A Touch of Darkness (Hades x Persephone Saga Book 1)

“Persephone!”

Someone was calling her name. She rolled over and covered her head with her blanket to muffle the sound; she left the Underworld late last night and, too keyed up to sleep, stayed awake to work on her article.

She had a hard time choosing how she should proceed after watching Hades help that mother. In the end, she decided she had to focus on the bargains Hades made with mortals—the ones where he chose to offer an impossible terms. While she worked on the article, she found she was still frustrated, though she couldn’t tell if it was over her bargain with Hades or their time in the stacks—the way he’d asked her what she wanted and refused to kiss her.

Her skin had prickled with anticipation at the memory, though she wasn’t anywhere near him.

She’d pressed save on her article at four in the morning and decided to rest a few hours before rereading it. But as she started to drift off, Lexa burst through her bedroom door. “Persephone! Wake up!”

She groaned. “Go away!”

“Oh no, you’re going to want to see this. Guess what’s in the news today!”

Suddenly she was wide awake. Persephone shoved off her blankets and sat up, her imagination already taking hold—had someone snapped a picture of her in her goddess form outside Nevernight? Had someone caught her inside the club with Hades? Lexa shoved her tablet into Persephone’s face, and her eyes focused on something much worse.

“It’s all over social media today,” Lexa explained.

“No, no, no,” Persephone gripped the tablet with both hands. The title across the top of the page was black and bold and familiar:

Hades, God of the Game by Persephone Rosi.

She read the first line aloud, “Nevernight, an elite gambling club owned by Hades, God of the Dead, can be seen from anywhere in New Athens. The sleek pinnacle expertly mimics the imposing nature of the god himself and is a reminder to mortals that life is short—even shorter if you agree to gamble with the Lord of the Underworld.”

This was her draft. Her real article remained safely on her computer.

“How did this get published?” she hissed.

Lexa looked confused. “What do you mean? Didn’t you submit it?”

“No.” She scrolled through the article, her stomach in knots. She noticed some additions, like a description of Hades she would have never written. Hades’ eyes were described as colorless chasms, his face callous, his manner cold and boorish.

Boorish?

She wouldn’t dream of describing Hades in such a manner. His eyes were inky but expressive, and every time she met his gaze she felt like she could see the threads of his lifetimes there. In truth, his face could be callous at times, but when he looked at her, she saw something different—a softness to his jaw, an amusement alight in his face. A curiosity that burned, and his manner was anything but cold and boorish—he was passionate and charming and refined.

There was only one person who had gone with her and seen Hades in the flesh, and that was Adonis. He’d also invaded her workspace and read her article without permission.

Guess he’d been doing more than just reading it. Persephone’s anxiety was now as strong as her fury. She tossed the tablet aside and jumped out of bed, angry and vengeful words raced through her head. They sounded more like her mother’s than her own.

He will be punished, she thought. Because I will be punished.

She took a few deep breaths to cool her anger and consciously worked to uncurl her fingers. If she wasn’t careful, her glamour would melt away. It always seemed to react to her emotions—maybe because her magic was borrowed.

In reality, Persephone didn’t want Adonis punished, at least not by Hades. The God of the Dead had made his dislike of this mortal abundantly clear, and bringing him to Nevernight had been a mistake for several reasons—that was clear now. Perhaps this was part of the reason Hades had wanted her to stay away from him.

A third emotion rose inside her—fear—and she tamped it down. She wouldn’t allow Hades to get the best of her. Besides, she’d planned on writing about the god despite his threat.

“Where are you going?” Lexa asked.

“Work.” Persephone disappeared into her closet, trading her nightshirt for a simple green dress. It was one of her favorite outfits, and if she was going to get through this day, she figured she need every arsenal in her toolkit to feel as powerful as possible. Maybe she could get the article taken out of publication before Hades saw it.

“But…you don’t work today,” Lexa pointed out from her perch on Persephone’s bed.

“I have to see if I can get ahead of this.” Persephone reappeared, hobbling on one foot to buckle her sandals.

“Ahead of what?”

“The article. Hades can’t see it.”

