Authors Note: None.
Dedication: To a great guy named Michael. Listen to this Livia can have a friend who is 2 years older than her but me and my BFF can't! (pay no attention to me just another author blowing off steam)
Warnings: A little strong language.
Ratings: G/PG
Summary: What happened to Eve during those years that Xena wasn't around?
Our Lady of Laurel Academy
By Hope
Octavious held the baby, Eve, in his arms. Just two days ago, Ares had taken Xena and Gabrielle to only Zeus knows where. He knew that they had to be dead. There was no way that they were alive, now.
The first thing he had to do was make an alias for the child. As much as he wanted to leave her name Eve, he knew that was immpossible.
Eve cooed in his arms as he said, "From now on your name will be Libya." He suddenly stopped speaking. His throat went dry, and his knees felt weak, as he felt a dark presence fall over the room.
"Libya...............Hmmmm......................Not exacly a name I would have chosen. How about Livia?"
Ocatvious didn't know where the mysterious voice came from, although Eve seemed to be happy to hear the deep and husky voice. Suddenly, Ares appeared revealing himself to be the voice.
Ares sauntered over to Ocavious to stand right in front of him. Octavious held Eve even closer to himself.
"I will sooner die than let you lay a hand on this child!"
"An amusing offer, but I'm not in the mood for a massacre right now." Ares said cooly. "You can either give me the baby, and I'll spare your life. Or, I can kill you and take Eve anyway!" he threatened.
"I'm not gonna let you hurt her, even if it costs me my life!" Octavious genly set Eve down on the table adjacent to him, and then got into a fighting stance.
Using his powers, Ares turned Eve invisible(only to Octavious' eyes), and floated her into his arms, then making Eve visible once more.
"Thank you , Octavious. You have been most helpful." And with one last smile, Ares disappeared.
"NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
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Ares appeared in his chambers, at one of his temples', with Eve still in his arms.
"You know, I hate to talk about her, now that she's dead but, how stupid does she think I am?! It was so obvious, that it wasn't Eve in that cart, but that stupid "dolly" she used to trick me with at Amphipolis!" he said, thinking out loud. He turned his attention back to the baby. "So, what do you yhink of the name Livia?" Eve giggled. "Yeah, me too!" A huge smile began to creep up his face. "Can you say da da?"
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In the not to distant future sits Livia and Ares in a chariot.
"Why can't I just get a private tutor?" pleaded the 11 year-old Livia.
"This is better than a tutor. Our Lady of Laurel is the best school the known world has ever seen." Ares simply stated. He was not about to budge on this issue.
"That's only beacase Aunt Artemis told you that.........." she muttered under her breath.
Ignoring this comment he went on. "You'll have the best training, the best teachers, the best of everything!"
"But da----d!" Livia whined.
"I don't wana hear it! You're registered. You're tuition is paid, and that's it! The subject is closed! Besides, it won't be so bad.........Your sister Alicippe goes there."
"Wow! Now I'm really excited!" She said sarcasticly.
Ignoring another smart-alec comment, he continued. "Plus you need to be around people your own age. I read in one of those parenting magazines that it's not good for you to be locked up in your room all day doing sword drills." he said sadly. He knew Xena wouldn't have wanted her to be a warrior. But what would she expect being in that kind of enviroment all the time.
"You do it.................." Livia was getting mad now. Her dad was being a total hypocrate!
"Yes, but I promised your mother you wouldn't end up like me!" Ares said dryly.
"Speaking of which, everytime I ask you about my mother, you go and change the subject!" Livia screached.
"Gods! You're as bad as Discord!" he said to himself.
"You know that is a terrible insult to me!"
"LIVIA! I am sick and tired of that smart mouth of your's ! I raised you better than that!" calming down, "Look, we're here. I'll be vistiting you in six months."
"Don't bother! I'm not gonna wanna see you!" Livia grabbed her bags and stormed out of the carrige.
