"You have always upheld the greatest and most sacred justice."
"In your eyes, it has never been only yourself, nor do you merely look down on everything from on high."
"The compassion in your gaze is granted fairly to all beings. Even the most lowly, the most small, you have never forgotten."
"You turned the mightiest thunder into a gentle rule that safeguards all beings; with the greatest power you created and guard a truly universal good; with a supreme heart of mercy you bestowed loving-kindness upon every life in the cosmos."
"You drove out the darkness, erased fear, set right injustice, and granted the brightest hope to the whole universe."
"You are the most merciful and most just father of all things and all beings!"
"You shelter and care for every living thing. You have been ever perfecting the order; so many laws and ordinances I could never have imagined were conceived because of you."
"My love, I—Order—have grown ever more complete because of you. All that I possess now was once beyond even my boldest dreams—beyond anything I could imagine even by exhausting all imagination."
"You love me deeply, you understand me, you help me reach completeness; you set me upon the most sacred, broadest path; you let me realize my full worth."
"You love me so much, believe in me without reserve, and even grant me all power without reserve. How honored I am."
"My love, whenever I see those new laws and orders coming into being, I feel heartfelt joy. For they are the foundation of a better universe."
"To comb them one by one and weave them into your great Heavenly Order is sweetness to me; I could not wish for more. What hardship is there to speak of?"
"My love, it is because of you that I was not twisted by the darkness of old; that I could continue to exist; that I could hold to justice and magnify justice."
"Because of you, I could preserve myself and fulfill myself. Justice is sublimed because of you!"
"So, my love, please forever and ever never speak any distant or formal words to me."
"For I shall always be yours! Forever and ever, wholly and completely, I belong only to you!"
Zeus felt as if ten thousand acres of thunder-fire ignited at once within His breast, a prairie set ablaze.
He held Themis tight—tighter still—and murmured into her fragrant hair, "Themis, Themis, my beloved Themis."
"My justice, my order, my beloved—I am so fortunate to have you, to have your love."
"In the boundless flow of time, in the eternal years, I am proud to have you. Yes, yes—Order exists because of me; but Justice is beautiful because of you."
"You hold the scales of order, and I hold the scepter of thunder. I defend fairness and balance for you; and you bring me eternal justice and clarity."
"This is us. We are the eternal measure of one another's being."
"My Themis, I love you. You are the sacred presence in my divinity without which I cannot be. Ever unchanging!"
"Zeus—my love!" The bewitching Themis's eyes were like spring; feeling ran so deep she could no longer restrain it.
She rose and gathered all her myriad charms into a radiance of order and gave it all to her one eternal beloved.
When power sheds its edge, justice sheds its frost.
Like dawnlight tearing night's mist, lifting the blade of daybreak, laying the prelude to all things waking.
When lightning splits chaos, it is always wrapped in the holiest light.
Thus thunder turned to tender strings and plucked the harmonious movement of order.
Breath matched breath, heartbeats fell in sync.
I, with gentleness, embraced your edge; you, with ardor, kissed my hesitation.
Souls embraced, bones entwined.
The golden light of judgment kissed the splendor of justice, and all things sang in chorus within interlacing strands of light.
As your breath washed over me, divinity resonated before our lips, and shuddering became the rhythm of our hearts.
Two clusters of eternal primordial fire embraced at the beginning and end of time.
Spirit and desire fulfilled each other in their gasps.
They burned one another, yet in each other's reflection grew ever more luminous.
All things fell back; from then on, they were each other's only law.
Because of love, therefore we shine.
Order is born of the God-King and endures through Justice.
The God-King is hallowed by Order and radiant through Justice.
Clinging and coexisting, breathing and engendering each other, never to be parted.
Light is bright because of love; law stands because of love.
Between might and law, love and right, the myriad realms found their imperishable ground.
After a full one hundred and twenty days, the God-King finally helped His beloved goddess of Order completely comb through all the new laws and refined the Heavenly Order once more.
Though the two separated after only one hundred and twenty days,
they still clung together, unwilling to part even for an instant.
The God-King and His "executive vice–God-King" sat upon a single throne, unwilling to be even an inch or a hair's breadth apart.
