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Grover was nervously pacing at the base of the Thrill of Love ride. Percy and Annabeth were picking their way down the side of the pool to get Ares’s shield and Aphrodite’s scarf, while he was on solid ground for protection. At least, that’s what Percy called it. Grover didn’t buy it.
What Percy had asked earlier, if this was going to be a repeat of the whole Echidna-in-the-Arch thing — it stung probably more than his friend realized. He had failed at being a protector once years ago with Thalia, and now again with the Arch. He couldn’t do it again. He wouldn’t let his friends down like that again. Why, if there were monsters here, he’d go up to Mr. D himself and remove his own petition for a searcher’s license. He’d pack up as many tin cans as he could and rough it out in the Amazon. He’d—
“Hi.”
Grover may or may not have bleated a bit.
He turned his head and came face to face with a figure he had seen just a few hours earlier under less-than-ideal circumstances. This couldn’t be good.
“Oh!” Grover squeaked. “Lord Ares. Your majesty. I mean, your highness. I mean, your esteemed godliness. I mean- “
“Dude,” Ares cut him off. “Chill out.”
Grover thought that was a bit idealistic considering that the god of War was literally a foot away from him, a humble, nonviolent satyr, but he chose to keep his mouth shut.
“Has Dio not taught you how to address gods? Feels like something he should be responsible for,” Ares mused, rubbing his beard and looking over to where Percy and Annabeth were still sliding down the pool.
“Dio?”
“Oh, Dionysus,” he clarified. “He says he hates it when we call him that but I think he secretly likes having a nickname. Makes him feel more included on Olympus, y’know? He’s such a softy. Even after like 3000 years, I think he feels like he’s not one of us.”
Grover wasn’t entirely sure the words “Mr. D” and “softy” should ever be in the same sentence, but really, what would he know? Besides, this wasn’t time to work out the psychological issues of his patron god. No, Grover was here on this quest as a protector, and he would do whatever it took to keep his friends safe from the war god.
“Sure,” he agreed. “May I ask why- “
“How about we do a little etiquette lesson, hmm? Aphrodite loves giving me those,” Ares interrupted again.
“Um- “
“Your majesty, your highness, that’s all way too formal,” the god said. “The older generation like my parents and all, they’re a bit more intense about the whole “titles” thing. Us younger gods are a cooler bunch. Just lord is fine.”
“Um,” Grover could have really done with a tin can around five minutes ago. “Okay.”
“Great,” Ares said cheerfully (which, yes, was a little disconcerting). “Let’s start from the top. Hi.”
There was an expectant pause during which Grover realized that it was his line.
“Oh. Hello… Lord Ares?”
“Perfect!” Ares clapped his hands together. “You satyrs are such a quick learning bunch. I like you, kid.”
“Thanks?”
“Now,” Ares took off his glasses, and with a jolt, Grover noticed that instead of the flames from the diner, his eyes were actually heterochromatic — one was cool blue and one a warm brown. For Zeus and Hera, he realized. “You’re probably wondering, “what could I have done to earn the undivided attention of the god Ares himself?” ”
“Yes,” Grover nodded vigorously. “I was very much wondering that. You are so intelligent, Lord Ares.”
Ares looked pleased, which probably meant that Grover wasn’t about to turn into a satyr-kebab anytime soon. Little mercies.
“I’m here to give you a warning,” Ares turned serious. The air around them seemed to pulse just a little faster than Grover’s own heartbeat, the California heat becoming the slightest bit stifling. Whatever was coming next wouldn’t be good.
“There’s a war coming, kid. I can smell it on the horizon. And your little friends Percy and Annabeth over there? They’re a lot more important than anyone realizes.”
Ares put a hand on Grover’s shoulder, forcing him to make eye contact with the god.
“You cannot second-guess yourself with them. What happened with your friend Thalia — you gotta get over it, kid.”
“Get over it?” Grover cried. “She was one of my best friends, how do you expect me to just get over it? My lord,” he added hastily.
