by Eris Adderly
Nervous laughter was the best she could do as he released her to walk at his side.
The last of the bridge joined the palace proper once more, carrying forward to form yet another corridor. Real torches guttered past as they went, Hades leading them and Persephone having to trust it wasn’t to slaughter.
“I forgot to thank you,” he said, trouble billowing behind as he walked.
“For what?”
“For wearing it.”
There was a brush of a hand at the small of her back. Her eyes fell to scarlet linen, eddying around her feet with each step. Just like obedience, it had been another choice. Where would she find herself with her next?
*
At the end of a wide, high-ceilinged corridor, a pair of doors at least twice Persephone’s height stood closed at their approach. Panels in some dark, burnished metal she couldn’t name hung with the weight of ages from hinges as long as her leg. Inlaid in milky quartz, crossing from one door to the next, was a symbol she knew from before her descent into the earth. She’d seen it carved into mortal tombs.
The mark of Hades.
It would seem he makes a habit of placing his mark on entrances, wouldn’t it?
He halted before the doors and turned to her, assessing.
“Before we go further, you will recall your promise to me,” he said.
How in the three realms could she manage to forget? “I recall, my Lord.”
“And what did you promise?”
Of course, he would make her say it aloud. It would only drive home the point. Persephone swallowed.
“I promised to obey.”
A phantom of a smile stirred that stern expression. “Yes you did.”
Three words could not have weighed more.
After all his displays of bending the earth to his will, the sight of Hades taking one of the sturdy handles to open a door struck her as oddly pedestrian. He gestured for her to go first, and Persephone stepped through into more uncertainty.
The chamber beyond resonated in such a perfect pitch with the god at her side, she wouldn’t be surprised to learn he’d manifested it himself.
They were standing in what had once been an active, limestone cave. As in the other chamber, a sourceless light banished shadows in every direction. There was no sign of moisture or sounds of dripping now, but well overhead, a forest of stalactites bristled, somehow both decorative and threatening at once. At least a dozen impressive stalagmites rose like sentries around the perimeter of the chamber, but the rest of the spacious floor lay cleared of formations, leveled, and polished to a low sheen.
A wide, unlit fireplace dominated the furthest curving wall. Before it sat a low table and a pair of heavy walnut chairs. Perhaps out of nerves more than anything else, Persephone clapped hands over her mouth in a laugh.
“Where do you get wooden chairs in the Underworld?” she asked. “I feel no trees here.”
“You receive them as a gift.” His voice, along with the sound of a door latching, came from behind her. “Perhaps an unintentional gift, but no matter. Aphrodite insisted on bringing them when she tired of standing.”
“The Fair One was here?” Lust and the Lord of the Dead? In this private place? She was both surprised and not, at the same time.
Do your eyes grow greener so soon? Perhaps the god knew more about ‘courtship’ than she’d care to admit.
“She was,” he said, “a very long time ago. It was when we made this.”
Persephone turned to follow his voice and almost took a step back when she found him.
Hades stood in front of an enormous black sphere, half again his height, hovering an arm’s length from the floor. It bobbed in place, the motion as subtle as breathing, and she could see their reflections in the gloss of its surface. Something indefinable in its looming presence promised and tempted, yet made her want to cower in fear.
Or was it Hades who did those things? Or both?
“What … is that?”
“That,” he said, “is the cause of your presence in my domain.”
“But what is it?”
“It is the Elaionapothos.”
“Oil of Desire?” She cocked her head. “I don’t understand.”
He smiled and held out an arm for her to approach, which she did while keeping a cautious eye on the ink-dark globe.
“At the touch of a deathless god, the Oil forms itself into that immortal’s deepest desires.” His arm slid around her waist as she came to his side, a confusing distraction as they faced the ominous thing.
“And this has what to do with my being here?”
Hades ignored her and leaned down to bury his face in her hair. She felt him inhale and hum an approval, his presence as intense and flustering as the hovering mass before them. He cleared his throat and returned to her question.
“The Elaionapothos obeys any god with the practice of its use, regardless of which realm he occupies. You feel your power weakened in my domain, yes?”
She nodded.
“Even with your abilities hobbled, the Oil will be as you wish it,” he continued. “Were I to take it above the earth, or to Olympos, where I am naturally weak, well …” He shrugged, stepping away from her side. “It will take whatever form I desire.”
He moved around the thing now, and it began to do just that: descending, flattening. “How do you imagine Zeus would react,” Hades said, “if he knew I possessed such an advantage? Do you think he would allow me to keep it here for myself, when under my command in his realm it might be a chariot? A ship? A storm of swords?”
As he moved around the Oil, it morphed from one black version of those things to the next, as quickly as the words left his mouth, and Persephone felt her eyes widen.
A weapon like that …
It settled into a circular, knee-high platform on the floor, as wide as it had been tall. A glossy lake with no vessel to contain it, the Elaionapothos now stood between them, defying logic.
“And what of Poseidon?” he asked, “Or Fates forbid, that hot-head Ares? If one of them were to discover it? I’d have half a dozen gods making plans to infiltrate my domain and seize it for themselves. Until now, there have only been two aware of its existence. You are the third, aside from myself.”
