Chapter Text
A/N: I originally published this on fanfiction.net a few years back. I recently reread it and was horrified. The grammar was... let's go with not great.
So I decided to give it a quick look over (quicker than I probably should) and repost it here. Let me know what you think! :)
When Hades took her, Persephone was furious.
How dare he steal her as if she were some mere mortal? She was a goddess, daughter of two of the six Originals. She was the goddess of Spring, born by the goddess of the Earth and sired by the King of Gods and Ruler of the Sky. She wasn't some man's mere plaything.
Not that she was there to please Hades. At least in that way. Instead, she found that the King of the Underworld, Ruler of Death, had fallen in love with her, however ludicrous a thought that might be. He hadn’t taken her to force her to share his bed. He had taken her with the sole purpose of marrying her – of making her his Queen.
But still, Persephone was furious. She screamed and raged, cried, and did everything in her power to make him miserable. Every gift he sent her was met with ingratitude if not an outright refusal; every plea to talk went unanswered. She refused to eat or to let him show her around her new home. Instead, she barricaded herself in her room, ignoring him and his many attempts to reach her. He tried persuasion, anger, and, finally, pleading, but the Lord of the Underworld could not make his own wife speak a single word to him.
Persephone wanted to make her husband miserable, and she succeeded immensely well.
She wasn't the only thing he had to worry about either. He had many duties as the King of the Underworld, and these duties only grew as Demeter raged over her lost daughter. Thousands of mortals died every day of starvation as Demeter refused to serve her duty as the Goddess of the Earth. Finally, Zeus had enough, and he sent Hermes as a messenger to the Underworld under the explicit order not to return without Persephone.
Hades received the messenger with grim determination. He told Hermes – didn't ask, never asked, because the only person Hades ever asked anything of was his wife – that he would send Persephone with him after one last goodbye.
Hermes willingly agreed, thinking that Hades wanted one last thrust, and unwilling to refuse the feared Lord anything.
For the first time, Hades barged into Persephone's room without at least trying to ask for permission – a question that had always gone unanswered anyway – and ignored her indignant command that he immediately leave.
”I love you,” he vehemently told her.
Persephone shot him a look filled with disgust. ”And I hate you,” she answered.
Hades merely laughed, drily and bitterly. ”I'm quite aware, my dear wife,” he told her. “Nevertheless, I have no intention of losing you. To anyone. Even the King of Gods.”
Persephone's eyes widened. “Zeus has commanded that you release me,” she guessed, the hope and joy evident in her voice. It hurt Hades even more than her earlier declaration of hatred.
“Yes.”
The triumph was clear on her face. “Even you can't go against Zeus,” she told him.
“And there are laws that even Zeus can't go against,” her husband answered her.
Persephone frowned. Which laws? She supposed that he could try to force her to make an oath on Styx, but she knew that he would fail. She was too stubborn: Wanted to leave too badly.
Instead, Hades went to a bowl of fruit standing on a nearby table. He'd made sure that there was always food freely available for Persephone in the hopes that his wife would one day actually eat something. Now, however, he had no more time to wait.
Picking up a pomegranate, he tore it open and bit into it, careful not to swallow, and turned towards his reluctant wife. In three strides, he was at her side, and then he kissed her.
It wasn't like he'd imagined their first kiss to be like. He'd imagined that he'd slowly win Persephone over, get her to fall in love with him, and their first kiss would be gentle, sweet, and consensual.
Instead, his own wife struggled against him as he pressed her against his chest, a firm hand holding her head still. She bit him, and the metallic taste of blood mixed with the juice of the pomegranate. Still, he kissed her until he was sure that the seeds had slid down her throat, sealing her destiny. Only then did he let her go.
Persephone pushed against him with obvious horror. She knew the unwritten rules as well as he did. No one who had eaten the food of the Underworld could leave. He'd won.
Except, looking at her wounded face, he knew that he hadn’t.
As expected, it didn't go smoothly from there. Zeus was furious, Demeter even more so. She didn't care about the unwritten rules; she wanted her daughter home with her, safe from her beast of a husband.
Zeus, however, overruled her. “She ate the fruit of the underworld,” he told his sister and former lover. “I cannot force Hades to give her up. However,” he added as he saw that she was about to protest. “You shall have her back. Your daughter ate seven seeds, and for seven months, she shall remain with her husband. For the remaining five, she shall live above ground, under the open sky.”
He turned towards Hades. “You shall not force nor trick your wife into eating any more of the Underworld's food,” he ordered. “You got your wife, and as she's been with you for over seven months, it is now Demeter's turn.”
Hades considered refusing. He considered threatening Zeus with war if he didn't give him what he wanted. But then he thought of his wife, and the loathing in her eyes, which just barely covered her misery. He knew that she was feeling homesick. Hopefully, letting her return for only a short time would help alleviate this and not merely give Demeter time to pit his own wife against him.
And Hades didn’t want to start a second war amongst the Gods unless absolutely necessary.
Still, he needed one assurance.
“If I can neither force nor trick or persuade Persephone to eat the food of my world, then Demeter cannot do the same to make her daughter take the vow of the virgin goddess,” he said.
Zeus startled. “The virgin goddess? You can't take that vow without being untouched, and surely you have already...” his voice died out as he realised the truth. “You haven't slept with her.”
It was clear that this was merely incomprehensible to the insatiable Zeus.
Hades didn't answer, and he knew that Zeus wondered if there was truth to the rumours that he was dead from the waist down. He could have told him that the exact opposite was true and that he yearned to make love to his wife, but refused to do so by force. He could have said all of this, but he remained silent.
Zeus awkwardly cleared his throat. “Very well. Demeter, I forbid you from forcing, persuading, tricking, or even asking Persephone to take the vow of the virgin goddess or any similar vow.”
Demeter started to protest, but a single glance from Zeus silenced her. The King of Gods then turned towards his brother.
“You have until sunrise,” he told him.
Hades nodded gravely. “Very well. I shall send her up tomorrow.”
And pretend that his heart didn’t ache painfully at the mere thought.