Ash couldn’t breathe from the raw emotions he felt as he watched Styxx push himself to his feet.
They were so much alike physically and yet polar extremes when it came to their past and their present.
All they really had in common was that they were both longed-for heirs. Styxx was to inherit his father’s kingdom while Acheron had been conceived to destroy the world for his mother.
It was a destiny neither of them had fulfilled.
Instead, Ash had been born human against his will and against the delight of his human surrogate family that had somehow sensed he wasn’t really one of them.
And they had hated him for it.
“How long have I been here?” Styxx asked, looking around his dark prison.
“Three years.”
Styxx laughed bitterly. “It seemed like forever.”
It probably had. Ash didn’t envy Styxx having to suffer the memories of Ash’s human past. Then again, he envied himself even less for having lived them.
He cleared his throat. “I can return you to the Vanishing Isle again, or you can stay here in Tartarus. I can’t take you into the Elysian Fields, but there are other areas here that are almost as peaceful.”
“What did you have to bargain with Artemis and Hades for that?”
Ash looked away, not wanting to think about it. “It doesn’t matter.”
Styxx took a step toward him then stopped. “It does matter. I know what it costs you now … what it cost you then.”
“Then you know it doesn’t matter to me.”
Styxx scoffed. “I know you’re lying, Acheron. I’m the only one who does.”
Ash flinched at the truth. But it changed nothing. “Make your decision, Styxx. I don’t have any more time to waste here.”
Styxx took another step forward. He stood so close now that Ash could see his reflection in Styxx’s blue eyes. Those eyes pierced him with sincerity. “I want to go to Katateros.”
Ash frowned at him. “Why?”
“I want to know my brother.”
Ash scoffed at that. “You don’t have a brother,” he reminded him. It was something Styxx had proclaimed loud and clear throughout the centuries. “We only shared a womb for a very short time.”
Styxx did something he had never done before. He reached out and touched Ash’s shoulder. That touch seared him as it reminded him of the boy he’d been who had wanted nothing more than the love of his human family.
A boy they had brutally spat on and denied.
“You told me once, long ago,” Styxx said in a ragged tone, “to look into a mirror and see your face. I refused to then. But now Mnimi has forced me to look at my own reflection. I’ve seen it through my eyes and I’ve seen it through yours. I wish to the gods that I could change what happened between us. If I could go back, I would never deny you. But I can’t. We both know that. Now I just want the chance to know you as I should have known you all those centuries ago.”
Angered at his noble speech and at a past that no mere handful of words could ease, Ash used his powers to pin Styxx back to the wall, away from him. Styxx hovered spread-eagle, above the floor, his face pale as Ash showed him his true god powers. He could tell by Styxx’s thoughts that he was aware of exactly what he could do to him. Even though they were linked together, Ash could kill him with a single thought. He could shred him into pieces.
Part of him wanted to. It was the part of him they had turned vicious. The part of him that belonged to his real mother, the Destroyer.
“I am not a god of forgiveness.”
Styxx met his gaze without flinching. “And I’m not a man used to apologizing. We are linked. You know it and I know it.”
“How could I ever trust you?”
Styxx wanted to weep at that question. Acheron was right. He’d done nothing but hurt his brother.
He’d even tried to kill him.
“You can’t. But I have lived inside your memories for the last three years. I know the pain you hide. I know the pain I caused. If I stay here, I will go mad from the screams. If I return to the Vanishing Isle, I’ll languish there alone and in time I will probably learn to hate you all over again.”
Styxx paused as grief swept through him at the truth he could no longer deny. “I don’t want to hate you anymore, Acheron. You are a god who can control human fate. Is it not possible that there was a reason why we were joined together? Surely the Fates meant for us to be brothers.”
Ash looked away as those words echoed in his head. It was a divine cruelty that he could see the fate of everyone around him except for those who were important to him, or those whose fates were intertwined with his own. He held the fate of the entire world in his hand and yet he couldn’t see his own future.
How screwed-up was that?
How unfair?
He looked at his “brother.” Styxx was more likely to skewer him than he was to speak to him.
And yet he sensed something different about him.
Forget it. Erase his memory of you and leave him here to rot.
It was kinder than anything Styxx had ever done for him. But deep inside, down in a place that Ash hated was that little boy who had reached out for his brother. That little boy who had cried out repeatedly for his family only to find himself alone in Atlantis.
What should he do?
He set Styxx back on the ground.
Ash didn’t move as memories and the emotions they reawakened assailed him. He could sense Styxx was approaching. He tensed out of habit. Every time Styxx had ever drawn near, he had hurt him.
“I can’t undo the past,” Styxx whispered. “But in the future, I will gladly lay my life down for you, brother.”
Before he realized what Styxx was doing, Styxx pulled him close.
Ash didn’t move as he felt Styxx’s arms around him. He’d dreamed of this moment as a child in Atlantis. He’d ached for it.
The angry god inside him wanted to splinter Styxx into pieces for daring to touch him now, but that innocent part of him … that human heart, shattered. It was the part that he listened to.
Ash wrapped his arms around his brother and held him for the first time in his memory.
“I’m so sorry,” Styxx said in a ragged tone.
