"Humans came, and we retreated, and when they kept pressing on, with the help of the Olympians, we removed what was left of our people to the reflection of Olympus, taken from all the places they dwelt, Cyprus, Laconia, Elis, and those who were scattered among other humans who had not been . Here, in the mountains between Olympus and our Peleon, in this reflection of the human world, we brought our people to a new home. We have rebuilt our numbers. We have made our own ethos, our way of being together as a people. And now Heracles, Dionysus, Apollo, and Hephaustus have granted our desire. We, like all who dwell in this reflection, are no longer quite mortal, but we could not have new children. When one of us would die, their shade would depart for a time, and then a centaur mare would find that she had become pregnant, and the one who passed would be reborn, with only their best memories from their earlier life. But now, you have come and you have new and different life, and Ananke has told us that this is so our people can once again grow in numbers."
Derrick and Jules choked on their wine. The animal part of them was aware of what was coming next, and the human part was not fighting it at all.
"Let all those who rule over fertility bless us, for to repay Ananke for her gift to them, these two strong stallions will be busy tonight."
And with that, the herd surged forward and pulled Jules and Derrick into their midst.
----
They had started this in the morning. The party had continued, through the day, with only short respites for rest, and a very tiny amount of ambrosia diluted in a large amount of wine provided by Dionysus three times before the next sunrise. It wasn't ONLY sex, of course. The centaurs who had been married with Hera's Blessing did not wish to attract her anger, so they each been given a small pellet that they were to insert into the opening of their stallion's member before they engaged in the celebration -- and the pellet was a delivery system that imbued the stallion's seed with the healing magic of the Sun and the machines that Hephaustus had crafted, ensuring their offspring would be as much heroes as those engendered on the many other fillies in the great herd. And, a few stallions had demanded that they be bred as well, to gain what virtue they could, or just to enjoy being ridden by the two amazing stallions.
The orgy, to use that crass term for the recreation of the Centaur people, was held in Centaurica, the homeland-refuge that had been granted to them when they were driven from Earth by the humans. It was made up of a broad expanse of plain, rippled with hills and rivers, surrounded by mountains that rose impassable on the eastern and western borders, with only a single city on the northern end of it where the ocean met the land at the mouth of a river. The southern end was closed as well, except for one mountain: Olympus, which rose on that side and anchored Centaurica to its own place in the dubious reality of the voids. A single fire-wheel spun above the land, distinct from the sun, anchoring it to reality. This was the entity who was set to ward the Centaurs.
It came down near evening-time, its many eyes opening and closing along the edges of its wheel, and watched the twins for a time, then closed all its eyes, vanishing back to its usual station. A wet northerly wind began to blow soon afterwards, and in the following weeks brought rainclouds to water the plains, which had been in a perpetual state of mild drought for a long time. Derrick and Jules had been distracted, but the "Centaur V2.0" system that Hephaustus had integrated into their bodies had noticed the fire-wheel's visit.
They returned when the sun rose again, having impregnated every filly that had wanted it, and sharing otherwise with the stallions. They didn't share with the foals, of course -- even though their spirits were old, their bodies remained those of children, and it would have hurt them to no good end. Apollo and Hephaustus had made sure that each of them was given a small amulet containing a pill like those given to others, so they could, when they were mature, bear a child of the Heroes.
And it took almost half a day to travel back to Olympus to the Olympus Spa, because Apollo had to drive the sun, and Hephaustus had to get back to his forges, creating far too many weapons for their expected fight.
The Trojan Suite was empty when Jules and Derrick got there, so they took the time to concentrate and return to their proper ages, the Centaur V2.0 components vanishing into their bodies and their original Drum Horse configuration returning, though they were still more muscular than a human gymnast or weight-lifter. That, apparently, was now part of their reality, because they both remembered how when they reached the age of 13, they started to grow muscle even when doing nothing in particular. And something was strange with their parents as well. Neither of them could remember that John was a Nemean Lion back in the regular world, and their mother seemed not to have been a functional hermaphrodite, but they knew the older versions of them wasn't true either.
Their parents didn't return that evening, so they went to the front desk to ask after them, and the Hostess told them that they'd gone on an Adventure, and would likely not return until the next day.
That left them at loose ends, but there was plenty they could do. They went to the meal at the Agora, where they found that more than half the guests had accepted some sort of transformation. Three of them were centaurs, one of these being more of an elk-centaur than built from a horse. There was a minotaur boy, not yet into puberty, who was being guarded by a pair of rather burly satyrs.
Dinner was a select-from-three-menus arrangement, with pre-selected courses. Across from Derrick, there was a man dining alone, a plain human, who complained bitterly when asked, that his wife and daughter had gone to be mermaids, and he was stuck alone again. Jules sent a note back to the Hostess asking what was happening with that, and their now-usual satyr messenger came to tell them that the man had made his choice and they had gone without him because he was what they had deemed a "wet blanket" -- a very strange but appropriate term. Derrick went to the salad bar, and asked Dyon if there was a way to break the man out of his funk, and the god noticed the fellow for the first time.
"He hasn't been up here yet. He's been ordering from the Maeneads instead. How about you put this at his place at the table, without him knowing," and the look of mischief made Derrick smile in return. "This" was a small gold-embossed symbol on a placard. Derrick found that he could be sneaky even though he was a Centaur, by having Jules distract the fellow. Shortly after, "Minnie" the head waitress called their attention.
"Look next to the water pitcher at your table setting. If you find one of these," and she held up a copy of the placard, "then come up to the food line, for a special dessert, hand-made to order."
