A/N Tadaa! Hope you like today's chapter, guys!

If there was one thing they Nico desperately hoped he'd never have to do again, it was to wait, on tenterhooks, for his new worst enemy to kiss the boy he loved. Seriously, never again.

It was a few hours after breakfast, and he'd left the Stoll brothers painting his cabin (under the strict observation of Rosetta, one of the zombie maids from his father's palace. He probably won't notice that I've borrowed her...), and had been following Tanaka for the better part of an hour already.

So far, she'd touched up her make-up with the help of a small hand mirror encrusted with pink gemstones (even though it was already flawless); sparred in the arena with Piper for twenty minutes; gone into the changing rooms; come out fifteen minutes later in a new shirt (keep calm and wear pink, honestly,); and had now - finally - met up with Will on the edge of the forest.

She didn't kiss him hello, Nico noted with a strange sense of disappointment, then gave himself a mental slap. Instead, she took his hand and pulled him into the trees.

Keeping to the shadows, Nico followed behind them.

They walked slowly, clearly in no rush to get to... wherever they were going with the picnic basket Will was holding. At one point, Drew stopped them to watch some birds flying through the trees, at another they removed their shoes and socks and paddled in the stream.

Eventually, they reached a small hill, clear of trees, in the centre of the forest, where they spread out the red chequered rug and started pulling plates from the basket.

Just kiss him, already! Then Nico wished he could invent brain bleach and unthink that.

Sitting in the shadows, watching his nemesis and his boyfriend eating lunch together whilst he wished that he had indeed eaten breakfast was not fun. His stomach growled, and he remembered Will telling him that, "neither of us is ever missing lunch again..."

He sighed, then stiffened, sure they would have heard him - they did not move.

Will packed the remaining food away, and Drew cuddled up to his side.

Half of Nico yearned to reach for her and wrap his fingers around her slender throat; the other part needed them to kiss. He stayed put.

The daughter of Aphrodite laughed, and the tinkling sound travelled right to the clump of trees in which he was hiding.

Come on... come on...

She tilted her face up to the son of Apollo, and he said something in return.

Just a few more centimetres...

She raised a hand and brushed his hair out of his eyes.

I'm the only one that should be allowed to do that, he thought, and then, JUST KISS ALREADY!

Their lips met.

For a few seconds, Nico was sure his plan had failed. Will seemed to sink deeper into the kiss, and Nico half turned away in broken-hearted disappointment.

Then Will's eyes snapped open and widened to their full extant, and he stiffened perceptibly. One of Drew's hands settled around his neck, massaging gently, but he did not relax again.

Instead, he removed his hands from her waist and hair, put them on her shoulders and shoved her away. She looked up at him, hurt splattered across her ovalesque face, and his lips curled first with disgust, then with horror.

Will turned and ran from the hillside, the sunlight gleaming off of his golden hair.

Nico shadow jumped back to his cabin; this was where Will would be headed, he knew.

The Stolls were gone, his cabin restored to normal.

XxX

The door slammed open, light flooding the darkened exterior, and Nico looked up from his perch on a sofa to see the silhouette of his boyfriend.

Will's eyes were red and tears traced their way down his cheeks. "Nico- Nico, I-"

He took a deep breath. A tiny, self-destructive part of Nico's brain wanted yell at Will, to kick him out, to hurt him the way Will had hurt him.

But Will hadn't been himself when he did that, he reminded himself.

Still... "Will," he said, coolly.

The other boy flinched at the coldness of his voice. "Nico, I'm so, so sorry. I swear, I-"

Gulping, he gestured towards the opposite couch. Nico nodded, and he sank into it. "I didn't remember anything since waking up in the Sculpture Garden in New Orleans. I only just remembered now, when I - when I..."

"Kissed Drew." Will looked at his feet, drops of salt water running down the end of his nose and dripping onto the charcoal grey rug.

"Yes," he said, and his voice was a whisper full of self-hatred. "I just... I'm sorry, Nico. I... I understand if you... if you can't forgive me."

He raised his head again, and looked directly into Nico's eyes, bloodshot blue into bottomless black, and Nico felt his emotions bubble to the surface inside of him. It almost hurt, they were so sharp, and he'd been trying to suppress them for so long.

Will clearly mistook the look in his eyes for anger, as he stood and stumbled slowly back towards the door.

No!

"Wait! Will, wait-" Nico flung himself from the crushed velvet cushioned seat towards the other boy, who turned around just in time to catch him and gather him up in his arms.

"I forgive you, Soleggiato," he whispered into his ear, and burst into silent tears, shoulders shaking slightly.

Will hugged him fiercely and led him gently over to the seat he'd just left. "I'll make it up to you, Death Boy."

"Do you swear it?" Nico's voice was a little muffled.

"On the Styx," Will confirmed, and bent his head down towards the son of Hades'.

When they broke apart, he smiled tentatively at Nico, who leaned back in.

Putting the Ehtel blood into Drew's lipstick stash had been a risky move, a desperate move.

But it had worked.

A/N Congratulations to jman197, the only person to twig that Ehtel was Lethe spelt backwards and write it in a review. Well, if the Ehtel does the opposite to the Lethe, I thought, why don't I just reverse its name?One final chapter coming tomorrow, promise. I just have to write an epilogue.

Thanks to all.

~Fi