.

Kurt, king of the dead, loved to admire his kingdom. It was filled with a graceless kind of beauty, all craggy black walls and long pendants of lime crystals and sudden lines of shimmering opal. Natural, rugged, dark, just the way Kurt enjoyed. An earth child would despise his world and find its hushed halls peculiar, but then, it was not made for earth children. Kurt had no desire to visit the earth's wretched surface, so he did not suffer such people their protests. He was fairly content in his duty and his kingdom; he tended the souls of Erebus well and without complaint.

But the king was lonely. The dead do not look for new companionship; they only search fruitlessly for their lost loved ones. The closest things Kurt had to acquaintances were his servants, skeletal pale things. They did nothing but moan for life, for freedom, for the freshness of grass and twittering of birds. And Kurt, after years of contentment, was growing restless.

So when the creatures of the mountain started making their ruckus, banging the earth and cracking it as giants tend to do, Kurt was glad for the opportunity to escape the unnerving emptiness of his caverns, even if it was for the bright, pale sun. As he investigated and sealed the cracks deep enough to reach his kingdom, he let his mind creep lazily into wanderlust, and soon found that he was once again fixated on this idea of a companion; an escape from the dreariness of routine. He felt almost human.

As he squinted into the bright horizon, he sighed. Flights of fancy, nothing more. And yet he ached to have to return to his dark kingdom so soon. He sat down on a boulder to rest, feeling his skin warm under the hot sun. He closed his eyes. Surely his duty afforded a few moments of rest as well.

When he opened them, he was stunned by what he saw. Directly in his line of sight there was a beauty unlike none Kurt had ever seen. And Kurt had seen beauty. A young man, his skin bronzed by the sun, stood bathing in a creek about twenty paces away. But this man was too fantastic to be human. And his creek was too close for him to not have noticed Kurt in the shadows. As if on cue, the man turned and looked shyly over his shoulder at Kurt, smiling a full, lush smile when he saw Kurt was awake. Kurt mused over the roses in his cheeks. This man was everything Kurt desired, everything he'd been blindly searching for – and everything he could not have. Kurt's own smile fell when he realized that he would have to leave this gorgeous creature behind when he left, and his aching heartbreak doubled.

Why? A snarling voice in his head asked him, why? What law commands you to leave him? You are a god. You obey no law but your own. So Kurt stood, shaking the dirt off of his cloak, and walked to the edge of the creek. The young man turned towards him as he approached, ready, it seemed, for some kind of charm and flattery, but Kurt did not know how to woo. He could not curry favor as lovers do. As he stared into the young man's eyes, Kurt panicked. Grasping him roughly by the wrist, he pulled the man off into the shadows. He ignored the young man's protestations and muffled them. They descended into the darkness of his kingdom.

…

The young man slept twisted in the black sheets. And Kurt watched. He could not explain his still-growing fascination with the youth, but chose to humor it as long as it lasted. It wasn't as if he had much else to do; his kingdom ran fairly smoothly.

The man's eyelids fluttered, the shadows his eyelashes cast over his cheekbones stretching and shivering. Then his eyes opened and Kurt was looking into pure hazel. The man didn't start as Kurt expected him to, but looked around, taking in the high-ceilinged cavern and the face of his captor.

"What's your name?" Kurt asked, wanting to avoid the questioning of his own actions for as long as possible.

The man's lips puckered into a perfect confused pout. "Blaine."

"Blaine." Kurt grasped the hem of his ruby robe to keep his hands from shaking. "Beautiful."

Blaine cocked his head to the side and said something that Kurt had never expected. "You're beautiful." When Kurt ducked his head and blushed, cursing himself for acting so vulnerable, so foolish, so human, Blaine expounded: "I saw you on the riverbank, sleeping. I thought you were beautiful."

Kurt laughed shakily. "So you…undressed for me."

That perfect pout curled into a wicked smile, transforming Blaine's face from the perfect picture of innocence to something more mature. "I know my assets. My body is one of many. After all, it's my job to be fruitful." He laughed, the sound jingling off of the walls.

"Fruitful…" Kurt's eyes widened. "You're Demeter's son."

"One and the same." Blaine sat up, curling his knees to his chest. "And you're Hades."

"Kurt," he corrected. "That's more of a formal title."

Blaine's smile stretched wider, if that was possible. "And you'd like to know me…informally?"

"Will Demeter do something drastic?" Kurt asked, only half-joking.

Blaine barked out a laugh. "Probably."

"I'll chance it."

Blaine raised an eyebrow. "Really? You'd risk that? I should have guessed you'd be the one god brave enough to cross my mother."

Kurt rose from his chair. "You're worth it." Blaine, for the first time, broke eye contact, looking down at his lap. His eyelashes brushed his round cheeks. Kurt wondered how many times Blaine had heard that in his life, if he had ever heard it.

