His legs buckled as the door was shut behind him.
“Styxx?”
He lifted his head to find his uncle moving closer.
“Dear Zeus, what have they done to you?”
Styxx couldn’t answer. His throat was too raw from the screams his treatments had wrung from him.
Estes cradled him in his arms like an infant. “Can you speak?”
Styxx shook his head, wincing as more pain went through him.
“Here.” Estes pulled a small skin of wine from his belt and held it for him to sip.
It burned, but tasted wonderful. He hadn’t had anything but spoiled milk, fouled water, and other disgusting things that were designed to drive the demons from his body. Swallowing hard, he licked his dry, cracked lips. “P-p-please, Uncle,” he whispered. “Take me home.”
Estes ground his teeth as his eyes flared with anger. “I can’t, little squirrel. Xerxes said that you have to stay here until you’re healed. He would be furious if I took you home without his consent.”
A tear slid down Styxx’s cheek at those words, burning the wounds that were left from blows he no longer felt when they were given. So much for Estes’s boasts of bravery in battle. In the end, he, who lived in a foreign country, was as scared of his father as everyone else.
Fucking coward.
“I’ll speak to your father on your behalf. Has he been here to see you?”
Styxx shook his head.
“I will get you out of here, I promise. Gods, I can’t believe Xerxes has condoned this.” Estes laid him back on the floor. “I’ll be back as soon as I can.”
Don’t leave me. Please, Uncle. I can’t take any more. I can’t.
I’m just a boy.…
But his uncle was gone before he could get one word out.
His breathing labored and pain-filled, Styxx realized that for the first time in months he wasn’t locked up. If he could get to the door Estes had used, he might be able to escape. Seizing that hope, he forced himself to ignore the agony of his bleeding burns and wounds to crawl across the ragged cobblestone floor. It took several minutes, but he finally reached the door.
Joy spread through him as he rose to his knees and touched the latch.
Almost there …
Styxx was so close to freedom now that he could taste it on his parched tongue.
He’d just freed the latch when the door behind him opened. Terrified, he shoved against the wood and forced himself to stand. As he tried to run, someone slammed into him, knocking him to the ground.
No!
Roughly, a priest rolled him over and crashed Styxx’s bruised body against the stone. “Where do you think you’re going, Highness?”
Back to Tartarus.
Styxx turned his head so that he saw rays of sunlight through an open window in the temple hall. He hadn’t seen the sun since his father had dumped him here. Without a word, he reached for it, wanting to feel it just one more time. But the priest seized him and dragged him back to his dark cell where he left him alone.
Closing his eyes, Styxx did his best to remember what the sun had felt like on his skin as he heard the door lock him in his misery. He hadn’t been crazy when they’d put him here, but with every passing day, he felt his sanity slipping. He did his best to hold on to it, yet what was the use?
“Why? Why can’t you kill me or take my mind?” Styxx silently asked the god who came so often to torment him.
“All you have to do is say the magic word, little prince. You know my price.”
Tears filled Styxx’s eyes. “I will not be your whore. My freedom’s not worth it.”
“No?” the god mocked. “Well then have fun with your priests.”
August 30, 9535 BC
“We’ve had progress. But the evil daemons are attracted by his great beauty and wealth. They are fighting us hard.”
Styxx opened his eyes as he heard the priest entering his torture chamber. For a full minute, he couldn’t breathe as he saw his uncle and father with the old man.
His lips quivered as hope went through him. Was it finally over? Surely his father couldn’t leave him like this.… Not if he loved him.
Estes rushed to his side and placed a tender hand on his bald head. “Styxx? Can you hear me?”
He gave a weak nod.
A tic started in his jaw as Estes looked back at his father. “See what I was telling you? They’ve ruined him.”
Styxx met his father’s gaze, but the lack of feeling there hit him harder than the priests’ blows. How could his father not be indignant or horrified?
Something …
But the king stood there, stoically. Unsympathetic to his pain. “It’s for his own good, brother.”
For his own good …
Styxx would laugh if those words didn’t bite so deeply.
“How can you say that? Look at him. They’ve scarred him abysmally. He’ll never be the same.”
“The scars are necessary, Highness and Majesty. They keep the daemons from coveting his young body.”
But they didn’t keep the gods from coveting it. The irony of that sickened him even more.
Estes cursed. “This is insane, Xerxes. The boy needs to go home.”
I don’t want him home again until he’s normal. Burn it all out of him.
Styxx winced as he heard his father’s cold, brutal thoughts.
“Do you still suffer from headaches?” his father asked him.
He knew better than to say anything other than what his father wanted to hear. “No, Majesty.”
“You’re lying.”
Styxx panted in desperate panic. “Please, Father. I’ll do anything you ask. Please don’t leave me here.”
“That’s the daemon in him talking. Hear how his voice has changed, Majesty? How hoarse and deep?”
Daemon? Was the old man as crazy as he accused him of being? He was hoarse from months of screaming.
His father was pitiless. Now you understand what it means to be king. You can’t allow your emotions to cloud your actions or judgments. You do what you have to. His father’s thoughts made him ill. “You need to stay until the priests clear you of your daemons.”
