Rachel Alexander's Blog, page 245

a-gnosis:But when the earth shall bloom with the fragrant...

a-gnosis:

But when the earth shall bloom with the fragrant flowers of spring in every kind, then from the realm of darkness and gloom thou shalt come up once more to be a wonder for gods and mortal men.

Demeter to Persephone, The Homeric Hymn to Demeter, translated by H G Evelyn-White.

*incoherent screaming* I can't breathe. I love the underworld squad so much!!?!? They are the best and aww to the later hades and persephone scene. I'm not going to be spoilery, but they deserve a hug. Thank you so much for another wonderful chapter! Xxxx

Thank you so much for such a glowing review! ❤️

Ok we should both go to sleep now

The Good Counselor - Chapter 7

Book Three in the Hades and Persephone series. Seventy years have passed since Elysion was created, and Persephone’s efforts to conceive a child with Hades have been in vain.  But a secret rite on Samothrace might  bend the Fates and give her all that they have dreamed of, or pave a path of untold suffering.

Chapter 7

After her first disastrous homecoming, Persephone’s return to Aidoneus’s side was always a joyful yet sober affair.

They would cloister themselves in their rooms, then hold a quiet feast in the main hall on the next full moon— their anniversary. Hecate joined them without exception, as did Hypnos and Thanatos, the twin gods of sleep and death. Their mother, Nyx, the Goddess of Night, would make an occasional appearance, as would Askalaphos and Menoetes. An assortment of Erinyes and Stygian nymphs rounded out the feasting company. Charon was a rare sight in the hall, which made his arrival so surprising.

The doors opened loudly, silencing the idle chatter between Hypnos and Persephone. Askalaphos straightened, turning away from Nychtopula, who grasped his arm and peered around him. Aidoneus sat up on his divan, then stood in mild astonishment. Charon leaned on his oar as a staff, his thin frame even more frail against the backdrop of the great hall, then moved to kneel.

“No, no, please, Charon.” Aidoneus stretched out his arms. “Come in, friend; it’s good to see you.”

“And you, my king.” He turned to Persephone, “Aristi.”

Persephone smiled at him and returned a slight nod.

Charon swayed, the motions of the Styx still deep in his bones. “I have something for you. A gift, of sorts.”

“For me?” Persephone said.

Charon fought back a smile. “Beg pardon, Aristi, but this one I saved for your husband. It is a curiosity I found eight days past. Or rather, it found me.”

Aidoneus glanced back at Persephone and shrugged. When he turned back, his eyes widened at the perfectly cut ruby Charon produced from the folds of his robes.

“It fell into my boat. Nearly hit a poor shade on the head.”

Hypnos immediately dropped his gaze and fought back laughter. Hecate pointedly brought her fingertips to her lips and exchanged a glance with Thanatos. The God of Death rested his chin on his folded hands, silver eyes boring into Aidon’s back. Persephone’s bewilderment was palpable.

“We have the whole earth above us, so pebbles and such fall all the time,” Charon explained. “But this stone was just… so finely cut…”

He turned it over in his hands, letting the light from the braziers shimmer through it. Thanatos cleared his throat, barely suppressing laughter. Aidoneus felt heat creeping up his neck and reddening his cheeks and ears.

He knew how that ruby had fallen into Charon’s possession.

Aidoneus would wait within the Plutonion for Persephone each fall, listening to her mother’s priests drone on as they prepared the masses for her departure and the barren winter ahead. His hand would reach out from the shadows, and take hers gently, not daring so much as a squeeze of affection in front of all of Eleusis. None knew it was him: he knew it would sully all of Persephone’s progress with the mortals if they knew that the feared Lord of the Dead stood in the shadows.

Once the door closed behind her, they would retreat through the caverns in silence. He would walk her to his chariot, hoist her up, and they’d be off, plunging through the scorching depths of the earth to emerge in the dark reaches of Erebus. Only then would he kiss her with all the uncaged fervor of six months spent without her in his bed. Normally, Aidon would stay away during harvest time, in part to let his wife work, but largely to avoid ever-present Demeter. By the time they were alone together it would have been at least two months since their last encounter. This year the wait had been  worsened by the fact that Aidon had forgone their usual midsummer visit.

