vvitchsdesire | original: be the sun as my witness (Reply)

ao3 || wattpad || fictionpress

Title: what yields the need
Fandom: Original
Rating: G
Wordcount: 20594
Summary: She knows she’s not her parents’ real daughter; they’ve made that abundantly clear from day one, still a child of eight years old.

She knows she’s not her parents’ real daughter; they’ve made that abundantly clear from day one, still a child of eight years old.

Many years ago, the Count Louis of Foix received news that his wife, the Countess Anne of d’Etoiles-Foix, was infertile, he despaired. Many long nights of drinking, of nights full of nightmares not leaving a legacy behind - of having to adopt his brother’s children as his heirs, something that deeply revolted him, refusing to accept a gaggle of bastards to run his state after he died, all controlled by women drunk with power, a mirror of his own terrible childhood - and a tumble in bed with a maid later brought him a solution, by the same lips of the woman he had an affair with. She told him, in low, hushed tones, of the gods in the woods, of altars drenched in blood and guts, grounds littered with small bones, of exchanges.

“That’s how my sister got her second husband.” She whispered, dressed in moonlight. “She traded something for it, never told me what. Some blood in the altar, and nothing more was thought of it.”

The man was desperate enough to take his wife and follow the maid on a night of full moon, a lamb under their arm bleating softly. She guided them to an altar in the woods, stone dark and soaked with dried blood, and her whispered words guided them as she slashed the lamb’s throat.

The rest was history: their youngest for the god, her fertility gained in exchange, the trade valid when the child was eighteen, when the god would take it to his realm. They proceeded to have four healthy children: Charles, Louise, Agnes, Phillipe, and no kid had anything of ill health, not even a toothache.

Then, by the time Phillipe was two, Louis sent off Anne to the countryside, claiming she was having a high-risk pregnancy and needed to rest. It was an excuse; there was never a countryside to go to, Anne simply went traveling using a disguise, enjoying life away from the children: she had always claimed to be unfit for raising children, and this was her reward for bearing four just for Louis. The ruse was also one they needed.

Louis was a smart man, studied the law and knew its loopholes. The god that had granted them four children said their youngest to my realm, and Phillipe, his blood, his spare heir, would not be the blood price, sent off to marriage or whatever death awaited him. So if they adopted a child, and it was younger than any of his kids, then wouldn’t that little bastard be the youngest by definition? And, of course, he couldn’t let it run wild, so it had to be trained well enough to pass in court. They’d claim that the pregnancy had left Anne weak, so she would rest in the countryside, and the babe would be too sickly to travel while young, or maybe even forever: he didn’t want his children to grow attached to someone that would invariably die. The servants were paid handsomely for their silence in these delicate matters, and when the right time came, the child would become the youngest, and his actual blood children would be safe.

He still remembered the god in the woods: more beast than man, looking with eyes that seemed red in moonlight down on them, horns curling towards the full moon.

He would not subject his children to that blood-thirsty god.

Psyche didn’t always used to be Psyche.

She used to be called Thérèse, a name as simple as her origins, a life with hard bread and the sun shining on her skin, living under the leaky roof of the local orphanage. She collected mushrooms in the nearby forest, said hello to the dryads that lived in the shade of oak trees, asked for the water nymphs permission before diving in their lakes. It was a good life, the taste of winter berries and summer fruit heavy on her tongue, rain on her hair and the sun in her eyes.

Of course everyone knew of the beings in the forest, the protectors and gods that lied in the shade: they protected the villagers, gave them food and aid.

Of course no one knew of the beings in the forest: it would be heretical to suggest they existed, an affront to the God that watched over His flock.

Then came the Countess to the sleepy little village she lived in, claiming she needed a child to give her love to instead of her children, and Thérèse, before she was Psyche, was sold to her for a few shiny coins as a companion.

She had been six, and had never been allowed again in the sun: they feared the Countess wouldn’t like her anymore if she was tanned like a peasant, instead of the fair skin of nobility, which made no sense for Thérèse, really, her skin the color of copper already, only slightly paler in winter.

The first month had been… Alright, maybe. Lots of time spent in the company of the Countess, listening to her stories of countries far away, of food she would never eat. The Countess taught her a smattering of things, as one would teach a small creature tricks for their own amusement: Latin and French, reading, some arithmetics, etiquette, sewing. Thérèse enjoyed learning at the knee of the Countess. At night, after the Countess retired for bed, Thérèse went back to the orphanage, told the nuns and the other orphans everything the Countess had taught her.

She liked it less when one day - eight or so, already good with her letters, reading snippets of the bible for the older woman and with the Countess promising to teach her how to write - the Countess’ husband sent for Thérèse, as the king had summoned the entire family to Versailles, since the Count had been decreed to become part of the king’s Chamber of Reunions.

Not only his wife. For Thérèse, too. The Countess explained their plan, crafted for years and with Thérèse at its epicenter: she was to be their youngest daughter, and when she was eighteen, ten far away years from now, she would become the plaything of a god, his wife in a sick facsimile of a marriage, her absence until now excused by Thérèse being such a weak child that they feared she would die if she moved.

It terrified her, and it must’ve shown in her face, for the Countess gripped her tightly, the eyes of a madwoman glitzing like a candle’s flame reflecting in silver.

“I’m not losing one of my kids, Psyche.”

She knew of the tale of Psyche and Cupid, since the Countess had made her read it to practice her Latin: the girl who was to be the sacrifice for a beast even the gods feared, the story barely understandable to her. She had never been called so before, and it sounded, even to her ears, like an insult.

“Yes, Countess.” Thérèse said demurely, and the madness retreated from the Countess’ eyes. She was a mere orphan with no power, and one mouth less in the orphanage was better overall.

“I’m your mother now, and the Count, your father.” A pause, the Countess looking over her, as if not seeing her as she was, but just as a body devoid of blood, pale and dead. “Psyche will be a good name for you, little walker in the forest. Yes. And you look so much like my little Louise, too…”

She never said goodbye to her fellow orphans, to the dryads and water nymphs: it was like she simply vanished from their lives. The Countess did not allow her to leave the grounds anymore, citing she had much to learn, much to do, and Psyche couldn’t find it in herself to protest, beaten down to bare bones.

At night, sometimes, she would look through the large windows of the room given to her - too big, and her, too small -, and swear she saw bright green eyes staring at her from the edge of the woods, waving at her; Psyche waved back.

She arrived in Versailles, that glittering city-palace, one early morning, and she had been amazed by its size: the biggest building she’d ever been before was the Countess’ country manor, and this palace could’ve swallowed it, spat it out, made a playhouse out of it, and Psyche wouldn’t even have noticed. Every window seemed to glitter with candlelight, and the air smelled of sweet roses. Was the paint made with actual gold? She did not want to ask those questions, but she must’ve shown it in her face, the Countess pinching the soft skin of her arm.

“Act less like a peasant and more like nobility.” She hissed, and Psyche, with a quick nod, did her best to school her face into something more like the passive boredom everyone sported in their faces.

Servants, dressed in finery better than anything Psyche would ever own had she stayed back in her little village, guided them to apartments. The floor had carpet so plush her feet sank into it, every wall seemingly covered in paintings so realistic they could’ve been doors to other worlds, sparkling red velvet hanging from the ceiling as curtains.

They let the two into a small dining room, where a family ate their breakfast: an older man, dressed finely, and his four children, food all but spilling out of the table in a way Psyche couldn’t have imagined.

“Anne, my dear.” He said, interrupting the meal with three words. The kids - all between somewhere south of fifteen and north of eight, if Psyche had to guess - looked expectantly at the woman, the older one much more than the youngest boy; the youngest one looked at her with some kind of resentment.

It took her a while to hit her that the youngest boy probably did not have memories of his mother, since she’d been away for most of his life - and if the children believed their father’s story about Psyche being their weak sister, then it was her fault that their mother wasn’t around.

She wasn’t even their daughter; no, she was just a thing, a person to be sacrificed on a stone altar like a pig.

“Children, met your sister.” The father that was to be Psyche’s said, and even though she had dreamed of rich parents, it never had been like this.

She gave them a polite little smile, however, curtsying like the Countess had taught her to.

“I’m Psyche.” She said, looking at them through her eyelashes. “It is a pleasure to finally be a family with you.”

She could’ve puked on that carpet that was worth more than her life ever would be.

The children went off to their tutors after breakfast, the youngest girl tugging the youngest boy to move, who kept glaring at her, and Psyche stayed with her adoptive parents, retiring to a solar as opulent as any of the rooms before. It was dizzying, breathtaking, choking her in its cloying opulence.

She was starting to get an aversion to gold.

“So she’s the child you got?” The Count said, circling her like an animal would circle its prey, analyzing her every breath. The Countess flopped on a chair, sighing loudly, and Psyche lowered her shoulders, trying to make herself smaller. “Doesn’t look like much.”

“I’m not letting some adopted chit be the center of attention instead of Louise and Agnes.” The Countess shot back, and the Count gave a sharp nod, lowering himself down to Psyche’s eye level, one firm hand on her shoulders.

“Know your place, and you’ll have a good ten years under our care, daughter.” He pronounced every word slowly, as if she was not all there, but Psyche couldn’t do much more than merely nod.

Time passed as slow as a crawl. Psyche grew up in the shadows, her dresses always less splendorous than her sisters’, her education always a step behind than her siblings, her every item of lesser quality. They interacted little with her, too, unless forced by their parents: all of them, on some level, resented her. She spent a lot of time alone, reading people's words about the world; these were nicer than the words directed at her.

“Look at her.” Hissed Louise, behind her fan, to Agnes. Her eyes, so like her father’s in its steely coldness, cut through Psyche like a knife. Psyche, who was doing nothing more than simply getting measured for a new dress with her adopted sisters, pretended to not hear. “Her posture is quite terrible. She can’t even stand straight.”

“She may have noble blood, but she will never amount to more than a country bumpkin.” Agnes murmured, all silk and poison, dressed in a green that was nothing like the dryad’s eyes, all wrong in its shade. “How much you’ll bet me on her being sent to be a nun so no one will have to be forced to marry her ugly face? Look at her nose!”

Louise gave a shrill little laugh, and all it earned was a quick glare from their mother. It didn’t stop them, though, from leaning closer to each other and whispering in low voices - not low enough that Psyche still didn’t get the gist of what they were saying, which amounted to pretty much classless little chit, ugly little duckling.

She wanted to scream; Psyche wasn’t even the Countess’ real daughter, she was just a loophole, a way to not make one of them dead before their time. But it wasn’t like she could go ahead and say it, because then the Count would send her back to the streets, and what did she have, besides a noble education? A noble education wouldn’t put food in her belly.

Psyche stayed quiet. She played with the children of lesser nobles, children of servants, bit her tongue when her older sisters spoke about the men who wished to court them when they were older. No one looked at gangly Psyche, twelve to their fourteen and sixteen years old, too small, too ugly, the girls preening like peacocks under their soft cooing, as if being married to a man so much older was a prize to have. Maybe it was, and Psyche, who carried a death sentence in her neck, just couldn’t see it.

She had an inkling that her adoptive parents preferred her to be ugly. No one would miss the unremarkable youngest daughter, and that would be better for them.

Of course, that wouldn’t do.

As if blessed by some sort of mischievous creature from the woods that fed on suffering, Psyche grew seemingly overnight, too tall for her clothing, dark hair glossy and lips full, her nose finally fitting into her face. It was as if a fairy godmother from stories had seen the way she was being treated and gave her a new appearance: from ugly little duckling to a beautiful swan, and she hated it.

Suddenly men looked at her, instead of her sisters. They looked at her and sent her trinkets, jewelry that her parents made her throw away or give to maids, a rejection as cruel as it seemed.

After all, it wouldn’t do for their little plan to be foiled for something as foolish as love.

