Chapter 2
Persephone
If it weren't for the fiercely strong grip Hades had over my emotions, I would have begged Hecate to take me back to New York the second my eyes cleared.
We were standing in a cavern similar to the Empusa's lair, except it was much bigger, the walls glowing deep red and the smell almost unbearable.
There were bodies everywhere. Few of them appeared to be human, but all of them looked as though they had been ripped apart by an animal. Trying desperately to ignore my roiling stomach, I scanned the gruesome space for Hades but saw only corpses.
“Shit, he's moved,” muttered Hecate, then I heard heaving and retching. I turned, and felt the blood drain from my face as I saw my brother, spewing his guts up onto the cavern floor.
“Sam? Hecate, why the fuck did you bring him here?”
“I told you he could come with us, now shut up,” she said, and her eyes turned white as she glowed blue. “Shit, shit, shit, he's nearly at the mouth of Tartarus, she said, and grabbed and me and Sam, before flashing again.
The river of fire we'd been transported to flared into life beside us, but I didn't even notice it.
Hades was monstrous.
There was no other word for him. He was the size of a building as he moved towards the cave mouth, his back to us. His body seemed swollen with hulking muscle, and something black was moving under his skin, licks of smoke coiling from him.
Blue light emanated from his body, but there was no army of defensive corpses forming around him this time. The light was forming a carpet of carnage in his wake, broken bodies with faces twisted in terror surrounding him as he screamed.
“Campe! I'm coming for you!”
I heard a thump behind me, and spun to see Sam collapsed on the ground.
“Hecate, get him out of here, he's human, he'll die!” As I said the words I felt my vines spring to life in my palms.
Without a word Hecate knelt to grab my brother, and they disappeared.
“You're next, Cronos!” bellowed Hades.
“Hades!” I yelled, as loudly as I could. He didn't falter, only a foot from the cave mouth now. “Hades!” I tried again, and launched my vines at him. Just as his foot moved into the darkness, my black vines wrapped around his enormous shoulders.
Darkness consumed me completely.
Kill. Die. Fear. Burn. Blood.
The words hammered through my head and I gasped, dropping to one knee.
There was no light, only sparks of life flaring in my vision, calling to me.
They needed to be extinguished.
Everything needed to die.
Fear always won.
It could not be conquered.
Death was the only certainty.
“Persephone?” The voice was strained, but light crept back into the edges of my vision as the sound of my name filtered through to me. “Persephone, is that really you?”
“Yes,” I gritted out, unable to see him, but sure it was Hades speaking. “You have to stop.”
“I can't. I can't.”
“Please. I feel it now. The bond. Can't you?” Hot tears streamed down my cheeks as wave after wave of hatred and violence crashed down the vines, flowing into me, poisoning me.
Kill. Kill them all. Tear them apart. Leave nothing. None of them deserve to live.
“The monster inside me is too strong. It will always win.” Hades’ voice was suddenly hard and cold, and the little light seeped away again fast.
“No! You can fight it, you're not a monster!” I shouted, but the torrent of fury coming from him said differently.
He was worse than a monster.
He didn't just want to destroy, he wanted to torture. To ruin, to break, to brutalize.
I had to sever the connection to him, I had to remove my vines.
I couldn't take his power, couldn't handle the fearsomely brutal desires.
He had told me that he was too strong for me to ever steal his power, and he had been right. There was too much, it could flow endlessly into me and he would still be just as strong.
It felt like he was filling me with his wrath, and every second I held on I lost more of myself. Why did my power do this? Why couldn't I take the fury away from him, instead of turning myself into something just as awful?
The gold vines. The thought powered through the cascade of furious darkness. The gold vines did the opposite of the black ones.
I willed the vines that I could no longer see to turn from black to gold, clinging desperately to the remnants of my infatuation with him, the strength of my connection to him, the desire to make him happy, content, loved.
I recalled everything Hecate had told me about him, how he'd given up parts of himself to serve Olympus, how he had been forced to become this beast by his brother.
I filled my head with the feeling of his lips on mine, his hands on my skin, his beautiful silver eyes, always so filled with emotion when he looked at me.
He had created life.
As much of him that craved death and destruction wanted life and light. I could give that to him.
I poured my power into my vines, praying it was reaching him.
“Persephone.”
I opened my eyes and gasped, shocked by the light.
I focused on Hades, and took in a deep breath.
He was still huge, but the blue glow and all the bodies had gone.
The new light was coming from the gold vines stretching from me to him, morphing into shining tattoos that coiled around his shoulders and chest, covering almost all of his skin.
His eyes were fixed on mine, silver and stunning and haunted.
“Hades,” I breathed. “You're back.”
“So are you,” he croaked, and thudded to his knees.