Danger in Deep Space by Carey Rockwell (motivational books for students txt) 📕

them had heads that were too big. Others too small. The same with their features: many had eyes that looked enormous, or noses that looked sharp and jutting like a knife, or two stretchy fat finger-things that she barely recognized as lips. She thought that most of them were men, because their hair was not long like hers and they had fur on the bottom of their faces. But she could not tell for sure.

Isme had sometimes wondered what the words “ugly” and “handsome” meant. “Beautiful” she knew from the way the sea looked before a storm—although she did not know how to apply that word to people. In stories, characters reacted to ugliness and beauty in positive and negative ways, but Isme had little understanding of what the qualifications for each descriptor were.

But now she knew: she and her father were handsome, by comparison to these unfamiliar and ugly people in all these bizarre shapes. If the rest of mankind looked as odd as these people did, then the gods themselves must have been cursed—for they would have to spend their endless days looking down at hideous people.

As they approached her father, Isme saw that some of them were far taller than she thought people could be: if her father had set her on his shoulders like he had when she was very small, then her eyes would reach these men’s eyes in height.

“Well met, stranger,” said a man aside one of the animals, when they were about an arm’s reach of distance. He pulled a leather strap tucked in the animal’s mouth, and it halted. To Isme’s eyes, the creature looked like an enormous deer, many times the size of the deer on the island, which came up to about her knees.

She wondered what the name of this creature was. Her mind reviewed different words in the stories: donkey, horse, sheep, cow. Words that meant animals which were very different from deer, or so her father insisted.

“Greetings,” her father responded, seeming calm. Isme decided this must mean that nothing was wrong, even with the man being atop this strange creature. She supposed that in a fight her father would win, for he was a primeval Titan.

Not that the stranger would recognize this. With her father explaining how ordinary people did not understand the truth behind the stories, Isme supposed that the people of this caravan had no idea that they could meet a Titan, much less that they were talking to one. All at once, Isme felt sorry for them. What terrible boring lives these people must have, without even the truth of the stories to comfort them.

“I suppose it is futile to ask if you are with a gang of robbers ahead,” said the stranger. He seemed as though he was making some kind of joke, although Isme thought that talking about being attacked was a strange way to provoke laughter.

But her father smiled. He said, “I suppose you think that I would say ‘No, of course not,’ even if I was actually a robber.” The stranger on the animal shrugged, as if to admit that her father was right. And then, another joking question in his voice, her father said, “But what if I said that I was? What then?”

The stranger raised both of his eyebrows about halfway up his forehead. But his voice was still joking when he responded, “I suppose I should have to try and kill you. But no one has ever answered that way before, so I don’t know. I should like to think that a man that honest would not become a robber in the first place.” And then, his voice lingering on the edge between a joke and something else, the stranger said, “Are you going to claim you are a robber?”

“No,” said her father. “But, as we just discussed, my word does not actually mean that much in this situation.” He spread his hands. “Therefore, you must decide whether or not I am worth the risk. Although, for what it is worth, I am not a robber.”

The stranger tilted his head, as though contemplating the patch of skin on the crown of her father’s skull. He said, “I also should like to say that you are not a robber. I have met men who are willing to joke with their victims before attacking them, but I like to think that most men are not that way, and that when they speak to someone they are less likely to hurt him afterwards.”

Her father nodded his head, but with some sort of satisfaction stamped on his features. He said, “And what worry I had about this caravan feels much lessened when a man of quality shows himself to be the leader.” He held his big paw like hand up to his chest. “I am called Epimetheus by those who know me.”

The stranger gave a small laugh. He said, “It is a known name, and also a good shame that such an unflattering name fits someone so well.” He seemed for a moment to consider for himself, and then he said, “I am called Eutropios.”

And he cast his hand back over the company of travelers. Isme’s eyes followed the trajectory of his fingers, and saw that all of their faces were fixed on her father’s shape, and many of them were grasping staves or had pulled knives from cords at their waists. However, they all seem to be relaxing, slowly.

Eutropios said, “We are traveling troupe of actors, and intend to reach Delphi by the end of this moon and Athens by end of summer.” And he seemed to turn speculative, eyeing her father. He said, “I don’t suppose you would be willing to play a clown.”

“As they say,” her father responded, “Everyone has his price. Mine is higher than others.” They and the caravan laughed together and Isme felt tension easing from her own limbs. It seemed as though these people would be friendly to travel with.

“But it is not just me,”