“…and so auspicious,” Charon continued, “since this jewel fell into my boat on the very day our queen came back from the corporeal world…”

Aidoneus had been hasty with her. And she with him, he recalled, deepening his blush further. Her fingernails had gouged his neck and flanks in the dark as she had struggled to rid him of his himation and then his loincloth. His garments had fallen in a heap on the chariot’s podium. As he was wrapping the reins around one hand and tugging at her dress with the other, he’d grown impatient, and with a growl he yanked her jeweled girdle off her hips. The gold set stones jingled and clattered in the cart. Neither one noticed. By then, he was pressed deeply into her, a rhythm growing between them, his senses flooded by the warmth and scent and sound and taste of her surrounding him…

Afterward, in the waxing light of the Styx, she fished for her clothes and righted his, only to discover that a large ruby on her girdle missing from  its setting. Persephone fretted about the jewel as they alighted in the courtyard, but it was no matter to Aidoneus. He was the master of earth and all the precious things contained therein. Summoning a replacement would be easy. And so, amidst the following days of their private reunion, he had forgotten all about it.

Until now. And of all the damnable places for it to turn up…

“I thought to myself,” Charon smiled, “I could keep this, perhaps with all the coin I’ve received over the aeons, but no, that wouldn’t do…”

Hecate snickered.

“Such a marvelous trinket should be given to you, so you could gift it to your dear wife,” he said, holding it aloft before dropping it into Aidoneus’s open palm. “In front of all of your gathered friends, of course.”

One of Hypnos’s silver wings arched forward to shield his face. Tisiphone didn’t bother masking her harsh cackle, her body doubling over,  one hand on Persephone’s shoulder. Nychtopula whispered in Askalaphos’s ear and his eyes grew wide.

“Which one of them put you up to this, Charon?” Aidoneus asked, his lip twitching into a smile.

“I swear it wasn’t me.” Hypnos shook with laughter. “I swear it!”

Thanatos parted his hands and raised one finger. Aidoneus looked at him in surprise, and Persephone smiled, her cheeks rosy with a mix of embarrassment and laughter. Aidon returned to his seat and sheepishly handed over the ruby. They exchanged a quick kiss and the laughter ended in quiet applause.

Charon smiled. “Now all’s right with the world.”

The Minister of Death would have been the obvious culprit a century ago, but Sisyphus had changed him forever. He was more somber, and Aidon had heard no complaints from Hecate, no boasts or rumors about him chasing after the Lampades—  or any woman or man, for that matter. Aidon was relieved that this prank had been Thanatos’s idea.

“Won’t you stay, Charon?”

“Perhaps. You know the first days of winter can be busy—”

“Oh, please,” Persephone said. “Anyone newly arrived can wait a mere hour. Come share the nectar that was sent to us.”

“Nectar.” Charon’s jaw tightened.

“Courtesy of Hera,” Aidon said.

“Do you recall the last time she sent us a… gift?” He looked pointedly at Aidoneus.

“It’s in good faith, Charon. Persephone got on well with Hera this summer, and this was delivered by Hermes earlier today for the anniversary,” Aidoneus sipped from his cup; he had quietly vowed to have only one. Everyone who had witnessed what happened that night was eager to lay the blame at Minthe’s, or Demeter’s, or even Hera’s feet— anyone but him. Aidon knew the truth: if he hadn’t downed that entire glass— and so many before it— he wouldn’t have been so gravely affected by the ergot. “It won’t alter your senses, I assure you.”

Charon’s shoulders dropped and he sighed. “It had better not. If I forget to collect a single obol tomorrow, I’m laying the blame squarely on you, Aidon.”

Hypnos poured him a glass and they carried on well into the evening, trading stories and tales from above and below. Orphne and Clymena had brought a cithara and a tambourine, and with some encouragement from Tisiphone, Persephone rose and danced, showing them an epilinios she had learned during Anthesteria on Crete. Aidon’s gaze was fixed on Persephone the whole time, relishing her ease and happiness at being home again. Her potent glance in his direction edged him closer toward dismissing their guests so he could have her to himself.

But he could also feel her many questions for him lingering. She knew that he was withholding something. And he needed to tell her.

Warmth suffused and enveloped her. Warmth from his hands wrapped around the small of her back, warmth from each gasping breath where she leaned against his shoulder, and warmth radiating from where they were joined. The gentle breeze around them, his scent of cypress, and the sheen of sweat on Persephone’s skin provided a cool counterpoint that made the after effects of her peak all the more sublime. Aidon pulled her down hard and threw his head back, his fingers digging into her hips, and a final burst of heat made her shiver.

He leaned back into the grass and pulled her with him, then uncrossed his legs. She released him and rolled away, awkwardly unfolding her limbs to fall in a heap at his side. They stared up at the stars of Elysion, breathing in time, their fingers lacing together.

“Happy anniversary.”

“Indeed.” She kissed him on the cheek. She lazily raised a finger and pointed from star to star, tracing the winter constellation of The Hunter. Decades ago, they had stopped wondering why the sky here in Elysion, their Paradise within Chthonia, was filled with stars, why the moon shone at night and the sun during the day. Instead they had decided to just enjoy this mystifying world.  “The stars look just like this above, right now.”

“Yes. I remember.”

