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‘Fine,’ he said. ‘If it will help us get to Tartarus, we’ll do it. What do you want, Gorgyra?’
Nico did not like the way the nymph smiled.
‘Nico di Angelo, why don’t you tell me a story?’
Nico bristled at that. A story?Anyold story? That seemed too easy after everything they’d been through.
After all the suffering.
He looked to Will briefly, and his boyfriend arched an eyebrow. He looked tired.Tootired. And his bandages …
Nico’s stomach roiled. The gauze strips were soaked through with blood again.
He turned back to Gorgyra. ‘A story aboutwhat?’ he asked.
The nymph examined Nico’s face, then Will’s. Was she going to pull soul threads out of them again?
Nico felt something brush his knuckles. He glanced down and saw that Will was trying to hold his hand. He opened his fingers and let Will slip his in between.
Nico’s heart sank. Will’s grip wasveryweak.
Nico had to do this. Hehadto finish what they had started.
The whispers called out to him.
And then Gorgyra did, too.
‘Tell me about the two ofyou,’ she said.
Now they sat on the dock, their feet dangling above the Acheron’s current.
All their stories had been told, except for this one … and whatever happened to them afterwards, assuming therewasan afterwards once they dropped over that precipice.
Nico turned the coin in his fingers. ‘I always keep this with me,’ he said.
‘Same,’ said Will. ‘I mean your ring, that is.’
The dock boards creaked as Gorgyra came closer. ‘Tell me about them.’
Her tone reminded Nico of Mr D – and not in a bad way. When he helped Nico unpack his nightmares, the wine god could be surprisingly gentle and patient. The memory made Nico ache for Camp Half-Blood.
‘We traded keepsakes,’ said Nico. ‘After Nero.’
Will and Nico did their best to relate the final battle with the resurrected Roman emperor. Given Gorgyra’s isolation, she’d only heard snippets of what had transpired aboveground, and what shedidknow came from souls she had collected.
The victims of the war.
This meant the two demigods had to back up a few times to explain things, especially once Will mentioned Apollo.
‘Your father wasinthe battle?’ she asked. ‘Why was he getting involved in mortal affairs?’
Then they had to explain the wholeZeus punished Apollo by sticking him into the body of a sixteen-year-old boy named Lester Papadopoulosthing, which Gorgyra found deeply, deeply amusing. ‘The gods can be quite funny when they want to be,’ she allowed.
Finally, Will got to the part of the story he wanted to tell. ‘After watching my father go off to fight Python, I wasn’t sure I was ever going to see him again. There was something sofinalabout his departure … It got me thinking about what was important to me.’
He leaned against Nico. ‘Then, once Nero and Python were destroyed, I asked Jake Mason to make me something special.’
Nico held up the coin for Gorgyra to see. It was a dull bronze colour, but the embossing was extraordinary. On one side, Jake had managed to perfectly replicate the stylized sun tattoo that Will had on his pectoral – every beam, every angle, every detail. On the other side was the helm of Hades.