Luckily, Ares didn’t seem to take it too badly. “Look. I get a bad rep ‘cause of the whole “bloodlust” thing, which in my opinion is suuuper undeserved because hello? I’m literally such a green flag outside of that, and it’s not like anyone else in my family doesn’t brutally torture and murder anyone. Actually, I probably do it less than many of them! It’s just so- “
Grover coughed.
“Right,” the god grumped. “Anyways. Look, my sister may be the goddess of warfare and making people win, but there’s a reason we’re both on the council. I am War. I watch over the soldiers signing up for a likely death in order to protect their people. I watch over the troops who are saved by one person sacrificing themselves for their comrades. I watch over the heroes taking their last breaths with pride and honor.
“I do that for every. Single. Soldier. I come to them during their last moments and watch them smile and be at peace, because what bigger reassurance can there be than the god of War coming and telling you that your life meant something? Do you get what I’m saying?”
He hesitated a bit. “Not… not entirely, my lord.”
“Hmm,” Ares frowned. “How about this? When you think of Thalia’s stand at Half-Blood hill, what do you think about?”
“About how I failed,” the words spilled out of Grover without him realizing, the guilty emotions coming easier to him than he expected. The way Ares had been able to amplify anger back at the diner... maybe his powers worked the same way with other emotions. At Ares’s encouragement, he braved on. “I… I think about how I should have been a better protector. A better friend. And… "
“And?” Ares prompted.
“And that I was a coward,” Grover whispered, digging his hooves into the ground. “They try to tell me I did my best. But I should have taken her place. She was meant to be so much more than me.”
“Okay,” Ares shrugged. “So what I’m getting is that you don’t respect her at all.”
“What?” Grover demanded. “How could you possibly get that from everything I said? That’s insane! Respectfully.”
“I’ll move past that because you seem a smidge emotional,” Ares raised an eyebrow. “If you really respected her, you wouldn’t minimize her sacrifice like that. She was her own person. She had the autonomy to make her own choices.”
“But those choices could have been different if I had been different!”
“Maybe. Who knows, really?” Ares said. “Fact is that she had the choice between letting her friends die or getting them to safety. She was brave enough to choose the latter. All I’m saying is to put some respect on her decision and on her name.”
“I guess I never thought about it like that,” Grover swallowed. “I‘ve always been so caught up in what she could’ve been that I didn’t appreciate her for who she was. A hero.”
“Exactly,” Ares smiled. It wasn’t a cruel or grotesque smile like Grover was expecting. It was almost warm. Comforting. Proud. “You’re a pretty brave warrior yourself, Grover.”
“Oh,” his eyes may or may not have watered a bit. “Thank you.”
Ares put his hands in his pants pockets and watched Percy and Annabeth bickering about something or the other near the ride. “There’s a reason why I’m telling you all this, you know.”
“It wasn’t just to heal my emotional scars?”
Ares snorted. “Nice try. It’s because of what I said before. War is coming. And in war, people will always sacrifice themselves. That’s what makes a victory, a life, worth anything. Knowing that someone gave up everything just for you.”
He turned to squarely face Grover again. “People will die. People will give up their lives for this. You cannot take every sacrifice as a personal failure. Without your stability, without a tether back to humanity for your friends to rely on, they cannot win this war. You must be strong for them.” He knelt down until he was eye-level with Grover. “Let people die with dignity and honor. It is the only way to move forward.”
“That’s a big responsibility,” Grover whispered.
“I wouldn’t have given it to you if I didn’t have faith in your spirit,” Ares said. “I am not the god of courage for nothing. It takes a lot of bravery to try again at something after failing, and you’re doing that as a protector right now. I can respect that.”
“Oh,” Grover was pretty sure he was blushing right up to his horns. “That means a lot to me. Thank you, Lord Ares.”
“Yeah, yeah,” he waved Grover off. “Don’t tell anyone about this little conversation. I got a reputation to uphold.”
“Of course.”
Ares put his sunglasses back on and his body began dissolving into reddish-gold particles. “Oh, you might want to help out your friends. They seem to be struggling a bit.”
“Wait what- “
He was gone. Grover turned to look at Percy and Annabeth who were signaling something (well, Percy was signaling. Annabeth was screaming about… spiders?). Grover let out a sigh. If what Ares had said about a war was true, then this was going to be a long few months.