The Sea Queen (The Dark Queens Book 1) (13 page)

“Thalassa, oh goddess,” he murmured, nipping at the shell of my ear with his flat but sharp teeth.

He stumbled back, carting me with him, our almost-fall broken by a vertical piece of rock poking out of the ground for him to rest his weight upon.

A terrible keening noise rang through the solitude of the gardens. The noise was mine.

I might have been embarrassed, but I felt too wonderful to care.

Hades rode me like a bucking stallion, making my breasts jiggle wildly from the bumpy ride.

I felt myself about to fragment, and this time, rather than grow scared, I relaxed into the dark pull, floating toward it happily, already knowing I’d shatter—but also knowing he’d catch me.

With a roar, he screamed my name, and I erupted. And just as I knew he would, he caught me.

Hades always caught me.

~*~

Themis

I found her. As the Goddess of Justice, none could deny my entry when I was solving a case. I stared at Spring, who hung suspended in air, her eyes closed, deep in slumber.

Though I was blind, I could see, not with my eyes, but through a sort of second sight. She was as lovely as she always was. A cool breath of new life.

She was well. Not a scratch on her.

But my heart sank.

Hades was guilty of this crime. Not of murder. But he’d brought Spring here. Judgment would need to be handed out.

Aria, keeper of Spring’s body, looked at me.

“You know why he did this, don’t you?”

Never taking my eyes off Spring, I nodded slowly. “I know.”

“You can sentence him, Themis, as is your right to do. But were I you,” the element of Air personified turned to me, “I’d think on this long and hard. Sometimes the punishment does not fit the crime.”

Deep in my heart, I knew that this time, she was right. Zeus would not like this. Closing my eyes, I hung my head. “I will think on what you’ve said. Thank you, Aria.”

~*~

Hades

I closed my eyes after staring at the same pattern on the coral ceiling of my temporary bedroom in Calypso’s temple.

We’d returned several hours ago from our excursion into her gardens, and as always, she’d disappeared soon after.

I’d searched for any sign of her outside my window, but after an hour, I gave it up as a lost cause. Whatever she was about, she wasn’t here. I felt the absence of her in the waters keenly.

Sensing a sudden oppressive surge of power, I opened my eyes just in time to see Aphrodite’s watery form materialize. She floated above me, her hair undulating on the gentle current.

“Hello, Under Lord,” she chirped, “how’s it hanging? And by that I mean, has she totally satisfied you, or do I need to take care of business?”

I glanced at my soft phallus. “What do you think?”

Dite could force me to “get it up,” as Calypso would say (it was within her power to do so, after all), but without the inducement of magic behind it, it seemed my cock cared to rise for only one female.

“Yes, well, I would be insulted, but she is quite the horny little she-devil. Who knew she had it in her?” She giggled, seeming both amused and mildly surprised. “Anyway,” she flicked a wrist, “I came to update you. Themis has hidden herself away in her cave. None of us are exactly sure what Crazy’s got going on, but she doesn’t want anyone around right now.”

Those words had me cocking my head. Themis only hid in her cave when she was trying to make sense of a dilemma. My case was cut and dried, or so I’d thought.

“Mind telling me why?” She gave me huge owl eyes. Aphrodite was no one’s fool; I could sense she suspected much more than what she let on. But she also refused to speak first.

I shrugged. “No idea.”

“Hm. Well, if you don’t want to answer that question, how about telling me why Calypso is currently raging on Olympus.”

I sat up. “She’s what?”

Aphrodite laughed. “What? She didn’t tell you where she planned to go today?”

“Not a word.” I thinned my lips, wondering what she was about and why.

“How odd. Apollo’s furious, threatening to scorch the Earth if she doesn’t leave now. But that woman is wild and crazy and just a little bit amazing. Honestly. I would
hate
to be on her bad side. Anyway, tootles, got people to see and places to be.”

“No, wait!” I reached out to grasp her elbow, but it was already too late. With a pop of displaced power, Aphrodite vanished.

The wench had told me just enough to make me crazed with questions, and now there was no one around to answer them.

“Damn you, Aphrodite!” I snapped, and the waters burbled with laughter.

Chapter 12

Calypso

Coming to Olympus was a little like swimming through a vat of maggots: unpleasant at best.

