Month: September 2019

R6 Greta: Jupiter, part 3 of 3

M G Kizzia Leave a comment

Up close, it became clear the gate had been broken down, and burned from the look of it.  That much seemed obvious, even in the dark.  What Greta could not figure out was, how?  Explosives would have splintered the door.  A bulldozer might have done it, but no way this got done by a bunch of men with a battering ram.  It almost looked like it was pulled off the hinges from the inside, and that made Greta wonder if the enemy broke in or the towns people were trying to get out.

There were bodies and pieces of bodies everywhere inside the gate.  Men, women and children looked torn, shredded and partially eaten with an arm here and a leg there.  Vedix thanked the gods it was dark enough to disguise the full impact of the horror. Hermes held a cloth over his mouth and tried not to look too closely.  Even so, Hermes threw up when he tripped over a torso with the head still attached and one dead eye staring up at him; and Mavis almost joined him. Alesander and Briana could hardly force their eyes to look away, like rubberneckers on the highway.  By contrast, Nudd kept his eyes shut tight, and for once, Greta did not blame him.

Lord Crag lead them quickly to the drain grate. “The main lines are tall enough for a man to stand upright,” he told them, while a troll ripped off the cover. They heard a howl echo through the city streets and Lord Crag added a word.

“Hurry.”

Greta found the underground as dank and dark as advertised.  The goblins and trolls did not mind too much, being used to living in the swamp, but they turned up their noses against the smell.  Mavis did throw up a little then, and Hermes gave her his cloth to cover her mouth.  Bogus and Pincushion remained stoic the whole time, but walked like statues with their mouths open and their eyes bulging.  Greta knew dwarf eyes saw better in the dark than human eyes, and she figured Bogus and Pincushion saw plenty up above.

“There are lots of caverns that drip limestone and create pillars out of stalactites and stalagmites,” Bogus said.  “But the smell can get hard to handle.  We should be fine if this trip doesn’t take too long. Trust me, you would not want to see my vomit.  It would not be sweet and dainty like your handmaid.”

“I could vomit,” Ulladon volunteered.

“Never mind,” Briana said.  “How about some light.”

Lord Crag had several goblins light torches which were specially prepared to be smokeless.  He spaced his men between members of the group to give light for the journey.  Ulladon made a fairy light and floated it out front.  It had a slight green tint to it which did not help the queasy stomachs in the group.  Mavis also made a fairy light, but it appeared bright and warm like the sun.  That helped everyone’s disposition, except maybe the trolls.  Mavis let her light follow the group, but kept it in front of the ogre and the trolls who brought up the rear.  Bonebreaker did not mind the light, and fortunately he blocked enough of it to keep the trolls from protesting too loudly.  But then poor Bonebreaker had to bend over almost the whole way underground, and twice he had to squeeze through places where the tunnels had partially collapsed.

The group moved as fast as they could, and quickly came to one of those underground chambers.  When the two fairy lights raised toward the ceiling, they could see the drip, drip of the water they felt as they walked.  By the time they reached the far side of the cavern, they heard the howls behind them.  Lord Crag tried to hurry them up, but the group could hardly move fast by torchlight when their footing crossed wet and slippery rocks and broken bits of tunnel ceiling.  They were inclined to stumble.

“We should reach the next cavern soon, just before the river,” Rotwood said, though no one really listened as their ears all focused behind to hear sounds of what followed them.  The tunnel emptied out into a small cavern with a high ceiling that had the feel of a grotto by the sea.  They saw boulders all around on ground level which kept large sections of the cavern in the dark and made spooky, flickering shadows in the torchlight.

“The river is straight ahead,” Rotwood said. “We need to climb up here to get out of the drain by the docks.”  Lord Crag sent a half-dozen goblins up the walls to the drain to open it, check out the area, and see if there might be a ladder or something to help the humans.  Everyone else paced and looked back the way they came, expecting the Wolv any minute.

It honestly was not long, even if it seemed forever, before a long ladder came down from the drain opening along with a long rope.  Two more goblins went up first, one on the ladder and the other by way of the rope. With the all clear, the group began to climb.

