SEX/SUBTEXT/VIOLENCE: Nope.
RATING: PG
TIMELINE: After Season 5's Motherhood.
FEEDBACK: Is water wet?
Thanks to everyone who encouraged me to write!!!
Believe Me, If All Those Endearing Young Charms
Believe me, if all those endearing young charms,Which I gaze on so fondly today,
Were to change by tomorrow, and fleet in my arms,
Like fairy-gifts fading away,
Thou wouldst still be adored, as this moment thou art,
Let thy loveliness fade as it will,
And around the dear ruin each twist of my heart
Would entwine itself verdantly still.
It is not while beauty and youth are thine own,
And thy cheeks unprofaned by a tear
That the fervor and faith of a soul can be known,
To which time will but make thee more dear;
No, the heart that has truly loved never forgets,
But as truly loves on to the close,
As the sunflower turns on her god, when he sets,
The same look which she turned when he rose.
- Thomas Moore
Strange, that the heartless murderer of innocents known as the Destroyer of Nations should value such a noble attribute like loyalty.
But I did.
I never did quite figure out what it was in me, but somehow, despite the atrocities I'd committed and the fear I doubtless struck in their hearts, men flocked to me like lost sheep. Perhaps they thought that joining my army would give them direction, reason. Maybe they just needed someone to lead and control them. Or it might have just been that they loved me. Whatever the reason...they came, ready to give me their lives if I asked them for it.
And many of them did. Many times, I surrendered the lives of the men who served me, simply because I felt that ultimately, my goal would be worth much more than their lives. Some of them didn't know my true intentions when I seduced them, of course...but many did. And yet they did my bidding anyway. And as they died, I know that I was the last thought in their minds, my name the last on their dying lips.
I was their Princess, who gave them life in battle, and who likewise led them to their oblivion.
Their sacrifices never went unnoticed by me. They were the truly brave, those men who so honorably gave their lives for their great leader. And for that, I loved them, as truly as a rampaging demon with a black heart could love.
Those days are behind me now. The path of repentance does not allow for the heart's exploitation.
And yet, even now, there are those who remain loyal to me, love me even.
Do they know that I have bathed in blood and hatred, that I once plotted to destroy all things pure? Do they know that any second now, I could embrace the monster I once was as if I had never left that path?
I think they do. And still, their loyalty holds fast.
For the life of me, I still can't figure it out.
Their association with me has brought them more pain and loss than they could have ever imagined. Because of me, they've been threatened with death, been persecuted, shunned and loathed. And one, the one - she's died so many times that I've lost count. And it's my fault.
Have they deserted me because of this? Yeah, you'd think they would, wouldn't you? But no...somehow, they have loved me through it all, despite it all. And I love them for loving me.
Now, you...I don't understand you.
I turned my back on you, shunned you, rejected you more times than I can remember. Logically, you should hate me. At least, I expected you to hate me.
So when, on the marbled floors of Olympus, you saved my daughter and my best friend, and when you gave up your immortality all because of our thing...frankly I was flummoxed.
But in the back of my mind, I was expecting it. After all, I had to learn the value of loyalty - and I learned from the best. And though for years we have looked at each other over an increasingly widening gulf, a part of me has always known: my soldiers and friends weren't the only ones devoted to me.
Would people laugh if they were told just where the war god's loyalties truly lay? Ahh, sorry to say, that is the least of your problems.
Proud though you still are, you are a broken being now. You were not meant for the sensitivity and harsh colors of mortal life. You belong in divinity, in the soft, dull glow of godhood, not in the furious, passionate pace of humanity.
And I will personally see that you get there, back where you belong.
Why would I help you? Why indeed....
I have always appreciated loyalty. I have received it from you - and now, for the second time, I offer it to you.
FIN