A/N: Hello everyone! Well this is a new story. A six shot to be exact. Weird thing about this story though. I saw it in a dream (I should get myself checked I know!) so I wrote it because it wouldn't leave my mind. Since it was a dream don't expect any logic lol.
Aside from the dream this story is based (loosely) on a Greek Myth. The myth of the Sun God Apollo and Troy's Oracle Cassandra.
However since the story is basically based on Greek tragedy expect a lot of...tragedy.
Many thanks to my beta Anastasia Dreams!
If you haven't read her stories you should definitely do it! It would be an amazing gift for the new year because she is one of the best writers (klaroline and otherwise) you can meet :)
Summary:
More often than not, a blessing from the Gods is the mortal's curse. Everyone knew the tale of the cursed Oracle the God of the Sun had damned. How disbelief in her blood prophecy condemned Troy to fall. But, no one knew the truth beyond the legend, the true story of love and hatred that spanned the ages.
Klaroline Greek Mythology AU / Dark [Six-Shot]
Warnings:
Dark mature themes. Tragedy.
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Disclaimer:
I own only my imagination.
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Useful information:
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The mentioned Olympian Gods in this story are:
Apollo : Klaus
Zeus: Mikael
Hera: Esther
Poseidon: Elijah
Ares: Kol
Aphrodite: Rebekah
Hades: Finn
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Πρόλογος: Γέννηση.
(Prologue: Birth)
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What if I told you that I can see what your future holds?
Would you trust me? Would you heed my warnings? Would you believe me?
…Of course you wouldn't…
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New York,
Year 2014 AD
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She could hear every single sound and noise from miles away. She could hear the music, cars speeding outside the pub, people talking, walking, laughing. Her acute hearing, however, was not distracting her from indulging in the small pleasures like the one she was succumbing to right now.
Caroline slowly sipped her coffee; enjoying the rich scent that was reaching her nostrils as much as the smooth flavor that was caressing her taste buds. Throughout the centuries she had come to realize that it was the little moments and the simple pleasures in life that made the world seem brighter somehow. She had seen the light and the darkness through the cracks of immortality and her mentality had been warped into something different from the mortal girl she once was.
However, there were parts of her that still longed for life and light. Parts of her, that wanted to cherish the fleeting moments, even simple ones, like having a cup of hot coffee and relaxing amongst mortals.
She hummed and smiled, realizing that one of the greatest human creations was cappuccino. Of course, the one she was drinking now paled in comparison with the real thing she could get in Milan as it was the first day it was invented.
She finished her coffee and decided to walk around the city for a while. New York was one of her favorite destinations in the whole wide world. And, she should know since she had traveled all the way around the globe multiple times and in different periods.
However, this city was magnetic. It was always thrumming with life and it was intoxicating to the senses. She wanted to be surrounded by electrifying atmosphere and intensity. It made her feel alive and after the boredom of her existence through the ages even the Old One craved that feeling.
She wrapped herself inside her warm, black-leather jacket and her chunky woolen scarf and even though she could not feel the cold she liked the sensation of beautiful and fashionable fabrics on her body. The high heels of her stiletto boots clacked against the pavement as she walked, feeling the soft warmth of the weak winter sun on her skin.
It had taken her centuries, upon centuries, to come back to the light of day but once she had, she realized she would never trade her daylight ring for anything else. No matter how much she would try to deny it she missed the sun more than anything else.
The carved gold of the ring that encircled the lapis lazuli stone was shining on her index finger. Over the gold band the words "Εν'ονόματι του Πολέμου [1]" were carved.
"In the name of War" indeed.
The ring was a gift from the God of War himself for her part in the battle of Salamis in 480 BC. She had joined the Athenians and fought for the name of Greece back then in a war that defined Europe's fate and laid the foundations for the future Western civilization; and even though she had hated the Greeks with burning passion for a long time, she never forgot that she had once given birth to sons with Greek blood and in their memory she had aided Themistocles and his heavily outnumbered allies. She also never forgot how it was to have your homeland under siege and what it meant to eventually have the conqueror win the war. In a sense, she fought for Troy even by standing next to the Greeks. However, she had never forgotten she had brutally slaughtered and shed a lot of blood in the name of those memories thus making the God of War proud and her conscious heavy with guilt for her careless disregard of human life.
