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#and Annabeth Chase (or at least what I imagined she would sound like)
darkstarknight03 · 3 months
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Why is no one talking about how blunt Annabeth is??? She’s??? Perfect???
Like, I read the books on audiobook the first time, and the recording always made her sound really sweet, with more emotion in her voice, and every time I read the books afterwards I would see her like that. But this Annabeth is so blunt. She probably doesn’t speak more than one sentence at a time, and most of her lines are one word, or she just doesn’t say anything at all.
I love it.
I think part of the reason as why she’s written in the books, or at least appears in the books to be ‘sweeter’ is that our automatic idea of what the “pretty girl” should act like is ‘nice’. Similarly, Clarisse’s lines in the show have a lot more smirking and less growling than in the books.
And yes, part of it is about the fact that the writing intentionally is making it different. For both those characters, they were described a certain way, so our perceptions were mostly influenced by the way they were described, on top of the added aforementioned stuff our brain does to make us perceive characters a certain way. But it does give us this side to Annabeth that we probably wouldn’t be able to see in Percy’s lovestruck (even if he didn’t know it yet) point of view. And it’s still definitely Annabeth. They aren’t messing up the character by doing this.
This new interpretation will also probably be giving a lot to the story. We don’t really see much emotion from Annabeth until that moment right before she pushes Percy into the lake. I imagine she will open up a lot more as the show progresses, and we will be able to see some top notch character development from her, in addition to the development already written into her character, as opposed to her flat arc in the book. (Nothing against flat arcs, but more character development is always welcome, especially when we get to see the characters go through puberty because that time is really important for character growth and people don’t always acknowledge that)
Not to mention the fact that she just wasn’t included as much in the Camp Half Blood episode, giving Percy a lot less opportunity to see her when she’s not judging him. Again, we only saw that in the moment by the lake. This development is not only important to show Luke and Percy’s relationship, and make it so much more heart wrenching when you know what happens, but it allows us to avoid Annabeth’s crush on Luke without straight up denying it. Because while, generally speaking, we already knew how Luke felt about Annabeth, Annabeth’s feelings for Luke are now up in the air. The lack of her crush also means less showing emotions for Annabeth, as I’ve already mentioned, so that in this initial episode, Luke seems like the warm brother figure and Annabeth is just the stalker girl who pushed him into a lake.
In conclusion, I love Annabeth Chase. Thank you for coming to my TedTalk.
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Also I love how intense she is when she says this line lol.
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phykios · 2 years
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If I Were A Blackbird, part 9 [co-written with @darkmagyk] [read on ao3]
For three days, Percy had gone back to his room in the evening, taken out his phone, and stared at the name Annabeth Chase in his contacts. He’d toyed with the idea of changing it a few times to Princess Annabeth. Or maybe just adding a crown emoji or something. But he’d done nothing, save for closing his phone, and sighing with relief when Jason showed up and he no longer had the space for a long, quiet, private conversation with… no one. 
But on that third day, he had nothing to do. It was a rest day, with no practice, press things, or even friend’s events to watch. Jason was right on the cusp of his big race, so he wasn’t even around to distract him. 
And as the hours dragged on, the name in his phone could not be ignored.
He’d called his mom. He’d facetimed Estelle, managing to avoid Paul for royal watcher reasons. Luke was technically at work, but they’d spent an hour or so texting. He’d even IMed Nico about his travel plans.
All his attempts to reach out to Rachel had ended with her asking if he’d called his princess back yet. 
He was basically down to messaging Thalia, who would be rightly pissed if he interrupted her in the middle of something important, or breaking down, and actually calling Annabeth. Just to talk to her. Just to hear her voice.
So he listened to half a podcast on the history of the Byzantine Empire. But he could not focus, barely making it through half an episode on the history of the Fourth Crusade. Not when Annabeth’s phone number waited for him. 
He tried to imagine what she would even say to him, if he called to talk. In your dreams? Thanks for the memories? 
For that matter, what would he even say to her? 
The minutes ticked on. He watched his battery drain, ever so slowly, rubbing his thumb across the screen every time it threatened to go to sleep. It was just after 3 pm when, finally, he hit her name on his contact screen, and listened to it ring. 
After two rings, he was ready to give it up. This was a stupid idea. She didn’t want to talk to him. She was screening his calls. She had something more important to do. She didn’t…
“Hello?” 
And his heart jumped.
He’d almost expected her to sound different. More princess-y? What were princesses supposed to sound like? More European, at least. He still didn’t hear much of an accent from her. 
“Percy?”
Oh, shit, he hadn’t meant to not say hi.
“Oh, did you not mean to call?” 
Oh, shit, he hadn’t meant to swear! “No,” he said, quickly, “no, I just… I didn’t really expect you to pick up.” 
“Why wouldn’t I?” she asked, sounding… confused. Or sad. Maybe. 
“Cause… I figured you had more important things to do than talk to me,” he said. 
“I always want to talk to you,” she said, simply, and with a palpable conviction, even over the phone. 
He blushed, even though she couldn’t see it. How do you even respond to something like that? “Me too,” he said, then immediately had to physically sit on his hand so he didn’t smack himself. Fucking idiot. 
But she laughed, a tinkling, musical thing. Like stars strewn across a dark sky, pointing the way to shore. 
He let out a laugh too, shaky, but firm. “So… am I going to be put on some government watchlist for calling you?”
She laughed again, a soft chuckle. Gods, her laugh was the same as he remembered it. And so damn pretty. “I don't really know how to tell you this, but they've already run like four background checks on you.”
That was… something. Not exactly surprising. But still not something he’d considered. “So… find anything good?” he asked, partly out of a sense of preservation, because boy, did he have some wacky stuff in his background. 
“We have determined,” she said. Was that the Royal We he had heard so much about? “That you, Percy Jackson, are a sailor, a historian, and an upstanding gentleman who loves his family and his sport.” 
Oh. Well that was nice.
“My dad was very impressed by your academic background, too,” she added.
“Oh.” Her dad was impressed. He had impressed her dad, the future king of Sweden. If Paul were here, he would have had a coronary. “Anything else?” Hopefully he would impress the future queen, too.
“Yes. We determined that you were also devastatingly handsome.” 
“Well… that’s nice.” He had expected flirting even less than the future king of Sweden being interested in his academics.
“Were you expecting them to find something?” 
Talk about loaded questions. He was suddenly extremely thankful for all the times Luke had been there during a run in with the police. No one ever caught Luke up to anything. And some minor larceny had never been Percy’s modus operandi on his own, anyway. “Not really,” he said instead. “But, ah… got any weird holes I might be able to fill?” he offered up, thinking about a rather glaring one, and wondering what her people might have come up in the father-sized void in Percy’s life.
“Yeah, actually.” He thought he could sense a light layer of trepidation in her voice, hidden beneath her casual tone. Oh, what he wouldn’t give to listen to her voice for hours, mining for every hidden meaning and nuance. “Your father? His name’s not on your birth certificate.” 
“So,” Percy said, “before I actually tell you,” sort of, “I want to state, for the record, that it is super weird that you know that.” 
“Sorry.” 
“No, no, don’t be sorry,” he said, sitting up as the tone of her voice dropped. “It’s okay, I totally get it. And I’m sure Swedish James Bond has a gun trained on me right now.” 
She laughed again, maybe a little bit more subdued. “You aren’t that big a deal.” 
“Ouch,” he grimaced. “That is just what my ego needed to hear.” 
“Good. Girls like a little humility, especially from a sports star-turned-influencer.”
“Do they? I thought they were into bad Olympic puns and blue sandwiches.”
“Some of the weirder ones, maybe.” 
“Nah,” he said, “only the ones worth knowing.”
She was silent, for a moment. He imagined her maybe sitting on her hotel bed, a mirror image to him, holding her phone, and smiling down at it. At his words. He imagined her lips as they curved upwards, highlighting her strong cheekbones, little crinkles at the corner of her gorgeous eyes. 
He coughed, dry and useless. “Anyway, um… my dad.”
“You don’t have to talk about it if you don’t want to,” she said, extending him the same grace he had given her earlier.
“It’s okay,” he said. “If it helps, I don’t mind.”
And she didn’t push back against it.
Percy sighed, leaning back against his headboard. “My dad… He’s… I don’t even know how to describe him.”
“What does he do?” 
He had a sudden image of Annabeth at a desk, pencil in hand, bent over and furiously scribbling away in her Percy dossier. It had hearts all over it, and a cartoon valkyrie on the front. The mental picture made him smile. “He’s kind of a bum. He fishes a lot, but other than that… I’ve gone fishing with him a few times, but,” he shrugged, “I’ve really had next to no contact with him.”
She hummed over the phone, sympathetic. “Does that bother you?”
“Not really,” he scoffed. “My dad’s the kind of asshole who had a fling with an eighteen year old girl who was completely alone in the world, and then didn’t even stick around long enough to put his name on the birth certificate.” 
“I’m sorry.” 
“I’m not. And I don’t need you to be sorry about him, either,” he said. “It’s just… you know when you spend your whole life swinging wildly between cursing someone’s name and wanting nothing more than their acknowledgement and approval?” 
“Yeah,” she said, softly, and with more than a little bitterness. “Yeah, I do know that feeling.”
“Things are good with your dad, though, right?” He prodded, softly. Her dad. Prince Frederick. Future king of Sweden. 
“He’s only about half of it.” 
Ah. “Your mom?” 
“Mmhmm.”
“Wikipedia said she died when you were a baby.” He cringed as soon as he’d said it, as absolutely nothing from that sentence worked on any level.
Annabeth actually snorted in response. “Want to talk about weird? Cite my Wikipedia page.” 
“Well, you were probably breaking down my high school transcript with Maxwell Smart before I even knew you had a Wikipedia page. So there.” 
“Oh, yes, I was very disappointed by that B+ you got in Latin.” 
“That was my teacher’s fault for scheduling the midterm the day before my swim meet.”
She sobered. “Percy, I was kidding. I haven’t seen anything like that. I… doing checks on you wasn’t my idea, I swear,” she said. “It was more a… preventative measure once the pictures got out. I only knew about the thing with your dad because it was mentioned in the debrief.”
“You had a debrief on me, and my calls are still allowed to come through?”
“I wanted to talk to you,” she said. So damn earnest. His heart skipped another beat. “And I didn’t mean to be weird about your father. I just… I do know what it's like to be missing a parent and to desperately want their approval, and also to hate that they aren’t there for you.” 
“Did your dad ever look at you, and you knew he was seeing your mom, and it kind of crushed you?” Percy asked, quietly. It hadn’t happened a lot, not really. But every time he’d noticed it, he’d felt it in his chest. He’d felt guilty about it, too, which was why he’d never mentioned it to Luke. Luke had so much worse to deal with on the mom front than he did. It hadn’t seemed fair to bring it up. 
She sighed, heavy, world weary, and tinny. “He did.” 
“It sucks.” 
“It does,” Annabeth agreed. “Is… I saw that you had a stepfather. What’s he like?”
In his mind’s eye, he was at his mother’s wedding again, walking her down the aisle, and trying not to cry at the naked love and adoration on his stepfather’s face. “Paul’s amazing,” he said. “He’s just what my mom always deserved.” She’d avoided relationships for so long, devoting so much of herself to taking care of Percy and May and Luke. He couldn’t even really remember her having a lot of friends. He’d been so happy when she’d seriously started working on her writing again, and then going back to school. And then when she’d met Paul, and they’d gotten serious, he’d been absolutely thrilled for them.
“Oh,” said Annabeth, taken aback. “I… I’m glad.”
Oh. “Um… I guess you and your stepmother… uh…” He trailed off, unsure how to continue his thought without accidentally insulting a member of the royals. Somehow, Paul would sense it, and then he’d probably have a heart attack. 
Annabeth sighed. “You don’t want to hear about my messy family politics.” 
“I think family politics for royalty might just be normal politics.” 
“That’s my point,” she said, tiredly. Percy figured maybe she had tread this ground before, maybe even hundreds of times–with her family, with her friends, with her country, even. She had no reason to rehash it, and especially not with him. 
But. “I love my stepdad,” he said, “and he's awesome for my mom. But, also, when I was two, my mom started working for my Aunt May, who we later found out had a relationship with my paternal cousin. I am pretty familiar with weird, fucked up families.” Even giant, old, European ones. Though he didn’t say that part. “So, if you want to vent, or something… I can listen. I don’t mind.” 
She didn’t say anything, not for a long time. But he could still hear the gentle static of the ambient noise of her room. Sitting here, together, in silence, separated only by a phone signal, it was strangely, wonderfully intimate. 
“I don’t really want to,” she said, after a few minutes. 
“Of course. You don’t have to share anything with me.” 
She sighed. “It's not that. It's more just like… I want to talk to you about happier things. Things I actually like. I may not like my stepmother, but I do like you.” 
Percy smiled, slow and creeping, even though she couldn’t see him. “You… like me?” 
“I do,” she said. “Do you like me?”
“I do.” 
And if either of them noticed that those sounded like the responses at a wedding, they didn’t say it out loud. 
“So,” Annabeth said, the noises over the phone making it sound like she was readjusting her position. Maybe she was snuggling into bed, pulling a blanket over her, her hair spread out over her pillow as she relaxed. “What are you up to, today?”
“It's a rest day,” he said. “With the big race coming up, I have to relax at least a little. I have one every two or three days, but my last rest day fell on the equestrian event, so I went and watched my cousin. And my other cousin Nico was there, so we had fun.” He was finally going to get to properly see Nico at dinner tonight, which was good. And Nico hadn’t given him any shit about the whole princess thing. Which was doubly nice. Though, Percy couldn’t help but wonder if it wasn’t because of the whole countess for a mother thing, or because he’d spend so much time in his father’s court. 
“But not today?”
“Not today.” Nico and Hazel were celebrating her silver together. And he’d been invited, but with that kind of reluctant vibe that made it clear the siblings wanted some sibling time, at least until dinner. “What about you? Don’t you have some babies to kiss, or some war to avert, or some village to sack?” 
***
She laughed, despite herself, her head back against her pillow. “I wish,” she said. “You could come with me. We’d sack up and down the coast.” 
“You think I’d be good in a fight?” He asked, a smile in his voice. 
And yeah, actually, she did. But she wasn’t sure why. “You did mention fencing in an interview, right?” 
“You watched my interview?” 
“Wikipedia,” she quickly responded. That was going to be a good get out of jail free card so she didn’t look like a total stalker. At least for a while.
“Well, I did do some fencing, both standard style and more of a–period style, for a time. People tell me I’m not half bad with a sword.” 
“Neither am I,” she said, “We should have a go, sometime.” 
“Oh, I’d like that very much,” he said, his voice tipping down an octave or so. 
Color rising in her cheeks, she changed the topic. “I was–I was actually thinking about the boat thing. Vikings were seafarers, as much as anything. I bet you could get me to all the most well-stocked monasteries.” 
“Well, I’ll admit I’m better in salt water, then fresh, and I know the vikings liked to go up river.” His voice was so bright, like he was talking to a normal girl, a regular old twenty-something who was chatting up the boy she liked, asking if he were down to do some pillaging. “But I bet I could handle a longboat. I’ve managed a lot of boats in my time. I could get you anywhere you want to go.”
“Guess you should have run away with me that day in the marina. We could be living large by now, viking down the coast of Florida.” 
“I do hate Miami,” he said.
For a moment, she could picture it: him, her, a boat, and the open waters. No shitty family to hold them down. No reporters to trail their every step. No responsibilities beyond each other. “I’m sorry, Percy.” The words tripped out of her, like a runner out of the gate. “I’m so sorry that I dragged you into all this.”
“It’s okay.”
“It’s really not.”
He sighed. “I guess not. But I understand.” 
“You do?” she asked, twisting the blanket around her finger. “You’re… not mad?”
A pause. “Maybe I am, a little bit.”
She swallowed. “Makes sense,” she mumbled. “I did lie to you. I’m really, really sorry. I should have told you the truth from the beginning.” 
He actually let out a little laugh. But it wasn’t his normal, buoyant, grinning laugh. It was wry, instead. A little dark. A little guarded. “That’s not why I’m mad.” 
“It’s not?”
“Of course not,” he said. “Look, I’m not, I don’t think, unreasonable. You had no reason to tell me at the beginning. Honestly, it would have sounded like a line. And as hard as it is for me to believe, we did only just meet a little while ago.” And that was the truth, wasn’t it. They’d only just met, not even more than a month ago. They’d known each other for so little time… but it sure as hell didn’t feel like it. “And I’m not entitled to all your secrets. Just like you’re not entitled to all of mine.” 
“You have secrets?”
“Of course I do, Annabeth. Gods, yes, I have secrets. And I like you–a lot. But I’m not–I don’t want to share them all with you right now. And I’ll always extend to you the same courtesy.” 
“Oh,” She said, a wave of curiosity bubbling up in her. A desperation to know. To find out. He’d learned her secrets, after all. But then again, not all of them. Not even the juiciest of them. But, then… “So, why are you mad?”
She heard him blow his breath out, tinny and staticky. “Because… Look, I totally get not wanting to give me the whole story. I’m sure starting off with ‘Hey, I'm a princess and I have security and sometimes the press follows me around’ would have been intimidating. But we didn’t have to go somewhere so public as a movie theater. Or even just walking around the city. I would have happily kept up seeing you in private places.” 
And then, a second fantasy, even more whimsical than the first. They were walking down the streets of Stockholm together on a bright, sunny afternoon, holding hands. She closed her eyes, willing it away.  
“I’m not mad that you didn’t tell me you were a princess. I’m still scared the Swedish government is going to put out a hit on me, but I’m not mad about that. But I am mad that you put me in a really shitty situation with the paps and Twitter and the world, when you knew better, and I didn’t.” 
“I’m sorry,” was all she could say in response. It was not enough. 
“Me too,” he agreed. “I… I can’t say it's okay. Or that it isn’t a big deal. But I know you didn’t mean to do it. So, that helps. I can take negligence over cruelty any day.”
“Still.”
“Yeah. But I’ll get over it.” 
“Soon?” And it was such a dumb, childish thing to ask. 
“Probably,” he said. “You’re pretty cute.” 
“I thought I was beautiful?”
“That, too.”
“Well,” she said, biting her lip to keep herself from smiling too hard, “if… if you want something private… You said it was a rest day. I could send my driver to pick you up. I’ve got a princess suite and I can get you almost any kind of room service for dining.” 
“Almost?”
“Well, I haven’t tried everything yet.” Or… “Or, if you wanted… Maybe I could give you something better to eat.”
“Oh, yeah?” 
Sense memory reared its head, the tug of his lip between his teeth, the feel of his hair in her hands. “I think it could easily be arranged.” 
He hummed across the phone, vibrating into her ear. “I like the sound of that. Tell me more.” 
“This bed is awfully big,” she said, lowering her voice to match. “And I’ve been in it all by myself for days now.” 
“No other Olympian gentlemen callers?” He asked. 
She shook her head. “No one else would help me sack Palm Beach. What use would I have for them?”
“Is that all I am to you? Some muscle? A tongue and a pair of thighs?” 
He didn’t sound too put out at the idea. “But what strong thighs they are, and what a talented tongue. I’ll give you a sword, if you want.”
“But I already have a sword.” 
Boy did he. It reminded her of her favorite dagger, actually. It wasn’t the biggest or flashiest. But it could get into where it needed to go. And do all sorts of damage once inside. 
If Percy had taught her anything, it was that the old saying was true: it wasn’t the size of the wave, it was the motion of the ocean.
“I mean, I do really have a sword, but… that’s not what you meant… uh…” And now he was all tongue tied and adorable and he was probably blushing and she was so blindly desperate to see him. And his sword. Metaphorical or not.
“Um,” she confidently began her offer, “I can call Hans, my driver from the other night, to go pick you up. Sound good?”
But she was not met by any more delicious flirting or awkward stammering. Just a long moment of silence that got longer and longer. 
And his voice had returned to its normal, pleasant tenor when he said, “Maybe we should pump the brakes a bit.”
“Oh.” And she knew she couldn’t keep her deep deep disappointment out of it. 
“Not–not for long,” he rushed, “just… maybe until after the Olympics are over.” Another three weeks. She felt her heart jump into her throat. 
It was probably the smart thing to do. She was working. They were both working. But, then again, the idea of waiting on pins and needles for the rest of this pomp and circumstance was not exactly her idea of a good time. “Sure,” she said, eventually. “That sounds good.”
“Thanks.” 
But, she supposed it was worth it, just to hear the relief in his voice. She could give him a little more time to think about it before dragging him down with her into her world. 
“I should probably warn you, while you think about things,” and she hated to do this, but it was only fair. “Things might calm down a little, but speculation, attention, media stuff. It won’t go away. Even after the Olympics. So… you should probably consider that, while you’re deciding if this is a thing you want to get involved in.” 
“I think you misunderstood,” he said. “I’m not deciding about anything. I’ve made up my mind. I am so down to date you.” The grin that broke out on her face could have left a permanent scar, her heart jumping in her chest. “I just… I need some time for my races. And maybe to warn my mom.” 
“You’re really cool with this.” It was kind of unbelievable. It was kind of amazing. 
“Should I not be?” 
“No, I’m just… surprised, I guess. But, pleasantly.”
“Would you believe me if I said that the hot girl I was seeing turning out to be a princess isn’t the weirdest thing that’s ever happened to me?”
She paused. Because not really, no. And then Piper’s words came wiggling into the back of her mind.
“So, I have to ask,” she finally said, hating every word that was about to come out of her mouth. “Are you a secret prince?”
“...Am I what?”
“Like, maybe of some dynasty that lost its power in the wake of one of the world wars? Or maybe in the German Unification?” 
There was a long moment of silence. 
“Is…” He didn’t seem sure how to respond. “Um… is that a thing that happens?”
“Not in my experience,” she admitted, “no.” But stranger things had happened. 
“I mean… there’s a family legend that my mom’s mom’s family was descended from the Byzantine emperors,” he said. “But other than that… probably not.” 
“Probably?”
“Anything’s possible, right? But really, no. I promise, I am just a Connecticut Yankee in Princess Annabeth’s Court.”
“That’s so fucking cute,” she said. “I hate that.” 
“Thank you. I try very hard.”
“I’ll talk to you soon?”
“Definitely, princess.” 
She shuddered. “Annabeth.” 
“What?”
“Please, just… call me Annabeth. All the time, but especially if you’re just talking to me.” Beneath her blanket, she curled her legs up, tensing her toes against the soft fabric.“I can do that, Annabeth,” he promised, and she felt like she could breathe again. “I can do that.”
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theblackberrygirl · 3 years
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OH SHI-
I just realized that the voice in my head changes depending on who my comfort character is at the time
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ananbeth · 3 years
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“Problem Solved” or “that wasn’t supposed to happen”! Love love love these, by the way. <600 words and you make me FEEL things about these two idiots 🥰
lmao thank u sm <3 I hope u enjoy this absolute nonsense which totally got away from me 
Percy met Grover in middle school and he’s still the nicest person he’s ever known. Which is why he can never say no to him, even when he really wants to. Even when he has the absolute worst track record of setting people up and tells Percy over their lunch one Wednesday that he knows the perfect person for him and they should totally go on a blind date that weekend because she’s new in town and she’s really headstrong - just like you! - and he thinks they would be great together.
Percy hates blind dates. He’s been on four of them - which is far too many, in his opinion - in his life and they were all terrible. Grover had set up two of those, one with a girl who quite honestly scared him and not in a good way, and the other with a guy who Grover worked with and was too far on the hipster side of hippy for Percy to be able to hold down a genuine conversation with. So Percy’s hopes are not high, even if this girl - woman - is someone who Grover knew from when they were kids at the same summer camp and even if she’s the smartest person he knows and even if the worst that could happen is that he gets a nice dinner out of it.
But Grover is his best friend and he had given him those big doe eyes, full of hope, and Percy had been helpless.
Despite how reluctant he had been to come on this date, he’s still cursing himself for running so late. Percy is many things, but he is not rude and the idea of leaving this woman sitting alone in a restaurant, thinking she has been stood up, makes his stomach twist. When his train finally pulls into the station, he turns his shoulders to weave through the crowd and breathes in sharply at the cold air of the street when he reaches it, taking a moment to orientate himself before starting down the street in a jog towards the restaurant Grover had directed him towards. He doesn’t even have her number to text an apology, given Grover’s insistence on this being a blind date. Why, Grover, why?
Percy is panting and a little sweaty when he finally arrives at his destination and he takes a moment to catch his breath before he steps inside, to be met by a smiling hostess who asks him for his reservation details.
“Um. I’m meeting someone. Annabeth Chase?”
The lady smiles and checks her tablet for a moment before looking up again with that pleasant, customer service smile he’s sure she’s spent years perfecting.
“Yes, she’s already here. If you go through the main restaurant, your table is in the back room.”
He follows her pointing finger through the busy room and lands on a woman sitting by herself at a table. He’s too far away to make out anything beyond her blonde hair but he thanks the hostess and makes his way towards the table, wiping his hands on his pants as he goes.
He doesn’t know anything about Annabeth. She “doesn’t do social media” according to Grover, who had only childhood photos to show him; along with her display photo which is of her standing in front of the Lincoln Memorial, throwing up a peace sign but too far away to make out anything other than her curly blonde hair.
That hair is currently pulled away from her face in a half up half down sort of thing, leaving her face unobscured and golden ringlets falling over her shoulder. And she’s...wow, okay. She’s super pretty. She’s like, Percy’s dream girl level of attractive. He can’t really believe that Grover knows somebody like this. She’s nursing a glass of wine as she peruses the menu and Percy cringes again at his lateness.
She looks up as he approaches and Percy has never met somebody with grey eyes before but here they are, staring back at him, wide and wonderful. She actually looks him up and down and he tries to let that settle his nerves, rather than thrill them up.
“Percy?” she asks, putting down her wine glass.
“That’s me. I’m so sorry I’m late.”
She stands up, creating an awkward greeting decision for them both which ends up being a hand shake.
“That’s okay,” she tells him as she grasps his hand. “Grover gave me a bit of warning.”
They let go of each other and take their seats as Percy holds back a groan. “I dread to think what he told you about me.”
Annabeth’s smile is full of secrets. “I promise you he was very kind. I don’t think he can be anything other than kind. He just told me you don’t have great time management.”
She says the last part into her glass of wine, meeting his eyes over the top of the glass, like a challenge. Percy shakes his head, having no counter-argument to that comment.
“I’m curious what he told you about me,” she says when he doesn’t offer a verbal response.
Percy picks up his menu to avoid eye contact. “That’s you’re really cool and really smart and probably out of my league, honestly.”
That startles a laugh out of her which he has to look up and see. The smile pushes a dimple into her left cheek and the compliment sends a rush of pink to her complexion as she shakes her head.
“Like I said, he can’t be anything other than kind.”
“You’re not wrong. But also, neither does he seem to be.”
Annabeth meets his eye. Percy is not one for suave charm. His mother has told him countless times that he is charming, but she’s his mom, so it really doesn’t count. He is not a natural flirt, he’s too self-aware and lacking in confidence to ever pull it off. But he’s not going to sit here and not compliment the most beautiful woman he’s ever been fortunate enough to have dinner with.
They are interrupted by the waiter who has arrived to take their orders and Percy picks one of the first things he sees on the menu, eager to get back to their conversation, as premature as it had been.
“So,” he says when they are alone again. “Grover said you’re new in town?”
“Oh. I mean, I’ve been here four months, so I suppose I still am. I’m from here though, originally.”
“Right. Grover said something about Camp?”
Annabeth smiles. “Oh man. Yeah, that place was my whole childhood. I lived with my mom in the city but she was busy so much that I became pretty much full time at camp. Then my mom decided to ship me off to live with my dad in San Francisco. And the rest is, uh, history.”
“So what brought you back?”
“I’ve always wanted to come back here. I even ran away from my dad’s a few times, but didn’t get very far.”
“No way?”
“Yeah. Turns out a thirteen year old with a backpack full of jerky and capri sun didn’t have much chance of travelling cross country.”
“Sounds like you had a fighting chance.”
Annabeth’s smile is rueful. “Well I got dragged back home and ended up staying until I finished grad school before I managed to follow through on my escape plans.”
“Congratulations then.” He lifts his glass in cheers and their glasses clink together delicately.
“Thank you so much.”
“What did you study at grad school?”
“Architecture.”
“Oh shit. Grover was right about the smart thing.”
Annabeth rolls her eyes, but she is smiling too and she doesn’t deny the compliment. Percy has always known that he likes confidence. His friend, Beckendorf, calls it a competency kink which is mildly mortifying and something that Percy does not want to be thinking about right now.
“Okay, enough about me,” Annabeth announces. “I want to know more about the nicest guy Grover knows.”
Her tone is teasing but in a way that makes Percy want to blurt out his life story to her. And he doesn’t quite do that, but it comes close, and Annabeth gently teases him through the whole thing. She laughs at his bad jokes and makes him laugh even more in return and truly, Percy does not want the night to end. They drag things out over dinner and dessert and then the Limoncello which the waiter convinces them into having.
It’s needless anyway, when they leave the restaurant and begin walking in the same direction without saying a word about it, continuing their conversation from the table. Percy has no clue where they are walking, he just follows her lead, hanging off of her every word. Then she’s announcing that they’ve reached her building and she’s standing on the step so their eyes are level and they haven’t kissed yet but their arms have been brushing together on the walk, sending shivers through Percy despite the thick jacket he wears.
Those grey eyes are blinking at him and her pink lip is bitten beneath her teeth and her cheeks are rosy from the chill of the evening and Percy wants in a way he doesn’t remember wanting somebody before. Not least on a first date.
His breath spills out in a cloud between them as he steps closer and Annabeth’s hand is icy cold on his neck but he doesn’t pull away. He wants to pull her close and warm her up. But in the end, he’s not the one who closes that distance, grasping the collar of his jacket and the back of his neck as she draws him in. Her lips are cold too, but not for long. Percy finds himself inexplicably drawn to her, against and around her as they kiss and kiss in the cold New York evening. He doesn’t want to allow any space to come between them again and is grateful that she apparently feels the same way.
“Do you,” she says, breathily, with her arms still wrapped around his shoulders. “D’you wanna come up?”
Percy takes one look her eyes, the grey of her irises almost obliterated by wide, black pupils, and knows he will never be able to say no to this woman. Not that he wants to. His answer is a smiling kiss pressed against hers as he moves up onto the step to crowd her against the front door. And Annabeth just pulls him closer.
--
Annabeth groans as she stretches awake in her bed, feeling the sheets slide over her bare skin as she slowly wakes up. She’s alone, which is not how she fell asleep, and immediately feels a rush of anxiety clench her chest tight as she imagines her date having slipped out of the apartment before she woke.
But then she hears a clatter from outside the bedroom, followed by a curse and the smell of coffee. And she realises that Percy didn’t flee. The thought of him clumsily trying to master her coffee machine in his boxers brings a smile to her face and that tightness in her chest is replaced with a spreading warmth as she pulls herself upright against the headboard.
A moment later, Percy walks through the door with two cups in hand and smiles when he sees her.
“Good morning,” he greets her.
Annabeth smiles. “Morning. I thought for a second that you had gone.”
Percy hands her one of the mugs and carefully sits on the bed. He is, in fact, just wearing his boxers, and he looks just gorgeous with his mussed hair and bare skin all on show.
He scoffs. “As if.”
She grins into her coffee, keeping an arm over her chest to hold the sheet in place there. He had seen it all last night, but still.
“That...wasn’t supposed to happen,” she says after she has taken a sip of coffee. It’s good. He had managed to win the fight with her fickle machine.
“What?”
“Um. Last night. I didn’t plan to take you home.”
“Oh. I didn’t assume that you had.” He shifts on the bed, folding one leg under the other and keeping a careful hold of his mug. “Do you regret it?”
