“But does it mean I am no better than those who hurt me?”
Hecate offered a sarcastic laugh. “Whoever said so has never been hurt—not like you have and not like I have.”
Persephone wanted to ask Hecate more questions—how had she been hurt? But Persephone also knew the kind of sorrow those questions unleashed, and she did not wish to bring that upon the goddess.
“Your mother wages war on the world above,” Hecate said. “Do you wish to defeat her?”
“Yes,” Persephone hissed.
“Then I will teach you,” Hecate said, and her words were followed by a terrible surge of power as black fire gathered into her hands, casting shadows on her face. She looked terrifying, her face ashy and drained of color.
“I will fight you like your mother will fight you,” she said. “You will think I never loved you.”
Before Persephone could think too long on those words, Hecate unleashed her shadow-magic. When it hit, she was thrown back, into the trunk of a tree. The pain was unbearable, a sharp ache that made her feel like her spine had broken into pieces. She couldn’t move, so she immediately called up her magic, working to heal herself, but Nefeli’s sudden bellow turned Persephone’s blood to ice. She’d forgotten about the grim who barreled toward her.
She wasn’t completely healed as she rolled to her feet and flung out her hand, using her magic to teleport the creature to another part of the Underworld. Across the meadow, Hecate stood still, and for the first time since Persephone met the Goddess of Witchcraft, she realized she had never truly felt Hecate’s magic. She’d sensed it in bursts—like ghostly lights igniting in the dark, guiding her intermittently and smelling of sage and earth. This magic, the kind she’d summoned to fight was different. It was ancient. It smelled bitter and acidic like wine but left a tang in the back of her throat—a metallic taste akin to blood. Sensing it left a feeling of dread embedded in her heart and suddenly, its irregular pounding was the only thing she could focus on—that and Hecate’s rapid approach.
She focused on healing and gathering her power, recounting words that Hades had used while he’d fought her in the grove.
If you were fighting any other Olympian—any enemy—they would have never let you up.
Hecate played by this rule, sending more shadow-magic barreling toward her. Persephone raised her hand, and for the slightest of seconds, everything slowed—but unlike the other times she had managed to freeze time, Hecate’s magic pulsed—as if she were only using a fraction of it before, destroying her spell. The shadows crashed into her again, sending her flying backward. Persephone landed hard, the wind knocked from lungs, the earth piling up around her as she came to a sliding stop.
As she lay there, the ground began to tremble and groan. She felt the earth yawn beneath her, and she scrambled to her hands and knees, nails digging into the dirt to keep from falling into the chasm that had opened beneath her. She looked up, finding Hecate only a few feet away. Her eyes were all black. She had broken the earth without lifting a finger. She had used powerful magic and was not lethargic. She had Persephone on her knees and she’d only used an ounce of her abilities.
Persephone tried to pull herself up, but she only managed to fall a little further.
“Hecate—” The goddess’s name fell from her lips, but she was not moved by her plea. Instead, her answer was to hurl more flame. Persephone fell, screaming into the chasm. It was dark for only a few seconds before she landed in the battle-worn clearing once more. She crashing several feet into the ground before coming to rest at the bottom of a crater.
She lay there for a second, blinking up at the Underworld sky. It was hazy and bright.
Again, she recalled Hades’ teachings.
How do I fight when I do not know what power you will use against me?
You will never know.
She teleported, appearing behind Hecate, magic stirring in her blood. As soon as she landed, the Goddess of Magic turned, and this time, instead of throwing shadow, black, thorny vines erupted from the ground. Persephone’s eyes widened before she vanished once more. As she appeared a few feet away, she dug deep, calling her magic forth—a similar thorny vine burst from the ground, thicker, sharper, with red-tipped spikes. It tangled with Hecate’s, a barrier between the two goddesses.
“Finally,” Hecate said, and a wicked smile cut across her face.
Persephone felt Hecate’s magic erupt, an energy so fierce and deadly, it made her heart rattle in her chest. Then the tangle of thorns exploded, and Persephone hit the ground, covering her head as spikes scattered across the clearing. She felt several sharp stings as her body was lanced with thorns. She roared through the pain, her magic sweeping through her, pushing the splintered wood out of her body and sealing the wounds.
“You are the only one who can stop your mother,” Hecate said. “Yet it seems to me you are waiting for the Olympians to intervene.”
Persephone flinched. Hecate was not wrong, but the difference was, the Olympians were far more powerful than she was.
“Perhaps more powerful then, but now?” Hecate asked.
“Get out of my head,” Persephone said between her teeth. The Goddess of Witchcraft ignored her.
“What if they do not side with you? What if they tear you and Hades apart?”
Persephone’s hands shook, and there was a shift inside her, a change to her magic. She was drawing from a well she had only accessed once before.
It was dark.
It was a part of her where she’d stored her anger and her doubt and her fear—every negative thought and experience she’d ever had. That energy seeped from her body and into the earth. All around them, the leaves and the grass wilted and withered, the limbs of the trees dropped as if melted.
She was draining Hades’ magic from the Underworld, stealing its life to feed her own.
If Hecate noticed, she did not hesitate in her speech.
“Zeus will take the path of least resistance. You are the least resistance. You are weak.”
“I am not weak.”
“Prove it.”
The earth at their feet was now barren. The trees that were once lush and emerald had turned to ash, the remnants carried away as a darkness gathered around Persephone, lifting her hair and tearing at her clothes.
“I am a Goddess of Life,” Persephone said. “A Queen of Death.”
As the shadows swirled, Persephone felt as though she herself were becoming darkness.
“I am the beginning and end of worlds.”
In the next second, she charged, moving faster than she’d ever moved in her life and as she neared Hecate, she brought her hands together. A dark energy pulsed there, shooting out and hitting the goddess in the chest. She flew back, her feet dragging along the ground, tearing up the earth. She came to land in a tangle of thorns Persephone had summoned, caging her wrists and her ankles.
As the dust settled, Persephone was left breathing hard, her body humming from the energy she’d managed to summon from the Underworld.
Hecate smiled.
“Well done, my dear,” she said. “Shall we have tea?”
Persephone felt something wet beneath her nose and as she touched her lips, they came away covered in blood.
Her brows knitted together.
“Huh,” she mumbled. “Yes, tea would be lovely.”