She rolled over and propped herself up on her elbows, her eyes trained on him.

He winced, then smiled at her. “You have questions for me. You’ve had them since we descended.”

“I wanted to wait before asking. I didn’t think they would be anything shocking. It was more in reaction to my mother hounding me just before the harvest.”

He tensed again. “I had seen to something early on in the season, and needed to think it over before I told you about it, sweet one. So rather than withhold, I avoided you. I hope you can forgive me.”

“Can you tell me now?”

“Yes.” He took a deep breath and let it out slowly.

“You don’t have to worry, husband,” she said, smiling. She folded her arms under her chin, propping herself up on his chest. “It’s just me.”

“After Eumolpus died, I spent months contemplating what to do with what he told us about Orpheus, about having a child. But I didn’t want you to hurt again. Not after last time.”

She looked down. Aphrodite had suggested going to a temple far to the east, and they had participated in the fertility rites there. She had cloistered herself on the temple grounds, abdicating her responsibilities in the first grain harvest, heedless of the fact that it would mean a hard winter for the mortals. Persephone had rationalized that it was only one year, that she would never do it again. When her cycle was late by a week she was overjoyed, and told Aidoneus to come to her immediately. By the time he arrived, she was spotting, and though worried, she was told by the attending priestess that it could be a good sign. But the next evening Aidon had awoke to find her collapsed in a heap on the stone floor, sobbing, blood streaking her thighs.

Persephone let out a long sigh. “I understand.”

“I didn’t want to give you false hope, either. I wasn’t going to subject you to that if I found out that it would just be more pageantry and nonsense. But this…”

“You spoke with Orpheus?”

“Right before I saw you at the villa. I couldn’t tell you then. And decided that I couldn’t continue to lie by omission in your presence until you were back by my side and we’d spoken about it.”

“And that’s the only reason you didn’t visit at midsummer?”

He nodded.

Persephone laid her head in the crook of his arm. “What convinces you that this will be different?”

“Do you remember what Eumolpus told us? That Orpheus honored a god of rebirth that was not yet born?”

“I do. But every fertility cult from Iberia to the Euphrates honors some unborn or unknown god or goddess.”

“Which I why I did not appear to Orpheus directly, nor did I tell him who I was. Though I suspect he well knew by the time I left.”

“We’ve done this before… masking our identities, appearing mortal—”

“We have. But this is something else, sweet one. I asked— no, I commanded him to name his professed god— the one yet to be born.”

She rose up and looked him in the eye, and he nodded. Persephone’s skin prickled and she leaned back on her haunches.

“Zagreus.” Aidoneus sat up with her. “Zagreus, Persephone, the name we want to give our son. Had you ever told anyone besides me?”

“Only Hecate knows, but no one else. Not even Nyx or her sons. If I had ever spoken about my wishes to Eumolpus, I used brimo, which means ‘the strong one’. And it’s an epithet given irrespective of sex.”

“Then how else could Orpheus have known?”

Persephone swallowed. What if this was just another stone thrown down another bottomless well? She couldn’t leave off her responsibilities ever again, and couldn’t endure a disappointment like the last one. “It might be coincidence.”

“Certainly. He could have heard the name somewhere else, though Zagreus isn’t any name the Thracians or Eleusinians would give a child. Maybe he divined it, though I know not how.” He looked off into the distance. “Or perhaps there’s something more sinister at play since he’s been sending mortals here with those gold scrolls, even though he seemed more earnest than anything else. Or…”

She was afraid to hope, but his half hearted excuses told her all she needed to know. He believed. Decades had passed since he dared to believe anything would come of their attempts, and yet here he sat, apprehension barely masking exuberance, waiting for her reply. She smiled and her eyes stung. “Yes.”

“Yes to what?”

“Let’s try.”

“I don’t want you to hurt again.”

“Wouldn’t it be worth it though? Wouldn’t all the years of past pain be worth this if it gave us our child?”

He let out a long sigh and leaned his forehead onto hers. “Yes.”

“What must we do? I cannot miss the planting or harvest again. Hundreds of mortals died when I stayed in Alikarnassos.”

“It  requires one day and one night, as the first shoots rise from the earth. No more.”

“What does the rite itself ask of us?”

“That was less clear.”

“Eumolpus said part of the sacrifice would be who we are… our most heartfelt desires.”

“Orpheus said the same thing, and would not say anymore. But he professes to abide by the will of the Fates. More so than most of the gods, even. I am confident we can leave this all to ananke. No one will know that Hades and Persephone are attending among mortals. As far as they are concerned, we will be a mortal king and his queen.” He glanced out at the shallow sea beyond and cleared his throat. “There is one thing though that could become… a problem.”

“What’s that?”

