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Her eyes opened, slivers of sky appearing between her lashes, as she yawned, her tiny fists rising towards the sun. Rhea stood over her, a faint smile on her face.
"See," her mother said, her words almost a coo. "What a darling baby."
"All I see," her father rumbled, the sun fading as he moved above her, as she suddenly became aware that something was not quite right. "Is a problem."
She sucked in a deep breath, her first cry cutting out as her father opened his mouth and swallowed her whole.
***
A hearth does not spark alone. She needs nurturing, help, coaxing in some cases, to flicker into warmth.
A fire does not bloom in damp places.
Likewise, homes do not last when there is no trust.
***
She grew in the stomach of her father, days passing into years, as her siblings were swallowed down beside her one by one.
She helped Poseidon take his first steps, taught Demeter how to braid hair, heard Hades' first cries, watched as Hera learned their truths.
She knew it was not the end of them, knew that they were not to stay in their father for their entire lives. She kept her knowledge bound closely to her chest, kept the loneliness that nipped at her heels hidden from the others as they fought and collided, none of them ever knowing the loneliness she was born into.
She was glad they would never know, glad she was alone, glad that the damp blankness was her burden to bear alone.
***
It is hard, to make a home.
It takes more than people expect, to carve out a spot among the rubble, to let yourself blossom in adversity, to fall into darkness but not into despair.
To make a home, a person must feel and want safety.
It is a vulnerable thing - when a person cracks themselves open and pulls themselves through, when they construct walls and a roof around them.
The vulnerability rises to an almost unbearable level when the home is not a place, but instead, a person, an emotion, a notion.
***
Hestia did not feel despair when she re-emerged into the light. She did not feel anger, or fear.
She closed her eyes, listening to the sounds of the world, feeling the breeze on her skin. She stood stalk-still, rooting herself down to the very earth, her powers unbound for the first time since she had been alive.
She slipped into the earth, spread her senses as far as she could go, neatly avoiding the other Gods and Titans connected, and let herself become one with the world for a brief shining moment that lasted for an eternity, before she returned to her body to watch as her youngest brother became King of the Gods.
***
The feelings associated with hearth and home are ones that are intrinsic to humanity. The joy of others, the laughter of friends, the feeling of curling into a safe place to sleep.
It is protection and goodness and security.
People tell each other. Bad things do not happen at home.
*
Sometimes though, people lie.
***
She stood, the flickers of flames splashing across her face as she listened. She was not sought out, was not wanted, or listened too.
She simply sat at the feet of the Gods, tending the eternal hearth, and listened to her siblings and her nieces and her nephews, debate the sanctity of human life without seeking her counsel or even the counsel from the God of the Dead.
She rose from her spot, unnoticed, and slipped into the fire, arriving neatly in the Underworld, her face set in furrowed unhappiness.
She dipped her head to Hades. "Lord and Brother," she said, squinting at him. "I wish to know how you are."
Hades threw back his head and laughed, warmth shining through his cold eyes. "Have you lost your senses?" He asked, as the fire warmed beneath her feet as the sight of his laughter. "Have you taken leave of propriety, dear Sister?"
She tossed her hair over her shoulder, sniffing at the sight of his laughter before laughing as well, and stepping from the hearth. "For all that they speak," she said, linking her arm gently with his and guiding him from his throne room. "They have never said much, have they?"
"I fear not," he said, patting her on the hand. "And I suppose they must've forgotten that the oldest is the wisest."
"I am not sure that Aphrodite is always the wisest," Hestia demurred, a sly look in her eyes. "For surely, in our halls of power, Love strides the loudest."
He hummed under his breath, and looked at her from the corner of his eye, before shaking his head. "There are things I will never understand about you," he said quietly. "Eldest-Born holds a high place, and surely-"
"They do not know," Hestia interrupted, keeping her gaze from him. "Hollow people ring like bells when they are with their own kind, and among the cacophony, I do not mind simply listening."
Hades watched her steadily for a moment, before dipping his head, and leading her through the land of the dead, their pointed words tucked away for another visit.
***
She did not tell anyone of the hunger that gnawed at her bones, of the pit of darkness that swallowed her mind.
In order to know how to be herself wholly and completely, she had to know the antithesis of herself, had to know how damage and darkness lurked beneath the skin of those she loved, had to know just how far people would go to destroy themselves and their families.
She knew how deep hatred ran. She knew how bloody family was.
She knew, intimately and profoundly, how much promised safety could twist a person on a hook, how tempting lures could cause more poison within, how the desire for family could taint the very soul.
***
She did not speak of the eons of moments spent alone in the stomach, of how she cracked herself open and took out her soul, examining it with an air of confusion.
She wanted so badly to be with someone, so badly to be known, she did not quite think of how someone would get stuck with her.
***
Hestia sat on the beach, the warmth from Apollo soothing her skin, until the sky spun itself to dusk, and the moon began to rise, Artemis' familiar hounds baying in the thick woods. She pushed herself up from the sand, dusting her hands off on her dress, and slogged into the water, following the pinpricks of lightwarmthsafety she could feel from Poseidon's hearth, all those miles away.
She closed her eyes as she sank to the bottom of the sea, cupping the saltwater in her hands and slipping through the darkness until she arrived in Poseidon's home, the sensation of water being one she was quickly adapting to. She slid into the throne room, reaching for the nearest glint of a hearth in her senses, and stepped through, the green-blue glimmer of flames rising high to welcome her in.
