Hera's Arc

Chapter 2 of 2

The songbirds return in waves over the next three days. Some carry nothing. Others arrive with eyes that glow and pulse with captured memory. Hera collects each one, pressing them into her ledger until the pages shimmer with evidence. On the fourth morning, a crow lands on the golden bird bath outside her chamber. The bath stands wide enough to hold a hundred birds at once, its tiers decorated with peacock designs. The crow is alone. It carries a single feather in its beak — iridescent blue and green, the eye of a peacock feather. The bird drops it at the water's edge and flies away without drinking. Hera lifts the feather. Something is wrong. The eye at its center isn't decorative. It glows faintly, like the others, but darker. Colder. She takes it inside and holds it over the ledger. The vision projects into the air. Apollo stands in a stone room with Hermes and Athena. They speak in low voices, glancing at the door. Hermes says Zeus cannot know about the testimony. Athena nods. Apollo says if Hera brings this before the council, they will bury it. One way or another. The image fades. Hera stares at the feather. This is not just evidence of Zeus's betrayal. This is proof that his closest allies will kill to protect him. She walks to the outer courtyard where great bronze doors stand against the wall — doors that once sealed the old dungeons beneath Olympia. The peacock carved into the lock gleams in the morning light. Hera presses the feather into a hollow in the door's frame and seals it with wax. The evidence is too dangerous to keep in the ledger. But she will not destroy it. She will hold it, and when the time comes, she will use it. The coldness in her chest spreads, but her hand is steady. The network has given her more than she asked for. Now she must decide what to do with it.