‘Now that I am the God-Killer,’ she said, her voice slow and smooth as still water, yet edged with steel. ‘Will you tell me the truth? All of it?’
Hades pouted faintly, staring into the dark heart of his wine as though the glass itself might hold an escape. ‘And what truth do you seek to unearth?’
‘The reason you created me.’
A fleeting shadow crossed the molten red of his eyes, an echo ofunease. ‘What do you mean?’
‘You forged me for this, shaped me into the God-Killer. But why?’ Mal placed her hand on the table, fingers splayed like a queen laying claim to her throne, and arched a brow. ‘You long to sever the curse that binds you, me, and Hecate in its cruel threads. If I strike her down, if I kill my own mother, she will not return. The curse will shatter.’
Hades only watched, silent, his expression unreadable.
‘But here lies the cruel jest… you have already slain Hecate once, only to force her rebirth. Now she walks this world again, somewhere, no more than a helpless babe.’ Mal’s lips curled into a bitter sound that might have been laughter. ‘Thanatos I cannot kill, for he is death itself, eternal and untouchable.’
‘Is that what Thanatos has told you?’ Hades chuckled.
‘Ash Acheron I refuse to slay,’ she said, ignoring his words. ‘That leaves me with…’ Her head tilted, the pale marble of her face twisting into a smile that glittered with danger as her eyes fixed upon him. ‘You.’
Hades laughed, dark and low, the sound curling like smoke. ‘You cannot kill me here, not in my own dominion. Only upon mortal soil.’
‘True,’ Mal said, tapping her fingers against the stone in a soft, deliberate rhythm. ‘You could hide within this realm, a coward’s eternity beyond my reach.’
‘But?’
‘But I know how dearly you crave the end of this curse.’
‘Enough to forfeit my life?’ Hades regarded his nails, idle and thoughtful, like a man pondering the colour of his own blood. ‘Intriguing.’ He smiled. A wicked, perilous thing that promised nothing good. ‘You are right, child. I would do anything to end this curse.’ He leaned forward, his crimson eyes narrowing, burning. ‘But the question is… would you?’
Before she could shape an answer, Hades snapped his fingers.
It felt like falling through eternity. One moment Mal had been seated upon the chair in the Underworld’s spectral castle, the next the ground was torn from beneath her, the world vanishing into a chasm of nothingness, only for her to land once more in that same chair, in that same hall, as if time itself had folded in on her.
A smile tugged at her lips as understanding dawned.
Hades had cast them back into the living realm, the mortal world. No longer bound by the weight of the Underworld’s silence, they now sat within the Kingdom of Darkness, in the grand, echoing hall of the wyverian stronghold.
Mal turned her head to the window frames—bare, glassless arches that let the cold air creep through, and stared upon skies of leaden grey, as familiar as the scars of memory. And somewhere in that distance, cutting through the wind, she heard the haunting roar of her wyvern.
Hades rose from his chair with lazy grace, leaving behind the half-rotten apple upon the table, its flesh bruised and darkened like a dying star, resting just before her.
‘Did my father know?’ Mal asked, rising too, her fingers curling around the hilt of her sword as she drew it free with a whisper of steel.
‘King Ozul?’ Hades scratched at his neck, eyes narrowing slightly. ‘Know about what?’
‘About me.’
A silence lingered before Hades turned his attention to the skeletal window frames. ‘Yes, he always knew. I doubt he realised that Hecate was the Seer, though.’
‘Why did she do that to me?’ Mal’s voice was quieter, yet edged with venom.
‘She was suppressing your power,’ Hades said, his tonedeceptively mild. ‘Caging the godhood inside you, making certain it would not awaken.’
‘Why?’
‘Because she feared you would become what you are now, the God-Killer. And that you would strike her down.’
Mal nodded once, slow and deliberate, her grip tightening upon her blade until her knuckles paled. Hades’ eyes, sharp as garnets, drifted down to the weapon.
‘If I kill you,’ Mal said softly, dangerously, ‘the curse will end, won’t it? I will be freed from Ash and Thanatos, and he will no longer hunt Ash.’
