Shimmering Splendor

by Roberta Gellis

  Psyche shivered a little as she belted her robe and tucked Teras’s blood token, which she had been holding all the time she dressed, between her breasts. She drew on a warm shawl then and went down to break her fast. She did not want to prove anything to Eros. She did not want to see Eros. She wanted Teras, her own dear monster swathed in darkness.

  The servants were very nervous. Kryos nearly dropped the tray he was setting on the table when she looked at him, and Hedy’s hand shook so much when she poured the wine that half of it splashed onto the floor. Psyche could only assume they had heard Eros yelling and perhaps had felt the magic. She had no idea what to say to them to calm them and so she ate quickly, wanting to get away from their anxiety, which had awakened her own. She could explain what she had done, but what if Teras, or Eros, did not come?

  Rising, she found she did not want to go either to her workroom or the book room. She was certain that any work she tried to do would turn into a disaster and no book could hold her attention. Fortunately the sun was shining, and though it was chilly, it was not too cold to walk in the garden. Psyche headed by instinct for the bench near the fountain. As she drew near it, she remembered the kindness, patience, and good humor with which Teras had wooed her, and she grew calmer. He might be angry, but he would not deny her a chance to explain herself. She approached the bench and stood smiling down at it.

  “You evil devil!”

  Psyche whirled about, her eyes and mouth round with shock. Despite the fury of the words, the voice was sweet and pure and the woman—no, girl—who confronted her was so lovely, so innocent looking, that the rage which twisted her mouth and made her eyes burn looked like an ugly scrawl added over a beautiful image. Her face was familiar, too, but Psyche knew she had never met this ethereal creature.

  “Ungrateful, treacherous bitch!”

  “No,” Psyche gasped, recovering a little from her shock and growing angry in turn. “Why should you say such a thing to me? I have never done you harm. I do not even know who you are.”

  But she did! Even as she spoke the words, she remembered where she had seen those features. The face was that of the statue of Aphrodite in the temple, except that the cold stone could express only a small portion of the beauty of the animated being, even now when the living features were all twisted with rage.

  “Murderess!” Aphrodite hissed.

  “Whom have I killed?” Psyche asked indignantly, drawing herself up, surprised to find that she was taller than the goddess and not at all overawed.

  “You tried to kill Eros, you devil. That you failed, that the only words he said were to plead for you, are why I have not struck you down.”

  “Tried to kill Eros?” Psyche echoed stupidly. “I tried to counter his spell against my father, but—”

  “Last night!” Aphrodite shrieked. “You decided to free yourself from what you thought was a monster by murder, by using a token he had given you in love.”

  “No!” Psyche cried. “No! I only used a counterspell to break the spell of darkness. I did him no harm. I love my monster. I would not hurt Teras for all the world.”

  “Liar! He lies in my house near death now. Only Asclepius’s skill has kept breath in his body.”

  Psyche was trembling now, head bent, hands prayerfully clasped. “Lady,” she said faintly, “say you do not mean it. Say that you are only trying to punish me for rejecting you. It was only a counterspell to the darkness. I swear. I will show you the spell. I have so little power. I could not have done him harm. If the spell failed, it would only have lashed me with loose power.”

  “But you used his blood token to enforce it, and it burned into his vitals—” Aphrodite’s voice was also trembling, and tears misted her clear eyes.

  Psyche’s head came up, staring eyes round with horror, unheeded tears streaming down her cheeks. “The token,” she whispered. “It drove the spell too deep.” She clutched her hands at her breast. “I meant no harm. I only wanted to prove that I loved him, that I cared nothing for his monstrous form and would love him even after I saw him. Mother, help him. Help him. I meant no harm.”

  “You had better pray for his well doing, for if he dies, I will tear you in pieces. All the years I have struggled to keep him alive, and you—”

  Aphrodite’s voice broke and she raised her hand as if to strike Psyche. Psyche’s eyes flicked up to the raised hand, but she did not flinch.

