Chapter 23 Ophelia
Ophelia
I try to close the door, but Mother Callista is stronger than she appears, and her hand snaps out, stopping me immediately.
I push against it, but she barely presses against the old wood, and I'm falling backwards, allowing her room to enter.
"Sweetheart," she coos, her voice slightly different than I recall from the flower shop. "How I've missed you."
My blood turns to ice.
"How the fuck did you find me?" I don't move. Don't even breathe too loudly. My mind races through possibilities — did she follow me? Track me somehow? Did the cult have this place under surveillance all along?
I'm kicking myself for allowing my emotions to cloud my judgement. I knew it wasn't safe, and yet I'd allowed myself to forget that.
And I played right into her hands.
"I'll always find you, Persephone," she reaches for me, and I grab the baseball bat that I keep by the door, brandishing it.
"Don't come any closer." I swing slightly.
She jumps back, agile despite her old age. Her lips turn down, and she's frowning. "I suppose this is understandable, considering —"
"Considering you're trying to kill me, yeah, I'd say so."
She tuts, scolding me like I'm a child. "I would never kill you, darling. You're my daughter."
Her words stop me mid-swing. "Excuse me?" I remember my mother, and she was a lot younger than Mother Callista. But I can't ignore the magic at play here.
"Hades has been filling your head with such nonsense, but I assure you, Persephone, I've never meant you any harm. I know that you are scared —"
"I'm pissed," I snap.
She smiles. "I heard you were quite fiery in this modern world. I must say it is interesting to see, my flower."
My flower. A memory snaps into place. A woman brushing my hair, weaving daisies and baby's breath into a braid. "I love you, my flower."
The bat droops in my hands in shock. Zeus warned us, but I didn't listen. "Demeter?"
Her smile is wide and bright. "I knew you would sense it."
I move backwards, stumbling slightly. "How?" I swallow thickly. "How are you here?"
"It's an ancient story," she says, gesturing towards the couch. "It would be more comfortable if we could talk inside."
"So your cultists can kidnap me without witnesses? No."
"I'm alone."
I snort. "You're a Goddess," I remind her. "I don't think you need an entourage."
She frowns, her eyes turning hard as marbles in anger.
Now I can see the power in them, similar to how I see it in Hades.
There's a spark there that isn't quite mortal.
"I do not have access to my divine powers in this form.
" She crosses her arms over her chest, irritation clear on her face.
"If I did, I would not need to be skulking around, waiting for you to be alone. "
I breathe a small sigh of relief. Demeter is bound, and somehow, instinctively, I know it's a good thing. Still, I hold the bat tightly, just in case.
"You've got two minutes," I take a step backwards, allowing her to enter. "And if you try anything, I'll turn your lungs into rosebushes."
"Thank you," she says softly, stepping inside. Her eyes scan the apartment, landing on the threadbare couch. She frowns. "Oh, sweetheart. You've been suffering so much."
"Cut the concerned mother act." I snap. "You don't need to pretend. I know what you want."
She holds her hands up in a placating gesture, eyes wide and open, full of motherly love. "I know you're angry. You have every right to be. But Ophelia, I need you to understand — everything we did, we did to protect you, to bring us back together, as we've always meant to be."
"Protect me?" The laugh that tears from my throat is ugly. "You're planning to have Zeus rape me and turn me into a living incubator."
"No." She shakes her head firmly. "We were going to save you."
I snort. "Sure, okay." I roll my eyes like a petulant teen, but Demeter is full of shit.
"By reuniting you with your mother. Just like you wanted."
The words hang in the air between us.
"What are you talking about?"
"The bond between mother and daughter is sacred," Callista says.
"Divine. When the gods fell, when worship faded and power began to die, I was one of the first to weaken.
The goddess of harvest and growth, reduced to nothing as humanity turned away from me and towards technology.
" Her voice cracks. "I was fading. Dying.
And you, Persephone," she reaches a shaky hand towards me, but she doesn't connect with my skin. "You couldn't bear to lose me."
"Stop." But my voice lacks conviction. I can feel the truth in her words. I've always longed for a mother, and I can only imagine the lengths a daughter would go to keep the one she had.
