Death Bound

Chapter Four

A half-blood usually had nightmares or visions when they slept, but Nico had no dreams at all. His sleep was peaceful, for the first time in years, maybe ever. When he opened his eyes again, feeling much better, it was to the smell of food. His stomach rumbled loudly and his mouth, which was feeling a bit odd and tingly, watered. He sat up slowly, expecting pain, and was shocked when there wasn't so much as a tug on his muscles.

The girl who had rescued him was staring off into the white space. She had messy hair done up in sloppy pigtails, but most of her dirty-blonde (the color, not dirty itself, though it was) had fallen out and hung around her shoulders. She was wearing a black t-shirt that clung to her, and he could see a scar on her right arm, just below her shoulder. Her eyes had been bright gold yesterday, but today had faded to a green-yellow. She had pale skin, a slender figure, and a slightly up-turned nose.

"Good... morning or evening... Sleepyhead." she greeted, pausing awkwardly at the 'morning or evening' part. No way of telling time was annoying.

Nico grunted and saw what she had in her hands. Nothing special, just some beef jerky. It was the original-kind flavor, the cheap stuff you could find at a gas station or on the cashier stands at Wall Mart, but to Nico it tasted like a million dollar steak fit for a king. That could, however, be because it was the first thing he'd eaten in a month. He hadn't even known it was possible to go without food for longer than three days.

He devoured fourteen pieces of jerky before the bag ran out. Zanna didn't even mind tossing him her share. He hardly batted an eyelash as that, too, went into his black-hole of a stomach.

"Okay, so this is me assuming Nico di Angelo is feeling better?" she grinned.

"Much. I feel better than I have in a while." He nodded.

"I'll just take that as a conformation that pouring nectar on your lips and making sure you didn't choke on it while you slept helped then." Zanna laughed, and Nico's eyebrows shot up.

"You did what?"

"Well, you wouldn't drink it any other way. You needed to rest, and we needed to leave. Honestly, half the time I thought you might have been half-conscious. You swallowed the nectar. I didn't give you a lot, didn't want to overdose you, but it seems to have helped."

"Oh. Thanks." Nico found himself once more having to be grateful to this strange girl whom had appeared out of no where. His eyebrows furrowed at that realization.

"Nico? What's up?" Zanna asked. She had stood up and dusted off her pants. "You ready to go?"

Nico stood as well, feeling a surge of happiness when his legs didn't shake. "Uh, yeah." They started off along a path that seemed to have cropped up as Nico slept. It was made of jet-black stone, but it was perfectly straight and clean and neat, as though it had never been walked before.

"Okay... you look like you're thinking about something. What's going on?" Zanna asked after a while, her eyes scanning Nico's face.

Nico met her eyes warily. "You're a daughter of Thanatos." he said. Zanna looked a bit hurt.

"Well, yeah. Please don't tell me you're going to not trust me because of that. I did just save your life." She mumbled, looking away.

"No, its not that. It's... where'd you come from?"

Zanna looked at him again, confused. "What do you mean?"

"You weren't at Camp Half-Blood. You weren't at Camp Jupiter. You're too powerful and too old to have survived alone, and even if you had I'm sure I would have come across you when I moved around the world. You're too potent in power to miss. Where did you come from?" Nico explained slowly, as if thinking it over while they walked. Zanna fiddled with the edge of her torn short shorts.

She didn't answer for a while, and when she did her voice was quiet and subdued, all humor gone. "I've been here."

Nico didn't understand. "What?"

"I've been here. The Path of Death." she murmured. Nico couldn't believe her.

"Why?" he queried.

Zanna looked at him. "I'm the daughter of Death. I wouldn't fit in up there, not that Daddy-dear gave me a chance. See, he didn't want it to be common knowledge I existed, because then people like Gaea would use me like they used you, and since I'm alone... well, he didn't like that idea. He didn't really want me either, and didn't want me getting in his way, so he stuck me here. I've been here since my mom died - ironic, I know, Mommy got taken by the thing she fell in love with – when I was six." She sighed.

"That sucks. Seriously." Nico told her. There was another silence that stretched uncomfortably.

"It could have been worse... at least I got to meet some... people." Zanna tilted her head to the side, sending her hair falling over her shoulder. Their steps were in sync now, a loud crunch, snap, crunch, snap on the stones.

Nico looked at her quizzically, though he was feeling awfully uncomfortable. He didn't have many conversations, at least not with people he had just met, and certainly not about the past.

Zanna saw his look and clarified: "Sometimes, ghost-like spirit things come through here. Its not often, maybe once or twice every couple of months, but its someone to talk with. Usually they're people who died from something like cancer, so they died slowly, piece by piece. By talking to them... well, I could remind myself that it could have always been worse..." she trailed off, blushing slightly. "But, anyways, enough of my sob story. You're the son of my Daddy's boss. Hows that?"

"Sucks. People outcast me. You learn to deal with it, though, and at least I can interact with kids like me. You've been alone what... six years?"

Zanna held up seven bandaged fingers with a twisted smile. Nico shook his head and his dirty hair fell in his eyes. As he brushed it away with his fingers, he remembered why Zanna's were bandaged: frost-bitten phalanges. "How are your fingers?" he asked.

Zanna shrugged and held up her left hand for him to see. "Not bad."

He nodded and they continued the walk in silence.

The ground on either side of the path, Nico noticed, fell away into absolute nothing. Blackness that had no bottom or top. There was only this path, and as far as he could see it went on for miles and miles and miles. It never turned, or swerved, or even deviated. It was just this.

Nico hated it's perfection, and they walked on.