I sat at the head of the table with my goblet in hand, swirling the wine slowly as it caught the firelight. Crimson ripples lapped the rim like liquid rubies. It was the fifth cup, or maybe the sixth—I wasn't counting—but it wasn't about the drink. Not tonight.
Tonight, after almost ten years, we are finally moving into planning how to save our siblings.
Zeus paced back and forth across the cave floor, arms folded behind his back like he was trying to convince himself he was already a war general. His forehead glistened with sweat, betraying the restless fire burning inside him. He looked to be around sixteen, with wild, insane curls of white hair cascading to his shoulders, just like mine—untamed and looked almost electric in a way.
Amaltheia sat across from me, sharpening a knife as she glared at me for cutting her off from the wine. Adrastea leaned against the far wall, her arms crossed. We were waiting for Rhea, this would be the first time in ten years since I had last seen my mother.
From what Adrastea had told me, when she had dropped off baby Zeus, she had learnt that I had survived and was brought by Gaea to the cave, it is the reason why Gaea told her to replace Zeus with a rock and bring him to this very cave.
The air shifted suddenly, and I straightened my posture as the air shifted in a pulse of light as Rhea and her guests had arrived.
My mother was wearing a simple white dress with a light blue shawl. Her light brown hair was braided and over her shoulder, just the way that I had shown her how to do. She looked like she had aged so much since I had last seen her, looking so tired as if she hadn't been able to sleep in a long time.
"Hades," she said softly, as her eyes landed on me. I smiled as I greeted her.
"Mother."
She stepped forward, her hand brushing my cheek as she smiled with something that looked like pride and sorrow tangled together. "You've grown."
"Almost getting eaten by my own father would do that," I said, and her smile tightened.
Zeus didn't wait. He rushed forward and hugged her tightly, and for a moment, he seemed just like a normal teenage boy.
"Hello, Mother," he said, muffled in her shoulder.
"I missed you both," she whispered. "Every second."
Behind her arrived two other Titans. The first was Themis, Titaness of Divine Law and Justice, dressed in a black himation trimmed with gold, her expression calm but unreadable—like she already knew how things would end.
He walked with a slight hunch, like his thoughts were heavier than his body. His hair was dark and messy, tipped with faint orange embers that flickered now and then. He wore a simple, sleeveless tunic with old symbols stitched into it, and a faded cloak hung from his shoulders, singed at the edges.
He looked more like a wandering philosopher than a Titan—quiet, sharp-eyed, and always thinking. Prometheus didn't say much, but there was a spark in him that made you feel like he knew something no one else did.
"Let's sit," Rhea said, her voice cutting the silence clean.
We gathered around the table.
Prometheus flopped into his seat like a man who hadn't slept in days, I caught him fiddling with some kind of glowing brown clay? He hid his hands under the table as he seemed to try to pay attention to what was going on. Themis sat perfectly upright, hands folded neatly as Rhea sat just like a queen, and seeing her I could understand where the default grace of a queen came from.
Mother started the meeting, quickly getting to the point.
"This will not be easy," she began, her eyes scanning our faces. "But it must be done."
Her voice tightened, trembling just slightly with the weight of old pain. "Cronus has devoured our children. My daughters, Hestia, Hera, Demeter, and my son, Poseidon. Now I am relying on my eldest son, Hades… and you, Zeus, to save them." She looked directly at my brother, her gaze steady. "This act will a hundred percent lead to a war and so I am hoping that we can come up with a plan."
"The problem," Themis interjected. "Is that we need to somehow get close enough to Cronus and there will not be an easy way for that to happen when he has Atlas and the four directional Titans by his side at all times."
"So we take them on, I believe that I can easily take them on." Zeus said firmly.
Prometheus snorted. "You'd lose before you even set foot in the castle."
Zeus's brow furrowed. "I have the domain of lightning now. I can use it to easily win if I get enough time."
"You are but a fletching," Themis snorted. "Just because you have a domain does not mean you just become a master in its uses. And you who only just received your domain of lightning is still far behind Hades."
Zeus did not look happy at this comment.
"We could break into Mount Othrys at night," Amaltheia offered as she moved the topic along. "Slip into the palace."
"But we still have no way of retrieving the other godlings," said Adrastea. "Unless you plan to knock him out and slice his stomach open?"
Zeus grimaced. "If we could just get him out of the throne room—"
"You can't just get Cronus to do anything," Themis snapped, patience thinning. "He has been getting more paranoid as time goes on and if he has an inkling that you're his child he will do whatever it takes to make sure that you fade from existence."
Zeus rubbed at the back of his neck. "There has to be something."
"There is something," Rhea said softly. "But we just need to figure out exactly what it is."
The cave was silent again.
I sipped my wine, as I swirled it lazily in the cup. My eyes drifted to the dark red spiral in the goblet, I tapped the rim of my goblet with one finger. "There is a way we could do it, save everyone and lead to us winning."
