By some miracle, Zeus kept his mouth shut, but she didn’t think it was out of any sort of kindness. No, he was most certainly plotting his next move. If he knew what she intended to do, then he would be desperate to get her off the dais.
Lytta pulled a blade she had sheathed at her thigh and let it glint tauntingly in the moonlight.
“Do you know what this is, Zeus?” She paused for a moment to let the realization sink in. “It’s a brimstone blade forged in Tartarus.”
“Pandora,” Zeus urged. “Get down off of the dais and we can make a bargain.”
She huffed a small laugh filled with sadness.
“That’s all I’ve ever wanted.” Lytta turned her gaze from the dagger to the god before her. “A bargain with you for my life. Anything to ease this pain and fury raging inside me. But all you ever did was laugh and revel in my misery like a sadistic fuck. I’m done wishing for bargains from a false god.”
Lytta let a smile of rage cross her features, her scars alight in the flames of her chaos. She turned back to the well and sat upon its lip. She didn’t let herself turn to see what may lurk in its depths. She refused to let fear change her mind. She had made a commitment to herself and this world that she helped to burn.
“I learned a little secret on my path to discovery, Zeus. Would you like to know what it is?”
“Pandora…” He was panicking and had begun stepping slowly toward the bottom steps of the dais. He was still a good hundred feet away, but no distance was too far if it came between a ruler and his crown, a man and his legacy. She wouldn’t make the mistake of underestimating him.
“A little birdie told me that you haven’t just been dumping your chaos into me. It’s much more complex than that.”
Genuine fear and panic flashed across his features.
“No, you tied your essence to mine. Our very souls are bound, Zeus, and you lied to me that night on the river. Your arrogance clouded your judgment. But, by the fear painting your face, I’m betting you knew that and counted on me never figuring it out. I know what you did,” she sneered. “You stole from the Deathless God to win your war, and now you can’t contain his power. It would drive you to madness and rot you from the inside out like it has done to me. But, that’s not my favorite part. My favorite part was when I learned that by giving me your essence, I am bound to the Deathless God as you are, Zeus. Did you know that?”
She didn’t give him time to answer before continuing.
“I don’t think you did. Because if you did, you would have held that part of you a little closer. You would have treated it better so that it would have stood by your side rather than run from it. You may have made me an immortal Zeus, but here? In this place of sacrifice to the Deathless God your magic is impotent. I’m just a mortal woman here, and if I make my sacrifice to him I can give back part of what you stole.”
“Gods fucking dammit, Pandora! What do you want? What will make you stop this and come home? Do you want a place at my side in Olympus? Handmaid’s waiting on your every whim? Fields of flowers? Say it, and it is yours!”
“The great Zeus begging at the feet of a lowly goddess,” she mocked. “How disgusting. If only your Olympians could see you grovel.”
Thunder rolled through the night with an unforgivable wind that threatened to knock her from the well. Rain poured from an open chasm in the night sky. Pandora took in her surroundings, appreciating the elements as they came and wishing one last time to gaze upon the stars.
It won’t matter soon, she told herself, for you’ll be a part of them.
Without wasting any more time, Pandora placed the brimstone blade to her throat, closed her eyes, and prayed to the Deathless God for mercy.
“Father of Darkness, keeper of the light, ruler of the chaos filled night.” As she chanted, Zeus ran, forcing every muscle beyond its limits to reach her in time.
“I give myself wholly to you. Take me to the void between the lights.” She gripped the blade tighter, her clammy palms shaking with effort as she dragged it across the delicate flesh beneath her chin, opening her throat to the darkness below.
Pandora’s body went limp and fell into the gaping chasm of the well. A hand brushed her foot as she fell, grasping in a desperate attempt to pull her back, but the darkness was greedy and eager for her sacrifice. It would not let her go so easily.
Pandora thought death would be painful, that her life would end as dreadfully as it had begun. Her sacrifice would mean the end of the Earth, for her blood would open a box of famine, war, pestilence and death, but she had to hope that it would not be in vain. Her lungs seized in their last effort to pull in oxygen, but her mortal body was fragile. She was dying. What a relief to no longer feel pain, but what a sorrow for the world she was leaving behind.
“Doyouseenow?”
Brooks opened his eyes, disoriented from living in someone else’s dream and the fall to darkness.
He was standing in the bioluminescent field of asphodels before the naked goddess sleeping in her hollow.
Brooks turned to see twin goddesses standing side by side, one with her thorn of crowns and glistening tears, the other with a crown of stars and white blooms budding from open sores.
A flare of recognition hit him.
“Atropos.”
A small, sad smile graced her feminine features.
