Chapter Text
“No.“
The word rang trough the throne room like a gunshot.
Hermes’ fingers, which had previously danced over the screen of his caduceus halted and he raised an eyebrow as he looked up at Poseidon.
The Lord of the Sea held his head high, regally, unrelenting. His eyes were as dark as the waters surrounding Charybdis and his glance bored into each and every one of them, while his hands rested on his trident.
A silent threat.
“No?”, Disbelief transformed Zeus’ expression into a deep scowl. “What do you mean, “No”?”
“The meaning is quite obvious, don’t you think?”
Hermes exchanged a look with Apollo, who drew his eyebrows together. Slowly, he took his headphones off and sat up straighter in his throne.
This was supposed to be an obvious decision. Quickly finished, making a debate unnecessary.
Poseidon was the last one to vote, and no one had expected him to disagree and cause any delay to the end of the meeting at this point.
Dionysus had already opened a new can of diet coke; Hephaistos’ consciousness was halfway back at one of his workshops and Ares had been busy sharpening his knifes with a bored expression, but now, their heads snapped up once again, eyes bright and alert.
Even Hades leaned forward and silently watched his brothers, his face a façade of serenity, but his strained hands, which tightened around his throne almost unnoticeably betrayed his discomfort.
It had started with a dream.
Gods rarely got them, and when they did, they were in full control. But this time was different.
This time, it was a message from the Fates without the usual vagueness they liked to hide their meanings in. They couldn’t have been more specific if they had tried.
“To achieve a better future, one must look at the past,” the whispery voices of the Fates still rang in Hermes’ ears, so clearly, as if they’d sit right behind him. If he didn’t know any better, he would say their usual neutral tone was twisted by impatience.
Their yarn had been almost luminous and changed it’s colour from an electric blue, to an orange, a purple and a blinding gold, in an eternal cycle. He had seen their threads hundreds of times before, but for a reason Hermes was unaware of, that specific yarn had been almost hypnotic. He couldn’t tear his eyes away. “An ancient spell, a window to the past, the insight of the demigods, who shed blood in the last two wars. Thoughts and feelings completely revealed will enlighten the necessary path.”
“Thought and feelings completely revealed.”
If that meant what Hermes thought it would mean, then it became rather obvious why Poseidon was so vehemently against it.
Normally he wouldn’t care for the possible damage their actions might cause, the mental issues, that came with listening into someone else’s head, but this most certainly would involve Percy Jackson.
His favourite son.
“We don’t even know if your son is going to have a major part in this yet,” Zeus said, his voice shaking with barely restrained anger. “This could be about any of the half-bloods.”
“Please”, Poseidon scoffed. “If we’re going to watch and hear about the last five years, who else but Percy is it going to be about? If you forgot, he was the one who defended Olympus from father.”
Fond pride was underneath the determination in his tone, the same one they always heard when he talked about Percy, and which had been the subject of several heated discussions between the Olympians. Especially the eldest brothers.
Zeus’ eye twitched. “How could I forget, when you remind us of that at every possible opportunity?”
“But he’s right,” Artemis noted. She had been watching the two of them like a hawk, silently, and observing, but she could tolerate needless arguing even less than the rest of them during a council meeting. Especially a meeting as important as this one. “To think any story about the wars would leave him out would be foolish.”
“It would be more foolish to ignore the Fates. That we’re discussing this in the first place is laughable” Athena’s voice was hard as steel. “A demigod’s privacy is nothing compared to the fates wishes.”
Poseidon’s hands tightened around his trident. “If you think I will let you put my son trough this, after everything that happened to him already...”
“The Fates demand it!”
“Percy walked trough Tartarus to defeat Gaia,” cold fury filled Poseidon’s voice and Hermes couldn’t help but flinch. “Do you honestly think I’m going to make him relive that?”
Silence snuffed the discussion out, like candlelight.
Tartarus. Right.
Hermes still had a hard time coming to terms with that.