  “I meant no harm,” she said, more steadily now. “You know I meant him no harm. Lady Aphrodite, you love him too. Take me to him. Let me nurse him. I am a good physician. Perhaps because it was my spell, I can be of some help. I will do anything. Let me prove my love.”

  Aphrodite made a low, contemptuous sound and turned away.

  “Wait,” Psyche called. “I still have his blood token. Please take it back to him.”

  Shocked at having forgotten something so important, and torn between rage and an uncomfortable knowledge of the true devotion that made Psyche remember, Aphrodite turned. Psyche held out the bloodstained cloth. Aphrodite stepped forward and snatched it from her fingers, her eyes instinctively glancing at the girl’s face to measure her reaction. What she saw there made her hesitate. More than weak devotion lit the perfection of feature that was Psyche’s face. There was intelligence in the broad brow, courage in the violet eyes, tear-drenched but meeting hers firmly, and great determination in the firm chin and set lips.

  “Is that supposed to prove your love?” Aphrodite snapped. She turned and began to walk away. Then, just before she invoked the translocation spell, she looked back over her shoulder and added grudgingly, “Well, you did offer before I wrested it from you, though I am sure you knew I could take it whenever I wished. Still… Perhaps I will let you try to prove the love you avow. And if you prove it, perhaps I will let you come to serve poor Eros…perhaps.”

  The words held out hope because Aphrodite had realized as she looked into Psyche’s face that if she did not give the girl hope, desperation would drive her to some irremediable act. If she should kill herself… Internally Aphrodite flinched. It would not matter to her if Psyche died, but to Eros? She was not sure. It was true that when Asclepius had revived him before sending him off into a deep, drugged sleep, all Eros had whispered was, “Do not harm Psyche. Do not.” But there was still a chance that when his wits were restored and he thought about what Psyche had done, he would be sickened and his love would end.

  Unfortunately, Eros was not a fool and he knew a great deal about spells. When his wits were restored, he might just as well recognize that only an uncontrolled and overpowerful counterspell had been used. If so, he might easily work out the same reason for using a counterspell that Psyche had already given. Whether the reason was genuine or not was irrelevant. Once Eros seized on it, he would be only too glad to believe Psyche had not tried to kill the monster. Then, if he learned she was dead, he would follow her into the grave as soon as he could.

  As soon as she arrived in her house, Aphrodite went in to look at Eros. A young boy, not one of the little cherubs but a child approaching puberty and the time of leaving her household, sat by the bed, attentively watching Eros’s face. It was marked by pain and by two deep grooves between the brows, as if trouble haunted his sleep, but the ghastly pallor and the sheen of cold sweat were gone.

  “How is he?” she murmured.

  The child started but smiled and bowed from his seat as he turned toward her, replying in a low voice, “Lord Eros ate a bowl of broth, but he was mostly asleep even while he ate, and Master Asclepius gave him more of the sleeping potion.” Then the child looked anxious and added, “He asked for you. I told him, as you bade me, that you would soon come, but he was troubled and fought the drug. Master Asclepius was angry. He said he would return in the afternoon, that the drug would hold until then, but Lord Eros is not easy.”

  Aphrodite bit her lip, then slid between the boy and the bed. She knelt down and stroked Eros’s hair and, very gently, the grooves on his forehead. “She is saf
e, love,” she murmured in his ear. “I swear to you, she is safe at the lodge. Rest, love. When you are better, you will think what to do.”

  He turned his head restlessly, his lips moving. Aphrodite was certain that what he thought he was doing was calling for Psyche. She assured him again and then again that Psyche was safe and well. Finally some sense of what she said seemed to penetrate his drugged mind, for he grew quieter and his frown lessened. Aphrodite rose and went back to her own apartment.

  She had been so enraged by needing to offer assurances she did not wish to give that she began to wonder, as she knelt beside Eros, whether she could have the girl killed and leave evidence in the lodge that Psyche had fled. By the time she reached her chamber, she had dismissed the idea. Aside from the difficulty of finding someone who would do the deed and then keep silent, the notion was useless. Eros was far more likely to recover from his love if he thought Psyche was safe and comfortable at the lodge and indifferent to his suffering. If he thought she was miserable or in danger, he would only begin to search for her, and he would continue to search until he was sure she was dead, and then the besotted idiot would kill himself.