“Oh, god no,” she says, too quickly, but can’t find herself to regret it as that wonderful smile spreads over Percy’s face. “I think it’s probably the best decision I’ve made since I decided to come back to New York.”
“Well,” he says, blushing all the way to his ears and trying to hide behind his coffee. “I can’t argue with that.”
They are both quiet for a moment as they drink their coffee, stealing glances and shifting closer in the large bed as they both slowly wake up and Annabeth is filled with absurd thoughts of waking up with this man tomorrow and the day after, and the day after that. She just doesn’t want him to leave, can’t quite bear the idea of him walking out of her door and not seeing him again. So she makes a decision. Playing her empty mug on the bedside table, she gathers the sheets around herself and moves into Percy’s space, forcing him to abandon his own coffee.
“So, what do you think about breakfast?” she asks, maneuvering herself into his lap.
Percy’s arms move around her as if on instinct. “I love breakfast.”
“Okay. How about breakfast with me?”
He smiles, like fucking sunshine. “Even better.”
“Okay,” she says.
Percy laughs and shifts so they are more firmly on the bed. The movement causes her sheet to drop some but she doesn’t move to cover herself and Percy doesn’t complain.
“Okay,” he tells her. “Breakfast it is.”
They don’t make it out of bed until after midday and wind up getting a late lunch instead, not that Annabeth is complaining. While Percy is in the shower, she sends a thank you text to Grover and feels her chest fill up with that warmth again when he replies telling her Percy had sent the same text several hours ago.
Yes, she thinks, he’s a keeper.
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fbfh · 3 years
Text
I mean, you did ask - leo x reader
all  characters are aged up to 18+ for smexy subtext
word count: 2k
pairing: leo x gn child of calliope reader
genre: adventure, romance, hints at a lowkey soulmate au
summary: after a bumpy reunion turned interrogation with your friends, you finally prove to Leo that you’re someone worth catching up with
warnings: swearing, friends hold you at knife point (for good reason) memory loss, dimesion/reality travel, the phrase “horrible sexy little goose” not about an actual animal, moderate time difference between worlds, reader is acting like a cocky piece of shit half the time, you call yourself sexy a lot, annabeth slaps reader and reader is unbothered, reader and leo hae very visceral reactions upon seeing each other, piper picks up on this, moderately aggressive face grabbing, discussing personal info with someone somewhat privately, brief mentions of hand holding and hair pulling during sex, you spill tea about the rest of the demisquad, I think that’s it pls tell me if I missed any
song rec: choke - i don’t know how but they found me
a/n: this is from a very vivid daydream I had so er ah if reader seems op coded that’s cause she is uwu
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You were excited to reunite with your friends after so long, but being tied up and held hostage at knifepoint by the people you love who don’t even remember you wasn’t the welcome wagon you were hoping for. Then again, as a child of Calliope, you can’t say you’re surprised. 
Apollo has a lot of kids, but demigod children of the muses are exceptionally less common. They’re volatile, really powerful, extremely engrossed in their art, and usually care more about their latest thesis paper or painting or manuscript than going on quests, and more often than not have very specific powers. You, for example, love quests but feel like you never get to go on any, usually because you’re fighting monsters somewhere else. One fun little power you inherited from your mom is - somewhat involuntary - dimension shifting. 
A lot of times you just get summoned somewhere else, with a little inherent background knowledge and your weapon, set free into the new world like a horrible sexy little goose. There’s usually some kind of objective you need to meet; find this person, set something in motion, give someone support in a time of need, deliver a package. After that, you get sent back to your family at camp half blood. The catch, one of them at least, is that a few days Somewhere Else could be no more than a few minutes in your homeverse. 
Another catch is that because of all that, and the fact that you wouldn’t know how to begin explaining, let alone if anyone would believe you, no one knows you can do this yet. Chiron has an idea, but you’ve never told anyone outright. 
You guess now is as good of a time as any to come clean, as Percy holds his sword threateningly close to your neck. You let out a disbelieving laugh, and bite the inside of your cheek.
“Okay, okay… you want the truth?” he starts to back off, and you continue, leaning forward, “I’m not surprised you’d want to know where someone this sexy-” your words cut off as Annabeth’s hand slaps you across the face. You let out a laugh of disbelief, cheek stinging.
“A cheap shot, Annabeth? Wow, I really didn’t take you for the type,” she grabs your face, leaning in close, knife once again against your throat. 
"How do you know my name." She hisses, and behind her, the door opens. Messy dark curls peek over her head in your vision and you know instantly who it is. Your heart starts pounding, loud and hard, and something heavy starts swirling deep in your gut. Your eyes lock as soon as he enters the room and an instinctive smile blooms on your face, knowing what's inevitably on its way. 
"Hey Sparky…" 
Your voice, slow and drawling (and, he'd be lying if he didn't say kind of very sexy) impales him as soon as he enters the room. He watches your pupils expand, eyes locked, immediately swept away by your magnetic aura. A fox like grin decorates your pretty face, and he gets the feeling you know more than you let on. Way more. He's so drawn to you on a guttural level, way more than he's ever been to someone before. His face is hot, and when you slowly wink at him, he feels flames erupt on his cheeks. It takes him a second to put it out, feeling your white hot gaze on him the entire time. 
Piper, who's been helping with your interrogation, looks back and forth between you two as this progresses, taking in a breath and mumbling a shocked, "Oh," as she begins to understand. 
"How are those repairs coming?" Jason asks, oblivious to everything that's happening between you two. 
"Uh… nearly done…" Leo mutters, watching as you hold back an elated giggle at the sound of his voice. You never forget how good it feels to see him again, but the fresh feeling is always better than you can imagine. Jason glances between you two, and walks over to Leo, suspicious of your interest in him. 
"I'll walk you back," Jason says, glaring at you. Your eyes stay locked with Leo's until the door finally closes again. Piper stares at you, bewildered by the tension turned to frantic energy crackling around both you and Leo. She can sense it on him even after he's out of the room. 
Annabeth finally drops your face, pacing and pinching the bridge of her nose. Percy slams him hands down on the table and levels his face with yours. 
"I'm gonna ask you one last time. How do you know us?" 
You stare at the table for a second, still thinking about him. You have to see him again. You’ve waited for too long, you just can’t do it anymore. 
“H- okay. Um,” You blink a few times, facade falling away almost instantly as you look up in a silent prayer that this doesn’t go as badly as you feel like it will. You sigh, looking back up at the other people in the room, a new, deliberate intention in your eyes that they hadn’t seen before. 
“You want to know why I’m here?” 
Their answer is the silence that follows.
“You’re not gonna believe me.” They look around at each other, collectively thinking about everything they’ve been through in the last year alone.
“Try us.” Annabeth replies. You sigh again, and introduce yourself. “...I’m a child of Calliope, muse of epic poetry, and I know you all because we grew up together. One of the fun - quirks, I inherited from my mom is traveling into different stories, or realities, I guess. It’s hard to control, and sometimes happens involuntarily. I adapt to wherever I am, and the universe sort of auto adjusts to follow the rules that stories have to follow. 
The reason you don’t remember me is because I was gone for a really long time, and your story had to keep going. Trying to find me wouldn’t have moved the plot forward, questioning where I went would have been confusing, so it did the simplest thing and edited me out so you could get closer to meeting your objectives.”
Once again, their silence is your answer. 
“Guys, sidebar.” Annabeth says, pulling Percy, Jason, and Piper out of the room for a moment. The come back in a little while later, and she looks you dead in the eye.
“If you really know us as well as you say you do, prove it. Tell us you’d only know if we were as close as you say we were.” 
You sigh yet again, having lost count at how many times that’s happened today alone. You roll your shoulders and bob your head, irritable that you’re still restrained and itching to move. 
“Is there anything we can do before the whole tell me something really personal thing?” 
Percy looks at you, challenging.
“Can you do it or not?”
Another noise of exasperation leaves you, and you agree, resignation all over your face.
“You know what, yeah. Okay, we’re doing this. Someone go get Leo.” An involuntary smile once again launches onto your face at the mention of his name. Jason starts to object. 
“Hey, I’m not going to spill something personal about someone when they’re not in the room.” They agree reluctantly, and Jason leaves, returning again with Leo. You look at him again, enraptured by his presence. He can’t say he doesn’t like the attention - a hottie like you looking at him like that? Yes, please - but something about it feels different, and he gets the feeling there’s a lot more going on than they’re aware of. 
You nod your head once, indicating for him to come closer. He gets a little closer. You widen your eyes, nodding two more times, and he hesitantly gets within whispering distance. 
You turn your head to your left, dangerously close to his face. He can feel his pulse already speeding up. Heat radiates between your faces, your breath fanning over his neck as you whisper slowly,
“You really… really like holding hands, and when I pull your hair during sex.” 
He pulls away from you quickly, beet red, bewildered expression obvious to everyone in the room. “H-how-”
“How do you think?” You reply calmly, loving everything about him, “Okay, to be fair…” you nod once more, eyes flaring, and he leans in once again, equally hesitant and curious. Your words tickle his ear, seeming to light up his entire nervous system like a firecracker.
“I really really like when you bite that spot on my neck, just below my ear.” 
He pulls away again, trying not to literally and figuratively combust. He stares in your eyes intensely, searching for anything besides the truth. He finds absolutely nothing. He turns around, unable to look his friends in the eye. 
“They’re legit, guys.” 
“Wait, what did you say to him?” Piper asks, unsure if she wants to know the answer. 
“Yeah,” Annabeth agrees, “what if it’s some kind of mind control-” Your deep, burning desire to finally hold Leo after god knows how long is starting to beat your better judgement, and you really, really want to be untied from this stupid chair. “Annabeth! Your favorite show was Cyber Chase growing up, you used to come up with plans on how to defeat Hacker, your best was cutting off his food supply - good strategy, I’ve used it before, myself. 
Percy, you feel like you can’t sing because you were forced to participate in an elementary school recital and some kid called you tonedeaf behind your back, it kicked you right in the RSD balls. 
Piper, you’re a closet weeb, you watched Ouran High School Host club obsessively and still do sometimes, you fell for Jason because he had, quote, 'Tamaki's looks and Kyoya's brains, the ideal man'. 
Jason, that scar on your lip is from biting a stapler as a child-"
"Okay, everyone knows that-"
"-and," you continue, showing no signs of stopping, "the reason you ate the stapler is because you were pretending to be a trash compactor because you saw one on TV. 
Nico is totally not right outside the door keeping guard right now, but if he were and you asked him if he likes the diary of a wimpy kid movies he'll ask how the hell you know that - should I continue."
Again, the answers are in the silence hovering in the room. 
“I think it’s about time to catch me up on what I missed.” 
A beat passes.
“Right,” Annabeth says, blinking and readjusting her ponytail as she sits down across from you, Percy already taking the bindings off of your wrists, “so, about the quest…”
She starts to fill you in on the details you missed, bringing you up to speed. After a little while you all decide to call it a night. Piper senses your energy ramping up in spite of the exhaustion settling in. You finally bid them all good night, but Piper’s not sold by your forced yawns. After what feels like another lifetime, you finally leave the room you’ve been in for hours with one objective. 
You can’t stay away from him anymore, you have to find Leo. 
After navigating a maze of hallways and doors, you finally push open the right one to see him looking up at you, and find yourself saying for the second time tonight,
“Hey, Sparky…” 
His heart is racing, and he gets that heavy, full feeling in his chest again, not having fully shaken it from the last time you saw each other. Looking into your eyes makes him nostalgic for something he can’t quite remember, and he knows with full certainty that you have more history than he’s aware of. He wants more than anything in this moment to remember. He sets down the wrench in his hand, taking a step toward you.
“Hey…”
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annabethy · 3 years
Text
under the mistletoe, watching the fire glow day 20: childhood
Character A and Character B are estranged childhood best friends,, percabeth,, this is definitely my favorite day
Percy Jackson is seven years old when he falls in love.
He doesn’t know it at the time, or for a long time after that.
When he first meets her on the swings, when she’s sitting by herself, he thinks she looks like a princess. Her curls are pretty and blonde, not a hair out of place. The first thing he really notices, though, is that she looks sad.
Looking back on it, he thinks that maybe that’s why he approached her. Percy was never the kid to step out and make friends first. But she looked like she could use it.
So as he sits next to her on the swings, he asks her, “What’s your name?”
She looks up from where her feet were kicking at the dirt, covering her pretty princess shoes in specks of black and brown. Her eyes are a striking grey – the kind that he could not possibly forget, even at the ripe age of seven. She tells him, “Annabeth,” and doesn’t say another word.
He responds with, “I’m Percy,” and follows her lead, silence settling all around them. He tries again the next day when he finds her sitting by herself on the same swings during recess. Today, she’s in a blue dress, and he tells her that it’s her favorite color.
“Really?” she asks, kicking the dirt again. “My daddy wanted me to wear the pink one.”
“I think the blue one looks better than pink,” he says.
At twelve years old, he thinks that’s when she became his best friend. That wonderfully dull day when the grey clouds rolled overhead on a chilly October day. It was the day the clouds matched her eyes too, he remembers.
It was the day he fell in love.
Percy Jackson is twelve years old when his heart first breaks.
He’s sitting in the grass outside her house, watching her cry. The tears roll down her face, and matching tears roll down his. It’s funny because they do everything together. They experience love and heartbreak and friendship and tears at once, and always together.
Percy and Annabeth, together forever and always.
Or so he thought.
But it’s only a week later that she moves out officially, and he never sees her again. They’d promised to keep in touch, but like all friendships, it always fades. She’s in California, and he’s in New York, and they’re both twelve. So young and wrongfully full of hope. But that was them too. Hopeful and bright, wishing of a future together.
At eighteen years old, he remembers their promise to find each other again. It had been an offhand comment, one that they’d seen in TV shows and movies. If they both turned twenty and weren’t married, then they’d marry each other. Percy can look back on it with a smile, because twenty was so young. So much life yet to come. But they had been ready to marry each other.
Maybe it was them being naïve, or maybe it was them being in love and looking for an excuse to stay by each other’s side.
Percy Jackson is eighteen years old when he gets his first girlfriend. Her name is Rachel, and he thinks that she’s really pretty.
(Not as pretty as Annabeth was, but he doesn’t tell her that.)
(He doesn’t need to. She already knows.)
At twenty-two years old, he now understands that he was always in love with Annabeth. It was rooted so deep inside of him that it made him who he was. There was never any getting over her because she’s what made him him. He was so young when he met her that he was still creating himself and his personality, and when she became a part of his life, she became a part of him.
There’s no one to blame for his failed relationship except himself. Somehow, Percy isn’t too upset anyways because he loved Rachel, but he never loved her the way he loved Annabeth, and he never would.
Percy Jackson is twenty-two years old when his heart aches for her.
There is a girl that looks just like him standing across the street. Or at least he thinks so. He hasn’t actually seen what she looks like because she hadn’t had a phone when she moved, and any forms of social media he’s sure she has now, she didn’t then. He’d lost contact with her entire family too.
But there’s something about her calling to him. She has those beautiful blonde ringlets down her back, not a hair out of place, and she is wearing a blue felt coat that falls to below her knees. Her shoes are white, with specks of black and brown as though she’s been kicking at the dirt, and it brings a smile to his face. Annabeth never did grow out of that habit for as long as he knew her.
Percy crosses the street, but he has no intentions of actually speaking to the stranger. He just needs to get back to his apartment, and she happens to be standing in the way of that. She turns just as he passes by, so he doesn’t get a glimpse of her face, but that’s okay. Millions of people live in New York City, and it is not possible that the one standing before him is her.
But then he is unsure if it’s his imagination when there is a faint, “Annabeth!” called from somewhere along the sidewalk, and she turns to the voice, and he turns to her.
His heart stops. She’s looking at someone else, but he can see the striking grey eyes that match the clouds overhead on this wintery December day, two days before Christmas. It has to be his imagination because she doesn’t move, but then she starts towards the voice, and he hears her name again, and it’s her.
Percy chases after her, weaving through the crowds along the street, and she is so close –
So close –
Percy’s fingers curl around her shoulder without thinking, and she jumps, whirling around, and he catches fear in her eyes that causes him to shrink back.
His voice is stuck in his throat because he is face to face with the girl he fell in love with fifteen years ago, and there is recognition in her eyes.
“Percy?”
“Yeah,” he chokes out.
Then she smiles and laughs, pulling him in for an immediate hug. “Oh my god, Percy.”
His arms wrap snugly around her, and she smells so good, and is as perfect as he remembers. He’s afraid if he opens his eyes, she’s going to disappear. “Open your eyes, silly,” she says.
He tells her truthfully, “I’m scared you’ll disappear if I do.”
She laughs again, a beautiful sound to his ears. Her hand slides into his, thumb rubbing soothingly. “I’m right here.”
So he opens his eyes, and she’s looking earnestly at him. He’s towering over her now, different from when she was taller than him at twelve years old.
“You’re somehow even prettier than I remembered,” he says before he can stop himself. His face blushes suddenly as he realizes what he just said, and he’s about to apologize before she stops him.
“I’d hope so,” she teases. “I was twelve! Braces were not a good look.” “You made them work,” he says, stepping to the side when someone tries to slide by. Everything is suddenly overwhelming, the sounds of cars rushing by and chatter all around, the honking of horns. He spots someone standing over Annabeth’s shoulder patiently. “I’m sorry, am I interrupting something?”
Annabeth shakes her head and motions the girl closer. She’s pretty too, but she doesn’t even begin to hold a flame to Annabeth. “This is my friend Piper. We were just walking around the city for a bit before heading home. Piper, this is my best friend from when I was younger. I told you about Percy?”
Piper makes a sly face at Annabeth, to which Annabeth pointedly ignores. Piper reaches a hand forwards to shake his hand. “How could I not have heard of the famous Percy? She talks about you all the time.”
“I talk about you a healthy amount,” Annabeth corrects. “He was my best friend.”
“The way you speak of him, I would’ve thought you still were.”
Annabeth and Percy lock eyes. “Yeah, well, I guess we just fell out of touch.”
“It’s a shame,” Piper says. “You two would have been cute as husband and wife.”
The statement makes Percy’s heart flutter. “Husband and wife?”
Annabeth rolls her eyes playfully. “I told Piper about our agreement to get married at twenty. I think we may have missed the deadline, though.”
Percy laughs. “I guess we did.”
They fall into a silence, and then Piper says, “I should get going. I’ll leave the two of you to get reacquainted, maybe even married.”
“Yes, thank you, Piper,” Annabeth says.
“I’ll see you at home, love,” she says. “Be safe.”
“I will,” Annabeth answers. They both watch as Piper leaves, and then Percy’s addressing her.
“Home?” he asks. “Where exactly is that now?”
“New York, actually. I moved here for university. I wasn’t sure if you still lived here though.”
“I couldn’t move away from here,” he jokes. “I had to stay put in case you ever decided to come back so you’d know where to find me.”
“I’m not going to lie, Percy. You’re a part of the reason I decided to come back,” she says. She shifts her feet like she wants to say something but doesn’t know if she should. “There’s so much to say I don’t even know where to start.”
And Percy knows exactly what she means. “Why don’t we go back to my place? I can make us some hot chocolate and we can catch up.”
“I’d like that.”
It’s a quick five minutes spent walking before they’re back to his apartment. He opens the door and is immediately overcome with warmth, a drastic change from outside. Annabeth steps inside, kicking off her shoes slowly as she looks around.
“This is a nice place,” she says. “You live alone?”
“Yeah. I tried the roommate thing, but it just didn’t work out. My job pays well enough for it, though.”
“And what is your job?”
“Oh, uh – I work at an aquarium. Nothing too fancy yet, but I do get to play with animals a lot. I’m a marine biologist.”
“I always knew you’d be,” she teases.
“And I always knew you’d be an architect,” he says. “Did that come true?”
“It did, actually. I’ve made it pretty far pretty fast too, and whenever people ask how I did it, I tell them you. You were always the person to cheer me on when we were younger. It helped a lot more than I think you realized.”
“I’m glad.”
They both sit on the couch, close but still far enough to keep a couple of inches between them. He faces her, one leg up on the couch, and she leans into him. It feels comforting, like they’d never been split apart.
Percy suddenly remembers when they were twelve and agreed to marry each other when they reached twenty. It causes him to start laughing, and he’s sure he looks insane.
“You okay?” she asks, amused.
“I’m just remembering – we could be married by now. I mean, obviously we wouldn’t be, but we really said we’d be twenty and marry each other.”
“We really did that,” she agrees.
“I don’t know why we chose twenty,” he admits. “Why not thirty?” He snickers. “We were so young we didn’t even understand that most people aren’t married by twenty, or even done with school.”
She smiles softly. “I knew, Percy.”
“What?”
“I knew twenty was too young to be married.”
“Then why did you agree to it?”
“Because I loved you,” she says. “I thought it was obvious.”
“I loved you too.”
She gives him a look. “It was more than just loving you. I was in love with you, and I wanted a reason to marry you. Even if I was twelve.”
“I’m hurt,” he says, a hand over his heart. But his heart is beating so fast he wouldn’t be surprised if it plops right out of her chest. “You were in love with me?”
“Would you be alright if I said I still was?”
“I’d be more than alright with that,” he says, “considering I’m quite certain I’m still in love with you too.”
She smirks but doesn’t move. “Something’s changed, Percy.”
“What?”
“I can’t read you anymore. I used to be able to tell what you were feeling, but now… I can’t tell if you’re joking.”
“I’m really not,” he assures her. “It’s insane, and probably way too soon to say this after seeing you again, but I would actually drop everything and marry you if you just said yes.”
“I’m tempted to,” she says.
“My mom would be over the moon.”
Annabeth coos. “How is your mom?” “She’s doing well. She had another baby, actually. I have a little sister, Estelle. She’s four now.”
“I’m happy for her.”
“Me too.”
And they’re silent again, but her face is right in front of his, and she may not be able to read him anymore, but he can surely read her.
He wants to kiss her badly because even after ten years, his love has never disappeared. He could live another lifetime and still be head over heels for her. So he whispers, “Can I kiss you?”
And she answers, “Yes.”
It’s everything he could’ve imagined. His breath is taken away, and her lips fit his perfectly. She’s soft and warm, and she’s beautiful and perfect, and now she’s here in his arms.
He pulls away, and when he looks her in the eyes, he sees a burning passion. And he feels it in his stomach too. Because a simple kiss will not make up for lost time. And it’s been ten years, but when a love is as strong as theirs, there is no point in waiting.
It happens fast. Percy’s shirt is pulled over his head, and hers follows soon after. They quickly make their way to his bedroom, and everything happens so fast after that that he is unable to keep up. His heart pounds, brain goes numb, lips swollen with every agonizing kiss she places on him.
It’s heaven and hell, fire and rain, and Percy and Annabeth.
Percy Jackson fell in love at seven years old.
He is twenty-two years old, and that love is finally his.
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hellpotter · 3 years
Note
17 and 31 from the prompts list plz<3
this is not your fault, okay? i promise and i don’t deserve to be loved | percabeth
warnings: might contain triggers (mentions to war, death and ptsd)
Annabeth is still in that post-sex daze when Percy rolls to his side and curls up besides her, throwing one arm over her waist.
The feeling pulls her back to full consciousness and her body stiffens instantly with the realization that he’s probably almost half asleep. She straightens up quickly and notices his eyes widening and his body waking up with the movement.
“Hm, I-,” she mutters while searching for her underwear between the sheets. She realizes she has already used all of her good excuses for leaving him previously. It had been getting harder and harder to come up with a reasonable justification for her to go, and she accepts that today it is going to be ridiculous.
“Looking for this?” His voice is hoarse and low, and he holds her cotton panties between his fingers. When she tries to snatch them, though, he yanks them away from her reach.
Guess he isn’t as sleepy as she’d thought before.
“Percy,” she scowls. “That’s not funny.”
“No?,” he says, as he pulls her panties further when she tries to reach them one more time. “I disagree.”
“Please, stop it. I really should go, I... Uh, I-,” he raises his eyebrows when she mumbles, trying to figure out what to say next. “I have to work early tomorrow, I need to rest,” she makes up.
He sighs and hands her her underwear, but what he says next makes her paralyze.
“No, you don’t.”
“What?“
“Tomorrow’s Sunday, Annabeth. I know you’ve been making excuses not to sleep with me.”
“What makes you say that?”
“Well, for instance, the fact that we never go back to your place after a date, and the one time we did, you basically kicked me out as soon as you could,” he leans on his elbow, lifting his upper body. “Or that you say things like ‘I need to work’ on a Saturday night, or that your mom has ‘come to visit’ at least 5 times in the past 3 weeks.”
There’s an uncomfortable silence and Annabeth tries to think of something decent to say, but she can’t. So Percy goes on, the dim light making it hard for her to read his expression.
“Look, I-,” he sighs and sits up, putting one hand on her thigh. “I know you don’t owe me anything and it’s okay if you don’t want to... stay the night. But we’ve been seeing each other for, what, more than a month now? I was really hoping we could move forward with this, but I can tell there’s something going on, so...” he clears his throat and trails off.
Annabeth takes a deep breath, considering how she’ll handle this. She’s not sure if she’s ready to tell him the truth.
“Percy, this is not your fault, okay? I promise.”
He nods and waits for her to say something else. She realizes that maybe the truth is her best way out of this now.
“Ok. Maybe we should talk,” she whispers, avoiding to look in his eyes.
She can tell he’s surprised when she gets up to put on her panties and then searches for the shirt he’d been wearing before, pulling it over her head.
“Can you make me some tea?” She asks.
“Okay.”
They stay in silence until the moment he hands her a cup of tea and sits in front of her by the kitchen table. He looks at her expectantly and she stares down at her tea, breathing in.
“So. Remember I told you about when I volunteered to serve in Afghanistan?”
“Yeah. I remember.”
“Well, I-,” she finally looks up and finds his concerned eyes. “I have been diagnosed with PTSD. It’s, um, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder.”
He reaches out and takes her hand on the table. “Oh. Yeah, I... I know what it is.”
She nods. “So, I-,” Annabeth’s not sure why, but she suddenly feels like sharing the whole story with him. “I didn’t really want to go. I mean, it wasn’t exactly my idea. I, um, I had this girlfriend. Reyna.”
She stops talking and takes his expression in. She hadn’t told him about her sexuality before, and she wasn’t sure how he would take it. She notices his eyebrows raise slightly for a second, but he doesn’t say anything, and his eyes hold the same concern. So she continues.
“Reyna and I went to college together and we, um, we were good together and she understood me like anyone else. But she was, like, a natural warrior. Really, I know it sounds stupid, but she was. It wasn’t really a surprise when she volunteered right after we graduated, not at all. I’m not the greatest supporter of American military action, so what really surprised me was when I started to consider going with her. I was so terrified of being alone and of losing her that the idea of going started to feel better than staying. And I could use the money, so it sounded like a win-win.”
She pauses and takes a sip from her tea. She hadn’t talked about this with anyone, except for her therapist, and it was a lot for her.
“Do you regret it?” Percy asks softly. “Going, I mean.”
“I-,” she wasn’t expecting that. “I don’t, actually. But I wouldn’t go back or do something like that again.”
He nods and caresses her hand with his thumb, and they enjoy the silence for a while.
“Anyway. So we went, together. And it was fine, most of the time. We had a lot of quiet days and we got to spend a lot of time together and we met some incredible people. But the bad days... They were really bad,” memories start flashing through her head and she notices there are tears coming down her face when Percy reaches out to wipe them away with his thumb. “So there was this one day. We had a huge fight, me and Reyna. Our time there was ending and she wanted to stay for another year. And I didn’t, I just wanted to come back and start building our life together. A normal life, without guns and tanks and bombs and training.”
The tears are rolling down her eyes uncontrollably now, but she can’t control herself.
“She had to leave before we could even end the discussion. And there was- There was a, um... There was a bombing a few hours later,” she stops and stares at the wall, trying to even her breathe. “And she... I couldn’t even say goodbye.”
Percy gets up and knees down besides her, holding her close while she shakes violently.
“Hey... It’s okay,” he whispers carefully. “You don’t have to say anything else. I’m sorry.”
She tries to remember her therapist words not to feel ashamed of crying, but it’s hard when she’s basically spilling her heart out to... Well, the guy she’s sleeping with, ‘cause she can’t even call him her boyfriend. Or can she? That’s probably something for them to talk about later.
“I’m sorry about that,” she whispers when she can breathe normally again.
“Don’t be,” Percy leans back just enough to look at her face and pulls some curls behind her ear. “I’m sorry you had to go through all that.”
She answers him with half a smile and takes a deep breath. “After that I came back and... Well, I guess a part of me never did. I blamed myself for it, I felt like I should’ve done something to protect her, and a part of me still does,” he opens his mouth to say something but she goes on. “So most nights I have nightmares, and I wake up screaming or- Well, I can get aggressive sometimes. Or if it takes too long for someone to wake up in the morning I start wondering if maybe something happened to them and I... I lose my mind,” she looks at him, intensely. “It’s hard to... deal with it. For me and for... whomever is nearby. And when something bad happens I feel like... I feel like I don’t deserve to be loved.”
He holds her face in his hands and sustains her gaze. “I can’t imagine what you’ve been through. But I won’t let you believe that, okay? It’s not truth, and it’s not fair to yourself. This isn’t your fault, and it doesn’t make you less good or less worthy of love. You do know that, don’t you?”
Annabeth looks down for a moment, his gaze and his words too intense for her to absorb. Rationally, she’s known all of this for a while, and therapy had been helping her cope with all of these feelings well. But the way he looks at her makes her feel actually loved for the first time in years, and that’s a new feeling.
“Hey, listen to me,” he continues, softly. “You have nothing to be ashamed of. And I completely understand if you don’t feel comfortable sleeping with me. It’s your choice, and I’m here to support you nonetheless. Trust me, I can handle messed up and complicated and difficult. But I- I really like you, Annabeth Chase. And well, if you’re up to it, I hope I get to spend a lot of nights with you,” he drops a soft kiss of her lips. “And mornings,” another kiss on her cheeks. “And afternoons,” he whispers close to her ear before kissing the crook of her neck, making her giggle.
She pulls away softly to look at him, her eyes filled with appreciation. “Okay,” she mutters. “I guess I am up for it, after all.”
He kisses her slowly, and, in that moment, she knows she’s starting to fall in love with him. And it scares the hell out of her, but it also makes her heart feel so warm, she’s afraid it might burn.
She can’t tell exactly what it is that they’re starting there, but she knows it feels like something good. And she’s pretty sure they’re off to a good start.
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cuquitalocita · 3 years
Note
hi! love your writing and it said you were looking for prompts :) maybe do an emotional hurt/comfort percabeth after tlo?? touch starved annabeth and soft percy are just something that can be so personal
AN: yeah this one hurt and i am... SO sorry
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~~
“Alright, Ares! Let’s do this!” Cheers followed Clarisse’s voice as the game of capture the flag began and campers sprinted off in the direction of the forest sporting their bright blue and red helmet. Percy smiled a little, glad that at least some of the campers seemed to be having fun so soon after the war. Chiron and Mr. D had quickly agreed that things needed to go back to normal as soon as possible- Chiron said it would be easier to adjust that way, and Mr. D said he couldn’t handle any more crying campers. Charming, that one. 
“You coming Percy?” one of the younger campers asked as he passed him, and Percy shot him a friendly smile- attempting to not be as intimidating as he knew the younger campers thought he was.
“Sure thing, I’ll be there in a sec. Don’t beat the Ares kids too bad, eh?” The camper laughed and scampered off, his smaller sword clattering against his massive battle armor as he ran. The nostalgia that the sight brought had a lump growing in Percy’s throat that he quickly shoved down.
 Something felt different today- he didn’t know what… but something was off. It didn’t help that the gods had been unusually quiet as of late. And with the new prophecy, he and Annabeth had heard only a few short weeks ago…
Annabeth.
