Chapter 30 Ophelia
Ophelia
I hold up my hands.
They're sticky with Hades's blood. Dark and still warm. The ash of what used to be him clings to my palms, mixing with the crimson until I can't tell where one ends and the other begins.
He's gone.
The thought should break me. It should send me spiraling into the kind of grief that shatters worlds.
Instead, I feel nothing.
No.
Not nothing.
Rage.
Deep, deep fucking rage.
How fucking dare Demeter take Hades from me, especially after I just realized I loved him.
"Well." Demeter's voice cuts through the ringing silence. "That went nicely. Now," she claps her hands, as though she were at a sporting event, "let us proceed. Aphrodite—"
Everyone is frozen. The other gods: Hecate, Poseidon, Athena, even Zeus, stand like statues, staring at the place where Hades was. Where ash now settles on ancient stone and blood stains the floor.
I'm on my knees, frozen, staring at where Hades was just seconds ago. I feel like I am having an out of body experience.
Demeter just killed one of the most powerful gods in existence, and it happened in seconds, and now we are all expected to go on like nothing happened.
I'm not going to allow that.
"Give them a dose of your powers," Demeter orders, waving her hand dismissively at Aphrodite. "We've wasted enough time. The ritual needs to be completed before—"
I see a sparkle off in the distance, and I catch sight of my necklace.
The rubies catch my eye, and as I reach for it, the memories hit.
Not gradually. Not gently.
All at once.
A flood of images, sensations, emotions that aren't mine but are—
Running through fields of wheat, young and laughing, my mother's hand in mine.
The first time I saw him. Hades. Dark and terrible and beautiful. I knew immediately that he was mine. He possessed me even the second we met eyes, and he never let go.
The pomegranate seeds. Eating them willingly. Choosing him. Choosing death over the suffocating love of a mother who would never let me go.
Six months in sunlight. Six months in shadow. The perfect balance until it wasn't, until things started to fall apart.
Mother's face when I told her I loved him and wanted to stay, to build an eternity with him, and that I wanted to have his child.
Learning about the fade.
The ritual. Binding my essence to hers because I was desperate, because she was fading, because I thought I could save her without losing myself.
Her lies. My regret.
Dying. Fading. Feeling my divine essence scatter because the bond that should have sustained me instead drained me dry.
And Hades. Always Hades. Loving me through every lifetime. Waiting for me to come back to him.
The memories snap back into my mind, and I am angry. I'm so fucking angry that I literally can't see straight. I'm not Ophelia or Persephone: I'm rage made flesh.
"Why isn't it working?" Demeter's voice sounds uncertain now.
Aphrodite is holding my hand, and I can feel her power, but it's doing nothing. Not that it would. She can't reach me.
I squeeze her hand, reassuring her, and I stand.
The movement is fluid. Controlled.
"Ophelia—"
"Stop calling me that." My voice doesn't sound like mine. It's colder. Harder. "Actually, no. Keep calling me that. Because I'm not your daughter anymore. I'm not Persephone, but I'm not a vessel or a shade or a replacement."
I look up at her, and I feel it. Power. Life. Death. It's all there. Whatever was blocking me is gone.
"I'm the thing you created when you refused to let go."
I inhale deeply, and I swear I smell lilies and ash.
Life itself pulses in my chest. I feel it all. Every root system. Every flower. Every single bit of life in the desert.
And I pull.
Plants erupt from the stone floor.
Not the careful, controlled growth I've managed before. This is violent. Primal. Vines as thick as tree trunks tear through marble like it is paper, reaching for the ceiling, the walls, spreading across every surface with terrifying speed.
Roses bloom in seconds: blood-red with sharp thorns, beautiful and deadly.
Energy pours into me, and I feel my power settle into place. Not borrowed. Not stolen. Mine.
Life and death.
Spring and shadow.
"That's impossible." Demeter backs away, her restored youth flickering at the edges. "You shouldn't — the wards are blocking divine power. You should still be mortal. You should be—"
"What?" I take a step forward, and vines move with me, reaching for her. "Weak? Helpless? A vessel for your delusions?"
The vines wrap around her waist, her arms, her throat. I sink my thorns into her skin, getting satisfaction as I see her bleed.
She gasps as they lift her off the ground, squeezing. I watch her struggle and feel nothing but cold satisfaction.
"How?" she chokes out. "How are you—"
"Because I'm not like you." The vines tighten, and I hear something crack. "I'm not just life. I'm not just death. I'm the cycle itself. The balance. The Fates were able to bring me back because I'm what holds everything together. Hades knew that."
Outside the temple, I hear shouting. Cultists trying to reach their goddess.
I don't even look.
