Destroyer of Light (29 page)

The scene before him had been repeated several times this week. Sisyphus was preparing for yet another mockery of the
hieros gamos
, and his intended mate in the ritual stood by, cloaked under a heavy saffron himation and veil.

“Ah, you’re awake again,” the god king said with a smile. “You see? It is as I told you a few days ago.”

“You talk a lot,” Thanatos ground out, “yet never seem to say much. But I’ll humor you. What
great truth
do you have to impart upon me this time,
suagroi
?”

Sisyphus smirked at the insult. “That this is the way power changes hands. Nearly all of the Olympian children were begat on the daughters of Titans, all of whose fathers and brothers are in Tartarus, no less. Spoils of war, I suppose. The Children of Kronos handed Zeus the cosmos after the Titanomachy, and he filled it to the brim with his divine children. A wise move, to cement his claim over that of his brothers. Not a single drop of blood needed to be spilt, and all the former domains of the Titans were handed over to those loyal to him by birth.”

Thanatos managed a brittle chuckle. “Is that what this farce is all about? I thought this was the only way you could get it up anymore.”

The king smiled, his blue eyes sparkling. “You’re awfully clever up there on your perch. If only you had been that clever when I captured you.” Sisyphus motioned to the woman at his side. She let the cloak and veil fall from her shoulders, revealing long flaxen hair and perfectly curved hips. “No, Death. In truth, this is the only way one of my kind should ever copulate with lesser women.”

“Your kind?”

“A father of gods.”

Death laughed again until his chest ached. “Oh, where do I even begin? You honestly think that your blithering at your judgement is true, you great fool?”

“Of course. And it would have benefited your king then, in all honesty, to listen to me then. I pleaded my case in the throne room. ‘Return me to the sunlit world, and I will consider you an ally and trouble you and yours no more.’ If I had turned my attentions to overthrowing Olympus it would have been a boon for him. I can’t imagine that Hades is terribly happy with Zeus after the King of the Gods stripped him of his bride for half the year.”

“You expected us to make an exception for you? After all you’ve done?”

“I already explained why you should,” he said. “I wouldn’t have been condemned in the first place if I hadn’t interceded on Asopus’s behalf. But I suppose stopping the rape of a goddess isn’t worth your king’s consideration. Not that I should expect it
would
be, given what Hades did to Demeter’s daughter.”

“You know nothing.” Thanatos narrowed his eyes. “By the by, do you call your bedmate a ‘lesser woman’ to her face? Or are you fucking yet another girl who doesn’t speak Greek or Theoi?”

Sisyphus ignored him and started reciting the words of the ritual in Minoan. The woman lay supine in the center of the circle, propped up on her elbows, her legs apart. The sorcerer knelt between them.

“You know that it was women who created the
hieros gamos
, who chose
their
consorts, you mange-ridden dog, and allowed them to participate. Whatever this farce is, it is for your amusement only.”

The woman spoke her words, responding in Minoan and following Sisyphus’s lead. Her voice sounded familiar.

“Times change,” the king replied. He removed his robes and positioned himself over the woman, reciting the last part in the ancient tongue.

“I watched that empire rise and fall as you would watch a day and night pass. You think that saying those words in a dead language makes them more powerful? Or your actions more legitimate?” He winced, the Chains tearing at his arms with every breath he took. “You can pour perfume on
kopros
all you want, but it’s still shit.”

Thanatos looked away when the Ephyrean king penetrated her. The woman gasped, but made no sound beyond that. Death turned back to see him rutting above her, propped up by his wrists and knees on the floor, his hips smacking against the girl’s thighs as she tried to hold her position on the cold limestone. She let out a soft moan.

“Seem that’s the most you can get out of her.” Thanatos started laughing.

Sisyphus looked up at him with a glare.

“Am I breaking your concentration?”

The king smirked at him then dropped his gaze back to the girl, redoubling his efforts, driving harder into her.

