In dirges, poets sing of dark Tartarus, of black shadows and perpetual midnight in the Underworld.  But here, on the fertile shores of Styx, the low, sunless sky catches the water's reflection and colors the air a silvery green.  Like the world seen through an emerald.  Strange trees flourish on the riverbanks, nourished by the deadly-still water: the bark, pale brown, with thick green leaves and fat black flowers.  Stranger still is the fruit: lumpy, red and round, tipped, it seems, with shriveled nipples, like demon's breasts.  When they fall, overripe, on the grass, the thick peel bursts, exposing raw, thickly-seeded flesh. They say there's a pomegranate for every lost soul.

***

Hades slowly rubbed a split fruit over his lover's shoulder, then licked up the pomegranate's sweet blood.  "Delicious," he said, pushing deeper inside the hot body.

"Harder," Iphicles whispered.  "Oh please...Harder."

"He can't hear you.  Not here."  The punishing bite made the king cry out.  "Not that I blame Ares for keeping you to himself.  You're such a slut...Makes me so hard..."

"Tell me...Tell me how much you love it."  Iphicles' fingers tightened on the tree's slender trunk as Hades reached around, staining red the king's chest then his cock with the dying fruit.

"I love your tight ass...I could fuck you forever," the god moaned.  Desiccated, the pomegranate dropped to his feet, rolling down the incline until the river swallowed it.  With his empty, wet hand, Hades stroked the king's swollen skin.  "You're mine now.  I'll never let you go."  The shouted words echoed through Tartarus and made Iphicles come in quick, sharp bursts.  His creamy semen splattered on the tree until the god covered the leaking head with his bloody fingers.  "Yes...Come for me, king.  Come hard."

"loveyouloveyou..."

At the low confession, Hades wrapped his arms around Iphicles' waist, pressed his mouth to the warm, damp skin of his lover's neck, and shuddered out his orgasm.

The man thrust back.  "It's so hot...Your come is so hot.  I love you..."

Spent, the two lay down in the grass, surrounded by the broken, bleeding bodies of pomegranates.

At the top of the hill, the dark-haired woman stared down a heartbeat longer, then vanished in a ripple of green air:  Persephone, queen of the dead, who understood more than anyone the seductive power of sweet red fruit.

***

"They're lovers."

At first, the war god didn't recognize her.  She'd given up her six months in the sun eons ago, and Ares avoided Tartarus--all the gods did.  But as the woman moved, the sunlight from a high window struck her, playing off  the greenish sheen of her skin, making it glow like old copper.  "He'd never betray me."  And not with your cold, pale husband.

Persephone laughed, skin flushing pink for the length of a breath.  "I saw them, you idiot--Hades pumping into him, Iphicles coming all over the place.  Trust me.  Your uncle's stolen your favorite toy."

"He's just a mortal."  He settled back on his throne, fingers drumming a beat of indifference on the studded armrest.

"You're such a fucking liar.  All of you are."  She drew a deep breath.  "Just because I live there doesn't mean I don't hear things.  The shadows talk, Ares.  When they first show up, they can't *stop* talking.  I know all about you and Iphicles.  Your obsession.  So spare me.  I just want to know you're going to do something about it."

"If you're so pissed off, why don't *you* do something?"

She made a sudden move, silver claws drawn, then stopped.  "I hate you all..."   A visible struggle for control: jaw tightening, colorless eyes narrowing.  "I can't do anything, Ares.  My powers are limited--just a few bones Hades threw me in the beginning so I'd stop crying.  Of course, when I finally did, I lost my appeal.  Your uncle needs reluctance--that's why he went after Iphicles."

A deliberate yawn, bone-cracking, lots of teeth.  See? He means nothing.  "I've got other concerns.  There's a war about to break out between Sparta--"

This time Persephone did lunge.  Instead of attacking, though, she wrapped her witchy fingers around his biceps, leaning into his face.  Ares almost recoiled, expecting rot, the slimy feel of decay, but his aunt smelled like spring rain and her hands were warm.  Something dangling ‘round her neck bounced lightly off his chest.

