7. Return #2
One moment, I was Aiden—a man with no family, no home worth returning to, and a cause I thought was justified until Zeus revealed the truth that I was being used as a pawn.
Then, with his help—that I accepted until Hades grew too proud to let Zeus roam free in the Underworld…
especially after he admitted that even Tartarus was infallible, something my god took grave offense to—I knew what was expected of me.
No longer a soldier, I was the general. No longer a killer, I was the king of the dead.
More than that, with Hades awake, I began to remember lives that weren’t mine, and a kingdom that now was.
And, because I am Hades, I remembered Persephone most of all.
Not her face. Never that.
The magic was cruel enough to leave me with a longing for her just as Hades yearns, but without any idea of the woman I’m hoping to find.
Deep down, I know the warmth of her presence.
The green, living scent of her true magic.
The way the Underworld once changed for her, blooming beneath her feet despite being a realm meant for the dead.
I remember that I loved her, even when Aiden is too much of a broken man to ever love again. He’s also too much of a coward to risk becoming an Unmentionable: one of the lost souls who die before their story has been told, their shades left to rot without any hope of future reincarnation.
Hades assures me that he’s too strong of a god for that to happen, but I notice that he retreats when my thoughts turn that dark. It’s almost as though he knows the price I’m paying for his madness, and he gives me just enough time to be Aiden before reminding me that I am Hades.
And Persephone belongs to us—
The cup cracks in my hand. Nectar spills across my fingers before evaporating into smoke.
I stare at the broken silver and scowl. A huff, and the pieces are gone.
You need our bride to keep you whole, Hades tells me. Stop being a foolish former mortal. Go to her. She needs you.
“She isn’t here,” I snap, hoping to the God I try to still believe in because I know it frustrates the Greek god inside of me that he settles down and leaves me the fuck alone.
I’m tired. I’m on edge. I feel one step away from shattering, and though everyone in the Underworld knows to leave me alone when I get in these melancholy moods, Hades is the only exception.
And isn’t that the rub considering he’s the one who’s made me like this?
Don’t believe me. Don’t listen to the god who has sensed her arrival and knows her calling like the blooms bursting into life in her wake. Maybe then you will learn that taking what you want is the only way to attain it, and if you don’t take your queen, someone else might.
My stomach goes tight. As much as I pretend like my next breath doesn’t rely on the hope that I’ll be reunited with Persephone one day—the only thing I can hope for in this dreary, gloomy hell—the truth is that I’m as obsessed with the idea of her as Hades is.
Flames burst from my palms. When I lose control, my once-mortal body conjures the fire from the edge of the Pit like I’m some kind of magician.
Only it’s no trick. The fire’s real, and a sign that I’m real close to losing the control I’ve clung to from the first moment they took a scared kid from Brooklyn and told him to fire and kill.
At first, I had to swallow my fear. Then my rage. My hate. My pain…
The fire grows. I fist my hands, taking it inside of me, using it to warm my cold heart for the first time in so long.
Persephone. My Persephone.
If someone tried to take her—
A bark splits the peace of the Underworld. One at first, followed by another as two of Cerberus’s heads call for me.
Not the third one, though, and while I thought Hades gave up his pestering for a minute, I can sense him perking up inside of me.
I ignore him, focusing instead on the giant hound shaking the walkway. He’s supposed to be watching the gate he just burst through, keeping out meddlesome heroes and gods while also adding a layer of protection to the prison the Underworld is for all souls—and for me.
I vaguely noticed his absence earlier while I peered down at the Furies. Now? They screech and untangle themselves from the nest they built, taking flight as Cerberus thunders down the stone path, heading toward the palace of Hades.
Cerberus has spent the last season disappearing into the Other without permission; mine, at least, though I suspect Hades has been sending his hound out for his own reasons.
Each time, my three-headed dog returns covered in pollen, mud, blood, or some combination of all three.
I don’t know what he’s hunting, and since he’s never threatened the balance (and he can obviously leave, unlike me), I haven’t bothered to stop him.
Maybe I should’ve. Maybe I should’ve been curious the first time I saw him trot down the pathway, missing two of his heads.
He’d been the size of a puppy from back home, wagging his tail happily.
Sure, he transformed into the three-headed beast I know and tolerate once he drew up to the gate, but I couldn’t understand why he was changing his appearance to go above when the creatures that lurk in the dark woods would eat him in one bite.
Not now. At the moment, Cerberus is large enough that his shoulders come up to mine as he leaps, landing with a thud behind me on the balcony.
Three massive dark heads rise above a body built from shadow and flame.
Smoke curls from his fur. Each of his six eyes burns with the same red-orange fire that fills the Pit and illuminates the deepest caverns beneath Tartarus.
Most beings with even a vague instinct for self-preservation avoid him, even though he really is just like a mortal dog when you don’t mess with him. And, like any good dog, he wants his master’s attention.
Over the last eighty years, Cerberus has never cared whether I want his company. Which is why, when his center head lowers, nudging my shoulder with enough force to move me half a step, I frown at him.
“Oh? So you leave your post, and I’m the one in trouble?”
His left head shakes. The center head whines.
I blink. Cerberus… Cerberus doesn’t whine. He barks and he growls and he guards the gate to the Underworld fiercely. But whine?
My confusion—and concern—is sudden enough that I give Hades the opportunity to take control.
Next thing I know, the shadows around me come flocking to my body.
Because I refuse to wear anything but the same style of suit I’d arrived in the Other in, the shadows match the black perfectly—until they slither up, covering my pale hands, my pale throat, my pale cheeks.
My eyes blaze; I know from Zeus that when Hades is in control, they turn white, glaring out of the dark shadows.