Chapter Text
Olympus had always been too much.
Too high. Too golden. Too fragrant. It floated above the mortal world like a fever dream of divinity—its foundations made of cloud and magic, its halls carved from marble that never cracked, vines that bloomed midair, and waterfalls that defied gravity mostly for dramatic effect.
Temples curved where they should have collapsed. Starlight was piped in through open ceilings, even during the day. The wine flowed freely, the music played itself, and somewhere in the southern wing, a nymph had been mid-orgy for the past two hundred years. She was doing great.
Olympus had been like this for millennia—hedonistic, lavish, stupidly pretty. It had never needed to change.
And yet... it had.
In recent centuries, something had shifted. Not in the marble, or the magic, but in the gods themselves. The new pantheon—the current reigning gods, the loud ones, the horny ones, the chaotic ones—were not like the old Olympians. They didn’t demand reverence. They didn’t speak in riddles. They didn’t particularly like wearing full robes unless absolutely necessary.
They were casual. Irreverent. Powerful, yes—but also just a little too chaotic to function. Olympus ran... mostly fine. The wine flowed, the prayers came in, the mortals didn’t riot. But it was messy. Disjointed. A divine realm held together with glitter, ego, and sheer stubborn will.
Everyone knew something had to change. Balance had to be restored. But no one knew how to begin—let alone who would be reckless (or brave) enough to try.
But perhaps most scandalously of all, these new gods started letting mortals call them by different names. Not their True Names. Not the ones etched into sacred scrolls and whispered at ancient altars. No. Nicknames. Mortal names. Harry. Louis. Zayn. Liam. Niall.
It had started out as a joke. A mortal poet wrote a sonnet calling Harros the “soft king Harry of love,” and instead of smiting him, Harros had smiled. Then he kept the name. Wore it like silk.
The others followed. Not officially, of course. On scrolls and during rituals, they were still addressed by their divine names. But they didn’t mind the mortal ones. In fact, they liked them. Mortal names were short. Playful. Charming. They made the gods feel approachable. Relatable. A little less terrifying, a little more adored.
Except when praying. Or when being worshipped. (Or, for some of them—those more attuned to their own longing—when being fucked.) Then, the divine names returned in full force, deep and shining, humming with old power and ruinous potential. But for now? For now, they were just Harry, Louis, Zayn, Liam, and Niall.
Five gods with too much power, too much free time, and absolutely no impulse control;
Harros, God of Want.
He was always barefoot. It was a thing. Flowing robes, rings on every finger, the scent of myrrh and jasmine trailing behind him like a promise.
He didn’t cause desire. He merely revealed it—like scraping paint from gold. Mortals wrote poems after seeing him pass by once. Some started wars. Some just cried.
When he spoke, people listened. When he looked at you... you didn’t forget.
Louos, God of Rebellion.
He was always late, and always too pretty to be held accountable.
He was born of defiance—a divine embodiment of “you and what army?” He had once incited a three-day riot in the underworld just because someone told him not to touch the crown. He touched it. Then he wore it. Then he burned it. Then he laughed.
Mortals carved his sigil into their skin and claimed it was for protection. He never corrected them.
What it actually did was make them his. A tether—not of safety, but of spark. The moment they bled for him, he could feel it: their fear, their fury, their secret craving to disobey. It made him grin. Their rebellion was a hymn, their defiance a prayer. The mark didn’t shield them. It unleashed them.
And Louos adored every goddamn second of it.
He drank mortal wine like it was nectar and wore armor like it was aesthetic. The old gods hated him. He loved that. It’s who he was at his core.
Zanthis, God of Dreams.
Zanthis is stardust and disinterest, all half-lidded eyes and limbs that never quite remember how to hold tension. He doesn’t sleep. He is sleep—the divine embodiment of every fevered dream, every drifting thought at 3AM. The more dramatic the dream, the stronger he grows.
Some say he lounges across floating chaises in the east wing of Olympus, draped in silk and smugness. Others swear he only exists between blinks.
If he spoke to you in your sleep, you woke up changed. If he kissed you there, you didn’t wake up at all. Did that mean you died? Technically, no. Emotionally? Also no. But you probably quit your job, moved to an island, and started worshipping moonlight with your tits out. Zanthis doesn’t kill mortals. He just ruins their LinkedIn profile.
He liked mortals. They were weird little creatures full of longing and fear. He thought they were fun.
Lyamnos, God of Glory.
Lyamnos is posture and purpose, jaw set like marble, arms eternally crossed—as if holding Olympus together by sheer will alone. He is strength incarnate, valor made flesh, the immovable pillar of divine order.
He craves peace. He worships honour. He suffers the company of chaos with noble restraint.
He would never admit how often he thinks about Zayn showing up shirtless in his dreams. (But the gods know. The gods always know.)
Naelos, God of Music and Pleasure.
Naelos is rhythm and ruin, always a little too shirtless and never holding his own drink. He is the god of music, of pleasure, of losing your dignity in the name of art. He’s invented twelve instruments (on purpose), seduced at least one thunder deity (by accident), and once lived as a satyr for half a year purely for the aesthetic.
