11. Persephone
Persephone
The blood-stained teeth were barely a foot from us when white light flashed.
For the first time since coming to this damned forsaken place, I couldn't have been more grateful for that light. It meant I was being transported somewhere else, and there was literally nowhere at that moment that could be worse.
I found myself on Poseidon's throne room floor again, dry and on my ass. I moved to stand as the light cleared from my vision, but immediately dropped back to the stone floor. My leg...
The wound on my ankle was turning black, the torn leather of my pants revealing how swollen it was. As I reached out to touch it new fear and pain blazed through me.
I couldn't move my hands, and pain was lancing up my arms from my wrists with such intensity I could barely focus on anything else.
“You used the wrong gem,” boomed Poseidon, and I blinked up at him. He was standing in front of his throne, the eleven other gods behind him, just as they had been before I'd started the Trial. His face was different somehow, like he was straining against something.
“Where's Buddy?” I asked, before I could stop myself. Poseidon inclined his head a touch. “The way you treated my hippocampus was commendable. He is safe.”
“Good. What do you mean I used the wrong gem?” I said through clenched teeth, trying to flex my fingers. Nothing but pain, shooting up my forearms. I felt sick.
“That gem was not the same as the other two in the trident. They were turquoise and the one you found was blue. The correct gem was in the other room. You may now be judged.”
My mouth fell open, but as I started to argue I was cut off.
“And so to the judges!” the commentator's voice sang out from behind me. I swiveled around on my butt, not giving a shit how it made me look.
I couldn't stand, and I couldn't use my hands. Standing and falling on my face would look a lot worse. My head swam as I looked at the judges, fresh waves of pain stabbing through me. “Radamanthus?”
“No tokens,” the cheerful judge smiled at me. I felt the fury morphing my face.
“Aeacus?”
“No tokens,” the serious man said.
“Minos?”
“No tokens.”
I glared at them as they vanished, injustice pounding through me, then the world flashed white once more.
I wasn't in my own room when the light faded. I was on a bed though, and I looked around warily, anger still rolling through me in waves, every pulse of pain tearing through my arms and leg making it worse.
I got past a snake and that freaking sea monster and got nothing at all for it?
This was complete and total bullshit! You don't want to win, what the hell are you angry about?
The rational voice inside me cut through the fury.
And it was right. I didn't want to win, I just wanted to survive. This was a good outcome.
But it didn't feel good. In fact, I didn't feel good.
A fuzzy feeling overcame me as I tried to take in my surroundings, and my vision abruptly turned bleary.
“Is she alright?” said an urgent male voice, and I tried to look for the source but instead felt the top half of my body collapsing on the pillows behind me.
“I don't know, get out of the damned way!” answered a female voice that my brain barely registered as Hecate's, before I blacked out completely.
“You know, you should stop passing out after every Trial. It's not a great look.”
I sat up quickly, and Hecate leaped backward before I accidentally head-butted her.
“My hands!” I said, fear making my skin crawl. I hadn't been able to use my hands... I raised them fast, and watched my fingers flex in relief. They were working, and they didn't hurt at all.
“They're fine now. Your vines broke both your wrists, that's all.”
I looked at her incredulously.
“That's all? Are you serious?”
“Yeah I'm serious. You just needed a rest to fix those, the venom in your ankle was a totally different story. That shit nearly killed you.”
“R-really?”
“Yeah. Good job one of the most powerful gods in the world has a soft spot for you,” she said, with a little wink.
“Hades?”
“He healed you. He'll get in some serious shit if anyone finds out, but to be honest I'm not sure what else Zeus can do to him.” She sighed and sat down on the edge of my bed. It was narrow and I looked around as I processed her words. Hades had healed me.
“Where am I?”
“Infirmary.”
I nodded. That explained the metal cabinets lining the walls and the three other single beds.
“Where's Skop?”
“Hades wouldn't let him in here. Doesn't want Dionysus to know he healed you.”
“So... Are the other gods expecting me to die from the snake venom?” I asked. My tummy rumbled loudly. I was freaking ravenous.
“Nah, he'll make up some story about an apothecary having the right antidote. Which will exist somewhere, but we didn't have time to find it.”
“Thanks. Again. For saving me.”
“I did nothing. This one was all up to the boss,” she said, but the smile she gave me was as real as any I'd seen. “I know you're not gonna like this, but we have to go to Poseidon's party.”
“You're fucking kidding.” My stomach twisted as I stared at her. I needed some time to get over the fact that I apparently almost died. Again.
“I'm not. He told the world publicly that if you survived he would host a feast in your honor. So that's what he's doing, and you have to be there.”
“I got no damned tokens! I failed!”
“But you did survive. So get dressed.”
Hecate gave me a long yellow dress to wear, which was fairly plain except for the white daisies that adorned the skirt. I accepted her offer to magic my make-up and hair into something presentable, and sat still while her eyes glowed milky white opposite me.
This was ludicrous. They would have let me die for this damned competition.
And they tricked me with a fucking fake gem.
I mean, seriously, who would have noticed that it was a slightly different color?
Anyone who took the time to look properly, answered the critical voice inside me that I'd spent years trying to squash. I felt my eyes narrow as I huffed.
“They're a bunch of fuckwits,” I announced, and the white leaked away from Hecate's eyes.
“Yup. You're all done.” There was no mirror to hand, but I trusted her.
She'd made me look great before. “Except Hades,” she added, moving to the door.
“He's less of a fuckwit than most of the others.” A thrill danced across my skin at hearing his name and I stopped myself from rolling my eyes. I needed to get over this. Now.
