The Blacksmith

CW: ableism.

First posted August 2022.

Hera kindled within her a flickering flame of rage as she watched the halls of Olympus fill with her husband’s children: Athena with her bright shield and stern brow, Hermes with his winged cap and wicked grin, Artemis with her bow, Apollo with his lyre. Each new golden seat at their feast table was another log on the fire of her fury, its gentle crackle growing steadily into a roar. She was a furnace powered by the heat of her anger, and from the forge of herself, she fashioned her revenge.

His name was Hephaestus. The new god was born with sweat on his brow and a hammer in his hand: like his mother, a maker of things, a crafter of wonders.

A roaring fire starts small, with a little spark nurtured as Hera had nurtured her wrath. Hephaestus shared the brightness of Zeus’ children, but instead of a promising flame, Hera saw a dying light. His legs were thin and weak, malformed and unsteady. The shaking limbs gave way beneath him and his hammer echoed as it fell to the floor.

Scowling, Hera watched as her son struggled before her. Dark ichor pooled on the gleaming marble floor of her chamber and trailed behind Hephaestus as he dug his bleeding fingernails into the grooves between tiles, pulling himself towards her inch by inch. Hera neither moved nor spoke as he grunted and gasped, clutching at the hem of her skirt.

“Mother,” he wheezed, exhausted by effort.

She recoiled. Grasping him by the back of his neck, she picked him up and raised him to her face. Cold sickness roiled in her stomach and her vision doubled as she tried to fix her gaze on him. This was not a problem she could fix, she decided. Holding him gingerly by the tips of her fingers, she marched to the window and threw open the curtain.

The next thing Hephaestus knew, he was flying.

The sky was alight with flame, red streaks fading into purple between the thin, scattered clouds. Cold air rushed around him as the golden edifices of Olympus disappeared from view, replaced with the endless, dull white of the clouds surrounding him.

As he fell, he remembered her looking at him, while he had looked back at her with curious scrutiny. In her eyes he saw sickening disgust and furious despair, but what had taken him by surprise was a flicker of cold fear. He wondered what cause she had for that.

In the space of a moment, the clouds were above him, growing smaller with each passing second. It was so quiet in the empty air between earth and sky, with nothing but the salt and decaying seaweed-scented air whistling in his ears as he fell. He hardly had time to appreciate the peacefulness before he hit the water, the crack of the impact jolting through his back before the waves rose over him.

His dreams were red. Light from the flames in the roaring furnace danced on his face as he worked. He drew the back of his arm across his forehead. Sweat matted his hair and dripped down the sides of his face. The steady thrum of the fire was broken by the ringing echo of his tools, clanging on the steel he hammered against the anvil.

The white heat of the metal quickly faded beneath his blows into a yellow glow. In the forming blade, the shades of sunset burned: orange into red into fading purple, dotted by the stars of golden sparks flying with the impact of the hammer. He watched the steel cool into the silver of the sea and touched a calloused finger to the dull edge.

Turning in his chair beside the anvil, he placed the blade back into the furnace and watched as the flames encircled it. The smell of the heated metal was like blood, laced with sweat and smoke. Red pulsed through the steel as it heated, and he felt the echo of it throb through the veins in his hands. The light from the furnace suffused him with red; he and the metal glowed in the sweltering blaze.

He took the steel from the furnace and began to work again. Flakes of metal fell in showers off the blade as he hammered it into the shape he saw within it. The piercing sound of metal against metal faded as it repeated, dulled as if he heard it from underwater. Against the blade, his hammer rang in the same high note over and over, and in a lower note against the anvil when he rested between sets of strokes. Rhythmic music more felt than heard filled his body as he worked.

Cooling silver glinted in his eye. He remembered the sharpness of his mother’s gaze, her revulsion tempered with rage. The sword lifted easily in his strong arms as he swiftly plunged it into the water beside him. Acrid smoke filled the room as the steel hissed, whispering to Hephaestus in short, quick words he could not discern.

As the smoke cleared, he held the blade up to the light. The red flames of the furnace reflected, shining in the steel as water dripped off the edge. Just below the hilt was a slight warp, an unintended curve that disrupted the smooth, clean reflection of the dancing fire. He pressed a finger against the sharp edge of the sword and pulled back with a clean slice bleeding black in the dark red light.