With a snap of my fingers, I created a ravishing gown of shimmering, crystal-clear water that danced with seahorses and colorful guppies, because their little tails were so feathery and beautiful and honestly, the way they zipped across my body made me look damn good.

My presence was immediately felt. The mountaintop rumbled. Hermes—wearing winged shoes, jeans, and a black muscle shirt—fluttered by.

“Zeus’s little crony.” I glowered at the five-foot-nothing boy of a man, who couldn’t even grow facial hair. I mean, come on, I was supposed to be intimidated by that?

“Thalassa,” he bowed, giving me suspicious eyes. “To what do we owe this honor?”

His eyes were probably the prettiest thing about him. Golden bronze like heated metal, they were positively enchanting. But the face that came along with it was utterly forgettable. He was also quite sweaty, and his hair looked unwashed, as though it’d been a couple days. He was usually a little cleaner than this, which made me wonder where he’d been.

No doubt gathering intel about my sex slave.

I gazed up the dizzying set of steps that led to Zeus’s little slice of the sky. Olympus was as beautiful as every ancient painting had depicted it to be—actually, probably even more so.

The sky was a deep azure and the clouds white and fluffy. Trees bearing fruit of every sort grew from the fertile grounds beneath my feet. Fountains with masterfully crafted images of each god and goddess burbled while birds wheeled through the conifer-scented skies. What a pretentious, pompous, a-hole bunch of poo-poo heads.

Planting fists on my hips, I sighed. “Must I have a reason to come visit you, my little daffodil?”

He seemed completely offended, and I couldn’t help but laugh. “You’ve never come before.”

Getting bored with his suspicious ways now, I stared at my perfect nails. “I’ve only come to speak with Themis. I’m not here to start a war,
Pepe le Pew
.”

He sniffed at himself. Oh, he tried to be subtle about it, pretending to lift his arm and scratch at the side of his face with it, but I caught the not-so-subtle sniff test. He did smell.

“And where have you been lately, if you don’t mind
my
asking?” I smiled sweetly, giving him a face that clearly said, “See, you can trust me.”

But apparently my sweet face hadn’t been as sweet as I’d thought.

When he reached for his back pocket, I knew immediately he was going for his horn. With one mighty blow, he’d call all the ancients to attention. I’d have an angry mob on my hands if I let him blow it.

Flicking a finger, I gathered particles of water from the air itself until they formed into a spear and aimed it squarely at his heart.

“Blow that thing and I’ll stick you like a pig.”

His hand quivered.

“Now, leave me pass, or I’ll—”

“Calypso!” Apollo’s voice thundered through the very heavens, and I groaned.

I’d almost forgotten about the tiny palace-flooding incident. Chariot Boy had not, however.

His golden chariot raced across the sky, dragged by two flaming horses I liked to call Gassy and Gassier, as they were known to pass gas with some regularity. Something to do with the particular brand of fire oats Apollo fed them.

They were within five yards of me when Apollo dropped from his chariot with all the grace of an eagle in flight. He was truly a magnificent man—ideally masculine and yet with a touch of femininity to his face that softened his otherwise harsh features, making him delectable eye candy.

He lifted a fist. “You drowned my fire orchard, you venomous bitch!”

His face twisted into a snarl, and I yawned. “Apollo, are you not my friend? For I don’t think I could bear it if you weren’t.”

Flame haloed his golden head, heating the very air and making my own water sizzle.

The little seahorses and guppies scattered to the back of me.

I grinned. “Oh, is it playtime, pet?”

Lifting my hands, I sucked the moisture from his lungs, and his lips parted as he clutched at his chest. Immediately the temperature lowered as Fire Head’s wrath cooled.

“Would you like to breathe again, Apollo?”

His nostrils flared with fury, but he nodded.

“Then apologize to my babies.” I glanced down at my gown, where my guppies were now quivering with fear.

When I shoved the water back into his body, he took a deep breath, glared murderously back at me, and refused to say anything.

I swear, I was going to pull that idiot over my knees and give him a good spanking, when suddenly a thick black fog rolled between us, immediately obscuring Apollo from sight.

But I sensed rather than saw that the fog had actually enveloped me. Not to hurt me though; it was almost a shield.

How odd.

“Hurt her or hers, Apollo, and so help me, you’ll live to regret it.” Hades’ words were a ghostly echo around me.

