by Liz Meldon
* * *
“This is not the first time one of our temples has been desecrated, nor will it be the last, daughter.”
Athena turned her tight-lipped expression from her father, surveying the streets of Rome with calculating interest. In accordance with the lateness of the hour, only drunks and Vigiles wandered the narrow, cluttered roads. No one, patrolmen and inebriates alike, paid heed to the two cloaked figures seated on the steps of the great Pantheon, a sacred space thus far untouched by the population’s growing desire to strike pagan belief from the empire.
“I understand temples rise and fall,” she insisted, wishing he would instantly share her concern rather than question it. After all, they were two pieces of one whole, Athena and Zeus, for she had been born from his head. His wisdom begat hers, even if he whispered sometimes that she had long outgrown him.
“And I understand it can be upsetting to see your sacrifices stolen by these—”
“It’s not that.” She frowned, unable to quell the anxious churn of her gut. “It’s… Father, times are changing. The Cult of One gains traction with each passing day. Edicts are written in their favor. Many within the empire wish for the end of our reign.”
Zeus scoffed, his thick white beard twitching. Sometimes Athena wished she had been born an infant, like a mortal, rather than breaking from her father’s skull a full-grown woman. If she’d been a child, she would sit in his lap and toy with the wispy white curls. But she had never been a child. Athena had shouldered the weight of this world as soon as she clawed her way into existence.
“We have ruled the minds and hearts of our people for centuries,” Zeus argued lightly. Both their eyes fell to a scantily-dressed woman hauling a stumbling man across the viae, his speech loud and slurred. The scene lasted for only a moment before the whore pulled her client into one of the shadowy alleys across from the Pantheon, disappearing into the night. With a soft clearing of his throat, Zeus brought Athena’s attention back to him. “This is a passing fancy of zealots. Be at peace, daughter.”
“I cannot,” she said sharply. Athena let her father place a well-worn hand upon her cheek, thumb stroking her skin, but she refused to let the gesture soothe her. “This is a declaration of war on our kind. And we are not the only godly house against which this cult has made declarations. Their churches rise across the empire—in the east and in the west.”
“Let them rise—”
“They are taking our worshippers.” Athena held in an exasperated breath. She had long been accustomed to slowly, tactfully laying out her reasoning for those who refused to see from her perspective. While her brother Ares was quick to anger, especially when his point wasn’t immediately conceded, Athena had learned that patience and gentle explanation went a long way.
“Worshippers who would turn their backs on our family are not worshippers we want,” Zeus told her, “or need.”
“But you miss the point, Father,” Athena continued, taking his large hand in both of hers and giving it a squeeze. Mighty Zeus—dismissive and flippant with all, save for her. A soft sigh escaped her lips when their eyes met, his electric blue catching her weathered grey. “The more worshippers they take, the less there are for us—”
“I’m not a child,” he interjected briskly, brow knitted. “I understand the basic premise.”
“Father…” Athena bit the insides of her cheeks, unsure if she ought to lay the entire point of her argument out plainly or let him come to the conclusion on his own. In the interest of time, she opted for the former. “You know what becomes of gods who lose their worshippers. Their powers fade. Some turn mortal if enough forget. Think of the house of Anu in Mesopotamia. Most of their people worship a single god now, and his pantheon is all but dust.”
Zeus chuckled, though the sound lacked its usual carefree warmth. “Anu will be quite angry when I tell him you equated him to dust.”
“Father, he and his kin have lost nearly all their godly abilities. They are wandering vagrants—”
“I know, child,” he muttered, drawing her to him with an arm around her shoulders. Athena pressed her lips together again and waited, feeling the weight of his arm across her back. She had a plan, of course, to combat the spreading cult practices, but she refused to act without Zeus’s consent. Her remedy would involve outside pantheons, many with whom she had already established personal connections. If her father wished to handle the problem internally, Athena would respect his wishes for now—all the while continuing to argue her case, of course.
“This is a problem for the many,” she whispered.
