Percy's dream, part two: Persephone takes the lead in Hades' meeting with Hecate.

Chapter Rating: General Audiences

Content Warning: Sexual Themes (mild)

Word Count: 5264

Just a quick warning--I didn't put it in the trigger warnings, because I never even use the word, but I do imply via Greek Myth that a rape took place. Basically, if you've read the myth, Persephone's the result of Zeus raping Demeter via snake transformation (i am soooo not making this up). So... it's mentioned that Zeus doesn't really want Persephone on Olympus because she's a reminder to Demeter about said event. I don't use the word, and I don't describe it. It's just kinda there, so...

Also, worth repeating: I use less common versions of the myths in this chapter; please don't get mad at me because you think it might be wrong. I can't actually cite this source, since it's from a print-out my Mythology teacher gave to me months ago, and I've since lost said print out, but this isn't a school report, so even if I get some of the details wrong, I remember the gist quite well (#photographicmemoriesareboss).

So... yeah. Just trust me on dis!

And all the characters are owned by J.K. Rowling, or Rick Riordan.

____________________PERCY____________________

Percy's mind was racing, reeling, and generally freaking out as he watched the scene unfolding in front of him.

Nico's missing?! How can Hades not find him?! Hecate's magic is somehow involved?! Why does Hades suspect Hecate of kidnapping Nico?!

Oh, yeah. And what on OLYMPUS is Hades so scared of?!

Outside the son of Poseidon's thoughts, things were just as chaotic. Hecate, in all her blazing glory, looked downright murderous. The pockets of Greek Fire had taken over her whole body; her hair and dress were both completely aflame, her torchlets (Percy wasn't as good as Hazel at naming things) had enveloped her arms, and her headdress and eyes both burned iron-hot.

Hades and Persephone bore the same expressions as they'd had most of the dream, but, seeing how they'd already looked ready to kill, that didn't say much. It made sense why Persephone would've suspected her husband of acting without thought; if Nico were missing... the last time he'd disappeared without a trace, he'd ended up in Tartarus, then a bronze jar. As for her own anger, even if a lot of it was likely for Hades' sake, Percy knew the Queen of the Underworld had warmed up to her stepson... well, she didn't want to kill him, anyway. Which, in the gods' world, was as good as an "I love you."

The only thing that didn't make sense was why Hades was holding back. Persephone, Percy understood; she'd always been a voice of reason in her domain. But Hades? The only time Hades ever held his temper was when someone or something (translation: Persephone and/or threat of Lightning War) held him back. As far as Percy knew, Zeus still had his Master Bolt, and, based on the conversation Percy had seen before Hecate arrived, Persephone had nothing to do with this sudden control of temper.

So... why now? Hades, what's keeping you so calm?

"I won't stand here and listen to these accusations!" Hecate roared, flames rushing forward to frame her figure, extending so far forward they almost touched the foot of Hades' throne. "You're a coward, Hades! You dare blame me for your incompetence as a father--"

Hades started to rise, but a dark, thorned vine with black roses instantly grew around his waist, holding him back. Persephone shot him a warning glance, instructing him to keep his temper under control. He begrudgingly stopped resisting the vine, and it slithered away from his lap.

"--and do so in the depths of your realm, where you're master, instead of in front of the council, where you'd be responsible for such lies?! Apologize at once, or you will pay for this--this weakness!"

"Explain, then," Persephone challenged her, taking over for her fuming husband. Which was smart, since all the thorned vines in the world didn't look like they'd keep Hades from cutting up Hecate Kronos-style.

"I will explain nothing," Hecate vowed. "I expected such a slight on my honor from your husband, Persephone, but you?! Against me, your only visitor--your only friend--during your time in the Underworld?!"

"Millennia ago, Hecate," Persephone reminded her. "You haven't paid me company since before the fall of Rome."

"If it weren't for me, you would never see the sun!" Hecate screamed, her fury mounting to Hades' level of dangerous. "You would be nothing more than a kidnapped goddess, a fallen beauty, a tale mothers use to warn their daughters of handsome strangers and careless, ditzy, immature bimbos!"

