Over the following days we settled into a silent understanding: we were still a couple. I spent most nights at his house; he even gave me a key. He answered any and all questions I had — though I didn't ask any about himself, any that would make him more real, that would solidify him as a god. He continued training me in self-defense, and I actually started to enjoy it. Neither of us referred to his admission of loving me again.

I couldn't quite explain to myself why I was staying, why I kept coming back to him. I wasn't suddenly fine with everything. I was still insecure (and admonished myself for that) about all those women in his past. I was still astounded by the fact that my boyfriend had children, let alone this many and this long ago. And I still couldn't quite fathom that all of this was actually happening.

It wasn't just sex that made me stay, even if it was more fantastic than I could put into words now that he was himself. It wasn't that I was just that much in love with Noah — I was, but Noah wasn't really there anymore. He was different now. He had said he was still the same person, but he wasn't, not exactly. I couldn't put my finger on what was different about him. He was more open, sure — the baseline for that had been low — and he wasn't afraid to use his godly abilities in front of me: when I'd left my phone downstairs, he disappeared into his golden light and came back with it a second later. When I had forgotten to bring clean clothes, he pulled them out of thin air. And when he came to my apartment one day full of cuts and scrapes, he didn't hide how they healed almost instantly.

It wasn't just those obvious things, though. There was also some deeper layer to his behavior that had shifted. He had come across as confident and laid-back before, but I realized that that might have been a thin veneer. He was now sincere, and relaxed most of the time in a completely different way from how he had been. Maybe it really had been a long time since he'd felt like he could be himself.

But even so I did find him looking at me cautiously when he might not think I'd notice. I knew that he realized I wasn't sure about him and about my feelings for him.

So why did I stay? Why did I stay if the Noah that I'd met was gone and if the new Noah, the real Noah — I still couldn't say or even really think his true name — was not someone I felt entirely comfortable with? I honestly didn't know. Maybe it was because I simply enjoyed being around him. Maybe it was because despite everything, the fun we used to have had come back and it was sometimes almost easy to forget everything else. Maybe it was because he was the only one who understood, even if only for a bit, what I was going through. Maybe I had to be honest with myself and admit that I was actually in love with this Noah, too.

And there was something else, something that I hadn't yet allowed myself to think about but that I couldn't ignore any longer. I had mostly recovered from my anxiety — I hadn't even seen my therapist in over two years. But it was still there, it was still a part of me, even if it didn't classify as a disorder anymore. Medication, back when I took it, had calmed me, but it hadn't changed who I fundamentally was and how I fundamentally approached things. Therapy had taught me how to get through panic attacks, but that didn't mean I never had them anymore. But then I'd met Noah — and my nightmares had stopped. Then I hadn't had any panic attacks for months until that night with Daniel Beck. When Noah was with me — at least up until this crazy rollercoaster had started these past few weeks — I felt a certain inexplicable peace of mind that I didn't want to lose.

I had thousands of questions and many a night was spent drinking wine — he would never give me Dionysus' wine, and I was starting to wonder what was so special about it — and talking for hours. I couldn't resist, now that I almost literally had all the knowledge of the world at my fingertips.

"Joan of Arc. Was she real?"

"Yep. I liked her, even though she took all my messages as the word of her Christian God." Noah rolled his eyes, but smiled. "She had a fire in her."

Whenever he mentioned having met the people I asked about, having lived then, having been around for all of it, it was as if my brain shut that part out. Noah seemed to notice that and never elaborated past his initial answer. It was part of our understanding. But there was still a whole world of things I was dying to know.

"The pyramids. How were they built?"

"With a little help from my family and me."

"Right." He did make it very difficult to ignore the reality that was right in front of me. "The Marianas Trench, what's down there?"

"You'll have to ask Poseidon, I've never ventured into it."

"Who was Jack the Ripper?"

"I don't know. Never met the man. Or woman."

"How did Amelia Earhart disappear?"

"Plane crash over the Pacific."

"That's boring. I thought it was more mysterious."

