It had become routine, for Kore, to see Hecate less and less. Whisper of her questions must have come to Mother's ear. Mother could not actually block Hecate from visiting her, and Kore believed there was no force in the Cosmos, save for Zeus or Ananke, that would be able to prevent her visits, but they turned infrequent, and from infrequent turned spare.
But Kore had so many things to ask her… and Hecate did not answer, when she tried. It had seemed her revelation of the name of Zeus' brother had… changed the situation.
But Kore had no way to ask anything else. Mother wanted her in her Garden, tending to plants, night and day, day and night.
And when she got out, it was not Hecate.
She hanged out with nymphs, now.
They were supposed to be a good influence on her, Mother had said.
Would keep her mind from… wandering.
Kore hated nymphs.
She could only cross her arms over her chest and try to focus on the song of all things that grow, cutting out the endless chatter of her forced companions.
Three there were with her that day, and she had forgot her names already. They were fair, and tall, and beautiful, all things she would never be, of course. On and on they chattered.
The unrivalled beauty of Apollo's last song, soon to be toppled by the next one.
Artemis had seemingly found a new lover, whom she would discard soon.
And what of that mortal queen, Cassiopea, who seemingly had an armor in the fashion of a cow built for her…?
Kore rolled her eyes and turned away from the giggling nymphs.
As she often found herself doing these days, her gaze then lowered onto the ground. She leaned forward, her fingers delving deep into the damp, warm earth.
Could she hear a hidden heartbeat there? And the echoes of the song she had heard, when the soil had opened up, and that forgotten God had walked out, tall and broad and dark?
With her fingers deep into the earth, Kore was the first one who felt it.
The vibration.
Kore knitted her eyebrows, and slowly lowered her ear to the ground. There. Beneath her ragged breaths and the drums of her heartbeat, another sound came: a rumbling echo of galloping horses, like all the mares in the Garden of Hesperides had gathered and went into a crazy dash.
Du-dum, du-dum, du-dum, came from the earth.
And the nymphs felt it, too. They lifted their necks, and looked about, alarmed like a pack of sheep by the far-away howl of a wolf. And just like a pair of sheep they closed against each other, besieged by fear.
"What is this?" Asked one.
"An earthquake!" Replied another.
"It's Cronus! Mighty and accursed, he his awakening!" Prophesized the third.
They were all wrong.
Shadow fell upon the sun, and the day was veiled. The three nymphs screamed, shrieking like thin shattering ice. Kore lifted her eyes from the ground. The thundering noise grew closer and closer, stronger and stronger.
She stood up, one leg, then another.
Too slow.
Kore turned.
Du-du-dum du-du-dum.
From behind them the earth bent, grew like a tumor. Soil and grass and roots erupted in a flower of dirt, and a snow of shaken leaves covered Kore's eyes for a moment.
The thee nymphs scattered now like doves before a cat, screaming, bellowing.
And Kore, instead, stood, rooted to the ground like a graven image in one of Athena's temples.
Two, then four, six tall dark horses galloped out of the wounded earth. Their manes flew like smoke in the darkened air. They pushed a carriage. And on the carriage, a dark figure snapped the reins, and the six horses rushed forward with even greater speed, and yet strangely slow to Kore's terrified sight, until it was too much for her, and she screamed and ran as well, her feet impacting the warm soil.
Du-du-du-du-dum was the noise of the approaching horses, or maybe it was her own heart.
"Hecate!" She screamed. "Hecate, help me!"
The horses were almost there, now. She felt their warm breath on her shoulders. She ran and ran – her breath broken, her lungs burning, she ran and ran, uselessly.
"Zeus!" She screamed. "Father!"
But no thunder echoed from above.
Kore stumbled, wavered, and was about to fell on her face. The horses galloped right behind her. They would trample her under their hooves!
"Mother," she begged, before something caught her, and lifted her high in the air.
A large hand.
Kore turned, aghast, and saw a pair of black eyes looking deep into her. Black eyes with speckles of gold inside them.
The hand let her go, gently. Her body touched the wood of the carriage.
Kore lifted her eyes to look at the stern face of the one who had taken her.
But just an instant later the earth opened once more, in front of her this time, and darkness and silence engulfed her, and blackness came to pour into her eyes, and she saw nothing.