Chapter Text
-- Some Time After ---
It wasn’t fair, but that was Death for you. And you’d think Nico would’ve understood that the best, being a harbinger of it himself. Still, his mouth tasted bitter.
“Nico.”
The quiet knocking hadn’t stopped, despite that it’d been at least ten minutes since Nico’s last audible noise. He ignored it though, tuning out the voice as best he could and watching behind a curtained window.
It was late. He could hear crickets. Even still, Nico watched brave demigods sneak past. Whether to sneak in snacks or creatures or friends into their cabins, it didn’t really matter. Usually, Nico wouldn’t have found watching these people interesting… except now he recognized a few. It was in their eyes.
“Nico, you’re going to have to come out of there sometime… Please?”
Ever since the Nightmares, Nico could easily pick out who had been affected by them. It was the same as determining who was close to death or who had recently died, but he could lock those powers away, he could ignore them. He couldn’t change the way someone looked, even if they wore it on their faces..
A sort of hollowness. Shame.
Nico could empathize, for gods’ sake, the kids lived their worst nightmares and had it exposed in front of everyone. Apollo campers teamed up with some Hypnos kids and held a small therapeutic gettogether around lunch every other day now. Gods, he never went.
“Listen… I know it’s been hard on you, it’s been hard on me too..” There was a soft ‘thump’ sound as Will rested his head against the cabin door. “I can’t find Lou Ellen anywhere, and.. A-and I can’t… ho-hold it in much longer…”
Nico lifted his head from where he’d buried it in his arms and glanced at the door, the soft ‘thump’ing noise slowly continuing and getting louder as the blonde added more strength into it. Nico sniffed and made his way to the door, opening it just as Will fell forward. He caught him wordlessly.
The blonde had tear streaks down his face and puffy, pink eyes. He was still in his pajamas, having snuck out only an hour before last call for lights out. He hiccuped onto Nico’s shoulder, the younger demigod reaching behind him to close the door again.
Day fifteen... Nico kept the thought to himself, maneuvering his boyfriend until they both sat on the bottom bunk of the bed.
The first day… after had been a rough one. Cleanup and rebuilding was of course a priority, but they had gone about it with solemn expressions and whispered voices. Hae Won and Tadashi discussed the most efficient ways to patch up the cabins that had been clawed and pried apart. Dustin pulled up the foxgloves, which had withered all at once that morning. Clef and Lou Ellen found privacy in the big house, though Nico noticed the rims of red under both of their eyes, Lou Ellen’s fingers tightly grasping Clef’s sleeve and her eyes wide and her face slack. It hurt him to see her like that, but he couldn’t imagine what she must’ve been feeling.
Nico couldn’t help anyway. He disappeared, thankful that he had healed enough to shadowtravel short distances without popping a nose bleed. He hid in the strawberry fields in the day, then in the southern woods at night. Avoiding.. Well, everyone. Everything. … Will.
He found plates of food by his cabin door, and he’d eat what he could, but mostly he pushed the food around until it was taken. Several times, Reyna or Hazel or Piper would come to his cabin. He’d listen to them voice their concerns through the cabin door, but he never answered. Will came, too, usually with the light hearted suggestion that they join the campfire, or go stargazing… but Nico would choke on his own voice until Will resignedly walked away…
This day was different, he saw. Nico stroked the blonde curls from Will’s face slowly, tucking what he could behind his ear and leaving the rest to fall. He murmured in Italian; nonsensical things, recipes, nursery rhymes.. But it seemed to work, Will’s cries slowly calming into small sniffs and hiccups.
“S-Sorry..” he muttered, furiously rubbing at his eyes and pulling away from Nico’s hold. “I know you don’t wa-want to see anyone, I’l go--”
Nico grabbed his hand before he could stand, shaking his head. He.. didn’t want that. He didn’t want to be.. Alone… anymore… He couldn’t even recall what had made him want that in the first place. He knew he was hurting Will yet he still…
He tugged the boy back, interlocking their fingers and setting his head on Will’s shoulder.
“I’m sorry,” he whispered after a lengthy silence. He kicked his feet and let them swing over the side of the bunk, keeping his eyes down. “I’m sorry for shutting everyone... you out for so long… I don’t know what I was thinking I just--”
“It’s okay,” Will answered softly, nose pressed to Nico’s hair. “You were grieving, we all were--”
“But I wasn’t there for you when I should have been.” Nico bit his lip. “I-I was being selfish, you had to hold it in for two weeks , Will, I should have been with you, I’m so sorry.”
He felt Will nod a little, breath hitching. Nico ran his thumb over Will’s trembling hand, swallowing back the guilt he’d let build up those last couple of weeks. Of course it had to have been tough for Will, why wouldn’t it have been? They had both been close to… She’d done quite a bit for them, didn’t she…
Will drew in a shaky breath, trying to calm his nerves. After a few, he seemed more relaxed, and finally told Nico all of his thoughts and feelings, voice breaking any time he said her name, eyes casting themselves downward at the mention of how many kids were seriously injured, how many didn’t make it due to the extent of their injuries, how many suffered psychological trauma and confessed feeling that the Nightmares were still chasing them.
