Page 79 of Love, Nemesis
“Off-color,” he repeated as if she’d been the only other person he’d heard say it. “The armies are already in place. I will not urge them to withdraw. I planned their route, ensured they’d go unnoticed, diverted all Numbers away from them. It’s already done.”
“But you don’t have to go with them.” Her tone was as calculated and severe as his. “You can withdraw from all of this.”
Ares didn’t reply, and for a while they waited there together in front of the paintings. He watched the bird sitting on a limb outside with the same intense, open eyes that he’d used to watch the painting. “It’s a beautiful day,” he remarked with a smile.
Ana didn’t move, not for a long time.
Ares moved to the corner of the room and picked up a bucket, walking past her before casting the bucket forward, dousing the painting in black.
He handed her the handle, black paint dripping down the sides.
Ana watched the painting, taking the soiled handle as black paint slid over the grotesque images. She stood up, finding her place beside him.
“I was born to be a murderer, but I don’t create these pictures to punish myself. I create them to release those feelings that might otherwise poison me,” Ares said.
Bucket handle in her fingers, Ana saw how it stained her hands.
“Paint over the black.” He grabbed the cloth and dried off his fingers again, walking toward the door. “Each piece of art is a smattering of the soul. We cannot create that which is not inside us, and in that, our art reflects the innermost parts of ourselves. We create wherever we go, painting people with our impressions, our soft and subtle actions that ripple out in ways we will never understand.”
“Ares.”
He turned in the doorway, still holding the cloth.
“What are you saying?” she asked.
Ares tossed the cloth back on the stool. He gestured to another painting hanging on the wall, one Ana hadn’t noticed yet.
She faced it, her expression faltering. “Setting Sail,” she whispered, tentatively reaching a hand up to it. The vast array of rich blues almost glowed in the morning light. “Is this…?”
“The original? It is,” Ares said, folding his arms. “The one thing I ever stole but didn’t need, I’d say. You gave it to Evan Gilbe, ifyou recall. Now, if you can turn my devastation into something like that, I will be truly impressed.”
Ana turned back to Ares’s painting. She reached out with bare fingers, covering the canvas until it was completely black. Still, she couldn’t help but imagine the faces beyond it.
She sat there in silence for a while.
Ares spoke for a final time.
“Our creations surround us, reflect us, and in such a way, they judge us. We are enslaved by the fates, which we dictate. Kings caged—at the mercy of the kingdoms we unwittingly create. As such, looking to the frightening challenge ahead of me, I brace myself with the truth that I am the State’s creation and its fate must soon become my creation. This dilemma is years in the making. Decades.”
“Then break that cycle,” Ana whispered. “Paint something else.”
A minute passed, perhaps more. When Ares didn’t elaborate further, Ana turned, but he was gone.
She looked back at the painting, mulling over their conversation and wondering if he’d consider her proposal at all. He had, after all, kept Setting Sail, perhaps a way for him to imagine a different future for himself.
She hoped that’s what it meant.
“I’m leaving now,” another voice said after a minute. She turned to see Lethe leaning against the doorframe, his arms crossed. He glanced past her at the painting but didn’t ask about it.
“Ares give you an answer?” he asked.
Ana set the paint bucket down. “I’m not sure.”
They both stood there in silence for a moment, Lethe’s eyes observing the paintings. His eyes lingered on Setting Sail, and for that one moment, Ana felt exposed.
“The last Strike,” were his next works, sending an uncomfortable stripe of tension up her spine.
“Do you really think you can kill it?” she asked as he walked into the room.
