The Scared God [ManXManXMan]

Chapter Thirty-five: Конец игры - Konets igry

~Chapter Thirty-five: Конец игры - Konets igry~

"Well, isn't this a surprise?"

My eyes snap from the dark sky to the tall figure standing on the path between the house I am in the yard of and its neighbor. It is too dark to make out his appearance, but I recognize his voice, as he is one of the Greek gods I have had the most contact with in the past. He is actually not a bad god...once one gets around the fact that he likes to beat his opponents into submission.

Why did it fucking have to be Ares?

When I do not reply, Ares takes a few steps closer, and my gaze catches on the tall spear in his hand and the sheathed sword at his hip. I have a dagger at my hip for emergencies, but it is hardly going to do me any good against a long range weapon like his spear or even his sword. At best, it will make dodging easier; at worst, I will be outmatched and end up on the ground with a sword pressed against my throat.

My hand must have moved unconsciously towards my knife at some point while I was consumed by my thoughts, as Ares tenses up and widens his stance, one hand going to his sword while the other raises the spear threateningly. "Don't make this harder than it has to be, Veles," he warns. "You weren't raised in battle; this isn't a fight you can win."

He's not wrong about that.

"I won't go to Zeus," I reply, my voice steady, despite the rolling anxiety in my stomach.

It's a good fucking thing that I don't need to win; I just need to last a little over three minutes.

My magic flutters a little in warning, as the oath I swore was about fleeing at the first sign of danger. However, if the oath was still in effect, my magic would already be trying to enforce it by making me leave before vanishing if I was to refuse, which means that, as expected, since I already finished setting up the ward and am just waiting for it to work, the magic behind the oath does not count this as 'before setting up the ward while there.'

However, that is not to say that I am not taking the oath I made seriously; I do genuinely want to make it out of this alive, if for nothing more than to gain Perun's and Hors' trust for future events like this. I want them to be able to feel like they can trust me. That is not to say I will always follow what they tell me to do, as I am a trickster and am prone to doing my own thing, but I want them to trust me to stay alive long enough for our...our whatever relationship to work out properly.

I really wish I knew where we stood with this whole relationship thing.

However, despite my desire to remain safe, if I teleport now, Ares will almost certainly try to follow me – along with whoever else Zeus sends upon sensing my magic, as I am pretty sure the king god would be here by now if he knew I was in his realm – which means he will not be on the right side of the ward when it forms. If I want this to work, he has to be stuck inside, as Ares is the number three threat in his pantheon after Zeus and his uncle, Poseidon. While all of his family poses an almost equal threat to me, as almost all of them have more war experience than I do, it is the threat he poses to my pantheon that makes him number three. All war gods are dangerous, but the Greeks did not win so many battles because Zeus is a great strategist; Ares is just that good.

"Last chance, Veles," Ares offers, which is more than he has ever offered anyone else. Most people might mistake it for the fondness of a friend, but Ares and I were, while civil, never friends, and I know better; he just hates beating down opponents he knows are helpless against him. Because of that, he will go easy on me at first, likely to show me just how outmatched I am, and that is what I am counting on. If he is going easy on me, I have a better chance of making sure he stays on that side of the soon-to-form ward while I remain on mine.