The Olympians had now got a new member: Dionysos, the new god of wine, madness, theatre, parties, vegetation and the afterlife.
But it wasn't celebrated as much as it would have normally. The young god didn't mind; he knew why and he understood, that this was no time for a party.
They would have been thirteen now, but Hestia had given up her place in favour of him, thus they stayed twelve. Athena found, that the round looked kind of … incomplete without Hestia.
But her chair wasn't the only empty one.
Two other deities, who were still here, but hardly showed their faces these days, were leaving their places at the table vacant. Yet, when they did show up, they often killed the mood in the room, just by looking like the Algea¹ themselves. Zeus tolerated it, as he could relate to their grief.
Ares and Aphrodite looked strange in mourning attire.
Crushed, far less alive, mere shadows of their former selves.
Clad in black from head to toe, no jewellery or armour, they even were wearing ashes.
Aphrodite's lovely hair had been shorn, the way mortal women did, when mourning. It was odd to see the bright love goddess wear nothing but black. Her duties no longer delighted her, nor did the other Olympians ever hear her bell-like laughter these days.
Ares was neglecting his job entirely and never looked anything but weary, broken and defeated. He had dark rims under his eyes and always seemed close to either tears or a fit of anger. And he had taken to wearing a brooch with Harmonia's face engraved on it.
Dear, blameless Harmonia, Ares' and Aphrodite's beloved daughter and sunshine, who was gone, gone forever, who would never come back, who had forsaken divinity … who was dead.
It was still so hard to believe for everyone.
Goddesses didn't die.
Only once had Athena seen a goddess die: her first friend, whose name she had adopted to honour her. Except that Pallas had simply become one with Pontos² again.
She was, in a way, still there.
Not so Harmonia; she was really, truly dead and nothing would ever bring her back.

Ares knew, that the rest of the family had trouble stomaching this too.
Even for him and Aphrodite it was hard to believe, and even harder, if not impossible, to bear.
My lovely daughter, my little sunshine, my joy and pride, my sweet child, she is gone, gone, she will never come back, she is dead, dead, dead-
Both parents had fallen silent.
They rarely spoke anymore and if they did, it was always about Harmonia. They didn't know how else to cope with their grief.
For their divine children it was the same.
Once they'd had a fight with their youngest sons Phobos and Deimos, who had confronted them and doubted, that if one of them would die, their parents would be remotely as affected. The fight had escalated into screaming, shattered earthenware and broken furniture, but had ended in tears and a group hug.
Ares could understand and relate to this, his children's worry, still he didn't want to hear such an accusation ever again.
There were moments, when the pain got too overwhelming, that Aphrodite would randomly burst into tears or wails and Ares would clench every muscle in his body, trying to suppress his emotions.
They both knew why things had come to this.
Ares had known before Aphrodite had.
The necklace … the necklace Hephaistos had once given Aphrodite (after their divorce, after the incident had happened), who in turn had given it to her daughter as a wedding gift.
That cursed piece of jewellery that, as Ares soon had found out, had been made with malicious intent.
Dionysos (this boy, who was both his half-brother, his nephew and his daughter's grandson, this god of madness, who had caused part of the trouble) had been the one to point it out.
And once Ares had actually taken a look at the necklace of Harmonia, it had dawned on him.
The necklace had been made by Hephaistos, obviously, but he had also recognised the handiwork of Eris, the baleful essence of her and her children. Whatever way the blacksmith had persuaded her and the Kakodaimones to help him was beyond Ares, but that wasn't the point. It was oozing with misfortune and woe.
And then he remembered overhearing a conversation between the smith and his new wife, Aglaia.
The thing was fucking cursed.
The maker had wanted her to suffer for her parents' crime.
My Harmonia, my child, he wanted her to suffer for something that was mine and Aphrodite's fault, he wanted to hurt her, because she reminded him of the incident.
The realisation had made Ares burst into dreadful laughter, terrifying every living being within a hundred mile radius.
Of course.
How could he ever have assumed, that his brother would possibly gift something to the daughter of Ares and Aphrodite, to the girl who had been conceived on that disgraceful day.
How could he ever have hoped that Hephaistos would forgive them?

Of course Hephaistos hadn't forgiven them.
He hadn't forgiven Ares and Aphrodite for betraying him, so how could he have forgiven their daughter to come from it?
At first he had wanted to take his wrath out on them directly, but had quickly noticed, that they themselves left no opening for the curse to work (then again, Ares was friends with Eris and her brood of evil, so he was probably completely immune to their vibes).
Aphrodite giving the accursed necklace to her daughter had just been a stroke of luck; Harmonia, a third generation goddess with a mortal husband and children, had been a lot more vulnerable to the baleful curse of her wedding gift.
Deep down, the smith had felt sorry for his niece, even though under his friendly facade he had always loathed her for being spawned under such circumstances. Still there had been no denying, that she had been sweet and innocent and hadn't deserved to suffer.
Yet, his pity had been drowned out by the grim satisfaction of seeing her parents heartbroken over their daughter's misfortune and subsequent death.
Maybe one day he would regret, what he had done, but that day was yet to come. For now his heart was flint.

