The first thing Annabeth noticed when she woke was a strange weight on her legs.
The second thing she noted was that she was in a bed, a real, normal bed, with soft sheets and warm blankets. She opened her eyes, finding herself in an unfamiliar room, late sunlight streaming in through a window behind her, and Perseus asleep on her legs. The third thing she noticed was that her mouth tasted inexplicably of apples, but she forwent that information in favor of watching Perseus sleep.
She couldn't help but smile softly as she looked over him. Clearly he'd been sitting on the now-empty chair beside her bed, had gotten tired, and somehow ended up falling asleep on the side of her bed, still kneeling beside her, his head just above her knees. That made her a little worried as to how long she'd been asleep, but at least they were safe, as far as she could tell.
Annabeth sat up, closing her eyes as a wave of black rushed over her vision. She could feel Perseus shifting slightly below her, but the weight didn't move, and when she opened her eyes again he was still laying there, fast asleep.
She ran her fingers through his dark hair, noting as she did that he had dark circles under his eyes. Annabeth was debating whether or not she wanted to even properly wake him when he blinked sluggishly, taking the decision out of her hands.
"You're awake," he said, relief lighting up his eyes as he lifted his head up, rubbing his face with one hand. The bruise on his cheek had faded, the two cuts on his face still red, but clearly healing.
"So are you," Annabeth said, just a touch of humor in her tone. He tried to return her smile, but it didn't quite meet his eyes. He was trying not to show it, but he'd been scared, she could tell.
"How long was I…?" Annabeth trailed off.
"Asleep?" he finished for her, forgoing the chair to take a seat on the side of the bed, "Two days."
"Two days ?" Annabeth gaped at him, but he just gave a small shrug. Once again, Annabeth got the distinct feeling that he was downplaying how worried he'd been.
"Just about."
"I— what even happened? Where are we?" Annabeth asked, looking around at the room again.
"It's— there's a lot to explain," Perseus started, running a hand through his hair. It had already been mussed from Annabeth's fingers and his awkward sleeping position, and that did nothing to help it from sticking up at odd angles. He still looked dignified somehow, but there was no denying that something was making him nervous.
Annabeth just waited, suddenly anxious for what he was about to tell her. She knew a little bit— that she'd looked at her mother in her true form, which had apparently been a very bad move— but it seemed like there were details she was missing, details that Perseus did not seem at all excited to share with her.
"I'm sorry, Annabeth," he said, suddenly looking away, "There wasn't another way, you were dying—"
"What happened?" Annabeth asked again, more urgent this time. Preemptive dread was already starting to pool in her stomach, making her hands shake. She clenched them into fists.
"I—" he swallowed heavily, closing his eyes for just a brief moment, "I had to give you nectar. In front of the others. They know now, they know about everything."
Whatever Annabeth had been expecting him to say, it had not been that. Her heart sunk like a stone, the emptiness of the room suddenly becoming quite clear to her. She was still alive, and that had to count for something— but they still weren't here. And from the look on Perseus's face, pained and guilty, it hadn't gone over well at all.
"Everything?" Annabeth asked, voice small.
"I'm sorry," he said again, basically a confirmation, "I had to, to get them to let me give the nectar to you. They didn't understand, they thought I was lying, and it was just— it was the fastest way."
Her mouth felt dry. She couldn't stop looking at him, and he couldn't stop looking away. She wanted him to meet her eye so badly, to tell her that everything was fine. The fact that he couldn't even look at her scared her worse than anything that could come out of his mouth.
So, her secret was out. In the most unceremonious way possible, her not even conscious for it. It didn't even feel real, but she knew he wouldn't just say something like this. She suddenly felt sick to her stomach.
"How…"
Her words got caught in her throat, suddenly rendering her unable to speak. He already knew what her question was, though. Maybe because he knew her, or maybe because it was the most obvious thing to ask.
"They were… upset," Perseus said, wincing, "Or Piper was, anyways. Jason was quiet, mostly, but he still seemed… off."
Jason wasn't necessarily the most talkative person in the world, but Annabeth knew exactly what Perseus was describing anyways. When Jason got angry about something, really genuinely angry, he didn't yell. He just got silent. It made sense, considering demigod powers tended to be triggered by emotions— if Jason let himself have an outburst, it would probably come with a side of lightning.
