Iris

Chapter Ten

"One pain is cured by another. Catch some new infection in your eye and the poison of the old one would die.”

~William Shakespeare

***

My eyes drifted open and the smells of the city were gone, along with my peace of mind. The fragrances of strip clubs and cigarette smoke were replaced by an airy scent of flowers that wafted around me and danced in the breeze that flew in through the open window.

Also gone was Romeo. He said he would be here and that I wouldn't see him but I couldn't even feel his presence. That familiar weightlessness made the satin sheets against my skin feel more like sand paper.

I was in such a daze that I didn't even notice the door slowly swing open. She poked her head in as if she was checking on me like a mother checking up on her sick child. I didn't know who it was but I knew it was not my mother or anything remotely close to a motherly figure.

"How brave of you for sacrificing yourself for Phoenyx . . ." A chillingly familiar voice said sweetly to me. It was light and warm like the soothing crackle of a fire.

I forced my eyes open and saw who it really was that entered the room and praised me for my courage. It was Aphrodite. I turned cold as I spoke. "You've put him through enough crap in his life, someone had to cut the guy some slack. You know, do something nice for him." I spat, mustering even more of that courage that she supposedly liked about me. What did she know about courage? She'd never been courageous; she'd never been afraid of anything . . .

"He is my servant and I do with him as I wish." She explained slowly, in the sort of voice one uses with an invalid.

"He remains obedient to you and this is how you repay him? With the way you treat him?"

She rolled her eyes and I suddenly began to wonder why Iris or Phoenyx or I even tried with her. She didn't care. It wasn't in her heart to show compassionate to someone when she didn't have to. And yet she had to with Phoenyx. No one deserved mercy more than him. He ran to her when his family pushed him away. He gave her his trust in exchange for his services and she got greedy, waited until he was wholly hers, and she smashed his trust into millions of tiny pieces while he watched with hopelessness in his eyes. He was a boy and she took advantage of him and now he was trapped.

"It's Iris's fault for sending him into that cave in the first place. It's his family's fault for being so brutal to him. I had nothing to do with it. It's not my fault their society was how it was." She shrugged daintily, "I don't know what Phoenyx told you, but . . . well, I've been there for him. Just because he doesn't like how brutally honest I am, doesn't mean I'm cruel."

I remained silent. I had given up. I couldn't win with her. I couldn't reason with her when she had a stone wall of stubborness blocking her heart.

She sighed as she examined her perfectly manicured nails, then started to giggle cruelly. "Anyway, about you being brave . . . I don't like brave people. They build too much confidence and they begin to think that they are invincible. No one is invincible--even gods . . ."

My eyes dropped to her hand, tucked behind her back. She took it out from behind her, revealing a shimmering dagger with a golden hilt.

"You know," She said softly, "I have a lot of fun with breaking people's spirits. Just take a look at Phoenyx and those couple of millenia I've spent with him. I am the goddess of love; I like bringing out people's emotions, their passions, their inner machinations. Eventually, of course, things break and I get bored and have to toss them away . . . but Phoenyx was so much fun even after he broke. Like the gift that keeps on giving! Do you know why? Because he's still finds strength in the midst of his misery. He builds confidence and he gets this spark of hope that he's strong enough to--I don't know, resist--even when I'm crushing him beneath my heel . . . I can't let him think that he's all that, not when he's still so weak. However . . ." Her brow furrowed in frustration, "Whenever I think I've gotten to that point--the point of now return where he breaks . . . He doesn't. Phoenyx has held on this long. I suppose there's just more work to be done. I'll have to call him back and teach him how to beg."