The Path to Victory

Chapter 7

When Poseidon awoke the next morning, he saw that Hades had snuggled up to him at some point in his sleep. Carefully he disengaged from his older brother’s still form, dressed himself, and attended breakfast with the rest of his family.

Apparently the creature had taken to the offering of fruits and vegetables easily and was again swimming in the bathing pool. What was unsettling though, was that it had grown to a height reaching Zeus’ hip. In probably no time at all, it would be too big to keep within the fortress, but would it grow big enough in time to be ready for one of Cronos’ attacks?

Poseidon brought a platter of food and wine with him when he returned to his quarters, but Hades was still asleep. Clearly his body would only wake when his healing left him strong enough to rise from bed. And so Poseidon and his kin could only wait, remaining close by until Hades awoke, and that time was unknown to any of them.

Having nodded off in the chair he was using to sit watch, Poseidon awoke to find his bed empty. Alarmed at first, he calmed when he saw that Hades was fully awake and standing in the far end of the room, but became concerned when he realized where exactly his brother was standing.

Hades was regarding himself in a full length mirror.

“Brother, how are you feeling?” Poseidon asked carefully, standing up, ready to approach his brother, and if necessary, lead him away from the mirror.

Hades did not reply at first. He could only stare at his own reflection with loathing and disgust over how he looked. His hair had started to grow out, but even the new hairs were dry and brittle; a bad imitation of his beautiful mane before bearing the creature consumed all his energy.
His body, though no longer swollen and misshapen, was still far too emaciated and the skin around his belly, now deflated, was wrinkled and saggy.

His face was what he found the most unbearable to look at, however. His eyes, so hollow and deep-set, seemed to be the only sign of life in it anymore. Turning to look at Poseidon, Hades felt an overwhelming urge to hide his miserable form from his brother’s view. How could the other even look at him without turning away in disgust?

Poseidon approached, arms out to show he was not affected by his brother’s appearance. True, the older god still looked as though he would fall over dead at any moment, and his midsection was still not yet healed from being so swollen with carrying the Olympian weapon, but Hades was lucky to be alive. This was still Poseidon’s brother, and he walked toward him, hands reaching out to take him by the shoulders.

Hades flinched when he was touched, and he stood stiff in his brother’s hold, refusing to believe that he was receiving comfort from the younger god.

“Don’t pity me,” he finally managed to say, his voice trembling nearly as badly as the rest of him. “Don’t you dare pity me”—

Poseidon did not let go. He wrapped his arms around his brother and held on despite the resistance he received. Hades fought, but he was still not very strong, not in mind or heart. He soon broke down and began to weep in his brother’s arms.

“Give it some more time,” Poseidon said encouragingly, his hand rubbing soothing circles on Hades’ back. He tried to ignore how each individual vertebra and rib could be felt through his brother’s skin. Hades had to be famished.

“It’s only been a day since you gave birth, which nearly killed you. It would be unrealistic to expect you to make a full recovery in such a short time.”

Full recovery? As far as Hades could tell, he had not recovered the slightest bit, if one excluded the budding re-growth of his hair. “Nothing has changed… I still look the same,” he remarked, his bony fingers and long fingernails digging into his brother’s flesh. Poseidon did not seem to mind.

“You’re standing up, are you not?” the other god replied. “Even that is a great achievement so shortly after what you suffered through.”

Hades lifted his head from his brother’s shoulder and looked up at the taller Olympian. “I am weak, feeble, and I look like an absolute monster. Maybe it would have been better if I had died, rather than continue my existence as something like this.”

“Hush…” Poseidon said, his tone stern yet gentle. He removed part of his robe and draped it around his brother, surmising he had to be cold in his weakened state. Sure enough, some of Hades’ shivering faded as he gathered the cloth closer to himself.

“Come back to bed,” Poseidon offered, guiding his brother with an arm around his shoulders. “It’s warmer there.”

“More so if someone is there to share it with me,” Hades suggested. Poseidon took the opportunity to place a hand over his brother’s head and gently pull him closer, planting a kiss on his forehead.

Once Hades was comfortably arranged beneath the sheets, his younger brother eased into bed next to him, holding him close and offering his warmth.

“My child…” Hades muttered, causing Poseidon to lift his head and regard him with curiosity. Thus the elder god continued. “My child is beautiful.”

Poseidon smiled. “He will prove to be a magnificent creation. The Titans do no stand a chance of winning.” The Olympian wanted to believe his own words, but in truth he could not be sure – none of them could – before their newest weapon was put to the test. Hades’ child, but not his alone. Poseidon could not help but wonder if the beast had sprung from Zeus’ seed or his.

