Girl, Goddess, Queen, page 30
I turn to Hades, tiredness vanishing in the heat of my excitement.
‘It worked!’ I screech, and I reach for him, throw my arms round him.
‘It did,’ he confirms. He designed this paradise but he’s not even looking at it any more. He’s staring right at me, tired eyes alight with wonder. He wraps his arms beneath my own, his hands on my waist, and I jump up and down and he spins me and I hold on tight. He smells like pine needles and paint.
‘It will need work, some refining as issues come up, but … Hades, it worked!’
He puts me down but I don’t let go. He tucks my hair behind my ears. I don’t think he even notices he does it, but I’m rooted to the spot, heart pounding. Then his hand is on my shoulder, warm and heavy, and I can’t stop staring at him, every plane of his face, every eyelash, every tiny movement. I just created something incredible but, right now, this ledge with him feels like the real paradise.
‘It did,’ he confirms. ‘And the whole court shall know about it, will know it was you. No more hiding.’
How does he do that? Always know the things I want without me even having to say.
His hand squeezes my shoulder. ‘You once asked for the world, Persephone. Congratulations, you just created one.’
When we’re back in the palace I assume we’re going to celebrate, just the two of us.
But Hades disappears for a few minutes, leaving me in the courtyard, and when he returns the whole court begins trickling in. Just on the edge of the horizon, you can see the humans – you can see paradise.
‘Your queen has an announcement,’ he declares.
I’m not even nervous about speaking in front of them all, revealing myself to them. I don’t know where to start so I just say it. I look at the crowd of faces – Styx grinning and Charon confused and Hermes intrigued and more gods I’m yet to know casting uncertain glances towards one another – and I say: ‘I’m the goddess of life. And I just moulded the afterlife. I created paradise for the mortals.’
A beat of silence is broken by Styx screaming: ‘Rivers of Hell, you did it!’
Which is followed by a stampede to porticoes and a dozen different exclamations.
I jolt as Hades comes up behind me and wraps his arms round my waist. He brings his head close to mine and whispers in my ear, ‘I imagine the whole court is wondering how I got so lucky.’
I press back into him almost instinctively, his firm body against mine, and I’m arching my head to find him when I suddenly remember our performance – the romance before the court. This is an act. He’d never hold me like this if it weren’t for the audience.
In the rush of everything, I was swept away from the pretence.
I don’t want to feel the weight of my disappointment. I don’t want to reckon with all those feelings right now, not when I should be so excited.
‘Oh,’ I call in a desperate attempt at distraction. ‘Also Hades never kidnapped me. I ran here. There was a power in this land that was calling to me and I’m so pleased to have found it.’
No more hiding.
But I won’t destroy the illusion of our love – that would get back to my father. This hint of the truth we might survive. So I clutch my hands over Hades’, keeping his hold on me – an attempt to tell him not to give the full game away.
The court fall silent as they reckon with this new information.
‘Ah, that makes so much more sense.’ Thanatos shakes his head.
‘To Queen Persephone!’ Styx calls, raising a bottle of wine.
Hades curses beside me. ‘I knew I never should have shown her where I kept that stuff,’ he mutters, but he’s swiftly drowned out by cheers.
It’s like watching the humans again – the gods grab instruments, food and drink. Some rush off to see paradise and return so elated that others run to see it too. I spend the whole night dancing, talking to subjects who seem genuinely happy I am here. I feel more at home having removed one facade. My love for this realm has never been more potent.
I pull Hades aside. ‘Thank you for giving me a way to stay here.’
He hasn’t been able to stop smiling, has been wandering around the party in constant conversation, his smile not wavering once, even as he sways on exhausted feet, his power drained from him. He has shaken off any suggestion he might rest, too busy revelling in the celebration, always beaming with delight. But now his smile falls and he looks at me, serious and sincere. When he speaks, it’s with a gravity beyond mere words. ‘Thank you for staying.’
