Cupid and Psyche |Lesbian Version|

Chapter 13: The Wandering

The poor princess had fainted there on the ground. When she recovered her senses, she felt the rough patch of grass beneath her soft form. Then she rose and stared around her again. Psyche was still alone and everything felt like a horrible dream. But then again, she did not know which one was a true dream. Did she dream about finding a beautiful home and a divine lover in the first place?

Yet the ache in her chest was so real. Her eyes hurt from salty hot tears, and she remembered what she had done. The grief and loss struck her with a heavy blow once again. It wasn't a dream but her current reality. Her dearest deserted her, and it was all her fault. Psyche let out a howl of despair, blaming herself for her haste and naivety.

Then wild with sorrows, the poor princess decided to set out and follow her lover into the wood. In her random wanderings, Psyche was suffering as she went heedlessly. She sought the day and night to trace her lover, crying to the goddess and hoping her voice was heard. The maiden was restless in mind but hoped she could soften her wife's anger again.

Over the mountains and valleys, she ventured without food or repose. Day and night, she searched for her wife, though her legs begged to stop, her stomach cried out in hunger. At last, she was travel-worn and hopeless.

When she chanced upon a river, she hurled herself headlong down from the cold bank. But that kindly stream was doubtless keen to pay homage to the winged goddess who often scorches its waters, and in fear of her, the river at once cast Psyche back ashore with the gentle current without injuring her, setting the princess on its grassy bank.

At dawn break, the rustic god Pan trotted by the brow of the stream, holding the mountain nymph Echo in his arms and teaching her to repeat after him all kinds of songs. The other woodland satyrs were sporting and grazing the river-foliage when they found beautiful Psyche lying listlessly.

They informed the goat-god, who came to her. At once, he was well aware of the calamity that had befallen Psyche. Pan bore her to his grotto and fed her barley drink. When the maiden regained her consciousness, she was surprised to find herself in the face of a god, but her grief was too heavy, and she only began to sob in more distress.

"Why am I still breathing and alive while I feel like dying?" the maiden said. "My love is gone, and so shall my life. O Lord Pan, you should have left me there to die!"

Pan spoke to her gently, soothing her with consoling words.

"You are an elegant lass, and I am a rustic herdsman, but my advanced years give me the benefit of valuable experience. If my guess is correct, although sages actually call my guesswork divine insight, I advise you to quit your stumbling and wandering steps. Your pale complexion and mournful sighs told me that you are still suffering grievous love-pains. But you must hear me: do not seek to destroy yourself by throwing your body into the river or by seeking any other means of death."

"But what should I do to regain my wife's love?" Psyche cried.

"Cease your sorrowing, dear maiden, and lay aside your sadness," Pan said. "Instead, direct your prayers of adoration to Cupid, greatest of goddesses, and by your caressing, you shall win the favor of that wanton and extravagant girl in the end."

Psyche made no reply to this advice of the shepherd-god. She merely paid homage to his divine person and proceeded on her way.

~*~

While Psyche was at this time going from place to place, Cupid was lying groaning in her mother's chamber, racked by the pain of the wound and the betrayal.

A bird winged her way over the sea-waves, plunged swiftly into the deep bosom of the ocean. The bird came upon Venus there as the goddess bathed and swam. The bird perched beside her and told her that her daughter had suffered great agony and despair, that Cupid was lying in grief none had ever seen.

As a result, the House of Venus was in bad odor, the subject of gossips on the lips of gods and mortals everywhere. They were claiming that Cupid had been frolicking in the mountains and that Venus herself was idly swimming in the ocean.

Immediately, Venus made haste to quit the sea and went back to Olympus. She entered her golden chamber and found her daughter lying ill just as she had heard.

"My dear girl, who hurt you so? Tell your mother now, and I shall put justice to that wrongdoer." The goddess held her sobbing daughter to her chest, stroking her shiny lock.

Cupid reluctantly told her mother what had happened, "Mother, I was burned by love and betrayal. The pain on my body is nothing compared to the pain in my heart."

The winged maiden was weeping from the pang of loss.

"Love? What kind of love are you speaking of?"

"The one I inflicted upon myself for a maiden on earth," Cupid murmured.

Venus gasped in disbelief.

"This is a scandalous affair indeed!" Venus cried. "Who would have expected it from a decent goddess like you! So now that the fine daughter of mine has a girlfriend, tell me her name. Who is it that has tempted my innocent child? Is it one of that crowd of Nymphae, or one of the Horae, the seasons? Or one of the bands of Muses, or my servants, the Graces? Tell me, daughter, who is she?"

"Her name is Psyche," the youthful goddess reluctantly replied.

"Psyche!" Venus bawled out at the top of her lungs. "Of all the maidens! Can it be really true that you are in love with the girl who lays claim to my beauty and fame?"

Now the gods often quarrel, but Olympus had never seen such an argument as now flared between Venus and her daughter. The goddess stomped her feet in fury, the noises echoed through her palace.

"How dare she touched my child in such a manner! I must make sure she suffer for what she has done to you!"

"No, mother, no!" Cupid begged, though she was still in pain, she was also still in love with Psyche. "I love her dearly, and she did not mean to hurt me."

"Stop defending her, Cupid, see what happened when you disobeyed your mother! You are too kind and innocent, you have been tricked by a mortal girl!" Venus sneered. "Now stay here until your wounds are mended. And do not go back to that woman or I shall clip those wings, which I have steeped in the liquid nectar of my own breast."

These were her words. Then she bustled out, glowering and incensed with passionate rage. Her desire to destroy the girl that her daughter loves burned in her heart again.

At that moment, Ceres and Juno came to her home and found her in a resentful state. They asked her why she was cloaking the rich charm of her radiant face with a sullen frown.

"You have come at a timely moment," Venus answered dryly. "I am sure that the scandalous gossip concerning my household, and the behavior of that silly daughter of mine, have not passed you by."

Of course, the two goddesses knew quite well what had happened, and they sought to cool Venus's raging temper.

"My lady, how is it that your daughter's deed has caused you this much anger?" Ceres asked. "What harm is there, we should like to know, in her giving the glad eye to a nicely mortal lass? Don't you realize that Cupid is in the prime of maidenhood, or are you forgetting her age?"

"Just because she carries her years beyond her looks, doesn't mean I should disregard the insult dealt to me," Venus spat back.

"You are the mother and a sensible one at that," Juno said. "Throughout the world, gods and mortals bear with your sensual power, but why you sourly refuse to allow love in your own house?"

The two goddesses defended Cupid because they feared her arrows and were seeking to win the winged girl's favor. Venus knew that for a fact. She was seething inside as the insults against her were treated so lightly. The goddess cut the two's speech short and turned on her heel before stalking off to sea. She must find a way to punish Psyche.