He’ll fuck anything that says please. He once wrote a ballad about a rock. It went platinum in three realms.
And on this particular morning—if time meant anything in Olympus, which it didn’t—they were all about to be very, very inconvenienced.
Because the prophecy was coming.
And none of them were ready.
⚡
Lyamnos, God of Glory, stood thunderously alone in the Inner Court.
His arms were crossed, his sandals were polished, and his jaw was clenched like he was holding Olympus together with his molars. The hall shimmered around him, resplendent and echoing—columns glowing faintly with divine power, vines hanging from nothing, the air thick with suspended golden dust and disrespect.
He had been waiting forty-three minutes. He had counted.
“Unbelievable,” he muttered, pacing a precise line across the marble tiles. “There was a time the gods respected the sanctity of gathering. A time of structure. Of honour. Of—”
A soft exhale interrupted him. Zanthis, God of Dreams, was sprawled across a levitating slab of obsidian nearby, draped in a loosely belted robe and nothing else. He stretched like he hadn’t moved in a week. (He hadn’t.)
Lyamnos did not look. (Except he did. Because of course he did, wouldn’t have been able to help himself if he tried.)
Zanthis’ robe—if it could still be called that—hung open at the chest, teasing a generous expanse of smooth, golden skin that caught the light like polished honey. His collarbones were sharp enough to sin with. And lower—gods, lower—the loose belt did absolutely nothing to stop the robe from parting just enough to reveal a strip of toned abdomen and the kind of hipbone that could derail entire wars.
One of Zanthis’ legs was cocked lazily to the side, the robe riding up so high it was practically a philosophical question whether he was still wearing it at all. A glimpse of inner thigh—scandalously bare and infuriatingly sculpted—flashed as he moved, the fabric shifting like it had been designed by temptation itself.
Lyamnos clenched his jaw and redirected his gaze with the speed and discipline of someone who had very much trained for this kind of trial. He focused on a spot on the opposite wall and imagined a battlefield. Or taxes. Or literally anything that wasn’t whatever the fuck was happening over there.
And then, just to make it worse, a soft, knowing hum spilled from Zanthis’ lips. Barely a sound. Barely anything—except for the slow, smug curve of a smile that tugged at the corner of his mouth.
He knew. Of course he knew. The gods always knew.
Lyamnos inhaled through his nose like a man who had never once considered murder but was now thinking about it in vivid, multi-step detail.
He wanted peace. He wanted honour. He wanted—he absolutely did not want—Zanthis to keep shifting like that. (He wanted that a little.)
“I’ve been here for four days,” Zayn said, voice a velvet drawl. “You’re the one who’s late.”
Lyamnos did not dignify that with a response. He simply gestured sharply. “Lying horizontal and dreaming about your own cheekbones doesn’t count as being present.”
Zayn smiled. “It does in my realm.”
Liam opened his mouth to argue—and then stopped. Because the air had changed.
A hush fell across the space. Light shifted. A thousand unseen candles flared brighter. The vines leaned in, scenting want. And then he arrived.
Harros, God of Want, entered barefoot and glowing.
Harros did not walk—he glided, long robes trailing behind him like mist summoned by reverence. Gold cuffs flashed at his wrists, divine runes etched into the skin beneath them—tattoos that pulsed faintly, as though responding to the air itself. They were not for decoration. They were not entirely his.
His hair fell in loose, dark waves past his shoulders, tousled as if constantly stirred by a breeze no one else could feel. He looked like he had been carved from devotion itself. Sculpted not from stone, but from the ache of longing.
Mortals dreamed of him. Some gods did, too. And when he spoke, the air had held its breath to listen.
He radiated. Not metaphorically. Literally. A soft halo shimmered around him like he'd just rolled out of a sunbeam and into a skincare ad.
“Ah,” Zayn said lazily. “The drama queen cometh.”
Liam exhaled through his nose. “You’re late.”
“I don’t believe in time,” Harros said, smiling faintly. “It’s terribly linear.”
He was greeted with reverence by a dozen hovering attendants. One burst into tears. Another offered him grapes from their cupped palms.
Lyamnos rolled his eyes. “Do you have to glow indoors?”
Harros flicked his gaze toward him. “Do you have to yell outdoors?”
Zayn snorted.
The thing about Harros was: the rest of the gods had grown used to him. Used to his presence, his glow, his devastating dimples and soft-voiced declarations of lust as a divine principle. They could tune it out, like a background hymn.
But Olympus itself could not. And neither could the mortal realm.
To mortals, Harry was the holiest of holies. The god they wrote poems to and started cults over. The one they called on in the night, begging for love, for attention, for the impossible.
He pretended not to like the attention. He said it made him feel disconnected. Trapped.
He also had a golden mural of himself painted on the ceiling of the Love Temple that spanned seventy feet and had a strategically placed constellation over his crotch.
So. There was that.
