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I.
He’s the most beautiful mortal Simon’s ever seen.
And he’s seen a lot of them.
Basil’s pale and almost-grey pallor looks almost transparent in the sunlight, forcing Simon to blink in order to look at him. He’s used to that with himself — mortals have always insisted it’s near impossible to look right at him. Basil seems to have no issue with that.
It’s certainly something Simon really likes about him.
Simon likes everything about him. Especially when he’s upset and makes that sweet little frowny face when Simon does something out of the scope of Basil’s understanding.
He’s doing it now.
Well, he did it already, but Basil is practically glaring because Simon did something otherworldly and Basil’s sweet little mortal mind can’t wrap around it.
“How?” Basil asks, eyebrows screwed together like he’s going to figure out Simon’s godlike powers by focusing heavily enough on him.
Simon laughs loudly, continuing to let the light shine from his palms, forming shadows with his fingers on the chariot they’re resting beside. “Oh, darling,” he says fondly. “You could not even imagine.”
Basil pouts. He’s pretty when he pouts, and he knows exactly what it does to Simon. “I simply wish to understand you, Simon.”
“You will,” Simon promises. “One day.”
Basil perks up a bit at that but Simon pushes at his shoulder so he’s shoved back down into the grass. Simon leaps to his feet and spreads his arms wide, his wingspan seeming to take up the entire sky for just a moment. Basil shades his eyes from Simon’s light.
Simon had taken Basil for a ride in the gift he’d presented to him just a week prior. Basil complained about the gift constantly because Simon was the only one who could pilot it, but secretly, Simon thinks he loves the excuse to be around him in order to use it.
The present being, of course, a chariot drawn by large and beautifully white swans.
Basil and Simon now reside, lounging and laughing, at the top of a hill overlooking the city of Delphi. Basil, a native of Amyclae, is far from home — they’d traveled over plain and sea in almost the blink of an eye.
Simon stops mid-spin and looks down at Basil who lays out against the grass, one knee tucked up in towards his hip, looking as at-ease as ever. The tunic is starting to ride up Basil’s lovely thighs and Simon has to focus his gaze at Basil’s face (which is just as beautiful) instead of the smooth and pale skin of his legs. “You’re beautiful,” Simon says.
Basil almost-blushes, his complexion not allowing for any actual pink to tinge his skin aside from that from the sun. Simon would offer some protection from the sun for Basil, but he likes how he looks sun-kissed. “So I’ve been told,” Basil says, not un-arrogantly.
Simon laughs softly. “Oh, I forget that all the mortals claim that you’re the loveliest youth in the land, or whatever it is they yell from the cliff sides.”
“They yell nothing of the sort,” Basil insists.
“Oh, but they write sonnets,” Simon moans dramatically, falling back onto the grass next to Basil. “They orchestrate hymns about your beauty and the way your hair falls against your shoulders—”
“Have you been thinking about the way my hair falls against my shoulders?” Basil interrupts, smiling softly and shaking his hair out, distracting Simon with how it catches the light and shines almost blue for a moment against the usual black.
“Let me finish!”
“If you’re just going to mock me, then—”
Simon quiets Basil by kissing him.
He hasn’t done that before.
Basil’s stunned for a moment, his breath catching against Simon’s warm lips, but then he responds back, pushing himself into Simon’s light.
If one could see the young lovers from above, the shapes of their bodies pressed together against the grass form a curved line, half grey and half gold, shining and shadowing in the setting sun, one would find any reason to make sure they stayed that way, laughing into each other’s mouths and having the sort of love that scholars try to study and scientists attempt to recreate.
II.
Simon takes Basil to his favorite place. Basil insists that Simon teach him the game of quoits and Simon agrees because he likes how Basil looks when he’s listening to instructions.
“Then shift your weight onto your right foot,” Simon instructs, demonstrating by shifting around and watching Basil do the same, the discus swinging out but not leaving his firm grip quite yet. “And let go.”
Basil isn’t even holding a discus yet — he wasn’t ready for it according to Simon — but he uncurls his fingers like he’s just thrown it, matching Simon’s form perfectly.
“Yes,” Simon says, smiling. “Just like that.”
Basil offers a matching smile and steps out of his wide legged stance to shove his shoulder into Simon’s. “Willing to let me try it sans the over-careful training?”
Soon enough, there’s a discus in Basil’s hand and a smile playing on his lips. He steps perfectly into position, twisting his hips and sliding into his often-practiced and well-maintained quoits form, spinning in a tight circle and flinging the discus out of his hand, watching as it slices through the air.
Simon watches with his jaw dropped open. He turns to Basil the moment that the discus hits the ground.
“Oh deception!” he shouts. “You already knew how to play!”
Basil smirks and shrugs his shoulders easily. “You know little of me, O Great One.”
Simon steps over to Basil and slips his arms around his waist, tugging him into his chest. “Have they always taught beautiful young Spartan princes to play quoits?”
Basil braces his hands against Simon’s shoulders. “You should know better than I, God of Sun and Music, who has been around since the dawn of time itself.”
