Chapter fifty-one Persephone
Chapter fifty-one
Persephone
“How are you faring here?” Hades asked as we left the building behind. I was grateful to have sky above me, even if it were overcast and tinged slightly green. He strolled with his hands casually linked behind his back as if he’d not a care in the world. “Hecate told me you seem sad. Despondent.”
Fucking Hecate. Of course she would be his little spy.
“I’m well enough.” I paused, scrambling for the right words. “This place, it’s…”
“It’s dark and dreary, I know,” he said in a voice that made my insides twist, turning away from me as if in shame. “The Underworld is a bit of an acquired taste for many.”
“Actually, I think it’s hauntingly beautiful.” If I had been asked my thoughts a week ago or more, I would have had a much harsher answer. But today, I surprised myself by meaning it. “Peaceful in a strange way. Like a well-kept burial ground in the mortal realm.”
“A burial ground?” His surprise was evident.
“In the town where Mother and I resided, I tended them. I ensured all the headstones had flowers on them, especially those that had worn and faded with time. The ones nobody visited.” I could see them so clearly, the dull grey stone against an even greyer, more dismal sky.
So many names had worn. Faded. Forgotten.
I had dutifully embellished each headstone with floral vines of honeysuckle or wisteria, each bursting with vibrant hues to combat the storm of grey.
My vines surrounded each headstone with flowers until the land resembled a well-tended garden more than a graveyard.
I could have spelled my flowers never to wilt, but the beauty in honoring the dead was showing up.
Every month’s beginning, I would will to life new flowers in new colors, just for them.
Sometimes lilac, so the dead could smell the sweetness.
Sometimes larkspur to paint the dreary grey away for them.
Blue forget-me-nots tangled between the graves, never missing a single one.
Occasionally, weeping families would thank me.
Far more often, I found myself utterly alone amongst the persistent grey ruin, much like the forgotten headstones.
Hades looked deep in thought, though the ghost of a smile touched his lips as I continued, “The best way to honor those who pass is to remember them. And if we can’t remember, or if we never knew them, the next best thing is to honor their resting place.
” I couldn’t help but feel sheepish at my admission, but Hades’s smile widened, so small a movement I nearly missed it.
“It makes me miss my garden back home. Why are you smiling?”
“Because I think my surprise couldn’t have been more perfectly timed.”
Hades’ chariot awaited us, drawn by two black horses with manes and tails of black flame. Their strangely intelligent eyes glittered like hot coals, the color changing and morphing moment by moment.
“These are my horses, as promised. Aetheon,” Hades gestured to the horse on the left who stamped his hooves impatiently, “and Alastor.”
“Blazing and Avenger, in the common tongue?” I mused, hoping with excitement that they might take a bit kinder to me than Cerberus did at first.
Hades shrugged sheepishly. “These names sounded like they belonged to the King of the Underworld, what can I say?”
I didn’t mean giggle, but that was just not what I expected him to say.
“Okay, okay, pet the horses and get in the chariot,” he admonished, but his tone held very little bite to it this time.
He himself made no move to climb into the chariot, standing with me by the closest horse to me, Aetheon.
“They’re not so discerning as Cerberus. They’d let even the worst of beings pet them if they have an apple. ”
“But I don’t—” Suddenly, my hand was filled with something hard and round. An apple there.
“Your mother told me you loved horses,” Hades said by way of explanation, with a shrug like it was no big deal.
“Mother is well?” I didn’t mean to round on him, hungry for any detail from her. His smile stayed in place.
“She’s fine. Pissed off a lot of the time, but honestly, I’d be more concerned if she wasn’t. She and Zeus are fielding plans of attack in the Overworld.”
I huffed a laugh. “Hera must love that.”
Hades burst out laughing the way one laughs when they genuinely weren’t expecting to, the sound easing the tightness in my chest a fraction as I held the apple out to Aetheon.
I grinned in delight when his greedy lips found it with several big crunches.
When half of the apple had been devoured, I gave the other half to a very impatient Alastor.
“I’m sorry to make you wait, friend.” I stroked his neck by way of apology, careful to avoid the flames of his mane, but enjoying the way the heat drove the chill from my hands. “I’ll try to score you both another one later.” Aetheon stamped his front leg as if to say, Another now!
I lovingly gave him a final pat before moving towards the chariot where Hades waited with an outstretched hand.
I took it, stepping up. It was odd being up here, feeling every movement the horses made however small.
The handrail at the front was most welcome.
My loose, easy grip quickly white knuckled when Hades gave the order to take off.
With a toss of their heads and a cry, they eagerly did so, taking us to the skies.
Hades took pity on me, placing me in front of him and his arms on either side of me, securing me with his body. His very warm body. It was cold as death up here, which I supposed made sense.
Up here, I could see the eerie green of the River Styx winding around House Hades, and the black shores of the Acheron lapping on the other.
The Lethe wound between them and away into the horizon, taking all memory with it.
I wondered if it eventually joined the Mnemosyne, the River of Memory.
If that were how the shades got their memory back one day, when the two rivers joined.
If that weren’t it, I didn’t want to know.
I didn’t want to ruin the imagery there that was in its own way beautiful.
Mountains wreathed in mist and shadow anchored the landscape, but massive pockets of mist encompassed the endless range beyond. It was magical. Incredible. Infinite.
“Hades take me.” The old mortal adage escaped my lips on a whisper, a habit that was hard to drop. I didn’t miss his responding chuckle vibrating the surrounding air.
