Destroyer of Light

by Rachel Alexander

  “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.”

  16.

  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.

  Eris sauntered past the hosts of the Underworld and opened the gates with a groan. She hummed to herself and skipped inside the courtyard. People shuffled about the square, muttering the same wordless nonsense as the guards.

  One burst out in laughter, startling Ares. Two musicians played, one so out of tune on his flute it made him queasy. A number of Sisyphus’s guards stood around a great barrel of barley mead, their cups sloshing fat drops of thick malt all over the ground, the barrel’s spigot a wellspring trickling into the street. Their words rose and fell, but they said nothing intelligible.

  If Ares were drunk, more drunk than he’d ever been in his life, this place might feel normal. But he was stone sober, and fear— that detestable emotion, his greatest and most hated frailty— clawed up his throat with every step he took. A child loped past them with a moan and only when Ares looked at the boy’s face did he realize that his eyes— and everyone’s eyes— were closed.

  “Gods above, what dark magic is this?” he whispered.

  “Something the gods above aren’t capable of,” Hades said. “You wanted to charge the walls of Ephyra, Ares? I give you a better strategy— walk right through their front door.”

  ***

  Thanatos stared at Sisyphus before belting out a painful laugh. “You… are you serious? Kill Hades?”

  “Why would I not be? I can do this to you, can’t I?”

  Death’s laugh turned into a howl of pain as Sisyphus twisted the doru slowly, its sharp tip digging further into his flesh. Gold-tinged ichor dripped onto the floor. He gritted his teeth and looked away.

  “You have no idea what you’re calling down on yourself!”

  “I think I do,” Sisyphus said. “I know what I risk to finally end the tyranny of Olympus. Can you think of a better reason than the thousands who suffered and died during Demeter’s winter?”

/>   “A winter you made worse…”

  “If so, my part pales compared to the destruction caused by the Bitch of Eleusis. Must all suffer because of a petty marriage dispute? With you here, Thanatos, all men are immortal. The equals of the gods. And once the gods are dead, we won’t have to live through your famines, your plagues, war and pandemonium, old age… But a point must be made to Zeus. The gods must surrender quickly, or there will be a bloodletting that could cost the lives of all mankind. How better can I show the Olympians that I am now the arbiter of life and death than to destroy one of the three rulers of the cosmos? The God of the Dead no less?”

  He twisted the spear again and Thanatos screamed through his teeth, fearing they would break with how tightly he clenched his jaw. Through pain-blurred eyes he saw Voleta stand and wrap the gold veil around her body. Run, Voleta. Run. Get away from here. How he wished he could speak with her where Sisyphus could not hear her— that they had the kind of bond his parents shared, or his king and queen shared. “So confident in your victory. You are the arbiter of nothing! It’s only a matter of time before they—”

  “They?” Sisyphus stopped and raised his eyebrows. “Just how many are coming to your aid?”

  Thanatos was about to answer when Voleta filled the room with an angry cry, female, primal, and determined. She threw her legs around Sisyphus’s waist, knocking the air out of him, and rained blows on his shoulders and back. The doru clanged loudly to the floor, and the king of Ephyra twisted fruitlessly. Voleta wrapped her arms around his neck, squeezing with all the strength she could muster. Sisyphus gripped her wrists, trying to pry the girl’s arms from around his throat.

  “Run! What are you doing?!” Thanatos screamed. “Run!”

  Sisyphus stumbled and reached back to yank at her hair but cursed when her teeth closed on his hand. He threw an elbow into her ribs and she recoiled, loosening her grip on his throat. He reared his head back, crushing her nose. Voleta yelped as he twisted her around to capture her in his arms, then kicked her feet furiously before going limp and crying.