My knees feel weak and I want to grab his robes and pull him down to me. I could kiss him – we’re in public after all – and he’d kiss me back. But I don’t want this to be fake too. So I settle for hugging him. My head pressed against his chest, I could almost convince myself I hear his heart beat faster.
Rumours of my new-found power will undoubtedly spread and I think of my father finding out. A few days ago that would have terrified me. If he thought me a thing to be managed before, me being truly powerful can only make that thought worse. But now that I am queen of an entire realm? There’s nothing he can do about it, which is pleasing enough by itself but I have never imagined anything outside Father’s remit. He is all-powerful. And yet here I am, perfectly safe in a home I have built for myself with people I am growing to love.
There are gaps in Zeus’s power.
And I am one of them.
I WAS PREPARED TO FOOL EVERYONE with a wedding, less so with married life.
Now that court is officially open there is nowhere Hades and I can go without having to pretend, except the topmost floors of our home. In court I hold Hades’ hand and he kisses my cheek and there are so many careless glances it feels more of an effort not to pretend when we cross the thresholds of our rooms. It’s all pretence. It all hurts. But letting go of his hand when we walk upstairs aches more than I thought it could.
It’s only been a few weeks and the loneliness of all this distance from him is cutting. I have no idea how I’ll survive a lifetime of it.
I can’t even take solace with Styx or the mortals, or even finally visit my mother, because the demands of the new afterlife and court are so pressing. There are so many disputes, so many things to arrange, and, while I’m confident things will settle down eventually, right now it’s thrown everything into disarray.
‘So if I’m ferrying the dead souls, do I take them to Elysium, Asphodel or Tartarus? Elysium is what we’re calling paradise, right? And, wait, did we settle on just calling it Tartarus or did we go for the Dungeons of the Damned?’ Charon asks. ‘My vote is still for the latter.’
‘Kind of unfair that the mortals get all this paradise. Don’t we deserve one too?’ This from the Furies, and I promise that as soon as the mortal afterlife is fully functioning, I’ll create more beauty in this realm for them to enjoy too.
‘More people are dying lately,’ Thanatos says. And when I look at him with shock he continues with a shake of his head. ‘I don’t know why, but there are certainly more than usual. I can manage for now but soon I’m not sure I’ll be able to fetch all the souls. Can we get some sort of contingency in place?’
‘Which god is having a tantrum this time?’ Hermes calls. ‘And do we think it’s plague or war? Shall we place bets?’
‘Bets?’ I ask. ‘Shouldn’t we investigate? If people are dying from unnatural causes we should –’
‘Oh, it happens,’ Thanatos says dismissively. ‘Human lives fall to the whims of the gods and we tidy up the mess – give it a few weeks and it’ll blow over. I just might need some help if the numbers keep swelling. I’d put my money on natural disaster – those gods love an earthquake.’
I’m not exactly reassured, but the court know better than me and they’re already on to the next point. I’ll have to take their word for it.
In court, Hades is incredible. He can settle disputes in seconds, juggle a thousand tasks, soothe anxieties before they’re even voiced. But when they leave he groans and buries his head in his hands and asks how much longer we must stay here. He is a brilliant king – though he clearly hates it. I might be tired of the long hours, but I do not despise ruling the way he seems to. When I catch his eye he forces a smile, kisses my hand and performs a love he does not hold. Even that seems to tire him. In the mornings we eat breakfast in comfortable silence as he reads and I plan the day ahead. In the evenings we talk until the last stars appear in a sky we can’t see. It’s tiring and complicated and stressful, but for the most part I’m happy.
The only problem is that he’s clearly not.
It would be one thing if Hades were only sullen during the day, when we’re in front of everyone, but it’s when we’re alone too. For the first few weeks after we reunited it was bliss. We chatted and joked and spent all our time together, we moved back into the same room so the court wouldn’t ask questions, and we barely slept because we couldn’t stop talking.
