Styxx (DH #33) (102 page)

Damn, Styxx was talented. Who’d have ever guessed it?

What he found most telling was that while a couple of the drawings of Bethany had her seductively clad in Greek gowns, none of them showed her naked. Even though Styxx had never intended for anyone else to see this, he’d kept his wife’s honor sacred and respected her.

Urian stopped on the next page as he found one of a toddler boy dressed in a hoplite’s Corinthian helm. It was hilarious and adorable. Beside it, Styxx had written the name “Galen” in Greek.… He also had a few of an adult Galen, one of a woman named Tig, a horse and dog, and a few scenes from what must have been Didymos.

And then the ones that really floored him … images of Acheron in his modern Goth wear and long black hair, as well as pictures of them together with a bolt of lightning coming down between them.

When Urian turned to the next page, his heart stopped. Styxx had drawn Urian with Phoebe. Even though Styxx had never seen her, he’d penned her perfect likeness from Urian’s descriptions. It was absolutely eerie that Styxx could do that, and it showed him just how true to life his drawings of Bethany must be.

Incredible.

The love Styxx had for his wife and son bled onto every page. Since Styxx had nothing left of her to hold on to, he must have created this. And it was like looking into Styxx’s soul.

Urian set the sketchbook back right where he’d found it. But honestly, what disturbed him the most about that book …

He saw his own future. Phoebe had only been a dead a handful of years and it still burned inside him like a raging furnace. For Styxx, it’d been over eleven thousand and he still ached as much now as he had then.

That did not bode well for Urian.

Maybe that was why he was so drawn to Styxx. They were bound by similar tragedies and had been born virtual contemporaries in ancient Greece. Well, not quite, Styxx was the same age as his father, but close enough.

Urian glanced back at the sketchbook and cringed.
So that’s what I have to look forward to. Insanity.

Great.

January 21, 2009

Just after midnight, Styxx woke up covered in sweat. He was so cold, his teeth chattered. Someone pulled another blanket over his shoulder. For the merest heartbeat he thought it might be Bethany.

It wasn’t.

Urian stepped into his field of vision. “How are you?”

Broken. Completely. But there was no need in saying it. He still didn’t know how a dream could seem so very real. He’d felt Beth’s skin … her breath on his cheek. His son’s early morning demands for breakfast and entertainment as he tried to pull Styxx out of bed.

“Come Daddy, come!”

If only he could.…

When he didn’t respond, Urian squatted down next to the bed until their gazes met. “I know,” he whispered. “I still wake up and expect to find Phoebe beside me. I haven’t even deactivated her cell phone. I keep it so that I can call and hear her voice on those hours when I feel like I can’t take it anymore. It’s not fair that we’re forced to live without them while the world goes on oblivious to the fact that it’s missing the most vital part of it.” He let out a bitter laugh. “It’s why I’m here with your hairy ass. I don’t want to see Tory and Ash. Not because I hate him like you do, but because they remind me of what I no longer have. And while I don’t begrudge them their happiness, it makes my loneliness burn even deeper.”

Styxx finally blinked. “Why do you talk to me, Urian?”

“I don’t know. You’re entertaining when you’re not catatonic or in a coma. Or in a homicidal rage. Why do you talk to me?”

The answer slipped out before he could stop it. “Because I can’t hear your thoughts.”

“Excuse me?”

Styxx sighed. “It’s something I’ve been able to do from birth. With a tiny handful of exceptions, one of whom is you, I hear every thought in someone’s head.”

“That has to suck.”

“It does, indeed. That was what made me so lethal on the battlefield. I knew what my enemies were going to do and I could cut them off.”

“Yeah, okay, that would not suck.” Urian had meant to make him laugh, but if anything, it darkened Styxx’s mood, so he changed the subject. “You think you could eat something?”

“I don’t know.”

Urian handed him a bottle of water. “You need to sip this. While I know you can’t die from hunger or thirst, you still feel both. I’ll go recon the fridge while you take a shower.” He rose to his feet then left the room.

Wishing himself dead, Styxx sat up slowly and leaned back on his arms to survey his bedroom as sirens rang outside above the steady hum of traffic. How he hated it here.

