Helm Of Hades

Chapter one: The End



At a graveyard, of which there are a little amount of mounds of dirt inside it, our story begins.

The people of the small village, Velia, of eastern Greece, have gathered in for the first real funeral that they have held in over 3 years. They have been brought together all facing a bed with sheets covering the body.

‘We are gathered here today to mourn the loss of one of our own.’ Proclaims the local priest. ’ Myron Rivira, was an exceptional man. Husband to Elpis, and son to Alexius, was taken from this earth, by the hands of Zeus. As it was his time to leave life, we can only hope that Hades, god of the underworld, will be peaceful, and have mercy on our beloved.’

He gestures towards a tall woman with long black hair, down past her shoulders, and bright green eyes, misty with tears for her fallen lover. And a young child, no older than 17, with naturally spikey blonde hair, his father looks, and from an unknown source, bright crimson eyes, which nobody could explain. Both with tears streaking down their grim faces, and a look of utter disbelief, as they listen to the priest, heads bowed, hands clenched in prayer. Purely grieving.

The priest continued ‘Myron, age 43. Was a caring and loving man, but was unknown to many. But to those had did talk to; he would only speak of his son, Alexius, whom Myron had believe to be the joy of his life, apart from Elpis. Alexius and Myron were extremely close, as close as two people could get.’ And with that, Alexius stoop up, and ran away from the grave.

He ran, not knowing where to go or who to go to. No one dared to follow him; he was the fastest person in their village. He ran through empty walkways and fields. Obviously the whole village turned up to the funeral. He ran into a forest, of which oak trees were plentiful. Deeper and deeper into the forest he went, the trees grew thicker with every steep he took, eerier and eerier the forest became, sunlight creeping away in front of him. Only when he thought he was alone, he sat against the largest oak tree he could find. And that was the biggest mistake so far.

‘why, why would the gods take him away.’ he spoke aloud not caring if anyone could hear him ’WHY ZEUS, HOW COULD YOU.’ He screamed it the heathens, but the second he finished yelling to Zeus, twigs starting snapping in the distance, leaves rustling on the ground, voices made in the distance, Alexius thought to himself on the dimly lit forest floor, ‘please don’t find me, don’t look here’, but it was too late, as he got up to move away, between two large oaks, two men staggered in. Cyprus and Steelius, local bullies who enjoyed two on one fighting. A bottle, which was obviously wine, in their hand, drunk out of mind, noticed Alexius.

‘Well well well, look at this Steelius, little bittie Alexius crying his eyes out.’ Said Cyprus, the smaller of the two but obviously the leader of the pair ‘What happened Alex’ your daddy died, hmmm, do you miss your dad. HAHAHAHA, come off it Alex’, he’s gone, and he isn’t coming back. The gods must of taken him for a reason, maybe it was because he was in love with that oaf you call “mommy”.’

‘HOW DARE YOU TALK ABOUT MY MOTHER LIKE THAT?’ Screamed Alexius

But Cyprus completely ignored him and continued ‘or maybe it’s because he had you for a child.’

‘SHUT UP!’ screaming even louder than before. But Cyprus was laughing as hard as he could, so it almost seemed to hurt him, until he said, firm and clear to Steelius

‘Get him.’ And Steelius tensed, grinning with excitement. Alexius first thought was to run, but he was too exhausted. So his only choice was to fight.

As he made his decision to raise his fists, there was already one flying towards him, and hit him squarely on the mouth. He fell to the forest floor with a dull thud, Cyprus burst out with fresh laughter. Alexius was already getting to his feet, but was kicked back down, while he was halfway up, more laughter from Cyprus, this time he got all the way up, stood face to face with Steelius, and Cyprus ran around his friend and kicked Alexius squarely in the chest, he was lifted off his feet about three inches, and fell with a loud crash of bone on stone. He couldn’t breathe, winded, he tried to stand up, and with all the effort he could muster he got to his feet, and as fast as he could, he ran for Cyprus, and punched his laughing face straight in the jaw.

BANG a loud, earthshattering explosion and a flash of white lightning, which seemed to aluminate the ground and trees around them. Alexius was thrown back, 12 feet at least, and landed, head first, on an exposed root.

Knocked out he lay there and all he could see was a woman, sitting on the side of a four poster bed, head in her hands, sobbing, she lifted her head to show a glowing face no older than 25 she looked, but her war torn face was centuries old, her lips where quivering, liquid running from her nose, brown hair that seemed to shine from root to tip, unnaturally. But all Alexius could look at were her eyes, Crimson red, the same as his. He gazed at her, wondering if she was real, or just a figment of his imagination. But this dream was so vivid; he knew it must be real. Then he started to take notice of the room in which they were in, the room itself was light beige, with only one window, which was just a glass pane, opposite of the bed. Outside the window was, thick clouds, he thought that they must be thousands of miles above the ground. It’s only then that he realised how cold it was. His first thought was that they were on top of a mountain. He stepped over to the pane and looked down; all he could make out through the cloud was that they were above an ocean.

‘HERMES. GET IN HERE.’ She bellowed, making him jump, her voice ringing in the distance, until there was a reply from an extremely calm voice.

And from what she said, he knew that he was seeing a vision of the gods on Mount Olympus. ‘But how did he get there, why am I up on Mount Olympus, and who is the woman sitting on her four poster bed.

‘Yes madam on my way.’ The voice seemed to ring in the same way the woman’s did. And stepped in a young man, around the same age as the woman’s, he was a tall man, with a sarcastic grin on his young face, black spikey hair, toga like robe, and sandals, with small inanimate wings on either side.

‘It’s time’ the woman said, calm and clear

And then Alexius awoke, still on the ground, panting.

He looked over to see if Cyprus and Steelius were still standing there laughing, but they were lying on the floor, about 20 feet away. They weren’t moving, breathing, or blinking, all they could do was look at the heavens above. He saw small wisps escape their mouths. The souls escaping the empty shell.

‘Get up you childish fool, you’ll get yourself killed, Alexius.’ The sudden voice made Alexius jump, and starred to where the voice came from, and there stood a familiar man, staring back at him. no older than 25, he had a calm but devious face, deep blue eyes, and spiky hair quite similar to his own, except that it was jet black and a little bit longer than his. He wore a toga like robe and sandals with inanimate wings on either side.

‘Hermes?’ gasped Alexius

‘Good to see you have a brain. Now get up.’ The last three words said with such authority, Alexius had to obey.

‘How do you know who I am?’ Alexius asked, almost wondering if he was still unconscious.

‘Your mother sent me.’ He replied.

Alexius stood, dumbstruck, until he said, ‘but my mother’s at the funeral she could easily walk here herself, this is where I always come to be alone. How does she know you, you’re a messenger to the gods?’

Hermes sighed and replied, almost bored with, ‘that woman in that village is not your mother. Alexius Rivira, you are a demigod, you see you are the son of the goddess of wisdom and battle strategy, your mother is Athena’.