Shoulder to shoulder, sweetly affectionate, they handled affairs of state together, at times leafing through jade tablets of law, at times exchanging a smile.
Now and then one bent to whisper at the other's side—skin touching, cheeks brushing—and an unseen golden shimmer rippled through the Temple of Order again.
As the three Fates and three Horae came in to assist as deputies, once the golden clouds enshrouding the Temple of Order dispersed, they lifted their eyes in unison and saw the sight of "two high gods upon one throne."
Six pairs of eyes lit up at once, then froze at once, then in the same instant turned about in tacit accord and withdrew in silence.
Playful at ordinary times might be fine; but to be naughty now would surely earn a "miserable" return.
Only, in their six-goddess chat, the griping messages had already gone to "99+."
"Help! Father and Mother are at it again!"
"Aaaah—Father and Mother are really too much!"
"How long has it been—and they're still sitting together!"
"Exactly, exactly!"
"I feel my divinity being seared by a radiance called 'syrupy lovey-dovey'!"
"Who does this? So close and clingy—just watching makes my whole body tremble!"
"You can still watch? I can't bear to look!"
"Exactly, exactly!"
After a few breaths, another popped up:
"Forget it—let Them do Their thing. We still have to do our work. I'll post the division of labor. Atropos, stop playing dead—if you see this, reply with a one."
"One…"
Just then, Zeus quite obviously forgot the Lady of Night again.
Or rather, aside from the warm, soft jade in His arms, He'd basically forgotten every goddess not before His eyes.
This time His union with the goddess of Justice was comparatively restrained; it did not set off the grand portents of sky-covering golden clouds and seas of lightning.
It merely sealed the entire Temple of Order into a windless sea of golden light.
Gods upon Olympus could still see that cloud that signified the harmonious resonance of "order and power."
But gods not on Olympus truly might not have known it.
Far away in the Underworld, after her fury spent itself, the Lady of Night's heart—filled to overflowing with longing and desire—still could not help thinking and thinking of her most beloved God-King.
She found it most strange: with so much time passed, why hadn't her beloved God-King come to see her?
Recently, too, there had been no new portents.
What was that scoundrel up to???
This…
This couldn't really be a case of using me up and then pretending not to know me, could it?!!!
A god can't be that wicked, can he?!
"Impossible, impossible…" Nyx, lonely and cold, sat listlessly upon her throne.
This immortal, deathless, eternal most-high—her perfectly radiant, lovely face even showed a trace of haggardness; it was nearly unimaginable.
She murmured to herself, "Zeus is not that kind of god."
Then, by habit, she glanced down; hair like a tide, night like a curtain—after confirming she still could not see her own toes, she barely managed to soothe her fluttering heart.
Zeus is that greedy; there's no way he could bear to give me up.
What's more, that colossal surprise I prepared for him—he hasn't "eaten" it yet.
Even if he really did want to use me up and deny it—he hasn't used me up yet.
At her side, Hemera, goddess of Day, looked at her Mother's peerless profile, flickering between shadow and light,
and at the cloud of resentful blackness coiling around the throne, nearly solid, and her own heart pounded as well.
Though in this time she had gradually grown used to her Mother's moods turning now wrathful, now plaintive, now hopeful,
habit did not mean she felt no nerves; each time she saw it, her heart quailed a little.
And if she claimed she herself was not anxious, that would be false.
This stretch, she had felt time pass with a slowness beyond words.
What once passed in the blink of an eye now seemed frozen, unmoving.
The small torments of her heart were indescribable.
The face of the goddess Nyx shifted wildly again.
With a flex of her slender waist she sprang up; godly might around her turned to shadows that devour all—she would rush for Olympus heedless of anything!
But once she stood, she thought a moment, and the force that could shatter stars slowly drew back, and she sank down despondent once more.
Humble Lady Nyx truly did not dare risk even a hair's breadth of angering her beloved God-King.
Turn it over and over, and over and over again—silver teeth biting down—at last the Lady of Night decided she would keep bombarding that scoundrel with messages in the divine-message channel!
She swore to flood that scoundrel's channel utterly with her longing and resentment and force Him to come to the Underworld to see her!
She glared at the long string of "unread" in the channel and cursed inwardly: "Damn it! Is Olympus really that wonderful?!"
Then she went on sending messages…
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