Few had ever ventured into its depth, and on the rare occasion that one of the elder gods talked about it, they kept their stories as short as possible. How two demigods, three with Nico di Angelo, managed to survive and remain sane was still clouded in mystery.
The thought of Percy being down there… Hermes had to admit, he felt his throat tighten at that image. He swallowed.
Zeus had paled and leaned back in his throne, the same defensive stance he always took when the subject of the pit came up, while Athena froze, her eyes darting from one of them to the other, processing a million thoughts all at once. She was, without a doubt thinking about her own daughter.
Hades’ face remained neutral, but now he clutched the edges of his throne so tightly his knuckles became white, and the expressions of the other gods were twisted with discomfort.
Tartarus had become something of a forbidden subject to them.
Bad enough that the demigods had fought their war for them for a second time in two years, but that two of them had travelled trough Tartarus to achieve Victory, and succeeded at that, was more than an embarrassment. It was close to an outrage.
Especially since those demigods had been Percy Jackson and Annabeth Chase.
Again.
Zeus cleared his throat and when he spoke, it sounded like he forced himself to stay calm. “I’ll agree with you that some of those half bloods have already been trough a lot. Nevertheless,” he eyed Poseidon,” as Athena has already said, we do not get to ignore the Fates based on the negative impact it might have on mere mortals.” His expression became cold. “And if you have forgotten, brother, Percy Jackson is currently nothing more than that.”
Poseidon rose from his throne. “Zeus,” he rumbled warningly, and Hermes clutched his caduceus tighter, his shoulders tense.
From the corners of his eyes, he could see Apollo slowly reaching for his bow, and Demeter’s posture becoming stiff, her lips pinched together into a thin line.
He half expected Poseidon to attack, so intensely was he staring at his brother, but before anything more could happen, a new, soft voice started to speak.
“It might help him.”
Hermes’s eyebrows drew together.
Poseidon shifted his glare to his oldest sister. “How, in the name of the Fates, would it help him?”
Hestia hesitated. She sat in front of all the thrones on the floor and looked into her fireplace, the dancing flames reflecting in her sad eyes. No one interrupted. It was rare for her to be present during a council meeting, much less to speak up, but when she did, her siblings usually listened.
“He doesn’t sleep. At night he sits at the beach and stares up at the stars, sometimes for hours”, she sounded hollow, and frustration flickered over Poseidon’s face. He clenched his jaw. “The next day, he pretends that nothing is wrong and deflects when his friends try to approach the subject.”
She looked up at them, her expression transformed by worry.
“We have no idea what happened to him, Nico and Annabeth while they were down there. Or what they went trough over the last four years. Fates, it would surprise me if anyone besides them really knows.”
An uncomfortable knot formed in Hermes’ stomach, which felt dangerously close to concern. He did his best to ignore it.
“Annabeth talks to Thalia when she’s around, or to Grover,” Hestia continued, and every new word felt like a needle in his skin. “Nico talks to Will or Reyna. Percy…,” she stopped and bit her lips, seemingly searching for the right words. “Percy retreats. He pretends that he is okay, but by Fate, he is not. However intrusive, this might be the only way to get him to open up.”
“Involuntarily,” Hermes found himself disagreeing with her.
The attention of the other Olympians shifted to him, and he did his best to look as casual as possible as he looked back at them, an eyebrow raised defensively.
“I voted in favor,” he reminded Zeus, Hera and Athena, before they could even start to argue with him. “I’m simply saying, that we should not delude ourselves. Forcing Percy to reveal his most private thoughts and to relive his worst experiences, will without a doubt, leave scars. Never mind, his physical health. You do remember Hekate’s warning about the spell, don’t you?”
Hestia recoiled and guilt flickered across her face, while Poseidon’s gaze hardened.
The goddess of Magic, together with other minor gods like Iris, Hebe and Ariadne, had received the same dream they had, together with the knowledge of the spell necessary for such an endeavor.
