A/N: New chapterrrrr! And it's the tenth chapter mark! All the Muses are in this one again, so, once more you can find all their character sheets on my RotG tumblr, which is linked on my bio.
Drachegirl14, yes, that's how it works! And aw, you can still like Artemis as she is in legend and hate her in this story. ForeverACharmedOne, I think that could probably be a decent summary of this story, "Everything sucks. Every choice sucks. Nothing is okay." I wish we could pick more than two genres because I'd stick this in "angst" so fast. DreadDaora91, thanks so much! I'm really having fun with Artemis and her strategic approach so far. ArouraBorialice, haha, they'll figure something out! AkariWolfPrincess, right? Jack probably misses not having to deal with other magical beings right about now. dinohuntsmen, yeah, Apollo and Artemis are not making things easy.
"It's so stupid to be considering something like this to prove something to everyone else. That's precisely the last reason anyone should do such a thing, particularly in this day and age."
Chapter Ten: Defiance
Clio rarely entertained more than one person at a time. Two or three was about as excessive as her guest list usually got and that normally worked out just fine, as the long table in her workshop that was supposed to be a dinning table was mostly covered in unfinished inventions, open books, random notes, and tools.
So, when Calliope had said that the Muses needed to have a meeting and it was decided that Clio's workshop was the most appropriate place, Clio had stared at her table in dismay.
She never intended for it to get so messy, somehow it just always… happened.
In the time it took Urania to track down all the other Muses, Clio had worn herself out shoving books on overflowing shelves, inventions into closets, and toolboxes under her couch.
The other Muses were unsurprised to find her hastily wiping dust and motor oil off the surface of the table when they arrived.
"I do hope these tunnels you're having Bunny dig for us will have a common area," Polyhymnia said, setting a tea set down at the center of the table. "That might be easier to keep clean, and at least then we'll have a designated place for meetings."
"It will," Clio said with a nod, beginning to pour tea for the others. "I'm looking forward to more storage, honestly."
"I don't think that'll make a difference, you'll just hoard more things," Thalia said, shifting in her seat before pulling a wrench from beneath the cushion. Visibly baffled, she set the tool on the table.
"I am not a hoarder," Clio said.
"So, you'd be totally okay with me throwing away this… um, whatever this is, then," Euterpe said, holding some kind of contraption with a hand crank and springs poking out in all directions that had been beneath the table.
Clio snatched the item from the younger Muse and held it protectively. "Don't you dare, I need this."
Terpsichore covered her mouth and let out a cough that sounded suspiciously like, "Hoarder!"
"This isn't an intervention for Clio," Calliope said, helping to pass the tea cups around the table as Clio gently set the strange contraption on a nearby shelf.
"Yeah we'll save that for when we can't even walk in here," Erato smiled.
"Please tell me this is about the rumors going around," Melpomene said, stirring her tea lazily.
"What rumors?" Calliope asked.
"The Horseman and Maman Brigitte stopped me to say that they had heard we were cutting ties with the Guardians," Melpomene said. The other Muses began chattering right away, surprised and confused by this information.
"Wait, seriously?"
"Where would they get that idea?"
"Where would they have heard that?"
Calliope tried to shush the others, face falling at this news.
"Maman Brigitte and the rest of her family are already decidedly neutral, she just wanted in on some gossip," Melpomene said.
"What about the Horseman? A couple months ago you said he'd support us if things took a turn," Thalia asked.
"Not without the Guardians, he won't," Melpomene said. "He said if we're willing to cut ties with them after centuries, then it's too risky to chance a partnership with us. I told him it wasn't true, but judging by Calli's face, well…"
All eyes fell to Calliope, who was frowning deeply and suddenly very interested in the sugar cube dissolving in her tea.
"Calliope, what happened? Did something happen with Artemis?" Polyhymnia asked.
"I've heard whispers, too, I thought it was nonsense," Urania said.
