Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chloe likes to explore the world around her.

It’s something her mother, Ella, has always both admired and scolded her for. Yet in her defense, Ella has always been paranoid, especially when it comes to her daughter. She watches over all the living things on planet Earth — she knows how evil some can become.

Yet Chloe explores anyways.

She’s explored library after library under Faye’s, the goddess of wisdom, watchful eye. She’s explored abandoned battlefields and learns of their history from Maleficent, the goddess of war. She’s even taken a ride on Charming’s, the god of the sun, chariot around the globe for crying out loud!

She’s explored places from all over the world, but never as dark as this.

Skulls decorate the path she walks. She finds them cool, and they’re the only reason she continues walking. Perhaps, she can see even cooler things the more she explores. That’s always been something Jasmine, the goddess of the hunt, told her.  Though she was always shut down by Ella. Chloe can’t help but giggle to herself at the comforting memory of her protective mother scolding a guilty Jasmine for ever influencing her daughter to do such ‘dangerous, life-threatening’ acts.

The joy of her giggle causes a few strange-looking people to look in her direction. After all, her joy is a stark contrast to the disturbing atmosphere of the area she was currently walking through.

Chloe can’t help but admit that the more she walks, the more afraid she was getting. The dark seemed to become more of a looming presence as time went by, and her steps were beginning to grow more hesitant and calculated.

Eventually, she reaches a dark castle. It clearly belonged to somebody and Chloe was beginning to have guesses of who. Looking around, she nearly screams into the void seeing skeletons walking by her. She was definitely far from home now.

“Where am I?” A panicked Chloe calls out to nobody in particular, but then there’s a laugh and all of the goosebumps on her skins seem to appear at the sound.

“You’re in the underworld, little flower.”

Chloe knows that voice. She’s heard that voice many times on Mount Olympus.

She looks to where she had heard the voice, and her suspicions are confirmed correct. Shadows surround and embraces a barely visible girl. She is powerful though, Chloe can tell — powerful only in the way a goddess could be.

The Goddess of Death. The Queen of the Underworld.

She’s heard many tales about her. About how she’s cruel and ruthless, having no regard for the souls she takes in. How anybody who enters the underworld alive has a one-way ticket in because the queen is unforgiven and will have them join the lost souls without a second thought.

And if you’re an outsider? Well, the queen won’t be very forgiving to say the least.

How could Chloe be this stupid?

She doesn’t notice how she begins to back away slowly, getting ready to run.

“Hey, I’m not going to hurt you.” The Goddess of Death sounds strangely amused, “I’m Red.”

“I know.” Chloe says shakily, trying to muster as much bravery as she possibly could. The girl she was talking to was still shrouded in shadows, and Chloe was beginning to believe she was hallucinating this entire conversation, “Everyone talks about you.”

“Good things I hope?”

“Not exactly.” Chloe knows that wasn’t the best response in this situation, but with every normal response she received, her wit was beginning to come out more and more.

Red finally steps out, wearing a tight-lipped smile.

“Yeah, I thought so.”

Her deathly black hair is streaked with dark red, a stark contrast to Chloe’s own baby blue. Yet Chloe can’t help but notice her face is absolutely perfect, sticking out like a sore thumb amongst the skinless skeletons of the underworld.

What’s a face like that doing down here?

“So what’s a girl like you doing in a place like this? Ella hasn’t been looking for you?”

“Asking questions before you burn me alive? That’s a new low.” Chloe scoffs and Red bursts into laughter, “You seriously believe in that crap?” She shakes her head, as if unsurprised, “I’m just wondering if you were lost. You seemed quite panicked back there.”

“What are you even going to do about it?”

“How about you?” Red raises an eyebrow, “Do you even know the way out, little spring princess?”

Chloe looks behind her and sees a seemingly endless path. She pouts, and Red laughs.

“Thought so.”

“Fine, yes, I am lost!” Chloe whines, looking back at Red and the goddess looked annoyingly pretty despite the smug expression she was wearing. Red stares at her in silence for a few moments as if wanting to annoy Chloe further before smiling.

She walks forward and takes Chloe’s hand in hers, intertwining their fingers.

Chloe looks stunned and Red can’t help but laugh once again.

“Don’t fret, spring princess. I won’t hurt such a fragile thing like you. I’ll take you to the entrance to make sure you get there safe. Ella hates my guts enough, what more if I lose her precious daughter?”

