Chapter Text
She’s not quite sure how she got here.
It’s a blur of grief and memory, a hand on her shoulder and turning to find the mighty king brought low, quicksilver tears in his eyes. It’s six months of painful work, six months pushing everything down like it would press her burnt-coal heart into a diamond, before Persephone comes to her on the line, takes her by the hand, and takes her to the king’s bed.
It’s a king’s bed in every sense, lush and enormous, and the king is there sitting in it, stripped down to his shirt and braces, strangely shy. The Lady asks before she kisses her, and Eurydice is so shocked she can’t help herself.
That first time, Persephone’s kiss presses her gently to the bedroom door, and Eurydice feels like a butterfly pinned on her back. Persephone’s hands on her skin are hotter than the forges themselves, and Eurydice is aflame, alight. She slips the straps of her uniform down her arms and lets Persephone’s nimble fingers unwrap the bindings from her chest.
“Oh,” Persephone sighs when she bares Eurydice’s soft breasts and hardening nipples. The queen of the Underworld bows her head and murmurs, “may I?”
Eurydice can’t speak, she can hardly breathe, all her songbird sureness gone to Persephone’s touch. She shakes under Persephone’s eyes and hands and nods hungrily.
The cry that flies from Eurydice when the Lady’s mouth comes upon her, when her lips close around one of those pert little nipples, raises Hades from the bed. He crosses the room and comes to his wife’s side, stroking her hair, half in affection, half to hold her in place. Eurydice can feel the pressure of his touch through Persephone’s breath, tight and shallow around her pretty prize.
He hasn’t stood this close to her since that time in his office—she would say that day or night, but she’s learned quickly there’s no such thing in Hadestown—and it sets her heart pounding in her chest, two parts fear, one part intrigue. The sense of his body is broad and bold, a burning outline in the air, and even with Persephone between them, he’s too much, too close.
He touches her face.
Barely brushing her cheek, his thick, calloused, workman’s fingers send jolts of electricity through her, and being touched so gently by so brutal a god throws Eurydice into a full short-circuit. Her breath heaves, every muscle tense and trembling, and Persephone pulls back in alarm, abandoning her breast to the cool air—another shock.
“What is it, songbird?” Persephone’s hands hold her still, but they’re warm and steady, and Eurydice surges forward to kiss her again.
Her floral aura is all-encompassing, just this side of overwhelming, and the scent of her is a bright bomb of spring that drowns out everything else. Eurydice remembers falling asleep in a field of poppies once when she was a child and waking up feeling like she’d been dipped in a river of nectar. Eurydice chases her lips, chases the feeling, hungry as she’s always been. She clings to Persephone by the chin, by the cheek, burning kiss after kiss into her, and when she finally opens her eyes, Persephone pulls her close, enveloping her in the blissful embrace of summer. Eurydice buries her face in Persephone’s curls, in the warm fold of her neck, and breathes the deepest she has since coming way down.
After a time, Persephone pulls back to arms’ length, though Eurydice whines in protest. She glances at Hades over her shoulder, then holds Eurydice still again and carefully searches her face.
“Alright?” she asks, those amber eyes glowing with fragments of fading light.
Eurydice breathes deep again. “Mm-hmm.”
“I need to hear you say it, honeybee.”
So Eurydice says, “alright.” And she nods. Vigorously.
Persephone smiles like the sun. “Alright.”
She looks to Hades hovering at her back, gives him a quick nod of her own, and he comes to her. He brushes Persephone’s hair over one shoulder and presses a gentle kiss to the base of her neck that makes her hum and arc into his touch. His coal-dark eyes meet Eurydice’s across his wife, and she feels that she’s seeing into him, seeing all the way down. They move suddenly as one; him unbuttoning and unzipping Persephone’s dress while Eurydice slips its winged sleeves off her shoulders, uncovering her divine golden-brown body. Persephone moves with them and sheds the black velvet and lace like a second skin. Then she takes them both by the hand and leads them to the bed.
Eurydice shucks the rest of her uniform, unbuckling her workbelt, unstrapping her boots, and she kicks it all off beside her bindings. When she looks up, Persephone has Hades perched on the edge of the bed, his hands full of her ass, the two of them trading giggly kisses as she peels off his clothes; his silver pinstripe pants, sleeve garters, shirt, and undershirt all dispatched in short order. They look so young like this, so free, and Eurydice’s heart flies into her throat thinking of the time before, when everything was soft and simple. When she had a love like that.
