Page 73 of This Divine Revelry

‘It feels tingly.’

‘Tingly?’

‘Tingly,’ he confirms. ‘And on the rare occasion someone thinks specifically of me when they do it? It’s like a flare – a flame in the dark.’

‘Hmmm,’ I say, shoving another crumb into the flame and thinking Dionysus.

He jolts, his eyes going wide. ‘Oh no. You are going to abuse that, aren’t you?’

‘Yes,’ I say, reaching for another crumb.

‘Ariadne, could you please actually eat something? You’re a little old to still be playing with your food. Speaking of, Glaucus is a natural at palming tricks. Not a lick of actual magic but quick fingers – he’d make an excellent thief if Hermes got his hands on him. Might have given him a little talk about respecting women too, though I don’t – Ariadne.’

No, no, I had been fastidiously blinking back tears so that he wouldn’t notice. I know if I don’t contribute he’ll just keep talking and I’d been so hopeful that by the time he finally finished I’d have been successful in suppressing them.

He crosses to me – then hesitates, clearly not knowing what I’ll allow, and eventually his hand falls to my shoulder in clumsy pats.

I swat him away. ‘I’m not Sterope.’

‘I didn’t think you’d appreciate a hug.’

The tears are spilling over now but they don’t seem to be falling so much as surging. I swipe at them angrily and, distracted by my annoyance, they do seem to be slowing.

I push my plate away and stand, heading to the chest at the foot of the bed and digging through it for chitons.

I can’t believe I am back here. Returned to the mercy of my father’s rules and the tempered behaviour they expect of me. Disappointing everyone who once loved me with every word I speak.

‘What are you doing?’ Dionysus asks.

‘Getting ready for bed.’

‘What? No. Talk to me about whatever is wrong.’

‘There’s nothing to talk about,’ I snap. ‘It’s just a lot. Being back here and facing them all. I’m overwhelmed, not upset.’

He nods quickly but I can tell he doesn’t believe me. I’m not sure I believe me. I’ve spent so long focusing on revenge, but I hadn’t reckoned with the energy it would take to smile in the face of each dig, to brush off the shame they’re trying to place on me.

To pretend a part of me, a very small part, placed there by every doctrine ever drilled into me, doesn’t agree.

Dionysus offers a slight smile. ‘I’ve had fun with the donkey shtick but I’m very happy to move on to the “turning your enemies into dolphins” part of the plan, if you’d prefer.’

‘I don’t think Poseidon will allow you to do that just because his son slighted the slut he previously fucked and abandoned.’

‘Ariadne,’ Dionysus says, softer this time, and he moves back to my side. I fall to the bed and he’s right there with me, taking my hands in his. ‘You did nothing wrong. Absolutely nothing.’

‘I know, I know,’ I say. Because I do know that. Logical Ariadne can see those rules and consequences as exactly what they are – a means to control. To keep women marked as chattels. To determine our worth in a world where we’re nothing but tradable goods. I know that we can want too, and we can yearn, and that the men in charge demanding our feelings become secondary to the laws they’ve created is just another way for them to exert their power over us and keep us all in line.

‘I know!’ I say, growing frustrated because what I feel is a different matter. The guilt gnawing within is a twisting thing, its own sort of labyrinth, winding ever on. ‘I know that sex isn’t some moral test, just a thing. A fun thing, a meaningful thing, for some a meaningless thing, even – whatever it is to you, it is just a thing like any other. Not an indictment or … or …’

I’m getting choked up and he holds my hands tighter.

‘It’s also a tool,’ Dionysus says. ‘Because they’ve made it one. What it is and what the world has made it are two very different things. And in Theseus’s hands it was a weapon he wielded against you. You are allowed to be upset. It’s not illogical to be wounded.’

‘Right. That’s right too, I just … I agreed to it,’ I say at last. ‘I wanted it. I should have known better.’

‘You slept with the man you were engaged to marry. A man you thought loved you or at the very least cared for you. Those were the circumstances you consented to. People who lie to get you into bed don’t then get to claim you agreed to anything. And however you feel about that betrayal is justified.’

His voice shakes with anger, his hands taut in mine. But he’s trying to be level, trying to soothe me when I know what he really wants is to march down the hall and incinerate Theseus.