Percy doesn't know what he's doing.
"Estelle, please, oh my gods," He whines, hand darting out last second to catch the cup of applesauce before it can hit the ground. Percy sets it back in front of his baby sister as she erupts into a fit of giggles. He scowls at her. "Oh, that's funny is it?"
Estelle shrieks in amusement and slaps the cup off her high chair again.
Catching it midair for the fifth time in the last three minutes, Percy rakes a hand down his face, cursing himself for the tired smile the rascal's little giggles are dragging out of him.
Using his battle instincts to not spill baby food. If Percy's enemies could see him now.
He sighs and shakes his head. This is the first time his mom and Paul have left him totally alone with Estelle since she was born. With Annabeth back in Boston again helping Magnus and Grover frolicking up and down the West Coast calming forest fires, Percy's got no babysitting reinforcements nearby until his parents get home from their well earned weekend getaway to Montauk.
'We get along great!' He'd told his mom. 'How hard could it be?'
She'd given him a funny smirk when he'd said that. Percy had brushed it off. But now they're six hours in, Estelle is covered head to toe in applesauce and Spaghetti-Os, and Percy is ready to be abstinent for the remainder of his life just so he never has to do this again.
Now that he thinks about it, that was probably his mom's goal all along.
"Okay," He states, standing up decisively and setting the applesauce onto the counter (out of reach for her pudgy little evil arms of destruction). Percy lifts Estelle up and out of her chair, holding her out a good six inches from him to avoid getting equally drenched in tomato sauce and apples. "I think it's bath time. Ugh, gross, you're all sticky."
She giggles. Percy rolls his eyes fondly and starts walking her to his parents' bathroom.
"You know, I'm kinda a big deal on Olympus," He comments to the baby. "I'm famous! A big scary hero. Ready to knock down any monsters that come after my peeps."
His boasts don't seem to impress his sister. Estelle burps and swings her little socked feet in the air. Percy grins and shakes his head, turning on the bathroom light with his elbow upon entering.
Okay, she's still kinda cute, Spaghetti-Os and all. Maybe abstinence isn't necessary.
He won't pretend to be disappointed.
Percy sets his wriggling baby sister into her little bathtub. It takes quite a bit of tug of war before Estelle is willing to part with her racecar socks, but he eventually manages to get her bathed.
His mom and Paul tell him it's okay to use his powers if he needs to. They always say that Jules won't be able to hide her blood or scales from Estelle easily, so there's no point in Percy bothering. Using them feels wrong, though. He thinks...He thinks that this kid should be normal. Should get to be normal.
When she's grown up a bit, maybe he'll tell her. But, for now, Percy picks noodles out of Estelle's fuzzy black hair by hand and pretends to be deeply offended when she splashes him.
By the time he's fought the kid into a fresh onesie and put her down for a nap, Percy's clothes are soaked, stained, and his sleeves are both well chewed (by Estelle, not by him). Stumbling tiredly, he tiptoes down the hall to his own bedroom in pursuit of the sweet embrace of his pjs.
His room has felt weirdly big ever since the end of the war.
Juliette moved back to camp to be close to Will and the other healers. To Nyssa for help with her prosthetic. To Jason for...reasons. Percy understood, obviously, but it still sucked. Sucks.
Ugh. He doesn't know. It's been nice to have his own room back, but it's weird not listening to her (stubbornly denied) snoring all night. It's been a change to get used to. Especially when he wakes up in a cold sweat, and she isn't right there: five feet away, face half concealed by a fuzzy pink sleep mask, intact, alive, and breathing.
Percy pulls on some fresh clothes, frowning at the door that he didn't bother shutting. Why would he? It's not like Estelle is going to come striding through it to judge his battle scars.
Percy's here all by himself.
He yawns and tosses his clothes into the hamper, flicking his hand to pull the water out of them idly. He carelessly lets it splatter onto Jules' bed.
What's she gonna do? Yell at him?
Percy pauses when he hears it hit the covers, though. He frowns. He turns around and looks back at his little sister's bed.
That sounded weird.
His eyes land on a (now damp) paper bag. A big one. It's folded over on top and secured with bright pink duct tape.
Huh. Was that there before?
Percy doesn't think so. Although, he does vaguely remember Paul saying something about Drew dropping some stuff off at his classroom. Just some clothes of Jules' or something.
