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From a distance, the River Lethe glowed a familiar milky white, whose unchanging stillness was as bleak as ever.
Alecto descended on the rocky bank without so much as a flap of her enormous wings, scanning the deserted space. Silence shrouded the area like a murky veil. The muted ripples didn't fluctuate in their eternal flapping and the poplars bothered not to shake their leaves for a greeting. They stood like the rest of the Underworld, unchanging, enduring.
Within that timeless picture, it didn't take Alecto too long to spot the little demigod she was assigned to retrieve.
After all, this wasn't the first time she had to come to this place.
Bathing in the Lethe's silver light, Nico di Angelo may very well be one of the ghosts down here, bleached white and frozen. The waves cast a simmering luminous sheen over his silhouette, turning his thin, pale face further into translucent glass rather than living human skin and bringing the dancing little Caspers in his pajamas to life. Frost layered his ebony hair, puffy and almost white, which reminded Alecto of the first October snow that was left behind Persephone's steps as she walked the stairs to their Lord's side.
The boy sat alone on a protruding ridge, right on one of Hypnos' poplar's serpentine roots that barely held the Underworld soil together, a faraway look in his bottomless eyes that appeared to be reaching over even the racing waves, his thoughts seemingly as deep as the waters itself. He gave no indication of acknowledging Alecto's appearance.
The memories resurfaced, unpleasantly. Alecto remembered the first time they had been there: a different Nico di Angelo, so young and painfully young, whose utter fright had leaked over his quivering lips in the form of tiny sobs even in his sleep and trembling form a stark contrast to this Nico's calm and unperturbed facade. That time, the Lethe had looked much more cruel as Alecto watched the nymph coax her stale water to the demigods' lips, humming softly as if she wasn't burying their souls under a white blanket, never to get out.
(Both of them had left. Neither of them would return.)
The princeling had grown quieter and slower since moving down here. Alecto had caught di Angelo more often than not easily distracted and sometimes lethargic even after a lengthy nap. The Lord claimed that it was only the usual effect of spending a considerable amount of time in the Underworld. Yet, if Zagreus' grim expressions were any implication, Alecto knew it couldn't be that simple for a half-mortal to fight for his life in this land of thriving death, son of Hades or not.
The darkness was stubborn - she would give it that.
Folding her wings neatly behind her back, Alecto approached the lonely demigod carefully. "There you are, boy."
She walked up to him and Nico hummed, turning to her with a small, raspy "Hi, Alecto."
He sounded like a wounded, pathetic little animal, whereas his eyes held a sadness so sharp, so immense - the color of Stygian iron sucking the souls out of everything it touched. It was only thanks to many years of dealing with the Lord's bad moods and Lady Persephone's petty rage that protected Alecto from freezing at the spot, swept away by the daunting dismay in Nico di Angelo's eyes.
The demigod turned away, breaking the spell and resuming his contemplation without any sign of getting up. Alecto followed his gaze, only to see the vast greyness of the fog that blanketed the Lethe in boredom.
Nothing out of the usual, and Nico still didn't get up.
Though a bit skeptical, Alecto preferred to complete her task on time. She opened her mouth to urge him, however, Nico raised a hand, his finger angular and white, pointing resolutely above.
"What is that?" He asked.
Alecto followed his signifying and saw, from the other side of the Lethe, a white shark shooting upwards, shining bright as it cut across the dark ceiling of the Underworld before disappearing suddenly midair, leaving behind only a tail of silver embers.
She blinked, "It's a reborn soul."
"Oh" was the demigod's lame reply.
He didn't say anything more than that.
Alecto glanced at him from the corner of her eyes. The halfling kept his face tilted upwards in rapt attention. Another spark shot up, this time a pale yellow one, and Alecto watched as the color was reflected, mutely but sharply despite the far distance, in those black eyes as still as stagnant water. Even his skin glowed a bit golden at the newborn light, shaded by the poplar's leafage.
It wasn't something new, considering the numerous times Alecto had crossed this area before. But this time, it felt different, alright.
