Blood and Bone

The sword went flying out of his hand again, sliding away on the sand floor of the arena. Will clutched his bruised hand to his chest and hung his head.

"What was that?" Nico growled. "What are you doing? Fight!" Will sensed that the frustration that had been simmering in Nico for the last hour had finally come to a boil.

"I can't," Will said. "I lost my weapon. Again. I told you! I'm a healer, not a fighter. I can't do this."

Other legionnaires in the Roman training arena glanced at them curiously, but continued their sparring.

"You can't? You can't? You mean you won't. There's a big difference."

"I'm trying. Don't you think I've tried? I've tried to be fighter my whole life! I don't have the gift. I'll never be able to beat you. Not if I trained for a thousand years."

"Beat me? Is that what you think I'm trying to teach you? Do you think this is a game? A game of . . . of chess or something?" Nico was spitting with rage. His voice went cold.

"This is about survival. Not glory. Not laurels. Not heroism. Survival."

Will glared at him, still clutching his hand.

"Are you angry at me, Will?" Nico's voice was like ice.

Will dropped his hands and held Nico's gaze. "Yes."

"Are you afraid of me?" Nico's voice was an arctic wind, stinging Will's soul.

"No," Will admitted.

"Are you sure?" Nico asked raising his weapon. "Are you sure?" he asked again. "Because you should be. You should be afraid of me."

With a sickening crack, fissures formed in the floor behind Nico and skeletons in battle gear climbed out.

Will's eyes widened in horror for a moment, then he scrambled for his fallen sword. All around, them legionnaires stopped their sparring, their horror a mirror of Will's. Several turned to fight the skeletons arrayed at Nico's back. Frank Zhang stopped what he was doing at the edge of the arena. He walked towards the fight, concerned, but didn't unsheathe his weapon. He waived the legionnaires back, giving them a stand-down signal. The skeletons stood at the ready. Unmoving.

"So I'll ask you again. Are you angry?"

Will held his sword at the ready, his eyes full of bewilderment and hurt. "Yes," he said again.

"Are you scared?"

Will glanced at the legionnaires watching silently and a tear fell from one eye. "Yes." He was visibly trembling.

"Good." Nico said. "Take your rage, take your fear, channel it. Fight me." Nico swept in like lightning with a vicious swing of his sword." Will parried desperately, blocking the blow, but only barely. He took up a defensive position, eyeing Nico warily.

"Do you think you get to stop fighting just because you're crying?" Nico taunted. "Do you know how many battles I've fought with tears in my eyes? Don't you think I wept in Tartarus, wept tears of fire with every step. Do you think I ever stopped? Do you think I ever gave up?"

"No," Will rasped.

"That's right," Nico said with another brutal swing. "Do you know how many times over I'd be dead if I gave up in the face of overwhelming odds? If I'd given up when there was no way I could possibly win?"

Will just stared at him as he panted for breath.

Nico turned, his face a mask of fury and mowed down the skeletons behind him. The clatter of Stygian Iron breaking bone was deafening. The soft thunk of bone hitting sand was the sound of many pins dropping in the utterly silent arena.

Nico turned back and brought his sword up. "Again," he said. And moved in for the attack.

This time Will fought. He really fought. His rage and fear were like a tangible thing, a wild animal trying to claw it's way out of his belly. He swung his sword over and over as hard as he could. Nico parried easily. Frustration and fury filled his mind and he refused to give up. Nico found an opening and knocked the sword out of his hand with the flat of his blade, yet again.

The sword flew on the sand. Will's hand exploded with pain, and started throbbing. Will knew exactly which bones in his hand were fractured.

But this time he didn't stop. He dived into a roll, catching a handful of sand from the arena floor with his good hand and flinging it with uncanny accuracy into Nico's eyes, timed precisely to his blink pattern. By the time Nico cleared the sand Will was on his feet again, sword at the ready, ignoring the pain shooting through his damaged hand.

This time Will really looked at Nico. He saw exactly how he slightly favored his right foot, the result of an in old injury. He imagined exactly the cut that would be required to sever Nico's sword arm from his torso. A fast, clean amputation cutting the sinew and muscle and severing the bones. He feinted in precisely the right way to capitalize on Nico's weakness and then swept in for a surgical strike.

