Chapter 50 - Psyche

Rubbing the sleep from his eyes, Eros blinked back the blinding rays of morning sun. He wondered where hewas for a few seconds until the memory from the night before settled in.

Seeing Iris’s palace in the daylight was disorienting. Curtains were purple, couches were orange, pottery was green. And not muted, pastel versions either. These were full-on, ultra-saturated colors. The explosion of hues gave Eros a headache and he rubbed at his sore temples.

He’d felt like this before, but only after way too muchwine. And he’d only had a few sips of ambrosia while he was waiting for Iris to come back. But he didn’t remember her returning. In fact, he didn’t remember anything after sipping from her cup.

“That harpy drugged me,” he realized.

He picked himself up off the floor. Somehow he’d ended propped against a couch, meaning he’d spent thenight asleep on the ground. This would not weigh inIris’s favor if he ever caught sight of her again.

“Iris!” he called to the empty palace. “Iris, are you here?” He slowly circled the room to make sure his voicecarried to every part of the house.

When Eros’s own voice echoed back to him, it was clear he was alone. “Good,” he muttered, “because I might have to kill you if you were here.”

When his anger ebbed, Eros remembered why he was at Iris’s in the first place. She’d promised to help him find Psyche. But now neither woman was here. Damn it.

Eros pushed through the drug-induced stiffness in his wings as he bolted into the morning sky. As fast as he could manage, he flew to Aphrodite’s palace and pounded open the door. The golden portal crashed into the marble wall behind it, shaking the entranceway.

“Mother, don’t make me come looking for you. Get out here.” Eros clenched his hands into fists so tightly his biceps shook.

Aphrodite sauntered into the room as if nothing wereunusual about her son’s visit. “Ah, there you are. I was expecting you yesterday, but I guess you found other ways to occupy your evening.” Aphrodite half-smiled, twirling a ring on her finger.

Eros eyed his mother. “You sent Iris to drug me? So I wouldn’t get here sooner?”

“Umm…” Aphrodite answered with a sigh and brushed her fingertips along Eros’s shoulder, touching the remnants of withered flesh that still hadn’t fallen off after the burn. Eros jerked his shoulder back reflectively. “How is your scar healing?”

“As you can see, it’s fine. Almost gone,” Eros said through clenched teeth.

Aphrodite arched her eyebrows and turned her back on her son. Taking hold of her door, she removed it from where it’d come to rest against the wall and quietly closed it. Then she looked at the large crack that ranthrough her marble wall, running her fingers over thecrevice. “Something else I’m going to have to clean upafter you make a mess of it, I see.”

“Enough. Where’s Psyche?”

Aphrodite strolled over to a padded stool anddropped down into it. She pursed her lips and looked at the ceiling as she sighed. “Hades.”

The word worked better than a swift punch to thekidneys. Eros staggered two steps backward, clutchinghis gut in agony.

“You asked.”

Eros continued backing up until he found a stool to sit on. “How? How’d this happen?” He gripped his hair in his hands and rocked himself in denial. “I saved her from thesoldiers. I saved her. She got away. I saw it.”

“I didn’t say she died,” Aphrodite finally answered, after letting him marinate in misery for a few moments. “I said she was in Hades. I took her to the AlcyonianLake yesterday and Charon ferried her in.”

Eros’s eyes bulged as his hands fell away from the death grip he had on his hair. “You did what?”

“It’s a test. I’m sure you’ve heard of such things; Heracles had twelve of them.” When all Eros did was glare, Aphrodite continued. “Psyche’s actually getting off easy with only two.”

“Why’d you do this?” Eros demanded. “You loved her once too. We were all supposed to be family. Why can’t you just let it go?”

“I’m trying to, Son.”

“Excuse me?” Eros’s eyebrows strained for his hairline.

“I tried to bring the two of you together once and if you’ll recall, you both refused. How am I supposed to just act like that never happened? Or that you didn’t follow through on my curse? Or that she threw my divinegifts back in my face? And then that she tried to kill you?” Her head lolled back against the cool marble wall. “I still want the two of you to be together if that’s what will make you happy, but things are more complicated
now.”

As a god himself, Eros appreciated his mother’s need to avenge her reputation and her family. Her instincts weren't the prettiest side of her nature, but they all hadthem. No slight on Earth ever went unnoticed on Olympus.

“When she makes it out, does that settle the score?”

Aphrodite’s lips pursed together. “I’m still not sure.”

“Will you at least agree to call off Iris?”

“The trip to Hades and back is a long one.” Aphrodite went to her son and lifted his chin. “Don’t light a torchunder Iris’s pyre just yet.”



* * *



Just like his visit two weeks ago, Eros was left waitingwhen he reached the Alcyonian Lake. He paced along thebank, his steps falling with the graceful impatience of acaged lion. His eyes remained fixed on the cave entrance, but the only thing to see was the current of the river flowing out.

He forgot his pacing when he heard faint splashes onthe lake. Every muscle in his back coiled into rigid ropes as he stood frozen on the shore. The splashes grewlouder. Charon would be coming out of the cave any second.

Please let Psyche be in the boat.

Chapter end