Some people say that Helen of Troy was the most beautiful woman in the entire world. Some say it was Aphrodite or even Persephone.
But I know the truth. It was not Helen, Persephone, or even Aphrodite: goddess of love and beauty. Nah.
It was me.
I was never told this; and no one even ever thought this, or paid much attention to me in the first place. But I knew. I knew how they looked at me.
I am Eris.
Yeah, that’s right. Eris.
I know, I know, goddess of discord, strife, chaos, all that jazz.
But I am – the most beautiful I mean. I definitely am. Trust me on this.
I’ve got long twisted black hair that falls down my back in inky waves. I’ve got my brothers red eyes that get hot when mad. I can start any war just like my brother, but I’m really a nice person.
I just happened to be born with phenomenal destructive power.
Not my fault. Blame Zeus.
I’m Ares sister. He’s the god of war so it’s not much of a surprise I came out like I did.
But this is how it happened.
Zeus has Ares with Hera and then Zeus got so pissed off with his constant mad, violent state he made Ares part of the council so the other gods and goddesses could deal with him instead of his oh-so-busy self.
But what Hera didn’t tell him was that Ares had a twin. Me.
She had never told Zeus, or Ares, and I was forbidden to tell anyone.
Yet still I got along with my brother, we were perfect for each other if you want to put it like that. He as the god of war and I as the goddess of chaos. And I liked him well enough; I was the only one who could put up with his anger most of the time, but that was probably because I got mad at the same things he did.
Anyway, moving on.
See most people don’t like me all that much and I really only had a few friends. Ares of course who didn’t really count because he was my brother (not that he knew that).
And then there was Nike.
Nike was my…friend. Unfortunately.
I was in love with him. He was the god of victory and had been my friend ever since my first fight.
I had disagreed on a few of Athena’s war strategies and voiced my opinion.
She was my sister after all (not that she knew that) so wasn’t I entitled to my opinion? Apparently not.
She had stood and slowly walked over to me, her stupid owl giving me the evil eye. She had leaned over me and asked me if it was any of my business. Ares had gone silent, thanks a lot bro.
So I spit in her face.
Okay fine, so spitting on the goddess of strategy and revenge wasn’t the best idea, look at what happened to Medusa. Well I did it anyway. I have something of an anger issue as you can probably see.
So I spit and then everything goes real quiet like. Athena goes still and I see her eyes fill with fire and then I get a bit scared.
Then a boy appears by my side.
He’s a bit taller than me with shaggy blond hair and blue eyes. He’s gorgeous in every way and my vision starts to go a bit hazy when I realize the goddess has backed off.
I knew who he was at once.
Only one person could make Athena back off in a fight.
Nike. God of victory.
He gently touched my forehead and grinned at me as he spoke.
“For now on and forever I grant my power to this girl. Fight and she shall win.”
As he explained to me later, what he meant was, ‘Anyone who fights, threatens or in any way harms this girl will die.’
I beamed.
We had been friends ever since, why he had protected me I still didn’t know but I was not complaining. No one bothered me; I could do whatever I wanted.
Well…that wasn’t always true. I could win any fight but sometimes my temper got the best of me.
It all started as a bet.
I’m going to guess you are familiar with my work. Everyone is.
You know the Trojan War? Yeah, well, I kind of started it.
It wasn’t my fault! I swear!
It was that rat Hades. He bet me that he could start a war faster than me. Nike had touched my arm with a warning look on his face but I shrugged him off and turned back to Hades. I was the goddess of chaos. I was pretty sure I could start a war faster than a god of death. He could kill people, yeah, but getting people to kill each other?
That was Ares and my thing.
He gave me exactly a week and I chose the first gathering of gods I could get.
It just happened to be the wedding of Peleus and Thetis.
Now see Zeus had gone off and had another kid with some random human – Thetis. And then Hera got kind of pissed at him for cheating on her and forced Thetis to wed some random guy – Peleus.
Now at this big wedding all the gods and goddesses were going to be there. Perfect.
So I was sitting in my lair, eagerly awaiting my letter that invited me to the wedding while plotting.