He hadn’t seen his favorite blonde since breakfast this morning, assuming she was back in the Athena cabin doing some more research on Deadalus’s laptop or- knowing her- trying to figure out the new prophecy. 
But it was the end of the day now, the sun was going down over the lake and Percy had yet to see his girlfriend again. He made his way through the camp- empty now that capture the flag had started, only coming to a stop when he heard the unmistakable sound of familiar sniffling. He was in front of the Hermes cabin, one of the places he had been avoiding for the last couple of months, and turned only to see Annabeth Chase sitting on the ground, her knees pulled to her chest and her head turned downwards. 
Percy couldn’t remember the last time he had seen Annabeth cry. Maybe it had been at the end of the war when Luke…
“Annabeth?” Her head shot up in response, the arm that was wrapped around her knees immediately flying to the dagger that lay at her waist. She moved jerkily, so unlike Annabeth that Percy definitely knew something was wrong. But as her gray eyes met his green ones, Percy saw the pure desperation that lay in them. 
“Percy,” she breathed, her voice shaky. “Shouldn’t you be in the woods?” Percy tried for a small smile as he sat down next to her and leaned back on his palms. He felt more than saw Annabeth lean her body slightly towards him as if he were a beacon of safety. Like what she was to him.
“I came back to look for you. Are you okay?” The look Annabeth shot him from behind her curls told him that she very clearly was not okay. He winced a little at the familiar storm in her eyes. “Do you wanna talk about it?” 
Annabeth took a deep breath and when she released it sounded shaky. Percy couldn’t help but put his arm around her, grateful when she leaned in and placed her head on his shoulder. It was weird- the whole touching thing. They had touched as friends before, but things were different now. A good difference, just… strange in a way. 
He tried not to make it obvious how much he was overthinking as he allowed his fingers to twirl one of her sunny curls around in a fidget. 
“It’s his birthday today,” she finally said after a long pause of silence. “Or- it would be. He’d be twenty-one.” Annabeth let out a harsh laugh and Percy tried to ignore the shiver that went down his spine at how cold it sounded. “Twenty-one. Can you imagine? Luke, going to a bar and legally being able to buy a drink. He hated alcohol. But I guess things have changed since then huh?” 
Percy didn’t know what to say. In the years since he had come to camp, not once had they acknowledged Luke’s birthday. And he hadn’t once thought about how Annabeth, Thalia, and Luke may have celebrated when they were younger. Percy pulled her closer and squeezed her shoulder, hoping that he could convey exactly what he was feeling. 
Percy let out a breath. “And then there’s Charlie’s birthday next month. Silena’s present for him is still in the Aphrodite cabin.” 
Faces flashed in Percy’s mind of black hair and strong arms, blue and gold eyes, and eyepatches. Of kids who were just that- kids when their lives were taken from them. When they were ripped away from everything they ever knew. When monsters hunted them until their dying breath. When they grew sick of being overlooked by the very same people who were supposed to be the ones protecting them. When they died for a corrupt cause
Kids. All of them.
“Gods, when did things go so wrong for all of us?” Annabeth was crying again, thick tears streaming down her beautiful face as her body shook with sobs. But Percy was almost crying too now. Crying for his friends, crying for his father, crying for his life. Because he barely had any of it.  
Percy pressed his nose to Annabeth’s hair, hoping she could hear him when he whispered, “I miss them too.” Annabeth had turned her face to his neck and in any other situation, her curls might have tickled him. But as she placed her hand on the small of his back, his Achilles heel, his one weakness, he felt nothing but the familiar comfort that only Annabeth could give him. The same comfort that hadn’t faded since their first day of capture the flag. 
“But… Annabeth,” Percy’s voice was calmer now- steadier. “If we don’t live now, everything they did- everything they sacrificed, will be for nothing.” An image of the younger camper scurrying into the forest, his face alight with hope and excitement flashed through Percy’s mind. “Because Annabeth- we made it. We’re alive. And we’re here.” And he would be damned if he allowed the girl in front of him to give up when she had so much to offer the world. He wasn’t sure the world would even be able to handle an Annabeth Chase. But he was going to make sure he would find out. And thinking about it, he knew Luke would want the same thing. 
Annabeth had taken her head off of his shoulder and was looking up at him, her gray eyes shining with something Percy knew his own eyes were mirroring. 
“Percy I…” But the look on her face was enough. He nodded
“I know. Me too.”
Percy had lost track of the amount of time they had sat there when Annabeth nuzzled her nose close to his neck. It tickled a little and this time Percy allowed himself a small laugh as he heard her inhale. He just hoped he didn’t smell like gross seawater.
“Making sure I don’t stink Wise Girl?” he asked, looking out at the setting sun.
“No,” she replied quietly. “Just… making sure you’re still here.” If possible he hugged her even tighter.
“Hey,” he tried to choke out a laugh as he pressed a kiss to her hair. “What’s Wise Girl without her Seaweed Brain?” 
And he could’ve sworn the earth shook as he whispered, “I’m not going anywhere.”
~~
um... yeah... hehe :)
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outoftimewriting · 4 years
Text
Imagine (Son of Hades! Percy; Godswapped! Big Three's kids (6/7) or (11/12)
House of Hades Pt.2 - In the Argo II
Hello darlings! Before reading this, there's at least other 11 parts - and I almost had to divide this into two - check on the masterpost - but don't be sad is ending :(
First - I have no idea if I'll divide Blood of Olympus in two because I hate the climax Rick wrote - so probably? Also not sure if I'll need an epilogue - we're not delving into TOA, though.
Second - I'll keep writing! I have a handful of ideas that I want to do next - and the next AU will have Female! Percy - so keep logging in!
Check on the warnings before proceeding, and good reading :))
To say that things are tense in the Argo II is downplaying the major depression the ship seemed to be sunk in since Perseus fell.
Leo and, surprisingly, Nico are the only ones who are able to get anything done in the first couple of days, but they aren't fooling anyone - the white eyes of the son of Zeus seem to be every day a little more bloodshot, and more than one fire happens without no explanation.
Annabeth didn't stop crying for a second - even throughout Will's examination of her and her brother - for at least 12 hours. Then she crashed for another 12 hours - and when Annabeth woke up, she was enraged.
She is going to bring the damned statue back to Camp - and then she will kick her mother's ass. That's her best friend, not collateral damage.
And when her dumbass of a best friend comes back, Annabeth is going to kick his ass too. How dare he fall - for her, not even his closest friend - into freaking Tartarus?
Frank is devastated - he and Piper are coping by planning the future - how they can spend the summer at Camp and live in Nova Roma, how they'll visit Perseus if he decides to go to college in the mortal world. It feels a little like denial.
Hazel and Jason are coping in the totally opposite way. Where Leo and Nico are fueling themselves with determination, Annabeth is anger personified and the other two went in the road of negation - they're both in a deep state of panic.
The sea became too dangerous to travel - the tides answering to Jason's turbulent emotions - and any metal on board keeps exploding or becoming so fueled with energy that no one but Nico and Hazel can touch it.
They pray together - for Neptune, Jupiter, Pluto, Letum, any god that Perseus ever helped (a lot of them) - for his protection. Jason holds evening prayers - just like in Nova Roma - and they offer anything, everything, for Percy to be alive. Everyone goes.
Except for Will, who is in a whole other league. The moment that he arrived at Camp, Percy was the one to settle him, and calm him, and take care of him. It was a side of him no other person in this ship had ever seen - Nico got in Camp in the worst timing possible, and all the others were pretty independent when they met Perseus.
But Will remembers - the nights with hot chocolate, Percy's warm sweaters, a pair of blue gloves messing his hair, the anxiety when the boy left for school, just for him to keep IMing Will every evening - and he misses Percy.
After the Labyrinth, the war, the losses, they reconnected - the prejudices against Percy's parentage long gone - and it felt like nothing ever changed.
It was Percy who helped him coming out for his mother. It was Percy that held Will after he lost Sibele - a daughter of Momus - to her injuries. It was Percy, always Percy.
Percy is much more of a father then Apollo - and much better as a brother then some of Will's siblings. So Will just locks himself up in his infirmary - and grieves. It's weird in such a hard mission to remember that Will is just fifteen and that he is a veteran of war.
The mood lingers, even when they start fighting regularly against the Apennines - and isn't this a whole other mess.
The mountain spirits are pissed - because Hades/Pluto and his wife are really pissed. It's Malcolm - the only one with a phone and a good connection to the internet - that tells them that the world started having earthquakes every few days.
The mortals are confused because most of these are not even close to the tectonic plates - and none of those cause turmoil at the sea. It's just Hades - mightly pissed his only son is beyond even his reach.
Three days in fighting the Ourae - who don't like having their mountains shaken over and over again - the sky also starts thundering. Coincidentally, it's July 30th - they've been traveling for twenty-two days - which also marks Thesmophoria - the greek festival of harvest.
But, alas, nothing is blooming. Persephone is as dangerous as her husband - and Demeter seems to follow her daughter's lead. With the Earth corrupted - the crops aren't growing.
Jason doesn't blame his matron - he is not really happy himself. Besides praying for Perseus' safety, he spends most of his days in patrol against boulders and rocks of all things.
Leo barely sleeps - too busy keeping the ship from falling apart - and Nico is, most of the time, right behind him keeping the ship steady. They try using canons and fail miserably. There's no way to fight against mountains - it's like Dom Quixote fighting against the windmills.
The others, even Will, rotate between fighting rocks and sleeping. Four days after Thesmophoria, Leo decides it's enough, turns the ship around, and solves to not cross the Apennines.
He just hopes Perseus can last another seven days.
Hazel - the only one awake, because this is supposed to be her patrol and Leo finds her the most reasonable out of all their friends, who would probably insist on keep fighting the freaking mountains - is praying. Like always.
Leo doesn't know how he feels about praying. His extended family was very catholic - they prayed for a god that they couldn't see or touch. But Leo met the gods - or, if Annabeth is to be believed, one set of them - and he doesn't like them.
They're petty children who have no care for the fate of their children - the ones who fight for them, go on their errands, keep them alive, y'know. Leo doesn't want to praise them. He doesn't think they deserve it.
But Hazel's prayers are answered when her venti, Tempest, appears aboard. Hazel tells Leo to go on without her - she'll be back soon.
He is concerned for her - like always. Of all new people, Leo seems to be the closest to her - his overall cheeriness and electric behavior are endearing to her, a light in these dark times. Sometimes, his smile makes her flush - just like Frank's did and still does.
Hazel mounts Tempest and the venti takes her, through mountains and hills, to a door. There's mist curling at her ankles and a chill in her spine.
She isn't very thrilled by meeting Trivia - Hazel heard stories of her greek son by Perseus, who seemed to hold the guy in high standard, but she knows gods. The goddess of magic wants something.
Trivia is an imposing woman - taller than Hazel, she has the same midnight skin as Perseus, though hers looks purple-ish, and her eyes are entire universes - stars bloom in her irises and twin moons rise in her pupils.
The goddess is fickle - she seems to be there and not, at the same time. Ghostly. There's three of them, then one, then five.
Trivia beacons to the daughter of Jupiter and she follows, the cursed little girl she is. The goddess offers her three options: Perseus, prone in the ground as she, Leo, and Annabeth battle an invisible foe, the two demigod installments at war, or the Argo II.
Hazel chooses the Argo II, but she promises herself, and the goddess, that she will save Perseus, and that no demigod blood will be spilled by other demigod's hand. Not again.
She will learn how to control the Mist. But Trivia is very mistaken if she thinks Hazel is going to become her acolyte. She remembers well what happened last time - she died.
The Argo II is traveling without much hassle - when they're crossing Monte Falterona, in the Campigna National Park, they are attacked by a new mountain spirit - and this one talks.
"Get Pluto his brat back, you useless halflings!"
Like the boulders the immortal is throwing at them will help. Leo screams this back at the mountain, who is not impressed at all.
Their next foe is in San Marino - a chimera. Most popular knowledge is wrong about those monsters: chimeras are not just goat-lion-snake mixes. They are an amalgamation of any three or more animals.
This one, in particular, is a very... candid mix of a Pyrenean chamois, a monk-seal, a mouflon, and a goose. Not very lethal or hazardous - just very angry. It's the first time they hear Annabeth laugh since Perseus fell.
While Malcolm is chasing and being chased around by an evil goat-goose-seal-weirdass deer chimera that he is fending off with an encyclopedia, the others can't even bring themselves to help. It's ridiculous - the thing is not even big. It's just ugly and it sounds like a honking clown.
Eventually, they get around to killing the clown chimera - it honks as it vanishes - and following route to Bologna. Frank tries to mutate to the chimera during the travel - to different levels of failure - which makes everyone laugh.
Thanks to their two encounters, the crew gets to Bologna at two in the afternoon.
Frank can't help counting the days as they pass him by. He is not the only one - he can see Annabeth muttering the time every now and then - but it feels like a countdown. Can Perseus survive one more week in Tartarus?
Even with the pressing worry for his lost friend, he can't stop thinking about Hazel and Leo. The two of them are thick as thieves - and Frank wants in.
But he knows it's wrong - Leo is a boy. Hazel is younger. Leo bares a power that could kill him. Hazel is his best friend. They're two people. - but he sees them flirting and can't keep his eyes to himself.
It's wrong. Soldiers aren't supposed to date men. Men who dated men are prostitutes, entertainers. Less. And two people at the same time? Outside of a bedroom? Preposterous.
Frank wishes he was more like Perseus. Perseus is all about duty: he would eventually marry Reyna. Or Annabeth, or other pretty and intelligent warrior, and have two point five kids with a picket fence.
But no. Here he is - midday, they are stopping for lunch, and he can't keep his eyes off Leo and Hazel - who are quietly chatting in the other end of the long table.
Frank ponders what would they think. Would the two be repulsed? Would they laugh at him? He can deal with laughter. Their disgust, however, would cut his heart in half.
Nico is in a very similar, and yet completely different, situation. He has been in love - or as close as love could be when you never dated the person - with Perseus Jackson.
He knows it's okay to be gay - he is friends with Will and Jake. He lives on CHB since he was a pre-teen. Perseus himself was - is - queer.
But the thing is, he'll never have a chance with him. Not the chance he is longing for gods know how long. He failed Perseus yet again - he let the demigod fall.
Perseus can have anyone. Perfect Annabeth Chase, Shrewd Reyna Arellano, Magic Alabaster Torrington, anyone. And he wouldn't have a problem with that - no. The problem is that he can't make a choice. Because he is in Tartarus.
Because Nico. Let. Him. Fall.
He isn't even sure if he let Perseus fall on purpose. A part of his mind knew someone would have to go. It was always meant to be Perseus. Did he purposefully let him go?
The rational part of his mind knew that if he tried to fly them off, all he would accomplish is falling into Tartarus with Perseus, probably dragging Annabeth with them.
But the guilt creeps into his heart - again, yet again, Perseus suffers for something he did or failed to do. He can't sleep. He doesn't know how anyone can eat.
A rock for him in these difficult times has been Jason. The son of Neptune seems to be as affected as Hazel or Annabeth - but Nico would never be able to rely on them.
Hazel has her own problems - a lot of them since Trivia appeared - and Annabeth is a painful reminder of everything Nico is unable to have.
Jason, however, is different. They had dreams of each other - something about their conquests, Nico didn't pay attention - and that apparently brought them close. Jason, differently from Annabeth, isn't a competition. He isn't vying for Percy's attention and love.
He is just a close friend - like Nico pretends to be most of the time - incredibly worried about the son of Hades. Nico would tell Jason about how he feels - but the militar roman's sensibilities might not be adjusted to the greeks' freedom yet.
Nico, however, is also not the only one with heart problems. Piper finds himself entranced by Annabeth Chase - even when she knows, she knows because of her powers, that Annabeth is painfully straight.
And Piper knows it's not love - it's the heat of the upcoming war and the hormones of being cooped up with just other teenagers for twenty days. She sees the blossoms of young lovers everywhere.
The yearning between Leo, Hazel, and Frank; Nico and Jason unconsciously sharing long-term crushes on Perseus; Will missing Jake and his parental figure;
She wishes she was more like Malcolm. Malcolm is asexual - besides being the only other transexual person on board.
Before this war spiked from nothing, the boy was just back from his mission for Hermaphroditus - a two-month search for a missing choker. He is still adapting to his body - it's bigger and broader and he doesn't have to wear a binder. Piper thinks it's amazing - he tells her it isn't that easy.
It's not a slow transition. One second your body is something - and then it isn't. One morning, the demigod caught him holding a red binder in his hands. Sometimes, she sees a shot of testosterone tucked in his pocket.
One day, he was a boy stuck in a girl's body. Then, he wasn't anymore. He has the body he dreamed of for forever - and it's difficult accepting it. Malcolm tells her is not exactly body dysphoria - is just difficult to conciliate.
Piper thinks after this, she'll get her body. After all of this, she deserves it - her body, all hers, with boobs and a killer jawline. Maybe then, it'll be easier to like girls as well. Maybe then, she'll shave half of her head and get a piercing. And maybe, a couple of tattoos.
But while this doesn't happen, she is whining to her asexual friend about her crush in his sister. Malcolm crushes her with logic - "Annabeth has only shown interest in men. She might be bi or pan or even a lesbian, but the odds aren't on your favor" - and she tries to put the blonde out of her mind.
Lunch, however, is a little ridiculous for her. As a daughter of love herself, that table is such a mess of yearning and pining and infatuations.
Malcolm seems to be the only rational - but even he is a little flushed. Piper totally saw that picture of Mitchell in his drawer last week.
She couldn't blame him really - her brother is hot. All demigods are - in very different ways of course, but their godly blood made them more or less otherworldly compared to mortals. Didn't matter their ethnicity, their gender, if they're disabled or not - they are all hot.
Piper, however, doesn't spend all her time freaking over hot people. She is a teenager with a friend who has a good connection to the internet, so she does that a lot - but most of her time these days is looking at Katoptris.
She's waiting for a vision of Perseus. Anything - just proof that he is alive, that he hasn't curled in a ball on whatever is the ground down there and went mad.
It doesn't come. She is looking at this ridiculous lunch table, eating vegetarian burgers, and waiting. Just as it seems like her dagger starts glowing gold - two monkey twins sweep down and steal it. And Leo's tool belt and Archimedes' Sphere.
Piper is really pissed. She wants this mission to end - she wants to find Perseus and stop Gaea, and that's her magical item. It's important. So she and Leo go after the twin monkeys.
Using one of the armory's javelin - for lack of a better option - they sprint over roofs and marketplaces. Bologna is a beautiful city - but they have no time.
They corner the twin monkeys, get their things back - and some things pertaining to a god of harvest - Triptolemus. Perhaps if they make an offer to him, Demeter and Persephone will be more cooperative. Maybe Persephone will be able to calm her husband.
Piper really doubts it. If she learned anything in the nineteen days she traveled with Perseus, is that he calls Persephone "Kore" or "Mater". The only other person he refers to with such open childish joy is his own mother, Sally.
The guy IMed both of them twice a week - enough that Piper knows their voices. While Hades isn't high in the demigod's list of people, his wife seemed to be at least number #2.
But they go back to the ship and relay their plan anyway. They set route to Venice. In the hour that it takes them to get there, they're delayed twice: once by the personification of River Ádige - which enabled them to pass until Jason helped with a small problem - and then by a couple of ventis - which Hazel sent off.
Frank, Annabeth, Hazel and Nico venture into the drowned city - Piper declines to go, saying that she is waiting for Katoptris to cooperate - being Nico the only one who actually speaks Italian in the ship.
The city is infested with anteater-like herbivorous monsters called katoplebones, which are pointedly not from the Greek pantheon. It's pretty rare for monsters to cross pantheons - and the Egyptians are pretty good in keeping them under lock and key - but sometimes, this happens.
They aren't capacitated to deal with those. Annabeth has half a mind to call the Kanes and demand an explanation. Pretty sure they were possessed by the gods to avoid this kind of situation.
She doesn't have much time to think - Hazel is quickly overwhelmed by the poisonous breath of the cows. Of course - is there anything in Egypt that isn't connected to snakes?
They find Triptolemus - who is not thrilled with their presence. Demeter - his mistress - and her daughter are distraught by Perseus' missing status - and he blames Annabeth and Nico for it.
Annabeth tries to persuade him - after all, they have Jason on board, and he is blessed by Ceres. Triptolemus - a very greek god - is not swayed.
"Your trickster words shall not fool me, daughter of Athena."
That's how Annabeth became a rosemary bush - good for memory and brainpower. Nico, when he tried to fight back, became a corn crop.
Mars is whispering in Frank's mind - he is not really fond of his father but uses his help to kill the evil Egyptian cows and get a python for the god's chariot.
He can't let Hazel die. He can't see the light go off her eyes - to see the same pain reflected in Leo's eyes. But Frank is so using Nico's stunt as a corn plant as blackmail material later. Not with Annabeth thought - she would stab him.
Triptolemus, pleased, turns Nico and Annabeth back to human and heals Hazel. Then, he tells them they have to eat barley cakes - so they can survive the poison needed to enter the house of the dead.
Proceeding south down the Adriatic toward Greece, a journey that should take about half a day, the crew of the Argo II is first accosted in Koper - a city on the coast of Slovenia - by four monocerus in the middle of the night.
Monocerus, in Leo's very succinct explanation, are "evil unicorns with big feet that can't fly and shouldn't be in a flying ship".
Whoever, the monsters apparently don't care where they should or not be - and Annabeth - still reeling for her time as rosemary - takes two of them out, keeping the horns as a prize. Nico takes one, who is so beat that leaves nothing, and Malcolm kills one with a handgun.
It's not the most practical weapon, because celestial bronze is not that easy to fabricate/find/obtain - so to use it in bullets that will explode and render it unusable it's kind of a desperate - but it's the first thing he could get - Malcolm's double tessen was being repaired by Leo.
Because yes - not only was the twenty years old able to fight with normal blades, he also fights with freaking fans made of iron.
After the run-in with the evil unicorns - Annabeth looks really cool covered in gold blood and curved silver horns in her hands - they proceed across Croatia.
It goes well for about thirty minutes - in Zadar, they cross paths with Sciron. Sciron is a bandit and outlaw, who - for some reason, is assisted by a giant predatory sea turtle.
While Hazel tricks him into throwing himself off the cliff using her new-discovered Mist, Jason talks to the turtle. It says its name is Chelone - that it's the turtle who took Aphrodite Ourania from the depths of the sea to the shores of Cythera - when she was still young, with remains of other goddesses in her anima - Innana and Ishtar.
He convinces the turtle to stop killing people - mainly by saying that he should hunt elsewhere, deeper onto the sea. It may become a problem for his father, but Jason has bigger issues right now.
They go to sleep, and Hazel dreams. She expects any god to come - but who comes to her is none other than Pluto and his wife, Proserpina.
Proserpina is shrouded in black, and her eyes are not green - but yellowish, like dead leaves. She talks - and tells Hazel that the Doors of Death are in the bottom of the Necromanteion - her powers over metal energy would guide her - and will be guarded by Pasiphae, vengeful of Pluto - and, by default, Perseus - for the lack of punishment for Minos.
Her husband is a silent presence by her side. He is not in mourning... probably. It's difficult to tell, as he is always in black. But his eyes hold a weight easy for Hazel to understand - he just lost a son to the abyss. No matter that Perseus might be alive - he wouldn't get back whole and safe.
Proserpina ends her dream by telling her to wake up Piper - the goddess is putting all her strength to send a vision of Perseus to Katoptris - they need one much more than her, seeing that they are able to interfere.
What Piper sees don't tell them a lot - Perseus seems mostly okay, with some sort of companion that Nico says it might be Iapetus, a brand new scar over his face and a bad limp.
It's the last they'll see of him until their eventual meeting face to face, but it gives them hope.
Annabeth herself has a dream - a dream that the Romans give the statue to the greeks. She sends an iris message to Rachel - so she can meet personally with Reyna.
Reyna, on the other side of the world, mounts her pegasus, Scipio, and leaves. Not only her co-praetor is in freaking Tartarus, but they are on the verge of two simultaneous wars. They need peace.
As soon as she is out of the roman range, however, she sends an iris message to Jason - telling him to go to their hero's place of rest - she had a vision from Mars. That she will meet them in Greece. Jason tells Leo to set course for Split, in Croatia. There's a roman scepter there.
Of all of them, the most capacitated for this mission are Frank and Jason, who are both educated Romans, and Nico, who can fly - a very good power to have in unstable ruins.
They're confronted by Favonious, who takes them to his master, Cupid, in Dalmatia. Nothing good can come of talking to the personification of love - such an old concept that the god has been reborn twice.
"Well, well, well"
"What do we have here?"
Jason falls onto the ground - "You think you found true love, haven't you? But alas, I was where you last expected me" - and he hates love, for that single moment.
"I shall give you what you want, Romans, if each of you is able to tell me - who do you love the most?"
Nico trembles - guilt is a difficult pill to swallow - and Frank visibly wants to bolt out of there.
"Oh, are you afraid? But there's no hiding in the face of true love"
Jason - always the brave one - gives a look at Frank. His friend never met the greeks. He might hate Jason after this.
But they need this scepter.
"Perseus Jackson"
Two heads whips in his direction - one unbelievingly, and the other distressed.
"Ah, love crafted in dreams - the perfect mix between me and my wife. Tell me, Jason Grace, was it bad when he looked upon you and saw naught but a myth?"
A laugh creeps upon Jason's spine, and he turns around. His blade hits something hard, and he is on the floor again.
"Such luck, to be able to even graze love. Perhaps yours is the purest of all - not yet tainted by failures and mistakes. On that note, why don't you go next, Nico di Angelo?"
Nico shivers - he... they have no time for that. That is unnecessary drama - to cause unnecessary problems.
A memory rushes to the front of Jason's mind - that quick chat with Reyna in Nova Roma. "The blond girl, Di Angelo"
Nico loves Perseus. It rushes to Jason now - the way that the younger boy stared adoringly at the son of Hades. The drunkness of his lovesick gaze. The despair when Perseus fell.
"Tell them Nico di Angelo" Cupid prompts "Tell them all about your guilt, your mistakes, the way you let him down, again and again, and again."
Nico floats a little off the ground. It's years of pain and sorrow that won't bring Perseus back.
"Will you fly off yet again, in the face of rivalry? Will you be my next servant - just like Favonious, consumed by jealousy, Nico di Angelo?"
Jason sees the memories. Nico screaming at Perseus. Grover reluctantly telling him about their adventures. The way he betrayed Percy - and a dozen more scenes he never saw from Nico's perspective, only Percy's, that made him unable to speak.
"It's okay Nico... I.... I get it."
It's painful to utter these words - it's almost like he is giving up Perseus. But they have a war to get through - and then, when the other demigod is back, they can figure this out.
"P-Perseus Jackson"
And then it's Frank's turn. But Frank is as pale as a ghost - he seems to be close to vomiting.
"It's a costly thing isn't it, looking at the true face of love. Now it's the turn of the brave son of Mars. Will you tell your friends easily, or shall you be a coward like the son of Zeus?"
Frank doesn't talk. Jason doesn't understand why - it's Hazel, isn't it? Is it because of Nico? He mentions talking to the son of Zeus, but Di Angelo doesn't look at him - the Cupid knew very well how to play his game.
"Come on. Tell them - tell them of whom you think before you sleep and who dominates your first thoughts every morning."
"You don't scare me"
"Oh, I scare you very, very much. Face me. Be honest."
"H-Hazel. Levesque."
"That's just half my question, little half-blood. If you want to lead the roman legions, you must answer it fully."
"I love H-Hazel. She is the one I think before I sleep and when I wake up."
"Still hiding. You're not strong enough, Frank Zhang."
Frank tries to charge at the wind, but it just mocks him. It's weird seeing Frank crying - it looks like the world is crumbling at his feet.
Jason, yet again, doesn't understand. Nico is also confused - he looks between the Romans as if he never saw any of them before. But then it dawns on the son of Zeus.
"Not only my sister. That's why you keep gazing at them, isn't it?"
All the fighting and denial leave Frank at once. His sword clangs in the ground.
"I love both Hazel and Leo. Together." He spits out, still trembling. "That's the truth. Are you happy now?"
"I wouldn't say Love always makes you happy. It can make you incredibly sad, sometimes. But you have faced it now. It's the only true way to conquer me."
Cupid appears - in a flash of white wings. It might be the god Jason hates the most - his eyes seem to penetrate his very soul. There's a scepter in his hand.
"Only a true child of Mars Ultor can yield it. It's your destiny, Frank Zhang."
Then he promptly disappears. The demigods look at each other - there's a flurry of emotions deep inside their chests. Frank looked at both of them, waiting for an attack, or for them to start fighting.
"No one has to know" He starts "I'm s-so-..."
He doesn't end. There are copious tears rolling through his face - his cheeks are a deep shade of red. A sob escapes his throat.
"P-please, p-pleased-don't t-te-tell anyone." Frank sobs, and it's such a jarring sight that both Nico and Jason rally to reassure him, leaving their own issues aside.
"There's nothing wrong with loving two people at once. No one will have a problem with it, Frank - fuck, this isn't Nova Roma. Most of us are greek."
"Hazel would hate me though. This is unnatural- I- I can't."
"You don't know that. Hazel loves you, Frank"
But the son of Mars just keeps crying until they both promise not to tell another soul what they saw. It's enough for the weird atmosphere to return.
Midway in the trek back to the ship - a six-hour walk - Nico is too riled up to safely fly with two people and none of them being too fond of air right now - Frank summons enough power to ask the question.
"So... uh... hm... Perseus?... like, uh, I can see the appeal-... but... both?... forget I asked, just....uh oh, sorry."
Jason and Nico pointedly avoid looking at each other. It's very bizarre - Jason knows a lot about Perseus, but now he knows Perseus also from Nico's perspective - and this is all messy.
They go back to the ship, relay to Annabeth that they got the scepter, and immediately go back to their cabins - to cry, to scream, to think.
It's been a day and a half - and they're still eleven hours off Epirus. Leo is pissed - because not only their three heavy-hitters are pissed at something and won't communicate, and they're of course.
Emerging from the infirmary for something other than to eat and mend people is finally Will - at least. He takes patrol in place of Nico - the boy quietly mumbled at his friend that they had a run-in with Cupid. Will can imagine how that went.
He doesn't have a clue about Frank - but Jason and Nico? They have the same long-lasting crush on Perseus - everyone on board knows that. Except, apparently, for each other. And Perseus - because his mentor/kind of brother/bother figure is a dumbass.
When they're passing through the coast of Albany, they're attacked by Khione - who is still very pissed her ex-lover's son doesn't want to spend eternity frozen with her. Leo ends up being sent away - for the distress of both Hazel and Frank and the anger of his best friends, Piper and Jason.
Piper ends up stabbing Khione - while Frank transforms into the giant dragon and burns her - making her unable to freeze them. Eventually, she runs away.
Leo, however, wakes up on an island. There's a sad girl at his side - she is using a modern blue dress, and there's a crown of black flowers upon her head.
"You were not the one I was expecting."
The son of Hephaestus wants to scream. Well, he didn't want to be whatever here is either! But her face is so sad - her gaze down to her bare feet. She seemed to be crying. He settles for asking who is her.
"I... I am sorry. My name is Calypso. This is Ogygia."
It startles him. Mainly because he has heard this name before around camp - wasn't she supposed to be freed?
"What happened to you?"
The immortal girl relays her tale - how she got freed for a year, and then the war started. The gods - Zeus - didn't trust her not to turn against them. So they locked her up - she was not the only one. Leto, Themis, Rhea - good titans or their offspring. Locked away.
She, after a year of freedom that Perseus got her, was back into her old shackles. Calypso is waiting for him for months now - but she thinks he forgot her.
So Leo tells her what happened - the bits he knows anyway. Juno/Hera, Nova Roma, the mission. Calypso seems calmer. They stay together for a while - friends it seems.
