Starcrossed

Jason asked as he turned to Helen, a look of disbelief on his face.
    “Maybe a tiny bit,” Helen said, but Jason was too excited to really listen. He ran over to the box, pulled out a javelin, and chucked it at Helen. It bounced right off.
    “Okay, that stung,” Helen said, smiling and raising her hands to signal in a friendly way that she’d had enough, but Hector had already picked up a sword and was stalking toward her.
    “I’ll stop as soon as you start bleeding, okay?” he said casually before he started hacking away at her. Four strokes in, and the blade was ruined.
    Helen stumbled back with raised arms and fell down. She wasn’t wounded, but the instinct to protect herself was still there, and Hector was absolutely terrifying when he attacked. The rain of blows ended abruptly when the sword fell apart. She tried to stand back up, but as soon as she did she was thrown down again as something fell from the sky and landed violently on top of Hector. Lucas had rammed into Hector from above, driving his cousin two feet into the dirt before he reared back on his knees to hit him.
    “Lucas, stop!” Helen screamed in concert with Cassandra and Ariadne.
    Jason didn’t yell, but as usual, he dove on top of the other two to put himself between them. In his rage, Lucas hit Jason accidentally, and that misguided blow made him stop and look at his cousins more clearly. Hector lay at the bottom of the pile, covered in layers of dirt, his hands held up in a surrendering gesture. Jason lay across his brother’s body, bleeding from the mouth and pushing on Lucas’s shoulders to keep him back. Lucas blinked and looked up at Helen.
    “He was trying to kill you.” Lucas lowered his raised fist. He forced his eyes to focus on Hector and his voice frayed at the edges, like he was a young boy. “I saw it. You had a sword.”
    “I’m okay. Look at me, Lucas. No blood. I’m fine,” Helen said gently as she moved to the side of the trench. She put her hands on his shoulders and tried to coax him off his frightened, panting cousins. Lucas allowed himself to be led up out of the trench, docile with regret and confusion.
    Cassandra briefly explained Helen’s imperviousness to her brother as Helen, Ariadne, and Jason pulled Hector up out of the collapsing ditch. He was injured—not too seriously, but badly enough that he couldn’t walk on his own. Ariadne and Jason took Hector into the house, having to hold him up as he walked. Lucas watched his cousin half limp, half drag himself across the yard. He had to sit down in the sand at the sight.
    Three fast-moving shapes came rushing out of the house to see what was wrong. Pallas helped his children the rest of the way into the house while Castor and Pandora briefly conferred with Ariadne and then moved toward the tennis court.
    “Why didn’t you warn me, Cassie?” Lucas pleaded quietly while Castor shouted questions as he and Pandora entered the tennis court. Cassandra shrugged, avoiding everyone’s eyes.
    “She was afraid,” Helen answered defensively, cutting off Castor’s questions. She took Cassandra’s hand and pulled her close, a little angry that they would try to blame Cassandra for Lucas’s actions. “She had a vision of herself swinging a sword at me and she thought she was going to kill me. She thought she had to kill me. Would you have told anyone if you were in her shoes?”
    Pandora looked at Helen questioningly as if to ask if she was okay. Helen gave her an uncertain smile in response, relieved that Pandora had been sensitive enough to keep this exchange silent. Then they both turned their attention back to Lucas, who was still shell-shocked.
    “If you were scared, why didn’t you tell me, Cassie? You know you can always come to me,” Lucas said firmly, but she shook her head.
    “None of you are qualified to be my confidants anymore. I’m the only one who can decide what to reveal or keep hidden,” she said gently. Cassandra stepped away from Helen’s side and stood up straighter. It was as if she was throwing off her support system with one painful gesture. She took a wistful breath and turned back to Helen.
    “Standing there, waiting for me to cut your head off?” said the newer, older, and slightly more melancholic Cassandra. “That was the bravest thing I’ve ever seen.”
    That’s because you couldn’t see yourself , Helen thought.
    Cassandra looked down at Lucas, who was still in shock over what he’d done. She put a hand on