Forbidden To Love (The Erosians) (24 page)

Sentencing

~19~

Hades I presume this is, stops laughing as suddenly as he started. I hold my breath apprehensively as he eyes me up and down. “Why don’t you have a seat?” He opens his hand to the space next to me where a chair appears. It’s a carver chair with what looks like human skin for the seat. I gulp in horror and shake my head.                                                        “Well, fine.” He shrugs his shoulders and waves the chair away. It disappears.                                                                       “I hear you have been a bad young girl.” He starts to walk in a circle around the room, still tapping his fingers as he goes. His long cape, which the snakes are holding to his shoulders, stretches out behind him. “Is that right?” He stops and looks at me.                                                                                     “I don’t know,” I stammer not sure what the best answer is to give.                                                                       “Hmmm.” He carries on walking, nodding as he goes while beating his finger tips against each other. “Eros, you see,” he stops and gestures in front of him as if he was there, “tells me you have, and tells me to banish you to Tartarus.” He breathes in sharply and places his hand on his chest.                             He turns his head slowly towards me and grins as he resumes his circling of the room.                                                         I turn on my heel so I can follow him around, not wanting him to be out of sight for fear of what he could do. “I personally think Tartarus is a bit extreme for your crime. After all, it’s not as if you can re-commit it now that Joshua - was that his name? … ”                                                                                     I don’t respond, even though the ache in my chest flares up at the sound of his name and the agony it brings with it threatens to cripple me.                                                                       But he wasn’t looking for an answer, “Yes, well, now that Joshua is, well …otherwise occupied, shall we say?” He puts emphasis on Josh’s name like this is all one gigantic joke. I want to do something to defend his name but what can I do? I'm at the mercy of the Lord of the Dead.                                           Hades pauses and looks up at the ceiling, “Where was I?” he looks down at the ground and tilts his head to one side as he waits for his memory to return. “Ah yes! He’s currently otherwise engaged, so I don’t think I’ll be sending you to Tartarus.”                                                                                     I almost drop to my knees in relief that I won’t be going there but Hades darts from where he was standing to directly in front of me in a split second. I stumble back, but he grabs hold of my neck, pulling me towards him. The snakes are rapidly snapping and hissing at me, lunging forward to take a bite, but thankfully they are just out of reach. He moves his hands from the back of my neck until they are stuck on the sides of my cheeks.                                           They feel cool and rough, like there are prickly hairs covering his palms, which are scratching into my skin. I look at Hades. His eyes look like they’re shaking in their sockets and his lips are thin and stretched back, baring jagged spikes where teeth should be.                                                                                     “No, you won’t be going to Tartarus. You’ll be staying here in my palace as I have another use for you.” He laughs to himself, and I nervously look between him and the eyes of the snakes. In the small gap between the snakes and his head, I can see Luca. His head is tipped forward, I can’t see his face, but his fists are clenched at his sides.                                           Hades applies more force to my face. My cheekbones threaten to give way to his power. “You will make my Queen love me the way she always should have done.” His request sounds more like a threat and his eyes frantically search my face, waiting for me to agree but I don’t. I can’t do that yet.              My powers aren’t advanced enough to make Gods fall in lo
ve, only Eros' and Allana’s are. I can’t nod or shake my head to give any response, and there’s no hope of speaking as he crushes my jaw in his hands.                             Hades releases my face when I don’t give him any sort of confirmation that I’ll do what he asks. He takes a few steps away from me as rage begins to contort his face. “Luca,” he yells, and Luca appears at his side instantly, no longer stuck to the spot by the door.                                           “Take her to the turrets. Let her think about my proposition for a while.” He looks at Luca as if he is making sure he understands some other meaning behind his words, but Luca just gives a slight nod. “I fear she is still in shock from the evening's events.” Hades finishes staring at me with a mad obsession.                                                                                     Luca grabs my arm and starts pulling me towards the back of the hall.                                                                                     “But be warned,” Luca stops. I hear him exhale loudly as he turns me back to Hades, “there’s no way in hell I will let you leave.” Hades breaks into a cackle as he raises his hands to the roof and then he’s gone.                                                                       My feet only just manage to move me fast enough to keep up with Luca as he swings the door open wide and pushes me through first, shoving me against the wall at the other side as he kicks it shut.                                                                       “Are you ok?” Luca has his hands either side of me pressed against the wall so I can’t escape. He leans his head to the left of me, almost resting it on my shoulder while he looks down at the floor. Both our chests rise and fall at a rapid pace, mine from the terror Hades has just filled me with. I'm not sure why Luca is panting.                                                        “I think so,” I whisper, unsure of what’s going to happen now and why his sudden mood change. What would he care if I was ok. He was throwing me on the floor less than ten minutes ago.                                                                                     “I'm sorry about how I got you into the room.” He lifts his head slightly and looks at me.                                                         “I don’t understand.” And I don’t. I don’t understand why he was so awful to me and I don’t understand why he’s apologizing for it now.                                                                       “There were other guards watching. They would have reported back to Hades if I was being too ... I don’t know the right word,” he looks up in frustration, “ … too friendly with you, and a different guard would then be assigned to you, someone like Devan, someone who wouldn’t think twice about inflicting their own brand of torture on you just for fun.” He moves his arms from the wall and grazes each of my shoulders lightly.                             Torture? Is he trying to tell me there’s going to be torture? I'd better try and stay on this side of him if he’s been instructed to torture me.                                                         “Thank you.” It’s all I can force myself to say and all he deserves. My body and mind haven’t forgotten what he is responsible for. But if what he’s saying is true, and he was only doing it for my protection, I still don’t understand why.              “I really thought he was going to kill you when you didn't agree to his decision.” He closes his eyes tightly and pounds the wall with his fist. I hold myself still against the rough bricks as he works out his tension on them.               “Better get you up to the turrets. You’ll be safe up there. No one can see you,” or you, I mentally add for him.