A crack of laughter echoed through the golden arches.
A swirl of wind that hadn’t existed five seconds ago swept through the Inner Court, blowing petals, half-folded scrolls, and at least one startled owl across the polished marble.
And then, late as ever and glowing with mischief and Merlot, Louos, God of Rebellion, strolled in like he owned the place. Which, to be fair, he did. At least emotionally.
His robe was misbuttoned, his hair windswept, and there was what might’ve been lipstick on his neckline. Or possibly blood. He did not elaborate. A mortal trinket swung lazily from one hand—a delicate golden laurel wreath, obviously expensive, obviously nicked from someone important.
“Apologies,” he said, voice smooth as sin, “I got distracted. Mortal cult. Excellent music. Very oily.”
(Not technically his cult, but who was he to turn down adoration and free wine? If mortals wanted to rub oil on each other and chant his name in a sexy minor key, that was really their business. He was just there for the vibes.)
Liam let out a groan that could shake mountains.
Zayn remained entirely unbothered.
Harry, predictably, raised his eyes—calm, curious, mildly annoyed. His gaze locked on Louis the moment he entered—slowly, inevitably, the way storms notice lightning.
Louis noticed right back. Of course he did. They were magnets. They were problems. They hadn’t spoken properly in centuries, not since the Almost Kiss That Caused A Minor Earthquake™, and even that was usually only referred to in raised eyebrows and passive-aggressive thunderbolts.
Since then, they’d swapped barbs. Teased. Pushed. Prodded. Pretended it meant nothing. Harry said it was hate. Louis said it was boredom.
Niall called it foreplay.
Zayn had long since stopped caring.
Liam simply wished they’d channel half that energy into literally anything god-related.
Louis didn’t greet anyone properly. Just sauntered into the centre of the space, looked around like he’d forgotten where he was, then flicked the mortal trinket toward Harry in a lazy, underhanded toss.
“Here,” he said. “Some mortal gave it to me. Bit big for my head. Might suit yours, though. Or, you could sit on it. See how that feels.”
The laurel wreath arced in the air, gold catching the divine light, and landed perfectly in Harry’s palm.
He didn’t say a word. But his fingers curled around it like it mattered. Which, of course, it didn’t. Obviously. Because no one needed to know Louis had spotted it in a mortal jeweller’s window—tucked behind glass, shaped in delicate curls that looked almost like the tattoos Harry wore low on his abdomen. Laurel leaves pointing downward like a roadmap to a very blessed place.
No one needed to know he’d stared at it too long, stormed in, and left the shopkeeper dazed and without memory.
No one needed to know he’d measured it against his own head and muttered, “Too wide,” even though it wasn’t.
It wasn’t about that.
It wasn’t about Harry.
It never was.
Except it definitely was.
It always had been, ever since five centuries ago, when they were both younger, more carefree, and careless with feelings. It had started on a dare. Of course it had. Everything stupid between them started that way.
It was the Summer of Celebration—a hundred years since Chronas the Titan had last tried to destroy the world, and Olympus was still high on victory and nymphs. The wine had been sweeter, the gods louder, and the sky was full of fireworks for weeks.
Louis had been crowned God of Rebellion barely a decade earlier, still unscarred and unbothered by power. His throne had scorch marks on it by the second day. He hadn’t taken anything seriously yet. Especially not Harry.
Harros, back then, had been just as radiant but more reserved. Softer at the edges. The God of Want, but reluctant to wield it. Worshipped. Longed for. But he rarely took. He was always composed.
Louis had wanted to ruin that.
They had been circling each other all evening—at the celebration feast, glancing over golden chalices and flame-lit tables, pretending the air wasn’t crackling around them. Their gazes met and broke like waves. Brief. Intense. Charged enough to curl the edges of nearby scrolls.
When they passed, they brushed too close—not enough to be scandalous, but enough that Louos’ sleeve dragged along the back of Harros’ hand like an invitation. Harros didn’t flinch. He never did. But he did breathe in, slow and sharp, like he was trying to memorize the scent of rebellion.
Louos smirked. Harros didn’t. But he looked again. Every time.
Naelos noticed first, of course. He always did. He started humming something sultry and off-key, just to be obnoxious. Zanthis grinned in his sleep.
By the main course, Louos had somehow ended up with Harros’ goblet. No one saw the handoff—if there even was one. One moment it was beside Harros’ plate; the next, it was pressed to Louos’ mouth.
Harros watched from across the table, still and silent, as Louos tipped the goblet back and drained it with slow, deliberate ease. His throat moved with each swallow, his fingers curled lightly around the stem like he didn’t know how obscene he looked. (He absolutely knew.)
Then Louos lowered the goblet, turned his head just enough to meet Harros’ gaze across flickering candlelight—and licked the wine from his bottom lip. Slowly. Purposefully. Sinfully.
Something inside Harros shifted. Something low. Something ancient. Something that hummed beneath his skin and whispered, You want.
He did not ask for the goblet back. He wouldn’t have dared.
