"I mean I really like you. In a... more than friends way."

"...what."

"I... okay i didn't plan this far ahead, I thought you were gonna have disappeared by now."

"Zagreus, what's gotten into you?"

He runs his hand through his hair and tries again: "Yvette pointed out... a couple of things. To me. About how you... behave around me. And how I behave around you. And how we don't... act like... just normal friends."

"There's nothing normal about us. Is that all?"

"Than, I'm serious. I—look, okay, I have had five minutes to think about this, and I think it would have taken me much longer otherwise to really notice it but I've noticed it now and I don't want to hurt you. So: I think I like you in a romantic way, I think I probably liked you like this since way before—"

"Great way to treat someone you like, leaving them without notice like that—"

"—and that's a big part of how I noticed, okay, you—you came for me anyway, didn't you? I think some part of me knew that you'd come, or just expected that you would, because I... I can't imagine a world in which you're not there. You know? I think that was sort of my mistake. I just... assumed you would be there. But I didn't ask and I should have. I know I apologised, but I think I didn't do it right. I'm sorry for not taking your feelings into account, and for not realising that they are important to me and meaningful in what decisions I make."

"Why are you telling me this right now."

"Because I know how this story goes otherwise and I don't want it to go that way. So... I don't know, maybe you don't feel the same way about me. But if maybe you do... if you think you could... maybe we could skip the little game of cat and mouse we've been playing and just give it a shot. What do you say?"

"I—I have work to do."

And he vanishes.

...well, that was, in fact, more words than he'd expected. He'll count it as a win.

Yvette meanwhile goes to find Nyx. Because... she doesn't really know anyone else here, and Nyx seems like she's nice? Probably?

She turns into a little puddle of night and goes looking, because being person shaped might give people the impression she wants to talk, which: no. No she does not.

"Hello, child," says Nyx, when the puddle reaches her.

She reforms her body and looks up at the (much, much taller) goddess.

"Um. Hi. Thank you for, er. Petitioning for my Underworld citizenship. I appreciate it."

"I said nothing that was not true. You are closer to Chthonic than Olympian, and the Underworld will always have a home for you."

".... may I hug you," mumbles Yvette, who is back to having a lot of feelings again.

"Of course, child," says Nyx, and she opens her arms and embraces her.

Huuuuuuuugs.

"I'm really really glad to have a, a home, though I'm. I have another one, and a family that misses me besides, so I can't, er. Just." Sniffle. "Stop looking."

"... Child. There is something about your nature that you might not be aware of. What do you believe to be the circumstances of your condition?"

Why does she not like where this is going.

"Uh. I was human, poked a book, got eaten by it, and wound up somewhere else?"

"Exactly as you were?"

"... Well, no. I was, um. Different."

"Have you considered the possibility that you were the book, remade in the image of the human who touched it, and not a human turned goddess and taken far away to be abandoned?"