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The Cassandra Paradox

© 2026 by Feros Litae is licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International.

[Note from author: Hello! This is a fan work inspired by Cold Blood, a series written by Onyx Tao, a story that was started on this website almost 20 years ago that I read when I was very young and still a freshman in college and I never got it out of my head! This story is the result of that. I’m borrowing Onyx Tao’s minotaurs, and their extended culture. This world is of my own creation though, and I do have my own ideas and spin on things. If this resonates with you, I HIGHLY suggest reading Cold Blood, it’s sequel I, Dacien and Onyx Tao’s other works, there are other fan works of Cold Blood too! I’m not going to list them all here but again, if you like this, I do suggest reading those!]

Chapter I: Calibration

Nikandros steadily climbed the windy stone steps to the Imperial Temple of the Oracles. The tall spires of the structure looked like a crown on the mountain top, looming over the glittering, labyrinthine metropolis below, Maze, capital of the Rusval Empire. The city fanned around the mountain itself, known as Sibylla, it was the southern most peak that began the Auroral Cascades, a long spidery mountain range reaching all the way north to the polar seas. Rusval was a cold place even in the summer.

Furls of snow circled in the wind. He was wearing a black blindfold, leather chest harness and pteryges, his standard uniform, he had no need for cold weather clothing. His minor air barrier charm was more than sufficient insulation and it prevented snow from accumulating on his pelt. He didn’t understand why Kallistratos couldn’t just tell him what he needs to be told over comms. Well he did, but he didn’t like it. Supposedly it was because how imparting premonitions effects time, which annoyed Nikandros. Everything about prescience and divination and such viscerally irritated him. Kallistratos was his childhood friend though and he was happy to visit. They had mastered tempus together in their adolescence before going their separate ways due to different family matters, obligations and such. He didn’t have a lot of opportunities to see him.

The huge temple doors both opened for him as he approached the entrance. Snow bounced off the entryway. The temple’s air barrier spell kept the cold air out as he walked in. Two human attendants closed the door behind him and quietly shuffled off as a young blond man approached.

“The Crown Oracle, Lord of Wells, Kallistratos is currently in the Ocean Tower, sir.” He said in a soft voice. He must have been new. Nikandros could detect his shyness even though the young man was hiding it. He smiled at the human who began to lead the way.

“I can find my way there, thank you.”

The young man bowed and shuffled off.

The temple was ancient, and quiet, predating the empire by eons. It is heavily disputed who actually built it or at least designed it. Later on minotaurs had converted the central tower, the Celestial Tower into a proper observatory, which in was designed to also help tune the prescience of the oracles. It was also used by scholars, from all over the world, who went through the appropriate channels and were granted permissions of course. He walked past the petrified white olive tree sitting in a bed of black rocks at the center of the temple and headed up the adjacent stairs into a hallway and up another set of spiral stairs. The Ocean tower was on the far west of the temple, over looking the other side of the city, facing the Boreal Ocean. He passed large windows getting glimpses of the city as he climbed the tower steps. The lighthouse was on because of the heavy snow, and a storm that was coming in from the north. He could see several ships arriving and departing by sea and airships heading to and from the sky dock. Even in these conditions the city was busy as ever.

***

Father was peaceful in his study, going over old documents. He hadn’t realized what was happening yet. He had too much faith in the nobility preserving the estate, which hadn’t turned a profit in years. They were in serious amounts of debt, and the work he could find to support himself and his father wouldn’t nearly cover it. Not even selling himself into slavery was an option, something he would have gladly taken. It wouldn’t be enough. How simple would it be to be a slave. Existence assured, housing assured, health assured. Being a free bull didn’t mean you were no longer property, it meant instead of being one person’s property, you were the collective property of aristocrats. You were responsible to keep yourself healthy, fed, and housed, but you certainly were not free. His father had worked hard for serve the empire all his life only to carelessly be cast away by the progressives he had always supported. His own vocational skills were too mediocre to save himself or his father. He wasn’t going to watch his father be put away in a pauper’s asylum. He wasn't going to live as a debtor for the rest of his life. What would he do? Toil away on a commune somewhere in his shame? He held up a revolver aimed at the back of his father’s head. “I’ve been looking over some things and I think we-” the older bull started only to be cut short by a gunshot. Tears filled his eyes as he put the revolver into his muzzle. Another gunshot.

