Heir to the Underworld

by Walker, E. D.

  Abby sank into a chair. "What terms?"

  A muscle jumped in Polydegmon's jaw, raw fury ripping through his body like a hurricane. "Hades accepted Cernunnos' daughter in exchange for his own."

  Colin blinked once or twice, his face blank. He seemed to try forming words, but found he couldn't.

  "Cernunnos gave Freddy away so he could keep Kore as his mistress." Polydegmon burned with gall inside every time he thought of it. Like a forest fire. Like a volcanic pit. Like the darkest fathoms of his father's realm where the Titans were tortured.

  Abby glanced back and forth between Colin and Polydegmon. "Cernunnos gave Freddy to Hades? Why would Hades want Freddy?" Her voice trembled.

  "He wants her as a wife for his son." Polydegmon spat.

  "You did this." Colin's fist connected with Polydegmon's jaw before he had even registered the other man's arm winding back.

  Polydegmon staggered back from the hit. His jaw throbbed, but he swung a punch himself that connected with Colin's cheek.

  The other man shook his head and whipped back around, a vein pounding on his forehead, eyes red and raging.

  Polydegmon circled Colin, looking for an opening to strike as the other man sized him up in a like manner.

  Abby dashed toward a vase and plucked the flowers from it to toss them aside. Without preamble, she threw the water on Colin's face.

  Polydegmon gaped at the woman in bemusement and let his hands fall. Colin wiped the foul-smelling green water from his eyes and looked a polite inquiry at Abby.

  She sighed. "We can't afford to buy a new house if you lose your temper." She set the vase back down with a gentle click then motioned to Polydegmon. "Finish what you were saying."

  Polydegmon rubbed his sore jaw and warily eyed Colin, bracing for the man to hit him again. "Freddy has been given as wife to my brother, Clymenus."

  "But you--" Abby started.

  "Yes," Polydegmon cut her off. He couldn't breathe for all the stress congealing the air of the living room. He wandered away, and his steps led him into Freddy's room. He switched the lights on and looked around. The smell of her lingered, verbena mixed with some kind of citrus scent. Like someone had bottled summertime.

  Every inch of her walls, shelves and bed were covered in odd bits of memorabilia--books, pictures, plaques, ornaments and oddities. On her nightstand sat a graceful silver frame containing a picture of Colin as he must have been years ago, skinny but possessed of a wiry strength. He stood in front of a hand-painted sign for a Renaissance Faire. The Hound wore a brightly colored doublet with ribbons trailing off his shoulders. He knelt on the sandy ground, hugging close a chubby toddler dressed in an old-fashioned plain white dress. The baby possessed a mop of red curls and deep dimples pierced her pudgy little cheeks. Freddy. Polydegmon set the picture down too hard and stepped away toward her wall, the sight of Frederica suddenly too painful to bear, nearly bowing him to the floor with the weight of his guilt.

  His eyes fell on a cheap gilt frame with a collage of pictures, the banner read "Sadie Hawkin's Dance." She was dressed in patched overalls with oversized freckles drawn in a straight line across her nose, her red hair in two braids held aloft to either side of her head by some trick. She mugged and laughed with her friends in every picture, a brightness and joy in her face that had been wholly absent from the coiffed and sullen creature Cernunnos had presented to Clymenus as wife.

  "Lord Polydegmon." Abby slowly approached him. "What do we do?"

  A sour smile of self-disgust twisted Polydegmon's face. "There is nothing to do, lady. Freddy is lost."

  "No. You said--"

  "I was mistaken." Polydegmon leaned against the wall and faced Abby. "I cannot get her back anymore than you can. There is nothing we can do."

  Abby and Colin exchanged a panicked glance. She reached out to touch Polydegmon's arm. "You won't help us?"

  He glanced away in shame. "I cannot."

  "Will not," Colin snarled. "Coward."

  Polydegmon's anger churned. "My father is one of the most powerful gods in this world, Hound. How would you suggest I go about resisting him?" The Fitzgeralds' faces were taut, stricken. Polydegmon bit back his harsh haughtiness and lowered his voice. "I understand how impossible this is, how wrong it seems, but it is the only option left to us. Perhaps someday, after her marriage to my brother," he forced the rest out, forced himself to acknowledge the dreadful realities ahead. "I can persuade Clymenus to let your daughter visit you."

