Pandora Gets Greedy (13 page)

“Greetings, you two. I've heard much, I must say.”

Without warning, Aphrodite picked up a handful of powdered sugar from a bin below the counter and threw it at Venus. Then she fell back in peals of laughter. Venus responded by picking up a large tube of sweet cream and dousing Aphrodite.

“Greetings, blessed ones,” Pandy said, smiling with happiness in spite of herself. “I was certain I saw you both in the procession yesterday.”

“Good eye!” sang Venus.

“That was us,” Aphrodite cooed.

“Uh, I have to buy the bread for the household. But since you are here, great goddesses, and we were led here, I have a feeling there's a reason. Maybe?”

Again, there was huge crash of metal from the back room and Pandy clearly saw two men beating each other with … something.

“Are they okay?” she asked.

“Ares and Mars?” said Venus. “Oh, they're fine. You know them, they'd argue over anything. Right now, it's over which filling to put into the fried sweet dough: crushed apples or cinnamon paste.”

“Apples,” said Alcie.

Pandy looked at her.

“I wasn't swearing. I vote apples.”

Ares and Mars crossed the room again and Pandy saw they were beating each other with large baking trays.

“Okay, to business,” said Aphrodite, flicking a spoonful of honey at Venus.

“Right, business,” said Venus, ducking.

“So, yes, you're right; you are here for a reason.”

“Give her the stuff!” Mars shouted, poking his head out of the back room before a large metal bowl came crashing down on it.

“We're getting to that, sweetie,” Venus called back.

“Are you gonna tell her where Greed is hiding?” Alcie blurted out.

Venus and Aphrodite were silenced for a moment.

“Because that would be the only information I could
really use,” Pandy said, covering for Alcie and remembering that the good will of the immortals could change in a flash. “I have to get home.”

“Oh, that's right,” Venus said. “Hermes told us about your conversation with your father. He came home early this morning full of remorse at not telling you about the time travel thing. Having you find out the way you did. And Zeus and Jupiter feel bad too. Well, as bad as Supreme Rulers
can
feel.”

“Alcestis,” Aphrodite said turning to Alcie and pausing for a dreadful beat. “Someone is still a little Miss Sassy-Toga. And no, we're not going to tell you where Greed is.”

There was a sound from the back of something huge being pried from a wall, and a large clay oven sailed across the room.

“Because we don't know and even if we did we couldn't tell you,” Venus said, unfazed. “Zeus and Jupiter say we're all here only to guide if necessary, not solve it for you.”

“Yeah, yeah, only to help. I got it,” Pandy said.

“I beg your pardon? Who's a little ungrateful?” Aphrodite asked, her hands on her large curved hips.

“No,” Pandy said quickly. “No, very grateful. You have no idea how comforting it is to know you're here.”

In the back room, directly in her line of sight, Pandy saw Mars whack Ares with a large sack of flour, filling the room with a white cloud.

“Glad to hear it,” said Venus. “So, since we can't give you the answer, we can at least give you bread for your household.”

With that, she and Aphrodite reached down behind the counter and pulled up two large sacks full to bursting with fresh baked goods.

“Right then, the long loaves are for general household consumption,” said Aphrodite. “The rolls with the olives baked on top are for the spoiled daughter—
not
for anyone else. And there's a little sack with something special: sweet rolls with candied violets. Pandora, you, Alcestis, and Iole will enjoy them. There's one for each of you.”

There was a long pause, during which both goddesses tried to suppress a giggle, as if each held onto a great secret.

“Oh, Dite,” Venus said. “We really should tell them.”

“Tell us what?” Pandy asked.

“I was going to, Nussie. I was going to,” Aphrodite sighed with impatience. “Naturally, they'd never guess on their own. All right. Mars and Ares have baked special rolls for you three, which will give each of you whatever you need for six hours.”

“Strength, speed, a good throwing arm, whatever,” chirped Venus.

“Exactly.”

“B-but,” Pandy stammered, confused as she studied the little bag. “How will the rolls know what I—or we—need? Do we say it, or think it, or …?”

