She set his poplar crown on his head and felt him bristle. He knew that she wanted him to present himself as the Lord of the Underworld when she confronted Zeus. The sinews of his neck tensed, and she stroked a hand down his back. “You said you’d think on it.”
Aidoneus settled back in the chair and met her eyes in the reflection again. “I did. I still am.”
“Please, husband. Follow me, but don’t tell them that you will.”
“I can’t simply leave you there once—”
“Aidon,” she said resolutely. “I trust you. No matter what. I’ll…” her voice wavered, and she swallowed hard. She could still taste pomegranate seeds in the back of her throat. “I’m going to trust that you’re coming. I won’t even look back when we’re on our way to the surface. I’ll just trust that you’re there behind me.”
Her words pushed him ever closer to doing as she wished. As she had said, he might not ever get another chance to do so. They were separating him from his wife forever.
He immediately cast the thought from his mind. The more he dwelt on it, the harder it would be for him to let her go. He stood up in front of her, catching the scent of lilies and larkspur and a hint of pomegranate as she moved. Aidon felt her body heat against him as she arranged his himation to drape over his left shoulder, heard her steady breathing by his ear.
The sweet scent of pomegranate hung persistently in the air. He hoped it would last; when he shut his eyes, he could imagine that she was still there with her warmth and light. He pictured her lying against his chest yesterday morning, sated, blissful, the grass below and heavy fruits above, before everything fell apart. The trees in the grove were all that would remain of Persephone, the only trace that she had even been here at all. He violently banished that thought and focused on her.
Persephone was unnervingly calm, a serenity likely fortified by her desperately maintained notion that she could sway the King of the Gods to let her return. He cringed. He wouldn’t be there when she was told with absolute and crushing finality that there was no going back. But Hades knew his wife well. She would almost certainly defy them. Please, Sparing Ones, don’t let Persephone be punished on my account, he offered up in silent prayer to the Fates. She’ll insist, she’ll petition, she’ll attempt to come back. Please Fates, don’t let her destroy herself because of me.
“Aidon,” she said softly, motioning him toward the antechamber door. He’d been lost in thought. Persephone was standing at the door, ready to open it. He watched her gaze across the room one last time, memorizing every detail. The antechamber and the bedroom were the first rooms he’d built— carved out of the cave he’d drunkenly retreated into after arriving in the Underworld. The rest of the palace was almost an afterthought. This was his sanctuary— a place for him to rest and meditate, to retreat. But it had only felt like home once he’d opened the door and let Persephone in.
He took a final look at the room, and then shut the door behind them with a hollow thud.
***
Hermes stood still, listening. He was restless, wanted desperately to go somewhere, anywhere, but any step he took with his winged shoes would echo far too loudly in Hades’s throne room. The room was pitch black but for the silver light filtering in from the terrace, the heavy silence broken only by an occasional howl in the distance. Cerberus. Hermes’s wandering mind alighted on the very real possibility that Hades would change his decision, lock him up in Tartarus, and declare war on the Olympians for breaking a Stygian oath.
Hades has every right to go to war, Hermes thought, then urged his thoughts onward to less terrifying locales. He tried to discern which of Cerberus’s heads were baying when the beast howled. He couldn’t tell them apart.
“A wonder you slept at all, Psychopompos.”
He startled so violently that his petasos almost fell off his head. Turning, he saw a woman in crimson robes with a half moon held by intricately wound selenite beads on the center of her forehead. “I wa-wasn’t expecting you, Hecate,” he managed once his heart slowed.
“Few do,” she smiled. “A grim task you’ve been given, no? To sever a man from his lawful, beloved wife?”
Hermes pursed his lips before he spoke. “I have no choice. You know who my father is.”
“In that, yes. But what of the horses whose reigns you do hold?”
Hermes blinked and shook his head rapidly. “What do you mean?”
