Sweet Venom (14 page)

I stop at the section of books about my ancient ancestor and her immortal sisters. This is more like it. There are four full shelves of books, everything from collections of myths to anatomy to—

“Bingo.” I tug a book off the shelf. “
The Truth About Medusa and Her Sisters: Guardians of the Door.
”

This sounds like exactly what I need. Not more about the propaganda that turned Medusa—in the public's mind—from a protectress into a monster. Libraries and websites are full of the lies that steal Medusa's noble glory and make her a much-feared beast instead. This looks like a more factual account of her story.

I drop into one of the comfy armchairs and open the book. There is no copyright page, which means that it was either privately published or printed before the first copyright laws. There isn't an author's name, either. The book is attributed to “an anonymous descendant of the great Gorgon Medusa.” I suck in a breath. One of my ancestors wrote this book.

I trace my fingers reverently over the worn cover, wondering how many generations back this book dates. A few? A dozen? More?

I flip to the table of contents, curious about what topics the book might contain. As I scan the list, I see a lot of chapters I should probably read. Someday. Right now, though, I'm looking for one particular topic. Autoporting.

Since escaping from cobra lady, I haven't been able to repeat my disappearing act. It's a power that could definitely come in handy, so I'd like some hints on how to make it happen.

My eyes skim over the early chapters. History, mostly, detailing Medusa's life from her birth to her death at the hands of the supposed hero—aka Athena's pawn—Perseus. There are a couple of chapters on the Gorgons' roles as guardians and their powers. I'm about to turn to the chapter on their powers when the title of the last chapter catches my eye.

“‘Descendants of the Mortal Gorgon.'”

Forgetting about autoporting, I flip quickly to the first page of that chapter and begin reading.

 

Although most of the world believes the only offspring of Medusa were the great winged horse Pegasus and the golden-bladed giant Chrysaor, both born from the blood of her decapitated head—

 

How disgusting and horrifying and—I remind myself that this is my ancient ancestor I'm reading about—sad. To have your head chopped off and creatures born from your blood? That's awful.

I take a deep breath and plunge forward.

 

Medusa also had a human lover, a husband who has since been erased from myth and history. His disappearance was yet another strand in the web of deceit woven by Athena to justify her rage and jealousy at the Gorgon's supposed bid for Poseidon's love. But the lie that obliterated Medusa's husband from all written record provided another, unforeseen service: it protected the progeny of their union with a veil of secrecy. Their children, who would carry on the legacy of the Gorgon sisters, passing the magic of Medusa's blood down through the generations, disappeared from record.

     At first decried as sacrilege, Athena's fabrications about the evil, murderous monster who turned men to stone eventually became widespread, accepted fact. But if their existence was widely known, the mortal Gorgon's offspring would become the targets of self-proclaimed heroes, assassins, and anyone fearful of Medusa's true legacy and Athena's rage.

 

“What a scary time that must have been,” I muse. “I wonder how many of my ancestors and their friends and family had to risk their lives to keep the Medusa legacy intact.”

I'm in awe of the sacrifice. Their preserving the line made it possible for me and Gretchen to be here today. We owe a big thank-you to whoever made that happen.

I read on, desperate to know more about my legacy, hoping to learn something about my autoporting incident.

The next sentence nearly knocks me off my feet. I have to reread it three times and then read it once out loud to make sure I'm not imagining things.

 

Into every generation since have been born three children, three daughters to carry on the guardian legacy.

 

Three children? Three daughters?
Every
generation?

This can't be. Can it?

No way.

Tucking the book under my arm, I sprint to the computer and leap into the desk chair. It only takes a few clicks and taps to do a quick search for adoption records. There are tons of sites designed to reunite mothers and their children. I've seen all of them before, but that's not what I'm looking for. I need to find my official adoption records. I know I won't find that on any of those sites. The documents I need are protected, shielded by strict privacy laws. I need to get inside the Child Welfare Services website—into their internal database of completely top-secret and sealed records.

