The silence in the cave was a heavy shroud, broken only by the gentle crackling of the fire and the steady breathing of Seneca and Agatha, who had succumbed to exhaustion in their improvised hammocks.
Hermes, however, remained awake. Lying down, he felt each of his wounds like a map of his new, miserable existence. The pain in his broken rib was a sharp stab with every deep breath, his scalp burned with the memory of Geryon's violence, and his back was a web of stinging scars that reminded him of his helplessness.
He closed his eyes, but sleep did not come. Instead, his mind, against his will, drifted to Olympus. He saw his father's enraged face, the purple gleam in Hera's eyes as she cursed him, and Apollo's stricken gaze—a wound deeper than any physical cut.
The attempt to delve into those memories brought the familiar pain, an agony emanating from the mark on his chest, forcing him to retreat from his own past. He was a prisoner not only of that mine but of his own body and memories.
The sound of a crude horn echoed through the tunnels—the harsh summons for another day of toil. Seneca moved first, rising with the economy of motion of someone who had repeated the act for twenty years. Agatha groaned, curling in her hammock before forcing herself to sit, her young eyes already carrying the weight of a lifetime of suffering.
"Drink." Seneca's voice was calm as always. He extended a leather flask to Hermes. "You'll need your strength."
Hermes accepted, the warm, earthy-tasting water running down his throat. Standing was an ordeal—every muscle protested, and the pain in his rib made him gasp. Leaning against the cave's cold wall, he followed the other two out, toward the mouth of the tunnel that was now his home.
The sight that greeted him was the same as yesterday: a deep, circular pit, its walls riddled with carved tunnels connected by rickety ramps of wood and earth. Dozens of skeletal figures, dressed in the same rags as he, already moved slowly, their silhouettes outlined against the faint light filtering from the mine's top. The air was heavy, thick with stone dust, sweat, and despair.
A guard tossed a pickaxe at his feet, the metal clinking dully against stone. "To work, worm." The words were spat with disdain.
Hermes stared at the tool. In his divine hands, he had once wielded the Caduceus—a symbol of power and authority, but also of his downfall. Now, his wounded, calloused hands would have to wield this. Seneca placed a firm hand on his shoulder.
"Don't think. Just do," he advised quietly. "Find a rhythm. Let your body work while your mind rests. It's the only way to survive here."
And so Hermes began. The first swing of the pickaxe against rock sent a painful vibration through his arms and back into his broken rib. He grunted, but struck again. And again. The work was brutal, meaningless. He, the god of speed, was now chained to one spot, chipping stone for hours on end.
Days blurred into an indistinct haze of pain and exhaustion. Weeks turned into months. Hermes' body, once a divine sculpture, changed. The muscle shaped by nectar and ambrosia gave way to a wiry, resilient strength born of endless labor.
His once-immaculate hands became a map of calluses and scars. His white hair, the last visible sign of his former glory, had grown back but was almost always tangled and caked with mine dust.
His eyes, which once shone with Olympus' golden light, had dulled, though at times a flash of his old fury still lit them when a guard was particularly cruel.
He learned the unspoken rules of that hell. Learned to recognize the sound of the most sadistic guards' footsteps. But there was one sound that turned his blood to ice: the heavy, arrogant drag of Geryon's boots.
The ogre's presence was a torture in itself. The sour stench of his sweat and the wine-stained reek of his breath reached the tunnels before he did, and each time Hermes caught it, his body tensed involuntarily. His hand clenched the pickaxe handle so tightly his knuckles went white, and the memory of that night in the cell—of the pain, the humiliation—returned with nauseating clarity. He did not feel fear. He felt a hatred so deep, a revulsion so visceral, it threatened to choke him.
Avoiding Geryon became his primary goal—a deadly survival game he did not play alone. Seneca and Agatha, without a single word exchanged on the matter, became his eyes and ears.
Seneca, his senses sharpened by decades in that abyss, could sense danger approaching. A subtle tapping pattern of his pickaxe against stone—tuc… tuc-tuc—was the signal. At its sound, Hermes understood. He would move to the back of a side tunnel or blend into another work group, disappearing into the shadows moments before Geryon appeared, whip in hand, looking for a target for his cruelty.
Agatha, for her part, used her mobility. Being one of the youngest, she was often sent to carry water or tools. If she saw Geryon approaching their sector, she would run past, giving a subtle gesture—scratching her nose, adjusting her hair a certain way—as a warning. It was a silent system, an alliance forged in shared pain and the mutual understanding that in that hell, survival depended on one another.
Seneca was his silent guide, teaching through gestures and sparse words. Agatha, with her quiet presence, was a constant reminder of the human fragility he had once despised but now shared. The winged-sandal tattoo on her shoulder was a bitter irony he saw every day—a faint echo of a faith he himself had forgotten, and a reminder of those who had cast him down.
.....
It was on a particularly stifling afternoon, during the meager meal at the bottom of the pit, that he noticed them for the first time. The commotion began with a shout of anger, followed by a defiant laugh.
Hermes lifted his gaze from his piece of stale bread and saw a skinny boy, maybe sixteen, with an energy that didn't belong in that place. The boy had dark, unruly hair and a mischievous grin on his face, even as an older, larger slave held him by the collar of his rags.