"Artemis offered her allies and promised to be a more present leader than Apollo. She promised a new image, a fresh start, something bigger than all of us, something empowering," Calliope said, her tone not matching the wonderful things she was saying in the least.
"Well, that all sounds promising," Clio said.
"So what's the catch? Aside from the wrath of the sun god, obviously," said Thalia, having gathered a few mismatched teaspoons and attempting to stack them.
"And what does it have to do with the Guardians?" Erato asked.
"She said that if we join up with her, we have to cut all ties to Tsar Lunar and the Guardians," Calliope said. Again, the air was thick with gasps and exclamations.
"Is she insane?"
"We've been allies for ages!"
"Well, I mean, we've also been with Apollo for ages and here we are…"
"The Guardians are the whole reason we survived the whole ordeal with the Shadow People!"
"Does she expect us to just cease all contact? Toothiana is one of our dearest friends."
"North opened his home to us to keep us safe; we're supposed to turn our backs on him now?"
"What about Cupid? He follows Tsar Lunar, too, or did she forget?"
"She doesn't want us to have anything to do with Tsar Lunar, and that means nothing to do with the Guardians. She basically told me to pick between all of you and Sanderson," Calliope said, raising her voice in order to be heard over her sisters.
"That bitch!" Erato said. Polyhymnia cast her a disapproving glance. "Sorry, I know you hate that word but that bitch. How does she expect you to choose? You've loved Sanderson since… since you were the only Muse!"
"And I love all of you," Calliope said. "So where does that leave me if Artemis ends up being the better option?"
"Well, that's just it, she's not the better option if she's going to throw this condition in there," Euterpe said. A few of the others mumbled in agreement.
"So we stay with Apollo, who lied to us and neglected us?" Calliope said.
"I'd just like to say that I wouldn't mind cutting ties with the Guardians," Melpomene said with a shrug. "They get so… self-righteous."
"But if we cut ties with them then you can't make Jack uncomfortable on a regular basis by simply existing," Thalia pointed out, still carefully balancing her teaspoons.
"Oh, that's true…" Melpomene sighed. "And I do like when Bunny gets mad."
"Look, this shouldn't even be up for debate. The sun, the moon, the stars, whoever, none of that was at play when Calliope and Sanderson formed this alliance. No one else should be able to use it as a bargaining chip," Clio said.
"But they are," Polyhymnia said, glumly sipping her tea.
"How do people already know about this? Artemis just told you," Erato asked Calliope.
"I'd wager that Apollo or Artemis let some information out so there's more public pressure for us to pick one of them," Calliope sighed.
"They both suck so much right now," Terpsichore practically whined.
"Well, I guess we go with Apollo, then, if he's not going to make us cut ties with the Guardians," Urania said.
"Okay, but what happens the next time Apollo gets mad or gets jealous? The next time he needs a power play? He might do what Artemis is doing now and tell us to cut ties," Euterpe said.
"It shouldn't even be up to them, this is ridiculous!" Clio groaned.
"You're right, it shouldn't," Calliope said.
"So, we stand our ground," Erato said. "Artemis or Apollo, either way, the alliance with the Guardians stays. Artemis went through all this trouble and scheming to get to us, I doubt that's going to be enough to make her bow out."
"And what about everyone else? We can't look like we're fickle with our alliances, these rumors are going to keep spreading," Clio pointed out, watching as Thalia carefully set another teaspoon to her tower.
Melpomene casually plucked one of the spoons from the bottom, sending the entire tower clattering to the table's surface.
Thalia pouted, shoulders slumping.
"We've got to make some kind of statement," Melpomene said, twirling the spoon between her fingers. "So that they all know that alliance isn't going anywhere. I could sleep with Jack again."
"No," Euterpe said immediately.
"Haven't you destroyed enough lives?" Thalia said, gesturing to the remains of her teaspoon tower.
"That won't prove anything except that misery turns you on, which I'd argue most everyone already knows," Clio said.
"Do let the boy grieve without interfering, Mel," Polyhymnia tsked.
