2) Palace of The Gods

Artemis arrives in a strange place surrounded by strange people

2) Palace of The Gods

”So, yeah. This is where my story starts.” Those clouds in the distance, look quite threatening, I don’t know why, just something about them, gives me the shivers.

Once the ringing in my ears stops. I open my eyes. I expect to see something horrific. Blood splattering the walls, organs everywhere. The kind of thing you’d expect to see after an explosion.

Instead, I am more than the pleasantly surprised to find myself stood in a room. Hell, a cathedral. The room is massive.

“That doesn’t get it across.” I think for a moment. Desk-Head stares patiently at me. “Imagine two modern day cruise ships; put them into a plus sign. Then connect the ends of each ship, forming a square. That’s the room.” Desk-Head nods as if they can possibly understand how big this room was. But I’m not done. “Now, inside that square room put eight chairs in a horseshoe shape. Then scale those up, by, uh, I don’t know… one thousand. Forty times bigger than the biggest human. Then fill seven of those eight chairs, with giant men and women. Four women, three men. Each one… glowing.”

I stare at these seven people. And by God, they stare back. I would bet any money, they look more perplexed than I do. They stare at me in utter bewilderment. Eyes full of curiosity, maybe even anger �" or is it fear? Whatever they stare at me in. I stare back. Now, entering a stare contest with giant, presumably supernatural beings, is not high my bucket list.

It takes a couple of minutes, but finally, one of the women speaks. She sits on the first throne from the centre. Her throne comprised of human bodies. She herself has fiery purple hair. Literally. Her hair is on fire. And is purple. A bright, vibrant, purple.
“And you are?” She asks with a soft voice.
“Artemis.”
“And, what are you?”
“Human?” I ask, confused on why this is a question.
“Why are you here, Artemis?”
This question stumps me. Where the f**k am I? God only knows. 
“Well? Why are you here?” A man shouts. He sits in the foremost throne, a throne of effervescent white. His voice, isn’t unpleasant, but isn’t exactly pleasant. It sits halfway between sexy, and dickhead.
“I…. I… I don’t know.” I say blankly.
“What do you mean you don’t know?” He snarls.
“I think they mean, they don’t know.” Says another man sat on a transparent crystal throne. At a closer look, I notice little planets floating inside his chair.
“Well, if they’re here. There has to be a reason.” The first woman says. “And whatever reason that might be, we have to obey.”
“Why? Who’s going to stop us?” Sexy/Dickhead says,
“We are not getting into this argument again. You know who.”
“Fine.” Crystal man says. The room falls silent. Crystal man speaks again after a minute of uncomfortable silence, “What are we doing?”
“Gifts, and then send them on their way?”
“Why not. If it gets them out.” Sexy/Dickhead voice says grumbles. He stands, he approaches me, and with every step he takes, he shrinks, until eventually, he is my height. “Artemis, chosen of the Humans, I bear you my gift.” He taps a finger onto my forehead, “See clearly now, see what is hidden.” Then he walks back to his throne, growing with each step. The next person to approach me is the woman with purple hair. She steps up to me, smiles sweetly. She puts her hands together, and then pulls them apart. A knife appears, floating in-between her hands,
“Kill in my name.” She says handing the blade to me. Shyly, I take the blade. It feels perfect in my hand �" as if it’s meant to be there. Then comes the man from the throne of planets. As he walks, a ball of water forms in his hand.
“The first water in all of creation. Use it wisely.” He hands me the water.

A woman with brown hair approaches, she hands me a bag, “The best hiding spot is in plain sight.”

Another woman, this one with green hair hands me a small marble, “Three souls for one. Just add water.”

A man with pink hair hands me a gold coin, inscribe on it is a beetle, “When you’ve got nowhere to turn, and no one to go to, get a bus.”

Finally, a woman with blue hair approaches me. She stands before me, like all the people before her. “Good luck Artemis, I think you’re going to need it. My gift to you is my blessing.” She places a hand on my cheek. “Good luck Artemis Kaliaski.”  Then the foremost man clicks his fingers. The last thing I hear is the words
“What even is a Human?”

“So, like, yeah.” I look down at the floor, “What happened next?” I mumble to myself,
“What was that Artemis?”
“Nothing, nothing.” The clouds outside seem to be doing gymnastics, that or I’m losing it. Or have lost it. Whichever it is, my story isn’t over yet. It hasn’t even begun. I look outside, ignoring the cartwheeling clouds, outside to the road. To the houses lining the road, to the cars going past, to the carpark, to the people walking down the pavement. To the world that I once knew.

The next thing I know, I’m stood in a courtyard. I think, or is it a graveyard? I’m really not sure. There don’t seem to be any graves, but something about this place gives off a feeling of ‘Hey look! We’re all dead’, despite this feeling, the courtyard is quite nice. A gleaming tree �" and by that I mean, it literally gleaming, shining like surfaces in those Cillit bang ads �" stands in the centre of the courtyard, its pink petals shiver in the wind, its crystal bark stares at me. Hell, the entire tree stares at me, including something hiding in the branches. Before I can see whatever it is hiding from me, a voice shouts from behind me.
“Hello?” A soft voice, a nice motherly voice. I turn to face said voice, and I almost lose it. The woman standing in front of me is an exact replica of my mother. Right down to the very dress she wears. It was my mother’s favourite summer dress.
“Mum?” I whisper.
“No?” The woman asks confused. Then she nods, “Right. Right. Step away from the tree please.” She orders. I step away from the tree �" as if she’s controlling me. “Any better?” She says as her form swirls, like mist caught in a hurricane.
“Yes.” I say as she settles into a figure with glowing red hair, and a simple plain white dress.
“Right. I’m Janus. Um, and you are?”
“Artemis.”
“Right, if you’d come with me. Much appreciated.” And with that she starts walking away, and without my say so, my body starts following her.

