"I'm completely in love
with you and you haven't
even realised but I'm totally
fine with the crippling
knowledge that you don't like
me back. That's fine, I'm fine.
Totally fine."
[ LEO VALDEZ x FEMALE OC ]
[ HEROES OF OLYMPUS SERIES...
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0007. | WE CAN'T KEEP SECRETS, TRUST ME
Nadia had secrets. She had a lot of secrets actually, but these two were the worst. One she had shared the burden of with Annabeth who was great at analysing prophecies, and the other was one she couldn't even say out loud so she comforted herself by only saying it in her mind.
I'm in love with Leo.
Obviously, that usually wouldn't be such a fearful thing to say but Nadia had never felt this way about someone before, and she was scared. Scared about how strongly she felt, but also scared that Leo might not feel the same way. They had been together for six months and he hadn't said anything even remotely close to love.
Sure, he loved when she wore red. Or he loved when she had to stand on her tip toes to kiss him. Or he loved when she needed him to fix something for her. But they were all throw away comments, she knew saying 'I love when you-' wasn't the same as actually saying 'I love you' and she was scared that she had rushed into her feelings.
But Nadia's life wasn't even so simple as to only be concerned with her relationship. Nadia was also concerned with herself. This was another secret she hadn't told anyone - her nightmares. Well, at least, she had thought they were nightmares, but recently, as they got closer to New Rome, Nadia began to wonder if it wasn't just a figment of her imagination.
She saw Gaea's cruel gold eyes every time she tried to sleep. She saw her cursed sleeping expression with that smug smile like even under Nadia's spell, Nadia was the weak one.
She told herself she wasn't. She told herself she wasn't weak - she couldn't have been. She had fought her off; she had survived, but was survival enough? Truthfully, Nadia was terrified of the earth lady and she wanted to talk to someone about it but she didn't know if she could. She didn't want to burden anyone else with her fears of what Gaea was, or might be, doing to her.
But at least, in that moment, she felt safe.
She was by Jason's bedside with Piper, her head in her best friend's lap as Piper ran her fingers through her hair to distract herself from worrying about the unconscious son of Jupiter. The gash on Jason's head had closed up from the ambrosia but there was still a black bruise and a hard red scab over the welt.
Nadia had found a healing potion in her spell book that she had taken from the Hecate cabin before she left. The cauldron was now brewing in her room, stewing the crushed eucalyptus and strained seaweed. It had to thoroughly simmer before she could add the ambrosia and the phoenix feather clippings for it to be finished and ready to drink.
Piper was staring at her dagger, making Nadia think of her own. She missed having Kore with her, it was a source of comfort that she had given to Nico because he said it needed to be reforged. He told her something about dual metal blades and Stygian Iron. Nadia didn't really understand the theory behind it, but Annabeth had deemed it a good idea and Nadia trusted Nico. But now both her dagger and her cousin were missing and Nadia felt worse than ever. She missed that smiley son of Hades.