Lexa’s laugh and then covered her mouth quickly, speaking between her fingers. “Persephone, I hate to break it to you, but Hades has already seen the article. He has people who look for this kind of stuff.” Persephone met Lexa’s gaze, and her friend winced. “Whoa.”

“What?” Hysteria rose in Persephone’s voice.

“Your eyes, they’re…freaky.”

Avoiding Lexa’s gaze while her emotions ricocheted all over her body, Persephone reached for her purse. “Don’t worry about it. I’ll be back later.”

She left her room and slammed the door to her apartment closed as Lexa called her name.

The bus wouldn’t run for anther fifteen minutes, so she decided to go on foot. She dug her compact out of her purse and applied more magic as she walked.

No wonder Lexa had been freaked out. Her eyes had lost all their glamour and glowed bottle-green. Her hair was brighter, her face sharper. She looked more Divine than she ever had in public.

By the time Persephone arrived at the Acropolis, her mortal appearance was restored. When she walked off the elevator, Valerie rose from behind her desk.

“Persephone,” she said nervously. “I didn’t think you were in today.”

“Hey, Valerie.” She tried to keep her voice cheerful and act like nothing was out of the ordinary—that Adonis hadn’t stolen her article and Lexa hadn’t woken her up to shove said angry article in her face. “Just coming in to take care of a few things.”

“Oh, well, you have several messages. I, uh, transferred them to your voicemail.”

“Thanks.”

But Persephone wasn’t interested in her voicemails; she was here for Adonis. She dropped her purse at her desk and stalked across the workroom to his. Adonis sat with his earbuds in, focused intently on his computer. At first, she thought he was working—probably editing something he stole, she thought angrily, but as she came up behind him she discovered he was watching some sort of television show—Titans After Dark.

She rolled her eyes. It was a popular soap opera about how the Olympians defeated the Titans. Though she’d only watched parts of it, she’d started to imagine most of the gods as they were portrayed on the show. Now she knew Hades was all wrong—a pale, lithe creature with a hollow face. If he were going to seek revenge for anything, it should be how they depicted him on that show.

She tapped Adonis’s shoulder and he jumped, taking out an earbud. “Persephone! Congr—”

“You stole my article,” she cut him off.

“Stealing is a harsh term for what I did.” He pushed away from his desk. “I gave you all the credit.”

“You think that matters?” she seethed. “It was my article, Adonis. Not only did you take it from me, you added to it. Why? I told you I would send it to you once I finished!”

In all honesty, she wasn’t sure what she expected him to say, but it wasn’t the answer he gave. “I thought you would change your mind.”

She stared at him a moment. “I told you I wanted to write about Hades.”

“Not about that. I thought he might convince you he was justified in his contracts with mortals.”

“Let me get this straight. You decided that I couldn’t think for myself, so you stole my work, altered it, and published it?”

“It’s not like that. Hades is a god, Persephone—”

And I’m a goddess, she wanted to yell. Instead, she ground out, “You’re right. Hades is a god, and for that very reason, you didn’t want to write about him. You feared him, Adonis. Not me.”

He cringed. “I didn’t mean—”

“What you meant doesn’t matter,” she snapped.

“Persephone?” Demetri called, and she and Adonis looked in the direction of their supervisor’s office. “A moment?”

Her gaze slid back to Adonis, and she pinned him with a final glare before heading into Demetri’s office.

“Yes, Demetri?” she said from the doorway.

He was sitting behind his desk, a fresh edition of the paper in hand. “Take a seat.”

She did—on the edge, because she wasn’t sure what Demetri would think of the article; she had a hard time calling it hers. Would his next words be ‘you’re fired?’ It was one thing to say you wanted the truth, another to actually publish it.

She considered what she would do when she lost her internship. She now had less than six months until graduation. It was unlikely another paper would hire the girl who dared call the God of the Underworld the worst god. She knew many people shared Adonis’s fear of Tartarus.

Just as Demetri started to speak, Persephone said, “I can explain.”

“What is there to explain?” he asked. “It’s clear by your article what you were trying to do here.”

“I was angry.”

“You wanted to expose an injustice,” he said.

