(css: "font-size: 200%;")[(text-colour:white)[(live: 1s)[(t8n:"dissolve")[[[SPRING->intro2]]](stop:)]]](unless: (passage:)'s tags contains "no-header")[
(if: (history:)'s length > 0)[(link: "↩")[(goto: (history:)'s last)]]
]
All the foods and wines of the known world—that is, Greece—have availed themselves to you, but hunger is a beast known by many names including that which you call your own—and hunger is more than the lack of food.
You do not hunger for things to fill your stomach. [[You hunger for someone you don't even know.->intro3]]Your husband is unknown to you, and your marriage was a sham. They had
 put
  you
   on
    the
     cliffside, hung you out to die, and the West Wind pulled you to a new home, and as beautiful as it is, you've never once seen that husband of yours—that far-flung off, mysterious, faceless husband of yours.
You think you love him, but you don't know him. And therein lies the problem, doesn't it?
Spring passes (link: "without much fanfare")[(replace:?txt)[(link: "in hushed silence")[(replace:?txt)[quietly and altogether with a sigh rather than a whisper.]]]]<txt|
[[As far as you know, this is how it'll always be.->summer]]
(css: "font-size: 200%;")[(text-colour:white)[(live: 1s)[(t8n:"dissolve")[[[SUMMER->summer1]]](stop:)]]]When you asked if your sisters could come visit, you hadn't //really// meant it. But that nameless, faceless, mysterious husband had waved his hand and given permission and it sounded a little like—
  (text-colour:white)[(text-style:"smear")[Sure, Psyche.]]
  Aren't you too casual for a winged serpent?
  (text-colour:white)[(text-style:"smear")[Aren't you too audacious for a human?]]
And so on, and so forth. Your sisters, both married to kings, both irrepentant incessant gossips and voyeurs, make the climb to your palace. Irreverance dotted across their flushed cheeks, they take in sky-scraping towers in white marble. "So this is it?"
(cycling-link: "\"Yeah, that's me.\"", "\"Did you expect something else?\"", "\"Sorry that the winged serpent isn't here to greet you.\"")
The elder one says, "It's not bad. I guess. But you couldn't pay me to live in a beautiful palace like this if I'm going to die in the end."
"Right," [[you say.->summer2]]Is it really so bad that you don't care? Fear and reverence is no longer in season, cowering like a simpering little fool is no longer chic. You lead your sisters (link: "up")[(link: "up and up")[(replace:?txt)[(link: "up and up and up")[(replace:?txt)[up and up and up and up]]]]]<txt| the spiral staircase of your bedroom, curtained off in white muslin imported from another country. It's thin enough that the red of their humiliation
  could cut through your sheer curtains.
Your sisters sprawl across your bed. "Where's your husband's?"
"Other tower, over there."
"You haven't seen him yet?"
"Not a glimpse."
"He'll eat you, you know."
"So you can inherit my lovely bedroom?"
"Psyche, I'm serious."
[["Great, so am I."->summer2.1]]
[["You're asking a lot of me."->summer2.2]]
[["And why am I having this conversation with you again?"->summer2.3]]"Forget it, Psyche," says your sister. You're not even sure which one; they blend into one another like intertwined serpents, scales shimmering, forked tongues that flicker beneath candlelight. Fanged teeth bite the same in snakes and leeches.
"We're just showing concern for you," says the other one.
"It doesn't hurt to take a look."
"You need to know who you've married."
[["Don't you want to know?"->summer3]]"We would never ask for too much," says your sister. One of them, though they're both the same to you know as they were in childhood, and how strange to behold them when they're your size and no longer towering giantesses—Stheno and Euryale and Medusa, the three of you, but you've always been the odd one out.
  Medusa, in her youth,
  Envied her sisters who
  Did not garner the envy of
  Undeserving goddesses
  Such as the one we call
  Aphrodite. In other words.
"Just a look," one of the sisters says. [["He owes you that much."->summer3]]"I wouldn't say this if I didn't care for you," says your sister, but really, she doesn't. Care for you, that is, but she would argue otherwise and a hundred people would come and gather and clap in her defense.
You've always carried an undercurrent of resentment, not that you'd tell her now, but it remains tucked in your chest. If it were a child, why, you'd have borne him years ago. Resentment does not grow so fast—it festers uncomfortably, until it bites its way out of your womb and into the miserable light of day.
Needless to say, you ignore your sisters. They, in their cunning ways, do not relent. [["You could just take a peek."->summer3]]Alone in a palace for two, your sisters having traversed the mountainside they ascended, you sate your mortal hunger and rouse your immortal one as the sun sets in the distance.
