Chapter 8 #2
The breeze is fresh with the earthy scent of leaves and tree bark. I breathe it in, noticing how it mingles with the smoky aroma that always hangs around Hephaestus, pleasantly autumnal.
“How do you know?” I ask.
He squints at me. “You sound a little subdued. Isn’t this what you wanted?”
I take a breath. “It was,” I say. “I was so sure. You know, with Phaon, I didn’t stop to listen to what he wanted at the end.
He wanted to fight, and he might have succeeded.
He might not have died if I hadn’t tried to pull him out of that battle.
I did listen to what Pygmalion wanted, and I gave it to him. ”
“So?” he prompts. “What’s the problem?”
“She was just a statue. And then at once she was more than that.”
“Because of you,” Hephaestus says. “What are you worried about?”
“What if it’s not what she wants?” I ask.
He shakes his head, thoughtful. “This isn’t like Phaon,” he reasons. “She would never have lived at all without you. She was stone; now she’s flesh and blood. You gave her a husband and a charmed existence, blessed by you.”
“I knew you’d do that,” I say.
“What?”
“That you’d make me feel better. Make it sound so perfect.”
“Isn’t it?”
I twist my fingers together. “I hate the way that Zeus treats mortal women, like they’re a feast spread out on the earth beneath him, existing for his pleasure. But now I’ve done the same, giving Galatea to Pygmalion.”
He pauses in the shade of a spreading olive tree, gnarled branches twisting and curving behind him. “But she loves him.”
I laugh. “You know Zeus is always accusing me of meddling and manipulating. And I’m not saying that I never do it,” I say, reminded of Poseidon and my own former lover.
“But, really, I prefer to fan an existing flame—to draw out a person’s true desires.
Or a god’s,” I add. “I like it when I can make someone’s love blossom and flourish, when I can find that hidden craving and draw it into the light, or reignite a love that’s fading away.
It’s not the same as forcing someone to feel something they never would otherwise. I’m not sure that’s love, not really.”
It’s why Charis asked me not to intervene for her. I didn’t completely understand why when she first asked, but perhaps I’m starting to see it now.
“But for Galatea, there was nothing there at all,” he says. “She has only what you gave her. So isn’t it real?”
“But he made her,” I say, realizing the source of my discomfort now I’m saying it out loud. “He made her to his exact specifications. Nothing about her is anything that she chose, only what he wanted. And that includes her love. I gave it to her at his request, not hers.”
“Surely it was a kindness to them both?” he says.
“It was,” I say. “But when my charm fades, it will be up to him to make her fall in love with him for real. I’ve done the impossible part, I’ve given him the chance. I’ll let her adjust to her new life, but then I’ll let her choose.”
“So,” Hephaestus says, “if he wants her to love him back—to truly love him—he has to win her.”
There is an intensity in his face that throws me off-balance. All of a sudden, the air between us feels charged with anticipation.
A flash of flame streaks across the skies, and we both look up.
It’s the chariot of Ares, his fire-breathing horses galloping toward Olympus.
The wind changes direction, and a fragment of song drifts toward us from my sanctuary. Pygmalion might have rushed there already, pulling the mystified Galatea along by the hand to show her to the worshippers: Look how the goddess has blessed me; see how my piety is rewarded.
The moment is broken. “Go,” Hephaestus says. “Take the sculptor’s thanks. You gave him a miracle. It will send the mortal world wild. All the gods will be impressed too.”
It’s the kind of story bound to titillate and entertain them in equal measure. “Thank you,” I tell him.
He ducks his head. “Any time.”
And, as I hurry back toward my sanctuary, I feel much lighter.
—
Ares’ horses are still in the stables when I get back to Olympus. Their midnight-black eyes bore into me as I hand the reins of my chariot to the stable-nymph and step out to the courtyard.
He’s there, standing by the central fountain, arms folded across his breastplate.
Ares can go years without visiting our palace. Why is he here now, so soon after the last time?
“Please tell me,” I call out across the marble tiles to him, “that this isn’t about last night.
I have every right to go to the mortals that summon me, whoever’s land they’re in.
So, if you’re here to berate me for it, you can save yourself the trouble.
” My eyes sweep across the empty space. I wonder where everyone is.
“Zeus summoned me for another council.” I think I notice the faintest ghost of a smile flickering across his face. “He wants to know my war plans in advance this time.”