“Who is the other?”
“Aphrodite.”
Persephone raised her brows.
“She had a hand in its creation,” he said. “I was able to draw the raw oil from deep below the earth, and she was able to imbue it with the properties of desire. Each our particular gifts, you see.” Hades inclined his head. “We merged our powers into the Oil to give it the ability to read the deepest of wants. The price of her help was a favor.”
Her tongue grew heavy in her mouth at this.
So. His original intent hadn’t been to take a wife at all. She was here because of a blackmail demand: he could do as Aphrodite asked, or she would reveal his secret to the other gods. Her shoulders slumped the smallest measure.
Are you … disappointed?
“See for yourself?” he said, nodding across the Elaionapothos.
She stepped forward, cautious. “How do I …?”
“You’ll need to be touching it.”
She held her new chiton away from the black oil and peered down at the thing in distrust. “You didn’t have to touch it.”
“That comes with æons of practice,” he said. “Go on.” His smile promised nothing good.
Or everything good.
Ignoring the screaming doubts in her head, Persephone lowered a hand to the Oil. Her touch met with a flexible resistance, firm yet pliant, and not at all the liquid it appeared. The surface dimpled like a slick, dark skin under the press of fingertips.
“It’s not really an oil at all, is it?”
“Not anymore,” he said, sounding far too satisfied.
Was it her imagination, or was it warming to her touch? Her eyes rose to meet his.
“Why is this in your private rooms?”
His grin widened. “Imagine a place of rest that conforms to your every desire.” Black eyes glittered in suggestion. “But more important, the location of this room is known only to me. And now you, of course. No one will find this place unless I lead them here.”
Which also meant no one would find her.
The air in the chamber between them fairly crackled with portent as they faced off across the Elaionapothos. Hades crossed his arms over his chest and took some silent measure with his eyes. Persephone withdrew her touch from the Oil.
He lifted his chin in half a nod. “Come here.”
And it began, again. The price of her heavy bargain.
“I expect you to obey, Persephone.”
“And why would I do that?”
“Because you wish to leave one day.”
She closed her eyes for a moment, inhaling and exhaling, before starting around the Oil.
“No,” he said. “Across.”
The words halted her like a blow.
“… you will recall your promise to me.”
Was it fear that tightened her jaw?
The point of no return loomed large and she stepped up to meet its threshold. What purpose would arguing serve when her opponent could withdraw the very earth beneath her feet, the light itself from the space around them? The inevitable—whatever that was—lay across, and the sooner she faced it, the sooner it would no longer be a threat.
Persephone hoisted her chiton to keep it from tripping her up, and bent a bare knee up onto the black platform. The surface held. She put weight on it. Then it didn’t.
The Oil swallowed her knee, liquid long enough to close around the back of the joint. Her palm shot out to brace for a fall, to lever up and out, but the Elaionapothos consumed that as well, solidifying after it like clay in the sun.
Her eyes leapt to Hades, mouth coming open to match their panic. His chuckle rolled out in a wave the color of midnight, and he was no longer watching from across the platform. He was at her side.
She yanked at her arm, but the Oil held fast, gripping her wrist like a manacle while her fingers splayed and clenched, futile in the indescribable texture beneath the dark surface.
“Oh no, love,” he said, sliding his left leg between hers, one angled up and mired within the Oil, the other holding out hope of supporting her upright on the floor. “I have far more experience with the Elaionapothos—it will respond to my desires before yours.” Fingertips traced her shoulder now, contemplative. “I don’t think you’ll find them terribly unpleasant.”
She must have made a pathetic sight, partially bent over what amounted to a bed, straining to right herself, neck craned around to raise wide eyes to the god trapping her in place. The arrangement prickled her skin.
Prey. You are prey.
The question was, did she like it?
“Hades, what do you want?”
A smile unfurled on his face. “I want you to play my games.”
“Games?”
“Oh yes,” he said, leaning down to curl the heat of his body around hers and speak near her ear. “The game where I take your choices away and replace them with mine. As we began last night.”
She had to lock her elbows to prevent a collapse. That hold on her wrist, the way she’d splayed herself to his touch … The promise of pleasure under Hades’s hands had been great, but to what further limits would he push her?
“When we discover them, little flower, you will tell me to stop.”
Would he, though? No one would hear her protests otherwise, down here in this secret place. Just how much trust could she place in the Lord of the Dead?
“What is it you fear, Persephone?” His thumb brushed the back of her unembedded right hand, where it held her as upright as it could over the Oil. A caress for the prisoner. When the trembling began, did he feel it?
“You’ll hurt me.” She prayed the confession wouldn’t put her in more danger than its absence. Hades only chuckled.
“I won’t hurt you,” he said, tilting her jaw toward his with a knuckle. “Not until you ask me to.”
The naked impossibility of such a thought drew in Hades’s kiss on the tide of her gasp. That warm mouth made her reckless, the hot tongue urged her to forget. All those delicate parts of her hummed with want by the time he let her breathe. While she reeled from the nature of his argument, a dark hand slid to her elbow, drawing it back, toppling her last vestige of support.
