Total pages in book: 103
Estimated words: 99201 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 496(@200wpm)___ 397(@250wpm)___ 331(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 99201 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 496(@200wpm)___ 397(@250wpm)___ 331(@300wpm)
Pressia. That was her book.
And once I had these clues it all made so much sense. She tried to kill me. And the antlers of a royal beast, in combination with the wings of a pegásius, and whatever else was in that moldy magiceutical bag were how this was done.
Pressia had done this.
To Callistina. To Ire.
To me.
And she. Had. Failed.
This was when I made my promise. This was when I told Callistina, while she was still sleeping off her injury, that I was gonna end that woman if it was the last thing I did.
I had nightmares every time I fell asleep.
They always started on the roof of Building One in the Sphere of Science and Glory. The first time they were making us jump, to be exact. The erotes. Plural of me. Only I wasn’t a ‘me’ back then, I was just a ‘them.’ One of a collective. A possibility.
We were a bunch of wingless boys. Godlings, I guess. The potential to be gods was there. And we all commanded the power of love in some way. Just one way, actually. One very specific way each because there are a thousand different ways to love and no man, or god, should have power over all of it.
I commanded the power of sexual love. The heightened feeling one gets in the throes of passion.
None of that was the point of the nightmare, though. The point of the nightmare was to remind me how I came to be Eros, the god of love, and not simply Erotes 999, godling of sex.
And it happened on that rooftop when I was pushed over and wings—great, big, golden-feathered wings—sprouted right out of my back.
Wings like the ones I have right now, in fact. The exact same set.
I was the only one. The only boy who grew wings. And this is how I became the god. Not the first—they were making all the gods in that building at the same time. But I was the only erotes to become Eros.
How they killed the rest of them—because there is no death when you are just a numbered collection of primordial life-stuff. They just make you again, and again, and again. So how they killed them after I grew those wings, I haven’t a clue.
All I know is that all the power of love they had once possessed was now mine. They gave it all to me.
And then they wanted to take it back.
Because love is too powerful. No man, or god, should ever wield that kind of power.
They had made a mistake.
I was a mistake.
And they tried to erase me.
I know what it’s like to have a piece of your body cut off. I know what it’s like to miss your wings. That’s how they tried to dull my power. They thought it was in the wings.
And it was. Mostly. Because wings have feathers and the power is actually in the feathers.
They took my wings and when it was over, it was as if I was castrated. Emasculated.
And then I went crazy.
Kinda like Callistina did with her fake antlers, and her weird wooden blocks, and that mangy coat.
Only I used magic and she didn’t.
I’m asleep when this realization hits me. When all the stories of gods and goddesses, and myths, and pantheons fade into the background and only the cold, hard facts remain.
We are not gods.
We are nothing but rogue experiments.
It is day ninety-seven when I hear a small rustling behind me as I stir the pot of badger stew over the fire. And when I turn around, I find that Callistina is sitting up and looking around. She blinks a few times, like she’s trying to make sense of things.
I knew she was going to wake up for good soon. Her head is completely healed now, and she looks almost like she did when we started this cursed journey, so I was preparing for it.
But nothing prepared me for the joy I feel when it finally happens. “Well,” I say, smiling at her as she turns her head towards my voice. “Welcome back to the land of the living. How are you feeling?”
She blinks again, her eyebrows shooting up her forehead. “Eros. Where the hell did you get those wings?” She says this like it’s the most natural thing in the world. Like it’s the only question that matters. Like she didn’t just spend the last three months in a coma recovering from a heinous act by a bitter woman.
But despite all I’ve been through, all she’s been through too, a laugh bursts out of me along with a huge sigh of relief.
She’s gonna be OK. Again, I knew this. But it felt like a real act of faith over the past ninety-seven days. Like it was something only in the future. And the future would never arrive.