In Which Persephone Is a Woman
Ichor pooled between Persephone's legs as the summer moon rose high in the sky, completely full. It's great round face illuminated the meadow that she walked in as she felt the ichor wet the menstrual rag. She held her hand close to her stomach, though she did not feel any cramps.
Such pain was beyond that of goddesses.
Still, her steps were slow and her eyes seemed unfocused. She remembered long ago when she had first got her moon blood-or rather, her moon ichor-that Demeter had wailed for days. Such a sign meant that she was no longer a little girl, but a woman fully grown then.
Poor Demeter, Persephone thought to herself. Then, she quickly took back the thought. She didn't think Demeter deserved pity; Persephone was growing, not dying. And Demeter, she recalled with a hint of scorn, had kept her hidden away for so long. Do not go here, do not go there, stay away from him, stay away from them. Persephone had grown tired of the rules.
Demeter was overbearing and quick to anger, and she had been on Persephone's nerves longer than she cared to admit. She loved her mother, yes, but for the love of the gods, she wanted her to back off.
Let her live, let her grow, let her become her own person.
Persephone was a woman.
She was a goddess.
She was not a child. The ichor between her legs was proof of that.
Nymphs danced near Persephone in the meadow, though they didn't look her way. Persephone didn't much feel like joining in their dance; she had followed the movements over a hundred times that decade. So she walked away from them, letting their song reach her ears in soft fragments.
She pretended that she was alone.
The farther away she walked, the easier it got to pretend. Until she found herself so far away that the dancing nymphs were only a speck in the distance. The meadow was wide and open, and she could see for miles every which way. The nymphs were so small to her, and she wondered how far away she could get before they noticed she was gone.
Persephone walked even further away.
Her ichor blood flowed steadily.
A hiss and a breath stirred at her feet, the sound dancing in her ears. Persephone looked down at her bare feet that peeked out from beneath her chiton, and directly in front of it grew the narcissus flower from the Underworld. Its leaves shivered as if it were cold, and its petals glowed under the full moonlight.
Persephone knelt down to hear the whispers better.
It was only wordless chatter, if chattering was what you could call it. Persephone leaned even closer, but still she could not make out a single word. Only breathy rasps came from the flower, and try and try as she might, Persephone knew that the flower spoke only gibberish.
Still, Persephone could not simply leave it. Not when there was a mystery to be unravelled. She desired to know, what it whispered. Surely it must make sense, if only she could hear it better.
She reached down and plucked the whispering flower from the ground.
"She says yes," the flower whispered.
Persephone screamed in surprise as a black chariot leapt from the earth, dirt and flowers exploding around her and flying all around. The wheels landed with a heavy thud, and she heard the neighing of dead horses.
Persephone looked around, dazed and confused and slightly frightened, but all that vanished when she saw Hades atop the chariot. Her face softened again as she looked at him.
"Hades?" she asked, to make sure she was seeing what she thought she was seeing.
"Yes," he answered dryly.
Before Persephone could say anything more, he held out a hand to her. Persephone's hand rose, but she hesitated, not knowing whether or not she should grab it. Hades did not wait, but reached forward and clutched her hand in his fist, and pulled her atop the chariot.
Persephone didn't know what to make of it all, it was happening so fast. Before she knew it, the earth below her had split wide open into an enormous crack, like the plates of the earth broken after an earthquake. Then, the chariot plunged down into the darkness, Persephone becoming blind to all around her, and she saw the last traces of moonlight fade as the earth above her closed up and swallowed them both.
