The Rose

by Tiffany Reisz

  Mum raised her eyebrows.

  “See?” Lia said. “Two can play this game. Not so smug anymore, are we?”

  “You are definitely your father’s daughter.”

  Lia’s mother walked away. Thank the gods.

  As soon as Lia was in her bedroom she plugged in her phone, as she promised she would, pulled off her clothes and collapsed into her bed.

  Two seconds later, Gogo jumped onto the bed and stretched out next to her.

  “He’s not in love with me,” Lia said to Gogo. He seemed to sort of nod in agreement. Or maybe he was just trying to lick her arm. Hard to say.

  But Lia did know this—her mother was a loon. August was not falling in love with her any more than she was falling in love with August. The Rose Kylix or whatever the hell it was had aphrodisiac effects. She’d gotten swept up in the moment. That was all.

  When her dead phone came back to life, Lia sent a quick message to August.

  Psst...home safe.

  Please get a decent car so I can sleep after you leave me.

  It’s Wednesday, she replied. Our deal ends Friday, remember?

  I can’t see you after Friday? he wrote.

  I didn’t think you’d want to.

  I want to, he replied.

  Lia grinned at her phone screen. Then she wiped that stupid grin off her face.

  We’ll talk about it later. Good night/morning, she wrote.

  What do you want to play tonight? Zeus and Io?

  Wasn’t she the one he turned into a cow?

  Leda and the Swan, then?

  August added several bird emoji. He was never going to let her forget the bird noises.

  I’m not shagging a swan, Lia wrote. Surprise me.

  You sure about that?

  Was she? Letting August surprise her would mean she trusted the man. Did she?

  I’m sure. Goodbye.

  Apparently she did trust him.

  See you tonight, August replied. In your dreams. I’ll see you right now in mine.

  Lia set her phone on the nightstand and cuddled down into her blankets. She couldn’t quite stop smiling long enough to fall asleep.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

  Lia arrived at August’s flat just before nine. Eight-thirty, in fact—8:29 to be precise. She might have been the slightest bit eager to see him, though she wouldn’t admit that to herself. Instead she told herself a gargantuan lie. She was early because she was worried about hitting traffic. Or a water main could have burst. August lived near Camden. Real risk of rogue parades breaking out. Lia was not eager. She was simply using good common sense.

  Lia went to ring his bell, but she saw a note taped over the buzzer.

  Come in, Lia. All others stay out, please.

  Good thing he said “please,” otherwise the house would surely be overrun with burglars and murderers. Why did men always think they were immortal?

  Lia slipped in through the door, taking the note with her, and locked it behind her.

  “August?” she called out. No answer.

  She ran upstairs and found August already in bed, covers up to his hips and no farther, head on his white pillow, eyes closed.

  “August?” she whispered.

  No answer. She waved her hand in front of his face.

  Nothing.

  She placed her hand on his chest.

  Warm skin. Beating heart. Not dead. Good news there.

  The Rose Kylix sat on the bedside table. Propped against the kylix was a cream-colored notecard with the words “Drink me, please” written on it.

  Interesting. He must be trying to prove to her again that their nightly adventures were really trips to a fantasy realm as opposed to what she knew they had to be—a delectable combination of hypnosis and erotic hallucinations.

  Lia smiled when she saw August had also placed live roses on his night table next to the Rose Kylix. A dozen exquisite pink roses in a ceramic vase painted with dancing fawns. A white ribbon was tied around the neck of the vase, and sewn onto the ribbon—embroidered, in fact—was the name “Lia.”

  “Stop trying to make me fall in love with you, August,” she said, stroking the silky petals of the pinkest rose. “It’s not going to work.”

  August remained silent, sleeping on, lost in a dreamworld already.

  She picked up the Drink Me card. On the back August had written, “If you want, you can take your clothes off and get into bed with me, please.”

  Of course he’d added a “please” at the end.

  Since he’d said please...

  Lia undressed, placing her jeans and T-shirt over the back of the love seat next to August’s clothes. He’d nicely folded the T-shirt she’d loaned him the morning before, clearly intending to return it to her. She picked it up and held it to her face. When she inhaled, she smelled cypress and juniper. But it wasn’t cologne, because she’d smelled it on his skin Monday night after his shower in her bathroom.

  Lia placed the shirt with her clothes and told herself she would wash it as soon as she got home.

  Or maybe sleep in it. And then wash it.

  Or maybe she just wouldn’t wash it at all.

  Once Lia was naked, she walked to the bed, lifted the cup to her lips and then paused. Usually August said some kind of prayer or something before drinking but he always said it in Greek. She had no idea what to say. Cheers? Bottoms up? A good old Irish sláinte?

  Cradling the cup in her palms, Lia took a deep breath.

  “Eros,” she said, thinking August would like it if she invoked his deity’s name. “Thank you for letting August and me into your good graces.” She glanced down at him, at his hand on his pillow, his naked shoulder, his lips lightly parted, his lips she wanted to kiss. “And bless August, please. Even though he is a madman who has sex with clouds, he is a very lovely madman. Please help him do whatever he needs to do to get back in his family’s good graces. And let me help him if I can.”