"Let me tell you how Hades won over your pretty lover. I've heard the rumors.  And don't forget: I've been there.  He watches first, finds the weak spots.  And they're always the same.  We want to feel loved.  You've heard how my mother followed me to Tartarus after Hades kidnapped me?  Yeah.  Great myth--the perfect example of maternal devotion.  Well, that bitch didn't care about me at all before it happened. And when she found out that a god was sticking it to me, you know what she did?  Went to his temple and lit a hundred candles in his honor.  The only reason she haggled for the six months was to show me off to the villagers.  But when I started to turn into this--" she jerked her head at her coppery body--"and the village kids started crying when I showed up, she changed her tune pretty quickly...Anyway, the point is: I was ripe for him.  Just like your king was."

Unwillingly, he tensed.  "Iphicles--"

"Let me finish.  I'm not leaving til I do."

"Fine, go on."  Anything to get you outta here, you green-skinned bitch.

"The sad thing is, you were probably pretty nice to him--nice in your own warped, clued-out way."

Ares considered slamming her into the wall, watching that oddly-slick skin split, see if it bruised before healing.  But he didn't.  Let his aunt tell her little story.

"That's the irony: if you'd just been *you*--violent, brutal--and forced him, Iphicles would've been happy.  If you'd shown him how you feel.  But you didn't, did you?" Persephone didn't pause, not needing an answer.  "Hades did.  Hades raped him, the first time.  Took your king hard, making sure Iphicles came, so he'd be screwed up about consent.  And your poor lover's thinking, ‘Finally.  Someone who really cares.'  I know.  I've been there."

"You're crazy, you know that?  Get the fuck away from me."  He pushed her back, and she stumbled, falling to one knee.

A sobbing laugh.  "Crazy...Maybe.  But that doesn't change anything, does it? Hades is still fucking Iphicles.  Oh--and the best part?  Your king thinks he's in love: ‘loveyouloveyou,'" she repeated.  "Just as he came."

He tried not to flinch, but his aunt wasn't paying attention.

"I'm leaving.  It's up to you now.  But get him away from Hades.  Pretend you're doing it for me, if that'll make you feel better.  I don't care.  Just do something."

The last thing the god saw before Persephone vanished was the necklace he'd felt against his chest.  Dangling from the delicate silver chain was a small, red pomegranate.

***

His favorite place in the world: on a battlefield, surrounded by fire and death.  It wasn't the suffering that turned him on, despite what people thought.  He loved the intensity, as war ripped away every cheap moral restriction, leaving only pure emotions: rage and terror.  The combination gave him a permanent hard-on.  After each battle he went to the nearest temple, sat naked on his throne, and waited for the warriors to come.  And they did--in droves.  One after another, lining up to suck his cock with gratitude, while the floor of the dais grew slippery with blood, sweat and semen, the air thick with lust.

Once, Iphicles was one of those men.

That day, Ares noticed the bright hair and smiled.  Finally.  While Iphicles didn't know it, they'd even fucked before.  The war god, disguised as a traveler, had picked up the young man at an inn, planning to use him in his war against Hercules.  They'd spent two weeks together before Zeus, the hypocrite, intervened with a lecture about responsibility, and how love only fucked things up.

Screaming denial, Ares backed off, but kept his eye on the mortal.  He saw the hurt confusion when Iphicles realized that his new lover'd deserted him.  After that, Iphicles made mistake after mistake: supporting a warlord even Ares admitted was a violent tyrant; impersonating Hercules; marrying a woman who wanted his brother; accepting the crown to please his step-father; pissing off every soldier in Corinth, and not a few of the civilians...He heard the lectures that Iphicles got- -from Herc, Iolaus, Jason, Alcmene, Ajax, his councillors--and Ares felt a connection that formed even further into strange and warm and hated.  He buried it.

Somewhere along the line Iphicles seemed to realize his old lover's identity--the god was never quite sure how--and started to visit Ares' temples.  Never during the post-battle rush, either; he came only in quiet times, late at night, when no one would see him.  And the king never asked for the god to appear, just made a ritual sacrifice, usually a wild bird, lit some incense, and left.

Then, after a fierce battle between Corinth and Megara, Iphicles again showed up at his temple, this time with the others.  He hung behind the queued warriors, waiting, his head down.  Finally, when the last soldier's mouth was filled with the god's semen, the king moved forward.  To Ares' surprise, Iphicles avoided him, going instead to the altar.  There, he picked up a knife, hacked off a curl, dropping into the sacrificial brass dish.  Replacing the blade, the king took a candle and burned the hair before dropping to his knees.

Ares did nothing.

Iphicles remained kneeling, and the god admired the broad back under the blood-splattered cuirass.  Just ask, Ares thought to himself.  Just say it.  But the king stayed quiet, eventually rising and heading toward the door, the clack of his muddy boots the only sound in the dark hall.

