Title: from chaos, life

Author: Jade Sabre

Notes: I lied.

Or alternatively, w0rdnista (Niamah St. George round these parts) prompted me on a kissing meme, my choice, and I really had had this idea floating around in the back of my head back when I first wrote "from order, chaos," and while I must repeatedly stress that I do not have it in me to write a worthy sequel to that work, I hope you will enjoy this little tidbit of what-came-next.

from chaos, life

The Underworld wasn't quiet by the stretch of anyone's imagination, but all its sounds could easily be ignored: the quiet swish of rivers lapping against shores, the soft and steady moaning of dead souls, the occasional crack of shattered pottery when its lord and master was bored and engaging in target practice. He hardly noticed the sound of Charon's oar dipping into primordial ooze, nor the scrape of metaphysical fingernails clawing on the wooden sides of the boat as he made his rounds. The cavernous heights and depths of his realm meant that every noise echoed, but one didn't need to be a total narcissist to ignore that. For all intents and purposes, the Underworld was practically silent; and while the silence drove Hades crazy, he couldn't think of much he would rather have in its place.

Cerberus's three heads barking at once certainly didn't make the list.

He'd been in his central chambers, staring at a map of Greece and twiddling a dart in his fingers. That the current haphazard placement of darts—half of them in the Gulf of Corinth—hadn't yet lead him to the Wonderboy's whereabouts didn't mean he was ready to give up on this method of search. Poseidon had been rather hospitable, all things considered, and maybe a few more visits would convince his fish-headed brother to put in a good word for him with the other one. It kept the Styx from nagging at him, anyway, and if he wasn't quite ready to show his head above ground, well, there hadn't really been a deadline imposed on the search (other than, you know, death, but Wonderboy was already immortal and as for his wife—

Yeah. As for her. Well. Hades didn't have to sail by Prometheus on a daily basis to know what awaited him if anyone found out about—he'd keep visiting Poseidon. Rebuilding family ties. Zeus would like that—maybe would even believe he didn't have any malevolent purpose in hunting down—anyway, the salty spray of the ocean was even sort of refreshing after the damp, clinging wet of the Underworld. He could wait for the taste of fresh air.)

He even managed to ignore the first few yappings—usually when Cerberus got started, he would proceed to eat whatever was bothering him—but as the barking got progressively louder, he realized it wasn't the dog's usual alarm. No, the echoes sounded almost—excited? And really there was only one person who—

He would not, he would not transport himself instantaneously. He would make a grand entrance, Charon and all, and if he paused on the way out long enough to check his appearance in a previously nonexistent mirror, to slick his flame back just so—it was all for the sake of divine mystique. He tapped his foot impatiently—and really he only ever had a foot when he needed to tap it—as Charon ponderously paddled to the far side of the Underworld, checking his sundial (worn ironically, of course) every few seconds until the fog began to coalesce into shapes—

(And of course he saw her long before that, because of course he could see her light.)

—and then he was stepping out of the boat, sorting through a dozen witty greetings as she tossed Cerberus a steak and the dog rolled over with happiness. The thunderous quake accompanying this movement hardly fazed her, and as she turned towards him he opened his mouth, having finally settled on, Meg, sweetcheeks, did you miss me so much?, maybe with a jazzy (not that the Greeks appreciated jazz; Hades knew he was ahead of his time) back and forth with the hands, maybe to hide his eagerness—

And then she finished turning and he was left with his mouth hanging open and his hands vaguely pointing in her direction. He could hardly find it within himself to be angry at her smirk as she quirked an eyebrow and said, "Yes?"

"What," he said, now vaguely gesturing, "is that?"

"This?" Meg looked at the burden she carried on her hip. "Don't tell me you've never seen a baby before."

Of course he had seen babies before; infant mortality rates and exposure rates (though the latter resulted in fewer deaths than the mortals intended, at least as far as the children were concerned) were quite high, but by the time they arrived in his kingdom they usually weren't…squirmy, the way this one was, sucking on its thumb as it twisted to watch Cerberus chew on its steak. "A baby," he said.

"Yes. Nice to see you too, by the way," she said.

"You never mentioned a baby," he said. She'd banged the ground and told him of her travels, all the places she hadn't heard Wonderboy's name mentioned, and he told her of all the uninhabited watery graves he'd checked. She'd even visited once, recently, to ask advice about consulting the Oracle at Delphi. And it had been nice, and there had been no babies.

"You're a god," she said, eyebrow still raised. "Seems like the sort of thing gods pick up on."