“Selene proved herself a masterful storyteller— she spun such intimate details into her tale about your visit with Hades and Persephone in the palace grotto last week. But I know she has seen no such things…”
“I…” Hermes fidgeted as Hecate narrowed her eyes at him. “You see,” he tittered nervously, “er, that is, you can’t imagine how persuasive my brother Apollo is. He
insisted—”
“Your tongue is too easily loosened, Hermes.” She walked to the brazier and with a flick of her wrist, brandished an unlit torch. Hecate thrust it into the coals. “And loose enough to risk war between the realms.”
He took a quick step back when the torch flared white hot in her hand, illuminating the room as she approached him. Hermes swallowed. He’d heard whispered stories about what she’d done to her enemies during the war. “H-Hecate, I’m not stupid.”
“Aren’t you, now…”
“I’ll not repeat a word of what happened yesterday!”
“Few of the futures I see are certain, Psychopompos. But this is one of them,” she said, advancing calmly.
“Please; I promise!”
“Pretty words. I need strong words. Perhaps I should be more direct, and burn out your wagging tongue…”
“I’ll swear!”
Hecate stopped her advance. The torch hissed menacingly between them.
He drew in a full breath. “I, Hermes Argophantes, swear on the Styx that I will not reveal a single word spoken by Hades in the throne room yesterday. Not one! To anyone.”
“Hard to believe,” Hecate intoned and lowered her torch. “You are known to do the bidding of oath breakers, Hermes.”
“But I am not one myself,” the God of Thieves said quietly. “Whatever else I may be, I take that seriously.” Hecate’s torch flamed out and disappeared from her hand. The lingering darkness left him almost blind. He waited for his vision to adjust and saw her calmly standing exactly as she was. “And despite what all of you think, I respect Aidoneus.”
“Respect.” She raised her eyebrows.
“The very least,” Hermes said through gritted teeth, “I’m afraid of him. Of… both him and her.”
“As well you should be.”
She glanced in the direction of the tapestry-shrouded staircase, the sound of sandaled feet descending from the chamber above. Hermes swallowed. A slender hand moved the cloth aside and Persephone peeked out, dressed in the same manner as yesterday, when Hermes had tried to spirit her back to the world above. She nodded to him, her face blank of emotion, and Hermes returned the gesture. Hecate bowed deeply. Aidoneus was right behind her, his hand clasped within hers.
Hecate glanced at their hands, the rings smoldering with a light of their own, and exhaled in surprise and relief. She quickly returned her features to solemn regard, but not before Persephone noticed her reaction and understood that Hecate knew. She allowed the goddess’s expression to give her a faint sense of hope, and prayed that Hecate would know to say nothing.
The four stood in the dark throne room without speaking. Silvery moonlight still lit the Styx and the marshes of Acheron, and all could hear Cerberus baying at the water’s edge. Only Hades and Persephone could hear the cacophony of shades, those souls in Asphodel begging her to stay, lamenting that they were being robbed of their long-prophesied queen. She tried as best she could to ignore the plaintive cries; if she listened too closely, she would be lost. Persephone knew that her husband was more practiced at letting their voices fade into the background.
Aidoneus spoke first, quiet and staid. “Shall we?”
A pretty shade reached for the hem of Persephone’s peplos and kissed the embroidered cloth, her eyes wet with tears. Hermes squinted. The woman reminded him of his mother’s sister, Merope. Before he could get a better look, she vanished in a wisp of smoke, her apparition replaced by the tall, ghostly flowers. The mood was almost funerary. How appropriate, he thought.
He wanted to leave this land of sadness as soon as he could, but wilted when he remembered that by Persephone’s word, there was only one way across the river Styx— and the boat was already waiting for them.
Charon stood tall on one of the creaky bracings, his oar in hand, and his hood over his head to conceal his face in shadow. His eyes shone silver, matching the light from the river. Hermes looked away from the Boatman, feeling his heavy glare. He waited, watching Hades and Persephone look one another in the eye, almost as though they were speaking to each other. Persephone leaned into his chest and he stroked her hair gently. At last, Aidoneus backed away and silently took her hand, leading her to the boat.
