The Queen of Flowers and Roots

by Io

  “You got rid of the spring. You, me, you never cared about anything, you’ve never even considered me a daughter, but now the flowers don’t seem so stupid and childish to you, right?”

  I took another step forward to face him.

  “You may also govern the heavens, you can rule and burn each flower to the roots, but you know very well that if you do, you will give more power to those who only govern those roots. You do not have the right to make decisions in my kingdom!”

  It all happened so quickly.

  The hands of Zeus came down on me while the black shadow of Hades covered us both, snapping to place himself in the middle. For a moment we were all three immobile, like the statues of discus throwers at the entrance to gyms: action frozen and in suspense, so that they could contemplate infinity. Perhaps that moment was really endless. For me it was not.

  Then the hands of Zeus returned to rise and even dropped, heavy as the hammer of Hephaestus. He almost unhinged my back, in the beating and reverberation: I had the feeling that at any moment my arms would disconnect from me to fall to the ground, while the laughter of the Allfather reverberated in the fields.

  “You really took your time, eh?”

  How my father was laughing. He ended up leaning on me, clinging to my shoulders, and I staggered to support his weight, the aroma of oak and green acorns, his rough beard on my neck. A hand around my waist, really too confidential. I did not believe I’d ever blushed in my life, however I blushed, embarrassed to death and about to collapse. I think I would have fallen if suddenly Zeus had not been ripped off me.

  “Brother, What are you doing?”

  The voice of Hades would have stopped the heart of a marathon runner, but failed to dampen even a little of Zeus’ hilarity; Indeed, at one point his breath failed him and he began to reel, so much so that I feared he would be strangled.

  Bewildered, I looked in Hades’ eyes and saw in them not a reflection of my astonishment, nor the volcanic anger that I had learned to fear, but a sort of dull resignation verbally something that he could have expressed with a ‘here we go again’.

  “Father...”

  He raised a hand to ask for a truce. We had to wait for his laughter to die down, and it took some time, enough to make me think that, in this, my father was similar to me. Also I, when I laughed I could not stop.

  “Have you finished?” Hades asked coldly.

  Zeus sat up, pressing a hand over his eyes. In the sun that tore and scattered clouds, he composed himself, but did not give up hitting me on the shoulder, with the force of a washerwoman. It was not aggression, but the blows he gave me, and how.

  “Let’s start from here as well, Persephone: Now you’re in my kingdom, under my sky, and if you dare to threaten even the Heavenly Father, you will spend eternity as dry leaves scattered to the wind. Have you understood?”

  The threat would make me shrivel up on myself as if I was still a child, or as if I had become less disoriented.

  “No, father, I don’t understand anything about anything.”

  “Uh, I thought so... Hades, put jealousy aside for a moment, I have to talk to my daughter.”

  “You can talk here.”

  Zeus put his arm around my shoulders, without any inhibition, and said:

  “We can, but you cannot listen. Walk, Persephone. We will remain in view, stay calm. You’re prettier than Demeter, but your claws are too sharp and it gives me certain thoughts. When I want a woman like that, I can easily look for my wife.”

  I became purple with the naturalness that he expressed himself, albeit to exclude the possibility of laying with me. He pulled me down the path, and I was so startled that I let him. By now I was off known ground.

  “So sweet and obedient mamma’s baby has decided to challenge Olympus, eh?”

  I remained silent, it seemed the wisest answer I could offer. Zeus raised a huge smile, it made his beard open like a curtain that fell on the sides.

  “I admit, Persephone I had lost hope, with you. Always so polite, always so respectful, nice and tender, blessing with her buds, loved by all. No shadows, no Mysteries. To put it precisely honestly, my girl, explain how you could not nauseate even yourself?”

  I tried to express myself with all the eloquence I could muster:

  “Eh...”

  He pointed a finger at me, like a conductor’s baton.

