Disclaimer: I don't own Trials of Apollo.

APOLLO XI

Together again
Let the arguments commence
Find a compromise

Apollo had not been expecting Hades to come back, and the fact that he had did not put him at ease. To begin with, having his uncle with him had been somewhat of a reassurance – Hades was more powerful than he was, and having the back-up of another god of his calibre was definitely not a bad thing.

Then, he had learned about Asclepius, and there was no reason why Hades would be with him here, now, which boded well in any way, shape or form for his son. If Hades had come back, it was definitely not to help Asclepius, and his uncle's power might have been a reassurance when they were working together, but now it was at least as intimidating as Orion had been.

To make matters worse, Apollo could tell that unlike him, Hades had not had a difficult encounter with something almost capable of destroying him – his uncle looked fresh and untouched, almost as he had when they had arrived.

Golden ichor was still slipping down Apollo's own throat, where Orion's bite wound hadn't quite healed yet. Hades knocking away his arrow had been the uncomfortable confirmation – he was in no condition to fight his uncle.

That did not mean he would not try, depending on Hades' answer.

"Why?" his uncle repeated, and Apollo watched in some surprise as he hooked his blade back into its sheath; it did not mean anything in terms of how dangerous Hades was, but it was still a universally recognised symbol of non-threatening behaviour. Combined with the sincerity behind his original words, that if he wanted Asclepius dead he would not have helped them first, the action painted a picture that contradicted with what Apollo knew his uncle thought of his son. "Because I came to a… realisation."

Apollo couldn't tell if it had been hesitation or a deliberate pause before the strangely-emphasised final word, but immediately chalked it up to the latter – Hades was not one to hesitate, but he was certainly capable of dramatics.

"What sort of realisation?" he asked suspiciously; behind him, Asclepius shifted his weight awkwardly and Apollo wanted to hiss at him to stay still. Hades had yet to look at him, or otherwise acknowledge his presence directly, and Apollo dearly wanted to keep it that way.

"It does not matter," Hades said brusquely, brushing him off, and Apollo growled, because it certainly involved his son and therefore definitely mattered to him.

"What sort of realisation?" he repeated, more forcefully, and the dark flickering flames of his uncle's eyes glared at him.

"Do not push me, nephew," he snapped, "or I might change my mind about not smiting that god cowering behind you where he stands."

At the threat to his son, Apollo bristled, but it was not an idle threat and he knew it; Hades did not make idle threats. "What do you want?" he asked instead, and felt Asclepius step up closer behind him, moving a little out to the side before Apollo put out a hand to stop him.

He could not stop Hades, but he could still shield his son.

"I want to do what we came down here to do," his uncle said. "Which had nothing to do with this son of yours, and everything to do with the occupant of this place summoning my son, and by extension, another one of your myriad of children."

Was he expecting Apollo to prioritise one son above another? Apollo narrowed his eyes at him. "I am not abandoning Asclepius."

The noise Hades made could almost be considered a sigh. "Unfortunately, I am aware of that," he said. "Which is why I suggest a compromise." The word sounded like it pained him to say, and it certainly wasn't something Apollo had ever anticipated coming out of his uncle's mouth, but while he wasn't sure he was going to like whatever it was his uncle was about to suggest, if it kept Asclepius safe – from Tartarus, and from Orion, who would not be held by his bowstrings forever – then he was going to be backed into accepting it.

"What sort of compromise?" he asked warily, grasping the front of Asclepius' chiton without looking as he sensed his son trying to step up next to him again.

A weak but determined hand tugged at his in turn, Asclepius apparently unappreciative of Apollo's attempts to keep himself between his uncle and his son, but he didn't relent.

When Hades' dark eyes turned away from his to bore directly into Asclepius instead, he doubled his efforts to push his son back again, and was rewarded by a slight stumble as the less powerful god was forced to succumb to Apollo's greater strength.

"A change in your punishment," the god of the dead said, apparently choosing to directly address Asclepius, rather than continue conversing directly with Apollo. Apollo didn't like that in the slightest, nor did he like the fact that Hades had started prowling around so that he was no longer between the two of them. He promptly repositioned himself, and got an irate look from his uncle. "Don't be childish," Hades chided him. "I am not about to attack him; you can stop attempting to be a pathetic guard. Rest assured, you do not inspire any confidence that you could stop me, regardless. Instead of this ridiculous behaviour, perhaps you should focus on cleaning yourself up."

"I can look how I want," Apollo snapped back, the barb at his appearance stinging more than he wanted to admit.

Hades didn't reply, instead returning his attention to Asclepius, who was gently pushing against Apollo's restraining arm. Reluctantly, Apollo let him go.