“You’re doing it wrong, you know,” Thanatos called out over their rutting. “Not just the fact that you’re obviously a pitiful fuck. The position’s all wrong and there’s words that should have been said during this part. If you or your poor partner knew anything about—”

The woman’s spine arched and she let out a long sustained groan, her body thrown into extremis— faked, as Thanatos could easily tell— and as she arched, she looked at him with her wide violet eyes. Thanatos went cold. He knew that face. What was her name again? Philinnia? Lyra? Voleta…

Voleta! One of Hecate’s Lampades. A nymph he hadn’t seen since he’d had her almost four months ago.
Clever girl
, he thought.
I underestimated you
. If Voleta was here, that might mean she was using the ritual to distract Sisyphus… and lead her mistress, his mother, and his many brothers and sisters straight to them. They were coming to rescue him. He would only have to endure this humiliation for a matter of hours— perhaps minutes.

Sisyphus grabbed her chin and forced her gaze back to his. “Not at him,” he growled. “Look at
me
!”

Voleta shook, obviously afraid of the man using her body, trying to beget on her to further his ends. Sisyphus pushed her back to the ground, knocking the air from her and pinning down with his hand at her throat. Thanatos clenched his jaw when her cries turned to pain. Anger renewed his purpose, pushed the discomfort of his bindings out of his mind enough so he could think clearly.

This mating would come to nothing, he knew. If a woman lay down with Death, she arose infertile. It was one of the many reasons Hecate didn’t want him copulating with her acolytes. That thought gave him some solace, knowing that she wouldn’t have to carry this abomination’s seed, but having witnessed Sisyphus with the
kedeshah
on Chios, Thanatos knew there wouldn’t be enough time for the Hosts of Hades to find them. He would have to help Voleta, lest her sacrifice be for naught. Like the well-aimed
kantharos
from yesterday, it hit him.

He’d waited. He’d waited days to wield his greatest and most cherished weapon against Sisyphus and thanked the Fates that he hadn’t revealed it too soon. He knew it would enrage him. Thanatos might suffer greatly for wounding his pride. But if it did anything to blind the Ephyrean king long enough, it would be worth it. He heard another cry of pain from Voleta as her shoulders scraped across the floor, her hips bruising. Thanatos was resolute. A sacrifice for a sacrifice.

Sweat beaded on Sisyphus’s back and his face contorted, close to attaining his pleasure. Death smiled. It was worth it— worth whatever suffering he would endure. “By the way, Sisyphus…”

He grunted, at the crest of his plateau.

“I haven’t had a chance to tell you…”

The king gave a penultimate thrust.

“
I fucked your wife
!”

Sisyphus doubled over with a shudder and a halted cry, his eyes wide. He fell to his elbows, his satisfaction ruined.

Thanatos grinned, laughter bubbling up from deep within, and finally spilling out. He didn’t care how much the Chains shook and strained. Sisyphus seethed, his jaw clenched. He pulled away from Voleta and stood, staring at Thanatos, saying nothing, donning his robes as the God of Death hooted.

“And she
loved
it,” Thanatos laughed. He felt a twinge of guilt. Merope didn’t deserve to be shamed in such a way, but it was a means to an end. If he could use the night he spent with her to triumph over her murderer and send him to Tartarus, he would do just that. “My favorite part of Merope was that little mole next to her navel. And your wife tastes so, so very sweet. Like honeyed dates and wine, don’t you think? Though judging by her reactions to me, I doubt you ever tasted her as thoroughly as I did. She
begged
for my cock… four, maybe five times that night. I lost count, honestly.”

“Enough…”

“I fucked the very memory of you right out of her, Sisyphus!” He yelled over the shaking chains. “Merope loved it so much that she forgot all about you and had enough peace to finally drink from the Lethe!”

“Be silent,” Sisyphus snarled, pacing towards the throne.

“
Keratas
!! You might have me in the Chains now, you pathetic
suagroi
, but I’ll be out of these bindings eventually. But you, Sisyphus, will burn in Tartarus for eternity wearing a cuckold’s horns!”

“I said be silent!” Sisyphus yelled. He grabbed a gold ceremonial
doru
from the wall beside his throne and thrust the long spear under Thanatos’s ribs.

His abdomen seared and trails of light flashed behind his eyes. Pain radiated down his leg and through his lungs as he struggled to take in a breath. The wound made by the
doru
couldn’t kill him, he knew. If anything could, he’d have been dead from the injuries he’d sustained already. He looked down to see Sisyphus still holding it. He laughed, painfully, his guffaw coming out with a wheeze of air.

“Is that as far in as it can go? No wonder they all feign pleasure with you!” Sisyphus responded as Thanatos predicted, jabbing the
doru
in further. He gritted his teeth, but couldn’t hold back a yelp of pain.
Take it
, he thought,
take it as Voleta took it to help set you free. Keep him angry. It’s the least you can do
.

