Two hours, she said. At the fountain.

I’m not sure why we’re meeting in such a public place… some of my… past self’s past experiences with watching humans interact seem to imply that she may be trying to prevent me from making a scene? But if she was going to give me some kind of seriously bad news I’d have thought she’d just tell me over our link…

And yet, here I am waiting at the fountain.

…

I have to say, it’s held up unexpectedly well for how old it is. A testament to how robust the public works establishment is in my castle city, I’d suppose. I certainly can’t call it a castle town anymore, considering how significantly it’s grown over the past few centuries. And as I’d previously observed, most of the population is gorgons, followed by adventurers and finally, nightwalkers.

…

…

She’s late.

Not that it matters. I’ll wait for her. She has certainly waited long enough for me… and in some ways she continues to wait.

“Um. Hi.”

Ah, speak of the devil. There she is.

…

…Looking everywhere but at me.

“Hi, Izzy. It’s been some time. Are you well?”

“I’m… alright. Mostly alright, yeah,” she answers, clearly trying to hide a fidget.

I lightly furrow my brow. “Are you sure? I can tell something is bothering you, you know. You don’t have to tell me if you don’t want to. I certainly won’t make you.”

Izahne opens her mouth as if to speak before catching herself, the action draining instead into a sigh.

We stand in silence for a moment before I gesture to the edge of the fountain where I’d sat countless times before, watching the mortals come and go, but she simply shakes her head.

…Before seeming like she’s finally come to a decision.

She suddenly snatches my hand and we disappear in a cloud of pure blackness, instantly arriving somewhere else…

A bedroom. Hers, I’d assume… I’d instructed Rose to follow Izzy’s directions for the dungeon construction, so it’d make sense she’d have built herself a place to rest here.

…

And she’s just staring at me again.

I can feel Pearl’s will some distance away… it appears that Izzy keeps her old friend relatively nearby, and yet… unexpectedly far.

But I’m not going to bring that up right now. I’m pretty sure that my wife wants to talk, although why we have to be here specifically I’m not sure.

And then she takes my other hand as well, interlacing our fingers.

…

“I’ll admit, I didn’t expect this kind of reception. You’re sure you’re okay, Izzy?” I ask cautiously.

“I’m not really sure anymore,” she replies.

Not at all reassuring. But then she continues.

“You’re… not at all trustworthy. You break your promises… important ones. The most important kind. You have no respect for life, or consent, or even any understanding of basic human wants or needs…”

I nod lightly. I had a feeling she was going to offer a litany of my wrongs, so I’d been mentally prepared for it. I have no intention of denying any of them.

The story has been illicitly taken; should you find it on Amazon, report the infringement.

They’re true, after all. I really am a monster in body, mind, and soul. If there had been any question before, I’ve long since dispelled it via both my past actions and Astraea’s memories.

“In all honesty, I hate you. I have every reason to hate you, and loathe you, and fear you. I have as many bad memories with you as I do good… and even the good ones seem suspect…”

…

We simply stand facing each other, her gazing into my eyes in a way that’s completely inconsistent with the things she’s saying. I’ll admit that I’m getting more and more confused.

“Izzy… I know all of these things are true, and I’m not going to deny any of them. I’ve made a lot of mistakes, and simply saying ‘but I’m not human’ or ‘I wasn’t raised to know these things’ are no excuse. I’ve had a great deal of time to learn, and I chose to spend most of it sleeping… admittedly because I didn’t know what I was supposed to do without you, and then I gave in to my more base impulses and… did a lot of damage, and ruined what little positive reputation I’d worked for, and pushed away everyone around me – even the most loyal. I let our home fall to ruin. I withdrew from everyone and everything. In a sense… I broke almost as much as you did. But it’s still no excuse. Even assuming you were gone forever I should have worked to continue the things you’d worked to teach me, and I didn’t. I’m sorry.”

“I know,” she says quietly. “I know all of that. And you know that I know.”

