She really didn’t seem too concerned about it.
In fact, she really did look amused.
Yahn and Carl busied themselves with mundane tasks, pretending not to notice. “It’s not what it looks like,” I argued to the group in general.
Kára grew still. Then she turned to look at me. “Oh? And what does it look like?” she asked in a maddeningly calm tone.
Even though I wasn’t supposed to know how much she cared about me, there was one thing I was suddenly very consciously aware of. A jealous Valkyrie was not someone to poke a stick at.
Nor was it someone to admit you had spied upon.
I cleared my throat. “Tonight will come early—” Yahn fell into a coughing fit, interrupting me. Carl began smacking his back to help him. I ignored them, averting my attention so as to hide my now permanent blush. “We should all get some rest. We’re going to be busy soon.”
Yahn lost it. “One of us is getting busy!” he hooted. “And it ain’t the birthday boy.”
Kára swept her dual-colored eyes across the misty realm. “I’ll stand watch. I’ll let you know if I hear anything…strange.” And then she was walking into the fog, hefting her trident.
I closed my eyes and took a deep breath. Then I made my way towards Aphrodite and her hellacious hut of hedonism.
33
I closed the hut’s door behind me and warily scanned the room. I felt like I was walking into the cave of a great beast, wondering which shadow held the monster, but knowing I needed to keep going despite the danger. That something deep within this cave was worth the dangers.
“Aphrodite?”
“In here.” Her voice came from the back bedroom. There really weren’t all that many places to hide in the tiny hut. The door was only open a crack, emitting a narrow sliver of pale light. I fidgeted with my Titan Thorns absently as I approached, itching to getting them off.
At the door, I took a calming breath, focusing on my needs and wants for this meeting. Resolved, I opened the door and stepped inside. The door clicked shut behind me and I gasped to find myself in a twilight nirvana—not the hut’s bedroom.
We were deep within thick, almost impenetrable foliage, and I knew that no man had ever ventured this deep into this magical forest. The same could not be said about my host.
Badump-bump.
Keeping the theme going, the forest seemed totally virginal—unexplored by mankind, her secrets unknown, and her magic unimagined. Although untouched by man, there was a vibrancy of life to the place. Mystery and danger thrived in equal measure in this place.
It reminded me of the wildness of Fae.
Moonbeams of pale moonlight pierced the trees above, stabbing the dark forest floor with dozens of spears of white light. But my surroundings were not completely dark. I smiled at the pure, natural beauty of dozens of naked, glowing, will-o-the-wisps who were innocently bobbing through the air. They looked human, other than their gossamer wings and pointed ears, and were no taller than the length of my forearm. I smiled to myself, pleased to find magic untainted by sinful human nature. They were all dancing happily to the music of the forest, and some were using the moonbeams like…
I blinked.
Stripper poles. The goddamned innocent magical pixies were using moonbeams as stripper poles. What they lacked in size, they made up for in impossible acrobatics and enthusiasm. They…um, well, they were good. Very good.
I sighed. “Just when I begin to have hope that at least some magic can be pure and wholesome in this world, someone needs to hire a DJ to play Pour Some Sugar on Me and start flinging fun coupons,” I muttered, my innocence shattered.
Their tiny throats emitted whispers of chiming laughter, relishing in my dashed dreams. Their fairy song filled the rolling slopes of thick green grass in a pleasant, tinkling sound, reminding me of wind chimes or the siren song of slot machines at a casino—enticing innocent fools with empty assurances of triumph.
One of them paused mid routine—upside down and gripping the moon pole with only two fingers in defiance of the laws of physics—and shot me an expectant smile. I grunted. “Money-grubbing pixie strippers,” I muttered, storming past her. I was safe as long as she didn’t have any bouncers waiting in the shadows. A troll, perhaps.
Other glowing blue fairies hopped from flower to flower, leaping tall bushes in single bounds and covering vast distances with expert somersaults and backflips, their wings whipping out at the last second to extend their acrobatic feats for a perfect landing.
