"Dare I ask how?"
"The exact way you think that Zeus will make a fool of himself." Her amusement showed on her face, making me laugh along with her.
"I'll admit, I only have a cursory knowledge of mythology. After I realised the gods were real people, it felt weird to be diving into their stories. You'll have to tell me if I get something wrong about you."
She shrugged. "There's not much to get wrong about me. I'm Hel, ruler of Hel, that's pretty much all there is to it."
"So, do you come to the land of the living often?" There was no way I could stop the flirtiness from coming through my tone, but I supposed that wasn't a problem. Hel already had plenty of knowledge regarding my attraction towards her, it wasn't like I was revealing something new.
"It's my permanent residence. Which you know, considering you've seen my home." The expression on her face almost made it seem as if she was thinking about our night together, making me a little hot under the collar. It was one thing knowing that it had happened and I was supposed to ignore it, it was quite another to know that she was thinking about it.
"Right, yes, I'm sorry. That was a foolish question," I murmured.
"You're fine," she assured me. "But I can't go to the afterlife, I'm still alive. So I'm not really the goddess of anything."
"Except the bedroom," I murmured.
Hel laughed and flicked her light blue hair over her shoulder. "Don't let any of the love gods hear you say that, they'll be insulted that you're giving the title to me and not them."
"I haven't slept with any love gods to be able to compare."
"That you know about. You had no idea you'd slept with a death god until tonight either." She took a sip of her wine, drawing attention to her perfect lips.
If I wasn't careful, I was going to find myself slipping back into thoughts that were highly inappropriate given where we were and the fact she'd made it clear that we were never going to have more than one night.
I cleared my throat. "So, I heard you were a necromancer."
She raised an eyebrow. "And how did you hear that?"
"Daisy told me. She actually said that she'd introduce me to you because I needed to talk to a necromancer for a potion I'm working on."
"How intriguing. But you should know that I don't do work during socialising hours," she said.
"You have a lot of rules."
"It keeps everything the way I like it." She took a sip of her drink.
I raised an eyebrow. "What do you even do?"
"Did Daisy not tell you that?"
"She didn't, actually. She didn't tell me your name until tonight either."
"That could have saved you some time, especially if you'd looked up a photo of me," she said.
"I didn't realise there'd be any."
"Of course there are. I can't look this fabulous and expect no one to want to photograph me. Though you'll mostly find artwork from people who have drawn me over the years."
"Did you pose for any of them?" I asked curiously.
"Some." The way her lips quirked as she said it made me wonder which of the images she'd posed for, and what she thought of them.
I cleared my throat so I didn't get distracted by doing anything like recalling what she looked like naked. "So, your job?"
"I'm a mortician," she said.
"Isn't that a bit on the nose for a goddess of death?"
