Series: Willow Winters
Total pages in book: 103
Estimated words: 94417 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 472(@200wpm)___ 378(@250wpm)___ 315(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 94417 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 472(@200wpm)___ 378(@250wpm)___ 315(@300wpm)
I incline my head to my father and back away several steps before I turn and walk out the door. I will turn to the seers and relay what the Fates have told me as soon as I am able. I do not feel as graceful as Athena and Aphrodite. I envy them for how beautiful they are, and how confident they are, but I also envy them for the way they can focus on their games with mortal lives. They never have to worry about losing their powers. Their magic is strong and lasting. They never have to worry that their fate will see them cast out from the only home they have ever known, leaving them only with the hope of survival as a garden nymph… or worse, a mortal.
Slightly defeated, and yet still hopeful, I make my way back towards my rooms by a different path, one that takes me through a quiet set of gardens. Clouds still roll overhead from Zeus’s changing mood. The breeze lifts the leaves on the trees as I pass.
I welcome the cool breeze on my face and wonder in its pureness. For I may never experience a feeling quite like this again.
There is a pool of still water at the side of the path. Clouds reflect in it, some of them with the gray bottoms of a thunderstorm. I slow my steps, watching the clouds pass over the water, never touching. That is what my life will be like if I leave Olympus. My home will be like a cloud overhead, reflected in the water of the mortal lands but destroyed with a single touch. The smallest ripple will distort what I can see, and my memory will fade, the way a mortal’s does.
Between two clouds, a darker shadow shaped like a man forms. I am almost past the pool when I see it out of the corner of my eye. My breath hitches and my body freezes. A chill flows through my bones at the recognition. It’s him. A voice in the back of my mind hisses. I know it is the same man. I know it’s him by the shape of the shadows, even if I can’t see his face.
With haste, I walk back along the pool and stop at the center. There are the clouds with their grey bottoms. There is the sky beyond. There is my own face, waving in ripples on the surface.
I watch the clouds reflection for several minutes, but there is nothing else in the reflection. The man is gone. Although whatever feeling has overwhelmed me, lingers.
PERSEPHONE
In the darkness of the night, only the stars keep me company while I sit in the large garden nearest the courts under the stars. I can’t sleep, and I need answers. My mind circles them again and again, trying to uncover something I must have missed. Dead flowers sit limply in the grass before me. I lay my hands on them and try to bring them back to life, to make them bloom again. To do what I have done since only a babe.
And yet, nothing happens. My presence means nothing anymore. No amount of concentration brings me a spark of power. Nothing has changed in the hours I’ve sat here while the stars burn overhead. Watching and wanting just as I do.
My eyes are heavy, and so is my heart. My hair has fallen out of its braid, but I cannot bring myself to fix it. Strands blow across my face, and I flip them away listlessly.
I came out here with the idea that there would be a miracle. Some of my power would return. Alone in the dark, I would find the source of my power again. I would be able to make a flower return from the dead. I would not let it sink into Olympus to become another seed. It would be mine.
But, as the last hours have proven, I cannot. There is no power that remains. I feel like I may cry, but even crying doesn’t seem to have much point to it now. What would tears do? My tears hold no power of their own. I cannot weep over the flowers and expect them to bloom again.
I am a fallen Goddess, that is how the stars will remember me.
I rest my chin on my knees and stare at the wilted blooms in the moonlight. There is still beauty in them, I cannot deny, but it exists without me. My mind wanders to what will become of the gardens when I’m gone, but I know my mother, The Goddess of Abundance and Crops will provide for mortals. My tricks that bring smiles to young girls and beauty to plain pastures may be missed, but gardens will flourish if only my mother is asked.