NOVEL NEXT Chapter 8: Zoe
A/N: Damn, I read this really good PJO FF just now, and it had no business being as emotional as it was. I'm fucked up, but less see how this chapter turns out.
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Because of my stirring, as well as my violent reaction to what I had just discovered, Shalom soon woke up, hugging herself... no, himself closer to my body.
Yet, surprisingly enough for me, I didn't even think about pushing him away.
Those years... yes, they had taken a toll on me, but they had left me with something even better.
Looking within myself, I realized that my guttural reaction... hadn't been as bad as I had expected.
After all, Shalom was still just... Shalom, even if she had been a man all along.
There was also no chance that she had been deceiving us all this time. I had been the one to teach her speech for Hades' sake.
'It was probably our fault for not telling her the distinction between a male and female properly...'
I was quickly interrupted out of my thoughts that had been going a million miles an hour as Shalom said from behind me, her hot breath gently caressing my ear,
"Yawwwwn. Big Sis Phee, is there something wrong?"
Hearing her voice, I unconsciously smiled, thinking that even though she couldn't see my face, she could still tell how I was feeling.
As I turned around, she removed her hands from my body and started sleepily rubbing her eyes.
"It's... nothing, Shalom. Just... stay in this tent until I come back, alright? I need to talk with Lady Artemis about something..."
"Mhm... okay."
I quickly disentangled myself from her, dressed, and left the tent, glancing back once more to see her slowly going through her morning routine to wake herself up...
...not knowing that it would be the last time that I saw her like that.
~~~
Bowing, I quickly ordered what I would say in my mind, my liege standing in front of me, waiting for my first words.
"Milady... Shalom, I'm sorry I just found out today-"
"Get to the point."
I paused for a bit, working up the courage to say it, knowing that I could be bringing down devastating consequences due to my actions.
"...Shalom is a male."
"..."
Silence.
Pure silence.
As Artemis just stared at me inquisitively, her eyes gleaming in a light that I could not detect the intentions of.
"...both Zoe and you were not able to learn of this beforehand?"
"I... I-I only realized this morning... when Shalom had his first... erection..."
The word left a disgusting taste in my mouth, and I hated using it in the same sentence as the name of one of my beloved... siblings.
I waited in silence once more, as Lady Artemis began to stare into space, no doubt thinking about this peculiar situation.
"...I had just given her my blessing too. How was that even possible?" She muttered under her breath. Catching it, I quickly responded.
"It's probably because Shalom truly does believe herself to be a girl..."
"...we never thought to teach her about the other gender." I muttered the last part under my breath, blaming myself once more for my stupidity.
"So the oath and blessing worked because he truly thought himself a maiden... how interesting."
Somehow, the uncomfortable silence extended for even longer this time, forcing me to break the silence due to my nervousness.
"Milady, I implore you. Please don't do anything to Shalom. He's an innocent child, and it was all of our faults for not realizing that "she" was a man earlier."
As I laid the feelings in my heart bare before my mistress, I couldn't help but bow my head again, an invisible pressure weighing down upon me.
Yet, as quickly as the pressure had descended upon me, it disappeared, as if it had never been there.
"Yes, it was my fault too, for never paying attention to those closest to my domain. There's not a problem then, deal with him as you wish."
I let out a relieved sigh upon hearing this, eternally grateful to my lady for sparing my closest sibling.
"But, he will not be able to stay in the hunt anymore."
My head immediately shot up, my mouth opening as I prepared to fight for Shalom's rights, yet...
"I'll allow him to keep my blessing, but you know better than anyone why we CAN NOT allow a male into our camp... no matter how good of an influence he has been on all of us."
Her voice had tapered at the end there, making me realize that she too, the man hating goddess herself, held a sweet spot for Shalom within her heart.
'Well, she is my perfect little sister... brother after all.'
Yet, to have to kick him from the camp...
It was my job though, because picking him up from that stream on that fateful day had been my decision after all, hadn't it?
Leaving Lady Artemis' tent, I walked until I was in the middle of camp, before glancing up at the sky, dyed in hues of orange and red as the sun rose brightly over the snow capped mountains in the distance.
The birds were singing, there were little to no clouds in the sky, and everything seemed peaceful.
What a perfect day...
For such a horrendous task.
~~~
Needless to say, it did not go well.
Maybe informing the rest of the hunters before informing Shalom had been the wrong choice, but what was done was done.
He would have one more day to stay her, to gather himself and his stuff, before having to leave...
...forever.
Like me, the majority of the hunters had solemn expressions on our faces, saddened by the fact that our little ball of sunshine was leaving.
