Page 133 of Where Darkness Bloomed
His eyes lit, amusement sparking within. “Cerberus did not stand guard when I made the journey. No mortal had dared to enter before me.”
A wicked smile broke across his face. “Your husband was... displeased by my intrusion,” he added, the words humming with quiet relish. “After my journey, Hades sent Cerberus to guard the path.”
A cold knot tightened in her chest.
The path was real. It was there, tantalizingly close. But Cerberus was impossible, a barrier too great to overcome.
She let out the breath trapped in her chest. “Then... there is no way.”
Dionysus’s expression softened. The irreverent laughter ebbed, becoming almost tender. “There is another way,” he said. “Call out to your husband. Hades would not deny you.”
The words curled around her like a ribbon of incense—dark and sweet, tempting.
She ached to do just that. To whisper Hades’s name and feel him at her back, arms drawing her down into the sanctuary of his realm. Into the warmth of their bed.
But what would follow—
Demeter’s fury would ignite once more. The fragile accord with Zeus would shatter. The earth would plunge into further chaos. More death, more needless destruction.
She swallowed a sigh. “I cannot.” The words were hollow. “Zeus and Hades have reached an agreement. One my husband cannot break.”
Dionysus tilted his head, a lazy movement, his dark gaze slipping over her. “Then permit me to offer you a piece of advice.”
She waited.
His smile bloomed, sensual and full of mischief. “Only a fool would attempt to subdue him,” he mused. “But Cerberus, like most creatures, has his hungers. He craves sweetness found only in the world of the living. This is your key.”
A warm breeze stirred through the grove, fragrant with crushed grapes, pine needles, and something heady and forbidden. It slipped across her skin like a caress. Then Dionysus was gone.
God of madness, indeed.
She exhaled raggedly, frustration thrumming beneath her skin. “Not entirely helpful,” she muttered to no one.
The path lay before her. Epirus. The crystal cave. All within reach.
All, except Cerberus.
He was no ordinary beast. A nightmare made flesh—colossal, terrible, born of the Underworld’s darkest fire. The old tales called him a living mountain, black as coal, with claws that shredded bronze and teeth that gleamed like spears. A force even gods approached with caution.
She closed her eyes, rifling through memories, seeking any scrap of knowledge.
One surfaced—
“Koios, the Titan of wisdom, came the closest just after their imprisonment . . . He was forced back by Cerberus.”
A soft groan escaped her lips as she sank to the grass, heavy with dread.
Cerberus had repelled a Titan. Not just any, but Koios, the ancient keeper of wisdom and forethought. There would be no slipping past him. No clever ruse. No whispered entry. Not when even a powerful Titan had failed.
Persephone stared up at the dark canopy overhead, defeat closing over her like a crashing wave.
Then a flicker of movement.
Her head turned sharply, eyes finding the spot where Dionysus had stood moments earlier. She stared, startled.
There, nestled in the grass, sat two barley cakes. Thick golden honey clung to them, glistening in the last lavender threads of dusk. The scent rose, warm and decadently sweet.
A gift from the god of revelry.
