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“Do you think it will actually work?”
“It’ll have to,” Apollo sighed tiredly, “we need to be able to pass information around, especially concerning what the He is planning, but we can’t do that if the god of information is-“
“I know. We already talked about this,” Athena spat distastefully. She hadn’t even wanted to start another revolt at first, only frisked away in it since someone had to get their plans leaked, and there was no way in tartarus she could continue her “loyal objective daughter who always knows better” act infront of Zeus unless she had a death wish.
“Then quit pestering,” and he continued writing his letter. During this time any non-mortal was instructed to send their messages and packages through means of Camp Half-Blood, which had practically become neutral territory, so it could be more securely monitored. Rebels were also supposed to if they needed to send anything, and any who didn’t follow would have their messages intercepted by Hermes. That didn’t matter since it was going to Hermes in the first place. They would give it directly to him, preferably in his delivery headquarters which had been completely reduced to simply mortal mail, and hopefully he would recognize the symbol they had made to alert to urgent private tellings, long ago when they were younger godlings, before he could take it elsewhere.
It was weird—drawing the symbol, a simplified version of a spirling snake, after so long. Their little group—him, Artemis, Hermes, and Dionysus—had long since grown separate. At first it was simply passive distance, talking to other people, no trusting with secrets, no more hangouts in the little place above the trees they had built, but the war had certainly made it worse. Part of Apollo worried it would never be the same again. Artemis was still attempting to hide with her dances and acts to a worse degree, dismissing any of his concerns, Hermes became worryingly hateful and unhinged towards him, and Dionysus simply acted as the neutral part alongside Camp Half-Blood.
“Are you done?” Boreas’ eyes gleamed from where he leaned, lightly stretching his hand out. It was too risky to directly send one of the prominent rebels to Hermes’ place, so Apollo had opted to call in a favor from Boreas.
He let out a breath he didn’t know he was holding, and handed Boreas the now sealed envelope. Was it the most secretive and secure way to send a secret message? No, but none of his domains had the name trickster on them, and it would work.
“Great,” Boreas swiped the envelope out of his fingers, “now you’re indebted to me,” he said before whisking away into air.
Normally, Apollo would be more careful when it comes to becoming indebted to another deity, but he had no worries when it came to this. Boreas would just use it to try and make him take a winter vacation with him.
His mind was more worried about the other deity they were interacting with.
Boreas appeared in a flash of light into a small warm toned room, making the deity standing at the counter jump, but it wasn’t who he thought it would be.
“Angelia?”
“Boreas?” The daimona of messages and news sighed heavily, staring daggers at him, “didn’t you hear that non-mortals have to send items through-“
“I know- where’s Hermes? Why are you here?”
“My father has asked of me to completely fill in for his job organizing and sending mail for mortals, he has more important responsibilities to focus on now that… you know.”
They both cringed lightly at that. No one wanted to outright mention the revolt that was happening, and it was worse since the wind god in the room was directly helping them.
Angelia stared at the corner of the room for a second, seemingly having a little rest without closing her eyes. Even though her namesake led to the word known as angel, she certainly didn’t look like one, with her brown curls trying to escape the tight ponytail it was forced into and face that clearly showed she was not dealing with… anything okay.
She snapped out of her trance, “you mentioned- what do you need my father for?” Her eyes slid down to his pocket, where he kept the letter hidden, even though now he realized it was likely of no use.
He sighed, “can you perhaps get him? It’s important.”
“…This is not the average letter is it?” Angelia lifted her eyebrow.
“No, it's not,” Boreas snapped, with no effect, “but it doesn’t matter because it's for him specifically—and I’m on a time limit here.”
Another sigh escaped the spirit of messages lips, “Fine, I’ll call him over.”
30 seconds later, Hermes appeared in the room next to Angelia. His eyes glanced between them, settling on his daughter, “you need something?”
“Boreas needs you,” she waved her hand before turning around, “I’ll leave you to it,” before disappearing through the back door.
Hermes looked at where Angelia had been with an indecipherable expression for a few seconds, before turning his attention to the god in front of him, “yes?”
“I have something I need to give to you,” he started, pulling out the envelope from his pocket and stretching his arm out, “he said you’d know.”
Hermes grabbed the item, looking over it before seemingly spotting something that catched his breath. Boreas took that as his que to leave, not before stating, “I wasn’t here, I gave you nothing.”
His day was going okay. Okay- no- that's a lie- but now it had turned sharply left and that was worse. When his daughter had called for him he assumed there had just been a problem with the deliveries, or a misinterpretation, or anything else. He wasn't ready to be handed a letter stamped with a little drawing he hadn’t seen in millenia, a letter that could only be from one person.
Hermes slammed the door to his room as hard as he could without breaking it, and threw the letter on the desk. He still had work to do, things to keep in line, kings to appease, so he split a bit of himself off to explode for the rest of them. Unfortunately—or maybe fortunately—George and Martha had deliveries to make with another split version of himself.
He leaned against the door, trying to calm himself, while staring at the paper across the room from him as if it had killed his-… nevermind, there was nothing he could compare it to without upsetting himself further.
Was Apollo actually serious? He couldn’t believe he still remembered those stupid little symbols- made two millennia ago before being forgotten through the weaving of time. He couldn’t believe Apollo was out here- sending him mail?! What could he possibly need to say now and ruin? He could’ve just swallowed his pride and said whatever he needed to in person- okay- maybe that would be worse- but still, why?!
