Page 15 of His in the Dark

PERSEPHONE

T he bedchambers door is open. A crack only, but it is not locked shut.

I stare at it from my usual place in the center of the bedroom, disbelieving. I’m certain it was his intention to tempt me. To his credit, I am ever so tempted. I vaguely wonder what I have done to earn such things. The tour, the baths, the warmth of him throughout the night.

Although my life in Olympus was met with ease and comfort, never wanting for anything. Captures were not treated as such by my father. Zeus ruled with a firm hand of lightning for his enemies.

I am reminded though that Hades’s sickness is his belief in my attachment to him. As his queen. And with the promise of my powers.

He is deluded surely. But if his state allows me to roam freely, perhaps there is more of a chance to escape or to call for help. My mother will come. She could never stand for my pains and my wishes to not be met. I can only imagine her agony in knowing I have been taken against my will. If only she knows.

At that thought, my gaze shifts to the entrance of the room.

The door does not shiver and change as if spelled closed. The door stays open, giving me a view of the hall outside.

There it is. Quiet. Innocent. No one passes by the door. No one knocks on the frame. I cannot see if there is a guard standing by, but I assume there is one…if not right outside the door, then at the end of the hall.

To know that, I would have to go out, and that is where I’ve drawn the line in my head.

Watching the empty hall is one thing. Taking a step out?

I don’t know if it is a sick game or not. If there will be a punishment. Hades does not provide me with instruction. For a God of control, he does not attempt to control me apart from keeping me here. It is maddening.

Days have passed. Nights. I have eaten, and along with the nourishment, a certain clarity has returned to my mind. I can feel my body growing satisfied with its own energy again. The horrible, starved cravings have stopped, though I remain hungry for everything else.

My mother always told me the world is what we make it, what we believe is true is what will be. As within, so without. And so I stare at the door, convincing myself that it is my freedom, that is the right path for me to take. And yet, that truth does not hold true in my gut.

I do not trust this open door.

Even in the daylight, the sight is as forbidding as a dark shadow. I do not trust that it will remain light in the hallway, and I do not trust that the door is open as an invitation.

It feels more like a temptation. More like a trap. Meant to seduce me into going out, only to?—

What would happen if I ventured beyond this room? There is something inside of me that promises Hades will not harm me. If it were his intention, I believe he would have done so already. Yesterday, with his bloodied hands, he could have silenced me easily. I believe so much to be true, as much as I believe his brutality is worse than the stories we’ve been told.

I go a few steps towards it, testing the invisible chains that bind me to the room. They do not pull me back. If I move my arms quickly enough, they are there , certainly—bound to the Underworld, maybe? Bound to Hades? But they let me move toward what looks like freedom.

No. I simply do not trust that it is freedom.

I go back to where I was. With warm food and wine in my belly and energy in my blood, my suspicions are heightened. Days ago, I might have run into the hall, too desperate to think clearly, but now I wait.

For what? A soft voice in the back of my mind asks.

For him, another voice answers. Or perhaps it is the same voice.

For the man who sleeps at my side at night. For the man who holds me close to him so I can share his warmth although he’s the one responsible for the cold. For the man who kissed me as we looked into the heights of heaven and the depths of hell. For the man who showed me eternal torment, and eternal rest, and rules over them both.

I bite my lip, considering. I could call for him, I think. There is certainty within me that he would come if only I called. I could make it known that I wish to be in his presence. Would he believe that? Would he come to me, as I wait for him?

I have no choice but to wait for him, whereas Hades can go wherever he pleases.

What would I say, if he was here?

Would I ask him what the open door meant?

Would his answer mean anything to me?

And what of my powers? I have yet to do the most simplest of things. Ask him for them back. I do believe he’s stolen them somehow through my dreams.

Questions float idly in my mind. I wrap my arms around myself. It is not the questions I wish for in this moment. It is his warmth. When I have had a few morsels to eat, my body focuses on the cold instead. One problem solved leads to another to be dealt with, and I am cold still.

Answers would help, that voice whispers.

Maybe they would.

Maybe they wouldn’t.

I rub briskly at my arms, watching the hall outside these rooms for signs of danger.

There are none. The hall remains a hall. Silent and still.