The sulky man was nonplussed, but everyone cheered him and he was shamed into going up. He returned shortly after, blushing a profound red, and Derrick gave him a thumbs-up, which made him blush even harder.
After the next course had been finished and removed, they handed around the desserts, and the man received his: an ice-cream sundae draped around with gummi worms.
"I told him to do whatever he thought was best, and he sends me worms," the man said dolorously. He took a careful spoonful of the ice cream part, with its wine-grape-must syrup and tried to decide if he liked the flavor.
"Nobody loves me, everybody hates me, guess I'll go eat worms," Jules sang quietly, and the man glared, then laughed a little.
"OK so I am making a big deal. I just wish I had the chance to go along, but they shut me out before I even got a chance to try -- they had it arranged already. They know I'm afraid of drowning, but ..."
He took another mouthful of the wine-sauced ice cream, some sort of coconut sorbet with heavy cream and the tangy, rich wine, and then a very sour gummy worm that cut through the cloying sweetness.
"I like this. I think I will be happy eating worms."
He brightened up as he finished the dessert, watching the two centaurs as they were given a pair of small, honey-soaked sesame seed crackers.
The centaur boys took them in a single bite, and their eyes rolled a bit. There was more than the tiny serving of ambrosia in those crackers.
"Is something" "Happening right now?" Derrick and Jules said, finishing each other's sentences.
A note was stuck under the small dish that their sweet had been delivered on.
"You will need to escort Mr. Limpet to the sea port as soon as possible," the note read. "It's to the north-east, past the satyr glen."
"Is your name really 'Limpet'?" Jules asked. The man frowned.
"It is NOT, it's Patella. Means 'kneecap' or 'snail' depending."
"Ahuh," Derrick said, quietly and inconspicuously cheating by using the Centaur V2.0 control panel to look up the etymology. Limpets being a kind of snail also called 'patella' ... sure.
"Well, we're the Anderson twins, that's Derrick, and I'm Jules. I think it's very strange and you should go try to find your family anyway. You don't have to make them feel bad, you know, just be supportive."
"I..." he breathed in and exhaled, "I shall try. The water is so incredibly dangerous."
"We'll keep you from drowning. We're lifeguards," Jules said. Well, they were when they were human. That was a difference that Derrick noticed absently -- Julie had been too young to go swimming so Derrick didn't get to, and they'd never learned in that other past. But now? They were also on the swim team as well as gymnastics.
"You should have time to see them before they leave, if they're on the Underwater Visitation," Derrick said. "I was reading the schedule earlier, they don't leave until midnight."
The man looked uncomfortable, but Derrick shook his head. "How often do you get to ride a centaur?"
Apparently that was sufficient temptation. Jules signaled "their" messenger satyr. "Please let Hestia and my parents know that we're going to take Mr. Patella to the seaport. If we get caught up in things, we might not be back tomorrow."
"Got it, Boss," the satyr grinned, and fist-bumped Jules. "See ya at the gym when you get back."
Derrick let his harness manifest, with a pair of leads on it so the man could pretend to steer, and got a small blanket from a nearby nymph, so the man could ride on his back. They headed for the port.
Of course, getting past the Satyrnalia was a bit more challenging than it would have been for the excursion carts that delivered guests around. Without the official "Not Interested In Hijinks" placard, they were fair game for horny satyrs, and while they could filter out the magical harmonics themselves, Patella could not, and Derrick was nearly caught off guard as the man tried to get off his back at a full gallop.
"Whoa there, pardner," he said, twisting around and grabbing the man under one arm. "You stay where you are. Jules tell 'em to cut it out."
Jules smiled and let targeting locate the magic spike, then pulled a rubber-y type slingshot catapult out of the small carry-pouch that he wore in a "gun holster" arrangement.
"You have a count of ten to stop trying to charm us," he called out, "Ten, Nine, Eight, Seven,"
The satyr ignored the warning though his ears had twitched at the voice. The temptation of an untouched, unchanged human was high and the satyr was drunk.
"Three, two one." The sling-stone smacked into the pan-pipes, knocking them flying. The satyr, knocked backwards, rolled to his feet.
"HEY you skipped some numbers!"
"Would you have stopped?"
"Uh, NO."
"Then shut it. Next time I use an arrow," Jules said. "This man needs to get to the port, Dyon's orders."
"Why didn't you say so?" the satyr asked, and ran over to join them as they continued. "I'll warn off anyone else. You owe me pipes," he complained.
"I so do not, but yeah, come by my place later, we're at the Trojan Suite."
It wasn't more than a half-hour at a gallop to the seaport, and the satyr had to ride on Jules' back because they were much faster than he was.
The port itself was not too large, perhaps a hundred or so blue-roofed white houses, dotting the hill, with a steep road switching back and forth to the shore, and a visible dock going out from there. The four flags of the Spa were flying over the dock, and a boat was just pulling in.
"We need to get there fast," Jules said. "Derrick, you got the speed-movement macro ready?"
"Yes, I do," he replied, and gemstones appeared on their bodies at key points, then a fuzzing glow spread out to cover them and their passengers like a coat of phosphorescent paint.
PLOT 20 MS TRANSIT TO DOCK STATION, Derrick told his 'cybernetic' system, and a path appeared before him. He began trotting along the path, with the world practically frozen around him. Jules was doing a similar thing, but not quite the same path. He drafted off his brother for part of the distance, then pulled into the lead to create a lower-resistance path for the others to follow.
They returned to normal-time just as the boat began disembarcation.