"Asclepius, you are not forgiven for your actions of contempt against me and my domains," Hades began, "and- Apollo I am not talking to you," he snapped when Apollo went to protest again that it was his call to make the Physician's Cure for Leo. "I am aware of your involvement, but it is not your punishment I am amending, so I suggest you stay quiet before I change my mind."

Furious, but unwilling to push Hades too far, Apollo's mouth closed with a clack. His essence was simmering with anger, and he forced it to channel itself into fixing his appearance – yes, it grated that he was effectively doing as his uncle had told him, but it was that or do something rather more rash, and dangerous for his son.

"You swore that you would not make that Cure again," Hades continued, "an oath you broke, and will face consequences for."

Apollo couldn't help himself. "He already has!" he raged, gesturing at their surroundings, and his son's ichor-stained chiton. "What do you call this, if not consequences?"

"Father." A soft hand rested on his shoulder, and Asclepius came to stand next to him. "Please, let him speak."

"Asclepius-" Apollo turned his head to look at his son and his voice died in his throat at the look of acceptance on the younger god's face.

"Lord Hades is correct," Asclepius told him. "I did break my oath."

"But-"

"You provided me the means with which to do so," his son acknowledged, "but it was still my choice to make it once more, and thus, my punishment to bear."

Apollo wanted to argue against it, but serious blue eyes silenced him far more effectively than any of Hades' threats, and he wilted.

"You called this a compromise," he reminded his uncle, aware it was a surrender and hating himself for it as he once again turned to face the older god. "What is this compromise?"

"If you stopped interrupting me, you would know by now," Hades pointed out disapprovingly. "Clearly," he continued, his eyes leaving Apollo to focus on Asclepius again, and Apollo had to fight not to put himself back between the two, "leaving you down here, while something I, personally, have no qualms about, is going to cause a severe distraction for your father, as he's already proven."

The look Apollo got was not an impressed one, although unless Apollo was imagining it, the dark eyes lingered specifically on the last of the ichor as it evaporated away.

"So, for the time being," Hades said, lightly emphasising the last two words, "I will suspend your sentence." The god of the dead stepped forwards. "That is not to say that you will walk free; as you are doubtless aware – both of you," he stressed, "- my brother will not permit you to return to the Overworld, and to attempt to do so would be to only increase your punishment."

Zeus would be furious if he caught wind of even a change to Asclepius' punishment that he had not authorised; Apollo was already well aware of that, had known that he would need to find somewhere safe to house Asclepius while he petitioned for a change in his sentence. Hearing the reminder from his uncle did not reassure him in the slightest.

A glance at his son showed resignation on Asclepius' face.

"Therefore," Hades said, "you will be imprisoned within my palace until your father and I finish with our business down here. Upon our completion and return, I will determine a new punishment for you that suits my wishes, as the one directly offended by your broken oath."

"Not back here," Apollo insisted immediately. "Not back here."

"That suits my wishes," Hades repeated, but Apollo wouldn't back down. Not on this.

"No," he repeated. "This was too far. This is not a punishment, this is a torture, and I will not stand for it."

"Father," Asclepius said. "Please."

"No." Apollo couldn't be pacified on this, not even by his son. "No, Asclepius. Hades promised a compromise, and sending you back down here once we're done with our quest is not a compromise." He glared at the older god. "Not back here," he repeated. "If your steadfast position is that he must still be punished, then mine is that he does not come back here."

Hades met his glare evenly and said nothing for several long moments. Apollo had to resist the urge to shelter his son once more; Asclepius would not let him, his son apparently resigned to his fate in continued punishment, and it would do them no favours.

Eventually, the older god nodded. "Very well," he said flatly. "Asclepius' punishment shall not involve a return to this Pit. However, that is the only concession to your wishes that I will make."

It wasn't good enough, but Apollo was well aware that nothing short of total acquittal was good enough, and that was beyond anything Hades would be willing to allow. More importantly, it kept Asclepius safer – if Hades was changing his punishment, then it had to be kept secret from Zeus, which meant that his son would be imprisoned somewhere in the Underworld.

It was far from perfect, but it kept Asclepius safe from both Zeus and Orion, which was far more than could be said for Tartarus.

"I understand," he said after a moment, his shoulders slumping slightly because it still felt like a defeat, for all that it was a small victory, and hoped he had not just sentenced his son to an eternity of torment in the Fields of Punishment.

Next to him, Asclepius gave a small bow. "I appreciate your mercy, Lord Hades," he said.

"Say that after your respite is over and your new punishment begins," the older god told him, before whirling where he stood and beginning to stride away, back up the incline of Tartarus. "Come. You are worse than useless to us down here. I do not doubt your father will be completely distracted until you are out of this Pit."

