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“Fucking,” it got him in the stomach and he bent over double, everything in him was straining to keep himself upright instead of immediately folding into a foetal position where he’d absolutely definitely be killed. “OW.”
“Magnus?” Annabeth put her sword through the back of the monsters and it straight up dissolved right in his face, leaving him coughing, and regretting his hankering for chocolate an hour ago.
“I’m fine,” she didn’t look like she believed him but she was worse. There was a dark stain at her shoulder, and the shirt was ripped there exposing more than just skin.
“Are you okay?” He picked himself off the shelf he’d been heroically clinging to, and reached up, as if to touch the wound, but leaving a gap so she could brush him off easily if she didn’t want him to.
“Um, well, I’ll live.” She was avoiding looking at it but he could see the tension in her shoulders and the tight set of her face.
“May I?”
“I was going to have some ambrosia but if you don’t mind.” He pressed his hands to it and hissed. It was pretty nasty, her muscle was torn where she’d been stabbed, but he started glowing all the same. He was mildly relieved that the cashier had been the monster, because otherwise he would have had a lot of explaining to do, and he wasn’t sure how a glamour would disguise this .
Jack floated around somewhere in his peripheral vision. He wasn’t going to take him back until they were somewhere he felt comfortable passing out. Preferably a motel bed, but he suspected it would be in the passenger seat of the car instead.
She’d last been thinking about food, and the house in Boston, and there was a glimpse of a paper coming out a typewriter. It wasn’t any of his business to see this, but he’d never quite been able to turn it off. An unpleasant side-effect of his powers. He was never healing Halfborn again, unless it was an absolute emergency.
He didn’t do all of it, he knew his limits pretty well now. It was useful being somewhere where you could die with no consequences to test the absolute limits, but the tear knit itself back together, and the skin was healing by the time he pushed himself back, and straight onto his ass.
Annabeth helped him to the car, with the bag of food they’d bought right before the cashier had decided to make him dinner, “Thanks. I could have taken ambrosia, but it’s not great to take too much at once. I might still have some though, to get the last of it back.” she swung it out in a circle, joints cracking as she circled it round and around.
“Shame about your shirt, it looked nice.”
She shoved him in the seat and did his belt up for him when he realised he didn’t even have the energy for that, “Thanks. Why is it always my nicest clothes that get ruined?”
He didn’t answer, just grabbed Jack, and then he knew no more.
She was still driving when he woke up, but the sun was high in the sky now, and he’d passed out a little after it had set. He could only hope it was just the next day. Jack was back around his neck, and the deep set exhaustion was yet to leave his bones. “Here,” she passed him a bottle without taking her eyes off the road. It wasn’t water. It was some kind of energy drink.
“Thanks,” he said once he finished it, and straightened up in his seat, twisting his head from side to side. “How’s the shoulder?”
“Much better than it would be otherwise, even with nectar and ambrosia, thanks to you. That’s a pretty neat trick.” He wasn’t sure if he’d call it a neat trick , given it had, at least in part, caused him to pass out for at least… twelve, fifteen hours? But regardless, he got what she meant.
“I filled the tank about twenty miles back. We’re almost there.”
He’d found a list of items and locations in his uncle’s desk drawer’s false bottom when he’d been clearing out the study, covered in runes relating to Loki. For some reason, he had thought this would therefore make a great cousin bonding experience. The list of items did not link each item to each location. That would have been useful, but Randolph was as unhelpful in death as he had been in life. At least he was consistent.
“Oh my insurance is fucked ,” she said, staring at the smoking wreck of the car.
Magnus briefly mourned his snack collection before speedrunning the stages of grief all the way to acceptance when he saw what was literally on the horizon, and charging at them. “Annabeth, that’s, yeah, bad and all but you see the horde of wights, right?”
She pulled out her sword, sounding unbelievably tired, “Yeah. I do.”
He woke up in a motel this time. He wasn’t sure if this was an improvement on the car. On one hand, his neck didn’t hurt from being at a weird angle for so many hours. On the other hand, everything else did, and he could already smell the mould.
“I bought a van,” his cousin tossed a squashed croissant at him. He tried to catch it, flailed for a second, and it hit him squarely in the eye right before he fell off the bed.
“You what?”
“Bought a van.” She helped him up. “It’s got a bed.”
“Great, because I think you’re going to have to carry me now. Every bone I have in my body is on strike right now.”
She threatened to defenestrate him. He walked out to the van.
It wasn’t a thing he ever wanted to look at under a blacklight but it did have a bed, and he’d slept in worse places so he’d survive this too. And take a cleansing lava bath once he was back in Valhalla, provided he could find one first. There was definitely washing to the death right? Like yeah, that was probably more drowning related but they did like it when you got creative with the activities.
“Okay, first off, holding the sword.” She sighed. “No, you’re overextending your wrist.”
“Why can’t Jack just fight for me?”
“Aren’t you going to lose him before Ragnarok?”
“Yeah?”
“And you need to fight at Ragnarok?”
“I mean, fight’s a strong word. I’m kind of expecting to straight up die ten minutes in.”
She smiled grimly, “If you keep a grip up like that you’ll be lucky to last two minutes, let alone ten. Now keep your guard up.”
Jack decided this was a great time to practise his one-sword rendition of Bohemian Rhapsody. He failed to hit any note, most especially the Galileo (Galileo) and got half the words absolutely wrong. Magnus rated him a C+ for enthusiasm. Annabeth openly contemplated murdering an immortal sword.