You draw a lantern to your side, light the candle, and ascend the staircase
 [step]<stp|
  (click: ?stp)[by]<by|
   (click: ?by)[step]<stp2|
(click: ?stp2)[until the ground is a thing of the past. Your husband's spire stretches so far into the sky the stars blink with each star you crawl up, until you've ascended to the peak of Heaven and all that's left is white curtains, layered so thick you push past sheets and sheets of it just to find his bed cocooned [within.]<etc|]
(click: ?etc)[[[You raise your lamp.->summer4]]]He's the most beautiful creature you've seen.
(cycling-link: "Like a teardrop,", "Like a drop of rain,", "Like a raindrop,") a bead of wax drips from the lantern and beads on his lovely, lovely face, and his eyes snap open.
Almost accusingly, he says, "You looked."
(cycling-link: "\"I wanted to see you.\"", "\"I had to know.\"", "\"Why should it matter?\"")
"Love," he says, "cannot live without trust."
Oh, is it your fault you had to know? It was all ordained by the fates in the end, believe it or not. It's not your fault.
Oh, but it is, and he leaves, and by summer's end he never comes back [[again.->autumn]](css: "font-size: 200%;")[(text-colour:white)[(live: 1s)[(t8n:"dissolve")[[[AUTUMN->fall1]]](stop:)]]]Aphrodite gives you a choice. You'll complete her three tasks if you want to see your husband again, or...
Well, she didn't give a clear or. She never said. Goddesses never feel the need to explain themselves, particularly goddess mothers of boys. Mother-in-law doesn't like poor Psyche, last you heard—and you're Psyche.
  Aphrodite asks of you,
  Psyche, so mortal and frail
  If your heart remains true,
  (if: (history:) contains "faildie")[(text-colour:white)[(text-style:"smear")[If you'll wear the bridal veil.]]](else:)[[[If you'll wear the bridal veil,->fall2]]
  [[Or if you're destined to fail.->faildie]]]
(if: (history:) contains "faildie")[[[This was your only choice.->fall2]]]
(else:)[]Your clothes, your meagre posessions, you pile them into a small rucksack and leave the palace the next morning—if you're not what she wanted, you'll let her have just that. The autumn days pass slow, as Helios drags his chariot across the sky.
You think, stupidly, that you can wait until winter—until Aphrodite's anger withers away, but it was never really her son, you know. You were too beautiful, and a woman whose beauty is her only selling point never does know when to give it up.
So before autumn is even halfway over, she hunt you down and kills you.
[...]<dot|
(click: ?dot)[...]<dotdot|
(click: ?dotdot)[...]<dotdotdot|
(click: ?dotdotdot)[(text-colour:white)[(text-style:"smear")[
Psyche, oh Psyche...
How I pity you, and me both...
There is nothing for you here, anymore.
Would you come back, turn back the clock, return to me?]]]"Eros is my son, a god among gods, far above your station and unreachable to a creature born of the mud and shaped from our breath as you; even Pandora, unseemly as she was, carried more divinity than you bear.
But I am not a cruel woman, no. I am sympathetic to the matters of love, the plight of even creatures born of mud and breath as you are. Rejoice, for my sincereity has bore fruit and you relish in its flesh and rind.
If you truly love my son, you'll do these three things for me.
 [[You'll sort these seeds into mountains of their own kind.->grain1]]
 [[You'll fetch the golden wool of Helios's flock.->wool1]]
 [[You'll fill this pitcher of water from the Styx and Cocytus.->styx1]]
 And last of all, you'll bring me a box of Persephone's beauty."The night has only just risen; before you, a mountain of seeds and grains. Your fingers slip through
 [mixed wheat,]<1|
 (click: ?1)[barley,]<2|
 (click: ?2)[poppyseed,]<3|
 (click: ?3)[chickpeas,]<4|
 (click: ?4)[lentils,]<5|
 (click: ?5)[and beans, like sand through the gaps of your fingers, time you'll never get back. On your hands and knees, you pluck each grain, one by one, and toss them to the right, left, front, [[behind.->grain1.5]]]
Babbling brook, stumbling stream, you're the lone figure wading in the water as Helios's flock of golden sheep bray and bite, chew and chomp, mouths filled with the verdant green grass of a shore you're too afraid to touch.
You're here,
                   and they're there,
because you're mortal and
                  they're immortal sheep
that have never feared for their death.
