Hades and Persephone: Crown of Souls (Gods of Myth #3)

Chapter 27

Chapter

Twenty-Seven

H ades

I know where this is going even as Persephone bravely challenges, “I’m listening.”

“When my son betrayed me, desiring my power for his own?—”

She interrupts, “Apple didn’t fall far from the tree, did it?”

“Watch your tongue, girl, lest you lose it,” Uranus growls his warning.

“What?” she bravely taunts. “You can steal the power of another God, but you can’t hack it when it’s done to you?”

With my lips pressed to the shell of her ear, I murmur, “Stop.”

Persephone stiffens in my arms, but I hear the snap of her teeth as she closes her mouth. Uranus is seething. Even I can see the play of his ire where it leeches from the flesh Hecate has loaned to imprison him for this discussion.

I’d come here to learn of the way he’d been attached to Atlantis, but now I have an entirely new question. That being how, considering his castration, he could be the father of my little spitfire of a goddess.

Because Uranus is her true sire, of that I am now certain. He had been in possession of the souls of both Aether and Chaos at the time of her conception, explaining how she came to be in possession of their gifts. In her previous life, the flashes of light I would catch in her power were so fast and bright, it had been easy enough to believe the lie we’d been fed, that she was the child of Zeus. That it was his lightening she claimed.

Now, though—she possesses the light of all life without a doubt. Under her skin is the power of the sun. It radiates from the depths of her soul and through her eyes as the sun might peer down through the blue of a cloudless sky.

But I had been so certain that light had been the light of Hyperion, if a little brighter.

I’d been certain, even after I’d drank from him in the truest test of truth, and he had assured me he had never lain with Demeter.

“How did you do it?” I demand low, but I know he hears me even over the howl of the wind. “How did you sire her?”

Hecate’s face splits in a monstrous grin. “Ah! Not so daft, after all, Hadeeees. It only took how many centuries for you to figure it out.”

“You were castrated at the time of her conception. In fact, you didn’t have a corporal body at all.” I tell him, ignoring Persephone’s sharply horrified inhale and the little ‘no’ that follows.

Uranus laughs. “Yes, child. You are my daughter.” Hecate’s nostrils flare with his deep inhale. “I can smell it even now. You are mine.”

A rumble of protest forms in my chest at his claim, broken by Persephone’s, “Impossible.”

She shakes her head, denial already setting in.

“I will tell you everything, for a price.”

“What do you want?”

Persephone whirls in my arms. “I won’t bargain with him, Hades. He’s evil.”

“Nothing is wholly good or wholly evil, little girl. You should know that already.”

I ignore the plea of her eyes even as I feel them searching my face. I ask Uranus again, “What do you want?”

“I want what I’ve always wanted. My own realm, and to be whole again.”

“Is that it?” I work to keep the racing of my heart steady as I bargain with an entity far older than I am.

“That is all I have ever desired.”

“And your world shall worship you,” I vow to him. “If you help us understand how it happened, and that understanding aids us in the defeat of Demeter.”

Hecate’s black eyes—the inky color of Uranus’ soul, spark with dark interest. “It would be my pleasure to watch Demeter fall. To watch her destruction.” At his excitement, Persephone instinctively cowers against me. To sooth the fear, I increase the heat I allow to pulse from my form as I hold her even tighter.

Uranus begins to tell his tale. “Before the Hydra’s portal was sealed, Demeter was known to frequent Lake Lerna, was she not?” Before I can answer, he continues, “The ancient Lernaean Mysteries were sacred to Demeter, you recall?” His smile stretches. Pure evil. “It was in her honor the great festival was held on Lernaean Lands. This accounts for much of her time spent surrounding the deadliest portal into the Underworld.”

Demeter was always known to insert herself wherever there was a temple for me and the Underworld. For the dead.

Prickles of unease rise on my flesh as Uranus continues, knowing my mind is racing far beyond the knowledge he relays.

“Demeter used her temple in these lands to excuse her presence there for decades. She went entirely unsuspected by you or the Underworld. Not that you cared who entered your domain at this time. You were a monster, spending nearly all your time in the beast form of your God, were you not?”

At Persephone’s stiff response, Uranus raises a brow. He taunts, “Oh, does she not know about that yet?”

