Chapter Eight
Nobody slept that night. Everyone sat together on the cold, hard floor. No one talked. No one moved. Everyone just held each other, waiting for the first peek of dawn to see what was in store for them.
At some point, Nico couldn't tell what time, footsteps came echoing down the hallway and a hairy man appeared.
He stood from his place in the corner. Will and the others followed suit and watched the man as he unlocked the door.
"Hazel Levesque," the man announced, beckoning them.
Everyone turned their heads to look at Hazel. Nico's sister's eyes flicked back between Frank and him, unsure of what to do.
"I'll go," Nico said, stepping forward. His friends were here because of his mistakes. He was their leader now, and he would take as many blows for them as possible.
"No," the hairy man growled and glared at him.
Hair rose on Nico's neck and he looked over to Reyna and saw that she had heard it too. The man on the other side of the bars was actually growling, and Nico realized with a start that his hairy body was not normal body hair. before. The man was a werewolf.
Hazel took a step forward, out of Frank's arms, but Nico held an arm up in front of her.
"She's not going anywhere with you," he said defiantly.
"Nico, it's fine," Hazel whispered, trying to convince her brother that it was fine. Nico didn't back down.
The werewolf growled again. His eyes were glowing with anger as he grabbed the door of the cell and smashed it open.
All the demigods instinctively took a step back, and the werewolf marched right over to them, grabbing Nico by the collar of his shirt.
Gasps could be heard from all around him as he was lifted into the air, his feet dangling in the clasp. He grabbed the wolf man's arm and tried to turn it to let himself free, but the man was strong.
The man pulled his fist that wasn't holding Nico back, and brought it fast to his face.
Shouts rang in his ears and all Nico could see was black everywhere.
Another blow and he was dropped to the ground.
Nico's legs collapsed under him but he managed to catch himself back with his hands. Something loomed over him and two more blows came, but this time to his stomach.
"Stop!" Will's voice cried.
"Fuck off, you monster!" Percy exclaimed.
"I'll go, just........stop!" Hazel finally cried.
Nico wanted to protest, but he knew she was right. He was out of practice and weak from his comfortable life at Hogwarts. He couldn't fight back, not today.
The figure moved out of the way, and Nico took the chance to try and clear his vision. He lifted a hand to his eyes and could feel the blood on his hand.
The sound of a key turning and metal moving was heard from the other side of the cell, and footsteps receded down the hallway.
Nico lifted the hem of his shirt and dabbed at his eyes. He held it there for a minute and felt the blood seep through the seams. With one wipe, he tried to remove as much as possible and opened his eyes.
The group had more or less dispersed, Frank over by the bars and Jason and Piper conversing a few feet away. Will was sat next to him, watching him take in the scene, Percy and Annabeth also watching with their back up against the wall.
He turned his head, throbbing as he did so, and saw Reyna was sitting behind him talking to Leo in hushed Spanish.
"Figlio di puttana," Nico muttered to himself. He turned back and looked down at his shirt, bottom half drenched in blood. He let go of it and put his hands back on his eyes. The right was swollen, probably turning purple, the left had a cut on the eyelid and one below his eyebrow. It could've been a lot worse.
Will leaned forward, obviously holding back from codling him which Nico appreciated. He nodded to his boyfriend, letting him do his healing work.
A small, sad smile appeared on Will's lips and he placed both of his hands on Nico's cheeks. Gently, he placed Nico's forehead to his own and whispered a prayer under his breath.
The pain of the injuries faded and Nico could feel the cuts and bruise heal, but his heart and stomach still ached.
After the magical healing, Will helped him to his feet which brought everyone's attention, except Frank's, to him.
Nico nodded to them, telling them he was okay. There was something eerie about the atmosphere there that made talking hard. It felt like those times in movies where the characters are in a dark and tense situation and everyone is silently waiting for the shoe to drop.
No one spoke and barely moved as they waited for when all the suspense led to that one, terrifying moment.
Then, that moment came.