That was not the first battle or the last war she had participated in. And, in time her understanding of the world changed. No longer did nations or counties or political borders made any difference for her. The world was a vast place with no boundaries for her and her past alliances of blood and birth belonged to the past. To an ancient world that was nothing more than a legend to history's memorandums. The meaning of human conventions changed in time and none of them mattered for her. What she considered important, essential or even simply honorable was not influenced by the logic of mortals. For centuries, she had chosen to not view herself as an immortal but her connections with mortality faded in time. The scope of her perspective had broadened in ways humans could never even begin to comprehend. Wars came and went and each time she saw them differently until all became the same for her. The outcome always remained the same. It was the same acts of a flawed humanity over and over again with different faces and advances but with the same meaning that was negated by the mere fact that humans had no power over life or death and their wars were simply fleeting moments in their borrowed time.
However that particular war against the Persians had given her the ring that decorated her finger for so many centuries. Over the years, she collected more enchanted jewelry that allowed her to walk in the daylight but it was that specific ring she never parted with; pretending to bask in the glory of the God of War. She didn't hold any respect for any of the Olympians however she did prefer to acknowledge every God except one. She was certain that her decision to accept that gift from Kol had been a provocation against the God she would not name –an idea in which she relished in– and at the same time it must have also been a small victory for Him since now she walked under his light again allowing his power to caress her skin once more.
She looked up and admired how the light shined and bounced over the skyscrapers as she gracefully kept walking, ignoring the noise and the pollution surrounding her and choosing to focus on everything beautiful this place had to offer. She recalled another time when those tall buildings were just beginning to get build. A different city back then; a different time all-together.
She got lost in memory but that was not enough for her not to react. A child was running towards her direction, the mother chasing after it in haste, and the boy would have fallen if Caroline hadn't instinctively reached out to him and held him up before he could fall on the ground. Her movement was so precise and masterful that even the boy was surprised.
As she supported the little frail body in her hands her eyes darkened. She gulped and let the boy go as if he had burned her. And then she saw a black raven flying in circles above them before darting away and finally resting over a tree across the road, his yellow eyes targeting the young boy.
"I am so sorry!"
Caroline raised her eyes, only to see the worried mother running towards them. She tried to smile convincingly to the distraught woman but failed to do so.
"He always runs around without looking!" the mother scolded her son.
"It is okay," Caroline reassured the woman and smiled at the boy tenderly.
"What do we say?" the woman chided the little boy.
"I am sorry ma'am," the kid said shyly and Caroline smiled.
"I am really sorry too. He is just really excited for the winter wonderland," the lady said and Caroline nodded.
The woman and the boy were ready to leave but Caroline couldn't help herself.
"It does look as if it is about to rain. Maybe you could skip the wonderland?" she suggested kindly and the woman looked curiously at her at first before her eyes filled with a known animosity that somehow always managed to hurt Caroline.
"The sky looks clear!" the woman scoffed and looked at her with disbelief as if Caroline had said something crazy. Caroline simply nodded and then the mother turned around with her boy and left hurriedly as if Caroline's presence was something despicable.
Caroline shook her head with sorrow.
"Άδικη μοίρα, [2]" she lamented, her whisper vibrating the sadness she felt as images of a dead boy surrounded by many people in the winter wonderland emerged inside her head. She could try to compel the mother after all those centuries she knew better than to interfere with fate.
She then tensed, every nerve ending of her body tingling. Her mind screamed danger and something else. Something familiar. It was not her sixth sense that made his presence known to her before he appeared. It was as if she was always synchronized with him. The air always seemed to be vibrating whenever he was coming closer.
"They never listen do they, love?"
She closed her eyes and held her breath. His close proximity always overwhelmed her. She could feel him even before he made himself known to her by piercing the veil of his invisibility allowing her and only her to see him. She turned around and watched his blue aquiline eyes watching her intently. As always.
Anger flashed through her and his smirk challenged her in ways that she hated. He would never quit. After all these centuries, he would always make it clear that she could never escape him.