Hekate had stood before them, dressed in her dark robes, the light of her twin torches flickering, as if a wind was blowing trough the room, and explained the possible side effects, that the mixing of past and present might bring with it. One of those, the risk, that previous injuries could resurface once again.
His mouth tasted bitter, and he had to swallow down the wave of protest at the idea.
“And what does that matter to you?” Hera’s voice was cold, and her mouth a hard line. She studied him with scrutiny.
Hermes’ hands tightened around his caduceus. He had to force his voice to remain neutral when he spoke. “Is it wrong of me to worry about a friend?”
“A friend,” her eyes narrowed. “He’s simply a demigod. Friendships with mortals hardly matter here.”
His jaw clenched. “I’m aware of that, Hera,” he managed to press out, and sent the queen of the goddess a glare. “Which is why I voted in favor.”
“Is he just a friend though?” Aphrodite, who had previously been busy checking her nails, interrupted them and sent him a sweet smile, a dangerous glint twinkling in her eyes. “Forgive me my curiosity, Hermes dear, but it sounds to me like you’re starting to see him more as a cousin than a simple friend. I can’t remember the last time you spoke out for a demigod like that. At least, one who wasn’t your own child.”
Typical.
A discussion about the fate of the future left her cold, but as soon as the conversation focused on something like this, she became alerted.
Zeus scoffed. “Don’t be ridiculous.”
“Oh, am I?,” she wrapped a long, raven black curl around one of her fingers. “What do you think, Hermes? Does the thought not lure you?” Her appearance changed into a figure with the familiar blond hair and lively eyes of May Castellan and Hermes was wondering if it was coincidental or if she did it solely to get a reaction out of him.
His fingers twitched.
Acknowledgement.
Heavy weight lied behind that word.
Gods didn’t have DNA. Differently to humans, they technically had no familiar relation to demigods who weren’t their own.
They had little contact even to their own children, so it was rare that any of them spent enough time with another half-blood to form any kind of relation, much less see them as part of their family.
But somehow, because of some stupid, incredulous reason he really didn’t want to explore, Hermes almost hesitated.
“You can change,” Percy’s voice echoed trough his head like so many times before.
They had stood in the wreckage of Olympus, after Kronos’ defeat. The setting sun had dipped below the horizon, dyeing the sky brilliant hues of orange and coloring the eternal city in a golden light.
His jet-black hair had been disheveled, and his orange camp t-shirt ripped, and despite a lack of scars or wounds, the demigod had still looked different from only a few days prior. Tired, but somehow older, and more powerful.
It was easy to confuse him with a minor god nowadays.
“After three thousand years, you think the gods can change their nature?” Hermes remembered himself asking.
Percy’s sea green eyes had looked sharp, and so determined, Hermes had wanted to believe him, despite the millennia of knowing his and his family’s nature. “Yeah, I do.”
He blinked and forced himself out of his thoughts with a light shake of his head.
“Percy and I do get along rather well, don’t we?” He said, trying his best to sound nonchalant when he met the goddess’ gaze again. “But I can assure you Aphrodite, I do not plan on doing such a thing. I’m not that foolish. Besides,” he rolled his eyes. “As much as it flatters me to be the subject of a council meeting, aren’t there more important things to discuss?”
“Again, it shouldn’t even be a subject of discussion,” Athena pressed her lips together into a thin line. “Our own wishes matter hardly anything in comparison.”
The discussion started again around him, and Hermes allowed himself to relax again. He leaned his head against his throne and looked at the ceiling.
Millions of stars blinked in the night and reminded him of his first meeting with the young hero, at the beach of Camp half blood.
Percy had rested his head on his knee and looked out at the ocean. His hair had been ruffled by the salty sea breeze and his brows had been furrowed in thought. Back then, Hermes couldn’t have imagined him as the future Saviour of Olympus and hero, who would one day fight against gods, titans and giants alike.
