Persephone's Orchard (The Chrysomelia Stories) (23 page)

“Hermes,” Demeter pointed out now, “will try, and say, anything.”

“What about the horses? You have to admit those are a wonder. Useful too.”

“I use them when I must, but it makes me nervous to bring you along. It’s only a matter of time before someone crashes into a mountain and gets their mortal companion killed.”

After a couple of years living among the spirits, Hades had happened upon a combination of plants from the Underworld that, when woven together, fastened instantly to souls. Realizing there were ghost horses roaming the fields, animals accustomed to pulling chariots or being ridden by humans, he wove a harness and gained a new mode of incredibly fast transportation.

The spirit horses never tired, never needed feeding, and went wherever you wanted—though if left to their devices, they would point themselves to the Underworld. Within the year, all the immortals kept and used spirit horses to get around, even Demeter. But she drew the line at letting them carry Persephone to the Underworld itself.

“Look, if the Underworld were so horrible,” the girl persisted, “it wouldn’t have given us anything so good, and I’m sure Hades wouldn’t live there. I just want to see it.”

“Stop asking. The very idea gives me chills.”

Her voice was sharp enough that Persephone did, in fact, stop asking, for many years. Nor did she see her uncle Hades much at all. Those gatherings of the immortals happened infrequently, and usually some of the invited guests were too busy to attend.

She kept the necklace Hephaestus had made for her, and wore it nearly every day. He had polished the amethyst and set it into a nest of gold and silver petals so that it looked like a violet, and hung it on a leather cord wrapped with threads of gold. She supposed it should be Hephaestus she thought of when she looked at the beautiful object, but whenever she closed her hand around the cool stone flower, she thought instead of the magical place it had come from, and wondered what Hades was doing and discovering there lately.

Violets were her favorite flowers. She no longer remembered whether they always had been—perhaps that was why Hephaestus chose that shape for her?—or whether she now liked them because of the necklace.

When she was sixteen, she accompanied Demeter to a spring equinox feast in Aphrodite’s palatial home on the island.

Looking around the airy room, all pillars and flower arrangements, Persephone examined the people she had been accustomed to view as her aunts and uncles. Today, having not seen many of them for months or years, it struck her that they all looked younger than she remembered, and quite lovely.

Her gaze landed upon a young man across the room in a dark purple cloak, his beard clipped short, his curly black hair braided back and adorned with a wreath of ivy—much less showy than the bright spring flowers Persephone and the others wore in honor of the equinox. He stood apart from the others, squinting against the bright sun as he gazed out the window at the sea.

Soon he turned his head and noticed her. The brooding expression on his face evaporated as he regarded her, an appreciative smile taking its place. Truly, he was quite beautiful. They gazed at each other a moment longer than was proper. A pleasant flutter danced in Persephone’s belly. Was he an immortal? Gold did seem to glint beneath the ivy, as if the vines were twined around one of the gods’ crowns.

Then she recognized him. Hades.

She dropped her gaze, the recognition giving her a shock that radiated out to her fingertips.

Well, he wasn’t
really
her uncle, so it wasn’t incestuous to have admired him. Still, he might not agree, and her mother certainly wouldn’t approve. Persephone kept her eyes averted, and let Demeter lead her to Aphrodite for a welcome hug.

The goddess of love, as she was already being called, was scented divinely with oils and flowers, with a few blossoms tucked between her breasts, just above the line of her tunic. She engaged Persephone in a conversation about local youths that made them both laugh immoderately. But Persephone kept stealing glances at Hades. What was it like to live in the Underworld? When could she pull him aside and ask him? Better yet, when could she visit?

Hades, conversing with Hermes, glanced at her a few times too. Each time, she felt her heart beat faster. Burying her nose in the cup of wine Aphrodite handed her, she began thinking up what to say in greeting to him, what kind of question might hold his interest.

She would have asked him about the Underworld even if he had still seemed to be her mature old uncle. But already her fascination with that realm was colliding and mingling with the fact that she had found him beautiful today. And she knew it was going to be very difficult, perhaps impossible, to regard him as her uncle ever again.

Chapter Nineteen

G
RRR
, SAID THE TEXT FROM
Sophie.
I’d just gotten to us meeting at Aphrodite’s house when I was 16, then my alarm went off. Where’d the night go? I want back in!

Adrian grinned. He had drifted off to sleep in his bed in the Airstream, but the buzz of her text message awakened him. The rising sun filtered through the window blinds. His breath made clouds in the air, as did Kiri’s as she slept on her dog bed. He rolled onto his elbow and thumbed in a reply.

Now that you’re there, you can remember it awake.

Yes, but that’s very distracting and I have classes. Argh, I’m going to be thinking about it anyway.

I was just in those early days too
, he answered.
The next bit is like a romancey chick flick. And don’t tell anyone, but I totally love it.

Everyone loves their OWN romancey chick flick. Even boys. OK, getting ready for class.

Update me often. This is fun.

I will. Bye.

Adrian settled onto his back, smiling. He lay in dog-scented chilly air inside a caravan, and would have to sneak into the living world again soon because he had nothing to eat for breakfast except some stale granola and a bruised apple, but happiness enfolded him.
Us
, she called Persephone and Hades. She craved more of their story. She was a part of it now.

Watching the dim orange sunlight spread onto the curved ceiling, he let his mind return to Aphrodite’s house on that balmy spring afternoon.