And Piper— well, when Piper got mad about something, everyone in a five mile radius was aware of it. She could keep her emotions under control in most situations, but if something really got under her skin, really bothered her, she let it show.
"I'm still alive," Annabeth noted. It was a small pittance, but maybe it was all she deserved.
"They didn't react like that," Perseus said, shaking his head, "I mean, they didn't exactly take it well, but I don't even think that crossed their minds."
"Really?" Annabeth asked, tentatively. It was hard to not entirely believe him about this, but it was so difficult to parse out their reactions with him as a filter. As much as she loved him, he didn't know them the same way she did, couldn't read their body language and facial expressions like she could. He gave her an apologetic look, maybe recognizing that himself.
"I think they were just… I don't know. Confused. Maybe angry at first, but now it's harder to tell. They haven't really said much about it."
"They're still around?" Annabeth asked, surprised. Perseus nodded.
"Piper was here earlier, but Jason made her go to sleep. She probably still is, I think it's still the middle of the night," he glanced over his shoulder to a window behind the bed. Annabeth glanced over too. It was pitch black outside.
"Jason's been wrapped up in meetings since the second we got out of that place, but he still checked on you when he could."
Annabeth let that sink in. Maybe this wasn't as disastrous as she'd thought.
Or, maybe Piper wanted to give her a piece of her mind in person before she banished her forever, and Jason was planning on avoiding her for the rest of her life.
Both seemed equally likely at this point, though Annabeth was starting to relax with the knowledge that she wasn't immediately in danger.
"How did we get out?" she asked, letting herself focus on other things, fill in other gaps in the story.
At this, Perseus looked suddenly embarrassed. His cheeks heated, eyes ducked down.
"I may have, uh— caused a small earthquake."
"You did what? " Annabeth asked, shocked. It did nothing to answer her question, but she was now much more concerned with the words that had just fallen out of his mouth.
"It was an accident," he admitted, still blushing, "Sometimes if there isn't any water around and I get upset I kind of… do that."
Annabeth closed her eyes for a second, readjusting to this new information. It was easy to forget sometimes, just how powerful he could be if he wanted to. Even without the sea, Poseidon had still been worshipped as the Earthshaker. Apparently that aspect had been passed down to Perseus as well.
She didn't have to guess when it had occurred either. The damn ceiling had collapsed right when Octavian had been about to kill her. But that still didn't explain how their friends had found them so quickly, how they'd practically been waiting at the ready to jump in the fight.
"But how did that—" Annabeth started. Perseus anticipated the end to her question before she could even voice it.
"Hazel," he said, though this did nothing but confuse Annabeth further.
"Hazel?"
"She can sense tunnels underground," he explained, "Apparently she's a daughter of Pluto as well as a sorceress."
"Pluto?" Annabeth repeated. She was less shocked about this new piece of information than other revelations she'd had today, but she'd be lying if it wasn't at least a little bit of a surprise. It explained the precious stones from earlier, at least, but she still hadn't seen it coming at all.
"Pluto," Perseus agreed, smiling just slightly, "She was sorry for not bringing it up earlier, but she didn't realize it would be relevant."
Annabeth didn't blame her at all— Pluto tended to get a bad reputation for obvious reasons. His children were rare, and usually not embraced with open arms. She doubted anyone in the group would have cared, but Annabeth could understand better than most why someone would want to keep that a secret.
"So…" Annabeth trailed off, still trying to put the pieces together.
"So when Fai led them to the entrance to the tunnel, she could sense that we were already right below them. They were just trying to figure out if they should risk going underground or figure out how to come in from above when—"
"The ceiling collapsed," Annabeth finished. Perseus nodded, still looking guilty for some reason. It came to her a second later, when she remembered where they'd found the tunnel entrance in the first place.
"My mother's temple," she realized. They must have been right below it— and that must have been why Annabeth felt such a draw to the place to begin with. Yes, it was the idolatry of her mother, but she'd also been able to sense her actual mother below.
They must have used that temple to capture her in the first place, maybe even to keep her in place once they had her. In the end, it had been a trap for both of them.
"It was destroyed. I'm sorry," Perseus said, his eyes ducking down again.
Annabeth just shook her head. "It was tainted anyways. And I'm sure the city has plenty more."
