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Zagreus’ next fight with Hades was… hard. And not in the way he was expecting.
Knowing why Hades was trying to keep him from finding his mother didn’t make the desire any less potent. Hades told him, frankly, that he could not allow Zagreus to leave the Underworld any more than he could stop Zagreus from trying to escape.
Zagreus thought he was prepared for the fight.
He was less prepared than he thought.
It started normally. Zagreus and Hades traded blows, and then Zagreus darted around their little frozen arena as Hades began to attack in earnest.
They’d done this dance before. Zagreus was familiar with it. This time, he was leading it, and that… unsettled him, the longer he danced out of the way of his father’s attacks.
“If you leave,” Hades snarled, a blast of fire sending Zagreus scrambling behind a pillar, “I will not be able to protect you.”
Zagreus didn’t respond. He knew that. He knew that Hades would not, could not, follow him out of the Underworld. He knew that once he made it out, he would be on his own.
But the boon Hades had taught him how to feel still thrummed in his chest. Zagreus couldn’t be controlled again, not like Aphrodite had done it. Hades had made sure Zagreus wasn’t helpless, even if he was ruined.
It was a genuine shock when several fights later, Hades fell.
Zagreus found himself lurching toward his father with a cry, despite knowing that Hades would return to the Styx, same as Zagreus. He caught Hades’ hand as the god fell, clinging to it even as Hades’ body went limp from blood loss and a particularly nasty slash that went from his left chest to his right jaw.
Hades met his eyes, some nearly indecipherable look in them that almost resembled a ragged, bleeding hope, and then Zagreus was holding only the slick, fading feeling of the Styx’s blood.
He’d won.
He’d actually won.
Zagreus slowly stood, looking at the gates back into the Underworld.
“I’ll be back,” he called to it, “Eventually, I will be back. I promise.”
Before, he’d had no intention of returning. Now… now the idea of leaving everyone in the Underworld forever felt… wrong. Even Hades, who might have deserved it if Zagreus never came back, would… be missed.
Zagreus would return once he’d found Persephone, and had a chance to discover more about himself beyond everything that had happened down there. He needed the space. He could handle himself.
Every step away from the Underworld felt like a step closer to disaster. Zagreus kept looking around himself, expecting to see… he didn’t know. The beautiful, alien sights that should have held his attention were ignored in favor of constant sweeps to make sure nothing was approaching him.
Zagreus was confident he could face almost anything the surface could throw at him. That confidence did not extend to his body, tense and ready for an attack that didn’t seem to be approaching. The grass was green, the sky blue, the air fresh and moving past him coolly, and nothing was anywhere near him.
He shook his head and kept moving. He wasn’t going to give up. Not now. Not when he’d finally gotten out. He was going to find Persephone, and he was going to get some answers, and then…
He’d figure it out. He had to, now that he was up here. No Achilles or Nyx to turn to now.
Zagreus wandered, trying to calm his racing heart as he did. Nothing attacked him. No one approached him. It was all quiet, and peaceful. It made his skin crawl.
When he noticed the vine-covered archway, he hesitated, then entered beneath it, hearing a woman’s voice humming. The sound made something resonate in Zagreus’ chest. He moved toward it.
There was a woman tending to a garden ahead. A goddess. A goddess with wheat-blonde hair and verdant green eyes. Eyes that matched his.
“Who’s there?” she asked, straightening up as he approached.
“Are you… Persephone?” Zagreus asked.
Her eyes narrowed.
“Who is asking?” she asked back.
Zagreus hesitated, then stumbled over his words until he managed to say, “I- my name is Zagreus and- I think I’m your son.”
Persephone glared at him, her hands balling into fists.
“If this is some sort of cruel joke-” she began, the ground beneath them rumbling ominously.
Zagreus raised his hands.
“No joke! I promise! I fought my way out of the Underworld to meet you again, and I’m not going to leave until I get some answers about why you left us!” he said, trying to ignore his racing heart.
This goddess did not know him. He knew the kind of damage a goddess trying to help could inflict, did he want to risk what an angry one could-?
Persephone took a step toward him and paused, now staring at his feet.