Was this, she wondered, sitting quietly in her bed, surrounded by opulence and wishing she was back at the orphanage they had taken her from, that the ugly duckling had felt like when it grew up to be a swan - the sudden acceptance that was as false as it seemed like, people seeing the beauty but not the inside?

Maybe the pre-arranged marriage to some sort of god was good for her, even if she was just a trick: away from reality, whisked away to a peaceful death, she wouldn’t have to deal with the attention of others.

Phillipe never warmed up to her. He always regarded her with less than disclosed hostility, and Psyche supposed herself lucky that at least he tried to keep a facade, even as thin as it was.

When she was fifteen, it came to a head: he barged into her rooms as she slowly brushed her hair, trying to untangle it, still wet from the rain she had caught earlier. She had taken to horse riding, but it did not seem to make men less interested in her.

Still, she liked the freedom of wind in her hair, leaves braiding themselves in the black tresses by skilled dryads, liked to pretend she could make the horse jump right over the palace walls, pretend she could go back to her orphanage, still a child of eight, still innocent, still ugly, still able to dream of a lovely simple life, one where she didn’t need to ignore the beings that lived in the forest to keep up appearances lest she be called heretic and insane.

He was drunk when he opened the door with a kick, lightning illuminating him in odd angles and shades. She yelped, a hand to her chest, heart hammering wildly against her ribs. He wasn’t supposed to be here: he was supposed to be preparing to be sent to war with Charles tomorrow. Not sent to war to fight, of course; no, he was just going to be yet another noble playing around with soldiers on a map like toys.

“Phillipe!" She yelped, as he closed the door, glaring at her, trailing water as he walked, his clothes a mess. “What are you doing here?”

“Can’t I visit my dearest sister?”

I’m not your sister, she wanted to say, but this entire farce depended on them all believing she was.

“And what does my dearest brother want from me?” She spoke through her teeth, fingers clamped around the golden handle of the brush: a gift from one of her many suitors, one that she refused to part with. There was no rhyme or reason to it other than she thought it looked lovely.

“I was drinking,” That much was obvious; Psyche was a few meters from him, and she could smell it on his breath. “, and I was wondering if that’s what you really enjoy.”

“Enjoy what, exactly?”

He rolled his eyes, throwing himself on one of the many chairs her room had. He took a moment to adjust his ruined wig; their father would kill him, if he knew of this.

“The attention.” He waved a hand dismissively, and her fingers gripped the hairbrush tighter, knuckles whitening under pressure. If she beat him to death, maybe her adoptive parents could send Agnes to be a god’s wife instead, since it wouldn’t be precious, darling Phillipe, their youngest anymore. “Do you like it? First from our mother, and now from Louise’s suitors. Don’t you get tired?”

Red colored her vision. How dare he think she wanted this?

“Do you think I wanted to be here? At Versailles, surrounded by people that hate me?” Psyche bit back, speaking the truth for the first time in years, and he huffed. “If it were depending on me, I’d have stayed at the country house.”

“Then why don’t you go back? None of us wants you here, as you’ve so clearly stated. Go back to your beloved country house and leave us alone. We were fine without you, and we’ll be fine without you again.”

Because if I did, she thought, words bitter, you’re going to be the one sold off to a forest god like cattle.

“Father has plans for me.” A sliver of truth. She went back to brushing her hair, avoiding his eye through the mirror, ignoring the sound of water against the carpet, soaking the armchair he was in. “They do not involve Louise or Agnes’ suitors, so fret not. Our ever so precious sisters are safe.”

Our: what a lie. What she wanted to say was your, but that would break the carefully made illusion.

“Mistress of a king, then? What a brilliant plan for you, to be breeding bastards. That’s exactly what we need in this family.” His mouth was open, ready to say more, when a knock interrupted him. The door opened without Psyche inviting the person, and Charles strode in as if it was his own room, his military uniform without a button out of place. He seemed more put together than Phillipe, but she could see the slight wobble in his steps. He was as wet as his brother: had Charles ran after him?

He didn’t even glance at her, as if Psyche wasn’t even present, as if these weren't her rooms.

“What? Can’t I say what we all want to say to her?” Phillipe asked, defiant, huffing. “We all think that father is going to make a whore out of her, but Louise and Agnes are too well-bred to speak it out loud.”

He still didn’t look at Psyche, who gripped the handle of her brush tighter, as if it would save her, as if it was the handle of a sword - but no. It was just a hairbrush. They were the ones with swords, the ones who would live beyond eighteen years.

“Truth as it may be, Phillipe, you still should not enter a lady’s room, even if the…” A pause, and he glanced at Psyche, with her tangled hair and sleep clothes, a discarded pile of twigs and leaves on the table. “Lady herself allowed it.”

Phillipe gave a hearty laugh as he rose without prompting, left staggering, as if she had dismissed him. Charles left two steps behind, closing the door with a finality that was fatal.

Let them think that, let all of her adopted siblings think she would live a cushy life with the king, instead of being just more altar blood.

Psyche waited until the sound of steps in the carpet faded to nothing to let tears fall from her eyes, the rain masking her sobs.

Her sisters did not like Psyche getting attention either. The tension between the three girls was palpable, and Psyche - sixteen, still beautiful, still unmarried, still alive for the next two years - did not understand why. Did they think she wanted to be there? She did not. She wouldn’t have left the country house if it weren’t for the king’s summons.

They liked it even less when Dowager Princess de Conti, the king’s favored daughter, called her to be her lady-in-waiting instead of them. It wasn’t official, just an excuse to manhandle people around and daydrink, to discuss the war amidst joking, to have a prettier gaggle of girls around than either of her sisters, like the beautiful frame around a portrait. It was something of a rivalry, one that she and the Princess de Conti Marie Thérèse, had a temptative alliance between each other against their sister, the newly minted petite-fille de France Françoise Marie.

Psyche could understand sisterly rivalries; she was living one, too. At least out of this one she got sweet-smelling perfumes and beautiful jewelry: the Dowager Princess, Marie Anne, refused to have her staff less beautiful than her sisters’ staffs, which means all those clothes that the Dowager Princess used once are hers to fight over with the other ladies-in-waiting.

“Sisters are all vapid creatures.” The Dowager Princess said, waving her fan as if it was a weapon. Psyche kept sewing, embroidering beautiful roses into the napkins. Then, a pause. “But so are men, really. All they want is a pretty young thing who’ll open her coffers and her legs.”

With a loud thwack, louder than the giggling amongst the others, the Dowager Princess hid a smile behind her closed fan; the noise made Psyche miss a stitch, hitting her finger instead of the fabric.

“Well, except mine, but he was surely special!” She laughed, a bubble of blood forming in Psyche’s thumb, falling into the red roses she had stitched, blooming beautifully.

She did not ask if the same advice was valid for old gods, but she didn’t think it was.

When she was seventeen and a half, her adoptive parents sent her away in a carriage with Charles. The public excuse was that her health is once again faltering, and a few months in the peace of the countryside would do her well. For her brother, the reason was another: he had come back from the war without his right leg and without their father’s favor, so much like a broken toy, they would put him out of sight and out of mind.

The Dowager Princess, when she broke the news of having to be let go of service, raised an eyebrow.

“How mysterious. While in my service, my dear, you seemed so healthy.” She gave a wry smile that promised nothing good. Psyche swallowed a shudder: she was one of the roses in the portrait frame, she knew, and the Dowager Princess loathed the idea of her gaggle of ladies-in-waiting going away without her blessing - she had even set up Marie Émilie to one of her older half brothers, someone that Psyche had never interacted with but had seen from afar; the Dowager Princess enjoyed keeping people in debt to her, spinning a web they could never be free from. “But if you must go, then you must go. Come back healthy to me, and I’ll find you a wonderful husband.”

She doubted it would be for free. Nothing ever was.

“Thank you for your generosity, your highness.” Psyche curtsied, gentle, and didn’t speak of her going away again to no one else.

The real reason for her exile, she knew, was to set up her fake death, to let her be sent off in peace to the arms of a god in the forest, never to be thought of again, their debt repaid.

She had never talked too much with her oldest of adoptive brothers: even as a child, he was too serious, too distant, and Psyche, still reeling in from all the visual information on Versailles, from the glares her other three siblings sent her, never sought him. What was the use, when he was probably going to treat her the same way? And the feeling of hatred was probably something he felt, too, since he never sought her.

Except, of course, that one night. It didn't count.

Maybe she should've done the legwork; now she was on a carriage ride with him for the foreseeable future, waiting for her imminent death to come, silence heavy as rain between the two.

That was fine, really. It’s - it’s fine. Psyche didn’t care that her entire adoptive family would commemorate her death.

The manor was somewhere between Versailles and the countryside manor Psyche spent her first two years: not as simple, but lacking the luxury and gold of the royal palace. The butler gave her a room with a view to the deep, foreboding forest, a smile playing coyly on his face.

“Your father asked for you to get this room. He said it would be good for your health, my lady.” Psyche gave him a weak nod, and waited until the butler left her new room to let her knees fall, the ground meeting her in a flurry of skirts and petticoats and silk.

She tore off the jewelries off her neck, feeling her throat close, the bracelets she wore shackles, everything a pin gold and silver and diamonds and rubies and pearls. She was going to go willingly into her demise, would walk the forest path into a moonless night dressed in white like a lamb to slaughter with a smile on her face, like she’d been told to everyday since she was brought into this damned family’s fold: must they rub salt into the wound? What was the reason behind it - just to see how much suffering they could cram into a living being before it lost the will to live?

Would Thérèse, that little girl from a little village, allowed this to happen to her, if she had been given a chance to grow? Psyche was not Thérèse - she hadn't been her in years -, but she didn't think that girl would've let them do to her what Psyche's adoptive parents were doing. No. She refused to entertain the thought of their victory.

Psyche wouldn’t let them win. They were trying to con a god, a being that made an infertile woman like the Countess birth four healthy children. No, that wouldn’t do. Psyche would walk with her head high into that god’s lair, tell it of the schemes to fraud it, and if she died, she would die with her own name in her lips, certain that her adoptive parents would get their due, too.

From the depths of her mind, Psyche recalled her childhood, all the little rituals the older children told her to obey if she wanted to go through the forest and come back unscathed. She went mushroom and berry picking in the forest, claiming it would be good for her ailing health, and people let her. seeing it as the dying wishes of a girl.

She befriended the dryads and water nymphs, leaving them little food offerings wrapped in embroidered handkerchiefs. She would not interact with them, aware of their presence - the rustling in leaves that sound like fingers parting them most gently, the babbling of the lake suddenly interrupted -, giving them a short curtsy and a plea to be allowed to stay in their forests.

They didn’t answer, although Psyche sometimes caught glimpses of them: green eyes, deep blue hair, fingers that quickly snatched her offerings as she looked from the corner of her eyes.

When Psyche passed back, her handkerchief stood empty, sometimes soggy with wetness, other times with mud caked atop. After a while, they came with elaborate knots and gifts inside: smooth pebbles, flowers that she pressed into bookmarks, scales that gleamed, opalescent in sunlight, and remarkably, once, a handful of cherries, out of season by a good six months but as fresh as the day they had been picked.

She ate them while embroidering another handkerchief, her fingers staining the fabric in patterns she made into flowers.

Why was she even doing this? She very much doubted these spirits would answer if she cried in distress, begging for them to save her from becoming a sacrifice. Still, it felt nice to try to save herself.

Her brother spoke nothing about her outings. Psyche doubted he knew, and if he did, doubted that he cared, too busy with reading, holed up in the dark library.

Doubted: she was going back to her room, mud hanging on her skirt, holding it above the ground in one hand, the other hand busy with her shoes. Psyche was passing by the drawing room when someone hit the wood, so hard she swore she could hear wood splinting.

Psyche paused at the door, peeking in through and seeing her father, looking haggard, drinking a copious amount of bourbon, and Charles, the face of fury. She was surprised: she had always thought him a blank slate.

