Several days passed, and the boy had not come back. The girl wanted to cry, to scream, to go and find him and ask him if the previous events and words meant nothing.

‘How could he just abandon me? Where is he? Is something wrong?’ Thoughts kept running through her head. And so she decided to do something that was very forbidden, very much against the rules of her imprisonment in Tenebris Paradiso.

She took from her hat a deep purple cloak, one that seemed to swallow all of the light around it. She threw it over her shoulders and disappeared underneath it, blending in perfectly with the shadows. Then she slipped out the gate, and into the confines of the Underworld, making her way towards Styx. She passed Sisyphus, the Furies, even Cerberus, and none of them noticed her, although Cerberus took a big sniff in her direction. However, once she got to Styx, she had to talk to Charon.

“I know that there are two of us on this boat.” His voice was raspy with age.

“Yes Charon. Will you accept payment for taking me across and keeping my presence a secret for as long as possible?” She held out two drachma.

He nodded, taking them, and she settled in the boat. He took her to the entrance of the Underworld, where she jumped out before the rush of the newly dead came forth like a tidal wave. She hurried along the passageway; when she reached the top she shoved open the heavy door, letting in the bright sunshine. It was normal sunshine, and it shined gently down on her face, something she had not felt since the last time she had been on the surface and her curse had wreaked havoc on it.  But things were very different from her times in England and even more so from her times in Greece.

There were no horses, or people in full dresses, or sooty skies; no, there were these big metal boxes hurtling along the streets, and people—of all the horrors—were wearing nothing but knickers and short nightshirts around, and the skies were a baby blue. There were all sorts of new noises that she had never encountered before. But where she was the people had funny accents, and so she knew that she was in a new place…the doorway usually opened to wherever you needed to be. She steeled herself and walked up to one of the men standing on the street, selling some sort of cold something or other.

“Sir?” He swiveled his head towards her, “Can you tell me where I am? What country is this?”

He laughed, but then realizing she was serious he looked at her funny.

“Uh…America…this is New York City.”

The girl inwardly cheered. The boy had said that he lived in that place, on a small street. She asked where it was, and got a pretty good set of directions. Before she left though, he stopped her.

“Did you want some ice cream? I have some I can spare.”

“Um, sure.” The girl didn’t really want that cold stuff, ice cream she now knew, but she didn’t want to refuse his curtesy. He handed her a cone thing with a big scoop of white goop. She tasted it and boy was it COLD! But she found that it was very sweet, and creamy, like the cream mix that people used to make in Greece. She walked along, looking for the boy’s street. She found his house, and slipped the shadow cloak on before picking the lock. Inside, nobody was home. She walked along looking in doors, finding more new things that she had never seen before, until she came to a room that had paintings that weren’t really paintings of the boy and a bunch of other boys in it. They had some funny black and white ball in some pictures, while in others they were dressed up in black clothes. There was a huge bookshelf, a bed, and a desk with a wide, metal, box-like thing on it. But there was no boy. In fact, as the girl looked closer it seemed as if there hadn’t been an occupant in some time, as everything was coated with a layer of dust. She went back out into the sitting room, where there was something she recognized with great joy. A piano! Although black and shiny, the basic structure was still there. She sat, and began to plink out a tune that she had heard the boy hum before.

Suddenly the door slammed open; the girl barely had enough time to get into a corner before a couple of boys and girls came in.

“I can’t believe this.”

“Yeah…I hate it. But at least we can pack his things for his mom.”

“What is this city going to be like without him here?”

“I don’t know…but let’s just get this over with; he’s gone.”

They moved into the room that the girl had left, carrying boxes.

‘Gone? Where is he gone?’ The girl looked after them, then looked in the mirror.

When she did, she was taken aback for a moment before becoming very, very angry. There, shining in the mirror, were the past reflections of Zeus and Hades, who looked grim. Aphrodite was there as well, looking happy as a little lark.