“Oh, Pandora,” Aphrodite said in a tone Alcie recognized at once. “Must we think of
everything
for you? So much has been done on your behalf. Can you not answer these questions for yourself?”

Pandy was stunned, but Alcie smiled big and bright, showing as many of her teeth as possible.

“Cool!” she called out cheerily. “Can't wait!”

“We thought these would be fun!” said Venus. “Use them wisely.”

“Very well, off with you now,” smiled Aphrodite.

“Uh, how much do I owe?” said Pandy, still surprised at Aphrodite's outburst and feeling somehow as if she were being rushed out of the bakery.

“Nothing. You've paid a lot in the last few ticks of the dial, so go,” Aphrodite said, blowing her a kiss.

Instantly, Pandy and Alcie found themselves halfway down the street. Turning back, Profit Rolls was gone and an ordinary insula was now in its place.

“What was that about?” Pandy said, her eyes wide. “It was a simple question!”

“No, no, it's not you,” said Alcie quietly. “That's what happens when the gods don't know an answer. That's the same thing Hades said to me when I was in the underworld and I asked about how I was going to contact you once I got to Baghdad. He got furious! Told me he couldn't solve
all
my problems. But Persephone knew it was just because he didn't know. And the gods don't like to admit there's anything they don't know.”

“Huh,” Pandy said. “I guess I never realized there might
be
something they don't know. Okay, so we'll figure out the rolls for ourselves.”

“I can't remember how to get back,” Alcie said, turning toward the maze of streets before them.

“Leave that to me,” Pandy said, walking on. “I noticed things on the way here, like that green robe hanging on that line overhead to dry. And that missing stone in that wall over there.”

Within moments, she had led them both to the door of Lucius Valerius. Alcie stopped before they went in and put her hand on Pandy's arm.

“I'll say it, spectacular. You're getting so,
so
clever; just like your dad.”

Pandy sighed and hung her head.

“If you make me cry, I'm gonna slug you.”

“Attagirl.”

Suddenly, the front door was thrown open and Rufina
stood there, flanked by Crispus and another slave, her arms folded across her chest.

“Just about to call out the guards. You're both very lucky. Where's the bread? We're all starving to death.”

Pandy began to hand her bag to Rufina, but a powerful unseen force pushed the bag back into her arms at the same time Alcie's arms were thrust forward, literally shoving her bag into Rufina's hands.

“Excellent,” Rufina said, opening the bag and taking a bite out of an olive-topped roll. “Oh! Oh, yes! That hawker was right; this is the best thing I have ever tasted. Well, what are you waiting for, you stupid slaves? Take the rest to Balbina or I'll have you whipped.”

Rufina turned and began to walk up the stairs as Pandy and Alcie headed toward the food-preparation room.

“Uh!” Alcie said involuntarily as she noticed Rufina's bottom moving upward.

Pandy stopped and followed Alcie's gaze.

Rufina's backside had become, in a matter of five stair steps, slightly but noticeably larger than it had been. As the girls watched, it bulged out even further, lifting the hem of her robes an extra centimeter. Pandy and Alcie blinked, trying to clear their heads.

“You see that?” whispered Pandy.

“You mean the place where she keeps her brains poofing out?”

From the food-preparation room, Balbina called for the household bread.

“Come on,” Pandy said. “My curiosity will just have to wait.”

That afternoon, four hundred snow white doves were delivered in ivory cages to the house of Lucius Valerius. Then came twelve thousand red and orange butterflies in a large teak crate, twenty trained monkeys, three alligators, thirty lion cubs, ten snow leopards from the slopes of the mountains in the Far East, ten black swans, and an entire family of tame white tigers. The forty elephants were tethered together in the courtyard.

“Tigers, check,” Varinia said, referring to her master list. “Elephants, check. Jugglers, acrobats, mimes, and fire-eaters have all checked in. Good. Now we're just waiting for the two exotic Asian dancers with the fifteen-foot yellow python.”

“Oh … well, naturally,” sighed Balbina, surveying her once spotless marble floors.

