The Iron Queen (Daughters of Zeus)

  And I’d tried so hard.

  Tears sizzled as they ran down my cheeks, tracing painful paths across my face before they dripped to the floor. What if there wasn’t a— No! I wouldn’t think that, I couldn’t let myself, or I’d give in to him. Clenching my blackened knuckles, I made a fist and swung at Zeus’ face. He fell for it, catching my arm with ease, and pinning it above my head with a grimace as the goo that had once been my flesh stuck to him. My other hand shot out, not at his face where he would see it coming, but at his kidney with as much force as I could muster.

  He grunted, moving back just enough for me to break free of his grasp and make a beeline for the door. Lightning flashed, scorching the floor in front of me, and I scurried to the side. Zeus tackled me.

  “You stupid bitch!” He grabbed me by the neck of my shirt, dragging my charred body across the misty floor until he reached that oh so familiar wall. Yanking me up so high my tiptoes barely brushed the surface of the floor, he pinned my arms above my head. I felt a flash of power and gasped as my hands passed through the wall. The frigid mist swirled, solidifying into a wall around my wrists.

  I yanked against the bindings and lost my tenuous tiptoe hold against the ground. My feet slid out from under me, and I slammed against the wall, supported only by my wrists. Zeus stabilized me, hand turning bright with the blinding light of electricity, and he put it to my throat.

  The human body was never meant to survive prolonged exposure to lightning. While Zeus held me under a steady stream of electricity, a myriad of things happened at once. In the last several however-long-it-had-beens, I’d gotten past the intense and stunning pain enough to dissect each phase of agony.

  First my muscles contracted, going rigid and stopping my heart while freezing me into place. Then I started to sweat. Sweat fueled the electrical current, causing more heat to build up in my body. Until I cooked. Heat built up, setting my blood boiling until any liquid within me became so pressurized that it burst free. That bit was excruciating, but it wasn’t the worst part. No, that came later. Meanwhile, the electrical impulses that controlled my nervous system short circuited, sending conflicting and of course painful messages to my brain.

  For a while it seemed as if life were pain. Like nothing else had ever existed or would ever exist, making hope feel like a distant memory. Then came that blessed moment when I stopped feeling altogether, no pain, no thoughts, no hope, nothing. If I had a human body, that would be the point where I would die. Death is freedom. How had I never realized that until now?

  But I’m not human, so something worse happened.

  I started to heal.

  Healing from a lightning strike at godspeed is exponentially more painful than the initial strike. My liquefied muscles re-knit. Haltingly, my heart began its painful pump, faltering until my blood returned to its veins and capillaries, rebuilding the infrastructure of my body. Cooked flesh healed as my nerves roared back to life. Death would be a mercy. Hell, at this point I’d settle for loss of consciousness, anything to put a stop to the horrific pain. But Zeus was far too skilled to allow that to happen.

  I screamed as another bolt hit me. Gods, it hurt! Electricity tore through my body like liquid fire, setting every vein and nerve ending aflame.

  “Okay, okay!” I sobbed, collapsing against the wall. There was no way out. It didn’t matter how hard I fought or how resourceful I was. The crushing hopelessness that accompanied that realization brought me to a point where I just couldn’t take the pain anymore.

  My head hung, and I stared at the bright blue sky beneath my feet. I twitched my fingers outside the misty wall, tantalized by the sky and the freedom it represented just beyond my reach. If only I could just drop through the floor and back to my realm.

  “Do you have something to say?” Zeus’ voice slithered through my ears, sending a shiver through me.

  I nodded, tears chasing each other down my cheeks. I’m so sorry, Hades.

  Hades couldn’t hear me. Maybe equilibrium didn’t cross realms? Or maybe Zeus had somehow burned away our connection. I took a deep, shuddering breath as I realized it was probably for the best that Hades couldn’t see where my thoughts were headed. I’d wanted to be stronger than this. But torture was torture. And I was broken. After dealing with the Reapers for months, I’d thought I could handle anything, but Zeus put me through levels of anguish I hadn’t known existed.