Smiling, he picked up another bar of steel and placed it in the furnace.

He awoke surrounded by blue. A net of waving lines drifted back and forth on the rocky ceiling above him, and the gentle rush of the tide filled his ears with soothing rhythm.

The stone beneath his back was cold and wet. He placed a hand down to push himself up and found a spot of plush moss squelching beneath his fingers. Wrinkling his nose, he wiped his hand on his tunic.

Quiet laughter ringing like a small, faint bell echoed from deeper within the cave. He looked in the direction of the sound, past torches made of conch shells glowing blue-green on the walls.

She was shining silver, like polished steel, and her step was graceful as the waves as she flowed around the cave’s stony outcropping. Her smile was kind, but there was a firmness behind it — the sheath that hides the dagger.

“Son of the gods.” Her words were slow and almost slurred, flowing into each other with the rise and fall of a river current.

Hephaestus watched the reflection of the water move on her face, her features shifting slightly with each undulation. “How do you know what I am?”

Her musical laugh filled the cave again. “The same way you can tell what I am.”

She was right; there was an unmistakable presence about her, like pulsing heat radiating from metal, or the tight fullness of the air before rain. Hephaestus had never encountered anyone who was not a god, but he recognized her as someone of his kind.

Watching him watch her, she smiled knowingly. “I am Thetis. And you are safe here, as long as you wish to stay.”

The taste of salt stuck to the roof of his mouth as he swallowed. A sea cave would not be his choice of home, but he did not know what he would choose instead. The red room of his dreams, lit by the flames of a furnace, burning metal glowing in the shadows — it was only a dream, after all. Before that was only Hera’s blood-stained chamber in the halls of Olympus, and he did not need to be told that was forbidden.

There was potential here, though. Tiny waves lapped at the rocks on which he sat, wearing it away so slowly no mortal could see the progress. The edge of the platform had already eroded in places, uneven and jagged. Steadily, the waves continued, hammering the rock into a design known only to the sea itself.

“I am Hephaestus,” he said, inclining his head with respect, “and I thank you for your hospitality.”

The sea goddess’s cave had a curious way of shifting, much like the sea goddess herself. One day her eyes were wide and blue, and the next they were narrow and green. One day she walked on human legs, and the next she crawled through the cave on the twisting, curling limbs of an octopus. No matter her form, Hephaestus recognized her. To him, she was always as she first appeared: cold steel in warm leather.

A chamber in the cave opened for him when he decided to stay, and another when he thought of his forge. Heat harnessed from the bottom of the sea was still heat, and with that, he got to work.

He covered their table with silver goblets and candlesticks, and crafted silverware with handles decorated in shining seaweed and streams of bubbles. He made iron gates that they never opened and keys without matching locks. Sparks flew from the glowing sunset metal as it cooled to the colour of a storm at sea. In his hands, the chunks of minerals torn from the ocean floor moved like water from one shape to another.

It was hard to keep up conversation between the strikes of his hammer, but Thetis often came to sit with him in his workshop regardless. Like a painter working from a model, he made her a bright dagger that shone like the moon on the water. Her eyes glinted as she pressed her finger against its sharp point.

He asked her once if the sound of his work bothered her. She shook her head.

“It’s like bells,” she said idly, turning her dagger over between her hands. “The bells the mortals ring, to let you know they have not forgotten you. That they are praying to you. That they hope you will hear them. But all you hear are the bells.”

The steady rhythm of his hammer on metal echoed off the cave walls. “No one prays to me.”

“No,” she said, after a pause. “Not to me, either.”

Resuming her usual silence, she watched him work. He felt her eyes on his back as he turned his chair toward the furnace, waiting for the metal to heat to the right temperature. Usually, he made several small trinkets a day, useless but pretty things that filled his time. It had been days since he had completed anything to show Thetis, but she hadn’t said a word. Still, he could feel an intense curiosity in the gaze fixed on him.

However, this project was not for her, or for them. This one was solely for him.

He took the glowing metal from the furnace and turned back to the anvil, beginning to hammer a curve into the long strip. Glancing up at Thetis briefly between blows, he said, “Can I ask you a question?”

She gave a short nod.

“Why do you watch me work?”