I was pretty good at what I did and starting war was something I did a lot.
I knew that the three vainest goddesses on Olympus would be at this party – Athena, Aphrodite and, of course, Hera.
And I also knew that each of them wouldn’t like it if one of the others was supposedly more beautiful than them.
I laughed out loud and got up from the huge red velvet couch I was lounging on. I walked over to my cabinet on the far side of the room and slowly opened it, dodging the knives that flew out for anyone besides me who tried to open it.
I sorted through the poison and weapons and poisonous weapons and finally found what I was looking for.
A golden apple.
Yes, the golden apple.
I took out my flame thrower – yes – I have a flame thrower in my bedroom. What did you expect? Fluffy bunnies and unicorns? I’m the goddess of chaos!
And then I melted three words onto the shiny gold surface.
For the fairest.
Tossing the apple from hand to had I lay back on the couch and grinned.
Well it turned out that Zeus had somehow forgotten to invite me and that annoyed me beyond belief.
I had spent like five minutes figuring out how to start this giant war and I was not going to be put off by Zeus being stupid.
So then Nike showed up at my door all dressed up and I’m not going to lie. I went breathless for a minute and we both kind of stood there staring at each other.
I was dressed for the party too, even though I hadn’t been invited.
I quickly explained I was going to crash the wedding and Nike readily agreed to help. He of course had been invited and was going to accompany me.
Did I already tell you how much I loved Nike?
So we show up at the wedding to see all the gods and goddesses lying around, bored, drunk or flirting with each other.
Zeus sits at the highest table and looks jealously at Peleus as he and Thetis kiss at the lower table while Hera glared at him.
I busted the doors down as the sky grew red from my anger and Nike clutched my arm tightly, warning me.
I looked at all the gods as I stalked along the isle where the bride had walked not one hour ago.
“You forgot me.” I thundered to Zeus as he stared in at me in apprehensive shock.
Zeus slowly stood and held out his arms, “I’m very sorry Eris, you are welcome to stay.”
I laughed at his words.
Nike glared at Zeus from beside me and I turned to him. He saw the apple glimmering in my hand. His eyes ran over the words and his eyes widened.
“No.” he said.
Everyone froze.
I smiled innocently at Zeus, “Sorry I can’t stay, I have something to do but I do have a present for the loveliest one here.”
I threw the apple as hard as I could and it bounced once before rolling to halt at the foot of the goddesses table.
I laughed and then bowed mockingly at Zeus.
Nike reached out and tried to grab my arm to stop me from leaving, but before he could say or do anything I felt my anger explode and I was engulfed in flames.
When the fire cleared I was standing back in my lair, smiling in content, and then I sat back on my couch and waited for the world to explode.
There was a popping sound and suddenly Nike was at the door, leaning up against it like he owned my space.
I stood up stiffly and glared at him, turning away, I knew he was annoyed with me and I never liked it when he was mad at me. Even a little bit.
“Eris, how could you? You know what’s going to happen now.” he said softly, walking into the room. I turned to face his softly pleading eyes as he reached for me.
I sighed and nodded, crossing my arms in front of me. I did know – but it’s not like I was going to loose that bet!
Suddenly Nike was standing I front of me and had curled his arms around me in a rib-crushing hug.
Nike. Nike was hugging me. I smiled, wrapping my arms around him as well.
He had forgiven me. My boy had forgiven me.
“I still don’t forgive you.” Nike whispered in my ear.
“Drat.”
Well you know what happened next.
Not with Nike!
No, I mean with the Trojan War.
The goddesses fought just like I had predicted and, yes; I did win my bet with Hades, much to his annoyance, and he had to give me a box of souls to do my bidding with whatever I desired.
So that’s why no one likes me. At least no one on mount Olympus.
Well, except Ares. He loved the way I had started the war and patted me on the back for my obnoxious deeds.
And Nike – though we were something more than friends now if you know what I mean…
The goddesses all were all my friends as well. After I had told each of them the apple had been meant for her.
Heh. Well what did you expect? Honesty?
From a goddess of chaos?
No way.