“It is a balance,” Hades answered. Persephone had a feeling she was going to start hating that response. “People like Kal Stavros have already bargained their soul in exchange for magic.”
“What does that mean?”
“It means the price Kal pays for his power is his life,” he explained. “And the Fates say that is a better destiny than allowing him a longer one.”
Persephone swallowed, realizing again how complicated the rules of the Underworld--of Fate and Destiny really were. It was a convoluted network of bargains that all seemed to lead to a greater good, but the path there was hell.
“Are you afraid of me?” he asked after a moment of silence.
The question surprised her. She knew it was born out of fear, and yet, when she looked at him, his expression revealed nothing of his thoughts.
“No,” she answered quickly. “But it is a lot to take in.”
And an obvious example of why she couldn’t marry him.
Not yet, anyway.
How could he think of asking her to be his wife—his queen—when she had no idea about any of this? Was this not an empire she would also inherit?
Hades looked away, his throat constricting as he swallowed whatever unease had crept into his consciousness. “I will tell you everything.”
She had no doubt. She would make sure of that. She had so many questions. She wanted to know every person who entered this club, what businesses they owned, and just how much of the world Hades controlled.
Part of her wanted to ask him what he thought she’d do when she found out about Iniquity, but it was obvious he thought she’d leave.
“I think I’ve heard enough tonight,” she answered. “I’d rather go home.”
“Would you like Antoni to take you?”
She smiled a little, realizing that he thought she meant she wanted to return to her apartment.
“You might as well take me,” she said. “We are going to the same place, after all.”
His lips curled, and he put an arm around her waist, drawing her close before teleporting to the Underworld.
***
Persephone couldn’t sleep.
She lay still, cradled against Hades’ warmth, and agonized. Not over what she had learned about the God of the Dead, but over what Kal had said about Lexa.
If you thought Lexa was going to live, would you have come?
Kal was right, of course. Persephone couldn’t deny that she had sought a cure for Lexa’s injuries at Iniquity, and she’d done so out of the fear that she wouldn’t recover. The fear that, even if she did, she might not be the same.
She closed her eyes against the pain and left Hades’ chamber.
The halls of the palace were quiet and lit by the light of the night sky. Hades hadn’t succeeded to capture the brightness of the sun, but he managed the moon well. Maybe that had something to do with Hecate’s presence in the Underworld, though, she did not know for certain.
She cut through the dining hall and made her way into the kitchen. She’d never been in this part of the palace before. Hades always had food brought to them at the dining table or the library, the office or the bedroom.
Turning on the light, she found a modern and spotless kitchen. The cabinets were white, the countertops black marble, and the appliances stainless steel. She shuffled over the cold floor and began to search the cupboards for supplies, finding pans, mixing bowls and utensils.
That was the easy part.
The hardest part was finding the ingredients to bake something.
Anything.
She ended up gathering enough ingredients to make a simple vanilla cake and icing. It took her a few minutes to figure out how the stove worked. The one she used in her apartment was much older and had knobs not buttons.
Once the oven was preheating, she set to work, focusing on her task. There was something relaxing about baking. Maybe she liked it so much because it felt like alchemy, measuring each ingredient to perfection, creating something that would bewitch the senses.
Not to mention that the act always took her mind off things, but as soon as she popped her cake into the oven, an overwhelming sense of dread stole her breath. Frantic to stop it, she started to clean. Even though Hades’ kitchen had a dishwasher, she scrubbed every item by hand, rinsed, dried, and replaced them in the cupboards. After that, she focused on cleaning the stainless steel she’d smeared with her fingerprints.
By the time she was finished, the only indication anyone had used the kitchen was the smell of her cake baking.
The timer on the oven still showed she had fifteen more minutes. Fifteen minutes to be alone with her agonizing thoughts.
She turned on her music, hoping it would provide the distraction she needed. She clicked through the first few songs, their timbre dark and cold. Those songs reminded her of Lexa, the lyrics tangled with her thoughts and drudging up memories she didn’t want to recall. The longer she clicked through each song, the more she realized that it didn’t matter how the music sounded, it all reminded her of Lexa.
She turned it off, suddenly feeling exhausted. Her eyes were gritty, and her limbs were heavy. She sank to the floor; her body illuminated by the oven light, and drew her knees to her chest.
“Couldn’t sleep?” The sound of Hades voice made her jump. She swung around to find him leaning in the doorway, thick arms crossed over his bare chest. A tunic hung low on his waist and his hair pooled in dark layers around his face. He looked sleepy and beautiful.
“No,” she said. “I hope I didn’t wake you.”
“You didn’t wake me,” he said. “Your absence did.”
“I’m sorry.”
He smiled a little. “Don’t be—especially if it means you are baking.”
Hades crossed the kitchen toward her. She thought he might pick her up and carry her off to bed with the cake still in the oven, but he surprised her and sat beside her on the floor.
She found herself looking at him—at the way his muscles rose to the surface of his skin, at the shadow of stubble gracing his jaw, the full curve of his lips. He was impossibly handsome, unimaginably powerful, and he belonged to her.
“You know I can help you sleep,” he said.
She knew that because he had done it before.
“The cake isn’t finished,” she whispered her reply. It wasn’t because she wished to be quiet, it was that her voice wouldn’t go any higher as her exhaustion took over.
“I would never let it burn,” Hades replied.
After a moment, he shifted, and Persephone rested her head against his chest. Hades’ skin was warm, his scent as intoxicating as the vanilla in the air, and despite how much she wanted to see this all through to the end, she fell asleep in his arms on the floor of the kitchen.
CHAPTER XVI - BREAKING POINT
Persephone called Eliska to check on Lexa as she headed to work the next morning. In truth, she’d been avoiding Jaison since his hateful words after Lexa’s surgery and his comments about Hades. It was hard enough to reconcile that Hades couldn’t help, worse when Jaison questioned their love.
Lexa’s mother sounded exhausted on the phone as she communicated that there were no changes in her vitals. The whole thing felt like a nightmare, except that, the longer it went on, the more Persephone considered that she might have to live without Lexa.