AO 7 Ch 18

The journey went smoothly, with Viviana unexpectedly becoming a delightful social lubricant among the ladies. She effortlessly wove in and out of conversations, a skill I could only dream of.

However, I often needed to take breaks from her. She had a way of sweeping through the carriage and taking over everything.

The best hide-away was Maribelle’s bedroom, it was spotless like she wasn’t even sleeping in it. Inside the carriage was basically a mansion. In fact, it might structurally be the same as what Missy made in the Ardenium Palace.

It was one such break when Ditzy crept up on me with a smile. "You wouldn't be hiding now, would you?"

"Hiding? Me? Absolutely," I replied with a smirk but laying in bed was far more interesting than getting up. "Sometimes traveling in a carriage filled with so many people means you need to take a break from, well, everyone."

Ditzy sat down next to me, pulling up her dress and spun around to rest on the bed, like she was going to be there for a while. 

I gave her a long, slow glance. "In the risk of being rude, that does include you."

"Are you telling me to go away, Arden?" she asked.

I smiled at her, keeping a straight face, and blinked.

"Well, I must say," Ditzy shook her head, "I am impressed with just how thorough you are in resisting me."

"Eh," I said, waffling my hand. "I told you before, unless you are interested, I am not.” 

“And if I were to admit, I mean, say that I was interested, what would change? Hmm?” she asked, tapping at her lips.

"Well, everything, duh," I rolled my eyes. "Because, the second you say you are interested... Then you become a possibility, and my mind can go wild. Of course, we'll have to work through a few of the problems."

Those words made Ditzy frown. "Problems?"

"Yes, of course, if you don't get along with the rest of my ladies, then it's kind of a deal breaker. Do you have trouble with the harem? Also a deal breaker. It's not like I'm going to leave anyone for you. Finally, I'm sure you come with your own emotional baggage, and we probably need to understand each other and work through that. You know, the whole thing that you think I'll become somehow magically enraptured and make the worst decisions of my life just to get closer to you."

"I don't believe I've phrased it that way," she said pointedly.

"Tomato, tomahto.”

“I do believe there's something to nuance.” She argued.

“Like that," I said, pointing at Ditzy. "We've got to make sure that we are speaking the same language. After all, communication is key."

"I can understand how you frustrate Emlyn so much," Ditzy said. "And I'm also trying to figure out if you're just playing hard to get. So you think that's the best way forward?"

"Nope," I wrinkled my nose and shook my head. "Just me being me. Sorry if it frustrates you at all, Ditzy. But if you want to spend some time with me to confirm it for yourself, how about helping me with some of my godliness?" I wiggled my fingers.

"First off, the hand gesture is in no way, shape, or form necessary," she said.

I nodded, smiled, and repeated “godliness,” before wiggling my fingers again.

"Never mind," Ditzy said. "Aside from your Ardenium chains, what else has felt natural to you? Because, to be honest, the chains don't fit you at all." Ditzy looked at me quizzically, tilting her head to the side. "In fact, if I were to say anything, it's that you're far more attached to your own personal freedom. Thus, I've always thought the chain's a bit odd."

I tapped my chin, giving this some serious thought. "What if I said the chains are just the expression of the metal? Does that make sense?" I asked Ditzy.

"I think what makes sense to you may not make sense to a lot of people, Ard. But please, humor me and let's dig into this. So, you feel a connection with the metal, not necessarily the chain form."

I bobbed my head in agreement. "Does that make it better or worse?"

"Well, it makes it easier for me to understand, that's for certain." Ditzy leaned back on the bed and squinted at me. "Given that you've made the metal in your soul, and it seems to have a number of properties that interact with your soul, do you feel that its connection to your soul, or perhaps to magic in general is core to the metal's identity?" 

I deadpanned at her. "It's a metal, but a cool metal, because it's purple and glitters like starlight."

"Ah, right." Ditzy sighed in defeat. "It's important to know your audience, isn't it?”

“I kid, I kid. I will try and be serious." It let out a big huff, and summoned a piece of Ardenium into my hand. "Well, I named it after myself because, well, isn't that what most people do when they find something cool? That, or they name it really descriptively, and 'purple shiny metal' did not roll off the tongue quite the same as Ardenium."

Ditzy stared at me. "Are you saying it repeatedly just because you think it sounds good?"

I smiled at her, and let that be the answer.

Only for Ditzy to let out another heavy sigh. It seemed I was going to get quite a few of those during this lecture. "What exactly does the medal do?" She held a hand out, and I laid the piece gently in her hand.

"Well, I was able to take all of Missy's godly magic mojo with the ring I put on her," 

Ditzy recoiled as if the medal had bitten her. "You weren't about to try the same with me, were you?"

"No, absolutely not. I asked Missy before I did it to her, and I would certainly give you the same courtesy." I crossed my arms over my chest and glared at her. "Do you really think I would do something like that without asking first?"

"Of course not," she said quickly, but had enough self-awareness to look somewhat guilty. "It's just startling enough for me to be at least a little cautious. After all, if you've stolen her magic, you've done exactly what she was fighting Freya to prevent."

