You'll Learn to Love Me

Chapter 44: To Rome

A metallic CLANG-CLANG-CLANG jolted Percy and Laylana out of their sleep. They were still lying down as they had been when they fell asleep the night before, with Laylana's head snuggled into Percy's shoulder. Laylana noted the sound was the landing gear being lowered. She rubbed her eyes as someone knocked on her door. 

"Come in," Laylana called out. Jason poked his head in. The bruises on his face had faded. His blue eyes glittered with excitement.

"Hey, guys" he said. "We're descending over Rome. You really should see this."

Laylana shoved her brother out of her room as she quickly dressed in her usual joggers and a t-shirt. She threw one of Leo's sweater's around her waist and ascended the stairs, shielding her eyes from the sun. The sky was brilliant blue, as if the stormy weather had never happened. The sun rose over the distant hills, so everything below them shone and sparkled like the entire city of Rome had just come out of the car wash.

As mentioned, Laylana had seen some places. She traveled across country numerous times for quests. Hell, she was from New York, which was massive. But the sheer vastness of Rome halted the breath in her lungs. She gaped as she overlooked the city.  It spread through hills and valleys, jumped over the Tiber with dozens of bridges, and just kept sprawling to the horizon. Streets and alleys zigzagged with no rhyme or reason through quilts of neighborhoods. 

Laylana stood next to her boyfriend, intertwining hands with him. Everywhere she looked, there were wide piazzas and traffic-clogged streets. Parks cut across the city with a crazy collection of palm trees, pines, junipers, and olive trees, as if Rome couldn't decide what part of the world it belonged to—or maybe it just believed all the world still belonged to Rome.

"We're setting down in that park," Leo announced, pointing to a wide green space dotted with palm trees. "Let's hope the Mist makes us look like a large pigeon or something."

Laylana wished she could shroud the boat in her shadows. But the sun blared so brightly that there was definitely not enough to cover everything, and it would take up way too much energy. She needed to save it if she was going to save Nico. Nevertheless, it seemed to work. Laylana didn't notice any cars veering off the road or Romans pointing to the sky and screaming, "Aliens!" The Argo II set down in the grassy field and the oars retracted. The noise of traffic was all around them, which Laylana found oddly comforting. She had lived her entire life in the city, and she kind of missed the noise.

To their left, a green lawn sloped toward a line of woods. An old villa nestled in the shade of some weird-looking pine trees with thin curvy trunks that shot up thirty or forty feet, then sprouted into puffy canopies. To their right, snaking along the top of a hill, was a long brick wall with notches at the top for archers—maybe a medieval defensive line, maybe Ancient Roman. To the north, about a mile away through the folds of the city, the top of the Colosseum rose above the rooftops, looking just like it did in travel photos. 

Laylana's mind went blank. She thought she had gone on enough quests at this point in her life, and thought she had seen it all. But in a way, she was connected to this place. This was home to possibly various ancestors of hers. 

Jason pointed to the base of the archers' wall, where steps led down into some kind of tunnel. "I think I know where we are," he said. "That's the Tomb of the Scipios."

Percy frowned. "Scipio...Reyna's pegasus?"

"No," Annabeth cut in. "They were a noble Roman family, and...wow, this place is amazing."

"You can say that again." Laylana breathed out. "If this place wasn't so dangerous, I'd say this is where we go on our honeymoon if we ever get married."