the great war | luke castellan

the shared dreams

"Say that again."

"No." Luke replied through a soft laugh.

"Come on." I lightly poked my finger into his side, but his quick reflexes made him dodge and instead reach out to tangle my fingers through his.

"So you can laugh at me?" Luke raised his brows and tipped his head to the side, his nose almost brushing mine as we laid on the small patch of lawn.

Ghosts of tingles rushed over my face at our proximity. Even though we had been here for longer now, the kiss was still a lasting memory on my lips. I got quiet, "I won't make fun of you."

He watched me for a moment. The small smile on his lips extended into a grin. Luke looked towards the sky, "I've liked you since the day you told me to mind my own business."

I blinked at the side of his face. I thought he had misspoken or joked the first time he had said it, but his tone was earnest, "Why?"

He frowned and met my eyes again, "Do I need a reason?"

"I mean...yeah." I snorted, if only to distract him from how flustered I was, "I was really rude."

"Yeah. You meant to scare me off. I think that's why I immediately knew that you were hiding something underneath." Luke mused, "I tried to ignore it...you were scared and new to all of this and I didn't want to overwhelm you. I tried to keep my distance but that didn't really work."

"Luckily it didn't work." I whispered, "Who knows where we would be if you hadn't been so persistent."

"That just makes me sound obnoxious."

"You are."

Even though I tried to tease him, there was nothing but joy riddled through my words. Luke didn't even say anything back, just grinned at me, giving a shrug as if he was proud of it.

"And you?"

"I'd say I'm obnoxious. But not as bad-" I curled away with laughter as he tried to shove me. The sounds ebbed and I tried to come up with an actual answer, knowing he wanted to know the moment I had caught feelings for him.

It required some hard thinking- I hadn't even known until people pointed it out to me. I knew now he had always made me flustered, but I've never had a crush on someone before and didn't know if that already did it.

"I cared about you at first." I almost flinched at how I broke the silence, attempting to rummage through my memory, "But feelings...I don't know. They built over time, I think. I only realized how deep they were when they were hurt."

The explanation was weak and barely made sense, but Luke nodded nonetheless. It seemed to suffice to make him turn back and smile at me.

It was all too good to be true.

I couldn't believe that we had ended up here, stargazing on Olympus, alive and somewhat well after everything that had happened.

At that, I raised our hands into the air and twisted his wrist gently to take a closer look at his blackened flesh. It was almost like a coat of coal, but small scars veined up his fingers.

I recalled what he had said to Kezi, about wanting to keep it, sending a lurch through my stomach, "Did it hurt?"

Luke flexed his fingers and turned his hand over to let the soft moonlight glow over the scar, "I've had worse."

I tipped my head to the side and he understood that the humor had to be replaced with full honesty. As if we both suddenly understood how I needed the closure.

"It felt like being electrocuted. A zap, then blood, then it got warm. But it healed quickly." Luke murmured, "A small price to pay for getting you out of that trance you were in." My muscles were tense as I tried to nod and he caught onto it, "How bad is it?"