PERSEUS MEANS DESTROYER

Ho Hey

I belong with you, you belong with me,

You're my sweetheart.

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The air surrounding the table was tense.

And Loki was sick of the pretence that everything was fine—it was not.

He was sick of sitting at this table, night after night, for nearly a week now, as his so-called 'brother' and 'father' ate their meat and drank their mead and quite neatly skirted around the nasty little fact that he had been trying to kill them not three months ago.

That he still felt the urge to end their lives, as impossible as it might seem.

He purposefully dragged his knife harshly across the ceramic to elicit a bone-grinding screech, watching as the two blonds seated at opposite ends of the table winced in near unison.

He wasn't sure how long he would be held in his new prison—because, as mortal writers seemed so fond of pointing out in their stories, 'A prisoner with all the comforts of the world is still in prison.'—before being returned to his old one (which undoubtedly had more in the way of entertainment value), if it was ever going to happen.

Not that he particularly cared one or the other; it was as simple as the fact that this facade was far more tiresome and far less interesting than the Avengers' Tower, and residing in this palace (it might have been a temple. He'd never put much thought into the way it was arranged, but Loki wouldn't put it past his adoptive 'father' to live in a temple dedicated to himself) was like living under a boulder; he wasn't exactly sure what Odin had discovered, but it was enough to have weighty stares sent in his direction every dozen minutes or so, and it was enough to have made the 'all-mighty Allfather' nervous enough to summon Loki back to his seat of power.

He couldn't help but be curious, although he didn't imagine Odin had figured out the truth of anything; he didn't appear anywhere near worried enough for that.

It was more like the Allfather was being overly cautious.

When Annabeth found Percy on the beach, the sun and moon hung heavy at opposite ends of the sky, both casting light across the surface of the water.

She bent down to pick up the crutch he had discarded in the sand, wishing briefly—and not for the first time—that she could use a phone or something to take a photo of the ocean.

With the dazzling colours of the sunset reflected and refracted across pools if water interspersed with seafoam, it looked a little like an alien world.

Percy was standing somewhere between knee- and waist-depth, soaking his jeans and getting splattering if water in his hoodie as waves crashed into his legs.

Silhouetted against the horizon next to him was his favourite pegasus; Blackjack. He was resting his hand on the side of the pegasus' neck, vaguely looking out across the water.

Annabeth sighed. She felt like she'd been doing it a lot lately, and she felt like she was getting older every time she did it.

Then again, she was less than a month out from turning eighteen. Which meant Percy was getting closer to the milestone birthday, too.

Annabeth set Percy's crutch back down on the sand, resolving to meet him back at his cabin. If he was out in the water again, he probably had a reason. She knew sometimes he just needed the waves to calm down after a hard day, and sometimes he was waiting for Poseidon to show face.

They hadn't seen their godly parents since the previous year. Percy had been to Olympus to meet with the gods in relation to his current quest-mission-thing, but that never really counted.

The last time she had been to Olympus was with Percy and the four other members of the Seven still alive, along with Nico and Reyna, the gods had seemed a little uneasy in their presence.

Given that Piper had just charmspoken a primordial—a protogenoi—back to sleep, even with assistance, and three of them had just returned from a place even the gods were scared to go, one of them was one of the leaders of the armed force that had just tried to wipe them out, and all of them had spent the last three months battling across the Ancient Lands to prevent the destruction of Olympus, it was likely warranted.

She wasn't entirely sure if the gods had caught wind of what Percy had done to Akhlys in Tartarus or not, and she couldn't remember if they were always unnerved when the scars on hers and Percy's hands flared up—if they hadn't, it was a gruesome enough sight. If they had, it was a horrendous reminder; hands drenched in ichor for a killer of gods.

She wasn't sure if she could ever convince Percy it wasn't his fault. He still woke up screaming for her, apologising over and over again, no matter how many times she promised it was okay, that it was fine, he was protecting her. And he had stopped before it had gotten bad. He'd listened to her when it mattered.

Although there was something... heady, if not terrifying, about holding that power over him. Over the gods (if she asked, and he would do it. If she asked him not to, he'd stop). But she never, ever wanted to be the manipulator, not to him, not to her Seaweed Brain. Not after the trust they shared, not after everything they'd been through together.

She pushed the door behind her shut with the heel of her foot. Percy froze halfway through pulling his shirt over his head, turning partially toward her.

"Hey, Wise Girl."

"Hey, Seaweed Brain."

She caught a glimpse of one of his famous (infamous?) crooked smiles as he finished pulling the camp shirt off his body.

"You alright, Annabeth?"

"Hmm?" She pulled her hair tie out, tugged a little more harshly than she meant to when it got tangled in her annoyingly frizzy hair. "Yeah, why do you ask?" She placed the hair tie on the bedside table next to her bunk, picking up the hairbrush next to it and doing her best to tug it through the knots.

Percy shrugged, moving his crutch from the floor to leaning up against the wall near his bed. He always said his leg hurt more when it was stiffer. "You seem a little tense."

"You're heading back to the Avengers' Tower in two days, I'm just a little worried. Why was Loki even taken back to Asgard in the first place?"

Percy laughed quietly. "I don't know, Annabeth, and even if I asked I don't think they'd answer me anyway. And you're stressing this far out?"

She rolled her eyes, making short, sharp strokes at the ends of her hair to pull out the knots that had gathered there. "Don't tell me you're not worried as well."

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First published ::: 18.10.22
FIrst edit ::: n/a
Wordcount ::: 1147
Chapter dedication ::: n/a

<3

Yours,