Page 32

Chapter

Twenty-Nine

P ersephone

I don’t know how Leuce can sleep after everything we’ve seen. Perhaps she’s seen her fair share of it throughout history. I can’t imagine.

The last three days have been a nightmare. I am uncertain if the screams I can hear are echoes of the torment of earlier or if they’re real now.

Rolling onto my side, I pull the pillow around my head and do my best to sleep despite the torment that plays in my mind. I fail.

I miss the Underworld. I miss Hades.

When I can no longer suffer the ache for home, no longer remain in bed to the sounds of a woman screaming, I slide from the covers. With a glance at Leuce, my heart in my throat, I creep to the door. Hydra snuffs a sigh and I freeze, halfway to escape.

If either of them wakes, I won’t be slipping out that’s for certain.

I hold my breath so long it burns before I dare another step, then another. At the door, I realize that not only am I about to slip from the protection of my room in little more than a nightdress, but I have no weapon.

My shoulders fall and I am about to turn back to the bed, my moment of foolish heroics at its end when another scream threatens to peel the flesh from my bones. It’s louder somehow, echoing in the chambers of my mind rather than the room around me.

I don’t understand what is happening.

I grab a small marble statue that is surprisingly heavy.

A quick glance tells me it’s another of Zeus claiming a victim.

I don’t have to see her face to know she cries.

They all cry. There are so many of these statues in this room.

Versions of the God claiming women who don’t wish to be claimed. Raping.

The way I feel for Zeus is far beyond hatred. I’m not even sure how I would describe the feelings I have for him. I’m not sure what I would do to him, given the opportunity. I loathe the fact history paints him as a good, benevolent God. Mercy is not something he is capable of.

Pushing thoughts of the terrible God from my mind, I grip the statue hard and turn to the door. My hand trembles as it lifts to the lock. I slide it over slowly, holding my breath at the little click and the sound of Leuce rolling over in the bed we’ve shared since we arrived.

The hall flickers under the same low golden light that illuminates the darkness in my room.

Burning stones, reminiscent to lava rock in the wake of freshly spilled magma, shimmer in little bowled plates that have been fastened to the white marble walls by curling arms of bronze, the plate suspended by the clawed paw of a carved lion.

I’ve seen servant girls— I hate calling them that —collecting the stones and leaving them to charge in the sun.

Now, under the burning light, images hidden under the bright light of day come alive in the polished white stone. Secrets carved into the walls of a history long since forgotten, even by Gods.

A chill whispers across my flesh, fine hairs rising. My hand connects with the wall, and I feel it. I feel the slight groove of chiselled stone, so smooth it shouldn’t be possible.

The image, a God of light and a Goddess of night, are two points that connect to one in the center, lower. A Goddess unlike all those who have come after, the first of her kind. Neither good nor evil, neither light nor dark. She was everything.

She was Chaos.

A delta triangle or upside-down triangle of Primordial Gods, blending power.

Inside the triangle, a realm my ancient soul recognizes as Olympus is formed.

But outside, connected by a thread of lightning that surges from Chaos’ bare feet is another realm.

It is surrounded by the carved waves of the sea, surging power through Chaos into Olympus, feeding the ancient realm crafted for the Gods.

Atlantis. It is fed exclusively by Chaos.

I can’t tell whether Atlantis is the beginning of everything, or if it is a product of everything.

Only that it is connected to everything.

For there is a thicker vein that pulses from Atlantis to a realm I recognize deep inside my soul, where darkness and wonder and eternal love live. The Underworld.

Three veins connect the Underworld to the triangle, one from Atlantis, one from Chaos, and one from Olympus.

Only, the vein from Olympus is faded and thin.

Perhaps even broken, I think, as I run my fingertips over the stone and momentarily lose the vein before connecting again.

The carving glows in the same vein of the burning coals.

Surrounding it all, its carving in the stone not as deep, is what I recognize as earth. Dull. Not alive.

The realms are sentient, intended to thrive in sync, like the powers of the Gods to feed the life it was always intended to sustain.

The thought is not mine. It’s also not the tongueless trifecta of voices I’ve come to know as the Moirai—another three, I realize. This voice is deeper. I think, perhaps, it is the sound of my own intuition. An awakening of a part of me that has long since been asleep.