Yeah, Acheron had given him millions of people in this city, but Styxx didn’t relate to any of them. The handful of women he’d talked to had rammed home how out of synch he was with this time period. While he was hornier than hell, he couldn’t bring himself to sleep with any of them. The minute they opened their mouths and started ranting about trivial things, he lost interest.

He missed discussing philosophy, ideas, and politics with Bethany. Listening to her hum and sing when she wasn’t even aware she was doing it …

No other woman could touch her beauty or grace.

With a heavy sigh, he forced himself to get up and shower. As he caught sight of himself he grimaced. He still had Acheron’s long black hair. He curled his lip. How could Acheron stand it? It made Styxx feel like a woman. Not to mention it was unsanitary and got all over the place. For that matter, how could Acheron fight with it?

Unable to tolerate it any longer, he went back into his bedroom to get his shears from his desk drawer then returned to the bathroom to cut it off. As he moved to throw out the ponytail, he remembered seeing ads for Locks of Love that made wigs for cancer victims. He coiled the hair up and left it on the counter before he started the shower.

Once he was cleaned and clothed, he headed for the kitchen to find Urian eating a sandwich.

“You know, food still tastes weird to me. It’s hard to get used to eating when I lived on blood for eleven thousand years.”

Styxx grimaced at the reminder of what Apollo had done to his own people. “I’m surprised you haven’t filed down your fangs.”

“I’ve thought about it. But I’ve never seen myself without them. Too old to change now. Might throw off my bite and I have enough trouble chewing as it is. You probably don’t realize chewing is a skill. And the first time I bit my tongue … be glad you weren’t there for it.”

Styxx sat down to eat his own ham sandwich. “What made you decide to go Daimon?”

“Rage mostly. My best friend was a couple of years older than me and he refused to fight the curse. So I watched him age to an old man in less than twenty-four hours, screaming in utter agony the entire day until he decayed into nothing but dust. All I could think about was that he’d never harmed anyone. Never even been in a fistfight, and all because of my own grandfather over something that happened before I could walk. It pissed me off. But after losing Phoebe, I can understand why Apollo was so upset and cursed us. I’d have done as much, if not more, if they’d murdered my son and beloved, too.”

Styxx released a painful sigh. “He didn’t love Ryssa.”

Urian arched a brow. “What?”

“She was a possession. Nothing more. Most of the time, he bitched about her whining and complaining … which she did all the time, about everything.”

“That’s not what Ash says.”

“He and I had two entirely different sisters. She coddled him and hated me.”

“Why?”

Styxx swallowed his bite of food. “What can I say? I’m an asshole. As for Acheron, she felt sorry for him. In her mind, she was convinced that I stole our father’s throne and his love from my brother.”

“Is that why he calls you a thief?”

Styxx shrugged. “I don’t know. Ironically, I didn’t even want the throne. I just wanted a family that didn’t hate me.”

Urian finished off his sandwich. “I’d have gladly given you some brothers. Man, there was so much testosterone in that house, I don’t know how my mother and sister stood us. But we were mostly happy. Although my older brothers said that my father was a very different man before Apollo cursed us.”

“How so?”

Urian shrugged. “He was happier and much more easygoing.” He picked up the pickle from his plate. “The only thing I really hated was not seeing sunlight.” He laughed bitterly. “My father used to get so mad at me when I was kid. I’d stand in the door at dawn, trying to catch a glimpse of the sunrise. And he’d start screaming that if I wanted to burst into flames then he was willing to begin the process by setting my ass on fire if I didn’t get to safety.”

Styxx laughed. “He loved you.”

“Yeah, to the day he cut my throat. I’ve never understood it. After Darius died, I adopted his son and daughter who were toddlers at the time. When Ida and Mylinus died, it about killed me. I can’t imagine ever getting so mad at them that I’d do something like that, and they weren’t technically mine.” The anguish in his eyes pierced Styxx’s heart. “How do you cut your own son’s throat?”

“I don’t know, Uri. I’ve never understood it, either. When I was just a boy, my own mother tried to kill me for giving her a birthday present. She stabbed me I don’t know how many times.”

Urian’s eyes widened with incredulity. “Your mother?”

He nodded. “Ryssa, too.”

“Stabbed you?”

Styxx took a drink of his milk before he responded. “Ryssa gutted me the day before she died.”

“What’d you do?” The way Urian asked the question, it was almost comical.

Unfortunately, he’d done nothing to them. “She attacked me over your grandfather.”

“Apollo? Why?”

Styxx flinched at the memory. “Jealousy.” A shiver of revulsion ran through him. “She stupidly thought I was trying to seduce him as a lover to take his attention from her.”

“Ew!”

“Believe me, I couldn’t agree more. No offense, but I hate your grandfather with every part of me. Just being in a room with him makes my skin crawl and my stomach turn.”

“Don’t worry. I’m not going to defend him. I personally think he’s a rank, sorry, selfish son of a whore.” Urian’s phone rang. He looked down and checked the ID. “Excuse me, I need to take this.” He got up and left the room while Styxx finished off his food. By the sudden exit, he assumed the call must be from Acheron.

Urian came back a few minutes later while Styxx was cleaning up. “I have to head out.
AOM
later?”

“Sure.”

Urian held his hand out to him. When Styxx took it, he pulled him into a brotherly embrace with their hands between their chests. Without another word, Urian vanished.

Styxx finished his chores then went to get his sketchbook. He flipped through the pages, touching the faces of his past that always haunted him. He stopped on the image of Bethany with their baby. It was just like his dream. She sat in a field, on a blanket, cuddling his son. And now he knew these images were what had fed his hallucination.

The boy he’d held wasn’t real.

And Bethany was gone. He should have known it was all a dream by the mere fact that Bethany had been able to see them. But he’d been so grateful and happy that he hadn’t questioned that small miracle.

A single tear slid from the corner of his eye. Styxx brushed it away and sighed. He was so tired now. More tired than he’d ever been before.

He remembered a time, long, long ago, when he’d known his destiny. Known who and what he was.

Now …

I belong nowhere
.

Worse, he belonged to no one.

In that moment, he knew what he needed to do. It was time he took his life back, such as it was. He might have lost sight of things for a while, but at the end of the day, he was a fighter. It was all he knew. And he was tired of other people making decisions about his existence. From this moment forward, he was on his own. And he was going to find some place where no one would ever again control or imprison him. Some place where he was comfortable. Some place where he belonged.

January 24, 2009

Urian tried to call Styxx again, and again it rolled to voicemail. Afraid Styxx might have slipped into another coma, Urian flashed himself to Styxx’s condo.

He knew the minute he materialized that something wasn’t right. Everything about the condo felt off. But glancing around, he saw nothing out of place.

“Styxx?”

No one answered.

He quickly searched the condo, to find it empty. This time when he went into Styxx’s bedroom, he saw that Styxx had pulled out the sketchbook page of him and Phoebe, and left it on top of his desk with a folded note. Fear cinched his gut as he opened it and read.

Urian,

You’re the only one who will notice that I’m not here. Don’t worry, I’m not doing anything particularly stupid. I just don’t want to live in a world I don’t understand anymore.

When I find my place and the peace I need to function, I’ll be in touch. Until then, take care, my brother. And thank you for being my friend.

S

Grinding his teeth, Urian wanted to find him and beat the shit out of Styxx for the pain he felt right now, and he didn’t know why he felt it. Why should he care? He barely knew Styxx.

It must be that they were kindred spirits. Styxx was the only one who really understood about Phoebe. After six years, everyone else had lost patience with his unwillingness to move on and find someone new to love.

But it wasn’t that easy. Not when you had a past that was so hard to share with another person. One that left you bleeding and vulnerable. It was difficult to open up to anyone because the moment you did, you knew you ran the risk of being hurt worse, and humiliated should they ever tell your secrets, and when you’d been hurt all your life by others …

There was only so much bravery in any given soul.

To finally find the courage to trust and to dare lay your heart in the hands of another and then to lose them was the ultimate cruelty. And it was not something you got over. Ever.

Six years was just a blink of the eye. And apparently so was eleven thousand.