OCTAVIAN

The night was quiet, the air crisp with a hint of lingering autumn chill. Stars stretched across the sky like scattered gems, each one reflecting faintly in your eyes as you lay on the soft grass outside your barracks. Hazel had already retreated to the comfort of her cabin, leaving you alone with the hum of the camp settling for the night. For a moment, it felt peaceful—almost serene—the kind of peace that reminded you why you had agreed to this exchange program in the first place. A year away from everything familiar, a new camp, new people, a chance to prove yourself.

And yet… it wasn’t perfect. Not completely.

Because there was always Octavian.

You could feel his presence long before he spoke, that same sharp energy that seemed to cut through the air wherever he went. You knew him by reputation first, of course—the camp Augur who ruled over omens and prophecies with a cold, calculating precision. Everyone feared him. Everyone respected him. Everyone, that is, except you. You had spent months navigating his subtle barbs and icy stares, surviving his pointed comments about Greeks and Romans alike, and somehow coming out amused rather than defeated. Somehow, against all odds, he hadn’t managed to ruin you yet.

Now, as you sat up, brushing the damp blades of grass from your sleeves, you caught sight of him. Octavian stood a few steps away, his posture impossibly straight, piercing blue eyes fixed on you with that infuriating combination of judgment and… something else.

“What are you doing out here so late?” he said, voice sharp, carrying that same scolding edge he always seemed to favor. It wasn’t exactly a question, more a declaration that you had clearly overstepped some unspoken rule.

You tilted your head, trying to appear nonchalant, though your heart thumped a little faster than usual. “I was just… looking at the stars,” you said carefully, letting your words float softly in the night air.

Octavian’s gaze didn’t waver. He stepped closer, crunching the grass beneath his boots, and you couldn’t help but notice how deliberate every movement was. There was a certain precision to him, a calculated grace even in casual gestures. Somehow, that made him more intimidating, more impossible to ignore.

“You’re going to get eaten by monsters if you’re out here alone,” he said, tone still clipped but the faintest trace of… concern?… threading through it. His eyes flicked to the tree line, where shadows stretched into long fingers, then back to you.

You snorted softly, trying to mask the flutter in your stomach. “I’m Greek. We’re… used to being eaten by monsters.”

His lips quirked just slightly, a micro-expression almost imperceptible, and he shook his head. “Hilarious,” he muttered, brushing past you to stand beside the blanket of grass you had been lying on. Somehow, he managed to be both annoyingly close and impossible to ignore at the same time.

You frowned. “So… what are you doing out here, then?”

Octavian’s eyes flicked to the sky for a moment, as if considering the stars themselves held some divine answer he needed. “I could ask you the same thing,” he replied flatly, tone giving away none of the hint of amusement you thought you saw. “But I’m here now. So… what?” He gestured vaguely at the night around you, the soft grass, the stars. “Explain yourself.”

You hesitated. There was something in the way he spoke that made it almost impossible to maintain your usual teasing, sarcastic tone. Maybe it was the subtle shift in his presence, the faint lowering of his guard, or the strange tension in his posture—something told you he wasn’t simply trying to provoke you this time.

“I just… like to look at the stars,” you admitted softly. “It’s quiet. Peaceful. And sometimes it makes me feel… small, I guess. In a good way.”

Octavian blinked once, sharply, clearly surprised that you hadn’t fallen into your usual pattern of witty remarks or defensive comments. He folded his arms, his piercing gaze not leaving you. For a brief moment, it was as if he was analyzing every nuance, every syllable you had spoken, trying to decode some hidden meaning, though you weren’t sure if he’d ever admit to it.

“Huh,” he said finally, voice lower, quieter than before, and with a strange weight you weren’t used to hearing. “I didn’t expect that answer.”

You raised an eyebrow, shifting slightly on the grass. “Expect what answer?”

He shook his head slowly, letting a few strands of blond hair fall across his forehead. “Not this one,” he muttered, almost to himself, before his gaze snapped back to the sky above you. “Everyone else would’ve either ignored the stars completely or complained about the cold.”

You laughed softly, the sound mixing with the gentle rustle of leaves overhead. “Guess I’m not everyone else.”

Octavian’s lips pressed into a thin line, and he made a low sound that could have been a chuckle, or a sigh, or some hybrid of the two. You couldn’t tell, and you weren’t sure you wanted to. Instead, he sat down beside you on the grass, leaving just enough space between you to feel his presence but not too close to be suffocating.

For a while, neither of you spoke. The night was filled with the quiet whispers of wind through trees and the distant calls of nocturnal animals. You felt the tension ease slightly, the way it always did when Octavian was near—tense, yes, but familiar, like a strange rhythm you’d learned to walk alongside.

Finally, he spoke, voice still quiet but sharper than before. “You’re… different,” he said. “Most people… they annoy me. Constantly. You, though…” His gaze flicked toward you, then back to the stars. “…You’re tolerable. Necessary, even. I don’t know why.”

You turned to look at him, startled. He wasn’t smiling, but there was a softness there you rarely saw. Vulnerability, perhaps. And yet, just as quickly as it appeared, he seemed to mask it behind his usual cool demeanor. “Necessary?” you repeated cautiously, unsure if you were reading the moment correctly.

Octavian’s eyes met yours, steady and piercing. “Yes. Necessary. Don’t think too much about it. Just… sit here.”

You nodded slowly, unsure what else to do. Instead, you leaned back slightly on the grass, letting the quiet of the night wrap around you. For the first time in weeks, the irritability and constant tension Octavian seemed to carry softened, if only a little. You didn’t know why he was here, why he was choosing to spend this late hour in your company, but you felt the shift.

And maybe that was enough.

For now.

Octavian, the infuriating, sharp-tongued, impossible augur of Camp Jupiter, was sitting beside you, not saying much, but not leaving either. And somehow, in the stillness of the night, that felt… strange. Good. Safe. Maybe even necessary.

For some reason, you had the sudden, unshakable feeling that he wanted this as much as you did—whether he’d admit it, whether he understood it himself, or whether it was just another way to annoy you, you couldn’t tell.

All you knew was, beneath the stars and the quiet of the night, for once, the world felt less heavy with Octavian there. And for some reason, you didn’t want him to leave.