Hadeia

When I came to my senses, there was only pitch-black darkness.

I couldn’t even remember how I returned to the underworld. I heard the horses panting with foam at their mouths from the tightly held reins. Only then did I loosen my grip. 

The chariot, which had been racing like a fallen star, slowed down. I painfully spread my stiffened hand. Red marks remained where I had clutched the reins. I looked down at the wound that was beginning to turn purple.

He does not love me.

He was struck by a golden arrow and immediately abducted by me.

Since I was the first person he saw after being struck by the golden arrow, he merely imagines he loves me.

He does not love me.

“It’s only natural.”

Who did I want to speak to? I caught my breath while looking at the underworld rivers swaying in the profound depths.

‘I never believed he truly fell in love anyway. He left his mother’s side for the first time and acted like a man for the first time, so he’s confused. Even if it’s because of the golden arrow, the conclusion is the same.’

It was I who dismissed Persephius’s confession as a child’s whim. I never believed he would truly marry me and stay in this abyss forever. 

No matter how long it took, he would eventually return to the sunlight, and only occasionally remember his time in the underworld while drinking wine under the evening star. That’s what I believed.

But why is it so hard to breathe? 

I shook my head. A lifeless, quiet wind clawed at my cheek.

In the end, I couldn’t even speak to Zeus, let alone go near Olympus. I fled in haste like a drunkard caught in a lie. To h*ll, where no one could chase me to condemn me, where my sins and futile delusions awaited.

‘I can’t wait any longer. I must send him away, even by force.’

I clenched my teeth. Since Persephius was struck by a golden arrow, he should rightfully be treated as ill. He had lost the right to be responsible for and control his own mind and body. Whatever he begged for, whatever affection he showed, whatever sweet words of love he whispered, I would no longer listen. I didn’t care if he threatened me. 

Let him talk all he wanted about how I r*ped him, took his purity, imprisoned him, tried to force him to be my husband. I would bear such dishonor.

I had taken a child struck by a golden arrow into my bed and joined bodies with him. Shame twisted my insides. It felt like a red-hot poker was searing my stomach, my chest.

I did not cry. Hades has no tears.

Cerberus yapped at me, but I had no time to pet him affectionately. I didn’t even unhitch the horses from the chariot. My mind was filled with only one thought: I needed to find Persephius. 

Find him and tell him. Tell him everything, the truth. 

That he was struck by Eros’s golden arrow, that his belief that he loves me is nothing but a trick, a deception. That he should return home immediately before his mother withers all living things. 

I am Hades. There’s no way I couldn’t drive out one daffodil-like youth from my territory.

The palace was in disarray. I suddenly stopped walking. 

From afar, muffled commotion and shocked cries rippled through the air. I sensed gods, nymphs, and the dead all gathered in one place. It was in front of the great hall.

“Lord Hades.”

The door to the great hall was open just about the width of a fist. But none of those crowding in front of it dared to push their way in. This was because fierce red and yellow light, burning bright, was leaking out from inside the hall. 

A feast of colors that couldn’t exist in the underworld. The very fire that Prometheus stole for humans. A vivid light that made one recoil from its heat just by looking at it. 

Could such a thing exist in a place where only bluish underworld fires had been present? 

Pale faces, afraid they might get burned by the shadow of that light, all bowed to me at once.

“Lord Hades, Minthe has…”

Morpheus couldn’t continue his words. Thanatos had turned his head away, and Momus was crouched in the dark corridor like a frog. The nymphs were crying silently.

I asked nothing.

I simply opened the door and entered.

It was dazzling. Flames red as cyclamens burned on each pillar surrounding the arched ceiling of the great hall. The blue torches of the hall were enchanted to extinguish themselves when the ruler was absent. 

Yet now they were flickering so hotly, so blood-red. What could this mean? What omen was this?

At the far end of the empty hall, I could see my throne. And…

“What have you done?”

Persephius was standing right beside the throne. Under the flickering light, his skin was stained with shadows, looking burned. He turned to look at me with wet eyes. 

