“Sounds good,” I said, wrinkling my nose as he rubbed it. “Thank you.”
“It’s my pleasure,” he said, leaning in and kissing my lips quickly. “Let’s head back.”
“Okay.”
We put away the tools we’d been using in the shed on the outside wall of the cabin and went inside, laughing over my newfound skills in the garden. I was more used to working with the animals on the ranch versus growing things, so it had definitely been a learning day for me.
“You go ahead and get in the shower,” Hades said, opening one of the closed doors and revealing a bedroom. “It’s just through here. I’ll lay your dress out for you.”
“What about you?”
“I have some stuff to set up out here. Don’t worry, I’ll clean up, too. Take your time though, really.”
“All right,” I agreed, kissing him quickly again as I passed by him and entered the bedroom.
It was small, but homey. A good sized bed took up most of the room, a dresser off to one side under the window matching the woodwork. The door to the bathroom was to the right and I slipped in there, eager to feel clean again.
There was the usual bathroom fixtures in the small space and another door, which I guessed led to the other room I’d seen when entering the cabin. After all of the grandeur of the castle, it was nice to have such a simple place to stay. I felt much more at home here, among the woodwork and the plants, the sun shining down on us.
I did as Hades suggested and really took my time in the shower, letting the hot water wash over me and relax all my muscles. The smell of the green apple shampoo I lathered into my hair made me almost never want to get out. Eventually, I decided I’d been greedy enough with the water and turned it off, towel drying myself slowly and wrapping my hair up before going into the bedroom naked.
True to his word, Hades had brought another dress for me, as well as under clothes that made me blush slightly. They were all beautiful, though, taking my breath away as soon as I laid eyes on them. Next to the clothes on the bed were an array of hair and makeup products, along with a note explaining I should get fixed up fancily.
I giggled, picking up the white lace bra and panties, holding them up to my body and examining myself in the mirror. Whatever Hades had planned, I was sure to love it, if only because it was his idea.
I slid the undergarments on and gathered up the beauty products, carrying them into the bathroom. A frown covered my face as I unwrapped my hair and wiped the fog off the mirror, the black veins under my eyes worse than they had been just hours ago.
I set to carefully doing my makeup, covering the lines expertly without putting on the same amount of makeup as a hooker. I knew I would be discovered soon, if they kept getting worse, but was at a loss when trying to think of how to fix it.
Sighing, I finished putting on my face and then went to work on my hair, pinning it up elegantly. Only a few small curls hung down to frame my face. Finally, it was time to put on my dress.
I walked back out into the bedroom, smiling happily at the beautiful, white dress. It had pearl accents and a low, swooping neckline. I’d never seen anything so beautiful. Carefully, making sure to not mess up any of my previous work, I slid the garment on, the fabric hugging my body perfectly. It was as if it had been made for me. Once dressed, I examined myself in the mirror once more.
I looked like a queen, a woman loved by a man who would do anything for her. There was something about knowing how everything on me had been picked by Hades that made me feel that much more beautiful. All of the white gave me the look of a bride as well, the only thing missing being a bouquet.
Satisfied I was completely ready, no shoes in sight anywhere, I opened the bedroom door and looked out to see if Hades was waiting for me. Instead, I found a trail of rose petals and candles, leading to the outside.
Curious, a largest smile of my life plastered onto my face, I followed the trail, exiting the cabin and stepping out into the now dusky light of the garden. The trail continued on, its end out of my sight, and I strode out onto the cool grass, picking up the skirt of my dress as I followed it.
The rose petals ended at a beautiful garden arch, the lattice work having been woven through with several different kinds of flowers. Under the arch was a small table with two candles on it, unlit, and a velvet box, the contents closed away from my sight.
I looked around, Hades not anywhere to be seen. I couldn’t believe he’d gone through so much trouble for me.
A rustling of leaves caused me to turn around and there he was. My breath sucked from my chest upon seeing him, his usual black attire having been switched for that of a white suit, a single red rose pinned to his chest. As he slowly walked towards me, my heart beat faster and faster, my body fighting the desire to run to him and throw my arms around him. Something told me I needed to stay exactly where I was.
“You look beautiful,” he said softly as he neared, reaching out and taking my hand.
“So do you. I mean, handsome, you look handsome,” I laughed.
“I wanted to ask you something,” he said seriously. “And I couldn’t think of any other place I would want to do it but here.”
“Okay,” I said, grinning.
“When I first saw you, picking those flowers all those lifetimes ago, I knew I had to have you. But I went about it the wrong way and you ended up hating me for it. Our relationship hasn’t exactly been one most husbands and wives share. But now . . .” He reached down and took my other hand, pulling me closer to him. “Something changed. We grew closer together. I learned more about who you really are. I learned I can trust you, that I want to trust you. The things I should have done before, the things that would have made us a real husband and wife, are finally occurring.