“Well, if you consider Helios—”
Basil puts his mouth on Simon’s, not letting him get any further into the thought. “Darling God of Light,” he whispers, his words only slightly muffled in Simon’s mouth. “You are the God of my heart and soul.”
Simon, an immortal god, blushes at Basil’s words. He holds Basil tightly and kisses him with the passion of, well, the sun. Easily, they fall into laughter against each other.
“Sentimental fool,” Simon murmurs.
Basil nods and then steps away from Simon. “Alright, all-powerful and all-knowing immortal, show me your discus prowess.”
Simon grins. He’s good at most things — he’s the deity of a lot of them — and quoits are no exception. He grasps a discus in his hand and Basil gives him a smirk before running down a few yards like he’s going to catch the discus before it hits the ground once Simon throws it.
“Be in awe!” Simon shouts, his voice booming over the plain, the sun shining in his hair and his eyes. He gets into position, curling the discus in towards his chest and taking a deep breath before unwinding, spinning, shifting into his right hip and throwing the discus with just enough strength for it to be impressive.
The discus splits open the sky, the unwrought iron tearing in a line in the air over Basil’s head, sailing fast and true.
Basil runs after it, having moved far enough away from Simon that he can nearly catch up. He’s always been a fast runner and this is no exception, his feet carrying him far and quick, practically gliding across the field.
And maybe it’s the Fates or maybe it’s being in Simon’s presence that pushes Basil to catch up with the discus.
The discus falls and hits the ground. It was traveling in such a way that it hits the ground and bounces back.
Simon watches as the discus, thrown by his own traitorous hand, rebounds back and hits Basil in the temple.
A fatal blow.
III.
Simon rushes to Basil. He glides there in barely a second, catching Basil in his arms before the youth has even hit the ground.
Simon falls to his knees, Basil resting his lap with his head leaning up against Simon’s forearm, the blood from his wound staining Simon’s tunic.
“No,” is the breathless sob caught in Simon’s mouth, bubbling up past his lips and taking too long to say.
Basil’s long from gone, but the blood is sliding down his face, soaking his hair and sticking to his eyebrows and cheeks. He looks gaunt and frightened.
“Simon,” he whispers, reaching up to stroke Simon’s face, cradling the edge of his jaw in his hand. Even as he lay dying, the touch is soft and sure, like Simon’s the last thing Basil would want to see in life anyway.
“Darling Basil,” Simon returns, feeling a tear fall down the top of his cheek and land on Basil’s forehead, diluting the blood with the drop for a fleeting moment. “Let me fix you.”
He starts to move, his hands laying Basil completely down flat on his lap so he can push them into his bloody hair, murmuring a soft call for healing.
Nothing happens.
The wound on Basil’s head continues to flow and Basil’s skin continues to lose its color.
Simon tries again, saying louder, “I call upon the power of healing and demand that this illness be cast out!”
Still. Basil still lays dying in Simon’s arms.
Far from giving up, Simon moves to conjure a piece of ambrosia in his hand and feeds the edge of it to Basil. Basil graciously takes it and swallows with difficulty, but his eyes are set. He knows it will do no good.
Simon does the same with a goblet of nectar, carefully tipping Basil’s head to catch the golden liquid in his mouth.
“Simon,” Basil whispers once he’s swallowed the nectar to no avail. “It’s alright. I— The Fates have their mysteries.”
Simon, upset that Basil accepts this end from the Fates, raises his head to the sky and curses openly, “May the Fates see my wrath and hear my cries of anguish!”
“Bit dramatic,” Basil jokes quietly. He can’t even muster up a smile.
The tears still falling from Simon’s eyes, he lets out a choked off laugh and more tears patter against Basil’s skin. “You exist to torture me even as you lay— dying.”
Basil has just enough energy left to lean up and press his lips against Simon’s cheek for the briefest kiss. He lies back and grimaces in pain. “Don’t forget me,” he says. Insecure. Insecure and afraid of mortality. “You loved me, right?”
Simon nods fiercely. “I loved you more than anyone before you,” he insists, “and will continue to hold you in high regard above any to follow.”
Basil seems content at that.
They hold each other for several moments, eyes locked even though Simon’s are shining and bright with tears and Basil’s have just started to flutter closed. Simon’s arms are around Basil’s waist now and can do nothing but hold him. His powers over healing have forsaken him just when he needs them the most.
Basil dies, holding the immortal he’d chosen over all else.
A part of Simon dies with him. A bit of his soul, no longer immortal, finds its way into Basil and takes hold, claiming him as its own.
Even long after Basil’s body has grown cold in Simon’s arms, the god weeps for the youth he loved.
He cries out for the gods to turn him mortal, for them to show an ounce of compassion and let him be with Basil, let him die along with him.
The gods are cruel and Simon remains immortal, cradling and crying into Basil’s chest.
As a very last attempt to keep Basil in his heart and in his mind, he lifts his hand, covered with Basil’s blood, and uses the stain to create life, pressing his palm into the grass just next to Basil’s hip, the thin leaves curling out from the stalk and forming a basil plant.
