Hades chuckled. "Relax, Thanatos. I'm not mad about it. This proposition intrigues me." He leaned back, stretching his legs out before him. "Grant the request. I will give them fifteen years. And I will make sure their mother dies before they do, so that she doesn't have to deal with the heartbreak of losing her daughters twice."
Maria bit her lip to keep from panicking. She heard whuffing in a corner, like dogs wrestling with each other. She half got up to go see what it was, and then remembered the warning and froze. But she made a sound, her foot scraping against the floorboard, and instantly the scuffling puppy sound went away, to be replaced by a low, menacing growl.
She whimpered in fear, for the growling was getting closer. Then something hit her back, hard, sending her sprawling on the floor. She expected to feel teeth on the back of her neck, not... a tongue? Whatever it was, licking her neck?
She rolled over slowly, barely having time to see an enormous black mastiff puppy before her vision was obliterated by the licking tongue.
"Oof!" she mumbled, trying to push the puppy, which probably weighed more than she did, off of her. "You're so slobbery, get off of me!" But the puppy wouldn't.
In exasperation she pushed the puppy's face away from her own and shouted, "Lord Thanatos, help, please? Your puppy--" and then the puppy resumed his enthusiastic cleaning job.