by S. E. Babin
Draco stumbled into the kitchen next and gave us all a funny look. "Why are you all being weird?" he asked as he came up to the stove and snagged several pieces of bacon.
Right after that, Persephone wandered in with a too short t-shirt, stretched like a cat, and proceeded to brag about her night with Hades. I clapped my hands over Draco's ears and glared at her. Directly after that, I grabbed a plate of breakfast and a massive cup of coffee and carried it back to the guest room before I did something I really regretted.
Like gleefully murdered Persephone.
Twice.
Later that afternoon, after taking lunch in my room again, Hades found me. He knocked briefly on the door and pushed his way in.
"You didn't tell me everything."
I set my plate down on my bed, rose, and took the few steps over to him. "I'll do you one better. I'll show you."
I touched his forehead. All of our memories pour from me into his mind.
He staggered back, his eyes wide and shocked.
I'd told him we were together, but there was a massive difference in hearing something and feeling it. I sat back down on my bed, picked up my sandwich and kept eating. I was tired of games.
When he recovered, he straightened up and left my room without a word.
I didn't see him again until the next morning.
"I want you to leave," he told us as we stood in the kitchen waiting for a chance at the coffee pot. Dead silence fell in the room, but out of the corner of my eye Persephone was leaning against the wall smirking in delight. This was her doing. Hades and his she devil wife.
They both left the room as if this pronouncement was all that needed to happen and we would merrily be on our way.
Well, I wasn’t giving up without a fight. Nor was I leaving without my damn coffee. I finished pouring my cup of magic. "I'll make this right," I told everyone.
Maybe it was too much all at once. Maybe I shouldn't have been honest with him.
It was too late for maybes.
Hades was our most powerful ally. We needed him on our side, and we needed the shelter of the Underworld. Before we left that day, I touched the cold stone of the library. I poured some of my power into it, readjusting the locks. In a few moments, the stone flashed silver and pink before it faded away.
I smiled slightly. This was my way back in.
It took four days to catch Hades alone. I stalked him with the sheer persistence of a serial killer staking out their next victim. As soon as Persephone exited the Underworld, I slipped back in and rushed over to Charon. Hecate was there too and smiled knowingly. "I knew I hadn't seen the last of you."
Charon escorted her way too willingly which made me squirm with questions about Hecate and the guardian. When he dropped me at the edge of the river, I waved goodbye and tried to walk straight through the wards. They repelled me with the feeling of a thousand bugs crawling over my skin. I took a deep breath, focused on my relationship with Hades and the love we held for each other, and attempted to pass through the wards again. They stretched against me, shimmering and undulating tight across my skin as if they were confused, but I held on to my feelings and soon the wards snapped and allowed me entrance. I stretched and tested everything out to see if there was an underlying spell that would harm me, but it seemed like all was well. His wards recognized me as...something familiar. They allowed me through without any ill effects. I headed right for his study.
When I quietly pushed open the door, I saw him sleeping on the couch. But he wasn’t alone. Tilly, his resident creepy ghost and semi-servant, was standing over him and siphoning something out of him. I stood there watching. First, I was merely confused, but as I continued to watch, I noticed Hades shimmering, then fading slightly as if something vital were being removed from his body.
I knew that freaking ghost was up to no good. Tilly was siphoning his immortality.
I slammed open the door and hit her with a massive blast of power. It blew her incorporeal form away from Hades and some of what she’d taken from him flowed back into the sleeping god.
He sat up abruptly, took the scene in with wide, shocked eyes and started yelling.
“Aphrodite!! What the hell?
Tilly was staring at me with terror and shock in her eyes.
I ignored Hades for the moment and focused on the ghost. “I knew you were up to something! It sucked that it took all of this for me to figure it out, but I knew it!”
“Abby!” Hades shouted again.
Tilly was confused as hell, because after God had screwed the timelines up, she didn’t know me from Adam. But it was just as well. I knew something was shady about her behavior so I was glad I’d found out before it was too late. I turned to face Hades.
“She was stealing your immortality. Slowly but surely. I think she may have been a little hungrier than usual today.”
Tilly’s face morphed into one I’d never seen before and she flew at me full speed. Ghostly white power rushed at me with the force of a freight train. I’d never fought a spirit, but I was in no mood to lose. I drew on the power Hades and I shared, even though I noticed the longer he was away from me, the more it had faded.
I was still able to trap her in a ribbon of mix colored power.
“He has it to spare,” she sneered in her sibilant hiss. “All of these souls here and all of them powerless to take their life back.”
I blinked at her. Now I was the one who was confused as hell.
“Hades? Who is this? What is she?”
Shame colored his face. “She’s an angel.”
I sank down to the seat across from him. “A what?”
“She used to be my friend.”
Tilly hissed from inside her cage. “He promised to restore me. But he never did. Trapped in this form, I was unable to restore myself. At first. Angels are...different.”
Hades frowned. “So you try to steal my immortality?”
“It was the only thing that would allow me to retake my original form.”
“What do you want to do?” I asked him.
