Author's Note: Thank you, sweetkid45, and Amazonfire for your kind reviews. You're keeping Fearforget writing on this. Much appreciation to you all!

Chapter Fourteen

The villagers were indeed hounds. It seemed the Furies had used them before, as the villagers had honed this down to an art. Like seasoned pros, they had split off the forest into three sections and were alternately setting traps to catch them if they came out and the others taking groups deeper in.

Up above, back in the trees again, Joxer and Callisto looked down at all the villagers, who just didn't think that their prey could escape so far up the tree. Callisto had spent a lot of years on Xena's trail, so she knew how to escape like the Amazons did. Luckily, there were two trees together which had been here for ages. They had clutched each other, and they were so big and so strong, they made a perfect platform, almost like a treehouse.

It had already hit lunchtime, so Callisto caught a bird and plucked it, and then Joxer started a fire and cooked it. "They aren't going to give up," Callisto mentioned trying to get Joxer to talk. He hadn't liked the fact that she had seen his mother in that position, and he had pulled a stony face ever since, not even grunting at her.

Now, he shrugged and still gazed downward. "The Furies are like wolves."

Callisto smiled. "Okay, good so you're over that whole thing, great. I wasn't trying to see your mother like that, you know."

"Don't talk about her!" Joxer said under his breath so the villagers couldn't hear him, but there was ice to his tone. "I may tell the truth about almost everything else, but when it comes to my mom, I lie all the time. I told Gabrielle and Autolycus that she was a warlord's wife! Her! Like she could harm a fly. And you saw her . . . You just had to barge in didn't you?"

Callisto didn't know what to say. Through this all, Joxer had seemed like he was the one who couldn't harm a fly. He always seemed so . . . gentle. Now, he was a raging bull: he reminded her of herself. "I can pretend I didn't see . . ."

"You know I said she had thought of me as a black sheep. I only lie about my mother. You can't talk about her!"

"Apparently you want to, though," Callisto noted.

Joxer gave her a glare and then sat down with a huff. "I . . . don't."

"Okay, then don't. We have a fire, though," Callisto joked, ready to forget this whole thing.

"I did that to her, you know," Joxer announced.

"Okay, here we go," Callisto said. It was obvious Joxer never had had anyone to talk about his mother with. Almost everything he told Gabrielle and Xena had been the truth in a weird way, but he out and out lied to them about his mom. It was Callisto he was choosing to open up with. Though it made her completely uncomfortable and want to just push him out of the tree so he would stop talking and trusting Callisto of all people with his secrets, some part of her heart swelled. There was a strange connection growing between her and this idiot.

"I drove her mad. I told you I was Ares' son. I told you about the curse, but you haven't asked how I grew up."

"You, too," Callisto shot back.

"Oh, like I'd want to open up that can of worms," Joxer said with a slight grin. The tree was no place to pace, but Callisto could tell he wanted to.

"Alright, fine, you want to talk about her. I'll listen on one condition," she said.

"What's that?"

"That you never ask me to open up about my own childhood, deal?"

Joxer nodded.

"Alright, we have time before nightfall. When that comes we have to move and see if we can get out of this forest, but in the meantime, I'm in the mood for a story. How'd you grow up, like Hercules, or with the gods?"

"With the gods? Oh, no, no, never with. I was above them. I was groomed to be Ares' assassin."

"Like Nemesis?"

"No, Nemesis had nothing on me. She exacted justice for mortals. I extracted lives from gods."

Callisto gasped, staring at Joxer with a new look. "Are you telling me you killed a god?"

"A god? No, over seven hundred fell to my blade. You don't know the gods' hierarchy do you, of course not, you weren't born a god. You were only made one. You had such a will, you automatically got put up there with Ares. But there were dozens of gods. The bigwigs like Zeus and Hera, Hephaestus and Aphrodite, they had nothing to fear from me, but the lesser ones trembled.

"See, when a god is born, they have abilities over mortals of course. But they need to be named, like Ares God of War, Zeus King of the Gods, Hephaestus God of Metal, so on and so forth, but there are a lesser breed, the deities. Every named god has their fair allotment of powers, while the deities have a lesser store. Any god who dies loses powers. Whoever kills one in the name of whatever god they wish, that power swirls into the god named. You know this. You saw what happened when Strife died. Since you didn't do it in your name or even Dahak's the power just went wild and caused that earthquake.

"But the higher gods are extremely difficult to kill. I'd like to see anyone even try that. The lesser ones, the deities, however, all it takes is hind blood and a skilled assassin. There were two Fortunes at one time. The muses were seven."

