Someone shook me rigorously. “Hey. Are you okay?”

I opened all three of my eyes. It was dark out, and it was the human girl, Heidi, whose life I had saved. Why the Gods would send me close to the girl I’d saved confused me as I sat up and rubbed my head. There was a crater all around me, almost as if something had exploded. Most likely I had struck the ground as a lightning bolt, and destroyed the green grass all around. I looked about. Like I’d seen in my pool of water, her village was a nice place; so green and quaint with tiny houses and thatched roofs that it was impossible not to love it. Yet I couldn’t enjoy it because I was still upset about what happened. And, feeling huffy, I sighed.

To go among mortals for a year… shameful.

The girl laughed, though there was a great deal of confusion in her voice. “What are you huffing about? Did you just fall asleep here or something?”

I noticed she was careful to avoid looking at my third eye, as if it were a deformity. “Don’t address me in such a way, mortal,” I said expressionlessly.

“What’s your problem?” She asked, looking miffed. She gave me a hand.

I got to my feet. Although Heidi was a girl of twenty-five, she only reached five feet, and when she saw that I was ten feet tall, her eyes lit up, wishing she were that tall. Like all humans, she had a jewel embedded in her forehead to protect her from the poisonous vapors that covered the world. The jewel emitted a shield of light about her body in a circular fashion.

“I don’t hail from a foreign kingdom. I hail from The Above,” I explained, looking at the girl I had sacrificed my comfort for. She would never be beautiful by human standards, but she had a spark of life to her that was infectious, and she certainly was cute as a button, as the mortals said. She was plump with raven-black hair, and she liked wearing dresses over the overalls that her father tried to make her wear. She was filthy; her father never let her take too many baths. She had suffered much, I knew, and despite all that, she still couldn’t stop smiling. The last thing I expected was to smile back.

She giggled again and suddenly looked directly at my third eye. “What are you?”

“I’m the God of Justice.” I said simply.

“Very funny. Alright, I’ll play along. Are you traveling, Mr. God?” She asked sarcastically.

“Yes, and I’d like to spend my stay in your house, as I saved your life.”

She raised an eyebrow. “You’ve got some delusions. What a line. I’m too smart to fall for that. If you love me, just say so, but don’t lie and say you’re a God.”

I was confused by her bluntness for a moment. “I don’t love you. You didn’t deserve to die in my eyes, so I saved you.”

“Alright, I’ll humor you. Tell me your story.”

I told her everything, about Justice and Vengeance, and how I judged… everything. It wasn’t against the rules, after all. She seemed surprised that I happened to know how her father died, and everything concerning her life recently, but she simply dismissed it, thinking I must have heard about her circumstances from someone else.

“Wow, you’re crazy… I suppose maybe your head just got hurt. You can stay the night.” She nodded. She grabbed my robe as we walked to her house and observed the fine fabric as she did so. “Wow… this is beautiful. Did you make this?”

“No. Art did.” I answered.

“Art, huh? Another God?” She snorted derisively.

“Yes... you don’t believe me?” I looked at her, surprised.

She opened the door to her house, and then gave me a look as if to say, ‘what do you think? Just look at me.’

The house was a horrid mess. Her Father had left wine glasses everywhere, and there was dirt and all manner of items scattered around on the floor. Everything was dusty, there were cobwebs…. Just an absolute disgrace. It didn’t help that the house was only one large room. Heidi set me up a sleeping pallet. “Yeah, I know, I’m no princess. But you should count your blessings that I’m being so kind to you. Tomorrow, I’ll go ask the village elder what you are, and we can get to sending you back to where you came from.”

I was ashamed and disgusted that a God should have to sleep in such conditions. It should not be this way… but I had nowhere else to go.

__

While I dreamed, I chased that butterfly through the bloodied landscape and past it. I met two other Gods in the dream, one an adolescent, and the other still a child yet. We ran together, but when it came to running with them as opposed to the butterfly, I would always pick the butterfly.