“And how do you propose the many stop it?”
Athena wriggled out of Zeus’s grasp and crouched before him, her hands on his thick knees, her face tilted toward his. “A council of all the godly pantheons across this world.”
His thick brows rose, lips twitching as if fighting a smirk. “Athena—”
“A representative from each house will voice their family’s opinions,” she pressed on—one of the few who dared speak over Zeus. “The most levelheaded of us will come together and address this problem. It will be on all of our doorsteps if we let it go unchecked.”
Her father exhaled deeply, his breath sending a gust of wind across the square. Athena braced against it, letting her hood fall back so the moonlight kissed her cheeks.
“Very few houses get along with their own members, child, let alone with outsiders.”
“Outsider or not, I am ambassador to each.” Over the years, Athena had taken it upon herself to make an acquaintance in every godly family she could find. Although Zeus’s house stood well above the rest, she had always thought it wise to have friends in all realms. While she had never expected to call on them to face a common enemy such as this, the goddess had always had an inkling that a day would come when they all ought to unite. After all, there were more powerful beasts than gods in this world—just because primordial beings like the titans lay dormant didn’t mean they weren’t a threat.
“Let me travel to each,” Athena suggested, head cocked to the side as she surveyed her father. He had always taken her counsel in the past—so long as his pride wasn’t at stake. “I will start with Danu’s children in the Western Isles. My whisperers say Dagda rules the Otherworld alongside the triple goddess Morrigan. From there, north to Odin and his great Asgardian halls.”
And so on, and so forth, until Athena had a sizeable council of respected, logical representatives of the foreign pantheons. From there, they would discuss the growing threat until a solution presented itself.
“Morrigan… The Phantom Queen,” Zeus said with another scoff. He rose to his feet, swift and surefooted, and lifted Athena to hers. “You would be wise not to trust her.”
“She has the gift of prophecy. Surely she will see and understand the growing threat,” Athena argued with a smile, leaning into her father’s hand when he caressed her cheek once more. “So you approve of my plan?”
“Of course.” Moonlight, caught under the fold of his cowl, twinkled in his eye. “But you must not travel alone.”
She resisted the urge to roll her eyes. “Naturally.”
“And you will see me for one last council before you depart,” he added. Typical. Now he would go off to ponder her proposal, and when they next met face-to-face, there would be new stipulations, new restrictions, imposed upon her.
Athena kissed his warm cheek, nodding. “Of course.”
With one last affectionate squeeze of her shoulder, Zeus drifted off into the night, whistling as he went. Once he disappeared into the shadows, a distant rumble of thunder barreled across the now clouded skies. As Athena drew her hood up, she caught the brilliant flash of lightning, so bright one might mistake it for a second of daylight, followed swiftly by more thunder.
Perhaps the desecration of her temple had affected him more than Zeus cared to admit.
At the sight of two patrolmen striding toward her, she gathered her cloak and eased
back behind one of the nearby pillars.
And by the time the Vigiles would have reached her, Athena was long gone.
Chapter 2
“Will this cursed fog never lift?”
Athena hid her smile in the cowl of her cloak at the sound of poor Pan’s hooved feet catching on yet another exposed root. He swore under his breath, near enough that his ill temper made her horse whinny softly. Calm and collected as ever, Athena stroked the mare’s mane, willing her to find her courage, and led on.
“It won’t lift,” she said at the chorus of grumbling agreement to Pan’s complaints from the small entourage of deities who followed her. “As long as Morrigan rules the land, she will keep it in fog and shadow.”
“What a dreary existence,” she heard Sia groan. Of course this place would be unsuitable for an Egyptian god. While he had been the first to accept her invitation to travel to foreign courts, the miserable weather upon their arrival in the western lands, abundant with marshes and bogs and damp green fields, had soured his enthusiasm. She had chosen him for his mind, keen and sharp. Before her house had absorbed his pantheon, Sia had been his people’s god of wisdom, the kind of wisdom one finds in one’s own heart. Athena had always thought his skills complemented hers, particularly when a problem called for skilled tongues over brawn and sword.
