Scion - Part 3 - A Favour

Ares leaned back on his chair, his face becoming serious. “I think it’s time we had a little talk.”

“Oh yeah?” said Cam, his eyes narrowed in suspicion. “The last time we met, you told me that the reason why those wolfspawn had attacked and killed my friends was because of me. I was just twelve years old, I’d just seen my best friends brutally torn apart and I was still in shock. You dumped a crap load of blame on me, convincing me that it was my fault they were dead. Do you have any idea what that did to me?”

Folding his arms, Ares fixed his son with a hard and calculating look. “Wolfspawn are attracted to the divine essence given off by Scions and they’re used by the enemies of the Gods to track down and eliminate Scions who haven’t yet come into their powers. Those wolfspawn were hunting you, so what I said was true. If it wasn’t for you, those four people would still be alive today.”

Orin suddenly felt a shiver, causing him to back away from the table involuntarily. Waves of anger were flowing out of Cam, his father seemingly oblivious to them. The boy’s eyes positively burned with barely suppressed rage. The spirit had never seen his charge look like this. “That’s not what I’m talking about,” Cam said through gritted teeth. “You knew those things were in the area, you told me yourself back then that you’d been tracking them. But for some reason, you were just a little too late save my friends, a little too late to stop me from getting this,” Cam lifted up his hoody to show the scar across the chest, “but just in time to save my life by playing the big damn hero.”

“What are you saying?” Ares asked quietly.

“Cam...” Orin said carefully, worried about what the boy was going to say next.

“I’m saying that you could’ve stopped the wolfspawn if you wanted to but you didn’t. You wanted Andy, Ben, Toby and Mr Harris to die. You as good as killed them yourself. For all I know, you probably planned the whole thing!” By the end, Cam was on his feet yelling at Ares.

The god slammed his fist down on the table, the force of the blow reducing it to splinters. “Boy,” he roared, spittle flying from his mouth, “I could crush you like an insect. I am your father and you will treat me with respect or by Zeus, what I do to you will make Prometheus’s punishment look like a reward.”

“Just because you banged my mom fifteen years ago, don’t give the right to call yourself my father!” Cam yelled back. “I’ve known junkies that made better dead beat dads than you.”

“INSOLENT WHELP!” Ares jumped out of his seat and struck Cam across the face. The force of the god’s blow knocked the boy off his feet and sent him flying across the room. He crashed through the front window, landing in the car park and startling the gang members sitting on the bonnet of their car. They drew their guns, unsure of what was going on, but preparing for trouble all the same. Ares climbed through the window carrying his sword, the metal tip scraping across the concrete.

Cam lay dazed on the ground, blood dribbling from his mouth and missing a tooth. He opened his eyes to find his father standing over him, the features of his face distorted by a ferocious rage. “Dumbass,” he thought to himself, “you had to go and anger a war god didn’t you.”

At the broken window, Orin watched on, conflicted. Ares was his lord and master and he was honour bound to obey his orders and wishes. One of those orders was to stay with Cam and watch over him, protect the boy from harm. Now, Ares himself was threatening to harm Orin’s charge. If Orin did nothing, he would be disobeying an order to protect Cam. If he intervened, then he would be violating his oath to his master. The guardian spirit didn’t know what to do; then he remembered what Cam had said to him less than an hour earlier.

Ares raised his sword above his head, poised to strike at his son lying prone at his feet. “This is it,” Cam thought, his eyes closed and his arms shielding his face. The expected blow, however, never came. He opened his eyes to see Orin standing over his body, the wolf spirit’s fangs bared and growling at Ares. For a moment, no one moved. Then the expression on his father’s face softened. He lowered his sword and stepped back.

“Lord Ares,” one of the gang members said, “is everything okay?” The god waved his hand dismissively and the gang members stood down.

“Lord Ares? Since when did bangers talk like that?” A confused Cam asked, looking between Ares and what he had assumed were just simple gang members.

“Einherjar,” Ares said by way of explanation, an explanation that didn’t really explain anything as far as Cam was concerned. “A gift from my Norse counterpart. Wonderful warriors, loyal to a fault. Bit too fond of mead for my tastes but that’s Vikings for you.”

“They don’t look like Vikings,” Cam said glancing at the Hispanic-looking gang members.

“You don’t look Greek,” Ares replied with a raised eyebrow. Father and son watched other warily until Ares sighed and held out a hand. “It’s been a while since one of my children got me that mad, well done.”

“So,” Cam said cautiously before accepting the hand, “you’re not going to kill me then?”

