Total pages in book: 169
Estimated words: 161535 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 808(@200wpm)___ 646(@250wpm)___ 538(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 161535 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 808(@200wpm)___ 646(@250wpm)___ 538(@300wpm)
She paints a black circle and what looks like a smile.
I’m so confused. Confused and bizarre’d out by her. Is this part of their plan? To send someone from my world over to chat with me, befriend me (or confuse me) and get me to lower my guard? “Kalos isn’t going to be happy that you stole me.”
“We noticed. Also, he’s Apathy, so one can’t expect him to be too happy with much.” She taps the end of her brush on her lip, studying her picture. “But we’re working with that. Does this seem like a mouth to you?”
I glance at her picture again. “What are you painting?”
“Well, when I’m done, it’s going to be a dog in a party hat. But right now, it just looks like a snowman made of turds.” Margo tilts her head. “The party hat is going to have to do a lot of heavy lifting in this picture, I’m afraid.”
I can’t help but ask the obvious. “Okay, I’ll bite. Why are you painting a dog in a party hat?”
Her mouth curls up in a tiny smile. “I like painting. Doing something with my hands calms me. I feel like I can focus when my hands are busy, otherwise I just feel like a weirdo standing around and doing nothing.”
“But…a dog in a party hat?”
“Oh, that.” She laughs. “I paint animals in party hats because it annoys Seth, and I enjoy annoying him. Before this, it was just an endless stream of pictures of Seth kicking puppies, but that joke grew passe so now it’s party hats.”
Weird. “You’re not friends…with him? Your, er, god? Seth? Which Aspect is he?”
“He’s none of them. He’s a special case and no one’s very friendly to him because of it.” Her mouth twists, her smile disappearing. “I can’t blame them. The guy isn’t exactly oozing friendliness, but the gods here are all fuck-ups, you know? If they were so good at their jobs, they wouldn’t be exiled to the mortal realm. Seth is good at what he does, at least. He motivates people. He’s always got a dastardly plan. There are worse things, and someone’s got to be the bad guy, right?”
“So why would we team up with a bad guy?”
“Because you’re bad guys, too? Duh?”
I recoil. “What? We are not! Disease doesn’t have to be a bad thing!”
Margo rolls her eyes at me. “Denial’s not just a river in Egypt. Go on and tell me all the great things that chicken pox has done for society.”
“You’re looking at it wrong,” I protest, even though I know she’s got a point. I needed convincing, too, didn’t I? “Kalos might have an unpleasant job but that doesn’t mean he’s a bad person. He’s working on improving how he handles things. That’s what they’re down here for, right? To become more sympathetic and better at their jobs?”
“How do you become better at diseasing people?”
“He’s not just disease!” I reply hotly. My temper is flaring. She’s being unjust to Kalos and he doesn’t deserve her ire, especially when she’s shacked up with freaking Set or Loki or whoever. “He’s rebirth, too. Medicine. Things wither and die to make way for the new.”
Margo eyes me and turns back to her painting. “Sounds like a lot of excuses to me.”
“It’s not!”
“So you’re telling me he’s spending all his time swanning around and healing the sick?” She paints a pink triangle above the “dog’s” head, the start of a hat. “Because we’ve had spies watching you both and I haven’t heard anything about that.”
“We’ve been trying to stay alive, thank you.” I tighten my blanket around my body, anger burning in my belly. Margo might be acting friendly but I’m seriously starting to dislike her. She doesn’t know Kalos like I do. She doesn’t know that it’s difficult for him to get out of bed sometimes, or that I can tell when he enters his “apathy” state and goes silent and distant. I’m constantly prodding him out of it, trying to get him to smile, but it’s like being with someone who has intense depression.
And depression isn’t anyone’s fucking fault. It’s just something that one must deal with. Doesn’t make someone a bad person.
“Why are you here, Margo?” I demand. “If it’s so we can become friends, you’re not exactly winning me over by criticizing the god I serve. Like it or not, I’m on Kalos’s side.”
Her expression softens. “Look, I’m sorry. I know. We’re not responsible for whatever the god we’re attached to does. I know that more than anyone.” She grimaces and sets her paintbrush down, turning to face me. Her necklace glitters in the lantern-light, sparkling like a cluster of stars. “I’m not trying to make you defensive, Elsie. I’m just pointing out why it’d be good for our two teams to work together. Seth isn’t entirely bad either, but the perception of him is negative, just like the perception of Kalos is negative. Why not join forces?”