The Heir of Olympus and the Forest Realm (37 page)

Shortly thereafter he reached the top frame of the lyre and sat up. He lifted his hands off the thick string—shooting them out to the side to catch his balance during a momentary bout of vertigo—then felt around the outside of the lyre’s frame carefully until he found a nook. He curled his fingers into the engraving and squeezed, testing the strength of his grip in the shallow niche. Deeming it adequate, he pulled himself upward.

Once again he was dangling, but this time fifty feet in the air. He scrabbled with his left hand to find another groove above the first and succeeded. Slowly but surely, he scaled the piece until he stood atop the uppermost ledge of the frame where he hugged the curved ornamentation. He pressed his cheek against the stone to steel his nerves.

“I hate you, Giorgio,” he whispered into the vacuous air. He turned his head so that his other cheek pressed against the stone, and he started when he saw that he was eye level with the green portal floating ten feet in front of him, forming a right angle with Apollo’s navel. In the portal’s depths he could see what looked like an empty foyer or greeting hall. The room swam in the fluid green light, appearing to be green itself, but he figured that was the effect of the gateway’s ethereal nature.

This was the very last leg of his ascent and the most trying. Where his leaps had been directed toward tangible objects before, no such comfort existed here. This would be a leap of faith. Hopefully he would pass into the portal, transported to its mysterious locale. Yet a part of him feared he would pass right through it, not to the other side, but to its
backside,
where he would then plummet fifty feet to the unforgiving floor below.

Gordie shuffled his feet until he was facing the portal directly with his right hand still palming the ornate frame for support, and made a concerted effort not to look down. Slowly, he lowered his hand to his side and stared at the doorway between worlds. With one last deep breath, he swung his arms, and jumped.

14

Apollo’s Confession

Gordie landed on his chest on a hard floor. Eyes closed, face pressed against the cool stone, he focused on reining in his ragged breathing. His body had only fallen a couple feet after he dove through the portal between realms, but his brain was convinced he had fallen fifty—or maybe that he was still falling. Eventually, his fright diminished and his breaths became slow and calm.

He opened his eyes and blinked. The floor his face rested on was a dark jade with verdant, smoky swirls frozen in its sheen. There was a great mural along the wall. Gordie looked at it sideways. It depicted a large man—a giant really—addressing a group of wide-eyed humans. One man stood in front of his people, accepting a gift from the giant. The great bearded man was bending down to this courageous fellow, handing him a crackling flame. The little man was holding out his hands, his palms forming a cup, anxiously awaiting the gift of fire. 

“That’s gonna hurt, buddy,” Gordie mumbled as he pushed himself up.

“Indeed.” Gordie started and whipped around to face the giant man who had addressed him. “Almost all interactions between humans and the Olympians have hurt. Although, in this particular case, I believe Prometheus here suffered most of all.” Apollo waved his hand towards the bearded flame-wielder in the painting, but Gordie didn’t look. He looked up at Apollo, staring him in the face. He had seen him before, but he had not gotten a good look at him. Now he did, and he was surprised at what he saw.

Apollo’s sandy-brown curls were cropped close to his head, but they no longer supported the wreath he had seen him wearing when the god had communed with Chiron. His face was coated in stubble, some matching his hair color, but much of it a dull gray. His eyes were dim, with the shadows of bags underneath, and his forehead was lined. He looked like a young man who had seen too much stress in his short years. Of course, he was no youth. Neither was he a man, which was evident by his frame, towering feet above Gordie’s head. But he was slim. He did not have the venerable strength that was apparent in Hades. He looked peckish, gaunt. And most of all, as Gordie had once noted before, he looked tired.

“Welcome, Gordon Leonhart, to Koryfion, my home.” He swept past Gordie in his radiant robes, which Gordie recognized as the pale gold of the sun, so bright they were nearly white. He turned to watch him pass and gasped. Apollo had walked to the end of the hall behind him, but it wasn’t an end: it was an
edge
.

Four massive columns stretched upward at the lip of the jade floor. Beyond was a purple hued sky that exists only on the border of the atmosphere. Gordie gingerly approached the edge and looked out. It was as if he were seeing the world from space. He was so sure he was out of the ozone layer that he started to have trouble breathing, knowing that there should be no air up here for him. Once again, he had to override his brain, and tell himself he was safe before he could regain composure enough to look back out. Land masses huddled around a great blue sea. He could make out the topography and the vegetative state of the land. The upper landmass had patches of dense green on a texturally varied landscape; the lower landmass was mostly brown, but flat.