  Then she drank.

  As soon as she put the kylix back on the nightstand, now empty, she felt a sudden sleepiness, heavier than ever before. Quickly she lay in the bed next to August. She didn’t feel right holding him while he slept, but she didn’t think he’d mind if she lay very near him, close enough just for their toes to touch under the sheets and their faces to face each other. When he woke up, he’d see her there. This time she wouldn’t leave while he was still sleeping. He might follow her home again. Gods forbid.

  A thick fog seemed to fill the room, scented with the sea, electric as a storm. She inhaled the salt and the wild wind and closed her eyes as sleep took her like a rough lover.

  She woke up on a beach.

  A beach?

  Yes, of course, a beach. Why was she surprised? She’d fallen asleep on the beach the night before. Why would it seem strange to wake up there? She didn’t want to open her eyes quite yet. The journey by ship had been hard. Too hard. Strangely hard. The storm that had blown up last night was like no storm she’d ever seen before. A small but furious squall, it had surrounded their ship like the storm bore it a grudge. No matter how hard they fought it, with sails and oars and prayers and supplication to the gods, there had been no fighting the rage of wind and rain.

  Thank the gods it seemed the storm had not wanted to destroy them, only steer them. It had forced them onto a sandbar where Theseus had dropped anchor. Once their feet had touched the soil of this island, the storm passed. But it was late and dark, and they were tired and hungry. Theseus had found a small dry cave to serve as their shelter. Their shelter. She and Theseus would sleep in the cave along the beach’s edge while the six men slept outside on the warm sand, standing guard. They had no desire to sleep in the cave, anyway, they said, and be kept awake by the sound of Theseus and his witch lady celebrating their victory.

  She had not dressed again
after Theseus had finished with her. She’d hoped to bathe this morning in a spring before returning to the ship. Standing, she clasped her cloak around her so that nothing of her body could be seen but her face and feet. She left the cave.

  The morning was pure and bright, and as soon as she left the cave and stepped onto the beach she saw a terrible sight before her.

  The ship was gone.

  “No...” she breathed. “No...”

  Not this. Anything but this. Anything but to be left behind, abandoned and without a word...

  Why? She ran up a grassy hill. Perhaps from a high ridge she could spy the ship or Theseus. She reached the ledge and saw empty ocean everywhere she looked.

  “I saved you in the labyrinth,” she whispered. “I guided you with my thread. I helped you slay the Minotaur and free the people of Crete from his wrath. I made your name for you. The great wide world will know the name of Theseus for centuries to come because of what we did together in that terrible maze. And you leave me? You said you would make me your queen... I would have had your child... I would have had your son...”

  “Count your blessings, my princess,” came a mocking male voice from behind her. “I could have killed him. Or turned him into a dolphin. So tempting...”

  She spun to face the voice.

  A man stood under a cypress tree, not twenty paces away from her. He wore a scarlet sash tied around his hips and a crown of grape leaves in his curling brown hair—and nothing else. His body was tall and long and lean, and he loosely held an amphora by the handle.

  “Who are you?” she demanded. “What have you done with my fiancé?”

  He left the shade of the tree and walked toward her. He walked slowly, no hurry in his steps at all. He had a fine male form, she couldn’t help but notice. The muscle of Hermes in his thighs, the beauty of Apollo in his bearing and the seductive smile of Zeus on his lips.

  When he came to stand before her, he lifted the amphora. “Wine?”

  Before she could reply, he lifted the amphora to his lips and took a long drink. He offered her the jug and she shook her head no.

  “You must,” he said. “You’re surely thirsty.”

  “I can’t...” She held the cloak together around herself. If she took her arms from under it to drink, she would reveal her nakedness to this strange man.

  “Allow me.”

  He lifted the amphora to her mouth. When he brought it to her lips, she nearly cried out with the sort of pleasure she’d felt when Theseus had taken her against the rough stone walls of the labyrinth. The wine was like none she’d tasted before. Sweeter, tarter, brighter. It burst in her mouth like a fat fresh grape. It was thick as blood and cold as a winter river. One sip had satisfied her strongest thirst.

  “What is that?” she asked as he lowered the amphora from her lips.

  “Wine,” he said. “Wine from blessed grapes.”

  “I’ve never tasted its like,” she said, panting, amazed. “Who blessed these grapes?”

  “I did, of course.”

  “And who are you who blesses the grapes of the vine to create wine like none other?”

  He smiled at her again, a wild animal smile. She took a step back from him in fear.

  Only gods could bless crops.

  Only one god would bless vines.

  “Dionysus,” she breathed.

  “At your service, my lady.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

  With a flourish, Dionysus lifted her off her feet and swept her into his arms.

  “Where are you taking me?” Lia asked the god of wine and revelry.

  Dionysus held her against his chest easily, though she squirmed like a house cat trying to escape the unwanted affections of a child.

  “I’m taking you to my vines,” he said in a tone that warned her such a thing ought to have been obvious.

  “Where is Theseus? What have you done with him?”

  “He’s gone to Athens, of course.”

  “He would not have left me behind,” she said. “Not by choice.”

  “No, he wouldn’t have. But I gave him no choice.”