She would tell him about the visitation she'd had with her mother, but not right now. It didn't feel like the right time, somehow, and she was still processing everything that had been said.
"Still," he said, squeezing her hand apologetically.
"How did we get out?" she asked, returning to her original question.
"Well, Jason and Fai can both fly, so that helped. Hazel shifted some of the stone into a stairway too, that's how they've been getting in and out since," Perseus said.
Annabeth didn't quite understand who the "they" was in that sentence, or why anyone would want to continue to go in and out of the tunnels, but she had more pressing questions that needed answering.
"What about Octavian?" Annabeth asked. Predictably, Perseus's expression dropped into a grimace.
"Still alive," he said shortly, as if he regretted that that was still the case, "Apparently I didn't hit him on the head hard enough. He's actually been useful, though. Broke right away, swore to tell the truth and convince everyone Jason was innocent as long as we agreed to not kill him, or give him the death sentence later."
"And Jason agreed?" Annabeth asked, her heart sinking. Perseus grimaced again.
"He didn't have much of a choice. Octavian was pretty high up in whatever conspiracy had set out to kill Jason in the first place. He gave up a lot of names."
"And people are actually listening to him?"
Perseus shrugged, not a careless gesture, more an unknowing one.
"From the sound of it, yes. We got lucky that Jason has some old friends stationed in the city who were willing to hear him out. They let us stay here, too, while everything gets sorted."
Annabeth glanced around the room again. There was nothing really spectacular about it, but it was plain enough that it had to be guest quarters, if anything.
"He knows," Annabeth said, meeting Perseus's eyes nervously, "He was right there when Kronos was saying everything, he has to know."
Perseus's expression hardened, just slightly. He was trying to hide his anger, and not doing a great job of it.
"He won't say anything," Perseus said, sounding a little too sure about the matter, "Not right now at least. He knows he's already treading a very thin line."
That didn't solve the problem of later, but despite having slept through the last two days, Annabeth felt too exhausted to even begin to deal with thinking about that. The events of the past few days were starting to crash down around her. Getting separated from him, realizing who Luke really was, Octavian almost killing her, Luke dying, speaking to her mother, her secret getting revealed— she almost wanted to just curl up in this bed and never leave.
And Perseus— he looked so tired and so stressed, and she knew it was all her fault.
Without really thinking, Annabeth crawled forward on the bed, suddenly desperate to touch him. He opened his arms to her, and she wrapped herself in his embrace, sitting on his lap, crossing her legs around his back. He settled into her easily, tucking his head into her shoulder.
Annabeth closed her eyes, just focusing on the security of his arms, his steady heartbeat under her cheek, his soft breath against her shoulder. He smelled like sleep and ocean breeze, and she buried her forehead in his chest, right by the crook of his neck, determined to stay there forever.
She had no idea how long they stayed like that, just wrapped in each other's arms, their bodies tangled together as close as they could get them, but it was long enough that Annabeth felt the stiffness and anxiety that must have been haunting him for the past few days start to dissolve. She felt herself relaxing too, despite everything. There was nowhere in the world that she felt safer than in his arms, she was realizing.
Annabeth pulled back, not wanting to leave the security of his chest, but not being able to stand not seeing his face anymore either. He didn't let go of her, just pulled himself away from her so he could see her again.
"I love you," she said, looking up into the sea-green of his eyes, meaning every word so ardently she was sure her heart would burst. He loved her back. She could see it in his eyes, feel it in his arms, see it in the soft upward tick of his lips into a smile so genuine it was a wonder she didn't melt right then and there.
Then he leaned down and kissed her, and she could feel his love in that most of all.
It started slow, gentle, but like most kisses with him, it didn't stay that way for long. Soon Annabeth was leaning upwards, desperate to have more of him.
It was so dizzying she truly thought she might just dissolve his arms if they didn't stop. She pulled back, lost for words and breath in equal parts. He was so stupidly beautiful with his kiss-swollen lips and wild eyes, with that infuriatingly gorgeous smirk on his face that let her know he knew exactly how undone he could make her. But two could play at that game, and Annabeth was already barely restraining a teasing smile as she prepared her next words.
"What, not going to say it back?" Annabeth asked. The impact was slightly dampened given that she was still a bit breathless, but he laughed anyway, head falling back to reveal the perfect scope of his throat, the hollow of his chest.
