Page 34 of Invoking Ruin

I shrug. He thinks like a mortal, still, and cares about them. I’m not going to feel bad about some ant getting fired. “If I worried about the consequences of using my powers, I would never use them. I’m not here to be a force of goodness in the world. Mortals don’t need goodness, not all the time.”

“Why, because they need to struggle and learn?”

The answer is obvious, but I still laugh, shaking my head. “Because that’s just the way things are. There are gods of pleasant things and gods of unpleasant things. You can argue philosophy, if you like, if goodness is superior and whatnot. But that’s for mortals to worry about. I am what I am, how I was brought into the world. It would be to act against my own nature to try to be benevolent. Why should I?”

“So you never feel regret for your actions?” he asks.

A waitress brings the coffees and a few pastries on plates. I stare at them, hearing distant screams, seeing black Void drip over the edge of the coffee cups. I close my eyes, but all I see it Lethe and I struggling for that blasted rift knife. It slipping in my grip and cutting her open. Letting the Void eat her from the inside.

“I didn’t say that.”

When I glance up again, Sandro is staring at me, his face unreadable. He slides a sfogliatella towards me, and I snatch it up, tearing the delicate layers apart and putting it in my mouth bit by bit.

“Do you want to talk about it?” he asks, his voice careful. I shake my head.

“Not today.” Not ever. What happened between Lethe and I isn’t exactly the sort of thing you confide in other people. He won’t understand, but he will judge. “We have much to do. You should eat.”

The rest of our breakfast passes in silence. Not exactly uneasy, but not comfortable, either. The silence of an impasse, a battle delayed but not forgotten.

After our morning coffee date, we leave the town behind. I keep a pastry in a napkin for Pegasus. He deserves a treat after the long day he had, and the horse is notorious for his love of sweets.

He’s quick to greet us when we reach the landing spot, snuffling first at Sandro’s pockets before trying his luck at mine. I chuckle and let him gobble the pastry from my hand.

“How did you find Pegasus?” Sandro asks. “Or was he always yours?”

“He was wandering alone. His caretakers had forgotten both themselves and him.” I stroke Pegasus on his long snout and he nuzzles me in return. “That was centuries ago. We’ve been together ever since.”

That wasn’t the whole truth, of course. I also killed Megaera to get him. Given what she might have done to Pegasus, I don’t regret it.

“So, in a way, we’re both your strays.”

The words are so casual, but I can see the challenge in his eyes. Pegasus might be happy to be picked up like a lost puppy on the side of the road, but a temporarily amnesiac Dionysus is far more complicated.

“Something like that.” I know he just told me to stop dodging his questions, but he’s gotten enough answers from me today. “I’ll get him unhitched, and we’ll get going.”

It’s a quick process, and Sandro doesn’t fight me getting into the chariot this time. My time spent attending to the various reins, knots and latches would have been a good chance for him to run, but he doesn’t.

I try to take heart from it.

Once we’re in the air again, I turn Pegasus eastward.

“Are you going to tell me where we’re going now?” Sandro is gripping the rim of the chariot once more, a look of determination on his face.

“You won’t get sick this time.” At least I hope he won’t. “The reason the last flight was so bad was because you had a concussion.”

“What if getting sick is just who I am?”

“It’s not.”

His expression is skeptical and I have to bite back a laugh. “You used to ride in these all the time, you know.”

Sandro shakes his head. “You say these things about me, but they all feel impossible. I remember my life. I remember going to school, making friends. The house I grew up in.”

“Your mind has been filling in the gaps Oblivion left in you.” I take his arm. “Those are false memories. Only skin deep.”

He shakes me off, and I try very hard not to let him see how his rebuff stings me. After all, he’s right to be wary of anything I tell him.

“I know none of it is real. Momus made that very clear when he asked me what my mother’s name is, and I couldn’t tell him.” He turns his twilight eyes toward mine. “Do I even have a mother?”

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