“You did all you could,” Nico would answer softly, tucking blonde locks away from ocean eyes. Will wouldn’t reply to that, only swallow his arguments and nod with a faraway look.
“We should have known right away,” Will’s voice broke the lulling silence that had stretched between them. “That something wasn’t right. What sort of Goddess just… happened to be in the wood and happened to see her and happened to--”
“But we didn’t know,” Nico replied easily. “How could we have? When she seemed so genuine, when we just wanted to have our friend back? We were tricked and betrayed, hardly a historical happenstance in the world of demigods…”
“I hate this.”
“I know, me too.”
And for a while, they just sat, content to be in each other’s company. Will was the first to fall asleep, and the sheer force of exhaustion he’d given off made Nico wonder how many nights it’d been since the boy closed his eyes. A few at least…
He settled in next to Will, remembering his first few days in the infirmary. The beginning of… of them . Of all of it. Nico was asleep moments later.
--
Lou Ellen was there for breakfast the next morning, though she didn’t eat much. She would poke at the eggs and tip the bacon over, but never actually put a morsel to her mouth. She had her knees drawn to her chest on the bench, and her chin tucked on top, her gaze rather hazy and dull. Will and Nico sat with her, on the opposite bench, quietly.
Will had run into Lou Ellen only a few days after. She’d been with Clef and Dustin at the time, helping out at the infirmary. Will had only walked in to see if Nico had been around, but he saw Lou Ellen and felt his chest tighten and suddenly he was just staring and stammering, feeling like he had to be careful around her, eggshells and all that. Lou Ellen noticed immediately, growling and throwing the bandages she’d been rolling to the floor. The door had slammed behind her, Clef had winced. Dustin pet Will’s shoulder awkwardly. Hae Won swatted him over the head.
“Well, idiot, go after her.”
“She.. she doesn’t want to see--”
Hae Won lifted her clipboard again and Will never ran faster.
He found her by the lake, sitting on the dock with a small pile of stones beside her along with her shoes. She dangled her feet over the edge, just barely missing the water, and lobbed stones across gracelessly, waiting for that satisfying plunk! before throwing another. She stiffened as Will sat next to her, letting the silence between them grow.
“Lou--”
“Will, I really don’t want to talk about this..” Lou Ellen sighed, sounding weary to her very bones. She watched the water ripple with the breeze, crossing her arms. “I’m really… really tired of talking about this…”
He nodded. He could understand that, but…
“I think she cared about you,” he found himself saying softly. “I’d watch her sometimes. She looked at you a lot.. Like… like you were something she’d never seen before..”
“...Really?”
“Yea.. you were always looking away, but I could see it. She cared about you.”
Lou Ellen rested her fingers over another stone, feeling it’s smooth surface. She let out another shaky sigh, gripping the stone tightly.
“I.. I cared about her, too.” She threw it. It plunked .
“Oh, obviously.”
Lou Ellen sputtered. “Wh-what? What do you mean, ‘obviously’?”
Will put his hands behind his head, leaning back to lay down with a yawn. “I mean, it was obvious you liked her. As soon as you saw her, you were practically making up excuses to be close to her.”
“I-I!!... I was not --”
“Is this what it feels like talking to me? Was I this oblivious about Nico, or are you just a special case?”
“ Will! ”
“No seriously, do I look at Nico as googly eyed as you looked at Darcy or was I just imagining things?”
With a flustered huff, Lou Ellen shoved his leg half-heartedly, cheeks and ears bright red.
“Shutup..” she mumbled, unable to hide how her lips quirked up at the corners. “She was…” her face fell again. “She… wa-was…” The sentence died on her tongue and she swallowed it, pulling in her legs crossing her arms over her knees.
Will sat up again, gently leaning against her until his head landed on her shoulder.
“Yea, she was..” Will gulped, letting the moment last a second longer before leaning away again and casting his gaze to the water.
“You know,” he started. “I was there.. When she... “ he gestured vaguely in front of him. “ Left … she told me to tell you something, and I told her she could just tell you when she got back… but…”
Lou Ellen nodded, lifting a thumb and beginning to chew anxiously on the nail, waiting.
Will knew there’d be no point in delaying the message, but still he hesitated. Maybe it was the hopeful, sad look in Lou Ellen’s eyes, or how the lake had gone eerily still, how his voice sounded so loud over the silence that stretched between them, but whatever it was, he forced it to the back of his mind and then let it go.
And at first, nothing happened. Lou Ellen turned her face back to the water, expression still lingering and thumbnail tapping slowly on her lower lip. She nodded a few times, and suddenly stood, clambering to grab as many stones as she could hold. Then she screamed. She shouted.. Hurtful things. Things Will knew she could never actually mean.
Each stone splashed in the water and sank, and when she was out, she just kept screaming, hot, angry tears spilling down her chin.
It took a few minutes and several hushed and (hopefully) soothing words for Will to calm Lou Ellen down, and even then her crying made her incoherent. She simply slumped against his chest, sniffling and cursing. And Will pet her hair in the way he knew she liked, and did his best to be comforting-- talking about nonsense, old stories, memories of when they were younger.
