36. Sandro
Sandro
6 months later
“A re you ready?” Hades looked deep into my eyes, and the weight in the pit of my stomach eased.
He looked so radiant in his loose black shirt with the deep neckline held together by string and the equally loose-fitting trousers.
He didn’t exactly look formal, but then again, neither did I, matching him in all white.
But if someone had an issue with our wedding attire, they could say it to our faces.
“More than anything,” I told him and wrapped myself around him.
Our love hadn’t dwindled in all the thousands of years we’d been apart, so I didn’t know why it surprised me that his embrace was still as comforting and peaceful six months after reuniting, but I couldn’t help myself. The part of me that was just Sandro found it extraordinary that such love existed.
But maybe it was more than that. Maybe it was the fear that something could happen, something worse than what had happened already, that could pull us apart once more.
That was why I didn’t mind how surprising I found it. I didn’t want to take him for granted. I wanted to savor every moment I had left with him, be it a year or a million.
“Let’s go.” Hades kissed the back of my hand and pulled me out of our bedroom and toward the staircase.
We ascended onto the roof terrace where all our family was. My moms, Tomasz, Loki, Hela and her brother, Drew and his very own demon boyfriend, and, of course, the Moirai, dressed in beautiful white dresses.
The bitches were trying to outshine me, but I guessed that was our fault for inviting them and letting them perform the ceremony.
Cerberus was there too, standing between my moms and nudging them for head scratches every five seconds. If he had been a needy little puppy as Pluto, he was three times so as Cerberus, but everybody loved him even though he was a big, intimidating dog.
“Welcome, everyone,” Chloe said as we walked down the blue carpet laid down as an impromptu aisle, candles lit on either side of it and the night sky above us with the full moon illuminating our ceremony.
The rest of London was cast away by a spell, so it was truly just us.
“We’re here today…” Lacey said.
“For a promise to be made,” Aisa added.
“Between the god of the dead and the god of the living.” It was Chloe’s turn again.
I didn’t know why, but they annoyed me more with my memories than without them. They’d always been weird like that, finishing each other’s sentences. Frankly, they needed a new schtick.
Lacey nodded at Hades, and he took the metaphorical mic.
“Sandro, my beautiful king, my life and soul, I have waited so long to be reunited with you, to finally breathe the same air as you. I never, not for one moment, gave up waiting for you to find me again, and, forsaken chaos, did you find me.
“You came to me for help, to save you, but it was you who saved me. You gave me purpose and meaning again. You lit a fire in my cold, dead heart. You made me care again. And you freed me from the prison of my kingdom and my mind.
“I wouldn’t be here without you today. We defied all odds, even fate itself, when it was snatched from us. That’s why I wanted to stand here and make a vow. Because you saved me, and I wanted everyone to know, family and friends, the universe, even fate itself, that you’re mine and, most importantly, I’m yours. Not because we’re fated. But because we chose to be together after everything. And if anyone tries to mess with you—with us—again, there will be no mercy.”
My heart fluttered and a chill shot through my spine, an effect of his touch and words combined that spiked my eyes, making everything kinda blurry.
“My Hades, my death, I love you so much more than life itself. It was you who saved me. It was you who saved us both. I may be the god of life, but you’re the one that makes it possible to live.
“Every time I remember my life before you, my life as just Sandro, I feel sorry for that guy, but not because he couldn’t remember who he truly was or because he was sick, but because he didn’t know who his heart was missing.
“To think I could have perished…” I choked on my own saliva. How very godly of me. Hades wiped a tear off my cheek and flashed me his smile. A smile that made me weak at the knees. “To think I could have perished never knowing you…never remembering you. Remembering us . I couldn’t think of a fate worse than that.”
He cupped my face, and I tried to compose myself.
For crying out loud, Sandro. You said you wouldn’t cry.
“Aw, boys,” Ma sniffed, hiding her tear-streaked face.
“Oh, pull it together, honey,” Mom said. “Or you’re gonna make me cry too.”
Mom broke down too, and I couldn’t help but laugh.
“By the power of life,” Chloe said.
“Death,” Lacey added.
“And fate itself,” Aisa said.
“We pronounce you soulmates until the end of time.” They spoke in unison, and I fought hard not to roll my eyes.
“And husbands. Don’t forget husbands. Soulmates doesn’t get you a tax break,” Mom said, and everyone laughed.
