Page 29

Chapter

Twenty-Six

P ersephone

The halls of the golden castle are plenty large enough for Hydra to lumber as Ares guides us to the rooms we will occupy while we are here.

The halls are long, and the walls are a white marble that widens into yawning lookouts with overhead rooftops crafted of the same white marble from which images of ancient history have been painted.

It is held up by massive white marble pillars that are gilded at the base and crown with intricate mouldings of gold.

The balcony's rails are the same gleaming white and gold that bakes in the high warmth of the sun.

I want to move closer, to peer over the rails into the realm beyond the castle, but Ares moves quickly through the halls, allowing little time for curiosity.

He clearly wants to be rid of us.

Hydra’s smooth voice echoes in my mind. “It is too bright here.”

I don’t tell her I think it’s beautiful here. When her nostrils flare on a loud sigh, I can’t help but flash her a small smile.

“Thank you for being with me.”

“I will always be with you, my Persephone.”

I turn back to face forward, glimpsing the hard set of Leuce’s eyes on Ares’ broad back. Every step she takes is tense, firm, assertive. Leuce naturally exudes a more dominant air than most, but she’s taken it to a whole new level since we arrived in Olympus.

It’s no secret she wants to be feared, but she is a nymph in a house of monstrous Gods. I have an unsettling feeling that the games played within these walls are treacherous.

Aries stops at a set of high double doors crowned by a thick border of ancient script. I don't think I've seen anything but white marble and gold since I arrived, so the towering wood doors stand out. As do the curling décor of the gold handles.

Everything here is so bright and shining, it’s almost blinding.

I’d thought after a time in the Underworld, cocooned by the darkness, that I would crave the sun. The Underworld is warm, but I always thought nothing would compare to the feel of the warmth of the sun on my skin.

Here, in Olympus, I crave nothing but Hades and the darkness of the realm he commands.

Ares’ gold eyes pin to mine, his large hand settling on the gilded knob. “These are your rooms.” He points to another door down the hall. “That door also accesses your suite.” His eyes flick to Leuce and back to me. His lip curls, but it’s not in a smile. “Your bodyguard will occupy that room.”

Leuce grunts, I nod, and Aries opens the room. It's a little hard not to gape at what greets us.

The opulence is loud. It is nothing like the quiet luxuries of the Underworld.

Olympus is just wealth .

Everything is bright and shining and abundant to a point it’s over the top.

Even as I am overstimulated, I can’t deny that it is beautiful.

As soon as I have the thought, a tug pulls deep inside me. It’s shockingly unexpected, and I lift my hand to cover my belly where the sensation of warmth is now spreading. A feeling of home shudders through me that is not my own, and yet it’s strong enough to bring tears to my eyes.

Tears I quickly blink away when I catch Ares studying me quietly, his curiosity darkly unsettling in this place of light.

My eyes cut to Hydra as she lumbers past me to the far side of the room, which is lacking a wall and instead boasts a massive balcony that looks at a view of a pearl-ish gray mountain so massive, its peak so high, the tip of it punctures the blue of the sky that blankets the realm, fading into the misted glow of the sun that spills over it all.

There is a solid moment where I can’t breathe. It’s so…

It’s breathtaking . Beautiful. Exquisite.

And that sensation of warmth deep inside me grows. There is recognition and adoration for this place that lives inside the soul I carry, the soul I grow . Even as her sister shudders a cool abhorrence for this place, she is warm.

And I feel like falling to my knees in grief, for I now know that one of my daughters is fated to find herself in this realm of dark dealings masked by light and love.

She is fated in such a way by the Moirai that there will be no escaping it, no changing it.

No unravelling the threads that bind her.

A burning tightness constricts my throat as Hydra lets out a noise that is more growl than anything else as she peers over the side of the railing. “Come, my Persephone. See this.”

I leave Leuce and Ares standing stiffly in place as I join Hydra, moving slowly across the room. It’s hard not to take it all in. There is so much to see.

Nothing is simply done.

Even the lamp bases are carved of stone into scenes of battle and sex.

A hot blush stings my cheeks as I pass a statue of a couple.

A mortal woman with a God, I realize. Her head is thrown back, limbs wrapped around a God with wings that burst from his back.

His eyes are fixed on her face. I find my own eyes drawn to her expression, riveted there by horror and curiosity.

She looks lost to passion, her lips parted in what I’m sure would spill a moan if the statue came to life. Her eyes are half-mast, lashes fanning low. But there’s something about her expression that tightens my stomach, twisting the beauty into something other. Something wrong.

I look closer and from the corner of one eye, I see the smallest bulb of a tear. It clings to stone lashes so intricately carved; I can’t help the awe that rises despite her grief.

