“If it makes you feel better to believe that, go ahead,” he says. “Do you want to take me up on my offer or not?”
To help Isabel.
Oh gods. Here I am thinking of straddling him when I should only be thinking of what happened. I’m so all over the place right now. Out of control.
“Yes.” My next words come out on a harsh, accusatory whisper. “No one deserves to die that way.”
He searches my eyes. “No.”
“These Labors are fucked-up.”
“I know.”
“We’re not disposable,” I tell him, anger burning away the last of my despair. “Mortals. You gods toy with us like you think we are.”
Hades lets loose a sigh almost as heavy as I feel. “The others do because for them, mortals come and go. Blips. If you think about the lifespan of a butterfly from a mortal’s perspective, so short compared to yours…” He shrugs. “You think of it as a beautiful but doomed thing that is here, then gone too fast to get attached.”
“But we don’t delight in crushing that beautiful thing under our bootheel, either.”
Hades doesn’t defend himself or his fellow deities, and I lift my gaze to study his face, what’s behind the look he’s giving me. “You said the others do,” I say slowly.
His brows twitch up. “So?”
“You don’t think of mortals like that?”
“No.”
“Why not?”
That expression, the lost one, returns. “Because they all come to me in the end.” Those nine words are so laden with burden, I don’t know how they don’t crush him.
It hits me for the very first time that the King of the Underworld is exactly that. A king. The ruler of every soul ever to believe in the Greek gods and end up in his realm after they die. A ruler who must punish and reward the lives those souls lived. A ruler who must know the heartbreak of the people left behind in the mortal world when a loved one passes, because he’ll see those souls, too, eventually.
“We’re not butterflies to you,” I whisper. “We’re eternity.”
His eyes flare briefly with something savage, but he doesn’t speak.
My eyebrows draw together as I think through that, shaking my head. “But you forced me into the Crucible like you didn’t give a flying—”
“I believed you were strong enough to survive the Crucible. There are other reasons, but I did think that.” He winces. Hades actually winces. “I didn’t realize you’d have such a soft heart under that tough shell, though. I’m sorry.”
I stare at him.
“What?” he asks.
“You apologized.” Astonishment rolls through me. “I didn’t know gods could do that.”
His mouth crooks to one side, flashing a hint of the dimple there. “Don’t let it go to your head, my star.”
“Right.” The endearment makes a little part of me think maybe he must care a tiny bit to bother, if only in a vague, guilty way.
I’m not sure how to feel about that. It’s easier to think of him as a callous, selfish, even malicious deity who is just playing his games at any expense. Particularly mine.
“You were really mad at me,” I whisper. What pit of the Underworld did that come from?
Hades shakes his head. “I was…” He glances away. “Frustrated. When I’m truly mad, you’ll know it.”
I’d rather not. “You can really make Isabel’s afterlife…nice?”
“Yes.”
My chin wobbles annoyingly. “Thank you for that.”
After only the briefest hesitation, he gives a single nod. Then he gets us both on our feet, setting me a little bit away from him. The discomfort of my sodden clothes finally penetrates, and I shiver, plucking at my shirt.
He glances down over me, and I try not to feel the prickles that follow in the wake of his gaze. Unaware of my struggle, Hades snaps his fingers. And now we’re both in a dry change of clothes, and I might as well have showered, I’m so clean, though my short hair is also dry. I’m wearing jeans, like he is, along with my tactical vest over a tailored white button-down rolled up at the sleeves. Imagine the amount of time that handy trick would save every day.
“I was so looking forward to another soak in the tub,” I grumble more to myself than to him.
Hades shrugs like he didn’t think of that. “You’d have just wallowed and cried in there.”
“No. That’s not me at all.” Although neither is the way I’ve been reacting since I showed up here. Embarrassment warms my cheeks.
Trying to look anywhere but at him, I glance around the room. The same one where he kissed me only yesterday, and suddenly that’s all I can picture. All I can feel. His lips on mine.
Stop thinking about kissing the god of death, Lyra.
“Hey.” His voice is soft again, compelling and yet harsh at the same time. “Don’t do that. Don’t tell yourself you can’t cry.”
