Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

On the windswept isle of Tenedos, where three ancient temples stood sentinel—one to Apollo, one to Poseidon, and one to Dionysus—a new temple had risen. Modest in scale, unadorned with excessive wealth, it perched upon the jagged cliffs by the shore, where the merciless waves hurled themselves against its gleaming walls, leaving behind a kiss of brine on the stones.

Its marble shone untouched by the ravages of time, its pallor luminous against the tempestuous sea. It seemed to breathe a sanctity both tender and defiant, as though daring the elements to mar its fragile perfection. It compelled those who passed to avert their gaze or linger uneasily, bewitched by its unblemished splendor.

Word spread across the island of the temple’s mysterious patron: Einalian, the son of Poseidon. Though his mythos was but a fragment whispered among mortals, it carried the weight of the ocean’s depths. The tale spoke of a night when Poseidon’s voice, sonorous and commanding, invaded the dreams of his devoted—a shared vision of towering waves and a boy’s shadow dancing on the crest of the tides. The god’s will was clear: a temple must rise, a sanctuary for this newly revealed son, carved into the very bones of Tenedos’s rugged shore.

And so the faithful obeyed, erecting the temple with reverent hands and hearts. Within its walls, smoke mingled with the cries of gulls, weaving the prayers of supplicants into the fabric of the heavens.

From that day forward, the temple drew pilgrims and dreamers alike, each yearning to pierce the veil of the divine and glimpse Einalian or his fathomless father.

Today, within the hallowed heart of the temple, a boy stood, small and solemn, his cherubic form a contrast to the weight of the incense-heavy air. His bare feet made no sound on the marble floor, and his golden curls, kissed by sunlight, fell across a face as guileless as dawn. Yet, in his eyes, there smoldered an ancient, knowing fire—one that belied the innocence of his form.

He gazed up at the statue towering above the altar, his expression a delicate symphony of awe and longing.

The statue, hewn from flawless white stone, depicted a young man with his eyes veiled. In one hand, he clasped a fishing net, its delicate carvings catching the light like strands of moonlit water; in the other, he bore a torch, its flame forever frozen in the cold embrace of marble. The god’s head was bowed, as if burdened by unseen truths, while his hands reached upwards in silent contradiction—a dichotomy embodied, half of the sea’s tempestuous depths, half of the underworld’s shadowed domain.

The boy tilted his head, examining the marble effigy with a peculiar intensity. His lips moved, forming a whisper too soft to carry.

“Einalian,” the boy murmured, his voice a dulcet lilt. “Are you listening?”

Suddenly, a playful wind stirred, teasing at his curls and tugging at the hem of his tunic. It swept through the temple, scattering ash from the altar in mischievous spirals. The boy frowned, his small hands reaching to restore the sanctity of the altar, smearing the soot across his soft, dimpled fingers.

“You’re far from your mother, little Eros.”

The voice came from above—a lazy, taunting drawl. The boy froze, his body stiffening before his gaze lifted to the figure perched atop the statue. The West Wind, reclined against the marble effigy, his lithe form draped over the veiled head as though it were a throne.

The boy’s face twisted into a feral scowl unbecoming of his youthful guise. “Zephyrus,” he hissed.

“Praying to him again, are we?” Zephyrus mocked, his fingers idly stroking the stone torch as if it might spark to life. “You think he’ll hear you? Or are you only here to feel closer to the mortal you’ve so foolishly tethered yourself to?”

The boy said nothing, his small fists tightening at his sides, his knuckles pale against the ash that stained them. His golden curls framed a face that was carefully neutral, but his pink eyes—dark as bruised rose petals—betrayed a flicker of fury.

“Gods don’t pray, Eros,” Zephyr said with a mocking lilt. “And certainly not to something that is not one of us.” His fingers tapped idly against the marble.

Eros’s cherubic face hardened. “He is more than you understand,” he said, his voice small but sharp, like a child’s retort hiding a deeper truth.

Zephyr tilted his head, feigning interest. "More? Or just another fleeting obsession?”

Eros rose abruptly, the illusion of childishness falling away as the air around him thickened with divine presence. “Leave,” he commanded, his voice cold, his form trembling with barely contained anger. “You know nothing of what binds me to him.”

Zephyr slid from the altar, his movements fluid as water, and approached Eros with leisurely steps. But before he could reply, another wind swept through the temple, cold and biting. From its depths emerged Eurus, the North Wind, his visage stark and imposing.

“Enough,” Eurus said, his voice a gale that silenced all protest. His gaze fixed on Eros, piercing and unrelenting. “You linger too long in mortal spaces, boy.”

The winds surged around him, lifting his slight form effortlessly. He thrashed against the invisible currents, his small fists striking at nothing.

Zephyr’s laughter rose again, taunting and cruel. “See how easily you’re carried away, Eros? Without your wings, you’re nothing but a helpless child.”

Eros’s teeth clenched, fury radiating from his small form, but his words were swallowed by the wind. Suspended and powerless, he could only glare as Zephyr’s hand reached out, his fingers brushing against the golden curls.

“Don’t forget who you are, little god,” Zephyr whispered. “And don’t forget who we are. You play at love, but we are the storm.”

The winds released him suddenly, dropping him unceremoniously to the temple floor. Eros landed with a soft cry, his small hands scraping against the cold marble. He stayed there for a moment, trembling with frustration and humiliation, before rising to his feet. The winds materialized before him, swirling into existence like a tangible force.

“Don’t underestimate me.” Eros said, his voice low but laced with authority. “You are the storm but I am desire.” He folded his hands behind him, the motion deceptively casual. In the next heartbeat, his bow and arrows materialized—gleaming, lethal. The winds, in their arrogance or ignorance, paid him no mind. They laughed, a sound like rustling leaves and distant tempests, a camaraderie forged in the chaos of their nature. But brothers they would be no more.

When Eros blinked, the pink glow of his gaze burned like embers catching flame. His movements were a blur, swift as a whisper, his form shifting with an elegance born of predatory instinct. An arrow was nocked, its point shimmering with the essence of his power, and loosed with unerring precision.

The projectile struck Eurus, the elder wind, whose stoic visage faltered as the arrow’s enchantment sank deep. His eyes flared the same luminous pink, his will bending, reshaped by the god of desire.

Zephyrus noticed at once, his brows knitting in confusion as he took a wary step back. “What are you—?”

His question died on his lips as Eurus’s hands gripped his arms with a sudden, unrelenting force, pulling him into an embrace that was fierce, almost desperate. Zephyrus froze, his breath hitching as Eurus’s mouth found the curve of his throat.

The elder wind’s breath was warm, an intoxicating gust against Zephyrus’s skin, laden with something far more dangerous than the storms they wielded.

Zephyr writhed, managing to wrench free of Eurus’s grasp, his expression a mix of confusion and anger. But there was no reprieve. Eurus pursued him with determination, his movements guided by the aura of desire that radiated from Eros like an unseen tide.

“What did you do!?” Zephyr shouted, his voice thin against the rising wind. But there was no answer, only the relentless chase.

The two wind gods became a blur, Eurus hunting and Zephyr fleeing, their forms weaving through the trees with a chaos that mirrored their tumultuous natures. The forest swayed and groaned under their passage; leaves whipped from their branches, and the earth trembled with the force of their struggle.

Eros lingered below, his diminutive form framed against the wild symphony of the winds, his pink eyes shimmering with quiet satisfaction. The gods vanished into the horizon, their tumultuous cries dissolving into the ether, leaving only the restless whispers of the trees to fill the silence.

He adjusted his tunic with a measured grace, golden curls settling like sunlight upon his brow as the air surrendered to stillness. A sigh escaped his lips, and he turned back to the temple. With deliberate care, he began to cleanse the altar.

Percy galloped through the wild terrain, the horse’s hooves pounding against the earth as it swerved between low-hanging branches and tall, swaying grass. His eyes flickered, catching fleeting glimmers of ichor as they passed.

The first thing in Percy’s mind was the memory—Apollo, resplendent in his wrath, casting Paris to the ground with blinding light, his golden radiance scorching everything in its wake. The crack of arrows followed, sharp and merciless, and Paris had fallen, ichor dripping from wounds that glimmered like molten sunlight. The image burned in Percy’s thoughts as if it were seared into his soul.

He urged the horse faster, the rhythmic pounding of hooves a desperate cadence against the quiet night. But then, as if sensing a shift in the air, the horse began to slow, its steps faltering, cautious. The creature’s ears flicked back, its movements growing wary as they drew nearer to something strange.

Before them rose a heap of earth, a grotesque amalgamation of soil, stone, and splintered trees, as if a mountain itself had raged and fallen, burying all beneath its wrath.

Dismounting swiftly, Percy gripped his pin. Riptide sprang to life in his hand, its celestial bronze warm and reassuring against his skin. His feet crunched against the earth as he stepped around the weird mountain.

He paused, kneeling, his breath catching in his throat. The mass moved—subtle, slow, like the shallow rise and fall of slumbering lungs. Was something alive beneath? Could Paris be entombed within this suffocating grave?

The thought struck like a thunderclap, spurring Percy to action. His hands pressed into the damp soil, and with a command that echoed through his very marrow, the earth yielded, splitting and groaning under the force of his will.

What he uncovered made his breath falter, his pulse stutter in his veins.

It was not Paris.

