by River Ramsey
The darkness is closing in fast, Fenrir warned. It’s already eaten away at the edges of the realm.
“We have to leave,” Dionysus insisted.
“If we do, what happens to the dead?” Kore asked, looking straight at me. “What happens to the ones who are left? To your mother?”
My throat tightened and I found myself unable to give her an answer I didn’t want to accept. My silence seemed to speak enough, judging from the look of horror on her face.
“No.” She shook her head adamantly. “No. There has to be something we can do. Some way to make it right.”
“The River Styx is the lifeblood of this place, and it’s all but depleted,” I said, gesturing to the barren riverbed on the horizon.
Kore stared into the distance, and I could tell she was already forming one of her harebrained schemes. To be fair, they worked a hell of a lot more often than they should have, but that didn’t ease my nerves.
“Wait!” I cried as she took off running down the hill. Fenrir shot after her and the rest of us joined the pursuit. He was faster, but I soon realized he had no intention of stopping her. Just following her like a loyal puppy.
Damn traitor. He listened to her more than he ever had to me.
They reached the edge of the river first and to my relief, Kore stopped just shy of wading in. Not for long, though.
“Don’t,” I snarled, rushing to catch up with her to no avail. She was already in the river, and the milky blue stream of souls running past her barely came up to her ankles. It was even worse than I’d imagined.
She looked around in the same dismay I felt. For better or worse, this place was my home, and my responsibility. We might have stopped my father before he could devour the other realms, but I had already failed this one.
I waded into the water to get her, putting a hand on her shoulder to draw her out of her shock. “Do you see now? There’s no fixing this.”
Her eyes met mine, and something in them filled me with a flurry of emotions I didn’t understand or want. Just par for the course where she was concerned, but knowing what it was like to lose her, I figured I could get used to it.
She took my hand with a look of certainty that echoed in her voice. “We can,” she said firmly. I realized she was no longer herself, not fully. The same change that had come over her when Eris surfaced was visible now, but this time was different. She was in control. Maybe she was more herself than she ever had been. I didn’t know, but I was left in awe of her all the same. “As long as we do it together, nothing is impossible.”
Her words echoed my father’s final words so closely, but they struck such a different chord within me. I wanted to believe her. It went against everything I knew, everything I had been conditioned to think and feel in order to survive my corrupt destiny, but I realized now that I believed in her more than I ever had in any of it.
“Ares did say she’d know what to do when the time came,” said Fenrir, human once more as he walked into the water with us. “I trust her.”
“So do I,” Dionysus said, following him in.
Loki seemed to realize we were all watching him expectantly. “What?” he demanded. “I’m on board, but there’s no way I’m stepping in that shit.”
Dionysus rolled his eyes. “Pussy.”
“Shit,” Kore muttered, clutching her head suddenly as if it hurt.
“What is it?” I asked, reaching to steady her. “What’s wrong?”
“It’s Eris,” she answered, her teeth gritted and her hands covering her ears like she was trying to mute a sound I couldn’t hear. Just the faint rush of the river and the emptiness beyond it. “I feel her energy, trying to take over again.”
“Now?” Fenrir asked in disbelief.
“I’ll fight it, but you can’t stay here,” she said, her voice laced with genuine fear for the first time since we’d come to this realm. Fear for us. I saw it in the desperate look she was giving me. “If I lose control again…”
“No,” I said, taking her face in my hands. She clung to me, despite trying to push me away. “Eris isn’t something outside of you, Kore, she is you. I should have seen it the day we fought, but it took me this long to figure it out.”
“What are you saying?” she asked, her voice cracking with the strain of fighting the energy I could feel welling up within her.
“I’m saying it’s time to stop fighting who you are,” I answered. “I was destined to kill my father, but your fate is more than that. You’re everything I’m not. Everything I never could be. What I’ve tried to gain by controlling death, it’s nothing compared to what you’re capable of doing.”
“She creates chaos,” Kore protested.
“You create life,” I countered, sweeping my thumb across her bottom lip. I could feel the power within her rising to the surface. It danced across her skin, almost visible and definitely tangible. “Whatever happens to this realm, you were always the one meant to decide it. It’s in your hands.”
“He’s right,” said Fenrir. “There’s something within you that terrified Cronus. Something he knew was a threat to his very existence.”
“Chaos is an underrated force,” Loki mused. “You can’t make order without it. Maybe this realm could use a little.”
“It’s not like we have anything left to lose,” said Dionysus. He gave her a reassuring smile. “We’re with you. Always.”
His words seemed to soothe her, and I decided to ask him for pointers if we survived all of this. She finally nodded, even though she didn’t seem any more certain than she’d been before. “I’ll try. I’ll try to let go.”
We waited anxiously as she closed her eyes, and at first, nothing seemed to happen. I could tell from the conflicted expressions on her face that letting go was harder for her than fighting ever had been. She finally sank to her knees, and before I could catch her, her eyes opened, glowing a familiar emerald.
“Eris,” I breathed.
She reached out, sweeping her hands over the water. Her movements were slow and deliberate. She looked every part the fearsome goddess she was, and all I could do was stare.
