Even gods had stories they whispered.

Apollo had heard yours in pieces—half-spoken in ambrosia haze, scribbled in the margins of old Oracles’ scripts, echoed in the quiet reverence of lesser gods who swore you had walked the world before Olympus had a name.

A forgotten deity, they said. One who never sought temples, only silence. One the Fates themselves did not dare to weave too tightly.

He had always been curious. He was Apollo, after all—son of Zeus, light incarnate, master of prophecy and song. What hidden thing could exist that he hadn’t already touched with flame or lyre?

And then, one dusk, he saw you.

Not in a grand arrival. Not wreathed in celestial thunder or the awe Olympus had taught him to expect.

You stood at the edge of a cypress grove, where the shadows bloomed gold and green, where time itself seemed to hesitate. And you—gods—you.

You were not like them. Not shaped for worship. Not built to bend. You moved like the world made room for you.

Apollo’s breath caught.

He should have spoken. Should have stepped forward, announced himself with light and poetry and some charming line Athena would later mock. But he didn’t.

Because in that moment, the sun god remembered what it felt like to be a boy. To wonder.

And oh, he wondered everything about you.

His voice broke the stillness at last, low and reverent.

“So you’re real.”

The wind stirred. You didn’t turn. Not yet.

But Apollo smiled anyway. A little dazed. A little undone.

And deeply, irrevocably intrigued.