by Mila Young
The invisible current surged between us, growing to such an extent, pulling at each fiber of my being that part of me couldn’t help but feel as if we’d be ripped to shreds if we didn’t separate ourselves.
Poseidon and Apollo must have felt it too, because they both jumped away from Elyse, breaking contact. I remained the only one still touching her, but I drew long, hard breaths, and her eyes were wide.
“What the hell was that?” She glanced at each of us for an answer, her forehead wrinkling.
I shook my head. None of us seemed to know. But the power had been so intense, almost intoxicating. It left me dizzy, the room spinning around me for a few moments. Imagine if we could use this kind of energy and harness it for something better. It seemed completely volatile right now, but with the four of us together, maybe we could actually beat X.
“Whatever it was, we can’t use it as long as we have no idea what to do,” Poseidon instructed, his voice deep and authoritative. “What if it’s not a new power, but a random effect of our magic?”
Yes, Dad, kill the buzz.
Elyse clenched her jaw. “I don’t have time to explore another power right now. I’ve already been working hard just to master my new ability. And if I’m going to go with you guys to get Catina back, I can’t afford to lose control.”
“You can’t come with us,” Apollo said, taking a seat on the sofa’s armrest.
Elyse frowned at him. “Yes, I can. She’s my friend, and there’s no way I’m not coming with you.”
“We don’t even know where we’re going,” Poseidon argued, standing akimbo.
I watched the two of them go back and forth about how dangerous it could be since Elyse was ultimately human, even though she had divine abilities.
“She should come,” I finally interjected.
Apollo and Poseidon both glared at me.
I lifted my chin. “If she’s strong enough to fight X, she’s capable of coming with us to get her friend back. Elyse isn’t a child. I’m pretty sure she hasn’t been for some time now.” I smirked at her and winked.
She met my gaze, and her eyes were filled with determination. I slid my glance to her lips and remembered she tasted sweet, like honey. What would the rest of her taste like? Divine, I had no doubt. Yes, I’d go to the ends of the Earth for her. And it was only right she came with us, wherever we had to follow X, Elyse would be part of our team.
She was the type of woman who was dangerous for me to be involved with, because I could fall so desperately in love with her. It would be the end of me if I lost her. And she was human, so loss would be inevitable. But something about her asked me that if I didn’t risk being with her, if I didn’t give my heart to her, there would be no point in doing everything I did. I needed purpose, otherwise I’d end up wandering forever. Just as I’d done for so many centuries after losing Aphrodite, so either way, I was fucked.
Chapter 6
Elyse
Since Catina had disappeared, I’d worked hard so I’d be ready to face X. But I hadn’t slept well since she was taken. I prayed every second that she’d be safe, and that Ares was right about X not killing her.
By Friday morning, my muscles ached. I’d pushed as far as my body would allow. Since I’d died the second time, my powers had ramped up to a whole new level, and I was more comfortable in my body now than I had been since Heracles started training me.
But there was still a limit. And I’d reached it today.
I rolled out of bed with a groan and decided to take the day off from training. Working sore muscles was usually the best remedy, but I’d pushed myself so hard lately, a day off wouldn’t kill me.
X just hadn’t returned. I’d half-expected him to lure me out and fight me, if that was what he’d been trying to do with Catina. If he was taunting me.
At least, that was what everyone else was saying. I wasn’t so sure. What if, after everything, Catina turned up dead anyway? My stomach hurt each time I thought about her being tortured, picturing her fear as she faced Death. She didn’t deserve this and he’d targeted her only to get to me. X wasn’t exactly a merciful guy and sparing her life didn’t suit his personality.
A sickness rose through me, but I kept moving, anything to avoid letting myself focus on those horrible thoughts of Catina’s captured. I’d begged the gods to tell me where they thought X was hiding, but they had no clue and searched the whole world on my behalf. They reminded me I needed to get ready because X had something planned and would return. They hunted for Catina. So I did my best, tried to hone my skills, but I felt deflated and so lost, unable to concentrate.