“Yes, but there’s more. It’s not the whole story,” she said. She’d really only shown Hades in one light—and that was really in no light at all, just darkness.

“I hope it’s not,” Demetri said.

“What?” Persephone straightened.

“I’m asking you to write more.”.

The Goddess of Spring was quiet, and Demetri continued. “I want more. How soon can you have another article out?”

“About Hades?”

“Oh yes. You have only scratched the surface of this god.”

“But I thought…aren’t you…afraid of him?”

Demetri laid the paper down and leveled his gaze with hers. “Persephone, I told you from the beginning. We seek truth here at New Athens News and no one knows the truth of the King of the Underworld—you can help the world understand him.”

Demetri made it all sound so innocent, but Persephone knew she would only bring hatred upon Hades from the article published today.

“Those who fear Hades are also curious. They will want more, and you’re going to deliver.”

Persephone straightened at his direct order. Demetri stood and walked to the wall of windows, his hands behind his back. “How about a bi-weekly feature?”

“That’s a lot, Demetri. I’m still in school,” she reminded him.

“Monthly, then. What do you say to…five, six articles?”

“Do I have a choice?” she muttered, but Demetri still heard.

The corner of his mouth quirked. “Don’t underestimate yourself, Persephone. Just think—if this is as successful as I think it will be, there will be a line of people waiting to hire you when you graduate.”

Except it wouldn’t matter, because she’d be a prisoner—not just of the Underworld, but of Tartarus. She wondered how Hades would choose to torture her.

He’ll probably refuse to kiss you, she thought, and rolled her eyes at herself.

“Your next article is due on the first,” he said. “Let’s have some variety. don’t just talk about his bargains—what else does he do? What are his hobbies? What does the Underworld really look like?”

Persephone felt uncomfortable at Demetri’s questions, and she wondered if they were for him rather than the public.

With that, he dismissed her. Persephone walked out of Demetri’s office and sat down at her desk. Her head felt foggy and she couldn’t concentrate.

A monthly feature following the God of the Dead? What have you gotten yourself into, Persephone? She groaned out loud. Hades was never going to agree to this.

Then again, he didn’t have to.

Perhaps this would give her a chance to bargain with him. Could she leverage the threat of more articles to convince him to let her out of the contract?

And would his promise of punishment turn out to be true?

***

Persephone went straight to class after leaving the Acropolis, and it seemed like everyone had a copy of New Athens News today. That bold, black headline glared back at her on the bus, on her walk across campus, even in class.

Someone tapped her on the shoulder, and she twisted to find two girls huddled together in the row behind her. She wasn’t sure of their names, but they’d sat behind her since the beginning of the semester and said nothing until today. The girl on the right held a copy of the paper.

“You’re Persephone, right?” one of them asked. “Is everything you wrote true?”

That question made her cringe. Her instinct was to say no, because she hadn’t written the story, not in its entirety— but she couldn’t. She settled on, “The story is evolving.”

What she didn’t anticipate was the excitement in the girls’ eyes. “So, there will be more?”

Persephone cleared her throat. “Yeah…yes.”

The girl on the left leaned farther over the table. “So, you’ve met Hades?”

“That’s a stupid question,” the other girl chided. “What she wants to know is what’s Hades like? Do you have pictures?”

A strange feeling erupted in Persephone’s stomach—a metallic twist that made her feel both jealous and protective of Hades. Ironic, since she had promised to write more about him. Still, now that she was posed with these questions, she wasn’t sure she wanted to share her intimate knowledge of the god. Did she want to talk about how she’d caught him playing fetch with his dogs in a grove in the Underworld? Or how he’d amused her by playing rock-paper-scissors?

These were…human aspects of the god, and all of a sudden she felt possessive of them. They were hers.

She offered a small, unamused smile. “I guess you’ll have to wait and see.”

Demetri had been right—the world was just as curious about the god as they were afraid of him.

The girls in her class weren’t the only people who stopped her to ask about her article. On her way across campus, several other strangers called out to her. She guessed they were testing her name, and once they discovered she was Persephone, they ran up to her to ask the same questions—Did you really meet Hades? What does he look like? Do you have a picture?

