Chapter 9:
"We didn't realize what the curse meant until that night," Grace said as she finished telling Nico about Aubrey. "We were trying to figure out what the prophesy meant and Aubrey was getting more and more frustrated; the next thing we knew, there was a monster attacking us," Grace paused, sounding unsure about whether she should continue or not. Nico's head was spinning, but he tried to keep his calm façade and motioned for Grace to speak. The next words out of her mouth however, had Nico wishing he hadn't. "Turns out, it wasn't a monster," Grace's leg bounced up and down repeatedly, a nervous habit of hers Nico had noticed almost instantly after meeting her. "It was Aubrey," Grace sighed, "She had transformed into some…creature or something. She was unrecognizable; she was just clawing everything and looked like some sort of nightmarish monster hybrid." Grace took a shaky breath, and allowed Caleb to take over.
"Grace and I weren't able to restrain her without hurting her; to be honest, neither of us wanted to risk hurting her; we knew that wasn't our Aubrey," Caleb spoke softly, "We were lucky that Milton came back when he did; he played music on his pan flute, a 'song of healing', he said, and was able to change Aubrey back." Nico let out a breath he didn't realize he had been holding and ran his fingers through his hair. "Is there anything else?" Nico prayed there wasn't. Caleb shook his head; "Not really," he replied, "Aubrey was confused when she came to, and once she realized what the curse meant for her, she didn't say or do anything for hours." Caleb made hesitant eye contact with Nico and explained earnestly; "But Milton had been helping her; giving her medicine and stuff that was filled with things to help her; almost like the healing song he used, but in an edible form. She was doing better but…" Caleb's voice trailed off. Nico felt like his head was about to explode. Remembering to speak gently to Caleb, Nico asked, "But what, Caleb?" "But Milton hasn't been here, so she's having a harder time." Caleb sighed, "Look, you know that Aubrey already has difficulty with anger and frustration, and the fact that this curse seems to feed off of intense feelings makes it that much worse for her. She's already scared and confused about this prophesy. I don't exactly know what it is about Percy that set her off, but she's trying to stay in control; she doesn't want or mean for any of this to happen."
Nico was reeling. He couldn't believe that Aubrey had gotten cursed, and that none of them had deemed it a good idea to tell him. As shocked as he was, however, Nico couldn't entirely blame Grace and Caleb for keeping quiet about Aubrey; both of the demigods before him were extremely loyal. Nico also knew that if what happened to Aubrey happened to him, he wouldn't exactly be forthcoming about it either. He stayed quiet for a bit, allowing himself to process what he just learned. If Aubrey was cursed, then everything anybody knew about the prophesy before was completely different now. Nico racked his brains, a thought half-forming in his mind that made something dangerous regarding the prophesy occur to him.
Before the thought could be fully formed into something less abstract, Nico sat up straight in a manner so sudden, he felt a bit of a head rush from moving so fast. "Uh, Grace, Caleb," Nico began, a sense of dread settling in his stomach, "Speaking of Aubrey and Percy, where are they?" Caleb shrugged his shoulders in response and Grace's eyes widened as she realized where they were. "Aubrey went out to the fire escape," she answered, "And Percy followed her." Grace turned to Nico desperately; "If her curse was triggered while they were both out there…" She didn't finish. Nico cursed under his breath, thankful that neither half-blood in his company spoke Italian. "We need to find them, now."
The three hurried to the fire escape, and Nico hoped to find the two of them out there, unharmed and safe. Unfortunately, Nico had never been a lucky person, and tonight was no exception. He stepped out onto the fire escape with Grace and Caleb, and felt his dread expand as he saw that Aubrey and Percy were nowhere in sight. The fire escape looked like every other fire escape in New York, except most fire escapes didn't have the railing bent almost beyond recognition. While the metal safety rail was normally rigid to the point of seeming unbreakable, the railing Nico was looking at had bent completely in the middle, as though an extremely heavy weight had been laid on it; it was practically in the shape of the letter 'V'. Percy was gone, and so was Aubrey.
Nico ran his hand through his hair for what felt like the millionth time that night and turned to Grace and Caleb; his face wore a grim expression. "They're gone," he said, "And we need to find them before someone gets hurt." Grace and Caleb nodded in unison, both filled with trepidation. Nico wasn't sure what was going to happen next, but what he did know was that they needed to find Percy and Aubrey, and they needed to do it quickly.
Because since Percy didn't know about Aubrey, he might think she was a monster, and if Percy thought Aubrey was a monster, there wouldn't be anything stopping him from killing her; and Nico couldn't let that happen. Mustering up an expression he hoped conveyed bravery, Nico asked, "Are you guys ready for some field work?" He began climbing down the fire escape before either demigod could answer, silently begging that his dad wouldn't have any new residents by the end of the night; but again, Nico had never been a lucky person.