“My feelings for you have changed as well. I know I’m not good at expressing how I feel when it comes to stuff like this,” he laughed, his hands gripping me tighter. “But I think I love you. When I look at you, I don’t see that girl in the meadow anymore. I see a woman I want to spend every moment of the rest of my life with, if she’ll have me.”
He looked at me, waiting for me to answer, but I couldn’t find the words right away. Part of me was broken at hearing him talk of another woman that way, but my heart soared at his words. He’d fallen in love with me, Katrina, not Persephone. He didn’t realize it, but the things that had changed that brought on his feelings were all me. I was the one he wanted, not Persephone.
“I love you, too,” I finally said softly, laughing slightly. “I don’t even know what else to say other than that. I love you.”
He smiled widely, leaning in and kissing me softly, still holding onto my hands. Breaking away quickly, he cleared his throat and then started again.
“This is our real wedding, if you will. I figured, if everything was going to be real for us now, this might as well be, too. Since we’re already technically married, though, I hope you don’t mind it being just us.”
“Of course not,” I laughed.
He released my hands and picked up the velvet box off the table, opening it to reveal a sparkling pearl necklace.
“I got this to go with your dress,” he explained, placing it around my neck and closing the clasp for me. “I figured you already had rings and I wanted to get something special for you.”
“It’s beautiful, thank you,” I said, touched again by the amount of thought that had gone in to all of this.
He set the box back on the table and picked up the candles, lighting each of them with a snap of his fingers before handing one to me.
“The candles symbolize the two of us,” he explained. “We were in the dark before. Now we’re together, in the light.”
He took my free hand then and started leading me in the direction he’d come from, into the trees where soft lights hung in the air. It was then that I saw our small and simple dinner set up under the trees, more candles sitting around and rose petals sprinkled on the ground.
“It’s not much,” he said,
taking me to my seat and helping me to sit down, our candles set on the table.
“It’s perfect,” I contradicted him. “I don’t need anything big and fancy, just you.”
Getting down on his knees in front of me, he took my face in his hands and ever so gently, leaned forward until our lips met. It was much like the kisses from before today, that ignited passion and desires that shouldn’t be spoken out loud unless you intended to act on them. It was also soft and sweet, though, a declaration of deeper feelings and commitments that could only be expressed by such a simple action.
Our dinner passed quickly and quietly, glances and smiles exchanged frequently as we basked in the company of each other. When we were finished eating, we picked up our candles again and walked back to the cabin, hand in hand.
“I have somewhere special I want to put these,” Hades said as we came inside, motioning to our special wedding flames.
He moved across the sitting area, to the door I hadn’t seen opened yet. Following after him, I was surprised to find that behind it was a room full of items that looked like keepsakes, some of which were obviously very old. There were many simple things, such as a piece of paper or a worn out pen. Other things seemed vastly important, like a sword hanging on the wall. On one end of the room was a wardrobe that must have been holding even more items.
“I want them here, in the window,” he said, setting his candle down and motioning for me to come over. “That way, I will always see them and their flames burning and remember what tonight was like.”
I smiled, setting my own down right next to his and watching the fire’s reflection in the glass.
“This is a good place for them,” I said. “Sitting with all of your treasures.”
“Nothing in this room will ever be as important to me as you,” he said, pulling me into his arms.
I reached up, wrapping my arms around his neck, and pulled him down to meet my lips, kissing him with all the strength I had in me. The night had meant so much to me and I didn’t know how to tell him other than to show him how I felt.
His hold on me tightened, his hands spanning across my back as he reciprocated my eagerness, his tongue slipping into my mouth and exploring the space there.
It only took a few seconds for me to remove his jacket, sliding it off his arms and tossing it in the corner before starting on the buttons on his shirt. Normally, I would have been scared to move so fast, but not with Hades.
His hands moved up my back and into my hair, pulling the pins from it and letting it fall down onto my shoulders. Once he was satisfied that my locks had been sufficiently released, his fingers fell to my shoulders, sliding the straps of my dress off to the side. His mouth left mine then, feathering kisses down my neck and across my collar bone, causing the heat inside me to skyrocket.
I sighed softly, holding him to me tighter, and he suddenly picked me right up off the ground, his mouth returning to mine as he carried me out of the room and into the bedroom. Within seconds, he had me on the bed and was sliding my dress off the rest of the way, his fingers pausing slightly as they brushed over my bra and panties.
Once the dress was a puddle on the floor, he climbed on top of me, his warm kisses falling on my bare midriff and moving up me until the found my mouth again.
The spinning of happiness in my head made it hard to focus on anything but the way he was touching me, but I somehow still managed to get his shirt off, revealing the abs and chest I hadn’t seen since the first night of my arrival. How scared I’d been of him then, and how much I loved him now.
“I love you,” I whispered against his mouth, running my fingers over his bare skin.
“How much?” he whispered back, pressing his face into the crook of my neck, his tongue flicking out and licking a sensitive spot there.
“More than I ever thought it was possible to love someone,” I said honestly, content to let him send shivers through me.
“I love you,” he said, holding himself over me again so he could look at me.
“How much?” I teased, repeating his question.
