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“Why are you sorry?”
“I should not have left to go to Poseidon on my own,” she said.
He was quiet. Then he said, “I went to him the day before. I didn’t tell you because I thought you were still angry with me and I…” He let his voice trail off. He hadn’t wanted to disturb her, but it didn’t matter anymore. What was done was done. Now, they had to move forward. “Poseidon does not have Medusa. I’m not sure where she is, but the worst part about her situation is that her power is only active after she’s dead.”
Ariadne met his gaze. “What?”
He had nothing more to say.
“Perhaps it’s best if she stays missing,” Ariadne said after a moment.
Dionysus did not disagree at this point.
Neither of them spoke for several minutes, and Ariadne had gone so quiet, he thought she had fallen asleep.
“I blame myself for what has happened to my sister,” she said, her voice soft. She wasn’t looking at him anymore; her gaze had returned to the ceiling.
“Why?” Dionysus asked, confused.
“Because I introduced them,” she said. “Theseus was…with me first.”
Dionysus bristled, surprised by just how hot his jealousy burned.
“Why didn’t you tell me?” he asked, though that felt like a stupid question. She didn’t have to.
“Because I’m ashamed,” she answered, her voice thick with emotion.
Her words cut through him, and he shifted closer, hovering over her.
“Ari,” he whispered, letting his fingers trail along her cheek. “You have nothing to be ashamed of.”
“I don’t care that he never loved me,” she said. “But I hate that he does not love my sister and that she is so devoted to him. She deserves more. She deserves everything.”
Dionysus studied her, and after a moment, he asked, “And what do you deserve?”
She was quiet.
“Ari?”
“Nothing,” she said, looking at him.
He frowned and started to speak, but Ariadne pressed her fingers to his mouth and shook her head. Tears welled in her eyes and her mouth quivered. After a moment, she managed to speak in a quiet whisper, “Good night, Dionysus.”
CHAPTER XXVIII
HADES
There was a roiling in Hades’s stomach and an ache in the back of his throat. Poseidon had known Persephone’s location; he’d taunted him with images of her broken and beaten body. “You are here fighting for a woman who does not even belong to you while yours suffers at the hands of my sons,” he’d said.
Hades had left.
There was no thought behind what fate he might leave Dionysus and Ariadne to face because he could not shake his fear, and after what had befallen Adonis and Harmonia, he had to know Persephone was okay.
Except that when he appeared in the basement of Club Aphrodisia, he found a bloodbath. Hephaestus was there holding Aphrodite by the shoulders. The Goddess of Love clutched a human heart in her hands. There were bodies strewn about, limbs misshapen and chests gaping. Then there was Persephone, who sat on her knees amid the carnage, the center of a circle of bodies.
None of them were lucky enough to escape her magic—Persephone included.
Her body was torn. It was the only way to describe it. It was the same horror he had witnessed the night she’d mistaken him for Pirithous. She was bent slightly, and as she breathed, her chest rattled.
