I leaped up. It was Scylla, the plump tortoiseshell cat, sitting primly on a rock. My breath caught in my throat at the sight of her. At least a few of the animals had escaped; something of the world I had built with Eros survived.
I reached out to the cat, fingers shaking. Scylla sniffed me, hissed, and ran into the undergrowth.
In the morning, I slipped over shale until my feet found solid earth once more, following the ruins of the staircase up the rock. When it terminated in the jagged debris of the seaside house, I climbed hand over foot to reach the plateau beyond, the same that Cupid – no, Eros – and I had taken on our way to Taenarum. The memory, once so sweet, now felt as bitter as hemlock.
I moved quickly and made little noise. I soon took grateful refuge in a forest, far safer than the unsheltered plain, and prayed that I did not run across any bandits.
It was afternoon when a breeze stirred over my skin, a welcome relief from the day-ripened heat. A pair of ghostly fingers skated over my arm, materializing in a wiry form beside me. Zephyrus.
‘Psyche! What happened to the house? Where is Eros? And you, are you hurt?’ There was a panicked note to his voice that I had never heard before.
Once when I was practising sword fighting with Atalanta, she hit me so hard by accident that I could not draw breath for several seconds. Seeing Zephyrus again felt like that – a reminder of a world lost, a pain so sharp it froze my heart.
I wasn’t physically hurt, save for a few scrapes and burns. Butinside me was a ragged wound, salted by my encounter with Aphrodite the night before. And anger, endless anger at both myself and Eros. All this rage spilled out of me now, venting itself upon Zephyrus.
I swept Zephyrus’s hand from my shoulder and stepped back. ‘You knew about it, didn’t you?’ I accused. My nails dug into my palms hard enough to leave red half-moons. ‘You knew. And you never told me.’
Zephryus wrinkled his nose, perplexed as a puppy. ‘What?’
‘The curse,’ I snarled. ‘You knew that Eros – who you let me believe was some fake god named Cupid – was cursed to love me. And to disappear before my eyes if we ever saw each other face-to-face. Oh, you must have delighted in such a jest.’ I was trembling now, as though my bones might leap out of my skin to claw at him.
Zephyrus was staring at me as though he did not know who I was.
‘The curse,’ I continued. ‘It was the only reason Eros cared for me, wasn’t it? And why we could only meet in darkness. I should have known. Eros never loved me, he only wanted me as a … a pet, a distraction. Like your little Hyacinthos,’ I added, spitting the words.
Zephyrus looked at me with the expression of a man run through with a spear. ‘Hyacinthos was never a distraction,’ was all he managed.
‘You are a monster,’ I thundered on. ‘I should have known when you destroyed the Mycenaean village just to draw me out. Not a god to be worshipped, just a monster. I imagine Hyacinthos saw that too.’
That was enough. Zephyrus’s shoulders rose and a wrathful wind stirred his hair. ‘Then run away!’ he shouted as the trees began to bend and sway around us. ‘Whatever you’ve done,whatever evil you’ve brought down on him and yourself, I will leave you to it. As for me, I will go looking for Eros.’
I was blinded by a gust the same way I had been that fateful day on the plateau near Mycenae. I threw up my hands to protect my face as the wind whipped my flimsy garment.
A moment later, I was alone in the grove. Sunlight shone through the branches and birdsong echoed in the air, as though no god had ever been here at all.
21
Eros
A lightning flare of pain startled me from sleep. I looked up into brown eyes rich as the earth itself, a face framed by hair that was a lion’s mane of perfect curls in the lamplight. Psyche.
A lamp. A light.
I felt a flare of anger – she had broken her promise, she had betrayed me – but by then it was too late for anything but resignation.
The curse struck with the force of a tidal wave and dragged me down. Agony drove its knives through my immortal body, and I tried to scream, but the sound was torn from my throat as I was wrenched from my familiar bed. I fell through ice and fire, through rock and whirling veils of nothingness. I should have known that Aphrodite would make the process of separation as painful as possible. She had left barbs in the curse, sufficient to cripple a mortal. It was not enough to destroy me, but it did leave me drained. I could not die, but I could fade until I was nothing more than a spark of attraction leaping between two sets of eyes. I could become like Nereus, a wash of foam who had forgotten he was ever a god.
Then I was back in my body again, and I sagged forward. Rings of fire burned at my wrists, forming manacles that heldmy body upright. But crueller still was the pain from the burn on my chest, caused by the hot lamp oil Psyche had spilled on me. I remembered her face, her wide eyes and the awed circle of her mouth, illuminated by the lamp I had forbidden her to light. The knowledge of her betrayal was more bitter than the burn.
I thought she understood. I thought she wanted to stay.
I opened my eyes, scarcely noticing the difference. The darkness in the room was oppressive, relieved only by a dim rectangle of light shining around the outline of a door. But I could tell I wasn’t alone.
‘I should have known something had gone wrong,’ a familiar voice said, ‘when that mortal wench vanished so suddenly, and I saw no evidence of her humiliation. I told myself it was only baseless worry and that all was well. I should have known better than to trust you.’
‘Aphrodite,’ I replied. ‘Alas, I can only give you a poor greeting in my current state. Now, where is Psyche?’
‘Last I saw, she was near the ruins of your little house, weeping her eyes out. Really, my dear boy, I don’t understand what you ever saw in her.’