The carrige raced off and Livia felt like crying. But she didn't dare. Her dad told her if you can't control your emotions, it's a sign of weakness. And she was not weak.
Our Lady of Laurel was a massive school. On her left there was a large off-white building, with the word "Auditorium" scrolled accross the top. On her right were two huge brick buildings and a smaller column style building. This time, with no words on them.
Up ahead were four signs. The first one said, "Auditorium, west." The second one said "Dorms, north". The third one said "Office, northeast", that was the smaller one. And the last one said "Classrooms, east".
"Well I do need to check in." she said, thinking out loud.
She followed the "office" path, and somehow ended up in the garden.
Just then a girl about Livia's age walked by.
"Hey!" Livia shouted. The girl turned around. Livia saw she had dark red Hair, and brown eyes.She thought she was one of the prettiest she had ever seen.
"Um, I got lost on the way to the office, and I was wondering if you could give me directions?" Livia asked.
The girl smiled and said, "You're new here aren't you? Everyone get's lost on there first time here. Heck, I'll do more than give you directions, I'll take you there myself!" she said.
Livia smiled."Name's Livia."
"And I'm Nadia." she said with a warm smile.
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"So anyway she says, 'Move out of the way slow poke!' and I'm thinking 'Yeah, before you trip and roll over me'!" laughed Nadia (Livia almost fell over herself laughing).
It had been six months and already Livia and Nadia were best friends.
Livia looked at her wristband-sundial. "Gods! We're gonna be late for class!"
Livia and Nadia raced through the garden, to the classroom building, up the stairs, down the hall, and in the classroom just in time for the bell to ring.
"Livia, Nadia, one of these days you're not going to make it to class with two seconds to spare." lectured Mr. Andrew.
"Well I've been doing a good job of it so far, why break a good habit?" laughed Livia, the whole class joined in.
"Take a seat. Alright time for roll call. Alicippe?"
Livia rolled her eyes. She really did not like her sister, Alicippe. "Overachiever." she muttered.
"Here!" Alicippe said enthusiasticly.
"Ashley?"
"Here."
"Bliss?"
"Here."
Bliss, one of her other good friends.Although two years older than her, neither of them really noticed a difference.
"Claire?"
Livia really did not like Claire. She called Livia ugly, when it was obvious she got wacked with the ugly stick a couple hundred times. Her dad's nickname for her was "The mouse". Simply beacase she has a huge nose, beaty little eyes, the ugliest color of hair (If that's even hair.....), and she was about two heads shorter than Livia.
Livia came out of her vision of knocking Claire silly, just in time to hear Mr. Andrew call her name.
"Livia?"
"What did I do now?!"
The whole class laughed.
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"Hey, ugly!" shouted Claire.
LIvia, and Bliss were on their way to gym class, and Nadia, on the other hand, was on her way to Latin class, but they all just happened to be walking together. Just then "The Mouse" decided to make her presence known.
All three of them turned around.
"What do you want, Claire?" Livia asked calmly.
"I just wanted to say 'hi'. Well, see you around, ugly!" she jeered.
"You better shutup before you get yourself into trouble." Livia said menacingly.
"Are you challenging me?" Claire said mockingly. "Ha! You just started your fighting lessons last week!"
"You might be surprised." she retured equally curt.
"Hmm. I don't think so." Claire turned or her heel and began to walk away.
"That's right just keep walking. You know if you go up against me you'll get your @$$ whipped!" Livia shouted at her.
Claire turned around, the humor was now gone from her voice.
"Fine. You're on. P.E., be there." And with that, Claire walked away.
"Livia! Do you know whay you just did? You just challenged her!That means you fight until someone get's knocked out!" Nadia said franticly. "Look, I wish I could stay and offer some morral support, but I've got the study of Eli with Ms. Clarion Herald." she said sadly. Before she left she wispered something into Bliss' ear and he nodded. "I gotta go......buh bye......." and with that she was gone.
Livia turned to face Bliss. "Why are you so quiet all of a sudden? You're not ussually like that." Livia asked suspiciously.