Ash nodded as he pulled away. “To err is human, to forgive divine.”
Styxx shook his head at the quote. “I don’t ask for your forgiveness. I don’t deserve it. I only ask for a chance to show you now that I’m not the fool I was once.”
Ash only hoped he could believe it. The odds were against them both. Every time Styxx had been given an opportunity to assuage their past, he had used it to hurt him more.
Closing his eyes, Ash teleported them out of Tartarus and into Katateros.
Stunned, Styxx pulled back to gape at the grand black marble foyer, he’d never …
Styxx blinked slowly.
For a full minute, he was confused as his own memories finally surged past Acheron’s. At first, he’d thought this room new. But he’d been here before. Centuries ago, the Atlantean gods had held him here.
Don’t think about it.
Ironically, had he told them then where his brother was, the old gods would have ended an aeon of suffering for him.
As he glanced around the huge marble fountain and columns, he realized nothing had changed. It was all as perfectly preserved as it’d been when they tortured him here. A part of him swore he could even hear their laughter and jeers.
“So this is where you live,” Styxx breathed, trying to keep his tone level as pain lacerated his heart.
“No.” Acheron folded his arms over his chest, and indicated the tall, gilded windows that looked out over the tranquil water that stretched toward the horizon. “I live across the River Athlia, on the other side of the Lypi Shores. There is no Charon to ferry you across the river to my home so don’t bother looking.”
He was completely baffled by that. “I don’t understand.”
Acheron took a step back
from him and Styxx was puzzled by the suspicion he saw in his brother’s silver eyes. “I will see to it that you have servants and all you could ever desire here.”
“But I thought we were going to be together.”
Acheron shook his head. “You made your choice and you wanted to come here. So here you are.”
But this wasn’t what he wanted.
Styxx tried to approach him only to find his pathway cut off by an invisible wall. “I thought you said to err is human, to forgive divine.”
Those swirling, silver eyes burned him. “I’m a god, Styxx, not a saint. I do forgive you, but trusting you is another matter. As you said, you shall have to prove yourself to me. Until then, you and I will take this one step at a time and then we shall see what is to become of us.”
As soon as those words were spoken, Styxx found himself alone. And the instant Acheron vanished, every single memory of Styxx’s came back to him.
Full force and with complete clarity.
Contrary to his brother’s thoughts, Styxx had not lived a perfect, happy life. He had not lived in luxury.
He had known pain …
Isolation.
Starvation and suffering.
Throwing his head back, he roared in fury. “Damn you, Acheron!”
He was the one who’d had pity on his brother, and now he knew exactly what Acheron had always thought of him. The horrid truth. And how wrong Acheron’s thoughts were where Styxx was concerned. For three fucking years that bitch had made him live his brother’s life and hold Acheron’s memories of their world and past as if they were his own.
“Oh, this is rich.… You stupid punk!”
Styxx was not the one who needed a dose of reality. Rather it was the petulant bitch-brother of his who refused to remember their childhood. At all. But then that was Estes’s fault. He’d filled Acheron’s mind with hatred and twisted it to the point his brother had forced himself to remember nothing other than Estes’s lies.
Just as Acheron had once hated Ryssa for abandoning him. Yet somehow, Acheron had managed to forgive her and see the real truth of her actions.
But Acheron would never forgive him. He had no intention of looking any deeper than his own twisted and erroneous facts.
While Styxx had held on to those early memories of their friendship that had allowed him to feel for his brother, Acheron had locked out every one of them. He remembered nothing of the kindness Styxx had given him. Ever. None of his attempts to free him.
And now …
Acheron had abandoned him again. Because his brother refused to look at Styxx’s life as it had really been.
Instead, Acheron judged him as everyone else had. On an assumed reality that had never existed anywhere other than inside their own jealous minds.
You are a prince and your father’s beloved heir. You’re rich. What problems could you possibly have?
How dare you complain, Styxx. You don’t know what real suffering is. You can’t imagine what the world is really like.…
His brother knew nothing of the years they’d lived apart. Nothing of Styxx’s war career. Or Galen.
Nothing of Bethany.
Pressing the heels of his hands to his eyes, Styxx laughed as insanity claimed him.
His brother was across the river with his demon daughter and friends, and here Styxx was locked away again. With no one and nothing but memories that tore out his heart.
Take your sanctimonious indignation, Acheron, and shove it up your ass.
But all of his anger changed nothing.
Yet again, Acheron had made Styxx’s situation worse. Strange how Acheron thought he could see Styxx’s sins so clearly and yet he was blind to his own. In the end, Acheron was a god. He acted like all the others. He chose his pets, and the rest of humanity could burn for all he cared.
And worse, like Apollo, Apollymi, and Artemis, Acheron was capable of incredible acts of cruelty against anyone when he felt justified, right or wrong, for hating them.
That was bad enough when it was done by a human. Acheron had the powers to look into the hearts and pasts, and to see the truth. He had done it for others … for all of his Dark-Hunter brethren.
Yet not his own brother.
Unlike a human who couldn’t, Acheron chose not to see Styxx. That was what made it worse. That total lack of regard.
