A/N: I'm sorry. 

'Fairy tales always begin with the words, "Once upon a time".

That's how I start addressing the watching crowd.

'But this is no fairy tale. This is no tale of love and happiness. This story starts with my death.'

I lean forwards on my seat, as if I'm inviting them to share a secret. In reality they're learning mine. In this supposedly innocent city of spring, my only bargaining chip is my usefulness— and whether I can convince my mother that the cunning I inherited is aligned with her interests.

So, I talk and talk. I talk more than my voice allows, and it crunches and croaks on occasion, until I clear it into speaking once more. I talk about inner feelings I'd never normally share. I lie among the truth, and along the way, the lies start to sound truthful to my own ears.

'You have his power over the dead?' my sister, Despoina, interrupts. I've been retelling the part where I escape Elysium. The room is quiet, with only the rustle of leaves in the canopy to bristle in between the story. Even Dio is uncharacteristically still, as if the court has sobered him. Quill watches and listens and observes. Sybella just stares at me, her face white, her nails gripping her knees.

I hedge. 'Not exactly. I have necromantic powers, yes. But I do not have his. He alone can sever the ties of life. They are the gifts of the Reaper alone.'

'The Reaper...and any future partner,' my mother says softly. 'Why have you not slept with him yet?'

Clinical, casual. Most parents want their children to be choosy about their sex lives. Mine can't understand why I haven't put out yet.

I can't tell them that feelings got in the way. I can't tell them that at first, it was a matter of pride. At first, Hadrian refused. At first, I didn't need to. Then, when I began to want to, there never seemed a right time. There never seemed enough time. I don't want to feel forced by circumstances.

I'm not being forced, I think slowly.

But I still want to.

If he'll have me.

Will he?

I give her my most serious expression. 'If I sleep with him, I'm tied to him forever.'

'Not all Gods live forever,' the Queen Demeter replies, her expression neutral and her tone calm. Calm considering the words she's just uttered implicate killing my fiancé.

I quirk my eyebrow, feigning my own level of calm. I examine my fingernails as I respond, 'And how do you propose to kill the God of Death?'

A glittering smile. 'Does dismantling him count?'

Oh, gods. Would he still be conscious? I avoid glancing at Sybella, and what she makes of this talk. 'A novel idea, Mother. I have a lot to learn.'

Plutus chuckles. 'We can teach you, sister. If you stay with us.'

A test. An invitation? I swivel on my butt to face him, tapping my lips as I pretend to think. 'But brother, if I stay with you, I won't get my wish.'

'Wish?' asks Despoina.

I turn with gravity to face her. 'I may have jumped to my death to find my little brother, but now I have something much bigger in mind.'

'Oh?' the Queen Demeter's brows rise. She waits for me to continue.

I shift, looking uncertain. 'I'm sorry. I don't know if I can trust you.'

I can't trust you at all...

Despoina opens her mouth, letting out a huff of indignation, whilst Plutus stands, enraged. Philomelus raises his head to look at me, curious. Cerelia waves a hand to silence them.

'Go on, daughter,' she commands.

'As you know, I am a mere few weeks dead, and I do not know the alliances the Gods have,' I breathe, as though I am afraid of the words. 'I have been killed for a man who barely acknowledges the sacrifice. But for all I know, you may be allied with him. You may be reporting my every move.'

Cerelia actually smiles. 'I would expect no less from my daughter. Philomelus, take note. She's raised a human and already knows how to play the game.'

I hide a nervous swallow. Have they already figured out my ploy, that I have launched an offense to avoid theirs?

But the Queen Demeter does not fear me. She does not consider my cunning enough of a threat to have double crossed her— for she grins and offers me a deal.

'Sleep with the Underworld King, daughter,' she commands. 'I promise you, sleep with him before your wedding night. And afterwards you will see that Spring has not allied themselves with him.'

I hold her stare. 'And if not? If I sleep with him and you betray me?'

