It was more than her head that ached when Megara woke next. Constricting chains and the heat of a flame that was too close oriented her back to reality despite the dreamlike few hours she'd spent away from her master.

"That was some party, huh?"

She couldn't lift her head, but she tried to wrench her eyes open so she could join Hades in the conversation. He wasn't the most patient of the gods, to put it mildly. Her attempt to reply came out in a half-coherent mumble.

"Yeah, looks like you had some real fun out there. Wanna tell me what happened when the Minotaur showed up?"

How did he expect her to talk at a time like this? He was the lord of the dead. He should know how close to death she was.

Megara mustered as much control of her body as possible and murmured, "Dropped the roof on me."

"Correction: almost dropped the roof on you." The chains around her tightened. "And what about Hercules? Did you know he cut my Minotaur to pieces?"

A series of jagged wheezing noises escaped from the shambles that was Megara's body. "I didn't." Something was caked onto her face. It crackled every time she moved her lips. Blood, perhaps? "Too bad. He was surprised. Everything went according to plan, but he still…" the chains tightened again.

"How do I know you didn't warn him?"

Megara hissed through her teeth. "Because you didn't warn me? How was I to warn him of anything if I didn't know what you were going to do?" If she was a better person, she might have warned him. No, she would have warned him. But she wasn't a better person. She was too focused on her own self-loathing and an attempt to escape it. Selfish.

"I'll just have to ask you a few questions. Starting with what are you wearing?"

She fished through the absent depths of her aching mind. "Clothes?"

"That's not the dress I sent you away in."

Fleeting images of the pre-party time she spent with Medusa and Galatea returned to her. "Had to blend in. Pushy party host. Was going to change back after the party. Now I'm here."

"I see. Now I suspect you'll want to go back for your original dress?"

"Honestly, I don't care what happens to me or the dress. Why am I restrained when I can't even move?"

"I think it's a little convenient that I'm down from three Gorgons to zero the night I turn you loose in Athens. I was just on Olympus hearing all about how Aphrodite was beseeched, and a very clever mortal talked her into transforming Medusa into some kind of love Gorgon. She said it was the best idea she ever heard and was embarrassed she hadn't been the one to think of it."

"There's all sorts of clever people out there. Most of them know better than to talk to you."

Would that she had been even a little more clever.

Her skin was on fire. Not the hypothetical kind of fire that accompanied general wounds. Actual fire. Megara screamed and twisted in the chains to escape the fire lapping at her body. There was no escape, nothing she could do.

"You wanted six years back for that recruitment drive!" Hades roared in her ears over the sound of her screams. "You're a double-crossing traitor! How much more have you done?"

Even if she'd known how to reply, she couldn't have. Her whole body convulsed. If she could fully open her eyes, she might have seen how quickly she was roasting, but all she could think was that she would never have to work for Hades again. Then a second thought invaded the agonized haze of her mind: she'd never get to speak to Hercules again. He'd never know what happened to her.

Maybe it was better that way.

She was on the ground. The fire had stopped.

"You really thought I'd let you go, didn't you?" Hades's voice asked from above.

Her mouth was frozen open. How was she still breathing?

Though it should have been a relief, it was with horror that she recognized her body was healing.

"I'm not done with you. You've got another five hundred years to serve me."

Five hundred?

No, that wasn't right.

Her mind scrambled for the math that she'd been whispering to herself all along. It should be less than that.

"Surprised? I make the rules! I'll tell you if you've earned my mercy or not!"

He'd finally healed her enough that she could make a counterargument. She pushed herself up on her elbows and spat blood onto the stone below her. "You're the one who told me you don't have any! Do you think I'm so stupid I'd forget who I'm working with?"

"You've been on a bit of a losing streak, eh Meg?" Hades lifted her back to his eye level using the smoke chains wrapped around her body. "Ever since Wonder Boy showed up, neither of us have gotten anything right, have we?"

"So, what? You're twisting the knife on me because none of the monsters you've sent me to recruit have been good enough to beat Wonder Boy? How's that my fault? You couldn't kill him as a baby or all through high school. Suddenly, I'm on the team, and your constant failure is a me problem?"

Hades drew up to his full height, eyes glowing with malice. "If I were you, I'd watch my tongue. That sounds like another fifty years. Wanna shoot for a hundred?"

The last shreds of Megara's sanity came loose as her jaw trembled. Don't say anything, she told herself, but she'd never been great at taking her own advice. He'd never piled fifty years back on before. She could feel them weigh her down. She'd rather he went back to frying her. "What do you want from me? Once you've got the cosmos, you'll own everyone, right? What does any of this get you?"

"I get to see that smug little face when you learn your place!" he pointed an over-long bony finger at her and laughed. "You can't run from me. You can't fight me. So every time you forget that, I'm going to remind you." He filled his hand with a fireball. "I can take you out and bring you back. Do you need the reminder, or will you show me the respect I deserve as your master?"