As Athena followed Aglaia through the smithery, the Kharis seemed to be far more sober than usual.
"Approach him with care", she warned the wisdom goddess, "He's in a really bad mood today."
"I can imagine", the taller woman muttered. "Don't worry. I can handle this, I know what to do."
Aglaia nodded in acknowledgement, but whispered: "Alright. Just don't say their names. And don't mention the incident."
She bowed courteously and saw herself out.
Athena took a deep breath, before going deeper into the workshop.
Don't say their names … that would be impossible, because she was here on their behalf.
"Hey, Athena. I know you and I hate each other, but can you do me a favour …?"
Once Ares had told her, she hadn't been able to refuse.
The blue-eyed goddess needed to look for a while, until she spied Hephaistos hunched over a desk, doing precision work. His face was stone and he was currently burning brightly, not bothering to keep his flames inside his body.
In a really bad mood, Aglaia had said – what an understatement! If the normally composed smith was on fire, that could only mean that he was on the verge of exploding!
It was only when his hands were free, that Athena knocked on the door frame to make herself known.
He turned his head.
Holy Khaos, if looks could kill even gods, she would have dropped dead on the spot!
"Your shield isn't done yet!", he snapped at her and sparks fell out of his hair.
She swallowed her agitation and replied: "I'm not here because of that. I'm here, because someone asked me to give you a letter and didn't trust Hermes to do it."
Hephaistos stared at her and his flames died down.
After muttering an apology for his rudeness, he pushed his wheelchair around the desk and offered her a stool.
"Do you want some nectar?"
"No, thank you. As I said, I'm only here because of the letter."
The smith was obviously still extremely pissed off, but he closed his eyes and took a deep breath, before speaking.
"Athena, if this is a letter from Ares, give it back to him and tell him to shove it up his-"
"Listen to me!", she interrupted him. "I didn't read this, but he came to me, even though he hates me, and asked me for help. So this has to be important!"
"… Fine."
"When he gave me this, he mentioned another letter he sent you before."
"Hephaistos scowled and confirmed, that he had indeed received a letter – more than a millennium after the incident.
Athena lifted an eyebrow. "You didn't read it, did you? He suspected it too. Said, that this time he wants you to read it in my presence. I hate to admit it, but sometimes he does use the single-digit number of braincells he has."
The smith snorted at the jab, but told her to wait here, rolled out of the room and came back with another, seemingly far older scroll of papyrus.
"You are both right, I didn't read it", he admitted. "But for some reason I couldn't bring myself to burn it either." A sigh. "After all, no one has ever gone through remotely as much trouble as to write me a letter."
"Maybe you want to read that one first", she proposed.
Hephaistos scowled down at the scroll in his lap. But after unrolling it, he blinked.
"Huh. The prick sure has clean handwriting."
Oh. That really was unexpected. However, it didn't matter right now.
"What are you waiting for?", Athena urged.
He puffed his cheeks. "I still don't see a point in reading it. It's probably something really offensive about me stealing his girl or some shit."
She chuckled. Yes, that sounded like something Ares would have written after the incident.
"Well, can he make you any angrier than you already are at him?"
"I guess not."
"Then read it anyway. And if it pisses you off, burn it. But at least you'll have read it."
The blacksmith rolled his eyes, but gave in. "Alright."
Clearing his throat, he began to read:
"Dear little brother,
since that golden net incident, you have never given me the chance to tell you, how I feel. And because you won't listen to me, I'm sending you this letter. I beg you, read all of it. When you've finished, you can burn it, if you want, just … hear me out …"
Athena looked over his shoulders, as he read it to her.
She was actually impressed.
Never ever would she have pinned Ares to write something even remotely as deep.
If she hadn't known better, she would have thought it was Aphrodite's hand – but it obviously wasn't; her writing was cursive and ornate, as opposed to Ares' clean, but plain hand.
Except that what he had written was so genuine and candid … alright, it was definitely Ares.
Hephaistos read everything, but his voice grew shakier with every paragraph.
By the end, he was full-on crying.
"Fucking arsehole!", he choked and burned the letter in his hands, "First he gives me a lesson about love, rubs his relationship with Aphrodite in my face and then he tells me, that he loves me?! Of all the things he could have written, this …"
Gently Athena stroked his back, as he sobbed into his hands.
It took him a while to compose himself.

