For who could ever learn to love The One who doesn't know love?
By Asso
Chapter Five
Zeus' cerulean eyes darted on the black figure sitting silent, as if waiting, on the marble throne and ebony.
"It is really a long time, Hades."
"Indeed. Really a long time, Zeus. Longer than time itself."
No. His eldest brother hadn't changed, just as his voice.
Soft, restrained.
Almost hushed.
Zeus had always wondered how such a velvety voice could sound so chilling.
Just like now.
But he was Zeus.
The one who had been able to dismember Cronos.
And to deceive and condemn to eternal nothingness the appalling shape sitting now, black and motionless, on that lonely throne of marble and ebony.
Sinister and grim, sure, such as to inspire fear in whomever.
Certainly.
But not in him. Not in the King of the Gods.
Mighty.
Certainly.
Maybe as powerful as him. The King of the Gods.
But not more than him. The King of the Gods.
He raised his head so proud.
"Why are you here?" And his voice resounded anything but beaming by brotherly affection.
The diaphanous right hand of the black figure rose. It waved quietly in the air.
"To congratulate you, of course, my brother."
Hateful! Hateful was that voice calm and low.
Hateful the taunting jeering that in it leaked out.
"What do you mean, Hades?"
"You know, brother. You know"
The dark form rose slowly. It stood erect before its throne.
"Persephone... that's her name, right?... the daughter whom our chaste sister Demeter - chaste, but not too much, evidently - gave you."
A shadow, only a pale shadow of a pale mocking smile on that pale mouth, on those pale lips.
"Congratulations, my brother. My most heartfelt and sincere congratulations. Really I've never seen more beautiful creature."
Courtesy? Unknown word to the King of the Gods. The King of the Gods could afford to be rough if and when he wanted.
With anyone.
Even with him.
With the brother he would rather not have.
Especially with him.
And especially now.
And especially in the face of the wrath that the transparent sarcasm of that damn brother aroused in him. In the face of the wrath of having failed to cheat fate, as he had loudly proclaimed that he would be able to do.
Because Hades, that cursed, was there!
Aware of all!
He had seen all!
All!
And was subtly deriding him because fully conscious of what he, Zeus, would have wanted to do and hadn't managed to do!
Courtesy?
COURTESY!?
May his rude words push that damn and unwelcome brother to go back to hole up in his beloved Underworld!
The right place for him!
The only place for him!
"Allow me to say, my dear brother, that you're not an expert in this field. What beautiful creature could you have seen, ever, in your dark realm? All you can be versed in, it's ugliness and monstrosity."
The black shape seemed to shrivel.
And Zeus gloated.
He gloated because he realized he had hit the mark.
And he piled it on.
"Beauty is not thing for you." Zeus snorted. "Persephone's beauty is not thing for you."
Still a stab. The worst. "You weren't supposed to see her."
But the very moment he pronounced these words, Zeus realized he had made the biggest of mistakes.
It was a human saying, that's true, and Zeus was more than justified for not knowing it, but surely it would have been definitely good for him being aware of what it meant 'more than enough is too much'.
The eyes of darkness flashed obscure.
The bloodless lips contorted in a sardonic grimace.
And Zeus realized in a flash what was going to happen, what it would be the reaction of that damned dark brother who was at all out of the patterns of his tidy Olympus.
Changed? No. Not at all. His sombre oldest brother had not changed for anything and in anything. At the most, he had become more unsettling than it had been before.
As in his mocking, unnerving laugh.
Low.
And chilling.
Like everything of him.
The black laughter quieted slowly. The alabaster face was back to be the usual icy mask.
"I know, Zeus, my powerful brother. I know."
The dark figure stepped forward towards Zeus.
It stopped a few steps away.
"You, in fact, haven't informed me, this time."
Those eyes, those eyes wide open into nothingness, narrowed.
"You haven't told me anything about the consecration ceremony of the new Goddess, as well as about her birth itself."
The eyes became two slits of bottomless obscurity in the opaline white of that visage of ice.
Persephone gasped.
What was happening?
What obscure insane threat carried it with it, the silvery light of the moon?
Those eyes...
Those eyes, lightless and timeless...
His eyes!
There were not!
They did not exist!
They were just in her mind!
But why did her mind see them?
Why!?
There have been no half-words.
"You wanted to conceal Persephone from me, Zeus."
There have been not.
"You shan't have Persephone, Hades."
Those eyes!
THOSE EYES!
And, at that moment, at those words of Zeus… it happened.
Zeus would never have thought that it could happen.
But it happened.
The tall, powerful, dark figure wavered.
Moved back.
Sought its throne.
Sat heavily on it.
Seemed to curl up in its large, shapeless black mantle, as if to seek refuge in it.
And sighed.
Deeply.
While the eyes made of darkness did shut, as to conceal any thought that was stirring in the brain behind them.
Zeus did not wonder what those thoughts might be. What mattered to him at that time was that Hades had recoiled patently at his peremptory statement.
He seemed to have withdrawn into himself.
And that meant...
Zeus rejoiced inwardly.