Styxx sobbed aloud at the horror his father was relegating him to. He couldn’t help himself. The agony was too brutal for him to bear anymore.
The king turned toward the priests with a curled lip. “And for the sake of all the gods, can you stop him from bawling like a woman? I’m sick of it and he’s too old to weep like that.” How could I sire something so weak and pathetic?
Styxx glared at him, hating everything about his father. Let me chain you to a stone and burn you to the marrow of your bones, you skatophage. See then if you cry or not.…
Furious at Styxx for crying, his father stormed out with the priests trailing behind him.
Estes touched his bruised cheek. “I’m so sorry, Styxx. I’ll keep trying to convince him to release you. I will do my best for you, I promise.”
And then Estes, too, was gone.
Styxx’s gaze fell to the old scar on his forearm where his father had cut him years ago. The king still didn’t really believe he was his son. How could he leave him here to suffer if he thought it?
I am alone in this world.
Except for Acheron. That lucky bastard was with Estes, who had some love for them. Surely his uncle was taking better care of his brother than this.
But the phantom pains he felt at times in horrifying places on his body made him wonder. Something caused injury to Acheron.…
And it, too, was highly unpleasant.
The door opened again. “Time to be bled again, Highness.”
Styxx slammed his eyes shut so that he wouldn’t see the leeches they were about to cover him with. His stomach heaved in revulsion as all reason abandoned him.
I’m never going home. Unless he agreed to be a god’s whore, this was his lot. He might as well learn to accept it. Hope was nothing more than a fickle bitch who mocked him daily
.
Grinding his teeth, he tried to block out the pain and the priests. To dream of a place where someone might learn to love him.
But he knew such a place didn’t exist. He had been damned from birth and there was no comfort for those the gods had damned. No peace.
No haven.
Bitter, and filled with hatred, he laughed out loud. “Go on and bleed me, you suagroi. Take all my blood.” If he was bloodless then maybe the god who kept coming to him would leave him alone.
“Don’t look at him. It’s the demon taunting us. We’re finally making progress.”
No, they weren’t. They were turning him into something he didn’t want to be.
His father.
Cold. Callous. Unfeeling.
Years ago, he’d begged his sister to teach him how to love. She’d rebuffed his pleas with her coldness. Aphrodite had spit on him that day and turned her back to a child who’d only wanted to belong to someone.
It was Odia and Lyssa who now took him to their breasts and suckled him. He drank the warmth of their venom in and let it strip the pain away. His family had failed to teach him love, but from the world and their callous arms, he’d finally learned how to fully hate.
January 2, 9534 BC
“I have to admire your strength, little prince. While I find it appalling, I do have to respect it. Especially given everything you’ve suffered.” The god brushed his hand against Styxx’s neck.
Styxx quickly jerked away then grimaced in pain.
“In that regard,” the god continued, “I think I should be insulted and highly offended that you’d rather be so abused than lie with me … but you’re young so I will forgive you.… For now.”
Lying on the floor of his cell, Styxx didn’t bother to look at the god who’d returned to torture him again. He was used to his visits. The Olympian came often to flog Styxx’s spirit and will while the priests flogged his body.
“Am I really so repugnant to you?” Well aware that Styxx wouldn’t answer, he shoved Styxx onto his back then ran his hands over the burns and scabs on Styxx’s skin. “I could heal all of these.”
“I won’t be your whore. I won’t be anyone’s whore.”
The god smiled. “Spoken like a true prince. But here’s the thing. Sooner or later, everyone whores themselves for something. And I am tired of watching you be hurt.”
Then stop it, you bastard!
“It’s not that easy. You want out.…”
Styxx shook his head, refusing to pay the price the god demanded.
The god growled at him then grabbed his jaw in a fierce grip. “All right. Fine. I know that one day, there will be something you are willing to whore yourself for, and then you will come to me on your knees. And you will receive me. In the meantime, before they do any more damage to your beauty, I will amend my terms. If you want to go home … remove your clothes and lie here with your arms open and your knees parted. I will leave my clothes on, but you will cradle me like a lover while I feed from you.”
Styxx cringed at the very thought of it. But given the other things he’d been put through these past months, that didn’t seem so bad. Besides, the god would feed from him anyway. He knew that for a fact. The Olympian had tied the two of them together and there was nothing Styxx could do to stop it.
“I have your word you won’t rape me,” Styxx breathed through his hoarse throat.
“I swear on the River Styx that this one time, I will not rape you. But only so long as you hold me and let me feed until I’m full.”
I can go home then?
“I will have you sent home on the morrow.”
Styxx nodded in consent.
The god withdrew from him and watched as he slowly pulled his coarse stola off. Naked, Styxx lay back on the floor and did as the god had asked. Turning his head so that the god would have access to his neck, he closed his eyes and waited.
Apollo took a moment to savor this one small victory that he knew had cost the prince much of his pride. Honestly, he’d expected Styxx to refuse. “Remember the terms of our deal, human. Until I’m sated. If you fail to cradle me like a lover, I can have you any way I want.”
Styxx nodded again.
