Dionysus entered the Crysos Gallery of Art and wove his way through the crowd, heading straight for the bar. The attendant must have seen him because he already had a glass of wine prepared. Dionysus snatched it with a nod and continued through the fray, observing the gathering.
He was looking for anyone he recognized, but not because he wanted to chat—it wasn’t exactly a friendly crowd. It was more a matter of assessing competition for the upcoming auction. While those in attendance were making a show of observing artistic masterpieces, it was not the art up for sale tonight—it was women and young men.
Dionysus had come in search of Medusa, a gorgon who had the power to turn men to stone. She had last been seen on the shore of the Aegean. As he’d feared, Poseidon had found her, and once he’d had his way with her, he claimed to have left her alone.
“If I had known the value of her beautiful head, I’d have cut it off where she lay,” he’d said, informing Dionysus that she could only turn men to stone once her head was separated from her body. It was a cruel revelation, and it left Dionysus uncertain as to whether it was best to find her at all. But if it wasn’t him, it would be someone else who valued her use over her life. Even if he did not manage to find her, he could at least extricate a few sex-trafficked victims and make note of the rest.
Eventually, the maenads would rescue them all—at least that was the goal. He hesitated to call it a plan, because he’d done this enough to understand that plans never went smoothly. Sometimes they were too late.
His chest tightened.
One day, he hoped they could put an end to this vicious cycle of abuse.
He made his way into the adjoining room, which, while more spacious, was far more crowded, likely because it featured mostly erotic art. Dionysus scanned the room, his eyes passing over portraits of Aphrodite in the hands of mortal lovers and glades full of naked nymphs, until he caught a glimpse of someone he recognized, though she was the last person he’d expected to find here, and that was because she shouldn’t have been here at all.
Detective Ariadne Alexiou stood across from him, and he could not help the eruption of heat that started in his groin. His heart pumped harder, and blood rushed to every limb, making him very, very aware of the heaviness between his legs.
Motherfucker, he thought.
She was supposed to be at his club, Bakkheia, training with the maenads, yet she was here, wearing an electric blue dress that only drew more attention to her beauty. He couldn’t help thinking about how she had wrapped those long legs around his waist when he’d fucked her against a cave wall on the island of Thrinacia or how he’d twisted his fingers into that thick, dark hair just to gain better access to her mouth. She had tasted so sweet, and she’d felt so good around him.
Fuck, he ached for her.
She had yet to notice him, but as he took a step in her direction, a man handed her a glass of champagne.
What the actual fuck?
“Ari,” Dionysus said as he approached. He felt almost breathless, but he knew that was his frustration.
She was in the middle of taking a drink when she spit it back into the glass, her eyes wide with surprise. Clearly she had not expected him to be here either.
“Dionysus,” she said. “Hi.”
“What are you doing here?” he asked.
“You know Lord Dionysus?” the man beside her asked.
Know was an understatement.
“Yes,” she said. “Casually.”
“Casually,” Dionysus repeated. “Sure.”
Her gaze seared his skin. He knew what she was saying without speaking.
Don’t fuck this up for me.
He pointed to the two of them. “So what’s this?”
The man, who was young with a swath of blond hair, hesitated and stuck out his hand. “Leander Onasis,” he said.
Dionysus looked at his hand and then met his gaze. “I didn’t ask who you were,” he said.
The mortal blushed and dropped his arm. He started to speak, but Ariadne interrupted.
“Leander,” she said and offered an apologetic smile. “Would you give us a minute?”
He hesitated, glancing at Dionysus. “Of course,” he said. “I’ll, uh, see you in the room?”
“Sooner,” she said.
He grinned before walking away, and Dionysus glared, unable to suppress the jealousy and anger that shot up his spine.
“Really? Sooner?” he asked.
“What the fuck is wrong with you?” she asked between her teeth. “We had an agreement.”
“You wanted to go back to work,” he said.
“This is work,” she snapped.
“Really? Because I happen to know your boss put you on traffic duty.”
“Are you stalking me now?”
“Never stopped,” he said, though it wasn’t stalking, and she knew it.
They’d agreed that she could go back to her day job as a detective for the Hellenic Police Department, but she had to accept that the maenads would also watch her every move. He was going to have to have a conversation about this, however.
“Did you arrive with him?”
Her eyes were like fire, and they singed every inch of his skin.
“Is this about my job or the men I fuck?”
“I thought this was work,” he shot back.
“You are such an asshole,” she seethed.
She spun and stormed away. He followed, catching up to her.
“Ari—”
She rounded a corner and turned toward him abruptly. “Don’t call me that!” she snapped.
“What? Your name?”
