An Undertow of Sand (Percy Jackson and the Cthulhu Mythos)

[Shujin]

Summary: "A half-blood child of the eldest gods, shall reach sixteen against all odds." Who decided the sons of Kronos met the criteria? There are older gods. Elder Gods. Percy is the Child of Prophecy, but his very existence is a flaw. An anomaly. A bend in Fate. And if Fate can bend, then it can break.

Hello. First story here. We are going to be a bit behind thanks to my perfectionism still looking for things to edit better. It will be one chapter a day until we catch up. There are only seven chapters right now. I have the same username on Spacebattles and SV. It's Shujin1 on Ao3 and FF. Please let me know if you have any questions.

An Undertow of Sand
A PJO Fanfiction
​

My first clue that everything was about to go to hell was when the hairs on the back of my neck stood up. I was now in mortal danger.

In a shopping mall.

Spidey Sense? Super cool. What's not cool is needing it because of literal monsters out to kill me. But that's life. Lemons, lemonade, Molotov cocktails. You know.

I slowed down my walk, angling for the overly complicated monstrosity of a fountain in the middle of the concourse. I think it's supposed to be some kind of octopus, but it might have been Cthulhu. Stones of all shapes and sizes, but differing shades of blue littered the bottom along with a bunch of quarters and nickels people had thrown in. I scanned the Mall of America's three upper levels in the water's reflection, but all I saw were people enjoying their Saturday afternoon. They could definitely use the sunshine after the week we've had. I turned my body even more, fishing in the pocket of my jeans for a dime as I glanced behind us.

Oh hell.

"So don't look," I said as they caught up to me, cutting through whatever they were arguing about now. I threw my dime into the water. "But there's an evil dog on our six."

Of course, they both looked.

Here's what they saw: a creature the size of a healthy horse that looked anything but healthy. Matted orange-brown fur that did nothing to hide the contours of its ribs, weeping sores and bloated stomach, wiry limbs ending in paws that were more claw than flesh and a long snout decorated with a fanged grin. Its tail was literally a string of bones. Blue eyes cloudy like it had cataracts lazily roamed the concourse. It looked like it would drop dead any second. No one was calling for animal control, so I assumed the Mist was hiding it, but people still knew it was there. Some instinct screaming in their hind brains made them avoid it.

It was generally accepted that mortals lived in a different world than we did. The Mist did a thorough job of keeping us separate by hiding away what was truly there. Where we saw a rampaging monster, they might see gang members on PCP or like, escaped animals from a zoo. Greek vampires (don't ask) were actually serial killers using barbeque forks. A dude ate another dude's face? He's from Florida. See an older teenage boy escorting two twelve year olds through a mall?

Look again.

Unless you could see through the illusion, you were a NPC. At best you were traumatized by whatever you thought you saw. At worst? Collateral damage.

And there was nothing you could do about it.

Sorry.

Sometimes it worked against us. Put down a demon snake from Grecian hell and it was a coin toss if mortals saw you stop a mugging, or commit one. Let's just say I had many reasons to try to stay out of the cameras, and my father seeing my face in the news was one of them. Still, I'd take it if it meant most people could live normal lives.

In another life, that would have been me. Or maybe I would have wished it was me.

Look, I didn't ask to be a half-blood.

But if I had the choice, I don't think I would have given it up for anything.

Luke turned right back around, right hand drifting to his pocket for his dad's lighter. He's a half-blood too and you can be half of anything, but we're the type commonly known as demigods. One parent was normal, the other? A god.

Gods are real.

So are monsters.

So why are we in a shopping mall?

It's a long story, but the gist of it is: Zeus lost his favorite sparkler, so we have to get it back.

And we were running out of time.

Luke's left hand gently cuffed a still staring Artemis upside the head. "Keep moving."

I expected her to snap at him for touching her. I think Luke expected her to break a few of his fingers. What we got was her wordlessly draining the last of her soda and dumping the cup into a trashcan. When she turned back to us to catch up she looked, well, kind of spooked.

Luke and I exchanged glances.

As a rule, if something spooks a god, it's probably bad.

"What is it?" Luke hissed under his breath. The demigod son of Hermes, the Greek god of Thieves and Travelers was already looking for an out, peering into every kiosk we passed.

"Something that should not be free," Artemis answered quietly. "A cruel creature, an eater of children."

So evil dog was very evil.

For some reason, Luke's eyes flickered over me. "How do we kill it?"

Our girl scout just swallowed. Hard.

"It was killed before, right?" Luke pressed. "Or trapped? Or…"

Now it was her turn to look over me, prompting me to look down at myself wondering what the problem was, before she deliberately looked away. "It has never been killed by anyone."

I didn't want to hear that.

"No one? " It didn't come out as strongly as I would like, but it wasn't a squeak. "But - okay, but it can be trapped with something. You said it shouldn't be free."

"There were special circumstances," she began carefully. "My father was allowed to turn it to stone and cast it among the stars."

And Artemis, Greek Goddess of the Hunt (no, I didn't stutter) was already fulfilling our quota of godly interference. This was fine. Obviously. My first Quest as a demigod pulls out Uber Monster 2000, but I was the one who argued for a literal god(ess, whatever) in my adventuring party so I was kind of asking for it. Come on, Luke was, like, a level 10 adventurer at least and I was, maybe 2. I'll be nice to myself and say I was level 3, but made up for it in magic items. I've played enough sessions with my father as Dungeon Master to know that he would take one look at my party, laugh, then make me suffer for it.

"Shit," Luke muttered. His left hand palmed his face, stretching the scar that ran down from his left eye to his chin into a pale, thin line. "Perce," he said in a low tone. "I'm eighteen. " I blanked on why that was important. He rocked his head back. "Child eater."

I spun towards the other twelve year old kid in our group. As soon as I met Artemis' moonlit eyes, I recognized the flaw in my thinking.

"Oh right," I muttered. Gods can look however they like, so this twelve year old girl was more like twelve thousand year old. "And you're actually ancient."

So I'm fucked, is what Luke was saying. Good. To. Know. I knew this was going too well. Well, I didn't know that, I lied, but considering we're after a WMD Master Bolt god weapon not even the gods could find, it had been going well in hindsight. And everyone knows hindsight sucks.

My Mythomagic card deck was burning a hole in my jacket. I pulled out the aluminum tin embossed with a stylized etching of Mt. Olympus. One of my inherited abilities from my god parent included divination. It's a Fate and Prophecy thing. I used trading game cards to help me get a glimpse of what was waiting for me. Regular cards, like the ones you use for poker or Solitaire were too vague. So was Pokémon. I still have no idea what drawing a shiny Charizard means. No one had time for a full tarot reading but maaayyybeee…?

I flipped the first card.

Thanatos, the God of Death.

Okay, maybe not.

"What's the trick?" I asked as I stuffed my cards back into my jacket. I even remembered to pull up the zipper.

"It is destined to never be caught," Artemis said.

What?

Oh for -

Mom, I prayed to my divine parent. So, like, one of your toys? Is stalking me. Can you maybe do something about it?

Her response was a series of electronic beeps.

Luke had caught on the same time I did, nudging my shoulder. "Maybe your mother can - "

"Tried." I cut him off, annoyed. "Busy signal."

His face pinched.

"You can just feel the love," he drawled with that bitter undertone in his voice. I can totally see where he's coming from now. My mom is the best mom in the world and she still pisses me off sometimes. Imagine if I didn't know her at all. "Can't you?"

"Dying builds character."

"I bet."

"She has ignored you?" Artemis asked carefully, always wary of accidentally insulting my godparent. Apparently being turned into a small woodland creature is only funny when Artemis does it to someone else.

"No," I said curtly. "Mom will never ignore me." I ignored the sad, indulgent look Luke gave me. "This is just her way of telling me to stop being a whiny bit - "

Like a sign from providence, the crowd thinned off to our left, revealing an eye wear kiosk where some brown haired boy was trying on sunglasses in front of a mirror. They were wrap-around shades like mine. A slim futuristic solid piece of opalescent material in a black matte frame. His just darkened the world a little bit.

Mine?

" - perhaps if I were to unveil my divinity…" Artemis trailed off.

Luke picked up the slack. "It would vaporize everyone here. That's not a solution, that's mass murder."

"If it can rid us of the fox - "

"Evil dog," I muttered as I took off my shades. She ignored me.

" - then it would be well worth it. You know what is at stake should we fail. Perseus - "

" Percy." I was ignored again.

" - is necessary."

Luke gritted his teeth and cast his blue eyes around again. Without my glasses, I could now see his ghost. It overlapped his living form and had pale, nearly gray hair and worn, haggard features that were out of place on someone so young. It was begging, pleading for something. It would take the dagger and stab itself in the black, pulsating dot.

I see dead people.

Or rather, I see how people are going to die in 20/20 vision.

People. Plants. Animals. Inanimate objects too, like machinery or weapons. Even buildings aren't immune to the concept of Death. I got my eyes from my mother. It's a Fate thing.

"We can lure it," Luke whispered. "Underground parking garage, next left, through Macy's."

I nodded, feeling sick to my stomach. There were hundreds, maybe thousands of people in the Mall of America, going about their lives. I bet most of them took tomorrow for granted, even with everything that has been happening. I stuffed my glasses into the side pocket of my jacket and tried to ignore the ghosts of the world falling apart, rotting, dying around me.

"Less people will see her magical girl transformation if we can get it down there," I quipped.

I made the mistake of looking at said magical girl. Her ghost was physically older, maybe late twenties and looked like an actual ghost, fading away from the bottom up. She stared at the red, pulpy blood on her hands with an absolutely shattered expression. It was the look of someone who didn't want to live anymore.

"If that doesn't work, maybe we can collapse the place on it?" Luke thought out loud. "Don't look at me like that."

"Dude. " I waved at his everything. "What do you have against buildings?"

"That was not my fault - "

"It cannot be trapped," the Goddess of the Hunt said sullenly. "Only evaded. Its protection is absolute. Perseus cannot run forever."

Luke hissed. A long drawn out sound of frustration. He fiddled with his lighter. "Why hasn't it attacked us yet?"

"Is it not obvious?" Artemis raised an auburn eyebrow. "It is playing with its food."

That must have been the cue it was waiting for. A loud, high pitched cackle bark sounded from behind us. Against my better judgment, I turned my head.

I met the eyes of Stephen King's Cujo trailing us. It was still keeping its leisurely pace, Cheshire grin widening. Now that my glasses were off I could see some kind of heat wave, or aura around it. Like it was just slightly out of sync with the rest of reality. Like it distorted the world around it. It was almost tangible. It didn't have a ghost. That meant it didn't have a destined death.

You can't die without one.

The world glitched . It rotated a few degrees to the right, slid to the left and moved down.

Not now - !

The sudden vision speared through my temples. A little girl skipped past me at her mother's side with a teddy bear completely unaware of the danger. Her ghost had changed.

"Artemis!"

Her silver bow was suddenly in her hand, drawing back a bright moonlit arrow. The shining celestial bronze sword Reclaim sprung from Luke's vintage lighter as everyone around us let out cries of shock and alarm. There was a flash as the Goddess of the Hunt let loose her arrow. She had thousands of years of experience and practice. She was known as one of the Twin Archers of Greek mythology. I'd personally seen her shoot through a crowd to hit a target the size of a dove at 500 feet. Her very existence was tied to Hunting as a concept.

She missed.

I could see it, the way reality twisted around the Hound of Dracula, Zoltan to turn a bullseye into a few inches off. Artemis had already notched another arrow, but I already knew it wasn't going to do any good.

A cruel creature, she had said. It was here for me. It had my attention. For the record, I thought in my mother's general direction. I fucking hate your tests.

I shut my eyes and yanked at my necklace. The tiny silver sword pendant came off in my hand, unsheathing Damocles.

I still heard the crunch. Everyone screamed.

Cruel creature, Artemis had said. Child eater. Just because it looked like a dog doesn't mean it isn't a monster.

"Luke, fire alarm. Clear the mall." I threw my bag to the side. Blood was rushing through my ears, a low roaring in time with my pulse. The world snapped into crystal clear focus. Some ADHD part of my brain just shut off the unimportant stuff. I was vaguely aware that civvies were headless chickens making a lot of noise running anywhere that was away , but I could hear the click of claws on the marble floor. I could hear it breathe. A drop of blood dripped from a fang and I could hear it hit the ground. "Blow something up if you have to."

He probably wouldn't have to. Children of the God of Thieves just get locks.

He'll probably blow something up anyway.

"'Temis, we're killing it."

"Perseus," she protested, voice tight with grief and rage. Artemis hated failing. Luke did that thing he did where he turned on his heel and faded into the background. "It cannot be killed."

"We are killing it."

That was how Fate and Destiny worked. If there is a beginning? There is an end.

I had to believe that.

Gatekeeper Zuul let loose another harsh, laughing bark. I didn't think it spoke, but I was pretty sure it understood English. Call it a gut feeling. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Artemis' silver bow dissolve into motes of moonlight, replaced by twin hunting knives. Teeth idly snapped in her direction, as if it was taunting her. The bone tail lazily swung back and forth as it stepped towards me. I tensed, shifting my grip on Damocles' long hilt, but it seemed content to let me make the first move. I wasn't a huge fan of that. I had no idea how strong or how fast it was. Then there was the whole special snowflake destiny thing it had going on. If I didn't know better, I would say it had more of mom's support than I did. And I'm...a twelve year old boy. A demigod, but still not the most impressive thing on the planet.

"Are you going to make me wait all day?" I asked, gesturing with my sword.

Just so we're clear, I was asking Cujo.

Not Luke.

There was a 'whump' sound followed by a bang as a giant gout of flame flared into existence in the food court we just left. The fire alarms started screaming with gusto, strobing emergency lights snapped on, fans in the walls roared to life, the whole nine yards. That wasn't enough for the resident pyro. Thick, billowing smoke poured out of what I think was the Taco Bell. There was another explosion followed by an electronic screeching sound like R2D2 was being tortured.

Cabin 11, Hermes. Not even once.

I shouldn't have taken my eyes off it.

My Spidey Sense screeched.

I blindly threw myself to the left and took what felt like a shotgun blast to the right shoulder. I felt my body spin out of control, landing in a heap on the floor with enough momentum to slide into the legs of a bench.

I still had my right arm. Good jacket. Nice jacket.

Ow.

I felt Damocles' subtle pull and went with it, swinging the blade with my left arm in the general direction of danger. If I was up against a nice, normal Hellhound from the depths of Tartarus, Damocles ' edge would have cut right through its jaw as it leapt at me, splitting its skull in half. But I wasn't. I could hear some kind of discordant clang as the evil dog's head seemed to bend around the sword. The monster flickered and it was suddenly a foot to the right and three feet higher.

It got do overs?

My sword hit nothing but air as it alighted on the wall and I knew I didn't have enough time to bring it back around. I tried anyway.

A giant brown paw batted me out of the way. I could feel a wet crunch that was probably my hip dislocating. My gasp of pain was completely drowned out by a roar as the giant Grizzly that came out of nowhere took the hit for me. The two massive animals crashed into Cthulhu's fountain, scattering blue stones like marbles. Zuul flowed like sand, evading each and every attempt to pin it down as it tore into the bear.

"Get up!" I heard Luke yell. I swallowed the pain down and used my sword as a crutch, forcing myself to my feet. We have to lure it, I thought. And then - and then what? Can't hit it, can't kill it. Can't trap it. I heard the squeak of Luke's sneakers zooming past somewhere above me. Second floor?

The bear avoided a vicious bite to the jugular by suddenly shrinking, twisting shape. Sleeker, more agile. Hooves and sharp, vicious horns. What should have been a disemboweling headbutt hit nothing. The goat became a majestic eagle, swooping out from under raking claws. Jed from The Thing laughed, leaping back and fixing its cloudy blue eyes on me. A growing sense of dread sunk into my spine. Can't hit it, can't kill it. Can't trap it.

Mom, I pleaded. I can't -

I can't run like this.

I have to.

Luke let out a piercing whistle. Jed lunged for me. I was already moving.

"Perce! Come on!"

I don't know where I found the strength to put one foot in front of the other. The sprinkler system was on, coating the floor in puddles of water that didn't help anything at all. Everything was a blur. All that mattered was the back of Luke's red vest fluttering a floor above me. I could almost convince myself we were back at camp, racing for a bag of Butterfingers. Almost. If not for that feeling prickling at the back of my neck telling me I was about to die.

I threw myself over the miniature garden decorating the center of the concourse like the divider in a highway. I could feel the displacement of air as the monster just barely missed me. To my bewilderment, it actually skidded across the wet floors like it took an unwanted water park slide. It bowled over clothes stands left in front of a kiosk, a trash can and was on a collision course with a fossil stand.

So.

We can't hit it, but it can hit things by itself?

So physics was still a thing!

Luke doubled back, somehow running down along the column (maybe physics wasn't a thing) and hauling me to my feet by the collar of my jacket. I stumbled, feeling my hip grind before I hit my stride. My right arm was a noodle of pain. The knuckles of my left hand cracked as I loosened my grip on my sword.

I was vaguely surprised I haven't dropped it yet.

"We're close to the elevators." Luke spoke quickly. "I've got a plan."

"Elevators work during a fire alarm?" I panted.

"Alarms are my best friends!" Luke shot me the same sly grin he shared with his father Hermes. It pulled at his scar. "With a little persuasion."

On the other side of the concourse, a twelve year old girl in a silver parka ran past us. "Don't look back!"

I don't care who you are, or who you're leaving behind. When a god says that?

Don't.

It was like a bomb went off behind us. I could hear everything just shatter. Heat pulsed against my back as a tangible thing. Blinding light. That gut twisting shockwave of the rejected physical world shifting around the presence of divinity. I let myself hope for a second, hooking Damocles back onto my necklace.

The light blinked out with a cry. Zowie the Zombie Dog let out a cackling bark.

"Wait, Art - "

"Leave her!" Luke snapped at me. "She'll live!"

Right. Literal god.

But -

Never mind.

Luke leapt. One foot pushed off the column, the other kicked off the neon green lights of a kiosk front as he reached for the rails. I watched him vault onto the second floor. Okay. Like the Climbing Wall back at Camp, with less lava. I focused on the burn in my legs as I made the jump. I almost made it, my fingertips brushing the ledge. Luke grabbed my wrist.

"I got you."

We sprinted through Macy's, knocking over every rack and display and mannequin that didn't get out of our way fast enough. At the top of the escalator, the lone open elevator surrounded by red alarm lights was like seeing an oasis in a desert.

Luke reached them before I did. He dove through the doors and pulled me in behind him. There was a red light on in the car, a fireman's helmet. His keyring was already in his hand, keys dangling right next to the lockpicks. It took him two seconds to unlock the car. Maybe three. Tops.

The hairs on the back of my neck told me that was all the time we had.

As soon as I saw Man's Best Friend Max's ugly grinning mug, I yanked Luke behind me and slammed my fist into the Close Door button. I had enough time to realize that I was stupid - I just killed us - that button doesn't do anything! Reclaim flashed from Luke's lighter as he let out a wordless yell. I think I screamed too as I saw Death take a flying leap towards us -

The elevator doors closed.

There was a loud bang as the doors buckled inwards as an imprint of Cujo's face.

I couldn't stop my grin. "Bad dog!"

And as if we hadn't just narrowly escaped dying horribly, Artemis had the gall to yell back from somewhere. "It's a fox!"

I turned to Luke. "You're right. She's fine."

Luke just snorted. With a flick of his wrist, his blade was just a lighter as he kneeled. "Emergency hatch, quick."

I climbed onto his shoulders. I could see the outline on the top of the car, but no obvious way to open it. There was another loud noise, and a groan of metal but it came from just to the left of our door. Our girl scout was buying us precious seconds. Damocles' silver-gold rippled edge bit into the metal. Like opening a tin can. With a sword. I flinched as I hit some active wires, spitting sparks into my eyes.

Come on. Come on.

Another loud bang and a screech as the doors parted. Luke grunted and shook. I completed the square and slammed my right fist into the hatch. With a thunking sound, it came free. I scrambled out on top of the car. Luke came after me with a slight wheeze and just in time. The second he cleared the top, the doors burst open. The entire elevator dipped with the sudden weight. Razor teeth snapped at the hatch opening, before I heard that barking laugh I was starting to really hate. It shifted, pressing a cloudy blue eye close to the hatch, just grinning at us.

Like it was having fun.

"Cocky bastard," Luke muttered. The elevator shaft was a wide concrete space lined with cables and hydraulic pipes. It stunk of grease and I don't mean the good stuff on quality pizza. He grabbed my right arm, ignoring my hiss as he pulled it around his shoulders. Pressed close like this, Luke smelled like fresh blood. I don't know if the other cars were up or down, but it was a long drop either way.

I trusted Luke.

As he pulled us over the edge, I smiled back at Miles "Tails" Prower. "Bye!"

The floors flashed by. Luke twisted, pointing his feet down. "Maia!"

Honest to god wings sprouted by his ankles.

I laughed out loud. "Dude! Featherfall!"

I could hear him huff. "Nerrrrd. "

The landing in front of closed elevator doors shook my battered skeleton. I groaned. Luke practically collapsed to his knees.

"You okay?"

He straightened and that let me see what I missed. His grey T-shirt was soaked red all along his side. The fabric was sticking to a long cut running from his back to his stomach.

"It nicked me, it's fine." He winced as he stood up. It's fine. Right. He glanced around and unsheathed his sword. "Get the doors, yeah?"

Normally telling a twelve year old to pry elevator doors open by himself was a good way to have closed elevator doors.

But.

Demigod.

It's not just a word.

I had just gotten a good grip when Star Fox made an unwanted appearance, breaking through the doors floors above us.

"Doors!" Luke roared. There was a staccato of ringing snaps and celestial bronze cutting through steel.

I pulled.

Then it was just a lot of sound. Screeching, tearing, grinding, cracking. Echoing up the shaft. Echoing through the garage. A discordant clang echoing in my head. The world tilted on an axis as Luke tackled me from behind, both of us spilling out onto cold concrete and cigarette butts moments before the final crash. It didn't stop the spinning. There was a train. Collapsing bridge. Empty town. A beach filled with police. A lion? Images flashed by in first person - in bird's eye view - in a kaleidoscope.

"You alright?"

"Yeah," I lied, turning to Luke. His eyes were gold. Blue. Gold. His ghost was different. This time it was screaming as light broke through cracks in its skin. I squeezed my eyes shut. I thought of an endless ocean. Sapphire waves stretching to a far horizon. "Sudden migraine."

I haven't had one this bad in a while.

"Ah." Luke sighed. "Well, I think you can take a breather. I'll get a car."

"Sure. Sure." When I opened my eyes again, I was staring at a dirty nickel squashed into pink bubblegum by a sneaker footprint. Back in the present. Take stock. Right arm, usable. At some point, I must have either popped my hip back into place, or my nerves gave up. I rolled over onto my back and sat up.

Oh.

Huh.

The elevator doors looked like the Hulk opened them. The gun metal gray doors were crumpled with clear hand prints as if they were made out of aluminum. Some of the concrete bricks on either side were either broken or shoved out of place covered in mortar dust.

Cool.

I picked myself up.

Maybe I'm actually a Level 4 Adventurer.

I took two steps before I realized what was wrong with the whole picture. Disney's Robin Hood followed us into the elevator shaft.

It can't be hit. It can't be trapped.

So where is it?

A loud, growling engine purr kicked in, making me jump. Someone's vomit green 2005 Ford Mustang pulled out of the rows, Luke behind the wheel. I glanced at the wreckage of the elevator behind me. Just. Making sure it didn't move. Or anything.

When Luke pulled up next to me, it took two tries to open the door. Shout out to everyone that can consistently remember to unlock the passenger side. You are literally god tier, okay?

My mother is an actual god. Her batting average is trash.

The All American muscle car smelled like cheap cologne, cigarette smoke and potato chips. I buckled in because Safety First, then blindly reached behind me in the back seat for my backpack.

But wait. You're probably thinking, when did he get his bag in the car?

I didn't.

And at the same time, I did.

You know how that Scrödinger guy had a cat?

Mom doesn't skimp on birthday presents.

"I can dig out the ambrosia?" I offered as I hauled the canvas backpack forward, settling it between my feet. I probably should break out the medical supplies. Food of the gods, like Greek ambrosia and nectar, were great for demigod injuries, but to be completely honest, I could really go for a Snickers right now.

"Save it." Luke turned the corners of the parking garage a little too fast. His thumbs drummed the steering wheel. "Artemis will find us. She can dress it later."

I bit my lip.

Later. When we're safe.

A strange shiver ran down my back. That felt too much like jinxing it.

We cleared the last turn and Luke floored it. The red and white cross striped bar of the ticketing station splintered across our grill as the machine protested. The speed bump hit hard and then we were out under the sunlight. I heard Luke let out a sigh of relief.

The hairs on the back of my neck stood up.

"Fuck!"

I heard him slam on the brakes. I felt the bone-breaking impact shudder through my side of the car. I hit the cup holder hard, knocking the wind out of me. The world tilted but it wasn't a vision. Just the car turning over onto its side, wheels still spinning. My ears rang with the screeching of metal on the pavement. Glass was breaking. The front window. Luke's window. My door crunched as the monster fox jumped onto the car, cackling. Its bone tail lashed out in a whip strike - I raised my right arm and that saved my life. The bones were sharp. Not being able to be cut or torn didn't stop my forearm from exploding in bright, grinding pain as shards of glass flew everywhere from the shattered window.
In a flash of movement, the fox bit down on the door. With a crunch, a large chunk was torn away and then there were just teeth.

The only reason I didn't immediately die was the flash of celestial bronze from the driver's seat. Reclaim carved a radiant upwards arc. I heard that discordant clang as the fox's head seemed to split around the blade's path before it flickered.

But I was ready for it this time.

Reclaim crunched into the roof of the car as gleaming, ivory fangs closed on Damocles.

Clang.

Luke swept his sword down.

Clang.

He seemed to expect it, stopping the blade a centimeter from my head, and flicking his wrist.

Clang.

I stabbed in the shadow of Luke's swing.

Clang.

Have you ever seen a dog snapping at water from a hose? I don't know if we were the dog, or the water. It was all a game to the fox though. It had never been killed, not even by the gods themselves. Just put among the stars. I had never seen it bother to dodge. Why should it? Can't hit it, can't kill it. It cannot be trapped. From the moment it caught my scent, it had been playing with me. Eventually, the game would have to end.

But I don't want to die.

I twisted my body to lunge for its exposed neck and instantly knew it was a mistake. I overextended. I just got in Luke's way and for absolutely nothing.

Clang. Clang.

A silver hunting knife flashed through its eye.

Artemis.

She only wanted to help. If I was faster. Smarter. More experienced, I could have used that split second she bought me to correct my mistake. But all I saw was the fox flicker when it shouldn't have. My swing went wide in the wrong direction. Jaws crunched into my chest. My lungs ignited. My ribs felt like they were melting. Bile rushed up my throat as my sword fell from nerveless fingers. I thought I would see my life flash before my eyes. That's what mortals always says happens. Instead, my world narrowed in focus.

The clouds in its blue eyes were moving. This close, the shifting, twisting aura of the monster danced before my eyes. It was almost tangible.

Oh, was the dim thought. I'm stupid.

I can't put into words exactly what I realized. I would never be able to.

I raised my free hand, feeling my forearm bones grind as the fox dragged me out of the car. Luke's blade flashed.

Clang!

A burning tug pulled at my gut.

The fox yelped.

The vise grip around me disappeared. I hit the ground. I might have blacked out. I didn't even have the strength to scream when someone - Luke - pulled me up and it felt like every bone in my chest cavity shattered. All that came out was coppery liquid and broken air. It didn't matter.

A beautiful wound had ripped its way up the fox's face, taking out its left eye. It was no longer grinning.

I was smiling though.

It had a ghost.

"Maia!" Luke screamed.

I knew we didn't have the time to get out of its range. That was okay.

It was well within hers.

Time seemed to slow as she knocked the gleaming arrow and drew it back. She took a moment to savor her aim, and then a flash of light. Back to the car wreckage, half in the air, I was a sitting duck. Thing is, mid-leap like it was, it was one too. It's seeming invincibility had taught it bad habits. My heart skipped a beat when I saw her silver eyes light up, nearly glowing with excitement, wonder and pure joy. The only thing ruining the Hallelujah chorus I could almost hear was the feral, bloodthirsty grin that pulled at her lips as every line of her body relaxed. At this range, Artemis couldn't miss.

It was a perfect shot.

One moment, the stink of monster breath was slapping me in the face, teeth snapping an inch from my nose.

The next, it was just golden dust blowing away.

Bye, Fiona.

"Percy!" I definitely felt the landing. "Styx!"

My legs buckled. My right arm was a dull throb of pain, but I could feel my ribs screaming as I slid down to the ground. Wet coughs tore its way through my lungs and up my throat like magma welling in a volcano. It seared the whole way. I clumsily dug into my jacket with my left hand and pulled out my sunglasses. It wasn't for the sake of fashion. My head was killing me.

I can't tell you if I meant that literally.

"Not dead yet," I whispered. I shoved my shades back onto my face. The ghosts of the world disappeared and that tight knot of pain between my eyes loosened. So, take stock, just like Mom taught me. I felt like shit. Glass shards to the face meant I probably looked like shit. I'm probably going to pass out in a bit if the darkness at the edges of my vision mean anything. And my jacket was definitely best present. I blinked slowly, staring up at the sky. Luke's head filled my vision. His blond hair was matted with blood on one side. He must have hit his head on the window when the car tipped. He didn't seem to notice it.

"I've got - we've got ambrosia in - in - where's our fucking bags? "

"Here." I cast out my left hand, thinking about my backpack. My fingers fell on the canvas that definitely wasn't there a second ago. And that was all I was good for. The urge to sleep became almost overpowering. Artemis, flushed and trembling, knelt at my side. She gently pressed a hand trailing silver moonlight to the side of my face. The pain didn't lessen, but it stopped mattering as much.

"The Teumessian Fox, killed for the first time in our very long existence." Artemis nearly whispered as Luke tore through my canvas backpack.

You would think literal food of the gods would be stored in something other than a Ziploc bag but, uh, no. A small cube was shoved into my mouth. It tasted like my dad's special hot chocolate blend. A little pepper, a little vanilla and lots of marshmallows. He always made me a mug every time we pulled out the character sheets and twenty sided dice. As soon as I swallowed, I was given a second square. A warm feeling slowly spread from my stomach, like I actually had that hot chocolate. I let my eyes drift closed.

"Oh?" I heard Artemis murmur. "He has a high tolerance."

"For - for ambrosia?" Luke asked just as quietly. "How is that possible?"

She was quiet for a moment. "Sleep, Perseus."

Sleep sounded good. Unfortunately when I go to sleep, my brain shuts down first. Then my mouth.

And my mouth decided on a haiku.

"Lying here dying, refuses to use nickname, why are you so cruel?"

There was a pause. I was nearly completely gone when I heard Luke snort.

"Okay. Your brother's not allowed around him anymore."

"Agreed," I vaguely heard Artemis reply.

I might have said more before Hypnos pulledme under. It might have even made sense. I don't know. I don't want to know.

You're probably wondering what the hell is going on. To be honest, I am too. And I grew up around this stuff. Demigods. Monsters. Greek gods? They aren't the only ones still hanging in there. Thor's an actual thing. The Jotunn are too. Ra? Definitely. Susano'o, yup. Lakshmi, Quetzalcoatl, Anansi...sorry. I'm going too fast. You kind of came in the middle of everything here. Let's rewind. Everything will make sense then. I promise. And who knows? Maybe revisiting the beginning will help me figure out where this is even going.

My mother would tell you it's a story millions of years in the making. If we cut out the history lesson, it began when I was born. Cut out the baby pictures, it started when I turned five and there was a sun god on our balcony. But what really set everything in motion was a Royal New York Cheesecake Blizzard from the local Dairy Queen Grill and Chill. I get one every Friday after school, no matter what school I'm going to. It's been my habit for years.

It's how a satyr named Grover Underwood found me.

 

[Shujin]

An Undertow of Sand
A PJO Fanfiction​

'The Wheel of Time turns, and Ages come and pass, leaving memories that become legend. Legend fades to myth, and even myth is long forgotten when the Age that gave it birth comes again.' That's how the audiobook of Robert Jordan's The Eye of the World starts. I must have listened to it at least ten times by now, but I still remember the first time.

I was a cute six year old standing on a stool, being walked through using a kitchen knife on strawberries without murdering myself. Dad had turned down the sound there and said something like 'Is that how it goes?'

My mother, hands gently guiding mine, had pressed a kiss into my hair and said 'There is a certain safety in repetition.'

'There are neither beginnings nor endings to the Wheel of Time,' the old man narrated and I remember her laughing softly. It hadn't been a happy sound.

'But it was a beginning.'

This beginning took place in Trinity's boy's bathroom.

That's the school I go to. Trinity School. It's a K-12 private school in Upper West Side Manhattan and pretty nice as far as schools go. Nice building, nice facilities. A lot of extracurriculars, a modern library, the cafeteria didn't suck and unlike my last school they did not have a fully armed and operational cannon in the front yard.

It was stupid. I don't want to talk about it.

Most of my teachers were cool. My geography teacher, Mr. Panotti was from Sicily and had ears he could use as a blanket, they were nearly as long as he was! I was pretty sure they don't practice ear-stretching in Italy, but I've never been there, so what do I know? For science, I had Mr. Pretty who wasn't, but he did have a great sense of humor. Everyone swore up and down that our English professor Ellen was an escaped Hollywood star hiding under a fake name, even if no one knew which one. And Mr. Brunner was replacing Mr. Carlyle for the end of the year in Latin. I didn't know him well, but he seemed alright for a centaur. He could be a merman of some kind, but I was pretty confident in my guess. My Pre-Algebra teacher was a blood sucking witch, but we had an understanding. If she behaves, I won't bring my mother into it.

Trinity started almost two weeks earlier than other schools, but that just meant summer vacation came sooner too. I had one last final exam, Latin with Brunner, before I was home free. Nothing had burned down. Whatever exploded wasn't my fault and best yet? It was not only Friday, but the third Friday of the month.

It was a study hall. My tutor had come to sign me out of the classroom so we could use a private room in the library. ADHD things. On the way there, nature called. Loudly. I had to go. Let's just say the tabasco sauce on my breakfast eggs had not been my best idea.

So there I was, in the boy's bathroom of Trinity, taking a massive dump when the vision hit.

As far as everyone and my medical history knows, I'm one of those unfortunates cursed with chronic migraines. It lets me keep my sunglasses indoors without questions and if I get the rare bad vision, I can sleep it off in the nurse's office.

This one was Bad.

I don't mean one of the 'sleep it off' bad. I mean, cosmic imagery, mind opening and blood boiling Bad.

As in, seizing, shaking, clawing my face, shrieking and screaming fit Bad.

The whole apocalyptic nine yards.

While on the toilet.

Taking that massive dump.

I don't remember how I got to the Nurse's Office. I'm hoping that's because I managed to knock myself out, because if not, that means I was paraded through the hallways as the victim of an epileptic fit. Someone had bitten the bullet and pulled my underwear up, but the jury was still out on if my pants were part of a package deal or if I had flashed the entire school with Surfer Dude boxer shorts.

When I woke up (was released) in the Nurse's Office, I clapped a hand to my sore face and hoarsely screamed. "Oh my fucking God!"

I would honestly take dumping my entire class into a shark pit over this. Because I didn't need to come back next year. We had a good run. There were other Ivy League Prep schools in New York. Dad would understand.

"It gets better," the voice of my tutor and best friend Cliff(ord) Randall drawled from somewhere to the left of me. He sounded like he was the bearer of bad news and loving it. "Your boxers were a complete write off so…"

I shifted in bed and realized exactly what had happened. I had to be changed.

"I'm wearing diapers."

"You're wearing diapers."

There was only one thing I could say to that.

"Kill me."

He made that amused sound he did. It wasn't quite a laugh. I think he was allergic to those. It was more a short exhale of air and a grumble. "Ah, no. Sorry."

He did not sound very sorry.

I groaned and pulled the blanket over my face. I briefly considered smothering myself with my pillow. I had some bad summer send offs before. There was that time the gym burned down because, well, vampires. The school picnic that had been ruined by an actual rampaging bear berserker thing. Accidentally swallowing glass (don't ask). The, uh, cannon. But I can safely say this one was the worst ever. Of all time. I don't know how I was supposed to even think about showing my face in the hallways ever again.

Forget life support, my dignity was already applying for reincarnation in Elysium.

"Hey," Cliff ventured. "You are okay, right?"

I sighed into the soft, fuzzy blanket and reluctantly pulled it back down. I looked over and met Cliff's Labrador brown eyes. I ignored his ghost with practiced ease. Mostly practiced ease. "How bad was it?"

He let out a soft whine and I winced.

"It was like you were dying," Cliff's hands squeezed his knees as he reflexively licked his chops. His right leg started jumping before he caught himself. He was a cool kind of guy. He wasn't the type to get worked up about anything. That he was showing this much? It meant he was rattled. "Like something was killing you and I - and I couldn't do anything. I just - I ran for the nearest adult."

"There's nothing you can do, it's - "

"All in your head, yeah, I know." He finished miserably and raised a hand to scratch behind his floppy ear. "I gave you a bit of ambrosia for the cuts on your face. Cleaned you up a bit."

If you've caught on that Cliff is not quite a standard human, you'd be right.

My best friend is one of the Cynocephali, which means 'dog-headed.' He's not a lycanthrope or anything. It's not a curse. No transformation magic was used and no animals were harmed in the making. He was born like that, from equally dog-headed parents. Human from the shoulders down and Golden Lab neck up. He's people though, like you and me. Some are peaceful law-abiding citizens and some aren't. Cliff's one of the good guys. Keeps his nose clean.

The Mist made him look like just another fifteen year old kid with blond hair and brown eyes. I mean, he's a little under three years old, but that's basically fifteen in dog years.

And he tutors me in English and Latin.

Me and reading? We don't get along.

I sighed again. "Thanks. They called my Dad?"

"They wanted to call the ambulance," Cliff sneered. "Like human medicine can do anything. Your father talked them out of it, though. It's, um," he checked his celestial bronze watch. It had been his second birthday present from our family. It had his initials etched into the watch face glass and turned into a khopesh. "Half past two, they excused you from the rest of your classes."

It was the Friday before school let out for the summer next Wednesday. Class at this point was basically playing jeopardy, hangman and charades for candy. Don't get me wrong, I would like to look my fellow students in the eye somewhen this side of never, so it was still appreciated. I missed lunch, which was annoying, but it was the third Friday anyway.

"Anything else?"

"No," Cliff said, a bit too quickly. I frowned. "Yes?" He changed his answer. He brought his hands up and softly clapped them together as if praying. "Don't - don't take this the wrong way. I wasn't sure and I had to get help and then I couldn't get too close and it was noisy and - "

"Cliff."

He huffed. "It's just - I thought - aren't you Greek?"

"Grecian born, Celt raised," I confirmed. "Why?"

Cliff eyed me.

"Just spill," I said, feeling tired.

"So," He licked his nose. "They pulled you out of the bathroom, right? And you're still yelling, but not just 'aah' yell, but talking yell. Speaking yell." So I didn't manage to knock myself out. That's great. "Chanting, almost."

Shit.

"Are you telling me," I began slowly. "That I might have given a Prophecy in front of everyone?"

It was theoretically possible.

Practically impossible.

Mom would never allow me to hold an Oracle, no matter how much Apollo begs.

"If you did, it was in no language I know of." That ruled out Greek, Latin and Egyptian. I mean, I highly doubt it was Egyptian and I'm working on my Irish Gaelic, but it was good to be thorough. "It sounded creepy, whatever it was. I think there was a word you were repeating." Cliff's upright left ear folded back on his head in shame. "Not helpful, I know."

"Don't sweat it, man," I told him. "That's, like, Mom's thing. She'll know."

Speaking of?

I could have done without the literal pants shitting! I thought in her general direction. Some kind of hint, clue or warning would have been real nice.

I got a faint brush of a feeling back. An apology, before it shifted to feel more like a plea for patience.

I breathed a harsh breath through my nose.

Fine.

I swung my legs off the bed, grimacing as my...diaper...made crunching noises with the movement. My jeans had been replaced with cheap grey sweatpants that clashed something horrible with my purple and teal button up shirt. The look practically broadcast 'I had a whoopsie.'

I held out a hand and Cliff deposited my sunglasses into it. "Tell me I didn't shit my shoes."

"You didn't shit your shoes," Cliff said obediently with a hint of a doggie grin pulling at his chops.

I did shit my shoes.

Jeeeeezuus Aaaaayyych.

I could have screamed.

Generic sneakers and socks were waiting for me under the bed. I shoved my feet into them, ignoring the pinching as I stood up. I felt a little sore all over, the kind you get after pushing your body the day before. I expected that. My blood was still simmering underneath my skin. It was an uncomfortable shifting feeling. Cliff pulled back the curtain for me and I stiffened my spine as I walked past him to the front section of the Office.

Nurse Kim was at her desk doing paperwork with silent, mechanical patience and glazed eyes. Cliff held out his hand and snapped his fingers.

The Mist wasn't just some kind of mass hallucination or illusion. Or, it was, but those of our world could learn to manipulate the magic of it. Change a mass hallucination to a more subtle, personal illusion. It could be used as a form of hypnosis that way. The Young gods had it the easiest, using it essentially by instinct when they weren't outright changing reality to suit their whims.

Cliff took a three-month course on it as part of getting his Watcher license.

Egyptians were as bad as the Romans in a lot of ways.

As for me? I had both no talent and too much in Mist manipulation. Cliff notes (pun?): It was really hard using something you couldn't feel or see. If Cliff wanted to, he could use an active illusion to look like a normal boy to other demigods too.

He has never managed to fool my eyes.

"Look who's finally up, Nurse Kim!" Cliff's hand came down heavy and supportive on my shoulder.

The woman animated as she blinked away the cobwebs. She set aside her pen as she gave me a genuinely relieved smile. She was an older, Korean woman who had just started getting gray hairs. She probably had a few more because of me today. Lord knows, the responsibilities of the average school nurse start with lice management and vaccinations, and end with calling 911.

There was no medical certification for 'demigod bullshit.'

"Look who's finally up!" She said warmly. "How are you feeling, Mr. Stele?"

Mortified.

"I've been better," I said instead. I adopted a hangdog expression "I'm sorry for worrying everyone."

"We're all just glad you're okay." She searched through the papers on her desk and pulled out a sheet clearly designed to be filled out. The only splash of color on the white, gray and black worksheet was the logo of Trinity School.

Parent homework.

"Your father told us the last time you had a seizure was about seven years ago," she said delicately as I took the paper. "There is a possibility you'll have another before you graduate, so we would really appreciate it if your parents took the time to fill out a Seizure Action Plan for us. It will help us make sure you get the care you need, okay?"

"Sure thing." I folded the paper into a square and stuffed it into my sweatpant pockets. "Can I go home?"

"Of course, hun," she said with a grimace of sympathy. She slowly reached for the phone. "Your classes were canceled for the day. Your mother can pick you and your clothes up at the Front Desk. I'll let the secretary know to expect you."

Fingers softly snapped.

"I'll make sure he gets there okay," Cliff volunteered as the sudden confusion in the school nurse's eyes faded.

"Can you make sure he gets there okay, Mr. Randall?"

Cliff grinned, tongue lolling out. "No problem."

As we left the Nurse's Office, I asked under my breath, "What are you using me to skip?"

Just as quietly, Cliff hissed. "Statistics!"

I mean.

That's fair.

Thankfully for the sake of my sanity, class was still in session. We made it to the Front Desk with minimal human contact roughly eight minutes to the bell where Cliff and I parted ways.

Personally, I thought 'Front Desk' was a bit of a misnomer. It looked like someone had shoved an office building into a school. The entire wall was made out of glass allowing visitors to look into a tastefully decorated waiting room. A cheerful banner that said 'Welcome to Trinity!' was strung up underneath the glass shelf attached to the wall. The shelf was covered in brochure holders, application papers, and chained up pens for parents writing checks for fees. The actual Front Desk was behind the greeters, a large U shaped throne for Ms. Jensen, the true ruler of the school.

The Principal existed, but the only time I've seen the guy was at our interview two years ago for my application. A real schmoozer that needed a third hand to find his ass. Everyone knew Jensen called the shots.

"Hey, sweety." Alice, the personable greeter, started as she got up from her chair. That twitch might have been the other greeter acknowledging my existence. Or despising it. Alice opened the glass door for me. "You can wait in here for your - "

"Stele," Jensen said in an iron tone. She didn't even look away from her computer screen, expecting the world to obey. "Charles Brunner is giving you the option of taking your Latin exam early. You can take it this afternoon and be released for the summer, or study over the weekend and be here Monday." Steel grey eyes met mine. "Your choice."

The way she said that made it clear she knew what I was going to choose.

As if I would give up not having to see anyone in my home room for at least three more months.

I smiled brightly at her. "I'll take my exam now."

"His office." I was dismissed.

Five minutes to the bell.

As a late year substitute, Mr. Brunner's office wasn't in the '6th Grade teacher cluster' of offices at the end of the East Hall. He wasn't far from it though, because we 6th Graders still had to be able to find him. His nameplate was clearly temporary as a rectangle of paper with C. Brunner written on it instead of a brass plate.

He responded quickly to my desperate knocking. He opened the door looking alarmed with a fancy pen in hand, then confused, then relieved. "Mr. Ste- "

"Pleaseletmeinclassisgoingtoletpeopleinthehallways!"

Wordlessly, Mr. Brunner backed his wheelchair from the door so I could scoot in. The door closed behind me just as the bell rang.

Safe.

I sighed in relief, almost collapsing against the door. The centaur's lips were twitching. I gave him a warning look and he ducked his head.

My Latin teacher looked like he could have been a famous quarterback competing in the Super Bowl before breaking his back. It was in the scruffy beard, thinning dark hair and the fact the guy looked like he could break me over his knee, wheelchair or no wheelchair.

"I've already set up your workstation in the back. Let me know if you need to use any other accommodations." He handed me his pen. As I reached for it, the world stuttered. As I stiffened, I saw another hand, smaller, feminine and darker skinned gently push the gleaming hairpin the pen had turned into towards me. As my fingers closed around it, the vision faded. The pen was a pen.

Mr. Brunner didn't question my reaction. "Good luck."

He rolled his celestial bronze and silver wheelchair back to his desk. Greek lettering was etched into the silver, anchoring what was no doubt a complicated feat of folded space to the outside reality.

I want a Tardis.

Not until I'm old enough to legally drink, though. That was the rule.

"Is it multiple choice?" I asked him.

He looked up from where he had been digging another pen out of a drawer. "No."

I grinned cheekily. "Then what does luck have to do with it?"

The centaur grumbled under his breath. I slipped into the small back room. It held nothing more than a cheap four legs and a slab desk, a chair, a cotton candy pink alarm clock, the reader, a box of Kleenex and a tiny trash can. The walls were blank of all decoration and color. A single uncovered light bulb dangled from the ceiling.

School was prison, but this was a little too on the nose.

I sat down. The first thing I checked was how many pages the test had.

Ugh.

I turned the pink alarm clock around, so I couldn't see the moving hands.

My name was pre-filled on the page in stenciled lettering, highlighted with neon yellow: 'Perseus D. Stele.' Yes, I have a middle name. No, I'm not telling you what it is. It's awful. My grandparents are still under the impression my Dad had been on a huge rediscovery of the family's Greek culture trip when I was born.

Dad had still been interned when I was born. No, my name was Mom's fault, 100%. I don't know what she was thinking.

I drew a solid ink line through 'Perseus' and wrote a shaky 'Percy' above it. Then I looked at the first question.

The letters were playing musical chairs.

I...I have dyslexia. Me and reading don't get along. I'm okay writing, maybe a little slow. Numbers are more or less fine, but letters? I glanced at the clock, remembered I turned it around, turned it back forward, then went back to my test. I bit my lip. No matter how hard I stared, the letters refused to stop moving. I slowly reached for the start button on the reader, and... I felt like I had already failed.

I'm not stupid. I know I'm not. I'm not.

I don't need a Speech-to-Text, or colored post-its and highlights. I'm fine. I can do this.

I can do this.

"Question 1. Name the members of the Dodekatheon," Mr. Brunner's voice said evenly from the reader. I felt the relief and then the shame for feeling relieved. "And their Roman counterparts."

Right.

Easy enough.

Next to the bold 1) I wrote the Greek Name of my favorite of the Greco-Roman pantheon: Hestia. Her Roman Name followed. Vesta.

Might as well do it in Awesome order. I had to really think about putting Apollo next over his twin.

I will admit to being a tiny bit biased there. A little. How could a sun god that crashed on our couch every weekend, was my Paladin's Disaster Bard of a son, taught me how to handle my visions and play poker just barely eke out his twin sister whom I've only met twice?

If your answer is A Humongous Crush, Just The Biggest Ever you are…

Goddamn right and I hate it.

I sped through the rest of the list with Minerva/Athena and then Jupiter/Zeus down in the trash where he belonged.

Easy.

I looked at the clock. Holy - that took longer than I thought. I turned the clock back around. That was not helping. I hit the play button on the reader.

"Question 2. According to mythology, how was Rome founded?"

With a loud sigh, I got to writing.

"Question 3…"

I don't know how long that test took. I knew I heard the end of the day bell, which was a relief even if it meant I was cutting it close. How close? I don't know. I kind of took apart the pink alarm clock. I would put it back together, but I lost two screws, a spring, and a little lever thing somewhere. I marched out of the room. I calmly placed my completed test on Mr. Brunner's desk, handed him his pen and said,

"The clock was a mistake."

The centaur's lips twitched. "I'll keep that in mind. Do you want to attempt the bonus question?"

"Yes," I said immediately. I learned early never to turn down extra credit.

"The fall of Kronos - Saturn - was part of your syllabus for the year. He overthrew his father to become king and it was prophesied that he would be overthrown by his children in turn. So he swallowed them whole as they were born, sowing the seeds for his own downfall." Mr. Brunner steepled his hands, peering at me over them. "How does that myth relate to real life?"

"It teaches us that all prophecies are self-fulfilling," I said without missing a beat. "It teaches us that if we let our fear control us, we create things to fear. It is our choices that decide our destiny."

He studied me for a long moment. I don't know what he was looking for.

"A good answer that deserves full credit," he finally said softly.

I smiled as I watched him write a + 10 to the top of my test. "Thank you for letting me take it early, Mr. Brunner. I appreciate it."

"We might not have had long, but it was a pleasure teaching you, Mr. Stele." He placed his pen in his shirt pocket and adjusted the blanket over his forelegs before scooping up a dark green backpack from beside his desk. "Now I don't know about you, but I'm ready to head home."

Dude. Today has been a special kind of hell.

He let me out the door first, but as he closed it he spoke up, as if he didn't want me to just take off without him. "I take it you're a believer in destiny?"

And with the perfect sense of dramatic timing like the wizard she is, a goddess rounded the corner with my backpack slung over one shoulder, a plastic bag of shitty clothes in the other hand and the subtle smirk of a crownless queen on her lips.

I am absolutely a Momma's Boy.

Fight me.

"Mom!" I called out with a giant grin on my face.

At first glance, the only thing I shared with my mother was our straight crow wing black hair. We both wore it feathered, mine parted in the middle brushing my shoulders and hers brushing the small of her back. At second glance...uh. Nope, that was it. I was olive-skinned, she was pale. She had freckles and I didn't. Everything from our ears to our chin was different. I knew I looked a lot more like Dad's classical Greek, save for my eyes. She had eyes of black diamond, a fractal gaze that reflected bloody death.

Behind my sunglasses and beneath the Mist, my eyes were the color of an aurora borealis. I had my mother's eyes.

It's just this was not the Name of my mother that gave birth to me. It was the Name of my mother that raised me.

"Percy," Mom greeted me gently. She kept a soft, but noticeable Irish accent. If anyone asks, she's from Ulster. She inclined her head towards my Latin teacher. "Mórrigan Stele, Mister…?"

"Brunner," the centaur said evenly. "Charles Brunner, filling in for Mr. Carlyle."

It happens sometimes. Take the Greeks and their Roman Names. Pallas Athena, Goddess of Strategic War, Wisdom and Crafts, the Patron of Athens and Heroes was shoved off the Fucking Useless tree by the Romans.

And she hit every branch on the way down.

Her Name Minerva was so limiting and weak she was basically a minor goddess of basket weaving. The power of Athena didn't go anywhere, she would just be unable to access it. Her presence and awareness would be diminished. If you cursed out 'Minerva,' only the part of the deity allowed by the Name would answer. Exactly how limiting a Name was depended on a bunch of stuff. As a rule of thumb, the older the Name, the stronger it was. The older the god, the more a Name was more like an avatar, than a state of being. Young gods were called Young for a reason.

I was born to Ananke, a Name of the Primordial Deity of Fate, Compulsion, Necessity, Inevitability and Circumstance. A Protogenoi. It is an old and powerful Greek Name. It is not a safe Name for mortals to witness. She learned that the hard way with my father. This way, she could be there for me, for both of us. After all, how does that saying go? What's in a Name?

She has older ones.

Much older.

Knowing them was too much of a risk.

Even for me.

My Mom shifted my backpack up higher on her shoulder, freeing her hand so she could offer it to my Latin teacher. "A pleasure."

"You should be proud of your son," Mr. Brunner said and I'm not entirely sure I was imagining the emphasis on 'son.' "He's attentive, hard-working and really gives the material thought."

The corner of Mom's mouth curled up. "I am very proud of him."

I knew she was. It was still nice to hear it. I grinned at her and pulled away from my teacher. "Have a good summer, Mr. Brunner!"

"Yes," the centaur replied faintly. "You too."

I made it past two classrooms before I began to feel super self-conscious about the bag of shitty clothes.

And the diapers.

"Uh, Mom," I began awkwardly. "Can you do something about - uh, the whole situation that I am...unfortunately...dealing with here?" I know - mentally - that my Mom was the one who dealt with the poop factory that was baby me, but this was...not the same thing? That was over a decade ago and I had a thimble of pride left that was chafing as hard as the diaper was. I could see the corner of Mom's lip slightly curl up again as she opened the side exit and held the door for me. "At like - some point?"

"In broad daylight?" She asked as if it was ridiculous, but I could hear the laugh in her voice. I heard it. "You can't wait until we get home?"

"Mom. Mom, please."

As I passed the door frame, the uncomfortable sweaty, lumpy diaper became nice, roomy boxer shorts. The sweatpants were now black slacks and the pinching of my feet abruptly stopped in black dress shoes.

"Oh my God, thank you." I sighed and stretched in the sunlight. I opened my mouth.

"No, I'm not mind wiping your classmates."

Damn.

"Yes, you are coming back next year." Mom gently hip-checked me - plastic bag of shitty clothes conspicuously missing - on her way to the silver Mercedes parked directly in front of us in a reserved parking space.

"I'll convince Dad," I threatened over the hood of the car.

The amused look she gave me was also very smug and I didn't appreciate it.

She got in the car, preoccupied with putting my school bag in the backseat while I tried to get in the car. You would think a goddess would remember to unlock the passenger side. It takes a single extra second!

But no.

She already had a finger up as I sat down. "Not one word."

So I said four words instead as I buckled in. Safety First. "I didn't say anything."

But Mom, I thought. Really?

"I heard that," she said as she put the car in reverse. "You know I heard that."

"But I didn't say anything." I said smugly as I elbowed the door for the window.

"I don't know why the passenger just doesn't unlock with driver."

"Yes, you do."

"Percy - " she glanced over and let out a resigned sigh. "Percy, no."

"Percy, yes."

As we left the school parking lot, I stuck my head out of the window and bellowed at the top of my lungs. I made sure the entire block heard my best impression of Mel Gibson's William Wallace.

"Freedoooooooommmm!"

Someone's dog howled back like it was being murdered.

Everyone's a critic.

"You are definitely your father's son today," she groaned in mock disappointment.

"You know you love me." She just hummed like she was considering it. "You know you love me," I repeated. I held up my fist for a bump. As always, she left me hanging. I don't know why. It boggles the mind. A fist bump would not kill her. "You are perfectly capable of just - " My fist danced around. "Come on."

She raised her hand, and my hopes at the same time, but, no. She grabbed at my fist, somehow uncurling my fingers so we were holding hands. She gently squeezed mine before letting go.

"What's the Friday Plan?"

"DQ," I said immediately. Because Royal New York Cheesecake Blizzard, obviously? Do you even need to ask - It's pretty clear how that works. "Then Manhattan Pizza. Barnes & Noble. Water Park."

"City?"

I scoffed. Water was my go to. The pool, the beach, the water slide, you name it. "As if you need to ask, the pool bag is already in the trunk, isn't it?"

Her lip curled again, not bothering to deny it. The third Friday of the month was our day to hang out. Just my Mom and I. It was my day to be as much of a kid as I wanted. I wouldn't have to do homework or chores. I choose what we have for dinner. No bedtime!

"I'll think of something after that."

She made an amused 'hn' sound. "Do you want a hint?"

"Let me at least think of it first!" I threw myself back in my seat, throwing an arm over my eyes. A second later I asked, "What's the hint?"

"I'll let you think of it first."

I knew it.

"Manhattan Pizza for dinner," I said and heard her sigh fondly. Look, it's not my fault they're awesome. Everyone agreed with me. 5 star reviews. Mom was just a heretic.

We spent a few minutes in comfortable silence, but I had to break it at the next intersection.

"Hey," I said softly. "What happened today, was it - ?"

"Just a vision," she said just as softly. The knot of unease I didn't even know was there loosened.

"Thank God."

She cleared her throat.

I rolled my eyes. "And you, I guess."

She was never going to forgive my paternal grandparents for being devout Greek Orthodox.

Her fingers briefly squeezed the steering wheel. A small shudder went through her before she looked at me. She had one of her unreadable expressions on. A little less humanity, a little more god. Her eyes reflected a hundred different gruesome deaths and I reflexively straightened my back.

For Elder Gods, Names are avatars. They are always there though. The only difference is by how much.

"It was a milestone," she said distantly. "You're getting stronger."

"Sweet." I smiled, tentatively hopeful. The rest of the drive I spent telling her about my day. She already knew, but she liked listening to me.

It kept her grounded.

The local Dairy Queen Grill and Chill was one of those stores that was a lot bigger than it looked on the outside. You had to build long, not wide to find the space which meant the store fronts looked claustrophobic, but once you were in the door, it opened up. It was pretty empty for the time of day, just one person ahead of us in line.

"Hey, G-Man!"

The youth behind the counter shot me a bright, goofy grin. Then his brown eyes darted behind me and widened as his smile wilted. He hurriedly turned back to his customer, tugging his cap down firmly over his curly hair. Probably embarrassed. My Mom did that to pretty much everyone sixteen and over. Goddess thing.

He's new and stays at the counter since he has some kind of muscular disease in his legs that makes a lot of movement difficult. Standing all day like he was couldn't be comfortable either, but he was a trooper. My last two appearances were with my Dad, so he hasn't met her yet.

As soon as the young mother with two small children moved to the side to wait for their order, I stepped up to the counter. "Getting the hang of taking orders yet?"

He gave me a weak smile. "Hey, pressing buttons is harder than it looks."

His name was Grover Underwood, G-Man for short. He was a young looking sixteen, with a wispy start of facial hair and acne.

"Wh - what are you getting?" He swallowed nervously, eyes flickering to my mother and back. He was one of those apparently. Some people just find it difficult to think around my mother.

"Guess."

He bit his lip. "The cheesecake?"

"Damn straight. Large."

My mother leaned in and Grover straightened as if he was about to snap out a salute. She let her hand tap a rapid rhythm on the counter as she made a show of looking over the menu. "Medium Oreo, if you would."

"Yes, My Lady," he said immediately.

"My Lady?" I laughed as his face fell, turning red. "It's the twenty-first century, dude."

"I meant - ma'am." He looked down at the computer, tapping in our orders with burning cheeks and ears. He looked like he was wishing the floor would open up and swallow him whole. "I meant ma'am. Ma'am. I just - " He whispered a quiet, "Styx."

Oh he's Greek.

"I'm sure it just slipped out," Mom graciously allowed.

"Yes!" Grover latched on to the excuse. "I do - uh, over the summer, I have...drama club." He was cringing, but kept going. "You know, re-enactments?"

"Like a Renaissance fair?" I asked.

He nodded miserably, like he was expecting me to rip into him for it.

"G-Man. I play Dungeons and Dragons. Table top." I smiled at him. "I don't have room to say shit."

He tentatively smiled back. "Okay, that'll be 13.47."

As we moved to the side, the store's door opened to admit three old women. And I mean old, real senior citizen material. I'm talking brightly colored cardigans (because old = cold), sandals with socks, large sunglasses and granny pants. They each had sequined purses with electric blue yarn dripping out two of them and large shears out of the third. Don't quote me on this, but I think they were siblings rather than just friends. Something about their faces.

You ever get the feeling that you are missing something important?

"Uh, welcome to Dairy Queen?" Grover's voice warbled.

And as they walked up to the counter, they threw my Mom absolutely poisonous looks. Sometimes that happened too. Random asshats, like this one guy who refused to believe the ring on my mother's finger meant anything. That got my hackles up. I didn't care that I was about to make a scene, Mom would back me up. We could humiliate them.

"Wow, okay, excuse you," I said loudly. I made a show of turning to my mother and asking, "What did you do?"

The corner of Mom's lips curled up. "Your father."

I stared at her in complete disbelief.

"Blah-ha-ha!" Grover bleated out a surprised laugh while the mother with two kids snorted so loudly into her bite of ice cream she started choking.

I could have died.

"Wha- oh my God, Mom! Filter! Filter!" And she started laughing. It didn't happen often, but when it did she wasn't afraid to laugh, which just made everything worse. "Stop! It's not - you're not funny!"

"Uh, a Royal New Yor - "

"Here!" I grabbed our orders from the man and escaped.

I can't.

As the car pulled away from the DQ, I mumbled around a spoonful of cheesecake ice cream. "You're not funny."

"I am funny."

"You're really not."

Thankfully, the rest of the day was a lot of fun and free of any more embarrassments. Our last stop turned out to be the game store for more packs of Mythomagic cards, hoping to complete my roster. That fact that it would help refine readings was a nice bonus.

We got back to the apartment building a little before dinner time. We lived in the top floor penthouse, courtesy of the grandparents. It was...a penthouse. We had a nice balcony with a pool and view of the Manhattan skyline. We had a lot of plants. I don't know what else to say about it? It's home.

"Pizza!" I called as I walked in through the door, carrying the two boxes of large cheesy, pepperoni goodness. I had just put them on the coffee table when my Dad emerged from his office.

"Did someone say pizza?"

My father is Dorian Stele. He's a lawyer, which I think is why he's such a pain in the ass Dungeon Master. He's Greek-American with curly brown hair, strong stubbled chin and a proud Greek schnozz. He had one of his many, many ties draped around his neck and a broad smile.

"He was your son today," Mom announced as she tossed the car key fob onto the table by the door.

"Is that how it is?" Dad asked her as I grabbed him in a massive hug, the biggest I could manage. Dad returned it as best he could with one arm. He had a small glass of - I took a small sniff - whiskey, I think, in the other hand. I could kind of already tell from the bags under his eyes that it hadn't been a good day. "Look at that, fifty percent of the credit, one hundred percent of the blame."

In retaliation, Mom stole his tie.

"Am I getting that back?" Dad called after her as she went towards the kitchen.

Mom glanced back at me for some reason, the corner of her lip curling up as she met Dad's eyes. "Later."

"I like the sound of that."

"Are you guys being weird?" I asked my Dad's chest cavity. "I feel like you're being weird."

Dad sighed. "Pizza?"

"One large pepperoni and a half and half mushroom pepperoni and ham pineapple," I reported like a good son.

He ruffled my hair.

"That's a good mini-me." I refused to let go of him, so chuckling, he marched us both over to the couch. "Can I sit?"

"No." I couldn't hug the shadows out of his eyes, but I was never going to let that stop me from trying.

I never looked at him without my sunglasses.

"Huh." He said. And then, "You know, I got the most fascinating call from your school earlier today - "

I let go of him. "I hate you."

He laughed softly as he sunk onto the couch. I sat next to him and separated the small stack, opening them both to check which one was which. Mom came in with the paper plates, napkins and -

"Um." She placed the canvas backpack at my feet with a grimace. Dad stiffened. "Why'd you bring the Bag of Holding?"

She then made this strange pained expression.

"Uh oh," Dad said.

Mom had a special look for what Dad called Quantum Stupidity. It's Stupid she could see coming, but got Stupider every time she looked. A little disturbed, I slowly grabbed a regular pepperoni and a ham and pineapple slice.

There was a knock at the door.

Mom got up to answer it.

Standing on the other side of the door were two men in classical Greek chitons, cloaks and sandals like it was the normal thing to do. The tall one had curly black hair, zephyr blue eyes and elfin features. He carried a sleek phone in one hand with an extended antenna that had two small snakes twinned around it. I think...that's literally an iPhone with a caduceus attached to it. The shorter, blond haired man had a clipboard and ball point pen.

"Hermes," the black haired man introduced himself shortly. He jerked his head towards his companion. "Milos." He grimaced. "By the authority of Zeus Olympios, King of the Gods of Olympus, Zeus Agoraeus of the Dodekatheon and Zeus Astrapios of the Sky, we've come to investigate a reported cross-pantheon violation regarding the rearing of the Greek demigod, Perseus Stele."

"What?" I said, bewildered.

Cross-pantheon violation?

That's a thing?

"We would appreciate your cooperation. It will help us resolve this in a just and timely manner," Milos said like he was reading off an index card. "Please state your name for the record."

"The Mórrigan," Mom replied easily.

Hermes' eyebrows rose.

"Uh. What... is that?" Milos asked as he flipped pages on his clipboard. "That's - that's Norse, right?"

"Celtic." Her voice was frozen.

"You guys are still around?" Milos blurted out. He grunted as Hermes sharply elbowed him.

"I apologize for him. Sensitivity training isn't what it used to be."

"What the actual fuck?" Dad whispered. He was staring at his drink as if it had betrayed him.

"I am afraid the rules and regulations of Olympus are clear and absolute in this matter," Hermes said. "As a Greek demigod, we are required by law to remove the boy from foreign influence until such a time that he is claimed by his godly parent."

Milos was speed writing something on the clipboard, finishing with a flourish and a proud smile as he presented my mother with a yellow slip of paper.

"You have been summoned to appear before the Dodekatheon." Milos said proudly. "As a member of a Class Four pantheon, you have seven days to respond. Failure to do so will result in penalties."

Mom took the slip. "I understand."

I did not!

Hermes nodded. "Thank you for your understanding. Come along, kid."

"Wait," I grunted, beyond confused. "What?" I slowly stood up, reflexively grabbing my canvas backpack and keeping a firm hand on my paper plate. "What is - Mom?"

"Go with them, Perseus," she said softly. She turned her back to the door and slowly, one corner of her lips curled upwards. Her black eyes glittered with vicious amusement. "I am certain your Greek parent will not wait long to claim you."

Hermes made a sympathetic noise, but said nothing.

I swallowed the lump in my throat and slowly walked to the front door. I swung my bag up onto my shoulder. My mother pressed a kiss into my hair when I reached her. I got a brush of a feeling.

Patience.

Honestly, that was what kept me from absolutely losing my shit by a thread.

What even -

"Okay, so." I glanced at the two Olympus stooges as the door closed, leaving me alone in the small hallway to the elevator with them. I've been in this hallway over a hundred times, but all of the sudden it was too small. I felt like the walls were closing in. I opened my mouth as if just speaking would push back against the black feeling in my stomach. "I guess I'm being confiscated now?"

Hermes dragged a hand down his face.

"Yeah," he said eventually. "Yeah. Let's call it that. It sucks, but the law's the law."

"No appeals, huh?" I muttered.

Hermes snorted. "Appealing the Fates...good luck with that."

It is not all bad, young one, one of the snakes said. Because god, apparently? Whatever. Talking snakes. Not the first talking critter I've seen. You belong with your own.

"Camp Half-Blood?" I asked, just to make sure I wasn't going to be stuffed into a cell.

"You know it, that makes things easier." Hermes turned to Milos. "You know the drill, file the paperwork. In triplicate."

"But - "

"You're still around?" Hermes mocked him as the blond flushed.

"Got it, Boss." Milos disappeared in a breeze of wind.

"Idiot." Hermes turned back to me. "You might want to close your eyes. I'm told the first time is the hardest."

I squeezed my eyes shut. The lurch was not great. The sudden noise of dozens of people talking was almost worse. I opened my eyes and found myself standing in an old style Greek pavilion on a hill overlooking the sea. A large brazier burned in the center and there were nymphs and satyrs moving between the long tables. There were kids everywhere, staring at me over their plates of barbeque. The noise slowly dropped as more and more people realized I was there.

I was still holding my pizza.

"Nice entrance," A chubby black haired man with a red nose and a tiger print shirt grunted from one of the tables. "Who the hell are you?"

"Uh, Perseus Stele." I said. "Hermes...sent me."

Hermes fucking literally just dumped me here.

The man rolled bloodshot blue eyes and pointed to a table already full. Some of them were even sitting on the ground. A few looked like they could be related, something about their noses and mouths. Some shared eye color, but a lot of them didn't look anything like each other at all. What they did share was this expression. The whole table as one looked resigned.

"Cabin 11."

"That's nice?" I said slowly. "But - "

A thousand tiny, sparkling stars appeared around me and trailed upwards to a point above my head. I watched as they formed a gleaming holographic image: A blood red spindle of golden thread.

A blond haired, grey eyed girl from a table filled with other grey eyed kids spoke up in the sudden hush.

"Who...is that?"

"Well," the hungover man said.

He took a long pull from his Diet Coke.

"Fuck."

 

[Shujin]

An Undertow of Sand
A PJO Fanfiction​

I'm going to take a second here to recap.

My day at school literally went to shit. My mother thinks she's funny (she's not). And Olympus, the government of the Greek pantheon, has stupid rules. Oh, you're Greek. So we Greeks rule over your Greek, and we don't want you raised by a non-Greek god because they have cooties. Stay at the Greek camp and let your Greek parent claim you because you're Greek. It reminded me of one of my grandparents' crazy neighbors. Old guy was still butthurt Germany lost.

Greeeeeek.

And then she does and the reaction she gets is 'Who is that?' - what do they even teach demigods these days - and 'Well, fuck.'

Today needs to stop.

Seriously.

"Okay," I said harshly into the silence. "I'm not familiar with how you people do things? But - "

The hung-over man stood, hands up in surrender, grumbling something. I think I heard the name 'Chiron.' As in that one centaur trainer dude? Back in the day, if you wanted your demigod to amount to anything, you'd have Chiron train them.

Diet Coke Man rounded the table, making motions for the rest of the kids to stand and pinning anyone a bit too slow with a harsh look. He stopped a couple of feet from me and cleared his throat. Then he knelt.

"All hail Perseus Stele, son of Ananke." It got really quiet when her Name was spoken out loud, like someone had turned the volume down on the universe. Tiger print shirt guy paled as my back straightened. I felt a smile slip onto my face.

Mom had always been more as Ananke. It was the older, more powerful Name and having her attention like this was rare. If I had to make a comparison, it was the difference between your Mom giving you a hug in private and your Mom giving you a hug while wearing her crown in front of the cameras. It was just different somehow. Mom was Mom, but there was something about knowing this Name had me, made it special.

The campers didn't seem very happy though. Everyone looked alarmed. Their mouths were moving, but her attention crushed all of the sound.

Diet Coke mumbled into the still air. "Protogenoi of Fate, Inevitability and Compulsion. First of Chaos. Mother of the Moirae, of Darkness, of the Celestial Sky. The Great Serpent, Eater of the Bloody Tongues, The Ruiner, The Beautiful One, The Thousand Mirrors -."

I had a feeling he could have kept going with those Names, but the fire in the center brazier suddenly snapped at full volume, making everyone jump. The chubby man I was beginning to suspect was a god bent over completely, forehead to the ground.

"Whoa, no!" My smile fell off my face. Some people might like having others bow before them, but I didn't. Mom deserved that, but not me. I was just her kid. "No, no, no, no." There was a shift in the air. My ears popped. "Mom! No."

Noise flooded back into the pavilion as Mom lost interest.

That...stung a little.

Okay, it stung a lot.

She was...wasn't she going to...fix...this?

She saw nothing wrong with me being here? I thought - in a year or two maybe, and planned. I imagined both my parents dropping me off at camp, maybe with Cliff tagging along just to see what it was all about. The Greeks knew about the dog-headed, as long as he kept the Egyptian to himself, they wouldn't have a clue. Dad would have loved a tour. It would be a fun couple of months and then I'd go home.

This was a test, right?

It had to be a test.

"You can all get up," I said uncomfortably. The camper kids didn't look like they were ready to believe me. The lone adult did though and I smiled weakly. "So...Cabin 11 you said?"

"Ah," Diet Coke guy said. I followed his gaze up. The red spindle of golden thread was still hanging over my head. Just slowly spinning around.

Menacingly.

"I'll...clear out a room at the Big House?" The spindle bobbed. He gestured towards the table he had been sitting at with a few nymphs and two boys. "And...there's room at the table for Cabin 12."

The spindle faded.

The man closed his eyes, pinched the bridge of his nose and took several deep breaths. I'll say this right now, I was pretty good at identifying gods. Mom's drilled me on it often enough and there's always something giving them away. Usually, it was the eyes. 'Eyes are windows to the soul' isn't just a saying. Pretending to be a normal human or an animal was a classic god trick, but usually the Mist had to give them a hand in looking like a mortal. Even Mom needed to rely on it to help her blend in.

The Walmart greeter being able to see their own deaths whenever they looked at her would have given the game away. But it's hard to pretend to be mortal when you don't know what mortality even is.

This guy was kind of weirding me out though. I could maybe-sorta-kinda feel divinity? But he looked like a cherub that reached middle aged in a trailer park. His red nose was probably a coke habit and the bloodshot blue eyes were the booze.

I tried not to let all the quiet stares of the campers bother me when Maybe God motioned for me to follow him out the pavilion.

The rest of Camp Half-Blood was sprawled out at the base of the hill. To the left there was a massive structure like an artificial cliff overseeing an amphitheater. A large lake fed by an ocean-bound river sat next to an open rectangle of twelve gleaming cabins and a more mundane elongated building that was probably...the bathrooms? Other large buildings and clear spaces, including what looked like an arena, almost looked unreal in the setting sun. Half-modern and half transplanted out of ancient Greek history. Large gardens ran right up to the borders of a foreboding forest and a large sky-blue farm house-mansion thing marked the camp's entrance.

There were stragglers coming up the hill towards the dining pavilion. A few older campers. Some nymphs and satyrs including one oddly...familiar...looking one in an orange Camp Half-Blood T-shirt…

I know that satyr?

I stopped walking. The satyr saw me and at first he smiled a bright, goofy grin, before flinching and suddenly looking very, very guilty. He had wispy facial hair and acne, putting his age anywhere from fourteen to a young looking sixteen.

I know that satyr.

I dropped my bag on the ground. I turned and handed the chubby god guy my paper plate of pizza - "Can you hold that for a sec? Thanks." - and marched over, a big smile on my face. "Hey, G-Man!"

Grover Underwood looked relieved. "You made it! I - "

I punched him in the mouth.

Satyrs roamed the world looking for Greek half-bloods to guide to Camp Half-Blood. Safety in numbers, although I heard there was some kind of barrier around the place now too. Demigods with only mortal guardians had to defend themselves.

I didn't need protection. I had my mother.

I knew he knew that. That had to be the reason for his slip earlier, when he called her My Lady. It was the traditional address for female deities. I bet he's the one that made the report bringing Hermes to our door so Olympus could take me away.

"Thanks," I spat at his crumpled form. "Protector."

Chubby God (I had no idea which one this dude was, but pretty sure it was a god) had a constipated look of almost-amusement on his face when I took my pizza back. I bit back a snarl and just stuffed my pepperoni pizza slice into my mouth.

We continued walking down the hill into the camp in an uncomfortable silence. I had nothing to say. I was still angry. I was pretty sure this guy wasn't Zeus, so complaining to him was not going to do much. My Mom apparently had different priorities than I did. I could run, but that would mean living on the street dodging monsters while Dad slowly lost his mind worrying about me. It would be just like Mom's tests, except it wouldn't end.

I couldn't do that to Dad.

I let out a long breath. My gut churned. It was almost painful.

"I guess I just stay...for the summer?" I bit my lip. "Like a normal camper."

"Normal camper," he snorted. He gave me a look out of the corner of his eyes. "I'm not gonna lie, kid," he grumbled. "You existing? It's shitty." He tensed then, glancing around like he was expecting to be jumped from the bushes. When nothing happened, he relaxed and motioned with his hands. "The timing? Very shit. The parent? Double shit. And you're a little shit, don't try to deny it."

Okay. He had me until the second half.

"I aim to please." I said sarcastically.

He rolled his eyes.

"One of those," he mumbled. "Look, Peter - "

"Percy," I cut in.

"Whatever. It's nothing personal." He said in an almost conciliatory tone. "You just mean the end of the world."

I almost stopped walking again, before remembering.

"Oh right, that Prophecy thing?"

Chubby God did stop walking. He pinned me with this narrow eyed look. It might have been scary if he wasn't wearing a Hawaiian tiger print shirt over a gray wife beater, if his nose wasn't pulling a Rudolph and if he didn't look completely hungover. I'm sure there is a story behind a literal god that can look however they want looking like a deadbeat, but for the life of me I had no idea what it was.

Was he cursed?

"You know about that." He said slowly. It was hard to get a read on the emotion in his voice.

Mostly because I was still wondering if he was cursed.

He's probably cursed.

"I got told when I was nine," I answered him. Dad had taken me and child-sized Apollo out for a game of laser tag. Apollo had cheated (outrageously) and then dropped the bomb on both of us while we were eating chili dogs that I was the center piece to a Great Prophecy. Signed, sealed and delivered by the Oracle of Delphi, Apollo's most famous prophetess.

He flubbed the delivery.

Let me tell you, there is nothing like a chili dog after being told you'll probably die on your sixteenth birthday.

All three of us came back from our boys' day out bawling.

Mom was unimpressed.

The thing about Prophecies is that they all have one thing in common: Shit happens. If you are lucky, your Prophecy starts and stops with a broad strokes 'how to fix shit happening.' If you are unlucky, it goes into detail and if your luck is abysmal, it will tell you that shit can't be fixed at all.

Mine went into detail.

Mom told me not to worry about it. I figured she would know. Fate is her thing. I know you're probably thinking 'You were nine? Maybe it was a white lie.'

No.

Mom doesn't lie. Not to me.

"I don't see the problem," I said. "I just have to not."

Chubster shook his head and started walking again. "And we're supposed to take your word for it?"

"Yes?" I said, confused. "I like the world the way it is."

"Everyone says that," he replied, sounding tired. "Until they're offered something they want more, or they have nothing to lose." I frowned. There was nothing I wanted that badly. I had everything to lose. "You've got years to change your mind," he continued, like he could hear what I was thinking. His voice picked up. "Best case scenario, you're disqualified for the crime of dying while heroic! Win-win."

I gave him a flat look.

If this jerk was an Olympian, we were two for two on assholes.

"Sure," I drawled. "I'll get right on that. Mom will love it."

"She's Fate, or something. Apparently." He gave me a sick looking smile. "Ball's in her court."

I relaxed a little.

I didn't often think about it, because it was a bit too big to wrap my head around. The personification of Fate was my mother.

The ball was always in her court, wasn't it?

But it's our choices that make our destiny, I remembered.

And Mom doesn't lie.

I adjusted my backpack and started munching on my ham and pineapple before my pizza got too cold. It looked like we were headed right for the big blue farm house. I guess that was the 'Big House' I would be bunking in. It had four floors and some kind of deck running around the outside. We swung past the bathrooms, allowing me to dump my empty plate in a trashcan. The shortly cut grass gave way to packed dirt. The twelve cabins were arranged in a large open rectangle, one for each throne on Olympus. It was half-funny and half-annoying that the cabins looked exactly how Apollo described.

His was solid gold, shining with the light of the setting sun. Artemis totally did steal his idea with an all silver cabin that would do the same with moonlight. Ares had no taste at all with badly painted red walls on a squat military style barracks and barbed wire on the roof for no reason. Aphrodite's was a 1950s doll house. Demeter's cabin needed a hobbit door. Dionysus just threw grapevines on his cabin. Athena's was boring. Hephaestus gave his kids a factory, Hermes' was a dump. Zeus and Hera didn't have summer camp cabins so much as miniature banks complete with Hellenic columns and Poseidon's was the best made out of seastone with seashells and coral on the walls.

Camp Half-Blood was a summer camp for Greek demigods, but more than just the Twelve had half-mortal kids. Or adopted kids, in Artemis' case. I'm proof of that.

"Where do the others go?" I asked my guide. "The other gods' kids. The Big House too?"

"Cabin 11." Chubster grunted.

My eyes swung back towards the run down building and its peeling brown paint. A caduceus was etched into the door and painted in with flaking gold. Cabin 11, Hermes. The God of Travelers.

"That's it?"

He grunted an affirmative and I swallowed.

Oh.

That was why their table at the mess pavilion was so full.

That didn't make a lot of sense to me. It wouldn't kill anyone to have a neutral cabin or two, right? Or a neutral table? Just enough to fit everyone comfortably. Hestia used to have a throne on Olympus. She was not only the eldest but neutral. Even if she would never have a demigod, she was still the goddess of Family and Home. Trusting her with kids should be a no brainer?

Did Hades have kids? Did they just get stuffed into Cabin 11 too? He's one of the 'Big Three.' Even if he didn't have a throne on Olympus, he was still Lord of the Underworld. They wouldn't…

I looked over the cabins again.

Exactly twelve.

Maybe Hera?

Goddess of Familial Love, right?

Or am I stupid?

...I'm stupid.

Maybe not Hera.

Trusting Hera with any number of demigods was...probably a bad idea, now that I thought about it. Like classical Greek tragedy bad. She was the reason Heracles nearly Total Party Killed his entire family and killed his best friend. She put him through some shit, is all I'm saying. For the crime of being her husband's bastard. And he wasn't the only one.

She had a cabin just slightly smaller than the eternal playboy Zeus'. A pretty, useless, empty building.

"Can't we just build more cabins?" I asked.

"You can sign that petition Larry Castillo whoever sends to Olympus every summer," Chub said uncaringly.

My eyes caught on the large campfire in the middle. There was a small girl about seven or eight years old in brown robes kneeling next to it, poking at the coals with a stick that refused to burn. Was she - had she been there a second ago?

She felt me staring, I think. Her head turned to look at me and her eyes were literally on fire.

Which was, uh, new.

I blinked.

Oh.

Oh!

I know who that is!

Grinning, I waved at my favorite goddess with both arms. She gave me a small, dimpled smile and raised a hand.

Hestia Prytaneia and Hestia Potheinotáti, I prayed with the only Names she allowed herself to keep. They meant 'of the Hearth' and 'the Beloved' respectively. I wanted to make sure she heard me. You are awesome and adorable. Your dad was an ass. Keep up the good work.

Her eyes widened as I gave her a double thumbs up for good measure before turning back forward.

I was led across a small, narrow vine bridge across a slim river. Up close, the Big House was huge. It loomed, making me wonder what all the rooms were used for. The deck around the house was littered with lawn chairs and tables. On the top of the house, there was a bronze eagle weathervane with still wind chimes that was definitely not what it seemed. When we rounded the house to the front, someone was waiting for us.

It was a tall woman in business casual. A white blouse with gray stripes on her shoulders and matching gray pants. I was pretty sure it was a goddess, but I could be wrong. Chubster was making me doubt myself.

"Dionysus," the maybe-goddess said tightly, surprising me.

So deadbeat god was an Olympian. I am…

I am actually not surprised at all.

"And you must be the son of the Serpent," she continued as we drew closer. She had a voice made for karaoke, but I think she would murder anyone who tried.

She looked like that kind of person.

"I guess?" I said. I guess it was like calling a Poseidon kid 'son of the Earthshaker.' "Percy Stele."

She had black hair that curled at the ends and eyes that reminded me of the coral skeletons I saw in a marine museum as a kid. Black Coral, I think? At first, it was just dark gray, but it was made up of millions of spots of other colors, blue, red, yellow, green and more like a color collage. It made her eyes shine like an oil spill. Like some kind of weird optical illusion.

She inclined her head. "Athena."

Okay.

So that was another Olympian.

I -

Huh.

Meeting the hungover God of Parties kind of hit different from a Goddess of Strategic War.

I smiled and tried to look harmless. "Not as Athena Promachus, I hope?"

If she was here as a war and battle Name, I might be in trouble.

Her eyes widened a little before her face blanked again.

"No, I did not think it was necessary," she said smoothly. "I speak to you as Athena Areia, Polias, Hygieia and Glaukopis in one." Her eyes searched my face. Something told me she couldn't see through my sunglasses, but that didn't stop her from trying. "And you know what that means, don't you?"

"Judge, Protector, Physician and Observer," I recited respectively.

Those weren't the literal translations. 'Glaukopis' meant something like 'bright eyed' or 'owl eyed,' but you get the idea. It was like equipping a perk in a video game, or a title in a Role Playing Game. If my Paladin earned the epithet 'Vampire Slayer,' and all it meant was 'I killed 2 vampires yesterday and almost died?' Then that would be pretty lame. Instead, it meant I killed a lot of vampires. I got good at killing vampires. I was known for killing vampires and gimme that +2 to damage rolls against vampires!

If my Paladin was then ambushed by werewolves, I would be back to square one. However, there was nothing stopping me from earning a 'Werewolf Slayer' title. If I worked hard enough, my divine warrior could gain a title for underwater whistling. A Paladin wasn't built for that, but I could.

The Young gods worked the same way.

Athena was still a Goddess of Wisdom, Handicrafts and Strategic War just like my Paladin didn't just randomly lose Lay on Hands, but her Names shaped her focus.

Apollo was Apollo, but it was the Prophet I shared my visions with, because he understood better. It was the Archer that dragged me outside, because not feeling the wind on his face bothered him. The Twin was a bit (more) of an idiot, but the Locust could get mean.

Put all of Athena's current titles together and you get something like...

"Risk assessment?" I asked slowly.

Her gaze sharpened like she was looking down into my bones. "Just so."

Drunkard God grunted. "If you ask me, he's too dangerous to keep."

Whoa, wait.

Before I could panic, Athena held up a hand.

"Your feelings on this matter are irrelevant, Camp Director," She told her half-brother with this carefully even tone of voice. Now that I noticed, everything about her seemed careful. Carefully blank expressions. Bland clothing. Hair down. Her hands were at her sides and empty. Non-threatening. "He could be dangerous, as can all demigods."

That got her an unimpressed look.

"Prophecy," Dionysus said flatly.

"Which explicitly gives him a choice," she countered casually. "He can. If we prove ourselves to be fools, however, his mother will."

So…

Yeah.

There wasn't anything I could say to that.

Mom was not a forgive and forget kind of person.

Think of every terrible Fate you've ever heard someone suffer and then imagine how much worse it could get to personally be on Fate's shitlist.

"It's some kind of fluke," Chubster God waved a hand at me. "There's no way - "

"Dude, what is your malfunction?" I interrupted him. "Is this because you're cursed or something?"

Now that I knew who the jerk god was, he had no room to complain about Fate. Sure his mother was a moron, but Zeus gave a damn. He escaped Hera cursing him by getting her mother to overturn it. That's like being blacklisted by Steve Jobs, but convincing Bill Gates to hire you. Demanded to be worshiped while mortal, wiggled out of all attempts to punish him for it. Then Mister Demigod-of-the-Huge-Cajones invaded the Underworld twice to rescue people, succeeded, got happily married, and not only achieved immortality but was granted a major godhood. He wasn't guarding a rock somewhere, Hestia lost her Name of Queen giving him her throne on Olympus.

"Because if I remember my myths right, Mom gave you enough success to choke on."

I don't know what I was expecting him to do. Get angry maybe? Instead he kind of just - it was like he was a whoopie cushion.

I could almost hear the wet raspberry as he deflated.

"You do not have to like the boy, but you will respect his parentage," Athena said coldly. "I tell you this for your own sake, if anyone wishes you to fight Fate? Don't."

Her younger brother lowered his eyes.

"Not even the gods fight Ananke." He said bitterly, like he was quoting someone.

There was a flicker of Mom's attention. A bit of pressure killed the breeze before she was gone again. Both gods stiffened and lost color in their faces.

That was weird to me. What were they feeling from Mom's presence that I wasn't?

"Fuck," Rudolph the Red Nosed God said. "Not doing that again."

"A fluke, is it?" Athena said. The 'you idiot' could be heard in her voice. "You were told what to do if any came to Camp."

"You're kidding, it's been millennia - "

"Your first mistake was thinking you knew better. You're not suited for it." She stepped forward, shutting his mouth and waved a dismissive hand towards the Big House. "You have your duties, Camp Director."

The jerk god gave me this unreadable look and for the first time I saw the divinity behind his strange mortal disguise. A purplish glow brewed in his blue eyes, shoving images of people eating each other, cutting off their own limbs and carving still beating hearts out of each other's chests to place on a black altar into my head.

It looked like something I'd see in Mom's eyes.

Deadbeat God snorted. "Figures."

He brushed past me and disappeared into the house. I scowled at his back. I literally haven't done anything to deserve whatever his problem with me is.

"Dionysus is the youngest of us," Athena reminded me with a sigh. "He does not understand, but he will not harm you."

"Uh huh," I said skeptically. "I'll behave if he does, we'll be great friends."

She chose to take my word for it.

"I will admit to having questions I must ask you," Athena ventured after a moment. "Are you amenable to speaking with me?"

"Sure?" I shrugged one of my shoulders. She was polite, at least. "Can we sit?"

"We can."

The metal lawn chairs on the deck were comfortable enough. They had well-used cushions with floral patterns bleached by sunlight. I put my bag down beside me under the table that stood between our chairs. There was an umbrella on the table, but judging by the stains under the strap holding it closed, it hadn't been used in a while.

Athena crossed her legs as she leaned one arm on the table. Her gray eyes searched me like I was a puzzle she was putting together. Or like a bug under her microscope.

"Take a picture," I muttered.

"Photographic memory," she said simply, not even blinking. "Your name is Percy, then?"

"Perseus," I admitted. "But Percy, yeah."

"I assume you live with your mortal father?"

I nodded.

"And you learned about divine Names," she mused. "What else were you taught?"

"We covered Domains, Signs, Wards, Monsters, World Knowledge, Pantheons," I ticked them off on my fingers. Summer school, basically. "General combat stuff, Quest Preparation, uh, Sensitivity... and...my inherited abilities." I said a bit quieter.

Failing at learning my inherited abilities.

The best I've been able to do is read my cards. Mom said she was proud of me anyway. I believed her. She was. She is. But I've never been able to actually use my divinity. I don't know what I should even be able to do. I don't know what Mom was waiting for, or why she couldn't just tell me what I needed to do.

Maybe a demigod of The Mórrigan would be too different, so she had to wait for Ananke?

And the best we got from her was that I needed to get stronger first. How strong? I don't know.

"Your father taught you this?" Athena asked.

"My mom," I told her.

Obviously?

Athena's brow furrowed. "You were personally educated by the Serpent?"

"Uh, no?" I said. That would have been a bad idea. Her face relaxed for some reason, and I suddenly realized that they didn't know. They had no idea the Celtic Harbinger of Fate was another Name of Ananke in service of the same Elder God. That was why they gave her a ticket. They thought I was fully adopted.

And Mom didn't correct them.

Yet.

"I was raised by The Mórrigan and she taught me."

Athena's lips pursed. "Cross-pantheon upbringing...It is good you were removed then."

"What? No!" I protested immediately.

"You are concerned with losing a parental figure." Athena tried to be comforting. She was shit at it. "That is understandable, but The Mórrigan should never have risked - "

"There wasn't any risk!" I snapped at her, slamming a fist onto the table. The metal crumpled. "Mom wanted her to!"

It was suddenly hard to breathe. They had their reasons. I didn't like it, but they did. They were probably stupid reasons, but they had them. I closed my eyes and tried to calm myself down. It didn't work, not until I felt someone gently card fingers through my hair. I inhaled a shuddery breath but there were no tears.

"Of course," Athena said softly. "It would be foolish to assume Fate herself had no hand in your upbringing."

"Right," I said, just to say it. Just to hear it said. "Right…"

They couldn't keep me here. Not if Mom didn't want me to be. At most, it would be three months. Just a normal summer camp. She said I'd be back at Trinity next school year. She said so. I'd have to be home for that.

I'd have to be.

My breathing evened out. It's fine.

It's fine.

Athena patted my shoulder, rising from her crouch behind me. "You must understand, we are unfamiliar with demigods of your caliber. Before you, there were only two in all of Olympus' history. One of Night, the other of the Pit. And they were…".

Nyx and Tartarus. Night and the Pit.

"Monsters." I finished for her.

"Yes." She took her seat again as I cringed. I wanted to believe they grew up like I did. But I knew better. "And then there is you, given a divine education and mortal." She paused. "You are mortal."

Uh.

A divine education?

"Uh, my spine sticks out a bit, I guess," I offered with a weak smile. It's why my hair was long. It wasn't bad or anything, just noticeable. If I hunched over, it was actually awesomely gross! "A few extra ribs and organs, but I bleed red. You can ask Apollo!"

Athena's eyes narrowed. "Apollo."

"Yeah?"

He was kind of the God of Medicine. You'd think he'd know a little something on how to tell mortals from everything else.

"Apollo knew."

"He found me when I was five."

"Apollo knew for years."

"Yup."

…

...

That sound you just heard was Apollo screaming from under the Olympic-sized bus.

"I see." Athena closed her eyes. Her face twisted in frustration before it smoothed out again. I had to wonder what bothered her more, that Apollo knew or that it was Apollo that knew. Her eyes reopened. "May I see what your glasses hide?"

I flinched, but reached up for my sunglasses anyway. According to Cliff, the Mist hid my eyes just like it hid his doggieness, turning the shimmering colors of an aurora borealis into a static greenish-blue. Sea green. That wasn't why I wore my glasses though.

We both sucked in a breath at the same time.

Her ghost was messily dismembered. Someone took the time to rip it apart, piece by piece.

"You say you are mortal," Athena said softly.

"I am? I just inherited them from my mom," I said uncomfortably. I kept my eyes locked on hers stubbornly. Ignoring ghosts like hers, the ones that spoke of malice, were always the hardest. An accident? Sure. In battle? Okay. From sickness sucked. It was great when people died in their sleep, at peace, surrounded by friends and family.

Most of the time they don't.

I guess not even gods.

"Sometimes it happens, right?"

"No," Athena corrected me. "It does not." I made a confused noise in my throat. "First, I will ask a question: What color are my eyes?"

"Black Coral," I said, trusting the Goddess of Wisdom to know what I was talking about. She should. That was her thing. "Color collage. Shines like an oil spill when the light hits them a certain way."

One of her slim eyebrows twitched up.

"Yes…" She drew out. "Be careful looking beneath the Mist like that. Not all expressions of divinity are safe to see."

"I...literally can't help it," I admitted.

Her brow furrowed again. "Your glasses shield you, then?"

"Nope," I said, popping the 'p.'

There was the 'bug under a microscope' look again.

"The easiest way to explain," she moved on, but it was probably too much to hope she forgot, "is that the eyes of a god are literal, while the eyes of the half-mortal children of said god, if they even inherit it, are merely evocative."

I caught myself raising my hand like I was in class. "Sorry. Evocative?"

"It is suggestive of, or strongly reminds you of, something else. A certain shade of red may be evocative of a ripe apple."

I think I understood what she was getting at. "So, I can see the sun in Apollo's eyes. But."

She nodded once. "If his children inherit his blue eyes, they will be the shade of a clear afternoon sky. You will not see the sun in them. Evocative of divinity, but too mortal for it."

I saw my birth mother in my Dreams once.

I had her eyes.

Stars and everything.

"Oh."

"Perhaps it is simply a rare peculiarity, like one of Aphrodite's defects," Athena thought out loud, but I don't think she believed it. "And Apollo's gaze does not blind you?" It sounded like she didn't expect me to answer but I nodded anyway. "Interesting. Still, if a god requests you look away, I would not recommend disobeying."

"Duh," I grumbled. I'm not that stupid. "What about the other kids?" I had to ask. "From Night and the Pit? Maybe it's our thing?"

"One did not even have eyes," Athena said evenly as she stood up. "The other…"

Ouch.

Right. Monsters.

She smiled thinly. "I will tell my father that Olympus' intervention will not be necessary at this time. I would ask that it stays that way."

"I'll behave," I muttered, putting my glasses back on. "I'm not - I'm not like them. A monster. I'm not dangerous."

"All demigods can be," she replied. She turned to leave, stopping long enough to warn me. "Aphrodite is whole. The Five Ages of Man began with the Titan Lord's reign. The Titan Lord was the Sky Father's son, and he deposed him with the aid of his brothers and the Earth Mother."

What?

That wasn't what I was taught at all.

Kronos wasn't related to the Sky Father at all. Aphrodite was a hot mess and the Five Ages started way before the Titans were a thing!

"Do you understand?" Athena pressed. Her gray eyes bored into mine.

I didn't understand, but… "Yeah. I won't say otherwise."

A tension I hadn't noticed was even there drained out of her shoulders.

"Some knowledge," she explained softly. "It would be best if we forgot."

I shrugged one shoulder. I get it. Some things are dangerous, even just to know about. Like all the Names of my mother. There was a difference between knowing that her Names were dangerous, and forgetting she even had Names though. Forgetting you could call things up, doesn't mean it isn't a mistake forgetting how to put them down.

Just because you forgot history, doesn't mean it won't repeat.

"And that way…"I asked slowly. "The knowledge forgets about you?"

The Goddess of Wisdom didn't answer.

I'm not sure how long I sat in that lawn chair after she left. I tried to put my arm on the table, but it was broken. I don't remember when that happened. It had to have been me, Athena didn't seem the type for random destruction. I ended up hugging my canvas backpack to my chest, listening to strains of the campers singing songs I didn't know as the sun was swallowed by the horizon, just trying to accept that I was at Camp Half-Blood. I was always going to go. I had even been looking forward to it.

Cliff was a great friend, but he was my only friend.

I couldn't ask a classmate about the easiest way to kill a cyclops. I couldn't ask the kids that lived a floor under me how they figured out their divine powers. I couldn't go to the park and expect the kids throwing me a football to know the glory of audiobooks. I doubt anyone at the water park knew what it was like being hunted by monsters. To everyone at the library, the myths of gods and monsters, magic and giants, prophecies and heroes were just that.

Myths.

I could be just another kid here.

A demigod.

Like everyone else.

I sighed.

"Take a picture," I grunted.

"Percy, right?" The God of Wine grunted back.

"Yeah." I looked up at the God of Wine. He was frowning, but not at me, I think. He was just grumpy. "You got a nickname? Or…"

I have my own issues with the name 'Dionysus.'

"Mr. D is fine," he waved off. "We've got a curfew. You can stay outside all night, but the harpies will eat anything."

Yikes.

I followed him into the Big House.

"Most of the rooms are used as extensions of the infirmary, usually after Capture the Flag on Fridays." On one hand, aww, I missed Capture the Flag! On the other hand, what kind of Capture the Flag game needed an infirmary? "Chiron's office and rooms are over there. The driver is in the back. Mine are one floor up."

"Where is Chiron?" I asked.

"Off playing teacher at some mortal school," Mr. D grumped. "House call."

I nodded like that made sense.

"Third floor is mostly classrooms, a mail room and study rooms for antisocial brats." I smothered a smirk. Hope he wasn't referring to me. "Attic is off limits."

I already knew what was up there. The Oracle of Delphi. Her corpse, at least. She died ages ago. World War 2 or somewhen, I think. If I focused, I could feel her. A soft thrumming feeling running up and down my spine of borrowed power, feeling so very similar to Apollo's but twisted, somehow.

"I won't go looking for trouble," I promised.

Mr. D just gave me a look.

"Demigod," he said, pointing at me. "I'll believe it when I see it."

Oh, he'll see it, alright.

This would be a nice, quiet summer for me.

"You'll be staying here." He opened the door to a large bedroom. It was about the size of my room at home with a bed against the left wall, a nightstand and dresser for clothes. There was a desk and chair in the corner, an empty rack of shelves and a plush red carpet in the center of the room. I had a ceiling fan with a light, but it didn't look like air conditioning was a thing. A door off to the right led to a small half-bathroom. I could see Mr. D's influence in the potted grapevines by the lone window across from the door and in the slim bands of Celestial Bronze crossing the wood walls.

Celestial Bronze looked just like regular bronze, if regular bronze was polished to a mirror shine all the time and glowed. It was a godly metal, magically conductive, capable of killing monsters and wounding immortals.

In the low light, the bronze would be like a night light. That was cool.

Not that I needed a night light or anything.

I didn't.

It was just neat, using the metal like that, is all.

"This is really nice," I said with a smile. "Thanks, Mr. D."

"Yeah, yeah." He closed the door as he left and I could see there were Celestial Bronze bands on the door too, forming unbroken lines around the room when shut.

I took off my shoes and crawled onto the bed. It was a little high, and definitely big, but I'd grow into it. I dug into my backpack for my money bag. It was a soft, leather purse jingling with the sound of gold coins.

Authentic gold drachmas, the currency of Olympus. A little bigger than a quarter, stamped with various gods of the Dodekatheon on one side (usually Zeus) and the Empire State Building on the other, which would probably confuse the hell out of any historian of Ancient Greece.

Then out came my 'phone,' a small gold tablet with two large hieroglyphs in the center and smaller runic letters around the edges.

Time for a phone call home.

I rubbed the crowned half-circle symbol with my thumb and a rainbow flickered above the tablet.

"Oh Iris, goddess of the Rainbow, please accept my offering." I tossed a gold drachma into it and the rainbow swallowed it. "Dorian Stele, Manhattan."

Our kitchen appeared within the rainbow. Dad was sitting at the table, head in his arms with a nearly empty bottle of something nearby. I searched for a glass, but didn't find one. Had he been drinking straight out of the bottle?

Fuck.

"Dad!"

He jumped up.

"Percy - !" His flailing arm knocked the bottle over the side of the table and I winced as it smashed on the kitchen floor. "Shit!" He bent, his chair scraping across the floor with a screech, then thought better of reaching for the glass shards with his fingers. He took a step towards the pantry, stopped, swore again, running a hand through his hair. "Percy, I - "

"Dad, breathe. I'm okay. I'm fine."

He looked awful. He was pale and the bags under his eyes were dark. His eyes were red and there were stains on his shirt.

"You're okay," he repeated dully. "You're fine."

He fell back into his chair. It screeched again. A brown liquid was spreading across the floor from the broken bottle.

"I'm at Camp Half-Blood," I said as calmly as I could. "We talked about it before, remember?"

Please remember.

"Yes," he croaked, running a hand over his face. "I - I remember. Summer camp, like I did as a kid."

"That's right. You had fun, right?"

He took several deep breaths.

"Best times of my life," he murmured. "Parents sent me." His distant eyes searched the table before finding the bottle on the ground. "Oh," he said. His hands shook.

"Dad," I said slowly. "Where's Mom?"

He shuddered, as if hit.

"She - " He shrugged. "Gone. She left." My stomach twisted sharply as he let out a wounded sound. No, Mom - my parents loved each other. They were married. She wouldn't just leave. "She - she left me."

"Did she leave the ring?" I demanded. Dad flinched. "Dad! Did she leave the ring?"

"I don't - " He looked around, like he was trying to spot it on the counters. "I don't know."

"It's probably like five years ago, remember?" I said, feeling like I was going to explode. "Remember? She had to go, but she came back. She plans ahead, and sometimes she has to leave for a little while."

"Five years," He said blankly. "Five years ago?" His left hand traced patterns in the air. "You were...seven? Your - your birthday?"

"Yes! But she came back. It's just like that, okay? It's just like that." Apollo will be there tomorrow, I thought.

He better be.

"She'll come back," Dad breathed out. He ran a hand through his hair again. "Okay. Okay…" He blinked slowly and squinted at the microwave. "Shouldn't you be in bed?"

"I - third Friday." It hit me like a lightning bolt. Mom plans ahead. "Today's the third Friday of the month. I don't have a bedtime!"

Dad stared at me for a bit, and then his shoulders slumped. A sound that might have been a laugh left him. "You're not staying up all night taking care of me."

"Bite me." I said. I moved my backpack behind me so I could lean against it. "I got my own room at Camp," I started with. "I don't have to bunk with anyone and even have my own bathroom. Still need to use the communal shower though."

Dad huffed and ran a hand down his face. "Wouldn't be a summer camp without communal showers…"

I described Camp Half-Blood to him, everything that I saw on the walk to the Big House, as best I could. I told him about seeing Hestia with a minor detour reminding him why she was awesome, and my impressions of Mr. D and Athena. I talked about my day at school, as humiliating as it was, and the water park, my audiobook orders and how Grover the Dairy Queen counter server had actually been a satyr.

And then I just...talked to talk. Anything I could think of.

Dad needed me.

Eventually, Hypnos' pull grew too strong and I made the mistake of lying down when my neck complained.

I said something, but I can't remember what.

Dad laughed. "Good night, son."

I didn't sleep long. I woke up to my Spidey Sense screaming. The soft glow of Celestial Bronze on the walls shone through a spooky, heavy green mist.

There was someone on my bed.

I bolted upright, already reaching for the silver sword pendant on my necklace, but whoever it was lunged at the same time. I grunted as they pried my arm away from my weapon, and then I wheezed when their other hand closed on my throat.

"It's changed!" The Oracle of Delphi shrieked into my face. "It's changed!" Her emaciated skull loomed in the darkness. Her shriveled eye sockets burned with green light as wisps of mist curled out of her shrunken nose and billowed from her mouth. "Hear me, son of the Ruiner! Loosen the shackles and relinquish control!"

"I don't - " I choked out as I tried to kick her off. "I don't understand!"

Opening my mouth was a mistake.

The green mist rushed in and it was cold. Like ice fresh from the freezer, sticking and pulling all the way down my throat. The world spun as visions assaulted my mind. A horse and an eagle fighting, desolated cities, flowers bloomed and died within seconds, people I have never seen before fighting, talking, laughing, dying, monsters, giants - the images were coming faster. Too many. Too many! A great chasm opening in the middle of a park and my vision swooped down into it. Down. Down. Down.

Come down, little hero! Come down!

I heard a woman's voice. "I foresee the future. I cannot change it. It is a small blessing, but a greater curse."

You shall go west and face the god -

And fail without friends -

One shall perish by a parent's hand -

And lose a love to worse than death -

The forge and dove shall break the cage!

A half-blood child of the eldest gods -

To storm or fire must fall.

"Take it, boy." The Oracle sneered. I could feel it coiling within her. Apollo's borrowed power fed off a thread that felt like my mother, but lesser, infusing a soul and there was a dark, oily barbed wire strangling it all together. Binding it to the corpse with razor shards. I could feel it. The wire had reached out, raking across my mind. "Take it!"

I can't.

"Take it!"

I can't!

"I am the spirit of Delphi, speaker of the prophecies of Phoebus Apollo, slayer of the mighty Python!" I slammed my hands into her forearms. They gave with dry snapping sounds, but her grip just tightened. It wasn't the corpse I was fighting. I could barely see the light of the bronze. My lungs burned.

"Approach, seeker," she crooned. "And ask."

Anger replaced the fear. It was like something in me broke. All the stress of the day came out at once. A sudden strength flooded my body and my vision sharpened. I could see shapes within the green mist. The wrinkles in her dead skin. Every crack in her lips. Every strand of brittle hair. I abandoned trying to stop her, and reached out for her skull.

Take it.

Loosen the shackles.

The green fire in her eyes bored into mine.

Take it!

"Fine," I said and my voice resonated. The Spirit, the power, the curse, the soul. There was a burning, twisting, greedy tug in my gut, as if it had a mouth that had just opened up wide.

Take it!

And swallowed it all.

It felt…

Amazing.

I was powerful, I was aware, I could see, I was flying and I wanted more -

The light of the Celestial Bronze was suddenly blinding.

The wind beneath my wings stalled.

And like Icarus, I crashed hard.

 

[Shujin]

An Undertow of Sand
A PJO Fanfiction​

I tried to Dream. Habit, really. I'm asleep, I Dream.

When you sleep, your soul tends to roam. Usually, it ends up in this particular Dark in-between connected to the various Otherworlds of the pantheons. I vaguely remembered feeling Morpheus, a god of Dreams reach for me, like starbursts on my skin, but I was so out of it, I couldn't greet him back.

Morpheus loved mortals, always grabbing as many as he could, just like his dad. That's not a bad thing, he took good care of them. His brother Icelos was a different story. He had a few other Names. Phobetor was one of them, meaning 'Frightener.' Otherwise known as Nightmare. Demigods of all kinds could go further in this space in between, but if they don't learn properly, the best they could do was straddle the borders. Sometimes they Dream like mortals, sometimes they see Beyond into the Crossroads and sometimes they fall into the Dreamlands.

Like I did, when I was two years old.

It's basically Narnia. A whole new world under a red sun where Dreams reigned supreme. When night fell here, a shattered golden moon rose in its place. And just like our world, things lived here. Built cities and tamed the wilds. What could be tamed, I mean. There were deserts and oceans and forests. If you were careful and knew what you were doing and when to run, there was a lot to explore. The Spires, the Moon, the Flat, the Crystal Seas. There was the Pit.

You don't want to go there.

The Old and Elder Gods were known here, even if they weren't exactly worshiped.

Worship means getting attention. Getting attention was…

Complicated.

I landed in my home away from home in the Dreamlands like normal, but it was all wrong. It was like I was drunk. The furniture shimmered, stretched, duplicated and moved. The colors were off and the walls were partially see through. The miniature penthouse looked as solid as a soap bubble. There was light coming in through the windows of what I knew should be afternoon sunlight, but it was a ghostly blue color. There was a fire crackling in the hearth, but it was green. If I didn't know any better, it looked like I was Dreaming. But I did know better. I don't Dream like this.

The only thing that looked right was my orange and white pet tabby cat groggily blinking from his bed by the fireplace.

"The fuck -" The cat exclaimed as he looked around. He had an accent, so it sounded more like 'tha fook,' but I've gotten used to it. I'm sure you've heard worse. Don't cats talk in your Dreams?

Sam and I go way back. I practically fell on him my first time here. I'm still not sure if he's Dreaming like I am when he's here, or if he's awake and his home somewhere in the UK is the Dream. He's the one I learned the Queen's English from as a kid as Dad put it. It didn't do much to improve my vocabulary, but it certainly expanded it.

"Sam!" I called out and then winced. My voice was all echoes. Everything from his uneven whiskers down to the small crook in his tail was just as it should have been. So what was wrong with me? "What's going on?"

Sam sounded a bit uncertain as he asked, "Lil' Fucker?"

"Yeah?" I replied.

"What the fuck did you do?"

"Nothing!" I said quickly. "I think. I'm pretty sure. I got jumped by a zombie oracle - "

I was cut off by my entire apartment buckling inwards - a loud bang rumbled through me as something slammed into the front door. I glanced out the window and saw a dense jungle filled with brightly colored flowers and dark, dark shadows. The trees looked like they were moving as shapes flitted above in the canopy. We were nestled in the side of some kind of pyramid made out of stone blocks as big as my body. A staircase for giants led the way down into a wiggling darkness.

I had no idea where we were.

That's bad.

Sam's ears folded back on his head as his tail puffed.

"He's not in!" Sam screamed back at the door. "Fuck off!"

You got visitations here too. Like I said, things lived here. Friendly neighbors with cookies. A bum down on their luck. A few of Sam's friends for a round of poker. Some gawkers who'd never seen a half-mortal before. Lost wildlife looking for a meal.

Twisted, shrieking cultist abominations.

You know. Missionaries?

I took an unsteady step towards the door. Everything tilted back and forth like I was on a ship. "I can take the call. It's fine."

"Uh huh." Sam looked me up and down.

I looked down at myself and saw an amorphous blob of gray smoke covered in burning green eyes. Which was not great. Also, weird as hell. This wasn't something that usually happened to me. At all. I didn't even know where to begin . I guess that explained my voice? Did Morpheus do something to me when I passed the border? Why? I watched my leg try and fail to form a solid shape as I took another step. I tried to concentrate and a gold-silver rippled sword blinked into existence.

And then fell straight through the blob that was my 'hand' to the floor.

We both stared at it.

"Bullshit," Sam summed it up.

The apartment shuddered again. Something was yelling, but it sounded like they were garbling golf balls while screaming into a wind tunnel. A trickle of unease jolted down my back. It wasn't going away. Why wasn't it just going away?

"His Royal Highness, the Tail-Puller - " Sam was never going to let that go. I was two! It's been a decade! "Is currently fucking indisposed! Come back later!" Whatever was out there didn't like that answer and the door groaned as another impact crashed. The cat looked up at the ceiling. "I do not get fucking paid enough for this shit."

"You're right, you deserve a bonus," I offered as whatever passed for my stomach now crunched into a little ball. I still don't know what was out there. If I left, Sam was going to have to deal with it. I shouldn't be worried about him. Sam lived here. He didn't need me to look out for him, but I couldn't help it. "The whole spread, whatever you feel like."

"Damn straight." He stretched along the floor, even as the hairs on his back reached for the ceiling. "So, zombie oracle?"

"Uh, yeah." My brain flailed for a moment, before my mouth blurted out, "I think I ate her."

"What the fuck." The walls shook and Sam groaned, rolling his eyes towards the door. "For the love of - would you kindly go fuck yourself!" There was more yelling from outside. "Ya think I give a fuck mate!?"

Another bang rattled the walls. There was a loud roaring sound, like somebody was trying to out-compete a drunken rock concert in the distance, with the sound suddenly echoing off like it had other things to do.

I tried to bite my lip and felt my 'face' wiggle as I willed one of the windows open. I let out a small laugh of relief when it worked and Sam's ears relaxed. "Can you make the jump?"

The orange tabby's tail flicked towards himself. "Fucking cat."

"Sorry." I watched him jump up on the window sill and peer out. "Talk later?"

"Sure. We'll chew the cud, kill some things, whatever." Sam looked back at me and his cat green right eye swirled into a burning orange matching the now molten stripes on his fur. I felt a phantom hook drag itself through my insides, pulling me out and away. The apartment began to fade away, leaving just the walls and the window. "Zombie oracles - the things that fuck puts in his fucking mouth, I swear..."

He was never going to let that go either.

The walls imploded as something broke through and the last I saw of Sam was his crooked tail as he jumped. I think I saw what came in, but I couldn't be sure. It did something funny to my eyes as I was tossed out of the Dreamlands.

Morpheus caught me on the slingshot. Maybe he said something. Maybe he laughed. I burbled back a thanks as best I could as he passed me back into his father's realm. Hypnos, the god in charge of Sleep's ever grasping presence found me immediately and pulled me close.

