Pandora Gets Angry by Carolyn Hennesy

with your life!”
    Suddenly Persephone started laughing so hard at her ridiculous joke, Alcie thought the goddess might throw up. Then Alcie started laughing, but stopped when she saw Hades just staring at her.
    â€œAhhh, I amuse, I amuse. So, what bargain did you make with the Fates?” Persephone asked when she had calmed down a bit.
    â€œThey never get to have any fun, so I invited them all down for a picnic, and they asked if, perhaps, we might do it on a regular basis. We decided the day after every third full moon, they’re showing up for a little sunbathing without the sun, and some lamb. Clotho wants to throw rocks at Tantalus in his pool. Lachesis wants to watch Achilles toss a javelin. Things like that.”
    â€œYou’re so good!” Persephone said.
    â€œNo, wife,” Hades said, attempting to loosen up and be casual. “ You’re good!”
    â€œI know ! Oh, but Buster … we have another problem. Alcie’s going back now and she wants to let her friends know that she’s coming. Otherwise they may fall down dead at the sight of her and then we’d have to do this all over again. Do you think that she could use the Borrower’s Bile?”
    â€œI think that might be arranged. Although your friends, Alcie, are in Persia. It will be quite a reach. I cannot vouch for the clarity.”
    â€œS’okay,” Alcie replied.
    â€œBut she’s worried,” Persephone continued, “about the whole channeling thing and one of her friends losing their life.”
    â€œWife, do you not think that I take that into account every time I communicate with another immortal?”
    Hades looked at Alcie.
    â€œWhile I, perhaps more than any other immortal, understand that all life is precious, there is a hierarchy of living things. This device singles out that which is the closest but lowest form to the recipient. I’m always hoping for a fly or a snail or a slug.”
    â€œHera,” Alcie blurted out before she realized what she’d said.
    She looked quickly at Hades, who was now staring hard at her. Persephone’s head was whipping back and forth as she looked between the two. Alcie was certain insulting the Queen of Heaven in front of another Olympian was, perhaps, the worst thing she could have done. She was about to ask Hades if he wanted her life-thread back when he started laughing.
    Hard.
    He threw his head back, his black hair falling out of his eyes, and opened his mouth wide, revealing perfect white teeth. He bellowed so loudly that Persephone was stunned into silence. He laughed so long that he doubled over, and Persephone finally had to pat him on the back several times.
    â€œOh, Alcestis,” he said at last, when he had caught his breath. “If only there was a way.”
    He shook his head as he focused on the floor.
    â€œIf only.”
    Then his face became even more somber than normal.
    â€œNow,” he said approaching her, “you have a choice to make. If I send you back to the world of the living—your world— our world, then I can control exactly where I deliver you. Your own home perhaps? I can set you down right in front of your mother and father. You may contact Pandora now and tell her that you will be safe and sound in Athens and that you will be waiting for her when, or if, she ever comes home. Or, you may join her where she is, a place called Baghdad somewhere in the Persian Empire. If this is your decision, however, I cannot vouch for what will happen. My powers are limited as to what I may do, and while I believe I can get you there, you may materialize in a wall, or in the bed of a deep river, or you may be altered in some way, the specifics of which I have no way of knowing. The choice is yours.”
    Alcie was dumbstruck. She had just been given something no other mortal had: her own life to do with as she pleased. Yet, within the next few moments, she might end up at the bottom of a river.