Dionysus’s mood darkened at the mention of Hera, and Hades knew why. The Goddess of Women had been the bane of his existence in antiquity. She’d struck him with madness, made him travel the world endlessly and listlessly. She was also responsible for killing his mother, Semele.
“So the woman in the bathroom?” Dionysus asked. “Was she a setup?”
“No! I would have never…” She paused and huffed. “I know what you must think of me, but Theseus does not control every part of my life. I came here with my own motivations.”
“Because you thought I was trafficking women,” Dionysus replied sourly.
“I came because I thought you might be able to help me,” she snapped, her words silencing Dionysus who stood, stunned. Then she added in a quiet voice, “He doesn’t know about Medusa, and I did not tell him. I couldn’t bear the thought of putting another woman in danger.”
Hades had to admit, that piece of information was a relief and likely an advantage they had over the demigod.
“When they came without the eye, he was angry, but he kept them alive for a time, and he only decided to kill them when he thought that you might be able to rescue them,” she said, looking at Hades. “Hera gave him access to hydra venom, and he thought killing the Graeae was a way to test how much he needed to murder the Divine. Of course, Theseus didn’t actually make the kill. He sent his soldiers to do it.”
“Who are his soldiers?”
“Other demigods, mostly,” she replied. “There are mortals too, but he only finds them useful when he wants the public to think the Impious are acting alone.”
Other demigods, Hades thought. There were a number scattered about New Greece, and he had no doubt that most carried a lot of resentment toward their Divine parents.
“He wants to overthrow the Olympians,” she said. “Even the ones who side with him now.”
“Do you know his next move?” Dionysus asked. “If he intended the Graeae to be a weapon and they turned into his victims, what’s next? He needs more weapons and new targets.”
Ariadne shook her head, and Hades frowned deeply. While he was not surprised by what she had shared, it brought on an immense amount of dread.
Perhaps the worst part was that he would have to tell Zeus, though the only good that might come out of that was leverage against Hera, who still thought she held power over Hades with her labors.
She was about to discover quite the opposite.
Dionysus looked toward Hades. “I’ll send maenads to scout. Maybe they can discover his next move.” He looked at Ariadne. “And start planning an escape for Phaedra.”
“I thought you didn’t take sides,” Hades replied.
“Yeah, well, fuck anyone who sides with Hera,” Dionysus said.
Chapter XXV
The Forest of Despair
It was late when Hades returned to the Underworld to find Persephone waiting up for him. She turned to face him as he entered their room, dressed in a full-length gown. It was black and gold and the sleeves were long but split, so she looked as if she wore a cloak that touched the ground. On her head was a crown with jagged edges. It was black in color and encrusted with diamonds and pearls. It complimented his own, and he knew that it had been done purposefully, likely by Hecate.
She took his breath away, though she gazed at him unhappily, looking like a queen—his queen.
“I did not think you would be awake,” he said.
He had expected her to be asleep, exhausted after celebrating with the souls. Instead, she looked bright-eyed, almost lustful, and there was an excitement that curled in the bottom of his stomach.
“Where were you?” she asked.
“I had a few things to take care of,” he said. Explaining what had happened with Dionysus and Ariadne needed too much context. It also opened up a whole new part of his world that, while he’d eventually be glad to share, was too uncertain.
Luckily, she did not seem interested in pursuing his whereabouts.
“Were these things more important than your realm?”
“You are angry that I was not at your party.”
He frowned, in part because she knew why he did not often attend celebrations. He made people uncomfortable, as much as she believed otherwise.
“Yes, I am angry,” she said. “You should have been there.”
“The dead celebrate everything, Persephone. I won’t miss the next one.”
“If that is your view, I’d rather you not come at all,” she snapped.
His brows lowered. Obviously, she was searching for an answer he could not give. “Then what do you want from me?”
“I don’t fucking care how much they celebrate. What’s important to them should be important to you. What’s important to me should be important to you.”
“Persephone…”
“Don’t,” she snapped, and he pressed his lips together, repressing the surge of frustration that erupted at her command. “I understand you don’t know what I don’t tell you, but I expect you to be aware of what I am planning and show interest—not only for me but for your people. You never once asked about the solstice celebration, not even after I asked you for permission to host it in the courtyard.”
He stared at her in silence for a long moment. It was true he hadn’t taken it seriously. Even after Hecate’s reminder, he had dismissed the importance of attending, and for that, he felt ashamed.
“I’m sorry,” he said at last.
“You aren’t. You are only saying that to appease me, and I hate it. Is this why you want a queen? So you don’t have to attend these events?”
“No, I wanted you, and because of that, I wished to make you my queen. There are no ulterior motives.”
Did he respect her more because she loved his realm and his people? Yes, but those characteristics came from her compassion and her kindness, and that was why he loved her.
After a moment, she took a breath and closed her eyes. “Look, Hades. If you don’t…want this anymore, I need to know.”
He stared at her, confused, and waited for her to look at him again. “What?”