"I will always find you, anywhere at any time," the Sun God had once told her and he was right. He could.
She sighed and turned around watching the woman and her son distancing themselves more from her and walking straight towards their unavoidable fate. Even from this distance she could hear their blood pumping inside their veins and she could distinctively hear their heartbeats separating them from all others. She knew that soon one of them would be no longer. One young heart would no longer tune any melody.
"No, they don't," she said, resolution covering her disappointment, and she walked away from him, feeling his eyes boring holes to her back. The black raven spread its wings and flew above them soaring higher in the sky before it vanished into thin air leaving her to become one more faceless face in between the thousands who unaware of their fates walked the streets of New York.
Klaus was right. They never listened. No one ever listened.
And it was his entire fault.
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Ancient Greece.
Year 1310 BC
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Carmine light, one breath before the falling of the night, was illuminating the horizon. The crispness of the evening seeping in his flesh evaporating in steam from the fire that lingered inside.
He stood on the golden balcony facing the endless depths of the mountains and chaos below his feet. Colors unseen to the mortal eye now filled his vision as he let the winds of Olympus cool off his heating skin.
He was burning up, molten lava scorching its way inside his veins driving him insane. The need he felt in his dream for the creature yet unborn was giving life to a rising fever. Memories that hadn't happened yet flashed before his eyes, time losing its essence inside his mind.
A beauty wrapped in chains and sheer fabrics reflected in the sky, burning embers falling all around her. A siren lost in mourning surrendered in the blood of battle. Her scent stronger than the stench of death all around her. Her tears falling over her torn chiton that was bestowed on her in order for her to carry his grace.
Klaus's jaw tightened while a fate that was yet to come to life taunted him with no relent.
Perfect smooth skin, beautiful curves, her whole body a glorious sight in every inch. Passion and lust locked inside a human unborn entity and his need to lose himself inside her heat was growing bigger and bigger as he impatiently awaited her arrival.
"Caroline," he spoke the name with reverence as if the God had found his divine. Sweet ambrosia, a torment wrapped up in syllables made from dulcet poison that took over.
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The white raven glided through the sky. It winged its way along the ether spreading its glorious wings into the wind.
He looked at it with eyes burning with fire and the raven changed its course. It rose higher and higher invoking all magic, bringing along his message of imminent birth and death.
He extended his hand and waited for the creature to glide across the sky into the waning beams of the blinding sunlight until it would find its way back to him.
So it was and the white scavenger of death came to his hand. He stared deep into the bird's gold eyes and visions appeared into his mind. He stood immensely still as flashes of light brought forward visions of blood and darkness.
The city of Troy had fallen.
Spans of massacred bodies and black winged birds picking at the mangled flesh of the fallen warriors expanded into his burning vision. A never-ending battleground with ten lasting years of tears and blood. Human skin besieged with glimmering black feathers sunk into blood.
He could hear the wolves howling and the mothers screaming for mercy. The horse was standing still and inside its belly's depths lingered only death.
Eerie day as the moon has covered the sun followed by the bloodiest of nights as the stars disappeared from the heavens. The Gods would watch the other way, all except him. He was waiting for a prayer that would never come and when it would come it would be too late.
Amongst the chaos and the wailing of the children and the women a beauty like no other he had seen before, ever since the Gaia's birth, had kneeled to the ground. She was pulling at her hair screaming. Blond hair colored by the sun dripped with blood as her fingers furiously pulled them away from her head. Beneath her torn garments she had inflicted wounds upon her body; her hands were bound in chains, her crown fallen on her feet.
Her whole body trembled. He watched her closely his eyes travelling all over her broken body. Desire flared inside his eyes, as they turned golden.
Possessiveness emerged as he took in every detail of that beautiful creature. A muse gifted with the light's grace, a maiden so fair as the sun he protected.
She raised her head and he gasped. An emerald shade called upon his soul. The beauty of a mortal goddess reached to him and brought him to his knees.
Her ripped transparent tunic was pushed against her desirable body as the wind grew stronger. He then saw the emblem of his house.