(cycling-link: "Glinting", "Glistening", "Gleaming") in the glimmering sun, [[their wool winks and taunts you.->wool2]]You decide to take the scenic route up to mother-in-law's death trap waterfall; gray skies overhead, weeping willows that brush the ends of their branches against the barren ground. The dirt is ash-thin, like Atlas long ago had rubbed his heel deep into the soil and rendered it into fine particulate.
<div id="first-passage"> (text-style: "buoy")[And here you are,]
<div>
<div id="first-passage"> (text-style: "sway")[amidst a rushing current,]
<div>
<div id="first-passage"> (text-style: "buoy")[wondering when you'll go home.]
<div>
<div id="first-passage"> (text-style: "sway")[Wondering where home is,]
<div>
<div id="first-passage"> (text-style: "buoy")[[[in the first place.->styx2]]]
<div>
But woe to the goddess who thought she could outsmart you! (if: (history:) contains "graindie")[He](else:)[You] knew there could be no fair way to win—clever is the one who knows every detail of her undoing.
As you ponder on how to best escape this fate, a faint voice echoes in the silence of your prison.
(text-style:"subscript")["Excuse me... Would you like some help?"]
You look down, see the little tarsi of an ant crouched down below. Its antennae wave at you, one first and then the other. Up, down.
Legs first, you lay them flat against the stone. Stomach pressed against cool rock, cheek against the floor, eye to eye with your savior. "I would love that," you say. "If you would."
The ant isn't alone; as you lay flat on the floor, countless more swarm into the room—before your eyes, one pile becomes two, four, six. Dawn breaks on six neatly sorted piles, and you've not moved a [[finger.->grainchoice]]
One, two, three, four... This endless eternity never ends. (text-style:"blur")[Five, six, seven, eight...] With your eyes like this, you'll never see straight. (text-style:"blurrier")[Nine, ten, eleven, twelve...]
Oh, why did you do this in the first place?
  What was it that made you try?
  Who was it that made you this way?
(cycling-link: "It's love.", "It's hate.", "It's survival.") None of it matters, if you can't get these grains to settle. For a moment, you lean against the pile and feel it shift against your weight. (if: (history:) contains "graindie")[(text-colour:white)[(text-style:"smear")[But there's no sense in throwing in the towel.]]](else:)[]
(if: (history:) contains "graindie")[[[You can't fail when someone else is pulling the strings.->grain2]]]
(else:)[[[You can't do this, not on your own.->grain2]]
[[You have no choice but to do this.->graindie]]]Dusk to dawn, your hands sort through the endless pile of grains and seeds, and with each that you pluck another handful takes its place, and you sort and sort but at the end of the day—or, shall we say, at the dawning of the morning, you're nowhere near close to done.
This was never a task Aphrodite intended for you to complete. Maybe you knew that. Maybe you remained ignorant to the end, but isn't that wonderful, to have retained some sort of hope in the gods that govern this world.
Aphrodite disposes of you when the sun stretches across the piles and piles left unfinished.
[...]<dot|
(click: ?dot)[(text-colour:white)[(text-style:"smear")[
Psyche, oh Psyche...
That was not how this was supposed to go, my dear.
This is no longer something I can turn a blind eye to.
Turn back, my beloved Psyche. I'll help you.]]]Aphrodite, aglow in the sunlight, towers over the work you've not done. She sniffs. "So you've succeeded," she simpers, unimpressed. "Very well. But I'll not have you celebrate your successes so early, when my son is still languishing from the burn you marred him with.
So tell me, Psyche, where does your heart take you next?"
 You've already sorted the seeds.
 (if: (history:) contains "wool3")[You've already fetched the golden wool of Helio's flock.](else:)[[[Will you fetch the golden wool of Helios's flock?->wool1]]]
 (if: (history:) contains "styx3")[You've already filled the pitcher.](else:)[[[Or will you fill this pitcher of water from the Styx and Cocytus?->styx1]]]
 (if: (history:) contains "grain2" and "wool3" and "styx3")[[[Or has the time come for you to bring a box of Persephone's beauty?->winter]]](else:)[]You have—at least, you're under the impression you do—a drive to survive and live until the end, to hold your breath in clutched palm as you breathe from its small, infinitesimal supply of courage.
And you'll die if you can't complete this. Rushing waters part around your legs, as you step closer and closer still towards the riverbank.
  And if you were to look back now, you think
You'd at least hold a little resentment towards your husband
Yours in name and Aphrodite's in practice
And yet, you think, if he were here now,
What would he tell me to do?
  (if: (history:) contains "wooldie")[(text-colour:white)[(text-style:"smear")[Wait until they fall asleep, my love.