"Well, Freya wanted to take her magic by, well, eating her." As I said that, Ditzy raised a suggestive eyebrow, and I felt my cheeks warm up. "Not like that, and we both know it." I chided her before clearing my throat. "Back to the medal and its properties. It seems very absorbent of all forms of magic.”

“Do you know where it goes?" Ditzy asked.

I frowned, thinking through that question. "The palace of Ardenium that I made in Soulgard," I said after a minute. "The place just soaks it all up like a sponge. At the same time, I can pull magic out of it."

Ditzy looked at the piece of Ardenium. "So if I put a touch of my magic in here, can you follow it?"

"I suppose so." How did my resting turn into more work? Then again I did want to figure this out.

She raised an eyebrow and waited for more.

"I mean, yes, fairly certain. Would you like me to try?" I beamed.

"Yes, please," Ditzy said, and held the piece of Ardenium up as a few pink sparks jumped out of her other hand and practically dove into the medal.

I closed my eyes and drew myself into Soulgard with practiced ease. The place had changed rapidly as I had advanced my soul magic and used Missy’s freshly squeezed soul juice to nurture it.

Now most of it was entirely made of bluesteel, towering spires around the city’s walls and streets made of shiny cobblestones. It was like something out of a fairytale, but ultimately it was just made of the strongest thing that I could think of. Unlike a city, however, there were no people in it. It was completely empty.

The only thing not made with the blue-tinted steel was the crown jewel, the Ardenium Palace. A massive structure on a hill in the center, the glittering purple metal caught the light no matter what angle you viewed it from. Four spires rose from the corners, each holding one of my magical spheres and within them was a representation of my anchors guarding the sphere and soaking up its excess magic now that I had bound all four of them to Soulgard.

The second I appeared outside the Ardenium Palace, Ditzy popped up next to me. 

"You guys have really made yourself at home here, haven't you?" I squinted at her before wandering into the palace. 

"Well, you did leave us alone in here for enough time. We had to get comfortable, no?"

However, I had already begun ignoring her and following the sense of her magic as it flowed through the palace. 

Ditzy was hot on my heels as I ran my hands along the wall, feeling the metal draw the magic deeper and deeper. Unsurprisingly, we grew closer to the center of the palace the longer we followed it.

Eventually, it led to chambers that had become my bedroom. Here in Soulgard, though, I never exactly slept. Missy had other purposes for ensuring that I had a bedroom here. One of the walls was entirely a mural, something chaotic and dizzying. It looked more like trying to draw those dreams that you wake up with but can't quite remember . It often resembled something, but not enough for me to say with certainty what exactly the mural was. 

"Here," I tapped the mural. "It goes somewhere here." I paused to stare at it a little longer. 

"Chaos," Ditzy said with a smirk. "This picture has to be the embodiment of chaos."

"It's not that bad," I said hurriedly, after all I had made this. It must mean something to my soul.

Only for the goddess to turn and squint at me. "It's pretty bad."

I puffed out my cheeks, wanting to argue before just letting out a heavy sigh. 

"I don't know why it looks like this, it just came this way," I shrugged. 

"You can't help the way you're born," Ditzy consoled me with a healthy dose of sarcasm. 

"Gee thanks. While you're at it, any idea what this actually is?" I tried to steer the conversation back on point before the blonde goddess drove it off a cliff.

"I wasn’t critiquing the quality, it feels a lot like the godly aspect of Chaos." She ran her hands along the mural. "But at the same time, it's artistic, it's passionate. Even if its form isn't entirely revealed." She gestured at one part of the art. "Since there is beauty in art, I have some ability to understand this. Even if you don't." She tapped at part of the mural. "This is a crown, no, a broken crown. But you can see there's something, perhaps, vines sprouting from the crack." She tapped away at the mural. "Seven points on the crown. People often say there are seven emotions."

Frankly, art was beyond me, especially something so abstract. I was half convinced such things were an excuse for nobles to bullshit each other and see who could come up with the wildest theory.

"Oh no," I grinned, deciding to give it my best shot. "I'm the god of heartbreak. Everywhere I go, women are going to fall in love with me, but then never be able to get me. And I'm going to be the god of heartbreak."

She turned slowly to stare at me as if I was an idiot.

"What? It makes sense. The king of heartbreak," I said, impassioned by my new understanding of my abilities. 

"I'm going to hit you if you don't take this seriously. Given the ladies around you are so smitten and you are too, that is ridiculous." She put her fingers over the mural. "There's something chaotic, regardless of everything else. I could have accepted Chaotic Love… no that’s not it."

Perhaps I’d been a bit of an ass while she was trying to help. "Thanks for taking the time to look at this and look through some of it with me. It is sort of scary for me to do this, like it is going to decide my life for me."

Ditzy’s expression softened considerably. "What do you see when you look at this?" she asked, her voice suddenly filled with patience.

I frowned and stepped back. "Well, it's kind of spirally and it has multi-colors. You see, like here, this is kind of an unbroken color as it weaves around in this spiral. And here's another. And then the thing you said was the crown is there, sort of towards the center," I rambled, not really skilled at the fine art of understanding, well, art. This time I was genuinely trying. “Those are what stick out to me besides the crown you’ve pointed to.”

