Page 180 of Hekate: The Witch (Goddesses of the Underworld #1)

Hades’ Domain

Thanatos was watching me

as we emerged from the woods,

brambles stuck in our clothes

and blue-black leaves caught

in our hair. I took in the

four strange obsidian towers

that simply disappeared

into the earth’s crust above us

and the skulls that had been

hammered into the walls

as though a morbid decoration.

Bats flew everywhere,

one even landed in my hair,

but I shook it out before it settled.

Thanatos gestured to a small archway

at the very back of the palace.

It was twice his height

and I began to walk towards it,

but then he said, ‘We will take this way;

it is the servants’ door.’

With two thumps from

his scythe, the heavy doors

swung open. He walked ahead of me

whispering, ‘Be very quiet,

and let me do all of the talking.’