Hades and Persephone: A Fated Love Book 2

Persephone's Return

That night, Hades and I walked to his chariot together. He held my hand the whole way and allowed me time as I hesitated again. I didn't run this time, but the fear still gripped me as I considered the descent into Tartarus.

"I want to close my eyes," I said.

"Alright," he nodded, and gently moved my hands so they were over my face. "You don't have to look."

I let him guide me up the step and reminded myself it would be quick. The first time he stole me happened so fast I couldn't scream. I had been terrified, and even after everything, that primal fear hadn't been erased. It was something that had taken a long time to forgive him for.

"Hades—" I whispered, but it was too late. My voice caught in the wind as we plummeted into the earth. When things were still again, I stayed frozen in place. Hades's presence shifted beside me and he coaxed me off the chariot even though I kept my eyes squeezed shut.

"I'm right here," he murmured.

I was too stubborn to be led by my hands so he pressed his palms into my hips and guided me down from the chariot, shivering in the cold air. It had been almost a year since I'd come here and all the memories flooded back from the laws broken to the laughter we had.

"Think about something else while we walk," he said. I didn't ask where he was leading me, but when I opened my eyes, they barely adjusted to the dark. He grabbed a torch from the wall with one hand and locked our fingers together with the other.

"Hephaestus asked me to be his wife," I said.

Hades didn't even tense. "You told me you were having a passionate love affair with him," he said. "Tell him you've married a very jealous god."

"I think he already knows," I replied.

The caverns grew wider as we walked, and my spirits lifted in the open air. It was easier to breathe here, away from the claustrophobic dark. Like the dark pools I bathed in around Minthe, this place was filled with an expanse of water, black as midnight. Steam hovered on the surface like clouds, roiling with tension as we approached the bank.

"I never showed you this because I wanted you to find it one day," he explained, tilting my chin to the sky. Above, the constellations twinkled their silent histories, surrounded by the artistry of many gods. Pretty Selene and Nyx must have spent mortal lifetimes on those colors of blue. When I finally pried my eyes away, Hades was already watching. "I want you to love exploring our world, but I know the places you have found have not been so beautiful."

I didn't know what to say. I only knew that I wanted to slip below the surface and lose myself in steam.

I didn't speak as I undressed, and he didn't reach for me. It was as if he knew the waters called to me, and I had to answer them like I had for a hundred years. Maybe above, this pool fed into the brooks I liked to chase. Hades joined me in the water, basking in the heat and darkness. He swam with me to the rock ledge and we pressed our forearms into it, finally calming in the quiet of our home.

"Did you mean it when you asked to stay here forever?" he asked. He closed his eyes placidly.

"Yes." I replied, keeping mine open.

"Why?"

A beat passed between us, but he pressed on calmly. "I understood what you said, but why you would you return here after everything you have seen? After what has broken between us, I imagined I would have lost you to Olympus."

It was a question I hadn't expected him to be brave enough to ask. Perhaps brave wasn't the right word. Hades was not a coward, but he was cautious all the same. I hadn't expected him to give me such a plain opportunity to change my mind or reject him. But maybe we had finally turned a bend in our relationship where he knew I wouldn't. He always understood me, but maybe I finally could feel his pain too.

"I had a friend once," I whispered, looking at the stars. "Daphne. She was a nymph Apollo took a liking to, but she was always too fast for him to...to catch her. During my last visit to Olympus, he found out she had slept with a mortal and Apollo drowned him with Poseidon's help. She ran from him, but he was faster that day and her father turned her into a tree to try and save her. It can't be undone. And Apollo defiled the tree anyway. Even now he wears her laurels in his hair to show how he won her."

Hades didn't respond but his mouth hardened. I continued, "Years ago, Hermes used to sneak into my mother's meadows. He was the only one who knew where to find me and we kissed for hours. She caught us after he began to ask about my hand because he wasn't satisfied with romancing a maiden. Demeter pushed me from his post to show me what might happen if I were his wife. I broke my back on impact with the gold road."

Hades reached beneath the water and grazed the slight imperfection of my skin. It was a scar smaller than my fingernail between the lower ridges of my spine so faint I couldn't spot it myself unless it was summertime. But his fingers found the mark as if it were still an open wound. I closed my eyes as he traced the shape of it, light as air.

I sighed. "I am tired and I want to be away."

"I would tear the world apart with war if I could change them or reverse what has been done to you," he said softly. "But I am powerless against the culture of the gods. The only right I have is to guard your happiness and dignity as my wife, which I will protect to my death."

I thought of Aphrodite's taunt from months ago. We can't all be as lucky as you, Kore. And it was true, but I didn't feel nearly as gratified as I had then. I had a powerful—and vengeful—protector. Dolos would never be able to stand against me any more than Ares or Apollo could dream to.

Still, I felt lost lazing below the waters.

"But I fear it isn't enough anymore," he said as if he could see everything as clearly as the night sky. I peered at him apologetically, but he was already looking back at me with a knowing I couldn't explain.

"I never wanted to be queen of your underworld, and I didn't think I could," I began. "And I was right in some ways."

"And proven wrong in others," he replied.

"Yes and now, I have one request of you. Not as your wife, or your friend."

"As what then?" he prompted, but there was the same prideful tinge in his voice that had been there during Dolos's trial.

"As your equal," I said. All my fears or hurts hardened into a stoic heart like the one that beat in Hades's chest. I could master the depths of Tartarus just as I could admire this divine sky we gazed at. And I would do both for an eternity. "I want to make this our world."