Living in the Underworld and using shadow travel, Nico had heard many screams in his time. The calls of the forgotten, the cries of the lost memories, and the shouts of frustration and terror that was always a dull buzz in the Field of Punishment. It had come to a point where Nico was sure he would never flinch at a scream again.
That was until he heard the cries of his sister.
The ground tilted and looked more like quicksand. It was high and horrible, and even after the first cry, the sound echoed in Nico's ears until the second one came.
"Hazel!" Frank cried. He rattled the metal bars and kept shouting her name which mixed with the screams echoing in Nico's ears.
Right then something clicked in Nico's brain. He pushed Will off him and stumbled to Frank who was still yelling for his girlfriend.
"Frank," Nico said urgently, head still throbbing from the blood loss.
"Hazel!" he continued to cry.
"Frank, stop!," Nico told him and grabbed onto his arm.
Finally, Frank turned to look at Nico, who was barely standing.
"You can't call for her," Nico told him. "That's exactly what they want. They want to torture us by torturing each other."
"They're hurting her!" Frank protested.
"I know!" Nico exclaimed, then had to balance himself with the bars as the large amount of air left him. "She's my sister. I want her safe just as much as you do, but she'll be safer if we don't give them what they want."
Frank opened his mouth to argue, but then must've realised Nico was right, and he just turned away.
Two hands grabbed Nico's waist and arm and Will led him away from the worried boy. He took him to a newly formed circle with all the other demigods watching him approach.
When Will and Nico entered the circle, everyone exchanged glances before Jason spoke up.
"So, what's the plan?"
Nico looked at them, perplexed.
"You know more about this world than us," Piper explained.
"And you seem to know what to do more as well," Reyna added, gesturing to Frank.
Another scream filled the air and Nico could see Frank's grip tighten and he flinched, but he didn't say anything.
Nico knew they were right. It was his fault they were there, and he probably knew more about escaping cells then they did after his fiascos on the streets. This time would be different though, because usually he'd just shadow travel out, but he couldn't do that here.
"Okay," Nico said finally. "I think they're going to do this to us one by one. Hazel will be dropped off and then someone else will be taken and so on until we're all thoroughly tortured."
"I prefer my prisoners only slightly tortured," Leo said. "Oh, and a bit of trauma and PTSD on the side."
Piper smacked him lightly. Nico smiled despite himself. Only Leo could make a joke in times like these.
"Anyway," he continued. "We have to make sure that we don't react out loud. I know that sounds hard, but if we show that they're getting to us, then they have the upper hand."
Everyone nodded. Hazel's screams kept haunting them and they could all practically feel her pain themselves. Nico turned back to Frank and gazed at him sadly.
"We also have to look out for each other when we are in here," he told them, still looking at Frank. "Comfort each other and remember what it's like outside of here. We will get out."
"How do you know?" the son of Mars asked, not looking at him.
Nico paused for a second. "I can feel it. None of us are close to death, but it's also more than that. We've survived Titans, Giants, Gaia, the gods, constant monster attacks. We can defeat a bald snake wizard."
Frank didn't turn around or say anything, but Nico could feel his words sink into him.
The group had dispersed after that. Piper and Annabeth were murmuring in the corner, Jason, Leo, and Percy were smiling at memories and jokes, and Reyna and Nico were planning quietly against the back wall.
Nico looked over to Will and Frank who were just watching out into the hallway. They had no idea how much time had passed since Hazel left, but Frank hadn't moved from that spot yet. Will, being the healer he is, decided to just stand there with him. They had hardly talked at all, but Frank didn't seem to mind the company.
Suddenly, there were footsteps in the hallway and everyone turned to the door. Nico stood from his spot on the floor and took a step towards the cell's door. The hairy werewolf walked past the bars and Nico gasped at the limp Hazel in his arms.
The werewolf opened the cells and threw in the chained and unconscious Hazel. Nico reached out and controlled the shadows to break her fall. She was caught by the darkness and was softly lowered to the ground.
