Prologue
A somber gray sky arched in pain toward the heavens across the slouching stone barriers, the scream of the eastern wind it’s only cry of despair. The palace walls were thick and hard, permeated with the damp coolness of a long forsaken dungeon. Along the faded stone face, years of history etched into each jagged scar. The grounds seemed more like a decaying tomb or a shroud of never ending agony, than the beautiful tapestry of magic it had once been. The skies shed no light, showered no mercy across the faded, rotting landscape sprawling toward the distance. The shivering, cool wind brought the stench of death, of hell, of a thousand broken, lost souls. It was a wind of ill fortune, of curses and pestilence –of death.
For the Heavenly Kings, tonight was a grim night indeed. It was at the denouncement of their Master that each had begun the sinister fall toward the darkness. Even now, the languid rolling of their earthly powers were devolving toward the most vile, demonic hands of the underworld. The King of Hell himself had mocked the growing despair, the Immortal Gods declared their spiteful condemnation. It would all end soon, in the haze of fire and smoke, beneath the crushing hand of a Demoness that once stood at their side.
Tonight, all things would shatter and fall into ruin. At dawn, the Fates themselves would watch in cryptic silence as the world they’d worked so hard to create fell to dust beneath their broken, damned seals. They would watch an entire pantheon of Gods weep in agony; their immortal tears shed for a time since lost to the pages of history. Yes, the Fates would watch as the world they knew fell to rubble and vanished, and with it, the souls they had spent so much time manipulating.
What would they be without their little pawns, their cackling, wretched fingers forever twisting the threads that wove the ancient tapestry? What would they be without their haughty, knowing smiles and impossible creeds and regulations meant to distort the human family to their own sinister ends? Such was a place soon to be discovered. Such was a place soon to be a terrifying reality.
Within the quiet, lonely chambers, he paced. The aura gracing his fast moving feet was of agitation, worry. He had made his choice long ago, and did not deny it, nor shrink from it. It had been his to make, and therefore should never have involved so many. The onyx-like feathering hair glimmered faintly by firelight, his mouth set in a firm line. Death waited for all of them now, it was too late to turn back. Perhaps the most frightening realization for the young man was that, given the same situation again, he wouldn’t have changed a single decision. The Fates could rot in their self-constructed hell for all he cared, and the Gods could be their whipped bedmates.
The whole damn mess was their doing; yet another twisted little game they’d played with the mortals. Well, they had lost this round, he knew. They had been forced to release the Demon Queen in hopes of repairing their awful mistake. Even should the battle prove to be their death, the Fates had been forced to sacrifice all to achieve it. It was a very small victory, but one he would take with pride. It was one he knew his sweet lover would approve of heartily.
His pace slowed a fraction at the thought of her. At their first meeting, she had come to him by moonlight. He had lain in the dewy springtime gardens of the palace beneath the warmth of the softly glowing orb, and she had come. Her form had been swathed in the mantle of the Immortals themselves, perfect in every curve and measure. Her eyes had been soft, beckoning, and his heart had answered the silent call, had felt the awesome power cleverly disguised as a beautiful Demi-God.
But the meeting was ill fated. For the breathtaking Goddess had already been promised to another by the ever meddlesome Fates. Their decree left no room for discussion, for the two never should have met. He thanked all the great stars above and every ancestor he’d ever heard of for her rebellious spirit, her strong will. For without those two, such a love never could have existed, nor thrived in such adversity.
The Fates had announced their fury. He had not cared. Even had she not been a Descendant of the Highest, he would have fallen the moment that gaze touched his face. Their disapproval mattered not. He had already given in, had broken Taboo, had defied the Gods themselves for her hand, for her soft kiss….
Midnight eyes steeled in determination as his pace quickened once more. He would make the same choice again, if only to have her. He walked the room; body tensed at the thought of the final battle, of leaving his father’s side to stand beside her, to protect her from a nightmare he had unknowingly created. The grim line of his mouth deepened as he thought of it. Perhaps there was one decision he would change freely; the meeting of the midnight witch in the fields to the north. Even the thought of her brought an angry curse to his lips. He had been so young…so naïve….
“Endymion.”
He spun on his heel, outrage clear on his anger sharpened features, to see who had dared approach him on such a night. Already he had been banished from the war council and the company of his men at arms for treason by his father. No other should dare to speak to him in his wrath. But his visitor bore no resemblance to any mortal man, tall form easily reaching the stone ceiling above his head, eyes as dark as the blackest pits of the underworld. He wore no symbols, no signs, yet the enraged prince could tell he was one of the Gods.
He did not smile in greeting, his face was somber and long, and his hair a shadow not unlike the forest at night. The robes were a stoic grey, yet his presence filled the room with closely guarded power. Endymion felt as though his breath would freeze in the air between them as his visitor began to speak, filling the room with his words.
