I know that she is made of smoke... Who: Rylee & Lia/Aphrodite What: Halloween Event Prompt Where: Pax Letale pool When: 31 October: the wee hours Warnings: Undead bishes! Or one undead bish. But a nasty one! Notes:Rusalki are the ghosts of young women who generally have died by violent/unpleasant means, often suicide, often drowning, associated with the “unclean force.” According to Zelenin, people who die violently and before their time, such as young women who commit suicide because they have been jilted by their lovers, or unmarried women who are pregnant, must live out their designated time on earth as a spirit. They appear in the middle of the night as beautiful young women, usually in the water or close to it, mesmerizing men with their alluring appearance and pleas for help, luring them into the water to drown them.
In his sleep, Rylee reached for Charlie and found his bed empty. The sudden space beside him woke Rylee; he had grown used to being tangled with his girlfriend over the past month and to have her missing from his bed caused him to sit up and look around. He didn’t hear her in the bathroom, in fact, his apartment was generally silent.
Getting out of bed, Rylee threw on boxers and padded through his apartment. It was dark, Charlie’s costume was still tossed on the floor, but there was no Charlie that he could see. Returning to his bedroom he added pajama bottoms to his wardrobe and called Charlie’s cell but it went to voicemail. With a sigh, he slipped out of his apartment and took the rickety elevator to the first floor. Stepping out of the elevator, Rylee paused and looked at the door to the apartment pool. He had intended on going to Charlie’s door but for some reason, Rylee felt pulled to the pool. Well, he might as well give it a look.
Stepping out into the pool area he crossed his arms over his bare chest and looked around. It was void of people but the pool water was moving as if someone had just gotten out. Moving closer, he looked into the pool water that glittered from the pool’s underwater light.
Rylee froze as his eyes focused on a figure at the bottom of the pool. His jaw agap, a moment passed before his brain worked out what he saw. A woman drowning or already drowned. She was motionless on the bottom of the pool, her hands stretched towards the waters surface as if reaching for the air and brown hair covering her face. Her hair settled, floating and shifting away from her face, and Rylee let out a desperately heartbroken cry.
He was in the water and trying to swim to the bottom of the pool before he could really consciously consider what to do. His eyes stung slightly as he looked for Charlie. He hoped, prayed, that it was Charlie and not Charlie’s body. Desperately, he reached for her, his hands passing through her hair and just reaching her. He went to gather her to his body, much as he had done in the waking world, when her arms locked around his throat and with a strength he had never known Charlie to have she kept him there at the bottom of the pool.
Though they’d spent the night otherwise, when the call for Samuel came, he and Lia had awakened tangled up in each other, but as themselves again. She’d kissed him goodbye and told him to be careful, and she found knowing that he was going to that island made sleep impossible. So despite the late hour, she got out of her ridiculously disheveled bed (were the sheets torn? How did that even happen?), and did her best to set the room to rights. Shaking her head at the disaster, she dragged her hands through her hair. The dresser had fallen over, pictures and perfume bottles and other boudoir items were strewn all over the floor. When she left the room, she saw their guests hadn’t left the living room alone, either.
When she moved just so, she looked down at herself, and saw that she was naked and bruised, and gave another sigh. Vague memories of the Greek deities they’d been lingered, though sharper, certainly, than they’d been the year before. They weren’t entirely unpleasant, but for crying out loud.
Things would seem better after a shower.
Once she was cleaned up, and the major damage to the apartment somewhat repaired (she left the heavy lifting for Samuel, of course), she decided a walk on the beach might clear her head a bit. There might have been some intention of looking out at that damned island, but she figured it would be two birds with one stone.
It was chilly out, and she was grateful she’d had the sense to wear long yoga pants and her hoodie as she stepped through the back entrance to move toward the beach. As she passed the path that would lead to the pool, however, something lurched inside her.
“Oh Jesus, what?” she muttered to herself -- or rather, to the presence inside herself. Moving forward became increasingly difficult; she felt some compulsion to turn toward the pool.
“Really? Come on.”
But the force was insistent until finally, Lia turned and walked to the pool area, opening the gate.
“What the -- oh my God,” she breathed as she recognized the shapes at the bottom of the pool.
And that was the last Lia said for a while.
“Phobos!” Aphrodite cried out as she indelicately shoved Lia aside. “Phobos, you come up here! This instant!”
Rylee struggled, the water making his sight blurry as he tried desperately to push off the bottom of the pool and bring Charlie to the surface. Why was she fighting? She somehow had some leverage here under water. She was able to stay at the bottom of the pool and her arms grew tighter around Rylee’s neck, forcing what air he had taken in before diving to squeeze out.