“How can you tell me she’s sick, father? The girl won’t stay in a sickbed!” Charles yelled, expressing more emotion in one phrase than he had in all his years. “She’s active, as healthy as a horse. I don’t see why you’ve sent her away. Is it Agnes and Louise, father? Louise is married, and that girl did nothing except hang in the shadows during it! Do you fear Psyche will outshine Agnes? Was that why she wasn’t at Louise’s wedding? She’s your daughter and yet I’ve heard nothing of prospective marriages, not even a rumor. In fact, you’ve...”

Psyche stepped back, surprised: she didn’t even know Louise had gotten married. When did that happen? When she had left, or before?

“Do not say another word, boy, my patience is already thin enough with you. I know what I’m doing with her.” He replied, smooth as the drink he poured. “She has a marriage set aside for her already.”

Psyche grimaced at this. Yes, she’d be wed: her blood to stone, her corpse to the soil, her bones to the worms.

“With who? Who could be better than the many, many powerful people propositioning her? Even the king...” His words trailed off. Silence was Charles' answer. Psyche, who knew who was to be her husband, took her cue to leave.

The shadow of her adoptive father loomed heavily under the house, darkening its corners; even Charles, quiet and somber Charles, seemed unnerved by him. That was a fair assessment; the older man seemed nervous, mumbling about things Psyche didn’t fully catch.

Of course, his presence there meant Psyche’s outings had been cut completely away: her world was the large room with a view of the forest that would host her corpse, waving to green eyes that shone amidst leaves.

She opened the window, leaned out, and waved back. It was nice to know they’d miss her when she was gone, feeling once more like a child.

The night of her eighteenth birthday was a night of a full moon, yellow and hanging heavy in the sky. The forest was not noiseless: crickets sung gently, and she could hear leaves and twigs being crushed beneath her bare feet, looking to her adoptive father’s back as he guided her.

The dryads stared at her through the forest, mumbling, adding to the insectoid song, but Psyche was not nervous. It was just the culmination of her life, of her adoptive parents’ efforts: the blood that would repay their debt, finally spilled, the stain in the family finally gone.

Of course, there would be no salvation for her. Psyche had been stupid to think it could’ve happened, that someone would’ve taken notice and taken her from her family. The dryads caught at her hands, but never stayed.

The day had started normal, as any did: she had been woken up, dressed and taken to breakfast. Charles had not been present yet, and frankly, Psyche had forgotten it was her birthday; it was barely celebrated during her life. Her father was there, reading letters over a plate of meager food. Psyche greeted him, which went unanswered, so she grabbed her plate of food and started eating slowly, spreading little jam over bread.

Food had been scarce lately: not in Versailles, never in Versailles, but there had been a distinct lack of variety that she had grown used to and now was missing. She wondered how things were going with the peasants, if even nobles had little food, but Psyche knew it probably was not good.

“Happy eighteenth birthday, Psyche.” He said, slowly, putting away the letter he was reading and picking up another, seemingly at random, from the pile. “I assume you know what will happen tonight.”

Eyes low to the food: not her last meal, but one of the last. She grabbed another croissant.

“Yes, father.” Psyche mumbled.

When night had fallen, Psyche had dressed herself in her finest gown and sat in a chair, watching the moon rise in the sky, and it mocked her with its slowness.

She didn’t know the time when the Count knocked, a candle in one hand, and she simply deigned to follow him.

Now there they walked, to the stone altar where a god would claim his payment that was long overdue.

The clearing was nothing special, absolutely forgettable: a circle empty of trees, three rocks stacked one on top of another like a table, at roughly waist level. The moonlight made the rust-like stains shine dully, almost dangerous.

There were no crickets here, no green eyes amidst the leaves. Maybe because of the presence at the opposite edge of the clearing: a man, perhaps, although the shape of his body was hard to see, hidden amidst shadows. He was tall, made taller by the gleaming, curled horns on his head, eyes a shade of pink she had only seen in Versailles.

“You’ve brought your blood?” The god asked, and when the Count gestured to Psyche, his pink eyes fell onto her. “I see.”

And then Psyche saw nothing more.

There was darkness, but this time she was sitting comfortably in a plush armchair. A tea set was in front of her in pale porcelain, sweets in high piles, a teapot steaming by their side. A fireplace roared in front of her, but she didn’t feel too warm; no, it was as if she had just gone inside after a long day out and was just now warming herself up.

She wasn’t dead, but the place didn’t feel real: it was off, as if she was back in Versailles, but everything was a few centimeters to the left - wrong, but she couldn’t point out why.

“You’re that man’s daughter, I assume.” Said a voice behind her, leafing through books. Psyche dearly wanted to look behind her, from where the voice came up from, but she did not. Instead, she reached for a biscuit, deciding to die with something sweet in her mouth. He moved around, steps muffled by carpet and then resonating against wood.

“Not really. He tricked you.” She admitted, the words spilling from her mouth as she attacked the sweets, washing it down with copious amounts of the also sweet tea. The god listened quietly, forever leafing through a book. “So, to summarise, I’m not his daughter, not his blood.”

“I see.” He closed the book, moved three steps, opened another and went back to leafing. “I figured this would happen. Humans try to get out of contracts through my carefully established loopholes all the time. It’s part of the test. If they fail, well, that’s actually better for me. ”

Psyche didn’t want to think about why it would be better if people failed. Maybe he much preferred a traitor’s blood than bloody sacrifices.

“Will you kill me for his errors, then?” The words spilled themselves out of her mouth. Death had been promised to her for so long that it now seemed like a reward, instead of an end.

A pause, contemplative and heavy. She went to grab more tea for herself, mouth dry.

“How about a test, instead?” The god suggested, and Psyche stopped in her tracks. “If you, for a year and a day, can resist the temptation of looking upon my face, I’ll let you go with riches beyond your imagination.”

“And if I can’t?”

“Defeatist, are we?” He chuckled, a dark sound that sent a shiver down her spine. “Well, death, perhaps, since you asked for it. Although maybe I'll offer you redemption. I can be easily amused.”

Psyche gulped, and the god said nothing more. Instead, he closed the book with a thud that sounded final, grabbing another.

“Ah, here it is.” He scribbled something on the book. “Failed to make payment. Punishment… Death.”

Were his words about the Count? Did she want them to be?

“I accept your test.” She said, ice in her veins. A year and a day: she could keep her head down and away from this god. Freedom at her fingertips, and she could taste its cloying sweetness.

“Very well. What is your name, then?”

“Psyche.” The god laughed, and she so dearly wanted to turn and face him; instead, she continued the motion to grab more tea, forcing herself to stay facing the fireplace until her eyes burnt.

“Well, then call me Eros.”

He left soon after, claiming some unfinished business to solve. Psyche didn’t move until the embers had died down, and only then, secure in the knowledge she was (probably) safe, that she peeled herself off the comfortable armchair, looking around.

It was, obviously, a library: stacks of books headed into the ceiling in dark mahogany shelves, each tome as thick as hands were wide, encased in leather that, upon further inspection, did not look like any sort of animal. No, it reminded her of skin, tanned and cut into rectangles.

She remembered him scribbling into a book; this was where he kept notes on every single wish he made into reality. No doubt the payment was also in there, then. Temptation made its way through her, and she so dearly wanted to touch one of the books, find what kind of death the Count would get. It sung through her veins like magic, and she slapped her own hand away from them.

Psyche avoided it completely, resisting the lull of magic, and blindly went for the door, wide and white, and when she went to open it, it did it for her. She cocked her head, but passed through the doorway, the doors closing when she arrived in an open hallway, reminiscent to her of the drawings of Greek temples of old: white marble, tall columns, a green interior garden, lush with life. She approached it with quick steps, touching one of the trees, and finding no signs of a dryad within its bark. It felt… Unnatural, to not have green eyes staring at her from the forest. It also meant that all her careful work had been in vain; no dryads would keep her company, nor take her away.

She shook her head, taking her hand away as if it had been burnt, and looked to the hallway, both sides leading to unknown places.

It was like Versailles, but… No, she wouldn’t think of Versailles. This place was nothing like it - for starters, she hadn’t even made anyone hate her yet.

Every door opened itself for her, revealing rooms that seemed to grow richer: drawing rooms decked in gold, several music rooms dedicated to one instrument only such as grand pianos and lovely harps, sitting rooms, solars with windows that went up to the ceiling, interior gardens that smelled sweet and ricketed with crickets, small chapels that seemed unused for centuries, its pews thick with dust, bathrooms of marble with bathtubs as big as a room and fragrant lotions and rosewater bottles, all neatly stacked together.

There were no people other than her. Every empty room just made her seek company in other rooms with a fervor that was almost religious, begging, for once, for the sight of other people. Being alone with only her godly captor would be maddening, since she wouldn’t even be able to look at him. Even a butler would be welcome, even a lowly rat.

When absentmindedly complaining of hunger, set upon finding a kitchen to steal a few bites from and even maybe a kitchen maid to chat with - only for the next room to become a dinning room, plates piled high with food, a fire crackling in the fireplace, tall chairs with green velvet just waiting for people to sit. The decorations shone, well-polished, as if the dinner table had been set and people had forgotten to tell the king to come down to eat.

There was so much food - so much food she hadn’t seen since she had gone to her family home. She looked around the hallway, found no guests to arrive, and entered the dining room, sitting with her back turned to the door (a preventive measure; if the owner of the house, the god of the forest, Eros, came in, she wouldn’t lose the test less than a day in), and grabbing herself a plate.

She was in the middle of her second portion - definitely not ladylike, but she did spend the day going through rooms, so her hunger was validated - when two things happened: one, the door opened, proving that her foresight had been welcome, and two, more food started to come in.

There were no servants, though: just floating plates coming and half-empty dishes being taken away, carried through the air as if weightless. A chair was moved this way, as well, passing by the side of her.

She did not look back.

“I see you have figured out how the palace works.” Eros said, smoothly, and she heard plates exchanging hands. She closed her eyes; would Psyche need to learn how to eat in the dark? There was the scrape of a chair, directed near the door.

“I haven’t learned anything, lord Eros. All I’ve seen were rooms, and when I was hungry, this convenient room appeared.” Someone brushed past her, making the hairs on her arms rise with gooseflesh. Were there servants in there, now that her eyes were closed? Why had they been hiding from her?

“Well, that was what was there to learn.” She heard him sit down, probably start eating. “The finer tricks you’ll get with time.”

She opened her eyes cautiously, finding that he wasn’t sitting near her after all - but if Psyche looked behind her, she’d bet on him being there, near the door, in the same chair that had floated past her head.

So this was a test of her curiosity, not if she would catch him because he had planted himself in front of her. Okay, Psyche could abstain from curiosity for a while. Fine. She went back to eating, cutting the meat delicately.

“So the rooms appear as I will it, the doors open by themselves…”

“That’s one of my servants, actually. They’re all invisible, but maybe you’ll see them one day.” Psyche gave him a curt nod, and then, realizing he couldn’t see it, remembered, with a flush, that she had to speak up.

“Oh. So I’m not alone?” It had been, admittedly, a lonely experience: the idea of being all alone in the divine palace had scared her senseless.

“No, of course not. I’m a god, but I’m not cruel.”

She pushed her plate away in disgust at his words - it was not cruel to keep her for an entire year, then? -, and it was taken from her almost immediately, being substituted by a clean one with a dessert atop it: eclairs with powdered sugar atop a layer of caramel. Her stomach rumbled.

“I see. Is there anything else I should know, or should I discover it?” Psyche asked, eating her well-earned dessert. She had eaten too much; maybe Psyche should imagine herself finding a room.

“I don’t know what questions you could have, so I can’t make up answers for you.”

“Where am I to sleep tonight is a good start, lord Eros?”