"Oh, I was joking," Melpomene said with a dramatic sigh.
"She's right though," Urania said.
"You want to have sex with Jack?" Thalia said, cocking a brow as she tried to reconstruct her teaspoon tower, a fair distance from Melpomene.
"Uh, no, I'm still asexual, last I checked," Urania cringed.
"Well Erato's always saying sexuality is fluid and all that. Besides, at this point maybe we should give him a punch card. A 'Frequent Muse Bedding' card, if you will. Ten stamps and you get a free therapy session," Thalia said. "Sex with Melpomene is worth twenty stamps."
Terpsichore snorted, nudging Erato with her elbow. "Get North one, too."
"I told you, nothing's happened!" Erato hissed.
"I meant that Melpomene's right, that we need to make a statement," Urania said hoping to bring the conversation back to more important matters, "Make sure it's clear to everyone that we're standing by the Guardians, and vice-versa. That even though our leadership situation is… complicated right now, that alliance is strong."
"Well, it's not like we can hold a press conference," Clio said.
"I could do something with the stars," Urania suggested.
"Not everyone knows how to read those," Euterpe pointed out.
"I think," Calliope said hesitantly, "I might know the perfect thing. But I must discuss it with Sanderson."
She stood from the table, setting her teacup aside before heading for the door.
"Wait, you're going now?" Thalia asked.
"Yes, I think we're done here, Sisters. Erato, do be a dear and fill North in, I'm sure he'll hear about this soon enough. He'll let the other Guardians know we're not going anywhere," Calliope called over her shoulder as she pushed her way through the door.
In a flash of light, she took the form of a bird and flew off.
Jack hadn't gotten a bit of sleep since speaking to Apollo the previous day. It had to be showing, judging by the look of concern that passed North's features the moment Jack stumbled into his workshop, rubbing his tired, bloodshot eyes.
Before North could bother asking, not to mention lecturing yet again about the importance of sleep to one's overall health, Jack explained that he had been up all night because Apollo had visited him. North had closed the door to his workshop for something resembling privacy while Jack relayed everything that Apollo had said to him.
"I don't know what to do with this. She didn't want this, but… do I just leave it alone and spend forever wondering if I could have gotten her back? All I've wanted since she died was to undo it," Jack said, sitting atop the table, legs folded beneath him and hood up.
"And now Apollo is offering you an opportunity to do so," North said with a slight grunt, his brow furrowed and his hand absentmindedly stroking his beard in thought.
"Right," Jack said. "I can't just, I mean, I can't ignore something like this, right?"
"You want me to tell you to take him up on it," North said, eying the boy skeptically.
"No, I mean, I want you to tell me what you think I should do," Jack said, eyes fixed on his staff and mind racing with possible outcomes. "I just, I don't have any idea."
"I think you do," North said. "I think you know exactly the right thing to do, but it is not the thing you want to do."
Jack's thumb, which had been outlining one of the grooves in his staff, came to a stop, along with his erratic train of thought. He peeked back at North from beneath his hood, hesitantly.
"I… I mean, I…" Jack started before clearing his throat. "I don't know."
"Yes, you do," North said, staring the boy down. Did he seem disappointed? Disappointed in Jack's indecision, disappointed in the way he kept avoiding what the clear answer was?
This was ludicrous. As Jack had made clear several times, North was not his parent. North had no room to be forcing him to go to bed for "his own good," or lecturing him, or judging him, or being disappointed in him.
And Jack had no room to feel guilty about it.
But the fact was that after a terrible, conflicting night, it only made sense to go to the North Pole. When he didn't know what to do, North seemed like the person to ask.
When he had to talk to someone and Rowan wasn't an option, North was.
And so, here Jack was, sitting beneath North's critical gaze and feeling guilty.
He groaned. "It's not that easy!"
"What's not?" North said.
Jack was growing more and more frustrated by the minute. North wanted Jack to say it, to acknowledge and get to the answer by himself.