But soon, Blaine's self-assured air came back, and he shoved the sheets off of his (elegant, beautiful) body with no regard for his nakedness. Kurt stopped looking a few moments too late. Blaine seemed to enjoy watching Kurt's Adam's apple bob as he swallowed. "Want to show me around?" he asked. "I've always wanted to see the kingdom of the dead."

….

There was a lot to see, as it turned out. Blaine took it all in with only the occasional incorrigible comment. Kurt could tell he appreciated the beauty of the dark caverns and the arched ceiling of his throne room; precious stones winding their veins through the walls. Blaine was perfect. He loved Blaine's beautiful form; that was certain. But he also loved the compassion and empathy that showed through his sometimes hard exterior. There was warmth in every teasing smile and an intrinsicality in his laugh. Blaine was the perfect companion in these halls he had so often walked alone.

But where the dead shuffled about or stared emptily through them, Kurt saw Blaine shiver and look away.

"Does it ever bother you?" Blaine asked as they stood in a corridor by the gates, watching the line of ghosts slowly move forward. "All of…them?"

"It's what I do," Kurt answered, shrugging. "Without them, I have no purpose." Still, he wished he could tell Blaine what he wanted to hear; that he would change it if he could, that he would rather them all be immortal, but he couldn't. He didn't feel that way. Death is as natural as life.

Blaine met his eyes then and Kurt swore he could see straight into his soul. Blaine was much more innocent than he had let on. "Don't you wish it was different? That you could save them all?"

"They are saved," Kurt said. He looked away, back at the ragged souls in line.

"I think that's sad," Blaine said. "I've always wanted to help mortals. They have such a short time to live."

"You nearly put me out of business ending those famines and such," Kurt tried to joke. Blaine didn't laugh. He sighed. "They have eternity down here."

Blaine stepped closer to him, barely brushing his arm. Kurt shivered at the contact, looking down at Blaine's beautiful, sun-tanned skin and huge dark eyes. "Do I?" Kurt smiled, absently reveling in the idea of having a future with someone, with him, and was about to lean down and kiss him when Blaine asked, "Am I a prisoner here?"

Kurt sucked in a breath, taken aback. "I – I – I don't know," he stuttered. "Do you not want to stay?"

Blaine bit his lip, casting his eyes down. "I don't think I can." He looked out again into the enormous cavern; this was the largest one; past the lines of the dead waiting to be judged you could see the Styx, and beyond that, the fields where the already judged stayed. "This isn't a world for me."

Bitter tears, for the first time, stung Kurt's eyes. He didn't have time to be surprised at this sudden wave of emotion. He grasped Blaine's robe. "Please," he begged, not knowing what he was begging for. For Blaine to stay? For him to give up all he'd ever known to be miserable in the dark?

For him to love Kurt back?

Blaine's sad eyes looked up at Kurt and Kurt could see that they too were filling with tears. But he tightened his jaw, saying firmly, "I need you to take me home."

…

Kurt had persuaded Blaine to stay just a little while longer, just long enough for Blaine to sleep again to get his strength up for the journey back. Blaine had reluctantly agreed. Now Kurt was toying with the object in his lap, waiting for Blaine to wake up.

He had decided that he would rather have Blaine miserable than not at all. Maybe it was selfish of him, maybe it wasn't right, and maybe it wasn't what Blaine wanted. But gods are selfish. And Kurt was a god.

Unable to wait any longer, Kurt climbed onto the bed next to Blaine. Without hesitation, he kissed him awake. Blaine's eyes barely opened and he gazed up through his lashes. "Do you trust me?" Kurt whispered. Blaine, heavy with sleep, nodded slowly. Kurt held up the pomegranate he was holding and tore into it with his fingernails. He coaxed a seed out of it and held it in his mouth, pressing his lips to Blaine's. Blaine took it with his tongue and swallowed it easily. Kurt dug two seeds out next and repeated the process, swiping his tongue over Blaine's bottom lip first and enjoying his shiver. Then he rested three seeds on his hand and held them in front of Blaine's face. They glistened there for a moment, three ruby drops, as Blaine's eyes opened more and he awakened, sitting up. He met Kurt's eyes for a moment and smiled before moving those seeds down to Kurt's fingers and sucking them off, one by one. Kurt's fingers twisted in the sheets, and he eagerly shook more seeds out onto his palm, but when he looked back up, Blaine's expression had changed from content to horrified. He had realized the plot. Anyone who consumed food in the land of the dead would remain there.

"I trusted you," he whispered brokenly, tears slipping down his cheeks. "And you've trapped me here forever."

"You're mine," Kurt said. "You belong here."

"I was never yours," Blaine answered sadly. "I could have given myself to you, but I didn't. I was never yours. And now I never will be."

A miserable companion is better than none at all, Kurt had thought, but as he watched Blaine gaze bleakly up at the dark ceiling – as if he was imagining the sun on his face – he wondered if the dead had it right after all, wandering empty halls for eternity, just to find that person who had once made them happy.

.

A/N: Title is from Alison Townsend's poem "Persephone Under", which was very much an inspiration for this story.