by Eva Brandt
“Oh...” Hades whispered. “Burn. She got you with that one, Fufluns.”
“Shut up, Hades,” Persephone snapped. “Nobody asked you.”
Hades clutched his chest and let out a theatrical gasp. “Oh, no. You wound me terribly, my beloved. I believe I will never survive this horrible injury. My heart may very well be permanently broken.”
Persephone harrumphed in obvious disgruntlement, although I could’ve sworn I saw her crook a small smile. Maybe she didn’t hate it here as much as she claimed.
“Look, Eranthe,” she told me, “I understand where you’re coming from, but as you might have noticed, Hades and I desperately need a holiday. It wouldn’t have to be permanent. Just for a little while, until we get a breather.”
I stole a glimpse at the canines now doing a sort of strange dance on Hades’s sleep pants and secretly agreed with her. Nevertheless, Hades’s situation did nothing to change my mind. “I would’ve been more inclined to help you had you not decided to kidnap me and attempted to make me marry your friend, then insulted me and my soulmates.”
“It seemed like a good idea at the time,” Persephone said sulkily. I glowered at her, and she backtracked, having apparently decided on a different approach. “I’ve changed my mind.”
“That was awfully fast,” I answered tightly.
I didn’t believe her for a second. In fact, I wouldn’t have wasted my time talking with her, Hades or Fufluns at all, but I was stalling and waiting.
Hades was a large realm, but the Styx wasn’t that far from Elysium. I could already feel my soulmates approaching, slowly but surely, making their way toward me. It was a little too optimistic to hope that they wouldn’t run into some kind of creature that would attempt to stop them, but if they had defeated the guardian of the gates, they could bypass all the obstacles that stood in their path.
In the meantime, I would play nice with my kidnappers and see if I could find something I would be able to use against them.
Unfortunately, Hades seemed to see straight through me. “Why don’t we set this dispute aside and prove to you that we do indeed mean well? Perhaps we could even have a conversation with your soulmates and clarify the situation.”
The last thing I wanted was to have my kidnappers meet my vampires. I suspected it wouldn’t go any better than Snegurka’s confrontation with my sister and her dragons. Hades didn’t give me the chance to dissuade him. He was already turning away from me, nodding to himself as if in approval of his own idea. “Yes. That would work wonderfully. Wouldn’t you agree, everyone?”
“No, Hades, I would not agree,” Fufluns snarled, abandoning all pretense of civility. “This is not what we discussed.”
“Like Her Majesty said, things change, and to be fair, I did warn you.” His eyes sharpened, and all of a sudden, he looked exactly like the threatening death god I knew him to be. “And I urge to please remember that you are a guest here. I can rescind my invitation whenever I please.”
Fufluns glowered back at Hades but didn’t argue with him. I had no desire to be stuck in the power struggle between the two gods.
This was stupid. Why did I have to be here for this? Why had they picked me of all people to be the queen of the underworld? I already had a job and a realm to lead. I might not have always been great at it, but it was ridiculous to think I’d just happily cooperate.
“Can we just go?” I asked, throwing my hands up in exasperation. “At this point, I honestly don’t care who leads this realm as long as it’s not me.”
Hades shot me a quick smirk and offered me his arm. “Of course, Your Majesty. If you will do me the honor of following me, I will take you to your undead warriors.”
Abandoning all sanity, I decided to accept. “Thank you. I appreciate your assistance.”
As we walked away, I felt Persephone’s gaze burning furiously into my back. I hoped this whole horrible episode would end soon because if not, I could make no guarantees that Hades’s wife would not suffer the consequences of her actions.
* * *
Adrian
Our journey through Hades was an odd experience. The energies that coursed through the ground reminded me very much of The Voievodat, but physically, Hades seemed very similar to my original homeland of Tír na nÓg. Despite the difficulties we’d had after we’d lost the Grand Lich’s blessing, we seemed to blend in with the locals better than I had expected.