The king smirked and propped the butt of the spear against a tile line on the floor. He stepped back and shook his head. “Arrogant, foolish boy…”

“We’ll see,” Thanatos hissed through his teeth, “won’t we?”

“I have an honest question for you.” Sisyphus’s thin mouth broke into a wide smile. He folded his arms and cocked his head to the side. “Do you think you’re buying yourself more time by insulting and distracting me, Thanatos?”

Death’s face fell and his skin prickled with cold.

“I know who’s coming for you,” Sisyphus said. “The entire world knows I have you here. Why else do you think I would show you off like a caged beast? Hades would have to retrieve you eventually, and tonight of all nights: midsummer, the first harvest, when the boundaries between worlds are thin, would be his first, best chance.”

Silence hung between them. Voleta staring up at Thanatos from where she lay on the floor. Her eyes watered, horror written across her face.

“You’re mad,” Death finally whispered. “What could you possibly do to the God of the Underworld?”

“That might be the best part of keeping you here,” Sisyphus said. “You’ll get to witness it for yourself.”

Boots paced back and forth
through the field, crushing grass and gouging the mud with each about face. Ares pulled off his helm for the third time, wiping his brow. It was warm and stiflingly humid this evening. The swine penned in nearby only made the stale air more putrid. The sound of the beasts rooting in the soil further stoked his impatience. “Why must we wait? And who told you we should, anyway?”

“A little bird… with three holes in its breast,” Eris said with a smile.

Ares looked at her askance, then huffed and shook his head. Her tattered chiton hung off her left shoulder, the pin falling down one arm. She raised a wing and nudged it back into place. The glimpse of flesh made Ares recall their afternoon together, and he bit his cheek. Eris plucked a rose growing against the fence she sat upon and closed her fist around its thorny stem.

“You want to charge in?” she asked disinterestedly. “Charge in. See what happens. I’m anxious to see you try… Daddy.”

“Damn you, I—” Ares silenced himself and fumed. He despised giving her the satisfaction of getting under his skin. He breathed through his nose until he calmed. “You’re going to tell me why I shouldn’t.”

“I might,” she said, splaying her fingers. “But it would be far more entertaining to watch you crash headlong into the wards that sorcerer placed around the city, alert Sisyphus that we’re here…” Thorn pricks bloomed red in her hand before closing. “…and see him flee all the way to the Indus, again.” She smeared her palm across the white rose petals, turning their edges carmine. “I’d love to see the look on Mother’s face as you try to explain your failure.”

“Nyx isn’t your mother.”

“No, she’s not,” Eris giggled and shrugged. She ripped petals off the bloom and scattered them to the pigs.

“So who is?” Ares asked, immediately regretting it. The beasts shuffled around in the mud, eating the stained petals.

“Maybe my mother is your paramour. The one who says she sprung up from Ouranos’s blood?”

He shook his head and snorted. “You look nothing like Aphrodite.”

“How would you know? She changes her appearance to suit her needs.”

Ares grumbled an acknowledgement. Eris leapt off the fence and sauntered toward the God of War.

“And Aphrodite isn’t her
real
name. She is ancient and
her
divine calling is the mother of us all.” Eris cocked her head to the side with a smile. “The mother of fucking… You like putting your prick in ancient women, don’t you?”

“When will you stop prattling and leave me be?” Ares’s face grew red, as he spat out his words.

“As soon as you tell me what it’s like to fuck your mother.”

He growled and lunged toward her before stopping himself and balling his fists. She threw the decimated rose over her shoulder. A squeal of pain pierced the air, and the herd converged on the fallen swine. Ares took a step backward. Eris spread her wings and clapped her hands together in delight. “You Olympians are so entertaining! A little insinuation gets you all frothy and raving, yet look at who squirted
you
out!”

“It doesn’t work like that with our kind,” he mumbled. “You know that…”

“Then you won’t mind if I ask Queen Persephone what it’s like when she fucks her—”

“You will do no such thing!” His eyes widened. “It would be
unwise
to anger him tonight. Say all you’d like about them once they’ve gone.”