Chloe can’t reply or argue, not when Red’s hands feel so soft against hers. Red’s hands were cold from the frequent interactions with death, a stark contrast to Chloe’s own hands warm from the sunlight after hours of gardening. It’s a wonderful feeling.

Chloe can’t reply, not when Red looks so pretty while being focused. How she gently pulls Chloe in different directions when death is meant to be harsh. How she looks over at Chloe every now and then to check if she’s still following with such a soft gaze it gives Chloe whiplash.

Truly, why did Chloe believe in such crap? Red, the goddess of death, isn’t cold and mean, she’s otherwordly beautiful, soft, and so, so very gentle towards Chloe. Chloe doesn’t know why but her face begins to warm the further they venture away from Red’s palace.

Red, on the other hand, doesn’t know why she’s doing this. Chloe was right to some degree — if ever there were any outsiders that entered her kingdom, she would simply send them away to fend for themselves in the vast underworld she calls home.

Never would she ever go out of her way to help them.

Yet this girl was special in the way she had so fearlessly spoke back to Red when other travelers she has met would go weak in the knees at the sight of her. Red tells herself it’s because Ella would come to the underworld personally to strangle her with her bare hands if her precious petal was ever hurt, but even Red doesn’t believe that herself.

For some reason, Red feels strangely empty when they reach the entrance that separates the realms of the overworld and the underworld.

“Ah, I must have took a wrong turn here.” Chloe thinks out loud to herself, and Red can’t help but laugh, “Sure, princess. Take a turn towards the dark and long tunnel, that will do you good.”

Chloe huffs out of embarrassment, but has no drive to defend herself, not when Red looks so good grinning so widely at her. Red will admit that she appreciated Chloe’s clumsiness and lack of direction, especially when that lead the girl straight to her.

Chloe then clears her throat.

“Thank you, by the way.”

There’s a clear blush that dusts Chloe’s face which annoys her greatly. She can only hope Red doesn’t mind it, or doesn’t see it whatsoever. The old wives’ tales that haunt the entirety of the world have never warned her just how attractive the Goddess of Death would be!

Red looks intrigued by her. It was as if this was the first person that’s never looked at her like she was a monster, or at the very least has been fearful of her.

She smiles. This was interesting, she thinks to herself.

“Of course.” Red nods, “Get home safely.”

Chloe looks at Red, and gives her a blinding smile that Red will think about for the next century, she believes. “You’re not too bad, you know.” She says before quickly exiting the realm of the underworld, unwilling to deal with whatever witty response Red will come up with that will have her stuttering and speechless.

Red tells herself she doesn’t frown at the exit.

And as Chloe makes her way back up to her mother’s garden, she doesn’t notice the spirits following her all the way up, only disappearing when she melts in the arms of her worried mother.

She earns a long, long lecture. A few goddesses pass by, sending her sympathetic looks for they know how Ella can get when she feels protective over her daughter. Yet Chloe is able to take scold after scold after scold, for all she can think about is the beauty of the girl she was taught to avoid.

Her heart is beating far too fast, and she knows Ella will notice anytime soon yet she cannot help it.

A small seedling sprouts beside her.

———

The Olympians are made up of a wacky cast Red thinks would do better on stand-up comedy than handling the universe. By far.

There’s Charming, the god of music and the sun. There’s Bridget, the goddess of love and beauty. There’s Uliana, the goddess of the sea (and being a jerk to literally everyone). There’s Maleficent, the goddess of jumping to conclusions (and war). There’s Chad, the god version of video advertisements, (read: annoying). There’s Ella, the goddess of the harvest (and having the biggest stick up her ass the universe has ever seen, not that she would say that out loud.)

There’s her, the goddess of the coolest mancave in existence (…a couple corpses too, but she tends to leave out that part.)

And then there’s Chloe Charming, goddess of the spring.

A young flower, maybe even a seedling, and somebody far too fragile to even be near Red. There’s a reason Ella has a burning hatred for the Goddess of Death. She’s everything Ella simply can’t stand — death is the opposite to life, and death is the end of life.

Every dying crop Ella grieves is one Red accepts without hesitation. Every storm that has Ella crying out for mercy for the poor farmers, Red counts down the days without any sort of remorse.

Despite that, her daughter is a presence Red frequently welcomes in her palace. A place many others would die trying to reach. Chloe is like a plant in the midst of a dry desert. A sunshine that suddenly appears, brightening Red’s dark days when she needs it most.