But I couldn’t think like that. I repeated Apollo’s words in my head about not letting X win. But imagining Catina dead was so painful, it left me physically crippled. The last thing I’d ever wanted was for my problems to somehow affect her.
Maybe I was a fool to believe I could continue a human existence while everything else in my world changed.
In the shower, I sat on the tiles warmed by the hot spray and let the water cascade over my body. I remained in the middle of the cubicle, and the water ran over my face, my nose, my lips. The onslaught on my senses was enough that my mind couldn’t overwork. Anything to numb the fear ripping me apart, the grief of what was coming, the guilt of what my connection to Catina had done to her.
I stayed in the shower until the water ran cold. When I climbed out, I toweled off my hair as the sound of the television slowly penetrated my thoughts. At first, I thought nothing of it.
But I hadn’t watched television after getting out of bed. It should have been off.
I dressed and crept to the lounge. I expected to find one of my men on my couch. Lately, my apartment had been a halfway house for the gods. I didn’t mind—I loved it when I found one of them, or all of them, spread out watching television. Their company brought me a comfort I hadn’t experienced since I’d lost my dad. They made my apartment full and cheery and enjoyable.
But this time, when I walked into the living room, the person on my couch was a woman. And I couldn’t for the life of me work out who she was or how she’d gotten into my apartment.
She turned her head. She was the most gorgeous woman I’d ever seen. Her pale skin contrasted with her dark hair and deep red lips. Curls cascaded over her shoulders and halfway down her chest. She wore a small crown of intertwined white flowers and green vines. Her eyes were almost black, and her face seemed regal—the face of a deity.
“Elyse,” she said with a voice that would give any guy an orgasm. Maybe even a woman because she was stunning. “You’re awake.”
“What are you doing in my house?” I asked, studying the closed door and shut windows.
She pointed at the television. “We have nothing like this in the Underworld. The best I get is touching one of the souls and watching the life they had.”
I frowned. The Underworld?
“Persephone?” In Greek mythology, the only other women in the Underworld were the Fates, and they’d been far from beautiful when Heracles took me into the Underworld to meet with them.
She smiled at me, and her radiating beauty was exquisite. “In the flesh. I’ve wanted to meet you, you know. Ever since Hades came to Earth, the whole Underworld shivers at the sound of your name.”
I sank into the armchair closest to me, unsure why anyone would talk about me in the Underworld. My hair hung in wet strands over my shoulders, soaking the T-shirt I’d pulled on. Was Persephone really in my home?
“You’re much prettier than I thought you’d be. You look like your mother,” she continued.
I froze on the spot, confused by her reference to my mother, but then again, she was the goddess from the Underworld. “How do you know my mother?” I glanced over at the photo of Mom on the TV stand, figuring Persephone might have seen the picture of us.
“Everyone knows your family, honey, even your mother—married in. The Lowes have a reputation. For fighting evil. For sticking it out and doing your job when ever
yone else gives up. That’s a big deal.”
This was crazy. Persephone, Hades’s ex, was sitting on my couch having girl chat with me as if it were the most normal thing in the world. I supposed, seeing I was already dating Apollo and Poseidon, and I had a thing for Hades, it shouldn’t have been so weird. But hell, it was freaking bizarre.
“Aren’t you supposed to be down there?” I asked. “I mean, I don’t know how it works now you and Hades are over… Six months, that was the agreement, right?”
She laughed—a gorgeous sound—like chimes in the wind. Mesmerizing, hypnotizing. If I gushed so much over a goddess, what impact would she have over humans? Would they fall so deeply in love with her, they’d do anything she requested?
“Everything is on its head now. X running around like a child, doing whatever he wants and not sending the souls to us, is breaking down the Underworld. It’s unstable. You’d think the Underworld can’t get any worse, but there it is.”