She made excuses to get away quickly. If there was one thing she hadn’t anticipated, it was this—the attention she would receive. She couldn’t decide if she liked it or not.

She was just passing through the Garden of the Gods when her phone rang. Grateful for the excuse to ignore more strangers, she answered it. “Hello?”

“Adonis told me the good news! A series on Hades! Congrats! When do you interview him next and can I come?” Lexa laughed.

“Th-thanks, Lex,” Persephone managed. After stealing her article, it didn’t surprise her that Adonis had also taken the opportunity to text her friend about her new work assignment before she even got a chance to tell her.

“We should celebrate! La Rose this weekend?” Lexa asked.

Persephone groaned. La Rose was an upscale nightclub owned by Aphrodite. She had never been inside, but she’d seen pictures. Everything was cream and pink and, like Hades’ Nevernight, there was an impossible waitlist. “How are we supposed to get into La Rose?”

“I have my ways,” Lexa replied mischievously. Persephone wondered if those ways included Adonis, and she was about to ask as much when she caught a flash in the corner of her eye. Whatever Lexa was saying on the other line was lost as her attention moved to her mother, appearing through the garden’s foliage a few feet in front of her.

“Hey, Lex. I’ll call you back.” Persephone hung up and acknowledged Demeter with a curt, “Mother. What are you doing here?”

“I had to ensure you were safe after that ridiculous article you wrote. What were you thinking?”

Persephone felt the shock run deep, like an electrical current splicing through her chest. “I thought—I thought you’d be proud. You hate Hades.”

“Proud? You thought I’d be proud?” she scoffed. “You wrote a critical article on a god—but not just any god, Hades! You deliberately broke my rule—not once but multiple times.” Persephone’s surprise must have shown on her face because her mother added, “Oh, yes. I know you have returned to Nevernight on multiple occasions.”

Persephone glared at Demeter. “How?”

Her eyes fell to the phone in Persephone’s hand. “I tracked you.”

“Through my phone?” She knew her mother wasn’t above violating her privacy to keep tabs on her; she’d proven that by having her nymphs spy on her. Still, Demeter hadn’t bought her phone, nor did she pay the bill. She had no right to use it as a GPS. “Are you serious?”

“I had to do something. You weren’t talking to me.”

“Since when?” she demanded. “I saw you Monday!”

“And you cancelled our lunch.” The goddess sniffed. “We hardly spend time together anymore.”

“And you think stalking me will encourage me to spend more time with you?” Persephone demanded.

Demeter laughed. “Oh, my flower, I cannot stalk you. I am your mother.”

Persephone glared. “I don’t have time for this.” She tried to sidestep her and leave, but she found she couldn’t move—her feet felt as though they were welded to the ground. Hysteria erupted in her stomach and lodged in her throat. Persephone met her mother’s dark gaze, and for the first time in years, she saw Demeter as the vengeful goddess she was—the one who lashed nymphs and killed kings.

“I have not dismissed you,” her mother said. “Remember, Persephone, you are only here by the grace of my magic.”

Persephone wanted to scream at her mother, Keep reminding me I’m powerless. But she knew challenging her was the wrong move. It was what Demeter wanted so she could dole out her punishment; so instead, she inhaled a shaky breath and whispered, “I’m sorry, Mother.”

For a tense moment, Persephone waited to see if Demeter would release her or abduct her. Then she felt her mother’s hold loosen around her shaking legs. “If you return to Nevernight again, see Hades ever again, I will take you from this world.”

Persephone wasn’t sure where she gathered her courage, but she managed to look her mother in the eyes and say, “Don’t think for a second that I will ever forgive you if you send me back to that prison.”

Demeter gave a sharp laugh. “My flower, I don’t require forgiveness.”

Then she vanished.

Persephone knew Demeter meant her warning. The problem was, there was no way to get around going back to Nevernight; she had a contract to fulfill and articles to write.

Persephone’s phone vibrated in her hand and she looked down to see a message from Lexa: Yes to La Rose??

She texted back: Sounds great.

She was going to need a lot of alcohol to forget this day.