Hello everyone! I wanted to quickly say thank you to anyone who's read my story. It's meant so much to me, especially the reviews people have left me.

I've been working on this story for going on 7 years now, and I decided that I wanted to come back to it and revise it. I've mostly made grammatical, structural, and spelling corrections. (However, it's still far from perfect!) There is also some new material I've added and some plot points that I've strengthened/clarified.

One last note, I just want to say that this story is dedicated to my oldest sister. Without her, I never would have actually finished writing it.

I hope you enjoy the new edition of the story!

Thanks,

-Katrin11

Prologue

"Hades, no!"

The cry ripped the air, through the sounds of battle, through the moans and retching, through the sickening thud of metal slicing through skin.

The young god's hands tightened their hold around the neck of his father, as if he hadn't heard the plea of his sister. But he didn't deal the final blow.

Yet.

Power, invisible to the naked eye but still tangible to all around, swelled within Hades. The power sought an outlet. It was only held back by his will, and only then by a hair.

"Hades, think of what you are doing." She was beside him now, and her voice was soft. So soft that only his ears could hear it. Her hands were over his. Warning cries rose across the field.

"Hestia, don't be a fool!" Screamed Aphrodite. Despite the cyclops's enormous hand around her own throat, the frenzied goddess recognized that Hestia was in greater danger than them all. Small and timid Hestia now threw herself into a danger than no other god dared to face.

Hestia ignored them all and focused only on her brother. Hades's breath was heavy and strained, and his eyes were wild. She remembered a different time. It seemed an age ago now. She remembered a different time when those deep blue eyes had looked innocently onto the world for the first time. She remembered the hope and joy and excitement they had once held, as well as the long sorrow. All were gone now. Suffocated slowly by the long, exhausting pain of what seemed to be an eternal war.

"Hades."

"I must do it, Hestia. I must." The choked words were no more than a whisper but had the energy of a thousand cries.

"No, not here. We must preserve justice, even if we never feel it ourselves. He will face justice, and then you might be called upon. Wait till then."

She could feel the force of the god-power he had called upon, could feel it pushing against all resistance, ready to burst. Even his considerable determination would not hold it back for long.

His hands tightened again. He longed to give in. To release.

"You will regret this moment until the earth burns." Hestia's voice was suddenly clear and ringing. The prophecy had the desired effect that none of her pleadings had.

With a strangled cry, Hades ripped his hands from Kronos's throat and grabbed a fleeing titan. The titan's dying shriek filled the air as its flesh was torn from its body by the mighty surge of power that emanated from Hades. Its very bones were crushed into powder.

The titan was completely and immutably dead, body and soul.

The silence of fear fell on the battlefield. Hades stood before all the astonished gods, covered in ichor - both his own and the demolished titan's - and gasping for breath. He didn't see their horror. He saw only the fear of the remaining titans as they either surrendered or tried to run. The end of the seemingly eternal war had come.

Hades laughed in triumph, savoring the sudden release, the freedom that came from victory over tyranny. He turned to the other gods now, expecting grins to meet his own. He saw only disgust. Shock. Terror.

The smile slowly fell from Hades's face. He looked towards Hestia, his oldest and most dear sister. It was she who he had come to know best in their long years of isolation. She knew more solitude than he, since she had been alone for many long years before he was born. And then it had only been the two of them, together for ages before any others had come. It was she who knew and loved him best, and now she too looked at him with fear.

It was that fear that made all the gods eventually turn against him.