| Respite (Olympus) [Tag: Lethe] |
[22 Jan 2008|09:55pm] |
It felt strange. Walking about on the paths and in the gardens of Olympus was an almost wholly alien experience for him, and it left him feeling isolated, outcast, a barely welcome refugee. Those feelings contrasted sharply with the bright colors and deep greens surrounding him. The environment certainly didn't suit him, yet he turned away from the idea of leaving Olympus. The Underworld was closed to him, while his family pursued their mad, myopic course to their own ruin--he couldn't even brave the journey to Hades's halls. And he didn't want to be stuck on the surface, alone and exposed; here, at least, if he were accosted, there would at least be some outcry over interlopers invading the tranquility of the place, superficial though that peace may be.
He sat upon a hillock, greatsword unslung from his back. It lay beside him, incongruously grim and bitter amidst the happy greenery. He imagined that that was how he looked: grim and out of place. He himself was an interloper, a leech living off the kindness and hospitality of Asklepios, and hiding under the shadow of Zeus's decree without requesting it formally. Was he a coward, for staying here, out of sight, and for the moment, hopefully out of mind? Was he a traitor, for seeking sanctuary up here, far away from the grey and misty fields to which most of his charges went?
The questions rolled through his mind with thumping, incessant force. It was hard to believe, sitting here, that his family could be at spearpoints with the gods that ruled up here, that war seemed as inevitable between gods as it did between mortals.
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