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“IT FELT LIKE I’D TURNED into my father in the worst way possible, killing the woman I love through stupidity and ego.”
“You’re definitely not your father. I’m not dead.” She assured Dionysus softly, holding both his wet cheeks in her hands. “It’s fine. We had fun and it got out of hand but we both learned a lesson.” She summed up gently.
When he just stared at her, dazed, she pulled him in for a rib creaking hug. That seemed to trigger something in him, and he squeezed her back even tighter. They held each other for a long moment before pulling back, cuts beginning to ooze again.
“Let’s get cleaned up.” Dionysus pulled her to her feet and they stagger to the bathroom. They washed the blood, ichor and remains of far too much sex off each others skin. Together they got dressed and began tending to their wounds.
He ran hands heavy with magic over every gouge and tooth mark on her with a frown, her skin tightening as it knitted together under his touch. The remaining cuts looked like something a human would do in a moment of intense passion rather than an animal mauling. The bite marks refuse to heal much at all, bruising spectacularly. Ariadne dug up a balm that soothed bruises that she rubbed on them both, not finding a lot of places that didn’t need the balm.
“Why can you only heal it a little?” She asked, gently daubing a different paste on his cuts.
“Because I’m trying to be gentle. Even healing magic can destroy if you use too much of it. I’m not going to risk you.” Dionysus pressed a kiss to her last scratch, eyelashes tickling the underside of her knee.
“Then there is no reason you can’t heal yourself.”
“A little pain won’t hurt me.” He put her leg down and gestured, pulling a stack of clothes out of the air in another absentminded show of power.
“Dionysus.” He raised a belligerent eyebrow at her tone and hands her half the stack of clothes.
Ariadne sat it in her lap and lifted her chin. “I don’t want you to punish yourself. We are both consenting adults. Bringing your powers into things wasn’t the smartest thing we could have done but-”
“I almost lost you!” Dionysus jerked to his feet, snarling inhuman and deep from his chest “How do you not understand that? Can you not understand what that felt like for me?”
Ariadne bit her lip but didn’t look away. “I’ve almost died before,” She started but was cut off again.
“I didn’t love you then!” Dionysus stopped. His hand went to his mouth, touching it gingerly as if he couldn’t believe what had come out of it. He elaborated awkwardly, “I cared that you were one of mine, but the way I feel about you now is different. Losing you then would have been infuriating. Losing you now... I can’t. I can’t do that.” He finished in a whisper, green eyes glossy.
“I told you that I wouldn’t let anything happen to you. Then I almost killed you right after with the powers I swore to get under control.” He buried his face in his hands. “I always wind up killing anyone who cares about me. I drove two of my aunts and an uncle mad and to their death. My cousins, my nannies, all of them.” Dionysus confessed.
“That’s a lot of family.”Ariadne said numbly.
“All of them dead now because of me. Sometimes I wonder if my mother asking father to see his true god form was because of me as well.” Dionysus took a breath and held it, trying to control his ragged breathing. He let it go to beg, “Please don’t leave me.”
“I won’t.” Ariadne reassured him. “You didn’t lose control last night, remember? We just went further than what I could handle.” She acknowledged with a wince.
Dionysus searched her face, looking for something he could understand. “Why aren’t you running for the hills?”
“I’m not capable of understanding Olympian tongue, remember? People talked in from of me. I’ve known about your childhood since the first week on the mountain.” Ariadne told him bluntly. “Nothing detailed, just the shape of things.” She added at his look of horror.
“I know what I am getting into.” She stepped into his personal space, looking at him down then up, meeting his gave steadily. “I want you. I want this.”
He kissed her.
There was a knock at the bedroom door.
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