The ground may have dipped and rose, but trees too thick for me to wrap my arms around filled the woods all around me, seeming to form a barrier to protect this haven. A steaming pond of crystal blue water occupied the area to my right, and I was surprised to see that a small waterfall fell from a rock face about twenty feet tall. I hadn’t even noticed the bubbling, splashing sound, but I realized it was having a calming effect on me, causing my shoulders to droop. Not in lethargy, but as if an expert masseuse had finally removed the last knots from my shoulders.
The air was warm and moist, and tasted faintly sweet with each breath.
A handful of trees circled a raised, flat-topped hill that overlooked the pond, forming a canopy of thick, waxy leaves, and aromatic flowers over the hill’s peak. From my position, it actually resembled a naturally grown garden tent. Dozens of candles—or perhaps glowing fairies restrained by their favorite bondage gear, given my luck—illuminated the space within.
Vibrant vines bursting with large, glowing flowers the size of my head, hung down from the canopy to the ground, serving as privacy curtains. Yet they did not block out the view of the steaming pond and waterfall. They served as an open porch to the magical oasis.
With a resigned sigh—not even bothering to question how the inside of the hut in dreary Niflheim had been transformed into a National Geographic Valentine’s Day scene—I expertly parted the curtains with two fingers to enter the magical tent.
Of course, I found Aphrodite waiting for me.
The goddess of love lounged on a reclined, moss-covered stone slab. I was surprised to find her nudity both emphasized and concealed by the neon glow of bioluminescent body paint that covered her godly curves in mesmerizing swirls and maddening geometric shapes and symbols. I realized, with a start, that the place was not illuminated from within by BDSM fairies. The light was from her head-to-toe body paint. The moonbeams hitting the canopy above had somehow turned the space below into the equivalent of a teenager’s blacklight bedroom.
Aphrodite’s teeth gleamed a luminous white as she beckoned me to join her. Her flesh was a pale, bluish gray wherever the numerous splashes of neon paint didn’t distract. Her hair was pulled back into a long, thick plait that curled over her shoulder and draped down between her breasts to rest on her belly, making me think of a sleeping serpent. She wore a woven crown of glowing, hot pink flowers.
She patted the mossy stone—wide enough for two, of course. I made my way over, not even surprised to learn that I had naked-ed myself upon entering her tent. I forced myself to play along with the scene that Aphrodite had so carefully crafted, even though my thoughts were on Alice’s safety.
Because my chances of rescuing Alice would drastically improve once I removed the Titan Thorns. Which meant I needed to take one for the team. To save Alice. Right.
I briefly wondered if this was an illusion or if Aphrodite had actually taken me away from Niflheim. If Kára entered the hut, maybe she’d find me sitting on the floor naked, having a conversation with an imaginary goddess of sex, and write it off as me tripping balls on Niflheim shrooms.
I shrugged off the thought. It wouldn’t be the most embarrassing thing my friends had seen me do. I’d downplay it as an arcane magical ritual. They always believed that one. Fools.
I sat down beside her. Surprisingly, the moss-covered stone was as comfortable as a broken-in couch, and my bare ass actually sunk into it a few inches. Without warning, Aphrodite pressed my shoulders down until I lay flat
atop the angled, Tempur-Pedic mosstress. In utter silence, Aphrodite pulled over a wooden bowl of glowing yellow paste and set to work on my chest, painting wild, savage, geometric shapes down my abdomen and arms. I watched her work, marveling at the glowing symbols on her torso, finding myself unable to verify whether she was actually naked or not.
I knew she was, but the glowing paint broke her form into distorted segments of pleasant curves, darkness, and dizzying symbols. Each breast was different in both theme and color, but both were mandalas of infinite, impossibly tiny, unrepeated patterns that made my head spin so profoundly I forgot they were breasts after several seconds. So I tried again, naturally, to play pin the eyeball on the nipple. Temple’s never quit.
As a whole, her body art reminded me of those Halloween costumes consisting of black clothes and a full-sized glowing skeleton on the front and back. The kid could stand on a dark street and wave at you and, just for a moment, your pulse would speed up and you would forget it was just a costume, not a real skeleton.