The goddess of wisdom had left, after reading the second letter to him, as he had asked.
Hephaistos just needed some time alone.
He … he didn't know how to deal with this.
Everything was way too much and too confusing and he needed distance.
The other gods could wait for their stuff. Or they could just ask his assistants to finish the crap.
He would go on a holiday trip.
Far away from Olympos.
Preferably even away from Hellas.
Sicilia?
That was the place.
He hadn't seen Vulcanus in a while.

"… And that's basically, what happened."
"Hm …"
Vulcanus peeked at his Greek colleague from behind his cup.
"Let me check, if I got this right", he spoke, "You avenged yourself on the adulterers by placing a curse on their innocent daughter. A girl, who never did anything to you aside from that one flaw she can't help – that she was conceived through adultery – which, as I just said, really isn't her fault, who was pretty much as pure as the rays of the sun above", the Italian god commented. "Well, I'm not going to question your motives. But do tell me: are you proud of yourself and of what you have done to Harmonia?"
Hephaistos didn't answer immediately. He was just stubbornly staring into the fire.
Alone, Vulcanus already knew the answer, long before the older god spoke.
They didn't meet often, but knew each other oddly well – as if they were brothers.
Perhaps in a sense they were.
Finally Hephaistos admitted: "No, I'm not."
The Italian god cleared his throat: "Y'know, I have found, that time can fix that kind of shit. Revenge isn't always needed. Besides, you already exposed and publicly embarrassed them and divorced Aphrodite, it was not necessary to get back at her. Why make a cruel and complicated revenge plan, when you can just … let it go? I know it's easy to say and hard to do, but it's true. Think about it; is she that important to you, that you cannot forgive their betrayal, even after thousands of years? Trust me. Revenge isn't always the right thing. It doesn't make you a good person in any way."
The Greek god sighed in obvious frustration.
But his facial features gradually softened into a pensive expression.
Eventually his face became determined, he muttered a begrudging "Ugh, fine", rolled his wheelchair around and bid his colleague goodbye.
"What will you do now?", Vulcanus wanted to know, as he stepped aside to let his colleague out.
Hephaistos turned around and was (surprisingly) smiling.
"Travel to Illyria. I'm going to meet with an old friend."