Sweet little lies
~20~
We walk through an endless row of ominous narrow corridors. They’re deathly quiet, but I know when there are others around because Luca grabs my arm roughly instead of loosely holding my wrist as he guides me along. It’s hard to see in the passageways. A mortal would surely be terrified here as they wouldn’t be able to see their hand in front of their face. I can make out Luca in front of me but not much beyond that. Maybe that’s for the best.                                                         I glance at the walls either side of me as we slowly walk along; I avert my eyes to look straight ahead when I see what look like fingernail marks scratched into the walls. Luca must have felt me tense because he looks over his shoulder to me and whispers “You ok?” I nod, even though I'm not. Luca moves his hand from my wrist and places it on the small of my back, pulling me to the side of him, so we are walking side-by-side. “It’ll be ok,” he breathes in my ear.                             The sound of his voice so close to me sends shivers down my neck and makes my heart beat a little faster. He tries to stifle a laugh. Is he doing this on purpose? Does he know the effect he’s having on me? If he does, it is downright inappropriate. I still haven’t forgotten that hours ago he sent Josh to his death.                                                                       There’s no point questioning him and getting into an argument. I may as well just let him guide me to wherever I'm destined for. I look out in front of us and see nothing but a darkness that I feel is going to swallow me up and never spit me out.                                                                                                   Josh, wherever you are, I love you, and I'm sorry I never got the chance to tell you. Please don’t be angry at me. I want to rip Luca to pieces right now for you, but he’s the only chance I’ve got. For whatever reason, Luca seems to be my saviour in this place, and if I don’t keep him on side, who knows what they will do to me? I pray he can hear my thoughts and understand my words.                                                         As we approach the end of the corridor, there’s a small stream of light spilling into the hall. It’s highlighting a spiral staircase which is dotted with the tiny windows I saw from outside. Luca leads me up them, and I try to look out of each one so I can figure out which part of the palace I'm in.              Luca forces me along too fast, though. He moves his arm further around my waist and lifts me slightly off the ground, then flies up what must be twenty sets of staircases, not pausing at any of the small landings we pass.                             It’s not until he sets me down in what must be the top turret - as there are no more stairs leading up - that I hear the screams from below.                                                         “Who are they?” I almost scream myself, horrified at the piercing noises coming from downstairs.                                           “I was hoping you wouldn’t be able to hear them up here,” Luca replies blankly while he fiddles with a twisted dungeon door made out of bleached white sticks. He springs it open and gestures into the circular room which is to be my prison. But I'm not moving until he tells me what’s happening down the stairs.                                                                                     Luca stands waiting for me to go in, but when I don’t respond, he looks down at the ground and shakes his head. “You’d probably feel better if you didn’t know,” he tells me and looks expectantly, hoping that will be the end of it.                             “Try me.” I lean back on the small windowsill and fold my arms.