Calypso tells him about her year - about how she wanted to explore the world. She tells him she wanted to join Artemis' hunt - but, courtesy of Odysseys, she is no maiden.
He tells her about Hazel and Frank, Perseus, and the love hexagons he doesn't even know he is in - omitting the part that he is now in Tartarus. They talk about Festus - Calypso tells him about how his father is good to hear - how he came to visit, sometimes.
A week passes, maybe a week and a half. Leo vows to take Calypso off the island once the war ends, and she believes - once, a hero as brave as Leo made her the same promise, and stuck with it through the end.
In Cancun, Africa, Jason and Nico are having daily audiences with Auster, the Roman god of the south wind, in connection with the Seven being able to proceed on their way to Epirus - seeing that their ship is all broken and they have no Leo.
Auster is indolent and seems increasingly disinclined to cooperate with Jason and Nico: he dislikes the son of Zeus, and the wind never had a good relationship with the sea. Annabeth also tries her hand at it - but it's rebuffed at every turn. Piper is prohibited from entering the palace because of her magic voice.
Jason and Nico - even though they aren't speaking to each other - have for a long time admitted they don't fit completely at either camp. Jason is still too militar for CHB. Nico is too old for CHB. Both are too free with their personal lives for Nova Roma.
Auster agrees to meet with them and tells them to commit to one side - greek or roman. They deny it - they're both. The gods are both, they have been thrust in a war of both sides, they commune with gods on both aspects and they ask them to run errands for both pantheons. They have the right to be both.
Auster is not happy with this - mainly because he believes they should keep the sides separated. But it's the first time Nico and Jason agree on something - and they fight together for it. No god has the right to define those petty things when the demigods are fighting their war.
Auster merges with his greek counterpart Notus - an amalgamation of both his carefree and his militar side - and sends The Seven on their way when coerced by the threat of a hurricane and a typhoon.
He sends them to Valletta, Malta, where they find the Argo II fully repaired and in the harbor. In the port, on a small cafe, there's Leo - sitting and raging internally against the gods, who once again, fucked up something.
They trade stories, and Leo just rages more. He isn't sure how Perseus didn't ally himself with Kronos in the first war if that was the bullshit he had to deal with every day.
First Khione, then Zeus locking Calypso up, then this Notus guy - they are a week and a half late. Is Perseus still alive after nineteen days in the Pit? Is he sane? Did he tried to get out - and they weren't there?
It's with a shocking gasp from Annabeth that they realize that Perseus's birthday is in three days. They have been traveling together for thirty-seven days now - and they have to get Perseus out of Tartarus before the 18th, at least. Is the minimum.
It takes them a day to get to Epirus. There are enough monsters in their way to start a menagerie - Gaea is actively trying to stall them, so there must be a reason. Perseus might be alive.
Arriving at the Necromanteion, which they learn is just a very fancy name for catacombs, Hazel, Frank, Leo, Annabeth, Will, and Piper descend into the ruins, leaving Nico and Jason - who are both completely useless under the earth - behind with Malcolm - who, since Arachne, is pretty much claustrophobic.
They eat the barley cakes to protect themselves against the toxic potion they must drink in order to enter the temple. It's difficult to swallow poison - it burns as it goes down.
The mist tries to confuse them at every turn - Hazel diverts it. Her power over metal energy guides them - she can feel the basis of the building, way down where they are.
Katoptris burns in Piper's hand. It shows her Perseus' face - he looks cadaveric, shrouded in death. Sometimes he flickers, like a ghost - but he is alive, and heading to the Doors just like they are.
It's enough to spur them forward. Perseus is doing the same journey - from a much difficult side. They will meet in the middle.
Earthquakes strike the caverns, making part of the floor collapse. In a side, Piper and Will, surrounded by monsters in all sides. In the other, Frank, Leo, Hazel and Annabeth. The son of Mars doesn't think twice - the scepter.
He uses the Scepter of Diocletian to summon ghostly Roman soldiers, and as a Legatus Legionis, he does have the power to command all of them. It would be more controlled if he was Praetor, but the actual Praetor is Perseus, and so, in his absence, Frank will have to do.
The tunnel collapses. Hazel. Leo. They might be dead - but Frank can't panic right now. They are alive. They will protect each other, they have Annabeth Chase with them. Hazel controls the mist - everything will be just fine.
Anger grew in his chest. Those are his friends, his... his loved ones. This freaking ruin don't get to kill them before Frank summons enough courage to submit himself to the ridiculousness of telling them.
Hazel wants to cry - they left Frank behind. He might be dead - they might be all dead. Leo isn't much better. For all that Zhang seems to hate him, his infatuation with the Canadian never disappeared.
Annabeth however, is practical. She tells them Frank will be fine - the guy can transform into a dragon. Or a chimera. Probably a poisonous one, after the stunt in Venice. He has an army - it's okay.
Pasiphae is a bitch. Leo hates the woman - she reminds him of Aunt Rosa. Or Juno. Or Lady Muddy herself. He and Annabeth let Hazel do the majority of the talking - but both of them bristle as the Doors shake.
An unauthorized presence. Perseus actually did it - they have twelve minutes, in accord to Annabeth - who Leo knows better than to doubt - to open the Doors. Or he is dead, lost forever.
"It's a pity Gaea needs a son of the Earth and a daughter of the Sea... But none of you are children of the Underworld or the ocean, are you? Not even the acolyte of Trivia."
Everything indicates that she'll open the door herself - but Annabeth can't risk she whisking Perseus away to Gaea before they can reach him. So she sneaks past with her cap while they fight.
Pasiphae goes down to Hazel's illusions. Annabeth opens the Doors, before cutting the chains as Hazel and Leo distract Clytius. Perseus stumbles out, a giant tiger in his heels.
Leo didn't think he would ever see a harsher picture. The tall boy was still muscular - but gaunt as if he hadn't eaten since the fall. There were scars everywhere.
He couldn't look more - Clytius is threatening Perseus, but both Annabeth and the tiger stay in his way. Trivia appears - but they aren't truly winning until Piper, Will, and Frank are able to reach them through Hazel's magic.
Will goes immediately to Perseus' side - there's panic in his eyes. Leo can't see much this far - he hopes the son of Hades isn't dead. Piper and Frank fight alongside them. Annabeth is still hovering protectively over her best friend's prone body.
There's not much need for help - between Hazel and Trivia, the bulk of Clytius powers are unusable. The shared power of Piper (love is never where you expect it), Frank (and his undead soldiers), a very angry Annabeth, and Leo is just overkill.
They win. Will is feeding Perseus ambrosia - there's something really wrong because there are tear tracks in the blonde's face. Leo comes closer - their friends follow.
Perseus is destroyed. He looks like he has been through hell - there's a scar crossing his face and his eyes are sunken in. But that's not where it stops.
Leo's gaze goes down, to the ragged clothes that are barely recognizable - the sweatpants he was convinced to wear to go underground, the once-green sweater - and sees what is missing.
Where Perseus' leg once was, there's a metal one. The boy is curled in the fetal position - his metal leg sticks out like a sore thumb, and it looks like he might cry if he wasn't so dehydrated. The tiger nudges its head against the boy's leg and growls at them, but it doesn't attack.
"I... I can't touch him. I touched him and he started panicking... I... We have to take him back to the ship. He is stable, but..."
Frank picks up Perseus in a bride-carry - a month ago, he wouldn't be able to do it. But now, he is stronger - and Perseus must weight ninety pounds wet.
The tiger follows - when they cross to the daylight, they can see it's not a normal tiger. Annabeth - with a distraught look in her face - tells them it's a skeleton tiger. Probably a saber-tooth.
They go back on board - Piper goes up to call Nico, so he can fly Perseus into the ship. He does, but the expression in his face is so crushing Leo almost wishes they had delayed it by destroying property and landing the ship on the street.
The mood of the ship is yet again somber. No one wants to leave the infirmary - but Will forces them to rotate, so as to not overwhelm Perseus. Hypocrite - he is living in there.
Leo, Malcolm, and Piper - the least close to Percy, even though they are friends - let the others take the bulk of the shifts. Annabeth, Nico, and Jason almost get into blows about it - she wins on the fact that she knows Perseus longer.
It's difficult to IM both Rachel - who is a minute away from depression since he fell - and Lady Persephone. It's even harder to tell Sally - they leave the task to Annabeth.
They harbor for two days, waiting for Reyna. She appears from the sky during dinnertime - her horse has to be euthanized almost immediately after a run with the spirit mountains.
They talk - and end up deciding that she will take the statue back to Camp with Malcolm, the most resourceful out of them. Percy would be the logical solution - taking him out of Gaea's reach - but the son of Hades would probably be unable to shadow travel so soon.
While this happens, the others will set course to Athens - to stop Gaea and destroy the Giants. For now, they eat.
Midway through their meal, Will comes into the board - everyone knows what it means. Perseus is awake - on his birthday to boot. They take their food to the infirmary - to see the boy looking at the ceiling.
He gives them a faint smile, but no one misses the way he curls into himself any time there's someone a little too close. Perseus relays his tale - it's heavily edited, Annabeth can tell.
But he tells them about the leg - but not how he lost it - about the tiger - the name is Small Bob, but he doesn't talk about Bob - and about the firewater - but not how he got the injuries.
Small Bob never leaves Perseus's side. The demigod insists that he wants to go outside - he ate enough ambrosia and drank enough nectar that even some of his scars are gone. Not the one in his face though. Will let him go - but Annabeth thinks that he just asked out of courtesy.
He doesn't have green eyes anymore - they darkened to a point they can't distinguish his pupil. They observe as he sits calmly in the deck, metal leg sticking out, and strokes the head of the tiger, who is acting more or less like a giant house cat.
None of them miss the tracks of tears across his face, or the look he gives the night sky - it's bittersweet.
"Bob says hello"
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Empires on the Horizon VI
Jason is a CEO: Part VI
Here’s my masterlist for the next part and my other stuff
TW: not really overt but there is mention of NSFW activities. 
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every story has a
beginning
middle
and end
not necessarily in that order
-Tim Burton
“Annabeth Chase, my favourite impulse-controller,” Jason smirked, pulling his friend into his chest for a hug.
Her grey eyes sparked with mirth, “What do you want you troublemaker?”
“I find it offensive that you think I’m a troublemaker. We all know it’s your boyfriend that gets us into a mess.”
“Lies and propaganda,” She raised a brow, “You two are in a committed relationship with hullabaloo.”
He gave her a wide-eyed look, “Hullabaloo?”
“I’ve been spending way too much time with Percy,” She sighed.
He burst out laughing, “Who in this day and age says ‘hullabaloo?’”
“Percy discovered the word when we were in high school and thought it was the most hilarious thing he’s ever heard. He used to say it all the time.”
Jason shook his head amusement dancing on his lips, “So why did you want to meet me? I thought you’d be with Leo today since you’ve been out of state all week.”
They collapsed onto his couch. Annabeth tucked her feet underneath her and he propped his on the ottoman. When they settled down, she finally looked at him.
“Yea,” She pinched the bridge of her nose, “He had to go into work today because the part-time lecturer couldn’t make it for classes.”
“What’s going on? Why do you look so…” He had never been good at finding the words that matched the emotion, “So frustrated?”
“I’m not,” She gave him a weak smile, “I’m not. I just miss him.”
“You saw each other last night, didn’t you? He picked you up for the airport?”
“Yea but we haven’t gotten the chance to talk. I don’t know how to–, I just miss him.”
“Hey,” He grabbed her hands, “Take a deep breath. We have all the time in the world.”
Neither of them had quite figured out how to handle emotions, how to express them. It was an ongoing frustration when he and Luke were dating. Annabeth and Leo had learned how to read each other after all these years; four years of friendship and three years of dating had cemented that bond, had it running core deep. But him and her still couldn’t quite get the words out on their own.
“I miss his presence,” She breathed, “We saw each other last night but I was exhausted, and it was late. He practically had to carry me from the car to our bed and then he left early this morning. We just haven’t had the chance to catch up, to exist together yet.”
He held her close, let her head fall onto his shoulder.
“Being away from him is like losing a limb or being thrown into the deep end of the pool when you don’t know how to swim, like walking through darkness. You know what all of those have in common?” She looked up at him, grey eyes lined with tears.
“What?”
“Emptiness, the absence of something vital.”
“I think,” He tilted her chin up, caught the storm in her gaze, “I think you are lucky to have someone who makes saying goodbye so hard.”
“Did you just quote Winnie the Pooh at me?”
He winced, “Yes?”
She dissolved into laughter, “Really Jason? Winnie the Pooh?”
“What?” He gave her an indignant look, “It’s a good quote, and better than anything I could have come up with.”
“You are something else.” She managed to rein in her amusement, “What’s been up with you?”
“Nothing exciting,” He shrugged.
“Nah uh Mister,” His friend gave him a look, “Leo tells me you met a lady? What happened to my cousin? And how did you meet her? Do you have a picture?”
“Alright,” He chuckled, “Slow down. I don’t have a lady; we’ve been on one date. Next one is tomorrow. Your cousin and I didn’t get to exchange numbers at the dinner and I’m sure you know he’s now seeing Reyna. Thalia introduced Zoe and I, she’s a vet at the Conservatory and no I do not have a picture.”
“I hope you know all that information gave me a ton more questions.”
He rolled his eyes, shoving her shoulder lightly, “Let’s get some coffee going and maybe bring out the choc chips and then you can harass me with your endless curiosity.”
“Hey, this curiosity is what made us friends.” Her voice followed him as they walked to kitchen, where she promptly hoisted herself onto the countertop and plucked a cookie from the jar.
“As far as I understand it was Leo’s dumbassery that made us friends.”
“Yea, but without my curiosity I wouldn’t have bothered to check why a skinny, curly-haired, Latino was cursing a blue streak underneath the table.”
“I still think we should be crediting Leo because if he hadn’t gotten his foot stuck in my backpack and tripped thereby falling underneath our table it wouldn’t have been me and you who helped him.”
“Oh gods,” She giggled, “We really were a chaotic bunch weren’t we?”
“Nothing has changed Chase,” He handed her a steaming mug of coffee, “We just have less opportunities to be chaotic now.”
“I used to be so excited to grow up, but all my years have escaped me, have sped by me faster than bullets and I’m not yet grown.”
He leaned across the counter, bringing his cappuccino to his cheek, “I don’t think we ever really are. We’re just an accumulation of all our years before now. I am still one and two and ten and twenty.”
Annabeth looked at him then, caught his gaze in her grey eyes, “When did you get so wise?”
“Guess I’m spending too much time with you.” He winked, “Now please help me find something to wear for tomorrow. Zoe is taking me somewhere in nature and she says I should be prepared for a little exercise.”
“Are we talking a walk in the park or a hike up Blood Hill?”
“I don’t know she said it was a surprise and I don’t get any more information than wear clothes you can move in a little.”
His friend smirked at him, “Sounds steamy?”
“I’m pretty sure sex requires clothes off, not on, t least to some degree.” He rolled his eyes.
“Mhmm, okay. All i’m saying is make sure you pack a condom, or multiple.”
“We are not having- we will get arrested for public indecency.” He grumbled, pushing her shoulder, “So get your mind out of the gutter Chase.”
Her laugh was bells and beauty. “Come on then Mr Grace, let’s go raid your closet.” She held out her hand for him to help her off the counter, and the two blondes disappeared into his room.
***
Jason took a deep breath, letting his nerves find their space in his chest, stomach, lungs. He didn’t like walking into things when he didn’t have all the information; ergo surprises were avoided as much as possible.
A knock at his window pulled him from his mind.
“Are you going to come out? Or do you want to have a car date?” Sparkling dark eyes and a bright smile peered at him through the glass.
“I’m coming,” He laughed, grabbing his wallet and keys before opening the door.
“Hello Jason,” She stood on her toes and looped her arms around his neck. He folded his arms around her waist, catching the soft hints of juniper berry and clove that was purely her.
“How are you?” They pulled away.
“I am nervous,” He admitted, “I don’t like surprises.”
“Yes I did imagine so, I am not fond of them either, but this one was a necessity as it needs an explanation.”
“Well I hope I dressed okay?” He gestured towards his jeans and loose white tee.
“It’s perfect.” She looked him up and down, her eyes flashing, “Now come on, we only have the place for a couple hours.”
“Hold on,” He moved to his trunk, “These are for you,”
“Oh Jason,” She gasped softly, taking the flowers from him, “These are­– Who is your florist because these bouquets are unbelievable?”
He ducked his head, attempting to hide his reddening cheeks, “I choose them myself.”
“Well, your taste is exquisite,” She smiled up at him and he knew he had picked perfectly. Sunflowers because the dress she wore on their first date was liquid sunlight. And red roses because she was beautiful, poised, regal, just as they were.
While she admired the bouquet, he took the time to note their surroundings. They seemed to be on some sort of field, school or farm he didn’t know. A small wooden marquee sat a few meters away, but it was unoccupied which meant they were alone out here.
“Okay,” Zoe started, “So I don’t know how weird this is going to be to you, but I figured I’d get all my secrets out before you’re in too deep.”
“I’m starting to get mildly suspicious,” He raised a brow quizzically.
“Don’t worry I don’t plan on murdering you. I could probably take you in hand to hand combat but for someone of your size, drugs or poison would be the better method.”
He blinked at her, “You spend a lot of your time wondering what the best method for murder is?”
“This is not going well,” She giggled, “I don’t plan on killing you. I brought you here so we could practice some archery.”
“That does not make me feel even remotely better.”
She slugged his shoulder, mirth bouncing in her eyes, “I’ve been doing archery since my first year at varsity and I thought it’d be cool to share it with you.”
“Oh,” Was his eloquent reply, and then, “Well I’m honoured, thank you.”
“Don’t get too sappy on me, I’m only willing to go easy on you in the practice trials.”
“This implies a competition of some sort?”
“Of course. One question answered to whoever gets bullseye or as close to it.”
“I feel like I’m at a serious disadvantage here,” He pouted at her.
“I wouldn’t say that. I’ve only been doing it for nine years,” She smirked.
He groaned, waving his hands, “Oh gods, I see I’m going to be bared to the bone after this.”
“Don’t worry Grace you get to torture me on our next date.”
“Be prepared Nightshade because after this set-up I am not going easy on you.”
“I certainly hope not,” Fire danced in her eyes.
He narrowed his gaze, taking a single step towards her, “Is that a challenge Miss Nightshade?”
“Aren’t scared of a little heat, are you?” She mirrored him, closing the distance.
“Bring it on,” His words were nothing but exhales and anticipation.
Their noses brushed, eyes of midnight and electric storms pinning each other to the world.
“Ready to learn?” She breathed.
“Ready to be taught.”
“Okay,” She stepped away, taking a deep breath before moving to the table that he now noticed had two metal bows and various arrows.
“You’ll get the thirty-pound bow and large arrows to start. Hopefully you don’t need anything heavier because I did not ask for the thirty-four.” She frowned, “Okay some rules. Never have your arrow nocked until you’re on the firing line. Don’t collect arrows until everyone is done shooting. Don’t hold your bow sideways, you will hit someone. Do not under any circumstances pull the string back while there’s no arrow.”
“Got it.” He nodded.
“Cool, you’re gonna do great!” She clapped her hands, excitement radiating from her every movement. “Let’s get you equipped so you don’t end up with string-snapped wrists or a raw thumb.”
And then she was handing him all sorts of equipment, guiding him so everything fit where it was supposed to. Her hands, calloused and small, brushed over his as she adjusted the arm guard and made sure the thumb flap was correct. She explained how to stand, moving his feet and angling his shoulders until she deemed it good enough.
“Okay, let’s do some shooting.”
“I’m ready!” He smiled at her, hoping his own excitement was evident.
“Don’t worry about hitting bullseye, just choose a spot on the target and try to get all your arrows to land in the same place.”
He nodded, rolling his shoulders and moving to stand in position.
“Since it’s just us I’m going to forego formalities, so began shooting Grace.”
He had a clumsy start, arrows falling short of the target, or flying far over it, but Zoe was patient, adjusting and helping him each time.
“This is…” He stared in wonder at the arrow he had managed to bed inches away from the center. ‘I can understand why you enjoy it.”
“Great because now it’s time for Question and Arrow.”
“Fun,” He chortled, “You come up with that?”
“Yes, I thought it was rather clever.”
“Oh it is, I never expected anything less doctor.”
She snorted at him, “Ready to see the queen take her throne?”
“Please Your Majesty,” He bowed low, gesturing to the field.
She laughed and took her stand at the line, adjusting herself and making sure the sight on her bow was at the right level. She took an arrow from the stand in front of her feet, placed it on the string with trained casualness and looked over her shoulder at him. Her smiled was wicked.
She lifted the bow, pulled the string taut and fired the arrow. Before he had time to see where it had landed, she was already nocking her second one, and moments later her third.
He blinked, stared between her bright eyes and the three silver arrows now embedded in the small red circle fifteen meters away, and adjusted his pants.
She smirked, “How was that?”
“Possibly the hottest thing I’ve ever seen,” He breathed.
“Ready to answer some burning questions?”
“If I say no will you keep shooting?”
She raised a brow, “Hot and bothered, are you?”
“No thanks to you,” He growled.
She pulled him to the line, “I’m glad you’re taking to it so nicely.”
“I think I’m taking to you,” He grabbed her wrist, pulling her flush to him.
“You don’t even know me?”
“After that little display I’m half willing to marry you on the spot.”
She laughed and shoved away from him, “You’re a special breed Mr Grace. Men do not usually fall into marriage ideas after seeing a woman shoot arrows.”
“Then they are not men.” He frowned, “And besides, anyone with aim as accurate as yours has many, many advantages.”
“Questions Grace,” She took a step back, amusement and… something else passing over her face.
“Right okay,”
So they stood to the line and fired. Her a question him an answer. Then an arrow. A curse as she hit the center and he missed the target completely. Another question, answer, arrow. Question, answer, arrow.
Until two hours had blurred by and Jason had confessed to three college pranks, horrible braces in high school, and the weirdest fear of bricks. She had taken pity on him and answered her own questions after he kept losing their little battle. He knew she regretted her college days because she had wasted them studying, knew she was as gorgeous in high school as she is now, and her weird fear was thunder.
“This was great Zoe, thank you.”
“Thank you,” She beamed at him, “For not thinking I’m weird, or for dismissing this.”
He wrapped his arms around her, speaking into her neck, “I think this may be the coolest second date I’ve ever been on.”
“Really?”  She lifted his head, tugging at his hair until they were staring at each other.
“Really.” He smiled softly, “I did not know archery could be so…”
“Grounding?” She offered.
“Yes, and exhilarating.”
“I don’t know if I can put into words how much it means to me to hear you say that.”
“I was thinking,” He stroked his fingers down her side gently, “Since you didn’t get to do the typical college things maybe I can plan the next date?”
“Sounds like a dream, what are you thinking?”
“Drive-in theatre? I’m fairly sure ‘When the Stars Burn Out’ is playing.”
She nodded, eyes wide with excitement, “I’ve always wanted to go to a drive in! When?”
“Give me a couple days to plan but how does Wednesday sound?”
“Perfect.”
He cupped her cheek, memorising the constellations in her eyes, the soft lines around her mouth  that told you she smiled often, and the lines between her forehead that told you she frowned often too.
“You are divine.” He exhaled.
“Are you going to kiss me?” Was her reply.
He grinned, wild and undaunted, “Happy to.”
And then their lips were meeting, soft and steady. The world fell away, became swirls of colour and sound, became the background of a Monet, became life. And oh gods, Zoe’s hands may be rough with the proof of living, but her lips were softer than petals, than clouds. He held back a groan at her nails scraping his neck gently.
Reluctantly they pulled apart, resting their foreheads against each other.
“Wow,” She whispered.
“Indeed,” He chuckled.
It was that kiss, lingering spice and the smell of beginnings that followed him into his apartment later. Rolled down his skin as he took a shower. Fluttered behind his eyelids as he finally collapsed into bed. That kiss that marked the beginning.
--------------------------------------------------------------
HOW MUCH DO WE LOVE ZOE? Very much because Ciara just projects onto her??!?!????!!??!! oops.
Tags (if you want to be added to/ taken off the tag list just let me know, all my channels of communication are open):
@lesbian-peanuts​
@queen-of-demons-and-hell​
@msdrpreist​​
@sparkythunderstorm​​
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biclarisselarue · 4 years
Text
This is mainly happening thanks to @biannabethchase and all of her lovely words of encouragement and advice. Thank you <3
……
The sound of guards jogging past her hiding spot combined with how far she is from the docks is not helping Annabeth’s mood. If she’d have known this village was under protection from the king, she would have never attempted to drop anchor, let alone go to the market and haggle for fresh fruit. Cursing under her breath, Annabeth peeks out from behind the cart, looking for a way out.
“There!” She whips her head around to see a weary-eyed woman pointing towards her, and, sighing internally, she takes off running again. Finally, she manages to evade the new group of them on her trail by quietly ducking through an out-of-the-way unlocked door. She rests her forehead against the grain of the wood, wishing she was back on her boat with her crew, the familiar rocking of the sea under her feet.
“Oh… I wasn’t expecting any new clients today- woah!” Annabeth’s sword comes to rest under the chin of the young man standing before her, who immediately raises his hands placatingly.
“I guess you’re… not here for a sword then.” She narrows her eyes at his amused tone and takes in the room around her, at how it’s filled with all sorts of steel. The workmanship takes her breath away.
More shouting comes from outside, and Annabeth tenses.
“Is there a back entrance in this house?”
The man looks her over appraisingly and grins. “You won’t get very far dressed like a pirate.”
“I didn’t ask for your opinion, did I?” She snaps. “Besides,” Annabeth draws herself up to her full height, “I am a pirate.”
“Percy.”
“I beg your pardon?”
There’s that irritating grin again. “I figure if I’m going to help you get out, we should at least know each other’s names.”
A moment passes where she simply stares at him, sword point wavering slightly.
“Annabeth. Now, the back entrance?”
Percy pushes her sword down deftly and shakes his head at her, irksome smile still firmly in place.
“Two conditions.”
“I do not take orders from some common villager.” She sneers, and is taken aback by the brief flash of anger in Percy’s eyes.
“You will if you want to get back to the Parthenon.”
Her eyebrows knit together. “How-”
“Everyone knows the name of Captain Chase’s ship.” He pauses. “Plus, I can see it clearly from my back window. Now, my first condition is that you do exactly as I say from the moment we leave this house to the second we get to his ship.”
“No.” It’s an instant, gut reaction. She clenches her jaw as he scans her face.
Seeing something in her expression, he relents, “Okay. Okay. At the very least, allow me to take the lead out there; I know this town better than you do.” At her tight nod, he smiles again. “Second, I want a chance to join the crew.”
Annabeth feels a slow grin spreading across her face. “You? Join the crew? Why would Captain Chase want you?”
Percy gestures around the room. “I’m a blacksmith. I can make as many swords as the crew wants. Plus, I know the sea, and I have experience working on ships. I deserve an opportunity to prove I can be an asset.” He stares at her, unyielding.
“Fine. What’s your plan?”
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
“I hate your plan.” Annabeth mutters under her breath, scowling.
Percy laughs and loops his arm through hers. “Nobody will believe that you’re my sweetheart if you’re frowning like that. You look so uncomfortable.”
She forces herself to smile and leans over to drop a kiss onto his cheek, a genuine grin forming at his startled look.
“I hate corsets, and I hate this plan.”
“We’re almost there, and once we make it to the cove, you can change back into pants.”
“And then we use a rowboat to get back to the Parthenon.” Annabeth relaxes a bit from going over the plan.
Percy makes a sound of assent and smiles warmly at a passing old man.
She looks down at what she’s wearing. “Whose clothes are these?”
His smile droops a little, a faraway look in his eyes. “They were my mother’s.”
Neither of them say anything else for the rest of the walk. At the cove, Percy waits as Annabeth ducks behind a rock and hurriedly changes back into familiar territory, gently folding the dress and smoothing her hand over the soft material, trying to imagine what kind of mother he might have had.
When she comes back out, he’s got the rowboat already ready and gestures for her to get in. Once she does, he pushes them out far enough and hops in himself, while Annabeth takes note of his sure movements and steady hands. Surprisingly, they quickly fall into an easy rowing rhythm and it isn’t long before they reach the ship and the crew helps them onboard.
“Captain, it’s good to see you!” Annabeth’s quartermaster, Piper Mclean, greets her with an arm flung around her neck. “Didn’t know if you’d be making it back.”
“Of course I would. I’m not Captain for nothing am I?” Grinning, she turns back to Percy who stares at her with something like admiration and guilt in his eyes. Percy, who is currently being held at sword point by both of her gunners, Jason and Hazel, is a vision of deja vu as he holds up his hands complacently.
“Will you honour the second condition, Captain?”
She scans him appraisingly. “Well… I am nothing if not fair.”
He starts to grin.
“You can start by scrubbing the decks.”
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phykios · 3 years
Text
the marble king, part 12 [end] [read on ao3] [rated M for adult situations]
Constantinople, 1453
Even here beneath the waves, down in the darkness of the crushing ocean, all she could smell was smoke. War drums still thundered in her ears. On her lips, she tasted blood and salt--though whether it was the seawater or her tears, she could not say. 
But it was not enough that she had failed to defend the city of Constantinople. It was not enough that she had lost her unit to a man, or had abandoned her post, or had allowed the Ottomans through the Kerkoporta on her watch.
Any one of these things would have branded her a failure--but that the wretched, insufferable, intolerable son of Poseidon had borne witness to it all only turned the knife even deeper, salting the wound and taking pleasure in her misfortune.
To be reduced to a weeping woman like this, taking refuge in his embrace, it was disgraceful. It was nearly as painful as the loss of the city. 
The city… gods above, the city.
The heart of the known world. The defense of Europe. The last gasp of the Roman empire. 
Gone.
And all that was left of it was him.
And so she clung even tighter. 
It felt vaguely sacrilegious to be here, holding his hand, beneath the shadow of the temple erected to his father’s defeat. Her siblings would shun her. Her mother would disown her. The earth should have split open and swallowed her whole for such blasphemy.
And yet, it felt so right.
They had traveled so many miles together, weathered so many storms and stood against so many monsters. He had followed the Hunters of Artemis all the way to Mauretania, chasing a hazy vision of Annabeth struggling beneath Atlas’ burden. He had returned from certain death, thrown himself before her when she was in danger, had refused the gods’ offer of immortality. Then, even after she had spat in his face, expelling him from her sight, when the world crumbled around them and he could have so easily turned and ran, straight into the arms of the sea, his protection and the source of his power--he had sought her out. 
“If you agree, Annabeth,” he said, strikingly earnest in the way that only he could be, “let us, here and now, tie off these threads of our history, as one would to a tapestry. Let us end this rivalry of ours.” 
Percy had always risked life and limb for her safety. And, she thought, her old shoulder wound itching, she had done the same. They were a team, a partnership. In the absence of their brothers in arms, of their divine parents, of all trappings of the world they once knew, they should stay together. His logic was sound.
“A plan worthy of Athena,” she said. “I agree to your terms.”
That her mother did not immediately emerge from the temple, in all her heavenly glory, to smite her for such an insult was even more proof that her spirit no longer dwelt in this place. Lady Athena had never attempted to hide her distaste for her uncle’s son.
“To think,” he wondered, softly, hazily, “that such a legendary rivalry could have been resolved so easily.”
“It is strange,” she admitted, looking out on the diminished city, the light streaking across wooden roofs and weathered stone, “that along with my mother and our ancestral home, I have lost this as well.” 
As long as she had known him, Percy had been a remarkably consistent presence in his life--in some ways, even more solid than the other foundational truths of her life. Her mother would not always be pleased, her friends may not always return from war, but Percy would always be there to irritate, antagonize, and infuriate her to previously unreached heights. To let that go as well, to be so unmoored… it was frightening. 
