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“—louder! Louder, man!” One of the dancers clapped at the lout player—red-faced and happy on too much ale. “It’s a celebration. My boy’s off to fight for Olympia tomorrow.”
“Then the Roman empire claimed Greece and all in its path,” Alex continued, drawing my attention back. “But the Romans were wise, my friend. They may have changed their names, but still, they too, worshiped the gods of Olympus. They hoped in doing so that the gods would favor them too, granting them a vast kingdom and the power to defend it. And so they did. Everything was perfect until... it wasn’t.”
I leaned in closer and our noses almost bonked. The band heeded demands to play louder, and I didn’t want to miss a word. “What happened? Why wasn’t it perfect anymore?”
“Because, Aella. Zeus, Hera, Athena, and the gods granted the mortals a lot, but they asked for much more in return. Women bore Zeus’s children only to suffer terrible curses and messy, brutal deaths at Hera’s hands. The townspeople gave poor offerings in Poseidon’s temple one day, and the next, their home was washed off the map. Maybe they could’ve lived with all of that if it wasn’t for the monsters.”
“The monsters?”
Lips pressed tight, he nodded. “With the gods’ great capacity for blessings came their great capacity for evil. They birthed humans, fire, the seasons and drove the sun across the sky. They also birthed sirens, cerberi, harpies, and hydras,” he said. “One thing they all had in common—monsters hated the gods. Some used to be mortals who were cursed to become monsters. Some were gods or the children of gods that were banished from Mount Olympus. They weren’t worthy enough to sit on a throne beside Zeus and Hera.”
“Discrimination,” I muttered. “Exclusion. Pushed out and bullied because of how you look or who you are. Because you’re too different. It’s the same story in every world.”
Alex tipped his head, expression grave. “Yes, it is.”
“But how did it lead to our worlds separating and everyone on my side thinking gods and monsters are myths?”
“For one simple reason,” he replied. “Monsters hated the gods. They wanted to punish them. Make them suffer. But, of course, they couldn’t. What match were they against the most powerful beings in the universe? So instead, they went after the next best thing—their favorite pets: the humans.”
“They went after humans to hurt the gods? And that worked?”
“It worked too well, Aella.”
My cheeks warmed. I couldn’t help it. The way he said my name, combined with his nearness and strong ale—my defenses were coming down quickly.
“Endless attacks,” he said. “Constant battles with monsters. Legions lost. Families wiped out. Villages burned down. Innocents slaughtered. Children eaten.”
Did he just say eaten?!
“Humans. Regular, mundane humans were being hunted down and wiped out, and they had no defense. All because they were unfortunate enough to be forced into the middle of a fightthat wasn’t theirs. They were at the end of their rope when whispers spread of the Christian god.”
He paused to eat some bread, leaving me hanging off the edge of my seat. “Mmm. This is good. Should I get us some more?” He rose up. “Matter of fact, I should order dinner. Is lamb okay? They do a great lamb and barley stew here.”
“Later!” I tugged him back down. “Keep going. What happened when word spread of the Christian god?”
“Oh, right. Okay, so at first, those in power did their duty to drive out this new god and all talk of him. They teach you that in your schools, right? What the Romans did to Christians?”
I whistled. “Oh, yeah. Tortured, burned alive, thrown to wild animals, and crucified. It was bad.”
“It was all too late. Here was a god who asked nothing of them but their faith. He wouldn’t strike them down for having no temple offerings. He wouldn’t seduce and then abandon them to the punishment of his jealous wife. He wouldn’t turn a blind eye while monsters of his own creation destroyed everything they built.
“Before the gods of Olympus knew it, their temples were torn down and churches were built in their place. Down came their statues and up went the cross. The humans were turning their back on them and soon the gods had no choice but war.”
“War with who? The humans? The monsters making their lives hell?”
“The Christian god.”
I could only stare at him. No, this part was not taught in my schools. “They went to war with God?”
“And they lost.”
I leaned back in my seat, mind blown.
“The Greek gods or the Roman gods,” Alex said. “The mortals stopped worshiping them under any name all throughout the world. And without their faith to sustain them, the gods grewweaker and weaker until they were nothing but pale copies of their former selves. I ask you, Aella, what is a god who has no one to believe in him?”
My fists balled. “The same as the rest of us,” I whispered. “Nothing.”
“That is exactly what they were becoming. Nothing. The gods faded from existence as they did from the hearts and minds of man, so in one last effort to save themselves and live to see the day Mount Olympus was restored, they reduced their forms down to their very essence and scattered into pieces.”