Then came the final moment; the calm before the tsunami crashed to shore. Silence fell over the three gods. Hades, furious, terrified, desperate, worried, and now dying to spring to his wife's defense. Hecate, enraged, fuming, insulted, dishonored, vengeful, and pushed to harsh words by a sense of disloyalty and unappreciation of her gifts.

But, no one doubted--for even a second--who was going to initiate the challenge, who was going to lay down the law and defend her honor.

Like spring itself, Persephone was a sweet, innocent beauty. She was gentle, kind, the break of dawn after weeks of snow and ice. She was the warmth of the April sun on your cheek, the fever of joy at the first March day that hit sixty-five degrees. She had the appearance of a sixteen-year-old girl, with long, soft, dark brown hair that curled into waves as gentle as a spring breeze. Everything about her was gentle, soft, youthful, and light: glossy, pink lips, bright, golden eyes, pale, baby-soft skin... it wasn't hard to see why she'd caught Hades' eye millennia ago; she was such a contrast to the constant, harsh darkness of his realm.

But, for the first time, Percy remembered the moodiness of spring, how it ran on pure emotion, shifting back and forth from hot to cold at a moment's notice. Like spring, Persephone's moods were, in general, harmless expressions of teenage rebellion, and only in the face of her mother, Demeter, or father, Zeus. An annoyance at most, like a day of sunny warmth, followed by a week of cold rains.

That didn't mean that spring always kept things harmless, though. On that rare day, its controlled and gentle kindness gave way to the unimaginable. Spring wasn't just the beginning of life anew, but the birth of hurricanes, tornadoes, droughts, floods, thunderstorms. Too much cold or sudden warmth or influx of insects kills the crops, causing famine that starves thousands, which gives rise to plague, to poverty, to war.

Like that March day right before the Storm of the Century, Persephone's appearance didn't change; she was as gentle and youthful and beautiful as ever. But, though not one inch of her face or body had shifted the slightest amount, something behind her distant and cold stare carried the paralysis powers of ten drakons.

"Permission to speak my mind to your guest, my lord?" Persephone asked.

Hades didn't dare deny her. He nodded his head, wariness in the small movement, knowing what was about to happen. He met Hecate's eye, and the message was clear:

You really shouldn't have said that.

"Let me make one thing clear, Hecate," Persephone began, her eyes as dark and cold as a March storm, "I am not--nor will I ever be--nothing but a 'kidnapped goddess.' You want to use that legend against my virtue, fine, but first, know what you're talking about. "

Hecate opened her mouth to respond, but a flash from Hades' eyes kept her silent.

Anything you say will make this worse, Hecate, his eyes warned. You pissed her off, you ran your mouth, now deal with the consequences, before her anger and father's power bring a tornado to my realm.

"Because of the events of my birth, my mother didn't trust the male gods. She practically declared me a maiden goddess for all eternity before I could speak. Any time even the most minor god attempted speaking to me, she'd appear before them and scare them off. And that's not even to mention how little freedom I had. The only time I ever left her side was when her nymphs took me to the mortal world and babysat me while they picked flowers and spoke to other nature spirits in the meadows. So I went whenever I could, to get a moment to myself. I enjoyed the sun, the sky, the freedom--that idea that I went for the 'pretty flowers' came from Demeter's bitterness long after Hades and I married."

Percy started to gather why this was such a touchy subject. Persephone only had a few famous myths: her birth, her marriage, that one time she cheated on Hades, and that one time a demigod hero played music to make her cry. None of them painted her as anything more than a dumb blond or a jealous wife; if her whole nature and most famous myth--one of the most famous myths in all of Greek mythology--no longer resembled the truth... and she'd had an aeon to get more and more pissed about it...

"All the gods knew I wanted to marry, just to finally have a chance at freedom. I didn't care who, I just wanted to escape. But, no god was brave enough to try for my hand, even if they found me attractive, because of my mother's temper.

