To my reviewer, thank you for the reviews. :) They make me feel better about spending my early summer stuck on a blank screen. Hopefully it continues to go well.

"Tell me that you enjoyed the food, my dear." Hades' voice resounded through the blankness of the night. He guided her along the unseen path that lined the mountainside, giving no pause to consider the world around him. Perhaps he did not notice it.

"This is the first time that anyone's treated me as something other than a child."

"They would mourn the day that they are told otherwise. Tell me, what holds you to them so tightly? Why do you not leave them?"

She closed her eyes. The thought had come to mind time and again, but she had dismissed it as the irritation of a child restrained. Now here was a man asking her what held her back, and she found that she hardly knew what the real reason was for obeying her mother for so long. "I would miss it if I left... The fields, the flowers, are all I've ever known."

Kore opened her eyes to find Hades watching her. His eyes glowed in the moonlight, and for the first time, there seemed to be life in them. His hand brushed her face; she could feel the faint warmth of his skin reassuring her. "Is that how you want it to be?" His voice was gentle, and held a tenderness that even her mother couldn't have mimicked.

Her thoughts came in a blur. She could not understand why this strange, terrifying god would speak to her as an equal, or why her unimportant desires would matter to him. She was a silly little girl – Hermes and Demeter had told her that for years, and she believed it. Why did Hades stand so close to her on such a dark night and deny everything she had been taught?

"I don't know, Lord Hades... No one has ever asked me."

The god grew distant in that moment. His eyes were the eyes Kore had heard about in myths, as merciless as death and as empty as his heart was rumored to be. "I should have expected as much. You have been taught by Demeter, and I commend her for the job she has done."

"My lord, I don't understand – "

He raised a hand to silence her. "In time you will. If you remember nothing else from this encounter, Kore, know this: you are no longer a child, and you shall not be treated as one. Live your life well, my dear."

Kore searched for the meaning of his words, but they seemed to have the same cryptic tone as nearly everything he had told her during the evening. "Lord Hades, do you really mean to leave me – ?"

He had already vanished into the darkness.

Hermes had looked everywhere for her before he remembered the peaks of Olympus, the barren portions where gods only traveled when a choice was to be made. Had Hades taken her there and seduced her? He chastised himself for not staying by her side every moment of the trip. She was beautiful and naïve; the god could have lured her to his side in an instant, and she would lose her innocence forever.

Forever was a long time when Demeter entered the picture.

At last he spotted her kneeling alone on the path's edge. "Kore! Where have you been? You mustn't wander off like that!"

She sighed. "I'm not hurt, Hermes. You needn't treat this like a dangerous night."

"But it is dangerous! Hades was here, Kore, and he had his eyes on you every moment of the day! You don't begin to know what you're meddling with."

Hermes placed a caring hand on her shoulder, but she brushed it away, irritated. "Don't act like he's evil when he's not! He's just like any of us! In fact, I think I prefer his company to yours."

He huffed in disapproval. "Now you're just pressing your luck. The difference between he and I, despite me obviously being the more attractive one, is that he's not used to things like this. Kore, he's alone. He's been alone all this time, and he would stop at nothing to get what he wants because of it. You may not realize it, but he came here for a reason."

"What makes you think that?"

Hermes took his place beside her. "I've been to these meetings since I was old enough to make the journey, and I've never missed the chance to come. This is the only time Hades has come here, and the first thing he did was to make some deal with Zeus. That may sound innocent, but with Hades nothing is that simple."

Kore did not want to hear her friend speak so negatively of her new companion; she was used to his lighthearted jests, and anything else disturbed her. "I think you misjudged him. I'm sorry, Hermes, but I can't do this. Not today. I'll see you when I return home."

He turned and watched Kore's retreating figure as she returned to the entrance of Olympus without hesitation. Since her youth he had played with her in the fields and offered his support; he had treated her with kindness second to only Demeter's as she grew into a woman, and even then he humored her to preserve her childhood. She was lovely, and for the first time, she was walking away from him. Hades had changed her.

He would never roam the fields without mourning her name.