Work Text:
He was doing it again. Keith tightened his grip on his sword and glanced over to the archery field. Everyone was giving it a wide berth and that was because of a certain demi-god. What they weren’t realising was they were the reason Keith was feeling a bit off balance. Well not them in particular, though the feelings of distrust and unease were helping. It was all the negative emotions being carried around by one person.
Lance McClain, son of Hades.
Most people, like their god parents, were untrusting of Hades and in connection, his children as well. Lance was the only known child and while at first, people would think he could be either the child of Aphrodite or Apollo, they were pretty quick to turn their backs on him. Which lead to a lot of negative emotion that Lance seemed to carry around him.
Which for a child of Aphrodite and someone who could read emotions pretty easily, was off putting to Keith.
“He’s doing it again.” He muttered as he turned back to his duelling partner but Shiro heard him.
“Who?”
“Who do you think? Lance is a walking bubble of angst and he keeps throwing me off balance.”
“I’m actually surprised he’s out here now. I usually see him come down here in the morning.” Shiro said looking over in Lance’s direction. Shiro didn’t dislike Lance, he never disliked anyone, but after an altercation with a fury that Lance had been too late to stop, Shiro didn’t go out of his way to approach Lance unless they happened to cross paths.
“Well he’s throwing me off.” Keith complained again, not able to focus with the nagging emotions floating around him.
“Keith, I’ve seen you avoid him like the plague.”
“Look who’s talking.” Keith snapped back
“I know I avoid him and my reasoning might not be the best, but Keith, you’ve gone out of your way to avoid him the most. Is it really because of the emotion reading?” Shiro asked
Emotion reading was a trait for Aphrodite kids. It was a trait Keith could do without. He had issues sorting through his own emotions, having everyone else’s dropped on him because of his mom wasn’t his idea of fun. While his siblings were all loud and having fun being happy, Keith was happy to sit in a corner and ignore everyone. He still didn’t understand how the goddess of love was his mom when someone like the god of war fit him better. He liked getting dirty and fighting and would punch anyone who pissed him off enough.
“It’s hard not to read his emotions when he projects them so easily.” Keith said, looking over to see Lance walking away from the archery field, glares from the other training demi-gods still sent his way. Keith would send his for carrying around all those emotions but avoiding Lance was easier. He didn’t do well with people with tons of emotions.
“Who does that death kid think he is? He goes around like he’s the hottest shit.” A son of Ares vented, loudly enough that Lance had stopped walking and glance over at him. The next thing they knew, the earth under the Ares child broke, causing him to stumble and fall over. Lance continued walking
“Wow. He’s as petty as you are.” Shiro said, smiling at the glare Keith shot him. “look, I know I avoid him, but I can’t help but think he’d do some good with a few friends. I hear that one of the cyclops who work in Hephaestus’ cabin is the only one who will approach him.” Shiro said, sheathing his sword.
Keith did the same, seeing how training was obviously over. “are you telling me to make friends with him?”
“No. I get why you avoid him. I just wished he had a few more friends here. He hides out in his room most of the time. I think Coran is the one who makes him come to dinner since no one in the kitchen will make him separate meals.” Shiro said, walking over to Keith
“You’re such a gossip.” Keith said, leading them off the training field to put their weapons away.
“When your boyfriend is the son of Hermes, you hear a few things.” Shiro said shrugging. “Adam worries about him, since you know, Lance stayed in the Hermes Cabin when he first came here. He was there for almost a month and then he was claimed and everyone he’d been friends with had turned their backs on him.”
Keith understood why all the emotion hung around Lance, but it was getting to be an issue. Someone needed to deal with it and get him to calm the hell down.
When Keith had been thinking how someone needed to deal with Keith, he wasn’t asking for that person to be him. He had been walking around the camp grounds, avoiding the spa day that had taken over his cabin. He also didn’t want to bump into Nyma, knowing his sister were turn her charmspeak on him to get him to join. She’d done it before. He heard arguing and his curiosity had gotten the better of him. He found Lance standing outside his cabin arguing with the head camp councillor, Coran.
“What do you mean I can’t go training in the morning anymore? How is this fair?”
“I’m sorry Lance. Some of the campers have been complaining-”
“Bullshit!”
“Language Lance.”
