Chapter 3: Make Love, Not War

Initially I didn't see anything. Now men are renowned for two things—not being willing to accept directions, and not being able to locate a woman's clitoris with a map, compass, and GPS. Fine, it's a joke, but I still didn't see anything unexpected. Nice yes, unexpected no. And that intoxicating aroma wasn't present either.

I looked at her; she looked back at me, saying without saying that this was my show.

Yes I could have made her tell me what I was trying to find out and she would have had to do it. And I would have just made another strike against any acceptable relationship that we might ever have. I ought to be able to figure this out myself as long as she wasn't actively opposing me—and active opposition is something I definitely would have put an immediate stop to.

Just because I didn't see anything didn't mean that it wasn't there, although my thinking on it was that I'd already been rather impaired at the time when I thought I'd seen something. But one thing I've learned is that what your eyes can't see your fingers can still find.

I started probing gently, looking up often to ensure that I wasn't causing any unnecessary discomfort. Although Hera looked a little uneasy, she wasn't trying to pull back like she had before.

As was not unexpected for her, attention down here aroused her pretty quickly and soon she was wet enough to carefully enter. Without a speculum—and who carries one of those with them—this was going to be a manual digital examination.

The first circle of my finger around her inside passage felt nothing but very slick surfaces. I'd already verified that if it existed at all it had to be in here. It was on my second pass that I felt something different.

It was definitely inside, and felt like a seam or a fold in the skin. I stroked its length gently and Hera gave a sudden sigh. Although she tried to remain serene after that I knew I was onto something.

Gentle stroking led me to feeling a hardening lump, and soon after that it emerged from its hiding place with a whiff of the floral scent I recognized.

Although I'd clearly been pretty messed up before there was one thing I hadn't been confused about. Hera's clitoris—at least the exposed part—really was the size of the last joint on my thumb, making it obvious to see its female relationship to a male's penis. Or maybe it wasn't a simple clitoris at all, but something unique to the Goddesses.

It certainly wasn't where one would find a typical clit—although men never seem to know where to actually find it. Rather than try to figure that one out at the moment I decided to treat it as one until further notice, even if its size has required it to find a new place to hide out. When I looked at her with an obvious question on my face she gave an eloquent shrug of her shoulders that didn't need her telepathy to clarify it.

It's not my fault if other women are under-endowed.

Once it had pushed its way out into the light I could see that it had more of what I could only call her hallucinogenic pre-cum. While I didn't plan ingesting any more of that and wondered if just touching it would lead to a transdermal infusion into my bloodstream, I couldn't stop myself from rubbing my thumb gently over the head of this amazing clit.

Hera squirmed the moment I did it, but not in pain. This part of her seemed to be as sensitive as it was large—especially given how protected it usually was. I wondered if it normally remained recessed during lovemaking, or if I'd just missed noticing it altogether before? Truth is I'd been rather selfish about my goal of dominating her and whether she was having or orgasms, or faking them, they still counted anyway. I hadn't cared all that much about what was happening here before. Now I was realizing that if I wanted this person I really ought to be learning about her as well as telling her more about myself.

Hera seemed initially confused by this new, far more conciliatory, tone of mine. I don't blame her for being rightfully suspicious considering how we'd been sparring with each other since we'd met, but she came around surprisingly fast. Perhaps it was her ability to hear the thoughts behind my voice that helped it happen so quickly. You can disguise your voice a whole lot more easily than you can your mind.

But there was something else apparent as well. That she was finally agreeable to having a discussion about her secrets to someone who could truly appreciate them.

We sat down on the floor together, held hands and talked. I learned a lot!

One of Hera's super-abilities, if you care to think of it that way, and one that all the Gods had was that all of them could produce this powerful hallucinogen in their pre-cum—although it was optional at any given moment and, "Only we Goddesses can produce it in large quantities. Zeus, Apollo, Hermes, or any of the rest of the males could seduce any individual woman with it and speak to their mind to make them believe pretty much anything—like, 'Hi, I'm a swan, so this is all okay between us'—but the ability to produce enough of it to influence an entire crowd was an ability reserved to the females who didn't use ejaculate for any other purposes. That made it part of a Goddess's power in the same way that my breast milk can cure any sick infant. The male Gods always had to come to the women when they had to work with crowds, in the same way we used them for protection when it was more than just a few humans that we had to defend against."

Now that was a lot that I'd never heard, or even suspected, before. I had this picture in my mind of Hera squatting down and squeezing as hard as she could to milk out enough hallucinogen to dope an entire arriving congregation of worshipers, all of whom would take a touch of it from a bowl to their tongue when entering her temple out of respect. Sort of like a bowl of holy water at the entrance of a church. Then, with her ability to speak directly into their minds, they would have an experience like what I'd gone through with the mighty figure standing in the front of the temple. With no other experience to compare it against, of course they'd worship her as Goddess.

"Is that how you had eyewitnesses who swore they saw someone transformed right in front of them?"

"Of course."

There was something else in what she'd told me.

"The woman and her baby that day... ?"

"The baby was sick—I could have helped," Hera said quietly.

Now I felt like a complete heel—instead of one who'd allowed this Goddess to heal as she could.

"Can we find her? Still help her out?"

"I told her to return later and I would help."

"But how did she even know to ask?"

"Women know—we always have."

While I wanted to head back out onto the streets immediately, Hera said not to worry. That the baby hadn't gotten any worse and that the woman would return soon."

So that was it. The Gods and Goddesses were their own separate offshoot, each with their relative strengths and weaknesses. The male Gods were stronger, more physically impressive, with more powerful electrical abilities and endurance, while the Goddesses could protect themselves against individual mortals, better influence crowds, and had their own unique healing abilities. Just how close to human... ?"

She must have heard that thought. "Of course we can interbreed. Haven't you read enough stories about that already?"

While Hera retained her spirit, which I was very happy hadn't been completely broken by my callous earlier actions, she wasn't adversarial any longer. As she put it in a direct manner that stated how Goddesses are powerful enough to not need deception, "I've always needed someone to ride herd on me. All of us did, which was our undoing. I just never found one, or always managed to get out from under him or her, before they could win me."

In translation, Hera had just stated that I still had to win her by her rules, but as that goal grew closer I felt she was rooting for me to make it. I don't have her abilities, but with them she didn't have as much to need to hide her feelings and things leaked out. I was sensing that she wanted this to be over as well. That she was tired of all this continual conflict in the game of love and that losing might actually be winning.