“Your… your feet,” she murmured, “They… last time I’d seen them they had gone out… you… you were dead.”
Zagreus tilted his head a little, then inhaled in recognition.
“Dead, as in actually dead. You… you didn’t know I came back, did you?” he asked.
Persephone looked at his face again, eyes now shining with tears, and shook her head.
“Zagreus,” she breathed, stepping forward and gently cupping his face in her hands, “My son? You… you’re alive. You’re real.”
Zagreus leaned into her touch and nodded.
And then he was being hugged. Zagreus sagged into Persephone’s hold and felt the anxiety, the gnawing fear of being alone aboveground, dissipate. He’d found her. He’d found his mother. Everything would be okay.
He got to talk with Persephone. She wanted to know everything about him, his life, how everyone else in the Underworld was, what his plans for the future looked like, who Meg and Than were and if they were making him happy…
Nothing about his experience with Aphrodite. Nothing about how he was dealing with it. No odd looks of concern or pity. It was so refreshing not to have it hanging over him. He had a fresh start up here. He could move past it.
And then the first wave of fatigue rushed through him.
Zagreus tried to ignore it, tried to wave it off, and then Persephone told him, quietly, that he was as bound to the Underworld as his father was, and that he could not leave it.
He held it together even as his body gave out and the Styx whisked him away, promising he would come back and see his mother again.
When he climbed back into his father’s house, Zagreus stood still for a moment, feeling his heart throb in his chest, and then…
He sobbed. He buried his face in his hands and sobbed openly, the grief and horror and relief and joy all mixing inside him into a tempestuous, overwhelming, uncontrollable wail that barely sounded human.
Zagreus felt small hands grip his shoulders, then felt much larger ones scoop him up like a child and carry him away. He just kept crying.
He’d made it out. He’d made it to the surface and met his mother and found out that all his thoughts about getting to start over and gain some distance from everything that had happened in the Underworld could never come to pass. He was trapped. He would always be trapped.
Another hand, large but not as broad, rested on his back and gently ran up and down it in a slow, soothing pattern. In his ear, someone breathed in tandem with the hand, and Zagreus found himself matching it.
Slowly, slowly the world came into focus around him. He was in Hades’ room, leaning into Hades’ chest as Nyx guided him out of his desperate gasps and into slightly more controlled breathing. He was still crying, but it wasn’t as all-consuming as it had been. His hearing was returning as well.
“-reus? Zagreus, child, can you speak?” Nyx was asking, still rubbing his back.
Zagreus swallowed roughly.
“Yes,” he managed to rasp.
“What happened, child? Hades told me you made it to the surface,” Nyx said.
Zagreus tangled his hands into Hades’ chiton.
“I did,” he whispered, “I did and I still ended up back here.”
“Were you attacked?” Hades asked, his grip on Zagreus tightening a little.
Zagreus shook his head.
“Did you find Persephone?” Nyx asked.
Zagreus nodded.
“Is she alright?”
He nodded again, unable to keep from sniffling a little.
“Were you able to talk to her?”
Zagreus nodded, then mumbled, “You didn’t tell her I was alive.”
Hades stilled, then said in a tight voice, “She made it clear she did not want to hear from me again, and with you unable to leave-”
Zagreus pushed away from him, eyes wide.
“You knew?!” he yelled, betrayal lancing through him.
Hades stared down at him.
“You… did not?” he asked, sounding bewildered.
Zagreus had to take a moment to breathe again, feeling his ribcage shudder wildly as his lungs fluttered. He shook his head.
“Oh, child,” Nyx whispered, and he felt her press a kiss to his temple, “I am so sorry. I am so sorry you only found out about this now, and in this way.”
Zagreus buried his face into Hades’ chest again.
“You need to stop assuming I understand things you don’t tell me about,” he growled, although it was undermined by the break in his voice midway through.
Hades rested his chin gently on Zagreus’ head, and rumbled, “I… will try.”
That was probably as good as he was going to get from his father, so Zagreus nodded and tried not to feel the quaking relief in his core. He would never be too far from the Underworld’s protection, even if he wanted to be. He would never truly leave this place.
He wasn’t sure if the thought made him more comforted or sickened.