Chapter Text
It came to him out of the blue, his second chance. He spent his days in a renewed and more suffocating isolation; fulfilling his duty as the bitterness only grew. The seething hatred searched for another way, another means of revenge and taking what should rightfully be his.
Perseus was never much of a concern. Hades did not truly entertain ideas of revenge upon his bastard nephew. It would not be that long before the boy's soul rode Charon's ferry once more - this time as his bones turned to dust. No, Hades did not even spare much thought to Perseus at all, and those thoughts were merely tainted by disdain and contempt. Too simple, too soft; emotions easily eaten up by the rage that never went away.
Zeus was the one he needed to tear down and destroy. It was Zeus who had tricked him and damned him to the brutal underworld. While the victory over their father was because of Hades, it was Zeus who claimed all the glory, the sweetest spoils - and Hades could do nothing more than fade into shadows, taking in the many wicked souls of Zeus' spawn. Zeus raped and manipulated and played with his creation like the pawns they truly were, but it was Hades they feared and reviled.
As ever before, the god of the underworld carried out his duties with only the company of his own hatred for his brother. Always thinking, always trying to find some way, some loophole to slip through; a weakness, a chink in Zeus' armor.
For days, for weeks, for months - perhaps it was years - Hades tried to form a new plan to make his brother suffer.
And then it came to him. During a moment when he wasn't looking for it; a rare moment when his mind was consumed with the only thought that could break through the bitterness.
Kore.
A young goddess - the maiden, she was called. A being of light and love, a glimmer of bright and shining beauty that even he could not deny was perfect. Daughter of Demeter, the goddess was kept shielded from the backstabbing politics and wanton lust that permeated the halls of Olympus. She spent her days in a sea of flowers with nymphs that could not hope to match her exquisiteness.
The delicate creature had come into Hades' vision by pure chance. A rare visit to Olympus to see his brother as her mother swept her away from her father.
One look, and he felt the foreign sensation of hope and want for something other than Zeus' suffering. Hades had questioned Eros later, convinced the little imp had snuck in an arrow without Hades noticing.
But he'd plead innocent, and Hades had known it to be so.
He tried to brush it off. For a little while he did. Then she danced into his thoughts some time after - a fleeting thought, nothing but a passing curiosity. But the seed was planted; days later she was not some idle thought that he could ignore. Maddened by the fact that he could not get her out of his mind, Hades stole a look into the mortal realm, to the island Demeter had whisked the goddess off to.
She was even more beautiful.
Foreign feelings returned. They lingered with him longer this time. And so it continued, until she was a regular occurence; a thought that would come to him whenever she pleased, and refused to be brushed aside and ignored. No matter his current disposition - no matter how strong his rage burned or how oppressive his despair grew. He would look in on her, fascinated and filled with a longing he'd never known before her existence.
The failure of his plans to capitalize on the mortals' rebellion did not remove her from his thoughts. His renewed bitterness was still not strong enough to combat his interest whenever it returned to overtake him. But it was some time before that interest - that overwhelming need - clicked with his other desires.
Hades often forgot the simple fact of who Kore's father was. It was not until he was watching her - picking wild flowers with gossiping nymphs and staring longingly at the sea - when he pondered over Demeter's reasoning for shielding her daughter so greatly. He then thought, why wouldn't she? With a daughter as pure and perfect; so lovely and so naive, she would be too easy for Zeus to ruin.
And then it hit him.
Zeus. Her father. Weeks of pursuing Demeter until she finally gave in had resulted in two sisters hating each other and a child swelling within Demeter's belly. Zeus had further torn apart their family and tortured his siblings more - but out of such wretchedness, somehow Kore and all her perfection was born.
To Zeus.
Hades was too mad with hate and too blinded by loneliness draped in lust to realize that he might be the one to ruin her.