“Well,” said Percy, squeezing her hand, a silly little smile crossing his lips, "my first act, in the shedding of our rivalry, is to pledge myself to our future empress, Ana Zabeta Palaiologina." 
Palaiologina. The word cut through her in a way she could not quite understand. 
Maidens the world over dreamed of marrying into a family with such prestige, spent every waking moment scheming how best to attach themselves to royalty. Annabeth herself had done the very same thing, not days previously. To ingratiate herself to Thomas and Demetrios would be child’s play for someone with her abilities. 
And yet… she did not want Percy to call her Palaiologina. 
He raised her hand to his lips, and kissed the skin there, gracious, deferential. Or mocking, if the glint in his eye was any indication.
Phykios, she grumbled to herself.
Pulling her hand back, she wiped it on her dress, hoping to rid her fingers of the hot, tingly sensation which had taken hold.
 ***
 The words echoed in her head, long after they had been spoken aloud, clanging like the bells which sat atop the churches on every corner, inescapable. 
Percy had long since gone to sleep, safe in the strength of their companionship. How easily had he divulged his secrets to her! Were their rivalry still intact, she would now have the precise knowledge she required to ruin him entirely. Alas that the same knowledge which would have brought her victory years ago now brought her to ruin and despair.
No mortal woman.
Again, for what must have been the fifth time since he had fallen asleep, she examined every corner of their conversation, turning each word over for double, triple, twisted meanings, meanings which he may not have even been clever enough to imply. That he had rejected Rachael’s advances, even though she had been a fine marriage prospect, that she had never seen him in the company of another woman, that he had admitted to relations with a man so easily, that he had never pursued her, despite years of questing and friendship and several less-than-obvious hints--it all pointed to one logical, if devastating, conclusion.
Yet there was another side to such a terrible coin. She should not have spent so many years agonizing over her words and actions which had turned his heart from her, for she had never had his heart in the first place, had never had a chance to it. No woman had. Annabeth need not have gone to such lengths, seducing Katya when she had expressed an interest in Percy’s hand, monopolizing his attention, flaunting her femininity before his eyes, for he never would have noticed her at all. 
While Annabeth was beside herself, worrying herself sick over his health and safety, Percy had been languishing in the arms of another man--of a man of the Legion.
She felt so cold, despite the fire, despite her cloak, despite the heat of the summer night which lay upon her, heavy and still. 
None of it had mattered, she was coming to realize. Not the time he had refused immortality, nor the time he had returned from the island of Ogygia, nor the time he had crossed the known world to rescue her from Lukas and the titans. A maiden’s fanciful romance, she had enjoyed imagining that at least some of it may have been for her sake. 
The stars blurred before her eyes, her breath hitching.
No. She would not let herself fall to pieces, in her silent, lonesome revelation. There was no sense in weeping over spilled oil; to mourn for a future which had never been possible was a waste of time and energy.
And yet. Gods above, and yet.
She had so successfully repressed the stunning depths of her feelings for him for years, her stubborn, willful pride refusing to let go of a silly grudge and a terrible misunderstanding. How fitting, then, that it should resurface as soon as she discovered such an avenue had never been available to her.
Sniffing heartily, she scrubbed at her eyes, wiping the tears which had gathered in them.
Do not weep, she told herself. There were more wars to fight, more battles to be won, and matters of the heart did not take precedence, no matter how much they hurt. 
 ***
Her siblings, as children, always teased her for her fixation on her hair. Blonde was not an unusual color at the agoge, but children of the war goddess were not supposed to be so concerned with such things as physical appearance. That was strictly the purview of the sons and daughters of Aphrodite; Athena’s children were supposed to focus their wits on things far more deserving of their attention than beauty. Beauty was fleeting, ephemeral, intangible--beauty did not win battles. Athena and Aphrodite were always at odds, in this way.
Yet when Annabeth, a child of fourteen years old, one day very shyly sidled up to Silena, having swallowed her pride to ask the older girl for assistance, Silena agreed immediately, without ever having to hear any arguments. “You have always had such lovely hair,” she had cooed, sitting beneath the shadow of one of the olive trees, her hands deftly twisting her thick, curly, unruly hair into sleek, orderly locks. “Many a sibling of mine has lamented that you have been given so many gifts, your tresses not the least among them.”
Annabeth had smiled, pleased. The older she became, the more comments appraising her apparent beauty she received, and she was not always so pleased to receive them, though coming from Silena’s mouth, they seemed much more sincere. “You speak truly?”
“Of course! And it is not only my siblings who say so.” Then, Silena had leaned over, slipping Annabeth a sly wink. “I have heard tell that a certain son of Poseidon has expressed quite a particular admiration for it as well.”
Indignant, she had squawked, lightly smacking her friend, while Silena tittered, very prettily. “Cease with such falsehood! I know you do nothing but jest!”
“It is no falsehood, korie,” she had said, pulling on a curly forelock. “Carlo has told me how he often speaks of you in such flattering tones. One would think he had decided to court you already!” And then she had laughed again, gaily, delighted--but never mocking.
Flushing, Annabeth’s heart had begun to pound as she considered the potential truth of such a statement, that Percy had spoken of her that way. Recently, she had developed a rather peculiar set of reactions to Percy’s presence: flushed cheeks, pounding heart, an absence of all her faculties so that she, at times, became nearly as foolish as he.
She did not like those feelings. Not at all. 
“Can you teach me,” she had said instead, unwilling to dwell on such strange emotion, for such things were so obviously beneath her, “how you wove your hair so skillfully the other day?”
“Of course,” Silena had said, a knowing glint in her eyes. “In fact, I will teach you one better. My siblings say that this particular braid is supposed to resemble the tail of a mermaid.”
Annabeth had practiced the skill for years, long before and long after the moment she had divined what those feelings of hers had truly meant. The mermaid’s tail, however, had not caught its mark--nor had any of the other simple or complex plaits she had mastered and perfected. By the time she was old enough to begin covering her hair, as older girls were meant to do, it seemed that there was nothing she could do with her hair to entice a particular man’s gaze, nor with any other part of her.
Of course, now she understood why.
How cruel were the Fates, that they had finally given her what she had so fervently desired, Percy’s hands in her hair, at such a terrible, unromantic time! 
Still, he treated her with all delicacy and respect as he quite crudely hacked away at her gathered hair, sawing off all traces of her femininity. Annabeth was not endowed with so much in her hips nor her breasts; her hair was certainly the most obviously feminine part about her, thus with its removal, she would be better able to pass for a man, and be better kept safe from marauding bandits with evil, grasping hands. 
It was sound logic, yes. But it was not her only goal. 
She closed her eyes, measuring her breathing so as to keep the rapid war-drum of her heart from alerting the other party. All she could smell was the comforting salt scent which seemed to engulf her, like the warm embrace of the sea on a sunny day.
With a tug, then, it was done. “There,” said her companion. “It is finished.”
How odd, she thought, to feel air on her neck, so cold and exposed. “Well?” she asked, turning round before she let fear get the better of her. “Am I sufficiently boyish?”
He looked on her so oddly, his face a strange concoction of overlapping emotions, coalescing into a furrowing of his handsome brow, a pursing of his lips which still sent her into madness if she should consider them for too long. Please, she nearly prayed, as though she could change his mind from the force of her want alone. Am I as beautiful as all the boys in Rome? Am I someone you could love?
It seemed he had learned quite a bit of tact in their years apart, for he relieved her of her little fantasy ever so gently. “I am not certain,” he said, careful, deliberate, “you could pass as a man--though, perhaps you could be seen as a particularly delicate one.”
Her foolish wish shattered, as glass hurled against a wall.
Well. What was done was done. With a snap and an appeal to his gentlemanly nature, she sent him away so that she could pilfer a dead man’s clothes--and mourn her childish dreams--in peace. 
 ***
 Something in the air, the cold snap of it, the feeling as though one were breathing in pure ice, little shards of glass tickling the lungs and stomach--she had not realized just how much she had missed it. Of course the summer nights of the south were pleasant and fair, but there was something so sublime in the frigidity, the freezing, the ice in her fingers and the heat in her cheeks.
And, truth be told, something to say of her traveling companion as well.
Percy had been… nothing short of a miracle. Ripped far from his home, from everything he had ever known, and from his great Roman love (she thought to herself, with an internal scowl), he had been, the whole time, staunch, stalwart, solid. A better companion she could not have asked for, nor a better friend.
She told him as such, and distantly enjoyed the way his face flushed, ever so lightly. Tanned a deep, dark brown by the sun and by his natural coloring, it was sometimes difficult to tell what he was thinking, but she knew him well enough now. Had known him well enough for years. 
He was very, very close now. For warmth, they had begun drifting closer together, their bodies’ natural attempts to stave off the bitter, northern cold. 
She saw his eyes flick down to her lips.
No, she told herself firmly, no. He did not want for her advances. She had done everything she could to demonstrate her interest, short of simply throwing herself at him, and he had never risen for a single one. Annabeth and Percy were simply not meant to be, and no amount of forced companionship could change that.
For a brief, agonizing heartbeat, she thought she saw him twitch closer. 
Then, from the corner of her eyes--light. “Percy, look!” she gasped.
Ásbrú, the rainbow bridge, pierced through the night sky as a blade through water, a burning ribbon of color, near as bright as the moon itself, even more beautiful than in her wildest imaginations. Though she knew well its existence, the bridge had never presented itself to her, not as the mountain of Olympus had. To see it now, it felt like stepping through a silk curtain, passing some invisible line. It felt like a rush of bloodlust, a guttural roar, like a warm fire and the hot curl of mead in her stomach.
“I can’t believe it,” she murmured.
It felt like coming home. 
 ***
 How little her father had changed. 
Politics was certainly not his area of interest, but he threw himself into his work as passionately as he had with the histories of Anglia and Gallia. His collections of papers, books, and pamphlets of various sizes and subjects were dizzyingly well-researched, a kind of organized chaos which resonated within her, every piece of information in its precise place, even if the place was incomprehensible to others. However, she could sense how little he cared for it.
“My dear,” he said, exhaustion in the slump of his shoulders, “I am afraid there is not much else that I can do. Mary tells me the Totts are growing more and more insistent--and they are merely the kindest about it. Word of both your reappearance and your inheritance has spread far faster than either of us had suspected it would, and we are expected to reply to a demand.”
Annabeth had returned to Svealand, it seemed, in the middle of quite the precarious situation. In the years since she had escaped her monastic doom, there had been no less than three separate kings who had ruled over the joining of northern lands: one deposed, one dead, and one perilously close to danger. Now the union had split apart, and had been at war with itself, with no signs of stopping. 
Like many, many noble girls, Annabeth was being paraded around for marriage. At first, when she learned her mad uncle Randulf had left her some properties and the like, she had been oddly touched. She had never known the man personally, nor his children, who had died by some supernatural force whilst she had been roaming the European countryside, but she supposed it had been a final act of some charity, some avuncular affection for his brother’s daughter--yet, after she had learned what the inheritance had brought with it, she wished her uncle had given it to Magnus instead. Or at the very least, kept it to himself. 
At least her father was equally upset at this turn of events, if not more so. 
“Understand me well, Anja,” he said, his voice thick with fear and worry, “were it up to me, I would never allow it. If I had known you would have been subjected to the predatory whims of the blue-blooded fools in Uppsala, I would have never prayed for your return. I did not get you back just to lose you to--”
“I understand, papa,” she interrupted, gently. It would do neither of them to lose their heads at this time. “Of course I understand.”
“The rebellion is growing, and it is powerful. I do not think it will be very long until Karl Bonde is overthrown, but I worry this land cannot undergo any further crises. To see you enmeshed in such bloody business is one of my deepest, darkest fears, and yet…” He then put his head in his hands, the picture of defeat. “I see no way out of this.”
For her part, Annabeth could think of a few ways, each more distasteful than the last, full of lies and conceit. If she knew she would be forced to be married after all, she would have done more to convince Percy to take her to the Morea.
Then, a thought occurred to her. An idea. A magnificent, inspired plan. A dirty, sordid trick.
“What if…” she said slowly, considering. The next few words out of her mouth could determine a whole host of things, be they pleasant or or unpleasant. She had to speak carefully. “What if I were already married?”
He raised his head, peering at her curiously. “Are you--?”
“No, no,” she assured him. “Certainly not.” Not for a lack of trying, anyway.
Still, he looked thoughtful. “That is a clever idea,” he mused, rubbing his chin, “though I suppose they would then question why we did not think to mention it sooner.”
No doubt her stepmother had paraded about her unmarried status to all who would hear her. “We could say I was married in the eastern church. Perhaps that could explain the irregularity.”
“Perhaps.” Her father sounded doubtful. “I fear, however, that without a union in this church, it would not be recognized as legitimate.”
Seated in her chair, her foot tapped against the floor, quite unbecoming of a lady. Her fingers twitched in her lap, blood pulsing. “Then I suppose my ersatz husband and I must be married again.”
He nodded. “I see… yes, I see. And have you someone in mind for the role?”
It came tumbling out of her mouth so quickly, she ought to have been embarrassed. “Percy.”
“Your friend from the agoge?” 
Upon her return, she had relayed a number of stories to her family of her adventures--and of course, nearly all of them included Percy. They had all been privy to tales of his nobility, honor, and gentlemanly nature; surely there would be no reason for her father to refuse the idea. 
She swallowed, a knot of terror in her stomach.
“Percy,” he said again, “yes, I do believe this could work.”
At his assent, Annabeth nearly collapsed. 
“Another brilliant idea, my dear,” said her father, fondness suffusing every word, “though I cannot say I am surprised. Even as a child, your mother’s influence shone through quite clearly.”
Were she of a crueler, colder nature, Annabeth could have walked away right there and then, freedom solidly within her grasp, in a form most pleasing to her. Percy’s hand in marriage--the dream of many a girl in the agoge. She could leave it at that, and be done with the whole affair.
But. But. 
“I will speak to him on the morrow, then,” he said, gathering up his files. “Is there anything else you would like to discuss?”
“Just--” she blurted, heat rushing to her face. “Only--promise me, papa, that we will not move forward without his consent to the match. I do not… I would never wish to force his hand in this manner.”
She may have had him in her grasp, but she loved him too much to keep him there. 
But, she vowed, as long as Percy was beside her, she would never be able to marry another man, not a lord nor a king nor an emperor--for what were any of these compared to her prince of the sea?
 ***
 She silenced the little voice of doubt in her mind, cast aside all thoughts of fear or nerves. 
Percy had agreed to marry her, and, all told, it had taken very little convincing, as she had suspected--his nobility was well-documented and unflagging. He would never have left her to such a horrid fate if he thought he could do something to save her.
It did not make her feel better.
But, in the end, they were married in the local church, in a simple, unfussy ceremony. Annabeth wore blue for the occasion, a garment of her own creation, and a garland of flowers, as was custom. Percy, of course, was unfairly handsome as always, his eyes lighting up when he first saw her, and when he kissed her, as the ceremony required, she allowed herself to pretend for one beautiful, beautiful moment, that he had kissed her of his own volition. 
She was smiling as she pulled away, carried off by the fantasy, even as she could tell he worked very hard to keep his composure. It would not do to show open disgust at his own wedding, she surmised.
They were forced to kiss once more by her dastardly cousins, Magnus cheering and jeering and egging them on until they participated in the little wedding game devised by Alejandro. Her cousin was far more empathetic than many people realized, and though she had never spoken of it to him, she was almost certain Magnus knew the truth of her feelings, and had decided to play a cruel trick on her. If only it did not make her heart tremble so!
Fortunately, or unfortunately, depending upon the perspective, she could not dwell on it for very long. The marriage bed awaited them. 
Her family accompanied them there, to see her off on this final portion of the path to womanhood. Magnus and Alejandro were still quite inebriated, but her father was sober as could be, embracing his daughter warmly. “Tell me, Anja,” he whispered to her, in their language. “Do you love him?”
Athena would only have chosen the cleverest of men with whom to create a child. Of course he had uncovered the truth of it.
She nodded into his chest, and he held her even tighter. “I am glad,” he said. “I am so glad.”
Then releasing her, he nodded to her husband--her husband--and he left them alone with the marriage bed.
The two of them had shared a bed several times during their journey. It should not have affected her so--but there was a slight, yet significant, distinction between a bed shared by two friends, and one shared by a husband and wife. A distinction she could no longer ignore. A distinction which Percy, too, seemed well aware of. 
A distinction which, unfortunately, changed the nature of their relationship. 
The trinity men believed a marriage was not valid until intercourse had occurred--the rule held even more strongly for those of the nobility. Percy and Annabeth shared no such inane assumptions, of course, but they were beholden to a different set of rules, now. To please the land-grabbing nobles of Svealand, they would have to consummate the marriage.
Annabeth wished she could say she explained the matter plainly and calmly, and that Percy had accepted her logic without much fuss, and they had gone to bed in order to fulfill the silly contract set out for them.
In reality, that was not how it had gone.
She had fallen to pieces, dissolving into tears, so intense he had had to hold her, and she could not even enjoy the feeling of his arms around her, so ashamed was she by her display of emotions. Haltingly, punctuated by sobs and hiccups, she explained her case, and all but begged him to make love to her.
And he did. Because he was a noble man.
And it was just as wonderful as she had always imagined it.
He finished inside of her, glorious and copious, and she could have died in that moment, so full of him, she might never be empty again.
But the truth swiftly fell upon her like a sword: she had coerced, tricked, and beguiled a good man into her bed, a man who did not, and would never, love her. She felt cold all over, from the pit of her stomach to the tips of her toes, still wrapped around him. 
It was done. They were married. And Annabeth had never felt worse. 
Not even sleep could soothe her, for that night, she had a most frightening dream. 
In her dream, she stands upon a stone hill, overlooking a little town. From the rocks beneath her burbles forth a spring, salty and strong, and beside, an olive tree, of thick trunk and golden branches. Before her, there is a king, his body compounded of a man and a serpent, and there is a god, he who is the wave and the storm and the thunder of hoofbeats, and she, too, is a god, she who is the owl and the spear and the shield who strikes terror in the hearts of men, and the king delivers judgement onto them. He says then to the wave and the storm, “The people have spoken, and their choice is clear. This land shall be ceded to the goddess.”
“Bah!” scoffs the god, the rumble of the earth in his breath. “You would insult me so, who cares for your sailors and delivers them home unharmed?”
“Cecrops has spoken, uncle,” she says, in a voice not her own, silver and gold and unyielding. “The Oracle has given the people of this city the power to choose their patron, and chosen they have. You, who lay claim to the bounty of waves and the power of the sea, will you not allow me this little hill? Will you not respect their judgement, and go in peace?”
But the god frowns, his thick brows drawing together above the typhoon in his eyes, and he brandishes his weapon, the three-pronged trident which had split the very earth itself. “I shall go,” he says, as the crash of water on the shore, “I shall leave you the city--but be warned, glaukopis, and be wary, king, for you and your people have made a powerful enemy on this day.” 
“No, uncle,” she says, commanding and columnar, the sound and the fury and the cry of triumph, bolstered by the land which now belongs to her, and the people who are already worshipping in her name, an ever present thrum in the core of her being. “It is you who has made a powerful enemy.”
He glowers, the black, heavy clouds of the horizon, and he strikes the stone with his weapon, and from that spring which had been his gift, now becomes his curse, a mighty wave pouring forth from the earth itself, powerful and unyielding as the hundred foot waves and the stampede of horses, rising up as the sea itself, flooding the plain and the people and the king and the goddess, burying it all beneath the sand and the water, but still the stone hill remains, and still the olive tree stands upon it, its branches stretching towards the sky, defiant, willful. It stands, proud, rooted, planted, immovable, immutable. 
Permanent.
 ***
 Annabeth had dreamed of married life with Percy for far, far longer than she was willing to admit. In her dreams, she had imagined it to be endless fun, endless bickering, and endless bliss.
It was none of those things. 
He did not love her, nor any woman. He’d married her to secure her hand away from squabbling lords and wicked step mothers, and possibly for the financial security of her land--she did not blame him for it, of course. Such a large favor demanded an equal reward, and if any man deserved to rest on his laurels it was Percy. She was happy to take care of him, but as the days dragged on, she wondered if that was what was happening at all.
Marriage seemed to have drained all the light out of Percy. He floated around the manor, gray and listless, speaking rarely, and then mostly to Alejandra. They shared a bed, closer than ever before, and yet, she was not sure she’d ever felt so distant. He looked at her, yet she was not certain he saw anything at all. 
She tried to entice him to enjoy the finer things, offering to hunt with him as Alejandro had, suggesting that they go for a trip around the lake, even attempting to arrange for them to visit his new holding, so he might see where they were to make their estate. Each advance was summarily turned down. He resisted meals together, and ate very little. He retired to bed early, and stayed in after she’d gotten up. 
Once, desperate and sad, she even asked him to join her to view the beauty of the midnight sky. It was an indulgent thing, but she thought only the night sky could compare with him in beauty, and she wished to see it all up close. 
He declined. 
He did not even seem to notice when she found herself ill several mornings in a row. He slept for much of the time these days, but it still hurt--once upon a time, he had been so quick to observe her. 
Her maidservant tutted as she instructed a chamber girl to take the chamber pot into which Annabeth had vomited away. She was a middle aged woman who had served Annabeth’s aunt, and was rather eager to have another woman in the family, because Alejandra did not like having a personal servant to help with dressing for reasons Annabeth understood, but that was not well known beyond the family. After the pot had been emptied and the dirtied linen had been delivered to the laundry, she had helped Annabeth into her gown.
Annabeth had not engaged any servants in Constantinople, obviously, nor at the agoge, and could lace her stays perfectly well, yet there was something delightful about having assistance. The gowns here were heavier, after all, the fabric much thicker and the detailing far finer. Not having to do it all herself was a relief, as was someone to clean the room and cook the food. 
“Will you and the master be moving to your estate before or after your babe is born, ma’am?” asked the maidservant.
Stunned, all she could say, was a single, inelegant, “What?”
“I know you were inquiring with the steward about going and surveying them, and the houses,” said the older woman. “But no one was sure what you’d found.”
Slowly, like the pieces of a good strategy, the woman’s meaning began to make itself clear: Percy, her master, and the estate her dowry, now transferred to her husband, where they would have to move sooner or later. “We have not yet gone,” Annabeth said. Percy had not wanted to. “We have not yet gone,” Annabeth repeated, because she could not quite understand the last part of the maid’s question. 
“Then, if Lord Magnus and Doña Alejandra will have it, best stay here until the baby is born. You and your husband can have some time then to engage the household. My brother in law would be a good candidate for steward, ma’am. He’s learned in his letters, can write anything the master might need, even in Latin.”
“Percy can write Latin,” Annabeth said distractedly. 
“Oh, of course, ma’am. I should expect nothing less of a prince.”
Annabeth could not even begin to parse that statement. Percy was, technically, a prince, but that status was kept even from the small group of people who still kept the heathen gods in her cousin's house, and this woman was not one of those. But--“What baby?” she asked, instead of interrogating the woman what she knew of Percy. 
Her servant blinked, and paused in her lacing, just above Annabeth’s stomach. She gave a kind of condescending smile which would have normally rubbed Annabeth all the wrong way, but she was too struck with terror by the implication. “Well,” she said, speaking as though Annabeth were a little girl, “you can never quite tell before the quickening, of course. However, it has been seven weeks since your monthly, and five since your wedding. Now you have fallen ill in the morning,” She had a twinkle in her eye. “I won’t be getting anyone in trouble, but there has been lots of talk, given how taken you and your prince are with each other, for how long it would be before you’d be with child. Such a joyous occasion is to be celebrated, even if perhaps it wouldn’t do to go around announcing it just yet. For safety's sake."
Her blood rushing, the ocean in her ears, with almost trembling hands, Annabeth touched at her belly. Nothing felt different beneath the layers of fabric.
It had not occurred to her it could even be a possibility. Percy had only laid with her once, on their wedding night, and only at her insistence. Now that the idea had entered her head, it began to grow, taking shape in her mind and her heart. Just like Percy’s seed in her womb. 
Percy’s child. She could give Percy a child. 
That happy thought carried her for several more weeks, as she monitored the signs and tried to find the perfect time to speak with him, to get him to visit their land, so she might show him his fortune and share the news that she would give him an heir for it as well. 
Men wanted sons, she knew. Perhaps, perhaps with luck Annabeth could still win him, could give him money and a son, and earn a little of his affection in return. 
As the days turned longer, still his mood did not improve, until one day after the morning meal, she prodded him to eat more, so she could then take him out to see all that was his. 
He told her instead that he wished to leave. Leave Svealand, his newly acquired land, and leave her, too. 
Struck with panic and despair, still she would not resort to cheap ploys. She fell back to the tricks that always worked with Percy: a little bullying, a lot of logic, and a refusal to let him go without her. 
By the end of the week, then, the plan was set. Once again, she would set out for lands unknown, leaving her father and her family behind, with no assurance she would ever see them again. This time, however, she was able to give her a proper farewell--and to tell him her suspicions. 
He embraced her, his joy overtaking his sorrow, and she embraced him in turn. 
To leave once before nearly rent her in two. Leaving him now was sorrowful, yes, but startlingly simple. The road would be long, and hard, and dangerous, but she was going to have Percy’s child. She was going to find her mother.
Let all manner of horrors just try and stop her. 
 ***
 She was beginning to understand why her mother had sworn to remain a chaste goddess.
Pregnancy was a truly nightmarish invention. Between the nausea, the soreness, the constant need to relieve herself, the inability to use the full spectrum of her wits in the manner to which she had been accustomed, she was well and truly suffering--to say nothing of the incessant, unending, all consuming lust which would strike her at the most inopportune times. The wind could merely change direction, and she would suddenly be aflame with carnal desire, aching for the touch of her husband in her most private, feminine parts, unable to think for the haze of want and need.
It was maddening. Utterly, utterly maddening.
Then, her hand would come to rest on her stomach, and it all would fade away at the mere thought of the child inside of her. Percy’s child. Their child.
Their son, she prayed.
And oh, how she prayed for a son, a little boy with wild black hair and eyes the color of the sea in the sunlight, who drooled in his sleep and loved his mother above all other women!
Concern gripped her, then, cold fingers around her heart. 
What did Annabeth know of being a mother?
She had only met her true mother a handful of times, and had barely ever received an ounce of affection from her. Her father’s wife had been the sworn enemy of her childhood, the two of them always at odds, until it had reached its boiling point, and Annabeth had taken her chances with the wild. The most she knew of motherhood had been what little she had been able to glean from Percy’s mother, Sarah, who had been more than happy to share the secrets of her trade--yet she could have spent a lifetime under Sarah’s tutelage, and still she feared it would not be enough. 
Annabeth was not a kind, nurturing person by nature. Hard rather than soft, sharp rather than gentle, none who had ever known her would have ever imagined her to be a mother. In truth, as a young girl, Annabeth had not even imagined it for herself. A warrior woman, a daughter of Athena: she had been so sure that she had been destined for greater things than marriage and children.
How foolish she had been.
Wives and mothers won wars in ways that Athena herself could not even conceive of. When she considered motherhood now, she thought of Mary, her father’s wife, moving money and bodies on a chessboard of titanic proportions. She thought of Sarah, who had labored every day beneath the notice of the men around her to provide and care for her son, to teach him what he would need to know to defeat the titan lord. 
Now she better understood why Hera, queen of the heavens, had also been the patroness of mothers.
Annabeth would do everything in her power, she swore, to shore up influence around their little family, to ensure that they were safe and secure and comfortable in all ways, both seen and unforeseen. And, well, if Percy would not accept her affection, as was his right, then at the very least, she would be able to give it to their son. 
 ***
 He was perfect. By all the gods above, he was absolutely perfect. 
Her son. Their son. Little Alexandros. 
She had so wanted to name him ‘Perseus,’ not after the slayer of the gorgon, but instead the hero of Olympus. No matter her personal feelings, for all that he had done, Percy deserved to be immortalized with the best of the heroes, for he was the best of the heroes--no, the better of all of them--and he deserved to have his name and his legacy passed on.
But, alas, it was not meant to be. Percy, gentle as could be, rejected the name for their son, and so they had settled on Alexandros.
He had been right, to her great surprise. Alexandros, the name, was perfect.
“The ship’s crew are in a tizzy,” was Nico’s greeting the day after her son’s birth, and nearly three years since they had last seen him.
Glibly, she said, “I had not meant to give birth aboard.” 
“That is not the issue,” he said, his eyes locked on Percy. “They have noticed we are, apparently, traveling at a much faster pace than we should be.” 
“Do they not wish to reach Venice in a timely manner?” Percy asked, before busying himself with her shawl, though she had assured him she was warm enough. 
Nico’s eyes had not left him, piercing. “They are wondering if it is an ill omen.” 
“They should be happy that the new mother and her child will be in safety soon,” was her husband’s only response.
“Yes,” Nico nodded, “about that…” He trailed off, eyes boring into her now, brimming with so many questions. 
“You promised you would not pester them so soon,” Will scolded, though he had a smile in his voice. 
“Well you cannot expect me not to wonder at such extraordinary circumstances.”
Annabeth did not remember Nico and Will being particularly friendly during their days at camp; in fact, she distinctly recalled Nico running away from any sort of friendship at the first chance he could. He had been a surly, combative young man, with his stony glare and frightening aura. That he had attracted a friend as sunny and cheerful as Will was nothing short of a minor miracle, and that they tolerated each other enough for light teasing was quite the achievement.
In her memory, Niccolo di Angelo was still a skinny little thing, carrying an ancient, profane sword too big for his body, following Percy about like a lost puppy. She would confess to not knowing much about the young man, but she was certain she would have remembered if he had been a noble--yet somehow, the revelation that he was a count had completely blindsided her, with a fortune fit for the son of the god of wealth. 
“Well, what of your story?” she asked, adjusting her position to better support her sleeping child. “We have not seen you for nearly three years.”
He raised a brow, familiar disdain on his face. “I reside in the city.”
Oh. Well, then. Annabeth had sort of been under the impression that he lived in the Underworld, with his father. “Truly?”
“My mother was a countess,” he said, “many years ago, and, with some light forgeries, I was able to access her estate, as her sole living descendent.”
Many, many years ago, on their very first quest, Percy and Annabeth had sought to take refuge in a large tavern, only to discover it to be the den of the Lotus-Eaters, whose power stole time away from one’s perception, seducing them with food and wine and cards and dice to trap them there completely. Though they had not realized it at the time, Nico and his sister had been trapped in the same establishment, stashed there by an Underworldian associate some seventy or so years prior. How strange it must have been for him, to emerge into a world he could no longer recognize, and all his family long since perished.
But Nico would not be moved. “Our tale is long and tedious by comparison, but yours--now that has piqued my interest. I understand you and your husband were still in the city on the eve of its fall?”
“We fled as the walls were overrun,” she said. “We had thought to make straight for the agoge, but when we arrived, it had vanished, as if it had never been there at all.”
He frowned. “Yes, it had gone by the time we had arrived as well. Afterwards, then, Will and I traveled to Aachen, to speak to the Legion. I would have thought you would have gone as well.” He turned his eyes to Percy. “Iason sends his greetings, by the way.”
Clenching her teeth, she busied herself with something on Alexandro’s blanket, so she would not open her mouth and say something particularly foolish.
“We traveled to Thera, and to Athens, first, to try and contact our divine parents” said Percy. Annabeth did not think she could detect any changes in his voice, any hints of longing or the like, but she heard nothing--though that, in itself, did not necessarily indicate much. “Once we were unable to reach them, we decided to travel to Annabeth’s homeland in the North, to return her to her father.”
“A successful journey, I take it?” 
Lightly, Will swatted him. 
“After our marriage, then,” Percy went on, “we thought it best to return to the South.”
“And Venice?” he asked. “Have you any family here?”