That meant that he had won!
Yes! He had won!
Once more his dismal brother had accepted his fate of woe!
And he, Zeus, had kept his promise to his wife. He had not been able to fool Destiny, had failed to keep Hades away from the ceremony, but once again he had managed to bend him to his will.
And not by fraud, this time! But with his might of King of the Gods!
He had won!
HE HAD WON!
But, then…
Just then…
Just as he was starting to enjoy his victory…
Those eyes reopened.
Abruptly.
And they sparkled.
Literally.
Their darkness seemed to glow.
What did they want, those eyes glowing with uncannily glamorous darkness, from her?
The dark shape stood up again.
The broad mantle whirled like the wing of a huge bat.
The dark, low voice made itself be heard once again in the more and more fresh air of the growing night.
Calm.
Almost serene.
"So is it so?"
Zeus came forward, dominating with effort his disappointment and frustration.
"It's so what, brother?"
The alabaster face of Hades bent down for a second.
Then it lifted.
Those eyes open in the nothing seemed to let glimpse for a moment the nothing that they had fatally to contemplate. That only they were able to withstand.
Zeus found himself having to suppress the shiver that that nothing aroused.
Soft, softer than ever, was Hades' voice.
"You know the answer, Zeus, o my mighty brother. Or, more exactly, you know the answer of Destiny."
Persephone wrung her hands.
Why could she see those eyes?
Why could she hear... could she hear that voice?
So low. So soft.
So darkly...
So darkly fascinating.
What did all this mean? And just on that very evening? On the evening of her wonderful day?
She had no answer.
Who...
Who did have it?
What... did have it?
"I do not understand what you mean, Hades."
The eyes made of black void darkened.
Hades made one more step forward.
"You did not seem surprised to see me, brother. You were expecting me, weren't you? Did you think it was Destiny?"
"What?"
"Destiny doesn't let itself be fooled, my brother, not even when it appears consenting to let itself be duped. Destiny…" A low, short laugh, undeniably resounding of not hidden bitterness. "… is not me."
"I fail to grasp the meaning of what you say, Hades."
"You tried to steal her, Persephone, your daughter, from my sight. You knew that in this way I'd come to know of her existence. And of her beauty. But you failed. And you knew you would have failed. This is why you weren't surprised to see me. Because you knew that Destiny..."
Destiny?
It was Destiny that had the answer?
But...
But what wanted it from her, Destiny?
Those eyes...
That voice...
What...
What was her destiny?
Zeus raised imperiously his hand, stopping brusquely his brother's words.
"Persephone won't be meant to you, Hades. It won't be this, her destiny."
The black mantle fluttered threatening.
The puissant body hidden by it, turned out in all its might, its sculptural and powerful structure well evident from below the black short tunic that covered it.
The eyes of dark ember flashed with fury.
The alabaster hands tightened in two diaphanous, strong fists.
Zeus suddenly found himself stepping back.
It was something that never had happened. But the one in front of him, the menacing, powerful figure facing him ... was Hades!
And he... he was about to...
Was it about to happen?
Really?
Was it possible?
His brother, the ghostly Hades - powerful at least as him - was about to...?
But suddenly, just as it had started, Hades' rampage vanished.
The black cape closed on the high and muscular corporeal shape.
The pale face became, if possible, even paler.
And the eyes... those eyes made of shining darkness... went out.
And Hades spoke
And there was no trace of sarcasm in his voice. Nor of anger. Nor of resentment.
There was...
There was amazement.
"I did not understand, Zeus, my brother. I did not understand."
A new, strange light appeared in those eyes, as they stared on Zeus who stood dumb to listen.
"I was sitting on my gelid throne down there, in my gelid realm. A day like all my days. The chill, lonely, of all my days."
Zeus felt a weird thing inside.
He knew what Hades' life was.
But now... now Hades was opening up to him.
Hades - the monstrous, gelid, hateful Hades - was telling him the chill of his life.
And… and he was revealing him that, somewhere inside that body of ice, there was something that pulsed.
There was a heart.
A heart that suffered in the chill of his gelid, lonely life.
"No. I did not understand. I did not understand the strange feel, that thing, never felt before, that was stirring inside me."
The strange, dark light of those eyes shone more and more.
"A longing, a yearning. A sort of obscure recall."
The eyes drooped for a moment, as if searching for words.
They got up again. They shone even more obscure.
"I did not understand, brother. But now I do. Now I understand. And..." An odd sweetness appeared in those dark eyes. "…and I can understand why you have acted in this way, Zeus. My brother."
Zeus felt something unknown in his throat. Something he had never felt before. A sort ... a kind of knot. It was... it was difficult to speak, with that lump down his throat.
"You understand?
"She's your daughter, my brother. And she is the brightest of creatures. She's the light in itself. You've condemned me to darkness. Why on earth should you accept that your luminous daughter may be sentenced to the darkness you've treacherously sentenced me to stay in? To be?"
At those words, Zeus' face turned to stone.
"Hades ..."
"Destiny is really evil, my brother. He made me what I am through you, and now it makes fun of you."
