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The lump in her stomach was dissolving with the warmth and security she felt in his arms.
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“Hades,” she said, her voice filling the quiet room as thoroughly as if she had yelled. “Hades,” she repeated, flicking at the arm draped over her. When he remained asleep, she slapped his arm, the sound of her palm colliding with his skin sharp and stinging, and lifted it by the wrist before flinging it behind him.
Shifting onto his back with the momentum of his arm, Hades grumbled as he woke, “I’m sleeping.”
Persephone rolled over to face him, watching his body lilt precariously toward her as the bed sunk with her movement. Sinking deeper into the mountained blankets beneath them, she struggled to prop herself up on an elbow to look down at him.
“Hades, I want to punish Pelops.”
Black eyes met hers, narrowing as they found her face, as the words tumbled from her mouth.
36
REGRETFULLY, HADES
“No,” he said. His voice was thick with sleep, but firm as ever as he shot her down.
“Yes.” Her face remained gentle, her features soft and buttery, but her eyes were alight, glowing with fury. The deep brown of her irises darkening to a shade he had only ever glimpsed in his own reflection.
“Right now?” He almost whimpered at the thought of leaving his warm, comfortable bed. The pile of blankets was as comfortable as he imagined sleeping on a cloud to be, and sleep was darkening the edges of his vision, beckoning him to sink back into the dreamless place of his mind.
“Yes.” The clear command of her voice was irritating.
“No.” He shut his eyes again, ready to let himself fall back into sleep.
“Hades,” she ground out. He did not have to look at her to know her teeth were clenched and grinding, and the hand that had rested on her hip was wrapped into a tight fist, ready to be used against him if he continued to disregard her.
Rubbing his face roughly, he breathed out a quick, “Why?”
The bed tilted again. Hades felt her move around a moment before the blankets rose higher on either side of them, creating a soft, warm fortress for their bodies.
Finally, just as Hypnos’ hands wrapped around his mind and slunk down his body, weighing his limbs enough that he could barely raise a finger if he wanted to, she spoke.
“Because he deserves more than to wander the Fields for what he has done.”
“Does he, though?” He shifted again as she moved and he blurted, “Hear me out,” before removing the blankets beneath them. Every movement causing them to shift and slip around reminded him of a boat in the ocean, undulating with every wave that washed beneath them. It made him sick.
“Fine,” she said, throwing herself back onto the bed. The air in her lungs blew out in a quiet huff as her body slammed into the few remaining blankets there.
“He is suffering.” Hades stared at the mural above them, rather than at his wife. “He has no thoughts, no motivations. He is forced to wander aimlessly through the Field for eternity, unseeing and unknowing, unable to speak, or touch, or feel anything.” He laid a comforting hand on her shoulder, letting his fingers gently wrap around the curve of it. “All of his senses are lost to him. There is no body, there is barely a soul left of the man who was once Pelops, Persephone.”
Her eyes burned into him as she ground her jaw back and forth. For a moment she looked as if she might say something, but she kept her jaw clenched tight and her eyes never wavered from his.
“I do not believe he is worthy of less, and I believe I made that clear when I hung and killed him in front of you,” he took a sharp breath, waiting for her to cut into him for that again; but she was silent, “and when I brought him back to you, only to show his accelerated decomposition. I ensured that he was aware of it all, Persephone.”
He dragged his fingers down the soft, velvety skin of the inside of her arm, drawing circles on the inside of her wrist before holding her hand. As he linked their fingers, he raised them up and kissed the back of her hand, turning to face her. Softening his eyes and his voice, he said, “I do not see a reason to torture him further.”
The Fields were created specifically for this purpose. Those undeserving of more than he initially puts them through are sent to the Fields to rot away. It had been exhausting running his realm for the first few decades after it fell into his hands, his days filled with torture and torment, screaming and blood curdling wails. In the Fields they were silent, and did all the work themselves, and if he stopped the entire system of the Underworld, it could collapse.
He was not about to let one miserable soul ruin the world he had created.
The skin of Persephone’s cheeks went taut and she yanked her hand from his loose grasp. “And I do not see a reason not to.”
Hades sighed. It was clear he could not argue with her on the matter. “I will think about it.” And I think not, he finished in his head. No point in pissing her off more than he had already.
“I don’t need your permission. I am Queen, and fortunately for me that title comes with perks. Neither your presence nor your agreement is required for me to do or decide anything here, Hades.” Her words were clipped and harsh, her eyes as black as night, from rage or the dark room, he was not sure.
