03
rage
That's how Ares and Aphros spent their days. Stolen moments; a ride on his chariot one day, a stroll through rose bushes the next. A vulture had landed on his shoulder, and he thought she would flee at the sight of it. But instead she studied it in awe, and sent a dove in its wake.
'Do you know who you are, yet?' he had asked one day, when they were swimming in a spring.
'No, I don't think so.'
She ducked back under before he could ask again, her hair like blood in the water. He hadn't said anything, but he was sorting out what she would be on his own. That tenderness for soft things, the way she thought everything was beautiful and nothing could be ugly. He was surprised when he stood by Hermes one day as she walked past, and commented on the shine in her blonde hair.
But this was something that belonged to her, so he kept it to himself. Time would reveal her speciality, as it would her proper name. Until then, until that moment the Fates struck her with a label and imprisoned her in a box like his mother, he would enjoy the company.
She was joining him on a hunt in the woods one afternoon. The sky was a war of yellows and reds as the sun sank behind its horizon. The dying light set her hair aflame, and as she trailed behind him smiling at the sparrows, he felt a surge in his chest. To his surprise, it was not the rage he was used to - this felt warmer.
'Do you really kill with that spear?' she asked as he waited for her to catch up.
'Why, do you resent it?'
'No, all things must die.'
He stared in surprise. 'Yes, they do. I like to think that at least this way, they die in honour.'
'Is there not honour in a normal death?'
'What glory is there in peace?'
She thought of it for a moment, studied the spear in his hand. It suddenly felt wrong. He wanted to throw it in the bushes, hit himself for scaring her off.
Her tone in what she spoke next was not rooted in distaste, however.
'There is plenty of glory in peace. A man doesn't have to die in a fight to be honoured. If he was kind, I believe that is enough.'
Ares looked to darkening woods instead of answering. He had never been comfortable in talks like these. War was heroic, it meant courage; that's what he had always believed.
'You should probably go home soon,' he said to change the subject. It was the truth, Hephaestus would wonder where she was.
'That's not my home.'
'You have to go back to him.'
'But I want to stay with you.'
That warm surge in his chest made its way to his throat and suffocated any chance of a reply. If she kept looking at him like that, he might just choke. Why did she have to be so beautiful? He might've kissed her then, if he hadn't felt it.
A shift in the wind. Sword unsheathed. The familiar scream that followed.
Ares was gone before he could think. Aphrodite was too slow, went to seize him, but instead caught only empty air. He left her there, confused and shouting his name.
