Chapter Forty-Nine Hades
Chapter Forty-Nine
Hades
It had been ages since Hades visited the Ellenes’ apartment in New York.
When the elevator doors opened into the penthouse, he took a curious step forward, holding a lavish arrangement of flowers.
It might have been a while, but he knew better than to show up at Hera’s home empty-handed.
Especially when Hephaestus was still in critical condition, weeks after the accident on Ismene Island.
Hades had seen it all unfold, of course.
He had strolled into the candlelit ballroom at Ismene along with everyone else, dressed in his tuxedo, a blood-red poppy tucked into his pocket.
The other gods had cast him a few curious glances, then shrugged and ignored him, consumed by speculation about Ares and Julia, and eventually, Julia’s tardiness.
When Ares had announced that Julia was missing, Hades had quietly twisted his ring, making himself invisible. He had a feeling that the fireworks were about to start.
And what a fireworks display it had turned out to be.
Hades hadn’t anticipated how, exactly, this would play out. He’d only known the prophecy about Julia, a prophecy he intended to use for his own purposes. He could never have guessed that Aphrodite would shape-shift into Julia and seduce Ares, prompting Julia to run off with a broken heart.
Then Hermes had revealed Hera’s secret, and Zeus had overreacted.
Really, Zeus might have had far more power than any other god, but what good was such power if you couldn’t control it—if you fell prey to your own tantrums like a child and your anger leaked out in vicious thunderbolts to wound your wife, your son?
Of course, no one could ever have guessed that Hephaestus would step in front of his mother and take the blow meant for her.
Hades certainly had no friends among the other gods.
He found Hermes entertaining, and he had a grudging admiration for Poseidon, for carving out territory separate from Zeus and finding happiness, or at least contentment.
But Hephaestus had always struck Hades as a different kind of god.
The rest of the Olympians, including Hephaestus’s wife, were so consumed with themselves—their bottomless want, their rivalries and jealousies.
Hephaestus alone seemed to cast his gaze outward, to worry about others before himself.
He deserved better than what he’d gotten, though Hades was not such a fool as to think that anyone got what they deserved, especially among the gods.
Now, several weeks after the non-wedding, Hades had ventured here into the lion’s den. He knew from quiet observation that Ares was still searching for Julia. If he hadn’t found her yet, he would eventually; Ares wasn’t the type to give up.
Now Hades wanted to gauge the status of the other Olympians.
Voices emanated from the living room to his left. He glanced over and saw that it was full of gods: at least a dozen of them, lounging on the antique furniture as they talked, eating Hera and Zeus’s food, drinking their wine. They saw him and erupted into more furious gossip, but Hades didn’t care.
They were all here doing the same thing: pretending to be concerned for Hephaestus’s welfare, trying to figure out where the chips would fall.
If the unthinkable happened and Hephaestus didn’t survive, there would be a power vacuum.
A chance for some other god to rise up and take a position among the Olympian Twelve.
All these minor deities—gods of mountain ranges or seas, of childbirth or nightmares or any of the other countless forces that plagued humans—thought this could be their chance.
They had all come to advocate for their own cause.
“You crushed those!”
“Persephone,” Hades said coolly, trying to hide his surprise.
He’d never paid much attention to Demeter’s daughter, the goddess of spring.
She looked a few years younger than Hades, like a woman in her late twenties.
Her long blond hair was twisted at the back of her neck, and she wore a billowy dress in dark green that emphasized her eyes.
She reached for the flower arrangement in his arms, and Hades was startled enough to hand it over. He watched as Persephone delicately examined the flowers. Her fingers brushed over a bruised hydrangea, the broken stem of a rose.
Her eyes glowed from green to a bright golden color, and Hades felt the pulse of her magic, sunshine-bright and scented like freshly mown grass. Within seconds, the damaged flowers repaired themselves, their blossoms unfurling once more.
“Much better,” Persephone declared, handing the arrangement back to Hades.
He felt a bizarre urge to apologize. “I’ll admit, I’m not in the habit of carrying flowers.”
