CHAPTER 105: CONNECTING THE PIECES (PART 1)

The secret tunnel was exactly where Ares remembered it—buried behind a collapsed pillar near the foot of Mount Olympus, covered in vines and years of divine neglect. They had teleported as close as possible without alerting the celestial wards above, then made the rest of the journey on foot, cloaked by Aphrodite’s magic. The farther they descended, the more the world around them grew still—too still.

No wind. No animals. No sound but their footsteps echoing off cold stone.

Ares shoved aside the last bit of rubble and ducked into the crevice. "This was sealed after the Titanomachy," he muttered. "Even Zeus forgot it existed. I didn’t."

Aphrodite followed close behind, illuminating the tunnel with a soft, golden light that pulsed with her breath. "How did you even know this would lead to the Fates?"

He gave a half-smirk, eyes scanning the darkness. "Because once, long ago, I followed one of them down here."

She stopped. "You spied on a Fate?"

"Clotho," he said with a shrug. "She was... different. Curious. I think she knew I was there. Let me see more than I should’ve. I didn’t understand most of it at the time. But now—" He trailed off. "Now I wonder if she wanted me to remember."

The tunnel opened into a circular chamber carved into the mountain’s roots. The walls were lined with murals—some fresh, some faded with age. Threads of gold and red and black spiraled outward in fractal designs. In the center stood a broken loom, abandoned and overgrown with thick strands of something... organic.

Aphrodite approached cautiously. "This was a loom of fate," she whispered. "I can feel the echo."

Ares nodded grimly. "Someone tried to tear it out, but the threads fought back. Look—here." He knelt beside a scorch mark on the ground. The shape wasn’t random. It was a handprint. Charred into the stone.

Aphrodite touched it gently, and in a whisper only she could hear, the world responded:

"You are not forgotten."

Her eyes widened. "Someone’s still here."

The air thickened. Behind the broken loom, a sliver of space shimmered—like light reflecting off a blade’s edge. A veil. A hidden door.

Ares stood, spear in hand. "Stay behind me."

She didn’t argue.

He stepped forward and thrust his hand through the shimmer. It passed without resistance. No alarm. No flash of divine punishment. Just cold.

Together, they stepped through.

The world beyond was not a room. It was a realm.

A long bridge of woven thread stretched into darkness, suspended over a void of stars and swirling memory. Fragments of forgotten lives floated below—flashes of battlefields, lovers’ kisses, cradles and graves. Aphrodite gasped.

"This is... the Loomway," she murmured. "The passage between fate and memory."

"But it’s broken," Ares muttered. "Look."

Parts of the bridge were frayed, snapped entirely. Whole sections dangled over the abyss, lost. The deeper they looked, the more they realized how much had been unraveled.

And standing at the center of the bridge, facing away from them, was a figure cloaked in gray.

"Clotho," Ares said, taking a step forward.

The figure didn’t turn.

"Clotho, is that you?" he said again, louder this time.

Still no answer.

Aphrodite stepped forward and spoke softly. "We remember, even if the others do not."

The figure stirred, then slowly turned.

But it wasn’t Clotho.

It was Lachesis. Her face was gaunt, eyes dim, as if she had aged beyond her own time. Her hands clutched a broken spindle.

"You should not be here," she said, her voice thin and strained.

Aphrodite’s breath caught. "What happened to the Loom? Why is Olympus forgetting?"

Lachesis looked at them with something between pity and warning. "The threads were severed. A choice was made. Not by us."

"Who, then?" Ares demanded. "Zeus? Hades?"

Lachesis shook her head slowly. "Not one of the Twelve. Not even a Titan. Something older."

The void around them groaned—a low, shuddering pulse, like the heartbeat of something vast and unseen.

"He comes from beyond the pattern," Lachesis whispered. "A being not woven into fate. An intruder. He offered... mercy. Freedom. He said our purpose was slavery. That we were jailors of destiny."

"Did you believe him?" Aphrodite asked.

"We refused him. At first. But then Clotho..." Her voice cracked. "She saw what he offered. She unraveled herself. Atropos tried to stop her—and he took her. Her and the Shears. Without them, I am all that remains."

Ares stepped forward. "Then we fight him. Whoever he is."

"No," Lachesis said, her eyes filled with ancient dread. "You cannot fight what does not belong to time. He walks behind forgotten doors. He eats memory. Already, many of you are fading."

Aphrodite shook her head. "But why us? Why now?"

Lachesis looked at her.

"Because you’re immune," she said. "Love. War. Desire. Rage. These cannot be erased easily. They are not thoughts, but instincts. That is why you remember. Why he fears you."

Ares’s jaw tightened. "Good."

Lachesis turned, pointing to a remaining thread, glowing dimly in the distance—barely holding on. "There is still one who may resist him. One whose story is still being written."

Akhon.

Aphrodite followed her gaze. "Then we protect him."

Lachesis nodded. "And beware those already taken. He speaks through them."

A sudden shudder shook the bridge. The void below shifted violently, as if stirred by awareness. Lachesis cried out.

"He knows you’re here!"

Threads snapped. The bridge began to collapse behind them.

"Go!" Lachesis shouted. "I will delay him!"

Ares grabbed Aphrodite’s hand, pulling her back toward the veil.

"You’ll die!" Aphrodite cried.

"I already have," Lachesis whispered, and then she vanished in a burst of gray light, consumed by the rising dark.

The two gods burst through the veil just as the entire passage behind them imploded. Stone cracked. The murals split. The room was collapsing.

Ares raised his spear and slammed it into the floor. "Olympus, now!"

