Pertemis: Timeless

Chapter 9

Artemis POV

"Apollo help!!!" I shouted desperately when we appeared in the middle of the meeting.

All attentions drew to us as some gods stood up in shock at the sight of Perseus. And despite the situation, that idiotic brother still managed to be childish.

"Hah! Finally, after three thousand years, my little sister has asked me for help" Apollo laughed with that annoying sound.

"Come hear right now!!!" I yelled in rage. Anymore of that bullshit and I'd have had his head.

But one thing now that was absorbing all that range.

Perseus.

His condition was turning worse, especially after taking the final blow...for me again. His breathing was not normal anymore. He had to gasp sometimes to get enough air. At the moment, I didn't care whether I would be responsible for his injuries or possibly...death. The fact that he threw away his life for me more than just once already sealed a deal between us. I had debt to pay and he was not going to die without accepting that payment. Moreover, the sight of him being hurt snapped something in me. As if my heart was also screaming in agony at his wounds.

His knees crumbled and I just had time to press my hand on his chest for support and push him up to his feet again.

"Please don't die, please" I muttered to him, my eyes stung at that moment.

Apollo face changed to serious, perhaps from noticing the despicable black spear protruding from Perseus' back.  He rushed over to us.

"What happened to him" Apollo grimaced, inspecting the wound. Tendrils of darkness from the spears that were sucking away Perseus' life force danced around my brother's fingers.

"No time, do something please" I begged him for the first time. I didn't care at that point if someone would tease me about crying over a man afterwards. Because the image of Perseus taking that spear for me kept displaying over and over again in my head and they hammered into my chest each time. It hurt.

Apollo nodded and picked Perseus up, then flashed away with a column of light.

Silence emerged the room as I stared at the spot where Perseus' lifeless body was laying a moment ago, to the spot of his Ichor that was now spreading across the white marble floor.

"Please be alright" I muttered to myself.

"What happened to him?" Zeus' sudden voice snapped me out of that trend and I startled before turning back at him. I looked at the gods and they seemed just as anxious to know the story. So I took a deep breath to calm myself and when I felt the panic passed. I looked up and recounted the story.

It was painful to dig up those memories again, but I managed to give them a brief story of the attack somehow. My lips trembled the moment I mentioned when Perseus attempted to help me and the result had cost him dearly. My heart felt even heavier when I told them the last part which he took at spear for me.

The gods went silence as I looked up to them with blood-red eyes. The flame from the hearth of Hestia suddenly surged up in a great gigantic column of red and amber fire before it died down and suddenly ceased to existence. Everyone stared at the hearth in shock, at the ashes and wood that remained because we all knew that fire had never burned out before. The throne room became full and dark without the hearth presence, without its source of power, the Lady Hestia herself. I knew Perseus was close to Hestia, but I didn't expect his injuries would affect her that much, to the point she shut out her own fire. Deep down, the relationship between Hestia and Perseus somehow made me uncomfortable. I didn't like it that way, perhaps because Hestia was much older than him so imagine them being together feel kinda weird. But I knew it was more than that, it was this fear and anxiety in there which I could not explain. Those same spark of fear that I knew I'd encountered before and just very recently. Then I realised it was the same fear I had the day Perseus was made god and that moment when he captured every goddess's heart.