She had stopped crying when he started in on a classic Stoll pranking mishap, chuckling because it was one she had heard before, but Will prided himself on how she laughed softly despite that. And Will gushed over Nico and the cute faces he makes when he sleeps, and Lou Ellen smiles and calls him a dork, squishing his cheeks together, laughing when Will still tries to talk though he wasn’t making any sense anymore.
--
It was day thirty-one when Nico felt like he should at least honor Darcy’s memory with a funeral. Most everyone who had been there that day had shown up, the exceptions being anyone who was too injured to leave the infirmary or those that suffered the mental toll of being attacked and possibly hurt by their nightmares. Nico didn’t blame them, and he harbored no hard feelings. No one did. (Curiously, however, D’Elormie and Annabel Lee were not in attendance.)
It was a simple ceremony. A patch of marigolds had been spotted growing beside the lake where the foxgloves had once been, and they held it around that. Clef quietly admitted she felt somewhat responsible. Nico watched Lou Ellen take her hand and reassure her that she wasn’t.
He had just taken Will’s hand after the ceremony had ended when he heard a small voice cautiously call his name. He turned his head.
Dillon looked pale, even for a ghost, his grassy eyes sunken into his skull with dark bruises colored around them. Nico was sure if he lifted his shirt, he would see ribs. He wondered how a ghost could’ve gotten in such a state, and asked as much. Dillon explained with a breathless voice that he could only survive so long as a ghost within his mother’s, Lyssa’s, palace.
“With… with her gone, I-I can’t find… I don’t kn-know…” He slumped his shoulders, defeated. “And without… Darce, I just don’t know if I… if I can…” He made a vague gesture with his skelton-like hands.
Go on, Nico finished. He doesn’t know if he can go on without her.
Dillon swallowed. “I’ll become mindless. Like a ghoul. A.. A phantom... Not alive but not… not dead either. I don’t know what you must think of me, after all of this, after what… Erecura made me do and after she used my image as a pawn, but... “
“You want to be put at peace,” Nico finished, out loud this time. Startled by a voice other than his own, Dillon jumped, but nodded vigorously, eyes expressing gallons of gratitude.
“ Please … I’m.. I’m so tired .”
Will gave Nico’s hand a small squeeze, quietly inquiring if he’d be alright. Nico shooed him with a nod and a squeeze back, and Will left the two.
It was a simple task, but Nico still fought the knot forming in his throat. He began praying silently to his father, wishing Dillon’s soul well on the journey blah blah blah blah…
“Thank you.” Dillon whispered. Nico looked at him inquiringly. “What for?”
“For this. For everything you’ve done for me and my sister… you’re a good person, Nico di Angelo.” His Irish accent was a touch heavier than Darcy’s had been, so Nico’s name sounded strange rolling off his tongue, but he grinned at the effort made.
He reunited with Will minutes later, and if his eyes were watery, Will didn’t say anything.
--
Months later and the air had gotten cooler, inviting more clouds and more showers as summer slowly but surely prepared to break for autumn. Nico and Will were spending their afternoon hiding from their teams in capture the flag, enjoying each other’s company by the lake.
“Oh, come on, please?”
“Will no, I’m not riding in a stupid canoe with you.”
“Why not!”
“Because last time you tipped us over trying to play a guitar and paddle at the same time.”
Will reached over from where he sat, hooking his arm around Nico’s shoulders. “I promise I won’t this time.”
“Uh huh, forgive me if I don’t actually believe that.”
With a guffaw noise of offense, Will leaned close enough to slide his fingers up Nico’s ribcage, making the boy giggle and shove at him, though not as hard as he could have. Nico was subjected to the torture of his boyfriend’s fingers, raking at his sides and in all of his soft spots, until he had to beg for mercy amidst his laughter.
Finally relenting, Will sat back with a broad smile. Nico pushed him over with a loud, “ Idiota! ”, all the while a flustered, flushed, beautiful mess.
“You know,” Will drawled. “Just last week, like eight different campers came in with reports of seeing a man walk out of this… very… lake?” He inched his face ever closer to Nico’s, unimpressed/amused glare.
“Are you trying to scare me, Solace? Me ?”
Will held his hands out to the side. “Why, you feelin’ spooked, di Angelo?” He asked with a smirk and a wink. Nico rolled his eyes and snorted.
The wind got a fraction of a degree chillier, and Will watched his Italian boyfriend shiver at it’s touch. He felt his chest swell with affection, and he couldn’t help but kiss him chastely on his pinkening cheek. Nico seemed shocked then, eyes wide with a cute, confused expression.
Pushing himself to his feet, Will offered down a hand. “We should go, huh? Wouldn’t want you to catch a cold, right?”
Nico stared after him for a second, drinking in the blonde’s appearance. His freckles were fading, but still dotted his skin deliciously. The glint of laughter ever-present in his ocean blue eyes still twinkled with every smirk. Will was beautiful and soft, he was sunlight and guitar hums, he was violin strings and strawberry cake and--
Nico finally grabbed his hand. “Oh, I don’t think I’d mind.”