But...when the water hit the bag, it sounded sort of...
Hmm.
Percy feels...funky. And the bag is the reason. So, he does what any older brother would.
He snoops.
He doesn't feel bad about it. He's pretty sure it's just some of Jules' never ending wardrobe stuffed in there, and he's already read her diary that she left behind, anyway (He got bored, and it was funny, alright?). The tape comes off messily, tearing part of the top of the bag off with it, so Percy just impatiently turns the whole thing upside down and lets the contents spill out onto the bed.
He's expecting, once again, clothing. Or makeup. Or nail polish or something.
Percy's not expecting to watch Juliette's camp beads fall out onto her lavender bedsheets.
All at once, the atmosphere of his day turns on its head. The bottom drops out of Percy's stomach. He stares down at the colored beads on the blanket.
The Golden Fleece. The quest that they met on. The year that she saved his life.
A maze. The Labyrinth where Percy thought he almost lost her.
The Empire State Building. The battle where she and Nico turned the tide. They'd have lost the war if it weren't for them.
He has never seen Juliette take her camp necklace off. Never. Not to shower, not to swim, not for cheer, or even for school picture day. Hades, she wore that thing to homecoming last year. And...beyond that...
With a shaking hand, Percy reaches past the camp necklace to the golden chain partially hidden by the purple letterman jacket Jason gave her (barf). His breaths feel sharp as glass when his fingers hook around the chain and raise up the little heart shaped locket he was hoping wasn't real.
Percy can't move. He can't think. He stands there in the middle of his-their room and stares at Silena Beauregard's necklace.
Juliette doesn't take this off. She has never taken this off. Ever. Up until this moment, Percy had believed she might actually die before she gave it up to anyone. Gods, he would probably die to keep anyone from taking it from her.
If this is here...If her camp beads are here...And this jacket...
A horrible realization is forming in the pit of Percy's gut.
Across the apartment, Estelle is waking up. Her cries start to get shrill, peeling at his ears.
Percy stares at the locket as she screams.
He's been lied to.
Hasn't he?
Percy really doesn't know what he's doing.
Piper can't do this.
"He's not dead."
She stares down at the oozing cuts on her legs. Her voice sounds crazed and frantic. She doesn't care.
There's a splash. Without even meaning to, the blowgun she's been carrying around just got lobbed into the shallows. Another thing lost.
No, not lost. Not lost because-"He's NOT dead!"
"Piper..." Apollo mutters.
"NO!"
Seafoam has splattered up Piper's legs. It makes rage boil in her like hot tar. She scratches it off of her skin until her flesh is raw.
"HE ISN'T DEAD!"
The others say nothing. She can feel them staring, though.
Piper's jaw is busted. The whole right side of her face is hot and swollen. Her lip ring is gone. Torn out.
The wound it left is deep. It's going to scar.
Gods, it better.
Piper needs it to.
She needs to remember what happened here today.
This is all because of her.
"He isn't dead," She sobs.
He can't be. He's Jason.
Both of Piper's best friends can't be gone.
"Maybe," Meg mumbles, trying once again to wriggle ambrosia into Piper's clenched fist. "We'll find out. You need to rest and heal."
Piper throws the chunk of ambrosia into the waves. She yells. Shouts. Then she covers her bruised face and lets out a sob.
"Maybe?" Shuffling. Apollo. "Meg, you didn't see what happened! He...Jason...the spear-"
Piper screams, fighting at Tempest's winds to get back to the ship. She watches Caligula smirk and slam his spear back down between Jason's shoulder blades.
"Tempest will find Jason."
He will.
He'll find him.
And Jason will be alive.
"Meg-"
"We just have to wait-"
"He's dead."
Silence.
Juliette might have screamed.
Her whispered words scrape like broken glass down to Piper's eardrums.
She's trying not to throw up when she looks over at her sister.
Those are the first words that Julie has spoken since the ship. She's on her knees in the surf. Her thin dress is waterlogged. She's pale. Sickly. Her face is hidden by her matted hair. There's a scar from her jaw to her collar bone that Piper hasn't seen before. There are ugly, purple burn scars down both of her arms.
And yet, she's blank. Like she isn't even sitting with them. Not a flare of power. Not a whisper of an anguished aura.
Piper watches her sister dip her hand into the ocean. She cups a bit of the seafoam. Gently.