Greta sent Lucius, Alesander and Briana up first saying, “Like in the wilderness, you take the point.  Find cover and guard the exit for the others.”  Vedix, Bogus and Pincushion followed with instructions to head for the docks and find a boat.  Hermes got prepared to start up the ladder with Nudd following, and Ulladon got half-way up the rope when Mavis balked.  She refused to go up before her mistress.  She said she would climb the rope when Greta climbed the ladder. Greta insisted she would be fine and right behind her, and anyway, she had Bonebreaker between her and the tunnel, but Mavis looked unmoving.  Then the Wolv arrived.

One Wolv came out of the tunnel and let out a yip-yip before it got tackled by the three trolls.  Greta could not watch, but she knew despite the shielding and laser-like weapon, the Wolv would not survive that encounter.

A second Wolv came from the tunnel and had time to look at Greta and drool.  Nudd, who had his eyes open to climb the ladder, pulled his sword and this time he charged before anyone managed to glue his feet to the ladder.  The Wolv appeared to laugh, but it got hit in the back by a steady stream of rocks that shot out from the dark behind a boulder.  The Wolv shield protected him from the impact, but the push from the rocks combined with the slippery rocks at its feet caused the Wolv to fall over.  Nudd raced passed the Wolv and headed for the dark, like he saw something the others could not see.  When the Wolv regained its feet, it roared and seemed to forget all about Greta as it bounded after the boy.

“Nudd!”  Greta and Mavis both yelled, but Lord Crag and the last goblin underground urged Greta to climb.

As a third Wolv stuck its head from the tunnel, Bonebreaker finally caught up with what was going on and had a thought, always a dangerous thing for an ogre, and he yelled, “I’ll save you.”  He charged, shoved the Wolv back into the tunnel, and roared a much deeper and more frightening roar than the Wolv could produce.

“Bonebreaker, no,” Greta said, but not too loud as Lord Crag and the goblin grabbed her and all but carried her to the surface. Mavis scurried up the rope and met her there, and they all hurried to get down behind the boxes and barrels that lined the dock and now would never go downriver.

There were a half-dozen Wolv in and around the warehouse buildings that sat back from the docks and provided the Wolv with cover. The Wolv were firing their weapons, but they were receiving return fire from Alesander, Briana, Vedix and Hermes. Lucius, Bogus and Pincushion were missing, but Greta could not worry about that just then.  The goblins, having recognized that their arrows were ineffective, were preparing to send some flaming arrows and set the warehouses on fire.  Two goblins had the magic to fire explosive arrows, which at least kept the Wolv back and wary.

It began to look like a Mexican standoff, and Greta wondered whose old and used up weapons would run out of power first, when a bolt of lightning crashed the front of two barrels. They exploded and sent splinters everywhere.  Greta heard a laugh, saw the man, lion head and all, just as she had seen him in her vision.  He was the Jupiter, the judge, and he was clearly not in the mood for play.

A second bolt of lightning struck the dock and made a gaping hole in the wood, and Greta stood, only it was not Greta.  Junior stepped into the fray and he threw a brick calculated to graze the lion’s head.  While the lion looked up to blast the brick, the brick turned into a dove and flapped in the lion face before it flew off.  That mesmerized the man-beast just long enough for Junior to arrive in the lion’s face.  One swing with Wyrd and the lion head bounced to the cobblestones.

An arrow just missed Junior’s shoulder and hit the serpent head, spoiling the serpent’s aim.  Junior forgot about the serpent that curled around the lion-man’s feet. It struck even as Junior struck, but Mavis fired at the same time, and before the serpent could gather itself for a second strike, Junior cut its head off, too.

The snake body became pinned by a dozen goblin arrows, and the goblins followed to chop the body to pieces while Junior went to work on the lion-man.  He first cut the man body in half at the waist and then chopped at the lion head. Mavis, Ulladon and Briana came up with the goblins and started slicing up the serpent head when Junior stepped back to look.  The Wolv all staggered and held their heads, like men suddenly loosed from a great enchantment.

Junior backed off completely.  The lion-man began to dissolve, like ice under a hot sun, and the serpent pieces began to melt making one big melted whole.  A spark of light broke free of the melted mass and rose above their heads.  As the melted mass vanished, or perhaps seeped beneath the cobblestones, the spark raced off to the north to disappear in the dark.

“Boat.  Hurry.” Bogus yelled from the dock. Alesander and Hermes raced to collect Briana and Mavis while Junior vanished so Greta could return to her own place.  Greta and Briana both paused to give Ulladon a thank you kiss on the cheek.  Mavis chose simply to smile and Ulladon returned a knowing smile that said they were friends but there were limits on how close a dark elf and light elf could get.