Percy cast her a sideways glance, one she could not quite parse. “We… wondered if, perhaps, the gods had landed here,” he admitted, in a low voice, “after they fled the city of Constantine.”
“We have not seen hide nor hair of them,” said Will. “Nico has not even been able to contact his father."
Percy’s eyes widened. “Lord Hades has gone, too?”
“It seems so,” Nico said, looking pensive. “The ancient doorways have moved as well: the River Styx, the Door of Orpheus, and others.”
“The only clue we have is a message imparted to us in dreams from our parents,” said Percy, “the city of old soldiers.”
Will straightened in his seat. “I, too, have had such a dream.”
“As well, there also was a vision from my mother. In this city, she said there is a church, green and white with a red dome. Have you ever heard of such a place?”
Nico hummed, thoughtful. “Possibly. I was delivered a different clue, it seems: Zagreus and Thanatos, blood and death, appeared to me in a dream, and bade me to seek the birthplace of fire itself.”
As one, they frowned, turning over their words as though they had been handed one of Rachael’s prophecies. As one, they all came up empty. “Well,” said Will, after some time, “I do not believe we shall divine an answer today. There is another riddle I have in mind, one quite simpler: Percy, Annabeth, have you a place to stay in the city?”
With little persuasion, Nico had been insistent that they stay with him for the time being, in his large palazzo. When Annabeth was feeling better, he swore, Nico would show them all his available properties--for, of course, he had several--and that they would discuss rent at that time. Quickly and expediently on their arrival, he arranged for his staff to move their things, and granted them use of his beautifully appointed rooms, a separate one for each of them, down the hall from each other. In an uncharacteristic stroke of compassion, she thought, he had even located a wet nurse for Alexandros. Though Annabeth was loath to part with him during the day, she found it to be a godsent at night, even after only a week, allowing her the sleep she so desperately needed.
Percy proclaimed the procurement right and good, but it took her several days to realize he wanted to relieve her of her son. “Let Nico handle it,” he said, fussing over her, “you should rest.”
Days turned to months, and he let Nico handle a great many things. He spent hours holed up in Nico’s study, discussing matters of economics, travel, and management, as the Conte di Angelo poured his resources into a new business venture--a shipping company, financed by Nico and overseen by Percy.
The months stretched on into a year, and predictably, Percy had already seen great growth and investment from some other bankers and merchants in the city, what with his ability to not only turn the seas in his favor and outrun any marauding raiders, but also to simply discern the best days to sail, to predict weather patterns and wave directions. 
She always knew he’d be superbly successful at this line of work--even without his father’s blessings.
Annabeth, meanwhile, had not been sitting idly by. Once again, with Nico’s assistance, she had entered the expatriate community of Constantinople, rubbing elbows with certain persons who would not have even deigned to look her way, had they known her before, in the fallen city itself. Now that she was moneyed and married to a very important shipping contractor, a whole world of politics had opened itself to her strategic ways, though she largely tried to avoid the thorniest problems. Even now, there were whispers of what to do with the poor princess Zoe, how they might set her up in marriage with a Roman prince or Northern lord, and grow their strength and finances until they had mustered enough of a force to retake the city of Constantine.
Even with all her newfound money and influence, unfortunately the men of the community did not often take her thoughts into consideration--unsurprisingly. 
Besides, she was a mother now. She had a child, and a new sympathy for Zoe’s plight. Were it her decision, she would recommend that they leave the young lady alone. 
Annabeth could not say that she liked her new friends. They were pleasant enough people, and provided ample stimulating conversation, but many had never known the feel of a weapon in their hands or had tasted their own blood, never mind that they were all, of course, Christian. Oh, there were a few children of the gods here and there, one or two legacies of the Legion, but they were few and far between.
Percy was not always working, but he was not one to be confined to the home. He adored the city, and the city adored him right back, filling him with a kind of life and energy she had not seen since those few, halcyon months after the second Titanomachy. He was thriving in Venice, not just financially, but emotionally--and physically. Somehow, in the year since they had arrived, he had grown even more handsome, merry and always flushed with laughter after he returned from Nico’s residence. 
A part of it pained her to see him thrive among the Latins where he had only shriveled up in her own homeland. He had not looked poorly in Svealand, of course--Percy could not ever look poorly--but there he had been so sour and withdrawn and cold, and here he very nearly burst with life. After weighing the differences between there and here, she could only conclude that the greatest changes in his life had been the lack of snow, and the presence of a companion he liked better.
Not her, of course.
When she was feeling less charitable, it seemed to her as though her husband spent every waking moment with the count. They were an odd trio, Percy, Nico, and his doctor friend Will. At the beginning, she had thought Percy was exercising some latent protective tendencies over the count. She knew he still harbored no small amount of guilt over the death of his sister, many years past; the man of noble character that he was, of course he would want to see that Nico was well taken care of. It was one of the things she loved most about him.
Then they became business partners, a sound financial move. Then they began to spend the bulk of their time together. Then, during the Carnival season, Annabeth had heard them stumbling into her house together, no doubt having just come from the raucous festivities which had captured the whole city, tittering like a couple of young girls. 
Things began to piece themselves together after that.
“The next time we travel to Aachen, you and Percy should accompany us,” Will said, extending an invitation for which she had a distinct feeling only came from him, at supper one night, while Percy and Nico were out overseeing some new contract or other. “I know Iason and Franko always ask after Percy; I suspect they would be very pleased to meet you.”
Franko, perhaps, she thought to herself, but certainly not Iason. Annabeth very much doubted he would be pleased to make his acquaintance with the woman who had stolen his great love from him, trapping him with a phony marriage and an unplanned child. 
The children of the elder gods had a kind of undeniable sway; Annabeth had felt it for herself. How darkly amusing, she thought, that not even Percy was immune to its influence, having attached himself not only to the son of Jupiter, but the son of Hades as well.
“I should be very pleased to meet them as well,” she replied, sipping on a cup of tea. 
She would not, but she had no real recourse to refuse. 
Annabeth had made her deal with the devil, and now she reaped the rewards: her son’s love, her friends’ affections, her social standing, and her husband’s indifference. If she had to meet another of her romantic rivals, she would do so with all the grace and poise her station required of her.
Even if she would rather die.
 ***
 Venice, 1455
The distance from Conte di Angelo’s residence was a little farther than she would have liked. Most days, she would have taken a gondola all the way from the palazzo to their little house, but today, she needed time to think. What better way to do so, she supposed, than by strolling through the Piasa San Marco. 
Annabeth adored the square: the red stone with its straight, white lines, the beautiful arches on the surrounding buildings, and of course, the church which dominated the eastern end. Mammoth and blocky it was, yet it reminded her so strongly of the old St. Sophia, from the golden walls which shone in the morning sun to the grand domes which rose above it. The domes still had their weight borne by expertly decorated pendentives, each surface layered with gold and portraits in the style of Eastern Romans, hideous, of course, yet comforting in its familiarity. Whenever she walked around inside the building, pretending as though she were observing the rites of the Christians and ignoring the scandalous gazes of older women as she went about with her hair only lightly covered, a complex crown of braids piled upon her head, she felt as though she were inside of a great, golden jewelry box, fit for an empress. It was not, she thought, the church of Sarah’s dream, but it was beautiful nonetheless.
She did not enter the church today, but stayed outside of it, settling herself in one of the arches of the surrounding buildings, observing the strange procession of Christian men as they passed, their steps and their songs hypnotic, in their own way. Annabeth was no expert in the rituals of the trinity, but even to her untrained eyes and ears, the differences between such displays of piety on the part of the fathers, and the rituals and regimens of the eastern patriarchs were stark, almost exaggerated. 
Some days, she missed Constantinople and the agoge so much it ached. The good St. Mark, despite its Latin trappings, helped her to feel a little less lonely. 
And her son, of course.
Even thinking of her son, she could not help but smile. Little Alexandros. Already he took so much after his father, his same dark hair and green eyes and large nose. He would grow up to be very, very handsome, she could already tell. To her great delight, he was just as attached to her as she was to him, eschewing the nursemaids and nannies for Annabeth instead. He was her great comfort while Percy was out conducting business on the water, the little piece of him that he had left with her.
Annabeth loved her son, more than nearly anything else in the world. All of her immediate peers, however, they had large, sprawling, enormous families. Annabeth, with her single child, simply could not compete, and she so hated to lose. Was she merely lonely? Jealous, of the family ideal? Perhaps. 
But even besides… she still loved Percy. Even though he had barely so much as looked on her ever since they arrived. He was a decent husband and a magnificent father, and she wanted to give him more. She wanted more for herself. 
And selfishly, she wanted him to touch her once again. She could no longer satisfy herself, not when the sense memory of his fingers inside of her still haunted her dreams.
So, she had gone to the count in order to petition him for the use of her husband.
Nico had only stared at her, flabbergasted.
“...Come again?” he had asked.
In her finest dress to prop up her ego, she had once again repeated her request. “I know you and my husband are involved,” she had said, her head raised high, “but one child is not enough for a family of our class. He will need an heir, of course, as well as daughters for dowries and sons to carry on the business. I can provide those for him.”
Yes, Annabeth could--and not Nico. This was the keystone of her strategic brilliance, a body which could bear children. 
Still, he had stared at her, more confused than ever. “I… Signora, I do not understand.”
What was so confusing? “Your excellency,” she had said, ready to try again, “I have come to you today to--”
“No, no, I understand that,” he had said. “You have made your request quite clear. My confusion is thus: why do you feel the need to petition me for children, when you could very easily ask your husband?”
“Because…” Was he being deliberately foolish in order to mock her? “Well--because, you two are…”
He had raised an eyebrow. “We are what?”
Gods above, was he going to force her to say it?
“I think, perhaps, you may have misunderstood the nature of our relationship, Anna Elisabetta,” he had said, dryly. 
“With respect, sir,” she had replied, “do not mistake me for one of the trinity zealots of this city. I know what heroes do when they keep company with each other.” 
He had frowned, befuddled. “You… are you implying that your husband and I--”
“I, too, have kept company with women,” she had said, quickly, suddenly worried he would take her words as an insult, “and I would never seek to cast judgement.”
Then, he had done something she never expected.
He had laughed.
“I beg your pardon?”
He only laughed harder. 
So uncivilized, she had thought, her irritation growing by the second.
“I can certainly say,” he finally said, when he regained his wits, though stray chuckles still escaped every now and then, “that this was not what I was expecting.”
It had been odd to see him laugh. Odd, but not unpleasant. Truly, he had a lovely laugh, the dourness falling from his countenance. It was not difficult to see why Percy might be so taken with him. 
“Oh, Annabeth,” said the count, “I do not know what mist has deceived you, for it can only be through magical means that you do not recognize just how deeply Percy loves you.”
He had sent her away shortly thereafter, to seek out her husband, and ponder on his words, which was how she found herself at the church of St. Mark, lingering as the day stretched on into evening. 
Did… did Percy love her?
She thought he had, once. In their youth she had sought his affections and thought she had been making progress. She had spent several long months waiting for him to ask for her hand. 
She had destroyed all hope of them, then, and then he had found the legion, and the beauty of men… or so she thought.
Had he not gone around the world with her? Had he not agreed to marry her, to stay with her and build a family with her? Had they not shared intimate moment after intimate moment, exchanging secret words and heated touches?
But he had also avoided her as best he could, eschewing her companionship for that of his friends. He had only lain with her once, at her insistence. He had had to be convinced into the truth of his marriage, that they were a union, and not two people unhappily bound together. And those same, maddening words, the ones which had haunted her for months, ever since they had made camp in the ruins of Olbia, they rang so clearly in her ears: no mortal woman. The implication there was clear. Whatever interest he may have had, he had not acted on it.
However… 
Perhaps she had been… mistaken. 
A different sort of fear took over her then. Had she been mistaken? Had she missed such an obvious clue, and thus doomed herself to a life without love, all because of a silly misunderstanding?
She could not think on it for too long, lest she become consumed by the hurricane of her own fears and misgivings. 
Rather than take the river road, she chose to walk the rest of the way to their apartments in the eastern end of the city, the neighborhood they called Castello, hoping beyond hope that her heart would have calmed itself by the time she made it back. 
It hadn’t.
Entering her home, she was first greeted, as always, by Freya the cat, who had, in the intervening years, grown even softer and furrier than she had been as a kitten, the tiny little puffball. Trotting up to Annabeth, her tail held high, she gave her mistress a perfunctory sniff, and a sweet little bump of her head, before darting off to commit untold amounts of feline mischief, as was her wont. Following her inside, then, her heart already softened, the next thing she saw was him.
Percy must have taken off work early; she had assumed he would still be at the port for another few hours at least. He had Alexandros with him, as well. They made such a wonderful picture together, father and son. When she next had a stretch of uninterrupted time, she would go about having this moment captured in perpetuity in a tapestry, a moment trapped in time and memory, just to make her smile. He had not yet noticed her, so taken with their son was he. 
Then she saw what he was doing. 
“There you are,” he said, popping another olive into Alexandros’ mouth. “Yes, they are your favorite, are they not?” 
In response, Alexandros gurgled, happily. He had spoken a few words already--”mamma” and the like--but he did not need words to express his joy at being given his favorite food.
“Indeed?” he asked, as though he were truly carrying on a conversation with his son. “Another?” He held out another olive to him, but Alexandros would not accept it, clumsily smacking his hand away. “Oh no? You are finished, then?” 
He shook his head, indicating Percy with his thick, chubby hand.
“What,” Percy gasped in delight, “you wish me to eat with you? Yes?” he asked, bringing the olive to his mouth in order to test his hypothesis.
Alexandros giggled, clapping.
“Oh, very well,” said Percy, his bright, beautiful smile like the glint of the sun off the water. “Since you insist, and since I love you very very much, I shall share this with you. Not a word of this to your grandfather, however--understand?”
Then he popped it into his mouth, and swallowed. Alexandros giggled again, smacking his hands together. 
“And here I thought,” Annabeth said, unable to keep her silence any longer, “you hated the fruit.”
To his credit, he did not jump at her presence. His smile did not fall either. “I think our son is more important than my father’s disdain for olives, no? Say ‘hello’ to mamma!” he bade his son, hoisting him up on one hip. 
Alexandros reached for her, his sea green eyes wide and wanting, and she took him into her arms, kissing his forehead. “Hello to you, too, angele mou,” she said, falling in love all over again. “I apologize for being gone so long.”
“It was no trouble,” said her husband. “We were able to keep ourselves entertained well enough.”
She recognized the look on his face well enough. It was the one he wore whenever he was overcome with love for Alexandros, a silly little grin crossing his face, his eyes soft and shining, his whole being exuding warmth and comfort. 
But he was not looking at their son. He was looking at her. 
She swallowed. 
Many months ago, she had asked Percy how he knew that his mother had reached safety, and he had responded thusly: that it was a matter of faith. 
Pressing another kiss to Alexandros, enjoying the way his face scrunched up at the odd feeling of her lips, she passed him off to the nanny who had been observing the scene from a respectable distance, whispering, though he could not understand at so young an age, that she would be with him shortly. 
Then she turned back to Percy. Still did he look on her with that same expression, softness and affection, care and comfort, home and serenity. 
A matter of faith. 
Stepping up to him, she slid her arms about his neck, and pressed her mouth to his.
He responded in kind. 
His hands immediately went to her hair, tangling his fingers in the free-flowing strands. He tugged on them, just a touch, but enough that as her mouth opened in a gasp, he was able to slide his tongue inside, and there she tasted all of him, felt the firmness of his body as he pressed up against her. 
Yes, she thought, her senses full of the sea. Yes.
Pulling back, he chased her lips with his, whining a little as she did not let him continue, and oh, how she wished to continue, but words had to be exchanged first. She could not be wrong again. She refused it.
“I love you, Percy,” she murmured, gazing deep into the waters of the ocean. “I love you, most ardently.” 
Those eyes crinkled in the corners, joy crossing his face in thick lines, like the faces of the saints on the walls of St. Mark. “I love you, Anja,” he whispered back, bringing her hands to his mouth, kissing the knuckles. “I have always loved you.”
Then, without further ado, he kissed her again, and she melted into the warm embrace of the waves.
 ***
 The first thing she felt in the morning was soreness. 
She felt it everywhere, but she felt it most keenly in her stomach, pulsing out from the core of her into every muscle and sinew and bone.
No, not her stomach--lower.
She flushed.
Ah. 
With a groan, she rolled over, only to be met with the smiling face of her husband. “Oh,” she mumbled, still half asleep. “Good morning.”
“Good morning, Annabeth,” he said. “How was your rest?”
Deep and fulfilling, for she had been pushed to the very brink of exhaustion by their activities the previous night, a fact which he most certainly already knew. “Well enough,” she replied, with an air of disaffection, and he chuckled. She could feel it against her chest, realizing, belatedly, that he wore no night shirt, cuddled so close together they were. “And yourself?”
“Wonderful,” he said, and he kissed her cheek. “Marvelous.” He kissed her nose. “Absolutely divine.” He kissed her mouth, running one hand gently over the bare skin of her side, and she shivered.
“Mmph, Percy--” The force of his kisses stoked the fire within her, and as much as she desired to give into it, she felt that there were a few things which required a brief discussion. “A moment, please.”
At her request, he pulled back, though he kept a hand loosely curled at the juncture of her shoulder. His fingers brushed against her, as though he could not stop himself from touching her the way he wished to, the way she wished him to. “Yes?”
“We…” By the gods, she could not focus when he looked on her like that, dark and arresting and wanting. “I--”
But she could not help herself, breaking down into giggles and laughter. Percy joined her, until the two of them were as children again, laughing at nothing and everything. 
“Oh, perdono, perdono,” she said, breathless with humor. “There were things I wished to say, I swear.”
“There will be time later for discussion,” he replied, a familiar heat overtaking his gaze. “Now there are different sounds I would have you make.”
Rolling her on top of him, he kissed her once again, his mouth hot and insistent against hers, crushing her to his chest, the currents of his hands running through her hair and buffeting her body. With great, great regret, she lifted herself up, pulling herself away from him, even as he rose up after her, eyes gleaming with such affection that she could not even fathom, as boundless as the sea that was his lifeblood and his birthright--she drowned in him, and she would be more than happy to die with him once again. 
“Percy, wait,” she said, firmly. She could not let this go on a moment further without saying her piece.
Obedient, attentive, loyal to a fault, he sat up with her on his lap, his fingers curled about her hips, tapping lightly, waiting for her. She touched him in kind, her hands about his shoulders, rocking back and forth on his lap as she tried to settle her nerves. 
“I…” She swallowed, raising her eyes heavenward. Old shame caused her cheeks to heat, mistakes long since made rising from the fog of the past, like mountains. “There is… something I must say to you. Please, allow me to say it in totality, and without interruption.”
Frowning slightly, nevertheless, he nodded.
To ground herself, she squeezed his shoulders, focusing on the swell of his bare chest as it rose and fell with each breath, indisputable, irrefutable proof of his life, of his life with her. “What I said to you,” she began, haltingly, “all those years ago--please, you must know I never truly wished you dead.”
“Annabeth--”
She squeezed again, more firmly. “I beg you, allow me my space to speak.”
Mouth twisting, he acquiesced. 
“When you disappeared,” she said, casting her mind back to that horrible, terrible time, “I--I thought I had left you to your death. You, the person whom I loved most in the world, I thought I had left you to tender mercies of some monster, and that in my moment of weakness, I had abandoned all that I had been taught by Chiron, Thalia, you, to never leave a friend in peril. For over a year, I lived in my shame and my weakness, and when you did return, miracle of miracles, know that I was happy. I was so happy to know you were safe.” She could not count the hours she had lost to tears and sleeplessness and self-hatred. The year had passed as though in a terrible dream, in bursts of meaningless activity which she could not recall and had only served to render her even more miserable. To see him home once more had felt like the passing of a sea storm, or the healing of a wound, but then--”But when I saw the mark of the Legion upon you, I--I was so angry with myself, to think that I had spent all those months worrying myself sick for nothing, when you were as hale and healthy as one of our kind can reasonably consider to be… but that feeling, in itself, was childish and immature. I should never have thought those things, or treated you thus, yet I let my baser instincts take over until I pushed you away in the most vile manner, and for that, know that I am deeply, deeply sorry. I do not beg your forgiveness, nor do I deserve your love.” Then, taking his hands in hers, she kissed the knuckles there, as he had done to hers many times before, and closed her eyes against his face. 
It was not graceful, but it was the truth. She had never been so skilled with words, but she could not let another moment pass her by without her great confession.
Percy was, by nature, not a vengeful person. In that way, his mother’s influence far outweighed his father’s, so she was not surprised when he pulled her forward, and kissed her forehead. Opening her eyes, she saw Percy looking up at her, his beautiful gaze shining like the glass of Murano. “Of course you are forgiven,” he whispered. “Of course you are loved.”
“You forgive too easily, kærasti.”
“I most certainly do not,” he said. “But we were young and misguided in many things, and we deserve a little grace between us.” He kissed one cheek and then the other. 
“I do not want there to be anything between us,” Annabeth said. “no ambiguity or animosity. You must understand how much I adore you and always, have.” 
“I love you.” Even at such simple words, she felt her face grow hot, felt her mouth curl up in a smile. “I have loved you for so long, certainly since before we arrived at your father’s house, but, truly, for much, much longer than that--ever since I was a child.”
“You have?” she whispered, afraid to even voice the question, lest the fantastical words be ripped from her.
“Do you remember,” he said, twirling a stray curl about his finger, “the night of the Solstice festival upon Olympus? When we danced in the hall of the gods?”
Of course she did. She had been taller than him then, bless him, but they had danced together well into the small hours of the morning, to a song both sorrowful yet bursting with hope.
“That was the moment I realized that I loved you, and I have never, never stopped--not even during my time with the Legion.” His countenance changed, then, frowning lightly. “My only regret is that I did not tell you before I went with them. I should have said something on our way to Aachen, but, you must understand, I had nothing: no money, no employment, no--”
She placed her finger on his lips, silencing the stream of dour truths. “I know,” she said. “Of course I understand.”
“Never did I think that I could have this,” he said, around her finger, kissing the tip of it. “The gods saw fit to bless me with your hand and your child, and I would have been happy with no further.”
“But now you have me, too,” she responded--perhaps a little cheeky.
Percy liked a little cheek, she knew.
He grinned. “Oh yes,” he said, sweeping her close once more. “Now I have you, too.”
And if it were up to him, she knew, he would have her, again and again and again, a series of events to which she was not unopposed. Yet, he had given her so much, his life and his love and his loyalty, and so he deserved something in return. Something she had never done for anything else. Something she never imagined she would do at all. 
His arms crossed the bare skin of her back, one high, one dangerously low. It was almost difficult to move, to shimmy herself out of his embrace and down, and not only because Percy was stronger than she. He must have made a valiant effort to control himself during their little heart-to-heart, for she could feel the hard press of his cock up against her, no doubt having been awakened by such a warm, friendly presence, rocking back and forth upon it. As he had done the previous night to her, so she did to him this morning, kissing her way down the planes of his chest, his stomach, his hips--a body worthy of Phidias, of the greatest marble-men and bronze-workers of the ages. 
“Where are you going?” he pleaded, petulant. “I have not had my fill of kisses.”
“Worry not--you shall have all the kisses you desire, and more.” Truly, he must have been a man of particular restraint and discipline, to have gone all those years without kissing her, so demandingly, so full of passion. To think that such a romantic had been lurking beneath the surface of the sulky, downtrodden boy who had stumbled into their camp! Certainly, she had never imagined that they two would be in this position, until one day, when she could no longer imagine being in this position with anyone else.
Both in the literal sense and the metaphorical.
Lukas’ betrayal and Percy’s disappearance had made things… somewhat difficult for Annabeth, in the realm of romance, and without Silena, her closest confidant, to help her make sense of her feelings, she was left to the whims of her own imaginations. Though she never acted on any of them, her imagination had provided her with many, many scenarios to dwell upon, most, if not all of them, featuring the man before her--and being pregnant had only made them even more intense. To have known his attentions so intimately, to bear the proof of it so obviously, made her dreams even more vivid and agonizing than usual, particularly since he was so physically close, yet so maddeningly far away. 
She had not had a chance to perform this on her wedding night, too burdened with hesitation and dread. Now that she had him as he had her, she would not hesitate. 
A student of art and architecture, Annabeth was no stranger to male anatomy--beyond the simple study of marble and body, she had grown up with a number of young men and women in very tight corners, which did not allow for much privacy. She was even no longer unfamiliar with Percy’s anatomy, having studied it quite extensively the previous night. 
Upon seeing it again, she could not help but flush, biting her lip. 
Percy was a proper man, with a proper man’s cock--small and perfectly sized, unlike the large, boorish, sex-crazed animals in the poems and drinking songs. He wielded it as skillfully as he wielded his sword, bringing her to greater and greater heights with each thrust. 
She should thank it for giving her a son, no?
Annabeth then wetted her lips, and kissed the very tip of him. Percy nearly jumped out of his skin, his knees knocking into her shoulders. “Anja!” he gasped, “what--”
But she would not let him answer, taking the whole of him in her mouth. 
For some time, she had him prisoner there, hypothesizing and experimenting and committing to memory everything he enjoyed, which twist of the tongue or pull of the lips brought the most broken, wrecked sounds from his mouth. At his sides, his hands flexed and unflexed, hypnotic like the tides, grasping at nothing but air. “Anja, Anja, Anja,” he babbled, breathless and writhing, and Annabeth found she was quite enjoying this. The taste was not so pleasant, but the sight of his head tilted back, his chin pointed to the sky, the strain in his muscles as he struggled not to thrust in her mouth so that she would not be so rudely interrupted, the control and the power--she liked that very, very much.
It was not long before he was pawing, clumsily at her head. “Anja,” he groaned, “I cannot--I cannot--”
Even this, too, was becoming more and more familiar, the state of him as he neared that point. She must have miscalculated, however, for it was not a moment later that she was forced to pull her head away, her mouth suddenly very ill-tasting.
Unable to grasp any sort of control, he spent himself in her hand right there and then, so forceful it even landed on her face, and in her hair. 
“Cazzo, cazzo, merda, Anja,” he sighed, twitching and moaning as he fell once more to earth. “Oh, Anja.” His chest heaved as he gasped for his breath, his limbs boneless and lax. On his face was a smile, sleepy and silly, his eyes closed. 
She gave him one more lasting caress, and he shuddered, whimpering.
Climbing back up the expanse of his body, she returned much the way she came, kissing each exposed inch, from stomach to chest to shoulders to neck, then meeting him once more at his lips. He groaned, his face twisting quite adorably at the taste of himself in her mouth. “If I must taste it, love,” she said with a smile, “then you must too.”
His eyes popped open, then. “No,” he said, “no, no, you mustn’t do anything which you do not like.” With some effort, he craned his neck to see her, his hands coming up to cup at her face. “Neither something to me, nor with me, nor for me. I will only see you brought perfect pleasure in our bed.” 
“You misunderstand me,” she said, raising a brow. “I did not dislike it. I did not dislike it quite a bit.”
A moment, then he blushed, divining her true meaning, and flopping his head back down. “I see.”
She tittered, feeling once more a girl of sixteen years old, in love with a boy and with the funny feeling in her stomach whenever he smiled at her. 
“As well, I felt as though I had a debt to pay for all the pleasures you performed upon me last night. I must say,” she said, nestling into the space of his shoulder, drawing her finger up the planes of his chest, “that was very well done for one who has never known a woman.”
He frowned, though she more felt it than saw it. “How do you mean?”
“What you said to me, all those years ago--that you had lain with ‘no mortal woman.’” It had been a phrase which had haunted her waking dreams, ringing in her ears like the bells of the churches on every street corner, frightening her into withholding the truth of her heart for far too long. 
An odd smile crossed his face, then, something far more smug and self-confident than she had ever seen him before. Percy lightly stroking the skin of her neck, she shivered, pressing into him. “No mortal woman, yes.”
The implication of emphasis was clear. 
She leaned up on an elbow, incredulous. “An… immortal one?”
Strange little smile, he nodded. 
Her heart thudded in his chest. An immortal woman. The pool of potential partners had just expanded considerably. “Well,” she said, perhaps a little shakily. “Look at you.”
Look at me, she wished to say. Look at me, so plain and mortal. Look at me, who spurned and rejected you, whose beauty shall fade in time, who will one day leave you, through no will of my own.
Curiosity overcame the greater part of her fear. “With whom?”
But Percy, sensing her turmoil, raised himself up on his elbow to look her in the eyes. “One day,” he said, soft and low, “I shall tell you the truth of it. I shall divulge every moment of that time, and how each one paled in comparison to the long, cold, lonely nights beside the Danapris. For now, however,” he reached out to tuck a stray curl behind the swell of her ear. “Now, let us have peace. There will be time later for talk--a whole life’s worth of it, and one I look forward to sharing with you.”
“A whole life’s worth,” she agreed, settling down beside him. Instantly, he turned his body towards her, his arm coming up once more to pull her close. “I cannot think of anything better.”
“Nothing?” he teased.
“Well,” she said, stretching her neck up towards his face, matching smiles adorning their faces, “not quite nothing.”
In truth, there was nothing more she required of him than this, his body beside hers, their fingers intertwined, and their hearts finally, finally, finally together.
But she would never say no to another kiss.
It took them the better part of the morning, but they did eventually find the strength to pull themselves out of each other’s arms in order to get dressed and rejoin the household. The feel of Percy pulling the laces of her stays made her wonder if perhaps her maidservant would find herself relieved of that duty. When he was done, he pushed her hair aside and kissed her neck, the feeling of his chapped lips against her skin inspiring yet another surge of heat inside of her which nearly forced her to rip her clothing right back off, but the dual promises of food and her son kept her from pulling him back to her bed.
The bed they would now share, she was sure. 
She found one of her veils, a white one detailed in blue that she had hoped her husband would like, and began wrapping it around her head. “Must you torture me so, my love,” he said, face set in an adorable pout.
“How do you mean?”
“Why do you insist on covering even more of yourself?” As he spoke, he reached under it before she pinned it in place, and pulled several of her curls out of it. 
She giggled at his expression, strikingly reminiscent of the one which Alexandros wore when he did not wish to eat his sprouts. “You wish everyone to see me?” 
“Well, perhaps not all of you,” Percy admitted, his hand curling around her waist. “Some parts of you are mine alone.” He brushed his hand over the space where her feminine center lay, and even through her gown, it was nearly too much. “Yet, if it meant I never had to have it shielded from my view, I would not mind everyone seeing your hair.”
Pausing, she considered his eager, wide-eyed look. It was a little scandalous, but… there was not much work to be done outside of the household today. What was the harm? 
She stripped her veil away running a hand through her hair. Unexpectedly, it caught on something hard and crusty resting in her curls. Frowning, she pulled on her hair, confused--then when she realized what it was, she felt her entire face heat.
“If you insist on spending your seed in my hair, love,” she said, dryly, “then I will not be able to walk around with it uncovered.”
He flushed, too, dark and red, turning and retrieving one of her combs from her table. “Allow me then to rectify my mistake.” 
“Oh, no, no.” She waved him off. “As your punishment, I am going to keep it this way. But, as I am a respectable, married woman, and respectable married women tend hot to keep their husbands seed in their hair, it will be covered, for now, to teach you a lesson regarding aim and husbandly manners.”
Thoroughly chastised, yet still smiling, he set down the comb. “Might I… plait it, before you cover it, then?” 
Once he promised he would not attempt to remove his dried seed, she acquiesced.
It was not her boldest fantasy about the man sitting beside her, but she had long dreamed of the feeling of his hands through her hair. The only time she had experienced the feeling before had been the day he had cut all of it off. It had been quite the experience, certainly, and convenient in many many ways, but given his affection now, she vastly preferred this. 
He made quick work, weaving her hair into a rope, not as delicate or intricate as she might have done, but still, the fact that it was Percy doing the weaving, Percy tracing his fingers about the shape of the curls, Percy performing the act, made all the difference.
