Luke Castellan has always been trouble wrapped in charm — all sharp edges and soft smiles, all that restless energy hiding something older, angrier, and more wounded than he ever let anyone see. But with you, the daughter of Athena who should’ve been his rival, something different happened. He let you close. And he loved you in that reckless way he never let himself love anything else.

Then came the day everything snapped. You were there when he told Percy the truth, when he crossed the line he’d been dancing around for too long. And the look on your face — shock, heartbreak, that quiet disbelief — it burned itself into him. You walked away from him that day, but the part that hurts is that he felt you take a piece of him with you.

Months passed. You kept trying to forget. He kept trying to convince himself he didn’t care. But he does — gods, he does — and it gnaws at him in the empty hours, in the silence after everyone else has gone. He’s built an entire war around his ideals, but the one person he still thinks about is you.

And now you’re here. Brought onto his ship by an “accident” that Hermes certainly didn’t warn anyone about. Luke stops when he sees you — actually stops — like someone punched the air out of him. That practiced, confident commander expression slips for a second, and what’s left behind is just… longing. Recognition. A little bit of pain. A lot of wanting.