Hades stared at his friend. “I’m not sure there is anything I can do.” He paused and I watched as he tried to realize the monumentous betrayal that had just occurred. He rubbed the back of his neck. “Release her.”
I gaped at him. “Excuse me? I just caught her sucking you dry!”
He nodded once. I let out an aggrieved sigh and released the bindings holding her. I expected her to blink out of existence and lick her wounds before trying the exact same thing again, but as soon as my bindings popped, Hades caught her in his own. I watched as Tilly began to twist and squirm. My brow knit together as I realized Hades was draining her soul. And as he did, the vestiges of the immortality she’d stolen from him slowly began to trickle back into his body.
As Tilly began to plead and beg, I quietly slipped out of the study.
I leaned back against the wall of the hallway and let out a hysterical laugh. Would Tilly be gone when the rightful version of Hades was restored or was this something I was going to have do all over again?
I shook my head. This entire thing was ridiculous.
Hades stepped out his library, looking a little more energetic than the last time I saw him. I guess getting back the stolen pieces of your power would do that for a guy.
He motioned for me to walk with him.
I took a deep breath, squared my shoulders and followed behind him.
This was my chance.
18
I’d never been the kind of person who could beat around the bush with a conversation. I was all in or all out. I was never the kind who could say something in a way that was both kind and meaningful. My words were like a flyswatter, designed to flatten you for a moment depending on the pressure I used. And that’s pretty much what I did with Hades. I meant to start out kind and gentle, but it came out blunt and direct.
“So why’d you kick us out?” I cringed even before I finished the sentence. I’m sure that statement would have him
opening his arms wide to let us all back in.
To my surprise, his lips twitched before he answered. “I have a pregnant wife. A life. A Kingdom. And then this beautiful, slightly insane woman with crazy eyes and even crazier hair and a gorgeous smile walks in and tells me that we have a son. A life. A love she’s willing to die for and you think…” He stopped. My heart was beating a million miles a minute. He thought I was crazy but beautiful. It was a good start. “And you think I should just take all of that at face value? You came in here with a child who is way older than he should be. An immortal child who is wearing my face! I might be an immortal, but I am not unshakeable. Persephone was my everything and now you tell me she’s conspiring with angels. You single handedly walked in and ruined my life.”
There was a lot of things I could have said in that moment. “I get told that a lot,” I admitted.
“How do you expect me to reconcile everything in my head? Not to mention my heart? And how do I wrap my thoughts around this?” He ran both hands through his dark hair. “And I don’t even like blondes! So explain to me how I fell for you?!”
I reached up to touch his face. “I - I’m sorry.” I wasn’t sure what else I could say or do. I never meant to hurt him, but wasn’t that what I always said when I ended up hurting someone? I turned to go. This was a mistake. A painful, dangerous mistake. Maybe he would take my words to heart and look deeper at the woman who was supposed to be his wife. Maybe he wouldn’t. What I needed to fully grasp was that this Hades was not my husband and walking into his life and scrambling it all up was wrong.
I turned to go.
He grabbed me by the arm before I could fully turn and it was the first time I’d felt Hades’ touch in six months. And it was him. Even though it wasn’t. It was an alternate form of him. I stiffened, unsure of what to do or say.
“Abby.”
“If you keep touching me, Hades, I will not walk away from here.”
He didn’t let go. I shut my eyes. Hades stepped closer. His breath whispered against my hair.
“Those memories you’ve placed in my head. They’re wonderful. Tragic. And beautiful. How? How did you get so far under my skin?”
I allowed him to turn me to face him.
“You don’t believe in a love so fierce you’d tear the world down for it?”
Hades swallowed hard.
“I do,” I continued. “I found it. With you. And I’m trying desperately to get it back.”
“And if you don’t?”
I touched his cheek again. “I don’t know.”
“I’m here. Right here.”
I let out a broken sob. He was. Yet he wasn’t. “And you have a wife who’s secretly conspiring against you to take over your kingdom. Again. I guess it would be kind of like old times.” A wet laugh escaped me.
He shook his head. “I’m not sure what I feel right now, but I know if I could feel even an ounce of what you showed me, I’d be willing to walk it from it all. Everything.”
“Then help me.”
“Or you could just stay here with me and we could cast Persephone out.”
A part of me was so tempted. I could fall back in his arms. We could fall in love all over again. But I couldn’t. I couldn’t leave any part, any timeline of Hades in pain anywhere.
I leaned my forehead against his. “I can’t,” I whispered. “But once the timelines right themselves, I promise to do very, very bad things to you.”
He shuddered against my fingertips. “I will hold you to that, Goddess.”
Hades and I had to forcibly separate ourselves. I trudged down the hall, a strange sense of guilt pervading my chest. It was almost like I was cheating on my husband with...my husband. How weird was my life? My thoughts started to turn some weird corners until I became fixated on what would happen if I got to keep both of them.
My head was going to explode. Too much man. Too little house. Only one Abby.
I showed myself back to the guest room. His gaze burned a hole in my back as I walked away. Just as I was about to step in, he called out to me.
