Page 16 of Loved By Aphrodite

Aphrodite

Aphrodite put her phone down and sighed. All this waiting was driving her crazy. She had never felt so helpless as she did now, not to mention, the prayers and emotions from everyone who had downloaded the app overwhelmed her to the point she couldn’t concentrate properly. Thankfully, she’d learned to manage it before it became a deluge by putting a temporary block on the prayers. However, this was a conscious effort on her part, and if she got distracted, the block sometimes slipped.

Like when she saw Hephaestus with Artemis.

After the divorce, she’d heard a few murmurs about her ex-husband and the goddess of the hunt, about how they’d been spotted together or how she was often seen entering and leaving his home at all hours of the day. It shouldn’t have bothered her. She and Hephaestus were, after all, divorced after what essentially had been a marriage in name only. Also, whenever she met with Artemis, she’d never felt anything off or awkwardness from the other goddess, nor did she have that glowof someone in lust or love, so she knew that the two were only friends.

Still, seeing the two of them looking so obviously comfortable with each other had struck a nerve in her. Hephaestus had been guarded around her this entire time, which was understandable given the circumstances. But it was obvious her call had interrupted them. When Hephaestus had laughed at something Artemis had said off-screen, a stab of jealousy pierced her right in the chest. Aphrodite could only count a handful of times she had seen him truly laugh, and usually, it was not because of something she had said or did.

She mentally shook her head. Hephaestus owed her nothing. In fact, she was the one who owed him, not only for rescuing them from Cyncus long ago but for taking care of Eros.

And now here he was again, playing knight in shining armor.

But she couldn’t just sit back and play the damsel in distress, not this time, and certainly not when the world was in peril. She was the goddess of love, after all, and she had a duty to mankind. She would locate Eros and make him fix what he broke.

But where was he?

Making a mental list of his usual haunts, she visited each one, searching for her son. There was his favorite dive bar in Paris, a private island off the east coast of Malaysia, the rooftop of St. Mark’s Cathedral in San Francisco, and several other locations where Eros was known to hang out. She’d exhausted all of them, and yet there was no sign of her son.

Well, there was one place she hadn’t checked. It was, unfortunately, the one place in the world she never wanted to go back to.

Vale Crossing.

Eros had never hidden the fact that he often returned to his place of birth, though that was some years after Cyncus had died. She couldn’t blame him; after all, while he attained godhood andwas able to retract and unfurl his wings, he was still half geryon. Perhaps that part of him longed to be around other creatures like himself.

Vale Crossing was a sanctuary for magical beings who didn’t have the luxury of being out in the open. Thousands of years ago, humans and magical beings lived together in harmony, though as time passed, people changed and as their belief in the gods and magic waned, they also turned against the creatures and condemned and cast them out.

Shifters like Geri and Cade had human forms and therefore could live out in society to some extent. However, creatures who couldn’t transform, like Minotaurs, satyrs, centaurs, sirens, and of course, the winged geryons and gigantic scaly Drakkons needed a place to live, and so, they founded Vale Crossing.

Vale Crossing’s location was secret, except for those who already knew where it was. Aphrodite wasn’t quite sure where it was located on the Upperworld either, as the magic that protected it was older than the gods themselves. All she knew was that it was vast enough that the various creatures who lived there had staked out their own territory. For example, Cyncus had been the leader of the geryons and their city was founded atop a high plateau that only winged creatures could reach.

She thought about the last time she was in Vale Crossing, ignoring the knots in her stomach as she teleported there.

Opening her eyes, she found herself in the middle of the capital city, Alindale. It wasn’t officially the capital of Vale Crossing, but it was the largest and oldest city and thus the most modern of all the places. It reminded her of a smaller London or Paris, and the River Cirdell like a cleaner Thames or Seine.

“Oops!” She felt a jostling behind her as someone bumped into her.

“Pardon me!” a feminine voice said.

“No, it was my fault.” Whirling around, she faced the other person. “I just appeared out of nowhere, sorry about that.”

The woman dressed in a smart suit and high heels holding a coffee cup in her hand looked like any young office worker in a big city except she had a head full of tiny serpents for hair. A gorgon, she wore dark glasses to shield others from her deadly gaze. “No, I was in a hurry and wasn’t looking where I was going. Anyway, tata, I’m late for a meeting,” she said before rushing off.

Yes, she truly was in Vale Crossing.

Glancing around, she saw she had arrived at a busy intersection. People dashed about on the sidewalk, toward what appeared to be a large underground subway station. It was rush hour, if the buses, cars, and trucks slowed to a crawl on the street were any indication.

It’s all so different.

But then again, she hadn’t been here in millennia, so of course it had all changed. Gone were the quaint little streets and winding cart-filled roads and little shops. They had been replaced by steel buildings and busy sidewalks and department stores. While she’d heard about the changes to Vale Crossing over the years from Eros, to see it herself was a marvel.

She began to walk, taking in the sights, hoping to find some trace of him. She wasn’t headed anywhere in particular as she didn’t recognize anything anymore. She was hoping to find a sign or something familiar, but as hours passed, it became more apparent to her that this was like finding a needle in a haystack. And while everything that she knew about this place was long gone, she couldn’t help but think back to the years she spent in Vale Crossing with Cyncus, when it was good, but mostly, the memories of the latter years overtook her brain.

She stopped, feeling her chest tighten.

Eros, she called silently, stirring up the magical link between them. As his mother, she could usually sense where he was andeven transport herself to him in an emergency, but she rarely used that particular power. For one thing, she had caught him too many times in compromising positions. But mostly, it took so much energy that it could leave her drained for days, and she was already using most of her power to keep the prayer block in place.

Eros, she called again, but heard nothing back. Nor did she feel his presence anywhere near.

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