Red light from the furnace flickered in her eyes as she looked up from the anvil to his face. “You have no idea how remarkable you are, do you?”

He huffed, swinging his hammer a little harder than intended. “Remarkable enough that my mother flung me from Olympus.”

Thetis crossed her arms over her chest. “She’s afraid. They all are, up there.”

The memory of Hera’s eyes flashed into his mind. “Of what?”

“Power.”

Hephaestus frowned. “Are they not powerful enough?”

Shifting in her chair, she sighed. “They are. So were their parents. They fear power different to theirs. Like yours. Like mine.”

He turned the hot metal in his calloused hands, the wavering red and purple glowing beneath his fingers. “I’m just a blacksmith.”

Tilting her head thoughtfully, she leaned back. “You look at things and you see what they have the potential to become. And you have the power to make them so. To shape them according to your will. That is a power they fear.”

It was hard to argue when she put it that way. Still, he had never threatened to use his skill against them. He had never been given the chance to prove he could use that skill for them. He wondered what he would’ve said if he’d been asked.

Flaring flames danced on Thetis’ face, altering her features subtly in the changing light. Hephaestus remembered she had said they feared her power, too.

His hammer thudded dully as he placed it on the anvil, wiping sweat from his forehead. “What about you?”

She looked up, flashing her dagger-like grin. “I am destined to give birth to a son greater than his father.”

Turning the metal in the furnace, he thought for a moment. “And the gods fear that your son will be more powerful than them.”

She hummed in assent. “I didn’t wait to find out what their plan for me would be. I came here to escape.”

Silence resumed between them as Hephaestus worked, bending and hammering the metal into shape. He did not think of anything while he worked; there was nothing but the material, the tools, his hands. In his mind, the image of what he wanted to create filled his vision. From beneath the cracking flakes of falling metal and showers of sparks like shooting stars, the wheel began to emerge.

“Did this prophecy say anything else about your son?” Hephaestus asked. The question came without conscious thought, voiced before he was aware of it.

She hesitated briefly before replying, “No.”

For a moment, he regretted asking the question. Thetis seemed to slip into melancholy, staring without focus into the flames of the furnace. But the work called to him, and he forgot all else as he picked up his hammer.

The sound of a splash and the swing of the iron gate at the entrance echoed through the cave. Hephaestus paused, his hammer in mid-air, as he looked toward the doorway to his forge. Thetis rose from her chair and ran out to the main chamber. Putting down his tools, he wheeled his chair quickly after her.

Hephaestus knew a god when he saw one. The dark-skinned man standing in the hall, his long hair soaked with seawater and his arms covered in wounds seeping ichor, was certainly a god. His presence crackled like fire, and Hephaestus half expected to see sparks fly off him with a single touch.

Standing in the centre of the room across from the newcomer, Thetis pulled herself to her full height. Her welcoming smile was yet wary, and Hephaestus saw the glint of the dagger he had made for her tucked into her belt.

“Son of the gods,” she said. “What brings you here?”

He looked up at Thetis before catching sight of Hephaestus behind her. A sparkle flashed in his eye and the faint hint of a smile crossed his face before he returned his gaze to Thetis. “My lady, I am Dionysus, son of Zeus. I have been chased into the sea by King Lycurgus, and I seek refuge.”

Thetis let out a shocked, short laugh. “How foolish must a mortal king be to cross a god?”

Darkness clouded Dionysus’ eyes, turning their merry sparkling waves into abyssal pools. “He denied that I am what I am. Frankly, I grow tired of mortals declaring who they believe I am allowed to be.” There was an airiness in his voice that was not quite humour — a light sword with a sharp edge.

Hephaestus wondered that there could be any doubt in a mortal’s mind about Dionysus. He shone like polished bronze and thunder rumbled in his voice. Thetis’ words came back to him, of his singular ability to see things others could not. He thought of the fear he saw in Hera’s eyes, fear he had put there simply by existing. Though he hardly knew Dionysus, he knew what he saw: not fear, but rage, and the power to make that rage felt.

“There is no refuge for you on Olympus?” asked Hephaestus, raising his voice to be heard across the hall.

Thetis turned as he spoke, a curious expression on her ever-changing face. Dionysus met his gaze with a twinkle in his eye and laughed darkly. “No, my friend. There is not.”