***

Yoav jerked awake gasping for air and yelping as the tall arched ceiling of the temple tower focused into view, he could see snow violently swirling around outside through the high windows and hear the echoes of his whimpering bounce off the walls as if mocking him. Large powerful arms firmly cradled him to a warm white furred chest.

“Shhhhhh. I’m here. I saw it too.” Kallistratos said, a deep gentle voice, as he caressed his human seer. “It’s not going to happen anytime soon. Don’t worry.”

Yoav looked into the bull’s eyes, they were obstructed by a blindfold but he could still see them, feel them, intently gazing at him. Yoav started to breathe normally and relax as his trembling subsided. Kallistratos slowly re-positioned Yoav, wrapped a blanket around the human and moved the his head to his exposed left nipple, holding him there firmly but gently. It took Yoav a second or two to rouse again from his languor and then he latched and started suckling as the minotaur took a deep breath and let out a long sigh. Today of all days for him to have a dream like that.

Before Yoav had been given to Kallistratos, his prescience was a deterrence. It was constantly dis-aligned. Just out of skew enough to make every decision seemingly several steps behind. It was almost like being cursed, the folk tale kind of curse, not an actual magical curse. Even more insulting he came from a line of pristines known for their excellent prescience. He just could never tame his sight properly no matter how hard he tried, no matter what he could reasonably put himself through. Until he met the human, he was an outlier in his family. A joke really.

Yoav, like most dream seers, didn’t have it great either. A human plagued with horrific, often violent nightmares since birth. It was difficult for him to tell reality from his dreams and his “gift” deeply affected him. He had extreme anxiety attacks, narcolepsy, dissociation, and deep set trauma from living a lifetime of a mind seemingly designed to torment him. Worse, he took drugs to make the condition more prominent, for the sake of the empire. Human dream seers all suffered from similar maladies but Yoav, acutely. Minotaurs couldn’t see the future the same way. The way minotaurs saw it was more natural. It made more sense, because they are seeing through time. Minotaurs had the ability to detect, even move time itself and prescience was a manifestation of that ability that few minotaurs were gifted with, some lines more than others though. A minotaur looking into the future is to see thousands of possibilities at once, going in different directions, and to determine which one is most likely to occur.

Humans didn’t have such a luxury. A dream seer experiences everything as if they were there. They didn’t see things from a distance, they didn’t see lines of trajectory. They almost became “possessed” by time itself, experiencing different personalities, people, and often reliving utterly horrific events over and over. Yoav was in bad shape when he first was given to Kallistratos. Afraid to speak. Afraid to look anyone in the eye. He had been terrorized for so long he barely had any grip on reality left. He gradually became more lucid and calm as he began to pair bond with Kallistratos and Yoav’s dreams began to temper the minotaur’s prescience. What was once a tangle of lines to Kallistratos, each one leading to more uncertainty, was now becoming less tangled, leading to more possibilities. When Yoav had a dream, some of those lines would vibrate as if they were strings on an instrument, indicating the causal lineage of that dream. Dream seers made it far easier for time seers to hone their prescience and Yoav was a perfect match. Unfortunately Kallistratos’ prescience did not offer similar comfort to Yoav. Kallistratos had to rely on himself for that, and while minotaurs were naturally equipped with tools to pacify and calm humans, Kallistratos felt he could never do enough for his sweet Yoav. He looked down when the human, satiated, stopped suckling and drifted off to sleep again, a lithe and beautiful man. He had tried to get Yoav to eat more and it had been working. slowly.

“Lord of Vectors, Nikandros, is awaiting your counsel, master.” One of the temple attendants, a soft human voice, sounded in Kallistratos’ left ear with a silver device clipped to it.

“I will receive him.”

The doors of the scrying chamber opened as a very large, ebon minotaur walked in. The human attendants quietly closed the doors behind him, on their way out. He walked towards the rug with sitting cushions and sat on the carpet, cross-legged before his old friend. “Hello Kalli.” His voice gently boomed.