"God of the dead," he said, his hands finally dropping to his sides. "Not…babies. That's someone else's department. What was I supposed to pick up on, the glow of motherhood?" His family had provided ample examples of how it happened, but he didn't know much about how it worked, women carrying babies to term. There were goddesses for that, even if it was what kept him in business. He supposed if mortals ever stopped having babies he might bother to worry about the process—but again, somebody else's department, somebody else's business, and no explanation as for why Meg had thought bringing a baby to the Underworld—"You are—"

"She's mine," Meg said, brushing dark curls from the baby's forehead, and there was no mistaking the depths of protection in the statement, even without their oath. He felt the tug, felt how somehow Meg considered this…thing vital to her revenge. Great.

"Hard to miss the resemblance," he said, bothering to notice its wide violet eyes as it caught sight of him, thumb jammed in its mouth. Bothering to notice its own light, separate from its mother's—and he didn't often have the opportunity to look for family resemblance beyond appearance, but he'd seen hundreds of thousands of dead children's souls, and they certainly hadn't been so bright. He knew souls that had lived full lives and not been as bright. It was still a young unformed thing, compared to Meg (but then, few mortals could match Meg), and yet it was present, crackling at the edges with white flame—

Hades didn't usually bother with mortal curses, given how inapplicable they were to his existence, but he thought now might be a time when oh shit might apply.

"So," he said, as casually as he could, "and the father is…"

"I didn't mention it because I was in denial," she said, "and then she was born, and babies are hard to ignore." It whipped its head up to look at her, eyes still wide, and she kissed its forehead and jiggled it absentmindedly. "So I left her with Phil when I came to talk about Delphi, but he was using her to coax nymphs over to his place so I had to put a stop to that, so she came with me to see the Oracle—"

"You took her to Delphi?" He couldn't help a bit of a flare at that one; if Apollo had seen the kid—well, it was half-Wonderboy's, but that hadn't seemed to help the other two—they were doomed. And of course the kid mistook the sudden horror on his face for something inviting, because it took its thumb out of its mouth and reached for him, drool dripping in a long strand from its mouth to its sticky hand, and he leaned away as subtly as he could, trying to keep his grimace from being too noticeable. "Did—ah—ee—" the kid followed his every movement, hiccupping "—did they say anything about it?"

She shifted the baby to her other hip, bringing it closer to him, jiggling it again as she did so. "I left her with one of the priests at the door. She didn't like him as much as she seems to like you." The baby leaned forward, reaching with both hands, fingers wiggling in a grabbing motion. "Want to know what the Oracle said?"

"Sure," he said, inching back towards the shore. "Want to—ah—have this discussion elsewhere? Wouldn't want the little squirt—" and as if on command, it blew a spray of bubbles from its lips "—to fall in the water."

"It's two danake," Charon croaked.

Everyone else froze, even the baby, as they turned their heads to look at him. His body worked up another rattling breath, and he wheezed, "Have to pay for," he paused, inhaling for eons, "the baby's seat."

"Do I look like I'm made of money?" Meg asked, and then, out of the corner of the mouth, "He can talk?"

"I'm surprised he can hear," Hades muttered back. He didn't mention that Charon counted his coins every day and had probably noticed the, oh, three or four he had swiped to help Meg pay for her sacrificial offering. He wasn't sure, but he thought there might be a resentful gleam in the old man's fiery eyes. "We'll take the long way," he said, and before the ferryman could protest he opened the gates to his realm just enough to crowd the shore.

As Charon dealt with the wailing souls, Meg drew the baby close against the chill and said, "I appreciate the invitation, but I really ought to go. They're expecting me in Argos."

"Who is?"

The baby squirmed and Meg sighed and said, "Fine, down you go," and before Hades could protest it was sitting on his shore—his shore—sucking its thumb and considering the rocks at its feet. "Eurystheus," she said, though Hades was still staring at the baby. "He's king down there somewhere, and the Oracle told me if I wanted to earn an invitation to Olympus I needed to talk to Eurystheus."

"You know they'd only invite you up there because mortals don't step through the gate without turning crispy."