'Well, I've already given you the tip to dismantle him.'

'Is that the reason you wanted to meet me? To tell me to get on with it?'

Her eyes do not soften. If anything, my selfish plea has made her mouth into a thin, firm line. 'Do not look to me for affection, Nerissa. We are alike, you and I, and I see the same efficiency and ruthlessness in you as I do in me. I wanted to meet you to see whether you were worth it.'

'Worth what?' I echo.

The Queen Demeter rises, her face a mask of cold and brutality once more. 'Saving,' she replies brusquely. 'I will see you soon, daughter. This court session has ended.'

Cerelia, shoulders back and spine straight, waits for nobody as she strides back up the stairs towards the exit. There's been such an abrupt end that everybody is glancing around, shocked and confused. What conclusion had she come to?

I want to know that too. Am I worth saving?

'Guess I'll find out,' I mutter, shaking off the feeling of foreboding. My siblings have woken from their stunned silence and are asking me another barrage of questions.

When Dio puts his hand up and bobs up and down, excited, I turn to him. 'What is it?'

He grins at me. 'Can you finish the story? You escape from Elysium. And then...?'

I sigh. But he looks so sincere, I can't help but continue.

A short while later, I sit alone in the court room.

My story had reached its natural conclusion— my decision to come here, although I'd had to alter my ideals to protect Hadrian to something like self-preservation. To my relief, Sybella had known my lies— she clasped my shoulder before she left, giving me a swift squeeze of support.

Dio, after hearing the story, had wanted to show me more of spring, but he had been content enough to show Sybella instead. I had cried off— I feel exhausted. I needed ten minutes alone to recollect my thoughts, to think through what Cerelia had said. My siblings are in the gardens, waiting with Quill, to take me to see Keiron.

I look down at my knees. They're still shaking, even when the Queen Demeter had left over a half hour ago. I grip my stomach, fighting to settle the nausea that meeting her had brought on.

A game. To her, I am a game. An expertly placed chess piece, and not even a valuable one at that. She's the queen. I'm expendable.

Sleep with the Underworld King.

I promise that you will see afterwards...that we have not allied with him.

Cerelia has a plan— and I'm a convenient piece in it, but not central. It will work with or without my cooperation, although I would be an added sweetener if I played her hand.

Sleep with him, before your wedding night.

She wants me to have his power, that much is certain.

'But why?' I mutter, pressing my fingers to my temples. 'Hadrian is still alive. Even with his power...'

...not all Gods live forever.

Sleep with him, before your wedding night.

'Before...' I whisper, eyes staring at the ground, unseeing. Instead, I envision a scene where I'm walking in a white and grey dress, with Spring courtiers at my wedding.

I swallow, an awful realisation pouring through me. 'Before. I have to sleep with him before, because there's not going to be an after.'

A terrified thought runs through me. 'What is going to happen at our wedding?'

In answer, I hear a rumble through my feet. The voice speaks through me, inside me, in answer.

'Are you the little saint bride?'

My gasp is stifled by my hand that clamps over my mouth. I leap from my seat, looking around to see who is in the room with me— but it's empty. I don't know who has spoken, and, more importantly, I don't know how they're speaking to me.

'Who are you?' I ask, still spinning slowly, trying to catch a glimpse of the speaker.

'My name is Persephone.'

My legs catch the roots on the ground and stumble. The voice doesn't sound feminine. It doesn't even sound human. I back towards the tree, trying to keep the room in my vision.

'How is that possible?' I croak. 'Persephone is dead.'

'I am not dead,' comes the reply. 'I have always been here.'

I'm embarrassed to say that I stop worrying for my life, about the location of the speaker. Instead, a slow burn stings my chest. If Persephone is alive, then...will Hadrian still be marrying me in two days' time?

My arms circle my stomach, fighting another roll of nausea. I have to tell him she's alive, but I'm dreading seeing his response. I'm dreading that moment of joy. The moment when he stops looking at me, and goes back to looking at her.