“With me. We are married, after all.” Psyche rose from her seat, hands on the table, but she didn’t look back; no, she wouldn’t give Eros that satisfaction. “Is there something wrong?”

“You expect me to carry your children without ever looking at your face? What if I can’t bear them? I have seen your shadow, you have horns, they’ll tear me up from the inside!”

Eros choked, which was a very pleasant sound to Psyche’s ears. She waited until he coughed out whatever he had misplaced, staring at her hands that trembled in anger - or maybe fear; it was hard to decipher the jumble of emotions inside her chest.

“No, no - I am not the type of god that forces people to have my children.” His voice sounded rough, scraped up. “If you wish to have my children, you’ll have them out of your own free will. No, all I ask is for your company in bed. Add to your curiosity.”

She sat down, feeling her hands tremble.

“So it is just part of your plan to see me fail? What a cruel god, lord Eros, that you are.”

Eros laughed, a sound that reminded Psyche of the rustling of leaves.

“Darling, it would be better for me if you did.”

She left the dining room after finishing her eclairs through a door opposite the one where she had entered, finding herself back in the hallway. It was still day: perhaps time did not pass in whatever place this was like it did back… Home?

Could it be a home, if all she had been primed to do was die? Psyche shook her head and set back to wandering from room to room. This time - maybe because it had been echoing in the back of her mind - all she seemed to find were bedrooms, all perfect and ready to be used, clean linens and furs piled atop beds. The decorations were all polished, as reflective as mirrors, and heavy velvet curtains hung from golden rods, making the rooms seem as dark as a moonless night if it weren’t for the candles that shone delicately. Psyche went through what felt like a hundred of those, until she gave up, hands in the air.

If all the divine palace would offer her were bedrooms, then fine, she would sleep. Psyche marched off to a wardrobe in black wood, opening it to find it fully stocked with dresses she could only dream of and nightshifts of the finest fabrics, mirrors on the inside reflecting two of her, showing a girl unmade. Psyche had to stop for a moment simply to feel the fabrics glide against her fingers before selecting a dress at random, pressing the soft green fabric against her body and watching the emeralds glitter against the light, full of jewels. It was beautiful. It was more than she deserved.

In second thought, didn’t this probably belong to some sacrifice posterior to her? With a shudder, she put it back in place, hesitating before grabbing a nightshift for herself. Those were more anonymous than dresses in Psyche’s mind, and she quickly undressed herself, setting aside her sleep clothes for a new nightshift, kicking it out of her way before sliding in bed, looking around.

Would her new husband - the word sent a shiver down her spine; she hadn’t even thought it would be a valid marriage, since nothing was exchanged but words that she didn’t even pronounce, an agreement made before she was even a thought in her parents’ minds - mind that she used his old wives and husbands’ clothes? If he did, would he kill her?

She buried herself under the covers and tried to not think.

At some point during the night, there was a knock on her door. Psyche found herself awake, blinking in darkness, sitting in a bed that didn’t feel remotely like her own. The memories of the day flooded into her mind after a moment, and she cringed.

“Who is it?” She asked, groggily, even though Psyche knew the answer to it already.

“It is your husband, wondering if he might come in.”

Psyche pulled her legs closer to her body, paused for a moment. How kind of him, to give her a moment.

“Of course.” He said all those pretty things about free will, but how would it hold in practice? She doubted it. Men were men; the words of the Dowager Princess rung in her ears. A pretty woman who would open her legs and her coffers - although Psyche doubted an ancient god of the woods had any need of money.

The door opened. Psyche kept her eyes trained on a fixed point, suddenly illuminated by pale yellow light, watching a shadow theater: a man’s slow walk, clack clack clack against the floor until his feet reached the carpet, and then no more steps. The door closed without someone nearby, maybe one of the invisible servants, and she felt the bed give under a new weight.

Psyche did not lay down again. Her eyes were looking at the spot in now darkness, waiting for silence to break.

“Why me?” She asked, and did not look at him. “You could’ve let me go.”

“You were sold to me by arcane laws. Unfortunately, a year and a day is the least amount of time I can hold you.” He replied, and Psyche, giving up, laid down, eyes closed, back turned to him.

She did not sleep again. She doubted her husband slept, too - if he even could have that small semblance of humanity.

Psyche heard him leave, and waited until his side of the bed was cold to rise herself, stretching her sleep-addled muscles until she seemed, to herself, to be vaguely awake.

She could take a nap, but maybe somewhere else. Psyche walked to the wardrobe, opening its doors, and looking at the seemingly infinite options offered in front of her. Psyche did not know how she’d put one of those by herself, but maybe if she spoke into thin air, she’d manage to grab the attention of one of the servants and they’d help her dress.

But first, a bath: it felt like it had been ages since she last took one. She spied a door on the other side of the room - one that definitely hadn’t been there before - and went for it, opening it by herself. Thankfully, the room she had spent the night in seemed free of servants. Psyche wouldn’t know how to deal with an invisible servant watching her false sleep.

The bathroom was like all others she had seen the day before, and she enjoyed warm water in a large bathtub, sinking into the water that smelled like roses, washing her hair. There were still sticks in it, and Psyche slowly worked them out of her hair, watching the water become a filmy grey, riddled with leaves and mud, which she did not know how got in there. A blush crept through her face; she had eaten dinner and slept like that, as if she were still that little peasant girl from a tiny nameless village.

She shook her head for a final time and rose from the bathtub, grabbing a fluffy towel from a conveniently placed pile, and dried herself as she walked back inside the room.

A servant stood there, dressed like a maid, and very visible, although if asked, she wouldn’t be able to describe the woman: it was like her features erased themselves out of her mind if she looked away. Psyche stopped in her tracks, wondering if her eyes had been playing a trick on her.

“Ma’am.” The servant said, giving her a small curtsy. Psyche gave her a nod. “Lord Eros has said that you might be more comfortable if we had a physical presence, so here I am. You might call me Daffodil. What might I call you?”

A flower. Of course, the lord of the forest would have flowers for servants.

Psyche cleared her throat, feeling the weight of the towel against her body.

“Psyche. Psyche is just fine. Might you help me into a dress?” She took a deep breath - her adoptive parents had never given her a maid of her own, being attended to a maid of Versailles and then, at home, dressing herself in simple clothes that she wouldn’t mind dirtying -, so this was all very new to her. As an afterthought, she added: “You might choose what I wear. I have no preferences.”

Sure, she had seen her sisters with their maids, trailing behind her like a veil, and had thought it gaudy. She hoped Daffodil wouldn’t do the same.

The maid curtsied again, turning almost mechanically to the wardrobe, looking through dresses.

“Pink will suit you best, then.” Daffodil said, no emotion whatsoever in her voice as she picked up a dress of pink satin, embroidered with lines of pearl and gold thread. It looked old, but not out of fashion: like a well loved, barely worn dress from a century or two ago that still could be worn with a few adjustments, although she definitely did not have the long legs the dress begged for.

The maid set the dress aside, grabbed a box that Psyche hadn’t seen yesterday, and extracted several pieces of jewelry from the inside, all gold and pearl, beautiful shackles that reminded her of her position.

“Is that really necessary? It’s not like I’ll be seeing anyone.” She put a strand of wet hair behind her ear, and the maid looked at Psyche like she was speaking in tongues.

“It is my job to make you beautiful, ma’am.”

Psyche, defeated, sat down on the bed.

“Very well, then do your job.”

She stared at herself in the mirror, and barely recognized the girl within its reflection. Sure, she mirrored every movement of Psyche, but she couldn’t possibly be her. Yes, she had dressed in fabrics that did not suit her before, had her hair made up, jewelry borrowed so she could use it, and she had been thought pretty - too pretty , her sisters would whisper, but pretty. Now she looked as if she could’ve belonged to a painting, ethereal and unreal. The dress that she had thought too big fit perfectly, as if made for her, and the jewels glinted in the light of candles: she looked made of pure starlight.

“Is that me?” She asked, gloved fingertips touching the reflection; the girl inside the mirror did the same.

“Of course it is you, ma’am.” Daffodil answered, and Psyche gave her a curt nod.

It didn’t feel like her.

Her day was much the same, except now Daffodil trailed behind her exactly as she had feared she would do, opening doors for her and providing light snacks if she ever as much thought about it. She was a quiet presence, though, and Psyche almost forgot she existed. Through her wanderings around the seemingly infinite palace, she had seen other servants: people that looked exactly and yet nothing like Daffodil, who gave her short curtsies and bows and then went back on doing whatever they had been doing before. It was a chilling thought to know that all those people had seen her in the palace yesterday and had done nothing more than open doors for her.

Almost. She had been in one of the many libraries, reading a small romance she had found amongst shelves, forgotten by time - the books here not even similar to the thick tomes of the room she had woken up and, after a few quick questions to Daffodil, deemed safe enough to enjoy, even if most were dull treaties of countries long gone - when she heard Daffodil’s dress move. Psyche dismissed it, grabbing a canape with her free hand, nose buried in the book. She was probably going to grab more food.

“Welcome, lord Eros.” She said in a small, quiet voice, and Psyche’s good mood was over in a second. “How may I serve you?”

“Would you please leave for a few minutes? I would like to talk with my wife.” She closed the book with a loud thwack, and Eros gave her a small chuckle as he waited, in silence, for the door to open and close. “How are you finding your new home?”

“You asked me that yesterday.” She heard him snap his fingers, and a chair floated past her, Psyche’s eyes trailing it until she couldn’t see it anymore without turning her head.

“Well, yes, but yesterday you thought yourself alone.” He paused, for a mere moment, as the chair found the floor, sitting after moving it a bit farther from her. “I figured you would feel less alone if the servants were not invisible.”

“I can’t say I have decided on that subject yet, but it is nice to have Daffodil’s company, Lord Eros.” She played with the edges of the book, keeping her eyes distracted. Don’t look and you’ll be safe , she thought to herself. “About the clothing…”

“I got it for you while you slept. Are they to size? I’m afraid that even gods can’t know everything.” She was surprised. He had picked up the clothes for her? All that beautiful jewelry, too?

“Yes, thank you, Lord Eros. They fit perfectly. I hadn’t expected that, truth to be told.” Maybe she had spoken too much, but it wasn’t a lie: Psyche hadn’t expected that, had thought the clothing in the wardrobe had belonged to others long gone. “Will I see you for dinner?”

She didn’t know what to hope for: if he said no, it would be yet another meal for her where she had no one to speak. If he said yes, it would be a meal where she could barely move.

“Will you turn your eyes to me, then?” Psyche rolled her eyes at him, and he gave another chuckle, as if it had been a funny joke. “Yes, you’ll ‘see’ me at dinner. Have a good day, Psyche.”

She heard him rise from his seat, and she nestled herself further in her chair, willing herself not to look.

“You as well, Lord Eros.” Psyche replied, cracking open her book. There was no sound of steps on the carpet.

“Eros.” She closed the book, biting her tongue to fight the urge to turn her head and face him.

“What?”

“The servants might call me lord, but as husband and wife, I’d rather have you call me without formalities.” After a moment of thought, he added hastily: “If you please, of course.”

Psyche stammered for a moment, dog-earing the book and then unfolding the corner for several seconds that seemed like lifetimes.

“If you wish for it, of course, Eros.”

“Thank you. If you need me, just call my name and I’ll appear. Behind you, of course.” Then, finally, blessed steps going away from her, the door opening and Daffodil murmuring quietly.

She did not know what to make of him, the husband that was a god and cared for her thoughts and opinions. With a heavy sigh, Psyche went back to reading, but if asked, she wouldn’t be able to say what had happened in the book.

Dinner was much like the one before: she ate alone for a while, and in the middle of her second serving, he arrived, had a servant move a chair, and got food from a second servant. He asked about what she had seen, and Psyche, rather truthfully, replied that she had holed herself up in the library he had found her in. He then had said nothing more, but the silence had been comfortable, at least.

