All That Lives Must Die - Eric Nylund [50]
Mr. Mimes’s ever-present smile faded. “I’m afraid not. This will undoubtedly be your hardest assignment. You’re going to go to Paxington. Really go. No more cheating. Musty books, boring lectures, gym class—all of it. You must go for the entire year, Robert. And you must pass.”
15. Soma is a ritual drink associated with divinity among early Vedic and Persian cultures, thought to have been prepared from an (as yet) unknown rare mountain plant. Soma is analogous to the mythological Greek ambrosia—what the gods drank and what made them deities (which also appears to have addictive properties). While mortals have struggled for millennia to find the correct plant(s) to brew Soma, and others, most notably the alchemists of the Ancient China and Middle Age Europe, have tried to invent the famed Elixir of Life, none have succeeded. It remains an open question if the correct formula can be discovered—or if it has been discovered but does not have the desired effect on mortals. Gods of the First and Twenty-first Century, Volume 4, Core Myths (Part 1). Zypheron Press Ltd., Eighth Edition.
13
JUST THE START
Eliot walked fast. The sun had already sunk behind the eucalyptus trees in Presidio Park, and the last thing he wanted was a moonlit walk with Fiona through a graveyard.
He just wanted to get home and have this day end.
“You think . . . ,” Eliot started. He had a hard time saying it: it was so stupid. “You think that was really Hell?”
“Yes,” Fiona replied. “It felt like the Valley of the New Year. Like a dream. But different from a dream, because you felt more awake there.”
Eliot nodded.
If their father was Lucifer, he had come from someplace, right? But Hell?
“So there must be a Heaven, too, right?”
Fiona ignored him as she rummaged through her book bag.
Maybe it didn’t matter if there was a Heaven or Hell, as Mr. Welmann had said . . . just that there was something else out there, a greater destiny waiting for him.
Or maybe he should stay focused on this world’s problems.
Like his hand.
Eliot flexed his fingers. They didn’t hurt anymore, but earlier, when he played “Julie’s Song” to stop those birds and the people at the fence, the pain had flared so bad, he had to stop. It felt like fire, burning him to the bone. All he’d been able to do for a full minute after that was hold his arm to his chest and let the agony pulse away.
Earlier this summer, a snapped violin string had cut his finger and it became infected.
Eliot, however, no longer thought this was a simple bacteriological infection. There was a connection between the pain and his music. Or maybe the connection was to Lady Dawn. Sometimes when he touched the violin, the infection in his hand felt normal, sometimes even better than normal . . . but sometimes when he played her, it hurt more, too.
Her? Why did people always refer to musical instruments with gender? And why female?
Lady Dawn. This was obviously a girl’s name . . . which made sense because he’d always had trouble with girls.
The violin was safely tucked in his backpack, and Eliot was in no hurry to take her out and experiment with what made him hurt and what didn’t.
“This is ridiculous,” Fiona said. She’d retrieved their Paxington required reading list. She shook the pages at Eliot. “Do you know how long it’s going to take us to get through all these?”
Eliot glanced at list. There had to be a hundred books, and only two—the King James Bible and Bulfinch’s Mythology—did he recognize from the references they’d seen in other literature.
The rest were probably things Audrey would never have let into their house because of Rule 55, the “nothing made up” rule, which covered books on mythology, legends, and fairy tales.
Despite this rule, however, he and Fiona had learned things—from snippets of overheard conversations, people on the radio, and bumper stickers. Things like, HAVE FAITH IN GOD, THE DEVIL MADE ME DO IT, SINNERS AND DEMOCRATS BURN IN HELL, AND WALK GENTLY ON MOTHER EARTH.
“It’s like her entire plan to keep us