Vedix and Lucius held the boat with poles while everyone piled in.  When they shoved off, Greta said good-bye and waved to the goblins, knowing they would see in the dark.  The current took them quickly, but not before they heard the howls of frustration from Samarvant.  The Wolv were disoriented for a moment when Jupiter was ruined, but it did not take them long to pull themselves together.  Greta had no doubt they would follow the group along the shore and be there when they docked.

One down, six to go, Greta thought.

************************

MONDAY

They have to make it down the river without being caught by the Wolf, and all the while, Greta wonders what will be the next piece of Mithras she has to face.

Until Monday.  Happy Reading

*

R6 Greta: Jupiter, part 2 of 3

M G Kizzia Leave a comment

In the impossibly far future, Greta would live two alien lifetimes.  Gallena of Orlan, an exobiologist who could dissect the Wolv and name every part. More importantly, because of Gallena’s understanding of so many alien cultures and alien psychology in all of its rich variety, she might be able to predict Wolv behavior.  Greta imagined that could be useful.

The other impossible life, Martok the Bospori, lived as a mathematical engineer who looked at the weapons and shields of the Wolv like Greta might look at late Neolithic stone-tipped spears.  Martok could easily repair the Wolv craft and send them back out into space, if she could figure out how to get him close enough to do it.  Greta shook her head at the idea of getting close to the Wolv ship and in her thoughts, took a step closer to her own time.

Still in the far future, she remembered the storyteller who kept track of all that went on in this and her many lifetimes, though to be honest, if he did not write down the names and things, he could get as confused as her.  Still, he knew the history of Greta’s day and age, and in a broad way which Greta could not grasp because she sat in the midst of it, and in a sense stayed too close to the subject to see the forest from the trees.  Greta grinned as she thought that, but then apologized to the storyteller because he hated clichés.  Anyway, the storyteller knew what belonged in Greta’s day and what did not; and the Wolv definitely did not belong.  I know that much, Greta thought.

Doctor Mishka came from the century before the storyteller, or at least the lifetime before.  The good doctor taught her many things about healing that even Mother Hulda did not know.  As bad as it felt at times to not be allowed into heaven, to be constantly forced into a new life, to have to live over and over and still not get it right, there were some advantages to having lived so many times.  She reluctantly admitted that in her mind where she often refused to admit it in her heart.

Greta sighed and thought again.  In the near future, there were two more lives that she seemed to be living at the same time as her own, though they quite obviously lived in their own time and place.  Gerraint sadly learned all there was to know about battle, and Greta feared his expertise might be needed in her day before this all finished, and indeed, she had already used him in that capacity.

“I volunteered,” Festuscato spoke directly from the future into Greta’s head.  Greta felt startled, and looked around to see if anyone else heard.  She told herself to be quiet and continued with her not so private thoughts.

Festuscato had some talents at negotiation, especially in negotiating with pig-headed barbarians, if only he could restrain his glib tongue.  At the moment, he still whispered in her head and reminding her that it was his turn next. Like a mom, Greta could only answer, “We’ll see,” and she backed her thoughts into the past.

In the near past, she lived as a Greek princess, gifted to the hunt by Artemis herself and master of more weapons than Greta could name.  The princess did not have the strength and natural talents of an elect, like Briana, but she more than made up for it by her training and the spirit of Artemis that dwelled in her.  The storyteller once put on his best Festuscato accent and quipped that she could track bedroom slippers across a field of linoleum, whatever that meant.

Greta smiled at that image, but turned her thoughts to Diogenes, chief of spies for Alexander the Great, sometimes called Alexander’s Eyes.  Now, he was the consummate warrior and already knew enormous amounts about battle, but he also had a special talent which might be called the talent of a true rogue; rogue being a word which she thought would be nicer than thief.  He could get in and out of a guarded room with whatever he went after, and before anyone noticed.  The storyteller said he could spy out a party of dwarfs without their ever noticing.  It was a bit of an exaggeration, Diogenes being only human and all, but not too far from the truth.

Greta shifted her seat as she remembered the gods she had been as her mind wandered into the deep past.  She remembered that on four separate occasions she lived among the gods.  Sometimes that memory made her more uncomfortable than the aliens, Martok and Gallena.  But setting her personal discomfort aside, there were four gods that stood at the four corners of the earth, and the first she thought of was the nameless god.