There, amid the clinging dirt and fractured rock, was buried the wolf—his wolf. Or rather, the creature he once thought was his. Nibbles, the familiar shadow that had often trailed him with silent vigilance, now sprawled in a broken heap. Divine ichor clung to it’s fur, its radiance obscene against the muted darkness.

Percy’s breath hitched. He knew. He had known for some time now. This was no ordinary beast but Apollo himself, the god who had burned him with radiance and pride, who had haunted him.

Apollo defeated? Brought low by Paris? How could it be? How could a young, untested god overcome the burning might of the sun itself? But then, wasn’t Paris something more? Something darker, cloaked in shadows that defied reason? Percy’s thoughts twisted into knots, his understanding fraying like threads under too much strain.

He stumbled back, his knees weak, his vision blurring with disbelief. His hands scraped against the bark of a nearby tree as he braced himself, retreating into its sturdy shadow. His breaths came in sharp, ragged bursts, as if he had inhaled the acrid smoke of a dying fire.

The steed stood waiting, unmoving, its ruby eyes fixed on him with an eerie patience. Did he see it—some flicker of judgment glinting within that crimson gaze?

The wolf—Apollo—lay so near, his once-mighty form now scattered across the unforgiving earth like a shattered constellation. Percy’s chest swelled with a bitterness that threatened to drown him.

His nails dug into his palms, drawing crescent moons of pain. How many times had this god wielded his power to render Percy insignificant? How often had Percy stood defenseless, bare beneath the crushing weight of Apollo’s light?

A memory surged into his mind: Aregos, his friend—her body wrapped in the scalding embrace of Apollo's flames. Her final hiss, a wail of agony, echoed through him like a dark symphony.

Now, the god who had stolen her life lay crumpled and defenseless before him, the predator rendered prey.

This was his moment. His chance to balance the scales. To exact retribution.

He pushed off from the tree, his xiphos spinning in his hand, each turn a promise of reckoning.

The wolfish form lay ravaged, its divine arrogance crushed under the weight of its own hubris. Percy loomed over the fallen god, his shadow stretching across the stones like the harbinger of an ending long overdue.

His hands rose, steadying the blade for a final blow, the strike that would sever the treacherous thread tying them together. Here was his chance—to end him.

But as his face contorted in a grimace of anguish, a tremor rippled through his resolve. In the wolf’s stillness—in the god’s suffering—he saw something that froze the fury in his veins.

The xiphos wavered in his grip, its deadly arc faltering, and when he struck, it was not flesh. Instead, the celestial bronze bit into the earth, embedding itself mere inches from the wolf’s head.

He couldn’t do it. The rage that had propelled him dissipated, leaving only the hollow ache of failure.

The words came back to him, unbidden, from a distant day when he and Apollo hunted doves beneath a golden sky.

“Strength lies in knowing when to wield power and when to withhold it.”

Now, as he stared down at the battered creature before him, those words weighed heavier than the blade in his hand. The wolf, broken and unable to defend itself, was no adversary. Striking it down felt unjust, a cruelty that would not heal his wounds but deepen them.

With a guttural exhale, Percy knelt, his body folding into the earth as if in surrender. His eyes burned, the rawness of his grief and frustration coiling around him like a serpent.

His fingers brushed the damp earth, the coolness of it grounding him. Then, they moved, almost against his will, to the wolf’s coarse, sticky fur. A tremor rippled through its frame, faint and shuddering, as though even now it recognized his touch.

“You’re no friend of mine,” Percy whispered, his voice trembling with the weight of truth.

Percy hated himself for the tenderness that bloomed in his chest, unwanted and uncontrollable. This was Apollo, yes, but it was also Nibbles. The one who had walked beside him, protected him, trusted him in the wilderness. Perhaps that was the cruelest trick of all, but in this moment, it did not matter.

“I should leave you,” Percy murmured, his voice a whisper swallowed by the wind. His hand lingered, fingers brushing against fur clotted with divine blood. “I should walk away.”

But he didn’t.

With gritted teeth, he dug into the soil, his fingers clawing through the cold, unyielding ground until the wolf’s body lay fully exposed. Once pristine white, its fur was now smeared with earth, streaked with the brown and gold of blood and ichor.

Percy’s hands hovered for a moment before pressing down on the worst of the wounds, his palms meeting fur and flesh slick with molten sunlight. The ichor clung to him, searing his skin, each drop a reminder of the power coursing through the broken form beneath him.

“You’re a god,” he said, his voice trembling. “Heal yourself, damn you.”

The wolf stirred, its golden eyes cracked open, the light within muted but piercing, locking onto Percy. They held him captive, unblinking, filled with an emotion he could not name.

Not gratitude, not pride—something deeper, older, and unbearably sad.

And then, as gently as they had opened, the eyes closed again, leaving Percy alone in the silence, with nothing but the trembling of his hands.

How could he heal a god? He was just a mortal. Percy’s hands curled into fists, his knuckles pale as the tremor refused to subside.

But the thought ignited a spark in his mind—water. Water was his gift, his sanctuary. He healed in its embrace. Could it be enough to mend even him?

Determined, Percy ripped the hem of his chiton, fabric tearing in jagged strips beneath his fingers. He tied the cloth tightly around the wolf’s worst wounds, crude bandages meant only to stave off further loss of ichor. The god’s body felt unnaturally light, yet solid, as though the mortal form it wore betrayed its divine essence.

With a grunt, Percy lifted the wolf into his arms, the sharp edges of its form pressing into his chest. He staggered under the weight—not physical, but metaphysical, the crushing realization of what he was carrying. He heaved the creature onto the back of his horse, then, gripping black mane with bloodied hands, he led them towards the sea.

The night hung heavy, the stars dim, the horizon holding no promise of dawn. Was it because Apollo lay so injured? Percy dared not ask aloud, the thought itself too precarious. He simply pressed onward, the ground beneath them softening as they approached the shore.

When they reached the sea, Percy did not hesitate. He called to it, and the water answered. Tendrils of liquid silver reached out, encircling the wolf’s battered form with a gentleness that belied their strength. The god’s body was lifted from the horse, cradled by the sea as if it were a child, sinking slowly until only its face remained visible above the surface.

Percy stepped into the water, the chill biting at his legs as he waded deeper, until he stood beside the floating creature. He cupped his hands, drawing the water’s power to him, feeling it pulse and hum in response to his will. Closing his eyes, he concentrated, guiding the energy to the wolf’s wounds. The water glowed faintly, an otherworldly shimmer tracing the jagged lines of torn flesh.

He would tend only to the worst wounds, Percy told himself firmly. Just enough to ensure the wolf would survive. Nothing more. Once it regained consciousness, he would leave—vanish before he could second-guess his choice or be drawn into something deeper.

The wolf’s body twitched, its chest rising and falling in uneven gasps. Percy worked in silence, his focus unyielding, his breaths steady.

The sky remained dark, the horizon stubbornly refusing to surrender to the dawn.

The first thing he felt was the tender brush of sunlight grazing his cheek—a timid caress that dared to rouse him. Apollo’s eyes flew open, wide and sharp, his brows knitting into a scowl that seemed to curse the heavens themselves for allowing him to succumb to unconsciousness. His breath hitched, caught somewhere between confusion and wonder.

Percy’s face hovered above him.

It was a vision that stole the air from Apollo’s lungs—a visage of quiet resolve, every line and shadow etched in delicate focus. Percy’s hands gripped his shoulders, steady and firm, their bodies suspended in the cold embrace of water. His eyes were closed, lashes casting faint shadows over his cheekbones. His lips—cherry-soft, painfully inviting—were pressed into a thin, determined line.

Apollo lay still, unwilling to stir, unwilling to shatter this fragile moment. He could feel it, a tangible force weaving through him: Percy’s magic, cold and deliberate, sliding into his wounds like ice before sealing them with an exquisite finality. A shiver lingered in its wake, more intimate than pain, leaving him both healed and helpless.

Why? Why was Percy doing this? The memory returned like a jagged blade—Paris, a mere hatchling had bested him. A humiliation most bitter. And yet... gazing upon Percy now, the memory of defeat twisted into something absurdly, bewilderingly sweet. Should he thank Paris for the cruelty that had brought him here, into these arms?

But— didn’t Percy despise him? Had Percy not looked upon him with fury, with resentment so sharp it seemed to pierce the sun? And yet, here he was, pouring his magic into a god who had wronged him.

Would Percy leave if he knew Apollo’s wounds were healed? A flicker of panic seized Apollo’s chest, and he willed his body to resist, to preserve the fractures Percy’s hands worked to mend. But the effort was futile, laughable even. Percy’s magic swept through him with the authority of the ocean, commanding every broken fragment to knit itself anew.

A god healed by a mortal. The indignity of it burned for the briefest moment, only to be quenched by a far more intoxicating realization: Percy had done this. Percy, who should have let him suffer, had chosen to save him. And done so with a grace so exquisite, so agonizingly tender, that Apollo felt undone.

If this was the price of holding him close, of being in his arms, then let the heavens rend him apart and the earth shatter beneath him. He would gladly be broken again and again if it meant waking to Percy’s face, if it meant feeling this strange, unbearable tenderness flow through his veins.

He sensed a darkness within Percy—not the consuming abyss of malice, but a quiet, tentative shadow, softer than the blazing arrogance of Apollo’s light, yet no less profound. And as Percy’s hands had stitched him back together, pouring life where ruin once reigned, Apollo felt his strength swell beyond measure. It could have been the magic, the unspoken power that Percy wielded with such defiant grace. A power potent enough to unravel the threads of his wolfish form, leaving only the man behind.

