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“A solution? What, do you intend to have them over for Ambrosia? Not even you can fix a broken family, Persephone.”
“You’re right, Hades! I can’t. Certainly not by myself. So, are you going to help me, or what?”
“…I would do anything that you would ask of me.”
“Then, first, talk to your son.”
He tried. It had hurt his pride immeasurably to apologize to his son, but he had meant what he said to Persephone. He would do anything that she asked of him. His apology had been strange and halting, and the words left his lips with no lack of difficulty.
Accountability as a ruler of a kingdom was crucial. Accountability as a father was something Hades had never had to deal with.
But he had tried. And he had thought that had been the end of that. Zagreus’ ransacking was made into an official role in the House of the Dead, and even Hades had to begrudgingly admit his son excelled in his newfound role. Their interactions in the House were still tense and more often than not limited to the span of a few minutes at a time, but they no longer held the same venom as before. On the surface, their battles were as fierce as ever. No holds barred, “two men enter, one man leaves” affairs.
“You could start being a better father at any point. There’s no one stopping you but you.”
Unfortunately, Hades greatest impediment was always his own obstinacy.
Zagreus was trying. He was not longer spitting the title of ‘Father’ at him like an insult. His son’s biting words and acerbic wit had not faded, but he no longer tried to actively undermine Hades’ authority or flaunt his blatant disrespect for him.
And Hades? He considered the matter settled. He expressed more patience with Zagreus and did his best to retire the epithet of boy, but that was more or less the extent of his actions. He never expected forgiveness from his son, and at the rate he was going, he’d never receive it.
Perhaps that’s why Persephone had raised this strange matter as the two of them settled into bed for the rare occasion in which they rested.
“Hades, have you ever hugged our son?” She had asked, while unbraiding her hair for the night, or day, perhaps?
Hades responded with stony silence. One could almost mistake him for Bouldy if not for the perpetual frown he wore upon his countenance. Even a cursed rock smiled more than he did.
“I only raise this matter with you because it occurred to me, he may have never felt the embrace of a parent before I returned to the Underworld.”
Hades neatly folded his cape and stored it alongside his many others. “Ngh.” Was all he could force out in response.
“I ask that you try to show him some small act of kindness, Hades. If not for your own sake, then for mine.”
He had meant what he had said: he would do anything that Persephone asked of him.
Zagreus dashed into his chambers, his ever-flaming feet scorching the stone beneath them. He had only just resurfaced from the wine-dark waters of the Styx and had forgone his regular rounds with the House inhabitants to check the Fated List of Minor Prophecies. What he found waiting for him in his chambers, however, had shocked him more then any prophecy he had ever fulfilled.
His father stood in his room, surveying the scene with his usual disapproving scowl. Amongst his messy chambers, Hades looked utterly out of place. Too large for the godling sized furnishings and too stern for the lavishly decorated fittings Zagreus had funded with his habitual jaunts through his father’s domain.
For a moment, Zagreus could only stare at his father in open-jawed silence.
Hades was the one to break the silence. “Your mother, the Queen, has demanded we partake in… a Father-Son bonding ritual.”
“What?”
His father let out a deep, exasperated sigh. “Swear to me, Zagreus. Swear to me that what I’m about to do will never leave the confines of this blasted room of yours.”
Zagreus’ stomach churned with anxiety. What exactly was his father going to do? This whole scenario was so out of the ordinary for him, Zagreus could do little else but go along for the ride. “What? OK, fine. I swear.”
His father scoffed. “Not like anyone would ever believe you.”
Was that a joke? Zagreus thought his father utterly incapable of any gaiety or humor, but his remark had carried the odd inflection of a jest. And a jest at his own expense at that. Surely, Zagreus thought, Father had finally been driven mad by the obscene mass of parchment-work he did on a day-to-day basis. Zagreus briefly considered running for his life before his father attempted whatever horrid deed this manic episode had spurred on.
Instead, Zagreus stood there as his father opened his arms wide for an embrace. Though his arms were opened in invitation, his gaze was focused anywhere but his son. Instead it was trained firmly on the scroll of Dionysus that hung upon Zagreus’ walls. Hades eyes, two burning hot coals in a sea of black, threatened to alight the scroll with their intensity. Zagreus wouldn’t have been surprised if the scroll suddenly burst into flames.