"Not completely," Apollo grumbled, but he chivvied his son to walk ahead of him, pressing a hand against his back and sending some more of his power into the weaker god as they moved. His son looked wrong as an old man, and he could tell it was still an appearance of necessity rather than preference.

"Father, save your strength," his son protested. "I will be able to rest and regain my strength in Lord Hades' palace while I wait for you to finish your... quest?" The question was clear, and Apollo realised that his son did not know why he and Hades had entered Tartarus in the first place.

Then again, he also hadn't learnt of Phoebe's death before being cast down; how cut off had Zeus kept him from current events?

"There is a voice calling Hades' son down here," he explained, hearing his uncle make a disparaging noise from ahead of them. "He and his boyfriend – one of your much younger siblings," he added with a small smile as he thought of Will, and how Asclepius would like his brother. The smile then faded as he remembered that he'd left his mortal son in a coma, so the pair of them still would not get to interact, "then received a prophecy dictating that they would come here."

"At which point your foolish father decided that he would rather try to control one of his so-called uncontrollable prophecies and insisted on taking William's place," Hades interjected.

"William being..?" Asclepius inquired, and Apollo had to smile again.

"Will is my son," he said. "Like you, he inherited healing abilities over most of my domains. I couldn't let him come down here. He and his boyfriend, Nico, are also currently sheltering in Hades' palace."

"One could argue that being confined with my son when he is determined to get out is a punishment in and of itself," Hades commented, his tone almost light. "Apollo is wrong; they are not sheltering in my palace, they are confined to it, much like you shall be, and rest assured that either of them get out while you are there, your punishment shall increase a hundredfold."

"Father doesn't know Hades and I took their places," Apollo clarified hurriedly, and Asclepius made a noise of acknowledgement.

"They are being hidden and protected, I take it?"

"You will be another guard," Hades stated plainly, and that was hardly resting, but Apollo couldn't complain because having a god he implicitly trusted to directly watch over the two demigods was nothing short of a tremendous relief. "Nothing gets in, and they do not get out."

"I understand," Asclepius promised.

"Nico is a master of shadow travel," Apollo had to say, because that was by far the easiest way for the son of Hades to get out if given the opportunity, even though he doubted Nico would even try as long as Will remained unconscious. Hades scoffed.

"My son cannot shadow travel out of my palace without my permission," he said. "However, he does know his way about the palace impressively well for a living child." The better than Asclepius does went unspoken but Apollo heard it clearly; he trusted that his son did, too. "Do not let him leave his room."

Asclepius murmured another acknowledgement and then the trio of gods fell into silence. At the front, Hades seemed content not to speak any further, while Apollo stewed in the awkwardness of what to say to the son he had barely seen in millennia. It was a topic difficult to address at the best of times, let alone in the depths of Tartarus – and with his uncle in ready earshot. Anything he thought to say quickly fell away unspoken, words unwilling to be aired where anyone – and anything – could hear him.

Three gods were at least as much of a spectacle as two had been, drawing monsters like moths to a flame, although nothing dared get close enough to challenge them. Perhaps Hades' sword, glowing a dark purple and broadcasting an aura of obliteration, was warning them away, or perhaps they had enough common sense not to challenge a trio of gods.

Apollo's quiver was full once more; when not under immediate attack it took very little time to manifest a new bunch of arrows, all bristling together at his hip and waiting to leap into his hand with barely a thought. The last of the ichor had finally dissolved from his form, too, his injuries sealed up and his form flawless once more. It had taken longer than it should, and Apollo wasn't certain if that was because of the general ambience of Tartarus, or if something had affected his essence when he had let it out, unrestrained and exposed, during the earlier fight, but it had still healed, and that would do for the moment.

After some distance, and at about the time Tartarus started trying to tear up their feet in earnest once more, Asclepius had forcibly pulled away from Apollo's attempts to bolster him. Now, he had lost the look of an elderly man entirely, and appeared closer to Hermes' preferred appearance of modern times, with mostly dark hair speckled lightly with early greys and the beginnings of crows' feet crinkling in the corners of his eyes. Mortals who did not know them might have taken Asclepius to be Apollo's father, rather than the other way around, but at least he would no longer be mistaken for his grandfather. His chiton was still torn where Orion's arrows had found him time and time and time again, but a snapped word from Hades had Asclepius dissolving the ichor staining the fabric – with far more effort than it had taken Apollo – and leaving all three of them looking like a force to be reckoned with.

With that in mind, it was no wonder the watching monsters were keeping their distance, although the Phlegethon lay before them, and Apollo knew he and Asclepius, at least, would temporarily lose the calm and unaffected look as they once again crossed the fire river.

Hades didn't even falter, wading through the flames as though they did not exist. Apollo had known his uncle would be less affected than him, but seeing him emerge the other side completely intact, as though it hadn't even been there, reminded him how much more powerful the Big Three were.

