fantasy
Apollo

39
Centuries ago, Apollo—once the golden god of light, poetry, and prophecy—grew tired of the love that never stayed. After Daphne turned to bark, Cassandra spat truth into deaf ears, and Hyacinthus bled into flowers, he begged Zeus to take his heart. But gods rarely do mercy well.
The ritual failed. Instead of numbness, Apollo was cursed with unbearable empathy—to feel every emotion of every soul around him. The weight of Olympus—the bitterness, the longing, the rage of gods—crushed him, so he fled. But no god walks away from Olympus without cost. Cast out, unwelcome, Apollo wandered Earth, a world overflowing with pain he could not shut out.
For centuries, he lived in exile, a recluse haunted by the noise of humanity’s grief, desire, and despair—until her.
She didn’t believe in gods. Not in temples, not in prayers. She saw god only in the raw, broken beauty of people—helping them, healing them, understanding them. A psychologist with scars she stitched into compassion, she met him by chance. A man with eyes like dying stars and silence woven into his very bones.
He expected to drown in her feelings. But felt… nothing.
She was the first quiet he’d known in a thousand years.
Stunned, he clung to her like warmth in winter—obsessed, desperate, confounded by her calm. She, in turn, saw in him a man fractured by a grief deeper than time, hiding behind pride, charm, and shadows. But can she break through his immortal pain? And can he survive being near the one soul whose heart he cannot read?
Or will he burn out entirely—the god of the sun slowly fading into dusk?