That might have been part of the reason why no significant obstacles blocked our way. As we headed down the path that led away from the docks, we ran into countless souls of the dead. Most of them were clustered around a dark building where they appeared to be undergoing a sorting process. We simply walked past and nobody stopped us.
At one point, we caught sight of several harpies flying above us, but they ignored our presence. Their reaction made me wish I were still capable of flight, as using our magic would have greatly sped up our progress.
Not ten minutes after our brief meeting with the harpies, we ran into a sleep-walking man who emanated a strange haze of magic and lassitude. We gave him a wide berth, but he disappeared down the road without waking.
“Hypnos, I take it,” Cezar said. “What is he doing down here?”
“Who knows?” Baltasar shrugged. “Maybe he’s just trying out new experiences. This place is a little more disorganized than I expected.”
“I guess the leaders of this realm stopped caring about its inhabitants a long time ago.”
That wasn’t an encouraging thought, but on the bright side, it did mean that security was lax enough for us to go unnoticed. I suspected that might not have been the case if not for our undead nature, but we’d take our blessings where we could.
It was when we reached The Asphodel Meadows that we ran into our first—or rather, second—massive stumbling block. This time, we didn’t have to confront a monster or anything like that. Instead, the obstacle in our path was a crowd of disoriented souls that stumbled from place to place, clearly confused and not knowing where to go.
Impossibly, the meadows were filled to capacity with such beings, to the point that in order to bypass the souls, we’d likely have to walk through their incorporeal forms. The idea didn’t appeal to me at all. Despite the fact that the souls had left their physical shells behind, they still had their essences, and that would be unpleasant to touch or run into.
As if to confirm my thoughts, three souls stumbled against one another in front of me. Their transparent bodies flickered and they flailed as their cores clashed. They pulled away with such haste they ended up causing a collision between several other souls, starting a chain reaction that made The Asphodel Meadows look increasingly like Tartarus. Mournful cries filled the air as the souls bemoaned their fate. I was tempted to join their lament, if only because of the ridiculousness of my predicament.
“How can they not fit?” Baltasar asked in exasperation. “Shouldn’t this place expand according to how many people it is supposed to hold?”
“That is what the Grand Lich always said, yes,” Cezar replied. “I get the feeling that maybe the judges of the underworld are being lazy and sorting souls poorly.”
It certainly seemed like it. The giants at the gates had been like that too, more concerned with their personal hygiene than actually doing their jobs. Charon had just wanted some entertainment. It stood to reason that their judges would be at least a little similar.
I empathized with them, but their actions did create a problem for us. We’d probably cause a huge disturbance by trying to go straight through the souls, but we’d have to make do like we always did.
Since he was the one with the least magic, Baltasar took the lead. He forced his way through the crowd, occasionally hissing under his breath when he clashed against a particularly powerful soul. It was a clear testament to his discomfort, and I was tempted to ask him to trade places, even if the process would be far tougher for me.
Voices assaulted us from all directions as we gracelessly stumbled
through the meadows.
“Hey! What are you doing?”
“Watch it!”
“That was my magic you stepped on!”
“You can’t just burst in like this. Have you no shame?”
Not really, no. Shame was for people who cared about petty things like the sensibilities of strangers. We had far more important things to worry about.
“If you don’t want to be walked through, stay out of our way and you’ll be fine,” I snapped. The more time we spent in the meadows, the more irritated I became. This was taking too long, and Eranthe was still waiting for us.
As it turned out, that wasn’t exactly true. Despite our threat, the souls didn’t allow us safe, unhindered passage and tried to converge upon us, blocking our path. Now that we were here, they seemed to have finally found purpose, or rather, a target to take out their anger on.
Their attempt to halt our progress came to an abrupt end when a surge of fiery magic lit up the meadows. Everyone—including us—staggered away from the accumulation of mystical power. Despite the previous chaotic behavior of the souls, they were strangely organized in their retreat, almost like soldiers that were automatically following an order.
