OCtober Day Eight: Festival

Horns blared in the distance followed by booming drums but Syagros couldn’t care less. He didn’t come here to party, rather he came here to find some answers. What kind of answers he was looking for, was beyond him. All he knew was that he had to know at the very least. Though it had been a thousand years since he had been in this part Greece, a thousand years since he had been tortured by his mother, a thousand years since he left the shithole that was Tartarus, he hoped that being back would give him answers. 

Since he had been tortured by his mother and came into his godhood, he gained powers he thought he would never possess in life: strength, mind reading, and the ability to look into the past and future. Of course the latter was tricky; seeing the past and future meant understanding there was nothing that could change it but there was always a way to make it worse. 

He didn’t want to alter either of them in any way. All he wanted to know was what happened to the human mother who had raised for twenty-three years. What fate did she meet after everything she gave up to raise him as her own? 

His heart thumped against his chest as fast as the drums in the distance. The festival of Artemis. If he didn’t know her personally, he might have been there, too, celebrating the goddess of the hunt, the moon, and childbirth. From the time he knew what the gods were, she was his patron. If she hadn’t helped raise him, he didn’t know what would’ve become of himself. But did she show the same mercy to the human who took her in perceiving her to be a orphan? He hoped so. 

“Syagros?” The beautiful, euphoric voice behind him gave a sense of solace. 

“Artemis.” He turned around to see her fiery hair in a crowned braid, a green dress floated down her body like liquid. 

“Are you ready to step back in time as I showed you?” 

Honestly, no, he was not but it was now or never. Once he knew, he was never going to come back here again. If her body remained, he would burn what was left and take it with him. If there was nothing left, he would keep her memory alive in his heart and mind. 

“I will be here every step of the way. If it gets to be too much, tell me and we will stop.” 

Syagros nodded. At the very least, he was happy he had Artemis with him. He could scarcely believe it. Never would have imagined that he’d be walking among the gods let alone be one of them. 

Taking Artemis’ hands in his, they sat on the ground where his house once sat and he let his mind wander the day he was taken away so he could see exactly what happened with his mother.