CHAPTER 3
Our cities grew in careful balance, governed by reverence and restraint, and peace endured so long as we remembered who granted it. Laughter filled the streets, for the gods had not yet taught us the cost of abundance.
Snippet from “The Book of Natural History” By Priestess Antonella Killoran
Lyra went home in a daze. Her world felt as if it had turned upside down.
Is this some cosmic joke the gods are playing on me?
Out of boredom, chose a random human to fuck with, or some twisted game they play randomly for a laugh.
Plus, why me? A wave of bitter tears pricked her eyes, and the sour taste of self-pity filled her mouth as it rose within her.
Her feet carried her down the street to the tram on autopilot.
Her body felt tense, as if every muscle were strained.
She swiped the tram card her father had bought her to get on the tram.
Walking to the back of the car, she wanted to be alone to stew in her thoughts.
Her eyes darted around, looking at the others on board.
A woman in a crisp, blue-green business suit sat across the aisle, clutching a leather briefcase; her eyes glanced at Lyra.
She wore her hair pulled back into a severe, perfect bun, and a tiny, silver wave pendant—the sign of a Mira-worshipper—gleamed at her throat.
Lyra knew a Mira-aligned person had a secure, respectable job, likely in trade or city planning.
Does she know? Is she silently judging my shabby clothes?
Her fingers smoothed the fabric of her skirt; the worn cotton was a stark contrast to her shaky skin.
Further down the tramcar, two males in matching rough-spun brown jackets were laughing over something on one of their phones.
Petro symbols—a carved wooden leaf—were pinned to their lapels, marking them as Earth-worshippers, likely tradesmen or builders.
Their laughter seemed too loud, too careless.
What are they laughing at? Is it me? Why is this happening to me?
Lyra felt a flicker of paranoid certainty that every smile was a sneer, every hushed conversation was about her—the cosmic joke playing out in a crowded tramcar, and she was the star.
An older gentleman near the front, dressed in immaculate white robes, was reading a scroll—a follower of Elio, no doubt.
He was the epitome of the favored class: prosperous, secure, and radiating an air of untouchable certainty.
He briefly glanced up, his gaze sweeping over her without recognition, yet Lyra felt a surge of hot shame.
She pressed her head back against the cool glass of the window, shrinking into herself. The revelation from Alaios felt both monumental and ludicrous. Goddess. It was a word that felt heavy and sharp, completely disconnected from the messy, defeated girl riding home on the tram.
There is no way I am going to become a goddess.
This is a joke made to destroy me. Who would choose me?
I am a nobody with no job, no social life, and a whopping disappointment to my family.
I can’t even remember the last time someone wanted to go on more than one date once they realized I worship no god.
Why they chose to pick on me is something I don’t understand.
The ride seemed so short as it pulled into her neighborhood. She walked the couple of blocks from the station to the house.
She looked up at the house as it came into view.
It was a sturdy, butter-yellow Craftsman.
A deep, covered porch ran the width of the front, sheltering a swing Lyra hadn’t used since childhood.
The genuine pride of the home, however, was the front yard.
It was a lush, vibrant tapestry of greens and subtle floral colors, clearly cultivated with the devotion of true Petro-worshippers.
Her mother, Diane, and father, Pollo, maintained it with exacting care—a daily ritual that advertised their piety to every passerby to the Earth God.
The lawn was a dense, immaculate carpet of emerald grass, and flower beds overflowed with carefully chosen—hostas, ferns, and thick clumps of deep blue irises, all signifying groundedness and stability.
It was an orderly, flourishing ecosystem, a quiet, botanical affirmation that the Nymphaea’s had found their proper footing under the Earth God’s dominion.
Nothing showed who their youngest child was.
Luckily, she knew both her parents were at work right now so she could avoid disappointing them once again until later.
The humid air inside the house, heavy with the sweet, intoxicating perfume of gardenias, enveloped her as she stepped through the doorway.
Sunlight streamed through the window, illuminating the white blossoms of the potted plant on the entrance table.
With a soft clink, she dropped her keys into the woven basket nestled beside it.
Her mother’s diplomas, neatly framed and hung on the wall in the room, gleamed with her professional achievements.