“Weren’t you boasting to Thanatos a few months ago that you could rule the world below? My, how you change your tune as they approach. My poor, little Ares…” Eris stroked his clean-shaven jaw and pouted. “The brave and fearless soldier, afraid of the God of the De—”

Ares grasped her throat in one hand, pinning her to the swineherd’s fence. He gritted his teeth. “If you were not immortal, I would end you right here. I’d be doing everyone a favor.”

“Only one—” she gasped in air and smiled. “There’s only one who can kill me.”

“If only he would.” Ares let go abruptly and stepped away from her. She faltered, bracing herself against the fence.

“Makes you feel a bit… impotent, doesn’t it? He is the only one who can kill anything right now,” Eris reminded him. She turned her back on him and rested her chin on her folded hands, watching the pigs conclude their feast and slowly spreading her wings. “I wonder… The rose couldn’t die. Do you suppose that its petals live on in the bellies of the pigs? Do you think the one they turned against is wriggling in bits inside his friends? I wonder what that’s like…”

Ares turned pale, acid welling up in the back of his throat.

“And how do
your
worshippers fare? The Chalcidians are at war with Thrace now, retaliating for the sacking during winter. Tell me: do they stagger about on the killing fields with great holes ripped through them? With missing limbs?” she taunted, hopping around erratically on one foot. “Do they shamble without heads, even?” She laughed, wandering aimlessly. “I’ll bet they refuse to fight now, knowing that honorable death is beyond them.”

“Why
else
would I be here?” Ares barked.

A breeze blew across them and the air grew colder. The sound of flapping wings engulfed them, as though a great flock of birds had descended on them. Eris smirked. “It seems our wait is over…”

“What do you m-m—”

A four-lamped torch ignited in the dark, silencing Ares. Hecate narrowed her eyes. “Two lonely jackals. Where is the rest of the pack?”

“They must have been too afraid, or are too busy celebrating.” Ares folded his arms and lifted his chin. “Where is your master, witch? Afraid to show
his
face?”

“Hardly,” Hades said behind him. Ares spun away from Aidoneus and stumbled. Demeter’s daughter stood at his side. Ares sneered. Such a fuss had been created over this girl, and for what? She was pretty, and had a little red in her hair, which he liked, but she wasn’t worth destroying the world over.

Creatures whirled about them on shadowy wings, a wisp or an outline caught in the meager torchlight, then blurred again by night. A woman wrapped in darkness with unsettling silvery eyes hovered before him. A silver-haired, silver-winged version of Thanatos, who Ares recognized as his twin brother Hypnos, walked forward with a shrouded man who stumbled when his feet touched the ground. Hypnos steadied him. “Easy, Morpheus. We’re here.”

“Thank the Fates,” said the Lord of Dreams. “How many more pompous Olympians must we deal with tonight? I can already
smell
one of them.”

Ares scowled and thought of lame Hephaestus. “You bring a blind god and three women with you, Hades? Your little flower girl, no less? You must be very confident or very foolish.”

“I advise you to hold your tongue,” he said. “She could be of more value here than you ever could.”

Persephone smiled to herself, basking in her husband’s praise. Ares puffed out his chest, but Persephone noticed the lump in his throat bob. His hands were shaking. Taken aback, she realized that Ares was afraid of her husband. Aidoneus was a hero of the Titanomachy; the God of War had never faced anything that could destroy him. Ares had only slaughtered or sided with one faction of humans or other, moving them around like stones on a
petteia
board. Her husband had vanquished Titans.

“What have you seen so far?” Aidoneus asked.

“A crow. With three holes in it,” Eris said, winking at Persephone, who paled. Eris licked her teeth. “Hello,
Mother
.”

“Be silent,” Nyx hissed. “Abomination of Chaos.”

Eris giggled. She turned to Persephone. “You might need me, you know. And you
do
know. Discord may prevail tonight if all else fails.”

“How…
uncharacteristic
of the crow to share her baubles…” Hecate muttered.

“I’m not here for
you
,” she jeered, scrunching her nose. “That little blood and clay king is holding my favorite fuck captive.”

Hades rolled his eyes. “Ares? Anything?”

“Nothing. Mortals celebrating the harvest. Everyone is behind the walls, but none of the gates are barred… those idiots. It would be an easy thing for
two
to rush the gate and go in unseen. You have your Helm, we have our swords. As I said, you brought too many people, Hades,” he said.

“I’ll likely have no need of my sword.”

