passed hours there with her, tending to his business while she read or helped him with his work.
All in all, they had fallen into an easy rhythm and shared the kind of life he had never dreamed of having, one that often filled his heart to bursting.
That heart filled to bursting all over again as he gazed at his love, watching her as she tended to her garden, quietly singing to herself. She gently lifted her left hand, brushing a rogue wave of spun gold behind her ear only for it to slip forwards again and brush her cheek as she bent over something. Her cerulean corset and trousers accentuated her curves, had his mind racing forwards and blood rushing as he flexed his fingers, able to feel the buttery softness of the leather against them already.
No more pretty dresses for his goddess.
He had tried to buy her one and instead she had requested the clothes she wore now.
Something she could move in, as she had put it.
And gods, the way she moved.
He had been hard as stone the moment he had seen her in the tight clothing, aching for her then as he was aching for her now. He sighed. One thing hadn’t changed between them yet though. He still found things difficult from time to time, had yet to shatter the hold his past had on him enough to find release within her, but every time he failed, his little goddess was gentle with him, soothed him before rage took him, coaxed him back to her, and he was sure it was only a matter of time now.
Calindria was quite insistent that it was.
He hadn’t believed her at first, but now he did.
Every day he spent with her he was healing, putting his past behind him in the quest for a brighter future.
Calindria noticed him the moment he had passed the black fluted columns that lined one end of the pool, stood and turned towards him in one motion. Her face lit up and his heart lit up with it as she ran to him, as she leaped into his arms and curled hers around his neck.
Thanatos wrapped his arms around her and held her to him, captured her lips and savoured the desperate way she kissed him—a way that confirmed she had missed him as much as he had missed her.
Gods, how he had missed her.
Not long ago he would have been eager to return to his castle so he could be alone, and now he was eager to return to it so he could be with her.
He pulled her closer to him, cursing the black metal plates of the armour that protected his legs and hips as they hindered him, stopping him from being able to feel her body pressing to his.
She pulled back, stealing the pleasure of her lips from him, and her blonde eyebrows met in a frown that darkened her blue eyes. They turned troubled as she gazed into his.
“It didn’t go well?” Her soft voice undid him.
He had been aching to hear it as fiercely as he had been aching to feel her pressed against him. When he shook his head, she sighed, the sound melodic, and shifted her left hand. She twined the hair at the back of his head around her fingers, maddening him, stoking that fire she always ignited in him.
“We will find her one day, Thanatos. Perhaps next time I could come with you and my brothers? I could use my connection to the earth to root her out.”
The urge to tell her she would be remaining at the castle, far from any danger, barely rose within him before it was vanquished by a stronger need to keep her by his side, close to him where she would be safe. Not only that, but he could see how much she wanted to help, had listened to her speak at great lengths of how she needed to help her family. Her brothers wouldn’t be pleased about it, and he doubted Hades would allow it, but Thanatos was close to agreeing to his persistent little goddess’s demands that he take her with him. He knew in his heart that she could be a great help to them on this hunt, and he knew in his soul that she could handle herself, and also how desperately she wanted to spend time with her brothers.
But not in the way she had before her captivity, tailing them around the palace grounds and waiting