Surpise, Surprise

PART THREE

HADES

Minthe had somehow found her way back into his house. Hades stood at the kitchen counter when he heard footsteps across the floor, soft ones that couldn’t have been Cerberus’s nails click-clacking on the tile. He stepped away from the coffee maker and peered around the corner, and sure enough, she stood with her heels in hand and an expression on her face he’d never seen.

They stared at each other for a long moment.

“You’re not answering my calls,” she finally said.

Hades crossed his arms, suddenly aware of his bare chest and flannel pajama bottoms. “You didn’t think that might have been intentional?”

“I thought we should talk.”

“The last time I tried that, it didn’t end well for my face.”

Exasperation pulled at her expression. “You’re a god. It’s not like you can’t take it.”

“Minthe—”

“Just hear me out. Please?”

Hades thought about disappearing. Pulling himself out of the visible spectrum and leaving her spluttering. Letting himself out the nearest door or window that wouldn’t squeak and waiting her out. But if she’d had the audacity to skip his locked front door and try another way into the house, he doubted that would be enough to get rid of her.

“You’re not at work,” she said, filling the silence he’d left.

“I took a day off.”

She looked at him like he’d sprouted an extra limb. “Are you feeling all right?”

Hades leaned against the wall. “What do you want?”

“I…wanted to apologize.”

Hades waited for more, but none came. “Apology noted. Can I get on with my morning now?”

“I know I haven’t always been…easy to be around. But I wanted you to know that I care about you. I’m sorry if I never made you feel like I did.”

A month ago, those words would have been everything Hades had wanted. He’d long worried that she stayed with him only because he’d asked her to, and not because of any affection on her part. The pain in her eyes said maybe that had never been true, no matter how often she’d made him feel it.

If only he could stop seeing the horror on Kore’s face when Minthe had hit him, and the shame that had flooded his chest that he’d ever let it go so far.

“Thank you, Minthe,” Hades managed. “I appreciate you saying that.”

Confusion drifted into her expression. “That’s it?”

“What’s it?”

“That’s all you have to offer?”

“What else do you want me to say?”

Her eyes found the ceiling. Hades watched her take a deep breath. “I was hoping you would apologize, too.”

Hades pushed off the wall, his arms falling to his sides. “For what?”

“For keeping me out of the loop.”

He could not keep the surprise from his face. “When you showed up, I told you everything I could. And when you came the second time, I explained the whole situation. It’s not my fault you didn’t believe me.”

“I had to come banging on the door to make you talk to me! You wouldn’t have said anything if I didn’t drag it out of you.”

“Why do you think that is?” Hades settled his hands on his hips. “Tell me, Minthe, at which point in the story would you have believed I hadn’t done everything just to spite you?

“I—”

A knock on the door cut her off. He and Minthe shared a glance, and he could see that she, too, wondered who would come around at ten-thirty on a Tuesday morning.

Hades shrugged, and maybe this time she would actually believe him that he didn’t know. He pushed past Minthe to collect a shirt from the basket he’d left on the couch, then swung around to the foyer. The big picture windows showed him a familiar figure standing on his doorstep.

Hades’s teeth clicked together.

Hermes looked about as happy to be standing outside the door as Hades felt to be opening it. He looked Hades up and down and scowled, like wearing pajamas past nine o’clock on a weekday was some sort of fashion crime. “You have a message.”

Hades waited.

Hermes did too, apparently wanting much more drama than Hades presented. “You don’t want to know who it’s from?”

“I figured you’d tell me, since that’s your job.”

Hermes rolled his eyes. “Your new paramour is asking for you. Apparently, it’s urgent.”

For a moment, Hades didn’t know who he could mean. Then the chiding tone and the shit-eating grin clicked into place, and dread shot down Hades’s spine. “Is Kore okay?”

“She’s fine.”

“Where is she?”

“Relax, she’s safe. She asked if you could talk with her, and I said I’d check in. Honestly, I think you both should get some cell phones, but live your lives.”

She’d found the coin. Hades fought the stupid smile trying to burst onto his face. Kore could be in some kind of trouble, and he was only happy that she’d asked for him?

“Let me get dressed, then we can go.”

“I have shit to do, you know. I can’t hang out here all day.”

“You can wait five minutes.”

Hermes made an exasperated sound, but leaned against the door frame and crossed his arms.

Hades retreated back towards his bedroom, his heart racing. Minthe met him halfway, and when he didn’t stop for her, she fell into step beside him. “What’s going on?”

“No idea. Hermes said Kore needed to talk.”

Minthe stopped at the entrance to his bedroom. “Her again?”

Hades stripped the thin t-shirt and rummaged in his closet for a thicker long sleeve. “What do you mean, her again?”

“I thought you got her back to her mom’s. Case closed, moving on.”

He stepped out of his pajama bottoms and into a new pair of jeans. “I can’t help it if she called Hermes. Maybe something’s gone wrong and she needs help. You want me to leave her there?”

“Yes.”

Hades paused in reaching for the nightstand for his wallet and keys. “I guess it’s a good thing it’s not your call anymore.”

