Chapter Text
I check my messanger bag, hoping—No, pleading—, for the gods to settle any quarrel without my aid. I cannot endure another delivery.
I start descending from Olympus, nevertheless, must have I acquired Tiresias’ prophecy abilities, for my prediction is unwillingly granted as voice invokes my being by title.
“Heralds of gods. I must express my… profound displeausure on a critical issue.”
Hera.
I will not emerge from this wing-footed, will I? Am I going to be known from now as “The non-winged-footed messanger”?
I turn before Hera, sat on her throne, and plast a smile. “What has troubled you, Cow-eyed, that you seek for me? Is it perhaps an urgent message I must deliver? I suggest you to summon your messanger, Iris, for I—”
“Rather not. I seek for you since I’ve taken notice about your time management, and, I must say, it is quite unusual how your outcome is, most of the time,… identical.”
“How so?”
“Tiresias.”
I go stiff. This is the subject she wants to broach. My wings unconciously try to cover my eyes. I do not let them, as it’d be a sign of fear—which I do not possess—...
Well, I may be a little terrified, yet, I have cast myself into the waters of devotion for them, and this event will be the testament to my unwavering resolve.
“We both clearly distinguish this name, correct?” She asks amused. I nod, trying to be as carefree as I could appear to be.
She stays silent, searching for ways to place politeness to her statement.
“I am indignated on how you could remiss for the one who durst humiliate me.”
Well, I may have been on the wrong; Mistress does not want to use any euphemism.
The debate seems to still linger on her mind. If maybe I could try and open her mind into a more mortal perspective. “While aware of this, Hera, they were fated to a unfortunate outcome both ways. They were impelled to side with Father—”
Disrespectfully, I am cut off—by, likely, the third time—by the outraged shout directed at me, making my wings shiver reflexively and myself to retract a step back. (Stupid, stupid reflexes.)
“That is no justifiable reason! You are having intimate connection with the individual who livid me in countless circumstances!”
In the corner of my left wing, I watch Athena rotate their head to me, a complete expression of bewilderedment targeted to me beneath her headgear—I ignore it. I avance a step foward to Hera.
“The same individual who might have enranged you continued to compensate you in many other circumstances.” I rise up just so my wings have at least something to do and, if necessary, for a quicker elude. “They became a priestess for you, learned from their actions, even used your seven year curse into good and developed a family.”
“I thought that was your domain.”
I should probably not goad her in revaluation.
She doesn’t back down, exclaiming back, “He abandoned his daughters—his spouse!”
“They abandoned him!”
Hera aggreviedly gasps, aghast that I even dared to raise my voice to her. I must have a subconscious suicide mission, I thought. But, what can she even do? Smite me?
…
Where is Father when I need him?
Hera sighs in irritation. Nearby bystandar gods watched the scene forming before them simultaneously. Still, none dares to intervine, passing from afar. She makes a sign with her hand, commanding a behest. A nymph, white hair and silver clothes, pours wine into a golden cup, hands it to her before vanishing as rapid as her entrance.
Don’t think of the other being with white hair that is ignorant to what they´ve cause. Don’t remember.
Hera persists with a more machiavellian, moving to a more personal approach. “It seems my emotional well-being is not the main priority of your empathy. If you were actually concerned for my state, you would not desire to have such a obscene relationship with the dead.”
At least she isn’t shouting anymore.
At last, I remain quiet, fixing my helmet that had displaced moments ago by the intensity of Hera. Both of us remain silent for quite some time. My eyes fly everywhere, calculating any and every possibility this can end in.
Maybe I can plummet down?
No, she will prohibit my entrance.
Where is Zeus when most needed?
Probably with a mortal.
Can’t she just focus with her husband’s own love life?
Of course, my innocent affairs are far more scandalous. How inconsinderate of me, truly.
It appears my stillness provokes her fury further more than an actual reply. “I await an answer, swift-footed messanger.”
I silently entreat for the skies to aid me in overcoming the raged goddess with unwavering perspective. “I was unaware of your hostility toward him, but I assure, they have changed. I ask for your forgiveness on his behalf, and, if it calls, proof of such worthiness. And, if I truly can't engender a recant from the Cow-Eyed Queen, thus, I may take his punishment–”
“Hera, I’m constrained by circumstance to speak now, before this private disagreement kindles into an unquenchable conflagration, in all the sense of the word."
The gods have favoured me.
I could recognize that poise in Tartarus; Athena has a coverted amusement, normally with a subtle tilt of their head, that only I quite notice.
“This impetuous, ill-advised, foolhardy—” She glances at me. I find it uncalled the need to overemphasize with such adjectives; perhaps a ‘charming’ would balance it. Still, I consider it is more than comprehendable the message Athena is trying to send, . “—trickster, albeit his judgement is… inane, my purview suggest his assertion holds some water.”
“I can’t thank you enough. Seriously, like, you came just in time before she crushed me!” I chuckle half-heartedly.
Her eyes drifted from me as to express dissapointed, even if the line in her lips was slightly skewed up. Athena’s look of disapproval couldn’t be more forged.
I informally elbow her. “Come on, darling, you know it was hilarious! I think she just was attempting to find an excuse to berate me and choose the first one she found.”
The lady of Athens sighs exasperated, even though her shoulders faintly drop from the taut line they were held in. Her gaze comes back on me, where they harden and, yet, proceed to soften as if a pliant, mortal object being forged.
“Perhaps measuring restraint would bring order. One would do well to weigh the gravity of their methodology before executing their act.”
I dismiss her unecessary concern with the wave of my hand, keening to finally egress back to my beloved.
Before leaving, I exclaim with passion, “They’ll have to get rid of my wings first then!” before plummeting down.