Psyche had almost forgotten she had company when Eros spoke again.

“Is there anything you’d like? Clothes, books, food? As much as I would like to give you a few tests for the sheer amount of fun it would bring me, I do care about your well being. So please speak up, if you wish.”

She let go of her cutlery delicately, stomach rolling for no reason she could discern. It made no sense, to Psyche, that an ancient god treated her - a mere sacrifice, blood for the altar - better than her adoptive parents. There was no reason for him to do it - and yet.

Psyche took a deep breath, grabbed the cutlery back again. Her hands trembled delicately.

“I’m fine with what has been offered so far, thank you, lord…” She swallowed dryly, and took another deep breath, quickly correcting herself. “Eros. Although, if I may be honest, your book selection is quite lacking. I don’t think I can spend a year going through treaties alone without going mad. I might even look upon your face, if this happens.”

She hadn’t been allowed to read for fun, even the bawdy little books the Dowager Princess made them read aloud to her bringing nothing of pleasure to her. She liked the sonnets, the love stories, all those things her life lacked: song and dance, rhyme and light.

He laughed, and Psyche bit her tongue, unsure if it was a positive or negative thing.

“Books can be arranged. That’s such a simple request. Are you sure it’s all that you want?”

“I don’t dare ask for more.”

“Very well, then. Enjoy your dinner.”

They spoke no more, and Psyche was more thankful for the silence than for the literature.

Daffodil helped her undress and undid her hair, and Psyche stared at reflection, watching the stranger in the mirror become herself once more. She preferred herself this way: with no decorations, no finery.

Maybe because she was used to it being like that, undone. Unpretty.

She turned her nose at the thought, hair falling in gentle waves around her, and Daffodil stepped back.

“It is done, ma’am.” She said, with a small curtsy, and Psyche gave her a nod. “I’ll see you in the morning.”

A servant dismissing itself; such an odd concept, but it made sense - if Psyche had no use for her anymore, then why should she linger around? Things surely were different around these parts.

“Very well. Until morning, Daffodil. Please snuff the candles for me before you leave.” Psyche replied, rising from her seat and going to bed, slipping between the covers as Daffodil silently moved around the room, bathing the world in darkness as she moved. She heard the door open and close, closed her eyes, and then - knocking.

He had come early, or maybe she had fallen asleep and not noticed. Either were probable.

“Come in.” Psyche said, burrowing herself amidst the covers. Once more, the door opening, the sound of steps on the floor, like a clock’s tick, tock, tick, tock: regular and steady until swallowed by the carpet.

He said nothing to her, and Psyche did not speak as well as he slide by her side.

When she woke up, there was a pile of novels by the side of her bed, taller than she was, and Psyche wondered what it meant.

Every day was the same: she woke up, Daffodil helped her dress, and then they spent the day wandering through the infinite palace. Sometimes she played music in the music rooms, although she didn’t know how to play a few of the instruments; other times, she took naps on solars, bathing in sunlight like a cat. She cleaned the chapels with Daffodil’s help, along with a handful of other maids, just to pass time, and sewed on the nighshifts the things she saw around the palace so that they wouldn’t be as bland. Once, memorably, she had found a book on flowers, and spent two days inside one of the many flower gardens trying to find matches between the drawn flowers and the real flowers, feeling silky petals against the tip of her fingers, sweet smells filling her world.

Eros joined her on a few of these outings, sometimes. It wasn’t uncommon for her to wake up from a nap with a blanket over her and her head on a pillow. When asked, Daffodil replied that sometimes Eros had to use the same rooms, and seeing her asleep, he sent the servant to grab the items for her. Psyche, befuddled, would never wake up, as if he would cast his magic to make sure his steps were silent.

She didn’t understand why he offered her, a prisoner, such kindness.

Then one afternoon, one like any others, with nothing special that Psyche could remark on, she had woken up from one of her naps to humming, and had sat up with closed eyes, the book in her lap falling noisily into the ground. Had she fallen asleep in such a dangerous position?

“Behind you.” He had said, the sound of his voice guiding her. She heard the shuffling of paper and smelled glue. “Of course, you can always open your eyes and see for yourself.”

“I’m in front of a window. There’s a chance your reflection will show.” She replied, pressing her eyelids tighter together. “What, may I ask, are you doing here?”

“I thought you might enjoy some company. Putting together the books for payment is a lonely activity, and I long for chatting.” He sounded bored, stifling a yawn. Psyche didn't see how it could be boring.

“The tomes from the library?” Psyche asked, curling into herself. She peeked one eye open, keeping it carefully on the ground, and then another. “The ones with strange leather?”

“It is human skin, but yes.” Psyche shuddered. Human skin, so carelessly used: would her skin become a book, if she failed his test? Just more reason to not open her eyes. “How are you finding your stay? Today marks three months and a day. You have completed one fourth of your trial.”

Three months had gone past already? Psyche had barely felt the time go through. Sure, the pile of novels was already dwindling to almost nothing, and she had made a note to speak about Eros acquiring more for her, but she hadn’t expected it to have been so long already. Seasons didn’t change, and neither did the rays of warm light that constantly flowed in through the windows, the temperature always stable. It didn’t even rain.

She doubted her adoptive parents even knew today was three months.

“Very pleasant so far, Eros. I find the gardens riveting. So many flowers I didn’t know the names for.” It was true; the book she had found had taught her much with its colorful, detailed drawings. Hadn’t she touched the books, she would have thought someone had pressed flowers whole to the pages.

“I’m glad you find them pleasing. It’s the only place my servants cannot touch.” She put a hand to her mouth: she had done way too much touching during her time in there. “Some of the flowers in there don’t exist in your world anymore. The times have changed too much for them, and now I am guardian to the last few specimens.”

“I… I am so sorry, but I have…” He chuckled, and Psyche closed her eyes. She wouldn’t die because she had looked at him and failed his probably insanely gruelling tests, but because she had touched some extinct pale flower that looked like it would have bloomed in an unassuming corner of any garden.

“I’m aware you have touched them. The plants have told me. They even chided me for not letting people appreciate them more.” He huffed at this. “I have told them that they are not paintings to be appreciated, but alas, they’re relentless and wish for you to come back.”

The fact she would not be killed for the fact she had intruded upon Eros’ rare plant gardens wasn’t even the most important fact of this conversation. Psyche so dearly wanted to look upon his face, but she did not. She had already escaped death once today.

“You can talk to plants?”

“I’m a god of the forests, Psyche. If I couldn’t talk to plantlife, I wouldn’t be a very good god, would I?” She heard him put the book on the table, and then drop something heavy atop it. She heard him pick something that sounded like skin on skin, and something that definitely wasn’t, adjusting the leaves together. “How are you finding the books? Are they to your tastes?”

Psyche beamed.

“Oh, yes. I’ll admit I haven’t heard of most of them, but they’re very pleasant to read.” He gave a pleased chuckle to her, and Psyche experimentally opened one eye, directing her head to the ground. She found the book she had been reading, opened both eyes, picked it up and opened it on the middle, laying down on the couch again, putting the book on top of her eyes. “Where did you find them?”

“Around. Forgotten things tend to find themselves with me.” His voice sounded grave, and Psyche made a vague, inquiring noise. She opened her eyes, staring at old ink and paper, the words fuzzy and out of focus for their closeness. “I’m glad you’re enjoying the books. Would you like more?”

She could feel herself growing excited at the prospect: these books had been a few of her diversions, and so many of them were delightful reads. They reminded her of the Dowager Princess; she was sure she would’ve liked to have them read to her aloud.

“I’d love to have more. I have enjoyed the books of sonnets especially. They’re all so easy on the tongue.” Psyche said, and he gave her a murmured agreement. “So you’re a god of the forests and a god of the forgotten?”

“Something akin to that. My true function has disappeared long ago, so I manage to live by on scraps. Wishes are very profitable to me, though, so I’m glad people are still greedy for those.”

“How do you grant wishes, may I ask? You waited over eighteen years for, well, me, and even so…” Psyche bit her tongue, and Eros made an inquisitorial hum. “I’m sure it’s magic, but I’m afraid I don’t quite understand how… Well, anything works, really.”

“Do you know how someone produces coherent thoughts? How does the mind conjure memories? How do you recall a nostalgic scent?” Psyche cocked her head, trying to imagine answers, but she couldn’t; she did not know the interior mechanisms of the body. “It’s the same for me. I have it imprinted in me, and I simply do it, much like breathing. All I have to do is hear what they ask, set the conditions, and the magic does the rest. All I am is a conduit, a means to an end. Sometimes, even a god lacks control.”

It made no sense for Psyche. If he could set the price, then why ask for her? He could’ve asked for cattle, for gold, for finery. Why a human being? Why subject her to ten years of the life she had led?

“So why me? If you could ask for anything, then why ask for their youngest?” Psyche took out the book from her eyes, the poem inside revealing itself as she did. She read without reading, waiting for Eros to offer her an answer.

“The conditions are an eye for eye, tooth for tooth business. If I give someone gold, they have to pay me gold. If I hand someone talent, they must hand me the fruits of their talent. And if I give someone the ability to have children…”

He let the phrase end for itself, and Psyche gulped dryly.

“I… I see. I am sorry I asked.”

“Do not be. It must be a hard subject for you, so I figured honesty is the best policy. Although I’ll admit that, usually, when I take someone’s child, it isn’t a marriage.” A pause. “Usually they’re my servants for a few years before I can send them off to the mortal world again. But because your adoptive father misunderstood my words for so long, it changed the contract. Isn’t a first with me, but never like this.”

Psyche raised an eyebrow at that, then closed her eyes and the book, lowering the book to her lap and grabbing a throw pillow.

“So if I am to understand it correctly, the only reason we are in this situation is because he misunderstood everything for twenty or more years?”

“Yes, pretty much.”

Psyche took the book from her face, staring at the painted ceiling as she blindly reached for a throw pillow. She put the pillow in her face and screamed.

At dinner that night, Psyche kept her head on the table, picking off desserts that she had asked a servant to bring instead of food.

“It’s not so bad.” Eros tried, eating behind her. Psyche had grown so used to the fact he wouldn’t move that she had her eyes open, staring at a lovely painting of a woman in her best court finery. “I mean, he could’ve understood it as an actual blood sacrifice, and you’d be dead.”

“I know it could be worse, I just wish he had something between his ears.” Psyche sighed, raised her head, licking her fingers clean. “My life would have been so different.”

“If I’m honest, you’re not a half bad company, Psyche. You have demanded nothing except for books.” There was a note of sincerity in his voice. “I’m sorry this happened to you, though. If he had stuck to the lines of the contract...”

“It’s not your fault. We do what we can.” She rested against the chair, sighing. “It feels nice to complain. I wasn't allowed that liberty.”

She gestured for a servant to take her plate away, and he did, bringing her clean cutlery and a plate full of delicately piped and baked animals in meringue. She popped one whole in her mouth.

“You weren’t allowed to complain?” Eros repeated, and she heard him exchanging plates with a servant. She finished eating as he spoke. “Life has changed much in royalty. Noble girls used to do so all the time.”

“You were there, before?” She analyzed the small animal: a duck in pale yellow, sweet-smelling. What dye had they used? Flowers, maybe?

“I’ve been around for a long time. I’ve granted wishes to kings and peasants alike, men and men who would become godlike. I’ve watched history unfold from the shadows.”

Although his words were grand, there was a bitter tone to them, as if every wish had costed a finger that he, himself, had been forced to cut, gnawing at it with his teeth until only bone stood.

“Would you tell me stories, then? I’m sure they must be interesting.” Psyche chirped, and there was another pause from his side.

“They’re not sonnets. They’re rather bloody.”

“I grew up being told I’d die gruesomely on an altar, Eros.” Psyche rebated, and the god sighed.