I wouldn't call myself a hacker. Most of my coding skills are used for purely legal purposes. But I've finessed my way into a server or two. And now is definitely not the time to get squeamish about legality. I might have sorta accidentally peeked at my record before, but that was just the individual record of my adoption by my parents. I never thought of searching for any siblings.

Now that I know what I'm looking for, my entire brain focuses in on figuring out how to get what I need.

By the time I hear Gretchen's shower turn off, I've broken through their firewall, cracked their surprisingly weak encryption, and am entering the keyword search to find our record. When my record pulls up, it contains all the details I've seen before about my adoption, but nothing about where I came from. Or who I came
with
.

Next I try searching my name and Gretchen's together. Maybe if our mom named us— “Holy goalie.”

“What?”

I jump at the sound of Gretchen's voice. I'm sure my face looks white as a ghost as I spin around in the desk chair to look at her. She's rubbing a towel over her hair and doesn't notice my utter shock.

“I pulled up our adoption records,” I explain.

My hands are shaking and I have to take the Medusa book out from under my arm and set it on the desk so I don't drop it. Adrenaline fills my bloodstream.

I've never felt so completely thrilled and excited and terrified all at once. Not even when I saw that minotaur walk into the dim sum parlor. Not even when I saw Gretchen at Synergy.

“Yeah,” she says, flipping her hair forward to dry the back. “And?”

How can she be so blasé about this?

Gretchen doesn't talk about her adopted parents. Ever. She just says that she ran away when she was twelve and never looked back. Which, I suppose, tells me everything I need to know.

But this has nothing to do with them.

This is going to knock her to the floor.

“Gretchen,” I say, my mouth spreading into a shaky smile, “we're not twins.”

“We're not?” she asks, lifting her head and paying attention for the first time.

If I weren't freaking out, I might take a moment to gloat, because she looks a little disappointed, sad, even, at the suggestion that we're not sisters. But there's no time for gloating. This news can't wait another second.

“No.” I slowly shake my head, still full of disbelief. “We're triplets.”

I
'm telling you, Veronica, an ice sculpture would be tacky on a colossal scale.”

“But Greer,” the edging-on-whiny voice of my Immaculate Heart Alumnae Tea co-chair pleads, “can you imagine our school mascot in beautiful crystalline ice, wings spread wide over the buffet? It would positively be a miracle.”

“Until it melts.” I absently rearrange the sample place settings I've laid out on the formal dining table. The gold flatware looks cheap next to the aqua china but goes beautifully with the violet-trimmed porcelain. Perfect. “Then we have a big puddle of dragon all over the hors d'oeuvres and petit fours. Less miracle, more disaster.”

“We can keep the air-conditioning cranked,” she suggests, not willing to let her horrid idea go. “If the temperature stays below—”

“The guests will all freeze.” I'm bored with this debate. Especially since the main reason Veronica's so married to this idea is that her boyfriend—her poor, starving, tortured artist boyfriend—has recently taken up ice sculpting to pay the bills. I am not about to let the wealthy, powerful, and influential alumnae of Immaculate Heart shiver through afternoon tea so Veronica can indulge her latest fascination with some lowlife guy. Time to end this discussion. “We are not having an ice sculpture.”

“But—”

“Final decision.” The doorbell rings, giving me the perfect excuse to hang up—not that I need one. “The petit four samples have arrived. Must go.”

Before she can get in one more plea, I end the call and set my phone on the foyer table. That girl seriously needs to find another way to get her parents' attention. Slumming it with that sad, talentless excuse for an artist is only going to turn into a tragic after-school special.

I reconciled myself long ago to the fact that my parents aren't the demonstrative, caring, supportive type. They're too busy running Fortune 100 companies and making sure they stay on all the right social lists. In a good week, I see them a couple of mornings before school. In a less good week, not at all.