“That is a nickname. It denotes familiarity, a privilege I have not given you.”
“I fucked you. I’d say we are pretty familiar.”
“I gave you access to my body,” she said. “That doesn’t mean we’re close.”
Her words stung, and Dionysus tightened his jaw against the terrible things he wanted to say. He wasn’t sure what he’d expected but he’d hoped that when they returned from the island, she’d still want him.
It turned out to be the opposite.
“Do you regret it?” he asked after a moment, unable to keep the pain from his voice.
“We’re not talking about this here,” she said, averting her eyes, glassy with anger.
“Now seems as good of a time as any,” he said, because he knew outside this moment, she would continue to avoid him.
When she met his gaze, the full force of her fury hit.
“Every time you do this, I regret it more and more.”
He searched her face desperately for any sign of a lie but found nothing.
She was telling the truth.
He took a step back, swallowing hard.
“Watch your back,” he said. “You aren’t among friends.”
“Thanks for the advice,” she said, returning to Leander, who welcomed her with a smile and a fresh drink. After a few moments, she seemed to relax around him, and Dionysus hated that she could not seem to do the same with him.
It took all his power to tear his gaze from her, but he finally left her for the main floor, returning to the bar for a second glass of wine when he was swiftly cut off by a man with a badly bruised face.
His name was Michail Calimeris, and he was the owner of Maiden House, a brothel in the pleasure district.
“Well, if it isn’t Lord Dionysus,” he said.
Dionysus had gone to the mortal at the start of his search for Medusa, but things had escalated quickly when Michail had recognized Ariadne as a cop. She’d ended up killing two of his men.
It was just another reason she should not be here.
“Michail,” Dionysus said. “You’re looking…recovered.”
It was a lie, but it was also the nicest thing he could think to say to a man he loathed.
“I’m on the mend,” Michail replied as if talking to an old friend.
“If you’ll excuse me,” Dionysus said, attempting to step around Michail, but he was stopped when the mortal stuck out his hand.
“You’ll forgive me,” Michail said. “But I don’t think I will.”
Dionysus took a step back and then glanced to his left and right. In the time he’d been with Ariadne, the gallery had been cleared of civilians, and the only people who remained were Michail’s men.
They surrounded him on all sides.
Dionysus held Michail’s gaze.
“To what do I owe this honor?” he asked thickly.
Michail gave a wicked smile. “I just wanted to have a friendly chat.”
“You don’t look particularly pleasant.”
“It might have something to do with the nose job you gave me when you slammed my face into the floor.”
Dionysus shrugged. “An improvement if you ask me.”
“No one did,” Michail said tightly.
There was a beat of silence, and then Leander walked into view with Ariadne. One of his hands was clasped tightly over her mouth, and he held a gun to her head. Dionysus’s fingers curled into fists as he tried to assess how he was going to get them out of this situation.
Fuck.
He shifted his gaze from her to Michail again.
“You should have just let me have the detective,” Michail said.
“She’s not mine to give.”
“It sure didn’t look like that to me,” he said.
Dionysus imagined not, given that Michail had walked in while Ariadne was grinding against his cock, but intimacy did not equal possession or ownership.
“So you’ve decided to take her?”
“I’ve decided to kill her in front of you,” he said.
“You think I would let you?”
Michail chuckled. “You may be a god, Dionysus, but what power do you possess beyond filling glasses with wine and a sharp pine cone?”
Dionysus was used to people questioning his divinity. He was the God of Wine and Revelry. His influence on the world was minimal compared to the Olympians, but these mortals had not been alive during the time of his madness. They did not know what he was capable of when pushed.
And this was testing his limits. The edges of his vision were already turning red.
“You forgot one,” Dionysus said. “I’m pretty skilled at breaking faces.”
“But not skilled enough to realize when you’ve been lured into a trap.”
Dionysus had to admit, that stung a little. The truth was he had not thought twice about coming tonight. He’d been to similar auctions many times; he’d taken this one for granted. Still, trapping a god was never a good idea.
Trapping Dionysus was worse.
“I am impressed,” said Dionysus. There was a tremor to his voice that some might have mistaken for nerves, but it was really anger.
Michail’s eyes gleamed with pride. “Thank you.”
“Not with you,” Dionysus said. “I’m impressed that you think you’ve trapped me when I have most certainly trapped you.”
Dionysus summoned his thyrsus. The men in the room laughed at what they called a pine cone–tipped staff, but the fennel was a symbol of his power over nature, over hedonism and pleasure.
It was also a weapon, and his vision was red.
He hurled the staff at Michail like a spear, and it went straight through his chest, striking the wall behind him with a loud crack.
There was a moment of stunned silence.