]]](else:)[]
And now, it's all up to you.
(if: (history:) contains "wooldie")[[[You only need to wait until these sheep count themselves and doze off.->wool3]]](else:)[
[[When they're preoccupied with eating, I'll brush some off with this reed.->wooldie]]
[[What am I to do? I have no choice but to back down.->wool3]]]
Bravery is often gifted to those in least need of it and you've always been a recipient of the gifts none would cherish, whether it was those countless admirers who sought a glimpse and nothing else for you, or a marriage with a man who'd flee at first sight.
How brave you are, Psyche! You reach for the wool that will save you, but the only thing to be held in hand is the blood you staunch as it pours, and oh how it pours, seeping and spilling from where divine, immortal horn has punctured the vessel of your soul, your psyche—your sorry excuse for godly ichor cries from the gash dug into your being.
It is here that you'll die, and it is here that you'll remain.
[...]<dot|
(click: ?dot)[(text-colour:white)[(text-style:"smear")[
Brave, brave Psyche, you've shot on ahead to where I can't follow.
I'm merely immortal. The realm of the dead is beyond me.
Won't you come back this way, Psyche? And please, don't look back.
I couldn't take the heartbreak.]]]Within the rushing rapids of the river, you rest a while; you wait until sun dusks and night dawns, until the sheep have rolled themselves away to a grassy field far beyond reach. You pull yourself from the water and wander, water dripping from your legs, to the bramble patch just at the shoreside.
(if: (history:) contains "wooldie")[(text-colour:white)[(text-style:"smear")[Don't prick yourself, Psyche. ]]](else:)[]Where once sheep were now remains their glistening wool, illuminated by moonlight as you pluck enough scraps of wool to fill a bag-full. Enough for whatever the goddess desires to be made remains within.
The bag sits above your head as you ferry it
                   all the way across
                   the river once more
until you reach where you once were. The sun's beginning it's ascent high in the sky, and Helios will be happy to know his flock have had a [[restful night's sleep.->woolchoice]]Aphrodite, hair sparkling with the same lustre as the golden wool, sniffs. "So you've succeeded," she simpers, unimpressed. "So this is what my son wasted his days away on? Lesser mortals have done more than you. But fear not, for another task is at hand.
Tell me, Psyche, where does your heart take you next?"
 (if: (history:) contains "grain2")[You've already sorted the seeds.](else:)[[[Will you sort these seeds into mountains of their own kind?->grain1]]]
 You've already fetched the golden wool of Helios's flock.
 (if: (history:) contains "styx3")[You've already filled the pitcher.](else:)[[[Or will you fill this pitcher of water from the Styx and Cocytus?->styx1]]]
 (if: (history:) contains "grain2" and "wool3" and "styx3")[[[Or has the time come for you to bring a box of Persephone's beauty?->winter]]](else:)[]The vessel in your hands shudders a hateful tune as you lift its against where certain doom cascades down, splashing dark foam across jagged rocks that bray for your blood. Its crystalline shell reflects the meagre sunlight back across your face, but the longer you look the more the distortion splits your mind apart into fractures and fragments until you nearly forget why you're there.
Each jagged rock is a reminder of why you're here.
  Each
    jagged
      rock
        which looms above, and nestled within its crown of spikes is the wellspring where the waters spring forth. You look from the vessel to the cliffside, watch the waters froth and seethe.
(if: (history:) contains "styxdie")[(text-colour:white)[(text-style:"smear")[But remember, Psyche, that fortune favors the patient.]]](else:)[]
(if: (history:) contains "styxdie")[[[There's no such thing as a cliff someone else can't climb for you.->styx3]]](else:)[[[If you just get a little water from the pool down here, surely she won't know the difference?->styx3]]
[[Best to get it over with and ascend the cliffside, jagged outhang by jagged outhang.->styxdie]]]Your (if: (history:) contains "styxdie")[patience](else:)[surprisingly cunning plan of deception and deceit] is rewarded when, moments later, an eagle swoops from the sky and scoops the vessel from your hands. Its talons cling tight, wings flapping
     (text-style:"sway")[(text-style:"buoy")[from]]
        (text-style:"sway")[side]
     (text-style:"sway")[(text-style:"buoy")[to]]
        (text-style:"buoy")[side]
ascending a cliff not meant for mortal hands such as yours, and it returns with a vessel filled with dark water.