“It’s always nice to see you Nikos.”

“Forgive my prying, but do you ever get to leave the temple these days?” The ebon asked trying to sound less concerned than he was.

“I always have the choice to take a break from all this.” Kallistratos sighed. “However that inevitably makes my job more complicated, and even more complicated for those who pick up my slack. Sometimes I wish I was still a defunct seer and no one depended on me, but of course not seriously. It’s really no problem for me.” He said before he let too much on.

“How is Yoav?” Nikandros asked. His eyes were fixed on the sleeping human now. Kallistratos could see, even behind both blindfolds. They had both their own ways of seeing without seeing.

“He is a lot better. He is starting to open up and talk more now. Taking interest in hobbies and reading books. I can’t leave him alone for too long though or he regresses.” The pristine bull sighed again. “And admittedly, I’m still uneasy when I’m not near him. I’ve learned to control my prescience without him just fine, but, I suppose it’s the influence doing its work, or perhaps I’m just concerned about him.” He softly stroked Yoav’s hair while he looked down at him.

“It’s been three years already and you’re not fully bonded?”

“Oh, we are. We were bonded within the first month actually. I feel everything he feels and I see everything he sees, it’s just... he’s a miraculous dream seer who was neglected and experimented on for years.”

“Yes… I know.” Nikandros said feeling somewhat foolish for asking that question, and angry at himself, and the situation at whole. “Still your work with him has been phenomenal, and I’m not talking about your augury.”

“Thank you Nikos, that means a lot.” He said, still looking at his human. “I know you don’t go around just saying things like that either.”

A small moment had passed between them. The room was very quiet, despite the maelstrom outside, as are all rooms where seers meditate and counsel. The silence was very slightly broken by Yoav’s soft rhythmic breaths as he slept in Kallistratos’ arms.

“I suppose we should get to what you need to tell me. I know your time is short, although I would like to catch up sometime.” Nikandros said.

“Ah yes, that would be nice. We shall make time for it one day, hopefully sooner than later my friend. As to the reason you’re here, you have been invited to survey the new crop of students at Themikos University. You will observe an activation ceremony and you will find the human relevant to your next task.”

“I’m assuming you’ve found a match for my signature.”

“Even if I knew that for certain, what I know now for certain, is that I can say no more about it.” Kallistratos said with a wry twist of his muzzle. Nikandros smiled back and shook his head.

“Until next time, then.” He bid to his friend.

“Yes, until next time.” Kallistratos responded.

Kallistratos spent the rest of the time before his next consultation meditating with the human sleeping in his arms. Yoav, thankfully, would have no more dreams that day.

***

A blue bolt of lightning struck on the outskirts of Maze, Themikos, a city around eight hundred miles south of Maze, Rusval. Nikandros rose from kneeling position where the lightning struck. Traversing a fire path, or “riding the lightning” as everyone else inevitably put it, was a pretty convenient way to travel for him, at least across the country side. He could probably get clearances to do it in cities without getting zapped out of the sky by ward towers but that would cause more trouble than it would save, needlessly draw attention, and he was in no rush to get back to his frigid homeland.

The Themikos clan had been the Rusval clan’s oldest ally before the empire formed, and thus shared a large portion of the empires wealth and it showed. He could see the Maze rise almost like a geometrically carved out mountain in the distance while the spread evened out around it in various terraced hanging gardens. This Maze had a lot more greenery than Maze, Rusval did. There were gardens and greenhouses decorated the terraced buildings, many of the buildings roofs were crowded with greenery in pots, and various beds, if not converted to skygardens themselves. Minotaurs revered agriculture and ecology and integrated it into their architecture as much as they could. There were three different sky docks in different districts of the city, all accepting air traffic. The sea ports were bustling as well. It was one of the world’s busiest cities due to it’s location, sitting on both sides of the Myrkovos Strait, which fed into the Seven Serpents (the Obsidian Sea, the Black Salt Sea, the Ashen Sea, the Lime Sea, The Misty Sea, the Silt Sea, and the Coral Sea), which fed into estuaries that spread throughout the continent, forming a vast coastal trade network that began with Maze, Themikos on the far west side and ended with Maze, Talmyrus, in the east, another one of the world’s busiest cities, controlling the Strait of Zenobia which divided the Coral Sea and the Equatropic Ocean. This formed the sprawling Rusval Empire as of now.