Hephaestus and Thetis looked at each other, both grinning. She turned back to Dionysus, arms held wide open, and said, “Then you are most welcome here.”

Never before had the table in the sea cave hosted such merriment. Dionysus filled the cups Hephaestus made with wine of incomparable quality, and their laughter echoed through the cave day and night. The three of them sat in the forge while Hephaestus worked, chatting in the space between strikes of his hammer. He had not noticed the air of melancholy that hung over the forge while he and Thetis sat together in silence until it was broken, and somehow even the shadows seemed lighter in Dionysus’ presence.

Pleasantly mellowed by wine and conversation, Thetis drifted off to sleep in her chair, her head falling to Dionysus’ shoulder beside her. He smiled and took another sip of wine, turning his attention to the blacksmith.

Gesturing to Hephaestus’ wheeled chair with his cup, he said, “That’s quite a contraption.”

Hephaestus nodded without breaking the rhythm of his work.

“Why not make it flashier, though? Could do with a bit of gold.”

“Don’t need it to be flashy.” Hephaestus turned the chair around and put the metal back in the furnace. “Need it to work. Gold’s too soft, not sturdy enough.”

“Huh.” Dionysus tapped his fingers on the side of his cup. “You know, Olympus is mostly gold.”

Hephaestus raised an eyebrow. “Planning on storming the gates?”

Dionysus laughed. “It’s tempting.”

The moment of quiet between them was almost audibly filled with thought. Hephaestus took the heated metal from the furnace and turned back to his anvil.

“Have you ever thought of going back?” Dionysus asked, his voice low.

Hephaestus paused, then resumed hammering before he spoke. “I have no desire to be somewhere I’m not welcome.”

Dionysus’ brow knitted with some emotion Hephaestus could not quite decipher. “I…hm. I don’t want there to be anywhere I’m not welcome.”

The curve in the bronze beneath Hephaestus’ hammer began to form a smooth line. He turned the metal, starting on another side. “I don’t think that’s something you have control over.”

“Why not?” The furnace flames reflected in Dionysus’ dark eyes. “I can make them take notice of me. I can make myself unignorable.”

“Is that the same as being welcome?”

Dionysus didn’t answer, draining his cup instead.

Hephaestus continued his work until the metal cooled too much to bend, and returned it to the furnace. “Why’d they kick you off Olympus?”

“I’ve never been on Olympus.” Dionysus absentmindedly rolled the empty cup between his hands. “My mother was a mortal and Hera…well. You know how she is about Zeus’ children.”

Hephaestus looked up with a grin tugging at the corner of his mouth. “If it makes you feel better, she’s the same way about her own children.”

Laughing, Dionysus raised his cup, full once more. Hephaestus glanced at his hardly-touched cup on a table to the side, picking it up and clinking it against Dionysus’.

They drank in silence as Hephaestus watched the furnace. He had hardly thought of Olympus since he washed up at the mouth of Thetis’ cave. Going back had never occurred to him as an option.

Hephaestus looked at materials and saw what they could become: this steel, a sharp sword — that iron, a cooking pot. Thetis was shimmering silver, but Dionysus was molten bronze that shines gold in bright sunlight. For Dionysus, Hephaestus saw a crown, a throne with wild cats sculpted at his feet, wrought gates opening before him. It was easy to look at others and see their potential, but for himself, he could not see past his own hands. Perhaps that meant nothing. Perhaps it meant something.

Dionysus did not stay long. There was a steadiness to Thetis and Hephaestus: in her, the endless push and pull of the tide, and in him, the rhythmic strike of his hammer. Dionysus was a whirl of colour and light and sound, an uncontrolled flare, a rolling boulder picking up speed. The sea cave could never have contained him.

Before he left, Hephaestus placed a newly-forged kantharos in Dionysus’ hand. Grinning, Dionysus promised him a toast with it on Olympus. For once, Hephaestus was inclined to let himself be buoyed by hope.

It was a dangerous thing. Once he let hope in, he could not seem to rid himself of it again. His mind wandered with each strike of his tools. In each ringing echo, he heard music from far-off Olympus, Apollo’s lyre and the Muses’ song. Gold trinkets joined the piles of silver and bronze he had spent all of time crafting.