"He stumbled on me in the meadows on the rare day he ascended into the mortal world and became infatuated with my beauty. He returned, day after day, to watch me with the nymphs, never realizing I was the off-limits Persephone. He overheard me speaking to one of my handmaidens one day, complaining about my lack of suitors and desire to marry. I mentioned Mother by name; he realized who I was and that he could have me. So, he went to my father to ask for permission to make me his bride."

Persephone let out a harsh laugh, like the sound of branches snapping in a harsh wind.

"Zeus had so many children with so many women, he'd become the god of absent fathers. Marriage would relieve him of what little responsibilities he had to me, and marriage to the God of the Underworld meant he'd never have to see me, and Demeter wouldn't have a constant reminder of his violation of her. He knew she'd never bless any union he picked out for me, so he convinced Hades to kidnap me to the Underworld, so I'd marry him, and Demeter wouldn't know until after I was Queen.

"They waited until my mother was far away, and I left with my nymph bodyguards for the meadows. Zeus warmed the sky to exhaust my handmaidens with thirst, and they soon fell into a deep sleep. As a goddess, the heat didn't affect me like it did them; in fact, I almost didn't notice it. All I knew was that I was alone at last. I ran as fast as my legs could take me, drunk on freedom, tempting myself with images of escape, convincing myself I could outrun Demeter. Even if I couldn't, the thrill of trying was too glorious to deprive myself of. I'm a goddess of nature; we're all free spirits. We can't live in a cage for long."

Her last sentence was the first that betrayed her profound sense of fury. There was only a drop of bitterness in them, a pinch of anger, but that was enough to scare the other two gods. Hades, no doubt thanking Olympus that wasn't directed at him, acquired a sudden interest in the hems of his robes. Hecate had already been fighting not to wilt under Persephone's glare; with that dangerous hint of hostility, she lost the battle. Her eyes widened--only a tiny bit, only for a millisecond--but it was enough. From her expression, Hecate was starting to clue in on what had brought Persephone to such a tangent... and it terrified her as much as the meeting scared Hades.

"But, my father was able to manipulate his grandmother, Gaea, in her sleep to wear me down for Hades. I'd run into a secluded valley, far from anyone, magical or mortal. Zeus grew flowers with such intoxicating smells they hypnotized me into stopping to pick them. When I pulled the flower from the Earth, I caused a slight disruption in Hades' realm. He knew that was around the area where I often visited, so he knew it was likely I, and went to claim his bride.

"He erupted from the ground right in front of me, with his chariot and horses and sword at his side. I only saw the helmet that covered his face, engraved with the kind of grotesque imagery Demeter never exposed me to. Caught off guard, I screamed and fell to the ground."

Persephone gave her husband an amused glance, the drakon aura fading long enough from the room for Hades to make his first comment. "My mistake, to wear the helmet. But, it at least got a reaction from you; made sure you'd remember me."

"As a demon," Persephone reminded him with snarky amusement.

Maybe they're less of an odd-couple than most give them credit for.

"He realized the obvious and took off the helmet. I stopped screaming on the ground; I'd never seen him before, I had no idea who he was, and yet he seemed to know me. I was curious, this was the first stranger I'd ever met."

Her eyes were still on Hades, and her amusement turned into a kind of nostalgia. "He waited for me to calm down, and ask who he was. He said, 'I am Hades, Lord of the Underworld. I love you.'" She gave a soft smile in his direction, and for a second she looked just like her old self, the youthful beauty of spring, the light of Demeter's life.

Then, she turned back to Hecate--still paralyzed with shock, anger, and fear--and resumed her terrifying, indifferent, challenging rage. Hades didn't lower his eyes again. Instead, he watched his wife with wary eyes. He knew what was coming next; he'd lived through it, after all.

"Most retellings of the story just end it there, instead of finishing the conversation. Now, it states that I just screamed again, and he grabbed me, no doubt filling in for the abrupt ending over the millennia. But, why does no god on Olympus ever question why I'd fall in love with Hades if he were my kidnapper first? There was no Stockholm Syndrome in Ancient Greece, so they all just assume I was some stupid, submissive innocent who fantasized about a strong, powerful man to sweep me off my feet. Like you do, Hecate. I hate to inform you, but you couldn't be more wrong."

