Shadows and Magic

Chapter 1

NICO

 Jason was dead. 

Nico still couldn't believe it, couldn't believe that his very first, true friend was gone. Gone. 

Jason was gone. 

Jason was dead.

Nico was running.

He didn't know where he was going,  where he had already gone, but as he raced through the streets of New York, rain flitting across his face and tears rolling down his cheeks, he felt the pain he was feeling slowly ease into a dull, consistent throb, as his mind couldn't take it anymore, wouldn't register the truth.

Jason was dead.

He stopped by an alley way and stumbled against a wall, leaning on it and breathing heavily as he tried to gather his thoughts. Thinking about Jason hurt, and it just felt so unfair. Life had taken everything from him, his mama, Bianca, Percy (in a way), comfort, the feeling of safety, and nearly his sanity. And now Jason. Anger wormed his way into his sadness, and Nico felt the shadows started to solidify around him, fueled by his anger.

Was Nico alone in the world now? 

The son of Hades glanced briefly at the darkening shadows, and tried to get a rein on his feelings before he accidentally murdered someone. 

But why would he care if someone died? One death of a mortal, as punishment to the world for killing Jason. Somewhere in his dark mind, it sounded sensible enough. 

Because Will. 

Because his sunshiny, positive, the-world-will-get-better dork of a boyfriend would absolutely murder him if he killed a mortal.

Because Will had believed in him in the past, when no one else would, and he couldn't betray his trust by going on an evil killing spree. 

(Gods, he must have inherited his dad's brutally-murdering-someone-when-furious gene.)

Thinking of Will warmed Nico's heart. After finding out he was a son of Hades, the least popular god of all time, he was certain he was going to be alone for the rest of his life. No one wanted to be friendly with the son of the dead, and his dad being dark, scary, and a bit too powerful (even if he had 4000 attack points in Mythomagic) certainly didn't help win popularity points. But Will had still came to him, hung out with him, acted friendly, and they had slowly gone from chilling out together, to dating. 

Nico loved him. 

Sometimes, he couldn't believe he actually had a boyfriend. He kept expecting someone to come by and say, "Sorry, these don't belong to you." and take them away, throwing him back in the abyss of loneliness. But it had been a few months since the Giant War. Nico was still with Will. He had been Nico's first true buddy in ages, along with.. Jason.

And now he was back in the pit of anger and hurting.

"What do we have here..?" A lazy drawl jolted him out of his thoughts. Nico whirled around, slashing his sword, and was met with a dracaena with a total of 3 three hellhounds snarling beside her. 

"We would appreciate a light sssssnack before we move on, wouldn't we, boyssss?" The dracaena fixed her eyes on Nico with a hungry stare.

"In your dreams." Nico hissed, his eyes flitting around, trying to calculate how fast he could take them down. "I've faced worse, you aren't going to get me."

"You're forgetting ssssomething though...... Don't you sssee? We outnumber you greatly, sssson of Hadessss, what a horrible disssaster. For you." The dracaena mocked, before one of the hellhounds decided to make the first move.

It leapt towards Nico, growling, and he slashed at it with his sword, disintegrating it instantly, but then another pounced at him from behind. As Nico turned around to face it, the last one bit into his shoulder with its huge canine-like teeth. Nico yelled in pain, and stabbed it with his sword, then sliced the final one into dust as it made a swipe at one of his legs, and ge staggered a bit, wincing in pain. He looked up, breathing heavily, the world swimming before his eyes. While his anger had given him the adrenaline rush he needed, Nico guessed he it wouldn't last until he was done with the snake woman before him. Dracaena weren't like hellhounds, some happened to be extremely sly.

"Ssstupid demigod... you are weakened from battle... no-one with ssave you now..." She cackled and leapt at Nico, snarling hungrily. 

Nico was aware of the blood seeping from the bite. He was at the verge of collapsing, he realized. A rhino sized monster gnawing on you was definitely not good for one's physical health. He was in no shape to fight the dracaena. Welp, time to flight.

I have to get out of here, he thought panicky. Shadow travel anywhere, just get me somewhere safe. Immediately, the shadows bent in to his will, and he disappeared from sight, just as the monster had sliced down on the side of his face. 

Nico arrived at a small pavement in the middle of the night somewhere, and instantly fell to his knees. He was going to fall unconscious soon, and he would much rather pass out inside than in the middle of nowhere. But where could he go? In front of him was a building that looked abandoned and dusty, a seemingly perfect refugee for a lone demigod. There, it should be a good place to lie low for now. Using all his strength, he one again used the shadows, and collapsed in the house. He groped around, trying to reach into his aviator jacket and get the small pack of ambrosia he always carried around. I need.... but it was too late. The world went dark and Nico slowly drifted into unconsciousness. 

 So how do you like the story so far?

I apologize for any mistakes so far in this story!

Hope you enjoyed! 

P.S, the words in italics are the words in Nico's thoughts, and the words in bold are my notes. 

Here's an extra question for whoever's out there, reading this and thinking, "What the heck is this person blabbering about?":

 What is Nico's greatest fear?