Eurydice swallows her heart.
“Lay back, lover,” Persephone murmurs, smoothing her hands down Hades’ arms, and he obeys more easily than Eurydice would’ve expected of a king. Persephone pushes him down to the sheets, down on his back, and then she turns and beckons to Eurydice. “C’mere.”
Eurydice goes. Persephone playfully tugs Eurydice’s arm, and Eurydice tumbles happily to her. Persephone embraces her and kisses her sweetly, once, twice. Then she leans back against the great headboard with Hades’ head against her hip, and Eurydice’s focus falls on the king’s cock properly for the first time.
Just the size of it takes her breath away, and a pit burns in her stomach—half horror, half desire—imagining what it would feel like inside her. It’s so pale, the light gold of his ichor shining through the thick vein running along its underside, and the head is already glazed with precum. Eurydice maps his bare body, taking in the full god before her. His thighs are thick and sturdy enough for a solid pounding, while his stomach and chest fall somewhere sweet between soft and firm, showcasing a downy snowfall of white hair. She’s seen his tattoo of the wall many times before, but now she sees the other arm is wrapped above the elbow in sweeping script she quickly realizes reads ‘Persephone’. Eurydice inches closer to the man, reaching out to touch the tender shape of his wife’s name on his skin.
At the last second, though, she hesitates. She looks up, and they’re both looking right at her. He gives her a little smirk, maybe as close as he can get to a smile, but Persephone takes her hand and guides it to his arm, helps Eurydice trace the letters of her name. Then she sweeps Eurydice’s hair back and leans in close.
“It’s alright,” she says, low as hell itself. “You can touch.” And she kisses the skin behind Eurydice’s ear.
If Eurydice were alive, her heart would be beating out of her chest.
But she takes Persephone’s permission and runs with it, runs her one hand up the king’s arm like she’s sculpting the muscle of his shoulder herself. He might as well be marble, given how hard and still he is beneath her and his wife. She lets the other hand wander down Persephone, following her outline as carefully as she did the tattoo of the Lady’s name. Persephone’s kissin’ her neck, sucking hard enough she’s surely leaving a trail of wine-stain hickeys, and the goddess’ hands slide down her sides until her fingers part Eurydice’s wet cunt. She rubs there, slow and sweet as sugar, and Eurydice can feel her eyes on her, watching every minute move of Eurydice’s hips, tuned to every tightened string as she clocks what Eurydice likes. And brother, she is a fast learner.
Persephone slips two fingers inside Eurydice quick and easy as opening a seeding hole in damp earth, and Eurydice throws her head back. A deep groan bubbles up from the root of her as she pushes down on Persephone’s fingers, braces herself on Persephone’s shoulder with one hand, and slaps the other over her mouth.
“Hey,” Persephone murmurs, pressing kisses to Eurydice’s cheeks and her fingers deeper into her cunt. Eurydice whimpers a cut off cry into her hand as Persephone’s fingers split and scissor lightly inside her, searching her walls for a soft spot. She’s gentle as ever, twisting a slow swirl in Eurydice’s core that’s quickly turning into a tornado. Persephone’s thumb skates over her clit, and Eurydice strangles a shout in her throat, smothers it with her palm. “Hey,” Persephone says again, nuzzling her. “Let it out, honeybee.”
But Eurydice can’t. She can’t, and she shakes her head and shakes on Persephone’s fingers and bites down hard on one of her own to keep from wailing when Persephone finds her sweet spot. The queen is running hard circles around her clit, never quite touching it, and the pleasure is slickly electric. She hears more than feels the wetness between her thighs, smacking and sucking hungrily after Persephone’s fingers each time she pulls back, and the sound and feeling together make her lightheaded and hazy, like she’s underwater. From underwater, she feels more than hears Persephone’s voice and Hades’ answer, low rumbling vibrations, another wave running down her frayed nerves.
Then someone is pulling her hand away from her mouth—rough calluses, strong and steady—and, uncovered, she can’t stop herself from rasping out a shameful “more.” But neither of them laugh, neither of them turn away from her blind mortal hunger. Persephone just tucks a third finger into her little quim, Eurydice digs her nails into Persephone’s shoulder, and they moan together. She wants to kiss Persephone but somehow Hades is between them now, sitting up where they’re half hung over him, the Lady’s arm draped low across his lap to keep her hand inside Eurydice, Eurydice straining forward so she’s nearly straddling his leg.