"They are beautiful," Nico commented, sounding almost absentminded.
Alecto had an inkling that the Lord would not be pleased with their tardiness when they finally made it back to the palace.
As expected, the demigod was quick to prove her theory. "Did Bianca also look like that?" he asked again.
The question successfully stunned Alecto for a moment.
She was no stranger to the siblings and the tragedy that had befallen them since the day Zeus decided to act on his pettiness. After all, Alecto had been an active participant in said tragedy, albeit just a side character. That hadn't stopped her from keeping a close eye on the children onward, however. If Megaera were to prob, Alecto would claim it to be her dedication to making sure a task done right, by which she was keenly aware of how much Bianca di Angelo meant to her brother and how easily it was for the Ghost King to break down at the first mention of the girl's name.
So, the question raised a flag inside Alecto's head. She had been told enough about the halfling's fragile state to know that she should tread carefully.
"That's how the souls are sent back to the Upper world upon choosing reborn," she explained factually, "there is no exception."
Nico hummed again. He nodded and his body swayed like a willow in the spring breezes, the pajama was a blanket hanging on his thin frame. The demigod was as skinny as a skeleton, much to Lady Persephone's chagrin.
"They looked like shooting stars," he smiled, rather dreamily, in a surprisingly childish way that reminded Alecto of the naive children who didn't know better. "Have you ever seen them?"
His black gaze flickered to her, searching, inquiring, though not unkindly. Nico's curiosity wasn't an unfamiliar thing, and Alecto tried not to show her displease at his invite to a conversation that would definitely delay her work.
She clucked her tongue mentally. Better humor the princeling for the time being, then. "Yes, honey. I've roamed the earth long enough to see Asteria in passing at least once."
Nico tilted his head, intrigued. "Is that how you call them? Asteria?"
"Leto's sister. The Titaness." Alecto clarified loftily, "They said that she turned into a quail and threw herself into the Aegean to escape the sky brat. The shooting stars were her descent."
At her extensive explanation, the demigod blinked owlishly before his lips curved up in the same pleased and satisfied smile Persephone usually sported when her least favorite character got crossed off. "She was admirable, then."
Alecto couldn't help but agree. The absolute spite of Zeus was one of the rare traits they shared, and Alecto would gladly cheer him on should the demigod decide to act on his (rightfully) grudge.
Nico did no such thing. His gaze returned to the monochrome fog looming above them. When he spoke up again, his voice was shaking. "I had a dream."
"Oh?"
"About Bianca."
Something stung inside her chest. Alecto ignored it, determined to keep her calm. Because at the end of this, she was sure that at least one of them would be wrecked to the core.
"If you want to tell me, you can, boy."
Alecto noticed Nico swallow silently. The poplar leaves fluttered when he heaved a long sigh, as though Hypnos was there with them, cheering the demigod on through the recalling of his dreams.
"You know, back when we were still in the Hotel, we used to watch the stars together." The demigod started. "I remember, we couldn't open the windows, and since our floor was so high, the sky was the only thing outside the Hotel could see. When the night came, the stars were. Bianca used to distract me with them."
Nico raised a pale hand, spread wide and tremulous because of the fatigue still plaguing his body. He smiled and his smile held a type of reverence Alecto had seen in regretful ghosts. And yet, his eyes were filled to the brim with nostalgia.
"Back then, I was so scared, you know? Because I couldn't remember mamma. I was so confused, always on edge. I felt something missing, but my amnesiac ignorant mind couldn't for its life figure out what that was. It got worse at night when we had to go back to our rooms. So Bianca would point at the sky and tell me about the stars." A pause. "Thinking back, most of her stories were probably made up, what's with them never really making sense."
The chuckles tumbled out of his lips like the cracks of a broken music box. (It wasn't like much of him managed to remain intact). Alecto didn't find anything funny, but she held her tongue.
"Still, it helped. I cried less and less until I started asking for the stories instead of mamma and Bianca didn't have to lose her sleep over me being a crybaby anymore."