He could hear a voice from above the water and waved his arms for help. Even though Rylee was quickly being choked, he was ecstatic that Charlie was moving, that she was alive. But all too quickly his lungs were beginning to burn and he weakly tried to pry the locked arms from his neck.
Normally, this would have been a moment for a grand, yet subtle, display of distress for Aphrodite. Rescue was not her normal milieu, and generally speaking, she had her boys or Enyalios around to manage most major tasks. But this particular circumstance was one she couldn’t recall dealing with in the past: one of her children was actually in danger.
“Help! Someone help!” she cried out prettily. It was important that it be pretty. Who would come to the aid of some shrieking harpy with a voice like claws on granite? No one with standards, that was who. Aphrodite looked toward the building, expecting some nubile young warrior to come running her way for a moment before she felt a sharp internal nudge from what she recognized as Maricelia-Lia.
Get in there and save him! the voice urged. Aphrodite looked appalled.
“Get in there?!” she appeared to say to no one. “It’s absolutely frigid out here. And we just had a bath -- or whatever you call the indoor rain we were just in. Someone shall be along shortly, fear not.
“Hello! Can someone please help? My son is at the bottom of this pool!”
Another sharp nudge.
Listen, you have to get in there. If you don’t, Rylee -- err -- Phobos will drown!.
“Don’t be ridiculous,” Aphrodite scoffed, tossing her dark hair, which glowed with unearthly lustre. “Phobos is a perfectly strong swimmer. Besides, gods can’t drown. He’s just being difficult and trying to play a trick. He does it quite often when I haven’t been paying enough mind.”
Aphrodite, Phobos can’t drown, but Rylee can!
Aphrodite looked over the edge of the pool, where Phobos was waving his arms quite frantically, and he was being gripped by a repugnant creature -- hair choked with underwater plants, flesh falling from her face and limbs, some half-rotted gown floating diaphanously around her. She didn’t recognize the thing specifically, but she knew the type well enough. She gasped.
“How dare she!” With that, Aphrodite stripped down to Lia’s underwear; she’d intended to strip completely, but Lia’s presence was vehemently insisting she not. With a shrug, Aphrodite dove in.
Kypria was sea-born, and took to the water better and stronger than any fish could hope. It was barely seconds before she was next to Phobos-Rylee. The water stung her eyes, and that was monstrously irritating, but her ire at this creature far outweighed the discomfort.
Get OFF of him! Aphrodite commanded loudly enough in her mind to believe the creature heard her. Though that was unlikely. She raised a hand, then hurled a ball of the deepest emotional misery, the most physically debilitating agony, she could at the disgusting thing.
Rylee was growing weaker, his head had a heavy pulse and already he had accidentally taken in a breath of what would be air if he wasn’t under the water. He was being pulled from the body and brought upwards. Soon he felt the cold night air and mindlessly pulled at the side of the pool until he was coughing on his side. He took in as much air as he could, his mind immediately becoming clearer and his memory zapping back into place. He sat up and found Lia climbing out of the pool in her underwear. Blinking twice he coughed before looking back to the pool.
“Lia, why did you leave her down there?” Rylee cried out but it only brought on more coughing. “I have to get Charlie!” He began to push forward again, he knew what he saw, but he had already forgotten that the thing at the bottom of the pool had tried to drown him.
“Oh for the love of Gaea,” Aphrodite said, her eyes stinging from the accursed water of the pool as she wiped at them. Realizing what Rylee-Phobos was about, she frowned severely at the thing beneath the water before grabbing him by the sodden waist of his pyjama pants and pulling him away with strength she hadn’t known Lia had. Hmm. All those strange stretching and writhing rituals she did must have pleased some minor strength daimon. Seeing no other option, she pushed Rylee onto his stomach and sat on his back.
“That, my sweet boy,” she said, pointing at the decaying figure in the pool whose rotting face looked almost petulant from this distance, “has not been a her in hundreds of years, I’d be willing to bet.
“She’s actually remarkably well-preserved for how old she feels,” Aphrodite noted thoughtfully. “I wonder what beauty treatments she used in life?”
“It’s Charlie,” Rylee began to sob. He did a push up, not minding that Lia was on his back and barely feeling her weight. “Get off, Lia. She’s drowning! I thought she was happy! I need to help her!” Heaving a sigh, Aphrodite got up, shaking her head. Once Lia was off his back he turned to her, wiping at the tears from his eyes. He felt like his heart was in the pool. His entire body was vibrating. His Charlie, his girlfriend, his best friend and she was at the bottom of the pool. She was drowning. He had thought she was happy, thought that she had been in a good place. He had failed her miserably if she was killing herself. He would be failing her more if he let her die. Rylee reached for Lia’s shoulders. “Go call 9-1-1! Don’t just sit there!”
