Aphrodite's Flame

50. Dust

Ares and I find ourselves uncomfortably caught in a near invisible net. The more we move, the more uncomfortable our positions become. We are still very much intertwined, a knot of legs and arms. Then, a golden woman enters the room, and I look up. She is holding something that reflects the light in Ares' bed chambers.

'Aphrodite,' a low rumble comes from the shadows.

'Hephaestus?' I ask hopeful. 'O Titans, I'm glad to see you.' After having been caught for almost an hour, I need to get out of this position and this net. 

'Are you now?' I blink a couple of times before I realise we are caught in an invisible net no one else than my husband could have manufactured. My heart turns ice cold. 

'Hephaestus, please.' 

'Let us go,' Ares warns, his rage hot and powerful, his flame bordering on light blue, crackling like electricity. The net falls on Hephaestus' command, dropping Ares and me on the bed. We are both naked, and I grab the silk sheet to cover myself up. I don't know why I do - I have never been uncomfortable in my own skin. But I am uncomfortable now. 

Hephaestus turns around to the golden woman.

'Is that- Is that a looking glass?' I ask, my voice cracking, hardly audible. The face of the golden woman remains expressionless. The looking glass is a way to show your surroundings. It is connected to Hera's mirror pool. 

'Lo and behold,' the God of the Mountain roars, as he gestures in our general direction. 'I hope you all enjoy the fact that you are - in fact - right. Whoever wagered on Ares, please collect your winnings.' He walks out of the room and I wind the sheet around my naked body, before jumping up and following him, leaving Ares behind.

'What are you doing?' I seeth through gritted teeth.

'Ah, if it isn't my wife, in the arms of another.'

'I'm sorry?!'

'Explain to me, how it is Ares you went to see after you fulfilled your promise. Why did you not come to me?'

'Ace made a huge mistake - I came here to fix it.' I shouldn't have. It wasn't my responsibility. It never was. I should have gone home first. 

'You fixed a mistake in his bed?'

'How dare you assume I would climb in his bed and on his cock voluntarily?'

'How, Aphrodite? You did.'

'I did NOT! This was not voluntarily, Hephaestus. Open your eyes! Look at me!' He shakes his head.

'Someone told me where you were on your way here, Aphrodite. Everyone knew before me.'

'Then everyone knew before me,' I hiss.

'What do you want to hear from me? You went over here and you got what you wanted.'

'How dare you?' I cry out, my eyes filling with tears. 'Were you there?' And, when he doesn't immediately answer me, 'WERE YOU THERE?'

'No.'

'Then don't tell me what happened! I came over here because he took Persephone. I didn't know my ex lover and my husband concocted a plan to catch me - by raping me and catching me in a freaking net. You're disgusting.'

'I'm disgusting? You are the one who is running around naked in Ares' palace. It's okay, though. I should have seen it coming.'

'Seen it coming?! Seen what coming? That he would rape me?!'