Your hands hold it tight as the eagle flies away, and you're left to carry it back in both hands through the same gloomy route, until twisted thickets turn time. And when you round the corner, you know who you'll [[find.->styxchoice]]Your fingers slip into hair-thin cracks, feet finding little nubs to tuck themselves into as you pull yourself up the cliffside in little miniscule moves. One hand here, another hand there, you're breathing heavy with each hand that you stretch high above your head to clasp yet another jagged spike that spires high into the sky—
And when you reach again you can't find the right grip—
And who thought it was safe to climb a cliff full of spikes, anyhow? Whose brilliant idea was it?
You fall from grace, from the heavens to the dirt below. Each time you're cut on the sharp edges as you plummet, the cliffside sings in joy. They bleed you of every last drop.
[...]<dot|
(click: ?dot)[(text-colour:white)[(text-style:"smear")[
Psyche, must it be this way?
You're brave, Psyche, you're courageous, but won't you learn a little restraint?
I'm not mad, my dear, I merely worry for you.
So come back, please. This isn't how it's meant to go.]]]Aphrodite, glittering in a brightness the gloom of the Styx couldn't even wash away, sniffs. "So you've succeeded," she simpers, unimpressed. "It was not a hard task at all. And I'm sure my son could have done that with his eyes closed and hands tied behind his back. I don't celebrate mediocrity, but let's celebrate your surprising competency with a new task.
Tell me, Psyche, where does your heart take you next?"
 (if: (history:) contains "grain2")[You've already sorted the seeds.](else:)[[[Will you sort these seeds into mountains of their own kind?->grain1]]]
 (if: (history:) contains "wool3")[You've already fetched the golden wool of Helio's flock.](else:)[[[Will you fetch the golden wool of Helios's flock?->wool1]]]
 You've already filled the pitcher.
 (if: (history:) contains "grain2" and "wool3" and "styx3")[[[Or has the time come for you to bring a box of Persephone's beauty?->winter]]](else:)[](css: "font-size: 200%;")[(text-colour:white)[(live: 1s)[(t8n:"dissolve")[[[WINTER->winter1]]](stop:)]]]Through the snow you trudge, making your way to Tairanon in the midst of winter. It was not your intention to follow through in a way. You were (link: "pragmatic")[(link: "predisposed for negativity and hardship in life")[(replace:?txt)[(link: "perhaps thinking a little too much at the time")[(replace:?txt)[a coward]]]]]<txt| that day at the windowsill, but you're a new woman now. You're changed.
//Go on, then,// taunts your mind's version of your husband. A mean, snarky thing—in this way, not so different from the days when he was nothing but a voice. //Tell us what you were doing that day.//
How do you describe it? When Aphrodite commanded you to walk down into the Underworld to retrieve beauty from a goddess...
   Your heart seized, fear swallowed you whole;
   (cycling-link: bind $tower, "No choice but to die in heart and soul.", "It was foolish, but you only sought control.")
[[Yes, back on that day...->winter2]]The first thing you did was to make your way home to that castle you lived in so slovenly and ignorantly; you returned to a home that belonged to a different Psyche, one who lived every day like she wouldn't see the next. (if: $tower is "No choice but to die in heart and soul.")[And you hadn't expected to see the next, either.](else:)[]
Up and up, up the tower you climbed, until stars took the place of clouds; until heaven was so close you could reach out and touch it, and then you walked to the open window, pulled the muslin curtains away and away until starshine lit your face, and you put your hand on the rail. One foot stepped out.
(if: $tower is "No choice but to die in heart and soul.")[It had been your last laugh, your last triumph, that final piece you could hold above Aphrodite—and if Eros loved you the way he was supposed to, you'd languish in his heartbreak from the grave. Your life for a bit of discomfort in the godly dealings up in Olympus. Worthy, no?](else:)[It hadn't been like that. It wasn't like that. You wanted to feel like you had your heart in your hands again, not clutched in the vain hands of Aphrodite. You wanted to feel like that silly, egotistical woman you once were again—a woman so beautiful the goddess of beauty couldn't stand to see your face.]
All excuses. All said in the name of trying to sound like a woman who spun her fate, but you were always part of the web and never the one spinning.
And as fate would have it, [[the tower spoke to you instead.->winter3]] (text-colour:white)[(text-style:"smear")["This is not the way to go, I'm afraid."]]
 "And you would know?"
 (text-colour:white)[(text-style:"smear")["Such a fine day, and all you can think of is jumping out and making a big mess."]]
 "How could this be a fine day? This high up, it's nighttime."
 (text-colour:white)[(text-style:"smear")["Fine, it's a fine night and all you can think of is jumping out and making a big mess."]]
 "What other choice is there? At least this way I can still get to the Underworld."