By the time the dinner was over and the festivities had truly begun and the stars had begun to tilt lazily overhead, the circling had turned into something sharper. Quieter. Measured in half-steps and near-touches, in silence loud enough to shatter.
Louos moved behind him—unhurried, entirely at ease—and as he passed, he let two fingers trail down the inside of Harros’ bare arm. From elbow to wrist. A single, deliberate stroke.
It wasn’t possessive. It wasn’t even sexual. It was worse. It was intimate.
Harros froze.
It was the kind of touch mortals dreamed of: not a demand, not a command—just an acknowledgment of want. Uncomplicated. Unhidden. Offered.
The warmth lingered far longer than it should have. Harros didn’t move. He didn’t speak. But the tattoos beneath his cuffs pulsed once, sharply, like they knew something he didn’t.
Louos didn’t look back. He didn’t need to.
And then someone had said it. “Bet you wouldn’t kiss him,” Naelos slurred, draped across Zanthis’ shoulder, halfway through his fourth musical number. “You always act like you’re above it, Lou.”
Louos had grinned, sharp and fearless. “Please. He’d combust.”
“Then prove it,” Naelos goaded. “Get him to his knees.”
Louos didn’t hesitate.
He approached Harros with the reckless swagger of someone who had never been told no. Who didn’t believe in consequences. Who thought feelings were funny little tricks mortals suffered from.
“You know,” Louos said, eyes gleaming, “it’s fascinating.” He circled Harros like a flame testing paper. “I’ve spent the whole night wanting—the wine, the heat, the look you get when you think no one’s watching.” He leaned in close, breath brushing Harros’ ear. “And I think what you hate most is that you want too.”
Harros hadn’t moved away. He had just looked at Louos. Looked through him. And then he’d smiled—small, dangerous, wanting.
“You don’t even know what you’re asking for,” Harros had said.
“Try me.”
Their faces were inches apart. Breath mingled—hot, shallow, uneven. The kind of breath that trembled with restraint and temptation. Harros stood impossibly still, as if movement would shatter something delicate. Louos didn’t move either. He didn’t have to. He was already everywhere.
Magic thickened between them, syrup-slow and electric, curling through the air like a storm winding itself tight around the centre. It tasted like ozone and old prophecy. Like something ancient waking up between them.
Above, the sky began to shift. Clouds bruised purple and gold rolled across the stars, slow and roiling, as if Olympus itself felt the pressure building in their skin. Wind whispered along the marble colonnades—quiet at first, then louder, teasing the edges of their robes. Harros’ hair lifted slightly, tousled by a breeze that hadn’t existed moments before.
Lightning flickered on the horizon. No thunder followed.
Louos smiled, just a little. Not kind. Not cruel. Just… inevitable.
“You feel it too,” he whispered. Not a question. A fact. A confession. A dare.
Harros didn’t answer. His eyes burned green-gold, and his fists clenched at his sides like he was trying to hold himself in place—hold himself back.
The goblet lay forgotten somewhere behind them. The feast was silent. The gods had stopped pretending not to stare.
And above them, the clouds kept swirling.
Because when Want met Rebellion, the world knew better than to interrupt.
Because when Want met Rebellion, the world knew better than to interrupt.
But it didn’t mean it wouldn’t react.
Louos’ hand slid to Harros’ waist, slow and certain, his fingers settling like they belonged there. His other arm started to curl around Harros’ back, pulling him close—closer than they had ever allowed themselves before.
Harros’ hands rose, hesitant but steady, and cupped Louos’ jaw with a reverence that didn’t suit a god known for restraint. His thumbs brushed along high cheekbones. Louos leaned into it, just barely. Just enough.
Their lips brushed, barely a graze. Not a kiss. Not yet. A whisper of contact, breath warm between them, the tremble of something about to become everything.
And then—The sky cracked.
Not thunder—rage. A sound like the heavens themselves being split in two. The clouds above surged black and gold and furious, churning like a living thing. Lightning struck the outer wall of the amphitheatre in a blinding flash.
A marble statue of Aphrodite exploded into flame. A nearby fountain cracked down the centre and erupted, water crashing over stunned gods and startled servants. Wind howled through the feast like it had teeth.
Magic screamed.
Louos and Harros didn’t move, frozen in that unfinished moment—lips parted, breath caught, the air around them spiraling.
Somewhere behind them, Naelos clutched a fruit tart to his chest and yelled, “Oh for f—was that me?!”
But no one answered. Because the storm was still building.
And they hadn’t even kissed yet. They never did.
Louos pulled back, breathless and pale, suddenly unsure. Harros looked wrecked. Like he'd glimpsed something sacred and terrifying in Louis’s eyes.
Louos had turned and walked away.
He didn’t speak to Harros for fifty-seven years after that. Not directly. Not kindly.
And by then, the damage had been done.
Back in the Inner Court, the silence hung heavy. Harry turned the laurel wreath over in his hands once. Then twice. He didn’t put it on. But he didn’t let go either.