Usually people don't really remember being asleep. You are aware of it, trust me. It's just a hard feeling to hold on to. I guess it was like floating in still water. There was nothing to hear, or see, or taste. I drifted. What little I could feel was Hypnos' grip, like a reflection on glass. You know what that's like, right? Ever feel like you woke up from a Dream and you get up to go about your day, but then you wake up from a Dream?

Don't worry. That just means you were interesting.

There was a moment when I thought - maybe I imagined - something or someone else noticed me?
I don't know why a Primordial would ever bother with me.

Uh, Hypnos? Hyp - buddy, I think we've got a visitor - !

Hypnos grip went from gentle to restraining, dragging me further down into Sleep. Concepts wormed into my mind as the god approached. Hypnos' pride and congratulations was more comforting than it should have been. The logical part of my brain was screaming its little heart out, reminding me that not all of Mom's Names were safe for mortals, but I was asleep. The logical mind did not rule here.

Oh.

Hypnos sent me a vision of a planet cracking open, releasing a creature that reached into space with a lot of reaching claws and ten heads screaming a note that killed the sun.

So...like your mom? I get it.

I could feel his pride.

The star was close enough to see. It was in the shape of a dark haired woman in a star studded black dress, but her shadow loomed behind her as a massive, reaching shape. With every step she took, the shadow gained more definition, more mass. Vague shapes were birthed from her shadow, vanishing into the aether or being consumed. One escaped towards me and it was a deformed thing. Lopsided almost, with too many limbs on one side, eyes all over and its mouths eating its own face. Hypnos crushed it with a thought and its blood was green slime.

Something told me I didn't really want to see his mother up close.

But that wasn't a reason to be rude.

Hi, Hypnos' mom!

The woman smiled as she came to a stop a safe distance away, her shadow's form hazy to my eyes. She was close enough for her shadow to dwarf her son, like a writhing cage. Her head tilted like a curious dog as she looked me up and down. She asked a question.

I'm Percy, uh - ma'am...?

I know, I know! Ma'am? But I'm really not a 'My Lady' kind of guy. 'Aunt' was technically not true. I could name her as Nyx, but Names to an Elder God were avatars. They were always there. The only difference is by how much and the god behind the Night was very much there. I could see it in her eyes.

A dark star looking back.

Your son's awesome. Sleep is great.

She agreed with me, obviously. And I got a compliment! That...didn't make any sense to me whatsoever.

Um, thank you?

Her smile widened. I got the sense of amusement/curiosity/adventure. And - a gift?

Oh shit.

Wha - no, no, no, no that's okay - !

OGTHROD AI'F GEB'L-EE'H VEEM'ARFH 'NGAH'NG AI'Y ZHRO!
…
...
I'm just a demigod? So it was probably some weird thing that my ADHD brain did sometimes.

All too soon, I woke up.

I regretted it.

My body felt like there was a millipede in stilettos tap dancing on my every nerve and a scorpion made a nest in my mouth. My tongue was dry and nasty and every one of my teeth hurt. My nose had that ache that told me I slept with my sunglasses on. I felt like I was swollen, like my skin was pulled a bit too tight. My brain might have been dribbling out of my ears. I groaned out loud and went to pull my blanket over my head.

"Don't move."

I froze in place, caught mid-blink. My hands hung in the air with one leg twisted over the other as I obeyed the voice. Which - I don't - the hell? There's no way that came from a human. Whoever they were, they sounded like how I imagined an octopus sounded speaking English underwater.

Just bizarre.

"Wait, I think he's actually awake this time," said a voice I definitely recognized. Whatever force was holding me disappeared and I collapsed back into my -

Chair?

I pried my eyes all the way open.

I was in one of the lawn chairs on the porch around the Big House in front of a card table with a blanket over my body and a pillow under my head. The first thing I saw was the valley running all the way up to the water which glittered like sapphires about a mile in the distance. Were we on Long Island? Yesterday, the setting sun had given everything a surreal look, but now the marble columns of ancient Greek architecture shone proudly in the afternoon sun. Kids were everywhere I looked. Playing volleyball in a nearby sandpit with satyrs, shooting arrows at targets in an archery range, milling around the cabins, riding horses with wings.

A strong breeze blew through, drawing my attention to an unclaimed glass of iced apple juice in front of me, complete with the fluttering little pink paper parasol I had noticed and a slice of lime on the rim. A teenaged boy about sixteen years old with hair of spun gold and the sun in his blue eyes was sitting next to me on a wooden stool. He had on a bright orange T-shirt like most of the kids running around the Camp and ratty jeans with flip flops. He finished shuffling his deck of cards and held a hand up in my face.

"Paladad," my Dungeons and Dragons Bardson said with the perfect grin I was still jealous of. "Do you feel better after seeing my gorgeous face? Do I brighten your day? Are you basking in my glory?"

I stared at him.

He sighed. "How many fingers am I holding up?"

"Three," I croaked back. My voice was hoarse, but at least it didn't echo.

"English!" He exclaimed. "He's good." The man, the myth, the legend of literally cursed dice because he won't apologize to Tyche for being an idiot, the Disaster Bard Phoebus Apollon himself squinted at me. "You are good, right?"

"Why are you asking me?" I rasped. "God of Medicine?"

Talking back to a Greek god? Leave it to a professional, don't try this at home, kids. Don't say I didn't warn you.

"Because I can never tell with you." Apollo frowned at me. "Smartass."

"What kind of doctor are you?"

"There is no medical certification for demigod bullshit."

Like I told Athena, Apollo found me when I was five years old. What I didn't tell her was that he never left. It was too far to say he raised me. But he helped. I loved my parents, but I knew they weren't perfect. Grandpa loved telling me that my birthday present when I was two years old was a stuffed animal and learning that my father was being discharged from the psychiatric hospital.

And I was Mom's first demigod.

Seven years ago, Mom still had a bit of trouble being human all the time. Sometimes the Elder God bled through. She had pushed a little too hard and I saw too much. It was the start of the major visions that made me seize up, just like Dad told Trinity. I was five years old. Young children break easily. Being a demigod, I was sturdier than most, so I bounced back. What I did remember from that event was feeling Mom's raw regret. I went outside - or was led outside? Left outside? - and Apollo then face planted on our balcony in front of me wearing a white blazer and missing a shoe. I thought he was an angel, like the ones my grandmother told me about. Just very clumsy. He'd reached for me with a drop or two of golden blood dripping out of his broken nose, awe and fear on his face.

'Found you!' Were his first words to me as he picked me up.

'You die sad,' were mine to him. His ghost was the first one I saw. Mom - Ananke - made her presence known then. Apollo had very slowly, very gently put me back down and then scrambled back, accidentally launching himself into the pool. I threw him a floatie, as the angel was too busy freaking out at the attention of the Primordial of Fate to remember how not to drown.

After he pulled himself out, dried himself off and straightened his nose, Mom shaped thin sunglasses out of thin air in front of us. They deposited themselves in Apollo's hands as he gaped.

'These...I think these are yours.'

'Cool!'

'You got a name, kid?'

'Perseus, you?'

'Apollo! The Greek god of the sun!'

'Cooool!'

I got the whole story later. Apollo had been looking for a 'Disturbance in the Force' for years when he spotted me on that balcony. He tried to teleport, couldn't because Mom warded our home and instead of memorizing the location for later like a normal person, decided to blind jump off the fucking sun chariot.

Like a moron.

He didn't stop to think that maybe something that could stop his teleport could maybe flay him alive.

Which she could.

"Since when did you need certs, god of Healing?" I pointed out. "Don't you have thousands of years of experience?"

"Look, you little shit," Apollo sighed as he turned back to his cards. "Are you good or not?"

There was a snort and I realized that Apollo wasn't the only god at the table. Across from me on the other side, Athena and Mr. D sat in their own chairs watching the sun god deal the cards. Athena had a half and half blouse on, one side plain white and the other covered in blue and red geometric patterns. Mr. D's Hawaiian shirt was covered in coconuts with red and white straws sticking out of them.

I had no idea why three Olympians were here.

No. Wait.

Zombie oracle.

"He better be," a girl huffed and I swung my aching eyes around to my other side. "Aren't you supposed to be some super demigod and not some weirdo?"

"Weirdo," I repeated.

Like she was one to talk.

"That's Drew," Apollo jumped back in, leaning into my line of sight. He was grinning, but his eyes were warning me. "Drew Tanaka, newly claimed Daughter of Aphrodite."

Weird Girl was a little younger than me, maybe? But she couldn't seem to decide what she looked like. It was like she was two different girls and was constantly shifting features between them. One girl had pale skin, almond shaped brown eyes, a small mouth and short straight black hair. The other had a mocha skin tone, large hazel eyes, a pouty mouth and red-brown wavy hair. Every time she moved, or even just breathed, her form changed. Borrowing noses, swapping chins, altering ears.

Wait.

I'm not sure it was a blink-and-you-miss-it kind of thing. It might have been an attune-to-the-right-frequency kind of thing. The girl had a third form, I think.

And it didn't look human at all.

"Aphrodite, huh?" I said slowly. Not what I expected. Not gonna lie. "That's cool."

She scowled at me and crossed her arms. There was a - was that seaweed? - bracelet on her right wrist with a large pearl shimmering with all the colors of a rainbow woven into it. It was faint, but I think I could feel divine energy coming from it.

"What do you mean by that?"

"Uh, nothing?" I said blankly. Why was I getting the feeling nothing I ever did was going to be the right thing with this girl? "Daughter of Sea and Sky, one of the Olympians…" I gingerly sat up in my chair, feeling everything scream. "Love is cool."

She stared at me like she was trying to catch me out on a lie. The hazel of her eyes seemed to shatter into a kaleidoscope of colors for a second. I felt something. Maybe a pull? And I pushed back?

Her eyes were brown as she looked away. "Whatever."

I tried.

"Okay. Who pissed in your Cheerios?"

Honest question.

Annoying Girl just sneered at me and turned towards Athena. "Am I free to go, my Lady?"

The goddess glanced towards Apollo who nodded as he bid his cards. Athena gave the girl a small smile. "Continue to learn as quickly as you did today, and you will go far. Thank you for your assistance."

"Your welcome, my Lady!"

I watched her flounce off, confused. " Assistance?"

Apollo passed me the glass of apple juice, making sure not to let go until I had a good drip on it. I took a sip and even knowing it probably wasn't apple juice, it still took me by surprise. It tasted exactly like Mom's honey mead. It was rich, sweet and it even burned a little on the way down. The pain slowly began to drain away as I drank what I now knew to be nectar. Drink of the gods. It would always take on the flavor of what you liked most. Chouchen, I think Mom's mead was called. I was allowed one small glass every New Year and tasting it now, I could almost pretend nothing was wrong.

Almost.

"Assistance with what?" I asked as I took a sip.

"Stopping you from tearing off your arms and beating everyone to death with them," Mr. D grunted as he picked up some cards, discarding others.

I spat out my drink.

"Ignore him," Apollo said, rolling his eyes. He cleaned me up with a flick of his fingers. "It wasn't that bad. You had some seizures in your sleep." Oh, visions. That's weird. I've never had a vision in my sleep before. Or, maybe I did and just didn't remember it? "Like the ones you had when you were five."

So. Bad.

Like the one I had at school yesterday.

"And we have got to work on your lines, man. Asking a girl who pissed in her Cheerios is not a winning strategy. Take it from me."

"I don't understand how she helped," I ignored him, like usual. "She's like nine. And rude."

Athena played her turn. What game are they even playing? Rummy? Poker?

"Rarely, a child of Aphrodite inherits more from the Sea than others." The goddess raised a slight eyebrow at me as her eyes shone. I understood. That was the cover story, and probably the reason Drew Tanaka had a pearl bracelet that screamed divine gift on her wrist. A Mist cloak, maybe?

She was one of the goddess' defects.

Demigods inherited from the Names the godparent had them in. That's how you could get this kid of Zeus throwing around lightning bolts, this one with super strength, that one was pretty and none ever with the divine ability to enforce Laws.

Not even Zeus was that stupid.

As far as I knew, it worked the same way for the Old and Elder Gods.

It's just that Aphrodite was a special case.

She was broken.

Athena studied her cards. "They have an ability similar to Siren Song and you needed to be restrained."

So the octopus command voice had been Love Brat.

I crunched on my ice. "Restrained?"

"You were hurting yourself - " Apollo started.

"On the anti 'get fucked' measures." Mr. D finished. Both of his siblings glared at him. "Just saying," he waved his Diet Coke around. "I was this close to popping you like a pimple and letting Father sort it out."

I crunched on my second ice cube. "That wouldn't have ended well."

"We know," all three gods replied.

I smiled innocently. "Just saying."

Mr. D glared at me.

"So, you got a Camper from Aphro - " I paused. Drew Tanaka, newly claimed , Apollo had said. "You brought someone to Camp to help me?"

"To help me," the God of Wine, Mr. D corrected before bidding. "What, you thought the bronze on the walls was for decoration?"

"Uh, yeah, actually," I said.

Guess it wasn't a fancy night light.

It was a cage.

Figures.

"Suppressors?" I asked quietly. If you needed to bind something with divinity, Celestial Bronze and Adamantine. Stygian Iron technically works, I guess. If you are mostly-dead, you are automatically not a problem. "I'm not dangerous."

I'm not!

My gut clenched as I looked towards the sun god. He knew me almost as well as my parents did. He knew me.

I'm not.

Apollo winced. I could see him searching for the words. "Percy…"

"It was an emergency measure only to be used as needed." Athena said calmly. "Are you able to tell me truthfully that you were absolutely of no danger to anyone last night?"

I cringed. My chest felt tight. She didn't even look at me, setting aside a pair of her cards as I thought back. I remembered the high I had been riding before the light of the Celestial Bronze hit me. I could almost still feel it. The sensation of flying, like I didn't have a body weighing me down. I should have felt horrified, I realized. Not free.

Congratulations to me.

I tapped into my inherited divinity, like I've been trying for years.

I ate the Oracle of Delphi.

And I had wanted more.

"As I said, we are unfamiliar with your caliber of demigod." Athena reminded me. "We developed a means of rudimentary control for the son of Night. He was blind. Lethargic during the day, but under his mother's influence - "

"Good kid, Chiron said. Hard working, he said. Means well, he fucking said." Mr. D grumbled. "He's just fucking batshit, no big deal."

Athena smiled thinly over her cards. "And the Pit's daughter was... difficult to put down."

I swallowed hard.

"Sorry," I whispered. I didn't know what else to say. I felt like Athena lanced a boil I didn't know I had.

All demigods could be dangerous.

The Goddess of Wisdom inclined her head as she drew cards. "Training demigods is the purpose of this Camp. If we can avoid a repeat?"

"Yeah," I replied, staring down into my empty glass. No more eating oracles. Easy. "That sounds like a plan." Apollo clicked his fingers, refilling my glass with more nectar. Athena's eyes narrowed, studying me as I started drinking. Halfway through the glass, my pain was down to 'mildly sunburned with some cavities,' which was a huge step up from before. The taste of Chouchen reminded me. "'Pol', my dad?"

"I'm with him," he reassured me as he played his turn. "He's a bit hungover, but okay."

"He was...a little confused," I admitted. In my peripheral vision, I saw Mr. D go to say something, only for Athena to stop him with a shake of her head.

"He was rattled a bit." They played a few rounds before Athena claimed victory with a short 'royal marriage' and her brothers groaned. "From his point of view," Apollo continued. "He just got told his wife got in trouble with Olympus and possibly her own pantheon for raising you. For all he knows, we can't send you home until she divorces him."

I bit my tongue until I tasted blood.

Apollo nudged me with his shoulder. "It's going to be okay," He said quietly. "Your mom's almost as awesome as I am. Trust me."

I did trust him.

He was basically my big brother.

I know it's a bit unusual for a demigod to claim that of an Olympian, but in my defense, he grows on you.

Like mold.

"So Percy," Apollo pointed a finger gun at me. "We need to talk."

I was suddenly filled with dread. "Yeah?"

"Starting with the quality of women you let in your bed."

Mr. D snorted into his soda.

"I did not let - " Like my mother, Apollo thinks he's funny. He's not. "Do you have to say it like that?" I handed him my glass when he opened his mouth. "No, don't - I'm not - it was your zombie oracle!"

"And she was a damn fine one!" Apollo said indignantly, tossing the glass over his shoulder. It hit the porch and vanished. "Eighty years ago."

I was not doing this.

I threw up my hands. "Why was she even in my room?"


The sun god immediately pointed accusing fingers towards his half-sister.

"Ask her," he nearly snarled.

Athena's thin eyebrows rose. "I had nothing to do with - "

"You grilled me for hours." He held out his hand and all the playing cards fluttered into it, like animated paper birds. He was still frowning as he shuffled. "Hours. On the stupidest shit . You dragged Father into it!"

"You were being unreasonable."

"Does Eater of the Bloody Tongues ring a bell?"

"That does not excuse keeping us completely ignorant. " Athena caught herself getting heated, leaning back into her chair with a small frown. She carefully spoke. "A Protogenoi had a child would have sufficed. You did not need to tell us which one."

"Prophecy," Apollo countered flatly. "As if we would have voted to leave it at that with Olympus on the line. Can you imagine if the Child of Prophecy was of the Pit? What happens? Of Earth? Even Night, Father would risk it."

"He would not," Athena protested.

Her brothers just looked at her.

The only sound between the three Olympians was the shuffling of cards. After a bit, Apollo began to deal them out, including me.

"I wanted some good news," he said quietly. "I thought someone had qualified for a Quest and it would change the subject from you, Perce. So I signed off on it." He shrugged and smiled, but it looked a little brittle. "God of Prophecy, single handedly stops war, because he's that cool."

Mr. D rolled his eyes at the sudden haiku (I can recognize haikus. Apollo has ruined me) and I would have too, if not for one word.

"War?"

My D&D party member god waved a careless hand. "Dad's Bolt was stolen months ago."

"Apollo." Athena said sharply.

"No," was all he said, but it had the same energy as 'fuck you.' He turned to me. "Remember the rules for pinochle?"

My mind was spinning. Zeus' Master Bolt had been stolen? Months ago? That was actually pretty big. I could care less what it meant to Zeus' ego, anyone smart would be more worried about a god level WMD floating around who knows where. When I say god-level, think nuclear bomb aimed at Oklahoma, but capable of making Texas into something it would never accomplish on its own: being its own country.

Moat and everything.

What did - well it was Zeus so that meant he spent those months blaming people. Or a person, I guess. I would bet this month's allowance that it was Poseidon. Either him or Hades, depends on who he argued with last, but it was the Sea God. And I could not think of a single reason for Poseidon to do that? So he probably didn't have his brother's oversized sparkler and to say Zeus was stubborn would be an understatement.

Ugh.

Might explain those freak storms we had this winter. Did someone really swipe the Master Firecracker during Winter Solstice?

And they hadn't used it yet. It would be really obvious if they did. What were they waiting for?

I grabbed my cards. "I thought you said pinochle was a shit game."

Mr. D gasped. "How dare you."

Apollo wagged a finger at him. "God of Truth!"

"So your oracle...lied to you?" I asked and Apollo paused. His face scrunched into a thoughtful frown as he set his cards down. He was quiet as Mr. D and Athena played their turns in silence. The Greek god of the sun was actually thinking. It was a rare occurrence and none of us wanted to fuck it up for him.

I hesitantly bid under Apollo's considering look.

"Maybe she didn't?" He finally said as he drew cards.

"I didn't get a Quest." I felt compelled to point out. I didn't get a Prophecy either. Just nonsense. Apollo would know the moment a real Prophecy got made. That was his thing. It didn't mean anything.

"I got a murder attempt."

"I'm the god of Truth, not Facts." He defended himself. "Maybe it was true, from a certain point of view."

"Not the Star Wars quotes."

"Wait a minute," Athena cut in, sounding strangely thrilled. "You think he might - "

"I lost it, yeah," Apollo said, still looking at me. "That doesn't exactly mean it's gone."

I froze mid-draw as what they were implying hit me. They think I might have taken the oracle spirit when I ate her. "You mean -"

"Maybe."

"No."

"I said maybe."

"There must be some tests we could conduct." Athena said the word 'tests' like she meant 'dissect' which was not filling me with confidence. "Perhaps a resonance sampling against the Grove of Dodona, or one of the other oracles you've been neglecting."

"I haven't been neglecting - " Athena gave him an incredulous look and Apollo corrected himself. "I got better!"

She didn't bother responding to him. "As the son of Fate, you do have some prophetic talents, don't you?"

I felt trapped. "But. Mom said - "

"That she wouldn't let you hold an Oracle." Apollo rubbed his chin. " Technically, you aren't holding it. You're not a girl which is important. You didn't swear to me which is necessary. Your mother out ranks whatever blessing the Fates would have given you and it's not possessing you because of...whatever it was you did to it." He tilted his head. "Just to be thorough, what did you do to it?"

"I ate it," I said numbly. I wondered if I could throw it up.

"You - " he stopped. "Right. Okay." He breathed in through his nose heavily, making his nostrils flare. "Percy. Get your cards."

I opened my mouth to ask if he was serious, but I couldn't get the words out. He was serious. I bit my lip and reached down to the left of my chair for my canvas backpack. As I pulled it up into my lap, Mr. D's blood shot eyes widened as he tried to understand where it came from.

"What the - "

"A gift. From my mother." I opened one of the pouches on the front and pulled out the aluminum tin case holding my deck. I rubbed my thumb over the etching of Mt. Olympus on the front before opening the latch. The sound was unexpectedly loud, making me flinch.

"Okay," I muttered as I dug out my cards.

The thin geometric patterns of black and silver that decorated the back of every Mythomagic card was intimidating. If you've never heard of Mythomagic, it's a modern take on Magic: The Gathering. Collectible cards with the theme of Greek mythology. You had character cards like Apollo and Athena, hero cards like Hercules, monster cards like the Hydra, item cards like Vial of Centaur Blood, etc. I knew how to play and it was fun, but I also knew how to read them like they were Greek tarot.

Nothing fancy or anything. Vague warnings or foretelling.

I shuffled my cards. I placed the deck on the table and drew the first card.

Zeus, King of Olympus.

Fuck.

"It doesn't mean anything," I said before anyone could say anything.

It didn't mean anything at all.

I drew the next card and the next until I had my usual four cards in a line on the table. I took a breath and stopped my drifting hand from picking a fifth card.

"Percy…" Apollo said slowly.

I gritted my teeth, clenching my traitorous hand in my lap and trapping it with my other one. I stared down at my four cards and knew they made no sense. I had years of practice at this sort of thing. I could feel it down to my bones. That feeling pooled in my gut like I had swallowed a jar of tadpoles. As I stared down at my cards, I felt like I was looking at my Latin exam all over again and the letters were playing musical chairs.

The reading was incomplete.

Finish it.

My fingers uncurled. My body relaxed. I drew a fifth card. And then a sixth. I kept drawing, carefully placing each card at equal distance from the previous until I had two even rows of six. Twelve cards. I felt the soft click in my brain and knew I was done. My dyslexia took a back seat, allowing me to read them. Or maybe I wasn't reading them with my brain. I was aware I was shaking as I reached out and picked up one of the cards in the first row.

I buy packs of Mythomagic cards sometimes. Just to get new cards, it was a collectible game after all. Just like Pokémon, Magic: The Gathering or even baseball cards. The more unique cards I had, the more I could refine my readings. When you could only read four cards, every little bit helps.
It got real old, real quick drawing Thanatos, the God of Death card only to figure out later it meant I was going to stub my toe. Now I got bad news in the form of Moros, the God of Doom and annoying things were Koalemos, the God of Stupidity. I kept an eye out for what I was still missing from the collection. It wasn't a perfect system, but it worked out alright.

I flipped the card in my hand around, showing Apollo The Oracle of Trophonius card.

He blinked and then smiled. "Oh yeah! That - "

"I don't have this card," I whispered and the god's mouth shut with a click. "I don't know where it came from." I swallowed. "'Pol'. I don't have this card."

He took it from me. "Breathe, kid."

I tried to.

I don't want to be an oracle. I can't be an oracle. I just wanted to be a normal Camper. Make friends. Have fun.

Go home.

Mom, I prayed, Tell me this is a joke. You didn't mean it.

"You're not my oracle," Apollo said, as if he had read my mind. "You didn't swear anything to anyone. You're not mine."

I don't know what I felt from my mother in response to my prayer. It was alien. Like she jumbled several concepts together and the translation just tickled my brain. I almost understood. It was like I just tried to read a message in the reflection of a funhouse mirror.

And I'm dyslexic.

What? Mom?

I understood the next message.

Patience.

This was -

This was actually happening.

As Apollo placed the Oracle of Trophonius back into its place between the cards of Hermes, God of Thieves and Artemis, Goddess of the Hunt, Athena abandoned her seat in favor of the empty chair next to me.

"Fascinating," she breathed and I fought the urge to hit her. That would not help. "Card reading as a means of divination is a more chthonic tradition."

Chthonic means Underworld, more or less. It's the realm of the dead and the home of Elder Gods like Nyx and Tartarus which means the usual translation is 'Bad Juju.'

"But this is undoubtedly a Prophecy," Athena finished.

Her eyes shone as she traced the cards with her fingertips. She probably had a dozen potential meanings already bouncing around her skull.

"Better than that!" Apollo laid a very warm hand on my shoulder and squeezed gently as he picked up an item card from the line up. Zeus' Lightning Bolt. "It's a Quest!"

"Yay." Mr. D deadpanned. "Are we going to make the little shits draw lots then? Rock Paper Scissors? Sudden death match!"

"I've never…" I swallowed. "I've never read for other people. Just myself."

Athena made a considering sound. I could almost see the puzzle pieces being put together in her head. "You issued a Quest for yourself?"

Please no.

"Secondaries were two out of the four if not negated by three, right?" Apollo mused, remembering the rules for how I read my cards. He was the one who helped me figure it out. He hovered over the card of Boreas, God of the North Wind. His brow furrowed. "Which means assuming it's not you, and expanding for the number, it's…"

He picked up the sixth card. It was of his twin sister Artemis, Goddess of the Hunt.

Athena scoffed. "It is likely an allusion to her domain as a literal interpretation of the task required."

Apollo glanced at her, but pinned me with burning blue eyes. "Percy?"

"Uh." My mouth was dry. There were protective older brothers and then there was Apollo.
He wasn't older, but don't try to tell him that.

"She...literally goes on Quests all the time for Olympus?" My mouth said without the thumbs up from my brain.

It was just so obvious?

Killing monsters was her job which I was led to believe was at least 80% of demigod Quests. The other 20% was a scavenger hunt.

"Her Domain allows for tracking objects or people." I began to list off. "She's practiced at moving among mortals. She can kill monsters and mortals without breaking any rules and has almost as much leeway for travel through godly Domains as Hermes."

If I was Zeus trying to find my OverCompensator Plus Ultra, my first pick would be Artemis. That's because something like the Master Bolt flat out can't be directly stolen by another god. It would just return to its true owner. However, it can be stolen by a mortal or a monster. Something funky with the metaphysics of Domains. A god like Hades could challenge Zeus and take the Bolt after beating his ass into the ground, but he can't steal it. He would need a mortal Champion to do that. And when it comes to mortals, there are Ancient Laws against just smiting every annoyance.

That doesn't mean they can't kill you, because they very much can. They just can't do it directly. Even indirect smitings still have to work within their Domains. If a god wants you to not be a thing, they have to get you to Challenge them somehow. That way they can do whatever they want to you. If you didn't Challenge them, their hands were tied.

Unless that god is Artemis.

Hunt was an exception. Always has been.

"And she already failed once finding Father's Bolt!" Mr. D crowed. Athena grimaced as Apollo gritted his teeth. "Brat's got a point."

Athena took Artemis' card from Apollo before he set it on fire. She studied it as if she wasn't sure it should even exist.

"There is a card for her Name as Goddess of the Moon, isn't there?" She asked suddenly.

"Yeah." I offered a smile that probably looked like a grimace. "All of the Dodekatheon get multiple versions of their cards."

'Dodekatheon' was the Greek term for the Twelve Thrones of the Olympic Assembly, the highest level of government in the Greek pantheon. Which meant Apollo was basically a senator.

Weird, right?

Athena's eyes darted back to the card table. "King of Olympus. God of Thieves," she said thoughtfully. The puzzle pieces were shifting around in her head again. "What can you tell us about this card?"

She picked up the tenth card. The Right Hand of Kronos, the Titan Lord.

Fuck if I know.

I said the first thing that came to mind. "It's banned in tournaments."

Athena rolled her eyes and Apollo cracked a small smile.

"Uh, there are five cards in total?" I kept talking. I don't know why. Did I even have that card? I can't remember if I had that card. "Right and Left Hand, Right and Left Leg and Head. If you assemble all the pieces of the Titan Lord in your hand, you automatically win. It's game over."

Apollo wasn't smiling anymore.

Athena dropped the card back onto the table as if it had burned her. I knew why. You know the story, right? It was my bonus question on my Latin exam from Mr. Brunner. Kronos got a Prophecy saying he was going to be overthrown, so the paranoid asshat decided to eat all his children so that they couldn't do the overthrowing. They got free and went to war with the Titans for ten years. And when they won, they cut their immortal father up into a thousand pieces and threw him into the Pit.

They were still a little angry.

The victors established Mt. Olympus and the rest was history.

Kronos is not dead, though.

Mr. D sighed like Christmas had been canceled. He got up from his chair. He pointed to me with his Diet Coke can.

"I hate you."

Then he walked away.

"Fuck you too, buddy," I muttered.

I did not ask for this.

"What else?" Athena demanded sharply.

I looked over the cards wildly. "I don't - I don't know! We - she - needs to go north maybe? Moros and Despoina together is probably bad? I - " My eyes caught on the Oracle of Trophonius card. Something in my mind was pulling at me. Oracle of Trophonius and Despoina, Goddess of Mystery. Connected? Then wouldn't it be better to put them...like this? Moros, God of Doom and Geras, God of Old Age were...beside? Boreas, God of the North Wind…

I started to arrange the cards. Some invisible counter in my mind kept track of the draw order. Four, four, four, it whispered as I moved Hermes, God of Thieves to the right. Eight, eight, eight. The Cydonian Cincture. Twelve, twelve, twelve. A Harpe Sword. When I was done, there was a circular pattern on the card table that looked like a wheel. Or maybe some kind of star? There was space for a thirteenth card in the upper left 'corner.'

And I was exhausted.

I slumped back into my chair, head on the pillow and stared up at the fluffy white clouds in the sky.

"Time-gated," I said. Even my voice sounded weak. "It's not active yet."

I was too tired to feel relieved.

"You did good, kid," Apollo murmured. "First times can be a little rough, and messy and unsatisfying, but practice makes perfect!"

I rolled my eyes. "Dude."

"What?" I could hear the smile in his voice. "I'm talking about Prophecies , obviously. Get your mind out of the gutter."

I groaned.

I heard the chair creak as Athena stood up. "This may not be what you want, Percy, but remember that should the Lords of Sea and Sky go to war, millions will be collateral damage."

I grimaced. I guess. I was being selfish. I wanted friends, but not at the cost of putting my Dad in danger. Not if I could help it.

And.

Saving everyone else would be great too.

She leaned over the table, examining the cards. "And your ability is remarkable. No petitioners or requests required. You simply tire rather than losing consciousness and memory. A time-gated Prophecy. " She straightened, tapped the table and turned to go. "If there are any more developments from the Oracle of Chthon, inform me."

Apollo gave a low whistle. "Chthon?"

She gave her half-brother a superior look over her shoulder. "Do you have a better idea?"

She turned the corner of the Big House and I knew she was gone.

My Disaster Bard grinned. "Sun god's protege, growing into his awesome, credit to the team!"

We never should have let Apollo go to Japan. His haikus were garbage.

"Your oracle still tried to kill me," I said, tired. My eyelids were starting to get heavy.

"But didn't!" He said as if that excused everything. "I've been trying to do something about her for decades. Not the solution I would have picked, but your mom plans ahead. I have faith in you."

I think my heart grew three sizes. I couldn't help my pleased smile. "Thanks, Bardson."

"Anytime, Paladad!" He fluffed my pillow with a wave of a finger. "Take a nap. Eat something later." His voice lowered a bit. "And about my sister - never mind. Maybe it just means one of her Hunters, or something."

"Yeah," I lied.

Hunter of Artemis was its own card.

The sun in his eyes flared and I knew he heard the lie.

"It'll be fine," I said ahead of him. "She's almost as awesome as you are."

"True," Apollo allowed himself to be defused, striking a pose. "If anything happens, shoot me a rhyme!"

After the last Olympian left, I took that badly needed nap. I didn't dare try to Dream. Sam would be okay. He had to be.

I woke up to the sound of people talking. The sun was just touching the horizon over the water, painting the sky in various shades of pink and purple. Camp activities were winding down with people putting away the canoes, abandoning the volleyball game and stabling the winged horses. I turned my head and saw a bunch of older teenagers leaving the Big House. One of them looked over at me. His blue eyes widened, before he smiled and walked over.

"Hey! Perseus Stele, that right?"

"Percy," I corrected, trying to match his smile. I sat up and aside from a twinge in my stomach, I was good as new. I threw my blanket off and saw my black slacks from yesterday and bare feet. Someone had cleared the card table, leaving just an aluminum tin with the Mythomagic logo etched into it lying there as if nothing had happened.

"You?"

"Luke Castellan, son of Hermes. Counselor of Cabin 11." He had an easy grin that softened the scar running down the side of his face from his eye to his chin. He had thick blond hair and he'd torn the sleeves off his orange Camp Half-Blood T-Shirt to better show off muscular arms. "So...from what I understand, you aren't actually in a Cabin, but you're still a Camper, yeah?"

I nodded.

"Mr. D had all Counselors draw lots for, uh, 'adopting' you. Show you around, make your schedule, settle you in."

My chest tightened. "And I'm speaking to the loser?"

Luke blinked. He studied me quietly for a moment.

"The winner." Luke said firmly. He offered me a hand and hauled me out of my chair. "No one's given you the tour, right? We've got some time before dinner, go get some shoes on."

I stared at him like an idiot for a few seconds, then rushed back inside the Big House. I was smiling as I found my shoes and dug out fresh socks from my bag. I faltered a little when I got back to him as he was talking to a vaguely familiar blonde girl with princess curls and storm gray eyes.

"Percy!" Luke nodded. "This is one of my friends, Annabeth Chase, Daughter of Athena. Cabin 6."
I immediately saw what Athena had meant about demigod eyes. Annabeth's eyes studied me, much like her mother, as if she could see down to my bones. But the only color in her eyes was gray.

"Hi," I offered her a smile and a wave. "Percy Stele, uh," I probably shouldn't draw my mother's attention here. Not after how the Campers reacted. "Son of Fate."

She smiled back, nodding her head.

"I looked up everything we had on your god parent." She dove in immediately. "I've got a list of books that mention her, a few poems but they link her to Aphrodite which is ridiculous, but a few highlight connections to Night and - "

"Annabeth!" Luke laughed. "Let's start with the Camp first, eh? Giving him a tour, coming with?"

She blushed, mumbling under her breath.

"Uh, thanks." I replied. I was a bit confused. Why would she offer to tell me about my own mother?

"Alright, that sandpit is the volleyball court." Luke pointed as he led the way off the porch. "Sometimes badminton." It didn't take long for Luke to start grabbing other kids milling around, introducing me to them and coaxing them to pitch in telling me about the canoe races, the contests, the Climbing Wall…
My face was starting to hurt from my smile when a strange horn sound signaled that dinner was starting. My unease had all but disappeared. I was still a little homesick, but it wasn't crippling anymore. Mr. D's kids, Castor and Pollux pulled me over to their Table 12, telling me how it all worked. Non-alcoholic drinks for the enchanted goblet so chouchen was out, but apple cider was in! Apparently they gave burnt offerings here. Guess it was a Young God thing.

I chose a portion of my barbeque, some grapes and bread to chuck into the fire.

To Hestia Prytaneia and Hestia Potheinotáti, I prayed.

The smoke didn't smell like burned meat, burned bread or burned grapes. It smelled like Dad's hot chocolate. A hint of spice and vanilla. And underneath, it smelled like fresh grass and spring water, the scent I associated with Mom. It smelled like home.

Thanks. You're the best.

Mom plans ahead, I remembered as I sat back down and dug in, fielding questions from curious satyrs.

Apparently, I smelled like the stars.

Mom plans ahead.

Everything was going to be fine.

 

[Shujin]

An Undertow of Sand
A PJO Fanfiction
​

"So what happened Friday night?" Maybe-Pollux asked me when we sat down for breakfast in the dining pavilion. Mr. D was already at Table 12, face down and gently snoring. No one seemed surprised, so I guess it was just something the god did.

"If you can tell us," Maybe-Castor chided his brother and I swore to myself that eventually, I will be able to tell them apart.

The twin sons of Mr. D looked a lot like their dad's current mortal disguise before the trailer park and booze. They had his slightly curling hair just blond instead of black, violet eyes and cherubic look complete with Pillsbury Doughboy smiles. In their orange Camp Half-Blood T-shirts and khaki shorts they looked completely identical until you noticed that Maybe-Castor wore sandals while Maybe-Pollux was a filthy heathen in sneakers without socks.

Breakfast was very Greek with yogurts and fruit and feta cheese and flatbreads and these sourdough pancakes made with olive oil and honey. It was the type of food Grandma swore by, so it wasn't as big of a culture shock as it could have been. It was actually kind of nice. My grandparents didn't know this place existed, but they definitely would have approved.

Well maybe not the part about honest-to-God lava on the Climbing Wall - that was asking for a heart attack - but everything else.

"Some bug crawled up the Oracle's ass that made her try to kill me," I said as I dumped a handful of grapes into my yogurt. "So I ate her."

"What." Pollux (Castor? Damn it) said with his fork hanging out of his mouth while his brother stared at me over the top of his goblet and I realized that maybe I shouldn't have said that last bit. Or at least changed 'ate' to 'kill.' They were demigods, right? You got used to things trying to kill you and killing them back, no matter how they looked or what they said.

I could almost hear Cliff's exasperated sigh and 'Can you, like, not?'

Apparently I can't not.

Speaking of, I needed to call him. Before he got to school Monday, saw I wasn't there and assumed the worst.

"Uh." I waved my spoon around in the air as I searched for the words to explain what happened. "Oracle spirit?" Then I gestured towards myself. "Son of Fate. Weird shit happened."

Both boys nodded like they understood completely and I absolutely did not cry into my pancakes. Some of the flowering nymphs around - stuff got in my eyes, you know how it is. My sunglasses got most of it, of course. There was maybe a tear or two to clear away. You can ask the twins!

One boy smiled gently at me, while the other politely shooed some of the nymphs away. It felt like this invisible chasm in the table between us had shrunk, if it hadn't disappeared completely. Conversation yesterday was all about the Camp. Friendly enough, but it had been like no one was sure I was going to be a normal Camper.

I could be a normal Camper.

"We've all been there," Castor (fuck it, he's Castor) the Sandal Wearer said. "One time the neighbor's dog chased Castor - " damn, he's not Castor - "into a ground bees' nest and he escaped to a wild strawberry patch - "

"And that's the story!" The actual Castor the Sockless said loudly. "It was a literal pain in my ass, thank you," he said as an aside to his twin. "Dog died. The end."

Pollux sniggered. "Weeeelll…"

"The end!"

I could be a normal Camper.

"We visited Niagara Falls," I offered. "Dad had to smuggle me back on the tourist bus without my pants because of a giant evil badger."

Yeah. Don't ask.

"We were kidnapped by trees when we were seven." Castor shot his snoring father a cheeky look. "Pops wouldn't let us out of his sight for a month, literally put us on a leash, fretting like an old woman."

Mr. D snorted mid-snore.

"Heard that," the god muttered, turning his head just enough to cast a bloodshot blue eye over his sons. His thick unruly black beard bristled.

"He burned the forest down," Pollux said with glee, winking back. "Turns out the Hunters were in it! The moon goddess was pissed."

Their father groaned, burying his face in his arms, mumbling something incomprehensible as we laughed. The dining pavilion was filling up with campers and the fire in the central brazier grew from hot coals to a roaring fire, as if responding to the amount of people around. Most tossed handfuls of fruit into the flames resulting in sweet smelling smoke. I wondered who they offered too.

I thought about making an offering to Mom. Some cheese or something, but I couldn't do it. I stood at the fire like a stump, a fork on my plate ready to scrape something into the flames and felt like I was two inches tall.

I know how to make a proper sacrifice. That was not it.

I finished off my pancakes and started to mix oats into my yogurt. "Pixies ruined my tenth birthday party."

Pollux's eyebrows wiggled. "Was exorcised twice."

"Twice?" I mumbled, impressed in spite of myself.

"The priest thought he was me!" Castor blurted out. He threw back his head and cackled.

Breakfast at Camp Half-Blood was already great!

We continued to trade stories in short blurbs out of an unspoken agreement that it was hilarious not getting all the details. Mid-way through the Pollux's 'Escaped a polka dance led by Pops' demented fancult' sentence, Luke Castellan the Counselor of Cabin 11, Hermes, coughed and tapped the table for attention.

"I'm not even going to ask," he said, eyebrows raised.

Luke looked much like he did yesterday, but he was either not a morning person or didn't sleep well. There were dark bags under his eyes and his shirt was rumpled. It was long-sleeved this time and orange on black, like a color inverted Ancient Greek vase. His scar in the morning light looked worse than I thought. Even half an inch higher and he probably would have lost his left eye.

Demigods were resilient. We heal faster and heal better than normal people. That's before we get into our ability to eat and drink godly food without turning to ash. Whatever gave him that must have been mean.

Pollux and Castor grinned identical smiles up at the older boy.

Luke grinned back.

"He stays with Cabin 11, sorry boys!" The twins immediately dropped their smiles for pouts. The son of Hermes was unphased. "You lost fair and square."

Pollux coughed. "Hermes Cabin wins a game of drawing lots, what a surprise."

Luke's grin shifted to something definitely more sly looking. It pulled at his scar, narrowing his eyes and making his sharp features stand out. It made him almost look evil.

"I don't know what you're talking about. The goddess of fortune is my sister." He barked a laugh as the two members of Dionysus Cabin rolled their eyes. "Alright, alright. I need to borrow Percy for a few minutes." He fished a paper square out of his jean shorts and started unfolding it. "I've got a schedule made for you, but I want your opinion on it."

"Sure." I nodded.

Then there was this awkward moment where I didn't move and Luke didn't move and we kind of just stared at each other before he realized I wasn't getting up and I realized he wasn't sitting down.

"Uh," Luke looked taken aback, glancing down at the bench like it was a rattlesnake. "The tables are only for cabin members," he said slowly. A frown was pulling at his lips and I saw him glance towards some of the empty tables in the pavilion. "We're not allowed at the other tables."

Oh that's right. Camp was stupid.

I opened my mouth.

"You were given permission," Luke preempted me. The smile he plastered onto his face didn't look happy. "Your mom's too big of a deal to make you sit on the floor. I don't think it'll work the same for me. It's only for a couple minutes, it's fine."

"Never know until you try?" I asked.

You might be wondering why I'm pushing this so hard. Just stand up, Percy. Just go with the flow, Percy. Can't you see this is getting uncomfortable, Percy? Yes, I could see that, but there was one thing about this whole situation that was so compelling, so intriguing and so fascinating that it was like waving a red flag in front of the Minotaur.

It was fucking stupid!

I inherited my father's tolerance for stupidity and I'm not going to apologize for it.

We all looked towards Mr. D sawing logs as a bold nymph braided a strand of his black hair. She knew the god didn't need to sleep right? That he was at least partially still aware right? She had to.

"It's fine?" Castor said a bit louder than normal. The god didn't move and Castor nodded to himself. "It's fine."

Luke looked like he swallowed a lemon.

He gingerly sat next to me. As soon as his butt touched the seat he went rigid like he expected the bench to set off firecrackers under his ass. When nothing happened, Luke glanced back at the God of Wine again. A thoughtful look passed over his face.

"Huh," he said.

The twins were frowning. Pollux pushed some of his cheese around on his plate as Castor stuffed a pancake in his mouth with a deep furrow in his brow.

"Should have asked sooner," Pollux muttered, looking towards the over-full Cabin 11 table across the pavilion.

"You know how he is," Castor said after swallowing. "Now we know."

Luke spread his paper out on the table where a timetable had been sketched out with pencil and a pen with a larger than normal point size. A few mistakes were crossed out here and there. Luke had this blocky way of writing that I absolutely had to copy. The letters still tried to skip around on me, but reluctantly. They were easier to recognize. Like they were trying not to piss me off but just couldn't help themselves.

"Every morning we have inspections for the cabin, making sure we didn't trash the place. Chiron will probably do that for you as he also lives in the Big House," Luke explained, pointing at the times printed by the blocks. "I'll take over when he isn't in, so tomorrow morning? Clean your room." He moved to the next block and offhandedly asked, "How's your Ancient Greek?"

"Fluent in all dialects," I answered with a shrug. Luke's mouth snapped shut with a click as the twins perked up.

"How long did that take you?" Castor asked, leaning forward. "Pops is grilling us on Doric Greek right now and we've been learning since we could talk."

I smiled apologetically. "Born with it."

Greek demigods have it a bit rough. The nature of our inherited divinity takes a hacksaw to the part of our brains dealing with language. Almost literally. I found out about that when Dad took me to the doctor after a bad vision 'just to make sure' my visions weren't hurting me. He ended up getting questions on what happened to my brain, why wasn't I a drooling idiot, and are those eyes?

We got to keep the images, even though the doctors didn't get to keep their memories.

You can see it with an MRI.

Children of Athena have a preference for Attic Greek, the language of Ancient Athens and its successor dialect Koine Greek. Children of Ares are for Doric and Macedonian because of Sparta and conquerors or something. Everybody has a basic competency with Mycenaean Greek. What I'm getting at is that we're hardwired for Greek. Our first words were probably Greek, even if we'd never even heard the language before. The problems start the minute you give us a not Greek language.

My brain takes one look at a sentence written in English and has a panic attack. Translation errors that come from being the child of a personified concept meant apostrophes were added out of nowhere, consonants shoved together and vowels repeated. Eventually, I end up with some bizarro language that probably predates Linear A Greek so much it's no longer technically Greek and is definitely worth an F on my book report.

It's a Greek thing. Every kid at this summer camp has dyslexia. Some have it worse than others. Protogenoi kids have translation to human problems. Everyone else inherited that translation to human problem because their parents' divinity was welded on.

The Titanborn are probably suffering bad in English class. It wouldn't surprise me at all if the children of Athena and Hermes had an easier time than the rest of us due to the Wisdom and Orators Domains their parents had respectively, but everyone had it.

If you meet a Norse demigod, chances are they can read English just fine.

Which was...

I mean, that was probably fair, honestly.

The Norse had their own problems.

"Seriously?" Luke muttered.

"Born...fluent?" Pollux puzzled as we watched Luke fish a pen out of his pocket and strike through the whole block with a thick blue line. "Were you blessed or something?"

"I - I don't actually know?" Now that I thought about it, Apollo had been pretty surprised by that too. "I think it's because she's a creator goddess and even languages have a Fate."

It's normal for gods to be all kinds of broken within their Domains. For my mother, it's her Domain that's broken.

"Okay…" Luke moved to the next row. "How about your mythology?"

"Know 'em." I scraped up the last bits of my yogurt. These grapes were awesome, way better than store bought. "We focused on gods of the pantheons though, not the heroes."

Athena already outlined Olympus' lies. I was pretty sure those weren't the only ones. If they are willing to lie about something as basic as Kronos fighting with Gaia's help, then they are willing to lie about anything.

The Five Ages of Man began with the Titan Lord's reign. Aphrodite was whole. The Titan Lord was the Sky Father's son and overthrew him with his brothers and the Earth's help.

I told Athena I won't say otherwise.

I won't.

I don't need to lift the curtain.

Poke enough holes in any deception and it will fall apart on its own.

Apollo taught me that.

"I could use a bit of a refresher," I said with an innocent smile.

Luke immediately looked suspicious.

"It's a book heavy course with tutors from Cabin 6," he warned me. Cabin 6 was Athena, right? "We do use Greek texts, but don't think you'll be able to breeze through it." I promised not to start a riot, but I don't think he believed me. "So advanced, huh?"

He scratched his cheek with the top of his pen before giving the twins a long suffering look.

"Just put him with us." Pollux rolled his eyes as Castor grinned.

"Annabeth has enough headaches as it is. She does not need to know about your dad's attempts to get her mother drunk," Luke deadpanned, but he sighed and made a note on the paper. "The whole mythology actually matters thing is still new to a lot of campers, so its either stick you with kids who've been here a long time or - "

"Cabin Twelve!" Castor crowed.

We hashed out the rest of my schedule as breakfast wound down. Activities like learning how to track and horseback riding and canoeing were interspersed with chores like making lunch, maintaining armor and chopping wood. I will be the first to admit I was looking forward to monster killing class and archery, but making fireworks and learning the javelin did sound fun.

Tomorrow I'd get my finalized schedule, but for today I was sticking with Cabin Twelve, Dionysus which meant wood chopping right after breakfast followed by cleaning out the stables.

Yay.

I followed the twins back towards the Big House. Our destination was the Arts and Crafts 'building.' It had four marble pillars, no walls, and a roof that wouldn't have looked out of place in a museum on Ancient Greece. As we got closer I could make out other details. Old school looms were set up across from painting easels. Long tables covered in bits and bobs, baskets stuffed to bursting with spools of yarn, plastic bags holding buttons and zippers. There were shelves upon shelves of materials. Tinsel and glitter reflecting sunlight, rolls of stickers, jars of paint. There were a few kilns on the south side of the building along with a pile of chopped and unchopped wood.

"The Forge also uses wood for some work, but for the most part Cabin 9 have their…" Castor waved both of his hands. "Thing."

"If they need wood, they get it from here, so we have to make sure there's enough for the kilns, for carving and the Forge if they need it." Pollux explained to me as he passed me an axe.

There are a few tricks to chopping wood I found out. Getting the angle right on uneven cylinders of dried wood, putting enough strength into the swing but not too much, eyeballing where the best split was.

"You'll get the hang of it," Pollux promised after my log pulled evasive maneuvers and dove off the stand with nothing but a chip in the bark for my efforts.

I wouldn't call it back breaking work, but I definitely felt like the spoiled city kid swinging that axe under the morning sun. My cheesecake blizzard from Dairy Queen seemed like forever ago.

Oh shit, my cheesecake blizzard!

What was I going to do about this upcoming Friday? Should I pray to Mom about it? Was that dumb? What if she said no? Could Dad drop it off before it melts?

I might actually go into withdrawal this summer.

"Pops stayed with Ma to raise us," Castor said out of the blue after a few more logs. "She had cancer." I winced at the past tense. I had a feeling that was not because she was healed. I said it before, deaths caused by illness sucked. "He couldn't do anything, because she had to go."

I cringed. "...sorry."

"No, that's not - " Castor exchanged a look with his brother.

"That's not what he meant." Pollux split his log in one smooth move. The twins didn't look that strong, but you'd be surprised. Demigods are always stronger than they look. "The point is our father stayed to raise us. It's Sunday, so Clovis won't wake up until tomorrow. Every three days, Alabaster and Liza get a polecat for the day. Lou and Moni get a puppy. Butch can make Iris messages for free. Twice a week, Fred is a member of Cabin 7."

I waited, but apparently he was done. I had no idea why I was being given random facts about random campers.

Castor's face scrunched.

"You see your ma a lot, right? Not your step-mom, your birth mother. The god." Step-mom? Whatever. I nodded and he sighed. "We figured."

"You know too much," Pollux said seriously. He turned away to grab some more wood from the pile. "You're not surprised, about anything."

My breakfast gained fifty pounds in my stomach.

"Is that ...a problem?" I asked quietly. "You're acting like it's a problem."

"Not for us," Castor said bluntly. My stomach twisted at the thought that it was a problem for other campers. "Luke seems okay with you, but he remembers his pa walking out. Most of the campers here don't even have that much. Some have a divine gift or two. Others were visited once or twice?"

"A lot have never seen their god parents at all." Pollux shrugged, smiling sadly.

I sucked in a breath through my teeth. Not so random facts then. I pointed at them. "Dionysus. Clovis is Hypnos'?" The twins nodded. "Alabaster and Liza are Hecate's."

"Lou Ellen's hers too, pretty sure. Along with Moni." Pollux said.

"Okay. Butch is Iris'. Cabin 7?"

"Sun." Castor split a log.

So Apollo saw his kids, at least. Good. He had a terrible taste in incognito names - Fred, really? - but that meant this Paladad wouldn't have to kick his Bardson's ass for being a deadbeat.

"And?" I prompted him, a tight feeling in my throat.

"Maybe there's more?" Castor offered, looking at his brother as he leaned on his axe. "If their parents are raising them, they don't have to come to Camp, ain't it? Like the Hunters."

"There's an underwater camp somewhere," Pollux mused. "That's for water gods and their kids. That's all we know of in Camp Half-Blood though," he finished. "That's - that's it."

"So...what? The Camp is a - an orphanage?"

That's why Annabeth offered to tell me about my mother. Because she thought the few mentions in mythology were all I had.

Oh hell.

Annabeth.

The easily embarrassed, impulsive, smart girl that took me on a tour around Camp with Luke.

Annabeth Chase, Daughter of Athena.

The few mentions in mythology were all she had.

I was starting to regret not hitting the woman when I had the chance.

It's just -

Why?

They could be in multiple places at once by just using their Names!

I thought about Dad.

I thought about Mom never coming back.

I felt sick.

"Yeah, we don't - we didn't understand it either," Castor drew me out of my darkening thoughts with a careful nudge to the shoulder. "It's not a problem, okay? Shitty parents aren't your fault. Don't feel guilty that yours care."

I met Castor's violet eyes. "Do you feel guilty?"

"Not anymore."

"Still do," Pollux admitted quietly. "Sometimes. When there's a new kid and no one Claims them." He blew out a breath and his words sped up. "We're not trying to protect you or nothin', but we have a cabin to ourselves and kind of know what it's like - "

"If we'd known about your Ma, we would've cheated on the drawing lots." Castor said with a mischievous smile. Pollux blushed, kicking at a log. "Protect, no. Poach, definitely."

I snorted.

"Is it working?" Castor continued unrepentant.

"Yeah," I said. It was. The twins were good people. Maybe even friends. "Thanks." I made a show of looking the boys up and down. "And if you learn how to wear proper socks and sneakers, we might even be friends."

I was hit with twin Pillsbury Doughboy smiles. Pollux wiggled his toes in his sandals.

"Our free time is right after lunch," Pollux told me as he placed a log on his stand. "We share the slot with Cabin 7 and there's this...okay, don't laugh, but have you heard of Dungeons and Dragons?"

I nearly took out my own kneecap with the axe. "Have I heard of it?"

"It's not terrible!" He protested immediately and I had to laugh. Dad was going to love this. Cabin 7 was Apollo, wasn't it? Note to self: Get Dad to draw up some adoption papers for one Phoebus Apollo Stele. "I said don't laugh!"

I swallowed my snickers as best I could and held out a hand. "Hi, I'm Percy Stele. I'm a Paladin!"

Equally shocked faces turned to face me, before the surprise melted into glee.

"Druid!" Castor yelled as Pollux grinned and said, "Cleric."

"So Lee runs the game when Fred isn't around," they told me as we turned back to our logs. "We have no idea what we're doing, but it's fun…"

The Arts and Crafts building slowly filled with campers. We watched them pull their projects off the shelves with obvious tenderness. It didn't matter if it looked like it could be sold to a museum or a piece of garbage. It meant something to them. I started thinking about a project of my own. Something for my parents for being awesome. I set a log on my stand and adjusted my grip on my axe.

Maybe some custom dice.

I brought the axe down and with a satisfying chop, it split in two.

Wood Chopping: Check.

It was time for our second chore. I saw the winged horses my second day at Camp and couldn't wait for the chance to ride them. But we weren't riding them today.

Today we were picking up their shit.

I'll be frank, cleaning out the pegasi stables was a disaster.

It was nasty and smelled horrible and the horse-pigeons did not like me at all.

By the time I was done, the feeling was mutual.

Stable Cleaning: Check.

After taking a shower and ditching my clothes, it was time for the javelin toss.

And I was right about tossing javelins around.

At first I had to sit through a lecture about safety from this bulky Ares' kid which boiled down to 'don't throw spears at people' and 'don't poke your eye out.' I made all the right agreeing noises at the right places and soon enough I got to pick out a javelin.

My first throws were terrible.

No distance and no accuracy. After ten throws, my target stood proudly unmarked. The dirt all around it, not so much. Ryan pulled me back to the table after a bit and examined my hands.

"Nice calluses. Sword?" In answer, I pulled on the silver sword pendant of my necklace. Damocles flashed in the sunlight and he whistled. It really was a beautiful sword. It was leaf shaped similar to a Greek xiphos but with shallower curves. The thick center of the blade was bone white and layers were shaved away as you got to the silver-gold rippled edges. The cross guard was bowl shaped bronze with a long leather grip and a small bowl pommel facing the opposite direction. Strands of horse hair dangled from the hilt.

Ryan held out a hand.

"May I?" I handed it over after a moment. Ryan's eyes closed and it was like he had a waking dream, his eyeballs shifting rapidly behind his eyelids. He came out of it frowning. "What's this made of?"

"Bone."

He blinked.

"Nice." He handed it back and picked out a javelin from the table. At first, it looked like all the others, but when he handed it to me I could feel the difference. "Narrow leaf-shaped spear head." He pointed out. "Different balance."

I threw the spear.

It hit the target with a thunk. I pumped a fist in the air as my tutor nodded.

"Again."

I was kind of right about tossing javelins around. The first fifteen minutes were great.

The next half hour?

Ugh.

Javelin Throwing: Check.

While breakfast and dinner was made completely by the nymphs at Camp Half-blood, lunch had the Campers pitch in to help. That meant it was the only variety in the menu ranging from sandwiches to flat bread pizzas.

Lunch today was a lentil stew that didn't taste half bad.

Don't tell my grandmother.

A few Campers were coaxed to join us at Table 12. Mr. D gave us all the hairy eyeball and grumbled the entire time, but he didn't say no. His sons gave him megawatt smiles as we all thanked the Wine God loudly.

He opened a new can of Diet Coke and grumbled louder.

Lunch: Promising.

We didn't have anything pressing to do after lunch.

With our stomachs full, we headed over to the shining gold cabin where my BardGrandchildren were setting up. I am...not sure why the set up included a guitar, bongos and a feather boa. After a round of introductions and a summary of the story so far, the 'music guy' Michael started playing dramatic guitar music.

When Castor and Pollux said they had no idea what they were doing on their D&D campaign, they Were. Not. Kidding.

It was more like they were playing through the idea of the campaign Keep on the Borderlands with a Player Handbook they tore a few pages out of before setting the rest on fire and flushing it down the toilet.

Everything ran on demigod logic, which meant lots of homebrew rules. Things like Wizards and Clerics not having to prepare spells, Bards can do anything they want, whenever they want, Katie Gardiner's Monk was a god in disguise, you made Perception Checks by playing the Danger Bongos and don't get me started on the animal companions. Monsters aren't supposed to count!

It was basically 'Whatever Rule of Cool You Can Convince Lee Of' followed by 'Hope Your Dice Aren't Cursed'.

It was heresy.

It was awesome.

Free Time: Roll to Confirm Critical.

Greek mythology class was where things got a bit interesting.

Mom hadn't been too interested in mortal heroes. I think it was just a little too small in scale for her, or maybe she didn't want to set any expectations for me, good or bad. I knew I shared my first name with a demigod son of Zeus. The way Grandma put it, he spent his heroing days sticking it to Poseidon. Killed Medusa, gave the Sea God's rival Athena the head, saved a girl from the god's monster, and lived happily ever after.

Being part of the advanced class meant you were thrown headfirst into genealogy studies led by Malcolm Pace, Son of Athena. It was all about the mortal heroes of Greek mythology and who was related to who, and who was king of what when and his family line, etc. I felt like I was in a college level course with a kindergartener's understanding of physics.

Thankfully, Malcolm was really good at reading my 'Help me' expressions. So when Perseus was mentioned, he made sure to tell me that he was a demigod of Zeus. He whose mother was seduced by a ...gold shower?

I squinted at my notes, but the words didn't change.

Like...is that supposed to be literal? Or...I mean, how does that - I don't want to know how that works.

Oh God, now I was thinking about my parents.

I don't want to know how that works!

"That's not the worst of it," Masayuki said under his breath, leaning slightly over. He was also one of Athena's with the rare black hair but storm gray eyes like all of his siblings. "Myrmidon. The Sky Lord fathered him as an ant."

Apparently the King of the Gods is all kinds of deranged.

"More proof Athena should have stayed king," I muttered back. I didn't think I said it that loudly, but the loud screech of a chair on wood flooring drew my attention up to Annabeth Chase standing in front of my desk and the rest of the class staring at me.

"What did you say?" She breathed.

"Uh," I answered intelligently. I looked towards the twins for help, but they just looked back with identical wide eyed expressions. "More proof Athena should have stayed king?"

"Stayed king," Malcolm said blankly from the front of the classroom. He was blond and gray eyed just like his sister. "That implies she was king."

"When?" Annabeth demanded.

I held up a finger and closed my text book. The name of a human scholar danced mockingly in front of my eyes. The human records of Greek mythology got a lot wrong.

I had wondered what they were teaching demigods these days.

The answer was nothing.

So.

Okay.

"Where did Athena receive her Name of Apatouria, the Deceiver from?" I asked as a starter.

"From Aethra, mother of Theseus," Annabeth answered immediately, beating her brothers by a few seconds if Malcolm's exasperated eye roll and Masayuki's open mouth meant anything. The twins of Dionysus hadn't even tried, but they had identical expressions of concentration on their faces.

Theseus. That was the founder of Athens, right? We literally just went over that guy.

"And what did she do to be Given that Name?"

"Gave Aethra the plan to have Theseus by the Sea God in a dream." Annabeth was on the ball again. I said ball, but it was more like a whoopie cushion.

Because wow.

Hearing it first hand was kind of surreal.

"And that's a deed worthy of the title Deceiver?" I asked incredulously. "After all of Athena's plans and guidance and insights? That's what it takes?" Everyone had thinking caps on. I could almost see steam coming out of Annabeth's ears. "It was a Given Name. There is power in it. You don't get that by doing one mortal woman a favor and having her insult you."

Remember my Vampire Slayer example? That story was the 'killed two vamps yesterday and almost died' kind of lame. You get a Name by either doing something a lot or doing something epic.

"Given Name?" Masayuki asked, pen poised over his notebook.

"Their epithets." I shrugged. "Have you ever wondered how Apollo can drive the sun chariot and appear someplace else at the same time? It's because his Phoebus Name is driving while God of - I don't know - Medicine or something, Acesius is overseeing an operation at a hospital."

"Avatars then," Malcolm mused. I made an 'eh' rocking motion with my hand.

"Close enough." I drew a crude tic tac toe board on my paper. "The more Names a Young god has, the stronger they are. They have more to draw on when they are whole and the more options they have. It's a source of godly power. It's earned."

"What did she do?" Annabeth's gray eyes bored into me like lasers.

"Fulfilled a Prophecy," I said honestly. "And convinced everyone she didn't."

"Metis' two children, girl then boy?" The girl asked, not even bothering with complete sentences any more, thinking furiously.

"A very wise child was destined to be born of Metis. A warrior greater in strength than Zeus' lightning bolt." I tried to mimic my mother's voice. It was a bit of an odd lilting sound. I really wasn't any good at an Irish accent. "If the boy was the problem, why did Zeus swallow Metis before the girl was born?"

I shrugged, opening my text book again. "The Titan Lord did the same thing, right? Since when does fighting a Prophecy ever work?"

"Holy shit." Masayuki sounded stunned. "When?"

"Who built the walls of Troy?" I threw out in response. I knew about that story of the rebel's punishment for failing to keep Zeus off the throne from Apollo. To this day, Poseidon still had that favor hanging over his head. Asshole king tried to cheat who he thought was a poor worker out of money, challenging him to build the city walls in a day with only his 'friend' the sheep herder for help. Luckily for a mortal Poseidon, his sheep herder friend was mortal Apollo.

And Apollo couldn't stand sheep.

They were stubborn, stupid animals perfectly willing and able to off themselves at the first opportunity.

His words, not mine.

"The revolt didn't fail. It's just that the new regime didn't last."

You could thank Hera for that one.

"It's why Poseidon and Athena hate each other." I explained. "Poseidon stood by her ascension and fought for her, and would have kept fighting for her right to keep it. He was willing to let the world burn for that, but the child of Metis was the king of gods and men." I smiled weakly. "She wasn't. They never forgave each other for it."

She abdicated her Name Athena Olympios when her father retook his throne the same way he took it the first time.

By being an underhanded son of a bitch.

And true to form, the 'rebels' were punished. I guess the only reason mankind even knew about the revolt was the fact that Poseidon and Apollo's punishment building the walls of Troy was not subtle, even if the details were lost.

Or lied about.

The Goddess of Wisdom had a bunch of Names for Good Governance, Sovereignty and the Welfare of Kings.

Had.

The Young gods could lose Names. They could give them up.

They could have them Taken.

"Oh my gods," Annabeth whisper-screamed.

"Why aren't there any records of this?" Malcolm actually sounded heart broken.

"Wouldn't be much of a deception if there was," I said, feeling bad for him.

"How do you know this?" That was the first time Alabaster said anything all class. He was still in his corner, a translucent blue card shimmering on his desk. He had dark brown hair and bored green eyes. Well, not so bored looking now.

Pollux and Castor exchanged a look.

"His Ma taught him," Castor said. Everyone stopped at how hard his voice was. "Like Pops with us."

"Did you know this?" Alabaster asked next. It sounded accusing.

"No," Castor shrugged. "But he does say a lot of things were before his time. Some things he says don't match the books, but the books say a lot of things so it didn't matter?"

Pollux nodded thoughtfully. "Are there any...true books? Like a master record or something, Percy?"

"Mnemosyne's library," I volunteered. "That's at Mount Othrys. Uh, Orphism gets a lot more right than it does wrong. The Underworld probably has some texts." Dead people do tell tales. "He's not a book, but if you can get Hypnos' attention, he'll tell you. My Mom also mentioned this one book that has everything, but it's dangerous."

As in, 'you can find all of the Names of my mother in it' dangerous. Hers and the Names of others, like the god behind the Night.

Names that could drive even a god mad.

"Mount Othrys," Annabeth muttered to herself as she went back to her desk. "Titaness of Remembrance. God of Sleep. Orphism…"

Masayuki looked thoughtful. Alabaster looked angry. The twins looked determined and Malcolm looked like he was about to cry.

I did not think this through.

Greek Mythology: Derailed.

Canoe racing was next on the list.

I have never been in a canoe before and it was pretty nice. I didn't set any records or anything, but I didn't do too badly. I love water. Whether it was the beach or the water park or a river on a camping trip, I enjoyed it all.

It was similar enough to kayaking so I picked it up quickly. The naiads were new, but they just watched from afar. I was partnered with Pollux the whole time and we raced Castor. He lost all five times, and blamed his partner who was a bit of a wimpy looking guy from Aphrodite Cabin.

The sixth time, Castor and Aphrodite Cabin boy got into a fight and capsized.

Canoe Racing: Check.

We had archery next.

Music Guy Michael Yew was my tutor for this class. He fitted me with a bow and gave me some blunt arrows.

"Alright, so the stance you want to take is - "

I knocked an arrow and let it fly. With a puny thud, the blunt arrow smacked off the target. I frowned. I'm going to blame the balance of the blunted arrow for that. I turned back to my tutor who raised his eyebrows.

"Your dad taught me."

Michael nodded and swapped out my arrows for real ones.

With the bows and arrows, the twins looked even more like cherubs. That illusion lasted right up until you heard the curses spewing out of their mouths.

Archery: Check.

The day wound down with some strawberry picking.

There are a few tricks for that too. You've got to pick by the stem, not by the fruit so you don't damage it. Eyeballing bruised and rotting fruit was also a learning experience. Mainly learning that rotten strawberries will only show you their good side so that when you go to pick them, you get disgusting multicolored goop all over your fingers.

I'm sure the good ones tasted great, but when they go bad...

Blegh!

Strawberry Picking: Mixed Bag.

I spent my 'free period' before dinner down by the water.

The ocean was breathtaking here. The way the sunlight of the setting sun sparkled off the waves and the water lapping against the clean sand. The far horizon slowly pulling on its coat of many colors, readying itself for nightfall. I loved the Manhattan skyline, but there was something about seeing the smooth, glass like blue marble in the distance that settled my soul.

I flung out my left hand and pulled my backpack to me. I dug into one of the pockets for my phone. With my thumb, I rubbed the second large hieroglyph on the front.

"Clifford Randall."

My phone vibrated. There was a soft high pitched static sound for a few seconds before Cliff adjusted the spell.

"Reminding you to fix that," I said as a greeting. If anyone came across me on the beach, it looked like I was talking to myself with a small bronze tablet on my lap. While it would have been cool to see Cliff's Labrador face, he was still working on it. "For the hundredth time."

"Yeah, yeah." There was a sound a lot like someone rubbing a cloth on a microphone. He was probably moving around. "I have no idea what's causing that. Kills my ears. Whatever. I have, like, a dozen projects making me shed right now. It's on the list."

"And non-humans aren't real Magicians, so you aren't getting any help." I guessed.

From what I know, human kids start learning how to be Magicians young and there's this big Much Ado about being able to trace your bloodline back to the Pharaohs of Ancient Egypt. Cliff was only three years old, but I was convinced he was a genius. This phone was the work of a month anchoring a spell not meant to be anchored with only a few tips from a "real" Magician.

The Fall of Egypt fucked up a lot of their records. They preserved what they could, but it meant there was a lot left to re-discover. Magic included. Now convincing them that it was time to stop worrying about preservation in the twenty-first century was looking like the hard part.

Cliff sighed. "One of these days, I'm going to wrangle you into a Nome and let a Magician demonstrate how broken they are."

"One of these days," I agreed, smiling even though he couldn't see it. A Nome was like Camp Half-Blood for Egyptians, if you're curious. There's one in Brooklyn! Wouldn't really recommend trying to find it without a sponsor though. They're pretty strict.

"Besides, Watching has gotten pretty interesting lately!" Cliff's voice picked up with actual excitement. "It's looking like someone's waking up or paying attention again. Two hits of the same signature within twenty years!"

"Uh, isn't that bad?"

"Absolutely!"

Sometimes I wondered about him. "As in apocalypse bad."

"Only if we fuck up!" Cliff squealed like a preteen girl. "We've actually gotten some big names from the First flying in from Cairo trying to isolate who it is."

"Planning on picking their brains?"

"You know me!" Cliff made his amused exhale rumble sound. "I'm seriously considering blowing off my finals for it."

"You do that, your mom will skin you alive," I warned him. Cliff's mom was a Mastiff headed woman. Sweet as pie, really.

Also?

Terrifying as hell.

Cliff sighed again. "Might be worth."

"Cliff."

"Statistics, Percy."

I snorted loudly and buried my toes deeper into the damp sand. My sneakers and socks were further up the beach behind me, safe from the water. I watched a waterfowl of some kind wing past me out over the water.

"That reminds me, I'm not going to be there Monday. Brunner let me take my exam early so I'm at summer camp now."

Cliff paused.

"At...summer camp," he repeated slowly. "The summer camp?"

"Yeah."

"I thought - next year? "

"I know," I said a bit moodily. "But Olympus found out about Mom and took me early."

"That sucks, sorry man."

"Yeah."

"So you just got there this morning?"

"Friday evening," I corrected him. "Good news is Mom - my birth mother, I mean - was able to claim me right away and - "

"Wait, wait, wait." Each 'wait' got progressively more excited. "Wait. Friday evening. At the Greek Camp on Long Island? North shore, somewhere thereabouts?"

"Yeah?"

"Did you get claimed between the time of 6:30 to 7:00 PM?"

"Ye - es?"

"And you're twelve!" Cliff said as if he had just solved a problem that had been bothering him for years. "The way the Duat breaks down around you - Great Ra, no wonder you made no sense!"

"...I feel so attacked right now." Was all I could say.

"Be right back." Cliff said quickly and the line went dead. The high pitched static sound came back.

Right.

Okay then.

I waited around for a few minutes, doing my best to tune the annoying sound out when the spell picked up noise again.

"Still with me?"

"Cliff, what's going on?"

"Sec. Sir - " And that came out quieter, almost muffled giving me the impression that whoever he was talking to hadn't quite caught up to him yet. "Percy Stele, Greek demigod. Percy, I grabbed Houy."

"He of the Flooded Toilets?" I quipped, just to beat down the jitters in my stomach.

I heard a man groan. "Randall."

"Sorry, sir."

Cliff's...supervisor, I guess would be the word for him, cleared his throat awkwardly. "So you did get it working, I see." He definitely sounded like how I imagined an Egyptian would sound like. Very educated with a medium sized stick up his butt. "Notes later."

"Sir!"

"Now, Percy, was it?"

"Yeah?"

"I - hold on," There was a shuffling sound as Houy promptly lost the plot. "Why were you talking to a Greek?"

Well this was awkward.

"When I met him, he was being raised by a Celt, sir."

That meant something to the Magician who sucked in a breath. "Ah, I see now. Percy, are you able to tell us the name of your godly parent?"

Am I able?

What kind of question was that?

I glanced around the beach. I wasn't the only one enjoying the beach front, unfortunately. It wasn't like there were a lot of people around, but I also had no idea what kind of mood Mom would be in if I drew her attention. It might be just a flicker. It might not. And really, I didn't need her attention like that right now.

"Would titles work?"

It probably would.

"That would be fine," Huoy said as if he expected it. With Ptolemy, there was a lot of exchange between the Greek and Egyptian pantheons, even though it all crashed and burned shortly after. The Greeks might be fine letting people believe lies about their own history, but that kind of thinking would go over like a lead balloon with an Egyptian.

"Uh, okay. The Great Serpent, Eater of the Bloody Tongues, The Beautiful One - "

"Yes, yes, that's enough," the Magician said in a strained tone of voice. "That is...quite enough."

"That's why we didn't know which one," Cliff interjected. "It's using the Greek Name!"

Oh I get it.

"Mom has an Egyptian Name, doesn't she?" The Magician made an 'urk' sound and Cliff started cracking up for some reason. "Uh, surprise? False alarm! Well not false exactly, but this is 'mildly alarmed' and not 'end of the world' alarm. No apocalypse is good right?"

"Percy," Cliff wheezed. "Percy, can you, like, not?"

"What did I do now?" I demanded.

"Be born, apparently," Cliff deadpanned. "You don't do anything by halves. You're not capable of it."

"That's called being awesome and I will not apologize for it."

"I'll have to inform the others, perhaps summon the Chief Lector," Houy was mumbling to himself. "Every senior Magician must be recalled, perhaps a team dispatched to Amarna - Blessed Nile, this is a disaster!"

"Only if we fuck up!" Cliff said cheerfully.

"Randall!"

My dog-boy best friend tried to sober up. "Sorry, sir."

"It's really not that big of a deal," I said before this Houy pulled all his hair out. Or maybe he was bald. He sounded bald. "She had me, she Claimed me. She doesn't want the world to end. My Dad and I live in it. Simple."

"No," Houy said darkly. "The machinations of The Black Pharaoh are never simple."

The Black Pharaoh.

Just the title alone sent a crawling shiver down my spine. I did not want to know what the Name would do.

"It's not what you think," I said quietly. I don't think Houy was intending to scare me, but I really didn't like the feeling of that title. Mom was Mom, right? Knowing all her Names was dangerous, because it drew her attention and not all of her Names were safe for mortals to witness. That was the reason why I only knew two of the multitudes. To protect me from exposure.

That was the only reason.

Mom doesn't lie.

"It's not what you think," I repeated. "She doesn't want anything bad. She's good people now. I promise."

"Oh," Houy said softly. "I hope so too."

They'll see.

I bet all their senior Magicians with their fancy magic spells are going to feel mighty stupid when nothing happens.

I didn't feel much like talking after that and Cliff understood. I promised to call him at least once a week before hanging up. As soon as I did, I regretted letting him go, because now I was alone on a beach with a setting sun and the whirling of my own thoughts.

About Names.

About lost history, secrets, lies and more.

The Black Pharaoh.

You know something strange? Maybe I'm not special in this and it's just me entertaining paranoid thoughts for no reason but…

I don't know how my parents met.

By that I mean, how did Dorian Stele meet Ananke?

I know when The Mórrigan and I met Dad for the first time. It was after he was discharged from the psychiatric hospital. I was two and a half with a brand new stuffed tiger toy. Grandma took the picture. I was sucking my thumb. Mom looked like she was about to burst into tears and the wonder on Dad's face as he stared at me in her arms was heartbreaking.

My parents loved each other.

But…

"Penny for your thoughts?" Luke's voice came from above me.

I craned my head back and there he was in his orange on black Camp Half-Blood long sleeve shirt and shorts.

"My parents," I murmured. A complicated expression flickered over his face and I cringed. That was smart of me. Not. "Sorry."

"For what?" Luke eyed me. "Did you make Hermes a piece of shit?"

I was suddenly very aware that I had never heard a camper use any of the Young Gods Names this entire day.

Only titles.

"Uh, no."

Luke shrugged. "Then you have nothing to apologize for."

I let out a breath. Lucky Luke is so cool about things like that. "Right…"

"So I heard from Cabin 6 that you made a bit of a mess in Greek mythology class." Of course he did. "You promised no riots," he said with a wide grin. "Mr. D just locked them all in their cabin. Satyrs are going to deliver food through the windows."

I stared at him. "Are they rioting?"

"No," he snorted. "They're researching."

That sounded even worse!

"Oh."

He barked his laugh and held out a hand. I took it, allowing him to haul me to my feet.

"How was your first day at Camp?" He asked as I grabbed my sneakers. I got a curious look when I left my backpack where it was after putting my phone back into a pocket.

Thieves beware. This was cursed by a Celt and they know how to make you regret it.

"It was great! Well, the pegasi stables part not so much, but everything else."

He clapped me on the back. "No one likes cleaning the stables. You get used to it."

"I am going to be sore tomorrow, I can tell."

"You get used to that too," Luke said, completely unsympathetic. "Chiron gets back tomorrow evening from his house call and he might make a few adjustments to your schedule, but for now, I've got you bouncing between Cabin 6 and 12."

"That works," I shrugged. "Castor and Pollux are cool. Athena's kids seem alright too."

"Gotta say," Luke began thoughtfully as the dinner horn sounded. "They've got me real curious what exactly you told them. Mind educating a poor ignorant soul?"

Well." I thought for a minute. "How much do you know about godly Names?"

"Like...what they mean?"

Oh boy.

I launched into what was probably a rambling, confusing lecture because I'm not a professor and I'm not Mom, but I tried. It helped that Luke was a really good listener and by the time we reached the Dining Pavilion, he had a good enough understanding to start asking questions.

"They can lose Names?"

"Sure can. Take the Titan Hyperion, lord of light. His Domain is the passing of time by the light in the sky. He had Names of the Sun, Moon and the Dawn."

"But Apollo has the Sun and Artemis the Moon now," Luke caught on immediately.

"Yeah, those Names are gone. He still has his Domain, but all that extra power?" I fluttered a hand over my hand. Poof. "It's the same for everyone that had Names of that same type. Eos, Oceanus, even Rhea. It all belongs to the Twins now, on top of their inheritance from Helios and Selene."

Luke nodded slowly. "Can Names be Taken?"

I felt my nose wrinkle. "Yeah. Ever seen a documentary on zombie ants?"

Luke joined me and the twins at Table 12 with a few of the younger Cabin 11 members and a sincere thanks to the ever-grumpy Mr. D for his benevolence. That got him a 'whatever Larry' but we'll take it!

After dinner I learned the basics of how to maintain armor, but since I was a total newb, I was stuck on polishing shields duty. After that was the Sing Along with Cabin 7 where I didn't know any of the words, but enjoyed myself anyway. I called Dad when I got back to my room in the Big House and he really did seem better. I told him all about my day and as I went to bed, I realized that I was looking forward to tomorrow.

And maybe the days after that, all the way until I had to go home again to get ready for another year at Trinity School.

I sent Mom a quick prayer, reminding her about her cross-pantheon violation ticket and got back a very amused response. She sent a super mild rebuke for being a cheeky little shit. It was followed by a feeling of reassurance and then a gentle nudge. It felt like 'good night.'

I put my sunglasses on my nightstand and wiped a few stubborn tears from my eyes.

My parents loved me.

That thought kept me warm for the next three weeks of Camp activities and chores and BBQ dinners. I could safely say that I had friends at Camp Half-Blood. Chiron was my old Latin teacher Charles Brunner and the one who reported my Mom like an asshole. Grover apologized for bringing me to Olympus' attention in the first place, even though he was surprised that my scent had strengthened so much after I was Claimed. And I got used to random Campers, mostly of Cabin 6, asking me random questions about mythology.

I let my worries fade into the back of my mind.

Then one day, I woke up to the crack of angry thunder and I felt a pull towards a certain aluminum case in my backpack filled with Mythomagic cards.

And I realized that in the life of a demigod, nothing good lasts.

 

[Shujin]

An Undertow of Sand
A PJO Fanfiction​

Have you ever gone to the store or been at the gas station and felt someone watch you? The hairs on the back of your neck stand up, or maybe you feel a shiver go down your spine as humanity's atrophied sixth sense warns you. You turn around, you catch them staring and all of the sudden you are hyper aware of exactly where you are and where that creepy weirdo is and you turn around and try to mind your own business and in your head you're kind of like 'Look at how completely normal, boring and uninteresting I am! Please don't stalk me.'

Except my creepy stalker is a pack of Mythomagic cards.

I'll take 'Sentences I never thought I'd use today' for 300, thanks.

It's all in my head, but my head was full of ADHD things. I kept track of that aluminum tin. I felt really uncomfortable just cleaning up my room. I grabbed my clothes for the day and nearly ran out the door.

I was not ready for this.

I've...never done a reading for other people. My cards were just harmless fun? It wasn't like Mom needed any help knowing her own future. Or Dad's. She was the one making sure he wasn't in that five car pile up a few years ago. It was just something that made me feel closer to her, to what she was.

Fate.

Now I was an Oracle of some kind. Or had an oracle spirit, or whatever. I was closer than ever.

It didn't feel good.

I closed the door to my room behind me and took a deep breath.

I let it out.

You can take the spoiled cityboy out of the city, but it was going to take more than three weeks at Camp to take the spoiled city out of the boy. I barely ached in the morning any more, not after something in my spine seemed to 'click' a week in and I had new calluses from training with the javelin, making runs at the Climbing Wall and canoeing.

I had been here long enough to know that there hadn't been a Quest in two years. Luke's had been the last one and for a Camp full of kids almost desperate for attention from their god parents, that was two years too long. No one seemed to remember that Luke's Quest killed two Campers and almost killed Luke!

I almost understood sometimes. I almost felt it sometimes, when I pulled off that disarming sword move Luke taught me, or competed at the archery range, or when I looked out over the Camp from the top of the Climbing Wall.

I was a demigod. The son of Fate herself. I could bring glory to her Name! I was made for more.

And then I would remember that I bleed red. I would remember that I couldn't control my divinity. I would remember the one rule that governed Mom's tests: She would never give me a task she didn't believe I could do. That she didn't know I could. That did not mean I could not fail. That I couldn't fail her. I would remember that I'm twelve and think,

'I'm not ready.'

Did that make me a coward?

I told myself that the Quest wasn't about me. And if it was, I could refuse somehow, or have someone else take my place and it would all turn out fine. I told myself Dad would understand. He would.

Mom would still be proud of me.

And then I felt sick.

So I was not going to think about it.

That has never gone wrong for anyone ever!

The Big House had a bit of a weird interior design. There was something of an expanded foyer once you got in the front door making the ground floor's floor plan look a little like the steering wheel of a ship. The rooms coming off it and the staircase at the back where the peg spoke things and the intake desk in the center was the, uh, center. There were places in the wall and the floor where it was pretty obvious there had been walls that were knocked down to give Chiron more space.

I know.

A god made the Big House in Camp for Chiron to live in, and the centaur had to remodel so that he could actually live in it.

I'm eighty percent sure that god was Apollo.

Considering Apollo basically raised Chiron, him building a house Chiron can't live in should surprise me.

It didn't.

As I shuffled across the big room yawning and stretching, I heard voices getting louder as they approached the double doors at the front to the Big House.

" - get used to how fucked everything is and now I'm learning something new every day!" Mr. D exclaimed as the doors flung themselves open. I blinked. I had to. I wanted to make sure I wasn't hallucinating.

There wasn't a Hawaiian shirt in sight.

The god was in a white long sleeve shirt underneath a bright orange Camp Half-Blood T-Shirt. Black pegasus and all. I squinted at the extra writing above the horse.

Dreitcor.

Did that say Director?

"Learning from my mortal sons." There was a giant shit-eating grin on the Wine God's face. "That's novel is what it is!"

Chiron was right behind him in a light blue button up shirt, frowning. I'm going to stop a moment here and confess something. It's important, okay?

His scruffy beard bothered me.

Chiron was the kind of dude who was comfortable in a tweed jacket. He ironed his shirts. His white coat was always brushed. He shined his hooves. But the beard! Maybe he was like Dad, who couldn't grow a good one for the life of him, but unlike my father, he didn't have Mom to make him stop trying.

"And that is exactly what is drawing the King's ire."

"He'll get over it," Mr. D flapped a dismissive hand. Chiron gave him a look. Two raised eyebrows and everything. "Look, let's say I do that. Wipe everybody." He held up a finger. "But one."

They both turned to look at me.

"Uh." I clutched my clothes in front of me like a shield. "Morning?"

Chiron returned my greeting, but Mr. D jumped right in with, "If Pollux forgot that cock and bull story about fire and humanity shit with Prometheus wasn't true, are you gonna correct him?"

I swallowed. The back of my throat burned and I thought - maybe - that I was tasting sulfur. My gut churned.

If Pollux...forgot?

"Yes." I said, slowly. "I would."

The Wine God's bloodshot blue eyes almost looked cruel as they bored into me. "Even if I order you not to?"

"On pain of what?" immediately came out of my mouth as I glared at him. I was not going to be pushed around. Not by Olympus. I was not afraid to remind him why that was a bad idea. All it would take is saying a Name. I was pretty confident I had the bigger stick.

I expected it, but the Young God didn't bother threatening me. Instead, he turned back to the immortal trainer of heroes and waved his hands like he was presenting me as an answer.

"That," he said. "And then the little shits figure out the wipe and the Camp continues to sail down shit creek, but now with enthusiasm."

Chiron rubbed at his forehead. "As you say."

"He'll get over it," Mr. D repeated as he conjured a can of Diet Coke for himself and popped it open. "So will step-mother dearest," he chuckled as he headed towards the stairs. "They got no choice."

Had there been some kind of meeting on Olympus today? I eyed Mr. D's orange Camp Half-Blood T-shirt.

And he went looking like that.

"Good job being a pain in the ass," he told me as he passed by. I had the funny feeling that was an actual compliment. Which was...uh, weird. Very strange. Apparently I was causing problems, and Mr. D was A-Okay with it.

I remembered what Athena had said my first night at Camp. Dionysus was the youngest of the Olympians. He didn't understand.

My stomach flipped a little.

How many Young gods and goddesses were in his shoes, learning the truth second hand from previously ignorant demigods?

Not like I could stop now.

"Still hate you though," the god continued. That was more like it.

"Nothing personal?" I asked Mr. D's back.

"You got it."

I rolled my eyes and turned back to Chiron.

The old centaur looked old with his brow furrowed like that and clearly unhappy by the deep frown and the hand he was running through his thinning dark hair. I slowly walked towards him. I was thinking, maybe I could come up with something comforting to say? I mean, it wasn't really his fault or anything. Not like he could have known. Dealing with an annoyed Zeus and co. must be stressful.

Yeah.

Who was I kidding?

"Bet you regret reporting my Mom now, huh?" I said with a broad smile as I waltzed past him out the front door of the Big House.

"Immensely," Chiron growled and that just made my smile bigger.

After a nice refreshing shower, I stopped by my room to stash the simple white T-shirt and black shorts I used as pajamas and made a second sweep of my room. Normally, I just made sure my room was up to Dad standards. Buuuut Chiron might be a tiny bit annoyed with me right now? So I didn't want to give him any excuse to make me clean out the pegasi stables.

I just don't want Camp Half-Blood's beloved horse-pigeons to suffer, okay?

Because if I have to deal with them trying to crush me against the walls and kick me in the chest and bite my hair and take off my glasses… if I have to pick up their shit one more time…

Suffer, they will.

The conch shell horn sounded as I straightened my sheets. Time was up. I...chose not to take my cards.

I had more of a walk to the Dining Pavilion from the Big House than the Campers. That was fine with me, because it meant that every day I got to walk with different Cabins. Yesterday, Castor and Pollux dragged themselves out of bed early to get me and we met up with the early rising Apollo Cabin. Today, it looked like I was just in time for the clusterfuck of stragglers from the Ares/Aphrodite/Hephaestus Cabins. With the gods in question, you'd think they wouldn't get along, right? That love triangle is pretty infamous and a frequent source of misery.

You'd be wrong.

Hephaestus Cabin makes the weapons. Ares Cabin swings the weapons. Aphrodite Cabin, most of them, are social butterflies who want to be liked. They just had strange, ritualistic priorities you had to get used to, or not care about in the first place.

And Hephaestus' and Ares' kids didn't care.

Maximillian had a very strong sense of fairness, even worse than Ethan's, with a gold drachma he flipped when he couldn't decide while Jacqueline's mood was determined by the feathers in her hair. Where she got the Northern Bald Ibis or Kakapo feathers, no one has any idea since they're fucking endangered, but there you go. Lacy/Lace could be a boy or a girl at any time and was scary for a seven year old with healing powers. If you are wondering where a child of Aphrodite got healing powers, join the club. Renicio woke up at dawn every day like his dad was Apollo, had a perfect internal clock, hated Castor's guts, and I'm not entirely sure he's actually Aphrodite's at all. I know she Claimed him like all her other kids.

But the Hindi?

"If it isn't Horseshit!" Clarisse La Rue, Daughter of Ares, ambushed me with a meaty arm over my shoulders. "Come 'ere!"

I didn't protest as she dragged me over. I learned that doesn't work. Ares was her dad. That didn't work on any of them. Sometimes Ryan pretended it did, but it didn't.

"Do you have to call him - " Silena Beauregard, Daughter of Aphrodite, horse-pigeon whisperer and honorary Apollo Cabin member at the archery range, cut herself off with a roll of her eyes. "You don't, but you will. Forget I said anything."

"Damn straight!" Clarisse squeezed her bicep around my head. She had light brown, almost blonde hair cut short, red-brown eyes and like all of Ares's kids, she was solidly built and liked fighting. "Gotta make sure this noggin doesn't get too big."

I'm just going to say it right now: I don't understand Clarisse.

After Chiron ruined my 'Initiation Ceremony' of a toilet swirly, she wanted my head on a stick. Capture the Flag that week was painful. Then there was the thing with the rabid horse-pigeon dragging me out of the stables covered in horse shit? I had to be rescued.

I, uh, did not have...nice...things to say?

Queen's English, you understand. Sam would have been proud.

Making friends was easier after that. In Castor's words, putting me on a pedestal got difficult after a pegasus shat all over it. Clarisse was one of them.

No idea why.

"My head won't get too big," I said dully.

My head was squeezed again. "Or I'll kick your ass."

Maybe she wasn't my friend, but a really strange enemy.

"Or you'll kick my ass."

Weird Girl Tanaka snorted from Silena's other side, making a face at me. I scowled back as I finally squirmed free. Silena reached over and absently fixed my hair because she had absolutely zero sense of personal space.

The usual stragglers were made up of Clarisse, Counselor of Ares Cabin after the last one died two years ago. Mark, who may as well be co-counselor since he did everything Clarisse didn't want to, was another solidly built boy of Ares with black hair and eyes. Silena was a perfectionist who had to be the last to leave with black hair and blue eyes most of the time. Weird Girl stuck to Silena like a barnacle. Angelina, Counselor of Hephaestus Cabin was a carrot top with hazel eyes, a pencil behind her ear, a notebook and whichever of her half-siblings she managed to drag out the door with her. Today, that was Everett, with tightly curly black hair, great tan and brown eyes. He worked on jewelry instead of forging like most of his siblings. And last, but not least was Clovis, Son of Hypnos and a perpetual late riser.

I made my way over to Clovis and waited until his one good eye - it was the left one right now - focused on me.

"Hey, little cousin." I greeted him and heard Drew scoff - 'weirdo's related to the other weirdo' - making me roll my eyes. "How were the Dreamlands?"

"Big cousin," he said as the left side of his face lifted into a small smile. "Father didn't let me stay long, but it was nice. New."

If you looked at us side by side, we didn't look like cousins. But at the same time, I thought we did? Clovis reminded me of a baby cow with a mop of strawberry blond hair on a wedge shaped head, a wide flat nose and too big blue eyes. He used to have a thick body with thin limbs, but that was changing with exercise.

I'm not saying I looked like a cow, okay? It was the other stuff.

His spine stuck out too. He had extra ribs and a second heart. He was always half asleep with one side of his brain, like a dolphin. He picked his words carefully, because he had two extra rows of teeth behind the first set and his tongue sometimes got in the way. We swapped teething stories. Mom got rid of my second set before I started school somehow? But I remembered it sucking a lot. I think I still have the bronze sheep I used to nibble on.

It was in his eyes too. Blue, normal enough. They just didn't reflect anything. Like a mirror that swallowed light instead. You looked into them, and saw nothing at all.

Ethan's were like that too.

"Thank you for convincing my Father to let me try." Clovis said happily. "My brothers taught me a lot."

"Anytime my dude. We'll get you a cat." He nodded slowly and I nodded at the sky. "Nice weather we're having."

Clovis looked up. "Is someone upset?"

Angry dark grey storm clouds threatening thunder and lightning boiled overhead.

Camp Half-Blood had been blessed with good weather by the Nine Muses at some point. That meant no rain, no fog, no snow, hail or sleet. It's never been anything but sunny since I got here. The Campers making their way to breakfast were bravely ignoring it.

I think everyone knew it was Zeus throwing a tantrum.

"A little." I pinched my index finger and thumb together for emphasis.

My first cousin once removed (thanks Annabeth!) smiled again. Now that people were talking to him, he had really come a long way. He gave me a bland, "Oh no. Whatever shall we do?"

"Oh, she isn't." Silena huffed suddenly and I followed her gaze to the large campfire we used for singalongs.

"Beckendorf 2.0!" Clarisse bellowed. The young brown haired girl in brown robes and shawl flinched, then huddled closer to the flames like she was trying to become one with the background. She probably was because her "curse" kicked in and a sudden obnoxious beam of sunlight fell on her head making her flinch again.

I should feel bad about my part in this.

I don't.

Camp was stupid.

It shouldn't be an orphanage. Claimed kids like Iris' and Hecate's shouldn't be relying on Hermes as vagabonds. Claimed kids like Annabeth, Ryan and Silena shouldn't be waiting for their divine parents to throw them a bone. Unclaimed children shouldn't be a thing at all. My other first cousin first removed Ethan shouldn't find out his mother was Nemesis after two years at Camp.

Something was fucked so something had to be done to unfuck it. I'm not going to say this was my fault, because it totally isn't. None of this was my idea. I was just as clueless as the rest of them when I first heard 'Beckendorf 2.0' screamed across the Arena.

I think it started when some brave soul asked out loud how Athena could be king, not queen and believe me, that was a shit show.

Long story short: Humans are weird.

After the Titans got their asses kicked, the defender of the Hearth did not have the ambition to rule all of Olympus. She gave up the Names of her birthright. And when that was not enough for Zeus' insecurities, she carved out the rest. Once upon a time, she would have been satisfied with just being noticed once in a while. I thought that was cool of her.

Apparently I'm a dumb ass!

It was Masayuki that pointed out that a home had to be maintained, not only noticed once in a while. You had to take care of your family to keep those bonds. The State had to be properly governed, or it fell apart.

An ignored hearthflame dies.

Our collective reaction was somewhere along the lines of 'Oh. Fuck.'

No one was happy about that. But Ares Cabin were bulldogs with a bone.

"Don't you pull that shit!" Clarisse barked, hands on her hips as Silena's face paled. "Where's your Camp T-Shirt?"

Hestia gave up on trying not to be noticed. Her shoulders slumped as her brown robes split into khaki three-quarter pants, and the bright orange Camp Half-Blood T-Shirt.

"Better!" It was Mark's turn to shout, spear over his shoulders. "You're with Cabin 5 today, 2.0! Spar after breakfast!"

"2.0" grabbed a tongue of flame from the campfire as she stood up. We were hit with an adorable pleading look. How she pulled that off with her eyes on fire, I don't know.

"Make sure 1.0 isn't starving himself like a moron." Clarisse was unrelenting. "No hiding today or I'll break a foot up your ass!"

Silena finally cracked. "I'm sorry, what?"

The pleading look turned incredulous.

Then Hestia's lips twitched as the campfire behind her leapt into the air and we were all rewarded with an eye roll before she ran off towards Hephaestus Cabin.

"Would you look at that!" Mark laughed. "We actually got some sass out of her. There's hope yet!"

"Why." Silena threw her hands up in the air. "You idiots do remember who that is, right?"

"Dumbass self-sacrificing scary pacifist workaholic who won't talk unless she has to," Mark said. He raised an eyebrow. "Like Beck. But smaller."

Silena opened her mouth.

"Don't," Angelina cut her off as she scribbled designs in her notebook. "He's right. We all know it."

"She needs to be less of a dumbass!" Mark declared, pointing his spear at the sky. "So a family that doesn't treat her like shit, talking with someone who understands the pacifist crap, getting used to fighting again and motivation."

"I can make anyone hate me!" Clarisse declared proudly. I guess she was the motivation? "It's a gift."

"Mhm," Everett muttered under his breath. "Sure is."

"She's like a rusted weapon," Mark continued, and I think I found who was responsible for this. He had clearly put some thought into it. Not sure how he talked Apollo into helping him. "No self-respecting warrior ignores one!"

"Hence, the therapy," Angelina concluded, absently waving her pencil around.

"Therapy." Silena blankly returned. "You. Cabin 5." She pinched her nose. "I can't." Then she blindly pointed in my direction. "This is - "

"Not my fault," I insisted. It's not. "You can't blame this on me!"

I knew before he even opened his mouth that Clovis was a damn dirty traitor.

"Yes, we can."

I pouted the whole way up the hill to the Dining Pavilion.

Breakfast was normal?

That's a question because I haven't been here long enough to know what was normal, what I messed up and what was just the Campers being Campers.

Mr. D was never going to stop complaining about his table, but whatever. Luke was still giving the Stoll brothers the stink eye for the food fight yesterday (or maybe it was the glitter bombs) over at the no-longer-full Table 11.

"Everybody!" Apol - Fred proudly escorted a very overwhelmed mini-Fred towards the center brazier for Apollo Cabin's first offering. "This is Will Solace!" The holographic image of a sun and golden bow appeared over the blond boy's head and his blue eyes went huge. "Make a wish!" Fred paused. "A reasonable one. Something that won't get me - that amazing god Apollo smited. Remember, little G god, not big G."

After a moment, Will threw one of his pancakes into the flames and Fred grinned. A gold glow flared around Will for a second.

"Just...don't bring anyone back to life," Fred said. "That tends to go badly."

There were some very loud snorts.

Table 6, Athena was covered in books, paper, highlighters and pens and a bunch of gray eyed kids ignoring their food. Half of Table 5, Ares brought weapons for no reason with a few playing finger dance with daggers. Table 10, Aphrodite were actually focused on eating ever since Melanie banned cosmetics and magazines from the Dining Pavilion. Table 4, Demeter brought their pet plants to present to the nymphs.

Beckendorf 1.0 (his name was Charles. But it was Beckendorf) was a darker skinned fourteen year old boy, but was tall enough for seventeen with a permanent scowl. He looked like he could break people in half with the muscles he earned in the forge, but was probably the nicest person at Camp, second only to his trusty sidekick 2.0.

The frequent all-nighters of Hephaestus Cabin trailed in behind him. Hestia pinned Fred with an unamused look as she was prodded towards Table 9. She got a completely unrepentant waggle of fingers in return.

The Tables for Poseidon, Artemis, Zeus and Hera were empty.

Breakfast came to a close as it always did with a soft toot of the conch shell horn. The clean up began and Campers began to split off to begin their day. I watched Mark and other members of Cabin 5 ambush Hestia, hoisting the small goddess up on his shoulders as everyone cheered on their way out of the Pavilion. As soon as I dropped my plate off with the harpies, I was ambushed by Annabeth.

"Arts and Crafts, javelin practice, armor maintenance," she said in one breath.

I stared at her.

"Did you seriously memorize my schedule."

It wasn't even a question, because I knew that was exactly what she did.

"Please say you're not stalking me."

She rolled her eyes. "I'm not stalking you."

So she just memorized other people's timetables for fun? I squinted at her. "Are you lying to me?"

"No!" I could see her think through what she was going to say at least three times. "Why are you like this?"

"Awesome?"

She gave me a narrow eyed look.

Alright.

So not awesome?

"This." She crossed her arms, eyeing me like a bug on the windshield. "You know so much more than everybody here about the gods, but you - you're a dork." Ouch. "You act like it's normal. Like it's just a history lesson. Like all of this - you dumped barbeque sauce on the sun god."

You would not believe how hard it was not to correct her.

I was going to be a good boy.

No outing the other pantheons.

"In my defense, Fred had it coming," I said. "He was blatantly cheating."

She shook her head with a reluctant smile.

"Dork."

"Nerd."

"Aren't you the one that plays tabletop games?" She pointed out with a smirk. "Dweeb."

"No need to be insulting." I was smiling. "Dink."

Her blonde eyebrows rose. "Where'd you learn that one?"

"Insults of the Day." Have I ever mentioned how much I love my dad? "So if you're not stalking me…"

She sighed and the smile she had slipped right off her face like I had just imagined it.

"Cabin 6 has free time right now and I was hoping - " The Counselor of Athena Cabin bit her lip. Yeah, you heard that right, Counselor. That was a title given for the oldest members of a Cabin. Annabeth was just as old as I was, twelve. Like Clarisse, her predecessor died two years ago, leaving the ten year old girl responsible for her half-siblings. Luke helped her as much as he could while looking after his own siblings and all the extras.

Like I said, Camp is fucked.

"- we were hoping you could tell us the whole story?" Uh, yup, that was the entire Cabin 6 still at their table. "About...Apatouria."

...I was not going to be that guy and say they could have asked Apol - sorry, Fred.

"Yeah, okay."

You might be thinking that maybe this was a bit risky. Zeus was already mad and probably paying attention by the way the clouds were still blocking our sunlight. Maybe laying out one of Olympus's big lies in detail right now was not the best idea.

As far as I was concerned, if you don't want people thinking you're a jerk, mmaaaayybeee you shouldn't be a jerk?

Food for thought.

I sat down and looked around the table.

About a dozen kids, mostly blond with two black haired ones, each and every one of them with storm gray eyes looked back. They had pencils and pens ready over blank pieces of paper.

No pressure.

"So...the beginning," I started. The actual beginning would probably be explaining Ouranos' whole deal with False Prophecies in the first place, but that was a lot of shit to dump on them right now? Not to mention, that would be blowing the lid on Athena's List of Things Not To Talk About.

Okay. Not the beginning. But a beginning. "Zeus was a fucking idiot."

Thunder clapped.

Everyone but me flinched.

"Metis, elder Okeanide of Oceanus and Tethys held the Domains of Good Counsel, Planning, Cunning and Wisdom. She was her boyfriend's advisor throughout the war with the Titans and did a good job." I drummed all ten of my fingers on the table. "They won the war. They got married and were expecting an heir when Zeus let the fact his wife was smarter than he was get to him."

It had been getting to him. Months, if not years, wasted fighting because of pointless pissing contests with someone who just wanted to help him. Who just wanted it all to stop.

"He let the power of his eldest sister get to him, even though she gave up the throne. He let the Domains his second eldest sister shared with their father get to him, because she was the Earth Mother's warden. He let his brothers' strength get to him. And so he went to the Sky Father for advice and the Voice of Heaven will answer only one question." I held up one finger. "So he asked 'What should I do, that no other should hold royal sway over the eternal gods in place of me?'"

Up and down Athena's table, faces twisted.

"A wise child is destined to be born of Metis. A warrior greater in strength than your lightning bolt. It is the snake to whom you will lose your throne. Consume it."

"Oh," Malcolm said, looking down at his paper. "Is that why one of mother's symbols…?"

"Is a snake?" Annabeth finished for him. She pinched the bridge of her nose. "I never wondered why snakes were associated with wisdom."

"Didn't...didn't Greeks believe snakes speak words of wisdom, or something?" One girl I didn't know the name of asked. She could have been Cas and Poll's younger sister with her whole chubby cheeked blond look.

"And that's why no one could understand a snake?" Masayuki said dryly. "Cause and effect. Snakes were wise because the Goddess of Wisdom was a snake."

"This is insidious!" Annabeth burst out. She looked down at her books like she was trying to set them on fire with her eyes. "Think about it. All of us come here and we're told one of our parents is a god. The Greek gods of mythology are real. And then...then we aren't told anything. Not about how any of it works! Just that they're real and we can do things mortals can't and so we just accept this." She shoved a book away from her. "As real too. Even when it doesn't make sense."

There was a minute of uncomfortable silence.

Annabeth took a deep breath and then glared at the sky. "Sorry. Please continue."

Everything about this situation sucks.

"Anyway." The whole story was pretty bad, but this part was scummy. "Zeus took Metis out on a date. He told her he was apologizing for being an ass." Immediately, the faces of my audience darkened and I cringed. "There were flowers, food, music and everything. After she forgave him, he challenged her to a contest. They would compete in the form of animals. As she was a clever goddess, he needed a handicap. She would be prey animals and he the predator. If he couldn't catch her before she made it back to Olympus, she could ask him for anything." I opened my mouth and nothing came out for a few seconds. "She was a clever goddess."

I swallowed hard.

"She almost made it?" Alistair, black haired and gray eyed, whispered sadly. He was Lace's age, I think. Seven, maybe eight.

"Yeah." I cleared my throat. "You know the whole 'born out of his head wearing armor' thing. Metis' doing." I was starting to regret not keeping my goblet. My mouth was dry. "Good thing too." I smiled weakly and mimed throwing a spear. "Ate a Master Bolt immediately. Blasted right off the mountain and landed by a river."

They were making notes.

"Myth says when Athena was born the heaven and earth cried out and the sun stood still," Malcolm muttered. "That was just the murder attempt. Thunder and the flash of light."

"Some origin stories say she was born by a river," Annabeth mused. "And the weird myth about gold falling down on humanity to celebrate her birth?" Annabeth unsheathed her Celestial Bronze dagger from the holster on her waist. The divine metal shone. In the firelight from the central brazier, the bronze really did look like shining gold. "Pieces of her armor?"

The weird game of telephone that was the human record was kind of funny.

I don't mean 'ha ha' funny.

"Her landing site was lucky. Athena was still the Daughter of Metis, Daughter of Oceanus and Tethys. As soon as she came into contact with the water, the river swept her away to the sea. It was actually Tethys that named her and fostered her with Amphitrite and Triton where she healed and was protected. Which was a problem for Zeus."

"The fatal duel!" Annabeth jumped ahead in the story. "He interfered on purpose so that she would kill the sea nymph Pallas, Triton's daughter and break her protection."

I nodded. "Everyone knew it was Zeus, but it was the first crack. She kept the protection of her lineage, but the tension grew. To prevent war, Athena asked to be presented to Zeus. 'I would know of my crime before the King of the Gods,' she declared. 'You were born,' her grandfather told her, but she was escorted to Olympus. She stood before Zeus and demanded to know what the fuck gives."

Some of Athena's kids snorted and I flapped my hand.

"Insert flowery Ancient Greek words here. Whatever. Point is she got her Prophecy out of him." I felt the smile beginning to form on my face. "And like her mother, Athena is a very clever goddess."

"A wise child was destined." Masayuki tapped his pencil onto his paper. "No gender, no birth order."

Malcolm was smiling too. "And technically, he consumed the mother, not the child. Either he messed up, or he did what the Sky Father told him to, and she wasn't the one."

"Maybe she had a twin brother," Annabeth threw out with a grin. "He bought that."

"They all did," I said. "Metis wasn't there to say otherwise. Zeus couldn't and his pride would tell him he did just as the Prophecy told him to. And he's arguing with Athena."

Seeing the pride on their faces hurt.

None of them have so much as talked to the goddess. Annabeth had an enchanted baseball cap that turned her invisible.

That was the only clue the entire cabin had that she cared about her kids at all.

"History happens. Zeus is an idiot and a jerk." Thunder again and while the younger kids flinched, my friends just tensed. "And Athena had proven herself wise and powerful against the Giants and against Typhon." There was a sudden flurry of scribbling from my audience. "She was the King's heir and the King was too busy shitting on everyone to rule properly. So obviously, he had to go."

"The sea and sun gods?" Annabeth ventured.

"Her mother and childhood meant the sea was a given. Zeus treating Leto terribly and screwing the twins over repeatedly meant she had the sun and moon." Seriously. Kallisto's entire thing where Zeus raped one of Artemis' Hunters while transformed into Artemis was really fucked up but also not the only tragedy. "Demeter's Persephone thing where Zeus helped Hades out meant he pissed away all of that good will." I paused. "Forever. So she had the harvest. And finally, he committed the crime of making Hestia regret abdicating, so she had the hearth."

There were round eyes all around.

"Hephaestus was neutral. Hermes wasn't born yet. Same with Mr. D. Ares, Aphrodite and Hera were with Zeus. Really, Aphrodite's the only reason there was even a fight."

"Really?" Annabeth said skeptically.

I almost swallowed my tongue.

Aphrodite is whole.

Shit.

"Uh, she was a bit different back then." I tried. "Sparta liked her for a reason?"

My too-smart friend made a face. "I guess…"

"Anyway!" I moved on quickly. "Zeus got the boot, Athena ruled for the next few millennia."

"Millennia!?" Several voices shouted at once.

"At least two," I mused. "I never asked exactly how long, sorry." They stared at me. "Eventually, Zeus crawled back out from under his rock, but he knew he couldn't win fighting Athena directly. So he asked Hera if she had any ideas. And she did. She went to Hephaestus."

Annabeth grimaced. "Let me guess. 'Craft me an unbreakable chain?' Like in the myth?"

"Yup. 'I can't do that,' he said. 'For everything created must one day break. But I can make chains that can't be broken by the one ensnared. What will you give me for it?'"

They all put on the classic Athena Cabin thinking face. Which meant they looked like they were trying to set something on fire with their eyes.

"His birth myth is probably wrong," Masayuki muttered.

"Definitely," Annabeth murmured back. "But I bet not all of it is a lie. Is the answer 'I will love you as a mother should?'"

I shot a finger gun at her. "Bingo! She swore it on heaven, the earth and the river Styx." A rumble sounded far off in the distance. "Now all that was left was setting the trap. She approached her sisters Demeter of Sacred Law and Hestia of the State with her head bowed. For stubborn Hera with the Domain Legitimacy of Rule had just the bait. An official coronation. Because Athena was wise and powerful." I sighed. "And very proud."

Faces fell.

"She was shackled to the throne. The rebels smuggled in as guests attacked. Caught by surprise and without Athena, it was closer than it should have been. The lines were drawn between all the gods of Olympus. The old rule versus the new. It was a proper war this time. An Olympiomachy."

"Athena was suspended over the edge of the Devouring Void by those chains." Annabeth said and I was a little worried? Because her voice was completely flat. "Her father visited every day, threatening to break them and send her into the abyss."

"Unless she gave up her Kingly Names," I said as gently as I could. "She stalled as best she could, claiming some Names as Kingly when they weren't, but she had to give up something. Once a day, she tore out a Name for the Void to take. The war waged, and she bled herself of power."

"The Nereid Thetis saved my mother, didn't she?" Annabeth's storm gray eyes boiled.

"Yes," I said slowly. "With the aid of her foster son Hephaestus who felt guilty about the clusterfuck. They escaped right before Athena was made to give up her last Kingly Name, he got every bone in his body broken by Zeus when he found out his prisoner was gone. Athena returned to her people, but not nearly as strong as she had been."

"And then?" Malcolm asked impatiently when I stopped.

"God wars are bad," I said with a grimace. Mom could have shown them how bad, but she wasn't here. And it probably wasn't something I wanted to show a seven year old child of Athena anyway. "For everybody. Your mom wasn't in the greatest of shape, uh, mentally after...everything," I finished lamely.

"No kidding," someone muttered, but I could have sworn no one said anything.

"We know the rest," Annabeth almost snapped out. "Mom didn't want to kill everyone to get her throne back. The sea god didn't care."

"They fought over it. He won and that proved her point. She couldn't. It was the last straw." I rubbed at my forehead, wishing I could take off my sunglasses to rub my eyes. I mean, I could, but it was a bad idea. "Zeus struck at his traitorous twin children first. Leto tried to protect them, but he was angry and she didn't defend herself. The lightning burned right through her. Then it nearly burned through - "

"Artemis," Apollo's voice said tightly and we all turned.

Apollo was sitting on his Table, feet on the benches as he hunched over his knees. He still had on his Camp Half-Blood T-Shirt and ratty jeans with flip flops, but he was not Fred right now. His hair was like molten gold and flowed like lava. The sun had burned out the blue of his eyes. Arcs of soft white light came off him like those telescope pictures of solar flares.

"Who was protecting me. Her little brother." He pursed his lips. "It was my idea, you know. Kicking Dad off the big chair. My fault."

"Apollo." I said as casually as I could. "Think of the poor mortals."

"Hm?" He said absently before looking down at himself. "Oh. Right." He dimmed, allowing the children of Athena to cautiously crack their eyes open. He eyed their reddened skin thoughtfully and I felt the small pulse of energy from him. "Did I hear that right, owl head kept one of her Kingly Names?"

I nodded.

"Huh. Which one?"

I shrugged. "Ageleia."

You could read it as 'Protectoress of the People' but it also meant 'Leader of the People' if you changed the context.

Guess why she didn't want to burn the world down for a throne?

Apollo's eyes went huge, like his son Will's had earlier.

"No shit?" I stared at him as he let out a small chuckle. "She said that was one of her Names of War. Her sponsorship of heroes, defender of cities and it was - she's still - " He couldn't seem to get the words out. Then he laughed in a short, angry, desperate bark. "Every fucking time Athena."

"Adrasteia named her Deceiver for a reason." I reminded him. Mom knew what she was doing. "She earned it."

"Yeah," Apollo breathed as his hair lost the fiery glow and his eyes were once again blue. "She sure did." He sighed and looked down at his hands. "Story time's over, Athena Cabin."

They packed up their books and notebooks, pens and papers without comment. Except for Annabeth who looked between Apollo and I several times. "Later, Percy."

That sounded like a threat. Why did it sound like a threat?

"Uh, okay?"

I watched her leave, bewildered.

What did I do?

Apollo huffed. "Think of the poor mortals?"

