Pandora's Gift (Part 3)

===
Click here to start at the beginning.
===

"Can I ask you something?"

"You can ask."

"Did you love him?"

She spluttered on her coffee. We were sitting in a small, rather sleazy looking cafe next to the docks where I'd found her. An overweight man in a wife-beater who looked like he'd stepped out of a stereotype had leered at her when she ordered for about half a second, until she'd given him a look that shut him up and sent him bustling to meet her every demand. He probably didn't know himself what it was about this girl that had him wanting to keep her happy. I was amused to see she wasn't above using the gifts we'd given to get her way.

"Love him?" She played with her unused sugar packets absently. "I don't know."

I waited.

"I don't think so. I couldn't have, right? I mean, in the end, I..."

She trailed off, frowning into her coffee.

"In the end you betrayed him."

She looked up, hurt and a little shocked. "I didn't mean..."

"That's what you were thinking though, wasn't it?"

She frowned slightly. "I just meant that I didn't have any choice. Back then. You need choice for love, don't you?"

I laughed. "Most mortals would disagree with you there."

"That's because they don't understand what not having choice is really like." A pause. Her voice almost inaudible, "But Hephaestus did."

Next