The silence broke with Liam’s deep, pained inhale—the kind taken by gods, fathers, and long-suffering administrative assistants the realm over.
“Well,” Liam snapped, “now that we’re all finally present, perhaps we can return to the purpose of this council—”
A flash of light interrupted him, blinding and theatrical. It smelled like glitter and bad decisions.
A winged messenger crashed through the Inner Court ceiling, bounced off a floating harp, and landed face-first in a vat of nectar.
Someone gasped. Someone else applauded.
Harros didn’t blink. Louos sipped his wine.
The messenger groaned and lifted his head, nectar dripping from his curls. “Message for—uh—possibly the Court? Or maybe just Harros? It’s a little smudged. Also, I might’ve sat on it.”
“Ah,” Zanthis murmured, barely awake. “Hermes Junior.” Hermes Jnr, Messenger God, was well known for confusing everyone and everything.
Liam pinched the bridge of his nose. “Oh for—”
Hermes Jnr—small, breathless, drenched in something that looked suspiciously like ambrosia margarita—popped up, holding a scroll sealed with a grape stamp and glitter glue.
“Ahem,” the little deity announced, brushing nectar off his tunic with far too much flair for someone dripping sugar syrup. “I come bearing word from the Most Divine, Most Hungover, Unofficially In Charge of Vibes and Good Times, His Holiness Naelos—”
“Kill me,” Liam muttered.
“—who deeply regrets his absence from this meeting, and has instead chosen to extend a generous invitation.”
Zayn opened one eye. “Oh no.”
Harry turned very still.
Louis leaned forward, positively glowing. “Go on.”
Hermes Jnr cleared his throat. “Naelos humbly invites the four of you to attend his ongoing celebration. He regrets he cannot leave, as he is the host and—quote—‘everyone’s very emotionally reliant on me right now.’”
“He’s been emotionally reliant on wine for four hundred years,” Liam said flatly.
The messenger continued, unfazed. “The celebration, now in its twenty-fifth year, is themed ‘Prophe-sexy: Kiss or Die Trying,’ and Naelos wishes to personally debrief you all. And possibly do body shots off one of you. Not naming names. Zayn.”
Zayn sighed like he’d been personally victimised by joy.
Harry exhaled slowly, fingers drumming once against the table. “Last time Niall invited us to one of his parties, I nearly lost my godhood.”
Across from him, Louis smirked without warmth. “Right. That was when he told the entire mortal realm you were actually a fertility god.”
Harry’s jaw flexed. “They built shrines to my arse.”
Louis tilted his head, eyes gleaming. “Some of them were... shockingly accurate.”
Harry’s eyes snapped to his, golden and unamused. “I had to bless crops.”
Zayn, who had been reclining nearby, nodded. “To be fair, the crops did grow.”
“That was also the night Niall poured ambrosia down my chest and declared it the ‘holy wine slide,’” Harry added, voice cool.
Louis gave a derisive hum. “They’re still reenacting that in Thebes.”
“And the moonlight orgy ritual,” Harry continued, like a man filing grievances at a board meeting from hell. “The goat-wife prophecy. The hymn made entirely of—”
“Moans,” Zayn supplied helpfully. “It charted.”
Harry didn’t blink. “He printed scrolls naming me the Patron Saint of One-Night Stands.”
Louis’ smile sharpened. “A bit on the nose, isn’t it?”
“I am not a saint.”
“No,” Louis said, voice low and measured, “but you do love being worshipped.”
Their eyes locked. The air tightened. Magic flickered somewhere overhead.
Liam sighed—loudly. “Please. For the love of Olympus. Not again.”
“Don’t flatter yourself,” Harry said to Louis, not looking away. “I’m not interested in martyrs.”
Louis arched an eyebrow. “Just sinners, then?”
The table groaned. Literally. A fork melted.
Liam, nearly vibrating, dragged both hands down his face like he was trying to wipe away the entire pantheon. “So help me, if this ends in another cursed conga line—”
“It was blessed,” Zayn offered smoothly.
“Not by me,” Liam snapped. “I’m sick of the scrolls. I’m sick of the orgies. I’m sick of the goddamn tension so thick I could weaponize it.” He flung an accusatory arm between Harry and Louis, who hadn’t stopped glaring at each other from across the table. “Whatever this is? Fix it. Fight. Fuck. Fated-mate-bond. I don’t care. Just pick a lane so Olympus doesn’t spontaneously combust from all the unresolved eye contact.”
Neither moved. Magic hummed. Someone’s goblet cracked down the middle.
“And now,” Liam pressed on, turning his wrath toward Zayn, “we’re going to another one of Niall’s depraved disasters because no one here has the spine to say no. Another Party. Orgy. Party… Pargy.”
“Because it’s themed,” Zayn said mildly, lifting his drink.
“I swear, if it’s another ‘Whispers in the Wine Garden—’”
“It’s Kiss or Die Trying.” Zayn paused, then added innocently, “Right up your alley.”
Liam choked on absolutely nothing. “I’m sorry—what?!”
