Jason P.O.V

Our first stop when we got back to New York was Hephaestus Garage to hand over our cargo to the Stoll brothers, Travis and Connor: two lanky, elvin featured guys about our own age. They were nearly identical looking though one was said to be older than the other. No one was ever able to figure out which one was the oldest: Travis or Connor.
They were accompanied by a short, skinny kid with a pale, skeletal face, shaggy, dark hair that looked like the feathers of a raven and deep, brown eyes. His tie clip and cufflinks sported the Di Angelo skull.
"My father calls for a war council on Friday," he said, "It concerns all of you, so we'll be expecting you there."
A raven was a good comparison for the Di Angelo kid. When he showed up, it was always bad news.
Since I worked for the Olympians, I was under their protection. The Titans had threatened my life and killed a man on Olympian turf, so the Olympians were obligated to respond. Hence why Hades Di Angelo had called for a war council.
"See you then, Nico," I answered.
He glared at me like it was my fault something bad had happened. Take my word for it, you don't want to be on the receiving end of one of Nico Di Angelo's glares. The little shit can scare the hell out of even the biggest and toughest.
Perhaps he was right. Because of me, Beckendorf had been shot and that wasn't going to be the end of it.

At sunset, I stood out on the fire escape of my building to smoke a cigarette.

"Hey Jason!" a girl's voice called up to me from the alley below.
Looking down, I saw that she was tall and black-haired; lithe, like a panther with dark, fierce eyes. She wore a pair of dark blue slacks and a red and white striped shirt.

In each hand was a cup of shaved ice and under her arm was a newspaper.
"I brought you a piragua. Cherry-vanilla, your favorite."

"Thanks, Reyna," I replied. The piragua felt heavenly on such a hot day, "What's the newspaper you got there?"
Reyna's mouth tightened into a prim crease and she turned her eyes away from me before handing over the newspaper.  It was dated from about a week earlier. The headline read: Mistress Behind Gangland Shooting.
"The senseless murder of Charles," I read aloud, "Beckendorf, a hard-working and upstanding citizen, a loving husband and father-to-be, was merely a casualty of a mobster's jealousy and a floozy's fickleness... Titan's motive for wanting Grace dead was that Grace was having an affair with Titan's mistress, Piper McLean."
"Jason, before you get mad..."
"No, it's better to hear it from you. I guess you were right about Piper all along."
Reyna's dark eyes were like onyx: black, cold, and shining. They hardly ever showed what she thinking or feeling but then I could a glimmer of regret.
"I never wanted to see you hurt, Jason."

Hazel P.O.V

Frank called me and said to meet him at my father's house on Friday. Nico explained that father was holding a war council to discuss how the Olympians were to respond to a threat from the Titans and Frank, along with his friends Percy, Jason, and Leo, had been ordered to be there.
My brother insisted on walking me to the war council. I wore a white dress trimmed with black lace, with a silver flower in my hair held in place with a skull-shaped hairpin, and skull-shaped shoe buckles to show my allegiance to the Di Angelos. Nico wore his usual skull tie clip and cuff links and a skull buckle on his hat. A lit cigarette bobbed up and down in his mouth.

I felt safer when Nico was with me. Our family had a lot of enemies so we needed to stick together. As a colored girl whose mother was called a witch and a boy who loved other boys, we attracted a lot of negative attention. We'd had to learn to keep our cool and not lose our heads if someone jeered "daughter of a witch" or "fairy" at us but Nico always carries a skull studded set of brass knuckles in case he needed to defend our family's honor.

The front hall of my father's house had a spiral staircase with a wrought iron banister and a pale greenish-blue carpet with a pattern of red roses. At the foot of this staircase was a grandfather clock decorated with skull motifs.

Our father was waiting in the front hall, wearing an expensive looking black suit with a large skull ring made from gold, and a cane with a brass skull in the other. He kissed my forehead and shook hands with Nico.
"Glad you could make it," he said.
A willowy, pale, delicate-looking young woman in a floral print dress, our stepmother, Persephone, walked down the stairs carrying a floral centerpiece for the dinner table. She looked like she stepped off of a black and white film screen with her colorless complexion, black Louise Brooks bob, and dark Theda Bara eye makeup.
Father took her hand and kissed it.
"Hazel," Persephone said, "I'm making shrimp gumbo for dinner tonight," Shrimp gumbo was my favorite food,
"And Nico, I bought some zeppolis di San Giuseppe for dessert."

Persephone was young enough to be my older sister but she made Father happy and always went out of her way to be nice to Nico and me. Her mother was Ma Demeter, head of a minor Olympian family who sold marijuana out of her flower shop. It almost caused a rift in the Olympians when Father had run off with Persephone and things were still awkward between him and Ma Demeter, who would be there that evening, along with the other Olympian heads.