"Most mysteries aren't very mysterious, Emms."

"Oh…" I was a little disappointed. "Why was Stonehenge built?"

"It's a solar calendar. And, incidentally, a graveyard. Nothing spiritual about it."

"Who was the first human?"

"I don't know, I didn't exist yet."

"You didn't — oh." I'd almost ventured into a territory I didn't want to enter just yet. I bit my lip and hoped he would brush over it.

But he'd noticed it too and he watched me closely. Seconds passed and I felt the tension grow — I didn't know what to do, I couldn't pretend it hadn't happened.

I tried, though. "Are aliens out there?"

"Emma." He was still watching me with those intense eyes — pained eyes, even. "Please. We can talk about this."

I looked at his hands. The hands that I couldn't ignore had hurt so many people. Touched so many women. The hands that had probably been bloodied and broken thousands of times over all those thousands of years. The hands that despite all of that still looked smooth as marble.

I couldn't do it.

"You can't avoid it forever." His voice sounded strange, as if he had a lump in his throat, and I looked up. He hadn't stopped staring.

"I don't know," I managed to stammer.

I saw his chest rise, then fall with a deep breath. "Why not?"

Did I have to? Did we really have to have this conversation now? Could I really not avoid it forever? Could we not just pretend he was still Noah and he just happened to know all these things and happened to be outrageously hot and strong and there was no such thing as Greek gods?

...Of course we couldn't, not anymore. Everything had changed and there was nothing I could do about that.

"I can't." I felt my throat constrict. I tried to breathe into my belly, but the air wouldn't go down, I couldn't breathe deeply enough to keep my body relaxed, to keep a clear head — my thoughts went all over the place and I wanted so badly to flee this whole situation —

And suddenly it was gone. Suddenly fresh air flowed freely into my lungs. My muscles softened, my jaw that I hadn't even noticed was clenched loosened.

My eyes had gone everywhere but towards Noah during this bout of panic, but now I saw that his gaze was firmly trained on me, the warmth of his brown irises more apparent than ever, and his intensity could have scared me if I didn't feel so calm.

I looked down. His hand was on mine. Skin-on-skin contact had never felt better — and it hit me. He was calming me with his touch. His presence these past months hadn't just coincidentally helped soothe my anxiety, he had proactively been doing that.

"I thought… I thought you were… chaos and brutality." The words came out in a whisper. It still sounded completely insane.

"I am," he said, his voice more impassive than his face.

"So… how..?"

"There are two sides to every coin."

"So you don't… just bring violence?"

"No." His eyes still hadn't left my face. They were earnest, but his mouth started to smile ever so slightly. "I'm more than what the books tell you, Emma."

I looked at him, really looked at him now. He was, indisputably, first and foremost the freaking god of freaking war — he was the image of the ideal warrior, with that soaring height of his and those broad shoulders, that crazy powerful body, and those sharp features that might hint at a certain aggression. But there were also the softer parts of him, the ones I associated with Noah and not with Ares: his caring eyes with their long lashes, his full lips with that pronounced, perfectly rounded cupid's bow (and I suddenly realized where that phrase might have originated), his slender uncalloused fingers. The strong-arched feet that made him an agile fighter but also an amazing dancer. The dimples that I knew appeared in his cheeks when he laughed genuinely.

I had assumed Ares was pure force and bloodlust — especially after that scene just a number of days ago, and the one with Daniel the week before that — and that everything good that I'd experienced with Noah had been, well, Noah. His human pretense. That all of that was part of some second personality that warred with who he really was.

But what if Noah wasn't a farce? What if all of that was just as much a part of him as the things I'd read about Ares? And what if those two selves didn't collide within him but were rather... two sides of the same coin, just like he had said? What if in these past days I had witnessed not some strange middle ground between the god of war and his fake human identity, but the real Noah? The real... Ares?

He seemed to sense the thoughts clogging my mind and softly squeezed my hand. "It's okay, Emma. I'm here."