Michail was still on his feet though there was a hole in his chest. He staggered, and blood burst from his mouth, spattering the floor.
Then he fell to the ground, dead.
Dionysus’s gaze shifted to Ariadne and then to the men surrounding him.
They all looked horrified.
“I forgot to mention,” he said. “My pine cone is pretty sharp.”
Leander cocked his gun, and the men started to close in on Dionysus, only to freeze when a strange lurching sound escaped from somewhere deep in their throats.
They exchanged looks, both confused and fearful, before a dark liquid burst from every orifice of their bodies in a stream so powerful, they were thrown backward into the walls. When it was over, they fell to the floor like dead fish in a pool of red wine.
He’d turned their blood to wine and filled them full of it.
As he stood there, his vision started to clear, but he knew the madness was not over—this was just the start. He was about to spiral.
He had to get Ariadne out of here.
He crossed the room and plucked his thyrsus from the wall. When he faced Ariadne, he was surprised to find that she had not fled. They were both covered in blood and wine, and the smell of it thickened the air between them.
He reached for her, brushing a finger across her cheek.
“Are you afraid?” he asked.
“Yes,” she said, but she did not push him away.
Dionysus held his breath, and his hand moved to the back of her neck. He stepped closer until she was forced to tilt her head back to hold his gaze and there was no space between them.
“Now you know who I really am,” he said, and then they vanished, leaving the mayhem behind.
Dionysus hoped when they arrived at his house, Ariadne would put some distance between them, but she didn’t, and he did not have the power to push her away.
“Ari,” he whispered. His hand was still tangled in her hair, braced at the back of her neck. “I need you to leave.”
He spoke the words, but he held her tighter, his body vibrating with an unfathomable lust. It was the cycle of the madness he had been cursed with, and once he was in its grip, there was only one way out.
It made him feel ashamed, that spilling blood ignited this frenzied need to fuck, and he did not want Ariadne to be the victim of his unrestrained desire, even if she thought she could handle it.
“Dionysus.”
She spoke his name in a breathy whisper, and he closed his eyes as it shuddered through him. His mouth hovered over hers, and his throbbing cock pressed into the bottom of her stomach. There was no mistaking what he wanted, except that she likely could not sense the violence quaking inside him.
If they came together tonight, it would not be gentle, and neither of them would be the same.
“You do not want this version of me,” he said.
His brows were furrowed, and every muscle in his body was like a bowstring pulled taut. If she said the right thing, or maybe it was the wrong thing, he would succumb to the insanity of this desire.
Ariadne brushed a few of his braids over his shoulder, and when her fingers trailed along his brow, he opened his eyes and met her gaze.
“Don’t tell me what I want,” she said.
“Fuck you,” he said, and then he kissed her.
He bent her head back, his tongue sweeping into her mouth deeply. She could not kiss him in return, but he did not need that yet. This was not a give-and-take. It was possession.
Ariadne didn’t resist, looping her arms around his neck and holding on until he eased his assault on her mouth and let her kiss him back, her tongue twining with his in a desperate dance. Then he left her mouth, kissing along her jaw and her neck, his hands moving to her breasts and then to her back, anchoring her against his arousal.
“I need this now,” he said.
He pulled away enough to meet her gaze even though his vision was hazy.
“Yes,” she whispered, breathless.
He groaned.
“I will not be gentle, Ariadne,” he said.
“It’s okay,” she said, and this time, she kissed him.
His hands moved to her ass, and as he dragged her up his body, someone cleared their throat. They froze, and when Dionysus turned his head, he realized they were not alone—far from it. His living room was full of people.
“Way to go, Hecate,” Hermes said. “They were just getting to the best part.”
“What the actual fuck?” Dionysus snarled. His desire turned to fury instantly, his focus solely on Hermes.
“Easy now, Dionysus,” said Hermes. “We had no choice.”
“No choice?” Dionysus asked, releasing Ariadne and turning to face them completely, his hands fisted. “I will tear you to shreds.”
Hecate stepped into his line of sight, blocking him from Hermes. Her eyes were swallowed by darkness. Her energy was like shadows, reaching inside him. He heard her voice in his head.
“Be at ease, son of Zeus,” she said. “Hera has no power here.”
A cry erupted from his throat as he was freed from the claws of Hera’s madness. He arched his back against the pain. It felt like his chest was being torn in two, and when it was done, he shook with the release. He glared back at Hecate, breathing hard.
“If you think that makes me any less violent, you are wrong.” He spoke between clenched teeth. He still wanted to rip Hermes into pieces. This wouldn’t be the first time he’d cockblocked him.
He was just as bad as the fucking sheep from the island.
