Chapter 1

Third-person

"Now, where were we? Oh, yes! Flaying your mortal form!" The sorceress cackled.

Apollo, or rather, Lester did not have a good feeling about this.

He tried to get a burst of godly power, and threw himself onto the sorceress, meaning to tackle her and dump her into Helios' ichor, or just simply kill her, but the chains strengthened.

"Resist!" Herophile urged him, leaning next to the former sun god. "Resist! Apollo, you must resist!"

Resist? How am I supposed to resist? At least this seems like one of those stories where a rescuer comes, Apollo thought.

Medea kept chanting in ancient Colchian. All these ancient languages were harder to translate for Apollo, but his brain whirred and he caught snippets of the things Medea was saying.

Kill…dissolve…Apollo….sun god…Neos Helios…

None of them sounded very good. Apollo hoped that the former princess of Colchis was saying, Kill Caligula..dissolve Caligula…Apollo is the sun god…the New Sun is dead…

Apollo's POV

I was quite sure that Medea was trying to kill me, then dissolve me, either way, and make Caligula the sun god. However, I was not as excited as her.

"Meg!" I called. Ooh, how could Herophile survive so long in these burning hot chains? And I really needed to wee. At least there was a toilet. But because the chains were bringing me down, I couldn't move across the platform to even pee. Ew, I hate this human body. Gods don't need to pee (Don't believe the numerous demigods who claim they went to Olympus and saw a bathroom labeled Gods)!

Meg glanced over. "Yeah?"

"I need you to disrupt Medea. Maybe get some grape vines on her…" I croaked. Unfortunately, Medea could hear what I was saying.

"Apollo, number one, she can hear us. Number two, I don't have grape seeds! Number three, um…how do you plan on getting out?"

Typical Meg. I hate her reasoning. When did Meg become reasonable? Plus, those were probably her longest sentences ever.

"Oh yes, I can hear you! Sorry. But Apollo is in the Sibyl's place, so only he can build the crossroads, and sorry again, but Apollo is weak and I'm going to flay him! He's powerless. Caligula will soon be the sun god!" Medea interjected.

Medea's Colchian lyrics wormed their way into my head (again!) and made me think of Caligula, how he was perfect and I was not.

That is the last thing I thought before my memory bank was wiped out and I fell limply onto the ground, golden shimmers coming out of my chest, and I died.

Meg's POV

I screamed when Apollo fell. He was limp, and a golden shimmer came out of his chest. Medea cheered and the shimmer dissolved into the huge pool of Helios' ichor.

"WHAT DID YOU DO TO HIM, MAGIC LADY?" I shrieked. The Oracle — Herophile, Apollo called her, wept. She stood up and walked over.

"Nothing much, Meg, dear. Simply dissolved him! He's dead now. Caligula will be the New Sun!" She said.

"YOU CAN'T!" I screamed, about to leap forwards when I noticed that there was lava everywhere. I silently complimented myself on my observing skills.

I kicked and screamed and struggled as Medea dragged us to the New Sun.

Caligula looked elegant in his golden armor, tan and dark hair. He clapped his hands in excitement as he spoke.

"Well, Medea, it seems that this is Apollo and Helios' essence mixed together!" He said, holding up a bag with golden slimy stuff that Medea had given him.