Page 235 of Styx

my eyes glistening with tears.

I had missed her deeply,

even though I had tried not to.

Eras without her had been

so hard to bear. Her own eyes

spilled over with tears as she whispered,

‘Styx.’ We embraced

and I remembered

all those days when we were girls.

Everything we had made together,

from the eels to the starfox,

eons ago, and yet those memories

were the happiest of my life.

I realized then as I felt her body hold mine,

how motherhood had changed us both.

‘Asteria,’ I said quietly,

pulling back to take a look at her,

‘I heard you had a child.’

Betrayal

In a happier time, we would have been

together through each child’s birth,

as we had promised each other

all those years ago, our naivety stemming

from an immortality that had never known

war, destruction, pain.

Torn apart by this conflict,

we had missed so much of each other’s lives.

Perses and Pallas had still got to see each other

through the wars, but we had been kept apart

all this time. Goddesses and nymphs were forbidden