Another soul shot up and Alecto watched the firework through the hollow between Nico's fingers. She thought of the glinting bars of Celestial Bronze that surrounded the Lotus Hotel, protecting it from monsters, and locking in its fallen pilgrims also. She drew in her head - the image of two children gazing at the sky, trying desperately to cling to something they knew that, unbeknownst to them, hadn't been theirs anymore. The children to whom she had turned her back, left behind the glamourous golden doors of a trap she knew they could never get out of on their own.
Nico dropped his hand. All traces of reminiscence were gone, melancholy clouding his expressions. "And when I woke up again, I was already here. By the Lethe."
Alecto scrutinized the demigod, gears turning in her head, "So you shadow-traveled in your dream and landed in this place?"
The demigod shrugged his protruding shoulders. "I guess."
When it came to the son of Hades, who had been admitted to the Underworld due to the severe corrosion caused by the darkness within himself, a direct consequence of his detrimental self-exploitation, unconscious shadow trips, as it turned out, weren't a rarity. Alecto had spent enough time in Tartarus watching Nyx's house from afar to recognize the obsessive hold the shadows were having on Nico di Angelo, how they pulled him in whenever they liked and only spat him out when he was coherent enough to rip himself off their invisible arms.
Zagreus said nothing more other than that Nico didn't have a good grasp on his own abilities as he used to, let alone his subconsciousness. The shades, instead of being at di Angelo's disposal, for him to command and mold as he preferred, now acted as tumultuous as an over-excited Cerberus on his decennial walks, dragging their owner around with the leash binding them together.
But Alecto also knew - the shadows were also the reflection of one's mind. Like how they outlined them under the light, they encompassed their inner darkness, and be defined as such. The shadows didn't have a personality of their own. They were but what Nico, like any other, embraced.
Like Cerberus returning to the Gates at the end of his walkaround, they always had Nico's best interest at heart. Being the deepest in his mind, they listened to his concealed, unaware wishes and then acted as he would have wanted - for whatever he could or could not.
The puzzle pieces clicked into place in her overworked mind.
Alecto turned to watch the stagnant water. Images of the old days flashed through her mind, still distinctive in the flow of her thousand-year-old memory: the black-haired girl kneeling at the edge of the river, Lethe was all white and silver whereas her Lord wore funeral black. Nothing had changed since then.
"It's natural, then," Alecto said, digging her toenails between the smooth stones and sharp icicles, "This is where your sister last stood, where she bathed in the Forgetfulness to bleach her soul white." She extended her arms, gesturing to their surrounding. Alecto watched the foliage above them flicker along the movements of her wings because she couldn't bring herself to see into Nico's eyes just yet, "This same poplar tree, rocks, and sand has watched Bianca di Angelo leave her previous life behind. This is where the last piece of the Bianca di Angelo you have come to know rests."
"The shadows have brought you to the end of her existence." She concluded.
Silence befell them after her revelation. Alecto could feel the demigod's eyes on her, could hear his breaths grow ragged as each of her words was broken down into pieces for his mind to process. She was generous enough to give him all the time he needed.
"Really?" came the demigod's trembling, breathless voice.
There was no tear on his face when Alecto turned back to him. She could hear him cry still. She nodded and Nico exhaled as if he had been carrying Atlas' sky on his shoulders. He laughed hoarsely, wetly, puffs of air escaped his pale lips like they couldn't decide whether to be his dying message or a humorless chuckle.
"What does it say about me, then?" The demigod questioned, in a tone that suggested no need for an answer.
Alecto said it anyway. "Perhaps, are you looking for your sister still, little one?"
The demigod only nodded. Sadness spoke of longing in his bottomless eyes, flickering in the Lethe's milky fog. "Would you believe me if I say I've let go of her?"
Considering the length he had gone through to reach Bianca di Angelo, Alecto doubted it, but she held her tongue. "Does it matter?"
Nico shook his head slowly. Frost piling on his shoulders like snow and stars in his hair, a stark contrast to his inky eyes.
