Of Thorns and Bones: Hades and Persephone Duet Read online

  Of Thorns and Bones

  The Hades and Persephone Duet: Book 1

  Heloise Hull

  Henwin Press LTD

  Contents

  A Note on Grammar

  Of Thorns and Bones

  Prologue

  1. Persephone

  2. Hades

  3. Persephone

  4. Persephone

  5. Persephone

  6. Hades

  7. Persephone

  8. Hades

  9. Persephone

  10. Hades

  11. Persephone

  12. Hades

  13. Persephone

  14. Hades

  15. Persephone

  16. Persephone

  17. Hades

  18. Hades

  19. Persephone

  20. Hades

  21. Hades

  22. Persephone

  23. Hades

  24. Hades

  25. Hades

  26. Persephone

  27. Hades

  28. Persephone

  29. Persephone

  30. Hades

  31. Persephone

  32. Persephone

  33. Hades

  34. Persephone

  35. Hades

  36. Hades

  37. Persephone

  38. Hades

  39. Persephone

  40. Persephone

  41. Hades

  42. Persephone

  43. Hades

  44. Persephone

  45. Hades

  46. Persephone

  47. Hades

  48. Persephone

  49. Hades

  50. Hades

  51. Persephone

  52. Hades

  53. Hades

  54. Persephone

  55. Hades

  56. Persephone

  57. Persephone

  58. Hades

  59. Persephone

  60. Persephone

  61. Hades

  62. Persephone

  63. Persephone

  64. Hades

  65. Hades

  66. Persephone

  67. Hades

  68. Hades

  Afterword

  About the Author

  A Note on Grammar

  There are special rules for possessive nouns that are from the classical tradition, i.e. Socrates, Hades, Zeus. If a noun has two or more syllables, it only needs an apostrophe. If a noun only has one syllable, it needs an apostrophe and an S.

  Socrates’ writings

  Ramesses’ spear

  Zeus's thunderbolts

  Hades’ Helm

  Technically, Zeus needs an apostrophe and an s but I thought it would look wrong to readers if Hades didn’t have the extra s and I’m fairly certain most of you don’t care about Merriam-Webster and their rules, so I didn’t do that. Apologies if you do care.

  Plural possessive Nouns MW

  Of Thorns and Bones

  Hades and Persephone as you’ve never seen them before… where the attraction and grudges are as ancient as the gods.

  It’s been hundreds of years since I last stepped foot in the Underworld. I crave its cold embrace, and I miss my subjects.

  But Hades hates me. Frankly, he has every right after all I’ve done. Still, I desperately need to get home.

  He ignores my pleas, so I do what any jilted wife would do. I sneak into the Underworld, breaking every rule that has been in place since our separation.

  The moment my feet touch his land, Hades senses my presence. I tell him I’m sorry and—I can’t even finish the sentence before I’m in his dungeon.

  But I have a secret, and I refuse to rot with the demons. No more nice flower goddess. I am the Dread Queen.

  Indulge in this new twist on the Hades and Persephone myth. An intense romance that begins with Of Thorns and Bones and concludes with Of Flames and Thrones. Perfect for fans who want C.N. Crawford to have a baby with K.F. Breene.

  Flectere si nequeo superos,

  Acheronta movebo.

  If I cannot bend Heaven,

  Then I shall move Hell.

  Virgil. Aeneid. In the Mouth of Juno.

  Prologue

  Hades

  If my name makes your neck bristle and your body shudder, it is not because of me.

  It is because of her.

  I would prefer to let you go. Go, die. Let the worms eat your soul.

  If you fear me, it is only because she gave you hope of a life after death. It can hardly be my fault that it was a lie. Instead, the blinding pain of mortality ends, and I am standing over you. I may look different than you expected or speak a tongue you can’t quite match, but you still understand.

  I am the balance of life and death, and you are standing on the edge of it.

  Right now, I may be a breeze on your neck or simply a feeling creeping up your spine. You believe someone is watching you.

  I assure you, I am much more concerned with other things. You don’t need to shake and tremble and beg. You may try to ask for her, but she is gone. I am your judge. I am your salvation. And I am laid bare.

  Abandon hope, all ye who enter here.

  For she didn’t merely mislead you. She betrayed me, too.

  I am not violent. I am not a terrifying beast. I am merely nothing. You may think of me as the god of absence.

  It is she you should fear.

  1

  Persephone

  Varna, Bulgaria

  Summer, 2001 CE.

  The god of death was watching me. I could feel his gaze linger. Good, let him enjoy the show.

  The manticore dressed in a stolen Adidas tracksuit accessorized with fake gold chains and a white baseball hat was also watching me. But he didn’t know better. He was too busy congratulating himself for finding such an easy target.