“Acknowledgement”. He would be lying to himself if he said the idea had never crossed his mind before.
There was no denying that he enjoyed the demigod’s presence on the rare occasion that he spoke to him, but their interactions were too few and far between to make such a possibility reality.
Should he ever get to know him more though… Hermes wished he could deny it, but he knew, that his opinion of Percy would only improve. Dangerously so.
And if they go trough with the Fates plan, - and despite Poseidon’s current disagreement they would have no choice but to do it - … it looked like that would be the case sooner rather than later.
The discussion was going in circles from that point on. With Athena and Zeus insisting they had no choice but do what the Fates wanted, and Poseidon stubborn refusal to agree. But deep down, despite how much he hated the idea, Poseidon knew as well any other god in the throne room, that ignoring the fates would lead to even worse consequences.
In the end, he had no choice but to agree, even if his face darkened even more and the storm, that brewed in his eyes, escalated into wild hurricanes, promising a destruction that left nothing in its wake.
Most gods left the throne room quickly after that.
Hermes lingered a few seconds longer, checking new messages on his caduceus and trying to push all thoughts relating to Percy Jackson in his subconscious.
When he looked up again, he was surprised to find that not everyone had left yet.
Poseidon, and Aphrodite stood next to Hestia in the middle of the room, deep in conversation.
He should have left right then and there, but curiosity and suspicion got the better out of him. There was only one reason he could think of why the goddess of love might want to talk to Poseidon after that mess.
“Others might get to know him as well,” Aphrodite smiled innocently as he joined them. “Amphitrite, Rhode and Triton received the same dream, didn’t they?”
Poseidon’s face hardened. “Do not think me delusional.”
“There is nothing delusional about what you wish, Poseidon.”
“Don’t try to fool me, Aphrodite,” Poseidon’s mouth transformed into a snarl. “I am well aware of Triton’s dislike towards Percy as well as Amphitrite’s and Rhode’s disinterest in him. And I also know about Percy’s wish to remain mortal. No one knows better than me how futile my aim is. For now, and the nearest future at least, it will remain impossible.”
“Impossible,” the goddess of love shuddered, seemingly not bothered by Poseidon’s anger. Her eyes glinted dangerously like she enjoyed whatever game it was; she was playing. “I do hate that word. Too many stories have ended too early because someone believed this lie. They might require sacrifices too grand to do or courage that someone lacks, but nothing is impossible when it comes to love, my old friend. Familial or otherwise.” She winked. “I should know.”
A sense of unease began to grow in Hermes’ stomach.
Poseidon glared at her. “Do I need to remind you, that Triton refuses to even entertain the idea to think of Percy as his brother?”
“Perhaps currently,” she shrugged nonchalantly, as if she wasn’t playing with fire. In some ways, Hermes begrudgingly admired her for that. In others, he wanted to strangle her.
“So suddenly you can see the future,” Poseidon raised an eyebrow. “Do you desire to take the gift of prophecy from Apollo?”
She laughed. “Fates forbid. Seeing the future would ruin all my fun. I do not see conclusions, Poseidon. What I see, are possibilities. No matter how slim they are.”
That made him hesitate.
It took everything Hermes had not to slap his forehead with the palm of his hand.
Zeus would explode, should he hear about this.
Poseidon’s affection for his only demigod child was already bad enough, they didn’t need anyone fueling his resistant hope that Percy would ever accept immortality.
He made it quite clear that he was happy with his life as it currently was.
“You think there is a possibility?” The question was short, voice forcibly calm.
Aphrodite’s smile became sharp. “I see it as clearly as the night sky. As clearly as I saw the love of Justinian to Theodora. Of Achilles to Patroclus. Of Gilgamesh to Enkidu, of Catherine to Potemkin and of Alexander to Hephaestion.”
She sighed wistfully and winked at Hermes. “And I do enjoy a good story about family.”
He wasn’t sure if that last bit was aimed at Poseidon or at him.