I smiled. The darkness was him. What a lovely fool to come to my rescue as he had, though I’d certainly not needed rescuing. I wasn’t quite sure how he’d shown up here, but I knew my sex slave when I heard him.

“Unbind me, Hades,” I commanded.

Immediately the darkness eased up, and I was able to peek out from between thick bands of shadow to witness that not only were Apollo and Hermes here but now too were Aphrodite and Zeus.

I waved at Dite, who waved cheerily back at me. She was dressed in a red leather halter-top-style gown with a vertical slit that ran from her ankle all the way up to her breast line and was held in place by a scrap of fabric at her hipbone.

Hm. I wondered if I could get her to let me borrow that someday.

“What in the hell are you doing here, Hades?” Zeus snapped, his big, beefy body completely nude and on display.

The tip of his comically long penis glistened. Which meant either (A) he’d been getting pleasured by one of his many slaves, as everyone knew he and Hera never screwed anymore, or (B) he’d been pleasuring himself.

I voted for (B). I mean, who wanted to sleep with that goat-faced brute willingly? Well, unless you were a nymph and didn’t much care what stuck its tab into your slot so long as you got tabbed good.

Nymphs were so shallow.

“I’ve broken no rule.” My lover’s deep voice put Zeus’s high-pitched quack to shame.

Okay, so maybe I was being unfair. It wasn’t really high-pitched or ducky sounding, but he was just so disgusting to me that it was hard to think kindly of the louse.

“You were to remain in the waters.”

“And there I am.” Hades’ voice shook with power.

I wagged a hand through the shadow. “He’s right.” I said. “Not physically present means still following the rules.”

I felt rather than saw Hades chuckle.

“You speak when you are spoken to!” Zeus thundered back at me.

I gasped, jaw hanging open. He did
not
just talk to me like that. I was ready to charge him, but a wall of shadow suddenly hardened in front of me so that I could not move through it.

“Allow me,” Hades intoned, and then, as if a quiver of arrows had just been released, bolts of shadow drilled through Zeus’s middle.

And then there was chaos. Utter, violent, land-roaring, sky-splintering-with-lightning, shrieks-of-grizzly-violence, fire-spewing-from-the-very-depths-of-the-universe chaos.

Two of the most powerful gods going
mano a mano
with each other, and all over little ol’ me. It was just about enough to make a girl want to titter with delirious excitement. Of course, I wasn’t really a girl, and I didn’t titter. Ever.

But I did let the two beasts play because it was fun to watch.

I was safely cradled from the storm in Hades’ shadow blanket, so I took a seat, called a little bowl of popcorn to me, and watched with a goofy smile on my face.

Aphrodite came and found me a moment later. “Give me some of that,” she said then reached into my bowl and tossed some in her mouth. “Mm. It’s good.”

“I know,” I said. “I’m a great cook now.”

We watched in silence for a moment, and then her grin grew wide.

I have never seen Hades act like this over anyone.

Zeus’s mountaintop crumbled, sending thick piles of rock to the ground, knocking down a couple of trees. The ghostly wails of the dead came shooting out of the ground like a mama giving birth to a babe. Up they came, heeding their master’s command.

I was so turned on right now. He was so hawt.

So why did he trick Persephone if he didn’t want her?
I asked.

I hadn’t realized the question had been bothering me until I’d asked it. Hades was an amazing catch. Why had he resorted to such trickery?

She frowned.
Hun, don’t you know the truth? I mean, the story is really old now, but still, someone should have set you straight on this eons ago.

“You got this, sex slave,” I rooted my boy toy on when Zeus slapped at his shadow with ten thousand volts of lightning, sparking up the sky with a violence that looked as though a nuclear bomb had just been dropped on the place.

Hades shook the marbles loose from his head, gave me an answering grin, and then they were right back at it.

What story?
I shoved a handful of popcorn in.

Persephone fabricated the entire tale. Hades fed her, yes. As he would have to feed any of us who showed up at his door unexpectedly, because that’s who he is. Persephone ate of the fruit, then ran home that night and told her mother that Hades had not only deflowered her but tricked her as well and that she must now spend six months out of the year with him, or her mother’s cherished crops would cease to grow, as Hades would curse them all.