Chapter 13
Charis sits alone in my quarters, surrounded by the fragrant blooms that the Horae have picked on Cyprus.
“He survived.” She looks up at me. Her hands are clasped together in her lap.
“That’s right,” I agree. I summon up Demeter’s words, hoping they will feel true. Hoping that they are true. “And Zeus will relent. He’ll forget his own edict in time, I promise.”
She shakes her head. “He’s unforgiving. He’s never reprieved a god before.”
“But Hephaestus is his son.”
“That doesn’t matter.”
“He’ll be all right,” I say. “Hephaestus is so unassuming and gentle that the other gods forget how strong he is. The thunderbolt didn’t break him.”
“It’s so unfair,” Charis says, an unfamiliar seam of bitterness in her voice. “Hera is the one who wronged him, but it’s Hephaestus who suffers for it. You saw her in the council. She’s still the queen.”
I’m reminded of Ares telling me it would never matter which side he took between Hera and Zeus; the only winners would be them.
“Hephaestus will be restored to his position,” I tell her.
“How can you be sure?”
I’m not. “Because you love him,” I tell her. “And I’ll make sure you get him back. Somehow.”
“I never told you that.”
“You didn’t have to.”
“Of course not. You always know.” She sighs. “But even if you get him back—how, I don’t know—he won’t be mine. He doesn’t love me, and you know it. He loves you.”
I’m quiet for a long moment. “I know that too,” I say at last. “But I don’t love him, except as my friend. In the end, he’ll see that.”
She shakes her head.
“You know,” I say gently, taking her hands in mine, “I could make him forget what he feels for me. I could make him see you instead. I could stir up his passions when he looks at you so that he never thinks of me again.”
“But you promised me,” she says, “that you’d never do that.”
“I did,” I say.
“I won’t change my mind.” She stands up from the couch, her fingers sliding out of my grip. “And, right now, it doesn’t matter who he loves. It only matters that he’s freed.”
“You’re right,” I say. “Charis, just wait a while. We’ll find a way, I promise we will.”
She reaches out a hand and brushes the bloom still tucked in my hair. “Where did you find this?” she asks. “I’ve never seen a flower like that before.”
I wish I was still in Ares’ courtyard, watching the strange purple petals unfurl before this day happened. “I don’t remember,” I lie.
She nods, her eyes clouded. “I’ll go and find Pasithea,” she says, and leaves.
I gaze through the fluttering drapes that hang from the archway to my balcony.
Helios has sunk his chariot beneath the surface of Oceanus, dousing the golden rays of the sun in its dark waters, and Nyx has thrown her veils of black mist across the dome of the sky, glittering with stars.
Silver-haired Selene coaxes the moon into fullness, her pale beams bathing everything in soft silver light and gray shadows.
As I watch the gauzy fabric drifting in the breeze, my attention is caught by a movement. I pause for a moment before stepping through the thin material and onto the balcony.
“You’re here.”
He’s leaning against the low wall of the balcony, moonlight shining on his dark hair and bronze armor. His helmet lies on the ground at his side, along with his spear and shield.
“Where did you think I’d be?” he asks.
I shrug. “Thrace. Thessaly. Wherever the war is.”
“Without saying a word to you?”
“How did you know I’d be here without my attendants?”
He looks surprised. “I didn’t think of that.”
“That’s why you’re not the God of Strategy,” I say. “If Athena were planning illicit trysts, she’d have all contingencies covered.”
Surprise sweeps over his face, then he smiles slightly in amusement. “So you’ve never discovered Athena in your chambers?”
“She’d look almost as out of place here as you.
” The balcony wall that he leans against sits on top of slender white columns of marble, each twined with pink roses.
Sprigs of myrtle blossom spill out of shining vases clustered in each corner, and the floor is polished tile.
It’s so incongruous to see Ares in the midst of it, dressed for battle.
He tilts his head in acknowledgment. “Will your attendants be back soon?” His tone is casual, unconcerned, as though he doesn’t care about the answer, but there’s a meaning in his half-lidded gaze and my heart flutters.
“Well,” I say, “how long are you staying?”
“That depends.”
“On what?”
“On when you want me to leave.”
It’s supposed to be over. But here he is: a secret temptation under the stars that no one has to know about.
But I can’t pretend that nothing has happened, push the events of the day out of my head, even if I’d like to.