Except the amalgamation of Aphrodite’s body art transformed her into a deadly magical spell come to life. Her unsettling and captivating canvas of vibrant symbols, letters, shapes, and designs turned her into something deadly and dangerous, tickling the distant corners of my mind. Something I wasn’t supposed to talk about, but that I kept finding references to.
The Omegabet.
The longer I studied Aphrodite’s glowing body paint, I began to grow more and more certain that some of those shapes and designs were not coincidental. Had she painted herself with the Omegabet—whatever that was, exactly?
I snapped out of my thoughts as I felt her hot breath kiss my damp cheeks. She leaned over me, focused on her work as she applied a glowing blue paste to my cheeks and forehead, decorating me with designs of her own choosing. It suddenly felt much warmer in our tent, as I became consciously aware of how close—and how naked—we both were. Even knowing how dangerous it was to let someone cover my body in spells, I had committed myself to trusting Aphrodite—anything to get me out of these manacles.
Finally, she smiled down at me, tucking a strand of my hair back from my forehead. She let out an approving sound and set a glowing finger over my lips. I stared back, silently glad that she hadn’t decided to decorate anything below my waist. Judging by the intricate artwork on her lower half, I had feared she would focus entirely too much time on my more sensitive areas. To make sure we matched—and to be evil. Thankfully, she twisted around, reaching behind her. This gave me an alarmingly close look at her painted back and the glowing symbols trailing down her hips and over her —
She turned back to me, holding a flat wooden tray brimming with grapes. Smugly, I admitted that Aphrodite was way better at picnics than Ryuu. Chump ninja.
Aphrodite set the tray down between us and then plucked a grape out of the pile. She lifted it to my lips, forcing them apart to slip it in. Her finger—just the tip—wormed its way in for a quick second. She grinned before extracting it and scooping up another grape—this one for herself.
“This is how I first saw you,” she finally whispered, the sound tickling my raw skin. This was the first she had spoken since my arrival, I realized. I nodded, recalling how I had been covered in war paint from Fae when she had seen me fight Athena. “I promised myself you would be my greatest conquest,” she added in a serious tone.
I cleared my throat, convincing myself that the word conquest should not be used too many times, given the circumstances. “Is this all an illusion?” I whispered. “Because if not, you should know the fairies are pole dancers. Well, moonbeam dancers, technically. And I’m out of cash.”
She pondered my question for a few moments, ignoring my quip entirely. Instead, she slipped another grape past my lips. I nipped at her fingertip and she let out a playful giggle. “This is an illusion, but not in the way you think. This is an emotion,” she said, enunciating the word, “and emotions have the power to override current surroundings. Much as a memory of a loved one is particularly embellished and vibrant. How you remember a walk through the woods with a lover feeling romantic, yet the trail is painfully plain and uninspiring years later when walked in solitude. Without the lover’s companionship, our trail through life is merely dust in the wind.”
I nodded. “So, is this your emotion or mine?” I asked, studying our surroundings.
Aphrodite considered the question with a thoughtful frown. “I would assume it is a bit of both. I draw desire out of my lovers. Our surroundings reflect your desire as well as mine.”
I nodded thoughtfully. “How did you find me? I didn’t have your ribbon in my pocket, and I was in a realm outside of your…jurisdiction.”
She pursed her lips. “I grew alarmed when I learned you no longer held my ribbon, but I found another way to locate you,” she said, a coy smile replacing her displeasure. “You picked up a pearl on your journey. My lesson must be working.”
I frowned suspiciously. Well, wasn’t that convenient…
“A pearl?” I glanced down pointedly. “I’m not wearing pants, as you are well aware. And I would know if I was carrying around a pearl.”
Aphrodite laughed, making the roof of my mouth tickle as I felt her breath roll over my tender skin. She set her palm on my chest, right over a symbol that looked eerily similar to the Omega symbol. “The pearl is yours, not mine. That is how you have chosen to symbolize your love. And I can always find a man looking for love. You must have progressed on your quest.”