The second time Chloe appears at the front door of her palace, Red is further intrigued.

“People are usually put off by all the corpses, you know?” She prompts, trying to understand why Chloe had come back. Chloe only smiles shyly, “I think it’s pretty cool.” She says, “The symmetry of it all is…well, it’s pretty fascinating. Your taste for furniture is like mine.”

“Is it now?” Red raises an eyebrow, taking another step closer towards Chloe who seems to have been caught off-guard.

“Tell me the real reason you came back, little flower.”

Chloe doesn’t answer immediately. All she can do is look away away, her face bright red and lips trembling. Red can suddenly feel her heartbeat which is running at many miles a minute right now.

It’s concerning, Red thinks with a frown.

She doesn’t understand what sort of sickness these could possibly imply. She’s the Goddess of Death, so she does know of a few medical conditions that cause many in the mortal world to fall.  But could any of these affect a goddess?

And then she recalls something Bridget once said at a meeting.

It was a one-off joke, but Red couldn’t help but agree.

“Love is the only disease that could possibly affect a goddess.”

Red takes another looks at Chloe’s face. Pinkish cheeks and wide eyes. Lips pretty yet trembling all the same. It’s a sign of nervousness, Red can tell despite her limited interactions with other gods and goddesses.

All of which are signs of love, or at the very least a crush.

Chloe is interesting, Red concludes.

After all, the Goddess of the Spring crushing on the Goddess of Death is such a strange and doomed combination that Red wants to laugh at it. Yet she cannot be hypocritical, for Chloe looks far too pretty at the moment for Red to think properly.

Chloe giggles after what felt like eons of silence.

It’s music to Red’s ears, a beautiful melody in the midst of the pained screams she is used to.

“Flower? Such an honor is bestowed upon me to be called such a name.”

“You are beautiful like a flower.” Red replies, ignoring the fact that Chloe had so confidently and so easily deflected her question. It’s not like anybody can do that, too fearful to talk back to her no matter what. It’s fine. She feels as if she knows anyways, so she’ll play Chloe’s game.

“Aren’t you quite the flatterer?” Chloe tries to deflect once again, but Red can see the way her cheeks burn brighter than before. Red knows why her heart feels so full at the sight.

She leans in a little closer, shocked when Chloe suddenly squeaks.

“Oh my gosh, it’s nearly midday, isn’t it?” Chloe pulls away, and Red can feel the usual loneliness of the underworld sink into her bones once again with the loss of the girl’s presence, “Mother is going to kill me again! She talked my ears off the last time.”

“Sounds like Ella…” Red mumbles grumpily, her arms crossed and her eyebrows furrowed. To say she was annoyed would be an understatement.  Chloe doesn’t hear her in her haste, quickly walking out of Red’s palace.

Yet the sight of Chloe walking away from her has Red feeling strangely…sad.

“Will you come back?” Red suddenly blurts out. She knows she sounds pathetically hopeful. The Goddess of Death isn’t meant to be like this — all pleading and begging. She’s meant to be ruthless, unforgiving, and cruel just like death as a concept is.

Chloe is different. Instead of shaking at the sight of her, she pauses in her tracks and walks towards Red. She then leans forward. Her hot breath could be felt on Red’s ear, and for the first time in her many years of living, Red felt like the prey instead of the predator.

“If I can see that you want me to.”

For the next few months of that year, no crops die.

———

Red can’t have flowers in the underworld.

It’s an obvious thing to say.

Flowers are a sign of life, and the underworld is nothing but death. Corpses, skulls, depression and everything that flowers are not a symbol of are all that could be seen in the realm.

Yet Red has a smiling flower in her arms at this very moment, and the flower isn’t wilting nor dying at the sight of her. To say Red has grown fond of the witty yet gentle spring princess would be the understatement of the century.  After all, said spring princess is sitting with her back pressed to Red’s chest at that very moment.

“I do not understand why history does not like you.” The Goddess of the Spring thinks out loud as she looks towards the girl above her.

An uncharacteristic, gentle smile is on the said girl’s face as she looks down on the younger, a stark contrast to the dark skulls that decorate her coat, “You are kind to me. Kinder than most. You are very beautiful as well.”