Pandy and Alcie worked like never before, moving furniture, smashing walnuts and dates, kneading pastry dough, milking goats, polishing floors, setting out cushions, picking up swan poop, feeding elephants, beating rugs. And, all the while, glancing furtively to each other. When they had taken the second sack of bread into the food-preparation room, Balbina had found only the long loaves; no rolls with candied violets. It was several hours later that Pandy had found the bag of them, magically transported to the end of her cot, and had quickly hidden the bag below.

As Apollo and Phoebus Apollo were heading into the west, dragging the golden orb of the sun behind them, Pandy and Alcie were in the great hall sweeping the floor for the third time. All of a sudden, they heard a muffled shriek from the upper floor and a commotion on the stairs. Varinia and Balbina hurried in from the food-preparation room along with several other house slaves. Melania and Iole were the first down the stairs and into the hall, Melania's eyes searching frantically for her mistress. But before she could speak, a shape appeared behind her.

Rufina.

Who was now quite … enormous.

“Daughter!” Varinia cried at the sight. “Are you all right?! Was she attacked, Crispus? Is there a beehive
somewhere close by? I see no stings! Rufina, why are you … swollen?”

“Stop it, Mother!” Rufina snorted. “You know, all you ever do is tell me to diet. ‘Don't eat this, don't eat that!' Diet, diet,
diet
. Minerva's toenails, I'm awesome, and nobody
gets
it! I only had two rolls the entire day! Perhaps I'm actually undernourished, did you ever think of that, huh? Besides, I just looked myself in my glass and I don't think I've ever looked lovelier.”

She glanced at Pandy and Alcie, who stood with their mouths open.

“In fact, there's a certain stable boy who might be very interested in putting his eyeballs on me right now.”

“It's the rolls,” Pandy whispered to Alcie. “The olive rolls. She started eating one before she even went upstairs. They had to be enchanted!”

“Yeah,” Alcie whispered back. “And they're so enchanted she can't even see what they've done to her!”

Varinia cleared her throat, not at all interested in continuing the discussion with her daughter in front of the servants.

“What is it you wish, daughter? Why have you left your room? You know your father wants you to remain …”

“I'm going to practice my dance for the feast,” Rufina said curtly, holding a sheer veil above her head.

“I don't think your father will allow …”

“Oh, he can lock me my in room with Cris-
pus
here guarding me until I'm dried up like a prune, but I'm gonna dance for Caesar,
Moth
-er. It's my festive and celebratory dance and I've been working on it for days. Watch. Everybody, watch!”

“There are no musicians, daughter.”

“I'm going to hum.”

For the next several moments, everyone in the great hall stood transfixed at the horror. Not only was Rufina achingly out of tune and a supremely bad dancer, but with her body plumped out the way it was, she was also uneven and fell more than once on her considerable backside. To keep from giggling, Pandy and Alcie pinched each other's arms until they actually drew blood.

“What's going on here?” Lucius bellowed, entering the hall. “What's that on the floor?”

“Your daughter,” said Melania.

“Why is she writhing around like that?”

“She's trying to get up, dear,” said Varinia. “She's practicing her dance for Caesar's feast.”

“Oh. Well, fine,” Valerius said, turning from the room.

“Lucius,” cried Varinia. “What do you mean ‘
fine
'?

We've scheduled jugglers, joke-tellers, and other dancers who can actually dance! You're not seriously going
to let your daughter—in her condition—
display
herself like that for Caesar, are you?”

“I don't care.”

“Lucius!”

“Wife,” the senator snapped. “I don't
care
! It doesn't matter, do you hear? None of it matters. Pandora! Get me some water!”

Pandy dropped her broom, raced out of the room and up the stairs to the senator's private chambers, but she paused on the stairs long enough to catch his last words.

“In a week you'll be moving to the Palatine Hill, do you understand?” he shouted, not caring who heard. “You'll be happy to know that, once the golden laurel wreath sits securely on my head, I have decided to keep you as my wife even though you are far too unambitious for my liking. But that …”

He pointed to Rufina, struggling to stand up.