Perhaps it was not merely the healing itself, but the offering—Percy’s attention, his time, his touch—that left Apollo incandescent with unbearable happiness. The thought burned within him, radiant and insatiable—he felt as though he could devour the entire world in a single, triumphant breath.

Had Apollo been too eager, too transparent in his reverence? Percy stirred, his eyelids fluttering open as if roused from a dream. But his gaze didn’t fall on Apollo at first—it lifted, drawn to the horizon, where the sun began its languid ascent. Its light reflected in Percy’s sea-green gaze, transforming it into a molten tide, both fierce and serene.

And then, citrine met azurite.

Apollo lay beneath him, his body half-submerged, hair fanning out in impossibly long tendrils that shimmered like molten gold spilled across the waves. During the healing, they had grown, unruly and vibrant, as though the magic that coursed through him had defied restraint, blooming where it pleased. Apollo didn’t know why this transformation had occurred, nor did he care—he only knew that Percy’s gaze had finally found his.

Percy’s expression was unreadable, save for the faint flicker of something Apollo hoped was more than indifference.

But just as quickly, the moment broke. Percy released him, his touch vanishing as though it had never been, and with it, the fragile connection that Apollo had dared to imagine.

Panic flared in Apollo’s chest, raw and unrelenting. He reached for Percy without hesitation, his arm encircling his waist to draw him close. His golden eyes searched Percy’s face, then darted downward, locking on the place where he had glimpsed a wound before. A wound made by Paris.

His hands trembling as they roamed over Percy's side, searching, desperate. The thought of injury gnawed at the edges of reason. He knew—knew—demigod could heal in water, yet the fear refused to abate.

With a sharp shove, Percy cast Apollo's hand aside, and a torrent surged forth, crashing over the god with the wrath of a scorned sea, as though the very ocean spat in his face.

A scowl, dark and unrelenting, shadowed Percy’s features as he dragged the tattered chiton back over his skin. Every gesture screamed accusation.

Apollo’s brows knit in confusion, his golden gaze searching Percy’s face, unable to grasp the rejection. He had only sought to ensure the mortal was unscathed, to chase away the imagined specters of harm.

Did he cross the line? The tempest of anger on Percy’s beautiful face was clear, but there, too, in his gaze, a flicker of something else. Fear.

It was a guarded vulnerability, wrapped in anger’s armor, and it struck Apollo deeper than any spoken rebuke could.

Apollo, trembling with an ache that seemed to bleed into his bones, decided to not advance again, yet something in him resisted—how could he, when Percy was so fleeting, and there was no one to stop him from claiming what had always felt his?

Percy remained before him, a shimmering figure who had not yet vanished into the cold embrace of the ocean. He was there, still, a flickering breath between them that Apollo could not let go.

"Don’t run." Apollo rasped, his voice hoarse, as hunger still danced in the burnished gold of his eyes. "I won’t hurt you."

The faintest twitch of Percy’s brow was the only sign of the disbelief that churned beneath the surface.

"I thought you’d left me to rot," Apollo murmured, his chest rising and falling beneath the strain of his words. "Or worse—landed that strike right in my heart…but you didn’t. You stayed. You healed me. So tell me—what does that mean?”

"Nothing," Percy replied, his voice sharp, icy. "You simply looked too pathetic to ignore." His words were a rejection, a cold front that should have cast Apollo away, but instead, it only seemed to draw the sun god closer.

Apollo’s gaze lingered on Percy’s lips—those lips, always poised to spill venom like a serpent coiled to strike.

But the thought of that mouth, claimed by another—Paris—flickered in Apollo’s mind like a shadow he could not outrun. Did Paris posses more than just the taste of Percy’s kiss, Apollo wondered, as jealousy and a bitter, scorching possessiveness twisted in his chest. The idea of someone else’s claim on Percy, on what he believed was his own, burned.

"For you, it might mean nothing," Apollo murmured, his golden eyes now dimming with something darker, more vulnerable. "But for me, it means everything."

And then, poisoned thoughts spiraled back to Apollo—the wound of his folly, the searing edge of pride that had steered Percy to his death.

The memory unfurled like a dark bloom in his mind: the day he cradled Percy’s lifeless body in his arms, the warmth of life extinguished, leaving only the cold weight of his failure. The days stretched endlessly after, standing vigil over that unmoving form, his golden hands trembling with a god’s impotence, wondering if those eyes, once so defiant, would ever open again. It was a torment that burned brighter than his own light, a grief that no hymn could soothe.

“Since the day your heart ceased its rhythm,” he continued, his voice raw and trembling on the precipice of confession, “I have been unable to escape the specter of my greatest failure—my inability to save you in time.”

Percy’s lips twisted into a bitter smile, the kind that concealed wounds too deep to heal. “I remember that day well. I called for you,” his voice quavered, straining to swallow the hurt clawing its way from his throat. “When Eros defiled me, drank my blood, sank his claws into my heart, I was counting the seconds for your arrival. But the world grew dim, my pleads went unanswered, and then...I was no more.”

Apollo’s expression darkened, regret pooling in his features like ink spilling across a golden canvas. Sadness. Helplessness. Regret so palpable it could crush the air from the lungs. And yet, Percy felt no satisfaction, no reprieve from the storm within.

“Please...” Apollo’s voice wavered, trembling like a bowstring drawn too tight, yet beneath it lurked a warning. He could not bear it—not from Percy’s lips, not the echo of his failure spoken aloud.

But Percy pressed on. "Was that your design?" he asked, his voice trembling, haunted by the past. "Were you finally tired of tormenting me? Did you cast me into Eros’s grasp, to let him finish what you had started?"

"Enough!" Apollo’s voice shattered the air. “Don't for a second believe that," he said, voice fierce with conviction. “I left you with Eros because I believed—foolishly—that he could make you immune to love’s magic. But my arrogance, my hubris… I did not foresee the cost. I did not foresee that you would suffer in the process, that Eros would turn on me, lose control, and in his madness, kill you.”

Percy’s laughter was bitter, a sound carved from the marrow of his anger. “Well, you can rest assured it worked,” he murmured.

Apollo straightened, the faintest glimmer of relief flickering across his face—a sight that only deepened the storm raging in Percy’s chest.

Why was he still here? Why was he talking to Apollo? He should be gone, swallowed by the ocean’s embrace, far from him, far from this ache that refused to die.

“You pushed me down this path,” he continued, his words low and venomous, “without my knowledge, without my consent. And this—” Percy’s breath caught, the weight of it all pressing against his chest like a stone. “This will be yet another thing I cannot forgive you for.”

Apollo watched, his heart sinking with the weight of the words, each one a strike against him.

"If I could turn back time," Apollo whispered, "I would do so without a heartbeat, and I would undo every single mistake, rewrite the fates."

But even as he spoke, Apollo’s mind flickered to his conversation with Kronos, to the unbearable knowledge of Percy’s origins, so far removed in time. So far...

"What can I do to atone?" Apollo’s plea was laced with desperation. "I will do anything, anything... but do not cast me away," he whispered, a prayer carved from the rawest need.

Percy paused, his mind a storm of uncertainty. Apollo could take him to Mnemosyne, help him reclaim his memories. But there was fear—fear that once Percy set foot on Olympus, he would never leave. A gilded cage, locked and heavy, awaiting him.

There was too much at stake. He was ensnared by forces far beyond his understanding—Paris to find, a city to protect. And there was no certainty that Apollo would lead him to Mnemosyne at all. Trust had long since fled, and now, more than ever, he could not be contained.

"What can I do to atone?"

Apollo’s question hung in the air, unanswered, as they stood frozen in the thick silence between them. Rough sand clung to their skin, the screech of seagulls above was the only sound that dared to break the stillness, while the waves whispered against their bodies.

Should Percy even grant him the mercy of atonement?

"Perhaps..." Percy’s voice was low, a murmur that trembled with the weight of his thoughts. “Perhaps I would command you to blind yourself, or sever your tongue and rob yourself of speech. You could seal yourself within the gilded tomb of your palace, never to emerge. To stand powerless, your divine hands idle, as your friends fell before you.”

His words dripped with venom, each one a cruel reflection of the torment he had borne and the raw desire for justice.

Apollo’s chest tightened, his breath hitching under the weight of Percy’s wrath. Without warning, he conjured a dagger, its blade glinting like a shard of fallen starlight, and without hesitation, he drove it toward his own eye. The motion was frantic, a fevered act of penance.

The blade struck true, tearing through divine flesh. A rivulet of ichor, luminous and golden, spilled down his cheek, a macabre mimicry of tears. He raised the dagger again, his grip unsteady, poised to blind himself completely.

But Percy’s hand shot out, iron and unyielding, clamping around Apollo’s wrist before the blade could find its mark. With a force that sent shockwaves through both their bodies, Percy wrenched the weapon away, flinging it to the sand where it landed with a muted thud, its brilliance dimmed against the grains.

“Have you lost your mind?” Percy demanded, his breath ragged as if it had been stolen mid-battle.

Apollo blinked, ichor dripping down his cheek and onto his heaving chest, the golden rivulets glimmering like threads of liquid light. “Did you not command it of me?” he rasped,

Percy looked at him as though seeing a stranger, his brow furrowing. “I didn’t expect—” His words faltered, the thought left unfinished.

Since when did Apollo listen to his requests, Percy wondered bitterly, the thought a sharp barb lodged deep in his chest. Was Apollo ensnared by some enchantment? Could Eros have loosed one of his wicked arrows? How else could he explain this strange, reckless devotion?

“What else can I do to earn your forgiveness?” Apollo asked, his voice raw with desperation and a fragile, aching hope that made Percy freeze. His heart stuttered at the words, the impact of them radiating through him like a ripple on still water.

“This is not how it works,” Percy said sharply, though his voice wavered. He shook his head, his gaze narrowing. “You are unbelievable...” His words softened into a whisper, a mixture of frustration and disbelief. Then his eyes flicked to Apollo’s wounded face, the slow, steady drip of ichor staining his skin. “Why are you not healing?” he asked, his tone edged with suspicion. “Doesn’t it hurt?”

“It does,” Apollo admitted, his voice calm, too calm, as though the pain were an old companion. He did not flinch, his expression unreadable. “You’ve done wonders before. You could heal me now, too.”

Percy blinked, momentarily stunned by the absurdity of the request. “Aren’t you the god of healers?”

Apollo’s gaze did not waver, his face an enigma, untouched by the irony. “I’m too weak to heal myself yet,” he answered, the corners of his mouth twitching ever so slightly.

Percy turned his head sharply, as though the weight of Apollo’s plea were a physical thing he could escape. There was no way he would waste his energy on Apollo again. He deserved this pain, Percy thought grimly.

Apollo hissed softly, covering his wounded eye with a trembling hand, his fingers slick with ichor. The sight should have been pitiful, but there was something theatrical about it, as if the god himself were staging his suffering.

Percy turned his head slowly to Apollo, his gaze sharpening. Was Apollo truly not jesting?

Even as a part of Percy found satisfaction in the sight, there was a sharp edge of irritation gnawing at him.

He approached Apollo, his movements sharp with irritation, but his touch—when it came—was surprisingly steady.

Without a word, he reached for god’s hand, pulling it gently away from the wounded eye. The god’s fingers were trembling, slick with ichor that gleamed like molten gold against his skin. Percy ignored the way Apollo’s breath hitched at the contact.

“If I heal you,” Percy began, his voice a dangerous calm, “will you stop this madness? Will you finally leave me be?”

“Is this the only price you demand?” Apollo’s voice was a sigh.

“Yes.” Percy’s answer was final, a hard edge to it that left no room for negotiation.

In the briefest of breaths, Apollo blinked—and in that moment, the wound on his eye vanished, as if the world had forgotten the shape of pain, as though the dagger had never existed, the memory of suffering erased with the simple stroke of a god’s will.

Percy’s face shifted rapidly—surprise flaring in his eyes, confusion clouding his features, before the unmistakable heat of anger set in, a fire that burned hotter than before.

He recoiled, as if the god himself had poisoned the very air around him, his hand rising, trembling with the desire to strike—but Apollo caught it with a maddening smirk.

“You were toying with me,” Percy’s voice cracked.

“I did miss our games,” Apollo replied, his voice a velvet echo. “You have not changed, my love. The same naive boy you always were.” His words were not mockery, but something far more dangerous—tenderness laced with a kind of ache.

But beneath that tender sheen was a raw, ravenous hunger, unmistakable and searing. Those golden eyes fixed upon him like a predator’s, unblinking and coiled with intent. Percy felt as though he stood before a creature no longer caged.

His breath came in shallow gasps, and he wrenched his wrist from Apollo’s grasp with a single, desperate motion. Apollo let him go, but that was not enough. He was still ensnared by his gaze, still trapped in the heat of his presence.

“I’m sorry,” Apollo said suddenly, as if the weight of his own actions had caught up with him in a single, crushing moment. “I just wanted to feel your touch.”

Percy stood frozen, his pulse roaring in his ears, torn between the ache of something unspoken and the overwhelming need to flee.

But answers. He needed answers first, as desperate as the air he breathed. And now, with the water lapping at his feet, the tide an old ally, Percy felt confidence. The sea was his domain, a realm where he could bend the very currents to his will. Here, with Apollo standing before him, he was not a helpless mortal, but a creature of the deep, with all the power of the ocean at his back.

He could fight Apollo here, could vanish into its depths if the need arose, let the waves swallow him whole, leaving Apollo to burn alone.

He grasped at the thread of an important question, one that had gnawed at him since the mountain had given up its captive.

What force had dared to imprison a god?

“What happened to you?” Percy murmured, the words barely more than a breath.

Apollo drew a slow, weighted breath, the ache to close the distance between them twisting within him like a wound. “I felt it—your pain,” he said, his voice a low, tremulous chord. “I came to you the moment it struck me. I saw your side bleeding, Paris in pursuit, and I knew. I went after him, and then….”

His hands rose, hesitant yet yearning, fingers brushing the air near Percy’s temple. Percy recoiled, tilting his head back, his wariness palpable. Apollo’s whisper was soft but insistent. “Let me show you.”

Percy’s eyes flickered with hesitation, the weight of his mistrust warring against curiosity. After a breath that felt stretched into eternity, he leaned forward, surrendering inches. Apollo’s fingers, light as breath, touched his temple, and the world fractured into memory.

The heavens raged, the sky a tapestry of searing gold and bruised shadow. Clouds churned like the surf of an angry sea, and the wrath of gods burned in each streak of light Apollo loosed from his bow. Each arrow was a spear of radiance, descending in a blinding deluge upon Paris—or the creature he had become.

What stood before Apollo was no longer merely a god. His skin was the hue of smoldering embers, his eyes molten, alive with the chaos of flames that knew no master.

Yet, beneath the volcanic rage, Apollo glimpsed something else—a fissure, a trembling void. Paris’s fury was untamed, wild, yet in its heart, it seemed to lack direction, a child lost in a labyrinth of its own making. He appeared almost pitiable, his rage a howl against the wind of something he could not name.

Apollo’s pity, however, was fleeting. The image of Percy’s blood-streaked form burned brighter than compassion. His arrows struck true, shards of divine fury meeting flesh that burned and mended in a grotesque cycle. Athena’s barrier barred him from Percy’s side, the magic impassable even as his heart screamed to reach him. Paris, though wounded, remained a maelstrom of danger, his every motion a ripple of destruction.

In the chaos, Apollo began to understand the truth of Paris’s transformation. Whatever power Hera had bestowed upon him, it was unbridled, a force too vast and too volatile for prince’s hands to wield.

At one moment, Paris clutched his head, his fingers clawing at his temples as if to tear the power from within. He fell to his knees, his scream ripping through the air like a jagged blade.

The god’s fingers trembled against Percy’s temple as the memory began to fade, but its echoes lingered.

“No,” Percy said, his voice sharp and urgent. He reached up, his hand guiding Apollo’s back to his temple with a resolute grip. “Show me more.”

Apollo faltered for only a breath, his golden eyes wide with something that could have been hesitation—or reverence. How could he deny Percy anything, especially the truth? And so, he obeyed, his touch steadying, the memory surging forward once more.

The earth quaked in answer to Paris anguish, a groaning protest that swelled into calamity. From the fractured ground, a mountain rose—ancient, primordial, torn from its slumber.

Apollo’s breath caught, his body blazing with molten light as he prepared to strike. Yet even his fury could not overshadow the awe of the sight before him. The mountain loomed, its shadow vast and consuming, swallowing the light of the sun god as it ascended.

And then, with a deafening roar, it fell.

The mountain struck, its impact a cataclysm that rippled through the earth and sea. Waves rose in anguished protest, forests trembled and split.

Apollo was cast into shadow, his light dimmed beneath the colossal weight and then the darkness claimed him.

He waited there for days, each moment stretching into an eternity, his heart torn between longing and despair. Then, through the haze, he saw it—Percy’s face, faint and blurred like a half-remembered dream. But to Apollo, it was unmistakable. He would know that face, that scent, that touch, anywhere. The air around him seemed to hum with it, the familiar warmth of Percy’s presence sinking into his soul, a sweetness too sharp to bear.

Percy’s grip tightened, then loosened, and in that moment, he severed the fragile thread that bound him to Apollo’s memories. They were back on the shore, the rising sun casting its golden hue upon the world.

“Why didn’t you heal?” Percy asked. “Your wounds weren’t that severe.”

Apollo’s golden gaze flickered, a faint shadow crossing his face before he replied. “You’re right,” he admitted, his tone calm but laced with a bitterness that was almost imperceptible. “But somehow, Paris managed to slow my regeneration. Clever little prince,” he added with a wry twist of his lips, though his eyes betrayed no amusement. “He struck in just the right way to weaken me—bled more ichor from me than I should have lost.”

Percy stared at him, the weight of the words sinking in.

Manipulation of time again—it was a power few could wield. Could Paris possess such an ability? Hera wouldn’t have gifted him such a weapon. Who else could have?

His mind latched onto a name, a figure draped in shadows and chains. Kronos. The Titan of Time. But Kronos was bound in Tartarus, his power sealed, his reach severed. Wasn’t he? Percy’s chest tightened, the pieces refusing to align, the logic slipping through his grasp like grains of sand.

This didn’t make sense. None of it did.

His gaze shifted back to Apollo.

“Paris slowed you,” Percy murmured, his voice more to himself than to the god. “That shouldn’t be possible.”

Apollo tilted his head, a faint smirk tugging at his lips.

Percy’s jaw clenched. “If you know something, say it.”

The sun god’s eyes darkened, shadows pooling in their golden depths. “I know as much as you do,” he admitted. “But time is not immutable. It bends for those who have the will—or the audacity—to twist it. If Paris wields such power, then someone far greater than him has placed it in his hands.”

Now, more than ever, Percy’s resolve to find Paris burned like a fever in his chest. There was no denying it—something spectral shadowed Paris, warping him into a figure Percy could scarcely recognize. And when the moment demanded courage, Percy had fled.

But what choice had he, truly? Paris had become a force beyond mortal reckoning, a tempest Percy could not command. That he had overpowered even Apollo was a testament to the unnatural affliction gripping him.

Percy regarded Apollo with narrowed eyes, the god’s face maddeningly serene, far too composed for one who had been bested by a lesser divinity.

The thought gnawed at Percy: Should he confide in Apollo, reveal his suspicion that Paris’s soul might not be his own? Possession—an idea too wild, too far-reaching. Yet, could it be the truth?

No. Not yet. Percy needed to return to Troy, to confront Paris, to unearth whatever truth still lingered in the chaos. If words could reach him, Percy would find them.

“You want to go back to Troy, don’t you?” Apollo’s voice cut through Percy’s reverie, sharp as a blade. “To him.” Percy blinked, startled. Were his thoughts etched so plainly on his face?

“You barely escaped with your life, and now you’d walk willingly back into the lion’s maw?” Apollo’s tone carried disbelief, his gaze searching Percy’s face as though for a shred of reason.

“I just want my friend back,” Percy whispered. Paris was the last tether to the world he cared for; without him, Percy drifted, unmoored and directionless.

“This friend of yours,” Apollo said, his voice steeped in a cruel sort of clarity, “flung a dagger toward you. He doesn’t care for you anymore—Hera has reshaped him into her own image.”

Percy turned his head, unable to meet the god’s piercing eyes. “Paris would never harm me—not on purpose. He meant the blade for Helen. I simply... leaned into its path.”

“Of course you did.” Apollo’s lips curled into a smile, but it was the kind that carved wounds. Bitter and despairing. His hands found Percy’s shoulders, their grip firm, almost pleading.

“Don’t touch me,” Percy warned.

“Perseus…,” Apollo said, his voice like the tremor before a storm. “Always dancing on the knife’s edge, so willing to bleed, so unwilling to live. Do you think the gods are unfeeling? That I am bereft of feeling? Or is it that you delight in testing the depths of my torment, seeking the limits of my care?”

Percy’s fists clenched, and the water around him began to stir, coiling in restless spirals as though mirroring the storm within.

“Both!” Percy’s voice tore through the air, raw and unsteady, a wound laid bare. “You didn’t care about my feelings.” The words broke from him like a dam giving way, and though he fought to keep them at bay, the tears came, hot and traitorous, carving silent paths down his cheeks. “Why should I care for yours?”

The question hung between them, a jagged thing. In Percy’s eyes, Apollo was bereft of feeling, when he defiled Percy, when he killed Aregos before his eyes. That was the Apollo Percy remembered—the one who had stripped away the pieces of him, leaving only the raw, exposed wounds to fester in the dark corners of his mind.

Apollo’s lips parted, but no words came at first. His hands, so often instruments of destruction, now curled around Percy’s shoulders, trembling as they gripped him with a gentleness that belied his strength.

“I loathe what I’ve become in your eyes. And yet, I cannot let go of this hope…that maybe one day, I could be more than the monster you see before you.” He swallowed hard, his gaze searching Percy’s face for something—anything—that might absolve him. “I am sorry, Percy.”

Percy shivered at the sound of his name, the syllables falling from Apollo's lips like a warm wind, stirring something fragile and broken inside him.

“So sorry… for everything. For all the pain I’ve caused you... and for the love I never knew how to give.” Apollo’s voice faltered, the weight of his words heavier than any blow he had ever struck.

Percy listened to Apollo’s words, but they felt foreign, as though they did not belong to the face that was staring at him. This man—this hollow god—stood before him, draped in anguish like a borrowed mask, a mask too human, too unbearable to be real.

He had seen too much of this version of Apollo today: first, crushed beneath the mountain’s wrath, reduced to a broken creature clawing for life, and now this—this god undone, weighed down by invisible wounds.

Could this be Apollo’s game, a masterful performance meant to make him forget the monster he was?

“Stop this,” Percy said, his voice trembling with a weariness that clung to his bones like frost. His hands rose, gripping Apollo’s wrists. Slowly, he withdrew the god’s hands, casting them away like dead weight.

“Stop what?” Apollo replied, his voice a quiet thunder as his hands fell, a sunbeam extinguished, to his sides.

“Pretending you’ve changed.” Percy answered, his words a whisper of defiance. He met Apollo’s gaze with a steady, unwavering look, his heart a fortress that no apology could breach.

Apollo stepped closer, the space between them shrinking until Percy could feel the heat radiating from his skin. “I know you cannot see it now,” he said, his voice like honeyed fire, smooth yet searing, “but in time, you will. I am prepared to love you as I was meant to. All I crave is to shield you, to tend to you, to please you.”

The lure of Apollo's gaze, deep and endless, threatened to swallow him whole. The sharp angles of the god’s face, every curve a promise of something lost and never to be had, nearly tore him apart.

Percy remembered the dream Hypnos had sent him—crafted to torment, to show him what would forever remain out of reach—and yet, despite the cruelty of it, Percy could not sever the tie.

The longer he gazed upon Apollo’s face, the sweeter the honeyed words that lingered in his ears, the deeper the temptation to surrender, to believe, began to gnaw at him. Yet, the scars of betrayal ran too deep, the wounds too fresh, to allow trust to rise again.

With a steadying breath, Percy tore his gaze from the god’s face, forcing the temptation back down where it belonged. For Apollo, it was a wordless rejection, a silent truth that his words, however eager, were nothing but fleeting whispers against the iron of the armor Percy wore around his heart.

Apollo’s jaw tightened, a flicker of something dark passing across his eyes before he acted. In an instant, his hands shot out, seizing Percy’s wrists with a grip unyielding, pulling them toward him. His chest, bare and searing with heat, pressed against the demigod’s palms.

"You found me beneath the rubble. You saved me, mended me with hands so patient, so careful.” Apollo’s voice was no longer a plea, but a demand, sharp and insistent. ”I know there is a place for me in your heart, even if it is but a shadowed corner. I will take it. I will cherish it. But please—let me in.”

Percy gritted his teeth, the word escaping his lips like a frozen blade.

“No.”

Percy called forth a vortex, the waters spiraling into a maelstrom that enveloped them both. The sea reached for its chosen son, pulling Percy into its depths. Apollo, radiant even in the chaos, was cast out, hurled ashore in a cascade of brine and fury.

“Perseus!” Apollo shouted, his voice raw with frustration, his golden eyes searching the empty waves.

But the sea—vast, eternal, indifferent—responded with nothing but the low hum of its ceaseless waves and the sharp screech of distant seagulls.

For a fleeting moment, Apollo’s body burned with an ethereal flame, a blaze that consumed him entirely, scorching the air, before it vanished, leaving only frustration in its wake. He stood there, his chest rising and falling with the ragged breath of a god who could not, for all his power, grasp the one thing he desired most.

Apollo’s gaze flickered to the side, drawn by an almost imperceptible disturbance in the air.

There, like a serpent, Ares sat sprawled languidly atop a cluster of sun-bleached rocks, the sea glinting behind him. He tore lazily into a dried fig, his gaze sharp and watchful, though his grin curled with cocky amusement.

Apollo’s voice broke the stillness, sharp and cutting. “What are you doing here?”

Ares flicked another fig into the air, his teeth flashing as he bit into it. “Keeping my eye on the kid,” he said, his words muffled by the mouthful he chewed. He meet Apollo’s glare with an infuriating calm. “Hungry?”

Zeus summoned Poseidon before him, his throne towering high and casting a shadow over the god of the sea, whose presence rippled like the undercurrent of a storm restrained beneath an unbroken surface. The air between them was thick with unspoken tensions, a stillness that carried the weight of distant thunder—a silence that felt like the held breath before a tempest.

“Your son, Einalian, where is he now?” Zeus’s voice broke the quiet, yet heavy with a subtle undertone of something darker.

Poseidon’s eyes flickered, softening at the mention of Perseus—a brief, almost imperceptible moment of pride—but then sharpening as the question settled. Zeus’s interest was never casual, and this inquiry felt poised on the edge of something treacherous.

“In Troy,” Poseidon said slowly, his tone guarded. “Why do you ask?”

Zeus leaned forward on his throne, the faintest smile tugging at his lips, though it was devoid of warmth. The golden bands of his armrests gleamed in the dim light, reflecting his inscrutable expression. “From what I’ve learned, I have come to suspect that Perseus is not what he claims to be,” Zeus said, his words precise.

Poseidon’s blood turned to ice. His fingers flexed, and the faint scent of brine filled the chamber as his power threatened to spill out. “What are you accusing my son of?” he demanded, gaze piercing like harpoons aimed for truth.

Zeus did not flinch under Poseidon’s glare. Instead, he leaned back, his fingers drumming against the arm of his throne, the rhythm steady, maddening. “Let me pose a thought to you, brother,” Zeus said, his tone almost mocking, though not without its usual gravity. “What do you truly know of him? He who appeared so suddenly, so completely, yet carries with him an aura that feels… foreign to your tides?”

Poseidon’s hand tightened on the shaft of his trident, the golden weapon humming faintly in response. “I know my son,” he growled, his voice now laced with a low warning. “I see myself in him—my strength, my defiance, my storms. Speak plainly, Zeus.”

The King of the Gods chuckled softly. “Do you now? Or do you see only what you wish to see? He is not the mirror you believe him to be, Poseidon. There are whispers—whispers that his blood is not entirely yours. That perhaps it is another’s.”

Poseidon stepped forward, his towering presence now darkening the hall. The still air seemed to churn, ripples spreading outward as if the very atmosphere responded to his fury. “Choose your next words carefully, brother,” Poseidon warned, the faint echo of waves crashing resounding in his voice.

Zeus’s eyes glinted, his confidence unshaken. “There is a connection, a thread, that binds Perseus to Hekate,” he said, his words deliberate and cutting. “Too much magic lingers in him—too much darkness that calls to shadows rather than light. Is it not curious how his path weaves with hers, how her presence cloaks him like a second skin?”

“Sea has its darkness as it has its light,” Poseidon intoned. He held Zeus’s gaze, his own simmering with defiance. “It is no strange thing that the boy leans toward death in times such as these, times steeped in war and chaos.”

Zeus’s expression was a mixture of pity and disdain “The sea is vast, yes—but it is also treacherous. Hekate’s magic is no less so. Her child could take on any shape, any guise, to sow the seeds of ruin.”

The mention of Hekate sharpened Poseidon’s focus. “You accuse her now? A Titaness who has stood apart from Kronos’s schemes? Who fought by our side when Olympus stood on the brink?”

“And yet, she has always walked the line between us and the Titans, her loyalty to none but herself. What would stop her from crafting a weapon—a child capable of deception so perfect that even you, her intended victim, would remain blind to the truth?” Zeus countered, his voice a whisper of storm winds and electric menace. “Isn’t it convenient? A mortal boy appears, claiming the blood of Poseidon, wielding powers even the eldest gods hesitate to name. Do you truly believe this is coincidence? Or is it design?” He gestured towards the heavens as though the Fates themselves whispered in his ear. “What if he was sent to deceive us?”

The very foundations of Olympus trembled beneath his rage, cracks spidering across the marble as his voice thundered. “Enough! I will not stand here and let you sully the name of my son with your baseless accusations!”

Zeus remained unshaken, his expression cold and detached, as if Poseidon’s wrath was nothing more than a distant storm on the horizon. “Baseless, you say? Then tell me why this was found beneath Kronos’s prison.” With a flick of his hand, a gleaming sea-green pearl materialized, pulsing faintly with ancient magic.

Poseidon reached for the object, catching it in his palm, and froze, his fury tempered by a sudden and gnawing unease. “What is that?” he asked, though he already knew. His heart clenched.

“Your son's eye,” Zeus said softly, the words cutting deeper than any blade. “It was lying there, under Kronos’s feet, enchanted to reveal his every move. Why would it be there, Poseidon, unless he himself placed it?”

Poseidon’s heart skipped a beat, but his face remained impassive as he studied the pearl in his hand. Kronos had used it to watch him.

A chill ran through Poseidon’s veins, not of cold but of something far deeper—something ancient and protective gnawing at his soul.

Zeus straightened, the folds of his robes shifting like storm clouds as he loomed over his brother. The hum of his power was low but insistent.

“You and I both know—for you to sire a mortal son is improbable, at best. And yet…” He let the sentence linger, heavy with insinuation. “And yet, he tastes of salt and storm, carries the scent of brine and kelp, and his gaze—ah, his gaze—matches the depths of your oceans.”

Poseidon’s jaw clenched. Still, Zeus pressed on, his voice now dropping to a silken hiss, every word poised to wound. “The Titaness of sorcery, mistress of the crossroads. You know her craft as well as I—illusions layered upon illusions, truths buried beneath lies. She could shape a child to mimic your bloodline, to charm even your immortal senses."

The words echoed through Poseidon like a tsunami crashing against a cliff, but the god of the sea steeled himself, knowing he had to navigate through the storm of words that Zeus spun around him like a web.

His hands gripped the pearl so tightly that his knuckles turned white, but he refused to let it fall.

But still, beneath it all, Poseidon held on to one truth: Percy was his son. And no matter how many gods tried to tear that away from him, it would never change.

“You summon me here,” Poseidon began, his voice sharp as sea glass, “to accuse my son—not only of conspiring with Kronos but of being unworthy of the blood that binds him to me?” He swiped a hand over his brow, the motion more for clarity than weariness, though the tension was beginning to gnaw at his resolve.

Zeus leaned forward. “I am saying,” he drawled, each word weighted with menace, “that I will wait for his misstep. And when it comes—because it will come—I will prove to you that he stands with Kronos, much like Hekate. They both hunger for his return, and I will not sit idly by until their ambitions undo the world.”

It was not a threat; it was a promise. The faint crackle of thunder in the distance seemed to punctuate his words.

Poseidon’s lips curled into a snarl. “Perseus is mine,” he said, each word a declaration of war. “And I will not let you—or anyone else—take him from me.”

Zeus’s smile was a cruel crescent, sharp enough to cut the air between them. “Then you had best keep him close, brother,” he said, his tone dripping with mockery, yet edged with something darker. “For the day he falters, I will be there to catch him—and to prove you wrong.”

Poseidon’s eyes widened, the weight of the threat crashing over him like a rogue wave. The chamber seemed to quiver as his rage rippled through the air, his aura darkening with the wrath of the ocean unleashed. “If you so much as harm him,” Poseidon growled, his voice now a thunderclap that reverberated through the halls of Olympus, “you will have war.”

For a moment, the tension teetered on the edge of violence, the heavens and the seas poised to collide. But then Zeus stepped back toward his throne, his retreat more ominous than reassuring.

“War with me would mean ruin for us all. You cannot outmatch the lightning’s fury.”

“Perhaps,” Poseidon said, his voice quieter now, more dangerous for its calm. “But even the mightiest storm begins with a single drop.”

Zeus’s jaw tightened, but he said nothing.

Poseidon left the throne room of Olympus in a tempest of silence, his aura swirling like restless waves beneath a darkened sky. He descended from the lofty heights of Olympus, shedding his godly form like a serpent discards its skin, until all that remained was the guise of an old fisherman, weathered and bent by the tides of time.

He appeared on the shores of Tenedos at sunrise, the sea bathed in the soft gold and rose hues of the morning light, as the sun crept slowly over the horizon, spilling its warm rays onto the waters.

The salty wind tugged at his gray, unkempt hair and the tattered cloak draped over his shoulders. In his hands, he held a fishing net, frayed and patched, a tool too humble for the Lord of the Sea but fitting for his disguise.

Settling onto a rock smoothed by centuries of tides, Poseidon cast the net into the water, the act mechanical, his focus elsewhere. His azure eyes, now dulled to dark, bruised blue, swept over the horizon. The day seemed too tranquil, its gentle stillness betraying the turbulence within. It did not mirror the chaos unfolding on Troy’s blood-soaked sands, nor the tempest churning within Poseidon’s heart. Good, he thought, the word bitter on his tongue, an absurd wish born of fleeting hope. Tenedos should remain untouched by the cruelty of the world. Peaceful, eternal—for his son, for himself.

He turned his gaze back, eyes falling upon his son’s temple, a silent monument carved from stone and devotion. Waves licked its ancient steps, leaving trails of foam upon the stone’s cold surface. It’s time, he thought, a solemn weight settling upon his chest. Time to show his son what the world had crafted in his name.

The depths were cool and unyielding, their silence pressing against Percy’s ears as his muscles burned with exhaustion. The currents tugged at him like invisible hands, insistent, but he swam on, his resolve carving a solitary path through the shadowed abyss.

Then, as if the sea itself whispered his name, he felt his father's call—a soft, invisible force that urged him toward an unseen shore. He allowed the pull of Poseidon's magic to cradle him, guiding him gently towards the waiting arms of land.

When Percy surfaced, the sun’s rays kissed his back, their warmth an immediate balm to his chilled skin. He climbed up the rocks, smooth from the endless caress of the sea, each step a whisper against centuries of erosion. At the top, he saw the old fisherman, a figure hunched over his work, his weathered hands deftly tying the torn net.

"Come here and help the old man," the fisherman’s voice rumbled, familiar in its depth, and Percy needed no more invitation. Instinct surged through him like the pulse of the ocean itself. He knew, in that quiet moment, this was no mere mortal. This was Poseidon.

Percy climbed higher, catching the other end of the net as his father threw it to him. The strings slipped through his fingers, and with swift, practiced hands, he began to tie them together.

Poseidon’s eyes lingered on Percy, tracing every inch of his son’s form with a quiet, unspoken intensity. Zeus's words still echoed in his mind, sharp and unforgiving, and as he watched Percy work—his skin slick with sunlight, glistening as if kissed by the sea itself, and dark strands of hair clinging to his face. Droplets of water fell from his brow, tracing paths down his nose, dripping onto his thighs as he leaned into the net.

His sea-green eye narrowed, filled with a focus so intense it seemed to pulse with the rhythm of the tides. There was a shadow of worry etched upon his features, as if his mind, too, were tangled in some unseen storm.

He hoped the work would distract Percy, even if just for a breath’s time.

But even as he observed, Poseidon could feel the weight of the pearl tucked within the folds of his tattered robes, pulsing softly with a strange magic. He could feel it, yearning for its rightful place within Percy’s face, pulling toward his son like the moon’s pull on the tides. It called to him, a silent promise of sight.

Poseidon’s fingers twitched, the pearl’s weight now a gnawing temptation. If he kept it, the magic it held would grant him knowledge, the ability to track Percy’s every move, to sense his presence no matter the distance. It would give him a semblance of peace, a semblance of control.

If Zeus neared, Poseidon would know.

His heart fought against the quiet logic of the pearl's power, but in the end, Poseidon knew one truth—there was no peace without protection. And he would sacrifice whatever he had to, even if it meant keeping Percy incomplete.

"Why have you called me?" Percy asked, his chin lifting taking Poseidon out of his thoughts.

“We are on Tenedos for no trivial reason,” Poseidon replied, his tone rich with meaning. "I wish to show you something." He folded the net with a slow, deliberate motion, tucking it into the folds of his robes, before rising with a grunt.

"But first, you must change, boy," Poseidon added, his gaze sweeping over Percy’s disheveled chiton, torn and tattered. What would Amphitrite think of this? He could almost hear her sharp voice in his mind—better to walk in nothing at all than to disgrace oneself in such rags. Yet, Poseidon himself had never much cared for outward appearance, but Percy, his son, ought to at least adhere to society’s expectations. A chiton would suffice—perhaps a himation, too.

Before Percy could protest, a great wave rose with a suddenness that left no room for hesitation. The swell crashed over him, draping him in its icy embrace. As the water receded, foam clung to Percy’s form, transforming the ragged remnants of his attire into a creamy chiton, flowing and pristine, and a dark blue himation embroidered with gold.

Percy stood momentarily stunned, his breath caught between protest and confusion, before Poseidon’s voice broke the spell. “Come,” the god commanded. “Walk with me.”

They left the shore behind, their steps echoing softly against the stony path that wound upward like a trail of fallen dominoes. The uneven stones, weathered by time and tide, seemed almost precarious, as if they might tumble further at any moment. Above them, perched on the cliff’s edge stood a temple. Its walls gleamed an almost blinding white, the marble too pristine to carry the weight of centuries.

Percy’s brows arched as they climbed, the sight of the temple stirring a flicker of unease. The wind teased at his himation, tugging it playfully around his legs.

Poseidon entered the temple first, his figure a commanding presence, leaving Percy lingering at the threshold. The temple was eerily empty, a stillness that Poseidon welcomed. Percy hesitated, his gaze immediately locking onto the altar where a statue stood—an image carved with agonizing detail, painfully similar to himself.

"Father, what is this place?" Percy’s voice cracked the stillness.

“This is your temple,” Poseidon replied, his tone steady, yet undercut with something unreadable. He turned to Percy, is gaze piercing. “Do you recall Thetis’ wedding? I told you there was a way—a blood price for a blood debt. Apollo himself named it. A devotee could be sacrificed, someone willing to lay down their life to sever his hold over you.”

Percy recoiled, his shoulders stiffening as he remembered. “Father, I am no god. This place—it feels wrong. Turning my struggle into the suffering of others is a path I cannot walk.”

“The sacrifice I speak of is a necessity,” Poseidon answered, his voice roughened, his brows knitting with displeasure.

“I am free,” Percy shot back, his voice rising. “Look at me—standing in your domain, walking the earth unbound. Apollo holds no claim on me. This temple, this altar—it’s meaningless.”

“Meaningless?” Poseidon’s voice dropped, darkening with the tempest brewing in his gaze. “It is more vital now than ever. You will be worshipped when you ascend.”

Percy gripped the temple’s archway as though it might anchor him. “What did you say?” he asked, his voice taut with disbelief. “Didn’t you say it was my choice—to ascend or remain mortal?”

Poseidon’s chin lifted, his jaw tightening with resolve. “You may delay the inevitable, but you will not remain mortal for long.”

Percy pushed off the threshold, his steps deliberate as he approached Poseidon. His gaze a blade searching Poseidon’s visage for truth. “What changed your mind?” His voice cut the air, demanding answers.

Poseidon’s mouth pressed into a thin, unyielding line. His hand moved, gripping Percy’s nape, his fingers threading through dark locks.

The words that lingered on his tongue remained unsaid; he would not burden Percy with yet another weight, not when his son already carried the storms of the world in his gaze. Instead, Poseidon resolved to watch over him, to shield him from the encroaching shadows. Zeus would not lay a hand on him—not while the sea god still drew breath.

For now, he would bear the weight of this fear alone, letting it churn in the depths of his own heart.

"Father?" Percy asked, his gaze catching the shadow of an unspoken turmoil devouring Poseidon.

“I have one more place to show you,” Poseidon said at last, his voice a low tide, steady and unyielding. “A sanctuary you will reach when the need to shield you from the world arises.” With that, he released Percy and turned toward the temple’s threshold.

This was painfully suspicious. Poseidon was shielding him from something, but what? The Trojan War? Unlikely. His father knew of Percy’s resolve to stand with Paris, to protect the people of Troy, even against the tide of fate. Was it Apollo? Perhaps—but Percy had never seen his father so visibly unsettled, not even at Thetis’s wedding when he had been bound to Apollo’s side.

No, this was different. Fear of something far worse than Apollo, worse than war. It was an unease so profound that it had driven Poseidon to bring Percy here, to show him these places now, as though the act itself might prepare him for what lay ahead.

Percy lingered for a moment, the stillness of the space pressing against him. Frustration and curiosity warred within him, compelling his feet to follow Poseidon. Yet, as he moved, something drew his gaze—a glint of crimson against the muted tones of the altar.

There, amidst the curling smoke of incense and humble offerings of seashells and olives, lay a single red rose. Its petals were impossibly vivid, as though untouched by the mortal hand that had plucked it. Percy’s steps slowed, his breath catching as a heaviness settled in his stomach.

The rose seemed to shimmer, a soft glow emanating from its velvety folds, intensifying with each step he took toward it. When he reached out, its petals unfurled with a languid grace, as though greeting him.

And then he felt it—a presence as unmistakable as the sharp tang of salt in the air.

Eros.

Percy’s gaze darted around the temple, his heart hammering as though the god might descend upon him at any moment. But the space remained empty, the silence unbroken save for the faint rustle of the sea breeze.

Unease prickled his skin, and he pulled his hand back, leaving the rose untouched.

With hurried steps, he turned away, the weight of unseen eyes pressing against his back as he descended the stony steps to join Poseidon on the path to the shore.

As they resurfaced in the new place, Poseidon transformed before Percy’s eyes, shedding his mortal guise like a shadow vanishing at dawn.

The silence stretched between them, heavy and uncertain, until Poseidon’s voice cut through. “I wonder,” he began, his tone contemplative, “how I should call you. You are of the sea, so Einalian suits you well. But I’ve heard Apollo call you Perseus, and it made me wonder.”

Perseus. The name lingered in Percy’s mind, its weight pressing against him. The sacker of cities. A name that carried weight, the weight of destruction and conquest, of myth and expectation.

Einalian, too, seemed incomplete. Of the sea. It spoke of his bond to the sea, his father’s domain, but it felt distant, impersonal, like a title bestowed rather than a name lived.

Neither felt wholly his, as if they were cloaks draped over a figure no one truly saw.

And then there was Percy. A simple name, a mortal name. When they called him Percy, there was a strange warmth, a quiet hum in his chest that he couldn’t quite place. It felt real. It felt his.

He glanced at Poseidon, his expression softening as the decision settled within him. “Percy,” he said at last, his voice steady, carrying the faintest trace of a smile. “You can call me Percy.”

Poseidon’s gaze lingered on him, his sea-green eyes reflecting something deeper than amusement, something almost tender. “Percy,” he repeated, testing the name as if tasting salt on his tongue. “So be it.”

The air carried the scent of brine and wild earth as Poseidon led Percy through the shadowed grotto. The cavern yawned open like a beast’s maw, its walls glittering with salt crystals. There was a strange warmth here, a dampness that clung to Percy’s skin, and the sound of deep, resonant breathing echoed faintly in the depths. He followed his father’s towering silhouette, his steps faltering when a low rumble, more growl than greeting, vibrated through the stone.

“Do not falter,” Poseidon murmured. “He is of your blood.”

Percy swallowed hard, his fingers brushing his pin—unnecessary, he reminded himself. He’s family. Yet as they rounded the bend and the figure emerged from the shadows, Percy’s breath caught.

A cyclops loomed before him, colossal and hunched.

His skin, a riot of color, resembled the vibrant coral reefs—brilliant oranges, deep greens, and the muted blues of the ocean depths, thick and furrowed like the textured layers of the sea floor.

From his forehead, two jagged reef horns curled back, their edges sharp.

His face, framed by these strange, coral formations, bore a single, massive eye at its center. Beneath it yawned a cavernous mouth, a black abyss that seemed to inhale the salt-laden breath of the ocean with an endless, hollow hunger.

Etched into his body, as though forged from the wreckage of forgotten ships, were the twisted remnants of timber, barnacles, and rope, as if Poseidon had shaped him from the very bottom of the ocean in a burst of impatient creation.

His elongated fingers, sharp and gnarled like the tendrils of seaweed caught in an eternal current, twitched idly at his sides, clawing restlessly at the earth beneath him. Behind him, the faint bleating of sheep echoed through the cavern, their cries rising and falling in a dissonant hymn

“Father, who did you brought me?” Polyphemus roared, his voice a thunderclap that rattled Percy’s teeth.