“The promise by which we will ensure his discretion.”

motivationsforlife:Kauai by Spencer Watson

motivationsforlife:

Kauai by Spencer Watson

Photo

Photo

First Day of Spring making you a bit sad for your OTP?

therkalexander:

Console yourself with a new chapter of The Good Counselor tonight, featuring lots and lots of happy Underworld reunion fluff.

Do you think Hades would sometimes visit his wife when she’s away from the Underworld?

Yeah, definitely. I wrote a chapter of The Good Counselor here where he does exactly that.

Any news on the tv show?

I have a meeting tomorrow night. More details are forthcomoing.

Hey Rachel! Are you doing the director's cut thing still? If so, can you the scene with Aidon, Hecate, and Nyx in the garden in RoM? Right before Aidon and Persephone make up? Thank you so very much!

OK! Here we go…

I really wanted to have Hecate have a  moment to shine instead of waltzing on screen to be effusive and mysterious and then disappear the next. I also wanted to introduce Nyx in a big way and hint that there is a lot of prophecy at work and a line of succession and esoteric knowledge that has been passed along since Mother Chaos created the Universe. 

This was her last day as the Maiden. She stood taller, nearly flowered. Hecate could feel the impending shift to the Woman as surely as she had for a hundred aeons. She walked through the garden in her white peplos, her adolescent feet padding over the earth. She sensed the bursts of colorful blossoms at the garden’s edge before she could even see them, felt the warmth of breathing life radiating from the six trees. They had taken a little less than a moon’s cycle to bloom, their flowers vibrant red against the rich green leaves. Their brilliance stood like a beacon against the pallid grays and midnight-darkened evergreen of the Underworld.

Ducking under the branches, she stood in the middle of the small grove. Hecate walked to one of the flowers and peered at its petals, soft and translucent red, glowing as if the sun shone through them. She reached out and touched the waxy leaves, then drew her hand back in surprise. They were warm, as if they were basking in the daylight of the living world above. The red blossom would be unremarkable if it were growing above ground. But this was Chthonia. This sun didn’t shine here. Hecate pulled a single petal from a low hanging flower, examining it in her hand. As she did, the one beside it shook loose and floated to the barren ground below. She rolled the petal in her hand and smelled it, tasted it, closed her eyes and moved the energy of the ether through it, trying to find something, anything, unusual about it. She could find nothing that made these trees any different from those growing in the world above, other than how quickly they grew. Perhaps that was their only miracle.

In case anyone had forgotten that the flowers had started blooming on the trees after Aidon and Persephone really had started communicating with each other, and the following morning when everything had broken down. I wanted to showcase it through her point of view, because she has seen so many visions about them and views them as a prophecy. I also wanted to hint at the creation of Elysion without actually saying “and this was a portent for the Elysian Fields to be created.

Hecate tucked the single petal into the neckline of her peplos, and reached for the one that had fallen to the ground. When she picked it up, she cupped her hand to her mouth in shock and stumbled back, falling hard on her rump. She stood again, feeling her heart beating out of her chest, and dusted off the back of her peplos, staring closely at the place from where she’d picked up the fallen blossom. Hecate’s fingers feathered over a small tuft of light green grass. It grew in the exact shape, in the exact place of the flower that had fallen to the infertile ground. She leaned over, her breath teasing the fragile blades. “It can’t be…”

She stood up again and looked at the trees all around her, breathing shallowly. “It can’t be!”

Hecate turned her eyes upward and called out to the mists above. “Nyx!! Mother Nyx, you must see this!”

She waited.

“Nyx?”

“Your mother was Asteria— daughter of Phiobe, daughter of Gaia— who pledged you as my acolyte, young one,” a lilting voice said behind her. Hecate turned to meet the silver rimmed eyes of her mentor, the Goddess of Night, aged as many centuries as Hecate could count years. Darkness wrapped around the curves of her body like an unbound, thin himation, clinging to her and flowing around her as though she were underwater. Her jet-black hair waved about her weightlessly, and her bare white feet stuck out below the cover of darkness, hovering above the ground. She smiled at Hecate. “And after all these millennia, Hecate, we are more friends now than teacher and student, no?”

Again with the trying to show without telling here. I wanted to allude to a chain that stretched back to the creation of the universe itself, with one woman teaching the next about the dance of creation. I also wanted to give a real sense to just how ancient Nyx really is.

“Yes, my lady,” she smiled.

“What troubles you, young one?” Nyx looked around at the red flowers and answered her own question. “Is it the trees? They are no doubt the work of your student.”

“His hands couldn’t grow this orchard. Not his two alone,” Hecate said, walking over to the tree and brushing her fingers over the leaves.

“Which is why I first hesitated when you told me you had chosen Aidoneus,” she said. “The line of our sacred knowledge has always been passed from goddess to goddess— never to a male.”