"Well, yeah. You were kind of…" I waved my hands around vaguely. "Goddy."

"And you weren't affected at all," he said slowly and I frowned. "And 'goddy' isn't a word."

"Sunglasses?" I offered. "And yes it is."

He snorted. "Sure."

He gave me one of those considering looks he hadn't given me in years. Not since he found out I could understand the Ancient Greek he had been born knowing. The dialect was too old to even have a name anymore.

"The Prophecy's active, isn't it?" He asked suddenly.

And just like that, I was hyper aware of the Mythomagic cards stalking me again. I don't know what face I made, but Apollo rolled his eyes.

"God of Prophecy. I could feel it too."

Oh.

That's right.

Well now I feel stupid.

He smirked at me. "Dumb ass."

"Why didn't you say anything earlier?" I demanded, trying to ignore the fact that I was guilty as charged. My eyes burned. The Pavilion was a bunch of Hellenic columns and trellis with no roof or walls but it still felt like the world was closing in on me.

His smirk shifted into something a lot more sad. "Same reason as you, I think."

I tried to swallow the sudden lump in my throat, but it didn't go away. That just made my throat hurt.

"I'm scared, 'Pol.'" I told my big brother. I didn't have it in me to feel embarrassed about my voice cracking.

"Yeah." Apollo murmured. "Me too."

We lapsed into a comfortable silence.

I don't do well with silences. It gave my ADHD brain too much time to think. Eventually, I had to break it.

"Okay. Let's see what the survey says." I leaned to the side and picked my backpack up from the floor. I found the aluminum tin so quickly, it was almost as if it had leapt into my hand. I pulled out the cards. I shuffled them. I drew thirteen cards and then arranged them into the star-like pattern I knew they belonged in.

When I was done, I leaned back and took it in. The new card sat comfortably in the upper left corner as if it had always belonged there. It was an item card.

Vial of Centaur Blood.

"I think I prefer my Prophecies being made of words," Apollo remarked. At some point he had drifted next to me, looking over my shoulder. "Rhymes are always better."

"You should have thought of that before you let your Oracle try to kill me."

"I'll definitely remember for next time!"

My Bardson was an ass.

He reached out and picked up his sister's card again.

"Two out of four if not negated by three." He picked up the fourth and fifth cards. Hermes, God of Thieves and The Oracle of Trophonius. "Or it's not negated."

"A triplicate," I said miserably.

Yeah.

It's fucking me.

"And a demigod of Hermes," Apollo murmured. "While he can go places and run his mouth, that's about all Hermes' Domains would allow for on a Quest." I looked up at him in surprise and saw his expression twist. "You were right about my lil' sis." He sighed. "I decided that I'm going to...trust you with her wellbeing."

I stared at him.

"I'm the one that bleeds red here." I had to say it. "Also? If I tell her that, I will die."

Apollo gave me a very hairy eyeball.

"Then don't tell her."

He didn't say anything about the whole 'fucking mortal' bit, I noticed.

"Grab Chiron and tell Dionysus to let Athena know Prophecy's up." He moved his hand through the air and the air rippled, and bent into a rainbow. "Unless…" He began hopefully. "You want to be the one convincing Arte - "

I hopped out of my seat.

"Chiron and Mr. D to Athena. Got it."

I ran away.

A bit later on, I found myself at the throw range. Unfortunately, it wasn't going well. I was super distracted during javelin practice. It was like I had never picked up a spear before. Ryan benched me after a particularly bad throw, pressing a bottle of water into my hands.

"Focus."

"Can't," I muttered back.

He eyed me like I was a puzzle piece to the wrong puzzle. "What's stopping you?"

Have you ever seen a moon landing?

I'm not talking about putting things on the moon, I mean the moon itself landing on Earth. I should have expected it, even if I was hoping it would take at least a few hours. Or even days. It was only a few nights after a New Moon, meaning her chariot was virtually invisible unlike Apollo's sun chariot that was as obnoxious as the god himself. I could hear the Campers start to yell that the Hunters were here and I felt everything in my chest cavity drop into my stomach.

"That," I moaned, standing up. I gulped down enough water to feel sick.

Mom, I kind of threw out there. I had no idea what I was going to say.

She already knew.

Her presence was there, even stronger than it had been when she Claimed me on my first night at Camp. It was thick and churning, almost straining, and so comforting. In a bubble of absolute silence, I felt like I was a fish submerged in water for the very first time. The world made sense and I knew my place in it.

And that place was larger than I had ever imagined.

This must be what stars feel like when they explode, I thought.

It was only for a few seconds, but when her attention moved on, I felt like it had lasted forever. I went to screw the cap back onto my water bottle, only to discover I wasn't carrying one anymore. Everything around me: the bench, the grass, the dirt, had been ground into a very fine wet dust in a perfect circle around me.

Ryan had backed away. His face was milk white and his brown eyes had some burst blood vessels in them.

"Oh," I said blankly. "Sorry for her." I opened my mouth for more words, but they didn't come. A vague sense of wrongness made me close my mouth. Ryan was hurt. I looked around and saw more scared faces. The wrongness got a little stronger.

I left the javelin range. The fear was gone.

Thanks, Mom.

My feet carried me to the Big House. On the ground floor if you take an immediate right after getting through the double front doors, you end up in the Rec Room. It mainly has a bunch of old arcade machines, a TV and the ping pong table where the Counselors of the Cabins meet up for meetings. Right now, instead of kids aged 12 to 18 gathered around the ping pong table, it was gods aged 4600ish to…

Wait.

How old is Athena anyway?

Annabeth's mother glanced up at me. Luke's dad was there too, for some reason? He was in a salt and pepper middle aged man get-up with brown hair, but I'd recognize those zephyr blue eyes and that sly grin anywhere. He was rolling a pair of dice. Chiron looked overwhelmed. Dionysus was sitting in a chair backwards, looking bored as he sipped at his Diet Coke. Apollo saw me and smiled, putting the card he was holding back down onto the ping pong table.

"Hey, nice timing. We were just about to get you."

Across from him, Artemis turned just enough to look at me. I bit my lip to stop what was absolutely going to be a stupid smile.

"So this is the new Oracle," she said. A girl the same age as me in a silver parka and blue jeans eyed me curiously. She had auburn hair tied back in a simple ponytail and a silver bow leaning against the ping pong table next to her. Her eyes were a hungry void with the faintest sliver of silver at the far left edge of her irises. I watched with my heart in my throat as her brow furrowed.

You ever been in a situation where you really like your older friend's sister and she doesn't notice you at all because you're a lot younger than she is? But then you meet up again years later and you've grown up a bit and she looks at you like she's never seen you before? But then the spark of realization comes into her eyes and you're hoping you made some kind of impression and then she's like,

"I know you. My brother's little tag along."

If you haven't?

It sucks.

A lot.

 

[Shujin]

An Undertow of Sand
A PJO Fanfiction​

The breath I hadn't realized I was holding left me in a pained wheeze. For a moment, I imagined I was exhaling my soul. My heart plummeted from my throat back all the way down to huddle somewhere in my left big toe. I felt like my spine had scrunched into a little ball and now I was about an inch in height. I don't - I don't have the words to describe my disappointment.

Maybe it was stupid of me to expect anything, I know. Last time I saw her, I was eight and I've been nursing this stupid crush this entire time and I hate it. But you can't help what the heart wants, isn't that how the saying goes? I mean, sure, she was smart and caring and amazing and the void in her eyes was wow and - and had literally thousands of years on me and spent every single one of them avoiding relationships.

That was fine. I wouldn't change her for the solar system. We could just be friends!

Right?

I just had a bit of a handicap.

Or a lot of one.

"That's me," I said weakly. I turned to Apollo. I usually don't pray to other gods but right now I was silently begging him to put me out of my misery. "The little tag along…"

"That's cold, sis." Apollo came to my rescue with a big smile and I felt my spirits lift. "I thought the little Tail-Puller would have made more of an impression!"

I remembered why I don't pray to other gods.

I said it before and I will absolutely say it again.

My Bardson was an ass.

I watched the small sliver of moonlight in her eyes light up. She definitely remembered me now and not at all like how I wanted her to.

Hermes snorted as he tossed his dice again and even Athena's lips curled up. I probably looked like I was about to keel over dead from a heart attack or a stroke, because Artemis gave me this pitying look I never wanted to see again and tried to reassure me.

"I hold no grudge against you for that," she said evenly. "I am well aware of how small children are around furry creatures and heal quickly."

My soul was starting to shrivel. I could feel it. The little amused smile that stole across her face for a moment made me wish I could go back in time, grab my five year old self by the shoulders, and shake him until all thoughts of pulling the wolf's tail fell out of his stupid little head!

Sam was never hearing about this.

"Uh, good," I said numbly. "That you don't hate me. For that."

"Yes, 'good,'" she echoed me and shifted her weight from one foot to the other as she frowned. "You are taller, but have not changed much, have you?"

This was a fucking disaster.

"Um. I guess not," I said miserably because every guy wants to be told they're basically five years old by the girl they like. "Is that bad?"

She hummed thoughtfully.

"No, I do not believe so," she offered, but I was scared to get my hopes up. And then I got my hopes up anyway - I couldn't help it - because she smiled again and asked, "You...have learned that tails are not for pulling, at least?"

I shouldn't have gotten my hopes up.

She just had to ask.

Why?

Chiron was starting to look constipated attempting to smother a smile before he gave up, hiding it behind a hand even as he flicked his own horse tail. This was not how I imagined this going. I thought maybe there had been something when I was eight? She credited me for Apollo being slightly less of an idiot, but maybe that hadn't been about me at all, but her brother. I was expecting….I don't know, anything but being called out on my tail-pulling ways. I had to defend myself.

And I - !

I -

I got nothing.

I didn't need to ask who could tell I was dying inside, because Hermes had a sudden, suspicious coughing fit while I stood there with lead in my shoes. Mr. D obnoxiously opened his can of Diet Coke as Apollo whistled. The final nail in the coffin was Artemis' lifting eyebrow, making it clear she was expecting an actual answer.

I can't.

I -

Someone. Anyone.

Please kill me.

Mom.

Please.

"Yeah," I croaked eventually as the gods laughed at me. "I grew out of it. You're good."

Let me die.

Artemis nodded, looking very pleased with herself. Apollo grinned at me from across the ping pong table and it took a moment, but it finally clicked.

I sighed.

Right.

Twins.

She asked because she was fucking with me.

"I'll be honest," my mouth jumped ahead of my brain. "Sharing a sense of humor with Apollo is definitely a mark against you."

She let out this soft laugh, slamming my heart right back into my throat.

I made her laugh!

In a good way!

"That is fair," the Moon Goddess allowed. "I was told you are to be a companion on my Quest."

Holy shit, that's right!

I was going on a Quest with Artemis!

Mom, I love you, I prayed immediately. I take back every bad thing I've ever said about your tests.

Her amusement this time had a bit of a malicious edge to it that definitely didn't say great things about the Quest, but I was going to forgive her.

"Perseus, was it not?" Artemis asked neutrally.

"Percy." I corrected her hopefully.

She blinked slowly and I had no idea what she was thinking. I watched the void devour the sliver of moonlight in her eyes. That was her inheritance from Selene, wasn't it? Just - just wow. She looked away suddenly, passing a hand over her face as she turned back to the ping pong table.

"I hope you did not pick up too many of my brother's bad habits."

"Excuse me? My bad habits?" Apollo frowned at her while the sun in his eyes flared and Artemis relaxed against the table, leaning in his direction as the void receded. "I've spent years training him - "

"Perseus. You have my sympathies."

"Can you not be a little shit for two seconds?"

Athena cleared her throat.

I won't claim to be the most observant guy on the planet but I did notice the way the twins immediately gave her their full attention. Hermes shifted slightly away like he was bracing himself and Dionysus didn't seem to pay attention at all. If a random demigod at Camp saw them like this before I got here, they would have no idea how much history between them they just betrayed.

Chiron, lastborn of Kronos and older than everyone here, quietly stood in his corner like a child in a classroom waiting to be called on.

"To business then." The Goddess of Wisdom raised her hand and with a soft snap of her fingers, a very pretty wooden chair appeared at the ping pong table for me. The plastic folding chairs were still against the wall. The sitting gods had made their own chairs. I thanked her and took a seat. "This is the Oracle of Chthon. He had an altercation with the Oracle of Delphi that granted him its ability to discern Prophecies."

That was a fancy way of saying 'he ate it.'

"He ate it," Mr. D said.

Hermes' eyebrows jumped. The lopsided troublemaker smile I often saw on the faces of his sons Travis and Connor briefly appeared as he glanced at Apollo. "You let him get away with that?"

It was probably supposed to be a joke, but Apollo didn't take it like one.

"The Fates are his half-siblings," he reminded the Young god who winced. I winced too.

"You're the son of the Serpent then?" Hermes sucked on his teeth. "Guess I should have seen that coming." He cracked the same sly grin Luke had. "Maybe you can appeal to the Fates, eh?"

I felt my face twist. "I'll pass."

They made it very clear I was not their brother.

Starting with the attempts to get Mom to abort me and I'm pretty sure it didn't end with the Pit Scorpion in my crib. You ever wish you weren't related to people because they were complete and utter cunts?

Yeah.

The Stele household left them off the Christmas list.

"I assume that is where the Mythomagic cards come in? A form of divination?" Artemis asked and my brain stalled for a second. She knows Mythomagic?

Officially my second favorite god of the entire pantheon.

Apollo sighed. "Do I want to know why you know the game?"

"Why do I know anything?"

"To lord it over me."

She raised an auburn eyebrow before tilting her head.

"You are not wrong." She picked up her own representation from the table and after a second, Hermes did the same. "Of the Hunt," she murmured before picking up the item card Zeus' Lightning Bolt. "I see."

"Told you." Apollo blew on his nails, buffing them on his orange Camp Half-Blood T-Shirt. "I know what I'm talking about when it comes to Prophecies."

"Sometimes," she agreed and ignored her brother's indignant squawk. "However, you must admit a Quest offered to a god of Olympus is most unusual."

Hermes rolled his head back and forth, cracking his neck.

"You mean, that doesn't happen. Ever." He eyed the Hermes, God of Thieves card in his hands like it was a rattlesnake. "A thief took it, a thief to take it back," he mused. "I can negotiate and travel, but unless I want to get ass blasted by the Fates, which I don't," he stressed as Mr. D snorted into his soda. "I can't do much in confrontation with anything but another god."

"It makes me question the nature of our enemy if two gods are necessary," Artemis asked with a side glance towards Athena.

"The prisons are holding," she replied. "For now."

"Maybe not two," Hermes said as he put his card back down. "I would - " A breeze kicked up in the god's zephyr eyes as his voice broke. "I would volunteer my son, Luke, as your thief, Artemis. I can justify teaching him a few tricks for this. It's unprecedented after all." He seemed to get into the idea, leaning forward in his seat. "Give me a few hours and maybe get him a proper weapon…"

Luke too?

I smiled to myself.

We were going to be just fine.

"Your eldest?" Artemis' eyes narrowed. "Ye - es...I remember him. He was tolerable. I accept."

"This is fucking weird," Mr. D muttered from his seat. "Quests are for mortals."

Yeah.

Quests are for us poor bastards that can die.

Dick.

"Would you recommend recruiting extra members, Chiron?" The Goddess of the Hunt idly asked as she inspected the other cards on the table. "I would prefer at least one of my Hunters with me."

"The tradition is three members for the sacred number," the immortal trainer replied from his corner. "It has served very well in reducing unfortunate incidents."

He means deaths.

People dying.

"Pythagoras was a rather useful boy of mine," Athena said with an amused quirk to her lips. "Three then, or seven for your sacred number."

"No offense," Hermes ventured. "But if it's just find and retrieve, seven seems... "

"Too many. I agree. I will go without." Artemis glanced at me as she placed the cards in her hands back in their place and then tapped the Right Hand of Kronos, the Titan Lord card. "How certain are we that this is not a Great Prophecy?"

Uh?

Apollo and I exchanged glances.

Fuck.

That was a good question.

"It came to him, not me?" Apollo offered, sounding more than a little unsure. I knew why. His Prophecies came from Mom's triplets, the Fates. And like he said, being Mom's kid outranked whatever blessing the Fates would have given me as an Oracle.

"Yes," Athena said quietly, pinning me with her shining eyes. "It came to him, the son of Fate itself." I sat there in silence as everyone stared at me, feeling like my heart had just dropped out of my ass. "That would change things, wouldn't it?"

"Would it even be about returning Father's bolt then?" Hermes ventured. "Right Hand of the Titan Lord, King of Olympus, Lightning Bolt, God of Thieves." He plastered a bright smile on his face. "And can't forget the God of Doom!"

"No one forgets the God of Doom," Mr. D grunted. "We wish we could, but we can't."

"It's not a proper Prophecy without him."

Apollo frowned at them. "Well aren't you rays of sunshine?"

Hermes opened his mouth.

"Don't say it."

Mr. D sighed noisily.

"Two meetings in one day is two too many. And Father's already sitting on a cactus." He gave me a look out of the corner of his eyes. I smiled back and tried to look extra prickly. "So we're dragging this little shit back to Olympus, or what?"

"Do we want to?" Athena asked softly. She met everyone's eyes. "Say that we do present him to the King of Olympus with this Prophecy. We do not have much to go on. We are unfamiliar with the characteristics of his Prophecies. It might be as the difference between the Grove of Dodona and the Oracle of Cumae."

If you're wondering what that difference is, one is a bunch of prophetic trees (and boy did Mom rip Rhea off big time with that one) and the other is talking bone dust in a jar and technically Apollo's fiancée.

Or something?

He tried to explain once but I hadn't been paying attention.

Look.

Calling his love life a dumpster fire was an insult to burning dumpsters.

"It might still be a Quest?" Artemis picked up another card. Vial of Centaur Blood.

"Hope that it is." Athena said. "Unless we want Father to accuse the North Wind, Old Age, or the Lady of the Underworld of theft instead?"

Boreas. Geras. Persephone, in that order. The card was her in her Name of Despoina of Mystery which meant it wasn't that simple, but, you know.

Zeus.

Everyone winced.

You probably already know this, but Demeter was a wee little bit touchy on the subject of her daughter. Just ask Hades. He made the terrible decision of asking Zeus to help him court Persephone. That ended in a kidnapping. Demeter came back to find her daughter missing, Hecate reported the abduction and then Zeus was like 'what does her not wanting to go with him have to do with anything?'

Every mother wants to hear that!

So because Zeus was useless, she gave killing all life on the planet a good ol' college try and nearly broke open the Earth Mother's prison in the process.

Accusing her daughter of stealing the Master Bolt would not end well.

For anyone.

"If I may," Chiron spoke up. After he got the nod from Apollo, the centaur stepped closer to the table. He picked up the item card The Cydonian Cincture. "An item representing all of the cunning bewitchment of mankind, belonging to a certain daughter of the Night."

He means Apate, the personification of Deceit. She's my first cousin. So are Geras, Moros, Hypnos, Nemesis and Thanatos. And the Furies.

Nyx has a lot of kids, okay?

I'm talking, no joke, at least several hundred and that's just the immortal gods and spirits. She's also got monsters for children! Actual Eat-Demigods-For-Breakfast monsters. Like the cute and cuddly furry bundles of violent death Hellhounds she had with the three headed dog of the Underworld, Cerberus.

I didn't ask for details and you shouldn't either.

"Along with two sons of Night, Old Age and Doom, and then the goddess of Mystery," He finished.

Athena's eyes narrowed as she inspected the star pattern of the cards.

Mr. D grunted. "That's a lot of Underworld references."

"It is," Artemis said slowly. "Mystery and Deceit. The Pit where the Titan Lord is imprisoned is within his realm as well. If The Crooked One could reach any of us with his whispers, it would be him."

Hermes closed his eyes wearily. More gray appeared in his brown hair. "And Father has not been shy in giving him all the incentive in the world."

Wait, what?

Were they talking about Hades?

What?

"What?" I asked out loud. Athena's nose wrinkled as if she smelled something unpleasant. Hermes gave me a sad smile. Chiron looked away with a distant look in his eyes, as if he could see through the walls of the Big House. Mr. D grumbled something under his breath. Artemis sneered and the void broke free to swallow the whites of her eyes. My breath caught. Apollo nudged her, drawing her attention.

"He can see that," he said, pointing towards me. "By the way."

For a moment, his sister stared at him in incomprehension and then horror swept over her face as she hurriedly closed her eyes.

"It's okay!" I said quickly. "It doesn't bother me. It's fine." I swallowed 'It's beautiful' because by that expression she just made, I don't think she felt the same way. I have no idea why not.

"It's fine?" Hermes repeated and Chiron just...looked at me. After a moment, he started to stroke his beard thoughtfully.

"He is unaffected," Athena confirmed. "The Mist hides nothing from him."

Mr. D gave me this weird look, like he went to bite into a chocolate and discovered some jerk had turned it into black licorice.

And he didn't know how to feel about it.

I did.

Licorice is nasty.

"Neat trick," he said quietly. That was the second compliment he's given me and it's starting to creep me out. "I didn't manage that until I was...forty something."

"Uh, thanks…?"

Have you ever seen something move in your peripheral vision? You can't see what it is, what shape it is, or color, but you know it's there and you know it changed. Something like that just happened with Artemis. I could see it and couldn't at the same time.

I bit my tongue as she opened moonlit eyes. Almost like molten silver.

I guess they were okay.

She leaned away from me. "What is he?"

She's still great.

But.

That was kind of rude.

"When you find out, let me know," Apollo said, shrugging. "Where were we?"

"Uncle Dead," Hermes said, still glancing back at me.

The sun god snapped his fingers.

"Righto! So you know about the Prophecy, the big one," my Bardson said after a moment. "A half-blood child of the eldest gods, soul reaping at sixteen, world in endless sleep, yadda yadda? You weren't born yet. We thought that meant kids of the Big Three. Sky, Sea, Underworld."

Zeus, Poseidon and Hades.

I snapped my fingers, a habit I picked up from him. "So that's why their cabins are empty!"

Only a literal apocalypse would get Zeus and Poseidon to stop chasing skirts.

"I know!" Apollo burst out. "Super weird, right? You gotta admit, Dad and Uncle Sea do got hella game. Leaving the field unplayed is so not them."

Artemis made a disgusted sound.

"So the eldest - "

Wait a minute.

The sisters were older than their brothers. If they thought 'eldest gods' meant the children of Kronos and Rhea for...reasons? I got plenty of cousins that fit that title and there are Titans still around and gods like my mother, but whatever! Then Hestia, Demeter and finally Hera were born before Hades, Poseidon and Zeus.

Where'd this idea that the younger set of siblings were the 'eldest gods' even come from?

Did they just go 'prophecy about demigods, who here can't keep it in their pants?'

They probably did.

I will admit, I don't see Hestia ever having a demigod, Prophecy or not.

I know how it works. Kind of. Sam's a cat, Mom does not have a filter and Apollo forgets I'm twelve sometimes. So I have an idea.

Anyway, Hestia swore off that. On her little brother's head.

As in she would have to sacrifice Zeus' head to her flames first. When Hestia makes an oath, she means it.

Yes.

When Mark said she was a scary pacifist, he was not kidding.

Hera, on the other hand?

I think keeping her marriage vows when Zeus wouldn't was a point of pride for her. How much pride she has left after all these years is anyone's guess. A demigod of Hera would be an immediate clusterfuck worthy of a Doomsday Prophecy, but I can easily believe no one wanted to be the one telling the Queen of Olympus that to her face.

Demeter had demigod kids though. Apollo's Cabin played Dungeons and Dragons with them. The current Counselor Katie Gardner was an overpowered monk.

"But, Demeter?" I asked, confused.

Athena threw up her hands.

"Thank you," she nearly hissed.

So it wasn't just me.

"To be fair, we just got done with that whole mortal war thing, what did they call it, World War...Two?" Hermes spoke up with a wide shit eating grin. I suddenly understood why his kids are all bastards. "Their kids screwed everything up, they absolutely would do it again."

"They grew up in the belly of a time god," Mr. D pitched in. "They got thrown up in reverse order, so technically…"

"And you were wrong anyway, so there!" Apollo exclaimed and stuck his tongue out at her.

"The current demigod children of the Three had already passed their sixteenth birthday, as required by the Prophecy," Artemis cut in before the three idiots could goad Athena into strangling them. "Except for two young children of the God of the Dead." A muscle in her jaw jumped as she ground her teeth. "A girl not yet twelve years of age and her younger brother."

Oh.

I think I know how this ends.

"He killed them," I said.

"Yes," Artemis replied softly. A tarnished silver chair appeared behind her for her to sit in. She sighed, arm on the table. "Father killed them."

Yikes.

So if Mom wasn't Mom...it would have been a good idea to invest in rubber shoes.

"The Three made an oath on the River Styx not to sire anymore demigods," Artemis continued. A low rumble sounded in the distance as a warning of the ancient river's attention.

Huh.

"Just the river?" I asked to be sure.

Her eyes widened.

"What do you mean 'just the river?'" Hermes asked with a frown as Athena's attention suddenly snapped completely to me from the cards. "It's the most binding form of oath we know of."

I opened my mouth to ask what happened to swearing on the Voice of Heaven and the Bones of the Earth when I finally registered the warning look Chiron and Athena were giving me.

"Oh come on!" I nearly yelled. "That's ridiculous!"

Athena's eyes closed wearily. "I know."

I waved at Hermes. "Literally a god. Throne and everything."

"I know."

Hermes raised his hand. "What am I missing?"

"Swearing on the Styx alone is for mortals." The problem with pissing off the border between the land of the living and the dead is that she can change your address really easily.

From Living Street to Dead Avenue.

"Perseus." Athena said tightly.

"And Hades," I amended as Athena rubbed at her temples. "He is kind of right there in the Underworld, and Styx is the Goddess of Hatred, so that'd still suck for him, but for the rest of you? What can she do?"

"A fate worse than death," Mr. D said flatly.

"Exactly," I said, pointing a finger at him. "She has to ask the Fates. And they punish when and who they feel like it."

The Moirai have never let silly concepts like justice, fairness, morality in general get in the way of a good weave.

"A true oath offers your intent to heaven, trusts the earth with the punishment for breaking it and calls upon the Styx as witness."

And insurance the Earth Mother won't devour more than her due if you're a stupid oath breaker.

See?

I gave Athena a smug look.

I can teach and keep secrets.

She sighed.

Hermes stared at me a moment too long. Then his head slowly turned towards the older Olympians. I could almost hear it creak.

"Is that true?" He asked quietly.

Athena pinched the bridge of her nose as Chiron cleared his throat uncomfortably. Apollo shuffled his feet, looking anywhere but at his half-brother. Artemis sighed and bit the bullet.

"Yes," the goddess of the hunt said. "Have you not wondered why Father and his Queen keep some oaths and not others? Even when they clearly despise it? Particularly, the ones made before you were born?"

Mr. D sighed heavily again. "Son of a bitch."

"I thought...it was because he really cared…about…?" His middle aged guise melted away, leaving a black haired young man with zephyr blue eyes looking very small in his elaborate winged chair.

I didn't want to, but I was starting to feel sorry for the Messenger God.

Sure, he ticketed my Mom, but it was starting to look like he didn't know anything. Even though he really should.

He was Luke.

"Yes, he cared," Athena sneered. "He cares so much that when it comes to the fate of Olympus, he just could not help himself. Thalia Grace was because he cared."

Wait, what?

What?

"As in the pine tree?" I blurted out. I lifted an arm to point in the general direction of the Camp entrance. "The one right out in front of the Big House? Just down the hill? Thalia's Tree? On Half-Blood Hill? That one?"

"That one," Athena confirmed.

I knew my mouth was hanging open. I couldn't help it. No wonder Travis had been so weird about me climbing the pine tree.

It had been a demigod.

"The God of the Dead sought revenge. A horde of monsters was sent after the girl. She had companions. One of mine." She didn't seem at all concerned about that, so I was hoping whoever it was made it. "And one of Hermes'."

The God of Travelers still looked lost.

"She faltered and fell. Father intervened, turning her into a pine tree at the top of the hill and robbed his brother of her soul." She punctuated her words with little waves of a finger, like a conductor in front of an orchestra. "She died with the intent to sacrifice and Hestia accepted."

Hermes' eyes tried to escape his skull.

"Hestia? But Father - " He pressed his lips together and the wind within his blue eyes swirled dangerously. He breathed in and let it out slowly. "Later."

A quicksilver smile flickered across Athena's face. "As you wish."

"Okay," I jumped back into the conversation. "So Olympus killed his kids and he couldn't take revenge. Is that really enough to go to war with everyone over? He's not dumb."

Mom would do it in a heartbeat, but that's because she could.

"He is in a rather unique position," Athena allowed. "We are no longer actively worshipped by humanity. Are you aware of why we allowed this?"

"Stability?" I guessed. "No more Given Names, but also no more pesky clashes with other pantheons, having Names atrophy, having Names Taken and no more assholes deciding they don't want to be mortal anymore like Mr. D."

The Wine God saluted the room with a new can of Diet Coke. Hermes stared at me in complete bewilderment. He looked around the room like he thought someone was playing a trick on him and was trying to spot the camera.

"Shit, kid. What weren't you taught?"

That was a dumb question. "How would I know what I wasn't taught?"

He palmed his face.

"The Mist allows mortals to believe a different explanation of the truth. Such as our chariots." Artemis said and she paused. "Then they die."

You know.

I have never wondered how atheists feel when they end up in the Greek Underworld. Or any of the afterlives.

Awkward as hell, I'm guessing.

"You think he's still getting Names from mortal worship." I said slowly. "It's just that his worshippers are dead."

They were all quiet.

"Is he?"

"We do not know." Athena pursed her lips. "He is invited to Olympus during the Winter Solstice, but the influence of Night on him makes it...difficult to discern."

Apollo snorted. "Try impossible."

Athena's eyes flashed.

"Difficult."

"Night gave him power once," Hermes told me. "Who's to say it won't happen again?"

"What about all of mommy dearest's fucking kids?" Mr. D grumbled. "I do not want to deal with that shit again. And that was just a demigod."

"But motive?" I came to Hades' defense.

I had to.

The guy is basically my retirement plan if Mom decides not to pull rank.

From what Mom told me, he seems like a cool dude with more than enough work on his plate. Imagine being king of a small country with a permanent refugee problem. You have to accept them. There is a quota on how many you can kick back out at a time, but they'll always come back. And you have to accept them. None of your citizens will ever die, because they are already dead. But they still feel hunger and pain and cold just like living people. Your 'help' is a hundred different gods with a hundred different ideas on what to do. The Night and the Pit are your next door neighbors.

And every winter, your mother-in-law Demeter is on your ass 24/7.

Unless his cunning plan was quitting his job and going to war against Olympus to make someone else do it?

"That's right, the motive," Mr. D drawled with that cruel look in his eyes again. "Why don't you tell him what you all voted for?"

Artemis nearly jumped out of her chair.

"You abstained!" She spit. "Do not act as if you made that decision with any principles."

"My principle was not licking Father's sandals." The Wine God rolled his eyes as Hermes stiffened, lips pressing together as his eyes narrowed. "Although…" He smirked, glancing between his sisters. "I've recently learned that maybe there's a reason for that, isn't there?"

"Careful," Apollo warned him. "You have no idea what we've been through - "

Athena was stone faced. "I voted for it as I agreed."

"What?" Apollo's flaring sunlit eyes swung back around. Chiron shrunk back into a corner by an arcade machine. "Why?"

"It would settle the matter, once and for all." She had on this grim little smile that was making my stomach scrunch into a tiny ball of ice. Settle the matter of...his Names?

No.

I swallowed and the back of my throat burned. My gut twisted.

No.

Please tell me they didn't.

"One must learn to choose their battles, as I did."

Apollo was not a loud angry. He was a loud annoyed, but when he was truly mad? He got quiet. He spoke slowly and his words seared. "You think everyone can figure out how to lie to Adrasteia, Athena Ageleia?"

Adrasteia, my half-sister. Giver of Reward and Punishment. The Inescapable.

To go before her was to expose the very make up of your soul. Her presence brought it out for everyone to see, like blood welling up from a cut. Can you imagine? Everything that makes you you float to the top. The ties of your existence, your Domains out in the open. You could see the Names you were developing, and which ones were withering away. You could identify all the Names of a Young god like that.

You could carve them out.

Mom brought my small sliver of divinity to the surface once.

I never want to go through that again.

They voted to torture him.

Artemis let out a small cry of dismayed surprise echoed by Hermes, but for very different reasons. "You lied?"

"It's true!?"

The room devolved into arguing, shouting over each other, accusing each other while I sat there in my chair, numb. My mind spun in circles. Hades' kids were killed. He couldn't take revenge. That was it. And Olympus voted. There were only twelve members. If Zeus proposed it, he couldn't vote and Mr. D abstained. Ten. It needed a majority.

Artemis. Apollo. Hermes. Athena.

That's four.

Olympus voted to force him before Adrasteia, like he was already guilty when he was the one wronged.

Just because he might be getting stronger when they weren't.

"What the fuck." It came out of my mouth as a hoarse whisper. I could barely hear it, the gods were so loud. The air in the room was thick and heavy, like moments before a storm broke. I could feel them, what they truly were, battering my mind.

Kneel.

Beg.

No.

Fuck you.

The numbness was starting to burn away with rage as it truly sunk in. Blood rushed in my ears as my head pounded.

How...fucking...PETTY!

"What the fuck - " It was a struggle to even speak, but I pushed, clawed at the pressure until I felt that yawning pit crack open in my stomach and was able to stand. " - is fucking wrong with you?"

My resonating voice cut through theirs.

"With all of you?"

Artemis bared her teeth. "If I were you, I would hold my tongue, boy."

I snarled right back. "I would, if you acted more like a goddess and less like Zeus' by-blow!"

So.

Alright.

I'm going to blame Dad's Insults of the Day for that one.

It felt like the world froze.

Then thunder roared through the house and there was a shout from someone -

- a fucking mountain lion leapt over the ping pong table, intent on ripping my throat out with her teeth -

- I heard my mother laugh in my ear -

- And a raging bunny rabbit with auburn fur and silver eyes missed my jugular by a mile, smacking into my chest and falling back onto the table in a furry heap. The pressure I'd been feeling unceremoniously broke like a fart in a packed elevator.

No one said anything for a good thirty seconds.

We all just watched the small moon rabbit struggle to get to her feet, going from pissed, to confused, to terrified. When she started squeaking in distress, Hermes cracked with his cheeks puffed and a loud wet,

"Phhhhhhbbbbt!"

Chiron palmed his face as Apollo snapped out of his shock. "What the - turn her back!"

"I didn't do it!" I protested immediately. Hermes was chuckling in fits. He'd stop himself, then look at the rabbit on the table and start up again. "It was Mom!"

Mom, thanks? But - Oh, she was absolutely laughing her ass off. You are still not funny. Turn her back.

Athena made a chair for herself and shakily sat down. She breathed out and her forehead made a thunking sound as it hit the ping pong table.

Artemis remained an angry rodent.

"Get her to undo it!" Apollo yelled and that was the last straw for Mr. D who started with a snigger, but when the mad moon bunny turned on him, squeaking, he started to howl.

"I already tried!" I almost wailed. The consequences of my actions had just hit me. This was my chance! And I called my crush a bastard to her face and got her turned into a rabbit! Was it even possible to recover from this?

I -

I ruined everything!

"You know how she is! She thinks she's funny!"

"She's fucking hilarious!" Mr. D wheezed, his voice breaking several octaves higher. "How's that for some irony! Get me some hunting dogs!"

"You - you're not helping," I told the Wine God who broke into a fresh wave of guffaws. "That is the opposite of helping."

He tried to say something, tears coming to his eyes, but I couldn't understand it.

"Do you need a minute?"

"It's got to wear off, right?" Apollo was examining the bunny with brightly sunlit eyes. "Healthy, at least, but it can't be permanent, right? She's in the Prophecy. She can't go on a Quest as a fucking rabbit!"

I think the answer was yes, he did need a minute as Mr. D staggered to the door and left the room, laughing all the way.

"Okay then," I told his back.

Hermes made a sound like he was dying.

"I - I'm sorry," I offered the sun god miserably. "I'm willing to pay an Athenian reconciliation price."

A muscle jumped in Apollo's jaw. "Athena."

"She did try to kill him," the goddess responded. Her voice was a little muffled because her head was still on the table, but she sounded tired and relieved and exasperated and just...a lot of things.

And more than a little done.

"He has the greater claim. The burden of paying reconciliation falls upon Artemis."

Oh.

Well, I guess.

I'm a demigod. We get used to murder attempts. At some point, you figure out how to shrug off the emotional baggage.

"I provoked her," I said, not willing to let myself completely off the hook. Because I did and if I didn't want her to hate me forever, I needed to own up to it. Dad always said that if I have to insult the person, I lost the argument. "I apologize," I told the silver eyed woodland creature on the ping pong table. "I lost my temper and said something completely uncalled for. I offer reconciliation anyway for my part in it."

The bunny gave me a narrow eyed look.

"Sorry," I whispered, feeling my heart start to crack.

The rabbit's ears twitched as she looked towards Apollo. He sighed. "Not my call. I hate to say it, but if you had killed him…"

"Yes," Athena said sharply as she raised her head to glare at the moon rabbit. "If you had."

Artemis shuffled a bit on the table and before my heart could shatter completely, she nodded with a small affirmative squeak.

I bit my lip to stop the stupid grin from forming on my face. She was willing to forgive me! "Thank you."

I already had an idea for my price too!

I said I grew out of it.

I reached out and before she could react, I gently - gently! - pulled on the fluffy white cotton ball bunny tail.

I am a lying liar who lies.

I turned away from the stunned moon rabbit to Apollo proudly as Hermes bit his thumb. With my hands on my hips I declared, "Paid in full!"

My Bardson stared at me.

"What?" I frowned. "Now we're even."

His mouth opened and closed a few times before he just shook his head.

"I...am not." And with that he scooped his small rabbit-sister up off the ping pong table. She curled up into a little ball in his hands. She was really adorable, but also not very happy with what had just happened. Her ears were hanging down against her head. I don't know rabbit body language, but if I had to guess, she looked almost depressed.

I get it.

I wouldn't want to be stuck as a bunny either.

"Any ideas?" Apollo threw out half-heartedly.

"Hunt a few sacrifices, build an altar, beg mom for mercy?" I suggested with a grimace.

Artemis whimpered and her brother cradled her, sighing. "Yeeaaap."

"Wait," Hermes looked up with wide eyes. "An altar? We can do that? We do that? That's an actual thing?"

"Not something to do lightly." Apollo jerked his head towards the door. "Chiron, still remember how?"

"To the Serpent?" The old centaur mused as he followed the two gods out into the foyer of the Big House, stroking his terrible beard. "I believe so. Might I suggest the Myrmeke nest within the Grove of Dodona? They have been getting aggressive lately."

Then it was just me and Athena.

Who was leaning on the table with a hand over her eyes like she was hoping the world would go away if she ignored it for long enough.

"I do not know whether to curse or praise your existence," she said eventually.

"Uh. Both?"

"Both," Annabeth's mother agreed.

"Did you really vote because you thought it was the right thing to do?" I had not forgotten. "You know what that's like."

"I do not make wrong decisions."

I stared at her in blank disbelief.

"Often," she gritted out as if it was being pulled out of her with a chain and a pickup truck.

"You know what I mean."

"Yes, morals." She said that word 'morals' the same way I would complain about dog shit on my shoes. Charming, really. She shifted her hand off her eyes, peering at me with black coral orbs that shimmered with the rainbow in the light. "Ethics. Temporary discomfort is worth the King of Olympus being wary of war, rather than having him desire it."

Temporary discomfort?

I felt my anger rising again and beat it back down to simmer in my stomach. I already lost my temper once today. I don't need to have her mad at me too. She might not be able to hurt me directly, but if there was anyone I could trust to find a way to make me regret it without triggering my Mom, it would be the Goddess of Wisdom.

"There must have been some other way."

"None so definitive," she dismissed with a bored glance over the cards still on the table. The star pattern was still messed up where Artemis landed and she reached out to fix it. "If you had arrived a year or two earlier, perhaps I would have had more suitable options."

I rolled that around in my mind.

Options?

That didn't sound like someone who was at all upset with me telling the truth.

"Aphrodite is whole," I said quietly and that amused quirk came back to Athena's lips.

"You are a young boy who was raised by one not of our pantheon. I would hardly expect you to buy into millennia worth of propaganda, and we have no leverage to quiet you, do we?" She settled her chin in one hand. "You were given an education worthy of a young godling. It would be a shame to suppress it."

I nodded slowly. "And when the Master Bolt is found?"

"You will ensure Artemis returns it to our father, of course. Now is not the time for instability." So there is a time for instability, it's just not right this minute. "We have four years until you turn sixteen, after all."

Note to self.

Athena is a snake.

I bit my tongue and decided to let it go. I was pretty sure Boreas of the North Wind card in my Prophecy meant we weren't going anywhere near the Underworld entrance in Los Angeles, so Hades was probably very innocent. And we're going to prove it. I'll get the vote overturned, somehow. Maybe Adrasteia would listen to me, or I could beg Mom to talk to her.

I'll think of something.

I changed the subject. "Have you considered visiting Cabin 6 while you're here?"

Athena frowned. "No, why?"

"It's full of your kids." I pointed out dryly. "Who just learned Olympus has been lying to them and who all want to get to know their mother."

"They will adapt to the truth," she said easily. "As for their wants…" She glanced up towards the lazily spinning ceiling fan of the Rec Room. "Perhaps if any others prove worthwhile."

Yeah.

I was expecting that.

I was not her biggest fan for a reason.

"Any others?"

"One has intrigued me this past Winter Solstice when the Camp made their little field trip. She inherited far more of Strategic War than usual." Athena pursed her lips, tilting her head deeper into her cupped hand. "Annabeth. She must have been an inspired creation. Her father was a military enthusiast."

I'm pretty sure I would have heard more affection from someone showing off their new car. Everything about Camp Half-Blood was really making me appreciate my own parents.

"You gave her a divine gift." I said, hoping to spark some...I don't know. Maybe a clue that my friend was anything more to her mother than 'inspired creation?' I'm not sure what I was feeling, but I wasn't happy. Was it possible to be heartbroken on someone else's behalf?

"If she wants to live, she'll use it well," was all Athena had to say about it. She stood up and vanished the god made chairs with a wave of her hand. "This meeting is adjourned, unless there is something else?"

I swallowed thickly. It was one thing to read about it in the books Mom got for me, it was another to hear it first hand. Athena had all the makings of a great king. What made me uncomfortable was that it was so easy for her to be a terrible one. Maybe I was biased because I was mortal and really didn't like the idea of drowning, but some of her decisions regarding humanity seemed cruel. She didn't want to kill us all off, but that didn't exactly mean she cared. You ever heard that saying about a frog in a pot of water, slowing cooking to death? The Goddess of Wisdom could justify anything and if she couldn't, everyone else would make excuses for her because she was competent. I had a hard time deciding what was worse: suffering caused by stupidity or suffering caused deliberately.

That gave me an idea.

"Talk to Hestia, at least?" I tried weakly. Athena's former Queen. They weren't married or together or anything and I was high key regretting that for the sake of Athena Cabin. They would have had an awesome step mom.

No, Poseidon and Hestia had been Athena's key advisors. The empathy and compassion she didn't have. Over time they picked up new Names suited for the roles they played. Hestia Basileia started out as a title for a high ranking official, but the meaning of it changed. Now it meant Queen. Hestia had to carve that Name out when she gave up her throne for Dionysus. I don't know if Poseidon got all his Names back after his mortal Trial. It would not surprise me if he didn't.

I don't think Athena was going to ask Poseidon to advise her any time soon. But I was hoping she still considered Hestia's opinion worthwhile.

Athena paused.

"Perhaps," she allowed after giving me a knowing look. "I will try to act surprised if any of my children discover an urgent need to talk to her as well."

And she saw right through that.

Figures.

"Well, I mean, you're not my King or anything," I said, wincing. "But I'm sure if you ask Cabin 6, they'll have a different answer, Wanax."

That thing that happened with Artemis earlier, where something changed but I had no idea what, happened again and Athena's expression screwed up in pain, taking a step back like she had just been punched in the chest.

Oh fuck!

"Do not - " She snarled at me before catching herself. "Do not invoke that Name."

She actually still had the title!

Great.

I try not to piss her off.

Do it anyway.

"Sorry." I whispered. "Won't happen again."

Her eyes bored into me like she could see down into my bones.

"I believe that is all." She strode to the door and paused with her hand on the door frame. "Both, indeed," she said quietly before she left me in the Rec Room with my Mythomagic card Prophecy still on the ping pong table.

I quietly packed them back up in the tin.

A few hours later, I was looking around the Dining Pavilion at dinner, rubbing at my aching right shoulder. He didn't say anything when he gave me rusted swords to polish, but I was pretty sure Ryan was pissed.

'Test of competence' my ass.

It was much like breakfast with a few extra gods and the Table 8 for Artemis Cabin wasn't empty. Apollo was back in his guise as Fred sitting by his newly claimed son, Will. Hestia was at Athena's Table along with Athena because she was a miracle worker when she put her mind to it. Mr. D was at our usual Table 12 staring at Clovis and Ethan with morbid fascination as they talked about their time with Hypnos. Artemis was -

Uh.

I looked over Table 8.

The Hunters were an all girl group of the moon goddess' adopted kids. Maybe you've heard of them? Once they swear an oath to her, she blesses them with immunity to disease, halted aging and a greater ability to kick ass. You could tell who had it at the table by the silver glow under their skin. The Lieutenant of the Hunters was her second in command, a girl who looked fourteen to fifteen, but was actually older than Hestia, the Firstborn of Kronos.

Zoë Nightshade, Daughter of the Titan Atlas.

She kind of looked like a Persian princess with copper skin and slightly upturned nose. Her long black hair was tied back at the top under the silver circlet that was her badge of office. The only thing that gave her away as not being like her younger sisters was the dark, sluggishly swirling fractured nebula in her eyes.

She was also holding a small depressed bunny rabbit with auburn fur, silver eyes and white cotton ball tail.

I winced as Mr. D started snickering into his Diet Coke again.

Oh my fucking god, Mom, please.

"Hey," Luke's voice said as he sat down next to me with his plate of barbeque. "I - look, Chiron's probably going to tell you after dinner. I don't like it, but I can't change it."

"Uh," I turned a bit in my seat to look at him. His face was pinched, clearly unhappy with whatever it was. "What's going on?"

"A Quest." Luke gritted his teeth. His blue eyes burned with anger as he looked back at Table 11 where his father Hermes sat with his half-siblings. Telling jokes from the look of it. "I've been voluntold to steal back Zeus' Master Bolt or die trying."

That's when I remembered Hermes walked out on Luke and his mom.

So the 'die trying' bit did make things a little awkward.

I'll admit it.

"Yeah," I sighed. "With me and Artemis."

He blinked in surprise. "You already know, eh? Another volunteer?"

That was one way to put it.

"Does it count if I'm the Oracle that gave the Prophecy for it?"

His mouth fell open. "What."

"Oracle of Delphi?" Castor asked from his seat across from me. His eyebrows looked like they were making a good effort to invade his hairline.

"Yup."

"He ate it," Pollux told Luke casually, like it was no big deal and I appreciated it. "It tried to kill him that night when he came to Camp."

"Son of Fate," I finished. "Weird shit happened."

Story of my life.

"I am now the Oracle of Chthon. Apparently."

Luke stared for a few seconds more before he rolled his eyes and then pinched his nose. "So you, the Oracle that gave the Quest Prophecy is going on the Quest, which is bizarre, a goddess known for killing men is in charge which is fantastic, and then there's me, dragged into the mess to steal a god weapon back. Is that right?"

Uh.

"Yeah, that's about it."

Luke whimpered and buried his head in his arms. "Put Annabeth in charge of my burial shroud."

"It's fine," my mouth said as my brain hung up on that word 'burial.' "We're going to be fine." I looked at my friends. Pollux was chewing on his lip and I think that was supposed to be a smile on Castor's face.

Luke's Quest killed two Campers and almost killed Luke.

Our godly back up was still a rabbit.

"My mother knows what she's doing," I said. "It's fine."

I hope.

That night, after talking to my Dad which I did every night at Camp, I made a beeline straight for my apartment in the Dreamlands once I fell asleep, burbling a quick greeting to Morpheus on my way through the border.

It was still a little weird, but every night the flaws in my home away from home were getting fixed. Everything was the right color now and the random teleporting to that black pyramid had thankfully stopped. I don't know what was up with my form here, but I was working on it. I was solid now, just with a few too many burning green eyes. It was a bit like I had somehow forgotten how to ride a bike years after I learned how.

I was just a bit rusty.

For no reason.

I crept up on the sleeping orange tabby cat in front of my fireplace and reached out.

Sam's ear flicked as he moved his crooked tail just out of range. "I will fucking cut you, mate."

I pouted and sat down on the floor. "Sam, you would not believe the day I just had."

"I already believe it," my feline friend yawned, stretching out with his claws on my wood floor. I buffed away the tiny scratches with a thought. "You only have two kinds of days. Nothing Happens and Fucking Disaster."

I mean.

That's fair.

"You remember what I told you about Artemis, right?"

He licked at a paw for a moment, thinking. "The...queen you want kittens with, yeah?"

"I'm twelve," I reminded him with a sigh. "I don't like anyone that way."

"Toms don't fucking gush to other blokes about a bird they just want to be friends with, is all I'm saying."

Sam's kind of an asshole.

He's a cat, so no surprise there.

"Whatever. So that Prophecy thing came active today - "

There was a polite knock on the door, which confused me a little. I wasn't expecting any visitors. Clovis wasn't at that level yet, and Ethan was just starting. We weren't in any towns either, just a cliff dropping off to the Crystal Sea and salt plains for miles around.

Sam tilted his head, both ears upright and fully alert.

"Who is it?"

Sam blinked at me slowly. "Some fuck named Kronos. Know 'im?"

 

[Shujin]

An Undertow of Sand
A PJO Fanfiction​

I may have screamed.

Not for the reason you're thinking!

Sam's tail shot straight up as his fur began to glow and his right eye began to burn orange. "Right. Booting."

"No wait!" I yelped.

I wildly looked about my living room as Sam sputtered out. So I kind of just copied our actual living room for my apartment and pieces of my bedroom had crept in because Dream. The logical mind worked in the Dreamlands, but it had a severe handicap. The unconscious mind was far stronger and it kind of just did what it wanted. I was still working on it?

Our white leather couches and glass long table was right where they should be. My room's desk with the small model of the dragon Bahamut on it was not but it wasn't that obvious. Most of the windows opened up to the balcony where the Crystal Sea stretched out down below from the cliff to the horizon. Except for one window that opened out to a black sand beach. I closed the blinds on that one. So there were patches of my bedroom's star studded wall paper interrupting the beige and dark wood wall of the living room, but it didn't look too bad? This was okay? Maybe this was okay. Alright, the baseball bean bag I could just get rid of - wait, shit, the baby pictures! He can't see the baby pictures.

"Just, uh, tell him I need a minute."

The wall full of framed images went blank, but as soon as I stopped concentrating on it, they came back. Of course they did. The pictures were part of my actual living room, so the association in my mind was too strong.

Crap.

"So..." Sam began. "Were we expecting this motherfucker or - "

"Uh, no. But that's okay! I don't mind." I said quickly.

Sam took his job watching over me seriously, which was great, but sometimes he was a little trigger happy. I didn't need to leave the Dream. I needed to talk to him!

Maybe the kitchen?

No, not the kitchen - you don't meet people in the kitchen, what am I thinking!

"Are yooouuu sure? He's fucking dodgy, mate, calling from the fucking Pit and I don't think - "

"He's literally in a thousand pieces right now," I interrupted him. Obviously not any of the bedrooms, but the balcony might work? Nice view right? And it's got chairs. The yellow duck floatie in the pool was eh. "He's Dreaming, Sam. He can't do anything to me here, it's a good faith thing. Really good."

...why was the duck even there!?

"...why does he need a good faith gesture." Sam asked flatly and I cringed.

Maybe good faith wasn't the right term to use? I mean, Olympus was his problem, right? Mom wasn't the one who cut him up and threw him into the Pit. Sure, he got that False Prophecy, but he knew that wasn't Mom's fault, right? That was just Ouranos being a prick!

He probably knew, right? He was a smart cookie.

"Why does he need a good faith gesture?" Sam repeated with a bit of a growl.

"Can't you just work with me here?" I shifted my apartment around us. The open space of my living room blurred into my replica of Dad's office.

"No!" Sam snapped as he hopped onto Dad's big black art deco desk, scattering a few of the manila folders and spilling their blank white pages on the floor. His tail batted at the small lamp shaped like a giant piece of cut emerald as he stared me down with his green cat eyes. "Gimme a good answer or I swear I'm booting his creepy arse back - "

"He's like Potato!" I pleaded as I picked up the papers. "You know Potato, if he comes to visit we still try to break out the good treats and toys and everything?"

"Well yeah, but that's only because - " Sam stopped and then pressed his forehead into the lamp. "Potato's a fucking dog."

"It's the same thing!" I insisted as I inspected the office. It was the same thing.

Right?

It was all dark wood walls with an equally dark wood floor underneath a plush red carpet. There was the diamond patterned shelf for Dad's wine collection complete with the dusty bottles of wine that would probably taste like fire and sunlight if I opened them. The wall behind the desk was a giant bookshelf stretching wall to wall and all the way up to the ceiling. The left side had the books, notebooks and blocks of paper clipped together for his work and the right was the fun stuff. I knew that set of books was Tolkien and that was Jordan even if I couldn't read any of the spines and the pages were either blank or full of gibberish. Reading in a Dream was already a bitch and a half. My Dreams still ran on demigod brain so that was not happening.

This would work.

"Perseus." Sam said seriously and I bit my lip as I rounded Dad's desk. He wasn't going to work with me. I collapsed into Dad's plush brown leather chair and spun around once. "What the fuck."

I snorted and kicked my feet.

Where to even begin? The Dreamlands had visitors, but it also had natives. People who were born here would probably ask me if 'Greek' was a food. Cats not being able to talk? That's crazy. No one batted an eye when my apartment popped up on a street corner. To most of the people here, Earth might as well be in a different galaxy.

Uh, maybe it actually was?

Anyway, you learn pretty quickly what you take for granted when you talk to a cat.

"I'll explain," I promised. I guess it couldn't be too different from teaching some of the kids at Camp. "I guess, from the beginning?" A beginning. "What's the history of the Waking world according to Sam?"

Cats in the Dreamlands didn't have any official titles for the place. They just called it Here and There, changing depending on where they were.

Sam was clever though.

"Cats ruled the earth, then you fucking wazzocks popped up out of nowhere." Yup. That version of events coming from him did not surprise me at all. By 'wazzocks', he meant humans. I think that word meant something like 'idiot' but I'm not sure. Sam had a lot of words for idiot. "Training you took forever."

Trust a cat to have his priorities straight.

"There was a war," I told him. Sam knew what that word meant, but I think it was more of an abstract thing. It once took me an hour to explain what a billboard advertisement was for and by the time I was done I was the one confused. He knew killing though. "The star-spawn rebelled."

Sam's head tilted.

"Right. There was something about the Waking sun…" His eyes narrowed as he thought. Eventually, he started to pace back and forth on the desk as his right eye began to softly burn orange. "Yes...we had a blue one. Something broke out of it." Sam paused, looking back at me. "You were a bit different then. Less fucking fragile, but a lot more manky."

'Manky' meant ugly. Sometimes it was hard to believe Sam actually spoke English.

"Humans were vessels for…" I waved a hand vaguely. "You know."

"Them muppets," Sam said with a nod.

He wasn't a fan of gods.

Any of them.

I guess we kind of still were vessels? I mean, demigods were viable for a reason, right? Anyway, it had been all about the Elder Gods. I don't know if we evolved or if we were created because Mom wouldn't give me a straight answer, but I do know that we came to Earth through a Gate and we were 'manky.' We couldn't help it though. Who you served and which planet in our corner of the cosmos you came from meant sometimes you had two arms and sometimes you had four.

"The war lasted...a lot of cat years."

Sam huffed, raising a paw to groom his uneven whiskers. "This chuffer some big shot from all that then?"

"One of them," I admitted, fiddling with the drawers of Dad's desk.

I opened the top one and couldn't stop the embarrassed, pleased smile when I saw the picture Dad kept there. It was just me and him at SeaWorld. Mom must have taken the picture. I looked about six with a toothy grin and Dad's hand on my shoulder to keep me in one place as a dolphin curiously reared out of the water to look at me.

"Mom would tell me bedtime stories and I always asked for more about him." I smiled. "He was one of my favorites."

Wodanaz was another awesome dude I went to sleep hearing about.

You know him, I'm pretty sure.

He goes by 'Odin' now.

Sam's ears flicked back and then forward again. "Was?"

I closed the drawer a bit harder than I should have as my smile flattened. "Yeah. Was."

Sam's face wasn't made for human expressions, so I didn't know what he was thinking as he started to pace again. He walked from one side of the desk, all the way back to the gem lamp and then did it again before finally setting his butt down on the papers I had just picked up from the floor.

He ignored the look I shot at him and sighed. "I get it. Fucking Potato."

"Fucking Potato," I agreed.

Potato had been the mayor of a nice little town in a lush, forested area in the shadow of the mountain range that dominated the south pole here.

He was a dog, but that didn't matter as much in the Dreamlands. He couldn't talk, but he learned how to write in Dream letters. He started out an ambitious, adventurous pup following at the heels of an alchemist. He got there through hard work, long hours of study and connecting with the right people. A classic success story everyone knew about! He could have been happy with what he had, but you know how it goes. Eventually, it wasn't enough. Despite warnings about the mountains of madness, he sent out survey crews to see if he could start up a mining enterprise. People were reluctant to work at the sites out of unease. They suffered horrible nightmares. They became obsessed. He couldn't just leave it alone.

They woke something up.

Now he was an old dog, mayor of nothing. Everyone knew about that too.

Try not to stare at the scars.

Sam sighed again. "Well, your guest's a patient arselicker, I'll give him that fucking much."

The door to my father's office closed with a flick of Sam's tail. I slipped out of Dad's chair and double checked the office before heading for the door. He's Dreaming, I reminded myself as I reached for the doorknob. The butterflies refused to sit still in my stomach. Nothing was going to go wrong. I knew nothing was going to go wrong, and if it did, I could fix it.

Some part of your brain was still a chicken with its head cut off for no reason.

It was annoying.

My hand landed on the carved wooden knob and I felt my eyebrows try to invade my hairline.

Wow.

He got fucked up.

I could feel the shattered pieces of the Titan Lord beyond the door. It kind of felt like someone threw a handful of confetti in my face. His presence was very weak and I just knew he wouldn't be anything more than a voice.

Disappointing.

But that's what you get for being an ass to your kids!

I took the call and opened the door.

"Hel - " The powerful voice of the Titan Lord started before I did...something. I don't know. I'm going to blame my unconscious brain for it. He was now in my home as a disembodied voice and my Dreaming mind had things to say about that. It felt kind of like when I manifested Damocles in my Dream. What that meant was that all the gravitas of the powerful fallen evil dark lord whatever instantly disappeared as his voice broke two octaves higher. "- Llloooooo?"

Kronos blinked surprised eyes made of golden sand at me with his mouth falling open, before quickly raising his hands in front of his face. He went through about a dozen different emotions within two seconds before closing his eyes. He breathed in, then out, clearly thinking.

"...How?"

Fuck if I know.

The Titan Lord looked exactly like how Mom showed me years ago. Short curly black hair and olive skin with heavy brows. He looked a bit like Dad. I think it was his chin and cheekbones giving me that feeling, but unlike Dad his short beard didn't look patchy. My unconscious mind had put him in a classic brown chiton, thank God, with blue trim. The only hint that his form was a Dream construct were the harsh golden lines where every piece fit together.

Did I actually pull him from the Pit into the Dreamlands proper or…?

"Lil' Fucker is made of bullshit," Sam volunteered from the desk. "Don't think about it too hard."

"I am awesome," I corrected my cat friend and rolled my eyes. "Duh."

I stepped back from the door so Kronos could enter the office. That's when I realized what I had been missing this entire time.

A fucking chair for him to sit in.

I made another copy of Dad's office chair in front of the desk and tried to look like that had been the plan all along. Sam snorted and I gave him a warning look.

"So, awkward question, but are you still in the Pit?"

Kronos clenched his hands a few times into fists before slowly lowering them.

"...I do not believe so."

Oh.

Oops?

"Well Sam could probably toss you back - " Like the Titan Lord was an unwanted fish, but you know. Kinda. - "cause my apartment moves? Annnd you probably don't want to be a pile of body parts in the Salt Plains."

The vultures were murder.

Kronos sighed. "You might have just ruined everything, but I will forgive you."

See?

He's a cool dude.

"Sorry, thanks and call me Percy," I offered with a small smile as I went back to my Dad's chair.

"Percy it is," he said easily. He flashed me a small grin after searching the room. His sand eyes traveled to Sam where the cat was spinning in a circle on the desk, preparing to lie down next to the emerald lamp. He dipped his head. "Master Sorcerer."

Sam groaned as he laid down and put a paw over his face.

"Oh fuck off with that shit," he moaned. "It's Sam."

Kronos confidently sat down in the seat offered and let me tell you, a tall Greek dude in a classic chiton sitting in a modern office chair was kind of a surreal picture.

"Sam of Ulthar, I'm assuming?" He asked.

I flinched.

It's not like Ulthar was a bad place! It was one of the largest settlements in the Dreamlands and it's been around for a very long time. It was actually really nice. Very rustic. Lots of cats. It's just that unless I wanted to be used as a scratching post for all of eternity, it would be a bad idea for me to show my face there.

And Sam had been banished.

I had just...wanted to see my Mom. My birth mother, I mean. Face to face.

I was stupid.

It's a long story.

My fault.

Sam bristled just as I knew he would as he glared at the titan with two colored glowing eyes as his fur turned molten.

"Do I look like some bitch to you?"

The Titan Lord held up both hands in surrender. "Forgive me. I meant no offense."

"Hmph." Sam curled up against the lamp, looking like he was determined to ignore the world. I ignored the urge to pull his tail in favor of a few back scratches. "Why're we entertaining this knob head?"

"Potato," I reminded him and ignored the completely bewildered look on the Titan Lord's face as I tickled some exposed toe beans. Sam tucked his feet closer into his stomach as he pinned me with a one eyed glare. "Be nice?"

"Fuck no."

"He's an ass," I told Kronos blandly.

He shrugged. "Cat."

Sam grumbled. "You fuck up, I fuck you up."

"Noted," Kronos said dryly.

The titan leaned in the chair, propping one arm on the armrest and resting his head on his hand as he studied me. I wiggled a bit in my own chair suddenly super self-conscious about the burning eyes on my left collarbone and forehead and right shoulder.

I -

I have no idea how I forgot about them.

I bravely resisted the urge to spin my chair all the way around away from him.

"You do have her eyes," Kronos observed softly.

I straightened. "You've seen her?"

"Once," he said wistfully. "Then the Gate closed and the vision was lost to us forever." He let out a little laugh. "Iapetus actually mourned her departure, stubborn fool."

Uh.

Wait.

"Please tell me you don't have a crush on my mom."

Much to my relief, he snorted. "No, boy, I'm just not blind." Okay, that's fair. "Though I do wonder what caliber of man your father was." ...Was? "What god was he born of?"

I frowned. "Uh? He's mortal? From...two mortal parents. And still alive?"

His heavy brows lifted in surprise. "Indeed? Your eyes - perhaps I have severely underestimated the degraded creatures wandering the world now," he mused. That was a little harsh, but he's also not wrong. "I assumed a mortal would be dust in her presence."

"Oh, no he's - " My brain chose that time to remind me of the ring of dust around me at the javelin toss and the burst blood vessels in Ryan's eyes. " - fine." I rethought the definition I was using for 'fine.' "I mean, he lost his mind for a few years, but he got better."

"Ah, of course. That does sound like her." Kronos said with a little smirk. "She must have been fond of your father, if it wasn't permanent." His gaze drifted. It was the same look Mom got when she was remembering something she thought was funny. "Others were not so fortunate."

"Only if she's mad," I said a bit defensively. "And that takes a bit. Unless you're stupid." Awkwardly I ventured, "Like your old commanding officer?"

Kronos' sand eyes snapped back to me.

"You know about that?" He asked in surprise. The sand in his eyes rippled, like there was some kind of worm moving just below the surface, as he studied me. I'm not sure what he was looking for. "She actually raised you, didn't she? Her demigod."

"Yeah?"

He leaned forward a bit eagerly. "What else did she tell you of us? The Titans?"

I wracked my brain for a minute.

Maybe I should have paid more attention to the boring stuff. How the armies were set up and the tactics used and all of the logistics, but I just kind of focused on the fun stuff. 'Tales of daring do' as Dad would say. The heroic, the clever and the just plain stupid.

Can you blame me?

I learned the important parts, like where the prisons were and how mankind used to be and the difference between the gods. Everything else was gravy.

"Background knowledge, but my actual history lessons started with the Feast and went on from there." I bit my lip. I wouldn't call myself shy, but admitting this felt a little strange. "You were one of my heroes," I said with a limp hand wave. I could feel myself smile sheepishly. His eyebrows rose and I sped up my words. "I mean, one of my first bedtime stories was that time you had to rescue Hyperion from the Spinner with the chains and the mirror - "

Kronos pinched his nose.

"I should have left that fool there," he muttered, but I thought he looked pleased. Emboldened, I let myself smile widely.

" - and about the Devourer in the Mist with Wodanaz? The Dweller with Atum? The Sky's surrender?" I sighed happily, leaning back in my own chair. I snuck a glance at Sam to find him taking a catnap. He was a sloppy, deflated cat loaf, looking like he had collapsed against the lamp and face planted into his paws. "It took us three nights to cover the campaign against the Earth Mother."

"Well, she couldn't have told you everything," Kronos said in a mock arrogant voice. "We had many great deeds to our Names, such as when Iapetus slacked on latrine duty - " Oh. Oh! I think I know this story! " - passing off a ready made pit as his work leading Okeanos to uncover a nest of chthonian worms - "

"By shitting on them!"

"That too? Amazing." He barked a laugh. "By the Void, we were stupid then."

I smiled, but then I had to look down at Dad's desk.

"For years, I wanted to be you." I confessed softly. "The story ended so well. You got a hero's reward and married the girl."

Kronos' smile withered. "Ah."

Good, he knew where this was going.

"So what the fuck happened!?" Sam cracked an eye open at my raised voice. I took a deep breath, forcing the unpleasant bubbling of my stomach down and shook my head. My cat went back to sleep as I leaned forward over Dad's desk. "You had everything. You won! Why did you have to ask? How could you believe Mom would betray you like that?"

Like I said, he was Potato.

Mom told me it was out of fear, but I couldn't believe that. This was the man who boldly demanded the attention of Mom's absent-minded nerdy ex-boyfriend to save his friends and got out of that mess with a mortal Name.

Kronos.

He was born Zagreus.

This man was so scared of his first immortal child that he couldn't think straight?

He ate his kids.

Mom doesn't lie.

But.

I didn't want to believe that.

The Titan Lord sighed. "It was because I knew your mother that I believed."

"What?" I hissed. Blood immediately started rushing in my ears as my gut clenched with anger. I immediately tried to control it, because it was easy to fall into an emotional feedback loop in a Dream. The logical mind wasn't as strong here. I still don't like people insulting my parents. I don't care who you are. "Pick your next words very carefully."

Kronos shifted in his chair, eyeing me like you would eye a hungry wolf. I was vaguely aware that I had sprouted more burning green eyes all over my body and I was...hazy? I could feel my spine shiver, sending ripples across my shoulder blades.

"I know what you were told," he said in this soothing, calm voice. He clenched and unclenched a fist on the arm rest as his sand eyes bored into mine. "That we were soldiers or warriors. We were rangers, scouts, researchers and physicians. That we were heroes." His lip curled into a sneer. "We were slaves, boy."

The hot ball of anger abruptly bled away

I -

What was I going to say to that?

I was told they served, but I don't remember asking if it was voluntary.

Mom doesn't lie, but I knew that didn't mean she told me everything.

Maybe she had just been waiting until I was older and could understand what I was being told without my ADHD getting in the way too much. I got the kid friendly version of history. Kind of. It was easier to show me a battle, than to show me economics.

I don't remember being told their service was voluntary.

"Generations upon generations upon generations fought for our gods." Kronos said with this tightness to his voice. "We bled. We suffered. We died. We were promised freedom. How did we get it?"

"The Feast," I murmured. I fell back into my chair.

"I can barely remember it," Kronos admitted. "It is like a dream, filled with ecstasy and confusion. Our gods gave us one of the star-spawn. It was still alive. Our gods guided our blades. We dismembered it as it screamed. We ate it alive."

I remembered more than he did. It was a serpentine creature with many limbs and two heads and it had been born from the blue star that used to be the Earth's sun. Greek tradition remembered it as 'Phanes.' That meant light-bringer. It had other names that made more or less sense. Erikepaios. Eros. Protogonus.

Dionysus.

His lips twisted into a wry smile. "I do remember how much growing out of my own skin hurts."

The celebrated and the favorites of each Elder God were chosen to ascend and they each had their own meal. A captured star-spawn.

You could literally trace each pantheon back to dinner.

The birth of the Young gods still lingered in human consciousness. That concept of eating divine flesh to ascend could be found all over, but it wasn't like you could just take a bite out of a god and get superpowers.

Your divinity had to be welded on.

Something, or someone, had to do that for you.

This didn't bother me. I was way more annoyed that Apollo's stupid Oracle tried to kill me than I was about eating her. Maybe it should? You've probably guessed by now that Dad was in charge of my morals. But this was god stuff. He left that to Mom. I've known since I was little that this was how it was. It didn't matter that they ate it alive. I remembered being so proud that Mom's Chosen wouldn't grow old and wouldn't die, not like some of the others. This was history.

This was now.

"But you were free?" I tried uncomfortably.

Do you ever get the feeling you aren't as great of a person as you thought you were?

"Free," Kronos repeated blandly. He laughed lightly and it was not a happy sound. "Free. Who were we fighting?"

I blinked at the change in topic. "Uh, the star-spawn?"

"The same star-spawn that lay helpless as it was butchered alive the moment its betters tired of its rebellion?"

Something lurched in my stomach, making me feel sick.

"All it took was a moment of their attention and there it was." Kronos was almost snarling. The golden lines holding his construct together began to bleed. "Time could have saved us. Fate could have saved us. Night could have saved us. The Pit could have saved us. What were we dying for, boy?"

I -

I don't know.

The unconscious mind was stronger in a Dream, but now that I was thinking about it the idea that Mom was ever truly threatened by the likes of the Earth Mother seemed...childish.

I don't know.

He said he knew my mother and that's why he believed she would betray him. He was a slave. Mom's slave. The star-spawn rebelled and he only saw her once.

I was - I was missing something?

And I didn't like anything my mind was coming up with to fill in the blanks.

"I - I don't - "

"You do not know," Kronos said for me. "Perhaps it was nothing more than a game. Some divine whim that spilled over to this wretched world. What need does She Who Stalks Stars have of this dirt?"

My mind was reminding me of The Black Pharaoh and the unpleasant feeling it gave me. The trip to the moon I took with Sam. Eater of the Bloody Tongues.

She said he was afraid.

Mom doesn't lie.

Do you ever get the feeling your parents aren't as great as you thought they were? The very thought that the Egyptians, the Greeks, the Titans, everyone had a good reason to be afraid of her and I was the one who was wrong…What did that mean for them? What did that mean for Dad?

What did that mean for me?

I had a Prophecy. It said my days would end in four years.

The room spun. For a terrifying second, I actually thought I was having a vision as my apartment warped around me. I felt suddenly unanchored, like some part of me had broken off and had begun to just float away.

"The fucking fuck - " Sam was suddenly there, headbutting me in the chin. "Oi, Lil' Fucker. Breathe." His eyes were glowing, orange and green, along with his molten fur as he turned on Kronos with his fur beginning to stand up. I felt that phantom hook drag itself through my insides, beginning to pull me out and away. "What the fuck did I miss? What did you tell him, you fuck!"

"Mom doesn't lie," I forced out as the apartment began to fade.

"Your mother is Fate," Kronos pointed out ruthlessly as he watched me with eyes made of sand. "She does not lie as a Prophecy does not lie." He smiled at me. "And Prophecies always mean what we think they do, don't they?"

I was tossed out of the Dreamlands.

Morpheus caught me. I was pretty sure he said something but I was a little out of it as he passed me back into his father's realm. Hypnos welcomed me, pulsing feelings of pride and excitement as his ever-grasping presence pulled me close. The complicated mess of emotion swirling in my head and chest and stomach was doused in ice cold water when the immense pressure of someone's attention fell on me.

A woman with long twisting black hair in a pitch black dress studded with dismembered stars was looking at me. She had black eyes, like her pupils had swallowed her irises but a galaxy burned very faintly within and moonlight shone from under her skin. She stood underneath her planet sized shadow as it loomed over Hypnos and me. It was a living thing, moving and reaching and birthing twisted creatures that scrambled to escape before they were dragged back into the mass.

I had this vague uneasy feeling. It was like...She was too close. I knew she was too close. I could almost hear the sirens wailing in my lizard brain. The reaching tendrils of her form were not made out of skin, or maybe they were? Like solid clouds or mist but it was still shifting like it was only following the idea of being solid in this way that kind of made my head hurt. There were drooling mouths filled with constantly gnashing teeth. I could see every contraction ripple through her shadow as another monster crawled free.

I pressed back into Hypnos.

Hi, uh, ma'am.

Hypnos immediately hit me with an amused rebuke, followed by encouragement and happiness.

I cringed.

Uh, Aunt Nyx?

I hope he didn't just get me killed. Mom would be so pissed.

The galaxy in her eyes sparked as her blank expression softened. I felt a pulse of approval from her before her attention moved off me, letting me breathe.

I don't know how long I slept as the third wheel to Hypnos' visit with his mom, but it felt like I was watching a buddy get fussed over, complete with washing behind his ears, giving kisses to the cheek and questions about having enough clean underwear.

Awkward.

On top of that, I had my own issues popping up again. It sucked, because I knew I wasn't able to think it through properly, but the thought of making myself wake up and having to think it through in the light of day was terrifying.

Eventually, Nyx started to turn away and I felt a surge of desperation for answers. I needed to know. Problem was, I had a hundred questions, but didn't know what they were. I didn't know how to ask or what to ask or what I wanted to hear. I reached out anyway, because I was stupid probably, trying to stop her from leaving.

Wait! I -

I don't know!

It all came out somehow. Like I pushed it out or threw it at her. I thought I just imagined it, but she stopped and her attention was on me again.

I shrunk back into Hypnos. All my insane courage just evaporated. I didn't uncurl until Hypnos gently prodded me and I looked up to see the faint, almost thoughtful expression on Nyx's face.

There was a burst of hostility from her and I flinched, hard.

But.

It wasn't aimed at me.

You have enemies?

Approval.

Oh.

I mulled that over and felt something unclench.

That made sense.

It was like a comic series, right? You had the street level stuff. That was where you got the boots on the ground, like Kronos, and then you had the high level stuff with higher stakes. Basically the difference between the Punisher and Superman.

Right?

Mom wasn't perfect. I knew that. That was okay. She probably didn't want to worry me. Maybe this was her being, for once, overprotective. Missing details were fine. I was still a kid.

She'd tell me when I could understand.

I felt relieved.

Anchored again.

Thanks, Auntie Nyx!

She sent me her amusement as Hypnos radiated curiosity and confusion. Her attention shifted, probably to him because he was suddenly happy. He grabbed me in a 'hug' as his mom left, taking her terrifying shadow with her.

He gave me a moving picture along with a sense of anticipation. It was...an egg? I think that was an egg, of the bug type. A pale, spongy sac that bulged and stretched until some kind of ugly as sin grub finished eating its way free.

Uh?

I puzzled.

Uh, congrats on the new kid? Clovis...might be a little weird at first cause his mom? But he'll get over it?

Hypnos paused and then I was nearly bowled over by his amusement.

I rolled my eyes.

Laugh it up, buddy. I'm fucking twelve, what do you want from me?

More amusement.

Oh come on!

Prick.

I woke up annoyed.

I laid in my bed for a few minutes, staring up at the ceiling as my stomach crunched and loosened and crunched. Thoughts chased each other around in my head. The bands of Celestial Bronze around my room were still shining in the dim light. Did I wake up early? It was a lot darker than I thought it would be.

I might as well get up, even if it was early. I didn't feel like going back to sleep.

I grumbled wordlessly as I made my bed and then dug through my backpack for clothes to wear today. As I closed the metal latch on the canvas bag, I remembered my tin of Mythomagic cards in the pockets and the now active Prophecy.

And Prophecies always mean what we think they mean, don't they? Kronos' voice rang out in my head, but I pushed it away with a simple reminder.

It's our choices that decide our destiny.

The Prophecy bit was the wrong thing to focus on. By its very nature, a Prophecy does mean whatever we think it means. Maybe it's not so much that Mom doesn't lie, so much as she can't.

Ha!

See?

I breathed out the lingering unease. Nothing sinister here! Logical thinking is one of those things you don't miss until it's gone.

And then you really miss it.

I felt pretty good as I shuffled, yawning, to the front door of the Big House. I felt pretty good as I reached for the bronze doorknobs. I stopped feeling good when I opened the door to see the sky was still covered in angry boiling thunderclouds and Apollo-as-Fred was there leaning against the wooden rail of the porch looking completely defeated.

I closed my eyes.

His sister was still a rabbit, wasn't she?

Mom.

Please.

"You're up," he said with a failed smile. His eyes dropped to my bundle of clothes which was some shorts and my Camp Half-Blood T-shirt. "You probably want to wear...something else." He rubbed a hand down his face. "Father issued an ultimatum. He wants his bolt back by the Summer Solstice or Olympus is going to war."

Um, what?

There is now a time limit? His sparkler could be anywhere, as a few months was definitely enough time for a mortal thief to catch a plane and get out of dodge. If they couldn't find it then, it was going to need a lot of luck for us to find it now.

"That's in thirteen days," I said slowly and watched Apollo grimace.

"He has full faith in the Oracle of Chthon." That sounded like a load of premium bovine excrement. "And Artemis can't fail him."

"But isn't she - "

"Serving a just punishment. Her actions endangered Olympus," Apollo said dully with his shoulders slumped and golden hair hanging limply, some of his curls getting into his eyes. "And who are we to fight Fate?"

Soooo.

Not only is he setting up his daughter, and by extension me, to fail, he's also pinning any and all consequences for his petty bullshit on my mother.

…

...

Zeus is a fucking maggot.

"Okay," I said, feeling like I was going to explode. "Fine."

"Half-Blood Hill at 10." Apollo slowly reached out like he was afraid I was going to bite him and ruffled my hair. "Sorry," he said softly. "Dad's an ass."

I just nodded as I turned back towards my room.

I felt oddly calm, like I was so angry I had wrapped all the way back around to chill as I folded up my shorts and put them in the dresser I was criminally underusing. I took all of the other unsuitable clothes out, like some sweatpants and random swimming trunks I don't remember putting in my Bag of Holding. I didn't have to remove much, because the point of it was to have my backpack ready made for any of Mom's tests.

Or Quests.

I double checked my thermos of nectar and my Ziploc bags of ambrosia squares. I adjusted how my sleeping bag fit next to the small tent and made sure my essentials pack was where it belonged. Flashlight. Matches. Water purification tablets. Toilet paper.

That was a mistake I was determined to only make once.

Knife. I unsheathed the small Stygian iron dagger. It was a short diamond shaped blade as black as a nightmare set in a pale wood hilt wrapped in some kind of bumpy brown leather, like it came from a reptile. Not all of my siblings were jerks. Erebus cared a little. I sheathed the dagger and put it away.

Going through my check was calming. I had done this dozens of times and making sure I was as prepared as humanly possible helped bleed off some of my anxiousness. I didn't have to worry about the weather or medical supplies. I had my ATM card linked to my bank account in the little leather wallet in my bag. Mom wouldn't give me a test she didn't believe I could do.

It looked bad.

It looked really fucking bad.

But she wouldn't do that to me.

I finished the check and brought out my tin of Mythomagic cards. I drew cards from the top of the deck until I had all thirteen cards of my Quest Prophecy out on the desk.

I eyed the card for Zeus, King of Olympus.

Did it just mean it was a Quest on his behalf? That he would be responsible for kicking it off? Just doubling up on the fact that it was his symbol of power that was missing?

My eyes drifted to The Cydonian Cincture. The symbol of Apate, personification of Deceit.

Or maybe we would find it.

I just didn't have to give it back. If whoever took it could hide it from the gods, then maybe…

I don't know.

Maybe.

I shouldn't make decisions while angry. That's what Dad would say. I want to make an angry decision though.

I want it bad.

I packed my cards back into my bag and picked out one of my favorite shirts. It was an ocean blue tunic - and I mean tunic, real Robin Hood looking shit - with complicated looking Celtic knot designs in silver thread along the hems. I don't know if Mom enchanted it. It took some work to catch her doing something. I wasn't that good at Sensing yet. She never said anything and they were a package deal with my comfy Beholder slippers and the Lego version of the Millennium Falcon, so probably not.

Wouldn't hurt to wear it though.

I rubbed the designs lining the collar with my thumbs. Anger is good, but it was not going to help me right now.

Anger was good, but not now.

Not now.

I smiled a little.

I sounded like Athena.

Guess Wisdom is good for something.

I picked up my new chosen outfit and headed out the door.

As soon as I got to the shower stalls I noticed something strange was going on. For one, there were a lot less people waiting around than usual and for second, I could feel that subtle thrum of divine energy coming from the long building. There was no way I could miss it. This wasn't some minor working, but a big recent thing.

Did someone curse the place?

I watched Melanie, Counselor of Aphrodite Cabin exit the building with some of her siblings, brown hair still wrapped up in a towel. I eyed them suspiciously.

They didn't look horrifically cursed. They didn't sound it either.

Was this going to be one of those things where the curse has a delayed activation and everyone keels over dead at dinner? I cautiously crept up to the boys' side of the building and poked my head in. I felt it immediately.

Not cursed.

Very much not cursed.

After a refreshing shower, I made sure to stop by the campfire pit.

"Thanks for doing something about our showers, Hestia," I said loudly in my most obnoxious voice behind her back and watched her head whip around towards me as several passing Campers slowed on their way to the Dining Pavilion. "It was getting kind of crowded."

Her eyes darted around as she shook her head.

"Oh, my bad," I said with a wide grin. "Spatial warping is complicated." It is. Mom's Tardis explanation lost me in 0.003 seconds flat and if Apollo ever lost his car keys it would take him a literal century to figure out how to change modes on his sun chariot again. "I just figured since the divine energy was a direct match for you that you did it."

"You can feel that?" She blurted out the first words I have ever heard her say.

As a confirmation of her guilt!

She realized that too, giving me a flat, unamused look that meant nothing because she was currently seven and cute as a button.

Have you seen a three week old kitten try to intimidate somebody?

Same energy.

"Duh." I rolled my eyes as the eavesdropping Campers came forward to thank her. "I am awesome."

I will never stop saying that.

It's true. And if it isn't true, I will become awesome to make it true!

"Someone's in a good mood," Castor said as the brothers joined me at Table 12 for breakfast.

I knew it was Castor because he was usually the more forward of the twins. Three weeks was more than enough time for me to figure out some of the differences between them. They were both clever, but Castor's sense of humor was stupid while Pollux was a nerd in denial. If one of them spoke up first, it was probably Castor.

That and his shirt was inside out.

Pollux still didn't like socks, but at least he knew how to dress himself.

"I'm in a decent mood," I corrected him. "I am focusing on the good stuff."

Luke is cool and a friend. Artemis is great and will probably not be a rabbit the entire time. Maybe just one more day? I can do this. Zeus set me up to fail, Mom did not.

"Because if I focus on the bad stuff, my first name will be spontaneously legally changed to Ethan."

"I resemble that remark," Ethan Nakamura, son of Nemesis deadpanned as he sat down in his usual seat next to where Clovis will eventually sit. Once he woke up.

"The first step to solving a problem is acknowledging it exists!" I told him happily.

He narrowed his eyes at me as the twins snorted, but I knew he wasn't really mad. Ethan had contradictory eyes of dark brown but someone spilled a few drops of mother of pearl in them that moved around without his input. His eyes shined, but didn't reflect anything. He was less cousiny. You could see his spine through his shirt, sticking out more than mine and Clovis' and the bones were a bit weird looking, but he was otherwise normal. Well, maybe his canines were a bit long, but that was it.

He was definitely a less annoying cousin than Hypnos.

It is so stupid he's stuck in Cabin 11 as a vagabond relying on Hermes' Domain. His grandmother was the Night. Would it really be too much to ask for a 'Protogenoi' cabin for Nyx's grandchildren and me?

"Keep it up and I'm taking you off the Christmas list," Ethan threatened.

I gasped and turned back to my food, pouting.

"Really?" Pollux drawled. "The Christmas list is what gets you?"

"Presents," was my defense.

I take them very seriously.

Castor nudged his brother. "Remember. He's a spoiled city boy."

Let them laugh.

Mom always helps me with my presents. Threatening to take them off my Christmas list will hit that much harder when I already have one under my belt.

The Dining Pavilion filled up, getting louder and louder as everyone got their food and sat down with their friends and family. Fred was getting considering looks from his children at Apollo's Table. That was probably because this was his third day in a row being at Camp when last week, and the week before that, he only stopped by twice. Hestia was watching the finger dances at her table among the Ares kids like they would randomly behead each other if she so much as blinked.

Mr.. D grumped his way to his table. He sat down, made a can of Diet Coke and saluted me with it. "Good luck."

...oh my god, he's been replaced by the Illuminati.

Castor and Pollux both checked their father for a second head as Annabeth Chase sidled up to our table with a plate of food.

"May I sit with you, Ethan?"

Nemesis' son immediately looked suspicious. "What do you want, daughter of Wisdom?"

"I want - " Her eyes flicked to me, then back. She took a deep breath. "I want to know about your uncle. I want to know the truth."

Ethan bared his teeth like a wild dog.

And, uh, remember when I said his canines were a bit long?

My bad.

Those were fangs.

"Everything was fine until it's your mother on the chopping block?" He growled.

"It wasn't fine!" Annabeth snapped back. She reigned herself back in just like her mother did. "It wasn't fine, but there wasn't anything we could do. Just making trouble for the sake of making trouble - "

"Isn't wise?"

"If we want things to change, we need a plan." She arched a blond eyebrow in this challenging way. "We don't have one. I think we should."

Storm gray and brown with mother of pearl stared each other down until Clovis walked right between them sleepily, carrying a plate topped with fruits and feta cheese. He sat down, drowned his fruits in maple syrup then seemed to notice Annabeth standing there awkwardly.

He scooted over to make space for her. "Hello?"

She shot a scowling Ethan a triumphant look over Clovis head as she sat down. "Hello! Clovis, right?" She smiled sunnily as he nodded dumbly. "I was wondering about your father…"

Even though there were like fifteen girls at Table Eight, they were definitely the quietest table because every single one of them looked like someone told them Santa wasn't real. The reason for that was on the table, miserably staring at a small plate of grass and the lone baby carrot her Lieutenant just snuck on top.

I quickly turned back around to my own food, before any of them caught me staring and decided murdering me would be worth it.

Wait a minute.

I turned back around (again) and scanned the Dining Pavilion.

"Where's Luke?"

Apparently his dad was serious about the training thing. That's cool, don't get me wrong, but also weird? Like...he abandoned Luke as a kid, right? Did he just decide he made a mistake tossing his son away after all these years or what? Luke nearly died two years ago on his Quest and his dad had been nowhere in sight.

Now he was personally training him?

After volunteering him for a Quest where he might die for real?

I don't get it.

None of that makes any sense.

Hermes didn't look that crazy when I last saw him, but you know. You think you know someone…

When breakfast came to a close, the twins stopped me with uncharacteristically serious faces. Castor had set his chin to jut out stubbornly, while Pollux couldn't seem to meet my eyes. I swallowed as I faced them, feeling my stomach sink. This was probably going to suck.

"I hope you don't mind…" Castor began. "That Cabin 12, Dionysus is going to be in charge of your burial shroud."

Yup.

Oof.

"No, I don't mind," I said quietly. I won't need it. I'll be fine. We were all getting through this. Then on a whim I blurted out, "Make it ugly. Really ugly. Super gross."

Both boys stared at me.

Then, slowly, Castor began to smile. "Let me guess. Something you wouldn't be caught dead in?"

Pollux groaned. "You're an idiot, Percy."

I laughed as I grabbed them both in a massive hug, the biggest I could manage. And maybe I wasn't laughing and maybe my eyes were burning and maybe my voice was a little watery when I complained,

"I resemble that remark."

"You do," Castor said and maybe his voice was a little watery too.

Pollux sniffled. "You really do."

Time flies when you're having fun.

I was absolutely blaming Mom's absent-minded nerdy ex-boyfriend for time slowing to a crawl when you are anticipating being sent off on a dangerous Quest you are supposed to fail.

Chiron came to get me from Archery class. By now, everyone knew I was going on a Quest and their stares followed me out of the archery range. I felt them boring into my back as I put on my jacket and it changed from a plain looking duster to a fancily decorated burnt orange poncho with ocean blue designs to match my shirt. I slung my backpack over my shoulder and headed to Half-Blood Hill.

"Percy." Luke was there in a grey T-shirt with a red vest over it and jeans. He didn't look like he'd slept well again, but was just a little tired and not exhausted. He had two bags of his own, a purple and black backpack like he was just going to high school or college and a second bright yellow one strapped around his hips.

Forget impending doom.

Someone call the fashion police!

"Is that a fucking fanny pack?"

Luke smirked. "Don't knock it until you try it."

Standing by him silently was a very tall, very buff, blond dude with blue eyes all over. Literally. He had eyes on his arms, hands, cheeks, forehead, neck, you name it. He reminded me of my Dream self, if my Dream self was a surfer dude from California. I nodded at him.

"Argus?"

He nodded back. So Hera's pseudo-Giant servant. I could ask how he felt about everything but I was not going to push my luck. At least she was contributing something to Camp Half-Blood.

And no, her empty pretty cabin no one could use did not count.

"Cool."

A little ways down the hill a white SUV sat. Luke saw me looking.

"Traditional drive out of Camp Half-Blood." He smiled sadly. "He's not going with us. Neither is the SUV."

Damn.

Chiron cleared his throat. "If I may, the Lord of the Underworld is a dangerous opponent. If you are to face him, you are going to need to plan it out thoroughly."

I gave Chiron a look.

"We're not going to the Underworld," I said and Luke's head swiveled in surprise. "We're going North."

"North?" Luke asked, bewildered.

"Yup."

"...what's North?"

"Death, probably."

Chiron looked like he was going to say something to me, then thought better of it. "Luke. Please watch over Perseus."

"Percy," I muttered.

"I know," Luke said a bit indignantly. "Son of Fate, really big deal and my responsibility. My Camper."

"He's twelve," Chiron said gently and Luke recoiled as if he'd been slapped. The son of Hermes looked at me then and he had this complicated expression I didn't know how to read.

"I know," Luke said again.

"I'll listen to Luke," I promised Chiron. "Unless he's wrong. Then I, uh, won't."

Luke snorted as the immortal trainer of heroes sighed. "Jason, Herakles, Achilles...all had more training." He made a rumbling noise deep in his chest as the heavy brows he inherited from his father hung over his eyes. "I suppose all I can do now is trust in your destiny, whatever it may be."

"It's whatever I decide it to be," I said.

I had to believe that.

Argus' wristwatch went off for our departure time as Apol - Fred - fuck it! Apollo walked up to us in bare feet ahead of the Lieutenant of the Hunters, Zoë Nightshade. Up close, the fractured nebula in her eyes looked broken. Like someone had messily ripped out a few wires behind the screen leaving the lights flickering, sputtering, and on the verge of fading away completely.

She looked between me and Luke as her lip curled in contempt. I made the mistake of holding out my hands and awkwardly watched her hand her precious cargo over to Luke.

"...your pet is not coming on this Quest," Luke declared as he tried to hand the bunny back.

With a sound of disgust, the Lieutenant marched off.

"Don't scruff her," Apollo said in a no-nonsense tone straightening Luke's spine even as the confusion on his face settled in deep. "That will tear the skin from the muscle, basically flaying her and if that happens, I will flay you."

"I - I understand, Lord Apollo."

The rabbit made a small moaning sound as it shivered in Luke's hands. I wanted to comfort her. Maybe a pat on the head or something, but I think she will probably bite me.

"Make sure she eats grass every meal, don't let her skip, give her enough support while holding her - how you're doing it now is fine - you better know where she is at all times and don't involve her in any fighting!"

"I will take good care of your pet, Lord Apollo," Luke said blankly, clearly not getting it at all.

The silver eyes were a dead give away!

Apollo sighed.

"That's Artemis."

Luke's grip on the rabbit went from 'I am holding a small, helpless creature' to 'I am holding a live grenade.'

"Long story," Apollo said.

"She tried to kill me. Mom objected," I said. Apollo gave me a very hairy eyeball as I shrugged. "Not that long."

"Our godly Quest member is a rabbit," Luke said flatly.

See? Not even worrying about the attempted murder. Demigods knew how to prioritize.

Apollo shrugged. "Yeah. Good luck."

Mom.

Please.

I felt her. A gentle, warm feeling of reassurance and confidence. My eyes burned and I adjusted how my sunglasses fit on my face.

Argus jingled his car keys and with that obnoxious 'bwark bwark' sound, the SUV unlocked.

"Don't die." Chiron threw in.

Her comfort faded with a feeling of finality. She wasn't going to hold my hand anymore. The test begins now.

It was time to go.

 

[Shujin]

An Undertow of Sand
A PJO Fanfiction
​

I want to say the Quest got off to a good start.

I really want to say the Quest got off to a good start. The best start. A truly auspicious beginning to a great and epic tale of triumph!

But the truth is...

The truth is the Quest started with the doorstep of Argus' white SUV being a little further away or a little higher than I thought it was.

Look. Don't laugh. I was nervous and anxious and feeling all kinds of not great things and wasn't paying as much attention to my shitty depth perception as I should have been. Don't tell me that's never happened to you. I won't believe you.

Still.

I blame my sunglasses.

My sneaker toe kind of just slid off it. I fell forward into the vehicle, banging my right knee on the step and my head off the surprisingly hard back of the passenger side chair. I flinched backwards (because OW!) and the weight of my backpack and my concussion meant I ended up falling right back out of the SUV into Luke. I tripped over his foot as he held Artemis safely over his head and the jerk just watched me hit the ground hard enough to slide down a little on the wet grass of Half-Blood Hill.

I scrunched my eyes shut through that sick feeling you get when your brain gets rattled. I heard a meaty thwack as someone's palm met their face.

"He can't even get in the car!" A very muffled voice groaned.

Chiron choked as I raised a middle finger in Apollo's general direction. Mr. Blind Jump Off The Sun Chariot Because I Can't Teleport has no room to talk.

At all.

It took a bit for the stars behind my eyelids to go away and when I opened my eyes again, there were three blue-eyed blonds looking down at me. Luke looked disbelieving. Argus looked concerned and Apollo looked constipated.

Artemis wasn't looking because she had buried her face underneath her paws.

I sighed. "Tell me we can pretend that never happened."

"No." Luke said very seriously.

Like many of his siblings, Luke was a bit of a bastard.

Apollo pinched the bridge of his nose as Argus helped me up.

"I know I am asking a lot Luke…" the Greek sun god said slowly as he passed a hand radiating a soothing, healing light over my head and leg. "...but please keep him alive too."

"His first week at Camp," Luke announced as he got in the van with Artemis tucked under his arm. His voice became a bit muffled as he got in the back seat. "He was nearly murdered by a pegasus."

"You promised not to hold that against me!" I protested, a little hurt as I snapped the hem of my poncho-jacket and the grass stains vanished. I did nothing wrong! I checked my footing this time and held on to the little bar by the door. "And that wasn't my fault! The horse-pigeons hate me."

"What's your excuse for breaking the Climbing Wall?" Luke asked as he shrugged off his backpack and set Artemis down on the middle seat. She immediately curled up in a miserable ball of fluff.

"Clarisse started it." I shot back as I took my own seat. That was my story and I was sticking to it. "Both times."

"I had to save you from a nereid."

"She was blaming Mom for her dumbass boyfriend being a dumbass and she should have left his suicidal ass," I grumbled as I closed the door. "What was I supposed to do?"

Luke gave me a look. "Maybe not say that while you are in the middle of a lake, on a boat, with no water powers."

So.

Okay.

I'll admit it.

He's not wrong.

Mom doesn't need me to defend her honor, but I'm going to be honest. The drowning part I could have really done without, but breaking that bitch's nose was great.

"I have no regrets," I said stubbornly.

Luke rolled down the window and stuck his head out as Argus got behind the steering wheel.

"You are asking a lot," he deadpanned at Apollo. "I am going to need a miracle."

Apollo gave the dark, boiling thunderclouds covering the sky a skeptical glance and grimaced.

"No promises."

And that was a total buzzkill.

"Gee, thanks for the vote of confidence," I muttered.

Argus turned the key and I could pretend the funny feeling in my stomach was just the vibrations from the engine rumbling to life. Luke pulled back and went to roll the window up when he froze, and then put his head out again. I followed his gaze and saw that by the Big House, a blonde girl with princess curls was on the deck with her arms wrapped around herself holding a long dagger to her chest like it was about to break into pieces.

Luke's face was blank as he raised a hand. The girl waved back with wild, sweeping gestures. The kind you expect out of an over-eager four year old kid and not a Daughter of Athena. A little forced, maybe.

A little desperate.

Chiron fished a bronze pen out of his shirt pocket and uncapped it. A shining Celestial Bronze leaf shaped blade flashed through the air as he saluted us. Argus adjusted his mirrors and I felt a slight crackle surround the car. I thought I heard Apollo growl, but maybe I was mistaking the purr of the engine and the crunch of the tires on the gravel road for it as he flung a hand at the heavens. His father's clouds reluctantly parted just enough to let through a ray of sunlight as the SUV started down the hill.

Heh, 'god' rays.

…

Don't say it.

Annabeth was right. I am a dork.

Luke rolled the window back up and rested his forehead against the glass, sighing. Artemis shuddered as the car hit a small bump at the bottom of the hill and curled into a tighter ball. As for me? I buckled in, because Safety First and slowly counted to ten.

First rule of survival: Don't panic.

Mom's tests aren't new to me. I've had them ever since I turned seven, but back then they were graded on a curve. They were impossible to fail because they were basically placement exams, and Mom would bail me out if I was about to die. It was like my personal version of Camp Half-Blood's training, but better.

Camp Half-Blood was sink or swim at both ends, which was another reason it was stupid. Untrained demigods fight monsters getting to Camp where they are then trained, but their version of live exercises were Quests where you chuck kids at a monster with no backup and hope they make it out alive.

Definitely preferred the way Mom did it. She made sure my basics were not only solid, but tempered first.

Then I get thrown into the deep end.

Luke was six years older than me, but this was only his second Quest. I guess third, if you count how he got to Camp?

Huh.

I had twelve tests over him.

So maybe he should be listening to me!

Artemis blew us both out of the water with thousands of years of Hunts under her belt, but she couldn't really lead the team right now. We don't speak rabbit and I hate Charades.

Okay, so, second rule.

Trim the objective.

I drummed my fingers on my knees as I looked out the window. We were leaving the countryside into western Long Island. It felt a bit weird being on the highway again. After almost a month at Camp Half-Blood, the rest of the world seemed dull and boring. My eyes skipped over the McDonalds, the billboards and shopping malls as unimportant. I smiled a little as I spied a small kid, maybe around five, playing on her Gameboy in the back of her parents' car.

But she was unimportant too.

So far so good. Ten miles and not a single monster!

"The real problem is the time limit," I said, breaking the silence. A mortal hero stole the Bolt, so we probably didn't have to dive into a monster pit for it. They probably had godly backing, but the Ancient Laws still mattered. They could send monsters and that would suck, but the objective was the Bolt, not killing them.

"Yeah. Thirteen days." Luke straightened and ran a hand through his hair. "Our best bet is our Prophecy, any chance you remember it?" He smiled weakly. "No one actually told me what you said."

Oh.

I dug into my backpack for my tin of cards.

"So, my Prophecies aren't in words." I flattened my backpack on the floor to use as a makeshift table. I paused with my hand over the cards. "It's a Quest," I made sure to tell him. "It's a Quest because we are going on a Quest."

"Okay?" Luk's brows furrowed as Artemis' ears twitched back towards us.

"That's how this works," I explained.

Because if it was actually a Great Prophecy and we were fucking things by going on a Quest instead, that would be stupid.

Mom's not stupid.

I started to draw those thirteen cards and put them in their star pattern. As soon as I laid out the last card, The Right Hand of Kronos, the Titan Lord, Luke sucked in a harsh breath. His eyes bounced between Hermes, God of Thieves and The Right Hand of Kronos as the blood drained from his face. I could hear his grip on the door tighten, making the fake leather squeak.

"It's okay!" I said quickly and he jerked towards me, like a weird flinch where he was half-pressing back into his seat away from me and half-leaning forward with this feral look in his eyes. "Luke, it's okay!"

He froze. After a few moments, he blinked slowly. He glanced at Artemis still curled up in a ball and then back at me.

"It's...okay." He repeated dully.

"Yeah?" I shrugged. "I mean, Titan Lord is scary, but don't worry about him." Artemis snorted and I shrugged again. "The thief probably wants to bring him back or works for him or something, but that doesn't really matter?"

Because if I know Sam, and I do, Kronos either ran away from or got his ass beat by a cat.

We were basically at Hello Kitty Vader levels.

He's still Vader, but I wasn't really feeling it right now.

"It doesn't matter," Luke said, echoing me again. He relaxed slowly. "That's right…" He smiled slightly. "I keep forgetting. Your mother has nothing to worry about so neither do you." He gave me this weird, distant look like he was rolling that around in his mind over and over. "It makes no difference if it's Olympus or Othrys. You know so much because you owe Olympus absolutely nothing." He let go of the door and slumped over, threading his fingers in front of his face. "It doesn't... matter to you if the thrones fall?"

"The backlash would suck," I admitted. "But they don't have to fall." Luke tilted his head towards me. "They can be surrendered, right? Hestia and Mr. D."

His eyes widened. "It doesn't need to crumble to be replaced?"

"Nope." I popped the 'p' and shrugged. "Some deserve to lose their fancy chairs."

The bunny stiffened.

Luke pinned me with an intense look. "Who doesn't?"

"Uh, Apollo's good people," I said slowly. I shyly glanced at our resident moon rabbit. "His sister's cool too." Artemis snorted again and relaxed. "I would give Hestia her throne back." I frowned and muttered, "Dunno about Athena. Maybe."

Maybe.

Luke snorted as he leaned back. "And your mother could do that, if she wanted to."

"If she wanted to," I agreed.

"That is so weird," Luke breathed.

I get it.

The Camp was built around the Twelve Cabins for Twelve Thrones of Mount Olympus. Luke spent four years getting used to the idea of being a demigod in a place where the children of every other god were extras. Vagabonds. At Camp Half-Blood, only the gods with thrones got tables in the Dining Pavilion. Got a Cabin for their kids. They called Hecate, the Three Formed and Queen of Those Below, Titaness of Everything Ever Because Fucking Magic, a minor goddess.

She could have been King of Olympus. She was third in line.

Because she scared people shitless.

But they didn't know that. No one taught them. It's been millennia since a demigod of one of the Protogenoi was at Camp. They didn't know other pantheons even existed.

To Luke, Olympus looked like the only thing that mattered.

"Why are you on this Quest at all?"

"Zeus," I said tightly. "My Dad lives in Manhattan." If I failed - no. Mom wouldn't - my parents loved each other. She wouldn't put Dad's fate on me. So it had to be an assessment. A placement test? She was going to grade me on a curve and maybe I couldn't actually fail.

Maybe I couldn't actually fail.

A knot in my chest loosened as I pointed at The Oracle of Trophonius card. "Mom decided I should probably stop the King of the Gods from throwing a tantrum over losing his sparkler."

Artemis let out this muttering sound as she lifted her head to look at me. I raised my eyebrows.

"Tell me I'm wrong."

The rabbit returned to her sulking.

Thought so.

"So these three represent the Questers?" Luke asked. I nodded and he reached out for his father's card and his lips curled into a slight sneer. "Hermes volunteered me in his place?"

"Uh, yes? But actually no." I made a rocking motion with my hand. "He technically can, but he'd be pretty useless."

Luke gave me a look of disbelief. "Pretty useless? He's a god."

As Mom would say, "That doesn't actually mean anything."

Luke stared at me.

I sighed. "You know about the Ancient Laws?"

Luke frowned. "Aren't those just decrees from Zeus?"

I groaned and bumped my head into my window. "Oh my fucking god, no!"

Every time I think it couldn't get any worse.

"Well," Luke shrugged as he also looked out the window. Traffic was really beginning to pick up. It was late morning on a Wednesday in New York City. No one was going anywhere fast. "We got time for a lesson?"

"Short version," I said. "The Fates are cunts." Luke choked as Artemis cast an alarmed glance over her shoulder and shuffled as far away from me as she could without falling off her seat. I sighed. "They are my sisters. I can say that."

The son of Hermes barked a short laugh. "What's the long version?"

"The long version has like a dozen pages of exceptions but basically a Young god's divinity is their Domain," I quoted and watched Luke frown. "It means they can't act like a god outside of their Domain."

"He's not a war god," Luke said slowly.

"Right. So if he gets jumped by a Hellhound on a Quest, there's a million things that will get him ass blasted by the Fates - " damn it, Hermes. " - and three things that won't." I ticked them off on my fingers. "Dodge. Let it chew on him. Recall all his Names from whatever they were doing and unveil his divinity." I shrugged. "So yeah, useless meat shield."

Now it was Luke's turn to bump his head against his window. He glanced down at the card in his hands and then cast a sideways glance at Artemis.

"At least he's not a rabbit."

A tiny growl rumbled from the furball as I wagged a finger at him. "That's not nice. I'm sure you don't want to be a rabbit. Think of how her Hunters feel about their patron being a prey animal."

Artemis flinched.

Luke raised a skeptical eyebrow. "Didn't you say she tried to kill you?"

I scoffed. "Come on, it's not like that's super important."

If I held a little attempted murder against everybody, I wouldn't have my best friend!

"Ye - es," Luke said. "It kind of is." He paused. "No, it really is."

I stared at him. "And you call yourself a demigod?"

"What does that have to do with -" Luke blinked, then he rubbed at his temples. "By the Styx, no, Percy, just because lots of things want to kill you, doesn't mean people trying to kill you is normal. That's not how it works."

"If shit normally happens," I said slowly. I wasn't trying to traumatize the guy. "That shit's normal, dude."

"Wha - no."

"It's the twenty-first century!" I threw my hands up. "And we use swords because we're demigods. It's normal for us! That's definitely how it works."

"Merciful Rhea." Luke buried his face in his hands. "That explains so much about you."

Artemis groaned in what was totally a defense of me and thumped her head against the back of her seat. In the front, I caught Argus' helpless smile. He saw me looking, of course, and the blue eye on the back of his neck winked at me.

The drive was a long one.

Just so you know Montauk, New York was at the very tip of Long Island and Camp Half-Blood was about a ten minute drive from there. We had to come all the way back through Long Island to Queens and then a bit of Brooklyn to get back to Manhattan. Traffic really slowed us down once we got to the city so by the time we got to Manhattan proper, the sun was already setting.

Twelve days left.

I swallowed down the sudden lump in my throat.

Placement test.

Luke peered blearily out the window after his short nap, taking in the skyscrapers and shimmering sunlight on the water surrounding Manhattan island as we crossed the bridge.

"You live in Manhattan, right?"

"Upper West Side." I squinted at my Gameboy Advance screen as my character Isaac got jumped by yet another random encounter.

Let me complete the puzzle already!

"Why?"

"Know where to find a pet store?"

Artemis' ears twitched as she raised her head and gave him what might have been an incredulous look. Bunny faces made it hard to tell. Hey, at least she was paying attention? I didn't want to say she had been ignoring our existence, but...she had been pretty much ignoring our existence.

Not that I blame her.

Not much for a rabbit to do on a road trip.

"We're late for dinner," Luke pointed out. "How'd you think we were going to feed her on the Quest? Keep buying salads at Wendy's?"

"Uh. Yes?" I tried, pausing my game. "Maybe McDonalds?"

He sighed. "We need rodent food, some way to deal with her shit and maybe a collar," he muttered. I kind of froze for a second? It had not occurred to me that moon rabbits might need to use the bathroom. Is that why Argus tossed her into that bush? Had that seriously been the first time Artemis had to poop in her entire life?

Mind. Blown.

"Do rabbits shed?"

I was about to answer him when I saw the way her ears were flattening against her head.

"Uh, Luke - " I began.

Luke held out both hands as if measuring her. "We can pick up some kind of carrier, for a gerbil or something."

We didn't have to ask what she thought of that idea because the moon rabbit fucking hissed at him.

I did not know bunnies do that.

"Okay," Luke said with his eyebrows raised as I leaned away from him and the impending blood spray. "Maybe a cat carrier." As soon as she started to growl, he cuffed her on the head and she sputtered out in surprise like a dying lawnmower. "No," he snapped. "If you get stepped on or run over in the streets of New York, your brother is going to make it my problem."

I winced.

Apollo do be like that.

"Give her a little bit?" I tried to defend her. "She's had a really long time being goddess of the hunt and a really short time being..." I waved at the flinching moon rabbit. "That?"

"Does it change anything?" He asked me pointedly.

That's fair.

"Maybe not a collar," I offered in compromise. "Or a leash. We can carry her."

"We can always get her microchipped," Luke said with a bit of a mean smile as he poked the rabbit's side. "That way we can't lose her, unless she prefers being carried by me - ow!" He recoiled and clutched his bleeding finger to his chest. His eyes were wide in disbelief. "You bit me."

"You put your hand in biting reach." I had to say it as Artemis deliberately turned away and huddled into an annoyed rabbit loaf. "What did you think would happen?"

"I didn't think the famed Artemis, goddess of the Moon would fucking bite me!" Luke raged.

They don't need to be friends, alright? But it would be nice if I could be sure Artemis wouldn't just murder Luke the second the Quest was over. Because that would kind of suck? Luke was one of my friends and that would devastate Annabeth and the rest of Cabin 11.

It would also be nice if 'can a rabbit murder someone' remained a hypothetical.

"Can we just - okay, Artemis, you are a rabbit."

The fur on her back bristled for a moment, before this shudder ran through her as she whimpered and shrunk in on herself. She shuffled further away from us, tucking into the crease between the back and seat of her chair. It was almost like - like she was trying to be angry and to stay angry, but despair kept winning out.

There was nothing I could do about it.

That didn't feel great.

Luke's face twisted as he looked out the window. "So what's the plan?"

Uh, right.

The Plan.

I used these ten hours on the road to come up with the elaborate, genius plan of action known world wide as 'fucking winging it.'

If we were going North…

What was North?

"We could pay Boreas a visit?" I tried to make it not sound like a question, but it was totally a question.

"Right, the North Wind. He had a card," Luke murmured. He gave me a thoughtful look. "Think he knows something?"

"Olympus is right in the middle of the intersection between him and Eurus," I replied. That's the East Wind, if you were wondering. The brothers were still arguing over which states counted as 'North East' and there was something about the US Census definition and Delaware, but whatever. "He takes his job seriously and everyone overlooks wind spirits. If they didn't see anything, they probably heard something."

Words are wind.

Literally.

Artemis chittered, turning her head with her ears perking up.

"Good idea, right?" I asked her and she reluctantly nodded. I grinned. "Awesome! So we can just get a few plane tickets - "

"And I am stopping you there," Luke cut me off. "You know Zeus hates you, right?"

Duh.

"If he brings down my plane," I said darkly. "He won't need to worry about Kronos."

Also duh.

"Yeaaaahhh," Luke drawled with a glint in his eye. "But we'll still be dead."

Right.

Why did he have to put it like that?

Wait.

Oh no.

Oh no!

Fucking no!

"I am relying on Zeus not being a fucking moron!" I yelled out my realization to the heavens and smacked my Gameboy Advance into my forehead. Thunder rumbled threateningly as it began to rain. Argus huffed and silently turned on the windshield wipers. "Like a fucking idiot!"

Luke looked out at the overcast sky that had followed us all the way from Camp Half-Blood. Lightning flickered in the clouds. "No planes. You absolute koala."

I sputtered. "What did you just call - "

Our rabbit honked.

Luke and I both turned to stare at Artemis who stared back in blank surprise.

"Did you just laugh at me?" I said with a growing smile and watched her quickly turn away and huddle into her loaf again. "I think she just laughed at me. What do you think, Luke?"

His lips twitched. "The rabbit doth protest too much."

"I think she does."

Artemis inflated like a furry balloon and then let it out in a loud wheezing bunny sigh.

"Hey Argus," I twisted in my seat to look through to the front. "You know Penn Station?" Hera's disowned son nodded with a smile, turning on the right blinker and shifting lanes. I twisted back around. "So we take the train to Quebec City."

"Canada, huh?" Luke rubbed his chin and then glanced down at Artemis. He looked at me and then looked down again, more pointedly.

I sighed.

"Pet store first."

If you've never been to New York City, I'll let you in on a secret. If it isn't fighting for space, it's huge.

Penn Station was short for Pennsylvania Station, which was the main rail station in New York City underneath Madison Square. The entrance was a giant triangular building with a flat top and the front all covered in glass with dozens of arcing lights making everything dazzle. It was faced by the James A. Farley Building which was basically Doric Order Columns, The Building. Even though it was time for a late dinner, the station was still full of people going places making the long, wide concourse still feel claustrophobic.

Argus accompanied me to the ticket counter where we played Bratty Son, Mute Dad for the lady so I could buy our tickets without awkward questions and the police being called.

People got weird when a lone twelve year old tries to leave the country.

We grabbed two cheesy pretzels at Rose's Pizza and nabbed a spot on a bench. Argus sipped at his Raspberry Iced Tea as he fished Artemis out of his duster and set her on the bench between us. The rabbit stared at the people rushing by with wide silver eyes. Several people not caught up in their lives did a double take and there were a few smiles.

There was this one red headed girl flanked by what I was pretty sure were two bodyguards that noticed Argus instead, doing a triple take before visibly giving up, pinching the bridge of her nose and walking faster.

Clear-sighted maybe?

Cool.

I just saw a demi-alien.

I swallowed a big bite of my pretzel. "Does the Earth Mother talk to you too?"

Argus started to shake his head before pausing and then wiggling his head side to side instead.

"A few Dreams only?"

He nodded, absently pulling the edge of his duster out from under Artemis' furry butt, toppling her onto her side with a very disgruntled sound.

"That's not too bad." I reassured him. "Probably only vaguely aware you even exist."

That got me a relieved smile.

