Chapter Text
Some part of her, upon waking up, expects Hermes to be up and moving already, but Sally is pleasantly surprised when she wakes up with the Messenger still wrapped around her. She can feel his breath tickling her neck where his face is buried in her hair, and she finds herself smiling, considering the fact that he doesn't actually need to breathe, as a god. One of his arms is stretched out under her pillow while the other is wrapped around her, his fingers just beneath the hem of her shirt where they can rest against the bare skin of her belly.
Slowly, she shifts, smiling when his fingers slide over her skin as he tightens his arm around her and pulls her closer. She chuckles, though, when she feels his nose touch her neck, and rolls in his arms so that she's facing him. His arm holding her loosens, but remains around her, and Sally marvels at how human he looks in this moment, with warm eyes still hazy with sleep and a soft, slightly awed smile on his face. She leans in then, pressing her lips to his in a sweet, simple kiss.
"Good morning, Ermis," she murmurs against his lips. Her smile sharpens just a little when she feels a tremor run through the Messenger, and she watches the way his eyes darken slightly as he stares at her.
When he kisses her, she isn't surprised by the intensity of it. He presses into her space and Sally welcomes him, sinking one hand into his hair as she smiles against his lips. He is oh so gentle as he rolls them so that Sally has her back flat against the mattress, and she resists the urge to roll her eyes. Hermes has always been gentle with her, after all. The weight of him above her makes her hum pleasantly into their kiss, fingers tangling a little tighter in his hair.
As her grip in his hair tightens, he gasps slightly into the kiss, and Sally slips her tongue between his lips. He nips at her tongue and Sally can't help but break the kiss briefly to laugh. In turn, Hermes trails kisses across her jaw and down her neck, and she bares her neck to give him better access, her fingers still nestled in his hair.
"Mmm," she hums, then lets a soft sigh escape as his kisses become a soft nuzzle against her neck. They both know that they have more important things to take care of.
Sally appreciates the way he doesn't make her feel bad as the air between them shifts. She feels him press one last kiss to her neck, and lets her hand slip out of his hair. Then, he lifts his head and kisses her properly for just a moment before he rolls smoothly to the side and gets out of bed. There is no tension between them, no feeling of regret for cutting their intimate moment short—actually, it doesn't even feel like the moment is cut short. And when he grins at her as she rolls out bed herself, Sally smiles right back as excitement dances through her veins.
While Sally showers and gets dressed, Hermes pops out to get them both coffee. By the time she's stepping out of the bathroom, he's back, and she takes the cup he holds out with a warm smile. A small sip reveals the unique combination of cinnamon, raspberry and espresso, and Sally lets her eyes close for a second in appreciation.
It's still relatively early, but she has no doubt that at least the Roman God King will be up, so she and Hermes head over to Beryl Grace's house as soon as Sally has taken a couple sips of her coffee.
She feels a zip of nervousness as they stand on the porch, but it has more to do with meeting a tiny Thalia than it does with facing Jupiter again. Hermes is buzzing with energy beside her, but she's pretty sure that has more to do with keeping hold of his Greek form in the precense of the Roman God King.
Truthfully, she isn't entirely sure how the Greek and Roman gods function as a whole. She knows that they are separate gods, technically, but that society and humanity as a whole has caused a kind of blending of the two over time that has forced a lot of them to become one being with two distinct and separate forms of consciousness. Sally doesn't know how it actually works, though.
She is torn from her thoughts when the front door of the house opens, and she finds herself face to face with Jupiter again. With a steadying breath, she meets the gaze of the God King.
"We have a solution," she tells him simply, and Jupiter lifts a brow as he looks down at her.
"Do you, now?"
"Yes," Sally confirms. "The Greek goddess Ariadne will take on the pregnancy," she explains. Hermes is quiet beside her, but they decided before they arrived that it would be Sally to take the lead in this.
"Hmm," Jupiter hums, scrutiny clear in his eyes as Sally holds his gaze. "Interesting choice, Sally Jackson," he says slowly, and the scent of ozone surrounding the god gets heavier. As the air seems to sharpen around them, Sally has only a brief moment of worry that he will reject their solution. But then she feels vivid anger rising within her at that very thought, and suddenly, the air clears. "But an acceptable one," Jupiter finally continues, and Sally can't help the way she just stares for a long moment. An acceptable one.