  Colin started toward him. "Get out."

  "Colin, wait." Abby's face paled, but she seemed calm as she stared at him. Her voice was firm. "Lord Polydegmon, you said you won't help us get her back, but will you do something else?" Her gaze slid up to his face.

  Polydegmon eyed Abby, mistrusting the seeming innocence of her request. "What?"

  "Carry a message to Freddy."

  Polydegmon raised an inquiring eyebrow. "And what, dear lady, will this message be?"

  Chapter Seventeen

  Freddy slept late the next day and woke with a swamp in her mouth. Her face was greasy and a headache prickled around the edge of her skull. Belly churning in seven different kinds of awful, she couldn't remember too much about how she had gone from dinner to bed. Half-remembered embarrassments hovered at the fringes of her mind, adding to the sickness in her gut.

  Someone stood in her doorway.

  Wide awake now, Freddy dropped her legs to the floor and braced for a fight.

  "Apologies. Did I startle you?" The speaker was bent, her face narrow and harsh-featured with dark, clever brown eyes. She had wrinkled, knobby hands, and her clothes were faded and well worn.

  Freddy squinted at her. "Who are you?"

  "Your maid, my lady."

  "I can take care of myself, but thanks anyway."

  The woman's voice was a deep croak. "Of course. My new mistress must already know the proper mode of dress for her new station." Her English sounded good, if heavily accented. "How to do her hair, what jewelry would be appropriate, what kind of make-up to apply--"

  "I get it." Freddy scrubbed at her scalp with her nails. "Right. Great. Let's get me gussied up."

  The maid's smile as she came in to the room was grim--and not at all encouraging. She proceeded to dig through the trunks and piles of clothes. She made careful selections while Freddy flopped backward on her bed, trying to doze amidst the rustling and slamming of drawers and lids.

  The maid approached with a pile of clothes and rolled Freddy out of bed to stand. Pale violet silk descended over Freddy's head. The top and bottom of the chiton, as the maid called it, hung open, and Freddy worried about how the garment would stay up. Just then the maid pinned the top of the cloth together with small round brooches at regular intervals along Freddy's arms.

  Once the sleeves were created, the maid fetched two long pieces of silver ribbon. She tied one right under Freddy's breasts and the other farther down on her hips, creating an interesting beer-gut effect. At Freddy's frown, the maid explained that it was very fashionable.

  "Yeah, in, like, the first century," Freddy muttered. The lines of the skirt were graceful, and, odd waistlines aside, the ancients had known how to make a lady feel graceful.

  The maid yanked Freddy to a short stool in the dressing room. "It is time to attend to your hair."

  Freddy grimaced. Her loose cascade of red curls looked fine, pretty against the lavender of the dress. But this maid had other plans. She dug in to the labor of brushing out Freddy's bed head, pulling roughly on the hair.

  Freddy's scalp smarted after a short time and she tilted to stare at the woman, hoping to distract her so her head could have a break. "What's your name?"

  The maid turned Freddy's face forward again with firm fingers. "I was called Metea in the world Above. It means 'Gentle One,' mistress." Metea gave Freddy's hair another yank.

  Freddy gritted her teeth with pain. "Pretty name."

  When Metea finished, she held up a hand mirror to show off her handiwork. Fr
eddy bit down on her tongue to keep from sticking it out in distaste.

  With the help of some hairpieces, Freddy wore a tiara made of red curls propped four inches high on her head like a cracked-out crown. The back was arranged prettily enough in a demure coil, her curls tucked into a silver net. The front though…oh, the front…

  She slammed the hand mirror down, sick of the sight of herself. The whole process had taken a mind-numbing amount of time for her to end up with such a horrifying arrangement on her head.