Simon pours every ounce of his overwhelming love for Basil into the creation of this plant, carving each line into the leaves like Basil carved his way into the god’s heart. The stalk grows not very tall, mirroring how little time Basil and Simon had together.
Simon mourns his lover, weeping, watering the plant with his sorrow.
Basil’s body fades from Simon’s grasp and Simon clutches himself instead, crying and wishing he himself were dead.
But the Fates have a different end for him in mind and who is Simon to defy them?
IV.
The people of Amyclae mourn Basil, their sweet young prince, and Simon watches from above, showering them with extra daylight for several weeks.
A celebration of Basil’s life and beauty, Hyacinthia, begins, and Amyclae joins Simon in missing him.
On the last day of Hyacinthia, Simon obscures the sun. The people of Amyclae are cast into darkness and they beg and cry to Simon, the god of the sun, to grant them light once again — to end his mourning and move forward.
He won’t.
Not yet.
—
Alas, alas.
Simon inches his hand away from the wall where he’s finished scribing the words. He did not have to take the difficult route in etching the words into the stone — he’s a god for gods’ sake. (The god of poetry no less.) He simply could have waved his hand and the verse would appear.
But it felt wrong to take the easy way out. He wanted to feel the rough stone against the outside curve of his palm, the mortal feel of the chisel pressed against his fingers.
And it felt good to do this himself. To, for once, settle into what must be done with no tricks or powers that raise him above regular mortals. It felt right. He owed it to him.
The thought of him bubbles up in Simon’s throat and he has to choke it down, dropping the chisel carelessly to the floor next to his bare feet.
He scoops up the thick folded over section of parchment, recreasing it where it had been opened and closed time and time again, tucking the seemingly sacred texts of Basil’s writing into the folds of his cloak that rest close to his heart.
His heart that’s still managing to beat after all this time. After all this pain, this trying to forget. Trying to forgive.
Simon leaves the small room with one last glimpse of his sprawling handwriting on the wall. The doorway crumbles behind him as he steps away. He turns his back on the now-ruins, leaving behind his affection and attachment to the hand that originally wrote those lines now locked in a ruined tomb forever.
The lines are from the last note he ever received from his lover, inscribed with the words Alas, alas, that we will not be one for all time. It was written before Basil knew he would die so young.
A patch of soft basil plants spring up past where Simon walks away, leaving a short path away from the ruins.
He still holds the parchment close to him, never drawing it out to catch a peek of his lover’s writing, but always feeling it there, cooling his heart and reminding him of what comes of antics with mortals.
Heartbreak.
V.
Simon doesn’t see Basil again.
Until he’s awoken by the soft tickle of something against his face. He wrinkles his nose and turns to the side.
“Simon,” someone whispers.
Simon assumes he’s dreaming. He’s had many dreams of hearing Basil’s voice again — of seeing his long-gone lover again, getting to touch and hold him. To simply be in his presence.
“Basil,” he sighs quietly, still not opening his eyes. If he opens them, the dream might slip through his fingers, and he’d do anything to hold onto this. “My darling.”
“Wake up,” the voice says. The feeling of fingers combing through Simon’s hair makes him open his eyes.
It’s too bright at first to see the details of the face looming above him. And then, as it comes into view, Simon swears he’s being tricked. There’s no way that…
“Simon,” Basil says. Smiling softly, the way he used to when he was alive.
As often as Simon has dreamed of seeing him again, he’s never been able to reach up and touch him like he does now. He’s never been able to slide his fingers across Basil’s cheek, push them into his hair, trace the shape of his ears and of his cheekbones.
Simon touches Basil’s cupid’s bow, just to see if his mouth will move when he talks. “Basil,” he says again. “Why are you here?”
Basil places his hands on Simon’s cheeks. “For you,” he murmurs. “Always for you.”
“You…” Simon trails off, finding it difficult to articulate. “You passed. How are you—?”
“Talk to the Fates,” Basil says, smiling. He’s so lovely. “I’ve been granted eternal life.”
Simon’s eyes become unfocused. “Why?”
Basil pinches Simon’s cheeks. “You cannot believe I was influential enough in life to deserve an immortal life next to yours?” he asks.
Simon recognizes the teasing tone. It makes him teary-eyed for not hearing it in so long. “No,” he says, carding his fingers slowly through Basil’s hair, refusing to stop touching him in case he’ll disappear on him. “Of course you were. You were beloved by your people. And by me.”
Basil blushes prettily. “As are you by me.”
He stands up and Simon moves to follow. Basil steps out of Simon’s range of touch but offers him a hand.
“Come with me, Simon,” he says.
Simon is unsure if this is a trick or not. Perhaps he’s still dreaming or perhaps this is someone’s cruel idea of a laugh.
Simon doesn’t care. He would follow Basil anywhere. He’d take his hand at any time.
So he does. And he does.
Alas, alas.
What heartbreak it is to be in love with a mortal.
What bliss it is to find that very same mortal with you for all of eternity.