"Good," she says, her voice warming to a much friendlier tone. "But before we do that, we'd like a couple of days to get to know Thalia, and for her to get to know us," Sally adds firmly. She's mildly surprised when Jupiter just nods and steps back, allowing them to step into the house.
"Beryl is asleep, but Thalia is finishing her breakfast," Jupiter says, his tone quiet and almost conversational.
Sally steps into the house with Hermes right behind her, and she takes a small sip of her coffee as her gaze travels over the foyer. She follows Jupiter down a dimly lit hallway, and has to stifle a gasp when they step into an open floor style dining and living room combination. Reaching behind her with her free hand, she finds Hermes' hand and squeezes as her gaze locks onto the little girl sitting at the table.
"Thalia, child. You have visitors," Jupiter speaks, and Thalia looks up warily, eyeing her and Hermes with those sharp blue eyes of hers. "Have you finished your breakfast?" He asks her, and the little girl nods. "Very well. Why don't you show your visitors the back yard?" The God King nods towards a glass door.
Sally frowns at the way he doesn't even really introduce them. Thalia looks back and forth between them and Jupiter for a minute before Sally finally steps forward.
"Hi, Thalia. My name is Sally, and I would really like to talk to you for a little while. Would that be okay?" She asks gently.
Slowly, Thalia nods and climbs down from her chair at the table. With one more glance at Jupiter, the little girl turns towards the glass door, and Sally follows her, tugging Hermes along behind her.
Outside, Sally sees Thalia's tense little shoulders relax, and she plops down in the grass with a little huff. Sally smiles at the sight, and tentatively sits down beside the girl, pulling Hermes down to the grass, too.
"Are you here to talk about Mommy?" Thalia asks, looking up at her with a look somewhere between worry and hope. The question alone makes Sally wonder if there have been check-ins from the mortal world, but the look on Thalia's face makes it even worse.
"Have other people come to talk about your Mommy?" She asks softly. Thalia is silent for a long time, eyes flicking back towards the house a few times before she finally nods.
"She doesn't play with me like other Mommies and Daddies. Sometimes she forgets about me, too. Daddy is better. He reads to me, and he makes me pancakes and spaghetti, but he doesn't play with me either," Thalia murmurs, blue eyes looking down at the grass as she plucks little blades out of the ground. "Last time a lady came to talk to me, Mommy yelled and cried, and Daddy made the lady leave," she continues, and Sally feels her heart break in her chest. "Mommy yells and cries a lot."
"Oh, honey," Sally murmurs softly.
All she wants to do is wrap Thalia in her arms and never let go. She does find it interesting that Thalia is calling Jupiter her father, but she has a feeling the little girl doesn't understand the difference between Jupiter and Zeus. And it's not like her actual father even cares enough to notice, she thinks to herself.
"What kinds of games do you like to play, Thalia?" Hermes asks from beside her, and Sally watches Thalia look up at him with a curious expression.
"I dunno," the little girl shrugs, her brow furrowing adorably as she thinks. "Before Daddy came back, I played a running around game! But Daddy doesn't let me go out front anymore," she tells them. Sally feels horror twist her stomach at the thought of this tiny girl running around out front with no one to watch her.
"Did you play that game with other kids?" She asks, and Thalia nods, making Sally hope that at least some adult may have been supervising.
"Can you teach us the running around, game? We could play it with you," Hermes suggests, bringing Sally's smile back as she glances gratefully at him. She takes another drink of her coffee as Thalia looks up at them with bright eyes.
"Really?? You'll play with me??" Thalia exclaims excitedly, and Sally's heart aches even as she nods.
"Absolutely," she agrees.
They play three different variations of Tag with Thalia, for what feels like a few hours at least. Not once does Sally see Beryl or Jupiter in that time. She tries to ignore the anger that simmers below her skin, and tries to tell herself that maybe Jupiter is simply keeping Beryl distracted so that they can spend time with Thalia uninterrupted. But still, her anger persists, despite the joy she feels running around the yard with Thalia and Hermes. She can't wait to take the girl home and introduce her to Luke.
When Thalia finally collapses in the grass in a fit of giggles, Sally lowers herself to the grass beside the girl. She smiles at the pure joy radiating off the little demigod, and when she looks up and finds Hermes watching them with a warm fondness in his eyes, her smile brightens even more.
The first time they see Jupiter since their arrival is when he steps outside to inform Thalia that it is lunch time. Sally and Hermes follow the little girl into the house, and Sally is surprised when Beryl is still nowhere to be seen. She doesn't say anything, but she has a feeling Jupiter can read her well enough.