“Perhaps not,” she said. “But now you cannot blame Hera for your actions.”
He glared, and the Goddess of Witchcraft stepped out of the way, and he could see Hermes, Apollo, and a female goddess he had never met. Persephone, he assumed. She looked like spring with honeyed hair and bright eyes, yet there was a darkness to her. It lived on the edges of her aura, like storm clouds haunting a bright sky.
Dionysus stared at her.
“What do you want?” he asked.
She was not fazed, and she did not hesitate.
“Hades has been captured by Theseus,” she said, and then her gaze shifted to Ariadne. “I am told you may have information about the labyrinth.”
Ariadne went rigid. “Who told you that?”
“Is it true or not?” Persephone demanded, frustrated.
Dionysus took a step forward. It was a strange instinct, a wish to protect Ariadne in some way, even if it was just from words.
“If you came hoping for help, you are out of luck,” said Dionysus. He felt the heat of Ariadne’s gaze. “She will not stand against Theseus. Not when he has her sister, Phaedra.”
She’d told them as much when Hades had asked her for information about the demigod’s operations, and while it was frustrating, Dionysus knew he couldn’t even begin to understand the fear she had for her sister. Ariadne had been with Theseus before he’d moved on to Phaedra, and she knew his cruelty better than most.
It was torture, watching someone so strong bow to the will of her abuser. Theseus influenced every decision she made, whether she realized it or not.
“He has your sister?” Persephone asked.
“He’s married to her,” Ariadne said. “He will assume any information about him was shared by me, and she will suffer for it.”
Dionysus expected Persephone to be angry, to challenge Ariadne in some way, maybe even offer to save Phaedra the way he and Hades had, but she didn’t.
“It doesn’t matter anymore,” she said, looking at Hecate, then at Hermes and Apollo. “Trap or not, I have to go.”
“No, Persephone,” said Hecate.
“There has to be another way, Sephy,” said Hermes. “We just don’t know all our options yet.”
“We don’t have time for options!” she seethed, her eyes watering. It was like seeing her in a new light. She was broken beneath that beauty. “Theseus has the Helm of Darkness. He has released Cronos from Tartarus. He has stripped you of your powers and placed a bounty on my head. We have no time. We were out of time the moment he took my ring.”
“Theseus has released Cronos?” Dionysus asked.
That was news.
“We believe Theseus will use Hades as a sacrifice to gain the Titan’s favor for the coming war,” said Hecate. “Unless we find him in time.”
No one spoke. Dionysus wanted to look at Ariadne because he wanted to see her reaction to these revelations, but he also didn’t want her to feel like he was guilting her into divulging information on Theseus.
He held Persephone’s gaze instead. He was about to suggest summoning his maenads, who might be able to give them other options, other ways into the labyrinth, when Ariadne spoke.
“I can help you through the labyrinth.”
Dionysus’s head snapped in her direction, and he could tell by the spark in her eye that she was formulating an idea.
He already didn’t like it.
“No,” Dionysus said, and Ariadne glared. “You would be playing right into his hands!”
He hadn’t exactly figured out why, but Theseus was obsessed with Ariadne, to the point that even Poseidon knew who she was and had threatened war over her.
“We’re all playing into his hands,” she snapped.
He narrowed his eyes. “When Hades asked you for help, you refused. Why change your mind now?”
“Hades wanted information without a plan to rescue my sister,” she said. “Theseus will want to watch our progress through the labyrinth. While he is occupied, you can rescue my sister.”
“Ari—”
“It’s the only chance I have to get her back!” She cut him off, her voice full of venom.
They glared at each other. Then Hecate spoke.
“You say you will lead Persephone through the labyrinth. What exactly do you know about it?”
“I know that the most dangerous part isn’t getting lost,” Ariadne said. “It’s that you might choose to stay.”
“Why would anyone choose to stay?” asked Apollo.
“Because,” Ariadne said, “it will offer you what you want most.”
Dionysus did not know exactly what that meant, but he instantly felt dread.
If Ariadne went through the maze, she would face the same obstacles, and they both knew what the labyrinth would offer her. Could she leave her sister behind?
He now knew he had no choice but to rescue Phaedra. Ariadne had to go into the labyrinth believing in him, believing that by the time she left, Phaedra would be safe.
“I will free your sister,” said Dionysus, and Ariadne met her gaze. “If you promise not to stay in that maze.”
Ariadne hesitated. He wasn’t sure if it was because she was surprised by his request or if she was frustrated by what his words implied. Finally, she spoke.
“I promise.”
Her voice was too quiet, too hesitant. It made him think that she did not even trust herself to face the maze, but he supposed they would all find out.