“Screw my language! No one here likes me, I don’t understand why you won’t let me stay home and now you’re taking away the only things I like to do here. Why don’t you just throw me out if you can’t stand me that much!”
Anger, hurt, disgust with self, sadness, frustration, loneliness. Keith could read it from Lance a mile away as he watched Lance stomp back into his cabin, the flowers that sat in pots outside the door starting to brown as the aura of death followed Lance.
“Lance, Lance, open the door. I don’t hate you, you know that. Lance, please.” Coran stopped knocking on the door and sighed. “come talk to me after dinner.” Silence was the only thing he received, making Coran sigh and walked away from the obsidian cabin.
Before he could stop himself, Keith found himself next to Coran. “Coran, what’s going on? Why is Lance upset?”
He could read the confusion on Coran’s face at his question. “well, some of the campers were complaining that Lance isn’t cleaning up the skeletal soldiers from his training he does in the early morning, which I don’t believe, but a few of them are thinking of praying to their godly parents to complain. Most gods wouldn’t care about any problems their kids have but no one seems to love Hades. I wouldn’t put it past them to try and do something because of who Lance’s father is. I told him he’s not allowed to train in the morning anymore and can only train at the same time as everyone else.”
Everyone else? Like it had been today? Keith would never be able to get any training done because of Lance’s emotions and the emotions of everyone else.
“I do wish that I can show Lance his parent doesn’t matter, and he shouldn’t listen to what everyone else says but he holds onto a lot of anger. Almost like you did when Aphrodite claimed you. But look at you now!” Coran threw his arm around Keith’s shoulders, pulling him into a tight side hug. “child of the goddess of erotic love, kicking ass and taking names. You can take on most of the Ares Cabin and send them to the infirmary.”
Keith looked over his shoulder to Cabin 13, the Cabin of Hades. Keith had been claimed into a house where despite how he was different he was still accepted. Lance wanted nothing more than to be accepted but wasn’t just because of who his father was. Lance would probably always hold those negative emotions until he felt accepted.
“I can’t believe I’m gonna do this.” Keith muttered.
“What’s that my boy?”
“Nothing.” Except for the fact, he was going to try and make friends with the most emotion ridden person in the whole camp.
Keith looked over to the lone person sitting at the 13th table as he and his siblings went to go make their offerings to their mother. Lance was picking at his food. Did Lance ever eat? He always looked like he never wanted to be there. He also noticed that his camp necklace was actually around his wrist as a bracelet, the beads looking bright against his tan skin. He was also wearing a canvas jacket, which looked odd with all the other campers wearing their camp shirts and shorts.
“Keith, hurry up.” One of his brothers called, pulling his attention away from Lance. He dropped some of his chicken in the fire, sending his usual greeting to his mom before following his siblings back to their table. He quickly fit himself next to Nyma.
“What are you doing here?” she asked, pushing her blonde hair over her shoulder.
“I need advice about something. You’re like friends with everyone right?”
“Not everyone, but pretty close.” She said, as she started stabbing at her salad.
“Have you ever been able to make friends with someone who no one likes?”
Nyma looked confused. “why are you asking something like that?”
“Just answer the question.” He urged
“Well, I can assure you that if most people don’t like the person, if you try to make friends with them, they’ll definitely be harbouring distrust to you. To be honest, just be yourself so they can see you’re not trying to be someone else. Ok, who are you trying to make friends with? You don’t make friends with anyone.” Nyma begged, her desperation obvious to anyone who looked her.
“No one, bye.” Keith said, getting up and taking his stuff down to his usual spot. So, he had to be himself? That should be fun. Keith hoped Lance didn’t try to unleash a skeletal army in retaliation if this didn’t go well. He wanted to try talking to Lance after dinner when everyone went to the bonfire, but he saw Lance head to the nearest shadow and disappeared. Instead, he told his plan to Shiro and Adam, the head of Hermes Cabin.
“Honestly, Lance is a good kid. I know you’re doing this, so you can lessen the emotions he’s carrying around, but honestly I think the two of you can be great friends.” Adam told Keith. Keith didn’t have many friends, so he really hoped Adam wasn’t expecting a lot of this. If Lance wanted nothing to do with him, he wasn’t going to push. He got enough of that from his siblings.
