Chapter 32

Chapter

Thirty-Two

H ades

I meant it when I said I'd burn the world for her. I would. All of it. I would loose the flames of Tartarus and watch them spread across the realms, devouring life in all its forms. I spent centuries thinking Zeus got the better end of the deal, living in his golden city high above the earth. For a long while, I even envied Poseidon his command of the seas. The freedom my brothers were granted to spend with the living was a luxury I had not been awarded.

For a long time, I resented them for it. For the dank darkness of my realm. For the pain and fear I lived within. For the souls who would come to me ruined by a painful life and meant to linger in my dark realm to heal from that life which they lived under Zeus' rule. For the evil I'd been forced to face, the sins I'd been made to endure upon judgement of a soul who would learn their lesson—who would repent—in the flamed land of Tartarus.

I resented them until her. Until Persephone.

She breathed life into the God of Death, as Hecate said, and birthed the God of After life .

When she'd been taken from me, I had begged Zeus to stand against Demeter. To punish her for her crime against her daughter, and against me. He'd failed me.

And I'd stewed. I'd been stewing for centuries.

But in that time, I'd come to realize that I wasn't the God who drew the short straw after all. I may not be the God who lived in the golden city of Olympus, or commanded the magical cities below the sea, but I am the God—the only God with the power to end it all. Including them.

For when the Underworld was cursed to me to rule, I became the only creature with the ability to handle the flames of Tartarus. It was my responsibility to contain them. To ensure they thrived. I had been doing both for a very, very long time.

It is not a thing that escapes me, as it escapes the other Gods who have forgotten me as I linger in the shadows of the Underworld, that I have the power to begin everything again.

Isn't that what flames are for, after all? Without flame, old life lingers to snuff out the new before it even has chance to grow roots. Without flame, the sins of life would be left to rot the souls.

Flame is like a hot shower for the earth. It can scorch away even the vilest of dirt so that new and vibrant life can take its place. And the Gods who stood back and watched Demeter's heinous crimes against her daughter might very well be the most vile there is. After all, Zeus had been her father, and he's not acted in the aftermath of her tragic death.

If I'd been blessed with the life of a child, there is no act I would not do to see its survival. Unlike my father, and clearly my brother, I would not see my own suffer so that my life would remain as it was.

If I had planted life inside Persephone…

"Hades?" she whispers beneath me, and I blink. I don't realize I've lowered to an elbow, my forearm slipped beneath her neck as though to cradle her in my arms, beneath me. My other is holding her hip in a brutal grip that I loosen immediately.

"I'm sorry."

"Where were you?"

I cannot give her the whole truth. I am tired of not giving her the whole truth.

She is not ready for the truth. "I was thinking about someone taking you from me. "

She laughs, her smile bright and innocent. Her lashes are still wet with emotion, and there is a lovely pink flush to her cheeks. "No one will take me."

She says it with such confidence. "How can you be so sure?"

"Hades, no one wants me."

She's wrong. "You're wrong."

"I'm really not."

I don't want to bring up the reborn Adonis. I really don't. "Addison."

She touches a hand to my face. It's so gentle, so unlike the way most touch me, if they even dare, that for a moment I feel like I could crumble in her hand like dust.

"He doesn't want me, Hades. He might want ten minutes with my body, but me—" She shakes her head. "No."

"No one gets any minutes with your body." I can't help the way the words growl from the deep of me.

She laughs again. It's a sweet and innocent sound. It's far too light for the God of Death. There is a moment that I think I feel the heat of sunlight within the sweet warmth of her laugh. It's jarring.

Her hand moves from my face down the length of my neck to press against the ancient heart that thunders in my chest. Every beat is for her. Every single beat spells the love I feel for this woman with the soul of an ancient Goddess, my mate.

My body heats above hers with the need to sink into her. To connect. To spell my affection in long strokes that touch her where no one has ever touched her before, or will ever touch her again. No one but me.

My body shudders with need as I fight the urge to claim what is and has always been mine.