“Get on with your story, Uranus,” I grit through the grind of my molars, ignoring the way my fangs lengthen with a need to spill the blood of a God I’ve long since drained dry.

He chuckles a sound of malicious delight. “Demeter visited Tartarus frequently, under the cloak of her God’s beast. She used the village youth to distract the Hydra so that she could enter unseen.”

Fucking Demeter.

“I don’t know how she knew I’d stolen the Gods’ power, but she did. She convinced me of a way that I could use the power of Chaos that I had stolen to recraft the physical form you’d stripped me of. A way that I could again be whole. You see, even stripped of my corporal form, I’d been unable to utilize the powers of Chaos. But Demeter convinced me of a plan she had concocted with Zeus to overthrow the Kingdom of Gods and begin anew. A plan I was, in my state, delighted to be part of.”

Fucking Tartarus, this is far bigger than I imagined.

Uranus speaks. “Demeter’s plan was to sire a child with her. To infuse the souls of Chaos and Aether into that child, a daughter. When that child was born, she would be a weapon we would use—a weapon we would forge—to overthrow the Kingdom of Gods.”

The curse that ghosts over my lips is enough to make Uranus throw Hecate’s head back and laugh. Persephone cringes from the sound.

When he composes himself, he continues, “She would be a child of power greater than any other to ever live. But the powers of harvest, light, chaos, and sky weren’t enough for Demeter, and since we needed a host to provide the seed in which would transport the souls I would offer to the child, possession became the only way. It was with great deliberation we chose Hyperion to be my host.” Uranus smiles a dark and dangerous thing, his voice pitching low along with Hecate’s. “You see, the light of all life, paired with the other gifts she would be bestowed, would create within the young Goddess a power of ultimate fertility. The ability to birth from nothing. She would be the mother of all life, much like Chaos, but far, far more powerful. For she would not be bound to the form of matter, and from her virtue, worlds would sprout.”

“You took possession of another to—to have sex with Demeter—to create me ?” The horror in Persephone’s voice is so great, I regret allowing her to accompany me in this visit. I regret the pain I know her soul will suffer in the whiplash of this knowledge I wish I could have had the foresight to shield her from.

“I did what I had to do,” Uranus says through Hecate. “I recall the day the Goddess was born, the child of my spirit and Hyperion’s seed. Even the Underworld felt the birth of what had never been born before. A child of many gifts—only she quickly became known as the giftless Goddess, did she not?”

At the curl of Uranus’ lips, I growl, “She has never been giftless.”

“Oh, but she was. Although not by her choice. The Moirai do love to play, don’t they.”

I stiffen at the mention of the Moirai.

“Who?” Persephone asks.

Uranus sighs. “Does she know nothing?” I don’t get the chance to explain before he’s talking again. After millennia alone, he is hungry for conversation. I can’t say that I blame him. “The Moirai are The Fates, my child.”

“Don’t call me that.”

“So touchy.” Black eyes taunt her as the icy wind picks up. “Demeter visited the Moirai. Your birth, your creation, was sanctioned by them.”

“By the Fates?”

“Such a new age title for a trio of Goddesses who predate even the Mother Goddess, herself.” Hecate’s lips curl. “I imagine they loathe the disrespect.”

“This isn’t a history lesson on the Gods, Uranus. Get to the point.”

His eyes remain fixed on the little goddess in my arms. “There are no true tales, my child, in which craft their beginning. Only threads of a web they weave, too sticky and intertwined for even the Gods to separate. But you see, I’ve had some time to think. To consider. To unspool their sticky web and retrace the threads of their will.” He steps as close as the shield of magic that protects us will allow. The curl of Hecate’s lip shows a flash of white teeth. “We trusted their part in our plans, for we had no other choice. They are life and they are death. The thread of your cord must be spun as all other lives are spun, and we foolishly put our faith in them, certain they were sympathetic to our cause.”

“They weren’t?” Persephone dares ask. “They fooled you, didn’t they? They are the reason I was giftless. The reason I held none of the power you were promised.”

“How were we to know they would turn on us before we’d ever put our plans into place? How could we know the limits they would weave into the power we bestowed to you?”

“Get on with it,” I growl when Persephone shivers again. Even the heat of my God, which syphons from the pits of Tartarus, is not enough to keep the chill of this icy land away. For I created this cold to do far worse than nip at the flesh of the living. My intent had been to burn the immortal soul with the merciless bite of frost.

