This time when he pulled away, tearing her hands off of him, Cyane let him go.
Then she recalled something. She brought her hands up and pressed her palms to her brow. “Hades said...he said I helped Demeter discover where her daughter was.”
Hermes hissed. “That can’t be, I was there, I would remember—”
Cyane looked up at him.
He stared at her, his mouth parting slightly, as his eyes flickered over her hurriedly. “There was a naiad, a naiad who gave me a belt. The belt Persephone wore the day she vanished. Her name…”
“What was her name?”
“How could I have forgotten,” he breathed, pivoting away.
“What was her name?” she urged, asking again.
“Ciane.”
“My name.”
“But she was transformed. She wasn’t a naiad, not anymore, she was—”
“What?”
“A pond,” he said. “I only met her the one time, but I saw her play with Persephone from a distance when I used to, erm, watch the goddess.”
It had to be her. It had to be. The name wasn’t quite the same, but it was undeniably close. And Hermes had said he recognized her, although he couldn’t place from where. “Can you take me to this pond? Does it still exist?”
“I don’t like going there anymore.” He turned away, and Cyane felt like she was losing him, losing him right when she was so close to finding out the truth and understanding why.
Hades had brought her back to life, but for what? Why did she have any purpose in his plans? He kept reminding her of her lowly status, that she was nothing in comparison to a god.
“Why?” she asked.
His eyes shuttered. “It was where my beautiful maiden was last seen, where I lost her to the dark and depravity of”—he spat—“Hades. He stole her. Stole her purity, and the flowers of this world died with Demeter’s agony. My beautiful Persephone, raped by such a man.”
“Did he…” Cyane tried to imagine it, imagine Hades, as depraved as the spectacle of the day before. “Did he truly rape her?” It made her sick.Poor Persephone.But the goddess had smiled, had seemed almost eager to leave her mother’s embrace and return to the dark. Even so, anger and a terrible sadness filled Cyane to think that such an innocent, beautiful creature like the Goddess of Spring had been subjected to that.
The grief, the pain, was familiar and old, as if a friend returned from her past, one that had been dead.
I know her.Did Cyane truly know her? Cyane’s heart screamed she did, but there were no memories. Even now, as she wrung her hands into her dress waiting for Hermes’s answer, she wasn’t sure.
“He tore all that was innocent from her and took it for his own, without allowance, without appeal.”
“But Persephone was brought home?” God, why did she care? “Take me to the pond, Hermes. Please.”
“She was rescued, but her sentence was final. There was nothing anyone could do once Zeus decided.”
“She didn’t seem upset to descend?”
“Because she is innocent and believes Hades is good,” he scowled.
It didn’t make sense. “And yet you were celebrating with him these past seven days.”
“Don’t think to question me. Mortals do not command me. Now that you’re free of Cerberus’s protection, I could do all manner of things to you, and no one would help you,” he dictated, rounding on her. “More than you could imagine.”
Cyane stiffened but kept her feet rooted. She was in the sunlight and wasn’t going to be intimidated by him, didn’t even think she could after all she’d been through. “The deal you made was to take me where I wanted to go, God of Crossings, and you have yet to do anything but escort me down through a tunnel to a place I could’ve gone myself.”
A sneer tugged Hermes’s upper lip. His beauty diminished with a single gesture.
