Persephone couldn’t help herself; a single cry of anguish broke from her throat. Only Hades’s hand on hers steadied her.
But his words almost undid her. “Let it be so,” he said, and though his face was impassive, there were tears in his words. “But know that she does not look unkindly upon me. Know that I truly love her above all things. And know that I, who can make her a great Queen of the Kingdoms of the Olympians, am no unfit husband for Demeter’s child.”
“All this may be true,” said Hermes, “yet still she must go. Make ready your chariot that I may take her to the Upper World.”
“First let my husband and my love give me a last ride in his chariot,” Persephone demanded. “Husband, I would bid farewell to the Fields of Elysium, the kindly realm where the worthy souls find their home, and to Rhadamanthus who is lord over it.”
Hermes nodded; the chariot was brought, and Hades took the reins. Persephone stepped into the chariot beside him and he put his arm around her. Hermes crowded in with them.
“Is it ripe?” he whispered urgently to her. She could only shake her head.
“I don’t know,” she replied. His arm tightened and he said no more.
Hades had no need for doors or gates within his own realm. The horses had carried the chariot only a few paces when they broke through the mist and into the bright light of Elysium. Persephone recognized the path to her little tree immediately as the horses stepped onto it, and with a shiver of apprehension, she felt the chariot lurch as it headed up the slope. She hid her eyes in Hades’s shoulder. She couldn’t bear to look.
The chariot stopped, and she felt Hades—moving. Passing the reins to Hermes. Reaching out with the arm that was not holding her.
“Look up, my love,” he whispered, and Persephone looked up to see him pulling the branch of her tree within her reach. And on that branch was a single, gloriously ripe fruit that glowed like a ruby in the sun.
Her heart soared. She plucked the fruit from the branch; it came away in her hand so easily it might not even have been attached.
“Will you share it with me?” he asked tenderly. With a nod, she broke the tiny fruit in half and handed half to him. Within her half were seven scarlet-pulped seeds. She ate them.
They were tart, very nearly bitter and dry—and she thought she had never tasted anything so good in her life, because the poor little tree had given her the best that it could, fully ripe. No one could say otherwise, and Hermes was the witness.
In fact, Hermes’s eyes were as big as an owl’s. He surely knew that nothing grew in the Underworld except the asphodel. Well, nothing had, until now.
Hades stepped down from the chariot then, his half of the pomegranate still untasted in his hand.
Demeter waited, impatiently, on the top of a hill just below Mount Olympus. Her stubbornness had cost the land dearly; the thin, brittle grass beneath her feet was brown and lifeless, the trees around her leafless, and nothing stirred on the wind but dust. There was not a bird or an insect in the air, and the only living things on the ground were the gods themselves, who waited with her.
Demeter felt a moment of guilt, but only a moment. All of this could have been prevented if Zeus had forced Hades to relinquish her daughter moons ago. Now her magic, pent up within her, stirred and pressed against her, threatening to burst out at any moment. And she could feel the great weight of The Tradition hovering over her, waiting.
She saw a plume of dust in the distance, a plume that soon became a trail, and beneath the trail, the black form of Hades’s chariot. It was driven by Hermes, and beside bright Hermes—
Yes! It was Kore!
She flew like a bird to meet her daughter, love and magic bursting out of her, the grass literally greening at her feet as she ran. Everywhere that her footsteps fell, grass and flowers exploded out of the ground, and streaks of grass and flowers raced away from her. As those streaks of magic reached the trees, they, too, came to life; buds swelling on the branches, and unfurling to leaves and flowers in a moment.
But Demeter had no eyes for that, only for Kore, who leapt from the chariot and into her mother’s arms.
“I didn’t realize until now how much I missed you!” Kore cried, and for a long, long time, all they did was hold each other, kiss and weep.
But then, as the first sound of birdsong in moons echoed across the greening fields, and as the Otherfolk crept out of whatever places they had been keeping themselves until Demeter restored the land, Demeter’s heart…felt a moment of doubt.