“If you don’t want me, if you don’t think you can forgive me, I don’t think we should be in a relationship, the Fates be damned.”
The words were out, and they lingered in the air between them. Hades spent a few moments processing them before making his way toward her.
“I never said I didn’t want you,” he said. “I thought I made that clear yesterday.”
“So you want to fuck me? That doesn’t mean you want an actual relationship. It doesn’t mean you will trust me again.”
He paused before her, towering over her small frame, and despite the difference in their statures, she held her own, glaring furiously back at him.
“Let me be perfectly clear,” he said, leaning close as he spoke. “I do want to fuck you. More importantly, I love you—deeply, endlessly. If you walked away from me today, I would love you still. I will love you forever. That’s what Fate is, Persephone. Fuck threads and colors…and fuck your uncertainty.”
“I’m not uncertain,” she said between her teeth, her eyes searching his. “I’m afraid, you idiot!”
“Of what?” he demanded. “What have I done?”
“This isn’t about you! Gods, Hades.” She turned her head. “I’d think you of all people would understand.”
He studied her profile for a moment—her angry, glistening eyes and the hard set of her mouth.
“Tell me,” he begged.
It took her a few tries, a few deep swallows before she managed, “I’ve longed for love all my life. Longed for acceptance because my mother dangled it in front of me like something I had to earn. If I adhered to her expectations, she would grant it; if I didn’t, she’d take it away. You want a queen, a goddess, a lover. I can’t be what you want. I can’t…adhere to these…expectations you have of me!”
He had to admit that he was stunned. He had never imagined that calling her his queen would come with so much weight.
He turned her head toward his, and she met his gaze, eyes red and watery. “Persephone, what do you think of when you think of a queen?”
“I don’t know,” she said. “I know what I would like to see in a queen.”
“Then what would you like to see in a queen?”
“Someone who is kind…compassionate…present.”
The last word was meant for him.
“And you do not think you are all those things?” he asked. He let his thumb brush over her lips. He wanted to kiss her because he hadn’t in a very long time. He wanted to bring her comfort and to assure her that there was no title she needed to live up to because she was already enough. “I’m not asking you to be a queen. I’m asking you to be yourself. I’m asking you to marry me. The title comes with our marriage. It changes nothing.”
“Are you asking me to marry you again?” she asked, her words quiet and slow.
“Will you?”
She stared, and he already knew the answer, even as the tears slid down her face, and he had never felt so conflicted—so desperate to hear her say yes but so content with her no. She’d shown him tonight how willing she was to defend his people, how she had adopted them as her people, and he knew that meant she loved him.
“My darling,” he whispered. “You do not have to answer now. We have time—an eternity.”
Finally, he kissed her, and the release was instant but quickly overpowered by an all-consuming need to be inside her. Then she touched him, sliding her hands down his stomach and over his cock before unbuttoning his trousers, fingers curling around his bare flesh. He groaned, loving the feel of her on him, and he wanted more.
He let his tongue and teeth play across her lips, over her jaw and down her neck, and the harder she breathed and moaned, the more he teased and sucked her skin, which was why he was surprised when she pushed him away. She took a moment to stare at him with hungry eyes, then placed her hand on the center of his chest, pushing him back until he felt the edge of the bed behind him.
“Sit,” she ordered, and as he obeyed, she removed the crown from her head and set it on the nearby table. She placed her hands on his knees, holding his gaze as she lowered to the floor.
“You look like a fucking queen.”
She always did.
She smiled as she answered, “I am your queen.”
Then she touched him, her hand working up and down his cock. He took a breath, the heat of her touch going straight to his head.
“Persephone.” Her name felt rough on his tongue, and while her hands felt good, her mouth felt better, closing around his crown, tongue trailing around his head before she brought him fully into her mouth.
He drew her hair into his hand and held it away from her face so he could watch her take him deep. She was warm and wet, and the pressure her mouth offered was far different from being inside her. There was something all-consuming about this, and he had an acute awareness that she was somehow in every part of his body, though she touched just one. After he came, he brought her to her feet with him and devoured her mouth while his fingers worked to unlace her dress. Once she was naked beneath his hands, he lowered her to the bed until she was on her back, rising once more to shed his own clothing.
She watched him from where she lay, and his eyes never left her body, so exposed in the firelight of his room, cradled in the darkness of their sheets. As good as her mouth had been on his body, he couldn’t wait to be inside her.
He climbed on top of her and rested his body against hers. There was nothing like the feel of her against him, nothing that felt more like home. She placed a hand on his face, then twined strands of his hair around her fingers.
“Why do you wish to be married?” she asked.
He wasn’t exactly sure how to take her question, though they had never discussed each of their perceptions of marriage, and perhaps that was part of the problem. He had asked her twice without knowing how she felt. He was definitely an idiot.
“Haven’t you always dreamed of marriage?” he asked, curious, though he imagined she hadn’t thought it was ever going to be a possibility, considering her mother had probably never encouraged her to think beyond four glass walls.
“No,” she answered. “You didn’t answer my question. Why is marriage important to you?”