Aphrodite frowned fiercely up at Rylee-Phobos and slapped his hands away sharply.
“It’s not Charlie, unless Charlie has been dead for a number of centuries and is now a dark spirit that likes drowning things!” With a huff of impatience, she muttered to herself, “Honestly, men are so easily manipulated. You never hear about dark drowning spirit men who tempt women into the water.”
Shaking it off, she reached up to hold Rylee-Phobos’ face in her hands, and began to leach away the fear, the panic, the pain.
“Listen to me, my sweet Phobos,” she said, stroking her thumbs across his cheekbones. “I know you’re in there, love. Everything is fine. That isn’t Charlie-Eris at the bottom of the pool. Just an inferior creature far past her prime --”
An outraged splash came from the pool.
“-- who wishes to drown you because she’s ugly now, and bitter. Which is always the way of things, isn’t it?”
Rylee let out a sigh, his eyes growing large but the tears leaking away quickly as he listened to Lia. It wasn’t Charlie, it wasn’t her, but he looked to believe it only to see a decaying form beneath the surface. He leaned back, pulling his feet away from the edge of the pool before he looked back at Lia. “Phobos and Eris,” he whispered. Charlie-Eris? Somehow, that was right and his eyes flashed his understanding. “You aren’t Lia. You’re Aphrodite.”
“Well of course I am,” she said, motioning to her somehow far more lovely, almost glowing form. “Look at me.”
It was simple and to the point, but Rylee was unsure how else to put it. “What do we do about the thing in the water?”
Aphrodite looked back at the pitiable creature, who seemed in the midst of a good pout that might turn into a tantrum soon enough. She pursed her lips, trying to assess the situation. Fighting off the undead had never been her strength. It simply wasn’t her milieu.
“Well, haven’t you any heroes here? Enchanted nets or magical swords? Spears? If only Hephaestus were here...”
Aphrodite cast her sort-of-son a look. “Don’t tell your father I said that.”
Then she pursed her lips again. “Anything?”
Rylee let out a small laugh and shook his head. “We don’t have anything like that...” He coughed again, his throat sore and burning from his close call. Giving a sniff, he looked down at himself and realize he was in his dripping wet pajama bottoms and shirtless. Carefully, he folded his arms over his chest and a blush rose on Rylee’s cheeks as he realized Lia...or rather, Aphrodite, was still nearly undressed.
“I don’t think Samuel would be thrilled to know I’m seeing you in your underwear,” Rylee said quietly as he peaked at Lia’s eyes. He frowned and looked back at the pool. “That...thing. You’re sure it couldn’t hurt Charlie? She’s not involved at all?” He frowned and looked back at Aphrodite. “I know Lia didn’t know Charlie, do you?”
Aphrodite gave him an odd look and put her hands on her hips, looking down at herself. The garments weren’t even sheer; simple aqua blue fabric that hadn’t even become translucent when she’d gone into the water. Looking back up at him, she said,
“Darling, I know our family has some unique proclivities, but really, I’m your mother. In a manner of speaking. And I don’t know Charlie, but we spoke of her in a dream... well, Phobos and I did.” She felt a shiver though and huffed again. ”Gaea, these weak human bodies; able to drown, sensitive to cold -- how do any of you survive past birth?”
She walked over to Lia’s clothes then reached behind her for the clasp of Lia’s breast-holder.
“You might want to turn around,” she said, a subtle note of amusement in her tone.
Rylee’s eyes grew large and he turned. He busied himself with squeezing out the water from his pajama pants and coughing occasionally before getting to his feet and staring at the apartment complex as he waited. Nervously, he looked at the pool and saw the creature staring angrily at him. For a quick moment, she became Charlie again and Rylee felt his heart twist. But he stepped away from the pool, wiping at his arms to get rid of the excess water and to get the creature out of his sight. It wasn’t Charlie, not his Charlie.
“I’m just Rylee,” he muttered to Aphrodite. “Phobos... Phobos isn’t here right now. I’m sorry you can’t see him.” In fact, something deep within his mind seemed to be stirring. It was like becoming drunk, that sensation of the slow loss of control over your body. But he still had a good level of control over his body. Phobos wasn’t coming out...at least not right now and he still had to find Charlie. “I remember that dream though. It’s fuzzy but I remember it.”
Aphrodite shrugged as she slipped out of the bra, then Lia’s underwear, only to pluck Lia’s pants up from the ground, shaking head at them.