Argus and his brother Hephaestus were living proof of Hera's brand of arrogance. Elder Gods like Ananke and Nyx could and did have fatherless children. They were powerful gods in their own right. Mom's firstborn, Adrasteia was hell to experience but I've been told she looks the most like our mother who has the title of The Beautiful One for a reason. Nyx was known for monsters, but even the Furies could look however they wanted.

Hera, Young goddess of Motherhood and Childbirth, Queen of the Gods of Olympus was going to do the same. She would have a perfect heir made from her own divinity.

The problem was her inherited divinity had been welded on.

Maybe you've wondered for a minute or two why Hera would reject her son for being ugly, when Young gods could change their appearance. They grow up really fast, so in a few days, he would have known enough to hide the defects. His divine form would be more of a problem, but a few Names could paper that over pretty easily. Maybe you thought Hera was just that fucking petty.

I mean.

She is.

But there was a bit more to it.

Hephaestus was given to the nereid Thetis to raise as a two week old baby. It took him over a century to physically mature. He couldn't change his appearance. He didn't have a divine form. Hephaestus was able to kill the Giant Mimas by himself, without demigod help.

Because technically? Hephaestus is not a Young god.

Hephaestus and Argus have a father.

Phanes.

The Light-Bringer.

He's got some weird Domain interactions too. Hephaestus' kids all inherit from his Names as a god of the Forge and their connection to their grandmother is stronger than usual for demigods. I've never heard of Hephaestus having any demigods of Magnetism or Gravity. I wonder if Fire was still too risky? I wouldn't be surprised if he, like Aphrodite, had 'defects' too.

Hera learned the wrong lesson and maimed Argus in a different way.

"Your mom's a jerk, by the way."

Argus nodded as he pulled apart his cheesy pretzel, then he shrugged.

"I get it. Mine is too sometimes."

He nudged me with his shoulder, squishing Artemis a little who protested with a squeak.

"Yeah. She thinks I don't notice, but I do." I checked the giant digital clock hanging down in the middle of the concourse with the list of incoming and outgoing trains. "She's my mother though. And she loves me."

Argus shrugged again with a helpless smile.

"She's got Dad though. Hera's got a joke."

The eyes on the left side of his body opened for a moment like he was 'looking' in that direction. Then the right side opened. Then left again like he was expecting a ninja to jump out of the crowd. Then he solemnly nodded.

I smiled and pointed at him for the rabbit's benefit. "He knows what's up."

A loud, high pitched gasp interrupted our conversation and I looked up to see a tiny blond boy pulling at his mother's hand with one arm and a Pikachu pillow wrapped up in the other.

"A bunny!" He squealed. "Can I pet - Mommy, please, can I pet the bunny?"

His mother looked exhausted with dark hair that had been in an updo at one point today, but had long since given in to gravity.

"Daniel…" She sighed and adjusted her grip on the suitcase as she looked towards that big clock. "I - fine, I'm sorry," she addressed me with a very resigned tone. "Can he - ? He will be careful," she directed more towards her son who nodded very quickly. "Only for a few moments."

I looked down at the rabbit.

Artemis looked back up at me with a clear pleading expression, ears hanging down and everything.

This was beautiful.

I grinned.

"Don't worry," I said brightly as I snatched Artemis up before she could make a run for it. "She is well aware of how small children are around furry creatures and heals quickly." I gave the kid a skeptical look as I held out the very resigned small bun. "You have learned that tails are not for pulling, right?"

Artemis let out another one of those wheezing rabbit sighs.

With an eager nod, the little boy stepped closer and gently brushed fingers over her head. That seemed to be the cue for a bunch of less self-conscious people to come forward for a late evening dose of cute bunny rabbit.

Five minutes into the pet show, someone cleared their throat.

I turned and saw Luke standing there bemused with a cat carrier, a small bag of hay under his arm and a churro hanging from his mouth.

He swallowed and put the carrier down. "What'd I miss?"

Argus beamed and with slow, deliberate movements reached out and patted Artemis on the head.

As far as I was concerned, her look of shocked betrayal was justice.

After Artemis escaped into her carrier, the fun was over. We finished our pretzels (and churro) and threw out the trash. Argus escorted Luke and I to our train once again playing Mute Dad. Before we got on the train, the pseudo-Giant stopped us, placing a large hand on our shoulders. Luke looked surprised, his mouth falling open at Argus' warm smile as he gave us one pat.

I think that was 'Good luck.'

I smiled back. "Thanks, Argus."

He walked away, but the eyes on the back of his head and neck opened to watch us board the train. We quickly found seats at the back of our car. Demigod things. Just because we were in a moving metal box did not mean we were safe from monsters. It was just better for our nerves to sit by a clear exit. Artemis was placed on the ground between our feet and I dug my Gameboy out of my bag.

Luke sighed as he leaned his head back. "How much did you spend on our tickets?"

"About two fifty," I said absently as the Golden Sun logo came up on my screen.

"Two...hundred?"

I looked over to see him staring at me. "Two hundred fifty," I corrected him. "Well, two hundred forty seven dollars and thirteen cents but who's counting?"

His brows furrowed. "The camp store usually loans out about a hundred dollars to Quest leaders, but I guess Artemis is…" A rabbit. Or maybe he meant that usually a goddess doesn't need a couple of Benjamins. "So you got it? Are we broke now?"

"Not even close," I snorted as I chose my save file. "I used my debit card. Last I checked, I have something like thirty two thousand dollars."

Luke choked. "How?"

"My allowance, selling Quest rewards and Mom's part-time job." I double checked my progress and party members before I felt Luke poke the side of my head. I looked back at him.

"Your mother just gives you all of her money." He said incredulously. "For Quests."

It wasn't like she needed it.

"Dad's a trust fund baby and corporate lawyer," I explained. "Mom does random shit when she's bored and is occasionally paid for it."

Sometimes it's translating a stubborn text for archaeologists in Ireland (that will probably ruin someone's theories and/or career) and sometimes it's getting a dude to volunteer himself as dinner for another dude in Germany.

I know.

I think one of the two had been a demi-something of some sort, but I might be getting that mixed up with something else. It was a few years ago and I'm still not sure what that was about. Dad had been horrified, but he's human. If I got weird about the guy getting exactly what he wanted, I'd be a hypocrite.

"So don't worry," I told Luke.

"No - I mean, that's great - but it's more…" He trailed off, searching for the words. "Being a demigod sucks ass," he said suddenly. "But the more I hear about your mortal parents, and how much your godmother gives a damn, it sounds like it doesn't suck for you." His face twisted for a second. "Why can't we have that? Why don't we have that?"

"It sucks a few times a year." I don't like Mom's tests. "It's just...Camp is that bad."

"Yeah," he sighed and ran a hand through his thick, blond hair. An alarm sounded as the doors to the train closed. "It is." As the train began to move, Luke glanced at me out of the corner of his eye. "You know, I send petitions every summer to Olympus for more Cabins, more showers, some extra tables at the Pavilion. It's gotten to the point of including invoices and cost analysis sheets where the Campers do everything."

I vaguely recalled Mr. D mentioning something about that my first day at Camp Half-Blood.

"Do they even get answered?" I was actually curious.

"Once." Luke's smile was sharp. "Apparently, my petitions have been gracing the desk of Hera, as the patron of Camp Half-Blood in her capacity as Queen of Olympus."

And probably in her capacity as 'Maybe I Won't Murder Your Bastards, Zeus.'

So even if someone like, say Hermes, wanted to make some changes, he would have to go through his step-mother that loathed his very existence.

Holy fuck.

"Oh," I said dumbly. "So the reason why Camp is a shitshow circus…"

"It's because it's being run by a clown," Luke finished for me. "Yes."

Our rabbit honked all the way out of Manhattan.

My ass was completely numb by the time we got to the Metro station in Yonkers, New York. Billions of taxpayers dollars bought us only the very finest of hard plastic butt rests, as Dad would say.

The sun had completely set when we got off the train. There were only a few people around, most carrying some kind of suitcase or bag as we walked through the old station to the next. I presented our tickets to the old man at the counter, who squinted at them behind coke bottle glasses. He gave Luke directions and then grumbled,

"You're supposed to arrive thirty minutes before departure for Amtrak." He tapped the small digital clock he had on the desk for emphasis as I blinked at him. "It's boarding right now, so be quick."

Luke looked at me helplessly.

"Uh," I said. "We didn't buy Amtrak tickets?"

You kind of need to book that ahead of time, like you would a plane.

That got me the standard 'Idiot Kids These Days' look as he leaned over and pointed at the slips of paper in Luke's hand.

"You've got a reservation for the 8:30 departure to St. Lambert in Montreal, dated for today."

We both looked down at the dancing letters.

I closed my eyes and nodded. "Right, sorry. Thank you, sir."

"Be quick or you'll miss it," he reminded us as he waved the next person up to the counter.

"This font is murder on my eyes," Luke grumbled as he held the tickets up to his face, squinting. "And why is it so small?" I bit my lip as I scanned the signs, looking for the stenciled letters and numbers on brightly colored circles that would tell me where to go. "I think we have reserved seats? Private car?" He lowered the tickets. "Mr. Moneybags getting us first class?"

"I didn't buy Amtrak tickets," I said tensely. "Our tickets were swapped."

And I didn't even feel it happen.

Fuck.

Luke nodded and then he registered what I said. He turned sharply on his heel, scanning the entire station for anything out of the ordinary.

"God or monster?" He asked sharply as Artemis thumped in her carrier.

"First class tickets," I shrugged. "Probably god. Don't challenge them."

Whoever it is.

We were both quiet as we checked in, registered our carry on bags and got Artemis' carrier checked. Luke pulled out this vintage lighter from his pocket (maybe a weapon. He's not crazy) absently flipping the cap on and off as we shuffled through the rows and rows of seats behind our attendant.

She seemed like a nice lady with mousy brown hair and wide hazel eyes. She probably didn't deserve Luke eyeing her like she was going to sprout fangs, a tail and second head but…

Lowkey, I was doing that too.

She chattered about the amenities of our private sleeping room and the services that came with our tickets as she showed off how to flip the seats into a bunk bed.

"Breakfast starts at 6:30. There is a last call for dinner due to the train schedule." She looked at us earnestly. Probably not a monster?

Something was stopping me from being sure about that, which wasn't a good sign. I didn't put my bag down and after glancing at me, Luke didn't either.

"Usually dinner ends at 9 o' clock sharp, but it's been extended by fifteen minutes." Her name tag read Alice and she was clearly trying. "I can show you to the Dining Car if you want to get something before the kitchen closes?"

Luke shifted his weight from one foot to the other.

"I could eat," he muttered out of the corner of his mouth.

My stomach chose that moment to demand more offerings. My cheesy pretzel had only appeased it for a half hour.

"So could I," I admitted.

This was a classic Mouse Trap.

Hungry demigods (or full gods) are lured into doing something they really shouldn't because they were promised something tasty. One of the oldest tricks in the book.

Because it fucking worked.

My stomach felt like it was trying to eat itself and I knew my half-melted Snickers in my backpack were not going to help.

Luke lifted the carrier so we could all see the rabbit. Her nose was twitching like crazy as she sniffed around her carrier, but when she noticed we were looking she froze like a deer in headlights.

"Verdict?" Luke asked.

The rabbit shrugged.

We turned back to Alice, who had a very confused, very strained smile on.

We're not crazy. We're demigods.

"Lead the way," Luke said with a frown.

"If we meet anyone, let me talk," I said.

Luke nodded. "I understand. I won't say anything."

Luke was also a goddamn liar in need of duct tape because the moment we got to the Dining Car, he zeroed in on the lone passenger seated at a table and snarled out,

"What the fuck are you doing here?"

The definitely-goddess with short, curling black hair under a black and red baseball cap tilted her head back. "And who do I look like to you?"

I spoke up before Luke did something stupid.

"Your eyes are awesome." I complimented her.

Imagine two mirrors facing each other, reflecting the same image between them in an endless corridor. Now imagine the image being reflected were teeth. Two endless corridors of gnashing fangs, needle hooks, serrated shark teeth and grinding molars. Her pupils were the centers of the infinite gullets.

The goddess had a vaguely familiar lop-sided troublemaker smile. Who did I know that smiled like that?

"Thank you, uncle."

Okay.

That narrowed things down by a lot, but that still left way too many.

"Your welcome, niece," I said with a forced smile as I squinted at her black leather jacket and blood red shirt. "Sorry, I must have missed you at the last family reunion? So I have no idea who you are."

Luke did a double take and squinted as well.

"So not Hermes," he whispered.

Hermes?

Wait.

"Wait," I said out loud, holding up a hand as the goddess opened her mouth. "Let me guess."

I walked towards her table as I examined her. Everything else could change but her eyes. Maybe this was a stretch, but they reminded me of the drooling mouths of Night's shadow. The more I thought about it, the better I felt about that guess. Hair color didn't mean anything, but she did cast a very dark shadow.

One of Nyx's.

"Nemesis?" I ventured and the forgotten car attendant let out a low chuckle as she passed us, holding menus.

"So not just a pretty boy?" 'Alice' asked teasingly.

"Are we seriously going to use the word pretty?" I gave Whatever-The-Fuck-She-Is a flat look as I pretended to scratch the side of my neck. I was about five seconds from unsheathing Damocles.

Nemesis snorted. The teeth in her eyes shifted as she looked over us both before gesturing towards the seats across from her. "I am willing to swear on Earth, Heaven and the River Styx that I mean you no harm, uncle."

I wasn't the one I was worried about though.

"Don't bother with that little stick, boy." 'Alice' rolled her eyes at Luke. "You are not worth the effort."

Luke ground his teeth and the handle of Artemis' carrier creaked.

I sighed.

She could be like Mr. D and his perfect mortal guise? Another goddess playing second fiddle to Nemesis, Daughter of Night? Immortal spirit or monster? Probably a monster? I couldn't see a spirit pulling off a convincing human act.

I sucked on the inside of my cheek.

Fucking 'Alice.'

"Alecto?"

Luke gasped and then glared. The Fury eyed me. "Not just a pretty boy at all."

I scowled at her.

"Sit," Nemesis invited us. "You have a long trip ahead of you." She glanced at Alecto who handed Luke the menu. After a long moment, he stuffed his lighter back into his pants pocket and took it. "And I hope you succeed in your Quest."

"Really," I drawled as I shoved my backpack against the wall and sat. "All this just to see me off? You could have stopped by Camp sometime over the last forty eight hours? Ethan would have loved it."

Luke hissed through his teeth as he sat, but thankfully he didn't say anything.

"Yes," was all Nemesis said.

The goddess of Vengeance, Balance and Retribution had not been spanked enough as a kid. I was telling Erebus that in my next postcard for the holidays. Might be an awkward Thanksgiving at Nyx's house, but damn it.

"If you are willing, we would add additional objectives to your Quest for the Master Bolt," my niece said as we grudgingly opened our menus. "Consider it an official request from the Lord of the Underworld."

Fucking what.

Luke froze and I looked towards Alecto, who was leaning on the table on the other side of the aisle.

"The Master Bolt was stolen during the Winter Solstice," was all the Fury said.

In other words, the one day of the year Hades is allowed on Olympus. He lost something important enough to flag down Questing demigods for it on the same day Zeus Bolt was stolen with reason to believe Questers looking for that would find his toy too.

"What the fuck is Olympus using for security?" I muttered. Either the thief was a literal god (not possible) to swipe two symbols of power in one night under the gods' noses. Or this was the equivalent of securing the nuclear football with a Post-It Note saying 'donut steel' and a Chinese Finger Trap. "Fucking shitty padlocks?"

Luke swallowed a laugh.

"Their hubris has been repaid," Nemesis allowed. "Do what you will with the Bolt."

That sounded like Hades' hubris had been repaid.

Zeus was still in the red.

"I will." Once I figured out what I wanted to do with it. "Alecto, I get it now, but what do you want?"

Hades couldn't really order Nemesis to do anything. Neither could Zeus or Poseidon, making her something of a free agent. She was Balance. She had to be. Also?

She said 'objectives.' Plural.

"Two things," the goddess admitted. "Firstly, I am curious about the demigod Mother has taken to." Her grinding eyes looked at me like she was memorizing every detail. "It seems she has taken an interest in your development."

"More than an interest," Alecto murmured. The hazel of her eyes burned away to reveal brimstone. "It's as if he's a lost pup, can you feel it? She's touched him."

"What?" I said dumbly.

Was that - was that what Hypnos had been trying to tell me last night?

And instead of explaining, he just laughed at me.

Like a jerk.

"And he didn't go mad." Nemesis sounded almost impressed. "It seems our brother does have a decent taste in friends after all."

"Talk about a backhanded compliment," I complained.

There was an amused tug at the corner of her mouth. Ethan's mother tilted her head towards our menus.

"Order. I can hear your stomach from here." I coughed a little. "Perhaps a salad as well," Nemesis told Alecto. "For the sister of the Sun."

Wait, how did she - oh. The Goddess of Retribution probably knew the second Mom rabbited Artemis.

I am not gonna lie.

It was a little weird telling Alecto, the Persecution and eldest of the Furies, to go get me a sandwich.

A BLT, extra bacon and fries.

Luke was an extra picky four year old, changing his mind at least three times and being very specific with his shrimp scampi. I am pretty sure it was just to annoy the Daughter of Night for some reason? The food was actually really good. She might be a terrifying bat lady monster, but she knew her way around a kitchen.

We let a very reluctant Artemis out onto the table for the large plate of greens and a few blueberries. The rabbit's ears were spread and flat against her back. She was crouching and didn't move from where Luke put her, staring at her dinner. Was she shaking?

"Artemis?" I whispered and she let out a short, keening wail.

Nemesis flashed a smile filled with teeth.

"I have not forgotten about you," the goddess purred. "Eat. It would be absolutely tragic if you were to starve." That didn't seem to help. The bunny was practically vibrating. "I have a great amount of respect for you, Daughter of Leto. You have always been so very committed to getting what you deserve."

Ouch.

"Mom just thinks she's funny," I mumbled around some fries.

"Perhaps we should convince her to write the punchline to more jokes," Alecto said with a side glance at the frozen rabbit and Luke tried to laugh around a mouthful of pasta.

Don't do that.

It doesn't work.

Once he was sure he wasn't dying anymore, he pointed at the Fury with his fork. "I still don't like you."

She rolled her eyes.

"Mother taking passing interest as the Night would have been impressive enough," Nemesis cut in. "But she - " Her eyes flickered to Luke. " - bothered to offer you a measure of protection from us. Her children."

"...no more Hellhound attacks?" I asked hopefully.

"...less."

I'll fucking take it!

"Grandmother must have invested quite a bit in your birth, which makes it all the more interesting."

"Because I'm a demigod." I've heard that before, from Apollo. He was used to demigods being throw-aways. Dad set him straight.

Alecto scoffed. "Try spawn."

Rude.

"Demigod," Luke snapped. He flinched, but held his ground when the Fury's burning eyes shifted to him.

"Reaaally," she said.

"I bleed red," I muttered.

Nemesis frowned and shared a glance with Alecto.

"Not all mortals are human," the goddess said quietly. I frowned. I knew that. Cliff was mortal. "I suppose we shall see. Grandmother clearly has a plan for you." A slightly satisfied expression came over her face. "At the expense of the Fates' plan. And mine."

I frowned.

"That's why you Claimed Ethan, isn't it?" I asked with a sinking feeling.

"He was made for a role that is no longer required," Nemesis confirmed and beside me Luke stiffened. "A pity. I invested quite a bit in that boy."

"What…" I began slowly. "Did you need him to do that meant you let him inherit a lot, but didn't want to Claim him?"

That annoyingly familiar smile came back. "Force my hand."

Uh.

What?

"I am Balance," Nemesis explained. "Does Olympus seem balanced to you?" Luke snorted. "I enjoy tearing down the proud and powerful, but the Fates have seen fit to restrict me. I will not let Mother be the arbiter of my Domain - " Good call. Nyx being in charge of Greek karma sounds like a terrible idea "- and so I must make do. Demigods are loopholes." She pinned me with this look I didn't know how to parse. "Remember that."

"Okay…" I mopped up the rest of my sandwich and fries. "You still haven't said what you want."

"I want you to continue on your Quest, succeed and receive your due." Nemesis eyes trailed to the rabbit on the table. "Without her."

"Um."

I did not expect that.

"This train will not reach the US - Canada border," Nemesis stated and Luke went still. "There will be a technical difficulty and all passengers will be asked to transfer to another at the station. There will be a ten minute layover. Leave her, or die with her."

Artemis whimpered, shuffling back towards Luke. My brain stopped working for a minute. That was why Apollo had looked so defeated. That was why his sister had been so depressed. Artemis had to eat and use the bathroom, because she was fucking mortal.

Mom turned her into a regular rabbit.

She can die.

"Wa - wait, can't we talk this over?" I tried. "I'm sure she did some, uh, shit in the past but Mom gave her this Quest - "

"You will have problems of your own to handle. It is out of respect for your mother that I am telling you this at all, uncle," Nemesis said blankly as her dark shadow crept up her red shirt. "Choice and consequence is her Domain."

What was left behind was a seething mass of snapping, grinding teeth, inky shadows spilling from between the cracks like blood. Luke hissed, turning away and shutting his eyes as if someone had shined a spotlight in his face.

"V̶e̴n̸g̷e̷a̷n̶c̶e̶ ̷i̸s̸ ̵m̷i̶n̸e̵.̶"

Her shadow shattered into a billion pieces, making me flinch. When I opened my eyes, she was gone and Alecto was once again a hazel eyed train attendant. Before she left, the disguised Fury reached across the table to nudge the salad plate back in front of Artemis with a malicious grin.

"Enjoy your last meal, huntress."

I didn't say anything as I finished my sandwich. Luke didn't either until he went to pick up his bread roll. He put it up to his mouth, glanced down at Artemis and sighed, putting it back down.

"Well, shit."

"We can't abandon her," I said immediately.

"Can we afford not to?" Luke asked mildly.

I turned on him. "We can't - the Quest - "

"War, remember?" Luke cut me off. "Millions of people at risk, remember that?" I bit my lip. "And...like it or not, your mother is Fate. We're Questers, yeah, but it's about you, isn't it?" Luke savagely bit into his bread roll. "It's always going to be about you. Not Artemis. Not me."

"I'm not leaving you," I promised the rabbit even as I felt my chest ache as every ounce of fear I thought I got rid of came flooding back.

I just accepted a lethal side quest.

Worse.

A lethal escort quest.

Mom's tests were simple.

There was no such thing as extra credit.

"You should eat though," I said thickly. "You'll need the energy." The rabbit looked up at me with wide silver eyes, but eventually started nibbling. "We'll be fine," I said with false cheer, patting her back. "Didn't Chiron say you were the best swordsman he's seen in three hundred years?"

Luke smiled weakly.

"That's right." He brought out his lighter I saw earlier. Up close, it was actually pretty cool looking. It was made out of bronze and was patterned out of grooves in the metal making gentle curves reminding me of waves. "Hermes gave me this to celebrate that."

He frowned at the lighter, before twisting the cap and a shining Celestial Bronze sword sprung out.

"Whoa." It was a harpe sword with that characteristic sickle or hook-like extension near the tip. It wasn't all bronze. There was a thread of greenish-white crystal winding through the blade. "It's laced with Adamantine," I said in awe. "Do you know how rare that is?"

Luke frowned harder. "Like his own sword, huh?"

"Have you named it?"

Luke's face went blank as he stared at the weapon.

"...ανασώζω." He said eventually. "Reclaim."

I wasn't going to ask why he chose that name. It seemed personal.

"Hey," Luke said softly. "I haven't gotten the chance to ask, but all those myths about the Titan Lord? That it was a Golden Age for humanity, that he was King of Elysium and all that." He was still staring at his sword. "You said the Titans didn't make humanity and he's still locked away. Does that mean they were lies too?"

"When the Titans ruled, people lived longer," I said. "That's just how we were though. Reaching seven hundred wasn't rare. Sickness wasn't really a thing." I frowned and looked out the window of the Dining Car. It was just black with the occasional flash of light from buildings and lamps. "He ruled well, before he lost his fucking mind. Mom approved of him, I think."

She never said it like that, but I got that feeling.

"He did govern Elysium though. Athena gave him parole." I frowned as I rested my head against the window, squinting out into the darkness. "Atlas and the others helped Zeus overthrow her and he stabbed them in the back."

"Of course," Luke muttered.

"I'm going to get Mom and Dad to adopt Apollo," I decided. "After the Quest." Artemis squinted at me. "You'll still be his sister," I reassured her. "But you might want to ask Demeter to make your thing official too. Two moms aren't bad to have."

The rabbit's ears drooped a little as she went back to her meal.

Shit, Leto.

Right.

That night, I claimed the top bunk bed to Luke's rolling eyes and Artemis huddled into a corner. I called Dad, because ghosting my father was not an option, and made small talk. I let him know I was leaving the country in case he got pinged about my passport and that I was traveling with a qualified Camp counselor to run a little errand for Olympus.

Yes, I prayed to Mom about it.

She said it's okay.

Technically true.

Luke eyed my phone as I put it away. "I want one of those."

I laughed. "I'll ask."

Holy fuck, Percy, I thought as my eyes closed. How are you going to get out of this one?

 

[Shujin]

An Undertow of Sand
A PJO Fanfiction
​

I woke up.

The disorientation that hit me on seeing the roof of the train car was real. I guess some part of me still needed to get with the program. I wasn't going to be seeing my star studded bedroom wallpaper, or the Celestial Bronze banded ceiling of my room at Camp Half-Blood for a while.

I thought about going back to sleep.

What time was it?

I had no idea when Nemesis' vengeance would kick in and stop our train. So that meant...go back to sleep.

After I used the bathroom!

I learned a long time ago that there was zero point to holding it. Use the toilet now, so you don't have to use a bush or the back of a dumpster later. Sometimes you'll get stuck in that awkward moment of waiting for something to happen, but trust me, it beats needing to hide from a hungry hydra, trying to be absolutely still and then suddenly realizing you needed to pee.

Bad.

I put my sunglasses on and slipped off my bunk.

Then I rushed to the bathroom. Amtrak was guilty of the same crime frequently committed by airports and medical clinics:

Putting the air conditioning five degrees above freezing.

The cold does funny things to your bladder.

After I finished my business, I crept back into the main compartment and blinked in surprise.

Luke in the bottom bunk bed slept like he expected to be attacked. He was curled around his pillow with his back to the wall and oddly tense. Like he was trying to stop himself from moving in his sleep and wanted to take up as little space as possible.

It wasn't until I saw Artemis' small form at the foot of his bed that I remembered that kids in Cabin 11 shared bunks. There weren't enough beds for them all, and some still had to sleep on the floor.

That - that was what he was doing. Luke trained himself to sleep like that. To not bother anyone and to be as small as his six foot, eighteen year old frame could be. And I - I have never felt more spoiled in my entire life.

I slowly walked towards the bunk bed.

Artemis woke up as soon as the step ladder to the top bunk creaked under my foot. She panicked a little, swinging her head and ears around as she tried to free her front paw from the sheets.

"Hey," I called softly. "It's just me."

She slowly calmed down, then shuffled even further towards the end of Luke's bunk like she would catch on fire if he so much as twitched in her general direction. I smiled a little.

"Comfy?" I teased her.

The rabbit's eyes narrowed.

"Sorry," I said quickly. "Were you cold?" I got a very reluctant nod. "Okay, give me a second." I quickly climbed the ladder just enough to grab my jacket from under my pillow. "Here," I whispered as I threw it over her. The jacket reshaped itself into a red woolen rabbit sweater with a hood fitting around her ears and a small stitched golden reindeer chasing a crescent moon on the side. "It can't be cut or torn," I said uncomfortably as the rabbit stared at me. "It absorbs some of the impact too, not all of it, but it will help." I shuffled from one foot to the other. "Help you not die, I mean. Just don't get hit really hard. Or at all." I needed to stop talking. "Um...yeah. Good night."

I escaped back to my bed.

I tried to Dream again when I fell back asleep, but I wasn't headed for the Dreamlands. Morpheus burbled at me curiously. Something that felt like 'back again?'

It took me a bit to respond properly.

It wasn't really a language thing. I could talk to Hypnos just fine. I'm not sure what it was, exactly. Maybe a mindset thing? You don't really 'speak' while Sleeping. The physical isn't a thing and you're way too far in Hypnos' influence for that. It's like the difference between talking to Poseidon as a person and talking to Poseidon as a clam in his realm. English is useless.

Hypnos and I got on just fine though. And his mom seemed to understand me pretty well even if the other way around was a bit odd. The thing is, there has always been a separation between Morpheus and I. We were still buddies, don't get me wrong.

It's just that his father Hypnos and I were Greek.

Morpheus was Roman.

The difference between Hypnos of the Greek pantheon and Somnus of the Roman was...they used different letters to spell their name. There wasn't a difference. Hypnos wasn't a Young God. The Roman Name was just an avatar. I think the only reason he even bothered was his Roman wife. I don't know if Nyx even knew she had a Roman name. It was kind of new. Mom knew about hers. She acknowledged it was a thing.

Her Celtic dudebros got kind of shit stomped by the Romans. Many of whom also had Greek Names.

Like Jupiter had Zeus.

Made things a little awkward for her at one point.

'Somnus' gave his son a Greek name because he didn't give a shit about the pantheon divide.

It mattered to Morpheus though.

Good Dream? I carefully mumbled at him. The lesser dream spirits avoided me. If I wanted to Dream like a mortal, I had to have some help. Morpheus responded with surprise and concern as he drew me close. Please?

More of his concern sparkled on me, but he shifted. His presence solidified, twisting and then I was looking at a man in long black robes with permanent bed-head gray hair, scruff on his chin and blue eyes the same shade as Clovis'.

He studied me for a long moment.

Just when I thought he was going to refuse, he reached for me and then -

I woke up in my bed.

My actual bed. The one I had at home, in our apartment under the sparkling band of the Milky Way on my ceiling as space ships like the Battlestar Galactica, the Event Horizon, the Death Star, Lego Millennium Falcon, and Lego Enterprise hung on their transparent strings.

I got up and noticed I was in fuzzy Wookie pajama pants and a white T-shirt. My pants were a little too short on me. Dad made me throw these out, I remembered. I exited my room and saw a hazy Manhattan skyline underneath sleepy, gray clouds and falling snow in our windows.

I heard someone's voice. Was that - ?

With my heart in my throat, I crept into the living room.

" - he'll be fine," Dad was saying sleepily with his head leaning against Mom's. I reflexively looked away, before remembering that I was Dreaming. This was an illusion. I wouldn't see their ghosts. I cautiously turned back. They were sitting on the loveseat by the couch sharing a duvet blanket in front of the lit fireplace like they were on the Hallmark channel in their matching black pajama shirts. Sitting side by side, the white arrows on their chests pointed towards each other. I didn't have to read it to know what it said. I know the shirts. It just said: Mine.

"I believe that," Dad murmured into Mom's black hair. "We raised a badass."

Mom hummed as she snuggled into his shoulder. "Because I insisted. You kept saying he was too young."

"He was!" Dad protested, pulling back a little. "I reserve the right to be concerned about my three year old with a huge scorpion in his crib. That's not a sign he's ready to be killing monsters."

"That three year old didn't scream or cry when he killed it," Mom pointed out smoothly, taking his hand in hers. "Unlike someone I know."

I blinked back tears as I heard Dad groan and half-heartedly try to defend himself before finally grumpily admitting,

"That's fair."

The corner of my mother's lips curled up in amusement as she looked away and saw me standing there, staring at them like they were going to disappear. She held her arm out and I carefully squeezed in next to her. Her arm settled around my shoulders and I knew I was crying.

It's stupid.

I'm stupid.

I've only been away for a month.

"Is that Percy?" Dad sounded very tired and sleepy.

"It is," Mom said softly as she rubbed the tears off my cheek with her thumb.

"He'll be fine, right?" My father slurred as his eyes closed and he slumped against us. "You promised."

Mom just smiled this little smile and squeezed his hand.

"I greatly prefer your father physically and mentally well enough to raise you," she said without prompting and Dad snorted softly. I heard a faint 'love you too, beautiful' from him, making her expression soften. "He is important to me," she said quietly. "But not as important as you."

I looked up in surprise.

And saw a hundred bloody, painful deaths in her black diamond eyes.

That - wait.

This wasn't an illusion.

"Mom?"

She was actually here. In my Dream.

"And…" Suddenly, Dad's question - 'he'll be fine, right?' - meant so much more. "Dad?"

"We are in his Dream," my mother confirmed as her eyes drifted back to her husband. She laid her head back onto his shoulder. "Try not to wake him," she whispered. "He needs this."

"But - " I sputtered. I had no idea how I ended up here. "I didn't - "

"Morpheus," Mom said absently. "He sent you to me reeking of doubt and…" I swallowed thickly, curling into her. "Fear."

I flinched.

"It's nothing," I said quietly into her side. "Just a bit homesick."

"I understand." She hummed and gently rubbed the back of my neck. We sat like that for a while. All three of us before the fireplace like we had turned back the clock and it was just a few days before Christmas again. Back then, I was trying to guess what my Christmas presents were, was looking forward to Dad's days off work and was slowly writing out holiday cards to my grandparents. Like any other kid.

Now, I couldn't stop thinking about how that snowy Manhattan skyline would change if Olympus went to war.

It wasn't even about the Quest. Not really. Even if I didn't die for Zeus' ego, and even if Sam managed to keep Kronos in the freezer, Athena wasn't going to wait forever.

And there was this Prophecy…

"I can hear you thinking," Mom said softly.

I bit my lip.

"Percy?" She prompted, squeezing me about my shoulders.

"I'm a little scared," I admitted.

"About?"

I shrugged uncomfortably. "Dying, I guess."

Mom blinked and dragged her eyes away from Dad's face. "...why?"

I frowned.

Why?

I had to take a second to remember that my mother was literally older than dirt and all of my siblings were gods.

"Pain is pretty bad," I said dryly. I watched her eyes light up as she glanced back at my father. Uh oh. I knew that look. "Filter," I warned her. "I don't need to know." That one side of her lips curled up. "Filter."

"You have never feared pain," Mom said curiously, rolling her eyes at me instead of traumatizing me with whatever horror she was thinking of. Again. "Are you sure that's it?"

I shrugged again and picked at the fuzzies on the duvet blanket.

I guess not.

Pain was bad, but...I wasn't scared of it. If I got hurt enough to die, that would suck, but then it would be over and I knew there was an afterlife. It wasn't like I was going to disappear. Dying trying to help someone would probably be enough to push me over the line to qualify for Elysium? That wouldn't be too bad. I wouldn't be able to leave the Underworld, but I could still get visits!

Cliff would end up in Tartarus maybe, but that wasn't too far away. My other friends were aiming for Elysium too. I would have to wait for Dad, but Mom could see me whenever.

There was a painful lump forming in my throat.

"Figured it out?"

I did.

Dying wasn't the problem.

I was afraid…

I was afraid of proving my half-sisters, the Fates, right. That Mom never should have had me. That I wasn't worth it. That I didn't make a difference and didn't matter. I was afraid of being forgotten. I was afraid of disappointing her. I was afraid that Mom didn't expect much from me, compared to her immortal children. My siblings.

I wasn't afraid of death.

I was afraid...that if I put myself into a dangerous situation and I actually died, that meant Mom didn't love me like I thought she did.

It was stupid.

Wasn't it?

"I just don't want to disappoint you," I mumbled.

"Oh, Percy," Mom sighed fondly. "You may fail me, but you could never disappoint me."

My breath caught and I looked up at her. "Really?"

"Really really," she said easily. "You exceeded even my wildest hopes the moment you were born."

"How?"

Even as I asked, I just knew it was going to be something full of Kraft cheese about parents and their kids, or mother's and their sons or whatever.

But instead, Mom gestured and the wall and windows of our penthouse fell away, replaced by an image of the swirling cosmos. Have you ever been in a planetarium? It was like that, except everything was HD. I felt like if I reached out, I would burn myself on some of these stars. I stared in awe at the planets and nebulas around and eventually, my gaze was drawn to the very center.

Where there was nothing.

A large void hung there in the center of the sparkling beauty. Just an empty hole.

No.

Not empty.

The more I stared, the more the void started to gain details and texture, even if everything in my mind was screaming that there was nothing there, I could see it. Some massive, dark thing was in the center, mindless devouring everything that was helplessly drawn into its reach. Clouds of space dust, asteroids, planets...stars.

Mom was looking up at it too.

"The moment you were born, I could tell that your mortality allowed you to take after your grandfather." My grandfather? I thought - well, myths say Ananke was born from Chaos, but Ananke herself was just a name for an older Elder God. Maybe she meant Chaos though?

Chaos is my granddad?

Whoa.

"My little Perseus," Mom murmured as she held me close. "I could not be more pleased with you."

I grinned at her, but I couldn't keep my eyes away from that devouring void.

"Beautiful, isn't it?"

I absently nodded.

We watched it together for who knows how long. An hour? Maybe two? Then the sound of a loud, piercing alarm ran through my head and the Dream shattered like glass.

I woke up to the lights of our private train car flickering on as the brief alarm died. I snatched my glasses up. There was a thump under my butt and a curse as Luke hit his head. I smiled a little, but the ice growing in my chest made it wither. The intercom crackled.

"Hello, this is your conductor speaking," a man's voice said calmly as I slipped off my bunk with my backpack. "I'm sure you all heard that alarm, but please do not be concerned. We are having some technical difficulties and will be pulling into Plattsburgh Amtrak Station."

Luke caught my eye as he shoved his feet into his sneakers, but he didn't say anything. I didn't either. Artemis whimpered, beginning to tremble in place. Hermes' son raised his eyebrows when he saw her sweater, but that didn't stop him from picking her stiff form up and putting her back in her carrier as the conductor continued speaking.

He didn't tell us anything we didn't already know.

We didn't reach the border. They had called ahead and there would be a regular train that would take us through customs at Rouses Point all the way to St.Lambert in Montreal. Amtrak would meet us there for the rest of the trip to Quebec City and back down to New York for those with round trip tickets.

Expected layover time: ten minutes.

It was still dark out with the faint glow in the horizon that said it was maybe three to four o' clock?

Of course it's dark, I thought. Nemesis was still the daughter of the Night and my half-brother, the Darkness. If it wasn't like she couldn't send monsters after a rabbit in broad daylight, because she could. It didn't need to be nighttime for Nemesis to use a shadow to drop a monster on us. It's just - I don't know.

Artemis had been scared from the start. She knew.

It was dark.

I have a bad feeling about this.

Really bad.

I quickly ran through my morning routine and even offered Luke my spare toothbrush. It helped with the anxiety. If I was going to be eaten by a monster, at least I would still have my sparkling smile!

Luke sighed as he wrapped his toothbrush in a napkin and shoved it into his backpack's front pocket. "You're still going to try to protect her, aren't you?"

I nodded slowly.

"Fine," Luke said shortly and pursed his lips. "How? Take her on the train with you?"

My gut clenched.

"Can't," I said quietly. "That would put everyone else in danger."

There were more than a few monsters in Greek mythology that could casually derail a moving train. That was assuming it wasn't derailed by my niece herself by breaking the track or something. Remember, no direct smiting, but that kind of shit was fair game and I was sure in a train full of people, there would be at least one Nemesis wouldn't mind getting rid of as well to justify it.

Which sucks for everyone else on that train, but hey, she'll make it up by blessing others with good fortune to maintain the Balance so it…

It would still suck for everyone else on that train.

Luke eyed me. "So no train, you can't fly, your only real option is stealing a car and do you even know how to drive?"

"The basics," I defended myself weakly. I mean, it would be very illegal, but demigod. Obeying mortal laws come a really far third to getting the Quest done and not dying. "But, uh, don't suppose you have a How To For Dummies book hidden somewhere on hotwiring cars?"

"You're going to hoof it," Luke said flatly. "Across the border to Quebec City, on foot, while defending a rabbit from monsters."

Remember when I said I accepted a lethal escort quest?

Literally what I did.

"I guess," I mumbled. There was a faint, high pitched squeal as the train put on the brakes and began to slow down.

Almost there.

Luke stared at me disbelievingly. "Why are you risking so much for that?"

I rocked back a little in surprise. His 'that' came out really strong as he jabbed a finger towards Artemis in her carrier. It wasn't enough to replace the word with a curse, like shit or something. The anger behind it was raw and disgusted and bitter. He said 'that' the same way that butthurt-over-Germany-losing neighbor of my grandparents said 'Jew.'

Luke seemed to realize it, taking a calming breath and shaking his head once. "Millions of innocent people are on the line here, Percy," he said in this even, soothing voice. "Her Domains can be covered by others. Hecate the Moon, Lelantos the Hunt and Wilderness - " I knew that name. He was Leto's twin brother, a Titan. "Perhaps Hestia can watch over Maidens in her stead?"

Yes, but -

But actually no?

"I'm not worried about that, it's just - " I shifted from one foot to the other. "What about her Hunters?"

"Hestia can take care of them too," Luke said easily. "She's the goddess of Virginity and Family, after all." Luke's blue eyes looked straight into mine. For a second, I forgot I was wearing my sunglasses. "Have you thought about how your parents would react if you got yourself killed?"

I didn't want to.

I could almost see Mom's face.

She never looked disappointed. Mom didn't really do the angry parent thing. She's never grounded me in my entire life, no matter what kind of stupidity I got up to. It probably helped that she knew sometimes I'm just a dumbass and she could see it coming. Instead I would just get this blank, almost confused look for a few seconds like she didn't know who I was.

Or couldn't believe I was hers.

The ice in my chest was so cold, it was hard to breathe.

Ringing in my head was Dad's sleepy "He'll be fine, right? You promised.'

I was a demigod.

But Dorian Stele had never wanted his son to be anyone's hero.

He would say that I should think of keeping myself safe first. I'm twelve. It's not my responsibility. Do what I had to, survive, and come home. Heroes are for stories, songs and tabletop campaigns. He's never been shy about letting me know that Mom and I were his world. The rest of it can burn, as long as we're okay.

He doesn't understand that I just can't.

Mom would protect Dad, but if I die, I think he will break. I can't do that to him. I can't disappoint Mom. I can't abandon Artemis. I can't hurt my father. I can't ignore someone that needs my help. I can't fail Mom. I can't. I can't.

Ï̵̝ ̷͕̂c̴̰̀́á̷͈͝ǹ̵̘'̴͎̤̚t̸̪̺͐.̶̢̒̈́

"Percy!"

I snapped out of...whatever just happened to see Luke looking down at me in concern. He had both hands on my shoulders and they ached a little, so he must have been shaking me. I blinked slowly up at him.

"Hi," I said blankly. "What the fuck just happened?"

Luke eyed me as he slowly let go of my shoulders. "You tell me. It was like you were having a seizure."

"And you shook me?"

Luke threw up his hands. "I didn't know what else to do! Slap you out of it?"

I was saved from having to answer by our private car door opening. On the other side was our attendant 'Alice' who wore a pleasant smile and an elderly couple with suitcases.

"We have reached Plattsburgh, New York," the disguised Fury said simply. I bit my lip. I hadn't even noticed we'd stopped. "We are requiring all passengers to disembark."

Luke and I exchanged glances.

I picked up Artemis' carrier and followed the tall blond demigod out into the train corridor where we were shuffled along to the open doors out into open air. I stared up at the building. The Plattsburgh Amtrak Station was an old looking building made out of red brick with some kind of turret and towers like it was a castle. A big orange sign with an arrow pointing towards the doors leading into the building was in front of us.

"All passengers of Adirondack Amtrak Line are invited to use the waiting rooms in the station until the replacement train arrives," Alecto said, saving us the trouble of having to read. She checked the elderly couple for their tickets and identification for customs, then ushered them forwards. She then turned to me. "Have you decided?"

I can't leave Artemis to die.

"Yeah," I nodded. Then I blurted out, "It's not you coming after her, is it?"

Alecto just smiled and dismissed us with a polite wave, her eyes fixed on the carrier in my hand. "Bye, honey."

I tried to feel good about it as we entered the building. Sam hadn't hung me out to dry when we went to see my mother on the moon, right? He even got banished for it! How could I do less than my cat? And - and Dad said Mom promised I would be fine, right? And she said I would be back at Trinity for the next school year! So I'm definitely going to live through this. She must know I'm going to be a bit stupid, so this was fine.

And I've got that Prophecy! If the Great Prophecy was about me, it would be hard to die at sixteen if I was already dead at twelve.

And Prophecies always mean what we think they do, don't they? Kronos' voice mocked me.

You shut up.

Mom does not lie.

I was going to get through this.

The real problem was making sure Artemis does too.

Luke stopped at some empty seats in the lounging area of the train station. They were old style square chairs with right angle arm rests and plaid cushions. I stopped too, but for a different reason.

"You go on ahead, Luke," I said as confidently as I could. "We'll catch up."

Luke froze in the act of putting his bag down by his chair. "Percy," he said, completely exasperated. "You're being a dumbass."

I shrugged with one shoulder and smiled. "I know."

I turned quickly and strode for the doors. Behind me, I heard Luke curse, but that didn't matter. I pushed the front doors open and Plattsburgh, New York lay sprawled out before us.

It was a quaint little town, the kind that had less than twenty thousand people with that typical colonial look common in the North East United States. Old fashioned houses and buildings with wooden placards with short street lamps that had flame shaped light bulbs. The whole place looked like it would give off a nice cozy feeling in the morning, but right now the dead streets, dim lights and wide open spaces gave it the appearance of a ghost town.

By that I mean, where you can either find a ghost or become one.

I scanned the town again, looking for anything at all that could help me. I started walking along the street, looking for a good vantage point. Artemis shuddered so hard in the carrier that the entire thing vibrated against my hand.

"It's going to be okay," I told her. "Trust me."

I don't know how long I walked, maybe five or six minutes before I was able to see that there was a river running through the town. I could follow it to where it fed into Lake Champlain which separated this part of New York from Vermont.

There!

Thank god for squat colonial buildings. Far in the distance and across the river was a very tall narrow building with a tapering tip.

An obelisk.

As soon as I saw that, it was like I drank 3 large expressos with extra cream and a Red Bull energy drink. The ice melted completely, replaced by the pace of my heart speeding up as this jittery feeling ran down my limbs. A million thoughts whirled about in my head, but there was one screaming really loudly:

I can do this.

An obelisk is supposed to represent a frozen ray of sunlight, a symbol of illumination and veneration. But Apollo wasn't the god these structures called upon.

It was Ra.

It didn't have to be an original, but it did have to hold some meaning. And in a small, Northeastern town like this that still clung to its colonial roots? I had a good feeling that the tower was a proper monument or a memorial, not just a cheap tourist attraction. And just like the pyramids, a proper obelisk can be used as a portal using Egyptian magic. I wasn't an Egyptian, but I did have one on speed dial.

I set Artemis' carrier down on the curb and then searched around in my backpack for my phone.

"I have a plan," I told the frightened rabbit. "Everything sucks, but you're mortal and that will work in our favor." Artemis whimpered, trembling. "I mean it," I said breathlessly as my fingers brushed against the cold metal of my bronze and gold tablet. "You can't just be smited now like you could before and you are on a Quest, so that gives you some protection."

Not a lot, but it was something.

"Once the hunt for you begins, Nemesis can't intervene." I pulled my phone out. "You know what that means, right?"

Artemis stared at me with wide silver eyes from behind the bars of her carrier. Then she jerkily nodded twice.

This was Nemesis' chance, but that was all it was.

A chance.

We just had to make her blow it.

"So if we stay three steps ahead of whatever she sends after us, we'll be fine, because she can't help her monsters catch up or track us."

That was the rule. Just as Young Gods were limited in how much they could help a mortal on a Quest out, they were also limited in how serious their murder attempts on a Questing mortal could be. Artemis was mortal now and I would bet my left leg she'd been grandfathered into those rules, or else Nemesis would have just smited her.

That's why the rules of Challenge were so important. Because if you Challenge a god, all of these rules and regulations and whatever else my fucking half-sisters came up with get thrown out the window.

I rubbed my thumb against the second hieroglyph shaped like a bird.

"Hope you don't have anything against Egyptians," I said a second before that annoying high pitched static sound assaulted my ear drums.

"What the - Percy?" Cliff's mumbly voice came through. A second later the noise went away. "Do you know what time it is, man?"

"Uh, no," I said. "Early."

"Fucking early," Cliff agreed. "What's the emergency?"

"My niece wants to kill my rabbit."

There was this dead silence on the other end.

"...this is going to be good," Cliff muttered.

I mean, I was trying to keep the details on a Need To Know basis, but if he was going to be like that, fine. "I'm on a Quest for Olympus and Nemesis has an issue with one of my companions who has been temporarily transformed into a rabbit by my mother."

Cliff did that thing where he sucked in air through his teeth. "You have the Rhamnousia on your ass."

"My rabbit has the Rhamnousia on her ass," I corrected him. Artemis began to nibble on the carrier's door, so I reached over to open it up. "I need to know if you got the emergency teleporter function on my phone worki - hey, wait!"

Artemis ducked under my hand and bolted.

"Wait! Artemis! I - " Her little cotton ball tail disappeared into the brush of the small woods along the edge of the park we were in. She just - she just left. She ran away.

Trust me.

I have a plan.

I turned and kicked the carrier away, sending it crashing into the base of a street lamp.

"Fuck!"

"Percy? You okay, man?"

Luke chose that time to appear, jogging up with an annoyed expression and what might have been a folded map in his hand. My heart leapt into my throat. He followed me! He wasn't willing to just let me do something stupid without him! "Tell me you have some kind of plan, or do I have to knock you out - " He caught sight of the carrier. His eyes narrowed as he looked around, then back at me. "Where'd she go?"

Yeah.

"She ran away," I said dully. This empty feeling was trying to take root in my stomach. She'd rather take her chances as a rabbit alone, than let me help.

"Who's she? The rabbit? You named your rabbit Artemis? Wait - oh shit."

Luke crossed his arms over his chest. "You know what the gods of Olympus are like. You really thought she would accept your help? Why?"

Because Apollo wasn't like that. Hestia isn't.

I thought…

I guess I'm just stupid.

"She did us a favor," Luke pointed out ruthlessly. "If she doesn't want to be helped, then let her go."

"I thought she was different," I said miserably.

"Huh?"

Oh right. "Not you."

Luke raised an eyebrow. "What?"

"Not you either!" I held up my phone. "I'm on a call! I had a plan, but now we've got to track down Artemis and make sure she doesn't get herself killed - "

"We?" Luke said pointedly.

Fuck.

"I - I'll give you my wish if you help me out protecting Artemis." I resorted to just straight bribery. I really didn't have anything to say that would work on Luke. He's been stuck at the shit show that was Camp Half-Blood for four years and by this point, I'm pretty sure he wouldn't spit on Hermes even if the god was on fire. The first thing he noted to me about Artemis was the 'infamous for killing men' part which wasn't a great first impression, I'm not gonna lie. "I always get a small boon at the end of a te - Quest, and this one is no different. You can have mine. You can ask for whatever you want."

"Percy," Cliff said low and warning. "Your mother is the Serpent, that's not something you just give aw - "

"I know," I cut Cliff off. She's a creator goddess and Fate and Elder God and Luke might ask for something outrageous and knowing her, she'd think it'd be hilarious to just give it to him. "I know, but I can't - "

The hairs on the back of my neck stood up.

Luke and I both turned.

Oh hell.

"Is that...the Minotaur," Luke said blankly.

I swallowed.

"No. It isn't."

Luke looked at me curiously, then looked back. He squinted. I knew the moment he saw through the Mist because the blood drained from his face as his pupils dilated. He stumbled back, hand flying to his jean pocket for his father's lighter.

"What the fuck is that?"

The monster was vaguely humanoid. It was covered in thick, ropey scar tissue the color of blood, almost looking like it was something that had been flayed alive and all that was left was the muscle fibers stretching over pockmarked and pitted black bones. The main head was eyeless and noseless, just a cone jutting out from a humanoid head, but then it opened like a blooming flower. Slimy, drooling tentacles covered in gaping mouths like the suckers of an octopus waved at us. There were two shrunken heads hanging off its body as it dragged its knuckles on the ground. They were covered in wide, bloodshot eyes wildly rolling around.

It stepped out of the shadow it had come in, light spilling over every disgusting detail and even though it towered above us by at least three feet, there wasn't a single sound. Silver scraps of some kind of cloth were barely hanging on for dear life. A tendril extended from one of its mouths and it tongued, or sniffed (?) the carrier. It's head swiveled suddenly, fixated on the direction a certain rabbit had run off in.

I was really hoping it would just ignore us.

Nemesis didn't exactly say it would, not if the 'or die with her' part meant what I thought it meant, but I was hoping.

Praying.

"Hey Cliff," I heard myself say faintly. "I'm going to have to call you back."

Mom? I prayed. I might need some help.

And for the first time in my entire life, there was only silence.

 

[Shujin]

An Undertow of Sand
A PJO Fanfiction​

It was the sound that got me.

There wasn't any.

The monster took another eerily silent step. A visible shiver ran down its back, like something was moving under its skin as it lazily extended tendrils in our direction. Luke stiffened, shifting into a fighting stance as he freed his lighter from his pocket while I - I did something I haven't done in years.

I panicked.

I froze.

It must have weighed a couple hundred pounds, but you couldn't hear anything. It dragged its knuckles on the ground. Its black claws on the hind legs crunched through the pavement as the shrunken heads flailed around, tugging at the main body. And it was completely silent. It was like it wasn't quite real. In between this reality and somewhere else where what should happen...couldn't.

Luke was right there, Cliff was still saying something into my ears and I had never felt so alone. I couldn't think. I couldn't move. It was like I was drowning in molasses as I stared at the monster as my neck thrummed in tension, almost cramping. I was used to the warning coming in bursts, screaming for my attention, but this was a low, steady warning that just being in this thing's presence was dangerous.

I have never seen this monster before. I didn't know what it was.

I knew my education was incomplete. I'm still only twelve. But these past few weeks, I've gotten used to being the guy who knew more than anyone else and now that I wasn't - my tests sometimes throw curve balls but they never were - I still knew.

I didn't know what to do.

"Mom?" I whispered as the monster slowly raised a hulking hand and then brought it down. Artemis' carrier crumpled. The hard plastic snapped under its weight, breaking off around the rivets. The little lattice door twisted off its hinges. I could hear the blood rushing in my ears. I thought I could hear Luke's heartbeat. The carrier door clattered to the pavement in absolute silence.

Mom, please.

"Perce," Luke whispered harshly and I blinked slowly. She wasn't answering. Why wasn't she answering? "Percy."

I couldn't help my shuddering as I tried to swallow the wail threatening to come out of my mouth.

"Any ideas?" Luke asked. The monster had begun to move towards us with slow, pondering steps. It wasn't walking in a straight line. It would take a few steps to the left, then double back a step or two and start approaching from the right.

It felt like it was studying us.

I don't know what to do.

Mom, please, I screamed in my mind. I'm sorry! I'm sorry! I'll let her -

I choked on 'die.'

Mom, please.

I don't even know why I was still asking. I don't know what I was hoping for.

Mom was Fate.

And everything comes to an end eventually.

"Percy!"

"Yeah?" I croaked as I woodenly turned towards Luke. We should run was my dim thought as I looked up at Luke's frown and the sweat beading on his forehead. I felt numb. "Probably run."

Luke's blue eyes flickered down at me.

Neither of us moved.

It was like some small part of our hind brains was digging up every long forgotten prey instinct in the vague hopes of not dying.

Movement drew a predator's attention.

" - unstable." Cliff's voice came into focus. There was a lot of static in the background and whooshing noises, like he was in a wind tunnel but it was probably him moving around like a labrador puppy on caffeine and crack. "It will spit you out somewhere random and probably blow up your phone, but it will work!"

What?

My phone.

My brain came back online.

Holy fuck, my phone.

It will work!

"Thanks, Cliff." I hung up on him. He'd understand. "There is an obelisk on the other side of the river," I said quickly out of the corner of my mouth. "We need to grab Artemis - "

"Why?" He hissed.

"Because I will give you my boon from my mother if you help me with her. I swear on the River Styx." The rumbling from that ancient river sounded in the distance as Luke drew a sharp breath in through his nose. The thunder drew the monster's attention. It paused. The tendrils extending from the petals of its head shifted towards the west.

I was mostly thinking about how my father would probably ground me forever if he ever heard about my oath.

"Deal?"

Luke breathed out.

And the monster moved.

It should have been a blur of red and black, like everything else that moved fast. Instead it was like a living slideshow. Like the world glitched. It kind of just...blinked and slid and bent. One moment it was still in the middle of the wide highway. The next half of it was over the median, maybe three feet away leaving its legs behind and one of the shrunken heads hanging in mid air like a broken image and Luke cursed as Reclaim flashed from his lighter and then -

It was gone.

It -

What?

But -

Shit.

I whirled around just in time to see the back of it vanish into the small woods after Artemis.

"Deal?" I turned on Luke.

The older boy stared at me with his lips pressed together so hard they were white. He was thinking it through hard.

"Fine," he said slowly, almost snarling. "Deal."

I'll be honest, as soon as he said 'fine' I was already running after the monster. As the small branches slapped at my face and arms, the Styx's gaze fell on me for a moment. An ice cold shiver, a slight burn of what felt a little like acid crept along my skin.

Choice and consequence, son of Fate, the ancient river reminded me before her attention faded away.

Yeah, I know.

Luke caught up to me in a heartbeat with his son of Hermes-ness.

"Follow," he barked.

He sped up in front of me and then something weird happened? It was like I could feel my stride changing. Wait - I could feel my stride changing. We were running and then as his red vest flapped between the brush in front of me, our footfalls were off beat and then that beat got closer and closer until I was almost stepping into his footprints. Luke was way faster than me, I knew that from experience on the track at Camp but somehow I was keeping up. He was letting me keep up?

He was making me keep up.

Hermes Enagonios, I thought just to keep my mind off the ball of ice sitting in my stomach. Hermes of the Games, patron of athletes.

I followed Luke when he made a sharp left and we spilled out into an abandoned downtown section of Plattsburgh, New York. It probably wasn't actually abandoned, but it looked like it was at this time of night with flickering lamp lights, dark windows and half the road dug up with construction efforts complete with a bulldozer and trucks filled with gravel.

My heart fell as I took in where we were.

There was a river cutting through the town. You could follow it to where it spilled in Lake Cheliak separating this part of New York from Vermont. There was a bridge to cross, but that meant a wide open four lane road and one way to go.

We weren't anywhere near the bridge. We were further from the obelisk than when we started. I wanted to think Luke had tricked me into running away from her and I just needed to turn around, scoop her up and get out.

I just needed -

Please.

My gut told me we were right where we wanted to be.

Artemis was alone and a rabbit. The former goddess of the Hunt. She would try to stay in a comfortable environment where she knew where she was at all times, where nothing would dare hurt her. The one place she would instinctively feel safe.

Her Domain.

But she didn't have that anymore.

The woods led away from the highway in a circular curve and abruptly cut off here.

In the opposite direction of where she needed to go.

As soon as I thought that the old gas station to the right of the road blew up.

Shards and slabs of the wall and roof just exploded out, pieces flying anywhere as an auburn blur ran for the car garage next door. I saw what might have been an old freezer bounce in the parking lot as glass scattered all over, catching lamplight to sparkle like diamonds on the pavement as the side of the roof collapsed in.

Without a single sound.

I yanked Damocles off my necklace. I've never seen this monster before. Doesn't mean it can't die.

"Artemis!"

What I got back was a shrieking, piercing howl. The rabbit bolted for the small opening under the car garage's door as the monster glitched behind her, raising a lazy hand and I needed to be there. I tried to push more speed out of my legs, knowing that it wasn't going to be enough - I had to be -

Then I was there, at least fifteen feet from where I should have been, my spidey sense screaming, kicking Artemis under the door as I raised Damocles just in time to deflect the hit.

Tried to deflect it.

It felt like being hit by a speeding ice cream truck. The pavement, or maybe it was my ankle, cracked underneath me. Damocles sung as my arms immediately went dead. My right shoulder wrenched in its socket as I spun with the blow, crashing back into the garage door so hard I could hear the metal hinges squeal as it buckled.

Damocles tugged at my arm and I swung with it, hearing some kind of whale song from the bone blade as it hit something.

I only knew I hit it because I felt the impact echo back down my arm.

It was still completely silent.

The screaming warning at the back of my neck fell back into the low thrum of tension. When my everything stopped ringing, I was able to see the damage.

The monster had backed off. Its head was tilted almost curiously and on its arm was a thin line bleeding a luminescent gold.

My heart fell again.

Monsters - true monsters - don't bleed the blood of Phanes, the Light-Bringer. Most bled a mortal red. If you cut someone like Cliff, his very essence leaked like burnished bronze dust. It was the color Apollo bled. That Athena, Kronos, Zeus and the various immortal nymphs and spirits of Ananke's pantheon bled.

This wasn't a monster.

It can't die.

I swallowed hard.

"You're, uh, you aren't one of my cousins, are you?" I ventured cautiously and watched it tilt its main head the other way as the twin bobble heads attached to its left side and right chest spasmed wildly. "Uh, sorry?" And then because I'm stupid, I continued, "I gotta admit, I do not see the family resemblance - "

Its face unfurled, like a long petaled poisonous flower from the deep jungle. In the center, a round mouth opened, filled with rows of hooked needle-like teeth similar to a lamprey. Its throat pushed out of its mouth, stretching a pink membrane as it snapped at the air a few times.

Then came the sound.

It felt like taking the razor edge of a hollow echo filled with black noise right to the brain. Pain is too simple a word to describe it.

It felt like being ground out of existence.

Every single nerve lit on fire. This sick, oily pain sliced underneath my skin, a nauseating discordant note stabbed at my eyeballs and eardrums. It was hard to think. To move. To breathe.

"Stop it," I whispered, hands pressed against my ears, but it didn't help. Hot bile was crawling up my throat. I was going to throw up. My stomach was twisting and churning as I tried to crack it open. I searched for the power I knew was there, but it didn't come. "Stop - !"

I vomited and from the iron taste, it was all blood. My heart was pumping too fast, a pain in my chest was growing as my temples throbbed. There was this sick fluttering feeling at the base of my throat and at some point I had fallen to my knees.

It had to stop. I was going to - I had to make it stop.

I don't have - I had dropped Damocles.

Where?

I could barely open my eyes.

I had to -

Stop it.

I opened my mouth and the burning tug in my gut pulled. I dug into it, deep.

More.

STOP IT I yelled, but what came out wasn't in words.

It was this roaring, whooshing, echoing sound that drowned everything out. So loud, I thought maybe it wasn't really coming from my mouth, but my stomach too. That floating feeling was back. A strange happiness was bubbling up. I was vaguely aware of Artemis dashing out of the garage into my large, winged shadow. And I -

And I was full of eyes -

With a very different kind of roar, a John Deere bulldozer came out of nowhere, plowing the thing into the side of the car garage building. My stomach snapped shut so hard I almost barfed again. My head spun as I watched Luke back up his bulldozer and ram it right back into the building.

I -

I didn't know what to think.

"Hey!" I heard an unfamiliar voice shout from the direction of the road. "Hey you thieving fucks!" I turned, wiping my mouth and saw an old off white Volvo with a dumb looking dog peering out one window and an angry young black man shaking a cell phone. "I called the fucking police you - "

I saw the mortal's eyes go wide.

I glanced back over my shoulder.

The thing was reaching towards me with broken limbs, towards Artemis from where it had been crushed against the side of the building. The light from the street lamps caught on the scraps of silver cloth clinging to its form.

Then it spoke in this sickening, cruel sounding croon.

Never...safe...my….lady….

Something stabbed me in the chest and twisted.

Luke backed up calmly, adjusting this lever that dropped the shovel in the front, and then surged forward with a machine roar. With a loud cracking, crash sound the brick wall finally broke. The slab of brick, wood and a couple of metal beams fell forward onto the creature and the flat nose of the bulldozer.

Luke kicked open the battered door covered in brick dust and squeezed out.

"That boon," he growled as he stomped up to me. "Better be fucking worth it."

I could see why he would say that.

Blood was streaking down the side of his face from his ears. Similar trails came from his nose. There were bright red splotches of burst blood vessels in his eyes and his bottom lip was torn open so badly, I could see flashes of his blood stained teeth behind it. The wound was crescent shaped like he was bit by a clam or -

He bit through his lip.

I could barely move and he - he bit through his lip and drove a bulldozer into the thing.

I want to be Luke when I grow up.

"It's not dead," I said quickly. "It can't - "

The brick pile rumbled and we all jumped.

"Get the fuck in!" The mortal called out. I didn't question the complete 180 and neither did Artemis, the auburn fur ball making a beeline for the Volvo. Not even the dumb looking terrier in the window barking at her scared her away.

Not that I was surprised.

"Shut up, Bradley," the man hissed as we got in the backseat of his car. He didn't even wait for the door to finish closing before he stepped on the gas.

I -

I had to just breathe for a moment.

I just -

Fuck.

"You alright, kid?" I looked up to see the mortal peering at me through the reflection of the rearview mirror. His car smelled like mint and potato chips. The passenger side was occupied by the lopsided eared dog, a suitcase and a pillow.

"Yeah," I said.

I brushed my hand under my nose and then checked my ears. It came back clean. All I had was a lingering headache and a slight upset feeling in my stomach. Beside me, Artemis whimpered, with blood matted fur around her ears and tears still spilling from her eyes. Luke was digging into his fanny pack, pulling out a Ziploc bag with the golden blocks of ambrosia as his bottom lip pulled and bled all over his chin and dripped onto his shirt.

Yeah, I was just fine.

I felt my fists clench in my lap.

"Right," the mortal let out this shaky, wheezing sigh. "What was that?"

"Bear," Luke said the same time I said "Mountain lion."

Luke gave me the evil eye.

Sorry, I mouthed at him. I can't read minds, sheesh.

"Monster," the mortal said, thumping the heel of his palm on the steering wheel. "God fucking damn."

"You saw it?" Luke asked in surprise around a cube of god food. He offered a tiny piece to Artemis, who hesitated before nipping it off his fingers. I am assuming that tell tale 'you just ate a fucking ghost pepper' warning didn't happen, because she immediately scarfed it down and didn't burst into flame.

So.

Demigod rabbit.

There have honestly been stranger things.

"Yeah, I fucking saw it!" Our driver hissed. "I wish I fucking didn't!"

Same.

"Who the fuck are you?" The man pressed down harder on the gas pedal after barely stopping for a stop sign. I was impressed that he even bothered to pay lip service to traffic laws with something like that behind us. He had a spine. "The Illuminati?"

I think he meant it as some kind of strange joke, since in the mirror he looked like he was really hoping the answer was no.

He was in luck!

"We're demigods," I said with false cheer as we sped down towards the highway at 80 MPH. "And you're clear-sighted."

The mortal squinted at me in the mirror. "You said that like it means something."

"It means you can see the world as it truly is," Luke answered before I could. He was rubbing his ears. The ambrosia working on his eardrums probably itched something fierce. "The masquerade is real. It's called the Mist and it helps make sure most people live normal lives."

"And what about that?" The mortal said a bit hysterically. "That wasn't fucking normal. Did this Mist just fucking break?"

Luke opened his mouth and then paused. He glanced at me. "There's like one to two percent of people in the world that can see through the Mist." More like three percent. "Because…" Luke trailed off leadingly, glancing at me again.

"Because you're a demi-alien." I said simply.

Luke turned to stare at me in complete disbelief.

"The fuck?" His dog sniffed around the dashboard as the fake leather on the steering wheel creaked under his hands. "You're fucking with me. I know who my parents are, kid, and none of them got butt probed by a Martian."

"I'm not," I sighed. "You got it from Selene."

"The - the Roma - Greek? The moon goddess?" He scoffed. "Are you seriously telling me pagan gods are real too?"

I shrugged. "My mom is pretty real."

And she didn't answer me.

"So is my father," Luke deadpanned. "Demigods, remember?"

The mortal stared hard at us, looking for the lie that wasn't there. His eyes dropped back to the road as his right hand came off the wheel to absently scratch behind his dog's ears.

"Fuck," he muttered.

"Alien?" Luke asked under his breath. "Not demigod?"

"She was adopted," I told him. "She came from the stars. A few galaxies over."

"Huh," Luke murmured with his eyes wide. The whites of his eyes were almost entirely bloody red. "The more you know…"

You might be going, wait a minute. Isn't everyone an alien? And...you'd be right, I guess. If you saw things from a cat's point of view. Humans aren't natives and I guess technically, mom is an alien too. When I say alien, I mean everyone who came in after everything was settled, and humanity won the Earth for themselves. The stragglers and unaffiliated. Not all of them came from another galaxy either!

I was pretty sure Aphrodite's great-granddad still lived on top of his space elevator in Kadath, of the Dreamlands.

Some aliens were friends and some were foes. Most ended up attached to one pantheon or another. The Egyptians have been dealing with Apophis for ages.

Selene had been our adoptee.

Her and Pontus.

"Fuck!" Our driver repeated himself. In the mirror, his hazel eyes shifted color from brownish to something a lot more green.

"Sorry," I said dully. My chest was still aching as I ignored the rabbit between us. "Don't go looking for monsters. Try not to see too much."

That got me a narrow eyed look in the rear view mirror. "Why…?"

"You'll start growing extra eyes," I said and Luke jerked in his seat. "On the inside. And if it gets really bad, you kind of tend to go rabid."

Hunting down the feral descendents of her predecessor would have been the job of a certain rabbit.

"You'll grow out of it eventually," I tried to reassure our Good Samaritan. "There's just this transformation window...thing."

"...fucking alien puberty," the mortal muttered. He looked a little lost. "This is fucking insane."

He had no idea.

We rumbled across the bridge linking one side of Plattsburgh to the other and I pointed it out. "You can drop us off at the obelisk."

The man glanced out his right side window. "Macdonough Monument? You sure?" He worried at his lip. "I mean, I'm already taking a long trip. I don't mind taking you a bit further away from that - that - whatever that was."

Well, if he was offering…

"Where are you headed?"

The man flashed a shaky grin. "Montreal, actually."

Luke and I looked at each other.

What were the fucking odds?

That empty feeling in my stomach settled and I felt like I could breathe again. So that was how it was going to be.

Still.

Thanks, Mom.

"I was just here visiting my girlfriend," he said with an awkward shrug. "Heading back home, so... I can give you a ride."

Wow.

I have got to tell Apollo.

He was wrong!

The mysterious Canadian boyfriend does exist!

"We're headed for Quebec City," Luke volunteered. "Just getting us over the border would be a big help."

"Corey," our driver introduced himself. "And this - " he rubbed his sleeping dog's head. "This is Bradley."

"Percy."

"Luke - " He was cut off by his own yawn. The scabbing on his lip cracked and blood bubbled up again. "Sorry."

"It's fine," Corey brushed off. "It's four in the morning and it's already been one hell of a day." He snorted to himself. "Actual monsters. Christ."

Yeah.

That revelation was going to take him a while.

"So Luke, question." I began nonchalantly.

"Hm?"

"Bulldozer?" I deadpanned. He had to cross an entire gravely field of construction work first to even get near me. "I didn't hear a thing."

Luke smiled sleepily as he clumsily held a finger up in front of his mouth. "I was sneaking."

Oh.

So that's what happens when Hermes bothers to train one of his kids. They figure out how to turn a John Deere bulldozer into a magic weapon with sneak attack dice.

"I will pay for you to join my D&D campaign," I said very seriously and Corey snorted. "When did you learn how to operate one?"

Luke shrugged with one arm, his eyes already closing. "Didn't," he slurred. "I just stole it from Annabeth."

What?

"Annabeth is on the other side of New York," I said slowly.

"Nah," he murmured faintly. "Lil' sis is always with me."

That was not how it works.

Was it?

Maybe it made me a bit of a creep staring at Luke as he fell asleep, but his entire existence had stopped making any sense whatsoever. Hermes threw him away.

And yet…

From what I could tell, Luke was up to four different Names in his inheritance. That was one more than Ethan. Hermes Promachus, the Champion was where he got his skill with the sword from. Hermes Enagonios, of the Games turned him into a casual Olympic sprinter. Hermes Hermêneutês, the Translator, helped him with his dyslexia and Hermes Pheletes, the Thief made him damn good at sleight of hand.

Mom let me inherit from all her Names, because she wanted me. She loved my father.

Nemesis let Ethan inherit a lot from her on purpose.

If Hermes didn't care about Luke…

Was this another Nemesis situation? Was Luke made for something?

But what?

I frowned as I rolled my shoulder, wincing as it ground and popped.

I glanced at the rabbit.

She was an auburn ball of fur, tightly curled up between us on the floor with her little red sweater on.

"Artemis."

She looked up.

"That thing…" I didn't want to say it. I had to. "Did you do that to her?"

The rabbit flinched and silently turned away, curling up again.

Right.

Okay.

I bit my tongue until I tasted blood. For a moment I wanted to just - just wring her little neck myself.

I should have listened to Luke. Nemesis had even made a point of needling Artemis over getting what she deserved. Artemis had been scared before the goddess of Retribution had even said anything. She knew what had been coming.

Choice and consequence.

I had the feeling we were all on the hit list now.

I was an absolute moron.

I moved over to huddle by my window, as far away from her as I could get. I watched the New York countryside go by as Corey took us onto the greater highway expanding from 4 to 8 lanes across. He turned on the radio, flicking through the channels until he came across some late night ghost hunters.

He paused.

"What do you think, Brad?" The dog shifted in its sleep, snorting wetly. "Yeah, why the fuck not. Jesus."

At some point I fell asleep.

I didn't feel like Dreaming.

 

[Shujin]

An Undertow of Sand
A PJO Fanfiction
​

Apollo definitely knew his sister was a bitch, I complained to Hypnos. He could have told me.

The Elder God shrugged.

I don't know how long I've been asleep getting things off my chest, but I wasn't feeling any better. Dad always told me to talk out my problems, but it wasn't working right now. Maybe I was doing it wrong. She didn't owe me anything, right? She didn't claim to be anything. Lord knows, I've forgiven Mom for some shit. It's just me being stupid. I knew that. That rusted nail of betrayal wasn't coming out clean though.

I know it's none of your business, but...how bad is it? Really?

Hypnos shrugged again, radiating an apology.

I get it. You guys are a bit out of the loop.

The gods who called the Underworld home weren't really outcasts. Technically. They just had their own thing, Olympus had theirs and the only crossover was Hades once a year at Winter Solstice. They were basically their own kingdom. I think it was because, unlike the Sea, all of the big Names of the Underworld could make Zeus really regret pushing the issue.

Nyx. My brother Erebus. Tartarus who was probably still asleep? My cousin Achlys was still standing before the bridge to the center of Chaos last Mom checked and that's before you get into all the prisons down there.

But you're not surprised either, I commented.

Hypnos' presence bobbed with another shrug before I got a brief flash of Mt. Olympus as if to say 'Olympians...what can you do?'

Yeah, I was afraid of that.

I sighed. Girls suck.

Hypnos blasted me with a bark of amusement before giving me this condescending pat. Before I could call him out on it (he was married and he liked bitching about it) I felt myself being shaken out of his grip.

Someone was waking me up.

We exchanged quick goodbyes and then I woke up to Luke peering down at me, hand on my shoulder.

I was still in the backseat of Corey's car. We were parked outside of an A&W beside the highway with Apollo's sun chariot winking at us with morning light. Luke took a step back, leaning a bit on the open door with Artemis tucked under his other arm. Bradley the Idiotic Terrier was bouncing around his legs staring up at the rabbit, letting out little whoofs every three jumps as she silently stared down at the dog with her little nose twitching. I don't know what she was thinking.

I don't care.

"Bradley!" A piercing whistle sounded as I stretched. I adjusted my sunglasses, wincing a little at the sore bridge of my nose. It was Corey, coming out of the diner with a few bags and bottles under his arm. "Leave the fucking bunny alone already, Christ!"

Luke was giving me an assessing look. "You alright?"

He had a newly healed scar cutting through his bottom lip. Maybe in a week or two it wouldn't look as bad as it did now, still an angry red color with a bit of scabbing in the middle. He changed his shirt to a black T-shirt and I knew his other one was full of blood stains.

Crossing the border looking like there might be a body in the trunk was probably a bad idea.

"I'm okay," I said quietly.

He nodded. Bradley made a daring jump and he lifted Artemis out of the way like she was a small bag of flour over his shoulder. She didn't protest. Her little back paws and tail hung limply against his collarbone.

"We at the border?" I reached out a hand for my backpack. I was going to have to Dream my sword back, but...not now.

"We're about an hour from Quebec City," Corey volunteered as soon as he got close enough, shooing his dog away with a foot. "Luke had your 'passport.'" He did air quotes with one hand. "So we got through just fine."

I glanced at Luke and saw the small smirk he had on. He wiggled his fingers at me.

An illusion using the Mist.

"I just -" Corey continued with a self-conscious shrug. "Well, if I dropped you off in Montreal, you would have only been an hour out from...that." My blood ran a little cold.

It would heal.

It was still behind us.

We were still being hunted.

Corey's greenish-hazel eyes shifted color to something more of a blueish-hazel as he squinted up at the sun. He wasn't particularly tall, maybe two or three inches shorter than Luke with a thinner build. In the light of day, he was the color of espresso with wavy dark hair. He was wearing a long sleeve sports shirt with jeans. I don't know the team, but its logo looked like an elongated red C with an A or an H in the center.

"It's less than a three hour drive back home and it's for a good cause." He said with his lips pursed. "Luke filled me in a bit. Big guy lost his fucking lightning bolt and you're putting a stop to El Niño."

Basically.

"I said we'd reimburse him for gas at least," Luke said, giving me a look.

"Oh. Yeah." My fingers curled into the canvas of my bag. "Next gas station. I got you covered."

Corey's eyebrows bounced. "Can I just say how weird it is that a twelve year old is the one that has the money?"

Luke rolled his eyes. "My job sucks."

Corey shook his head, smirking. "Well, thanks. Now, I hope you guys don't mind some sausage and eggers. Brad needed a break and a walk anyway." He hefted the bags he was carrying and the smell of bacon hit my nose. "Thought we could all use some breakfast at the same time."

I felt this warm feeling spread in my chest. I felt less numb. Mom really was looking out for me. She knew about my choice and she didn't leave me alone.

Mom...

I needed to stop doubting her. Maybe I don't know the reason for everything, but that doesn't mean there isn't a reason. I knew she loved me. She said I would be going back to my school next year and she doesn't lie.

I needed…

I needed to stop feeling sorry for myself. I chose my own fate.

I don't want to die.

So I won't.

"Hey," Corey called softly. "Are you sure you're feeling okay, little man?"

I took in a deep breath as I unbuckled and stood. Luke hip checked the door closed behind me and Corey awkwardly handed me the raspberry iced tea bottle he had stuffed under his armpit.

Mom sure knew how to pick 'em.

A breeze blew past us, picking its way through our clothes and hair as we headed for one of the outdoor dining tables in the shadow of an eighteen wheeler. I tried not to look into it. Even if it felt like someone pressed a kiss into my hair. Sometimes the wind is just the wind.

I rubbed at my eyes a little. "I'm fine. Really."

Our breakfast neighbor was blasting loud eighties music in his truck as he browsed a newspaper, munching on a wrap. We each had one of those styrofoam plates with sausage, egg and cheese sandwich, some hash browns and two strips of bacon. Luke had a coffee. Corey had these foldable plastic bowls for his dog, filling them with dog food and water from a bottle for the little, lop eared canine. Luke just cut open the small bag of hay with his probably illegal switchblade and set it on the table, trusting the former goddess to know what to do with it as he went back to his bag.

"You know," Corey said thoughtfully between sips of orange juice. "I've never seen a rabbit with silver eyes before. Did you get her from a breeder or something?"

"We found her in a trash can," Luke quipped. Artemis froze mid nibble, slowly turning her head to stare at the demigod of Hermes with grass sticking out of her mouth as he pulled out a pet comb. He shook it at her, and we all watched the rabbit's eyes narrow.

Luke mockingly narrowed his eyes right back.

"It's true," I said dryly, backing Luke up. "Guess her family just didn't care that much."

Her head reared back from me with hay falling out of her mouth, straight ears and wide eyes. I then remembered Zeus' insistence that she can't fail. Rabbit or no.

Whoops.

She slumped and turned back to the hay. I should feel bad about that.

I don't.

"Shitheels," Corey muttered.

Truer words have never been spoken as far as I was concerned.

Luke's eyebrow quirked. "You're telling me."

Corey's hand drifted down to ruffle his dog's ears. "Good on you for taking care of her then."

Hermes' son was smirking as he ran the comb down the rabbit's small back. She stiffened under it. I was pretty sure Luke was only bothering just to rub it in that she was completely reliant on us right now. He told his brothers Travis and Connor off for that kind of petty payback often enough, but he totally did it too.

Might be a Hermes thing.

Tufts of pale red hair pulled free. "Her name's Artemis."

Corey grinned.

"Like the - " He waved a hand vaguely towards the sky. "A fucking moon rabbit?" He chuckled as he dropped a piece of bacon on the pavement for Bradley. "Not a fan of anime are you?"

Luke blinked.

"Japanese cartoons," I explained. Close enough. Luke's been living at Camp since he was fourteen and before that he was on the street. Dude was practically a Greek barbarian. "One of my god brothers is really into their style of comics."

Aether, if you're curious. On one of our Fridays, Mom caught sight of some of the bookshelves in Barnes and Noble and got a few for him. I think it was supposed to be some kind of in-joke between them that she didn't think all the way through.

Now he was addicted.

He had a habit of eating icy moons and asteroids, but I guess everyone needs a hobby.

"Oh righ'?" Corey turned to me. "Remember what he likes?"

"He's on this one about a pirate kid who ate a magic fruit…?"

Corey nodded. "One Piece. That's a good one. He has good taste."

"Mom got him hooked on it, really," I shrugged. "I think he just really likes anything new."

"Come on," Luke broke in with this little half-smile. "Your mother gives her immortal children comic books, eh?"

"Only one of her kids gets manga. She gets me Legos sets." Luke's smile slipped off his face. "The Fates used to get new sewing kits and Darkness does watercolor painting - "

"Stop." Luke held out a hand. He stopped brushing the rabbit and buried his face in the other hand.

I blinked. "Gods are people too."

"Just stop," he repeated a bit desperately. "Please."

What was his problem?

"Your mom is Fate," Corey sighed, slumping forward and rubbing his forehead. "Jesus Christ." He sighed again, rolling his head until his neck cracked. "I almost forgot. Demigods." Bradley had finished his bacon and was begging for more with his front paws on his owner's lap. Corey absently scratched the top of his head. "Aliens and monsters." He huffed. "And they called Mémé crazy," he murmured tightly.

His eyes paled from blueish to yellowish when he dropped his head, shadowing them. Wolf eyes. If you weren't paying attention - if you didn't know he was clear-sighted - you could be convinced it was just the light hitting his eyes differently. Or maybe other people didn't notice because Hecate was hiding the results of her handiwork?

"They called her paranoid. Monsters don't exist." He worried at his lip. "My grandmother...locked herself away in her home shortly after my parents had me. She was always talking about… I don't know. She was hard to understand on bad days. She saw things my parents couldn't, but I think..." Corey's brows drew together. "I think I did…I know I did." He frowned harder. "I was never left alone with her."

"I think…" Luke began slowly. "My mother could see too." He looked down for a moment. "It didn't do her any favors."

"Oh so that's no longer outlawed?" came out of my mouth.

Luke gave me a bewildered look. "Outlawed?"

Shit.

"Uh, nothing." He continued to stare at me. "Long story."

Made sense, I guess.

You'd have to explain to Young Gods like Hermes, who didn't know anything, why demigods with clear-sighted demi-aliens weren't allowed. The whole 'sometimes nothing happens and sometimes you get freaks of nature' thing.

Like Herakles.

Hermes didn't even know the gods of Olympus could build altars to Elder Gods.

Aliens would probably blow his mind.

"Jesus. Is that what I have to look forward - " Then Corey froze. "Wait a fucking second. It's not just the Greeks, is it? Does that mean people - gods - like Odin…or Tsukuyomi -" There was a very, very faint flicker of someone's attention.

The Japanese moon god would be paying attention to all of Selene's descendants.

It was a little personal.

"Names," Luke warned, looking spooked right along with Artemis. I was kind of surprised he felt that. I was trained to feel that and it barely felt like anything to me. The attention of a Young God usually felt like nothing unless they put real effort into it. "It's not just the Greeks," Luke said faintly. "It's not just the Greeks. Fucking Styx."

This wasn't my fault.

Tsukuyomi outed his pantheon all on his own.

"Sorry," I muttered and got this wild eyed look from him.

"You're sorry?"

"Okay." Corey gulped. "I just...when I say God, is he really listening?"

Luke snapped out of his shock with a shaky scoff. "Not - not that one? He doesn't exi - "

"Mom won't give me a straight answer on what he is," I cut him off. "But I get the feeling she kind of hates the shit out of him."

There had to be something to the whole business or else she wouldn't have this thing about me going to church with my grandparents. It's just that, uh, my grandmother also had this thing about it. Long story short: Nana earned the awe and adoration of toddler me by breaking everything in her arm punching out my mother, who I think was still missing a tooth.

And I went to church.

Yeah.

Mom is never going to forgive the Greek Orthodox thing.

"I still go to mass with my grandparents when we visit. Makes it a little awkward," I admitted. I munched on the last of my bacon and as I swallowed realized that it had gotten real quiet all of the sudden. I looked up to see both were staring at me.

In the silence, Artemis let out this oink as she fished another blade of hay out of her bag. Then the bunny paused, seeming to realize what she just did, closing her eyes and slowly leaning over until her nose hit the table.

"You're Christian?" Luke asked in disbelief. "Why?"

"Think about it!" I insisted. My Grandma made a good argument about it this one time at church. "God is such a generic word. There are thousands of those. If he's really paying attention every time his multi-tasking must be crazy good." I sipped my juice. "Like, you don't even know. My mom can't even do that and his demigod is also super chill." I frowned. "Jesus stood Thor up for a duel a while back, but I can't blame him? Thor's kind of obnoxious."

Luke had this scary blank look on his face. He was just still. I think he stopped breathing. Artemis gave him a worried glance. The Canadian Boyfriend's eyes searched my sunglasses. Then he gave Luke this helpless look.

"I can't." My fellow demigod finally breathed out. "I hate that I can't tell if you're fucking with me."

"I'm not!" I yelped, a little hurt. "I don't know everything, but..."

Luke waved me off and then patiently steepled his fingers in front of his face. His mouth opened, then closed. Then he slowly asked, "Tell me something I don't know about -" He suddenly balked. He swallowed thickly and for a moment he looked almost afraid. You could see him cast about in his mind for something else. Anything else. "Athena."

Uh.

Okay?

He already knew about the King deal.

So.

Something small, I guess?

"Probably still engaged to Prometheus," I said after a moment.

Luke's eyes closed wearily.

"I mean, Oceanus and Tethys are her parents, right?" I offered. "I think it was Tethys' idea."

Unlike Hestia, Athena isn't under any kind of virgin oath. The pantheon was still Old School. The father was responsible for setting marriages up for his kids, but Zeus kind of pissed that right away. Hera convinced him to marry her off to Hephaestus during the Giant War, but Oceanus shut them down pretty hard.

"They actually tried, but Athena is…" I searched for the words. There were too many. "Athena and Prometheus is a genius idiot."

Corey snorted.

How would Dad explain it?

...he would probably say Athena was some kind of divine melee gish skill monkey character with rule breaking stat allotment points roleplayed as an asshole. That made Prometheus the overpowered wizard with sky high INT, but WIS was his dump stat. On paper it was fine. In practice it was a dumpster fire.

Maybe you didn't get all that.

It's true though.

He's lucky Mom's ex-boyfriend Time has a soft spot for knowledge seekers. The Gate would have eaten him alive otherwise.

Uh.

Like that eagle ended up doing because Zeus found out he tried to open it.

Long story.

"Their kid was king of Athens for a bit. We covered him in class last week."

"Class." Corey deadpanned with this resigned grin. "...public school class, right?"

"Summer school."

"Erekhtheus," Luke said dully with his eyes still closed. "Otherwise known as Erikhthonios. The snake eyed child from the earth."

"From clay," I corrected him.

That was an interesting lesson. Apparently everyone was told Hephaestus was his father instead of Prometheus, somehow? And that the Earth Mother was his mom who gave him to Athena to take care of and then she tried to make him immortal, but it fell through because her priestesses were morons and went mad?

Like she would adopt anything the Earth Mother gave anybody.

Goddess of Wisdom, not Stupidity.

At least that last part was true-ish. Her priestesses were morons and they did go mad, but the ritual didn't fail because Mom's ex did show up to help -

Oh.

Duh.

That's why the story was changed.

Now that I thought about it, it was obvious. Immortality was complicated. Did you know that kids at Camp Half-Blood read myths in books that tell them ambrosia and nectar makes you immortal? Then they pack it in Ziploc bags and some thermos to help with injuries and no one asks why it doesn't meet the hype. If it was that easy to make people immortal, there wouldn't be a huge ass poisonous dragon guarding Hera's stolen apple tree.

There was nothing like having every single kid in that classroom stare at me, daring me to open my fucking mouth because I had the audacity to squeak at the blatant lies. However, the whole Earth Mother thing was still a no-no!

Dude.

Athena really is smart.

She kind of hamstrung everything I could say with three sentences.

I'll just tell them later!

"Isn't she one of those 'no kids' goddesses?" Corey asked around a mouthful of sausage.

"She thinks her kids into existence," I explained. "Usually. Erik was her first kid, some kind of proof of concept? Joint project."

"I am not asking you enough questions," Luke said with this quiet, intense tone. "I underestimated how much - I need to ask you more questions. About everything. Ever." He let out a very long sigh. "It is...too early in the day for this."

"You asked!" I protested.

He rubbed his face. "I know."

The rest of breakfast passed without too much drama. Corey told us about himself. His dad was from South Africa who attended university in Canada where he met his French-Canadian mom. Corey himself studied abroad in Dublin where he met his current girlfriend who had been doing the same thing.

" - it was crazy. I almost thought I saw - " He stopped then groaned. "I probably did see it. Fucking...fuck."

He was twenty-seven.

His sight should have started dimming by now. Maybe he just didn't notice? It took Luke being told and a few seconds to see the creature hunting Artemis for what it was. Corey saw it right away. His sight should have started dimming by now. It wasn't really alien puberty like he said, but it was basically alien puberty? By the time they get to around fortyish, they can see a bit less than a normal demigod. It would take effort to pierce the Mist. Eventually, even that goes away.

It took longer to fade the more eyes they had though. I didn't really know how that worked. I wasn't his eye doctor. I was probably worrying over nothing.

"Welcome to the real world." Luke drawled at him. He mopped up the rest of his sandwich like nothing was wrong, but he gave me this look while we were cleaning up. It reminded me of that considering look Apollo gave me the day before we left.

"Sorry," I apologized to him again as we tossed the bags. Artemis hovered around our feet, keeping a wary eye on Bradley. "About the whole pantheons plural thing - "

"It's fine," he said. His blue eyes examined my sunglasses for a second, before he turned away. "Why did Hermes bring you to Camp?"

I blinked as I let my napkins fall into the trash can.

This was the first time anyone asked.

I snuck him a cautious glance.

"...because I'm Greek," I said slowly. "And my father's wife is Celtic." Luke's nostrils flared and I shuffled uncomfortably from one foot to the other. "I was raised by The Mórrígan," I mumbled. "Olympus has some stupid rule against it, so they took me away."

"...that explains a lot. Both of your mothers are gods." His lips twisted unhappily. The scar on the bottom one was flushed an angry red. "Do the demigods of other pantheons go to a 'Camp Half-Blood' too?"

I'm not stupid.

I knew the question wasn't about the name of the place.

"Norse demigods usually don't get trained until after they die." I watched his eyes widen. "I guess that's better," I murmured. "Because your kid not getting into Valhalla is a big deal and Frigg will probably kick your ass."

Luke's face scrunched.

"Depends on the god for the Celts, but most of them raise their demigods." Mom and her - shit, I forget if Manannan mac Lir was still her King or was it technically Jupiter? Anyway, his daughter came to my tenth birthday party. The uh, the one ruined by fucking pixies.

Her fault, not mine.

"The Shinto have this internship thing where everyone gets a personal spirit trainer and I heard the Bureaucracy has like three colleges you have to go through after you go through college." I waved my hands. "It's crazy! Egyptians don't really have demigods at all, but then they are kind of on ice, but the House of Life keeps track - "

"Stop," Luke choked out.

I shut the fuck up.

The son of Hermes waved Corey off as he slowly, shakily sat down right there on the curb by A&W's outdoor trash bins. He was probably getting leftover chocolate milkshake and a rotting tomato slice on his ass. Our breakfast partner started up his eighteen wheeler truck, his music roaring louder as if it was trying to drown out the massive engine as Luke buried his face in his hands. I stood there, feeling like sludge as I watched his shoulders tremble once.

"It's just us, isn't it?" he said brokenly. "We're hunted down. We're lied to. We're thrown away." His voice strained. "Just us."

"I - " I didn't know what to say. "I don't know about everyone." It felt like a weak excuse. As far as I know, only demigods of Mt. Olympus were regularly hunted down by monsters at all ages, because our Queen of the Gods was a cunt. "I don't - I mean maybe - "

Luke shook his head.

A drop of water hit the ground between his feet.

Corey was glancing back over his shoulder at us in concern, distractedly tossing a ball for his dog. We probably looked weird. An older boy having a crisis on the curb of an A&W parking lot with a twelve year old and a rabbit looking over him.

"All...those...thrones…" Luke said slowly, in this lilting, dark tone. Artemis made the mistake of letting out a worried sounding chittering. His head snapped up as he snarled, "There are fourteen girls sleeping on the floor in Cabin Eleven while yours - " His voice rose to a roar. " - is empty for years at a time!"

The rabbit recoiled from him.

Bradley started to bark his little head off as the last of Luke's shout died in the wind.

Before I got to Camp, some of those girls would have eaten their meals on the floor, because sitting at Artemis' empty Table for her Hunters wasn't allowed. Cabin Eleven had less free time in their schedule, because everything was divided by Cabin. They had rotating shower blocks because the showers were already crowded. Throw in a Cabin with twenty some more kids than the maximum it should have had competing with other populated Cabins like Apollo, Aphrodite and Ares. Try to get them all to breakfast on time. Make sure they all had enough to eat and finished on time. You can't.

Luke tried.

"You are a disappointment, Artemis - " He paused and then rolled one of her titles off his tongue. It sounded like a hydra's poison. "Paidotrophos."

The bunny's eyes went huge.

That meant Caretaker or Nurse of Children.

"Your throne is a waste. Only fit to be ground to dust under the whimsical cruelty of Fate," Luke said softly. "I like the sound of that." He stood up and absently brushed off his pants. "Come on," he muttered. "The faster we figure out how to get the Bolt, the sooner I can do something about our worthless lot in life."

I kind of just stood there like a dumbass.

"My mother always gives me a boon after a Quest," my mouth said numbly. Proportional, so I couldn't ask to be President of the United States because I chased off a dryad's stubborn ex. My biggest wish so far was healing my grandfather. "I don't know what I would have asked for this time."

Maybe making Dad immortal? Was that allowed? Their marriage vows were the 'until death do us part' version. If Mom meant forever, wouldn't it be forever?

Yeah, I know.

My father put a ring on it.

I do not need to be having secondhand angst over her commitment issues.

I'm pathetic.

"I gave it to Luke." Artemis looked up at me sadly. "So that he would help me protect you." I snorted, trying to hold back tears. "He was fucking right. About everything."

Her eyes dropped to the ground.

Corey wandered over, casting questioning looks at Luke's back as he clutched Bradley tightly to his chest. "Is everything okay?"

"Yeah," I croaked. I just realized Luke had been festering in rage this entire time and maybe Mom's going to end up wiping Olympus off the map because of my stupid crush, but otherwise I was fine.

The lop eared terrier stretched to sniff my face and reeled back with a whine.

Take it back.

Otherwise, I was stinky.

"It's just...been a long day."

Corey's head bobbed. "I hear that."

We stood there a little while longer in silence.

"Thanks for helping us out, Corey," I murmured.

The Canadian Boyfriend shot me a look, but he shrugged, bouncing his dog. "Not a fucking problem, believe me." He lowered his voice. "And you're twelve. I couldn't not do something."

"Age doesn't matter," I muttered as I headed back to the car. Luke was leaning against it, flipping his switchblade. "I'm a demigod."

Of Fate.

As promised, we were only an hour out from the outskirts of Quebec City. We didn't carry the tension with us all the way. Corey wouldn't let us. I don't even know how it started, but somewhen between fighting over the radio, his awful Greek mythology Dad Jokes (who's the Greek god of regret? Apollogies. I was using that one) and Luke's list of pranks, we drove right over the bridge leading into the city arguing Disney movies.

"They're terrible," I insisted. "Not suited for children. Abominations."

Luke snorted. "Have you ever seen a Disney movie?"

"I saw Bambi."

"Oh shit," Corey said as Artemis buried her face in her paws.

I don't know who was more traumatized.

Me or my mother.

"Abominations," I repeated.

Luke thumbed his bottom lip, checking the scab. "I liked Hercules," he said quietly. "Speaking of, how is he?"

"How is he?" Corey asked too. He had this exasperated expression on in the rear view mirror. "Sure, okay, why the fuck not."

"Demigod bullshit," I reminded our Good Samaritan. "Guarding the Old World." Luke gave me a questioning look. "Greece. The Earth Mother is imprisoned there, so he was exiled to the border." I thought of another way to phrase it. "Like a prison guard posting transfer from cushy New York to Bumfuck, Alaska."

Luke made a silent 'ah' face. "What'd he do to earn that?"

"Athena was his King."

"Wait, what?" Corey asked as Luke settled back, thoughtful. "Herc - Ath - Earth - you can't just drop that shit on me!"

"He's been doing that for as long as I've known him," Luke said dryly.

"That doesn't make it okay!"

"Dude," I said. "Chill."

"Fuck no!"

Apparently the other stuff he could swallow with a few strips of bacon and some orange juice but Heracles still being around was what got him.

Mortals are weird.

But you know the saying. All good things come to an end. Corey pulled into a Shell gas station off the main highway. I swiped my card for him.

Quebec City was a cool place. It didn't have the same claustrophobic, super modern look of Manhattan. It was a North American metropolis on the bank of the Saint-Charles River that looked more like a French city than Paris. Everything had this really classical look of red and brown brick walls and few high rises. Once you got off the highway, the thoroughfare narrowed to cobblestone streets with the same kind of traditional hanging signs and awnings I saw in Plattsburgh, New York. The whole place was built around a massive hill, where a castle stood on top behind an honest to god walled upper town. If you took out all the MacDonald's, cars and electric lights, it would look like we were still in the 1700s at the latest.

"Nice place," Luke whistled.

Corey grinned at us from over the hood of his Volvo. "If you ever come back with some free time, take the chance to look around. I could give you a tour." He looked around himself, absently shoving Bradley's head back into the car as a white limo turned into the gas station. "Got any idea where you're headed?"

Uh.

Good question.

Luke raised his eyebrows at me.

"Boreas has a penthouse," I muttered at him. It'd be so much easier if the North Wind's palace was like Mt. Olympus on the Empire State Building: hidden by the Mist. I'm pretty sure a floating building would be easy enough to spot on the Quebec City skyline. "Give me a minute to remember the address."

All my brain was spitting out right now was 112 French Name French Road which wasn't helpful.

112...Something French...Sainte-Anne…?

Or was it Champlain?

"I can probably run around screaming his Name," Luke volunteered dryly. "If he doesn't smite me on principle, he might just send someone."

I sighed. "He can't just - "

"Hey guys?" Corey interrupted us absently. "I think he just did."

We both looked.

Oh okay.

Wind spirit in a tuxedo.

That was kind of a dead giveaway. Not gonna lie.

We watched the person-shaped swirling breeze in a black tuxedo with white gloves open the door on the white limousine that had been conspicuously parked across from us.

And that was a goddess.

With a dress made out of snow and high heels made of ice, she wasn't even trying to hide it. I glanced at Luke only to see his eyeballs were trying to escape his skull. Corey looked like he had been slapped with a pool noodle and it was the best thing that had ever happened to him.

"She has snowflakes in her eyes!" He hissed excitedly.

"I know!" I hissed back.

The goddess finished stepping out of the limo, absentmindedly shortening the length of her dress so it wouldn't touch the ground. She kind of looked like a sixteen year old Snow White with long black hair and milk white skin. The only spots of color being her pink cheeks and lips. Snowflakes danced in her eyes as ever-changing geometric patterns that never repeated.

"Khione," she introduced herself simply as the goddess of Ice and Snow. She had a soft French accent. That didn't mean she was French or French-Canadian though. Still Greek. The accent thing was a choice, just like their appearance was.

The Mórrígan sounded Irish. Athena was British. Mr. D was from a Jersey trailer park and Apollo from Beverly Hills. Before pissing my mother off, Artemis had the classic Greek accent, but most people would probably mistake it for Spanish.

"I understand you have business with my father."

Her dress was that kind of high fashion shoulder cut away thing, but I felt like she was wearing it inside out. It exposed the dark ugly, puckered puncture wound scar under her right collarbone where something had punched right between her second and third rib and then cauterized it.

I feel like I should know what caused that.

...Apo...llo…?

Which was weird. I was assuming she was pretty. Gods usually aren't not pretty unless they're weirdos like Mr. D. And in Apollo's own words he tried not to hurt pretty girls if he could help it. His definition of 'if he could help it' was a little fucked, but Dad's been working on him for years.

Two words: My mother.

Dad had experience.

The staring contest was broken by a tiny, high-pitched squeal.

"...shut up Bradley." Corey muttered.

"That was you," Luke whispered.

Corey ignored him.

"Demigods on a quest to save the Eastern Seaboard for Mt. Olympus are met by the daughter of the North Wind," he narrated, clearly having a whoa moment.

Khione's lips twitched as she inclined her head.

"That does sum it up, yes." Her eyes roamed over us. "Luke Castellan, son of Hermes. Perseus Stele, son of...Fate." I waved a little awkwardly with a muttered 'Percy.' She glanced over Corey.

"Extra," he volunteered.

"Are you not missing someone?" she asked leadingly. Luke reached backwards through the open passenger side window and hauled out a small auburn fur ball.

"Behold," he deadpanned. "Our mascot."

Artemis cringed in his hands.

"How absolutely...delicious." Khione did not smile, but it looked like she really wanted to. "The fierce huntress, defender of her own virtue, beauty and pride." Her lip curled into a sneer as she brushed fingers over her scar. "You certainly won't be mauling anyone who dares take pride in their appearance like that." Her gaze flicked away dismissively. "Behold, indeed."

Oh my fucking GOD!

"Wait." Corey caught on. "The fucking rabbit?"

Yes.

The fucking rabbit.

"Okay." I sighed. "Is there anyone you haven't screwed over?"

Artemis gave me a wounded look.

"Honest question."

Khione let out this musical little laugh. "I can see why Olympus has been so...lively, as of late."

"He has no filter," Luke agreed.

Which, uh, excuse me -

"For the better." Khione cracked a small smile. "You have ended father's silence on certain matters and for that, I will be forever grateful."

Right.

So if I had to guess...

"Like why the fuck Aeolus?"

Luke groaned as Khione blinked with a surprised bark of a laugh.

"No. Filter," he repeated.

"I have a perfectly working filter," I made sure to correct my hugely mistaken friend. "You have no idea what no filter looks like."

Corey raised his hand like he was in a classroom. "Sorry, who's - "

"The Master of the Winds," Khione answered calmly with a slight shift of her eyes to him, then back to me. "He commands gods while not being one himself." Her expression didn't really warm so much as it got less cold. "Thank you, truly. I have found myself revisiting much of what I thought I knew. Weakness became pragmatism. Hesitation to patience."

"Uh, don't mention it?" I tried. What the fuck did I say? Was this about him choosing Athena over Zeus and being on house arrest for the last few millennia? Or did Boreas just decide shit was fucked so he spilled the beans on everything? Was I reading too much into this? "I wouldn't put Aeolus in charge of a popsicle stand so it was kind of - "

Corey pointed at me. "Is there some rule I'm not getting about the Names thing? I thought that was a bad idea - "

"It is a bad idea," Luke admitted, stuffing Artemis under his arm. "Unless you don't care about the consequences."

"Or the consequences do not exist," Khione said smoothly but her lips twitched, amused. "There are many who would avenge a careless invocation of their Name, but this is the son of Fate." I'm not sure if it was just the swirling snowflakes in her eyes that made her stare uncomfortably intense or what. "There are very few who would dare."

On that cheery note, Khione gestured towards her limo. "Please. Allow me to offer you a tour of our beautiful city and we can discuss your business in a few hours over lunch."

We were...kind of on a time limit?

One a bit more urgent than Zeus'.

Khione's eyebrows furrowed a tiny bit. "I do have my father's full confidence and can tell you everything you need to know about the theft on Mt. Olympus." Her eyes shifted to Luke. The snowflakes in her eyes slowed their turning into an icy kaleidoscope. "And perhaps offer my assistance in retrieving it? In place of...your mascot."

Artemis squirmed a little, growling but Luke just squeezed, trapping her against his bicep.

"Sounds great," he said with a winning grin. She didn't smile back, pinning me with a questioning raised eyebrow.

I squinted.

She's been nice so far. My last godly Quest member tried to kill me so it can't get much worse than that.

"I guess…?"

The goddess spun on her heel, throwing herself back into her limo seat in this boneless flop that just managed to not look stupid. "Excellent!"

Luke grumbled wordlessly.

The gas pump thunked as it kicked off and Corey started, before rushing to pull it from the nozzle from the tank.

"You said yes first," I hissed at Luke as we got our bags from the backseat of Corey's car.

"Not the point," he hissed back, as he tossed Artemis onto the seat and strapped his yellow fanny pack back around his waist.

"Then what was the point!"

"Ask me again in a few years!"

I hate it when Dad says that and I hate it now too.

"Guess this is it, huh?" Corey murmured, patting Bradley on the back as the dog leaned out of his window to watch us.

"Yeah," I said sadly. "You've been great, Corey. I - " had an idea and if Iris didn't allow it, I'd just ask Cliff. "What's your last name?"

The Canadian Boyfriend raised his eyebrows. "Achebe."

"I don't have a cellphone but I will call you." Then came the self-consciousness. "I mean, if I'm ever in the area again and you don't mind our kind of weird butting in…"

"I won't mind." He smiled. "No phone, no number but will call, huh? More demigod bullshit?"

I grinned back. "You get it."

He held out his hand and when I shook it: "One last thing," Corey said with a mischievous smirk. "The Illuminati still doesn't exist, right?"

"The whole triangle and all seeing eye of enlightenment shit? Course not," I said and as Corey started to nod, I continued with, "The pyramid is a metaphor for the three founding members who've been around since Rome and some dumbfuck in the 1700s added the eye bit. No idea why it stuck."

Corey's grin disappeared. "...what?"

"If you're really curious, they're like super corporate now, publicly traded and everything - "

"Hurry it up!" Luke called back.

Corey let go of my hand and pinched the bridge of his nose. It was an expression I saw a lot at Camp.

But, uh, Corey wasn't a Camper. I was just used to -

My bad.

I probably fucked up.

"You asked?" I tried.

"Yup." He said shortly. "I sure fucking did."

"Right." I was getting the feeling saying anything else was just going to make it worse. "Bye!"

He waved half-heartedly as I crossed the gas station aisle to the white limo.

"Whoa." Stepping inside was like stepping into the inside of a snow globe. Flurries of snow fell around us, blown by unfelt winds like the doors of the limo were made out of the same material as the Star Trek holodeck. The chairs were definitely made out of real leather (white, duh) along with the typical 'I'm so rich, I replaced my brain cells with money and no longer know what's a good idea' accessory pack.

"Do you like it?" Khione asked me curiously.

Have you ever tried to play Ping Pong in a moving vehicle?

Why?

"It looks...expensive," I said honestly as I sat down. I glanced out the window as the limo began to move and saw Corey still standing outside, but with his head buried in his folded arms on the top of his car.

Yeah, I fucked up.

As soon as Luke loosened his grip, Artemis wriggled free and made a beeline for the back of the limo as far from us as she could get.

All three of us rolled our eyes.

"You will love our city," Khione said, ignoring the grumpy rabbit. "A tour of Old Quebec, a walk among the fortifications and divine wards at the Edge, perhaps the cable car over the Montmorency. It is taller than even your Niagra Falls."

That actually sounded really cool. I loved my trip to the Falls with Dad.

Sensing she was winning me over, Khione offered, "There is a ferry along the river St. Lawrence. Of course, the ice flows have melted, but…" She gave me a little sly smile. "Winter can return for one day."

I chewed on my lip. "We can't take too long."

"Of course. A few hours and then to the Old Port for lunch at the finest restaurant in the city. We will make our preparations there." She shifted in her seat, crossing her legs making part of her split dress fall and Luke turned to look out the window. "Do not fear. The Bolt is as good as recovered. Olympus will shower you in praise soon enough."

Yeah," I muttered. "All hail the conquering hero."

Zeus was still on my shit list.

I was pretty sure he would continue to be himself, so I don't think the current King of the Gods was moving off my shit list any time soon.

Which put me in a bit of a pickle.

When Khione looked at me then, something happened in her eyes. It was like the never-ending rotating snowflake kaleidoscope had, for just a second, messed up or jumbled and made an altogether different weird pattern. It was jarring. It didn't belong, like a random trumpet in a string symphony. It was beautiful though. She turned her head to the side absently, as if listening to a gust of wind.

"Yes," she said softly. "All hail."

The hairs on the back of my neck shivered.

Fuck.

I twisted in my seat to look out the window again, scanning the highway even though whatever it had been passed. My neck felt fine. I wasn't sure it was even a warning. It felt different. I wasn't taking any chances though.

"Hey, there wouldn't happen to be an obelisk in this place?" I asked tightly.

Luke gave me this bewildered look.

Oh.

I never actually told him what I needed obelisks for.

"...there is the Wolfe–Montcalm Monument," Khione said after a moment. "The second oldest war monument in Canada and not too far from the Old Port."

That'll do.

She gave me a puzzled look. "Is something wrong?"

Yes.

"No," I said. I reached for the seatbelt with shaking fingers. I was supposed to buckle in as soon as I sat down. Dad'd be so upset with me.

Safety First.

 

[Shujin]

An Undertow of Sand
A PJO Fanfiction
​

Alright.

I will admit it.

I didn't think much of the icky, wet, cold and boring winter unless we're ice skating, but the crash of ice floes on top of a rushing river and crunching underneath the bow of the ship was nothing short of,

"Absolutely awesome!" I yelled, pumping both of my fists and ignored the chuckling from an older couple nearby.

"Of course it is." Khione gave me a small, satisfied smile before looking back out over the water herself and absently snapping a picture on a white camera. "I would expect nothing less from my city. It is my home."

The St. Lawrence was a beautiful river. I insisted on buying our tickets for the ferry legitimately and in no time we were bobbing along with what felt like the whole city on display on the banks. Maybe I was too used to Manhattan, but there was something about the brick walls with the splashes of color and old fashioned roofs that just looked more real to me. Manhattan from the water looked like a toy city, like you could reach out and flick a shining glass and chrome skyscraper over with a finger.

Khione had traded out the ball gown for this loose pale blue turtleneck shirt with white pants and dress shoes. Silver snowflake earrings hung from her ears. Our ferry was one of those huge triple story half boats where one side looked like a cruise liner and the other like a parking lot with cars and everything. It was packed with people enjoying the summer breeze while also being completely fucking dumbfounded at the ice clogging the river in the middle of June. I was pretty sure people were just taking pictures to make sure the ice wasn't going to disappear on them.

The captain of the ship had a little mental breakdown over the radio, but, uh, he'll get over it.

Global warming, amirite?

"There is nothing better than - ow!" Khione yelped and pitched forward, bringing up her right leg reflexively before turning on the culprit. "Why, you little - "

A small auburn rabbit in a red sweater darted back across the deck of the ship, running through legs and around bags right back to Luke, who looked like he was either going to laugh, or throw himself over the railing to drown in the river.

He snatched her up.

"What is wrong with you - " He cuffed the rabbit upside the head. "Can't you understand English?" He hissed at the offended bunny now looking like he had decided on throwing Artemis over the railing. "What part of - " Luke bit down on the rest of his words, gave us an awkward smile and turned back to the river, grumbling.

Khione clucked her tongue as she inspected her right ankle. There was a tiny welt flushed a tarnished gold color. Yikes. Greek gods were durable. Artemis must have chomped super hard. "Miserable creature."

"Um, yeah," I said lamely. "She does that."

I was beginning to think Artemis had some kind of legitimate brain issue. Could that happen to gods? Was that a thing? Did she just spend way too much time as an animal over the years? Was the bunny thing getting to her? This was the third time in two days. I finally learned not to bite people in second grade.

Thousands-year-old goddess everyone.

"She does," Khione said sourly, straightening. "Everyone knew the moment your mother acted," she continued and I winced.

The entire pantheon would know when a goddess died.

She was just a rabbit now.

"We could feel it," she murmured. "Just what was done...well."

She glanced back to where Luke had grumpily stuffed the rabbit back into his red vest and then Artemis just as grumpily poked her head out again. With their matching colors and his backpack, he looked like a high school graduate on a summer tour before college who just couldn't leave his pet bunny behind.

Either that, or a wannabe Pokemon trainer.

"There are few better it could have happened to."

I winced again.

Khione turned back to me with a small, brittle smile. "You don't know the story, do you?"

"I, uh," I cleared my throat. "I'm still learning," I mumbled. "Covered major events in world history and identifying gods of the pantheons."

The smaller details, like who had built the infamous walls of Troy and why were extracurriculars I learned from my Bardson. It was a scale thing, I think. Mom thought I should know that Athena had been King for a while and that there was a crack in Ouranos' prison.

It was Apollo who quietly told me that Athena's pride wouldn't let her admit defeat in fixing that crack until her 'solution' had already consumed a few ten million mortals, give or take.

At least Atlas got to stretch his legs!

Fucking ungrateful bastard.

"World history," Khione repeated. The snow in her eyes was really pretty and it took all I had not to stare. "The true history." She looked out over the water. "You know about the prisons."

I nodded.

Khione smiled wryly. "Demigods had always struck me as so...blissfully ignorant. Too weak, too fragile, too stupid. Most couldn't even see the truth if it was shown to them." Her accent thickened as she tilted her head to the side. "Imagine the unpleasant surprise, when it is I who have been so blissfully ignorant. Too weak. Too fragile. Too stupid."

I shuffled uncomfortably.

"A few months ago," Khione said wistfully. "I would have envied you."

It wasn't just Hermes who didn't know anything.

"Now I…" Her lips pursed as her swirling eyes dropped to where a large block of ice bobbed on the water, bumping into the hull of our ship. "The story is short and simple," she said abruptly. "Under Olympic Law, only deities are full citizens." She glanced at me out of the corner of her eye. "And a deity is not a state of birth or being. It must be recognized and ratified."

Uh, wait.

"You had to apply?"