The creature’s affinity for the water mirrored Poseidon’s own, but he had not mentioned this particular observation to Zeus. For some reason he suspected the leader would not be fond of the idea that their weapon had not been conceived by him, even though Hades had clearly expressed a desire to create something from Poseidon’s seed rather than Zeus’. Besides, the little beast did not even tolerate Zeus; that much had been obvious from the moment it was born.

*

When the two Olympians awoke again, it was already sunset and almost time for supper. Poseidon managed to convince his initially reluctant brother to join his siblings around the dining table, though Hades did not want anyone to see him in this miserable state.

The weakened god was lent a robe and a pair of sandals by his younger brother; all of which were far too large for him. Hades was also still in too much pain in his nether regions to walk unaided, and was thus forced to enter the dining hall holding on to Poseidon’s arm.

“Remind me why I agreed to this again…?” Hades asked as the two gods entered.

“You never gave a reason for your compliance,” Poseidon answered, then turning to the others seated at the dining table. “Good evening, brother, sisters. Hades has deemed himself strong enough to attend supper with us.”

The others returned the greeting and Hestia stood up with a hand out. “Will you need assistance to sit down, brother?” she asked Hades.

The god waved his hand in decline. “I’m sure one will be enough to help, thank you,” he replied.

He allowed Poseidon to help him sit, though the solid nature of the chairs proved the process to be very painful. Hades grimaced as he settled into his seat, and he required Poseidon to push his chair forward, but otherwise he was not in enough discomfort to leave.

“You seem to be recovering,” Zeus stated once both of his brothers were seated. There was no sarcasm in his voice, and so his sympathy seemed to be clear, or that he was at least trying to show he could care.

Hades wanted to point out that he certainly hadn’t noticed, but the sincerity of his brother’s voice made him hold back his sarcastic reply. “I am, thank you, brother,” he said meekly and bowed his head; a motion that made his long hair fall forward and cover most of his face, for which he was grateful.

“Are you sure you’re well enough to be out of bed, Hades?” Demeter asked concernedly. “You look… weary.”

The food he had managed to swallow so far became a suffocating lump in his throat, and Hades realized it had been a mistake to come out here. His appearance was obviously scaring his sisters, and he could not exactly blame them. Hades made an attempt to rise from his seat, but Poseidon’s hand on his forearm stopped him.

“Eat some more, brother,” the younger god urged. “You have to eat to recover your strength.”

“Would you like something to dull the pain in your nether regions, Hades?” Demeter asked. “I have made some ointment that might help.”

Hades again felt lucky that his hair was in the way of his face, for the offer made him blush quite deeply. He felt Poseidon apply just the slightest bit of pressure to the grip on his forearm, a subtle gesture of reassurance. Demeter had not let Hades down in the past, especially not a day ago, when she never left his side and helped him to give birth. Were it not for her, he would have lost his child in the midpoint of his pregnancy, as well as his own life.

Taking a breath, he swallowed the feeling of apprehension down and replied. “Indeed, giving birth has made menial tasks… difficult, to say the least,” he said. “I am able to stand and walk, but the wound obviously still has not fully healed. Perhaps I shall try your offer.”

Demeter smiled and took a drink of her wine. “Nothing would make me happier than to be able to help.”

The dinner passed on for several minutes in silence while the gods ate. Looking around the room and listening for any signs of life in the distance, Hades finally spoke up. “Where is our weapon?” he asked curiously.

“In the bathing pool in your quarters,” Zeus himself replied. “It seemed very comfortable there, so we saw no reason to relocate it.”

What Zeus really meant, however, was that moving the creature had been deemed too much of a handful and they had allowed it to remain there out of convenience. Already the little beast – not so little anymore by any standards – had grown to the size of the Olympians themselves, and its appetite grew along with everything else.

“I wish to see him,” Hades said. “I wish to check in on his progress.”

Zeus found it odd and a bit amusing that Hades referred to their weapon as a “he” even though none of them was sure of the creature’s sex. It was as though his older brother wanted to view the beast as one of them instead of simply an object to be used by them.

“It is not a “he”, Hades,” the leader said. “There is no way to tell if your offspring is male or female.”

“What else would I call it?” Hades responded, sipping his wine. “Other than give the thing its own name, I’d rather just refer to it as a ‘he’. Until we know otherwise, what difference would it make?”

“Perhaps the creature does need a name,” Hera suggested before Zeus could make some sort of argument. “A name would make it easier to refer to, rather than just as a creature or a weapon, especially when it is on the battlefield.”

“I agree,” Hestia said. “Everything must have its own name.”