She belonged to him. She was a priestess dedicated to him. To the God of the Sun.
She was…his.
Her gaze suddenly locked with his as if she could see him inside his premonition and now he knew that he was staring directly at the green eyes of an Oracle. She was transcending time, reaching out to him.
She was looking straight into his soul, seeing him clearly. She felt his presence. He felt her condemnation. The one and only gift that was his to give she had it. Its power surrounding her like a shroud.
He shivered, the God of heat finally feeling the burning desire when her eyes connected with his. He could hear her whispers. He could feel the curse that enveloped. She was a blend of hot feeling. Spikes of hatred and love. The longing and the sorrow. She was all emotion caged inside a human trap.
He could see the fierce grief and the intense defiance but most of all he could see her pain. He could feel it and it enthralled him.
"Why won't you believe me?" the girl cried in agony and he tried to reach for her only for the raven to escape his hold and take her image with it.
It flew far away cawing the echo of her name in its departure.
"Caroline."
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Klaus stood at the edge of the marble balcony staring at Olympus' abyss with a vacant gaze. Bellow his feet, underneath the Olympians' reign, earth lingered just a breath away from Finn's Underworld. His eyes, turning from gold to embers, searched the ends of the world until his vision reached out to Troy and settled there.
The Sun God took a deep breath and brought the golden-rimmed glass to his lips. He let the nectar run down his throat, enjoying the glorious sensation, before he exhaled slowly.
The vision of his priestess was constantly etched upon his mind. Every time he was thinking of her and her lush form a carnal need evaded his senses driving him wild. He could have any mortal he wanted and, yet, he only wanted the one that wouldn't walk the earth for decades to come. No matter how many earthly distractions he would use to distract his mind, he always seemed to wait for her arrival.
Time meant nothing to a God and here he was for the first time in his eternity feeling an impatience he could not understand. His control was waning and it took all of his self-discipline to show restraint and not visit the fates asking them to clear his visions and present him the future undiluted from the haze the prophecies carried within.
However, he had to be careful. The last thing he wanted was for Mikael or another of the Gods to consider his attraction a game and to interfere with his need for this mortal. Caroline was to be his and his alone.
Soon enough a shadow appeared in front of him, blocking the sight of earth from his eyes. The colors of Troy slowly dissolved as the white raven spread its wings in front of him, just a few inches away from his face.
The magnificent feathers shining as he reached out and caressed the raven's glide.
The bird stretched its wings more, some of its feathers dropping to the emptiness of the cosmos beneath, travelling as an omen to earth.
"Intelligent creature, you are," Klaus praised the raven that settled on his forearm.
Ravens were his creatures. The ultimate oracles of his own choosing; trust worthier than the mortals, less misleading than the Gods. He was the one that had given two of them, his best two, as gifts to Odin much to Mikael's great dismay.
Klaus had graced the feathered beasts with the heavy duty of revealing omens and signs and foretelling the future. They were the communicators of the deep mysteries of nature and in return for his gift the raven of his dreams cursed him with the vision of his sweet Caroline.
He smirked and whispered.
"You can't keep a secret can you?" he asked with veiled mirth and the bird cawed and tried to fly away only to find its wings bound to the God's will.
Klaus' eyes sparked with fire within.
"Your whispers are divulging to Mikael too many truths. I can't have that anymore," the Sun God claimed with fury lacing his tone.
The bird crowed with sorrow as the burning gaze of Klaus started turning its wings to black. Slowly the white faded into shades of the darkest ebony.
"Messenger of sorrow," Klaus judged and the raven flicked its black wings in mourning for the loss of its bright white feathers.
The God of the Sun set it free and the winged creature spread its wings and floated in the wind.
"It's time for your wisdom to join the mortals," Klaus decreed and the bird, now flying in black, obediently descended from Olympus to the mortal world.
Its flight leading the Sun God's omens straight to the city of Troy.
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Ilium.
Known to the world as the City of Troy.
Year 1266 BC
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It was in the hottest hour of the summer solstice when Caroline Princess of Troy was born. For two fortnights, the people of the city celebrated her birth. They danced and sacrificed their meat and crops to the Gods and especially to the God of Light. The Sun God was the patron of Troy and Princess Caroline was now Troy's joy and jewel.