 (text-colour:white)[(text-style:"smear")["You wouldn't be able to come back."]]
 "Who cares about coming back? I've got nothing to return for."
 (text-colour:white)[(text-style:"smear")["Go to Tairanon, in Sparta. You can get to the Underworld without killing yourself there."]]
 "Didn't you hear me? I have nothing to go for."
 (text-colour:white)[(text-style:"smear")["You have me, Psyche."]]
[["Oh, that's rich coming from //you//."->winter3.1]]
[["I'm not interested in going for you."->winter3.1]] "You flee the moment I find you, you hide while your mother sends me on these impossible tasks—am I supposed to be //impressed//, Eros?"
 (text-colour:white)[(text-style:"smear")["I'm hoping you get a little self-reflection in for betraying my trust. I'm still quite hurt, you know."]]
 "I could have //died//."
 (if: (history:) contains "graindie" or "wooldie" or "styxdie" or "towerdie")[(text-colour:white)[(text-style:"smear")["Who's to say you haven't? I'm not as cruel as you think, Psyche. It's not so black and white for me either."]]](else:)[(text-colour:white)[(text-style:"smear")["I wouldn't let that happen. But it's not so easy for me to come and go as I please otherwise, Psyche.]]]
 (text-colour:white)[(text-style:"smear")[(if: (history:) contains "towerdie")["Tairanon. That's all I ask of you."](else:)["Think what you want and what you will, Psyche, but go to Tairanon while you do. Please."]]]
(if: (history:) contains "towerdie")[[[And the truth is, you had no other choice.->winter4]]](else:)[[[But you didn't want to.->towerdie]]
[[And you were weak to the word please, so you did.->winter4]]]You walked to Sparta. You went to Tairanon with two coins; one for the way there, one for the return trip. Across the river you sailed,
(align:"==>")+(box:"=XXXXXXXXX")[until you made it into the Underworld entirely, a living human come to visit thinking she could escape with her life. Orpehus had made that mistake, so what made you so different?
Persephone, upon her high throne, almost seems to think differently.
"I'm more than happy to help you," she says, extending a graceful arm out for the box you've prepared. Atop her throne, glistening with beauty, she smiles into the box and a moment later it's back in your hands. "All you have to do," she assures you, "is to not open it."
"I won't," you promise her, and you turn your back to the goddess of spring and walk out of the Underoworld without a look back]
until your face is met with the [[sunlight.->winter5]]You'll head back from here, find Aphrodite. She'll accept this beauty, even though it's merely a drop in the ocean of her grace, and she'll wave her hand and you'll be cast back into nothing.
Psyche has always been a mortal. You've always had limits more concrete and closer by than the immortals you consort with.
You're not a foolish woman. Psyche is not a foolish woman. And yet, you're in the light of day—and the box is in your hands, and the end is in sight, and you're haggard and tired from all these trials that you moved few fingers for—and you think, you think, you just think,
  [[//God, I need to show Aphrodite up.//->winter 5.1]]
  [[//I can't stand to be seen by Eros like this.//->winter5.2]]In the days of your youth, before your marriage, you were still a worthy contender against Aphrodite. Goddesses like Persephone surely have an infinite wellspring of resources and beauty they pull from, their youth a fountain and yours a simple puddle. Well, she won't miss a little glimpse of this beauty.
You flick open the [box]<1|
 (click: ?1)[and you don't realize]<2|
 (click: ?2)[that it was never beauty in the box]<3|
 (click: ?3)[but rather a deep, deep sleep]<4|
 (click: ?4)[until it's too late]<5|
 (click: ?5)[and all of a sudden the world flies away and you hit the ground, and then you're gone—your mind, your audacity to think you could ever compete with a goddess, whatever sort of remant of love or something like love that you held for Eros.
There is no time to lament your fate or decry your foolishless, because you slip into a deep, dreamless sleep [[moments later.->winter6]]]He is, Eros is, an immortal. His love for you is nothing compared to the love you have for him, if you have any at all. Yours is rooted in survival, necessity. His is a byproduct of his work and certainly not something with deeper meaning than an arrow-prick.
You need him. You depend on him. You have to hold his gaze with as much of an equal's stance you can and, well, the only thing a frivolous creature like you knows is to be beautiful.
You flick open the [box]<1|
 (click: ?1)[and you don't realize]<2|
 (click: ?2)[that it was never beauty in the box]<3|
 (click: ?3)[but rather a deep, deep sleep]<4|
 (click: ?4)[until it's too late]<5|
 (click: ?5)[and all of a sudden the world flies away and you hit the ground, and then you're gone—your mind, your audacity to think you could ever compete with a goddess, whatever sort of remant of love or something like love that you held for Eros.