But if he was attempting to reassure me, he failed miserably, because with those simple words a frightening thought came up — "Can you read my mind?" I asked in a small voice and tried desperately not to think anything at all.

The compassionate smile on his face grew and reached his eyes. "I could," he said, "but I don't."

It sounded sincere. I decided to believe him, and let out the breath I'd been holding. "Okay."

We held each other's eyes, neither of us speaking first, and it wasn't tense (or was that just the effect of his hand that was still on mine?), but even so it was only a few seconds until I couldn't take it any longer. "Isn't this, uh, the part where you break the ice and say you're hungry?" I said awkwardly.

He stared at me, puzzled — and then burst out laughing. I laughed along with him, first a little sheepishly, but eventually as mirthfully as him. "I think you just did that job for me," he said with a grin.

"I'm not hungry," I said with a slight smile, "But I am thirsty."

He pulled his hand back — the warmth faded, but my tranquility didn't — and refilled my glass. As I watched him pour the wine and lick a drop off his finger that had trickled down the neck of the bottle, I realized I could no longer deny my feelings nor the truth: I was in love with Noah, and Noah was Ares — I had fallen head over heels for Ares, the Greek god of war. And if I wasn't walking away, if I was going for it, going all in, I needed to face what I had been afraid to talk about. I needed to acknowledge the long life he'd lived and the things that had happened in it. I needed to get to know him all over again — as Ares this time.

There was no way back. But I knew now I didn't want to find a way back anymore.

Ares. Ares. Ares. I repeated the name to myself as I watched him straighten to get another bottle of wine and a block of cheese. I repeated it in my mind while he poured himself a glass. Ares, Ares, Ares. If I was going to be open to who he really was, then I had to use his name, too. Ares.

"So you've killed people, then?" I found myself asking suddenly. I bit my lip, tried to push myself further into the back cushion, and didn't know where to look. I settled for his chin — I couldn't look him straight in the eye now.

He paused with his hand holding the bottle still outstretched. "Yes." He tried to meet my gaze, but I focused on that slight chin dimple.

"When was the last time? This morning before you invited me here? Last week? Five hundred years ago?" My voice was soft, but determined.

"That I —? Emma, do you really want to know?" he frowned.

Maybe I didn't. That answer said enough. But I had decided to face it all. I swallowed. "Yes."

"Thursday."

Only two days ago. Holy shit. "Before you picked me up from work?"

"Well, I did go home and change first." His stiff body language told me the comment wasn't as offhand as it sounded.

I looked away. "Do you enjoy it?"

He slowly set the bottle down and settled into the sofa, still watching me. He didn't seem confused, or annoyed, or ashamed by my questions — rather, he seemed to want to take the proper time for honest answers. What a world of difference to just a few weeks ago, when our relationship had been defined by secrecy and avoidance.

"There's a big difference between murder and casualties of war, Emma."

"But you're the god of both, aren't you?"

He sighed. "True. Murder is more of a… job I was given. I don't enjoy the killing itself. But there's a certain — a rush, I suppose, that comes with battle, with charging armies, with the raw unraveling emotion of it. There's something beautiful about it."

I stared. "Beautiful? How can something so… destructive be beautiful?"

He pensively leaned his chin into his hand, his elbow on his knee. "It's the purest thing there is."

"What do you mean?" I frowned.

"Well, you see…" He tilted his head, looking for the proper words. "I'm sure you agree with me that most of the time, people are putting on some sort of performance. I mean humans. You're different depending on who you're with, how you're feeling, how confident you are, right?"

"Sure…"

"Everyone is self-aware, self-editing, pretending," he continued.

"Right. I guess."

"But in war… in battle, there is no space for any of that." A sparkle danced in his eye. "There's only fury and fear, courage and euphoria. I dare say that I am the only god who sees you as you really are, without the pretense." He grinned. "Well, maybe Dionysus too. I've seen enough of my little brother's bacchanals to know all inhibitions are lost there."

I didn't share his chuckle — none of this was really funny to me. "But people die. Don't you care about that at all?"

