“A good plan. A shame it was for naught. My sister is in Tartarus where she belongs.” He knew he had messed up when she broke away from him.
“It is not over yet. She will finish this,” she spat and he tensed.
They were still planning something, and she wasn’t talking about his sister now. She was talking about Mnemosyne.
Had the goddess of memory been behind everything this whole time? Everyone had thought Eris had been the one leading the group, but what if she and his other siblings had only been another diversion, a way of keeping the true mastermind hidden?
Had Mnemosyne hoped Eris and his siblings would succeed in toppling the gates and merging the Underworld and the mortal one, allowing her to take command without Hades ever knowing of her betrayal?
Or had she known Eris too would fail and everyone would believe it was over?
It struck him that the latter was the likely explanation. Mnemosyne had been aware Eris and his siblings would fall to the sons of Hades and that Hades would believe the danger was over and would lower his guard.
When it wasn’t.
He needed to escape this place and tell his god-king, but he had the terrible feeling the only reason Harleena was telling him all of this was because he wouldn’t be leaving this place any time soon.
She knew he wouldn’t reach Hades before Mnemosyne set her plan in motion.
He glared at her back as she stormed to the table and grabbed another goblet.
She poured clear liquid into it and scowled over her shoulder at him. “I should have known you would take steps to guard yourself against me. Well, know they are for naught. You will not be able to resist if I make you drink all of this.”
She pivoted towards him, her damp silver hair swirling outwards from her shoulders, and her breasts bouncing with each fierce step she took towards him.
Thanatos growled at her and beat his wings as hard as he could manage, ignoring the pain that burned in the injured one. The table nearest him toppled and the torches guttered and went out, and she raised her free arm to shield her face as she struggled to keep walking towards him, leaning into the wind he created.
“You will drink this.” She teleported, appearing right before him, moving too fast for him to track.
Before he could do anything, she seized his jaw and dug her fingers into his cheeks, forcing his mouth open. He growled and wrestled against her, grabbing her waist and weakly pushing her back, hating the way the toxin she had already drugged him with stole his strength. He tried to strike her with his wings but she was too close to him.
She shoved the goblet up above him as he struggled and poured.
Most of it hit his face, but enough of it went into his mouth. He went to spit it out but she shoved the flat of her palm to his chin, snapping his mouth closed, and he couldn’t stop himself from swallowing it.
The effect was instantaneous.
Heat rolled through him, made his skin feel too tight, had him trembling badly with a need to sate the fire blazing in his veins, burning in his loins. He shook his head, trying to fight it, but the heat only burned hotter as she released him and his head drooped, his gaze falling on her bare curves.
Need swept through him.
Hunger riding on its heels.
“That’s right,” she purred and tiptoed, caressed his cheek as he stared at her, lost in the wicked urges running through his mind. “Surrender to me, Thanatos.”
She stroked her hands down his chest and in the wake of them, coolness washed across his skin, making it feel less tight. Those hands reached the waist of his leathers and tugged at the lacing.
Rage burned through him, hitting him out of nowhere and shocking the part of him that ached for her touch.
“Harpy,” he snarled as he smacked her hand away.
Her lips twisted in a mulish line and she swept the dagger up off the floor. Her violet eyes flashed dangerously as she turned on him and anger rolled off her.
“This is that little bitch’s fault,” she barked and flexed her fingers around the hilt of the dagger. “She’s tainted you… turned you against me.”
“I was never with you,” he growled and tugged at his chains. His head turned and he shook it, fought the encroaching wave of heat and hunger, but it was too strong for him, easily overpowered him and dragged him back down into the thick haze.
Her eyes lit up as his hands fell limply to his sides and he couldn’t convince himself to lift them, and then he could. Because he wanted to touch her. He wanted to grip her waist as he pounded into her from behind. He reached for her and her lips curled into a satisfied smile.
“That’s right. I’ll give you what you want.” She trailed the tip of the dagger down between her full breasts, all the way to her navel and the thatch of pale curls between her thighs. “You know how badly I want it.”
His cock stiffened.
Hunger tore a growl from his lips and had him reaching for her.
A flash of another female overlaid onto her. Blonde hair. Eyes the colour of an endless summer sky. Soft pink lips that begged him to kiss her.
He reared back as that tempting image faded, revealing another female, one who made him feel sick just by looking at her.
Her face twisted, features pinching hard as rage lit her violet eyes. “You think of her.”
Her. Calindria.
His eyes widened as something dawned on him. The demigoddess wanted more than his body. She wanted him as more than her slave. He wanted to laugh in her face at that.
“I will make you think only of me.” She grabbed the waist of his leathers and yanked him towards her.
“Impossible. You will never have me. Never. You can touch this body, but you will never reach what you really want to touch… You will never make that part of me yours.” Glaring down into her eyes, he made sure she was looking deep into his so she would know how much he meant what he was going to say. “My heart already belongs to another. I love Calindria.”
She screamed at him and raised her dagger.
Thanatos saw a way out in the flash of that blade, saw freedom that might come at a high price, but it was his only option. The only way. It would send him into the veil, removing him from this place, and when he made it out the other side, he would be far from here. He swore he would see Calindria again and hoped he would remember her.
He would remember her.
His love for her would transcend death.
He closed his eyes, tipped his chin up and accepted his fate.
Accepted death.
Chapter 29
Calindria hurried across the black wasteland, rushing towards the mountain range where she had last seen Thanatos. Calistos kept pace with her, his blue eyes constantly scanning the terrain, charting everything.
She still couldn’t believe it was really him, here with her again, even when she could feel it in her soul. That connection they had shared was still there, weak but growing by the second as they marched to war.
But neither of them were the reckless young fools they had been when they were last together.
Calistos had proven just how much he had grown in their centuries apart when she had wanted to teleport him to the town that now stood over two miles behind them. He had made her teleport the commander who had helped her with them, and had dispatched him to the palace as soon as he had gotten his bearings so he could bring others to aid them.
So he could bring them an army.