For a moment, Megara saw her body beneath her. She had left Hercules's arms and now rested in those of Thanatos.

"My friend, I will adorn you with the graces owed to you when you arrive in the Underworld," Thanatos assured her. "You will not be ridiculed for the sacrifice you made for your precious ones."

Megara could only stare down at her pale, blood-streaked countenance, which Hercules clutched along with all three of their children. Had she the eyes to cry, she would join him in weeping. Her final expression was one of solemnity. She looked much like the statue of a goddess.

If only…

Rhea looked up at her, and raised a hand to her. "It is not over," she said, and clasped Megara's limp, spectral hand in hers. The goddess's power surged through Megara's psyche.

"We go no further, friend," Thanatos whispered to her, and gave her a hug. "I've harvested you twice, but never again. When we see one another next, it will be as equals."

What did he mean by that?

Thanatos answered that internal question she didn't have the wherewithal to ask by slowly lowering her to join them.

Her skin, clammy and taut, warmed as she sensed the touch of her family all around her. The goddesses had swaddled the boys while she was separated from them, and now each one of them had begun to glow as tiny, furious gods in their father's arms. Their thick hair was marred with her blood but their skin glowed nonetheless. She had done what she resolved to do, and now her second golden apple wish was hers. She'd gotten what she deserved.

Hercules's tears mingled with her sweat in her hair, and she wished she could speak to reassure him her heart was beating again. But that was not the end, either.

A light appeared, warm and powerful, from within her body. It was more than her racing heart beat which pumped fresh blood through her. Not blood, she realized: ichor.

Her heart and her lungs were full and her very bones illuminated.

This caught Hercules and Harmonia's attention.

"Meg?" Hercules gasped softly.

Her eyes caught his. She didn't know what was happening, but it frightened her. She could feel the ichor which had once been his coursing through her veins, and she knew that now, she was simultaneously herself and something more.

Hercules clasped her hand in his while Harmonia screamed "Mama!" in her ear and held onto her hair.

"Mmm," was her best attempt at telling them she was fine, but it was unnecessary.

The light from within Megara lifted her into the air. Hercules stood to his full height, still holding her hand, and Harmonia hung on stubbornly. Rhea and Hera each held one of the twins while she floated over her loved ones, desperate to return to the stool or the bed, where things made sense. But no, the cosmos had other plans.

Light flooded everywhere in the room so brilliant that she expected it to hurt her eyes.

Instead, the flashing brilliance was full of color that she had never known to comprehend before, and seemed to speak to her with its very presence.

She was more than a woman who'd died twice, though that was remarkable enough for one lifetime.

Now, she was a goddess. But goddess of what?

Her answer was delayed by Harmonia wrapping herself around her neck whispering, "Don't go away again."

Megara wrapped her newly-luminous arm around the girl and let herself sink back to the ground. She would have hit the bed again, but Hercules firmly coiled her and Harmonia into his arms.

"I thought I'd lost you," he whispered. "Gods, I wouldn't have known how to go on without you… And now… I never will!"

It didn't seem real.

In her experience, death was like going to sleep, and hearing something going on in the next room through a dream. Rather than anything of that kind, this experience heightened her every sense and made her feel that not only could she better feel through her body, but she could also better control it.

Gone was the emptiness she felt inside from the evacuation of her sons. She was curled in Hercules's arms, healed from all travails of labor and pregnancy, though with some of the benefits he so enjoyed.

"Is this okay?" she whispered to him.

"What do you mean?" Hercules appeared baffled.

"I mean…" She looked around. Everyone had seen that. It must be real, from the way they were staring at her. "Am I really allowed to be a goddess?"

"Of course!" Hercules dove in for another kiss. "Don't ever doubt that. If anyone ever earned it, we did. Never forget how much we did to get here."

This wasn't death. It was life. Abundant, everlasting life surrounded by more love than her heart had ever known it could comprehend. And somehow, it was for her.

"Everything is perfect," Hercules's voice echoed in her ears, and he drew her in for a kiss. "Finally."