Menacing.
If he was a musical melody, he’d be the Locrian mode—the darkest musical scale played on a piano.
Dark fog swirled around the man’s feet, and his eyes were an insidious shade of black.
A monstrous three-headed dog added to his daunting visage. The terrifying animal followed him with matching black eyes.
The man and his beast were notorious for running the underworld, a maximum-security prison that only housed immortal inmates in the North Sea. The place where Titans and incarcerated Spartans were tortured. It was where Medusa was infamously imprisoned.
Beside him walked a short woman with dark skin in a pink dress.
She was his foil: pretty and delicate.
A small laurel crown sat atop her curly blonde hair—signaling she was an Olympian heiress—and a dog-sized dragon was perched on her golden-tan shoulder with its tail wrapped around her neck.
Heiresses were super rare and highly sought after because of all the Spartan fertility issues.
As the woman stood on her tiptoes, whispering, his expression softened, and he wrapped his arm around her protectively.
Hades and Persephone.
Their love was legendary.
Persephone was the daughter of Demeter and Iasion—a dark creature who was rumored to have power over plants.
Because of her heritage, Persephone was uniquely powerful and beautiful.
That was partly why Hades and Persephone were so infamous.
It was also because everyone knew Hades would doanythingfor Persephone. Humans had been killed, and Spartans had been imprisoned for merely lookingat her wrong.
The other part was Spartans were known for their promiscuity (they had both male and female lovers in themultiples), and as a result, few Spartans took marriage oaths, and even fewertook an oath with a single person.
The rest of the House leaders were in relationships, such as Zeus and Hera, but they didn’t take Spartan oaths and were known to have affairs with other Spartans and humans.
It was rumored that centuries ago it was the norm for Spartans to take marriage oaths, and the largest wedding was betweensevenpeople.
Hades clapped Zeus on the back in a warm greeting, towering over the shorter, gold-skinned man.
While none of the separate Spartan families were related, they were rumored to be as close as brothers, and their collaboration had ended the Great War.
The hair on the back of the dog’s three necks stood on edge as it growled at the lion. The beasts stood eye to eye, teeth bared.
As Zeus walked away and his lion followed, a feeling of certain doom settled into my bones.
I took another step back in the sand.
Rain soaked me to the bone.
Hades spread his arms wide. “The initiation massacre begins now. Like always, weapons arenot allowed—whoever wields one will be killed.” His voice projected around the coliseum like a gunshot.
He looked down at us and his face was carved from marble, emotionless and cruel.
“Use your fists and your wits,” Hades said. “The adrenaline pumping through your veins will keep you going when your body would otherwise fail—above all else, this is a mental test.” His voice rose. “Spartans are gods... remember... there is no such thing as a stupid god!”
The crowd roared.
Shadows stretched around Hades.
