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Apparel
When Will released Nico from his three days of recuperation in the infirmary he brought him a pile of clothes. The stuff Nico had worn to the battle with Gaea was beyond salvageable. Will had scoured the big house for clothes, but had only found bright orange camp shirts and a lot of pieces of amour, so he had continued his search in the Apollo cabin, eventually finding underwear, socks and a pair of pants that he was sure had once belonged to Michael Yew.
Nico took them without any comment, but hesitated for a moment after touching the pants. Will wasn’t sure if the Son of Hades could sense some remnant of his deceased half-brother so he made an apologetic face and said: “I’m sorry. Those were Michael’s, we can get you something else as soon as Chiron allows people to go outside of camp again.”
“That won’t be necessary,” the son of Hades said simply and quickly got dressed.
The next day, he appeared in a different pair of black jeans, a black Sabbath shirt and a black and dark green bomber jacket. They looked well-worn and slightly too big for Nico’s small frame, but they still fitted him better than Michael Yews Camp attire.
Will caught up to him on the way to the pavilion and said: “Oh, I didn’t know you still had clothes in the hades cabin otherwise I would have just brought you those.”
Nico looked confused and just said: “I didn’t.”
Now Will was confused too and asked: “But whose…?”
Nico looked down at his attire and said: “I’m not sure. He had cancer.”
Will did not know how to react to that and saw Nico’s face closing off again and turning away from him, his shoulders rigid.
Quickly Will regained his composure and proclaimed: “I guess, he won’t be needing them anymore,” and sped up to walk besides the Son of Hades to breakfast.
~*~
School
The end of summer was getting nearer and although Will missed his mum, he had decided to stay at camp and attend the new Brooklyn Academy of the Gifted with some of the year-round campers like he did last year. While going on tour with his mum and doing distance learning with a special high school programme sounded good in theory, he had to admit that he wasn’t doing too well academically when he had to rely on self-organization and reading only. He also had high hopes of spending more time with Nico, who had stayed at camp all summer. Will was cautious to breach the subject since Nico tended to shut down if he felt that someone was getting too clingy, so Will simply asked: “Are you going to stay after the summer is up?”
Nico continued to watch the waves on the lake and shrugged noncommittally: “I guess.”
“You guess?” asked Will, confused, “Didn’t you have to enroll in school somewhere?”
This seemed to bemuse the son of Hades and a grin stole itself upon his face. “School?” he asked, as if the thought was ridiculous. “It’s been a while since I went to school. Didn’t do too well.”
Will could only imagine. Dyslexia and AdHD were bad enough for the regular demigods, but for those overpowered children of the Big Three it seemed to be worse, but Nico didn’t seem overly concerned about his education.
“I guess I have private tutors. So, you could call me home-schooled”. His grin took on a dark edge that made him look a little creepy and was one of the reasons most other campers were still so deeply uncomfortable with him.
Will wouldn’t let it bother him. “I guess it’s quite handy to be able to summon an expert on any field if the need arises.”
~*~
Custody
Will was taking a break from the infirmary and stood on the porch of the Big Blue House to soak up the sun for a minute, when he overheard Mr. D starting to talk to someone around the corner.
“Oh, di Angelo. You finally found the time to drop by, must be busy being a camper. We contacted Milton, Chadwick & Waters* to inform your legal guardian about your whereabouts. They said they still needed you to come in for signatures concerning the trust fund, which will now be held in your name only and some inheritance matters. You’ll have to make an appointment.”
There was a very long pause and Will heard no reply until Nico said in a tightly controlled voice “I’ll take care of it” and stomped off.
Wills heart constricted and he didn’t think twice before running after his friend. He knew it could be quite risky to follow Nico when his emotions were so close to the surface, but he was quite afraid that Nico would just vanish in the shadows and be gone for good.
“Hey, Nico! Wait up!”, he called, reaching him just as he entered the forest. Nico turned around, fighting to look more annoyed than sad, and said brusquely: “What?!”
“I heard. I mean: I’m sorry for eavesdropping, but I was standing just around the corner. I wanted to say: You don’t have to go alone. I could come with you to New York. We could make a day out if it.”
At first Nico’s expression grew even darker when he heard that apparently nothing remained private at Camp Half Blood, but he took a breath and forcibly relaxed his shoulders and grim expression. “I’m not going to New York.”
“You’re not?” Will asked confused.
“Alecto started this legal mess, so Alecto can sort it out for me. I don’t care about the trust fund or the inheritance.”
Will paused: “So you’d rather go to the underworld and talk to one of the Furies than meet up with a lawyer?”
Nico smiled at that mischievously: “Who wouldn’t?” Will laughed and Nico lost some more of his tension. His grin became wicked and a little self-deprecating: “Does your offer to accompany me still stand? We could make a day out of it?”
“Sometimes I just don’t know if you’re joking or not.”
To his own surprise, Nico laughed out loud: “I’ve heard that one before.”
* Milton, Chadwick & Waters is the name of the law firm from the 1997 movie ‘The Devil’s Advocate’, because I’m old. And Keanu Reeves. But mostly because I’m old.