"I love you. Gods, I love you," he said, looking back down to her, green eyes sparkling with conviction.
The impact of everything hadn't quite settled over her until that moment. They were both alive. The quest had succeeded. Her secret was out, but she was, at the very least, safe. The consequences of that would come in due time, but right now all she could think about was his skin against hers, the utter relief of touching him freely without the threat of discovery or death or torture hanging over either of them.
He seemed to be thinking along the same lines, because he leaned down and kissed her again, a little more urgently this time. She matched his pace, suddenly desperate for him. Her hands tangled in his hair, dragging him ever-closer.
"I love you," he breathed, pulling back just a hair, just enough so she could feel the words form on his lips, the soft air of them brush over hers. She'd never heard sweeter words, never known something to be more true.
"I love you," she said, not waiting for a response before closing the short distance between their lips again, unable to stand the absence of his touch.
It scared her how much she loved him, how easily she had come to need him, to depend on his reassuring touch, the love in his eyes, the complete stability of him and his love. But all of that just reminded her how tenuous it all had been even just a few days ago.
"I'm sorry I left you alone," Annabeth whispered, pulling back slightly. Her fingers trailed over the still fading bruises on his face, guilt washing over her afresh with each observed injury. She was too much of a coward to ask what they'd done to him, to know if there was any more pain she couldn't see.
He just looked down at her, brows pulled together in concern. His fingers found her cheek, brushing one of her unruly curls behind her ear.
"Annabeth," he said, impossibly gentle, "You didn't leave me. They separated us, it wasn't your fault."
She wanted to believe him, wanted to absolve herself just as easily as he had, but she couldn't. She had brought them to that place, her plan had hinged on talking to Luke alone. She'd known being separated was an inevitability, and she'd brought him with her anyways.
Looking at him, she wasn't sure she could vocalize all of that, or any of it. He wasn't upset at her, but that didn't stop her from being upset at herself.
"I brought us there. I knew it would happen, I told you to let them," she said, her gaze dropping.
"The quest brought us there," Perseus corrected, "You couldn't have known what it was going to be like, you were just trying to keep us alive."
Maybe he was right. Or maybe Annabeth had been selfish in the way she devised her plan, had taken him and his strength and his permanence for granted in an effort to try and fix things with Luke. She didn't know, and maybe she never would. There was something she was sure of, though, and that was that she never wanted any of it to happen again, in any form.
"Never let me do that again," she said, looking up into his eyes, "I don't care what happens, I just— I can't be without you like that again. Please."
"Never again," he promised, sealing it with a kiss.
She half wanted to go farther, to just give herself over to him again— but she couldn't, not with another source of guilt still bubbling in her chest. He sensed her hesitation, pulling back.
"Jason and Piper," she said, "I need to— I need to explain."
"It's the middle of the night," Perseus said, apologetic as he brushed a stray curl behind her ear, "They're still asleep, and you should be too."
Annabeth recalled her previous wave of exhaustion, and how much she'd wanted to give into it. But now she felt nervous, twitchy. She knew Perseus would help her wake them up now if she really wanted to, but she wasn't sure she really wanted to.
She could have a few more hours of peace. Of living in an in-between space where they weren't yet upset with her, at least not to her face. And given how stressful the past few days must have been for them, they deserved their sleep as much as anyone.
Well, anyone but her. She might have been tired, but she was willing to fight if only on principle.
"I just slept for two days," Annabeth protested.
"Being unconscious and being asleep are not the same," he said, a teasing smile already playing at his lips. She knew why— it was because he was using her own words against her, repeating the exact same thing she'd said to Jason all those days ago.
"You're an ass," Annabeth said, though she was halfway to laughing herself, "You've just been waiting to use that on me this whole time, haven't you?"
"Guilty," he admitted, kissing her one last time.
He didn't protest as she pulled him into the bed beside her, letting her curl into his chest like she belonged there.
Which, of course, she did.
A/N: I had a feeling some of y'all were going to be disappointed that the big reveal happens when Annabeth is unconscious, so I wrote that scene from Percy's perspective :) I know some people on AO3 also expressed they wanted to see his POV too, so I thought I'd kill two birds with one stone lol. You can read the bonus scene a href=" post/656903948174802944/surprise-under-freezing-stars-chapter-315" rel="nofollow"here!/a