Minthe took the jab, though her eyes flashed dangerously. “That girl is nothing but trouble for you. Look at what happened last time.”

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Last time. Last time, Hades had met a woman who grew flowers in her hair, who smiled easy as breathing and laughed like the sun.

“I’m sorry,” he said. “I’m going, whether or not you like it.”

Minthe scoffed. “Well, don’t expect me to be here when you get back, then.”

“Honestly, Minthe, I don’t know why you showed up at all.”

Her jaw tightened. She turned away from him, storming back into the house. When Hades emerged a few minutes later, dressed and ready, she wasn’t there.

Hermes, though, smirked from his place by the door. “If I knew there’d be free entertainment, I would have come earlier.”

Hades didn’t respond, only gestured for Hermes to lead the way. He didn’t move, instead offering a wild grin and leaning to touch Hades’s shoulder. As soon as he did, the world spun in a storm of color, and Hades lost the ability to stand on his own.

#

Hades hated teleporting. It was objectively the fastest way for a god to travel, even though he’d never been able to do it on his own. Truth be told, he’d never tried to learn after Zeus had whipped him around the planet the first time. The sensation of spinning while falling either made him want to throw up or take his head off. Sometimes both.

Hermes stood on the street, probably waiting for Hades to get it together. When he could breathe without tasting color, he opened his eyes. He stood on a city street, one he knew. Zeus’s office was two blocks up and one over.

“What are we doing here?” Hades asked. “Weren’t we supposed to be seeing Kore?”

“No, I’ve kidnapped the king of the Underworld for my own purposes.” Hermes rolled his eyes. “She’s waiting for us inside.”

Hermes walked a few feet to hold open a door. Hades realized they’d come to a diner, one of those places that looked like it had walked straight out of another decade.

He saw Kore as soon as he entered. She sat tucked into a booth towards the back, wearing the same dress Leuce had gotten her. Her curls had been left wild around her face, her brown skin practically glowing in the morning sun.

She smiled when she saw him, and Hades was pretty certain the world stopped turning.

Beside her sat a woman he’d seen only once, on the plains standing beside Demeter. The seat across from them had been left empty, and Hades hurried to slide into the vinyl.

“You came,” Kore said, like it had even been a question.

“Of course. What’s going on?”

Hermes sidled up to them, stilling her response. He leaned both hands on the table so he could bend close enough to stop the other diners overhearing. “Bargain fulfilled, right, princess? Can I go now?”

Hades bristled at the tone, but Kore nodded. “I appreciate you going out of your way. Thank you, Hermes.”

He didn’t wait for another answer, vanishing with a pop. If any of the mortals around them noticed, they kept it to themselves.

“Hades,” Kore said, bringing his attention back to the table, “I’d like to introduce you to Theophania. Theo, this is Hades.”

The girl didn’t offer a hand to shake, so Hades didn’t either. She only looked Hades up and down critically, and Hades wondered about all the things she must have heard about him.

“We have a…situation I was hoping you could help with,” Kore continued, swallowing hard. “My mother kicked Theo off the farm, and she doesn’t have anywhere to go. I was wondering if you could help us out.”

Hades looked between them, at the crease that had appeared between Kore’s eyebrows and the way Theo had picked the corner of the menu to a pile of shreds. “I’m sure I could figure something out. What did you have in mind?”

Kore dropped her gaze to the table.

Theo filled the silence. “Kore says the Underworld is nice this time of year, but I’m not so sure.”

“Are you looking to move there?”

“It’s not like I have anywhere else to go.”

If Hades had hoped to get straight answers, he was apparently sorely mistaken. He shook his head. “I think I’m missing something.”

Theo turned to Kore. “I told you he couldn’t do anything.”

Kore mustered a half-hearted glare. “That’s not what he said.”

Theo’s lips pressed together. “You shouldn’t even be here, since Demeter is going to start the second Titan War as soon as she figures out you lied to her.”

The waitress appeared, stopping Hades from asking anything further. The girls ordered breakfast, and Hades, too overwhelmed to think properly, asked for a black coffee.

When she left again, Hades leaned across the table. “Kore, is everything all right?”

A muscle in her jaw twitched. “I’m not going back.”

Theo sagged against the back of the booth. “She says that now. She doesn’t mean it.”

Another glare, then Kore turned to Hades. He’d forgotten just how green her eyes were. “I can’t go back,” she whispered. “My mother has made that very clear.”

“What did she do?”

Kore didn’t answer, but Theo picked up for her. “She kicked me and another girl off the farm for daring to get a flat tire while Kore was in the car. We went to a party too, but don’t tell her that, or she might burn the place down with Violetta and me inside it.”

Hades struggled to piece a coherent version of events together in his head. This was certainly not what he’d expected when Hermes arrived at his door.

Kore traced a fingernail over a divot in the plastic covering the menu. “You can say no if it’s too much. I don’t want to ask for more than I already have.”

Hades was shaking his head before he knew it. “Of course you can stay with me. I’ll need to make a few calls, though, since neither of you are supposed to be in the Underworld at all, let alone try to live there.”