The scroll remained unaffected, however, as Hades stood there waiting for his son to initiate his half of this exchange. Zagreus, struck dumb by the events unfolding in his room, did not budge. His father let out a booming cough to spur his son into action. Zagreus startled at the noise and folded himself awkwardly into his father’s arms.
Hades’ gigantic beard curtained either side of Zagreus’ face. The hair was coarse and scratchy, and strands of hair tickled Zagreus’ own boyishly bare face as his father inhaled and exhaled in an even rhythm. His beard smelled of ink, parchment, and the waters of the Styx, with the faintest hint of Ambrosia underneath it all.
The embrace was corpse-like in its rigidity with nary any a hint of warmth save for the glow of his father’s flaming feet. Hades tightened his arms around his son with a crushing force, almost as if he wished to strangle him rather than hug him. The force of the action knocked Zagreus’ laurel wreath askew.
Zagreus felt so strange in his father’s arms. So small, like Hades could easily crush him if he so wished. His cheek was smushed against his father’s belly in a way that made him feel childish, but he could do little to extricate himself. He looked down at the floor in embarrassment to see his fiery feet framed by his father’s own. He decided to train his gaze upwards instead.
Had his father ever hugged him before? Zagreus couldn’t recall. If Hades ever had held him it was as an infant and beyond Zagreus’ ability to recall. Their sole physical contact with one another had been relegated to their skirmishes upon the surface, which held no warmth, only deadly fury.
The room was deathly silent. All that could be heard was huffing of his father’s breath and the crackling of their burning feet upon cool stone. Zagreus was unsure of how long they had stood there together like this, but it felt as if an eternity had gone by.
The silence of their bone-crushing hug was interrupted by the muted sounds of Orpheus’ lyre floating into the room. Zagreus winced as Orpheus burst into an impassioned performance of Hymn to Zagreus.
Sing,
Of Zagreus, oh muse
Slayer of hydras
First of his name.
Born
Of Zeus as a serpent
In spite of Queen Hera
Zagreus came.
The music only compounded the near-death inducing discomfort of the moment. After this never-ending moment ceased, Zagreus had to pay his respects to the bard.
Thanks Orpheus, mate, truly appreciated the rousing hymn in the middle of the only physical contact I’ve ever had with my father. Much obliged. It only made the excruciating moment that much more horrid! Cheers.
If anyone could ever die of sheer embarrassment, Zagreus just might.
Hades sighed. Over their years together, Zagreus had learned to read the subtleties of his father’s moods. The subtle variations of his silences, the curvatures of his frowns, the rich tonal qualities of his disappointed sighs. But this sigh he did not recognize. He found the usual edge of exasperation in it, but none of the pointed disapproval or unstated loathing he had come to expect. It almost sounded… relieved? But that couldn’t be, Zagreus thought, his father couldn’t truly be enjoying this embrace… could he?
Finally, and thankfully, Hades let him go. Neither of the could stomach looking at each other. Hades stared fiercely at the cluttered walls of his son’s room, and Zagreus stared bashfully at the ground, feeling like a child again. They said nothing to each other. There was nothing to be said. They stood awkwardly in each other’s presence as Orpheus’ falsity filled hymn came to its dramatic conclusion.
His father turned away and skulked back to his post, sparing a brief moment to glance back at his son. His gaze was as stern as ever, but Zagreus swore he saw a spark of tenderness somewhere deep, deep inside.
“Take this moment to clean your pigsty of a room, Zagreus.” Hades growled. “And remember your oath.”
He could only nod bashfully at his father, for once not finding the words to needle him back. Whatever tenderness he thought he had spied in his father’s eyes had been ruined by Hades ever constant need to scold his son. Even so, the demand felt rote and rehearsed, merely a play-act of their usual barbs.
As his father beat a hasty retreat, Zagreus collapsed into a chair he had never once used to puzzle over the baffling events that had just occurred. His mind churned with disbelief as his eyes alighted upon a recently fulfilled prophecy that lay on the desk before him.
The Son of Hades shall someday feel the stern embrace of his Father’s arms around him.
Un-fucking-believable.