"Thank you for the ride, Helios", Hephaistos thanked his driver.
The sun Titan laughed merrily: "Hey, anything for my best buddy! Besides, I understand what you're up to, man. You sort things out and if you need a ride back to Olympos, just call me up, 'kay?"
The blacksmith god smiled: "Sure."
"Alright!", the Titan exclaimed and jumped back onto his chariot, "I'll continue my trip across the sky, before your king gets the vapours."
The younger deity could only giggle.
The Titan grinned, before spurring his horses and riding off.
With a fond smile Hephaistos looked after Helios. The gods could say about that guy what they wanted, but he was a really good and reliable friend.
But his smile faded immediately, as he turned to the temple that contained the petrified remains of his niece and her husband.
This would be incredibly hard and he wasn't sure, if he actually knew what to say.
But he wasn't a coward and he definitely was no quitter.
He wasn't sure, if Harmonia could hear him, but he definitely owed her an apology – even, if he had to give it to a rock, since her and Kadmos' remains had turned to stone through Zeus' will.
That's my fault … it's all my fault …
"Alright", he murmured to himself. "Time to finally man up and face the shit I've done."
He entered the building and to his relief found, that it was empty.
Good.
It would be Tartaros to explain to a mortal priest or visitor, what a tan, young-looking man with long black hair and a wheelchair (it wasn't like the mortals knew those yet) was doing inside a funerary temple with an offering of incense, cinnamon, holy water and a bouquet of white roses. Bringing flowers was silly; the goddess turned mortal was now dwelling in Elysion, where the flowers grew fairest, but she would have been happy either way, he knew.
She was a real sweetheart … I have to give it to her parents, they raised her well.
He looked around the interior.
It was a plain, almost minimalistic temple and behind a simplistic altar, on an elevated pedestal stood a statue of two medium-sized Drakones³, entwined in eternal embrace. Thus the couple had passed on and thenceforth their petrified bodies had remained this way. It was both romantic and tragic.
He sighed: "Hello, Harmonia. It's been a while. The last time we saw each other was at your wedding, I believe?"
He set his offerings on the altar with some effort.
"I'm sorry I took so long. Well, for that and a lot of other things. This is kind of stupid, because I'm here talking to a rock, when I should be saying this to your face. But I can't, so this will have to do. I don't know, how much you knew. Or if you can hear me, for that matter. Still I owe you an explanation … and an apology."
Suddenly he was startled by a gust of wind, but when he looked around, no one was there.
After looking around cautiously, he just assumed, that it had been the draft and turned back to the stone.
"Well, there really are no words to make up for what I have done to you to get back at your parents, but I will try anyway."
He began with an explanation, then a confession, before attempting to apologise.
Eventually he said: "So … that's it. That's kinda how I ruined your entire family out of petty revenge. I know that a sorry won't cut it. But I'll try anyway. I'm sorry. I had no right to do what I did. Because of my grudge against your parents, I destroyed your every chance at happiness. Because of the circumstances you were conceived in, I hated you, even though you never did anything to warrant it. Back then I did it to make them suffer and didn't care about how you would handle all of this. Today I know, that I was in the wrong. I should have just let it go and instead I made an innocent woman suffer out of selfish spite. What I have done is unforgivable and I do not ask for your forgiveness, that I don't deserve. Still I want you to know, that I regret what I did. So I hope that you can hear this. If you hate me now, that's fine (you have all reason to), but if you can find it in your heart to believe me, that would be more than I could already ask for. Please believe me, when I say … I'm sorry. I deeply, truly am."
Finishing his apology, he took a deep breath.
There. It had been done.
Suddenly he felt a lot lighter, even though he had been talking to a rock.
For a moment the temple was quiet.
Then a voice made him almost yelp.
"That was a beautiful apology. Would've been better, if you had said it to her face, though."
Hephaistos turned his wheelchair around as quickly as he could.
"How long have you been here?", he gasped.
Ares shrugged: "I saw Helios drop you off here, when I came, so I think it's safe to say: the entire time."
The smith frowned; so that had been the gust of wind from earlier!
The war god shook his head and approached.
He too was carrying offerings in his hands and arms; a giant, quite colourful bouquet of exquisite flowers, a bottle of perfume, a peplos, incense and a bowl with fruit.
Ares set his rich offerings down on the altar, next to the one Hephaistos had put there earlier.
Then he crouched down next to the younger god's wheelchair with a sigh.
For a few minutes, they sat in awkward silence, before Hephaistos cleared his throat.
"Ares, maybe you should fold your wings away, before-"
"May they see 'em", the older cut him off. "They already have before. They know the father of their late queen."
Hephaistos could see the other's wings tense up and the fingers claw at the stone floor, before Ares composed himself.
"You have some nerve, showing your face here."
"I know."
"Was about fucking time though."
"Yes, it was."
"I've read your letters."
"Have you?", Ares muttered.
"Yes. In Athena's presence, like you wanted."
"Good."
"I've burned them thereupon."
The war god's mouth quirked upward. "Figured you would."
"Those letters were crap."
"Sure, whatever you say. And still you cried, before you burned them. Daddy's Owl told me. If you really had thought they were crap, you wouldn't have shed a tear."
Hephaistos couldn't help but be surprised, that the red-eyed god knew him so well, but he didn't voice it.
Apprehensively he watched his older brother.
Ares was grinning lopsidedly, but his red wings rustled and twitched in irritation, giving away that he wasn't remotely as casual or amused as he was pretending to be.
To be fair, neither was the younger.
"I still think that you're a prick, Ares."
"I know. And you're right. But I'm gonna level with you, brother – you've been an arse too."
Hephaistos smiled bitterly: "Yes, there's no denying I was."
"Ya know, when Aphrodite and I first realised it … that thing with the necklace … we were really mad at you, both of us."
"I don't blame you."
"Good."
Ares craned his neck to look his brother directly in the eyes.
"Why did you do this to Harmonia? How could you? Why to her? She … she …"
His toneless voice wavered and he quickly looked away again.
"It wasn't my intention at first", the smith whispered. "The necklace was meant for her mother."
Ares didn't respond. He didn't have to.
Hephaistos knew, what he would have said, if he'd had the words to say it. He also knew why he still wouldn't have said anything, even if he could have.
"I'm sorry", he finally whispered.
Ironic, really; never would he have imagined, that he would apologise to Ares of all gods.
The red-eyed god didn't answer beyond a heavy sigh.
The blacksmith god didn't know how long they sat in silence hereafter.
But at some point Ares placed his left hand onto the armrest of his brother's wheelchair – cautiously, as if to give the other the option to just slap it away, if he didn't want it there.
Hephaistos' brown eyes widened.
That was a rather tentative and gentle gesture from the abrasive, warlike madman that was Ares.
Then again, who was he to complain?
With a tiny smile he took the hesitant hand and gave it a firm squeeze.

1) Algea: the Greek Daimones (spirits) of pain, suffering and grief, bringers of weeping and tears, daughters of Eris, the goddess of strife.
2) Pontos: the primordial personification of the sea, a son of Gaia.
3) Drakones: serpentine dragons (mostly just enormous snakes)