"Interesting. Your interpretation is valuable after all. You made this," she gestured at the mural.

"I made it?" I asked, pointing at the piece in front of me. "If I made it, then shouldn't I understand it?" Ridiculous, I couldn’t draw much more than stick figures.

"Not entirely," Ditzy turned to look at me, this time far more seriously than she had in the past. "How do you think gods get these artifacts like the spear that Thor has been charging around with?"

I frowned and summoned said spear, still wrapped in Ardenium chains. "Well, I guess you make them.” 

“And how do we make them, Ard?" she emphasized, her eyes darting to the mural.

"With shitty art?" I asked, a small smirk betraying me.

"With our deepest desires," she corrected me. This time she stepped away from the mural and came behind me to take my hand and lean against me. Her thumb ran in small soft circles against my palm.

"That makes a little more sense," I said slowly, taking this all in.

"Just a little," she echoed. "And so, I think this will become clear," she nodded towards the mural. 

Sadly, that meant absolutely nothing to me. I frowned. Time wasn't exactly on my side, and being patient wasn't exactly my strongest attribute. But I suppose for something like this, I should try a little harder.

"But chaos as a foundation makes sense," she said, looking at me out of the corner of her eye. "That would fit you to a tee."

I beamed back at her. "I know, wouldn't it?" I smiled wide. “But what does that mean about the magic I’m taking?”

"Yes, well, chaos is only valuable for stirring things up. You still need to be skilled enough to shape it into your desired outcome. Whatever kind of chaos you employ, it certainly is having an effect on the magic around you." She paused to put more of her weight against me. “If I had to guess, you’re essentially breaking the ownership of the magic with your aspect and then just storing it in the Ardenium for later use.”

I bobbed my head in quick agreement. "Any other super cool thoughts about how my magic is even more awesome?" I asked with a massive grin.

"Well, it certainly isn't being humble. But then again, if you were so boring, you wouldn't be any fun. Now would you?" She looked up at me and I had to stop myself from leaning down and kissing her waiting lips. She was drop dead gorgeous and I felt that barrier that she’d put up was gone, leaving an open invitation.

"No, ma'am," I said quickly. It wasn’t time yet, last I needed was to put her off by moving fast. "What's the point of being fun if it also means you're predictable? Let’s sit." I gestured towards the couch.

"An odd way to look at it," she said, but didn't seem too upset particularly about the couch. "By the way, when this is all said and done, what will you end up doing?"

"That's a good question," I said, with a pensive frown, taking a seat and drawing her down next to me. "One of these days, I might figure it out."

Ditzy didn’t waste time and pressed herself against me cuddling almost as ferociously as Aurelia, only she looked me dead in the eyes with commanding presence unlike Aurelia who just became a cute ball of cuddle that wanted to rest in my embrace. "Come now, Ard. Nothing? You've gone to Zenovia. You've slain those that threatened Eva. What next?"

"Relax," I said honestly. "Open an inn somewhere. Serve drinks to weary travelers and listen to their stories, but most importantly, make sure they laugh at mine. Somewhere in there, I am certain Emlyn is going to get baby fever."

"Emlyn is now?" Ditzy asked though there was something in her tone that I couldn’t quite place.

"Uh-huh." My head couldn't bob hard enough. "I know she doesn't look it, but she's going to get it bad."

"And what makes you so absolutely certain?"

"Well, because I've known her long enough that I'm certain it's coming. If not today, then sometime soon. Of course, then I'll be trapped in a house with the kids and Emlyn, and I think that'll be my life, at least for the foreseeable future." After all, it was important to me that I was there for my kids unlike my father. I hoped all of this would end so that I could rush back and be there for Sienna.

Ditzy just shook her head. "Well, I then wish the best for you, Ard, for that particular future.”

“It'll be tough. I mean, Emlyn's spawn running around the kingdom?" I shivered. "Just think of the chaos that'll cause. What about you? Any thoughts for children?" I asked. "Wait, I think Missy already explained it to me. That your children can eat you if you're a god? Damn, that means you gotta raise them right."

"It does indeed." Ditzy had a far-off look.

"But I don't think that's a question we are quite ready for yet."

"Oh, that implies we'll be there eventually," Ditzy pointed out with a twinkle in her eyes.

"It does, doesn't it?" I agreed. Ditzy was all smirks, and I just knew that I'd somehow managed to get myself in trouble with those few short words. "So, if this is how godly artifacts come to be, why don't you tell me the story of yours?" Sometimes I could be an idiot, but I was smart enough to know when to change the subject.

"Smooth," she commented dryly. "The spear is originally Ares'. My first artifact was a belt, well a girdle born from the sea and the blood of many Naiads."

"Wait, blood?" I must have reacted how she expected because her only response was a small smirk.

"Yes, blood. It's not a very pretty story. Well, it is a story about beauty, but coveting it not about beauty itself.” Ditzy leaned against me for support.

"Well, I doubt anything with so much blood is a pretty story, but that doesn't mean it shouldn't be told. So, what happened next? I am dying to know," I egged her on.

"Well, if you must know," she pursed her lips. "It all started when..."