Chapter Text
Ben sighed, stretched the taut muscles of his back, and hid a secret smile as the last of the suppliants shuffled away. He hated suppliant days, but they were right to do more of them. It didn’t make sense to leave the poor souls hanging at the edges of the Underworld until someone deigned to notice their existence. As her argument went, it wasn’t their fault that they died without proper passage across the Styx.
Then again, Rey was always right.
He looked over at her throne a little enviously. His queen had chosen much better than he had, and it helped that she had the craftsman of the gods on her side. Her throne, like his, was carved from black obsidian, but it was engraved with all manner of plants and flowers and sunshine. She complemented that with real plants entwined on the armrests and back and a smile on her face.
His queen and wife shifted that smile to him as Hecate announced that the line of suppliants had ended. Ben thanked her and stood from that cursed throne. He really needed to get a nice cushion installed there like Rey had. How he had ever managed to convince her to marry him and rule the Underworld…well, he didn’t have to.
He’d woken from his pain-filled sleep induced by Tartarus and the first thing he’d seen was her eyes blazing with the remnants of her righteous fury. That and Finn who looked less than pleased to be treating the lord of the Underworld. Or perhaps he really objected to the sharp-eyed watch Rey had kept over him.
“You shouldn’t have gone into Tartarus,” he’d told her.
“Yeah?” she’d snapped back. “Well, he shouldn’t have thrown you in there.” And he had seen at once that her anger with Luke had not dissipated with the last of the flames in her eyes. Those flames…he’d been almost lost in Tartarus until he looked up and met her shining vision.
He’d known then that the humans were right when they’d named her the Destroyer. She would have split the world in two to get him back.
But her eyes had softened when they swept over him. “I’m not leaving the Underworld again,” she’d said. “So, you’d better get used to having me as your queen.”
How could he possibly object to that? And she had stayed and now, a year later, she still stayed with him.
“Your face is splitting open again a little, love,” she said as they entered their home again, long cloaks sweeping the floors behind them. She sat him down on the edge of their tub to smear the poultice over his stubborn wound again. It crossed his face and down his shoulder, the single reminder that he’d spent a day in Tartarus. Except it didn’t remind him of the horrors he’d seen there. Every time he saw it in the mirror, he remembered the brilliant, stubborn determination on her face. He doubted it would ever heal completely.
“It was worth it, you know,” he said.
She gave him a small, sad smile. “Don’t remind me. I could still split the sky for what he did to you,” Rey said, but there was no fire behind it. They had long since made their peace with Olympus, even though the first time he’d stepped foot there after Tartarus, a hush had fallen over the entire mountain. It took him several seconds to realize that it stemmed from Rey’s challenging glare rather than fear of his shadows.
“Rose and Finn are coming to dinner,” she reminded him. “And Phasma.”
He groaned. “You invited Phasma?”
There was mischief in her grin. “And Maz.”
“You hate me.”
“On the contrary.” She leaned down to kiss him. “I love you.”
“I know.” He smiled back at her. “Let’s go to dinner.”
She took his hand as they left the room and gave him another smile, the kind he once thought he’d never see again.
He was content to watch that smile grow for the rest of his life.