“What? How in Tartarus do you expect to do anything once the Ephyreans know we’re here? That city is a fortress!”

“Perhaps you should watch and learn,” Persephone said quietly.

Ares hunched to her eye level. “And what do you know of warfare, little girl?”

“That we needn’t slaughter every inhabitant of Ephyra to achieve our ends. We only need the one.”

He snorted and rose to speak to Hades. “The walls are five paces thick, and the sorcerer king put up wards around the entire city! This is the time for a siege, or a surprise attack!”

Aidoneus motioned to Hypnos. “Are you and Morpheus ready?”

Hypnos nodded with a half smile. “We are. But Ares is right about one thing. The wards they hide behind need to be dealt with.”

“It won’t take her long.” Nyx smiled, and Hecate slowly hobbled forward. Eris looked on, grinning widely while she pulled up another rose and began plucking its petals.

“Such arrogance. He hangs charms on his wall of sticks and thinks he has outwitted both the witch and the warrior,” Hecate said. She raised her torch and stretched her other hand toward Ephyra. The air shifted and grew warmer, the torch blazing brighter than before. The city itself seemed to blur, then grew sharper, its lights brighter. The sound of city folk filled the air where before there had been silence. Tambourines and pipes mixed with drums and laughing voices, all celebrating the bounty of the harvest. The torch flame steadied and diminished, and with a quick puff of air, she blew it out. “Sisyphus forgets that whatever magic he wields is borrowed.”

Nyx nodded to Hypnos. With a beat of his wings, he took off toward Ephyra. Sleep hovered far above the city, almost motionless. Voices went quiet and the music died down. Torches fell from men’s hands at the top of the walls and spears clattered to the ground.

Morpheus smiled in his mother’s direction, then raised his arms to either side. His unseeing eyes saw his own invisible world of shadows and light, each soul within the walled city giving off a slumberous glow. They were empty vessels, waiting to be filled. The Tribe of the Oneiroi massed above him and wound itself into a tight gyre, then flew toward Ephyra. With the Dream Lord’s guidance, the Oneiroi possessed every sleeping man, woman and child, filling them with dreams.

Ares squinted. The torches and spears along the outer wall lifted. The music began again, but the rhythm was slower and the melody broken. “What did you do?”

“I awoke them to my domain,” Morpheus said.

“What good will that do?”

Hypnos alighted next to Morpheus. “Let’s hope the rest of this is as easy, no?”

Morpheus smiled. “One can only hope.”

Grass crunched under their feet as they made their way toward the packed earth road leading to the great city gates.

“Wait!” Ares called out. “Stop!”

The Hosts of Hades paused and looked back at him.

“Are you all mad?! Do you think to just walk in there?”

“Yes,” Hades answered, annoyance edging into his voice. “Are you coming or not?”

Ares stood dumbfounded until Eris tugged at his arm. “Come on, Daddy.”

Ares snarled at the Goddess of Discord and Persephone smiled to herself. His boots thudded behind them. She looked up at Aidon, whose gaze was fixed on the gates of Ephyra. He grasped her hand within his, alternately squeezing her fingers in his tight grip and gently tracing her knuckles with his thumb. He did not return her gaze and Persephone’s smile faded. He set his jaw firmly when he felt her displeasure.

You didn’t send any word to me, Aidon
, she said.
For months. For three long months!

Persephone, please…
he said with a quick glance downward.

Please ‘what’, my lord husband?

He sighed.
There is much to discuss, wife, but we need to speak on it later.

She bit down so hard her jaw ached. Tears filled her eyes. Then she tamped down her anger and summoned her courage. They were there for Thanatos. Everything else could wait. Aidon’s fingers brushed past hers, and for the briefest moment she felt all the longing and regret seeping through the wall he’d built around him. She looked into his eyes.
You promise we will?

I promise.

They neared the imposing gates of the city of Ephyra. Men in armor staggered listlessly about, torches and spears bobbing, their motions mimicking a sentinel march. Eris giggled.

“Be quiet, woman!” Ares growled. “You want them to know we’re here?”

“They wouldn’t know me from Deukalion and Pyrrha. Look!”

Ares’s jaw dropped. Hoplites stood with long spears in hand and short swords at their sides, but their chins rested on their chests, snoring. Some mumbled incoherently. Ares stared at Morpheus. The Lord of Dreams grinned.