“Very well.”

He had been right: his stories were not the lovely sort, but Psyche listened, enthralled, to him describing warriors of old coming to him asking for protection in battle, of kings begging for the end of wars, of maidens crying for their lovers to come home safe. In turn, Psyche spared him what little court gossip she knew, precious scraps that she had gotten from the Dowager Princess about her sisters and members of their retinues, and that Eros found delightful for reasons Psyche didn’t understand.

It grew soon into a habit for the two: during the afternoons, when they caught each other midway, she relayed the court drama she recalled, and during dinner he told her tales of old. It was quite lovely, and it helped time pass by her.

He caught her embroidering sometimes, but she always set it aside before he could get a full picture. It was only once she didn’t have the time to do so.

“Happy six months together, only six months a day to go.” Eros said, strolling in in the solar she was storing all of her threads, and Psyche - giving the final touch on the overly complicated scene she was giving to her nightshift, a beautiful lake full of swans and plant life; she even had asked Daffodil to dye it blue to simulate a sky, and her first act had been to embroider a sun at roughly waist level (she had grown very good at embroidery in the, seemingly, past six months) - yelped as she hit her finger with the needle, quickly putting it in her mouth, scanning the embroidery: if any of it fell on the white swan feathers she had crafted with silver thread for the past three and a half weeks, she would make sure to look Eros in the eyes as she killed the god.

“You usually knock. Happy birthday to us.” Psyche shot back, and relaxed against her chair. She heard the god approach, and kept her eyes trained on the embroidery, picking up the needle, pleased to find the thread hadn’t fallen out.

“I did, but you never answered. What is that?” She picked up the nightshift by the shoulders - she had so many that she was thinking every night Eros just put up more every night in the seemingly infinite wardrobe, as if giving her a fresh canvas for her to pass her time with - and showed him the complicated work of almost a month’s works. “I don’t quite recall giving you that.”

“You gave me a plain one, and to pass time I’m embroidering it. This is just the more complicated one.” Claws reached past her, touching the fabric., and all she could see was skin in the same brown shade that hers used to be when she was a child: were she not taken by the Countess, would she still be that color? Her skin, even pale as it was after years of being cut off from the sun with layers of cloth, lacking the lead white and talc her sisters were given so freely, was still a shade darker than her siblings had been, and maybe that was part of their dislike - that otherness she had, the lack of fitting in socially.

She shook her head. No use thinking about them now. They had celebrated her death, she knew.

“It is very beautiful.” His claw raked through the threads delicately. Was it her eyes, or did it have a faint trace of scales embedded in there, shining in the light? It was hard to know, since there were drawings on his skin: beautiful branches in black with the outline of blooming flowers, birds in nests, apples heavy in the branches amidst foliage, a painting in which the canvas was bare skin. She looked at it for a long moment, and so dearly wished she could look into his eyes.

“Your skin…” Psyche started, and, startled, Eros pulled away his hand, disappearing from her field of vision. “I thought it interesting. The art.”

“Thank you.” Eros said, as if unused to the words. “If I gave you a few of my tunics, would you do the same on them? I’d love something akin to this.”

Psyche grinned.

“Of course. It would give me something good to do.”

She just hoped, faintly, barely registering the thought, that she could finish it before her allotted year and a day was over.

Psyche had been again at the greenhouse room, sitting amidst plants, embroidering a particularly tricky orange flower into one of Eros’ tunics to make the scene of a beautiful afternoon more full of life, when Eros made his presence known to her. It was around the seventh month mark: she had been keeping a vague calendar, written in the back of one of the many books Eros gave her. It had been two times already, and she was about to be finished, prolonging the time between piles by embroidering his tunics; she calculated that she’d have to ask one more time, roughly at the tenth month mark, for more books.

“Oh, Psyche, there you are!” He started, instead of a greeting, and Psyche wondered if he waited until she was with her eyes turned to something non-reflective to speak to her, as if he didn’t want for her to fail the test he had proposed. “I’ve procured more books for you. You are finished with the pile I gave you the last time?”

“Yes, just in time, Eros.” She smiled, and hoped it showed in her voice, because it wasn’t as if she could turn to face him. “I’ve finished the last book yesterday, and today I was just looking at flowers to pass time.”

“Fantastic. I’ve left them by your side of the bed. Is there anything you’d like?” She heard him move through plants, claws raking amongst the leaves gently as if to feel them. There was a muttered oh, you’re needing a drink? I’ll have it arranged, a snap of fingers, and the soft pit-patter of rain against earth, the smell hitting her a moment later.

“You can make rain?” Psyche stabbed the fabric, giving the last knot on the flower, and then taking on the line on the needle, exchanging it for another shade of orange. The cold air was the next thing to hit her, her exposed neck getting gooseflesh.

“I can make many things.” The sound of rain was stable, as if a small cloud stood its ground. “Do you need anything else?”

She gulped. Yes, it had been quite a while since she had seen rain, even longer since she had felt it against her skin: had it really been ten years since they had forced her to watch the rain from the inside, hidden behind panes of glass?

“Can you make it rain? For me?” Psyche wobbled to her feet, grabbing her skirts, putting the embroidered nightshift safely under a small shelf beneath the table that supported the plant life. It would probably not get wet, if he made it rain.

“You want rain? Is that all?” Eros asked, as if confused: why would a lady raised as a noble ask for something as idiotic as that? She felt shame cover her cheeks. “Very well, then rain it is.”

The first drop was on the crown of her head; instinctively she looked up, and watched as grey clouds gathered on the ceiling, and then she closed her eyes, feeling rain on her skin, plastering her clothes to her.

She stood there for a long time, just letting the cold water fall on her. No thoughts crossed her mind except the cool hits against her skin until she felt it become numb, the slow falling out of her carefully made hair as she raked her hands through it.

Psyche turned to where she hoped Eros was, lest she look foolish speaking to thin air, and smiled.

“Thank you for this, Eros. It’s… Been a long time since I was allowed this sort of freedom.” Since she had been Thérèse, that little girl, but could she even call herself that anymore? She had been Psyche for so long, she even doubted people would remember the girl with black hair and fingers dyed with sweet berries that once lived in that tiny village.

Psyche waited for an answer from the god, trying to mask the anxiety growing in her heart when his answer seemed to take a long time to come forward.

“Ah, it’s no issue, no issue at all. I’m afraid I have to go now. Would you like to stay in the rain for a while longer?” She frowned, but quickly smoothed her face into careful neutrality.

“No, this is fine. Thank you once more.”

“It was my pleasure.” The rain stopped unnaturally: one moment there was water falling, the next she could feel again the warm air. Psyche waited until she heard him go away, and only then opened her eyes, staring at the spot that he had hopefully been, wondering what had made him go away so suddenly.

At night, Daffodil had put a blanket on her shoulders and started to gently comb her hair, undoing the knots that walking around with it both wet and undone had made. Psyche braved the hair being pulled, even if it was gentle.

There was a knock on the door, its sound already familiar to her ears: it usually came in later, though, when Psyche already lay between the sheets of her bed. She looked at Daffodil through the mirror, and with a deep breath, closed her eyes, as if she was about to dive into a lake.

“Come in.” Daffodil kept brushing her hair, and as she heard the door open and close, she wished she had a blindfold of some sort. “This will sound like cheating, but do you have a blindfold I can use? I am, as you can see, in front of a mirror.”

Eros paused, then snapped his fingers. Something silk-like and vaguely in a long, rectangular shape fell into her hands, and Psyche quickly handed it to Daffodil, who set the brush aside with a thud , then skillfully tied the blindfold. She opened her eyes, and inky darkness greeted her, safe.

“Thank you, Eros. What is the matter?” Daffodil stepped back, and Psyche didn’t miss the pressure of the brush against her scalp, suddenly glad for the reprieve: she’d hate to be making faces at the mirror as she talked with Eros.

“I would like to apologize for leaving so abruptly today.” He started, approaching her slowly. “I’m afraid I’ve had some matters come up, and it was unfair to you that your diversion ended so soon.”

Just to have something to fidget with, she started to fray at the edge of one of her embroideries. If she recalled correctly, it was the one that was a perpetual work in progress, one of her more challenging embroiders: a night sky, every star a different shade of blue that she carefully had to make herself out of white thread. Daffodil was very good at finding dyes in the palace and doing the dye work.

“It’s okay. You’re a god, and many people must have wishes.” Psyche shrugged, and she felt Eros close - closer than he usually was when they were awake and out of bed. It was, for some reason, not as unnerving as she had thought it would be.

“Still. As a payment for your graciousness with today’s blunter, might I do your hair? I’m sure Daffodil would not mind the reprieve.” Psyche sat up slightly straighter, startled: the god of forests, the god of forgotten things, wanted to do something as meager as brushing her hair?

She gulped dryly, her fingernails embedding themselves in a weak spot of her sewing, undoing the knot.

“I am not worthy. You’re a god, and I’m just… I’m just Psyche.” She bit her tongue at the words. It was true enough: she was a nobody compared to him.

“You are my wife. It makes you worthy.” Then, softer: “I understand if you say no.”

Something about these six words made her take a deep breath.

“Very well. Daffodil, you are free to go for tonight. Please, Eros, be gentle. My hair isn’t at its best today.” A ruffling of skirts, the passing of the brush from hands to claws, steps: Eros waited until the door closed to put a hand on her shoulder, and the hand felt…

It felt warm. Sure, the palm felt like a palm, and the fingers were definitely not much finger-like, but it was warm, and she couldn’t ask for more.

“I’ll be gentle.” His voice was quiet, as if this mere activity made him nervous, unsure where to begin the work. The hand on her shoulder went to her hair, holding it carefully away from her back.

He detangled her hair gently, feather-light, as if afraid one strong hair pull would unravel Psyche to a pile of threads. Psyche allowed herself to relax when she saw that being nervous wouldn’t help him, shoulders dropping, closing her eyes - even though it was a futile endeavor - and resting against the chair.

She didn’t even notice dozing off: all she knew was that Eros gently shook her, calling her name softly, as if it was a prayer.

“Yes?” She asked with a yawn, and there was a quietness. “Eros?”

“Sorry for waking you up, but I’ve finished and figured you might enjoy sleeping more in bed than in a chair.” She passed a hand through her hair, finding it tangle-free, and turned to him, smiling. His hand stayed at her shoulder, and Psyche covered his hand with hers.

“Thank you. Shall we go to bed, then?” She rose, and he took his hand off her shoulder, but she followed the movement, their hands together. It felt natural to do so, so she did not question it.

“If it’s your wish, I shall abide.” Eros replied, simply. The two laid in bed together, and Psyche, facing him without seeing him, smiled softly. “May I touch your face?”

She blinked, but gave a quiet nod. Soon his hand was on her skin, as if afraid his claws would break her in half.

“I had forgotten humans were - soft.” He whispered, as if it wasn’t meant for her ears. “It’s been too long since I touched one and didn’t have magic controlling me.”

“It controls you?”

“Sometimes.” The hand stayed at her cheek, not even near the blindfold. He really wanted that, if she were to fail the test, it would be her choice. What did it say about him?

She made a motion to touch him, and then paused.

“May I, as well?” If he had given her a choice to say no to being touched, then so would Psyche. It was fair.

“Of course.” She finished the movement, finding his face: a sharp jawline, skin that felt as if it was lightly scaled. She knew of his horns, claws, pink eyes, but somehow what was surprising to Psyche - what truly set it in stone that he was not human - was the feeling of snake scales under her fingers.

Psyche found she didn’t mind, her hands wandering further north before heading south: a mane of long, soft and straight hair, eyebrows and a nose, then lips that felt soft and human, even with the two little fangs that gently poked out. She touched his chin, and held her hand in there. He leaned into the touch as a touch-starved cat might, almost purring.

“You’re very human.”

A pause from Eros, and she bit her lower lip.