When he had finished, he tied it off with a leather strap, kissing at her hairline. “Please,” he murmured, “do not ever think that you are not the picture of wifely virtue in my eyes.”
A flattery, for Annabeth could not quite imagine what about her was the picture of wifely virtue--she had just insisted on wearing her husband's seed, for gods’ sake. She was neither deferential nor demure. She had broken his heart, and forced his hand, ripping him away from his life to deliver her halfway across the world, and then once more. Certainly he loved her. She knew that now, and could see it through their long years together. But to see her that way, when she felt so much like she failed as a wife, and could only now make it up to him with the full force of her devotion, was almost more than she could take. 
“When I have the best husband in the world,” she said, “to be a good wife is no great difficulty.” 
He paused and took her hand in his once again, kissing at her knuckles and then the palm, along a very old, once very deep scar. Then, her hand still in his, he led them out of the bedroom, and into their house. 
In some corner of her mind, she had expected just a little bit more of a reaction from the other members of the house. She thought the servants would have given them a suspicious look or two, or, at the very least, for Alexandros’ nurse to raise an eyebrow, yet neither strange word was spoken, nor odd look thrown their way as they walked their apartments, or sat down for their luncheon. In that state of utter normalcy, then, when they were done, they went to visit Alexandros.
Usually, Percy and Annabeth had often spent much of their time with their son alone, without their partner, as Percy was often at sea, and on his return, Annabeth rather felt she needed to leave them be, so that they could bond without any external influence on her part. Today, Alexandros sat between them, trading smiles with his father. They looked so alike, it warmed her heart. 
It always had, from his first moments, and even before, as she had been eager for her son to look like his papa, yet for the past year, there had been something of a painful edge to it, to the heavy knowledge that, while she had the love of her son, she did not have that of his father. It had been sweet and pure and perfect, yet bitter and cold as well. Now, however, as a family, real and whole and complete, she could not help but be overwhelmed with them both, with how much she loved them, and with the knowledge that they loved her in return. 
After an hour or so, in which Percy entertained her son with his menagerie of little animal toys, Alexandros turned to her, wide-eyed and innocent. “Mamma,” he said, grasping at her breast. “Mamma.”
“Are you hungry, my darling?” she asked, picking him up and taking him onto her lap, as she had dismissed his nurse when they’d come into the nursery. Now that he was on solid foods, he required less nursing on the whole, but his nursemaid also knew that Annabeth vastly preferred to do the deed herself, in something of a break with convention. She had not done so in the presence of Percy since Alexandros had been the smallest of newborns, on that ship, in the tightest, most unavoidable of quarters, and when they had reached Venice, and Nico had set them up at his house while they waited to find their own, Percy had left her alone to it. No longer bashful, she undid her lacings, and pulled down her chemise, and with very little effort, began to feed her son. 
Percy swept several of the toys aside, and came and sat with her on the little bench she held him on. 
“I am so happy,” he said, in a quiet voice, “that you have such a wonderful mamma, Alexandros. You deserve only the best--and you have received it.” 
She looked at him, and there were tears forming in his eyes. One like a crystal rolled down his cheek, and he made no move to hide it, or pretend it was not there. Percy was not usually one to weep--that was more her own purview, to her great chagrin--but she was pleased to see how he presented no shame at the thought of revealing his emotions. Good, bad, towering, subtle, a crashing wave or a gentle tide, after years of being deprived of his feelings through her own foolish actions, at last, she had them once again. 
“I love you,” she said again, unthinkingly, though she must have repeated the sentiment a thousand times before in the last few hours. She had wasted many a year by denying them both the truth, and so, she vowed, she would never withhold it again.
He smiled, face wet like the morning mist off the shore, moving closer, shoulder to shoulder, hand in hand, kiss to her brow. “And I, you.”
The day proceeded as naturally as possible from there, though they did not return Alexandros to the care of his nanny until the hour had grown quite late. Watching Percy hold him, as their little boy drifted to sleep in his arms, she was loath to part with such a wonderful picture. 
They laid him in his bed together, then, as soon as they had closed the door behind them, Percy picked her up, clear off the ground. She shrieked as she suddenly found herself in his clutches, though she knew it to be the safest of all possible places. “What are you doing?” she gasped, breathless with laughter.
“Holding what I cherish as close as I can,” he said, a touch dramatic, and swept her off to her bedroom. 
“You lovesick fool!” she cried, giggling as he practically bounded through the halls.
The moment the door had closed behind him, he dropped her on their bed, nearly ripping her veil right off of her head. 
“Please, take care--I happen to quite like the stitching on that one,” but he stopped her chiding in its tracks as he wound his fingers through her hair, dislodging handfuls of it from its braid, and pulling her mouth to his. 
“You have punished me long enough, I think,” he smirked, “and now I shall have my revenge.” 
His revenge was the sweetest kind. 
With a gentle hand, much lighter than she had expected, he unwound her hair, and, picking up her comb from where he had set it down earlier, went about brushing it out, the slow, sweet process of removing his leavings from their earlier intimacies. 
She winced as he pulled on a particularly knotty section. Of the many pains and indignities she’d suffered, her hair being tugged by her husband was not terribly high on any sort of list, though she was a bit theatrical about it. 
“A thousand pardons, my love,” Percy said. 
Oh, Annabeth could hear him say it a hundred times, and she did not think she would ever tire of those words. She had no wish to abandon their old, childish names for each other, but adorations such as these filled her with a lightness she had never known. 
“I shall need a thousand more” she said, “as you should not have spread your seed so liberally. Going forward, we shall have to clean it more quickly.” 
“I will endeavor not to pain you so,” he replied as he moved all her hair aside, planting a hot string of kisses along her neck that caused her to question the sincerity of such statements. Then, taking up a jug, he poured a bit more water on the hardened curls, reapplying the comb. 
“See that you do,” she said, “and that, in the future, you shall place your seed where it belongs.” 
“And where, pray tell, would that be?” 
He leaned in again to suck at the junction of her neck and shoulder and she moaned at the feeling, bringing her own hand to her center, rubbing lightly, before it grew to be too much, and she pulled away from him turning around to face him properly. 
Lifting her skirts to sit astride his lap, she said, “It belongs inside of me.” 
Wrapping one hand around the curve of his shoulder, she snaked the other between them, down to his breeches. And squeezed. 
“Yes.” he breathed, hot and heavy. 
“Oh, yes,” she agreed, short and clipped, trying to force her own breathless desire down for just a moment longer, “for if you do not spill inside of me, how am I to give you more sons?”
She leaned in to kiss him again, but he pulled back. 
Not far, not out of her arms, but away. All lust faded from her, replaced with concern. 
“You do not have to give me a single thing,” he said earnestly, raising a hand, and tracing her cheek with a sword-callused finger. 
“What?”
Sincerely, far more sincerely than his earlier promise of decorum, he brushed a stray curl from her face. “You have given me more than any man deserves--yourself, and our son. Please, please, my love, my dearest dearest Ana Zabeta, do not ever think I would ask any more of you.” 
His words took a moment to sink in, but when they did, they strung with the bitter bite of a poison dagger. “You… do not want any other children, then?” she asked, attempting to keep her voice level, her face calm, her pulse slow. 
“Do not think me to be so greedy,” he said. “My love, do not think I would put you through such pain and fear again. I have our son, and I have you. My only desire is for your health and happiness.” 
“But…” She knew not what to say, how to argue against this. If he truly wanted no more children, if Alexandros was to be their only one-- 
He went on, beseeching. “Yet do not despair, for I can love and pleasure you in a hundred ways which shall carry no risk. I can give you everything you desire, and you shall never want for my affection and my care.” 
“But I do desire more children.” It sounded petulant to her own ears, but, there was no other way to express the force of her wants. “Alexandros is perfect, his father is perfect--how can I not wish for more? Faced with such perfection, how can I not dream of growing our family, our home, our love?”��
He looked at her, his handsome features marred by hesitation and fear. “I… could not bear to lose you, Anja,” he said, softly, achingly gentle. “I only just got you. I almost lost you so many times before, either to monsters or to years of silly arguments and pointless squabbling. I almost lost you to pregnancy last time.” His voice shook as he spoke. “I, too, would love more children, but not if it carries any risk to you. You are too precious to me,” he breathed, tracing his fingers over her skin, so careful. So wonderful. “I could not bear it if anything happened to you.” 
She leaned over, kissing his cheek, small, quiet tears at the corner of her vision. His pains were so clearly evident, for her and caused by her, all at once. “It will not be so dangerous as you imagine,” she said, hoping to put him at some kind of ease. “By some great fortune, Will is here. Not only is he the greatest healer in the world, he has magic: ambrosia and nectar and all sorts of potions and pastes.”
But she could not dismiss his concerns entirely. Bringing Alexandros into this world had been a frightening experience, her fear and terror lingering even for months afterwards, slow to fade.
“I will freely admit it is not without any risk,” she said, after a moment, “but we have taken so many risks together, for us and for others. We have faced only the greatest of dangers, dangers that our mortal peers could never even dream of in their darkest, most terrible thoughts. Let us face this smaller danger together, with all the comfort of our house, and all the safety of the good doctor. And,” she grasped the hand that still rested on her face, and pulled it away, bringing it to rest on her belly, “think of the reward.” 
He swallowed, casting his gaze downward. “It would be great,” he murmured, reverent, speaking before an altar.
“The greatest,” she promised. “I can give you more sons, each one greater than the last.” 
“And daughters?”
She blinked. “Excuse me?”
“I--” He flushed. “Well--if I am permitted, then, to indulge in greed…” He pulled his hand off her belly, taking hers and bringing it to his lips, kissing it, just as he had over two years ago in Athens, when they had sworn an end to their hostilities, speaking faster, and with greater intent. “Whenever I thought of a family for us, I always dreamt of a daughter, of your daughter, a little girl with all of her mother’s spirit, intelligence, and cunning, her strength of heart and her wickedness with a dagger.” 
“I see.” It had not even occurred to her. A daughter, yes, in passing, those things happened, but that Percy might wish it so strongly… “Yes,” she nodded. “We can work towards that, as well.” 
He slid a hand around her back, bringing her even closer, her chest flush against his clavicle, desire and worship in equal measure in the heat of his eyes. “Then let me give you as many sons and daughters as you wish, my love,” he whispered, a rumble in his chest she could better feel, rather than hear. “Let me see as many legacies of Athena as I can provide take Venice by storm.” 
And with that, he pulled her down onto the bed with him. 
 ***
 “I hate the lost years,” he whispered into her skin, “but the truth of the matter is that I could not have made you a good husband when we were young.”
“Of course you would have,” she said, breathless, her mind mostly on his hands as they combed up her flanks. His skill with his tongue, his hands, his cock, it all had to be innate.
Still stroking her tender, he said, apologetic. “I had no means to support a wife. I still have no means to support a wife. It is only due to a sheer stroke of luck that you possess enough means for the both of us.”
“I have looked at the accounts,” she pointed out. “In just two voyages you have earned back nearly all of our investment. Within a year, you and Nico will be clear and settled. You support your wife and your child quite well.” 
She’d almost said ‘children,’ but she did not wish to curry his excitement just yet. The midwife had not been so sure, and given Annabeth a whole host of other potential maladies.
Will had said it was not any of those things, but told her to feel for the quickening, and then they might all know for sure.
"You support us,” Percy said, “I merely work to make sure your money goes far. I do not mind,” he sat up, assuring, “It is not a question of some manly pride on my part. I am so very happy that you and Alexandros are so well cared for, and that you care for me, as well. That it must all fall to you, however, and that without our journey to Svealand, I would not be able to see you taken care of as you deserve, is what irks me so.”
“But I am,” she said, “I am well taken care of by you.”
His smile was too small and sad for such a happy conversation. “I love you with more passion than I believe some know to be possible,” he said, simply, “and I hope I take care of you in many ways. I pray that I am a worthy steward of your money, and that I represent you well when I use it on both of our behalf. Yet I must never forget it was you who brought such an asset into our marriage. We would have had nothing after the war with the titans, and I would have hated that.”
"I would have had you,” she told him, equally as simply. 
What a sweet thought! How they might have grown together in that time! How many children mind they have, now, if they had not gotten in their own way!  
“I would have worked my hardest to be worthy of you,” he said, all the earnestness of youth clear on his face, “but I fear you would have only ended up with the least eligible man in all of Constantinople.”
She laughed at his little jest.
He did not laugh with her.
Her laughter trailed off at his confused look.
By the gods, he was serious. 
“Need I remind you,” she said, “that you were the most eligible man in all of the agoge.”
“I was no such thing,” he said. “When my lack of any kind of material advantages showed, all women but you were rightfully scared away.”
Annabeth stared at him. This man. Her husband, father of her son, love of her life. A great hero, a brilliant strategist, the person she’d want with her in battle over all else.
And, she sometimes remembered, the occasional fool.
“Do you know how much effort I spent, Percy, seducing women away from you?”
He blinked. “What?”
“Oh yes.” And what a time that had been. “Most of the girls of our little village had their own money, you know. Katya had some truly wonderful land, I was told, and Tora’s father was simply dripping in silks and spices.”
“You… seduced them?”
“I did indeed,” Annabeth said, easy and straightforward. “I distracted them, made them think that a man would not be worth their troubles compared to the passion I could provide.”
It had not, precisely, been much of a chore. They had been beautiful women, all, vivacious and full of life. Clarice and Silena had been her own choices, of course, sweet childhood romances while she’d mulled over her feelings for Percy, but the women whom she’d engaged so they might direct their attentions away from the man she loved had proven to be sweetly entertaining nonetheless.
“You romanced Katya and Tora to get them away from me?” His eyes were wide, the blush in his cheeks winding its way down his chest, roses in bloom.
“Not just them,” she said. “Between our journey through the labyrinth and the great war, I must have bedded… oh, half the children of Aphrodite--save Silena, of course, who was too enraptured by Carlo by then. And then a few others.” It was truly a wonder she had not garnered something of a terrible reputation. Truly, the children of the gods were an enlightened few, unburdened by arbitrary rules. “You were quite the catch.”
He blinked again, his gaze very far off. “You must have been… very distracting.” 
His voice hitched, and she realized he might have been picturing it.
“Oh yes,” she nodded. “I was quite the distraction.” Leaning in close, she trailed a line of kisses from his jaw up to his ear. She liked the rough stubble against her lips, a feeling she’d only ever known from Percy. She’d long loved women, their smooth skin and sweet faces and musical voices, as friends and partners both, but she loved Percy, too. “Would you like to hear about it, my love? Would you like the stories of the women I seduced, so I could have you all to myself?” she whispered into his ear.
He whined, marvelously, his breath shuddering in his chest.
She would not give him all the stories today, as she had many to share. Before he went back out to sea, however, she would give him a few.
 ***
 “Do not think,” Annabeth said, attempting crossness even as she lounged on their bed, “that I shall allow you to continue to put off your voyage this way.”
“Think you so little of me?” She could sense him attempting crossness as well, though he was far less accomplished at it than she was. “Which one of us can control the waves, again?”
“And which one of us has put off the extraordinarily lucrative Genoese shipment for the last two months?” she countered.
Percy shrugged one shoulder, jostling the bowl of olives awkwardly held in the crook of his arm, though he had remained in that position for at least an hour, now. “Giovanni does not require my assistance to move a few silks and spices ‘round the country. L’Imperatrice is in good hands, I promise you,” he said, plucking a fruit from the bowl and feeding it to her.
L’Imperatrice--the Empress. That he had named his flagship after the little canoe which had carried them together through to the ends of the earth, which had taken her name from Percy’s private little fantasy, it sent her heart on a strange little dance.
Annabeth should have been cross with him, truly. In all considerations of the situation, to defer and delegate such an important shipment to his mortal second-in-command who did not possess even a tenth of Percy’s skill with the waves in order to spend time with his pregnant wife, rubbing her feet and hand-feeding her olives, was a poor business decision. She should have been cross, yet, doted upon and loved and with a belly full of his children, she simply could not bring herself to feel anything less than perfect bliss, neither anger, nor irritation, nor even a passing annoyance. 
Yes, children. Will, the poor man whom they kept poaching away from the Conte di Angelo,  suspected it to be two. Her treasures were many, and multiplying. 
She moved her body, just a little, repositioning herself on the soft bed. Though her pregnancy had been rather a dull affair, all things considered, as compared to the previous one, some things, unfortunately, had remained constant.
“Still,” she said, as she refused to give up quite so easily, “please do promise me that you shall go down to the docks to at least speak with the man before he departs.”
“I suppose I could,” he tilted his head, considering.
She narrowed her eyes. Having seen and catalogued all possible configurations of his handsome face by now, there was virtually no possible way to construe this one as sincere.
“Or,” he said, a lascivious grin crossing his face, his free slowly, agonizingly slowly, tracing random patterns on her shift and her skin, sauntering ever so vaguely downwards. “Or, I could spend the afternoon doing something infinitely more… appetizing, shall we say, than speaking to Giovanni.”
Percy, the absolute rapscallion, even had the audacity to lick his lips.
Damn him. Her sense memory was far too strong to resist.
It was only a matter of time before she gave in. She knew it, he knew it--to argue otherwise would only be prolonging the inevitable, driving their lusts higher and higher with impatience and anticipation.
So, then, she decided to prolong it a little.
She hummed, tapping her chin with a finger. “Allow me to think on it for a moment or two.”
“Of course, my love,” he murmured, his voice already deep and warm, the quality it only took on during activities such as these. His fingers had transported themselves from her collarbone and clavicle to the skin of her shin, dancing and tapping at the edge of her shift, occasionally crossing underneath the hem. “You shall have all the time you require.”
Tap, tap, tap, a maddening little dance he played on the bumps and ridges of her knee, so distracting she could not even focus on pretending to be uninterested, her hips moving of their own accord, ever so slightly.
As it happened, she did not require nearly as much time to decide as she had thought she would.
And she did not even mind terribly when the bowl of olives, overturned and spilled in haste, ended up on the floor.
 ***
 For weeks, Annabeth had been dreading the birth. Twice the children, twice the trouble, she had thought, and given just how dangerous the last one had been, she had been wracked with nerves for days. Not even Percy’s presence, warm and soothing and solid, could chase away her fears.
Though, at the very least, there was no danger of Percy accidentally raising another typhoon.
“Much simpler than last time, no?” Will had commented in Greek, attending to Annabeth while he had his assistant wrap the babies. “I was, at the very least, expecting some sort of earthquake to send the city plunging into the lagoon.”
Percy chuckled at the good-natured jest, far past the point of chagrin. “To have you here the whole time has put me much at ease, Dottore,” he said. “If you are certain there is nothing more I can do for you as repayment--”
But he waved Percy off, wiping down an instrument. “Think nothing of it. I am always glad to assist old friends.”
“Scusatemi, signora,” said his assistant, timidly, holding the newest members of their family in her arms. She had been somewhat scandalized when Percy had not made himself scarce during the birthing process, as was customary for menfolk, and though she had not been outwardly cold to him, or anything less than professional, Annabeth could sense she was still in something of a state of shock. “I tuoi infanti--un bambinetto e una bambinetta.” 
Having already assisted Annabeth into a sitting position, Percy relieved her of one child, passing it to his wife, then took for himself the other. She had received the bambinetto, the little boy, curly wisps of blond hair nearly invisible against his skin. Just as Alexandros had been, he was beautiful, tiny and wrinkled, yet sublime in his smallness, in the little hands which curled into fists, in the slow, sleepy blink of his gray eyes as he first ever beheld the light, beheld his mother’s face. 
Loving Percy had been an unexpected surprise, something for which she had neither predicted nor planned. Loving Alexandros had been something of a foregone conclusion, a soothing balm to her then-broken heart, and she had feared she would not have enough room in her soul for her son, so taken was she with his father, unwilling to exchange one for the other. Loving this little boy, however, and his sister, would be the simplest thing in the world. 
She turned to her husband, pleased to see the look of awe and delight on his face. “Well, kærasti? How fares you now, now that I have given you a daughter?”
So enraptured, it was as if he had not heard her.
The door opened then, with a creak, a small, dark-haired shape toddling his way in, past the reaching hand of his caretaker. “Mamma!” he cried. “Mamma!”
“Accidenti,” muttered the Conte di Angelo, standing in the doorway. “A thousand apologies, Annabeth, but your little… child… could not be contained.”
She laughed. “Worry not--I have heard more than a few similar such sentiments from his nanny.”
Clumsily, lacking all grace, Alexandros clambered up onto the bed, making to crawl towards his mother, until he was stopped by the nigh impassable barrier of Percy’s outstretched leg. “Careful, careful,” Percy said, sweetly. “Your mamma is resting.”
All wide eyes and curiosity, he crept even closer, his mouth hanging open in a child’s confusion, as doctor, midwife, and count exited the room, in the periphery of her vision.
“Angele mou,” she murmured, “would you like to meet your brother?”
He did not respond, not so old yet that he possessed the gift of uninhibited communication, but he did peer, curiously, at the small thing in his mother’s arms. 
If she cast her mind back, Annabeth could not quite recall the first time she had ever met her brothers. Buried beneath the dirt and rubble of time and more pressing matters, she tried to remember if she had been excited to become an older sibling, to have some sort of sororal responsibility for her father’s new wife. Her situation had been quite different, of course; she had been old enough to comprehend what was taking place, and too clever by far for her to not feel some resentment, and in a fit of terror and rage, had taken flight into the unknown. 
Alexandros, perhaps, did not yet understand the matter, could not quite understand that these two little things were now his family, that his mama’s love and his papa’s attention would no longer be solely focused upon him. 
“This is your brother, Lukas,” she told him, the name she and Percy had agreed upon, a bygone memory of a friend and brother who had taken care of them both, and risen above all his failures in the end. “Can you say hello?”
“Loo-kas,” he said, reaching out a pudgy hand.
“Very good!” She was charmed far too easily by her children, but she simply could not help herself--it was far too sweet an image. “And that,” she said, indicating her husband beside her, “is your sister.”
If Percy could even conceive of a world outside of his daughter, now, he showed no indication of it, barely even moving when Alexandros made his way over to him, grasping onto his shoulder for balance. 
Hushed, she asked him, “Percy? Have you chosen a name for her?”
They had spent weeks agonizing over names for their newborns. Names had power, they knew intimately, and had to be chosen with great care. When it was determined she would be having twins, they had each agreed to choose one child’s name, to be shared with their partner, or kept a surprise. Percy knew the names for which she had a distinct distaste, and so she was not concerned he would choose something she truly hated, but she was quite curious. 
His gaze, green and glassy, was fixed on his daughter, a single tear falling down his cheek, his throat working as he summoned the will to speak. “Anja,” he murmured.
“Yes, my love?”
He turned to her then, his mouth trembling, the sunrise of his joy breaking on his face, warm and brilliant. “Her name is Anja.”
If her heart were any more full, it would burst right out of her chest.
“Then, if you are able to part with her, I believe Anja,” her voice hitched as she spoke the name aloud, the name of the little girl with blonde hair and gray eyes and all of her father’s love, “is in need of a little food.”
Percy nodded, bringing his little Anja to his lips, and laying a soft kiss on her blonde head.
Carefully, then, he passed her to Annabeth, making sure she was well situated in her mother’s arms, then he brushed a hand over Lukas’s head, as softly and tenderly as he could. This man could fight and kill, lead armies and win wars. His blood was that of the earth-shaker, the vengeful, the violent, who cursed and doomed any who would harm his children. Yet here he was, the absolute gentlest of fathers.
Little Alexandros, sweet thing, was drooping, sleepiness over taking his frame. Plucking him up, Percy transferred him to his other arm, so that he could be even closer to her, tucking Alexandros beneath one arm, and Annabeth beneath the other, his fingers playing with the ends of a curl or two. 
The lord of the sea could never be so soft, cradling Sarah and a baby Percy, nor the lady of war so affectionate, cuddling with Fredrik while they looked on their little Anja. All children of the gods emulated their parents, in ways both great and small, proliferated year after year, generation after generation, all their mistakes reborn alongside the heroes and the monsters and the stories. Yet, sometimes, they could break free of it. A daughter of Athena and a son of Poseidon could learn to trust each other, to love each other, to end the mighty rivalry of the heavens--and thus, in this way, they were already better than their parents, like the words of the old poet. 
Yes, she thought, as Anja and Lukas took their food, as Alexandros fell asleep in the crook of his father’s arm, as Percy stroked her hair, the thump of his heartbeat beneath her shoulder, beautifully, breathlessly mortal. Yes, they were better, by far.
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catradored · 3 years
Text
Club Penguin Races (PJO Oneshot)
Set in the October between TLT and SOM
“Percy!” his mom walked into the room and handed the phone. “It’s Annabeth.”
Percy smiled at her as he put the phone to his ear. “Hey.”
“I’m going to beat you,” Annabeth said through the phone, and Percy could practically see the gleam in her eyes. 
“That’s what you said last time.”
“My strategy was off.”
“There is no strategy, you jump over the obstacles.”
 “There’s always a strategy, always an algorithm.”
Percy sighed as he watched Annabeth’s gray penguin avatar hobble over. She had a Halloween witch hat on (which Percy was matching with, she hadn’t noticed it yet. Well, she probably had, knowing Annabeth, but just didn’t mention it for whatever reason). 
They sat on the hill, and Percy could hear Annabeth’s breath through the speaker of the phone. It crackled a bit from her end, and he looked, waiting for her to say something, only to be met with dead silence.
“I’ve never beaten you in anything before,” he said.
“It was a fluke.”
“I’m not an instrument, Annabeth.”
“A fluke, Seaweed Brain, not a flute. It means an outlier, a mistake, something that won’t happen again.” 
He smiled as he sat into the waiting room at the top of the virtual hill. “Okay, Wise Girl.”
“You stole that from Clarisse.”
“Did not!” He leaned forward so he was close to the phone and said again, “Did not.”
“Agh!” There was the sound of shuffling and scraping from Annabeth’s side of the phone. “Gods, would you stop doing that? I told you I have the phone at my ear!”
“Put it on speaker so I don’t have to hear your breathing! Did you run a marathon before this or something?”
“You know what, it’s on. I’m getting in.” Her penguin plopped onto the race course, and the game was ready. Percy leaned over the keyboard, staring diligently at the screen as his penguin (blue, of course), sailed down the hill.
He saw the log and quickly slammed on the space bar, jabbed the right arrow key to avoid the rock, slid on a patch of ice.
“Percy, you’re going to break the keyboard!” his mom yelled from the other room, and he yelled out “Sorry!” as he stabbed the keys once again.
His heart was beating, eyes scanning the screen, and he had never felt as prepared for anything as he did in that moment to win. He pretty much made it through every monster attack with pure luck, passed school at the last second, but Club Penguin? Maybe it was a computer game, but he’d finally found something he was good at.
Something he was better than Annabeth at, he reminded himself. And that said a lot. Annabeth wasn’t perfect, but she was still better than Percy at a lot of things. He wouldn’t every admit it to her, but just being on her level at something was an achievement. Being better was like he won the Olympics.
Annabeth was still huffing and puffing into the phone, and he could imagine her eyes trained onto the screen, trying to figure out some pattern that didn’t exist. The thought gave him such a thrill his fingers practically danced as he tapped the space bar again.
Then the race was over, at least for him. Annabeth’s icon still showed on the progress bar she was only halfway through.
“Maybe if you spent some time to hit the keys for once instead of thinking, you could win,” Percy said.
“It’s not that easy,” Annabeth said, then groaned. She must have hit another log. “We have ADHD, remember? You just do things on impulse, I get lost in my head. I can’t control it.” The frustration was coming through, even hundreds of miles apart, and Percy leaned back in his chair and looked at the phone. Even if Annabeth wasn’t there, he could imagine her looking back at him in her new room, the small frown that came on her face whenever things didn’t go perfectly.
Things never went perfectly. He knew the expression well.
“I’ve seen you fight,” he said. “You’re not thinking all the time. When you kicked Connor, there didn’t seem to be a real tactic to that.”
“I was thinking about how much I wanted to slice his arms off for dangling a spider in my face,” she grumbled.
“Yeah, so think about beating me instead of beating the game.”
Annabeth’s chair slid from the other line. “Okay. Let’s do it.”
“Hey Percy?” 
He spun around, and his mom was in the doorway, her face soft as she looked at him.
“Were you watching me?”
“Only for a bit, sweetie. I have a call with my writing group in five minutes, I need the phone.”
“Hi Mrs. Jackson,” Annabeth said through the speaker, and Sally’s smile became even warmer.
“Hi Annabeth! Percy needs to go, alright?”
“Grover was supposed to join us,” Annabeth said.
“I know, maybe next time.”
“Alright. Bye.”
The phone clicked off, and Percy handed it back to his mom.
She took it, holding it by her side as Percy turned to shut the computer off. “I’m glad you’re still talking with your friends from camp.”
“Yeah.” He tried not to let the disappointment come through. He was happy his mom was able to do what she wanted for once without Smelly Gabe around, but he really wouldn’t have minded staying on the phone with Annabeth a few minutes longer. To beat her, of course.
He turned around after she was silent, and she was still standing in the doorway. “I’m sorry I had to cut you off.”
“It’s okay. It’ll give her more time to ‘strategize’ against me,” Percy said, rolling his eyes.
“Were you taught how to IM?”
Percy frowned. “Iris Message? Yeah, why?”
“Well, Annabeth and Grover can both use it too. And that way you won’t be hogging the phone.”
Percy took a second to process the idea, then grinned. “Oh my gods, Mom, you’re a genius!”
She walked over and kissed his forehead. “Not quite. I love you.”
“Love you too!” He leaned over and grabbed the water bottle near him, pouring it into an empty cereal bowl. Probably not the best setup, but it would work. 
Fishing a drachma from his pocket, he said, “Annabeth Chase,” and made sure to school his face from the grin that had developed without his knowledge before she could notice.
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claudiafekete · 3 years
Text
This is another ordinary story of “how xxx fandoms changed my life” -
- or maybe not. you decide. I want to write it down.  trigger warning for politics, discussion of sexual violence, mild gender dysphoria It’s also horribly long. Don’t say I didn’t warn you. 
When I first came to tumblr, I had just graduated from APH. Short for Axis Power Hetalia. I learned about it in the form of manga. For years it was my everything - I learned what fanfic or fanart meant and I learned the basic online etiquette. As I grew in years, it accompanied me.
Until it didn’t.
Shortly after I fell into solangelo.
It’s a fun story, how I picked up PJO years after years of absence. My brother was whining about something written in Magnus Chase. “What do you think the Norse Gods were going to do to Percy that Annabeth was crying?” He demanded. I expressed my confusion. He kept on with his different theories and I made the decision to look it up online later.
My online search of Percy Jackson’s fate soon revealed something unknown to me before: solangelo. The first canon gay ship I ever knew. Therefore, at the ripe old age of 19, I threw myself into this endless hole called “tumblr” for the first time.
It was the most LGBTQ+ friendly place I had ever been. I joke you not. It was also the place where I was taught not only how a healthy relationship should look like, but also how sex should or could be like.  You don’t learn anything healthy about sex in Chinese or Mandarin using fandom, at least during the years I was in them. There were rigid 攻/受(roughly translated as top/bottom) stereotypes that everyone rushed to squeezed their characters into them. A lot of time though both person might ship A with B, they wouldn’t interact because one thought A should top and another thought B should top. Their different topping designation resulted in depictions of the characters’ personalities so dramatically differed that you couldn’t recognize them as the same characters.  Other than the refreshing relationship dynamics, Magnus Chase and the Gods of Asgard offered me a chance to take a look at my gender identity. I had known that theoretically non-binary people existed outside of binary gender, but I hadn’t known how one might live as one or describe themselves as one. I’m not trying to claim that Alex Fierro’s story is the only story of non-binary people. I’m trying to say that it was the starting point for me to make exploration and find the label  “agender” for myself.