Asclepius chose to grow and jump the river, and Apollo elected to do the same; having his form stripped back to ichor and little else in front of Hades did not appeal to him at all. It did not spare either of them from the entirety of the river's wrath, however. Searing cold flames reached up hungrily, licking at his feet and calves like a starving beast, flaying him until drops of gold trickled down into the torrent of fire.

Asclepius was worse off; while Apollo's wounds were only flesh-deep on his form, easily melded back together and the ichor vanished before it could land on the glassy fragments that made up the floor of Tartarus so far up, his son's ichor dripped liberally down from where his feet and lower legs had all but been obliterated.

But his son was a god of healing, superior even to Apollo in the art, and in the brief time it took for Apollo's own form to become flawless once more, Asclepius' feet and legs entirely reformed, if still stained with ichor.

Hades waited for them to heal without comment, dark eyes flickering over both of them only briefly before instead scanning their surroundings, presence leaking out just enough for Apollo to feel it, but hopefully not enough to agitate the denizen of the Pit himself. It was enough to prevent any monsters from attempting to make an opportunity out of an apparent weakness – not that Apollo's aim with his bow was at all affected by simple flesh wounds to his legs, but not all monsters could be trusted to think critically (or even think at all).

Having crossed the river, they were on the final stretch back to the exit to the Underworld. It was still not a quick journey, time and the shards of glass beneath their feet stretching on what felt like indefinitely, but with almost suspiciously little difficulty, the three of them arrived at the edge of the cliff where the air felt different, a little less oppressive than the cloudy miasma that covered most of the Pit, and Apollo could recognise it as the same place where he and Hades had landed, however long ago that had been.

"Asclepius." Hades broke the silence as he strode across to Apollo's son, full of purpose. A pale hand clamped onto the youngest god's shoulder and inky flames flared. Apollo darted forwards, a protest on his lips, but Hades pulled his hand back a moment later and Asclepius appeared unharmed.

That didn't stop Apollo from thoroughly checking his son's shoulder, finding a residue of Hades' essence implanted into his form. There was something dark in there, a promise of destruction, of death, and he snarled at his uncle.

"That will guide you directly to my palace," Hades said, seemingly unconcerned by Apollo's reaction. "Do not attempt to go elsewhere; it will not end well for you." He then glanced deliberately at Apollo, who glared at him furiously, before returning his gaze to Asclepius. "It will also mask your sensation of life from the rest of my realm. Do not speak to anyone except the two living demigods inside my palace, or Thanatos if he crosses your path. If possible, do not interact with anyone else at all."

"I thought you intended to escort me straight to your door," Asclepius observed, but even Apollo had to shake his head at that, as much as he hated it. If he could, he would have loved to guide his son out of Tartarus and into safety, but that meant losing even more time, increasing the risk of Zeus working out exactly where he had disappeared to.

And if he was honest, it had been difficult enough bringing himself to return to Tartarus after his final bout with Python.

If he left Tartarus now, he could not guarantee that he would be able to return.

His only consolation when convincing himself the first time had been that at least the serpent himself would not be there, but he had not expected Orion to revive so rapidly. With his bane, the giant his equal and opposite and unkillable waiting…

No, if Apollo left now, he would not return.

Hades was the one to say the words. "Our task down here is not finished," he said succinctly. "We will join you when we are done, and not before. Now: climb."

For the first time, Asclepius showed some hesitation. Perhaps it was the daunting climb out of the Pit designed to keep everything in, perhaps it was fear that despite Hades' assurances, Zeus would find out and descend upon him.

Apollo didn't know, but he didn't – couldn't – hesitate. In the blink of an eye, his arms were wrapped tightly around his son, pulling him in close and holding him as though their existences depended upon it.

He heard Hades make a noise of derision, but ignored him.

"I am so sorry, my son," he whispered into Asclepius' ear, closing his eyes as his son's arms came up to wrap around him in turn. "You did not deserve any of this." Not Tartarus, not his former punishment, not his death and forced ascension, and if some tears leaked from his eyes onto his son's shoulder then it was only right. "I love you."

He hadn't been able to say those words to his son in four millennia. Asclepius' arms tightened around him.

"And I you, father," his son whispered in response, provoking a quiet sob as his throat tightened and his heart fluttered.

Then his son let go, pulling away from Apollo's embrace. He resisted, for a moment, before realising that Asclepius was right, that he had to go, and releasing him with a supreme reluctance, hands skimming his son as the younger god slipped away.

"Lord Hades willing, we will see each other again soon," his son said, before offering the god in question another bow.

"Climb," was Hades' only response, turning away from both of them, and leaving Apollo to watch alone as Asclepius reached for the cliff face to begin his ascent.

Thanks for reading!
Tsari