But then, Acheron was surrounded by people who kissed his ass and adored him. He had his daughter who loved him …
And I am the king of hell.
With no one and nothing.
Οτις μοί γ ’ νομα …
I am Nobody.
Sighing, Styxx sat on the floor and closed his eyes and thought of the only person who had ever given him comfort and love. One of only two people in his entire life who had seen him as he really was.
His Bethany.
And she had been murdered by Acheron’s mother on the day the two of them were supposed to leave all this bullshit behind. If one brother had reason to hate the other, he believed he had a few legs up on Acheron.
Not that it mattered. Acheron was with his family again. Cradled next to their loving bosoms.
Meanwhile, Styxx was in his hole where Acheron would soon forget his existence—if he hadn’t already. A hole that was a lot crueler than the Vanishing Isle, because here, Styxx saw nothing but Acheron’s real family using and abusing him, and laughing as they did so. It would be the same as locking Acheron back in Estes’s home for eternity.
Thanks, brother. I hate you, too.
May 4, 2008
Styxx sighed as he secured the last plank on the small raft he’d made. Over the last few months, he’d learned that when Acheron had said Styxx had to earn his trust, what he really meant was “get out of my face and don’t let me see you again.”
Acheron must have reconsidered the servants and supplies because nothing had arrived since he’d been confined here.
Not a damn thing.
The only difference between this island and the Vanishing Isle was that this one didn’t have predators to eat him. And while that made his world a bit safer, it also left him without much meat, and no way to make blankets or have sinew to use for bowstring and ties. Of course the twisted palm leaves could be used on his hammers and spears, but that wasn’t nearly as strong or durable as leather cords.
Styxx grimaced at the blood on his hand. The really bad thing about palm leaves and trees was that they had sharp blades and spines, and he had no way to make leather gloves to protect his skin. His hands were so swollen from previous cuts that had gone to infection that he’d lost even more dexterity, especially in his right hand.
Not to mention both hands throbbed constantly.
The other thing this island lacked … castor beans. He had no way of making castor oil to draw out the infection. Then again, there were no beans or nuts here of any kind. His diet had been extremely limited to shellfish and coconuts. He hadn’t even seen a bird, which meant no eggs.
The only good thing he could say about being here was that Apollo couldn’t get to him.
Woo-fucking-hoo. At this point, he’d gladly whore himself for just a single bite of steak …
A drink of untainted water.
Cursing, Styxx jerked his hand back as another spine bit into the pad of his finger and left it bleeding. He put it in his mouth and sucked on it while he inspected his raft. On the Vanishing Isle, his rafts would only circle the lagoon. Any time he tried to go out farther or launch from another spot … or even swim out … winds would blow him straight back to shore.
That would probably happen here, too. But he had to find out. Besides, it wasn’t like he had anything else to do … other than draw in the sand and watch the waves erase it.
Styxx grabbed the raft and hauled it toward the water. Grunting from the effort, he pulled against the hull. It took a few minutes to launch. Then he scrambled onto the back and grabbed his pole so that he could push it across the river. A lack of sail had never stopped him from
being shoved back in Hades, but maybe here it would keep him from being turned over.
He left the lagoon and kept his gaze on the opposite shore, where Acheron made his home. At this point, he didn’t care what his brother did. He just wanted to hear the sound of another human voice, even if that voice was cursing him.
To his shock and delight, he actually made it across the river. Bracing himself for the worst, he jumped into the water and pulled the raft onto the shore, out of the reach of the tide. He stored his pole then wiped the sweat from his brow. There was a huge mountain in front of him. It was Karnus, the mountain where the majority of the Atlantean gods had placed their temples.
Damn, that was a long climb.
Yeah, well, at least it’s something to do that won’t cut your hands. He laughed bitterly at that single truth then commenced his journey.
He didn’t reach the top until well after nightfall. All the temples were dark except for the main hall where Apollo had first dumped him in front of Archon’s throne.
Completely naked, Styxx had been bound in gold chains and gagged.
Archon had frowned at Apollo. “What is this?”
“My present to you. Styxx of Didymos. I was told by Athena to remove him from Olympus, and as I was doing so, I remembered you telling me during your war with Greece that you’d give anything to have him bound and tied at your feet for five minutes.”
A slow, sickening smile had spread across Archon’s face. “What reward do you want for this service?”
“Only the right to come and take possession of him whenever it suits me. The rest of the time, he’s yours to do with as you please so long as you don’t kill him.”
Archon inclined his head to Apollo. “Your rights are granted.”
Apollo had pulled Styxx up from the floor by his hair and forced him to kneel in submission to Archon. “In that case, have fun. Oh, you should be warned that he bites unless drugged. And if you fill him with Eycharistisi first, you’ll see why he’s branded as a tsoulus. He’s remarkably talented when he has no control of himself.” Then he’d leaned over to smell Styxx’s hair.
Styxx had jerked away and glared at him.
Laughing, Apollo had sobered then licked his lips. “Don’t worry, precious. I’ll be back for my turn with you later.” After one last grope, the god had vanished and left Styxx to the tender custody of the gods who had relished his total degradation and torture.
Styxx (DH #33) Page 73