spread across her face, then she giggled. 'There's six of you,' she slurred, then slumped to the ground.
'What the-' I started, then squinted as a small, naked gnome ran towards me. 'Skop?'
'Hedone thought she'd charmed me, but despite her being hot as holy hell, I am immune to such powers,' he said, talking fast as he reached me. I thrust the manacle out to him, one desperate hope left in me.
'Get my trident into the keyhole,' I said urgently. The trident could only be wielded by me, so it should be enough to unlock the manacle.
'I pretended she was in control, but secretly told Dionysus everything. He couldn't send me into Tartarus with Persephone, so he sent me to you instead. Armed with wine powder, but it won't last long. Ankhiale will come round in five minutes.'
'Zeus is behind all this,' I told the kobaloi, as he dragged the Trident toward me. It must have weighted three times what he did, and his bearded face showed the strain. Energy was building inside me, hope coursing through my veins.
'Dionysus worked that out when I told him you weren't really with Persephone. Zeus took the other gods to Leo to give you two some time alone. I believe Dionysus and Poseidon are confronting him now.' He had dragged the Trident to my feet and I ducked into a crouch, scooping it up with one hand.
'Help me,' I said, and together we wrestled the end of the long weapon into the manacle. With a roar, I forced the trident into the metal, and with a loud crack, the cuff opened.
Power flooded my body, the monster rearing loud and white-hot inside me, screaming up my chest, ready to end anyone or anything that stood between me and my Queen.
Twenty-Eight
Persephone
Cronos could free Hades. Free him of his eternal obligation and let him live as he truly wanted to. If I was going to die anyway, surely this was a deal worth making?
What if you can stop him though! Don't give in! The fighter inside me screamed. But my heart ached as I thought about Hades consumed by the darkness, the idea of him living trapped in Tartarus as a mindless machine of violence unbearable.
I barely felt the vines snake from my palms.
As though on magnets, they burst toward Cronos.
'Wait!' I shouted, but it was too late, it was as though I no longer had control of them. A slow smile spread across Cronos' face as they reached him, and the storm of light around him shimmered a dark orange.
'It appears you have made your choice, Persephone.'
'No! No I hadn't decided yet!'
'Your power responded to your heart, little goddess. You would do anything for him.'
My vines coiled around his arms, and I sent every ounce of power I had in my body into them to keep them green. As soon as they turned black, they would take his power. Sweat rolled down my back as I concentrated.
'But the thing is, I lied.' My eyes snapped to his. 'Hades has been my keeper for a very, very long time. Do you really think I would not repay him for his actions? After you have destroyed it, I will rebuild Tartarus, and it will be much, much worse than this. The Olympians have little imagination when it comes to torture. And Hades will spend at least as long as I have in the darkness.'
Fury raged through me, my passion and my instinct to protect him too great to suppress.
'It's Zeus you're angry with, not Hades!' I could feel my power reacting, the image of Hades' face fueling my strength, as it always did. I couldn't let him live that life. I had to do something. And my vines agreed. With a ripple, they turned black.
'No!'
Cronos let out a long breath and closed his eyes as black tattoos began to spread across his shoulders.
'No!' I screamed again, desperately trying to disintegrate the vines. But it was as though they were glued to him, he was too strong. And then the power flowing down them from him hit me, and everything stopped.
Time itself stood still as power consumed me, so vast I could make no sense of it. Within seconds it was overwhelming me, I was drowning in the infinite; swirling through a mass of light and shadow that never ended.
'Persephone!'
That voice... I knew that voice. That voice was the most important thing in the world to me. More important than anything else. I clung to it, the dizzying vortex