"Sister," Poseidon said, unsurprised. "Hades mentioned you might visit."
"Oh?" she said, stepping onto the coral tile. "How interesting. I was of the belief that you and he were not in contact."
Poseidon rolled his eyes, a familiar sight to her, having grown up with him the longest, and sighed. "Come now," he said, rising from his seat to guide her through his halls of power. "You and I both know that what our youngest siblings do not know will not hurt them." She smirked at him and he reached down to tug on her braid as he had when they were smaller. "I've missed having you," he said, after they had walked in silence for a long moment. "Sometimes I think that things were simpler-"
"When there was no power?" She said, cutting him off and watching him nod. "It is not a hard thing to long for the past," she said. "But it bears watching, so you do not slip from remembrance to actively seeking."
He nodded, and did not do her the disservice of rolling his eyes again. "I still miss you," he said softly. "There were long eons spent in the darkness between the two of us, and I would not like to see an eon without you."
"Why do you think I am seeking you out," she said, a smile on her face. "It is not hard to find the actual bonds that bind and follow them. You know, more so than anyone, that there is nothing that keeps me out when there is community to be found."
"I know," he said, smiling back. "Why do you think I built a hearth, except to pay my dues."
She swatted gently at him and he dodged, the two of them falling into a familiar pattern as they walked further into the dark sea, the shades of which harkened back to an age long past.
***
She plunged her fingers into the flames, rooting herself into her spot and refusing to remove them, even as the heat ate away at her skin, and her muscle and sinew melted to nothing.
When it was just her bones, glowing a harsh orange, her forearms smeared with hot ichor, she pulled them out and held them up to the sky. She pressed her hot fingers into her cheeks and paid no mind to the burning sensation. She let herself sink into her mind, let the pain fill her up until she thought she might burst, and only then, finally let herself pull away.
Be mindful, she whispered in the woods, her voice carried by the smallest of breezes. A hearth can hurt as much as it can heal.
***
She watched with heavy eyes as Mount Olympus became a hubbub of petty backstabbing and cruel tricks. She saw Gods turn on themselves in order to get ahead, in order to earn something she could not fathom.
She kept to herself as the promised land turned into nothing more than pretty lies and deceit.
It was heartbreaking, she had decided, that her youngest brother could not see the forest for the trees.
***
She stood alone in the throne room, her hands clasped together, the fire smoldering at her feet. She craned her head back, watching as light clouds passed overhead, listening as nymphs chattered outside the doors.
She looked over her shoulder as the door cracked open behind her, Zeus spilling in with hardly a whisper.
"Sister," he said lowly, ferocious anger clenched in his teeth before he sucked in a deep breath and relaxed. "What are you doing here?"
"Waiting," she answered, turning to look at him fully, her hands still tucked into each other. "For you."
Zeus narrowed his eyes. "I do not like surprises," he warned, looking into the shadows and shifting when he found no one there. "I do not like to be usurped."
Hestia blinked at him. "Oh," she said, her face smoothing out. "I know."
"Then why are you here?" He asked, stepping further into the room, his hand lingering by the bolt belted at his waist.
She sighed, stepping into the embers and cocking her head at him. "Where else would I be but at the hearth that burns," she answered. "As all hearths are, so am I." He scowled and she shook her head at him. "You do not know how to wait for your answers," she chided. "I had assumed that Kinghood would have taken this impatience from you but all it has done is expound upon it."
"Speak clearly," Zeus said. "Or do not speak at all."
She narrowed her eyes. "You do not have the power to bind my tongue, young one, and to presume you could fathom to do so, is an insult beyond measure." She laughed once, the sound high and sharp, much like the creak of wood straining before it explodes. "I suppose you do not know much of anything," she mused, her eyes glinting with unnamed emotion, "if you would attempt to keep me from my desires."
He opened his mouth and she shook her head, cutting off his words. "You believe that the worst that can be done to a person is to rend them from themselves, to put them into such pain that there will never be a reprieve, to hurt them. You believe all that, and you miss the pain that comes from broken trust and empty promises and from the dull rasp of a final goodbye."
She leaned down and plucked a lump of coal from beneath her. "You forget just which of us did not taste the sun or the sky until she was eons old, you forget who flourished in the dark pit of a stomach, who helped raise your siblings." She crushed the coal in her hands, embers catching on her grey shift until she was covered in slow tracks of smoldering fire. "More than that, Brother," she murmured, Zeus, tracking her every movement with a worried look in his eyes. "You forget who made fire bloom in a place so wet and desolate that the only option was to burn the self."
She looked up from her sooty hands and smiled at him, sharp and dark. "Do not fear me," she said, her eyes fixed on his. "I am simply here to welcome you home."
***
Caught in the darkness, Hestia looked up from her crouched position, her face illuminated in flames that glowed a strange muted gold. She felt her father swallow, heard the thump of a tiny body hitting the ground beside her, and stood, brushing her hands on her dress.
She cradled the baby in her hands, watched as he opened his mouth and began to cry, and felt the obscurity recede from around her, the blackness that had always swallowed her, fading to a dark grey.
She ran a finger down his cheek and smiled.
She would get out, one day, and the world would be hers, she was sure of it.