"He died...Now, please, shut up."
They do.
Nobody speaks a word until lightning flashes and Tempest is galloping, smoke billowing from his silver coat, on the waves.
There's a moment when Piper's whole body relaxes. She gets to her feet, heart jolting when she notices the hulking shape draped across the ventus' back. She sees his hair first - his Imperial Gold colored, shining blonde hair - and all of the fear and tension just bleeds out of Piper's bones. Tears of relief choke her. She smiles.
The expression makes the slice down her lip crack, and hot blood starts to pour again down her chin.
It runs the same color as the stains on Jason's school uniform.
"No."
She's shaking her head. Piper doesn't know when that started.
She can't stop.
"No. No, no. No, no, no-Jason!"
The cold Pacific waves reach Piper's knees as she stumbles into the sea. She passes Juliette's face of stone. Somewhere along the way, Apollo and Meg latch themselves to Piper's biceps, pulling her back.
"JASON!"
He doesn't look to her.
He doesn't look anywhere.
His eyes are closed.
His arms are dangling down.
His sword is nowhere to be seen, and his shirt-
"JASON!" Piper sobs, fighting her restrainers. "Jason, please!"
The wind is still. Motionless. Frozen. Piper falls forward into the waves and screams.
This can't be real.
This can't be real.
This can't be real.
This can't be-
Tempest steps right over her.
She pushes Apollo away and turns to watch him reach the shore. The ventus stops in the shallowest part of the surf. Just beside Juliette. He bends down to greet her as if she's the only other person on this beach.
Piper half expects Tempest to bite her. He usually does whenever Jason-
She sobs into her hands and struggles back down through the waves towards the scene.
Juliette lifts from the water with the grace of a nymph. Even beaten, half starved, battle scarred, and reaching up for the corpse of her first love, Piper's sister is stunning. It's a beauty that she's always been quietly jealous of. Effortless and kind. Gentle. Feminine.
Everything Piper has never been.
That ball of envy and anger hardens like lead in her chest as she watches Julie run a hand down the side of Tempest's muzzle and place her forehead against his. Piper sees her lips move, muttering to the horse. She trudges through the water as Tempest snorts something back at Julie before lowering down to the ground.
In a whirl of wind, a brief darkening of the sky, and a flash of thunderless lightning, the ventus is gone.
Piper isn't shocked. He was only loyal to Jason. And Jason is lying still on the sand, his nymph-like girlfriend's knuckles brushing his pale cheek.
Piper falls to her knees beside them. She scans what's left of her closest friend.
His whole body is spattered with sea sludge. His shirt is stained red. Piper can see through the wet fabric to where the spear tore through muscle and bone. One of Jason's shoes is missing. He was wearing socks with blue racecars on them today.
Jason's lips are dry. White. Piper buries her face in her hands so she won't have to watch as her sister runs the pads of her fingers across them so delicately.
"Fix him."
Meg's demand is directed at Apollo. In an instant, Piper's head is unburied, and she's looking hopefully for the former god.
She's watched Will Solace sew limbs back on. She's seen his light draw Nico back from the Underworld's doorstep. If anyone can fix this, it has to be his father, right?
But Apollo, although he's inching forward to press his hand against Jason's cold forehead, looks grief stricken. "Meg...I cannot fix death. I wish I could."
Bullshit.
"There's always a way!" Piper argues. Like Percy always says. There's always a way. "The Physician's Cure! Leo took it."
Apollo shakes his head. There are tears pouring down his pimpled face. "Leo had the cure ready at the moment of his death. He went through many hardships in advance to get the ingredients. Even then, he needed Asclepius to make it. That wouldn't work here. Not for Jason." He looks at her, pity in his painfully familiar blue eyes. "I am sorry, Piper. It is too late."
No.
No, no.
Juliette is unnervingly silent. Piper can't see her face. Her hands are wandering around Jason's features. Her fingers brush his eyelids. Her thumb traces his mouth. She tucks a strand of hair back away from his forehead.
Like a woman admiring her sleeping lover in the dead of night. It makes Piper release a frustrated shout and bury her hands resolutely in the sand.
"No! No, the Cherokee always taught..." But what does Piper know about the Cherokee? She thinks that her father's gods will help her now? After she spent sixteen years ignoring their existence? Even after months of studying her heritage, Piper still doesn't know what the fuck she's talking about. "There is a plant cure for everything! Even death. Some plant has the answer."