A wave of dizziness overcame him as the shadows dissipated, but he blinked it away. Frank, Nico, and Will all swarmed Hazel. Frank held her hand and kept whispering her name, Nico stroked her hair and put a hand to her face, checking that she wasn't about to die.
"Frank Zhang," the werewolf said.
Frank and Nico looked up at the man. They looked at each other and a silent conversation passed through them.
"Is she okay?"
"Yes."
"Will you watch her?"
Nico nodded and Frank let out a heavy breath. He squeezed Hazel's hand once more before standing and walking to the man. The werewolf pointed to the cuffs, and Percy picked them up and put them around Frank's wrists. He whispered something in his friend's ear and Frank nodded, before being ushered away up the stairs.
Nico waited at Hazel's side as Will worked his healing magic as much as he could. After his healing light faded, her eyes fluttered open.
"Hazel!" Nico cried.
Hazel smiled up at him, then she looked around, "where's Frank?"
Will and Nico exchanged a look.
Hazel's eyes widened.
A silence fell over them. Hazel looked off towards the edge of the cell, probably thinking of Frank. Will slumped onto Nico and he was surprised at how pale his boyfriend looked. It reminded him painfully of their time in Tartarus.
"Hey," Nico whispered. "Are you okay?"
Will snuggled closer to him and Nico wrapped his free arm around him.
"A lot of magic," he whispered.
Nico had almost forgotten about that. Apollo kids definitely were weakened without sunlight, and with the weird anti-demigod power walls, Will was extra vulnerable.
The three of them sat there for a moment, all of them thoroughly exhausted.
There was a sudden drop in sound, like just before the buzz fills ears.
Nico took his arm from around Will and quickly covered Hazel's ears right before the screams erupted.
Hazel's eyes went wide and Nico could tell it wasn't working that well, but he couldn't remove his hands.
Will, still slumped against Nico and half asleep, turned and curled into him and he held his sister's ears like if they just stayed there, she wouldn't hear anything.
But she could.
He heard Frank's pained cries.
His shouts of agony.
Nico closed his eyes but the tears still welled up and he couldn't stop them from trailing down his cheeks and onto his sister's equally sad face.
Frank returned after what felt like days, and Percy and Reyna helped set them together off to the side. Nico situated Will in a more comfortable position, or as comfortable one could be in a cell, and watched as one by one, his friends were taken and torture, till their screams echoed through the walls after they closed their mouths.
Jason, Piper, Leo, Reyna. When the werewolf threw a surprisingly still standing Reyna back into the cell, Nico heard the words he'd been dreading since the beginning.
"Will Solace."
Will, who hadn't ever really gone to sleep with all the screaming, looked up at Nico. He turned and planted a small kiss on Nico's lips before standing up. The werewolf and Will walked off together and Nico just crammed himself in the corner.
When he had told them all not to react, he'd known he'd have to do the same. He'd watched each of them cry and worry in the corner while someone, usually him, comforted them until their friend came back unconscious and it was their turn. Now Jason, Piper, Leo, Hazel, and Frank were all sleeping on the ground, their dreams probably filled with terrible nightmares.
He brought his knees to his chest and wrapped himself into a tight ball. It was a habit he'd been doing since the jar. When there was little space to go, he'd curl in a ball as if he got small enough he could escape all the bad things.
Two warm bodies sat down next to him, and Nico could tell without looking up that it was Percy and Annabeth. Their presence reminded him of all they had gone through. They had fought Titans in their teens, giants and the Earth Mother a year later. Nico had fought the Roman Emperors, and they had both gone to Tartarus. They had faced many prophecies, so what was a little bald snake-guy who's name sounded like moldy-shorts?
He started to feel a bit better, but then the screams came.
A mirror wasn't needed to know that Nico's eyes went wide, and he grew six times paler than his usual skin tone. He had thought that he could be strong, he'd been in so many prophecies so what was a little straight-on torture? But hearing Will sound like that, so scared and in pain, it completely broke him.
Annabeth and Percy's arms wrapped around him and he hadn't even realized that he was sobbing quietly into his legs. A third person, Reyna, walked over and even with her magical strength being put into him, he wasn't strong enough.