The rest of the Olympians arrived after we had finished dinner. Persephone set out a bowl of gin punch and a tray of cocktail sausages in the living room for her guests onto of a long ottoman spread with a leopard skin.

She had to open up the windows or else sitting in the living room would have been unbearable. The combination of flocked red satin wallpaper, heavy gothic woodwork, and burgundy colored hangings and upholstery turned the room into an oven when the windows were closed.

Family by family, each of the major Olympians arrived: Poseidon Marinos and his sons Triton and Percy (Triton was obviously unhappy that his bastard half-brother had been brought along), Dionysus Wine and his sons Castor and Pollux, Zeus Conroy and his son Jason (the reason we were all there), Ma Demeter, Leo Valdez, and of course, my Frank.
The Olympians had connections with some of the richest and most influential people in the state: Senator Ares La Rue and his wife Aphrodite Love, the shipping magnate Hermes Castellan, Apollo Phebous, who ran the New York Sun, and his sister Artemis, and the famous architect, Athena Pallas-Chase. But they were all much too grand to attend war councils. They had reputations to protect.
"You should have stayed in Canada," Zeus told his son.
"I didn't know there was a hit out on me when I left," Jason replied, "And what was I supposed to do, turn around back over the border like a coward? It's my fault that we're in this mess. I won't let any more innocent people get hurt because of me."
"What'll you do then?" Percy asked.
"I'm going to confront Atlas Titan and settle this once and for all."
"That's suicide," Leo cut in.
"The only other choice is going to war with the Titans and having who knows how many other people dying."
The big three of the Olympians: Zeus, Poseidon, and Hades discussed among themselves the pros and cons of handing Jason over to the Titans vs. sending him into exile over the border.
"Sending him back to Canada will only buy him a little bit of time," Poseidon said, "The Titans have eyes and ears everywhere. Sooner or later, they'll find out where he is."
"I know Atlas," added Zeus, "He won't stop until he gets Jason and damn whoever gets in his way."
"The boy made this mess," Hades grumbled, "He gets to clean it up."
Frank held my hand the entire time. Jason was one of his closest friends. He had always looked up to Jason and perhaps envied him a little bit.  All I could do was let Frank hold my hand. What else could I do? His friend was being thrown to the wolves. Nothing I could say or do would make this better.
"So it's decided," said Zeus, "You're on your own, son."
Jason stood there, looking strong and stoic.
"It's the right choice, father," he said.

Piper P.O.V

I was singing at the Ogygia when a familiar figure walked through the door: tall, blond, and ruggedly handsome. He sat down at a table close to the stage as I was about to perform Mean to Me by Annette Hanshaw.
"You're mean to me," I sang, "Why must you be mean to me? Gee honey , it seems to me : You love to see me cryin'. I don't know why. I stay at home each night. When you say you'll phone, you don't, and I'm left alone, singing the blues and sighing. You treat me coldly each day in the year. You always scold me, whenever somebody's near, dear. It must be great fun to be mean to me. You shouldn't, for can't you see what you mean to me."

https://youtu.be/mOkA6TknMtk

"She the one that Atlas Titan's been seeing?" a man in the crowd whispered to the one sitting next to him.
"The very one," his neighbor whispered, "She's certainly a knockout. No wonder there's been so much trouble over her."
When I was done with my set, Jason approached me. My first instinct was to run and kiss him, thankful that he had made it back safely, but the stormy look on his face kept me back.
"May I walk you home, Piper?" he asked.
"Of course," I answered, "I'm done for the night and I'm feeling tired."

As we left the Ogygia, I told him that I had moved out of the Central Park apartment and was now living in a boarding house near Selina. I assumed he knew about everything else that had happened while he was away since they had been all over the newspapers. Jason was quiet the entire walk home and couldn't bring himself to look at me.
"So you've been seeing Atlas Titan the entire time?" he asked when he finally spoke.
"I started seeing him before I met you," I explained, "He's rich and powerful and I thought he could help me with my career then I was in too deep and couldn't get away. You can't just leave a man like that."
"Why didn't you tell me all this? I couldn't have helped you. All of this could have been avoided."
"We both know that's not true. I didn't say anything because people I love would get hurt if I had. Now the Titans want you dead and my brother-in-law was killed."
"We had a war council today. I'm going to confront the Titans. It's decided that since it's my fault the Titans attacked, I should be the one to deal with it."
"No Jason, it's not your fault. Atlas just wants to hurt you to punish me." 
"And he won't stop until he gets me. This is the only way to prevent a war."
I kissed his stupid, brave, noble face.
"I love you, Jason."
He kissed me back.
"I love you too, Piper."

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