Or maybe it’s not me at all, but the Goddess whose ancient soul I harbour.

My gaze flicks down the length of hall and I fight a shiver as the engraving in stone repeats again and again as far as my eyes can see.

The hum in my ears I hadn’t realized was there suddenly abandons me with a pop, my auditory senses clearing fast as a rush of sound invades me. My reprieve from the screaming is no longer and I spin in the hall, racing in the direction of the sound.

It comes from an area of the castle I’ve not yet explored, but I continue down the winding halls toward the sound of the screams. She’d been quiet after the horrors of dinner, when her father had been massacred. But now she screams for help no one bothers to hear.

I bother.

I run harder; not certain I’m going to find my way back to my room.

What am I going to do with her when I get to her?

The statue is heavy in my hand as I race from one hall to the next. Castle Olympus is a labyrinth.

Will I be successful in defeating the massive man I’d watched slay the young woman’s father with this little, but solid, statue?

I have no idea, but I’m going to give it my best shot.

At the sound of another scream, this one harrowingly loud, I know I’m close. Just a few more doors. Just beyond the lookout that spills into a night that glows with stars.

“Oomph,” I cry as a band of iron snaps around my waist, yanking me from the hall into a shadowy darkness that is most definitely not owed to the glittering blanket of night.

My back connects a little too hard with the solid wall and my grip on the statue slips. It connects with the floor hard, the sound a vicious bite in the silence otherwise cut by the terror of the girl’s screams.

I feel my own scream rise to the surface, but a hard hand slaps over my mouth to contain it.

My eyes snap up to see rings of gold otherwise blasted with blood red.

Dark curls fall into the man’s forehead, threatening to sweep into those eerie eyes that threaten bloodlust, if not contained by those thin threads of shimmering gold.

“Ares,” I gasp his name. Inside my chest that heaves with deep, fear-infused breaths, my heart thunders.

A low sound climbs from the deep of his chest. It’s terribly harrowing, like a tiger in the night.

“What are you doing out of your room?” He slides his hand from my lips to wrap precariously around the column of my throat. There’s anger in his eyes.

I gasp in gulps of air. “I’m—I’m?—”

“You’re what ?” He presses when I fail to push a lie between us.

I can’t possibly tell him the truth.

“I’m going for a walk.”

“Funny,” he deadpans. “Looked like you were running to me.” Ares dips his head, those red eyes drilling mercilessly into my own. “Looked like you were running toward danger.”

Well, crap. There’s obviously no fooling him.

“I can’t leave her like that.” My voice shakes, but I steel myself against the mocking incredulity that has blades of gold spearing from the rings into the pools of red.

He wets his lips, the scent of bloodstained earth submitting to fresh citrus. He laughs, low and mocking. “Tell me, little princess, how you plan to save her.”

I bare my teeth and he laughs again. When my fingers curl into my fists, his tighten around my throat. Just enough to quicken the thunderous beating of my heart.

My eyes flick desperately to the statue I’d dropped. Ares’ eyes follow and his lips hitch up again, but this time no sound escapes. That mocking lilt to his lips squeezes the air from my lungs.

“Oh, you think a little marble would stop him?” His brows hitch with incredulity, but he spits, “Foolish human.”

The girl screams again. I think I see Ares flinch at the sound, but I can’t be certain because my own flinch had been so vicious.

“Stop this,” I beg desperately. “Save her.”

“There is no saving her from this fate.”

“This is cruel.” My entire body trembles against the wall. My nerves are shot, frayed.

My heart hurts .

Ares’ voice is a low and dangerous cadence that wraps around one of the souls the powers of the Moirai conceal with their magic. “The true cruelty would be to prolong the inevitable.”

“How can you say that?” I loathe the way one of my daughters warms inside me at the sound of his voice. At his nearness. The other, I think, recoils.

For a moment, I’m certain he isn’t going to answer me. His frightening eyes drift over my face, missing nothing. He sighs an impossibly weighted sigh. “I’ve tried.”

Wait, what? He’s tried?