Apollo sighs sadly.
"Piper, the Cherokee hold a great deal of wisdom, as do their stories. But even as a god, I couldn't offer such a remedy. If it existed, Hades surely wouldn't allow its use."
Julie's hand stills on Jason's cheek.
Piper shakes her head angrily. "The Doors of Death, then! Medea came back that way! Why not Jason? There's always a way-"
"Orpheus."
The conversation pauses. Piper, Meg, and Apollo all look to Juliette.
She's not touching Jason anymore. Her hands are laid flat on the tops of her thighs, the cuffs on her biceps gleaming gold under the sunrise. She's still looking down at him, though. Piper still can't see her face.
"Orpheus nearly did it."
Apollo shifts. Uncomfortably. "Juliette...Orpheus was a wonderful man. My daughter was blessed to share her life with him. But the point of his story is that death is final. No matter how strong a love of life one may hold."
Slowly, Julie turns her head to face them.
Piper's entire body jolts.
The ocean spray has washed away the black blood from her complexion. Her eyes are green again, as they should be. But the space beneath them...
Veins. Veins of...gold are spidering across her cheeks. They pulse with light. They smoke. Tears spring to Piper's eyes as she watches Juliette not even flinch at the pain they have to be causing her.
There's a chilling expression fixed on Apollo. She's never seen Julie look like that. So...blank.
So dangerous.
"He deserves to live."
The hissed words echo across the silent beach.
Apollo's hand twitches on his - Julie's - bow. "Of course he doe-"
"More than you."
The former god's mouth snaps shut.
Julie's gaze moves to Meg.
"More than you do."
To Piper.
"More than you."
It's true. Piper breaks her eye contact with Juliette to look back down at Jason.
No one is as good as Jason Grace.
She hates him. She's so angry. Who does he think he is getting to decide which of them should live?
At least Piper got to live already.
Jason...Jason was just getting started.
"Yeah," She chokes, agreeing.
Julie moves slowly. She rises to her feet. In the orange light of the rising sun, she looks like a vengeful goddess.
"Take him to Reyna," Julie demands. "And give me your keys."
Piper obeys without meaning to.
When did Julie learn how to Charmspeak?
"Where are you going?"
Her sister turns for the car up the hill. She turns her back on the ocean. She turns her back on Jason's cold body.
"Los Angeles."
The den is silent.
Zeus' feet are up. His cup has long run dry, even Ganymede having been too focused on the wall projection to uphold his usual diligence. The king of gods runs his fingers up and down the boy's thigh as he studies the scene on the California coastline.
"Someone should let our uncle know," Hermes mutters, slowly standing from his armchair.
Zeus narrows his eyes. "Why? It is not as if heroes have not tried this sort of stupidity before." Hermes pauses, lips pursed. Zeus juts his chin out in challenge. "My brother has his Furies for a reason. The little monster will not make it two steps into the Underworld."
"She has before," Ares comments, putting his cigarette out onto his palm, frowning. "She went with the Poseidon brat."
"And without Jackson, she'll be drowned in the Styx before she reaches Hades' palace," snaps Zeus. "This is of no consequence."
His children exchange glances. The kinds that always swirl the storm in Zeus' belly.
How dare they doubt him?
He grits his teeth. Ganymede sucks in a breath as Zeus' grip on his leg turns bruising.
"Jason Grace is dead," growls the king. "His tapestry is finished. He will be given Elysium, and the mortal world will move on."
Such is his command.
Zeus meets each of his children's eyes individually. He glares at them, daring a word of argument to emerge. They all let their gazes flit to the floor one at a time. Eventually, satisfied, Zeus sits back once again, and Ganymede refills his chalice with trembling hands.
Zeus pulls the boy against his chest, hand wandering beneath the neck of his robes.
There's movement off to his left. He rolls his eyes.
Silently, Hera has risen from her place on the sofa beside him. She stands for a moment, head high, shoulders square, peacock feathers woven regally throughout her dark hair. Zeus does not glance at his wife. And she does not look at him.
Hera turns, hands folded behind her back, and walks silently out of the hall.
Zeus coils his fingers around the throat of the boy on his lap. Lightning sparks in his anger.
He has had enough of that woman's disrespect.
This plan of theirs has been a long term production.