“It shows,” Persephone remarked. “Next time, spring for a courier. I bet you can afford it,” she added, raising an eyebrow at his cashmere sweater.
Hades couldn’t remember the last time another god had talked to him like this, as if he were one of them. They normally ducked away the moment he entered a room.
“Thank you,” he replied, still disoriented—but she had already turned on one heel and started back toward the living room, that green dress fluttering around her like a verdant flag.
“Hades?”
“Hmm?” Recovering, he turned to see Hestia, who held her hand expectantly toward the flowers. “How thoughtful of you to bring these. I’ll make sure Zeus and Hera know you stopped by.”
She was trying to get rid of him, but Hades wasn’t to be shooed off so easily. “Is Hera here? I would love to give her my regards in person.”
“Oh, no, it’s Zeus’s day to watch Hephaestus.”
“Zeus’s day?” Hades repeated.
Hestia faltered, seeming to sense that she’d revealed too much. Then she sighed and admitted, “They haven’t been in the same room together since they came back. After what happened…”
Of course. Hera had overlooked lifetimes’ worth of infidelities, but Zeus had finally done the one thing she couldn’t forgive. He had wounded their child.
“Is Zeus here, then?” Hades pressed.
Hestia gave in and gestured up the sweeping curved staircase.
Hades walked up to the penthouse’s second level. The room that Hephaestus now occupied was at the end of the hall. Normally a guest room, it was now filled with the scents of candles and ointments, and underneath, the unmistakable, acrid odor of burned flesh.
Hephaestus lay in the middle of a king-size bed.
His chest rose and fell with his breath, but those breaths were so shallow, the rest of his body frighteningly still.
His left leg was lifted in a sling that was fastened to a machine alongside the bed.
Something about the angle of the leg looked all wrong, as if it had been broken off at the hip and snapped back incorrectly.
A table on the side of the room was littered with Asclepius’s tools—enchanted stones, papyrus bindings inscribed with ancient spells, poultices ground from the seeds of the fruits in Hera’s garden.
If Hephaestus could be saved, it would not be by any human medicine, but by magic alone.
Zeus sat in an armchair near the bed, the other armchair conspicuously absent.
The king of the gods looked more disheveled than Hades had ever seen him.
He had several days’ growth of beard on his face, and dark shadows circled his eyes.
He seemed truly distraught about what he’d done to Hephaestus…
or maybe he was just lost without the silent support of his wife, a support he’d always taken for granted.
What would happen to Zeus if Hera never took him back? What would happen to all of the gods? Zeus’s marriage to Hera was one of the first magical rites that had ever taken place. Who knew how many spells would be unwoven if it truly fell apart.
“Hades.” Zeus stood. If he was surprised to see his brother here, he masked it, as always. “I’m glad you came; there’s something I’ve wanted to discuss with you. Follow me.”
“With pleasure,” Hades murmured.
He followed Zeus down the hall, up a hardwood staircase to the Ellenes’ private roof deck. A plunge pool occupied half of the square footage, along with lounge chairs and a wet bar; a terraced garden took up the remaining space.
Zeus wandered over to the railing, staring at the city as if it belonged to him alone.
Once, Hades would have been intimidated by this. Now he saw Zeus’s constant need to climb up high and look down on humans as a sign of insecurity.
“You brought her here, didn’t you.” Zeus’s words were low and dangerous, his gaze still fixed on the traffic weaving through the streets below.
“I’m sorry?” Hades asked carefully.
“Julia. You arranged for her and Ares to meet, because you wanted all of this to happen!” Zeus gestured downward, to where his son was currently fighting for his life.
“I’ve been asking myself what god would be reckless enough to plan such a thing, to use Julia as a pawn, lure her and Ares together.
And now you’ve come to gloat,” Zeus concluded.
“So, admit it. You planned all this, didn’t you? ”
“I can assure you,” said Hades measuredly, “I never wanted Hephaestus to be hurt, nor could I have foreseen it.”