  "Okay, I'm ready." She slumped back, half-curious, half-scared, and looked to Metea. "Now what?"

  ~~~

  The reek of perfume as he neared the throne room was enough to give Polydegmon a flaming headache. He entered and found the opulent chamber full of ladies, a teeming, fluttering crush of femininity. The dead noblewomen of the Underworld had descended on the palace en masse, all of them coiffed, painted, and puffed to within an inch of their lives--or deaths, rather. He retreated a half step as soon as the rainbow cascade of gowns was revealed to his sight.

  The women were fine in twos and threes, or alone. Some of them had held nations together with their bare hands, some had given birth to his very favorite cousins. But getting them together in a whole herd was begging for trouble. He pitied poor Freddy.

  Do not think of her.

  He had scolded himself so a million times that day already. But how was he not to think of her when the missive from her mother burned a hole through his toga? How was he not to think of her when all his stunted conscience writhed at not being able to help her? How was he not to think of her when every cell and piece and part inside him wanted nothing more than to see her again?

  His brief abstraction cost him his escape.

  The late Julia Augusta, first empress of the Roman Empire, raised her chin as she saw him, and held him in place with her best imitation of the basilisk. A short woman, the empress maintained a plump, pleasing figure under a stern, square-jawed face, beautiful but hard. She had died in her eighties, a stern Roman dragon, but she now looked to be somewhere in her thirties. Decked out in all her finery, a pale green gown and veil with a golden coronet settled on her blond curls, she was quite an imposing figure. As she stalked toward him, the whole gaggle of women almost stampeded in her wake. But Empress Julia Augusta spoke first, crisply, and in the old Latin. "Where is that girl?"

  Polydegmon sighed and fidgeted with the robes around his shoulder, wishing to be anywhere but there, with her. "She is getting dressed." He looked at the mass of women and grimaced an unfelt smile. "Soon enough she will be ready to receive…all of you."

  The empress sniffed and jerked her chin in a nod. "I should hope so. The sooner we see that girl the sooner we can get her coaxed into the proper forms before this scrambling wedding."

  Polydegmon gave an inward twinge. Poor Freddy. "My lady, I would wish…" for you to leave Freddy the hell alone "…for you to be kind to Frederica. She has lost much of late."

  "She has gained much of late. She makes a good marriage. Good enough for any girl." She pursed her lips. "Better than some deserve, I would say."

  "My lady--"

  Hades appeared, looking pleased but severe, as always. "Lady Augusta." The crowd parted a path for him to the empress. "I am gratified you and the other ladies could make it from the Elysian Fields. We have much need of you in the absence of my wife."

  Empress Augusta blushed. A smug smile hovered over her lips as she dipped her knees in a curtsy. "I am pleased to be of any service I might, Lord Pluto."

  Hades patted her hand. He nodded gravely to Polydegmon. "You sent Kore's old maid to the girl?"

  "Yes, Father."

  Hades stepped closer. Behind him, the ladies craned to listen. The Lord of the Underworld darted an irritated glance over his shoulder and dropped his voice low. "Is your brother sober yet?"

  If being passed out in a pool of your own vomit is sober. Polydegmon grimaced. "Not as such."

  "They want the happy couple." Hades' hand encompassed the hall packed with women. "The damned harpies won't leave until they have them." He rumbled displeasure in the back of his throat. "See to it. Bring the girl and your brother here as soon as may be."

  Polydegmon winced. His father was still displeased with him after his continued pleas on Freddy's behalf last night. Better to be biddable, and let his father enjoy how completely he had his heir pressed beneath his thumb.

  Polydegmon bowed ascent, and, not without a certain savage satisfaction, he left the throne room in a rush and abandoned Hades to entertain the conclave of women. Alone.

  ~~~

  Metea was not very helpful once she'd dressed Freddy. When she asked the maid what to do, Metea said, "Whatever it should please my mistress to do." She turned away and proceeded to neaten the mess she'd made getting Freddy ready.

  Freddy fisted her hands at her sides, sighed her frustration out, and settled onto a stool to stare out her window.

  Her thoughts turned again to pondering the perils of the Underworld.

  Metea kept busy in her room, folding and neatening her new things. Would the maid help her? Freddy shook her head in exasperation, tired and tense now from plotting what would probably be a futile attempt anyway.

  A lifetime passed--ten minutes--when someone tapped on her door. Freddy leapt up, but Metea beat her there.

  Clymenus looked tired and a little green, with bags under his eyes as he entered. He turned his lips up when he saw Freddy. He probably thought his distended grimace made for a passable smile.