“I think we’re lost,” she looked dismayed. “I thought the path was around here.”
“I think we’ve passed this tree three times.” He had no idea what had gone wrong, or where on earth they actually were.
“Isn’t your dad some kind of nature god? Can’t you find the way?”
“Not so far. Didn’t you go to camp demigod at like seven? They don’t teach tracking skills?”
“It’s called Camp Half Blood and you know it. They do, it’s just…” she trailed off, mumbling something about “boring” and “wet” and “reading architecture books” and “six years ago.”
Magnus decided to just keep walking.
“You did not say you could talk to animals,” Annabeth was staring at him like he’d shot a person in front of her. “I need to introduce you to Grover.”
“Your satyr friend?” He petted the goat on her head, “You kind of remind me of Otis. Hopefully you’re not going to stick your tongue down my throat, no you aren’t, no you aren’t. Lovely.” He turned back to his cousin, “She says this way.”
“We’re not keeping the goat.”
“Her name is Lulubelle.” He bent down, helping her into their van, glad for his einherji strength because his mortal arms would have given up at the thought. “Lulubelle, that is definitely a name.”
Lulubelle licked his face. It was still reminiscent of Jackie Molotov, unfortunately. Slightly less disgusting though. Somewhat.
“She reminds me of Amaltheia.” Annabeth said, once she was settled in the back.
“Who?”
“She was Zeus’ nursemaid. I never met her when I was on the road with Luke and Thalia, she let them to each other, and then into some super creepy house. It’s where my dagger came from apparently. Luke blew it up with Greek fire, or the old guy who was cursed in the house did.” She frowned, “Thalia didn’t want to tell me, and Luke barely did either. I can’t quite remember now. Apparently she had a pepsi udder, ice, and diet mountain dew.” She sounded completely serious.
“Fucking mountain dew? Diet?” He turned to the back where Lulubelle was trying to look at her own udders. She told him she was pretty sure she just did milk.
“That’s fine, Lulubelle. I have no idea how I’d explain an ice dispenser on a goat, let alone the copyright involved with the pepsi and mountain dew.”
“Sorry,” Annabeth turned around, her hand already on her waistband where the “mist” hid her sword even though they were in the middle of the street. “Are you Annabeth Chase?”
She frowned, and Magnus saw her eyes try and look the entire woman, who was holding a camera for some reason, over. “Um, did we go to school together or something?”
The woman’s eyes widened, “No! No, you are her, aren’t you? You were all over the news when you got kidnapped. I’m a podcaster and vlogger! Your case was fascinating, with all the discrepancies and-”
Magnus zoned out.
“I need you to destroy the footage.”
“What footage?”
She punched him lightly. “The footage of me, dumbass. From that vlogger. I didn’t realise she was filming me”
“Why? Is your hair bad in it?” He put his hands up, “Sorry, just trying to lighten the mood. Why me? You seem like you’d rather do this yourself.” Her whole body was a wire of tension and it was about to snap.
The vlogger’s camera ended up with an inexplicable Jack shaped hole in it, and the memory card having gone missing with no traceable backup. It was truly a mystery for the ages, and it would one day make a less than mediocre podcast that three people would listen to and she would lose subscribers and advertisers over: a real Greek tragedy.
“I could take her to camp. She’d be happy at half blood hill.” Annabeth chucked her under the chin. Lulubelle seemed to be warming on her.
“Absolutely not! I know how much Greek food involves goat, she’s coming with me. We have a garden.”
“You mean in your magic murder hotel?”
“I meant at the Chase Space. We have a roof garden. I put it in.” Technically it had already existed but it had been three tumbleweeds and some dirt. Now there was a fully blooming lemon tree, which he had definitely not cheated with alf seidr to grow. Not at all. Lemon trees were just naturally occurring on all Massachusetts roofs at all times of the year.
“Really?” She thought about it for a minute. “That sounds actually quite nice.”
“Yeah,” he looked at his feet for a minute, “I wanted some outside space, you know? For us, but also the kids.”
She sighed, “Being homeless when I was seven was rough, even though when I remember it, it was only a few weeks. It felt like forever though. I can’t believe you were like that for two years. Gods , it’s really good you’re doing that. It’s what both of us needed, not even as demigods, and I can’t imagine how many other people do.”
“Unfortunately I have the statistics on estimated numbers. I like to think it’s helping. I think it is.” Lulubelle licked his palm. She told him that she thought he was doing a good job. “Thank you, Lulubelle. Do you want to come with me? It’s pretty nice.” She said she would.
“I’m not saying I’m going to argue with you, but you could be saying whatever you wanted.”
“Sorry you didn’t get the talking to goats gene. That’s so sad. Do olives talk to you?”
“What? Olives? Like the plant? At least owls would make sense.” She looked sad. “They don’t though.”
They pulled up to the next location on the list, “I hope this one doesn’t blow up,” he said.
“Famous last words,” she unbuckled her seatbelt. “Be good, Lulubelle.”
She promised she would be, but she also winked. Magnus knew he was going to have to replenish all their snacks at their first opportunity.
It literally blew up in their faces. “If I could go back and change something,” she wiped soot off her face. “It would be to tell you to dropkick Randolph off that cliff.”
“I thought you didn’t give up on family.”
“I’m creating an exception.”
Lulubelle was happy to see them at least. She denied eating any of their food, even with breadcrumbs attached to her hair.
Magnus was happy to see that at least one of them here was a natural liar.