Page 51 of Where Darkness Bloomed (Of Stars and Salt #1)

The wind whispered mournfully, twisting across barren fields, rattling the withered stalks. Though the summer sun blazed overhead, the air carried winter’s bite.

Zeus strode through the desolation like a storm made flesh, his scowl darkening with each step. Beneath his feet, brittle stalks crumbled to dust, the lifeless land stripped of its bounty.

At the heart of the ruin stood Demeter.

Her fingers trailed over the skeletal remains of the fields, stems that had once been heavy with golden grain. Her radiance, once as warm as summer, had bled to spectral gray, cold as the glacial peaks of Hyperborea. Goddess of the harvest, now a wraith of famine and withering grief.

Without a sound, Zeus appeared behind her, his presence thickening the air like a storm about to break.

“How long will you neglect your duty?” His voice was low, thunderous behind its restraint.

Demeter did not turn. Slowly, she curled her fingers around a handful of dead wheat, crushing it to dust. “This is only the beginning.” The words were hollow, an abyss of cold, echoing fury. “Soon, Olympus and mortals alike will know my grief... and my vengeance.”

The heavens rumbled a warning that echoed through the dead earth.

“Careful, goddess,” Zeus growled. “Remember who you threaten.”

Demeter’s lips twisted, bitter as aconite. “How could I forget?”

At last, she turned. When her eyes met his, they burned—not with fire, but something colder, more terrible.

“My memory is long, Zeus,” she said softly. “I remember how you seduced me in my youth, planted your seed and abandoned me for your queen.” Her mouth tightened with disdain. “Just as you abandon our child, leaving her to darkness.”

The air crackled around Zeus. “She is not a child, Demeter,” he said, voice hard as stone. “Persephone has not been a child for many ages. You cling to an illusion that suits you.”

“Kore is—”

“ That is not her name !”

His roar split the heavens, and the world shuddered beneath it. Lightning tore jagged streaks through the sky, scarring dark clouds. The air quivered, the force of his wrath a tangible, suffocating weight.

“She is Persephone ,” he thundered. “The Fates decreed her path at her first breath. And yet you”—his eyes burned with the weight of judgment—“you would steal it from her. Twist her destiny to your will and rob your own daughter of what is hers by right.”

Charged silence followed. Demeter’s rage didn’t wane. It thickened, coiling dangerously beneath her stillness, like a serpent readying to strike.

Zeus drew a long breath through his nose, smoothing a hand over his beard as he tempered himself. “If you hate me for choosing Hera,” he said, quieter now, but no less commanding, “so be it. Curse me. But Persephone has no place in this between us.”

Demeter’s gaze was frigid as the wasteland she had wrought. A monument to grief, rage, and resolve.

“She is a queen now.” Zeus pressed the words firmly in the space between them. “With a husband suited to have her. You must let her be what the Fates ordain.”

For a heartbeat, the world held still.

Demeter’s eyes snapped to his, her wrath glittering within them. “I will see every mortal on this earth perish,” she hissed. “I will fill the Underworld with their souls before I abandon her to Hades.”

The wind screamed.

It rose, a maelstrom of grief and defiance tearing through the air, spiraling in a furious storm of chaff. In a breath—she was gone, vanishing into the howling gale.

Zeus’s rage answered.

A jagged bolt of lightning ripped through the sky, slamming mercilessly into the ground, thunder shaking the distant mountains. The land ignited in a ravenous rush, fire devouring the brittle husks as it rolled hungrily across the desiccated earth .

Stone-faced, Zeus watched the blaze rip across the land, an inferno consuming every remnant of life.

“Hermes,” he called.

A flash of silver lit the air above him. In an instant, the messenger was there—winged sandals beating softly against the smoke-tinged air.

“My lord.” Hermes’s keen eyes shifted from Zeus to the spreading wildfire.

“Go to Hades,” Zeus commanded. The fire’s reflection lit the depths of his dark-blue eyes. “Tell him I come to him.”

With a crisp nod, Hermes was gone, a streak of silver slicing through the ash-thick sky.

Above, the heavens churned, roiling in uneasy tumult.

Then the first flake fell. A single, fat drop of snow, tumbling from the ashen sky. It landed with a whispered hiss against the scorched earth, melting instantly.

Another followed.

Then another.

The first omen of a bitter winter.

***

“No.”

The word rang through the Underworld’s throne room. Shadows stirred and the torchlight flickered, recoiling. Hades’s eyes were dark as the void, flashing with fury that swallowed the firelight.

Across from him, Zeus met his hard glare with one of his own. “If you refuse, mankind will not recover,” he said. “This is a solution for now, one that will be remedied. This, I swear to you.”

Hades’s fury rose like a tide. “Demeter will never release her,” he bit out coldly. “You know this.”

Zeus’s nostrils flared. “It is not Demeter’s decision,” he snapped. “Persephone is your wife, and she belongs at your side. But the mortals are destroying themselves, and now Demeter’s wrath pushes them to oblivion. They will cease to exist if nothing is done.”

Shadows rippled at his heels as Hades took a rigid step forward. “Then chain her to a rock and send another eagle!” he hissed. “You’ve done it before.”

“And fracture Olympus into ruin?” Zeus thundered.

“You know what chaos that would unleash.” His hand swept toward the River Styx, where endless souls spilled into shadow.

“Look at them,” he demanded. “You hear their prayers—the cries of parents, the wails of widows, of children who will never see another sunrise.”

His voice faltered for a breath. Then it returned, uncharacteristically raw.

“We cannot intervene in Troy, not when the Fates have already foretold its fall. But this destruction might be avoided.” Stormbright eyes flashed at Hades. “You must yield. Demeter will not. When the war ends, Persephone will be returned to you.”

The air stiffened, turning glacial around Hades. “Demeter defies the Fates in violation of our oath, and you ask me to yield? To bend as she destroys the earth.”

The stillness between them threatened violence.

“Return to Olympus, brother.” The words fell with deadly calm. “You waste your breath.”

Zeus swore, a vicious oath in the old tongue, raking a hand through his hair, lightning flickering between his fingers. The throne room fell into hush, broken only by crackling torches and the mournful flow of the Styx.

Then Zeus asked, quiet and merciless, “And what will you tell Persephone?”

The question fell like a blow. A calculated fist to the gut.

He didn’t wait for an answer. “How will you comfort her,” Zeus pressed, voice coiling tighter with every word, “when she sees the river choked with souls? When the cries of starving children rise to her ears, day after day? She walked among them for eons, Hades. She will not look away as you do.”

Hades turned on him, fists clenched at his sides. “Demeter causes their suffering,” he snarled. “Not I.”

Without hesitation, Zeus struck back. “But neither do you prevent it,” he snapped. “Do you think she will forgive your neutrality when the riverbank overflows with children who died in their mothers’ arms?”

The sound that followed rose from Hades’s chest—not a word, but a raw, furious growl that shook the temple.

“You ask me to sacrifice my queen for the sake of mortals.” His eyes burned, fire banked in shadow, wrath smoldering deep. “I will not.”