Hades did too as he pressed his lips to mine and claimed my mouth with his tongue.
I breathed into him and took in this moment for what it was.
Us against the world forever after.
“I’ve got a surprise for you,” he whispered when he let go of me.
I raised an eyebrow in question.
“It will have to wait until they’re all gone.”
“That can be arranged,” I whispered back.
He smirked.
“They’re here to celebrate our love. Let’s celebrate with them,” he said.
So, of course, I listened to him, and we did. I never thought I’d see the Moirai dancing, but I guess when you’re possessing the bodies of eternal twenty-year-old models, there was no other option but to dance.
We may be completely isolated from the rest of the world, with only a handful of people by our side, but this place, this rooftop, felt like the most important place in the whole wide world and the ones beyond it.
“The guys were sorry you missed class today,” I told him as we danced to a romantic song by Sailen.
Hades looked at me sheepishly and apologized.
“New batch of souls arrived. Someone had to judge them,” he explained.
“I know, sweetheart.”
Our grim reapers were doing an excellent job marking the living for death and protecting them from the Wraiths, but he was still needed to judge the souls sometimes. Especially the bad ones.
“Were they upset?” he asked, and I thought back to class this morning.
My new friends were normal. Extremely normal. Which was a welcome change to the rest of my life full of witches, demons, death, and reincarnations.
“Of course not. They kept asking if you’re okay, that’s all. I told them you were busy with wedding preparations.”
They had been upset they weren’t invited to the wedding, but after I told them it was a family affair, they’d dropped the subject. That and after promising them we’d have a big party to mark the occasion tomorrow night.
I couldn’t invite mortals to a supernatural ceremony, could I?
“They did have a surprise for me though,” I said. “And for you, but you weren’t there, so you missed it.”
“A surprise?” Hades pulled his head back and smiled. “What surprise?”
“They gave me my sign name.”
I had been so happy when they showed me.
I’d been taking classes for three months, and even though I was making progress, I was still not proficient in sign language.
It was all part of embracing myself fully, and Hades joined me because he wanted to be able to communicate with me in every way possible.
But it was more than that to me.
I’d been using my hearing aids as a crutch my entire life, too depressed about my dwindling life to focus on anything else, too absorbed by everything I felt was wrong with me. Too absorbed by my imminent death to think about life. But now that I was alive, now that I was fully me, I wanted to focus on life. My life.
And it wasn’t just enough to embrace who I was in this life—my last one by all accounts—but to celebrate that person. And what better way to do that than by getting rid of the crutches and learning to communicate with my hands too.
I didn’t have to be scared of the silence anymore. I didn’t need to be scared of death anymore because death was mine and I was his. And the silence could be just as enticing as the noise.
“They did? What is it?”
I removed a hand from Hades’ shoulder and brought it to my face, extending my thumb and index finger over my lips as if stretching them into a smile.
“I like it! And it suits you perfectly.”
I didn’t know if it did, but I did smile a lot more now.
“Did they tell you mine?”
“No. They wanted to show you themselves. But…”
“But?”
“I’ve got a sign for you myself. Do you want to see?”
Hades nodded with a childlike excitement that was infectious and so damn cute.
I freed my hands for this one and twisted my index finger on my cheek.
“Sweet…” Hades interpreted.
I crossed my fingers on both hands and cast them forward.
“Death?”
I nodded.
“That’s what you are to me, aren’t you? My sweet, darling death.”
Hades pulled me back into his arms and trapped my lips in a deep but chaste kiss.
“And you, my love, are my life. My beautiful, wonderful, amazing life.”
I felt my face get warmer and our guests’ eyes on us.
“Okay. Now sign it.” Hades hissed, and I laughed.
I glanced at my moms, and they laughed too, but it was replaced by big smiles, the likes of which I’d never seen before. Not before my awakening into godhood anyway.
I’d put them through so much that it gave me some relief to know they didn’t have to worry about me anymore. That they could enjoy being moms, wives, witches together.
Gods, life is good.
It was the early hours of the morning when everyone decided to make themselves sparse, and by that point, I was dying to know what Hades’ surprise was.
I was giddy like a virgin when we entered our bedroom, and he shut the door behind us. I couldn’t imagine what kind of surprise he could possibly have prepared for me.
“I’ve been…practicing.” His whispers licked shivers down my neck as he loosened the strings of my neckline and freed me of the shirt.
