Page 85 of Queen of the Underworld

He reached the twin wooden doors and paused for a moment to drink his fill of her beauty and savour the relief that she had survived, stealing enough of her to see him through the night so he could resist returning to her and taking advantage of her.

“Back to help my men.” He frowned at his bare hands, walked to the side table, and grabbed his gauntlets. “And then to Tartarus.”

The flicker of darkness that crossed Persephone’s eyes said she knew what he intended to do there, and only made him want to hurt Nyx even more, because he hated seeing those dark thoughts in Persephone’s gaze. He hated the thought of her being tainted by them as he was. He wanted her to remain in the light, to always shine with warmth and tenderness.

Or perhaps he merely wanted to protect her from all the darkness of this world, and he had failed in that task.

He tugged his gauntlets on as he strode back to the door, waiting for her to speak, some part of him wanting her to stop him or show him that she wanted him to stay with her, or reveal that she was glad to be back with him. He needed something to go on. Another sign that she wanted to be with him.

He was fooling himself.

For all he knew, her words about wanting to bring an army from Olympus to aid him had been a lie designed to dampen his anger and keep it in check so he didn’t lash out at her for attempting to leave him. She had probably said whatever she had thought he wanted to hear in order to protect herself from his wrath.

Even the way she had held him had probably been an act.

He looked back at her, hoping it hadn’t been and trying to convince himself her behaviour and her desire to bring an army for him so he could retain his throne had been real.

Persephone remained still on his bed, her gaze on her knees, and he thought she would let him go without another word, without the sound of her voice to comfort him through the coming hours or a sign that his hope wasn’t unfounded.

How wrong he was.

When he opened the door and went to leave, she unravelled his world with two simple, softly spoken words that stole his heart and claimed it as hers forever.

“Be careful.”

Chapter 24

Hades couldn’t think about the events of yesterday without flushing with both rage and desire. He gripped his left shoulder and rolled it, grimacing as it grated in its socket and his muscles throbbed and twinged. His entire body seemed to ache, sore right down to his bones from his fight to protect Persephone and his battle to restore order to the Underworld. He should have rested after his battle with the wyvern, but his men had needed him in the western regions. Together they had managed to quell the rebellion and capture the people behind it. They were now in Tartarus.

With Nyx.

The goddess of night knelt before him under the single shaft of light in the darkened room. She grunted and stiffened as the large bare-chested male behind her struck her with the whip, the worn leather lashing at her spine.

“Again,” Hades muttered. “Harder.”

The male obeyed, striking her again, the whir of the whip slicing through the air and the harsh crack of it on her back sending pleasure rolling through Hades that fed the darkness within him. His shadows writhed around his feet, snapping at the ground in time with the whip.

He moved a step closer, coming to tower over her, and she weakly lifted her head, her bloodshot eyes seeking his.

He eased into a crouch before her, his left forearm resting on his bent knee, and her head drooped. She struggled to lift it again as her harsh breaths filled the tense silence. Behind her, the male shifted from foot to foot, his restlessness matching that of Hades’s shadows as they crept towards the goddess, agitated and hungry to lash at Nyx as the male’s whip had close to a thousand times.

“Why did you seek to destroy what is mine?” he murmured, his voice low and even, tightly controlled, just like his shadows.

Nyx’s bloodstained throat worked on a hard swallow and she croaked, “She is inferior. Weak. A female too delicate and unfit to be your queen. I did only what I thought right for this realm… for you.”

Hades bared fangs at her and his shadows shot towards her and seized her, wrapping around her arms and throat and slowly tightening as he glared at her.

“Inferior? Weak? Persephone is powerful in her own way, and that way is beautiful. She brings light and life and joy into this world. She is everything opposite to me.” Hades tightened his shadows until they squeezed her flesh, making it bulge between the ribbons of black that held her. “You interfered in my business, despite what I told you. For that, Nyx, you deserve death… but thatinferior,weakgoddess you despise so much has granted you mercy.”

Her blue eyes were wild as they sought his, filled with disbelief and a hint of relief, but also wariness, as if she couldn’t quite bring herself to believe what she was hearing and trust that his queen had spared her. He wasn’t sure whether it was because she knew under normal circumstances he would kill her for her betrayal, or because her view of the world was so dark, coloured by her life in his realm, that she couldn’t believe Persephone wouldn’t want her head in exchange for what she had done to her.

As if his gentle, beautiful queen would seek to harm another. If he had learned anything about her, it was that she abhorred death.

Hades tried not to take that personally, silently telling himself that she didn’t despise him for his role in this world. She had run to him. She had tried to protect him. After he had rescued her and teleported her to the shelter of the trees, she hadn’t found another branch to use as a weapon so she could defend herself against the wyvern.

She had found it so she could continue fighting—so she could aid and protect him.

That instinct to protect him, and the things she had said, reinforced his belief that she was coming to feel something for him.

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