At the table, Thetis put down the goblet he made and reached across for his hand. Her small, graceful hands were always cold. “You need not stay here forever,” she said softly.

He swallowed. The wine tasted dull and flavourless without Dionysus’ touch. “How could I leave you here alone?”

“Don’t flatter yourself,” she said, a twinkle like sunlight sparkling on the waves in her eye. “I was alone before you got here.”

He packed his tools, and as he left the forge, the opening in the cave wall closed behind him as though it had never been there at all. Foam from the relentless waves dotted the rocks wearing away at the mouth of the cave. As once she had brought him to her, Thetis ferried him back to shore, raising the waves around them as they travelled over the blue-green sea.

The sunlight was overwhelming after so much time with only the glow of the furnace for illumination. Ichor rushed in his head and he shut his eyes tightly, flashes of colour and light still floating behind his closed eyelids. The bloodrush faded into the gentle sound of the waves brushing against the sand, the wind rustling the leaves of pine trees, and the trills of birdsong deeper in the forest ahead.

Slowly, the world came into focus. Distant outlines of tall mountains, muted shadows on the horizon, rose from beyond the forest. Beneath the sea salt and pine needles, he smelled cedar wood, smoke, and the dirt-and-blood scent of minerals waiting for his hands to shape them. Sweat prickled at the top of his forehead, and he felt the heat of the sun warm him to the bone.

A flash of light caught his attention — the sun glinting on the dagger at Thetis’ side. She knelt beside him, holding his hands in hers.

It did not seem real — nothing since the closing of his forge had. He could not imagine waking up in this world and not seeing Thetis’ face. Squeezing her hand, he spoke, failing to keep an emotional waver out of his voice. “If you think of anything I can do to repay you—”

“I did not take you in for payment,” she interrupted, shaking her head. “But if I need anything, I will find you. Who knows? Perhaps that son of mine will need some armour.”

Hephaestus chuckled gruffly. “I hope not.”

She flowed around him like a gentle wave, pressing a cold, salt-laced kiss to his cheek. The tide receded from the shore, falling back into the sea, and Thetis went with it, disappearing in a cloud of seafoam.

The world was quiet. The birds hushed, the wind died down, and even the waves seemed to still as Hephaestus was left alone. He was not one to linger when there was work to be done. Turning towards the forest, he pushed on.

Time passed. How much, Hephaestus could not say; he had no cause to keep track and no inclination to do so. There was only the work, the iron nails hammered into planks of wood to form his new walls, the smell of hot metal, the steady beat of his tools chiming in endless echoes off the mountains below.

In the moments when his hands were at rest, his mind strayed back to Olympus. His time there had been so brief, he had no clear images to recall, and so his mind swam with conjured imaginings of seas of gold, towering marble pillars crowned with gilded capitals, and flares of light reflected off shining walls. Whose hands, he wondered, built the gods’ halls?

Longing did not suit him, and he knew that. He was a man of action, a maker of things. It would not do to wish for the bridge to be built when he could build it himself.

His bridge back to Olympus was not, in fact, a bridge; it was a throne. This, his second chair, was for decoration rather than hard work, and he wove into it all the beauty that was useless to himself. The gold gleamed so bright in his dark forge that he winced as he worked on it. Something fit for Olympus should feel out of place on earth, Hephaestus thought as he carefully sculpted eagles and lightning bolts into the radiant gold. Intricate geometric designs adorned every surface of the magnificent throne and mighty golden oaks rose to form the tall back.

Had Hephaestus been a less practical god, it might have pained him to let this masterpiece go. But this throne was a tool, and it was time for that tool to assume its purpose. He sent the throne to Olympus, and waited.

It was not word from Zeus that returned, however. Grinning Hermes dropped a golden scroll in Hephaestus’ lap, which, when unrolled, bore the words of Hera. ‘Ungrateful child,’ she wrote, ‘that you would honour Zeus and not your own mother. Why should he have anything that I do not?’

Calmly, Hephaestus rolled the scroll back up and placed it in the furnace. He watched the edges ignite and blacken, curling in the flames. Anger served him precisely as much as longing. Once more, he set himself to action.