  Calm washed over me as my body entered the blissful stage of non-feeling. Everything was going to be okay. Suddenly another bolt hit me, tearing through me and reawakening the pain. I couldn’t even scream.

  “I asked you a question,” Zeus reminded me.

  I couldn’t take the pain anymore.

  Chapter X

  Aphrodite

  Melissa sighed, again. The sigh was loud, heavy, and brimming with irritation. I rolled my eyes, flipped to another page in my fashion magazine, and circled another picture.

  Shooting me a dirty look, she tossed her brown hair over her shoulder with a huff. She sat on the floral-patterned comforter on Persephone’s loft bed as far from me as possible, with her knees drawn to her chest and her arms crossed over them. Melissa couldn’t have looked more sullen if she’d tried. Gods, she probably was trying.

  Melissa hated me. Oh sure, she’d deny it if I asked. After all, she did have that luxury. But her actions belied her words, conveying a hatred that ran almost as deep as the jealousy she so obviously suffered from. Whatever, I didn’t like her either.

  “How can you sit there and read”—her emphasis on the word made it clear how little she thought of my reading material—“while she’s missing?”

  I snapped the magazine closed and popped it on the wooden desk with enough force to stir every paper within five feet. “Your moping is no more helpful. They aren’t going to find her any faster no matter what we do. So excuse me if I don’t want to die of boredom while Persephone’s gone.”

  I should have never suggested Demeter leave me with someone I couldn’t charm. I’d forgotten my oath to never charm or allow harm to come to any of her priestesses. Especially Melissa the Teenage Bitch.

  Melissa narrowed her eyes and muttered something under her breath. I clenched my teeth and picked up the magazine.

  “I should be doing something.” Melissa stared at her knees with so much intensity I worried they’d burst into flame. “Not babysitting you.”

  I closed the magazine again. “Do you think I like this any better than you do? My sole purpose for existing is to let Zeus use me as he pleases and to be nice to look at. Do you think that’s fun? I hate him. And despite that, all Zeus has to do is snap his fingers, and I’ll stab my best, not to mention only, friend in the back. Sort of puts your tantrums into perspective, doesn’t it?”

  “Oh, shut up.” Melissa’s brown eyes flashed.

  Melissa’s mother, Demeter’s head priestess, wanted Melissa to stay at the local university instead of going to Iowa State. Instead of getting mad at her mom, Melissa got pissed at Persephone. Humans are so irrational. Never mind that Persephone hadn’t given a damn where Melissa went to school. Or that she’d made Melissa immortal. And sure, being a major deity’s priestess should have been a huge honor, but Melissa would rather move to Iowa. She wanted to give up being second in command to an all-powerful deity for school. In Iowa! Oh yeah, and during all that, people in Athens were dropping dead like flies, and Zeus was hunting Persephone. Naturally Melissa decided that—you know what?—right then would be a great time to bring all that up. I guess she figured Persephone didn’t have enough going on.

  And people said I was an attention whore.

  Treat her like you’d treat me, Persephone had instructed, unaware of course that I had to listen to what she said. Sitting quietly and being respectful while Melissa acted like a spoiled brat sucked. Fortunately I’d found a workaround.

  I got a whole lot more blunt with Persephone. Now I could say whatever I wanted.

  “Yeah, I don’t feel like shutting up
. So I’m going to talk to you some more and because you’re stuck with me, you’re going to listen.” Giving Melissa a malicious grin, I set the magazine on the desk. My smile faded and my voice went serious as anger I hadn’t allowed myself to feel came simmering to the surface. “I am so sick of the whole lot of you whining about how bad you have it. It’s a bit of a blow to the ego knowing that the world would actually be a better place if I didn’t exist. But I manage. Every single person I know by name on this planet wishes I’d never been created. That Zeus could ask me to drop dead at any minute and I would have to comply is more than a little terrifying. Have I sat around moping about it? Nope. I’ve been doing something constructive with my time.”

  “Constructive?” Melissa snorted.

