He looked at me sharply, but it wasn’t offense I saw in his gaze. He wasn’t the sort to become offended—he was too confident, and he didn’t actually care what anyone else thought, from what I could tell. Instead, he looked curious, as if I’d asked a question whose answer he should know, but realized he didn’t.
“I’m not sure,” he said, confirming my suspicions. His jaw set, and his gaze closed down. “Come. We’ll practice.”
He directed Horse toward the middle of the forest, and I followed, Sally picking her way between the trees. We reached a clearing, and Hades dismounted gracefully.
I tried to mimic his movements, but my foot got tangled up in the stirrup. My stomach pitched, and I was about to lose my grip when his strong hands gripped my waist.
Embarrassment burned through me as he helped me down. I vowed to learn to do this better.
After he set me on the ground, I turned. “Thanks.”
He nodded. “Are you ready?”
“Yeah. But I don’t know what for.”
“Come.” He gestured for me to follow him deeper into the forest. After a moment’s walk, he stopped in the middle of a circular clearing surrounded by huge oaks. They soared overhead, their twisted branches reaching toward the sky, forming a cage around us.
I stopped in front of him and looked up, trying not to be caught in his gaze. There was something about looking right at him that made my mind go a bit fuzzy. But I couldn’t afford to lose my focus, especially if he was going to touch me.
Hades
Seraphia looked up at me, her gaze set and determined. She was tiny but fierce. I’d known it ever since I’d first started watching her.
But she’d grown even stronger in her time away from me. Even more determined.
I liked it. I liked when she showed her spine of steel and refused to back down.
It was odd to admit to liking anything. As with emotion, liking things or finding pleasure in them was entirely strange.
And she seemed to ignite the most emotion of all. Even my people had been able to see what she was. They’d been bowing to her as much as to me, and the sight had filled me with a strong sense of satisfaction.
“So?” she asked. “How are you supposed to teach me my magic?”
“It’s not dissimilar to what we did before. But I’m not teaching so much as I’m helping you access it.”
“What do you mean, exactly?”
“I become a conduit for you to access your power. By touching another god, it helps you more effectively find and use your own power.”
She nodded. “All right. That’s kind of what it felt like before. You’ll touch my shoulder?”
“Yes, but you’re trying to control more than a small plant this time. You’re trying to control the forest.” I reached for her shoulder, moving slowly so that she’d see me coming.
She stiffened, watching warily, and I gently gripped her left shoulder. Her body burned under my gloved palm, sending a shiver up my arm. I swallowed hard as I turned her around to face away from me. I rested my hands on each shoulder, standing so close to her that it made my entire body vibrate.
“See what you can do,” I said.
She nodded, staring out at the trees. Her hair gleamed in the low light, twisted into a braid that fell down her back. The smell of it seeped into me, making my breath catch as it filled me with warmth. I wanted to lean down and press my face against her neck as I had earlier, drawing deeply of her scent.
No.
That wasn’t the purpose of this.
And things like that were enough to steal my focus and turn my mind. Not only did that kind of pleasure make me feel dreadfully human, it turned me away from the dark. The light beckoned when I was with her like that, and this was unacceptable.
“Here goes nothing,” she murmured.
Her magic sparked through her, prickling against my palms. I could feel it as she reached deep, trying to wrest it up from within her soul.
I drew in a steady breath and released my own power, feeding it into her, envisioning it traveling down my arms and into her shoulders.
She gasped and swayed, and her magic burned brighter.
In front of us, one of the trees began to move, its limbs reaching toward the sky. Tiny buds appeared on the branches, and awe filled me.
She was life.
The opposite of me. I shouldn’t be so impressed. But death had been my world for so long that seeing something like this was incredible.
Wonder filled me as I watched the buds appear. Then they stopped, almost forming leaves but not quite.
I could feel her frustration in the tension of her shoulders, in the way her magic flared.
“It’s stopped,” she said.
“Here.” I pulled her toward me, pressing her back fully against my front and wrapping an arm around her waist.
She gasped, the sound sending a fierce spike of pleasure through me. It was nothing compared to the feeling of having her in my arms, however. She was so much smaller than me, yet the memory of her ferocity streaked through me.
“Is this necessary?” she squeaked.
“Yes. If you want to keep that tree growing.” And it truly was. Though it felt so good that I might have lied about it just to have more of her.
“Fine.”
The closer touch allowed me to funnel more of my magic into her, and she responded in kind, reaching for more of her own. It surged to life within her, vibrant and true.
The fact that I could feel it was astonishing. I knew the theory of this kind of thing—I had read about it in preparation for finding her—but I’d never done it before. Never joined my magic with another’s in this way. It was strangely intimate, making me feel like my skin was too raw, but I craved more of it. Craved more of her.
As her magic began to grow within her, the trees responded. Buds appeared on every branch, and the sight of it made me wonder for the first time whether the underworld truly had to look the way it did.
7
Seraphia
Magic flowed through my veins like a drug, the power making me feel like I was flying. Hades’ touch burned across every inch of my skin. Desire followed, but I drew in a ragged breath, trying to ignore it as I focused on the trees.
He’d been right. His touch somehow made it easier to access the magic that resided deep in my soul. There was so much more of it than I’d ever realized. So much more of it that I couldn’t access, even with his help.
I could feel it, deep inside me. Locked away. Bound.
Alia’s word echoed in my ears. Someone had bound my magic.
But I couldn’t worry about that now. I needed to worry about these trees. I needed to bring them back to life. They called to me so strongly that I couldn’t resist.
I dug deeper, trying to find as much power as I could, and gave it to the trees. Heady delight filled me as I watched them heal. I leaned into it, letting the magic sweep me up. So much power surged through me that my head began to swim. My vision blurred, and my skin tingled as the forest rotated around us. Breathing became difficult, then seemed to stop entirely.
For the briefest second, my vision went dark.
Gasping, I blinked.
My eyes flashed open, but everything looked different.
The trees were the same, but I was standing in another part of the forest. I could no longer feel my body, in fact. All I could feel was the power—pure, heady, dark. It filled me with the most glorious strength and confidence, health and vitality.