“Practicing? Practicing what?” My voice was shaky, and I wasn’t even ashamed.
I couldn’t help how he made me feel or how my body reacted.
He guided my fingers around the hem of his shirt, and I took the hint and took it off him. We removed all our clothes, no barriers between us. Not anymore.
“You’re so creative in this life, my soulmate. It makes me jealous.” He peppered kisses along my neck and all down my right arm, sucking on each of my fingers when he got to them.
“You’re creative in other ways.” Like when he punished the damned. It was intoxicating to watch.
He shook his head.
“Not the same.”
I didn’t say anything. I couldn’t. The way his tongue left trails of chills across my body, it was impossible to respond, to even breathe.
“I wanted to…find a way to be as creative as you, but make it…mine. Do you want me to show you?”
We were lying across the bed now. Hades was on top of me and our cocks were pressing hard against each other, desperate for release. My throat was dry in anticipation.
I nodded.
Hades guided my left hand between us and picked my ring finger out from the lot. His own ring finger was right underneath mine, and when the flames appeared, they burned both of us.
It was different. It was cool, but it also burned, and his eternal fires usually didn’t affect me. It was painful. A familiar kind of painful. It made me hiss and salivate as the flames etched markings around our fingers, a dark floral design that seemed to start on my finger and end on Hades’.
I pulled my hand closer and inspected the design burned into my skin. It wrapped around my finger like a thick wedding band and looked the same on him.
“What? Where did you learn how to do this?”
He smirked.
“I had some unwilling test subjects,” he said.
I bit back a laugh.
How could I forget his favorite pastime lately. Going out and hunting for evil people. He wasn’t meant to judge someone until they died, but we’d bent so many rules lately. What was one more?
Besides, it wasn’t like we had to answer to anyone.
“Do you like it?”
This man.
He may be the god of the dead, taking pleasure in torturing people and having no qualms about killing, but he was still just a man wanting to be loved.
“I love it.”
He kissed the spot on my tattooed finger. His kisses led him up my arm and all the way back to my mouth as my cock throbbed.
“Would you like some more…tattoos?”
I groaned in his mouth in response, and he smirked, guiding his hands to my hips.
He spread my legs open and slid between them, pressing his thick crown against my muscle.
It only took a few of his flames to loosen me up before he pushed inside me, and I gasped.
His flames wrapped around my thighs and burned me something fierce. I threw my head back and screamed for mercy.
Not that I wanted any.
If anything, I wanted more. Whatever he was doing to me, I wanted it all.
I’d spent my entire life covering up my skin to hide something I thought was ugly. To hide my disease, my horrible power, my feelings.
And now, despite knowing there was nothing ugly about me, I still liked painting on my body. It was a comfort thing. And an art thing. It was also temporary, a canvas that turned blank with every spell I used.
But this…
This was permanent.
Like my love for Hades.
He etched more on my chest, my sleeves, my neck, my ribs.
And then he lifted me up to do the same on my back.
I fought the pain by riding him harder, taking his thick cock all the way to the root, though it was still not enough to satiate me.
My dick rubbed between us, precum connecting like a spider’s web that never stopped, and the more he hit my prostate, the more he burned my skin with beautiful designs, the more it leaked.
I was hanging by a thread, and we both knew it. His face was an image. A thousand words I couldn’t interpret in my blissful torture.
I just needed release. His and mine.
“Here.” I pulled one of his hands and placed it over my cock. “Mark it. It’s yours.” I practically growled in his ear.
And he did.
He called his flames, and they etched along my length. Five letters.
Hades .
I couldn’t hold back anymore. I let go, spilling my load all over his front, giving him his own sticky tattoo as he filled me with his essence.
I would have told him to etch my insides if he could. Etch every part of me the way he wanted.
“I love you, H. I love you so much, my death.”
I panted against him, and he swept my hair off my forehead with a gorgeous smile, acting as if he wasn’t out of breath too.
“I love you more, my life.”
I kissed him, reunited our lips, and groaned in his mouth as the soreness of his markings made my skin alight.
“Why didn’t you tattoo yourself too?” I asked him when I’d managed to catch my breath.
He pulled away from me and opened the bedside drawer. He took out my ink pen and handed it to me.
“Because you should be the one to mark me,” he whispered, and I wrapped my hand around his and the pen.
Yup.
If there was ever any doubt, let the record show he was perfection incarnate.
And I knew a thing or two about incarnations.