But now more time has passed, he drops my hand like it burns him the moment we cross the threshold of our private rooms. He hardly looks at me. When he speaks it’s with forced politeness. It took him a week to finally relent and sleep in the same bed as me, and even then he rolled as close to the edge as possible. Now, as I begin the usual chatter that would take us to the early hours, he turns away.
‘Not tonight,’ he says.
‘Is something wrong?’ I sound affronted but I don’t mean to. I’m concerned more than I’m hurt.
‘It’s getting to me, that’s all,’ he says. ‘All this pretending … I’m not … I’m not like you. I don’t enjoy lying with my every expression or manipulating people with my every word. It’s draining.’
The silence drags between us in the pitch-black room. I can’t see him but I know his eyes are open, staring vacantly anywhere but towards me. His breathing draws out the seconds until I finally break.
‘You think this is easy for me?’ I ask. My voice is steely but somehow catches still. ‘Pretending to love you?’
‘Isn’t it?’
Is it? It’s satisfying, yes, to see the gods who don’t question us, the goddesses who stare on with jealousy, and to know that it’s working. They’re convinced. But losing those intimate grins and careless touches the moment a door shuts? To second-guess everything … it’s hard.
I can’t tell him that for the first time in my life I’m being myself. I’m not worrying about fitting the mould of a perfect daughter or a good girl. I rule. I say what I want. I don’t apologize for my power. I’m so tantalizingly close to enjoying that freedom, and I would be if I weren’t pretending not to desire the person I’m pretending to desire. It’s destroying me, one tiny gesture at a time. And I’m ignoring the way it hurts because I have so many other things to do, a whole turbulent realm to run. I don’t have time to think about how much these unrequited feelings are harming me. And I thought that couldn’t get worse but the fact it’s hurting him too is unbearable.
But I can’t tell him that.
‘I thought not,’ he says to my silence.
As I toss and turn that night, I know he’s not asleep either. But I can’t think of anything to say so I pretend he is. When it comes to Hades, it seems pretending is all I can do.
A few days later I wake him earlier than I usually would.
‘What are you –’
‘Come with me,’ I say, tying a ribbon round my green gown, the sheer fabric made opaque with layers that rustle like crunching leaves when I move.
‘Do you have any idea –’
‘Trust, dear husband,’ I insist.
He mutters something but acquiesces.
He dresses and, a few minutes later, we’re walking across our world. On the horizon are the human lands and the blue sky above it melts into the black hanging over us like an ink spill. We walk through the garden I planted only a few months ago, trees sprung high and bursting with fruit we can’t actually eat if we want the freedom to leave the Underworld as and when we please. The leaves flutter overhead, the soft grass crunches underfoot, and the sweet smell of apples, pomegranates and nectarines follows us long after we have left the garden and begun traipsing through meadows.
‘Why are we doing this?’ he asks. ‘We could shorten the distance with one of Hermes’ doors.’
‘Just because we can doesn’t mean we should,’ I say, surprised. How can he not love this? Every step I take seems to pulse through me. ‘Have you ever just taken the time to look and enjoy this world?’
Hades glances around and shrugs. ‘It’s certainly nicer than it was,’ he says. ‘But it is still just soil and air.’
Is he serious? I can think of few things more wonderful than soil and air.
‘I want you to love this realm as much as I do. Where would you rather be? I assume not at court.’
Hades shakes his head. ‘There’s nowhere I’d rather be – that’s the irony.’
‘I always wanted to see Cyprus,’ I confess.
Hades snorts. ‘Aphrodite? How cliché.’
‘It’s a cliché for a reason,’ I say. ‘She’s the goddess of beauty and Cyprus is her island. It’s supposed to be just as stunning as she is. I’ve always imagined that the life that blooms there must be something ethereal. I feel it sometimes, calling to me – all those flowers. I want to explore further edges too, to visit islands like mine and islands the complete opposite, to see flowers blooming in snow and in desert, to see life on the shores and on the mountains.’
Hades stares into the distance.
‘Are you all right?’ I ask.