I shook my head. “I would never pick a pearl. That’s lame as hell. Tell me the truth.”
She rolled her eyes and then reached towards my solar plexus. She pinched her fingers and pulled back. I gasped to see her pinching a glowing white ball between her fingers. “Look. A pearl,” she said deadpan. I reached for it, but she purposely dropped it.
I tried catching it but missed. The pearl hit my chest and slipped beneath my flesh like a pebble thrown into a pond. I gasped as I felt a faint flare of warmth in my chest, and then the sensation of it sinking impossibly deep.
I stared at her, angrily. “I want it back! Where did my pearl go?” I snapped indignantly.
34
She arched an eyebrow at my about-face on treasured stone preferences. “It went back inside your heart, of course. Where you chose to lock it up inside the tallest tower you could imagine. It should be out in the world, in the palm of another’s hand, but you keep denying yourself this necessity.” She paused, sighing. “At least you found it. That’s progress.”
I frowned. “Necessity?”
“Love locked away is a soul in disarray.”
I drummed a finger on my chest, considering her words. “So, this pearl represents my love,” I said, wondering where I had found said pearl. As obvious as the guess was, thinking of Kára didn’t seem right. There were too many unknowns with her. “You said I subconsciously know who I love, so shouldn’t it be with that person?” I thought, momentarily thinking of Indie being reborn as Kára.
She snorted. “If you weren’t so thick-headed, yes. If that were the case, I could not find you so easily. I would not feel compelled to find you. You would not be in shackles.”
I let out a sigh, leaning my head back on the mossy stone. Aphrodite slipped another grape into my mouth, smiling warmly. Her other hand absently trailed up and down my ribcage, both soothing and exciting me. Any kind of physical touch was a great way to prematurely light a fuse to this bottle rocket, given my current frustrations and overall lack of romance.
“What have you been doing since we parted ways?” I asked gently. I didn’t mention overhearing Zeus and Hermes’ conversation.
Her face grew haunted and her finger stilled over my ribs. “Hiding. Watching. Spying.”
“Learn anything helpful?”
She lowered her eyes and retracted her hand. “I have troubling news.”
I tensed. “You learned something troubling, and you’re only just now telling me? Only after spending twenty minutes
painting my body with your glowing mud?” I demanded, swatting away the bowls of glowing paste beside us.
She nodded calmly, not reprimanding me for my outburst. “This paint—as fun as it is to play with—is actually a type of armor.” She raked her eyes across my face with a slight frown of worry. “When I tracked your pearl to the cursed realm of mist, I was startled to find you wore a different face. Yet I knew it was really you. Because of your pearl.”
I gritted my teeth, wondering why I hadn’t even thought about that. “Hermes did this. He tied it to the Titan Thorns when I tried to rob him outside my prison cell. The spell must have been linked to the mountain or something, activating the moment I left.”
She clenched her jaws angrily. “That snake,” she hissed, livid. She took a calming breath. “Seeing that you were now under an impenetrable illusion shed new light on what I had learned. I hadn’t considered it particularly relevant until I saw your new face.”
I stared at her. “What the hell are you talking about? What did you learn?” I demanded.
She nodded, pursing her lips. “I had intended a different, more intimate, lesson, but I was forced to alter my plans in light of my findings.” She indicated the mud painting our bodies. “Hopefully, it will keep us hidden while I enlighten you. My Father’s plans were more meticulous and far reaching than even I had feared.”
She climbed to her feet and held out her hand. I hesitated for only a moment. Then I accepted it and let her pull me to my feet with surprising ease. She was stronger than she looked.
“Come,” she whispered.
I gritted my teeth, resigned to my unfair life. Lines like that from women like her should never give a man nightmares. I guess I was just lucky.
Between one moment and the next, our twilight oasis was gone and we were in an entirely different, heavily populated setting. Aphrodite stood behind me, her arms wrapped around my waist as she pressed her naked body up against my back. She rested her chin on my shoulder, whispering sweet nothings into my ears. Not the sexy kind. The don’t panic, we’re safe kind.
Carnage: Nate Temple Series Book 14 Page 23