She’ll take what she can get.
She kisses him hard, sliding her tongue deep in his mouth, and he swallows her spit and screams as Persephone finally finally hits her clit. Lightning strikes up Eurydice’s spine, and Hades pinches her nipple, and she’s there, she’s right there–
Then nothing.
Persephone’s off her clit, and with a sad, half-painful squelch, she pulls out. Eurydice grunts at the sudden emptiness and feels her arousal dribble down onto Hades’ lap. She looks down and finds a little splash of her on his thigh. The shape reminds her of a snowflake. She looks up, still dizzy from the drop, and feels the blush in her face, feels the fury rise in her, and she opens her mouth to–
“Easy, baby,” Persephone tells her, stroking her hair. Then she slides her songbird-soaked fingers between her lips and sucks them clean. That holds Eurydice’s fire. She can feel Hades watching too, both of them hypnotized for a small eternity by the obscene beauty of his wife.
“Why did you–?” Eurydice starts when she recovers. The pleasure-pulse in her cunt is already dying, and she wanted it, dammit.
“Shh, songbird,” Persephone soothes. “Just gimme a minute. Fates know a little foreplay never killed nobody. Now, c’mon.”
And she nudges Eurydice’s legs into place, further and further open until she’s sitting spread wide in Hades’ lap, just shy of his cock. Persephone leans in, holding Eurydice’s hip steady, and slips the littlest finger of her other hand up Hades’ length. He leans back with a sharp little whine from his throat, and Persephone chuckles and bends to kiss him.
Then she straightens up and tucks her hand back between Eurydice’s legs, pulls it back glistening with wetness, then smears her husband’s cock with it. A couple quick tugs of her clearly expert hand draws a pair of bitten-off moans from the mighty king, and Persephone smiles, glowing with power. Her sticky hand and fawn-brown eyes urge Eurydice up, hovering over Hades.
Eurydice looks down.
Her little hands are spread on Hades’ stomach, the grime of the mines under her nails in stark contrast to his pristine skin. His nipples are pebble-hard, and she wants to touch them, to tease and torture them. His cock is flushed purple with anticipation, and she would almost deny herself the desperate release if it would leave him writhing a second longer.
Almost.
Persephone is a peripheral gold blur, but her hand on Eurydice’s hip stays in focus, and her voice comes through clear as spring sun.
“Go easy,” she says. “There’ll be plenty of time to go hard once you’re used to him.”
Eurydice doubts she’ll ever get used to this.
Persephone’s hand guides her, letting Hades slide easily against her folds. Then slowly, ever so slowly, Eurydice lowers herself down.
She gasps as the stretch of him blooms through her body, rippling across every muscle, every nerve. She has to close her eyes, choking out guttural groans as she sinks down the king’s cock. Everything’s still wet from Persephone’s ministrations—Eurydice’s pussy, her thighs—and she’s as full of grace and gratitude as she is full of cock. After a long, inching glide, she takes him to the hilt. Neither of them move for a long moment, settling into each other, and he watches her carefully from his pinned position. Persephone strokes his hair and pats Eurydice’s hip lightly at the same time.
It’s all the encouragement Eurydice needs.
She throws him a curt nod and squeezes hard around him until his hips buck. Then they’re off, all instinct and sensation as they find the rhythm, punctuated by gruff grunts from both god and girl. Eurydice’s plush ass bounces as Hades thrusts in her cunt, and she can feel the ichor pounding in his erection as his thighs pound into her. Persephone catches her cheek and kisses her messily, and when she hums, Eurydice feels it roll through her, tongue to tail.
The wet slap of skin on skin and Persephone’s filthy encouragement fill the bedroom, accompanied by Eurydice’s reedy gasps as little pleasure-sparks fly at the base of her spine. The wave is gathering slow, but it’s coming, and she wouldn’t be surprised if it’s the first of many with how his cock is filling her out, filling her up. And speak of the Devil, like he heard her think it, Hades’ thick thumb comes down to slide over Eurydice’s clit, and he takes this—of all things—slow. Methodical as she’s seen him with paperwork, he keeps his pace at her hips measured and his pace at her clit leisurely. Her cunt is weeping over him, keeping every touch half-slippery, half-sharp as electricity, as ice, and though she squeezes him again, he seems to be on a mission, and Eurydice wants to come.
“Faster,” she pants, driving her hips down harder to drive the point home.