“Come,” he said, and bore her down to the Oil without a fight.
His body covered the right half of hers, trapping her free arm beneath his weight and causing her untethered right leg to cantilever out over the edge of the platform, useless. The surface of the Elaionapothos molded to accommodate her curves. With her left knee crooked up onto the platform, secured in place for whatever ‘games’ were to come, Persephone knew her own vulnerability in the most unprecedented of ways.
Fates, I can do nothing to close him out! He will have whatever he wants!
He will have whatever he wants.
When the thought streamed by again in a different tone, she felt the heat rise in her face, and a hint of dew seep between her thighs.
Fabric tugged against her neck. Though she faced away from the god at her back, she could feel him pulling the fibula loose from her shoulder, coaxing it to release its hold on her chiton. The tension in the linen went slack and she froze, a silly attempt at prolonging the inevitable.
“Let me see you.”
Did his words try to assure as he peeled away the garment? The chiton opened on the left side of her body and Hades gathered it toward him, revealing the curve of her spine, her bare bottom. The heat of her secrets exposed burned against the cool air of the room like a blush.
She heard a hiss and some other sound of barely-restrained indulgence, but caught no sight of his face, no matter how far she twisted in the attempt. Charcoal-dipped fingers slid into view over her left shoulder, only to disappear and shift the mass of her hair behind her neck. Not one veil would he leave intact.
The silver crown of his hair tilted into view, and a mouth was on her throat. A surveying palm skimmed the length of her, from shoulder to thigh, pausing to weigh breast and buttock.
If his goal was to disorient her, stirring one new sensation after the next, crossing boundaries in rapid succession, he’d done more than achieve it. And the moment her breath couldn’t decide whether it wanted to come or go, the mass of his body left her.
Fabric rustled. The platform shifted beneath her.
Wha …?
Weight, once more, pressing her into the Oil. Hot weight. Naked weight.
Hard, muscled chest molded to her back, a heavy thigh draped over her hip, and—Fates help her—the intense heat of an erection wedged in the cleft of her ass.
“Hades.” A plea to the god unseen, but for what?
That purposeful hand returned to curve over her hipbone, to pull her back against him, stretching her trapped limbs against the hold of the Elaionapothos, so he might grind the promise of his lust into that warm press of flesh.
“Hades!”
She’d found no such heart-fluttering confusion on the mortal plane. Not once.
“I enjoyed the pretty sounds you made last night,” he said in that voice that turned her wrong-side-out. Some of the pull abated, but only for the gripping hand to snake over the swell of her backside, down between her cheeks. “Do you have more of them for me?”
Fingertips brushed pouting lips; slid into moisture. Persephone whimpered.
“It seems you do.”
His touch was everywhere, kneading, pinching, sliding. Each stroke carried with it instruction; Hades Nekrodegmôn teaching her body to beg.
And beg she did.
Forsaking all pride, Persephone tilted her hips, eager to learn. Somewhere behind her, a male rumble of lust thrummed against her spine. A pair of slick fingers curved and her teeth closed on her lower lip, reining in a moan. In her mind’s eye, she saw it: those dark k
nuckles, glossy and wreathed in the pale pink of her sex. Sweet pressure built in a way she wanted to both squirm away from and toward at once, insistent fingertips pushing firm and deep into the sticky meat of her fruit.
She made every sound for Hades. Some involuntary, some humiliating, and some she didn’t know she could make.
And then the fullness subsided, along with his touch.
Again? Again, he will deny me?
“Please.”
“Please?” A kiss marked her shoulder blade, and she could all but feel the mocking smile. With her neck twisted as far as it could go, his profile only just darkened the line of her sight.
“Not like last night, my Lord,” she said. “Please.”
Listen to yourself!
“Do I have something you want, Persephone?”
The pads of his fingers settled over swollen flesh, warm and still. Torture. She rocked against his touch, shameless. “Don’t.”
“Don’t what?” His words were a breath on her ear, and everything ached with need, straight through to her bones.
“Don’t leave me.”
What? Why would you say something like that?
Quiet laughter answered like steel over stone. “I think that’s the least of your troubles,” he said, making no moves to satisfy. “Tell me, Daughter of Olympos, if your hands were free, would you cure your own ills?”
She whined at the truth of it. Until he chose to let her up, the hunger would go unsated. Hades was undeterred.
“Have you done so already? Here in my domain?”
Persephone nodded, the bite on her lip becoming painful. Was it Hades making her want to offer up her secrets? How far did his powers in this realm extend?
Her hips wriggled for friction.
“Are you in need again?”
“Yes!” She wanted to cry! Fates!
Hades chuckled. “I’d make you ask me, but another game for another day, hm? Your body pleads sweetly enough.”
Her moan of relief mirrored sounds of pain when his fingers returned to work. He settled for no longer than a moment on any single approach, each lasting until she began to tense before it gave over to the next in a disorienting bazaar of pleasure.
