Page 73 of Invoking Ruin

Much like our first time in the olive grove, I’m remade by his touch, by his attention.

But only for a short time.

His desire to go his own way stings more than it should. I’d never thought I could keep him, not really. Today, alone, has been more than I ever expected to receive. I’ve had my sights set on him for so long, but I’m not going to fool myself. I’ve done too much fooling around lately in general.

But as he climbs from the bed, stretching lazily, the light from the setting sun playing across his golden skin, I hate how unaffected he seems.

If anything we’ve done together has touched him, it doesn’t show.

I can’t help but feel that it should. There should be a mark on him, some proof that I matter. He’s etched such proof so deep inside me I don’t know how to live without it.

He wants me to let him go, and has offered me my own freedom to get it. When will he realize there’s nothing for me without him? Especially now after I’ve had him, deep inside me in every way.

Maybe he’ll escape me for now. But he’s lost more than the last few centuries if he thinks his deal will be the end of it.

Dionysus pulls his trousers back on and helps himself to a bottle of wine, tipping his head back and downing it like water.

I lick my lips and force myself to sit up. “So how will you advocate for me to Nemesis, exactly?”

He glances over at me. “Are you agreeing?”

As though I would comply so easily. He can fuck me for days and I’ll retain enough of my wits to at least push back. I hope. “No. I’m just curious.”

He chuckles and passes me the wine bottle. “Nemesis gave me the means to get in touch. You’ll give me the knife and drop me off some place neutral, and I’ll do the negotiating.”

It all sounds so reasonable, almost charitable. Like he’s doing this for my sake and not for his. I want to vomit.

On the table, covered in a cloth made from the threads of fate, the rift knife slumbers. The air around it is just a little darker, a little more still, as though the Void is lurking beneath the surface of the cruel metal.

I suppose it is.

Climbing from the bed, I pass the bottle back to him and pull on my robe. My hair is a disaster from his hands and the rigor of everything we’ve done today, but I’ll worry about it later.

“You win me my freedom, return the knife, and then what? You leave, and act like I won’t follow you to the ends of the earth?”

“Atê…” He groans and sets the wine bottle on the table. “Yes. You let me go, and you find something else to do.”

I glare at him, as though it were so easy. “Do you suggest I take up knitting? Woodworking, perhaps? Join up with the sirens and lure sailors to their deaths?”

“You’d be good at that,” he points out with a grin. I fight back my own smile. He doesn’t get to make jokes. More seriously, he says, “You could always make amends with your sister. She holds no grudge against you.”

“She should.” No, I’m not going to see Lethe, not that Hephaestus would let me near her if I tried. I don’t want to see anyone.

Family had no time for me for centuries. I’m not going to find time for them now.

I swallow around the loneliness forming like a stone in my throat.

“Take me with you.” It’s meant to be a demand, but my voice is so weak, so desperate.

The pity in his eyes is immediate. I want to claw those eyes out. He has no right to look at me that way. “No, Atê.”

No argument, no justification. Just a locked door.

“Then I won’t let you go,” I counter.

He sighs, as though he expected this. “You don’t get to decide what I do or don’t do anymore. I can leave any time I like, by taking Pegasus or summoning Nemesis right here to take you. I’m giving you an opportunity. Don’t cut off your nose to spite your face.”

I wrinkle my nose at the terrible aphorism. Spite is something I know intimately, as I am my mother’s child. Like her, I’m willing to do a great many things for spite’s sake.

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