Vol. I Chapter III: The First Trial

Melissa’s eyes flew wide.

Dionysus merely raised his hand, and instant silence fell. He stared at Lucius for a long moment.

“Hmm… an unusual wish. Has my little wild thing twisted your head around that much?” the god said quietly, stroking his chin.

“Mortals and creatures like her don’t belong together. Your hearts don’t beat in the same rhythm.“

Lucius tried to speak, but Dionysus lifted a finger.

“A mortal… with my servant…” Dionysus stepped closer, then suddenly smiled, a wild, dangerous glint in his eyes.

“Very well, Lucius. If you really want her as your wife, you must prove you’re more than a simple mortal swept away by ecstasy.”

He raised his arms.

“You shall face three trials. Not of blood. Not of steel. But of Forgetting, Revelation… and Devotion.”

A collective gasp rippled through the Thiasos.

“If you succeed,” Dionysus declared, “she shall be yours. And if you fail… you will never see her again. And Melissa and the joys of my realm, will be stripped from your memories forever. The first trial begins at sunrise!”

The god’s words rolled like distant thunder through the air, and as though nothing had happened, the revel resumed. Everyone returned to wine, song, and dance.

Only Lucius stood frozen in place, unmoving, unable to turn around. Because behind him stood Melissa, staring at him. Then she seized his shoulder and spun him around. Her eyes blazed, glimmering with moisture.

She’d warned me, hadn’t she? We possess nothing. We love nothing but the moment. We don’t make promises. Those had been her words. Why would she ever agree to this? I should have asked her first…

But his thoughts were abruptly interrupted as Melissa grabbed him and turned him around, trembling.

“You… you foolish little idiot,” Melissa hissed, her voice nearly cracking.

“Do you have any idea what you’ve done? Do you even know what you’re asking for?” Her fingers dug into his shoulders harder than she probably meant.

“You want to face Dionysus’ trials? A god’s trials? You were only supposed to keep me entertained, not fall in love with me! I’m a Satyr, not a wife. I could never...”

She stopped, sighing heavily.

“Why couldn’t you just wish for an ever-flowing cornucopia, or a goblet of ambrosia to make you immortal, or…”

Then, softer, her voice tinged with sadness:

“This isn’t a fairytale, Lucius. And I’m not your princess.”

He said nothing. He simply looked at her, calm. And that calmness rattled her most of all.

“I love you, Melissa.” He repeated with the quiet conviction of someone prepared to fight for what he loved.

Her gaze flickered. The wild, untamed fire in her flared, and then sputtered dangerously.

“It would be better if you didn’t love me,” she whispered.

Then she released him, stepping back. Her voice grew firmer, colder, almost defensive.

“I’m dance and noise and fire. Your world and mine don’t belong together.”

“I don’t care, Melissa. Even if your home was the underworld, even if you tried to drive me away. I’d still love you.”

For a moment, they stood there, two worlds touching at their edges.

In Melissa’s eyes, tears glimmered in the dying sunlight. She closed them, inhaled deeply. When she opened them again, there was no anger left. Only melancholy.

“Then dance, Lucius. Dance with the gods if you think you can keep up.” She sighed.

“Because if you can’t… our dance ends forever.”

She turned away and disappeared into the celebrating crowd behind them. Lucius hesitated a moment, then staggered forward.

“Melissa, wait!”

His eyes searched the crowd, but found nothing. He stumbled. Hands brushed over his body. A nymph giggled in his ear:

“Why chase one heart when you could have a hundred lips?”

But Lucius pushed her away. All around him was motion. Music. Flesh. Voices. The night turned dark. His legs grew heavy and suddenly he collided with someone. A Satyr lurched into him, and Lucius fell. The goblet shattered.

He tried to push himself up, but the world began to tilt. His vision blurred. The music whirled around him. Everything flickered.

Then only darkness and silence embraced him.

A soft dripping. Something rattled. He opened his eyes—slowly.

The ceiling. His room. His house. The ceiling was gray. It was raining outside. The faucet dripped. A half-empty bottle of wine stood on the table. His head throbbed. The music was gone. Melissa was gone.