“If you’re offering, I don’t know if I can refuse.” His breath warmed my ear, sending the butterflies in my stomach into a frenzy. I masked the flush of my cheeks with a haughty toss of my hair over my shoulder, forcing him to ease back.
“Don’t flatter yourself, God of the Dead. I was admiring the view, not auditioning to play a part in your bed.”
“I’m wounded, little shadow. Here I thought you were finally confessing your undying devotion and admitting your obsession.”
“Should you ever be lucky enough for me to offer, I promise you, you won’t be laughing.” My voice dropped an octave, something that would make Aphrodite herself proud. “You’ll be too busy.”
Hades’s responding chuckle was dark and luscious, rife with something deliciously wicked. “Gods above, when did you learn to say such filthy things?” Hades chided with raised brows as we streaked through the sky. “One might think you’re not so innocent as you present yourself, spring goddess.”
As hot as the flames behind us scorching through the shadows, the tension heating the air between us was a blazing scorch. He was so close, his body a whisper away from mine, making every part we almost connected tingle with anticipation.
“I have no idea what you’re talking about.
I’m admiring the scenery, not the skeletons in your closet.
” My tone came out breathy, as if in complete awe of our surroundings, which wasn’t far from true.
In reality, my lungs refused to cooperate with Hades’s closeness.
Every inch where we almost touched burned, like a demand that we collide.
A demand to which I refused to yield.
“If you like skeletons, you’re in luck. This is the Underworld, after all.”
“I think you’re too used to flattery, Hades,” I teased. “Mortal sayings are dangerous enough without you bending them to fit your will.”
“What about you?” He pressed closer as he breathed into my ear, making me shiver. “Can I bend you to my will?”
Gods above and below. I gripped the chariot to keep my thoughts grounded. Thoughts of flowers. Of peaceful hours spent by the Styx with Cerberus’s heads lolling on my lap. Anything but the warmth of God of the Dead behind me. Anything but the rush his proximity coaxed from me.
“That sounds like someone is going to throw their back out,” I mused. I was ecstatic in how calm my voice sounded, in direct opposition to my pulse pounding in my ears. “And with your advanced age, it’s probably going to be you.”
His barked laugh elicited one of my own as we soared across the sky. Aetheon swished his head in a way that felt very intentional. As if to say, Get a room.
We streaked along the Acheron River, so immensely wide that from the shore I couldn’t see the other side.
Now that we were in the air, I saw why. A legion of white specters wandered the coastline, a display that was eerily silent.
With that many beings, there should’ve been the crunch of boots, the hum of voices, but none existed.
“What are those?” I asked, fairly certain I knew the answer.
“Souls awaiting to be brought across by Charon,” Hades said, confirming my suspicions. There had to be tens of thousands, if not millions of souls, all vying for a place on the boat that might hold about one hundred. “Essentially feral shades.”
“Why are there so many? So many that have no peace.”
“They carry no coins for Charon, so they must wait one hundred years before crossing as penance.”
The shade from earlier who said he’d waited a hundred years….
“That’s barbaric!” I cried. “It’s not their fault they don’t have coins. If nobody buried or entombed them with them. Can we drop some, or something? Anything to help them?”
Hades’s look was sympathetic.
“I cannot favor some souls and not others. Part of being the king means being impartial. They’re not treated poorly. Most of them aren’t entirely sentient, dreaming of still being alive.”
“They don’t know they’re dead?”
“It’s a kindness,” Hades explained. “Would you want to wake up here and be stuck on the bank of the Acheron for a century with nothing to do? Most of the souls are already half mad, this would only torment them in their fragile state.”
“Are they dangerous?”
“Gravely.” He pointed to where Charon’s boat was nearly to the shore on Hades’s side of the Acheron.
“These souls are feral. Half crazed, some more than when they dock. They’re unpredictable until they’re integrated and calmed.
Dangerous,” he repeated my word I’d chosen with heavy foreboding.
“Please, Persephone, never go down to the docks or the shore of the Acheron. That is a shore where the only living soul is supposed to be me. Promise me.”
“I promise,” I assured him, covering his hand with mine without thinking.
Muttering an apology, I pulled my hand away, but his chased it down, entwining our fingers and pinning it back to the rail, all without outwardly acknowledging the gesture.
A flush rose to my cheeks and my stomach was doing somersaults that had nothing to do with the motion of the carriage.
“Do you trust me, spring goddess?” he asked, looking suspiciously like he was up to no good.
“Depends on the context,” I admitted, enjoying the way his grin widened at my honesty. “Right now? Not in the least.”
His devious grin lit him from within.
“Let go of the chariot,” He whispered. I gaped up at him. “You showed me your brand of chaos. Let me show you mine.” When I hesitated, he squeezed my hand where we were still connected before letting go. “I’ll never let you fall.”
The words rang heavy with a gravity of their own, sounding far more dire than he’d likely meant it, but my breathing stopped nonetheless.
Slowly, cautiously, I let go of the chariot, bending my knees to absorb the movement the chariot made on the wind.
Hades’s arms boldly held me trapped against the front of chariot, leaving me brave enough to stick my hands out to the sides—like there was no chariot and we took flight on wings of my own.
I’d always strived to do the right thing.
The good thing. The safe thing. The thrill driving through my veins was entirely new, and I couldn’t help but let out a victory cry as we soared through the skies of the Underworld, sweeping left, right, up and down.
The horses joined in my joy as if they felt it too.
And when I looked up at the male behind me, his smile had lost most of its edge.
He looked almost happy.
Almost.