The throne room of Olympus looked so grand, and yet looked far too bright for my taste. In my opinion, my own throne room in the underworld was far better in design. Today was about judgment.
Zeus tapped his fingers impatiently against the arm of his throne, the gold circlet on his head catching the light. His thunderbolt leaned against the dais beside him like a scepter of raw power, humming softly. Hestia sat perfectly still at the far left, hands folded in her lap, her calm presence grounding the storm that was Zeus. Hera looked regal as ever, back straight, hair braided and pinned with polished amber beads that caught the flickering firelight. Demeter was next to Poseidon's empty throne, twisting a golden stalk of wheat between her fingers. She kept glancing at the sea-green seat.
And me? I sat third from the left, the bident across my knees, my shadows coiling restlessly around my ankles like half-tame cats. Ever since Erebus gifted me the domain of Darkness, my shadows have started to seem more alive.
A hush fell as the heavy doors at the end of the throne hall groaned open. Cold wind slipped through the marble columns, carrying the smell of iron and old stone. Alright, this was it, the judgment of the Titans, this will decide exactly how we Olympians are going to rule.
Briareus was the first to step in — tall and broad, four arms flexing under bronze shackles that clinked with every step. Beside him, Cottus and Gyges flanked a line of chained figures. The Titans. What remained of them.
Their heads were bowed under the weight of manacles forged from pure adamantine — our final victory turned into shackles that could bind even a god. Some glared defiantly. Some kept their eyes on the floor. A few looked hollowed out, shadows of the beings who once commanded the world
I recognized Naia immediately. Her silver hair fell in tangles around her shoulders, her violet eyes dull and empty. Beside her, Cael — the young fool — still radiated that storm-bred pride even in chains, his lips pulled back in a snarl. Vexa was last, draped in rags that did nothing to mask the stench of rot and plague that seeped from her very skin.
Drip.
A faint noise to my left. I turned slightly. Hestia had her eyes on Naia — soft pity there — but she didn't speak. She would not defend them. Not today.
Briareus pushed the line forward. He called out in his booming voice, "The Titans stand before the Olympian Court."
Zeus leaned forward, his voice rolling like distant thunder. "Alright finally! Let's get this over with! We have other more important matters to take care of."
We watched as the Titans shuffled in, chains scraping marble, shadows dancing across the high vaulted ceiling like twisted echoes of their old glory.
I cleared my throat, the sound echoing across the chamber. "You stand before Olympus to be judged for the part you played in this war." My own voice surprised me — calm, but sharp enough to cut stone. "Speak truth or forever hold your tongue."
Cael snapped his head up first. His eyes glittered like a storm about to break. "You think you've won something, Hades?" He spat the word like venom. "You think chaining us makes you kings? You're parasites gnawing on the bones of Titans—"
Zeus rose to his feet so fast the thunderbolt in his hand sparked. "Enough! Our father, Cronus lies broken in chains beneath our feet. You will bow or you will break."
The room trembled at the edge of his voice — a storm threatening to spill through the windows. But I raised my hand, palm out. "Brother," I murmured. "Save your lightning. Let him speak."
Cael sneered at me. "Listen to him. The calm one. The 'merciful' one. What mercy did you show when you tore the skies apart? When your serpent devoured Oren and Kael?"
I didn't flinch. I refused to. "They chose their fate when they betrayed us to fight for Cronus. So did you."
Hera's voice cut through next — smooth, cold, final. "Enough games. The sentence stands. Do you yield?"
Vexa laughed softly — a sound like a rotting carcass cracking open. "Yield? To you?" She leaned forward, her shackles rattling like broken bones. "We will outlast you. Your bones will crumble into dust and the Titans will rise again—"
Zeus slammed the butt of his thunderbolt against the dais. Sparks burst across the floor. "Do you yield?"
None spoke.
I looked down the line, my eyes meeting Naia's. She flinched, her dreams twisting around her like faint mist — a defense. A plea.
I exhaled. "Vote."
Zeus: "Tartarus. Let them rot."
Hera: "Tartarus."
Hestia closed her eyes, lips moving in silent prayer. When she opened them, her voice was soft but unwavering. "Tartarus."
Demeter: "Tartarus."
I closed my eyes. I felt their despair, their anger, their cold refusal to change. They would not rebuild. They would not bend. "Tartarus."
One by one, the Hecatoncheires dragged them back. Naia gave me one last look — an ocean of nightmares that would never fade — before Briareus pulled her away, chains scraping stone.
They came next. The neutral ones. The ones who watched but never lifted a hand. out of the total known 33 Titans, less than 10 had decided to stay neutral.
Zeus was already leaning forward, eyes flashing. "Neutral? There is no neutrality when the world burns!"