Joxer sighed and sat down in front of the fire, its embers glowing in his eyes. "When I was born, along with Jett and Jace, an oracle told Ares that I would have the power to become the assassin of gods. He left my brothers behind and took me to Olympus, where he from the moment I was old enough to pick up a weapon trained me in the art of death.

"Jett was devastated that I was chosen and not him, so he always treated me like an annoying kid brother whenever I visited. He wanted to prove himself so much to Dad he became his own assassin, killing mortals, but Ares never even gave him a second glance. Jett was lucky just to get ignored by Ares. Poor Jace . . . Never mind, he wasn't like us, so Ares shunned him.

"Mom didn't like my course, but I still visited her, from the time I was old enough to walk to nowadays. She always sang me my song, until I changed the lyrics. 'Joxer the tidy, always plays insidey, never hurts the other boys . . .' You know she was trying to make me peaceful. Because I always hurt the other boys, so much that pretty soon I was only an outcast, and I only felt at home on Olympus."

"You know, Joxer, you don't have to tell me all this. I know I caught you off-guard with your mom. I'm sorry."

"No . . . I didn't realize how much I held this in. My whole life, I've never had anyone to really talk to. I need to say this. I caused my mom to go insane. I killed so many lessers," Joxer said. His voice threatened to break, but he was very good at keeping himself under control. "There were hundreds of the deities. Dahak wouldn't have dared to try and come out into the world ten years ago. Now . . . the Greek pantheon is weak; it's faltering. There's a thin thread in this world ready to break. One snap . . . and the pantheon will fall. It's coming.

"There was a time when I got so cocky, I thought I could complete my father's plan. See he had saved hind blood for years. Ares always went and gathered it from the herd, long before Zeus destroyed them because he feared their blood. Every god I killed, I sent the power to my father. He has grown in power over the years. About five years ago, I decided to take it all at once. The queen of the gods was more than enough power for Ares to take Zeus' throne.

"I was a fool. You may have vengeance in your heart, but you always gave Xena a chance to stop you. You didn't kill her family, Gabrielle, or poison a whole village to get back at people. Hera always took the extreme vengeance. Hera took my challenge and was so angry. She sent the Furies after my mom. They drove her completely insane.

"I had to bring my mom to the asylum, keeping her from slitting her own wrists. She screamed like a banshee. All because I had to be so arrogant and try and take down Hera without any proof I could. I was lucky that Hera was satisfied with my mom. She stole Hercules' whole family from him. I could have lost Jett and Jace. I could have been cursed."

Callisto saw two tears fall down Joxer's cheeks but decided not to mention them. "Don't do this," she said.

"Do what?"

"Blame yourself when it was Hera. I committed so many crimes and blamed them on Xena, but it was my doing. You shouldn't feel so guilty."

"But I do . . . it's what made me a pacifist. Even now I hate myself for giving in to war again, for fighting when before it took my mom. She wanted so badly for me to be gentle. Only Jace has succeeded at that. Still, I fight. I became that masked warrior, and I still fight."

"For good. Your mother would tell you that's the only way to exist. I know it's funny coming from me. But I finally saw when Gabrielle sacrificed herself that to live selfishly is a way of killing your own soul, bit by bit. You fight not because you want to, but because others need you to. You are not being selfish." She paused and smothered the fire. Lunch was over. "Is there any chance of saving her? Of reversing the Furies' spell?"

"Only when they're dead, and they are gods. When I jumped ship, Ares destroyed the last of the hind blood, probably because he was afraid I might use it on him. I only had enough to kill Apollo with. It's all gone now."

"Why would you use it on Ares?"

"He told me to take down Hera in the first place . . . He knew I wouldn't succeed. He wanted to teach me a lesson about arrogance. He set the whole thing up, so I would lose my mom."

"Maybe there's a better way than through violence . . ." Callisto mused and then glanced at the sky, which slowly colored into pink and red through the leaves. "I think the sun will set in about an hour," she said and drew her sword, starting to sharpen it. "If you want you can get some rest."

Joxer nodded and curled up into a corner of the tree, looking up into the leaves. "I messed up my whole life. People think I'm an idiot. Gods think I am a menace. And I destroyed the only woman who ever believed in me."

"Go to sleep, Joxer." Callisto suddenly got a gleam to her eyes. "It'll all be better in the morning."

Of course by the time night fell, when Joxer awoke, the sounds of the villagers were long gone . . . and there was no sign of Callisto.