Maze, Rusval, the seat of the empire’s power, had a decent coastal economy as a clan, but it thrived much more as a bread basket before the empire formed from the clans after the Serpent Wars. Old patriarchs of clan Rusval had wisely sat on the territory’s many deep reserves of valuable metals. Two centuries ago, the first emperor decided to heavily subsidize and encourage trade with Themikos, their much more cultured, and worldly neighbor, particularly keen on developing new technology and rapidly industrializing the Rusval territory. This not only allowed the Rusval clan to efficiently tap into and refine its own metals for trade, but further refine and process them into valuable components in demand all over the world. Every machine known to the civilized world could be produced in Rusval, from scratch. When the first emperor, Tirboros III Leto Vsevolod, passed away, his brother, Alexei Ramus Vsevolod, Nikandros’ Grandfather, was formally crowned the emperor at the posthumous request of his brother, unanimous recommendation of the high council, and the extraordinarily rare unanimous vote by the Senate. He was a much beloved figure who presided over a golden age that had lasted to this day. Nikandros himself was uneasy about the optimism. He had never seen actual war in his relatively young age, 93, young for a minotaur at least, yet he had spent too much time around his own family to remain confident in the their collective leadership. Nikandros himself, like almost everyone he knew growing up, was born several generations into the high aristocracy. It was something he grew to deeply resent, he figured most minotaurs would feel the same way if they were in the same position and being remotely honest with themselves. Minotaurs were not supposed to be pampered and lazy. They were supposed to be vigilant, and rigorous, and to be fair, most of his relatives did find some way to set themselves apart from their status. The ones that didn’t ended up resenting the ones that did. As they say, nothing good comes from a bored minotaur.

One of the reasons Nikandros joined the Imperial Security Force was to get away from the suffocating mediocrity of his royal peers. He had mastered tempus with meteoric speed, alongside Kallistratos. The way his brothers and cousins treated Kalli because of his “imperfect” prescience, something which almost none of them even had in the first place, disgusted him and he was filled with immense pride and satisfaction when he heard Kalli had taken in a human seer that not only made his prescience manageable but took it to an unprecedented level, quickly earning Kallistratos recognition as the empire’s Crown Oracle.

“We have located your position. Would you like for us to arrange transportation, sir?” a bull’s deep voice asked through the silver clip on Nikandro’s ear.

“Yes.” He answered.

“Arrival time should be three minutes.”

Nikandros walked towards the road, stretching out with his hands behind his head. A minute or so later he saw a black car turn onto the lane about a mile down the road heading towards him and the city. It stopped next to him and he got inside before the chauffeur could get out and open the door for him.

“Hello.” he said as he sat down on the black leather seat in the back.

“Greetings sir!” the roan bull chauffeuring him responded. “We’re headed straight to the university or is there anywhere you want to stop?”

“The university is fine.” the ebon answered.

He watched the scenery of the city as they drove from the north part of the city to the east where the universities, schools, academies, the conservatory, and some of the guild halls were.

“What do you like to do in this city?” Nikandros asked the driver.

“Many of the ballets are currently in season. The Talmyrene Company has a new one that is considered controversial actually.”

“Controversial? A ballet?”

“It’s a new interpretation of The Rites of the Saturnine”

“I think I saw The Rites of the Saturnine once as a young calf, around fourteen years old. I might have fallen asleep.”

The roan laughed. “This version will keep you wide awake. It’s not the same winter pageantry it typically is. Everything including the score has been altered to be more faithful to the pagan feral human ceremonies it was inspired by.”

“Hmmm.” That piqued Nikandros’ interest. He always had an affinity for human culture and subculture. Atypical for his lineage but highly typical for his age.

When they arrived at the Imperial Dormitories on the university grounds, Nikandros handed the driver a hundred lucro bill and walked away waving off the driver before he could politely refuse the tip.