“What about Hephaestus?” I ask.
“What about him?”
“What do you mean?” I say. “Don’t you care at all about what’s happened?”
He steps over to me, framing my face in his hands. “He shouldn’t have got in Zeus’ way.”
I pull back. “Not even to save his mother?”
“Hera,” Ares says, “doesn’t need Hephaestus to save her.”
“This isn’t his fault.”
He slides his hand up my neck again, stroking the shell of my ear with his thumb. His touch ignites a fiery trail down my spine, making me crave more. “He should know that he can’t fix what’s broken between the two of them.”
I swallow. “Did you ever even try?”
He smirks. “No one ever expects me to fix anything.”
“No, they don’t,” I say. “You break things. Hephaestus puts them back together.”
He gives me an appraising look. “I don’t worry about Zeus and Hera. Olympus isn’t my home.”
“But you’re still here,” I point out. “Don’t you have another war to fight?”
He nods, and I feel the crush of disappointment in my chest. “I wanted to make sure, first of all,” he says, “that you were all right.”
My heart lifts.
“And that you weren’t thinking of looking for Hephaestus,” he finishes.
I stiffen. “Why?”
“I know you’re upset,” he says, “but you should stay out of it.”
A flush rises in my cheeks, a sting of irritation because he thinks he can give me an instruction, even if I know I won’t do anything yet, not while Zeus’ anger is still so fresh.
The memory of him hurling his thunderbolt stops me in my tracks.
But it doesn’t have to stop Ares. “You could help him. You’re never worried about defying Zeus. ”
His eyes harden. “I don’t want to.”
“Why not?”
“We’re nothing alike.”
“But you’re brothers.”
“It makes no difference.” The moonlight catches him so that half his face is in shadow, the silver shining on his cheekbone and tracing the line of his jaw, sparking in his eyes.
“It’s always been this way. Zeus and Hera hated us both from the day we were born.
Me for being angry and him for being ugly. ”
“Hephaestus isn’t ugly,” I protest.
His eyes are like flint. “But it didn’t bring us closer together. I ignored them; he kept trying to win them over, even though it would never work. They’ll never respect him. He’s free of them now.”
“So he shouldn’t have even tried?”
“He shouldn’t have cared so much.”
“That’s not in his nature. Maybe you should care more yourself.” I take a step back from him, my chest heaving.
“Aphrodite,” he says, and the arrogance has melted away, leaving only sincerity. “Just don’t go after him. Please.”
I curl my fingers around the low rim of the balcony, keeping my face turned away from him. I don’t want to look at him. His lack of compassion for his own brother is incomprehensible.
But then why did I expect anything different from Ares? A god who orchestrates death in a never-ending macabre dance…
…and so knows what it means to be alive more passionately than any other immortal could.
He moves closer, almost touching me, and my body yearns for him to close the final breadth of distance between us. “I only want,” he murmurs, “for you to be safe.”
A god who thrives on chaos…
…whose wildness can be tamed only by me.
He wraps a lock of my hair around his fingers, gently tilting my face up to his.
A god who can’t know love, when all he knows is suffering.
He came when he saw the storm above Olympus, not because he was worried about anyone else, only me. He stayed, despite his promise of more war, for me.
The snakes on his breastplate stare back at me, malevolent, their embossed eyes catching the silvered light with a crafty glint.
I know why I should resist, why I should tell him to go. It isn’t just his disregard for Hephaestus. It’s everything I know about the two of us. This can’t end in anything other than disaster.
But it doesn’t have to end yet. Just one more night, while we can still walk away.
“I’ll bolt the door,” I tell him.
The ichor in my veins is hot, surging like molten gold, racing through my body and melting away my doubts in a fiery dazzle.
He follows me through the drapes, his hands on my shoulders, sliding down my arms as I drag the heavy bolt across. When the nymphs return, they won’t interrupt. And they don’t need to know who was in here with me.
I turn to him, his arms closing behind my back. This time I take his face between my hands. I can see the fire in his eyes; how he’s burning for this, for me.
I pull his head down to me and kiss him.
The heat of his mouth against mine, the way he tightens his hold around me, obliterates the last of my thoughts, the ones still telling me this is unwise.
I don’t wield a thunderbolt, but I know that I’m the only one among all the gods who can harness this lightning and not let it burn me to ashes.