  Music pulsed from the row of nightclubs in the resort district, reverberating through my skull and making my chest thump as I picked my way over the cobblestones. The Eastern Bloc came alive in the summer, and stilettos clacked loudly as young women tittered and laughed on the arms of the wealthy oil tycoons and contractors vacationing on the Black Sea.

  I swerved into a darkened alley and took stock. Two rats throbbed with life energy, and another teetered on the brink of life and death. A mortal registered five meters away at the edge of the chain link fence, but he was walking fast the opposite way.

  As for the manticore? Well, he simply radiated death.

  The demon rimmed his lips with a blood red tongue and smiled with two, bright gold teeth that I knew were fake because I’d sold them to him last week. A tiny wave of apprehension skated over my skin, leaving goosebumps to pimple my arms. Finally, what I’d been waiting for. A chance.

  I’d been waiting for something to come. Not exactly him. Manticores were nasty creatures. They took joy in ripping off the limbs of mortals one by one to suck the marrow from the sticky centers of the bones. Add my forbidden magic to the mix, and I was downright irresistible. A mystery. Something to be savored and devoured all at once.

  My advice? Always let them underestimate you.

  My pulse thrummed at my throat as the warm summer breeze off the bay kissed the backs of my knees. The manticore moved closer.

  “I knew something smelled off about you,” the manticore said, stumbling a little as he entered my orbit. He didn’t notice his misstep, though. Instead, he stood watching me, his eyes dilating in his excitement. The gold chains around his neck jangled together like a delightful sea shanty. “The moment I stepped foot into that pawn shop, I said to myself, I said, ‘there’s something off about that one.’ And I’m never wrong.”


  Resisting the urge to roll my eyes, I put my hands together in a prayer position. “Oh please, good sir.” Here I winced. That might’ve been laying it on thick. When was the last time ‘good sir’ was in vogue? I couldn’t keep track. “Oh please, sir. Why don’t you swing by the pawn shop tomorrow? I’ll give you a real good price. Whatever you want. Jewelry, watches, more teeth. All yours.”

  “Cute. But you know what I want.” His red tongue skimmed his lips again. “I’d rather you not scream. Others might hear, and then I’d have to share you. Trust me. You do not want to be shared, girl.”

  Girl. That word. It was abhorrent to me in the old tongue. It was equally detestable in any language, and the very reason I refused to ever look younger than thirty in any incarnation. Believe me, I did not look like a girl. I looked like a woman in her mid-thirties who was tired of putting up with handsy tourists. I even had the crows’ feet from frowning to prove it.

  My patience for playing the gullible part pulled at the threads. While it was true that I was practically neutered in this realm and my stockpile of hoarded magic dwindling by the week, I was still a goddess. I let my cloak of magic diffuse in rose petal pink and enjoyed the way my prey’s eyes feasted on it.

  He wanted me. Badly.

  “What’s a girl like you doing with magic like that in this realm?” he asked.

  Hm. So perhaps not as thick as I thought. Honestly, he didn’t look like he had two brain cells to rub together to keep himself warm. And there it was, again. That abhorrent word.

  “Black market,” I tried, stretching my toes in preparation to lunge.

  “Nah. I know everyone that comes through. You? Never heard, seen, nor sensed you before.”

  I lifted an eyebrow. “Oh do you?”

  The manticore picked his lion fangs with a sharpened bone. “Yeah. I do.” He tossed it over his shoulder to clatter against the cobblestones and cracked his neck in both directions. He shook out his mane as he transformed from mafia to manticore. His hands widened into paws the size of my head, and a serpent’s tail flicked back and forth. I had the distinct feeling he wanted to whip me with it first.

  Good luck, buddy.

  The goddess inside of me wanted to obliterate him with carefully curated death magic, but the been-too-long-on Earth goddess settled on jabbing my fingers into his windpipe and flipping his body over my shoulder as he gagged and coughed.

  He squealed in surprise as his tracksuit tore along the rough stones before scrambling back to his feet. Instead of warning him off, my attack enraged him. He had no caution whatsoever, which suited me fine. I lifted my chin in a quick, jerking movement, egging him on.

  “That wasn’t very ladylike,” he commented.

  “Oh good. I thought for a second I was being too delicate.”

  The manticore narrowed his eyes, but I tossed a lentil seed at him, willing it to sprout before he could flick his deadly tail again. My seed somersaulted through the air, spreading its arms like some grotesque but adorable alien. They curled around the manticore’s head and clung tight as he stomped through the alley, roaring and demolishing dumpsters. I smiled grimly as the network of shoots finally managed to gag him.

  The shoots continued to grow, wrapping their vines around his back and trussing him like a pig ready for slaughter, forcing him to his knees. I couldn’t see his face anymore, but every line of his body twisted in rage.