Everyone turned to me. I didn't look up yet.
I stared at the wine and said, "We poison him."
Zeus frowned. "Seriously? Poison? What is that going to do to our father?"
I finally raised my eyes. "Let me and Zeus disguise ourselves as titans, and get hired to become his cupbearers. We introduce him to wine and get him hooked on it, and when the moment comes when he is intoxicated we add a mixture to the wine that will cause him to vomit the others."
"He'll never trust strangers," Amaltheia muttered.
"He'll trust us," I said, lifting my goblet. "Don't worry, knowing father we can easily convince him, by introducing ourselves as children of some other Titan we will be able to get into the castle."
Zeus blinked. "That's… the stupidest idea I've ever heard."
I rolled my eyes. "We need a plan, doesn't matter if it is stupid. All we need is something that will work."
Zeus opened his mouth again—no doubt to argue further—but Rhea raised her hand.
"Enough," she said. "No one else has offered a plan that even makes it past the front gates. Hades has, and if anyone can weave through Cronus's paranoia, it's him."
Zeus looked at her, then at me. He didn't like it, but even he could feel the weight shifting in the room.
Prometheus gave a low, grudging hum. "Wine… hmm. That could work. It's new. Cronus has a weakness for novelty. He'd want to own it. Control it."
"And he won't be able to," I said. "Not fully. Wine is chaos in a cup—sweet one moment, punishing the next. If we control the source, we control the tempo."
Amaltheia bit her lip, uncertain. "Even if you get inside, you'll be surrounded. One wrong move—"
"We won't make one," I said. "The mixture I add to the wine will target his insides, forcing a physical reaction. He'll never see it coming."
Themis nodded slowly. "You'll need an exact blend of divinities. Something that purges without killing. I'll help craft the formula."
Adrastea looked between us. "And the Titan who agrees to claim you…?"
"I have someone in mind," I said. "They owe me a favor. More than a favor."
Zeus frowned, suspicious. "Who?"
"I'll handle it."
That didn't sit well with him, but Rhea leaned in.
"We don't have time to waste doubting. Hades, if you believe this Titan will aid you, then speak with them. The sooner we move, the better."
I gave a slow nod, draining the rest of my wine. The firelight danced on the goblet's rim, red and gold like spilled blood.
"This ends with Cronus vomiting up the future," I said, rising. "One way or another."
Themis stood as well. "Then we begin tonight. I'll start working on the mixture. You two"—she looked between Zeus and me—"prepare your disguises. If this works… the tide turns."
Everyone else followed suit, rising, murmuring final thoughts and concerns.
Zeus lingered. "You really think this'll work?"
I glanced over my shoulder at him. "No."
He blinked.
"I know it will."
☼
The wind roared past my ears as I tore through the forest, the trees blurring into streaks of green and gold. My bare feet barely kissed the earth before lifting again, my momentum carrying me faster than any mortal could dream. The island behind me was shrinking with every step, the crashing surf of the sea ahead drawing closer.
I reached the edge of the cliff, the land breaking into a sheer drop, and I didn't hesitate. My muscles coiled, and I launched myself into the open air. The ocean yawned beneath me, endless and cold. My heart pounded—not from the fall, but from what came next.
Focus.
I reached inward, toward that strange place where my shadow stirred. The same space I had found when I'd escaped my father's stomach, when I'd broken free into the light. It wasn't a realm I understood, but it knew me, and I knew enough to ask.
The light dimmed. The sound vanished. For a breathless second, all sensation stilled—then the shadows clenched around me, snapping like a coiled whip.
CRACK.
I vanished.
When I reappeared, I stumbled hard, falling to one knee as the world spun around me. My body wasn't used to this, not fully. My control was like walking a tightrope through fog—I could cross, but barely. My hands found the earth—damp grass, wild clover, the faint burn of nettles—and I sucked in a lungful of wind.
I didn't have perfect control of it, and after trying I learnt all I could do was travel through shadows but not really manipulate it.
I stood and looked back and whistled. I had made it across the sea, quite a huge leap.
The shadows around me thickened and thinned with my will as I dashed forward again, slipping into each patch of darkness and reemerging farther ahead. My movements were jagged, imperfect, but they worked.
Westward. I could feel the pull of memory, of a familiar gravity dragging me toward a place I had once called a sanctuary.
After nearly an hour of sprints and shadow-jumps, I reached the cliffside.
It was just as I remembered.
The cliff jutted out like a massive stone blade, cutting into the skies above a wide green valley. Below, forests stretched for leagues, broken by rivers that glimmered like melted silver. Groves of olive trees and blooming pomegranate orchards hugged the valley edges, while golden fields danced in the breeze like a living sea. The air was fragrant—lavender, cedar, and something else I didn't recognize.