  “You are the spring, Persephone, or at least you were, before giving birth to that little thing, whose existence contradicts the laws...” He seemed to consider this. “Uh, I would say all the laws of the cosmos, including Chaos. A real record.”

  He swept away the trifle with a wave of his hand, he returned to hit me on the other shoulder and continued:

  “Not that Hades can be compared to me in this field, but he has had his share of nymphs, also I suppose mortals, and I have no idea who Ate and perhaps Eris have tasted the dish, every now and then... hey, don’t look at me that way. I would take his eyes out if ever. Try to understand, seeing that contrary to predictions, you seem to have it also.”

  To avoid insulting him again I threw a look behind me, searching for Hades. He was standing at the crossroads, and the stone goddess seemed to look at him while he looked at me. He moved his lips to ask: “Are you okay?”, But I could only give him a contrite smile, before returning to try to understand something.

  “I’m trying, father. But it is hard, you have to admit.”

  “No, no,” he assured me, giving me a pat on the back that almost laid me out flat, “you’ll see that it is very easy. Hades can not generate life, or he would have legions of bastards like any self-respecting god, but you’re so determined to spend eternity with him, look a little, you did everything on your own. You goddesses are terrible, when you put certain ideas into your head. For that matter, Hera pulled some of those tricks on me that...”

  “Kore is my husband’s daughter!”

  “We are gods, Persephone. Motherhood, like fatherhood, these are symbolic concepts, not practical tasks. Or do you think your daughter would die of starvation, if you did not giver her milk? On the head of Medusa, the gods uprooted and thrown from their mother’s womb outnumber the gods growing in remote corners of the world, those born from their mother with their father anxiously waiting!”

  I shook off his arm. Although I had seen how he looked at a daughter, at that point I really had had enough.

  “Even the gods need someone next to them to be happy, father. It will also be something symbolic, but symbolically speaking, is it really convenient to think so, don’t you think?”

  “Why complicate it?” Said Zeus, unperturbed. He found a flat stone and threw himself down on it to sit, without bothering to ask me if I wanted to sit down. He said,

  “Mortals die when the gods act, but they die even if they do not act, so it is needless perhaps to think about this. We must think of the universe, Persephone. The lesser gods are not capable. Who are you? A minor goddess, an immortal doll that keeps your adoring husband warm?”

  I shook my head, not to deny what he was saying but to clear my head. Zeus became comfortable, with one ankle sideways over the other leg, and even nodded at Hades, about thirty steps back. Hades, of course, stood firm.

  “Demeter is... amazing, really. I knew that a daughter born to her would be what was needed, here on earth, but it is always a possibility, not a certainty. How many failures I’ve collected...”

  “Please?” I exclaimed, unable to stop myself. “All the children you have sown in the world would that be possible?”

  “Naturally. What else?” I was speechless. Zeus, was reasonable as if speaking of spiritual theology and

  not of his many adulteries, he continued: “For mortals like the spring and summer, perhaps more than

  anything. You’re lucky, for that matter: mortals even like violence a lot, and you know very well what kind of children Hera ladled up. Even she hates the twins, Eris and Ares.” He chuckled. “Discord and war, only mortals can enjoy
similar things. What a story!”

  He slapped his thigh, amused.

  “But they also want these chances, and we have to offer them: they hate it when it happens, but if they could not be human, abjectly human as they wish, the time would come for the gods to die.”

  It was like an echo of Hades’ speeches, in the Avernus. I asked, uncertain,

  “You mean after our era?” Zeus nodded.

  “You were born from the Heavenly Father and Mother Earth, a real blessing for the people who look at a flower and think of you. No one can help but love you with all their heart, they care about you, longing for your smile. How sweet!”

  The tone was so derisory that I felt it was my duty to reply:

  “After all that has happened, you are still denying that a flower can be as strong as the sword of Ares? You don’t know...”

  “Oh, I know very well, Persephone.” The tone had become dry, so similar to that of Hades that I was rendered speechless. “I control the weather and decide if Mother Earth will be fertile or sterile. I am the Heavenly Father, there is ichor in your veins. I understand that very well.”