His hand was on the knob when Ares called to him.  "Iphicles--come here."  Very slowly, the man turned toward him.  The look on his face disturbed the god, made him speak more harshly than he planned.  "Suck me."  But when Iphicles reached him, Ares stood, cleaned himself with an impatient sweep of his hand, and peeled off the king's battle gear before fucking him hard against the temple wall.

Later, when Iphicles asked about those two weeks nearly ten years ago, Ares, more confused than ever, denied it.  "Wasn't me," he said with a shrug.  "Today was the first time I noticed you."

***

The more time he spent with Iphicles, the more Ares lied.

"The guy I fucked this morning had an ass as tight as yours," the god lied to his lover as he thrust inside him.  There was no one else.  "Sorry I didn't show last night--I was busy." Invisible, he'd stayed with Iphicles til dawn, watching him.  "I only fuck you from behind ‘cause it feels good."  Something opened inside him when he saw Iphicles' face as he came.

"Ares, if you think I'm so worthless, why spend all this time with me?"

"‘Cause I like fucking my brother's brother.  Why else?"

Sometimes when he was inside his lover, and it felt too good, he'd deliberately call out Herc's name.  Like he'd ever want that boring idiot. Herc was just a game, an old habit.  But Iphicles believed him.

Then Zeus paid his son another visit.  "You're spending too much time with him."

"Oh right...It's ok for you to fuck half the mortal world, but not for me."

His father sighed, rubbing his chin through the grey-threaded beard.  "Ares, it's not the same thing.  You're making a fool of yourself.  The mortals are talking.  Everyone knows you're in love with that king.  You're ruining your credibility as war god."

That burned.  "Cupid's throwing himself after Psyche, Hades after Persephone, Apollo after Daphne--why'm I so different?"  He knew the answer, remembered it from the plains of Troy, when Zeus reluctantly healed the wound in his son's gut made by Diomedes' goddess-guided spear.

But his father wasn't biting.  "You *are* different," he said simply.  "Leave the king alone, and do your duty.  Stop causing trouble for the rest of us."

"You old bastard--" he began, but Zeus disappeared.  Figured.

So Ares tried one more time.  "I've got a new lover," he told Iphicles.  "Sucks cock like he was born to it."

The king looked away.

***

Thinking back, he decided that was the time when Hades stepped in.

"Where'd you get those bruises?" he asked Iphicles the next night.

"There was a fight. One of my men got drunk. No big deal."

He laid a light finger on the king's purple shoulder. "Must've been some fight."

The king blew out the candle.  "It was," he said, and crawled between Ares' thighs, where he stayed til dawn.

The god knew now it was to avoid penetration.  Hades must've been brutal.  Why hadn't Iphicles said anything? But what could he say?  He thought the war god was just using him--Ares had rammed that point home often enough, leaving no room for confession.

Time to harrow hell.

***

Sometimes it seemed like he'd spent a lifetime watching Iphicles.  Ares had seen the boy's first orgasm, his first kill...Had seen him lose his virginity, become king...And now he watched him come for his uncle.

The two of them stood under a fruit-laden tree, Hades smearing red juice all over Iphicles' body, lapping it up while his hips never stopped their rhythmic pumping.  Even here on the hill, Ares could hear his uncle's grunts of lust, Iphicles' low moans.

"Pretty, aren't they?"

He refused to look at her.  "Why d'you love him?  He's a pig."

"What a stupid question," Persephone said.  "Who knows?  I just need him.  Now go down there and get me back my husband."

***

Ares materialized, leaning against the tree.  "Your wife's looking for you."

His uncle glared at him.

"What...What're you doing here?"  Iphicles asked.

The lie almost spilled out, but he pulled it back.  "I'm here for you."

Hades gave a harsh thrust.  "He's mine now, Ares.  Besides, I don't think he wants you anymore."

"He will."

"No.  Get the fuck outta here, Ares.  Go screw my brother, like you've always wanted to."  The king's eyes closed.  "Fuck me harder, Hades, the way I like it."

A dagger appeared in Hades' hand, and he pressed it to Iphicles' throat.  "If you touch him, nephew, I'll kill your king, and you can't stop me.  Then he'll be down here with me forever."