“I need your energy,” she finally said after several long moments of silence. I could tell she was sensing and seeing things that were hidden to the rest of us. Even to me. “The elements.”
“Elements?” Loki echoed in confusion.
“The ice that flows through your veins,” she answered, her voice soft and seductive yet powerful. She turned to Dionysus and Fenrir next. “The power of pleasure, and of the wild. And from you,” she said, finally turning to me. “Death. Life’s perfect balance.”
My throat tightened for reasons I couldn’t begin to understand. She was different in some way, but also more familiar than she ever had been. Like this was the first time we were both meeting face to face, every part of ourselves intact.
I did as she asked, funneling the same energy I had used to raise her from the dead into the vortex she had created, which was already beginning to stir the waters. They swirled in a clockwise direction as the others joined in, lending her their respective energy. Loki eventually waded in with us, and I felt the freeze of the blue energy emanating from his hands.
Kore took the power naturally, funneling it through her own, and the embers of life rising up from within her made my head spin. It felt like the air itself was alive and conscious, her essence spreading through everything around us.
Out of the corner of my eye, I saw the first tinges of color I had ever seen in the realm of gray and darkness. The earth on either side of the river bed was beginning to sprout with thin green tendrils of grass. At first, I thought it had to be an illusion, but the color spread like a flame, consuming everything with life as far as the eye could see.
Flowers bloomed where none ever had, as far as I knew, and great thorny vines rose from the crumbling earth, forming new pathways and natural structures that were almost too much to behold.
I turned back to Kore and realized she was so focused s
he’d gone into a deep trance. I could feel the massive amounts of energy rushing from her, filling the realm, and I started to panic. If there was one thing life had taught me, it was that miracles always came at a cost, and she was the one price I wasn’t willing to pay.
“Stop,” I commanded. “It’s too much. You’re going to drain yourself.”
She ignored me, or maybe she was too deeply entranced to hear at all. The sky grew light above us, turning a dark shade of blue. It was far from the world of bright colors and open air above, but it was equally enchanting and beautiful in its own way. As the thick gray haze cleared, the starry lights nestled in the lines of the sky shone bright, illuminating a realm I didn’t recognize.
The water itself was beginning to rise, heavy waves pushing and pulling against us, making it difficult to stand. Kore collapsed and Fenrir caught her before the waves could take her under. He looked around in the same confusion that plagued us all. “She brought everything back to life. The souls…”
He was right. It was impossible, since the Underworld wasn’t ever supposed to have been alive to begin with, but the rising water was proof that somehow, the souls my father had consumed were returning.
Because of her.
“That’s enough,” I pleaded, touching her arm. “You’ve done enough.”
Her eyes fluttered open and when she smiled, it was the smile I recognized. The smile I’d grown to love. “Nothing is ever really lost,” she murmured before her eyes fell shut. Her energy was so faded I could barely feel it.
She was wrong. If she was gone, then I’d lost everything.
Chapter 24
Kore
Light came from everywhere. Above, below, behind my eyelids. It was impossible to escape as consciousness pulled me back from the nothingness that had encapsulated me for so long. How long, I didn’t know, but I hadn’t expected to wake up at all.
The moment I gave in to Eris--to the chaos I now knew had been within me all along--I knew what I had to do. It was an instinct deeper than thought or knowledge, and in my heart, I accepted that it would be the last thing I ever did.
My only regret was not getting more time with them. Loki, Fenrir, Dionysus, Hades. Each so different, each so equally essential to my very being.
When the light cleared and I realized they were all gathered around me in a bed big enough for a small army, I thought I must be dreaming. That, or Death had taken pity on me and allowed me to live out a fantasy in the afterlife.
“Where am I?” I asked once I could speak. My throat was dry and my voice sounded hoarse. Loki handed me a glass of water that felt too cool and real on my lips to be an illusion. “Is this death?”
He and Hades exchanged a glimpse, and the amused smile on the latter’s lips made me question my initial assessment. “You came pretty close, but I guess he wasn’t interested in a second date.”
I sat up slowly and Dionysus moved to my side to help me. “Take it easy,” he warned. “You’re still not back at optimal.”
“What happened?” I asked, trying to figure out where we were. I didn’t recognize the room, for all its lavish furnishings and gilded surfaces. “All I remember is being in the river bed, then nothing.”
“What happened is that you brought the Underworld back to life,” said Fenrir. “And it’s the first any of us knew it was ever anything else to begin with.”
“Back to life?” Flashes of the blooming wilderness returned, but I was sure they were nothing more than hallucinations. “That really happened?”
“You should give yourself more credit,” Hades said wryly. “For once, your habit of leaving chaos in your wake actually paid off.”
I was too relieved to see him to bother dignifying that with a response. “I thought I was gone,” I admitted, hugging myself. The room was comfortable, but chilly.
“You came close,” said Loki. “Hades had to pull you back from the edge, but lucky for you, he’s perfected his technique.”
“I had help,” Hades said with a snort.