“Strange clothing,” she murmured as she arranged them on the concrete so that the leg-holes aligned properly. “And don’t be silly. Phobos is always there. Possibly always has been there, at least as long as you have -- though I’m not certain about that.”
Once she’d stepped properly into the two holes, her feet on the ground, she pulled the garment all the way up to ride low on her hips. “So impractical,” she muttered. Then:
“And I’m glad you remember it. I remember you, too,” She smiled at him over her shoulder, though his back was to her. “Phobos and my Enyalios came out recently. It’s nothing to worry about. They certainly won’t hurt you.”
She paused as she plucked up Lia’s shirt. “Well, they probably won’t. But not too badly. Not purposely, at least.”
“Ares almost shot me in the knee when he was out last,” Rylee muttered. “I’m not so sure he won’t hurt me. I’m glad you seem to be nicer....thank you for dragging me out of the pool.” Rylee looked at his feet and the puddle of water that had gathered around him. He took a careful step out of it and dropped his hands to his side. “Lia and Samuel have felt familiar since I met them. Charlie... she and I became best friends almost immediately. If she’s Eris...Eris was friends with Phobos, wasn’t she? I’m just starting to learn all of the deities...”
“Oh, I’m sure he didn’t mean it,” she said as she awkwardly stuck her arms into the garment. “Or at least, he didn’t realize the damage might be permanent.” She tugged at the fabric, her arms bent a bit oddly, then huffed, shifting out of it to try again.
“He’s just so stubborn. Impossible sometimes, really,” she told him, smiling in spite of herself as she managed to get her head through the appropriate hole. She considered this a victory. “But you’re welcome, of course, my darling! What are mothers for if not to rescue their children from the grasping arms of creatures who are beneath them?” She smiled brilliantly as she managed to get her arms through the appropriate holes -- though the shirt was inside out. Aphrodite didn’t notice. Picking up Lia’s strange, too-small cloak, she said,
“You can turn around now. And yes,” she continued with a grin, “Eris and Phobos are quite dear ‘friends.’” She chuckled. “As are Eris and Deimos, in fact.”
She sighed. “How I should love to see all my children. You don’t have any brothers, do you?”
Rylee turned back to Lia and looked at her wearily. She was very much Lia but Rylee knew it was Aphrodite and the little feeling of what he assumed to be Phobos tried to gain control. Giving a shake of his head, he squelched the feeling and stared at Lia. “No, I’m an only child. Charlie is the closest person I ever came to having a sibling.” He looked at the pool for a moment and frowned. “She’s my girlfriend now. When I came out here that thing looked like her. I thought she was drowning.”
A small smile formed on his lips as he looked back to Aphrodite. “I told Lia that you were Phobos’ mother. She seemed not to be sure if she liked that or not. Lia’s younger than me, it’s kind of weird.”
Aphrodite laughed, a sweet, melodious sound. “My poor Lia. It’s strange for her, I think. Though she is inordinately fond of you. Quite protective! It’s perfect.”
Abandoning the sodden undergarments on the concrete, she walked over to him, managing to get her arms into the tiny cloak much more easily this time, since it opened in the front.
“And girlfriend -- that’s what you call lovers these days, isn’t it? It makes sense. Things like that --” she waved vaugely in the direction of the pool -- “are seducers. Rank amateurs, but still. I imagine she projects whatever creature you desire most in order to drown you.”
She smiled. “That’s very sweet, dear heart.”
She looked him over.
“I suspect we should get you inside -- don’t mortals get ill or some such when they’re too cold?”
Rylee blushed, he certainly desired Charlie but it was much more than that. He loved her, she was his best friend and what made everything all right, to think she could have been dead had terrified Rylee. The creature had done the trick in trying to bring Rylee to the water. He looked up at Lia-Aphrodite, water still dripping from his wild hair and pajama pants. “Yeah, if you get cold you can end up sick.” He turned to the walkway for the apartment complex but still glanced back at the pool wearily. “I had come downstairs because Charlie wasn’t in my apartment. She usually stays over...maybe she’s back at my apartment by now.” His body shivered slightly and he let out another cough, rubbing at his throat sightly. Maybe if he went and drank water properly the burning itch would go away.
Aphrodite laid a hand on Rylee-Phobos’ back and patted him. Her feet were bare, but she didn’t begin to know how to put those strange, tiny, laced boots she called “sneakers” back on, so she simply walked with him. It seemed she was warm and he was not, so she slipped her arm around his waist to share her warmth with him.
“I am sure that your Charlie is fine.” Well, that wasn’t entirely true; Aphrodite was no seer, but if Charlie was anything like Eris, she was surely capable of handling herself. “Perhaps you shall get appropriately dressed and we can go look for her, hm? Maricelia has the most marvelous chariot! There are no horses at all, and you sit inside it! It’s really extraordinarily comfortable.”