I cut him off with a flick of my fingers. Shadows coiled around the dais, slipping under my cloak. "Brother, not everyone chose this fight."
"They did nothing—!"
"They did not raise a hand against us either," I snapped. My bident thumped against the dais as I leaned forward. "I say we offer them a treaty. Mount Othrys will remain their home. As long as they actually follow the Law's set they will be allowed to remain free— or they break it once and return to Tartarus."
Silence.
Zeus looked at me — lightning crackling just behind his teeth — but Hera's voice cut through, warm and firm. "He's right. We offer peace or we are no better than Cronus."
Demeter nodded. "Agreed."
Hestia's hand slipped over mine on the armrest. I felt her warmth seep into my skin — grounding me. "Peace."
Zeus grunted, but nodded once. "Fine."
"Then it's decided," I said. "Mount Othrys stands. They will have to rebuild their home themselves and will be subjects under Olympus, the choice of peace or imprisonment in Tartarus."
The neutral Titans bowed — stiff, hollow, but they bowed. The Hecatoncheires stepped aside, unchaining them. They filed out without a word. When the last one disappeared through the doors, I let my breath out, shoulders slumping for just a heartbeat.
Then came the Four Directional Titans.
The room grew cold as they were dragged in — the pillars. Our uncles.
Atlas looked ready to spit curses the second he crossed the threshold, but the Four — Koios, Iapetus, Hyperion, Crius — they were silent.
Iapetus lifted his head, calculating eyes locking with mine. The same eyes my mother once told me I'd inherited. I forced myself not to look away, though every part of me wanted to.
Zeus shifted. "They are too dangerous to remain free. They sided with Cronus by blood alone."
I licked my lips. The shadows around me tightened. "They are the pillars that hold up the sky and keep it from falling and crushing us all. If we are to imprison them, we are going to have to find a way to keep the sky up."
"Wait, why does the sky need to be held up? Isn't Ouranos still alive?" Hestia asked, confused.
"Yes, he had faded when Cronus and his brothers sliced him up. It was only thanks to these four that the entire realm didn't collapse and destroy the earth.
"So what do you propose?" Zeus growled.
I swallowed. "We bind them to their tasks. They remain as they are — guardians at each corner of the world. Chained in adamantine. Forbidden to leave their posts until we decide otherwise."
Hyperion flinched.
Iapetus stared dead ahead as if he had already accepted his fate.
I couldn't meet his gaze again. Instead, I stared at my knuckles where they gripped the armrest of my throne
"I vote yes," I whispered.
Heras nodded. "Yes."
Demeter. Hestia. Both yes.
Zeus hesitated. I felt it — the conflict thrumming off him in waves. But in the end, he spat, "Yes. But if they break free—"
"They won't," I said, voice hoarse.
Briareus stepped forward, chains ready. The Four did not fight. They only bowed their massive crowned heads. When Iapetus passed me, I felt a tear slip down my cheek.
I wiped it away before Zeus could see.
Last… Atlas.
He stormed forward, chest heaving, chains rattling like thunder. "You think you can hold me? I will tear your pretty mountain from the sky and bury you beneath it—!"
"Silence!" Zeus roared. "You will bear the weight you so love to boast of. Tartarus will be your throne — your punishment to hold the very weight of the entire world on your shoulder."
Atlas bared his teeth. "Never—"
"Yes," I interrupted. I didn't look at him. I didn't care. "Yes."
Hera: "Yes."
Demeter, Hestia. Yes.
Zeus grinned. A cruel flash of teeth. "Then so it shall be."
Atlas roared as the chains wrapped tighter, dragging him back through the doors like an animal. His curses echoed through the marble halls long after the Hecatoncheires vanished into the mountain's belly.
Silence settled over the throne room like falling ash. My shadows twitched at my feet, restless and uneasy. The room felt too bright, too clean for the judgment that was yet to come.
Zeus exhaled harshly, leaning back against his throne. "Bring in the last."
The massive bronze doors opened once more, and the ground itself seemed to tremble beneath the heavy footfalls of Briareus and Cottus. Both stood tall in their four-armed forms, between them, dragged like a broken doll, was Cronus.
Our father.
His once-towering frame was reduced to a hunched figure, gaunt and starved, eyes sunken in his skull. Chains of polished adamantine bound his wrists, ankles, and throat, each link glowing. But even like this… he radiated a pressure that made the air heavy. His gaze flicked up at us, empty yet burning with a black hatred that dug itself under my skin like thorns.
He was forced to kneel, and the Hecatoncheires stepped back, each folding their arms across their broad chests, silent sentinels ready to enforce whatever judgment we declared.
For a long moment, none of us spoke.
