Page 47 of Spring's Descent
Great tendrils of night stretched from my right as the wraith launched its mangled body toward me, moving with supernatural speed. I turned to avoid the worst of it, but the bony tips slashed through my chest with ease, making contact a moment before shadows descended.
I could smell sweet frost and darkness in the air as I screamed, the red splattering of my blood steaming as itconnected with the frozen lake. The wraith was reduced to powdered bone in the next breath, the ash dusting the pool of blood I knelt in.
My blood.
Then night closed around me. And I saw and heard no more.
30
HADES
Usingthe fire in my veins put there by Persephone’s life magic, I flitted through shadows, bypassing the lake’s edge as I darted toward a narrow break in the snow. It was slim, looking like nothing more than a split in the towering snowbanks, but it was the path that would take us to The Asphodel Plains—Persephone’s only chance at survival.
Clutching her tighter as I moved through time and space, my fury rose as I gripped the blood-soaked tunic. It was saturated. Despite me tying it as tight as I dared without stopping her ability to breathe, the bony claw marks along her ribs kept bleeding.
My magic was death. It only took. Never gave. I could do nothing but get her to Hecate or Thanatos and pray the Goddess of Witches and God of Death knew a way to stop this.
I underestimated Persephone. I shouldn’t have let her get so far away, but I’d thought last night had changed something between us. We were destined to be together. Couldn’t she feel that? Sense how our threads yearned to be joined?
Apparently not, because she’d stabbed me and then jumped off a fucking cliff.
She fuckingran. I knew my little witch needed freedom. Gods below, I was the one who wanted her to have the confidence to take it, but she had nearly got herself killed trying to escape me.
I couldn’t stand watching her fall to the Algea. The three of them swam through the darkest depths of the lake, singing songs of pain and sorrow. Of every type of anguish imaginable. Songs that obliterated the will to live. Most souls didn’t make it past the edge of the tunnels, succumbing to their whispers immediately.
But Persephone had.
Of course, she had. My queen was brave. Even when the odds were stacked against her. Even with her fear held like a vice around her neck, she lifted her chin and found a way to keep breathing.
I’d thought her leaping and free falling through packed snow was her testing her independence. I would have let her stretch her legs as I hovered in their periphery. But only until she was ready to rejoin me.
The faint illumination by the lapis lazuli stones faded as I flitted through the tunnel, but I didn’t need to see. Iwasdarkness, folding between the plains of this world until the blue gems gave way to rich earth.
Tapping into the full might of my power as we crossed into The Asphodel Plains, I moved quicker, careful to not jostle Persephone. I didn’t allow myself to think about how the scent of fresh soil was marred by the metallic tang of her blood or how she’d lost consciousness on the icy lake of Cocytus and hadn’t woken.
I could only focus on the growing light as the tunnel tilted up.
Another jump, and we surfaced, the bright rays of The Underworld’s sun heating her shaking body. Wilted grass and gnarled pomegranate trees stretched before us. The grove had been barren for years, leaving torturous branches with sparseleaves, but my gaze stayed focused on the gleaming golden spires in the distance: The Dark Palace.
A flash of feather-white wings appeared from the tallest balcony, his blond hair acting as a halo of light as he flew: Thanatos.
My jaw clenched. It appeared I wasn’t the only one struggling with my magic. Thanatos was able to flit through light the way I could shadows. If flying was the quickest way to reach us, it meant there were far greater problems waiting for me here than I’d thought.
Inhaling deeply, I rolled out my shoulders, allowing my great, leathery wings to unfurl. The prick of my ram horns returned, and my vision sharpened as my essence rooted in The Asphodel Plains returned to me.
My wings beat, launching us into the sky as the force of my power whipped through the shuddering grove, branches cracking and splintering as I gave flight. I stared down at my little witch, brushing a red curl back from her face. The freckles splashed across her cheeks were stark against her pale complexion, the beating of her heart now quick and faint.
“This is not your fate.” Pressing a kiss to her brow, I willed the fates to hear my promise to her. “You will be my queen, Persephone. My savior. Even if our realms fall and the gods curse us, I won’t let you go. Not now. Not ever.”
31
PERSEPHONE
It feltlike I’d just swam through the roughest ocean, my weary limbs scraping the edge of a sandy bank only for a strong current to drag me under again. Everything hurt. Each breath sent lashes of pain through my chest. I could feel soft cotton beneath my fingers and a fluffed pillow supporting the weight of my head, but it was all I could do to remain on the periphery of consciousness.
Voices were muffled, the words blurring together until a familiar tenor reached me through the fog.
“It’s Hypnos.” Aidoneus’s deep voice pitched, venom dripping from the name. “I’m sure of it. How else would I have been transported to the shores of the Lethe just outside of The Darklands of the North?”