After the dance, Aidoneus was even more so on Persephone's mind than before. Much of her days were spent idly laying by the fountains, running her hands through the water, talking to her imaginary lover. Other times, she'd play with one of the many gifts he'd sent her over the years; not all of them were dolls. He'd send her combs and jewels and sometimes even a dress or two.
Her nymph friends watched her with amuse as Persephone danced about the garden island, wearing her gowns and jewels, humming a tune by herself. The young spring goddess often forgot her duties, but her good friends covered up the work so Demeter wouldn't yell at her.
"Oh, she's got it bad, doesn't she?" The pink nymph asked the orange one as they sat on a tree root, eating fruit and drinking nectar as they watched Persephone waltz by herself.
"What? What's she got?" A teal nymph asked.
"Isn't it obvious, Minthe? Aurora's in love!"
"OoOoh!" The nymphs collectively shrieked together.
Persephone heard them coo and stopped dancing in embarrassment.
"Oh, but you were doing so well, your highness!"
"You're all the worst!" Persephone grabbed the cape in her hands and ran to the pool, drooping over the wall.
"What's he liIike?" The yellow nymph asked in a childlike voice.
"Yeah! Tell us! Pleeease?!"
"Oh alright!" Persephone pushed her hand through the water, splashing her friends as she sat on the edge.
"He's amaazing!" Persephone began, dreaming already. "He's so tall! Taller than father, even! His frame is, is just right! The right arms, to wrap around me." She wrapped her own hands around her arms, pretending.
The nymphs giggled.
"He's perfect! As if he was made of marble! And as strong as it too! Probably. And his hair!" She swept a hand through her own hair, pretending it was his.
"Darker than the night! And not a strand imperfect. And his eyes! Oh his eyes!"
Persephone drooped over the pool again, lost in his eyes.
"Tell us! Tell us!"
"Oh they're goorgeous! They're so blue, even Poseidon must be jealous!"
"Oooh!"
"And they glimmer, under the right light. And when they look at me, I can see my own reflection!"
"Ahhh!" With a sigh, the nymphs drooped on the floor as well.
"I can't wait till I'm 15" She quietly whispered to herself and all the girls in the garden fell asleep.
The next couple of days weren't better. They were worse, if that could be imagined. Persephone's lovesickness spread to all her friends, and they hummed and danced more frequently than nymphs usually did.
One particular morning, Persephone couldn't even be bothered with getting out of bed. Still, her friends dressed her and dragged her out of her room, all the while she was still in a trance.
"Aurora! Wake up!" They yelled when they got to the stairs.
Persephone woke up and ran down the stairs with her nymphs.
"Girls, why can't you just tell me what this is all about?"
"You'll see. It's a surprise!"
The nymphs dragged her to her little grotto in the hollow of a giant tree, where Persephone hid all her trinkets from her mother.
She gasped when she saw what was waiting for her inside.
"Oh, girls! You didn't!" Persephone shrieked as she made a circle around his statue.
"You girls are the best!" She gathered them all in one big hug and they all took a big sigh looking at him.
"It looks just like him." She left her friends and went closer to the flower statue, running her hand over his face.
"It even has his eyes. Why, Aidy! Run away with you?" Persephone dramatically wrapped her arms around his neck, one hand on his chest. "Oh, this is all so, so sudden!"
Her friends giggled and oohed as they watched her play pretend with her prince.
Persephone loved her gift. There wasn't a moment of the day she wasn't restless to be with him. With a statue in her hold, Persephone managed to focus more on her work than she'd done over the last few days. Still, she stole chance meetings with him whenever she got the opportunity.
One night, she stayed out too late.
Demeter couldn't sleep, so she went out on a walk around the cabin. She decided to see if Persephone was awake too so the goddesses could talk together. But when Demeter checked her daughter's room, it was empty. Persephone wasn't in any of the other rooms either.
"Minthe? Minthe!" She called out to her nymph and the girl came running, cool as the wind.
"Yes, your majesty?"
"Have you see my daughter?"
"The princess? She must be in the gardens, you majesty."
"I should have guessed." Demeter shyly smiled and walked towards the living room.
"Tell me, Minthe. Does Aurora seem happier to you these days?"
"Absolutely, ma'am. And she's been doing her chores so awfully well, too."
"If something had happened, you'd tell me, right?"
Minthe turned to the floor, wrists locked behind her back.
Demeter grew curious and suspicious.
"Minthe?"
The teal nymph could feel the goddess's ire in her veins, and couldn't keep it any longer.
"I'm so sorry, your majesty!" Minthe fell to the floor as Demeter rose from her seat.
"Tell me what has happened!" The goddess demanded, and the little nymph shivered.
"The princess... Aurora... is in love, your majesty!"
Demeter grew as mad as if someone had told her Persephone had died. She shrieked in anger, and her whole house shook, and she demanded that Minthe take her to Persephone.
Persephone was as ignorant as a bird when Demeter came storming in.
"Mother!" She shrieked, placing herself first so that somehow her mother wouldn't notice her things.
"I consider myself a reasonable mother. I set certain rules, and I expect those rules to be obeyed."
"But, mother, I..." Persephone tried to reason.
"Is it true you?!" Demeter raged. "You've met... a boy?!"
"Mother, you don't understand!"
"Contact between the humans and our world is strictly forbidden. Persephone, you know that!"
"You've got it all wrong!" Persephone pushed down on her fists, reaching her chin up as high as it would go. "You don't even know him!"
"Know him? I don't have to know him! They're all the same. Spineless, savage, murdering meat-eaters incapable of feeling-"
"Mother, I love him!" Persephone accidentally shouted, and immediately hid behind the statue.
"Have you completely lost your senses? You're sworn to Artemis!"
Demeter here was referring to the goddess of hunt's band of virgins.
"That wasn't my choice!" Persephone cried out.
"So help me, Persephone, I am going to get through to you!" Demeter pointed her finger and nose in Persephone's face. "And if this is the only way, so be it."
Persephone noticed her mother's skin turn green and immediately wrapped around her arm.
"Mother, No!"
Demeter took control of the trees, making its roots cave in on the grotto.
"No! No, please!" The tentacle like roots nabbed and grabbed at all of Persephone's things, taking them deep underground with them.
"Mother, stop!" Persephone cried, pulling at her mother's arm, but it did nothing to stop the raging goddess.
Lastly, Demeter saw the statue. Persephone gasped in horror.
"Mother, don't!" Persephone ran for her floral prince, but it up and withered before she got there.
Persephone fell to the floor on the spot, trying to collect all the fallen flowers in her arms. Finally she gave up and fell even more as she began crying in hysterics.
Demeter paid her no mind, but still felt a twine of guilt as she left the grotto.
"Persephone! I'm..." Minthe began, trying to console the princess.
"Just go away! Leave me alone!"