Chapter 15: Persephone's garden

Nico woke up laying in Will's arms. He prayed that his father hadn't come out of his room and saw this. He would never hear the end of it.

The room was dark, like it had been when Nico fell asleep. The only noise was the faint hum as the tv played, muted, and Will's obnoxious snoring. Nico plucked Will's phone out of his pocket carefully and clicked the button on the side. The screen, which was blindingly bright, turned on showing the time. 3:57 am, Saturday.
It was almost 4 in the morning. Nico cursed at himself. It wasn't uncommon for him to wake up randomly in the middle of the night, but there was usually a reason. When Nico looked around the room, he realized there was definitely a reason.

Skeletons, all wearing varying military uniforms, surrounded them. These were his father's servants. They would listen to Nico. They had to.

"What is your business?" Nico asked the skeletons, trying to sound stern but not wake Will up at the same time.
They chattered, the jaws clicking against their skull, trying to answer his question but not able to. Oh, right. Forgot about that.

"Well, whatever it is, it can be taken care of tomorrow. You are dismissed." Nico waved his hand. The skeletons didn't budge. Why weren't they listening to him?

When they began to approach the couch, Nico really started freaking out. They had to listen to him. They had to. Nico could dismantle them with his powers, but he wasn't much in the mood for dying right now. Plus, if he died, he was sure Will would kill him.

"I said, you are dismissed." Nico hissed at them. Maybe they just weren't hearing him.

That theory was blown out of the water when one of the skeletons shook his head, followed by the others. No. They had said no. This meant one of two things.
Either they had received orders from someone higher up than Nico or they were having a rebellion.
Nico seriously doubted they were stupid enough to have a rebellion. Or maybe they weren't smart enough, considering they didn't really have any kind of brains.

There were only two people who they would listen to over Nico, one of which was Hades, who was in the other room, letting his godly snores shake the palace. The other was his ever-so-lovely stepmother, who was out for blood. It didn't take much detective work to figure out who sent them.

A lone skeleton came out the of dark hallway that led to where Hades was sleeping. He nodded at the others. The skeletons moved in unison, making they're way down the hallway. Hades's snoring stopped.
Maybe it was a rebellion.

Nico quickly shook Will awake, which was not an easy task. He had to practically roll him off the couch to wake Will up from his coma.
"Get up." Nico hissed quietly.

"Whhhhyyy?" Will groaned, not even half awake.

"Because there's a bunch of skeletons here and they won't listen to me and I don't think they're here to be friends." Nico said as quickly as he could.

At this, Will sat up a little and opened his sky blue eyes. "A bunch of what?"

Will's question was answered when the skeletons came marching out of Hades room, dragged the God with them. Nico wasn't sure why Hades didn't dare to fight back. Why was Hades letting this happen? Why hadn't he even commanded them to back off?

Nico met eyes with his father. To Nico's surprise, Hades didn't even look mad or upset or anything like that. Hades looked peaceful.
Hades mouthed one word and Nico understood. "Persephone."

Persephone had sent the skeletons after them, to find Hades, so she could give her punishment. Nico was sure she was going to find some sort of excuse to punish him and Will too.

A smaller group of skeletons came and grabbed Nico and a very confused Will, restraining their arms like prisoners. The skeletons lead them up the staircase that they had fled down only a few hours ago. The walk back up seemed endless. Will stumbled up the stairs next to Nico. Tired wasn't a strong enough word to describe how Will must've felt. Nico swore that at one point, he heard Will start snoring again.

When they finally reached the throne room, the light blinded him. Nico estimated they had been climbing up the dark staircase for nearly an hour. Persephone stood on the other side of the room. Once Hades was carried into the throne room, the skeletons let go of Nico and Will. Will stumbled a little and almost fell over.
"Would you wake up?" Nico snapped at him quietly.

"You know, 5 in the morning is sleep time, not be-in-a-throne-room-in-the-underworld-awaiting-punishment time." Will muttered.

"You know, i think I like you better when you're asleep." Nico held his arms out, ready to catch Will if he fell, which seemed very likely.

Will gave Nico a half asleep smirk. "No, you don't."

"Shut up, Solace."

"So," Persephone boomed, silencing Nico and Will's bickering. "Here's the liar I call my husband."

"Persephone," Hades said softly. "My dear, I did what I did because I love you. I didn't want you to leave. I was jealous. I did wrong. But these two-" he made a grand gesture to Will and Nico, Will giving the goddess and awkward wave. "Helped me realize that. Punish me as you will, but they are innocent and had no part in this. Release them."

Persephone seemed to think it over for a minute.
"Fine, but you must give me an extra month in the mortal world."

"That's going to mess up the whole balance of the mortal lives!" Hades shouted, gaping wide from surprise.

"Yeah, I know." Persephone didn't even blink. "But you should have thought about that before you lied to me."

Hades opened his mouth like he wanted to argue, but Nico figured he didn't because Hades knew he had the disadvantage.

"But are they free to go?" Hades asked on Nico's behalf. Nico hadn't quite believed Hades back in Portugal when Reyna and Nico were bringing the statue to Camp Half Blood. He hadn't believed that Hades really planned on being a good father to Nico. He didn't believe Hades wanted Nico to be happy.

He sure believed it now.

"Yes, after they do a little garden work for me, they'll be free."

"Garden work? There are gardens in the underworld?" Will yawned, slowly waking up.

"There's a garden in the underworld, yes." Persephone waved her hand, summoning them to follow her.

...
Will thought Persephone's garden was beautiful in its own underworld-ish way. Most of the flowers and fruits glowed in every color of the spectrum. There were twisting white trees that were incredibly thin, but seemed to almost touch the roof of the underworld. They walked on a path made of black bricks and bones, which was cool, but Will thought the bones part was a bit overboard.

"All you have to do it weed the flower beds and water the garden. And then when you get done with that, I need you to plant some Moonlace." Persephone said, tossing a tray into Nico's hands. The tray was filled with a dozen little black flower pots, each one with a small silver-glowing flower.

The garden was huge. It was going to take hours to get all that work done.
"Don't you have a gardener?" Nico practically spit at her.

She waved off Nico's comment, ignoring him. "You two better get started. The sooner you get finished, the sooner you can leave."
She walked off back into the palace, slamming the door shut behind her. Will and Nico just stood there for a minute, Will not even believing how rude she was. Will felt a slight hatred growing inside of him for the flower goddess.

Nico sighed finally, breaking the silence. "Don't eat anything."