When he got to his ridiculously lavish room, he rolled his eyes and walked over to his bed and let himself fall backwards on it, trying not to be annoyed by the scarlet gold pattern on the walls, the overly large oil decanter, the extremely decorated liquor cabinet, which was somewhat welcome actually, but it still looked excessive, the carpet was also too red, everything had a gold trim, all the wood was black mahogany, he wasn’t even going to look at what futility they expected him to wear. He was going to the ballet in his uniform like he went everywhere else with it. He closed his eyes behind his blindfold and take a deep breath. He was allowing himself to become far too irritated at things. He was fine. He extended his metasense to detect nearby magic. He could pick up on seventeen signatures in the building right now, all locked. There were forty-six more nascents and latents in the building combined. He wondered which one of the humans would be his or if they were even in this building. He felt oddly nervous about it.

He pressed his index finger to his comms.

“I was thinking of going to see a ballet tonight.” He said.

“Box seats for The Rites of the Saturnine by The Talmyrene Company have been reserved for you at the Maze Opera Hall downtown. The show starts at 7:00PM. Transportation will arrive at 6:30PM.” A deep voice on the other end responded in his ear.

Nikandros snorted. “You’re far too good at your job Dmitry.”

“Thank you.” The bull on the other end of the device said. “Shall I debrief you about tomorrow?”

“Yes.” Nikandros answered.

“The activation ceremony will begin in the high evocation chamber. Twenty four human students will be activated. One of them will be going with you.”

“What if this human, who I am a complete stranger to, doesn’t want to come with me to Rusval?”

“Exceedingly improbable, if circumstances were to change so drastically, it would be considered dangerous for you to remain there and you would be called back and placed under protection until an oracle can determine if you are being targeted.” Dmitry explained as a matter of fact.

“I see.” Nikandros said, more amused than annoyed.

What on earth was he supposed to teach a human apprentice anyways? Almost all his magic was battle magic, which was illegal to teach to humans and he wouldn’t even think of putting humans in danger by teaching it to them even if it wasn’t illegal and even if they could safely learn it, the notion of a human needing to ever use it is ludicrous. However as much as he resented prescience, it hadn’t burned him yet and this was his job.

He eventually noticed a plate of neatly cut sandwiches on the tea table in the middle of his room. He wouldn’t have bothered to order food otherwise. He popped a cucumber sandwich in his mouth and poured himself some hot tea. Nettle tea. Dmitry really did do his job too well.

He headed back out a little bit before 6:30PM to wait for his transportation to the opera house downtown. He again, immediately, got into the vehicle before the chauffeur could pop out and open the door for him.

“Good evening sir!” The driver said, an older golden bull, resettling into his seat. “We should arrive in about twenty minutes.”

Nikandros looked out the window as the buildings grew taller and taller as they moved towards the inner city. The roads had started to rise and drop on various tracks and platforms. The city became multi leveled as they drove towards the center. Buildings had multiple entrances on different levels, depending on where you approached them from. It was easy to navigate for any minotaur though. Apparently the sheer structure of a modern Maze capital could throw certain humans into anxiety attacks, at least ones that weren’t accustomed to them. Something about the vertical complexity threw them off. It was very easy for humans to get lost in a Maze, even if they had lived there for years, even their whole lives.

The ballet was like nothing Nikandros had ever seen. It started regularly enough, with the elegant human dancers tiptoeing around the stage. It looked beautiful and delicate but he feared he might fall asleep again. The dancers all had beautiful texture art done on them, that gave them a metallic sheen that sparkled in the light. The lead dancer, had a glowing radiance and silvery lines across his body that would change colors as they moved across the light.

Then the music suddenly became energetic as a dancer leapt onto the stage from the left and then broke into a series of rapid spins and twirls. The texture art on his body was amazing. It looked almost overly-chromatic, and produced a shadowy afterimage and black fiery effect as he moved. He looked like a fiery, ghostly, kaleidoscope, and just as fast as he arrived onto the stage, he kicked off to the right side, as the audience, including Nikandros himself, applauded.

He began to pay more attention to the ballet now that he had been titillated. He didn’t remember it quite like this. He looked at the names of the ballet team in the programme booklet. Nobody he recognized. He became more engaged as the show continued, enjoying the duel between the lead dancer in the silver makeup, and the soloist in the fiery rainbow make-up.