Hermes dropped his gaze to his feet, angrily mulling over why Demeter would do this. Hades clearly wasn’t mistreating her. From what little he’d seen, they were well matched, and she had been granted a greater role in this world than a consort should ever expect of her lord husband. Hermes shook his head. How would anyone ever know the truth? Mortals and gods alike feared this place, and feared its stern master. Of course they would assume— their assumptions bolstered by Demeter’s wrath— that Hades had violated Persephone, body and spirit, and kept her here as his prisoner.
The couple ended their silent farewell and Hades picked his wife up by the hips as though she weighed nothing, lifting her clear of the water. Charon took Persephone’s hand, helping her the rest of the way into the boat. Hecate appeared by the queen’s side, gracefully shifting through the ether. Hermes let his winged sandals lift him and stepped in with them. He didn’t dare use them to carry him all the way across the Styx and await their arrival, though it could have saved him from Charon’s withering looks.
The boat lurched and Hermes sat down across from Persephone. Hades stood at the shore, his figure growing smaller as they rowed out into the river. His face was stone and he turned away suddenly, slamming the palace gates behind him.
The river was a pool of moonlight. When Hermes looked over the side of the boat all he could see was silver, and in the calmer parts of the river’s surface he could make out the darker seas of the moon itself, as though the whole bright orb were filling the Styx and they were gliding across it.
“Why do you look so sullen, Messenger?” Charon’s voice ground out, more strained than usual.
Hermes glanced up at him. Was it his imagination or did he see in the up cast moonlight a wet trail of tears on the Boatman’s sunken cheek? He felt a swell of compassion for Charon, but Hermes had no patience for his derision. “Do you think I take joy in this?”
“I would guess you’d be very glad. You’ve won after all— haven’t you, Olympian?”
Hermes gritted his teeth. “There’s no victory here, Boatman.”
“Oh isn’t there, now? Isn’t it victory when your king proves that he can break any sacred law he wants, assert his dominance over us and steal away our—”
“Charon, please,” Persephone said quietly.
He was instantly silent and lowered his head. “Forgive me, Aristi.”
Hermes fumed. “I was commanded to play this role and we all thought that Hades had—”
“Psychopompos,” Hecate hissed. “Perhaps it’s best if you hold your tongue.”
Hermes shivered, visions of a white-hot torch bursting into his mind. Hecate shifted in the boat and sat upright, letting Persephone lean onto her shoulder. The young queen looked down, her emotions starting to collapse under their own weight. It took all the restraint she could summon not to jump into the bottomless waters of the Styx and swim back to him. Hecate wrapped an arm around her and held her shoulder.
“Do not despair, my queen. Look at me,” Hecate said, waiting for Persephone to meet her gaze. “You have done a marvelous thing. No waters are deep enough to part you from this shore ever again.”
She prepared herself certain now that Hecate knew exactly what she had done, and thanked the Fates that she spoke cryptically to hide her meaning from Hermes and Charon. There was more she needed to know. Things to discuss more candidly, as Hecate had said. It was her first time apart from her husband and alone with the Goddess of the Crossroads, and she knew that neither the Ferryman nor the Messenger would dare interrupt them.
Hecate could sense what she was about to ask— whether or not she carried Aidon’s child with her to the world above. Her forehead tighten with concern and compassion as she gave her answer. “Blood is a dangerous thing in Asphodel,” Hecate said, echoing Aidon’s words from the night Persephone had first suspected she was pregnant. “It does not flow here.”
Persephone wilted. If her plan today failed, she had hoped to keep a more precious memento of Aidoneus than just the rings on her hand, or the jewels on her neck and girdle. Persephone grasped for possibilities. She hadn’t yet arrived in the Underworld when she could have first conceived by him, had she? And together they had already done the impossible. “What about the grove, Hecate? Life can be created here, can it not?”