I stayed in APH for 6 years. I had expected to stay in solangelo for longer.
Entered June 2019 with its whispers and anxious demonstrations. Entered folks pouring into streets in Hong Kong. Entered tear gas and facemasks and sticks and a bullet scarcely missing the heart and journalists beaten by police. Entered young students not of age disappearing mysteriously. Entered people dressed in white attacking citizens and not arrested by police. Entered dead bodies that were probably “被自殺 (being suicided)”.
Entered a city falling into the hands of tyrants next to your door, and you didn’t know how to help. You didn’t know what to do with yourself with your clean and spare hands. You were so far away from the frontline, you were angry and helpless and hopeless for that.
It was the first time I witnessed, first-hand, how the Chinese government directed the discussion online, so that it seemed as if there were random mobs who were disturbing the peace of Hong Kong and possibly taking money or being trained by US.  “Bullshit. Would there still be so many kids hurt on street if we have received any kinds of training for this?“  Of course, the majority of Chinese people inland wouldn’t hear that. Hong Kong is a former colony. Any calls of outrage toward the present government must be made by disillusioned young people who were unaware of colonization and imperialism. 
That was why I took refugee in Good Omens. I needed to run some where to stop myself from scratching myself to blood. I needed to some works for these clean and spare hands to do so that they wouldn’t pick up something destructive, such as a knife.
If the PJOverse fandom had felt the best place on earth, well, the Good Omens fandom lifted me into paradise. 
I’ve never seen so much kindness being showed under one tag. The creators and actors were all kind and interacted with the fans in their own ways. We were encouraged to do everything, anything, to build art with it however we liked. We as fans were recognized. We were seen. We were ... cared for. It was overwhelming, in a good way.  For that, I would be forever thankful to Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett and Michael Sheen and so many others in the production. I would be forever thankful to artists who liberated body types and freed the ties between gender expression and genitals. I would be forever thankful for the fantastic creators out there.
Would it seem as if I’ve only cherished the mutuals I met in Good Omens fandom? It wasn’t my intention. There are friends I keep in touch long after I fell out of love with APH. There are mutuals I got to know through solangelo and I feel, I hope that we are friends. Everyone who has chat with me I do my best to remember. (Though I do left conversation in weird places, become so ashamed of my incompetency that I do not continue them.)
What I’m trying to say is, as good as the solangelo fandom was, I still ran into biphobic posts here and there. It was only once or twice – but it was a constant reminder that being bisexual didn’t seem “valid” to some of the other LGBTQ+ members out there. Who cares what cis-gendered, heteronormative people said? Bullets that shot from friendly fire hurt the worst.
Besides, with a large and vibrant fandom like Good Omens, it’s easier to feel less alone and more… seen.
Damn right. Even after writing more that 5000 words in English it is still so easy to fall back into the comfortable nest of mother tongue. I can read simplified Chinese characters as well as the traditional Chinese characters I grow up using. There probably will never be getting the accent right but soundlessly devouring words in front of a screen? I excel at that.
That was what’s happening when the days rolled into January, 2020. I flew to US as an exchange student and exchanged long letters with a young Chinese woman I met in Good Omens fandom. I’ve never felt so alone in life. English as in creative writing has never come more naturally for me. The words burst in my head and arranged themselves freely on screen or on papers. I’ve never felt more hopeful about my writing ability.
The days rolled into March, 2020.
The first time my mom told me to come home over home, I laughed. The second time, I frowned. Before she pleaded me for the third time, I had grabbed a ticket.
I hadn’t imagined the disease plaguing China and its neighboring countries would affect the whole world.
You lived the rest of the story. I fled back to Taiwan.
 That was where Doctor Who came in. Or David Tennant. Such a strange time. For fourteen days I was the only living human in the house. I watched Casanova – or was it later? Hamlet definitely came before that. Then I could live with my family again. I handed in my homework and wrote in a different language than the people around me were speaking. My parents were working. My little brother was in school. When there was no one to talk to me I either read or watch Doctor Who to pass the time. I fell for Thirteen. I fell for twissy. Falling fast and hard and completely won over by their glamour.
I started internship. There were some small breaks where I could catch an episode or half, but never as much time as before. I dipped into fandom wiki and found that no matter how much research I did, there would always be details I overlooked simply because I could not afford hours watching all the episodes. No matter how hard I squeezed my schedule for time, no matter how much I devoted myself to the series, it would never be enough.
So I gave up, and let it go. For the first time in quite a while, I willingly gave up something for the simple reason of “I want to live a more comfortable life”.
 Came summer. Damp air combined with biting heat and piles after piles of biochemical terms made life agonizing. An ordinary kind of pre-pandemic “agonizing” which felt like a luxury in a world that was ending.
Hong Kong fell.
It was bound to happen. Once I heard protestors fought their way into the legislature I knew, for almost an year I knew, nothing good would come out of this. CCP would never allow its subjects acting out of hand. With such open despise to the authority, CCP would take nothing but a full conquest at the end of it.
See where we are now. As long as you’re “interfering” the political climate “inside” China, it doesn't matter which nationality you hold or where you were or how long it has been since you made the statement. “According to the law”, China can come for you. No, better, it can tell your country to hand you over. What a clever empire. What a graceful empire.
What a horrifying empire.
With the news I spiraled down fast. I kept away from the young Chinese woman I was exchanging letters with, I kept away from any kinds of Chinese social media, and the worst of all, I kept away from Good Omens, for it was sweet and kind and hopeful, for it reminded me of a time where fighting seemed to make a difference. I was empty and exhausted and a husk. Something must come out to fill the void. Someone needed to paint me in colors so that the world wouldn’t notice I was fading away.
I was surprised at who took the brush.
 After ten years, the first man I ever have a crush on strolled back into my life.
He was over thirty, but I always pictured him in his early twenties. Dark hair, eyes of grey or silvery blue. Loud laughter that sounded like a bark. Swift and elegant. Intelligent. Prideful. Stubborn. I embraced him as I’ve done ten years ago as a little child.
When I looked past him, I saw someone else.
Worn, weathered, with wry humor. Attentive and considerate. Tortured by the world yet never stop giving out kindness. Countless scars. Grey hair unfitting to his age. I didn’t pay him much attention ten years ago. This time, I looked.
Let me introduce you Sirius Black and Remus Lupin, my very first crush and the man who is too much like my last crush.
 2020, a month before Fall semester started, I trekked cautiously, timidly back into Harry Potter fandom.
The fandom of August 2020 was very different from fandom of 2010. The lack of author, for one – it became mandatory to denounce the author’s transphobic statement and other bigotry setting. I’m glad that everyone is doing their best to make it a friendly place for minority groups. Though I’m afraid, by making it a white or black situation with short statements and no discussion, it wouldn’t really help people understand why she is wrong in this. However irrefutable the author’s guilt seems to us, it is not something obvious to those who are unfamiliar with the subjects.
But it does feel good to see blogs and fics with the introduction such as “If you support the author’s transphobic bullshit this place does not welcome you”. It feels reliving.
The second was, I found the type of work I’m actively pursuing changed.
Back when I was young – when I was so little I didn’t even know what the word “fandom” meant – I read Character x OFC and some M x M. During the APH period I read an alarming amount of M x M and countless historical AU. When digging through solangelo, beside the canon divergence stories, simple AU like coffee shop grabbed my attention. Coming out stories were my comforts. The best of Good Omens fics were either in canon verse discussing desires, bravery, humanity and mortality, or setting in an AU with the promise of sweet, fluffy endings. Doctor Who almost always focused on Time and Space. Love was twisted and so often tainted by anger. Monster and god were very alike.
I came a full circle back to the Marauder era, and found myself not looking for heroes, but for young fighters struggling desperately in a seemingly hopeless war. I looked for people who were frightened but never, never ever going down without a fight.
I used to find characters and events unfolding in foreign places, now I want  characters who are close to what I am or what I want to be.
---
So, that’s it, my grand journey through multiple fandoms and basically a journey of self-discovery. It’s messy, sometimes painful, but always with so much joy blooming along the way.
Something doesn’t change. I’m still obsessed with words. I’m still a sucker for happy ending. I’m still wishing someone will come and love me the way I need to be loved.
Something does. I stop imagining that some magical power will come into my life and solve everything. I stop looking for others to save me from myself. I start believing that though wounds hurt, some of them do teach us to be a better person.
Long ago, I saw my friends and I as rabbits, without proper weapons to defend ourselves. That wouldn’t do. I thought. For my friends I’ll grow into a snake with fangs to protect them. Maybe I have grown into a snake. Maybe I haven’t. But I do hope I won’t stop fighting for those I love, with those I love.
I hope I won’t give up.
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mxsmwndr · 4 years
Text
Little Do They Know
Pairing: Draco Malfoy x PJO (crossover)
Summary: Little do they know, the Great War is only the beginning, and the reason behind Voldemort's doings are different than anticipated. Little do they know, there's a whole other world outside of the one of the Greek Gods' and Goddesses', or that of the wizards'. Little do they know, one so called 'son of Athena' can change the all history (or all future), and one Slytherin boy can do just as much. Little do they know, Malcolm Pace doesn't exist, and Draco Malfoy isn't as bad as he seems. Or maybe... he's worse than they could have ever imagined. (Basically in short form, Draco has to choose between Camp, or Hogwarts. If confused, read author's note)
Terms: X
Warnings: None? If you haven't read Percy Jackson or Harry Potter, there may be spoilers... but I think that's it. People are a little OOC, too.
A/N: Okay, so a few things. First off, Draco is 15 instead of 16, and Percabeth/others are 13/12/whatever. The prophecy of the Seven isn't out yet, too, because it was the prophecy that Lucius was supposed to get (and failed to, so therefore Draco takes his place). Lastly, Hogwarts and Camp Halfblood are in the same country--you choose whether it's America or Scotland, or wherever you want, but Draco still has a different accent than Percy/Annabeth. (As requested by @marieskeez , let me know what you think! Sorry it's not completely the request, it I do hope you still enjoy)
Disclaimer: Idea was a request, so I don't own it. I also don't own Draco, Percy, Annabeth or any other characters/scene. Also, the part that describes the Dark Mark is from Wikipedia... or something like that. I did change a few things, though.
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Draco hesitantly rose up from where he slept seconds before, the creaky bed below him causing him to flinch, while he tried not to wake any of his siblings.
C'mon, Malfoy. He told himself. You can't hide forever.
And he was right, Draco couldn't hide forever. Some day, they're going to realize that he isn't a son of Athena. That in fact, he isn't even a demigod. And when that day came, Draco didn't want to be there.
Draco opened an old notebook of his siblings', and scribbled a quick farewell after he took off his sweatshirt. He set it onto his bed. Then, he grabbed his packed bag and fled the camp, pushing the dread of his future away.
--
Draco noticeably shivered as soon as he stepped into the old hotel.
"Are you cold, my love?" A woman's voice asked.
Draco swallowed, "No," he said.
The woman cackled, and stepped into the faint light. "Are you sure?" She asked. Her blood red lips glistened, and her pearly fangs peeked. However, her eyes were still hidden in the shadows of her helmet. But that didn't stop their faint glow.
Draco nodded, scared, like a child. This isn't what Father would have wanted. He told himself.
The woman cocked her head to the side slightly, "Come here, my love." She said.
Draco dragged his feet over to her, and held out his elbow for her to take. The woman did just so, and guided Draco deeper into the Labyrinth, where Voldemort awaited his new tool.
--
All around, demigods cheered for their victory, hugging each other, clashing swords, and even a few scattered kisses from couples.
Well, most demigods cheered.
Annabeth Chase's happiness was short-lived when she realized what really happened. It meant Luke was dead, and Percy...
Oh, Percy! Annabeth's mind screamed at her. Her grey eyes widened, and she sprinted over to where she saw him last, but somehow missed him.
--
The mystery of Malcom Pace was still unsolved to Annabeth and Percy, but they knew he wasn't taken from monster.
At least, not a monster they knew of.
Annabeth Chase paced in her cabin, back and forth, back and forth, until interrupted by the sound of the front door slamming.
"Annabeth! I think I got something!" Percy's shouts echoed through Athena's cabin.
Annabeth shot towards him immeaditely, "What?!" She asked him.
Percy bent over his legs, and panted, holding up a finger to signal Annabeth to wait. Annabeth rolled her eyes, "Give me this," she said, snatching the paper out of Percy's hands.
Annabeth's grey eyes scanned the sheet of paper infront of her, while Percy's expression mocked her. Obviously, Annabeth noticed this, so she stuck her tounge out at him, and proceeded to read.
Finally, she asked "What the Hades is a death eater?" While handing Percy back the paper.
"That's the thing, I-I don't know. No one knows. I... haven't you read anything about it in your books?"
Annabeth looked back to her bookshelf, and back at Percy with a frown. "No." She simply said.
Percy squinted at her like she was crazy, but shrugged it off.
Something wasn't right here.
Annabeth must have noticed, because she walked over to her books, and started to scan though them. Percy followed her, and did the same.
Or, he tried to do the same. Dyslexia didn't mix well with ADHD and reading. Especially the reading part.
"Ha!" Annabeth cheered.
"What?" Percy asked, while scrambling over to her.
Annabeth pointed to a symbol on the paper.
"The Dark Mark is the symbol of Lord Voldemort and his Death Eaters. It refers both to a magically induced brand that every Death Eater bears on his or her inner left forearm, and to the same symbol summoned in the sky by curse.
"The Mark appears as a glittering green skull with a snake protruding from its mouth, which is believed to have been inspired by a Basilisk emerging from the mouth of Salazar Slytherin-- Heir of Slytherin, and founder of Slytherin house.
"The symbol is believed to also may be related to Lord Voldemort, as he is a Parselmouth, and leader of the Death Eaters.
"The original Dark Mark that is tattooed on the forearm is black, while the Dark Mark conjured by spell is green. It is also said that the Dark Mark represents immortality and power, a reasonable symbol for the Dark Lord.
"Inactive Marks appear faint, placed on the inner part of the left forearm. Active ones are jet black.
"As both a sign of loyalty and a way of summoning them, Lord Voldemort placed the Dark Mark brand on his followers' inner left forearms. The full process of Lord Voldemort's allies is unknown, but anonymous sources have claimed that this was done by the Dark Lord pressing finger to any Death Eater's Mark, which turns black immeaditely and delivers a burning sensation. Feeling the burn, the Death Eaters then Apparate to Voldemort's side--"
"What does Apparate mean?"
Annabeth shushed her boyfriend, and kept reading.
"It is unknown whether all Death Eaters feel the burning, or if Voldemort can choose to signal a specific person or people. Well known traitors hhave been rumored to somehow reject their summons.
"The deepness of the Mark's colour is connected to Voldemort's physical health. When Voldemort suffered his first defeat, the Marks on the Death Eaters faded. As he began regaining his strength, the faded marks became clearer, and burnt slightly to some, an eager sign of Voldemort's return. Other sources claim the burn comes suddenly and stings rather sharply.
"Death Eaters could also use it to signal Voldemort by pressing on their Dark Marks, as their lord would do. However, only Voldemort's inner circle is supposedly branded with the Dark Mark, which is considered a great honour among his followers.
"As a signature of their work, Death Eaters can also use an unknown spell create an image of the Dark Mark in the sky. The appearance of the Mark in the sky is the same as the Mark on the forearm, but green. It normally appears where there has been a murder by the hands of Death Eaters or Lord Voldemort. Due to the terror Voldemort and his Death Eaters had brought to the world in the First Wizarding War, the Dark Mark being cast over a location brings deep fear to the community, even after Voldemort's downfall.
"The spells used to brand and conjure the Dark Mark were likely invented by Lord Voldemort. He may have based the spell on the Protean Charm."
"Woah," Was all Percy could say.
Annabeth's eyes widened once again, and she scrambled to her feet, taking the book with her.
"Wait!" Percy called after her. "Where ya going?" He sprinted after Annabeth, into the Big House.
"Chiron!" Annabeth shouted, waving her free hand to the centaur. "Chiron," she panted, once she reached him.
Chiron looked down to her, and smiled sweetly. "Yes?"
"It's about Malcolm... the mark on his arm. We-we know what it is! We can--"
Chiron's face grew pale. "Come with me." He said, his eyes flickering to Percy for a minute.
He led them to the beach, and Percy's muscles immediately relaxed.
"Now, I understand you--"
"It's called the Dark Mark!" Annabeth said. Chiron shot her a look, as if to tell her to be quiet. Annabeth winced in apology. "Sorry," she said. "But it's from this guy named Voldemort... we," Annabeth looked to Percy, as if to say 'him and me', "read this book, and it told us something." Annabeth explained, flipping though the pages of her book. "It said that the Voldemort guy has these... followers, named Death Eaters. And they wear the Mark on their arm. It's supposedly set by a spell, but that doesn't make any sense, right? Magic doesn't exist."
Annabeth stopped when she saw Percy, who was talking to a crab. She rolled her eyes, mentally cursing his powers.
"Okay, well that's besides the point! The mark appears--"
"Uh, Annabeth?" Percy called, backing away from the crab infront of him, staring at the darkened sky.
"Black on their arms, but--"
"Annabeth?" Percy asked again.
"Can be spelled into the sky, which will turn it green, and--"
"ANNABETH!" Percy shouted.
Annabeth froze, astonished at Percy's sudden tone of voice. "What!?"
"Look up." Was all the demigod could squeak out.
Annabeth gasped.
There it was, the Dark Mark, in the sky, with people apparating out of the sky.
"Malcolm!" Annabeth squealed, and sprinted towards the horse stables.
"Wha-Annabeth!" Percy shouted while he dashed after her. Chiron just chuckled from behind the two, and trotted after them.
"C'mon, Blackjack." Annabeth said, trying to lure the pegasus out of his stables. Blackjack looked to Percy, Is she for reals? He asked. Percy just shrugged, "It's Malcolm." He said. Blackjack winnied, but followed.
--
In the air, Percy and Annabeth suddenly didn't feel so confident in themselves. Percy shivered from the cold airs touch, and Annabeth got an 'off feeling' in her gut. (It's called instinct, Annie, but whatever.)
When the couple made it to the Mark in the sky, fear brushed over them. But unfortunately, this was nothing new.
Suddenly, a flash of blond hair flew past the two.
"Malcolm!" They shouted. Startled, Malcolm turned around, but it wasn't Malcolm.
It was Draco.
But of course, they didn't know that.
"What are you doin' here!?" He asked. His voice changed, though. A tad deeper, yes, but it was also his accent.
He was British.
"Malcolm..."
Draco pressed his lips together in an attempted smile, but struggled to hold the expression.
"W-we came to save you," Annabeth mumbled, her eyes drifting towards the Mark on his arm. The Dark Mark.
Draco furrowed his eyebrows, Saving? He didn't need saving. He was fine.
"I don't need your help." He simply said, and tried to fly away. Annabeth had other plans, though.
"No, you're not. Come on, Malcolm. Come back to camp with us. You'll be safe--"
Draco's eyes widened, "Safe? Safe?! How can I ever be safe? Annabeth, I'm sorry but you know there's no escaping this."
Percy thought for a moment, and turned to face his friend. "What if there was?" He asked, right as Draco was about to fly away.
"What... what do you mean?"
"I mean, what if you didn't have to fight in... whatever this is. There's gotta be a way out, right?"
"'Fraid not." Draco mumbled.
Annabeth looked down, "No. No, there is a way out!" She suddenly exclaimed. "There is! And here's what we'll do." Draco inched closer to his two friends, and they discussed a plan.
--
Back at Camp Halfblood, life was no less messier than the usual, but Draco was there to help.
As Draco, too. Not as Malcolm.
After fighting his war, Draco was reluctant to go back to Camp, in fear of what others would think of him. What would they do? What would Chiron do?
The answer was, nothing.
Well, within reason.
When Percabeth and Draco returned to camp, demigods cheered. Again. But this time it wasn't because they won a war.
It was because Draco was back, healthy as ever. He greeted his 'siblings', and friends, but unfortunately, like any other good thing, his joy was short-lived.
"Malcolm!" Chiron said, excited that the demigod returned. Draco flinched, but reluctantly dragged his feet over to the centaur.
"Hey, Chiron," he said, and winced at the sound of his own voice.
"We are so glad to have you back." The centaur said. "But... I've been told that things are different, yes?"
Draco nodded his head.
"Very well. Come with me." Chiron said, and Draco followed, with his head hung low in shame.
"So," Chiron said once they made it into a more private area of the Big House.
"So..." Draco echoed, trying not to burst from emotion. He had finally found a place that loves him for who he is. Not for his mother. Not for his father. Him, for him.
"Look, I'm really, really... sorry." Draco said. "I never meant for anything to go this far, I just... it's so beautiful here, and I actually feel like I belong! But I just, I... I'm sorry." He said again.
Chiron laughed. He actually laughed. "No worries, my child." He said. Draco furrowed his eyebrows.
"What did you just say?"
"I said 'no worries'. Hakuna matata, right?"
"I uh, I have no clue what you're talking about."
Chiron laughed again. "It means 'no worries'." He said with a trace of fondness in his voice. "But anyway, don't fret. Percy and Annabeth told me everything." He paused, and then said: "And I believe you did the right thing."
Now, Draco was more confused than ever. Was Chiron mocking him? Was this a trick? Where's his punishment? Was this it?
Chiron must have noticed, because he smiled sadly at Draco, "I understand your pain," he said. No, Draco thought. No, you don't. No one does.
"But I do believe... you still deserve a second chance?" Chiron said. Although, it sounded more like a question to Draco than a statement.
So, of course he said: "If that's alright, yes."
"Of course." He said. "But I must ask, you're not a real demigod, are you?" He said.
Draco pressed his lips into a thin line, "No." He said. "I am a wizard."
Chiron nodded his head, "And I assume your name isn't Malcolm?"
Draco shook his head. "It's Draco." He mumbled.
Chiron studied the boy, and watched the way his eyes filled with panic. "That settles it, then." He whispered.
Draco heard him, and visibly flinched, expecting some sort of punishment.
"My child," Chiron said. "You don't need to worry anymore."
At that, Draco looked up.
"It will be our little secret."
Draco smiled. "But what will we say when they ask?"
"Hmm, family problems, perhaps?"
Draco nodded his head slowly and sheepishly. I mean, it's only partially a lie.
"Very well, then." Chiron said. "Off you go!"
Draco smiled wider at him, the worry lines across his face suddenly dissapeared, and walked out of the Big House, to find his friends.
But of course, not before thanking the gods.
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annabethy · 3 years
Text
under the mistletoe, watching the fire glow day 25: wishes
Character A has a wish, and Character B makes it come true
It’s a fleeting moment when he hears her for the first time. A mere whisper in the dark of a room when there is no one but them. It’s quiet in their bed, Annabeth wrapped in his arms in his attempt to protect her from the outside world, and he almost thinks it’s his imagination.
“Do you have a wish?”
Percy’s mind is ripped from far away back to this moment. His fingers brush up and down her spine, tracing the smooth skin, each individual curve of bone, and he thinks of a response. It takes a moment of silence before he can properly speak. “A wish?” Annabeth nods and presses a light kiss to his collarbone. “A wish. Just something you wish you could do?” “A Christmas wish?” He laughs a little.
“Something like that,” she agrees.
He shifts in his position on the bed, the creaking loud in the silence of the room. “Do you?”
“I do, actually.”
It surprises him because he’s never known her to have wishes. Annabeth has always been a bit headstrong, and that’s one of the things he fell in love with. She takes what she wants, so to think that there’s something she wants but doesn’t have feels… different.
“What’s your Christmas wish?” he asks teasingly, brushing his lips along the curve of her ears.
“I’m not going to tell you if you’re just going to make fun of me,” she pouts.
“Come on,” he prompts, “tell me.”
“I want one day to live my life.”
“You always live your life,” he tells her. “It’s what we do.”
She makes a sound of disagreement. “We survive, but it’s the same thing every day. We wake up, and we study, and come home to each other. I love it, but I want something different. Just one day where we are just with each other, and the rest of the world can be forgotten.” “So you want a day that we can spend together, not a care in the world? To forget the world?”
“Doesn’t it sound amazing?”
“It does,” he agrees. “I’m glad you included me in your wish.”
“You’re always included in my wishes,” she says. “You’re a part of my life, and I love you.” It makes him smile, hearing those words from her. “Then I don’t see why we can’t make your wish come true.”
She shrugs. “It’s not easy to just get up and leave everything, even if it’s for a day. There’s always going to be someone or something that needs us.”
“But that’s the point of your wish, isn’t it? To forget everything and just breathe.”
“I suppose.”
They fall back into silence for a moment, and he doesn’t mind. It gives him a chance to think of her wish. He wants to do it for her, because she’s Annabeth, and she deserves it. He’s determined to do it too, so he asks, “What would forgetting the world mean? What exactly do you want to do?”
She breathes, and a smile forms on her face. “Everything.”
“Everything?”
“I want to go ice skating and walk around Times Square. I want to look at the Christmas lights and play in the snow. I want to make dumb decisions, maybe even get married on a whim—”
Percy laughs at that.
“I want the world.”
“Then that’s what you’ll get,” he says. He turns so that he can hover over her and capture her lips with his. It’s slow and sweet, like they have all the time the universe has to offer. “I promise.”
And he really does promise.
He wants to plan a day to do it, but he quickly learns it defeats the purpose. It adds onto the pile of things to do and worry about. He thinks that she forgets what she said, and he doesn’t blame her. It was mindless babbles in the darkest hours of the night. It was a sharing of her deepest dreams, and if he had been her, he wouldn’t have actually expected it.
That’s what made Christmas morning so much more special.
It starts with stolen kisses in the early hours of the morning. It’s a white Christmas, snow falling from the sky. Light filters in through the blinds, covering her body in brightness, and it somehow makes her impossibly more beautiful.
“Good morning, princess,” he whispers into her ear before continuing to place kisses all around her face.
She stretches her legs and arms, smiling with her eyes closed as his lips trace her jaw.
“Are you awake?”
“I might be,” she says.
“I need you to wake up for me.”
“It’s too early,” she complains. “It’s Christmas. You’re supposed to let me sleep in.”
“Not when we have a whole day of plans ahead of us.”
One eye blinks open at that. “I didn’t know we had plans?”
He gives her a knowing grin. “Merry Christmas.”
He keeps it a secret from her until they get to the ice skating rink. It’s not until they’re inside that she rolls her eyes fondly, and she understands his plan.
“My wish?”
“You said you wanted a day for us, so that’s what you’re going to get.”
They laugh together as they struggle to get the skates on. Her eyes are on the laces and his are on her. Slowly, he falls deeper in love, and the box in his pocket burns at the contact.
As they slide onto the ice, Percy nearly busts his tailbone, and Annabeth laughs at him. They circle the rink slowly, Percy practically hugging the wall, until they get the hang of it. Percy and Annabeth are hand in hand, speeding past the people around them, and Annabeth’s gleeful laugh is a melody in his ears. Her hair flies past her in the wind, a mess of tangles and knots, and he has to resist smoothing it down.
Percy turns his feet in to come to a slow stop, and he swings Annabeth around to stand in front of him. They’re along the edge of the ice when he wraps his arms around her waist and pulls her close. She leans against his chest and lets him press a kiss to her forehead.
“I love you,” he whispers.
“Not as much as I love you.”
“Oh, yeah?”
“Mh-hm.”
And god, this is the woman he is meant to marry. He can hardly wait.
Hours fly by, and she thinks that this is their day. She’s content with it, he can tell, but she is the love of his life and deserves to much more. He practically has to pull her away from the ice, and she resists at first until she takes one look at his face, a promise of what is yet to come.
It doesn’t take long for them to make their way to Times Square. They take in the bustling streets filled with blinding lights. They walk and walk until the sun begins to set, intertwined hands swinging between them. It’s icy outside, so she’s curled in his side as they walk. Percy is warm, but for more than just the contact. He feels heat racing through him because time is ticking, and it’s only so long before he bends down on one knee. He feels warmth for this impossible love they’ve created – a love he’d die for.
They find their way to Central Park. There is a relatively fresh coat of snow, and he takes them to a more secluded area, away from the wandering families. They leave fresh footprints in the white snow, and the box holding the ring is unable to be ignored.
“Are we going to have a snowball fight?” Annabeth asks playfully. “I’ll kick your ass.”
“I know you would which is why I do not want to have a snowball fight.”
“Wimp.” “Simp,” he corrects.
“You’re both, actually.”
Percy pushes her shoulder softly. “Didn’t you say you wanted to also get married today?”
“Yeah, but that would mean you actually have to propose. Do you plan on proposing?”
She’s not looking at him, so he can tell she isn’t being serious. It pinpoints exactly what’s about to happen though, so he takes a moment to compose himself so that his voice doesn’t waver and ruin the surprise.
Thankfully, she moves off from that conversation as she turns back to him. “Can we make snow angels at least?”
He laughs lightly. “I mean, the snow would soak through your clothes, but go for it.”
“You have to do it with me,” she complains.
“Babe, we’re going to get sick if we lay in the snow, and people are going to think we’re insane.”
“You said you’d lay with me and forget the world,” she accuses.
He shakes his head with a subtle smile, but he gets to the ground with her. She leans back, and he does too, but they don’t make snow angels. Instead, he holds his arm out and lets her rest her head against his shoulder.
“We’re going to get hypothermia,” he tells her.
“At least we can do it together. It’ll be a fun bonding experience.”
“Nothing brings two people together like lost limbs.”
“You get me,” she says, a hand over her heart. She rubs her face against him as she begins to shiver.
“Cold already?”
“No,” she lies, snuggling closer to him.
“So you’re not shivering?”
“Not a chance.”
“You’re just shaking because you’re excited you know I’m going to propose today?”
She snorts. “Sure.”
“I’m serious. You don’t believe me?” “Should I?”
“You said that today you wanted to go ice skating, walk around Times Square, and look at pretty Christmas light, all of which we did. The only thing left is getting married.” “Getting married,” she says, laughing. “I didn’t say a proposal.”
“We can do both,” he suggests.
“I would love that.” She’s not looking at him, still staring up at the dark sky. There are no stars to be seen, but Percy doesn’t mind because the only stars he needs are in her eyes.
Percy nudges her up, and she looks around confused.
“What are you doing?”
It’s then that he shoves his hand into his pocket, fingers wrapping around the box. He pulls it out slowly, and her entire face changes.
“Percy.” “Yes, love?”
“What is that?”
“I already told you.”
She presses her lips together to try and smother the smile that’s forming, but it’s too late because her lips are already turning upwards. He moves so that he’s facing her, and then gets down on one knee, and now the smile is taking over both of their faces.
“Annabeth…”
“Percy.”
“I love you so much,” he starts, “and today has been one of the best days of my life. Every moment I’m with you, I’m able to forget the world. I want every day to be like this – I want the rest of our lives to be like this. And I want to spend the rest of my life with you.”
She laughs, teary eyed, and he opens the box.
“Annabeth Chase… Will you marry me?”
Tears fall from her eyes as she throws her head back and laughs, and then she’s nodding her head and pulling him in for a kiss. Against him, she says, “I’d love to.”
So he slides the ring onto her finger, and it fits perfectly. It is a symbol of their love. They have a love so strong and so powerful, and they were made for each other. They are each other’s halves, and it was always meant to be like this.
They are Percy and Annabeth, together as one.
He kisses her with everything he has because she deserves the world. He wants to give her himself, his mind, body, soul, because it’s always been the two of them and nothing else.
This moment is as ephemeral as the day she first told him about her wish. She wanted to forget the world, and he wanted to give her just that. Until this moment, he thought he did forget the world to just be with her, but now as he kisses the love of his life, he isn’t so sure that it’s true.
Annabeth Chase is his world, and she always will be. Percy can forget everything else, but Annabeth is not a person he can simply forget.
She is in his heart, burned into his mind, and she is his forevermore.
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