He was starting to think he might just prefer a lecture, rather than be forced to say what he was thinking aloud.
"She told me she didn't want this," Jack said. "She said it several times, she had no interest in coming back as a Muse. The right thing to do would be to leave it alone, the right thing to do would be not to try and make it more likely she'll come back."
"Because you love her, and you respect her, and you know that is what she wanted," North said, as though Jack may have forgotten and needed reminding.
"Right," Jack said, staring at the floor now rather than North.
"But you are struggling because while you know all of that, you miss her," North said.
"Right," Jack said again.
"I know this means very little now, but eventually you will accept her choice," North said.
"Like you did with Yelena?" Jack said.
"Yes," North nodded.
"But it's not the same, North," Jack said with a sigh. "Yelena lived. She got a life! She got a full life with everything she wanted and when she died it felt finished. Rowan didn't get any of that. She never got to finish school, she has so many stories she never finished; she never got to grow old or have a family or any of the long-term things she wanted. I kind of have to wonder if she would have felt the same way about immortality if she had known for certain that she was going to die right after turning twenty."
North walked over to Jack, setting a heavy hand to the boy's shoulder. "It is tragic, such wasted potential," North said. "But Jack, you cannot make this decision for her."
"Apollo made it for all the other Muses," Jack mumbled.
"And you aspire to be like Apollo?" North said, cocking a brow. "He who has to bribe Jack Frost with a lost love to try and get the Muses back on his side?"
"No," Jack said, shaking his head. He wasn't quite sure what point he was trying to make with that comment.
"If he brings Rowan back against her wishes, she will resent him. Do not make her resent you, too," North said.
"You think he might still bring her back?" Jack asked.
North shrugged. "The Muses may still choose to stay with him without your help. Besides, I would take any offer from Apollo with grain of salt. I will not pretend to be a close friend of the man, but I know him well enough to say that the idea that he would offer anyone such a favor makes me skeptical."
"So, he might be full of shit," Jack said with a frown.
"Apollo looks out for himself and the Muses, first and foremost," North said. "And he knows that Rowan's fate is power that he has over you. You do not have to give him that power."
"Easier said than done," Jack said.
So, what if he did nothing? Left everything alone and let Apollo do whatever he was going to do? What if Rowan was truly gone forever?
Could he spend the rest of his life wondering if the offer had actually been legitimate or not?
But what if Apollo was the wrong choice? What if he did manage to somehow convince the Muses to stay with him and things went terribly wrong? What if Rowan came back only to be ruled by the worst Apollo had to offer?
The right thing to do was to just let things happen and not interfere. But that required, well, doing nothing, and Jack didn't like that idea. He already hated the notion of sitting around and waiting to see what would happen when the anniversary of her death came around.
The past few months had dragged, and there were still a few more to go.
There was a knock on the door.
"I can tell them to come back another time," North offered Jack.
The boy shook his head. "No, no, I'm fine. Thanks."
North gave Jack a smile before walking to the door of his workshop and opening it, finding Erato on the other side.
"Have your sources told you anything about the alliance?" she asked immediately.
"No, but I haven't gotten my reports for the day yet, why?" North asked.
Erato stepped inside and North closed the door behind her. "You'd better sit down, I have a lot to tell you. Jack, you might want to stick around, too."
Calliope sat on one of Sandy's dream clouds, the small Guardian standing beside her and gently sending streams of dream sand every which way. It was a beautiful, clear night, and the lights of the closest city were distant enough that the stars were bright and sparkling in the sky.
It was truly a beautiful sight to behold, but Calliope was not watching the stars. Her eyes were fixed on Sandy, always intrigued and impressed by the way he cast his beautiful visions down to the mortal world below.
"I know we had basically said we weren't going to do this, that there wasn't any need to at this point," Calliope was saying, a slight tremble in her voice as she spoke. She tried clearing her throat, hoping it would go away.
Sandy cast her a friendly glance to acknowledge that while he might still be tending to his dream sand, he was very much listening.