“You expect me to believe this was coincidence?” Zeus snarled. “That the daughter of the only mortal I ever loved, whose mother Hera killed, met my son by complete accident? Her relationship with Ares has fractured this family, has nearly cost Hephaestus his life!”
“Call it coincidence or fate, divine purpose or true love. Whatever you like, they found each other without any help from me,” Hades said calmly.
Of course, Zeus, like Hera, was searching for someone to blame.
Both of them had assumed that Julia was a trap, a bomb, a weapon launched into their midst to wound them.
They couldn’t see otherwise, because they were blinded by their own self-centered vanity.
To them, everything was a power struggle or a game.
They forgot that sometimes the right explanation was the simplest one.
If anyone had drawn Julia to Ares, it was destiny. The Fates. Not one of the gods had planned this.
And none of them could stop it. Not even the most powerful among them.
Hades held his ring at the ready, prepared to vanish into invisibility and flee if Zeus struck. He spoke his next words carefully. “I didn’t plan any of this, but I suspected the truth about Julia.”
Zeus’s grip tightened on the metal railing, though he didn’t move.
“You knew that Hera killed Claire, and you didn’t think to tell me? I don’t appreciate those who keep secrets, Hades.”
“I had always guessed that Claire’s death was Hera’s fault. But more than that, I knew the prophecy regarding Julia.”
The afternoon sunlight suddenly vanished, great black storm clouds gathering around the rooftop. The sounds of the city felt muted, muffled as if behind glass.
“The prophecy?” Zeus repeated.
“I visited the Fates, years ago.” Something Zeus had probably never done. The Fates were idiosyncratic, erratic, impossible to predict. Impossible to find, even for gods, unless you spent years looking. “They revealed a prophecy to me,” Hades went on.
He repeated the words he’d only heard once, in a remote mountain cave, but would never forget.
“The divine order hangs in the balance. It will all be decided by the mortal daughter of a mortal woman lost to Zeus. For while neither the strength of men’s arms nor the power of their minds can unseat the gods, this woman will prove the weakness that could tear down Olympus.”
“That prophecy doesn’t mention Julia by name. I’m sure there are plenty of mortal daughters of dead mortal women I loved,” Zeus scoffed. “Not to mention that it said ‘could tear down Olympus.’ Not ‘will tear down Olympus.’ ”
He was right, of course. The wording of prophecies was of crucial importance—and was often deliberately confusing.
The Fates never made it easy, for those trying to guess at the future.
“The prophecy didn’t name Julia explicitly,” Hades agreed. “But I think now it’s safe to say that it’s about her. She has walked into her fate, set everything in motion. In falling for Ares, and setting off this chain of events, she has already begun to fulfill it.”
“She hasn’t fulfilled anything yet,” Zeus growled.
“Don’t even think about it,” Hades warned. “Julia is under my protection now, as well as Ares’s. As well as yours, since she’s still wearing the fragment of the Aegis that you gave her mother all those years ago.”
Zeus’s expression grew thunderous. Wisps of storm cloud detached from the sky to wrap around him like a coat, lightning crackling through the air.
Hades forced himself not to run. Not yet.
“What are you planning to do, Hades?” Zeus asked, through gritted teeth.
Hades smiled slowly. “That’s the best part: I don’t have to do anything. I’m going to let the prophecy unfold, let it wreak your downfall, without any interference from me. All I have to do is sit back and watch.”
“You don’t know—” Zeus spluttered, and Hades cut him off.
“You’re right, there are many things I don’t know.
I’m not certain how any of it will happen, but one thing is certain.
When it’s all over, I’ll be waiting to pick up the pieces.
You should take heed, Zeus,” Hades warned, almost cheerfully.
“You know as well as I do that prophecies always come to pass. Even if they come to pass in ways we never expected.”
As he walked off the roof, he saw that Zeus still stood at the metal railing, staring out over the streets of New York like a monarch surveying his kingdom.
But now he looked like a king whose days were numbered.