He’d felt it surge in his heart like a thunderclap. A gunshot wound that wouldn’t heal. Over time, it would consume him.

In time, it would devour him and plunge him into senseless anxiety. Into madness, into soullessness once again.

“Charon,” Eros begged, weeping gold into his mattress of clouds. “Charon, by gods, hear me, hear her, bring her back to me, she is my other half, she is my everything, please, please, please, bring—give—give her back, oh, please, oh, oh gods, oh gods, oh my mother, my mother, why have you done this to me…”

Impassively, Aphrodite watched, her arms folded and cradling an invisible child. Eyes of amber narrowed in discontent and she turned from her eldest son. The air breathed night-blooming jasmine and the scent of honeysuckle as she stepped out into the Olympus starlight, studying the clear night heavens.

It really never gets any easier, does it.