He was partially immortal though, that thought soothing our hearts a little due to the fact that, if fated, we would all meet him again one day.
He would be fine in the mortal world though, we had raised him after all.
At least, that was what we all hoped.
Herein, a few hunters had had different expressions on their face when they had found out that Shalom was leaving.
Yes, nobody had cared about the fact that he was a male.
Yet, there were some who openly cried and petitioned Artemis for a different judgement, but it was final.
On this day,
On this day wherein Shalom would have to leave us.
We had all mourned,
For the loss of one of the brightest lights in our life.
~~~
That morning, as if Apollo had heard our cries, the sun rose more slowly than usual, blocked by a massive wall of clouds that drowned out most of his chariot's light.
I walked as slowly as I could towards our tent, a tent that I hadn't been able to spend last night in.
Softly knocking on the frame of the tent, I asked, "Shalom, are you ready."
Yet, no answer came from the inside.
A little worried, I knocked once more, but was met with no response.
"Shalom?"
Pushing through the flaps of the tent, I worriedly rushed in, to find myself horrified witnessing the scene in front of me.
My visage blanched once more, as my mind once again began to race.
'Nonononononono... this can't be happening...'
There he was.
His body prone on the floor.
From the traces that had been left in the tent, I could piece together what had happened.
'Whilst kneeling, he took the knife and sliced off his balls and... in one stroke.'
'Then, he pressed the hot iron that he had burned on the fire to the flesh that was left, searing his wounds shut.'
'Yet, whether it was due to the blood loss, the pain, or a combination of the two, he eventually fainted, falling forward and face planting into the ground.'
'Thank god though that the knife in his hand was never once released from his grip, or else things might have gone drastically different.'
'Thank the gods...'
I was grateful, grateful that the knife had left him with a worse off injury.
Why had he done it though?
Hadn't I taught him better than this?
With tears in my eyes, I still had no choice but to follow my lady's orders.
Thus, alone, I patched him up, before packing his things for him and carrying him out into the woods.
He would wake up soon, I had fed him some nectar after all.
Tears continued to stream down my face, as I leaned his body against a rock.
"You're my student... You'll be fine, okay? Go out there, find yourself good friends, get yourself a good job..."
"Find yourself a better family than us."
And with that, I tried my best to wipe away the tears that endlessly flowed from my eyes before kissing him on the check and then bringing our foreheads together by grabbing the back of his head.
"You were the best of us, do you hear me? Don't let anyone tell you otherwise!"
Not knowing what to do anymore, I ran off, not trusting myself to do anything rash had I stayed there any longer.
At dinner at camp for every year afterwards, I sacrificed a small part of my meal to the entirety of the gods, praying for Shalom's safety in the real world.
~~~
Welp, that was my life story.
That had been 4 years ago, and I was know 17, at least, mentally.
It was weird you know.
I was like, an old fogey spiritually, 17 mentally, and 13 physically.
It was separations such as this that caused some people to lose their minds.
Yet, I was done with it.
For a good 5 years, I had pushed those memories to the back of my head, drowning myself in my "work."
I knew though that I wouldn't be able to do that anymore, as I was slowly approaching my meeting with the hunters again.
Thus here I was, acting as a mentally ill patient, trying to resolve the struggle between the two personalities in my brain.
And would you lookie here, I won, which wasn't surprising figuring that the other side was only 13 years old spiritually.
Looking at the stars that shone so brightly, as I lay on a certain hill, I admired them, how they could seem to care for nothing as they burned planets to ashes.
I realized something else whilst looking at the stars.
My emotions and personality... had cooled down significantly. I was more calm, more tranquil in my actions.
I was starting to resemble my old self again...
...and that was something I had been looking forward to for so long.
Hearing the sounds of a clashing heading my way, I quickly snuffed out the cigarette that I had been smoking (I know, a 13 year old shouldn't be smoking, but hey, I was like a centenarian now, wasn't I?) before clasping my hand around the bow that lay by my side.
Let's get started on my perfect revenge now, shall we?
The string of the bow suddenly grew taut, before a resounding thud rung through the air...
...and a cyclops fell down, it's head missing from atop its shoulders.
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A/N: Welp, there you have it. I didn't want to cut off the story, so I basically combined two chaps into one, hence the no chapter yesterday.
Also, there will be a flashback in like, 3 chapters that explains why exactly the MC did what he did. But yea, no more unreliable narrators from now on. Everything you read will be exactly what the person whose POV it is, is thinking.
I also decided to change the timeline in my planning docs a lot actually, but I haven't really mentioned when canon would be yet exactly I don't think, so there shouldn't be any continuity issues. If there are tho, do tell me and I'll fix em immediately.