Well, in the past timeline, anyway.
In this one, it seemed I’d given my body over to Zeus many times and then some. Hera loathed me—she had never liked being second best. I had no allies here anymore. I had no reason to stay.
I swiped at my cheeks with my thumbs, wishing I could go to Hephy’s forge and explain it all to him, make him see, make him understand that the woman he thought I was wasn’t me at all. Make him see that in my world, he’d been the greatest and truest love of my life. But he would not hear me, not anymore. I’d done too much to him in this new world, though it hadn’t been me at all. The memories he had of me were vile and ugly, and I simply didn’t know how I could overcome any of it. His reality wasn’t mine. As much as I longed for him, the attraction in this new world was simply far too one-sided to overcome.
No, there was nothing for me here in Olympus anymore. But there was still Hades and Calypso. And though I knew Caly would never wish this fate upon me and would admonish me to fix my own affairs—I grinned almost able to imagine her high-pitched shrill that I stop being a jackbanana, because bless her, she’d never been any good at phrases—there was nothing that could be done. I’d tried so hard to make my Hephy see me for who I really was, but…
I blinked, as I suddenly thought of something else. There was a reason and a purpose to everything. One merely had to believe it. Of all the gods on Olympus, I seemed to be the only one who remembered the alternate time in its fullness.
I had never believed in coincidences, which meant that if I remembered the alternate timeline, then there must be a reason for it. I’d tried to appeal to Hades’s heart, but he was morose, despondent, not the Hades of my time. He was different now. But also not quite like the older version of himself from the previous timeline before he’d met Calypso, that Hades had been cold and even at times seemingly uncaring and unfeeling. He was more like the nascent version of himself. Like the kind he’d been before I’d been conceived from the severed penis of my dear old daddy, Uranus. My origin story was weird and slightly repulsive, but it was a god thing and rarely had to make sense to be so.
I sniffed, rubbing my swollen nose, feeling miserable but also slightly hopeful. I’d thought myself an island, alone and forever apart from the land in which I’d once felt completely at home. But what if I wasn’t the only goddess who remembered? What if there were more of us out there?
What if…?
I stood nude, clothed only in the long blond strands of my gleaming, golden hair. It swished thickly around my ankles, nearly dragging on the pristine white floor as my heart suddenly turned over in my chest, pounding furiously within me.
“Time! Of course, you silly fool. She would know. Surely she would know.” I paced back and forth, seeing nothing, though my eyes searched the room.
Why had I never thought of her before? Surely, if anyone would remember the alternate threads, it would be her.
I grinned, hopeful and focused on something other than my own misery and anguish. I might not be able to save my marriage, but by damn, I would not let Caly and Hades suffer the same fate.
Wetting my lips, I thought of a garment built of the winds and of fire. I would go to her as the goddess I was. I would force her to see me as a power unleashed, even slightly unhinged should I not get my way—not hard to do considering I was a jilted lover, and as the goddess of Love, that was a stain I would never soon forget. The gown billowed like flame around me, moving in the supernatural breeze I’d fashioned it from, and I grinned.
I would go see Time and ask her what I should do. But first…
I squared my shoulders. If there was one thing I’d learned in my time with Calypso, it was that sometimes, to get one’s way, one had to throw a mighty tantrum to remind those around them who they really were.
I would not roll over. For any of them.
“I’m the goddess of love, dammit all to the Underworld,” I snapped, and with my chin held high I winked out of this space of existence into the darkest forge in the hottest heart of Olympus itself.
A loud, rattling clanging exploded like thunder and lightning all around me. Magma-intense heat shoved against my body, making me break out in a sheen of glittering sweat.
I lifted my eyes, and there he was, my deepest, darkest fantasy and desires. He was stripped down to his waist, his withered legs on display as he leaned against the fiery forge that would incinerate a mortal in an instant. His massive upper torso moved with the strength and agility of a predatory cat, and for just a second, I shivered, remembering just how those roughened and callused hands would move over me as though I were the finest of satin.
He raised his arm, ready to hammer down on the crackling fissure of molten white energy, when he suddenly stilled and twirled, nearly dropping his hammer as he clutched at the railing beside him.
Hephy had never much cared for using the steel legs he’d crafted. He’d only ever used them when he’d been forced to interact with the other gods. But with me, he’d always been free to be who he’d really been, trusting that I would never see him as less.
Setting his massive hammer down, he turned and reached for his mechanical legs. My heart squeezed. He did not trust me in this time.
I clenched my jaw, watching silently as he fitted the steel to his body, making him look half man and half machine. Normally, I was the taller of us, but with his steel legs, he towered over me.
His face was chiseled, so hard and severe that it looked hewn from stone. His jaw was square and looked as though it could cut paper. His nose was long and straight. His lips were full and the only soft part about him. I curled my hands into fists, digging my nails into my palms as I fought the urge to rush him and devour his body as he’d once done to me.
Gods, I wanted him now more than ever.