He got up early the next morning and walked down to wear the Hades Cabin was were Lance was outside, pulling out the flowers he had started to kill yesterday after his argument with Coran. He had always been curious why a child of Hades had perfectly growing flowers. He’d heard rumours that Persephone hated Lance or at least any child of Hades.
“Hey, aren’t you Keith?” Lance seemed to notice him lingering. “your Aphrodite’s kid, right? The one who’s at the training grounds all the time? A little lost, aren’t you?”
Keith couldn’t blame the suspicion. It was around the time most of the campers were down training, where Lance obviously wasn’t no doubt in protest of being forced to train with all the hateful eyes on him. He decided to get him to not focus on that first.
“How did you get the flowers to grow?” he asked, catching Lance off guard. “I’ve only seen flowers look this vibrant down at the Demeter Cabin.
“I would hope so, seeing how it was her daughter who gave them to me.” Lance said
“Wait. Persephone gave you those flowers?”
“You were never here when I got claimed were you?”
Keith shook his head. It was impossible to keep track of all the kids in the Hermes Cabin, with them accepting all the unclaimed children so Keith was sure Lance had just arrived right around the time Keith was sent out on a mission. Keith and his team were gone for a while. It had been near the end of summer by the time they had come back, and Lance had been claimed, greeting Keith with the large bubble of emotions that plagued him today.
“Well then, you’re lucky you missed this blonde, really pretty young woman coming over to my table, asking me if I was Lance and then dragging me back to my cabin. I was sure she was gonna kill me. She didn’t like me for a good part of our conversation, but when I refused to accept Hades as my dad, she got a bit nicer. Then my mom made me go to the Underworld to spend a bit more time with Hades while she explained to my dad why his youngest son was now in control of death, kinda.” Lance put the dead flowers in a bag next to him, getting up to where new ones were waiting I the doorway of his cabin. “I didn’t want anything to do with him, but my world was already being ripped apart back home so I had nowhere to go. Persephone felt a bit sorry for me, so I guess she decided to ignore her jealousy of what Hades did with my mother and talked to me a bit. I know she’s technically my stepmom, but she kinda reminds me of my sister Veronica.”
Keith could see the slightest bit of happiness and peace coming from Lance. All the negative emotions came from knowing Hades was his dad, but he could see that Lance had his happy spots.
“So, she gave you her flowers?”
“My mom likes gardening so when Persephone took me to her garden, I kept pointing out all the flowers I knew. We bonded more because of that. I look forward to being around her more when I have to go to the Underworld.” Lance said, his happiness growing slightly before suspicion came up again. “that still doesn’t tell me what you’re doing here though.”
“It’s hard not to notice you when you carry around all those negative emotions.” Keith said, Lance looking away.
“Right, you guys can read emotions. Sorry.”
“Least I can do is make those emotions stick around less. What’s the Underworld like?”
He could tell Lance was confused with how even after Keith confessed why he was around, he was just sticking around. Keith was putting himself out there, exposing himself to all these emotions. He just hoped Lance would do the same.
“I can go if you want me to. I don’t have charmspeak, so I can’t make you talk to me.”
Lance seemed to relax a bit at that. “it’s cold. I live in Miami so I’m not good with cold. The worst thing is now that I’m claimed, I’ve been feeling colder than usual.” That would explain the jacket. “there isn’t much to do. Whenever I have to go there, I’m either in my room with Kosmo or with Persephone. Gods help me if I’m there when her mother wants to visit.”
“Demeter is pretty bad huh?” Keith asked, crouching down so he was next to Lance as he planted in the new flowers.”
“I think it’s one of the only things Hades and I agree on, that woman is suffocating.”
“Sounds like most of my siblings. You won’t believe how much they yelled at me after I was claimed and still wanted to train. I could care less if we’re expected to sit there and look pretty. I’ve fought most of my life and I’m not going to stop just because I happen to be the kid of a woman who cheats on her husband and constantly changes her appearance.” Keith said
“You know, your eyes have changed colour.” Lance said looking over at Keith. “they’ve been grey, dark blue, grey-blue, blue-purple and now they’re purple. They remind me of Persephone’s favourite flowers.”