Zayn didn’t blink. “You know. Trials of passion. Emotional warfare. The gentle agony of anticipation. All very... you.”
“My what?! I don’t—I don’t even—kiss people!”
Zayn just smirked, eyes glinting. “Your ears went pink.”
“They did not.”
“They definitely did,” Louis said, not looking up from his goblet.
Harry didn’t speak, but his gaze flicked to Liam’s ears and stayed there. Judging. Possibly pitying. Possibly something worse.
Liam downed half his wine and stared into the middle distance like it might save him. “I should’ve been a weather god,” he muttered. “Clouds don’t get involved in foreplay disguised as feuding.”
⚡️
They arrived together.
Technically.
Four High Gods and one extremely unwelcome tagalong floated toward the pargy in a chariot of divine make and emotional violence.
No one spoke.
Everyone simmered.
Louis stood at the front, arms crossed, gaze fixed on a point in the distance like it had personally offended him. Behind him, Harry lingered near the back corner, posture suspiciously casual, gripping a golden laurel crown with the kind of passive aggression usually reserved for cursed weapons or exes’ keepsakes.
He wasn’t wearing it.
He wasn’t letting it go, either.
It just happened to be in his hand.
All the time.
Liam stood stiffly in the middle like a divine partition, shoulders tense, eyes forward. His entire aura screamed do not speak to me, do not breathe near me, do not bring up the thing.
Zayn reclined on the side rail, limbs draped like liquid sin, eyes closed, pretending to nap but clearly listening.
And then there was Hermes Jr. Hovering in a figure-eight pattern. Buzzing. Narrating. Absolutely thriving. “So,” Hermes said, far too loudly, “we all know why the air’s weird, right?”
Liam winced.
Hermes grinned, wings fluttering. “I mean, it’s not subtle. You four reek of emotional repression and divine blue balls.”
Zayn snorted. “You’re not wrong.”
“I’m never wrong,” Hermes chirped. “I read the whole scroll about the Kiss That Wasn’t. It’s basically canon now. There’s fan art. I commissioned three pieces.”
Louis’ knuckles whitened. “There was no kiss.”
“Oh no, no,” Hermes said, gleeful, “there was. Just not all the way. A whisper of lips. A breeze. A near-world-ending surge of magic that cracked the sky and set a statue on fire? Ringing any celestial bells?”
Harry said nothing. But the laurel crown twisted in his hand like it was trying to disappear.
Liam groaned into his hands. “Please gods, just smite me.”
“Oh!” Hermes perked up. “I also wrote a limerick about it—”
“No,” Liam growled.
Hermes turned to Zayn. “You saw it happen, right? Was there tongue?”
“I blinked,” Zayn said. “One time. I missed the whole apocalypse.”
Hermes nodded sagely. “Classic mistake.”
Silence stretched thin.
Then Hermes leaned in, wings humming, voice low and conspiratorial. “But seriously… do you think you’ll kiss at the pargy?”
Harry’s eyes snapped toward him. Louis didn’t flinch, but something in the air crackled.
“I mean, no pressure!” Hermes added quickly. “Just, you know—if you were to finally, epically, catastrophically make out in front of everyone, I might be allowed to stay on Olympus full-time.”
Liam blinked. “What?”
Hermes fluttered a little higher, clearly proud of himself. “I’ve been petitioning the Council. They said if I prove I can ‘handle high-level divine affairs,’ I might get a spot in the minor court. And what’s more high-level than this?!”
He gestured wildly between Louis and Harry like they were an unlit fuse and a match. “I mean, I’m practically curating your tension.”
“You’re exploiting it,” Liam said flatly.
“I’m documenting it,” Hermes said. “There’s a difference.”
“You printed t-shirts,” Zayn said without opening his eyes.
Hermes beamed. “Networking matters. The mortals are obsessed with it.”
Harry’s eyes glowed faintly. Louis cracked his neck.
Liam stepped between them. “Nobody’s kissing anyone.”
Hermes grinned. “Oh no. You’re going to die trying.”
The chariot dipped. They landed in silence, the divine platform settling onto the party grounds with an elegant thrum that belied the sheer chaos radiating from every direction. Nobody moved for a beat.
Then— Without speaking, all four high gods turned in unspoken agreement.
Zayn tilted his head slightly. Liam gave the faintest nod. Harry angled his laurel crown just-so. Louis… smiled. Very slightly. It was not kind. They scattered. Simultaneously, a passing nymph—glowing, giggling, and entirely too into winged messengers—sashayed by with a tray of something that steamed suspiciously.
Hermes blinked. “Wait, are we—are we splitting up? Do I go with—?”
The nymph looked him up and down. “You look like fun.”
Hermes beamed. “I am fun!”
She looped her arm through his and began leading him toward the spinning garden floor that pulsed in time with no known music.
Hermes glanced back over his shoulder. “I’ll find you guys later!”
They were already gone.
