Chapter Text
Orpheus wasn’t sure how he felt about all his efforts in the cave, and a hurried bargain between a god and Fate leaving him standing in front of a dumpster behind The Cave. Right in the middle of nowhere. He glances around, seeing the couple behind them, and smiles at them, awkwardly turning away when he’s met with a fierce glare.
Dionysus is standing next to him, smiling again, seemingly having forgotten about his hesitance from earlier. Orpheus takes a moment to consider the god standing next to him, he seems so… normal. A little excitable, and Orpheus almost wanted to think he was naïve, but he was a god. There’s no way for a god to be naïve.
The Fates throw open the dumpster lid and motion towards it. The two men who have been waiting to begin their decent into the Underworld look at each other before the other man hugs his wife, and resolutely climbs up the side of the dumpster before disappearing into it.
Everyone looks expectantly to Orpheus and his eyebrows raise in concern, “In there?” he gestures to the dustbin.
The Fates look unimpressed. Dionysus just nods at him with a big smile and pushes him forwards gently, something about that smile looks different to Orpheus.
“Are you sure?”
The god looks nervous. He doesn’t seem to doubt Orpheus, but he isn’t happy to see him go.
“Go on. Go get your wife back,” Dionysus says, still smiling too wide.
The man climbs up the side of the dustbin, turning to thank the god before he leaves, but another voice interrupts him, “Help Anatole. Please,” the wife’s voice is shaking as she addresses him, “Help each other.”
Orpheus considers her a moment before nodding resolutely, “I will,” he turns to leave as the Fates start to grow restless, moving closer. He should leave before they change their minds, but a thought suddenly strikes him and he turns to Dionysus in a rush, “Dennis. Take care of Dennis,” the god looked confused, “Our cat,” the confusion clears and Dionysus nods enthusiastically, surprising Orpheus.
“I’ll keep him company!” Dionysus’s smile settled back into the excitable and toothy one he seemed to always wear.
“He needs wet food and dry –“
Before he can finish, Lachy steps closer still, finally getting sick of him sitting there instead of just getting to it and pushes him in, slamming the lid shut behind him.
Dionysus wonders for a second what the man was going to say, but figures cats are probably not very complicated creatures. He smiles at the Fates as the head back to The Cave, and waves cheerfully to the young woman who is still standing in front of the dumpster with tears in her eyes before he makes his way into The Cave. He may as well hang around for a while and see how Orpheus is doing.
He smiles at the thought of taking care of a cat called Dennis. The thought of Orpheus having a cat with such a name warmed him in an unexpected way. He swore to himself to care for it as if it were his own.
The Fates had since made it inside, very satisfied with the events of the day. Lachy had been sick of the wide-eyed adoration Dionysus kept looking at the man but hearing Orpheus’s surprise as he fell, and the thought of a very entertaining few days kept their spirits high as they returned to watch the future unfold before them, smiling as everything started to fall into place.
Orpheus on the other hand was not having such a pleasant time. He fell for a lot longer than he liked before landing face first on a solid bit of what felt like concrete. Groaning, he rolled over, rubbing his face gently.
Anatole was already on his feet, and he didn’t look happy to see Orpheus. Getting up with a little difficulty, he thought of just abandoning the man here and making his way forward alone.
All round him, there was water, with no land in sight except where they had been stranded. It didn’t seem like he’d get too far alone either, so he turned to the man and said, “Let’s help each other, Anatole.” The man looked suspiciously at him, not saying a word, so he continues, “Your wife, she asked me to look out for you. We can protect each other down here.”
Anatole nodded, “Fine.”
“So, which way do you think?”
Anatole looked equally lost as he looked around before shrugging, “We could just swim?”
The silence stretched between them for a moment. Neither of them could come up with anything better. So, Orpheus just nodded, “Yeah. Yeah, you’re probably right.”
They pulled off their clothes bracing for the plunge. Orpheus steeled himself to jump into what looked like the absolutely frigid waters below and was a second away from diving in when a new voice rang out, startling both of them and nearly landing them both in the water, “What’re you lot doing up there?”
A man had appeared sitting in a small boat. Orpheus could barely believe their luck.
“We need to get across!” he shouted back, “Can you take us?”
The man looked between them before responding, “Only one may come.”
He thought of leaving Anatole behind. How easy it would be. Only one of them would probably be able to succeed and it had to be him. For Riddy.
But then he thought of Anatole’s wife, waiting teary eyed for him in the world above, he had to at least try to keep his promise. The man looked apprehensively at him, but Orpheus turned and shouted back to the stranger with the boat, “Both of us. Take us both across.”