About to leave, Ares heard the shriek from the cliff top.  His uncle heard it too, twisting back to see Persephone, long hair streaming behind her in the green air, head back, howling at the deathlit  sky.  With a bone-crunching blow, the war god knocked the knife away, wrapped his arm around Iphicles' waist, and took him from Tartarus.

***

"Why're you doing this?"  Iphicles asked.  He sat on the dungeon's stone floor, naked flesh still stained red, long legs extended before him.  Thick chains held his arms taut above his head.

A green-skinned ghost whispered in Ares' ear.  "Tell him the truth for once, you coward. Show him how you feel."

"Because you're mine.  I'm gonna show you."

"Fuck you, Ares."

"Something like that."   He grabbed the end of one chain, tugging it hard.

Iphicles winced, struggling to his feet. "What d'you mean?'"

"I mean I'm gonna make you understand how I feel."  He adjusted the other chain, leaving just enough slack that the king could face the wall.  A flick of his wrist, and a small wooden table appeared to Iphicles' right. On it rested a washing bowl and a folded cloth.  "I've always hated pomegranates," he said.  "Too sweet for my taste."

The first swipe of the warm, wet cloth cleaned the fruit's sticky juice from Iphicles' left shoulder.

"I don't know what you're trying to prove," the king muttered.  But his eyes never left Ares'.

Another swipe of Ares' hand, and the golden skin of Iphicles' neck emerged.  "There's a war going on in Laconia right now."

"So go."  The hopeful look disappeared.

"No."  Ares cleared a path across the king's chest, lingering on his nipples, which hardened at once.

"Your father--"

"Can go to Tartarus."  With one hand on Iphicles' hip, the god turned him toward the wall.  He dipped the cloth in the reddening water, then wrung it out over his lover's back.  Streaks of gold showed through the dark layer of juice.  More water, more clean skin.  Ares' clothes disappeared, and he stepped closer, pressing his hard cock against the king's ass.

"You're just doing this to piss off  Zeus.  To get back at Hades."

"Wrong," Ares whispered in his lover's ear, watching as the water trickled between the rounded cheeks.  Picking up the bowl, he stepped back, then threw the remaining water at Iphicles' back.  Instantly, it refilled, and he replaced it before turning the king around again.

When he saw the swollen cock, Ares smiled.

"It doesn't mean anything. Just a physical response.  Just like yours is."

His lover leaned close, nose to nose.  "I could be with anyone right now, Iphicles.  I should be on the battlefield, and I *will* go. Later.  But I wanna be with you first.  You.  Just you."  He picked up the cloth, moving it in swift, careful strokes over Iphicles' hips, before dropping to his knees on the stone floor.  The king's stained cock was close to his lips, and he almost took it in his mouth.

"Ares..."

"Yes?"

"Don't stop what you're doing.  I hate pomegranates, too."

Iphicles managed a small smile, and Ares felt...warm.  With cloth-covered fingers, the god held his lover's cock at the base, then pulled his hand forward.  The action brought a rewarding moan, and he repeated it, pausing occasionally to redampen the rag, until Iphicles' cock glowed gold.

Satisfied at last, Ares wished away the table, cloth and bowl, then grasped the cock by the base.  His tongue circled the head, tasting salt.

"I love that...Don't stop.  Not this time."

He pushed himself deeper down the god's throat, and Ares sucked hard.

"Oh fuck...You look so good between my legs...can't believe you're doing this...Ares...I'm...gonna..."

Pulling back, Ares shook his head.  "Not yet."  He gently parted the king's thighs further, licking the soft skin of Iphicles' balls, the crease between thigh and groin, before returning to the hard cock.

"Let me...come in your mouth.  Please."

His fingers closed over Iphicles' hips, and he drew the king closer, letting his lover slide deeper into his mouth.

"Yes...Like that.  Move your head--ohhh...Yes...Don't stop.  So close..."

With his lips closed tight over Iphicles' cock, Ares rocked his lover to orgasm, eagerly swallowing the semen that flowed like milk down his throat.  As he drank, listening to Iphicles' cries, the god suddenly gasped, then came on the smooth grey stones.

When he finished--when they both finished--Ares got up, wrapped his arms around his lover, and kissed him, letting their wet cocks meet as their tongues did.

"You came," the king said at last.

He squeezed Iphicles' ass, rubbing against him.  "Mmmm...Yes.  Couldn't help it."

"Why not?"

"Because I love you, Iphicles."

Somewhere, a green-skinned witch touched the carved pomegranate hanging from her neck and sighed with relief.