When our eyes met, he let his shoulders droop helplessly. I heard the sound of a broken white poplar branch falling to the floor from his grip. I smelled blood. 

Persephius’s hands were completely covered in blood. Because he had broken the white poplar stems and torn off leaves with his bare hands.

“To desecrate my throne, you must have lost your mind.”

I was angered by the sight of the white poplar, which had beautifully embraced my throne like an awning, now tattered from one-sided violence. Anger cooled my head. 

I walked quickly. If I didn’t slap that child’s face right now!

At that moment, a sharp fragrance rose from beneath my feet.

The sensation of delicate leaves and stems being crushed under my silently walking feet reached me belatedly. I stopped halfway up the steps and lowered my head. 

Between the cracks of the stone steps, where not even moss had dared to grow, unfamiliar small plants had spread, scattered like the blood of someone stabbed by a knife or pierced by a spear. 

I rubbed a leaf with my toe. A refreshing fragrance rose up green. It smelled like tears shed at dawn.

And through the covering of plants, I saw the truth.

Dried-up, colorless bouquets. Yellow palm leaves on the verge of crumbling. Prayers offered by humans clinging to Hades in the face of death.

“Minthe.”

A cool fragrance burst forth from under my feet, sobbing. I raised my head and looked at Persephius.

“What have you done?”

He looked exhausted. He wore a face I had never seen before.

“I don’t know.”

The smell of blood dripping from his fingers made me sick.

“You don’t know? After k*lling my attendant, that’s all you have to say?”

“I didn’t kill him. I just…”

Persephius shook his head.

“I can’t remember.”

Shadows swallowed his face. Making it unreadable even to me.

“I was angry. He made me angry. I think I lost my mind for a moment. When I opened my eyes… it was like this.”

I looked at my feet again. I saw the strange plant tragically adorning the steps leading to the throne. Poor Minthe! 

If I could, I would have restored him to his original form immediately. But one god could not overturn the miracle or curse wrought by another god. Just as Zeus had ultimately left poor Callisto as a bear. 

I bit the inside of my mouth. My fingertips froze.

Persephius was a youngster without any divine powers. This was because Demeter had prevented him from becoming a proper adult to block the prophecy of the Moirai. 

Although flawless ichor flowed through his veins and his birth was noble, he could not use any of his power as a god. He couldn’t perform even the slightest magic or create a single piece of convenient miracle.

Yet now he had transformed the son of Cocytus into a plant. He had cast the most terrible, supremely divine curse. And these hot torches filling the great hall.

Did he even understand what this meant?

He murmured, sighing: “…Marry me.”

“You are not in your right mind.”

I gritted my teeth.

“Is it not enough that you cursed and killed a member of the underworld? You dare speak of marriage at the scene of your crime?”

“I love you!”

The sudden shout sounded like a lion stabbed with a knife.

“And you love me too! Why won’t you accept my feelings? I’ve revealed my true heart and spoken only the truth, so why do you keep pushing me away? You want me, you embraced me! You stroked my hair, you kissed me! I like you. I don’t care if it’s the underworld, as long as I can be with you. How many times must I say it for you to believe? Sunlight, flower fields, they mean nothing to me! I want to be by your side!”

In my ear, Aphrodite whispers. That child was struck by a golden arrow. That child does not love you.

“How many times must I say it for you to understand? I will not marry you. Not you, not anyone. I cannot love anyone. I do not know love. What could be more ridiculous than Death knowing love! I will not let the sacrifices I have made for your father and mother, for my brothers and sisters, be in vain! Not even for you!”

“You said you wanted me!”

He screamed.

“You told me that, that you wanted me! When I kissed you, you embraced my neck, you didn’t reject me! You said so, and it was sincere. I know, I know that you wanted me too…!”

I composed my breathing. I could no longer give in to my selfishness. I had to hurt him.

“…I was not in my right mind then. What I wanted was not you but your warmth. That was all I recognized.”

“Not me, but my warmth?”

Persephius gasped. His eyes were completely wet with tear stains. Blood flows from me too, like holding a knife without a handle. I endure the heart-rending pain to avoid responding. 

