Death's Embrace (Nico Di Angelo x femOC)

1: Little Freak

Mariana Rodriguez woke up to another ordinary day at Camp Half-Blood. She yawned, her slender frame draped in her grey sleep, in the corner of the Hermes cabin where she slept. The air was cool and tinged with a faint scent of pine, a constant reminder of the forest surrounding the camp.

Pushing herself into a sitting position, Mariana glanced around the dimly lit room, noting the empty beds and sleep bags surrounding her. In this cabin, an overcrowded haven for unclaimed half-bloods and those whose parents were minor gods. She started her usual routine, that have been going since she arrived at camp three years ago from Colombia, she is now ten years old. She picks up her toiletries, and go to the common showers. One thing she had to be grateful for her heritage is that no one steal her things, and that's a hard thing to say when you are surrender by Hermes kids, no one also bothered her or prank her, brownie points for being the daughter of literal death.

After showering and dressing in the ugly orange camp shirt and her only pair of jeans, she picked up a hairbrush and started untangling her wild black curls, struggling in the process as always and wishing to go bald, because the amount of effort to keep her hair decent is just ridiculous.

When the mess of her black hair was somewhat tamed with a simple black ponytail, she walked out of the cabin to the breakfast pavilion, a large, open-air building in the center of camp where the campers would often gather.

This year the snow has been allowed to fall lightly; everything was covered in a white blanket. As she walked through camp, she greeted a few of the other campers with a nod or a brief wave just as her mom used to tell her 'You always have to greet everyone, is good manners Mari', but most simply ignored her, their conversation resuming the moment she passed. Her small frame, combined with her ever-present aura of melancholy, made her nearly invisible to the majority of the demigod community. She sits in the full Hermes table, where there's no space to even put your elbows on, but somehow when she arrives and sits, everyone scoops themselves together to avoid touching her, not like I'm not gonna complain.

She closed her eyes and think of having empanadas, and they appear magically, she stands up to the campfire and offer two 'to Thanatos, Buenos días papá and to Dionysus one day I am gonna win the pinnacle'. Before sitting and start eating her breakfast in silence, not that anyone would want to talk to her, the only sounds she could hear was the idle chatting of the other campers, all eating together and laughing around her. The loud voices always made her head spin, so she started to focus in finishing her food as soon as possible and get out of the dining pavilion where all the noise came from. Her plate quickly empty, she stands up and start walking outside the pavilion, making her way to the big house in the hope to find Chiron or Mr. D or both.

As she approached the Big House was decorated with strings of red and yellow fireballs that warmed the porch but didn't seem to catch anything on fire. Inside, flames crackled in the hearth. The air smelled like hot chocolate. She climbs the steps of the porch and open the door, letting herself in. The inside was cozy and welcoming, Mr. D and Chiron were playing a quiet game of cards in the parlor.

"Hey Maricarmen." Dionysus says without looking up from his cards. "Good morning, your majesty." Mariana said, knowing how much Dionysus enjoys the sarcastic courtesy. She could sense a hint of a smile on the wine god's lips. He took a sip of his Diet Coke, and continued studying his cards. He was wearing his neon orange leopard-skin warm-up suit and his purple running shoes and a golden laurel wreath was tilted sideways on his curly black hair, which must've meant he'd won the last hand of cards. Chiron glanced at her from the game. "Good morning, Mariana. How is your day going so far?" Chiron's brown beard was shaggier for the winter. His curly hair had grown a little longer. He wore a fuzzy sweater with a hoofprint design on it, and he had a blanket on his lap that almost hid his wheelchair completely.