Hades just chuckles—as if she weren’t fucking wet enough—and says “patience.”
She won’t beg for him. She’ll ride it out, and next time, he’ll get a cocktease to fell a god. Persephone is no help, all her touches skimming along without any offer of release, just tuning Eurydice tighter and tighter for her husband’s ends. Eurydice fights to keep her eyes open as Persephone dips her fingers into the king’s mouth, lets her legs fall open, and spreads her pussy for her own split-slicked fingers.
“Fuck,” Eurydice whines, watching her. Persephone takes three fingers right off, her other hand coming up to her breast, and she writhes like a live-wire, moaning lightly at her own touch. Eurydice wishes those were her fingers, that her mouth was swallowing those moans, and she feels it in the fluttering clench of her cunt. “Fuck, oh fuck.”
“You ready, songbird?” Hades’ voice rumbles through her, through the haze.
“Yes!” she sings, and he goes hard on her clit and, at the same time, brings a rough, heavy hand down to smack her ass.
Eurydice’s orgasm rages over her like a winter wind takes down dead trees. The pleasure is blinding, deafening. She must be making sound, and lots of it, since her throat is dry and raw, but she can’t hear herself think, much less scream. The impact catches her off-guard, and she snaps down to meet Hades, chest to chest. When she lands, she scrapes her teeth over his nipple and feels him jolt, jerking hard and ungraceful against her as he comes.
When Eurydice finally lifts her head, Hades’ cheek is nestled in the hollow of Persephone’s thigh, licking languidly around her fingers where they disappear into her cunt. She shivers watching Persephone knot her fingers in the king’s hair, tug him closer, and come with a ragged shout. She lets go of Hades, but he stays low, kisses her there, and when she pulls out, she lets him lick her fingers. Persephone looks him right in the eyes as he sucks them, then when he’s finished and upright, she tilts his chin into a kiss. The absurd intimacy of it makes Eurydice feel not quite right watching. Or, for that matter, sitting on his dick.
So she slides off, not nearly as quick as she’d like, given the size of him, and makes for her uniform, a sorry stack of leather and linen on the bedroom floor.
“Wait.”
Eurydice freezes, naked and cold without their skin on her skin, but she leaves her back turned to Persephone’s voice despite its notes of pleading. She feels Persephone’s breath on her neck when she’s close enough, and those must be Persephone’s hands on her waist, Persephone’s breasts at her back.
“What?” she says quietly. Persephone kisses the back of her head, holds her close, and Eurydice squeezes her eyes shut against the sudden storm of feeling it stirs.
“Stay,” Persephone murmurs. “Please, stay.”
And Eurydice can’t help herself.
She goes. She and Persephone end up on either side of Hades, and he’s gentle. Says nothing, but he takes her under his arm and strokes her shoulder as she lays her head on his chest. Persephone reaches across her husband to brush Eurydice's hair away from her face and traces the soft arc of her jaw. Then she settles down too, covering Eurydice’s hand on Hades’ chest with hers.
So she stays.
How she justifies it—or how she would, if she had anyone to justify it to—is that it lands her in the middle of a love that reminds her so much of the one she’s lost. It’s not the same, but in a lot of ways it’s close. She sees Orpheus in them both. In Persephone’s stubborn hope, her fervent love and liveliness. In Hades’ quiet care, his diligent dedication. Somehow, it’s the most comfortable and terrifying thing she’s done at once. It’s easier than breathing to touch them and be touched by them, but she falters when she has to look them in the eye. Gods above and below only know what they see in her.
Sometimes, in the aftermath, tangled together in the cooling sheets, Hades hums their song, though Eurydice doesn’t know if it’s for her or his wife. She never asks, and she doubts she ever will.
Instead, she falls back on what she’s always done, on who she was before Orpheus. When the gods close a door on Eurydice, she always finds a window, and this one overlooks Hadestown. The factories and warehouses. The workers she might’ve called kin. But without Orpheus, she is full of fear and doubt, and she dares not reach out her shaking hands to those below.
Now, she watches the kingdom of death from on high.
Only the dead are free from pain, only the dead know peace. But Eurydice’s not dead anymore. She’s not living up above or working on the line. She’s somewhere in between. Between life and death, Lady Spring and Old Man Winter. The irony is not lost on her that she finally found shelter from the storm in its very own bed.
Mostly, her time with Orpheus feels like another life, like it happened to another person in another world. But in the darkest moments, it feels more like a dream. Like she never had him at all.