“I’ve come to offer you a second chance, young prince. The Fates have decreed your death, as well as that of my Lady.” His voice was hollow, as if caught behind him in a large chamber and lost to the eternities. It was this effect that gave way to the Being’s identity, and stilled Endymion’s thoughts. The prince peered curiously at the God before him, wondering why He, of all of them, would be the one to deliver his death sentence for rebellion.
The news of his own fate pronounced so clearly in the small chamber made no difference. He had known at the first meeting that to love her and to be by her side would mean treason against the Gods. She was, after all, allotted to her own place and should never have been allowed to enter the guardian borders of Earth. He’d known that. He’d known only death awaited behind those silver eyes, her soft hands –yet he had gripped them anyway, and had held on tight ever since.
“I offer an exchange for your fate, if you will no longer be slaves to Them, become my willing servants.” He began again, setting the time key down against the stone as the Door of Eternity swirled into existence behind him. But his offer held no pull, for Endymion would rather die than be separated from the very cause of all his problems.
“No, my Lord Chronos.” He did not hesitate, did not bother to lower his eyes in some mock show of piety for One so powerful. As far as he was concerned, all the Gods had turned on him, and he would not allow them to think for one moment that Their intimidation would change anything. “What could an eternity of servitude to you offer me…if she is not there...?”
The question hung between them both, the only softness Endymion allowed past the careful barrier he had erected around himself. Chronos himself did not allow the smile to reach his face, but the temperature of the room altered, warmed at the defiance in the young man’s heart. He had indeed chosen his work very carefully.
“Her.” The word rang louder in the room than the earlier death sentence. Endymion paused his rapid thoughts, stilled the frustrated beating of his heart as his eyes settled firmly against those of the God of Time. “Do you accept?”
It was not often that the Gods chose to mislead mortals. All the same, it had been known to happen in the past to accomplish their twisted ends. Chronos himself had never been any part of the usual quarrels the other deities were so painfully remembered for in Terran books. If anything, the reigning forces had caused more problems than solved in the past 1000 years. Though They shielded them from outside forces that could easily erase human life on the planet, They did not simply leave the people of Earth in peace. How many times had Zeus himself caused a small war when laying with assorted maidens from one end of the land to the other, and his jealous wife Hera to destroy entire kingdoms in retaliation. They were more burdensome than helpful in the Prince’s mind, and he had few kind words to say to them.
But the offer was enticing. Chronos was always depicted as distant, removed from worldly affairs, locked away in his proverbial tower to safeguard the timeline and guide the prominent events to fruition. He would not be a likely candidate for trickery, and he very easily could use a servant of some kind to aid in guiding such circumstances. Shrewdly, midnight blue eyes slanted in thought as he opened his mouth to respond in the other’s waiting silence.
“If I have your word she will be exclusively mine forever.”
Chronos felt a tiny, nearly invisible smile peak at the corners of his mouth. The intensity and power hidden within the young man’s eyes was more than evident, nearly titanic in immensity, and would soon be lost to the unknowing Fates should he fail in this mission. It was with this end, and others yet unknown to the world, that he weighed the next few words with an eternal promise.
“Accept, and the two of you shall be Bound.” Endymion found himself feeling very strangely beneath the steady promise in Chronos’ eyes, as if he were being sized up for something larger. Some part of him knew that it could be a trick, it could be a trap of some kind to avert the coming war… but none of that really mattered to him beside the promise of her forever… “If this is your heart’s desire, listen carefully to my words, young one. The love you have shared with My Lady has torn the timeline free from it’s set course, and has sent it spinning towards the darkness. This world will not survive the coming battle. Having seen that this might come to pass, I have arranged for a second chance, both for this world and the next. If you wish to agree, it is with full knowledge that your soul shall never find it’s way to the immortal fields of Elysium. The both of you shall be forever Bound to one another and to my whims as the God of Time. But know this, Prince of Terra, that should you ever break her heart, the Binding spell shall break likewise, but your contract with me shall remain eternal.”
Endymion was not a brash man. He did not make decisions based on fanciful thoughts or feelings. Now, faced with the greatest contract he would ever face, he knew already the decision he would make without thinking, without feeling. After all, who else could ensure his Serenity’s eternal safety in his arms, or the allure of a thousand lifetimes at her side? No hill in Elysium could possibly compare, no battle would ever be too threatening so long as she stood beside him. The ominous warning Chronos had offered mere moments before held no validity in Endymion’s mind, for he knew it was impossible for any portion of his soul to ever reject the sweet presence of the Immortal, even should she be reborn as a human.
It was with this resolve that hands were outstretched and clasped, and the greatest contract ever created in history was made. That day, the sealing Keys were given, the ancient spell begun, and the world thrown into a blackness only to be dispersed by the creation of a new existence. In the end, it meant the sacrifice of countless worlds and souls, the loss of an entire pantheon of Gods that once ruled supreme in the heavens, yet it was a small thing indeed, for all hope for a future rested on the blinding, eternal love of the two Titans, and their never ending journey through the corridors of time.
Thus begins our story.
