‘Sit down,’ I say. ‘Tempest!’
Hades eyes me warily but sits down again and Tempest appears before us.
She crosses her arms, her weight on one hip, and glares at me. She’s so hazy, more solid than the humans but also even greyer.
‘You rang, my lady,’ she mocks.
‘I think I can send you back to the mortal world,’ I say before I can get too lost in whether it’s something I really can do. I need to feel that rush again and I need Hades to witness it.He’s seen me in ways no one else has, deeper even than Styx or the nymphs or my mortal friends. If he sees me like this too, maybe it will truly feel like reality.
‘What?’ she breathes, eyes snapping to Hades. ‘Is this true?’
Hades shakes his head like he doesn’t know how to answer. ‘I’m not sure but apparently so.’
I shrug. ‘No guarantees, but it’s worth a shot.’
She nods eagerly. She already seems more alive than before.
I offer my hand and she takes it. All I feel is a sudden drop in temperature, maybe the distant echo of wind, like a seashell to my ear.
I focus. This should be easy, given all I have done. Hades says it takes years but I don’t think that’s true – it just takeshimyears.
I don’t close my eyes this time but stare deep into Tempest’s until something tugs at my core. I pull that thread until it becomes taut.Life, I think. That one word is so glorious, so impossibly incomparable.
Tempest gasps as colour rushes into her. ‘You did –’
And then she’s gone.
I stare at the empty space where she once stood.
‘By the Styx, I didn’t even think.’ I bring a shaky hand to my mouth. ‘I should have said goodbye, should have forced a hug on her, I just … Fates, it worked.’
Hades nods slowly. ‘Um, yes. It appears to have worked.’ He’s staring, unblinking, at the space where Tempest was standing and the words seem to have tumbled from his lips without thought.
‘Hey.’ I wave my hands to get his attention. ‘Are you okay?’
He startles. ‘It would have taken me years to channel that power.’
‘You aren’t the goddess of life.’
He stands, walks round to the front of his desk uncertainly and leans against it. ‘And this … you say this is something you can do more of?’
‘I made all the human souls whole,’ I tell him.
‘Allof them?’
I’d love to tease it out but I’m too excited to linger on dramatics. ‘Yes. And I think I can create the afterlife. It’s easy, Hades. I’ve connected to it or embraced it and Hecate thinks I can do enormous things.’
‘Hold on,’ he says. ‘Let me wrap my head round this.’ I give him a moment to lose himself in his thoughts and, when he looks up, it’s as though he’s seeing me for the first time. ‘I knew you were powerful. This is something else.’
‘I know.’
‘And you can create the afterlife? You know how to do it?’
‘Yes,’ I say, a little quieter, a little less confident. ‘I just didn’t want to do it without you.’
‘Oh,’ he breathes.
I thought this would be easier. I’d felt so settled, so sure of what I wanted, but in front of Hades I realize I still feel lost. But I want him in my life again. I know that.
