Chapter III: Hades

CHAPTER III

HADES

Hades appeared in his chambers, darkened except for the fire, which was too bright, like the blinding fire of the Phlegethon. He almost wished it wasn’t lit, that he did not have to face more flames tonight, because the glow reminded him that the world outside this space did not wish for his happiness.

It made him want to become a recluse again, to shut out the world as he had at the start of his reign as King of the Underworld, but as he cast his gaze on Persephone, who lay sleeping in a sea of black silk, he knew that was impossible. She was too social, too loving, too invested to leave the Upperworld behind. She wanted to save the world, even the parts of it that did not deserve her kindness, and because she wanted that, he would want that too.

He sighed and ran his fingers through his hair, pulling out the tie that held it away from his face. He crossed to the bar and poured himself a shot of whiskey, downing it quickly before undressing and joining Persephone in bed.

He lay on his side and watched her, not wishing to disturb her sleep despite how he ached for her. Even in the shadowed room, he would know her face because he had memorized it—the arch of her brow, the curve of her cheek, the shape of her lips. She was beautiful, and her heart was so good. He was sure a part of him would always be in disbelief that she was his, that she had agreed to marry him despite everything that he had been and everything he continued to be, though there was a darker part of him that recognized engagements could end and so could marriages.

It wasn’t so much that he expected Persephone to leave as much as he expected the world to tear them apart.

Persephone sighed, and it drew Hades from his thoughts. He focused on her face and noticed her eyes moving behind her lids. She frowned then, and her breaths became harsher, her chest rising and falling faster and faster.

“Persephone?” he whispered, and she whimpered, her head pressing into her pillow, her back arching. Her arms remained over her head, fists clenched as if someone were holding her down.

Then she went rigid and whispered a name that made his blood run cold.

“Pirithous.”

Hades rose onto his elbow, fear flooding his veins. That man. That name.

Pirithous had kidnapped Persephone, encouraged to do so by Theseus after weeks of stalking her. Hades could still recall the entries the demigod made in a journal he’d kept at his desk, describing what Persephone wore, their interactions, and everything he wanted to do to her. It was chilling to read and added another layer of horror to the nightmare that was her abduction.

Those same feelings rose within him now, tearing open his chest.

It was a familiar feeling. He had been here with her before. Since the day Pirithous had taken her, he had haunted her sleep.

“Persephone,” Hades said and pressed his hand flat against her stomach, but at his touch, she whimpered. “Shh,” he attempted to soothe, but a sob erupted from her throat. She wrenched away and sat up, breathing heavily. He let her collect herself, fearful that touching her immediately after her nightmare would only upset her further, though he was desperate to take her into his arms, to help her feel safe, to never let her leave.

She turned her head and seemed to relax as her gaze fell on him, and he suddenly did not feel so useless. Sometimes he worried that he had done nothing right in the aftermath of her abduction and that one day he might unknowingly trigger some memory from that night, and then what would he do? How could he atone?

It felt impossible to keep her safe.

“Are you well?” he asked.

Her chest rose as she took a breath, studying him just as intently as he watched her. She was beyond anything he had ever imagined for himself—beautiful and gracious, far too good for the things he had done in his many lifetimes—and yet she remained, a steady light at his side, a beacon he could follow through the dark.

It was in these quiet moments when he felt most overwhelmed by his love for her.

“You haven’t slept.”

Her voice was a whisper that slid over his skin. It made him want, which felt wrong.

“No,” he said and rose to sit, angling so that he could look at her face.

She was flushed, and her eyes were too bright, an indication that she had drawn on her magic as she dreamed.

Hades brushed his thumb along her cheek, and her eyes fluttered closed, as if his touch brought her a sense of comfort. The thought made his heart beat erratically. There was power in how she made him feel, and she was the only one who had ever possessed it.

“Tell me,” he said, though he knew what she would say.

“I dreamed of Pirithous again.”

He let his hand fall from her face, fingers curled into fists. It was one thing to know and another thing to hear.

“He harms you, even in your sleep,” Hades said. Pirithous haunted her even though his soul was trapped in Tartarus—haunted him no matter how many times he had tortured the demigod to death. “I failed you that day.”

“How could you have known he would take me?”

“I should have known.”