She held Kore at arm’s length, and for the first time, saw that she was wearing the long gown of a woman grown, that her face had grown grave and beautiful and—mature. Saw that the loose, flowing locks of the girl had been bound up into the hairdo of a woman. And knew that there was more going on with Kore than just the change in appearance.
“My dearest,” she said, dreading the answer. “I know it should be impossible, for nothing but asphodel grows in the Underworld, but—has any food of Hades’s realm passed your lips in the moons you were with him?”
Her daughter raised her head and regarded her with clear, blue eyes. “As we bid farewell, I plucked a pomegranate from a tree in Elysium, and Hades and I divided it between us. I ate seven seeds.”
Demeter regarded her in horror. “Why would you do such a thing?” she gasped. “Was it some spell? Did Hades force you?”
She saw a strange expression on her daughter’s face then. One that at first she could not identify. And when she did at last, she could hardly believe her eyes, for it was pity.
“Ah, my dearest,” she cried, “if you had not eaten the pomegranate seeds you could have stayed with me, and always we should have been together. But now that you have eaten food in it, the Underworld has a claim upon you. You may not stay always with me here. Again you will have to go back and dwell in the dark places under the earth and sit upon Hades’s throne.”
“I grew that pomegranate myself so that I could eat it, Mother,” the young woman said softly. “I know that you do not understand, but I love Hades. Not because of something he did to me, or some magic spell, but for himself. He is my beloved, and I am his and I could not bear the thought of being unable to return to him.” Then her eyes filled with tears. “But now that I am here, I know I cannot bear the thought of being unable to return to you.” Her lips trembled and she managed a hesitant smile. “Can you not at least agree to share me? What you call the ‘dark places’ hold so much joy for me, because they hold my lord and my love.”
And that was when Demeter realized that little Kore, her baby girl, was gone.
As egg becomes chick, which becomes a bird that must fly, as flower becomes fruit that must ripen and fall or be plucked, so Kore had become Persephone. She who was the goddess of fertility, knew this better than anyone; and though it was bitter, it was something that she had, in her heart, known would come.
Weeping, she bowed her head to the inevitable.
“As you ate seven seeds, so seven moons of the year shall you be with Hades,” she said. “And in that time, I shall mourn, and Olympia will suffer winter as other lands do. But not always you will be there. When the flowers bloom upon the earth you shall come up from the realm of darkness, and in great joy we shall go through the world together, Demeter and Persephone.”
When she said that last, Persephone’s face lit up, for she had used her daughter’s adult name at last. “And when I go beneath the earth again, let that be a season of plenty and rejoicing, the Harvest Moon, when all things ripen and the earth is glad, for though I go from my beloved mother, I go to my beloved husband.”
“So be it,” Demeter said.
Leo stood before the throne of Hades, already exhausted. He had literally fought his way down into the dark god’s realm, step by step, guided by Hermes, but facing every sort of obstacle that could possibly have been placed in his path. He had climbed a cliff, picked his way across a field of jagged rocks that held unexpected pockets of fire, fought a one-eyed gia
nt, tamed a three-headed dog with the help of Hermes and had to outrun a pack of hellhounds.
And now, at last, he saw Bru for the first time in months, and he wasn’t allowed to go to her or touch her. They stood before Hades and Hecate with Hermes standing between them, preventing them even from looking at each other.
Hades sat on a tall throne carved of some black material, set in the middle of a courtyard in front of an enormous building that was the twin of the one Zeus called his home up on the mountain. But here there was no sun, no blue sky, only mist overhead, and more mist drifting across the courtyard, with a twilightlike light permeating everything.
The goddess was shrouded from head to foot in black material, and held a torch. Two dogs stood on either side of her—and Leo wondered, suddenly, what was the obsession that these gods had with dogs? Athena had dogs, Apollo had dogs, Hades had hellhounds and that three-headed thing, and now Hecate had these enormous beasts whose heads came up to her chest. “You have done well, outlanders, in all the trials that we have set you, but there is one task yet you must face, before we can reward you,” Hecate said, her face absolutely still as a stone. “You must face yourselves.”