The party stretched before them in a glittering sprawl of celestial madness. It was less a party and more an ecosystem. Pillars glowed with embedded stars. Trees bore fruit that dripped ambrosia straight into crystal goblets. Mortals and gods mingled freely—though you could always tell which was which by the amount of glitter and/or existential confusion on their faces.
Mortals had been invited “for flavour,” as Niall once put it. And to see if their vibes passed the threshold for continued divine favor. One mortal was weeping openly into a chalice. Another was trying—earnestly and with growing desperation—to flirt with a sphinx. The sphinx looked unimpressed. Possibly hungry.
Louis didn’t pause, but his gaze flicked across the scene with the precision of a predator. He made a mental note to circle back later. Not to intervene, of course. He just wanted to see how it ended. For research. Possibly inspiration. Definitely amusement. He moved on.
A centaur DJ spun dreamy trance remixes under a glowing dome of sound. Dryads danced in slow motion. Two minor gods wrestled in a pit of whipped cream and holy oil. Overhead, a constellation reformed itself into the shape of Niall’s face mid-orgasm and winked.
And in the very centre of it all, on a raised dais draped in soft velvet and regret, sat Naelos himself. He was, naturally, completely naked. Except for the strategically-placed golden lyre (was it a guitar? no one knew, it had strings and it was covering his bits), Niall was bare and radiant, legs crossed, curls tousled, eyes half-lidded in post-lust musical glow.
He was singing.
“There once was a nymph with a goat,
Who could bleat in a very high note…
We met by the spring, did unspeakable things—
And I still think of him when I float—”
Zayn looked disturbed. “Please let that be made up.”
“No one ask,” Liam muttered.
Louis, who was clapping along enthusiastically, leaned over to Harry and stage-whispered, “You’re going to pretend that’s not catchy?”
Harry did not respond. The laurel wreath glinted.
They were ten paces from the dais when it happened. Niall hit a particularly soulful chord—and then stilled. His fingers froze on the strings. His eyes rolled back, turning pure white. The music stopped. The party stopped. Even the mortals, high on divine fumes and too many nectar shots, turned to watch. Everyone knew what this was.
Naelos, Channel of Truth.
It happened sometimes. No one knew why. He never remembered. He sometimes denied it. But when it came, it came hard and fast and terrifyingly accurate. Niall’s voice, when he spoke, was layered—his and not-his, echoing through the chamber like a storm had swallowed a chorus.
“When the God of Want and the God of Rebellion fall to each other,
Olympus shall rise or fall.
From lips kissed in defiance,
The fate of the heavens will be rewritten.
One shall burn. One shall kneel.
The Titans shall stir.
The sky shall choose.”
Silence.
A long, stunned, wine-drunk silence. Somewhere in the distance, a dove burst into flames. All heads turned—gods, mortals, sentient vines, a harp with feelings—everyone turned to stare at Harry and Louis. Accusingly. Expectantly. Like they had known this moment was coming and were just upset they hadn’t gotten better seats.
Zayn blinked. “Well.”
Liam turned slowly to Louis and Harry, face pale, voice low and deadly. “What. Did. You. Do?”
Louis threw up his hands. “Nothing!” He gestured furiously between them. “I haven’t even kissed him!”
A gasp rippled through the crowd.
Louis gritted his teeth. “It wasn’t a kiss! I’ve seen mortals let their dogs lick their faces with more intimacy.” That was a lie. It was a beautiful lie. A polished, lacquered, perfectly poised lie. Because what happened that night? That almost? That had been everything. But it wasn’t a kiss. Not in his book. Not if he didn’t let himself admit it counted.
Harry said nothing. He just stared at Louis like he wanted to burn the truth into his skin and turned the laurel crown in his hands.
The silence stretched on. Then—
Screaming. Lightning. Someone spilled ambrosia on the divine scrolls. A minor god fainted. A major one started doing push-ups out of stress. A mortal caught on fire. The enchanted harp gave a stressed twang before falling over sideways. The prophecy had been delivered.
Louis laughed. A loud, delighted, scandalized bark of a laugh that echoed through the chamber like someone had just shouted “orgy” at a funeral.
Zayn said, calmly, “Huh.”
Harry—Harros—visibly paled, the glow around him pulsing in sharp, uneven flashes.
“I haven’t kissed him!” Louis yelled into the chaos, grinning like he absolutely would. “Yet!”
Liam turned a colour not previously known to exist. “You cannot be serious. You cannot be serious. A prophecy? Now? Do you know what this means?”
“Nope,” Louis said cheerfully.
“I think it means we’re all going to die,” Zayn offered.
A voice from the dais: “Why is everyone yelling?”
All eyes snapped back to Niall. Now fully returned to consciousness, he was blinking innocently behind his guitar, hair tousled, smile loose. “Did I pass out again? Gods, I was right at the goat verse.”
Zayn walked over slowly, bent down to Niall’s level, and in a perfectly even tone, said: “You just issued a multi-layered cosmic prophecy in the voice of what may have been a forgotten Titan.”
