Chapter 153: Why is Ragel not coming sooner?

Chapter 153: Why is Ragel not coming sooner?
~Lyra's POV~

Two months in Hades' realm felt like a lifetime and no time at all.

Time flowed wrongly here. I have noticed it, days stretched and then vanished.

Sometimes I would sleep for what felt like hours and wake to find only minutes had passed.

Other times, I would sit in the garden for what I thought was an afternoon and realize it had been three days.

My body didn't care about time anymore, it only knew that I was heavy with a child that Hades monitors every second to use her to make me obey.

How do I know it's a girl, I just feel it. Lauren hardly speaks out. I miss her chattiness but she says the realm we are in affects her.

The baby had grown enormous inside me, pressing me down on everything, making simple things like walking, bathing and even dressing up feel like an impossible task.

Without the help of the servants Hades placed to watch over me, I won't be able to do most things.

I can still remember when my cutlery fell down and goddess help me, I couldn't pick it up. I tried so hard but I couldn't until one of the ladies noticed and came to my rescue.

Hades kept the chambers comfortable. That was the worst part somehow because most of the time he acts like my old friend Hadrian.

My room is filled with soft beds, warm water, and food that was always exactly what I wanted the moment I thought about it.

If I craved something, it appeared. If I was cold, the air warmed. If I wanted to read, books materialized on the tables.

While at first, it felt thoughtful and reminded me of Hadrian, it's now getting old and it feels like he was keeping me like a prized possession, he didn't want to lose.

After having enough, I tried to run away in the second week, but he had simply appeared in front of me and smiled.

I thought he would be angry. But he wasn't, he had just… been patient. Like he had all the time in the world to wait for me to stop trying to escape and in a way he did because I know nothing about this realm or the people here.

"The realm won't let you leave," he'd said proudly when I tried again in the second week. "It knows who you belong to now. And that's me."

So I stopped trying after that.

Instead, I learned about the palace. I learned about the gardens where flowers bloomed in colors that didn't exist in the real world.

I studied the halls that twisted back on themselves. I learned which servants wouldn't speak to me and which ones would, though none of them seemed entirely real.

They all moved like they were following an order like puppets, responding to things but never truly present.

When I was finally losing hope was when I met Cael.

He was in the library, which surprised me. I had thought I was alone in the palace except for Hades and the ghost-servants and his weird concubines that I had never seen after that scene.

But there he was, standing in front of a shelf of books. An actual person with no vacant eyes and tint of a blue coloring their skin.

He was tall, with dark hair with a touch of white at the tips and orange eyes that looked older than his face.

In those eyes, there was a sadness in him that went so deep I could feel it from across the room.

"You're real," I said, without thinking, the joy was obvious in my voice.

He turned and looked at me and for a moment, I thought he was going to pretend not to understand me or act like those puppets.

But then, his face broke into a soft smile and expression softened.

"So are you," he replies. "Which is surprising. Usually Hades doesn't keep real people here except his concubines, which are not real if you think about it since all they think about is sex. So technically, they are not real."

Huh? Was that why that man had acted that way without shame when I was there begging him to fuck him, I could still remember how Hades treated him shit.

"How long have you been here?" I asked.

"Seven years or more, I can't say," he said. He looks at me to see if I understood what he met, when he thought I didn't, he went further explain but I already understood what he meant. "Time is flexible here."

I wasn't hearing anything else he was saying, seven years. He has been here for seven years, does that mean I am never going to leave here too?

I felt something my chest tightened painfully at the thought as my hand slid down to my bump.

"Why?" I asked.

Cael turned back to the books. But I already saw the sadness in his eyes.

"Because I made the mistake of knowing something he wanted to keep secret, and my ability is I couldn't forget anything I see and can't die." He paused.

"When he found out these abilities, he kept me because I'm useful. I am one of the people that don't need his god powers so he kept around to argue and banter with, you can say it's because he is a lonely god. I know the palace, I can show you around if he allows it. I also know what he wants. And most importantly, I can't escape because the realm won't let me."

I felt so sad for him and for myself because I could see how bleak my future was about to be.