“Only in that sacred place brought forth by you and your husband. And nowhere else,” she said. Persephone turned her face away to stare out into the river, frustrated. Perhaps Hecate was wrong. She ran her hand over her belly. Please let her be wrong.
Sensing her internal protestations, the Titaness spoke again. “The seeds of this world will bloom in the world above.”
“Which seeds?” she asked Hecate pointedly. She was thankful for the metaphors, but Persephone craved a clear answer.
Hecate shook her head. “The waters are muddied by endless ebbs and flows and the churned-up silt from all that has transpired. The Fates alone know the answer. But after today all will know. Nothing shall remain the same. Only that wellspring remains clear.”
The boat docked on the opposite shore and its passengers disembarked amidst a mass of shades. But instead of bowing to greet the procession of gods, the newly dead merely gawked at the mists overhanging the river. Hermes followed their wide-eyed gazes and felt ice crawl up his spine. A dark fleck was visible in the impenetrable mists, shrouded, but coming closer. He heard whinnying and saw moonlight glinting off golden wheels. Hermes stopped breathing.
It was Hades. Bearing down on them in his chariot. Oh Gods, Hermes thought in a panic. He’s changed his mind and chosen war.
Hermes rose up slightly on the balls of his feet, ready to flee Chthonia, perhaps warn the others in time. Before he could move, his wrist was caught and squeezed hard by the little flower goddess, the dread Queen of the Underworld. She spoke low and calm, staring at him with her cold blue gray eyes. “Stay right where you are, Messenger.”
12.
“You have to say something!”
“How can I?” Askalaphos brushed his fingers through his thin black curls again. “Do you have any idea what this means?”
Menoetes hushed his voice and whispered low. “It means that she stays! It means that they can do nothing to take her from us! And you intend to keep quiet and let her go, you fool?”
“I’m the fool, Menoetes? Can you even conceive of what will happen if anyone learns what she’s done? There will be war. A war to end the cosmos! Everything will die in fire. And
not just in the corporeal world, but here as well. You and me, our mothers, all the nymphs of the Cocytus and the Styx, the Lampades, even Nyx and Erebus!”
“It cannot be as dire as all that, Askalaphos. Now, come with me. We’ll find Lady Hecate or Morpheus and get this sorted out.”
“Please, we cannot go to anyone with this. I am not going to be known as the one who ended the world!”
“No, you will not, Askalaphos,” a voice above them said.
The broken pomegranate fell from the gardener’s hands and he stumbled back, gazing up into the darkness above. Nyx drifted down, bathed in moonlight, to hover inches above the ground. She picked up the open fruit, examining it. A smile crossed her face and she brushed her hand through the wavering edges of the darkness that cloaked her and trailed upward into the mists and Erebus beyond.
“So she did,” she said, answering the silent voice of her husband.
Askalaphos and Menoetes were bowed to one knee before Lady Nyx. The gardener stammered. “M-milady, please. I o-only wanted to—”
“Rise, Askalaphos,” she said, a smile still decorating her face.
The gardener swallowed, on the verge of tears, fearing that he was about to be annihilated by the ancient goddess. “I knew I couldn’t keep it a secret forever, milady, I… only… wanted to…”
She tittered. “After all these aeons, none of you seem to understand that we see all. My brothers and sisters and I are the earth and the waters and the air; the light, the darkness and the ether itself. Erebus and I already saw what was done. And we knew that it would be done.”
Askalaphos permitted himself to relax, and Menoetes stopped cowering, rising slowly with the aid of his staff.
“We saw our little queen sneak out as though no one could see her. But it is night here, and I am night.” Nyx laughed again and clasped her hands around the pomegranate, gazing in the direction of the grove. “Those dear little ones. Their intrigues are never hidden from us. Oh, they try, though!”
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