"Me interrupt? With you two blabbermouths having your conversation? How was I supposed to get a moment in?!" he asked incredelously.
"You got a point there........"
"Know somethin'?" asked Bliss.
"I know a lotta' things, but what in particular are you talking about?"
"I was about to say that you and Claire are the only ones that take classes that have to do with war......" his blue eyes sparkled.
"Big deal! What are you trying to ask me here?" Livia was getting irritated! Bliss was making no sense!
"I'm asking, how did you end up in those classes?" Bliss asked thoughtfully.
"I dunno. I guess my dad signed me up for it. Speaking of dads', how's Cupid doing?" Livia said changing the subject.
Bliss' eyes went big. He grabbed Livia's arm and pulled her into a corner.
"How do you know who my dad is? Not even Nadia knows and she's been my friend since first grade!" He said looking like he was gonna faint!
"My dad metioned a Bliss when he was blabbing on about Xena again. He said that Bliss stole Cupid's arrows and shot Xena with one and made her fall in love with Draco." At this moment Bliss' face was going red. "So I figured I'd find out if you were that Bliss by saying that simple little statement." she said as a matter of fact.
"Who is your dad?" he said as if he were afraid to find out.
"Ares. Unfortunantly he can't come to the parents' visiting day. he says there's this big war going on and can't get away. Is Cupid or Physce coming?" Livia said hopefully.
"Nah. They don't want me treated any diffrently beacase of them. Oh, they'll pop in every once in awhile............but uhh..........I don't see 'em that much." He said sadly.
"Okay I've got one more question. Where are your wings?" she said narrowing her eyes.
His smile went all the way up to his ears." They're rectracable!" By now they were at the crossroads, in the garden. "You wana see how they work?" just then two wings popped out of his back, and before she could protest, he had looped an arm around her waist and they flew up into the sky.
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"What did I tell you all? Livia is a chiken! Did you hear all of her big talk? She didn't even show up!" Said Claire happily. She really didn't want to fight Livia knowing who her father was.
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About a class period later, they landed right where they had left.
"My gods! That was so cool! I have got to get a pair of wings!" Bliss laughed.
"Sure better than a fight, huh?" smiled Bliss.
Just then the bell rang. Livia's eyes went big. "Gods! I missed the fight! Now Claire is gonna think I'm of afraid of her!"
Bliss had a guilty look on his face. He looked down towards the ground and began to shift uncomfortably.
"Bliss! Do not tell me you did that on purpose!"Livia said with one of those looks that pierce right through you.
" I swear! It wasn't my idea! Nadia just didn't want you to get hurt!" he said half defending himself, half defending Nadia.
"I'm not some pathetic girl who can't defend herself. Obviously, neither of you know anything about me!" and with that Livia stormed off.
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Livia went to lunch and recess alone.By last period she had completly forgotten that she was mad.
"RRRRRRRRIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIINNNNNNNNNNNNNGGGGGG!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"
Gods! She hated that bell! But now she could go back to her dorm and relax for the rest of the day since her dad wasn't coming.
Livia got up out of her seat and picked up her sachel, then headed for the doorway.
Suddenly, two hands covered her eyes, and a pathetic imitation of a girl's voice said, "Guess who?".
She tore the hands from her face and turned around to see none other than Bliss standing there with that smile of his on his face.
"Are you still mad at me?" he said with raised eyebrows.
"Who could stay mad at you with that smile of yours?"
"Cool! I'm forgiven." he said as they began to walk down the hall.
Livia turned around to face him. "Ohh, I didn't say you were forgiven, yet!"
"Fine what do you want me to do, in order to earn your forgivness?" Bliss said sarcasticly.
"I want a ride to my dorm!" Livia said with a huge grin on her face.
"Okay." and with that he encircled his arm around her. "Up, up, and away!" he shouted.
Please e-mail the author of this story with your comments. AshB512@aol.com
bleeding-heart[dot]net