Page 110 of Styx

My heart fluttering,

as I escaped from my father’s palace

into Nyx’s oncoming darkness.

He was standing watching the sea,

his handsome face looking like

it had been chiselled from

the same ancient stone of the cliffs.

I tried to quell my heartbeat.

‘Asteria.’ The way he said my name

made it sound like ambrosia itself.

‘Perses,’ I said softly.

For a second neither of us spoke,

until finally he cleared his throat.

‘While seeing you is a gift always,

may I ask what you wanted

to speak about?’

I ignored the way his words

made my spirit rise.

‘Your brother enjoys carving, yes?’

At his nod, I carried on.

‘Come with me. I will show you

things he can carve and leave for Styx.’

It Began Slowly From There

Styx, whom I had never seen take an interest in anything a male God did, started to visit Pallas at his forge more often. I would watch her stand by him having a brief conversation, before she would return to me and we would walk back to the cave together. Perses and I had arranged the first few times, but after that, she had taken to going alone. Perses, at my instruction, began to ask Pallas to carve things for him – an eel, a fox, a crab. Creatures Styx and I had invented. Then I would leave them at her chamber’s window. Inside the cave, I asked Styx to help me make a new kind of precious gem, one of amber, just like Pallas’s eyes. Together we magicked it out of pure sea stone. Perses left this for him at his forge, letting him know it was Styx’s gift to him. He was delighted with it and placed it within the handle of his newest burnished adamantine sword. And then one day, when Styx, Metis, Leto, and I walked into her room, we found the perfect wooden carving of Styx, sitting on her bed. Pallas had crafted a version of Styx who stood tall, her split eyes burning with passion, each tress of her green hair lovingly carved with tender hands. Her hands held swords instead of sitting in prayer. I watched her face as she turned it over in her hands, her eyes soft and full of admiration. ‘Go to him,’ I whispered softly. We watched from the balcony of her room as she approached Pallas at the forge he worked at, still holding his carving in her hand. Their eyes met and this time their souls did too, as she pulled him close into a gentle, warm kiss.

A Revelation

Gods believed in prophetic dreams

the way the ocean believed in its waves.

For us, prophecies were a gift and a curse,

the dark knowledge the future was

always advancing upon us.