  Lia shivered. Though his words were threatening, his tone was light. He spoke like a host at a symposium, regaling his guests with his best and brashest stories that he told first before they were deep enough in their cups to find everything funny. She stopped squirming in his arms when she realized she would not escape him. Instead she studied her new surroundings.

  Lia had never seen such a place as this island of Naxos. The trees they passed to their left looked hazy, like a watercolor forest. And the silver brook they followed on their right glinted as if the shallow bottom were diamonds instead of river stones.

  “What do you want with me?” she asked the wild god.

  “You, of course,” he said, and laughed. Such a laugh to set birds to wing.

  “Me? Why me?”

  He shook his head, laughed again, softer this time.

  “I watched you with that foolish boy. Ah, I was insulted seeing that short prince touch you. What you see in him is beyond me.” He set her on her feet at last.

  “He’s the son of Poseidon,” she said. “And he is not short!”

  “Never marry the son of Poseidon. Your children will smell of fish.”

  Lia punched him in the arm.

  He made an exaggerated face of pain and looked at her.

  “You struck me!”

  “He doesn’t smell like fish. You smell like wine.”

  “I’m the god of wine, for my sake!”

  “You’re the god of pissing me off,” Lia said. She slapped a hand over her mouth.

  Then she laughed.

  “Ariadne?” Dionysus said, eyeing her with narrow eyes. “Have you gone mad? Already?”

  She lifted her hand and whispered, “So sorry,” before putting her mouth behind her palm again.

  “Lia,” Dionysus said.

  She raised her hand over her lips again.

  “I think I broke character,” she said.

  “You did.”

  “I don’t know how.”

  “I know how,” he said. “Not that you’d believe me.”

  “Let me guess, this has something to do with magic.”

  “Look at me, Lia. Are you really going to stand here in this world and tell me this is nothing but a hallucination?”

  “It’s a very silly hallucination.” Then she gazed around at the strange isle. “But a pretty one.” She met his eyes. “Sorry I ruined it, August.”

  “August? Who? No!” He slapped his chest. “I’m Dionysus, god of wine, women and song!” His voice echoed across the valley.

  “You’re August and you’re adorable,” she said, still laughing.

  Dionysus/August’s shoulders sagged. His chin dropped to his chest. He shook his head.

  “Here I am, trying to throw you a nice orgy, and you’re mocking me.”

  “Guess I didn’t drink enough? Bit too sober for Dionysus?”

  “This was my fantasy,” August said. “I suppose I wanted to be with you more than I wanted to be with Ariadne.”

  Lia suppressed a grin of pleasure at his words.

  “I like your grape leaf crown.”

  “Do you?” he asked, turning his head left and then right. “Fetching, is it?”

  “I’m envious.”

  “Want one?”

  “Can I?” she asked.

  “Of course.” He wriggled his fingers in front of her face. Lia raised her hand to her head and felt fresh cool leaves growing out of her hair.

  “Very posh,” she said. “Can you manage a wardrobe change?”

  “The ladies who serve Dionysus wear sheepskin.”

  “Like condoms?”

  “Those are sheep’s guts,” August said. “She
epskins. Suede.”

  “Maybe something in cotton? Little warm for suede.”

  “If you insist, but we’re being very historically inaccurate.”

  Lia tossed the cloak off her shoulders and found herself now wearing a soft white cotton gown exactly like those she’d seen in a hundred Renaissance paintings of Ancient Greece.

  “Pretty frock,” she said. “Thank you.” She glanced around the scene before her—the meadow, the stone gate, the buttercup sun in the Aegean blue sky, August at her side in his crown and Pre-Raphaelite curls. “Why did you pick this place for us to play?”

  “You said you wondered why Theseus left Ariadne on the island of Naxos while she slept, even after declaring his love and promising to marry her. He was forced to by Dionysus, who had seen Ariadne and wanted her for himself.”

  “Didn’t Ariadne get a say in it?”

  “She did,” August said. “She said, ‘Yes, I’d rather marry a god than a short half-mortal philanderer.’ Worked out better for her than Psyche. Dionysus and Ariadne had one of the few rare happy marriages in Greek mythology. Meanwhile Theseus continued to womanize all his life and died heartbroken after the death of his wife, mistress and son.”

  “Ariadne dodged a bullet,” Lia said.

  “No bullets back then,” August pointed out. “She dodged an arrow.”

  “So did I.” She nodded with the realization.

  “Did you?”

  “With David. What if I hadn’t caught him kissing Mum? I might have spent weeks sleeping with him, falling more and more in love with him, totally oblivious that he was a complete bastard. And I never would have met you, then, right?” Lia asked. “Both Ariadne and I got screwed over. Then again, both Ariadne and I got to look ‘with mortal eyes on things rightly kept hidden.’” She smiled at August. “Just quoting The Wind in the Willows.”

  He put his hands lightly on her shoulders, met her eyes.

  “Do you trust me?” he asked.

  “Not even remotely,” she said.

  He looked at her, lips now pursed in disapproval.

  “A little,” she said. “Why do you ask?”

  “Because,” he said, “I want to do something for you. Here. Now. Will you let me?”