Hades took pride in knowing everything, anticipating everything. He had taken every precaution, ensured Antoni took Persephone to and from work, assigned Zofie as her aegis to guard her at all times, even from afar. He had allowed her as much freedom as he possibly could, which was likely more than he should have, given she was a target for so many—enemies she could not even fathom. But he could not keep her locked in a cage, even if that cage was the Underworld.

“You are not all-seeing, Hades,” Persephone said, her voice a whisper.

She was trying to ease his pain, and she could not know that her comment only made it worse. It did not matter that he was not omniscient. He still blamed himself for what happened. He had blamed Zofie too, and when he had tried to relieve her of her assignment as Persephone’s aegis, his goddess had defended her.

He was not proud of his actions. He should have been comforting Persephone. She struggled. He knew it. Even when he made love to her, he could feel the tension in her body, highly aware of the time it took to make her comfortable.

This man, this demigod had invaded their most private and intimate space, and it enraged him.

And this, he recognized, was the power of the semidivine.

Their power was unknown, their numbers were unknown, and one insignificant son of an Olympian had managed to kidnap not only another goddess but his goddess.

He refocused on Persephone and what should have been comforting words.

“You are right,” Hades replied. “Perhaps I should punish Helios, then.”

She gave him a look, unimpressed with his comment.

“Would that make you feel better?”

“No, but it would be fun,” Hades said. He did not admit that he had fucked with the God of the Sun so much over the last few months Helios was likely to never assist him again—which was not so much a loss as it was a relief despite the fact that he suspected the god either had or would side with Hera in her quest to overthrow Zeus.

Hades had only managed to threaten the Queen of the Gods to submit to his will, ensuring that when Zeus protested his marriage to Persephone, Hera had to come to his defense. She had agreed, though reluctantly. It was not that Hades did not wish to see an end to Zeus’s reign as King of the Gods; it was that he wanted Persephone at his side when he did. They were far more powerful together than apart, but then, Zeus would know that, which made him the greatest threat to their happiness.

“I wish to see him,” Persephone said.

It took him a moment to process what she had said because his thoughts had been in a completely different space. He felt guilty that he had been thinking of Zeus and Hera while she had been agonizing over Pirithous.

But there was a determination in her voice he knew he couldn’t fight—not that he would deny her request. He had made this promise to her the night he had rescued her, though not exactly as she had asked.

When you torture him, I get to join, she’d said, and while he had agreed, it had not kept him from going to Tartarus that night to torment the demigod alone—or returning nearly every night since to do the same. It was not that he did not wish to honor Persephone’s request. It was that he had been waiting for her to make it, because then, he knew she would be ready.

His only hesitation was that once she visited this part of Tartarus, she would know the darkest part of him. He realized she knew the purpose of his Underworld prison, but it was an entirely different thing to see it, and that triggered him, the fear that she might finally understand who she had fallen in love with and realize she was not in love at all.

He held her unwavering gaze and replied, “As you wish, darling.”

---

Hades took Persephone to the white room—one of his more modern torture chambers. It was used to deprive its occupants of their senses. Sometimes, Hades would leave a soul in here alive for weeks, and by the time he returned, they had lost all sense of themselves. He particularly enjoyed granting this punishment to those who used their status and power to wound and kill in the Upperworld. It made it all the more satisfying when they finally lost their sense of self.

It was here where Hades had last left Pirithous, having spent the better part of his time in the Underworld cycling through other methods of torture, both old and new. He had broken bones and cracked knees, cut off his balls and his dick, covered him in honey and let insects and rats mince at his body until his bones were exposed.

He had done all that and more, and his rage had not lessened. Even now he could feel it welling inside him as he looked at Pirithous, who was slouched in a chair at the center of the room, only held in place by rope that wound around his arms, waist, and legs. His skin was pale white, almost gray, and spattered with layers of dried blood from his previous torture. He was not a pleasant sight, and Hades wondered what Persephone thought now that she was face-to-face with the demigod.

Beside him, Persephone was still and quiet, her eyes fixed on her attacker. After a moment, she took a breath, which sounded sharp in the silence of the room.

“Is he dead?”

He assumed she whispered for fear that she would rouse Pirithous.

“He breathes if I say so.”

It occurred to him then that her only fear was that this man might be able to hurt her again. His hands fisted as she made her way toward the soul. He was overwhelmed with the urge to pull her back, to keep her near, to only let her observe him from afar, but he knew if she felt she could not do this, she wouldn’t.

