It was cold, so cold. Not like winter, or even a walk-in freezer. It was worse, almost impossible to take. She felt as though her skin should crack and break. That she should die.
But she kept her eyes closed. She trusted Cyrus. She did before she jumped him. And she knew even now, she needed to keep trusting him, even if their current situation seemed completely insane.
Gods and goddesses out of myth? It was crazy. But none of Cyrus’s family seemed stable. And Pluto seemed barely human.
She had to trust him. She had no choice.
The cold seemed to fade. She still felt lost though, as if reality wasn’t around her. She feared it wasn’t, but knew not to dare looking to find out. She clutched Cyrus more tightly. He was her only link to anything real.
She realized the warmth wasn’t a lie. She could feel the sun against her skin, even though that made no sense. It was barely the beginning of the night when they disappeared from River City.
“It’s alright,” Cyrus said. “We’re here.”
Marilyn opened her eyes.
She stood at the edge of a forest. The trees were empty of their leaves, dozens of tiny fingers stretching towards the sky. But they were trees. Oak and birch and willow. It certainly wasn’t her image of hell, biblical or mythological.
“What is this? Where are we?”
“Providence, Rhode Island,” Cyrus said. “Andy Hades, or at least the throne of it.”
“I don’t understand.”
“Hades isn’t a place in the traditional sense. It’s an idea, a concept that exists in Pluto’s very being. My father can move it wherever and whenever he feels. It takes a lot of his power though, so they relocate only once in a great while. Mom made him move to the New World in the early nineteenth century. I always assumed they appreciated the humor of settling in a city called Providence.”
“This is crazy.”
“It’s definitely not normal. It’s not what I wanted one way or another.”
Persephone walked towards them, stopped before them. She looked Marilyn up and down with what could only be described as disdain.
“Son, you’ve humored your consort long enough. We need to convene in the main hall. We have much to discuss over dinner, before the trial begins.”
Cyrus nodded. He turned, pulling Marilyn around with him.
As she turned, the plantation house came into view.
“It’s huge.”
The house was in the Southern antebellum tradition. Pillars filled the front area, surrounding dozens of windows and a gorgeous set of double doors.
She realized that she stood on the massive front lawn of a secluded home. The forest was just to block the house from the main room. A winding path led around it, obviously the drive way for the ancient house.
“It’s beautiful.”
“Beauty often masks corruption,” Cyrus said. “This estate is no different. My parents can pretend to be generations of owners, but it’s just another lie. Another salve over the pain.”
“Pain?”
“It’s a plantation. Only Hades House doesn’t grow cotton; it only breeds suffering. Everyone that works inside is a lost soul. My father makes them work to just get there, but takes pleasure from their continued torture. It fuels him.”
“And your mother?”
“She’s a harvest goddess that married the lord of the dead. That’s weird even for an Olympian. She has her own sadistic streak, only she saves hers for her family.”
They walked up the half a dozen steps on to the massive porch. Despite Cyrus’s warnings, Marilyn found it hard to look past the sheer opulence of everything around her.
The door opened as they approached. It seemed to move on its own, free of any contact. She wondered if it was mechanized or just part of the magic of the place.
A chill rushed down her back as they passed through the door. she suddenly felt light headed. The room started to shift under her.
She stumbled, nearly fell. Cyrus caught her, but the world was already changing around her.
It wasn’t a house at all. It was a pit. Darkness surrounded her, thousands of souls whispered in despair.
They cried out for redemption, freedom, forgiveness and a thousand more desires. But there was no helping them. They could not be saved from the agony. Not by her, maybe not by anyone.
Cyrus’s voice echoed through her skull.
“Marilyn, can you hear me? Marilyn?”
She blinked off the vision. She was back inside the house, back in reality or some modicum of reality at least.
Cyrus helped her back to her feet. Marilyn clutched at her forehead as the room slowly stopped spinning.
“I was somewhere else,” she said. “Somewhere dark and horrible.”
“I don’t know how, but you saw the reality of my father’s kingdom. No mortal should be able to walk in that realm.”
“I’m not just any other mortal.”
“No,” Cyrus said with just the hint of a smile. It was the first time Marilyn could remember seeing even the hint of happiness in him. “No, you certainly are not.”
“Sir, are you and the lady all right?”Marilyn looked up in the face of an older man, perhaps in his early sixties. His head was bald and he wore a finely pressed suit. His posture and perfect white gloves made him seem more like a caricature of a butler more than an actual one. But Marilyn was becoming more accustomed to this kind of thing. It seemed Cyrus’s world was filled with one odd thing after another.
“No, Stark. Everything is quite all right.”
“Excellent, sir. If I may, dinner awaits in the next room. You will be expected to dress for the occasion. I can summon a matron to assist the lady—”
“That won’t be necessary,” Marilyn said.
“Take us to a wardrobe and we can change together,” Cyrus said.
“Sir, it wouldn’t be proper—”
“It will be alright, Stark. Just do as I say.”
“Yes, sir. Please follow me.”
Cyrus took Marilyn by the hand as they walked towards the long staircase at the back of the entrance hall.
The hall alone was massive, large enough to hold her apartment twice over, maybe three times.
Cyrus leaned in close to her. “We have maybe thirty minutes until dinner. We will have to change and come up with a plan. It will be the only chance we have. Understand?”
“I understand. Let’s do this.”
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