Keith could feel his face getting slightly hot. Why though? He’d been complimented before, he was used to it. Why was it something as simple as being compared to a deity’s favourite flowers that made him feel embarrassed?
“Who’s Kosmo?” he asked instead
“Oh, he’s my hellhound.” Lance said, nonchalantly.
“A hellhound? You have a hellhound?”
“It was one of those gifts Hades gave me thinking I’d like him, but like all the stuff he’s given me, I’ll take but still hate him. But Kosmo is a sweetheart.”
“But he’s a hellhound.” Keith thought he should remind Lance
“Oh fine, I’ll show you.” Dusting off the dirt from his hands, Lance picked up the bag of dead flowers and dropped it inside his cabin before closing the door and tugged a cord from under his shirt. There was a dog whistle at the end. It was the same colour as the obsidian of Lance’s cabin with a blue ring around the middle of it. The sound it let out when Lance blew it wasn’t silent or even high pitch. It’s almost haunting sound echoed through the area at least twice before Lance pulled it away from his lips. Then, from the shadows of the cabin, a large mass started to grow. Keith got up, his hand going to his side where his dagger his mother – stepmother to be more correct but she was more of his mother than Aphrodite – had given him was but Lance but his hand on his shoulder stopping him. “Keith, meet Kosmo.”
The mass formed a shape and suddenly the shadows are shaken off by a large wolf? It looked like a wolf with blue markings and a line of blue fur running down it’s back to its tail.
“Hey buddy!” all the negative emotions disappeared as elation and happiness took over as Lance walked over to the large wolf, who at seeing its owner, moved up, trying to tuck it’s face into his stomach. “who’s a good boy? Are you my good boy? Yes you are! Such a good boy, I missed you.”
Keith couldn’t remember when he ever felt this influx of good emotions from Lance, if ever. It reminded him of when he was with his dad and stepmom, the three of them spending time after having to stay within the protective areas of Camp Half-blood.
“Keith, get over here.” Lance said, gesturing for him to come closer, Kosmo staring him down. Keith was cautious as he got closer. “Keith, this is Kosmo. Kosmo, this Keith.” Keith felt himself tense as Kosmo took a step towards him, his large nose sniffing him before Kosmo let out a sneeze, shaking his head. “I guess he’s smelling all that perfume on your clothes.”
“What? Seriously? Uggg, damn it!” Keith complained trying to smell whatever scent his siblings left all over his clothes.
“You do know that his kind hunt down any person who refuses the Fates call and any spirits who refuse to try and cross the River Styx. They have a much better smell than normal dogs. I will say this though, you are the strangest Aphrodite kid I’ve ever met though.”
It seemed like every day, Keith would find a reason to go see Lance. Usually Kosmo was there and he had started to worm his way into Keith’s heart. Lance was still never at the training field and Keith could tell he missed it, so he suggested they just go early in the morning like Lance used to do. Seeing Lance summon the skeletal soldiers to fight against was amazing. He could have been a child of Apollo with his accuracy of his shots. Lance was pretty good with a sword though Keith could still trip Lance onto his back with no problem. The amount of negative emotions seemed to disappear whenever Keith was around Lance, like he didn’t have to think about them.
It was strange spending so much time with a person that wasn’t Shiro or Adam. When Lance first let him into his cabin, he had been drawn to the wall covered in photos. There was a large portion empty that judging from the few photos of the lake there was had to of been from Lance’s time at camp before he had been claimed, but all the other photos showed a side of Lance he only seemed to see when it was just the two of them. Lance was surrounded by different people, most of who looked like him.
“That’s my family.” Lance said, after he finished turning on all the lights in the cabin on. Even though there was a fireplace, Lance filled the whole cabin with as many fairy lights as he could, making the room as bright as possible.
“You never did say what happened with your dad.” Keith said, remembering Lance talk about how his mother sent him to stay at the Underworld to stay with Hades and Persephone.
Lance shrugged, a small smile on his face and a small feeling of relief coming from Lance. “he didn’t care. I was his son and just because the guy who gave me the DNA to be here happened to be a big god, didn’t mean I was any less of his son. After I was claimed, I was really worried that he wouldn’t accept me. I’m glad I was wrong. My family doesn’t care that I’m a demi-god, I’m their kid and that’s all that matters.”
