Chapter Text
Will Solace always considered himself to be a rational person. A person who relied on science and on medicine. But everyone has their dreams.
Will’s father, Apollo, was a lord in their kingdom. As a relative of King Jupiter, Will was expected to fit into the perfect image the King demanded. While the King’s own children were outcasts, Will came closer and closer in line to the throne, a seat he very much did not want to fill.
Will was sitting in one of the many studies in the castle, like he did on most days. Medical journals and essays were spread out on the desk, notes and quills littered around the room. Light shined in through the dusty windows, making the blonde of Will’s hair shimmer. He rubbed his eyes, breathing out a sigh. He looked around the room, making sure no one was lurking, before pulling out a worn and yellowed stack of pages from underneath the mess.
He ran his fingers over the curving letters that read: The Pirates of the Half-Blood Seas.
The word pirate was not to be spoken in the kingdom. They were outlaws and thieves and were seen as the lowest of all creatures, the scum of the earth. Will saw them differently. Half of the things documented on the seemed like myths or folktales, something you tell to scare children into being good. But they were very real and Will was fascinated.
These so-called ruthless pirates sailed on a shipped names the Argo II. One of the Pirates on the ship is what made the group so infamous in the kingdom to begin with. Jason Grace, son of King Jupiter and former heir to the throne.
Will turned the page to see a sketch of Jason. He had short windblown hair, a scar on his lip, and a determined look in his eyes. He was said to be able to change the winds at will. Will remembered Jason from when he was younger. He was a little older than Will and was the perfect image of a son and a prince. After the death of his mother and the later disappearance of his older sister Thalia, something snapped. He ran and took up a pirate life. Rumors flew, some saying it was the trauma of losing loved ones, others say he was seduced by another pirate, Piper Mclean. But no one was sure.
Will turned the Page, to the very pirate that rumors revered for stealing away the golden prince. The drawing of Piper focused on her eyes. It was one of the few drawings that had color added and without even knowing her, Will felt that it didn't do them justice. She had high cheekbones and braids in her choppy hair. Many accounts had described her as a siren and that anyone she encountered obeyed her every command. They say she came from a far off land and she was pushed into a life of crime by the discrimination that she faced. When people spoke her name, they used words like savage. But in every drawing Will had seen of her, she had only ever looked kind.
The next page had Perseus Jackson written at the top. The drawing depicted a dark haired boy with a fierce and wild look on his face and a sword in his hand. Many saw him as the Captain of the ship, all of the crew followed where he went, trusted in his instincts. They called him Stormbringer and said that he could bend the sea to his every whim. He was feared and respected. Some even say that he was part fish himself and the sea had always been his home.
Always at his side, was Annabeth Chase. Waves of hair moved on the page, her stormy eyes boring into Will’s. She was calm, focused. She was the brains behind every battle and a force to be reckoned with. She always knew where they needed to go and calculated every move they made. Will always suspected she was the Captain and one of the few reasons they had never been caught. Accounts went back and forth, but some say even Perseus looked to her for direction.
Will kept moving, his eyes hungrily scanning pages he had read a thousand times. The next sketch had a elvish looking boy with dark curly hair and a mischievous light to his eyes. Leo Valdez was a wild card, always moving and leaving destruction in his wake. He had built the Argo II from the ground up and took a special liking to cannons and explosives. People liked to say he would set the seas on fire if he could.
Frank Zhang was one that had always intrigued Will. They called him The Animal. His picture was a muscular man with short dark hair and sharp eyes. He was a warrior and a weapons expert and he did not fear death. Some of the few that have survived his wrath claimed that he took that shape of fierce and deadly animals. While Will chalked this up to rumors and the fear of escaping death pumping in hallucinations, a part of him wanted to believe it.
Frank’s other half came in the form of a dark skinned girl with bright eyes, light curls, and an affinity for jewels. Hazel Levesque was in charge of all the treasure and had a knack for being able to sniff it out. She was a human treasure map. By most accounts she stayed out of the violence, sneaking around the bloodshed and stealing the gold and sharing it with her crew. But for years there were accounts of her spreading plagues by leaving behind poisoned gems in lands they had traveled. They named her Sea Witch and she carried death with her.
Her half-brother, Nico Di Angelo, was by far Will’s favorite. The picture of his was less detailed than the others, it showed a mess of dark hair, dark eyes, and a long black sword. They called him The Ghost King, for people believed that he could speak to the dead and knew all their secrets. No one has ever actually met him. He sticks to the shadows, moving in and out of sight. Some believed, after a mining accident, that he brought his sister Hazel back to life and that he could control death. Some believed that he was death itself.
Will traced his fingers over the drawing, smiling to himself. There was something about pirates and the adventure that had always held his interest.
Suddenly, the door of the study slammed and Will jumped, pushing the papers under the books littering the desk. He whipped his head around to see his sister Kayla smiling at him.
“One of these days you're going to get caught.” Kayla teased as she walked into the room.
Will rolled his eyes and sighed before dropping back into his chair. “I know. I just can't help it.”
“Father will have your head for embarrassing him if anyone finds out.”
Will smiled at Kayla. “Good thing no one will find out then.”
Grabbing him by the shirt sleeve, Kayla pulled him up from the chair. “Come one let’s get you cleaned up. You look exhausted and the banquet is in a few hours.”
Will groaned and let his head fall back as his sister dragged him towards the door. “Do we have to do this every year? It's the same people and the same food. It's boring,” He paused and sighed. “Nothing exciting ever happens.”
Kayla laughed and leaned in to whisper, “Maybe a pirate will come and sweep you off your feet,” before pulling him out the door.
-------
Will hated the banquet. Year after year he had the same conversations with the same tired people, all of them trying to worm their way into the Royal families. He watched as people danced and drank and ate and felt a heavy boredom sink into him.