Before either of them could ask what she meant, Hades spoke.
Now, Hades was impressive. Much more so than Zeus, to tell the truth. There was a gravity about him, and a stillness, that were quite unnerving. Like his brother, he was dark, but unlike Zeus, every movement he made was slow and deliberate. “Within you both are monsters,” Hades said, and gave Leo a penetrating look. “Your fears, your secrets, all the things you would never share with anyone, the things that will tempt you almost beyond bearing. Those monsters will take tangible form, and you must battle them—you will battle them alone, and yet bound together in faith. Leopold, you will lead the way, and Hermes will guide you. But you must never look back to see if Brunnhilde is following you. And you must never hope for her help in your battles, nor aid her in hers. These are yours to deal with alone.” He turned his gaze to Brunnhilde. “Brunnhilde, you must follow him, but you may never give him any sign that you are there, nor interfere with what he does nor how his confrontations go in any way. And you must fight your own battles, with no help from him, nor ask for any.”
Mist wreathed around Hades, emphasizing his distance. That was why Hades was more impressive than Zeus, Leo realized. Zeus was very human. Hades…wasn’t.
Leo nodded; he assumed that over on the other side Bru did the same. Hades lifted his hand. “Then let the final trial begin.”
Hermes turned and walked back in the direction they had come, into the mist that had suddenly billowed up behind them; Leo averted his eyes to avoid looking at Bru, and followed.
But of all the things his imagination had pictured for him to face, the first thing that appeared out of the mist and held up a hand to stop them was nothing he had expected.
“Leopold,” Aphrodite said, and smiled. She seemed to have an inner glow that warmed the mist around her, and the delicate swath of cloth that clung to her body seemed held there by nothing more substantial than force of will. Her hair was unbound, and tumbled down her back in impossibly silky waves. “You know, you really don’t need to go through all this.” She waved her hand vaguely at Hermes and the mist, and gave him a smoldering look. Her lush sexuality left him feeling more than half stunned. “Why, after all, should you? If you were to simply give up here and now, you could come back to the Upper World and Olympia with me.”
“And why would I do that?” Leo asked after clearing his throat.
Aphrodite pouted a little. “Why wouldn’t you? You don’t really think you’ll be able to stay with Brunnhilde, do you? You’ve never been a man to be contented with only one woman, so how long do you think it will take before you are bored with someone who is as much man as woman, hmm?” One delicate eyebrow arched upward. “Think about it, and be honest. You could come with me right now, you know. I like you. I know you find me alluring and hard to resist. Why keep resisting? I could show you things, couch games your barbarian never dreamed of.”
Leo felt himself growing hot and cold by turns, and his armored trews were suddenly much, much too tight. Her perfume wafted over to him, a combination of roses and musk.
“You wouldn’t get immortality, of course,” Aphrodite continued. “But why would you need it if you were leaving her to her own devices? And what I can offer you is worth so much more.” She winked. “You wouldn’t be the first mortal lover I’ve taken, so don’t worry, I’ll be gentle with you.”
His mind spun in circles as he tried to sort his thoughts out. Aphrodite was right, it was as if she had read his past, and even some of his thoughts, for he had never thought of himself as the sort to settle down with a single woman. And even when he had been trying to find himself a Princess, or at least a fabulously wealthy wife, there had always been the vague surety that there would be a mistress or two on the side…
Of course, that had been before he met Bru. Somehow, the moment that he’d seen her asleep in that circle of fire, something inside him had changed forever. Or, perhaps, the change had come earlier than that, when he had passed out expecting that he was bleeding to death from a fatal wound, and awakened discovering that the death of a gentle unicorn had given him an undeserved second chance.