There is no time to lament your fate or decry your foolishless, because you slip into a deep, dreamless sleep [[moments later.->winter6]]]If you were awake, you'd note the passage of time. You'd note the snow that pours in once the sunshine has left, the way it nearly buries you whole in the countryside of Sparta, too far from home as you are.
You'd feel the gaze of hundreds of forest creatures, bounding around you but never near you.
You'd hear a voice in the distance, calling //Psyche, Psyche, Psyche// for someone that can't hear him, and you'd hear the (text-style:"fidget")[crunch] of footsteps against snow as he grows closer and closer still.
And you'd hear, see, //feel// the arms that dig through the snow and pull you up, that brush the snow from your face, that holds you close before he finds the box discarded somewhere in the snow, he who draws the sleep from your face and tucks it back into the box.
You are privy to nothing but the first glimpse of snow since you fell asleep—a snowstorm howls past your cheeks, but Eros burns through the flakes of snow like a pyre. Your lashes are heavy with powdered snow, but you still hoarsely whisper to him,
[["You took your sweet time, idiot."->spring1]]
[["You look terrible."->spring1]]
[["I could've woken up on my own."->spring1]]And so what? No one can tell you what to do, least of all him, and you are a mortal in the clutches of immortals but at least mortals know how to die.
So you step out of the window and plummet to a ground far, far beneath you, and at least you have silence all the way down and when you hit the ground you cease to be anything at all, anymore.
Nothingmore.
[...]<dot|
(click: ?dot)[(text-colour:white)[(text-style:"smear")[
Turn back, Psyche.
There is nothing
for you here.
There is nothing I
  can do for you
    here.]]](css: "font-size: 200%;")[(text-colour:white)[(live: 1s)[(t8n:"dissolve")[[[SPRING->spring2]]](stop:)]]]The flower field out behind the house is pleasant again today, flowers and their petals brushed by the breeze as they dance and sway—sun bright overhead, you shield its rays with your hand and squint to where Olympus lies up above.
Lying beside you, fingers toying with the petals of a nearby flower, your something-like-a-husband sprawls into grasses and flowerbeds, flaxen hair intertwined in the stems. He looks like his mother, horribly so.
"Beautiful day, isn't it?" he asks, rolling onto his side to look at you. "You look almost like you weren't half dead in a snowbank before I came to find you."
You roll your eyes, roll a flowerbud in your fingers. "Whose fault was it I landed there?"
"Semantics," he complains. [["I'm back now, aren't I?"->spring3]]You can't argue this.
  He pulled you from the snowbank.
  He dragged you to Olympus.
  He insisted, before an audience of only gods, that you were innocent of fault.
  And when Aphrodite, flushed in anger, stood to her feet
    He held his hand and stopped her.
His wings, feathery-white and downy-soft, carried you back to the empty palace where that former self of yours still lay draped in white muslin. Your recovery was a few days; he attended to you all the while, not a word of complaint,
  and you wondered why he never did this before
  and you wondered what the point of all this was
  and you wondered if it would come to an end sometime soon
  [[and you wondered if you should stay.->spring 4]]It's still a nice day. Helios overhead, Demeter's efforts at your fingertips, the beauty of the world feels infinite and boundless in this moment
  and you have something to say to him.
"What's the matter with you, Psyche?" Eros calls, flicking a stray petal at you. He's got godly strength, godly aim—the physique that makes it possible to send a flower petal hurtling towards your forehead, where it plasters between your eyes. He has no sincereity, no genuinety, making a mockery of everything—
You fall backwards, back against the grasses and flowers, head nestled into greenery as you turn to face Eros.
For the man you spent a year with in the same house, in two distant towers, two seasons missing and two seasons chasing, a fifth in this infinite stretch of hesitation called a moment.
Seeing the look in your eyes, Eros grows humility and shrinks back, that godly glow diminishing into a sparkle. "I love you, Psyche," he says. "You know that right?"
You draw your hand from your side, place it atop his own, smile in the only way you now how—that same beauty that doomed you to this life in the first place.