"Hades wanted you to let it go, let me go," her voice is angry, bitter. "He grew so angry when you stayed on Earth, scared to go back to the Underworld. You were fearful he'd lock you away, and you'd never be able to see me again."
I swallow, because I can see that, even if I don't remember it. I was scared that Hades would lock me away in the Underworld to keep control of me. It was not an unreasonable fear.
"We performed a ritual," Demeter continues. "Ancient magic. Forbidden magic. You tied your divine essence to mine. Bound your life force to your mother's so that as long as you existed, I would too." Her eyes are wet now, genuine emotion breaking through. "You sacrificed yourself to save me."
"No." I shake my head. This all feels like too much. Like a scam. "Hades said —"
She laughs sardonically, shaking her head. "Hades is a liar," she snaps. "He says whatever he wants to get you to believe in him. He always has."
I look away because though her words aren't the whole truth, there is truth in them.
"I'm sure that he told you that you loved him more than anything. That you chose him over me. But how could you choose him when your very existence was anchored to life, and he is nothing but death? He wanted to isolate you, get you away from me, and this was his opportunity."
My breath catches.
"That's why you faded," Demeter says — I've stopped being able to think of her as Mother Callista. "That's why you died two thousand years ago. Not because of the Fall of Olympus. Not because worship ended. But because Hades killed me, Demeter, your mother."
The room tilts. "He wouldn't do that."
"He would," she says, each word precise and devastating. "And in doing so, he murdered you. The bond you created, the sacrifice you made out of love, became your death sentence. Because he couldn't stand sharing you with anyone. Not even the woman who gave you life."
"Hades wouldn't do anything to harm Persephone. He loved her." But doubt is creeping in, cold and terrible, because Hades had lied to me. Maybe it wasn't an outright mistruth, but he omitted information because he didn't trust me to make my own decisions.
Demeter's smile is sad. "You've seen his obsession. His possessiveness. Do you really think he'd let anything stand between you and him? Even your own mother?"
I want to argue. Want to call her crazy and throw her out. But I remember the way Hades looked when he talked about Demeter. The careful way he avoided certain questions. The way he lied to me about the prophecy.
Maybe there was more to it than just the prophecy.
"I don't believe you," I say, but it sounds weak even to my own ears.
"Then let me show you."
Demeter reaches out slowly, giving me time to pull away. When I don't, when I stand there frozen by doubt and desperate need to know the truth, her fingers brush my temple.
The world explodes into memory.
I'm standing in a temple I don't recognize. White marble. Gold accents. Wheat stalks woven into every surface. My mother, Demeter, sits on a throne that's crumbling at the edges, her divine form flickering like a candle in the wind.
"Please," she whispers. "Please, my daughter. I don't want to fade."
My heart is breaking. I can feel it, this ancient grief that transcends lifetimes. "We will find another way."
"The ritual —"
I glance over, looking at the real Mother Callista. "The ritual is dangerous."
"But it will work?" I ask. I'm trying to be brave, but I feel myself wavering. I don't quite understand everything, and I'm terrified of my husband's reaction. Hades warned me that there was more to something like this than what my mother was telling me.
"If you do this, you'll be bound to me forever."
I smile, trying to be reassuring. "We are already bound, mother. Your divine essence is part of me."
She looks away, and I can tell that she is angry. "His is stronger."
I sigh. Is this to be my eternity? A life stuck between my mother and husband?
"You're my mother," I say simply. "I love you, and we will find a way, but —"
I slam back into my body, gasping as the memory dissolves.
Demeter catches me as my knees give out. "Easy. Easy, sweetheart. I know it's overwhelming."
"That was real." The words come out choked. "That was my memory."
"Yes." She helps me to the couch, her touch gentle.
"You loved me as much as I did you. You sacrificed everything for me.
And when Hades found out about the bond, when he realized you'd tied yourself to me, he couldn't accept it.
Couldn't accept that your love for your mother might be as strong as your love for him. "
I'm shaking. The memory is still fresh in my mind — that overwhelming love I felt for Demeter. The desperate need to save her. It felt real. It felt true.
"So he killed me," Demeter continues softly. "Thinking he could break the bond. Free you from the obligation. But divine magic doesn't work that way. When I died, the tether pulled you down with me. You faded. Died. And he lost everything."
"But I'm here," I whisper. "I'm alive. How —"