The sun at its highest peak in the longest sunniest day of the year welcomed her arrival. A blessing as the radiance of sun evaded the room, where the Princess was being delivered, illuminating everything inside the walls of Troy's castle.
The cadence of her cries, a dulcet note that covered her exhausted mother's heavy breathing. A beautiful baby with hair shining like the golden wheat that shimmers under the scorching sun. Alabaster skin, soft as a silk, glistened like the moonlight, never burning even when the hottest rays of the sun caressed it.
A child born in beauty and grace and every soul in the city of Troy had joyfully celebrated their good fortune for having their royal blood beatified by the Gods.
But more often than not a blessing from a God is a curse for the mortal.
Upon the midnight clear, the raven spread its black wings and followed the path to Princess Caroline's room. The summer festivities in honor of the Gods had stopped as the Trojan night had fallen.
The summer hot breeze of the night was caressing the sheer curtains that billowed inside the stone room. The cooing of the baby the only sound to be heard.
Next to the wooden crib with the carvings of the wolves the wet nurse was sitting on the rocking chair reading to the baby the tales from one of the sacred parchments from the temple of the Sun God.
The God protector of Ilium.
Blinding light unseen to the mortal eye illuminated the room, the golden chains that hung on top of the crib as decorations and tokens of faith swayed into the light reflecting its glamour inside their metal's depth.
The flames inside the hearth on the far end of the room roared when the form of a man, dressed in a black robe with golden rims made from a material not seen to earth, appeared in front of the crib. He stood tall, his aura sending heat waves inside the room. A light sublime emanating from his skin changed the dark shadows of the room into the noon's light. Soon enough the light dissolved around him and the darkness of the night enveloped the dim lighted room once again.
Sheila, one of the priestesses of the God Niklaus's temple and the royal baby's governess immediately got up from her chair with a gasp and fell on her knees.
Her whole posture changing into one of respect and reverence.
"My lord," she whispered in awe, not believing her eyes.
She was in the presence of the God of the Sun. She could feel his identity as a burning mark on her skin; the vows she had taken in his name were now taking life inside of her revealing the truth of his name in the recesses her mind.
Klaus leaned over the cradle and a smile graced his lips. His orbs turned golden as the coals that surrendered to the flames; his eyes flashed fire.
The baby's green eyes looked at him almost with wonder and Klaus's hand reached for the small mortal head. He closed his eyes slightly giving the Princess his grace and the gift of long health.
As his eyes remained closed the gift of prophecy, that was always part of his divinity, triggered inside his mind visions from the child's future. He saw her growing up until her laughing form transformed into the one of sorrow that had taunted him for endless decades.
She was finally here. She had taken breath.
Without turning his attention to the kneeled wet nurse behind him he spoke with a low voice.
"The princess of Troy must be converted to my faith," he ordained with a steely voice, "she will not kneel for any other God, she won't pray to another. Her devotion shall be mine and mine alone," he continued without wavering before turning and facing his priestess, "teach her my ways and you shall rise as my high priestess. Ensure that in her times of joy and need she will always call my name and make sure that upon her sixteenth year her path will lead her to my temple ready to take the same vows you once did," he ordered and Sheila nodded with respect.
"If not, I shall lay your city to ruin," he darkly promised and heard the priestess's heart pounding in fear.
"Leave us," he commanded the woman and she hung her head lower and left the room in silence.
The God turned his attention back to the newborn.
Klaus smiled at the infant. He would have to wait for a few more years for her to grow up; for her soul and mind to mature and for her body to be shaped to the female beauty that plagued his dreams and waking moments, but alas now her presence had finally taken earthly form.
"I've been waiting a long time for you sweet heart."
Translations from Greek to English:
[1] Εν'ονόματι του Πολέμου : In the name of War
[2] Άδικη μοίρα: Unjust fate
A/N:
* So obviously I am having crazy dreams!
I hope you liked the prologue. Tell me your thoughts!
* And most importantly...Happy new year everyone! I hope this year brings you only joy!