The frown of Zeus became such as to distort his noble face.
"You won't have her, brother."
"You want war, Zeus? This is what you want? You want to fight me and Destiny?"
Zeus's chest swelled with anger.
"You will not have Persephone, Hades! Her fate will not be your fate!"
It was a scream. Not screamed. But it was a scream.
And once again Hades surprised Zeus.
Hades was predictable, in some way.
Darkness can only be darkness.
But the darkness of Hades was another thing.
It was a multi-faceted darkness and... unpredictable.
His diaphanous hand went up. But it was not threat.
And his eyes blazed again. But it was not anger.
And his voice rose again.
But it was not the voice of Hades. It was not the voice - the expected voice - of the Lord of the Dark Kingdom.
It was a voice... mild. And yet strong. And yet mellow.
And persuasive.
"Do not oppose, brother. Do not fight Destiny."
Was her Destiny that to be…
"Let my dark light be revived by a little true light."
…HIS!?
Was it a command? Or was it a prayer?
No! Impossible! Hades did not pray!
And yet... and yet, it was not a command.
It was...
It was...
Whatever it was, Zeus found himself saying words he wouldn't ever think he could say.
"Hades, but how will you do? Never will I grant you the hand of Persephone and, even in the case I were willing to give my consent, I have a promise to keep. I promised my wife that I would prevent your darkness from falling on my daughter. And, in addition to this, what about Demeter? Her mother? Never will she agree for our daughter to become yours. And none of the other Gods and Goddesses will ever be willing to help you in this crazy undertaking. You're alone. As you always were. As you…" But what a strange thing! Why he, Zeus, found it so hard to finish his sentence? "… as you always will be."
Those eyes, those eyes that let glimpse a feeble hint of things that only they could see and bear, became...
They became...
Was it possible they could be sad?
And that voice ... that cold and scratching voice...
Could that voice appear almost broken, while still resounding as the same voice of ever?
"Brother, it seems that Destiny has decided I don't have to be alone anymore."
Zeus reacted to those words. And he reacted vehemently.
His finger pointed at Hades' grisly face.
His voice thundered.
"Hades, we do not know what Destiny has decided. We think - we merely think! - that it has decided that you must have Persephone, but from here to thinking that you may no longer be alone... Hades! It is not enough to possess a woman in order to have her for real! To warm your heart with her willing warmth!"
Hades advanced.
His diaphanous and strong hand grabbed Zeus' outstretched finger, while his otherworldly eyes stared at him.
"You are a fine connoisseur of that, aren't you, brother?"
His voice! His damn voice! Again that one! Soft and chilling again! And mocking and biting!
Zeus freed violently his finger from Hades' grasp.
He hissed.
"Hades, I can be what I am... an infidel, a... a skirts-hunter, like you, my chaste brother, think of me."
Eh, even Zeus knew to be biting, and how! And the dark shadow in front of him seemed to become even darker.
"But, Hades, I've always had the heart of my conquests. Always. Because I know how to give love. And that... because I know love."
The dark figure in front of Zeus remained immobile.
It didn't speak.
It didn't move.
It didn't do anything.
Anything.
If not closing its eyes.
Those eyes made of nothingness
Then those eyes reopened.
The nothingness in them was even deeper. It seemed... it was... the eternal nothingness. A dark sidereal space made of chilling void.
Even his voice seemed to be made of astral nought.
"I don't. I don't know love."
No. It was impossible. Not even for the puissant Lord of the Gods it was possible not to feel a cold shiver down the spine at hearing that voice.
"But perhaps Persephone..."
Oh Uranus! And now? What was that voice doing? Possible? Could it really be a note of desperate yearning the one that in it resounded?
"... perhaps Persephone can teach me."
"Hades..."
Oh Gaia! How hard it was to talk! But how could it be possible that he, Zeus, had to find it so hard... and unpleasant... to resize the absurd hopes of that brother, so odious and hated?
"...Hades, to do that, she should learn to love you. And..."
"And for who could ever learn to love The One who doesn't know love?"
Persephone turned abruptly.
She ran away from the window, from the light of that moon that seemed to talk to her about obscure things.
She threw herself on the bed.
She pressed her face on the pillow.
Enough!
ENOUGH!
What was happening?
WHAT WAS HAPPENING TO HER?!
She bit the pillowcase.
You are light, Persephone! YOU ARE LIGHT!
And he is darkness!
DARKNESS!
And... and you do not even know him!
YOU DO NOT KNOW HIM!
There are not those dark eyes!
And... and so infinitely sad!
It doesn't... it doesn't exist, that voice!
IT DOES NOT EXIST!
That voice so dark.
So doleful.
So desperate!
There are not those words.
THEY DO NOT EXIST!
"For who ..."
THEY DO NOT EXIST!
"... could ever learn ..."
THEY DO NOT EXIST!
"... to love ..."
THEY DO NOT EXIST!
"... The One ..."
DO. NOT. EXIST!
"... who does not know love?"
For who could ever learn to love The One who doesn't know love?
End of Chapter Five
TBC