A.N. – I genuinely have no idea from where this came from. Possibly due to hitherto unknown levels of procrastinating in history and randomness, but yeah. No idea.
It would be really pointless to even fake calling the characters here mine. Still, nothing here belongs to me except the story and blah blah blah. Oh, and all the plants mentioned? I actually might have taken (by which I mean I totally took) a long stroll down the 'flower language' section in Wikipedia… so go there if you want to know why did I ever cite those. And I have no idea why I wanted that either, but it was fun, so…
Hope you like it, and reviews, improbable as they are, are really appreciated!
His hands are steady as they card through Persephone's hair, even as long locks become detached. He's used to these things happening, in any case. Lord of the Dead and winter cradling them- he'd expect some of the strands to fall like leaves.
But not so many, not from a young woman laying her head listless on his lap and barely twirling the ends of his long clothes around bony fingers.
"You might end up staying a full year with me, Persephone."
She barely nods, and he feels the smile ghost and crawl wide upon her face.
"And you might get a tan, Hades. No, I think…"
Persephone turns around, facing up to his long, pale visage. The smile is wan, the eyes have a bit less of the divine luster, cheekbones covered with Spring's bounty and rounded to pebble smoothness now show sharp angles. She's lost more, Hades notices. Not really obvious- Demeter probably has seen this as well, but so long as the blame can't be pegged on him, Hades will let her be.
Unlikely, but there's a chance. Oh, let's make Hades responsible- not the Fates at their loom, not the ignorant men- let's give our woes to the dead and his Spring Queen.
"I think I'll still return. Mother will be beside herself, and-"
He rolls his eyes.
"It's your duty, same as mine is keeping all the dear departed. Yet you still may be bound here for a year."
"You and your nihilist streaks, Hades, as if with words you'd chain me here."
"Oh, you know I tried."
She smiles, a brighter smile, and Hades is tempted to once again hand over pomegranates and gold-plated words. But they only worked the one time, at the old beginning and when his in-law hadn't dried up the earth in desperation.
"I'll be back. I always am."
For longer hangs in the air, catching in the little crevices of mineral veins and wilting flowers set there by a flagging force of will. The place is tragically dreary, Persephone once said when well-rounded, twirling balsamine and striped carnations. You should liven it up- she'd drape flowers between rivers of stone, hide ears of corn in the ground and bedeck some attending ghosts in spider lilies. He'd remind her of the final resting places, of sobriety, of them drying up in her absence and if she could just stay to tend to them, he'd be infinitely pleased…
And then, his gone-Persephone would laugh and sweep her arms. Every bloom would fade into the bauble-lamps of chrysanthemums, eglantines, lobelias. The fruit would round and ripen, glowing like the jewels Hades picks at times in his realm and she'd confine her exuberance to smaller details and curses in the petals.
You're incorrigible, Hades used to say, when Persephone would flare up in defiance and make an almost intolerable utopia of his cavernous domain. And she'd jest back, about him being an awful caretaker when her living protests wilted into pretty-colored rocks and the ghosts clung to anemones and rue like prayers.
Now, she just lets her previous thought hang in the air after repeating it- for faith, for luck, for who knows who. It's not like a goddess can now request for divine help- although Hades knows, if it was for him to fix, he'd give it a try at her behest.
"Why the melancholy, Hades? By now, you'd be… well, I haven't called any flora yet, so you'd be-"
"Just waiting on you. Or giving you the litany of those curses you are to set loose and avenge."
She gives one of the wintery smiles, the ones that say that well, she doesn't like this but she'll do it anyways. If only out of boredom, if only because she used to quite like the sapling-thin humans and is quite appalled by just having them drift along like autumn leaves.
"Those. Will they ever stop?"
"Hmm, do you think the men will stop soon?"
"No."
Hades does, so much it leaks into the prairies for the good and the paradise for the heroes. A spill of airy decay, a plume or two of burnt-away gods. He remembers receiving Hecate, cast down from her robes of cross-roads and moonlight and magic into cobwebs; Hades remembers Poseidon taking long breaks with him in what neither can disguise as interest in family; he is sure Persephone is still a bit haunted by an Aphrodite in sheer silk toying around with arbutus and plum blossoms. He's seen many gods take pauses in his Underworld, has even made acerbic jibes of charging for more than the boat trip or for a soft bed instead of the traditional stone.