We step out of the courtyard; I take a cautionary glance behind me. The tree remains in the centre of a grass circle. Whatever is in the branches is still watching me. We step into a covered walkway.
“Inspired by the Greeks.” Janus says, “Or where they inspired by us?” she muses, “Oh well, this isn’t a tour.”

The walkway leads us to a flight of stairs, which leads us to a marble landing. Janus walks over to another staircase, this one leading downwards. Instead of going down, she stops, and simply stands there overlooking the courtyard.
“Welcome to The Palace of The Gods.” She says plainly. The stairs in front of us lead back down to the courtyard. Three sets of stairs lead up to us. One from the centre of the courtyard, one from the left side, and one from the right. Only the side two are covered. Janus turns and heads towards a door, “Come on.” She says. And for the first time, I notice the giant castle stood behind her.

The door, being roughly big enough to fit an elephant, leads us into a grand hallway. “Vikings.” Janus says pointing to the pillars holding up a ceiling. She points at the floor, “Aztec’s based their calendar off that.”

She leads me through the hallway, until we reach a grand ‘lounge’, a giant rectangular fire lays in the middle, its flames leaping towards the roof �" good thing you could fit a couple stacked elephants in here, otherwise this place would’ve burned down ages ago. A giant man sits draped in a brown cloak, on a throne, overlooking the ever-burning hearth. A club leans against the throne.
“Janus. What is this?” He asks crudely.
“This, Dagda, is Artemis. And I believe they seek guidance.”
“Well, bring them here, let me see them.”  He says beaconing me with his hand. I stand in front of him. “And who are you?”
“Artemis.”
“And Artemis, what is it you seek?”
“I don’t know.”
“What are you?”
“Human.”
“You sure?”
“Yes.”
“Well, Artemis of the Humans, it is my honour to welcome you to The Palace of The Gods. Don’t break anything.”            

“Artemis, you’ve been through a lot. It is completely reasonable for you to come up with such a story to deal with what’s happened.” Desk-Head says; I know they mean good, but Goddamn, even God would hate this person. I don’t even need to say anything, I look at them, and they catch my drift �" shut the f**k up and let me tell the story.

Dagda smiles, as if he’d just saved my life. “If they seek guidance, The Seer would be a better place to go.”
“I know.” Scolds Janus. “Was just making sure twas all okay.” She turns to me, “It’s getting late, lemme show you to a room.” She starts towards another door, “Wait!” She shouts stopping, she turns to me, “Do Humans eat?”
“Yeah…”
“Are you hungry?” She asks. I don’t even need to answer �" I do answer, but not with my mouth. My stomach grumbles. “Take that as a yes.”

Janus leads Dagda and me into a dining room. It’s not a simple room. Etched into the wood panelling of the walls are intricate pictures, depicting stories. High above my head hang thick wooden beams, supporting the roof and the walls. In each corner of the room is a pillar, they also covered in intricate pictures and patterns. In the centre of the room is another pillar. This pillar is split in two �" the first half reaching about a metre, then a fireplace, then the rest of the pillar. Around the centre pillar is a circular table.

Janus plucks a bell from a shelf and rings it. “To tell the others.” She says to me. Then she gestures for me to sit down. Which I do.

Within minutes of the bell being rung, four others appear. A man with bright blond hair and blue eyes. And three women. One with red hair. One with Brown hair. The last with blonde hair.

We all sit around the table, Janus included. They chat away like family. Until finally Dagda taps his glass and stands.
“Today we are joined by Artemis of the Humans. We honour them as the first ever human to find Hy-Brasil.”

One by one, the other people in the room greet me �" the man tells me his name is Lugh. The woman with red hair is Macha, and her two sisters, Nemain �" the one with brown hair, and Badb �" the one with blonde hair.

The atmosphere as we eat is that of, happiness and pure content. Why they’re all so happy eludes me. But it is contagious. And soon I find myself laughing with them. 

One thing I’ve noticed since I started telling this story is that The Shadow People shift uncomfortably. Not a shifting of weight from one foot to another. But they shimmer, sometimes they disappear altogether before remerging somewhere else. I stare out the window. A bus passes by. I recognise it, why wouldn’t I?

I lay in the bed staring at the ceiling above me. The bed is eh. Not comfortable nor is it rock hard, somewhere in-between.
“That’s strange.” I say to the empty room. Carved into the ceiling are the initials R.G.G. I’m not entirely sure what’s weirder, the fact that Dagda said I was the first human here but yet there are human letters here, or the fact that these initials might not be human. Either way, I’m inexplicably drawn to the letters. “R. G. G” I say aloud. I sigh and roll over onto my side. I see a screw lay on the floor; and idea sparks in my mind.