A flash of red light—and they were gone.

---

They reappeared on a mountaintop under a violet sky, Olympus glowing in the distance.

Aphrodite dropped to her knees, trembling. "We’re running out of time."

Ares stood beside her, silent, watching the horizon.

And far, far below them, in a quiet corner of the mortal world... Akhon stirred in his sleep, his dreams shifting, his name spoken by a voice not his own.

And behind his eyes, something watched.

---

The shadows of Olympus were never still, always stretching in strange angles, cast by a sun that never moved. Aphrodite pressed her back to the marble wall of a long-forgotten corridor, heart pounding not from fear—but from adrenaline, and perhaps the presence of the war god beside her.

Ares crouched at her side, his red cape now replaced by a black cloak, the color of dusk. His breathing was even, focused, his eyes scanning the corridor with the precision of a predator. He hadn’t said much since she explained what she had found. But when she told him about the sealed entrance to the Fates’ old chamber, his eyes darkened—not with confusion, but recognition.

"You’re sure this is the place?" he asked in a whisper.

She nodded. "It was never supposed to be locked. The Fates were supposed to be untouchable, unreachable only by will, not by force. This isn’t just forbidden. It’s... erased."

Ares clenched his jaw. "Then someone’s gone to a lot of trouble to rewrite Olympus."

They moved forward, silent as ghosts. The corridor beneath the surface palace was ancient, dustier than anywhere Aphrodite had ever seen in the celestial realm. Walls bore no murals. No torches lit their way. Only Ares’ flickering flame—from his fingertips—cut the dark in short, sharp bursts.

A sudden grinding sound made them halt.

Aphrodite raised her hand, motioning Ares to stop. "That sound. It’s not stone."

He listened—there it was again. A mechanical hum, low and rhythmic, barely noticeable unless you knew Olympus never had mechanisms. Nothing here buzzed or vibrated. Not unless it was unnatural.

They followed the sound to a sealed archway of black marble. No divine symbols. No markings. Not even a handle.

"This shouldn’t exist," Aphrodite whispered.

Ares reached out, pressing his palm against the stone. A faint shimmer of magic pulsed in response—then withdrew.

He stepped back. "It’s cloaked with something... foreign."

"Foreign?"

"Not Olympian. Not even Titan," he muttered. "Something older... or newer."

Aphrodite furrowed her brow. She pressed her hand to the wall where Ares had touched. She didn’t expect a response—but instead, the wall shimmered again. This time, a thread of golden silk appeared, trailing from the marble like a single strand of hair caught between realms.

She gasped. "That’s Fate-weaving."

Ares looked down at her hand, now grasping the golden thread. "Careful."

The thread pulsed once. Then, the wall melted inward with a sound like fabric being torn.

A long hallway stretched before them, lined with mirrors—hundreds, maybe thousands. Each one reflected different skies, different eras. One showed Olympus in flames. Another, a mortal battlefield under a crimson moon. Another showed Akhon—laughing beside Athena on a balcony.

Aphrodite froze.

Ares followed her gaze. "That was recent."

"But not this Olympus," she murmured.

One mirror, however, stood cracked and flickering. A golden loom stood frozen inside it, rusted and cold. Aphrodite stepped closer, drawn to the vision. The loom... the Fates’ loom.

"This is a surveillance corridor," she realized. "A scrying mechanism. Someone’s watching the fabric of the cosmos—and deciding what to erase."

They walked past mirror after mirror. Most were intact. Some had been shattered, forcibly or perhaps collapsed under the weight of what they showed. When they finally reached the cracked one—the one that seemed most decayed—Aphrodite touched its edge.

A cold whisper ran up her spine.

She was pulled inside.

Ares shouted her name, but it was too late. The mirror swallowed her whole.

---

She found herself standing in a room that was at once familiar and foreign. She had seen this place in her dreams—where the Fates once sat, weaving time with calm, eternal hands.

But now?

Cobwebs lined the corners. The loom lay abandoned. And in the center of the room, chained by threads of dark amethyst, the Fates themselves hung midair, unmoving.

Clotho, Lachesis, and Atropos—bound like prisoners. Their eyes open, but glazed. Their mouths frozen, as if mid-scream. Around them floated runes of chaotic magic—foreign, corrupted, like the mist she had heard described only in whispers.

Then, she heard it. A sound behind her.

"A bold move, goddess of love," said a voice, silky and echoing. "But you should not be here."

Aphrodite turned slowly.

The purple mist coalesced again, just as it had before with Akhon. Its voice carried through the chamber like a haunting melody.

"You broke through what should not be broken."

"I knew something was wrong. You couldn’t hide the inconsistencies forever."

The mist laughed. "I didn’t need forever. Just long enough."

"For what?" she challenged.

"To reshape Olympus. To take back control. Your minds are so malleable, especially his."

Her heart clenched. "Akhon."

"You cling to that name like it means something. He belongs to me now. And soon, when all your gods bow to the order I have created, you too will forget."

"I won’t let that happen," she snarled.

"You already have," it whispered.

It surged forward.

But a spear of red light ripped through the mist. Ares burst through the mirror, flames blazing from his hands. "I hate mist," he growled. "Especially the smug kind."

Aphrodite leapt back as the mist recoiled, wounded but not destroyed. Ares helped her to her feet.

"You alright?"

"Now I am," she nodded.

He didn’t smile, but his grip on her wrist tightened reassuringly.

"We need to get out of here," he said. "And tell the others."

"No," she whispered, eyes still locked on the Fates. "We need to free them first."