Chapter Seven
The next few days were the best Nico could have ever imagined.
He had gotten a letter from Hecate that said he was allowed to return to camp for Christmas break, which made him gasp so loud half the Gryffindor table turned their heads in his direction. Harry had made good on their friend agreement and Nico began hanging around the trio more, especially since Draco had been avoiding him recently.
It was the day Nico was to leave on the Hogwarts express, and his friends made sure to have extra fun. He had a snowball fight with Seamus, Dean, and Ginny, which ended with Ginny and Dean making out in the middle of the battle, and Seamus and Nico leaving them to play Exploding Snap in the common room. Ron had given him a sweater he'd packed in his bag that was apparently from Weasley's mother. Harry and Nico took a long walk on the grounds, just talking about anything and everything, and it felt nice to have someone who could relate to some of his struggles.
That day, Nico had also been invited to Slughorn's party. But, he was glad to realize it was over Christmas break, so he would be gone.
Now, Nico lugged his trunk down the stairs of the dorm rooms. He set it on the floor to say goodbye to his friends, and Hermioen was the first to run up and give him a hug.
"We're going to miss you," Hermione told him.
"I'll miss you too," Nico told her, hugging her tight. "Don't you have too much fun without me."
"We won't," Harry promised from behind Hermione's head.
Hemione let go and Harry and Ron each gave him a quick hug too, before Dean and Seamus dragged him away.
His two friends walked him to the Great Hall where all the kids who were leaving for the break were gathering. He hugged them each and they both walked back towards the common room, telling him they'd be waiting for him to return.
There was a small group of students leaving and Nico buddied up with Demelza and some other Gryffindor friends, including Ritchie Coote and Jimmy Peaks. Just as Nico was about to follow the group out, he noticed the lean and pale form of Draco Malfoy standing a little ways apart. He didn't have a bag and he was looking right at Nico, clearly wanting his attention but unsure of how to approach.
Nico told his friends to take his small bag and he'd meet them there before looking back at Draco directly, signaling that he'd seen him. He went into a small jog and reached the blonde boy with only a few steps, just out of earshot of the crowd.
"Hey," Nico said, smiling at his friend.
Draco didn't meet his eyes. This wasn't strange, but Nico knew something was definitely off.
"I'm going to be leaving for like, two weeks," Nico reminded him. "But I'll see you when I come back, and you start talking to me again."
Nico meant it as a joke, but Draco practically flinched like he'd been smacked across the face. He tilted his head slightly and Nico noticed tears starting to come to the blonde's eyes.
"Wow, dude. I didn't know you cared so—"
"I'm so sorry," Draco said quietly. "I'm so, so sorry."
"What?"
Nico didn't get a chance to hear an answer before Filch was yelling at him to hurry up and suddenly Draco was running off.
Part of him wanted to run after him and ask him about his apology, but he also knew he had a train to catch and it would be a bit weird if he just appeared on the train out of the shadows.
He looked back once more at Draco's retreating form before deciding to ask him when he got back. Nico turned and ran off towards the train station and his home.
Nico had never been on a train before. Subways yeah, but not a train. There were tiny rooms called compartments and it was just like a limo except bigger, bumpier, and louder.
He was in a compartment with his quidditch team friends and he couldn't help staring out the window to watch the view pass by. There were lakes, fields, forests, etc. When he came back to Hogwarts, he'd take the train instead of shadow traveling.
'Wow,' he thought, 'me using another mode of transport besides shadow travel willingly? Will would be proud.'
About a quarter of the way into their travels, Ritchie popped out of bag of Bertie Bott's Every Flavor Beans and when Nico said he'd never had them, they decided to make a game where they eat jelly beans and try not to throw up. Nico thought that would be easy because they were candy, but he was wrong. This didn't stop him from winning twice though.
Half way through their third round, a knock came on the compartment door.
"Um, Nico," a Hufflepuff boy named James, who Nico had sat with in Herbology, peeked his head through the door. "You're needed up front."
Nico was a bit confused by the request but smiled it off. His friends 'oo'ed like he was in trouble, and he laughed with them as he followed James out of the compartment and down the train corridor.
James didn't seem like he was in the mood to talk, kinda like he was sleepwalking (which Nico could totally understand), so they walked silently to the front of the train. They stopped at the very first compartment and without a word, James turned around and left Nico standing in front of it.
Of course, Nico thought this was odd, but he assumed little James was just nervous to talk to an older student like him.
Nico knocked on the door and a voice inside said, "come in."
He pulled open the handle and stepped inside the brightly lit compartment. As soon as the door closed behind him, Nico's hairs rose and he knew something was off.
