Page 115 of The Catacomb King
Did I?
If I was being honest… there was a pull. Deep in the pit of my stomach. Like the pull I had felt toward the glassy freezing waters of the Lake, the first time I had laid my eyes upon it.
I swallowed. I closed my eyes. I said throatily, “No. I’m going to have to go back.”
Calix asked, “For your mother?”
I opened my eyes again. “What?”
He had no idea what we were talking about. But of course, why would he? He didn’t know I’d eaten the underworld fruit.
Calix repeated, “For your mother. She grabbed me down there — she’s fucking strong, Persephone, I don’t know what you did to her — and she shoved me out of the cavern like I was a tiny dog or something. I tried to go back for her, but everything was moving so fast. But I didn’t…” He hesitated. “I didn’t see her get… eaten. That big monster, the Monarch, it was…” He swallowed. “It was eating my men. But she was off to the side. She seemed… okay. So maybe she’s still down there.”
Please, no. I could not bear to hope this hard. Not again. All this hope was going to kill me. “She doesn’t even know me,” I protested pathetically. “She called memütte.”
Hades said, “She called youwhat?”
“Yeah. The Monarch called me that, too. And so did you, Elke!”
Hades glared at her. Elke shrugged feebly.
“And so did some other people,” I went on, “like Mackr. What does the word mean?”
“Don’t tell her,” Hades said at once to Elke.
“Your Lordship, I think she should know…”
“Tell me.”
Hades looked shifty. Elke sighed. She explained weakly, “Mütte was the name of the Monarch’s human wife. But we use it now as a kind of honorific. It’s kind of like how ‘His Lordship’ is an honorific for the Prince. Oh! I mean, the way ‘His Majesty’ is an honorific for the King. My apologies, Your Majesty, for my error.” Elke swept a light curtsy at Hades.
Hades, who still wore the crown.
“Oh,” said Hades uncomfortably, “you don’t have to do that.”
“Yeah,” said Calix, “you really don’t.”
“Youshut up.”
I asked, “What does the honorific mean?”
“It meansgoddess,” said Hades tightly. “And it also meanswife.”
My stomach grew hot. “So everyone who’s been calling memüttehas been secretly referring to me as yourwife? And, wait. When you called megoddess, were youalsocalling me your wife?!”
“That’s not important right now,” Elke interrupted hastily. “The important thing is, if your mother — who has a small piece of the Monarch in her, given her resurrection —”
“What? No one ever told methatwas how it worked!”
“No, we just told you not to do it,” Hades bit out. “But you just decided you were smarter than everyone else, didn’t you?”
“Iamsmarter than everyone else,” I said haughtily. “That’s why you kidnapped me in the first place.”
“You never talked like that back home,” Calix mumbled.
“Stop!” Elke screeched. “Everyone listen to me for once!”
Everyone shut up and stared.