Thalia thinks that she and her sisters could have done better. They could have eased their champion's suffering.
She will not pretend the matters were out of their hands. They are goddesses - goddesses already breaking ancient laws. One or two more offenses for King Zeus to charge them with so that Juliette Aster might sleep peacefully would not have been such a hardship.
They chose not to intervene. The three of them are certainly not blameless in this fate that has befallen their chosen mortal.
Alas, all that has come to pass was necessary. Necessary so that this child might change things. So that she, in her unremarkable, fleeting, insignificant lifespan, might make a difference for them.
So that she might save Olympus before it tears itself apart.
Thalia stands on the seaward facing terrace of the McLean mansion. The breeze - the cold, stale, dead winds - are not even brushing her dark skin.
Her locs lay frozen on her shoulders.
Her painted eyes are dry, unblinking.
Her mouth is held in her hand. Where humans have lips, Thalia has skin. Smooth as marble. Soft. Unmarred beneath her architectural nose.
Her lips are by her waist on the flat of a handheld theatrical mask. Where they sit, surrounded by brightly colored paints, they are frowning.
Frowning at the sounds echoing up to her from the beach. The screams.
"Will she do it, sister?" A voice asks quietly from behind. Thalia turns. Euphrosyne is smiling at her sadly. She looks similarly pained by their demigod's suffering, but her smile does not waver. It cannot waver. Ever. "Will it work?"
Thalia raises her mask, mouth placed below her nose. When she speaks, the plaster lips move with the words. "We have only one way of knowing."
Euphrosyne's smile does not twitch, but her eyes grow anxious. She joins Thalia at the railing and looks down upon the shapes on the sand. "She is broken."
Thalia closes her eyes. It does nothing to block out the sounds. The sights. The cloud of anguish reaching for them from below. "She is motivated."
"This is cruel."
"Is it necessary. For the boy's sake. He is our only hope. Remember what our goal is, little sister."
Euphrosyne's cheeks are trembling. Over her wide smile, tears are gathering in her eyes. "Thalia, she..." Thalia reaches for her hand when her young sister's voice catches in her throat. "She will no longer be mine."
"She will," Thalia denies. "Once she sets things right, she will feel cheer again. He will bring her cheer back to her."
"She has never felt so far from me." Euphrosyne looks at her, yellow irises shining. "How can you stand it?"
Thalia thinks for a moment. She looks down on the figures beside the ocean.
For all the McLean girl is howling, for all that Lord Apollo is sobbing, for all that the young child of Demeter is slashing angrily at the reeds by the water, Juliette Aster has hardly made sound.
For an hour, she sat on her knees in the surf. Motionless. If it were not for the gleam of the moon on the gold of her false limb, Thalia might have struggled to see her from so far away. The sight of the girl so silent, so...bleak...
Thalia drops her mask back down by her waist, letting her arm dangle over the railing of the terrace. She closes her eyes again and breathes deeply through her nose.
It was a night much like this one when she and Juliette last spoke.
When Thalia made her first hard decision.
When she inflicted the first cruelty onto a young girl who trusted her entirely.
Juliette Aster was a girl born to die. This is the mantra that has kept Thalia trudging forward through the perils of their treason. Through the sadness of her forever cheerful sisters. Through the betrayal of her innermost instincts.
She is a fertility goddess. A goddess of comedy. Of romance.
And the one child she has ever had the privilege of raising, Thalia released to the wolves. First to Kronos. To Luke Castellan.
Now, Thalia stares down at her demigod, her champion...her sapling...as she climbs behind the wheel of a broken down school van. Thalia watches the first tear fall from those golden veined eyes and prays that Lady Styx might give her petal a fighting chance.
The goddess holds out her palm. Euphrosyne rests her smiling, tearful head on her shoulder. They watch a thin, purple flower bloom in her hand and be swept away in the wind.
A flower in the wind.
What poetry.
A/N
Hey! Sorry for the wait - I had to take a break from writing to study for some tests. Planning on having Julie's POV back next chapter. To be totally honest, I couldn't figure out a way to write out how she might have really been feeling right here, because I don't think even she would understand it. I think maybe it's better to let you guys infer what's going on in her head right now.
Here we go, guys. Entering into the whole reason this fic was written. I'm totally not still crying. That's totally you, not me. Projection much?
Love ya! See you next chapter