Well, that's if Ragel can… but I know he can't. Underworldlians are no match for a god, especially one that was initially involved in their creation.

We talked for hours that day. He told me about the throne room and the anchor crystal that he believed powered everything.

Maybe because he hasn’t had anyone to talk to for a while, he was very chatty and spilling all the teas.

He told me that Hades' control over the realm came from that one thing; destroy it and everything fell apart but I fear it might not be that easy again who knows so I decided to know more.

"How do you destroy it?" I asked.

"Blood," he said. "From these books, it says divine blood, I think. Or was it blood moon blood? But, in simple terms, it must be something that matches his power but opposes it." He looked at me. "You are a blood moon born, right?"

Wait? How did he know about that? “ How did you know about that?” he just shrugged.

"Hades talks about it a lot," he said. "Especially when we are alone. When he thinks I am not paying attention or knows what he was talking about. He talks about your blood like it's the most important thing in the realm to him."

After that, Cael and I spent time together whenever we could. He was careful; he didn't want Hades knowing we were close.

But he brought me information. He warned me about passages to avoid just in case I am able to destroy the crystal and I am able to escape. He told me stories about the palace and how it worked.

And he also told me something very important, it was about the blood moon.

"From what I read with the books in the library, the blood moon rises every few fifty to seventy years," he said. "And when it does, this realm responds. Everything becomes more alive and real. And time jumps even stranger."

He paused and looked at me. "But that's when he's planning to do whatever it is he's planning to do."

"How do you know all these?" I asked.

He sighs. He looks exhausted all of a sudden. “ It's because he changes when the blood moon comes," Cael whispers. "He becomes more violent and intense like he's waiting for something to happen but nothing ever happens."

With his words, I started to understand. The pregnancy heat that Hadrian had healed wasn't actually healing, he had been messing with me right from the Swan clan.

And with the way he had been watching me lately, was probably because of the blood moon meaning he was planning to do something to my baby not if I will allow him.

When I left Cael that afternoon, Hades came to me in the evening, which he did more often now as if he was suspicious of me.

Sometimes he just sat in the chamber. Sometimes he talked about his plans for Salvatore, about what he would do when the seal broke.

While sometimes he just watched me with a dreamy expression that I couldn't understand.

"You're close to your time," he said. He was standing by the window looking out at whatever he was seeing.

"Yes," I agreed. I didn't see the point in lying since he was monitoring me.

"Good thing you didn't lie," he said. "Also, the blood moon will be rising soon and it's at this moment that everything I have waited for will finally align perfectly."

"What do you mean?" I asked, even though I thought I knew.

He turned to look at me, and the smile on his face was so full of anticipation that I had to look away.

"You'll see," he said. "Soon, you'll understand everything."

He left after that.

I lay in bed that night with my hands on my stomach, feeling my daughter move inside me. She was active tonight, stronger than she'd been in weeks. As if she knew something was coming.

“ Lauren, are you there?” There was no reply, tears filled my eyes.

I tried to reach her again. "Lauren, are you there?"

I got nothing again.

"Lauren?"

Still nothing but my tears were slipping down in torrents now. “ I am so sorry, Lauren. I miss you, please come to me. I can't do it alone, please Lauren.”

There was still no reply, I curled myself up as my big belly could allow me and cried real hard.

I miss Ragel, I miss him so bad. I messed up by choosing to run away instead of facing my problem head on, now, I was likely going to die protecting my child or end up in whatever plot Hades had planned for me.

What if I never get to feel Lauren again or even see Ragel again, what if… just my thoughts were spiralling the baby kicked so hard it took my breath away.

"I know," I whispered to her. "I know you're scared. So am I."

Outside the window, the sky of the abyss realm was slowly changing just as Cael said.

The dark colors were deeper now. As if the world itself was holding its breath for what's coming.

I feel the anticipation of Hades' within the colors of this world. “ Baby, what am I going to do?” I asked my child, I wasn't expecting any response but not getting any triggered me into another round of tears.

I was trapped in this beautiful, terrible palace with a god who was waiting for me to give birth under a blood moon that would change everything.

What am I going to do? Why is Ragel not coming sooner?