Only one way to find out, left his thoughts bitterly after pushing himself off and approaching. The envelope’s seal broke apart easily, and he unraveled the paper. Unfortunately, because he was practically still high on his emotions it took a while to be able to rack his mind and focus—eventually sitting down hunched over the writing.
Hermes. I sincerely hope you get this. I know our last interactions have been terrible, and I know we’ve been distant for so long, and I know you hate me-
Hermes winced at that. Part of him felt like he had been too harsh.
-but I need you to listen. Just read through this, and then you can burn it and never think about it again. I don’t know what happens in your head, I don’t know why you do the things you do, but I still know part of you. I know you know you’re better than this, even if that core is suppressed down with whatever else goes on in your mind. You know this—His tyranny—can’t continue, you know everything he does wrong and I know that you know very well that change is possible. You’ve never been one to fall blind into lies.
As he continued reading forward he felt sicker and sicker. Apollo wasn’t asking him to completely and publicly turn his back against father—just let messages between the rebels pass without telling Zeus, and maybe even give some information himself about the current state of Olympus. Like a spy.
A sigh echoed in the quiet room. Pushing himself up, he picked up the letter and summoned a lighter to burn it. The sight of the fire consuming the paper lightly lit up the room, before it landed in a puddle of ash. His eyes remained at that puddle for many minutes.
He wanted to convince himself he was burning it as a fuck you to Apollo. Like he himself said, burning it and then never thinking about it again. He wasn’t. It was more for safety—he couldn’t risk Zeus catching wind that he had even received a letter without his knowledge, let alone find that Apollo himself was trying to persuade him to join their side. The part of his head that was missing a wing still stung.
He always tried to ignore that side of Zeus. Made up excuses, faulted someone else or himself, dismissed everything because the attention he received felt like it outweighed the downsides. It was getting harder to do, and it showed with his recent acts of light intervention and communication in the mortal world beyond what was allowed.
There was also the other part that was holding him back however, the consequences. What going against what he had preached for millennia implied. That line of thought led to the table becoming scratched as he pulled his hands into fist shapes.
Deciding that a breath of outside air would do him some good, he walked slowly to the small balcony and sat on the ground.
Parts of Olympus were visible from the place he was perched up on. Deserted, quiet like it never was. Shops were closed down, if they weren’t they made no point to bring attention to themselves, with customers rather teleporting inside the buildings. Laughs of nymphs were absent, and so were the shoutings of young beings running around. Only moments it was similar to this were the aftermaths of tragedy. He had a feeling it would be in this state for a while.
The cold wind stung his dry face as he thought about everything that had happened in the past decade. Multiple of his children’s passings, words of young demigods who might’ve not been as wrong as he thought, Zeus’ behavior, Apollo’s trials and his sudden change. The letter.
Perhaps the implications of turning would be bad. However, if he had learned anything in the past few centuries, it would be how to block things out of his mind.
The urge to look up towards the night sky and find his mother’s star was ignored as he locked eyes with a crow.
“You’re not needed.”
Apollo was repetitively tapping his fingers on a table, likely tapping out a rhyme from a song he heard long ago and forgotten. His mind wasn’t focused on trying to remember its name or origin.
This had to work, it was basically one of their last hopes. This war had been going on for a while, not to the point of 10 years like the titanomachy, hardly in fact, and they also had many powers on their side (including himself—he supposed), itt was still making him anxious. Kronos was not nearly as paranoid as Zeus was, and at least on the gods' side they weren’t tightly restrained in their choices of where they could reside. It was awkward—and would likely cause even worse conflict—if they were to barge into another pantheon’s place to escape from their civil war. They also had limited resources, limited intelligence on the other side, and limited most everything.
When Boreas appeared to tell them the message had been delivered, they all knew it would take a good while to receive anything back. It still didn’t make him feel better. He sent a couple crows to sneak their way into Olympus and none had returned yet.
His reminiscing was cut short, as the sound of a door creaking open made his head snap up. Pushing himself up to fully see who had arrived, his lungs caught in his throat.
Standing in the doorway was Hermes, with a mostly neutral expression.
He observed everyone else, who all said nothing either, before locking eyes with Apollo. A couple of seconds passed as Hermes pulled out an envelope and handed it to Apollo. He took it gingerly, but only spent a couple seconds looking at it before returning his gaze towards Hermes.
Hermes spent a couple moments starting with an indecipherable expression, but left as quickly as he arrived, muttering a quick, “I wasn’t here.”
One of his crows came back shortly after, as if replacing the others presence
Athena quickly came forward and snatched the mail, opening up and reading through it. A small crowd of the gods present gathered around her. They chittered and shuffled lightly, anxious for her summary.
Her shoulders lost their tension with a breath, “he came through—hesitantly—but still.”
A chorus of breaths and small celebrations passed through.
Apollo asked, “what did he write?” Without waiting for an answer as he took the paper for himself.
The writing made him grin. It was a bunch of information on how Olympus was currently organized, areas that were less secure, how things were monitored, confirmation that he would let future information pass, etc, tied together with a note from Hermes that still showed some of his stubbornness in directly helping them. They were going to be able to pull this off.
“Well Iris,” Hera commented, smiling more than she usually allowed, “looks like you won’t have to be the main messenger anymore.”
“Nope”, Apollo said, still grinning, looking up at Athena, “we got our brother back.”