The Underworld dwellers, for all that the Upstairs creatures deemed them a threat for capable of, played little in the course of death and what it entailed. They were simply a poplar tree flowing down the Lethe, making a home in its water but ultimately powerless to change. They barely meant anything compared to Death's inevitability - not Alecto, not Nico di Angelo, and not Hades.
And yet, the Lord and his children seemed to have a penchant for defying the natural law, fortunately, or unfortunately more so, when they were the most powerful of them all.
"I suppose it cannot be helped." The demigod relented, defeated. "I just can't help it." He corrected, somewhat regretfully. "There is a part of me that would always search for her, despite all the bad things it has brought me. It feels like I have a hole inside me, one I cannot fill no matter how much I grow."
He drew his knees to his chest, curling up just on the verge of falling down the ledge. The son of Hades looked so small that it scratched somewhere deep in Alecto's barren heart of a thousand-year-old Underworld overworked employer.
Nico rarely showed himself pity, opting to feign resilience instead. However, right this moment, Alecto could trace the hurt in his tone, could smell the bleeding wound through the teardrops that streaked down his cheeks, gleaming much like the firework of souls that lighted up his face cruelly white; and she could feel the weight of his anguish that was shaking his lips in a broken smile rather of tragedy than a fairy tale.
Unpleasant feelings coiled inside Alecto's chest. Nico looked so small, so desperate, so hopeless. His hopelessness was not simply one at the bottom of despair. Alecto recognized it as the same despondency that broke even the most courageous heroes - the painful realization that the scintilla of hope they had been believing in and clinging to was but a delusion. It was deeper than any kind of adversity Homer could come up with.
And what could the demigod have been hoping for in such a nightmare dressing as a daydream?
The little halfling smiled as he cried. Dejected. Drained of it all. "What do I do now? I know she's not here anymore, yet still I want to see her so bad."
He asked the dark sky, and Alecto found herself with no answer.
What could one possibly do at the threshold of mortality but wait for Thanatos to pick them up? Similarly, what could they possibly do to tug at Bianca di Angelo's soul that had launched itself into the Underworld sky, exploded into pieces only to reform into something else entirely different, forever farther than their reach?
The Furies knew neither guilt nor pity. Yet, there was bitterness on Alecto's tongue and her nose was filled with the stinging burn of Nico di Angelo's tears. It tasted like waking up seventy years older than the world you belonged to, to see a new one so much larger, farther, scarier. It tasted like counting the days until your deary's return only to meet with a black sail and their bones. It tasted like immeasurable love and equally immeasurable loss - irreplaceable, unbearable loss - and Nico's tears kept trickling down to the faded rocks, becoming the unsoothable Cocytus all over again.
Alecto had seen enough souls, had tasted enough grief to spare her the luxury of hoping that the Cocytus inside Nico di Angelo would ever dry up - even though all the tears in the world wouldn't bring Bianca di Angelo back.
The demigod brought a shaking hand up his face, wiping his eyes with his cold pajama sleeves. "Sorry." His rough voice pulled Alecto out of the conundrum he had pulled her into. "Didn't want to dump it all on you. I was just--a little emotional---"
He scrubbed at his face furiously. The hiccups wrecked his scrawny body like a ragged doll. He was making more of a mess trying to get rid of the frost clumping on his eyelashes, only to end up getting more hair sticking to his cheek. The more wetness he managed to clean up, the more tears seemed to pour out from his already reddened eyes.
Alecto didn't quite know what to do. Consoling a weeping child wasn't included in her job training back then. She was more often than not advised to leave them to it - spirits wept all the time - but this wasn't just any soul, nor was he a ghost. The Furies was born as the representation of avenge, the opposite of consolation and acceptance. She could help Nico track down those who had wronged him to the end of the world, but she doubted her company would be appreciated as some kind of balm for his pains.
(She tried not to think about how tricking him for seventy years might have put her as one of those who wronged Nico di Angelo as well, Hades' plan or not.)
In a hasty attempt to lighten the mood, Alecto blurted out, "I've heard worse from the condemned souls," only to immediately figure it probably wasn't a nice thing to say at this sensitive moment.