“Demeter realized early on that Persephone’s ability to create was stunted, somehow. She began her tests with the young goddess as soon as she could walk, filtering her through the crowds of the people who worshiped, allowing the gentle strokes of loving hands to move across the child’s skin, watching as they shovelled food into their mouths with pitiful smiles on their face as they thanked the Goddess for their full bellies. The child grew to love the people, and then she made Persephone watch as she tore it all away with winds that whipped through lands of harvest. She made the girl watch as knees split from prayer and pleading, blood staining stone as people begged for Demeter to relinquish her ire. She was forced to sit and watch as Zeus again demanded sacrifice, and the hungry led prized animals to their altars. She watched as blood spilled from beast and then child. And she mourned. But she remained giftless.”

“You are despicable.” The grief in her words cuts through me like a blade. “Evil.”

Uranus wears her accusation with pride. “The price of power, my child.”

“Evil is not the price of power. It’s corruption. True power doesn’t need or want to strip the flesh from the backs of those who have less. It does not play life like a toy. True power is unity. It is love and honesty and connection, and one day you will watch as true power comes together and destroys you all. You’ll see it first, in the souls of the people. They will come together, they will rise above the obstacles and governments you’ve built and connect . The weight of their power will suffocate the evil that has held them all down. It will starve them all of the power they think they have, and the lesser Gods will see. They will see the power of their people and they will know the path to your destruction.”

The words she speaks ring in the icy wind like the chimes of a promise, engraving the words into the very spirit like the writings of a prophet. The day will come where her promise will come to pass. I can feel it as honestly as Uranus, for in that moment, I watch as quick fear the like I’ve never seen, flashes in the black soul that peeks through his eyes.

“Careful the words you speak, little fool. Power doesn’t like to be threatened.”

I tighten my hold on Persephone, projecting my voice above hers to conceal the retort that dares fall from her tongue. “If you have nothing of use, Uranus, we will leave you to your prison.”

My threat is enough to have his hateful eyes spearing to me. At least they aren’t trying to fillet her anymore.

“You made a deal.”

“That I will honor only if you honor your end. As of now, I have nothing I can use to defeat Demeter.”

A low sound of menace crawls up Hecate’s throat from the soul she restrains. “It was not until much later, as the giftless Goddess turned from child to woman, bleeding for her first time, that Demeter realized why her gifts had not formed. In the scent of her blood was another, familiar, although diluted scent. The scent of a soul she loathed.” Uranus’ eyes stay fixed on mine as cold realization spills into me. “The games the Moirai play are long and woven with deceptions. It’s no wonder we are what we are, after all.”

“What did she smell in my blood?” Persephone does not have the information I have—the knowledge I possess—to know without this explanation.

Still, when I hear the words from Uranus, knowing makes it no less chilling.

“She could smell the soul of Hades, for the Moirai had woven his soul into the fabric of your own upon your creation. This weaving could never be undone and was never seen before.” He chuckles deep and low. The sound is one touched by dark madness. “Oh, how I heard she raged when she realized. For years. And then she planned. She changed the way she trained the giftless Goddess, knowing that it would be with you that her power would finally surface, she prepared her for the time you would finally catch her scent.”

“What do you mean, she changed the way she trained me?” I can feel the tension that pours from her, hot enough to singe the cold air and heavy with dread.

Uranus’ black orbs land again on Persephone. I hate watching him look at her. “Demeter is the master manipulator. She makes even me look lacking. But her teachings really were genius. She used Zeus, plenty. He was happy to oblige in any way that meant your powers be unlocked and granted to him. He began to spend time with you, stroking that needy heart that longed for love and affection, but never giving too much. Always leaving you hungry for more, verging on desperation, right alongside Demeter. In her play for Zeus’ affection, Demeter took lovers, and always sent them away with practiced pain in her eyes. You were conditioned to believe that you had to work harder, to be better, to catch the heart of the one you wanted. To show them what you were worth, for nothing would destroy a God who had met his soul mate, quite like watching her with another would destroy him.”

Uranus laughs as the darkest piece of my puzzle falls into place with a chilling kind of snap. If I weren’t holding onto Persephone, my Gods’ beast would have shredded my skin in an eruption of rage.

The goal had always been to destroy me, and the little goddess who held part of my soul was the weapon of my ultimate destruction. I brought her gleefully into my own home.

