Page 35 of Hades

She moved across the empty room to another window, one that overlooked a familiar shore. Dusky rock snaked away from her, a contrast to the clear, crisp water. The land rose steeply less than thirty feet away, forming a dome of dusty tan rock spotted with pockets of dull green scrub.

The bleak cape looked as lifeless now as it had back when she had met Hades.

Only there hadn’t been a tower here at the time.

It was new. A modern construction. Recent if she had to guess by the neat mortar sandwiched between the smooth cream cut stones. Had Mnemosyne built it specifically for her? Is this what the titaness had been doing the last few months?

She had been constructing Persephone a cage—one that was heavily protected by wards.

Persephone had deciphered a few of them, but there were countless more spells she didn’t recognise all woven together into a barrier she couldn’t untangle. Some inhibited her powers. She had surmised others kept her hidden, preventing her children from being able to find her. She was sure they were scouring the mortal realm for her. It wouldn’t have taken Hades long to realise that Mnemosyne had brought her to the one place he couldn’t go.

Setting a trap for him.

To enter this world, Hades would have to severely restrict his powers, otherwise their dark influence would ravage this weaker realm, triggering natural disasters that could kill millions and cause irrevocable damage.

Or he would need to ask Zeus to come for her in his stead. Something she knew wouldn’t happen. Not because Zeus would say no, but because Hades would never ask him for help. He would view her abduction as business of the Underworld and keep his brother in the dark about it.

Persephone placed the blame for Hades’s reluctance to turn to his brother for anything on Zeus’s shoulders. Zeus was a terrible brother for making Hades rule the Underworld. He had known the effect it would have on Hades and rather than letting him come and go between the Underworld and Olympus so he could remain in the light, Zeus had all but banished him to the darkness.

Zeus was the reason Hades had grown so dark and vicious, and constantly struggled to control that part of himself.

She wandered back to the window that overlooked the sea and listened to the waves, the strangely soothing swishing sound of water rushing to meet the shore transporting her back to the day she had met Hades. Her lips curled and warmth bloomed inside her. He had been so dark and menacing, wrapped in shadows. She should have feared him, had expected to be afraid when she had seen him, but she had been drawn to him instead.

Powerless to resist his pull.

When he had compelled her to sleep and she had awoken in the Underworld—in a tower much like this one—she had been afraid. But rather than making her withdraw, it had made her bold. The more she had resisted Hades, the colder and crueller he had been, scaring her on purpose more than once. He had been hard on her, and had come close to hurting her, but whenever she had cried out, he had stilled and watched her through guarded eyes that had flickered with interest as he had loosened his grip.

Back then, Hades had been as much a beast as people on Olympus painted him. He had been a monster ruling a realm choked in ash and blood. The Underworld was still a little dark and grim now, as was her husband, but neither was anywhere close to how they had been back then.

As she had tamed Hades, she had tamed the lands too. The great volcanoes had slowly settled and the jagged fissures of molten rock that spread across the land had healed, and the sky had cleared, and the rivers had started to run with water and not fire.

And she had begun to feel a stronger connection to nature there. It had grown each day, until she had been able to change the land herself.

She felt as if she had grown each day too. Where Hades had calmed, she had grown defiant. Her dark god had lit a fire in her, and that defiant side rose to the fore again now. She couldn’t remain here. Their separation would be taking its toll on Hades and she didn’t want him returning to how he had been when they had met.

And she knew he wouldn’t want to become the beast again either.

She took in the empty semi-circular room that had been her home for days now and her heart clenched. Hades would be feeling bad about her being a captive too. Her husband never had overcome what he had done and how he had held her in a tower, concealed from Olympus and her family.

But he had tried to make amends.

When Zeus had demanded Hades return her, Hades had done as his brother wished.

A small smile played on her lips and she lifted her right hand and grazed her fingertips across them, still able to recall the sweet taste of the pomegranate. Her mother still believed Hades had forced her to eat the fruit of the Underworld, binding her to it.

Persephone had known exactly what eating the crimson seeds would do and she had seen it as a way to stay with him.

With the man she had been falling for.

She had been so afraid when they had been parted, but then he had come for her.

Just as she felt he would come for her again now.

But how was he to find her?

She watched a boat bobbing past, the two men in it bare from the waist up as they hauled in a line, sweat glistening on their tanned skin. She had seen many such vessels pass by her window at the end of the cape, but none had heard her when she had called to them. She was tempted to try again, but instead watched them drift by, heading around the bend and out of sight.

Persephone leaned against the cool stone, her heart heavy and body weighed down. She stayed there for long minutes, unable to gather the strength to move.

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