“I’m sure it’s not so bad,” Athena’s sister Hebe, sweet cupbearer to Hera and occasional attendant to Aphrodite, piped up. She led the group’s flock of servants, a mix of humans whose primary task was to keep Athena and her companions comfortable during their lengthy travels. Hebe had handpicked each one, though Athena had given final approval before they left Rome.
“Not so bad?” Pan sputtered, and Athena could picture his outraged face almost too easily. “I can barely see my own hands!”
The satyr had been invited last, for while Athena had ventured to the Otherworld once before, she thought it wise to take along a seasoned traveler too. Pan, Faunus to contemporary Roman worshippers, woodland god of travelers, nature, wildlands, and shepherds. He wasn’t Athena’s favourite godly creature by any stretch, but she had great respect for his father Hermes, and the half-man-half-goat’s knowledge of winding roads and paths unseen would be useful. Unfortunately, his lusty penchant for seducing nymphs had caused Athena to exclude almost half of Hebe’s original choices for servants. Hebe had been most upset, pouting her pale pink lips in distaste, but had quickly agreed that leaving them behind was for the best; neither had any desire to drag a wanton satyr off the serving girls every step of the way.
At the back of the caravan, behind the carts of supplies, rode a Roman by the name of Felix. Athena had started to favour him in battle this past decade, taken with his skilled combat—and his analytical mind. Dark-haired and green-eyed, he had been her only human choice when she had assembled her wandering tribe of emissaries. While she had no doubt of his strength, the man’s wiry frame wasn’t one to goad lesser men into a quarrel—something she had seen time and time again when visiting other pantheons. Gods were such prideful creatures; they never missed any opportunity to pit their best man against yours. Athena preferred a man like Felix, who could blend into a crowd, move like a shadow, and anticipate his mistress’s desires from no more than a look.
Should he continue to serve her so adeptly, Athena had considered raising him from a mortal to demigod—and then she could revisit him in a few decades to decide if he was worthy of a more godly status.
“The fog is a tactic,” Athena said, peering out into the grey nothing. “Invading armies cannot conquer what they cannot see. Morrigan cast it for protection.”
“I’d light the place on fire, then,” Pan muttered as he caught up to her side. The satyr had little interest in the Egyptian, and he knew Hera would skin him if he defiled Hebe—as would Hebe’s husband, Heracles. Felix remained tense in the goat-man’s presence, and Athena had forbid Pan from trifling with the servants. So, what other companion had he but her? Unfortunately, the goddess preferred his flute-playing to his conversational prowess.
“Light it with what?” Sia asked haughtily. “Everything in this foul realm is wet.”
Athena sighed and focused on the road—what little she could see of it, anyway. Nocta served as her eyes, flying ahead to scout a path, a whole range of calls and hoots in his arsenal to signal different circumstances. While the goddess’s grey-eyed stare could pierce the fog to some extent, it took a great deal of focus and memory to lead the party across the lands to the blessed entrance of the Otherworld. She hadn’t the ability to look out for trouble too. For now, they walked in the presence of mortals. Had Athena traveled alone, she would have flown with no one but Nocta for company, but Zeus had insisted she bring companions.
“Not far to go,” she told the group behind her, though she wasn’t sure who could hear her over Pan and Sia squabbling about the uselessness of damp wood. Although it had been some time since she’d visited the lands of Danu’s children, her memory served her well enough in finding the entrance to the fabled Otherworld. On a separate plane from the human world, much like the dead realm belonging to her uncle Hades or Asgard for Odin’s folk, the Otherworld had several entrances—though Athena was only privy to one.
A chill descended upon the group as they passed onto hallowed ground: horses’ hooves and sandaled feet treading softly where Dagda’s mortal worshippers buried their dead.
“Caution,” she warned at the sound of the humans gasping. “The dead keep many secrets.”