“I don’t understand,” Persephone whispers hoarsely, but I think she might, in a disjointed way.

“As you continued to grow into a woman, the scent of Hades’ soul in your blood grew stronger. Your body called to his, and she knew she had to show you success, for the time was close. She took her last lover, and in a play of jealous rage, Zeus finally snapped. He took the life of her lover and vowed himself to her for eternity, even forsaking Hera. To you, Persephone, it looked like Demeter’s years of sacrifice had finally reaped reward.”

“Oh, my God .” Persephone covers her gasp with her hands. I feel the echo of those words, the aching grief and soul-stripped agony of them imbed my own soul like thorns bleeding slow toxin, never to be plucked free.

It fucking hurts.

“The funny thing about the realms is how truly close the living realm is to the dead. It’s a little earth, a little nothing, and the worlds collide. From the years she’d visited me, she knew the patterns Hades kept. The way he stalked the borders of Tartarus between his sessions of torture. She aligned her garden of flowers that Persephone had grown to adore so deeply, with where Hades roamed in the Underworld. She spent so much time in that garden, plucking flowers, even I could scent her, and it was not my soul that had been woven to hers. It was only a matter of time before?—”

“Before he took me.”

“And he did, didn’t he? He couldn’t help himself, really. He was driven by a madness handcrafted by the Moirai.”

“But she wanted me to kill him.”

“Of course, she did.” Uranus scowls. “You were never supposed to love him more than you loved her. When she realized you would not end him for her, she realized she lost control.”

“And the Moirai sanctioned her death.” I hiss. The Moirai wanted me dead as well. They must, to have sanctioned all that they had. To plant the ultimate weapon— my bargained soul —inside the one meant to end me.

“I cannot answer for the Moirai in this. I only know that both Demeter and Zeus believed that in your rebirth, the ties that bound your soul to his would be severed.” He appraises us. “It appears The Lethe is not quite as powerful as we believed it to be, is it?”

“And you’re just willing to turn on them now? So easily?” Persephone rasps, hatred spilling from her in waves.

“Oh, you think the millennia that has passed, the millennia that I waited, in torture after torture, prison after prison, that I am now turning so easily?” An ancient wrath hums from the soul inside Hecate. “They promised me reprieve, and they abandoned me. After I sacrificed the souls of power I claimed, to you . To their weapon.” Uranus laughs a laugh of bitter spite. “ They failed me first .”

“You’re disgusting.”

Uranus’ black eyes land sharply on Persephone. “But you will, my dear child, see his bargain through. If you fail, the blood he pulled from me so long ago will corrode him, and by extension the Underworld, to nothing.”

At her horrified gasp, I ask, “What do they want with the Underworld? With the Crown of Souls?”

Uranus laughs. It’s a full, wild, unhinged sound of pure hell. “How many centuries did you spend loathing your placement in the Underworld?” Hecate shakes her head and rolls her jaw in a move that is pure masculine energy. “The Underworld is the true power of the realms. The foundation of the Underworld was crafted by Chaos. In its veins surges the power of the Mother Goddess. The power of her soul allowed itself to be wielded in the completion of the realm, offering even more power. A kind of power in which Olympus has never possessed. Zeus hungered for that power as he hungered for the power of Atlantis, for both would allow him to access the power of Chaos. Something both you and Poseidon are blind to.” His black eyes fasten on me. “With the Crown of Souls, Demeter would assure herself a place at Zeus’ side, for she would command an army of the dead far greater than any army Zeus could amass. He would rule the Underworld and Chaos’ power, finally, truly forsaking Hera.”

“That’s the goal?” Persephone breathes. “Demeter is in love with Zeus.”

“After years pulling apart the truths that linger between their lies, I believe this is the case.”

“They want to rule together.”

“Demeter wants to rule together,” I murmur through the racing of my mind. “Zeus is using her like he uses everyone. His mistake was the trickery that bound me to the Underworld. He wanted the Golden City of Olympus for himself, because he didn’t know the true power was in the Underworld. He will discard her as soon as he has what he wants.”

Persephone spins in my arms and I am stilled in horror by the blue of her lips. “Not if she wears the Crown of Souls.”

I don’t think as I sweep her up in my arms and exit the way we came through the swirling paint of the canvas.