A/N: Hello! This chapter took longer than I wanted it to, so I apologize for the delay, but it's here! And it's pretty long! And there are only 4 chapters left until the end of this fic! Hooray! But, on the other hand, I started online school three days a week and I work the other two, so the next chapters might take a while too. I apologize, and I promise I am working on them, they just can't be my top priority right now. But this fic is my top priority below school and work, and I promise I'm not abandoning it. I'll update when I can. In the meantime, I hope you enjoy this chapter. It has more Nicolas Angel in it cause it had been a while lol. Enjoy and please review!

Disclaimer: I don't own PJO. I do own my OCs.

Nico had once spent eight straight days in a death trance, trapped in a bronze jar, living on pomegranate seeds from the Underworld so that he could survive without other food, water, or oxygen. Even compared to that hell of an experience, he felt like he couldn't breathe.

All his worst fears had suddenly been confirmed. He was going to lose his sister, to the gods-damned Hunters of Artemis, again. And this time, he couldn't even feel resentful about it. The first time, almost eighteen years ago now, Bianca had been a child desperate to escape responsibility she hadn't asked for over an annoying little brother, in return for being cared for and accepted by the sisters who would get her killed.

If Adrianne joined the Hunters now, it would be because the other option was getting hunted down by monsters and cursed by the Fates the rest of her life. She might not have any other choice, no matter how much Nico hated the idea.

The whole point of going into the Lotus was so that Nico could get his big sister back, so that he could take a freaking break for once in his life and let someone else take care of him instead of him having the wellbeing of his sister, his cousins, and the (metaphorical) universe on his shoulders all the damn time.

Adrianne may have been older than him, technically, but as long as she was out in the world and in danger, he would always have to be the one taking care of her, not the other way around. He had decades of experience on her, after all. Plus, he was a hero of Olympus. Saving people was his job. No magic time hotel could change that.

But on the other hand, would he be able to stand going on with his life, fifteen years behind all his friends, knowing his sister was off hunting monsters and being conditionally immortal? What if the Hunters got her killed, again? What if they disappeared into the wild and Nico never saw her again? Even seeing her as seldom as he ever ran into Thalia felt like painfully not enough.

Nico didn't think he could do this. Both options seemed impossible. But there didn't appear to be a third.

"Nico. Nico! Nico, come on, say something, please!"

He jolted out of his own thoughts to the sound of his sister frantically calling his name as she shook him by the shoulder. "I'm okay, Adrianne, it's okay," he stammered, reaching for her hands and gripping them reassuringly.

They were still sitting at the wood grain table in the Hunters' tent, but they were alone; no goddess sat across from them. Adrianne was staring at him with wide-eyed concern, and before Nico could ask where Artemis had gone, she demanded, "What happened? You were totally out of it, I thought you were having a panic attack or something!"

Maybe he had been having a panic attack, honestly. Nico wasn't self-aware of his mental health enough to be sure.

"Sorry, I just— the idea of you joining the Hunters—" he forced himself not to say again; as hard as it was to believe it, Adrianne wasn't actually Bianca— "it just freaked me out a little." He hastily changed the subject: "Where'd the goddess go?"

Adrianne gestured vaguely toward the front tent flap without taking her eyes off of Nico. "She said she was giving us some space." She leaned closer, grasping Nico's hands almost desperately. "Would me being a Hunter really be such a bad thing, if it was the only way to keep me safe? I mean… they seem kinda cool."

Nico shook his head, shoving down any further mounting panic. "You don't understand, A. Bianca died on a quest with the Hunters. You wouldn't be any safer, and Hunters can only interact with boys under the rarest of circumstances, so I'd never see you. Adrianne, I cannot lose another sister to the Hunters!"

"Nico, stop! Who said you'd be losing me?" Adrianne shifted forward so that she blocked his view of the rest of the tent. She held both his hands in both of hers. "Listen to me, okay? Do you remember what you said to me the day my dad died?"

Nico shrugged helplessly; he'd said a lot of things.

"You told me your sister was safe," Adrianne reminded him. "That even after all your fear and tragedy, you found her again. And if anything ever happens to me, I know you'll find me again. Because I trust you, Nico. Maybe more than I've ever trusted anyone in my whole life." She dropped her gaze to the grassy floor. "And maybe… maybe I'd rather be a Hunter, even with all the dangers that comes with it, than be an orphan, hunted and alone."

You'd have me, Nico wanted to say, but he knew she was probably right. Despite her unique abilities, Adrianne wasn't a demigod. He wouldn't be able to take her to Camp Half-Blood. There would be no family dinners with Hades and Jeannine in the Underworld, not if he wanted Adrianne to be able to leave again. He wasn't even completely confident he could protect her, not the way a goddess could.

"Maybe you're right," he admitted, as much as it pained him to do so. "But before you make a decision one way or the other, will you just… will you come with me for a little while? I want you to meet someone."

