Olympus

"Clang, Clang!" was the sound that came from my anvil as I worked for days on end. Since my return to Mount Olympus, Zeus had me constantly forging weapons and tools for him. Of all the artifacts that I forged for Zeus, the thunderbolts were the most magnificent. Zeus called down lightning from the skies while I prepared a container to harness the lightning. Once the lightning was inside the container, I slowly drew out the energy and hammered it into the shape you mortals now know and depict it as.

At first, Aphrodite was the sole person that Zeus allowed me to interact with because we were married and I grew quite fond of her because of our time together. However, after a couple decades, he allowed the other gods to visit me as well. Athena and Hermes visited me often and I thoroughly enjoyed their company. They told me all about their adventures among the mortals and I laughed with them. At this point I was becoming complacent with my life even though I was more or less on house arrest.

It was this complacency that kept my eyes from seeing what was going on with Aphrodite and Ares. I did not notice at first, but as more and more time passed, I felt the gap grow between Aphrodite and myself. It started when Zeus allowed the others gods to visit me. Aphrodite would excuse herself and be gone for hours. Then she would be gone for nights, days, and eventually weeks at a time. One day she came back pregnant.

Like a fool, I held on to a small sliver of hope that the child was mine. Either way it did not take long to figure out that the child was not mine. Olympian gods can conceive and produce children in a matter of weeks so as soon as the young and healthy god was born, I knew he wasn't mine. He was strong, handsome, and loved attention. There was only one explanation and that was that Aphrodite had cheated on me with Ares.

I had to confirm my suspicions, though, and so I had Hermes contact Hades to obtain his help in creating a special helmet that would render the wearer invisible. Hades was extremely interested and agreed to collect the needed materials to create the helmet. I told him that I needed a soul, a fang from Cerberus, and a small portion of his own power. Hades gladly obliged and delivered the three items to me in no time at all. I lied and told Hades that the helmet would be ready in a few months.

I immediately began work on the helmet after storing away the portion of Hades' power that was not required in the creation of the helmet. After a single day I finished forging the helmet. I tested the helmet at night after Aphrodite fell asleep and the other Olympians had left or laid down for the night. I limped around Mount Olympus and saw a few things that I always suspected, but was not particularly interested in. Athena was reading the latest philosophies of the mortals, Hermes was running in his sleep, and Dionysus was passed out on a table with a wine skin in his hand. I laughed to myself and then returned to my forge, took off the helmet, and went to sleep.

Weeks went by and finally the opportunity to confirm my suspicions had arrived. Aphrodite left just before sunset and I hobbled as fast as I could to the helmet so that I could follow her. To my surprise the helmet was gone!

"You looking for this?" Athena asked.

I was at a loss for words because I had no idea how she knew what the helmet was. "Sister, please, there's something that I need to know!" I exclaimed.

"You're not very sneaky, you know that? I heard you limping around the other night even though you were invisible," Athena said. She continued, "That's why I borrowed Hermes' sandals for you to use." She threw the sandals to me and I put them on. "You better hurry if you're going to catch up to Aphrodite, but let me warn you, you're not going to like what you see," she said.

"Still, I have to know and see for myself," I said as I put the helmet on and vanished before Athena's eyes.

"Good luck!" Athena exclaimed in the direction that she thought I was flying in.

I quickly caught up to Aphrodite and watched as she went in the direction to Ares' home. "No... Turn a different direction," I thought. But she walked right up and into his house. I felt my hands begin to tremble, but I still hoped that they might just be there to talk about some insignificant mortal. I flew around to a window to see better and I saw Ares smile as he took Aphrodite into his embrace. My thoughts were on fire. "No! This can't be!"

Then I heard Aphrodite say, "I'll bring our son, Eros, by tomorrow so you two can spend some time together." My suspicions were confirmed. I flew back in a mad rage to my forge and began to grab all sorts of jewels and gold chains and I began crafting the most beautiful and wondrous necklace that any god or mortal had ever seen.

"I'll never forgive her for this! How could she cheat on me?!" I shouted. "I'll craft this necklace so that it will cause terrible misfortune upon whoever wears it," I said angrily to myself as I imbued Hades' power into the necklace. A couple hours later Aphrodite came home and I said with a smile, "Hey honey, I made this necklace for Eros. I hope he likes it."

Author's Note: In my intro I stated the few things that Hephaestus loves and this story served the purpose of telling why Hephaestus loved Aphrodite. I thought it would be good to include Athena and Hermes in my story as well since they have helped Hephaestus in the past couple stories. Additionally, I gave Athena the part of helping Hephaestus out because in my telling, she actually likes Hephaestus as a brother. Also, after my last story ended in Zeus taking Hephaestus to use for his own personal gains, I wanted to show how Hephaestus continued to make different weapons and tools for the other gods. In the original telling, Zeus received his thunderbolts from the Cyclops to fight against the Titans in the Titanochamy. Also, the necklace that Hephaestus finishes crafting at the end of this story is made for Harmonia as a wedding gift from Hephaestus and is actually a curse that leads to ill-fate. Additionally, since I am having Hephaestus create all these different weapons and tools I wanted to have a part where Hephaestus actually uses some of what he makes to his own advantage. That's why I wrote in the part of Hephaestus using the helmet and Hermes' sandals.

Bibliography: Hephaestus, theoi

Image 1: Lightning bolt

Image 2: Diamond necklace