The Goddess of Death merely watches as a dead soul burns into oblivion, their screams of pain and useless desperation echoing throughout the chamber they had foolishly decided to stay in. A laugh devoid of any sort of humor or joy,

“I wonder why.”

For some reason, Chloe isn’t fazed. It’s as if everything about Red — even the parts the world considers scary and ugly — is absolutely beautiful to her. Chloe only shrugs, leaning backwards to cuddle further into Red.

Red tries to act as unfazed as Chloe had, despite the way her face is heating up.

They are together more often now, ever since that accidental encounter.

Red swears that even the other gods are aware of it. Chad, the annoying and mischievous god that he is, sent her a wink and gave her a heavy pat on the back when he had seen her at the pantheon.  Bridget had done the same with a big grin. “See?” She had prompted, cocky and proud, “Even the Goddess of Death cannot escape love.”

Red hates that she’s right. Bridget is really annoying when she’s right.

But as Chloe smiles up at her and her heart skips a beat, Red can’t seem to even think of her pride for even a second. “I wonder why too.” Chloe nods, “There must have been a mix-up. You should have been the goddess of beauty. You are far too pretty for such a concept like death.”

Red is falling in love with Chloe. She knows it very well.

“You are playing a dangerous game, princess.”

“I’d gladly fall into any trap you place…” Chloe trails off, smiling brightly as she cups Red’s cheek gently. She can’t help but tease, “…my little sunshine.”

Chloe is falling in love with Red too. She just isn’t quite aware of it yet.

All Red has to do now is wait.

———

Chloe knows something is wrong.

She knows something is wrong when a flower blooms everytime even the vaguest image of Red comes to mind. She knows something is wrong when even Ella looks concerned with the overwhelming amount of extra flowers growing in her garden.

She knows something is wrong when Bridget smiles knowingly at her during the next Mount Olympus meeting she attends.

Something is wrong.

And Chloe knows it has to do with the way she blushes whenever Red comes near her, how confident yet flustered all the same she is with the goddess as if she’s doing everything in her power to impress the girl, how unafraid she is to face Red because she wants to see her that much.

She loves the Goddess of Death. There’s no denying it.

That day, Chloe runs to the familiar dark palace that’s become her second home. She knows this is a risky move. Getting rejected may send her into a long-term depression that will lead to the collapse of flowers worldwide and yet she can’t help but be selfish when it comes to love.

She swears she can hear Bridget cheering her on in her head as she goes to knock on Red’s front door, yet finds she doesn’t need to as Red immediately opens the door after the first.

“I love you.” Chloe blurts out unbashedly.

Red stares at her in silence for a few moments. Chloe braces herself, only relaxing when a hand cups her face and brings her close.

“I’m glad you found out, princess.”

Red leans forward to press a kiss to Chloe’s lips. She doesn’t need to say anything about her own feelings, she knows Chloe understands. They have always been like that. Opposites that have created such a beautiful balance that they are intertwined in every aspect of life.

Chloe doesn’t pull away.

In the overworld, citizens all over the globe marvel as garden after garden in every city and in every nation blooms.

———

“Chloe Charming, would you like to be my queen?”

Chloe is caught off guard at the question.

She looks down at Red, who is currently laid down in her lap. It’s amusing, to say the least, to see the Goddess of Death so nervous, so unlike the confident and nonchalant image she’s put on for the history books and the entirety of the council to see.

It’s an ego booster to Chloe, as well. Only she will ever see Red so free, so open.

Chloe leans down to press a kiss to Red’s forehead, the Goddess of Death’s lips parting ever so slightly as if wishing for something else far less innocent.

“Why should I?”

“I thought you said you loved the underworld.” Red pouts, and it’s so cute yet uncharacteristic all the same that Chloe doesn’t know whether to squeal or laugh, “Remember when you complimented my home decor? Would you not like to wake up to it everyday?”  Red’s pout deepens, “Would you not like to wake up to me everyday?”

Chloe only stares for a few seconds in complete awe, her heart full at the thought. In the overworld, flowers bloom and the townspeople are confused for it is still deep into winter.

“For such a powerful being, you worry far too much.” Chloe says again with a soft, fond smile. She leans in again, giving Red what she wants by pressing her own lips to hers. Death meets life in a strange clash, yet it is beautiful and delicate all the same in the way only love could be.

“Only if you will be my queen too, Red of Hearts.”

High in the skies, Bridget squeals whilst kicking her feet and Ella can only sigh, facepalming.