“I don’t know,” he admitted. “It became important to me when I met you.”
They stared at each other for a few moments, then their bodies shifted so that their hips met, and Hades reached to guide himself into her heat. He entered her hard, but once he was fully sheathed, he paused, bending to press kisses to her forehead. There he stayed as his hips began to move, taking her in slow, deliberate strokes, but the harder she held on to him, the harder he moved.
“So fucking sweet,” he said as his mouth pressed against her skin, tasting and sucking and nipping. “Take me deeper, darling.”
He shifted, snaking his arm under her leg, which lifted and parted her flesh even more. She gasped, her head digging into the bed. The deep fissures her fingers had made into his skin turned into scratches down his back.
“Harder!” she cried in a breathless plea, and he obeyed, completely disarmed as he watched her pleasure. He held on to that, unrelenting until she clenched around him.
“Come, darling.”
Feeling her come was the end of him too. He felt his whole body quake as he released into her, pulse after heated pulse.
Breathless, he bent to kiss her, then settled his weight on her before shifting so he could lie on his back with her draped across his body.
“Gods, I missed you,” she said and pressed a kiss to his chest.
He laughed and looked down at her as she stared up at him. He could tell she had something to say and understood why she was hesitating when the words came out of her mouth.
“You were going to tell me about Leuce.”
“Hmm. Yes,” he said, and he tugged on her until she shifted on top of him, resting with her arms crossed on his chest. “I had a meeting with Ilias at my restaurant. I didn’t know Leuce was there. She hurried after me as I was leaving and grabbed my hand. Old habit.”
He wasn’t sure why he added the last part, because he did not so much believe it had been a habit now. Persephone must not have liked it either, because she gave him a dull look, and he pressed his fingers to her lips, smiling wryly.
“I jerked away and kept walking. She was asking for a new job.”
It was a half-truth, but he did not wish to go into the details of Leuce’s own lie or deception. That would come later when he could prove it.
“That’s it?”
“Afraid so.”
She dropped her head, and he drew his arms around her.
“I feel like an idiot,” she said.
“We all get jealous. I like when you’re jealous…except when I think you might actually leave me.”
She sat up fully, her hands pressed flat against his chest, gliding to his stomach. Her eyes glittered in the dim light and her skin was flushed. He liked the look of her, liked being beneath her.
“I was angry, yes, but…leaving you never occurred to me.”
He studied her a moment, then rose into the same position, keeping his hands on the bed for stability while her arms wound around his neck.
“I love you. Even if the Fates unraveled our destiny, I would find a way back to you.”
“Do you think they can hear you?” she asked in a whisper.
He gave her a smile. “If so, they should take that as a threat.”
She laughed, and their mouths collided. Hades dropped back to the bed while Persephone sought his erect cock, positioning him once more near her entrance before bearing down on him. He inhaled as he watched her move, setting her hands against him so that her breasts pillowed and rose together. He held them as she rose up and slammed down, and when she was too tired to move, she went to her side, and Hades entered her from there and brought them both to release.
* * *
Hades woke hungry, which wasn’t usual. If he ever felt that gnawing rumble, he usually quenched it with a drink, but tonight, he found himself slipping from bed while Persephone slept and wandering the halls of his palace to the kitchen, where he discovered tons of leftover food from the solstice celebration, both sweet and savory smells competing for dominance. At first he thought he’d prefer something salty, but as he searched what remained in the array of dishes, he found something he did not expect.
Cake.
He remembered his previous battle with Persephone’s molten monstrosity. He’d never gotten to taste it, and while this was not her creation, it was still chocolate and it was cake. He shifted to look around the kitchen, which, while he technically owned it, was not really his. It was Milan’s, and the result was that he did not know where the fuck anything was. He started to look for a plate or some kind of bowl to put the cake on, but when he found a fork first, he decided he would eat straight from the container.
As he cut into the springy and fluffy cake, his stomach growled even louder, but then a horrible feeling trickled down his spine and he froze. It was like his body was being attacked by some invisible force. Chills raced down his arms, and there was a weight in his chest that kept his lungs from expanding. He could not take in breath, could not swallow, could not move.
Persephone.
He dropped the cake, fled the kitchen, and raced back to their bedchamber, where he found their room empty. Then he noticed the balcony doors open, and from there, he felt Persephone’s magic detonate. It was the only way to describe it. It dropped like a bomb, and the shock waves echoed throughout his realm. He had never felt anything like it, and his magic was not prepared to handle the sudden spike.
His world began to wilt. Even the garden below him wept, trees bowing, limbs curling, flowers disintegrating beneath the weight of Persephone’s magic. Within a matter of minutes, the Underworld was a desert of coarse black sand that stretched for miles and miles, only interrupted by desolate rivers and the ominous mountains of Tartarus.
What is happening?Hades thought.
She had bared the true nature of his realm, and throughout it all, a wail carried across a violent wind. It was anguished, much like his world.
His heart raced. Her power made him breathless.
Persephone.