So everyone takes the hieros gamos and puts their own spin on it. It’s a rite that speaks to creation, but as it goes forward it’s like a book into which everyone writes their own interpretation. I’m sure that Nyx did it differently than Mother Chaos, and Hecate does things differently than Nyx.

“And that sacred stream had never flowed to an avowed virgin before me. The world has its seasons, and sometimes we have to change with them. True, there is still much for him to learn. But please trust me, as I have asked and you have done before. Your favorite proved herself unworthy, after all,” Hecate replied. “Simple passions ruled her, not the call of wisdom. Her decisions may undo us all one day.”

The her is Demeter in case anyone wasn’t clear on that.

“Sooner than you think, young one. My dear son Thanatos walks the earth above too often. The Fates will cut too many threads from the Cloth of Life before this ends. Perhaps it’s best for all if we send the little queen back…”

“We cannot, Nyx,” Hecate said, returning to where the flower had fallen on the barren ground. “The soil itself tells us why. Look…”

When I wrote the story I wanted to make damn sure to create a situation in which Persephone was in the Underworld but that she wasn’t trapped in the Underworld. Nyx thought of sending her back and could have easily convinced Aidoneus that that was the right things to do. Of course, we see later in this scene that he had the same idea but for different reasons. 

Ok and coming up, I kind of love the idea of Nyx being bound not only to her husband and consort eternally, but that he actually is her very clothing. My inspiration for this was thinking about a woman wound up in yards of black georgette or silk and moving underwater. Nyx isn’t affected by gravity. She is older than gravity.

The Goddess of Night tipped forward as though she were swimming through the air, her hair gently waving behind her. The shroud of darkness followed after, falling away from one breast before it rushed up on its own to cover her once more. Nyx leaned down and looked at the tuft of grass. She listened intently to a silent voice above her and moved her hand along the darkness shrouding her body, caressing it and looking lovingly up to where it swept up and faded away from her form. A slow smile spread across her face. “I knew there was a reason my husband liked her so much.”

Hecate looked at her, perplexed, before it dawned on her. “I knew they first coupled before they reached the lands below, but I hadn’t imagined it could have been while they were—”

“Erebus said he was honored. He told me he bore witness to the Goddess mating with her thrice-chosen Consort in the ancient manner, the way it was done before the Tyrant.” Nyx spat the last word, refusing to say Kronos’s name. She rose, righting herself. “Chaos mated with the Void in kind to create the cosmos. It was the original hieros gamos, before my generation perfected it. The true Sacred Marriage of the gods— not the pantomime your Lampades engage in with the mortals.”

Ok, so I had some fun with this idea. I mean, Erebus is a person and a place, and he became the shadow way before the Titanomachy for reasons I will get into when I write the prologue for that particular book. But I kind of had an inward laugh at how Erebus would have reacted, seeing his prophesied queen and his wife’s adopted heir gettin’ it on in a rapidly descending chariot. Also, Nyx has more than a bit of snark about the spread of the hieros gamos to more than just one person at a time.

“Aidoneus’s eyes saw their union differently,” Hecate said, ignoring her teacher’s slight against her nymph acolytes. “And a mere moon’s cycle learning her thoughts gives me much doubt that Persephone would see it your way either.”

“You know better than most that things are not always what they seem,” Nyx said as she moved back to the trees. “The narcissus I had Gaia plant in the center of Persephone’s sacred grove was what drew her here. When she plucked it, she laid aside her old life and chose us and our ways. She chose him as her mate in that moment, whether she knew or not.”

“The divine purpose of that flower is unlikely to bring peace to either of their hearts.”

“Our ways are not the ways of the world above. Aidoneus has only begun to realize that. And she will see that one day as well.”

“They have not yet performed the Rite. Perhaps then—”

“All in due time. Be patient with them, young one.”

“My lady,” Hecate said, pointing at the small tuft of grass, “if these blades carry the meaning we suspect, and the true purpose of their union comes to pass— will you join your consort, and become the night as he became the shadow?”

Erebus had not always been the encompassing darkness that separated Chthonia from the world above. Before Kronos enslaved the entire House of Nyx and imprisoned them in the Underworld, all the Protogenoi walked the earth in forms made flesh. Erebus was a tall man with silver hair and midnight blue eyes. Every shadow cast in the daylight stretched forth from his raven black wings— the Lord of Shadows was a fitting consort for his wife, the Goddess of Night. After the war, one by one, they had chosen to fade from their tangible forms into their respective domains. Hemera grew more luminous until she was the daylight itself, Gaia took root and melded with the earth, and Erebus faded into the darkness. Slowly, others among the old gods followed in their stead, including Hecate’s beloved mother. Of the Protogenoi, Nyx was the last to retain her original form.