Alecto cursed under her breath. Babysitting wasn't in her spies of expertise, Jack of all trades she was. It was more up to Persephone's alley and she would rather it stay up there.
Nevertheless, Nico didn't seem to mind the comparison. His mind was too much of a mess to process social etiquette.
"I haven't grown at all, have I?" The halfling chuckled wetly between muted sobs, "I'm still that annoying, helpless kid. Always crying. Always asking someone to stay near. Too clingy for my own good."
The demigod finally gave up on salvaging his dignity, resorting to slumping tiredly on the poplar tree. He looked up at the foliage, at the firework of reborn lives, and whispered mindlessly, "She was right to leave, after all."
Alecto had half a mind to stick her hands on his face if only to get rid of the tear streaks. She would do it well even with all the talons.
She didn't do that, however. Instead, she flicked a bat wing in his direction, creating a breeze strong enough to blow the hair out of Nico's face. The demigod recoiled a little from the sudden wind, before looking up at Alecto with questioning eyes.
She arched a haughty eyebrow, "I'm quite sure some of us would consider your clinginess an endearing trait."
Nose red, Nico snorted, "I find it unlikely."
Alecto arched an eyebrow. She crossed her arms and leaned back on the rocks, relaxing as she hummed thoughtfully. "I don't suppose the girl wanted to leave you, little prince."
It got her an incredulous frown from the halfling. He laughed blankly, "I appreciate the gesture, but you don't have to lie to pity me, Alecto."
Oh, the nerves of him. If it was any other demigod, Alecto would have torn them into pieces for merely doubting her. di Angelo was lucky she was feeling generous today to ignore his jabs. "I would know, kid, considering I was there when she left."
Nico's eyes grew wide. "You were?"
Alecto could tell that Hades was still hellbent on withholding any information about his daughter from the girl's brother from the way Nico immediately leaned towards her, drawn like a moth to flame. She nodded and Nico sucked in a breath. He was careful as he pried, though no less eager, "H-How was she? Did she leave peacefully? Was she in pain? Did she--Did she--" He stammered.
Alecto spared him the struggles, "She hesitated."
"Hesitated?" Nico repeated dumbly, skeptically.
Alecto looked down at him, "You tell me. She stayed for you, didn't she?" She prompted and then watched the realization dawn on Nico's features in record time.
"The only successful summoning?" He mumbled out, to which Alecto gave a nod in confirmation.
She fished her memories of those days. The girl had been there, just a few steps from where they were reclining against this poplar tree, pacing back and forth under Hades' heavy gaze; her specter blinking in and out of sight since Nico had been just powerful enough to tug at her soul then; frustrated beyond calm to raise her voice whenever the Lord said the wrong thing. Sometimes Bianca would look at the water in yearning, only to tug at her own ghostly hair and mumble to herself her brother's name.
"Bianca di Angelo was worried about you, even on the verge of her reincarnation," Alecto divulged, "She kept turning back just when she'd come close enough to bath in the Lethe, as she hadn't made sure yet you'd be fine without her."
Nico's lips trembled. A mix of emotions in his gaze that Alecto couldn't decipher. "But she chose to leave."
"It wasn't what she would have wanted, honey, and you know it," Alecto stated firmly.
Nico's gaze dropped. His hands curled into fists where they were tucked by his side. He stared at the river bank, seemingly processing, overwhelmed.
Alecto supposed it was a lot of information for him. Bianca di Angelo had never been an easy topic for the demigod, but it could be a small measure of comfort for him to understand the depth of Bianca's feelings for him. God helped the boy with some comfort for everything he was going through.
Nico was going through a lot of stages if his expression were any indication.
"Please, tell me, when..." He stuttered out, "When, exactly, did she leave?"
Alecto vaguely recalled Hades standing alone by the silver river, looking at an empty Ceiling through which Bianca had disappeared, giving his order in his signature gloomy voice, a note of sadness carefully concealed. My son doesn't need to know this.
The Lord hadn't learned yet, that a part of his son had gone with his sister the day she walked out of his life.
