Chapter Text
The gods had forgotten her.
Styx still remembered the glory days. She had fought for the gods, despite not being one of them. Zeus rewarded her, let oaths be placed on her. He thought he had given her nothing, just something to appease her. He hadn’t realized the power he had given away.
Oaths are not such a small thing, to be ignored and thrown away. Oaths are binding. They are not to be broken. Styx remembered the first to break. They thought an oath was worth nothing, that it could simply be an empty promise, gone unfulfilled. They were wrong.
Styx learned of her power. She turned the god (nameless now, although he wouldn’t have been back then) mad for a year, then exiled him for nine. He may have come back, Styx didn’t know or care. The oath breaker was punished.
River of oath, they whispered, river of vengeance.
Zeus realized he had made a terrible, terrible mistake, but there was nothing to be done about it. Charon ferried his souls over the river, and more oaths were made on her waters.
Soon came the things, the things that showed the hopes of the humans that were never fulfilled. The promises the children whispered to themselves in the dark, the dreams they swore would come true. They may not have swore on her waters, but they swore it nonetheless.
River of hatred, river of dreams.
Her rivers were dirty, from the dreams-turned-nightmares. She liked it best this way. Better failed hope than never to have hope at all.
Power rippled on the surface of her waters. She should have known someone would try to use it.