The golden throne he crafted for Hera was an equal marvel to the one he made for Zeus. Two lionesses sat tall and proud beneath the arms of the chair, and shining gold peacocks fanned their tails on the back. In the fading sunlight, it glowed with an undimmed luminescence that was not entirely of earth. Hephaestus smiled as he put the finishing touches in place. He was a craftsman, but he was a god, too.

After Hera’s throne was sent to Olympus, a few days passed in peaceful tranquillity. Hephaestus did not fire up his forge but sat outside his little refuge, watching the sun rise and fall behind the mountains, and breathing the crisp, fresh air. Silence had, for him, always included the background crackle of the fire, but now, for once, the world was truly quiet.

The lull was broken, eventually, by the approaching sound of heavy, unguarded footsteps and a jovial hummed tune. He turned his chair toward the mountain road, his hand cautiously hovering over the hammer at his side.

Before the visitor was in sight, Hephaestus heard a familiar, hearty chuckle. “Be still, my friend,” came the voice of Dionysus over the hill. “I come in peace.”

Dionysus was just as Hephaestus remembered him: dark and glowing like low embers. The warmth with which Dionysus embraced him was alive with crackling sparks. Ivy was the only crown in his long, perfumed hair; all that was gold about him came from within. They went inside, assuming their once-familiar spots on opposite sides of the small table.

“I hear,” Dionysus said as he poured each of them a glass of wine, “that Hera’s been caught in a bit of a jam.”

Hephaestus’ brows shot up in surprise. “You’ve been on Olympus?”

Dionysus shook his head. “Zeus put out a call for help. Apparently, Hera sat in a shiny new throne that seems to have trapped her in it. They’ve all been trying to get her out, but no one’s managed it.”

Hephaestus couldn’t hide his toothy grin, and Dionysus returned it. “Naturally,” he continued, “I thought of you.”

Chuckling, Hephaestus crossed his arms over his chest. “Did you suspect I created the trap or that I would free her from it?”

“Both,” Dionysus chirped.

Still smiling, Hephaestus narrowed his eyes inquisitively. “Certainly I crafted it, but why would I release her?”

“Because,” Dionysus leaned forward, “it’s our ticket into Olympus.”

Hephaestus frowned. Getting in was the easy part; staying was another matter. He had hoped his gift to Zeus would be enough to garner him an invitation, but the silence with which it had been received was not a comfort. They would assuredly welcome his help, but whether they would welcome him was not as sure. “What’s to keep them from kicking us back out once she’s free?”

“They live by pacts, by promises. Trade her freedom for our seats at the table. They’ll honour it.”

Both of them had been born deserving seats at the table. Hephaestus never begrudged work he chose to do, but this endless task of proving himself grew sour in his mouth. “I don’t want to barter for what’s rightfully mine.”

Leaning back in his chair, Dionysus shrugged, resting the ankle of one foot on the knee of the other. “Well, me neither. Do you have another idea?”

He thought for a moment, though he knew nothing would come to him. Sighing, he admitted, “No.”

Light flashed in Dionysus’ dark eyes over his cup as he lifted it to his lips. “Then this is it.”

The wrought golden gates of Olympus were somewhat disappointing, actually. Hephaestus was sure he could make better ones.

Crowds of gods parted to make way for Hephaestus and Dionysus as they arrived on the cloudy mountain top. Hephaestus wheeled his chair — a new one: gold, ‘for the show,’ as Dionysus put it — forward through the open doors of the main hall, his eyes focused on the glint at the end of it.

Hera, bound by shining gold tethers, sat scowling in her throne beside Zeus in his own. She did not so much as shift her gaze as Hephaestus and Dionysus approached, though Zeus watched them with a curious smile. The same current in the air surrounding Dionysus emanated from Zeus, glowing with celestial fire. Bright light crowned the king and queen’s heads. There was a delicacy to them that Hephaestus had not expected; their radiance was insubstantial and airy, where Hephaestus’ was the strong, sturdy glow of heated metal, able to bend without breaking, to withstand endless impact.

“We’ve come to make a deal, Father,” said Dionysus, emphasising the address.

Zeus’ smile deepened. “What sort of deal would that be?”

Hephaestus cleared his throat. “The queen’s release, for our places on Olympus.”

Hera growled, her jaw visibly clenched. Zeus looked at her, then back at the two gods before him. “It’s a reasonable offer.”

Exhaling loudly through her nose, Hera continued to sit in conspicuous wordlessness.

Hephaestus manoeuvred himself into Hera’s line of sight. She shifted her gaze away from him, and he snorted in a laugh, which brought her narrowed eyes back to him.

As he looked up at her, he thought hard about what he wanted to hear. In truth, he was not sure even now what he expected her to say. She had not spoken to him before casting him out of Olympus. Somehow he knew she was too like him to come begging and pleading for his help. And she had not; Zeus had put out the call. There was no feat he could accomplish that would make her welcome him with open arms, no masterpiece he could gift her that would earn her love.

Where Hephaestus and his mother were alike was their steel, their unshakeable fortitude, loyal ever to their own judgement. Where they differed, he now realised, was that his respect was earned, and hers was given or taken as she saw fit; she loved those who did not deserve it, and hated those who did not deserve it, too. His mother’s esteem was not in his power to win; thus, he let it go.

He kept his face carefully blank as he spoke evenly and coolly. “I could tell you of the wonders I can create, Mother. I could tell you of my strength, my art, my work. None of that is why I belong here. I was born a god, and my place here is mine, whether you want me or not.”

She glared at him without speaking for a long moment. Flames leapt coldly in her eyes as she held her gaze steady, levelled directly at him. Finally, she muttered, hardly audible, “Will you free me?”

Without responding, Hephaestus wheeled himself behind the throne. Between the peacocks’ spreading tails, he easily found the hammer woven into the design of vines and flowers. The metal glowed beneath his fingertips, and he pressed into the shape. In a flash of light, the golden tethers loosed their grip and disappeared.

Hera rose from the throne, rubbing her wrists. She glanced over her shoulder, hardly making eye contact with Hephaestus as she thanked him. He bit back a laugh as he rejoined Dionysus, and together they made their way to the eternal feast.

The long, golden tables in the feast hall of Olympus were never bare. Wine flowed with what Hephaestus suspected was increased abundance since Dionysus’ arrival, though of course he had nothing with which to compare it. Baskets of overflowing fruits, sizzling platters of meat and onions, warm breads, salty olives, and bowls brimming with ambrosia never seemed to empty, no matter how much they consumed.

Hephaestus tried to ignore the wide berth given him by most of the other gods, and found it easier than he expected. Perhaps they would come around in time, and perhaps they would not. He was one of them; that could not be changed. Their approval was inconsequential, and just as he had all that time alone between leaving Thetis and coming to Olympus, he was satisfied in himself. There was work to be done between himself and his forge, and that was all that he required.

Sitting beside him at the feast table, Dionysus leaned into Hephaestus’ shoulder. “How’s it going?” he asked, eyes sparkling.

Hephaestus smiled but did not answer the question, instead posing one of his own. “Is it everything you expected?”

Laughing, Dionysus leaned an elbow on the table and tapped the rim of his kantharos with one finger. “It is exactly what I expected. Nothing more, nothing less.”

Nodding, Hephaestus took a sip of wine. His cup refilled itself before he set it back down.

Dionysus put his chin against the heel of his hand. “You know,” he said, lowering his voice, “you and I, my friend— we’ll never be like them, no matter how long we sit at this table.”

Hephaestus looked from Dionysus to Zeus, matching crowns of gold light shining from their heads. “We are like them.”

“No.” Dionysus followed his gaze. “We are of them, but not like them.”

Looking again at both Dionysus and Zeus, Hephaestus observed that, though they both shone, there was a heartiness to Dionysus that his father did not share: a strength rooted in the act of living, rather than the passive possession of eternal life. Without asking, he knew Dionysus would never trade what he was for what his father was.

Hephaestus glanced at Hera with a self-satisfied smirk. There was too much value in himself to wish to be more like her. He and Dionysus were different kinds of gods from their parents, and still, they were gods. “I don’t think that’s a bad thing.”

Dionysus turned back to Hephaestus, grinning. “No, it isn’t. But we’re here.” He flushed with pride, leaning back in his seat. “We’re here, and now they can’t ignore us.”

Hephaestus flexed his hands. There were metals that would never bend beneath his hands — but he knew now that he could build around them instead. “Let us see what we can make of it.”