not about angels - solangelo au

Chapter 14

Will showed up at the park with a creased brow and anxiety in his eyes.

"You okay?" I asked.

Seeing him anxious made me want to figure out whatever was making him worry and stop it. I squeezed my eyes shut and chided myself. This crush thing is getting out of control, I thought.

"Yeah," he said, resignedly, and sat beside me under the tree. "Just worried about the war."

"We don't know for sure that there's going to be a war," I remarked.

"Your optimism is encouraging," he replied, smiling. "But I'm pretty sure our side is declaring war soon."

I focused on the skyline, turning my head away from him; his smile had made my stomach flutter. "Do you know for sure?"

"No," he said, as I faced him. "I'm not that high in the chain of command, so I'm not totally sure. But Jason keeps mentioning a war declaration, without meaning to, I think."

"Oh," I said. "That's not good."

"No," he replied. "It's not."

I began to think about how it was crazy that before Will, I wouldn't have cared much whether there was a war, but now I do. And to think that before Will, I'd never felt affection for someone in a romantic way. He was amazing, though; how could I not?

I must have been blushing, because Will looked over at me and said, "Nico, are you okay?"

"W-what?" I met his sky blue eyes. "Oh, yeah, I'm fine."

"Sure?" he said, the worry returning to his eyes.

"Yeah, I'm sure." Does he actually care about me? Don't be stupid, it's just in a friendly way.

"Okay, good," he said. "Just making sure."

I could've sworn that his cheeks reddened slightly, but it was probably just wishful thinking.

~~~~~~~~~

Reyna was, unsurprisingly, waiting for me when I returned to the Underworld.

"Nico, you can't keep running off like that," she said, as I approached. "What if an angel finds you and manages to hurt you?"

An angel's already found me, I thought. But he definitely won't hurt me.

Out loud, I said, "First of all, it's okay, I wasn't even gone that long, and secondly, I can kill an angel before it can touch me, if I want to."

Reyna sighed. "True. It's just that I worry."

"You don't have to," I replied. "I can take care of myself."

"Yeah, yeah, I know," she said. "Though, you should stay here tomorrow. We think the war's going to start any day now, and we need you."

"There's other people who can fight," I protested.

"I mean, I need your mindset," she said. "A lot of people are supporting Octavian's ideas. And we really don't need any more dead angels. Too many are dying, and it's affecting the humans."

"Fine. But don't expect me to be happy about it," I said, sighing.

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Woah, look at that, the chapter's not super short. Actually, though, it is shorter than usual and for that - plus the mediocre ending - I apologize. One more chapter, and then things will finally start to get interesting. Anyways, sorry for taking so long to update and I hope you enjoyed this chapter.