Looking at his face was devastating. But if I averted my gaze even for a moment, he would notice that I was lying, that I was wearing a mask.

“Then, if it had been someone else, not me, would it have been the same? If someone else had asked, would you have answered like that? That you wanted them? It wasn’t Leuce you desired instead of me?”

Leuce? 

For a moment my lips parted. Yet no words came out. How did Persephius know about Leuce?

It had been hundreds of years since that poor sea man died. A young man who died because he loved Hades. I had saved him from Poseidon’s white horses on a whim. 

I felt sorry for him. It would be foolish for the god of death to sympathize with all the dead, but there are exceptions. 

Had he not loved me in vain, he would have lived at least four times longer. Out of fragile guilt, I kissed his corpse and turned him into a white poplar. That was all.

“How do you know that name?”

“Answer my question first.”

Persephius held out both hands to me. His hands, once beautiful like a sculpture, were a mess of scraped and torn wounds.

“Was I a substitute for Leuce? Was that really it? Have you never loved me, not even once? But you were so kind to me. You called me Persephius. If you had banished me from the first day, I would have died. Because I no longer wanted to live as my mother’s Kore. But, did all of this mean nothing to you? Was I really nothing? Would you not have accepted me if Leuce hadn’t existed? Did you think of that man when you kissed me? Why? I look nothing like him. Why, why didn’t you tell me about Leuce?”

Oh, please. How lonely is this thing called divinity? Why can’t I cling to someone and pray like a human? 

If only I could, if there were someone transcendent who received even the prayers of gods, I wanted to do so right now.

To ask not to take Persephius’s hands, to say I understood what Minthe had told him, to not say that everything was a misunderstanding and that I had accepted Leuce’s affection no differently than the many who worship Hades.

I wanted to die.

“You do not love me!”

The scream, poured out like a death cry, stopped Persephius who was approaching me.

“On my way to meet your father, I encountered Aphrodite. She told me. That she ordered her son to deliberately shoot a golden arrow at you. The feeling you have for me is not love. It’s just an illusion.”

And so everything ended. I had said it. This wasn’t how I had intended to reveal it, but in the end, everything had fallen apart so messily.

“I spoke dismissively of Aphrodite’s powers while arguing with Zeus, and she was justly indignant and took revenge on me. You were in the wrong place at the wrong time. That’s all there is to it.”

Persephius had turned pale, looking drained of all blood.

“I will speak no more of this. Tomorrow morning you will return to your mother.”

The fiercely flickering torches went out.

I turned away from him. I could have vanished immediately, but I didn’t. I walked back the way I had come. 

Had the great hall always been so vast? 

The scent of Minthe clinging to my soles, along with the smell of blood floating in the air, would not leave me. 

The final breath exhaled by the broken white poplar. Darkness. Solitude. About the catastrophe, the tragedy befitting Hades.

He did not stop me.

* * *

Persephius

I can understand why she doesn’t believe me. As long as she thinks I was struck by the golden arrow, she will never acknowledge my feelings.

Therefore, I will gamble with my destiny.

Because this is the only way I can prove my love.

* * *

Hadeia

He asked to drink from the waters of Lethe. I nodded. That was all.

While Hermes was coming to retrieve him, he brought water from the river in an Olympian golden cup. 

“This water, drawn by a god who can travel between the living world and the underworld, using a heavenly cup, belongs neither to the living world nor the underworld. It is simply oblivion itself.” 

These were Hermes’ words as he respectfully handed me the cup. That seemed right. What would be the point of feeding him underworld food now? 

I passed the cup to Persephius.

“Tell me if you’ve changed your mind, even now. If you don’t wish to forget your adventures.”

“It doesn’t matter anymore.”

“Didn’t you want to become a hero?”

“No. I want to prove that I’m sincere. That comes first. You won’t defeat me.”

I turned my head away.

“I love you.”

The cup hit the frozen stone floor with a clang.

I heard Hermes lifting the unconscious daffodil in his arms.

Now everything was over.