Nikandros found himself watching intently as the prince character danced wildly in front of the moon, moving his body in strange shapes. This was not the same ballet he fell asleep to as a child. The performance actually distressed him somewhat. Watching a human die, especially dance themselves to death or some other excruciating manner was viscerally traumatizing for anyone really, but especially for minotaurs, who had a powerful instinct to protect humans from harm. Watching the soloist effectively pretend to die on stage from exhaustion was realistic enough to trigger those instincts. Nikandros could now easily see how this was considered controversial. He found it exhilarating and daring. It definitely left an impression.

***

Kallistratos, bound, chained up in midair, blindfolded, and gagged, writhed and moaned as he worked through the lines of causality, trying to untangle them just a little more, using his senses to fine tune and hone the different lineages of possibility. He was face down, spread eagle, except his legs were bound to a squatting position. Every contraction mattered. Minotaurs in a certain sense, were time itself. The lines of time that flowed outside their bodies also flowed inside. Every bone, every muscle, every heartbeat, every nerve, affected the lines of time. Kallistratos was currently calibrating his prescience as precisely as he could, without causing too much stress to Yoav, who was also chained gagged, blindfolded, and bound to him, facing down and being fucked by him at the moment. Yoav’s lines were attuned to Kallistratos, meaning he had to be a part of every calibration. Usually calibrations occurred once or twice a month, sometimes more depending on current events. Only a few more minutes.

The chained bull breathed heavily and his tail arced as he concentrated and slowly pushed the steel plug out of his anus, almost completely. He braced himself. If he could reassuringly kiss Yoav or say something to him, he would. He spread his chest and legs indicating to Yoav what was about to happen to give him warning. He could feel Yoav push his head against his chest to indicate that he was ready. Kallistratos then relaxed his sphincter and carefully allowed the steel plug to enter him again as his breathing picked up and became more intense. As the plug reentered the lines began to pulsate and stimulate him. The minotaur let out a loud muffled bellow, Yoav suddenly screamed and whimpered through his gag as he came for the fifth time that night and Kallistratos erupted inside of him, once again. Yoav was covered in the bull’s sweat. All he could smell was the minotaur’s sharp, resinous, woody scent as he went limp from exhaustion.

Yoav woke up a little later as Kallistratos gingerly bathed him in a hot shower holding him upright against his chest. Kallistratos reached below Yoav’s loins and inserted his finger between his buttocks, pressing against his ring just enough to slightly open it. “Push.” he said. Yoav tensed up a little as he discharged a thick stream of Kallistratos’ seed from his bowels with a soft squelch and it began to wash down the drain. He could feel a furred finger circle around his hole with soap and then his buttocks, and slowly progressing towards the rest of his body. It was obvious his master enjoyed bathing him and he was glad because it was pure bliss. He was always diligent. His master lovingly washed every inch of him. Normally Yoav would wash Kallistratos too, but not on calibration nights. Calibration always took a lot of energy out of Kallistratos but it took almost everything out of Yoav, who could barely move after a session.

When they were done showering, Kallistratos took a large fluffy towel out of a nearby cabinet and carefully dried half asleep Yoav, starting from his hair, down to his torso, waist, and legs, finally wrapping the human up. The minotaur took out another towel. Yoav watched his master dry himself, admiring his powerful muscles and his beautiful fur. Kallistratos was such a handsome bull. He looked like a marble statue when he was still. He turned his neck and smiled at Yoav as he dried his left thigh, striking a pose for his human. Yoav blushed and looked down but then looked back up and smiled, still blushing slightly. Irresistible. Kallistratos finished drying up, gathered Yoav in his arms, and took him into the adjoining bedroom.

He settled in bed with Yoav, wrapping the thin blanket around himself and his human. He pulled Yoav close to him and kissed the human, who kissed him back. He extended his leg to envelop more of the human’s lower body while Yoav curled up against him and pushed his face into the bull’s neck, burying himself in his fur, inhaling deeply. Kallistratos had a particular scent that reminded Yoav of fir trees, in a snowy forest, which was the last thing he thought of before drifting off to sleep.