Megara eyed the fireball. Not again. Despite her pride, she dropped to her knees and bowed her head. "Whatever you want," she mumbled.

"Good… So, can you guess what I want?"

"Less and less."

"I'm putting you back in that palace. You'll start sowing discord in Athens. And then you'll make Medusa regret her life change. She'll resent the gods so much she'll come back to me."

She'd done one good thing in her wretched life. Hades wasn't about to ruin it. "I thought no god could undo what another god has done. Aphrodite is the one who fixed her up with the new look, not you. You can't take it away."

"I can make her suffer. I can make them all suffer."

Megara nodded. "Just being you around is enough. How about you give me a plan I can actually follow? Unless your real plan is to bore me to death."

Hades snapped his fingers.

Megara felt a change instantly but only recognized it was that he'd changed her back into her usual dress in a blink when he released her from the chains.

"Walk with me, Meg." One massive, spidery hand clamped around the back of Megara's neck. Hades pushed her forward, forcing her to walk ahead of him into the shadows.

The usual denizens of the Underworld went about their business. Thanatos flew a new batch of souls to the shores of the Styx, Charon ferried them across, and Hecate lazily trained her flying wolves. Megara marched past them all, knowing full well that nothing good waited for her. Hades was never more dangerous than when he seemed pleasant.

"I think you've gotten a bit too comfortable with your cutesy little rebellion act," he told her conversationally. His hand tightened around the back of her neck, making her stumble. "Oops! Don't trip!" Hades shook her, making her wish he'd snap her head off and end it.

A yawning portal loomed ahead. It wasn't Tartarus, but the way the Styx flowed through its opening concerned her. The nearer they got, she discerned the sound of a waterfall. It was deceptive in how slow it was. While most waterfalls rushed and crashed, this one took its time.

Hades brought Megara to a ledge overlooking a whirlpool of Styx water, where countless souls floated in the green haze. He pushed her so close to the edge that her sandals skidded on a jagged rock. The only thing preventing her from falling in was his grip. "Do you see that? For someone so smart, this should be an easy question: where are we?"

Megara stared into the eyes of the drifting souls. All life and hope had drained from them. Young and old, soldiers and civilians. Was that her Aunt Jocasta?

"This is the Vortex of Souls," she forced through trembling lips.

"And what happens to people who disappoint me?"

Megara watched Aunt Jocasta, a queen in life, now halfway down the vortex in the steady drop. Before she could answer, the Styx roared.

Water streamed heavily into the vortex below, bringing with it new souls to join those below. It filled the chamber until some of the water hit Megara's toe. She jerked her foot back, but not in time. Where she touched the water, her skin had gone pale. It was more than the biting cold. She felt as if she'd lost something essential.

"Careful," Hades said, pushing Megara closer to the edge. "Things change around here fast. Mortals need to be cautious."

Through the haze of the souls, she could see the outline of a massive stone skull. Its eyes and mouth gaped open, seeming to drink the souls down into it. The level of the stygian water lowered before her eyes, dragging them all toward that hideous face.

"That's a real beauty, isn't it?" Hades chuckled. "The souls are reset forever down there. In about a hundred years, if I feel like it, those souls can be reborn. Their memories are wiped away, and their personalities evaporate. Everything about them is drained away. Even if they've got a big yap on them and never learn their place!" He gave her a rough shake that forced her over the edge.

Megara flung her hands out to her sides to balance, but it was a set of smoke chains that stopped her from falling.

"I don't have much use for a minion who won't do what she's told," Hades snarled into her ear. "But who knows? One of these days, you might be more useful after a reset! That is if I remember to fish you out from the bottom of that hole. Who even knows how far down it goes?" His grip on her neck relaxed.

Megara flailed, only for the chains to tighten again.

The next time the water rushed past, it flowed over her legs. The current pulled at her with powerful suction. It should have taken her down with it, except that Hades hauled her away and onto her knees.

"How will you thank me?" he asked. Though he kept his tone light, his eyes burned into her with the rage she knew he would have unleashed on Pain and Panic, already.

"For…?" she asked, panting. At any other time, she might have pointed out that he was the one who put her in danger to prove a point, so it wasn't up to her to thank him.

A tendril of smoke curled around Megara's throat. It formed into a chain and tightened while the god bent close to her face. "You're the only person down here intelligent enough to make entertaining conversation. It'd be a pity if you weren't intelligent enough to understand that my patience is less than infinite. Thank me, or you'll see what ungrateful brats get in my Underworld."

"Thank… you…" Megara was shaking now, waiting for the smoke to strangle her. How long after he killed her would he bring her back? Would the year counter go down while she was dead, or would it pause until he felt like letting her try again?

Instead, it loosened.

Hades folded his hands together. "Take all the time you need, but you might want to clean yourself up. You look like you've been through hell."