“Not many have said this about me. Thank you, Psyche. I’m sorry I have taken you from your family.” There was a note of regret in his voice, his warm hand fleeing her face and leaving an imprint of it behind, burning in ceaseless fire.

Psyche did not give him an answer straight away; instead, she inched closer, pressing her lips against his forehead, before settling against him, forehead to forehead.

“They weren’t my family. You’ve treated me better than then.” She said, and it was the truth. He had given her choices, something Psyche had never been afforded.

She woke to a pile of books by her side once more, taller than she was, and Psyche smiled when she saw what lay atop: a silky strip of blue fabric, a note that said this would look nice in your hair .

“Daffodil.” She called, and the maid stepped out of shadows. “Can you please pick up a blue dress for me?”

Daffodil eyed the pile, the strip of satin in Psyche’s palm, the note, and gave a curt nod.

She had been engrossed in a book, almost dozing off, when Eros crashed in the chapel she had been resting, laid on a pew. It was one of the coldest places in the palace, and Psyche had been too warm. Maybe the seasons were finally turning in this eternal spring, but she very much doubted it: it had been eight months already, and nothing seemed to change the place she was staying in.

He crashed against the wood, and Psyche rose with a start, hastily putting on the blindfold before she went after him, following the noise he’d made.

“Eros?” Psyche called, quickly approaching; Daffodil had gone to pick up something cold for her to drink, and thus she was on her own with the god whose face she couldn’t look upon. Kneeling down, she touched where she supposed was his face, and instead her hands came away wet with blood. “Eros!”

“Sorry.” He whispered, weak, unlike him. She could feel sweat drip down her back. What could’ve possibly made the god that owned this sprawling palace and seemed to have seemingly infinite resources bleed? “I… A wish took too much of me. I need rest, is all.”

“And you came to me?” She grabbed the petticoats under her skirts, ripping them - there were a thousand like this in the wardrobe, she wouldn’t miss a few - and started using them to soak up the blood blindly. She hoped it worked. “What wish made this?”

“I feel safe with you.” He coughed, a wet noise she greatly disliked - memories of sickly children drudged themselves up from the depths of her mind, and she strangled them into submission -, and Psyche bit back a distressed cry. “It was… A man, asking for life. I gave twenty healthy years to him, and twenty years to repay me under my service as a servant. But to give life, you have to give life, and the man didn’t bring a sacrifice. Thus, my sorry state. I had to be the sacrifice to make magic work its way . ”

“Can gods die?” His claws wrapped over her wrists, guiding to his chest. She felt that his tunic was was ripped to shreds, as if he had taken out his heart to give out.

He laughed: weak, unlike what she knew. She pressed the ripped petticoats against his skin.

“No. I’ll be fine. What, would you miss me?” Her fingers grazed what felt like a wound, and for her efforts Psyche gained a low hiss.

“Of course I would miss you. You’re…” What was he? The god she had married? A friend? Psyche had no words. “My husband. This wound...”

A sigh that sounded tired. Psyche gulped dryly, hoping for the best, and prayed that he couldn't feel the tremble of her hands.

She didn't want him to die.

“Life has to come from somewhere.”

“Would you like for me to close it? You’d have to guide my hand, but I think I can do it.”

There was startled silence from the other side. She palmed for the small sewing kit she kept in her dress pockets, relaxing when she found it there.

“Yes. Yes, I’ll help you. Let me thread the needle.” She opened the kit with practiced ease, and handed it over to him. His claws clinked against something, her wrist abandoned, and then he handled her a needle, guiding her hand.

She worked slowly, his commentary making sure Psyche kept working in a straight line. As she gave the last knot, the wound closed, Daffodil opened the door.

“Lord Eros!” Daffodil cried out, and Psyche raised her head.

“Bring him some salve and some bandages. Some water, too, so I can clean the wound.” Her voice sounded firm and calm to her ears, as if Psyche was used to giving such orders, the lady of a house she reigned over. Daffodil set the cup aside before leaving again, leaving the door open by the distinct lack of the sound of it closing. She directed her gaze - even though she couldn’t see - to Eros once more. “You’ll be fine, Eros.”

Was it a reassurance to him, or to Psyche herself? She couldn’t say. His clawed hand held hers.

“I will be, this much I can promise you.” She couldn’t see it with her eyes, but Psyche was sure there was a serene smile on his face, the little fangs that she knew were there poking out between his lips.

Ever since the wound, Psyche’s heart had been doing odd things when in the god's vicinity. It seemed to flutter, as if his mere presence could destabilize her. Psyche wondered what it meant aloud, once - around the tenth month mark, almost eleventh, a good two months after the incident. It was as if, too, all the blood in her body pooled at her cheeks when he touched her hair in almost adoring manners, braiding it mindlessly as she read to him sonnets or focused on embroidering. Touching him every day, blindly making sure he was well and healed, feeling as the tissue became scars under her fingers, became a torture that she delighted to partake.

Eros always asked if he could. Psyche always let him. That act made it harder to disguise the gentle trembling her hands got, as if nervous of his mere presence - or maybe expecting the gentle touch of his claws against her hair, undoing Daffodil’s work, only to braid it in the simple manner a peasant might wear. Psyche didn’t mind.

Perhaps these were symptoms? Maybe it was some sort of sickness, the divine powers of Eros making her ill. It would be very ironic if the Foix’s proclaimed sickly daughter did, in fact, get sick - even if no one at Versailles had ever seen her with as much as a fever.

She was quietly reading, making her way through the third book pile he had given her when she stopped and looked at Daffodil, who was solemnly looking at emptiness. Being a servant must be boring, she thought, when the master did nothing at all like Psyche did.

“Daffodil, might I ask you a question?” Daffodil snapped into focus, her eyes whose color Psyche never could say what it was looking at her.

“Of course, my lady. What can I help you with?” Daffodil asked, in turn, polite as anyone would be.

“I’ve been having some sort of affliction, I think. My heart seems to beat oddly, and my faces grow warm when Eros is near. Do you think we have a doctor in the premises that could check me?”

Daffodil stared at her for what felt like a small eternity, her face carefully blank.

“My lady, do you permit me to speak my thoughts, unburdened by my service?” Daffodil’s question was a carefully crafted one, and Psyche gave her a nod. Maybe she knew something about medicine, and was about to ask something related to her health. “Are you stupid? Do you spend your time reading all those love poems and learn nothing at all?”

She sat up straight, staring at the maid with the indescribable face.

“What?” Daffodil sat up by her side, a look of a clear lack of patience she vaguely recalled the nuns of the orphanage sporting in her face. “Whatever could you mean?”

“My lady, my dearest lady, you’re in love. I thought you’d already realized this, by the way you’ve been acting overfamiliar with him, but it seems I thought your intelligence was higher than it was.” Psyche opened and closed her mouth, speechless. She knew she had given permission to Daffodil to speak that way, but she didn't expect such directness. Daffodil grabbed her hands gently. “My lady, I understand you’re some sort of spoiled noble brat, protected from the world, but I didn’t dare think it was to the point where you repressed your own feelings.”

She blinked very, very quickly, as Daffodil waited patiently for her to formulate some sort of answer. Yes, she had repressed her feelings: being told all you were was altar blood for ten years made you emotionless to cope with your own imminent death. All she had felt was fear, loneliness and rejection.

But love - could she even fall in love? It was such a foreign feeling to her that it felt odd to even think about the words. Love: did Psyche deserve it? All she had been was a mean to an end, not supposed to be seen or heard until she was useful, and even then, her only usefulness was a quiet death.

“I…” She started, slowly, very slowly, weaving words together in her mind before deciding on whether she would speak them. “I suppose your words make sense, Daffodil. But love? Can I even feel it?”

Daffodil gave her a smile, soft and simple, hands tighter against hers. Her hands were callused, as if whoever she was before she came to Eros’ palace had a hard life. Vaguely, Psyche wondered what she had wished for.

“My lady, anyone can feel love. It’s only a question of opening your heart, and I think you have done that. I understand your time with the lord runs short, but you should make the best out of it.” Daffodil rose, cleaned her hands in the apron of her uniform, and gave a slight curtsy, before raising her head, eyes shining. “Of course, nothing says you can’t ask for more time.”

Daffodil gave her a wink, and then politely excused herself out of the conversation, going back to the empty stare she had been sporting before this insanity started, and Psyche was left alone to deal with her feelings.

Now, with some vague awareness she could feel, Psyche felt weird to do what she had been doing with Eros. Sure, it was all chaste and innocent, him brushing her hair at night and talking with her, but the times his claws brushed against her skin set fire to it.

Therefore, she took the coward’s path of fleeing. She found excuses to leave early the rooms they shared, to be asleep the time he arrived in their rooms and asleep the time he left.

It took Eros a good two weeks to finally manage to corner her. He strolled in the room - a dusty chapel she had found with Daffodil a few months back and never got around to cleaning -, and Psyche, out of habit, hastily put in the blindfold he’d given to her so long ago. She heard Daffodil leave after a few words, and Psyche took a deep breath.

“You’ve been skittish lately.”

“Have you forgotten how to knock?”

They spoke at the same time, and fraught silence fell between them as Eros slid by her side. Psyche gave them a small buffer of empty space.

“If I had knocked, you would have fled the premises through a door and told Daffodil to tell me you had a sudden emergency, which is actually hilarious because there’s nothing around here. So, what is making you flee? I’d like to know so I can rectify it, if it's a mistake I have done.” His voice had a tint of genuine worry to it; Psyche felt bad to do what she had been doing, but what was her other option? Even separated by a palm’s worth of space already made her heart beat erratically against her ribcage, so loud in her ears that Psyche did not know how Eros wasn’t hearing it as well.

Could she even speak the words? Psyche did not know if she could do it.

“There’s nothing wrong. Perhaps I’ve been feeling sick, is all?” She phrased it like a suggestion, and he paused.

“Are you? Sick, I mean. May I touch you?” Psyche hated it: hated how even the mere asking for permission made her face flush with heat. She gave him a jerky nod, and his hand rested against her forehead. “Oh, you are unusually warm, in fact.”

The hand slid to her cheeks, cupping it, and Psyche leaned against the touch, like the touch-starved person she was.

“I’m well. Don’t worry about me.” Her voice sounded raspy to her ears.

“Of course I worry about you. You’re my wife, and when you’re gone, I’ll miss you.” Her heart, doing jumps: Psyche wondered if she could survive this. “The god of forgotten things will remember you. You’ll shine brightly, of that I’m sure.”

“Are you the god of prophecies as well?” These were not the words she wanted to say; what Psyche wanted to say was but what if I didn’t go?, but her traitorous mouth did not pronounce them.

“I dabble in many things. Prophecy is not something I partake in, but I make do.” His hand left her cheek, and she missed the touch immediately. “Shall I take you to rest? This dust cannot possibly be good for you.”

“I’m fine here. It’s quiet.” Quieter than her heart, beating like a drum. “You have many chapels in here. Many rooms. You didn’t seem like a god who liked the placings of religion.”

“All these places were forgotten. Sometimes people wall off places, and with time they forget. They come to me, and I keep them.” There was the sound of his hair moving, as if Eros was looking around. The chapel was small, but beautiful: wooden icons littered the stone walls, the altar with red cloth as vivid as the day it had been made, long white candles glittering gently, and a small window that cast the world in shades of blue. “Although I’ll admit, I should use these chapels more. It’s not unpleasant.”

“You don’t suit chapels.” It was true: what she had gathered from his appearance suited the wilderness more. The horns, the fangs: religion was neat and organized, human-like, and he was so much older than the humanity that it had.

“You’re right, but it makes me feel bad to forget things. My duty is to recall.”

“Then let me. If you’ll remember me, then I’ll remember these chapels for you.” Psyche declared, sitting upright, and his hair moved once more. “You can forget these places. I’ll do this for you.”