“What do you want?” he snapped, causing his black eyes, full of lightning, to spark and roil. “I think I made myself very clear that—”
“You don’t get to decide that for me,” I snapped, taking a step forward and noting the way his spine went taut and rigid and his amazing pectorals tightened. His abs were sheer masculine beauty. Hades might be the more attractive of the two, but Hephy was harder, more severe, like steel wrapped in flesh. He could physically break me with his touch, he was that strong. And yet he’d never done other than cradle me with tenderness.
His nostrils flared and fury twisted his features. He’d never been what anyone could call beautiful or even all that attractive. What he’d been was sublimely masculine, hard like granite and so unyielding, save for me. He’d always been putty in my hands.
My pulse raced out of control in my body, making my ears ring with the rush of blood. To see him right in front of me and not be able to touch him or hold him was one of the cruelest fates I’d ever had to endure.
“You just can’t stop yourself, can you? You want to hurt me? Wound me? It won’t happen, Aphrodite. You’ve made an enemy of me, mocked and jeered me for the last time. We are through. Over. You will never hurt me again. Not ever.”
I swallowed the heavy ball of tears in my throat, refusing to let them out. Refusing because if I gave into my misery, I would never be strong enough to leave. And I had to leave. No matter how desperately I wished I didn’t.
“I know you don’t believe me now, but you will someday, Hephy.”
He growled, taking a menacing step forward as he balled his massive hands into tight fists. “Never call me that. I refuse to be your—”
“You are thick and stubborn and so damned beautiful it makes my heart weep,” I whispered. My voice had grown scratchy, and I had to clear it.
His jaw clenched, and the muscle twitched. I could read his disbelief and his hate.
I shook my head. “I know you don’t believe me, and that’s okay. But I am not the woman you think I am. Whoever that monster is”—I tapped my breast—“it isn’t me. I tell you again—I am not of this time. I am from another. And in that world, you and I were allies. Partners.” I took a step toward
him, expecting him to roar or yell or even try to shove me back.
But he didn’t. He stood there, looking at me, and I finally saw something other than hatred. I saw the pain. Terrible, terrible pain. And it almost broke me, but I had to go soon, so I had to find my strength and press on.
“You knew me as no other knew me. The real me Not the silly female who lusted after tight flesh and wanted only the vain and superficial things of this world, but the one who laughed and cried and trusted you so completely that I handed over to you not just my hand, but my heart. You were the only one to whom I’ve ever given myself so completely, and deep down inside of you, you must know this is true. You may not want to believe me, but you know I do not lie.”
Fury tightened the mask of his features, but when I took another step toward him, he did not move, though he trembled with barely suppressed rage.
Being reckless, I did something I might never have done if I hadn’t been about to leave. I reached for his jaw, moving as though in slow motion, watching him as one might a venomous snake about to strike, wondering if he would pull away or even shove me back. But he did neither. He simply stood there, and when I touched the corner of his jaw, I felt the heat and warmth of him move through me like fire. I groaned from deep inside myself.
“Why do you toy with me, you bitch?” he asked, voice cracking as his eyes shone with wetness. I cringed.
He didn’t pull away. He looked broken, devastated. And when he raised his hand as though to shove me off him, he instead wrapped his thick, impossibly strong fingers around my slender wrist, holding me just as he once had, like I was fine porcelain and so easily breakable.
I tried to prevent it, but a single tear slid out of the corner of my left eye and rolled slowly down my cheek. His breathing grew harder, heavier, and I felt his eyes watching the movement of my tear.
“I will leave you now as you wish me to, my dearest love.”
He shook so hard, and I felt his internal battle. Hephaestus was so powerful, so brutally powerful, and it was that barely leashed beast within him that had always called to me.
I loved his dark side, craved it even.
“Why do you do this?” he asked, voice rocking through me with heat and pain, so much pain that I wanted to wilt from it.
I shook my head and searched his gaze, trying to find the one thing I knew was no longer there—his love for me. Just a glimpse of it would have given me hope to keep fighting, to keep hanging on. But all I saw was lightning and rage.
“I can’t live in a world where you don’t want me. Where you don’t love me.” I shook my head, and feeling that tear about to drip off my chin, I gently took it upon the tip of my finger. It had crystallized, and without overthinking what I was doing, I pressed that tear into the seam of his lips.
It was my love, my power. It was my heart. I would show him I hadn’t lied to him. I’d never lied to him.
I saw him breathe, saw the pink smoke of my majesty encapsulate his head like a glittering fog bank. But I had not tricked him. I had not forced him to love me. I’d not abused my power. I’d simply shown him my heart.
I stepped back, releasing my grip on him and forcing him to release his on me. When he opened his eyes, they raged with lightning, but his face had gone slack, and he looked at me questioningly.
“Who… who are you?”
I smiled sadly. “I’ve always told you who I was. Goodbye, Hephy. Goodbye.” Then I turned, and though I hoped that he might have called me back to him, he did not stop me.
With a heavy heart, I opened a tunnel that would lead me to Time herself. It was time to save the world.
Hephaestus
* * *
I stood there, numb, staring at the space where she’d once been and wondering if she’d been telling me the truth all along.
The Aphrodite I knew was a monster. A heartless, ruthless, and cold bitch who’d ruined me and razed my trust in others forever.