'You are human, and yet, you have the power of spring...' the voice sounds almost like a soft sigh. 'How do you exist?'

The phrase stirs a memory of when I'd first awoken my power, and a voice had hissed into my ear: 'Who are you, and how do you exist?'

'You've spoken to me before,' I say, with certainty. My eyes narrow. I hadn't been in spring at that point, which means the voice's owner is powerful. Persephone is powerful.

'Your gifts are a connection to me.'

My back hits the tree as I step into it. My fingers feel its cold, lifeless bark. For some reason, I'd expected the tree to throb with energy. But when I spy the leaves above, I see them tinged with darkness, death, and decay.

Spring is dying. The tree itself— the life of spring— is dying.

'Why?' my mouth talks as my mind whirs. The tree dying can wait; I have to find the voice's owner.

'Because that power was once mine.'

Then the bark under my fingertips changes, and I'm pulled backwards, into the tree. My scream is stifled by the wood that bursts around my body, wrapping me inside it. Uselessly, my hands scrabble against the strong branches, but despite dying, the tree is still more powerful physically. My world turns black, and a sick fear ratchets up my chest. Trapped. I'm trapped. Inside a tree.

No one will look for me here.

Before I can panic, I'm given a new sensation: light. Light and eyes, all around. I watch behind another's eyes. It's bright and warm, and my leaves are sprouting green, my blossom pink and healthy.

There is one sole occupant of the courtroom: a woman with long brown hair, perfectly combed, and a fierce expression of desire. She speaks to me, a command— a spell.

'Gods of the Chaos!' she shouts, raising her hands, 'The Winter Court and the Underworld are continually growing in power. Spring is weakening in the face of their union, and how can we bring about rebirth against a stronger foe?'

I rustle, listening to her. She is the current Queen Demeter, Cerelia. And since the start of her rule several years ago, she's become increasingly frustrated with the goings-on of her two enemies.

'I ask of you a way to bring down King Hadrian of the Underworld,' Cerelia breathes, demanding. 'I ask of you a way to bring down Princess Hecate of Winter. My informers tell me her design is to unite the courts by marriage with him. Already they are powerful friends. A union would make them almost unstoppable.'

A great sadness wells within me. What she asks for will have a great cost, one she cannot foresee in her short-term anger. A quick-tempered ruler, and hasty, can create disaster more thoroughly than one who intends to, such as Hecate.

But I cannot defy her. She is my Queen. She controls me.

My power is hers to command.

But I have a will of my own. If she must abuse my power so, then I will give it away. In a form she cannot predict. Cannot expect. Cannot control.

And, as I create all new creatures, my petals cast to the ground in a flurry of building and light. But more than the others, I give this form what is my own. I give her spring. I give her life. My power transferred, I am just a tree with a conscience.

When the light dies down, lying at my base, is a naked girl.

The Demeter flies into a rage. 'You give me a girl? A child? What can she possibly do? Or is this your answer...to tell me to distract myself with motherhood?'

Her words drip scorn.

But the girl moves, murmuring, and Cerelia's anger changes to curiosity. For around the girl's fingertips, tiny buds of flowers grow. The girl sits up, her long hair a pale shimmer not dissimilar to the blossoms on my branches. Her eyes are the green of succulent leaves, her face shaped like a heart. Her age would be roughly seventeen, by the length of her legs, the curve of her hips and breasts.

She rubs her eyes and looks around, her expression gentle. When she casts her eyes on Cerelia, relief shines through her features.

'Mother,' the girl says.

Is it that moment that Cerelia's heart opens to her? I cannot be sure.

The Queen kneels for the girl, like she has kneeled for nobody before. 'What is your name?' she asks, peering at her daughter.

The girl smiles. 'My name is Persephone.'

If I had lips, I too would smile. For I am her, and she is me. 

We are Spring. 

----

A/N: Sorry...Persephone is technically alive. How does that make you feel?

lots of love

Larissa

xxx