I love the idea of old gods, of generations of gods with the Olympians just being the latest iteration. And I think that the grandparents of the gods decided that maybe millions of years was enough time to oversee everything and decided to become the things they watched over, or the stars in the sky like Asteria did, etc. Also is it clear that I have lots of feelings about Erebus?

The goddess of night smiled as Hecate ruminated on their fate, what would someday be the fate of all the immortals. “Truth be told, Erebus likes holding me this way,” she said, brushing her hand over the wavering shroud of darkness surrounding her. “He says it makes him feel young when he touches me. I’ll keep this form for now. If our ambitions are realized— then we’ll see. I’m allowed to change my mind.”

Hecate sighed. “I thought to sow the seed of our future when we sealed the betrothal of Hades and Persephone at the river so many ages ago,” she said, running her fingers along the sun-warmed leaves. “Now, infinitely more hangs in the balance, and their sapling already twists in a storm.”

“They will find a way to weather it.”

“The aeons have passed us by, and only this and the next remain.”

I would tell you what I mean by this but I can’t. Like I still can’t. This isn’t a Chekov’s gun here. It’s a Chekov’s cannon.

“Patience.”

Hecate and Nyx turned simultaneously to see Aidoneus step out through the palace portico, walking slowly toward the grove. His arms were folded across his chest.

“Do they know?” Nyx asked.

“That these are their creation? Perhaps not. They have both seen how they flourish here. Persephone carried her husband to the grove’s heart when she found her own path through the ether, and both are led here in dreams. Aidoneus knows as well as I that creating them is beyond his wisdom, and Persephone is thwarted when she tries to grow even asphodel in the fields of its namesake, much less leaves soaked in sunlight.”

“How long since they spoke to each other?”

“Three days,” Hecate said, lowering her voice as Aidon approached.

“Have faith in them,” Nyx returned.

Enter Mr. Mopey.

They silently watched Aidoneus walk into the grove, the gravel crunching under his leather sandals. He touched the warm leaves, and then thinned his lips once he realized he was not alone.

“Hecate. Lady Nyx.” He nodded grimly to them in acknowledgement.

Nyx floated toward him. “What troubles you, little one?”

It was his least favorite sobriquet, and one she always managed to use when his frustration was greatest. Aidoneus said nothing; the Goddess of Night was a thousand aeons older than he, and with Erebus, had once ruled both the Underworld and the night sky. He was too tired to challenge her anyway, his body and soul weary from lack of sleep.

“You dislike it,” Nyx said, effortlessly reading him, “but our other name for you, Liberator, seems to fit poorly right now.”

He was the one who freed Nyx and her family from Tartarus, killing Kampe to do so. ‘Liberator’ is the highest title that Nyx has for him, and I got to use the word sobriquet in that paragraph too. Liberator is also a name for another character that has yet to appear and I debated using it an an epithet since it’s more associated with that character, but I think that both applications are appropriate here, especially considering what’s to come in the series.

Aidoneus merely circled the grove, his arms crossed behind his back.

“Ever as taciturn as you were before. Before her, at least. This isn’t about your new queen, is it?”

He clenched his teeth and looked away from her.

Hecate followed closely behind Nyx, who tried again to draw an answer from him. “Aidoneus, you can greet the rest of your subjects behind a mask of solemnity—”

“—but you can see through it, my lady; I know. I don’t wish to talk about it,” he paused, glancing at their expectant faces, and scowled before dryly continuing. “But clearly I’m to be pestered by both of you until I say something. I’ll be brief: I’m taking Persephone back to Demeter.”

Hecate shook her head. “Tilling the shoots under so soon?”

“Soon?!” he flared. “She has been here nearly a month! And as soon as there was a glimmer of hope that this could work, I destroyed it. I’ve ruined everything, Hecate. She will never find it in her heart to love me after what we did— after what I said. I’ve agonized over this for three days and I’m just going to do what is best for all.”

“And what does she have to say about this?” Nyx said.

“I cannot bring myself to speak to her, nor would she want me to. Not after we—” he walked away from Nyx and looked out above the twined branches of the trees, the waterfall in the distance cascading upward to the world above. “The mortals are suffering in her absence, thanks to her mother. After what happened between us, Persephone cannot possibly still wish to remain with me. We will still be married in name and title. She will live in the world above where she belongs, where she’s happiest, and my life can go back to the way it was.”

Here we see him returning to the comfort of who he once was. Before Persephone awakened him to emotions and love, he would of course have sent her back. The world above was dying and it would have been hypocritical of him not to. But that’s obviously not what he wants.

“There is no going back, Aidoneus,” Hecate replied, “And neither can she. What was done cannot be undone. You cannot build a new tree with those boards.”