Hearing that made him think of his mother, the woman who raised him. She knew that the boy she was raising wasn’t hers by blood but Korila was more of a mother to him than Aphrodite. She taught him to fight, knowing he’d be faced with any monster trying to attack him and told him that he didn’t have to always look like the best person in the room, that those who mattered would see that no matter what. Keith wasn’t used to sharing those feeling with other people. Shiro and Adam felt proud of who their godly parents were while him and Lance didn’t.
He got to see more of the actual Lance, not the one that hid behind a stony face and no speaking. He was coming down from lunch to see Lance hiding behind a tree, Kosmo sniffing not far from where he was. Lance saw him and gestured to keep quiet and Keith watched Lance look around the tree and call for Kosmo before traveling through the shadows to another spot before Kosmo could reach him, leaving the hellhound sniffing around for his owner. Lance was childish and sneaky and a normal person when he wasn’t hiding his hurt. Keith wanted to see Lance like this more often, which was weird. Not in a bad way, it was just not something he was used to, wanting someone to be happy. Then again, everything was different with Lance.
There had been a time where a couple of Ares kids caught them training early, which got them both banned from training early, though Lance cleaned his messes up with the skeletal soldiers, which lead to the bubble of those negative emotions that hadn’t been around for a while to make a reappearance. They had been sitting in front of Cabin 13, Lance looking down and all that Keith wanted to was just pull him into a hug, like Shiro would do when Adam looked stressed. Keith wasn’t big on physical contact, so that had been just surprising to him, but then he felt the urge at other times. It was a little terrifying and he wanted nothing to do than just run away but the idea of what Lance would feel if Keith just disappeared, that stopped him.
When he was told by Nyma she expected him to be at Cabin bonding, he was a bit happy, so he could have time from Lance to sort through everything, though the idea of spending the whole afternoon inside a sweet smelling cabin instead of the soft lighting of Lance’s cabin was disappointing.
“Stop pouting. Your gonna kill all the flowers.” Nyma said as she stepped over Keith’s legs as she brought in another basket of flowers.
“No need, his new friend can do that just fine.” One of the snootier girls called from her place.
Keith glared over at her. “Lance is better company than you and your gaggle of groupies. Then again, so is a gorgon.” He snapped at her, ignoring her gasp of insult
“Behave!” Nyma ordered, almost on the edge of using charmspeak. “if we can’t stop Keith from going down to the training field every day, we can’t stop him from making a few friends, no matter how odd they are.”
“He’s not odd, it’s not fun when you had friends who turned their back on you because of who your parents are.” Keith said. He also noticed if he heard anyone bad mouthing Lance, he’d be quick to jump to his defence. Lance had to stop him from attacking those Area kids who’d gotten them banned from early morning training when they decided to leave a few comments in Lance’s direction.
“Ok, no more talk of anyone who’s not in this cabin. I’m not stopping him if he decided to kick anyone’s face in.” Nyma said, holding her hands up. Thankfully everyone quieted then, knowing she really wouldn’t stop Keith if he did decide to attack. “thank you. Now, the people from Demeter’s Cabin gave us these flowers so we can make flower crowns – I saw that eye roll Keith – so let’s get to work.”
Keith didn’t move at first, letting his siblings take their pick of flowers first. He found flower crowns an overused idea, but it wasn’t like he could leave. When a basket near him was clear, he pulled it closer to him, looking at the flowers that were left. A few blue blossoms, a few purple and a few red. He pulled them out and rested them in his lap, playing with the leaves a bit until he could get hold of a pair of pruning shears. The purple of the flowers reminded him of how Lance compared to the changing colour of his eyes to Persephone’s favourite flowers in her garden. He controlled himself from blushing this time. Why was it that one comment that made his face want to turn red? The blue flowers looked like the blue fur on Kosmo’s body. The more he pondered over that thought, the more he realised Lance’s eyes were a similar colour. He silently groaned, hiding his face in his hands. What was happening to him?
“I can see the waves of whatever coming off of you. What’s with you?” Nyma asked
“Nothing.” He said, pulling unwanted leaves of the flowers by hand so he’d have something to do.
Nyma moved closer to him and handed him the pair of pruning scissors in her hand. “I’ve never seen you express these types of emotions. It’s like the ones I see on someone who’s got a…oh my gods!” everyone looked over to Nyma who waved them off before leaning closer to Keith, “you’ve got a crush on Hades’ kid?”
