This Immortal Heart: A Novel of Aphrodite(6)
She sighs. “There’s something I need you to do.”
I let her words hang in the air. “Dysis, more petals,” I say, turning my head, and Dysis jumps up from the bank to scatter rose petals in the water. Her damp, auburn hair brushes against mine as she leans across, and I breathe in her scent of woodsmoke and apples. “With all your wisdom, what could you possibly need me for?” I ask Athena lazily. Then, a thought occurs to me with a rush of excitement—perhaps I missed it when I searched, but it doesn’t mean it isn’t in there, buried deep within her. I find the silty floor of the pond with my toes and stand up, water streaming down my shoulders. “Is it love? Are you in love?”
She looks at me, mystified. “No.”
“Oh.” I subside a little, but gesture to Dysis to hand me my gown as I step through the waterfall onto the damp grass. “What is it, then?”
“I’ll explain when we’re there.” She’s letting her impatience show again. I can’t help but be intrigued; Athena’s never acknowledged any use for my power before.
She steps into her chariot, reins gathered in her fist, her horses silent and ready for her command. We all have our own chariots, but when the whim takes us we transform at will and soar or gallop in different shapes. Athena prefers to be a silent, swooping owl, though now she is on Olympian business and so we’ll travel together in a statelier fashion. Whereas my chariot is beautiful—gold-edged with delicate carvings, drawn through the skies by sweet, enchanted doves—Athena’s has none of that. It’s as austere and stern as she is. Nonetheless, I sweep up my flowing skirt and step up beside the warrior goddess.
Athena’s face is still as we rise. I think it unlikely that she’ll engage in any further conversation, so I look down as we ascend, leaving the earth beneath us. The tree-lined mountain is soft and green, giving way to a rocky peak that we skim before sweeping up over the bright jewel of the sea. I bid farewell to the frothy white waves and the turquoise fathoms of water, and lift my face to the clouds, toward the palace of the gods.
* * *
—
There are gods who wield the kind of power that can shatter mountains. With the strike of a thunderbolt, Zeus can raze towns to ash; Poseidon can shake the earth until trees topple. Helios can scorch the world until the oceans boil dry and everything is aflame. But that kind of loss means nothing without love. They can destroy everything in existence, but only I have the power to make life worth living in the first place.
My power is different. From the moment I was born from the blood-foaming waves and the dying Sky, I have brought the living creatures of the world together. Since I first set foot on the shores of Cyprus, it’s been my purpose.
This island has always been my home and I’ll never tire of breathing in its scent of cedar and pine and feeling the warm sun on my skin. The songs of the restless sea, gasping at the pebbles on the bay where I first walked, soothe me as they whisper in rhythm with my soul. There is nowhere else in the world like it.
But Mount Olympus is spectacular in a different way, and I can’t deny the thrill that shivers across my skin as Athena’s chariot glides to a halt in the stables. Divine horses stamp their bronze hooves, whickering at our arrival, and the air is crisp and cold in my throat. Before us, the palace rises from the snowy summit in a dream of marble and gold, the setting sun striking the gilded columns so that they seem to glow from within. It speaks of power—an opulent wonder at the top of the world that is made for us, and only us.
As we make our way up the broad, shining steps, I see Zeus at the entrance, waiting between two pillars.
“Aphrodite!” he greets me. “What’s kept you away so long?” There’s a lascivious gleam in his eye that tells me he’d love to hear the details of precisely what—or, rather, who—has kept me so preoccupied, but I only smile. He has a vivid imagination—one I don’t need to delve into the corners of his mind to discern—and he has little need of me to fuel it.
Athena brightens in the presence of her father. “Never mind that. She’s here now.”
Zeus looks briefly disappointed. He hates to be denied anything he desires, however inconsequential. But Athena is striding ahead into the palace, and he’s quickly distracted from questioning me. He catches up with her effortlessly, falling into conversation, and I trail behind them through the airy anteroom. It’s as fabulous as I remember: the high ceiling tiled in dark blue squares, each with a golden star sparkling in its center so that when night falls it will mirror the wide sky visible through the slender, silver columns. The walls are painted with a blue frieze that makes me yearn momentarily for the sea so far beneath us, but everywhere I look something else catches my eye—the glitter of gems, polished wood, a finely woven tapestry (Athena’s work, no doubt) decorated with animals so lifelike I expect to see them stretch and roar and run across the cloth—and I think that it could almost rival the rugged beauty of my island after all.
Athena and Zeus linger at the tall bronze doors to the throne room.
“Hephaestus has been busy,” I say, waving my hand around.
Zeus shrugs. He’s not so interested in his artistic son’s accomplishments. Since Hephaestus was born, the palace has become more awe-inspiring, full of his work, from trinkets and ornaments to furniture both comfortable and exquisite. But Zeus has a narrow definition of beauty. He doesn’t look at much beyond the shapely form of whichever nymph he’s chasing next. He’d notice if he wasn’t surrounded by elegance, but he’s not one to express gratitude.