“Fine,” Zeus said between bites of his food, becoming a little annoyed at the seriousness of the discussion. “The creature shall have a name, if it matters so much. Since you created the beast, Hades, you should decide on what name it shall have.”

“I have already considered a name,” Hades replied. “He is a twisted animal. A misshapen beast, never seen before in all of Gaia’s children of the Earth. I will name him the Kraken.”

Zeus raised an eyebrow, but at least he did not voice an objection. “As you wish, Hades. The Kraken it is.”

*

Once the supper was over, Hades demanded to see his child. He had felt it respond to him the first time he touched it, and he was certain that he was not in any danger from the creature.

“I will accompany you, brother,” Poseidon offered. Hades was still weak, and letting him venture anywhere unsupervised, especially near the Kraken, as the god himself had named the beast, was most unwise. Hades agreed, mostly because walking unsupported was quite a painful ordeal.

“You will be surprised to see how much he has grown,” Poseidon told him on their way to Hades’ quarters. “It’s difficult to imagine anything that big coming out of your body, dear brother.”

Hades’ bedchamber was quite different than how it looked when the birth had left it practically painted in blood. Though the floors were now spotless, both the sheets and mattress were gone from the bed. Before leaving dinner, Hestia had warned him ahead of time that while his sheets were clean, his mattress still was not, and would likely take longer to dry.

“Perhaps we should replace the mattress altogether,” Hades suggested as he was escorted through the room.

A splash suddenly sounded from the baths, and as the two brothers entered, they could see something very big surfacing on the water.

“You are right, brother,” Hades said to Poseidon. “The rate of his growth is quite a surprise.”

The Kraken’s head popped out of the water when it heard Hades’ voice a second time, and looking in his direction. Staring for several seconds, it swam over until it was in shallow enough water to crawl towards the man who gave birth to it. Staring back, Hades stepped forward without Poseidon’s help, though it caused him pain, and stopped at the edge of the pool.

Two tentacles slithered out of the water, and Hades found himself thinking back on the attack at the shore days ago. Refusing to back down, he held very still as the tendrils snaked around him, felt him, and let go, pulling back into the water. His eyes met with that of the creature as it stared him down again, made a thrumming nose in its throat, and retreated back into the deep end, content to continue swimming.

Since Poseidon had spent almost all his time with Hades since the creature was born, less than two days ago, he had been unable to assess its nature, and was therefore alarmed when the Kraken, now bigger than either of them, reached out for his brother.

His hand instinctively went to his dagger, ready to force the creature to a retreat in case it attacked, but to his surprise, it merely felt Hades and nothing more. Like a pet greeting its owner, he mused in amazement.

Hades, having noticed his brother’s uneasiness, placed a hand on Poseidon’s arm, and smiled placidly. “Worry not, brother. My child knows me, and he will cause me no harm. Just watch.”

The taller god could only watch in shock when Hades suddenly removed his robe and stepped out of his sandals, his intentions blatantly obvious. He was going to join the beast in the pool.

“Hades! Do you really think that is wise?” Poseidon asked in alarm when his brother took his first limping step onto the stairs leading into the water. He did not want to use physical force to restrain Hades, but he knew that Zeus would have his head for allowing madness such as this.

“Would Zeus really be so concerned if it were I who met a violent end from this creature?” Hades asked cynically.

When he was waist deep, the water stung him as it met with his wounds, but soon became soothing to him instead. As he continued deeper into the pool, he held his hands out in the water in an offer to interact with his child, though at first the Kraken hardly regarded him being in the
water at all. It slowly began to glide past him, closer and closer, until a tentacle wrapped around his forearm, hesitated, and let go, as if the creature recognized him. The sound of its crustacean limbs scrabbling against the bottom of the pool was easy to detect, and Hades knew that if this beast wished, it could easily tear him to pieces, even without its teeth.

The Kraken did not seem to need contact with its parent, as evidenced when it thrashed for a brief but frightening moment after Hades reached out to touch its underside like he had after the creature was born. But his child tolerated his presence, even welcomed being by his side, and would swim slower when close to the god, as though savoring their close proximity.

Again, Poseidon was in awe. A thought appeared in his head, brief but striking nonetheless. Maybe Hades was the only one who held any sort of influence over the creature? The Kraken, though perhaps not a sentient being like the Olympians themselves, was far from a mindless object blindly doing its creator’s will. After seeing how it reacted to Zeus’ touch, this became all the more apparent. If Hades had died, the gods might very well have been doomed, even with the creature on their side.

The Kraken went under the surface once more, and this time Hades followed. Unlike his child, he could not stay submerged for any longer periods, but swimming under water did not cause him nearly as much pain as moving his body on solid ground did.