  Freddy returned him a small smile. Her hands twitched together, and she twirled her engagement ring around on her finger. Looking at Clymenus was all kinds of weird. Her fiancé. She tried to bend her brain around the fact she would have to marry this guy. Her brain wouldn't. Couldn't. She swallowed hard and dipped her knees. "Good morning."

  "Hello, Frederica." He gulped and frowned, dropping his eyes away. "My father wishes to introduce you around. Will you come with me?"

  "Sure."

  He held his hand out for hers. His palm, clammy and cold, stuck against hers after just a few minutes. Freddy bit her lip and held on. Only a lifetime more of this to get through, after all.

  Shut up, brain. "Bye, Metea."

  Clymenus and the maid darted startled looks her way. Realizing she'd screwed up somehow, but not understanding how, Freddy sullenly hunched her shoulders and let herself be pulled from her room.

  He towed her toward the throne room. "I must apologize for all this unseemly haste about our wedding, but with your--well, in your delicate position, your father thought it best to expedite things. I admit I agree with him."

  Freddy froze in sudden worry. "You mean the Morrígan thing?"

  Clymenus nodded gingerly, like he was scared his head would topple off. "Yes. Cernunnos gave me to understand she made an attempt on your life the very night of our engagement."

  "I could handle Morrígan." That's bull, Fred.

  "Ah." Clymenus turned her to face him. "But do you feel up to handling this? Us?"

  Freddy's eyes slid down to avoid his gaze. She really wanted to avoid the question. How Clymenus feels up to discussing this after an all-night bender…she started to shrug again in dismissal but stopped herself. I'm marrying this guy. Why start eternity off with a lie? "Where I come from, I would have had a lot more time to get ready for this. I…I would have been able to choose my husband."

  Clymenus squeezed her hand. "Your father forced you?"

  "Black-mailed me. Do you mind?" She was half-hopeful he would drop her hand and storm off.

  Clymenus smiled at her. "Now I have seen your beauty, there is not much I should mind."

  "Oh." Freddy wilted in disappointment. "Oh, good."

  Clymenus scrubbed a hand over his face. "Tell me more about your marriage customs. Perhaps we can work some of them into the ceremony." His voice took on an overly soothing tone, as if she were a small child. Or an idiot. Freddy tried really hard not to feel patronized.


  She pinched her eyes closed then pinned a smile on her face as inspiration struck. "I did want to talk to you about something."

  Hung-over, bleary-headed and smitten, he lapped up her every word. In his weary, sickly stumbling state, he actually looked a lot like she felt--well, except for the smitten part.

  What a couple. Drunk and Drunker. No more wine.

  Clymenus cast her a glance under his lashes. "We are expected in the throne room but…could I show you something?"

  "Ye-es." Freddy hesitated then went to him. He led her on his arm out a back way and through the thick of the gardens she had glimpsed yesterday. Clymenus guided her over a bare green hill, taking her to a lovely house sitting at the hill's foot. Squat and square, the house stretched far back in a long rectangle. Clymenus beamed at its high white walls and red tiled roof. "This is my villa. It will be our home when we are married."

  The villa looked comfy, charming even. But Freddy had developed a strange gag reflex to the words married, wife, and wedding. She swallowed back bile and followed Clymenus inside.

  The house was open and airy with mosaic tiled floors and every wall painted with cheerful, charming scenes of naked women cavorting through idyllic riverbanks and woods. Clymenus guided her all through the place, showing her the petite kitchen, the airy atrium where they would receive guests and his patrons, his small office with shelves of scrolls and an old leather book or two.

  Clymenus told her she would have her own private room next to his. He showed her the doorway that led between them with a shy grin. Freddy tried to smile back, but her lips refused.

  There were more bedrooms in the place, two off the atrium, four more leading off from the garden. Clymenus smirked when he showed her those.

  "Guest rooms?"

  Clymenus held her by the shoulders and kissed her forehead. "Our children. I hope we shall be blessed with many sons." He frowned and cupped her cheek. "Are you all right?"

  Freddy shook her head and held her stomach, hunching over, suddenly sick. Children. He wants children.