Cupid: Greco-Roman God of desire and lust

A swoosh of the hair. A twinkle of the eyes. A scrunch of the nose. A twitch of the lip.

Cupid, son of Aphrodite and Mars, is among the most strikingly beautiful of the gods and wholly dedicated to the appreciation of human beauty. With his golden hair, purple silk suit open to reveal a perfectly muscled chest, and wings of brilliant feathers whiter than any real bird, Cupid overawes any beholder even before striking them with a bolt from his pink pistol of love. This weapon is powered by the same magic as his mother’s shotgun, but Cupid has expanded the array of potions with which it can be primed to inflict not only “love” in the conventional sense but also fascination, irrationality, lust, or simply outright depravity.

Cupid’s motivations for targeting humans with his pistol are generally inscrutable. His victims are sometimes high-profile people, or those connected to such figures, and a crush or ill-advised love affair may later become clear as a factor in a chain of events bringing down governments or building up political movements. Many of his victims are common people whose being stricken brings them into his fold as members of his cult. Cupid has been known to stalk a target for years, following them across the world, only for them to fall in love with someone for no known reason anyone can discern. And sometimes, strangely for a god, Cupid seems to spontaneously shoot humans to instill desire in them not for his cult, for his relations with other gods, for financial or political gain, but simply… for fun?

A consummate playboy, when not on the hunt, Cupid spends most of his time on other forms of hunt, appearing at his network of nightclubs to regale his followers and guests and to seduce women, men and gods alike. Cupid’s clubs are gaudy in style and unapologetically so, festooned with neon lights and dark velvet. They are places of luxury and indulgence, given over to the celebration of sheer debauchery. Typically an appearance by Cupid himself is a big event for which tickets are expensive and a nation’s VIPs scramble to clear their calendars, but Cupid does also simply appear unannounced, sometimes to pursue a particularly gorgeous guest, sometimes simply to be amused by the hysteria that ensues. Many of the world’s most fashionable sex clubs are owned by Cupid and his cult, but beware: rumor has it that many such places only claim to be connected to the man himself to drum up interest.

Cupid is in frequent contact with his mother, but he is no servant of Aphrodite, and their cults are separate. Where followers of Aphrodite tend to be high-minded about love and beauty, Cupid’s flock generally display no such scruples. Cupid is not known to operate with his mother, but should a war break out with other gods, speculation has it that Cupid will be on her side.