And yet the woman who’d just been with me had spoken truth. I’d felt it in her kiss.
With a roar, I turned on my mechanical legs and took up my hammer, forging Zeus’s lightning with the fury and intensity of a man possessed.
Who was she?
Who was she?
Who was that woman?
I gained no answers from my smithy, but I did not stop until I’d collapsed from complete and utter exhaustion.
3
Aphrodite
She stood in a cave with her back to me, wearing the form of a nubile maiden. I called her Time, but in truth, Lachesis was one of the three Fates, goddess of destiny, measurer of the soul string and reader of the present. She went by many names, but I’d always just thought of her as one-third of the twisted sisters.
Dressed in robes of transparent baby blue, with her golden skin gleaming like liquid metal, she was working on a project at a bench, stirring something into a hammered bronze bowl as an invisible wind swished at the hem of her skirt.
“It is about time you showed up,” she said in a youthful, nubile tone. “I quite feared I’d grow old waiting for you.”
I smirked just as she turned. Of course she’d known I was coming, probably even before I had.
Her breasts weren’t quite as perky as mine, nor her face as perfectly shaped. Her hair didn’t have the same lustrous sheen that mine did. But honestly, there was no comparison when it came to me. I knew who I was. I was the most beautiful woman in all of the worlds and realms. I rarely held it against others. There could only be one Aphrodite, after all.
“Lachesis, goddess of destiny and wisdom. So we finally meet, you and I.” I spread my arms even as I raised my chin, adopting my goddess demeanor.
The Fates could be fickle bitches when they had a mind to be. They knew past, present, and future, and they loved lording it over those of us who could not see in all directions as they could.
Her white eyes scanned my body, taking her time as she studied me. I could be a lot to take in for those who saw me for the first time. The Fates did not live on Olympus per se, and seeing as how I’d never needed their wisdom before, I’d never had any reason to make the trek all the way out to Gnósi—their hidden island home situated quite snugly in the center of the Never waters. Only gods and goddesses or those with business for the Fates could ever find their way to this forgotten and hidden realm. The twisted sisters were known to be a secretive bunch.
Finally, she looked up at me. “Well, I see that you are all I’d always imagined you might be, Aphrodite, goddess of love and lust, matron of whores and sex priestesses.”
I tipped my head in acknowledgement of my very old and very ancient title. I’d always been a particularly favored goddess to the temple prostitutes. I had no qualms about it either. Everyone needed someone to look up to, even those deemed unworthy by others.
My gown of flame roiled beautifully around my ankles. A strong breeze curled through the tips of my long golden hair. I looked every inch the haughty goddess.
“You know why I’ve come,” I said without preamble.
“Of course.” She grinned and tipped a glass vial of a glowing pink potion toward me. Just a second ago, she’d not been holding on to anything, so whatever she must have been crafting in the bowl was what she now held. “As I said, I was waiting for you.”
I lifted a brow, wondering what the potion was for.
“Then you will help me?”
She laughed. “Sure.”
I snorted because in that one word, I’d heard the dozen others she’d not spoken. The Fates’ help never came without cost to the seeker. But I was a goddess, not some mere mortal who’d not fully understood the tricks the gods played.
“So that we’re clear, Lachesis,” I said, taking a half-step forward, “what is it that you want from me?”
A grin split her not unattractive features, making her appear quite pretty in her own right.
“I do love how you get right to the crux of the matter. Quite a refreshing change of pace from what I’m u
sed to dealing with.”
“Deal with many mortals, do you?”
She rolled her wrists. “Indeed. Quite tiresome they are. You, on the other hand, are not tiresome at all. I always wondered how the goddess of lust made so many men and women fall simple and dumb around her. What could possibly be so attractive about someone so vain and petty and selfish?”
I clenched my jaw, loathing my perceived nature by others in this new life. I’d heard this same bloody refrain from Hephy far too many times to count.
“But I see now.”
She gestured with her hand in my direction, as though to encompass the whole of me, and shook her head. Her milky-white eyes glowed with a white flame. I’d always heard the Fates were blind, just as my one-time friend Themis had been. Themis and I were no longer friends in this world. Justice, as she was more commonly known to others, no longer knew me or remembered the bond we’d once shared. Just like everyone else, she hated me in this time.
But being hated by others wasn’t necessarily new for me either. I’d always been envied, and that envy had often turned to spite or even hateful jealousy until someone actually took the time to get to know me, not merely listen to the rumors about me. Though it did seem that in this timeline, I really was the wrathful bitch everyone thought me to be.
My stomach quivered, and that terrible sensation of hopelessness flickered through me all over again whenever I thought of all I’d lost.
I was an island, utterly alone. But not for long. Not if I had my way.
“What do you think you see, Lachesis?” I sniffed. “That I whore? Sleep around? Despise my mate?”
“Mate no more. I saw the decree.” She wrinkled her nose, looking at me with a smug lilt to her lips. “Had to sting, no? Love being dropped like a hot potato. Mmm. I must say, I do not envy you. Words I never thought I’d utter to one such as you.”
The Death King Page 4