The Valkyrie (14 page)

“Yes, yes it
is.” Liberty said.

“Your dress is
lovely.” Honour kissed Liberty on the cheek whilst trying hard to
not sound sad. “I’m sorry Lib I think I’m going to have to get
going. I need to treble check the figures before KW2 kicks off
tomorrow. You look beautiful.”

“I’ll come too.
Thank you for having me.” Bea said. “We’ll wait for you by the car
Glory”

“Are you
reporting for duty tomorrow?” Glory asked Liberty as she watched
Bea and Honour leave the room safely.

“No. I’m going
dress shopping with my mother and Hera.” Liberty replied

“Alright, I’ll
see you soon.” Glory embraced her friend. To her mind Liberty was a
smack addict. Glory turned to leave. She could see that Hera had
noticed her presence and was watching her closely. She walked
through the main doors, paused and took a big breath.

“I wondered
whether you would come. I wasn’t sure you’d be over Apollo yet. You
should be it was hundreds of years ago. It must be weird thinking
of him shagging your best friend though?” Zeus was leaning against
a balustrade.

“Father” Glory
said formally, taking in his form but not reacting to him.

“I hear good
things about you.” Zeus said as he sized her up “Don’t get too
good, otherwise I shall be forced to do something about you.”

“Do you
threaten all your children so?”

“Only the ones
who aren’t idiots.”

“Are you going
to swallow me whole?”

“Lack ambition
and you’ll be fine. How’s your mother Britannia?”

“If you were
really omniscient you’d know that. Good evening.” Glory took two
steps at a time down the flight of stairs.

“You’re angry
with me.”

“How could I
not be?” Glory stated over her shoulder.

“That is an
unwise tone to take with me.”

“Good evening
father.” Glory said, paying lip service.

“Daughter.”
Zeus turned back in to the party and Glory carried on out of
Olympus and back to Hackney.

Leto was mad beautiful,
although she was also pretty difficult to get a glimpse of. The
titan daughter of Coeus and shining Phoebe, like Prometheus Leto
had managed to stay the right side of Olympus after Zeus had
defeated his father Cronus and the other titans in the war. Now
Zeus was already married to Hera by the time that Leto accidentally
let her magic slip and he saw her. The stag saw the doe and gave
chase.

***

“But you’re
married.” Leto said.

“Yes, I am
aware of that.” Zeus said.

“To the goddess
of marriage.”

“I am also
aware of that. I never stop hearing about it.”

“So why have
you got your hand there.”

“Because I want
it to be there.”

“This is not a
good idea.”

“What isn’t a
good idea?” Zeus asked thinking not with his head. He leaned in and
kissed her. He kissed her. He kissed her. She kissed him.

***

“Leto’s
pregnant.” Hera said.

“Really?”
Zeus’s mind was absent and its location troubled Hera.

“Yes.”

“What?”

“I know it’s
fucking yours, you fucking cunt.”

“I should
damned well hope so unless the little whore has been cheating on
me. I can’t be doing with that.” Zeus said as Hera seethed. “You’re
stood there
expectantly
. Is there something you wanted?”

“Something I
wanted? When has what I wanted ever mattered to you?”

“It never has,
dear, and it never will.”

***

Hera by her own
nature wasn’t supposed to be cruel. The ill-fated Hera was held
enthralled to the tyranny of ‘the bride’, locked in her role of
wife to a despot with no hope of rebellion. Zeus had raped Hera and
the shame induced her to accept his offer of marriage. What a
propitious beginning the pair had. Inherently bad husbands make
good wives bitter – as is often the case in reverse too. The hate
of such a wretched wife breaks out sideways as it cannot forge a
path towards its real target. Hera hunted Leto down. She was
fearful that her husband’s bastards would gain prominence in the
then young Olympus where she too reigned as queen consort. How
could the goddess of marriage be belittled in such a way? Thus she
decreed that Leto could not give birth on terra firma.