"Hello," said the voice. There was a tall man with hair just like Draco Malfoy's standing looking out the window on the other side of the compartment. He wore black robes that were way more fashionable than the ones at Hogwarts, and he was holding a cane with a silver metal snake on top.
"You are Nico di Angelo?" he asked, turning to face him. The man had a long face and the same sharp eyes as Draco's. They must be related.
"Yes," Nico replied.
Slowly and carefully, making sure the man didn't notice, Nico reached his hand back casually, like he was just being gentlemanly. His hand fumbled around and caught on the doorknob. He needed an exit, and the room was too bright for shadow travel.
"Perfect," the man purred. "We finally have the whole collection."
Nico had always been known for his quick reflexes. Being on the streets and a child of the Big Three can give you that superpower, along with a good sense of dark humor. At this moment, though, Nico had spent months without fear of monsters or gods so his 'be quick so you don't die' instinct was lacking.
The man grabbed his shirt and Nico felt like he was being sucked through a straw. Darkness flashed by before him and he had to shut his eyes before it gave him a headache. He felt like he was being shadow traveled but more violently, almost like when he became the wind with Jason before he faced Eros.
The sensation stopped when Nico felt his knees hit the stone floor. Shock made him gasp a bit and he saw red scrapes on his knees. Strong arms grabbed his hands and pulled them painfully behind his back, making him look up.
Immediately, Nico's eyes zoomed around the room, demigod instincts finally taking over. It was dark, slightly green, like the dungeons at Hogwarts or the bottom of a lake. There were also multiple people there, all of them looking as clean as the homeless people Nico had seen at the stop lights.
"Chain him up, quickly," a voice called, coming from a bald man who seemed to be half snake, with his smooth skin, shallow eyes, and slits for a nose.
Nico's hands were pulled forcefully behind him a second time and he could feel chains wrapping around them quickly. He focused his power and tried to fade into the darkness, but there was a force keeping him just an inch away from freedom. A wall caging him into a weaker form of his powers, making him unable to fully melt away.
Realizing that escaping through shadow travel wasn't possible, he felt out to the shadows to gather more information. The house was big, probably a mansion, there was a burly man behind him, twelve others in front of him, and . . . no.
He turned his head to the left and almost gasped in horror. Nine bodies beside him. Nine familiar bodies he could recognize even know in the darkness. Nine bodies chain to the same floor.
In a row, heads down and backs slumped, were all of his friends. Percy, Annabeth, Hazel, Frank, Jason, Piper, Reyna, Leo, and. . . Will.
"Hello, Mr. di Angelo," the snaky voice said again.
Nico forced himself to look away and up to meet the man's gaze. He tried to scan the man's eyes for his soul, a way to see his past and find something to make his guard fall or convince him to let them go. The only problem, the man didn't have a soul. Not a whole one. Somehow, the man had divided it, shattered the one thing that made him human. He had destroyed himself from the inside out.
"Nico?" a softer voice called.
Nico glanced to his side and saw that his friends were now looking right at him. Jason had dirt covering his cheek and a small bleeding cut on his forehead. Piper's face was scarred with a long bleeding gash. Reyna's exposed arms were covered in what looked like scratched marks. Leo had either grease or dirt smudged on his face and a nice cut on his chin. Hazel and Frank both wore matching faces of defiance and smeared blood, and Annabeth's nose was bleeding. Percy and Will were the only two who seemed relatively unharmed, and both were looking at Nico with a mixture of hope and terror.
"As, yes," the man smiled. "I thought it would be cruel of me to have you here by yourself, so I collected your friends too."
Nico looked back to the man, a thousand questions racing through his mind but his eyes as sharp as a dagger. He wouldn't let the man see any weakness. His first reactions already showed too much of how much he cared for them, and that was dangerous.
"Oh, you are probably wondering how we found them, aren't you?" the man laughed cruelly. "You should be more careful with who you befriend."
The Snake-Man laughed cruelly, and Nico knew. He put it together. Why Draco had been avoiding him, why he apologized, the man who looked like a cruel and older version of his friend, all of it. Draco had told this man his secret. Wait, that would mean that that man was . . .
"Yes!" Voldemort exclaimed in delight. "Your dear friend Draco betrayed your trust. He told us about how you were not just any wizards and that your friends were at school in LA. They put up a fight, but us wizards have ways of . . . controlling others."
Nico remembered the boy, James, on the train. How he had seemed like he was just sleepwalking. They were controlling him.
"Of course to get the correct place, I did have to torture it out of that nature loving friend of yours–"
Nico's head snapped up again. "What did you do to Grover?!"