I wish I could say I was surprised. Mom told me the word 'god' didn't really mean anything. I thought she meant that it was overused. Not that it was fucking political.

"My mother applied for me. She did everything she could, even sacrificing her Name for me." Khione inclined her head. "It was rejected."

Of course it was.

"My mother was only a nymph, after all," the goddess of Ice and Snow said calmly. "The facts of my lineage were against me. My grandfather Erekhtheus, son of Athena was unrecognized. He married a nymph. His children narrowly avoided being labeled demigods of Praxithea instead. I was powerful, for a nymph, and that was all I was allowed to be." She frowned slightly. "It is only now, after thousands of years, that I finally know why it was my mother and not my father that applied." There was ice slowly creeping across the railing under her fingers. "It would not have mattered. I never stood a chance."

A harsh, cold wind blew across the deck of the ship like it was the middle of January, not June.

"And as a nymph the only mercy I could rely on was my father's."

Her brittle little smile came back.

"But I am beautiful."

Shit.

We stood together in silence as the wind slowly faded. The ferry boat crunched and groaned as it broke through the ice on top of the rushing St. Lawrence.

"You don't have to - " I started, but Khione shook her head once.

"I will make no excuses for my sins. I was young and very stupid." Her eyes flickered to me, then away. There was a long quiet moment before she whispered, "And afraid." The ice on the river cracked loudly and our boat lurched into the opening. "It was easier if I just accepted it. Poseidon was kind in his own way, by making it public. Few would dare to cross him by treating me poorly. Everything was almost as it should have been."

Yeah.

Almost.

"Father despised him." Her brow furrowed thoughtfully. "Even if I had known why, I don't think I would have chosen differently. Father could not protect me. I had what I wanted." She leaned over the railing and stared down into the icy water. "I didn't want the boy," she said distantly. "The sea was receding from me and I didn't know what else to do. I thought - " she caught herself with a sudden intake of breath. "It does not matter. I learned a harsh lesson. I knew what I had to do. It was easier to just accept it. I could even take a certain kind of...pride in it. I was beautiful."

And I felt sick.

"I made the mistake of comparing myself to the King's unobtainable daughter. The goddess of the Hunt. And for my hubris, I was gifted with an arrow."

It had left a dark ugly, puckered scar under her right collarbone where it had punched right between her second and third rib and then cauterized the puncture wound.

You would think that Artemis, goddess of Maidens, who had pushy suitors and at one point defended her own mother Leto from an asshole would -

I wasn't even angry.

I was just tired.

"Can you imagine what that looked like for the King of Olympus?" She murmured. "His favorite daughter, a goddess of a throne, an Olympian struck at a mere nymph in a public fit of rage and the nymph failed to die."

I could imagine.

I could see Zeus thinking that would reflect poorly on him. Worse, I could see how everyone else would see it. If the thrones of the Olympians weren't for the most powerful of the gods, then what were they for?

"Let me guess," I said softly. "Olympus miraculously discovered that it had rejected your application by mistake?"

Khione smiled coldly and bowed her head.

"Khione, goddess of Ice and Snow," she introduced herself again. "That Artemis was chosen for this Quest is well known, just as it is known that it is her second chance. If I were there in her place before the thrones of Olympus, proving that she failed yet again…" She shrugged a little. "It is petty," she admitted easily. "Perhaps there will even be consequences for me."

Oh, right. "The Fates…"

"I have complete control over decreasing temperatures, cold winds, ice, snow, hail, sleet and blizzards," she rattled off. "I can induce any and all symptoms of hypothermia at will, including confusion and hallucinations. I am sensitive to heat signatures and can see infrared light. I do not have any ongoing feuds against me and I know how to navigate the mortal world. I even have a mortal doctorate in physics with a focus in thermodynamics."

I blinked. The rest was cool and all, but the important bit was that this goddess actually went to a normal college. "You did homework?"

Her lips twitched. "I did."

Alright.

New second favorite goddess.

I stared at her in awe. "It sucked, didn't it?"

"Yes."

We shared small smiles.

"While there is much I cannot do, there are loopholes. I won't be a burden. And if your sisters object?" That song in her eyes spun as her voice turned so cold, you could hear the water in the air around us freeze. "They owe me."

There was definitely a story there.

Not a happy one.

"Her name was Sais," Khione whispered so quietly to the river, I almost thought I imagined it. "Do not be concerned about my ability to contribute," she continued with her voice back to normal. Dry, cold and French. "I am prepared to make the commitment."

"Welcome aboard," I said awkwardly. I don't know why I opened my mouth again. "Sorry things were shit for a while."

Really.

Really?

Olympus was a shithole and her life was fucked up and I said sorry?

"It - it shouldn't have happened," I tried again.

No fucking duh!

"I mean, of course it shouldn't have happened, but Olympus sucks and I - "

What is it about my brain that just can't when it comes to girls?

"You can stop me at any time." I gave up.

Khione let out a short, tinkling laugh. "I love heroes," she said fondly. "You're very sweet." She leaned against the railing, absently brushing the coating of ice off it. "Will you tell me about yourself, Perseus?"

"Percy," I corrected her.

"Percy." She flashed a smile. "Which god taught you? And how did you come to be here, on a Quest for Olympus?"

"Mom and Mom," I summed it up.

"Fate herself?" Khione asked in surprise. "Really?" When I nodded, I found myself studied by eyes full of dancing snowflakes like I was an interesting science experiment - a specimen she was both excited about and dreading having to dissect. "What is she like?"

I sighed and leaned against the railing myself. "Well, she thinks she's hilarious…she's not."

Judging from the look on Khione's face, she wasn't expecting me to start with that. No one expects to be told that about the cosmic serpent.

Too bad.

It's fucking true.

"And is probably the biggest troll this side of the Milky Way...."

The ferry ride just flew by. I think I heard it was supposed to take an hour and the ice probably added some time, but it didn't matter. Between the ice flows, the sights of the city, rescuing Artemis from Luke and Khione's dry sense of humor, I had fun.

I actually forgot we were on a time limit.

"So... you and the Boreide…" Luke ventured as we washed our hands in the public bathroom on the other side of the river after getting off the ferry. "Getting a little chummy, are we?"

I shrugged. "She's cool."

Pun intended.

Luke's eyebrows scrunched together.

"You don't think it's weird? You're twelve," he pointed out as he dried his hands.

I'm not sure what that had to do with anything?

"My mom?" I reminded him right back. "I'm kind of used to it?" If there was a totem pole of god power levels or something somewhere, Mom was pretty much at the top of it. Gods like Khione would be at the very bottom. "It would be weird if she knew who I was and wasn't nice to me for some reason."

Luke's mouth opened and then he closed it. He palmed his face. "I'm overthinking this," he muttered. "I am overthinking this. I'm overthinking this and I...am pathetic."

Uh.

Little harsh there.

Luke sighed. He grabbed a few extra sheets of paper towels from the dispenser, casually folding them to put into his pocket. I've seen him do that a few times. At Camp, it was usually just swiping some fruit right before it was cleared away to stash for later. Even though meals were three times a day, every day like clockwork. We stopped at Wendy's yesterday and I saw him tuck away some napkins and packs of ketchup into his backpack. Seemed like a good idea this time though, so I grabbed some too.

Luke flushed, self-consciously straightening his red vest in the mirror. "You never know," he mumbled. "When you might need some."

Luke grew up on the street.

"Right," was all I said, deliberately taking one more and stuffing it into my pocket.

He nodded stiffly.

We left the bathroom and returned to where our godly Quest member was having a staring contest with the rabbit perched on the table in front of her.

"Who's winning?" I asked.

"Me," Khione said immediately and the rabbit growled. Then she blinked and frowned at us. "Winning what?"

Luke snorted as he scooped Artemis up from the table. "Never you mind, princess."

"Very well." The shapes of the snowflakes in her eyes turned thin and sharp looking for a moment, but she glanced at me, before shrugging it off. "I hope you don't mind a bit of a walk?" She asked as she stood. "I could transport us to the top, but I promise you, the view is worth the hike."

"Sure," I said.

And I got a bright, triumphant smile with the sun shining down on her, sparkling off her earrings and the twirling symphony in her eyes. I didn't realize I was staring after her - why were her eyes so gorgeous? What was happening? - until Luke bumped me with a snicker.

"Get a move on, Romeo."

"What - no. I - no."

"Uh huh."

"It's not like that. "

"I'm sure."

"It's just - if you could see her eyes - "

"Need to write some poetry about 'em?."

I'm sure I said it before, but Luke was a bit of a bastard.

And Khione was one hundred percent right.

The view was worth the hike.

The Montmorency Falls was a gorgeous looking waterfall crashing over some steep rocky cliffs covered in evergreens with a suspension bridge above it. It was like the falls had been carved right out of the rock, leaving a perfect sheet of water tumbling down. A permanent rainbow hovered, rippling in the clouds at the bottom of the drop. It almost didn't look real. Like someone had painted it into existence, complete with a wide, burbling river winding through flat, open plain. Our hike took us along the banks of the river along a wooden walkway with some other tourists, but the best part?

You could climb the cliffs! And there was a zipline!

"The Climbing Wall has justified its existence," I told Luke as I strapped my helmet on. Chiron had said something about the value of finding stable footholds, unconventional approaches and balance adjustments, but whatever. "I'll try harder to stop breaking it."

Zipline.

Luke rapped his knuckles on my helmet.

"Because this is what it was made for," he drawled sarcastically as he checked his knee pads. "I'm sure Chiron'll be thrilled."

That centaur better be.

Because we went twice.

"Had fun?" Khione asked, soaking up the sun on the terrace as we got back from our second trip. Luke had set out a few blades of hay on the ground for Artemis before the second go and she was still nibbling under the table as the goddess of Ice and Snow sat at the round table overlooking the cliffs and waterfall.

"I am definitely coming back here," I said.

I could see Dad in Luke's place, eyes bright and grinning as he ruffled my hair and Mom in Khione's, waiting for us to get back with that soft, indulgent smile.

My chest tightened a little, but it wasn't a bad feeling.

I would come back.

"Good," the Boreide said as she absently stretched, squinting at the sun. "We will make our way to Old Quebec for lunch then, as it is time for - " She did a double take at the sky. Then she closed her eyes and a muscle jumped in her jaw as she ground her teeth. "For my brothers to ruin everything."

There in the sky were two figures I thought were birds, but as they got closer, I realized one bird was a three hundred pound quarterback and the other belonged in an 80s hair metal band.

With a loud sigh, Khione snapped her fingers as the two winged men with dusky wings shimmering with golden scales landed on the terrace and all of the other confused tourists suddenly had other things to do and other places to be. Artemis huddled further into the shadow of the table.

"What," the goddess gritted out. "Are you doing here?"

"Saving you," the Canadian Quarterback said simply and apparently Canadian Quarterbacks were hockey jocks. He had on a red hockey jersey with sweatpants and black cleats.

"From making a mistake!" French Hair Metal said hotly, with ice-white hair feathered into a mullet, tight designer jeans, leather boots with a million buckles and this eye-searing pastel green silk shirt with the top three buttons undone. "You did not think Father would not know you planned to go with him?"

He marched up to Luke with frozen eyes. He would have been more menacing if Luke didn't have fifty pounds, four inches, no acne and a better fashion sense on him.

Yellow fanny pack and all.

"Sorry," Luke said dryly. "Who are you again?"

"Do not play dumb, son of Fate!" Hair Metal snarled in Luke's face. His quarterback brother grunted, doing a better job of looking like a threat as he tapped a hockey stick he pulled out from nowhere in his hands. "You think you can come here and - "

"As always, you are an idiot, Zethes." Khione cut her brother off with a voice hitting sub-zero temperatures. "This one is Hermes' demigod."

Both of her brothers paused, then as one they turned to me.

"So…" Zethes began. "That one?"

"Yes," his sister said.

"...and he is…"

"Also a demigod," Khione said patiently. "Yes."

There was this awkward moment where we kind of just stared at each other. I didn't know what their problem with me was and they looked like their script just up and set itself on fire right in front of them.

"Tiny," Quarterback finally said.

"What the fuck?" Zethes mumbled. "Is he not supposed to be some kind of - why is he so small?"

Luke's cheeks puffed.

"Late bloomer," I offered sourly. Dad said it was normal and it happened to him too and right now even Annabeth was taller than me and I wasn't bitter about it at all.

Nope.

"He is small, because he is a child." Khione stressed. That stung a bit. I wasn't that little.

Right?

"You would know that if you paid any attention to the wind and weren't a moron."

Zethes squinted at me, then at Luke like he was waiting for someone to shout Psych! His sister rolled her eyes.

"If I may, Percy, these are my brothers, Calais and Zethes. They come in a pair," she explained. "Otherwise the singular braincell they each possess will get lonely."

Zethes let out an indignant squawk. "You take that back - "

"Didn't Heracles kill you?" Luke asked curiously. "On the Golden Fleece trip?"

Wait, really?

They used to be mortal? I guess that explained why they felt so weird. Khione felt as solid as an icicle. Her brothers felt like echoes.

Like puppets.

Poor man's immortality.

Hair Metal turned on Luke. "As if that stupid, unfashionable brute could ever - "

"Yes," Khione said dryly and her brothers winced.

"We got better," Zethes changed his tune.

"Ouch," Calais agreed.

"He cheated anyway," Zethes continued, sticking his pointed nose up in the air. "No one told us he was a god already - what was he doing running around doing grunt work with mortals, who even does that?"

Heracles, apparently.

Golden Fleece though...wasn't that - I know him. His name is on the tip of my tongue. That one dude Hera liked. If this was after Athena's rule, and Heracles was doing 'grunt work' with mortals like Hera's favored hero, then I...don't think he was there willingly.

He might have temporarily not even been a god at all.

"Now that we have established that you are embarrassments," Khione said loudly. "Why are you still here?"

Her brothers looked at each other.

"He is just a kid…" Zethes said slowly.

"Tiny," Calais nodded.

"But…" The Boread's voice turned dark. "Kids grow up, do they not? He might get ideas about our sister."

"Pound him?" The other one perked up like a dog spotting a ball about to be thrown.

"Not yet," Zethes soothed his brother. "But should he overstep…"

Was this…

Dad warned me about this a month ago.

If I saw a shotgun or a shovel, I was supposed to leg it.

"I... promise not to?" I volunteered quickly. I thought about throwing in a line about how she wasn't that pretty, but I was only stupid sometimes. "Pinky swear."

Zethes gave me a serious nod, like I had just offered to swear an oath on the Styx. "Consider this your only warning, demigod."

"One warning." Calais glared. With two black eyes and a freshly broken nose in a red hockey jersey.

Zethes conjured a sword of ice, jagged and gleaming wickedly in the sunlight.

That was not a shovel.

He pointed it at me. He might look like a disco era reject, but that thing looked like it would hurt.

"I do not care whose spawn you are, Ananke or no - "

He shouldn't have said that.

Mom was there for a split second. Overwhelming power, restrained and fleeting, but caustic with annoyance.

I felt myself smile, even as the wooden terrace underneath our feet rotted into dust. It felt like she had been paying attention on some level, and she knew better and didn't like that she couldn't help responding to her Name around me.

It's okay, Mom, I thought in her general direction. I know.

"- t holy shit."

The three children of Boreas, the North Wind had different responses to Mom's appearance. Calais lost any and all control over his appearance, leaving behind a bulky ice sculpture with wide, frozen eyes and gaping mouth. Zethes still looked like he was going to audition for Journey or Hall & Oates or something, but his sword had melted into a drooping popsicle and I think he pissed himself.

Khione laughed.

"Oh, that was…" she searched for the words with a giant grin on her face. "Bracing." With a wet crack and a thunk, her brother's sword fell apart as he stared dumbly at her. She ignored him, her swirling eyes pinning me to the terrace. "You are just perfect."

Mom's called me that before.

Felt different coming from someone else.

It was a good kind of different though.

I eyed her brothers. "So about that warning..."

"C'est tiguidou!" Zethes blurted out as he tossed the hilt of his sword over his shoulder, narrowly missing beaning his brother in the face. "Father knows what he's doing, we're done here." He turned on his heel, took a step and then spun back around. "Fuck you," he said to me. He turned to his sister. "Good luck."

Then he threw himself over the railing and flew away.

"Scary," Calais whimpered.

Khione cleared her throat, prompting her brother to look at her. She made a shooing motion with both hands. It still took a moment for him to realize the other one had left, but when he did, a flying leap over the cliff edge saw him frantically flapping away too.

Luke coughed. He was pale, with sweat beading his forehead, but otherwise seemed unaffected.

"So your brothers seem…" He trailed off.

"They are imbeciles," Khione said simply. She turned away from us and with a slim index finger, directed a small breeze at the ground. She examined the sawdust it kicked up thoughtfully. "Glorified gatekeepers with no real responsibilities for good reason. They aren't worth your time." She glanced back over her shoulder at me. "Forget them and everything they said," she said strongly. "We have a Quest to discuss."

My heart sunk in my chest.

Yeah.

I guess we did.

I watched Luke coax a trembling Artemis out from under the newly rusted table. He accidentally knocked over one of the potted plants on the terrace, and it shattered into fine grains of sand that mixed with the dark soil and the ash that had once been the plant.

The fun was over.

Khione caught me glancing back out the rear window of the limo, watching the Montmorency Falls fall further and further back into the distance. I could still see it. Dad would be laughing in the sun as he took the helmet off, gushing about the zipline as the panoramic view of the cliffs and river stretched infinitely behind him. It would be one of his good days, where he stopped worrying and work wasn't stressing him out and he slept well the night before...and Mom would look at him like she was a second away from reaching out and trapping the moment in time forever.

"You will come back," Khione said and it sounded like a promise.

I will.

Maybe spending a few hours accomplishing nothing was dumb. We could have insisted on seeing Boreas, or getting on with the Quest. Maybe we should have. We weren't on vacation. We were demigods with something we had to do and only twelve days to do it in.

But...

It was nice while it lasted.

Our limo sped down the highway and turned onto smaller, cozier streets between traditional buildings, museums, studios and galleries. Old Quebec was just what it sounded like. Everything tried to keep up that traditional feel and if anything was renovated, it was just to replace construction hazards, not to modernize anything. The side streets were packed with people on a summer afternoon shopping trip, flitting in and out of the stores. Eventually we reached the Old Port.

Don't let the word 'old' fool you. There were boats everywhere. Luke craned his neck to peer over my head.

"I want a boat," I muttered. "Eventually."

Luke hummed as he eyed the sailing yachts moored at the long piers, but didn't say anything.

The Old Port seemed to be the main tourist trap. Flashy hotels, brightly lit signs, taxi cabs and more modern high rises with concrete and steel designs seemed to broadcast that this was where all the tasteless yuppies were supposed to go.

With a 'please don't stink up the rest of our city' thrown in somewhere.

Our destination was one of those tall buildings by the water. It had a wide sloping pyramid base with a half moon shape leading up to a gold capped pillar. It was still way flashier than brown brick with Victorian towers like the rest of the city, but it wasn't nearly as gaudy as the Hilton hotel across the street.

We were led by our driver, the wind spirit in a tux, to the top floor where a really fancy looking dine-in restaurant greeted us.

Greeted Khione, I guess.

Because I didn't understand a word the waiter said. Luke didn't look as lost? More like a deer in headlights. It was like he was listening and barely understood what the words meant, but it was a spelling bee and it was his turn and he was just fucked.

After a brief exchange, we were led through a soft beige, dark wood and gold parlor to a private section by the large windows overlooking the Old Port. The whole place bordered that line between classy and too much. There were golden vine trellis on top of polished mirrors that functioned as the southern walls. The carpet was plush with soft earthy brown colors in rippling wave-like patterns. The tables were all dark wood with a brighter wood streak at the ends with soft velvet covered beige chairs. The lighting was hanging light bulbs in blown glass orbs with twisting patterns, but there were a lot of them, making the gold gleam.

We sat down. Luke plopped Artemis onto the table and stared down at the cutlery.

"There are four forks," he hissed.

Khione made a sound that was too polite to be a snort as she talked with the waiter who made a valiant effort at just ignoring the random rabbit on the table. I pointed at my own set up. "These are for dessert. Bread plate and knife. This and this is for fish. Soup spoon."

He listened as I told him what was for what with a slightly pained expression. "Lawyer dad, right."

I shrugged uncomfortably. "It's really the grandparents."

"...it's weird." His blue eyes flickered to me, then back to the decorated napkin. "This is the second time we're eating on a god's tab. In two days."

"Yes?" I asked, confused.

There was a reason I told him to let me talk when we met Nemesis. It's not like I thought I was more important than Luke, but I was kind of more important than Luke? There were rules for this sort of thing. Alecto was older than Nemesis, but my niece was the host probably because she was expecting to talk to me as a direct relation. If Artemis wasn't a rabbit, Alecto as the elder should have been host as a representative of Hades and daughter of Night to an Olympian. Taking responsibility for our group when Artemis couldn't would only help with our first impressions.

"It is not surprising," Khione said with a small smile as she sent our waiter away with a flick of her wrist. "For anyone else, but one such as you, Castellan." Luke glanced up at her, lips thinning. "This is ξενία, the laws of hospitality that we have carried through the ages and holds even now."

"Never heard of it," Luke grunted and I just kind of…

My brain stalled.

"You never heard of it," I repeated dumbly and out of the corner of my eye, I saw Artemis flinch away from us.

And the first thing Luke did was offer insult, even if it had been Hermes. If he had showed up on a Quest, it would have been as a Messenger of the Gods of Olympus. Not his dad. Instead, it had been Nemesis. I thought he had been rude on purpose, because he was pissed at his father, not that he literally didn't know better.

"Why would he?" Khione said evenly. "The laws hold for citizens, the gods of Olympus." The snow in her eyes glinted. "And demigods are stateless vagrants."

Luke's fingers on his napkin spasmed and I bit my lip.

Of course.

He didn't know because it didn't matter anyway.

No one would bother.

This black, ugly feeling began to crawl around in my stomach.

I had never been worried about myself. I thought it was weird when gods weren't nice to me.

Luke thought it was weird to be treated like he was a person.

How fucking much was I taking for granted?

"All demigods?" He asked softly.

"The Claimed are afforded exactly one basic right: to no longer be a vagrant," Khione said smoothly. "Instead, they are considered to be temporarily attached to a divine household instead of Olympus, much like a seasonal laborer and the worth of that status depends entirely on the head of the house."

Luke breathed in through his nose, then let it out his mouth. The scar on his bottom lip was flushed a livid red. "Seasonal laborer?" He asked bitterly. "Are you sure it isn't ktêma empsuchon?"

That was Greek for 'property that breathes.'

Slave.

Khione wrinkled her nose in distaste. "You have divine blood. That would be...gauche."

"I see," he said.

So did I.

Camp was fucked because Olympus was fucked.

The goddess studied Luke like it was the first time she was seeing him.

"So you do," she said eventually, before her eyes shifted to me. "Fate Claimed you, Percy. As a demigod, usually this would mean little but - "

"Mom's too big a deal," I said hollowly.

"She is above Olympus and its Laws." Khione confirmed. "You have...diplomatic immunity." She leaned back in her chair, crossing her legs and tossing her long black hair back over her shoulder. "As a visiting prince."

I didn't really feel like any kind of royalty right now.

I felt like a spoiled shit.

The waiter came back with a bread basket and Luke and I scrambled to figure out what to order. I am not going to lie. I was hankering for a chili dog and some fries, but I don't think I was getting one in a place where the menu didn't have any prices listed, there were four forks and everything was in French.

Steak was good. Steak was fine.

Can't go wrong ordering one of those.

Service was decently quick and it got even faster when our waiter realized we were barbarians relying on Khione as the only cultured one and switched to an accented English.

I stewed all the way through my meal.

I was - I was going to have to talk to Dad. He would know what to do, what I could do after the Quest. Make a lesson plan, instead of just answering random questions. Something organized. Make Chiron give me a block with all of the Cabins. I could get Athena's Cabin to help. I could -

I could do something.

"Why are you helping us?" Luke asked tightly as he put down his fork with a clink.. "Why go through all this trouble?"

"This city is my home. I act with my father's authority. Have I not been a good host?" she asked around a sip of wine, sounding genuinely curious and a little concerned.

"It was fun," I admitted quietly.

She broke into a relieved smile. "Non-material gifts." She gestured at our surroundings in the golden restaurant. "Food. Lodging. Safety." I don't think I was imagining the emphasis on that word. "And information, as promised."

Her cold gaze slid over to Luke, who stiffened as her smile turned secretive.

I could feel a pulse of cold divine energy emanate from her.

A ward?

"The Master Bolt is held by the God of War."

Oh.

Fuck.

There was a second where we just absorbed the kind of shit we were in when Artemis lunged at Khione, furiously screeching. Luke caught her mid-leap, earning a few nasty scratches on his forearms.

"Calm down!" he growled at her. "Unless you want to die?"

She struggled until Khione clucked her tongue, disappointed. "I am willing to swear that I tell the truth. But, your manners, girl." You could tell she relished saying that. "Have you forgotten? You are no longer a goddess of a throne, Artemis Prôtothroniê."

Artemis froze in place. The use of her Name, of the First Throne, got through. Her eyes went wide. I could see her pupils dilate as she seemed to realize something. She twisted around in Luke's hands again, but not to attack anyone. She looked down at our plates and then began to chitter, muttering at Luke and I in an endless stream of noise.

"I - we don't speak rabbit," I had to tell her.

Artemis got louder, more desperate. Khione reached across the table with delicate fingers and gently placed an index finger on the rabbit's nose.

"Shhh," she hushed the bunny with a smile. "I have been a good host. I am helping on the Quest for the prestige and for the opportunity."

"Opportunity for what?" I snapped. My stomach roiled. "The favored son wants a war!"

Athena. Apollo. Artemis. All went searching for their father's Master Bolt. All failed. All former revolutionaries.

There was no way Zeus was going to believe us over Ares. Luke's word didn't mean much and he couldn't really prove it on his own anyway. No one would believe a demigod of Hermes could tell Ares had the Master Bolt when Zeus himself couldn't.

Zeus probably wouldn't spit on me if I was on fire (feeling was mutual). Boreas was still on house arrest forever, we couldn't use his word as evidence. Even if by some miracle, Athena talked the Dodekatheon into believing he wasn't a rebel anymore, the fact that it's been months and he didn't volunteer to rat Ares out would count against him.

We couldn't use the word of his daughter as evidence either.

Ares Domain was War.

We couldn't fight him, not unless he wanted to fight us.

He wouldn't.

I was still the son of Fate. I had nothing he wanted to beat out of me.

Artemis was a rabbit.

All he had to do was wait twelve days.

"He does," Khione said calmly. "And he is no fool. He doesn't physically hold the item. The winds bore witness to a mention of hiding the weapon, but we did not hear where nor how." She shrugged her shoulders. "Best guess? A place sacred to the patron of Sparta, where he can easily detect intruders and would be able to kill without restriction or question." She gave us a thin smile. "Father thinks it is still within the States. To make it easier to produce the weapon after the war has begun with a suitable scapegoat. Intercontinental demigods have not been particularly popular with anyone but the goddess of Love since World War Two."

"Elegant," Luke said in a low tone.

"Uncharacteristically so," Khione agreed. Her eyes found mine. "I have told you what I can do. Consider the ability to completely map out a structure using heat and air flow without stepping a foot inside and putting the god on alert." Her voice turned pleading. "You need me."

Artemis was shaking her head like she was trying to bob it right off.

"This doesn't revolve around you," I pointed out and watched her ears fall. "...you mentioned an opportunity?"

"Once the Bolt is retrieved, we can return it." That haunting melody was in her eyes again. "...but not for free," Khione whispered.

I felt a jolt go down my spine.

...not for free.

Luke caught on right away. "If he attacks you, he loses everything anyway. If he refuses to pay, he doesn't get his weapon back, but everyone will know the sea god doesn't have it."

"You are mortal," Khione said gently. "You can keep it."

"And I can hold him to a bargain," I said slowly.

By making him swear on the Voice of Heaven, the Bones of the Earth and the River Styx.

This time the shiver went up from my toes to the back of my neck.

I liked this idea.

"I can make Camp better." I whispered. "I can make everything better."

Without a war.

I liked this idea.

"A meticulously worded contract. Witnesses. An oath," Khione said leadingly. "The wording of the King's ultimatum was only that his Symbol of Power must be presented to him by the Summer Solstice."

And no ordinary demigod would have the balls to dangle the Super Sparkler in the King of the Gods face in front of the entire Assembly of Olympians and not hand it over.

But I'm not just any demigod.

Guess I should be happy it's Zeus.

Athena would never leave a loophole like that lying around.

"You want a bloodless revolution," Luke said.

"I want change," Khione snarled.

It wasn't perfect.

If Hermes didn't know about true oaths, then it's been at least four thousand years since anyone has sworn one.

Since anyone has broken one.

It didn't matter what the consequences of a broken oath would be, if I died. That would still be terrible. For one, I would be dead. That's always a bummer. Two, I knew Mom would go to war with Olympus if I got murdered, because unlike Hades, she could.

The back of my neck shivered.

Fuck.

Hades.

He was missing a Symbol of Power too, wasn't he? And an oath would only bind Zeus' actions. It wouldn't do anything to Ares. Or Hera.

Or Athena.

Kronos.

The Great Prophecy still had some years left on it.

But what if I just did this? What if I blackmailed Zeus?

…

What if I did and it all came crashing down in four years anyway?

"We're getting ahead of ourselves," Luke warned, but there was a light in his eyes. I remembered my own oath and his boon. "This all means nothing if we can't steal the Bolt back."

"Yes, of course." Khione breathed out. "The only sacred place belonging to the god of War that I know of is the Metropolis Temple. It used to be in what is now Turkey and unfortunately, since the Migration, it has never stayed in one place."

"...where is it now?" Luke asked.

"In the most violent American city."

Figures.

"...Detroit?" I guessed.

Khione gave me a strange look.

"Baltimore?"

"Compton," she said dryly. "Compton, California."

Huh.

The more you know.

"I can't teleport directly to the city," Khione said regretfully. "Leaving my territory in such a way would send up a flare on Olympus and my ability to travel through godly Domains is restricted. I still can," she rushed to assure me. "If a cold wind can go there, so can I. But."

"It's the middle of June," I finished for her.

"We will have to travel somewhat traditionally south of the border."

"Somewhat?" Luke quirked an eyebrow.

Khione shrugged. "My Father has a stable full of Thracian horses. I am sure he would not mind if I borrowed a few." I think this was really happening. We knew who took the Bolt. How was a question for later, but for now, we just had to find it. We had a lead.

And...an idea of what to do once we had it.

Artemis, agitated, pulled on the sleeve of my shirt.

I sighed. "What do you want?"

"How are you with killing monsters?" Luke was asking the goddess.

"In the event they ever manage to even break through my ice?" she replied evenly. "As long as we do not run into any fire based creatures, such as the son of the Mother of Monsters - "

Artemis stared up at me with soulful silver eyes and the fur on her back bristled.

And I was suddenly aware that the hairs on the back of my neck had been standing up.

" - all that's left is getting rid of the dead weight."

I jumped to my feet, hand flying to my necklace where my fingers clumsily crashed against my chest.

Damocles.

I didn't Dream it back.

Luke pushed back from the table. His chair screeched on the grey tile lining the floor by the windows as one hand dug into his pocket.

Khione was watching me with a wintery smile and beautiful snow filled eyes. "Not you," she murmured. "Did I not offer my assistance in place of your mascot?" She asked innocently. "Have I not been a good host?"

Yeah.

To me.

Now that I thought back, she ignored Luke's acceptance of her offer. She paid him the bare minimum of attention to not break the rules, as if he was my servant. We did what I wanted to do. We -

I wasted time.

Even Nemesis fed Artemis as part of hospitality.

Khione didn't.

"Do not deny me this," Khione hissed, slowly rising from her seat. "Don't you dare."

I was tempted.

But I wasn't that far gone.

"It's been fun," I said instead. "Really, but uh, we gotta go. Now."

Luke grabbed his bag and grabbed the rabbit. "It's here?"

"Yeah, it's - "

In the mirror finish of the southern walls of the restaurant, I saw the dark shape close in.

My Spidey Sense screamed.

The restaurant windows exploded.

"Fuck!"

We dove onto the floor as alarms rang out, blaring and I could barely hear the screams of everyone else in the restaurant over the blood rushing in my ears and the tinkling of glass shards. Artemis squirmed out from under Luke's arm and bolted, a red blur under the tables and I had a moment of thinking -

Where is she going?

We were on the top floor of a thirty story building.

Where was there to go?

And I felt dizzy and breathless and my limbs felt like lead, like I was trying to move underwater or through a blizzard as I watched the black fractured blur break across the room - and then it was there.

The ropy scar tissue wasn't scar tissue. They were eyelids. Hundreds of bloodshot eyes glared out from between each flayed muscle fiber and large rotting gangrenous wings flared out from its back, pocketed with weeping sores and exposed black bone.

The bulldozer had just made it uglier.

And mad.

It screamed and my head exploded into stars. I saw Luke reach out with his hands and the tables and chairs moved, crashing into each other in its way as a small red blur ducked and weaved through the dining room.

It slammed through the furniture, letting out barks of black void sound like sonar that pulsed down my throat and squeezed.

I tried to reach into my stomach, but I felt sick and I think I farted. I didn't know how my powers worked. I didn't know how to control them. I just knew they were there.

I did it once. I can do it again.

There was nothing.

Not this time.

I couldn't breathe -

A cold shock slapped my face.

I was hauled to my feet by the front of my shirt.

"I can save you. I can teleport you out of here." My vision swam as I tried to lock on to Khione's icy expression. "Last chance, Perseus Stele."

Luke was on the other side of the room, jumping over a table with Reclaim flashing in his hands and the table silently shattered behind him as the creature swiped through it. Blood was already starting to drip from his nose. A scratch from a shard of glass had carved up his temple.

Another pulse of sound.

Luke stumbled, but he brought up his Celestial Bronze and Adamantine blade just in time to take the hit.

He went flying.

The creature glitched, a single arm appearing almost ten feet away, spearing down and my heart leapt into my throat as I saw the little auburn fur ball frantically throw herself to the side.

It almost wasn't enough.

There was a wet snap. Artemis screamed, sounding just like a terrified child as the black claw scraped, skidded down her flank covered by the little red sweater.

I can't leave them.

I didn't have to say anything.

"Of course. How could I forget?" Khione gave me a small, sad smile, already dissolving into a flurry of sleet and snow. At first, I was scared she was going to take me with her anyway, but then...she let me go. In a heartbeat, just her voice on a cold wind was left. Trying to be disdainful, but instead was brittle and painfully sad. "Heroes."

Knife, I thought and the weight of Erebus' Stygian Iron dagger fell into my hands. It was Nemesis' creature. It came through the shadows in the darkness of night. This might work.

This was crazy.

I was crazy.

I ran right at the living nightmare. I thought I was ready for the sound.

I wasn't.

It ripped through my head again, like it had shoved barbed wire into the inside of my skull and was pulling. I saw it turn, casually shattering a table as it raised a claw to swipe at me. I didn't duck so much as I fell under it, getting what was probably a really bad rug burn.

Small head covered in eyes, probably weak point.

I stabbed it.

The pitch black blade bounced off.

Okay.

Didn't work, was all I had the time to think before that feeling at the back of my neck blared.

I twisted blindly, just trying to get out of the way.

Fire seared up my side, racing to my back as the claw grazed me. Loosening my body was a practiced reflex, even as I bit back the scream. Don't freeze. Don't freeze. Never freeze. I reversed my grip on my brother's gift as I threw myself away from the creature. I hit the corner of a knocked over chair hard, rolling over it as the floor right where I just was crumpled under the blow. A large table with some art piece bronze tree in the middle of it wobbled in place, and then shot across the room, beaning the monster upside the head.

It whipped around.

Another pulse. My eyes felt like they were going to explode.

The monster glitched its torso after Luke, leaving its legs behind and I don't know what I was thinking -

I don't know why I thought it -

I raised my dagger and stabbed at the empty air in between.

It screeched.

The world itself shook and bent, like a black hole had just opened in the middle of the dining room floor.

And it was halfway between us, shuddering on the floor as if its two halves had snapped together and met somewhere in the middle. My knife was burning my hand and then it was getting up and I tried to move, but everything in my side wailed as my leg gave out and then Luke was there -

"Percy, move!"

Blood splashed onto my face.

Don't freeze, was the dim thought as my world shrunk down to Luke's red vest and the rapidly spreading dark stain. It had got him right between his shoulder and neck. He was bleeding in spurts.

Don't freeze.

My stomach yawned open. The fire on my back burned cold. I felt weightless. There was a flash of black, lashing out from behind me to in front of me and it simply…

Batted the nightmare away.

The remarkably pristine mirror finish of the southern walls silently shattered under its weight.

I can fight it.

But it won't die.

Luke grasped at the air with a weak hand, and a small unconscious bundle of fur was shoved into my chest. Realty snapped back to normal.

"Luke!"

He pulled at me, face set with a mulish jaw and tears streaming from his eyes as we stumbled towards the windows leading to a thirty story drop onto the pavement.

No where else to go.

Luke tightened his grip on me as the nightmare dug itself out of the wall, screaming, stabbing at my mind with dark, flaying knives.

Then he threw us out the window.

My world tilted.

Quebec City disappeared. In its place was a rugged mountain top. It was night time, a gorgeous avalanche of stars were strewn about the sky. There was a girl in front of me rocking the punk look with black hair and electric blue eyes, looking shocked. Behind her there was a girl that looked a lot like Annabeth's older sister with blonde curls and Athena's grey eyes, screaming. And beside her was a boy.

His sea green eyes widened in shock and disbelief when our eyes met, like he could see me from the other side of reality. He had windswept black hair and was wearing what looked a lot like my face.

Then I was falling down…

Down…

Down...

I could hear the crash of the sea against the cliff face. The wind was rushing by and I was so tired. I felt like a furnace that had burned hot and bright and hard for so long and now there were only embers left.

I had a thought. I don't know if it was even mine.

I'm so scared…

"Lady Rhea..." Luke's voice gurgled wetly.

My vision broke apart, scattering like flower petals on the wind. I felt it break. My stomach throbbed painfully, everything hurt and I felt like I was drifting. Like if I just stopped thinking for long enough, gravity would turn itself off and we could just float away.

It was as if...what I just saw had already happened.

Was happening.

Would always happen.

And now, would never be.

Luke sighed into my ear. "Now would be good."

The water of Quebec City's Old Port rose up with a roar and right before we hit the ground, it swept us away.

There was nothing like going from falling to death to drowning in the span of two seconds. I have no idea how my sunglasses stayed on.

I kicked and struggled, clutching my Quest members to me, but I was only twelve. The water had shocked Artemis awake, so I pushed her up towards the surface as best I could with one hand. The other was firmly wrapped around Luke's wrist. My lungs burned as I tried to drag his dead weight up from the depths.

Bad -

Bad choice of words.

Please, I sent out to anyone who was listening. Mom!

The water surged.

We were spat out on some cold beach somewhere. I hacked up half a lung as I crawled over to Luke. He wasn't moving.

"No, no, no, please." I turned him over onto his back, some half forgotten CPR lessons moving my hands. I think he was still bleeding, but sluggishly. I hoped he was still bleeding. That meant a heartbeat. He was too pale. I gently tapped his face. "Don't do this to me Luke. Come on."

I slapped him a little harder when he didn't respond. "Come on!"

My throat was beginning to close up. I tried to swallow and it hurt and I was panting as I shook him. "Luke, please. Don't do this to me. Luke!"

We were in the middle of nowhere.

I blindly reached out for my backpack. Just two squares, I thought dimly. I would just eat until I felt better but there was - hadn't Grover said something once, I think? Just two or he'll burn up and that won't help anyone at all.

I crushed the small cubes in my fingers and pushed the pulp into his mouth.

He didn't swallow.

I heard a slight whimper somewhere to my left and I just -

I saw red.

"Shut up!" I roared at Artemis. I didn't care that there was a bone sticking out of her back leg. "This is your fucking fault! If he fucking dies - "

My voice broke.

Something else broke too.

"If he dies," I said slowly. "You die."

I turned back to Luke.

"Come on, Luke. Show me those baby blues." I didn't - I didn't want to take off my glasses. Not even to check. I pressed my hands against the gash in his chest and shoulder and neck. It was - it was a bit too late for pressure but I didn't know what else to do. "Come on, you can't give up just like that. We have a plan for Olympus. For the Camp." There was snot coming out of my nose. "Well, maybe a quarter of a plan. You have to make it through this. You'll get to dunk on all your haters - not that you have any because you're awesome - and you even - " I was crying. "I can't believe you - Rhea actually answered you, you son of a bitch?"

Then from above me a woman's voice said, "I did."

My head snapped up.

Standing there like we had washed up at some music festival in the Bahamas was a dark haired woman with flowers braided into her hair, a brass Peace sign hung around her neck with a brightly colored shirt and short pants with a gossamer train.

There was also a fucking lion sitting by her.

Because why not.

"Uh. Hi." I said dumbly.

She raised a hand and slipped her round iridescent sunglasses down her nose. Behind them were the green compound eyes of the Matriarch of the Swarm.

"Looks nasty," she said casually as she lifted her glasses back into place. "Mind if I give you a hand?"

I nearly jumped away from Luke.

"Yes! I mean - no, no I don't mind. Please help me."

She knelt down on Luke's other side. She gently closed his mouth and then trailed fingers down to his chest. This energy welled up, flickering off her skin in streams of smokeless fire. It sunk into Luke and lit him up from within. I swallowed as I saw what looked a lot like his lungs behind dim bands of his ribs and a brighter spot that looked like a very slowly beating heart.

With a twist of her fingers, the tiny shuddering strengthened. Beneath him, the water of the sea or lake surged.

I snuck glances at the former Queen of the Gods.

This was kind of awkward.

"Not what you expected?" Rhea asked as she worked.

I shrugged and felt my back and side burn. "I...kind of expected you to have a bad luck penny glued to your ass or something."

"Ha!" She barked. She glanced up at me with an amused quirk to her lips. "Ain't that the fucking truth."

Glowing, writhing energy slowly filled up Luke's wound.

"He'll be okay?" I said and it came out very small.

"In time."

I could have fallen over in relief.

"Thank you," I said. "If there is anything I can do to repay you - "

"What do you see?" She asked me.

Oh.

The sea water crashed onto the beach in a small wave. Seagulls cried out in the distance. My hand flew to my sunglasses.

I paused. "...how things die."

Rhea looked at me thoughtfully. "Tell me?"

I took my glasses off.

I choked on a sob.

"Peaceful," I croaked. I have never seen a death like hers. Content. Ready to go. It was like she was just going to sleep after a long, hard day and she could finally - finally rest.

It was how I wanted Dad to go.

"Thank you." Rhea smiled, even as she studied me from behind her own glasses. "You do have your mother's eyes. I can even see her in the perfected look of your face, but the rest…" She rose and I jammed my glasses back on before risking a look at Luke floating up with her. She gently set him on the back of her lion and then turned to gather the pathetic fur ball that was her granddaughter up in her arms. "The rest reminds me so very much of my son, Poseidon."

The boy on the mountaintop. Black hair. Sea green eyes.

Rhea paused, looking over her shoulder at me.

"Coming?"

I followed her.

 

[Shujin]

This will be updated and changed as we go along with the story and learn more. There are also secrets hidden within.

Cast List:

Spoiler: Primordial Gods

Ananke
Primordial of Fate, Destiny, Compulsion, Necessity, Circumstance and Inevitability. Confirmed Name of an Elder God Nyarlathotep, the Crawling Chaos.

Greek Titles: First of Chaos. Mother of the Moirae, of Darkness, of the Celestial Sky. The Great Serpent. Eater of the Bloody Tongues. The Ruiner. The Beautiful One. The Thousand Mirrors. She Who Stalks Stars.

Symbol: Blood Red Spindle of Golden Thread.

Myth: Ananke is believed to have formed ex-nihilo from Chaos as the first being. Along with her younger 'twin' and consort Chronus, mingling together in serpent form, crushed the primal egg of creation to form the ordered universe.

Truth: Was said to have owned slaves, among whom she chose favorites to ascend by feeding them the still living flesh of 'Phanes' at the conclusion of the 'rebellion' by the star-spawn. These became the first generation of Greek Young Gods. The Titans.

"Only Fate (Eimarmene), or universal necessity (Ananke), the inevitable 'Adrasteia,' the faceless countenance and hollow sound of unknown Destiny, was absolute." - Vyacheslav Ivanov, Russian philosopher

Known Children:
Clotho, Lachesis and Atropos, the Fates
Adrasteia, the Inescapable
Erebus, the Darkness
Aether, the Celestial Sky
Percy Stele, demigod

Chronus
Primordial of Eternal Time. Confirmed Name of an Elder God Yog-Sothoth, the Lurker At The Threshold.

Greek Titles: Kronos, Khronos, Chronos

Symbol: Greek Zodiac Wheel

Myth: Chronus is believed to have formed ex-nihilo from Chaos as the second being. His elder 'twin' and consort is Ananke.

Truth: In an unspecified sequence of events, gave Zagreus his mortal Name of Kronos. Presumably owned slaves of humanity.

"For me, whatever share of excellence the throne of Fate endowed, I know full well that Khronos (Chronos, Time), although his foot be slow, shall bring it to the end ordained." - Pindar, Nemean Ode 4. 41 ff

Known Children:
Erebus, the Darkness
Aether, the Celestial Sky

Nyx
Primordial of Night. Confirmed Name of an Elder God Shub-Niggurath, the Black Goat of the Woods with a Thousand Young.

Greek Titles: Night

Symbol: Three Black Wings in a Star

Myth: Nyx is believed to have formed ex-nihilo from Chaos as the younger 'sibling' of Ananke, Chronus, Tartarus within the newly formed ordered universe.

Truth: Lives in the House of Night in the Underworld, at the place where Tartarus collides with the Devouring Void of Chaos. Presumably owned slaves of humanity.

"Be present, Goddess, to thy suppliant's prayer, desired by all, whom all alike revere, blessed, benevolent, with friendly aid dispel the fears of twilight's dreadful shade." - Orphic Hymn 3 to Nyx (trans. Taylor) (Greek hymns C3rd B.C. to 2nd A.D.)

Known Children:
Nemesis, goddess of Retribution
Thanatos, god of Death
Hypnos, personification of Sleep
Geras, personification of Old Age
Apate, personification of Deceit
Alecto, Megaera and Tisiphone, the Furies
Unnamed demigod
Hellhounds
Many others...

Tartarus
Primordial of the Abyss. Confirmed Name of an Elder God Magnum Tenebrosum, the Unnamed Darkness.

Greek Titles: The Pit, Tartaros

Symbol: A Red Eye in a Sinkhole

Myth: Tartarus is believed to have formed ex-nihilo from Chaos as the younger 'sibling' of Ananke and Chronus within the newly formed ordered universe.

Truth: Presumably owned slaves of humanity.

"The defeat of the Gigantes (Giants) by the gods angered Ge (Gaea, Earth) all the more, so she had intercourse with Tartaros (Tartarus) and bore Typhoeus in Kilikia (Cilicia)." - Pseudo-Apollodorus, Bibliotheca 1. 39 (trans. Aldrich) (Greek mythographer C2nd A.D.)

Known Children:
Typhoeus (Typhon)
Unnamed demigod
Rhea, Titan Queen

Gaia
Primordial of the Earth

Greek Titles: The Earth Mother. Gaea

Symbol: A Perfect Sphere

Myth: Gaia is believed to have formed ex-nihilo from Chaos as the younger 'sibling' of Ananke, Chronus, Tartarus and Nyx within the newly formed ordered universe.

Truth: Was part of the 'rebellion' by the star-spawn. It took three nights to cover the campaign against her.

"Khronos (Chronos, Time) ... [also called] Herakles (Heracles) generated a huge egg, which, being filled full, by the force of its engenderer was broken in two from friction. Its crown became Ouranos (Heaven), and what had sunk downwards, Gaia (Gaea, Earth). There also came forth an incorporeal god [Phanes or the primordial Eros]." - Orphica, Theogonies Fragment 57 (from Athenogoras)

Known Children:
The Hekatonkheires
The Cyclopes
Typhoeus (Typhon)
Nereus, the Old Man of the Sea
Rhea, Titan Queen

Ouranos
Primordial of the Sky

Greek Titles: The Sky Father, The Voice of Heaven, Uranus

Symbol: Eight Pointed Star

Myth: Believed to have been created by Gaia to be her consort. Father of the majority of Gaia's children, including the Titans who eventually overthrew him via castration and dismemberment.

Truth: Was part of the 'rebellion' by the star-spawn. Was said to have surrendered.

"He [Orpheus] sang of that past age when Gaia (Gaea, Earth) and Ouranos (Uranus, Sky) and Pontos (Pontus, Sea) were knit together in a single mould; how they were sundered after deadly strife." - Apollonius Rhodius, Argonautica 1. 498 ff (trans. Rieu) (Greek epic C3rd B.C.)

Pontus
Primordial of the Sea

Greek Titles: Pontos

Symbol: Ten Limbed Octopus

Myth: Believed to have been birthed from Gaia with no father. Together with his female counterpart, Thalassa, created the first of the sea life and Telekhines.

Truth: Is an alien, who came to earth and was adopted into the Greek pantheon.

"And Sea begat Nereus, the eldest of his children, who is true and lies not: and men call him the Old Man because he is trusty and gentle and does not forget the laws of righteousness, but thinks just and kindly thoughts. And yet again he got great Thaumas and proud Phorcys, being mated with Earth, and fair-cheeked Ceto and Eurybia who has a heart of flint within her." - Hesiod, Theogony (231–239)

Known Children:
Nereus, the Old Man of the Sea

Spoiler: Titans

Kronos
Titan of Time and the Harvest

Greek Names: The Crooked One, The Titan Lord, An Ass (by Percy), Zagreus
Roman Name: Saturn

Symbol: A Scythe

Myth: Son of Ouranos, the Sky and Gaia, the Earth. Overthrew his father Ouranos at the command of his mother with the aid of his brothers and his mother's gift of a sickle, which he used to castrate the Sky. His father foretold he would be overthrown by his children in turn and so he swallowed his own children born to him by Rhea. His youngest, Zeus was swapped for a stone and hidden away by his mother. Zeus returned when grown, and with the help of his childhood friend Metis, made his father vomit up his siblings and began the Titan War to overthrow him.

Truth: An Earthborn slave of Ananke, descendant of slave warriors originating from somewhere else in the cosmos. He fought against a race of beings referred to as 'star-spawn' and other creatures that might be part of the same group such as the Spinner, the Dweller, Devourer in the Mist, the Earth Mother and Sky Father. Consumed a living part of a star-spawn known as 'Phanes' and was ascended as a Young God. A Titan. For as yet unknown reasons, he received a Prophecy from the Sky Father that foretold his children would overthrow him, prompting him to swallow them as they were born.

Metis
Titaness of Good Counsel, Planning, Cunning and Wisdom

Daughter of Oceanus and Tethys, Mother of Athena, former Queen of Olympus, former wife of Zeus. Was prophesied by Ouranos, the Sky to bear a wise child to her husband Zeus. A warrior stronger than his lightning bolt that would be the snake to take his throne. In an attempt to avert the Prophecy, her husband tricked her into assuming the forms of prey animals to escape a chase. She almost made it, but was finally caught in the form of a fly and swallowed. Ensured her daughter was born wearing armor.

Mnemosyne
Titaness of Remembrance

Keeps a library holding records of the true history of the world on Mt. Othrys. Wouldn't spit on Zeus if he were on fire, according to Percy.

Leto
Titaness of Demurity and Protector of the Young

Raised her twins Apollo and Artemis. Tried to protect them from the wrath of their father, Zeus, when he took back his throne but was burned completely through by his lightning bolt. Her children hope she will eventually reform.

Rhea
Titaness of Motherhood, Legacy, Comfort, Ease and Female Fertility

Greek Names: Matriarch of Swarms, Queen of the Titans of Mt. Othyrs, the Great Mother, Goddess of the Mountain
Roman Name: Ops.
Phrygian Name: Cybele, the Queen
Egyptian Name: Qetesh
Semitic/Babylonian: Athirat

Kronos' wife, mother of his six godly children. Patron of the Grove of Dodona, an ancient grove of prophetic trees. Was 'ripped off big time' by Ananke, according to Percy.

Truth: Married into the Greek pantheon and is not actually a Titan, but a loyal star-spawn who did not rebel against the Elder Gods. Abdicated her title as Queen of the Gods with the fall of Mt. Othrys and is currently hibernating in an attempt to forestall her natural impulses which are implied to be detrimental to humanity and the Young Gods. Daughter of the god beneath the Pit and the Earth Mother, making her Percy's blood first cousin. Is stated to be a bug like Elder God, who has admitted to making mistakes with her youngest children, including letting Adrasteia, the Inescapable babysit Zeus.

Hecate
Titaness of Magic, Witchcraft, Sorcery, Night, Moon and the Crossroads

Greek Names: Goddess of the Mist, Queen of Those Below, the Three-Formed
Roman Name: Trivia

Symbol: A Strophalos (Hecate's Wheel)
A third generation Titan born to Perses of Destruction and Asteria of Falling Stars, Oneiromancy and Astrology. Sided with Zeus and the Olympians during the Titan War to overthrow Kronos. Was a candidate for the throne of Olympus.

Selene
Titaness of the Moon, Radiance and Insanity

Myth: The sister of Helios, Titan of the Sun and Eos, Titaness of the Dawn.

Truth: An 'alien' who came to earth from several galaxies over that was adopted into the Greek pantheon during the reign of Mt. Othyrs. Her legacies are 'demi-aliens' otherwise known as clear-sighted mortals. Artemis inherited the Moon Chariot from her.

Spoiler: The Olympians

Zeus
God of the Sky, Lightning, Thunder, Law, Order and Justice

Greek Names: Zeus Olympios, King of Olympus. Zeus Astrapios of the Sky, Zeus Agoraeus Protector of the Agora (assembly), the Dodekatheon, Zeus Anax, The High King. A Fucking Idiot (by Percy)
Roman Name: Jupiter

Youngest child of the Titan Lord Kronos. Was hidden away by his mother Rhea so that his father wouldn't swallow him. Was raised by the nymph Amaltheia, Daughter of Oceanus and Tethys in the shadow of Adrasteia, the Inescapable on Mt. Dikte in Crete. With the cunning of his childhood friend Metis tricked his father Kronos into vomiting up his siblings. After the Titan War, ascended to the throne as second choice with Metis after his eldest sibling Hestia abdicated. Was overthrown by his daughter Athena, but retook his throne thanks to his current wife, Hera. Is now known as one of the 'Big Three' of the Olympic Pantheon.

Hera
Goddess of Motherhood, Marriage, Women, Childbirth, Familial Love and Legitimacy of Rule

Greek Names: Hera Aigophagos, the Goat-Eater
Roman Name: Juno

Sister Wife of Zeus, thirdborn child of Kronos, the Titan Lord. Fought in the Titan War. Was on 'Team Zeus' during the Olympiomachy and vital in the capture of Athena with the help of her son Hephaestus' chains.

Demeter
Goddess of the Harvest, Cycle of Life and Death, Sacred Law, Fertility and Agriculture

Roman Name: Ceres

Second born child of Kronos. Was a candidate for the throne of Olympus but recused herself to become the Earth Mother's prison warden. Mother of Persephone. Once attempted to kill all life on Earth in response to her daughter's abduction by Hades and nearly broke the Earth Mother free in the process. Was on 'Team Athena' during the Olympiomachy.

Poseidon
God of the Sea, Storms and Earthquakes

Greek Names: Father of Horses, Uncle Sea (by Apollo)
Roman Name: Neptune

Fifth born child of Kronos. Lived in the Underworld with Hades until he was eventually married off by Zeus to Amphitrite, Granddaughter of Pontus and Gaia to become Lord of Atlantis. Was on 'Team Athena' during the Olympiomachy and served as a high ranking official and key advisor in her court. When Zeus retook his throne, was forced to undergo a mortal trial serving a Trojan king and built the walls of Troy. Inherited his mother Rhea's sea green eyes. Is feuding with Athena over her decision to surrender during the Olympiomachy and is now known as one of the 'Big Three' of the Olympic Pantheon.

Phoebe Artemis
Goddess of the Hunt, Moon, Maidens, Archery, Wilderness, Radiance, Forests, Childbirth and Insanity

Greek Names: Artemis
Roman Name: Diana

Symbol: A Silver Bow Against a Moon

Firstborn child of Leto. Illegitimate daughter of Zeus. When she was born, she rapidly aged to the maturity of a six year old child and was able to assist her mother in the birth of her twin brother, Phoebus Apollon. For this, she was granted the Domain of Childbirth. At 3 years of age, convinced her father Zeus to swear an oath to grant her one wish. Upon getting his vow, revealed that her one wish was to get six wishes fulfilled. Was a childhood friend of Persephone, who also wished to be a virgin goddess as a triad with her and Athena. Was on 'Team Athena' during the Olympiomachy. When Zeus retook his throne, nearly had her essence burned through by her father's lightning bolt as punishment. Inherited the Moon Chariot from Selene. Is a Quester.

Phoebus Apollon
God of Prophecy, Poetry, Music, Knowledge, Healing, Sun, Truth, Archery, Art, Disease and Plague

Greek Names: Apollo
Roman Name: Apollo

Symbol: A Golden Bow Against a Sun

Second born child of Leto. Illegitimate son of Zeus. Was granted the Domain of Prophecy upon his defeat of the mighty serpent Python. Is the patron of four oracle spirits, the Oracle of Cumae, the Oracle of Trophonius, the Oracle of Delphi and the Oracle of Erythaea. Was on 'Team Athena' during the Olympiomachy and was protected from Zeus' wrath by his mother and sister. Was forced to undergo a mortal trial with Poseidon, serving a Trojan king as a sheep herder as punishment. Found Percy when he was five and trained his prophetic talents. Plays Dungeons and Dragons as a bard, but his dice have been cursed by Tyche, goddess of fortune. Inherited the Sun Chariot from Helios.

Ares
God of War, Bloodlust, Courage and Civil Order

Roman Name: Mars

Legitimate son of Zeus by Hera. Was on 'Team Zeus' during the Olympiomachy. Lover of Aphrodite.

Hephaestus
God of the Forge, Volcanoes, Fire, Smiths, Craftsmen, Stonemasons, Sculpture, Metals, Magnetism and Gravity.

Roman Name: Vulcan

Firstborn son of Hera alone. The nature of his mother's divinity tainted the pathogenesis and Hephaestus was born with a genetic 'father' in the star-spawn Phanes-Dionysus. His father's influence proved dominant, enough to allow him to kill the Gigantes Mimas by himself without demigod help. A feat impossible for a Young god. He was raised from two weeks old by the nereid Thetis. He provided Hera with chains unable to be broken by the one ensnared in return for her solemn oath to love him as a mother should. Freed Athena from imprisonment with his foster mother Thetis and was hurled from Olympus, breaking every bone in his body by Zeus as punishment. Husband of Aphrodite.

Aphrodite
Goddess of Love, Beauty, Sexuality, Physical Pleasure and Procreation.

Sumerian Name: Inanna, Queen of Heaven
Akkadian/Babylonian/Assyrian Name: Ishtar
Hurrian/Hittite Name: Šauška
Canaanite Name: Astarte
Roman Name: Venus

Symbol: A Crowned Dove

Myth: Daughter of Ouranos, created when the blood of his castrated genitals met Thalassa of Deep Waters, birthing the goddess from the sea foam.

Truth: An foreign goddess ascended into an Old God by a Name of the god behind Greek Primordial of Fate was originally of the Sumerian pantheon known as the Queen of Heaven. Her presence in the Greek pantheon is unexplained, but it is known that she attempted to ascend beyond her means by way of consuming Ouranos. The attempt failed leaving a broken goddess behind. Was on 'Team Zeus' during the Olympiomachy. Lover of Ares, wife of Hephaestus. Has 'defective' demigods that possess an ability similar to Siren Song. Her typical children have a wide variety of talents born from her various Names.

Hermes
God of Travelers, Thieves, Messengers, Commerce, Trade, Diplomacy, Orators, Athletes, Trade and Invention

Roman Name: Mercury

Son of Maia, eldest of the Pleiades nymphs. Illegitimate son of Zeus. Born within a cavern near the peaks of Mount Kyllene in Arkadia. Shortly after birth, he snuck out and stole from the herds of Apollo. When Apollo was mocked for accusing a newborn godling of theft, Hermes promptly blew his own cover to eloquently argue before Zeus that he was too young and cute to possibly be the thief. This amused his father so much he was given the task of herding departed souls to the Underworld and was elevated to a throne as a member of the Dodekatheon. Has an assistant named Milos. Ticketed Percy's mother for a cross-pantheon violation. Tried to save his son Luke from his destined Fate by assigning the boy a Quest to steal a Golden Apple from the Garden of the Hesperides. Once eaten, that apple is capable of giving a demigod immortal life. Was punished by the Fates for this attempt by exposing him to Percy's eldest sibling, Adrasteia.

Dionysus
God of Religious Fervor, Ritual Madness, Wine, Grape Vines, Theatre and Revelry

Greek Names: The Twice-Born, Chubster God (by Percy)
Roman Name: Bacchus

Myth: Illegitimate son of Zeus by Semele. Former demigod. Was raised by his mortal aunt and uncle until they were driven mad by Hera, making them kill their children save Dionysus and then themselves. Was driven mad by Hera as punishment for his existence but was able to have it lifted by the Titaness Rhea. Rescued his mother Semele and wife Ariadne from the Underworld. Invented wine. Wandered Egypt for a time. Invaded India and was eventually forced to retreat, but returned having achieved apotheosis as a god. Ascended to Mount Olympus and was given the throne of former Olympian Hestia. Is the current Director of Camp Half-Blood.

Athena
Goddess of Wisdom, Strategic War, Handicrafts and Kings

Greek Names: Athena Promachus, Who Fights on the Front Line. Athena Areia, the Judge/the Warlike. Athena Polias, the Protector of Cities. Athena Hygieia, the Inspiration of Physicians. Athena Glaukopis, the Owl Eyed or Bright Eyed. Athena Apatouria, the Deceiver. Athena Ageleia, Leader of the People. Pallas Athena. Patron of Heroes. Wanax, the High King. Owl-Head (by Apollo)
Roman Name: Minerva

Firstborn of Zeus and Metis. Was prophesied to overthrow her father which lead to her mother's demise. Was born from Zeus' head after it was split open by Hephaestus in full armor and was promptly blasted off Mt. Olympus by the Master Bolt. Was named 'Athena' by the Titaness of Fresh Water Tethys and fostered with Triton, the son of Amphitrite and Poseidon. Hoping to break the sea's protection of Athena, Zeus interfered in a duel between her and her childhood friend, the sea nymph Pallas, causing her to land a fatal blow. Was escorted to Olympus by Oceanus where she confronted her father and received her Prophecy. Was able to convince Olympus that she was not the subject until it came time for her coup that led to the Olympiomachy. Was forced to give Names to the Devouring Void by Zeus after capture and eventually surrendered. Is feuding with Poseidon over her decision to do so. The architect of the Olympiomachy cover up. Lied before Adrasteia, the Inescapable and received the Name Apatouria by the Daughter of Ananke herself. Was barred from paying her debt to Luke by the Fates.

Spoiler: Other Deities

The Mórrígan
Tuatha de of Victory and Death in Battle

Celtic Titles: Morrigu, Anand, Mór-Ríoghain (Modern Irish), Phantom Queen, Harbinger of Fate
Mortal Alias: Mórrígan Stele

Was the consort of the Dagda. Is a confirmed Name of the god behind the Greek Primordial of Fate. Married mortal Dorian Stele and raised his son, the Greek demigod Percy Stele. Was ticketed for a cross-pantheon violation and is currently missing.

Aten
A solar deity of the Egyptian pantheon. Confirmed Name of an Elder God Nyarlathotep, the Crawling Chaos.

Egyptian Titles: Itn, Atonu, Aton, The Black Pharaoh

Was the focus of Atenism, a cult started by Amenhotep IV, who changed his name to Akhenaten and claimed to be a demigod of Aten. Aten was compared to Ma'at, as the Order and life-giver of the world, by means only belief in Akhenaten and his wife Nefertiti knew the truth of. The cult fell apart with his death as his son, Tutankhamun, reinstated traditional worship of Ra and other Egyptian deities. The cult was later erased by Horemheb.

Boreas
God of the North Wind and Winter

Was a revolutionary on Team Athena during the Olympiomachy and has been on house arrest under the command of Aeolus, Master of the Winds ever since. Stole away Oreithyia, nymph daughter of Erekhteus, King of Athens to be his wife. Father of the Boreads, Zetes and Kalais and the Boreides, Kleopatra and Khione.

Khione
Goddess of Ice and Snow

Daughter of Boreas, the North Wind. Unlike her siblings, she was born an immortal deity and received the Name of Khione from her mother in an effort to sway Olympus in granting citizenship to her daughter. The application was rejected and Khione was classified a nymph without the full protection of the law. She was loved by many gods, most notably Poseidon to whom she gave birth to the hero Eumolpus who was cast into the sea and given to his half-sister to raise by his father. Boasted of her beauty in comparison to Artemis, and survived the subsequent murder attempt. To save face, her application for godhood was reconsidered by Olympus. Wished to help on the search for the Master Bolt, but holds a severe grudge against the goddess of the Hunt.

Iris
Goddess of the Rainbow

Amphitrite's first cousin as the daughter of Thaumas, son of Pontus and Electra, daughter of Oceanus and Tethys. The OG Messenger of the Gods during the Titanomachy having sided with the Olympians just as her sister Arke sided with Kronos. Married to Zephyrus, the West Wind. Butch Walker's mother and appears to have a form that looks like a ten sided starfish built out of neon light astrolabe.

Nemesis
Goddess of Retribution, Vengeance and Balance

Greek Names: The Rhamnousia, Punisher of Hubris Before the Gods.

Daughter of Nyx, the Night and Erebus, the Darkness. Niece of Percy. Mother of the Greek demigod Ethan Nakamura. Has unleashed the physical manifestation of Artemis' past sins, her former Hunter Aura, to hunt the Questers. Has a form that looks like a grinding mass of teeth.

Alecto
Erinyes of Revenge, Crime and Punishment

Greek Names: Fury. The Persecution. Alekto, the Unceasing.

Daughter of Nyx, Eldest of the Triplets.

Odin
Æsir of Wisdom, Death, Knowledge, War, Sorcery, Poetry, Frenzy and the Gallows.

Germanic Names: Wōden, Wōdan, Wuotan, Wuodan, Wōđanaz, Óðinn, the All-Father

Was Named as a contemporary of Kronos.

Atum
Unknown deity of an unknown pantheon.

Was Named as a contemporary of Kronos.

Apophis

Egyptian Names: Apep, Lord of Chaos, Enemy of Ra

An alien that came to earth and was adopted into the Egyptian pantheon.

Hestia
Goddess of the Hearth, Family, Home, Domesticity, Virginity, Existence of State and the Sacrificial Flames

Greek Names: Hestia Prytaneia, of the Hearth. Hestia Potheinotáti, the Beloved. Beckendorf 2.0 (by Campers)
Roman Name: Vesta

Firstborn of Kronos and Rhea. Was offered the throne to be King of the Gods, but turned it down in favor of Zeus and Metis. Regretted doing so after Zeus swallowed Metis and became a poor ruler. Was on 'Team Athena' during the Olympiomachy. Was a member of the Dodekatheon, but stepped down from her throne in favor of Dionysus and carved out her Queenly name of Hestia Basileia. Was a key advisor and high ranking official in Athena's court. Is currently being aggressively befriended by Campers at Camp Half-Blood in an attempt to keep her from Fading.

Hades
God of Riches and of the Dead

Greek Titles: The Rich One, Uncle Dead (by Hermes)
Roman Name: Pluto

Fourth born child of Kronos and Rhea. Was made administrator of the Underworld and is considered the Lord of it. Is suspected by Olympus to still be gathering Names via his dead worshippers. Has the influence of Nyx, the Night, on him making it difficult for other gods to sense him. Husband of Persephone. Owner of Spot (Cerberus).

Persephone
Goddess of Spring Growth, Flowers, Vegetation and of Withering

Greek Names: Despoina, of Mystery. Kore, the Maiden. Lady of the Underworld.
Roman Name: Proserpina

Symbol: A Pomegranate Flower

Myth: Illegitimate child of Zeus. Ate six pomegranate seeds while in the Underworld, compelling her to remain for at least six months of the year.
Firstborn child of Demeter. Wife of Hades. Wished to be a virgin goddess as a triad with Artemis and Athena, but was abducted by Hades.

Hypnos
Personification of Sleep

Roman Name: Somnus

Son of Nyx and (step) Erebus. Younger twin brother of Thanatos, the God of Death. Friend of Percy.

Thanatos
God of Death

Roman Name: Mors

Son of Nyx and (step) Erebus. Older twin brother of Hypnos, the Personification of Sleep.

Morpheus
God of Dreams

Son of Somnus, the Roman Name of Hypnos and the Roman Grace, Pasithea. Is of the Roman pantheon, with a Greek Name because his father doesn't care about the divide. Guards the borders of the Dreamlands. Friend of Percy.

Erebus
Personification of Darkness

Roman Name: Scotus

Child of Ananke. Consort of Nyx. Gave Percy a Stygian Iron dagger. When Night fell, sent his step-son Thanatos to retrieve Hypnos and Percy, but when Percy turned down the invitation due to a misunderstanding, came to find out what was going on. Encountered Percy in a bit of trouble in the Dreamlands and proceeded to 'loosen his shackles,' allowing his little brother to take on an eldritch form to battle a sea monster.

Herakles
God of Heroism

Greek Names: Alcides, mortal name. Herakles Engonasin, the Kneeler. Herakles Mantiklos, the Hero. Herakles Leontothymos, the Lion-Hearted.
Roman Name: Hercules

Illegitimate son of Zeus by Alcmene. Was renamed Herakles to appease the Queen of the Gods. Husband of Hebe, goddess of Youth. During the Giant War, his divine backup was Athena with the exception of the slaying of Porphyrion at the behest of his father Zeus. Was on Team Athena during the Olympiomachy. Ascended to godhood at his death after being unwittingly poisoned by his second wife with the tainted blood of a centaur. Was an Argonaut after the Golden Fleece sometime after his apotheosis where the Boreads, Zethes and Calais convinced the crew to leave him behind and in return, Herakles killed them for the treachery.

Saulė
Goddess of the Baltic Sun

Latvian Name: Saule

The common solar deity of the Baltic religion of the Lithuanian and Latvian cultures. Is said to live in a silver gated castle at the 'edge' of the sea. Was stated by Percy that her orphanage and her duty was all she has.

Manannán mac Lir
Tuatha de of Violent Deaths on Sea and Land

Celtic Titles: Manandán, Mannan, son of the Sea, King of Tír na nÓg, the Otherword. King of the Tuath Dé

The Irish Celtic war god not only rules over his lands, and tribe, but also uses the Mist, called the féth fíada to conceal his home and the sidh dwellings of others. Has a demigod daughter that came to Percy's 10th birthday party.

Aether
Personification of the Celestial Sky

Child of Ananke. Boyfriend of Hemera. Gave his step-father Dorian Stele and little brother, Percy Stele a ball of star dust from an aborted star to eat. Manga addict and enjoys eating icy moons and planets out in deep space.

Hemera
Personification of Daylight

Believed to be a child of Nyx, Hemera is often at Aether's side, roaming the cosmos. Percy describes her as a 'pulsar' that his mother had to prevent from vaporizing him by accident and she once crashed his twelfth birthday picnic as a go-between his Elder brothers with their gifts, Erebus' Stygian Iron dagger and Aether's star dust ball.

Spoiler: Demigods

Perseus "Percy" D. Stele
Son of Primordial Fate and mortal father, the lawyer Dorian Stele. Raised by The Mórrigan. Currently the Oracle of Chthon. Prophecies are given via 'tarot' using Mythomagic cards. Has a crush on Artemis. Has a non-standard biology of protruding spine, extra ribs and undefined organs. Had additional sets of teeth, but they were removed by his mother. Is a Quester.

Clovis
Son of Hypnos, sleeps through Sundays visiting his father. Calls Percy his cousin and vice versa. Also has non-standard biology, such as a protruding spine, extra ribs, a second heart, the ability to sleep with half his brain, and three sets of teeth. Non-reflective eyes.

Ethan Nakamura
Son of Nemesis. Percy calls him first cousin once removed. Also has non-standard biology such as a visibly protruding spine with oddly shaped vertebrae, fangs and moving patches within his non-reflective eyes.

Bianca and Nico di Angelo
Children of Hades. Were alive when the Great Prophecy was given by the Oracle of Delphi. Presumed dead after being struck by Zeus.

Thalia Grace
Daughter of Zeus, currently a pine tree. Zeus turned her into a tree to save her soul from Hades' retribution. Hestia accepted her dying wish to protect her friends, Luke and Annabeth, creating the barrier of protection around Camp Half-Blood powered by her Sacrifice.

Luke Castellan
Son of Hermes and May Castellan, a prophet who went mad while trying to become the Oracle of Delphi, and ran against Hades' curse. Luke still holds a grudge against Hermes for this. Definitely did not steal the Master Bolt and doesn't work for Kronos. Was previously on a quest that failed, he made it out with a scar, the other two didn't make it out at all. The camp counselor for Cabin 11, which means he's also the counselor for the unclaimed and those without a cabin, and also Percy. Is a Quester.

Annabeth Chase
Daughter of Athena and the mortal Frederick Chase, a Military History professor. Friends with Luke, is the counselor for Athena Cabin despite being really young. Enthusiastic about learning more, a major character in canon, though hasn't been as much here. Has a cousin who's a Norse demigod.

Malcolm Pace
Son of Athena.

Masayuki
Son of Athena. Black hair.

Silena Beauregard
Daughter of Aphrodite's Name of Astarte. 'Horse-pigeon' whisperer, great Archer.

Drew Tanaka
An Aphrodite 'defect.' The cover story is that she inherited more from the Sea than usual, has a divine gift of a pearl bracelet. Percy speculates it's a Mist cloak. Called Percy a weirdo.

Maximilian
Son of Aphrodite's Name of Ishtar. Sense of fairness, flips a drachma when he can't decide things.

Jacqueline
Daughter of Aphrodite's Name of Šauška. Her mood changes based on what feathers are in her hair, has feathers of endangered birds.

Lace/Lacy
Child of Aphrodite's Name of Šauška. Genderfluid, with scarily good healing powers, especially for a seven-year-old.

Renico
Claimed as son of Aphrodite, but Percy thinks he's actually son of a Hindu deity. He has a perfect internal clock and rises with the sun.

Michael Yew
Son of Apollo. Does music and archery.

Lee Fletcher
Son of Apollo, very freeform with his Dungeon Mastering.

Castor and Pollux
Children of Dionysus, identical twins. Percy's friends. Play D&D as a Druid and a Cleric.

Katie Gardner
Daughter of Demeter, counselor. Play D&D as a Monk.

Charles Beckendorf
Son of Hephaestus. Has his '2.0' sidekick Hestia helping him around Camp.

Angelina
Daughter of Hephaestus

Everett
Son of Hephaestus

Clarisse La Rue
Daughter of Ares, likes hazing new kids. Threatened to put her foot up Hestia's ass, in an encouraging way.

Ryan
Son of Ares. Admired Percy's sword.

Alabaster and Liza
Hecate's children. Get a polecat from their mother.

Lou Ellen and Moni
Also probably Hecate's children, though they get a puppy.

Butch Walker
Child of Iris, can IM for free.

Chris Rodrigues
Son of Hermes, recently Claimed. Resentful of how long he was Unclaimed for.

Spoiler: Non-humans

Clifford Randall
A Cynocephali 'Dog-headed' boy aged 3. Has the maturity of a 15 year old human boy and looks like a Golden Labrador from the shoulders up. Has a mastiff-headed mother. Called Cliff by his friend Percy. Is an Egyptian 'magician.'

Chiron
A centaur son of Kronos and Oceanid Philyra. Was trained by Apollo in his youth and in turn became a trainer of heroes. The gods returned him to life and granted him immortality as long as he teaches. Is the Activities Director at Camp Half-Blood.

Sam
An orange tabby cat of the Dreamlands. Has a crook in his tail due to Percy (age 2) pulling on it. Will not let this go, calling Percy 'Lil Fucker and 'His Royal Tail Puller.' Has the title of Master Sorceror. Went to the moon with Percy and was banished from his home of Ulthar because of it. Lost his right eye during that trip and Percy's mother replaced it.

Argus
Watchman of Camp Half-Blood. Disowned son of Hera, known as a 'pseudo-Giant' servant. Like his brother Hephaestus, the nature of Hera's divinity tainted the process and he was born with a genetic 'father' in Phanes.

Spoiler: Notable Humans

Dorian Stele
Father of Percy Stele, husband of Mórrígan Stele. A Manhattan lawyer born of Greek immigrants who somehow drew the attention of Ananke. It cost him his sanity for several years, but eventually recovered.

Corey Achebe
Good Samaritan that gave our Questers a ride to Quebec City. A demi-alien clear sighted Canadian who lives in Montreal, attended college in Dublin, Ireland, has an American girlfriend, a Volvo and a dog named Bradley.

Wilhelm I
An old Prussian king that lives on after his death in the Dreamlands. Also known as Willie. Made the mistake of being a concerned adult, escorting Percy to the moon to meet his mother and in return lost his left arm. It was replaced and the replacement makes him very uncomfortable.

 

[Shujin]

An Undertow of Sand
A PJO Fanfiction
​

It was about two in the afternoon on the second day of our Quest.

Fuck.

How sure was I that Argus didn't drive us out of Camp Half-Blood years ago?

It felt like it had been years.

Maybe a decade or two.

I was a strange kind of numb. I should be feeling a lot of things and I think I was, but there were too many feelings and too much to feel and I had just stopped processing everything. My emotions were waiting for the next shoe to drop.

I felt like, and probably looked like, a drowned rat clinging to the mane of the lion carrying Luke. Everything dripped. Water was still making tracks down my face (but at least it's not blood). My shoes squelched. I was cold. It was overcast, wherever we were, with only occasional god rays of sunlight peeking through. The gravel road we walked on felt abandoned. Grass and weeds were closing in from the sides and there were puddles of water leftover from rain. I stepped over a pothole and pulled a little on the lion's mane to keep my balance.

It chuffed, glancing at me.

"Sorry," I told Sam's six hundred pound second cousin, relaxing my grip. "My bad."

"You're fine," Rhea said as she flicked the lion's ear. "Widdle just bein' a drama queen."

I gave the lion a look.

It was literally as tall as I was.

"Widdle?"

There were many things you could name your pet lion and then there was that.

Her lips twisted unhappily as she raised her sunglasses to settle in her braided dark hair. She might have given her pet a look too, but it was hard to tell exactly where she was looking with those fly eyes of hers.

"He won't answer to anything else."

The lion arrogantly lifted its nose into the air and walked a little faster.

I get it.

Cat.

We fell into silence again. I fidgeted.

"Where are we?"

"Long Beach," she answered. "Mississippi."

I stumbled a bit as my spine liquified. We were almost literally on the other side of the North American continent from Quebec City.

Safe.

At least for a bit.

I sniffled a little. I don't know why. We had some leeway. If we were lucky, we'd ditched the nightmare for good. I don't think we would get lucky, but there was no sign of it and we just had to keep moving as soon as Luke was back on his feet and get the Master Bolt and go home. Easy. We had our break and I was an experienced demigod adventurer. This wasn't worth crying over.

I shivered. I sniffled again.

Rhea bowed her head.

She said nothing.

"How long - " my voice embarrassingly cracked. I stared down at my shoes. "Are we almost…?"

"We're here," was the soft reply.

I looked up.

"Um." I winced, but said it anyway. "Nice place?"

Rhea squinted, like she had to check if anything changed, before she directed a wry smile my way.

"It's a mess," she said bluntly.

Yeah, I lied.

It was a mess.

We had finally reached the home of the former Queen of the Gods. And it was a small light blue bungalow home that had vomited out its insides onto the front lawn. It was half spring cleaning in the wrong month and half garage sale. There was an antique grandfather clock that looked like Big Ben right beside a Volkswagen safari van decorated with swirling black frond designs on burnt orange like a Greek Mystery Machine. There were random pieces of furniture (coffee table, nightstand, dresser, lamp, lamp, la - what is that? Weird lamp) sitting on the grass among the jungle of cardboard boxes that weren't all taped shut and giant cat toys. A lot of them.

Along with the giant cats.

An entire pride of lions lounged around in what little free space remained, or made free space like only a cat would, sleeping on unfolded boxes, crushing folded boxes under their butts, and reclining on the ratty sofa in the driveway. There were some cubs playing with a weathered soccer ball underneath the U-Haul wagon. It was a mess, but it looked like a comfortable kind of mess.

I guess that wasn't saying much.

Cats could make a paper bag look comfy.

"You're...moving?" I guessed. I stepped through what was definitely a barrier or some kind around her property. I could feel it taste me, raising the hairs on my arms.

"You got it," Rhea said easily. "I just closed on a nice place in upstate New York with this Indian cafe right down the street?" She let out a happy little sigh, absentmindedly bopping a curious lion on the nose as her granddaughter bled all over her blue and yellow shirt. "Their butter chicken? Amazing." The second step leading up to her front door creaked a little. "Mind the pottery."

Uh.

Right.

"Can't you just - uh." I waved a hand around my head as I stepped around the large Grecian vase in the middle of the foyer. The inside of the bungalow looked completely normal, like it belonged to a normal pottery enthusiast with a few exotic pets that were probably illegal and was moving out like a normal person. Half of the living room was cramped and crowded with boxes and a moved sofa while the rest of the room was blank and empty. There were glass cases with old school Minoan bowls and vases right alongside boxes filled with faded 1960s magazines proudly standing against the Vietnam War. There were photo albums stuffed almost to bursting. Stamp and coin collections were carefully packed away underneath a few paint splattered easels.

Why was she even bothering?

"Can't you just zap this all over there, or something?"

"And deprive myself of that 'finally moved in' feel?" She asked incredulously as we both made way for the lion carrying Luke's limp body (Luke was okay, he was okay, we're fine - ) to pad past us into a side room. "That's, like, an entire seven month process, man. You wouldn't believe how bummed out I would be if I skipped it."

The Queen of the Titans just used the word 'bummed.'

"Bummed out."

She raised an eyebrow. "Is that not in use anymore? You know, it would be a total mood killer, a downer, a complete drag - "

" - where'd you learn to talk like that?" I interrupted her.

"Woodstock."

That makes sense.

Wait.

"Why were you - " On second thought - "Never mind."

"It's the little things," Rhea explained patiently as we stepped into what looked like the kitchen. It was homey, dirty dishes still in the sink and everything. "Effort. Meaning. Time. It's all relative. Reality is a frame of mind."

Sometimes Mom did things like this. Like driving instead of teleporting me around. Putting just enough effort into burning our penthouse down so Dad would try to help cook or listen to me talk about my day. It helped keep her here. With us. Grounded.

"Trying to keep yourself from drifting?" I ventured.

"Trying to keep the Dream alive."

"Oh right, you're - " I had the word on the tip of my tongue and as soon as I went to say it, it disappeared. I quickly threw out another one. "Hibernating?"

She accepted that, nodding. "Repetition helps."

That took me right back to my childhood, in that weird word association way your brain sometimes does. Or maybe just my brain. Back to the audiobook Wheel of Time by Robert Jordan and the smell of freshly cut strawberries.

There was a certain safety in repetition.

I don't think that's what Rhea meant though.

"Like boring yourself to bed?"

That got me one of those softly amused looks, like I was this little yapping Pomeranian puppy she was sizing up for a sweater and booties. I watched her set Artemis on the counter and for a moment, I thought she was going to break out the cutting board and knives to put the rabbit out of her misery.

I felt bad for thinking that. Then I felt mad for feeling bad about it. Then I felt guilty for feeling mad about feeling bad.

It was -

It was a thing.

"Go on," Zeus' mother said as her hands lit up with that smokeless, writhing fire again as she prodded the bunny's broken leg. "Have a seat."

The kitchen table was a round, wooden piece covered in doilies with mismatched chairs, like she had just gradually added to the collection from garage sales. I picked a wooden chair with an overstuffed green cushion that looked like it had been chewed on a little. One of the legs was short, making me wobble.

Everything about this was awkward.

Rhea married into the Greek pantheon, but Mom...never explained what that meant beyond the obvious. Did she outrank me? Was it the other way around? Was it one of those things where we didn't want to piss each other off because I had Mom and she had the Pit?

Except he was asleep, while Mom wasn't so…

I don't know.

This was like the first time I met Hypnos, but worse. It was like going to one of those parties with Grandpa and getting introduced to his friends' kids who were all way older than me. I was supposed to play nice, but I was in sixth grade and they were already halfway through their college majors.

And I had to make friends anyway.

I was just a demigod at the end of the day. I was important to Mom, but I was mortal. Was I being dumb if I assumed Rhea thought I was any different from Luke, her great grandson?

I was probably being stupid.

Mom never told me anything personal about the other Elder Gods. Did she even like the god beneath the Pit? Was she friends with the god behind the Night? What were the rules with their Greek Names? There was this traditional greeting thing, and yeah I blew it, but Rhea spoke English first so it wasn't my fault? And it kind of made my throat hurt and my head feel weird, but it just wasn't the same in American and I…

I was a little worried about Kronos.

I don't think he was on Mom's side anymore.

That probably didn't mean anything, right? It would be like assuming Luke would jump to defend Zeus just because Hermes did. Maybe the Titan Lord was just like me. He didn't have the whole picture and what he did see was through a human lens and he misunderstood.

But Rhea...

Rhea was loyal.

Not all of the star spawn rebelled.

I was just being paranoid.

I breathed out, trying to calm my racing thoughts.

I was being paranoid.

The Matriarch of the Swarm had stepped in to save us (Luke was fine - he's okay), but her granddaughter was a piece of work and her son was mad at me. Her (ex?) husband didn't like my mother and the rest of her children in charge of Olympus were compulsive liars, but she saved us.

I didn't know what to say.

So I just kept my mouth shut as Rhea quietly worked on putting the rabbit back together.

I don't do well with silence.

In a desperate attempt to keep my ADHD from making me deliberately rock my chair - because that shit got annoying quickly and if I did it I would only be annoying myself - I started leafing through the doilies on the table. They were all ridiculously elaborate, floral designs made to mimic actual flowers. You could tell that this was a hibiscus and this one was a lotus just by the pattern.

I found myself picking at a loose thread in a lace dandelion when my back twinged. Something shifted in my bones. It felt like I pulled a long splinter out from underneath my ribs. I grunted, hunching over and accidentally pulled on the thread too hard. The corner of the dandelion visibly unraveled in my hands.

Fuck.

"That ought to do it." Apollo's grandmother hummed. I grabbed the nearest magazine and pretended to have been reading it (lingerie catalog, why) and casually slid the sloppy dandelion underneath it as she turned around. "How about you? Hurt anywhere?"

I shrugged. My back and side were already itching. Scabbed over already. My stomach felt a bit better, but it still throbbed grumpily.

"I heal quickly," I mumbled.

I was fine.

Again.

"Naturally." Rhea knelt beside my chair and laid her head on folded arms. She had multicolored bangles and bracelets with all kinds of feel good messages on them, from the lavender 'Peace is a Journey' to the silver 'Wake up. Kick Ass. Sleep. Repeat.'

"Would you say no to some nectar?" She asked softly.

I swallowed and mutely shook my head.

Then I stared as a Dora the Explorer sippy cup was placed in front of me.

"I - I'm - I'm twelve?" I had to say it. "Not two."

"There's a difference?" Rhea sounded genuinely confused, turning back to me from the pantry.

"Uh, yes." I said blandly. "A big one."

She crossed her arms. "Really?"

"A humongous differ - look, how do you not know this?"

"It's...been a while," she retorted dryly. "So you're twelve. Big whoop. I should've given you a bottle. Adrasteia was still nursing at your age."

That brought me up short.

"Oh," I said dumbly.

I tried to imagine the Inescapable in a high chair with a fucking sippy cup and I just can't. I couldn't even do it with Aether or Erebus.

The Fates in diapers??

Rhea was around for the birth of Mom's firstborn.

Rhea was older than the current sun.

You ever have that moment when you look at someone and realize they grew up before vinyl and just go 'shit, you're literally old as hell?' I have that moment a few times a year with Apollo and Mom and I am straight useless for about ten seconds each time.

No idea how Dad keeps his head wrapped around it.

With a click of her fingers, the sippy cup was replaced with a Stayin' Alive Bee Gees mug. After a moment of consideration, Rhea got her own mug with a rainbow 'Imagine' emblazoned on the side.

"Twelve years…" She mused out loud. She chopped her index finger through the air, as if counting on an invisible white board. "Your birthday ain't August 18th, is it?"

I blinked as I sipped the chouchen taste-a-like. "No, November." Right day though. "Why?"

She shrugged one shoulder.

"The Grove screamed on that day," she said airily, leaning back against her counter like trees just do that sometimes. Scream. "Scared me half to fucking death - I thought it had been gone forever but then - " She stopped herself with an odd little smile playing around her mouth as she absently petted her conked out granddaughter. "Your mother has always gotten a real kick out of doing what no one expects her to."

That sounded like Mom alright.

"She ripped you off," I mumbled into my mug. I winced as soon as it came out of my mouth. I probably should be more respectful. She might be touchy about that.

"Oh, hun." Rhea said softly, looking a bit pained. "I let those trees burn for a reason."

I almost choked. "Bwhat? But that's - "

"They put me through the age of telemarketing fifteen hundred years in advance."

" - completely understandable."

There is no way Mom didn't do that on purpose.

Come on. Taking talking prophetic tree seeds in return for fighitng the Earth Mother and then tens of thousands of years later you find out it was all for a fucking telemarketing gag? That was Mom's sense of humor in a nutshell.

She's still not funny.

"So Mom didn't just rip you off," I concluded as Rhea lifted her mug to her lips. "She also gave you the middle finger."

I could have kicked myself. Didn't I just say I needed to be respectful -

Rhea spat out her drink and laughed.

She laughed like Mom did. It didn't matter that it was a wheezing cackle like a pig with asthma, she was completely unashamed of it. She laughed like she had been waiting to laugh for centuries.

"You are so much like your sister!" She wheezed. "Oh, so much." Her voice turned wistful. "So much…"

"Yeah?" I asked softly, smiling.

"Totally," Rhea said with a toothy grin that showed a few too many teeth. "Absolutely righteous, in every possible way. Your mother deserves little shits for kids."

I mean.

That's fair.

"Your brothers are so boring," Rhea continued as that lingering awkwardness in the air faded away. I guess we had both been waiting for some kind of clue that the other didn't have a stick up our ass. "Aether had some promise, but Erebus…" She shook her head as she cleaned up with a napkin. "Took too much after his father that one." She means Chronus. Time. Mom's ex. "And don't get me started on - on - oh what is her name." She clicked her fingers a few times. "What is - the anal retentive one. The eldest of the triplets."

Rhea straight forgot the names of the Fates.

"Clotho," I offered.

"That's the one!" At first she was happy to finally have the name, but then...she had the name. The look her face shifted to afterwards was the most exhausted, put upon look I have ever seen in my life. It was like she had stared into the Abyss, wondering if it could get any worse and then the Abyss said 'Hold my beer.'

It had all the energy of Mom's Quantum Stupid face. Just with foreseeing obnoxious as fuck instead of dumb as fuck.

"...that's the one," Rhea sing-songed softly as she tossed the napkin. "That's the one."

"They are kind of…" I began, but then I realized the mother of the elder Olympians would probably know a lot more than me about my sisters'...everything. "Yeah."

"Absolutely," she agreed with the unsaid. She cast a thoughtful look at the rabbit on the counter and then conjured up a small wicker basket with a blanket inside. She picked Artemis up and the former goddess of the Hunt was a complete ragdoll, totally out of it and actually snoring with her mouth open.

"If you chew on this, I will tell your father to ground you," Rhea whispered as she gently placed the rabbit inside. "So what Domains do you have?" She asked me as she tucked her granddaughter in. "You feel...similar to your eldest sibling. Something from the Eimarmene Name?"

What?

"You're Young, right?" You could hear the capital Y. "Have to be, spawns take longer to grow - "

"I'm a demigod," I said sharply.

I'm not a spawn.

"I - I'm mortal," I said softer. "My father is human."

"Your fath - " Rhea blinked, like she had lost track of the conversation for a second. "Different Name, right," she waved off. "Mortal father." Her compound eyes changed color from green to a rainbow of blues and purples. "Unreal. I didn't think that was possible."

"...could you explain?" I asked, uneasy. Hadn't Kronos said something similar? He didn't, right?

He didn't.

"Wellll," Rhea drawled. "I imagine it was still a Tab A in Slot B kind of - "

"Oh my god, not that explanation!" I yelped. She was definitely related to Apollo. "I don't need that explanation!"

"And she raised a prude!" Rhea practically squealed. "How did that happen? Are you sure you're Greek?"

"I'm twelve!"

"Mortal, duh," she remembered. "Shit. Sorry." She ran fingers through the ends of her dark hair, transforming the flowers into golden bands engraved with flower designs instead. "A mortal child. With those eyes?" She hummed, looking up at the ceiling and then she shook her head. "That should have been lethal."

"My Dad's fine," I grumped.

"Not him, humanity isn't that far gone," she dismissed and then paused. "I think. Maybe. No, I meant you."

That hung in the air like a dead skunk in a garbage bag.

You.

I swallowed hard.

My sisters. The Fates.

They tried to get Mom to abort me once.

"Well it wasn't," I said weakly. "Mom would never let that happen."

"...I suppose," Rhea allowed. She tilted her head in this diagonal, sudden inhuman movement as her eyes shimmered a deep maroon color. "There's a Prophecy about you…" she murmured softly. "I almost missed it."

"Uh," I said, surprised. "Yeah? I mean, technically two, but - "

She grabbed a chair at her table, a worn dark wood piece with bleached cushions and flipped it around to sit on it backwards.

"Tell me," she almost barked before softening her voice to a near whisper. "Please."

I fiddled with my mug.

It's not a big deal.

It's not like it was some kind of secret. I'm sure everyone on Olympus knows already. And Prophecies mean whatever we think they mean.

So she didn't just ask me to recite my eulogy.

"A half-blood child of the eldest gods," I said slowly. "Shall reach sixteen against all odds. And see the world in endless sleep. The hero's soul, cursed blade shall reap." A shiver went down my spine, like a goose had just tap danced on my grave. "A single choice shall end his days, Olympus to preserve or raze."

It wasn't the same without Apollo stumbling through it, going on tangents to try to explain how it wasn't that bad compared to some of the other Prophecies he witnessed.

After all, at best, there would be only one death.

The Oracle of Delphi gave this one out sometime in 1945 after WWII which was just about sixty years ago. That was a pretty quick turn around, really. Some Prophecies have been waiting to kick in for millennia by now.

That didn't make me feel any better.

Rhea silently tipped her head back, gazing at the ceiling with her lips pursed.

I stared into my cup.

"Prophecies mean what we think they mean," I said stubbornly.

"They do." The patron of the Grove of Dodona murmured and something in my chest loosened. She agreed with me. Mom doesn't lie. "They can be interpreted differently. They can be...manipulated, to a certain extent. Forced down a path." Her gaze lowered, settling on me heavily. "A half-blood of the eldest gods…" The right corner of her lips pulled. Almost a smile. "Well. I suppose it had to happen eventually."

I frowned. "What had to happen?"

"An overreach," she said simply. Did she mean the Fates? "And the second Prophecy?"

"Um." The request caught me off guard a little. I leaned down, reaching out with my left hand for my backpack. It was dry and everything in it would be dry too. Mom knew her shit. I found my tin of cards and started laying them out on the table. I hesitated on number thirteen, but Rhea was a big girl. She could handle it.

"It's our Quest," I said as she gently picked up The Right Hand of Kronos card. She looked a bit sad, but that was it. I guess a few ten thousand years was enough time to get over one dumb motherfucker.

"Your son lost his sparkler and one of your grandkids swiped it somehow to frame your other son to start a war - " and I'm sure she wants to hear her family is being a bunch of idiots again. I cleared my throat uncomfortably. "We're, uh, we gotta find it."

"I see," she said softly as she put the card back down. "I had wondered."

I found myself staring at the card. The Right Hand of Kronos. It was a little skewed compared to the others and it felt right, somehow. Like this one card wasn't really like the others.

"I met him," my mouth said. "In the Dreamlands." I bit my lip. "A few days ago."

Had it really only been a few days?

Rhea hummed. "I can imagine what he told you."

I squirmed in my seat and wobbled on and off the short leg of my chair. I blurted out, "Were they really slaves?"

"Yes," she said simply.

"But they were freed," I said like a drowning man clings to a brick. Mom had slaves and they fought for her, but she wasn't like that anymore. "Right? They won their freedom. No more masters."

"Yes," Rhea said again softly, but she was giving me this sad, pitying look I didn't like. "No more masters."

I went quiet again. The easy atmosphere had died. I fiddled with my mug.

"Would you like some more?"

I nodded. "Yes, please." As she got up, I threw in, "Thank you, again, for saving us, I mean." I just wanted to not think about it. Mom was not perfect, but she never pretended to be. I don't - I don't want to be sitting here thinking about the answers to questions I never asked. It wasn't even about those answers. Mom doesn't lie. I didn't want to think about what it said about me that I never asked. "We were - there was one of - I think it was one of Artemis' former Hunters chasing us, but she was some kind of monster - "

"Ah." Rhea turned back to me with raised eyebrows. "Which one was it?"

Which -

I stood up so fast, my chair screeched across the linoleum floor.

My blood was boiling.

Which one.

"I - I need - " I couldn't breathe. I could barely see. "I need to - " I barely hear myself over the roar of the black feeling in my stomach. "I gotta go."

And I left.

I walked right out.

And as soon as I was through the barrier I broke into a run.

I found myself right back at the shore, throwing rocks into the violently crashing waves. I threw them harder, listening to them whistle as I threw them and hearing the sharp crack as the stones hit the water. Every part of me burned.

I was angry. I was hurt.

I felt smothered. The waves sounded weird. Warped. The rocks felt fragile and wrong in my hands, like there was something else I should have been holding. I felt like I was pressing up against an invisible curtain and if I stopped to really feel it would - I would -

I kept searching for rocks to throw, not even really seeing them. I barely registered the water climbing higher, getting my feet wet all over again. I just -

If I stopped -

It wasn't about Artemis.

The next rock I grabbed crumbled in the palm of my hand. Chunks of silt and debris dripped through my fingers.

I don't know what happened next.

There was a scream.

I snapped back into focus as soon as I felt him behind me. I didn't care what kind of excuses he had. He was the Greek god of the sun. It was two in the afternoon. He saw everything. He saw one of his sister's monsters try to kill us! My throat ached and my stomach was cramping as I turned around - he said nothing! - and launched myself at him with a roar.

Á̴̹̣͈̤̖̤͐̅P̴͖̥̱͍̯̆̿͆̋̀͂Ò̷̡̨̘̳͓L̴̙͚̑L̷͚̯̃̀̏Ō̶͇̝̻̙͑̾̎͝

The Greek sun god let out a pained grunt as I buried a fist in his gut. My heartbeat was pounding in my ears. I swung again, catching him right in the jaw as he straightened. He caught my hand on the third punch, yanking me close into a suffocating hug. I snarled and spit, kicking at him until he picked me up, so I headbutted him. He hissed and threw us back onto the ground, trapping me against the wet sand.

The hole in my stomach roared open as I thrashed, trying to break his grip. The sun flared in response, white and blinding and burning -

The next wave came in hard, washing over us.

We both sputtered and coughed.

My stomach painfully shut tight. I ached down to my bones. I felt sick and cold and tired. The fire in my blood guttered out.

I beat against Apollo's chest weakly.

"I'm sorry," he whispered.

Yeah.

Me too.

"What else don't I know," I whispered back. Apollo was the one who taught me what the gods of Olympus are like as people. Not as footnotes in Mom's history book.

And now I didn't know if I could trust anything he had said.

How much did he hide from me?

"Hey, English again," he said and I growled. He sighed. "Thousands and thousands of years worth," he said softly. "Even if I tried to tell you everything, I'm sure I've forgotten a couple of centuries, at least. Your mother's probably forgotten more time than any of us have been alive. Combined."

And I felt so incredibly small.

"How many times did you lie to me?"

"I didn't - I didn't lie, I just - " He sighed again. "I didn't think it - they would ever come up." His sister's monsters. "I focused on - I thought - I thought if you knew enough to make your own decision before you hit sixteen…"

"The Prophecy?" I snarled.

"All my stuff is on Olympus!" He defended himself. "Artemis is my twin. If the first time you met me, you knew in a few years I would either save or put your father in danger, wouldn't you do the same thing?"

I bit my tongue until I could taste blood and dropped my forehead onto his collar bone.

I guess I would.

"I didn't lie."

"Just didn't tell me."

"We're on a deadline!" He grunted. "If I started telling you stupid stories about all the other gods, we'd be here for decades."

That was probably true.

It was my turn to grunt. "You could have said Olympus is fucked up."

"It's...not all bad," he tried half-heartedly. "We're not all bad. Dad's second time is doing a lot better. He kept a lot of Athena's rules - "

"Like not murdering nymphs for saying something you don't like?"

Apollo flinched hard enough that I knew there was a lot more there than just his sister.

"...yeah," he said softly. He hugged me tighter, trapping my head under his chin. "Artemis...she's changed. She's not - " I could hear him swallow. "She's not like that anymore. I promise. She's changed," he insisted. "She'll prove it."

"She's a fucking rabbit." I said.

Because she tried to kill me, a demigod, for saying something she didn't like.

He sighed heavily.

"Have you changed?" I asked him quietly. I was thinking about all the times he said something a little off. About hurting people. Things that worried Dad and made him sit the sun god down and kept them in the living room late at night with mugs of hot chocolate. I wondered if it was because Apollo had been born a god of Olympus and just didn't know any better. Or maybe he knew enough to try to hide it, but it still leaked, because what he thought was okay was just that bad.

It was different with Mom. Most of the time, she followed Dad's moral compass. But sometimes I got the feeling that she was like a sentient black hole aping right from wrong. Like she didn't really know why Dad thought something was cruel or unfair, or maybe, it was more she didn't know why it mattered, but she knew it upset him.

She thinks I don't notice.

I do.

Apollo squeezed me once. "...I like to think so."

"Have you been telling Dad, at least?"

"No," he said shortly. He pulled away from me. "He's just a mortal. Why - would I?" I heard that catch in his voice. That was the only thing that kept me from losing my shit. I raised my hand and patted around to make sure I knew where everything on his face was. "Finger out of the nostril please."

Then I hit him. Hard.

"Gah!"

"I swear to god, Apollo…"

"I don't want to," he said like he was four years old. "You can't make me."

I waited.

"I like your Dad," he admitted softly. "I don't want - Why ruin a good thing?" He rationalized. "He's only got - what? Five or six more decades?"

"Don't fucking remind me," I grumbled.

"Sorry." He shifted, hugging me close again. "He already gives me enough shit on my bard. What he doesn't know won't hurt him."

"Like it won't hurt me?"

He didn't answer.

"He won't hate you," I whispered.

I didn't.

Maybe it really was that bad, but at some point over the years, gods like Apollo had learned to feel ashamed about it. Or maybe I was just being selfish and I wasn't ready to let my brother go.

"Maybe," he whispered back.

The water came in again, drenching us both. It didn't seem to drain back out again properly, leaving us ass deep in a lukewarm puddle. I craned my neck to look around and saw walls of sand. We were in some kind of crater or hole I definitely didn't remember being here. The sand under us was a bleached wet slurry like mud made of ash.

It must have happened when Apollo teleported in.

"I'm sorry," Apollo said again. "You're not just - I don't think you're just the Prophecy brat or whatever," he admitted and I reluctantly relaxed. "You were a small little shit and now you're a bigger little shit - " I snorted. "But you didn't deserve finding out like this."

No one did.

"What are their names?"

Apollo didn't speak immediately. "...you met Aura. The other is Kallisto."

I breathed out harshly.

"Kallisto is supposed to be a bear."

"Mist," he said simply.

Like how Luke saw a Minotaur at first. How many other transformations written in myth, lost to history, were really the twisted nightmares of divine cruelty?

My heart was lodged somewhere in my left big toe.

We just escaped one.

I shivered, swallowing the hard lump forming in my throat.

But there was another.

My stupid older brother shifted, sitting up carefully and had apparently decided to carry me like he hadn't since I was five. I wasn't going to complain. I'm pretty sure if I tried to stand on my own two feet right now, I was going to just fall over.

"I'm going to get you out of this puddle," he mumbled. I noticed then that he was actually in a classic Greek chiton with radiant markings, like he had bolted down right from the heart of Olympus. "Before you catch a cold."

"I don't get sick," I reminded him.

"Yeaaaaah," he drawled as he stood. "Another thing weird about you."

Dad always said it was because even viruses knew better than to piss off my mother.

"I'm just that awesome."

"You learned from the best," Apollo said unironically as he hopped out of the hole.

"You mean the Greek god of regret."

He made a confused noise in his throat. "No…? We don't have - who - you mean Aiskhyne?"

I sleepily smiled. "Apollogies."

He stopped walking.

I was able to count to four seconds before he dropped me.

My Bardson is an ass.

I led the way back along the cold beach. In hindsight, coming out here as a young demigod without Damocles was pretty stupid. I could have gotten jumped by anything out here. A vacant, out of the way beach right by the water? Just a demigod burger serving himself up for a hungry hydra.

Hold the ketchup.

Right at the tree line, where the beach ended and the rough gravel road began was a dark haired woman kneeling in the sand and a napping lion.

"What the - " Apollo's eyes went huge.

"Huh," Rhea said, turning away from the ugliest sand castle I have ever seen. It was detailed. She had clearly put some work into it. But it looked like it could have been one of those fancy gingerbread homes with dizzying wave-like patterns that looped into themselves like that optical illusion with the staircase? But someone took an artistic crowbar to it. "I thought I felt someone come around."

"Rhea?" Her grandson gasped incredulously. "How - " He turned to me and gestured at the star-spawn with both hands. "How. Do you know how long we've - you've been on a Quest for two days."

"Yeah?"

He whirled back around. "Where have you been!?"

"Around," she answered easily, drawing a shallow moat around her lopsided sand castle. "I moved south to help Huracan with - " she blinked slowly. "Did you just ask me something or was I having a flashback?"

"He asked where you were," I offered. The trees were probably whispering to her.

"South," She repeated. "There were a few seals breaking so I thought to lend a hand and I think that was this century."

"It's 2005," I said helpfully.

Rhea's eyebrows furrowed.

"Woodstock was in the sixties."

Her expression cleared. "Last century, then."

I think at this point, Rhea was keeping time by the power of Jimi Hendrix.

"But - we - " Apollo growled, tugging at his blond curls with sandy hands. "Do you know how many disasters we could have avoided if we had known where you were?"

Her lips twitched into a frown. "You give me far too much credit."

"I'm serious!" The Greek sun god looked like he didn't know if he wanted to hug the woman or strangle her. "Father has - "

"Made it very clear how much he digs his throne," Rhea finished for him. "If it was an emergency, you know how to draw my attention."

"We don't!" He cried out and his frustration echoed down the cold beach.

Rhea paused. She sat back on her haunches. Her dark hair was still braided with the gold bands decorated with flower designs and she had her round sunglasses on. Her blue and yellow shirt was pristine and so were her red pants even as she was getting sand all over her shins and knees.

"You don't," she echoed softly.

"Most of us don't," Apollo said painfully. "My mother - all she taught us was how to wake you. We don't even know all your Names."

I winced.

That was kind of like teaching your kids how to unlock the nuclear football as a fun activity with none of the safety measures.

"Oh, Leto," Rhea sighed.

"And then we were on Olympus and no one else seemed to know and the only ones who do are the ones causing the problem!"

Zeus, I'm guessing. By virtue of not being swallowed, he knew his mother the best out of all his siblings. Athena probably knew. Hera I was less sure. She did get fostered with Oceanus and Tethys for a while and they were first generation Titans. They could ask the Sky Father, but False Prophecies are a bitch so I get why absolutely no one would. And then Aphrodite fucked him, and herself, over so then they couldn't. Apollo didn't join my lessons until he figured out I was being taught things he didn't already know.

Demeter could ask, but the Earth Mother would probably just lie. Poseidon was on everyone's shit list. Aphrodite was barely Greek.

Hecate?

But she's the Queen of Those Below. The Underworld is basically its own kingdom with the only crossover being Hades once a year at Winter Solstice. Dead men do tell tales, but why tell Olympus who shunned you? Who classified you as minor gods and goddesses? When your realm will remain even if Olympus falls?

There were no neutral or Olympus-friendly Titans left. Between Zeus not taking no for an answer, there was the Titanomachy and the Olympiomachy. If they weren't in a prison somewhere, they were on house arrest like Boreas and Calypso. Mnemosyne of Remembrance wouldn't spit on Zeus if he were on fire.

Who was left?

My siblings? Who either hadn't been paying attention until Mom was or were the Fates?

Mom was ticketed for raising me as a cross-pantheon violation. Luke didn't know other pantheons even existed.

"Is everyone just...hoarding knowledge?" I asked incredulously. "Or covering it up or losing it or forgetting?"

Rhea looked tired.

"I'm sorry," she said heavily.

Apollo must have heard something in that apology I didn't because his shoulders slumped.

"...you've given up on us, haven't you?"

"Never," she corrected him gently. "And that is exactly the problem."

She rose to her feet, brushing the loose sand off her right shin with her left foot and then swapping. Her lion yawned as it got to its feet. For a moment, where there should have been orangey-brown big cat eyes, I thought I saw the eyes of a dragonfly.

"What is wrong with us?" Apollo said slowly.

"You are Young," Rhea said simply. "You are dependent on humanity. It is an uneven symbiotic relationship. You have elevated hundreds of humans to a semblance of power, leeching off you. Parasites."

"Asclepius is my son," Apollo snarled.

Like Zetes and Calais were Boreas' sons.

"Apollo. Grandson," Rhea said softly. "Beautiful boy. I am not sleeping because I am tired. I am the Queen. The Matriarch. I can not and will not be caged beneath anyone. And it has been too long since I could recognize humanity as anything more than defective."

Apollo and I both winced.

I remembered biology with Mr. Pretty at Trinity. Bugs usually weren't kind to defects.

Rhea gave us a sad, resigned smile.

"I will teach you what you should know," the mother of the eldest Olympians said as she turned away from us. "But do not ask me to fix Olympus, because you will not like the solution."

The rest of the walk back to Rhea's light blue bungalow was made in silence.

"You can't help Luke," I murmured as I stepped around the giant vase in the foyer for the third time today. "Can you?"

Rhea saved his life by virtue of being herself, but getting him back on his feet was still going to take a while. Apollo shot me a small smile and a faint white glow began to leak off the God of Healing. I could feel the warmth of it pulse against my skin.

"He would have to pay for it," he said airily. "I'm not here on business. Don't you demigods heal fast anyway?"

In return, I showed him Artemis still sleeping with her mouth open in her wicker basket and made sure he got a few good pictures before his grandmother roped him into helping her pack for her move the boring mortal way. He complained right up until he got his hands on her photo albums.

"Is that...Elvis Presley?" He flipped through the next two pages quickly. "That is! This was in Montgomery!"

"He wasn't one of yours, right?" Rhea's voice was muffled from the box her head was buried in.

"Nah, third generation legacy or something - " He stopped himself and looked around guiltily. "But if anyone asks, yes."

"Ha!" Rhea barked. "When did you stop formally adopting mortals again?"

"Rome."

"That's right."

He pried the photo out of the old plastic casing and lifted the entire thing out of the reach of a curious lion's wet nose. "Montgomery, 77'" he read off. "I can't believe it. We just missed each other."

Rhea hummed a few bars of some rockabilly song, prompting Apollo to hum with her. "Fate does tend to work in strange ways."

"Apollo was probably eyeing up a pretty girl and zoned out," I protested as I wrapped the fine china mug in more newspapers and ignored his indignant squawk. He could complain all he wants. We both knew that's what happened. "You can't blame Mom for that."

That got me another one of those 'you are a chihuahua in need of rocket ship costume' looks from her that I didn't really appreciate.

"Blaming your mother for everything is much like being a theoretical physicist," Rhea explained wryly. "There are only three options: You can't prove me wrong. I am not right yet or not even god herself knows what the fuck is going on."

Apollo snorted.

I wish I knew more about theoretical physics so that I could, in fact, prove her wrong.

I started flagging around the same time Phoebus Apollon in his sun chariot started eyeing up the horizon for a parking space, painting the clouds with light purples and pink colors. We had made a lot of progress. Helping Apollo's grandmother pack up her shit was definitely not something I saw myself doing on a Quest for Olympus, but I wasn't complaining.

It was normal.

Even dinner was some good ol' lasagna and some chocolate chip cookies.

After my third yawn, Apollo started ushering me off to bed in the guest room we just cleared out. It smelled a little stale with moth balls and the ceiling fan creaked, but I was dead on my feet. I made him promise to call Dad for me.

I fell asleep as soon as my head hit the pillow.

I didn't meet Hypnos.

Instead, I spun straight into a Dream.

I was in a forest clearing. It was a lopsided rectangular area bordered by trees in various stages of autumn leaf fall. There was a carpet of brown, orange and the rare green leaf on the ground crunching under my feet as ravens watched me from their perch on thin branches. The sky above me was pitch black and empty. There was a sick tree, tall and gnarled looking with large woodlice crawling over the cancerous bulges in the tree trunk.

At the base of the tree, an old woman sat on a rock. She was hunched over and bundled up in rough spun clothes dyed dark blue with wooden beads and black feather decoration. Thin, wispy white hair was stuffed under a coarse cap and she was leaning on a gnarled staff. Her eyes were milky white with cataracts. Her wrinkles didn't even look like wrinkles. They were so deep, they were more like grooves worn into rock. A playful breeze kicked up, rustling a few leaves off their branches. One bright orange one landed on her lap and as she went to pick it up, she changed.

She shrunk. Her face smoothed out. Her white hair and skin darkened to black and coppery tones. Even the clothes changed, bleaching white as gold decorations shined on his arms and around his neck.

The young prince patted the empty space next to him on the rock.

I took the invitation.

I recognized the subtle smirk on his face.

Mom stopped guiding me in my Dreams years ago. This felt like taking the school bus home every day for most of the school year and then one day you walk out the doors and see your mother there to pick you up without a hint of warning. It could be a good thing and maybe they just wanted to spend some time with you.

But the first thing my mind jumped to was 'Fuck, who died?'

"You were scared last night," the young prince said childishly and I winced. "So I watched you today."

"I'm fine," I mumbled, looking down at my shoes.

"You are," he agreed. Out of the corner of my eye, the boy grew up. The young prince became a wizened pharaoh. He set a warm hand on my head and spoke in a deep rumble, "And yet…"

I shrunk in on myself.

One of the ravens cried out and there was a flutter of black wings. The Morrígan sighed.