Now Leto wasn’t
daft and after a while she discovered that the island of Delos was
not attached to land and merely floated. It was here that she gave
birth to her eldest child, her splendid daughter Artemis, goddess
of the chastity and the hunt, and latterly the moon. Hera, who had
been unaware of that loophole, was seemingly undone until she
detained Eileithyia, the goddess of childbirth. And so Leto
laboured on and on. So after nine days and the assemblage of all
goddesses of note Leto gave birth to the blond haired Apollo. Some
say that Artemis acted as midwife which really must have been
traumatic. Imagine delivering your own twin. Or perhaps Zeus
eventually set Eileithyia free. This was how Apollo entered the
world and all the trouble began.

Even after
Artemis and Apollo ascended to Olympus and were formally recognised
as Zeus’s children, Hera could not be placated in her rage against
her marriage. She sent the giant Tityos – another of Zeus’s
bastards, she may as well try and kill four birds with one stone –
to rape Leto. When a foetus Tityos grew so vast so quickly that his
mother’s womb split in two and the earth had to carry him to full
term. Artemis and Apollo made quick work of him with their speedy
arrows. Hera should have learnt her lesson.

Daphne was a pretty basic nymph. Her
father was a river god; no one could be bothered to remember who
her mother was. She was a devout follower of Artemis and was one of
her virgins who traipsed after her around the world’s forests
killing miscellaneous creatures, like some sort of trigger happy
Brownie patrol. Poor Daphne was in the proverbial wrong place at
the actual wrong time. Now Apollo got around the block, he could he
was hot. He was also damn good with a bow and arrow. There was no
other god that could match him. Always an archer, clinical Apollo
did everything from a distance and from a high vantage point, even
love. Every now and then Apollo would get cocky, and every now and
then someone would attempt to teach him a lesson.

***

“Arrows aren’t
to be trifled with little one.” Apollo said.

“I am not
little and I am a very good shot.” Eros said.

“If you
insist…” Apollo smirked.

***

“But mother he
had so little respect for me, for love.” Eros said to Aphrodite,
the indignation tripping from his tongue like acid.

“Really
darling.” Aphrodite said as she inspected her nails.

“Would it not
be exquisite if he died from a broken heart?”

“That it would
darling and if not from a broken heart then a least from
embarrassment.” Aphrodite said and with that she sauntered off
leaving Eros with empty moral space, the little head case.

***

Eros steadied
his hand. His targets were in sight. He drew back his bow and fired
his first shot, an arrow of pure hate, straight into the heart of
Daphne who had merely happened to have made casual eye contact with
Apollo. Eros rapidly drew his second arrow, an arrow of deepest
love, straight into the heart of Apollo, the bastard. That would
teach him. That
should
have taught him.

***

No one, not
even an immortal, sees Eros’s arrow pierce their flesh only the
resulting sensation. And yet for some inexplicable reason they all
perceived the effect as a natural phenomenon. Apollo took that
little love dart to his chest with little dignity. Now first he
tried to talk to Daphne, which normally is a very sensible
beginning, but of course that did not work. She had taken her hate
dart with some poise and had managed to hide her disgust pretty
well for the first few weeks at least. This dignity did not serve
her well; Apollo read this as charming aloofness. After a week of
not getting any closer to her, Apollo tried a different tack:
poetry. A good old lyrical ballad always worked wonders for him, he
was the god of it after all and his lovers always found it
delightful. This of course did not work and Daphne remained
resolutely virginal. So Apollo embraced the next tactic in his
arsenal: alcohol. That clearly wasn’t going to go down well with
such a hair shirt of a girl. He thought she was still playing hard
to get. Thus Apollo was left with his last and final option: rape.
If Daphne just had sex with him – even if she wasn’t quite ‘aware’
that she wanted to – then of course she’d fall in love with him
too. Well after some Benny Hill style comedy chasing involving a
sizable erection Daphne lost her shit. She begged her father for
help. In obliging his daughter the river god turned her into a
laurel tree. Apollo then decided to wear her leaves on his head in
a crown. He was only being environmentally friendly. This was the
first time Apollo had ever suffered the indignity of such a violent
rejection, and he did so very publically.