"And as I'm sure you're aware, I don't, I mean, I'm not asking you to prove anything to me. I know precisely how you feel about me and I'm sure you know very well how I feel about you, and some, well, some silly showy ceremony isn't going to change any of that," Calliope continued, tucking a loose curl behind her ear and mentally urging herself to sound less nervous.
Sandy sent off one last stream of dream sand before settling beside her, amusement dancing across his face.
"It's so stupid to be considering something like this to prove something to everyone else. That's precisely the last reason anyone should do such a thing, particularly in this day and age. We wouldn't be doing it for ourselves, we would be doing it for the alliance, so I completely understand if you say no, Sanderson," Calliope said. "Although, I should add that, I mean, political pressure isn't the only reason I'm suggesting this, it just felt like the obvious choice given the circumstances and the fact that we love each other and have been together for so long."
Sandy cocked a brow, dream sand beginning to swirl and take shape above his head. Silhouettes popped above his head in quick succession, much quicker than he might "speak" with anyone else. Calliope's skilled eyes watched the dream sand before smiling, sheepishly.
"Yes, yes, I suppose this is my entirely unromantic way of proposing to you," she said with a sigh. "Okay, okay, let's… let's start over."
She straightened her posture a bit, taking his hand in hers. "For the greater good of the alliance, it has become clear that a statement needs to be made. A statement that shows the world as clearly as possible that we have no intention of breaking ties with each other."
Another few images popped above Sandy's head, which he tilted slightly, though still smiling.
"I know it's still more political than romantic, I'm getting there," Calliope laughed. "Sanderson Mansnoozie, you have been my best friend for so long that it's become increasingly difficult to even remember a time that I didn't know you, much less love you. We have seen each other at our worst and at our best. No one knows me like you do, and no one makes me happy like you do. Our love has done nothing but grow over the years and I know it will only continue to grow in the future.
"Imagining a life without you is too painful for words, and as a Muse, you'd think I'd be able to come up with a few. You and I both know this is forever, that we intend to see this through to the end. I think now is the perfect time to make all of that official. Despite disagreements and annoying little quirks, at the end of each day, it's you I love, and it's you I dream about when I go to sleep. You are my sweet dreams at night and the daydreams that make me smile when the sun is out. You inspire me more than anything else in the world. So, Sanderson, will you make it official with me? Will you stand with me and show the world just what we mean to each other? Will you marry me?"
Sandy smiled, leaning forward and pressing his lips to Calliope's, who gladly returned the favor.
"Was that romantic enough?" she teased when they broke apart. Sandy silently chuckled.
They pulled away far enough for Calliope to properly examine the figures appearing above Sandy's head. She recognized the two of them, back when they first met. She had stuck to him like glue for what seemed like ages, having no one else around to guide her through her new immortal life. After she seemed to get the hang of it, they had taken their separate ways, certain that she would be fine without him.
But despite their efforts to lead separate lives, they never went too long without crossing paths again, always overjoyed to see the other. She knew that there had been times when she had sought him out and then claimed to have run into him purely by coincidence, and later he had admitted to doing the same.
They had started the alliance: a promise to always look out for and support each other, whatever life may throw their way. Somewhere along the way, they had fallen in love. It was hard to pinpoint exactly when, much like trying to remember the exact time you fell asleep and began to dream.
More Muses and Guardians joined the ranks and the world around them changed drastically. There were more people, more work, and more distractions.
And yet, they were always there. It didn't matter if they had grown busy and preoccupied with their own work, they would inevitably find each other again, picking up precisely where they left off. Their company was a comfort, like coming home after a long, hard day.
Calliope was his home, and Sandy was hers.
Once these images were through appearing above Sandy's head, he offered her a nod, indicating that he accepted her proposal.
She smiled. "You're sure?"
He nodded again.
She kissed him once more, smile still fixed to her face. "We're getting married. Wait until the others hear about this…"