This Immortal Heart: A Novel of Aphrodite(80)

I drink, and Hephaestus follows suit.

Through the marble pillars, the sweep of the star-strewn sky glimmers. Somewhere in the world, Ares is under this same sky, but, even if I knew where, I couldn’t go to him. Wasn’t it always going to be this way? I couldn’t fall for the God of War and expect to find happiness.

He knows exactly where I am right now—and who I’m with—but his whereabouts and his company are a mystery to me. Perhaps he’s alone, on the bank of a dark river or on the lonely peaks of another barren mountain. Maybe he’s drinking wine too, his lowered brows and proud jaw silvered by moonlight. I wonder if Eris brings him news of the wars she foments in his absence. Or, if not her, maybe some other goddess is with him, or a nymph impressed with his brooding good looks, her eyes meeting his across a flickering fire. I drain my cup, slamming it down abruptly beside me.

Iris looks up, startled, and flutters over to me again, pitcher at the ready as I thank her.

The warmth builds in my chest, fanning out across my throat and my cheeks as I take another long draft of wine. I feel sly eyes on me, whispers rippling across the tables, and I shake out my hair as though shrugging off all the snide gossip. I turn properly to Hephaestus for the first time since I took the throne. “So,” I say to him, smiling for the benefit of everyone watching, “would you say this is a worse wedding than Zeus and Hera’s, or equally as bad?”

He stares at me, caught off guard. “Well,” he says at last, “I wasn’t at that one.”

I take another swig of wine. “Of course not,” I say. Hephaestus had yet to be born then. “You’ll have to take my word for it, then.”

His eyes are haunted. “I’m sorry,” he starts to say, and I silence him with a wave of my hand.

“Don’t,” I say. “Not now. Not while everyone is watching.”

His eyes flicker over the long tables and then back to me. “What do you want them to think?” he asks.

“I want them to think,” I murmur to him, leaning closer and letting my hair fall to screen my face from the most avid watchers, who might try to trace the movement of my lips, “that this is a game, and we didn’t lose.”

He lifts a heavy eyebrow. “We didn’t?”

I shake my head. “No.” I raise my goblet, swallowing more wine, luxuriating in the rush of it through my veins. “Don’t look so unhappy to have married me. It’s hardly a compliment.”

His jaw sags open. “I’m not going to gloat,” he mutters.

“Good. You’re not Poseidon, or Zeus, or Apollo,” I say. Any of those three would be truly insufferable in this moment.

“They’d make worthier husbands,” he says, and the wine catches in my throat so that I cough, violently.

Iris is at my elbow at once, proffering a square of linen, but I quickly turn the ungraceful splutter into a laugh, as though Hephaestus has said something amusing—which I suppose he did. “Hephaestus,” I say, “I didn’t want to marry you. I didn’t want to marry anyone. But, believe me, truly, I’d rather you than one of them.”

He sighs. “It’s what makes it more delicious for them,” he says. “That you had to have me.” I follow his gaze to Apollo, gilded in the torchlight, his face flawless and his hair flowing. “An ugly, broken god for Aphrodite.”

I wrinkle my nose. There’s no trace of self-pity in his tone, only a blunt honesty, and I’m certain that he’s not making any attempt to manipulate me into feeling sorry for him. “Apollo,” I say, “looks like he was carved from ivory. Like he was sculpted into perfection by an artist as talented as you. You”—I lock eyes with Hephaestus—“are more like raw stone.”

He shrugs.

“The stones of the earth that were shaped by Gaia at the dawn of the world. Made exactly as they were intended to be, to suit their purpose. I don’t find you any less beautiful for that.”

His eyes flare with surprise, but he doesn’t look away from me.

“And as for broken,” I say, “you were injured for saving your mother.” I take another sip. “It doesn’t make you lesser. Quite the contrary.”

“I thought,” he whispers, “that you hated me.”

Now I shrug. “I’m furious with you,” I say. “For the stupid blunder that got us into this mess. But here we are.”

And we’re here together. As the wine dizzies me and thoughts of Ares rise in my mind like the tide, I find I no longer want to see Hephaestus suffer. I don’t want to suffer either.

I find Dionysus in a cluster of nymphs, catch his eye across the hall and lift my goblet to him. A grin spreads across his face, the familiar radiance of wild hunger illuminating him from within, and I nod.

He seizes Auge by her wrist and whirls her into a dance. She’s startled for a moment; then I see her throw back her head and laugh. Hesperis and Dysis jump to their feet, their sandals darting across the shining tiles as they follow along. The Muses, already singing, lift their voices higher. Around the vaulted hall, gods start drumming their hands on the tables in rhythm. The noise echoes from the pillars; wine spatters from swinging cups, and the throne room of Olympus is alive with celebration.

For the first time since I entered, Hephaestus looks up with the shadow of a smile.