The Pandora Curse (Greek Myth Series Book 4) Read Online Free PDF

fastened on the vials. The vials she could not touch without being consumed by magical forces and turned to mere dust.
    “Vara, don’t!”
    His warning came just as she grabbed a vial from the bed and held it up to examine it. He expected her to go up in smoke at any moment. Hera had warned him about this. Still, she remained intact.
    “Is something the matter?” She looked at him with a mischievous grin with eyes of yet a different color: silver-gray, and with a translucent glow about them. “Afraid I might break your little trinket?” She laughed and tossed it up. Nikolai snatched it from the air, and then landed himself on the bed next to the other vials.
    “Perhaps someday I can show you some of my trinkets,” she said in a promising tone. “And I assure you, mine are much more interesting than a worthless glass vial.”
    She headed toward the door, and Nikolai placed the vial by the others and hurried after her, his eyes still searching the room for the minion.
    “Come, Calanthra,” called Vara. “You’ll need to instruct the cooks to warm the food, as I am sure it is already cold because of our disrespectful guest.”
    She stopped in the doorway and turned to look at Nikolai. He stared at her in confusion. How could she have touched the vial and not be harmed? He sincerely doubted Hera would lie about something like this. Could Vara have some sort of magical power herself? It made him wonder.
    “You will be joining me.” Her words were a command, not a request. Being so shaken, all Nikolai could do was agree.
    “Yes. I’ll be there momentarily.”
    “Good,” she said with a smile. She left the room, and her lady-in-waiting closed the door behind them.
    Nikolai looked quickly up to the ceiling, wondering if the minion could hang on to the rafters like a bat. Not seeing him there, he headed back to the bed to ponder the episode with the vials. That’s when he noticed something he hadn’t before. His mother gave him five vials to fill with the five vices of gluttony, greed, anger, jealousy, and lust. Yet here on the bed he counted six.
    He reached for the one Vara had thrown down, noticing a greenish tint to it. As he picked it up, it moved in his hand. Then it started transforming shape. He threw it down to the bed in surprise, watching as a green mist formed around it, and it shifted into the shape of Hera’s minion.
    “Baruch!” Nikolai jumped backward, grabbing onto the bedpost for support.
    The minion finished shapeshifting, and wiped off his arms and rubbed his shoulder. “I don’t like to be tossed around. One more episode like that, and I’m going to hit back.”
    “Y - you?” Dumbfounded, Nikolai could only point to the other vials.
    “Aye. And a good thing too. You never should have let her get so near the vials. She could have killed herself.”
    “You are a shapeshifter,” he said in awe, never having known one before.
    “I am a minion,” Baruch said proudly, raising his chin.
    “So that’s why Hera said you’d never be seen. You can change into anything to blend into the surroundings.”
    “Aye. That’s why. Now let’s go eat. I’m starvin’.”

Three
     
     
    Vara’s stomach growled. She pushed away her empty platter and instructed the servant to fill, it for the third time. She held out her wine goblet for the cupbearer to fill and waited until it spilled over the rim.
    Food never tasted so good. Or actually, it did. For some reason, she could never get her fill. She loved to eat and drink, and didn’t know what life would be like without this pleasure.
    A motion caught her attention, and across the room she saw the king’s little daughter and the nursemaid enter. Her guards stopped them and looked over to Vara. The little girl’s eyes looked so huge upon her face. Her arms and legs were like twigs, and her clothes were bedraggled and torn.
    She motioned for her men to bring the girl forward. When they approached the dais, Vara stood to see the small child over