“Heh, not today.” The god helped him to his feet and led the limping Cam back into the motel room. He sat him down on a chair as behind them the shattered window that Cam had been thrown through repaired itself. Orin padded over and sat at Cam’s side, keeping both eyes warily on the god. Ares sighed, “Let me have a look at that face.” He reached towards Cam, and just for a second, the boy flinched away before wincing in pain and finally allowing Ares to touch his face.

Cam sat in silence as “father” healed the wounds that he had inflicted and the tension between the two of them was palpable. Even though they were face to face, Cam refused to meet Ares eye to eye. It was Ares that finally broke the awkward quiet. “Do you really believe what you said before?”

“About what?”

Ares sat back and faced Cam, his expression unreadable. “You said that you believed I was responsible for the wolf spawn attack three years ago, that I had planned it.”

The boy settled back in the chair and sighed, suddenly very tired. “I don’t know, not any more anyway.” Cam yawned. “I don’t wanna get whacked in the face again, but was there something you wanted because I’m really tired.” His father reached over to the newly reconstructed table and grabbed a freshly chilled beer bottle, snapping the cap off on the side of the table. He offered a second bottle to his son. Cam shook his head. “It’s two AM, I gotta spend all day tomorrow finding a goblin market and I don’t fancy having to do it with another hangover.”

Ares roared with laughter. “With your constitution, you could drink an entire crate of these and not feel the effects!” The boy just folded his arms and fixed his father with a tired look. “Very well. There are things we should talk about; things I need to tell you but first, you hunted and killed a wolfspawn today didn’t you?” Cam nodded and the god allowed himself a brief smile. “Very good, you’ve certainly come a long way from that young boy I met three years ago.” There was just a hint of pride in his voice as he spoke but Cam was too tired to notice. “That wolfspawn you killed tonight, was it hunting you?”

“No,” Cam said after a moment’s thought, “Orin caught its scent a couple of nights ago not long after we arrived in town. It weren’t tracking me at that point; Orin has taught me to suppress my divine essence. I needed it to get my scent so I stopped suppressing it. After that, it was pretty easy to get him to come after me.”

“Not without incident I see,” Ares said gesturing to the bandage around his arm.

“Meh,” Cam said dismissively, “as I said to Orin earlier, I heal quickly and you know I’ve had worse. Plus I needed to look weak to lure it in.”

“Interesting strategy,” Ares glanced down at Orin and gave the wolf spirit a withering glare, displeased that he hadn’t put a stop to Cam’s reckless plan, “but anyway, the wolfspawn wasn’t tracking you, it was on the hunt for someone else.”

“You mean someone like me, another scion, except this one hasn’t learned to suppress its essence yet,” Cam said, remembering what Ares had said earlier.

“Bingo, as you kids say” Ares said snapping his fingers. Cam smirked, hiding his smile under the pretext of yawning. He’d never heard anyone his age say that, or anyone under the age of thirty for that matter. “Turns out this young Scion has ran into a spot of bother. I owe his father a favour so I said I’d get you to help.”

Cam sat up, this sounded serious. “Why me, and why can’t this guy’s dad help him out?”

“Fair question I suppose. There are rules about directly interfering in the lives of our children, ancient rules. I think Nezha is still doing the paperwork on the last time he ‘helped’ his son.” Cam laughed at the mention of paperwork. “I know, but Nezha is one of the Shen, an ancient Chinese pantheon. They don’t call them the ‘Celestial Bureaucracy’ for nothing. Anyway, he apparently doesn’t want to get in trouble again with his superiors. He mentioned something about having to spend time in the ‘hell for those who do not use block capitals on forms’ if he does. I swear, those Chinese have a hell for everything. Anyway, his kid’s in trouble and as much as he wants to help, his hands are tied. He sensed another Scion in the neighbourhood, you, and he called in a favour to get me to get you to help.” Ares’ eyes rolled in mock frustration. “Never play poker with a god of trickery.”

Sitting back in his chair again, Cam took a moment to think things over. He still didn’t see how this was problem and he wasn’t the type to snap to attention just because “daddy” said jump. Plus, things hadn't exactly gone well the last time he had met another Scion. However, despite all that, was he okay with ignoring the fact that this kid needed help and that apparently he was the only person in the position to do something. Cam glanced down at Orin who had remained quiet throughout all of this. The wolf-spirit nodded; whatever Cam decided, Orin would back him. “So,” Cam said, his mind made up, “what sort of trouble is this kid in?”