That was her name, wasn’t it?

His memories were blurred. The festival, the Satyrs, Dionysus, even their first encounter on that day in early summer, which he hadn’t been able to forget for months, now felt like nothing more than a hazy dream.

Lucius staggered through his apartment. Everything was in its place. Even the invitations for the housewarming party still lay on the table, never sent. No sign of Satyrs, of wine, of magic.

Was it all just an illusion? Did I imagine it? A fever dream… or was I just drunk…?

He rushed into the kitchen and stared at the wall calendar. It was early June.

“That can’t be right… It was already September…”

Lucius tried to remember what had happened that summer, but he couldn’t. Only shadowy fragments remained.

Then suddenly, something flashed through his mind.

The basement!

There was something in the basement, he was sure of it. He remembered finding something in this recently purchased house, a house whose previous owner had never completely cleared it out.

He dashed down the stairs, rummaged through the rotting shelves, dug through dusty crates, but found nothing except old junk and empty wine crates.

„Wasn´t there a book or something?“ He murmured to himself.

Disappointed, he climbed back up the steps, resigned to believing that perhaps it really had all been a long and bizarre dream, one whose details he could barely recall.

Yet there was one thing he couldn’t forget: a face with glowing amber eyes and the most mischievous grin he’d ever seen.

But the house stared back at him, gray and silent. And suddenly, he felt as if he’d never left at all.

The days passed, and life dragged Lucius back into routine.

He cleaned. He cleared out the old remnants of the previous owner. He even held the housewarming party with a few acquaintances. They drank, danced, and swam in the lake, laughing and enjoying themselves.

But sometimes, someone would notice Lucius staring absently at the reeds on the lake shore or the wine in his glass. When asked, he’d simply smile and wave it off with a casual remark before rejoining the party with forced enthusiasm.

Lucius worked, cooked, read. He lived. But something was missing.

And each time he sat down in his old kitchen chair, a quiet restlessness washed over him.

From time to time, he wondered whether this was truly living. Wake up. Work. Sleep. Every movement felt like winding an old clock. Everything kept going simply because it had to. And something, or rather, someone, was missing.

Then, one early morning, a thin mist drifted over the lake behind the house. Lost in thought, Lucius sat for a moment at the kitchen table, brewing himself a hot cup of coffee. Suddenly, something caught his eye. In a gap between the pantry and the wooden door, something glistened. It gleamed in a golden puddle on the floor. It was a hoofprint, made of sticky wine, butter, and crushed grape skins.

“Strange…” he whispered.

He reached out to wipe the stain away but hesitated. A strangely familiar scent rose to his nose. Wine. Honey. Something wild that made his heart pound faster. A headache throbbed his head. He dropped the rag and stepped barefoot out onto the terrace, coffee cup in hand, breathing in the cool, damp forest air.

Then he heard a rustling sound and perked up. But there was nothing. Only the wind stirring in the branches. Yet Lucius couldn’t shake the feeling that he was being watched. He went back inside, wiped the stain away, and more weeks trickled past.

Days became uniform again. Every day gray. Every evening ending in silence. Yet sometimes there was something. A whisper, a rustle in the wind. A glint where none should be. For deep in his heart, there still glimmered a faint memory of summer wine and amber eyes.

And one morning, when the mist lay like a veil over the lake, Lucius followed that feeling out onto the terrace. Coffee in hand, his gaze fixed on the forest’s edge.

And there he saw it, a deer.

It stood motionless, its head tilted slightly. Lucius blinked. It stared back at him. No sign of fear, no nervous twitch. But Lucius found his breath catching.

It’s just a deer… he told himself, bewildered at his own emotional reaction.

They gazed at each other, frozen in place. And at that precise moment, a few rays of sunlight broke through the veil of mist and shone directly onto the edge of the forest. The deer’s amber eyes sparkled in the light, and Lucius’ heart raced. It stared at him.

Then, a sudden jolt: “Ah, damn it!”

Hot coffee splashed from his tilted cup onto his hand, and the startled deer vanished into the trees. Lucius hesitated for just a second. The coffee cup crashed to the ground.

And then he ran after it.