Adrianne frowned and glanced towards the door. "Should we tell the others where we're going?"

"Trust me," Nico said, already starting to gather the shadows around them. "The Hunters will find us."

Nicolas Angel was surrounded by ghosts.

Technically, he wasn't sure if one could be said to be surrounded by something that was invisible, but sitting on the bed in his tower bedroom of the Nekros Castle, Nicolas definitely felt trapped. If he looked around the room, all he saw was his limited furniture and various movie posters. But as soon as he closed his eyes, he felt suffocated by the deep-seated knowledge that there were other… beings filling up every available inch of space. He could feel their presence, calling to him out of the darkness behind his eyelids.

Needless to say, it was overwhelming. So Nicolas had been awake for about 36 hours, trying desperately to keep his eyes open so that he could at least convince himself that he was alone.

Well. Relatively alone, anyway.

"How do they work, exactly?" his stepsister asked from her perch on top of his desk, pushing his rolling desk chair back and forth with her socked feet. She cut her gaze to him and added, "The ghosts, I mean," as if she could have meant anything else.

The glare Nicolas sent her wasn't as hostile as he would've liked it to be, and they both knew it. He gave up trying and settled for rolling his eyes instead. "They stand there, waiting for instructions. When I can't stand them anymore, I tell them to do something." He considered his words, amended, "Or I leave."

"They can't leave the Castle?" Levy clarified.

"Not currently. I have to keep telling them not to." He picked absently at a loose thread in his comforter. "They could when our father controlled them."

"My father," Levy corrected, perfunctory. It wasn't like he needed the reminder, and it wasn't like he was going to stop using the plural pronoun either. Once a family member tried to kill you, there was no denying your relation to them, no matter how much Nicolas and Levy both would've liked to.

"Do they talk?" Levy continued, sweeping her gaze over the length of the room.

Nicolas rolled his eyes again. He flopped back onto his bed so that he was staring at the rust-stained ceiling. Closed his eyes. Regretted it immediately as he felt the cold fingers of the dead start tugging at his arms and sifting through his hair. Opened them again. He let out an exhausted sigh. "If they do, I don't bother listening."

"Why not? They look nice enough."

Nicolas sat up, looking sharply at Levy. He vaguely expected her to have her eyes closed— it would make a sort of sense, after all for her to have the same attunement to ghosts in the darkness that Nicolas did. That Bi had.

But the younger girl's warm brown eyes were wide open and still scanning the room with more intelligence than her age suggested. There was a polite smile on her face, the king you directed at strangers who caught your eye on the street, or a particularly amusing but almost definitely fake anecdote at a party.

Dread started to rise inside Nicolas's stomach, colder than the touch of the dead. "What do you mean, they look nice?" he demanded in a low growl.

Levy looked over at him, surprised and maybe a little scared. "The ghosts," she said again.

Nicolas resisted the urge to strangle her. "Yes. I know the ghosts," he bit out. "Can you see the ghosts?"

Levy blinked like she wasn't sure she understood the question. "Can't you?"

Nicolas closed his eyes. Right away, he regretted it again, but he didn't let himself give up. He kept his eyes squeezed shut, ignoring the icy tendrils piercing his skin, and tried to focus his attention on the figures drawing at him. He could feel their energy around him, could sense their presence, could even pinpoint the exact location where each spirit stood, drifting formlessly atop and under and through his bookshelf, desk, and bed. But all that knowledge was supernaturally instinctive; it came straight from his brain, from his DNA, from whatever part of him had been affected by that damn crystal exploding all those years ago. It wasn't something that came from his physical senses, and it most definitely wasn't something that he could see. The ghosts didn't even have forms, much less bodily appearances; in the darkness behind his closed eyelids, all he could see was translucent blobs of white, and even they faded in and out.

He opened his eyes again and asked, "What exactly can you see?"

Levy obediently started pointing at various spots around the room and describing the figures she could see, including but not limited to a Civil War veteran, a decapitated twelve year old, three separate serial killer victims, and a burned woman who sounded suspiciously like Nicolas's estranged Aunt Espa.

Definitely not just formless translucent white blobs.

It occurred to Nicolas in that moment that, even though Levy was younger than him, hadn't grown up in the literal and metaphorical shadows of the Nekros Castle, and was generally ignorant of most of the things Nicolas had to deal with on a daily basis, it was entirely possible that Levy was even more powerful than he was.

He'd never realized it before. But Levy could be the Ghost Queen someday.

The hallway outside Hazel's hospital room was empty when Nico and Adrianne arrived. They stumbled out of the shadows, Nico almost pulling Adrianne to the ground with him before he managed to find his footing. It had been a long day, with a lot of mentally and physically overwhelming activities, and he'd already shadow-traveled a lot.

"Are you okay?" Adrianne asked immediately, gripping his arm tightly to steady him.

Nico leaned against the wall and closed his eyes for a moment. He could feel all of the day's stress and fear and panic rolling over him in one big wave of exhaustion now that he was finally out of immediate danger (and in his brain, just being in a room with the Hunters registered as danger). "Fine. Tired. You?"