The god approached him slowly. Styxx slammed his eyes shut, waiting for the familiar bite. Only this time, the god didn’t use his jugular. Rather, he sank his fangs into the femoral artery in his thigh.
Styxx barely caught himself before he shoved the god away. Any breach of their agreement …
It would be a lot more humiliating than this.
His jaw quivering, Styxx forced himself to sink his hand into the god’s dark hair and cradle his body as if he enjoyed the god’s touch. Bile rose in his throat. Biting his lip, he tried to focus on anything else to get him away from this moment of absolute horror.
Tears pricked at his eyes. The only good thing was that whenever the Olympian was around, the voices in his head stopped. He heard nothing. But right now, even that distraction would be welcome.
When the god finally finished, he crawled up his body then pressed himself against Styxx. Styxx had to force himself not to curl his lip or fight as he felt the god’s erection on his blistered thigh through the cloth of the god’s stola. He took Styxx’s chin in his hand and forced him to meet his gaze. “One day, prince, I will have you fully.”
“Will you at least give me your name now so that I know whom to avoid?”
The Olympian laughed. “When I’m deep inside you, prince, I will give you my name so that you know who honors you.”
January 3, 9534 BC
“Welcome home, boy.”
On the palace steps, Styxx inclined his head to his king as he drew his chlamys tighter around his body. Not because he was cold, but because he didn’t want to be touched by anyone ever again. “Thank you for your magnanimous benevolence, Majesty.”
He was lucky his father was too stupid to pick up on his sarcasm.
Swallowing the bitter hatred he felt for all of them, Styxx swept his gaze over the servants who’d gathered to receive him. Not that they had missed him or cared. Rather his sire had ordered them to be here. But the worst were their voices in his head.
He’s as mad as his mother.
Why would they release him when it’s obvious he’s no better?
What a wasted life.
How can that ever be our king?
Styxx did his best to block their thoughts, but it was impossible. And the more he heard them, the more the hatred inside him built. How dare they look down their noses at him. He wasn’t a pathetic waste. He couldn’t help being born the way he was and he damn sure hadn’t asked for it.
It took everything he had not to curse them. But the last thing he wanted was for his father to return him to the Dionysion for more treatment.
If he could learn to ignore the depravity and horrors he’d witnessed and suffered these last months then he could certainly ignore them.
“I see you’ve returned.” Ryssa’s frigid tone definitely didn’t help his mood. You don’t look as if you’ve suffered any. You look fine and healthy, except for that stupid bald head.
Ignoring her cruel, childish thoughts, Styxx met her cold gaze. She was beautiful, he’d give her that. But he pitied whatever man was stuck with such a heartless bitch in his bed.
“Come, Ryssa,” their father said, smiling at her. “Embrace your brother.”
The loathing in her eyes turned his stomach. I’d rather hug a snake. And grow your hair back. It doesn’t make you look manly. You’re sickening without it. And what’s with that voice? Trying to sound more mature? Please …
Styxx forced himself not to touch his head as her internal comments cut him to the bone. He couldn’t help the damage done to his voice. Unlike his hair, that was a permanent reminder of the months he’d spent screaming in agony and begging for a mercy that never came.
“It’s all right, Majesty,” he said to his father. “I’d rather go to my room … if I may?”
He sco
wled. “Of course.”
Styxx lowered his head and didn’t look up again until he was locked in a place where no one could harm him.
Even so, he didn’t feel safe here. He’d never feel safe again. How could he? At any moment, his “patron” nameless god could find him and feed on or grope him.
All the priests had taught him was a brand new hell. In the past, he’d detested being alone. Now he despised being with people, too. And while the pain and voices continued to torment him, he now had frequent panic attacks that assaulted him whenever he let his guard down.
His unidentified god could be lurking in any shadow.…
Worse, he’d learned that he was as disposable as Acheron. If he displeased his father in any way, he’d be sent back and left there. Then he’d have no choice except to turn to the Olympian who wanted to own him.
Styxx removed his chlamys then hissed as his palm began to burn for no reason whatsoever. It felt just like one of the hot irons they’d tortured him with. Shaking his hand, he tried to get it to stop, but it wouldn’t.
Damn it, Acheron!
What in the name of Hades was he doing? Why couldn’t his brother behave and not get hurt?
Styxx blew cool air across his palm as tears blinded him. Please don’t do this to me again. I don’t want to go back to that damn temple.
Next time, his father might never allow him to return home.
Cold fear gripped his heart. “I will be perfect. I swear.” Whatever his father wanted him to be, he would be without argument. Yes, he hated them, but he hated that temple most of all.
Styxx froze as he caught sight of himself in the mirror on his dressing table. Ryssa was right. He was hideous.
He ran his hand over his scalp, where only the tiniest bit of hair was growing back. Turning away, he lifted the hem of his short chiton. Though mostly healed, the blisters and scars were even more appalling than his head. While he healed faster than humans, it didn’t mean he wouldn’t scar. In fact, his entire left side from his armpit to his thigh was a solid line of vicious scars. They went along nicely with the ones in his shoulder and chest where his mother had stabbed him.
Styxx (DH #33) Page 9