Fate of the Dog Star (2K)

Goddesses can be killed, but we do not make it easy.

That which bestows our strength and longevity can be diluted through the presence of mortality. It was through the careless couplings of my forebears that my existence – that of a goddess so marginally divine that the muses oft forgot to whisper my name to poets of late – came to be.

Red threaded amongst the gold; so was the tapestry of my blood.

On the day of my death, I entered the Underworld knowing only that which our kind had allowed mortals to believe. I could not have known that Charon would not ferry me along the Styx, nor that there was more for me beyond the depths of Tartaros or fields of Elysium.

It was as if the Underworld had not expected me.

I was wandering along the banks of the Stithe when Thanatos found me, and it was with confusion and reluctance that he led me to his king and queen.

“What is your name?” Persephone had asked, and when I told her, she repeated the foreign syllables.

“Opora.”

Once the goddess honored through the transition from summer to autumn, I have since become just another wandering soul. Tethered only by what I had once been and disinterested in carving my own home within the Underworld, I choose to reside in the halls of Hades.

The dead do not dream, for we do not sleep. And yet I find myself unwillingly lost in half-lucid images of my death. I do not tell Persephone the nature of my demise; I do not tell anyone of the constellation god who tried to take me from my mortal husband; of the guileless tantrum he threw that nearly burned humanity alive. 

No one. I tell no one.

In the timeless time that moves the inhabitants of the Underworld forward, I had awaited in death; a shadow lurking just beyond the sights of the great Dog Star.

Sirius.

His name upon my lips is a curse and a promise of reckoning. 

A clock chimes within me, and I find my feet carrying me to the chambers of the Morai. The skirt of my auburn peplos sways behind me with the fervor of my gait. A goddess can only stand before the throne of vengeance for so long before the desire to claim it devours all else. And though the Morai do not sleep, nor do the weavings and cuttings of life and death ever cease, they do not always watch. 

In my quiet observation, I know well that the discrepancies between each of the three sisters lies beyond that of their role in this world. The second sister, Lachesis, has found much pride in her responsibility – to determine the course of one’s fate once a life’s thread has been measured. 

It is a funny thing; to consider the destiny of others merely a cog in a machine. My life’s meaning was limited by that which she deemed, and it is in my death I find more. 

I do not blame her for my story, though perhaps I should. When I enter their chambers, I do not make for the room within which they work. I mean not to confront her. Instead, I walk to the Hall of Souls. 

A glorified storage space, its great stone walls are lined with shelves upon shelves of glass vials holding the souls that remain. Like glowing light-filled worms, they swim and writhe against the confines of their carriers. Sporadically throughout the nearly immeasurable passage of time, Atropos enters the room to carry out her task, the threads whose time has come seeming to call to her; to beckon for their end. 

The scissors of legend are more than just that; These, the tool of death itself, sits on a pedestal atop a dais at the farside of the hall. It is a bewildering boldness to leave something so sacred, so integral, in such an open place for those with sufficient status to access; for a wayward god or goddess to stumble upon.

On this night, I am that wayward goddess. Their audacity is my key. 

The three sisters have taken to their primary workroom, leaving the Hall empty. Though curiosity prompts a desire to look at each vial, to discern the longevity of my kin or lack thereof, I move with haste to where the scissors lie. 

When I reach for them, I half expect Hades himself to manifest. Relief courses through me when I step backward away from the dais once more, the scissors in hand, and the Hall around me remains quiet and still but the wriggling of souls. Cool in my hand, the metal utensils feel like nothing more than that which one could find in the mortal world. I wonder if it is my god’s blood that has made this so, or if they are truly that menial. 

I place them in the leather satchel hung around my shoulder and make my way out of the hall. 

As the days grow shorter and the air grows cooler, Sirius prepares for his brightest season. In the respite before this, he visits the mortal realm. I shudder as I make my way from Hades’ domain through one of the few gateways, recalling such a day where Sirius first encountered me. For a fleeting moment, the self-loathing and regret I have sought to bury resurfaces. 

I swallow and, with it, rediscover my resolve. 

Accessible only to the gods and goddesses that reside in the Underworld, these gateways are most often used by Thanatos in reaping souls, and by Persephone during her seasonal pilgrimage to Olympus.

