34. Hades
Hades
“W hat do you have to say for yourself?” I circled around the wailing man as Sandro watched him from his throne.
Sandro looked so damn good in it, dressed in my robe, his blond hair looking wet and messy over the side from all the sweating we’d done earlier. His pink cheeks and bright eyes made him appear as the delectable god he was. My cock twitched at the thought of how naked he was under that robe. And how easily I could yank it off him and take him.
I was half tempted to do it now in lieu of listening to the fucker beside me.
“I was abused as a child. It’s not my fault. I couldn’t control my urges,” he cried out in defense of all his sins.
“You’re going to blame your trauma for inflicting more trauma on other people?” Sandro asked him with an intense glare.
“No one was there for me. I was acting out.”
Sandro exhaled and rolled his eyes.
“Boring.”
I grabbed him by the neck, pulled him, and yanked him to the floor, his translucent nature not a deterrent to my anger.
“You’re boring your king with lies. That’s another sin against you.”
The dead man’s face dropped, and he yelled, trying to look at Sandro, begging for mercy, but I wouldn’t let him. I conjured my flames, and they suffocated him.
He made a run for it.
“There’s nowhere to go!” I shouted. “Nowhere but Tartarus, where you will burn for all eternity.”
The man screamed, but the flames carried him to his sentence, and there was quiet again. I turned to Sandro and approached him, threading my fingers through his.
“I’m so happy you’re back,” I told him.
He nuzzled against my chest as he embraced me and hummed in agreement.
“I can’t believe how many bad souls we get. And I still haven’t found anyone to take over Thanatos for us. I should visit Elysium. I’m sure some of the heroes would jump at the chance to live again.”
“We’ll go. Together,” I told him.
It had barely been an hour since everything had been put back where it belonged, and we were reunited, and it was like we’d never been apart.
Judging souls together was a favorite pastime with my king, but it meant we hadn’t claimed each other’s bodies in a while. And an hour is a long time in my book.
I wanted nothing more than to take him by the hand, leave the throne room, retire to our chamber, lay him on our bed, and ravish his body.
“But first things first. I think we have some house calls to make,” I whispered in his ear, and he pursed his lips into a smile.
“You’re right.”
I put my hands around his back and held him tight, smelling myself on him, a smoky, devilish scent mixed in with his vibrant, sweet, citrusy smell, and I’d never felt more at home.
As if everything we’d been through to get back to each other was worth it just to get to this point.
No. Not as if.
It was. It was worth every horror and pain we’d endured.
I called forth my eternal fire, and it carried us away, back to Gaia, back to Sandro’s apartment.
Sandro let go of me and inspected his home. He grabbed the throw on the sofa and folded it, setting it down at the end and fluffing the cushions.
Then he looked up at the walls as if they were speaking to him. He looked so concentrated I didn’t want to disturb him. He picked up rubbish from the coffee table and the floor and put it in a bag before he found his ink pen and turned it in his hand.
“Are you okay?”
He looked so pensive and beautiful. He was as intoxicating in his current form as he had been in his first. I loved them equally, despite the fact I’d spent less time with Sandro than I had with Persephone.
I saw her in him from the moment I woke up. The way he carried himself, his creativity, the things that interested him, even the things he said, but now that we’d mated and his memories had awoken, he was even more her than ever.
From the way he spoke to how he looked at me and touched me…yet, he was still Sandro. The way Sandro may have been if he hadn’t been sick since the moment he was born. I’d seen glimpses of it before, in his sarcasm, his sense of humor, his determination.
“Yeah. Yeah, I’m okay.” He hugged himself with the pen still in his hand. “I just hate this mess. I guess I hadn’t realized how depressed I truly was before.”
“You were going through a lot. No one can blame you if tidiness wasn’t your priority.”
He nodded and looked up at the walls and the ceiling again as if he could hear voices I couldn’t.
He chuckled.
“What?”
“Nothing. I just realized that with Hermes out of the way, I own this place. I don’t have anyone to pay back. I’m sure the money he used was dirty anyway.”
After what we’d been through, there was no doubt about it. Hermes had orchestrated every aspect of Sandro’s life perfectly to drive him to me and his endgame.
“Is that a problem?” I asked.
“No. Not a problem. I’m just going to miss this place. I know I don’t exactly have the best memories here, but I love it here. And I love my clients.”
He stared at his ink pen again and sighed.