My gaze shifts back to the God who holds her captive in his arms. At first, his arm around her much smaller frame seems loose, his hand on her hip a tender caress.

But upon deeper inspection, I note the nip of his fingertips into her stone flesh, the slight angle of her head as though to escape the taste of his hungry lips on hers.

My eyes snap back to the God, who I now recognize as Zeus, although he is much, much younger.

There is a ravenous violence that lurks under the stone surface of his eyes, imprisoned in time by the chisel which carved the masterpiece.

I realize in horror that I am looking upon an ancient rape captured in stone.

Cutting my study of the statue, I am no longer flushed. I feel pale with horror. Sick with sadness.

I’m no innocent to the ancient ways. I spent every moment I could studying the ancient history of the Greek Gods, enthralled by the mythology.

I am wholly aware that in that time so long ago, Gods and men took women without thought or concern for her wants and desires.

Rape is a part of history, but it is not a history I wish to look upon.

Turning back to Ares, I ask, “Can this be removed?”

I don’t miss the slight cocking of his head. “No. Hera placed this piece here when it appeared.”

I frown. “Appeared?”

“Yes. Millennia ago, now.” Golden eyes speared with red land on the statue. “Born of the same power that birthed the realms.”

“You mean Chaos’ power?”

His eyes sharpen, for a moment the red wholly claiming the gold. “You know of Chaos?”

“Everyone knows of Chaos.”

“She is a lost Goddess. No one speaks of her, nor have they spoken of her in so long even the history books fail to teach of her.” He steps into the room, moving slowly. Dangerously.

I flinch when the door falls closed with a loud clang.

Leuce tenses, as though ready to sacrifice her life for my own in the event Ares, God of War, decides to ruin me.

Hydra looses a low growl of warning, but Ares pays none of it any mind as he demands quietly, lethally, “You are human, raised human. Tell me again, little human , how do you know of Chaos?”

An icy shiver slithers over my flesh, but I lift my chin.

“I might be human, but I’m not stupid. I don’t know you, Ares, and I don’t trust you.

” Something twists violently in my belly as he stops close, so close I can scent him.

Under the hot metallic scent of bloody earth is something else.

Something I know is owed to the soul I carry inside me.

The soul who belongs here in Olympus, perhaps with him.

The musk of flames licking at a darkening sky, of hot stone and sweet citrus. Of bergamot.

It’s entirely too pleasant, and that is alarming .

I clear my throat and take a quick step back. Ares cocks his head in response, sharp eyes narrowing as his brow furrows.

A low noise sounds in the back of his throat, and he rises to his full height. It’s rather intimidating, but I don’t allow myself to squirm even as the soul inside me titters in recognition I can’t begin to explain.

“The statue remains. Everything Hera abhors is hidden away in this wing of the palace.” His eyes flick to the statue before sliding back to me, though now he wears a disgusted curl to his lips that gives me pause. “If you don’t like it, throw a sheet over it.”

“I can always toss it over the balcony for you, my Persephone,” Hydra says.

I cough to swallow back my surprised laugh, my gaze cutting to my friend. Slowly, I give my head a quick shake.

I’d hoped for it to be imperceptible, but when I look back to Ares, I know for a fact he caught it.

His eyes are still dangerously narrowed on me as he slowly begins to move back toward the door. “Nothing and no one are as they seem here in Olympus. Watch your back.”

Hydra growls again and Leuce says, “I will guard her back.”

Ares’ eyes don’t leave me. I can’t ignore the scent of bloody earth with its now fainter undertones of bergamot. Ares opens the door but pauses mid-escape. “My rooms are across the hall from yours.”

He doesn’t wait for my response before he leaves, letting the door fall shut behind him.

In my mind, I hear his words on repeat, “Everything Hera abhors is hidden away in this wing of the castle.”

I don’t know why, but that twisting in my belly cinches painfully tight. Grief is the gasoline that splashes the flickering match inside my heart, erupting centuries of sorrow that does not belong to me.

My gaze shifts from the closed door to Leuce, whose dark skin shines with discomfort. I whisper, “Is Hera not his mother?”

“She is.”

I touch my fingertips to that burning place inside my chest. “But he said—but his rooms are?—”

Leuce bows her head. “The Gods can be ugly, Persephone.”

“So ugly that a mother does not love her child? So ugly that she would banish him to the wing of the palace where all that she hates is left to gather dust? To rot?”

Leuce’s beautiful eyes connect with mine. “You only have to look at Demeter to answer that question, my friend.”

My fingers curl where my heart thunders. I feel as though I’m trying to contain it inside me, for I cannot imagine carrying my daughters, nurturing them with my body, and not loving them more than anything else. Certainly, more than myself.

And now I am certain that Hera does not love Ares.