An ungodly roar echoed behind her as she ran, and she couldn't help but wonder why no one was at all troubled besides her. Aunt Petunia refused to tell them about the tooth fairy, for God's sake, how was she not bothered by the clearly supernatural happening right in front of her?
Thought was abandoned in lieu of running for her life. Whatever it was was chasing after her, though it was made difficult for him because of the small aisles and his chunky hands. Boxes of cereal and seasoning were knocked off the shelves; jars of were shattered across the floor; preserves and pickled vegetables everywhere; a shelf was dented by the force of the monster running into it.
Heri had flung herself behind a pineapple display and snatched up a box-cutter left behind under the stand. Her heart was going a mile a minute and she was positively vibrating with adrenaline. The safety knife looked incredibly pathetic when compared to what she was up against, but she pushed the blade up as far as it went and held it at the ready.
The monster came barrelling out of the dairy section and had snarled at losing sight of her.
"Come out, little hero," he crooned, falsely sweet. "There's no use in hiding from me."
Heri clenched her eye shut tightly and prayed to whatever powers that be that her weapon would be good enough and that she'd make it out of this alive. So caught up in her praying, she didn't see as the box-cutter gleamed brightly and took on a yellow hue.
"Here you are!"
The creature lunged forward, ripping aside the stand, sending fruit splattering.
Heri shrieked and flung herself to the side, just out of the monster's grasp. Left — right — side — other side — Heri desperately ducked and weaved, turning the beast round and round to stay clear of its hands. Too soon, he caught her by the back of her shirt and hoisted her into the air, grinning foully.
Not knowing what else to do, Heri jabbed out with her box-cutter, blade going right to the face. The tip pierced the monster through its eye, landing almost directly in its pupil. It dropped her like a hot rock and thrashed about, howling in pain. Heri landed on its great forearm and climbed back up it to twist the knife deeper, paying no mind to the blood, determined to end the thing. It fell to the ground, convulsing.
As the monster languished in the throes of death, Heri thanked the powers that be that she'd live to see another day. She climbed off the thing and almost fell to her knees in exhaustion. She closed her eyes and breathed deeply to calm herself down. Dear God, she had killed someone! He was trying to kill her as well but still!
"Heri!"
Heri's head snapped up at the sound of her name. Her aunt stood at the entrance of the fizzy drinks aisle, frowning.
"Heri, get over here at once!" Aunt Petunia called, gesturing impatiently. "I told you to stay by the cart! What are you doing over there?"
Heri looked at the place where the body of her kill should have been. There was nothing there. A quick look around revealed that the room was clear of anything that would indicate any kind of battle had just taken place. She looked at her hands that had just recently been dyed red with blood. They were perfectly clean.
Had it all been just some outrageous dream? Was she going crazy?
Something on the floor caught her attention. There, a few feet off from where the monster had lain, was a pocket watch. Bemused, Heri picked it up, testing the weight of it in her hand. It appeared to be a perfectly ordinary pocket watch until she opened it. Inside, on top of standard time markings, the clock showed days, weeks, months, moon cycles, and planetary movement. She gaped at the sight.
"Heri!" Aunt Petunia called again, impatience growing.
Heri tucked the watch into her pocket and trotted off toward her aunt. She wouldn't notice until later that the box-cutter followed her home.
St. Grogory's Primary School was one that specialised in Classical Studies. Every second day, they would attend art classes, attending music classes in between. This was because they wanted to promote a sense of refinement on the future generation and because parents paid more when they felt their children were getting better. Fourth-year and up even took Latin lessons, learning the language of the Romans as well as the mythology. At the end of the year, the three upper years would put on a show for the younger children about Roman culture and the gods.
Because she was known for being smart without being a teacher's pet, not a week into her third year an older student approached Heri about doing his Latin assignments for him. He was a lazy rich sort so he offered to pay her as well. Heri agreed easily enough and earned pocket money on top of getting a head start on the class she'd be taking the next year. The boy told his friends about her, and soon she was doing the homework of three other older students as well, getting ₤3 for worksheets and ₤5 for essays, more than enough that at any given time she could buy snacks and sweets to eat.
Heri spent most of her afternoon time that didn't involve doing chores reading up on the Olympians at the public library. The Latin teacher used the myths as the basis of her lessons so the stories they learned the language from were about the Greco-Roman gods shaping the world. Heri learned root words and how they came to be called such as well as marvelling at the outrageous feats the heroes accomplished.
Ceres, known to the Greeks as Demeter, was the goddess of agriculture. She was all about growing things and crops. Her name was where 'cereal' came from, cereal being a food product made of grain, a crop. She was also the reason the seasons existed; her daughter went to the underworld every six months to stay with her husband, and the plant-life began to wilt because Ceres missed her daughter quite a bit. Autumn was when Proserpina — or Persephone — left for the underworld; winter was when Ceres was consumed by her depression; spring was when Proserpina returned to her mother; summer was when Ceres was full of joy.