#amorevna

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It was her mother that got her into mythology when she was younger. 

All types of mythology interested her. Norse, Celtic, Arabic -- even Japanese.

But it was the Greek and Roman myths that sunk into her bones and rooted themselves in her ribs and whispered themselves to her as they unfurled like a rose.

And it was Persephone (the Goddess of Spring, the Goddess of Flowers, daughter of Demeter, sometimes the creation of Demeter, Kore -- the maiden of the pre-patriarchal myth of the Triple Goddess and also another form of Hekate as ruler of the Underworld. The Dread Queen she was, destroyer of light. Persephone. Queen of the Underworld and Goddess of Spring.) that seeped into her bloodstream and never actually surfaced until people she knew started going to greet the boatman of the Underworld and her friends and lovers were things that crawled up from Tartarus. 

As she looks back at it, Elena almost wants to laugh.

(Or cry. Mainly, she wishes she could tell Damon so he would say something snarky and funny and terrible about her being a Queen, or have Stefan regale her of the mythology he read as a kid, or talk about Hekate with Bonnie which Elena vows to do once she gets her damned body.)

Persephone, in all of the myths, always ruled the Underworld, always ruled the dead in the end. Death itself, most people would call her.

After all, they place Thanato's duties on Hades, so why wouldn't they?

(They already do.)

(She already does.)

(Elena has been surrounded by death since the very beginning, perhaps before even she existed.)

(She hates how comfortable she is with death and Death.)

These are her thoughts as she hears Katherine pretend to be her, pretend to say things she would never say, hurt others.

(Eris, Elena thinks Katherine is. But then, she's pissed off. Her labeling could very well be misguided but she doesn't think so.)

When Elena isn't worrying about Damon (she could hear every word Katherine said to him, and she was screaming, wailing, pounding at the walls of her own mind her own body she is trapped within herself now and not in any way like she has been before) or Jeremy or her other friends, Elena thinks of Persephone.

An old friend, and old self.

Elena remembers reading up on her favorite Queen/Goddess. She would read stories of where she chose to rule the Underworld (when Hades didn't exist) alone. Where Persephone lied and said "give me the fucking fruit." Where Persephone hated swine and being stifled by the sun and found back boots and stone floors as refreshing as a cool glass of water, where Persephone usurped power from her husband, where Persephone trapped Hades instead. Where Persephone never forgave Hades, where Persephone seduced Hades, where Persephone loved Hades,

where Persephone breathed life into the domain of the dead.

Elena felt like Persephone, but fuck it all she isn't Persephone. she has a handful of takes on the myths of Persephone and she picks and chooses and analyzes them carefully.

(She picks the ones where Persephone never forgives Hades, where Persephone rules the Underworld herself, where she alone sits on a throne -- she picks them then and there when she hears about a dead girl on the road and Damon.)

                                                ---

When she's back in control, when she's her again, only her, only her on the throne of her mind of her body of herself, Elena does not smile.

She is the Queen of the Underworld by choice, she is the destroyer of light, the dread queen with a curse put upon her name, she is a consort and constant companion of death, and her pomegranate stained lips do not curve into a smile.

What she does is she blinks, and stands, and walks out of the room, but not before smoothing down the lines of Damon's black and white and blue face -- it's an invitation he gladly takes.

(It's one of sex, and vengeance, and blood is involved in both propositions.)

They leave the house bloody, and come back bloodier.

The only difference is the unholy feral ruthlessness that replaces the god-like judgement and hatred in their eyes.