Age of Heroes

4| Sadie

My memory was a little fuzzy. Okay, more than a little, but the revelations that had just been flung at me were making it seem as if I knew bollocks. My head felt crowded with unexplored knowledge and old information, striving to replenish the sudden blank spaces Mnemosyne had created. I closed my eyes as I slumped in the velvety armchair, going back to the very origin of things to make sense of the new information being force-fed to me.

I knew that before there was anything in this world—there was Chaos. And from Chaos sprang primordial deities such as Nyx (the Night), Erebus (the Darkness), Tartarus (the Depths), and Gaea (the Earth). Each sibling heavily impacted the lives of the other and went on to bear a range of children that would play a prominent role in the lives of mortals—except perhaps Tartarus. I was pretty sure he hated his siblings and preferred being isolated in the depths of the world.

Weirdly enough, Gaea had a son all on her own; Ouranos (the Sky). In a sexual union that I preferred not to think about for fear of throwing up a lung, the mother and son duo brought forth the first race of the Titans. Each of them acted as a thread, weaving through one another in order to construct the world we lived in today. But the only thread I needed to concentrate on was the one secured to Cronus. He'd gone on to overthrow his father and ruled the universe with a tense hand. Fearing that history would repeat itself, he ate all of his children. Yes, ate. As in consumed. I had to consider that for a moment to make sure that it actually happened and that I wasn't making things up. These children—Hestia, Hades, Demeter, Poseidon and Hera—went on to become the first Olympians (minus Hades) after being rescued by their brother Zeus.

The war against the titans soon followed; a war known as the Titanomachy. Cronus and his brothers (excluding Oceanus) were imprisoned in Tartarus and Zeus became the new ruler of the universe. He conquered all those who resisted his family's rule and they reigned on Mount Olympus to this day, accompanied by eight other Olympians; Aphrodite, Hephaestus, Apollo, Artemis, Athena, Ares, Hermes and Dionysus. That's where I was at right now and as I explained this to the man in front of me—he claimed otherwise.

"So, you're saying Cronus escaped Tartarus?" I parroted my thoughts, staring at the grey-haired man who declared to be the headmaster of Alcides Academy. Iphicles, he'd said his name was. His eyes were a deep blue that observed me carefully, never leaving my figure since Gio had first brought me to what I now knew was his office. "And the Olympians are now trapped in Tartarus?"

It all sounded a little too far-fetched, and I was on the verge of asking him whether he was joking or not. Nobody just escaped Tartarus. Cronus had to have been helped if Iphicles was speaking the truth. But there was nobody to help him. His sisters and Oceanus had remained neutral during the war and were thus spared. His other brothers, each representing a corner of the world, were trapped alongside him.

Iphicles must've seen the direction my thoughts were headed because he offered me a commiserating smile. "The world is not the same as it once was, Sadie. The gods that once shielded us are now powerless, monsters roam the streets and titans are forcing worship."

I shook my head, brows furrowing. The greek gods and their stories had long ago faded into myth, leaving only a few to remember them and pass on their legacy. It didn't seem like there would be anybody for the titans to compel worship from. From the memories I still had, I could gather that I'd lived amongst people who no longer believed. I'd lived in an aged little house in the small village of Bladon, Oxfordshire where the population was below nine hundred, and I'd worked at the local library after having graduated from a small high school. Life in Bladon had been normal. My village certainly believed in ghosts but they probably would've thought me crazy had I brought up greek mythology in a literal sense. I couldn't imagine non-believers like them being recruited into a titan army.