The Epos Renzo

4

THREE

SON OF KHIONE, THE CHILD WAS CURSED

Khione, who was a goddess from a distant world unknown to the mortals of Lorenzo's own, had foolishly mothered the child, and upon the realization that she had wed a poor mortal man for his beauty, she fled the city in turn for the summer to sweep her away from that place. The man to which the demigod baby was left spent every dollar he had saved on the infant, but was, in the end, unable to keep the child in his care. Come the end of fall, the child was left abandoned in the alleyway of the home that bore him. Lorenzo knew nothing of the child's path, and so was overwhelmed with confusion as the great, cold form of Khione appeared before him. She caused him to tremble with fear, for the ground she touched spread with intricate ice formed patterns. Khione had not come to take the child back, but as the winter approached, she had returned to the city to destroy the last remnants of her accident. She strided towards Lorenzo, who was clutching the baby close to his chest, and held out her hand to the child, her hand which was so cold, it could stop the child's heart. A strange and mysterious boy suddenly broke free from the crowds of people moving around them and shattered the stillness caused by Khione's elegance. The boy ran into Khione with all his might, more might than seemed possible of such a small boy, and caused her, to Lorenzo's surprise, to lose her balance. Khione's hand was jerked away from the child, and a coat of silver had obscured the air. The mysterious boy  ushered Lorenzo with a finger pointed north to flee the place, and so he did. He briskly moved through the crowds of people on the busiest of streets as to avoid Khione's wrath. When he had begun to believe he and the infant were safe, it began to snow. The storm had come. Khione set upon the city of Philidelphia a vast and treacherous storm, for if she herself could not kill the child, she would make sure that it died in a ditch, cold and helpless.
With a long distance between them and the shelter Lorenzo searched for, he was sure that he and the child were doomed. The snow grew thicker each passing minute and colder yet did they become. When Lorenzo could not see within a foot of his face, he tucked the baby into his shirt, and trudged onward. It began to grow dark, and the temperature dropped even more so. Lorenzo could not feel his hands, nor the child. His heart had near stopped, and with a final stressful burst of energy and effort he fell into an alleyway, the snow forming a coffin around him. He peered down at the child tucked into his shirt, and was surprised to find it predominantly unaffected by the cold. With this thought he drifted into sleep, and let the cold engulf him.