“What? No, I don’t.” Keith said, getting everyone attention again.
“Something you want to share with the class?” the same snooty girl asked
“Yeah, you can’t mind your own business. So why don’t you fuck off?”
“Nyma!” she called for the Cabin head
“I warned you now shush.” Nyma said
“I do not have a crush on Lance.” Keith whispered
“Keith, sweetie, my darling little brother. While you don’t fully take use of the amazing powers our mother gave us, I do. I happen to have a much better understand of emotions than you do, and I recognise a person who has a crush, even if they don’t. how do you think I knew Rolo liked me?” she asked, mentioning her child of Dionysus boyfriend.
“Either he got drunk and told you, or your charmspoke it out of him.” Keith answered, knowing all the stories of how the confession went between the two.
“Ok fine, but still. I have never seen you spend so much time with someone who wasn’t Shiro or Adam. Do you actually enjoy hanging out with him?”
“Yeah so?” he asked, as he started twisting the flowers together into a crown.
“So? No one likes hanging out with him.”
“Because you guys don’t like who his dad is. Lance is actually a pretty cool guy to hang out with.” Keith defended. He noticed the look on her face. He could tell it was smug. “what?”
“You’ve been defending him a lot. Just admit it, you feel something for him.”
“No, I don’t. now leave me alone or I’m putting your clothes on the practise dummies.” He threatened, leaving Nyma pouting at him and turning away from him. There was no way it could be true. It couldn’t be. He was just Lance’s friend, right?
Then why did the idea of just being Lance’s friend feel weird in his chest?
He didn’t go see Lance that night. He didn’t even go to dinner. He stayed in his bed, staring at the finished flower crown that sat on his chest that acted as his bedside table. When he had finished weaving the whole thing, the first thing he thought of was to give it to Lance. He didn’t know if it had been Nyma putting ideas into his head, but he couldn’t stop thinking about Lance. Did he like Lance? He didn’t know. Keith never had crushes before. Being Aphrodite’s kid, it was never clear if they liked him for him or if it was the allure of their mother’s passed on beauty that attracted people. Had Lance ever been affected by it? He had noticed his changing eye colour but that was about it. Then again, Keith went out of his way to never look fully put together. He groaned, turning away from the flower crown. This was so stupid. Why was it he was good enough to read emotions to the point of getting affected by it but dealing with his own was the most impossible thing in the world?
“Keith? You up here?” he heard Shiro’s voice call, heading up the stairs to the boys’ level of the Aphrodite Cabin. Keith didn’t answer and let Shiro walk all the way down to the end of the row of beds to find him. “there you are. You weren’t at dinner. Nyma said you weren’t feeling well. Do we need to go to the infirmary?”
Keith sighed, “I’m fine.”
“I brought you an apple. By the way, Lance happened to catch me on my way here. He was asking if you were ok.” Shiro said, handing Keith the apple.
Sitting up, the child of Aphrodite rolled the apple between his hands. “Shiro…how did you know you liked Adam?”
“Huh? Why are you asking?”
“I just want to know.” Keith said, avoiding the question.
“Well, for one, he was the only one to call me by my first name. everyone else always called me Shiro because they could never pronounce my name but when I came here, Adam was part of Hermes’ Cabin and Apollo hadn’t claimed me yet and he asked my name and instead of asking if he could call me Shiro liked everyone else, he said, ‘It’s nice to meet you Takashi.’ It was the first time anyone did that. We started hanging out more and he helped me move over to the Apollo Cabin after I was claimed, and it felt nice to be around him. I remember we were hanging out one day after training practise and I was listening to him tell this story of something one of the Hermes kids got into and I just kept looking at him and thought, ‘I wanna kiss him.’ That pretty much made everything clear for me. Then I got so scared of how to ask him out, so I was taking a bit too long, so Adam comes storming up to me one day and demands to know what’s taking me so long to ask him out, because he knows he isn’t the only one to have feelings in the relationship. Keith, is this about Lance?”
Keith looked away. It was about Lance. He didn’t want to risk losing Lance on something that might not be real.