  He pierced me with his lightning look.

  “The question is, is now a good time, do you understand? “ I searched desperately for a thread that would allow me to

  find the exit to the labyrinth, “You’re... you’re telling me that you had planned everything?” He stroked his beard, almost wistfully.

  “I would say yes, but you have the Fates in the cellar, and I

  I would lie to you in an instant. No, of course I didn’t know what would have happened, but it was only that spring should give fruit. With good, Demeter would never have been convinced: Mother Earth is not easily controlled, as any farmer knows that sinks the plow into the furrow. I almost decided to think of it myself, when Hades came to talk to me about your beautiful eyes. The rest of the story you know, since you wrote it.”

  As I came to terms with the simplicity with which he had just told me that he would be quite capable of coupling with me, he stood up. He had an agility that belied the physical strength of his person.

  “I’m beginning to feel uncomfortable with my big brother looking at me sideways. He can’t wait to return to that depressing tomb that he wanted as a home, I suppose.”

  “The Avernus is a realm no less important than yours.”

  “But listen to her, she already has Hera’s hateful tone. Fortunately it’s not my problem.”

  Hades reached us in a few strides, splashing mud and water from puddles, and gave him a mighty pat on the shoulder; the healthy one, at least.

  “So life has been able to extend its domain into the Underworld! Apparently even death is destined to change, brother.”

  Hades straightened the shoulder that had been moved by the blow. “It ends here, then?”

  “It ends here,” confirmed Zeus, “the gods of the earth reign on earth, Olympus remains inviolate. The agreement between the sons of Cronus is sealed with divine ichore, as you had planned from the beginning. You owe me an immortal soul, Hades.”

  “You will have it in less time than you think. Temperance is not the main virtue of your offspring.”

  Zeus laughed again. I won’t say no. But we will see what you will tell me about yours!”

  I joined them, the puddles beneath my feet, threw out splashes, drawing gentle circles on the surface. Zeus turned to look at me, and there was a teasing glint in his eyes. But when he spoke, his voice sounded harsh:

  “Now you know the Mystery in its entirety, Persephone. You could have chosen Olympus, but you chose the land, from the flower to the root: it is a definitive choice, because it was your choice. You have made the world what it is, and it will be your responsibility to make sure that it remains as it is, from now on.”

  I did not look down. There was no reason that I should. Not any more.

  “I will, father. The seed is buried in the autumn and emerges to life in the spring. Mortals always honor the Heavens, but it will be us, to Hecate, that they turn their invocations, from both sides of their existence. And the new spring will be better prepared than I.”

  Sharp smiles, the same smile as Hades.

  “Prepared to face you right away, no doubt. Indomitable will, the spring of future epochs, because she will be free from the power of Olympus. The world is much greater than that.”

  For a moment it seemed that Zeus was torn between threatening me or devastating me with another of his pats. Instead he smiled.

  “You took the time to get there, my girl. But, considering that half of my children will never get there, I would say this is a great result.”

  The sky had cleared again.

  Epilogue

  “We have known the Mysteries, the true principles of life, and we gained not only a reason to live happily, but also a reason to die with more hope.”

  Cicero, De Legibus

  I squinted to ward off the lightning that blinded me. Delicate in his dismissal as he had been in the interview, my father had brought forth lightning without even a word of warning.

  So close it was as if I blazed inside: for a moment I felt the feeling of being lightning myself, white, pure white, pure lightning contained in a subtle human shell. He vanished in an instant, and I was reeling with the stab in the head from the lightning, as long as Hades supported me. He, it seemed, was accustomed to it.

  He smoothed my hair, hearing it crackle from the residual charge. If that meant being one of the Olympians, I thought, I had a narrow escape.