Nameless, an earth god, grandson of Odin and a Prince of Aesgard.  They presently traveled through territory that belonged to Nameless before the days of the dissolution of the gods, and that was perhaps why she thought of him first. Greta wondered why she even worried about Gerraint learning about battle, and Diogenes being trained in Macedonian school for war.  Nameless’ father was Tyr, the Aesgard god of war, and his mother was Vrya, goddess of love and again, war.  Nameless knew everything there was to know about war and battle, and maybe even invented some of it.  It ran in his blood, but then Greta decided she did not want to think about that.

Danna, great-great grandmother of Rhiannon, a fire goddess whose father Hephaestus lived and worked in the lava fields of Mount Etna.  She carried the underground fires of the earth in her blood, but she also served as a fertility goddess, thanks to her mother Bast, the cat of Egypt.  In fact, in Egypt, they called her Amonette, the serpent of the Nile, and considered her a goddess of creation, but that was a long story. Suffice to say, Danna gave birth to a whole pantheon of her own, and Rhiannon, her great-great grandchild or whatever, was ticking her off.  Greta frowned and thought again.

Salacia or Amphitrite, the queen of the seven seas, having married Poseidon, the one called Neptune by the Romans.  Her heart desired only to play with the little fishies in her streams and lakes and her lovely dolphins in the deep blue seas, but Greta remembered that Salacia had another side.  Don’t piss her off or upset her, because her anger could easily rise to hurricane proportions.  “But then everything feels so good and clean after the storm has passed.”  Greta heard the words in her head, and shook her head to clear her thoughts.

Then she thought of Junior, a man Greta felt especially close to because of her recent access.  Greta waited, but Junior kindly said nothing.  Junior, a god of the air, and she thought that like Nameless, his mother Ishtar had been a goddess of both love and war, but unlike Nameless, Junior’s father was Amun, the one true ancient god of the Nile, the creator god who became the Ra, the king of the gods of Egypt.  Amun Ra.  This could be good, Greta thought, not the power part, but the creativity.  Greta might need some real creative thinking to deal with the seven broken off pieces of Mithras, and Greta herself was not especially good in panic situations.

Greta shook her head again and put down her food. She stared at the city, and Vedix finally stole her attention when he spoke.

“It will be all right.  We will find them and get them home, safe.”  Vedix referred to Berry, Hans, Fae and Hobknot.  He apparently reacted to the look on her face, but had no idea what she really worried about.

The lives among the gods that she lived in the past were usually unavailable, no matter what lifetime she lived and no matter what terrible thing she faced.  She knew they were not there to step in and fix all her problems any more than she was there to fix all of the problems for her elves, fairies, gnomes and goblins. She knew it strongly related to the idea that she had to fight her own battles and cross her own bridges when she came to them, or burn those bridges, as the storyteller liked to say.  But in this case, Nameless, Danna, Amphitrite and Junior were virtually tripping over themselves to come and help her out. That really worried her more than anything else.  She supposed it was because she was due to start facing the godly, broken off pieces of Mithras, directly.

Mithrasis and the others failed to stop her by more indirect means, by threat, by general Pontius, by Chobar and his Dogs or the Lazyges. They failed with the initial hunters of the Wolv.  They failed with the followers of Helios and the followers of the lion-headed Jupiter. But Greta knew she had no power in her small human self to face such things as gods or demi-gods or whatever the pieces of Mithras were.  She felt grateful to her godly lives, but scared all the same.  She said something out loud, though perhaps no one listened.

“Now it begins in earnest.”

“Lady.”  Mavis got Greta’s attention as soon as they left the shelter of the swamp and headed out across the grass toward the city.

“What are we going to do about Stinky?” Hermes asked. “He might not fit through the tunnels, and even if he does, it is not likely we will find a boat big enough to take him downriver.”

Everyone heard and everyone stopped where they were. Alesander began to unload the mule. He made packages and divided them as evenly as he could between the members of the group so no one person would be overburdened.  They would not let Greta carry any more than her medical pack.  She protested, but got told bluntly that she had a baby to carry.

“I won’t even start showing for another month, at least,” she said, but it made no difference.

When everyone had been loaded down, Alesander’s final act was to remove Stinky’s reigns.  “I can’t imagine he will survive long in this wilderness,” Alesander said.