"Oh nothing much," the man smiled, enjoying Nico being so distraught. "He was stubborn, but one look in his mind told me everything."
Nico didn't know what to say. He didn't know what to do.
With a life like Nico's, he'd met many evil people. Some hurt others for their own gain, some because they were hurt by them, but the worst ones were the ones who didn't kill their victims. No, the far more dangerous ones were like cats. Always playing with their food before they finish them.
Nico didn't know Voldemort's intentions, but he knew he had to get his friends out of it.
"Lord Voldemort," Nico said, looking up pleadingly at the snake man, trying to reach that fragment of a soul still left inside. "I know what Draco may have told you, but you don't want these people." -he gestured to his friends with a nod in their direction- "Their powers are weak. Mine are a thousand times more–"
"I don't need your lies, Nico." The way Voldemort said his name made Nico want to change it all together. "There is no doubt that you are far more powerful than most of these other ones, but your friends are very powerful as well."
Of course, Nico knew that, but he couldn't admit it to him without getting them in more danger.
"But–"
There was a red light and pain erupted in Nico's chest. A scream escaped his lips and his eyes shut without even thinking. He had never felt such a surge of twisting pain so suddenly and unexpectedly. It was so powerful, he could barely hear the screams of his friends. Or maybe he couldn't hear them because his own cries were too loud.
The pain stopped and against his will, Nico crumpled to the floor. He didn't want to, tried to will himself to just get to his knees, but he was too shocked to move, even his eyes stayed shut.
"Nico!" many voices called out. He knew them all, and had doomed them all too. The sound of care that filled that one word made Nico want the pain back again to block out the guilt. He had put all of his friends in the path of a very dangerous man. This was all his fault.
"Throw them away for the moment," Voldemort's cold voice said to his comrades. "Let them greet each other."
Someone slipped their arms under Nico's body and he was lifted harshly. He was stronger now, but he didn't want to see the face of his holder, so he kept his eyes closed.
There was a shout and Percy's screams filled the room, mixing with the cries of all of his other friends.
"Don't worry, child," Voldemort chided him as Nico was led out of the room. "I was told about your abilities, so don't even try them on me."
Nico faded in and out of consciousness, fluttering his eyes lightly when he was awake to see what was happening. When he felt he could stay awake for a good while, he peered his eyes lightly.
He was being carried down some stone steps and into a cold room, the sound of multiple footsteps echoing through the dungeon-like place. There was the sound of metal screeching and the arms that were holding him fell suddenly and he was falling through the air for only a moment before hitting stone for the, what? Third time that day?
Without his arms to catch him, Nico tumbled across a hard, cold floor, his skin ripping off from the bumpy ground. He couldn't seem to care though as he tumbled. He just sat there on the ground, his eyes closed, and body aching inside and out.
He had let himself get too comfortable. Just when he'd found something good, it had been taken, again. And this time, it was all his fault.
Nico didn't open his eyes as he heard his friends get tossed inside the same cell as him. He didn't open them when the guard said something in a gruff voice and threw keys to someone. He didn't even peek when another someone proceeded to roll him over a bit and unlock his handcuffs. Warm and familiar arms lifted him up onto a lap he'd been laid in many times before. A soft, sad voice called to him from above, and only then did he let himself look up.
"Nico?"
Nico opened his eyes and stared into those comforting, warm, blue eyes Will Solace. The boy he loved more everything. The boy he had now put in danger, because he had dared to hope he could let his guard down for only a moment.
"I'm sorry," Nico whispered to him. He reached up with one fo his hands and held it to Will's warm cheek. Blurriness covered his eyes and Nico's throat tightened. "It's all my fault. I'm so sorry."
Will pulled Nico into his chest, just like he'd done so many times before, but this time, it was the last straw. He wrapped his arms around Will's waist and cried into his orange shirt. He let himself crumble in Will's strong arms and didn't care that there were others watching. He thought he was done being used and beaten. He let himself hope that maybe, just maybe, he could be happy.
Nico cried and cried into Will until the shirt was soaked, and his throat ached. Then, he sat up on Will's lap, his boyfriend's arms still around him, and took in his surroundings. They were in a cell, the ground was stone, his friends were all in there with him. Each of them were sitting around him, looking at him intently, like maybe he would have a plan to help them, get them to escape.
Nico cleared his throat and shakily got to his feet. Will followed him, holding his arm so he didn't fall.
