16. Kalistratos

There is Phoenix power here crackling in the air around us. It fills my heart, replenishing me. As we ascend the stairs, I feel like I'm in another realm. Not Tyler's world, not Circeana, but somewhere beyond everything else, where the power of mortals has no sway.

The sounds we're hearing are unmistakable. We're about to walk in on someone's good time.

Tyler and I stop as we reach the top of the stairs. Laid out before us is a large nest made from intricately woven lengths of reed lined with puffy white cushions, soft blankets, and furs. There is a golden tray with a crystal carafe of wine and several partially finished glasses. Four men with similar features to Feather are gathered around a man reclined against the cushions. Two are sharing his cock, swapping it back and forth between their mouths. The third kisses him, while the fourth pulls open the man's shirt and teases his nipples with his tongue.

My heart is racing. I know who I'm in the presence of, but I can't believe it.

The man looks up, and the four attendants all stop at once. They stand, as if sharing one mind, and immediately come to Feather and pass us, descending the stairs silently, their perfectly sculpted bodies moving in unison like a dance. The smell of spices and rich oils follows them. Feather then bows slightly to us and goes with them without saying another word. Tyler and I watch them leave, and they disappear into the sea of white silk.

The man is finely dressed in a long white robe embroidered with gold. His wrists are adorned with several silver and gold bangles, and he wears a necklace of gold feathers. He has long white hair that drapes down his shoulders, and when he moves his head, it seems to shimmer with many other colors. His eyes are a bright gold, and they examine us with a piercing intensity. He is radiantly beautiful, both masculine and feminine. His aura is incredibly alpha, yet at the same time, unmistakably omega and everything in between. I am in awe.

Then, Tyler suddenly blurts, "Uh, are you just gonna sit there with your dick out? Not everyone wants to witness other people's private time."

"Tyler," I grunt. "Don't you understand who this is?"

"I know who he is, but I don't care. Feather could've warned us we'd be walking into some weird orgy. Jeez. I'm pissed now. He has us running around, getting chased by demons, while he's here living it up getting his D sucked by a harem of hot guys? What the hell, man? And you couldn't have bothered to answer any of my prayers?"

I stare at Tyler in shock. I'm here, finally standing before the spirit of the Phoenikos, who I've been seeking for so long, and my mate is scolding him! I have no idea how he's going to react. But then the man throws his head back and laughs.

"Wonderful! I would expect nothing less from you, Tyler. You have no idea how much joy it brings me to hear your reprimand. I apologize. It's been some time since I've had visitors."

He stands, and his robes flow down around his body as he walks, like elegant plumage. He passes us, and his scent lingers in the air, pulling us along with him. We follow transfixed as he glides down the stairs. I have so many questions that I can't even remember what a single one of them is. All I can do is stare at the ground like a lost child. I'm stunned into silence.

Tyler, on the other hand, is not. Somehow, he's able to talk to a god as though he's speaking with a long-lost uncle—and I'm slightly mortified.

"So, what do we call you, anyway? Just Great Phoenix? Oh Lord? Oh Mighty Phoenix?"

"Do you remember my name, Kalistratos?" the Great Phoenix says, glancing casually over his shoulder at me as he walks through the room.

I nearly trip over my own feet. "Aethereos," I say haltingly.

He looks surprised, then nods approvingly. "Then it's not entirely forgotten. There used to be a time when every Phoenikos knew my name, but that was long ago, before my temple was lost in shadow."

"Lord Aethereos," I say, finding my voice. "I don't understand. What are you doing here? Why have you left Circeana and our clan?"

"I didn't choose to leave Circeana. I was forced to. Or, I should say, it was inevitable."

We enter an enclosed indoor garden filled with plants and trees I recognize from Circeana. The walls and ceiling here are built from glass around a metal skeleton shaped like the shell of a giant beetle. The rain cascades over it, making it feel like we are standing in the center of an orb of water floating in a dark gray sky. Lord Aethereos stops in front of a box of bare soil and selects a jar of seeds from a cabinet filled with them. He places a few seeds in our palms and motions for us to plant them. I make a hole in the soft, moist soil and drop the little seed inside.

"Phoenixes were given a great gift of unparalleled magnitude from the elder gods," he says. "Our powers stood transcendent to those of the other clans. We can command the elements, halt the relentless march of time, and even shape reality itself."