“We won’t touch him,” Rotwood responded as the goblins, three trolls, and Bonebreaker stood, ready to go.  Greta knew that was right.  Several had received electro-shock burns in the night.

Mavis and Hermes said good-bye to the beast. Greta stepped over to kiss the mule on the nose.  Briana offered one last carrot, and Vedix offered a Celtic word of parting, though he said it in jest.  The group turned for the city.  Stinky followed them most of the way, but stopped short of the gate.  It was like he sensed what was inside.

R6 Greta: Jupiter, part 1 of 3

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Late in the afternoon on the following day, the group came to the edge of the swamp.  From there, after a short bit of grassland, they saw the stone city wall, two stories high in most places.  Nudd called the city Samarvant, and he pointed off to their right where the road went up to a gate, the road they would have taken if they traveled the normal route, twenty-one days on the high road from the village of the Dragon Clan. Off to the left, they saw the river that Nudd called the Olevant.  The little ones called it the river Heartbreak, but Greta had another name for it.

“The Scythians own the Ukraine, but I hope we are beyond their area now,” she said.  “These great swamps and bogs and woods cover the border area, and they rest on higher ground where a thousand streams join together to form the river. The river on the future map that the Storyteller is looking at is called the Oka, it runs due north for a long way before it detours to the east where it runs straight into the Muskva River, and that is where we are going.”  Everyone looked at the river where it skirted the swampy area they were in and ran north along the edge of the city.  Everyone looked at the water since it was the route they would have to take, but the water was not the only thing they were looking for.

“Over there,” Alesander pointed toward the southeast side of the city where the wooden roof of a tower could just be made out. It looked burned.

“I see the scorch marks on the stones,” Mavis reported.  “But I see no one on the walls or around the gate and I hear nothing to indicate life.”

“Bogus?”  Greta turned to the dwarf.

Bogus shook his head.  “I smell trouble, but I cannot say what kind.  I think Wolv, but…” Bogus shrugged.  “Too much lime smell.”

“No cooking fires,” Pincushion added.  “This time of day I should smell cooking fires.”

“Briana?”  Greta turned again

“I sense danger.”  That seemed all she could say for sure.

“I recommend we wait until dark,” Ulladon said.

“Why wait?” Lucius spoke up. “No reason why we can’t find our way to the docks and grab a boat before they even know we are there.”

“Better after dark.  We can’t protect you until after the sun sets,” Lord Crag interrupted. “Rotwood,” he yelled in a voice that gave Nudd the willies.  “Run back and get the trolls and Bonebreaker, and hurry.”  Rotwood hurried, and Greta sat, so everyone found a spot and sat with her.

Pincushion, Ulladon, Hermes and Mavis set about building a fire to cook some supper.  Briana sat with Alesander and they looked at the city wall once in a while.  Lucius sat near them and stayed quiet except for the comment that he thought they ought to just go, now.  He said they would be all right and let the subject drop, but Greta wondered how he would know one way or the other, and surely caution would be called for.  She considered Lucius on this journey.  He had not betrayed them.  He had not done anything overtly to indicate he might be under the spell of Mithrasis, if she did not count almost being killed by his rockslide on the Rumbling Ridge; but there were subtle signs.  He urged them to return to Roman lands at the Dragon Village.  He went out all day from the elf village and Vedix said he and Lord Horns separated from him for a time, but that did not mean he met with anyone or set up any ambush.  Now, he urged a lack of caution, like he knew something but would not tell. There were probably other things as well, but her mind felt clouded.

“Lady,” Bogus and Vedix interrupted her thoughts with an argument.  “I thought maybe Chobar and the Dog Clan came up before us, and maybe that is the dog smell we are sensing, but Vedix says even if Chobar brought every dog, there would not be enough to attack a city like this.”

“I wish it was something as simple as Chobar and his dogs, but no,” Greta said.  “This is a city of the Bastarne people, as Ulladon said, and that is a Germanic people. I thought one or more of the outlying Scythians types might have attacked the city, like maybe the Capri or Costoboci, but no.”

“Why not?”  Vedix wondered.

Greta pointed.  “That roof is still smoldering, so whatever happened, it happened in the past day or two at most.  And there are no dead bodies or equipment, broken or otherwise, to indicate an assault on the city.”

“Maybe it got taken by stealth and subterfuge,” Bogus suggested.

