Hephaestus walked through the door of his home and through the halls and courtyards but he saw none of it. In his mind he was still seeing the terrain of Mount Olympus, the plots he had just spent the day considering, the visions of structures slowly building themselves in his mind. Olympus was his home now, finally, his place upon it assured. It was, he had always thought, his right. But it was an honor just the same. And he intended to show that he deserved a place upon it. He would build the gods temples, mansions, palaces to match their splendor. This thing he walked through, it hardly qualified as a building in his mind. It kept the rain from his head, and his wife's, but it was nothing like the gods deserved.
Like she deserved. Hephaestus paused outside the door to their bedroom. He could hardly believe that this was true. Their bedroom, his and Aphrodite's. But it was true, she walked inside of it in all the beauty that any god or mortal could sing of, and she was his wife. Hephaestus was no fool, he knew how that must seem to the gods, to her. And so he would have to strive a thousand times more to prove his worth to her. And it would all begin with their home.
Taking a long breath through his nostrils, Hephaestus held himself as tall and straight as he could and rapped quickly on the door. He waited a breath and then opened it. Her bedroom was his, after all, as amazing as that seemed. "Aphrodite," he called out, his nod to formality. In truth he was too eager to get to the meat of things. "I had something I wanted to tell you. To show you, if you like." He stepped into the room, one hand on the door, the other on his cane. His head turned in a sweep, looking for his lovely bride.