"Give it back, you rat!" the man growled.
"I don't know what you're talking about!" the boy shot back, his voice loud and full of a life the mine should have crushed long ago.
Beside them, a second boy intervened. He was the opposite of the first—pale, thin to the point of fragility, and wracked by a dry cough that shook his whole body. Despite his sickly appearance, his eyes were calm, and he moved with a gentleness that felt sacred in that profane place.
"Please, let him go." The sick boy's voice was soft but firm. "It was just a joke. Here." He pulled a piece of bread from his own pocket, offering it to the furious man. "Agouri didn't mean any harm."
The man looked at the bread, then at the sick boy—Theseus—and at the one he called Agouri. With a grunt, he shoved Agouri to the ground and snatched the bread from Theseus' hand, walking away to devour it.
Agouri stood, dusting off his clothes. "You didn't have to do that, Theseus! I could've gotten away from him!"
"And then you'd have gotten beaten by the guards afterward," Theseus replied, a hand going to his chest as another coughing fit shook him. "Eat your food. We need to keep our strength."
Hermes watched the exchange in silence. Agouri's recklessness irritated him—it was a mirror of his own long-forgotten arrogance. And Theseus' loyalty, his protective calm despite being the weaker one… it was a knife to his chest. It was Apollo—the same gentleness, the same devotion.
He quickly shoved the thought away, feeling the familiar pain of the mark on his chest, as if warning him not to dig into memories that could destroy him.
In the weeks that followed, the trio of Hermes, Seneca, and Agatha began to cross paths with the pair of Theseus and Agouri. Agouri was always in the middle of some trouble—trying to trick a guard, organizing rat races for bets of bread crumbs, or telling jokes too loudly. And Theseus was always there to mitigate the damage, his calming presence the only thing keeping his foster brother alive.
One night, the mine's tension was higher than usual. Geryon, the ogre who had bought Hermes, was making one of his rare visits, and his presence always meant more violence. The guards were on edge, doling out lashes for any infraction, real or imagined.
Agouri, in his endless ability to choose the worst possible time for mischief, decided that one of the crueler guards looked like a boar and began grunting behind the man's back. The muffled laughter of a few nearby slaves was enough for the guard to turn.
His eyes locked on Agouri. "You." The word cracked like a whip.
Theseus stepped forward, pale. "Sir, he didn't—"
"Shut up, you walking skeleton!" The guard shoved Theseus so hard he fell, his head hitting the rock wall with a dull thud.
Agouri stopped smiling. A low growl rumbled from his throat.
The guard smiled—a nasty, ugly thing. "Ah, the little dog bares its teeth? I'll teach you a lesson." He uncoiled the whip from his waist.
Hermes watched from a distance. His instinct, honed by months of survival, screamed at him not to get involved. Drawing attention was suicide. He was no longer a god, no longer a hero. He was just dust and ashes—a ghost in a mine.
But then he saw the look on Agouri's face. It was no longer mischief—it was pure hatred, the kind that drives a man to his death. And he saw Theseus on the ground, struggling to rise, a trickle of blood running from his temple. That image—a brother trying to protect another, and failing—broke something inside him.
The guilt he had tried to bury under months of dust and exhaustion exploded in his chest, more painful than any lash.
Before he could think, his body moved. Just as the guard's arm rose for the first strike, Hermes kicked a small pile of gravel with the tip of his worn boot. The stones scattered under the guard's feet.
Caught mid-motion, the man lost his balance. His foot slipped, and he stumbled forward, the whip cracking harmlessly in the air.
Hermes was already moving away, pretending to busy himself with a loose wooden beam, his face a mask of indifference.
The guard stood, furious and confused, scanning the crowd for the culprit. But all he saw were slaves with their eyes down, pretending they'd seen nothing. The humiliation of nearly falling in front of everyone was enough. With one last murderous glare at Agouri, he walked away, snapping the whip in the air like an empty threat.
Silence returned, heavier than before.
Later, as they made their way back to their tunnels for sleep, a voice called out.
"Hey. Whitey."
Hermes stopped, but didn't turn. Agouri came closer, Theseus just behind him, limping slightly.
"That… with the gravel. That was you, wasn't it?" Agouri asked, his voice lower than usual.
Hermes stayed silent. Admitting it would be dangerous.
It was Theseus who spoke, his voice soft but clear. "Thank you." That was all. His calm eyes met Hermes'. In them, there was no naïve admiration like Agouri's, but a deep understanding—a recognition of the risk Hermes had taken.
Hermes finally turned to face them. He looked at Agouri's defiant, vibrant face, and at Theseus' fragile but resolute figure. He didn't want this. Didn't want to connect to anyone. Bonds were weaknesses, and he could no longer afford weaknesses.
But as he looked at them, he saw more than just two slaves. He saw a spark of defiance in a world of submission, a fierce loyalty in a place of betrayal. It was stupid. It was dangerous. And, for some reason he couldn't explain, it was the first thing that had made sense since he'd fallen from the sky.
He gave a short, almost imperceptible nod, then turned, walking toward his cave, where Seneca and Agatha awaited him. An invisible thread had been woven, tying his fate to the two boys. Hermes felt a familiar weight in his chest—but this time, it wasn't the pain of his divine mark. It was the weight of a choice.