Margo glances over at me again. “The other Anchors. I guess you haven’t met anyone?” When I shake my head, sheshrugs and turns back to her painting. “I guess it makes it easier for us in the long run if you guys are flying solo. I’m Seth’s Anchor, FYI.”
I’ve heard a few other names of gods since I got here—Gental, obviously. Rhagos, Kalos’s estranged brother. Belara. The name Seth doesn’t ring a bell. “I don’t know who that is.”
“No, you probably wouldn’t. He’s an immigrant, so to speak. He snuck over from our world. I keep trying to get a straight answer out of him but near as I can tell, he’s either the Egyptian god Set, or the Norse god Loki, or some amalgamation of the two. I can’t get a mythology book and cross check, so I’m trying to pick up on context clues from our conversations. But Seth is kind of a butthole so he’s tricky to read.” She continues painting, coloring in her big brown blob.
I cross my arms over my chest, and remember I was holding the piss bucket, and wipe my hands on my dress. I’m freezing, so I go over to my shitty little bed (which looks worse with a bit of light on it) and pull the blanket around my shoulders. “What does this have to do with Kalos? Or with me?”
Margo glances over at me. “Well, Seth stole you to convince Kalos to come with us. He’s wooing him right now, trying to get him to form an alliance.”
“An alliance,” I repeat, uncomprehending. “For what?”
“Seth needs to weasel into this pantheon, so he’s picking at the weak spots.” She paints another brown, circular blob over the first one, and dabs her brush again. “He’s looking for allies, and we’ve heard a lot of scuttlebutt about an Aspect of Disease that was flying solo, so we headed in your direction. I’m not saying he’s a great guy, but he’s probably good to have on your side instead of an enemy. And I wouldn’t mind some buddies.”
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 tochat 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 betoohappy 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 gethim 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.