Hades stopped when he was literally face to face with the creature, and though it could have, the Kraken did not recoil from him or show any sort of aggression. Feeling bolder, Hades reached out one hand and touched the being where its cheek should have been, and while the Kraken’s terrifying maw opened in a silent hiss, no other negative reaction was present. For the first time in days, Hades actually felt triumphant. There was finally something that he mastered better than Zeus.

Curious, the Kraken once again felt Hades’ body with its tentacles, exploring every detail. Hades could feel his lungs straining for air, but he dared not swim away to resurface. What if doing so angered the creature?

As if realizing its parent’s plight, the Kraken’s strong limbs grasped Hades’ form and easily lifted him.

Poseidon was about to worry as he watched the blurred shaped beneath the water pause for quite some time, but he exhaled in relief when Hades emerged, looking none the worse for wear. A calm smile was on his older brother’s face, as though he was not surprised at his child’s actions.

“Getting along, I see…?” the younger god said.

“Come and join me, brother,” Hades called out. “He’s quite safe at the moment, I think.”

Lifting an eyebrow, Poseidon was of course hesitant. “Are you certain?”

“He is in high spirits, it would seem.” The older god answered, watching as the Kraken left him and went back to swimming in circles about the pool. “I think you will be alright.”

Still reticent, Poseidon slowly disrobed and approached the pool’s edge. “I’ll be blaming you should something happen,” he said before descending the steps leading into the water.

The Kraken stopped its repetitive movements when it felt another presence in the pool and once again, a misshapen head with a mouth full of teeth came above the surface, and Poseidon intently listened for any signs of discontentment from the creature.

“Don’t be afraid, brother,” Hades said encouragingly and grabbed his brother’s hand, tugging a slightly hesitant Poseidon toward the middle of the pool, where the water came up to their shoulders. The end where the Kraken currently abided itself was even deeper.

“Let him come to you,” Hades advised. “He won’t hurt you. He’ll merely want to find out what you’re like.” Smirking, he added, “Since you are both so attuned to water, there should be no problems.”

Poseidon felt even more reluctant to remain where he was when Hades stepped aside and moved to the edge of the pool, from where he could observe the scene. The Kraken disappeared under the surface again and Poseidon could see its streamline shaped form advance toward him. Determined not to appear a coward, the Olympian reached out his hand, hoping the beast would be content to simply sniff it and leave it at that, but he soon had to reconsider. Surging forward, Hades’ child threw itself at him and collided with his side, hard enough to knock him off his feet and send him under the surface.

Hades was startled at first, but could only laugh when seconds later a head broke the water’s surface, face covered in drenched auburn curls.

“I suppose I should be glad SOME of us are enjoying this,” the lump of hair said. Shaking his head to regain his vision, Poseidon looked around and saw the Kraken swimming around him in circles.

“I believe he is only curious of you, brother,” Hades remarked as he watched his child’s movements. “Allow him to get to know you.”

Treading water, Poseidon watched nervously as the Kraken approached him and proceeded to inspect his form as he had done with Hades. Tentacles wrapped around his limbs and the god could feel suction cups against his skin. Slowly, Poseidon became aware that the tendrils were pulling on his legs and dragging him underwater. He could only stare, submerged, as the creature stared at him for several seconds and let go, allowing him to resurface. Moments later, he was pulled under again and the same action was repeated.

“I think he knows your affinity for water, Poseidon,” Hades noted aloud.

“Yes, I suppose that is something we have in common,” the other replied thoughtfully. The beast gave him another nudge, this time almost friendly in nature, and Poseidon felt bold enough to touch its back as it swam past him.

“Do you…” He interrupted himself, feeling nervous thinking about the subject and even more so openly discussing it.

Hades raised a questioning eyebrow.

“Do you think that… he is mine?” Poseidon asked, eyeing the Kraken carefully. The fact that it seemed to despise Zeus and also shared his love for water were two strong indications that the leader of the Olympians had not fathered the creature.

“Yes, I believe so,” Hades answered gravely and joined his brother again. “I wanted it to be you. Perhaps… my wish made it true.” He grasped his fellow god’s hand and entwined their fingers, smiling.

Watching his brother now, as opposed to when he found Hades regarding his own reflection, Poseidon realized that the other was already looking far healthier. While still thin and pale, Hades had regained some of the luster in his eyes, which made his entire being seem more alive.

Smiling, Poseidon gave his older brother’s cheek a kiss and held his fellow god close. The embrace lasted only lasted a few seconds, however, as the Kraken ended it by shoving a thick, spider-like leg between them and separating them, swimming between their bodies.

“Someone is jealous, it seems,” Hades said, chuckling.


TBC...