“Miss it? Why are you going to miss it? Where are you going?”
“With you, of course. To the other side,” he said, playfully poking my chest.
“We don’t have to live there full time. And you still have your moms and friends here.” I didn’t like the suggestion that he would give all of that up for me. He may be my soulmate, but he was still his own person. He still had his own life to live. As much as I wanted us to be one so I never had to be apart from him again, we were two separate entities.
“But we have a job to do,” he said.
“We do, but it doesn’t have to take up all our time. Your idea of psychopomps and dream hunters was great. We can even ask them to do the judging.”
“But you love judging. You love torturing the damned. You want to live here with me?”
I shrugged.
“I love you more. And now that I’m with you again, I’d rather spend that precious time with you than with them. Always you.”
Sandro tipped his lips to mine and hummed, his vibration reigniting my body.
“I love you, Hades. I love you so much.”
“I love you too, my Sandro.”
We stayed there, glued to each other for seconds, minutes, hours even, and yet, when we peeled away from each other, it still hadn’t been enough.
We still had so much to do, and we hadn’t even started.
We left our house and paid a brief visit to Tomasz, Loki, and Hela to thank them for their help and ask them for a change of clothes since I’d burned all of Sandro’s our first time together and then moved on to the most important people on the list.
* * *
“Sandro!” Sandro’s moms screamed when they saw him standing on their doorstep in a cute pair of faded, ripped jeans, a tight white T-shirt that appeared painted-on—not that I was complaining—and his rosy cheeks, more alive than ever. “You’re back! You did it!”
They squeezed him in their combined arms and kept talking to each other, unwilling to let go. I could relate.
“So you’re not sick anymore,” Ivy asked
“No. Never again.”
“And you’re not gonna die on us again?” Mila asked.
“Not if I can help it.”
“So he kept his promise.” Ivy looked directly at me when she said it, and I tipped my head respectfully.
“He did more than I could,” I told her, and Sandro pulled away.
“Don’t listen to him. We did it together.”
Mila chuckled.
“Sweetheart, what you do in your private time is your business.”
“Mom!” he exclaimed and pushed her away.
“So what happened? How? Are you really Persephone? How does it work?”
Both of them continued to toss questions at him as he walked through the corridor into the kitchen, and he took the kettle to fill it with water.
“I’ll explain everything. I hope you’re ready.”
He smirked at them, prepared the French press so he could serve coffee to all of us, and started from the top.
The women hung on his words as if he was a preacher and they were his willing converts, but I knew what it was. The smiles all around were undeniable and irrefutable.
They were happy to have their child back, better than ever. They wouldn’t have to worry about his physical or mental health anymore, nor would they have to grieve him ever again. I may not have spent a lifetime with the poorly Sandro, but I could relate to their struggle. To their feelings for him.
“So…you’re a god? A god?”
“Yes. Mating with Hades awoke all my memories, along with my powers. Once I came back to life, that is.”
“Wow.” Mila exhaled.
“And you’re the god of life?” Ivy asked as if it hadn’t been clear already.
“Yes. In a way.”
Ivy and Mila looked at each other, and Ivy grimaced.
“What? What’s wrong?”
“Nothing’s wrong. Well, nothing if you really are that powerful, I mean,” she replied.
Sandro’s face darkened, and he leaned closer to them.
“Tell me.”
Mila grabbed her son’s hand and squeezed it reassuringly.
“The hospital called a few hours ago. Damian passed away last night. Since you were his emergency contact and weren’t…available, they reached out to us.”
“What?” Sandro dropped his cup but ignored the mess it created. “How? He came to me just a few days ago. We tattooed him. They were supposed to keep him alive a little longer.”
It was impossible not to remember the big, gruff man I’d tattooed with Sandro’s help. It had been such a special moment for getting to know this reincarnation of my lover that I imagined it would be imprinted in my memories forever.
That and it had happened only a few days ago.
“He got worse fast, and I guess his body just gave up,” Ivy said, hugging her cup a little tighter.
“But hey, you can save him now that you have your powers. You can give him another shot,” Mila said.
Sandro nodded and stared at the spilled coffee.
“I just don’t understand how.”
I offered him my hand, rubbing his thigh with a heavy heart.
“Maybe it was me. Maybe I did something wrong.”
Sandro immediately grabbed my hand on his thigh and shook his head defiantly.