It was beautiful. Terribly beautiful.
This had been my refuge. My escape when I wanted to leave Mount Othrys. Here, there had only ever been silence, and—
"You look worse than I imagined," a voice said behind me, low and gravel-lined, like a boulder dragged over bedrock.
I didn't jump. I knew that voice.
I turned slowly.
Iapetus stood a few paces away, framed by the ancient olive trees that crowned the cliff's edge. He looked exactly as I remembered—maybe older, maybe wearier, but still... imposing.
His skin was bronze and weathered like sun-warmed stone, scarred and lined with the evidence of countless wars. He wore a simple white toga cinched with a golden belt in the shape of interlocked spears. Over it, a piece of scale armor shimmered darkly, each plate etched with symbols I didn't recognize. His long, black hair was braided and slung over one shoulder, streaked with silver like lightning through a storm cloud.
And then there was the lance.
The Piercer.
Nearly twice my height, it was a brutal thing of adamantine and obsidian, he had built it himself, and through it he earned the title of, The Piercer. Something that he has shared with his weapon.
"Uncle," I said.
His gray eyes regarded me with something between amusement and sorrow. Then, with a grunt, he strode past me and slammed the Piercer into the ground beside him. The lance embedded itself with a deep thud, vibrating slightly.
He sat at the cliff's edge and patted the space beside him. "Come. Sit. You always liked this view."
I joined him.
For a long moment, neither of us spoke. The wind played with our hair, and a hawk cried somewhere in the valley below.
"I was worried about you," he said finally. "After all you children vanished, everything had changed on Mount Othrys."
"We didn't vanish," I said softly. "Our father, Cronus. He ate my siblings and only I managed to escape."
Iapetus chuckled darkly. "I figured he was always muttering and seemed to have started to go insane."
"Yeah, a lot has changed since then."
"I can see that. Now look at you. You are growing into quite a young man. Even got yourself some muscle and a tan!"
"I have been training a lot more," I admitted.
He turned his gaze on me, eyes narrowed. "So. Tell me, Nephew. Where have you been?"
I told him everything and Iapetus was silent through most of it, only grunting occasionally or asking brief questions.
When I finished, he rubbed his jaw, frowning. "Makes sense, that day I was frozen and yet could still see and hear everything that was going on. Though, Titans don't invoke our divine forms lightly. Takes too much out of us.. Our bodies aren't trained to exert so much divinity, we stupidity thought that we didn't need it and instead learned a far weaker ability we called mana."
I shifted, uncomfortable. "So, how is my father?"
"He's not doing to well," Iapetus said, surprising me. "He lost a lot of weight and he got a lot of scars from his transformation, he filled his wounds with melted gold and he kept muttering and pacing the castle."
I stared at the valley. "Then he's worse than I thought."
"It has been getting worse," Iapetus said quietly. "He gets far more angry now and hates everything, even keeping to himself at times and taking his frustration on others."
I said nothing for a while.
Then: "I need your help."
Iapetus didn't look at me. "What kind?"
"Just to get us into the castle. That's all."
"'Us'?"
"Zeus and I."
A pause. Then, a slow smirk. "So, Rhea's new brat is alive?"
"Yes he is, and he has been training his whole life to take our father down and save our kind."
"And the plan?"
"We disguise ourselves as Cupbearers. Get close to Cronus. Wait for the right moment... poison his drink. A poison that will cause him to vomit out our siblings. That'll bring back Hestia. Demeter. Hera. And Poseidon."
Iapetus arched his brow. "And then?"
"Then we leave and prepare for war. And when the time comes, we will defeat him and will establish a new rule under us."
The silence between us was vast.
Iapetus leaned back on his palms, staring out at the valley. "Do you know what I am, Hades?"
"The Titan of the West," I answered. "One of the Four Directions. You help hold up the sky."
"Exactly." His voice was low. "I hold the west horizon. I anchor the sky just like my brothers. I was there when Cronus slew Ouranos. I helped him and pierced my own fathers limbs from his body. I watched my father's mortal form die, watched him curse my youngest brother and watched as that young kid became the King that started the Golden Age."
He looked at me now, and there was something ancient in his gaze. Something tired.
"I swore loyalty to Cronus that day. An oath written in blood. It binds me, boy."
"I'm not asking you to join our side," I said. "Just please help us."
He chuckled. "You think that makes it easier?"
"Doesn't it?"
He didn't answer.
We sat in silence again. A breeze drifted up the cliff and stirred the grass.
Finally, Iapetus stood. He walked to the Piercer and yanked it free with a single hand, resting it over his shoulder.
"I'll get you in," he said. "But after that, you're on your own."
I rose. "Thank you."
"Don't thank me. I'm not doing this for you."
He turned and started walking into the forest, his massive form disappearing among the trees.
I stood alone on the cliffside, the valley stretching endlessly before me.