"I don't love your shadow thing," Adrianne admitted, and suddenly her grip on him felt like she needed it more than he did. "But I'm okay. Where are we?"

Nico opened his eyes and looked toward the door of Hazel's room. He could sense two people's souls through the wall; his sister's hurt and distorted as her diseased mind brought her closer to death; and Frank's, uniquely alive after all his own brushes with mortality.

It was comforting, somehow, knowing that Hazel and Frank still had each other after all these years. That when Nico had failed her, Hazel hadn't been alone.

And as much as he dreaded the thought of it, if he couldn't protect Adrianne from the Fates, the Hunters could. And at least she wouldn't be alone.

"I want you to meet someone," he explained, pushing off the wall to reach for the door. "My other sister."

"Your other…?" Adrianne repeated, then shook her head. "I didn't know you… had another sister."

Nico smirked. "You've read the books, haven't you? Nicolas has two."

With that, he pushed the door open and led Adrianne inside. Immediately, Frank stood from the chair at Hazel's bedside, one hand reaching for the bow slung across his back, but he relaxed when he saw who'd entered. "Nico," he said, but his gaze rested over Nico's shoulder. "Who's this?"

"Frank, this is Adrianne. She's…" Nico thought about it, then shrugged, realizing there was no reason to hide it anymore. "Well, she's the reincarnation of my sister Bianca."

Frank blinked, but only looked mildly surprised. Nico wasn't sure if this was because Percy had already mentioned Adrianne to him, because Frank was out of it from sitting and worrying about Hazel for so long, or just because Frank had been through so much that nothing fazed him anymore. Possibly a combination of the three.

But whatever the reason, Frank just said, "Sure, okay," and nodded semi-politely at Adrianne.

"A, this is Frank," Nico continued. "My… cousin once-removed, technically? If the gods had DNA? My sister's boyfriend, that's the important part."

Adrianne looked amused. "Nice to meet you."

Nico looked pointedly over Frank's shoulder. "Is she…?"

"She's asleep," Frank confirmed, taking a step back so that the bed behind him became visible.

Nico crossed the room and knelt next to the bed, laying a hand gently over Hazel's. As strange as it was to see all of his friends fifteen years older, seeing Hazel would always be the strangest. Even when she'd been saving the world, she'd always seemed so young to him. "She looks better," he noted. And she did— her face was fuller, her skin less tight around the eyes.

"She's been doing better," Frank said, coming over to reclaim his chair next to Nico. "Lucid more often than not, and easier to calm down when she does have… an episode. Dionysus has been by a few times," he added after a beat. "Apparently, your dad called in a favor. Mr. D says she should be fine in a week or two; he's cured the underlying madness; now it just has to run its course."

"Good," Nico said, feeling relief wash over him like a flood. He didn't think he'd realized just how worried he'd been about Hazel until suddenly he didn't have to be anymore. Nico turned away from the bed, getting back to his feet. Adrianne was still hovering just inside the door, looking like she wasn't sure what she was supposed to be doing. Nico smiled apologetically at her, then turned back to Frank. "Can we talk to you out in the hall for a minute?"

Frank frowned in confusion, but nodded and obediently followed Nico and Adrianne out of the room. "What's going on?" he asked as soon as he'd closed the door behind them.

Nico got Frank up to speed— on exactly who and what Adrianne was, on the meaning of the Great Prophecy, the trouble with the Fates, and the Hunters' offer to keep Adrianne safe as long as she vowed to follow them for the rest of her life.

The second Nico stopped for breath, Frank said, "Have you told Percy? I'll call Jason; we can help you—"

"No," Nico insisted before the son of Mars could start stringing his bow. He gave Frank as genuine a smile as he could manage. "You guys had your chance to save the world. Let us take care of it this time."

"If you didn't want Frank's help," Adrianne said a little while later, once the son of Mars had gone back into Hazel's room to call the rest of the Seven and make sure they stayed out of Nico's way, "then why did you bring me here?"

"To meet Hazel," he explained, "and if she'd been awake, I think you two would've really liked each other." He paused. "But also… I think I needed you to see… I think I needed to remind myself… that even though I lost Bianca, I still had a sister. And even if I lose you… I'll be okay."
He studied her face carefully, willing her to believe him because only then would he be able to believe himself. Adrianne stared back at him, her expression hard to read, but then something in her gaze shifted, and she shook her head.

"You won't lose me," she said decisively. "If the Hunters can help us, great. If not… we'll figure it out. Together. You're my family, Nico. I'm not gonna join theirs." She smiled sadly, and Nico felt his heart break as he was suddenly filled with the knowledge that it wasn't just Adrianne looking at him from behind those warm brown eyes. It was Bianca, too.

"I won't abandon you again, little brother."

A/N: Hope you liked it, I'll update when I can, and please review!