Total pages in book: 27
Estimated words: 25521 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 128(@200wpm)___ 102(@250wpm)___ 85(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 25521 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 128(@200wpm)___ 102(@250wpm)___ 85(@300wpm)
Excerpt taken from Dear God: A Post-3rd Diary
Nothing about humans had ever inspired Eros' interest.
He would observe them from time to time, and always they would exhibit a kind of fickleness and greed he found distasteful. Even worse, their capacity for cruelty was unfathomable for a race so weak, and his disenchantment with them only festered when one of his younger brothers had fallen for a mortal girl.
The affair had been short-lived, but its aftertaste so vile that he had thought it best to cut all ties with mankind. And it would have stayed that way if not for the girls showing up in his dream uninvited.
The three sisters were known by many names.
Moirai.
Fates.
Crones.
But for Eros, who had taken on the role of their guardian for a time, Clotho, Lachesis, and Atropos would always be like his little sisters, and it was why he had no trouble rejecting the scroll of prophecy that they pleaded and urged him to heed.
The world may now see these girls as powerful weavers of fate, but Eros was one of the few living beings who still remembered the days when the three had not yet disguised themselves as ancient "Crones" to strike fear in the hearts of those who sought their counsel.
There had been a time, albeit one much forgotten, that the three sisters had been so young and inexperienced, and in their admittedly earnest attempt to harness their powers they had ended up snipping countless life threads a mite too early or too late.
It was those days Eros remembered as he listened to the girls speak of a prophecy that left nothing to desire, those days that made him remember the girls were far from infallible, and that not all the words they uttered always came to be.
The girls begged Eros to listen, telling him with tears in their eyes that on his prophecy they were absolutely sure they were not mistaken. But the god was not to be swayed, and in a rare fit of impatience he threw his life scroll into the flaming waters of Phlegethon.
Eros had only done so to make his point, but instead it proved to be his biggest mistake. Centuries would come to pass, and only when it was too late for remorse that the god would learn how his action had been the catalyst. By the time the scroll was retrieved, and its words revealed, his attempt to defy destiny had already extracted a terrible cost.
****
It was the early days of April, and although spring had not yet fully come, divine blessings already had Rosethorne's trees blooming pink and green by the time its students returned from their week-long break. Orchids had started creeping alongside the ivy-covered walls of the infirmary while a delicate mass of Dutchman's breeches now shrouded the grounds of the labyrinth.
Spring was typically a time of the year that made people's moods mellow, but spring was also when flowers were at their most magical. And so when the noxious scent of hemlock crept under the windows of his office, the god knew trouble would soon be afoot.
In but a second he was on the move, invisible and swift as he followed the scent all the way to the sun-baked streets of a small middle-of-nowhere town in California.
It was here that the unseen taint of hemlock was at its heaviest, which many likened to the smell of mice piss. Hemlock only revealed its presence when foretelling grave danger, but the sheer mundanity of his surroundings had the god perplexed.
Why would the flowers take him to a 7-11 of all places?
The god eventually stepped inside despite his better judgment, and it was at that moment he saw what he was meant to see.
EIGHTEEN-YEAR-OLD GIRL WAKES UP IN A POOL OF BLOOD,
SURROUNDED BY THIRTEEN DEAD BODIES.
DID SHE KILL THEM?
The words made up the headlines of the local paper, and below it was the photo of a girl whose made his blood turn cold.
(no, fuck, no)
He had lived far too long not to know when the Almighty was wielding His power to shape destinies, and so Eros knew in that instant that this girl had everything to do with the prophecy he had dismissed with such divine arrogance.
Undeniable was the girl's beauty, with her hair like spun gold and eyes that reminded the god of Tahitian pearls. The dainty curves she possessed appeared made to perfectly fit his large, strong hands...never mind if said hands were now slightly shaking as Eros learned for himself the misfortune she suffered because of him.
Her story was dubbed as the state's most gruesome school massacre in Post-3rd times, and his guilt and self-reproach had the god traveling posthaste into the Underworld.
He waded unflinchingly into the fiery waters of the river of Phlegethon to take back what he had so foolishly rejected, and with hundreds of years already having come to pass, the scroll should have long crumbled into ashes.