CHILD OF PLUTO

It was cold. So very cold.

These were the first thoughts that came to him when he awoke. He thought of how strange that it was so very cold when he awoke amidst brilliant flames. How there was fire as far as the eye could see, yet upon his skin did he feel nothing save the chill night air. Well, nothing save the night air, and the eyes of the reaper standing beyond the tree line.

“I feel your gaze, spector. Show yourself to me at once.”

The reaper came like a shadow, gliding across the ground both weightless and free. “You call out to death, yet I feel no fear from you. You are a strange boy, Zagreus.”

Zagreus, he thought. Yes, that was his name, he knew this in his heart to be true, but still could he see naught beyond the fog. “What is this, spector? Why do you stand before me, when I have yet to see my eighteenth year?”

“You are many things, child, but a fool you are not.”

Within Zagreus’ chest began to grow a hole. Now could he recall when once before he had met the fated Reaper, and how they had seemed so distant. Like a phantasm in the corner of one’s eye rather than any real lurker. Yet now, there was no denying it, that this was no mere lurker. In front of Zagreus stood fated death, and never before had a time came when he had felt so powerless.

The silence which fell between the two was broken by a cry, quickly to be followed by another. When Zagreus turned to look upon these banshees, the sight which he beheld was one like a dream. For there, in the midst of the roaring flames and the dead of night, were his dear sisters Melinoe & Makaria. The child-burdened Makaria. And between the two girls was a greatly bloodied body, of whose identity Zagreus need not question.

It was then he felt a fire ignite in his cold chest. “I will not before the birth of my nephew.”

“Your sisters will do well in letting him know of who his uncle was,” said the Reaper, his tone neither sincere nor condescending. It was still & factual, as if he were describing the weather.

“Do you speak as if to comfort, Reaper? For I will say that I find no comfort in these words!” Zagreus felt his phantom blood boiling, lighting his skin ablaze in a feeling akin to when he was still breathing. “I have no desire to be a memory, foul reaper, and neither do I plan to die in this place!”

“Not many plan to die. Even fewer can avoid it.” The Reapers eyes never left the sister pair, never blinking when they fixed Zagreus’ corpse upon a makeshift funeral pyre.

“Then you may count me as one against the many, for never will Zagreus, god of the hunted, enter death’s cold embrace!”

At this proclamation did the Reaper begin to anger. Slowly did he rise to full height, so tall in stature that he and his raven black wings blot out any light from the aflame surroundings. “Pray tell, boy, how you plan to evade me?” His voice held no anger, no contempt, only wonder as to Zagreus’ plot. Never before had the Reaper claimed a god’s soul, nor had he claimed a soul so brazen in its disrespect.

Yet, when Zagreus was to answer, their attention was quickly drawn to the pyre. From the raging flames did a figure approach, wielding within their hands a great warhammer. They were not of Hades soldiers.

Zagreus was helpless to watch as the warrior charged for his mourning sisters, only blocked from pregnant Makaria by the efforts of Melinoe’s magic. A scuffle so erupted, of which Melinoe found her strength wanting, and Zagreus felt the hole grow deeper when he could do nothing but watch. “Aid me, Reaper,” he said, his voice a cry sob as he felt his powers fail him. “Save my sisters if you are unwilling to save me! Spare them a death in such a place like this!”

But his prayers were found wanting, for the Reaper was no savior. He was only a spirit, made of the aether to guide the deceased to where they all must go. And yet, the Reaper was a condemner neither, taking no joy in the deaths of the young.

In a time when Melinoe found her hold amidst the warriors war hammer, his aim now the distraught Makaria, the Reaper gave Melinoe only the slightest of a pull, with which she now found the strength to pull him away. She was quick, to knock his aim from her sister so she might use the moment to kill, running a dagger through the mans back. He then fell into the flames, and now were they all alone again. And now, were the sisters alone again.

“I did not come to torment you, Zagreus,” said the Reaper, his tone now filled with a bitter kindness as he held within his hand the blackened soul of the warrior. “I only wish to guide you to where kind souls such as your own must go.”

“Your sisters will be safe, and your nephew born soon.” The soul shrunk like a withered apple, never to see again. “And now it is your time to go.”

The Reapers words were distant in his ears, yet brought a sense of warmth to Zagreus all the same.

And like the theaters' curtain call, Zagreus watched as the light from the roaring flames grew dimmer and the cries of his sisters grew further from his reach. Now they were left in nothing but black, upon an endless twising road.

“And where, kind Reaper, might my soul find rest?”

“That answer is beyond me, child of Pluto.” The Reaper took his hand. “But let us find it, down this twisting black road.”

Enrique Alvarez hails from the sunlit suburbs of Florida. When he’s not writing, he can be found watching YouTube and learning about Greek/Norse mythology. Follow him at: Insta @_1unreliable_narrator1_