"What is the first rule of my tests?" Mom asked.

I swallowed hard. "You wouldn't give me a task you didn't know I could do."

"Yes," she said. "And I have broken it."

I felt my blood freeze.

No no nonono...

"You are having a more difficult time than I - "

"I can do it!" I blurted out. I felt like my stomach was trying to eat itself as my heart beat against my rib cage like it was trying to escape. "I can do it, it's fine, we don't have to change anything."

Mom sighed again.

I felt like crying.

"Percy. Perseus." She gently lifted my chin so I could look her in the eye. I shuddered. Those black diamond eyes weren't showing me my deaths anymore. They were showing me Luke's. "This is not your fault. It's mine. And I am sorry."

I'm too weak. She overestimated me. She thought I could do it, but now she doesn't believe I can. I'm not good enough. There was too much riding on this, she had plans upon plans for this and I wasn't going to make the cut. I thought about the Dream last night with Mom and Dad and how she said I took after my grandfather and would never disappoint her.

It tasted like ash in my mouth now.

Mom made a little exasperated sound, then suddenly gathered me up in her arms so I was sitting on her lap.

"Definitely your father's son," she murmured into my hair. "Not listening to a single thing I'm saying."

"It is my fault. You can't be wrong," I croaked. "You're Fate. You're never wrong."

Mom sucked in a sharp breath as her grip on me tightened.

Then slowly, painfully, she whispered. "...I wish that were true."

"It is." I pressed against her as much as I dared. "I'll do better! I'm - I'm figuring out my abilities and can do stuff with it now. We lost one of the monsters, so I can practice while Luke is recovering and it will be fine. I can do it."

"Percy, your abilities are what I am worried about."

Hearing that was like being stabbed in the chest.

"You were tired and right now you are running a fever in your sleep, because you overextended yourself."

Oh.

"That should not have happened, unless you are too - " she cut herself off.

"Too mortal."

"No," Mom sighed. "No, that is not fair. You are exactly as I made you to be."

So I'm just a failure then.

"Please don't leave me again," I begged. "We can figure something out. Maybe you can check and find out what's wrong and you can fix it!"

"Percy - " Mom started, but I cut her off.

"Just check!" I sniffled, angry at myself for crying now of all times. "Please. I can take it."

Mom leaned her head against mine, giving in. "Stubborn boy."

She raised her hand to hover over my abdomen. I waited for the excruciating feeling of my soul being flayed open so that my divinity could float to the top. Instead I felt like my stomach plunged right into an endless pit.

"What?" Mom said faintly. "What is - Who did this?" Her voice began to darken and I froze in place. I tried to make myself as small as I could. I have never heard Mom get angry before. Annoyed, yes. Mad? No.

"Who touched you?"

"Uh," I said intelligently.

Shit.

Nyx.

"Who...dared - " her voice suddenly boomed like thunder, hissed like it came from a giant snake and shattered the Dream from the sheer pressure of Ananke's presence. I spun out, tumbling ass over teakettle into darkness, feeling my very soul shake as a dark nebula uncoiled behind me. "INTERFERE WITH WHAT ISSSS MINE!"

A current caught me.

It didn't take me to the Dreamlands.

It took me to the usual demigod haunt, except I knew better than to let it carry me through to the Beyond. The uneducated (Greek) would call it Tartarus, because everything poorly understood and vaguely scary was thought to be part of the Pit. Cliff called it the Duat. Time and space got weird there. You know that movie where they could see what would happen in the future by bending light around the planet so you could see yourself?

I dug in my metaphorical heels and the current obediently dropped me off to the side of the pale Crossroads.

But not before it got in a parting shot.

I saw a three eyed black goat fighting with a giant vicious looking bat and with each clash, there were ripples echoing out over the world. Waking the world. The ground trembled. It broke open with screaming vents of steam. The sea churned, beginning to form a massive whirlpool. The stars in the sky danced and I could see where they would align -

" - didn't you tell me?" Luke's voice drifted past me.

"It was not necessary," a deeper, darker voice snarled. "You did not sacrifice. You did not lose. You did not suffer! You don't look at a man and want to both weep over the pale reflection and rip out its throat for the mockery! You do not get to. Lecture. Me!"

"Careful," a woman's voice said and I jerked away from the flowing, twisting roads with a gasp. That was close. I patted my face and sighed in relief. Cliff said I would sprout a bird head, but obviously he lied.

Around my feet, yellow daisies bloomed.

The Curse of Delos.

The flowers that only grew on the island corpse of Asteria, the Titaness of Astrology, Oneiromancy and Falling Stars.

I turned, already knowing who I would see.

Asteria's daughter, Hecate stood behind me, holding twin torches in one hand as a pitch black dog with red eyes prowled around her feet and a polecat rested about her neck. She was wearing a white classic Greek chiton with silver runic designs and a white cloak. She looked like her son, Alabaster, with long black hair and pale skin but her eyes were shrouded in shadows.

Be polite.

"Your grace."

The goddess of the Crossroads inclined her head.

"You do not belong here, son of Fate."

"Yeah, I know," I mumbled. Mom had always said the Beyond wasn't safe, not for me. "I didn't mean to intrude."

"Then I will escort you out," she offered. I walked over, careful not to crush any of the yellow flowers underneath my feet. I don't know if she approved. What I could see of her face was like a still pool.

With piranhas in it.

"Thank you," I tried politely.

"You are overthinking it," she said out of the blue. I stared blankly.

"I'm - I'm overthinking what?"

"It is not some platitude." Her pole cat hissed at me. "You have always possessed the ability to choose your destiny." She raised her free hand, but...it wasn't free. In her hand was a fucking black and silver Mythomagic card. She handed it to me. "Perhaps you should try using it."

I flipped it over.

Moros, the God of Doom.

"Hey, wait - "

I woke up.

For a moment, I just laid there and stared at the ceiling. I felt like I had gotten no sleep at all but I must have gotten a few hours in. The only window in Rhea's guest room showed a moonless, starless night. I rolled out of bed, immediately feeling what Mom had been talking about. I was shivering. My toes were cold as hell, but I also felt flushed and very thirsty.

I walked over to my room door and opened it.

It swung open soundlessly.

A bolt of adrenaline ran down my spine, because from the time I spent cleaning this room out today, I remembered this door had an annoyingly squeaky hinge. I strained my ears for the creaking of the ceiling fan, but there was nothing, even though I could see the shadow of it twirl around above the bed. I immediately thought of the nightmare, Aura and its absolute silence.

Still don't have my sword.

God damn it.

I crept down the hall towards the light coming from the foyer.

Knife, I thought. Erebus' gift settled into my hands. It was still warm to the touch. My heart thudded in my chest as I took a careful step and peeked around the corner.

"You're up," Rhea's voice was quiet. Hushed like everything else. It was like the world had been muffled.

Like when Mom had Claimed me.

The front door was open. Rhea sat on her front step in a long shirt with one leg bent up just enough to rest her head on it. It was a dark night. I couldn't see if there were any clouds or if there was anything at all. No moon. No clouds. No stars. Not even the lights of an airplane. You looked up at the sky…

And saw nothing.

"What's going on?" I couldn't even hear myself.

Rhea could though.

"The Night's undivided attention," she answered. "It is not safe to be out right now."

I shivered.

The star-spawn turned to look at me and frowned. "You're feverish?"

I mutely nodded.

She got up and we went to the kitchen for a glass of ice cold water and some more nectar. I went back to bed.

As soon as I fell asleep, Hypnos pulled me close. He didn't say anything, but he felt scared.

I was scared too.

 

[Shujin]

Castor​

TWO DAYS AFTER Percy left on his Quest, the planet fell into a black hole.

And Pops turned into the Silver Surfer.

Maybe he shouldn't think of it like that? 'Two days after Percy left' makes it sound like this was Percy's fault. That was impossible though. Percy was a demigod, just like him and while things could get weird around them, there was a limit, right? They were still just mortal kids. Launching the world off a cliff was definitely over that limit.

He still wouldn't be surprised if it was Percy's fault.

If you know, you know.

They still couldn't figure out how he broke the Climbing Wall the second time, by the way. The enchanted rock climbing wall in Camp. Pops actually got off his ass to help put it together the first time he broke it.

Didn't help.

Pops was an Olympian.

Castor, like most demigods, had a list.

It was a very nice list. It made sure he still had his feet planted in the 21st century even as he polished shields and struggled through Doric Greek because Pops was old as hell and a slave driver. It was a list of what was normal and what was not and Percy Stele looked at his list and freaking ate it.

It had been a month since Castor found out Athena used to be King of the Gods of Olympus and his head was still spinning.

Everyone sat down for dinner in the Dining Pavilion of Camp Half-Blood like Not-Normal. It was still a little weird without Percy there. The first day, he had been a bit worried that without the son of Fate around, everything would snap back to the way things had been like a crusty rubber band. It hadn't happened.

Hestia stayed.

Ares Cabin was still bullying her around and she was still too nice to stop them. Fred did leave, but not before chaperoning their super close Hunters vs Camper Capture the Flag game yesterday. It was 56 to 0, but almost! He even helped them back out of the infirmary, giving all the kids with healing powers tips while he was at it.

All the kids with healing powers, like Lou Ellen of Hecate and Lacy of Aphrodite.

Castor knew as soon as he and Pollux got to Camp and saw what it was actually like, that gods paying attention to their own kids was rare enough.

But paying attention to the kids of others?

That never happens.

But it was.

Happening.

Hermes had shown up again today, for the second day in a row since Luke left with Percy. It was like he was interim Cabin Counselor, keeping a half-hearted eye on the Stoll twins and taking over Luke's classes and refereeing the races. Castor saw him run with Butch, pushing him until he unlocked some kind of wind teleporting power to go faster.

Butch Walker wasn't his.

No one said it out loud, because she didn't Claim him, but Hermes still knew.

Iris, Messenger Goddess of the Rainbow Claimed her son after that race, just like Hermes Claimed Chris Rodriguez. It didn't change anything. Iris didn't have a Cabin so he was still in Cabin 11, but…

Ethan sat down at Table 12 and Pops still didn't do nothing, so it looked like this weirdness was here to stay.

Bizarre.

"Think he's okay?" Pollux asked as he sat down just like he had yesterday.

"He's fine," Castor replied, just like he had yesterday, but this time with a shrug. Percy had to be fine. Or else his burial shroud was going to make him so mad. "It can't be too dangerous," he reasoned. "The thief has to be mortal, remember? Gods can't steal Symbols of Power."

"But they can sponsor someone to steal it," Pollux said quietly. "Monsters count too."

"He's better than both of us with a sword and freakishly strong sometimes. And he's got Luke."

Brandon of Athena and Chloe of Ares had Luke too, but it would be stupid to bring up that failed Quest right now. Besides, most monsters weren't the Ladon.

"Yeah," his twin brother murmured. "He's got Luke." Pollux smiled weakly. "And a pet rabbit."

"Ssshhhh," Castor hissed and theatrically glanced over at Table 8, Artemis. "Don't let them hear that."

He didn't think Chris was trying to be mean about it, but the Hunters were really sensitive about the rabbit thing. As in 'break your arm and threaten to crush your balls' sensitive.

Probably because they didn't glow silver anymore.

Pollux's smile grew for a second, then withered. He bit his lip. "Still…"

To both of their surprise, Pops leaned over and put a hand on Pollux's shoulder.

"He's not like you two," their father, Dionysus, said bluntly. "Take it from me."

"Cause his Ma?" Castor asked after swallowing, even though he was pretty sure that was the answer.

Percy's Ma was a Protogenoi. A primordial. One of the first order of deities that predated creation itself. Pops had knelt for Percy's Claiming and no one else had been able to make a sound. No one corrected Percy's manners. He punched a nymph and she tried to drown him in response and she was the one who got punished.

Like, what?

Sometimes the son of Fate was kind of pathetic, like he was just hiding behind his mother's skirts (coils? scales?) and then sometimes it seemed like he could headbutt reality and reality was the one who'd walk away with a black eye.

He was cool about it though.

A good guy.

He made Castor feel selfish.

Pops was frowning into his Diet Coke.

"Yes," he said eventually. "No. Maybe."

"Helpful," Castor drawled.

Pollux shot him a warning look. Castor pulled a face back. Whatever else he was, Pops was Pops. Treating him differently just because they were at Camp now - sure maybe he'd still call the other gods Lord and Lady and whatever so he wasn't smited, but Ethan had been eating on the floor because they didn't treat their father like he was their father.

Castor had personally peed and shit and threw up all over Dionysus, so really, they had already hit rock bottom.

Pops sighed. "If he's anything like I think he is, the boy's a cockroach."

Like he thinks he is?

He's a demigod, though.

"Nuke him to be sure?" Castor quipped.

The smile his father gave him made his blood run cold. "And even then…"

When Pops turned to shoo a nymph away, Castor leaned towards his twin to whisper, "That was still a compliment, right?"

"The cockroach thing?" Pollux whispered back. "Definitely."

They took a moment to digest this.

"Weird!" They both declared.

"What is?" Clovis huffed as he sat in his new seat right next to them. He'd been evicted from his old one by Ethan who needed to be close enough to argue with Annabeth and Masayuki without anyone getting in the way. And Percy didn't need the seat anymore right now.

"Percy," Castor said. "I think Pops doesn't hate him as much."

Hypnos' kid blinked his blue eyes owlishly before traveling to where Pops was arguing with a satyr. "...glowing recommendation."

Pollux snort giggled into his apple juice.

Then the sky turned pitch black.

Everything went absolutely silent. Like when Percy had been Claimed by his Ma. Nothing made a sound. The crackle of the central brazier was missing, even as the flames leapt a good five feet into the air casting a pale, sickly yellow light on them all.

"What the fuck - "

Hermes' sudden curse cracked through the air.

Pops stood up.

And turned into the Silver Surfer.

Kind of.

If the Silver Surfer was a super pretty beardless man made out of porcelain on top of the molten silver. His Hawaiian shirt was replaced by a white marble loincloth and a spinning silver halo over his porcelain curls. His blue eyes were electric, almost visibly sparking. There were seams of the molten silver along his neck and shoulders and joints, like the porcelain was armor on top of a quicksilver god.

"What's going on?" Castor tried to ask him, but not a sound came out of his mouth. He tried again. "Pops?"

Dionysus' glowing blue eyes flicked over him dispassionately, then rose to the dark sky. There was a series of resonating notes, like someone was playing a pipe organ underwater, but he didn't answer.

"Alright, everyone just - just calm down," Hermes began, shakily rising from his seat. He sounded like Castor's elementary school teacher when the Twin Towers were hit a few years ago. "We'll figure this out - "

He was cut off by a blinding flash.

At first, Castor didn't recognize the new god.

His hair looked like it was spun from actual gold, standing out against his olive skin. Dark freckles dusted the bridge of his proud nose and high cheekbones. His eyes were a burning yellow color like miniature suns, mimicked by the radiant markings on his chiton like neon lights. Castor had never seen him before, but the golden bow in his hand gave him away.

"Split up!" Apollo barked and Castor almost couldn't believe this drill sergeant was the same person that had awkwardly defended his crush on Hestia yesterday. Who refused to help him out and stayed seven years old through his begging.

This couldn't be the same person.

They weren't, Percy's voice whispered in the back of his mind. Kinda, but not really? He's just using a different Name.

Not Fred.

Phoebus Apollon.

Castor glanced at his father, who was still and quiet, staring up at the dark sky.

Not Pops.

Dionysus.

"Hephaestus, Apollo, Aphrodite, Dionysus Cabins will be protected," Apollo said sharply.

Protected?

Uh oh.

"Get to them."

Hermes shakily raised a hand. "I can - "

"You can't." Apollo shot him a sharp look, gold eyes flaring so brightly, Castor almost flinched. "We must be singular beings and you are needed elsewhere, Pylaios."

Castor knew that word.

Doorkeeper.

As Hermes' head rocked back in surprise, there was a crack of thunder. But it was way quieter than Castor was used to from whenever Pops would rile up their grandfather. Weaker. Almost stuttering. It wasn't a bark of anger anymore, but almost like a cry for help.

Hermes' straightened. "Understood."

Then he just disappeared.

Popped out of existence like he had been as solid as a soap bubble.

"Hestia," Apollo said, softer. "Protect Troy's hearth."

Troy?

Hestia, pale and worried, nodded. The flames of the central brazier winked out as the small goddess burst into sparks. An eerie howling noise rose up on a bitterly cold wind that blew in from the sea, like it had just been waiting for the fire to go out.

"Split up," Apollo said again. "Now."

Castor glanced at his father and grabbed his plate.

Just outside of the Pavilion where the hill started to slope down into the Camp, they were met with what had to be another goddess. Because she was the most beautiful woman Castor had ever seen in his life and he saw Hera once! She even looked like the Queen of the Gods a bit too, but Castor had no idea what about her gave him that impression. She didn't look Greek at all, but he knew that didn't mean much. But unlike Apollo, she didn't wear a chiton.

Instead, she had silken loose pants, barefoot and a multi layered wrapped shirt with a rich purple cloak attached to a ring on her right hand. Her long dark hair was in hundreds of looping braids with colorful ribbons and bells woven into them and golden bangles glinted on her wrists and ankles. She had Silena's sky blue eyes that stood out against her dark skin. Castor followed her gaze up at the sky.

He dropped his eyes immediately, feeling his skin crawl.

There was nothing up there.

Just an emptiness that had swallowed the world whole.

And it still felt like something was looking back.

The foreign goddess glanced over them all. She didn't look worried.

Just amused.

Like the daylight died all the time. Like this was fun.

"Run along then, darlings," the goddess said with a lazy smile as she waved them off. She turned her back to them as she looked at the sky again and there on her cloak was a crowned dove in flight. Out of the corner of his eye, Castor saw Aphrodite Cabin freeze in place, gaping.

The goddess tilted her head in their direction. "Look at you all, just - " Her eyes lingered on Drew Tanaka for a second. " - perfect. You will be safe enough in my Cabin," she said with a soft laugh. "But it is going to be a long, long night."

Seeing Cabin 12 didn't make Castor feel any better.

Or safer.

In the daylight, Cabin 12, Dionysus had been an ordinary bunkhouse. Almost bland enough to pass for an army barracks if it weren't for the grape vines Pops grew all over it.

Castor stopped dead. He barely felt Pollux run into him.

Cabin 12 was writhing.

Something touched his shoulder and Castor actually screamed.

The dark sky swallowed the sound.

It was Clovis.

He had a grim little smile on, blue eyes flickering back and forth between Castor and the way the slug-like walls of Cabin 12 were struggling against the grape vines. Ethan brushed past them both, boldly walking right up to the front door, but it was obvious from the way Annabeth was looking back at them in confusion that she didn't see anything wrong.

Clovis shook him a little and tilted his head questioningly.

He's still your Dad, Percy's voice chimed in. Has he given you a reason not to trust him?

Castor breathed out.

Have I? Pops' voice asked, sounding hurt.

Not yet.

At least the inside still looked kind of the same.

He didn't know if his heart could take it if the eyes on the outside were looking in too.

He found his bed and sat on it. He put his leftover barbeque and spinach on his nightstand.

His hands were shaking.

He clenched them into fists and looked out his window.

It was just like Apollo said. Cabin 10, Aphrodite was surrounded in a barrier of glowing gold symbols, like lettering scrolling around the super dollhouse. Cabin 9, Hephaestus looked like it was on fire, throwing sparks up into the air and belching flames from the forge's chimney. The sun god's Cabin 7 had always been a little tacky made out of solid gold, but now it burned like the gold was molten and threw literal rays of sunlight against the darkness. In comparison, his twin Artemis' silver Cabin looked dead.

The soft moonlight had been gone ever since the goddess got rabbited, but from this distance the silver walls looked pitted and tarnished, or rusted. Like the void of the sky was eating away at it. Hermes' run down building looked hollow and condemned. The windows on Athena's Cabin were just as dark as the sky, making his skin crawl the longer he stared. The gaudy Hellenic Cabins of the King and Queen of Olympus were dull and washed out. Poseidon's longhouse looked like it was rotting right before his eyes. The odd one out was Demeter.

Cabin 4 seemed just like it always did, but when he really looked -

Yeah, Percy's voice said as Caster gagged, tearing away from his window with a wailing ringing in his ears. Let's not do that again.

But what did I do? Castor asked himself.

Looked, Percy's voice answered ruefully. We're noticing things we're not supposed to. Not everything, but enough.

Enough to what?

I dunno, the voice in his head said and that made his blood run cold. Percy basically knew everything. The Mist hides shit for a reason.

Pops?

His father's voice grumbled. Might be my fucking fault. Maybe. Perhaps. Possibly.

Pollux? Castor checked on his brother. He had his knees drawn up to his chest on his bed across the room, trying not to rock. Is he noticing anything?

Nah, Percy's voice brushed off. He's the grape and wine guy.

Despite himself, Castor smiled. That's true.

You, though.

Hearing voices and having conversations with yourself usually meant your mental health wasn't exactly stellar, but as long as you weren't delusional, a few extra perspectives helped more than they hurt.

Castor, demigod of Dionysus, the Greek god of Madness would know.

"Testing?" Castor heard faintly and he snapped his head around. Annabeth sighed in relief. "You heard me?"

"Yeah," Pollux croaked. "I can hear you."

That haunting howling was still drifting on the wind right outside the wriggling walls of Cabin 12.

There were some kids from Cabin 11 and 4 and 6 with them, like Chris and Monique and Katie had her little sister Billie on her lap. The others he didn't know all that well because they were younger, but watching them hesitantly pick out a bed to sit on with all of Cabin 12s unused space made something in his chest tighten.

Clovis was watching the door, looking a bit ill, like he was expecting something bad to happen. Ethan was looking outside too, with his face plastered right up against the glass.

"What - I mean how - " Annabeth licked her lips. "That sound is getting to me," she admitted.

No kidding.

Castor's goosebumps had goosebumps.

"I keep losing track of what I'm thinking, like it's in my head."

Huh.

Maybe he had too much in his head to tell.

"It's Hellhounds," Ethan said absently.

Annabeth shot a look at his back. "And how do you know that? I've never heard them sound like that before."

Castor figured Annabeth would know. She'd been out there at seven years old with Luke and Thalia, trying to get to Camp. She really didn't like Cyclops. Or spiders. But hellhounds were definitely up there.

Castor thought they were the worst kind of monsters to run into. Everything else had their weaknesses and places they couldn't get into, but Hellhounds just needed a deep enough shadow. And once the sun went down…

"You wouldn't," Ethan scoffed. "It's a happy sound, I think."

"You think?" Castor asked.

A happy Hellhound sounded like a Hellhound that was chowing down on a demigod.

Ethan turned to look at them for a second, then back out the window. "I had one when I was little. Kind of."

He had a Hellhound?

Like a pet?

"Kind of?" Annabeth drawled. "How do you kind of have a man-eating monster?"

"It hung around my father's place a lot. Always the same one. When - " his breath hitched. "I left, I think it helped me. It howled like this, but not as long and not with so many."

Annabeth's mouth opened, but then she closed it. Her gray eyes narrowed in the dim cabin lighting as she studied Ethan's thin frame against the window. Then her eyes turned to Clovis, who shrugged.

"I don't think we should go outside," Hypnos' son said blandly.

"I know that!" Ethan snapped, turning on them.

There was something wrong with his eyes.

What'd I say? Percy came back as Castor stared at Ethan's pupils, shrinking and expanding like gasping mouths as drops of pearl swam in his irises. Noticing things.

Castor closed his eyes as the son of Nemesis swallowed his temper.

Lately, Ethan and Clovis had started to look different. A bit off. Less normal.

Like Percy.

He couldn't remember when that had started.

"I know that," Ethan repeated, softer.

"But you want to," Clovis and his eight eyed shadow said calmly. "It's okay. We are grandchildren of the Night. The dark is in our blood. We're just not monsters."

"Yeah," Ethan looked up at them through his black bangs. He didn't look convinced. "Not monsters."

He tore himself away from the window and threw himself on an unclaimed bunk, burying his head in the pillow.

"But what is going on?" Annabeth murmured. "What exactly is happening? Why now? Why - why are only four cabins out of twelve safe?" She started to pace. "Safe from what?"

Castor poked the voices in his head.

Oh, puddin', Ma answered. Ya sure you wanna know?

Good point.

Not really.

"Castor?" Pollux asked timidly. "What happened to Pops?"

He shrugged uncomfortably.

"I don't know."

And that was the worst part.

"Maybe that's what he looks like, when he ain't pretending?" Pollux offered weakly.

"He didn't say anything," Castor bit out. "He didn't even - " he stopped when Pollux shrunk back into himself and gave him an apologetic look. "He was different."

"The sun god looked and acted different too," his brother murmured.

When things got back to normal, Pops was going to have to do some explaining, for sure.

If things got back to normal.

"A long night…" Annabeth murmured. "Do you think…it has something to do with the Night? Your grandmother? Clovis, do you think we could ask your father?"

Ethan perked up a little.

"He probably knows," Clovis allowed after a moment. "But I'm not sure it's - "

"We'll be sleeping anyway," Annabeth pointed out. "We can either have useless dreams or nightmares and not know anything until someone decides to tell us." She frowned darkly. Annabeth did not take Olympus' lies well. He knew she had asked Hypnos to show her Athena's doomed inauguration and Annabeth took everything personally. "And they won't, or…."

"We can find out for ourselves," Castor finished for her.

"What are you guys talking about?" A new voice entered the conversation and they all turned to see a suspicious looking Chris Rodriguez squinting at them.

"The god of Sleep," Pollux said softly. "We can ask him what's happening."

"Just like that, huh?" Chris sneered and Castor winced.

Hermes may have Claimed him today, but Chris had years of not knowing who his godly parent was. He had been living in Hermes Cabin as one of the Unclaimed, as a child of Hermes. Castor didn't know what that felt like, but he imagined it stung.

Bad.

"He always makes time for me," Clovis said defensively. "Him or my brothers."

"Lucky you."

"Chris," Katie said warningly from her spot near the back of the Cabin. "What would Luke say if he were here?"

"He's not here, is he? Because father volunteered him." Some emotion flashed over Chris' face. It wasn't a pretty one, turning the sharp features he shared with Luke even sharper. "He'd say we're mushrooms, kept in the dark and fed shit - "

"This is not helping," Annabeth said sharply. "We'll tell you what we know once we find out what's going on. Just...finish eating and act normal," she dismissed Chris, who clenched his fists and took a step towards her.

Ethan snarled.

"Whatever," Chris backed off, trying not to look as spooked as Castor felt. "Llueve sobre mojado. Do what you want."

"We will," Annabeth told him primly, because she always had to have the last word.

"Do you think Sleep knows why Pops looks like that?" Pollux asked.

He does, Percy's voice chimed in.

"Probably," Clovis admitted. "Father is old and your sire is the youngest Olympian. Sleep has witnessed a lot."

"I bet Balance knows more," Ethan said bitterly. "But we won't get anything out of her."

"We should come up with a list of the questions we want to ask," Annabeth said. "About tonight. Just so we don't overstay our welcome."

"Good idea," Castor said.

None of it was a good idea.

Because Sleep wasn't there.

But the Night was.

 

[Shujin]

An Undertow of Sand
A PJO Fanfiction
​

It felt like standing in the eye of a hurricane.

Grandpa described it to me once. I think I was five or six years old. He said it was the calmest, most peaceful weather he had ever witnessed. It had been a warm day with a slight breeze. The sky had been as blue as a robin's egg with the sun shining brightly. A picture perfect summer day.

But everything felt wrong, like being at the top of a roller coaster just before the drop. Except you knew there was no track at the bottom, just a dark pit. Just ten minutes earlier, the howling of a Category 5 hurricane had been ripping up telephone poles and trees, but now the air was dead. The streets were still flooded. Every animal was silent like they knew the storm wasn't really over, it was just Mother Nature taking a breath.

Safe, for now.

Trapped.

Grandpa said he looked out at the horizon and saw a solid wall of grey closing in with a distant noise like an oncoming train.

My grandmother called him an idiot during the story. He never denied it. It had been shortly before I was born and Mom didn't tell them until I was six or seven months old anyway. They were still living in Florida when Hurricane Andrew rolled in to ruin everyone's day. Grandma had been out of state visiting Dad in the psychiatric hospital. Grandpa had been caught with his pants down. He hadn't thought it would make landfall and he said it was because every yokel on the news stations make noise about storms out in the ocean hitting the coastline all the time and they rarely made it that far. He said he stayed to make sure the house was going to be okay. Grandma called him a liar and said he stayed to try to save his boat.

And I remember wondering, whether it was the house or the boat, did it really matter if he was there or not? Why didn't he just leave as soon as he could? Just in case? What did he think he was going to do against a hurricane?

The house ended up with too much water damage to salvage with a collapsed roof on one side and the boat had gotten unmoored somehow. Grandpa never saw it again.

I told Mom the story later when she came to pick me up, asking her the same question. What was he going to do against a hurricane? I remember the way Mom smiled then. It had been small and nostalgic instead of the usual amused quirk of her lips before she said 'nothing at all.'

I told her Grandma thought he was just dumb. She ruffled my hair in response.

'Do not judge him too harshly. That is the one kind of idiocy I adore.' I hadn't understood. 'There is nothing he could have done. He meant nothing to the storm. He was nothing, but you will always find a human willing to give it their best shot anyway. Who knows?' She had said with a small laugh as she buckled my seat belt for me. 'Perhaps he could have delayed the inevitable.'

'You know,' I had said then. Before my seventh birthday, I thought Mom was perfect in every way and knew everything about everything ever. Dad was the screw up who was lucky to have her and I was Mommy's perfect little boy that had to be convinced to play with mortal kids.

Man.

Looking back, Apollo was right.

I had been a small little shit and not in a good way.

Mom had made an amused sound in her throat. She didn't actually answer me until she had gotten in her side of the car and was already pulling out of my grandparents' driveway.

'Everything comes to an end, eventually.'

It felt like standing in the eye of a hurricane.

Maybe I could talk to Mom, I offered Hypnos weakly.

The Elder God pulled me even closer to him and shook back and forth in a clear 'no.'

I could, I insisted, even though the thought of calling her attention back to me right now didn't fill me with great feelings. She'll listen to me.

I have never seen Mom mad before.

I'm her son, I whispered. She has to listen to me.

I didn't know how to handle this. I don't know what to think about it. I didn't even know how to feel about it any other way than…

Terrified.

Hypnos hugged me. I could feel something like acceptance, or maybe it was understanding coming from him.

Whatever your mother did to me, it wasn't bad, right? I asked Hypnos. I had to make sure.

The personification of Sleep was still holding on to me tightly. To the point that I could really feel it. Usually, his grip was feather light, barely there, like a reflection on glass. Now, I could feel a hundred of his fingers clutching my Sleeping soul like a safety blanket. His presence was curled around me. I imagined he looked a bit like a giant hedgehog.

Kind of?

Just replace the quills with his fingers and stick a six eyed cow head in there.

I felt Hypnos nod. He gave me that moving picture again of the grub eating its way free of its egg sac along with a feeling of reassurance. The vision was longer this time, showing me the grub encasing itself into a cocoon and what broke out of it this time had six skeletal black wings.

It didn't look like any kind of bug I've ever seen before. My first instinct was to say it was still fucking ugly, but - I don't know. There was something charming about it.

She was helping, I translated and he nodded again, but he sent me a pulse of uncertainty. You think she was helping? Dude.

He felt a bit indignant.

She didn't think it was bad?

He agreed with that.

So if we could just talk to them -

Hypnos shuddered and seemed to shrink into himself.

Mom's a bit upset, but not at you, I tried to reassure him. You didn't do anything wrong.

I got a half-hearted response.

Erebus is your step-dad, so you're basically her grandson, I reasoned out loud. I didn't want to believe Mom would punish someone for something their parents did. That was for weak losers that couldn't or wouldn't get back at the one truly at fault. It'll be fine.

Hypnos gently, hesitantly showed me an image of a set of perfectly balanced scales.

It wasn't just about my Mom.

There were two sides to the equation.

I swallowed thickly.

I assumed Hypnos was scared because two primordials having, uh, words wasn't something that happened all the time. It was pretty rare. And by pretty rare, I mean I don't think it has happened since the Earth Mother rebelled which was a long time ago.

A long time even for immortal gods.

I thought he had a fear of the unknown, or of an unexpected negative change.

Some of my own fear was that.

I have never seen Mom mad before. Dad was the one who got angry, but it was because he was worried. When Mom left, he had been angry all the time and the alcohol didn't help. He scared me once, but he scared himself more. He cut back on the drinking and Apollo basically moved in with us for that year. Artemis had -

Never mind.

I was just about to go stupid about her again.

I know better now.

Anyway, I got my temper from Dad and I knew he was never going to be at his worst ever again.

Mom's not like Dad at all.

I get it, I said quietly. You're worried about your mom too.

His grip on me tightened as he gently questioned me.

'Too?' I could almost hear him say.

Mom's the best. I love her and I know she loves me. I tried to smile, but I don't think it looked all that great. I probably looked sick. But it's not Mom that's mad, is it?

It was Ananke.

I've told you this story, haven't I? When I was younger, Mom still had trouble being human all the time. The Elder God bled through. She didn't mean to break me as a kid, like I'm sure she didn't mean to almost throw me into the Beyond, but that doesn't change the fact that she did. Being a demigod, I was sturdier than most, so I bounced back.

My sunglasses should tell you that I didn't come back the same. At five years old, I was missing bits and pieces, adding up to months of lost memories because my head was just so full it felt like my brain was leaking out of my ears. Dad took me in for the MRI because my visions were relapses. For weeks after, I was obsessed with this little panpipe Mom got me, trying to recreate this strange flute sound I could barely remember.

And Apollo's ghost was the first one I saw.

I know my mother loves me, I told Hypnos. But she's not safe.

Hypnos pulsed with a sad agreement.

The picture he sent me was of himself gently nudging a piece of glass, but it shattered into a million pieces.

Fragile, my ass. I snorted. I saw your mom a bit and that was okay, right?

He paused, and I could tell when he remembered because he congratulated me.

Yeah, I'm stronger now than I was when we first met. I'm not a baby anymore.

Uncertainty.

Oh fuck right outta here.

He laughed at me.

It's not as if I don't know my birth mother at all. My education started at birth, maybe even earlier than that. My lessons were all in Dreams, to make sure that I would remember what she wanted to show me.

And she wanted to show me places far beyond this little blue ball, worlds under foreign stars at the ends of Yggdrasil's branches and oceans between the edges of reality. My favorite memory is of a star studded expanse, watching a cold, dark planet hurtle through space and my mother showed me how it felt to reach out, pluck it from its lonely journey and gently place it in the orbit of a binary star like I was decorating a Christmas tree with a star ornament on top.

She showed me the birth of the Young Gods. I remember what Kronos didn't anymore. Ananke taught me how to control my Dreams and at two years old, I fell into the Dreamlands and met a foul mouthed orange tabby cat with a very pullable tail named Sam.

She never spoke, because we never needed words. I never saw her, but it never mattered. She never touched me, but I could feel her wonder when I reached out for her.

She was my mother.

Then I got older and the Morrigan was there to catch me when I fell from the stars.

I've always known Ananke wasn't safe for mortals to witness. Dad was right there to remind me with his screaming nightmares for most of my early childhood.

But I had been a stupid little kid who thought he was so fucking special.

With only vague recollections from the Dreams I shared with her when I was little, I decided I was going to find the woman who had my eyes. I was going to find Ananke, my very own Dream-Quest. I even convinced some friends to help me, good people who didn't like the idea of a small child making the trip on his own, but knew they couldn't stop me.

Like Sam.

My Quest led me to the Dreamlands' very own golden moon.

It didn't end well.

Maybe I'll tell you about it, someday.

Do you think my brother - your dad can do something? I asked.

Hypnos cringed.

I guess between his consort and his mother would be a little awkward.

Hypnos felt incredulous.

Okay, a lot awkward.

The way he nodded, you'd think the personification of Sleep had never heard a truer statement in his entire life.

Maybe we can both try together?

He wasn't a fan of that idea, and to be honest, I wasn't either.

We have to do something, I said and forced my lips into a small smirk. Before your mom gets hurt.

Hypnos immediately hit me with his annoyance and I felt my spirits lift a little. If he was annoyed, he wasn't terrified. If I was annoying him, I wasn't drowning in my own fear.

Win win.

Uh huh, I said with a bigger smile. We both know my mom can beat up your mom - woah!

Hypnos turned me upside down.

I crossed my arms, dangling in front of him by a leg. Fate is way cooler than the Night anyway, I said in my most obnoxious voice. I borrowed it from Apollo. Nobody messes with Fate, but the Night?

Hypnos swung me back and forth like he was trying to shake me down for my lunch money, even more annoyed.

What a Momma's boy.

Not that I had any room to talk.

Admit it, your mom got shafted in the primordial department. The Pit, Time, Fate - come on, even the oceans are scarier. I grinned at the spike of his anger. What's she gonna do, make me go to bed early?

"Oh yes - " a deep, masculine voice echoed from behind me. " - and you will simply die in your sleep. Only the truly fortunate will stay dead."

I twisted my head around to look at the newly arrived melodramatic motherfucker.

It was a winged god, like the Boreads Zetes and Calais but instead of golden scales, his wings were shimmering with dark blues and purple feathers. He had skin the color of dark wood with pitch black long hair and was the kind of buff you only see in try-hard martial gods like Thor. The classic robes he was wearing were just a blank dark grey without any identifying features. He didn't carry any Symbols either. He could have been anyone, but his eyes gave him away.

Step-nephew! I said with as much cheer as I could fake. I'm not sure how it was possible, because I was just a fraction of my soul right now, but I'm pretty sure I just felt my heart drop out of my ass.

The corners of the mass of grinning skulls the god had for eyes crinkled in amusement.

"Little uncle," Thanatos, the God of Death replied. "So you are the reason for his tardiness."

He's late? I asked in surprise.

I...didn't know Hypnos had somewhere to be? This was kind of - I thought we were in his realm.

"Very," the death god said with his eyes fixed on his brother. "It is time to come home, brother."

Hypnos slumped like his Playstation was being taken away and it was my stomach's turn to drop out from between my butt cheeks.

Home? I asked quietly. The House of Night?

Nyx was ordering her children to come home?

Was it too much to hope this was a normal thing where play time was over and everyone was gathering for family dinner and Hypnos just wanted to throw a few more hoops before coming inside or something?

Thanatos inclined his head.

"You are welcome to visit, little uncle," he said, sounding amused. "Many of us know of you through our brother, Sleep and father shares your postcards."

Well didn't that just give me the warm and fuzzies.

Erebus really did care.

Uh, thanks for the invite - but there were two problems with that named fucking Alecto and Nemesis. I do not want to see them right now and the feeling was probably mutual. Not to mention, the House of Night had a nasty habit of driving mortals mad. But I'm gonna have to - wait.

Hold the fucking phone.

If Hypnos is leaving, what's going to happen to everyone who's asleep?

Wasn't it kind of important that Sleep itself was on this side of the Pit? The House of Night was in Tartarus. Much like how the River Styx was the border between the land of the living and the dead, the Pit was a border too.

Between us and Chaos.

It was the kind of place you throw things into when you really don't want them coming back out. Like the pieces of a certain Titan Lord.

I fucked that up, but you know what I mean.

Thanatos quirked an eyebrow. "The Crossroads will call to whomever it will, but the Oneroi and Somnia have been called home."

The Oneroi and Somnia were the spirits and gods of Dreams. That meant Morpheus wasn't guarding the entrance to the Dreamlands either.

But people still have to sleep. They can still sleep, right?

Hypnos sent me an affirmative, but it was edged with worry.

"Mother does not make idle commands, so no, you cannot stay." Thanatos gently chided his twin. "They will sleep as they did in the times of antiquity," he clarified.

You mean getting lost in the Night, I said bluntly.

"It will not be the first time," Thanatos said. "Nor will it be the last."

But that's -

" - of no consequence." The God of Death said just as I remembered who I was talking to. Yeah, I guess he wouldn't think a few cases of sudden death because people wandered too far and got their Sleeping soul fucking eaten wasn't that big of a deal.

Thanatos gestured and Hypnos reluctantly put me down.

I could immediately feel the difference as my soul drifted, like a planet slowly rotating around a gravity well that had just disappeared.

I bit my lip.

Thanatos didn't offer to help me, but then, I didn't ask either. For the first time in my life, Hypnos was the one telling me goodbye. I waved after them, until I couldn't see them anymore.

Then I was alone among millions and millions of the faint lights of sleeping mortal souls, slowly drifting away. I hoped they had a head start in staying put, but there was nothing I could do for them. I felt so very small again. Insignificant.

Mortal.

It felt like standing in the eye of a hurricane.

I shivered.

I thought of my apartment in the Dreamlands and willed myself there.

I, look, it's been a while since I haven't had Morpheus correct my trajectory, so I was a little off.

And, uh, I didn't exactly stick the landing.

I'll be honest.

I fucked everything up.

When I say something like 'I fell into the Dreamlands,' I don't mean 'I fell from the sky of the Dreamlands.'

That would be super counterproductive.

There was something about the sensation of falling that really didn't play nice with Dreaming. Some half-forgotten survival instinct left over from the days when sleeping meant wandering the Night. Back then, if you ever felt yourself falling down while sleeping, you better wake the fuck up.

There really wasn't anything you could do about wandering too far, but at least that was usually painless.

Falling into the Pit wasn't.

Evolution was funny like that, right? It was crude, but effective as far as failsafes go. Hypnos was awesome and tried his best to keep everyone safe, but I know not even gods are perfect.

When I say 'I fell into the Dreamlands,' I mean I fell from the outside in. And in the Dreamlands, shit only makes logical sense when it feels like it. You can 'fall' in sideways, diagonally, backwards and Sam told me about this one time he fell in five minutes ago. Time isn't constant in the Dreamlands either. He met himself five minutes later and things got weird.

If you are like me who remembered half-way through that I had no idea where my apartment actually was, Morpheus wasn't there to be my GPS and promptly panicked like a blockhead, then you can fall in from the bottom up.

Of the ocean.

For the second time today, I found myself drowning.

My first reaction was to panic harder.

Don't do that.

If you do that, you're a moron.

The Dreamlands is the last place in the universe where you want to be feeling really strong, negative emotions like hatred or fear.

It starts messing with you. Getting into your head.

For that one second, I was back off shore of that cold beach right after Rhea intervened again. I could feel Artemis' broken bones grind under her fur as she was shocked awake. I could feel Luke's weight pulling me down into the dark depths. The cold saltwater burned as it invaded my nose and my lungs. And somehow, through it all, I could still feel Luke's blood on my face.

A Dream doesn't have to make logical sense.

Dreamlands, remember? I reminded myself. It was still hard, even when I knew. We made it. We're safe.

I was a sleeping mortal soul in the Dreamlands.

I don't need to breathe.

The burn in my chest faded away as I gulped down saltwater, trying to ignore the iron tinge.

I thought of Artemis, how the little auburn furball slept on her back with her paws in the air and mouth open in her wicker basket.

Not here.

The thrashing form in my hands vanished.

I thought of Luke, unconscious on the back of a lion as it padded past me, but breathing. He was just sleeping in his own guest room and Apollo had snuck him a bit of help. He was fine.

Not here.

I stopped sinking. The weight of his arms slipped off my shoulders and I still reflexively turned towards it, reaching out (no, no, no Luke!) to stop him from falling away.

There was nothing there.

I was alone, floating in the midst of pitch black waters. The water itself felt ridiculously heavy, like it was fighting every move I made and I was wearing weights. Good thing I was a soul. If my body was here, it would be crushed to a pulp.

I had no way of knowing how to get to the surface or even which direction was up. I wish it was as simple as just willing myself out of here, somehow, but it didn't work like that. Not from inside the Dreamlands.

Sam would tell you that it wouldn't work, because it wouldn't work. He's not dumb, but he's a cat. He likes to keep things simple. One of Sam's friends, Wilhelm, would say the Dreamlands was a reality that operated on its own set of rules and physics, like bizarro gravity. You could try something clever, like make a teleporter, but logic had mixed results here because the rules weren't the same as reality.

They just pretended to be.

Your teleporter might not work. You might blow up. It might work, but what comes out the other side isn't you. It will look like you for a few minutes and it would sound like you, but everyone could tell something was wrong. It was just some squiggly thing that had hollowed him out in transit and was wearing him like a meatsuit, trying to convince us it was safe to try out too -

Anyway.

Potato - remember him? Dog that used to be in charge of a mining town in the valley of the mountain range down south until everything went wrong.

Potato told me the Dreamlands were alive.

I believe him. I didn't want to think about what was lurking in its oceans.

I should think about it.

Not thinking about it was a good way to get eaten by whatever was lurking in this ocean.

Getting my sword back was probably a good idea.

I thought of Damocles.

Damocles was a beautiful bone sword. I thought of the way light reflected off the leaf shaped blade polished to an ivory shine. I thought of the silver-gold rippled edge of exposed marrow, the curved bronze cross guard and pommel with the horse hair dangling from the end of the long leather grip.

A twelve year old with a sword, you might be thinking. Against a sea monster while in the sea.

Sounds legit.

Don't count me out just yet. Damocles has a few tricks up its scabbard. It's the rule of 'like to like.' If you want to kill or destroy something, use something just like it.

My sword was made from bone.

Mom made it from the rib of an ancient sea monster, the Coinchenn. The same one that had killed the sea monster Cu Chulainn's dad, Lugh made his spear from. She didn't name it. I did. I don't think she liked my choice, but it was mine to make. Everyone remembers the sword. I named it after the man.

Damocles was my reminder not to want what I didn't have.

I had to be okay with being mortal.

With being just a demigod.

My sword settled in my hand.

It was glowing softly, lighting up the darkness around me. It did that sometimes and I could hear it sing, distorted as it was in the water which was, uh, new.

No, wait.

It sung when we met Aura, didn't it?

"Yeah," I burbled at it. I picked a piece of plastic off of its crossguard and brushed a bit of gravel and dead grass from the leather braids of its hilt. A congealed drop of luminescent gold blood, Aura's blood, peeled off the edge of the blade and floated away. "Missed you too?"

Damocles chimed.

I...you know what? I'm just going to roll with this.

This was probably Mom's fault.

"You wouldn't happen to know which way to the surface would you?"

It pulled at my arm.

"Gotcha."

I started swimming in that direction.

It took a bit to really get going, but only because I realized I was a moron after a minute, and made a little motorized scooter like you use for scuba diving to help me out.

It blew up, because I forgot about the water pressure.

You ever do something and it doesn't work and you just automatically try it again like this time it will work even if nothing changes, but you don't actually think that it will work. You just do it again because you're braindead. And it doesn't really register that it didn't work until it fails a second time?

It's not just me that does that. I refuse to believe that.

My second scooter blew up too.

My third scooter was a thick, bulky boy with armor and was more like an underwater jetski. I hooked Damocles on its side and got on my way.

It felt weird for a bit. This wasn't fun and games in the sun off the coast, but deep in a watery abyss. I could only see by the glo-stick impression my sword was doing and a small red LED on my scooter so I could locate it. It was cold down here.

It was actually kind of nice. It shouldn't be, but it was. I can't explain it.

I loved being in the water. Always have.

I started being able to see fish, mostly from the small glints of light from Damocles flashing off red skin and glowing bioluminescence. I got a little curious friend. He was long and thin, but almost completely see through with glowing blue spots along his spine and a face that looked like it'd been smashed into a door a few times. He had one bulbous eye that looked like it was covered in cataracts.

I think he was wondering about Damocles.

"Hey buddy."

He darted away and I felt a bit bad for scaring him off.

"Wait a second, don't go, it's okay." He hovered just out of reach. "I won't eat you."

He darted right back. This time, he was inspecting the red LED light in front of me by bumping into it. He must have liked what he saw, because his face split open vertically, spilling dozens of thin probling tendrils. Maybe he was trying to eat it.

"Trust me, you are way too ugly for sushi."

He was unable to eat my light and the tendrils retracted. He bobbed along, investigating my sword again.

My new friend is now named Swimothy.

"Race ya!"

I imagined my scooter going faster, but it was really hard seeing how fast I was going in the first place when everything was just water and darkness. So I just ended up using the fish as a benchmark and soon pulled ahead of him.

I like to think he was a bit surprised by the way he bobbed a bit, before he caught up.

"That's more like it." I smiled. I cautiously held out a hand, feeling it stream through the water.

He just as tentatively bumped it. "See? I'm not scary."

Swimothy the Fish abruptly turned tail and dimmed his lights, vanishing into the darkness.

"Good talk."

Guess he didn't agree with me.

It only took me a few seconds to notice that I wasn't seeing any other fish around any more.

Fuck.

Damocles immediately stopped its glo-stick impression which was probably a good idea that I didn't like at all, because the waters were still pitch black. I smothered the red LED with my hand.

I couldn't see anything.

The small bubbles and tiny murmur coming from my scooter suddenly felt dangerous. I could almost feel the hairs on the back of my body's neck stand up, like I was giving myself away to something searching these waters for prey. I swallowed down the bubble of fear and panic threatening to well up in my chest.

I was still a demigod of Fate and divinity was soul-deep.

Even here, I could feel doom approaching.

By the light of my scooter's LED, I picked up my sword. I briefly thought about making a lot of lights, so that I could at least see what was coming, but I...kind of really didn't want to see what was coming. I had Damocles, but only an idiot or the kid of a sea god would look forward to fighting underwater.

My sword was a last resort.

I was Dreaming, after all.

I willed a brand new Dream construct into existence around me.

I forgot about the water pressure.

My everything exploded into pain as I fell, like I was an expanding balloon trapped in a tightening vice. My joints felt like they were separating as my ears rang and just to add insult to injury, I slammed into a railing stomach first. I almost threw up as I slipped off down to a cold, hard metal floor. Screaming alarms and the screech of bending metal assaulted my eardrums along with what sounded a lot like high pressure streams of water forcing rivets out of place. I painfully coughed up saltwater.

"Ah, fuck," I coughed. I shook the water off and willed my soul dry.

Good thing Damocles had twisted in my hand just enough so I didn't cut myself on it or else that would have been embarrassing.

I stood up and had to cling to the railing that sucker punched me through a dizzy spell.

"I'm okay," I muttered. I hooked the sword back on the necklace I just expected to be on my neck, and it shrunk down to the little silver sword pendant.

"It's fine!" I yelled. I hiked up the metal stairs, hand on the railing my stomach had just gotten acquainted with. Don't implode, don't implode, water pressure is fine, I made a highly advanced technological achievement that can brave the ocean depths and it's not going to implode.

I froze when I hit the top of the steps, because, uh, I had the vague thought of making a submarine? My subconscious was weird, apparently. Maybe it was reacting to my fear? I trailed a cautious hand across the large copper colored cylinders of what I knew to be missile tubes. Everywhere I looked, there were heavy duty lights stolen from a Cold War bunker and signs written in Cyrillic giving me a headache and levers and ladders and hatches leading off into other areas of the submarine.

I expected a deep sea exploration module instead of the Red October. I saw one of those in the Smithsonian in Florida with my grandparents - the exploration vehicle, not Tom Clancy's Russian military submarine from Dad's favorite movie.

Sure, sea monster bad, but come on, brain.

I don't need a nuke.

I hope.

Who knows what a nuclear detonation would do in the Dreamlands?

I backed away from the missile tubes.

Alright.

So...

The Red October.

I can work with this.

Rise? I thought.

Go up.

Fast.

Please?

Nothing happened.

I've told you before, logic doesn't really work the way you think it does in the Dreamlands. Turns out 'I made the thing, so I control the thing' is too much logic sometimes, because your subconscious has more of a say than it should. Like when I tried to get rid of those baby pictures on the wall of my apartment so fucking Kronos wasn't going to get an eyeful of baby me wearing pants on my head, and I couldn't because my brain said no.

If I made the Red October...well, it was from a movie and movies...have actors maybe?

On cue, one of the closed hatches banged open behind me, making me jump as a dark haired man in uniform stepped in. As soon as he saw me, he jumped too, hand flying to his hip and I threw my hands up before I got shot.

"I didn't touch anything!"

He huffed, relaxing. "There you are, boy."

I heard English with a heavy Russian accent, but his mouth didn't fit the words like an obvious dub.

"Uh, yeah. Here I am." I checked myself over.

Human looking, just a bit hazy like my clothes were steaming hot.

Normal enough.

He strode past me to a lever on the wall that he pulled, and the hissing of gas and water faded. I tried to search for the leaks I could have sworn were just here a second ago…?

The crewman snatched a wired radio off the wall. "Missile chamber, contained. Found the VIP."

The intercom crackled. "Understood, report to command."

I cautiously lowered my hands. "Sorry."

I don't know what I was apologizing for.

"Come then," he said as he looked around like he was making sure I didn't actually touch anything. I didn't speak Russian, but there was this auto-translation thing the Dreamlands does. Sometimes. "The captain wants you in the control room."

"Sure, okay."

We trekked through narrow passages filled with pipes and lockboxes with bright red letters. He opened the hatches for me and the further we got, the more people I saw in dark uniforms, going about their business. I stumbled around a ladder into what looked like the control room, because it was a big space with people sitting in chairs in front of computer screens with headphones on, or looking at clipboards or thick manuals looking a lot like the bridge of a spaceship made in the 80s. There were a few pillars with peppermint colored bars to hold on to here for the standing plebs and there was even a partially enclosed compartment with command chairs within in the center. My mouth was hanging open when Sean Connery turned around with his golden bands glinting in the harsh white light.

"He didn't get very far, did he?" The actor said with his iconic drawl somehow sounding the same in Russian.

"No, sir," my guide said curtly, saluting.

"Hm."

This was fucking Sean Connery.

I shut my mouth, knowing I looked like an idiot. I bit my lip.

I had no idea what to say.

Did my subconscious make me a prisoner? Someone's bratty nephew they took on deployment for some reason?

Asking would be a little awkward.

"Sorry, sir." When in doubt, don't piss anyone off. I don't always follow my own advice, but that's just because I'm stupid.

Connery smirked. "We will see how long that apology is good for. Keep an eye on him."

"Yes, sir."

I was shuffled into a seat in the corner of the control room. My minder leaned against one of the rails nailed to the floor, pinning me with a gimlet stare. I smiled at him weakly.

"I won't go anywhere."

"You won't," he agreed.

Okay then.

I kicked my feet back and forth. There were a few low murmurs of conversation between crew members and a familiar face - I had no idea what his name was, but he was in Jurassic Park - who was probably the second in command as Captain Connery observed. There were enough flashing lights and moving green lines on enough screens to keep my attention occupied for a bit, but, uh…

I think my Dream was literally holding me hostage at the bottom of the ocean.

Which was...not great.

It's not like you can't wake up from the Dreamlands, you just have to be careful about it. Because 'you wake up from a Dream when you die' is a decree the Dream spirits follow because Hypnos likes mortals. If you want to play with the mortals in his realm, you follow the rules of the game.

Hypnos doesn't rule here.

If I did something dumb and someone pulled a gun on me, I was not going to have a good time. And even if I did wake up, Hypnos was gone.

I would be alone in the Night.

I opened my mouth just to say something when there was a shout.

"Captain, picking up something on the hydrophone - " a loud rumble reverberated through the hull of my Dream submarine, rattling the teeth in my mouth.

"Drive status," Connery barked as he crossed the room and the crew men sprung into action. "What are we hearing and where is it?"

So something was out there.

"We've had movement on the passive sonar, but it's not another ship - "

"It doesn't match any known signatures, sir."

"Caterpillar drive status is green, all functions normal."

"Replay that recording," Captain Connery pointed at a section of the computer screen from over the man's shoulder. I don't even know what the screens were showing, they were full of bending green lines, updating from the top down like a slow, pixelated waterfall. "Put it on the speakers."

The crewman nodded, pushing some papers away from his keyboard. There was a crackle as the speakers turned on.

Then there were some loud whooshing sounds of something swimming through water, but weird. Chaotic, almost. Like we were hearing a lot of things moving in different directions, but still somehow close together?

...tentacles?

The whooshing turned and then we heard what that vibration sounded like through the hydrophones.

It sounded like a whale call, if the whale came from this little suburb a bit north of the absolute bottom of Tartarus.

It was this tortured, screeching moan that sounded like something was dying, but it was the underlying clicking vibration that made my skin crawl as the sound got louder before dying off.

"That is not a whale, is it?" Sean Connery deadpanned.

"It's big," the crewman said quietly.

I didn't like the sound of that.

We were in a submarine.

The Captain stroked his beard thoughtfully. "But not a vessel. Perhaps we are in its territory and our stealth capabilities spooked it." He thought for a few moments longer. "Stay our course, rise to twelve hundred."

"Staying course," the - was it helmsman or pilot? - repeated as he pulled on the small black steering wheel. "Rising to twelve hundred."

I watched the guy listening to the hydrophones frown, leaning forward as he raised a hand to his headphones. A tension crept up my spine to the back of my neck.

Fuck.

I jumped up from my seat and shrugged off the heavy hand that came down on my shoulder, "It's hostile!"

Heads snapped towards me.

Sean Connery held up a hand warningly. "Sit down - "

"Captain - !"

It felt like a Boeing 747 crashed into us.

I grunted as I was slammed off my feet into the console next to me and my right arm screamed as it bent around the folded metal edge. The alarms were blaring again and everyone was shouting as the submarine itself felt like it was rolling onto its right side.

"Right full rudder, reverse starboard engine!" The Captain snapped out. His XO repeated the command as the submarine screamed, vents hissing vapour above our heads as red lights lit up on consoles and my arm throbbed unhappily.

"Are you injured?" My minder said under his breath as he clung to the rail bolted to the ground.

I gritted my teeth. "Not really."

"Where is it?" Connery barked when the rumbling stopped.

One of the crewmembers snapped his head up. "It's fast, sir, we have sustained damage to the arrays portside - "

"Find it!"

Under my feet, a high pitched ping rang out and then there was a cheep! A quieter, more consistent trilling continued long after the ping before finally tapering off.

The control room went quiet. Everyone had their ears peeled.

Piiiiiing….cheep!

Out of the corner of my eye, I saw a change on one of the screens. It was a classic sonar panel, like it was right out of a game of Battleship.

There was a very large dot right at the edge of its range.

Piiiing...cheep!

"Captain!"

"I see it," Sean Connery said with a calm I didn't feel. "Speed?"

Someone swore.

"Twenty knots, accelerating."

"Starboard the helm, ready torpedoes." The Captain leaned forward, brows furrowed as he stared like he could see through the hull of the submarine. "Prepare for evasive maneuvers."

Don't be afraid, I told myself. I ground my fingers into my hurt arm, just to chase away the numbness in my toes. Deep breaths. Calm. It was far too easy to fall into an emotional feedback loop here. The Dreamlands was the last place I wanted to lose my mind in. It will start messing with me. Getting into my head. Don't freeze. Don't panic. Don't be afraid.

Piiiiing….cheep!

Don't be afraid.

Or I'll end up creating my own nightmares.

Piiiing...cheep!

….

....

Like my mother.

 

[Shujin]

Hello everyone, you might want to reread to catch back up to the story.

An Undertow of Sand
A PJO Fanfiction
​

I know what you're thinking.

He has nightmares of his mother?

Sometimes.

And maybe that sounds bad. Morpheus' brother Phobetor, the Frightener, wouldn't have anything to work with if you weren't scared of anything. Or anyone. And he taught his sprogs all of his tricks.

I get where you're coming from.

Kids aren't supposed to be scared of their parents.

But you gotta remember, I'm only half-human. The rules are different. We aren't the same.

I don't really Dream like most people. The minor dream spirits don't really…Hypnos, their boss (father - grandfather - great aunt's first cousin, whatever) was probably my next best friend right after Cliff and Sam. If you were a dream spirit, ensnaring me was kind of like playing a prank on the President's nephew while in the White House.

Awkward.

And don't quote me on this, but I think my familiarity with the Dreamlands was also a bit intimidating? There was nothing they could do that wasn't a pale reflection.

And I could tell.

I would take those pale reflections over the Dreamlands when it got its hooks in, though.

A dream is still a dream, no matter the power behind it.

Nightmares all work the same way.

It starts with being afraid.

Mom doesn't want to hurt me. I know it, Dad knows it, anyone who's interacted with her for a minute probably knows. Sam will admit it if you dangle tuna under his nose long enough.

What she wants doesn't mean much when she can't help it.

And nobody's perfect.

My mother is Fate. It takes a bit to sink in what that means and it kind of still gets me. I thought I had a handle on it and then I'm blindsided with the fact that Chaos is my grandfather. It's an open question how much that dude contributed to the making of the entire universe.

He's my grandpappy.

Think about that for a minute.

Mom is so far above me and my Dad that if she didn't ground herself by clinging to us with everything she had, her sense of Time meant she'd blink and hopefully we'd only been dead for a few centuries.

To put it another way, the Fates tried to get Mom to abort me once. And by that, I mean they tried to get Mom - to get Ananke, the personification of Fate to reconsider her demigod child. To have a moment of doubt. They just needed her to entertain the thought for a fraction of a second.

I'm mortal.

All it would have taken was a thought.

Really puts things into perspective, doesn't it?

It still overwhelms Apollo sometimes that Dad went the extra mile and actually asked her to marry him (he gets super smug about it every time Apollo brings it up too).

Mom never has to say she loves us, because we know.

Mom doesn't want to hurt me.

But I know the difference between 'want to' and 'could' from 'would.'

She wasn't as careful with me as she should have been earlier. It's okay. It's only her third, maybe fourth, slip in twelve years. That's a pretty good track record if you ask me, but it also means I can't lie to myself and say it won't happen again.

It was easy to remember when I was awake, when my logical mind was in control with everything I knew to be true, that we were a family. We all fucked up at one time or another and we would fuck up again, but the important part was that we forgive each other and never stop doing our best. My mother loved me.

In my nightmares, she doesn't.

I don't have the power to summon my mother. The best I could get would be whatever my subconscious fears brought to life and it wouldn't be worth it. Not if I wanted to live through this. Logically speaking, I should have nothing to worry about but she's angry

Dreams don't have to make logical sense.

And dreams are what have the power here.

Piiing….cheep!

You could cut the tension with a sword as the pings of the sonar got closer and closer together. All of the servicemen were still and silent, eyes glued to their screens and dashboards covered in knobs, levers and dials with LED lights. Some seemed to look through their stations with a gaze that was a little off to the side as they waited, tensing and relaxing to the rhythm of their own breathing with their hands at ready.

I just tried to keep my inner four-year-old screaming for his mother quiet.

The First Mate was eyeing the Captain out of the corner of his eye. Connery was hunched over in his chair, murmuring under his breath.

Piing -

"FIRE!" The Captain snapped out.

-cheep!

I expected to hear or feel something that would tell me the torpedo was away, but there was just a beat of silence and then an almost bored sounding report from one of the men.

"Torpedo away."

Another checked his computer. "Target lock established. Three hundred meters."

My Russian babysitter hissed under his breath. "Will one be enough?"

Yeah…

Probably not.

The submarine pinged in agreement.

"If we were to - hypothetically - if we wanted to nuke it, how hard - " The officer gave me this look and the rest of the question died on my tongue.

It wasn't a dumb question, was it?

I thought it through.

Nuclear ballistic missiles - okay, so maybe they weren't known for precision exactly and trying to tag a sea monster with one while playing keep away sounded…

Yeah, okay.

A hypothetically bad idea.

So.

"Fingers crossed?" I offered weakly.

Piing…cheep!

Push comes to shove, just fire all the torpedoes. Every single one. Which was another way of saying fire an infinite number of torpedoes because I sure as hell didn't know how many missiles a tub like this usually carried. As long as submarines fire torpedoes held strong in my subconscious, nothing else mattered.

You know what?

Fuck it.

I elbowed my minder with my good arm. "Tell the Captain to fire all the torpedoes."

My babysitter opened his mouth just in time for Captain Sean Connery to jump to his feet, hand flying to the peppermint railing above his head.

"Caterpillar drive full reverse, up bubble sixty degrees!"

His First Mate repeated the command as the room spun into action, different voices calling out broken fragments of the captain's command and the deck under my feet had just begun to feel like it was tipping back when the shockwave hit.

I was thrown clear off my feet, right into my USSR chaperone who 'oofed' as I collided with his ribcage, nearly tumbling both of us right over the railing behind him. My arm screamed - definitely fractured - and I braced my spine and threw back my shoulders so that I didn't curl into myself in pain.

I was Dreaming. If I ignored it for long enough, I would forget I was injured and then I wouldn't be injured anymore.

"Tell me that was a hit!" Connery growled as he straightened, sounding like he was garbling small marbles.

"It was a hit," someone said immediately, eyes glued to their computer screen. "But we just barely avoided being rammed - "

"It's still moving!" His neighbor barked. "It's coming around for another pass."

Don't be afraid. Don't be afraid. Don't be afraid.

Don't be afraid. Don't be afraid.

D̴͕̚o̴̝͎̒́n̷̢̾'̴̢̜̃͋ť̸̪̬ ̷̳̫͐b̵̨́̕e̸̼̓ ̵̺̃ȁ̴̩̍f̶̠̉ŕ̵͇a̵̬̖͠ï̸̚ͅd̷͙͋̈

I was …starting to regret not springing for that sleepover with my cousins at the House of Night.

Which was really saying something, because that meant surviving a walk through Tartarus, not letting Nyx's domain drive me mad and worst of all, hanging out with Ethan's bitch of a mother.

Russian orders were flying over my head as I tried to think of something else, anything else, than how I felt like a sardine in a floating tin can.

With a hungry shark prowling outside.

"Can't we just leave?" I asked. It came out weak amidst all the shouting, but my babysitter heard me.

He steadied himself, gripping the rail with white knuckles. He gestured with his head, towards where one of the crew poured over large white sheets of paper decorated with waving, curling lines of different colors.

"We're trying."

"Just head for the surface - can't we just go up?" I was trying really hard not to sound like a whiny, terrified kid but…

I was a whiny, terrified kid.

I can admit that.

A muscle in my minder's jaw jumped. "We would die."

"What?"

His lips thinned. "We took refuge in a submarine volcanic chamber - "

We're in a cave.

My mind went blank for a second.

Then I thought of what would have happened if I had control over the Red October from the beginning and ignorantly made it rocket up as fast as it could go until it crunched against the cave ceiling -

The submarine shuddered, high pitched metal squealing burst from the walls as steam hissed from valves and the men started shouting louder.

I need to -

I'm going to die here.

I lurched forward, ducking under the babysitter's grab and bolted for the hatch out of the control room. I heard several people cry out behind me

"Boy!"

Metal walls, pipes and ladders passed by as I scrambled for - I don't know. I needed to think and come up with some kind of plan. Trying to make my way through underwater caverns in pitch darkness was a non-starter. Lights might as well be a sign that says 'Good with ketchup' and it would be stupid to think my current problem was the only monster in these waters.

But…if I could get into a narrow enough area it wouldn't be able to follow me…and if my next problem was smaller I could probably try to fight it with Damocles. Or maybe, I don't want to tag the sea monster with a missile, I want to get as close to the seafloor as I can fire and fire a nuke up to the cave ceiling and hope it breaks through -

The hatch behind me banged open.

I glanced over my shoulder and rolled my eyes when I saw that my babysitter had followed me into the guts of the submarine. Orange Cold War bunker lights were flashing off and on and I was pretty sure the sub was taking on water somewhere if the alarms meant anything.

I could fix it. I will fix it.

But fixing it won't solve everything.

"Do you mind?" I said waspishly. "It's not like I can leave."

"Have you considered punching it," the Russian said from behind me.

"Have you considered - " I started, turning back to him and he was looking at me when something took him over and I couldn't breathe. " - fucking…off."

There were shimmering hues backlit by stars in his eyes.

I couldn't say anything for a good fifteen seconds as I just stared at whatever was wearing my Russian babysitter's skin. I think I even swayed in place, suddenly dizzy.

His eyes looked like mine.

Like Mom's.

"...who?"

That's what I intended to say. I don't know if it even came out of my mouth.

"Guess," the god said as he ran his hand through dark hair that looked less like hair now and more like liquid shadows. He raised an eyebrow at me with the same crooked, trouble-maker smile I've seen on a goddess with grinding teeth for eyes before. "I've been told you're good at that."

"Erebus?" I whispered.

Piiing…cheep!

His head spun a full 360 degrees on his shoulders like some kind of spastic owl before his human guise fell apart.

Or maybe it would be more accurate to say it imploded.

His arms and legs were sucked into his crumpling torso as the navy blues of his uniform darkened until it looked like it was eating light, making my eyes drift as it became impossible to focus on the black hole that was my brother. He was - I thought he was a perfect sphere, but then my gaze wandered just a bit further and I saw there were reaching tendrils spotted with blue eyes burning like neutron stars radiating from his dizzying center. His limbs didn't look like they were in one piece, but were interrupted by empty space in between like they were stitches in reality and I could only see the parts that were on my side of the divide.

I could feel those parts though. He wasn't all here. The rest of him was…

Big.

"Woah," I said, awed. Sure, Mom made sure I looked like Dad and she always said he was handsome, but honestly?

"I want to look like you when I grow up."

I'm pretty sure my god brother laughed, even if the sound hit my ears backwards and dripped down the inside of my skull like oil.

If I didn't already know I was Dreaming, I would have pinched myself.

My brother!

My brother was here!

One of my immortal siblings was here!

HeLlo, Erebus said and his staticky voice pooled behind my eyes. Lii-ii-ii-tle BroTHER!

"Hey, man." I said with just the biggest grin ever, almost splitting my face in two. I checked my face to make sure it wasn't actually splitting in two. You never know. "What are you doing here? " I forced myself to take a breath before I ended up babbling or giggling. "Did you just want to check up on me?"

The Red October's active sonar ping rang out and then echoed back a few seconds later.

Erebus hummed and it ended in a screeching note of electronic sounding feedback.

It's time to come in, you guys, he said with the voice of a tired young woman. It's getting dark out - the voice hitched and changed to an old man with a Texan twang - out here in the countryside, away from the city lights, you can really see the stars, just small - a crackle and his voice changed again to something muffled over a bad quality radio signal. Small step for man, one…giant leap for mankind.

It took me a few seconds to puzzle that one out.

"Oh," I said. My smile shrunk. He's not like Mom. "Uh, in my defense, I thought it was an open door policy kind of thing - "

The slick in my skull sprouted teeth.

I flinched (he's not grading me, he's not Mom, it's okay) and reflexively threw the memory of Thanatos' casual invitation to the House of Night forward and out.

The teeth chewed on the memory.

Then Erebus sighed, sounding like a frumpy old woman. Oh, that boy!

He buzzed, undulating in space like bubbles of ink on water sinking beneath out of sight and then resurfacing, before he hit me with an incomprehensible feeling that felt tight and cold and grated and was maybe something like 'annoyed,' but I wasn't really sure?

I think I understand what's going on. Erebus wanted me to come to the House of Night. He either forgot to tell Thanatos that or the god of death didn't believe him, so I got the lame 'come if you feel like it or don't' instead of the offer of protection it was supposed to be.

My brother thought I was shitting all over the rules of hospitality and came to find out what the fuck, I know Mom taught you better than that.

Sheesh.

Good thing we're bros or this might have been a little awkward for me.

Or a lot awkward.

"Yeah, sorry about that," I said with a weak smile. 'I didn't know."

He's not like Mom.

He can pretend for a while and communicate, but I don't think he really understands.

Mom had always been pretty strict about introducing me to any of my 'cousins.' No matter how much I complained about humans, the answer was usually no. I thought they'd be just like Hypnos.

'When you are older,' she'd say. 'And less fragile.'

I didn't learn what demigod really meant until she left us on my seventh birthday. It's a bit like being the one finally realizing what the word 'bastard' meant and why you kept hearing people say it around you. Except worse.

I'm half-human. Erebus is my half-brother. I can die.

He probably doesn't know what that means.

I don't know if he's even capable of learning what that means.

"I didn't - " The submarine's sonar pinged, reminding me I was somewhere I'd really rather not be. "You know, actually - "

It only took a second to echo back and that was all the warning I got.

I was thrown off my feet for the second time tonight as the submarine lurched. I twisted just enough to bring up my arm to save my head and couldn't help the pained gasp as my arm snapped completely on the valve.

Ow.

Better my arm than my head.

The alarms were ripping through my eyes, lights flickering on and off as water poured in. I watched the walls of the Red October buckle inwards like it had been caught in a vice that was slowly squeezing.

iT HunGErs, my brother mused, idly spinning as his own gravity well as the cold, salt water sloshed around my ankles. The Cold War lights flashed brilliant and orange one last time before they all winked out in a hiss of smoke and white sparks that red shifted as they streamed towards him. IT SlePT, it WOke aNd sTIll DReaMS. thrEAt. WhERe iS it? WHERE IS IT?

"Erebus," I wheezed, squinting into the dark. "Help me?"

Growing boys need their nutrition, he said in a patronizing, thin and reedy voice. If they want to grow big and strong.

"Uh, that's nice, but I'm the one on the menu!" The steel of the submarine was groaning, creaking and squealing with the staccato pops of breaking rivets. The hallway was becoming uncomfortably narrow. "Look, get me out of this and I - I'll owe you one and - "

Erebus shushed me with a slimy feeling that burned my lips and tongue.

Mother gave you too much and too little, he whispered as a small child with an echoing dark undertone lagging just a second behind that slithered into my left ear. (Too much, too little)

Beginning and end.

(Begin, end)

Success and failure both.

(Succeed. Fail)

Do not be afraid.

(Be very afraid.)

He was big.

In the crushed hallway of a Typhoon class Russian submarine with maybe half a foot of room to spare, I stood underneath the stare of a burning gas giant. I could feel him thinking. The weight of his concentration made bubbles in the Dreamlands, feeling a lot like pebbles and grit blown by a strong wind against my skin.

You are a slow learner, little brother, Erebus said, sounding just like he had at the start when he was teasing me with a crooked smile and human face. But THEY are not watching. I will loosen your shackles this time.

I had a flash of memory of my first night at Camp and the Oracle of Delphi screaming into my face.

Hear me, son of the Ruiner! Loosen the shackles and relinquish control!

"Erebus?" I asked, trying to keep myself from trembling as the giant burned.

I've got no strings to hold me down, he sang, warbling. To make me fret, to make me frown.

Something touched my forehead.

It felt like my brain flipped upside down and then scattered, leaving a mote of consciousness dangling in an infinite expanse studded with wailing stars.

Next time, my brother hummed. Remember you hold the key.

I felt my Dream construct break apart like an older sibling casually smashing their younger brother's sand castle and the dark, cold waters rushed in. I choked - trying to remember - I am a soul in the Dreamlands, I don't need to breathe - but it was cold or was I on fire? It was hard to think, as if my neurons were stretched between those screaming stars in my head, flickers of light traveling back and forth as I opened hundreds of my burning green eyes and my back shivered as it struggled to open against the surge of water pressing in -

Going, Erebus said softly as I opened my mouth - but I don't have a mouth - and (divinity is soul deep). Going, he repeated, quieter. Going, going, going…

Gone, I thought in a burst of light.

 

[Shujin]

An Undertow of Sand
A PJO Fanfiction
​

Everything in the Dreamlands makes sense. Even the things that don't make sense.

Especially the things that don't make sense.

An old Prussian king lived in a quaint cottage on the top of a hill, surrounded by a jungle village where a tribe of short, dark people prospered in the shadow of four-eyed sentinel birds. Most of the time, it resembled a log cabin, but sometimes bits of an old palace design snuck in.

The orange tabby cat with a crook in his tail slammed the front door open and watched the home he was invading warp and twist at its presence until finally spitting out the old man coming down from a violent start.

Quite literally.

The Dreamlands were true to their name. A land of Dreams. And nightmares were Dreams too. Guard your fears jealously here, for they are not safe.

This nightmare was a shadowy humanoid figure with a revolver, smoking from the shot. The cat banished it with a flick of its tail, ears pressed forward in alarm when the old man fell against the wall, clutching at his bleeding chest with his good arm.

"Ah shit!" The cat yelped as it darted into the house. "I forgot! I forgot, I forgot, I forgot - " the cat chanted, half an apology. The house was already beginning to break down, swapping out a domestic reality for a crowded cobbled stone street in an old city where the old man feebly applied pressure on the gushing wound, staring up at his assassin.

"Willie." The animal snapped. "You are a mortal soul in the Dreamlands!"

The nightmare wavered and the man blinked.

"Come on," the cat needled, batting at the man with a paw. "You're not seriously going to die to your own fucking nightmare like a little bitch are - "

A trembling hand reached out and batted at the feline's ears.

"Thought not."

"Sam! You - " 'Willie' coughed. At first it was wet and hacking, but he deliberately coughed again, brow furrowed in concentration and this time it was dry. The nightmare with the gun disappeared like a popped soap bubble. The street took longer to disappear. Cobbled stone slowly became a shifting floor that couldn't decide what it was made out of, stone, wood or tile, but was absolutely certain that it was made out of floor. A tell tale sign of memories blurring together. The shadows of the faceless gawkers melted back into the walls. The flat surfaces gained and lost details, changing from wood to brick to plaster and back with various designs and patterns arriving and leaving, but at least they stayed in one place.

The austere house at the top of the hill was back in roughly the same size and shape as before. It even had the chimney and the appropriate number of windows. For a Dream construct, the home practically broadcasted the owner's dedication and focus.

The subconscious ruled in the Dreamlands. Every memory was given life here, everything you have experienced, everything you have learned, everything you thought you forgot. From past trauma to something as simple as word association. Keeping your reality focused. Keeping it still took decades of study for Dreamers.

Not that it meant much, to a cat.

Willie was still shite at poker.

Not his fault.

It hadn't even been invented until he was thirty two and a whole continent away.

"You damn little - "

"Sorry Willie, but help." The cat demanded.

"Wilhelm," the man corrected automatically, brushing rust red flakes off his shirt before pausing. "I - help? You came barging into my home - " He stared from underneath heavy brows snowy with age. "Help with what?"

"Finding Percy real quick."

"Finding…" The old man trailed off. "What?"

"You know him, black hair, sparkly eyes." The cat held out a front paw an impressive four inches above the man's shifting floor. "My midget human, 'bout this tall?"

"He's grown since I saw him last, surely. It's been - " He began, still a bit slow on the uptake. "Wait - what happened?" He asked, suddenly alarmed. "Is he hurt?"

"Worse," the cat said gravely and Wilhelm tensed, prepared. "He's fucking lost."

The old man stared, before rolling his eyes upwards before closing them. "Of course he is," he muttered. With a soft grunt, he pushed off his wall, good arm still wrapped protectively about his chest. "Of course he is."

They didn't talk about his bad arm.

It had been a divine gift.

No one worshiped the gods in the Dreamlands. Sometimes Dreamers didn't always understand why not. The shrines had power. The temples were all occupied. At times, you could see the massive forms lumbering across the horizon or crossing the sky. Compared to the Waking world, the gods were obvious and omnipresent. Worship was a natural conclusion.

However, worship here meant getting attention and getting attention was…

Complicated.

They didn't talk about his bad arm.

Wilhelm wanted to forget it and Sam wanted to let him.

"Where did you last see him?" Wilhelm said, all business.

Sam gave a cat shrug. "I don't have a clue where to begin, mate."

"But then - "

"I'm a cat," Sam stressed. "I have ears. And a nose. And fucking eyes. If I knew, I'd just go get his ass."

The man sighed. "Then how do you know he's lost?"

"His apartment wiggled," Sam replied as if that answered everything.

It didn't.

Wilhelm pinched the bridge of his nose. "Elaborate."

"It wiggles, or shivers or whatever when he gets Here," Sam said tightly, compulsively licking his right paw. "Gets more solid. And it did, but he didn't show up." There was a very real, trembling note of concern in its voice. "He wouldn't leave me behind to go explore someplace. He - he fucking knows better. He wouldn't."

"Very well," Wilhelm said softly and the cat ducked his head, turning away grumpily. "We will find him."

"We better," Sam huffed as it brushed past the old man deeper into the house. "So I can kill him for being fucking stupid."

Wilhelm made a sound, little more than a harsh exhale, but the cat still turned back to look at him, eyeing his twitching beard suspiciously.

"By all means, after you," Wilhelm said, eyes creased with amusement as he scratched his chin. "I will need my salts from the study and then -"

He was cut off by Sam's groan.

"Why can't you just chew on a bit of nip or hop on one foot for your magic like normal people?"

The irony was almost painful.

"Take it or leave it," he told the animal and it just grumbled.

Gathering the necessary ingredients was the work of a minute or two of collecting vials and carved wooden bowls holding crushed mineral rich sand or spices.

"This works better," Wilhelm was saying as he set his workbench. The cat perched on top of the stool right beside him, watching attentively. "Because it serves to narrow the focus and allows one to truly hold the spell. Wanting something to happen is not actually enough, this place needs to understand what you are trying to accomplish."

"That's…" The cat gave him a sideways look as the last of the saltpeter was poured into the copper cauldron filled with darkened water. "Sounds fucking risky."

"It is not asking for attention," Wilhelm rushed to reassure it as he picked up his ladle and made a slow clockwise stir. "The Dreamlands already responds to our very existence, what more can we demand of it? This is simply…focusing on its natural inclinations."

They both held their breath as an image appeared within the water, shimmering like a silver reflection. As swift as a bird in flight, the reflection in the water blurred over the forest to the pits of black and bubbling and crawling before it hit the wide, blue ocean.

"The fuck?" Sam leaned in until it was nearly dipping its nose into the picture.

"Perhaps he just went for a swim. He always did love the water…" Wilhelm trailed off when the reflection dove into the sea. Down past the dizzying colors and twisted creatures of the shallow waters.

Down into deeper, darker waters with three headed sharks and a sliding ocean shelf made of ash gray sand and small, gasping mouths exhaling yellow bubbles of poison.

Down until the last shreds of light have disappeared. When the window stopped, it did so with such abruptness that at first they couldn't tell it had stopped in a blur of movement and churning water. The window shook, spreading jagged, sharp ripples through the water of his cauldron before they saw them.

"Fuck!" He vaguely heard the cat exclaim. "Turn it off! Turn it off!"

He was staring, frozen until a sharp pain stabbing his wrong hand brought him back to himself. "I - what - "

"Turn it off!"

He upended the table.

The cat leapt away, yowling as dark water black as pitch splashed onto the ground. The liquid hissed, eating through the floor like acid until Wilhelm wrung it out of his Dream.

For a long moment afterwards, neither said a word.

Sam's right eye burned a brilliant bloody orange as the animal batted at its own face as if to pry the eyeball out of its skull.

It, too, had been a gift.

"Fucking…hate that." It rolled his neck like a pro-wrestler about to step into the ring and coughed. "'Kay, I'm getting him."

"Him?" Wilhelm repeated incredulously. "There was no him."

He could still see the fighting behemoths in his mind's eye, tearing into each other like wild beasts over food or territory. One a roiling, seething mass as big as a building; a undulating tail like flowing fabric ending in a needle sharp barb did nothing to soften the antediluvian horror of flailing, coiling tentacles of a sickly shade squirming and shifting in seemingly every direction even as it collapsed into itself like some gelatinous, fleshy slurry rolling down a hill.

Its opponent had the upper body vaguely resembling a dark winged hydra, proudly crested serpentine heads of gnashing teeth beneath the spines and grasping tendrils spilling from its back; it's lower body spilled from the lower jaw of one of the heads into a great open maw lined by vicious fangs of teeth, inky shadows leaking between them like saliva and where the throat would be, where the tongue should be, where a mouth wasn't was the abyss of space, populated only by a thousand burning green eyes as distant stars.

He hoped their spying hadn't been detected.

That would be…

Bad.

"Something must have gone wrong with the magic," he murmured. "They were - they were too close, a kind of gravitational pull on the search…" Wilhelm glanced up, just realizing he had been staring at the floor as he registered that Sam wasn't saying anything. "There was no him," he repeated optimistically. "Why would he be fighting a sea monster? And how would he have gotten to the bottom of the ocean anyway?"

The cat blinked slowly. "I think one of them…" It got quiet. "One of them was him."

Wilhelm stared and his stomach churned. "O - oh?"

"The eyebally one," the cat said with forced nonchalance. "He had eyes like that before."

He was not going to think about that.

Scheiße.

He was already thinking about it.

He'd known that boy since he had been too young for any sense of propriety, running around buck naked with his nappies on his head just because he could. His favorite word had been 'yeah' as an answer to everything, even when he meant no, and was always putting something in his mouth.

He didn't want to think about it.

"Are you…sure it's not some…distant relative of his through his mother or member of her court…" He stubbornly balled his right hand into a fist to stop himself from reflexively reaching for the dead (it's not dead) flesh of his left. The Dreamlands tried to latch onto that memory with its relentless greed, but oh, he's far too familiar with that nightmare to afford it even an ounce of power.

They don't talk about his bad arm.

Sam closed his eyes. After a long moment, it sighed. "Maybe."

"I will need something more personal, a connection to follow so we can be absolutely sure…"

He didn't know what they would do if a second attempt led them right back to the horrors beneath the ocean.

Try to keep the cat from getting itself killed, he supposed.

"Yeah," the cat said, subdued. "Okay. His place is not far, can grab something."

"Not far?" The old man paused in the act of shuffling on his overcoat, hat in hand. "So the reason you broke down my door as if you ran, half-mad across the entire continent was because…?"

"I fucking swear on me mum…" Sam groaned again. "I forgot you're a bitch about loud noises, alright?"

"I was shot!" Willie sputtered. "Nearly assassinated! Three times!"

"You got over it!"

"I most certainly did not - "

"And a fucking cold got you in the end!" The cat jeered as it bounded out the door, crooked tail standing proud.

Indeed, the boy's home wasn't far at all.

"I did not realize he was so close." Wilhelm said with an unasked question. The cat had led him, huffing and annoyed, right to the small valley on the edges of the jungle village he himself lived in. It was little more than a pure white box with a red door, its pristine colors surreal against the dirt ground and dry grass that surrounded it.

It was…surprisingly solid for a Dream construct.

"It moves," Sam said.

"It - " Wilhelm began and then stopped.

The cat marched right up to the red door and opened it with a flick of its tail. "Mind the gap," it called back from over its shoulder. "First step can be a doozy."

"But there aren't any stairs…?"

Reality blurred with a step.

"Wha - " The old man gasped as he found himself in a sterile white hallway lined with windows showing a view ten, maybe twenty stories up as if he hadn't just walked in from the ground. He turned around to see that the wooden red door had disappeared, replaced by a gunmetal gray gate with buttons on one side. There was no way this space would have fit inside the small hut he had stepped into. "How?"

"No idea." Sam huffed. "Lil fucker's bullshit."

A polished wood door led to an expensive looking living space with white leather couches, dark wood and glass furniture and white carpet. There was a fireplace and exotic looking flowering plants in every corner. A wall full of baby pictures was right by the entrance to what looked like the kitchen and behind a glass wall was a balcony with a pool, complete with a yellow rubber duck bobbing up and down in the water. Just like in the hallway, they were inexplicably high up off the ground as if on the top of a very tall building.

"It is so…" Wilhelm gently removed one of the pictures from the wall. It was a memory. A picnic scene with an exhausted, but happy handsome swarthy father beaming at the photographer like his every wish had come true. He had a proud hand on both of his boys, the older one blond and blue eyed with the father's curls and darker skin flashing a thumbs up and winking and the younger…He was a little younger than when Wilhelm saw him last. Five or six, black hair and shimmering eyes. He wasn't smiling at the camera, but up at his mother.

The woman was beautiful, pale and dark haired with a gently amused curl to her lips. Most of her was facing her husband and sons, but it was as if she had turned her head at the last second. Her black eyes stared unerringly into his own.

Everything was crisp.

Solid.

"This is impossible," Wilhelm whispered.

As if spurned by his disbelief, the picture frame faded from his hands only to reappear in its place on the wall.

"Bull. Shit," Sam repeated. "Don't think about it. Just find something."

There was a window that was not like the rest. It did not show the forest canopy with colorful four eyed birds flitting among the leaves. It was a black beach with sand of razor sharp obsidian shards and in the distance a tall black spire rose amid a starry sky that abruptly became dark and empty in the center. The shadow of some winged creature flew in circles around the tower.

He tore his eyes away.

"This…this is not the home of a Dreamer, is it?" Wilhelm said thickly. It was nearly indistinguishable from the Dreamlands itself.

Real.

"I said don't fucking think about it."

The old man ran a weary hand down his face.

"Too late," he said miserably.

"If it helps," Sam began in a reasonable kind of tone as it laid down in that indolent way of felines. "He's still a dumbass."

"That's not the point, you little - "

The door to the apartment clicked open and they both went still and silent as they watched Percy walk into his home.

The boy was filthy. Covered in streaks of an oily, gray substance, a bird's nest of black hair on top of his head, a dozen bleeding scratches underneath tears in his clothing and an impressive shiner on his left eye, swollen shut and leaking a molten silver. He was missing a pant leg and both shoes, trekking barefoot onto the wooden floor and leaking saltwater. An almost hysterical bubble of laughter welled up in Wilhelm's throat at the thought that he looked just like any other ten or eleven year old boy coming back from a scrap in the streets.

So it had been at least five years.

There was relief, that he was still the contrary little shit who had stared up at him in awe, his mouth in a small 'o' of surprise before blurting out, 'You're old!'

Then there was the shame that he had spent half a decade avoiding a child.

When they had first met, he had been horrified by the thought that children, barely more than infants, could find their way into the Dreamlands by accident. He feared he had found the answer to the inexplicable sudden death of sleeping young children. In his mind, the boy was basically an orphan, fending for himself in a strange, savage land.

But he had a mother.

Wilhelm cleared his throat. "Perseus."

The boy startled and Wilhelm held his breath as a hundred burning green eyes blinked open on the boy's form for a moment.

'He had eyes like that before,' Sam had said.

Mein Gott.

"Percy," was the muttered complaint. He blinked his good eye and the dark pupil was blown wide. "Heeeyy, Will! I haven't seen you in a while, man."

The prickling running up and down his bad arm (Percy had a mother) tightened the old man's smile. "Are you well?"

"You got fucked up," the cat translated.

"Uh, no. I mean, yeah?" Percy stared at them blankly, a small wrinkle of confusion forming on his brow as if he heard what they said, but didn't understand. "Maybe."

A shiver went down Wilhelm's spine and he could see it run down the cat's back as well. Something was wrong with him. His stomach sank and he fought not to take a few steps back.

"Like Carl?" He murmured deep in his throat, barely more than a breath of shaped air, trusting the sensitive ears of the cat to hear him.

(Carl was dead.

He had to be dead, because the thought that he was still in there - that he came out of the other end of the teleporter not completely hollowed out by what got him - was a terrible one. He didn't want to go through that again, but Dreams were not wishes. No matter how hard you tried.)

Sam did not reply, but instead rose to his feet, stretching out as cats do. First the front paws, claws out and wickedly gleaming and then the back legs. Perfectly nonchalant, but the fur along the back remained ruffled and slightly raised.

Sam was a blunt creature.

If he didn't attack now, that meant he didn't know who, or what, was in Percy's skin.

The boy was oblivious to the tension, an utterly punch-drunk smile spreading across his face. He'd always had an awkward, but endearing smile, but now the sight of the crowded mouth - more teeth than the human jaw could ever accommodate - curdled milk in Wilhelm's stomach.

"You should see the other guy." Percy declared.

They did.

"We did," Sam said, deliberately casual. Only the line of raised fur along his back gave it away as not being as relaxed as it seemed. "Fucking ugly bloke, what?"

"Noooo," Percy trailed off. He looked down at his hands and actually wiggled his toes as if he was counting them, like he needed to remind himself how many appendages the human body normally came with. Then he nodded to himself, coming to a decision. "Maybe a little."

Sam snorted.

Another too-wide smile. "Delicious too."

The cat's tail lashed back and forth as Wilhelm stood there like a stump, uncertain what he just heard.

"Why." The cat asked flatly. "Are you always putting shit in your fucking mouth."

The boy had the audacity to look smug.

"'I'm not a baby anymore, Sam'," the cat mocked in a high pitched voice. "'I don't bite anymore, Sam. I'm not teething anymore, Sam.' Fucking liar."

"Oh, come on, Sam, it was - just - I mean basically calamari…" He tried to explain -

But the animal wasn't having it. "Didn't you eat a fucking zombie a week or something ago."

What?

Percy sputtered.

Can they talk about the zombie thing?

"You - " One could see the boy blindly cast about for an argument and it was clear having to think was paining him. "You - uh, you can't tell me what to do!"

"The fuck I can't!" Sam hissed. "Fuck you - who was it that told me not to bite -"

The boy's head reared back in mock outrage, glee shining in his one good eye. "Because you never know where they've been!"

Wilhelm palmed his face.

That had to be Percy.

The cat went blank and still as a statue for a moment. "Did he just - ?" Not even waiting for Wilhelm to respond, it turned back on the boy, spitting. "You fucking hypocrite - "

"Sam, Sam it's okay," Percy attempted to sooth his cat with an odd, lopsided grin. Just an amused curl of one side of his mouth. "It's okay - you cat," he pointed with a trembling finger. "Me half-god." He blinked slowly. "Half. Haaaalf. Not one-eighth. Not demi but…"

His nose wrinkled as he swayed in place. His bad eye opened a sliver and whatever rested within that socket whispered.

…Maybe it wasn't Percy.

"Maybe demi but different demi." The boy looked at them expectantly. "You know?"

"Uh." Sam leaned away from him, wary again as a drop of blood from a star dripped down the boy's face. "I don't - I have no idea what the fuck -"

"My mom. Mom is -" Percy mimed his head exploding, complete with a bassy, reverberating whoosh and expanding smoke effects from his hands. Then he flapped his arms, desperate to explain whatever scattered thoughts were flitting back and forth in his head. "I can't - I won't die until I do!"

The cat stared, speechless.

"That…is rather how it works for most of us," Wilhelm pointed out gently, for lack of anything better to say.

Sam only tilted its head in Wilhelm's direction, unwilling to take its eyes off whatever was masquerading as the boy they knew. The casual gesture was punctuated by the agitated lashing of the cat's tail back and forth.

"Death is a process. It has to happen, mortality itself is a collection of factors that -"

"People die when killed," Sam cut in.

Wilhelm sighed. "Yes. Fine."

Now it was Percy's turn to stare at them, completely and utterly stumped. His mouth flapped open and closed, searching for the words, but Wilhelm could almost see the thoughts dribbling out of his ears until the boy gave up with a whiny,

"Oh."

Sam made a soft yowling sound. "Hoooow's about we have ourselves a bit of a lay down, hmm? Just a small kip."

Percy frowned. "I'm already sleeping."

"You're shaking," the cat replied flatly.

The boy blinked and looked down at himself again.

He was. Tremors were running up and down his slim frame like beetles burrowing into a carcass.

"I can just - "

"Sit. The Fuck. Down."

For a moment, Percy was about to argue. Wilhelm could see it in the stubborn jut of his chin, but then he twitched like a puppet jerked on its string, swayed again, then plopped down where he stood with a loud put upon sigh.

"Happy?" He grumbled as he sprawled across the wooden floor.

"Ecstatic." Wilhelm drawled in response before the cat bit the boy's nose off. He yelped when the apartment shifted around them, the foyer stretching to place the front door far away from them until they were deposited in the middle of the living room. There were no distortions or hints of instability.

The sheer ease of it all!

He snuck a glance at the boy stretching out on the floor, leaving smudges of red blood too bright and shining to be real on white carpet.

"My brain is floating out of my skull," Percy said suddenly, very seriously, staring up at the ceiling. "Are my ears still backwards? I think Erebus turned them backwards. And my asshole ran away."

"Fucking tragic, that is," Sam replied, also very serious.

They were not actually talking about his literal…?

"Does that make me constipated?"

They were.

"Only if you need to shit."

"No. But I can't poop without one, so I better not." The boy's brows furrowed. "I was hungry, but I lost - I'm losing my stomach, Sam."

"Better hold on to your hat then."

"Okay," Percy said, as if that made any sense at all. He wasn't even wearing - a black bowler hat appeared on the boy's head and Wilhelm about swallowed his tongue. "My brother said I need to eat."

The cat blinked. "Aren't your siblings jackasses?"

'Siblings?' Wilhelm mouthed, horrified.

He thought of the smiling blond boy from the photo-memory. There were more like him?

Percy huffed. "Only - only the triplets. Darkness is cool. He helped and then - and then there were some looking," he said, skipping train tracks. "Other gods. From - around here, I think? And they thought I was cool. And I was. Cool. I won. I cheated, with a volcano," He whispered loudly, as if imparting a great secret. "It woke up," and in the Dreamlands, that could very well be completely literal, "but I didn't die, so it was fine. Not dying was important. And I think I got asked out on a date."

By what?

Percy gingerly rolled onto his side, giving them a heavy, one eyed look as if to ask them something very important. "It's not my fault mom's kids are good looking, right?"

"No," the old man said, completely bewildered.

"Right. Okay." He rolled onto his stomach and began to trace the swirling pale patterns in the rug. His hat was tipped rakishly, complete with a blood red feather sticking out of it. "I knew that. I'm too young for a girlfriend anyway."

He was …not going to touch that with a ten foot pole.

"We will get you a snack," Wilhelm offered, trying to escape.

"I could eat," Percy admitted. "Yeah, thanks." He lifted his head, throwing them a bright, hopeful smile. "Mom didn't really mean it, you know? She can't help it sometimes, but she was sorry!"

Wilhelm allowed himself to reach across to touch his bad arm. "I know."

"'Kay." He laid his head down again and his hat slid off. "We can be friends again, right?"

Wilhelm smiled weakly and shuffled the cat back into the next room when Percy's attention shifted to his hand as if it was the most fascinating thing he'd ever seen. And perhaps it was. It was shifting under the attention, fingers merging together, twisting, becoming spindly, becoming smoke before hardening into a dark spine before relaxing back into a human boy's hand.

The heavy wooden door closed behind them with a satisfying click and he let out a sigh. "Verdict?"

"The stupid burns."

"Sam," Wilhelm scolded. "You know what I mean. Is he…" He shrugged his good shoulder in Percy's general direction and whispered out the corner of his mouth, trusting those cat ears to pick it up. "Well?"

"Tripping premium top fucking balls," the cat said. "But yeah, it's him."

He was assuming by the context that 'tripping balls' was another way of saying 'acting drugged.' He wasn't going to ask if he was correct. He's always been a little afraid of asking the cat what it was even saying since he learned that 'clap' was no longer just a word for smacking your hands together in appreciation.

If it was Percy, and he was under the effect of some kind of hallucinogenic then…

Then…

He was dismayed by how little that actually solved.

Sam tilted its head, wiggling its right ear. "Not convinced he's alone in there. He's too fucking…"

It trailed off, searching for the words.

"Demigod," the old man ventured. "What do we do then?"

"Dunno," Sam said unhelpfully. Its tail lashed back and forth quickly. "If it were anyone else, I'd tell them to never put a fucking mushroom in their mouth ever again, but he's always mouthing shit and nothing ever fucking happens sooooo…" Sam glanced back at the door thoughtfully. And then shrugged. "Dunno."

"And when he wakes up from this Dream…?"

"He's a mortal soul in the Dreamlands, like you." Sam muttered. "You never wake up, you just leave for a bit."

"I see," Wilhelm hummed.

It was true. You never do wake from the Dreamlands.

He sighed as he had no ideas making themselves known either. "Well, I did say I would get him something to eat…"

The cat grumbled, turning towards the open doorway leading to what looked like the kitchen. "Right. Do something about the munchies…brat going to eat me out of house and home."

"Is this not his house and home?" Wilhelm asked mildly.

Sam shot him a dirty look.

And then it froze right outside the kitchen, its tail shot straight up, crook and all. "Fuck."

"Now what?" Wilhelm grumbled as he stepped past the animal…and stopped dead right at the door. "...what?"

The kitchen was a disaster.

There were cartoons and plastic bags holding previously frozen food that had been allowed to drip all over the counter top for hours, if not days. Streaks of multicolored brown goop had congealed on the white cupboard doors, right next to nauseatingly sweet, artificially fruity smelling puddles and bloody water from thawed meat pooled on the tiled floor.

The old man moved automatically. Most of it was driven by reflexive disgust at the mess, but he would be lying if he denied a sliver of concern over a black haired boy with a thousand eyes seeing all his spoiled ice cream.

"What even were you doing?" Wilhelm hissed, picking up the most intact packages - brightly colored plastic tubes with pictures of fruit on them - and rushed to the ice box.

"Shit, I had to do something with him - "

Him?

He opened the ice box.

He closed the ice box.

Wilhelm fell against the wall beside it and slowly slid down it, blueberry, raspberry and watermelon Pops!cle bags falling to the floor alongside him.

"There are body parts in the freezer," he said dully.

"Not my fault!" Sam protested immediately and for a moment, he foolishly dared to hope the cat had a reasonable explanation. "He fucking came like that!"

"Explain," he demanded.

The whole story didn't make any more sense.

"...he's got power, sure, but pop him in the noggin and his head fucking flies off. Ain't nothing fucking happening cut up like he is."

"Kronos," Wilhelm repeated in a dead voice. He was no academic in life, but he had been born into the last days of the Holy Roman Empire. There was no escaping that history. "Percy rescued the Titan Lord from the Pit and now he's on ice. Here!"

The cat blinked. "I just said that - "

Wilhelm reached out and swiped at the cat's ears, shutting it up. His head was beginning to spin unpleasantly (the pagan gods of the Waking world were real). "Is he conscious?"

The cat hesitated. "...no?"

He leaned away from the unassuming humming appliance. "You do not know!?"

"He can't do anything!"

"Anything can happen in a Dream!"

They glared at each other.

Sam was the first to look away. "I could take him. If he fucked around."

He could take - ignoring the sheer arrogance of that statement, because Kronos was an immortal god and Sam was an orange tom cat: "This is Percy's home."

Sam spit at him, chops curled back into a savage snarl. "You don't get to bitch about his safety anymore. You fucking left, remember?"

His bad arm prickled uncomfortably as the shame came flooding back.

"You are right, of course," Wilhelm mumbled contritely.

"Damn straight." Sam sat proudly, ears bent back against his head. "Which is why he'll be staying with you."

"What!" The old man sputtered. "Absolutely not!"

"He'll be away from Percy."

"He's a pagan god."

"...Okay," Sam said slowly, clearly not understanding the problem. "But, in pieces. He can't do anything you can't handle, seriously."

"You don't know that!" Wilhelm snapped. "He's a god!" His breath was coming fast, too fast. He could feel the weight, foreign and cold, hanging off him as a gangrenous limb fit only to be amputated. He didn't look at his bad arm, he never looked at it if he could help it, because it would look back.

His bad arm was a divine gift.

As much as a replacement for what you took could be a gift.

No one worshiped the gods in the Dreamlands.

Percy, painfully young and absolutely horrified, hadn't realized that insisting - 'it was an accident! She didn't mean it! I'm sorry! I'm sorry!'

(People died.

He almost died and he did not know what would come after, this time)

-only made it worse.

"You don't know that," he repeated, softer.

"He was human once," Sam nearly whispered.

His breath caught.

His curiosity burned. Humans could ascend?

Truly?

There was a long moment of silence.

"I will consider it," Wilhelm said stiffly as he gathered up the popsicles back onto the counter and then he rooted around in the refrigerating unit. "Clean up your mess," he ordered. "I can handle a few sandwiches."

He almost couldn't handle a few sandwiches.

Nothing looked the way it should have. The bread was already sliced right out of the clear, crinkly package. As was the bacon, looking almost like a different cut of meat entirely, and he had to be walked through using the 'microwave' by the cat, because the stove had a lot more knobs than he was comfortable with.

The future was not convenient. It was confusing.

At least the lettuce head was familiar, as was the tomato, albeit far larger than he was used to.

The knives were tucked away. The wood block almost shoved into the corner on the far end of the counter, as if they were trying to hide away. He reached for the closest handle.

Something took hold of him.

'Is that what you think?' A man hissed into his ear. 'Is that what you fucking think!? Come 'ere!'

Blood splashed onto the counter as the back of his hand opened.

'Look! Look at it! It's not silver! It's not fucking gold! It's red! Like MINE!' The man was yelling through tears. The stink of alcohol was almost a physical slap to the face. 'Tell me again what Apollo said, you little shit. You bleed red! She left BOTH of us!'

He felt so very, very small.

A grain of sand on an infinite beach, battered by the waves. Lost and drowning.

'We're. Mortal!'

Then it was gone and the kitchen knives, quietly tucked away in the corner, were silent.

"Willie?"

The old Prussian king grabbed one of the 'paper towels' from the counter and cleaned up the red blood staining the white surface.

"I am well," he answered quietly.

The cat eyed him dubiously. "What the fuck was that?"

He pursed his lips thoughtfully. "I do not know."

Another memory, like the picture? A nightmare? Both or something in between?

He wanted to ask, but whatever it was, it felt like an old, private shame.

He was familiar enough with those.

They finished making the sandwiches.

Percy was waiting, more or less patiently, in the living room. A small, spinning galaxy was dancing between his fingers as he slouched on the white leather couch before a long glass table. No shoes. A dirty white button up shirt rolled up at the sleeves. A streak of molten tears was still leaking from his swollen eye.

Every inch a bored, young godling resting after a fight.

"BLTs?" Percy asked. "Nice."

"There's a Titan Lord in your ice box." Wilhelm tattled.

Sam glared at him.

"Uh." The boy blinked slowly, hand hovering over a sandwich as his good eye traveled over to the cat. "Zagreus? You didn't throw him back - " He paused. His face scrunched up. "Throwing someone into the Pit sounds like a war crime, Geneva cares about that. So we shouldn't, because it's the 21st century, baby."

…What?

"High as fuck," Sam reminded him as a low hiss.

"Do you care about him being in your ice box?" Wilhelm stubbornly pushed on.

"My ice cream is in there," Percy responded and out of the corner of his eye, Wilhelm saw Sam flinch in the middle of stealing a piece of bacon. "But not really? He's not my problem and he doesn't want to be." Percy smiled guilelessly. "He's smart like that."

Wilhelm had absolutely no idea what to say.

He was saved from having to say anything by a loud, lingering honk. Percy's head whipped around.

"What was that?"

"The signal horn," Wilhelm supplied. "There is something of a market festival in the village today."

"We're near people?" The boy said abruptly. He stuffed the remainder of his sandwich into his mouth and stood up. "I wanna see, let's go!"

Sam bounded right at his heels.

If it pressed a little too long against his shins, a little too eager to keep its friend within its sights, no one said a word.

Wilhelm watched as Sam dug this cute little woven vest from the bottom shelf of the closet by the front door, shimmying into it. It had hooks on the side where Percy painstakingly perched leather pockets. Whoever made it for the animal had a sense of humor. It was decorated with a small orange cat chasing a red bird.

" - I ain't buying you shit," the cat was complaining as Percy tried and failed to make himself presentable. The most he could do was get some shoes on. "Get your own fucking money."

"I'll pay you back."

"Do you remember N'ath?"

"Um."

"Because I remember fucking N'ath, you cheap bastard."

"Oy, my parents are married!" Percy barked a laugh. "Luke called me a koala once."

"Yes," it said immediately. "What the fuck's a koala?"

"Sam. Sam! Sam," Percy said. "I love you."

The cat recoiled. "You really are fucking flying, mate."

Eventually, they remembered him and both turned to regard the old man still sitting, nonplused on the sofa.

"Willie. Coming?"

"I have seen more than my fair share of market days," he declined, patting his knee. "Let me rest my legs a little longer."

Percy's smile softened. "Sure. Stay as long as you like."

And he did.

He went out on the balcony to smoke a bit of his favorite pipe, the earthy, bitter taste calming as he contemplated. The yellow duck floating in the pool was free of judgment and he watched it make laps in still water.

He went back inside and glanced over the wall of pictures.

They were all of a very young Percy, from a chubby cheeked baby to a six year birthday party. The blond boy was present only in the last few rows of memories. Sometimes he looked as young as ten, perhaps twelve years old and in others an older teenager or young man with the same features appeared.

Not mortal, then.

Could this be Apollo?

His eyes searched for the picnic photo-memory and it took him longer than it should have to find it.

Because it had changed.

The mother was now returning Percy's smile, a possessive, gentle hand trailing through his black hair, ignoring the photographer entirely.

It had changed.

Goosebumps broke out all over his skin and he hurried away.

The kitchen was just as he left it. After a moment of thought, he retrieved the plate of crumbs and put it in the sink. He busied himself cleaning up the remains of the mess, little stains left behind by the cat's half-assed effort. The knives were still in their dark corner. An echo of their cry (we're mortal!) wailed in his ears. But eventually…

Eventually.

He opened the ice box.

"Lord - " What had Percy called him? He was unfamiliar with it, but he knew the power Names held. "Zagreus."

Something shifted.

He could feel it as the temperature dropped and the shadows lengthened.

The Titan of eld stirred.

"I have questions," he continued.

The deep voice came from everywhere and nowhere at once.

"Speak."

 

[Shujin]

An Undertow of Sand
A PJO Fanfiction
​

I laughed at Cliff for his 'superhero' Dreams.

We're besties, that means we're allowed to be assholes to each other sometimes.

Anyway, some random Dream spirit would manage to squirm through his wards and give him the most obvious, ridiculous Dreams. Ones where he was on top of the world, being awesome and rich and famous and all that jazz. I've heard everything from the Mist being gone and he was an actual dog-headed superhero to him being voted to Chief Lector of the House of Life, the head honcho of all the Egyptian magicians.

Yeah, right.

Then his alarm would go off and he'd remember that, actually, everything sucks! He had chores to rush, his half-finished homework to bullshit and if he didn't get up right now, he was going to be late for the school bus.

I didn't understand how he could let himself get suckered that badly. His disappointed grumbling was hilarious. Dreams were Dreams for a reason. What was the point of wishing they were real?

So.

I'm an idiot.

And a hypocrite!

I was the one who asked Morpheus to let me see my parents in a Dream when the Quest got to me. I hadn't known Mom'd actually be there when I asked. I was prepared to settle for a shade.

And I would have given anything for last night's Dream to be real.

I felt like I could take on the entire world, and every god on it at the same time. I had my cat buddy ready to kick ass with me, reconnected with an old friend and was allowed to forget about my Quest. For the first time in a long time, I wasn't afraid, because there was nothing to be afraid of. My big brother Darkness was there! I could feel his awareness of me the entire time, like I was worth something! I wasn't small and weak anymore! Mom had nothing to be ashamed of, because I was like him! Like all of them! I was -

I

I was

And then I woke up feeling like absolute, utter dogshit.

That had been tap danced on by someone in razor sharp stiletto heels.

Before they wiped me off on a wet curbside and threw me into a burning dumpster.

"Blarghable!"

It was worse than just waking up and remembering that Luke nearly died yesterday, my asshole rabbit party member was at fault for being her asshole self and that we had ten days to find where Ares' stashed the Master Bolt.

Way worse.

Because it was all that and I was fucking sick!

Every inch of me hurt with this tight, dry pain making me feel strangely bloated, like if I moved too much, I would tear out of my paper thin skin. I had a stuffy nose and a killer headache. I felt like I had a concussion. The world was tilting back and forth like I had water in my ears, my clothes were sticking to me with sweat because I needed out of this sauna that was my immune system and my stomach…

"Urghhuah!"

My stomach hated the ever living shit out of me.

I was hanging halfway off the bed, trying not to vomit all over my sheets and getting most of it on the hardwood floor and the yoga mat. And let me tell you, Rhea's lasagna and her chocolate chip cookies did not taste the same coming back up.

It also squirmed in my mouth.

I was blaming the lasagna.

"Guurgghah!"

Or maybe the cookies.

I also wouldn't put this past Alecto's cooking skills.

Mom's given me some questionable shit to eat before, sure. And maybe I had a habit of trying out stuff like those honey ants and fried greasy three-headed snake sticks I got Sam to buy for me, but nothing I ate in the Dreamlands counted!

None of it could move after being swallowed!

I want a refund!

I threw up again.

I don't know how long I spent upchucking, but the tank ran on empty pretty quick. Nothing but scorching bile and wriggling chunks I was starting to think were pieces of my intestines. I would not be surprised if I was actually spitting up my entire digestive system. The way my stomach ached and burned, twisting itself even tighter into knots, sending a sick flush right through my skull was not filling me with confidence.

I laid there, half off the bed, head hanging down hearing blood rush in my ears as I panted, coughing. The yoga mat was covered in what Sam would call a dog's breakfast. A thick slurry the color of kibble filled with mushy chunks and writhing bits of a gelatinous, sickly pale meat that I vaguely remembered eating.

At the bottom of an ocean.

I don't -

I don't know how that's a thing.

Damocles was the only thing capable of following me out of the Dreamlands. Because Mom made sure it could. Even now, it hung from my neck back in its place of honor as a silver pendant.

Nothing I eat in the Dreamlands counts.

This can't -

It's got to be Rhea's chocolate chip cookies. They were too good.

That's how you know they're evil.

The guest room door opened soundlessly as the star-spawn baker from hell poked her head in.

"Are you - " she started. I tilted my head just enough to see her out of the corner of my eye as I stared at the steaming pile of vomit. Or maybe it was smoking? I think the yoga mat was melting. We both watched as one of the flailing pieces, like a demented severed limb flopped its way under the bed.

I blinked slowly.

Um.

Okay.

Rhea pinched the bridge of her nose for a second.

"Why?" She asked me.

I wanted to answer that.

But I -

I got nothing.

I can't think straight and I have no clue.

"Right. I'll just - " Zeus' mom was honestly in a tie dyed belly shirt and blue sweatpants as she waved a hand in my general direction. I felt something in the world change as the smell of bile disappeared.

I could do that, I thought fuzzily.

I had done it.

"You're - I heard that? I think your brain is leaking," Rhea said.

It was just like when I fixed the tears in my couch because Sam hated scratching posts and authority. A simple exertion of will. I painfully flopped back onto my bed and feebly tried to kick my sheets off. My legs were noodles, so I didn't get very far. Everything I was wearing was sticking to me.

I had the thought.

Why don't I just do it right now?

Rhea barked. "Don't - !"

My stomach tore.

It felt like Zeus tagged me with a lightning bolt to the belly button. Pain seared right through the center of my navel to my spine, then crawled up it. Everything locked up. My limbs. My thoughts. My blood.

I couldn't even scream.

Rhea caught me as I fell off the bed.

The jolt of halted movement was all it took.

I threw up all over Apollo's grandmother.

Not my best moment.

Not gonna lie.

She stiffened and blew a harsh breath out her nose.

"...yup. Just like your sister," she said blandly before willing the mess off us.

I didn't even have the energy to cringe.

On a scale of one to ten, with one being 'miserable' and ten being 'doing great' I was at 'demigod shaped turd bucket.' So maybe a negative five. Aftershocks were making my fingers curl into twitching claws. I hurt all over. My fever was a billion degrees. I doubted I would be able to keep down water right now.

Am I dying? I thought slowly, draped all over Rhea.

Maybe?

Was my very first illness actually going to take me out?

Lame.

I tried to straighten, but from the way her hands hovered, purposeless around my shoulders, I wasn't doing a good job. I knew I was swaying in place, taking deep breaths to try to scrounge up some strength.