"I hear Ares loves them in his ambrosia," she said, and for a moment the grin they shared was so mischievous that he let himself slip into the physical realm, let go of his divine awareness to feel the puff of her breath as she said, "Thanks again." And the warmth in her words had nothing to do with his own fire, and he opened his mouth—"Oh, Macaria," she said, "don't drink—"

He turned his head to see the baby splashing at the edge of the Styx, then bringing her hand up to lick the water from her fingers. They waited a moment for the inevitable—you could dip a mortal in the Styx, but you shouldn't make her drink—but all she did was frown and then splash again as it started crawling along the bank. Hades flexed his hands, and when Meg didn't move he found himself chasing after the kid—who knew such a tiny mortal could move so quickly?—reaching out to catch her, but of course the Styx had made her slippery and she was determined to go—

Oh for Gaia's sake he was a god, and in a moment's thought he was a swirl of dark robes in front of the kid, scooping her up and wincing as she wiped her hands on his chest. Having a physical body was severely overrated at times like this. He looked up, and Meg's face was an odd—and her soul, not his and yet still bound to him, pained and amused with all sorts of strange currents he didn't recognize, motherhood less a glow and more a knot of anxieties and hopes. Not nearly as glamorous, although there was something to be said for the sweet mixture of sadness and joy and—

"No," he said, immediately reaching the kid back to her. "No way."

"I can't take a baby with me," she said, and this close to the Styx its nagging was more like a constant threat to pull him under. "Kings don't tend to like other people's children."

"But she's got your face," Hades said, squishing her slimy cheeks. "How could anyone resist?"

She smirked into the compliment, the sincerity having crept upon him unawares, and said, "Thanks, but I'd rather not take my chances."

"Oh, and she'll be safer sailing the rivers of death?"

"I survived," she said. "Don't underestimate the power of your protection. Besides," and for a moment she hesitated, and this was a different fear—not of potential harm, but of being left behind, "she's not exactly…"

"Normal."

Meg flicked her gaze to the river, and Hades again considered what the Olympians would do to a child who sparked with divine fire, who suckled the Styx and survived. (Well. They wouldn't be able to do much that a mortal would fear, but immortals had far worse punishments than death.) "There's no one else," she said finally.

"What about her father?"

"Finding him's your job, remember?" Her smile was all teeth. "Consider this extra motivation."

"All right, all right," he said, rolling his eyes, shaking his arm as the kid snatched at the edges of his sleeves. Annoying, but she did have her mother's eyes. "I'll babysit your immortal freak while you go seduce kings."

"Macaria."

"Macaria," he said, and the kid smiled up at him, her mother's smile and yet with a sweet innocence—and what mattered her mortal father, when he'd been the one to give her the spark? "And who's the blessed one?"

"I thought I'd give her a good-luck name, you know, counteract her parents," Meg said dryly. "And who knows, maybe she'll turn out all right."

"Says the woman leaving her child with the god of the dead." The god of the dead who'd occasionally tormented her by reminding her of her worst memories and the fact that oh, she was his slave.

"My god," Meg said, and Hades couldn't quite laugh at that. "Hades," she said, and then she stepped forward, and put her hand on his arm, looked down at her daughter, and then back up to—and she kissed him on the cheek.

It wasn't quite what he'd had in mind when he'd said he wanted to rearrange the cosmos, but it was—better.

"Ah," he said.

"Thanks," she said, stepping away from him, looking a bit bemused herself. If bemused covered hit over the head with a discus.

"My pleasure," he said.

"I have to go," she said.

"Have fun with your king," he said.

She leaned in, this time to kiss Macaria on the forehead. The baby's big violet eyes watched her, almost suspicious. "Goodbye, precious," she said. "I'll visit when I can."

She blinked as she straightened up, and Hades was not going to deal with drool and tears on the same day, so he lifted the kid's hand and shook it in a wave. "Shoo," he said.

"I'm going," she said, slowly backing away.

"Keep in touch," he said.

"You too," she said, and then she slipped the cap over her head and was gone. Leaving Hades with a baby, but before he could contemplate melancholy she grabbed his hand and started sucking on one of his fingers, abruptly startling him out of his physical immersion and scaring him to metaphysical realms far beyond her childish understanding. But even there he could still distantly feel the drool. He'd made a habit of not being around immortal children—if this was going to be a thing, it was going to have to stop.

First things first. He twisted his hand free, creating a skull-shaped sucker (no spikes, though who knows, the way this kid was going she might have liked them) and sticking it in her mouth before she could protest. She gnawed on it eagerly; it occurred to him that he didn't have anything for a baby—maybe he could get Thanatos to drop off a few outfits next time he stopped in; did Poseidon have any daughters? Maybe he would have a few hand-me-downs—let alone a hungry one.

"Well," he said, jiggling her as he flew towards the gardens, "I hope you like pomegranate, slimeball."

She giggled, all sticky-sweet smile and violet eyes, and Hades knew he was doomed. Again.