I've been putting chapters up pretty quick, sorting through the skeleton outlines of each one and fleshing them out as I go along. I live for reviews, I've only had one since starting this story and that one little note of encouragement, telling me that hey, people are actually READING this drivel, well... it gives me the drive to keep writing. If you like this, please, even a one word note would be great. If you have any comments, questions or need any clearing up, please don't hesitate to contact me. On that note... the next chapter will show us Persephone's latest rebirth. (I plan on scattering her various other lives as we travel further into their story). Now, onto Chapter 3!
Chapter 3: Infuriated
The rumors never died down and the stories never stopped being told. In fact, they had grown to the point that Hades' solitude on the mortal realm began to be threatened by young humans daring each other to see who was brave enough to approach the cottage. Standing, he forces himself out of the years-long despondency he had fallen into; his atrophied arms leaving his chair's armrests for the first time since he had retired from the garden. With barely a wave of his hand, he returns the house into its original state, the door slamming open for the first time in years as all the material possessions he had filled the home with crumble into dust and blow outside. Once satisfied with the work, he strolls out the front door; the ivy that has overtaken the cottage now receding back into the soil as he pauses to look over his field one last time. Despite his better judgement, he began making his way to the sapling, its growth seemingly stunted as it hadn't changed since he first planted it. He snaps a twig from the thin branches, twirls it between his fingers, and begins his slow descent back to the underworld; his fury at the injustice currently quelled by a quiet air of dejection, and leaving behind everything he had acquired or made.
Once his foot sets down in the realm of the Underworld, the air begins to transition from humid and acrid to cold and earthy. Detecting this change, a certain three-headed canine begins to sniff and quickly grows restless; the giant tail shaking the shore as it wags and thumps the ground enthusiastically. Charon, noticing the dog's behavior, looks up to find Hades approaching the gates.
"We all thought you were taking a permanent vacation," said Charon, stroking the canine's fur, as if he had maintained his place and had done so unceasingly since Hades' departure.
"You know, poor Cerberus here has been quite distraught since you left," Charon continues as he pokes his hood up a bit to eye Hades, who had just passed through the gates. The god barely regards his ferryman with more than a glance, before he resumes speaking.
"Truth be told, the entire realm has noted your absence and we couldn't take much more of the warmth or the smell. When you left, everything grew stagnant and despite the slow of souls lately, things have become a bit... crowded. It's quite hard to mingle with the women down here as it is, but when the heat does nothing to suppress decay... well, charm only goes so far." Charon leans forward on the pole, looking quite amused with his joke, despite his smile resembling more of a fearsome grimace.
"I made my peace up there, now it's time for me to return to my peace… here, provided I find any with how the waters now look," replies Hades in a soft, grave tone. A small smile of humor gracing his face, nevertheless.
Charon nods, his smile slowly growing more somber, before gesturing towards the boat. Hades, deciding against traversing by foot, accepts the silent offer and climbs aboard. Pushing off from the shore, the ferryman guides the boat across the river at a slow glide, throwing his body into each thrust of the pole as it digs into the soft silt at the bottom. The two old companions remain in comfortable silence the entire trip, even after parting ways once they reach their destination.
Dragging himself through the marble hallways and back into the Room of Judgement, Hades settles back in his throne and sets the small twig down on the stand beside him. He then gives himself a moment to quietly convalesce over the past few years before reaching abruptly for his list, which he plucks out of thin air and gazes down upon. Scanning it, he speaks to his three judges: Aeacus, Minos, and Rhadamanthus.
"More souls, more dead; one soul for my realm while five others are practically born the moment Charon greets them. There is still no winter, no famine and not enough death to balance them out. To put it simply, the mortals have already begun to outbreed their capacity to grow their food and will surely suffer greatly before they all succumb to mass starvation."
"It's between having such a nice vacation from judging all these souls and the ever-present threat of the flood that will come when the humans can no longer sustain themselves," laments Aeacus.
The other two judges nod simultaneously, remaining completely silent as they wait for their share of work; entailing the processing of mortals that have passed on during the years of his absence and sorting them into their proper afterlives. Hades then lets out another sigh, and with a snap of his fingers, he incinerates the list; the ashes floating to the ground. Soon, he and his three colleagues go about tending to the realm and the souls within as they constantly flow from the river and along one side of the Room of Judgement. Days become weeks, weeks become months and months into years until finally he had caught up with all that he missed while he had spent those many years upon the mortal realm. With the Underworld back in order, its climate returns to the cool and fresh condition it had always been in before Hades' prolonged hiatus.
Finding his throne for the first time since he started sorting through the souls that had congested and putrefied the realm, he falls back into it; arms splayed and flopping unceremoniously onto the armrests. Bumping the table beside it accidentally, he hears the sound of rolling and a dull thud of something heavy and fleshy hitting the marble floor. When he looks down, he discovers a pomegranate at his feet.
Hades' eyes widen as he stands up; the sudden, violent movement causing the table beside him to shake and quiver as if in fear before the temperamental god crashes over his throne, picking up the fruit and throwing it in his sudden rage. The pomegranate smashes against the nearest column, splitting open and leaving a smear of dark maroon across the white marble as seeds skitter across the floors. Incensed, he then looks around him, turning in circles for any clue as to who might have played this joke on him. The seeds are soon crushed beneath his sandal as he grounds them against the floor.
'Who dares to play such a trick?,' his mind seethes, jaw tightening in rage as he picks up the battered shell of the fruit before turning to head for the shoreline.
Spotting the ferryman on the opposite coast, Hades walks across the river with an infuriated gait, the waters churning violently at his feet and whipping about his ankles but not daring to slow down their lord. Once he touches down on the other side, a hand immediately snatches the front of Charon's robes, twisting and pulling him up face-to-face before shaking him violently.
"Who?" Hades booms at him, lips drawn back and baring teeth in a feral manner.
"What sort of joke is this!"
Hades lifts the hand that contains the shell of the pomegranate; the few remaining seeds within its being are crushed between his fingers and their juice drips like blood in rivulets down his forearm.
"Who was it, Charon? This damned fruit next to my throne. Who put it there, who would dare make such a jest?"
Sufficiently disturbed by the uproar, Cerberus then lifts all three of its heads, growling at Hades as he continues to shake the ferryman. The dog is then silenced quickly by a withering glare from the god as Charon calmly speaks.
"I know nothing of the fruit. I never leave my boat, nor the coasts. Every soul that comes through here, I deliver to their assigned destination; no deviations, no further than they need and never stopping short. With that in mind, there have been no heroes seeking a soul, nor anyone attempting to escape."
Hades breathes raggedly before releasing Charon. Finally regaining his composure, he blinks slowly and begins pacing the length of the coast, lost deep in thought before turning without another word and quickly ascending back into the mortal realm.