This time, Nico barely parried in time. The gash was hard to see through Nico's black t-shirt, but Will knew exactly how deep the cut in Nico's shoulder was - slicing skin and subcutaneous fat, but only nicking the muscle. It would need at least seven stitches.

Surprisingly, the wound seemed to calm Nico. He stepped back and eyed Will. "Better," he said. "Much better."

"Why?" The words emerged like they had been ripped from Will's chest. "Why are you doing this?"

Nico held his gaze for a moment. When he spoke, his deep voice was filled with resignation. "I've been to the underworld, Will. Many times. Don't you think I know?" His voice began a slow crescendo. "Don't you think I know exactly what it will be like when the light and the love and laughter have gone out of your eyes forever? When you don't even know who I am anymore? Don't you think I know?" he shouted.

"I would walk through Tartarurus - again - to protect you. And you just give up. Because you don't think you're good enough? Because this is some sort of game to you? Because . . . because I don't even know why." He threw his sword to the floor in disgust, and covered his face with his hands.

The legionnaires all around them could have been marble statues. The silence was deafening.

"I just want you to care about your survival half as much as I do." Nico turned his back on Will and slowly picked up his sword."

Frank Zhang stepped forward. "Hold," he ordered, and Will let the tip of his sword drop to the floor. Zhang looked around at the staring legionnaire's. "You've had a valuable lesson today on the importance of perseverance in the face of overwhelming odds, and in facing fear. Training for the day is over. Think about what you've learned." Frank extended his arm to Will in a Roman salute and then to Nico.

With a chagrined glance at Frank, Nico sheathed his sword and started to walk out of the arena. He never looked at Will. The other legionnaires began to move again, watching Nico leave warily.

Will stood, sword dangling from his hand, a stunned look on his face. Frank gently took the sword from him. "Are you alright?"

Will shook his head. "Hairline fractures of two of the metacarpal bones. But otherwise I'm OK."

"You should have a medic look at that," Frank offered sardonically.

Will snorted. "Yeah. I'll see what I can do."

"Go after him," Frank said.

Will stared at him questioningly.

"You know you'll be sorry if you don't. He needs you."

Will nodded, and began jogging towards the exit, his undamaged hand pressing the broken one to his chest for stabilization.

Nico was several yards away, walking head down.

"Nico!" he called.

Nico stopped, but didn't turn or even look up.

"Nico." Will stepped in front of him, standing as close as he dared.

"Don't worry," Nico said, still staring at the ground. "I won't bother you any more."

"What? What in the name of thundering Zeus are you talking about?"

"I'll understand if after all that you're done being my boyfriend."

Will stared at him. Slowly his head began to shake. "I'm sorry, but as your doctor I'm afraid I have to tell you that you are suffering from the worst case of nobility and heroic self-sacrifice that I've ever encountered."

Nico met his eyes, ruefully. "Do you think it's terminal?

"Almost certainly." Will placed his undamaged hand on Nico's neck. "Don't ever do that again."

"What? The skeletons? I won't."

"No, not the skeletons, you idiot. I don't care about that. Don't you ever say you'd walk through Tartarus for me. Swear to me, right now, that you will never vow to walk through Tartarus for me. I've slept with you at night. I know how the memories of that place still hurt you. I won't have it. Swear it to me now."

One side of Nico's mouth twisted. "Fine. I swear on the river Styx that I will never vow to walk through Tartarus for you." Nico's face set in a stubborn expression. "But you know that's not the same as a promise that I wouldn't, if it came to it."

Will shook his head. "What am I going to do with you?" he said. "You're impossible."

"Love me anyway?" Nico asked.

"Well, sure. That goes without saying." Will winced as he rested his broken hand on Nico's other shoulder.

"You hurt your hand."

"Technically, you hurt it. And it's only a couple of stress fractures, nothing major."

"Do you want me to bandage it for you?" Nico asked.

"Hades, no." Will laughed. "I want it to heal right. I'll splint it myself. And then I can practice my left-handed stitching technique on that cut of yours."

"Technically, it was your cut." Nico smiled faintly. "Good work, by the way. You almost took my arm off. I'm proud of you."

"I had a good teacher."

Two legionnaires saluted them as they passed them on the road.

"I think that was for you," Will said.

"Not likely. It was for you."

"We'll have to agree to disagree."