I turn away and go to the table near the window. Light pours through the enormous panes of glass, but what light is it? After Hades took me along that path, it is impossible to believe that my eyes show me simple reality. The world outside the window is something other than what it seems. Hades’s realm contains many lands, and many souls. From my place at the table, it looks well-ordered, almost calm, but beneath the surface, it seethes with punishments and torture. And rooms beyond rooms that only have one door house so many souls, many with agony that will last for eternity.

And…it also holds peace, for those who have been granted it.

I nibble a small amount of bread and a glistening seed of pomegranate. The sweetness bursts onto my tongue just as it did the first time I tasted one of the seeds. The food here makes me stop and savor every bite. It does not matter that I am no longer starving. There’s something about the food. About the Underworld itself…

Putting a name to it remains impossible. I have thought of it every time I’ve taken my place at this table. Every time I’ve looked out the window to the hills of crystals and buildings and land beyond.

If I am getting used to it here…

If that’s why the food tastes so rich and finely flavored…

But that can’t be. I was born to bring life, not death. I cannot thrive here. It is not my place or fate. I have been told my fate and I must return to Olympus.

Unless Hades is right.

After I have eaten, the plates and vessels before me disappear and reappear a few moments later in pristine condition. In all the time I have spent eating, I have not been disturbed.

I wonder if that is purposeful.

I wonder if he is watching.

A shiver of arousal runs down my spine and between my legs at the thought. His rough stubble and dark eyes suit him well and urge a darker side of me to play with the fire that lies beneath his gaze.

I try not to feel it. I try not to think of it. But there are things I cannot forget from our walk down the path, no matter how hazy the details become. The blood on that woman’s face. Her head tipped back in agony, or such powerful pleasure that it became agony. The way her body moved under the men.

The way the first man killed the one who had hurt her.

The way Hades stood over the body of the guard in that room. His blood spreading on the tile.

My horror should have been stronger. I should have been sick at the blatant ending of a life. And I was frightened, but I was also…

I do not wish to think the word. I do not wish to think of the heat in my face as I stood alone with the body, the scent of blood in the air.

I do not wish it, but the sensation has been imprinted on me, as surely as if I’d eaten it with the food.

No one has ever killed for me before. No one has ever needed to. I know there is an argument to be made that Hades did not need to kill the guard, but he thought it was so, and the man did not live out the hour.

That is what I would have if I ruled beside him.

That is what you already have, that voice says.

“Hush,” I tell myself. My pulse has already quickened, thinking of the blood, and thinking of how I should have emptied my stomach, but I didn’t. It was, I know, a horrific sight.

And…

There were other elements as well.

I move slowly around the room, keeping my eyes on the door. No one has come, and though the door itself has not changed since I sat down to eat, it seems to beckon me.

Where would I go? I could not find the rooms I visited yesterday if I wished to. I don’t even remember which way we turned when we exited the bedchambers. Shock and disbelief has hazed my memory.

One side of the hallway seems faintly brighter than the other, so perhaps I would follow the light.

Or perhaps I would try to discover what hides in the shadows.

A shiver, this one less pleasant, makes me shudder. Seeking beyond my abilities is what got me here in the first place. I should have been protected by the spell I cast at my altar, but instead, it opened a door for me to be stolen.

Unless that doorway was already open.

I narrow my eyes at the door.

I can feel it there, watching. There may be someone hidden from me by magic more powerful than my own. There may be eyes on the back of my neck even now. I do not whip my head around to look. I do not have the power to stop anyone.

I fold my hands together and let my eyes travel slowly over the crystalized gardens below.

I could have that power.

Though not here.

This is a familiar path to walk along, as far as my thoughts go. They circle around Hades again and again, returning to his insistence that he could help me. Returning to the blood on the floor. Returning to the offer he made of the guards with that dark heat in his eyes. Returning to his lips on mine. Returning to his arm around me in bed.

Returning, and returning, and returning.

Footsteps in the hall jostle me into awareness.

It’s him—that’s my first thought—but it is not. It can’t be.