That was because this wasn't like anything they'd done before. This wasn't a prophecy. He was sent to look after three kids. There was no saying that this was bound to happen or that it couldn't be avoided. If Nico had stayed stoic and hadn't let his guard down, no one would be there and Will wouldn't be hurting.
The minutes when Will was gone passed weirdly. In some ways, it felt like years, like falling into Tartarus again, but he also felt himself slip out of his body and into his head, going on autopilot, so it was only a minute. He did that when he was younger, going on autopilot, as a coping mechanism when things got really hard. Will had told him it was a thing a lot of people did when they couldn't physically escape a situation and instead did it mentally.
Eventually, Will did return and Nico had run to him and took him in his corner as Annabeth took his place and went with the werewolf. He spent that time with Will resting with his head in his lap and hugging Percy who clung to his side while Annabeth few cries reached his ears.
She had lasted pretty long. Most of them were screaming after being gone a minute at most. Reyna had lasted a whole three minutes before she cracked, and even after that, she was as sad as just angry. The past praetor was now a few feet away, looking like she was asleep but Nico had a feeling she was fully awake.
As the screams echoed Nico's mind, he tried to think of other things to keep himself sane. So, he thought of Hogwarts. When Dean and Seamus made him fly for the first time. Care of Magical Creatures and the kind, half-giant, Hagrid. Winning his first quidditch match. Going to Hogsmead and getting the gifts that were still on the Hogwarts Express now. Potions class, and finding out more about his mother's past.
Her whole story was crazy. She'd lived an awful life with her mom and dad and she loved her brother, Severus Snape. He had given her a time turner and she accidentally erased her own memories and turned backwards in time to go to an orphanage. From there she was taken to Italy and raised tehri before meeting Hades and making a family of her own.
He wondered about Hermione, Ron, and Harry. Did the train come back? Did they notice he was gone? Were they looking for him? Were Hermione and Ron finally together? Ginny and Harry? Was Katie Bell okay? Did Harry still think Draco was working for Voldemort? How was Draco?
Nico wanted to be mad at his friend, but he couldn't find a reason to. Draco was being used by Voldemort, and now that he had met him, he would have done the same thing. He also knew that Draco's dad worked for the snake guy too, so it was a safe bet that if Draco messed up, his dad would also get hurt.
Although godly parents weren't supposed to have good relationships with their kids, Hades had really come around in the last few years. They had bonded and Persephone treated him as her own. He would do anything to save them or his friends and especially Will.
Annabeth returned and collapsed with Reyna who comforted her while Percy left and even though Nico only saw him as a friend, even a cousin, it still felt like a stab of ice when he heard his screams.
When Percy came back, he took Nico's spot by Will as the werewolf called on the last person.
"Nico di Angelo."
He walked over to the man and let him handcuff his hands. He walked as far as possible from the werewolf. He didn't want a repeat of the trip with the Athena Parthenos.
They walked up dungeon steps and up to a house with green lights in the place of normal ones. It was echoey and cold and it just felt like another, cleaner, bigger cell.
Nico tried to memorize their path through the house, but it wasn't hard because after two left turns and a small staircase, they reached the same room he had been in the first night.
Inside is only the snake man, Voldemort. When he saw him walk into the room, the ugly man gave a sneering smile.
"Ah, Nico di Angelo! I've been waiting for our meeting."
The werewolf uncuffed Nico's hands and shoved him farther into the room. Nico stumbled and heard the door close behind him, locking him in with Voldemort.
The snake man walked forward to Nico, sliding across the smooth marble floor.
"Now," he said painfully slowly when he reached Nico, "I'm going to ask the same thing I did to all of your friends. If you don't answer it then . . . well, you've heard them."
Nico's eyes hardened. He wanted to punch the man, he was only a step in front of him and was so sickly and snake-like that he was sure he could do some damage. But Voldemort had magic and followers. Nico also needed to get his friends out, and that couldn't happen if Voldemort decided Nico was too much trouble.
"What are your powers Mr. di Angelo?" Voldemort asked.