“This is my marriage!” he said, turning back to them. “It’s my decision to make.”

“So,” Nyx said, “you will leave this realm without a Queen? Or do you have plans to take a concubine? Many of the nymphs who reside here would be willing…”

“No.” He felt bile well up in his throat as he contemplated any kind of intimacy with anyone but her.

“Would you stop her if she took a lover?”

His jaw and fingers clenched shut and he closed his eyes so Nyx could not see the fire that lit them. For all the nausea he felt at the idea of laying with another woman, the thought of his wife being touched by another man filled him with a rage so potent it could lay waste to the earth. The Olympian men had no qualms about seducing a woman once she was unbound from her vows of chastity. Unbidden images of Persephone’s body being dragged underneath Apollo or Ares tore at him until he thought he would scream.

Yeah, for all the progressive that Hades is, there isn’t anything that would cause him to become completely irrational like anyone else touching his wife.

“Did you think you could push her away so easily,” Hecate chided with a smirk, her eyes narrowed at him, “when you hold so tight?”

Aidoneus slammed his fist into the trunk of a tree next to him, feeling his skin break open on its rough bark. His wrist smarted at the impact. He looked at his abraded knuckles, then flexed his fingers outward and felt the wounds knit back together. The branches above dropped delicate red petals to the ground all around them.

“Do not presume that I came to this decision lightly.” His voice rasped and he forced his anger to subside. He wouldn’t let any of them— not Hecate or Nyx, nor his wife— destroy his hard-won peace of mind ever again. It had taken him aeons after the war to bury anything that could touch him. Now the wounds were open again. She needed to go back; he saw no reason why she wouldn’t want to go back. It was the right thing to do for both of them. Once she was with her mother, he would pay a visit to Olympus with a stern warning for each of the male gods. Their fear of him would keep her safe.

“Look around you, Hades. Our world is dark and deep and hidden— an eternal tangle of flowing rivers that surrounds and protects the souls waiting to be reborn to the world above. This is a realm that needs a Queen. We have been without one for too long.” The Goddess of Night moved toward him. “Setting me and my children free, drawing the shortest twig when Lachesis held out those three fateful lots for you and your brothers… Those pale beside the real reason the Fates chose you. The gifts and curses of ruling Chthonia were never meant to be your sole burden.”

“I have judiciously ruled this kingdom alone for thousands of years. Three and a half weeks are not—”

“And for those thousands of years we waited. We waited for the Queen to find you. To seek you out. And seek you out she did, beckoning you, before you were thrice chosen by her. First when you appeared in her dreams, second when she entered your sacred grove wearing a wreath of laurel and olive, and lastly when she plucked the flower that drew you to her from the depths.”

He shook his head. “That’s not how it happened, Nyx. I went to her father for permission to take Persephone as my bride, as it is done in the world above. I invaded her dreams; I chased her from her home, I rapt her away in my chariot and took her maidenhead in the dark.”

“Thousands of years, and still you think like an Olympian.” Hecate said. “Theirs is a different world, and ours are different ways.”

“Hecate, if I never hear you say that again, it will be too soon.” He turned to leave the grove again. “Please— both of you— just leave me in peace with my decision.”

“Hades…” Nyx breathed.

He turned, slowly and deliberately, to her once more. Aidoneus watched as she raised her hand and looked at the ground. Nyx splayed out her fingers and turned her palm upward. The red flowers lifted, hovering in midair as languidly as she did. They circled her and spiraled into a tight ball hovering weightless above her outstretched palm before bursting into flames, the embers shining like stars before vanishing into the darkness that shrouded her.

Ok I admit, this was a bit superfluous, but oh shit was it fun to imagine and write. Besides. One little tuft of grass is one thing, but when all of a sudden there are things growing in a place that’s supposed to be dead and still and unchanging… I had to herald it with something fun.

“Tell me, little one…” she said to him, “at what point should these be factored into your decision?”

Aidon looked down to where Nyx pointed her long fingers. On the gray, lifeless soil were scattered tufts of vibrant green, lying in the exact places the petals had been knocked to the ground. Making sure not to step on any of them, he walked carefully over to one, and crouched low to examine it. Aidon squinted at it and gingerly brushed his fingers along the soft blades of grass. “What in Tartarus…?” he whispered under his breath.

Hecate met his confusion with her placid gaze. “You are not the first lovers to quarrel, Aidoneus. But you are the first to create anything like this.”

“I did not… I cannot—”

Foreshadow, foreshadow…

“No, you cannot,” Hecate said. “Not you alone.”

“How are Persephone and I able to do this?” he said, his eyes wide with confusion.

Nyx and Hecate looked at each other. The Goddess of Night spoke. “My son said you came to him seeking an answer— that you’ve seen these in your dreams, and she as well…”

“Morpheus knew nothing about these,” he said. “They don’t appear in the dream world.”

