𝐌𝐞𝐦𝐞𝐧𝐭𝐨 𝐌𝐨𝐫𝐢━━Nico di Angelo

76

"Wait what?" Ajax spoke instead. "One of the seven? Are you sure you don't mean me?"

He took two steps forward which was brave. He stood tall, shoulders back, taking a deep breath, knocking shoulders with Nico. "I didn't tell anyone on board except Nico about my uh.. predicament"

"Ajax Avery, you've proved yourself quite useful" Hades narrowed his dark eyes at him as if he had forgotten he had been there. Nico wanted to shield Ajax from his father's attention. Nothing good ever came from it.

Nico's thoughts were still all over the place. One of the seven?

To his surprise, his thoughts didn't leap first to Percy. His primary concern was for Hazel, then for Jason, then for Percy and the others aboard the Argo II. They'd saved him in Rome. They'd welcomed him aboard their ship. Nico had never allowed himself the luxury of friends, but the crew of the Argo II was as close as he'd ever come, apart from Ajax of course. But Ajax was different. The idea of any of them dying made him feel empty – like he was back in the giants' bronze jar, subsisting only on sour pomegranate seeds.

Finally he asked, "Is Hazel all right?"

"For the moment."

"And the others? Who will die?"

Hades shook his head. "Even if I were certain, I could not say. I tell you this because you are my son. You know that some deaths cannot be prevented. Some deaths should not be prevented. And some deaths cannot be reversed. When the time comes, you may need to act."

Nico didn't know what that meant. He didn't want to know.

"My son." Hades's tone was almost gentle. "Whatever happens, you have earned my respect. You brought honour to our house when we stood together against Kronos in Manhattan. You risked my wrath to help the Jackson boy – guiding him to the River Styx, freeing him from my prison, pleading with me to raise the armies of Erebos to assist him. Never before have I been so harassed by one of my sons. Percy this and Percy that. I nearly blasted you to cinders."

Ajax may not throw off lightning when he got agitated, or wilt the grass around him. But Nico had been around him enough to notice the shift in his mannerisms. He grew suddenly very rigid like cardboard. There was a certain smell that surrounded them, like a chemical let loose, some sort of acid that could burn through pure metal.

Nico swallowed and looked to his left, at Ajax.

He wished they could talk telepathically. Sure, they hadn't really talked about what they were, how they would proceed. But Nico wanted to assure him this Percy business was in the past. All that mattered to Nico was him now, all that would ever matter.

Nico had never felt this way about anyone ever. This deep feeling inside him was so vast and completely different from the love for his sister, his mother, his crush for Percy.

Sometimes Nico thought he would drown in it, drown in Ajax. And he wouldn't even complain.

Nico took a shallow breath. The walls of the room began to tremble, dust trickling from the cracks between the bones. "I didn't do all that just for him. I did it because the whole world was in danger."

Hades allowed himself the faintest smile, but there was nothing cruel in his eyes. "I can entertain the possibility that you acted for multiple reasons. My point is this: you and I rose to the aid of Olympus because you convinced me to let go of my anger. I would encourage you to do likewise. My children are so rarely happy. I... I would like to see you be an exception."

Nico stared at his father. He didn't know what to do with that statement. He could accept many unreal things – hordes of ghosts, magical labyrinths, travel through shadows, chapels made of bones. But tender words from the Lord of the Underworld? No. That made no sense.