Scattered throughout the house were glossy, professional photos of her mother’s crowning projects: lush, towering vertical gardens adorning the sides of skyscrapers, and rooftop farms that transformed concrete jungles into verdant ecosystems. Across the hall, a shelf in her father’s study proudly displayed awards for his work as the Urban Terrain Marshal—certificates of excellence in land stability and civic planning.
Her brothers, Orin and Cadence, contributed their own quiet, steady achievements to the family narrative.
Proud pictures of her brothers’ achievements hung on the walls.
Orin had the city council job that involved overseeing water management—a vital, well-respected position.
Cadence, aligned with Petro, was a supervisor on major construction sites, ensuring the physical foundations of the city were sound.
They were settled, married, and had futures as predictable and sturdy as the earth their father surveyed.
And then there was herself, Lyra. The walls offered few reflections of her face. No gleaming awards or polished trophies, etched with her name, each space that should have held one seemed to echo her perceived failure, a quiet testament to what was missing in her.
She moved past a large, mounted photo of her mother’s most celebrated roof farm, the vibrant greens mocking the barrenness of her own life.
Twenty-eight years old, and now officially rejected by every single deity in the pantheon—including the one who took the rejects.
She was the family’s negative space, the absence of divine favor in a home built on allegiance and reverence.
A lifetime of menial, godless tasks stretched ahead, culminating in her living indefinitely in her childhood bedroom, a monument to her spectacular, embarrassing failure.
She was guaranteed to live out the rest of her depressing, miserable life right here in her bubblegum-pink bedroom.
Now the walls that had once seemed vibrant to her six-year-old self were a constant reminder of her own inadequacies.
The thought sent a fresh wave of panic through her, chased by the absurd, echoing statement of the God of Strife: when you die, you will be a goddess.
She flung herself onto her twin bed, wallowing in her own misery.
Goddess of what? Failure? Disappointment?
The idea was ludicrous, a cruel twist of fate that made her past twelve years of struggle—the applications, the rejections, the humiliation—feel utterly meaningless.
It wasn’t a joke; it was a cosmic demolition of everything she understood about her world.
She lay there staring at the walls for what seemed an eternity. Her brain buzzed with thoughts that seemed to bounce around. One moment she thought she had to be the butt of a joke, then the next she wondered if it was real and she was going to be a goddess.
She heard the front door open and knew her father was home.
She hoped to avoid him, to stay in her room.
But she heard his footsteps as he came down the hall.
A knock on her door made her jump. She took a steadying breath, smoothing down her dress.
Plastering on her brightest smile, she opened the door.
Pollo Nymphaea’s face, etched with a familiar mixture of concern and relief. His eyes, framed by full cheeks and a touch of middle-aged softness, mirrored his daughter’s own striking green eyes.
“They accepted you?” her dad asked hopefully.
His blonde hair, now thinning slightly at the temples, gave him an air of comfortable domesticity. He was tall, and Lyra, at five feet nine inches, knew she owed her own above-average height to him.
She smiled and replied, “They had a system error and told me to try back in a week.”
Her dad’s brow furrowed, a deep crease forming between his eyes. “Then why are you so cheery?"
She smiled brighter, hoping he didn’t sense the lies spilling off her lips. “Don’t you and Mom always tell me I have to be hopeful? So, I am.”
He laughed, shaking his head. “Finally, you take our advice. You have always been such a stubborn little pebble.”
She forced a chuckle, the sound brittle and unconvincing even to her own ears.
Pollo Nymphaea reached out, his hand hesitating for a moment before patting her shoulder with an awkward, heavy touch.
“That’s my pebble. See? Perseverance. You will get your application sorted out.
Once that is done, you will be exactly on the path the gods have chosen for you finally. "
"Yes, Dad. I will,” she lied, the words tasting like ash.
"Good," he said, his face relaxing into the familiar. “Dinner at seven. Your mother’s making that bean casserole you like.” He turned, his footsteps receding down the hall.
Lyra shut the door quietly, leaning her back against the cool wood.
The forced smile dropped, and she let out the breath she’d been holding, a long, shaky exhale.
System error. It was the best lie she could conjure on the spot—vague, corporate, and hard to verify.
It bought her a week, maybe less. A week of false cheer, a week of waiting for the inevitable moment her parents’ hope would once again curdle into disappointment.