This Immortal Heart: A Novel of Aphrodite(113)

Poseidon starts to rise, fury contorting his face, violence and retribution thick in the air. Ares stands defiant, his chest heaving and his eyes burning wild and savage.

“Ares.” I hardly recognize my own voice.

“Stop.” It’s Zeus, striding toward us. “Brother, stop.”

Seeing his effort is like watching someone try to turn back the tide, but Poseidon struggles and finds a way to master himself under Zeus’ command. His breath comes hard and fast, his eyes bright with hatred, fixed in a vicious glare, but he shudders and stills, waiting for Zeus to act.

Zeus takes in the scene. The broken mortal, the angry father and the unrepentant killer. Chains dangle from his fist, shining links clinking together in the soft breeze.

“Well,” he says, “what’s this?”

Poseidon groans, a noise hauled up from his chest, shattering with pain. “He killed my son.”

Zeus turns his face to me. “Didn’t I say that he would?”

My thoughts are scrambling, desperately trying to make sense of what I just saw. “Ares,” I say again. “Ares, why?”

Ares stares past me. His fists are clenched, his voice low and vicious. “He got what he deserved.”

Poseidon roars again, and Zeus drops the chains, seizing him to hold him back. “Brother,” he says again, “not yet.”

A rainbow brightens overhead, and Iris lands gently. Horror dawns on her face as she takes in the scene, staring from one of us to the other. “You summoned me?” she ventures to Zeus.

He doesn’t answer her. His hands are tight on Poseidon’s arms. “Do you deny it, Ares?” he asks.

“No.”

Zeus sucks in his breath. “Halirrhothios was no ordinary mortal man,” he says. “He was Poseidon’s son. This can’t go unpunished.”

He glances down at the chains on the ground, and my throat tightens with dread. “Zeus,” I say, “you were ready to kill him yourself.”

Poseidon slumps in Zeus’ grasp. “No,” he moans. “No.”

Zeus ignores us both. “We brought these chains for Halirrhothios,” he says. “We came to apprehend him for the crime of theft. But this is far worse.”

Ares stands rigid, his back to the clump of trees.

“Iris,” Zeus commands, “gather the gods.”

“Most of them are already at Olympus,” she says.

“Not Olympus,” Poseidon growls. “Zeus, not Olympus.”

“Not Olympus.” He takes a moment to think. “Where, then?”

“Athens.” Poseidon spits out the word.

“Athens.” Zeus nods. “Iris, order them to Athens.”

She nods, twisting her fingers together. “What shall I tell them it’s for?”

Zeus smiles. “Tell them it’s to stand in judgment. Ares is on trial. For murder.”





32


There’s no way that Ares will agree to come, that’s what I think in the frozen seconds after Zeus speaks. But, to my utter disbelief, he holds out his hands for the shackles.

Zeus’ eyes widen in surprise, as if Ares’ acceptance is some kind of trick.

Slowly, Zeus clamps one bronze circlet shut around his wrist. Then the other.

God-made, of course. These are the fetters of Hephaestus, and Ares can’t free himself from them. No one can.

“My chariot.” Zeus gestures to it.

“Ares.” I can’t seem to focus on him; he swims in and out of view, the solid ground lurching beneath me. “Ares, tell us what happened. Please.”

A muscle leaps in his jaw. “Let’s just get out of here.”

“Let’s,” Zeus agrees. A triumphant smirk plays on his lips. He can’t have expected it to be as easy as this.

“Zeus,” Poseidon says, “the body.”

“Iris will come back for it,” he says, resting his hand on his brother’s shoulder.

“What do you mean, a trial?” I ask him. “The gods have never held a trial.”

It’s always been up to Zeus to sit in judgment over the rest of us and bestow his punishments and rewards as it suits him.

“We will now,” he tosses back to me over his shoulder. He’s leading Ares toward his chariot. Even in chains, Ares walks with brisk purpose, as though this is something he’s chosen.

As though he’s eager to be away from here, for a reason I can’t fathom and he won’t explain.

Is it just that Zeus wants novelty? That he seeks some kind of spectacle? Or that he wants us all there to bear witness to whatever is coming—that he wants us to be part of it?

Poseidon rears up, crashing back to the earth as a mighty stallion, hooves pounding; he gallops and leaps into the sky.

“You’d better hurry,” Zeus tells me, “if you don’t want us to start without you.”

I’m frozen to the spot, but this shakes me out of my paralysis.

Whatever this is, whatever grotesque farce Zeus has in mind—and whatever reason Ares has to play along with it—I need to be there.

I’m the last of the Olympians to arrive. The others are already standing on the flat top of a great rock in the center of the city. Beneath us, under the stars, I can see fires burning and smoke curling from the courtyards of houses. No mortals could know we’re here in the darkness, an assembly of the gods in the heart of their city.