  The clear progression in her thoughts—Aphrodite was not much given to thinking things out—made her so furious that she upended a small table bearing a collection of priceless crystal ornaments, some of which burst with satisfying crashes when they hit the floor. Idiot! Idiot! One would think a being as old as Eros would have learned to avoid the more violent bonds of affection.

  The noise brought her little girls, and she sent them away to get one of the older womenservants to clear up the mess. There was no sense in adding wailing children and bloodstains to her irritation. As she stood, staring at the sparkling fragments, some tiny as grains of sand, her anger at Eros’s stubbornness brought to her mind the look of grim determination on Psyche’s face. The woman was an idiot too! Who knew how long the vague hope she had offered would keep Psyche from some new stupid action to “prove her love”? She would have to set Psyche a task, an impossible task, but one that might seem possible.

  The womanservant came and began to pick up the larger fragments, laying them for some reason known only to herself in ordered piles. Aphrodite sighed as the servant set aside a many-faceted globe, unbroken except for a chip that spoiled one edge. Persephone had given her that. Persephone, who loved Hades as madly as Eros loved Psyche… Aphrodite sighed again, recalling how desperately—and unsuccessfully—Demeter had struggled to break that bonding. But Persephone had been sure of Hades’s love. She had known of his desperate need for her from when he had first snatched her into the underworld. Eros already had doubts. If she could build those doubts gently into disgust, he might not seek oblivion as an answer to pain and disappointment.

  Aphrodite’s eyes still rested on the maid, piling bits of crystal in heaps. Her surface thoughts were of Eros, but on a deeper level she was still thinking of Demeter, who had accepted her conclusion that the bond was unbreakable and now seemed content to have Persephone with her only when they blessed the fields and the seed. Aphrodite’s mind clung to the word “seed,” because she did not want her deeper thoughts to come to the surface, and then made a crazy connection among what might make Psyche seem indifferent, the piles the maid was making, and seed—many different kinds of seed, some as small as the tiny, sparkling shards on the floor. Aphrodite drew herself up and smiled a little. She had an answer to the task she could set Psyche—a perfectly safe, incredibly boring task that would not seem impossible but actually was.

  While Psyche worked at the task, she would remain at the lodge. Aphrodite could assure Eros she was safe and busy and content. To tell him Psyche was content would make her fondness seem tepid and might cool Eros’s fervor. Aphrodite’s perfect teeth set hard. Why could the stupid girl not be stupid? All the others had cured Eros by their own silliness or ill temper or jealousy.

  Aphrodite hesitated, then walked slowly to the central chamber and lay down on her couch to think carefully. Did she really need to do anything, which Eros might learn about and resent? In the past Psyche had thought her lover to be ugly. Perhaps now that she knew her lover was Eros she would be like the rest and make his life so miserable that he would cast her off in despair. But Psyche herself was so beautiful that she might be sure of her hold on him and not be jealous. And she had already held him for almost two years, held him against his own fears and doubts.

  In the end, Aphrodite knew, she might be as unsuccessful as Demeter, but she had to try to break Eros’s fixation. Psyche was a native with little power. She would soon start to grow old. The decay of her beauty might wear away Eros’s love, but Aphrodite could not take the chance, because if it did not, Eros would die, one way or another, when Psyche died. If not for that, Aphrodite told herself, she would have accepted the half-loaf or quarter-loaf of affection and attention Eros could spare her while Psyche lived.

  Feeling pleased with herself, and rather righteous, Aphrodite sent a little messenger to the temple of the Corn Goddess, requesting a word with Demeter as soon as it was convenient for her. She did not expect any reply until dark because Demeter and Persephone were out blessing the fields all day, and, tired from her wakeful night and the emotional upheavals she had suffered, she slipped asleep on the couch.