I frowned. “So, you’re here to tell me I need to fix it? Catch X?”
Persephone leaned closer. “Oh, honey, no one is going to catch X. I’m here because of Hades.”
“I don’t understand,” I replied, but the unease that Hades was to blame surged through my gut.
“I’ve seen how he looks at you. And I think it’s a perfect match. Hades doesn’t easily fall in love, you know. Trust me, if anyone knows what Hades is all about, it’s me.”
My stomach fluttered as I tried to figure out what was going on. “Hades feels nothing for me but a healthy dose of lust.”
She laughed again, the tantalizing sounds skipping around me, but I felt as if she knew something I didn’t and it irritated me. I shifted in my seat to find a comfortable position.
“Just tell me what’s going on,” I said.
Persephone sighed. “You’re very naïve for someone who’s seen so much.” Cue the condescension. “Hades has a thing for you.”
A thing?
“I don’t think so.” Between Hades and me, I was the only one who gave a shit about what the other one thought. He didn’t even think twice about me after getting off. Which I kept letting him do by sleeping with him because I couldn’t resist.
“Honey, I know it’s hard to believe,” she said. “Trust me, when I first saw the way he looks at you, I thought it was silly, too. But he seems to be serious.”
I sighed heavily, ignoring the obvious intrusion of Persephone spying on Hades and me. None of this made sense. If Hades really had a thing for me, he wouldn’t keep kissing and fucking me, then vanishing as if I meant nothing. And so many lives had been lost since he’d arrived.
“What about X?” I asked. “You can’t tell me Hades is serious about me and then X keeps killing when he knows what I’m all about.”
Persephone shook her head, her dark strands bouncing over her shoulders. “It’s not Hades’s fault. He can’t stop X any more than you can. He decided never to love after me. And I don’t blame him. A curse is nothing to scoff at, and it affected both of us severely. But X got out because Hades decided to reject part of himself.”
“If he rejected love, why are you saying he has something going on with me?”
Persephone exhaled loudly and crossed one leg over another, reminding me of a school teacher about to educate a student who couldn’t work out the assigned homework. “Why don’t you make us some coffee? Then we can talk this all through, and I can help you see you’re the savior of the world for reasons other than your exceptional fighting skills.”
She’d just demanded coffee from me like it was normal. But she was a goddess. And the Queen of the Underworld. Maybe it was normal for her to snap her fingers and everyone jumped. Or didn’t, seeing as they were all dead.
I guffawed inwardly at my own joke and stood to put on the kettle.
Persephone followed me to the kitchen. She stood slightly taller than me, her body slim, yet powerful, and she ran her hands over everything, as if she were in a strange place, a tourist in my home.
I guess she was.
When the kettle was on, I leaned my hip against the counter and folded my arms.
“I haven’t had a lot of girl time.” Persephone hopped onto the counter. She wore a Greek-type robe the color of snow. I’d worn one of those when Apollo took me to Mount Olympus with him in something that had felt like a dream. I’d thought she’d wear something black and dreary, seeing as she lived in the Underworld. “The only conversations I have are with the Fates. Past, Present, Future? It can become a bit of a drag. And they aren’t into chitchatting over a cup of coffee.” Her smile was still gorgeous.
“I can’t even imagine what that must be like,” I responded, remembering how much I’d cherished my conversations with Catina, how just the simplest of girl chats eased my tension and helped me gain perspective. Sometimes I got so caught up in my world it was easy to forget another life existed around me. If I had no one to talk to like Persephone did, I’d go mad.
“Oh, honey, you don’t want to.”
When the kettle boiled, I pulled it off the burner and poured the water into two cups prepped with instant coffee. Part of me wished I had something better to offer the Queen of the Underworld. I handed her a cup and tried not to think too hard about how bizarre this was, about what conversation to start, and to just avoid staring at her in awe. For the last couple of months, I’d been surrounded by gods, but each time I met a new one, I’d ended up captivated by their presence.