That explained the energy I could feel buzzing through me. Five different strains, including my own, each one with a distinct flavor that somehow felt like it was already part of me. I wondered if that was just an aftereffect of the resurrection that would disappear in time, but part of me hoped it wasn’t. I could get used to this. Being surrounded by them all, and feeling them within me at the same time.
“Where are we now?” I finally asked, deciding it was going to take me a lot longer to actually process everything that had happened.
“Believe it or not, we’re still in the Underworld,” Hades said, looking around. “Not that there’s anything recognizable about it.”
“But Styx is restored?” I asked hopefully. “The souls are at rest?”
“Because of you,” Hades answered, touching my cheek. “Destiny made a pretty good choice, after all.”
I leaned into his touch, sighing deeply. “What now?”
“What do you mean?” Dionysus asked. Fenrir and Loki had joined us in bed and I wanted nothing more than to curl up between them all for warmth.
“Now that Cronus is gone and the realms are safe, what about us?” I clarified, desperate to know even though I feared the answer more than anything. “I know we’re still bound together, but that doesn’t mean we have to stay together.”
“You have plans of going somewhere else?” Fenrir taunted.
I gave him a look. “You know what I mean. The three of you will always be connected, but there’s no reason you have to stay with me.”
“There’s still the matter of ruling the Underworld,” said Hades. “If you think you’re getting out of our engagement just because you saved the world, you’re as naive as you were Freshman year.”
I gave him a halfhearted glare. “I’m not trying to get out of anything. I just don’t want any of you to feel trapped.”
“You say that like we didn’t all choose to be here,” said Fenrir.
“With you,” Dionysus added, placing his hand over mine.
“With all of us, together,” Loki agreed, shrugging. “Feels right, and besides. Why fix something that isn’t broken?”
As casual as his words sounded, I could tell from the look in his eyes that they meant more than he was usually comfortable expressing. Warmth spread through my chest, making the cold meaningless. “As long as you’re sure.”
“It does raise an interesting question of logistics,” Fenrir said, kicking back against the headboard to stretch out his long limbs. “How are we going to divide our time with her?”
“Don’t be so selfish with your toys, Fido,” Loki quipped. “Sharing is fun.”
“I’m not opposed to it,” Dionysus said wryly.
“We’ll take it one day at a time,” said Fenrir.
“Definitely,” Hades agreed, pulling me into his arms. “We’ll figure out what to do when we get back to the Academy, but while we’re here, the palace should be more than big enough for all of us.”
“We’re going back?” I asked, surprised.
“Of course.” He raised an eyebrow. “You’ve still got two years left, and I won’t have my Queen be a college dropout.”
I elbowed him in the ribs and he just smirked.
“He’s right,” said Fenrir. “There’s still a lot left to clean up in the living world.”
“Don’t remind me,” I groaned. I could imagine how long the meetings with the OSTF were going to be while we explained everything that had transpired in the Underworld. “I just want to enjoy the peace while it lasts.”
“Sounds good to me,” Loki said, his hand crawling up my thigh. “Speaking of logistics, we could give the five-way idea a trial run.”
“You’re kidding,” Hades muttered.
“Come on, don’t pretend you haven’t thought about it,” Loki scoffed.
His touch already had my mind in the gutter, and I probably wasn’t hiding how appealing I found the idea as well as I wanted.
“Sounds comp
licated,” said Fenrir.
“Practice makes perfect,” Loki purred, slipping his hands under the light gown they’d changed me into at some point.
I couldn’t help but squirm as he kissed the inside of my thigh. “Loki…”
“I’m not going to let you monopolize her,” Hades said, leaning in to kiss me. I moaned as his tongue swept into my mouth, brusque and forceful, as usual. I could get used to them being competitive if it was always like this.
Dionysus joined in, slipping the gown over my head. I leaned up to kiss him and felt Hades at my back, his fingers brushing down my spine.
“Eh, what the hell,” Fenrir snorted, slipping an arm around my waist.
They were all pressed around me now, so closely vying for my attention that I barely had room to breathe. I soon lost track of whose lips were where, or whose fingers had just slipped inside me, but as long as they didn’t stop, I was happy.
“Fuck,” I panted, slipping my arms around Loki’s neck, since he was the closest. His lips met mine and his tongue plundered my mouth, tasting of cool mint. Hades slipped my panties down to my knees and I wound up pressed between the two of them as they groped me in tandem. I writhed between them, pushing my hands back into Hades’ hair. “You’re gonna have to learn how to take turns or I’ll suffocate.”
Loki chuckled softly against my neck. “If you have a better idea, then by all means.”
I pulled back enough to catch my breath, my head still spinning with lust. I looked between them, each one half-naked with his perfect body on display. I was starting to have second thoughts about this whole taking turns thing, considering that I wanted them all right now, but I managed to be at least somewhat practical.
“You two, on your knees,” I said, looking at Hades and Fenrir.
They exchanged a dubious glance before Fenrir shrugged. “Your Queen has spoken.”
Hades rolled his eyes, but I could tell curiosity and desire were going to win out. They positioned themselves right where I wanted them, and I let my gaze travel down their muscular abdomens to the cuts of their hips. “Pants off.”