  For a moment, my body glowed oil-black with my true form. Glittering stars cascaded down my hair and power churned through me. I felt fanged and dangerous, hungry for more—and I liked it. It was sweeter than the ripest strawberry on my tongue, and I savored the power burst.

  “What are you?” he gasped. “I deserve… to know… what slayed me.”

  I bent down to whisper my name in his ear. As his body shuddered one last time, I added. “And I want him to know it was me.”

  Too soon, the power coursing through me dissipated as his essence splintered like dried spaghetti, and he left this world for the next. With it, I sent a prayer: I don’t want your kiss. I don’t want your crown. I want to burn your kingdom to the ground.

  2

  Hades

  The Underworld

  Summer, 2001 CE.

  When I thought of my wife, I imagined cracking her head open like an egg and examining her brain as a priest might do to the entrails of dying virgins.

  Why does she think the way she does? Was the answer written in the lobes and folds, or was it branded on her cortex like a scar? Was this recklessness from some childhood trauma, or was she simply always a brat and I was too blinded by her youth and beauty to see it? How I wished to probe her more deeply. To understand her.

  To crack her.

  “Basileus?”

  King.

  I pulled myself to the present. A map the size of a small mountain glittered in onyx, the lands of the Underworld outlined in gold and the rivers in silver. With a fling of my finger, I moved a few pieces of cabochon rubies representing three phalanxes of Kako demons out of Tartarus and over to the far east bank of the River Styx.

  Thanatos looked up sharply. “All of them, my king?”

  I nodded. “Tartarus is gone. We may as well accept it now and hold what we can.”

  As we spoke, fire bombs rattled the windows of my obsidian castle and blasted a section of the serpentine tunnels. I grimaced at the deaths. They died by two and threes. Waves of energy pulsed against the stone walls, but they held firm. For now.

  “As you wish.” Thanatos turned on his booted heel and went to withdraw his troops.

  Nyx and Hecate paused their conversation. They lived in their black cloaks with fox skull epaulets and Stygian bladed boots, constantly at the ready to do battle. We’d been living in this war room for a week now, although it felt as if no time had passed.

  We were at war. We were at war, and the sirens were drowning. I still tasted the sulfur on my tongue and felt the burn in my lungs and throat from when I’d swam across the Styx, suffocating as the siren’s arms wrapped desperately around my neck. I dragged her to the shore as she convulsed with one last request that I could not honor. Save my babies. If I couldn’t protect my demons, how was I supposed to save anyone?

  “What?” I asked my companions wearily. The diamond of my breastplate sparkled in the light of the flickering reed torches along the walls. Except for the fire crackling in the hearth, the room was deadly still.

  “Have you considered sending messages to Olympus?” Nyx asked carefully. “We have some stores of magic that might make the journey.”

  My jaw ground. I knew what she was asking. “No.”

  Hecate conjured a ball of green light. “I can show you what she’s doing. Perhaps she is—”

  The slam of my fist didn’t startle them, battle-hardened as they were, but it did shut them up as the reverberations echoed through the stone chambers. Hecate’s crow cawed softly at her shoulder, but she stayed silent.

  I straightened the greaves along my arms. “I said no.”

  Nyx retained her mild expression as she called for servants to bring wine and food, although I couldn’t stomach the thought of eating. “You have always been a prudent god. Even mortals say so, despite their fear of death. So you don’t want to consider her. Fine. Then at least consider surprising everyone for once.”

  “Stop being prudent, you mean.”

  “Precisely.”

  “And what did you have in mind?”

  “Besides the idea you dismissed out of hand?” Nyx asked.

  “Preferably.”

  Hecate knocked over a few rubies. “You could cut off access to the Underworld. When the dead begin walking around with no place to go, mortals would take notice.”

  “And what would that achieve?” I asked wearily.

  “How would I know? It’s never been done before. That’s why it’s the opposite of prudent.” Hecate’s face shone with an inner zeal that would make zealots tremble.

  “Leave me to think on this.”
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  “As you wish.”

  Where before the mortals worshipped us Olympians as gods, now they scorned us. Worse? Many had forgotten us, a consequence of their mayfly lifespans. After the Titan war, when the Olympians ousted the Titans from the Heavens and sent the most vengeful of them to Tartarus, the possibility of peace stretched to the horizons, but it was not stable. The Greek golden age lasted only until the end of the Roman Empire when the humans grew tired of the gods’ demands and sided with the demons.

  The Demon War was long and the battles threatened the existence of all. They rent the sky to reach the gods, and eventually, a human was able to unleash the caged Titans and turn the tide of war. Zeus surrendered and the Accords were struck. Humans no longer needed to smoke their sacrifices to him or to any other god. In fact, they no longer needed to recognize us at all.