Disclaimer: I am not Rick Riordan. I don't own any works credited to his name. I'm not Cassandra Clare, either, and I don't own any works credited to her name, either. I'm simply just me, and I only own works credited to my own name. Check out my profile if you'd like to see those! (Fangirl Queendom)

Previously on More Than A Friend:

She moved so that she was straddling me, her knees on either side of my hips. I sucked in a breath when her lips landed on my chest.

"What, um," I swallowed hard. "What are you doing?"

She traced a path up my throat, along my jaw, and to my ear with her lips. Her fingers traced lightly across my chest. "I love you, Sage Tucker." Her voice was low. "I love you, and I am not going to allow myself to leave this life without ever having been with you."

She pressed her lips to mine, and I wrapped my arms around her back, pulling her flat against me.

I woke up to someone rapping lightly on the bedpost. I opened my eyes and lifted myself onto my elbows. "Yeah?" I asked, voice heavy from sleep.

"Hey, Sage." It was Whit's best friend, and Dustin's cousin's wife, Andrea. So, technically, she could be considered the cousin of all my cousins. "We all got in at an odd hour last night, but why don't you come say good morning to everyone? Some of us haven't seen you almost since you became immortal. That, and some of them have never met you, but would like to meet the so-called god of the family. Mostly my father-in-law, Eric, he doesn't really believe in all that."

"Where's Eleos?" I asked. While Andrea was talking, I had realized she was no longer beside me.

"She's already come down." Andrea told me. "She was hungry, got herself some food. I think she's in the bathroom, now."

"Oh." I said. "I thought she'd left for a minute. Without saying bye."

"She said she was gonna have to leave soon, so you might want to get yourself up and downstairs." Andrea told me, turning to leave.

Once she'd left, I got up and threw on a pair of jeans and a t-shirt. Then I went downstairs myself.

I was greeted by a chorus of 'Hey, Sage' and 'Hello'. Everyone had managed to fit into the dining room, living room, and kitchen, somehow. There were alot of people in the family, and the house may have been large, but it wasn't extremely so.

"Sage, how have you been? I haven't seen my son in awhile!" My mom exclaimed when she saw me, coming over to give me a hug.

"Hey, mom." I said, hugging her back. "I like the hair."

"Thanks." She said, touching a hand to her hair. "Orianne touched it up for me."

"She's good at that." I responded.

"Course I am, idiot. I run and work in a salon." Orianne said teasingly, stepping up beside me.

"So you're the 'god' who forced us all here on such short notice and for an undetermined but long amount of time?" A voice asked. I turned around, and it wasn't hard to tell that this was Andrea's father-in-law.

"Hello, Eric. Hey, were you going to eat that?" I asked sarcastically. He glanced down at the plate he was carrying, looking shocked as his sandwich melted into a puddle of darkness that disappeared after a moment.

"Sage, there's no need to be rude." My mom scolded.

"Sorry." I said sheepishly. I waved my hand, and his sandwich reformed. He still looked shocked.

"Why don't you go say hi to everyone? Introduce yourself to the people you haven't met, and greet family who you haven't visited in awhile. And explain the situation." My mom suggested.

An hour later, I'd greeted everyone. It took so long because of the amount of people in the family, and because I'd stopped and talked to at least half of them.

Also an hour later, Eleos hadn't yet left. I noticed she stayed in the living room, sitting on the couch, legs pulled up under her, staring into space and picking at a blanket wrapped around her shoulders. She didn't want to leave just as much as I didn't want her to go.

Done with greeting everyone, I went over and sat beside her. She didn't notice until I gently set my hand on her knee. She jumped a little. "Hey." I said quietly.

"Hey." She answered, voice just as quiet. "I should leave soon."

"Stay with me for the day." I said.

"Sage-" She hesitated.

"This'll be your last chance to hang out for what could be a long time. Hang out with me today, everyone will be fine here for a day, and then you can go to Aphrodite's place." I suggested. "Please, Eleos."

She looked really conflicted, not knowing what to do. Then she made up her mind. "Where do you propose we go?" She asked.

"I've got a couple ideas." I told her.

~Eleos's POV~

We spent the day in a park. We hung out, talked, laughed, messed around, had fun. There might also have been a little bit of making out, but we tried to keep that to a minimum, as we were out in public.

We had a mini picnic for lunch, with food bought from a food truck parked on the side of the road. I used my middle name when ordering, as I'd been doing all day, because we didn't want any of this getting back to my enemy, just in case. We sat down in the grass in the area we'd been hanging out, over by the trees and next to the pond, and we talked and laughed and ate.

About half an hour after we were done, I got up to get rid of the trash and to go to the bathroom in the little building by the entrance of the park. I told Sage I'd be right back and he nodded.

When I got back, I stopped about fifteen feet away. "Sage, toss me the ball." I called. We had a tennis ball, we'd found it on the ground, and we'd been throwing it around and at each other.

He tossed it to me, and I caught it, but frowned at the weight. It wasn't the tennis ball. I looked down at the object in my hands.

It was an apple.

"What-" I stopped speaking abruptly. "Sage?"

When I looked back up at him, he was in front of me, down on one knee, a little box in his hands open to reveal a silver ring set with a gem that shifted colors. I let out a soft gasp.

"Sage?" I asked. A tear snaked it's way down my cheek.

"I love you with all of my heart and soul. And nothing is going to ever change that, because nothing could change the fact that you are you. You'll always be your unique, caring, kind, fiery, beautiful self. And I'll always love you for that." He started. "Will you make me the happiest being in the universe and do me the honor of being mine? Eleos, will you marry me?"