Most of the banquet happened outdoors, the patio lit up with twinkling lights, the stars bright above them. It was warm out. But Will could feel the breeze of the ocean against his face as he looked over the stone wall towards the dark and vast sea. If he listened closely he could hear the sound of the waves over the laughing and conversations of the party.
Something caught his eye as he looked out. A ship. It was docked, just out of sight in the shadows. Will didn't think he had ever seen it around the castle ports before, but he couldn't fully make out what it looked like. Something nagged at the back of his mind, but he brushed it off and turned to face the party again.
Something felt off. Every so often he’d see a shadow, just out of the corner of his eye, but when he turned, it would be gone. He looked around the room, his eyes alert. No matter how hard he tried to concentrate on the people laughing and dancing around him, his mind kept drifting back to that ship, and to that odd feeling creeping up his spine.
A hand landed on his shoulder making him jump.
“Are you okay?” Kayla asked, a concerned look on her face.
Will shook his head. “Yeah, I'm fine.” He looked around again. “It's just a lot of people. I'm just going to get some air.” He brushed past her quickly, feeling her worried gaze on him as he pushed through the crowd.
He took the stone steps two at a time, putting more and more distance between him and the party. He stopped to breath for a moment on a curve of the stairs that looked over the harbor. He could still make out the silhouette of the boat and his curiosity pulled at him.
There was a sharp clang behind him. He jumped and turned to see a girl hunched of a bag she had dropped. A dark purple hood was pulled over her head and she leaned forward, scrambling to pick her things.
“Do you need some help?” Will was already moving to crouch down to help, when she stood abruptly, all her things gathered.
“That’s mighty kind of you.” Her hood had fallen back as she spoke, revealing dark skin, light curls, and warm bright eyes. She smiled softly. “I’ve got this, sir. Don’t you worry about me.” She passed by him quickly, before disappearing around the next curve of steps.
Will blinked and shook his head. There was something about her, something he recognized. When it finally came to him, he slapped himself on the forehead and took off down the stairs, whispering “Idiot” to himself every so often.
-------
The ship was even more beautiful in person. He should have known at the party that this was it. He had poured over drawings of it for years. The Argo II. He should have know. But he hadn’t even recognized Hazel Levesque when she was staring him in the face.
He creeped closer to the ship hoping to get a better look. He had seen Hazel climb on board not long ago, her bags in her hands, but since had seen no one.
He could hear the beating against the wood of the ship and the wind rustling the sails. Laughter still trickled down and he could just see the soft glow of the lights if he turned around.
Will crept closer, the dock creaking under his foot as he moved. The closer he moved, the more breathless he felt. The ship called to him, pulled him forward. He knew he shouldn’t go any closer, he should turn around, go back to the party and never look back. But he couldn’t he had to keep going. He scrambled up the ladder and onto the ship. Once on the deck, anxiety began to set in. He looked around the dark ship, feeling the sea’s wind rustling his hair, smoothing over his cheeks.
“I want to get out of here as fast as possible.” A familiar voice floated through the air. In a panic, Will jumped through a door on the ship. Whatever room he had walked into it was Dark and Will took comfort in that. He kept the door cracked and watched two people walk onto the deck, still talking.
“It must be hard being back.” Piper said. Will could tell it was her by the way her hair was choppy and braided. She leaned into Jason who stood next to her, his blonde hair lit up in the moonlight.
Jason shrugged. He seemed stiff, like how he would act around his father when him and Will were children, rigid and uncomfortable. “It’s fine. It’s just not the best place.” She placed a comforting hand on his shoulder and he seemed to lean into it, relaxing.
Will stepped back away from the door and felt himself knock into another body. Before he could even yell, the person covered his mouth with a cold hand, pushed him into the wall, and pressed the tip of a sword into his side.
The moonlight streamed in through the crack of the door, casting light on the dark eyes staring back at him.
“Are you really so stupid that you would sneak onto a pirate ship?” The boy asked. His voice was coated in disbelief.
Will tried to speak, but the hand muffled his voice. He could feel the rough skin of his palm catching on his lips as he tried to moved them. He huffed and raised his eyebrows.
The boy rolled his eyes and pulled his hand away, but didn’t step back or remove the sword currently poking into Will’s side. “I didn’t mean to,” were the first words out of Will’s mouth. The boy’s eyebrows raised up in surprise and suddenly Will knew exactly who he was. “Holy shit! You’re the Ghost King?” He hadn’t meant for it to sound like a question and Nico shifted from foot to foot uncomfortably, his eyes casting downwards for a moment.
Nico pressed the sword into his side a little harder and glared. “Yeah. Do you have a problem with that?”
Will laughed in surprise. “No. No. No. I just…” He shook his head. “Nothing.”
“What?” Nico prompted.
Will rolled his eyes, his ears turning red. “I didn’t think the Ghost King would be so… cute?”
Nico seemed taken aback, his brown eyes going wide and blinking. He shook his head, a glare on his face contrasting the blush dusting his cheeks. “I’m not cute.”
Will held in a laugh. He couldn’t help but find Nico adorable, even though he was kind of terrified of him. Kayla always said Will had a talent of seeking out trouble and boy was she right. “You kind of are, actually.”
Nico huffed and stepped back suddenly. Will found himself missing the closeness. “Friendly reminder, next time you try to sneak onto an infamous pirate ship, cover up the mop of blonde hair.” Nico pointed to his head and Will knew his ears must be blazing red by now.
“Duly noted.”
The ship suddenly lurched and Will could feel the push of the waves. They were sailing out to sea. Nico sighed and looked up at him. “Another tip, don’t board a ship manned by Captain Chase, without an escape plan.”
Will felt his face drain.