“Does it help?” she asked, turning to look at him. For a brief moment, all he could think about was how strange it was to have something so beautiful in a space like this. “The torture?”

Hades studied her face.

There was something innocent about her question. Perhaps it was the assumption that he used torture to heal his wounds instead of feeding them, as was the case with Pirithous. No matter how Hades made the demigod suffer, it would never be enough.

“I cannot say.”

Her gaze lingered on him a moment longer before she turned and began walking around her prisoner. She could not know what this did to him, how this made him feel. She commanded this place like a queen, and she wasn’t even aware of it.

She paused behind the demigod, watching him, and all he could think was that she had never looked more beautiful, despite their surroundings.

“Then why do you do it?”

For a moment, he scrambled to figure out if she asked because she disapproved, but she did not appear to be horrified by him or the demigod restrained before her, so he answered truthfully.

“Control.”

It was something he sought daily because it had been the first thing taken from him when his father had swallowed him whole upon his birth, and then, just when he thought he was free of that horrible prison, he faced another ten years in battle. In the aftermath, control had meant a dark existence. It meant that everyone in his realm had to feel like he felt—wretched and tortured. He had believed no one was deserving of a peaceful afterlife after what he had seen.

Over time, his idea of what it meant to be in control evolved, and his empire bled out into the world above. He sought to make the darkest parts his own, feeding the underbelly of New Greece until power and status could only be obtained through him and anyone who operated outside that did not last long. There were few exceptions, but among them were Dionysus and, most recently, Theseus, who was helped mostly by his father.

But not even they challenged him like Persephone.

She had crashed into his life and defied him at every turn, and he had not been able to exercise any sort of control over her. She would not be contained, and in many ways, he could not blame her. She had only just escaped the confines of her mother’s authority, and then to come face-to-face with him—a virtual stranger who had attempted to give her rules—it was no wonder she had resisted.

In the end, she’d only wanted what he had wanted.

“I want control,” she said, and Hades felt like she was squeezing his heart.

He wanted to give her that.

He extended his hand. “I will help you claim it.”

She did not hesitate and came to him, placing her hand in his and drawing in close. He turned her so that her back rested against his chest, his fingers splayed at her hip, possessive and aware that Pirithous would soon awaken. Hades wanted the demigod to be reminded of what he had done, that he had taken the wrong goddess and challenged the wrong god.

With her safely in his arms, he summoned his magic like a spear and aimed for Pirithous. The demigod sucked in a sharp breath, as if he’d felt the pain of Hades’s power, and at the sound, Persephone went rigid. Hades shifted closer, as if he could shield her from her fear with his body. He let his lips brush the tip of her ear as he spoke.

“Do you remember when I taught you to harness your magic?”

He had taught her one evening beneath the silver eaves of her own woods. As he recalled that evening—how his body had cradled hers, how he had touched her, how she had slowly grown warm and aroused beneath his hands—desire kindled low in his stomach, and as much as he would have liked to suppress it, to focus only on the point of their visit to Tartarus, Persephone made it just as hard.

She shuddered, and her ass and shoulders pressed into his body.

It seemed he did not even need to know her answer, her reaction telling him she remembered that and what came after.

Still, she spoke.

“Yes.”

The corners of Hades’s lips lifted, and as he spoke, his mouth skimmed the edge of her ear down the column of her neck.

“Close your eyes,” he whispered as the demigod began to stir because he did not wish for her to have to look at him.

Pirithous’s eyes blinked open, brows furrowed in confusion as his sleepy gaze fell on Persephone, at which point he seemed to fully awaken. Then he spoke Persephone’s name, and it took everything in Hades’s power not to cross the distance between them and rip out his tongue.

Instinctively, he pressed closer to her, his fingers digging into her hip. Touching her made him feel grounded and reminded him why they were here—so Persephone could take back her power, and maybe then, she could finally sleep in peace.

“What do you feel?” he asked, concentrating on her. Everything was about her.

He spoke against her skin and felt her take a breath as Pirithous began to beg.

“Persephone, please.” His voice shook. The longer the demigod was awake, the more he recalled the torment at Hades’s hands, and it made him desperate. “I–I am sorry.”

Sorry.