He’s clearly pleased by the memory of Zeus’ frustration, or maybe he’s luxuriating in the reminiscence of burning that town to ashes.
But it’s his first statement that strikes me.
“Council?” I ask. “Iris didn’t come to fetch me.
” I look around the quiet courtyard. “Perhaps she saw me flying toward Olympus anyway,” I muse out loud.
He looks at me blankly. Maybe he really isn’t here for a fight. Or, at least, not one with me this time. I’m about to go up the stairs to the throne room, but he doesn’t move.
“Aren’t you going in?” I ask.
“I will.”
“Are you waiting for something?”
“I’m just preparing,” he says in steely tones, “to see my father.” To my surprise, he sits down on the low wall in front of the fountain.
The strips of rugged leather that make up his tunic fall across his thighs and I notice how taut with muscle they are.
“Is this why you’re always late?” All the councils he’s delayed in the past—is he just sitting outside, waiting to make his entrance? A laugh bubbles up inside me at the absurdity of the image, but dies on my lips. I don’t want conviviality with Ares.
“It’s not deliberate,” he says flatly. “I just can’t stand to be around him.
” He reaches up and pulls the plumed helmet off his head.
He is no less imposing without it, the planes of his face still stern and hard.
He looks like he’s just stepped off the battlefield, his skin bronzed and roughened from the hot glare of the sun, his black beard cut close to his jaw, his dark eyes flecked with an amber glow—unsettling and strange, with a kind of wild desolation that makes me think of the ringing of spears against shields, metal shrieking and glittering in the light of raging fires.
On each of his bronze shoulder plates, there’s a coiling design: two serpents, rising up as though to hiss at one another across his body, forked tongues and fangs and scales embossed on the dented surface.
“Why snakes?” I ask, and immediately want to bite my tongue. Why would I ask him a question?
“In Thrace,” he says, “they sun themselves on the riverbank. They stretch out on the rocks, absolutely still so that you might not notice they’re there at all.”
I glance toward the steps to the throne room. I should go. The gods will be waiting. And why would I care what Ares has to say?
“It’s where my worshippers live. As you know.”
My head snaps back toward him, startled that he’s not only answered a question but is elaborating on it.
His eyes are on me and I can feel the heat of the bonfire again, the intensity of the rites, the blood and the song.
“I must have startled one—it was so fast. It reared up and struck me, right here.” He taps just above his knee, and, obediently, my eyes follow his fingers to his thigh.
“It had no fear,” he says. “It sank its teeth right into my flesh.”
I swallow, my throat unaccountably dry. This is the most that Ares has ever spoken to me, in all the centuries we’ve shared on Olympus. I shouldn’t want to hear more, but curiosity tugs at me and I can’t help but ask, “What did you do to it?”
“Nothing.” There’s a kind of music in his voice; not the harmonies I hear when the Graces speak but a sound more raw and primal.
It’s the clashing of cymbals, a savage joy, the songs of war and fury that send a shiver up my spine.
“It pulled back and hissed at me, angry that I didn’t fall or run.
It didn’t care who I was, god or mortal, only that it wanted me dead. ”
I raise an eyebrow. “I can see why you like them, then.”
He laughs, grudgingly, as though it’s not a sound he’s used to making.
I never imagined that he could. Despite myself, I feel a tiny thrill of warmth—who would have guessed I could elicit any kind of joyous response from the War God?
“It was ready for battle,” he says. “It had the right spirit. So I put it on my armor, as a reminder.”
I see it as vivid as a dream. Ares, alone at the side of a broad river, the flat green water winding its way through a valley flanked by rugged mountains, meeting a creature spitting with rage and aggression, and finding himself charmed by its attack.
The image dissolves like mist in the dawn light, and it’s Phaon who rises up in its place.
The horror on his face as he died. The coldness in Ares’ voice as he ordered me away; the audacity with which he tried to forbid me from taking revenge.
It feels like plunging into a freezing pool, an icy shock that jolts me awake.
How can I stand and joke with the god who did this?
“Very fitting,” I say, and his head jerks up at the chill in my voice. I see a flicker in his eyes—is he startled by my sharpness? Something twists inside me, vicious as his snake, and poison rises in my throat. “Indiscriminate cruelty, no regard for life. That seems right for you.”
I hear the brisk slap of sandals on tiles, and Apollo appears between the scroll-topped columns, hurrying lightly down the wide marble steps to the courtyard, his hair rippling in the breeze. “Aphrodite!” he cries genially. Then he notices Ares. “And you,” he adds.
