Soon they were standing on a long thin beach, its pure white sands being whipped up by the violent waves lashing against the coast. ‘We can’t go down there,’ Rhiannon said pointing to the water. ‘I can’t anyways, I don’t have any abilities from my mom for breathing underwater,’ she said. ‘Can you?’
Luke shook his head. They stood looking out over the choppy steel grey waters wondering what to do when Luke pointed, ‘Look, over there!’ he said pointing towards a dark round thing bobbing in the distance. ‘I think it might be a Selkie!’ he said.
‘They are members of Poseidon’s kingdom, they could summon him for us!’ shouted Rhiannon with joy. Rhiannon whistled to the small seal-like creature in the distance and Luke gestured and shouted. The little head then disappeared under the waves.
They stopped whistling and shouting, disappointed. Then right in front of them a small shiny head popped up. ‘Are you a Selkie?’ asked Rhiannon crouching down on the sand to get closer to the creature. The little seal head made a little bark and what looked like a nod of its head. ‘Could you send a message to Poseidon for us?’ asked Luke, crouching down beside Rhiannon. ‘We need to speak with him. About all this chaos that is going on. We heard it’s a rebellion by all the demi-Gods,’ he explained. ‘And its tearing everything apart!.’
‘Please hurry,’ urged Rhiannon.
The creature looked at them with its large shiny black eyes and then disappeared below the choppy waves with a flick of its tail.
They sat down further up the beach, away from the encroaching waves and waited. Thunder boomed and lightening flashed behind them, and strong winds off the water and from the approaching storms whipped Rhiannon’s cloak and gown around them both.
Not more than half an hour passed when a voice rumbled up from the water. ‘You wanted to speak?’ bubbled the mellifluous voice, sounding like it was speaking with a mouthful of water.
Rhiannon and Luke jumped up and ran to the edge of the beach. As they looked down at the turbulent water, a face seemed to form out of the waves themselves. ‘Your majesty,’ said Rhiannon holding out her gown in a curtsey. Luke bowed to the face in the water. ‘Yes sir,’ he said. ‘We want to find out what is going on,’ he said. ‘Why are there these earthquakes and floods and tsunamis.’
‘And storms,’ added Rhiannon. ‘We’ve heard there’s a rebellion.’
The watery face seemed to nod with the movement of the water. ‘And who is asking?’ the face asked.
‘I’m Rhiannon, demi-Goddess, daughter of Nehalennia Goddess of seafarers,’ Rhiannon said pointing to herself.
There was a rumbling noise from the ocean, of comprehension. ‘Yes, I know of her. She helps me a great deal keeping the humans that sail my waters alive in my storms and squalls.’
‘And I am Luke, Demi-God, son of Solanus, God of mediation,’ said Luke pointing to himself.
There was a rumble of agreement from the water.
‘It was he who told us of the problems up here,’ said Luke. ‘We,’ he gestured to Rhiannon and back to himself, ‘are Assistants down in the Underworld.’
The watery face nodded.
‘We only noticed something was wrong because it was filling up with souls,’ said Rhiannon.
Luke jumped in, ‘Meaning lots of people up here are dying for some reason.’
The ocean seemed to groan. ‘It is the Assistants,’ it said. ‘They are not happy just being Assistants, they don’t want to just be Demi-Gods. They are not content, so they are causing this chaos. I am just one God, I cannot fight all the many Assistants that I have that help me, and that have turned against me.’
‘What about the other Gods?’ asked Rhiannon, exasperated. ‘What about my mother, she deals with the oceans, in a way’ she said.
‘No,’ rumbled Poseidon, the waves moving the face in a shaking motion. ‘The seamen and pirates your mother watches over and protects, they have begun to war amongst themselves, and she is using all her energy to stop them.’
Thunder pealed overhead and rain began to pelt the beach. Lightening lit up the sky over the ocean like tongues of liquid fire as it raked across the charcoal clouds. The face in the water disappeared briefly, and the ground shook violently underneath Luke and Rhiannon. They held onto each other to stay upright. The face reappeared, a look of anger etched across the vague features.
‘What can we do? How can we help!’ yelled Rhiannon over the din of the thunder and the shaking earth.
The face of Poseidon did not respond. After a few seconds it spoke again. ‘I do not have the answer,’ it said. ‘You must appeal to the King himself’.
‘Zeus?’ yelled Rhiannon and Luke at the same time.
The face was silent yet again and then slowly faded away into the waves.
Resigned, Rhiannon and Luke climbed onto their horse, their wet clothes clinging to their skin.
*****