A forgotten goddess, I reap the benefit of going routinely unnoticed. 

I find myself in a bustling city, the transition so seamless it feels as if my feet have stood on this very ground all the while. Mortals move about me, but my eyes catch upon familiar buildings. I have not set foot on this plane since my death and, though I know my mortal companions have long since perished, now existing in parts of the Underworld forbidden to me, I find myself yearning for them.

Familiarity guides me to my destination – a haunt of the minor divine. It is temple and pleasure house alike, and it is in his private quarters that I find him. 

Sirius is in his bipedal form, reclining in a chaise, his pitch black hair long and pulled back to reveal angular features. I am met with silver-riddled onyx eyes. 

If my form were of flesh, it would pebble in his presence. The shadow of it recalls the terror, the helplessness, and the nothingness that preceded. 

His stare grows wide, and though he has seen much as an onlooker of the world around us, he skitters back on the furniture at the horror of my form. 

I have come as I am. I do not hide behind my godly form; I do not present as a glistening spector. 

I manifest before him as he made me. 

My flesh, once a warm olive, is pallid and drained. The tissue that was charred by his celestial light — the fatal glow that emanated from him when I denied his pursuit — hangs haphazardly from my exposed ligaments and bones. My formerly thick brunette hair is gone, along with much of my nose. 

I see in his expression that he recognizes me. The horror twists into a fleeting flicker of disgust, and then it is gone, replaced by cool indifference. He straightens on the chaise, interweaving his fingers and resting them in his lap.

If I had blood, it would be boiling. 

“Opora.” His voice is a dagger, the deep timbre splicing through parts of me I am confident I had once healed. 

“Sirius,” I say. 

“I am surprised to find you here. You are looking…” He licks and smacks his lips. It is a lazy and indulgent show of sarcasm. “Well.”

I glower and walk towards him, closing the distance until there is a foot between where I stand, and where he reclines. 

“Death suits me, does it?”

He does not answer, merely inhaling sharply before saying, “How long has it been, Opora?”

My insides roil at his ignorance. "A century.”

“To the day?” 

My silence is more revealing than I wish, and he laughs mirthlessly. I am vulnerable and exposed in the wake of its sound, but I have come too far to surrender now.

“It is, isn’t it? How poetic of you, darling. If only you had endured long enough to utilize such skill in more meaningful ways.” He cocks his head to the side and gives me a smile of feigned sympathy. 

“Endured the outburst of a god who was denied the right to claim another as his plaything?” I ask, brows raised in question. 

Reaching for a goblet, he lifts it to his lips and drinks. Lips stained with deep maroon, he parts them to speak.

“Why are you here?”

“On the day of my death, you shone so brightly,” I spit the word and the volume of my voice escalates with each syllable, “that histories have been rewritten to honor you during a season that had long since been mine. The mortals believe they honor your livelihood; your shine. But their awe at the brightness of your ego is the desecration of my death and my legacy.”

“Darling, not everyone is cut out for godliness. You had a good run but, in the end…” He shrugs. “It wasn’t meant to be.”

“How dare you,” I shout, taking another step forward. 

I feel the absence of the magic that once flowed through me in life, but the weight of the Morai’s scissors across my shoulder are a reminder of my purpose. 

Bracing myself on the wooden frame of the chaise, I lean towards him. I can see the silver threads of his irises flickering as if preparing to summon his constellational body. My lifeless form thunders, pulsing with the warning of it; the memory that it was once the precursor to my dissolution. I fuel it into the surging anger as I speak the words I have considered with every moment I have spent in the Underworld.

“You shine in honor of my murder. For that, you shall never shine again.”

The scissors slide effortlessly into his neck, and they feel more like an extension of me now than an item in my grasp. It is with shocking ease that I glide them across the shaft of his throat, plunging them further and deeper as I effortlessly sever his head from his shoulders. His hot, thick blood floods and soaks us both, the ivory chaise turning a bright red with its flow. 

I watch as the silver leaves his eyes, and then the remaining onyx pools shift into his dog-like stare. It is futile, for with the power of fate itself, I have ended all manner of his existence. 

In this, I find peace and am reborn.