“When you first went to Persephone, my son brought you together,” Nyx said. “To dream of another or ask that another dream of you is one thing…”

Aidoneus thought about their first meeting. How full of confusion he had been when he discovered himself pressed against her skin. How natural it felt to be with her.

“…But to bring two together in the same dream, to unite them— has only ever been asked of my son once.”

“Remember how you appeared to each other in the dream,” Hecate said. “And consider that it was her dream.”

He looked at Hecate, dumbfounded.

I love how all this time, Aidon thought that he was the one who subconsciously decided that they would meet each other for the first time in the nude and mid make out, but Hecate is all ‘guess what dum dum…’

“Is it so hard to believe, Aidoneus?” she continued. “You dreamed you met her in her own shrine, and so did she. She dreamed of her future husband that night, the night you walked into her dream to announce your betrothal. How you appeared to her was her idea. Your name a mystery, your realm unknown to her, she still grew your sacred bloom from the earth where she slept and dreamed of you.”

“You are her chosen Consort. And just as was done in that first dream, you, Aidoneus, provided the seed to create these. Together you have dreamed the pomegranate trees into existence, little one,” Nyx said, softly motioning to the leaves and flowers hanging above them.

“But what does it mean?”

“That is knowledge I cannot pass to you,” Hecate said.

“Of course it isn’t!” he said sarcastically. “Because the day I get a straight answer out of either of you, the Styx will flow backwards!”

In more news of drawing parallels with Persephone and Hades, I figured that of course he would get annoyed as all hell if they’re not telling him everything. And I’m sure this isn’t the first time this has happened. I’m pretty sure that Hades thinks that Nyx and Hecate knew how his “courtship” would go all along and gave him zero information about it since he was convinced it would be a well orchestrated, planned out, very simple thing.

Hecate and Nyx stared back at him. Aidoneus turned once more to leave.

“I don’t think you understand Hecate’s meaning,” Nyx began, stopping him. “We cannot pass this knowledge onto you because we don’t know what these mean. There are possibilities, but that is all they are.”

He looked at them somberly. “A shame they will remain just that, then.”

“Aidon,” Hecate said, “do you love her?”

“You know that I do,” he said softly.

I just felt so bad for him here. Because here he is, he’s quietly loved this woman for thousands of years, got a taste of what love was, and then thought he had completely fucked it all up to the moon and back. This is sort of the middle interlude for him, between that kind of ‘white light’ realization moment during their fight and when he says to Persephone in complete terms exactly how long he has loved her and will love her.

“You fought each other with hard words— and you both chose how to end that fight,” she said, folding her arms. “Neither could have happened unless she loved you just as fiercely. You believe your love compels you to send her back, and you are willing to sacrifice your every desire for her happiness, Aidoneus. But one more offering is required— your pride. Go to her.”

He loved her. Throughout all this, he loved her terribly, achingly— his passion undiminished. Since their argument he’d barely slept, not even spending time in his own bedroom, instead electing to nod off in the evening for an hour or so, slumped on his throne between the increasing number of judgments. He swiped a hand over his unshaven face. It was a marvelous contradiction. Thoughts of her tormented his waking moments relentlessly, yet he couldn’t be at peace unless she was with him. His knew his needs, but what of her? Nyx, as she was wont to do, spoke of the metaphysical, the unsubstantiated. Her revelations were about a kind of love that Persephone wouldn’t understand— Aidon could barely wrap his mind around the imagery Nyx used, most of its meaning lost to the ages.

But he knew from the moment Persephone started tracing the scars of his past, healing him far deeper than the shallow marks on his skin, that she loved him as well. For that one sublime act, Aidon was eager to spend eternity returning that affection to her. How much would they miss, how many more perfect moments would lie cold and dormant if he released her back to Demeter? He stood at the precipice, fear flooding back into him once more. What if his wife wanted to leave him, and this was all for naught? Could he convince her to stay?

And here begins the second act of the book. And once he decides to get his shit together and face Persephone, that’s when Nyx calls him Liberator again.

Aidoneus plucked a single red flower, cradling it in his hand. It was bright and warm. He nodded and carefully tucked its red petals into the folds of his himation. Pointing at solemn Nyx and a wide-grinning Hecate, he said, “I’m not doing this for either of you,” and purposefully turned on his heels to leave the grove. “Or whatever you think may come of these.”

“We should be the least of your concerns. All you see here is mutable and inconsequential,” Nyx said, sweeping her hands out at the trees. She spoke quietly to herself as Aidon walked back toward the palace. “But your beloved queen is not, Liberator. Nearly anything can be forgiven, if one is willing to open their heart completely.”