I could wallow in self-pity, indulging in destructive and unproductive behavior, hoping they'll start paying more attention if my behavior gets bad enough. Or . . . I could act like an adult, accept that no one is going to coddle me in this world, and forge my life into what I expect it to be.

Not hard to guess which option I chose.

Or that Veronica chose the opposite.

I am long past regretting not fighting her bid to be co-chair. If I had known she'd be such a constant thorn in my side, I'd have made certain Emily won the position instead. Oh well, what's done is done.

Pushing Veronica and her taste for losers aside, I do a quick check in the gold-edged mirror hanging above the foyer table. Not one escapee from my meticulously straightened, crisp chignon; subtle lip sheen still in place; princess-cut diamond studs—real, of course—glinting from each ear. I dust a small speck of lint from my sky-blue cashmere crewneck before deeming myself ready for public appearance. Waving off Natasha, who is only now emerging from the kitchen to answer the door—if she weren't an impeccable chef, my parents would have fired her long ago—I release the dead bolt and grab the handle.

“Henri, you're early,” I say with a charming smile, swinging the door wide. “I didn't expect you until—”

My welcoming comment dies in my throat as I see that standing on my stoop is
not
the most sought-after pastry chef in the Bay Area, bringing me a sampling of petit fours to choose from for the tea. Instead, I see two girls, about my age. Who, despite wretched taste in clothes, hair that would make my stylist faint, and a pathetic lack of personal style, could be my twins.

Shock does not even begin to describe my reaction.

Not that I allow it to show on my face.

“Greer Morgenthal?” the one on the left, wearing generic blue jeans and a cheap graphic tee, asks.

I rest my hands on my hips. “And who might you be?”

She grins. “We're your sisters!”

When she starts forward, arms wide like she's going to hug me, I step back and thrust my palms out to deflect her approach. Her face falls. Is she certifiable?

“I don't have sisters.”

“I should have printed out the records,” the overfriendly one says. “I just never thought—” She looks at my face and then the other girl's. “I thought it would be obvious once you saw us.”

The other one rolls her eyes, her dark look matched by her gray cargo pants and fitted black tee. She looks like a walking Army-Navy surplus ad. I wouldn't be surprised to find daggers hidden in her combat boots.

“I'm Grace,” the cheerful one says, recovering from her disappointment at my reaction. “And this is Gretchen.”

Gretchen crosses her arms in what could be a defensive move, although it is more likely an intimidation gesture. I cross my arms to match her stance. I'm not afraid of her, no matter how many scars and muscles she has.

When I don't respond, Grace continues. “How funny, we all have names that begin with
G-R
. Grace. Gretchen. Greer.” She glances nervously from me to Gretchen and back. “Isn't that cool? I wonder if there's some special sig—”

“Stop making nice,” Gretchen grumbles, looking bored. “Get to the point.”

“The point?” Grace's brow furrows. “Oh yeah, the point.” She looks nervously around. “Can we come inside?”

Inside? These girls may look like me, but I don't know them. For all I know, they could be some new high-tech gang of genetically altered thieves who work their way into houses by posing as the owners.

All right, an unlikely scenario. That's what I get for electing to read the collected short stories of Ray Bradbury for my extra-credit English project. Too much science fiction.

Still, these girls are strangers. I'm not about to grant them open access to our silver drawer.

“Um . . . no.”

Grace looks slightly taken aback by that, as if she expected me to swing the door wide and say, “Come on in and help yourselves to our priceless art and antiques.”

Undeterred, she repeats slowly, as if I have a hearing problem, “We're your sisters.” She takes a deep breath, checks the empty street again, and blurts, “And we're also descendants of the Gorgon Medusa.”

“Excuse me?” I exclaim, losing my well-practiced icy demeanor at her outrageous claim. “I'm sorry. Medusa?”

“You might have wanted to bury the lead a little on that one,” Gretchen mutters.

They are
both
insane. I curse myself for leaving my phone on the table, several feet away. Since calling for help is out, I nudge the door closed an inch.