That word burrowed beneath Hades’s skin, calling to the darkness that lived just beneath the surface. It made him feel…

“Violent,” Persephone said, and he knew it because there was an edge to her power that he had never felt before. Beneath the warmth and the flora was something sharp and desperate. He wanted to taste it, run his tongue along it.

“Focus on it,” Hades commanded, his hand twining with hers. “Feed it.”

In the quiet moment that followed, Hades remained still, relishing the feel of her magic as she concentrated on gathering it into her palm. It was a rush, a great wave of power that hit him deep in his stomach.

“Where do you wish to cause him pain?” he asked.

“This isn’t you.” Pirithous’s voice turned to a keen whine, and Hades wished more than anything that he would shut the fuck up. “I know you. I watched you!”

Yes, he had watched her.

He had targeted and stalked her. He had taken pictures of her in her home, where she was meant to be safest. He had felt entitled to her body for no other reason than the fact that she existed.

And he would be punished eternally.

“He wanted to use his cock as a weapon,” she said. “And I want it to burn.”

Hades grinned wickedly.

“No! Please, Persephone,” Pirithous screamed, struggling violently against his restraints. “Persephone!”

“Then make him burn.”

He let her go, and she lifted her hand, which burned with magic, sending a current of energy straight to Pirithous’s cock. He began to writhe, his body jerking against the ropes that restrained him, cutting into his skin. His head snapped back and he bared his teeth. Hades imagined her magic felt much like being electrocuted. Even he could feel the current, like the residual heat from a fire, and it raised the hair on his arms and the nape of his neck.

“This…isn’t…you,” Pirithous ground out.

Hades felt Persephone stiffen at his words, and she straightened, lifting her chin as she stared at the demigod, and while he could not see her full expression from where he stood behind her, he knew she must look like a queen, because something changed even in Pirithous’s contorted expression—something that made him realize just how futile his appeals were.

“I am not sure who you think I am, but let me be clear,” Persephone said, her voice clear and resolute. “I am Persephone, future Queen of the Underworld, Lady of Your Fate. May you come to dread my presence.”

Her words tangled in Hades’s chest, stealing the air from his lungs. He had never felt so in love and so desperate to protect someone in his life, and while he had desired for so long to hear her embrace this part of herself—the title and power he had to offer—he wished it had come under different circumstances, that it had been born out of a love for the happier parts of the Underworld and not the darkest.

But there were few in this world who learned the truth of their power without strife. He and Persephone were no different.

“How long will he stay like this?” she asked.

Hades looked at Pirithous, who was still convulsing.

“Until he dies,” he said, and for a moment, he wondered if she was disturbed by the sight of his torture, if she would ask him to end it, but instead, she turned to him, tilting her head back to look at his face. He knew in that moment she was changed. He couldn’t exactly say how, but it lingered between them, as tangible as the violence that had punctured her magic.

His goddess was no longer made up of innocent things, and there was a part of him that did not know how to feel about it, that wondered if she had never met him if that would still be the case.

“Take me to bed,” she said.

Hades touched her cheek and then threaded his fingers through her golden hair. There were things he wanted to know, things he wanted to say. Did she still love him the same way she did before they came here? Would the trauma of this night fester in her mind until she realized she had become someone she did not wish to be? And would she blame him?

But he said none of those things and instead bent to kiss her. She welcomed him, her lips parting as his tongue sought hers, and his desire, which had not ceased, grew stronger than ever. He groaned and his arm tightened around her back, sealing every part of his hard body against every soft part of hers, and he considered that perhaps Pirithous’s greatest punishment of all might be that he had to watch them make desperate love to one another as he died for the thousandth time.

But that was a desire he would not speak, and instead he drew away and met her gaze.

“As you wish, my darling,” he said as he transported them away from the depths of Tartarus to their room, where he let her lead them to release.

---

Persephone slept.

She lay on her side, her hands folded under her head, her breathing easy and even. Hades sat on the edge of their bed, watching for signs that another nightmare had taken root within her dreams, but she remained quiet and still. There was a part of him that feared leaving her unattended. What if Pirithous returned? What if he was not here to comfort her when she woke?

He felt a keen sort of turmoil roiling within him as he wondered if her sleep would take on a new horror. Perhaps it would no longer be Pirithous that haunted her but the torture she had inflicted on him.