I opened my mouth to apologize for throwing up on her -

And then pressed my lips together when my stomach launched a surprise attack, sending a rush of burning bile to the back of my throat. Rhea's expression scrunched up in sympathy as she pressed a cool hand against my burning forehead. It took the edge off of the nausea, letting me swallow it back down.

"Easy, now," Rhea said softly as that smokeless fire swirled around the hand on my head. "Don't push yourself."

I leaned into that hand.

I knew she was trying to help me.

I knew that.

I still felt the heady rush of a greedy, molten tug in my gut as my stomach painfully snapped at her, like a starving dog offered a treat going for the whole bag instead.

She gently clapped back.

I say gently (and it had to be real gentle) because if the Matriarch of Swarms actually decided to metaphysically haul off and punch me in the gut? I'm not sure there would be enough of my soul left to complain to Mom about it.

Even if it definitely felt like she just hauled off and punched me in the gut.

My stomach cratered.

I bowled over as air rushed out of me in a harsh cough that was followed by a torrent of searing hot liquid iron. My hand flew to my mouth, because I didn't want to throw up on her again, but I couldn't hold it back.

I coughed again. Bright red blood dribbled through my fingers.

Oh.

Fuck.

I really am dying.

"Ah," Rhea said after a moment.

Then she picked me up.

Pain suddenly lanced down my back over my shoulder blades. My stomach was stitched shut into a cold ball of ice. My head felt like it had just spun right off my neck and some part of me, hurt and scared, lashed out like a dumbass.

I felt like I had just snapped a tripwire holding a ton of concrete blocks over my head.

The hairs on the back of my neck quivered as Rhea slowly raised an eyebrow at me. The hum of a thousand gossamer wings buzzed in the back of my head as I felt a rumble travel my bones, like something massive had just shifted right underneath my feet. The floors and walls of the unassuming light blue bungalow home actually buckled with just the threat of Rhea paying attention to me.

Attention I did not want!

At all.

I went limp like a puppy held up by the scruff.

"That's what I thought," the former Queen of the Gods snorted. "You're adorable."

I was never going to get any respect on this Quest.

Her home shifted around us as she took a step, transporting us from the guest room to the living room. The living room looked a bit better from earlier with my and Apollo's help. It was more blank, with the piles of newspapers and photo albums and collections of fine china mostly packed away into their cardboard boxes. The sewing table with the ruler attached to it and folded bolts of cloth and sewing machine was still there and so was the randomly placed ratty sofa, looking as if someone had just dropped a piece of doll house furniture into the room. Like every room in her house, there were lions. A pair was lounging on some flat boxes before a recliner chair.

Rhea slammed the door shut behind her with her foot.

Someone squawked in surprise.

"Wha - oh." That someone sounded a lot like Artemis. But, uh, she's currently a rabbit so it can't be her. I inclined my head, trying to take a look. "Is - what happened to him?"

"Domain sick," Rhea answered absently as she bumped one of her curious lions away with her hip. "Probably."

What?

Was that bad or do I just have a god cold?

I was set down into the blissfully cool reclining chair. Was this real leather? I burrowed into it as much as I could. Rhea tossed a feather-light sky blue duvet decorated with rainbows over me. My arm was immediately nudged by an ice-cold cat nose. Just flopping my hand on top of the fluff so I could pet the lion laying his head on my armrest was exhausting.

'Who's a good boy?' I mouthed at the lion, because my stomach was threatening to rebel if I put any more effort into it. He gave me that deadpan look cats do so well, but clearly the scritches were worth more than his pride.

Rhea flapped her hands in my direction, sending the bangles around her wrists clicking. "A real downer, but he can tough it out, I think."

"What?" The Artemis-sound-alike said blankly.

I felt like asking that too.

But I was just too strung out.

Miserable.

Thinking was hard.

The second lion shuffled a bit closer. A female, since she didn't have a mane, and there was a small auburn rabbit perched on her head as both of them stared at me.

I blinked, hard.

Nope.

Rabbit is still there.

Wow.

My fever must be bad.

The lioness huffed and actually rolled its eyes at me.

Rhea was already turning away, folding my Celtic shirt into a neat square with my jeans slung over her shoulder. I looked down at myself and weakly picked at the black silk chiton she replaced my clothes with. The blood on my hands was gone too.

I hadn't even felt her do it.

Come to think of it, I hadn't felt Nemesis swipe our train tickets either.

Mom graduated me from my Sensitivity lessons with a D- and just didn't want to tell me I sucked, apparently.

"What?" the rabbit said again and I could feel my eyes try to pop out of my head. The rabbit's nose was twitching, and it's mouth was moving a little, but it was more like the voice was being thrown into my ears rather than actually coming from it.

"Domain sickness," Rhea repeated, turning to the animals with raised eyebrows. She tossed my clothes into the air where they vanished. "You…do know what that is - "

"I know what it is!" The bunny snapped. "Why - he is mortal. That is not possible - "

"Ha!" It was Rhea's turn to cut the bunny off with a harsh bark of laughter. Her compound eyes shimmered blood red for a second, before settling back into emerald green. "And who are you," the Matriarch of Swarms asked slowly. There was ice in her voice and something more than a little cruel. "Has Selene's chariot gone to your head, that you would tell me what is and is not possible, child?"

The rabbit shrunk back.

Selene's chariot?

"Artemis?" I rasped in disbelief.

I saw that same disbelief mirrored in the rabbit's eyes as her head snapped towards me.

She was missing my jacket.

Maybe it was in the laundry. Blood and seawater are hell on fabrics.

"How - ?" She swung back to Rhea. "Are you - ?"

"No," Rhea hummed as she paced along the walls of the room, trailing symbols glowing with her smokeless fire along the paisley wallpaper. I could almost read them, like I had learned the language a long time ago and if I just thought about it for a few more minutes, it would all come rushing back. It's got to be some form of Greek, right?

"It seems he doesn't need help to speak, unlike you," she said, stepping over some of the boxes and around the easel in the corner. "Either he received leave or he is strong enough to resist."

What?

I searched the room with aching eyes until I found the window. My breath caught as my stomach twisted uncomfortably. Underneath the bamboo blinds and behind the glass was an abyss. I couldn't see even an inch beyond the walls of the house.

It was still Night.

I wanted to believe I'd only been Dreaming for an hour. Time is weird in the Dreamlands, right? A thousand years could pass in five minutes if you were unlucky. Wilhelm loses track all the time.

But I knew better.

"Strong enough - of course," the rabbit spat, her disbelief turned to anger. "Even now Fate mocks me. A boy I refused and her own personal perversion of divinity, her spawn."

My head pounded. "I'm not - "

"Save your lies for someone who would believe it!" Artemis snarled. Her ears were pinned back against her head, auburn fur bristling. "You think I did not notice how easily you shed your humanity when in danger?" But I - "Stop pretending! I do not require your pity!" The bunny was nearly hyperventilating. "What did you want from - "

The lioness tossed the rabbit off her head.

I bit my tongue as Artemis hit the beige carpet hard, rolling once before her former perch placed a heavy paw on her back.

I don't understand.

Was this about - about what I said on the beach?

"Ata…" the bunny squeaked, betrayed.

"Atalanta," Rhea said softly as she traced the windowsill with a burning finger. "Take her back to her room, if you would. And keep her there, until she decides to behave." The lioness obediently dropped its head, picking up the small woodland creature up within its massive jaws.

Artemis went very, very still between those teeth.

I don't blame her.

I turned to my lion buddy. If that was Atalanta, then was this one her dumbass boyfriend? Apollo said there was an IQ threshold and anyone that went out of their way to piss off a god just to get their rocks off fell far below it.

Can't argue with that.

I tilted my head questioningly.

He chuffed under my hand and then licked the leather arm rest. I gave him a narrow eyed look back.

Maybe not.

"But - " Artemis protested weakly.

Rhea turned away from her designs to regard the room with a cool look. She retraced her steps back around the room as the lioness padded to the door, rabbit in mouth.

"I - Grandmother, why - " The rabbit wiggled a little, prompting the lioness to pause.

"You disappoint me," was the simple reply. Rhea checked her work, completely dismissive. This wasn't Apollo's groovy grandmother speaking. This was the Queen. "I will not tell you how to treat your nephew, the son of Hermes," the boy Artemis said she refused. Luke. What did that mean? When did that even happen? "But this one is my cousin. You forget yourself."

That sparked a warm, fuzzy feeling in my chest that had nothing to do with my fever.

My cousins were awesome.

"It's okay," I croaked at Rhea. "I'm not offended."

In return, she tilted her head in my direction, but didn't spare Artemis a look. "But I am."

Ouch.

The rabbit blanched as the lioness trotted out of the room and the silence was allowed to hang for a moment.

I shifted in my recliner.

That had -

That had probably been about what I said on the beach.

'If he dies, you die.'

Now that I didn't have Luke's blood on me, I felt a little ashamed about threatening Artemis like that.

Because I knew Dad would be.

I guess I'm more like my mother than I thought.

"I had - " I began, trying to explain what the problem was. More for Rhea's sake than Artemis'. "On the beach, I - "

"I heard," Zeus' mother murmured. "As was your right."

"What?" I blurted out and regretted it as my head spiked with pain. My stomach roiled. This was her granddaughter we were talking about, an Olympian. "But I'm just - " The Queen of the Titans looked at me. The words 'a demigod' died in my mouth. I looked down at my hands again, half-expecting them to be painted red with my blood. "It was too far."

"Was it?" Rhea gently shooed my lion buddy away as she took a seat on the couch beside me. She reached for the table that hadn't been there a second ago to pick up a glass of water that also hadn't been there earlier. She passed it to me with a quiet, "Slowly."

I took a cold sip. It hurt going down.

"You have no idea what her punishment means, do you?" She asked.

"She's mortal," I said.

And a rabbit.

Maybe there was something more to it than Mom's terrible sense of humor?

Rhea blew out a breath like she was banishing the Titan Queen from the room. "Rabbits." She paused. My heart sank. "Rabbits are a species that do not need disease or starvation to turn to cannibalism."

She said it so easily.

Like it was an interesting factoid she read about in a magazine one day and not something she had personal history with.

My stomach twisted. I put the cup down.

Rhea studied me for a moment. "A mother rabbit when frightened, overwhelmed and… sometimes for no reason at all, will kill and eat her newly born young."

Artemis was the goddess of Childbirth.

All of her Names regarding children…

I felt like someone had just jabbed me in the throat. I could almost see Luke's wry grin and equally wry, 'What symbolism! Apropos, isn't it?'

If anyone could pass judgment on a god for - for dereliction of duty…

It would be Fate.

"Her transformation is an open invitation," Rhea continued, running a hand through her dark hair. "Fate's a bit unglued, this is the culprit, real 'will no one rid me of this meddlesome priest' energy, except they might actually be rewarded for it."

Like a pirate's black spot complete with a bounty.

A mark for death.

I wasn't stupid all the time.

My sisters, the Fates, gave Artemis that Domain just like they gave Apollo his Prophecy. They should have stepped in sooner. The Domains they grant are their responsibility. And if they slack off, our mother was the Supreme Court.

Which usually meant they could do whatever they wanted.

This was thousands of years in the making, and would have continued for thousands more because Mom didn't really care. I knew she would have continued not giving a shit until I was involved. The Quest could have chosen any god. Athena would have worked, she had a War Domain. Apollo's Archery might be able to swing something. Going on a Quest with Heracles or Nike would have been awesome.

Hindsight let me see the trap. I was twelve. Mom gave Artemis just enough rope to hang herself.

But Artemis didn't know that.

It was her final offense.

And Mom was not a forgive and forget kind of person.

This is why Nemesis and Khione did what they did. The Quest doesn't matter. Even if we succeeded, Mom had no intention of letting Artemis make it out alive. Ever. The only thing I could use to buy her life was my boon.

And I gave that to Luke so he could help me help her survive.

No wonder she didn't answer any of my pleas.

This is what fighting Fate feels like.

Like shit.

"Does she know?" I whispered.

"The former goddess of the Forest and all the wildlife within it, rabbits included," Rhea reminded me gently. There was that soft, pitying look again. "Fate was not subtle, not this time."

Yeah.

She knows.

I was going to ask if Zeus knew, but honestly, who cares if he knew the difference between 'probably will die' and 'definitely will die' when he made her go anyway.

Fuck him.

"But you - " I started, before I realized I was dumb. There were rules. If Erebus got in serious trouble, I couldn't do anything either. It'd have to be Mom. Real old school hierarchy setup, but. Gods. "You can't do anything."

Fuck.

I didn't let myself think about abandoning Artemis for too long, because I swore to give Luke my boon for helping me protect her. As long as Luke was onboard, I couldn't be seen trying to renege on it by sabotaging his efforts, because I swore I would.

Luke almost died.

Asking him to give up now?

The Styx was always watching.

I -

I think I fucked myself over.

The star-spawn paused and pinned me with a hard look that made my spine tingle.

"Can't?" She questioned me, deliberately light as she leaned her chin on a hand, propped up on the couch arm rest. "Not won't?"

"Uh," I said, taken aback. "Isn't the Pit - "

"Father still sleeps, yes," Rhea nodded.

Oh phew, I was worried for a second there.

"And you wouldn't ask your mom to petition my mom," I reasoned out loud. "Because…a lot of reasons?"

"Plenty," she drawled, amused.

Like I said, Rhea was loyal.

The Earth Mother hadn't been.

And also holds one hell of a grudge.

"So…"

"I do wonder what your mother has in mind for you," she said instead with iridescent compound eyes as she leaned in and flicked my nose with a finger. "You are just as right as you are wrong."

Um.

"I am not able to intercede on my granddaughter's behalf before the god within Fate, because that would never be an option." Huh? "I could only do that if Artemis was not Young." Her lips tugged into that almost smile she had when she heard my Prophecies. "And if I was not using the Name Rhea."

Oh.

God within Fate.

She means Mom's original Name. The First Name.

The Names of an Elder God were more like avatars. Sock puppets. Mom calls them Masks, you get the idea. They are always there, but drawing attention to that is stupid and probably wouldn't end well. You gotta know what you're doing. They are probably using that Name for a reason, like not wanting to kill you by proximity damage and, if they're anything like Mom, also wouldn't appreciate the game being ruined.

So be polite and call them by their preferred nouns.

And pronouns.

Mom is…

Yeah.

There you go. Elder God Etiquette 101.

Elderquette.

"Qetesh can, perhaps, on the behalf of Selene's successor," Rhea said thoughtfully and the buzzing, humming undertone in her voice slid through my bones with hollow knives. You couldn't see the difference in her eyes, but you could feel it. Elder Gods were always there.

Even when asleep and Dreaming.

Especially when Dreaming.

"Athirat, maybe," she mused. "Or - ah, Cybele."

And I -

I was going to throw up again.

Rhea breathed in a sharp breath and the pressure disappeared. "Man. You are…hella sensitive, aren't you?"

"I - " I swallowed hard and nearly regretted those sips of water. "I don't think so?"

"More sensitive than Dionysus was, for sure," she said. Sections of the fiery writing on the walls of the room lit up and changed around, casting an eerie light on the cardboard boxes and the vine pattern in the beige carpet. "I'll keep that in mind. Don't worry, I'll have you back right cherry in a bit."

My head was spinning.

Was she just talking about demigod Dionysus in general or was he sick too when she met him?

"If I'm sick, then maybe Apollo - " I tried.

She shook her head. "The absolute last thing you need is more divine energy anywhere near your soul, hun."

That didn't sound great.

"Besides, he is of the sun." Her lips ticked up in a mirthless smile as she glanced at the dark window pointedly. "He is likely occupied."

I nodded weakly.

"Domain sick?"

"A failed apotheosis," she explained in words that made no sense, because she was talking about me. "Overextended divinity, so much so that it starts changing things." She crossed her arms and legs, absently. "And burning other things for fuel." Like mortality. "But you didn't have enough to keep it up."

"Oh," I whispered.

"Yeah, 'oh.'" She clucked her tongue. "If that's not what happened, whatever you did is close enough. Don't do it again. You might shatter."

Like Aphrodite did.

Rhea waved it off as she stood up, almost springing from the couch. "You can recover, one hundred percent. It's a drag, but burn out is temporary."

Breaking, not so much.

If it was, Aphrodite would be whole.

I guess that made more sense. I was mortal, and Artemis was surprised because she didn't know my brother gave me a boost. She thought Rhea was saying I did this to myself. I didn't. I guess Erebus did me a favor and it gave me a sugar high. This was the fallout.

The crash.

…

I probably shouldn't have eaten the sea monster.

"- this'll be your pad while you're here," Rhea was saying as I regretted every decision I made last night. "Bathroom is that door, kitchen is this door, boob tube - " a large flat screen TV appeared on the wall opposite me, complete with a flare of the writing on the wallpaper and a remote on the couch arm rest by me. I don't want to know why the television has a name like 'boob tube.' The 60s were weird.

"Sleep in the chair."

"And the…" I waved a weak arm at the walls.

"Suppressors," Rhea said bluntly. Like my room at Camp Half-Blood. "Keeps the ambience in check so I don't off you by accident. The excess has to go somewhere because I don't want you poppin' off, freaking out and blowing yourself up, you dig?"

That's fair.

"Gimme some skin if you understand, lil' cuz," she held out a hand. I grinned as I gave the Titan Queen a high five. The warm and fuzzies were back. Lil cuz. I could get addicted to meeting relatives that wanted me in their family tree. And weren't jerks. "Far out," she grinned back, all teeth. She ruffled my hair. "I wish your mother told me about you," she said wistfully. "I missed babysitting sprogs."

"I threw up on you," I quipped faintly.

"'Teia and Aether did the same. Weak stomachs," she quipped back with a sage nod. "Plagues all your mom's kids."

…the last time the Stele household heard from Aether, he was sleeping off the indigestion that came from eating a cold gas giant in the Boomerang Nebula.

Weak stomachs?

"Oy," I grunted.

She made a raspberry sound. "Just shout if you need anything. You're family, I'll hear you."

That fired a few of my neurons.

"That's why you heard Luke?" I asked quietly.

"That dropout?" Rhea blinked. "Nah, he - " She tilted her head, pausing. "He caught my attention."

A small lion cub darted into the room, looked around with big, blue eyes and then ran out again. His sibling tumbled in after him and decided to stay, trotting over to Rhea who picked her up and tucked her underneath her arm.

"Your voice might go away in an hour or two," she tossed out as she made her way to the door that led to the kitchen, tickling the cub underneath the chin. "But don't be surprised if it doesn't - " Rhea hesitated. This strange expression I couldn't read scrunching up her nose and brow. "Demigod."

The door shut behind her.

"'Kay," I whispered.

I lasted maybe three minutes sipping water before I figured out that I had no idea what you're supposed to do when sick. I don't think taking care of Dad when he had a bit too -

Oh shit, Dad!

I flung my hand out for my backpack. Hauling it up onto my lap left me feeling like I'd run a marathon, but I found my phone and money purse.

"Oh Iris, goddess of the Rainbow, please accept my offering." I fished out a gold drachma and tossed it into the enchanted rainbow.

The coin bounced on Rhea's beige carpet.

A lump lodged itself in my throat as the small rainbow silently hung in the air in front of me.

Right.

It's still Night.

She's…probably busy.

I swiped my thumb across the hieroglyph and the rainbow faded. I bit my lip and tried not to think about how Mom was too angry to think about me.

There was a chime, like someone just rang Rhea's doorbell.

A rainbow flickered in front of my face.

My heart leapt as an image appeared in it and then I regretted it when said image nearly burned out my eyeballs.

There was a giant coruscating flashing neon lights thing made of spinning discs, like someone had taken the idea of an astrolabe and a rave party and not only built a ten sided starfish out of it, but decided to glue golden butterfly wings to its back for good measure. It was bright, spitting sparks of blue lightning and looking at it did not do my head any favors.

"Oh crap!" The starfish said and then it was a person.

A gold butterfly winged…gorgon…mermaid…person standing before absolutely massive ebony wood and silver doors etched with art-deco, framed in a pitch black metal that matched my Stygian Iron dagger.

She had thin sea-green tentacles for hair lashing about a sharp featured emotionless face that looked more like a shark than a human, with sharp scales, fluttering gills and dappled patterns that slithered across her form. She glowed like a humanoid firefly and her three eyes were those spinning rings of neon colors.

"You - are fine." For a moment, her look changed again to a dark haired human woman with the gold butterfly wings and a shimmering tie dye toga with a silver shawl, but then she seemed to change her mind and just stayed fishy. Her hair-tentacles pointed at me. "You're Hypnos' little buddy, aren't cha?" she asked in a burbling, watery voice. "My bad, I assumed only gods would be able to call me right now."

She said it matter-of-factly, but I still felt like there was a question.

"Sorry," I said quickly. "I know you're busy. I just wanted to check up on my father."

She glanced back at the closed doors. "Yeah, I got a moment. Remind me who he is?"

"Dorian Stele, Manhattan."

There was a beat of silence and then she shook her head. "I'm sorry, those are some nasty wards around him and at least half of them are Mr. Apollo's. I probably could punch through them - "

"That's okay," I breathed, feeling like a weight had been lifted off my chest. Dad's fine. "I can talk to him later, just wanted to know he's okay."

Amphitrite's first cousin inclined her head. "Anyone else?"

I thought about it. I could call Camp Half-Blood? I don't know what to say though, besides 'not dead yet, but not for lack of trying.' I sure as hell wasn't going to spill the beans on Ares having the Master Bolt. Clarisse and Mark and Ryan of Ares Cabin were kind of friends. It would make them pariahs overnight.

Telling the Hunters about Artemis would just be cruel.

Hypnos was at his Mom's house, Sam had been sick and tired of my shit when I left and I doubt Iris could reach the Dreamlands anyway, I can just pray to Apollo and everybody else…

Wasn't Greek.

"Not unless you're doing cross-pantheon again."

She made a bubbling sound. "Not for another seven years, unfortunately."

I did the math.

It physically hurt.

"What happens in 2012?" I asked slowly.

That got me a wide shark toothed grin.

"Nothing!" Iris chirped.

Should I be worried?

I feel like I should be at least a little concerned.

…I'll worry about it after my Prophecy is up.

"Now, you really need to detox," the Messenger Goddess of the Rainbow lectured. "Water's nice," she pointed at my glass. "But green tea. Or lemon water. Eat lots of fruit, brown rice and some asparagus and kale, oh! Greek yogurt really helps cut down on the repeats and honestly? Go Vegan. I swear by it."

The rainbow blinked out.

Butch's mom…

…is odd.

I dialed Cliff next.

The high pitched squealing only sounded for a second before he picked up.

"You're fucking alive!" Was the first thing he said. "Now is this crap your fault or no? I have a bet riding on this."

That was the second thing my best friend said.

"Seriously?" I deadpanned.

"Absolutely."

"Cliff."

"Hey man, last thing I heard, you were asking about an experimental prototype teleport function because of the Rhamnousia and who's her mom again?"

The Night.

Even the Egyptians knew that messing with her kids was a game of Russian Roulette.

"This isn't my fault," I protested.

"Damn."

Just feel the love.

"How are you talking, by the way? We've got the Nome warded up the ass - "

"I'm…" I looked around my new 'pad' in Rhea's house. The lettering on the walls shimmered. "Someplace that's warded too."

"Cool. Stay there."

I rolled my eyes, even though he couldn't see it. "Duh."

"Just saying."

"This has nothing to do with Nemesis." I dragged us back on topic. "Her mom just…thought I was interesting a while back?" I didn't know how else to explain it. "And my mom…just found out and didn't like it?"

"So it is your fault!" Cliff said triumphantly.

In the background, someone swore colorfully. I could hear the thuds of frantic footfalls leave the room.

Guess I was on speakerphone.

"I didn't do anything!"

"If you didn't exist, would this be happening right now." He said it like he already knew the answer.

Because he did.

"That's not fair!"

"Yeah, so, two of them. At the same time. Just - "

"Blame my mother?" I offered.

"Oh, I will." Cliff made a whining noise. "I've been up for over twenty four hours thanks to someone calling me at unholy hours for random bullshit and then that same someone - "

"Oh my god, I get it! I'm sorry!"

"Yeah, yeah." I heard the rustling of paper. "But…look, I know you're on an errand for the Greeks, but if you get the chance - maaayyybeeee stop by? It's your birth mother. And Houy will vouch for you."

"Really?" I felt my stomach sink. "I'm Greek. In an Egyptian Nome."

That hasn't happened for…

A long time.

Cliff sighed. "Yeah."

"How bad is it?"

"Not as bad as it could be!"

That…really wasn't saying much.

"I mean, we're still panicking," he continued. "Have you seen the news?" He asked, like I wasn't on a cross country road trip for Olympus. With a time limit. "There's a bunch of people dying in their sleep and the White House press conference was held on a fucking whiteboard and passed notecards because people can't make noise. No one really knows what to do. The last time was before the House stuffed the gods into a fridge."

"That was kind of a shit decision." I sniffled as my stuffy nose got a little unstuffed by starting to run and dug a packet of Kleenex out of my backpack.

Something about said shit decision was also giving me a fucking wild sense of deja vu.

Something about gods in a fridge.

'Don't." Cliff sighed again. "I've been hearing that from a dozen different people using different words and three different Egyptian dialects - " his voice picked up. "For the past twenty four hours! That I've been up - "

"Bye, Cliff," I said.

"Because someone - "

He was laughing when I hung up.

My friends.

Are just the worst kind of people.

I spent a little bit playing Golden Sun on my Gameboy and nibbling on a plate of flat bread and feta cheese that came out of nowhere. I did watch the news for a bit. He was right. It was all writing.

And I'm dyslexic.

I can just barely tolerate English's bullshit enough to play videogames, so that was a wash. A few lions wandered in and out of my room, like they were just checking to see if I was still miserable.

I was.

Just to make it clear how much this god flu was fucking me up, it took me another fifteen minutes before I realized: Rhea could not petition the god within Fate. But she never actually said she can't do anything for Artemis.

Or if she even wanted to.

I fell asleep at one point.

I think Rhea enchanted my chair without telling me, because the Dreaming part of my soul, what Cliff would call the ba, stayed put. Snugly tucked away in my mortal coil.

That was okay.

I understood.

Dreams aren't real, anyway. Not mortal ones. Not where it counts.

That's why they're called Dreams.

 

[Shujin]

An Undertow of Sand
A PJO Fanfiction​

I woke up like I was drowning.

Gasping for breath, flailing around, the whole nine yards. I felt trapped. I was suffocating. It lasted forever. It was over in a moment. Then I opened my eyes to Rhea's living room. There was a half-grown lion cub sitting on the couch next to me. He had a TV remote between his front paws, a plate of potato chips on the cushion next to him and an unimpressed look on his face. He was just starting to look fluffy around the neck, so I was confident it was a boy.

"Look." I told him. "It's been a rough couple of days."

The feline couch potato snorted as I scrubbed my face with a hand. I think I drooled in my sleep again. Yuck.

I still felt like a polished turd.

My skull was a throbbing radiator of heat, but at least it felt like it was firmly attached to my neck this time. Thinking was easier. My nose was still stuffy and my face still hurt. Everything hurt, like there was ice water in my bones. I was shivering. This spasm was pulling at the back of my right arm nonstop, making me feel like something was hitting my funny bone over and over. My stomach was quiet though. I wasn't going to call it a win. It felt hollow.

Empty.

The lion crunched on a few potato chips. Disney was on the TV, playing one of the new cartoons, American Dragon: Jake Long. There wasn't any sound coming from the speakers, but there were subtitles. I gave up trying to read fast enough for the scrolling after a couple of seconds.

If I wanted to torture myself, punching myself in the balls would be simpler.

"Danny Phantom is better." I adjusted my glasses.

The lion gave me the side eye as he shuffled his remote closer to his chest, like he was protecting it.

I held up my hands in surrender.

"Can I have a chip?" That got me another suspicious look, but eventually, he nosed the plate over. "Thanks."

He meowed back.

It was clearly a cat's meow, just with a decade of chain smoking at least four packs a day thrown on top.

There was a new glass of water with a lemon slice waiting for me on the small table by my reclining chair. My hands trembled as I picked it up so I moved slowly. My muscles still pulled and burned. I took a few sips and settled in to watch the inferior cartoon with the small-big cat anyway, because I'm a sucker for kids balancing supernatural forces and homework.

Relatable.

I couldn't hear a single thing any of the characters were saying, but it wasn't a bad watch. Middle school half dragon with a normal dad and dragon mom beating up bad guys and pulling tricks on a skateboard. I could see why my lion buddy was a fan of the new show. I had a lot of fun bitching about everything I didn't understand over his offended yowling. He was either trying to explain what was going on or he was telling me to fuck off, but I was sick and Rhea said this was my room, so there.

The commercial break revealed the TV had this fancy time table program showing what was next up on what channel. Teen Titans on Cartoon Network. We should watch that. I was just starting to get into explaining how it tied into DC's Justice League with my fellow junk food eater and cartoon watcher when Rhea busted into the room.

"Think fast!"

I didn't.

The thrown twinkie hit me right in the nose, then fell into my lap with a miserable sounding splat.

"What the fuck was that?" I asked.

Rhea blurted out, "What the fuck was that?"

I raised my eyebrows. Then I raised my hands out from under my blanket. They were still trembling. The overall awful had gone down, but now it was like I wasn't in complete control of my body with muscle spasms and twitches going every which way. Which meant the infamous demigod reflexes of mine?

They went fishing.

Check back later.

The Titan Queen's expression went blank for a moment. Then she sighed. Her head made a dull thunking sound as she slumped against the door frame.

"Domain sick, right," she remembered. "This is today, not…yesterday?" She didn't sound too sure. I'm not sure it was even her Trees of Random Foresight this time. The sun was still a no show.

I wasn't too worried about Apollo, but her orphanage and her duty was all Saulė, the Young goddess of the Baltic sun had.

"Yesterday," I confirmed.

"Or two days from now!" she said brightly (so maybe it was the trees). "I got it, I'm here, I saved you, the boy annnnnd…" Her eyes found the window and the darkness outside. I could see her good mood evaporate. "That. Yes."

I didn't feel like reminding her about Artemis.

"Who is…" Her brow furrowed. "Night and…?"

"Fate," we both said at the same time.

Rhea made a buzzing sound in her throat. "Should have known."

A second twinkie bounced off my cheek.

The lion barked.

"Laugh it up, buddy," I said.

I picked up my second twinkie as Rhea pulled a finger food platter out of thin air with olives, cheese, crackers, vegetables with some dip and cold meat cuts.

"Should have known?" I asked as she widened my small table, and I caught the flickering of the suppressors on the walls. "Are they feuding, or something?"

"Feuding?" Rhea asked. She looked amused at first, but then her face changed. "Not how mortals would understand," she allowed as she set the plate down and refilled our potato chips. She brushed the curious cub's nose away from my lunch and he lost interest when the commercial break ended. Back to the adventures of the American Dragon.

I felt pulled in three directions. The TV, Rhea and the plate with a rose vine pattern around the edges with bees. I couldn't help noticing, so at least my ADHD was still working.

Yay.

"But no, your mother's just a little shit."

I choked on my potato chip.

Rhea burst out laughing. A full on witch's cackle as I tried not to die. She threw herself onto the couch beside me and hugged the grumbling lion cub to her side. "Oh, she's got you fooled! I told you she deserved shits for kids!"

"Because she has a terrible sense of humor!" I came to my mother's defense. "Not for picking fights!"

"Amazing!" Rhea sounded thrilled. "How'd she manage to keep in the groove for so long?"

My mouth worked.

"In the groove?"

"You know, keep her cool." She gave the lion cub a noogie. "Stay calm?"

"Mom doesn't get angry?" I said, then reconsidered. "It takes a lot?"

"A lot," Rhea repeated incredulously. To add insult to injury, the cub was giving me a bewildered look too. "When things don't go as expected, your mother has the emotional maturity of a larva."

I had a hard time wrapping my head around that. Maybe I was just too mortal to understand. What was the definition of 'uncommon' to someone who had a lifespan in the millions of years?

Mom was Fate, right? Things being unexpected meant something was wrong.

Didn't it?

I knew Mom wasn't perfect, but I spent most of my life thinking she was. "But - "

"Literal baby," Rhea continued mercilessly. "For better or worse." She waved a hand as she leaned back against the couch and took the lion with her. He adjusted, laying half on her lap with his eyes still glued to the screen. "I will forever be grateful, her patronage is an honor, yadda yadda, but you should have seen her when Night decided she wanted your brother!" Rhea gossiped. "Flipped her fucking wig - sure, Night's a slut even by our standards - "

"That's my sister-in-law you're talking about," I said.

"She's my sister too," she countered dryly.

My brain tilted on an axis.

We haven't been talking about our mythological family trees.

I was, but I don't think Rhea is.

I have a lot of cousins and making the distinction between who is a cousin because they're the kid of someone who is actually related to me and who's a descendant of a Name everyone thinks is related to me is messy, because they are usually still related somehow. Some are human shaped and some aren't, doesn't matter.

The Greek pantheon isn't a family tree, it's a Celtic knot. I don't have a spreadsheet about who is my great nephew twice removed (thanks Annabeth) in my head like some people.

(Annabeth)

The Pit isn't Rhea's father, the god beneath it is her father. And he's the father of the god behind Night.

Rhea probably doesn't think of herself as Rhea, Greek Titaness of Legacy, Comfort and Motherhood. Goddess of the Mountain, the Great Mother, the Queen of the Gods.

It's just a Name, one of many.

Rhea wasn't calling me cousin how I used the word. She meant blood relation, at the highest level. When she said 'your mother,' she didn't mean The Morrigan. She didn't mean Ananke. The god beneath the Pit and the god within Fate were real siblings.

We're first cousins.

For real.

…why did Mom tell me she was a star-spawn?

"Night's calmed down some since your brother," Rhea admitted grudgingly.

My brain snapped back into place.

Holy shit, over two hundred kids with him, hundreds of hellhounds, another forty seven immortal spirits and a demigod is 'calmed down?'

"The way your mother reacted, you'd think she'd insulted grandfather."

"She's just protective." To be completely honest, Dad would probably react the same way. "And picky. High standards."

"Petty," Rhea corrected me. "Control freak."

"No," My mouth said automatically. Then I thought about it.

Describe the concept of Fate in two words.

"Well, yeah, okay."

Rhea sighed as she figured it out. "What'd you do?"

Why was everyone always assuming it was my fault?

"Nothing," I bit out. "Night thought I was interesting and she helped and Mom flipped out."

"Night thought you were…" Rhea trailed off and threw herself back, clapping a hand over her face. "No. No. I'm not doing this again, I am staying asleep, I don't care!"

Again?

"You care a little," I needled her.

"I don't care." She glared at me through her fingers. "Eat." She ordered. "That first," She pointed at my twinkies. "If you don't throw it up, you should be good."

I wanted to ask about what she meant by 'again,' but I knew a subject change when I heard one.

Most of the time.

I tore into the plastic. "Aren't you supposed to tell me I'll spoil my appetite?"

"Do I look like your mother?" Apollo's grandmother scoffed. "I won't tell if you don't."

I was really starting to wish Mom had let Rhea be my babysitter. My parents never understood the nutritional value of junk food. High fructose corn syrup, chemicals with long names and pure sugar, what's not to love?

Rhea bounced up and the leftover pieces of her furniture slid around the room, shoving everything against the wall beneath the TV and freeing up more space around the couch. She leaned over to check on my fever with the back of her hand and my new friend made a grumpy sound.

"Sorry," Rhea said automatically, moving out of his line of sight to the TV. Then she paused and gave the cub a wry look as a red teenage dragon with a green mohawk karate chopped the air triumphantly on the screen.

The lion's shoulders stiffened under her eyes.

She clucked her tongue. "Aren't you grounded?"

He mewed, but it definitely sounded like a whine.

I laughed at him.

I think he was hiding in here.

Rhea sighed.

"I'm not your mother either," she told the lion. "Keep the boys company and I won't say a word."

I swallowed my bite of twinkie. "Boys?"

My cousin did something to the main door into the room, making the writing on the walls light up with blood red light. There was a small twinge in my stomach as the door frame warped and expanded sideways like it was opening up for a sandwich. And then a bed scuttled through into the room on beetle legs with the bulbous eyes of a spider sticking out like tumors from the bottom with antennae waving from the posts. The small clicks of carapaced joints bending almost distracted me from Luke's still form under the white sheets. It made him look washed out.

Half ghost.

I sat up straight in my chair. "Is he - "

"He survived the night," Rhea shrugged and my chest tightened as I considered that maybe she meant the capital N Night instead. Luke had no way of knowing what was going on. Hypnos gave Hermes a part time job at one point. If Luke was used to Dreaming, I was hoping he inherited that Name too.

Maybe it helped.

"That's good." I breathed. "That's he's okay. Please tell me your furniture isn't bugs."

My cousin blinked.

"...no."

She had to think about it!

Suddenly, I was not okay with my recliner.

I slept in this thing!

"Panty waist." If she had pupils, I'm sure I would have seen her eyes roll. "That one I got in a garage sale. You're safe."

Thank God.

I relaxed back into the chair.

I eyed the couch.

The bed clicked its way to the other side of it, positioning itself to mirror my recliner as the eyes on the bottom jiggled, searching the floor. I counted twelve bug legs and eight bug eyes, five antennae and hundreds of these tendril things hanging off the side where the mattress should have been. They were tasting the air, curling in whenever they caught some dust.

"But why is it a bug?"

Rhea looked offended. "It's cute!"

"It's gross!"

Rhea jerked a thumb at herself with wide, innocent eyes and opened her mouth.

"No," I said. "Don't even." I pointed. "That still looks like half a normal bed. No."

Look.

I'm not shallow.

But I gotta draw the line somewhere.

With a title like Matriarch of Swarms, it should surprise no one that Rhea's base form was a giant bug. She was a pretty bug, don't get me wrong. Gem-like eyes, a shining bronze carapace and very nice wings. Everything was perfectly symmetrical. Looking at her felt like that first time you saw a butterfly land on a blooming flower.

At the time, none of the Elder Gods had human avatars. Rhea was the first. She didn't have to, she chose to.

I said Kronos was a dumb motherfucker and I meant it.

Dad would agree with me.

Aether's girlfriend Hemera crashed my birthday picnic last year. Mom gave her directions. And made sure Hemera didn't accidentally vaporize us. Pulsars, you know how it is. Anyway, Dad had some very nice compliments for her. Very smooth. I thought her eyes were great too. She had Erebus' dagger for me and Aether's stardust ball for Dad to try.

Actual stardust.

They found a tasty nebula with an aborted star and decided to share the treat with the mortal step-father. Because that's what happens when your frame of reference for modern day mortals is Dragon Ball Z.

Explaining would take too long.

Let's just say Aether's a bit confused, but he's trying.

When we got back to the car, he begged me to give him a year's warning if I ever wanted to date anyone with more than three eyes or non-human appendages. He was joking.

Mom said he wasn't.

But he was joking.

Rhea turned to the lion cub. "He's ridiculous."

The cub huffed at her.

"Don't you start."

Luke's bed settled. The insectoid features sunk back into wood grain, complete with a bed spring that was only a little rusted and a faded blue mattress.

"Happy?" Rhea said dryly.

"Not really."

Not being able to see what I knew was there actually made it worse.

"City boy," Rhea huffed, a little exasperated. She turned her head towards the TV and quiet, but understandable sounds began to drift out of the speakers. The cub purred, leaning in. "Try not to wake him, but if he does, make sure he stays put. He needs to get that excess divine energy out of his system."

I frowned and speared a piece of cheese and lamb on a toothpick. "Apollo's?"

"Mine."

"What's wrong with yours?" I winced as soon as I finished asking. Asking people 'what's wrong with you.' Even I knew that wasn't a good idea.

"Nothing." She raised an eyebrow at me and I winced again. This time what hit me in the face hard enough to sting was a Hostess chocolate cake. She cheated, but I deserved it.

I picked up the sugary snack. "I didn't mean it that way."

Rhea waved it off.

"Nothing," she repeated. She tilted her head slightly. "Our power, our being can overwhelm, even when we're trying to help. And he's only human." Her voice took on a classic Greek lilt as her eyes shined orange. "Exposure tends to change the exposed."

"So he's okay, you're just being careful?"

"Can't hurt," she shrugged. "He's healing well, though. You'll be back to it in a few days, trust me."

That's another thing about ADHD. Deadlines just aren't real until I'm staring one in the face. It made it easy to forget the clock was still ticking while I was watching TV and having fun. Khione used it to her advantage and that weakness was never going to go away.

Even if we were ready to tackle the Quest tomorrow, that left a little over nine days to track down where Ares' stashed the Master Bolt. While Night was still leaking into our reality. Hellhounds were bad enough. I don't want to know what else found its way through.

I fiddled with my lunch plate. "Just to…make sure." I swallowed. "You can't help our Quest, right?"

Her eyes were back to the sea green gem like shade as her lips twitched. "I'm not helping already?"

That's fair.

I'm an ungrateful fuck.

I raised my hands.

A wrapped donut beaned me in the forehead anyway.

"It's best if I don't," Rhea clicked her tongue. "It's been a while…" Apollo's reaction told me it had been a long while. "And just swooping in to help Poseidon of all people." She tilted her head back. "Even indirectly."

"Is that bad?" I asked slowly.

Rhea blinked slowly.

"He inherited my eyes," she said softly.

I didn't understand.

That mattered?

"It shouldn't." She read the question on my face. She tried to smile, but her lips turned down as she looked away. "It still fucking does. I made…mistakes with my youngest children. Out of ignorance. I fucked up a lot, if I'm going to be honest. Not all of them have been forgiven." Her nose wrinkled. "In hindsight, giving Zeus to your mother through Adrasteia to raise was also a bad idea."

I was going to protest.

But, honestly?

'Pull Out Your Soul If You Get Too Close' Adrasteia, the Inescapable was Zeus' babysitter?

Yikes.

She done goofed.

"No," Rhea concluded firmly. "Afterwards, though? I'll consider doing - " She blew out a harsh breath and ran her hands through her long, dark hair, turning it wheat blonde. "Something. I'll think about it."

"It'll help," I said quietly.

"Will it?"

I don't know.

"My youngest children are a bunch of idiots," Rhea said matter of factly. "But you didn't hear it from me."

I cracked a grin. "Got it."

"Yell if you need anything," she said, turning to go after one last check of Luke, me and rubbing the lion's short, stubby ears. "Including Stallone."

I looked over at my fellow couch potato. His shoulders tensed again. I shrugged. "As in the actor?"

He meowed.

Better name than 'Widdle.'

"Rocky?"

Another meow. It sounded proud.

He should be.

He had good taste.

"Will Luke be able to talk?" I asked.

Rhea blinked, glancing at Luke.

"Good question. You -" She cut herself off and tossed something at me and this time I caught it. It was a simple necklace. A wooden lion pendant on a leather string. "Give him that."

I nodded, turning the lifelike small big cat over in my hands.

"This will blow over," Rhea said. "It has to blow over. It will blow over, Night will forget about this and pop out another sprog and your mother will get over herself." She shrugged. "Either that, or the world's ending."

There was a lot in between those two options that I didn't want to think about.

"You're not worried," I observed. I tossed the necklace onto the far side of the sofa, close enough for Luke to reach out and grab it from his bed. "Aren't you going to do something about it?"

"Why must I do anything?" Rhea buzzed, an odd little smile on her face. "With eyes like that, I thought you'd be familiar with your mother's favorite saying. Everything ends."

Mom did have a favorite saying. Everything comes to an end.

Eventually.

I forgot. Rhea was my cousin, but humans weren't really people to her.

They were defective.

She can't be as worried about my father as I was, because a fully realized Matriarch of Swarms in the flesh?

She'd kill him herself.

It was hard to concentrate on the cartoons after that. I ate what I could stomach and sipped my lemon water. Stallone let me scratch his chin during the commercials. Luke slept on. I was able to get out of my chair and stretch my legs a little.

Stallone escorted me to the bathroom because I think he was afraid I was going to fall down and break my neck. I came back and went to the window and opened the curtains up wide, so that I could look out into the void dominating the night sky.

No sun, no moon.

Gods fade, I reminded myself. Things rotted and broke down. People got sick and they got old. They got hurt. Nothing is forever.

I wrapped Rhea's pendant around Luke's wrist. As soon as it settled, he hissed and shifted around a little in his bed. I froze and kept my eyes on him, but it was a false alarm. I went back to my chair. Stallone made a deep, growling 'mmrp' sound. It sounded like a question.

"We're good," I said.

I took off my glasses. Without them, the house was an overgrown pile of rubble. Stallone was a big Lion King with his ribs exposed from the wound that killed him. Luke's ghost gasped as he stared at me, pleading, mouth moving with words no one could hear as something pulled the dark claw back through his chest.

Even stars die.

It wasn't comforting.

Mom? I threw out in her general direction. For a moment I thought…

No.

There was nothing.

---

​

Luke woke up like I did.

Gasping, panting like he had run a thousand miles at a sprint with his arms flailing like he was trying to ward something away. It scared me half to death. I actually dropped my Gameboy Advance and it bounced painfully off my knee then hit the floor with a thud.

Luke flinched at the sound. I think he tried to sit up, but pulled on his wound. He flinched again harder, almost convulsing, before he fell back into his bed.

"Luke?" I tried.

For too long, there was just his harsh breathing breaking into the soft murmurs of the television.

"Perce…?" He whispered. I don't know if he dropped the EE sound on purpose, or if all he could manage was the initial puff of air.

"Yeah, I'm here."

His lips moved soundlessly and my chest hurt.

"I'm alive," he gasped. "That's good."

"That's great."

"Yeah," he breathed.

Then he passed right back out.

The second time Luke woke up didn't really count. I don't think he was lucid.

I hoped he wasn't.

He was sitting up in his bed, one arm crossed over his chest to painfully clutch at the vivid blood red scar on his neck. He was very pale, almost see through and his blond hair was plastered over his scalp with sweat. Rhea had put him in a chiton too, this one a dark green with gold lions prancing on the collar.

"What were you thinking, Thalia?"

He's been calling me that this entire time.

I don't look like a girl.

I don't think I do.

Alecto called me pretty but she was being mean.

I think.

Sam was never hearing about this.

"You blew off a god that wanted to help you?"

"Are you blaming me for not leaving you to die?" I threw my second twinkie at his head. He didn't catch it either. "I would have had to leave Art - " Don't confuse him. More. "Annabeth behind too and you know I couldn't do that!"

Luke made a frustrated sound, shaking his head back and forth. I don't know if I was imagining things, but his eyes didn't seem as blue as before. A paler, cloudy blue instead of sapphire.

"Fine," he grumbled. He inspected the twinkie. "Are we safe here?"

"This is Rhea's place," I told him. "She saved us."

His face went slack.

"Luke?"

He was silent. He laid back down and let out a shaky, watery sigh.

"She answered?" He said in a very small voice that cracked. The twinkie was crushed to a pulp in his fist. I regretted giving it to him. "She saved us?"

"She did," I said quietly.

His expression crumpled.

"The Queen of the Titans answers," Luke said, hiking his bed sheet up over his head as he turned away. "And my father won't."

"When did you ask her to help?" I asked. Now that I thought about it, didn't Rhea say she'd hear me because I was family, but Luke had to get her attention? I could still remember the rattling exhale in my ear before Luke said, 'Now would be good.'

She must have been prepared to answer him.

"Luke?"

He didn't answer.

Asleep again.

The third time Luke woke up, Stallone was kind of sitting on Artemis.

"Atalanta, please!" The bunny struggled from under the cub's front paws. Turns out, Atalanta, the former Arcadian princess, was Stallone's mom. She wised up to where he was spending his grounding. In hindsight, I should have expected it because the Disney channel wasn't exactly standard practice in a zoo.

"You cannot still be holding Meleager against me - " A growl. "Fine! I apologize! Again. Get your son off me!"

In my defense, Sam's an ordinary tabby cat and he potty trained me.

I was two years old.

Mom had gotten into the habit of just vanishing my diapers when I needed to be changed and back then Dad was nonexistent.

Don't.

And don't tell me cats can't teleport either. I won't believe you.

I noticed Luke was awake when he made a confused noise. He was blinking owlishly with pale blue eyes as he slowly sat up. He was looking around the room with the flickering orange lettering on the walls, ratty sofa with two small cubs fighting over an equally ratty soccer ball on it and the big screen TV with one of the first episodes of Star Trek: Voyager playing like it was the first time he'd ever been inside of a house.

"Ignore Artemis," I said and ignored the indignant squawk of a rabbit who didn't like being groomed with a lion tongue. "She promised to behave."

Artemis shut up.

Luke looked even more confused. His eyes drifted over the lions and the rabbit before coming back to me. One of his hands drifted over his new scar. His voice was hoarse when he asked, "What happened?"

"You threw us out of a building," I deadpanned.

Luke blinked and then the corner of his mouth pulled into a self-satisfied smirk. "It worked, didn't it?"

I ignored that. "Rhea saved our asses."

He clearly didn't remember our last conversation. I was prepared for his emotions to take a hit again, but he just looked relieved. Maybe a little vindicated. He was a lot harder to read. I realized it was almost impossible to tell how deeply Luke felt until it all came out at once. He looked down at his chest and traced the ugly scar until it disappeared under his clothes.

"Hey, look, I match," Luke said darkly, briefly touching the scar on his face running down from his eye. "It's almost like Ladon didn't miss."

Wait.

What?

"Ladon?" I said, horrified. "When did you face that?"

Ladon, more commonly known to the Ancient Greeks as 'What The Actual Fuck' was this dragon - snake - lizard thing with literally one hundred heads, fifty tails, six legs tipped with obsidian claws, solid bronze scales, the deadliest venom on the planet, bad breath and the worst taste in goddesses.

Rhea says he got that from his father, Typhon and is convinced her nephew is only guarding that tree because he has a crush on Hera.

God knows why.

"Why'd you fight that?" If you stopped to count how many things would kill you, you'd be pretty much dead.

Luke smiled this razor thin smile that felt like it should cut someone. "I'm not surprised no one told you the details. It's rather embarrassing." He glanced at Artemis and the lions. I don't think he was talking about himself. "It was my Quest from Hermes, to steal a golden apple from the Garden of the Hesperides and return it to Olympus."

That was his Quest? The one he failed? The one that killed the previous Counselors of Ares and Athena?

Stealing from Hera?

"Weren't you sixteen?"

"I've been at Camp year-round for two years at that point. I had nothing but training and before that, I was surviving with Thalia until…you know," he reminded me, but that was not the point.

"He thought you could steal an apple at sixteen?" I was vaguely aware I was starting to hyperventilate. Everything was jumbled in my head. My thoughts were firing at a hundred miles per hour. That didn't make any sense. Everything I have ever learned about Hermes from Apollo, from meeting him when he ticketed my Mom and at Camp and how he left Luke, the strongest demigod at Camp Half-Blood in decades, if not centuries…

None of it made sense!

"Herakles was twenty seven!" I nearly shouted. "He needed help!"

"Exactly!" Luke said viciously. "After all the training I'd done, that was the best he could think up. A repeat. My heart wasn't in it." Then his face darkened. "Or maybe he was just trying to kill me."

I couldn't take it anymore.

I got up and in quick strides, I was at Luke's bed side. I reached out and grabbed his face.

"Percy - "

"Luke." I said, very seriously as he flailed. "Luuuuke."

"What?" He demanded, muffled as I pulled his cheeks.

"What happens…" I pinched his cheeks harder when he protested. "No. What happens if you eat the fucking golden apple!"

Hera would say her golden apple tree had been a wedding gift.

Technically.

And she would say she got it from Zeus.

Again. Technicalities.

Because Odin knew arguing wouldn't do anyone any good and Iðunn, the Vanir of Eternity still had the rest of her garden. The apples were capable of giving a regular mortal a lifespan measured in millennia.

It could do more given to someone who already had a trace of divinity in their blood.

Luke froze.

"That's not - " He brushed my hands off. "I was supposed to take it back to Olympus," He snarled. "To come crawling on my knees for recognition and begging Hera not to smite me!"

Artemis made a sound.

I don't think she meant to, because she flinched as soon as our eyes fell on her.

"Artemis!" I barked. My stomach jumped, like it thought about doing something, but then went back to sleep. Stallone raised a paw and I snatched Artemis out from under him as she yelped. I held her in front of Luke's face, all four paws dangling with her ears flattened against her head. "Talk."

Her ears wiggled back and forth as she studied the hard, resentful snarl on Luke's face. She went limp, inflating like a rabbit balloon before letting it out in a wheezing bunny sigh.

"A successful thief keeps the spoils," she said softly. It wasn't official, but that was practically the oldest Law in the book. If you could take it, it's yours. From the soul of the deceased to the Master Bolt. "Hermes was punished for that Quest."

Luke froze again. His blue eyes went wide and there was confusion swimming in them.

"What - " He licked his lips. "What do you mean punished?"

"Do you not understand English?" She snarked and I shook her.

"Luke is your grandmother's guest, daughter of Zeus," I growled. I was not in the mood to entertain an asshat. "Behave."

In the background, Atalanta chuffed in approval as the bunny went limp again.

"The youngest of the Fates exposed him to the Inescapable," Artemis said dully and I felt my breath leave me in a whoosh. Adrasteia, my eldest sibling. She can pull out your very soul if you get too close, but just being in her presence brought it to the surface. "The Quest could not be rescinded, but it would fail."

Luke looked up at me.

"What does that mean?"

"My oldest sister," I began helplessly. Luke had no idea. The youngest of the Fate's threw Hermes at our elder sister? Atropos, the one who cuts the threads of life, punished Hermes.

For trying to make Luke immortal.

There was sulfur burning in the back of my throat.

The Fates were playing one of their games. They have never cared about anything else.

"She's…" I trailed off.

I shook the rabbit again.

"It is one of the worst punishments on Olympus," Artemis said automatically. "It is agony, every inch of you tears. A million knives slicing into you, flaying you and you can feel yourself hollow out." The monotonous tone of her voice drained my anger. I found myself gently putting her down on Luke's bed. Her silver eyes were unfocused. "You bleed, but you do not know from where. You scream with no voice. You cannot see it, but you can feel your pieces drift away."

I had the sinking feeling she was speaking from experience.

"Artemis?" I whispered.

Her eyes focused as she looked up at me.

Then she looked away.

"Athena was forbidden from assisting you," Artemis continued in a disinterested tone of voice.

Luke let out a strangled whisper. "What?"

Artemis' silver eyes found his blue. "My sister is not one for compassion, but she despises being in debt."

"Annabeth," Luke murmured. "Because I - I helped her daughter to Camp?"

"What else have you done of note?" Artemis sneered, but she dropped her head and ears as she hopped away from us to the end of the bed. And said in a much quieter voice, "I certainly did not."

Annabeth had been seven going on eight when she had been with Luke and Thalia on the streets, trying to make it to safety. Luke, the boy she refused. He had been fourteen. Thalia was twelve and she died.

Dereliction of duty.

I didn't like the picture my brain was putting together.

I felt sick.

"And knowing what I do now, I dodged an arrow!" Artemis chirped and Luke's fists clenched. "The Fates have their eye on you and it has never done anyone any favors getting in their way."

"You're lying," Luke declared.

"Why would I?" Artemis countered. "What reason have I to keep the secret? I can hardly be punished more."

Mom's judgment was final.

"Do you expect me to believe the only reason demigods are just abandoned is because the Fates told you to? Do I look that gullible?"

"Not all demigods," she said lazily. "Just you."

Luke's face flushed red, but then he thought of something. Or maybe he remembered something because then his eyes widened as his face went white. He turned to look at me, pleadingly, so much like his ghost it took my breath away.

He looked lost.

And like he was begging me to tell him it wasn't true.

I couldn't do that.

Nothing about Hermes' treatment of Luke made sense, until you considered the possibility that Hermes had no choice. And there was only one reason why Atropos, cutter of lifelines, would have an interest in keeping a random demigod mortal.

"The Fates - " I forced out of my mouth. "They are playing some kind of cruel game - I'm sorry, I don't know why they're like this - "

Artemis laughed at me.

"Have you forgotten who your mother is, boy?"

I turned on her, blood rushing in my ears, but when I went to take a step, Luke grabbed my arm. Rhea's lion charm dangled from his wrist.

He read it in my face.

There was only one reason Atropos would want to keep him mortal.

"The bathroom!" He gasped. His fingers dug into my arm. "I need - I need to - I'm going to - "

I pointed.

He bolted out of his bed.

As the door slammed behind him, I turned on Artemis.

"What is wrong with you!?" I yelled. Out of the corner of my eye, I caught Stallone giving me worried looks.

"I merely did as you asked, my lord," Artemis spat. "It is hardly my fault you did not like the result."

"That's not what I mean and you know it," I hissed back.

"You cannot be so naïve as to not know what your mother did to me." Her voice hitched. "What this means!"

"So what?" I threw my hands up. "You're going to die, so you've got to be as bitter a cunt as you can imagine on your way out? Is that it?"

"Do not judge me - "

"You're supposed to be better!" I shouted.

Artemis shut her mouth with a click and her eyes went huge.

"You - you're supposed - " My chest hurt. It was hard to breathe. I was angry. At Mom. At myself. At Artemis. At Olympus. I was panicking because I was going to have to keep this rabbit with a death wish alive, but most of all, I was disappointed. "Apollo told me - "

I cut myself off.

Apollo told me a lot of things.

I had been a small little shit when I was younger and not in a good way. I didn't want mortal friends. I had no one but Apollo and a pet cat until Cliff nearly got me killed. I barely tolerated Dad and he tried. If my grandmother hadn't split Mom's lip with her knuckles, I don't think I would have liked my mortal grandparents either.

For a few years there, I was convinced Nana was an actual goddess and was just keeping it a secret.

I was a dumb kid.

Mom left.

On my seventh birthday, I failed a Test. A simple survival mission. Make it across New York State in time. I would get my birthday present and the whole weekend at the beach. It was supposed to be a graduation to the next stage of my training. The time limit was harsh, but we both knew I could do it.

But I met a street kid.

A demigod.

She didn't know. Brown haired with a large blue hoodie and tattered jeans and sneakers. A few years older than me and thought she was going crazy, being paranoid about being followed by monsters. She saw me kill the Cyclops and insisted on sticking around for a little bit. Just to the train station. By then, I already knew about Camp Half-Blood.

Would've. Could've. Should've.

I didn't.

By the time I changed my mind and went back to where I last saw her to see if I could help, she was already gone. The only thing I found was a blood stained large blue hoodie I hoped wasn't hers.

I still hope it wasn't.

I was four or five hours late.

Mom looked at me stumbling into the clearing like she didn't know who I was.

Then she was gone.

Dad got off work and got worried when we didn't come home for dinner and came to find me. I'd been left in the woods and was too devastated to even think about moving. I kept hoping she would come back. I napped in a tree to keep out of reach of Hellhounds when it got too dark to see.

If Mom hadn't left and if Apollo hadn't practically moved in, crashing on the couch to help Dad who tried…

If Artemis hadn't come across a crying eight year old boy and his small shattered galaxy globe while looking for her brother. He hadn't been there, because he and the boy had an argument just before. That maybe Apollo only stayed because he was scared of punishment, not because he actually cared about anyone.

The boy's father had bought the globe for him because he knew what his son's favorite memories of his mother were. After an entire year of single parenting, he was still trying. And in a fit of rage and grief, the boy broke it because it wasn't like his Dreams. The stars were dull.

'Boy, why are you crying?'

It was fake.

'Sounds like your father cares for you very much. Not every child is so fortunate. Here.'

He regretted breaking it, because he knew it wouldn't bring his mother back.

'I will admit to being partial to images of the night sky, but there is still something missing…'

And Artemis thought to enchant the globe after she fixed it, to make it sparkle and spin and glow warmly like it was real, like he held actual pulsing stars in the palms of his hands.

'Ah. There we go.'

Just to make him feel better.

"I want to believe you're still the person that would fix a child's broken toy just because they were crying," I said painfully. "I want to believe that's the real you and you're just - " I waved an arm. "Just playing along with the worst of Olympus because you don't want to rock the boat or are just scared of the consequences or something and I know I'm being stupid!"

She didn't remember when I met her again.

"I know I'm being stupid."

But it meant the universe to me.

"I want to believe you're just scared," I whispered.

Artemis said nothing.

Fine.

I'm done.

I went back to my recliner. I picked my Gameboy Advance up off the floor and blew my nose. Very faintly, I could hear Luke in the bathroom. I don't know if he was crying or throwing up. I had just loaded my save back up when a small auburn furball with a white cotton boll tail and silver eyes whispered,

"Terrified."

 

[Shujin]

An Undertow of Sand
A PJO Fanfiction​

Dinner was awkward.

Artemis had clammed up after her confession when Luke came out of the bathroom, curling into a miserable ball of fluff with a huge lion tongue cowlick.

Luke didn't say anything either.

Back at Camp, I was used to hearing how the son of Hermes was a good looking guy from just about everyone from Aphrodite Cabin (Don't let Silena get started. You will never hear the end of it). A lot from Apollo Cabin too, some from Hephaestus and anyone with eyes could see Annabeth of Athena was in denial. But right now, his brow was etching wrinkles into his forehead as he frowned, like he was forty eight instead of eighteen. He looked worn out, exhausted and angry and still too pale. The scar on his face was a deep groove as he thought hard about something painful with reddened eyes that were still a little puffy.

Luke didn't look like the college aged kid with a bright future in front of him right now. He looked like he had just crawled out of a bombed refugee camp and realized the war would never end.

I pretended not to notice.

A tiny plate with a brownie slid across the table Rhea had dragged from the kitchen into our room to bump my arm. I looked up at Rhea. She raised an eyebrow with a silent question and jerked her head towards Luke, who was mechanically shoving the stuffed grape leaves into his mouth. I don't think he was even tasting the dolmades.

We made an odd picture. Two boys in chitons and bare feet like we were LARPing the Trojan War sitting at Rhea's rickety, chewed on table with a stack of travel postcards from all over Europe in the center weighed down by a porcelain ballerina. The radio was playing some boring song from the 50s over the smell of steamed grape leaves stuffed with minced lamb and chocolate brownies. Rhea herself was wearing some kind of college hoodie with a flattened red C shape and the letters ST in the middle and jean capris. It reminded me of Corey, because he had a similar hoodie and it reminded of Khione too. The only goddess I knew with a college degree.

I shrugged at my cousin. "My sisters are cunts."

I was trying to be nonchalant about it, because I didn't know what else to do. It wasn't like I could walk outside, Challenge the Fates on Luke's behalf and then beat them up. I'd get destroyed.

Mom wouldn't lift a finger if I did something that stupid.

There were a lot of things Mom wouldn't do anything about.

Sulfur was still burning in the back of my throat. The first day of our Quest, in the backseat of Argus' van, I said those exact words to Luke and Artemis. 'The Fates are cunts.' The moon rabbit had been alarmed, shuffling away from me like she was trying to get out of the blast radius.

Luke had laughed.

A lot can change in just a few days.

"Ah," Rhea said, frowning. She looked like she wanted to say something, but thought better of it.

I took a bite of my brownie.

"Umph!" Holy shit, it was good. "Wow."

Rhea perked up. "You like?"

"Yeah." I took a bigger bite. There were nuts and this gentle honey taste against the chocolate alongside some raisins and the white frosting. "You should definitely give Mom the recipe."

"Ha!" Rhea barked. "Yeah, I - " Her face went blank, almost the exact same way Mom's did when she was surprised. Like the guiding intelligence had just checked out for a second. Luke was staring at me too with his best chipmunk impression, cheeks full of food.

"Sorry," Rhea huffed. "Say what?"

I swallowed my brownie bite. "You should give my mother the recipe?"

"Yeah," Rhea sighed, then quietly grumbled. "That's what I thought you said." She sighed again, resigned to her own curiosity. "Your mother bakes?"

"It's a recent thing," I reassured them both. "It started in honor of Martha Stewart's prison sentence for tax evasion. I know," I said to Luke's constipated expression. "It was Dad's idea, he talked her into it."

You heard right. Dad talked Mom into putting on an apron and everything. She's gotten pretty good at it too. He gets her sense of humor, even when it bothers him. And he always seems to know what to say to get her to do things she wouldn't otherwise even think of doing. He's already a lawyer, so he tries not to use his superpowers for evil.

His words, not mine.

If you're wondering, my father is some kind of idiot savant.

Or just an idiot.

If he had been there in that clearing, I like to think Mom would have never left.

Rhea's mouth opened, then closed. Her eyes turned purple as she looked at me like this was the first time we've met. "Your mother actually raised you?"

It was my turn to eye her.

Kronos said the same thing.

"Yeah," I muttered. "She still is."

"Huh." She looked like her worldview had shifted a few degrees to the south. "With what Name?"

I thought about not answering.

There had to be a reason the Greek pantheon didn't know about The Mórrígan. I could say something vague and I knew Rhea would still get it. She might even be expecting me to after she realized how far behind on his education Apollo was, but honestly?

I wasn't interested in keeping Luke in the dark about anything anymore. Between Olympus' revisionist history and neglect and my own family, he's had enough of that.

And maybe I didn't care as much about Mom's reasons.

I shrugged and picked at the dolmades still on my dinner plate. "Celtic."

"Celtic?" Rhea repeated incredulously. I watched Luke's blue eyes widen, and then narrow as he figured it out. "Isn't that the one with The Hunter - why would she even - never mind," Rhea said abruptly. She made this strange pained expression that looked a lot like Mom's Quantum Stupid face. Even with the bug eyes, you could really see the family resemblance.

"Answered my own question," Rhea groaned down at the kitchen table, hands pressed against her temples. "She's incapable of not being a shit."

"The Hunter?" I asked. They must be a pretty big deal if Rhea thought their presence in a pantheon was a deal breaker, but Mom never mentioned anyone like that.

Rhea didn't answer immediately. Her eyes shifted to a deep sapphire color as she picked up our dinner plates.

"The Hunter?" I pressed.

"Someone who really doesn't like your mother and strong enough to actually do something about it," she admitted and I reeled a little. Strong enough to do something about it is pretty damn strong. What kind of Hunter can stand up to Fate? "If she hasn't told you, then I guess there's safety in ignorance?"

"I guess," I muttered. I was used to that. Safety in ignorance. I only knew two of Mom's Names for my own safety, even if I knew of a third now. Her Egyptian one. The Black Pharaoh. "Did she do something to them? Are they feuding then?"

Mom was of the opinion that only cowards and the weak took their anger out on their enemies' children instead, but not everyone would agree with her. If a god gave a shit about their family at all, attacking their weaker consort or kids might look like a good idea. And if Mom was speaking from personal experience?

That was.

Not great.

"Fuck if I know," Rhea said unhelpfully. "Ask her?"

She disappeared back into the kitchen.

I nibbled on my brownie.

"You don't have two mothers," Luke said over the radio commercial and I cringed at the odd tone in his voice. "You have one."

"Yeah," I said quietly. I felt weirdly ashamed. "I have one."

'Luke seems okay with you,' I remembered Castor telling me way back when at Camp Half-Blood, right before he and his brother told me that the 'summer camp' for Greek half-bloods was an orphanage. That no one really had both of their parents. 'But he remembers his Pa walking out.'

Luke's lips curled into a faint sneer as he shoved his own brownie plate around a little. "So it was all sunshine and roses for you, then."

"She left once because I wasn't good enough. For a year." Well, I'm pathetic. Luke's Dad never came back and he just learned why and I'm whining about a single year? Why did I even say that?

"But, yeah," I finished lamely.

Even when she was gone, I still had Apollo that year. Being my big brother 24/7.

But his mortal alias Fred was only at Camp Half-Blood a few times a week for his own children.

Sunshine and roses.

Luke's pale blue eyes flickered over me. "She's the one who trained you, then?" When I nodded, he frowned harder. "I knew something was off. Too defensive for self-taught, better at dealing with opponents with more reach and strength than you."

"Her Celtic Name is a War goddess," I offered tentatively. "She uses a spear and magic."

"And too high of a pain tolerance," he finished. "You broke your arm the first time you broke the Climbing Wall."

I blinked.

"Uh, yeah?"

"You didn't notice until later."

I shrugged. "Heal fast."

Back home, if I really needed it, I could count on either Mom or Apollo to do something about my boo boos. Preferably before Dad freaked out and called 9-1-1.

Luke made a half-snorting sound that was more like a harsh exhale through his nose. "And did your mother train that into you too?"

I wasn't going to complain about it. If Mom hadn't taught me how to not freeze in a fight just because I got hurt, I would be dead at least four times over by now. She never went further than breaking my leg because I was too slow, but that was the last lesson on pain tolerance and she never did it again.

I shook my head, frowning. "Only when she had to."

A muscle jumped in his jaw.

"Only when she had to," he repeated softly. "You know, a lot of things about you make more sense now, but a lot still doesn't. If you are being raised by your mother, why is she making you learn how to fight monsters?"

I opened my mouth, but had to close it.

My first instinct was to say that I was a demigod. Killing monsters was what we do, so she made sure I was good at it.

But why?

It wasn't like Mom needed me to protect her.

'What need does She Who Stalks Stars have of this dirt?' Kronos had asked me.

I don't know.

I punched Grover my first day at Camp. We're cool now, but at the time, I was angry at being confiscated by Hermes like some kind of Olympus Child Protection Services case. I didn't need protection, I thought then. I had my mother.

But she did make me fight monsters.

And this one undead Egyptian sorcerer jerkass.

Long story.

It's how I met Cliff.

Luke poked at his dinner. "Demigods are always hunted by monsters and your mother - "

"Only Olympic demigods!" I blurted out.

His eyes snapped up to me.

The Curse of Lamia, the nasty piece of work cast by a monster child of Hecate, the Titaness of Magic is what lets nature spirits and monsters sniff Greek half-bloods out from the middle of a crowd. It was Hera's version of mercy. She washes her hands of Olympic demigods forever. The mortal relatives were off limits. No more divine revenge on the affront to her Domain, but if the half-blood was not strong enough, fast enough, lucky enough…

They'll die anyway.

Olympic demigods.

Time. The Night. The Pit.

Fate.

They are above Olympus.

The Curse should have meant nothing to me, but I've been chased by way too many Hellhounds, Cyclops and demon birds for that to be true. And even if there was something funky going on with the Curse, it should have been trivial for Mom to get rid of it. Through magic of her own or just brute force.

Mom plans ahead, but that doesn't mean I know what those plans are.

"Only Olympic demigods," Luke said slowly in a very, very quiet tone of voice. "...only us."

I sat in my chair stiffly, mangling my napkin. I couldn't think of anything to say that would help.

"Maybe some of them…care," Luke drawled finally. "But that doesn't mean it's for the right reasons, or that they care like they should. My father - " His voice broke for a split second. "I had to blackmail him into helping the rest of his children in our Cabin while I was gone - " He was almost panting as his face flooded with hurt. "I had - I had to - " He savagely bit into a dolmades and mumbled. "He's still a piece of shit."

"Are we talking about my children?" Rhea asked as she came back from the kitchen, balancing a tray of drinks. "Because my bad."

"Grandchildren," Luke corrected her sullenly.

"I take it back." Rhea said immediately and refilled his dinner plate. "Not my fault, innocent until proven guilty."

"You're a little guilty," I said, just to be a little shit.

I really wasn't looking forward to having to travel the whole United States looking for a fucking god weapon during the Night with one demigod and a rabbit.

Yeah, Rhea was helping, but…

That wrapped donut still stung.

My cousin gave me the stink eye. "My children had no choice in how they were raised, but they should know better in how they treat their children. I made sure they knew." She passed me the drink, some kind of punch, but I could tell Luke's had nectar mixed in. "Especially Hera."

Rhea didn't sound angry, just disappointed.

"You tried?" Luke sounded surprised.

"I fucking tried!" Zeus' mother threw up her hands. The drink tray went flying and disappeared before it hit the wall. "Advice, warnings, fostering, throwing problem grandchildren at other people when I couldn't figure out their shit, everything. Didn't I?" Rhea turned her head and her voice had a sudden deep hum running underneath it that rattled my bones and made my stomach clench painfully. "Artemis."

The moon rabbit on the floor flinched, before slowly uncurling from her ball.

"You did," the rabbit croaked.

"And now Selene's dead," Rhea said tersely and Artemis flinched again. That made me wonder if Artemis' inheritance was a sore spot for the Titan Queen. Rhea didn't say she couldn't do anything for Artemis and she'd used Selene against the rabbit before. "Maybe. Probably."

"Maybe?" I repeated incredulously.

Artemis had the chariot and the new duty as a mirror of our sun, but the previous Titaness of Radiance, Insanity and the Moon Selene's calcified corpse still hung around in our night sky. Most of her really was a crater-scarred orb of rock and bone dust. The Mist didn't need to do much, but on a full moon, sometimes I looked up and could see right into her open eye.

I didn't do that often.

"Nobody knows," Rhea answered, sounding tired. Luke was looking back and forth between us. As the saying goes, there was a story there. I knew of it, but didn't really know it.

Apollo didn't like talking about how they got their chariots. He would always blame the Romans, but we both know that wasn't true.

"What happened, happened, but even as - " Rhea made a vague waving motion around her head with a hand. "Gone, she still did right by a Young goddess of the Hunt in the end." Rhea's voice was tight and sad, her eyes turning a poisonous yellow color. "Just because I asked her to."

"...I'm sorry," Artemis whispered.

Luke choked on his drink as Rhea's eyebrows flew up into her dark hairline.

"...what?"

"I'm sorry," Artemis said, louder, but not stronger. The former goddess' voice was so brittle, like she was about to cry and her small form was trembling. "I - I am sorry. You tried, you warned me about my Domain and I didn't listen and I don't - I don't - " Big, fat tears welled up in the rabbit's eyes. "I don't want to die."

Artemis sniffled.

"I - I don't want - I'm so sorry! I tried to be better!" Artemis cried as Rhea looked more and more disappointed. "I was getting better! I don't want to die! I'm not - I'm not ready. I tried. Why - why doesn't it matter?"

"Oh," her grandmother finally breathed out, softly walking over to scoop the rabbit up in her arms. "You poor, naive child…"

"I don't want to go - " The rabbit's paws gripped the hoodie desperately. "Please, I don't want to go, I tried, I'm not ready! Μάμμη!" She cried out, slipping completely into Ancient Greek. Grandma. "I don't want to go! I'm not ready for it to end!"

Everything ends, I thought.

Rhea left the room, whispering gently as Artemis openly sobbed into her college hoodie.

I don't want to go!

Luke let out a shaky snort. "No wonder she usually looks like she's twelve."

"I resemble that remark," I said.

"Mhm."

"Oy."

I threw my crumpled napkin at him.

I don't want to go!

Luke slowly started on his plate of seconds, taking sips of his drink between bites. I guess he had been starving, being unconscious for over a day. He needed the resources. I felt something nudge my arm from the opposite side and when I looked down, Atalanta was at my elbow. The lion's sorrowful golden eyes looked at me for a long moment.

I don't know what she was trying to tell me and I don't know what I wanted her to say either. The moment passed and she slowly herded her stubborn cubs from the room.

I don't want to go!

I pushed my brownie plate away. I didn't feel like finishing it.

Luke had finished eating and drained his cup by the time Rhea came back sans bunny.

"Sleeping," she said shortly with a complicated expression on her face. "How's your arm doing?" She asked Luke. "Range of motion?"

He windmilled his arm for her, wincing when he tried to lift his arm over his shoulder. After the nectar, the ugly scar had healed a bit so it was more of an angry dark pink ropy scar instead of a blood red line of scabbing and ripped skin.

Rhea made a clicking sound as she knelt by him. The writing on the walls lit up as that smokeless fire flickered at the ends of her fingers. My stomach felt like someone had dropped a rock into it. I held my breath on reflex, but I wasn't going to throw up. Hopefully, that meant I was getting over my god flu.

" - and when you meet him again," Rhea was telling Luke quietly as she reopened a part of his shoulder wound. "You can report that my debt has been paid. One intervention, as agreed."

"I can still - "

"I am not my father, taking advantage of desperation." She cut off his whispered protest. "A vow like that isn't until the end of your life."

I wondered what they were talking about. I almost asked, but my Nana went through a lot of effort making sure I had a basic sometimes-working filter on my ADHD mouth.

Unlike my mother.

If it wasn't any of my business, then it wasn't any of my business. I was guessing it had something to do with how he was able to get Rhea to help. I was family, but Luke had to get her attention. I was still curious, but watching him look away from her, clenching his fists, I didn't want to push him.

"Ah ha," Rhea exclaimed and pulled something from his shoulder. At first, I thought that maybe she extracted a bone fragment that was giving him trouble, but what she pulled out was long, thin, black as midnight. Pinched between her fingers, it looked like it was breathing. I think it even wriggled.

"What is that?" Luke looked spooked. I didn't blame him. It looked nasty and it had been in his shoulder.

"Hm?" Rhea said absently as she stood up, inspecting the black splinter. "Hair off the dog that bit you, pretty sure," she said, looking a bit disgusted. "Desecrated as they are, the Hunters still remember how to hunt."

Ice ran down my spine.

"It's Night," I said immediately and alarm flashed over Luke's face. "It - she can't just use the darkness to get here, can she?"

Because if Mom throwing a tantrum at Night meant that our safety net actually meant nothing…

I was going to be furious.

Rhea's lips pursed.

"Only those of my sister have that ability, so I'm gonna say no." She waved a hand and our clothes, clean and folded, fell onto the table in front of us. "But you should leave, sooner rather than later. I will keep this here, but I don't expect it to fool her for long."

"Thank you," Luke said sincerely, reaching out for his red vest and jeans. "For everything, Lady Rhea."

"Yeah, well." The Titan Queen shrugged "It's the least I can do. And - " She gave us a sad, resigned smile. "I would appreciate it, if you can give my granddaughter an hour to…recover."

"We can do that," I said quickly, ahead of Luke.

I thought he was going to refuse. I think he wanted to, but pressed his lips together before letting out an exasperated sigh, "Yeah, sure. We can sleep after the sun comes up, or something."

Oh, I thought.

Rhea raised an eyebrow at me and jerked her head towards Luke as a silent question.

Shit.

"Right…" I began slowly. Luke had absolutely no idea. "About that."

I floundered.

I had an hour to cram all the relevant information I learned over twelve years into Luke's head before we walked out that door and got ourselves killed.

My cousin snorted and abandoned me, leaving the room with a mocking wiggle of her fingers as Luke looked at me expectantly.

"About what? The sun?"

"I - okay." Don't panic. First rule. Don't panic. I dragged a hand down my face. Where do I even begin? "My mother and my - " Sister-in-law, cousin, aunt? Aunt. Aunty Nyx.

…would Tartarus let me call him Uncle?

Focus.

Important shit first:

It's not my fault.

"My mother and Aunt Night are mad at each other so Night's more active. Paying attention. That's making her realm bleed through so the sun - " I rushed through the rest. "The sun isn't going to rise until she…stops that?"

Luke stared at me blankly. Then he glanced behind me towards the window. "So when you say Night…"

"The protogenoi." The Primordial Night. "It means - it means a lot more monsters and I'm not talking about Night's Hellhound pups." I licked my lips. Fuck, Mom. You couldn't just let it go? I'm fine.

Why couldn't you let it go?

"Ancient monsters. From the Pit and beyond slipping through the cracks. It's affecting the mortals too." I pointed at his wrist where the lion charm dangled. "Rhea gave you that so you could talk - remember when Mom Claimed me and the sound kind of died?"

He nodded jerkily.

"Yeah, but for everyone. And we're going to have to be real careful with sleeping, because Hypnos is grounded so if you wander too far, something will eat you and if you ever feel yourself falling down while sleeping - "

"I better wake up," Luke said shakily. His blue eyes were starting to widen with fear. "I know. The Pit - " He swallowed thickly. "I know."

"Okay." I tried to swallow my heart back down. "Okay." Most people just jerk awake by instinct. If Luke knows without being told that falling down in your sleep meant you reached the Pit… "How good are you at Dreaming?"

"I can control it." Some emotion flashed over his face. Then he slowly continued. "Travel a bit. Change shape. Evade the Dream spirits."

Hermes Oneiropompus, Conductor of Dreams. Luke was up to five Names inherited from his father, but at least now I knew why. Hermes wanted Luke.

He just wasn't allowed to keep him.

"So if I say 'stay close to me' while you're Dreaming, you can?"

"I can," he said quietly.

"Good." I found myself rubbing the back of my neck.

Some of the things I learned, like Wards and Signs, weren't something I needed to use just to get rid of some man-eating sheep. Most monsters were far too stupid and weak to do more than hit you really hard with something. Or bite you. A rare few, like sirens or Artemis' former Hunter, could do more, but the average monster wasn't something you needed to Ward your soul from.

You just needed to worry about them killing you.

Big difference.

And Signs?

Signs only worked on those that weren't native to this reality.

In Dungeons and Dragons terms, they were variations of the Dismissal spell on Outsiders. Force one extraplanar creature right the fuck back home with a Will saving throw.

Or at least make it wish it was back home.

I was going to need them now. I found myself wondering what Mom foresaw me needing them for, but if I started going down that rabbit hole (did Mom know she wouldn't know what Night did and anticipated losing her temper by being surprised? How?) I don't think I'd come up for air anytime soon.

Here's to hoping Mom didn't pass me with a D- on those like she did my Sensitivity.

Because that would suck.

A lot.

"What kind of monsters can we expect?"

"I… can't answer that," I admitted painfully. "We can come across anything from the Pit and with the Stirring going on - "

"What?" Luke asked sharply.

I blinked.

Holy shit, they weren't even taught about that?

But fighting monsters is what demigods do.
.
"The Stirring. Great Stirring, whatever." I flapped my hand. "The Pit kind of…turns over in his sleep or something every ten or so thousand years. Monsters that haven't even been seen in eight or twelve thousand years start reforming and can find ways out to the surface."

Luke had an unreadable look on his face as he stared at me.

"...and that's happening now?"

"It'll reach a peak in…" I tried to remember my mother's timeline for my Uncle Pit. Shit. I can't. Soon. "Maybe five years? Some monsters start reforming early. I don't know how early, but just - be prepared for it?" Luke's face was pinched and he was clutching his clothes to him with white knuckles. "And not all monsters come from the Pit either," I finished quietly. "There are other pantheons, remember?"

A muscle jumped in his jaw. He remembered.

Greek monsters hunted Olympic demigods thanks to the Curse. That didn't mean the demigods of other pantheons were safe from the horrors of their own mythology. Or that we were safe from them.

"I can't tell you what to expect."

For a long while, we just stared at each other.

"Ok-ay." Luke's voice cracked. His blank mask crumbled as he bent over the table, a death grip on his red vest and yellow fanny pack, until he was just an overwhelmed demigod realizing how far in over his head he really was. "I - just - just give me a few minutes. Please."

I jumped up from the table like my seat was on fire.

"Sure, I'll just be - uh, over there."

I escaped to the other side of the room. Turning on the TV or playing my Gameboy did not appeal to me right now. My throat was still burning. My stomach didn't feel great. It felt like it was trying to open, but it had been stitched shut. I found myself looking out the window instead. Maybe I was hoping that Night had proved herself more responsible than my mother in the past half hour and I wouldn't have a bunch of bullshit ahead of me.

Wishful thinking.

The night sky was still a void. The lights from the house only extended just enough to show impossibly dark shadows of Rhea's crap still in her front yard and driveway.

Fuck.

I had a bunch of bullshit ahead of me.

When we returned to Olympus Master Bolt, I was absolutely going to make Zeus bleed for it.

When.

Think positive.

I let the curtains fall back into place -

Wait.

I opened the curtain again. I thought I saw movement. I expected some kind of monster to be probing the edges of Rhea's barrier wards. I half-expected to see Aura's ugly, pissed off mug out there, because that was my luck.

Instead, a small black bird fluttered into the square of light spilling weakly from the window.

A raven.

Its black beak clacked noiselessly and I watched a third eye open up on its forehead.

"Mom?" I whispered.

It stretched its wings triumphantly and bobbed its head. Then it hopped out of sight.

I scrambled back from the window.

Mom.

I ran out of the room in a mad dash for the front door. I passed Rhea who had something in her hands and maybe she tried to say something, but I wasn't paying attention. I yanked the door open and maybe it had been locked because I heard something break before my bare feet hit the concrete front step.

"Lil cuz, what's - " Rhea gasped as the black haired woman stepped into the light. The Titan Queen immediately threw herself to the ground. Hands outstretched as if begging for mercy, face down.

"Great One," she breathed.

Mom looked the same way she always did. Pale with freckles across the bridge of her nose, long dark feathered hair that went down to her back. The Morrigan was just in a white blouse and slim jeans with dress shoes. A silver pendant hung from her neck.

But something was still wrong.

It was her eyes, I realized after a second of staring. Where I once saw a fractal gaze of violent death, there was nothing. As if her eye sockets were empty. There were stars in them.

The Names of an Elder God were avatars. They were always there.

"Mom?" I ventured, taking a step forward.

She recoiled.

"...who interfered this time," she said distantly, an unreadable expression on her face.

I was suddenly terrified for my half-brother, Erebus.

"Mom - Mom don't be mad, he helped - "

"He." She looked at me like she was seeing right through me. "He?" She hissed. "You will tell me who - "

I risked talking over her. "He helped, I would have died if he didn't - "

"I take my eyes off you for a second - "

"It's been two days!" I yelled at her and Mom stopped mid tirade. "It's been - Rhea," I turned to my cousin and a sick feeling coiled in my stomach when she flinched away from me. "How long has it - " Why was she still on the ground? "You can stand up," I said quickly. "Please stand up."

It reminded me of that first night at Camp Half-Blood, with all the Campers and Dionysus, god of Olympus being made to bow.

Mom was looking at me like she didn't know who I was.

My throat was tight.

"Rhea's my cousin," I pointed out weakly. "My first cousin. She can stand."

My words hung in the air between us like a dead cat. I watched my mother's brow wrinkle slightly as the stars in her eyes flared, and then dulled. A few winked out.

Mom tilted her head towards the Matriarch of Swarms.

"You can stand," she told her softly. At first Rhea's hands pulled back. She froze, or maybe she was waiting for a reaction and when nothing happened, she sat up. I didn't like the bewildered, fearful look she was giving me.

"I have a very…" Mom's lips turned up in a strange smile. "...compassionate son."

"You must have broken a few laws of nature birthing him." Rhea quipped. She immediately flinched, looking like she was a second from throwing herself back onto the ground.

The Mórrígan smiled wider. "You have… no idea."

"Um," I said.

"Of course," Mom nodded at me like I said something profound. "I will inform your father of your change in status. He'll be overjoyed."

Rhea flushed red and then went white as all the blood drained from her face.

I'm guessing that's a bad thing.

"Wait, Mom - "

"Do you still want it?" It was her turn to talk over me. Her voice was like silk as she took a step closer. I fought the urge to go right back into the house and she wasn't even looking at me. "You have distinguished yourself in that mess a while back, haven't you? You have helped my son and that deserves…something, doesn't it? You already have my patronage. Your father's. And you know your place."

"Mom!" My sharp tone cut through the strange tension. My mother blinked slowly and then stepped back.

"If I may?" Rhea wasted no time in asking.

"Go."

I was left alone on the front step.

My heart was jack hammering. I was a strange kind of numb. I was feeling a lot of things, but they only registered as flashes of emotion breaking out of this high strung fight or flight adrenaline rush and I hadn't chosen one yet. I didn't want to run. This was my mother.

"It's been two days."

And I've had enough of her shit.

I chose fight.

"You nearly threw me into the Beyond when you got mad and abandoned me for two days. I prayed to you and you didn't answer. For two days."

Mom's face fell.

"I…I didn't - "

"Mean to, I know." I said. "But you still did it." An ugly suspicion rose in my mind. "I bet you didn't even check on Dad either."

Her head jerked in a strange way, like she forgot her body had a spine for a second. The thumb on her right hand started twisting her wedding ring. "He's…he should be - "

"It's okay. He was home. I'm sure Apollo picked up the slack."

She eyed me warily.

"You are…angry with me."

"Fucking furious," I bit out. "You know about Luke, don't you?"

"Yes," Mom said easily. She didn't need to ask what I was talking about and that just made me angrier. "It would be impossible not to." Mom almost smiled. "Sloppy work. Your sisters cut some corners. Overreached."

'I suppose it had to happen eventually,' Rhea had said when she heard the Great Prophecy. 'An overreach.'

"Why didn't you tell me?"

"You say that," Mom said slowly. "As if you expected me to care about dust."

It was different with Mom. The expectation for gods like Artemis or Apollo to be human just wasn't there. Most of the time, she followed Dad's moral compass. But sometimes, I got the feeling that she was like a sentient black hole aping right from wrong.

She knows I noticed.

"You sisters' machinations only concern me when they involve you."

I was almost too angry to be confused. "But - I drew a Prophecy. Hermes, God of Thieves card." Mom didn't say anything. She just watched me and I felt my confidence wither a little. "You gave me a Quest."

A very small frown formed on her face.

"You needed a thief. Their plans for the demigod of Hermes are irrelevant," she said softly and I felt my stomach drop. "You could have argued for his father. He has immortal children that could have taken his place. Prophecies mean what you think they mean." Her star-filled gaze pierced right through me. "It would have made no difference to me."

"I gave him my boon," I said like I was swinging a sword at her head. "By the way."

Her eyes narrowed immediately. "When?"

I only got a few words into the explanation of 'after getting off Nemesis' crazy train and the monster attack' before Mom let out a frustrated half-scream, stalking first in one direction and then back in angry pacing.

"That is - that is fine," she gritted out with clenched teeth. "I should have expected it after you changed things when you turned seven. It's fine. That's…minor, really. I can adjust. We have time! I can - "

"Mom," I stopped her. "I have no idea what you're talking about."

She opened her mouth, but I held up a hand and stepped off the concrete front step.

"You've got - I know you've got some kind of plan," I continued. "Some kind of roadmap or goal and I have no idea what it is. You need me to do something, but I'm left in the dark and you just - you flipped your shit over the Night - "

The stars in her eyes flared. "She interfered - "

"Why does that matter - "

"She ruined everything!" Mom spun on her heel, flinging her hands out like she was going to wring Night's neck all over again. "She altered the very composition of your soul, curbed your appetite! And I needed - "

Sudden silence.

I felt like there was supposed to be a cartoon record scratch right now, but I wasn't laughing.

"Needed?"

A shudder ran up and down Mom's back.

"Yes," she whispered. Her shoulders shook. "...walk with me." She started walking.

I followed, uneasy.

Needed.

She led us down the overgrown gravel road leading from Rhea's house down to the cold Mississippi beach. Without the sun, there was a cold wind blowing, making me break out in goosebumps. It didn't feel like it was the middle of June. I could only see by the soft light coming off my mother's silver pendant. Before everything, it wouldn't have mattered that it was Night and we were in a strange place and I was (weirdly) sick, because I knew Mom would keep me safe.

My chest hurt, like something deep inside was breaking apart.

We stopped at the shore.

"Mom?" I asked as she picked up a pebble and flung it out onto the cold, dark waves.

"When you were born," she began. "You exceeded my wildest hopes. You could never disappoint me, not even in failure."

It wasn't as comforting as the first time I heard her say that. I frowned, wondering where she was going with this. "Because I took after granddad."

"I could not be more pleased with you," she whispered, still looking out at the water. "Adrasteia was my first child. She was made for a purpose and without me she will cease to exist."

"She's - " I started, surprised.

"Yes."

I swallowed, hard. Mom kept my eldest sibling alive like a cat keeps a tick alive. I heard from Erebus and Aether. The Fates tried to have me killed, twice. My eldest sibling had always been a mystery. She Named Athena, but that was it. In the divine world, I don't think she even counted as a separate sentient being. More like a semi-independent Name. It was where the term 'star-spawn' came from.

Not a person.

I'm not a spawn.

But Adrasteia is.

"She inherited all the wrong things, or perhaps, it was not possible for her to inherit the right things. She failed me." Mom threw another stone. "I tried again. True children, split into three to limit their strength." She sighed, shoulders slumping. "And it turns out, I needn't have bothered with that."

"Mom - "

She shushed me.

"I turned to Time, so that wouldn't happen again, and it didn't. Erebus was a disappointment in other ways, an even split between the two of us in inheritance. Useless," she snarled. "A sweet child. Also an utter waste - but Aether." Her voice picked up as she found another rock and rolled it around in her hands. "Aether took after your grandfather too. Brilliantly. Strong and free."

Her face twisted.

"And impatient." She glanced at me, uncomfortable. "Put me off birthing any more children for a very long time."

I was so amazed by Mom actually bothering to filter that I had to ask.

"What did he do?"

"Ate his way out."

"Oh."

I regret asking.

"Yes…" Her eyes turned away. "And then there is you, my perfect little boy."

I clenched my jaw.

I wasn't stupid.

She didn't mean 'perfect' as a form of endearment this time.

Maybe she never did.

She had my siblings for a reason. She wanted them to be a certain way. She still cared for them. I was there when we were picking out manga for Aether or watercolor sets for Erebus and honestly, who gave a shit about the Triplets. The reason she had them wasn't everything.

But she had me for a reason.

"Why did you have me?" I asked quietly.

Mom let out a long, weary sounding sigh. The waves rolled in soundlessly and drained back out.

"What am I, Perseus?" she asked, just as quietly.

"Fate."

"Hm." It was almost a soft snort. "A half-blood child of the eldest gods," she quoted. "And Prophecies always come true."

I felt like my heart had a wooden splinter shoved right through it.

"You had to have me?"

"Oh, Percy," she said quickly, kneeling down in front of me and gripping me around the shoulders. "I chose you. You would have always been mine, but I. Chose. I did not have to raise you, I wanted to. I chose Dorian for you."

A piece of my stomach unclenched. I could have been like the orphans at Camp Half-Blood, but she decided against it. She wanted Dorian Stele to be my father.

I was still reeling.

I always thought I was born because Mom wanted a family with Dad. Maybe she still did, she just didn't have a choice about wanting it. It felt like I'd been told I was a rape baby. Mom always said I was more important to her, but I didn't know what to think.

"You - you don't love him?"

I still don't know how Dorian Stele met Ananke.

A weak smile curled her lips. "He makes it easier to be who I need to be for you." She glanced at her right hand and the platinum wedding ring with a celtic knot holding the pink diamond. "So very, very easy…Too easy." She slumped further. "But how can I?" She whispered, heartbroken. "I have witnessed trillions of mortal lives end, Percy. Humanity has degraded to the point that not even their souls last forever."

"Can you just fix it?" I tried. "For him, at least?"

She shook her head. "I've never done it before. If I tried and got it wrong, his soul might still not be able to take it, but he won't be able to die."

She made a face.

"Best case scenario: he goes irrevocably mad eventually."

Swallowing hurt. Breathing hurt.

Dad loved Mom. She couldn't quite bring herself to truly love him back.

Because she would lose him.

"I'm sorry," she whispered. "You were under the impression that I am all powerful and could never be wrong." She dragged her eyes back up to mine and raised that hand to the side of my face. "I wish that were true."

She took my sunglasses off and I met my mother's star filled gaze with my own.

She didn't have a ghost.

She had chains.

Shackles made out of molten stardust, moonlight and the bent, warped edges of reality dug into her painfully, weighing her down.

Prophecies always come true.

"You don't have free will," I whispered, horrified.

"I chose you," Mom said hotly, offended, but her gaze slid away, ashamed.

My head spun.

Mom couldn't free herself.

Aether took after our grandfather. Strong and free.

Adrasteia. Clotho. Lachesis. Atropos. Erebus. They were all here on Earth, but Aether was out traveling the stars.

I took after our grandfather.

And she always told me I chose my own destiny.

"You need me to free - "

She rushed to cover my mouth with her hand. "Don't say it."

"Who did this to you?" I mumbled into her palm. I tried to think. Nyx said they had enemies. "Was it - was it The Hunter?"

"It doesn't matter." She sighed, and rested her forehead on my left shoulder. "I planned for you to grow as strong as you could as fast as possible. Demigods are flexible, to a point. Your other inherited talents are nothing compared to what you inherited from Father. If you were forced to rely on your hunger to overcome greater and greater challenges then, perhaps…"

She trailed off.

"I had it all planned out," she said bitterly. "But I've made a real mess of things, haven't I? I failed you."

All this time. I thought I was a failure because I wasn't able to figure out my abilities, but the reason why she was never disappointed in me was because I wasn't supposed to figure them out. She directed Apollo to us for a reason. All the training was because she planned on putting me through the dangerous life of a normal demigod, not because it was truly necessary. All of the tests were to prepare me for a role.

But at the same time...

She knew I would be found by Olympus and made sure we had our Third Fridays just so I could have a happy last day and be able to be there for Dad. Apollo trained me, but he also learned how to be a better person. He still wasn't stellar, but he was visiting his kids. Had been for years. He was more responsible with his Prophecy Domain, reconciling with some of his Oracles. His twin sister had even noticed. My being at Camp let all the half-bloods know that they were being lied to, and even some of the younger Young Gods were learning. My upbringing meant I could not only change Camp, but that I wanted to.

If Mom was a control freak, manipulating everything, I couldn't just blame her for all the bad things in my life. She chose me.

"I wish you told me sooner," I admitted, still a little hurt.

"I do too," she huffed. "I am proud of you. Always will be, no matter what you choose to do."

"If I just want to fix Camp?"

"Then you will just fix Camp. We can figure out how to manipulate your Great Prophecy to make sure you're safe," she reassured me. "What's another thousand years?"

I bit my lip.

Mom didn't have a ghost.

She had chains.

If Mom didn't have free will, how much of anything was truly her fault?

"What do I need to do?"

"You can choose your own destiny," Mom said quietly. "But Prophecies. Always. Come true."

The contradiction jumped out at me instantly.

My blood froze.

"No."

I could feel her shake her head against my collarbone.

"No. I can't fight you - Mom. I can't."

"You can't," she agreed, pulling me into a full hug. "But you might survive. I want you to survive."

I hugged her back like she was going to disappear.

Part of me felt like she already had.

The mother I thought I had, wasn't real. The mother I actually had was even more flawed than I could have ever imagined.

She had chains.

A thousand thoughts were crashing together in my head. It was weird. The existential dread that you'd think I'd be living with since Apollo told me I might die when I turned sixteen never turned up. But the thought of going against my mother felt like I had just put on a pair of cement shoes at the edge of the harbor.

When she pulled back, her eyes fell down to my gut. "I should remove what Night did to you," she said thoughtfully. "Someone has already altered it." A small, but proud smile brightened her face. "But you are doing so well. You've already outgrown my ability to predict you."

She couldn't see the gossamer thread of stardust light up as she spoke, strangling her. Was it forcing her to think a certain way, right now? I wanted to reach for it.

To rip it off her even if I had to use my fucking teeth.

"You can do this," Mom said very quietly. "You will never disappoint me. But say the word, and I will take you home."

It's everything and everyone else that would go to shit.

I shook my head.

If there was some way to save Luke. To take Zeus to the cleaners and make things better for the Camp. To free my mother.

I had to try.

I chose my own destiny.

Mom smiled, a triumphant light in her starry eyes.

"I do love you, Percy." My heart felt like it would burst. It was the first time she has ever said it out loud in my entire life. And Mom can't lie. "I will…apologize to Night." She smiled ruefully. "I will hate every millisecond, but I will. With any luck, it will help."

"And you won't leave me again?"

"I will not abandon you," Mom said gently. "If you need help, I will hear you. I promise. And in the end, when all is said and done, we will be just like Father and I. Everything I have will be yours. We'll travel the cosmos together." She planted a kiss in my hair and placed my glasses back on my nose. "Absolutely inseparable. We will witness it all until the end of time itself."

Then she smiled with that curl at the corner of her mouth and her voice picked up that Irish lilt that told me she was quoting something or something. "And with strange eons even death may die."

I felt settled in a way I haven't since I met Kronos, but wary too. I hadn't forgotten that the Egyptians were not her biggest fans and there had to be a reason. I knew what this was all for and I wanted to believe her. My mother loved me. She can't lie.

But I've learned enough these past few days to know that didn't mean she always told the truth either.

"Where's that from?"

"An amusing man I met once. Selene's legacy is one that keeps on giving. It's in the blood, you see." She let out a thoughtful hum. "I believe he wrote a few books."

And in a flutter of black feathers, she was gone. A raven clawed for the sky as it soared over the dark ocean, cackling.

---

"Flashlights."

"Check."

I clipped the small flashlight to one of the belt hooks on my jeans for easy grabbing and chucked the other one into the front pocket of my backpack.

"Batteries."

"Tons."

Luke was staring at the Duracell D battery packs in his hands like they were going to explode. He volunteered to be in charge of Rhea's swivel electronic torchlight, so it was too late to complain now.

"Brownies."

"Delicious."

Artemis was quietly munching on one in her red sweater with the hood pulled up. Her ears were sticking out of the holes and a lion charm dangled off her cat collar.

"Clean underwear."

"Freshly laundered."

Rhea snorted at me as I smirked cheekily at her. "You are a little shit, cuz."

"Percy," I said.

I had never introduced myself, because I was a brat who thought labels mattered. My eldest sibling was a spawn. Rhea was my first cousin.

"Percy Stele."

Her smile was soft enough to make me feel bad for waiting so long. "I'd introduce myself properly, but eh - "

"Mortal."

"Right. Head might explode." We grinned at each other. "Compass?"

"Know how it works." I held up the analog watch with the clock face and compass encased in titanium on a tough cord on a carabiner. It looked like something you'd expect a sailor to have. And without a sunrise or set, it would definitely help if we couldn't hitchhike.

"That's it then," she said softly. She glanced down at the rabbit and drifted over Luke before meeting my eyes again. She looked like she wanted to say something, but thought better of it at the last second, leaving her to lamely wish us, "Good luck."

"Thanks."

We were off. It felt a lot different from our first few steps out of Camp Half-Blood and it wasn't just because the sky was pitch black.

"Nine days," Luke said, turning on his flashlight. Artemis was stuffed in his vest, hiding from the world.

"Yeah," I muttered. "Guess we better hope Khione was right - "

A cold wind blew past us.

Luke and I stopped walking.

"You don't think - ?" He stopped and we could both hear what sounded a lot like horses milling around. "No way."

I ran ahead of him.

There at the end of the overgrown gravel road, two huge white horses nibbled on the grass poking up through the pebbles and sand with golden saddles on their back with ice blue reigns. I could see white and blue envelopes tied with blue ribbon to each of their manes.

"Thracians," I breathed. I used my considerable talent at pacifying bitchy horse-pigeons at Camp to approach one without getting mulekicked and untied the letter.

Mine was a simple message written in Greek:

'Anywhere a cold wind can go, so can I.' - Khione

Luke's must have been longer, because he was still reading when I looked up. He lifted his head suddenly and then pulled out his Dad's lighter. I watched him burn the letter.

"What was that?"

"An apology," he said shortly. He let the ashes drop as he upended the envelope and shook a silver ring out into his hand.

"Woah." It wasn't all silver, but alternating bands of silver and what looked like carved ice. I could feel Khione's signature cold energy drifting off it. "That's some apology."

Young gods were notoriously stingy with divine gifts, because even though it was a tiny amount, it was still a permanent investment. Once it was gone, it was gone.

"Should I wear it?" Luke asked me.

"It doesn't feel cursed," I said.

"It's not," he agreed. "I'd be able to tell."

Jesus.

What Name was that one from?

"Well, we kind of need all the help we could get?"

His expression shuttered.

"Yeah." He fit it on his middle finger and his eyes immediately tried to pop out of his head.

"What - what does it do?"

"Wind currents. Air flow." Luke said, sounding awed. He was looking around slowly like he was wearing night vision goggles. "I can see the wind."

I usually don't pray to other gods.

Khione Thrêikion.

But she deserved this one.

Thanks.

A chilly breeze ruffled my hair.

"You know this means I'm right," I said as I put my foot in the stirrup. Damn, this boy is huge. He's got to be over six feet tall from the ground to his shoulders. My balls were not going to thank me for this later.

"What?" Luke's head swiveled towards me, bewildered.

"This is why I don't hold murder attempts against people."

Luke paused in mounting his own horse. "No."

"If I held a little attempted murder against everybody - "

"That still doesn't make it normal!"

"I'm just saying!"

Thracian horses straight from Boreas' stables were capable of going 0 to 75mph in about three seconds.

Next stop: Compton, California.

And after we found the Master Bolt, I was going to break a Prophecy.

Here's to hoping that's not going to bite me in the ass.

'A half-blood child of the eldest gods, shall reach sixteen against all odds
And see the world in endless sleep, the hero's soul, cursed blade shall reap
A single choice shall end his days, Olympus to preserve or raze'
- The Oracle of Delphi. The Great Prophecy to Olympus, Sept 13th 1945​

 

[Shujin]

Hermes​

Hermes let the image of his son racing away on the back of a purebred Thracian fade from his mind's eye as he stepped into the circle. It was a crumbling mosaic too badly damaged to tell what it had been anymore. He cleared his throat.

Aphrodite dropped the magazine and threw up her hands as soon as she saw him.

"Please tell me you're here to - "

"No," Hermes said with a handsome smile.

"Ugh." The goddess dropped back into the seat she had only just begun to rise from, rolling her eyes. "Then you're useless." She willed her magazine back into her hands, flipped to the exact same page she'd left on. "Go away."

"Wish I could," he said honestly.

Looking at her hurt.

She had May's wavy blonde hair, and it was even threatening to frizz in the damp air just like it should. The upturned nose, prominent cheekbones and small ears were hers, although he thought the natural slant to the pouting mouth belonged to someone else. It was familiar, that and the pointed chin, but he couldn't remember right now. He didn't want to, really. The eyes were all May, though. They even echoed like hers. The ones in her skull and on her spine reflecting back through the ones in her face, making them shine. Eyes and eyes and eyes…

All she had wanted was to do something good with her Sight.

For a goddess of Love, Aphrodite was always the last person anyone who'd loved and lost wanted to see.

He looked away.

"Anything worth mentioning?" He asked, before his phone rang. "Hang on."

'I have Demeter on line three,' Martha said.

"Not now," Hermes replied. "Tell her to leave a message."

'The last time you put her off, all of our packages for delivery sprouted thorns.'

"I'm not doing delivery, right now," he snipped back. "Door keeping. And singular. Tell her she's on the list."

His pocket vibrated again.

'Can I tell Frigg to fu - '

"No!" He cut George off. Holy Zeus, no. That woman scared him. "Redirect her to Iris, please."

Sometimes, he hated his job.

Iris didn't get it. She hadn't been demoted, it was a lateral move. And no, being able to go to new and exciting locales with the full backing of Olympus was not a bonus. Because no one was thrilled to see someone from Olympus anymore and this was the new and exciting locale.

A large, dark underground cavern.

Well, he supposed dark wasn't new. It was hard finding someplace that wasn't dark right now, but this was more than just the absence of light. It was more of a feeling, then anything. The large red doors were not barred or otherwise secured aside from an ornate and complicated looking Assyrian lock that made his fingers twitch.

He found himself frowning. At first, he thought it was just because he'd seen hundreds of dark caverns, Styx, he'd been born in one, but… the detailing on the columns and the type of brazier in the corner…the doors.

Was this even Greek? It looked…he was reminded of Alexander's former empire and he didn't like it.

"I have no idea where I am," he realized. How had that happened?

"You wouldn't," Aphrodite said dully, turning the page, bored of his presence already. "This isn't a place. There were a few cracks," she said and waved off his alarm with a flip of her long blonde hair. "That's hardly worth bothering about, really, although give it another moment to realize you're here - "

There was a pulse. It was little more than an uncomfortable feeling like his heart had just skipped a beat or turned over in his chest.

'Hermes?' May's voice called, sounding slightly muffled on the edges, like she was speaking through a keyhole. His eyes snapped to the red doors. 'Is that - are you out there?'

What - he reeled. He hid her. They didn't find her - they didn't know - The sudden terror had him casting his mind back to the white Colonial house in an ordinary, American suburb -

May's voice sobbed. 'Oh, I'm so sorry, Hermes. I wanted it to work - babe, I wanted it to work so bad…'

He didn't tell her that story so she could apply!

He took an unsteady step towards the doors. Why was she willing to risk it all to try to become the Oracle of Delphi? Luke had been so young - they had time…

'I'm so sorry! Where's Luke?' May wailed. 'He ran! Oh, my baby boy. I'm sorry - I don't want to be trapped in here - Hermes please!'

Trapped?

It was enough to snap him out of it.

May hasn't been herself for over a decade. Not sane. Barely human. And no one would have bothered to lock her away in a dungeon deep like this. They would just put her down.

First was the relief. It wasn't May.

Then came the rage.

"Hup bup bup," a well manicured hand pressed against his chest, stopping him in his tracks completely. "And you, don't make me come in there."

For a moment, he was confused. He wasn't weak. He was whole. All of his Names in one place, the weight of them heavy enough to send ripples throughout a three dimensional reality as he forced it to move around him. He pressed a little and found not a single ounce of give. He slowly turned his eyes to the obstacle.

"No," Aphrodite said. Her eyes were a steel blue now, the color of a reflection off freshly tempered metal. The ripples hit her form and broke. What was he seeing?

"That's exactly what it wants and if you break anything - " Her voice rose in that tell tale whine that had him already cringing. "I'm going to have to fix it and you know how much I hate responsibility!"

Hermes sputtered.

"Honestly." She rolled her eyes and shoved him back with little more than a flexing of the fingers she had on his chest. "Blast first and ask questions never, just what did I see in you?"

Hermes' mouth opened, then closed, strangely hurt that he lost out in a comparison to Ares, of all people. He tried, "I'm very handsome."

"True." Aphrodite admitted as she idly inspected her nails.

He felt like he should have whiplash.

"Come on," she needled him. "Did you really think I'm wasting the best hours of my life in this dump for fun?" She flapped a hand as he tried to wrap his brain around a crisis of this magnitude being anyone's best hours of their life. "Because trust, I am not."

He almost needled her back that Athena was the goddess of Wisdom for a reason… He almost needled her back. His anger finished draining as Hermes paused.

He wasn't weak. Even his father would have spent a bit more effort holding him back.

"What?" Aphrodite demanded. Her brows were furrowed in her signature annoyed pouting and her eyes remained wide and guileless.

He eyed the goddess warily.

"Oh, that?" Aphrodite turned to indicate the doors. "It was nothing you did, honestly, I'd be more concerned if you didn't have a reaction to it."

He swallowed thickly. "It sounded like - "

"Someone you love." Aphrodite swooned, spinning in a little, giddy circle with the back of her hand against her forehead and everything. "No wonder they have to hide this here, can you imagine if just anyone can hear it? The most powerful force in the cosmos is love…and no one ever believes me!"

"And you're safe because you don't love anyone?"

Aphrodite gasped in outrage, whirling on him. "How dare you! I love everyone equally!"

"Athena."

"I'd love her head on a stick!"

And something in his gut was still whispering:

Liar, liar, liar.

Aphrodite was old.

His father had cast the tie breaking vote to give her full rights and privileges as a god of the Greek pantheon, but that was well before his time. She was a terrific lay, fun mother and was very good at defusing people. Being non-threatening.

He'd noticed when the Fates came for their daughter, Tyche, the goddess of Fortune.

He still doesn't know what they said to her, but Tyche always managed to talk a whole lot without saying anything about it. Aphrodite raised their daughter and now Tyche was a goddess that knew just what she needed to say to convince everyone that Fortune wasn't dangerous. She had to have gotten it from her mother, because no one let him get away with anything anymore.

Tyche was just under a few Fated restrictions so she wouldn't interfere, is all.

He might have bought it, if he wasn't himself. Thief covered the grifters, the conmen, the cheats and embezzlers. The intersection with Commerce drew in the insider traders, the price gougers and the anti-trust. Someone who always wins, wasn't lucky.

They were rigging the game.

Four days ago, he learned he had never known how to swear an Oath on the River Styx.

He should be asking a lot more questions.

"What's in there?" He asked instead.

Aphrodite pulled on a lock of wavy blonde hair, shifting her weight from one foot to another, cocking a hip. "You know leucrota, yes?"

Hermes swallowed what tasted like pure bile.

They were monsters with the bodies of red-furred lions with the hooves of a horse and heads that looked like a cross between a horse and wolf, glowing red eyes and instead of teeth, their jaws were fitted with two solid plates of bone that clacked together. They were good mimics of voices, luring in the unaware.

It was something like a secondhand memory. That thing your mind does when you see your care keys and you aren't reminded of the last time you lost them, but of the time you got so drunk you had to take a taxi home, maybe you hit on the fat cabbie and then spent the rest of the night locked in the bathroom crying.

Not that he had any personal experience with that.

The point is, his mind jumped to the one time leucrota were hellbent on killing his son, Luke. He had been so much younger, running through the halls of an old mansion belonging to a cursed son of Apollo with the daughter of Zeus when he ran into an older blond man the boy instantly recognized as a god.

'He's your son, isn't he? How could you - what kind of father are you? He doesn't deserve this! He just wanted to save someone!'

He couldn't look Apollo in the face without feeling the urge to punch him for a year after.

"I know leucrota," Hermes said darkly.

Why was he allowed?

What made him so special he could overturn his son's cursed fate decades later without getting ruined?

"Well, that," Aphrodite jerked a thumb back at the large red doors. "Is their progenitor."

He looked over her shoulder. "Does it have a Name?"

"Yes."

He understood.

Aphrodite was old.

If he broke the doors, she would fix them. She took it for granted that she would not only know how, but could. That it was expected of her to. While contributing to the protection of all the Camps and Olympus and guarding this Door as a singular being.

And she did hate responsibility.

All of that just didn't count.

"Crocotta are from north Africa," he probed lightly. "India."

She rolled her eyes again before giving him a flat, unamused stare. He could hear the 'bitch, please.'

"The complex is secure, everything works, honestly if you're not here to relieve me -" Aphrodite absently adjusted the way her jean jacket fit over the pink blouse that had sparkling silver Beautiful, baby written on it. Her face brightened. "Actually a quickie would - "

"No," Hermes said with another handsome smile. Not when she looked like that. It would just flay his heart wide open. "I'll just - "

The coral, pearl and seastone walls of Atlantis blinked into existence around him.

" - go," he burbled underwater.

He was answered with attempted murder.

"Woah! Woah!" He danced out of the way of gleaming bone spear tips. To their credit, it only took the merman guards a second to realize that he wasn't an intruder, just an idiot.

He should have known they'd be jumpy. Everyone was.

Well, maybe not Aphrodite.

"Sorry, sorry," He showed off his Iphone. Its commercial release was in two years, but since when did that matter to him? "Official business," he said, swirling the phone and its snake antennae around his head.

'I'm going to be sick,' George, the left snake head, complained.

'Not on me!' Martha, the right, snapped at him.

Hermes ignored them both and tried out a winning smile.

The guards glanced at each other. The right fish man had an entire conversation with his eyes, gills and right shoulder, but Hermes could tell the left shark man understood maybe a quarter of it. They both shrugged at him, decked out in sea green scaled battle armor. Then left held up a small signpost made out of small sea coral and anemone.

'Lord Hermes,' it said in the pink words of blooming anemone. He almost laughed, but then he remembered.

Oh right.

Not everyone could talk.