Grand tombs sprung up around them in the mist, but there was a very particular tomb that Athena searched for. She even stopped her horse for a moment to take stock of the landscape, willing her memory to recall the carvings engraved on the upright stones. In the end, however, Nocta spied the tomb first and gave a cry so piercing that it sent Felix’s horse rearing. She heard the beast’s protests, followed swiftly by the soldier’s frustrated admonishment.
Grinning, Athena gave her own steed two sharp kicks to the side, pushing on through the fog, around tombs and over squishy green hills, until she found what she wanted. Pleased, the grey-eyed goddess slid from her horse and ignored the dull ache in her thighs as she crossed to the seemingly unassuming tomb. Two stones stood erect, narrow and daunting, and a thick capstone sat atop them, like an old Hellenic symbol—П. Peering into the tomb’s darkness, Athena knew a descending flight of stairs awaited those welcome to the realm. Unwelcome visitors would find nothing but dirt.
When the goddess smoothed her hands over the cool stone, she found the circular carvings, intricate spirals and knots, that from a distance made the shape of a large winged beast—a raven, if she remembered correctly.
“Dismount,” she ordered her company. “You will need to guide your beasts through the doorway.”
An uneasy murmur rippled through the group as those with horses complied, the shifting of swords and pots alike irksome to her ears. Athena turned her attention to the tomb, then filled her lungs with one great breath and blew away the surrounding fog. It would trickle back, of course. Yet, for a brief few moments, she could keep the Phantom Queen’s spell at bay.
“Couldn’t have done that once we got off the boat?” Pan grumbled, and Athena found the satyr studying her with crossed arms. Had he human feet, he would no doubt be tapping them impatiently.
“It’s a temporary measure,” she insisted. “I want to see that we are all accounted for.”
“So you won’t be leading the charge down there?” Pan nodded to the steps, clearer now that the fog had lifted. When she shook her head, the satyr tipped his head to the side, beady eyes narrowed. “Am I to lead, then?”
“You are the patron of travelers,” Athena said. It took some effort not to sneer it. Honestly, what had he expected?
Already the fog had started to roll back in, covering the ground with an unearthly mist. Athena hurried the group onward, assuring Pan he would know when he had gone far enough. The stairs spilled out onto a s
unny plain, if her memory served, beyond which was a great blue lake separating the pantheon’s palace from new arrivals to the Otherworld. Once they made it to the plain, Athena would have to figure out a way across the lake. Last time a boat had sat waiting for her. But no one from Dagda’s court had responded to her messenger regarding her plans for this visit.
Still, Athena knew she was welcome in the Otherworld. Sentries were bound to see them, and the gods would surely sense her, Pan, Sia, and Hebe as soon as they entered the realm.
“Hurry now,” she urged. Morrigan’s mist was relentless, creeping across the burial grounds with a vengeance as Athena ushered the group through the opening of the tomb. The horses fit, but only just.
When the last of them was through, Athena stopped trying to keep the mist back, lowering her guard. As the grey fog threatened to consume her, she ducked into the tomb—but only after spying a hunched, hooded figure watching from a distance. While the fog seemed to chase grey-eyed Athena, thick and malevolent, it encircled this crone like a lover.
Brow slightly furrowed, she left the fog behind and crossed from one realm to another—human to immortal—and for the first time since this journey had started, she felt as though she could breathe just a little easier.
* * *
“What now?” Sia demanded as soon as Athena’s sandal-clad feet touched the mossy earth at the base of the stairs.
She squinted, momentarily blinded by the unencumbered sunlight beaming down across the Otherworld. The god’s sour gaze fixed on her while the others attended to the horses and the supplies, ensuring all had made it from one realm to the other. Nocta soared overhead, offering a pleased screech as soon as Athena looked skyward, a hand hovering to shield her eyes.
“What do you mean?” she asked, still trying to get her bearings. As with the last time she’d visited, they had all ended up on a sprawling island of lush green grass situated in the middle of a brilliantly blue lake, dark like the seas but calm like a spring.