Hades raked his fingers through his unbound hair.

He was restless and anxious, and he had only found reprieve while he was with Persephone. His comfort came with her, whether she was astride him or beneath him. He wanted to be near her, inside her, filling her. The need was acute and primal, and in the hours after, it gave him the greatest pleasure to know some part of him remained within her.

If he could take refuge in her body every minute of every day, he would, but that was a sign of his addiction. It wasn’t healthy, but if he were to have a vice, it was the best of the lot.

He sighed and rose. It was too warm, his body still slick with sweat. Unlike Persephone, who drifted off after sex, he’d remained awake, his body a live wire.

He poured himself a drink and then stepped outside onto the balcony where the night was mild and breezy. The reprieve from the heat was pleasant, and he felt at ease, knowing he was near in case Persephone spiraled into another nightmare.

He looked out on a fraction of his realm where silvery moonlight pooled in the shadowed garden outside his palace. It was the garden where everything had begun, where he’d brought Persephone to plant the seed of her bargain. Create life in the Underworld, he had instructed, or be mine forever.

Gods how he’d hoped she would fail, because at the time, he’d believed that was the only way he’d get to keep her. She’d been so angry, and it had only gotten worse when he’d brought her here, to the Underworld.

She, like so many, had expected a barren landscape of ash and fire. What she had gotten instead was a lush world full of color and flora. It had also been the first sign that what her mother had told her about him over the last twenty-four years was not the truth, and that had devastated her.

She’d fought him. Hard.

But the more he’d learned about her, the less it surprised him. She had been so traumatized by her mother’s control, she’d resisted the idea of belonging to anyone. The stronger her feelings for him grew, the more she refused to love him, except there was no way to stop it once it had started, and when she finally succumbed, she’d opened the most powerful part of herself.

This…it went beyond love. It was devotion. It was worship. It was the power that began and ended worlds, and if he had to, he would do so in her name. He knew those words were true because he felt them so deeply, it hurt.

“Why are you naked?”

Hades was drawn from his thoughts and looked down into the garden where Hecate lingered, nearly invisible in the darkness.

“Would you really like an answer to that question?” he asked. “I can give details.”

She scrunched her nose in mock disgust. “I think I can guess. It is not as if you are quiet.”

Hades chuckled and Hecate arched a brow, though he could not help being amused at the thought of Persephone’s cries of pleasure echoing throughout the Underworld.

“Come off your high horse,” she said. “It is not as if you excel at giving pleasure. Some of us are just sensitive to sound.”

He rolled his eyes. “Fearful I will become too arrogant, Hecate?”

“I do not have to fear it,” she said. “You are.”

“Arrogance does not make something untrue,” he said.

“No, but it does make it annoying.”

He could not help laughing. “No one said you had to endure it,” he said. “Why are you here anyway? Aren’t there some pathetic souls in the Upperworld deserving of your haunting presence?”

“No one is deserving of my presence,” she said. “I am a plague upon men.”

“You are definitely a plague,” he muttered.

“I heard that,” she snapped.

“I’m aware,” Hades said.

“And you? Why are you sulking on your balcony instead of lying with your love?”

“I am not sulking,” he said.

“You always sulk,” she said.

Hades glared, unwilling to argue with the goddess. “I cannot sleep, if you must know.”

“Worrying too much?” she asked.

He did not respond.

“Perhaps you should not worry when you are with her,” said Hecate.

“That is when I worry most,” he said, because he thought of what he stood to lose if anyone got in his way.

“Trust that your love is stronger than any god,” said Hecate.

“It is not our love I worry about,” he said. “It is what I will destroy to keep it.”

“Since when have you ever worried over carnage?” she asked.

“Since I decided to marry the Goddess of Spring,” he said.

“Foolish man,” Hecate said. “You never had a choice.”

Her words made him uneasy. There was something he disliked about the truth of the Fates and their threads. He’d have liked to think he would have chosen Persephone no matter the weaving of their lives and that perhaps she would have chosen him, though he knew she feared that all they had was what Fate had given them.

He wondered if she still thought that or if she had begun to believe their love might be greater than ethereal thread.

There was a part of him that did not wish to know.

“Do not pretend Persephone does not know who she has chosen to love,” Hecate said. “She sees all of you. She is the Goddess of Spring after all. She is used to life and death.”