  She was wakened late in the afternoon by the boy who had watched beside Eros. Before she could feel any alarm, he said that Asclepius had come, but that Eros would not take the medicine he offered until he had spoken with her. Aphrodite hurried to Eros’s chamber, where she saw with relief that although Eros’s mouth was tight with pain, Asclepius looked merely irritated, not worried.

  “Psyche?” Eros said. “You did not harm her!”

  “No, of course not, you silly man,” Aphrodite said, sitting down on the stool where the boy had kept watch and taking Eros’s hand. “I do not say I would not have eaten her alive if I had gone when you first arrived here, but I was too busy getting you to bed and helping Asclepius. After he said you would likely recover, I only went to ask why she wished to kill a being who had been so kind to her.” Then her eyes and mouth grew hard in a way that was more horrible because of the look of innocence of the features. “But,” she added, “if you die, I will have her torn apart—”

  “Aphrodite!” Asclepius interrupted. “It will do my patient no good to be terrified. His spirit needs peace and a time to recover. I only agreed to your speaking with him for a few moments to relieve his worries and make him calmer.”

  Aphrodite smiled sweetly. “But there is nothing in what I said to worry him. All Eros has to do is resolve to live and obey your instructions and his precious Psyche will be safe.”

  “I am not trying to die,” Eros said, smiling faintly. “I want to get better. I must know why—”

  “She told me it was a mistake—” Aphrodite lifted a brow “—that she was only trying to break the darkness spell to…ah…prove she would love you no matter how ugly you were.”

  It was the truth, Aphrodite thought, and for the moment, because Eros was too tired and in too much pain to worry about the small, suggestive expressions, what she said would soothe him, which was necessary. Later he would remember the lift of her brow and the hesitation and wonder what she had really thought.

  “Thank you,” he breathed, “you are always my friend.”

  Aphrodite was rewarded by the easing of tension in him. His mouth was still drawn tight with pain, and he twitched from time to time as a mote of counterspell burned itself out, but his hands, which had been knotted together, fell open and one reached feebly for her. Aphrodite took it.

  “Yes, I am always your friend because you are always mine. We have each other, no matter what. That was why I took your blood token from Psyche when she offered it. She is so very ignorant about magic. Mother alone knows what more damage she might do you, wishing only to help…now that she has seen Eros.” She drew the cloth from between her breasts and put it into the hand she was holding.

  “But
if she needs me…” he whispered.

  “If you will tell me what good you would be to her in the state she has reduced you to, I will bring it back to her and urge her to invoke it.” Aphrodite laughed, bent down, and kissed his brow. “Go to sleep and have only sweet dreams, my love. I will make sure Psyche stays safe at the lodge where she will be quite content to wait for you.”

  “That is enough,” Asclepius said. “You must sleep now, Eros, and go on sleeping until the aftereffects of that spell are gone, or you will twitch forever.”

  * * *

  Psyche spent the day in an agony of indecision. One moment she was ready to plunge a knife into her own heart, sure that her love was dead. The next, she knew he was alive because she was certain Aphrodite would not deny herself the pleasure of telling her he was dead and exacting some terrible punishment. That thought was soothing. Psyche would welcome any punishment; no matter how dreadful, it would be less than the agony she suffered now at having hurt Teras, and to be punished might make that agony easier to bear. Yet her heart beat fast and thick at the thought of a long, painful dying, and she shivered with fear. Watering her terror with her tears made a small hope poke through the black earth of her despair: perhaps Eros was not near death, as Aphrodite said; if he were only sick, Aphrodite would not come.

  When the hope came to her, Psyche rose and went to look over her travel gear, which she had never put away, wondering whether she should set out for Olympus, If she presented herself at Aphrodite’s house, surely Aphrodite would allow her to tend Eros—unless he was so angry he never wanted to see her again. No, Teras would not be so unjust and so unreasonable. Teras would at least listen to what she had to say. Surely the return of the blood token would show she had meant no harm. But Aphrodite was angry at the damage she had done and perhaps would not tell Eros about the blood token.