“You know, the mortal Gorgon sister,” Grace explains, as if I'm not familiar with the myth. As if I haven't had an entire semester of college-level classical mythology. Ignorance of the subject matter is not the problem here. “The one Perseus slew by looking at her reflection in his shield.”

When I don't respond, she looks to Gretchen for help.

Gretchen, in turn, deepens her scowl.

“Of course, that's not the real story,” Grace continues. “She really was a guardian. History has been rewritten to make her look like a monster. Athena's involved somehow. Maybe another god too, but we're not sure who, because Gretchen's mentor has disappeared and we don't know where else to—”

“Stop!” I shout, abandoning my grip on the door and flinging my arm forward, as if I can physically stop her stream of babble. I never lose my calm. But honestly, if the girl strings one more phrase into that outrageous story, I'm liable to go a little insane. Maybe a lot insane.

“Look,” Gretchen says, “this isn't a game or a prank or a reality TV show. This is very real and very dangerous. You need to know what's going on.”

“I don't think so.” I reach for the door again and start to close it. “I'm quite busy right now and—”

Gretchen's combat-booted foot wedges between the door and the jamb before I can finish. She pushes against the door and, hard as I try to hold it shut, manages to send it swinging into the wall so hard, the mirror rattles. I meet her steely gray gaze, ignoring the fact that her eyes are almost the identical silver shade as mine and—I flick a quick glance to the left—yes, the same as Grace's. That doesn't mean anything.

“Have you ever seen a monster?”

“Of course not.” My mind is spinning, but I somehow manage to keep my face emotion free. My mother taught me well. I don't betray an ounce of how ridiculous this sounds. “What an absurd idea.”

Gretchen's eyes narrow. “You need to train,” she explains. “To learn how to defend yourself if a hydra attacks you from behind or an ichthyocentaur blocks your way out of an alley.”

“You're insane.” I shake my head. “Monsters don't exist.”

“They do,” Grace insists. “And it's our legacy to hunt them. To protect the unsuspecting human world.”

“They're dangerous,” Gretchen argues, pushing into the doorway. “Now more than ever. If they recognize you as a descendant of Medusa, then they won't stop until you're dead or in their power.” She takes a quick breath before adding, “Or both.”

That's it. It was bad enough, them trying to convince me they're my sisters and that we're descendants of some hideous monster, but now they're trying to scare me. I do not scare easily.

When Tommy Willowick tried to frighten the girls at my eighth-grade Halloween party by sneaking into my bedroom closet in a werewolf costume,
he's
the one who ended up running from the room, screaming for his mommy. I didn't let him scare me then and I won't let these two strangers scare me now.

I school my features into a falsely pleasant facade, a skill I learned early on from my mother.

“I'm sorry,” I say, not meaning it. “I have a very full schedule today. The pastry chef is delivering samples and then I have to confirm the place settings with the caterers, not to mention finalizing the seating chart, the menu, and the procession of events.”

“But you're in danger,” Grace interrupts.

I ignore the sincere fear in her eyes. While she may believe this fantasy tale, I do not. And I will not allow her delusion to disrupt my genuinely busy day.

Still, I can't dismiss our identical faces so easily.

“It's enough to process that you freaks
might
”—I allow the possibility—“be my sisters. But you're obviously deranged. And I have appointments.”

Gretchen rolls her eyes again, and I sense a moment of distraction. I snatch the opportunity. Giving her a quick shove to send her back a step out of the doorway, I pause only to say, “Thank you for stopping by,” before slamming the door in their stunned faces.

I do not have time for this kind of drama.

It's not until I'm leaning back against the door, dead bolt in place, that I realize my heart is pounding, my palms are sweating, and I have a truly horrid feeling in the pit of my stomach. A combination of fear and anxiety and nausea. I can remember feeling exactly like this only one other time in my life. Now that's an unpleasant memory . . . and an unsettling coincidence.