Read Online Goddess of Spring by P. C. Cast - Free Book Online

to take my place for six months? What am I supposed to do while she is being me?”
    Demeter appeared to consider the question. “There is a small task you could perform for me. For a woman of your maturity and experience it should be easily accomplished.” Demeter’s eyes captured Lina’s gaze as she mirrored the final words of her invocation. “Let us just say that you are returning my favor.”
    Lina had offered the deal. The goddess had accepted. And Lina the businesswoman would keep her word.
    She nodded stiffly. “Okay. What can I do for you?”

CHAPTER SIX
    â€œYOU want me to go to Hell!” Lina’s head was beginning to throb.
    â€œDo not think of it in your limited, mortal terms,” Demeter explained. “Hades is the Underworld. A place where souls spend eternity. There are many realms within the Underworld—most of which are places that hold both beauty and magic.”
    â€œAnd the rest of it is Hell,” Lina said. She glanced at Eirene, who was impatiently listening to her exchange with Demeter. If the old woman had had a watch she would have been checking it every minute or so. “I’d like some more wine, please.”
    Eirene huffed, but she refilled her goblet.
    Lina took a long drink.
    â€œYou still misunderstand,” Demeter said patiently. “There is no ‘Hell’ in the Underworld. There are just differing levels of reward or punishment.”
    â€œWhich are all filled with dead people,” Lina blurted.
    Demeter shook her head sadly.
    â€œOkay, not dead people—the ghosts of dead people.”
    â€œSouls, Lina. Hades is filled with souls.”
    â€œJust exactly what is the difference?”
    â€œYou of all mortals should well understand that difference. Does your soul not quicken within my daughter’s body? Does that make you one of the unnumbered dead? Or, as you would call it, a ghost? No, you are simply displaced. That is all that has happened to those who rest in the Underworld. They, too, have been displaced. Some of them will spend eternity amidst the wonders of the Elysian Fields; some will pay for their sins in Tartarus. Others will drink from Lethe, the River of Forgetfulness, and be allowed to be reborn within another mortal body. Some souls will languish beside Cocytus, the River of Lamentation, never able to cease mourning for their lost mortality. Still others—”
    â€œWait!” Lina blurted. “You’ve completely lost me. I don’t know anything about those rivers or the levels of Hell . . . ur . . . I mean the Underworld. How am I supposed to manage these . . . these . . . dead, displaced souls if I don’t even know where they should be or what they should be doing? It seems to me that you have the wrong woman for the job.”
    Demeter waved off her doubts. “That is all easily understood. Just listen to the voice within your body. There is enough of Persephone’s essence left within you to guide you through any difficulty you might have in understanding.”
    Lina looked dubious.
    This time Demeter’s lips did turn slightly upward. “Try it, child of mortals. Listen within.”
    Lina narrowed her eyes and concentrated. Demeter had said there were rivers down there. She’d only remembered ever hearing about one. Styx. As soon as she thought the word, the whisper of a response, like a half-forgotten memory, came to her mind.
    The River Styx is the River of Hate. Do not drink from it, it will cause no good end.
    Lina yelped in surprise. It wasn’t that there was another person inside her head, it was more like she could tap into an information source that was the ghost of a shelf of ancient encyclopedias buried somewhere in her medulla oblongata. Lina appreciated the irony of her analogy and smiled askance at the goddess, who was nodding in understanding.
    â€œAnd does Persephone have this ability while she’s in my body, too? Can