  I threw the magazine at her. It hit her knees and flopped down on the bed. Melissa snatched it and held it up like she was about to throw it right back at me, but stopped when she noticed the pictures I’d circled.

  “Look familiar?”

  Melissa flipped the page and studied a picture of a completely hot guy modeling preppy clothes. He was the ultimate golden boy with his blond hair, tan skin, and golden eyes. All the markings of a demigod.

  I walked to the door. Before my hand could so much as touch the doorknob, Melissa sprang up from the bed. “Where do you think you’re going?”

  I smirked, swinging the door open. “You wanted to do something so badly?”

  “You’re supposed to stay here.”

  “And you’re supposed to babysit. Coming?”

  Chapter XI

  Hades

  After my discouraging chat with Cassandra, I teleported to the Elysium Fields. I didn’t spend a lot of time here. For the most part, Elysium was filled with the best of the souls. Those who had done great good in their lives. But it was also home to deceased deities. Olympus stood over the bright sunny fields and meadows. Most souls felt the vibrant purple mountain added beauty to the perfect landscape. I disagreed.

  Olympus cut a dark shadow across perfection, serving as a reminder that there was no place untouched by evil in all of creation. I loathed Olympus. Everything changed the moment this mountain towered over my life. We had become what we’d worked so hard to defeat, perhaps not as bad as the Titans, but this mountain elevated us to gods, scowling down at all of creation.

  Yet it was in my Underworld. The fall of Olympus had been the final harbinger of the death of the gods. I could have incinerated the blasted mountain the moment it came down or left it to rot in Demeter’s realm. But it meant something to them, and they’d lost enough.

  Gods, nymphs, and dozens of other extinct creatures stopped what they were doing to watch me approach the palace. I didn’t come here often. Still, I didn’t hesitate when I walked through the columns. This was my realm.

  “Wow, two visits in one century.” Hera moved between the sand-colored columns with an inhuman grace. There were no walls here, only columns stretching an impossible distance into the air, holding up a very tall, very flat slab of stone ceiling. It couldn’t have been more different from my palace. That wasn’t a coincidence.

  “I’m almost flattered.” Hera’s curly brown hair was piled on the top of her head in an archaic Roman style. She wore a violet chiton. I hadn’t seen one of those shift-like dresses since the hydra last plagued Ancient Greece. Some people didn’t know how to move on.

  “Thinks the man in the cape.” Hera let out a throaty chuckle at my surprised look. “I can always tell what you’re thinking, Hades. Such an open book.”

  “You’re the only one who ever thought so.” I sat on one of the tall backless couches.

  Her lips turned up in a mysterious smile. “Maybe it’s not so much an open book as a mirror. Perhaps we’re both just damaged beyond repair.” She sat beside me on the couch, fingers trailing over the narrow strip of white upholstery between us. “What can I do for you?”

  “Your husband has taken my wife. Do you have any idea where?”

  She tilted her head and put a hand on my shoulder. “Poor Hades, will you ever find someone who deserves you?”

  I removed her hand from my shoulder with a bit more force than necessary. “It wasn’t consensual.”

  “Isn’t that your working theory on what happened to me? That I was charmed.” Her gray eyes bored into mine. “You want so badly for me to be a victim. Did you ever stop and wonder if maybe I just don’t love you?”

  I ignored her use of the present tense. “At the time it was easier to assume you weren’t an opportunistic bitch,” I replied calmly. “I’m not here about you. I’m trying to find her, and you haven’t answered my question.”

  “Do you love her?” Jealousy flamed to life in Hera’s eyes.

  “Exclusively. You still haven’t answered me. Where would Zeus keep her?”

  She kept her gaze locked with mine as though she were trying to unnerve me with her proximity. “What makes you think I would know?”

  I took a measured breath. What I wanted to do was threaten to throw her into Tartarus until she remembered how to answer questions. But Hera fed on anger like most people breathe air. If I snapped, she’d be in control. Hera had controlled enough of my life.

  “You were many things, Hera, but oblivious was never one of them.”

