Chapter 26
It was a long trek, but we finally managed to find a small village. It took us another long while, but we finally managed to find someone willing to let us use their shower. They even washed our clothes, which was kind of them. Once we were all nice and clean, Nico suggested getting on with the next round of shadow travel. The kind old married couple who'd let us clean up said goodbye, and we thanked them. Coach Hedge placed a few gold drachmas in the man's hand. The man rolled them over. "Drachmas?" He asked.
"Po." Nico said. (A/N- means "Yes." in Albanian)
"Demi-perëndi?" The man asked. (A/N- means "Demi-gods?)
"Po. A jeni?" I was surprised that we'd come across another demigod. (A/N- means "Yes. Are you?")
"Po. Biri i Demeter." He replied. (A/N- means "Yes. Son of Demeter.") "Ju duhet të jeni në kërkim. Paḉ fat!" (A/N- means "You must be on a quest. Good luck!") We said our thanks, and went to leave. Luckily we didn't have to travel with a poo covered statue. The couple had lent us cleaning supplies to make sure it was in good condition. We clipped ourselves back into the harness.
"Where to?" Reyna asked.
"Italy?" Nico suggested. I grinned like a maniac.
"YES!" I said, a little too quickly.
"OK. Off we go then."
Suddenly, we were falling. I looked down to see a crater. "GUYS!" Reyna yelled, the wind whipping her voice away.
"Pan's pipes!" Coach Hedge cursed.
"Whaaaaa!" Nico flailed. I saw him almost slip out of Reyna's grip, but she managed to grab him. I wrapped a hand around her wrist and managed to grip the back of Coach Hedge's shirt collar.
"That's Vesuvius below us!" Reyna exclaimed. "Teleport us out of here!" Nico looked around, his eyes completely unfocused, and I realized with dread that he would be no use for now.
"I- I can't! No strength!" Nico yelled, eyes wide and terrified. Coach Hedge bleated in alarm.
"News flash guys! Goats can't fly! Zap us out of here of we're gonna get flattened into an Athena Parthenos omelette!" I shut my eyes and tried hard to shadow travel us somewhere else, anywhere else, but I couldn't. I was still new with shadow travelling, and I didn't know how to transport this many people on my own. I heard Reyna murmur something, and she must've come to a conclusion.
"Guys, shadow-travel," she ordered, "I'll lend you my strength." Nico looked at her blankly.
"How-"
"Do it!" Reyna yelled. She grabbed our hands and I noticed the tattoo on her arm, the torch and sword symbol of Bellona, begin to glow. Suddenly, it felt like my entire body was running with electricity. I straightened, not deliberately but because of the sudden flow of energy, and just before we fell into the volcano, we slipped into the shadows.
"Oh my fucking gods!" Reyna exclaimed as we arrived. I bent my knees on impact, but fell to the ground. Reyna and Coach Hedge looked around, trying to see where we were. I felt sick. Nico had not been exaggerating when he described how exhausting shadow travelling could be. I was out of breath, it felt like I'd run a hundred miles, and I felt like I was going to pass out. Unfortunately, Nico did. He fell to the floor, hard, and just lay there.
"I guess we're stopping here for a bit." I said to Reyna and Coach Hedge. They nodded and began to untangle themselves from the harness.
"You guys get some rest." Reyna said. "I'll take first watch." Coach Hedge put his back up against the Athena Parthenos and shut his eyes. I shuffled over to sit with Reyna. We sat there in comfortable silence for about half an hour. I loved the way the sun felt on my skin, the feel of the breeze. It made me feel like I was home again, in my own time. "So where are we?" Reyna asked. I took a deep breath in.
"Home." I explained. "Italy." I pointed to the horizon. "We lived in Venice. I shared a bedroom with Bianca. I remember I was so jealous that Nico got his own bedroom, but he was the only boy, so..." I shrugged.
"What happened to it?" Reyna asked. "The house?"
"I don't know." I sniffed. "Maybe bombs, maybe Zeus."
"I can't wrap my head around the fact that you lived through World War Two."
"Yeah." I agreed. We fell back into silence, both lost in our own thoughts.
"What did Zeus do?" Reyna asked. "Why would he have destroyed your house?"
"The god of the underworld was hiding three children. Zeus didn't like the idea that he could possibly be overpowered by three bambini. Mama made us move about and we ended up in the United States. In this hotel in Washington. One night, our father ran in, told mama we had to go. She wouldn't let him take us, said we were staying here. He shadow travelled us out of there, and turned back to go and get mama when..."
"It's ok." Reyna said, realizing I was getting upset. "You don't have to talk about it."
"No, I... I want to. He turned to get mama when the hotel was hit by lightning. Turned out, Zeus had been trying to kill us. But he didn't succeed. He only managed to kill—" I choked, but continued, "He only managed to kill mama." I felt hot tears on my cheeks and I brushed them away. Reyna stayed silent, but she nodded, turning to face forward and rubbing her arms.
"Were you alright earlier?" I asked Reyna.
"Sure, why?" She seem confused.
"Well, it's just that when we landed you said 'Oh my fucking gods', and I don't think people normally say that if they're alright." Reyna gave me an embarrassed smile.
"When I lend someone my strength, I feel a sort of echo of their emotions. When I lent it to Nico, I felt so much anguish that I was almost overwhelmed, and that's just an echo of what he's feeling. But when I lent it to you, I felt like I couldn't breathe. I don't know what I was expecting, I mean, you spent seven decades in Tartarus for Elysium's sake. I just... it was almost impossible for me to lend you my strength, and that isn't even half of what you're feeling. I don't like people I like feeling bad." She explained.
"Oh." Was all I had to say in reply. I wasn't sure I liked the idea of someone feeling my emotions, even if it was just an echo.
The quiet was only interrupted by the snores from Coach Hedge. Occasionally, Nico whimpered in his sleep. It made me panic each time, thinking that someone was hurting him. That's one of the things I'd seen in Tartarus. I'd come across something that could manipulate the mist (mist was a crazy concept to me, but it made sense), and they made me see Nico and Bianca and mama being killed in a thousand ways. There was nothing I could do to stop it, no matter how hard I tried. I could see the monster laughing in the corner of my eye, enjoying my torment, but my brain kept telling me that this was real and it was my fault and I had to save them. I'd almost been glad to kill that monster. "You should sleep." Reyna said in the end. I didn't bother arguing with her, I simply curled up on the floor and shut my eyes. I was asleep in seconds.
Authors note- REVIEW! PLEASE! I have this story up on fanfiction.net as well and nobody every reviews it, despite the fact that I am lucky enough to have over 12k views. Sorry for begging, it's just frustrating to not get any feedback.