My body sags against the stone he’s pinned me to. Around my throat, his hand loosens. The tears I’ve somehow kept inside break from their restraints to flee shamefully down my face.

Ares looses another sigh. I flinch as he lifts his hand from my throat to wipe away the grief that spills from my eyes. It’s a tender gesture that seems to surprise even him, because he shakes his head and drops his hand. But he doesn’t step away from me.

“He never releases them.” Goodness, his voice is so deep and rough. As though he harbours deep inside him the wrath of all pain and suffering. “When a human soul dies here, they are trapped. Forever.”

“Who won’t release them?”

“Zeus.”

I want to scream at the name. Instead, I ask, “What will happen to her?”

“If she dies tonight, and I pray she does, then her soul will be sent to a lesser house where she will serve her eternity as a slave.”

“You—you hope she dies?”

“I hope for the end of her living suffering.” Ares winces, and his next words sound like a confession. “There is no death worse than the murder of innocence in the hands of bloodlust.”

I shiver, and Ares doesn’t miss it. I’m momentarily surprised when more blades of gold thread the blood red in his eyes. I think he’s surprised, too.

Ares tips his head, as though studying me. I’m afraid that he’s going to look too deep and discover the secrets I keep.

I swallow hard and his eyes bounce back to mine. I say, “She is human.”

“Yes.”

“Why, then, doesn’t her soul arrive in the Underworld when she dies?”

“Olympus is,” he pauses. “Think of it as a prison of sorts. It’s impossible for human souls to escape Olympus. And when they die here, they don’t truly die. Their bodies are not as they are in the Underworld.”

“What do you mean?”

He seems to cringe. “They come back in a sort. They don’t age, but they can suffer death again, though such a thing is rare. The more they die, the less they fear death and the less appeal the killing holds.”

I am horror-struck. “That’s?—”

“The girl’s soul will serve Olympus for eternity. To die in this realm is binding,” Ares interrupts. “That is the will of Zeus. Th will of Olympus.”

“Fuck Zeus and his will,” I spit.

Ares cocks that carefully amused grin. “Careful, human . Your soul is very alive in a place where being alive is most dangerous.”

I ignore his very blatant threat as the screaming lowers to a pained whimper and ask, “The house she is given to…will they…”

“Harm her?” he finishes. “Some would. Most, though.” He pauses. “I believe most weary of Zeus’ lust for pain.”

The whimper finally dies and I fear the girl has, too. Grief, hot and aching, erupts inside me.

My lips part as I gasp in a breath I know will split the air with a sob I can contain no more than I can wrap the wreckage of my rupturing heart.

Ares hooks me around the back of my neck, pulling me hard into the wall of his chest. All traces of blood-soaked earth are gone, leaving only the scent of citrus and a deeper, darker, earthy spice.

His chest absorbs the cry I let spill as his iron arms keep the rest of me from coming apart at the seams.

Finally, when there are no more tears left to cry, Ares releases me. He looks uncomfortable by the contact, as though it’s unusual for him. When he steps back and clears his throat, he commands roughly, “Go. Return to your rooms and stay there.”

I frown. “What will you do?”

His hard jaw hardens. “I will escort her body to a house. One—” He bows his head. “One I know will do the best they can by her soul.”

“I’m coming.”

“No.”

I repeat, more firmly this time, “I’m coming.”

Really, I think I’m ready to go to battle over this with the God of War.

Ares sighs as he appraises me. Then, oddly, he murmurs, “I can see why he loves you.” His eyes watch my frown deepen. His voice lowers, but it does nothing to soften the deep roughness of it. “There is very little that is truly good in all the realms. You, Persephone, are truly good.”

I’m about to respond when he says more firmly, “I will go retrieve her. Stay here.”

“Ares—”

He cuts off my protest. “I’m serious, Persephone.

There are some things a good soul should never see, for there are darknesses which hold the power to taint even the purest of souls.

That darkness can and will spread like poison until the good that once lived is slowly, completely eroded. ” He holds his hand, palm out. “Stay.”

I want to argue, but I can’t. He’s right. I’m not prepared to see that and I’m not sure the wreckage of my heart could survive it.

I promise. “I’ll wait.”