“I am the goddess of love, so I should be the expert on it,” Aphrodite purred as the thin draperies she wore shifted as she moved, alternately concealing and revealing her body in ways that were far more erotic than being naked could have been. “What you mortals call love is a fleeting thing, fragile and quick to fade. Better to be honest now, come and enjoy the pleasures I offer, and we will part when we are both weary, without any vows that are impossible to keep.”
Somehow, it was that last sentence that made his thoughts stop swimming, and settle. And he had been around Aphrodite enough the last several moons to have learned how to shake off the mesmerizing effect that her beauty and raw sexuality had on the susceptible.
“I know about you gods,” he said, carefully choosing his words. “The funny thing about you is that you’re a reflection of us mortals. A bigger reflection, like one in a mirror made to distort and exaggerate, but still, just a reflection of what we are.”
Aphrodite took a small step back, blinking in confusion.
“You see, we made you. We saw you, we made up stories that we thought fit with what you were, and we believed in those stories so strongly that you became what we wanted you to become.” He shrugged apologetically. “So, as the goddess of love, you’re basically what we mortals want you to be, and most of us, I guess, want you to be the way you are now, beautiful, sensual and …” He paused to think of a diplomatic word. “Liberal with your favors. Only a goddess could possibly be that generous. That makes you the expert on some kinds of love, but not all of them. If I wanted to know how to seduce someone, you would be my first choice for advice and help. But for how to stay in love with someone for a very long time? Not so much.”
Aphrodite’s mouth actually fell open for a moment as she stared at him. But a moment later, her sense of humor caught up with her shock. “You’re quite clever, Leopold. Perhaps not wise, to say such things to a goddess, but clever.”
“I wouldn’t have said something like that to a god who would get angry,” he replied. “I hope you noticed that I didn’t say ‘stay in love with someone forever.’ I don’t even know if that’s possible. I’m going to try, but I am not going to make any promises that are that, well, impulsive and inflexible. The Tradition loves those. It uses them to break people.”
Aphrodite nodded. “Well said. And you have passed your first trial. Pass on—and—good luck.”
“Thank you,” he said, and meant it.
She stepped aside and vanished into the mist. Hermes had been waiting for him, and now continued to lead the way.
When that barely clad hussy had tried to seduce Leopold right under her nose, it had taken all of Bru’s self-control to keep from running up t
o her and shield bashing her. “Goddess of love,” was she? All well and good, she was as promiscuous as Freya, but Freya didn’t go around trying to seduce other people’s husbands!
Bru’s hand tightened on the hilt of her sword, and she ground her teeth together.
And the way she was eyeing up Leo, like someone examining a particularly choice bit of roast she was about to devour—it just made Bru’s blood boil!
And that very anger was what woke her up to the fact that this might very well be one of her trials, and the monster she was facing was her own jealousy.
So she stood, and seethed, and clamped her jaws shut on everything she wanted to shout, told her feet that they were not going anywhere just now, and waited.
And inside, besides the anger, she discovered a hard, cold core of fear. Because she wasn’t anything like the lush, dark-haired Olympian beauty. Oh, she wasn’t ugly, but she wasn’t like that. Her body was muscular and hard, not soft and curved. She knew how to kill a man, but all she knew about how to please one, she had learned from Leo.
The more the woman spoke, with her dulcet voice and beguiling ways, the more her anger faded and her fear grew. She couldn’t deny that most men wanted as many women as they could get. She couldn’t deny that she herself was no great bargain unless you were looking for someone who could dispatch your enemies and then share a little bit of tickle-and-poke afterward.
But still, she did not move, or speak. How often had she seen her father running after some wench, and not anything Fricka could say or do would prevent him? In fact, her jealousy and railing seemed to make things worse. Whereas Freya, who actually led the Valkyria, could make virtually any male do her will in the same way that Aphrodite did. Why, she persuaded the gods to let her husband, Odr, enter Vallahalia even though he hadn’t died in battle! None of the male gods, and few of the female, could resist her!
Bru was no Freya…but she was no Fricka, either. She would not rail at Leo like a fishwife. He would be himself, and though he might choose to change, she would not try to make him.
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