~*~
Cabin Inspection
“Are you ready for the Cabin Inspection?” Will asked Nico at the end of summer. He was sweaty and dusty and a little frayed around the edges. He did not enjoy ordering a whole cabin full of free-spirited, artsy ADHD kids to clean up. The Apollo cabin had the second largest group of campers, just after the Hermes cabin, and Inspection Day* was always a hassle. The whole camp was still busy cleaning, taking out trash and making last minute adjustments to make their cabin look its best.
Only Nico was relaxed and seemed to enjoy having the small shore of the canoe lake all to himself.
“Yep”, he replied, but didn’t move to sit up or even open his eyes.
“Must be nice to be the only one to clean up after,” Will mused. He also assumed that dust just wasn’t as visible, if your cabin didn’t have any windows.
“Yep”, Nico said again and Will was about to give up on the conversation altogether, when a mark piercing scream echoed around camp and all eyes turned to the Hades Cabin. A very angry Drew Tanaka, followed by Miranda Gardiner, stormed out of Cabin Number 13 and angrily walked up to where Nico and Will were resting.
“1 out of 5! Zero out of five!”, she screamed, pointing angrily at the Son of Hades.
“What, why?”, Nico shouted back, irritated.
For once, Drew didn’t show any fear faced with an angry Nico. “Why?! You’re seriously asking why?! There are corpses in your cabin! That’s why!”
“Yes, so what? They are cleaning!”, Nico shouted back.
“No. Absolutely not. It can’t get any worse than that. That’s stable duty for you Death Boy Yuck!” and with that she turned around and stomped back, not giving Nico any opportunity to get another word in. Will watched as the reeds around the lake withered and heard Nico muttering: “Demeter literally has soil in their cabin and she acts like a bit of dead people in the Hades Cabin is out of place.”
Will laughed at Nico’s plight. “Oh come on. It’s not that bad. It’s not like you won’t summon more skeletons to muck out the stables, too.”
*Inspection Day – I have read somewhere that Cabin Inspection happens every day. Since I have never been to any summer camps, I wouldn’t know anything about it.
~*~
King of Ghosts
Will was sitting on the porch of the Hades Cabin. Once it had felt unsettling to be sit directly underneath the scull, on the cold and black obsidian steps, surrounded by Greek Fire torches, but somehow the Son of Apollo had got used to it. He was also used to the Son of Hades disappearing for hours at a time so he had not yet felt the need to inform Mr. D or Chiron of his absence from camp yet. But dinner time was getting closer and he wasn’t looking forward to making excuses for Nico, so he was quite glad to see the dark-haired boy approaching. Will had learnt to get a good read on Nico so he saw right away that Nico was in a good mood. He seemed relaxed and a bit amused.
“Hey,” Will greeted and Nico replied, “hey yourself,” before sitting down next to him.
“Where have you been?” Will asked curiously, not sure if he’d get an answer.
“I met up with Minos”, Nico replied and Will’s thoughts came to an abrupt halt: “What?!”
“He works for my dad. It wouldn’t be a wise to stay on bad terms with him,” Nico shrugged.
“But,” Will stammered, “but, didn’t he like trying to use you?”
Nico raised an eyebrow, still amused: “Seriously? You’re a demigod and you’re still sensitive about someone trying to use you?”
Will didn’t quite know what to say to that and knew that his shout of “It’s not the same!” wasn’t the most intelligent comeback.
Nico sighed and simply said: “It’s exactly the same. Only Minos actually tried to offer me things I really wanted instead of just playing the ‘We are family’-card. You know, he really is quite a good teacher.”
Will still looked stunned and so Nico explained further: “Here at camp they don’t really teach you about your abilities. Sure, they teach you how to wield a sword and how to shoot a bow, but your godly abilities, not so much.”
Will didn’t like Nico saying bad things about camp and said: “Chiron taught me to use my healing.”
Nico took this in his stride and just said: “I guess the kids of Apollo and Dionysus lucked out there. Minos taught me to navigate the Underworld, to understand how it’s run and its inhabitants. He taught me how to summon ghosts and skeletons and their differences. He taught me shadow travel. He taught me how to enter into death trance. He helped me work out which of the abilities known to be possessed by other children of Hades I might have. He helped me get my Stygian Sword and showed me how to use it. Or rather, he helped me find the right ghost to show me how to use it.”
Will still wasn’t on board with absolving Minos. “But didn’t he just do that, so he could use you better?”
Now Nico’s face twitched in annoyance. “Yes, of course. But why again do you think the gods are run two camps to train demigods in the art of fighting and survival? This is not an institution for you to collect happy summer memories. Or do you have a happy photo collection from the last battles that I don’t know about?”
Will kept his mouth shut, not mentioning that he would actually love to have photo albums full of his friends and camp memories if only smartphones worked for demigods.
“I still don’t understand how you can be so blasé about him.”
“I’m not blasé”, Nico denied. “I’m just seeing the whole picture.”