As I fill the hole with a swipe of my palm, a vision appears in the center of my mind. A world forming from a ball of fire, rich soil bursting with life, the never-ending rise and fall of the sun and cycle of the moon arcing across a whirling sky.

Lord Aethereos's voice seems to echo with the vision. "But our gift came with a burden. The Phoenikos clan's fate is intertwined with light and shadow. Our story traverses an eternal cycle of diminishment and rebirth, forever oscillating between radiance and darkness."

I see a thriving town filled with Phoenikos. Children are learning to fly with their families, soaring through the air over open fields and groves of olive and fruit trees. There's a river where aqua-plumed phoenixes dive for fish; craftspeople, guilds, and a thriving marketplace where beautiful phoenix-downed cloaks and other finely made phoenix ware are sold to neighboring clans; and in the center is a great temple with towering columns of opalescent stone, filled with braziers burning with bright phoenix fire. Scholars and priests walk the halls and fly the upper sanctums open to the sky.

This was what we were.

No one here is lost. No one here has to steal to survive, or hide their phoenix forms, or sleep with a blade close at hand. No one here is alone. Everyone belongs.

Then a shadow falls over the town, completely shrouding it in darkness. The phoenix fires in the temple go out. There is a dark form in the sky, swirling storm clouds that become the wings of a titanic black phoenix with silver moonlit eyes. My heart feels like it's been encased in ice. I see the decay of the temple, and it crumbling into ruin. I see the land going fallow and the Phoenikos clan breaking apart and scattering to the wind like dandelion seeds. Generations pass and traditions vanish without a trace. Everything fades beyond memory.

I quickly wipe my eyes as tears drip from my cheeks onto the soil. Beside me, Tyler has witnessed the same vision. He stares down with wide, shocked eyes.

"Who are they?" I ask.

A grim expression falls across the Great Phoenix's face.

"Umbrios," he says. "He is my brother."

A brother.

Every new piece of this story feels like a lightning strike. My fragmented understanding of Phoenikos lore is not so much being filled in as it is being blasted apart by a truth so far from what I could've ever imagined.

"He is my reflection, my counterpart," Lord Aethereos continues. "Before light, there is darkness."

"The First," Tyler says slowly.

"Yes, that's what he calls himself," Aethereos says as he walks through the garden. "Falling into my brother's shadow is as inevitable as the sun setting at the end of the day. I was exiled here, to Gaea. This is my prison."

Tyler looks around. "Well, as far as prisons go, it's not too bad."

Lord Aethereos laughs. "Yes, well, why not fashion my cage to be as much like home as possible?"

"I don't understand," I say. "Why is your exile inevitable? You say that our clan is burdened by a cycle?"

"That's right. My brother's jealousy of my light is reborn with my renewal, leading eventually to my downfall at his hand. It's written in the stars, as is your place in this story, Kalistratos and Tyler."

"Hold on," Tyler says. "Are you saying that this has happened before? That has been happening for…ever?"

"Yes and no," he answers patiently. "Before. Forever. Again. Never. These are all mortal ideas created in an attempt to understand a force that you can only barely perceive. There are some things I can't explain."

"Oh, great," Tyler says. "Nothing like having a puny mortal brain. So, does that mean that nothing I do matters? Everything is preordained?"

"You've always been Chosen, Tyler, and always will be. And Kalistratos has always been and always will be your guardian. But that doesn't mean that everything is in stone. The story you forge in this cycle is not predetermined. You can fail. And my brother will do anything to make sure you do. That's why he sent you back to Gaea—but what he didn't intend was for Kalistratos to come with you. It was your connection that did that, your bond, forged in the crucible of eternity. And now he wants to separate you forever."

"But why am I Chosen?" Tyler asks. "What the hell do I have to do with all of this?"

"The child you carry, along with the other children of the Chosen, bear a fire that will restore the flame in the lost temple. I will be reborn, and once again my brother will be banished to the darkness. The Phoenikos will be reunited."

"Other children?" I say.

"Tyler, you aren't the only Chosen," Lord Aethereos says. "Three Guardians. Three Chosen omegas."

Tyler and I exchange a stunned look. Tyler presses his fingers to his temples. "Wait, wait, wait, wait. Are you saying I wasn't the only guy to get yanked out of his life and sent to Circeana? Two other dudes are sitting around somewhere in need of our help?"

"Cheesus," I mutter in disbelief.

"Christ on a crutch," Tyler finishes.