Niall considered that for a second. Then grinned. “Ohhhhh shit. I did it again, didn’t I? Can I get a yeah boi?!”
No one responded, except Louis, who raised both arms like a referee announcing a goal and yelled, “YEAH BOI.”
Liam made a noise that may have been a whimper. Harry turned on his heel and stalked toward the exit. Zayn watched him go. “He’s going to try to pray this away, isn’t he?”
“He glows when he’s stressed,” Louis muttered. “We’re all going to be sunburnt by nightfall.”
Niall strummed a chord. “So who’s kissing who and how soon, is really my question.”
Liam’s eye twitched. “We need to convene. Immediately. The Council must interpret the prophecy. The sky is choosing, the Titans are stirring—”
“Wait,” Niall interrupted. “What did I say, exactly?”
Zayn blinked. “You don’t remember?”
“Nope. Was I hot? I always feel hot after.”
Louis nodded. “Honestly, yeah.”
“Can someone write it down for me? I wanna put it in a bridge.”
Liam screamed internally.
⚡️
Back at the Pantheon, the mood was... strained.
Liam had spent most of the morning ending Niall’s pargy by threatening war on three minor deities, two nymph collectives, and one nudist oracle who kept trying to lick his sandals. He was tired. And slightly singed.
Now, seated in the Council Chamber (which had once been a grand marble dome and now smelled faintly of ambrosia and shame), the five of them were finally assembled.
Their stone tablets—smooth slabs of celestial tech—buzzed softly with incoming prayers about the prophecy.. Zayn’s was upside down. Louis’ had wine stains. Niall’s was glowing suspiciously in the color of poor decisions.
Harry’s tablet kept pinging with declarations of love, marriage proposals, and one particularly long petition to father “seven to twelve” children with a mortal named Daphné.
He was not engaging.
“So,” Liam said, voice clipped, “we’ve identified three primary interpretations of the prophecy.”
With a flick of his fingers, the glowing scroll hovering at the center of the chamber shifted—its surface shimmering until three lines of golden text unfurled in divine script. Each interpretation now glowed in place, officially inscribed for the record.
Interpretation One: Their union will destroy Olympus.
Interpretation Two: Their bond is the only force powerful enough to defeat the Titans.
Interpretation Three: Naelos made it up during a hangover and it accidentally caught on.
The scroll pulsed faintly with magic. Somewhere behind it, Niall shrugged and sipped his wine.
He gestured to the center, where an illusion of the original prophecy written on a scroll hovered mid-air, glowing faintly with divine energy and the unmistakable aura of drunken rhyme.
“Interpretation One,” Liam continued grimly, “is the most obvious. If Harry and Louis ever complete their union, Olympus falls. Balance disrupted. Power fractured. The end.”
He paused. “I consider this not only the most plausible, but the most preventable. And I will prevent it. Personally. With fire, if necessary.” He looked at Louis.
Harry didn’t look up. “So you’re just going to smite us every time we almost kiss?”
“Yes,” Liam said. “Without hesitation.”
Zayn snorted. “Bit intense, mate.”
“Bit necessary,” Liam muttered, flipping his tablet to block a notification from a satyr fan club titled "Liam in Leather."
Louis scoffed. “Almost? Please. It’s been five centuries. That’s not ‘almost,’ that’s abstinence.”
He glanced at Harry, pointedly. “And just because he keeps looking at me like he wants to commit war crimes doesn’t mean I’m about to let him.”
Harry’s expression didn’t change. But his grip on his tablet tightened—just slightly.
Zayn hummed. “So you have noticed.”
Louis ignored that. And the heat crawling up his neck.
Niall lifted his head lazily. “Interpretation Two is much sexier.”
Harry stiffened.
“Powerful union, unstoppable force, only thing strong enough to defeat the Titans, etcetera,” Niall continued, examining his nails. “That’s the one the poets like. They’ve already written three ballads about it and one semi-erotic opera.”
“It’s not an opera,” Zayn said. “It’s a puppet show.”
“I funded it,” Louis said.
Harry stayed quiet. His tablet pinged again: “Please descend to my village, oh Lord of Want, I will feed you figs and devotion and I’m very flexible.”
Niall smirked. “It’s your favorite interpretation though, isn’t it, Harry?”
Harry finally glanced up. “I have no favorite.”
“Mm,” Niall said, not believing him in the slightest.
Liam pinched the bridge of his nose. “And then there’s... whatever this is.”
“Interpretation Three,” Louis announced brightly, “is the truth.”
Zayn nodded solemnly. “Niall was hungover. Made up the prophecy to get out of a meeting. It somehow caught on. Tragedy, really.”
Niall lifted his goblet. “It did rhyme.”
“It was absolute gibberish,” Liam snapped.
“Exactly,” Louis said, grinning. “That’s what made it believable.”
But beneath the sarcasm, Louis’ fingers tapped restlessly against his tablet. His eyes lingered a little too long on the glowing image of the prophecy. Interpretation Two... wasn’t wrong. But rebellion was easier than hope.
And no one needed to know that.