“How old are you?”
She hesitated a moment before answering. “Twenty, majesty.”
“And not married? Is there a flaw that cannot be seen?”
“I can assure you that is not the case. My father does not want me wed, unless it is to a very wealthy man, for I make him much money from my healing.”
“I see.” He stroked his lengthy beard, never taking his eyes off her face. “I would think the riches of a king should satisfy him.”
Her eyes grew wide at his offer. “I-I do not know how to answer.” She went to take a step back, but he grabbed her by the waist and pulled her closer.
“You will be well-cared for.”
To refuse him would mean death. She tried not to cringe as his spindly fingers attempted to undo the ornamented clasp that held her tunic together.
Before he was able to get the pin open, footsteps clattered outside the room. His hands fell to his sides just as guards surrounded her.
“What’s happening?” she asked, her voice coming out as a croak.
“You killed him, and now you will pay,” Eris screamed, stepping between two guards and leveling Iola a hateful glance.
“I do not understand. That is not possible,” she cried.
“It is more than possible. It happened,” she spat.
Iola’s entire body trembled, and she couldn’t take her eyes off the golden apple that the goddess held in her hands.
“She is not a healer. Her powers are dark,” Eris wailed. King Parlion tried to comfort her, but she would have none of it, pushing him away instead. “I never wanted her here. It was your idea,” she went on to say.
“I did not kill your son,” Iola interjected. “There must be some mistake.”
“Mistake? My son is dead after drinking your poison. The only mistake was bringing you here.”
The king’s naturally rosy complexion had turned a sickly shade of grey. “You were right about her dark powers. Just moments before you arrived, she tried to seduce me.”
Iola’s pulse thundered in her ears. “That is not true,” she cried. “Why are you both lying?” Her question went unanswered as a guard took hold of each arm and dragged her from the room. She looked over her shoulder as sheer black fright swept through her. “Please believe me,” she pleaded to the king. “I did not kill your son.” But her words fell on deaf ears. He had already turned his back on her.
She fought hard to escape the guards, but their rock hard hands held her tight, sealing her fate. Tears streamed down her cheeks as terrifying thoughts of what they were going to do to her flooded her mind. “Please let me go,” she begged, but she might well have saved her breath as she received no answer from either man.
The tips of her toes burned with pain from being scraped across the stone floor. Soon, she was taken down some stairs and then out to a courtyard with rows of statues, so lifelike, that at first glance, she’d thought them to be real. Her gaze flicked over each one until it landed on a group of elderly men with long straggly hair. She gasped as icy fear twisted around her heart. What was this place, and why was she there? Iola didn’t have to wait long for an answer.
A few moments later, Eris appeared. “Do you like my statues?” she asked with a smirk. “They look exactly as they did in life. I will make sure you do too.”
Panic like she’d never known before welled in her throat, making it impossible for her to speak.
“How long would you like to be stone?” Eris chuckled, seeming to take great satisfaction in Iola’s silence. “We will let the apple decide.”
The goddess walked over to an area of the courtyard that had squares painted on the stones. Inside each one were numbers. Eris tossed the golden apple into the air, then went over to where it landed. Iola watched in horror as Eris read off the numbers. “Three thousand three hundred and fifty-one. Those are the number of years you will be here. You see, death would be too easy. I want you to suffer. You will be cold and stiff, unable to move or speak. But you will feel, and you will hear. Long, silent torture is what you will endure.”
Iola’s stomach was clenched tight. “No, you cannot do that,” she replied in a small, frightened voice.
“I can and will. But that is not the end of your torture. When your time is over, you will return to life…temporarily. You will have until the moon is full in the sky to cure a child of an illness similar to Alexio’s. And because I am not as horrible as you think, I will give you one advantage. Your time in stone is extremely long. There is no way to predict what may happen in the world during that time or where you might end up, so to help you achieve your goal; you will be able to speak and understand the native language of the land you awaken in. However, if you fail, you will become stone again, and this time it will be for eternity.” She quickly made her way over to Iola. “Hold her still,” she ordered the guards, placing the apple against Iola’s forehead and chanting something in an unknown language.
Iola’s muscles grew heavy and began to ache—even her eyelids hurt—then a bone-chilling cold coursed through her body. She glanced down at her hands, and they were now too stiff to move. Suddenly, a sharp pain pierced her chest. Her heartbeat slowed, and then it stopped beating completely.
She had been turned to stone.
Chapter 2
Present Day, USA
Carter Johnson knew as soon as he set eyes on the stunning brick Georgian Colonial that he had to put an offer on the house. The ten thousand square foot, six-bedroom, seven-bath home was exactly what he’d been looking for. But the real selling point had been the