A pause. She hoped he was smiling, but blindfolded as she was, Psyche had no idea.

“How kind. May I?” She nodded, and he leaned in, warm, so warm, lips grazing her forehead. Something tingled under her skin, and then disappeared as his mouth left her skin, imprinted in there. “There you go. A blessing.”

“What for?”

“Just because.” He rose from the pew they were sitting on, and Psyche rose as well, cradling the book she had been. “Shall we go? I’ll ask the cook to make something light for you. What would you like?”

She wasn’t sick in the normal sense, but Psyche still smiled and asked for soup.

“So you said nothing, my lady?” Daffodil asked after sitting on the question for three days, which Psyche thought rather polite. “And he did not question you?”

“What was I supposed to say? Sorry, I’m not sick, I’m literally running away from my own feelings?” Psyche huffed, and Daffodil, who was walking with her through the palace, rolled her eyes. “I’m not saying that. We have what, a month? Less than that? As if he’d let me stay after my time is up.”

Daffodil threw her hands in the air.

“A month and two weeks, my lady, which is much more than many people have.” Daffodil shot back. “I understand your concerns, but he wouldn’t take your blindfold off in the midst of lovemaking.”

“Daffodil!” Heat pooled in her cheeks, her hands shooting to cover them, baffled by the directness of the maid.

“What? I speak the truth. He asks everything before merely touching you, a kindness many men do not possess. Do you think he'd fail you on this test he set up, when he won’t even show up in front of you without allowing you time to close your eyes?” Daffodil had been freely speaking her mind ever since Psyche had allowed her to talk about feelings. She found she didn’t mind it: it felt good to talk with someone.

In many ways, Daffodil reminded Psyche of the Dowager Princess, except she lacked the mind games.

“Still, it wouldn’t be fair. I’ll leave, and…” She said nothing else, biting her lower lip. “How can I even go back home? I have been considered dead.”

“Lord Eros sends those of us who complete their contracts somewhere else, so we can make new lives for us. Perhaps he’ll offer you the same kindness.” Psyche stopped in front of a door, and Daffodil opened it, revealing a small solar, decorated in reds and golds, gaudy and terrible. Psyche threw herself on a couch with no grace, and put an arm over her eyes. “You’re a woman grown, stop with the childish dramatics. It’ll be fine.”

She didn’t want to leave, but she very much doubted Eros would let her stay: she was just another contract to be fulfilled, a wife that would be divorced as soon as the last day was up. The hurt wrenched her heart in two: she did not want to leave, but she wouldn’t be able to stay.

“You cannot possibly understand.”

“I assure you I can.” She felt Daffodil sit by her side, gently taking her hands. “I sold myself for Eros for a new husband. Eros said I’d enter servitude as soon as I died, and I had planned for a long life.”

“But you’re here.” Daffodil gave a weak laugh, looking away.

“My new husband wasn’t satisfied that I gave him seven daughters and no sons, so he put his hands on my neck.” Psyche bit her tongue to avoid gasping in horror. Even the king, with his many daughters, had never resorted so low. “When I told Lord Eros why I was here to repay my debts so soon, he promised to give me a second chance at life. All I had to do was work a few decades, instead of the measly ten years my original wish had given me - and since I was already here, what was three or four decades anyway?”

Psyche slowly nodded, and Daffodil’s eyes snapped back to Psyche, who had sat down properly on the couch at some point.

“What I mean to say with all this dialogue is that you should try. Maybe not now, if you’re not yet comfortable with it, but I don’t think he’d send you away if you say you don’t wish to go.” There was a knock on the door, and Psyche ignored the amused look Daffodil sent her as she scrambled to put in the blindfold, moving behind her to help her tie it.

When darkness fell over her world, she told Eros to come in, and let Daffodil’s words ring around her head.

Psyche was a coward, yes - but it allowed her to be by Eros’ side without fearing reproval. She was used to rejection - just look at her entire life since the Countess had picked her up -, and the idea of having him not around her anymore made her retch. Thus, her silence on the matters of the heart.

Daffodil tutted at her, but what was she supposed to do? She waited for time to pass, for if she revealed her feelings there would be an easy way out, but at the same time she begged time to give her relief: to give her one more day, one more night, one last afternoon with the god. She wasn’t one for prayers, but she added one to a God that she didn’t even know existed now that she was aware of forest gods like Eros, and hoped for the best.

It wasn’t meant to be: the morning of her last day came, and Psyche sat up in bed, hugging her knees. The side of the bed where Eros slept was empty, and she stared at it for a long while.

“My lady?” Daffodil called, holding in her arms the dress for today: the green one from her first day that she never had the courage to wear. “The more you dwell, the less time you have.”

“I suppose you’re right.” She gave a weary sigh, rising from her bed, going to the vanity table. The girl there was not the girl that had first come to Eros’ palace, that scrawny thing that feared her own shadow and the god that owned her life. “If I have to go, I’ll miss you. Find me in a few decades?”

“I just have eight or twelve years more, my lady, so I wouldn’t say it’s a few decades.” Daffodil replied, setting the dress aside, and grabbing the hair brush. “Are you sure you won’t say anything? Even a day, my lady…”

She did not reply, and Daffodil, with a sigh that sounded just as weary as hers, said nothing more.

Psyche was wandering the palace grounds, trying to commit to memory the walls and places she saw, unsure if she’d ever see it again. She went through the chapels, the solars, the bathrooms, the drawing rooms and greenhouses. Psyche smelled flowers and played instruments for a few seconds before moving on, trying to cover as much ground as she could. Her feet hurt, unused to the long distances, but Psyche trudged on.

Then she came across a room she did not expect to: the wide, white door of what she assumed was Eros’ study. Daffodil did not make a move to open it, eyeing it as well.

“He’s inside, my lady.” Daffodil said, softly, and Psyche stood in front of it for a lifetime, staring at the carvings. From her pockets, she took the blindfold, tying it with practiced ease - just in case.

Then, a knock: gentle and soft. She doubted he had heard it, until Psyche heard him telling her to come in. Daffodil’s hand was steady on her elbow, and she guided her inside after a moment.

The room felt different from the hallway, thick with something she couldn’t name - magic, perhaps -, cold and unwelcoming.

“And here I thought you came to fail the test.” Eros sighed, a joking tone in his words.

“And I thought that you’d forgive my indiscretions at the last hour of the trial!” Psyche was guided to an armchair, plush and comfortable. She sat down, and heard Eros moving around, Daffodil disappearing into the background noise as her hand left her elbow. “Sorry. I’m just looking around, you know? Trying to keep this place in my memories. And you? What are you doing?”

A small chuckle, Eros passing by her and hesitating before the crown of her head, only mussing up Psyche’s hair when she gave him a quick nod.

“A noble task if I ever saw one.” Eros picked something, one of his cursed human leather books, and heard him leaf through it. “As for me, I’m just doing the keeping of the books. Wishes repaid, wishes made.”

He never spoke much of the books: sometimes when they spent their afternoons together he’d make more of them, and sometimes he’d tell the stories of wishes he had granted. Some were mundane: enough coins to buy food for a few days, a new cow, a day more for a loved one to live. Others were more complex: health, vast riches, a death reversed. She found the mundane more fascinating than the complex wishes - what sort of despair led a person to wish for the bare minimum? A cautious one, she was sure.

“Anything exciting?” There was a pause, and Eros grabbed another book.

“A man asked for a leg back.” He said, and there was the sound of moving fabric. “A woman entered my service. A boy gave me a batch of songs. Just another day of work.”

There was a long pause, and Psyche waited for the silence to end. She heard him approach, kneel in front of her, his hands hesitating near hers before she gave up and held him. Her breath caught in her throat: there was a god kneeling for her, a mere mortal, and she couldn’t even see what his face looked like.

“Psyche. Do you wish for anything?” He asked, slowly, very slowly, as if the words took conscious effort to say. “Riches. Power. A good marriage, better than this one we are in. Anything you ask, and I’ll pay the price.”

You, she thought: I want you, I want to see your face without failing this trial. I want your hands on my skin and I want your lips on mine.

But Psyche said nothing of the sort; she smiled, held his hands tighter against her own.

“I already have everything I want, Eros.” Psyche replied, which was half truth. The god sighed, hesitating for a moment. “If you’d like to touch me, you can.”

Eros rested his head against her knees, and Psyche freed one of her hands, carding her fingers through his hair.

“If you ever wish for anything when you’re gone, come to the forest and call for me.” His words sounded muffled, and Psyche hated his certainty that she would not stay. She curved herself onto him, her nose buried in his hair - the smell of grass overpowered her, but she did not move, nuzzling against his horns.“I’ll attend, even if I have other duties.”

“You’re too kind to me. What have I even done to deserve such honor?”

“What can I say, I grew attached to you, Psyche.” The words caught at Psyche’s throat, but she did not say them. Not now. Not until she was free.

The night stretched, terrifying in its length, and Psyche stood awake, looking at the dark. They had gone to bed after dinner as usual, but sleep, so easy to come in the past few months, evaded her now.

“This will sound weird, but hasn’t the day ended yet?” Psyche asked to nothing, and she heard Eros moving on the other side of the bed.

“Well, I was waiting for you to wake up before congratulating you on passing my test, but yes.” Psyche turned to him, and in the dark she saw nothing of his features, sitting on the bed. She heard Eros sit as well, the heat among them tracing paths her hands did not have the courage to make real. “If you wish to go now, I can have it done, and I’ll admit selfishness when I wished for your presence for a few more hours.”

She ignored his words, rising from the bed, going blindly for the curtains. She struggled with them, their weight too heavy, but she would not ask for Daffodil to come and light up the candles when night never fell on the god’s palace.

“Psyche?” Eros called, as she opened the heavy curtains, bathing them in sunlight. She turned, looking at Eros, and marching back to bed.

The god was beautiful: pink eyes with snake-like pupils, dark skin, scaled with silver and painted with vines and branches and animal life, long black hair that she knew the feeling of but not the color, horns that curled upwards, full lips with tiny fangs out. He wore one of his newly embroidered tunics - the one with the complex lake of swans -, and his face was sketched with surprise.

“I’m sorry, Eros.” She said, sliding back, making a motion to hold his clawed hands: they looked as human as they felt, fingers with long black nails whose color expanded to his skin, and then slowly faded into his skin tone. He gave them to her, and she interlaced their fingers together. He looked baffled. “I’m afraid I do not wish to leave. I’m afraid I have grown to love you. I’ll understand if you wish to send me away nonetheless, if my feelings are inconvenient for you.”

Surprise once more: Psyche had never known she longed to see how his face moved.

“Oh! Oh. So that’s why the servants have been grumbling about love…” A slow smile took his face, and Psyche was thrilled to see it. Less thrilled to know Daffodil had spoken to others about it, though. “I’m afraid it’s mutual; that when I saw you, I was glad for the blindfold, because it didn’t let you see the feelings I wore on my sleeve, like a fool. May I kiss you? I’ve been longing to do so for quite a while now.”

She nodded, the smile on her face refusing to part with her as his lips touched hers. She hadn’t expected this particular scenario, the reciprocation of feelings. Psyche had thought she would be rejected, sent away in shame, but the contrary had happened.

When she was a child, when the Countess had named her, in a mockery of her fate, after the girl in love with the monstrous god of love, the girl who had to go through the same test as Psyche did and failed, she hadn’t expected that it would happen to her as well - but Psyche wouldn’t change it for anything. She loved the god whose face she saw for the first time but knew so well nonetheless, and Eros loved her back, something quite new in her life.

She was Thérèse, the girl from a small village molded into a sacrifice for the god in the forest, but she much prefered being Psyche, the girl in love with the god of the forgotten things who loved her back.

"May I wish to stay?" She whispered, when they separated, and the god's smile was wide.

"You don't have to wish."
.

original: be the sun as my witness

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