“Is that the Mediterranean?” Gordie asked.

“It is . . . Your new home.” Apollo stared down at the world.

“Home is a stretch. But let’s cut to the chase. Why did you kidnap my girlfriend?” Gordie felt he had license to refer to Bridget this way (although he would not have dared if she were present). “And why am I here? You don’t look like you’re in fighting shape.” He tried to sound threatening, so he was annoyed when Apollo sniggered.

“I do not wish to fight you, young Leonhart. And I apologize for the means which I have used to draw you here. I would have come to you on my own, but I believe you are aware that Hermes has closed the borders between our worlds.” He looked down at Gordie with no expression.

“Yeah, but why did he do it?” Gordie asked.

Apollo sighed. “Well, I cannot say that I know for sure that it was Hermes, but I at least suspect. He and I have always been closely related, our fates intertwined. I was there at his birth after all. He was a troublemaker from the very first, and I have always tried to stomp it out, but I am sure what he has done was meant to protect you. I have tried to communicate with him, help him in this endeavor, but he has refused me. Still, I think you must thank him for your life.”

“Why didn’t you just come to me like you did with Chiron? Talk to me through your little green window?”

“He was shielding you from me. I had to get you away from him. He does not trust me, but he is wrong not to . . . it was not my fault.” Apollo looked away. Gordie waited to hear what had happened between him and Chiron, but was not rewarded.

“So, you brought me here to find out what exactly is going on, is that right?”

“More or less.” Apollo looked back out at southern Europe. “But I understand the crux of the issue: You are a descendant of Heracles and my father has tried to kill you . . . but why?”

“There was some kind of prophecy that said a descendant of Hercules would overthrow him.” Gordie shrugged while trying to cool his head over the cavalier attitude towards his attempted assassination, especially as it had resulted in his father’s death.

“No such thing could exist.” Apollo turned to look at him with an eyebrow raised. “Prophecies are made by the oracle—
my
oracle. If there were such a prophecy I would be the first to know.”

“Well, it does!” Gordie’s voice rose. “The Fates showed me! In their little weaving thingy.” He waved his hands in front of him in a motion that he thought captured the essence of weaving at a loom. Then Gordie told Apollo all about his interaction with the Fates, his convention with Hades, and Zeus’s plan to reclaim power, and his training under Chiron—the last of which Apollo was already aware. Apollo looked back out, the lines in his forehead doubling as he did so.

“So, it is no prophecy, but his
fate
. Then it truly does mean the end of Olympus.” He stood in silence for a minute. Gordie watched him tentatively. He was watching someone who had just been told of the end of his race, and this end would come by the hands of Gordie himself. He steeled himself for backlash, or hostility, not knowing exactly what to expect.

“My father,” Apollo paused, “has become a monster—has been, for quite some time. At the beginning of his reign he was merciful and just, but he became drunk with power, as cliché as it seems. For too long did he torment humans for his own pleasure . . . Yes, I see now that his power truly has faded, but he has been provoked by your arrival into this world, and it seems he is preparing to war against the humans.” He continued to stare out.

“Yeah.” Gordie backed away a few feet, his whole body tensed as he shifted into a ready position. “So the question is . . . whose side are you on?”

Apollo turned around to see Gordie in his fighting stance and waved a hand as he shook his head. “I have already told you, Gordon, I will not fight you. My father is a tyrant and he must be stopped. The time of the Olympians is at an end.
My
time is at an end.” He looked exhausted as he said this, and Gordie relaxed, feeling a sliver of pity.

“So, what do you plan to do about it? How can we stop him?”

“That is complicated. For now he is trapped on Olympus just as I am trapped here, but I am sure he will be working against those boundaries. Hermes is playing a dangerous game, especially if he is feeding our father false information. It is only a matter of time before he discovers Hermes’s deception and forces him to unlock the borders. If only I could convince Hermes to accept my help, but he is too stubborn.” Apollo pounded a fist into his palm, and Gordie was relieved to see that he was capable of
some
emotion other than despair.

“The Fates said that I’m the only one who can stop him, but in order to do that, I have to complete the tasks.” Gordie’s heart started racing. He looked down at his hands and felt the strength coursing through him. He was excited by the prospect of another task and acquiring more power, and now he was close. It was a physiological reaction as much as mental: his
body
was excited to become more powerful. He looked up at Apollo and stiffened, raising his head and standing to his full height. The words came to him as if they had always been on the tip of his tongue.