Alecto shoved the order at the back of her mind. "After we won the Second Titanomachy." Alecto replied, "Bianca di Angelo only departed after she saw to it that you'd found your place at Camp Half-blood. She messed up my schedule, let me tell you." She clucked her tongue half-heartedly, before directing a critical look at the halfling again. "I'm quite sure Bianca di Angelo loved you a damn lot, child."
The demigod's face contorted with a mix of emotions. Alecto watched as the revelation of Bianca's love for Nico sank in. He stared at her, dumbfounded - he had been wallowing in the thought of abandonment for so long that the depth of Bianca's feelings for him felt foreign. The inky eyes shimmered and teardrops returned, though this time they didn't taste as bitter.
When he realized he was crying again, the demigod hastened to wipe his tears again, shaking his head and flinging them everywhere.
"So you think she didn't want to leave me?" He asked, eyes wide, utterly vulnerable. A rather stupid question, if Alecto had anything to say about it.
"As I see it, I don't think you're the clingy one, child." She smirked, shrugging, "At least not the only one."
Nico smiled at that. A bright, profound smile that lighted up his blotchy face and bloomed on his cheeks like the flowers peeking out under the melting snow on the first day of Persephone's return to the Overworld.
He looked so happy to hear that Bianca didn't throw him away as she had always done in his nightmares. Alecto didn't know such a thing could make someone so overjoyed.
The demigod turned to Alecto. The dullness in his eyes had dissipated, replaced with translucent shimmering glass, so much clearer. "Thank you for telling me." He breathed out, gratitude shining like stars in his gaze.
It felt weird to receive thanks as a Fury.
Normally, people either screamed or cried when they came in contact with Alecto and her sisters. Though, Alecto guessed this wouldn't be the first time Nico di Angelo became an exception. He had been doing it a lot lately, since moving to the Underworld.
"You're welcome, kid." She waved a dismissive hand, "You're okay now?"
The demigod hummed, his gaze followed another soul that had just shot up. "I think so." He placed a hand on his chest, half reminiscing, half hoping. "I don't think the hole inside me would ever disappear, but I suppose I could live with trying to fill it anyway."
He smiled serenely, the curve of his lips weighted less now compared to minutes earlier when he bared his heart to Alecto in the most vulnerable state ever.
It was clear that the demigod was still struggling to come to terms with his sister's death. However, Alecto also saw a glimmer of hope in his eyes, as if the reassurance that was Bianca's love for him had lifted a weight off his shoulders. It was a bittersweet moment, and one of many steps in Nico's journey to healing and moving forward.
Maybe it was simply payback for all the things the Fates had pushed him through and she just happened to be the embodiment of avenge, maybe somehow, without her knowing, they had forged a bond that she couldn't ignore since the day they played house with each other - either way, for the first time in many centuries, Alecto found herself praying for a demigod's fate.
To avenge was to find a closure to one's rage or grief. Avenging was the last thing Nico needed right now, so Alecto hoped she had at least given him some sense of closure and peace.
"Now that we've settled it, I'd like to keep up with my tasks," Alecto walked out of the foliage and spread her wings, "Ready to go back, kid?"
Her wings reached up towards the demigod, and Nico nodded without hesitance. "Sure."
The demigod was light enough for Alecto to carry him in her arms comfortably. His arms wrapped around her neck the same way a baby would cling to their mother and she could smell ice in his hair. They were a mess of soaked clothes, thin limbs and bones, all jagged lines and sharp corners. Alecto made a mental note to inform Lady Persephone about the princeling's health status.
Faraway, Cerberus' howls could be heard from where the palace stood imposingly - the sign of Hades' impatience working up again. Alecto grimaced at the near scenario of being reprimanded.
Nico was quick to notice it. "Don't worry," he grinned, "I won't let Dad scold you."
"Oh?" Alecto arched an amused eyebrow, "I'll take you up on that, honey."
She flapped her wings, sending them disappearing into the darkness of the Underworld, leaving only the peaceful Lethe, forever unchanging.
And the reborn souls that exploded into sparkles in the middle of the Erebus night.