‘They were here…they had a hand in this.’

With that the girl went out, slamming the door and scaring the people inside, before rocketing up into the sky, heading for Olympus. People on the street could have sworn that there was a person flying, but they only would have seen a dark shape in their memories.

When she got there, she ripped off her cape and shoved it in her hat, stalking down the hallway, boots clicking, towards the throne room. She threw the doors, open, interrupting a meeting.

“WHAT HAVE YOU DONE?!” She screamed at Zeus, “WHERE IS HE?!”

He went pale “Whom? And how are you not torn apart?”

“DON’T PLAY FOOLS WITH ME, OR SWITCH THE SUBJECT.” She hissed “THE BOY. WHERE IS HE?”

Zeus and Hades had the grace to look down, “The terms of the deal have been fulfilled Calipsia. I’m sorry.”

She stood stock still. Then she let her temper get the best of her. Purple smoke drifted in, and static crackled around her. “THE DEAL?! WHAT DEAL?!”

“The one Aphrodite made with me.” Zeus looked shamed, “She has promised me eternal love from Hera, no matter what, in exchange for my letting her destroy your happiness and letting her rip your soul apart. I’m sorry Calipsia. There is nothing I can do.” 

She turned to Aphrodite “Is this true?”

She smirked “Now we’re square…you messed up my love story, now I’ve messed up yours.”

“THIS IS ABOUT HELEN?!” The girl, Calipsia, screams at her, “HELEN DID NOT BELONG TO TROY, AND THAT FOOL PARIS!! SHE WAS PROMISED TO GREECE!! TO A MAN WHO LOVED HER, AND TREATED HER RIGHT FOR THE BRAINLESS THING SHE WAS!!”

Aprhodite frowns “Helen was not brainless! She just…ignored it. And she and Paris were so cute!”

Calipsia frowns, “AND YET THAT WAS A GOOD ENOUGH REASON TO KILL AN INNOCENT BOY?!”

Aphrodite shrugs “He wasn’t innocent. He fell in love with you.” She smirks, “Morpheus and I just gave him a little nudge that’s all…sooner or later you two would’ve met. And big deal, humans die all the time.”

Calipsia walks slowly over to her, letting the smoke curl around her. She stands right in front of Aphrodite. “So you killed him just to get back at me?” Her voice is like cold, hard, steel.

Aphrodite, now a little scared but not backing down, “Of course.”

Calipsia smiles, a grimly sweet one. Then she lashes out at Aphrodite’s chin, her fingernails digging up into the soft flesh of her throat.

“Let me remind you all of who you allied yourself with to destroy Hecate.” She drags the screaming goddess down to the center of the room. “Let me remind you that none of you,” she gestures around, “were powerful enough to defeat her, and why you had to have her own daughter take her magic. Let me remind you why you all were secretly happy to have me go peacefully down to my solitude in Tenebris Paradiso.”

She throws the goddess on the floor, and uses the smoke to create a model of the earth. Little pink and red dots show up everywhere, along with two little white dots.

“Look at our Earth. See how many pink and red dots there are? The pink are those new, innocent loves, that are starting out. The red are those deep, strong loves.” She snaps her fingers and the dots grow purple inside of them. “I can poison every single one of their hearts.”

Then she looks down at Aphrodite, “Those white dots are the people you, my dear Aphrodite, would do anything for. One must be Eros,” she smirks, “But could the other one be this new man, the one I’ve been hearing about?” She looks down at Aphrodite, who is cowering on the floor. “Ahh yes…Aden.”

She pulls the white dots from the globe and it disappears. The dots fly to her hand, and she kneels down to look directly at Aphrodite.

“I could crush them like bugs.” She hisses, squeezing her hand shut, “You’d do well to remember that before you challenge the goddess of pure, unbridled power.”

With that she stands up, “You all had better fix this…or pay the price.” With that, she walks out of the hall, slamming the doors shut.