“Let me show you.”
Chapter Twenty
I dreamed about a rose bush. At first, it struggled for life, desperately trying to find something, anything that would keep it from dying. Over time it discovered water, drinking it up greedily. Eventually, though, the water ran out and the bush withered under the sun’s hot rays, with nothing to save it.
When I woke in the morning, it was to Hades’s handsome face, inches from mine, eyes closed in peaceful slumber. His arm was stretched over me, his bare chest uncovered by the sheets we’d practically demolished in our happiness the night before.
A blush covered my face as I remembered the many times he’d shown me just how much he loved me. It was everything I could have ever hoped for, right down to the amount of love I had for him. I’d never thought my first time would be with the man I wanted to spend the rest of my life with. Now that it’d happened, I couldn’t even begin to describe how grateful I was it had been. Sharing that part of myself with anyone else seemed like a crime, something to mourn greatly. I knew it would have been just as special if it wasn’t my first time, but the glow in my heart told me that this had been the way to do it.
Carefully, so I wouldn’t wake him, I wiggled out from underneath him and softly walked into the bathroom, taking my underwear with me and closing the door so I could do my business in private. Once finished, I opened the extra door into the keepsake room, smiling happily at our still burning candles in the window. They must have been some kind of magic since there were no wax trails or noticeable wear on either of them.
As I stared around the room, a few of the pieces caught my attention and I wandered in, looking over each one slowly, wondering what type of significance they held for Hades. I walked around the room, taking it all in, before coming to the large wardrobe. Opening it softly, I gasped at what I found sitting on the shelf.
It was a helmet. Not just any helmet though, the helmet. I wasn’t exactly sure what it was about it that made me so sure, but Erebos had been right when he’s said I would know as soon as I saw it.
Staring at it in awe, I didn’t even know what to do. There was no way I could take it now, no way I would want to. Doing so would betray Hades, a crime I didn’t think I could ever do now. If I didn’t take it though, the lives of my family were at risk, if Helios had been speaking the truth when he lectured me. Something told me I could rely on his word in this instance.
As I looked into the shiny, golden metal, I suddenly realized something was wrong with my reflection. Leaning in, I could see that the black veins had extended down even further, touching my cheeks like an angry black web. That wasn’t all though—some of the veins in my eyes had darkened as well, my irises having become somewhat deformed, like they were stretched out in several directions. It looked like I was some kind of monster with soulless eyes, staring into nothing.
Panic started to overtake me, the knowledge that I didn’t have any way to hide now hitting me full in the face. Hades was going to know something was wrong with me and I would never be with him the same way again. Telling him I loved him, succumbing to my feelings had destroyed the one defense I had here.
“Persephone?”
My head whipped around quickly, my heart jumping into my throat as I looked at him, standing in the doorway in only his pants from the night before.
“What the hell?” he said in confusion, looking at me like he was ready to pounce.
“I can explain,” I said, trembling, taking a step back and bumping into the wardrobe.
The helmet wobbled on the shelf, falling forward in what seemed like slow motion, right into my ready hands.
A hissing filled the air, smoke pulling from me and the ring on my finger and wrapping around the helmet greedily. In an instant, I was knocked to the ground, my disguise completely ripped from me and Erebos standing in the room with us, lovingly stroking the helmet in his hands.
“Thank
you, dear Katrina,” he cooed down at me, a sick, twisted smile on his face. “I couldn’t have done it without you.”
“Erebos,” Hades hissed, grabbing one of the swords off the wall next to him.
“It’s too late,” Erebos laughed. “I have the helmet now. The Olympians have lived their last days at the top.”
Hades lunged forward, not waiting for him to explain anything, swinging the sword down fast and hard, and knocking the helmet from his hands.
Erebos was just as quick though, smoke reaching out around him to suck it back to him.
My brain clicked over in an instance. Jumping to my feet, I grabbed the helmet and yanked it from the wispy grasp of the Titan. Before my better judgment caught up with me, I was running from the cabin as fast my mostly naked body could go, heading for the door back into the Underworld, praying I could lose myself in the trees fast enough.
There was a large explosion behind me, one wall of the cabin disintegrating under a massive wall of fire, and I heard the terrible, angry cry of Erebos, mixed in with the frightened horses who were now out in the open and running for cover.
Fear and adrenaline fueled my flight and I pushed myself faster, breaking through the secret door and into the trees.
“Darkness can not hide from its master,” Erebos roared behind me, moving much faster than I was able.
“Erebos!” Hades yelled angrily after that, revealing we were all in the woods now.
I ran for a little more before I felt I had to stop and breathe or die right there. Hiding behind a wide tree trunk, I gasped down a couple of breaths, looking all around me for the path I should take. I had no idea what I was going to do, especially with the helmet, but I knew I couldn’t let the Titan have it, deal or not.
“You,” a voice hissed behind me and I jumped, turning around to find Hades, fire whip in hand, advancing towards me.
Hades (The God Chronicles #3) Page 15