  Hera’s gaze went hard. “Zeus and I didn’t exactly have pillow talks. If you’ll recall, he sucked the life from me and threw me down a mountain the moment I outlived my usefulness.”

  “What I recall is you bringing down the mountain with you and single handedly ending the era of Olympus.”

  Hera’s eyebrows rose and her lips pursed into an “O” shape.

  “What?” I asked. “You thought it escaped my notice that Olympus’ fall coincided with your demise? I was around when you created this abomination. I remembered some of your…unusual design flaws. You’re the one who did all the marketing, too. When the mortals saw Olympus fall, they thought it meant the gods had died. So the gods did.”

  “You’ve always paid entirely too much attention to me.”

  “And you always sucked at answering questions. Where would Zeus keep my wife, Hera?”

  “To keep her from you?” Hera smiled. “As far out of your reach as possible. Beyond that, I haven’t the faintest idea.”

  I clenched my teeth to keep from cursing.

  “But I know of someone who’s always kept excellent tabs on him.”

  “And who’s that?”

  “My firstborn.”

  Athena. Demeter would know where to find her. I rose from the couch to go, then paused. As much as I hated to ask Hera any more questions, she was the only god I knew of who would know the answer.

  “After you married, were there ever times you couldn’t sense him?”

  Hera frowned. “What do you mean?”

  “Marriage, it’s unbreakable, right? He couldn’t—”

  She laughed. “Come now, Hades, you know the answer to that. Nothing is unbreakable.” I waited through Hera’s dramatic pause. “You can always kill her.”

  I rolled my eyes. “I meant from an outside source. Zeus hit her with lightning and it knocked me out. I haven’t heard her since.”

  “Knocked you out?”

  I waved away her surprise. “Yeah, I know. I always thought sympathy bonds were a myth, but apparently they come with equilibrium.”

  “Equilibrium?” Hera didn’t seem amused anymore. “With that infant?” She paused as if giving me time to object to her description. I refused to rise to the bait. Fluttering her eyelashes with a dramatic sigh, Hera responded, “Not possible. You’d know right away if you could feel everything she was feeling.”

  “Maybe we can only feel extremes. He hit her with lightning, Hera.”

  She fell silent, digesting this. “She’s still a baby, isn’t she? I suppose it’s possible he could have killed her.”

  I shook my head, unwilling to consider the possibility. “He still needs her. Besides, if she were dead she’d be down here.”
r />   “Doesn’t she have Thanatos’ power?” Hera asked, referring to the god of death Persephone had recently charmed to death. “If she swears fealty to Zeus, he could keep hold of her soul. He wants you to waste your time looking for her. What makes you think he doesn’t already have what he wants? Really, Hades, she’s a child. How long do you expect her to stand up to Zeus’ torture? Look on the bright side, this way Zeus can’t use her to kill you.”

  “To kill me?” I barked an incredulous laugh. “That’s not going to happen.”

  Hera’s face turned puzzled then crafty. “You don’t know.”

  “Of course I know.” As if I would have married Persephone without knowing all the risks.

  “She’s a part of you, Hades, and you’re a part of her. You exchanged power to get married.” Hera ran her tongue over her top teeth. “She could kill you, but it doesn’t matter. If you can’t sense her, she’s dead. And if by some miracle she’s not, you should probably transfer enough power her way to put her out of her misery. Otherwise Zeus will have access to your realm and your head on a silver platter.”

  Persephone wouldn’t do that. I could see her breaking and swearing fealty to Zeus. All that would take was a second of weakness and the words would be spoken, but for her to physically attack me? Unlikely.

  Not that it mattered, if she pulled a Boreas and swore everything to Zeus, he’d inherit the ability to kill me.

  But he’d still have to face me to do it.

  “Do you think I want him to win?” Hera asked, pulling me from my thoughts. “Hades, I have nothing left to gain. And you have a responsibility to this realm to eliminate any threat. Even her.”

  Out of the question. But I could change the rules, make up, down and black, white. I could strip Zeus of his powers. Hell, I could make him allergic to water if I wanted.