Even with Persephone only sitting on my kitchen counter, she held such grace and might as well have been seated on a throne. She carried an air that I could never pull off.
“If Hades can’t stop X, what’s going on?” I asked, sipping the scalding liquid.
Persephone tried the coffee, her shoulders softening and her mouth curling upward. “By Zeus, this will always be the best thing I’ve ever tasted. It’s not often I get to drink coffee.”
I nodded, unsure what to say to that. What did she drink down under? The tears of broken families? I shivered and pushed the morbid thoughts away. I looked at her, waiting for her to answer my question.
“X is upset he’s lived in Hades’s shadow for so long,” she finally explained. “That’s funny because there aren’t shadows where there’s no light. So now he’s on a rampage while he can be, consuming souls instead of sending them to Hades’s world and maintaining the balance. This is all about destroying Hades.”
“Why?” I gripped my cup of coffee. It never once crossed my mind all this was about killing Hades. Instead, I’d blamed him, when I should have asked more questions and understood the real problem.
Persephone ran a thumb over her lower lip. “Every god received something to rule over. Hades was tricked into the Underworld.” I knew about that. “X, or Thanatos, was an unfortunate side effect.”
“It’s his real Greek name, right?” I asked. “But no one really calls him that here.”
Persephone nodded. “It’s believed that if you say the name out loud, he’ll come to get you before your time is up.”
“Well, the ass is proving to be capable of that by cutting innocent victims’ time short.” Even so, I made a mental note not to say his name again.
Persephone laughed, but I didn’t think it was funny.
“The ass,” she said softly, the corners of her eyes crinkling from her smile.
“So, what am I supposed to do if I can’t stop him?” I asked, unsure why she was even here.
“Allow Hades to get closer to you. He’s not a bad person.” Persephone’s whole demeanor changed, replaced by something serious and godly.
“He’s not exactly a good guy, either,” I said.
“That’s not his fault. He’s been forced to rule the Underworld, cursed to marry me, and then, despite it all, we didn’t work out. The poor guy keeps losing. But with you, it seems different.”
I set my cup down on the counter, my mind swimming with so many thoughts and questions. “I’ll never have what it takes to en
tice someone like Hades,” I stated, and I regretted admitting that out loud. Especially to a heavenly deity who could have any man fall at her feet with a single glance. I was the opposite of Persephone in so many ways, and in all honesty, her presence intimidated me. How could I compare to her when it came to drawing a god like Hades to my side?
“Honey, you already did.” She placed her cup down and hopped off the counter, touching me on the shoulder. My skin tingled beneath her fingers, the pain in my arm muscles fading away.
Nothing made sense. Hades didn’t like me or care about me. He was the bad guy. I’d been trying to convince myself of that all this time, but I’d kept making excuses for him.
“How?” I questioned. “How am I meant to do this?”
“By being yourself. You’ll be surprised how much that means to someone who’s lived a lie most of his life.”
She looked sad when she said those words, her eyes lowering momentarily, her lips pinching slightly. Her voice softened, as if her admission caused her grief. And maybe it had. Hades wasn’t the only one affected by the curse. She’d been dragged into the Underworld, her life changed for eternity. How was she meant to find her true love when forced to spend six months of the year in the Underworld?
It seemed as though she was thinking about things, and I wanted to let her speak. For her to feel free to voice anything. It was what I’d enjoyed most while chatting with Catina. The ability to talk openly. Something we used to do a lot before the gods entered my life.
“I wish I could have loved him how he deserved,” Persephone admitted. “By the gods, I tried. I tried so hard, for his sake. Because I was stuck down there, and he loved me so much. But I couldn’t do it.”
I didn’t know how it felt to be forced to love someone, but I imagined what it would be like if I had to pretend that Oliver was mine forever. I cared for him, but it just wouldn’t work.
And a couple of centuries could really screw with you.