She was biting tears back as hard as she could. Harmonia's first stop was not home, nor Lottie's -where she did occasionally stay from time to time, but the modest little temple she had on Olympus near her father's. She rarely went there so it seemed unlikely that Philotes would go there first once it was noticed that she left Anteros' without further explanation. She didn't do much other than give an extremely vague and brief explanation, via text so he didn't hear tears in her voice and demand further explanation or panic more than he probably already was, to Tyr that she was going to be mostly off radar for awhile but would check in with him here or there. Well, and pack a modest bag with a very minimal amount of necessities -she could purchase most anything else if she needed it. And the less she lingered the less likely it was that Philotes or someone else was going to want to tag along and help... and risk getting hurt in the process...
And Harmonia could not risk someone else getting hurt because of her. She stopped at her father's armory and did lift a few things that he would definitely know were missing, but, she didn't know what she could run into -anywhere, and wanted to be prepared. He'd understand. He was the one that made sure she knew how to use it all anyway.
She didn't have a plan either, but she had to get away from Olympus and her family. So, knowing she needed to lay low, not stay in any one place for more than a night or two at a time, she started in Athens. A chain hotel, so it had wifi, which a lot of the smaller places did not, she set everything down, turned on the shower, stepped inside fully clothed and sunk to the bottom, body shaking with the tears she'd been holding in since she saw what her carelessness had done to her brother.
It seemed to be an omen. It was all doomed to failure. But she couldn't give up. She couldn't. Hephaestus had to destroy it. He had to. The cycle of death and destruction needed to end and if he had some vendetta against her because of some grudge against her parents, then he could say it to her face.
Except... Harmonia was having a lot of trouble finding Hephaestus. For someone who was lame and rumored to generally keep to his forges, she was not finding him. She was, however, finding unpleasant attendants and some rather strong animated statues that didn't really seem keen on her trespassing and wanting to just destroy it herself by tossing just it into the forge if she could.
Those bruises probably went down into her bones. Worse, the ache in her heart at being an utter failure at being able to stop this nightmare that she had no control over from the beginning was burning her to the core.
She failed. It was a hard thing to grasp, but she needed to concede it. She failed. Harmonia had the necklace in hand when she strode into the vault Hera had recommended a good year ago, the one her grandmother claimed Hades also had ties do. Surely he could help contain something with such a vile curse on it. And then, she broke down. It was secured, but it wasn't over. It was never going to be over. It was going to haunt her forever. Her pain, her nightmares, the fact that at any moment it could end up in someone else's hands and start the cycle of death and destruction all over again because her asshole step-father had a grudge over something she had no control over -because she certainly didn't choose to be born into this family, it was never going to stop.
But it needed to stop, she couldn't handle anymore. Her heart could not handle anymore heartbreak or she would go mad. Even with Semele and Ino -the latter of which she had not seen herself and just heard rumor of living in the sea, not on the other side, her heart hurt. What else would be taken from her? What other things that she loved? She was damned, wasn't she?
Her communications with everyone had been either non-existent or extremely vague. Now, she was giving up. Harmonia had not answered a message or call in days, her phone battery was dying. She was so hungry she actually was no longer hungry, she was dirty and bruised... scratched up... tired....defeated.
Harmonia was sitting in a surprisingly quiet area, an untouched patch of trees not far from the coordinates where Cadmus had died. “I've... failed,” she said quietly to the memory of the one who had passed there, the closest thing to a grave she had to visit, “I couldn't stop my family from doing any of this. If... if Zeus had left your sister alone none of this would have happened.” She tried to swallow the tightness in the back of her throat away. “It was never great... neither of us would say that... and really no one knows what it was for us, but it's my fault they all suffered... and it's my fault it happened to you, too. Just... because I exist... and I can't even stop it. I tried, and... I failed.” At which point the tears started falling.
“I want the pain to stop. Why won't it stop? I can't even wait for the release of mortality... because... I can't die. It just hangs on and on and on.” She tucked her knees up to her chest tightly. Her phone was beeping. Who was it now? A brother? Lottie? Idun? Tyr? Some of the messages were getting panicked and desperate since she wasn't answering anyone. “I kind of just want to hide... forever. Not worry about loving anyone else ever again because I won't see anyone again. Because... then they can't be taken away.” Phone beep, but all Harmonia could do was cry.