[["I love you too, Eros, but this time we'll do it on my terms."->loveend1]]
  [["This time around, let's just stay friends.->friendend1]]
    [["I think I need some time on my own.->hawkeend1]]
You set ground rules fast. (if: (history:) contains "faildie" or "graindie" or "wooldie" or "styxdie" or "towerdie")[No more manipulating your fate by way of resetting your death, forcing you to pick the right choice—and if he's going to do that, it'll be a suggestion and not an imperative. Did he think he was slick? Did he think you wouldn't notice? What a fool of the highest order. //Check.//](else:)[No more acting like the world's snarkiest know-it-all. //We'll take a rain check on that, Psyche.//]
No more mysterious unknown husband schtick. Hiding away expecting to be unfound, who did he think he was, one of Zeus's mistresses in the presence of Hera? //Check.//
No more letting his mother trample all over you. //Check, and I wasn't.// He was, and you liked the other Olympians much better anyways.
No more...ah, whatever, you'd have the rest of your lives together to come up with the rest.
Your hand in Eros's, you lie back and soak in the sun. Immortality still hasn't sunk in yet, but you're sure in years, decades, and centuries it'll come you.
"What're you thinking about, Psyche?" Eros asks, leaning over. "Anything important going on in that empty head of yours?"
"Nothing much," you say. [["I was just thinking..."->loveend2]]"I don't need you as a husband," you tell him. "You're not a very good one, anyways."
He stills, frozen into the backdrop—this silly, oversized, preening flower. But he smiles, and his smile blossoms, and his smole unfurls, and he says, "That's okay with me."
"It is?"
"Sure it is," Eros says. "We'll be friends. Good ones. I can't imagine not sharing a close bond with you, Psyche. You've scarred me for life."
You scoff, flinging a handful of grass in his face. "It was a drop of //wax.//"
"I'm a national treasure level beauty," Eros argues. "And—and don't laugh, it's really true, should I regale you with tales of my beauty?"
"Get me something to eat first," you retort. Eros grins, getting to his feet before he holds his hand out for you.
His palm faces you, the sky, Olympus above. [[And slowly, you take it.->friendend2]]There's always somewhere else on the horizon. There's always somewhere new, and suddenly, Greece feels so very small. You're still young—traveling across to new nations is in the realm of possibility, sailing to a brand new continent isn't out of the question.
"I don't know where I'll go yet," you tell Eros, "but that's the best part, isn't it?"
Eros holds a flower in his hand, turning it over and over in his fingers without looking up. "I'll miss you," he says. "You know."
"I'll write, if you'll miss me that much."
He smiles to himself, small and quiet, before he looks up and quirks the corner of his lips. "I'll hold you to it, Psyche. Where to first?"
Across to the distant horizon, where Helios will make his way at night, you turn. "Somewhere I've never seen," you say.
"Write to me," Eros says.
Already, you feel like you're there—not here. You assure him, far-off look in your eyes, [["I will."->hawkeend2]](align:"=><=")+(box:"=XXXXXXXXX")[(live: 1s)[(t8n: "dissolve")[Together, now and](stop:)]
(live: 3s)[(t8n: "dissolve")[always, your imperfect lives](stop:)]
(live: 5s)[(t8n: "dissolve")[have seen tomorrow.](stop:)]
(css: "font-size: 200%;")[(text-colour:white)[(live: 8s)[(t8n:"dissolve")[THE END.](stop:)]]]][(text-colour:white)[(live: 12s)[(t8n:"dissolve")[(align:"=><=")+(box:"=XXXXXXXXX")[(link: "Try again?")[(reload:)]]](stop:)]]](align:"=><=")+(box:"=XXXXXXXXX")[(live: 1s)[(t8n: "dissolve")[The clock turns to a](stop:)]
(live: 3s)[(t8n: "dissolve")[new day, a new kind of love.](stop:)]
(live: 5s)[(t8n: "dissolve")[You'll never turn back.](stop:)]
(css: "font-size: 200%;")[(text-colour:white)[(live: 8s)[(t8n:"dissolve")[THE END.](stop:)]]]][(text-colour:white)[(live: 12s)[(t8n:"dissolve")[(align:"=><=")+(box:"=XXXXXXXXX")[(link: "Try again?")[(reload:)]]](stop:)]]](align:"=><=")+(box:"=XXXXXXXXX")[(live: 1s)[(t8n: "dissolve")[Off in new lands, you](stop:)]
(live: 3s)[(t8n: "dissolve")[need not spare a glance backwards](stop:)]
(live: 5s)[(t8n: "dissolve")[though home is still yours.](stop:)]
(css: "font-size: 200%;")[(text-colour:white)[(live: 8s)[(t8n:"dissolve")[THE END.](stop:)]]]][(text-colour:white)[(live: 12s)[(t8n:"dissolve")[(align:"=><=")+(box:"=XXXXXXXXX")[(link: "Try again?")[(reload:)]]](stop:)]]]