T
HE GIRL ACROSS
the room had dark brown hair, braided at the sides and tumbling loose down her back. A crown of purple and white flowers rested on her head, with similar blossoms tucked into the woven belt that gathered her gown around her waist. She might have been anywhere between fifteen and twenty. And that face…Hades stopped moving as he took it in. Full lips, sweet eyes, long graceful brows, smooth skin. Though she stood beside voluptuous Aphrodite and radiant Demeter, she outshone them both.

Hermes wandered near him, and Hades tugged on his cloak to get his attention. “Did we find another immortal?”

“Where?” Hermes followed Hades’ gaze. “Her? No, you old fool, that’s Persephone.”

“That’s Persephone?” He stared in amazement, trying to reconcile this goddess-like individual with the scrappy little girl who had crawled into his lap to visit the spirit realm. “What—how many years—”

“She’s sixteen. I suppose you haven’t kept in touch, being busy down there with your dead people.”

“No. I suppose I haven’t.”

The young woman moved then, walking with Aphrodite, and Hades detected the limp she’d retained from her injury in the earthquake as a child. And when she turned to glance the other way, he noticed the scar marking the side of her face. None of it detracted from her beauty in the slightest. It only caused him a twinge at the reminder of her mortality.

“Got quite fetching, hasn’t she?” Hermes sipped his wine, watching her. “Believe me, I’ve noticed. After all, we’re not
really
her uncles.”

Hades blinked at him. “You haven’t…” He glanced again in alarm at Persephone.

Hermes snorted. “No. Demeter would castrate me and feed my balls to a pig.” He paused to frown in thought. “Wonder if they’d grow back? Well, I certainly don’t want to try it. Regardless, our Persephone is of marriageable age. So, fair game, I would say, if
you
want to give it a go.” He elbowed Hades.

“Enough, shut up.”

But it was only a few minutes before Persephone drifted close enough that he could turn and greet her. “Persephone.”

“Hello, Hades.”

He took the hand she held out, and kissed it, as he would for any grown female friend. “It’s been a long time. You’ve changed.”

“So have you.”

“Have I? That isn’t supposed to happen.”

She laughed. “You haven’t
really
changed, I suppose. But you seemed older when I was a little girl.” She gestured around to indicate the others in the room. “All of you look quite young to me nowadays.”

“Ah. Then thank you. So aren’t you and Demeter living in the south, same as me?”

“Yes. Along the Himeros. But above ground, unlike you.”

“I’ll have to come visit.”

“You’d be welcome. I also wish to visit you, if I may.” She looked over her shoulder at Demeter, who was in conversation with Artemis several paces away. “Mother still doesn’t like the idea. But I think the Underworld sounds fascinating.”

“Come anytime, if she can spare you. I’ll show you around.”

“I hear you even have furniture down there.”

“Yes, I’ve got a very comfortable set of chambers.”

“Do ghosts wander through them at all hours?” she asked.

“No, they stay in the fields.”

Persephone sipped her wine. “Hermes told me of the pomegranate that grows there. Mother doubts the story. She thinks it only makes people see and believe things that aren’t real, the way nightshade does for the priestesses.”

“Oh, it’s a much clearer-minded and less dangerous experience than nightshade. I’ve brought some of my mortal meditation experts there to partake, and none of them came to any harm. We all believe the memories are real.”

“How amazing. I’d love to know who I used to be.”

“So far none of my past lives have contained anything as momentous as immortality, but they have made me recover all the languages I used to know. That’s the main way we can tell it isn’t a hallucination.”

“Knowing all those languages would be extraordinary. I wonder why Mother says she wouldn’t touch the pomegranates?”

He glanced across the room at Demeter, who met his gaze with a cool nod. “Demeter has strong opinions about what is natural for a living creature, and generally it doesn’t involve anything to do with the land of death.”

“So I’ve noticed. Still, she doesn’t mind using those horses to dash around.” Persephone smiled. “All right, she’s beckoning to me. Perhaps we can talk later.”

“I hope so.”

Persephone slid a violet loose from her belt, and slipped its stem into the chain securing Hades’ cloak. “Come see me two days from now. I’ll give you some of our vegetables, and you can tell me more about your caves. Hermes knows the way.”

“Fine. I’ll see you both then.”

She was only curious and brave, the way young people always were, he told himself. Probably the appeal would diminish along with the novelty, after he’d explained the major points of the Underworld to her. Besides, Persephone was mortal, so he couldn’t court her even if she encouraged it—especially not with Demeter in residence.

Still, as he made the rounds and talked to his friends, his spirit bobbed pleasantly and his mind already planned the things he would say when he arrived at her house.

T
WO DAYS LATER,
Hermes climbed into the chariot with Hades in the Underworld, took the reins, and guided the horses up into the bright sunlight and over the land. He slowed to point out landmarks by which Hades could, in future, navigate to Demeter and Persephone’s village. Between instructions, he hummed a naughty song about a boy trying to bed a girl, a tune he had made up himself and taught to drunken people all over Greece. Hades finally had to kick him to make him shut up.

They landed beside a bend in the river, coasting to a stop on a large flat rock. Next to them loomed a forest. Huge rabbits and spiral-horned deer bounded away, disappearing in the undergrowth. Hades and Hermes tied up the chariot and switched into the living world. The wild forest transformed into a tidy orchard of pear and pomegranate trees, their green leaves shining in the sun.

A stone house stood near, small but charming. Its herb and vegetable gardens overflowed with plants. Flowers and bushes grew in pots all around—beside the door, hanging from the eaves, and sitting upon the gently sloped roof. Sheep and goats bleated from a pen behind the house.

Hades walked with Hermes up the dirt path. From the house wafted the scents of apples, wood smoke, and a savory stew being cooked.

Before they could knock, Persephone came around the corner, her arms around a basket of vegetables.