Luca looks slightly impressed at my challenge to him, but he quickly tries to cover it with a look of annoyance. “They’re prisoners who are being mercilessly tortured by the guards watching over them, something that they’ll all be expecting me to do to you whilst you’re up here.”                                                         He goes quiet at the end, and I stiffen up against the window, remembering the cold look in his eyes when he threw me through the first door, reminding me just what he is capable of.                                                                                                   Luca sighs and he’s at my side before I can even blink. “Don’t worry; I’m not planning on torturing you- unless you’d like it.” He winks at me playfully.                                           “Don’t hold your breath”                                           “Couldn’t even if I wanted to,” he mutters as he walks back over the prison gate. “Come on.” He nods towards the empty room, and I reluctantly move towards my cage.                                                                                                                 The room is small and round, with one tiny window directly opposite the door. The ceiling is a cone with beams leading up to the peak. Each beam is made of the same stuff as the door. I’ve never seen a material like it. It twists at odd angles and splits open in different sections but fuses together seamlessly at the top, and the colour is whiter than snow.              “They’re bones.” Luca is leaning against the door arch.                                                                                                   “What!” I exclaim.                                                                       Luca just shrugs. There’s no explanation he can give but maybe he could learn to be more tactful. I suppose I am in the palace of the Underworld. What more did I expect from the décor or the personnel?                                                         I continue to take in my new room. There’s a long bench at one edge of the room which must double as a bed. I’m glad I don’t need much sleep. I can see, peeking out from under the throw that’s been laid across it that it’s also made of bone.                                                                                                   “Are they from humans?”                                                         I can almost hear Luca trying to think of a different way of saying yes.                                                                       “Mostly,” is what he comes up with.                                           I walk across to the window and look out. I can only see the Asphodel fields and the plants swaying in different spots. I guess that’s where the dead are running through. To the left I can see the bridge we crossed, but I'm too high up to see directly below me. Just above me I can see the thick layer of cloud which must lead to Elysium. I sigh, wondering where Josh is going to end up.                                                                       “Do you need anything?” Luca’s voice snaps me out of thinking about Josh.                                                                                     “Erm … no.” I shake my head, knowing the one thing I do need he couldn’t give me. Only Josh would be able to fill the space that’
s getting bigger by the second in my body. I slump down by the window, so I'm sitting on the floor which mercifully is made of stone and of no other human parts.              “Okay, traditionally I would now shut this door, lock it and start to torment you.” A flash of pain crosses his face, but he shakes it off.                                                                       “Then why don’t you?” Now I'm up here and relatively safe, I can be done with the niceties between us.              Luca shakes his head at me slowly his face filling with disappointment, but I don’t know what’s causing it. Is this what he is then, one of Hades' guards, trained to kidnap torture and probably kill?                                                                       “If one of the other guards comes up, I’ll shut the door, but no need for now.” I almost laugh at how he’s trying to force the feigned official stuff after everything he’s already done which he would probably be cast to Tartarus for.                             “So are you like Hades' right hand man or something?” I don’t honestly want to learn more about him, but there’s something intriguing that makes me question him, and questioning him gives my mind something else to do instead of replaying Josh’s final moments.                                           As I wait for his response, he slides his back down the door arch, so he’s sitting at the same level as me. “I guess you could say that,” he answers, staring straight ahead.               “Why what else could you say?” He laughs at my twisting of his words.                                                                                     “You could say I’m a slave, you could say I’m a collector, or you could perhaps say I’m a guard.” He tilts his head towards me and smirks, impressed with his roundabout way of answering my question without actually giving me the truth. “You could say I'm your only hope.”                                           I stay quiet. Luca didn’t mean for me to hear that. He muttered it and looked away from me as he said it. He mustn't know I can hear everything he says, no matter at what volume. I jump as he brings his attention back to me.              Worry is painted across his face, but he shakes it off and stares at me coldly. I stare back at his eyes, and the red that was before just a border is now seeping its way towards his pupil, turning his eyes mostly the same crimson shade. But that’s not the only thing that’s different.                             Before, the hard set of his jaw and sharp point of his cheek bones made him look dangerous, but now, when we’re all alone, they’re starting to appear gentler.                                           “You want the truth,” he carries on without me replying. “I'm a soldier, a soldier for a war that’s yet to begin,” he sighs, “and one that’s tired of waiting for it to start.” He trails off, but I don’t leave it there.                             “Why?”                                                                                     He shrugs “Hades saw that Zeus had got Prometheus to make him more Gods, like you and that Poseidon had got him to make him the merfolk, so he wanted his own race made.” I shake my head at him.                                                                       “Zeus would never allow Prometheus to do that for Hades.”                                                                                     Prometheus only made the mortals for Zeus because he spared him from Tartarus. What could Hades offer him? He holds no power over Prometheus as he lives in Olympus.              Luca throws his hands out in front him and lets out an exasperated laugh, like he’s argued this point before. “Hades tricked Prometheus into coming to the Underworld with the promise that he would release a Titan from Tartarus if he helped him, but once Hades got what he wanted, he told Prometheus to leave, or he’d lock him away as well, and he would tell Zeus of his betrayal.” He finishes there, but I can tell there’s more to come.