The footsteps do not belong to Hades. They are too quick, and a bit lighter than his confident, commanding steps. I freeze, holding my breath as they get closer. How many people walked past my rooms on Olympus without me giving them any thought at all? It must have been hundreds. Thousands! And yet now I am wholly attuned to the sound of one man coming and going…

Or whether he is not returning. My heart fights between disappointment and an urgent curiosity. If it is not him, then who?

A fair maiden enters the room.

I raise my hand to stop her. It is an old instinct, left over from when I was a child—a simple spell my mother taught me so that I would know it when I gained control of my powers.

The magic behind the spell does not come. Nothing happens, and the maiden is not stopped.

Instead, she raises her own hand in a similar gesture, and the lights flicker. My heart leaps, pounding in my throat with immediate recognition followed by immediate suspicion.

A witch ? Is she a witch?

I feel my teeth chattering then. Feel how the cold has seeped into my bones. It gets more palpable, as if my body is trying to force me to act. As if it wants me to know there is help within arm’s reach.

I take a breath, searching for something to say.

“Help me.” The words are out of my mouth, and it is too late to stop them. I have no time to consider whether they have sealed my fate.

The maiden nods as if she is not surprised to hear me blurt out this plea. “I am here to do just that. What would you like to eat? To wear?”

“I—”

“I have been told not to offer comfort in terms of the cold, unfortunately.” She wraps her arms around herself and glances at the windows. They are open again, if not as far as before. The small gaps seem to let in even more of the cold. I have not seen Hades open or close them, but he must be doing it—giving me the merest hint of warmth, then taking it with him when he leaves.

The woman is tall and lean, with reddish hair swept up and pinned on top of her head. She wears dark, flowing robes. Her eyes are the palest blue I have ever seen. Her expression is very calm, as if nothing in the world could bother her, but there is a spark in her blue eyes that betrays the mind behind them.

As if she knows something I do not.

But where does the loyalty of that sharp mind lie? The most obvious answer would be to Hades. No one can come to me without his permission, so he must know of this woman.

He must also trust this woman. I want to trust her as well, but I don’t trust my own instincts when it comes to my desires. My desire to know more of Hades has been complicated and heartbreaking. My desire to know more of my own magic led me here.

“You can learn magic while in the Underworld?” I ask, finding no other words within me. If this maiden learned to harness her powers, then there is more life than I realized…even here. My mind spins in a new direction.

Magic. In the Underworld. Powers like mine.

I will help you. Those words echo in my memory yet again. I had assumed all this time that Hades was lying. That what he said was a trick to gain my submission.

I will never stand beside you. I will never obey.

A kiss does not mean I will obey.

When I said those things, I did not believe magic in the Underworld was a possibility. Not unless it was to Hades’s doing.

More suspicion floods in. Is this maiden here because Hades is tired of how I have refused to submit? Is she another trap for me to walk into?

I take a deep breath and study her. The light in her eyes is not a hostile one. There is no sign of dislike or disgust in her. I do not know her well, so it is too soon to trust her, but her aura is not one of subterfuge.

Or perhaps it is. My skin prickles with new goosebumps. I will have to reconsider everything in light of this new information. I cannot just leap .

“It’s cold in these chambers,” she says, avoiding the question. “You could make a fire.”

“I can’t.” I gesture to the fireplace. “There is nothing to burn.”

She glances down at the floor in a silent denial.

Frustration quickens my breathing. “Why are you here?”

“As I said, my queen. To help you.”

“I do not need help if you do not wish to help me escape.”

“My queen.” The maiden takes a few steps forwards, her robes moving elegantly with her. My queen … why do they all call me that? Simply to please Hades I imagine. I detest the name but stay quiet so I may observe her.

She glances meaningfully at the open door. Once again, it feels like it is watching me…or like it’s calling to me. Is she the one calling for me? “You need help more than you know. So much so, you haven’t realized the freedom you have.”

I do not clench my hands into fists, but the impulse is strong. It is not for this woman to tell me what freedoms I have or do not have. She should not dare to tell me what I know or do not know.

But then?—

She dares to speak to me at all, which makes me admire her. She may not be right, but she seems to be speaking honestly.

“I know the door is open. I do not trust it.”

“I wasn’t referring to a locked or unlocked door.” Her eyes meet mine, the light in them brighter now, and an answering light flares in me, like hope. “Please. If you need me, you need only think my name. Silvie.”