Persephone

It was cold. Even before my vision returned. I suddenly understood why Mother strictly forbade me from drinking. This sensation rattling my skull must be the closest thing to a hangover. I shook my head like a deer springing from a river.

My head still throbbed, and the freezing cold persisted. I felt completely buried in an ice mountain. It wasn’t just the chill. Even my nose had gone numb and stopped working. 

All the scents I had known since birth, the abundant daffodils and noisy primroses, the familiar fragrance of crushed honeysuckle, had completely vanished. Only then did goosebumps crawl up my spine. I rubbed my eyelids hurriedly like a shepherd boy. I needed to know where I was.

Through my blurry vision, I could see a tall throne. Everything swayed in darkness, pallor, and jellyfish-sad blue torchlight. Probably because my eyesight hadn’t fully returned. I had never seen such gloomy flames in my life. I shook my head once more and rubbed my eyes. 

The darkness became clearer. In the darkness, I could see bone-white, thin figures. And I saw the owner of the knife-cold silver throne. It was a uniquely shaped throne. Decorated with silver poplar leaves like an awning, it cast an even deeper shadow in the darkness. 

The deity sitting there immediately captured my gaze.

I marveled. Was it because I had never seen such white skin with such black hair? 

Her expression was gloomy and tired, looking as though she had never once seen sunlight in her life. Strangely, I couldn’t take my eyes off her. Her plum-colored lips parted and sighs poured out like thorns. I stared at the sight like an idiot.

“What happened?”

A tall man standing near the throne broke the silence. He was a man with terribly red hair and beard. His glaring eyes resembled an angry bull. Was he talking to me? 

No, that couldn’t be. I decided to just roll my eyes wide, just as I had always avoided Mother’s scolding.

“How would I know?”

The throne’s owner answered the servant’s accusation sparsely. This voice, too, resembled no one I had ever known.

“She’s Zeus’s daughter. At least, that’s how she appeared in the Enna Valley.”

She added the complaint that how could the tallest and most handsome blonde maiden among dozens of nymphs not be Zeus’s daughter. The murmuring in the shadows grew louder. I shrugged my shoulders at the prickling gazes surrounding me like chestnut burrs. Well, it wasn’t wrong.

The nymphs my mother Demeter placed around me were as numerous as daisies in the field, but among them, I was the tallest and most radiant. What about my golden hair, visible even from a chariot racing across the sky? 

Come to think of it, I had lowered my peplos from the top of my head to my shoulders because of a pointless bet. I wanted to see if my hair was more intense and captivating than daffodils. It was obvious, but I was bored. I felt I would go mad with nothing to do. Then… well. Hmm, where did I put my peplos?

Regardless of my concerns, the commotion quickly grew. The red-haired giant lost his temper again.

“How is that Zeus’s daughter? Goodness, you must have gone blind from being in the underworld too long!”

“I know, so stop it, Thanatos.”

Even the hand touching her forehead was marble-long and bloodless. She retorted tiredly.

“Enough, let’s stop here. What good would arguing with you do? I’ll handle this myself.”

She rose from her throne. She was a goddess much taller than I had estimated. Would her forehead reach my chin? 

It’s a bit funny to even think about this. I watched blankly as she took a step forward. Her tunic was black, darker than starlight could illuminate, and her unbound hair flowed like a waterfall. I suddenly wondered what it would feel like to touch such straight, dark hair.

“Who are you?”

Ah, and her eyes were an unbelievably vivid green. A cold, arrogant emerald green unlike any vegetation of mountains or fields.

“Answer me. Who are you?”

“Oh, me?”

I was still surprised that the all-white-and-black goddess had such striking green eyes. I responded somewhat late.

“Yes, you.”

“Why are you asking me that?”

“What?”

The expression on her face then!

“Weren’t you the one who brought me here? Isn’t it proper etiquette to introduce yourself first?”

“Do you know who I am?”

“If I knew, I wouldn’t have called you ‘you.’ It’s not a particularly pleasant title, especially for someone as impressive as yourself.”

She tilted her head back and placed her hands on her waist with a groan. Her attendants exchanged glances with sighs that could have been either shock or admiration.

As for me, I was quickly calculating in one corner of my mind what results this strange experience might bring. Mother wouldn’t have prepared such an adventure for me. And she knew I was ‘Zeus’s daughter.’ At least. 

So, perhaps this was the audacity of some deity with a grudge against father Zeus, but without the courage to shed blood? 

Judging by this dreary place, it might be a god of caves or a deity of swamps. But then again, the number of lesser gods in attendance wasn’t small… Hmm, this is getting stranger.

Ah, yes. It wasn’t a particularly clever deduction. But what did I know? I was a child forbidden from taking even one step outside Mother’s embrace. A bird raised in captivity, a horse bound in shackles.

“Are you saying you’re not the daughter of Demeter and Zeus? Answer only that.”

“My mother is Demeter and my father does possess lightning.”

When I shrugged my shoulders, she frowned. She was glaring at my broad shoulders and deer-like elegant neckline in disbelief. Also at the nimble muscles of my arms that, while not comparable to Ares, were certainly not flawed, and my large hands and feet. 

If I had my peplos, the question of gender would have been more ambiguous. No, that’s not right. The time when I could look like a nymph by wrapping myself in cloth had long passed. 

Nevertheless, she seemed to be consoling herself with the thought that she wouldn’t know for sure without removing my crimson tunic.

“But I’m not a daughter.”

Since my curiosity about who she was grew stronger, I drove in the wedge. I couldn’t help my mother’s efforts to raise me as her only daughter. I was dying to hear the name of the arrogant goddess standing before me.

“Not a daughter? Did they have children other than Persephone?”

“That would be me.”

I asked like a stomping colt.

“Then who exactly are you?”

“I am.”

Her voice suddenly descended low like a black hawk on the hunt. Commanding me to be gripped by terror, to submit in fear.

“The ruler of the underworld, the goddess of death.”

What?

I couldn’t help but frown. The ruler of the underworld? The death deity who rules the afterlife, my father’s brother and my mother’s brother? The one I had imagined as a gloomy solitary old man in black robes or an invisible, depressing hermit?

The goddess before me was too young to be my aunt, and by secluding herself underground, she was causing great loss to Olympus. If people in the world knew that death was this beautiful, they might accept their mortal fate a little more easily.

This is as absurd as me being a son. But my mouth moved without its owner’s permission.

“You’re beautiful.”