This Never Happened (Olympus Drive Chronicles)

Part 12 - I go to hell

I pretty much black out while hugging Ian on that sandbar. The next thing I knew, my father was carrying me ashore, easy as if I were a child. I didn't even try to escape. I just looked up at his face, dripping with rain water, grey-blue eyes rimmed with sadness, as he lay me down in the sand. I was blacking out, even as I tried to stand. Then he was pouring honey-sweet liquid into my mouth. It burned all the way down like fire and got stuck in my lungs. I coughed and choked.

"We're going home," he said, stroking my hair out of my face. Then he poured more of it in my mouth and I blacked out again.

When I woke up, I was on the sofa. In the big house. In my father's house. I was changed into clean clothes, a fresh purple sweatshirt, track pants, and there were inexplicably stickers on face. I was tucked under a blanket.

"Hi," Sol's little boy kneeling on my chest, applying stickers to my face. "I'm helping you feel better."

"Yeah you are," I say, smiling. He's grinning his fat cheeked little baby grin, dark bangs brushing the tops of his eyebrows. Thick soft padded hands pressing an inordinate amount of stickers on my face.

"Oh my god Ari—it's two am. You're supposed to be asleep," Juno rushes over. She's wearing sweats and a big shirt.

"He's fine," I say, sitting up a little.

"Bye bye," Ari blows me a kiss before running up stairs.

"Are you okay?" Juno asks, sitting down on the ottoman. Her dark hair is slightly damp and braided back.

"Yeah----where's Ian?" I ask, looking around.

"I put him to bed---you've been out for about six hours," she says, rubbing her arms.

"Sorry," I don't know what else to say.

"No I'm sorry! I can't believe my brothers did that--,"

"What, kidnapped me?" I ask, laughing.

"Yes! Them and their stupid---they're stupid."

"No, now that I've been through it I fully approve of their methods of screening people who are around their sisters," I say, smiling, "Do you know Thyme has some actual army of butch lesbians he hangs out with --?"

"Oh my gods they took you to –" she names a country I absolutely did not know I was ever in and I'm omitting for reasons relating to it being illegal that I was there.

"Yeah I guess, seriously, are you okay---?" I feel kind of bad. I've been gone over a month and we didn't say goodbye or anything properly. "Ian—,"

"I'm fine," she smiles, a little, "Ian and I looked for you, then we just tortured out of Sol where you were ----that was fun. And then yesterday Dara told us that the Hyrda was waking, so our father would have Gale bring you to kill it for your second to last task."

"Right," I'm not done. Of course.  Thanks a lot, Dad.

"I begged him not to make you do it, he said you could, but he didn't tell me how he knew," she says.

"What made him think I could do it?"

"I literally just said he didn't tell me."

"I didn't do it—it got struck by lightening, Ian and I would both be dead otherwise," I say, annoyed. Well. More annoyed. Seriously? He was going to let me and my nephew get killed?

"You struck it with lightening," she says, slowly.

"I also got struck with lightening yes that's how I died or whatever," I say, nodding.

"No---Hugh you controlled that lightening, when I was hitting him our dad said he knew you could," she says, quickly, "Have you ever done it before?"

"I didn't know I did it then---what makes you think I controlled it? I didn't it just---okay it went through me at the thing I was attacking," I admit.