‘Your mother keeping you locked on that island was such an act of cruelty.’
I bite my lip. ‘Maybe. But … Mother is a lot of things, but the dangers she spoke of? They’re very real.’
He nods. ‘Yes, that’s true.’
I need to write to her but, every second I don’t, the idea of doing so becomes harder, the consequences greater. I don’t know how to say all I need to say. I keep thinking of the many ways she might react – and lingering on rejection.
‘Sorry,’ Hades says. ‘I shouldn’t have mentioned your mother.’
‘I just …’ I shake my head. I can’t even tell Hades how I feel because I’m not sure I really know. And, if I can’t tell him, how am I supposed to tell her? ‘I love my mother so much,’ I finally manage. ‘But sometimes I think I might hate her too. I think I blame her for things that aren’t even her fault and I don’t know how to reckon with that. You’re right – I am angry at the fact she kept me on that island. But what else was she supposed to do? It’s so confusing.’
‘I can only imagine.’
‘Do you think she’s a bad mother? Am I a bad person for thinking all this?’
‘You’re not a bad person, Persephone,’ he says without hesitation, but he takes a moment to consider the rest. He stops walking and turns to face me. ‘From what you’ve told me, I think your mother raised a daughter who would survive this world. I think she tried to force you into a box you didn’t belong in, and she did it with enough scolding and praise that she convinced you her love was conditional on your behaviour. I think your self-worth is too bound up with your mother’s approval. And I think you’re allowed to feel however you want about it all.’
He’s right. Here I am, having gone against her, and I’m terrified she might never forgive me, might never love me again.
And still I can’t think of one concrete thing I wish she’d done instead.
‘I think maybe it’s impossible to be a good mother in the world my father created,’ I say. My voice catches on how devastatingly sad that truth is. Was I destined to feel this pain? Everything my mother did, all the difficult choices she made, she was always going to fail because this is not a world where you can succeed in a thing like having a daughter.
‘That’s probably true,’ Hades says. ‘But people can have good intentions and still hurt other people, and you don’t need to feel guilty for feeling upset about it.’
‘I don’t think I am upset. Or I’m not just upset – I’m angry too and I can’t really work out where the line separating those things is. I just … keep thinking of all the things she was trying to keep me safe from. Even you. All those barriers round the island, and I realized she’d never warded against the Underworld. If you were a different kind of person, the kind who would have exploited that, then she would have done everything right and still lost.’
‘I know,’ he says. ‘I think about that a lot. And then, on top of that, you chose to come here anyway. Sometimes I find myself … furious knowing you took such a risk, put yourself in such danger. I could have been anyone.’
‘It didn’t feel as big a risk as my parents’ plans. In the only stories I’d ever heard about you, you wouldn’t wield a sword, and I kind of … well, fixated on the thought that somewhere out there was someone – some boy – who didn’t want violence. Then I heard about the army of the undead. I couldn’t understand how a man could have that much power and Mother wouldn’t have a single story about him abusing it. That’s all I knew and it was a risk I was willing to take because I was desperate. Maybe you would hurt me but you’d at least be breaking xenia and there would be consequences – whoever Mother married me off to would’ve had the right to do all that.’
He is devoid of expression but tension creeps along his shoulder blades.
‘Come on,’ I say. ‘We know the world is terrible. That’s why we’re making all these changes to the afterlife. I don’t want any more girls to be raised on islands and told to dress a certain way, act a certain way and take precautions so that they don’t “provoke” men into violence. We’re creating our own consequences. We’re changing everything.’
‘With an iron fist,’ he says grimly.
‘Gentility will get you nowhere in a world where my father sits on a throne,’ I say firmly, as though daring him to disagree. ‘Do my methods bother you?’
‘I couldn’t do it. I’m not … ruthless like you are.’ I think he’s insulting me but when I look at him he almost seems admiring, his eyes sparkling when they turn to me. ‘But I don’t think it’s a bad thing that you are. It’s why you’re better at ruling this realm than I am.’