She snarled her last few words of her sentence at Hecate, which, coupled with her hostile aura and haughty demeanor, went past drakon bad, and into Khione territory.

"You know what happened next, what no ever seems to remember? I stared at him in surprise. He watched me, unable to control his nerves, unable to take his eyes off of me, waiting for me to say something. Finally, I managed, 'I've never seen you before. How do you love me?'

"'I've watched you,' he admitted to me, lowering his eyes in shame. 'In the mortal world. I know you're Persephone, daughter of my brother Zeus and Demeter.'

"I kept silent; Hades assumed shock or repulsion had taken over me, because of the stalking. And, yes, I had my issues with that, but I was more confused than anything else. Mother forbade all talk of Hades around me, she, like the rest of them, decided him a cruel, angry, moody, dangerous god, obsessed with death, darkness, and torture. They acted as though he chose Erebos, instead of Zeus demanding it when he, Poseidon, and my husband divided up the world. Demeter decided her daughter shouldn't know about such a 'disgusting' man. I didn't even know he was a major god until he referred to his relation to my father, much less that he was one of the brothers, with near unlimited power and control over the dark, shadows, and Erebos.

"He realized, from my silence and confused stare, that I'd never heard of him before. He explained how he was unwelcome on Olympus and banished to his realm under the Earth. 'No one can enter Erebos unless I let them,' he told me. 'Even if Demeter found you, she couldn't get you, unless I allow her to.' And I knew he wouldn't let her in without my permission. I could already see the depth of which he cared for me, even though we'd never spoken before. He respected me, and, despite my then lower status, viewed me as his equal, instead of a subservient being like my father, or a young daughter to protect, like my mother. So, I smiled at him, I took his hand, and I said, 'then make me your bride.' So, yes, he captured me... if consensual capture isn't an oxymoron.

"You heard that one scream, and assumed kidnap without any more information. I know your spells told you nothing; Hades and I together made sure to cover our trail with his dark magic and my nature. You told my mother --my overprotective, insane mother who refused to let anyone speak to me--that someone kidnapped me. It was so reasonable to her; it justified and strengthened her conclusion that I was some naïve little girl to protect. So, when Helios embellished what he'd seen from his chariot for some woman in a tavern, she decided it was the truth, and her stubbornness set in. She wouldn't believe anything else, even if I told her otherwise.

"Meanwhile, I married Hades in his palace. I became Queen of the Underworld, a goddess, rather than a goddess's daughter. At last, I had freedom from my mother; Hades let me do as I pleased. But, while I'd chosen the Underworld, it became a different kind of prison. Hades and I knew that if I so much as took a breath of fresh air on the surface world, Demeter would sense my presence and take me back. She'd never let me back into the mortal world without her by my side; though I'd taken a husband, I'd never see him again, and wouldn't be able to use marriage to escape again. I couldn't get married twice.

"Hades, proving more and more unlike any god I'd ever met, refused to call me his bride. His love for me hadn't waned after I joined him in his realm--in fact, it grew from its original obsessive infatuation to something much more lasting--but he wasn't delusional. He married me because he loved me, I married him because he offered me freedom. I didn't love him, and he refused to act otherwise. I would've performed any wifely duty he asked of me, but he forbade me from doing so unless I fell for him in return. 'You're my Queen,' he kept saying, 'And my love. But, I don't like pretending you feel the same way. If I am to have you, I won't have you from a sense of duty.'

"That didn't mean he didn't try to win my affections, of course. Before, Hades couldn't speak to me, in case Mother found out and attacked him. Now, he had all the time in the world to woo me, until Demeter realized I wasn't coming back and swore on the River Styx to allow me my freedom. Every day, he sent me bouquets of dazzling jewels, shaped like the flowers I could no longer see. He taught me my duties as Queen of the Underworld and allowed me the kind of power I'd only dreamed of as a forgotten princess of Zeus. Sometimes, I'd go whole days without seeing him, but I would always meet him at the ends of the day, when he ate his evening meal. I couldn't eat Underworld food without being stuck there forever, oath or no oath. But, I enjoyed his company, so I sat at the table night after night.