Page 118 of The Queen & the King

The rope begins to glow.

“Persephone.” Hera sighs.

A tear slides down my cheek as I look up at him. “Hades. Before you, I was lost in so many ways, constantly searching for something that I couldn’t identify. From the time I was a little girl, there was something pulling at me. I thought it was a draw to the mortal world, and I was supposed to make it my home. I was half right. The connection wasn’t to the mortal realm, but it was to my home. It was my bond to you.” My voice breaks a little. “My love. My home. My husband and my king. I choose you, Hades. Yesterday, today, and tomorrow. From now until eternity.”

The glow on the rope grows brighter before it dissolves into our bound hands, cementing our bond. It doesn’t feel a whole lot different. The bond we already have completely obliterates me every day in the best way.

Hades wipes a stray tear from my cheek. “Hera, say I can kiss my bride now.”

“You still need to do the rings, losers,” Mellie chimes in, but there’s emotion in her voice that I’ve never heard from her before.

Hades hands me the ring to put on his finger before he takes my hand again, sliding my wedding ring on. The ruby rose sparkles softly on top, and once again, my finger is bound by the comforting weight of our union.

I look down at Hades’ ring. It is the same one I gave him all those weeks ago when I officially chose him. I slide it onto his finger and meet his misty-eyed gaze.

“You better kiss me now, Husband.”

“You may now kiss the bride,” Hera says with all the joy and enthusiasm of a funeral.

Before Hera has even finished speaking, Hades’ lips are against mine in the most heartbreaking kiss I’ve ever experienced. I wrap my arms around his neck and press my body to his, deepening the kiss.

Husband. Mine.

He dips me over his arm, and I smile against his lips before he straightens, lifting me off the ground.

There is the slightest of shifts as Hera leaves, but I barely notice, just like I barely noticed her presence.

Hades places me down on my feet and pulls back. He looks down at me with such love, such lust.

“Mellie, Helios, don’t burn the palace down, and take care of Berry,” Hades says, and without waiting for a response, he wraps us in his shadows, taking us on our honeymoon.1

1 The Nightmare & The Daydream Epilogue

Seventy

Hades

THAT MOMENT SHE WALKED DOWN THE AISLE TO MEwill be something I’ll remember with perfect clarity no matter the millennia that pass. I’ll recall the slight blush in her cheeks, the way her gown hugged her curves, and the design marking the duality of her—the Goddess of Spring and Queen of the Dead. She’s both life and death, light and darkness. As am I.

For so long, I thought my abilities and my calling defined me. I thought my darkness was something to be hidden away, but as Persephone vowed herself to me, I saw myself through her eyes. Darkness might be my ability, but it is not who I am, just as she is not solely the Goddess of Spring. We are more than our gifts, more than what we can give to others.

I carry her to the cliffside cabin I created, not breaking the kiss for a moment. Luckily, the cliffs of the Isle of the Blessed are untouched by the battle that consumed the Underworld. She moans into my mouth, keeping us fused together.

I kick the door open, ripping the back of her gown open. I should be careful with it. It is beautiful, and I’m sure she’s attached to the garment, but at the moment, it’s between mywife and my touch. She grabs my bow tie, yanking at it insistently, even though we don’t break the kiss.

I grunt in annoyance when her gown doesn’t slide off, appearing attached by more than just a couple of strings. My claws shred the gown, and I growl against her lips, “This gown… I couldn’t think of anything but how it would look in tatters on the floor.”

She smirks and pulls back, ripping open my shirt. “Funny… that’s what I was thinking about your suit.”

We fall toward the bed, even as we struggle to remove each other’s clothes. Neither of us is willing to stop kissing long enough to remove our clothes completely. There’s an unspoken hesitation, a sensation of doubt in our reality, and a fear that, at any moment, this peace might shatter. We couldn’t bear being torn apart again.

She shoves my shirt off my shoulders and scrapes her nails against my arms. That small bit of connection is enough to reassure me, enough to remind me not to waste precious moments worrying about what might be.

I push the tattered remains of her gown off her body. “I missed you so much.”

It wasn’t just the time apart before the wedding or that we didn’t even have a moment to truly reconnect before the battle began. It was the weeks we spent apart, only connecting in dreams, the time I spent being devoured, and when we were at odds. We wasted so much time.

She fumbles with my belt in frustration, throwing it aside once she gets it off. “Those hours were unbearable.”

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