"Hey, you guys," Nico's voice cracked, raw from the crying and screaming. He looked down at his feet, not sure if he wanted to meet their eyes. "I'm really sorry about this. It's my fault we're here and I–"
Nico was hit with a second body and arms wrapping around his neck. He shifted his head to see over the person's shoulder and saw Hazel's fluffy hair in front of him and felt her slightly smaller body holding onto his. He wrapped his arms around her waist and another pair of arms engulfed him. He looked over and saw Jason was hugging him too. More arms and bodies came until they were all surrounding Nico, hugging him and each other.
"It's okay Neeks," Piper whispered in his ear. "We don't blame you."
Nico squeezed his friends tight. No matter what happened, he wouldn't let them go. He wouldn't leave until he could take them with him.
After a minute of hugging, they all unfolded and glance around at each other.
"What now?" Frank asked, asking what each of them had been thinking but were too afraid to ask aloud.
"We don't know much about what's going on," Annabeth said slowly, of course one step ahead of them. "So it's hard to make a plan."
"I've got some ideas," Nico offered. "I know all about Moldyshorts up there."
"Who's Molyshorts?" Percy asked.
"Evil-snake-man-dude," Leo answered.
"How did you know that?" Frank asked.
Leo rolled his eyes. "Who else would have a name like Moldyshorts?"
"That's actually–" Nico started but was cut off by Piper
"Let's hear your ideas, Neeks," she insisted.
The demigods sat down on the cold ground as Nico told them everything he knew about the Death Eaters and Voldemort. Will had sat next to him and had a hand on his the whole time, which definatly helped, but Nico couldn't help but remember his friends at Hogwarts. He wondered if the people in the compartment wondered where he went. Would Dean, Seamus, Harry, Ron, and Hermione realize he's gone when all the other students come back from break? Would they miss him?
Nico wasn't sure but after he'd explained his findings on the enemy, the demigods were silent, thinking.
"That explains a lot," Annabeth finally said.
"Yeah," Reyna agreed. "Especially the soul stuff."
"Yeah, no way that man's got a heart," Leo confirmed.
"That's not–" Nico paused on his correction. "How long have you all been here?"
"Not sure," Percy shrugged. "We were taken from our dorm a while ago."
"Yeah," Jason chimed in. "We tried to get away but they cast some weird spells on us."
"Then we woke up here," Frank added. "The guy, what did you call him? Moldy . . ."
"It's Voldemort," Nico supplied.
"Voldemort," Frank nodded, "he wanted information on you, but we didn't tell him, so he roughed us up a bit.
A stab of guilt hit Nico's stomach and he tried not to let his face drop.
Will's hand squeezed Nico's and they caught eyes.
'It's not your fault.' Will told him through his eyes.
Nico nodded.
Footsteps echoed through the chambers and all the demigods turned to see a hairy looking man came to the bars of the cell.
"You, di Angelo," he said, pointing at Nico. "Get your cuffs on and get out here."
Will's grip tightened on his hand.
Nico nodded and leaned into Will to whisper in his ear. "I'll be okay."
He stood up and grabbed his cuffs, asking Jason to lock them for him. He walked to the cell door where the man made sure his cuffs were on correctly before letting him outside.
Nico was guided up the steps, and through a few corridors he made sure to memorize, until he came to the same room as before and was shoved into a kneeling position in front of Voldemort. None of the other people were around, but that didn't make Nico feel any less comfortable.
"Nico di Angelo," the Dark Lord said softly. "I have a proposal for you."
The snake man walked over to him from where he stood and tipped Nico's head up to look at him with his slender fingers. "You were right that you are the most valuable to me, and I know you don't want your friends to hurt anymore because of you, so I have an idea. You work for me, and I'll never touch your friends again."
"If I work for you then you let my friends go," Nico countered back.
Voldemort laughed. "Oh no, Nico. You don't get to make the offers here. If you do not work for me, then I will torture you and your friends until you are broken beyond repair."
Nico scoffed. "You cannot break me."
That was not the right answer. Voldemort brought out a stick from his black cloak and the pain from before sprouted again. This time, Nico clamped his mouth shut, biting his tongue until there was a chance he would bite it in half. He didn't scream. He wouldn't let him have that satisfaction.
The pain stopped and Nico fought the urge to collapse again. He flopped forward but brought his gaze back up to look back up to meet Voldemort's gaze, a small smirk playing on his lips.
"Maybe your own pain will not break you," Voldemort said quietly. "But maybe the pain of your friend's will."
Nico's gaze hardened. He didn't want his friends to get hurt, but he needed to be sure they'd be safe before making any commitments to a snake.
"Throw him back," Voldemort called to someone behind Nico. "We will start tomorrow."