“What happened?”
She started to breathe heavier, and as he tilted her head back, her mouth quivered so badly, she couldn’t speak. Hades manifested a glass of wine and held it to her lips as she drank. When she was finished, he nodded.
“Start again,” Hades said. “What happened?”
“Lexa was hit by a car,” she said, and it was as if her breath had been knocked from her lungs.
Her words shocked him because he had not expected them. Despite many humans believing otherwise, Hades did not have a hand in orchestrating life-threatening injuries. Those were designed by the Fates, and while all were tragic, they often served a greater purpose, if not for the victim, for those in their lives.
“She’s in critical condition at Asclepius Community Hospital. She’s on a ventilator. She’s… broken.”
She spoke through tears and stumbled across words laced with pain and disbelief, and while he despaired over Lexa, he hated to see Persephone suffer. Though there was a dark part of him that rose, clawing at the fringes of his mind, bringing on a familiar dread that caused him to fear the direction this conversation might go.
“She doesn’t look like Lexa anymore, Hades.”
She wept harder, and she covered her mouth to contain her cries.
“I’m so sorry, my darling.”
They were the only words he had for her, because there was nothing he could do. Even now, he could feel along Lexa’s thread, which was not cut but rather bent—she was in a state of limbo.
In other words, her soul was undecided.
Persephone twisted to face him as much as she could.
“Hades, please.”
She didn’t need to explain; he knew what she asked. Her eyes were desperate, and because he could not see her like that, he averted his gaze, frustration making his jaw tight.
“Persephone, I can’t.”
He had had this conversation so many times, with mortals he had no personal connection with and gods he held in contempt. He had never faced it with a lover. Even if Hades could save Lexa, the consequences of such actions were dire, especially when the decision to live or die rested with the soul.
She scrambled off his lap, standing a few steps away. He did not try to reach for her.
“I won’t lose her.”
“You haven’t. Lexa still lives.” She was so afraid, it was like she already considered her dead. “You must give her soul time to decide.”
“Decide? What do you mean?”
He sighed, unable to contain the dread he felt at this oncoming conversation.
He answered as he pinched the bridge of his nose, an ache forming at the front of his head for the second time today. “Lexa’s in limbo.”
“Then you can bring her back,” she reasoned.
That was not how limbo worked.
“I can’t.”
“You did it before. You said when a soul is in limbo, you can bargain with the Fates to bring it back.”
“In exchange for the life of another. A soul for a soul, Persephone.”
“You can’t say you won’t save her, Hades.”
He was saying that, as hard as it was to admit. This was a situation of choice on Lexa’s behalf. To interfere, to bring her back when she was not ready, or worse, did not want to come, would mean a harrowing return to the world of the living. The consequences were endless.
“I’m not saying I don’t want to, Persephone. It is best that I do not interfere with this. Trust me. If you care for Lexa at all—if you care for me at all—you will drop this.”
“I’m doing this because I care!”
“That’s what all mortals think—but who are you really trying to save?
Lexa or yourself?”
She wanted to escape the loss and the grief. She didn’t want to think of a life without Lexa, and while he could not blame her, it was never for the living to decide, though they tried often.
“I don’t need a philosophy lesson, Hades,” she sneered.
“No, but apparently you need a reality check.”
He rose to his feet and removed his jacket, and when his fingers moved to the buttons of his shirt, Persephone snapped.
“I’m not having sex with you right now.”
He scowled, frustration making his body feel tight and warm. He shrugged off his shirt and stood bare-chested before her, dropping the glamour he used to hide the black threads marring his body. The newest was a thick band that wrapped around his arm and went across his back. It was Briareus’s, and it had burned a track into his skin as he’d taken the giant’s soul. They were all painful when they were made, but some hurt worse than others, and this one still throbbed.