I followed Hecate through the door into a long corridor lit with torches. They burned a normal orange color, no blue fire, like the Underworld.
“Did you know it was the wrong gem?” I asked Hecate, unable to shift the anger I still felt about being duped.
“Well, it was pretty obvious that you had to get something from the dark room. The other one was too easy.”
“Easy?” I stopped in my tracks, eyebrows raised as high as they would go. “Easy? That snake nearly killed me!”
“Yeah but the dark room was so bad you couldn't stand it for more than a minute. It was obviously the worse of the two.” I resumed my stride down the corridor, almost stamping after her, my fists clenched.
“This place is bullshit,” I seethed.
“So you keep saying. You know, you might end up offending some of the inhabitants if you carry on like this.”
“Most of the inhabitants are dickheads,” I snapped.
“I'm gonna take it you don't mean me,” Hecate answered slowly, blue light flickering around her dangerously. A trickle of alarm ran through my anger.
“No! Gods no, of course not.”
“Good. Although I can be a total bitch,” she said, with a small shrug as her blue light faded.
I didn't doubt it.
At the end of the corridor was a short flight of stairs leading down, and when we reached the bottom my rage abruptly abated as I took in where we were.
We were entering one of the tunnels I had seen earlier that connected the domes of Aquarius. And it was truly breathtaking.
The whole tunnel was clear, offering an unhindered view of the glowing gold domes all around us. I could see much more clearly what was inside the closest one now; white and bronze buildings surrounding a bustling courtyard filled with stalls.
Most of the people I could make out were humans and they were wearing Asian style clothing, brightly colored saris and fabric everywhere.
“Aquarius is famous for jewelry markets,” Hecate said, stopping to let me stand and stare.
“We're on the east side, which is the shopping district.
The west side of the city is more formal, all meeting halls and grand temples.
And in the north the domes get bigger and more sparse because they're all farms.”
“Farms?”
“Yeah. Poseidon likes to be self-sustaining down here, so he has farms. I don't know how much of his power it uses growing stuff down here, but that's what he does. He doesn't trust the other gods.”
“He doesn't trust me either,” I mumbled, staring through the water at the beautiful underwater city. “Why is he so moody?”
“I'm guessing being Zeus' brother will do that to anyone after an eternity. Hades—” she started, but stopped. I turned to her and she bit down on her lip.
“Go on...”
“Hades deals with Zeus in a different way,” she said slowly. “And he has more reason to dislike Zeus than Poseidon ever has.”
“Why?”
Hecate sighed.
“It really should be Hades telling you this,” she said, but continued.
“When Zeus rescued his siblings from Cronos and led the war against the Titans he became Lord of the Gods by default. And when handing out almighty roles in the new world, he made sure he became ruler of the Skies. The two most powerful remaining realms he gave to his brothers. The Ocean and the Underworld. One a place of life-giving, flowing power, the other a place of dark and terrifying misery.”
“Hades didn't choose to be King of the Underworld?” I breathed. Hecate shook her head sadly.
“No. He didn't. Zeus made the decisions. The three brothers took on the epic powers required of them to rule their domains. Poseidon gained ultimate control of water, Zeus of storms and sky and Hades... He is not a god of death. Thanatos is the god of death. But Hades was forced to become the only thing that could rule over and control the kingdom of the dead.”
“A monster,” I whispered, the hairs on my arms standing on end.
“Yes. He had to become more feared than any other god. It's not just the dead that reside in the Underworld, it's also home to the world’s most dangerous gods and monsters, who have been trapped in Tartarus. If they or the dead rose... Olympus would fall.”
My mind was spinning as I tried to imagine a Hades who wasn't surrounded by smoke and death, a Hades who ruled the seas or the skies instead of the Underworld. Would he be different?
Hell, I hardly knew anything about him now, how would I even know? And it wasn't like Zeus and Poseidon weren't terrifying in their own right. To an extent, they were all monsters.
“So, does he hate his brothers?” I asked. Was he an outcast? Memories of crying in my bunk in my parents' trailer flickered through my mind unbidden. I knew how it felt to be an outcast. I knew how differently people treated you.
“You'd have to ask him that. I certainly wouldn't call them friends. But Hades isn't stupid. Over the years he's aligned himself with the few beings in this world stronger than Zeus.”
“Oceanus?” I said, remembering what Skop had told me about Zeus being pissed that the ocean god was back.
Hecate looked at me in surprise.
“Yes. How'd you know that?”
“Skop. Oceanus is a Titan, right? Like you?”
“Yeah, except like a bazillion times more powerful than me. He, Prometheus, Atlas, Nyx, Helios, and a bunch of other Titans stayed neutral in the war. They mostly keep a low profile or have vanished though. Zeus despises Titans. But Oceanus returned recently.”
“So how come he hasn't taken the sea back from Poseidon?”
“It doesn't work like that,” Hecate said, and began walking down the tunnel. I followed after her. “Poseidon rules this realm, not all the oceans. Sure, he has power over water, but he doesn't own it. Hephaestus' realm is under the sea too, made up of huge volcanic forges.”
“Oh. Can a god have more than one realm?”
“Funny you should mention that,” she said. “No.” I waited for her to go on, but she stayed silent, our sandals on the glass tunnel the only sound.
“Why is it funny?” I prompted eventually.
“Talk to Hades about it. I'm sure you'll understand it better coming from him.”
I rolled my eyes, but the truth was that I was secretly longing for any excuse to talk to him.