Artemis never expected the slap from the irate blonde goddess. They had been fighting over love, and how Artemis would never find it. Then Artemis had said that sucker-punch line.
"How can you know about love if you've never been in love with anyone but yourself?" The last time someone said that to Cupid, they took eight hundred and seventy years to reform. No-one had ever said it to Aphrodite without dying – painfully, embarrassingly and unforgettably.
Aphrodite, however, had reared back as if struck, tears in her eyes. Then it came, hard, fast and stinging like hell. Her head was forced sideways, and the momentum span her whole body around, making her lose her balance and fall. Everyone stood in stunned silence, only Aphrodite's heavy breathing audible in the silent throne room.
Then she grabbed Artemis, pulling her up with surprising strength and turned her to face her, glaring hard enough that not even the famed, ice-cold Artemis failed to wince.
"How can I know about love you ask? Well listen to this. I am a fucking empath when it comes to love. All forms of love, I feel. The love for a man, a woman, a mother, a father, a child, a pet, even an object, I feel it. There are over seven billion mortals down there, and all, all love something. How can I know about love? Because I feel it every day."
Her speech had started out angry, but by the end she was whispering in the most emotional tone one could muster. She let Artemis' shoulders go, stepping back.
"And then there are all of you." She looked around to each of the gods, but her gaze still turned back on Artemis. "I feel everything you feel, everything you have ever felt for anyone that has lived. For you, Artemis, the list must be the smallest I've ever felt. All of your Hunter's, your mother, your brother, Athena, Zeus, Hestia, me, Orion and Percy. I would have wondered about the last two until I remembered that they both earned your respect, meaning they gained your notice in the good way and it escalated from there. Zeus has the weakest love – it is a love of someone barely there, have an obligation to love, and you do, if only because he sired your brother too."
She laughed hollowly. "Oh, you two fight each other, argue, and are far from the only set of twins to be totally different from each other – but the love you feel is as undeniable as the sun and the moon."
Artemis didn't look at her brother, who stared at her with wide eyes. Aphrodite wasn't fazed by the looks she was being given.
All this time, all these years they had thought her a naïve girl who couldn't keep fluttering her eyelashes or slipping into someone's bed. Aphrodite was a symbol of Love and Lust, literally the icon for whores. Yet she could say this, and if it were true, the turmoil that she went through every day was huge.
Artemis opened her mouth to speak, but before she could, Aphrodite came forward and took her chin, kissing her sweetly.
"And Artemis, I have been in love, am in love, with the person right in front of me." She said softly, kissing her forehead before disappearing in a golden light, leaving Artemis speechless.
Artemis never expected the slap from the irate blonde goddess. They had been fighting over love, and how Artemis would never find it.
Artemis never expected the kiss either, or the profession. But they didn't speak of it afterwards, and never did Artemis and Aphrodite argue.
Their battle was over, and no God or Goddess tried pursuing Artemis again. She had been claimed, and the Maiden Goddess knew it.