He doesn't say so to the dreamy woman, still lying on his lap, eyes half-closed and not really focusing on Hades' face.
"Then you'll still have to do the petty curses and last wishes. At least you don't have to sort them, which is a chore that makes me regret being left with perished heroes instead of living, ready ones."
She groans, sits up and combs her hair with hands that still get thick strands cobwebbed between each pass.
"Guess I'll get to it then, or when winter next rolls around I'll be drowning in work."
Or too sickly-air for greenery and barren stone, Persephone dear. In ethereal transparency, instead of the regal glow of a deity in her kingdom. I'll give you the queenly habits, but you'd have to stay and I'd get in over my head all over my head if Zeus still cared enough to fix this forsaken plight.
Hades beckons over for an attendant, gliding between stalagmites and metal spires. Makes the petitioners line up for an audience with their doting queen and sees their private hall crammed with the not-too-damned and the early departures, all handing over poppies and gladiolus and throwing spare wheat stalks at her feet.
Her term here ends again, the warmth rolling over in lazy hazes and cool nights that still annoy Hades to a point.
Before, Persephone would've run full-tilt towards the river, a last spark of corn and oats hasting behind her and straggling petitioners hounding her until the water's edge. And her laughter at freedom would bounce and cascade between the walls, the echoes chasing Hades for days and the reverberations ringing in waves. And he, he would slowly walk and hold the last jonquils he plucked from some valley or other and let them wilt to limpness on his hand as she crossed the wide river with a beaming smile.
Now, Persephone is more inclined to let Hades carry her over all the way to Karon's barge. She whispers encouragement- to who, Hades can't discern- and makes plans for every single detail she can think of, from birth to fall, in a hushed tone that doesn't carry well. There are no echoes, no last banshees to wail at her excited departure and no last cajoling for one more pomegranate seed or to try on another pretty trinket.
"Hades, you're getting all nihilistic again. I can sense it- seeing the nice outsides always does this to you."
"It's actually you leaving. Although, if you'd rather give such an insipid thing more value…"
A small you literal-minded god glare, with a weary smile playing counterpoint and Hades is reaching out to his pocket where he always keeps a couple pomegranate seeds in store.
(He likes a snack- even gods are allowed that, and Hades at least prides himself on being easier to please than any of his rambunctious younger siblings. And he will pass judgment on any who dare make fun of that fact, unless you so happened-)
"A last souvenir?"
Persephone closes her eyes, opens them to behold-
Not the fruit. Hades deemed himself 'unlucky' enough to pluck out a little wilted chrysanthemum along with his usual last gift. And Persephone, she departs as well from her usual shaking with 'mirth' and sidelong looks at a stoic Hecate also perched in the carriage or lounging by one of the last trees on the bank.
The thick flower is twiddled a bit on her finger, the usual bits of last sarcasm tinkle out and then the oars are paddling off in reverse, towards a light at the start of the tunnel and with an ethereal woman who doesn't look any more solid by the second.
"You know, your prediction might still be correct." A voice from under the witch-hazel, dripping with magic and accusing Hades of a correct (if unpleasant) guess.
"And, before you get any ideas, I still vow to spirit her away if you so dare act against-"
"Her express wishes. I sent her back, did I not, Hecate?"
The three-faced woman merely lets loose a harrumph from her right. Her left sips some Underworld wine with no fear of entrapment- as it is…
"Not to mention, you'd still be taking her to another part of my realm."
"I'll send to Hermes, then. I'd know he's still at large."
"You're still using magic as your aspect. Thought you'd have reverted to crossroads or moonlight by now."
"Leaving Persephone alone? I wouldn't, not when she was among my last duties. And I do fancy myself among the deities with a shred of duty left, even when I've left my lesser tricks by the side."
"That makes two of us-"
"And I've supped of your bread and salt. The dead have better fare than the living, at any rate."
"That's Persephone's doing, of course."
At this, the goddess of witchcraft fixes Hades with a look that on other days would get Hecate duly chastised for her insolence.
"Only reason why I still hold some trust in you. Mark this, if you please- you still might see her for a full year, or at least for a longer period than four months, yet. But-"
"It would come with the tedium of infinite paperwork?"
"Don't count on my magical aid for that."
Surer than pomegranate seeds or desiccated flowers, Hades thinks, and it just might be worth the crowding and the nigh-eternal springs.
But it may mean he sees her glow again.