“Apollo,” he almost bellowed the name, and Apollo looked taken aback, “I, Gordon Leonhart, demand the opportunity to prove my worth!”

Gordie had not consciously decided to demand Apollo’s task, but felt inexorably compelled to say the oath at that moment. Just as had happened between he and Hades, a cluster of ethereal silver strands exploded away from Gordie’s chest and wrapped around Apollo before they came streaking back towards the speaker, wrapping him in the same manner. In another instant, the ghostly strings were gone, but the god remained frozen in place. His eyes clouded over with a smoky green color, extinguishing any sign of iris or pupil—they looked like miniature versions of the portal through which Gordie had arrived.

Apollo stood rigidly for a moment, and then his mouth opened to deliver a thunderous message. “Gordon Leonhart,” Gordie’s eardrums pounded, but he watched with fascination, “I, Apollo, God of the Sun, command you to find my sister, Artemis, Goddess of the Hunt,” Apollo’s sonorous voice paused so long that the reverberating echoes nearly died away before he added, “and convince her to forgive me.” The command had resonated throughout the chamber with the force of a bullhorn, but the last piece about forgiveness was pierced by a deep sadness that made the booming tone waver.

Gordie watched Apollo as he shuddered and became unfrozen, then sidled backward looking shell-shocked. He placed his hand on one of the columns for support. A tear had formed in the corner of his eye; it quivered until it fell over the lower lid and rolled down his cheek. He stared at Gordie with wide-eyes and open-mouth.

“I-I . . .” he panted. Gordie, meanwhile, was feeling a sense of extreme disappointment. With his blood up, he had been envisioning great challenges of fighting monsters or moving mountains. But now he had to go convince some lady to forgive her brother? He was perturbed. But it did not matter. This was the task set to him by a god of Olympus, and he would have to see it through. He looked at Apollo who pushed himself up and rose back to his full stature, shaking his head.

“That was . . . unexpected,” Apollo said, staring at Gordie in disbelief. As the tear dripped off his chin, the track it had left on his cheek suddenly glowed and then disappeared just as quickly, as if it had never existed. Gordie studied him with curiosity, but remained silent, waiting.

Apollo looked at him for a time, then turned to look out at the heavens again. “My sister is the vision of purity.” His hands dangled at his side. “She is a maid—has only ever preoccupied herself with her craft. She is diligent and disciplined . . . truly great.” Gordie could sense the direction this was headed. He listened.

“There was a hunter. His name was Orion. He was a demigod, son of Poseidon. Many men had tried and failed to win my sister’s heart. Men, centaurs, satyrs, gods . . . none were good enough for her. But this hunter . . .” Apollo sighed, “this hunter caught her eye.

“She wanted to have him, give him her purity, but she wasn’t thinking clearly,” Apollo’s speech quickened. “They were in the forest together. I was watching—always watching. She removed her robes and waded into a pool, rinsing her hair in the fall that fed it. He looked at her hungrily. His carnivorous eyes scoured her body.” Apollo was spitting out into space as he spoke, his fist clenching.

“He stepped into the pool. He never should have entered the pool. I had my bow. I strung an arrow and released. He was a fool. He was so hungry, weak as all men. He never saw it coming. The arrow struck him between the eyes and he fell to his knees in the shallows.” Apollo put his head down and paused. Gordie watched with disgusted fascination. How many murderers had he been in the presence of now?

“My sister . . . screamed. She ran to catch him as he fell forward. There she knelt, with the man she loved dead in her arms. Or the man she thought she loved,” he said with a snarl. “He was not good enough for her either, although she did not see it.” There was another pause, the longest yet.

“She discovered me. I did not try to hide. She had known from the instant that he was struck down that it was my bow that dealt the death blow. She looked at me, fury and hate in her eyes. I have not seen her since.”

Gordie stood quietly for a time. “Orion is a constellation . . .” he said eventually, not completing his thought before Apollo interjected.

“Yes, he is. After I killed him I put him in the cosmos in the hopes that his sigil would give my sister comfort, and maybe that she would one day forgive me. The latter has not happened, as you know.” He sighed again.

“That’s why you follow the sun,” Gordie said, “because you don’t want to see him . . .  his constellation.” It wasn’t a question—he knew it was true and Apollo’s silence confirmed it. Gordie’s stomach dropped. How was he supposed to convince Artemis to forgive her murderous brother?
He
wouldn’t forgive someone for doing that to
him
. Now he really wished this task required a feat of strength or courage—but emotional reparation? That was impossible.