***

Silently Eros
had waited for some form of retribution for millennia over Daphne.
It took centuries to happen but he always knew that one day he
would have to pay recompense for his overreaction. One day that
little favour got called in and he was made to swear on Styx that
he would never tell of his involvement in Apollo’s marriage to
Liberty. He hadn’t taught Apollo a lesson but more accurately Eros
had given him a lucky break. Eros had a niggling feeling about the
whole Daphne business that he had never been able to shake although
he had not discussed it with anyone. Careless talk cost lives in
Olympus. Daphne was a sworn virgin and had dedicated her very
existence to Artemis. His aim in choosing her had been to play the
twins off against each other but Artemis had not once tried to
protect her girl Daphne, even when she was well within her rights,
after all her brother had violated her sovereignty. Why did Artemis
not stand up to her twin? Eros thought their relationship was
strange; and thinking that on Olympus was certainly something.

Apollo &
Cassandra

Cassandra was
once a priestess of Apollo’s. She was beautiful, as all of Apollo’s
women were. Her hair was long and rested on her lower back, and her
clothes were always accidentally a bit too tight. She was the
daughter of King Priam and Queen Hecuba of ill-fated Troy and
sister of Paris and Hector. Now Cassandra committed the
worst
of all offences, she changed her mind and said no.

***

Apollo loved
how Cassandra said her prayers to him: down on her knees and
looking upwards. As she was his priestess Cassandra was already
Apollo’s in name. He could only watch her going about her scared
duties for so long before he could no longer resist. The great
irony of this all was that as a priestess Cassandra had taken a vow
of chastity to Apollo.

“Excuse me, are
you still making votive offerings today?” Apollo asked as he leaned
suavely against a column.

“Until sunset,
yes.” Cassandra said as she swept the temple floor “Would you like
to make an offering to Apollo?”

“Apollo would
like to make you an offering.” Apollo was smooth.

“I’m sorry
what?” Cassandra asked, thinking she’d misheard the louche
stranger.

“If you let me
fuck you then I’ll give you the power of prophesy.” He wasn’t in
the mood for delicacy.

“Um, yeah.”
Cassandra said confusedly, this stranger was bigger than her and
she was alone in the temple, no one would hear her if she called
for help.

“Great, I’ll be
back tomorrow. I’ll give you the power of prophecy tonight. My
snakes will come and lick your eyes in your sleep.” Apollo hadn’t
realised that Cassandra didn’t know who he was. The sculptors who
made divine statues for temples often took great artistic liberties
with their appearances and she hadn’t recognised him.

When he turned
up the next day Cassandra had taken the day off and switched her
shift with a surly looking priestess with a moustache.

“Where’s
Cassandra?” Apollo asked.

“Oh you’re the
guy who came yesterday right? She isn’t going to sleep with you,
you know.” the priestess said as she shuffled off. Apollo was
livid.

In retribution
Apollo cursed her so that all her predictions would be true but no
one would ever believe her. Her family thought she was resolutely
mad and treated her as such. Cassandra predicted the trouble that
that bint Helen would cause, she predicted the entirety of the
Trojan War and she saw Troy burning at the end of the whole palaver
too. Not that anyone took a blind bit of notice.

Cassandra died
a death so tragic. As the Greeks took Troy she fled to the
sanctuary of Athena’s temple. As Ajax came for her she clung tight
to goddess’ statue. He dragged her away. The statue fell. He raped
her on the temple floor. He killed her. Athena wept and sought
revenge. Odysseus commanded that he be stoned to death for the
sacrilege and yet Ajax escaped retribution. Athena then enlisted
the help of her father Zeus and Poseidon. Not many of the Greeks
made it back.

***

Eros often
observed that everything was Apollo’s fault. A violent death was
the fate he subjected Cassandra to. Apollo never could take
rejection well and if he didn’t kill you himself, you’d end up dead
anyway. Even though in this case all the confusion arose because
Cassandra didn’t realise that Apollo was talking about himself in
the third person. 

Coronis was a knockout, she was also
very flexible. The mortal girl wandered about her father’s meadows
one sunny day, very bored. You can imagine in those days everyone
was a little bored without modernity’s diversions, but it was
particularly so for women: cook, sew, cook, weave, wander around
aimlessly outside, cook, marry your cousin, sleep, and repeat. At
least men got to go and try and kill each other every now and then.
This was where Apollo came in; he was a sizable diversion and a
blond haired one at that.