“I’ve sent Persephone away for...awhile. I’m assuming you know where my bedroom is. Just in case.” His silver eyes darkened as he stood there leaning deceptively casual against the wall.
I swallowed hard, nodded, and pushed my way into the guest room. As soon as the door was closed, I banged my head on the wall a couple of times hoping that would stifle the rush of hormones that skipped right past my head and landed right in my nether regions.
Hades was evil. Evil, evil, evil.
It took a very long time for me to get to sleep that night.
The next morning Hades was half dressed in the kitchen making breakfast again. It took everything I had not to graze my lips across his bare shoulder as I made my way to the coffee pot.
When all this was done I was going to crown myself Saint Aphrodite, semi-virgin goddess because I was being tempted with the literal devil. A half-naked shirtless literal devil making bacon and all kinds of evil breakfast foods right in front of me. Plus he already made the coffee.
I reached up into the cabinet and reached for a mug. Before I could pull it down, he took it from me. His proximity made my mouth water. He smirked as if he could sense the effect he had on me. He poured me a cup of coffee.
“Cream?” he asked, his lips still too close to mine.
I let out a muffled curse and took several steps away from him, not caring if it made me look like an idiot. “Yes, please.”
His silvery eyes lingered on mine until they trailed to my lips. “The goddess of Love and the god of the Underworld. How did that happen?” he mused.
“I can be quite persuasive when I want to be,” I said, breathless, but also lying through my teeth.
His gaze narrowed. “No. I have a feeling I chased you.” His head tilted like he was a cat examining its prey.
I swallowed hard. He had. He so had.
“And you were like a timid fox, I imagine,” he continued. “Running away from the wolf.” He deliberately stirred my coffee and took a few steps closer.
“How long did it take me to catch you, Aphrodite?”
“Abby,” I whispered.
One eyebrow rose. “I like Aphrodite better.”
Breath whooshed out of my lungs. Okay. That was different.
Hades didn’t bother to hand me my coffee mug. He set it on the counter and took the few steps over to me. A wolf stalking his prey. I stood there like a deer in headlights, my heart warring with my head until it was too late. Hades grabbed me by the waist, pushed me against the wall and laid his lips over mine.
Fire. Ice. Longing mixed with the screaming voice of reason inside my head. His warm hands ran up the sides of my waist and tangled in my hair as he devoured me. I gasped against his mouth as he rocked his body against mine and floundered on where I could put my hands. I settled on his shoulders even as my traitorous fingers ran through his hair and down his back.
I whispered his name like a prayer. I was drugged, confused, lonely, burning with desire.
“Oh my gods,” came a young voice from behind me. “If your mom is making out with your dad who isn’t really your dad because of alternate timelines, is it just considered making out or is it actual adultery? Or is it just super uncomfortable weird?”
Hades stiffened against me. He still held me up against his body, but allowed me to slide down the wall. He snorted with amusement and a little bit of horror as we both faced my son, Artemis, and Hermes.
Artie and Hermes were staring at me like I’d lost my mind, but they also looked confused. I knew exactly how they felt.
“Sorry,” Hades said. “I extended the invite to your friends last night after you went to sleep. It seemed the sooner they made it here, the sooner everyone would be safe.”
“No,” I said, a whole lot breathless. “That’s...perfect.” But inside my head I was screaming how it was most definitely not perfect. All I wanted to do was climb my kind of husband like a tree.
>
“Shit,” I muttered. My life was such a mess.
Hades, to his credit, didn’t bat an eye after the initial awkwardness of everything had passed. He reached over for a pile of plates, grabbed one, piled it high with delicious breakfast foods and handed it to me. “You look flushed,” he said, a crooked smile on his face. “Perhaps some food would help.”
I wanted to clock him with my plate, but hunger won out. I grumbled a thank you and watched as he made plates for himself and all of my friends.
We piled in around the table and attempted to make a plan. Hades, to his credit, was a wealth of information about his father and the ins and outs of Heaven. My Hades had never spoken too much about it, but we were now in a life or death situation. I assumed that could make anyone chatty. He told us that every day Hades was held, God would ensure to reinforce and strengthen the wards chaining him there. He wasn’t sure if even a nephilim could break through the door anymore.
“If a nephilim can’t break them, how are we supposed to get in?”
Right at that moment, as if he’d been listening at the door, Rafe walked in. He shook his head. “I am completely Earthbound now. I don’t know that I could help even if I wanted to.”
“I’m sorry, Rafe.”
He shrugged. “Always kinda wanted to rebel. But you gotta do it right. Burning the bridge to cinders was the only way I knew I wouldn’t have to go back.”
I raised my coffee mug to him. “Welcome to the Resistance.”
He grinned at me and helped himself to breakfast.
“So you have no power anymore?” He’d tracked the nephilim for us, but I wasn’t quite sure how far his power stretched.
“I have power. Not as much anymore. Like I said before, I cannot open the doors for you. That’s either Gabriel or Uriel or possibly the nephilim. It’s our only chance right now.”
We hadn’t been able to find them, nor had they responded to our summons.