Ares stands up in one fast movement. He slides his helmet back over his head, his face obscured once more, and strides off toward the palace.
“As friendly as ever,” Apollo murmurs.
“That’s right.” I curl my fingers into my palms. There’s a shaking in my center that I can’t explain. The resurgence of my anger, churning in my blood.
He looks at me curiously. “Were you talking to him?”
I shrug. “As much as anyone can ever talk to Ares. Or would want to.”
His gaze is keen, probing my face for more. “What is it?” I ask. “Were you looking for me?”
“Zeus is wondering where you are,” he says. “You’re late.”
“Don’t waste any more of my time, then,” I say, smiling so that he doesn’t know if I’m serious or not. I follow him up the steps and he pushes open the tall bronze doors to the throne room. I see the gods seated at the long table, each one in their golden throne.
“You’re here,” says Zeus, beckoning me to the table. “At last.”
As I sit, I notice one throne is empty. “We can’t start yet anyway—Hephaestus isn’t here.”
Hera waves my protest away. “Never mind Hephaestus,” she says. “Do we really need any report of what blacksmiths are up to?”
“Hera’s right,” Zeus says, and my blood begins to boil. I hate their dismissive attitude toward their son. He’s crafted the chairs we sit on right now, the ornate thrones behind us, and they take his kindness and his patience as their due, never expressing the tiniest fragment of gratitude.
My eyes alight on Ares, already seated, his armor glittering in the low evening sun that streams through the windows, his jaw set and stern. He’s the one who shouldn’t be invited.
“Ares, you were about to speak,” Zeus says.
Iris slides a cup of nectar to me, her wings brushing my shoulder as she passes by.
“The Thracians are moving south,” Ares says. “Armed and ready.”
“Another war?” I ask.
He nods.
“And how much of a slaughter should we anticipate?” I ask, a sharp edge to my question. It’s not just the memory of his most recent war that stings. It’s that we came close to a conversation out there in the courtyard. I made him laugh when I should have walked away.
“A significant one,” he drawls. “They’re proficient in battle, and bloodthirsty. They sacrificed a dozen bulls to secure my favor before they left.”
My breath hitches in my throat.
Zeus shrugs. “Will you grant it?”
“I’ll be with them,” he answers.
“Well,” I say, gathering my composure, “on Cyprus, they’re preparing to hold a festival in my honor. Since it’s a celebration of love, we can expect in nine moons’ time a host of babies to be born. Perhaps that will go some way toward countering all these needless deaths.”
Demeter nods in approval.
“Sounds like a lot of work for me,” Artemis mutters.
It takes all my restraint not to roll my eyes. “No doubt your tender manner will be a great comfort to the mothers in their hour of need.”
“Balance is important,” Athena interjects, her voice cool and measured. “Life and death. That’s why we’re here, discussing everything to make sure we’re keeping it all in check.”
“Enough of this war talk. I have a question,” Poseidon interrupts. “Zeus, why did you cripple the river god Asopos? All the Nereids are talking about it. Amphitrite told me you struck him with a thunderbolt and it’s got all the Titans chattering.”
Athena looks concerned. “Asopos is the son of Okeanos,” she says. “He didn’t fight alongside his brothers against the Olympians, and he still remains a valuable ally to us. Hurting his son could cause a problem.”
No one wants to see another conflict between Olympians and Titans.
“It won’t come to that,” Zeus says, irritated. “The River God was impudent. He challenged me.”
“Why?” I ask.
Zeus drums his fingers against the tabletop. He glances at Hera, then looks away again. “Something to do with his daughter. It was tedious. I forgot about her long ago.”
Hera’s face is pinched, her lips pressed tightly together in a narrow line. I think the contempt in her gaze should shrivel him to ashes there and then. Instead, he juts out his chest, defiant.
“He started ranting and raving at me. In the end, I blasted his leg with the bolt just to make him be quiet.”
“Well, he walks with a limp now,” says Poseidon. “But I don’t know why he’s complaining; he can still swim.”
The two of them snort with laughter.
When the council is over, Hera rises and stalks away without a word. Ares slides his chair back on the marble tiles and walks out without bidding anyone goodbye. I note the smug curl of Zeus’ lips, pleased that his errant son is back under his command.
For now, I think. But peace between the two of them never lasts long.
It can’t shatter quickly enough for me.