Greta shook her head, but said, “Maybe.”  She twirled her right-hand pigtail, considered how light her blond hair was, and wondered if she could get away with being ditzy and feigning ignorance about the world.  No way, she thought.  Not if she knew words like feigning.  She sighed and considered their predicament instead.  No one said the city got razed by Wolv, but it was what everyone thought. Greta was probably the only one who knew that it would not take more than a dozen Wolv to kill a thousand men, women and children.  The Wolv had shielding and advanced weapons, and true, the weapons were pretty old and worn out, but even with their claws and fangs, and speed alone, they were pretty unstoppable.

“Lady.”  Nudd interrupted Greta’s thoughts this time.  She looked at him, but still had her mind wandering through La-la land. Poor Nudd.  He had not left her side since just about Movan Mountain, and she could not be sure if he opened his eyes even once in the swamp.  “Lady,” he repeated, which got her to pay better attention.  “I’ve been thinking about Samarvant.  I was very young when I came here, but I remember some.  I remember they built big underground tunnels, drains they called them, to take away rain water and filth from the streets.  I remember because they scared me when I thought about getting lost down there.  I feared wandering around forever and never finding my way back up again.”  Nudd got lost in his own memories, and from the look on his face, they were probably memories of nightmares he had as a child about getting lost in a labyrinth of underground tunnels.  Greta paused while the information sank in.  Then she shouted.

“Alesander.  Bogus. Lord Crag.  There may be a way through the city.”  She softened her tone to speak again to Nudd.  “Do the drains empty out into the river?”

“Yes,” he said and shivered.  “And sometimes they flood the tunnels to clean them out.” He closed his eyes and turned away while the others came to listen.

It took almost no time to figure their route. Lord Crag’s people explored all the tunnels when they were first constructed, including their path through a couple of natural underground caverns.  Crag and his people wanted nothing to do with those caverns since they were so wet and full of stinky limestone, and since the townspeople sent flood waters through every now and then, but his people knew all about the tunnels, and several had maps in their heads and claimed they could take them right to the drain opening next to the docks on the river.

“The only problem is we will have to enter the city by the gate to get to a drain opening,” Lord Crag said.  “The ground beneath the city wall is solid, and you folks can’t walk through solid rock.”

“They will smell us,” Greta pointed out, though no one had yet said Wolv with certainty.

“If we move quick, we should make the drain, unless they are standing on it, and the underground smells only of limestone,” Lord Crag countered.

“Indeed,” Bogus spoke up.  “I can smell it from here.”

With that, they settled in for a good supper while they waited for the sun to go down.  Mavis, Ulladon and Briana made sure Nudd got more than enough to eat. They seemed determined to overstuff the poor boy.  Ulladon even called him the poor and needy son she never had.  Briana smiled at that description.  Mavis let out a true elf grin, and Greta smiled for them, even if she felt a bit left out.

Feeling left out felt like nothing unusual for Greta. She remembered when she turned ten and eleven-years-old and started to seriously study with Mother Hulda, the woman of the ways.  People treated her differently almost from the beginning, though her childhood friends hung on for a time.  She only turned sixteen when Mother Hulda died in a night, and the burden of the people fell on her shoulders.  She felt unprepared for that.  She felt like she hardly knew enough to come in from the rain, but the people had no one else.

Greta looked at Mavis, Ulladon and Briana. They were becoming good friends, but sadly, Briana thought of her as one who spoke to her goddess Rhiannon like Rhiannon was the child in need of instruction.  This did not make Mother Greta appear like a normal woman, like a person one could have as an ordinary friend.  As for Mavis and Ulladon, Greta was their goddess, and no doubt that had seeped into Briana’s thinking as well.  She could never be just friends with any of them. She remained the Kairos.  She had lived too many lifetimes over too many years if she added it up, though it did not honestly add up that way.

Greta paused to think through what it meant to be the Kairos, the goddess of history, though out loud she insisted on being called the Watcher over history.  She claimed only to watch history, but she admitted that sometimes it became a struggle to get it to turn out the way it was written.  It felt curious how that written history extended as much into the future in her mind as into the past.  As an ordinary human, she had no idea what tomorrow would bring.  The next hundred years or so always stayed a mystery. But through whatever future lives she currently remembered, she could understand how things turned out and look back to see what endangered the present.  Things were happening that could throw the whole of history out of whack if she did not act.  A Mithraic pantheon of gods ruling over Rome was not in the books.  Greta sighed and considered the future more closely.