More vines erupt from the earth, forming a barrier around the temple entrance. Roses bloom among them: massive, thorned things that would tear anyone trying to pass through into ribbons.
A cultist tries anyway.
His screams last three seconds.
Then silence. The cultists are smart enough not to try again. Someone shoots at my vines, but I'm jacked up on power and fueled by anger and a grief so intense I barely register it.
"You can't do this," Demeter gasps. She's clawing at the vines around her throat, but they only tighten. "The wards—"
"Don't work on me." I walk closer, tilting my head to study her. "Because I'm not just divine. I'm divinity itself. The Queen of the Underworld and the Goddess of Growth. You can't block what I am."
Her eyes widen. For the first time since I've known her, since Persephone knew her, I see real fear.
"Please." The word comes out strangled. "Please, daughter. I didn't—" She scrambles again. "I was trying to bring you back. To restore us. To—"
"To what?" I lean closer. "To drain me for your own selfishness?"
"I love you."
"No." The vines squeeze harder. "You are incapable of loving anyone but yourself. I failed to realize that all those years ago, and it cost me greatly."
Tears stream down her face. "I just wanted you back. I spent two thousand years—"
"Dormant." I hold up my bloodstained hands.
"And instead of coming back and being content to see me, you took my love from me.
You killed him. You killed Hades. The one person who loved me, who loves me, without conditions.
Without expectations. Without needing me to be anything other than what I am. "
"He corrupted you—"
"He freed me!" The words explode from my chest, and the vines respond, crushing tighter. "From you. From your suffocating love. From the prison of being Demeter's perfect daughter."
She's gasping now, face turning purple. "Please. I don't want to fade. Don't let me fade—"
"Like you let me?" I ask quietly. "Like you drained me dry to sustain yourself? Do not pretend to be anything but what you are, Mother. It's beneath you."
"I have information," she shouts, scrambling to buy herself time. "The Titans—" she chokes out. "The Fates told Hades there would be a price. Please, Persephone. They are coming. I can help you."
I hold up my hand, squeezing harder. Blood flows freely from her, and she's crying out in agony.
"Stop!" Zeus's voice cuts through. He's on his feet now, moving toward us. "Ophelia, stop. We need information. We need to know—"
I do not agree. Demeter will never help, and the Titans are not my problem.
"The price," she's gasping, as she writhes in pain, "they have been released. The price—"
I reach out. My hand has transformed, nails now thorns. I sink them into her chest, right where her heart would be if she had one.
And I pull.
Zeus roars behind me, but he cannot reach me, and I'm focused.
It's instinct. Knowledge that comes from some deep place that's both Ophelia and Persephone and something older than either. The same way I can make things grow, I can make them wither.
Life flows into me.
Hers.
I feel it draining from her body, her divine essence unraveling like thread pulled from cloth. She ages before my eyes: thirty to forty to fifty to ancient. Her restored beauty crumbles, revealing the truth beneath.
She was never whole. Never fully healed. The power she stole from me was just enough to maintain the illusion.
Now even that's gone.
Her skin turns to parchment, then dust. "Daughter."
"I'm not your daughter."
The last of her life flows into me, and then—
Nothing.
The vines holding her collapse as there's nothing left to hold. Dust falls where Demeter stood, scattering across the temple floor like snow.
Silence.
I stand there, filled to the brim with power, and watch my mother fade.
I lower my hand slowly.
Behind me, I hear someone gasp. Hecate, maybe. Or Athena.
Zeus says nothing, but I can feel his rage.
Aphrodite is crying. I can hear her sobbing from where she's collapsed against the wall, finally released from Demeter's blood debt.
I look down at my hands. They are normal now, and yet I feel uneasy. My skin itches with the power.
I turn to face the others.
They're all staring at me with varying expressions of shock, fear, awe.
I feel nothing.
Just cold.
Just empty.
"The wards are down." My voice feels far away. "Whatever was blocking you ended with Demeter."
"Ophelia—" Hecate starts. She reaches toward me.
"Don't touch me." I'm panting. The power is bubbling beneath me, it needs an outlet.
Release me. Release me.
I fall to my knees. I hear Hecate yell for me, but I'm being overtaken by pain.
I cry out. Not tears but shadows stream down my face. Shades rise from the desert floor and wrap themselves around me.
Release me. Release me.
There's pressure on my lungs. I dig my nails into the sand and lie there, pouring all my life into the earth.
It's not painful. In fact, it's relief. That power, that divinity, was corrupting me, and now it's back where it belongs.
In the earth, making dust into flesh. Bringing death back to life.
But it takes something from me, and I feel my eyes grow heavy with weariness.
The last thing I register is roses.
I smell roses.