Will was actually surprised that Nico was still talking to him instead of shutting him out and walking away. He reminded himself that pressure usually led to nowhere with Nico and tried to change his demeanor. He relaxed his shoulders and tried to be more open minded. “How so?” he asked a bit pleadingly, really wanting to understand.
Nico looked at him skeptically but decided to give him the benefit of the doubt.
“He wasn’t the first ghost I met.” Nico admitted and Will prepared himself for stories of ghost even more terrifying than the vengeful king of Crete.
“Ghosts are disconnected. Disconnected from everything they loved, everything they knew. They are desperate to fill that void, to connect to something or someone, to be seen.”
That wasn’t what Will had expected to hear and with a hint of fear he asked: “Fill that void with what?”
Nico shook his head and said self-deprecatingly: “Mythomagic and Pirates.” He laughed and continued: “Never mind. Nothing sinister. Just something to occupy their minds. Something they can still make sense of. They will talk your ear off, just to have someone to talk to, to share something and to feel connected to somebody again. They are quite grateful for someone to just listen to them. It’s, you know, a bit pathetic.” Nico looked uncomfortable sharing this and Will was a bit confused where this was going and so he guessed: “And you listened to them? And Minos? What did Minos want to talk about?”
Nico got back on track and went on to explain: “Minos is different. He is not wandering around lost in the fields of Asphodel. He’s got purpose. He’s got a responsibility and quite an important task in the underworld.”
Will still didn’t know what Nico was getting at: “So?”
Nico said: “I didn’t meet him by chance. He had heard rumors in the fields and took time off to find me. He was the first ghost, who didn’t smother me with whatever they couldn’t let go off, but who tried to find out what I was doing in the underworld and who I was. He saw me. Or at least he saw some potential in me. Of course, I was highly suspicious of him, he is a hell of a creepy guy, but he was also the only chance I had to learn anything useful at all. And, as I said, he’s not a bad teacher. He made a lot of time for me. He kept his promises. He was patient teacher. He believed in me. And he wasn’t entirely wrong about Daedalus either, he’s just very prone to hold a grudge, but, you know, being a Son of Hades I can kind of relate to that. That was one more reason for me to seek him out again and make sure we’re all right.”
Will made a face and Nico laughed. After Nico was finished laughing, Will asked: “And? Are you? All right, I mean?”
Nico sobered up: “I’m not his favorite person. But he’s smart, he knows that I have power over him and that I could probably sway my dad to revoke his position as a judge. He admitted it wasn’t a wise move on his part to lead me into a trap. Not that he apologized or anything, but I guess we are fine.”
~*~
Gift
Will was running late. He had had to clean up a mess in the infirmary after treating minor burns on the hands of a Hephaesus camper. The burns hadn’t been the issue, but the Camper had left soot, ash and oil stains everywhere he had touched. Now Will wasn’t sure if he’d make it back to the Apollo Cabin before the Harpies came out to reinforce the curfew.
He almost fell on top of Nico di Angelo, who was sitting on the steps of the front porch, twirling a stick between his fingers, but Nico’s quick reflexes and deceptively strong grip caught him, before he could tumble down the steps.
“Oh, I’m so sorry. I didn’t see you. What are you doing here? Are you hurt?”
At first Nico didn’t say anything and seemed to ponder something in his mind, but then determination stole onto his face and he said: “I brought you something.”
He held the twig up so Will could see it better in the dim light of the Big Blue House and a heavenly smell registered in Will’s nose. It smelled addictively like hyacinths and fresh summer mornings. There were a few tiny buds and blooms at the tip of the twig, shimmering a deep purple. Will had never seen this kind of flower ever before, but before he could ask what it was, a slightly flustered Nico already provided the answer.
“It is the flower of the Ambrosia Tree*. They are in full bloom in der Underworld right now. Like Ambrosia, they smell different to everyone. They don’t do well in the sun, it’s last a few days if you keep them in your cabin.”
Will couldn’t find any words. Butterflies were doing summersaults in his stomach and all the feelings he had amassed for the other boy in front of him threatened to spill over. He usually tried to keep a tight lid on them, afraid to scare Nico off for good. He looked into Nico’s eyes, biting his lip to somehow contain the biggest smile that wanted to break out on his face, and took a slow step closer so that their noses were almost touching.
Nico looked confused but didn’t retreat, which gave Will the courage to close the gap between their faces and press a soft kiss to the other boy’s lips.
Drawing back, a bit nervous to check on Nico’s reaction, Will asked: “Was that okay?”
Nico’s eyes were wide, his blush had deepened, but there was something like a smile tugging at the corners of his mouth.
Nico seemed to struggle for words and finally settled on “I guess that means you like to be given flowers,” before a real smile settled on his face.
Will beamed. He could practically feel the sun vibrating out of the huge smile on his face and he couldn’t tear his eyes away from the other boy. “Yes. Yes, I really do.”
*Ambrosia tree. Before reading the Percy Jackson books I always just assumed that ambrosia was a type of bread. Maybe it’s because I’m German and my brain is just wired that way. I don’t know if it makes any sense that Ambrosia and Nectar are made from trees.