“I think, I might...I think I have a crush on Lance, but I’m not sure. I don’t do crushes Shiro, you know me.”
“I do.” Shiro said, sitting next to Keith on the bed. “you went with the intension of getting Lance’s bad emotions under control right, but knowing you, you could have dealt with it long enough for it not to be an issue anymore and just left him. I think I’ve seen you head down to see him almost every day. I’ve seen you go to training with him, go swimming, I’ve even seen you play fetch with that hellhound of his. Your different when your around him.”
“I don’t like seeing him upset.” Keith said
“Shouldn’t that say something?” Keith shrugged. “Keith, I don’t know Lance very well. Maybe if the idea of getting attacked by Furies again didn’t scare the crap out of me I wouldn’t be so scared to try and make friends with him, but you’ve defended him from anyone who even looks at him wrong. I know he appreciates it and I know he’s lucky to have you.”
“But what if I tell him how I feel, and it turns out he was only attracted to me because of my allure?”
“Again, don’t know him very well, but Keith let’s be honest. You hide that allure very well. If he does have feelings for you, like you do for him, I’m sure it’s from his own decisions. Don’t let the power of your mother hold you back from doing what you want.”
Keith usually never did but this was different. He looked over at the flower crown, the blue, red and purple flowers tugging at his heart. He sighed. He fought Ares’ kids on a daily basis, why was telling a guy you might like him ten times harder?
“Not sure if you need more incentive, but he looked pretty upset when you didn’t come to dinner.”
Keith looked at Shiro. He heard Apollo was a bit of a gossip and obviously the same was with his kids, but it worked. If he didn’t go talk to Lance now, he’d only continue hiding and make Lance think he didn’t want to be around him. It was strange how he didn’t do emotions but when it came to Lance, he wanted him to fully understand how he was feeling.
The whole of camp was quiet as he walked to the black mass of a cabin. He spotted a spot of blue and realised Kosmo was asleep outside the door.
“Hey buddy.” Kosmo stared up at Keith, his ears flicking. “Lance inside?” Kosmo let out a huff before laying his head back down. “I’ll take that as a yes.” He knocked on the door and waited for an answer.
Lance opened the door, looking surprised. He was already dressed for bed, sweat pants and a large knitted sweater
“Keith? What are you doing here? I heard you were sick.”
“I guess spending all that time away from the cabin undid my immunity to all the smells of the perfume.”
Lance laughed at that. Keith read Lance’s emotions. He was peaceful, happy, content. These emotions mostly seemed to be around when Keith was with him, but they weren’t always there. How did Keith not realise just how much those negative emotions that would throw him off just disappeared when he was around Lance?
“Here.” Keith held up the flower crown and put it on Lance’s head. “I thought it would suit you.”
“Aww, thanks. Come in, no point standing outside. Kosmo.” Lance called, the hellhound getting up and slipping inside, going over to the fireplace and flopping in front of it. “are you feeling ok though?” Lance asked, dropping onto a fuzzy blue beanbag.
Sitting on the floor near him, Keith nodded. “um, hey. I was wondering. One of my siblings wouldn’t leave me alone about hanging out with you and they thought my allure made you want to hang out with me, which I know isn’t true because you kinda barely looked at me when I first talked to you.”
“I’m immune to Aphrodite’s allure anyway.” Lance pulled a sleeve back and showed his camp necklace that was wrapped around his wrist. Keith never noticed a small ice pendant with a flower pressed into it. “this is Styxan Ice. Persephone blessed it, so I could never be affected by charmspeak or allure, but I’ve always been immune to it anyway. Nyma tried it on me when I first came here, and I never worked.”
“Oh.” So, the emotions Lance felt were all his own, nothing of Keith’s influence.
“Why, did you think I hung out with you because of your allure? I hang out with you because your nice to me and you seem to care and,” Lance shrugged, “it’s nice being around you. I can tell you’re being truthful.”
“I like hanging out with you too. It’s nice and I like it.” Keith said, looking away
“Yeah, I can tell.” Keith glanced up to see Lance smiling at him with this gentle smile. It reminded him of the ones Adam would give Shiro.
Keith couldn’t say it yet, let alone ask, but knowing Lance could like him for him, Keith was fine taking his time for a while. He was close to Lance now and that’s all that mattered.