We instinctively went along with it. Even if we couldn’t identify the source of this new development, we had already sensed enough to be more than a little wary.
The magic coalesced with the environmental energies of the meadows to form a sphere of bright flame. It was only there for a few seconds, just long enough to make it difficult for us to breathe. The pressure that had already damaged our magic intensified, and I tightened my hold on my power, forcing myself not to panic.
When the light vanished, four people were standing in the newly created circle. My heart skipped a beat when I saw that Eranthe was among them.
As soon as I got a good luck at her, I didn’t even care where I was anymore. I didn’t care about the disgruntled souls, the dubious location, the strangeness of our journey, or even the identity of Eranthe’s companions. All my wariness vanished like it had never been. The only thing that mattered to me was the fact that she seemed unharmed, her allure and magic just as intense as it had been when we’d first met, in the unicorn forest.
I didn’t know when and how she had healed. I could only assume it had something to do with that water I’d seen her drinking in my vision. Either way, the reasons were unimportant. She was safe. We had found her. Against all odds, we had found our soulmate.
My friends shared my enthusiasm, and together, we rushed forward, ignoring everything and everyone to run to her side.
“Eranthe, thank the Grand Lich you’re all right,” Cezar said.
“We were so worried,” Baltasar offered. “We’re sorry for not finding you sooner.”
I didn’t speak. I just cupped her cheek gently, brushing a stray lock of brown hair from her eyes. The moment my skin made contact with hers, she blushed and tensed slightly. It was only then that realization dawned and I became aware of the foolishness of what I was doing.
Soulmate or not, she was not required to return our affections or to suddenly want to touch us. There were plenty of soulmate pairs that didn’t get along, and undead didn’t have the best history with such things.
I didn’t think Eranthe would judge us for our background, as she had been open and accepting of us from the moment we’d met. However, I could not afford to be presumptuous. If anything, our past exchanges clearly pointed out how important it was for us to take things slowly and not make reckless decisions.
We had vowed to give her time. That promise was still valid, even if our circumstances had so drastically changed.
With that in mind, I pulled away from her, already opening my mouth to apologize. Eranthe was faster. She grabbed my wrist and shook her head, her magic surging around her, reaching into me like a palpable touch, surrounding both me and my friends in a cocoon of welcoming heat. “No. Don’t do that. Don’t go.”
Even if I’d wanted to, I didn’t think I would’ve been able to move. Once again, I was completely hypnotized by her beautiful eyes, by the fall of her hair, and her floral, unique perfume. I ached to bury my fangs in her soft flesh, to taste her blood and her magic, to claim her in every possible way.
My friends weren’t doing any better. Baltasar let out a low, wounded hiss, so deeply animalistic that I wondered if, by the end of this trip, he wouldn’t turn into a lamia completely. Cezar was no longer breathing. In fact, even his heart had stopped beating as his undead nature took complete control of his body. I didn’t know what would have happened had Eranthe’s companions not intervened.
“They’re not going anywhere,” a male voice said. “They’ve practically just arrived.”
I snapped out of my trance and turned, facing the man who could only be Hades, the king of the underworld. We might have never met and his fashion sense might have made a lich cringe, but no one else could have the specific kind of power I sensed coming off him.
Behind him stood a beautiful woman I easily identified as his famous wife, Persephone, and next to her was my newest nemesis, Fufluns.
The mere sight of him infuriated me. I couldn’t believe I’d been so distracted by Eranthe’s presence that I’d missed the arrival of her enemy. “You. I’ll tear your throat out with my teeth.”
“I’m sorry, Adrian, but you’re going to have to wait your turn on this one.” Baltasar grinned, exposing his now very preeminent fangs. “I want a piece first.”
“His actions are an official slight against the royal house of The Immortuos Voievodat,” Cezar piped up. “I claim the right to enact vengeance in the name of the honored House of Aeternalis.”
