Page 24 of Styx

with full divine powers.

And the Oceanids

will live to serve and nurture

what was within their brothers’

rivers and their father’s seas.’

None of my sisters reacted,

but I felt like my insides

had been crushed,

so much so that I forgot

both my place and my silence.

‘But this means

we have no divine powers!

Nothing but our immortality!’

I felt the hard stare of my father

and heard the hiss of an angry aunt.

But my words were spoken

with such indignation

that Kronos’s blazing eyes

found me

amongst all my siblings.

‘Styx!’

It was the first time my mother

had even acknowledged me

in an age. The curse, I suppose,

of having thousands of children

is that you could spend an immortality

not speaking to some of them.

I did not turn to look at her.

Instead, I met the God-King’s glare

with the hot, burning rage