Left's sign flipped around. 'If you seek our Lord, he is overseeing defenses.' Makes sense. They had their own Camp too, didn't they. The sign flipped back and there was new writing. 'We can summon an escort.'

"I was hoping I could talk to Queen Amphitrite, actually," Hermes tried and watched them both frown. But they were fish. Mermen, whatever. They didn't have lips, so it was more like their bared teeth showed even more pearly white sharp. "Just a short report and then I'll be out of her hair, promise!"

The guards shared another glance, but they stepped back to the opposite side of the double sided palace doors. They couldn't be anymore different from the doors to the Olympian Assembly or even the Doors of Death. Those had Grecian mosaics, heroic scenes and legends etched into them of their history. These were crafted to look like the interlocking tentacles or limbs of some massive sea creature reluctantly prying open from the bottom, still staying stubbornly closed at the top. The hallway past the doors kept the image going, being circular and lined with pale curving columns like ribs as if visitors were walking right into its gullet. He hoped he was just imagining the contractions rippling through the slick, blood red walls.

The Elder Cyclops and Olympus. Erebus and Uncle Dead's House in the Underworld. It made him wonder, and not the first time, who built the halls of Atlantis.

He was let into the throne room with little fanfare and he felt it the moment the Queen of Atlantis noticed him. May liked calling it his Thief Sense. That feeling you get when your foot nudges a trip wire, when you spot a camera looking your way, when a guard dog stops and sniffs the air.

Poseidon's wife wore a stunningly beautiful woman with black hair tied back under a silk net of pearls on a clamshell throne and this time the circlet on her brow was made up of white starfish. A long teal fishtail flowed out from under her green and gold dress, fins idly moving with the current. She was dark skinned with regal cheekbones, straight nose and full mouth. The talk on Olympus was that she was a kind and gentle goddess.

They had the benefit of distance.

The eldest granddaughter of Pontus was kind enough, he supposed. Maybe if her sea monster kids weren't a dime a dozen compared to the four proper gods, he'd feel better about it.

One word: Charybdis.

As for gentle?

People couldn't tell the difference between genuine gentleness and ever present caution.

"Hermes," Amphitrite said. He would never like the meticulous way she said Names. Made his soul itch. "And what does Olympus want from me?"

He sketched out his best diplomatic bow. "Queen Amphitrite."

Technically, he wasn't supposed to. He was the Messenger of the Gods of Olympus. On the clock, he carried the full authority of his father, Zeus Olympios. It was a fact that Atlantis was under Olympic rule.

His father's Master Bolt was still missing and Hermes knew better than anyone stealing it wouldn't have been hard. Piss easy actually, for anyone who isn't a god. While he didn't think Atlantis needed to steal it, he wondered if that fact was close to overstaying its welcome.

He hoped not.

Uncle Sea was powerful, but his Queen was dangerous.

He wasn't even talking about her grandparents.

Either set.

"Just…asking if anything has changed down here," he offered as nonchalantly as he could. Looking into her eyes was uncomfortable, even for him. "Anything to worry about?"

The corner of Amphitrite's supple lips pulled up.

"Athena remembers," she said thoughtfully. Hermes bit his lip so he didn't blurt out that it was a request from Zeus.

But.

Yeah, it was Athena's idea. His dad deserves some credit for recognizing a good idea when he heard one, right? If one primordial was mucking things up, better make sure other massive headaches weren't getting any funny ideas.

"I had wondered."

Hermes patiently waited out the pause.

"The stars are not right. However, three of grandfather's lowest circuit are unaccounted for."

Yikes, Hermes thought. Weren't they all supposed to be dead in that sunken city of theirs? Or was it sleeping?

Or both?

"We are tracking them and do not require assistance at this time," Amphitrite offered. "She will know what that means."

"Thank you," he bowed again.

"Do not thank me," Uncle Sea's wife said mildly with a small wave of a hand. "The sea takes care of its own. I would have you remind her of this." Amphitrite paused. "And perhaps suggest that her preoccupation with forewarning has reached a limit."

Hermes frowned. "Forewarned is forearmed?"

He didn't mean for it to come out like a question.

The Queen of Atlantis studied him, making him shift in place. "Ah," she said softly and he felt his stomach sink. "You are under the impression that if one such as grandfather arose, or if the Night found our existence offensive, Olympus would be able to defend itself."

He waited for her to finish, but she didn't say anything.

"Oh," Hermes said quietly.

Maybe Hecate had the right idea. He kind of felt like praying right now.

Maybe not to the Serpent.

He could still remember the titanic weight of the Serpent's attention before Apollo's altar; cold, caustic and utterly uncaring. And maybe not Buddhism either. Iris tried to explain it to him once, but it just made his head hurt. The Hindus terrified him, so that was a no.

Hecate's White God?

Would he have to apologize for all his bellyaching over the past two millennia first?

Because he did a lot of it.

"Thank you. I won't darken your doorstep - " The last thing he saw of Atlantis was Amphitrite's blazing eyes as she tilted her head in dismissal.

Hello, Delphi, Greece.

" - any longer," Hermes whispered. He breathed in the air of the Old World from the top seats of Apollo's Theater. Time had worn them down to crumbling bricks baked pale gray by the sun, but at least it was mostly intact. It was recognizable. He dreaded the day when it would no longer be. The mortals had just gotten around to reclaiming Hephaestus' temple for study sometime before that silly war they had in Europe and the Oracle of Delphi no longer called Greece home.

Well, he guessed it called nowhere home now, because it was in the stomach of a demigod.

Good riddance.

"Alright," he said loudly as he approached the wheat blonde woman sitting on one of the Theater seats, making a daisy chain in the dark. "I'm here, sorry for making you wait, Aunt Demeter." The second eldest Kronide started a little, before she put the flowers down and crossed her arms, pinning him with a stern look. Hermes held up his hands in surrender.

'Told you,' Martha snarked.

"I'm here now. You wanted to speak with me?"

"Yes." Demeter nodded sharply. "If I had the choice, I would absolutely do it again. Give up on Kore? Over my dead body."

Hermes blinked.

"What?"

He was missing something.

"This is Delphi," Demeter said.

"I…know that."

"The Navel of the Earth."

"Know that too."

The Earth Mother was imprisoned here.

Demeter's face made a pained expression. "It's cracked."

"I - " Hermes stopped. "Oh dear."

His aunt wrung her hands. "I thought I fixed it after Kore finally left that no-good brute for just five minutes - "

"Demeter."

His aunt huffed. "I might have understated the damage I did to the prison," she said quickly. "Just a little! Turns out, it was more of a symbiotic relationship than I thought - really, it wasn't like it was even my fault - "

"You just said you would do it again," Hermes pointed out.

"Yes, well," Demeter began, looking a bit hunted. "Mother helped put things back to rights and that should have been the end of it."

Rhea?

"Maybe we should have known after that bit of trouble in Alaska a little while ago. Hera's hiding something - don't tell me she isn't, but Alaska? You just know the daughter-stealing ruffian was just asking for it - "

"Can't grandmother help us fix it now?" He didn't need this. None of them needed this. "The Questers came across her recently." Before everything went to shit. "I think she wants the Earth Mother back just as much as we do."

Which was not at all.

Demeter frowned and instead of talking about anything to do with the protogenoi that hated them getting free, asked, "What Quest?"

"The one for father's Master Bolt."

"Oh, that old thing?"

Hermes boggled.

"I thought Artemis found it?" Demeter looked at him expectantly with mismatched eyes as if he had just forgotten her second favorite had taken care of the problem already. "No?" She frowned harder before flapping both hands at him. "Don't look at me like that - you know I don't pay attention to these kinds of things. It's summer!"

"The Bolt was stolen at the Winter Solstice." Even as it came out of his mouth, he knew it wouldn't help. Winter Solstice was the only time of the year Hades was invited to Olympus and when it came to the Lord of the Underworld, his aunt had two modes: Bitch and Nag.

Her round face predictably darkened.

"Rhea fix Earth Mother's prison!" He said quickly.

"Without turning around and killing us all, maybe," Demeter said absently and Hermes reeled. "Well, maybe Geb - oh no, wait, the Egyptians are still useless, aren't they? What is Ra doing - "

"Demeter," Hermes croaked.

The Earth Mother's Warden blinked at him. "Do you remember the Byzantine?"

"No," he said, bewildered.

No one on Olympus remembered the Byzantine, not even Demeter, because humanity just up and threw them away long before Rome collapsed. They didn't Fade, but he supposed they might have slept. Dreamed.

Hermes paused.

Aphrodite remembered.

"Your grandmother is putting herself through that so that she doesn't cleanse the world of mortals."

Hermes' world tilted. "What? Why?"

"So she doesn't cleanse the world of mortals," Demeter repeated slowly at him, as if he was the one who didn't understand plain Greek. "They really are much alike," she said in this very reasonable tone. "Like Mother, like daughter as I always say. All you have to do is listen to them talk for a bit - "

"The Earth Mother is talking to you?"

"I am Her Warden," Demeter said. "Even the mortals figured out that solitary confinement was cruel."

Hermes stared.

"And throwing the pieces of your father into the Pit was just a little unfortunate?"

"For the record," Demeter said loudly, offended. "Hestia and I argued against that, but we all knew he was awful, no chance of changing his mind. Self-defense."

Hermes continued staring.

"Oh, She won't change," his aunt finally admitted. "But it's symbiotic. She is learning from me."

"That's - that's bad."

"It is."

A flower bloomed within her empty right eye socket, the long thin blood red petals unfolding like shapes within a kaleidoscope.

And it bloomed and bloomed and bloomed.

"Thank you for telling me, Aunt Demeter," Hermes said stiffly.

Demeter beamed at him.

"Of course, dear." She motioned for him to step closer so she could put her finished daisy chain crown on his head. "And I'll make sure you have plenty of those wheaties that you like so much," she promised as he smiled weakly. "Be careful running around in the dark, now."

He nodded. "You know me, Aunty. I'm always - "

Cold wind slapped him in the face. "- careful."

The god of the North Wind lowered his newspaper just enough to squint at him from over the pages. He was wearing a snow suit as usual with icicles clinging to his pale beard and eyebrows. Hermes glanced around and saw that he was…not where he was expecting. His inner GPS was telling him he was in Quebec, Canada and it certainly looked like it. He could still see The Edge from the icy penthouse's windows as a shimmering aurora borealis barrier separating their world from the land beyond the gods.

He didn't mean 'beyond' as in they couldn't go there. He meant 'beyond' as in they shouldn't.

It was a land where even gods were prey.

"How is the barrier holding up?" Hermes asked, looking up over the reflective Art Deco ice desk.

Boreas' eyes narrowed into slits.

Ugh.

Dealing with the Four Winds always felt like trying to teach a demigod common sense.

"Athena's checking?" He tried instead.

"Intact," Boreas grunted.

"I'm only asking because if you haven't noti - wait, what?" Hermes' mind spun.

He just saved himself an hour.

Holy Zeus.

"I - thank you."

A grunt.

Hermes hesitated, but then he decided to just go for it. A god only lives once. "And I would like to thank your daughter for her help on my son's Quest."

Boreas' eyes flashed back up to him as the god reared up, rising from his seat with his purple wings flaring behind him like an enraged stallion. "Khione hardly needs your gratitude, son of Zeus."

Hermes deflated.

May was a good person. And through her, he had come to realize that he…

He wasn't.

He was glad Luke took after his mother.

"I know." He said quietly. He tossed one of his business cards onto the god's desk. "She has it anyway. If she needs anything…" He finished hopefully.

Boreas' gaze cut through him, but eventually, the god sat back down. Hermes counted it as a win that he didn't just blow the card away.

"Get out."

He went.

A few more visitations, both Greek and not, and he found himself revisiting the Old World. Or rather, the outskirts of it. He already had his hands up in surrender when the one he wanted to visit noticed him, which was damn quick.

Heracles wasn't called the greatest hero in Greek history for nothing.

"Oh, it's you."

"I'm flattered," Hermes said.

His elder half-brother rolled his eyes as he leaned on his club, looking down on him.

Because he was very tall.

Hermes was actually kind of jealous. If he tried to make himself look that tall without going full god form, he'd look ridiculous.

"What do you want?" Heracles raised a skeptical eyebrow.

He had their father's black hair and was rocking the stubble look Apollo could never pull off. His eyes were an electric blue, also like their father's, but up close, Hermes could see that they echoed. Like May's.

"I can't leave my post, so if you're expecting me to do some stupid errand for you - "

"No, I - " Hermes was beginning to regret visiting. "Nothing like that. I just - "

He looked out over the island. The Pillars of Hercules loomed in the distance, jutting out over the sea like swollen fingers.

"What was Athena like as King?"

Heracles' eyebrows shot up into his hairline.

"Humor me," Hermes begged. "I don't - I don't know anything. Apparently."

Heracles scratched at the small scar on his stubbled chin, then sighed. "Exactly the same as she is now," he said and Hermes frowned. "You know that thing she does where she expects you to follow her train of thought, but she's crap at talking to people she thinks aren't complete imbeciles, so you don't get the memo and she looks at you like you're stupid anyway?"

"Oh yeah."

"Hate that," Heracles said. "My King or not."

The god of Heroism swung his club, knocking some white sand off his bare feet.

"I understand, you know," he said. "You've learned that you had it wrong this entire time and now you're lost."

I'm not, Hermes thought, but he couldn't quite make the words come out of his mouth.

"You are," Heracles said. "And you're looking around, hoping that this crushed feeling you have is because the world changed recently without having the damn decency to tell you about it. But it hasn't changed at all."

There was a painful lump in Hermes' throat.

"You did," Heracles finished.

"What do I do?" Hermes asked.

"I rebelled." Hermes cringed and his brother sighed. "Styx, I don't know. What do you want?"

Hermes didn't even have to think about it.

"I want my son Luke to have a future."

"A demigod?" Heracles asked knowingly. "Good luck with that, the laws haven't been changed - "

"He's not - " Hermes scuffed at the sand with a foot. "I've been looking for loopholes and it - it brought me to you," he confessed.

Heracles straightened.

"My way wasn't exactly…ideal," he said slowly.

"Not that."

His brother went still.

"His mother - May was clear-sighted. Badly." Hermes said quickly. "I know what that means."

"Aren't those records sealed?"

"Thief."

"How badly?" Heracles finally asked flatly.

"She could See - " He made a vague gesture in the air with his hands. "Diagonal. The Could Be." The way Apollo had explained it to him, the Could Be could be changed. If you told someone else, if you made a different decision, if you ignored it. It was Fool's Gold to the real thing, but that didn't necessarily mean it wouldn't come true. It just wasn't inevitable.

A False Prophecy.

All she wanted was to be able to do some good with her Sight.

That was all.

"And I invested a lot in him. My son." Hermes hesitated. "I gave him everything."

Finally saying it out loud felt like lancing a boil. He wasn't ashamed, he realized. Every single one of his Names was Luke's father and he wasn't ashamed of giving a mortal so much.

My son.

"He can - he can do something I can't. And I tried."

He demonstrated, wrapping the mantle of Thief around him and reaching for that one spot in the center, that one tiny, tiny place that felt like what he felt in Luke. Thieves stole things, but the concept was far too tied to stealing the material. Things of perceived value. Things you could pickpocket, grab, swindle and cheat out of someone else.

What he felt in Luke felt far more pure. Something that felt like Steal, but reaching for it felt like his heart would burst.

He let it go, huffing and puffing.

Exhausted.

"I see," Heracles said softly. Hermes looked up, but his face could have been carved from the stone of his Pillars. "An emergent daimones if you could argue it, perhaps," he mused and Hermes' heart leapt. Daimones, like their Nymphai counterparts, could live on Olympus. "But it's more likely he'd be destroyed."

"No!" Hermes shouted.

The god of Heroism raised an eyebrow. "Children with the clear-sighted used to be outlawed for a reason," he said mildly.

"But - "

"Like I said, my way isn't ideal."

The last time he felt this small, he realized he had never known how to swear an Oath on the Styx.

"Thank you for your time," Hermes managed to choke out.

"Hm." Heracles roughly nudged his right shoulder in an awkward, comforting gesture. "Sorry."

"...I am too."

Returning to Olympus was no relief. The golden streets were washed out pale gold without sunlight and the great palaces looked like condemned buildings against the void of the Night sky. Various immortals of all kinds wandered the streets, because life goes on.

Until it ends.

He reported to Athena and it was just as Heracles said. He could see it now, the way she asked for clarification and the way she looked to the side when she was thinking, like there were puzzle pieces tumbling around in her skull.

He looked the former King of the Gods of Olympus in the face and felt…

"Troubling." Her brow furrowed. "My preoccupation with forewarning," she scoffed. "The Earth Mother we can do something about, at least." Her eyes went through every color of the rainbow as she glanced up at the Night sky. "One last thing," Athena said in her sharp, cold way. "Your conversation with Heracles."

"You heard?" He nearly screamed, mortified.

Athena actually paused. He could see her make the effort to step back and lower her head as her expression softened. "Around Herakles, I always listen to my Name. Even if I cannot respond."

Like she was his divine parent.

Hermes' mouth opened, and then he closed it.

"This surprises you."

"Yes," he admitted. He supposed if there was any child her pride would gladly call her own if she could, it would be the greatest hero in Greek history. "Yes, it does."

"A habit from his, let's call it accident-prone ways and the Giant War," she explained, a quicksilver smile flashing over her face. "Boy could get into trouble standing still. I saw no reason to stop."

He wondered how Heracles felt about still being called 'boy.'

"I merely wished to reassure you that I will say nothing about it, and if you wished to have it argued - " Her iridescent eyes searched his face. "It would be best to approach Demeter of Sacred Law."

Hermes nodded sharply.

Athena owed Luke.

Well, in for the penny, in for the pound. "What was grandfather like?"

Gods only live once.

He should coin the phrase.

GOLO?

No, if he wanted to make it a thing, it's got to be more inclusive.

"Pragmatic. Efficient." Athena said immediately. If she was caught off guard by his sudden interest in the Titan Lord, she didn't show it. "Do not forget, the Golden still live within the fields of Elysium and they welcomed his return. However," she said thoughtfully. "It was also true that he is still an enemy of Olympus, no matter his role. He was bitter. Resentful. Scornful. Furious."

She paused.

"Grieving."

Hermes finished his rounds, all of the Doors under his jurisdiction pressing like hot brands at the back of his mind. Where was Thanatos when you needed him? The Lake of Lerna. The Doors of Death. Acheron. The Grove of Arcadia. He stopped at the last for a moment.

It was deep in the heart of the Amazon. The smoke of a nearby slash-and-burn tickled his nose.

His heart ached.

These trees used to be Pan's pride and joy, but now they were covered in cancerous-looking growths and clumps of bleeding fungi. Places where the gnarled, dark ash colored bark fell away revealed silvery lines like spiderwebs or veins on the wood, crawling with mutated insects and worms. In a jungle like this, there wouldn't be much flora anyway. He both hates and loves that he knows that.

The sickly sweet smell wafting from the rotting ground tells him enough, though.

He thought about it for a second. One of the ward stones wasn't far. All it would take was a crack and a gap in the Mist so mortal greed would find the grove…No, it wasn't worth it, he thought then, running a hand through the curls of his black hair. It wasn't worth it.

And it wasn't their fault.

The mortal need to destroy their environment was a poison they leached from the Black Goat first, not the other way around.

He threw a stone.

Startled, bloodshot eyes opened all over the dark trees as twisted roots ripped themselves up from the ground, flailing.

The dryads were restless.

It was his decision not to tell the satyrs about his son, Pan, not even when they made that ridiculous Cloven Council thing a while back with their searcher's licenses. Dionysus didn't care and it wasn't Hermes' fault they were so stubborn about it. And it wasn't like he knew where the Lord of the Wilds was now, so it wasn't as if their search was futile.

Just meaningless.

Why couldn't he save anyone he loved?

He smelled smoke.

Hermes stepped away.

He had work to do.

 

[Shujin]

An Undertow of Sand
A PJO Fanfiction
​

"On your left!"

I was swinging my sword before Luke even finished shouting. The hairs on the back of my neck had already been screaming the warning. Damocles fine tuned my aim, but I already had a vague hunch of where the danger was, even though I couldn't hear it coming. I was getting really good at listening to my sixth sense. I didn't have to see what the monster even was this time.

Spidey Sense?

Super cool.

What's not cool is all these monsters out to kill us. I was getting a sinking feeling in my stomach that it was only a matter of time before we ran into something we couldn't handle.

There was the impact vibration of my sword hitting something, a sound like a sigh, and then Luke's flashlight catching the gleam of dissipating ruby dust as he swiveled it around in a vote of no confidence to make sure I didn't just die on him.

Red essence. What was that, Native American?

Aztec?

Both?

We got ambushed an hour out from Rhea's place by some Greek poison harpies of pestilence and violent deaths, the Keres. I tried to talk them out of it because we were first cousins once removed (Nyx. Just. Nyx) but spirits being rational was an oxymoron. We didn't even try to fight. We just ran. Their venom can't be cured by anything less than divine intervention.

Can you imagine how embarrassing it would be to have to crawl back to Rhea a few hours after leaving and just be like,

'Never mind. We're the worst heroes in the history of ever. Please help.'

And it didn't stop there.

We were hounded by these flying shrunken head things (Voodoo?) as we passed Baton Rouge, some Draugr (Norse undead) were picketing one of the highways, Lethifolds (black cloak thing) from Harry Potter are real and to top it off, we got chased by a pack of Hellhounds (this is stupid) that wouldn't take 'bad dog' for an answer all the way across the Louisianan border.

I expected it, so just getting attacked wasn't the problem. It was what was doing the attacking half the time that was the problem.

Nemesis said I'd be getting attacked by less of her mother's kids!

Obviously, my niece lied to me.

My next postcard over the holidays to Erebus about that little spoiled brat of his was going to be spicy.

"Good?" Luke yelled.

"Good!" I called back and then we both went silent again as the hooves of our Thracian horses pounded the ground like the fall of icy hail on a roof. We weren't ignoring each other or anything. It's just that carrying on a conversation on galloping horseback was way harder than you'd think.

The plan we hatched with Rhea was to find the highway and follow the interstate all the way to the West Coast. It wasn't the most elaborate plan in the world, but it would get the job done. It would let us stick close enough to cities so we wouldn't have to hunt for food and keep our nights sleeping outside down to the bare minimum.

Because we really didn't want to sleep outside.

And we wouldn't get lost.

America is huge. I'm pretty sure I could fit at least fifty Greeces in the 48 states. No wonder the Migration when the Greeks and Norse moved over from Europe ended up a huge mess with everything everywhere. If we tried to cut corners off the main road into the forests and swamps of the southern United States, we could end up wandering into anything from a Greek god's junkyard to an Aztec god's favorite basketball court.

Both of those were bad news.

And doing that during the Night was called being dumb.

And suicidal.

But mostly dumb.

I knew how to ward against the various species of soul eaters, but without four walls, a roof and humanity around, anything at all might decide to just kill us instead.

I heard there were alligators down here!

Talk about spooky.

It was a good thing these Thracians were magic horses who could tell where they were going, because we sure couldn't. The scenery was just a blur of dark silhouettes on a dark background made out of dark darkness.

Imagine if walking outside was like locking yourself in a closet. There was a sliver of light coming through the bottom of the door, but it only lit up its immediate surroundings like it was also afraid of the dark.

That's how it was for Luke.

All we had was the light of our flashlights and at the speed we were going, hitting a tree branch would probably break my neck.

I could still see a little. Godly eyes, remember? I'm only half-god so there's some physical structure, but my irises are just an aurora borealis with stars within. It would be kind of annoying talking to Apollo with the sun shining out of his eyes and then being half-blind for a few minutes every time, right? I couldn't even imagine having to adjust to putting on my sunglasses beyond 'I see dead people and now I don't.'

I still felt blind.

I was relying on my peripheral vision and that was more movement sensing than actual sight because I had to stare at my flashlight before looking around so the Night would stop changing things on me.

You ever enter a room and you can immediately tell that something is not where it should be, even if you're not sure what moved?

The Night was messing with my eyes. Hiding things from me. Blurring the shapes and shadows I could faintly see in the distance into a solid wall of black like it was trying to swallow it into the same void as the sky above. Looking into my flashlight felt like peeling scales off my eyes. Uncomfortable. Itchy. A headache was starting to pound right in the middle of my forehead.

I kept doing it.

The very thought of not seeing what was really there spooked me a little. The thought that Night's passive presence was capable of doing that to me scared me even more.

I have godly eyes.

That was the problem with conceptual bullshit.

It's bullshit.

"Merging!" Luke called back and I leaned forward in my saddle as the empty road we were on led into a wide eight lane highway. This was eastern Texas. We just got here and I can already tell the state was like most states in America: a patchwork of 'modern civilization' and 'bumfuck nowhere at all.'

No in between.

The road was mostly empty, which made sense. There was a bit of an emergency going on right now. That didn't mean there was no one, which also made sense because good luck getting people to stop their lives unless the emergency was the type that would stop their lives for them. By killing them.

And maybe not even then.

Mortals were weird sometimes.

We pulled up beside an eighteen wheeler with a giant advertisement for fresh vegetables on the side. The driver was a bored looking thirty something with a red baseball cap and a lit cigarette. I expected music or the radio, but then I remembered that his tires burning rubber on the highway was silent for a reason. No wonder he looks half-asleep. He checked his side-mirror.

I waved at him.

He nodded politely and his eyes turned back to the road. Then I saw his eyes snap back in a double take, choking on cigarette smoke as his truck swerved away from us and his eyes bugged. He stared disbelievingly as Luke pulled up even and then pulled ahead. I was next and I waved at him again.

"Don't bait the mortals!" Luke had eyes on the back of his head.

"Make me!"

Our new trucker friend mouthed something as we sped past him. He wasn't clear-sighted. I don't think so anyway. He could see us. You would think the Mist would serve up something normal, so we didn't blow any mortal minds.

We're on horses.

Horses are normal.

Even if we're going at least 85MPH on pure white sparkle ponies with golden saddles trailing bright, flashing snowflakes and icy blue bridles. All they were missing were the flashing neon rainbow colors LED lights braided into their manes. It didn't matter that they were technically Khione's nieces and nephews a couple times removed. (Don't ask. Gods are gonna god.)

Still horses.

There's a reason why Chiron doesn't just walk around without his Tardis wheelchair in the middle of New York and satyrs like Grover tend to wear baggy pants over their goat legs and hide their horns.

The Mist isn't going to hide that shit. It has better things to do.

Like hosting Mt. Olympus above the Empire State building in New York City, protecting the mortals from monsters or making sure they can't see the Doors they really shouldn't open.

You can only stretch the top layer of reality so much before it starts to tear. Where do you think modern day ghost stories, monster and UFO sightings come from? It's not all from the clear-sighted, I can tell you that. The Mist is what separates the 'normal' world from the mythological, but it's not a hard barrier you could bounce off of. It just hides what is truly there and it's not perfect. The Mist will only do so much, because this is the reality we both live in, whether you're aware of it or not.

I'm not saying every dude in a wheelchair is a centaur and most likely that baggy shirt isn't hiding anything but a beer gut. But the next time you see something off or hear a sound you shouldn't be hearing, before you convince yourself it was nothing but your imagination, maybe what's actually happening is that you've got one foot on the other side. Way back when, the Mist didn't have to hide anything from humanity. We saw it all.

Some things, the Mist still won't hide.

Can't hide.

Our trucker buddy will just have to get over it. Regale some friends over a few beers. Tell his grandkids about the time some white horses carrying a couple of kids and a rabbit outran his truck on the highway to Houston, TX.

The truck's headlights lit up a good portion of the road ahead of us for a while. He must have been using a high beam, but eventually we lost him when he turned off onto an exit. The darkness closed in, barely held at bay by just the thin beams of our flashlights again.

We rode on.

I was right.

My balls were already not thanking me.

Viciously.

I awkwardly tried to adjust in the saddle and my horse made a snorting sound, turning his head to eye me.

"Sorry, Seabiscuit." I told him. That's not his name, but until he is able to tell me otherwise, he's Seabiscuit. "Not really a long distance rider."

He snorted again.

As if the universe, or maybe just Mom, wanted to remind me that safer on the road did not mean safe, the hairs on the back of my neck shivered just as the terrain evened out and we hit a flat plain. We were still alone on the road. I held my reins hard enough to make my hands ache as I looked around as best I could through the rolling motions of a horse at full gallop.

Aside from a signpost advertising a nearby rest stop, there was nothing but farmland dotted with trees for miles around.

Almost nothing.

A shadow in the distance the size of a big house stood up on four legs.

"You can't tire, right?" I whispered to my horse as I side-eyed whatever that thing was. It looked like a hunchbacked wolf with stiff bristles like a steel brush for fur and I really didn't like what it would mean if I could see details, but it was a mile away and still looked that big.

We're mortal.

Some monsters Mom warned me about would even consider gods prey.

My horse huffed and turned his head just enough to let me know that he saw it too.

"Right." I nodded to myself and made one last adjustment as the hairs on the back of my neck slowly began to stand. "Time to earn your paycheck."

He made a half-braying coughing noise that was probably him asking 'what paycheck' and a few extras.

"Language," I said. I didn't have to speak horse to know there was some cursing in there. "Don't worry, I'll talk with your manager."

The wolf turned.

There was a long moment where I was hoping it didn't hear us, but my luck is not that good, so maybe it heard us or saw us but was just going to let us go and then I thought, well maybe it doesn't even have eyes, that's a thing -

Burning orange orbs like hot coals lit up as the bristles of its 'fur' grew about 10 feet until it was a mass of vaguely wolf shaped tendrils looking right at us.

It has eyes.

"Uh, Luke - !"

The wolf howled.

It was a mournful echoing sound that seemed to bounce off non-existent hills. I expected to hear a bunch of answering calls from the hunting party because that was our luck so far, but there was nothing but that lonely note.

I didn't relax.

It if wanted to come after us, assuming it would have to physically walk would get me killed.

Luke slowed his horse so that he was only a bit ahead of me. In the light of his electronic torch, his pupils had a strange reddish glow to them as he looked back. It was like reality had just taken a picture of him with the flash on and the bloody coloring of the back of his eyeballs were reflecting back. I thought that was unique to photos, but I guess not?

Artemis had her head poking out of his vest with her ears flattened back completely and silver eyes gleaming.

"What was that?" Luke hissed quietly.

"Trouble?" I offered.

I have no idea what Squiggle Wolf was.

That was already getting old.

I know, I know.

I'm twelve. Can't know everything about everybody.

Still annoying.

"Right," Luke said, rolling his eyes. "Rest stop isn't far." Our horses were quick on the uptake, or maybe they didn't like the wolf anymore than we did, because they immediately started to slow down a little as they veered to the right so that they could take the next exit. "If we can just - "

A bolt of warning shot down my spine.

And then something tried to rip my soul right out of my body.

Imagine you're an onion and something was tearing you away, layer by layer as your soul wells up from the center like blood from a wound. It felt just like it did when Mom brought my sliver of divinity to the surface. I knew the feeling.

Like an immune system that already had a vaccine, my soul fought back.

Divinity was soul-deep.

My stomach ruptured.

(Don't freeze. If you freeze, you die and it sounded like Mom)

All of the air in my lungs rushed out with the scream I tried to bite back - the Sign, make the Sign! (Don't freeze. Don't freeze) the sick heat in my chest came with it, coating my tongue with the taste of iron as I desperately tried not to fall off the horse -

Damocles was in my hand as Luke cried out, the horses bellowed and Artemis screamed and my sword was singing a wordless song I knew as I slashed it through the air.

Luke stole something from me -

it's fine, he can have it

The Night lit up, blinding, with the shifting green-gold burning eye in its twisted star. I wasn't prepared to feel everything that I was just rebel against it. Searing tears started running down my face as my eyes burned and I knew they weren't made of water. The grip on my soul let go.

The symbol winked out with nothing else happening.

Oh, a native, I thought dimly.

Well, fuck.

The pavement of the highway was tearing itself up behind us as the wolf approached like the tremors of an unfelt and unheard earthquake. I held onto the reins with everything I had as a cold, sick feeling wind raked at my back like it was made out of knives -

A cold wind.

"Khione!" I yelled out, feeling my throat tear as my stomach tried to eject my guts onto the road.

I didn't even see what hit me.

My left leg snapped a split second before the ribs of my horse caved in as we went flying. I knew how to fall. And my experience with angry horse-pigeons at Camp told me that this was going to hurt bad.

Khione's nephew tried to protect me.

Twisting around so his hundreds of pounds didn't fall on me, but it didn't quite make it. The only reason I didn't just die on impact was because we didn't hit the tarmac, but collided with a deep pile of snow.

she answered

I don't know if the wet snap I heard was my ride's foreleg or its neck. I hoped it was just a leg even as my entire body screamed with my own problems. We hit snow, rattling my skeleton as we plowed right through it but, eventually it ran out and became tarmac.

The only thing worse than a rug burn was a pavement burn.

I was spared from the worst of it, but we were still going pretty fast. My shirt silently ripped as I hit the gravelly pavement. A fire raced over my skin and I'm pretty sure I just left a shiny wet streak of skin and blood.

I had just stopped rolling when a massive black claw slammed into the ground an inch from my nose.

I looked up.

And up.

And up.

Looming far above the streetlamp I'd found myself under was the Squiggle Wolf, peering down at me with two burning orange eyes that had three pupils in each one like it actually had six eyes that had just merged.

It exhaled and the stink of rotten meat slapped me in the face.

"Yeah?" I demanded. It had happened too fast for me to feel anything but anger. This was it? After everything? "What the fuck do you want?"

The light in its eyes flared and hooked needles of a savage, bloodthirsty glee prickled my brain.

"Please do not antagonize the Amarok," Khione's cold, dry voice came from somewhere behind me, sounding exasperated and I think my heart skipped a beat. A second later I told myself she just sent her voice and I was being ridiculous. "It was only playing."

It was only -

That just made me angrier.

I nearly died to a literal 'dog chases the car down the highway' moment?

"So you're not an enemy," I told the giant wolf slowly. "You're just an asshole."

Khione sighed as the wolf growled softly at me. "What did I just say?"

I tried to breathe (because I could breathe, I'm alive) and felt everything light up in agony.

I glared up. "It tried to rip my soul out."

"Yes, well," she allowed. "It does that. A little tug to see who is worthy of being prey."

So at best, it would leave normal people alone, but anyone who could defend themselves against 'a little tug' were up shit creek without a paddle. At worst, normal people would just hear a wolf howl and then drop dead.

I knew I had a bunch of bullshit ahead of me on this Quest.

"Luke?" I asked immediately.

"Unharmed," Khione said neutrally. "And I would love to know how he did it."

Are we ignoring the giant tentacle murder dog?

"Horse?" I felt his ribs cave in. I was expecting bad news.

"Immortal."

"Oh."

Didn't even make the top twenty of weird Greek shit.

"I don't know if you have the worst or the best luck in the world," Khione mused. "Definitely the most absurd."

We're ignoring the giant tentacle murder dog.

"Giant tentacle murder dog," I pointed out. Who still wasn't killing me. It was just watching. I didn't try to sit up in case it was like a cat and was just waiting for me to twitch. "Looking like the worst."

And absurd.

"Is it?" Khione's voice said and then I heard the crunch of someone walking closer. The footsteps rounded my head and the goddess of Ice and Snow walked into my line of sight wearing hiking boots and a light blue poncho rimmed in white. Her eyes were locked on the monster and she looked like she wanted to smile. "Because this is a perfect alibi."

My mind went blank for a second.

She didn't just send her voice.

She came to help.

"But Artemis…"

"Is still alive, unfortunately," Khione said coldly. She still looked like Snow White, but one that came from a college campus instead of a fairy tale. More naturally colored with braids in her black hair and diamond earrings. "You denied me."

"Uh, yeah," I said dumbly. "About that…" I gulped. "I'd apologize, but I'd be lying."

Khione actually smiled briefly. "I know."

The monster loomed over us, a hulking shadow haunting just outside of the weak light cast by a comically small looking flickering street light. It had slowly started looking less and less like a wolf at some point and looked more like something my mind automatically tried to reject and cling to simultaneously. My brain kept saying 'wolf' but my eyes were seeing something that looked like the physical manifestation of a black noise with burning orange eyes.

The concept of a predator bound up in something that wriggled and vibrated every which way, tasting the air and encircling the ground around us, digging into the tarmac to uproot chunks that just had an inky blackness underneath instead of dirt.

Khione stepped between me and the monster with her hands up, like she was trying to approach a hissy cat. A cold, numbing sensation swept over me, taking away the fire burning my right arm and back and letting my broken leg not scream quite as loud. I couldn't help the sigh of relief.

"You are very far from home," Khione said softly. She didn't flinch when it snapped at her, even though the force of it actually displaced enough air for me to feel it. She stepped even closer to it, gently chiding,"Don't be like that."

"Uh, Khione?" I said as she came close enough to pet the thing.

Monsters that messed with souls were kind of a Code Red the world over.

Gods have souls too.

"The Amarok is an Inuit legend from the Arctic Circle," Khione said almost absently. "The lone wolf that stalks the night, testing all that brave the darkness." She almost cooed at the thing. "And this was a test, wasn't it?"

The light in the wolf's burning eyes lit up as the needle hooks in my brain of a primal curiosity-amusement-anticipation dug in.

I fucking hate tests.

I snarled at it. "Still an asshole."

The goddess gave me an exasperated look. "Do you want it to kill you?"

"Can it?" I challenged. "Isn't it afraid of the light?"

"Of course not," Khione said immediately, almost offended. "I told you. It's playing."

I looked at the 'wolf' again and some of my anger turned to unease.

This wasn't a monster living under the watchful eye of Olympus or some other pantheon. It followed no one's orders, not even those of my sisters, the Fates. Maybe it didn't even care about the Mist. It had no rules, but the ones it chose. Like how the Morrigan bled the silver of Eiocha just like Apollo bled the gold of Phanes, but Mom was not a Celtic Young God.

She was only pretending to be.

"It's playing," Khione repeated slowly. "But the game is not over, is it? This one is not going anywhere," she said in a low tone as her attention returned to the monster. "The hunt was over too soon. The fun is over. You need something else to chase. Something that smells familiar, like ice and snow and blood, don't you?"

Something changed in Khione. For a moment, I saw double, but the second copy was more movement and light than anything physical. I almost thought I imagined it. A chilly breeze picked up and then the monster's eyes snapped around.

"Yes, that's it. Go on," Khione purred.

Her voice was resonating in my skull as something soft and very cold, replacing the needle hooks with a restless fascination. I caught myself leaning forward towards her when my ribs ground together. I wanted to stand up, even though I knew my leg was broken.

Khione gave the monster a small, indulgent smile.

"Catch me."

The wolf howled happily and then it just dissolved. An invisible force tore up the pavement right back out into the darkness, leaving big chunks jutting upwards over nothingness reminding me of the broken ice and dark waters of the St. Lawrence river in Quebec City.

I let my head fall back onto the tarmac and stared up at the Night sky. My left leg is super broken, my shoulder is not great and neither is my right arm. If my ribs aren't broken, they are at least fractured and I could smell the blood where I met the ground. If I was lucky, the friction burn only looked like tenderized meat.

Four and a half hours.

That was how long it took for my next near death experience.

The Night didn't fuck around.

I had to be saved again.

Mom, I prayed. Are you sure I can do this?

I expected silence with the subtle signs I thought she'd been using to answer me since the Quest started. Instead, I felt her. Gentle and reassuring with a wry twist at the end. Like she was saying what she believed wasn't important.

I choose my own destiny. Say the word and I can come home.

I breathed in ashy smelling air and finally looked around now that the wolf wasn't in the way. It looked like we had made it to the rest stop Luke mentioned.

Barely.

I was right on the edge where the road blended into the parking lot decked out in rows of lit street lights with two dark eighteen wheeler trucks and a few cars parked outside the building. There were a few curious faces peering out the windows, probably reacting to hearing a wolf howling nearby, but no one ventured outside.

"It's gone," Khione said at the shadow of a puke yellow dingy SUV parked a few spaces away.

Two sparkle ponies, one a lot more beat up than the other, a demigod and a rabbit faded back into view like someone pulled off a blanket.

"Uh," I stared. "Luke. You've got a bit of - " I raised my hand to demonstrate on my own face, trying to sit up, but Khione caught it and pushed me back down.

"Just tell me you're not injured enough and I'll oblige you," she said shortly. "All I did was numb the pain," but her eyes were on Luke too. "That certainly isn't yours."

"No," Luke's voice said thinly. There was a whistle to his voice like he had some kind of a lisp or a serpent's tongue. "It isn't."

My first thought on seeing him was, oh, it's Two-Face from Batman, Harvey Dent. With his blond hair and blue eye, he could pull it off. It's just that the other face of Luke's villainous lawyer from DC was Venom, the alien symbiote from Marvel.

I searched for something to say that wasn't pointing out how the right side of his face was weirding me out a bit. "How'd you do that?"

The left corner of his mouth quirked while the right sneered with serrated teeth. "Sneaking."

He turned on his heel and faded away, before fading back. He made a limp wave with his free hand as a half-hearted 'ta-da.' He led the horses over, Artemis still clutched to his chest and the human side of his face looked uncomfortable.

Khione clucked her tongue. "Don't play the coward now, son of Hermes."

Luke blew out a breath.

"Sorry," He said almost sheepishly as his third eye on his forehead closed up like it had never been there and the black reptilian scales with bioluminescent vestigial eyes dripped down the right side of his face like black ink leaving normal human skin behind. It pooled in the open hand he held out to me as he crouched down. "I panicked. I didn't know what was happening and it hurt and I just grabbed it from you."

When had -

What -

From me?

I stared.

"You can see more than I can," Luke weakly defended himself. "And that monster from before didn't seem to hurt you as much, so I thought - if I had a little of that - " he cut himself off. "I tried to be quick because I didn't want to distract you - "

"It's fine," I said automatically.

It was more than knowledge, or skills. Luke didn't even have to know what exactly he was swiping to take it for himself.

What the hell did he steal?

'Essence of Elder God?'

Khione's swirling eyes sharpened a little as she idly inspected the dark smoky ball dotted with burning green eyes in his hand that looked a lot like my Dream form.

"Is there a limit to what you can steal?" Khione asked slowly.

Luke shot a dark look at her.

"Is there a limit to what my father can steal?" He asked back mockingly.

"Yes," she said seriously, taking him aback. She raised a finger to her lips in the universal 'be quiet' gesture as her eyes pointedly looked down at his outstretched hand and then back up.

Luke's brows furrowed as he dropped the ball on me. My stomach lurched a little, like it was trying to roll over, but nothing else happened. Luke set Artemis down on the gravelly ground. The bunny immediately belly flopped next to me, looking like it had crawled through World War I trenches. Patches of fur were missing from her hindquarters with oozing sores.

Khione ignored her.

Luke didn't.

"Why didn't you say anything?" He said, exasperated, as he dug into his fashion disaster yellow fanny pack for ambrosia squares.

"It does not matter," Artemis said quietly, sullen. She squeaked when Luke gently cuffed her upside the head.

"You could have at least said it was blood because you were chafing on the ride," he grumped. "I thought you peed on me."

Her ears flattened against her head immediately.

"Maybe I should have - " and they began to bicker like children in the cramped backseat of a car on the way to Disneyworld.

Khione caught my eye and rolled hers at me.

They were distracting.

I don't think they were even snowflakes anymore. Ice shards made fractal dizzying patterns that endlessly looped back to crumble into themselves, like there was a tiny blackhole in the middle.

She noticed me looking and smiled. "You can see that."

I could feel my face heat up from being caught staring. "Yeah, I - argh!"

Khione mercilessly twisted my broken leg back into place.

I rolled around a little, trying to blink stars out of my eyes, but the adrenaline was long gone and the fresh wave of pain was overwhelming. The cool hand against the side of my face didn't help with trying to stay awake and neither did the ambrosia square someone stuffed in my mouth mid-curse.

It tasted like Nana's baklava dessert. Warm, and full of honey.

"Rest," Khione said. "You're safe for now. You can rest."

I can rest.

Okay.

My brain had already checked out when my mouth remembered something.

"Seabiscuit wants a raise," I said.

The cold hand on my face pulled back.

"What?" Khione said.

"The horse," I explained.

Luke snorted. I think the horse did too (or maybe Luke didn't do anything and it was just the horse) but I was kind of out of it.

"He earned it."

I passed out.

Unconsciousness is not Sleep. Your soul usually isn't suicidal. The Dreaming part of it up and ditching your body every time you get knocked out by something and are probably still in danger or hurt would be dumb. That's why you try to wake up from being unconscious as soon as you can and if you are too hurt to, then you sleep so you could heal.

It's not perfect, but when is anything?

Or anyone.

I didn't Dream.

When I woke up, it took me two seconds to realize that we were inside the miniature tourist trap and food court that was the rest stop. This one was boasting something called a Sonic Drive restaurant where I was stuffed in a booth and through the glass windows I could see the souvenir shop on the other side of the wide foyer. On the table across from me, Artemis was munching on blades of hay in a bowl. One of the workers behind the food counter kept looking over at our table with an absolutely sappy look on his face.

Guess he was a bunny person.

"Ugh." I rubbed my face. "How long was I out?"

Artemis ears flicked back and forth. She muttered and that's when I realized her lion charm was missing.

"What happened to - " I narrowed my eyes. Artemis was left alone with Luke and Khione. "Did you bite someone?"

The rabbit looked offended.

"You bit someone."

She looked away, sulking.

I sighed. "What's wrong with you."

It wasn't a question, because I didn't want to know.

I stretched a little, testing to see how much I had healed. The answer was most of it. There was a cast made of ice on my leg and my shirt no longer had a hole the size of Montana in it, so Khione must have cleaned me up a bit. My skin there was still a bit tender, so I must have been scraped pretty bad if I could still feel it when I couldn't feel my wrenched shoulder anymore.

I've always healed fast and having a full ambrosia square definitely helped. The food of gods was good for that if you had enough divinity to not just burst into flame.

It -

Wait.

"You can eat ambrosia," I said to Artemis who looked back at me with silver eyes. Her little sweater was folded up in a tiny square next to her, probably so her injuries could be looked at. Sure enough, she was still bald in some places, but the bleeding sores were gone already. Her burst eardrums were healed that way too, back when we first met Aura, Corey and his dog Bradley.

That seemed like forever ago.

Artemis nodded slowly, her eyes narrowing suspiciously.

"It's just - " I tried to get my thoughts in order. "I thought Mom took everything, made you a normal rabbit."

Normal rabbits don't have silver eyes either, I thought then.

There was something I'm missing.

If Mom just wanted to hand Artemis a length of rope to hang herself with, she could have done that at any time. If it had to be now, assigning the Quest to Zoe Nightshade or Sipriotes of the goddess' senior Hunters would have still compelled Apollo's twin to come to Camp Half-Blood.

But Artemis is on a Quest.

When mortals were allowed to break divine rules.

Her ears dropped a little. Maybe she was thinking, but bunny faces don't do many expressions that aren't 'mad' and 'mad cute.'

Was I reading too much into this?

The rules were enforced by my sisters, the Fates. Mom had nothing to do with it. But…

Mom is not perfect. And not all-powerful.

Artemis is still Rhea's granddaughter and maybe that can't be taken away as easily as the blood of Phanes could be. A few months ago, the thought that Mom can't do something would have been close to blasphemy. Since I first got taken by Hermes and shoved into Camp Half-Blood, I've learned otherwise.

Mom can't lie, not won't.

Am I reading too much into this?

Movement in the corner of my eye had my head snapping in that direction. The guy I saw behind the counter jumped and held out the tray he was holding like it was an offering.

Guess I was still jumpy.

"Yer sis ordered for ya 'ready," he said with a hopeful smile and Texan twang. I stared at him for a moment.

How was he talking?

That's when I noticed the simple silvery charm bracelet he had on with a small snowflake charm.

Words were wind.

He was the wiry, bearded type that looked like he lived on a diet of coffee, biscottos and spite with fluffy brown hair under his beanie and brown eyes that were a little bloodshot.

I took the tray.

"Thanks, man."

"Nuthin' of it!" He said brightly and it looked like it broke something in him. "Let me know if you need in'thang, extra napkins, some sauce packets, cutlery?" He asked like he was a restaurant waiter.

"Uh." I looked down at my food. The wrapper proudly proclaimed I got a SuperSONIC Bacon Cheeseburger with Chili. Fries and a Coke. "I'm good?"

"Change your mind, caw may." He gave me a stern kind of look. "Noelle didn't want you walkin' around on that leg, you've fixin' to go to Houston, you got a ways, aite?"

Noelle?

I get it.

Like the Christmas song.

Way better than Fred as far as mortal aliases go. Morrigan isn't even on the list, because clearly Mom didn't give a shit about hiding anything at all.

"Alright," I said.

"The rabbit hers or yers?" The guy looked like he wanted to pet the bunny for a second, but Artemis' narrow eyed look stopped him.

"Luke's," I smirked as Artemis glared at me. "Couldn't leave her all by herself home alone. Who knows what could happen to her?"

She might decide to murder Fate's demigod.

"Oh. Him." The dude's face tightened. "Don't look like a rabbit guy."

He's not.

"She's a rescue and he's a bleeding heart," I said drily.

Artemis glared harder.

I booped her nose and she reared back like I was a leper.

Or just had boy cooties.

"She's a bit of a bitch, though."

The best part was that it was true. Luke cared about Camp Half-Blood and having Mom's boon to clean up the shithole that was Olympus and that was keeping Artemis alive.

The food guy eyed the bald patches in her fur, coming to the completely wrong conclusion.

"Ye, some rescues are hef-feral til they learn to trust ya, 'specially if they were sick or 'bused. Fear begets fear, gotta teach them to stop being 'fraid first 'fore they improve."

The rabbit shrunk.

"Hey, your name?"

"Ah," He pulled at his name tag that had curled up, only half of the adhesive sticking to his shirt. It read 'J.D.' "It doesn't stand for in'thang," he said, sheepishly. "Just Jaydee."

"Percy," I said.

"Percy and Noelle," he mused out loud. "From Louisiana?"

I was saved from having to answer that (what was in Louisiana?) by the other two members of our Quest party triumphantly returning with a bag of vending machine snacks, a clean shirt without rabbit blood, a white cowboy hat and one of those travel brochures that unfolded into a map of the United States roads.

"Percy," Khione flashed a small smile as she handed the map to Luke, who switched the bag of goodies over to his other hand so he could take it. "Glad to see you awake."

I raised my Coke in greeting. "How long was I out?"

She took a step back and looked up. I was confused until I realized there was a clock on the wall above me. That just reminded me that I had Rhea's sailor compass clock and could have just made a guess myself instead of asking.

"Forty minutes, roughly." She set her white cowboy hat on the table. Luke tossed me my sword pendant and I snatched it out of the air. "I did find something I like, Jaydee," she addressed the food guy who smiled helplessly at her. "Thank you."

"Yes'm," he said in an odd higher pitched voice. "Need in'thang else?"

Luke slid into the booth opposite me, rolling his eyes. He offered Artemis a few roasted peanuts as Khione talked the guy around to leaving us alone.

"You feeling okay - after taking - " I made a vague gesture around my head with some fries.

"Why wouldn't I?" Luke said with a small frown. "I gave it back."

I have no idea.

I know I still have too many teeth, even after Mom got rid of my other sets. My spine sticks out and isn't shaped right and I have some extra organs and ribs. I have godly eyes and my body tried to make up for that by developing a few extras inside.

The Mist half-heartedly tries to hide what I called 'cousiny' traits just like it hides monsters and that told me enough. I'm not a monster. Neither is Clovis or Ethan.

But the children of the Pit and the Night were.

"Never mind then," I said.

He shrugged, eyeing me and popped some fries into his mouth. I didn't even notice him taking them and I was looking right at him. He winked back.

Luke was kind of scary.

I pointed at our pet rabbit. "Who'd she bite?"

Luke's good mood evaporated. He held up fingers I just noticed were bandaged. The story unfolded before me. They were arguing when I passed out. Probably kept arguing. Artemis bit him.

So he stole her voice.

"Can you not," I tried, speaking to both of them.

"She makes it very hard," Luke said and Artemis huffed.

I stared at him until he caved, clipping the lion charm back onto the rabbit's cat collar.

"Thank you," Artemis said stiffly.

"Mhm."

"Finally," Khione sighed as she came back to our table. She took a seat next to me holding a double chocolate cookie. "Could not take a hint."

"You literally told him you have magic," Luke pointed out unsympathetically.

"That has absolutely nothing to do with it," Khione said in a very, very dry tone of voice. "And you know it."

I have no idea what they are talking about.

"You tell everyone about you?" I asked instead. "And you said we were siblings?"

"Mortals tend to assume attractive people arriving together are related if they share any feature at all," she explained, fingering a lock of her black hair. "The same way they'll assume two people in the same room of the same race are related."

I blinked.

"Is thermodynamics the only thing you have a degree in?"

"No," Khione flashed a small smile. Before any of us could respond to that, she snatched the map back from Luke and spread it out on the table. "Houston should be your next stop," she said, pointing it out on the map. "We'll have to find someone or something willing to escort you the rest of the way through New Mexico and Arizona."

"You can't?" Luke asked.

"I shouldn't," Khione corrected him gently. "Olympus is currently on lockdown. We are advised to remain singular beings and we cannot rely on traditional borders and habitats during the Night." She pursed her lips. "The Amarok told me that much."

"You said it was a perfect alibi," I remembered.

"I am leading it back north," Khione said simply. "After the Migration, father and his brothers did not simply bulldoze their way in."

The way she said that gave me the impression others did. I wondered if it had anything to do with the classifications Hermes gave out when he was ticketing Mom. The Celts didn't exactly Migrate, like the Greek and Norse did. They were more like the Egyptians with their Nomes all over the place, but less centralized into Sidh sites.

I never really thought about how many toes the Greek and Norse stepped on coming over like they did.

"Alliances were made. It is a non-Olympic matter I am qualified to deal with and dangerous enough that everyone would assume I would be singular to do so. If any had a reason to check where the minor goddess of my father was - " Khione smiled a small, dangerous looking smile. "I would only be doing my duty."

That was what I saw earlier, I realized. Khione split off a Name. One for the wolf to chase, so the rest of her could help us here.

Artemis raised her head. "...why are you here then?"

Khione gave her a blank look. Then it turned to something that it was almost pitying. "Has it been so long since you answered a plea for help that you forgot what it looks like?"

"No, I - " The rabbit's ears flicked back and forth. "I am still alive."

"I noticed," Khione said flatly.

I winced.

"We talked it over," Luke volunteered, leaning a bit over the table. He and Khione glanced at each other with an unreadable look. "She's officially giving you help, Percy. And only you." He put on his father's crooked smile. "I'll just have to wing it as best I can, eh?"

I opened my mouth to protest, but then I remembered.

Luke is supposed to die. Hermes was punished and Athena was forbidden from helping him on his Quest.

"Are you on some kind of blacklist?" I asked him. "Because that's bullshit."

He shrugged a shoulder like it was no big deal, but I was there when he looked at me, hoping I could tell him it wasn't true.

"Can you blame anyone for not wanting to risk it?" He said darkly and Artemis flinched.

"I am abiding by the rules, to the letter," Khione said carefully. "I may not be a Messenger, but the wind does not need permission to travel. And the weather - well, it changes all the time." Her face twisted a little. "If your sisters object to their little brother getting legal aid, they are free to do something about it whenever they want."

There was a term Dad used to describe what Khione was doing. I can't remember exactly what it was, but it was basically following all the rules in just the right way to not get in trouble and still piss people off.

She tapped a slim finger on Houston, TX. "Safety in numbers is necessary if I don't want to draw attention to myself or you." She gave me an uncomfortable look. "...you don't want to meet a wendigo. I don't want to meet a wendigo."

I will absolutely take her word for it.

"So get to Houston, get someone to give us a lift or carpool," I summarized. "Any Greeks there?"

"No," Artemis and Khione said at the same time.

Well, that's great.

"Thank you for this," I told Khione. "I owe you a big one."

The goddess' face lit up. The ice shards in her eyes unfolding and crumbling from their center like eleventh dimensional rose petals. The effect was breathtaking, but some small part of my mind was wondering what it meant when a god's eyes could change.

"I will hold you to that," Khione warned me lightly, waving her cookie.

Artemis took a tiny step forward on her little paws. "I…also owe you."

Khione's smile withered. "I am certainly not doing it for you."

"But you are aiding Olympus," Artemis ventured quietly. An ugly look was on the goddess of Ice and Snow's face for a moment and then she tilted her head back like she was asking someone for patience.

"Is this really the time for your 'daughter of the First Throne' nonsense when you don't even have - "

"Not - not that either," Artemis interrupted her. The rabbit looked around uncomfortably. "Can - May I talk to you…outside?" Artemis said with her voice getting quieter and quieter. "Or…something…"

"If it isn't something you can say with witnesses, it isn't something I will believe," Khione said archedly with a skeptical raised eyebrow.

Artemis went silent.

Khione scoffed and nibbled at her cookie. Luke stole a few more of my french fries as I worked on my Bacon Chili Cheeseburger and can I just say, it wasn't bad at all. Strange, but not bad. Luke stole more french fries until I told him to get his own. Apparently, Khione had a debit card too, so I didn't even need to use mine for his Chili Cheese dog and fries.

I had just finished my nectar-infused Coke when Artemis spoke up again.

"You had a baby girl once."

Khione went very still.

Luke leaned all the way back into his booth as if he could melt into it and get out of the line of fire. I wanted to do the same thing.

The song in her eyes was back, making the ice shards chaotically collide in a mesmerizing dance.

"Choose your next words very carefully," Khione said softly.

"I intervened!" Artemis blurted out and then her small form was wracked by a full body wince. "I - tried to intervene. When the Fates…"

There was a sound like a massive frozen over lake had just cracked and the edges of Khione's form blurred, then sharpened back up. I fought the urge to scoot away from her. A couple of inches wasn't going to make a difference if she lost control of her divine form right next to me. I couldn't even run, she had me boxed in unless I dove over the table.

"You…" Khione whispered. "Tried."

"I wronged you," Artemis said in a very small voice. "I was just so angry - but I knew it was wrong. I owed you. So I tried."

"A life for a life," Khione murmured. Artemis tried to take hers, so I guess the only way to pay that back would be to save one for her. But if the Fates wanted someone to die…

"I thought it would work," Artemis pleaded. "It should have worked."

"It didn't."

"No," Artemis moaned. "It did not."

Khione looked over the rabbit coldly. "You were punished?"

"Yes," Artemis answered quietly and suddenly, I knew Artemis had been talking about what Mom's spawn my eldest sister was like from personal experience. "I thought - " She swallowed loudly. "I do not know what I was thinking. I wanted to tell you, but I - "

The bunny shrunk into a little ball.

"Could not?" She offered pathetically.

"You couldn't?" Khione said abruptly. "You couldn't?"

A wave of the goddess' hand saw the food guy forget about coming over at her raised voice, eyes going dull as he made an about face and marched back into the kitchen as Khione rose from her seat to loom over the rabbit on the table.

I wondered if I should make a break for it.

"My daughter suffered and you let me believe it was my fault!"

Another crack rang out and then the song in her eyes changed. Khione shook her head. Her hand raised to her temple like she had a sudden headache.

"No - no, of course, it makes perfect sense. Why am I - why am I surprised?" She sounded breathless. "Why do I - Olympus has always been full to - to bursting with lessons only suffering can teach." Khione whirled on me and I jumped. "Percy. I will ward the building so you can sleep here, but if you wish to press on, I can't - " She struggled to get the words out. "I - I can't - "

Another crack of ice.

"Luke, stay alive. Artemis. I will enjoy watching you die."

Then she was gone.

For a long moment, no one said anything.

Then Luke took a loud, obnoxious sip of his soda.

"So you not only screwed over everyone you know, but some people you screwed over multiple times," he said. "I'm in awe."

Artemis sighed.

"Why?" I asked.

I didn't have to explain what I was asking.

"Pride," she answered. "Shame? Or maybe I was just afraid to say anything…" she said quietly. "Your sisters are like your mother. There is always just enough ambiguity, just enough give, just enough rope so that we think we can fight it, but it never means what we think it does. And… this time?" She asked herself, almost wonderingly. "I can hardly be punished more."

She hopped over to the edge of the table and then down into the seat, disappearing from view.

"It was a secret I did not want to die with. That is all."

No, I thought. That wasn't the kind of secret I would want to take to my grave either.

I stood up. My leg complained, but I could walk.

"We'll stay the night," I said.

Luke eyed me.

"Deadline," he said gently.

Damn it.

He blew out a breath.

"Yeah, I get it." He looked down at the rabbit next to him. "I've been thinking. If your mother told the Fates to do something, they'd have to do it, right?"

"Yeah."

She just usually doesn't care to.

He nodded thoughtfully. "...it's only about an hour to Houston. Stopping here…"

My hands clenched into fists, but I nodded. "Fifteen minutes?"

"Sure." He got up and stretched, then started to clean up our trays.

I picked up Khione's white cowboy hat and limped outside.

In the back of an old pick up truck, I found a goddess.

"I'm afraid I will not be good company," Khione said quietly.

"You don't have to be," I said, hoping I could help even a little by just being here. I climbed into the truck and sat next to her. My leg ached. It wasn't the most comfortable seat in the world, but I could deal with it. I set the white hat down between us. "It's okay."

"It's not," she said and I winced.

Yeah. It wasn't.

"I thought my armor of ice was perfect," Khione said softly. "Flawless. I told myself they would make a mistake. They would weaken. I can wait." She shifted around a little and idly picked up her hat. I heard her whisper, "I hate them."

I looked around the parking lot and tried not to think about a certain Great Prophecy and how one of the choices was to raze.

"And it seems the beloved daughter does not even need a bow and arrow to pierce right through my heart." Her hand raised to her chest and I knew that under her fingers was her scar. "After all these years - " she let out a soft gasp I tried to ignore. "They can still hurt me."

I don't know if she was talking about the Olympians.

Or my older sisters.

"...it's not my fault," Khione said brokenly, as if just realizing it all over again. "None of it was."

Mom, I prayed. If you won't, or can't, do anything about the Fates.

I will.

Her response was carefully, almost painfully, neutral. It was not a yes.

It also wasn't a no.

If I was going to break a Prophecy, it only made sense that I'd have to go through the Prophecy makers first. Whatever it took. I wondered what that said about Mom, that the idea didn't bother her.

It didn't bother me.

All this time, I've assumed that I was just like any other Olympic demigod. Just as strong or important. But if I was, nothing about Mom's plans for me made sense. Mom put me on a Quest, where mortals were allowed to break the rules. By their own decrees, the Fates couldn't stop me.

I was not an Olympic demigod.

Maybe I should flex some diplomatic immunity. Mom had plans for me. I knew there would be consequences. Things Mom hasn't told me or won't tell me, but if she was willing to lend me the weight of her Name, then a lot could change. This might all blow up in my face. My only other choice was to do nothing. To keep the status quo and only do little things that wouldn't rock the boat too hard, to preserve.

Either way I was beginning to realize was a problem. It was one thing to say it or decide to do it. It was another to actually do it.

How do you break a Prophecy that was multiple choice?

And at the end of it all…

Something cold hit my nose. I looked up.

It was snowing.

Large snowflakes fell from a pitch black sky in the middle of June. The light from the streetlamps reflecting off the snow made it look like there were thousands of tiny, sparkling falling stars drifting lazily down to earth. Beside me, Khione shuddered, a tiny hitched gasp and she curled into herself, but she didn't cry.

I'm half-human, I thought. Only half-god, but maybe that was the wrong way to think.

I'm half-god.

I can do this.

Snow fell on my face and the tarmac and the truck.

The flakes melted instantly on the warm surfaces into cold droplets of water.

And fell to the ground as icy tears.

 

[Shujin]

THE DEMIGOD had the same tell as his father.

She would be the first to admit that he was a handsome boy in that familiar sharp edged, arrogant way. His mother must have given him that hair and nose, but everything else was his father. It was too bad Hermes' pretty head was one she wanted separated from his neck and it took everything in her to not let the spark of hatred burn.

Be ice.

It was in the minute twitching of his fingers. To their credit, it could have meant anything. The desire to draw a weapon, to strangle, to indicate in a direction, to steal…which is why she never bothered trying to decipher what it meant.

Luke Castellan, like his father, suppressed and hid the wrong things.

The faint crackle and pop as the surveillance cameras watching them died could have been caused by a number of different things, but Khione was a goddess. The way the top layer of reality inverted into a spike right through the mechanical innards might as well have been a bugle horn. She didn't have to look around the tourist trap to know that they were out of earshot and out of sight of mortals -

- that white cowboy hat was nice, actually. There were even little light blue buffalo prancing along the hat band! That was adorable. She could make a copy, of course, but having something that wasn't cold was appealing, once in a while. She set it on her head and turned around.

There was a sword at her throat.

She almost rolled her eyes.

Mortals.

The next Ice Age could not come fast enough.

"My criminal justice degree feels compelled to inform you that this is criminal assault in Texas," she tried.

The demigod's cloudy blue eyes (they changed, she noted. Has someone been exposed?) were hard as he spat out, "What do you want?"

Khione stared at him for a second. "You cannot possibly be this dense."

She could tolerate one oblivious demigod, but two would be pushing it.

Apparently, she was, in fact, dealing with two of them, because the demigod of Hermes simply edged his blade closer to her neck. And he would do it too, she could tell. If she took too deep a breath now, it might cut.

She inclined her head. "Immortal goddess."

He tilted the flat of the blade towards her and the fluorescent lights shined off the threads of greenish white crystal spreading through the centre of the sword like the thin branches of a tree.

"Adamantine."

She didn't need to spend even a second wondering how Hermes got his hands on the dangerous material (Thief), but she did make a mental note that this demigod was worth more to his father than most.

A lot more.

No wonder Hermes offered a favour. She was glad the boy wasn't dead yet, even if he had the same darkly mocking smile his father had.

"You won't be healing from this one," he finished grimly.

…Now she was curious.

'Won't I?' she wondered inwardly and let the question echo. There was a faint feeling of question from within. 'Cut forever,' she thought next and in her mind's eye an image of a flowering tree branch was cut off and the leftover stump withered away. The feeling turned to reproach and the stump bloomed again right through the rot.

"Won't I?" She asked out loud with what she knew was an inappropriate amount of glee. She adored her new mother, truly. Way more useful than her birth one ever was. "You can break the ice," she admitted easily. "Temporarily."

It cost her nothing to admit it. Ice could break. Has broken. Denying it was useless. There was nothing she needed to protect herself from here. He was just like all the rest of his type. Only capable of envisioning a god as something simultaneously powerful enough to own all the ills of mankind, but weak enough to punish for it.

He had a warrior's sense. She had seen enough men prancing before her in an effort to impress to be able to discern the wheat from the chaff. He was wary now. For a moment, she thought perhaps her eyes had given it away, but he couldn't even see through the Mist, could he?

It didn't matter.

"All ice needs is water."

The human body is sixty percent water.

"And cold."

The boy cursed as his outstretched arm froze all the way through.

He was quick.

Even through what must have been excruciating pain and unresponsive muscles, he flipped his sword into his other hand. She watched him swing the blade right through her neck. Her visage didn't respond besides raising an eyebrow as the sword passed through harmlessly. One of the symptoms of hypothermia was hallucinations. He immediately turned with a vicious backswing -

The blade glanced off the wall of ice that hadn't been there a second before because in the end, it was just metal. Snarling, he spun again and tired of the pirouetting, Khione froze his penis.

Everyone knows frostbite takes the extremities first.

The boy's eyes bugged as he soundlessly dropped to his knees.

He really did look too much like Hermes. She should know better than to let her wishful thinking slip through.

"You are fortunate I went to medical school," she mused as she came back from the counter, a newly purchased white cowboy hat on her head and slowly knelt down in front of him. She just as slowly reversed the freezing. Revelling a little, in the fact that she could reverse it, now that mortal understanding of their own physical limitations allowed for it.

The demigod glared up at her with tears in his eyes. Khione let herself smile at him. "Or maybe not."

"How many degrees do you have?" The demigod demanded, a bit high pitched.

"Enough."

She was especially proud of the latest one in physics, because it was incredibly useful, very interesting and finishing that doctorate was a bitch and a half she never wanted to do again.

Unfortunately, she probably would have to do it again in a century or two.

"I won't kill you," she reassured the wretch. She would have liked to make him beg for it, but she was not here to make enemies and he was unlikely to do it. Even if killing him wouldn't have been a step too far for the rules. "I don't want to and I don't care that you stole the Master Bolt."

His eyes searched her face. To prove her words, she took the lingering pain away as well. The cold deadened nerve endings.

Slowly, almost too slowly, the demigod relaxed.

"Of course not," he drawled. "You'd have to explain to Percy what you did with the body."

Khione smiled winningly at him. So he wasn't that dense, just paranoid.

"Because you're a dirty traitor, obviously. You even tried to sabotage the whole thing by attacking me in a souvenir shop when all I wanted was a hat," she mock chided him. "There won't be a next time."

It wasn't a question.

"No," the mortal said quietly. "There won't."

She let him get up and checked over her work. For obvious reasons, she wasn't as used to using her abilities to take the cold away. There was a little subdermal bruising, but demigods did heal rather quickly compared to more mundane mortals. It would be fine, no permanent damage. Good. He was useful and she would like to keep it that way.

"I am curious, though." She stepped in close and absently fixed his vest collar. He tensed for a second, but the moment passed and he just watched her with lidded eyes. "Is change enough? Or would you rather Olympus burns?"

"Which one for you?" He ventured cautiously.

"The second," she said coldly. "But…it doesn't matter, does it?" The collar fixed, she let her hands run down to smooth over the creases in the red vest before pulling away. "The son of Fate seems the compassionate type, but at least he has the power to actually do something about it."

She doubted Olympus even had the capability to truly change, but she would wait and see. She could be patient. If it proved that it couldn't? She hoped Fate's demigod turned out to be a truly just man.

"You don't have to put yourself at risk like this," he said, feeling out her conviction.

"Yes, I do," she said immediately. "The moment the shock of his Claiming dissipates, every god on that mountain will realise exactly what he is. They might get ideas," she said in a low tone. "And I can't have that."

His face scrunched up.

She scoffed. "Don't pretend that's not what you want him for."

The demigod's eyes averted. There was shame there, she thought. Someone was having second thoughts, but what about?

It didn't matter.

Whatever he had doubts about, it wasn't about this. She could see the moment he decided she was a potential ally and trusted a little.

"He gave me…his boon." The mortal's cloudy blue eyes swung back. "From his mother."

Khione's mind went blank for a second.

"From…his mother," she repeated. "From his mother?"

Gods giving a mortal any kind of IOU was almost unheard of, and to have one from Ananke herself?

Amazing.

Also terrifying, yes.

"He's only good for it if the rabbit survives," he said with a grimace and Khione turned completely away from him to bite her thumb so she wouldn't scream.

"That's…fine," she managed to say around the sweet golden blood in her mouth.

It wasn't. It wasn't, it wasn't!

"The best I can do is help the Quest in general succeed - " Because she could not stomach the thought of actually lifting a finger to help Artemis do anything. " - we can say I'm just helping the son of Fate. Officially."

"Officially," the demigod repeated dutifully.

She turned back to him. "And unofficially, if you need to cover your tracks so our mutual friend doesn't know, you have options."

"The god of War knows," he reminded her.

"The god of War is a brute that the goddess of Love has on a long leash," Khione said shortly. "If you can talk him into letting you go and keeping the Bolt, then believe that I am capable of much more." She tilted her head. "Besides, he kept it for this long. If he tells, who will believe him?"

The demigod waved a hand.

"He has the Helm too," he said airily, a challenging look in his eyes.

The Helm…of Darkness?

Hades' Symbol of Power that turned the wearer completely invisible and completely undetectable.

On a demigod of Hermes, god of Thieves.

Who just stole from Olympus.

"You…are an idiot," Khione hissed at the wretch. "If you had the Helm, why didn't you wear it instead of fighting the god of War?"

Fighting and losing.

The demigod's face twisted.

"The Helm was booby trapped to the Pit and back. I didn't have the time to disarm it all and thinking straight while escaping Olympus was…hard," he finished lamely and she revised her understanding of the situation.

At first, she had thought there was some unnamed god acting as his patron. How else would a mere demigod get the actual gumption to steal the Master Bolt of Zeus? A mastermind waiting for Camp Half-Blood field trip during the Winter Solstice to direct a demigod of the god of Thieves into the perfect theft that would set the Olympians against each other. It would allow for them to approach allies and consolidate power while Olympus were distracted.

Now she knew this boy was as much of an imbecile as his father.

"Don't worry," Khione said drily. "I'll treat you just like my brothers and be sure to do all the thinking for you."

"Hilarious," the demigod deadpanned.

"One last thing," she said and watched his eyebrows raise. "Steal from me."

"What? Why?"

"Just do it."

The boy sighed. There was movement a layer beneath the top and she could see a ghostly luminescent white silhouette covered in mouths with long prehensile tongues reach out of his body -

There was a crackling sound as they sprang apart, stung.

"Did you just punch me with your soul?" Khione asked incredulously.

"I was trying to steal something! Like you asked!" The mortal protested, then his brows furrowed. "How'd you do that?"

How did she do that?

How the everloving fuck

Be ice.

"...I was expecting it," she managed to say. "And gods have more awareness and control over our soul."

Such as it was.

Her mother called them 'Hollow' and she was not wrong.

"Be careful with that. In how you use it and in who knows you can," she warned him, because he was useful and she would like to keep it that way. "The wrong person will make you pay for it."

And maybe she was speaking from personal experience.

She watched his face flood with understanding.

"...Percy let me take a bit," the demigod said quietly as his eyes averted again.

"He's a kind boy, isn't he?" Khione let herself smile as she looped her arm around his and dragged him to the counter where he hesitantly picked out a silk handkerchief at her urging. It was in that vintage style with the state's flower, the bluebonnet and a decoratively cursive red 'Texas' on it. She was surprised. It didn't seem like his style.

"For my mother," he murmured, eyes lowered.

The mortal woman at the counter remained completely ignorant as she congratulated Khione on having such a handsome, thoughtful boyfriend in hastily scrawled writing. The boy's answering smile was faint, but passable as Khione simply compelled the woman to not ask too many questions.

They got a map, discussed their options and she carefully talked around the issue of Roman demigods in California. That one enforcement would not let go if she let it slip, but she said enough to make him suspicious that Olympus was 'hiding' something there unrelated to Ares' temple or the ruins of Mt. Othrys.

He had been to the latter before. It was where he got the scar on his face.

At the vending machine, he punched the buttons like the contraption had personally wronged him.

"It's Luke," he said forcefully.

"Pardon?" Khione turned back to him.

"My name is Luke," he said. "Maybe I can't see you like Percy can, but it's still in your eyes. It's not 'mortal.' It's not 'demigod.' It's Luke."

She opened her mouth and then closed it, honestly speechless.

And a sick, hot flush was welling up under her cheeks that she hadn't felt in centuries.

"Of course, f - forgive me." She cursed her tongue for the falter, but he didn't seem to notice as his shoulders dropped a bit of their tension and he collected the snacks as they dropped. She supposed she should be pleased he was comfortable enough to confront her. She would do him this courtesy. They were allies, after all and he was not bad company.

(they kept calling me girl) ​

It was not the same!​

She felt sick.

She quickly offered the feeling to her mother and it was quickly taken.

Too quickly.

She could feel it cut away this time instead of a gentle fading, leaving behind an empty, hollow feeling that she didn't like. It made her…wonder what it was exactly that she was giving away. The next feeling was one of an apology and she forgave her mother.

She was just restless due to the confluence of events. The Pit was stirring and for the first time, it was happening at the same time as the Night fell. She would not be surprised to hear that there was movement in the ocean depths so of course the earth would yearn to follow suit.

Not yet, though.

Just before they returned to the cafeteria, the demig Luke stopped her.

"So, we're good?"

Khione stared at him blankly.

"Yes?" She frowned. "I can't think of a reason why we would not be?"

His face slackened. "Criminal assault in Texas?"

She frowned harder. "We both agreed that wouldn't happen again."

"That's it? No hard feelings?"

"Immortal goddess?"

They stared at each other.

"So someone can just leave you to die - "

"Wait." Several things clicked into place for her. His paranoia and hostility. "Were you still holding that against me?" He stared at her, baffled. She huffed, almost offended now. "I gave you a reconciliation gift! What more do you want?"

Luke threw his head back and stared at the ceiling of the Chambers County Rest Area like it held the meaning to life.

"I get it," he said eventually. "Gods are insane."

"No," she countered as she eyed the map, mentally marking out godly territory. "Mortals are. It's all that dying you do."

Percy was awake. At first, he looked confused when he saw her, but she could see the moment he remembered that she came to help because his face then lit up. She felt a heady thrum of vindication and internally sighed wistfully.

He was going to be a beautiful man in a few years.

Mother did not approve, but Khione hadn't spent the time convincing her that the enemy of your enemy was a tool to be used to just give up on what she wanted.

She was less thrilled to see a certain furball again and even as annoying as it was, she welcomed the food clerk's efforts to get her attention.

Yes, it was technically against the rules to let mortals know about her. Olympus had a standing policy of non-interference in mortal affairs outside their Domains. Saying she had magic probably wouldn't fool any enforcement, but it also wasn't actionable.

And according to Olympus, she could tell this man whatever she wanted in order to fuck him. Leaving this man with a demigod to raise alone did not count as 'interference in mortal affairs' and bastards were not afforded any rights. If you were to ask, you would be told that the country they were in, America did the same thing.

Who were you to judge?

Canada did not.

Except for Nova Scotia, but no one cared about Nova Scotia.

Sometimes, she wondered who they were trying to fool. Either they were following the mortals, or they weren't.

…enough stalling.

It would be fine. She was a rabbit.

There was nothing Artemis could do to her anymore.

---

She was wrong.​

---

The ice had broken again.

She couldn't do it.

She supposed Greek heroes were used to leaving their women behind for one reason or another, but being that woman for a completely oblivious demigod was both a novel and horrid feeling. Either men knew what she wanted or they didn't care.

She hesitated at giving the emotion to her mother. Some wretched part of her wasn't ready to let it go.

She vividly remembered her own pleading, her voice breaking, the rocks digging into her knees as she begged for the only child she had actually wanted. She had stopped asking for her daughter's life (what did I do? who have i wronged? what choice should i have made, please) and now was just asking for it to end.

The Fates denied her.

In their own words, some lessons only suffering could teach.

But she wasn't the one they were punishing with failure. After all these years searching for a reason, a rationale (the terror always came, choking. if she did not care about them, they couldn't be used against her), or some kind of sign that the lightning would not strike twice and burn it all down again.

But it wasn't her fault.

Her senses followed them out of the rest stop, resuming their journey. Artemis was a dull grey blob of insignificance, only distinguishable from a plant by the spark of silver deep within. Luke was a sharp purple haze, the same colour as most demigods of their pantheon, but there was a creeping dark blue colour that shot straight through his core.

Percy's was slumbering. A lazily smouldering dark pit that felt like it was just biding its time until it could finally set ablaze and devour everything in sight.

She pulled her senses back, annoyed at herself for lingering on him. On the warmth. It was a bad habit. When would she learn? Even a dog could only reach out so many times, before it preferred the cold.

Fire always burns.

He would be ridiculously influential. She had seen the dark wings from his shadow contemptuously bat Aura away. He would be strong.

(he's kind)​

And what would kind get me?​

She ignored that little voice inside.

The meek do not only inherit nothing, they are robbed. The unjust will always have the initiative. The weak can accomplish only as much as the strong allow and the good is notoriously slow at coming to the worthy. If it ever arrives at all. Perhaps another plane, another state of existence supped on kindness instead of apathy, but if one such as that existed, it was not this one.

There was nothing inherently good about living.

She wished there was.

But that was the truth of things. She need only look as far as the ones who decided it would be so, to see it would never change. It took longer than she would care to admit, but she learned.

She learned.

This is what Olympus made of her. It would be inconsiderate not to let them enjoy the hard earned fruits of their labour. Now, if only she could keep her heart hard and cold and just do what needed to be done, she would be able to enjoy every second of it as well.

The Hollow Gods grow quickly. Perhaps that was why she was having such a difficult time putting her childhood down like the pathetic creature it was after all these years. That little voice inside had grown quiet, but not completely silent.

It was fine.

She could wait.

And one day.

Soon.

The girl she had been would no longer have the strength to break the ice with her pain and compassion, but would

Finally!​

drown.

 

[Shujin]

An Undertow of Sand
A PJO Fanfiction
​

Twenty minutes from the rest stop on our way to Houston, we came across our first roadblock.

As in.

The road was blocked.

"Alright," Luke drawled as my horse came to a stop beside his own. "I was…kind of wondering how bad it is for the mortals," he said with a thoughtful frown. "Guess they definitely know."

"It's Night," I said with a shrug.

We both looked out at what looked like the biggest traffic jam in America since 1775. You know the one. When that Paul Revere guy had to grab a horse to take the long way around, because the Brits were mad Americans dumped perfectly good tea into the ocean. They were jamming everything in Boston with their slow moving army waiting for the ferry.

FYI, I aced that test.

I'm not wrong.

The highway had gone from empty to stuffed full of cars, SUVs and trucks. No one was going anywhere fast. Police cars on the sides were flashing their lights and road flares were hemming in groups of people stretching their legs, feeding their pets and taking naps in sleeping bags or the backseats of their car.

It was a callback to 'ye Olden times' when humanity would know what was happening. They didn't know anymore, but it doesn't take a genius to figure out the safety in numbers and how important keeping the light on is. I don't think there's a human on Earth completely comfortable with not being able to see in the dark. It's not just because you might step on a rake.

There are things to be afraid of in the dark.

"I'm going to find out what they think is going on," Luke said as he started to dismount. "Stay here."

I saluted him.

Luke's feet thumped the ground as I found my plastic spoon and unhooked my Strawberry Cheesecake Sonic Blast from my backpack's front pocket. I absolutely did not make a noise that worried Luke when I saw this on the menu before we left. It was just like my New York Cheesecake Blizzard from Dairy Queen. I had to have it.

I'm not addicted. I can stop whenever I want.

Khione must have done something when we said goodbye because the ice cream hasn't melted nearly as much as I thought it would.

Still my second favorite goddess.

If Hestia wasn't careful, she could lose her number one spot!

I looked up to see that Luke hadn't actually moved. He was just standing in place, leaning his head on his saddle.

"Not to rush you or anything…"

"Yep," he said. He sounded pained. "She made it last only until I got off, didn't she?" He asked his horse, who snorted. I think it was a 'yes.' Luke huffed and then in an accented, rough tone said, "Fucking bitch."

My eyebrows shot up.

I was the one with the Sam Approved Queen's English here. Luke was hyper aware of all the young, impressionable ears in Cabin 11, so it didn't come out of him much. Plus, he raised Annabeth for a year, right? Annabeth didn't swear. Big Brother Luke taught his little sister to just stab you at the drop of a hat, but she won't cuss you out while sticking you with the pointy end. Last time Luke swore was…

Finding out the Olympians were Not Alone and More Shit Than Expected.

I was hard on Luke's vocabulary.

"I…thought you guys got along?" I said, a little confused. There was only one 'she' he could be talking about. Khione and Luke had looked friendly at the rest stop. Was I just that blind?

"Oh yeah, best of friends," Luke tried for something nonchalant, but it still came out tight. And muffled. Because he was speaking to a saddle. "It's affectionate," he assured me. "Comes from the absolute bottom of my heart."

He sounded like at the bottom of his heart was a pit of tar.

With spikes.

"Did something happen?"

Luke grumbled.

I thought I heard him say 'froze mah dick,' but that couldn't have been right.

I heard Artemis' muffled, 'What?'

"...just a little misunderstanding!" Luke said loudly. He was groping blindly into the fanny pack tied to the back of his saddle for a cube of ambrosia. The way he stuffed an entire block in his mouth, I thought he would have gone for two or even three if it didn't mean he'd be setting himself on fire.

Luke sighed in relief. He fished Artemis out from his vest and set her on his saddle. The rabbit had her ears flattened against her head as she stared back at him with narrowed eyes, looking as judgy as a small bunny possibly could.

"Don't even," Luke said to her, cuffing her upside the head.

The look he gave me was…I don't know what it was. It was a mix of Mom's Quantum Stupid and Dad's You Are Embarassing Me In Front of My Son. Then he turned on his heel and faded away.

I didn't even know where to start.

I went back to my ice cream.

"...I do not understand," Artemis said into the quiet.

"What?" Some part of me was glad she said something. I've never done well with silence.

"I…do not understand," she repeated quietly. "Why have you not simply left me behind? I have not…" She cleared her throat uncomfortably. "I have not made my case very well."

"You torpedoed your case and then pissed all over the ashes for thousands of years."

Her ears fell. "Why then?"

I could have said that I was pretty sure I was already on Nemesis' shitlist. The goddess of Vengeance wasn't really known for being a forgive and forget type. Who'd have thought? And she warned me. Not sure ditching the rabbit now would actually help. I could have spilled the beans on my Oath on the Styx and the boon I gave Luke.

"I don't want to put Apollo through that, if I could," I said honestly. He's still my dumbass older brother and I wanted to be a good sibling, just like I wanted to be a good son. I've certainly thought about it and really wished otherwise…

But I wasn't that far gone.

"I see. He said he trained you?"

"Mhm."

Artemis shuffled in place, ears flicking back and forth.

"Please look after him!" She blurted out.

"You really wanna be asking a spawn that?" I said. Maybe I wasn't as forgive and forget as I wanted to be either.

"I - I apologize," she said, shuffling around on her saddle again. "That was - that was wrong of me." Her little shoulders dropped. "All of it was. I will not defend it. I only ask that - that Apollo…"

"I will," I promised.

The rabbit nodded and looked out over the traffic jam. "And if - when our mother reintegrates, if you could…be gentle?" The rabbit choked out. "She tried and I do not blame her for anything. And - and maybe," her voice picked up, getting into it. "You could tell Demeter…!"

"Wait." I was sitting on a sparkle pony with a cup of melting ice cream in the middle of a packed Texan highway and this had suddenly become a deathbed confession. "You're acting like it's the end of the world," I said. "Come on, dying isn't great, but if anyone could get some strings pulled on their judgment, it would be - "

"Oh," Artemis breathed, looking at me with wide silver eyes. "I would have thought…your mother would have told you?"

I clenched my ice cream cup. "Told me what?"

"...your mother enjoys irony," Artemis said instead and the rabbit would know. "Her immortal, beautiful, glorious golden gods…" she trailed off. "There is nothing after, for us."

What?

"You don't go to the Underworld?"

"No," she said miserably. "Upon true death, there is just your grandfather. And his hunger." She blinked up at me. "You truly did not know?"

"We haven't reached that part yet," I said blankly. I knew what happened when a Celtic or Nordic God dies.

The same thing that happened to everyone else.

Mom was the Celtic goddess of Future Victory and Death in Battle. Her foster-son Manannán mac Lir ruled over the living and the dead gods as the Celtic god of Violent Deaths on Land and Sea and lord of their Otherworld. Celtic Hades, if he was also King of the Gods. They had a professional understanding.

That meant every Samhain, the harvest festival everybody knows as Halloween, he came over our place just to bitch about my mother to my mother's face.

Because she's Not Funny.

Yes, he knows what she is.

Thor would always laugh his reckless stunts off with a loud 'NOT TODAY' he stole from somewhere. If it wasn't against a giant snake, he was good. If it was, the end of the world was happening and he was due for a long sleepover at his first cousin's place. The goddess of Death, Hela, ruler of Niflheim, the land of the dead would take him in just like any other mortal.

I assumed the Greeks were the same.

"It wasn't important? You guys usually don't - "

"Die?" Artemis finished sadly. I didn't know what to say. I guess it was the end of the line for the rabbit. I said earlier that Mom's judgment was final, I just didn't know how much.

"We can't anchor you somewhere else?" I asked uncomfortably. I was grasping at straws. "Didn't Selene - "

The rabbit shuddered.

"...I thought I wanted that once, to Hunt forever, but now I would rather take nothingness." Artemis shrunk into the saddle and buried her face underneath her front paws. "...my brother went through this twice," she moaned in realization. "I am an awful sister."

"Not really. I mean, yeah, probably to the sister part." Not gonna lie. "But I don't think Apollo ever thought that far ahead while mortal - "

Wait.

Apollo.

"How did Apollo and Poseidon build the walls of Troy in a single day?" I asked suddenly. I told my Greek Mythology class that at Camp Half-Blood. Poseidon still had that favor hanging over his head and sheep-hating Apollo will never let me forget it.

"I…" Artemis' furry face peeked out from under her paws. "I assume they were allowed some measure of their strength still."

Putting aside that letting them be superhuman during a punishment was kind of weird:

"While mortal."

"Ye-es," the moon rabbit said slowly.

They still had some of their powers. Super strength and stamina at least to build city walls in a day.

They still had powers.

"It is not what you think," the bunny said quickly. "It is not the same."

I don't think Artemis ever saw a party she didn't want to poop on. Not even her own parties were spared.

"You're mortal," I said. "They were mortal."

Artemis' ears flattened. "I am a rabbit."

"Didn't stop the Beast of Caerbannog," I brushed off.

Her ears popped up hopefully. "I am…not familiar with that creature. Celtic?"

My God.

"No, it's - it's from Monty Python. How can you not know - never mind."

Olympus was irredeemable.

Some small, wrinkled shrieking thing burst out of the bushes lining the highway. A plastic spoon hit it in its wrinkled face first, then my sword did. The sprite burst into red dust. My Spidey Sense didn't even say anything, so nice that it was kind enough to give itself away for me. Why couldn't more monsters be so considerate?

"It's not different," I said as I put my sword away. I spent a second trying to find my spoon. I take it back. That monster was an asshole.

"It is," Artemis insisted. "Your mother punished me, not your sisters."

"So? You can still eat ambrosia." I pointed out. "It's not different."

"It is! I am an animal!"

"Ambrosia!"

"That does not change anything! You cannot fight Fate!"

I threw my head back and groaned. "And who are you talking to?"

"Her demigod."

Apollo was a fucking saint.

"It just isn't, okay!" I snapped at her.

"Says who! You?"

I hesitated. "Rhea, I think."

The fight drained from the bunny. "...truly?"

"I asked," I admitted. "She said she can't petition my Mom for you because you're Young." Artemis' nose twitched as I realized that maybe the Matriarch of the Swarms actually snuck me a clue on defying my mother. "Not because you're mortal."

Rhea never said she can't do anything for her granddaughter. She said I was just as right as I was wrong. Whatever she was hinting at, it bypasses my mother entirely.

"It's not like all Young Gods are immortal," I thought out loud.

I remembered being so proud that Mom's Chosen were better than everyone else's when I was little. Her beautiful, immortal, glorious, golden gods, just like Artemis said. I thought it was a sign of how good my mother was. Or at least how much she cared about them.

I never really had a reason to go back and rethink that.

Now I did.

"I am still a…Young goddess?" Artemis asked awkwardly, like she never heard the term before.

"Yeah," I said. "I think so. Just rabbit shaped."

"But I - " Artemis said painfully. "I cannot feel any of my Domains. They are gone."

"What have you been taught?" I asked and then a second later, I felt stupid.

She's been taught the same thing Apollo was.

"Your Domains aren't yours, you're just connected to it…" I trailed off.

Mortals could receive and use Names.

If Names needed Domains to exist first, then how did Kronos and Herakles get anywhere with theirs without being gods that actually had Domains? When they ascended, both of them got a Domain associated with their mortal Name.

Time and Heroes.

That couldn't be a coincidence.

"Connected to it?" Artemis prodded me.

"I'm thinking," I answered. "What would happen if someone Gave you a Name associated with one of your old Domains?"

"...does it matter?" Artemis was sad again. "There is no one who would."

For a minute there, I forgot there wasn't anyone Artemis hadn't screwed over.

"If we get out of this alive, you gotta stop that fucking people over shit," I said flatly. Seabiscuit looked over his shoulder at me in amusement as the rabbit shrunk into a small ball. "You helped Britomartis ascend. So she owes you, right?"

Artemis tried to make herself even smaller.

"I hate you." I'm not even going to ask what she did. "Kore?"

We both knew who I was talking about. Calling on 'Persephone' during the Night was risky. I had no idea of knowing who or what would answer right now.

Artemis didn't respond.

So maybe a few thousand years of watching your sister vote for screwing over the husband you actually like, Hades, wouldn't give you warm and fuzzy feelings.

"Apollo?"

"I will not take Archery from him!" She uncurled enough to spit.

"Do you want to die?" I spat back. "Are you a moron?"

"I will not do that to him!"

"It's just a Name!"

"Am I interrupting?" Luke's voice came from an empty patch of pavement before he walked into sight.

"No!" We both snapped.

Luke raised his eyebrows, but moved on. "We're going to have to go off the road a bit, they've got checkpoints into the city. Governor's orders, some kind of state of emergency." He nudged Artemis over and swung back onto his horse. She didn't look happy to be sitting in front of Luke's crotch, but it was that, his butt or back in his vest. She'll get over it.

"It's…bad."

"How bad?" I asked. Artemis was glaring daggers at me, but I ignored her. "Is it just as dark for them? Is Apollo taking the blame for this one?"

"They can't talk," Luke said slowly. "It seems to be better in some parts of the country for some reason. Whatever is helping, it starts in Houston going southwest towards Vegas and southern California." Artemis' ears flicked curiously. "That's why everyone is going. They can see that." Luke pointed up. I followed his finger, but there was just the void above us. "They don't know what's causing it. The Mist isn't doing anything."

"How can it?" Artemis murmured. "It cannot hide a lack of light because a protogenoi is eating it!"

"I mean, you can always ask my step-dad to give his Mist a boost - "

"No!" Artemis shouted at me, sitting up in alarm like just me opening my mouth was going to summon demons. Then she shrunk into herself, paws on her face. "Please no."

Now that I brought it up.

What do I call Time? From what Mom said, it sounded like she only wanted children out of him that weren't weak, not a relationship. So ex-boyfriend was probably wrong. What do I call my mother's baby daddy?

Does step-dad still work?

We weren't able to go off road, by the way.

The interstate highway we were on led right to a giant lake or river we had to cross. It was just like crossing into Quebec City or Manhattan. I wouldn't have expected it. I guess the Gulf of Mexico went further inland than I thought. We planned on swimming across for about ten seconds. That's how long it took for some kind of Loch Ness Monster Wannabe to decide to take a long look at us.

If I have to fight a monster underwater anytime this century, that's too soon.

It did jog my memory though.

"Oh right," I said, halfway across the bridge. My Sonic Blast was mostly slush, but the cheesecake was still good. "I think Kronos is in my freezer."

Luke choked on his Snickers.

Artemis might have had a heart attack.

"Pretty sure," I said. I tried to fish a piece of cheesecake out of my slush. I appreciated Seabiscuit trying to make it easier on me by not bouncing as much.

"You're fucking with me," Luke sighed as he waved his hand at the cars we passed and the people inside looked away.

I really am terrible on his vocabulary.

"No," I said, giving up and just tilted the entire thing into my mouth. "Longsh shtory."

"We have time!" The rabbit snapped at me.

I tossed the cup over the side of the bridge. There was a splashing 'snap!' as Nessie's cousin went for the Strawberry Cheesecake ice cream leftovers. Monster after my own heart.

"Met him in a Dream," I explained and Luke's eyes widened. "The Dreamlands - you know it," I said to Artemis, who maybe looked a little sick. Can rabbits throw up? "I've got a house there and he stopped by. We talked a bit - " Oh, right. "Okay, before you say anything, pulling him out of the Pit was an accident."

"...you what!?" Artemis exploded.

"I said it was an accident!"

Luke didn't seem to realize he was chewing on his Snickers' wrapper as he stared at me. He noticed a second later and pulled it out of his mouth.

"An…accident." He said it weirdly.

"An accident," I said firmly. "And he's still in pieces, so that was awkward."

"Awkward," Luke repeated blandly with a strange smile. "I bet."

I think he was just amazed I was willing to admit it.

Which, yeah?

Of course I'll admit it. I had nothing to hide. What was Zeus gonna do, smite me? I was going to pick a fight with my older sisters and hopefully figure out how to survive my mother.

The Titan Lord had never been my problem.

"Mom and him go way back, remember?" I shrugged.

Luke had asked on the train after Nemesis about the Titans. I didn't break Athena's rules (I think), but I did tell him the truth. He ruled well for a long time. Mom approved of him. Before the whole baby-eating dumbassery.

Luke's little smile got wider. "I remember. The Dreamlands, you said?"

"Morpheus usually guards the place," I told him. "When it's safer, I can show you around with Clovis and Ethan. They know it too."

Just because he wasn't my problem didn't mean the other demigods of Camp Half-Blood would be fine with being on the same plane of existence as the OG Worst Dad of the Year. I only remembered after it had already come out of my mouth. Luckily, Luke was used to me by now, so he just raised his eyebrows.

"You - I cannot believe you - why did you - how did - " Meanwhile, Artemis lost the ability to speak English. "How could you?"

"I said it was an accident."

"And you did not warn anyone?"

A little annoyed, I said, "Do I look like an Olympic demigod to you, daughter of Zeus?"

"He's right," Luke said mildly. "He's not."

"Thank you," I told Luke. "Besides, Dreamlands? I don't think he's going anywhere fast."

Artemis wasn't going to give up. "You just put everything at risk. Olympus has been a stabilizing force for Western Civilization - "

"Don't you mean the other way around - "

We crossed some kind of barrier or territory marker because something shifted its attention to us. It felt demanding, angry. Between the giant tentacle murder dog and this rabbit, I was not in the mood.

I opened my mind to it and snapped,

'What!?'

Whatever entity was watching over Houston, Texas just did what felt like a spit take.

It backed off and when it reached out to me again, it felt real polite.

Then it left.

Our argument died when this pressure in the air changed. I realized it was sound. It was still unnaturally hushed, but the ambient sound of a city was still there. There was a cool wind blowing. I couldn't hear tire treads on the road, but the wind carried the sound of faint car horns. I had no way of knowing if they were from far away or right next to us.

I meant that literally, by the way. When the wind stopped, the sound did too.

I held up a finger. "I thought Tezcatlipoca was asleep?"

The presence was there again, once again demanding, bloodthirsty and angry enough that Artemis' fur stood up on end as Luke hissed, "Names!"

Tezcatlipoca, the Aztec god of Magic, Cold, Death, Darkness and the Night Winds, the Smoking Mirror, paused.

This time the feeling I got was an 'oh, it's you' and then he was gone again.

"Tezcatlipoca." I said.

Yeah, he's decided to ignore me.

"Percy," Luke said, exasperated. "I could understand not caring about Olympian Names - "

"You think no one else knows my Mom is around?" I pointed out. "Kind of a Big Deal and not just to Greeks." Not sure why the Aztec reacted like that though. I didn't even get to introduce myself. "We're good. So…sleeping?" I prodded the rabbit.

"...I thought he was gone," Artemis said hesitantly. "I suppose the Night must have revitalized him…?"

Good point. Monsters weren't the only ones that would get a boost from the Night falling. Various gods of Darkness and Night would be able to do a little something. That was why Luke said it was 'better' in Houston and other parts of the country. Quetzalcoatl's brother was feeling protective of all the humans he was now aware of and I'm sure he's not the only one.

It wasn't like Night was actually trying to make things worse for everyone. Mom being a jerk was why we couldn't have nice things. Like sunlight. Night wouldn't be pushing back. The world going dark and quiet was just a little bit of collateral damage.

That made me feel better about the whole thing. Maybe Hypnos being grounded was okay too? All of the Young just had to earn their keep for a little bit.

Maybe Hypnos being grounded was okay.

I had a hard time believing that.

"Hey look." I pointed. "An obelisk!"

Luke humored me, looking. "Where?"

I bit my lip.

"Oh, right. It's a bit far. And dark."

The frozen ray of Ra's sunlight sparkled on the horizon as we rode our Thracians right into Houston, Texas. We dismounted in one of the lush urban gardens after passing about five police cordons, a few fires and fire trucks, some doomsday prophets with crowds and a llama.

I think they are native to Texas.

It was the highway sign above the traffic jam still reading, 'YALL NEED TO SLOW DOWN' that stood out.

The mix of gardens, trees and glass and stainless steel high rises along massive raised highways in Houston was weirding me out. It was pretty, but maybe that was just because the reflective buildings had taken on the appearance of a solid void in geometric shapes. State of emergency was right, police were everywhere, the streets were practically empty of people, the roads were full of cars and some storefronts were freshly looted with smashed windows leaving sparkling shards of glass on the dark pavement.

Luke looked around at the bright lights straining against the darkness (the power bill this month for everyone was going to be crazy) and the lines of cars on the highway looping around the center of the city. The quiet wail of sirens drifted on the wind.

Luke watched the thick plume of smoke from a building on fire blend right into the Night sky. "People lose their minds when something happens they don't understand."

"Mortals are weird," I offered. The bloodthirsty Aztec probably wasn't helping, but who knows?

He turned to me. "Now what?"

I thought about it.

"How do you feel about owing some gods a favor?"

He made a face.

Yeah, I wasn't thrilled about that either.

"Thanks for taking us this far," I told the horses. "Are you sticking around, in case we need a Plan F?" For Fail. Seabiscuit nuzzled me, blowing hot air on my face. "Thanks. Couldn't have made it without you."

I looked out at the skyscrapers and neon lights. This was starting to remind me of the first time I met Cliff. The sensation of being absolutely completely fucking lost on how I was going to do what Mom wanted me to do. That same kind of desperate, 'But I have to somehow' feeling was almost familiar enough to be comforting.

I guess there was no 'almost' about it. It was comforting. I just had to do whatever it took. Mom had no rules.

I squared my shoulders the best I could. Elder Gods not related to me were even more dangerous than the ones that were. We didn't want to owe any Young Gods. We'd get ripped off. Don't have any Texan demigods on speed dial. Dragging regular mortals into this as meatshields if we do get any unwanted attention was No.

I still hated Mom's tests.

But.

If I treated this Quest like one?

"Leave it to me. I have an idea."

---

"You have the worst ideas - !" Luke hissed from behind me as two kids and a rabbit walked the empty streets of Houston towards an Asian couple.

It was a good idea! Luke doesn't know what he's talking about.

If I had a nickel for everytime I had to ask a monster for help, I'd have fifteen cents. Which is not a lot, but the point is, it works. Cliff thought I was a dumbass (he's not wrong), but the smarter monsters were just like people.

And if this doesn't work out, they tend to die like people too.

"It's fine," I hissed back before raising my voice. "We've been walking around for a half hour, don't screw this up."

"Were you just walking around hoping to get attacked - "

And no one did! I heard Texans were nice, but even the monsters? What does a demigod have to do to get jumped around here?

"Excuse me, ma'am?" I spoke up. "Do you have a minute?"

The couple turned to us in surprise.

Well, the man did. The woman had already seen us coming and I was pretty sure she wasn't going to try to kill us in broad - uh, okay. There were lights everywhere. That counted. If I was wrong, Luke has the right to say he told me so.

Artemis can keep her mouth shut.

The woman pointed a slim finger at herself in a silent question. She looked like one of those shampoo commercial people with wavy dark hair. She had those kinds of nails that were just long enough to almost be creepy and you were sure they were fake. Hers weren't, pitch black and sharp enough to gut a rabbit. They were dressed like they were going somewhere nice with business casual, even though a couple of streets over, the shopping district looked like it had been trashed in a recent riot. That street was blocked off by police and the entire area looked newly abandoned.

It's just the kind of life I have that I was thinking 'one of 'em's a monster' instead of 'people are stupid.'

The hairs on the back of my neck shivered as the woman's purplish eyes looked me over.

I gave her my best toothy smile.

The feeling faded as she huffed in amusement and turned to her guy. "This will only take a minute, love."

There was a slight accent on the words, turning 'will' to 'bill' and making the 'th' of this harsh. He smiled at her blankly and just mentally checked out, looking east and not moving. If he had ever really been there in the first place.

Okay.

Maybe this wasn't a good idea.

Luke made a move for his lighter and I stepped on his foot making him hiss out, "Thank you, ma'am."

"So polite," she murmured as her eyes traveled over our little group. "You are, ah, kalahating diyos?"

A long barbed black tongue snaked through her lips to taste the air. I heard Artemis squeak from behind us as Luke shifted his weight from one foot to the other. The darker skinned Asiatic look she had was probably not a worn corpse, but I had no idea what she called us.

"Must be, to smell of stars."

"What?" I blurted out.

She could smell me? How?

"Oh?" She said idly and absently brushed back her long, black hair.The back of my neck shivered again as her voice dropped. "Do you not know your parent, little one?"

She took a step forward. I had Damocles out in a flash and Luke wasn't even a second behind.

"Let's not and say we did," I said brightly. "Come on, you seem like a smart monster."

"I am." She pouted even as she preened, eyeing our blades. "Were you not sired by Pinoy?"

"I'm Greek," I said quickly.

She's Filipino.

Great.

Monsters don't just move away from their Origin without something to sustain their myth. That was suicide. The Filipino pantheon was still in the Philippines and I don't think Texas has the population to substitute. Which meant…

I…

I actually do not want to fight this chick.

"Hemitheos?" She said curiously.

Artemis sucked in a breath and I could feel her press her head against my ankle in warning. It was the old Greek term for 'half-god' before everyone got punched in the face by Latin. The mangled French/English 'demigod' was standard now. Has been for centuries.

Age Estimation for this Monster: Pretty Fucking Old.

I really don't want to fight this chick.

Either she had enough of a Name to respawn endlessly (annoying) or she's been getting away with preying on humanity for that long (scary).

"Yes," I nodded sharply and lowered my sunglasses for a second as proof. Her eyebrows jumped in surprise and her eyes lowered to my neck with greed. A second was enough to see she would eventually burn. So she could die. That was good. "My parent is one of the protogenoi."

"Ah," she said with a gentle close-lipped smile as she lifted her eyes from my jugular. "That explains the stars. What is it you wished from me, child?"

"We need an escort to California," I said bluntly. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Luke's face make some interesting expressions. "Standard neutrality rules."

"Standard neutrality, of course." She laughed lightly like I wasn't serious, with a hand over her sharp teeth. "Sanatana Dharma or Shintō?"

"Shintō," I answered because Apollo had nothing but good things to say about Amaterasu. The Hindus scared him and Mom didn't like them either.

I said the words calling on the Japanese sun goddess. My accent wasn't just bad, it was aggressively American-bad. The nearby street light flared a brilliant sun yellow for a second anyway even though the head of the Japanese pantheon must be super busy.

Amaterasu's Bro Status: Confirmed.

"And you know what I am?" The monster asked lightly.

"Mandurugo."

The obvious predator in the monster's stance relaxed. It wasn't entirely gone, but I think I moved from 'prey' to 'curiosity.' So far, so good.

Luke didn't agree.

"What the Styx are you doing?" He hissed at me when I dragged my group to the other side of the road and knelt on the warm pavement to dig into my backpack.

"Getting us a ride out of here," I said. I pulled out the Ziploc bags of ambrosia and started stuffing all of the cubes into the biggest bag. "I'm going to need some of your blood. Yours too, Artemis."

"...she thought you were bluffing," the bunny said.

"I wasn't."

"Yes…" she said slowly. "You were not. Why do you know this? Are you sure you are a Greek demigod?"

"I am very certain," I said back to her in the 'Olympic' Greek she had been born knowing and watched the rabbit's ears go straight up in shock. I repeated what I said to Cliff a month ago after I shit my pants at school (thanks, Mom).

"Grecian born, Celt raised."

"What are standard neutrality rules?" Luke asked and it came out quickly. I looked up at him and he looked like he just realized he was drowning. He ran a hand through his hair as he paced on the sidewalk next to us. "What does being Celt have to do with anything?"

"It's everything. You're Greek. If she - " I waved my hands back at the monster. "Saw you on the train in Manhattan on a normal day, she would probably pretend she didn't see you."

Luke blinked, thrown. "Isn't the Curse just for - "

"Not having the Curse doesn't mean safe. You have blood and demigods are always healthier than the average human." I waved at her again. "Filipino vampire."

Luke's head swiveled back towards the monster who was inspecting her long nails. I knew what he was thinking. Greek vampires were Empousa and they had a donkey leg and a shining Celestial Bronze one.

Not subtle.

And each and every one of them were as sharp as a marble with the personality to match.

The aswang looked like a normal Asian woman with long nails and long hair. She even had the business casual blue blouse and gray-blue skirt with modest heels on. A nice purse was slung on her shoulder. As long as she didn't open her mouth all the way, you'd never know.

"Shapeshifters suck," I said as I helped Artemis cut her forearm and lifted her paw. "So do corpse users."

"Monsters…avoid us?" Luke said disbelievingly. "From other pantheons?"

"If an Egyptian roughed up Ethan, his mom - "

"Won't even care - " Luke tried to interrupt as he watched me add my blood to the plastic bag.

"Has siblings and cousins and connections including Hades and her parents that might do something about it!" I was getting angry, but not at him. He didn't know so he couldn't understand.

"You can always trust a Greek to be a petty asshole when it matters." I glared at Artemis when she looked like she wanted to say something. "They're shit, but some demigods would take being Greek over their own anyway. Because they're alive to be shit."

The Baltic pantheon had a single goddess, Saulė, left. The Yoruba were the only ones on the African continent that weren't wisps and the Egyptian pantheon has been locked away for millennia. The Celestial Bureaucracy tried not to screw their demigods over too much because they needed them. Just like the Norse needed the World Tree, Yggdrasil.

Luke took the Ziploc bag numbly. "What?"

"There are only a few Celts left." And some of those aren't even Celt anymore. "We don't have that safety net. We do what we have to. There's this girl, Evangeline. Her father is the Celtic King, Manannán mac Lir. She came to my tenth birthday party to say goodbye. The pixies ruined everything." Damocles refused to cut me, so I had to use Erebus' dagger. The Stygian Iron cut burned. "Her fault."

"Why was she saying goodbye?" Luke asked softly.

I brought it up and I still found myself hesitating. It felt personal. I didn't want to go into detail because it wasn't my story to tell. The truth is, if you have the power to spare, the obvious answer is to just make your kid a god too.

Manannán mac Lir would, but Eva knew that would cripple her father.

"She's throwing her humanity away." I shrugged uncomfortably. "Sometimes, you want to be a monster, if it means you live."

We just don't know if she'll even remember me afterwards.

It's okay. I wasn't surprised. Olympus used to outlaw demigod children with clear-sighted demi-aliens. The whole 'sometimes nothing happens and sometimes you get freaks of nature' thing. Even monsters could tell Eva was both powerful and nuttier than a box of peanuts, but that's because she's a clear-sighted demigod.

It wasn't mixing well.

I don't want to talk about this.

"Do you understand?" I said quickly.

Luke's eyes lowered.

"Borders don't matter during the Night. Anything goes. This isn't your world - " I stopped before I said the rest of what I was going to. It had just come to me automatically and I realized it was true, even though I didn't finish saying it. It wasn't Luke's world. It was mine.

"I get it," he said roughly. He stared at the bag. "This is normal."

"There are neutrality rules." Changing the subject was good. "The Sanatana Dharma are the Hindus." I made an exploding motion with my hands as my backpack balanced against my leg. "Big Deal, like my Mom. You remember Tsukuyomi with Corey?"

Luke nodded jerkily. Unlike before, we didn't get any attention. Only the clear-sighted with us mattered to the moon god.

"Some pantheons volunteered to be referees. The Hindu, Shintō, the Yoruba and the - " crap, can't remember the actual name! "The Babylonians. I used a Norito to call on Amaterasu to witness and by their rules, we pay for the favor. She gives us a token that we give back when we get what we paid for. It's just like swearing on the Styx."

Luke swallowed. "That was the light?"

"She's a sun goddess."

Luke's blue eyes darted between us, looking like his world view had just tilted again.

"...bargaining with monsters is normal," he said quietly like a weight fell off his shoulders. "Everyone else does it. There are rules. Without the Curse, monsters avoid us."

Was he okay?

Luke sucked in a breath. With a flash of Reclaim, spilled a bit of blood into the bag. "What are you going to do, when we get back the Bolt?"

"Shove it up Zeus' ass," I muttered. Dad told me not to make decisions when angry. I wanted to, though.

Imagine going out to eat at Olive Garden every day just to eat the breadsticks and you dump the rest out on the floor knowing just outside people were waiting by the dumpsters for the scraps. That was Olympus. Camp Half-Blood was an orphanage.

For no good reason.

My brain knew some demigods had it rough and before Mom left, I don't think I cared too much. I didn't realize that I was spoiled. My parents don't just love me, one is a lawyer and the other is a god. Apollo is my brother. I go to a private school and I really have to figure out how to describe my home without being awkward about it. I'm working on it.

But it was like knowing there were starving kids in Africa. Then you go to summer camp. You meet an ice goddess and actually, yeah, the gutter trash third world country was your own pantheon all along. The small hill I thought I was standing on suddenly became Mt. Everest. The bottom was a stupid long way down.

It hurts, like a splinter I couldn't remove.

"I meant with the thief." Luke double checked the seal on the bag. "The god of War had to steal it somehow?"

"The thief that's come the closest to triggering a civil war nobody can afford since Troy? One that would endanger my father? And millions of other people?" I said. "That thief."

"That thief," He said quietly.

I took a deep breath.

I don't know. I want to ask why they did it first.

"Okay, to be clear, you will help us get an escort to California." I said loudly as I stood up and took the bag from Luke. It was half-full of dark red mortal blood and I held it out in front of me as I walked back across the yellow divider line on the street.

"Yes." The vampire's eyes were locked onto the small plastic bag like a cat with a laser pointer. "I will personally introduce you to a...friend." She raised her purple eyes. "He will assist you. You have my word."

I'll take that. A personal introduction was more than I expected, but maybe we just smelled really tasty.

I tossed her the bag and in return, I snatched the 'coin' she tossed me out of the air. It was a shining gold bead, stamped with a symbol. It felt warm.

The aswang handled the Ziploc bag like it was full of liquid platinum. She also checked the seal on it, before gently placing it inside her purse. She took her thrall's hand again. He 'woke up' and blinked sleepily. He looked around and both of his eyebrows jumped when he saw us still there.

He said something to her, sounding confused, but relieved. She laughed, leaning into him. He nodded to us politely. "Tell me I didn't look too much like an idiot."

I blinked.

"You looked like you zoned out completely," I offered carefully. I didn't want to freak him out.

The man sighed and turned to the vampire. He shrugged and the movement of his collar showed some circular scars on his neck that would match her barbed tongue. "At least you didn't make me drool on myself this time."

I think he knows what she is.

Huh.

She is a smart monster. Not sure I like that.

She snorted and pulled him alongside her. "Come along," she tossed over her shoulder. "Aaron will drive us."

"When did I agree to this?" The man said, amused. She tilted her head towards him, giving him a look and he chuckled. "Just now, I see." He twisted around in her grip so he was walking backwards, giving us a polite nod of the head. "Aaron and this is Hiraya."

She hissed, turning him back around.

"What?" He asked, teasing. "You never introduce yourself…"

We walked behind them just far enough so we had to raise our voice a little for them to hear us. