Of Gods and Mortals

Chapter 6.

It took you a moment to make sure Lars had stopped choking on his caesar salad before you really processed that someone was now sitting beside him.

Well, more like the fact that someone appeared beside him. Y'know, out of thin air? 

It wasn't a sudden appearance like the magicians create; there was no puff of smoke followed by a shout of "Ta-Da!"

It was instantaneous, like the man faded into the booth across from you  in the way that a candle blows out--with a quick and almost diagonal roll out of (in this case, into) existence.

Your bite of pizza dropped from your lips and hit the paper plate on the table in front of you. Lars was coughing up a caesar salad-filled lung. It sounded like a mix of a crying billygoat and a nasty case of infantile whooping cough.

"Oh, please do make sure your satyr doesn't die so quickly. I need him as well, unfortunately," the man said with a light, airy, and slightly concerned intonation. He knit his eyebrows in a gentle, kind of spacey-feeling concern.

You took a moment to assess the man as he awkwardly patted your satyr's back, hoping to expel the lettuce from his respiratory system.

His face was thin and angular and completely symmetrical, like someone had carefully measured every side and angle with a protractor before cutting him out of marble. His skin was olive toned, the only contrast being his sculpted, rosy cheeks. Atop his chestnut-colored, short, wave-styled hair sat a purple fedora with a black stripe over the belly. He wore a similarly colored pinstripe silk suit with a white dress shirt and tie underneath. His tie was ebony, decorated with an array of gorgeously embroidered and vividly colored scenes of death that seemed to move like a film.

Oh, wait, they were moving. Tiny little nondescript gladiators were being murdered across the expanse of his silk necktie, showing live decapitations and several instances of gutting-by-sword.

Your drink froze into solid ice in the pit of your stomach when you reached his eyes. Somehow, their light pink color disturbed you more than the gruesome murders decorating his attire. They were full of this constant, unnerving insincerity, like he never meant anything that he said.

"I'm terribly sorry to interrupt your lunch," he stated, but the subtle glee in his tone and the reptilian gleam in his eyes told you he wasn't in the least apologetic. "But I've been anxious to meet you, Miss (Y/N)."

That only made the block of ice in your stomach drop lower. Bits of dread-frozen pizza threatened to come jettisoning up your gullet.

"Uh, sorry if I sound rude," you began, "but have we met?"

"No, I do believe this is our first encounter. It's a pity that my first impression lead to your satyr almost suffocating on a vegetable," he sighed in that mock tone of resignation. The tone was thinly layered over a narrow smile.

You quickly shifted your eyes over to Lars, seeing his immediate discomfort. His eyebrows were knit together and his back was pressed flat against the wall the booth was connected to. He looked like a frightened-satyr wall decal.

"Oh, how rude of me," the slippery tone dragged your attention back to the dapper man sitting beside your best friend. "I haven't introduced myself. My name is Zelus. My friends call me Z. So please, call me Zelus." 

"Zelus," you repeated slowly, rubbing your neck uncomfortably as if your were sympathizing with one of the warriors being decapitated on his attire. Lars looked to you, then to Zelus. He gulped, his Adam's apple bobbing up and down.

"You're the god of rivalry," he said in a shaky bleat. "Rivalry, zeal, and jealousy."

"Precisely," he smiled an alligator smile and sat up straight, crossing his arms over his chest. His arms were now acting as censor bars for the violent scenes depicted on his tie. You could almost see him hosting his own show, probably something violent like American Gladiator or a twisted, live-action Tom and Jerry.