I nod again. “Yes. But if I’ve learned anything from who I used to be, it’s that there is value in admission even if it’s already obvious. It’s part of owning up to the wrongs I’ve done.”

With a small sigh, she pulls me closer to wrap her arms around me, pressing her face to my neck. “I… don’t know what to do.”

“I don’t know what you should do, or what you want to do, you know. You’ve closed off your thoughts and feelings to me – which, I don’t fault you for – so I can’t synchronize with you like I do with… with Artemis.”

“Do… do you want to know why?”

Her voice is barely audible, even to True Sense.

I pull her more tightly against me with a hand on the small of her back, the other resting on the back of her head. Yes, this is the right way to comfort someone, I’m sure of it.

“Only if you want to tell me.”

A long silence stretches between us, but it’s somehow more comfortable than any of our current meeting. It feels… peaceful. Contented.

As though this is where we’re supposed to be, both of us.

Where we belong.

And I feel the faintest sparks of… something? But I’m not even sure what. It’s unfamiliar. But I don’t think it’s a bad emotion…

“I… hate you. I hate you so much. And I’m so afraid of you. I never want to see you again, not now and not ever, and I’m not sure that will ever change. You’ve broken my trust so many times, so many, Nemesis!”

Alright, yes, we’ve discussed this, but I’m sure she’s getting to some kind of point. Although I’m not sure why she’s spending so much time on this dramatic buildup… not that I have anything else to do today, I’d cleared my schedule for this regardless of not having actually had anything on it aside from ‘listen to Vivi’s report on what the mortals are doing’ and ‘try to find something to do that doesn’t remind me of a meaningless eternity stretching out before me’.

But I’m not going to let that impatience show, although I’m sure she can feel it at least a tiny amount of it.

“I have so many reasons to hate you…”

…

“…So why do I love you so much? More than before. So much more. I don’t even understand how much… I want to forgive you for everything, and I don’t understand why. I want to take you back, I want to give you everything and give up everything for you. This is dangerous, it’s so dangerous, and it makes me so much more afraid of you, and what else you could do to me or the people I care about. I haven’t forgotten poor Pearl.”

Well.

That certainly caught me by surprise.

…

“How can I hate you this much, and fear you this much, and still need you so much?”

No words come to me. I’ll admit, I’ve felt some kinds of emotions blossoming inside me toward her, even the smallest amount… at least wanting to protect her, and reconcile with her, and to watch her.

I’ve needed to watch her and see what she’s doing in her life, but I didn’t know how close would be alright, how much she’d allow. I knew she was angry and disappointed. Possibly disappointed most of all.

“How can I hate you so much,” she continues, “and still… w-want you this much?”

Blinking, I look down at her, meeting her eyes again. Her glowing, dewy eyes, searching for meaning in mine.

“I do have a guess… if you want to hear it. I’ll admit I’ve been feeling… things I don’t understand, toward you. Ever since I’d recovered you.”

“Then say it,” she almost snaps… but with an unexpected edge of tenderness to it, one of her hands rising to caress my face.

…

“Your Mantle, and that title, probably. Devotion. You do know how Mantles affect the gods, right?”

“Not really.”

“Well, um-” I begin as my almost-estranged wife interrupts me with a deep kiss, deeper than I’ve ever been kissed before in this life.

She’s already dragging me toward her bed with that brute strength of hers I’d nearly forgotten as I continue. “They change your personality. I got a lot more violent when I acquired the Mantle of Malevolence.”

“Mmm,” is all she says in reply.

She’s already too occupied to say more, her lips back on mine.

And although some small voice inside me is quietly screaming that something is wrong, something isn’t what I want, isn’t what I’ve ever wanted or understood…

I want this, somehow. I don’t understand how or why, but this… this is somehow something I’ve always wanted, more than I’ve ever wanted anything else. A peculiar feeling, an emotion, wells up within me.

A real emotion.

This is right. I know it is, I can feel it.

Because… of everything I’ve done in my long life, this is the most right by far.