The man stayed quiet for a long while and Orpheus thought maybe that had been the wrong choice. The man started up his boat again and he wondered if it was too late to push Anatole in the water and take the boat himself when the man started steering the boat closer, inviting them both on.
Anatole smiled thankfully at him as they both dressed and gladly climbed aboard.
The stranger was a handsome man, much older than either of them. Orpheus briefly wondered who he was and why he was on a boat in the Underworld cracking open what looked like beers.
Not wanting to accidentally say something that made the man change his mind about helping them, they both stayed quiet. It didn’t work.
The man cut the engine as the got far enough into the water that there was no land visible on any side. He looked expectantly between them and Orpheus felt a sick feeling grow in his gut. I should’ve just left Anatole behind.
“Go on then, I’ll let you decide who goes and who stays,” the man said, leaning back with a fresh beer.
“We already said both of us,” Anatole spoke up.
“And I said only one of you can cross on my boat. So decide,” he fixed his eyes on Orpheus who was already eyeing Anatole, wondering if he could take him in a fight, “fight it out.”
“We’re not goi-“ Orpheus grabs hits Anatole over the back of his head, using his surprise to tackle him.
Orpheus is not a violent man, but his heart was promised to Riddy. For her he would do anything. Nothing was too much. He would carve out his heart and offer it up to her if she were to ask. If it took killing a man to get her back, Orpheus saw no reason to deny her. In his haste, Orpheus forgot, Riddy never asked for him to bring her back.
The man, despite his wiry frame is surprisingly strong and soon Orpheus finds himself on the back foot, tripping over the seats on the boat, stumbling and fighting hard, kicking, shoving and biting, he even holds the mans head under the water as they fight. The disturbance draws the attention of something in the water and Orpheus startles, giving the man what he needs to break free.
Anatole manages to get the upper hand once more, his knee pushing harshly against Orpheus’s throat, choking him as the creature draws near when suddenly, the stranger throws him overboard, saving Orpheus.
Anatole tries to swim back to the boat. The creature is too fast, dragging him under, leaving the surface of the water perfectly still once more.
“You,” the stranger is standing over him, eyes harsh, “where did you get that mark?”
Orpheus looks down at his hand, shifting uneasily as he followed the older mans gaze, the bandages around his palm had unraveled during the fight, lying uselessly at his side. He traced the mark with his other hand, suddenly missing the pressure of the bandages the god had wrapped around his palm, “Fate marked me,” he responds distractedly.
The older man scoffs, turning on the engine again, muttering under his breath, cursing someone out.
Absentmindedly gathering up the old bandages, Orpheus stuffed them into his pocket before asking the man, “Why did you save me?”
“Don’t give yourself too much credit, I didn’t do it for you.”
The man stayed grumpy all the way to the shore. And when they reached shore, Orpheus expected to be abandoned with no second thought but the man got out with him, dragging the boat to shore and leading the way forward.
“I’m sorry I didn’t ask earlier, but what’s your name?”
Silence.
The man pulled out a water canteen and drank from it. Parched Orpheus looked expectantly at him, but the man emptied the whole thing and stashed it in his pocket again. Sighing, he kept walking, trying to keep up.
“I’m Orpheus by the way,” He looked to the other man before continuing, “I’m here for my wife, Riddy. She-“
“I don’t care,” the man looked annoyed, “This is how far I go.”
Orpheus looked around, they appeared to be in the middle of a desert, and he wondered what he was supposed to do here, “Oh,” he nodded to the man and stepped forward realising he wouldn’t help anymore, “Ok then.”
A few more steps forward and he turned around in a hurry, “Oh and thank-“
Somehow, even though he had just been there a moment ago, the man was gone. There was nothing but desert as far as the eye could see.
“Thank you…” He said anyway. Shaking his head he turned around and kept walking since he didn’t have any other option. He slipped his hand into his pocket, hoping to find the coin, Riddy’s coin, so he can feel the cold press of it on his hand reminding him of his purpose here, instead his fingers tangled in a soft strip of fabric, confused he pulled it out. Soft, dirty bandages lay bunched up in his hand, the coin long gone. The memory of Dionysus softly wrapping his hands rose unbidden in his mind and he blinked the image away.
A thought lingered in his mind as he marched toward Riddy, one step closer to freeing her, he saw my failure and even still, he dressed my wounds. A god of revelry and madness with a heart so tender, he could see the beauty even in the wreck of a man that is me.