Zeus looked down from his chariot and spoke again.

“Hera. Look at what you have caused.”

Lightning struck all around. Raindrops fell heavier. The wind had an icier feel to it.

Hera rolled her eyes and looked towards Athena. Aphrodite was still hypnotising her policeman, affecting him to disperse what remained of the crowd. Athena took her eyes off the man she had spotted looking out of a window and looked at Hera.

“He thinks I’ve caused all of this.” Hera said

“’Tis merely a storm, Hez” Athena said, suddenly remembering that the storm started the second they left the Lap, which seemed like years ago now.

“I can hear your thoughts” Zeus said, this time to Athena.

Athena looked towards Zeus’ chariot, which was hovering above them. She’d come this far, and nothing and no one was going to stop her from finishing what she had started.

“I was not thinking, Zeus. I was speaking.” She said, although she then realised that she had been thinking about the storm as well.

“You know not your actions. You know not your thoughts.” Zeus was far from happy. “And you know not the repercussions.”

The crowd had finally fled. Aphrodite had released her new friend, and he too had left the scene. The storm was still raging around them, but the three Goddesses noticed something had changed.

Zeus continued to speak. “You left the Gates of the entire Universe ajar when you left the Lap in rage. You crossed realms, mixing realities, times, events, and created this storm. This storm is now raging throughout existence, and all because of your need to speak to a mortal.”

Athena looked back towards the window where she had noticed the mortal that she needed to see. He wasn’t there. In fact, the buildings weren’t there. In place of the buildings now stood an old forest, which looked as though it had been there for centuries.

“By taking the child, this is what you have caused.” Zeus waved his arm across the altered existence before all who were gathered.

“I didn’t take the child.” Athena was adamant.

As if on cue, a baby started to cry.

Apollo stood behind his father in the chariot, and in his arms was a small baby, with a very loud cry indeed. Zeus commanded his horses to lower the chariot down beside the battered one used by the three Goddesses. Once landed, he and Apollo walked over to the three, who were now glancing very confused looks towards each other.

“This is the mortal Gerald you so desperately wanted to see.”

Apollo held the baby at arm’s length; the baby smiled and gurgled when he saw Athena looking at him.

Athena realised that she hadn’t thought things through, and now her own reality made no sense to her. She could also see by the expressions on Hera and Aphrodite’s faces that they too were just as confused.

A burst of baby laughter brought Athena’s attention back to Zeus.

“Well, then. What now?”

And this is where I’ll leave the Legendary Circles storyline for now.
The whole tale from the very beginning can be found by following the links in the Storylines menu option, if you want to catch up, up to this point.

What happens next? More to the point, what has actually just happened?
I’ll return to the Legendary Circles tale next year, and we should be able to find out then. I’ve always liked a nice cliff-hanger ending every now and then…