Working With The Thief (Percy Jackson)

Part III, Chapter Thirty Five: I'm Not A Grief Counselor (But I Need One Now)

*cocks gun* this one's gonna hurt (this is your warning that people are unwelllllll this chapter)

Percy Jackson

I wonder if Annabeth realized she has a matching grey streak with Thalia and Luke.

After what happened, I didn't dare bring it up— she seemed even more fragile than the two girls who almost died today.

For the most part, it was a quiet flight back to New York. The Pegasi can fly a lot faster than I remember, and with the incentive of a few sugar cubes, didn't even complain about it.

As soon as we landed, campers were running up to us, I'm sure having seen the pegasi from a distance. At the front of the group was the Hunters, Jason (who was technically flying), and then Chiron with Nico on his back, Octavian running alongside the centaur (or, trying to).

Getting off Blackjack, I thanked him again and gave him one last sugar cube before he flew off (I wonder if Chiron eats sugar cubes). The other three dismounted, though Phoebe and Zoë were essentially mobbed by their now ex-comrades.

Meanwhile, Nico almost broke his leg jumping off of Chiron and Jason almost tumbled as he flew down faster than he should've. The two of them were tripping over themselves as they ran up to us.

Only for both of them to see that their sisters weren't with us.

"Where's my sister?" Both brothers asked in unison.

The sons of Jupiter and Hades just... Stared at me as if they didn't just suck all of the air out of my lungs.

Sure, I expected the question from Jason. If Thalia originally assumed she'd come back here until the solstice, they wouldn't have given him a suitable goodbye.

I looked back at Chiron and Mr. D, because they knew about Bianca.

According to what Zoë said on the flight back, after we told Annabeth about Bianca, she said that Artemis knew about the daughter of Hades before we arrived. She said that Hades had sent her a vision the same day it happened.

She warned Zoë and Phoebe that the Hunters may be in mourning when we arrived because they should know about Bianca.

Chiron should have told them.

Chiron was supposed to tell them.

Yet, the centaur wouldn't meet my gaze and Mr. D did for a moment, but just looked down after that.

Before I could summon what I'm sure would not be the right words for this because I'm not a crisis counselor or a grief counselor or a therapist in any capacity and this isn't supposed to be my job, Annnabeth took a deep breath.

And then she ran off.

Grover squeezed my hand, stifling a breath out, seeming conflicted about what to do, our anxiety feeding into each other.

I'll go try to handle her. He informed me through our link.

"Annabeth!" Grover yelled, chasing after the daughter of Athena, who ran towards the cabins.

Which left me with Nico and Jason.

"Thalia... Sorry." I apologized, collecting myself. "Thalia will be back in New York for the solstice, I think— we sort of had a run in with the police in Albuquerque, so he's no longer considered missing, which means that there's a ton of stuff they have to figure out at your mom's estate. They just wanted to see how much it was before coming back. She's okay— you could probably send an IM, if you know how to, but she's just in Pasadena."