I won't have her—won't let myself take her—until she loves me in return.

If I can give her nothing else, I can give her that.

Still, I can feel her need for me. Her body aches as my own aches, but where I ache to fill, she aches to be filled. We are the embodiment of Chaos' perfection. The puzzle pieces of her most prized craft. Man and woman, fitted together as one. Mouth to mouth, heart to heart, connected. Mates.

I rock into her, watching her pupils expand as she pulls sharp breath into her lungs. My seed leaks into my pants from my tip, desperate to fill her.

Not yet. Not tonight.

I move my hand from her hip to the space between our bodies. Sliding two fingers between her legs, I absorb the tiny gasp she gifts me as her eyes connect with mine, surely seeing flame—a glimpse of the ancient God within the man—and not backing away. She is so soft and wet and hot .

I watch her face as I push two fingers into her, wishing it were another part of me, but loving this all the same. Loving her . Hoping to pull the curtains back on an affection she was made to feel for me.

Full rose petal pink lips part, and I am helpless to contain myself. Shifting up her body to take her mouth, the weight of my body pressing my hand so deep between her legs that I graze her core with my fingertips, I devour the sound of her moan with my kiss.

And then I make love to her with my fingers. With every thrust of my fingers between her legs, I'm given a little hitch. A small moan. A delectable cry.

I rock my body into her, kissing her, feeling all of her as she begins to unravel beneath me. When her body tightens beneath mine, I lift my head to watch as pleasure coils every muscle tight.

Her lips form an O of pleasure. A bloom of heat spills into her skin. I quicken my thrusts, my own breaths coming fast now in anticipation of her release. I can't take my eyes off her.

I want hers on me.

"Open your eyes," I command.

She obeys as she shatters around me, breaking apart beneath me with my name clinging to the sound of her lovely cry.

But I am frozen, my fingers rooted into the core of her as she spasms around me.

She had not been facing me the first time I'd made her shatter. The second, my head had been between her legs.

I don't miss it this time .

It's there and gone fast, but I see it. A flash of golden light—a beginning of all life—it's there in her eyes and then it's gone. As though her coming apart at the seams is enough to pull at the stitching that contains it, if only for a moment. The Sun. The light of all life.

But how can that be?

How can my Goddess of fertility also possess the light of all life? How can she behold the very sun?

It's impossible.

A weapon the Gods would war for.

A gift the Titans would rise again to possess.

And it just might be the secret Demeter feared so much.

A secret worth killing for.

***

Thank you so much for reading Hades and Persephone - Keeper of Sins. I hope you enjoyed this book as much as I enjoyed writing it, and want to continue on to Book Two, Hades and Persephone - Threads of Fate which is available NOW for Pre-Order Here

***

If you have the time and could consider leaving a review, those help us authors so much, and I would be forever grateful. You can leave your review Here

If you're into getting early release news, teasers/sneak peeks, deals, potential offers to ARC Read upcoming releases…you can sign up for my newsletter at the link below. I'd love to have you!

https://sendfox.com/alannahcarbonneau

***

A note to you, the reader:

I have always been transfixed by the story of Hades and Persephone. The idea of being stolen away to the Underworld…or any world that isn't this one, really, is a thrilling fantasy I entertain A LOT. I mean, who doesn't?? And that's not saying that I don't love my life, because I do. It's awesome. :) I just like to escape, too.

Anyway, their story is one of many that has lived rent-free in my mind for a long time. When I was deciding which of the (thousands) of books in my mind to write, I couldn't stop thinking about these characters.

Yes, I've taken some big liberties with the story, stretching the parameters of the myth by a lot. But with every book I write in this series, the weaving of myth with ancient legend and magical beings crafted of nightly whispers, I just fall more in love. More enthralled with this story, and the characters and the mysteries that make them.

Thank you for reading, for supporting me and falling in love with these characters, this world, and all the magic that is this book, with me.

I can't wait to see you in the next book!