"Humans die. It's what you do." He shrugged and leaned forward to pick up his glass, as if he hadn't just said the words that more than anything I'd ever hear him say made him sound as distant from humanity as he really might be. As if he really didn't give a shit.

"Is that what it is?" I asked softly. "You just walk onto that battlefield and decide which innocent person's time it is to die that day? Or, I don't know, to lose a leg? To get traumatized for life? Because I don't know much about war, but I do know that that is what happens to humans... Noah." His name came out only half audibly. I couldn't force myself to say his real name. Not yet.

His head whipped round, there was a fire in his eyes — "You don't have to tell me how cruel war is, Emma. I've seen it, I've lived it, I am it. I don't enjoy seeing torn-off limbs or the inside of people's heads or soldiers going mute with trauma, even if I do enjoy the fighting and that exquisite rush of violence. The fact is that I'm here, and humans die. That is how it's supposed to be, and every single person who happens to die at my hands was destined to die that day. I don't make the rules, I just carry out the Fates' decisions and I'm damn good at it. I was born to do it." He paused, and I stared, but he wasn't done. "But you know what? You can blame me for all of that, you can call me savage, cutthroat, Ares the manslayer, you can accuse me of reeking of decaying flesh, you can say I've got the blood on my hands of every victim of every war that's ever been waged, but that's not even true. I didn't create war. It's not like you humans got along fine until one day I showed up and told you to fight and kill one another. You created me. You brought me into existence and then you had the nerve to blame me for all of it. But I suppose that's on me, too, isn't it? Giving you courage?"

It was eerie how he went from that uncaring shrug just moments before to this impassioned outpouring, and then to the way he stared at me now and took a sudden large sip of wine without even blinking — but it wasn't the first time, of course: despite his steady demeanor of the months prior, in the past weeks I'd seen his temperament shift like a cloudburst more than once. He needed only the slightest trigger. I'd never met anyone who was so completely led by his emotions as Noah — no, Ares.

I didn't know what to say. I didn't know what expression to put on my face. I couldn't even decipher how I felt exactly: on the one hand I felt so small, so human, next to him, but on the other hand I saw my boyfriend who most of all looked frustrated and hurt, as if he was carrying thousands of years of embitterment with him. I slowly reached for his hand.

His fingers found mine, but he didn't really grip them. "Did you even understand any of that?" he asked cautiously.

"I… I think so?" I tried. Did I? Not really. There was so much to wrap my head around. Destiny, fate? A god not actually having the final say in things? Then who did? And what about how he didn't create war? How did that work?

"It's okay if you don't." He squeezed my hand softly now. The tidal wave had receded as quickly as it had come — he was calm again, and through his touch I felt it return to me as well. He looked down at our fingers then — "Oh, I'm sorry, Emma, I don't want to pull you along" — and as the sensation faded, I felt in control of myself again.

"It's… a lot, Noah." I inhaled deeply, sighed it out, inhaled again. "I mean — Ares." I barely got it out of my mouth. Forcing myself to think of him as Ares was still a wholly different thing from saying it. But I had to. I wanted to. I wanted to breach that distance.

His fingers on mine froze, his eyes widened. "Are you sure?" he said, his voice hoarse.

I swallowed, paused, and nodded. "Yes."

His stare lasted another second, then that sparkle returned to his eye and gratitude washed over him — his lips spread into a careful, then wide smile. "You have no idea how long it has been since someone other than my family has said my name like that."

I squeezed his hand now. "How long?"

"Over a thousand years. But even then… barely."

Wow. "I can't imagine what that must be like," I said softly.

"It's… lonely. Very lonely," he admitted. He scooted closer, wrapped his arm around me, and pulled me gently towards him. "So it means a lot, Emma. Thank you. Truly."

I knew it would be meaningful for me to use his real name — but I hadn't realized just how significant it would be for him, or that I would be the first in so many years to say it. I didn't regret it one bit, and with a contented smile, I let him envelop me in his warm embrace.