The Minoan Rhapsody

Rest easy. Rest well.

"They are here," Hephaestus warned everyone.

The Sintians immediately stood up on the lookout. Each of them grabbed one long, unlit torch. They did not see anyone on the grassland between the ruins that bordered the cliff behind them and the far away tree line. It was breezy but the wind did little to cool the Sintians, sweating from both, the mid-day sun and the fear of the unknown. In front of the brothers, a firepit was fighting off the wind that rushed towards the cliff. The wood hissed and the fire crackled as the burning ashes tried to reach the dried grassland. The Sintians glanced the fire, then the grasslands in front of them, then each other.

Ari was nowhere to be seen.

Two Myrmerkes rose from within the tall grass, a few paces behind the fire. Their appearance highlighted their soulless darkness.

The Sintians lit their torches.

Two more Myrmerkes appeared to the left of the previous ones.

The Fallen One remained unshaken, resolute.

Another pair revealed themselves. All of them were wielding their deadly sickles. The last one emerged in front of the other six. All seven stood tall, staring at Hephaestus with their bottomless eyes. Their faces were expressionless, statue like.

Hephaestus reached for Apator and pulled it from the ground. He positioned himself between the brothers, all spaced at weapons' length.

In unison, the Myrmerkes took an attack posture, curving their backs forward as they menacingly held their sickles, ready to charge. Slowly they marched, around the fire pit, while their opponents backed into a passageway made by the ruins. Suddenly, initiating their charge, the Myrmerkes screamed as if they were consumed by limitless pain.

The brother's blood ran cold as they fought their survival instinct. They turned around and followed Hephaestus through the ruins, running as fast as they could. They jumped on top of a large stone pedestal. Swinging their torches down from side to side, they kept the Myrmerkes out of reach as they avoided getting burned.

The sickles were wildly missing their mark, hitting stone, or swishing through the air. A Myrmerke was struck by Apator and cracked its chest. He swiped the yellowish, clear sap that oozed from its wound. It gripped its sickles and resumed the fight. No matter how many times they were set back by Apator and the torches, they kept attacking wildly, disorderly. Their violence emerged from rage, and it did not grow weary.

We'll not last much longer, Hephaestus thought as he saw the Sintians panting. "Get back!" He ordered, as all three fled, jumping from ruin to ruin.

Unaware, in the rush of the moment, they separated. Each brother faced two Myrmerkes while Hephaestus dealt with three. The brothers desperately tried to keep them at length.

One of the Myrmerkes yelled in pain as a torch burned him on the chest.

By the edge of the ruins, The Fallen One fought the three Myrmerkes that attacked him simultaneously. He kicked out with his bronze leg, striking one of them, who fell to the abyss. The Fatherless swung violently but was missing the Myrmerkes. They disappeared as the blade approached, reappearing as Apator recovered for a follow up strike. Hephaestus kicked the second one while Apator deflected the sickle strikes from the third one. The Fallen One severed off a leg from the creature he'd kicked as it lay on a flat on stone slab.

The wounded Myrmerke clenched its sickles, looked at Hephaestus and gritted his black teeth. It touched each side of his jaw with the knobs of his sickles. They fused onto his mouth morphing into the mandibles of an ant. His eyes, head, and soon his body morphed into ant parts as his size quickly shrank in size.

Quick as lightning, The Fatherless, swung from above Hephaestus head, splitting the stone slab.

The Myrmerke finished morphing into an ant before the strike.

Hephaestus spotted the insect and crushed it with a stomp from his bronze leg, pulverizing the stone on the ground.

While held by Hephaestus, Apator quickly blocked the strikes from the third Myrmerke before The Fallen One realized it.

The Myrmerke avoided the edge of the ruins. Time and again its sickles swished and clanked against Apator, sometimes with the blade, other with the shaft.

Hephaestus twirled the Fatherless and hooked the Myrmerke's leg with the lower curve of blade, pulling it.

It fell on the ground. Its sickles struck Hephaestus bronze leg, emitting a loud clank.

Hephaestus grimed as he let Apator fall on the Myrmerke's chest, crushing it on impact.

One of the Sintians climbed up a wall and continued to swing his now dwindling fire. The torch went off. "Kasaro!" Without a lit torch, the Sintian tried to flee running on top of the ruins until he reached a dead end. He fended off the sickle strikes with the shaft of his torch and kicked a Myrmerkes away. His torso was slashed open by the other attacker. He fell onto the ground, dead.

His brother's own torch was almost extinguished. Exhausted, he quickly looked around for his kin or his master. He was alone. Now prey, he waited for the kill.

The earth trembled as thunder cracked from the ground. It was Apator, striking the ground, calling for the Myrmerkes attention once more. Reminding them that they were here for Hephaestus, and not for a couple of Sintians.

Leaving the remaining brother alone, they surrounded The Fallen One who now stood in the middle of the wide-open dried grassland. As they moved forward, Hephaestus retreated, walking backwards towards the edge of the cliff. They grimed as he had nowhere to go.

"Turisa teti!" Hephaestus yelled.

Arindraai jumped out from her hideaway within the ruins and holding multiple small torches, ran towards the fire pit. She lit them up and threw in a semi-circle behind the Myrmerkes.

The grass ignited, and the wind spread the fire which quickly engulfed Myrmerkes and God alike. Within the crackle of the flames there was pain and agony without escape. One by one, the Myrmerkes burst, their insides splattering the flames.

Arindraai and her brother looked at the blaze, him gasping for air while she agonized over Hephaestus. There was nothing for them to do but to watch death wrapped its fingers around those within the flames. The fire quenched once it reached the edge of the cliff and had nothing else to burn.

There was no sign of the Myrmerkes.

The blackened body of Hephaestus got up from the ground with the aid of Apator, which he used to support himself.

Ari ran to him, paying no attention to the hot ground underneath her sandals. She helped him walk beyond the scorched ground. Once they were on unburnt land, she let him go and fell with him to the ground. Ari held him close, holding his head close to her chest. She swiped the ash from his face, reveling fresh burns over the healed ones. She was sobbing, her tears washing over The Fallen One. "I swear on the Gods, you shall never be on fire again."

"That would be very good," Hephaestus answered.

She kissed him as if it were the only kiss she would ever give.

The Sintian knelt by his brother. He swayed back and forth as tears ran down his cheeks. " qerau. Itinisa adu," he whispered.