“No, H. You did everything right. It’s not your fault. It’s just…”
“The shit nature of life,” Ivy said.
Sandro eyed his mother and gave her a smile that didn’t quite reach his eyes.
“That’s right, Mom. But now there’s something I can do about it.” He turned to me, and without even asking, I knew exactly what he wanted.
I closed my eyes, thought of the big man, and called his spirit.
He appeared before us, staring in confusion. Mila and Ivy kept looking from us to the empty space in front of them, still unable to see spirits.
“Where am I?” he asked.
Sandro pushed his chair back and stood in front of Damian.
“You’re in my family home,” he said.
Damian looked around with a deep-set frown.
“I thought…I was dead,” he answered.
“You are,” I told him.
“What’s going on? Who are you? What’s happening to me?”
Sandro put his hand on Damian’s shoulder and smiled at him.
“I’ve got something to tell you. I’ve been keeping a secret from you.”
Damian grimaced.
“What secret?”
“I’m a…witch.”
“You’re a god,” I reminded him.
Sandro glared at me.
“I was trying to ease him in, sweetheart.”
Damian took a step back and looked down at himself.
“What the hell are you on about?”
“Listen, it’s a long story, but the truth is, I’ve been tattooing you with healing spells for months now, trying to keep you safe and…you know, alive. But it clearly didn’t work.”
“Clearly,” Damian said and raised an eyebrow.
Even in death, he was a grump.
“However, I can bring you back to life. Give you another chance.”
“How?” He looked from me to Sandro’s moms and back to Sandro.
“I can reincarnate you into a new, healthy version of you.”
Damian crossed his arms and frowned.
“All right then. Do it.”
Sandro nodded and put his hand on Damian’s chest.
Lights appeared out of nowhere, but before they could reshape him, Sandro dropped his hand.
“I also happen to be recruiting if you’re interested in…a higher purpose in life.”
“Recruiting what?”
Sandro turned and winked at me.
“Psychopomps,” he said. “Grim reapers.”
“How…how would that work?” Damian asked. “And does it pay?”
Sandro laughed.
“It doesn’t pay, but I’m sure we can make some arrangements, right, Mom?” He turned to Ivy, and she looked confused. “Mom works for the high council. I’m sure we can get you a human job.”
“I’ll see what I can do,” Ivy replied.
Damian narrowed his eyes. “Why won’t she look at me?”
“She can’t see you,” I told him.
“How come you can?” Damian asked as if it was an insult.
I rose from my chair, my flames erupting across my skin.
“I’m the king of the dead, dear boy. Your boss, if you work for us.”
Sandro linked our hands and took a deep breath.
“You’ll basically have to mark people for death and make sure they move on to the afterlife, our domain.”
“Mark people for death? I thought you could save me? Why can’t you save everyone?”
It was a fair question, and I admired him for asking it. If only it had a simple answer.
“Death is part of the natural order, sweetie. So many things would go wrong if people didn’t die. The whole world would go down the toilet,” Sandro said.
“So why me?”
“I feel responsible for you. And no one said I couldn’t play favorites. Besides, it’s going to be hard work. You’d have to ensure the spirits aren’t taken by those horrible creatures, the Wraiths. They feed on souls. And we can’t have that. Everyone deserves an afterlife. Or a chance to be reborn if they’ve been good enough.”
“Okay,” he said. “I’m in.”
“Are you sure?”
Damian looked at me and back to Sandro with a determined expression.
“Yes. Like you said. Everyone deserves an afterlife.”
“Fantastic. You’re going to be great. I know it,” Sandro said and touched him again. “And did I mention the perks? The job comes with some great powers.”
“You don’t have to sell me on it. Just do it.”
Sandro smirked, and the lights reappeared, filling Damian until he was all light. When it died down, he was gone, returned to his human body.
But it was Sandro’s bright eyes and luminous grin that I couldn’t stop staring at.
“What?” he asked.
“Nothing.” I shrugged. “Have I told you how much I love you in the past hour?”
Sandro shook his head and enveloped me in his arms, planting a kiss on my lips.
“Criminal behavior, if you ask me,” he said.
“Absolutely wicked,” I agreed.
Someone coughed.
Mila was grinning from ear to ear at us while Ivy rested her head on her wife’s shoulder.
“Can I help?” Sandro asked them.
Mila shook her head.
“We were just wondering what Damian said,” she said.
“And when is the wedding?” Ivy added.