Rylee didn’t brush off Lia-Aphrodite’s arm. In fact, it was comforting to have her close. Not in the way that Charlie could provide comfort. But in the way that he felt safe, as if he was taken care of, a feeling he only ever experienced with his own mother. “Um,” Rylee began, not quite sure how to make this comment. “We don’t have...chariots...here. Unless you mean a car? But maybe Charlie is back at the apartment. She might have forgotten something in hers. I can go back up and change at the very least, like you said, and then look for her.”
He smiled slightly, feeling better and better as he walked further from the pool. The discomfort of what had happened was replaced by a greater desire to see Charlie and reassure himself that she is okay. The fact that Lia was apparently Aphrodite didn’t mean much, it just seemed natural by this point.
“A car, yes, I suppose that’s what she calls it,” she said thoughtfully. “I never really pay much attention to those sorts of details. I suppose I should, but it’s so tiresome.”
Aphrodite made a face.
“But I’m glad we’ve settled the business with Charlie,” she said as they walked into the lobby. “I think it likely she’s perfectly well, wherever she is. Perhaps she wanted wine!” she suggested brightly. “I know I usually like a little drink after spending time with a... boyfriend.”
She grinned up at him.
Rylee made a shy smile and bowed his head slightly. Reaching the doors, he pulled back a door and held it open for Lia-Aphrodite. It was amusing to hear her picking over her words and choosing the modern sayings. He found himself almost wishing he could show her more, teach her what he could, anything like that. It mingled on some level with a need to make her happy. Rylee, now knowing of Phobos, figured this was an influence by him.
He began to consider how strange that was but quickly brushed it aside. It just seemed better to just go along with all of this rather than try to make sense of it. “Um...are you going to go back to Sam- uh...Ares? Do you want to go to his apartment or back to yours?”
“I think I shall surprise him by awaiting him in his quarters, even though they’re even more abysmally small than Maricelia’s,” she said thoughtfully. “I believe I have his key.”
She reached her free hand into one of the small pouches in Lia’s tiny cloak and pulled out a set of even tinier keys. “His is one of these; I remember Maricelia using them to open Enyalios’ door.” She patted his chest fondly as they moved further into the lobby and approached the elevator. “Should your Charlie not be home, do knock! Enyalios’ quarters are close to yours, aren’t they? If you don’t come by, I shall assume you’ve found her and all is well, hm?”
As they reached the elevator, she looked upon it with suspicion.
“I do not like this thing.”
Rylee looked at the elevator and frowned as the doors slid open. “I don’t really like it either and I’m pretty sure we’re not the only ones with a negative opinion of it.” He stepped in with the never ending trail of pool water following him, urging Aphrodite to follow, and pressed the button for the seventh floor. “I live across the hall from Samuel’s apartment. I’ll definitely stop by if I can’t find her.” He smiled at her reassuringly as the elevator doors slid shut and they began their ascent.
“Good, good,” she said, though she was slightly distracted. It was with some reticence she did follow, and she stayed close to him while the “elevator” moved. A pretty word for such a strange little prison - and an unreliable one. Aphrodite looped her arm through Rylee-Phobos’ until they reached the seventh floor, and was suspiciously silent until then as well. When the doors finally did open, she dragged her son out of the tiny, moving room.
“Very well then, my sweet boy. I do hope you find your Charlie-Eris and you bring each other infinite pleasure until neither of you can walk for some time!” She beamed at him, then leaned up to kiss his cheeks.
Rylee smiled, patting Aphrodite’s hand reassuringly and leaning into the given kiss. His cheeks were reddened from the blatant reference to Charlie and himself having sex but he felt more assured than before. He’d find Charlie and hold her close and make sure she was okay. Then, maybe, he would tell her about Eris and see how she reacted. Or maybe they would do just what Aphrodite was mentioning. It was Charlie’s birthday after all.
He parted from her outside of the respected apartment doors and grinned. “Thank you again for helping me. I feel like Phobos really loves you, that you’re very important to him, I can understand why. I hope you...uh...enjoy your stay.”
Aphrodite smiled at him with a mixture of fondness and knowing as she put Samuel-Ares’ key in the lock. “Of course he does, and of course you can. And I love him, and you, as well, Rylee. It’s what I am.”
Another smile curved her lips - this one of a different quality. It took over her face, or perhaps even her whole body: warm, sweet, radiant in the sheer and simple love it communicated.
With that, and nothing more, she went inside, shutting the door behind her.