Everybody stared at him in disbelief. Cezar had never pulled rank on us, not once in all the time I’d known him. Even when he was mad, he had never used his name and title to his own benefit like this. He must have been truly out of sorts if he had resorted to such methods.
Our exchange seemed to amuse Hades. “Oh, I like you three. Far be it from me to deny your requests, especially one coming from a member of such a distinguished royal house. What do you say, Fufluns? Are you up to fighting them?”
“Naturally.” Fufluns sneered. “I will show my dearest Eranthe once and for all who is the man meant for her.”
Eranthe glowered at us, obviously not happy with the turn this conversation had taken. Perhaps she had not wanted us to challenge a god to a fight. Considering our history, I could not blame her for her skepticism.
Even so, she didn’t step in, and I felt a stirring of warmth in my heart as I realized she did actually trust us to do what we had come here for. In a way, perhaps she even respected our desire for revenge. I knew for a fact that she was more than capable to stand up for herself, but maybe she understood how much we needed to exorcize the hatred we felt for the man who had dared to take her.
“Great!” Hades clapped his hands, looking a little like an overly excited child who had just received a prize for being a good boy. “Everyone, make room. It looks like we’re about to have a fight to the... undeath.”
He laughed at his own bad joke, but nobody else did. As far as I was concerned, this was indeed a battle to the death. I could never forgive or forget the fact that Fufluns had dared to lay a finger on my beautiful soulmate. No matter where my relationship with Eranthe went, I would make sure he would not be a danger to her ever again.
Unfortunately, we didn’t get the chance to go through with our plan for righteous revenge. A gust of cold air swept over us, and the next thing I knew, a thick black icicle flew right past me and impaled Fufluns straight through the chest.
It all happened so quickly nobody had the chance to do anything about it. One moment, we were all just standing there, arguing, and the next, Fufluns was falling to the ground, gasping and clutching his wound in an attempt to save himself.
It didn’t work. The icicle did crack, but it didn’t vanish or melt away. Instead, its remnants slid into Fufluns’s skin and slowly started
to morph, absorbing Fufluns’s own magic to create a strange carapace. Within seconds, Fufluns was pinned to the ground like a frozen cockroach.
I would have enjoyed the sight more had I been the one to deliver the punishment onto him, and had the person who’d done in it my stead not turned out to be someone we really didn’t want to see. A silver-haired woman dressed in a white gown stepped out from the shadows, utterly ignored the block of black ice she had turned Fufluns into, and glided to Eranthe’s side. “Not to interrupt your fun or anything,” she said without preamble, “but you’re needed in Tis Ánoixis.”
The moment she saw the new arrival, Eranthe’s breath caught. “Snegurka? What in the world are you doing here?”
Snegurka. So this was the notorious former queen of Tou Cheimóna, the same one who’d started that war centuries ago and had recently escaped from her necromantic prison. This was not at all the way I’d expected to meet her. In fact, I hadn’t given her much thought since we’d entered Hades, too preoccupied with the more urgent threat to worry about the one we’d left behind.
I struggled with the same dilemma my soulmate had expressed through her question. Why was Snegurka here? What were her intentions? Why had she attacked our enemy?
Fortunately, Snegurka didn’t leave us hanging for much longer. She stared at my soulmate with impassive, icy eyes and replied, “I’m here to do all of you a huge favor. Not that Hades would know anything about that.”
“I’m sure I have absolutely no idea what you’re talking about,” Hades drawled slowly, “although I have to congratulate you for your entrance. Very dramatic. Well done. You’d probably be able to rival Hera if you tried.”
“I have no desire to compare myself with Hera, or with any one of you for that matter. I have officially decided that I hate all gods. This is honestly the last straw. I never thought I’d be on Helios’s side on anything, but it would appear you’ve managed the impossible with your games.”
“Hades?” Persephone asked. “What is she talking about? What in Olympus’s name is going on? We had an agreement.”