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So the stories said that they would go forth into battle with the gods on their side. They preformed the rites, the sacrifices, the libation, and yet the gods did not come. It was then that they realized their doom. Denial plagued them in that time too, and they fell, one by one, vanishing with the swirling dust into long-lost memory.
She still goes into battle with a prayer on her lips - her goddess has never been a warrior, and the battles of old have proved this numerous times - yet it is with her blessing that she can release her full potential. She is an avatar, an embodiment of love and of beauty - yet she knows what others before her chose to forget: she is nothing without the gods.
Half the time she feels foolish, offering herself in a prayer to gods that are so long-forgotten that they are considered 'classical' - but habit is a dangerous thing.
Still, she never expected to be forced to her knees before a being she knows so well, so intimately. Certainly not here, in the middle of a busy city street in the height of the evening crush of people hurrying to and from their destinations.
She had cut through the park, to be alone with ther thoughts. It was better this way, she reasons. But the sight of such a holy being in this place forces her to pause, wrenched away from the turmoil of her mind. She sinks down onto the fallen leaves of autumn and tries to remember what to do.
It has been a life time. She makes the sign for the goddess against her chest and averts her eyes. This is an honor - (or is it a miracle?) - she could ill afford disrespect.
There is a silence then, a long and painful stifling moment while she tries to collect her emotions. She feels she is being examined, laid completely bare before those heavenly eyes that she never dared to look into in the past.
"Why have you come to this place?" she asks when she can no longer wait for the goddess to pass judgment upon her.
The answer comes with a wan smile, "You are hurting, my child. As your patron, it is my duty to ease that hurt."
"You cannot fix this." Her tone is curt - rude. She should know better and her face burns with the humiliation of this situation.
"She is your consort, your lover - it is your duty to have her." The goddess says sagely, perhaps foolishly.
But like her goddess' love, it can never be.
She closes her eyes, for the pain was simply too much, but the words had to be said. "It is my duty to respect her decisions; my love is such that I can scarce hope for the opportunity to express it."
A hand on her head, tilting her face upwards, forcing her to face the goddess' gaze. She couldn't do this, it was sacrilege, forbidden.
And yet there was kindness, pity - the most expressive face in the world. "You truly are one of my own, Mina." Her name, her true name that so few in this life know. It sounds almost foreign to her ears. She inhales and truly looks at her goddess. There is a smile on her lips, and in her eyes. And pride there too. She feels so guilty, looking at the goddess in this way, in awe of her beauty and her kindness.
She knows does not deserve this pity. She has sinned, spurned the old ways with hopes that it would be enough to prove herself to that damned girl. The one who keeps breaking her heart.
She is doomed.
"You will find your muse. Sometimes these things simply take time." A lop-sided smile, so like her own. "You cannot force the ways of the heart. You of all people should know this."