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Per Aspera Ad Astra
(Through hardships to the stars)
Nothing cuts through Zoe Nightshade's defenses like the cold bite of nostalgia. Every once in a century, she feels the barest twitch of remembrance. Her memories are both her escape and her prison.
Her family's home. Her home. The endless glades of emerald green, the rivers of everlasting spring water. The sacred tree with the rarest shimmers of gold. And the stars—oh the stars! How they shone with such brilliance in their meadow. They outshone the fleece, they outshone the moon itself. They were majestic.
She remembers; there was the scent of freedom in the air. And the forever taste of paradise.
No thought of leaving ever crosses her mind, not until he came.
She has never known the feeling of infatuation until she sees him. She has never known how to care until she begins to care for him. When he asks her for a favor, she thinks, who is she to refuse? He is perfect and he needs her. Any misgivings or thoughts of consequences are banished the very moment she gazes into his eyes.
She gives him her hair clip, the most precious and only gift from her mother, and bids him luck.
"Thou may not survive. Danger is near. Death might follow." She is trembling for him. All for him. "Is it worth it?"
He grins and his teeth shine with all the light in the world. "Fairest lady, there is a saying in my land—per aspera ad astra."
She is crying already. "Then go, and land in the stars my brave one."
Then he's gone with all his strength and warmth and the traitor sister is alone with her thoughts of love and Happily Ever After's. She almost smiles.
Only when he doesn't come back—only then—does she see that she's been played for a fool.
Disowned. Ridiculed. Banished. It's almost too much for her to bear.
Almost.
Days turn into weeks, weeks morph into months. The sun has no more warmth, the stars no longer sparkle. She doesn't know who she is anymore, not until she receives the offer.
"Your past is of no matter to me," this woman—this goddess—says, and Zoe has the smallest thought that the Lady Artemis knows her pain—maybe not understand it, but knows it all the same, "all I ask of you is your allegiance. You'll be young and capable forever lest you fall."
She accepts and the halo of silver that is forever set into her aura is yet another reminder. She is starting to heal.
For years—who knows? Maybe a century has passed. She surely hasn't noticed—the world is her meadow. Her honor is her pride and glory. Her oath for male hatred is her retribution.
The closest she's ever gotten to her personal paradise.
But it never seems to be enough. No matter how elated or satisfied she feels one day there is always that one fleeting moment of regret, and she spirals down into depression, the scar made so long ago peeling little by little until the hurt feels new and fresh.
It gets to such a degree, her Lady calls her in.
Artemis is patient, Artemis understands, but that alone did not make the hurt go away and the she-hunter could not bear the thought of being released. Without the Hunters, she is nothing.
She tries to explain, "Lady Artemis, it's only a spell. Nothing is wrong, thou should not worry, I—"
"Lieutenant," her lady says and she is instantly silent. Artemis is in the form a little girl, with bouncy curls and the face of a cherub. But her eyes held all the wisdom of her years. "Dost thou fear change?"
"I fear nothing, my Lady."
She nods. "I have no doubt, my Huntress, but you have much to learn. Listen and learn this one thing from me—from now on you will not be held back by your past, I won't allow it."
She stays stiff and tense under the goddess's gaze and her throat is scratchy but she whispers "Yes my Lady."
"We can never turn back the hours of time—not even I nor my family can interfere with the fates' intentions—and we should never dare try. There are things I know you wish you could change but you can't, and I also know how much you fight yourself, Zoe, I know. You fight to hold on and yet you fight to let go."
Artemis's next words are meant with compassion, comfort, but she is not adept with expressing either so it comes out icy and frank.
"You must let go."
Zoe is dismissed and she leaves the tent with a new mission. When she looks up at the sky, she sees the first signs of the stars coming out and she knows what she must do.
She has to move on. The healing must start again.
Time passes, and as Zoe learns, it really does heal all wounds.
Her days are a blur of Hunts and footraces and Lady Artemis and girl camaraderie and she's content.
It's like every night, the stars shine especially brighter for her.
Her progress is put to the test the day he dies.
Of course she knows when he dies, it is impossible to not hear the whispers or the down-right shouts of any and every knowing being about his passing. 'A real hero' they call him, 'He'll be remembered forever' they say.
Suffer in Tartarus, she wants to tell them.
There's a whole ceremony at the site of the current Olympus, Verona, Italy, and attending is nothing short of mandatory.
Her head is held high the whole time, to the pride and approval of her Lady.
She doesn't even flinch when the gods announce his gift—immortality. He'll be honored 'till the ends of time, Zeus proclaims, no one, mortal or immortal, will not recognize this true and glorious hero.
She doesn't even protest when they put his visage with the stars—her stars—and not one tear passes as she slowly realizes: she'll see him forever.
Not one tear.
More years pass and somehow she's still going. The stars have long lost their appeal to her and that's just fine because she's doing her duty as Lieutenant. Her life has a purpose and she hasn't felt regret in years.
She's sitting around a campfire in a forest, delaying her current Hunt in the hopes for a new recruit.
This girl… she's different. She looks at her, the girl, and she sees herself.
Not in the physical sense however—not in the least! This girl has spiky dark hair, electrically dark eyes—but the personality is there. The fighting spirit. Or something else?
"Woulds't thou consider my offer? Thy needs would be very much met." Throwing obvious glances around, she has no doubt the girl knows that she's referring to her current living conditions. This girl was sleeping on a tree stump and living off of berries, and sharing with another demigod to boot by what she says, so surely she'd accept.
Surely.
"No. Thanks but no thanks."
She doesn't really comprehend that her offer was rejected because she believes that in the end, the girl would accept.
"And why dost thou refuse?" She asks, curious but still sure of the girls consent.
The girl shrugs, her queer leather jacket (is that what proper ladies wear nowadays?) rumpling but before she speaks there's a voice in the distance.
"Thali-aa!" it shouts and the girl turns around with instant attention. A boy comes around the bend carrying something on his back, "I got the firewood!"
This girl, Thalia, is smiling. It strikes the Hunter like lightning.
Oh Goddess. Love.
"It's not worth it, tragic fool." She whispers fast with no thought. She's not trembling—she's well past that weakness. And she isn't going to cry, because she's made herself stronger than that. "What makes thou think it is?"
Thalia looks at her and at first Zoe thinks she's going to deny it. But she says with such casualness it actually pains Zoe to hear—
"It's a shot. Shoot for the moon and land in the stars, y'know?"
The pot of boiling water that has been sitting on the fire comes tumbling down because she stands up too fast. She says a hasty "Fare thee well" before she leaves with her company and never looks back. She doesn't want to see the boy up close, afraid of seeing someone else's features in his. She's done. She never wants to go back and she most certainly doesn't want any more reminders. Hasn't she been reminded enough?
Let Thalia have her shot, she thinks, she'll see soon enough. They all will.
Zoe has finally numbed her heart. She's finally moved on.
She's tired, worn, and beat. But she still will not cry. She can't. There's no more hurt inside of her, only the empty sting of a memory. She remembers but she does not feel.
And one night (a time when everything is peaceful and the moon is out and she's all by herself, just the way she likes it), Zoe Nightshade the archer, the fallen Hesperide, the risen hunter, brings up her bow and notches an arrow. She aims it straight up at first, uncertain and wavering in the face of the silver orb.
Her eyes don't mist up but she finds herself disoriented anyway—there were so many stars. They were all so beautiful.
She remembers, a long time ago, when they were majestic.
"Shoot for the moon," she whispers, "and land in the stars."
Her arm steadies and her missile flies straight and true. A whistle to the skies in a silent night.
~xoxo, panini999