“Oh, great.” Theo’s tone had gone flat. “This is working out so well, Kore.”

Kore only managed a strained smile.

Hades squared his shoulders. “I got Kore in and out without causing a war. I’m sure I can do it again. Leuce is no stranger to being in the Underworld for the first time, and I’m sure she’ll be able to help.”

Theo’s body went rigid at the name. “Leuce?”

Hades nodded slowly. “She’s a nymph who works with me.”

“Tall, yellow hair, dimple on one side?”

“I take it you were with her on the farm before she left.”

Theo nodded slowly. “What is she doing in the Underworld? Demeter told us she’d gone back to the ocean to be with her family.”

Hades looked between them. Genuine confusion seemed to hang in the air, and with a crushing blow he realized Demeter must have kept Leuce’s story to herself.

“She found the garden,” Hades said. “I lived at the palace then, and I didn’t even know she was in the Underworld until it was too late.”

Kore’s mouth opened. “I thought I recognized her. I was young when she left, and I didn’t…how long has she been stuck there?”

“Too long.”

“What’s he talking about?” Theo asked. “What happened to her?”

“She got stuck,” he managed. “By the time I found out, there was nothing I could do.”

Theo swore in the old language, curses that made even Hades raise his eyebrows. “You never thought to tell anyone?”

“I told Demeter as soon as it happened,” Hades snapped. “I marched all the way up to your precious farm to do it in person. If she neglected to share that information, that’s on her.”

Theo looked like she wanted to argue, but in the end she turned away from him. She stared out the grimy window beside their booth, her eyes moving back and forth as she tracked people and birds and who knew what else on the city street.

Kore, too, seemed somewhere else. Hades wondered again what had happened that she’d run away from the very woman she’d fought so hard to get back to.

Finally, Theo drummed her fingers on the table. “How hard is it to get into the Underworld?”

“Depends. Am I by myself, or are we assuming I have two girls in tow?”

Theo offered a grimace. “Hypothetically speaking, of course.”

Hades sighed. “Do either of you have coins on you?”

#

“Are we sure a gate is the best way to go if we’re trying to sneak in?” Theo stared at the big, black arch, sparkling in the morning sun.

Hades glanced at her and the fear she tried to keep out of her shaking hands. “It is if you don’t want to accidentally land in Tartarus. I can take us down, but I don’t always know where I’m going to land.”

“You did well enough on the plains,” Kore mumbled. Her eyes, too, had gone wide, and Hades could only imagine what she remembered of the first time she’d landed on the beach. He didn’t blame her for not wanting to fight off the dead again.

“After your mother attacked us, we were lucky enough to land on a barren hillside,” he said. “We’re on the opposite side of the planet now, and for all I know, we might drop in the middle of downtown. I only have one extra hat, and you’re not unconscious enough for me to turn both of us invisible without one.”

Kore shared a glance with Theo. “Not like we can go home, right?”

Theo made a sound in the back of her throat that was neither approval nor agreement. “I guess not.”

Hades tried to smile. “This beach is a lot less populated than the North Bank. This is how I come in and out whenever I see my brother.” He gestured toward the arch, standing in the middle of Central Park. To any other mortal, it looked like a twisted iron art installation. “I’ll go through last, to make sure no one gets left on this side.”

Kore took a deep breath. “Here goes nothing,” she muttered to herself, and stepped through.

Theo made to follow, then paused. She lifted her chin. “Would you be doing this if it wasn’t Kore who asked?”

“What?” Hades stuttered, thrown by the question.

She turned to him, her mouth set. “I see the way she looks at you. If you don’t share her feelings, stop making her think you do.”

Before Hades could scramble a reply, Theo pushed herself through the barrier. Hades stood in the park, the birds chirping and the wind rustling through the trees, and wondered exactly what he was supposed to do with that information.

Both girls waited on the other side of the gate when Hades pushed himself through. He took a moment to gather his breath, then started down the hillside, towards the river. The ferry waited there already, the way it always did when Hades returned from the surface.

He felt Kore move near enough to brush against the fabric of his jacket. “There are so few of them here.”

Hades glanced around. The dead surged thick here too, though not nearly as many as the still-packed North Bank. The bodies did little more than watch as they walked down to the shore, though Hades knew if they lingered, they would shuffle forward to investigate.

The three of them reached the water’s edge. Charon emerged from the boat, his face lost in the shadow of his hood. He walked down the gangplank with measured steps.

Both girls pressed closer to him. Kore slipped her fingers around his arm and gripped tight.

“Visitors?” Charon’s voice, like steel on steel, grated in his throat. “They’re far from dead.”

“Extenuating circumstance,” Hades replied. He dug in his pocket and offered two coins.

Charon’s shadowed face moved from him to the girls. “They cannot stay long, unless they plan to join the ranks on the shores.”

“No. They’re here for business. I just need to get them across.”

He reached for the coins. “I hope they enjoy what time they have. If they linger, it won’t be much.”

Charon moved aside, and Hades motioned for them to walk up the ramp onto the ferry. Kore didn’t let go of him the whole way across the river.