Chapter Forty-Five - Family Arguments Turn Bloody
Posted: Tuesday 27th August 2024

Now, I had heard the prophecy enough times in my life to be able to recite it backwards whilst being waterboarded. I knew what it meant, from the moment I had found out I was pregnant I knew my son would be powerful, but until that moment I had never really comprehended just how powerful he would be.

I finally knew what he meant when told Austin that he was not a god. But, god adjacent didn't seem to cut it, he was closer to a primordial than to a god. No one, and I mean no one had ever been able to stop a bolt from Zeus' master bolt and Caius had done it without ruffling a hair on his windswept head.

"Okay," Caius took his seat again. "I will answer any questions you may have one at a time."

The Olympians, for the first time in their immortal lives, were silent. All of them gawking at Caius. That was, apart from Athena, who was still looking at me.

"So the prophecy has come to realisation," Athena stated, "Ariadne and Apollo have indeed created something wholly new, with power as of yet inconceivable."

I had no idea what to say. Athena's eyes, which always reminded me so much of my father, made me feel six years old again. The only thing I could come up with was, "oops."

Athena laughed. "It would be wise of us to make a friend of Caius, father. He would make a formidable enemy. And after all, the prophecy only said he 'could' destroy you, not would."

"I have no intentions of destroying you," Caius assured Zeus.

Zeus looked so angry that his head could have been about to explode, taking all of us out with him. But he seemed to see the wisdom of Athena's words, taking deep breaths to calm himself.

Just as it seemed that everyone in the room was calming down and I thought I could finally breathe again, a shadow passed over the room as night fell and I suddenly felt the horrible, familiar urge to fall to my knees before the figure that had formed in the middle of the room.

Nyx was here.

*

With my head bowed I could not see the reactions of the Olympians, but I could hear them.

"You are not welcome here Nyx," Zeus bellowed, "leave these sacred halls."

"You do not have the power to overcome me, Zeus," Nyx's voice rang through the room, as loud and clear as ever. I heard her move towards me and couldn't hold back a wince as she placed her hand on my shoulder, "Rise daughter."

I rose to meet her gaze, hoping that she could see the hatred burning in my eyes.

"I have come to make the acquaintance of my grandson," Nyx said, turning her back on me and facing the Olympians. "After all, he, like his mother, belongs to me."

Caius was glaring at Nyx with a burning hatred almost as strong as my own, "Hello grandmother." he said, his voice was so sharp it could have easily sliced through metal. "I belong to no one." he continued plainly.

"I have come to make you an offer," Nyx said, not deterred by his cold words.

"No offer you could give could persuade me to your plight," Caius said. He raised his head to address the rest of the Olympians, "You see, Nyx here has been scheming for years. Ever since the first time she heard the prophecy she has been playing everyone. When she met a son of Athena, my namesake, in the pit, she hit a goldmine. She positioned her Demigiod daughter, my mother, to restore the Titan Kronos, she placed an ancient Athenian wedding veil amongst my mother's belongings ensuring that she and Apollo would be bound together and then she knew that I would be born. She wishes to overthrow this council, to remake the world in her image." He turned his cold eyes back on Nyx, "The one thing you didn't count on grandmother, was that, like my mother, I would despise you."

Nyx clapped. A slow clap, I would have thought it was sarcastic if not for the fact that I knew my mother was incapable of sarcasm.

"It does not matter how you think you feel," Nyx said, "because I know your weakness. Also like your mother, you care too much." Nyx turned to look at me and beckoned me forward.

My feet moved against my will until I was standing at her side.

"Draw your sword, Ariadne," Nyx said to me. Once again, my arms moved without my consent and I pulled my sword free.

"Give it to me," Nyx said. I handed my sword into her waiting hands.

"Now Caius." Nyx looked at him directly as if they were the only two people in the room. As if he wasn't thirty feet tall, whilst she was the size of a normal human. "You have two choices. One; You defy me and I kill your Mother. Two; you join me and she lives."

I turned to look at Nyx in horror. This was her plan, this was why she had tricked me into swearing myself to her. This is why she hadn't cared when I was able to overcome her before. It had all been leading to this exact moment when she would hold my life over my son's head.

I tore my eyes away from Nyx to look at Caius. The expression on his face, so like Apollo's, was plain for me to read. He would do whatever Nyx commanded as long as she held my life in the palm of her hand.

"Do you need more incentive?" Nyx asked, "Perhaps I could seek out your father as well? If I commanded her to Ariadne would kill him herself."

It was as if my lips were sealed together by glue. I wanted to scream at Nyx, to hurl insults at her, to grasp my sword back from her hands and use it to cut her up into tiny pieces as the Titans had once done to Ouranos. But I was unable to even speak, let alone take control of my own body back from her for long enough to cut her up.

Suddenly, Nyx grasped my shoulders and held me in front of her, my own sword against my throat.

"I'm getting bored of waiting," Nyx said.

Caius stood slowly. I could see the cogs whirring in his brain, trying to see any way around this which wouldn't result in my death. But there was none. Ever since I had sworn myself to Nyx, there was no escaping her for me, no matter how much I loved my son, I knew that he would not be able to save my life.

Caius shrunk down to be the same height as myself and Nyx. All of the Olympians watched on in silence. No one breathed.

Nyx pressed the blade deeper into my throat. Drawing blood now. All I could do was stand there silently, my eyes boring into Caius' like drills. Blood began to trickle down my front and onto my shirt.

I wanted to scream at Caius not to listen to her, to let me die. But I knew that if our positions were reversed then I would do anything to save him. His face was so like his father's that I could read him like a book and knew that he would do the same for me.

"Come with me Caius, or I will kill Ariadne and reduce this world to rubble anyway," Nyx said. Caius took a single step towards Nyx and I heard the intake of breath from the Olympians gathered to watch.

"N-No-" I forced the words out of my throat, fighting against my very nature to my son from making a decision that I knew would be world-ending.

"Silence girl!" Nyx's command overtook me.

Leto's words to me rushed suddenly through my head, motherhood is all about knowing when to let your children take flight. I had to let my son take flight and become all that he could be, the only thing standing in the way of this was my life and the power that Nyx held over me.

In one fluid motion, holding onto my love for my son and fighting against every single command Nyx had ever or could ever give me, I seized the sword from her hands and drove it deep into my own chest.

Nyx's howls of fury beckoned me to death with a smile on my face.