"Sage, you know I have to leave soon..." I protested weakly. Another tear dripped off my face.

"That won't change anything at all. Where you are will never change how much I love you." He told me. "So, Eleos, will you marry me?"

"Yes." I said. "Yes, I would love to marry you." I threw my arms around his neck and hugged him tight. He hugged me back. When I pulled away, he slid the ring onto my hand, and I admired it as it turned a deep sapphire blue and stayed that way.

"So, I say we go do some walking around and window shopping, maybe some real shopping, and then we go out and go for a fancy dinner." Sage suggested.

"I say that's a wonderful plan." I told him. He laughed and linked his arm through mine, and we left the park.

We did end up doing some shopping, though we had to change our ages to look nineteen, because it would be odd for sixteen year olds to be there. We picked out matching wedding rings, simple little silver bands, but the guy working there was a son of Hecate, and he magically linked them for us.

He told us the enchantment worked differently for every couple, but that we'd find how it worked eventually. He never even realized we were gods, just that we could see through the mist because we saw his weapon.

After getting the rings, we went to dinner. We dressed up fancy, looked great, and had a fun time.

And after dinner, we went and had a wedding. It was small, and simple, but we didn't need anything big. Hera herself acted as the priest, because it was a wedding and so she knew about it, and she offered to do it for us. We accepted, figuring it'd probably be considered more legal up on Olympus if we had the goddess of marriage do it, rather than a mortal.

Sage wore a suit that he picked out at a shop while I was picking out my wedding dress from a shop beside it. My dress was rather simple, strapless and reaching to my ankles. I wore a pair of white flats with it. My hair was down, falling in loose waves, and I wore no makeup.

We went out for ice cream after the ceremony. He had chocolate, I had vanilla. We walked around the park while we ate, talking and laughing and looking up at the stars, all the while holding hands. A group of people were playing music quite loudly, and so we danced by the pond to end our day, dancing in the same area we'd spent most of the day.

~Sage's POV~

When we got back to the farm, we flashed directly to my room, so we could change. We decided not to outright tell anyone, to keep it from reaching the wrong ears. And because we just wanted it to just be our own thing that no one else needed to know about for awhile.

I just threw on some sweatpants, but Eleos didn't have any clothing here, so she borrowed some of my older sweatpants, still a little big on her, and a soft button down shirt that was big on her, which she wore open over a tank top she borrowed from Orianne. When I told her she looked cute, she blushed madly.

We went downstairs to talk to people and just hang out. She decided she could stay until the next morning, but she really would have to actually leave, so as not to put everyone in danger.

When we got downstairs, my mom came over to us. "How was your day out?" She asked us.

"It was fun." I answered. "How were things back here?"

"Just fine. Normal, boring day, except with a ton of people, half of which I don't even know but tried to get to know, seeing as I'm hosting them in my home." She said, waving a hand.

She glanced down at Eleos's hands, where Eleos was playing with the rings, twisting them around under the long sleeves. "Can I see your left hand?" My mom asked her.

Eleos froze for a moment, but I smiled at her and she extended her hand to my mother slowly. My mom picked up her hand and looked at the gem on the ring I'd given her. "Dark blue." She observed. "It was always yellow for me, around Liam."

"What?" Eleos asked.

"The ring's been passed down through my family for generations upon generations." Mom told her. "A son might receive it and give it to his future partner, or a daughter might receive it and give it to a future child, but it is always passed down. My mother gave it to me, the middle child of five."

"Mom gave it to me on my sixteenth birthday. I was a little too preoccupied with worrying about literally everything that happened that day, so I didn't ask any questions. I asked a little about it later on, though, when I got curious." I told Eleos, slipping an arm around her. She leaned into me.

"The ring is very important. Not just to this family, not just for sentimentality. It is a reminder of hope, that there is hope, and that there will be a better day to come. Take care of it and remember all that it stands for." Mom said. "My mother gave it to me during a bad time in my life, and I gave it to Sage when he seemed to give up on things." I looked down at the ground. I hadn't been my best self when I'd been made Tartarus. I'd been distraught over the death of my cousin, over meeting my brother, over killing my brother, over the entire war and everything I saw on the way as we were all dragged up.

"I think this is the perfect time, then." Eleos murmured. "I could really use some hope, right now. What with Athena, my enemy, Aliya, and everything else. I can only hope, now, that they do not figure out more than just that I am corporeal once again. That they do not realize who I really am, and go after my mortal family. I could not bear it if they got hurt." She rubbed a finger over the gem, repeating the action multiple times as she stared down at it.

"I think we could all do with a bit of hope in our lives." My mom said setting a hand on Eleos's shoulder for a moment. "Some more than others." She turned and went to go talk to her sister-in-law, Whitney.

Later, I was still awake, unable to sleep. I was laying beside Eleos, just watching her face as she slept. She seemed peaceful.

But then there was a look of horror on her face, and she shot up, gasping for breath, tears falling down her face. I sat up beside her, grabbing hold of her flailing wrists to keep her from hurting herself or me. "Eleos, what's wrong, baby?" I asked. "What happened?"

"No." She gasped. "No, no, no, no. No, we have to go check, we have to go check to make sure he's alive. They can't have gotten to him. They can't!"

"Eleos, it was just a nightmare." I told her gently.

"It was just a nightmare about Aliya, too, and look how that turned out!" She half-yelled.

"Alright, we can go check on whoever." I said. "But we have to be quick, and quiet about it, okay?"

"Okay." She nodded. "I'll flash us to his apartment."

So, this chapter is about five hundred words short, but I want to keep the next piece all together and I don't actually know how long it's going to be. So, here's chapter nine!

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