Nico almost flinched at the name. That's what Professor McGonogall had called him. She had always been strict but never unreasonable.
Hearing the same words leave that man's mouth felt like poison slipping through Nico's veins.
"You said that you were the most valuable," Voldemort said, fainting innocents. He lifted Nico's head with his cold fingers on his chin. "Prove it."
Instead of replying, Nico promptly stepped on his foot.
Voldemort let go of his chin and cried in pain. There was a pop and a woman with crazy hair appeared behind Voldemort.
"My Lord!" she called out to him.
"I am fine Bellatrix," the snake-man huffed. He lifted his wand and pointed it right at Nico.
Before he could move, a green light erupted from the wand's tip and the pain from the other night flooded him. Nico clamped his mouth shut, not daring to make a sound. He fell to the floor but did not scream as the light engulfed him.
Eventually it stopped and Nico let out a gasp of air.
"So, you've chosen to be stubborn," Voldemort snarled. "Bellatrix! Fetch the other things!"
There was a second pop and Nico suddenly remembered that name. Harry, Ron, and Hermione had mentioned her, said she was crazy.
Nico looked up at Voldemort defiantly. "Like I said, you can't break me."
Voldemort gave him a chilling smile. "Maybe magic won't, child, but I have other modes of torture for you."
Another pop sounded behind Nico and he was suddenly picked up by strong, thin arms. It wasn't like Will's arms, warm and comforting. These ones, the ones owned by Bellatrix, were like cat arms if cats were evil and made from steel.
He was roughly placed onto something wooden and solid. Before Nico could find the words to protest, he was being wrapped in rope.
Panic hit Nico hard and fast, his breath caught in his throat and he was right back in that bronze jar. He couldn't move and couldn't breath and what was he sitting on? What was happening?
His mind started to fuzz over and the world seemed to slant to one side. He was getting a panic attack. But he couldn't have one, not now. Not in that room, that house, or even in the world that held all the wizards and witches.
Nico closed his eyes a bit longer each time he blinked, trying to pay attention more to what he felt than what he saw. He felt the splintery wood beneath him, it scooped down for a seat and from the height, it was definitely a chair.
He was tied to a chair.
At the realization of some kind of clarity in his weird situation, his breaths came easier. His eyes started to focus back in, the ringing in his ears dying.
Then pain hit.
Not the blast of consuming pain that came from the green light, but the sharp and quick pain of a whip.
Nico was as surprised as he was pained and he couldn't stop a cry from escaping his lips.
Another hit. Another, and another to his back, his legs, his tied arms.
When it stopped for a minute, Nico took the time to look up at Voldemort. He was smiling at Nico as he tried to keep in his cries of pain. He knew that Nico knew his friends and Will would hear him. He enjoyed the idea of pain and torture.
Bellatrix walked into view now, and she wasn't holding a whip this time. Instead she held a knife in her hands.
Nico braced himself as she drew closer. She walked right up to him before placing a hand on his thigh. He flinched at the contact and tried to pull away as she slid her fingers up and up until she got to his waist.
Bellatrix grabbed the hem of his shirt and lifted it to his chin. She gave him an evil smile and then brought the blade to his stomach.
The cold metal cut through his skin like butter and ico's eyes went blurry with pain. He felt his mouth open but couldn't hear any words or sounds escape.
He couldn't see it, but he felt the blade make designs as the mad woman kept cutting his skin. When she was satisfied with his stomach, she raised the knife and moved to his face. Small, thin, shallow marks that burned with the cool air.
Darkness hung at the edge of Nico's vision, creeping in slowly but surely. He needed it to stop.
A surge of fear and defiance came through Nico and shot out into the shadows. He could feel the darkness spread out like a shockwave and push both Voldemort and Bellatrix to the ground.
As the last of his energy left him, Nico couldn't even care that he had just shown Voldemort a glimpse of his powers. He didn't care that he was going to pass out right in front of his enemies. All that mattered was that the pain was gone, and if it came back, he'd already be too far asleep to feel it.