“No one to eat, Polyphemus,” came the response, low and heavy, a shadow cast over the cavern. “His name is Percy. He is your brother.”

Percy froze as Polyphemus loomed over him, his breath hot and smelling faintly of seaweed and milk. The cyclops bent down, his horned head lowering until his saffron eye was level with Percy’s face. For a moment, Percy saw himself reflected there.

“You’re smaller than I thought,” Polyphemus said, tilting his head like a curious cat. “Much like my sheep.”

Poseidon chuckled, the sound as rough as breaking waves. “Polyphemus, show him your flock.”

At once, the cyclops straightened, his claws clapping together with a sound like breaking shells. “Yes…Yes. Come, Brother, you must meet them.” He turned with surprising eagerness, his heavy steps shaking the ground as he led them deeper into the grotto.

The sheep were strange, otherworldly creatures with thick, silvery wool that shimmered faintly in the torchlight. They milled about, bleating softly, their large, dark eyes filled with an unsettling intelligence. Polyphemus knelt among them, his sharp fingers surprisingly gentle as he petted one. “This one’s my youngest,” he said, holding up a small, trembling lamb. “Isn’t she adorable?”

Percy nodded stiffly, his eyes darting between the lamb and Polyphemus’s sharp claws. “Yeah, she’s… she’s great.”

Polyphemus beamed. “She likes you,” he said, pressing the lamb into Percy’s arms with a childlike insistence. Percy stumbled under its weight, the lamb’s wool impossibly soft and warm against his chest.

“This one is the oldest.” Polyphemus continued. He presented another sheep, its wool worn and tattered by age, its eyes clouded and milky, as though the passage of time had stolen its clarity. He pressed this sheep into Percy’s arms with the same unrelenting tenderness, making him let go of the youngest.

"And this one is my fattest," Polyphemus added, a gleam of pride in his voice. But this time, Percy stepped aside, unwilling to be crushed by the sheer weight of the creature. The sheep, indeed, was massive, its jaws working incessantly on something unseen.

Despite himself, Percy found his lips curling into a reluctant smile. Polyphemus, for all his monstrous appearance, had the innocence of a child. There was something endearing in the way he fussed over his flock, his claws careful not to harm them, his deep voice soft as he murmured to them.

“Do you like them?” Polyphemus asked, his eye gleaming with hope. “Father said you’d think they were wonderful.”

“They’re… yeah, they’re amazing,” Percy said, his voice quieter than he intended. He looked up at the cyclops, this strange, terrifying creature who, in his own way, felt more like a younger brother than an elder.

"So, which one’s your favorite?" Percy asked. 

Polyphemus paused, his head tilting slightly as his gaze swept over the flock. There was something in the stillness of his moment, as though he was searching for an answer not easily found. “I don’t have one,” he said, the words slow and heavy. “I like them all equally. They have their special traits, you see?” His finger rose in the air, gesturing toward the flock, but the light in his eye, once so full of joy, seemed to turn inward.

“How about this one?” Percy asked, his voice soft but tinged with something like challenge.

Polyphemus bent low, his single eye narrowing as he inspected the smallest lamb. Its wool was matted and its frame fragile, almost unnoticed among the others. “This one?” he muttered, his voice a low rumble, almost dismissive. “I don’t really like this one.”

Percy’s brow arched. “I thought you liked them all equally.”

Polyphemus shrugged, unbothered by the accusation. “It’s small, hard to notice. Always wriggling under my feet, like it wants to be stomped on.”

Percy’s gaze lingered on the lamb, its fragility striking a chord deep within him. “Maybe she just wants your attention.”

Polyphemus paused, his massive head tilting slightly as he considered Percy’s words. “Then why does she do it so recklessly?”

“Because she’s desperate for your love,” Percy said quietly, his eyes holding the cyclops’s. “Even if it means she’d be crushed under your foot.”

Polyphemus recoiled slightly, a sharp breath hissing between his teeth. “That’s sad... don’t say that,” he murmured, as if the thought itself wounded him.

“But it could be true,” Percy replied, his tone gentle yet firm.

Polyphemus glared at him, his gaze a sharp, burning gold. “I don’t like your words, brother. Leave me.”

With a reluctant turn, Polyphemus shifted his attention back to his flock, humming a low, rumbling tune. Percy, watching, felt a pang of something unfamiliar—pity, perhaps, or kinship. The cyclops was fearsome, yes, but beneath his monstrous form was a soul untouched by malice, a strange and fragile purity.

Percy’s gaze lingered on the cyclops for a moment longer before he stepped lightly to the edge of the cave, where his father waited, an amused glimmer in his eyes.

Polyphemus seemed more focused on the smallest sheep now, his immense form lowering as he crouched beside it, his single golden eye fixated on the creature with an unsettling mixture of reluctance and curiosity. The sheep, sensing the sudden weight of his attention, seemed to stir, her small body bouncing with newfound energy as if she had awakened to the force of his gaze.

Polyphemus, his eye widening, regarded her in silent awe. She seemed different now, brighter, as if the very essence of her being had bloomed under his gaze. His hand extended cautiously toward her, trembling slightly, as if unsure of this delicate shift between them.

Percy turned to Poseidon, his lips curling. “He’s adorable,” he confessed, and Poseidon’s brow arched in surprise.

“Few would speak thus of him,” Poseidon replied, his voice a mix of curiosity and humor. “More often, people flee in terror before they even glimpse his... beauty. Yet you, it seems, are unafraid.”

“He is large, I won’t deny that,” Percy said, craning his neck until it ached from the effort of constantly looking up at the cyclops. "But he is of the sea... he’s... home." The words carried a tenderness that did not escape Poseidon’s sharp eye.

God’s gaze softened, a rare moment of vulnerability breaking through his eternal composure. “He will protect you, and this,” he said, pressing a small pendant into Percy’s hand. It was delicate, a fragment of Polyphemus’s coral horn. “This will guide you to him.”

“Thank you,” Percy murmured, though a wry smile tugged at his lips. He couldn’t shake the feeling that, in truth, he would be the one to watch over the cyclops, not the other way around. Slipping the pendant over his neck, he let the weight of it settle against his chest, a strange sense of responsibility settling within him.

Polyphemus approached them then, his massive form shifting with surprising gentleness. In his hand, he cradled the smallest sheep, its wool soft and fragile in his enormous grasp. He knelt before his father and his new brother, his single eye wide with a tenderness that seemed at odds with his imposing figure.

“I think this one is my favorite.”

The day unfolded with an air of languid perfection, each moment unhurried as Eros strode toward the slumbering forms of Zephyrus and Eurus. Their bodies lay spent, glistening with sweat, the aftermath of their relentless chase and struggle evident in the smears of ichor and semen staining their skin.

Eurus had claimed his prize, while Zephyrus bore the bitter weight of punishment—a reckoning for daring to mock the capricious god of desire. Yet, the scene before Eros was more than the sum of vengeance exacted for insult. It pulsed with an undercurrent of deeper purpose, of designs veiled in the god's inscrutable smile.

Eros knelt beside the two wind gods, his slender fingers cradling a delicate conch shell. The shell shimmered in the light, its hues a tender blend of pink and white, like the blush of dawn meeting the purity of foam on a tranquil sea.

Once, Eros had considered keeping Zephyrus for himself—quick-footed and elusive, a creature of fleeting breezes. But Zephyrus lacked the tempest's fury, the strength to shatter and rend, to carry devastation across the seas, or to tear Perseus from his footing with a single gale. He was, in essence, insufficient for the grand designs that brewed within Eros's restless mind. Eurus, however, was another matter—a force of chaos, wild and unyielding, capable of sweeping worlds into disarray. Under Eros's curse, he would become a willing servant, eager to share the confines of the conch with his brother for as long as Eros willed it. Perhaps even until the god reclaimed his wings from Paris’s undeserving back.

A sly grin tugged at Eros’s lips as he lifted the conch to his mouth. With a breath as sweet as honey, he blew into the shell. The sound that emerged was haunting, resonant—a melody that seemed to coil through the air like a serpent of wind. In an instant, the conch began to draw the slumbering gods into its depths, their forms vanishing in a swirl of golden light. The shell devoured them whole, as if they had never been anything more than whispers on the breeze.

Eros lowered the shell and ran a hand over its smooth surface, his grin widening. He patted it lightly, as one might a cherished pet, before rising to his feet. The winds had been tamed, their power sealed within the shell. And Eros, triumphant, carried with him the storm in his palm, a tempest bound to his will.

No longer would he struggle to spread his influence. Lust, desire, and the aching hunger of the soul would flow from him with the ease of a breath, a whisper, a glance.

The first step of his resurgence was inevitable—he would return to his mother. The days of humiliation, of retreating into the shadows, of avoiding the pitying gazes of gods too blind to understand, had passed.

As the wind gods languished in the prison of Eros's magic, their power fading with every passing moment, his own strength surged. It was as though the very air around him pulsed with the rhythm of his growing confidence, radiant and intoxicating, a light that could no longer be hidden.

With a single, triumphant breath, he blew into the shell once more, and the wind began to stir. Slowly, the air lifted him, a soft, invisible hand guiding him upward. His balance steadied, and then—freedom. Wingless, but soaring higher than he had ever felt, Eros flew, his heart alight with the joy of reclamation, of power restored.