"Beryl is upstairs," the God King supplies. "It is best if she remains uninvolved until the transfer," he adds, and Sally narrows her eyes at the god.
"How could you possibly think that she could be a good mother the second time around? I know for a fact that you saw what she was like before you decided to have Jason," she hisses, keeping her voice quiet so Thalia doesn't take notice of her hostility.
"Perhaps it was a way to ensure the first child was cared for," Jupiter says slowly, like the point he's making is an obvious one. Sally is once again reminded of how little the gods understand about the mortal world with those words, and the anger she's been fighting to quell all day flares to life in her veins.
"So you bring a second child into the situation as an excuse to look after the first one for a few months?!?" She snarls lowly, grabbing Jupiter's arm and dragging him from the room without even thinking about the fact that she is manhandling the Roman King of the Gods until they are already in the foyer. Sally can't bring herself to care, at the moment. "That is no way to look out for a child!" She snaps. Somewhere in the back of her mind, she registers the way the God King actually flinches, but she doesn't let any thought dwell on it right now. "Mortal children can not look after themselves, Jupiter," Sally growls. "Not when they are so small! They need guidance, and attention, and love!"
"I understand tha—"
"No, you don't!" She interrupts him sharply, eyes blazing with anger. "Don't think I don't know about the Wolf House," she snarls, her grip tightening on the god's arm. "Those children do not deserve to die just because they are not strong enough to be warriors. Not every child should be a warrior." Sally glares up at Jupiter, daring him to counter her words.
"And what would you have done with them, Sally Jackson?" There is an edge to the god's tone, but he keeps his voice low. "Would you challenge Lupa herself for those weaker lives? Fight for the demigods Fate deems not worthy of survival?" He asks with a lift of his brow. Sally feels her lips peel back in her own wolfish snarl as she holds his gaze.
"My presence alone should tell you that it is not Fate that deems them unworthy."
•••○●○•••
Jupiter realizes a bit too late that he has underestimated the woman standing before him. She may not yet be a true goddess, but from what he can tell from the divine power rolling off of her, she is most likely only one powerful outburst away from burning through the sliver of mortality that remains. And as her anger burns through him, hot and sharp and undeniable, Jupiter knows that he does not want to be cause of her final blaze into ascension.
He's felt the anger of other gods, but never has it been like this. He can feel the undeniable righteousness of it, and for some reason, he is powerless to stand against it—the same feeling he got in their first meeting.
Sally's divinity tastes like the Parcae, but at the same time, it does not. He can feel the Greekness of her origin, and yet, he can feel the way she belongs among his own, as well. Her power is extremely volatile, yet she wields it with a strength and surety that would challenge that of the Parcae themselves. Which, in combination with the fact that she knew his son's name even now, gives Jupiter enough of a reason to listen to the words she speaks. He wasn't lying when he told her that she will make a good addition to their world, but he knows now, from the look in her eyes, that she will end up in a very different position among the Greeks than the one he will offer her among the Romans. Perhaps Juno will take a liking to her, he thinks to himself, though he doesn't dare speak the words aloud at the moment.
Jupiter does not enjoy the way Sally's power makes him physically flinch—the King of the Gods does not flinch—but he has enough grace to appreciate the way that she does not comment on it. But then her grip on his arm tightens and as they argue about his demigod camp, he feels her power flood the room. He can feel the divine protection radiating off her—can feel the way it reaches for Thalia, and even his unborn son, wrapping around them in an impenetrable shield of divinity.
Part of him can't help but feel amusement as Sally Jackson's power begins to strip Thalia Grace of her father's very claims, weaving her own in their place. Zeus is certainly going to get a shock, when he bothers to notice at all.
"Someday, Sally Jackson, you will be a true force to be reckoned with," he tells her quietly, holding her gaze as he speaks. "The Parcae chose well in this. And when you are ready to take your place, perhaps, should you seek guidance, may you come to me," Jupiter adds. The confusion that flickers across her face is intriguing, but his attention is pulled away when he senses Beryl moving around upstairs.
When he pulls his arm from her grasp, she releases him, and he is grateful for the illusion that she can't hold him. Her gaze narrows at him, but she does not protest as he steps back and glances towards the stairs. She requested several days to bond with Thalia, but he can see that those days are not truly needed, so before he goes to tend to Beryl—and to prepare her to forget she ever had children in the first place—he speaks once more.
"Tomorrow morning, you will take them home."