Then Zeus rose from his throne, thunderbolt in hand, eyes crackling with cold rage. His voice thundered across the hall.
"Cronus. King of the Titans. Father. Devourer of your children. Your crimes are endless, your betrayal unthinkable. You slaughtered your own kin, consumed your sons and daughters to preserve your twisted reign, tore apart the world in your greed."
He paused, pacing before our father like a lion circling its prey. The storm in his gaze could have torn apart mountains.
"For your crimes, I declare death. A true death. I will slice you apart like Ouranos, piece by piece and scatter your remains into Tartarus itself, where your soul will never reform."
His grip on the thunderbolt tightened until the marble beneath his feet cracked with a spiderweb of lightning.
Hera stood next, her expression hard and cold, though her fingers trembled slightly as she brushed them down the front of her robes.
"I disagree, brother," she said coolly. "Death is too merciful. He deserves to suffer for eternity, not be granted an ending. I propose… we seal him in a coffin forged of adamantine. We bury him deep in Tartarus where none shall ever find him again."
Cronus let out a low, rattling chuckle, the sound like stones scraping together. "Cowards," he rasped, voice echoing with threads of divinity despite its weakness. "Pathetic, trembling children…"
"Silence," Demeter snapped, rising to her feet. "You've lost all right to speak." She closed her eyes, inhaling shakily before opening them again with a cold resolve. "I… I believe he should be bound to the earth itself. Forced to serve as a pillar to hold up the Underworld, buried so deep that even the dead cannot hear him."
Hestia sat quietly, her gaze locked on her lap, fingers twisting together. When she finally spoke, her voice was barely above a whisper.
"I… do not know," she admitted. "I only wish for peace… for all of us."
Finally, all eyes turned to me.
I rose slowly, as I stepped down from my throne, approaching our father. Each step echoed through the silent hall until I stood before him. His sunken golden eyes flicked up to meet mine. There was no remorse there. No love. Only that cold, endless hunger.
What was a just punishment for a god who consumed his children? For a tyrant who tore down an entire generation out of fear?
I inhaled deeply, feeling the ancient darkness coil within my chest. Erebus' gift burned softly along my veins.
"We could kill him," I said softly, looking up at my siblings. "We could imprison him forever, bury him in Tartarus, bind him to the earth… but all of these are either merciful or meaningless. They do nothing to undo what he has done."
I turned back to Cronus. "You wished to rule time. To consume it for yourself. So be it."
My voice rang louder across the throne room, the shadows swirling around my ankles and coiling up my bident like black flames.
"I propose we drain his divinity. Strip him of it and seal it away in relics, hidden throughout the world. Let no one ever hold his power again. And as for him… we bind him to time itself. Let him become.... Father Time. Let him age, wither, and die—only to be reborn anew. Each death will mark the end of a year, each rebirth its beginning. He will live and die in endless cycles, never able to escape the passage of time, never able to control it again."
The silence that followed was suffocating.
Zeus glared at me, lightning crackling along his brow. "You would have him… what, become something that marks the passing of time? A meaningless existence?"
"In a way," I said quietly. "A slave to time. Forced to move forward, unable to control it, unable to stop it, unable to escape it. He will watch the ages pass him by in helpless agony. That is justice."
Hera was silent for a moment before a thin smile curled her lips. "Poetic," she murmured.
Demeter nodded, tears brimming in her eyes as she glanced at me with gratitude.
Zeus slammed his thunderbolt against the marble with a crack of thunder that rattled the pillars. "We vote."
One by one, hands rose.
Hera raised her hand for my proposal. Demeter followed, her fingers trembling but resolute. Hestia hesitated, then lifted hers softly.
Zeus scowled, eyes flicking between us before he raised his own hand in finality. "Four to one," he growled.
I hadn't realized I was holding my breath until I exhaled slowly, feeling the shadows at my feet flicker with relief. Cronus did not scream, nor did he struggle. He only watched me with those hollow golden eyes, an unreadable emotion flashing through them.
Briareus and Cottus stepped forward, their four massive arms each gripping one of his limbs as they dragged him from the throne room. The chains rattled behind him like the ticking of a clock, fading slowly into silence as the massive bronze doors closed.
I stood there, my heart thudding dully in my chest. The air felt thin, like the world had shifted under my feet.
Zeus sat heavily on his throne, rubbing his temples. Hera closed her eyes and exhaled shakily. Demeter wept silently into her hands. Hestia stared down at her lap, tears dripping onto her robes.
And I… I felt nothing but exhaustion. The war was over. Judgment was passed. The new era of the gods had begun.
But as I looked at my siblings, their weary faces bathed in golden morning light, I wondered how long this fragile peace would last.
".... So, can we get to deciding who is going to be the new King?" Zeus asked after some silence.