  I said, cynically:

  “He talked like that just so he didn’t have to admit having had his share of responsibility in what happened. I did not need to reveal my Mysteries. I know they have always been a part of me. My father tried to make himself look good after everything had already been solved, nothing else.”

  “You should not say such things about the Allfather.”

  “You have said worse.”

  “Because I never doubted who would win.

  Zeus always wins. It is his Mystery: however things go, the final victory is always his.”

  I rubbed my eyes, to get rid of the last spots dancing in front of me and to see better. But Hades seemed to be speaking seriously.

  I shook my head.

  “Should I believe he did this to ...”

  “Believe what you like,” he interrupted, “because you can

  be assured that everyone will do the same. The only thing that is common to mortals and gods is how we change reality according to our beliefs.”

  He looked back at the statue in the niche. Smoothed by lightning, cleaned of the grime, glistening with rain: different from before, almost unrecognizable. The only thing left the same was that it had three faces.

  And, of course, it cast a shadow. It stretched up the middle of the crossroads, to Hades’ feet.

  He said,

  “The gods can control mortals, but mortals are Chaos from which the gods were created. From the blackest abyss of Hell, from the damnation inflicted on the worst of them, come the blessings that regenerate humanity. Consider it the last of the Mysteries of our kingdom.”

  Our kingdom. They were words that were greeted with a smile, and with a smile I welcomed them. They smelled of magnolia and pomegranate and of spring.

  I held on to Hades. The chill of his armor took my breath away, but I did not give up reaching up on my toes to kiss him, a kiss that lasted a long time, a kiss that was returned. He took my face in his hands and narrowed his lips to welcome me, I felt myself flare up, as the ice of Tartarus chilled me. I was a torch that burned in the heart of winter, down in the impenetrable darkness. I had waited a whole eternity to live like this. The thought made me dizzy, its flavor stunned me.

  Hades then took me by the shoulders and pushed me firmly but also, it seemed to me, with some regret.

  “You are trembling like a wet squirrel,” he said, “you never learn, Persephone.”

  I smoothed his beard along the jaw
line. While I kissed him feeling, at the same time rough and smooth, as I liked. He removed any doubts about his masculinity, if I ever could have had any.

  “I was just trying to change reality according to my beliefs.”

  “On the Styx, don’t ever do that again. Once was enough.”

  He started to laugh again, and after he held me for a moment, decided he didn’t need to. I laughed and I laughed in the sun, at the crossroads of the choice between the triple goddess, my mother’s wood, and Hades’ altar. I laughed until I was satisfied, and when I was, I laughed some more taking the hand of death and pulling him down the path with me. Hades let me, until he realized that I wanted to go back to the spring.

  “Go,” he said pulling away, “and return to the altar with Kore. I’ll wait there.”

  I sighed. “What are the chances that you and my mother will get along, one day?”

  “None, my queen. I will go and prepare the horses.”

  He turned and very firmly took the other path. I watched him put on his helmet and move away among the shadows of the forest, and I was wondering how much the world would change, after I had changed so much.

  Kore will grow up in this new world. It’s her time, not mine. I felt a huge relief at the thought.

  At the spring, Leuka was still on her knees in front of the poplar, still wet even if some of the nymphs were thoughtfully rubbing their hair, still with faces transfigured by the miracle. With some concern, Minthe told me that her friend was in love.

  “With the tree?”

  “Leuka has never shone for her judgment, divinity, but this is...” I was puzzled for a moment before moving on.

  “Take my word, Minthe: there are far worse unions. If Leuka is happy so, we must be for her.”

  She was far from convinced, and I understood, but if there was something against which I would never move, it was other people’s happiness or mine. Leuka’s paradise was her grove, and among those silvery leaves there was everything she needed. I, who lived in the Underworld had found my paradise, I was the last person in the world who would have judged, or hindered her.

  I reached my mother, who was jumping Kore up and down in her arms to make her laugh. The little one was waving her hands and made ‘eeeh, eeeh, eeeh’ with so much joy that she made me jealous.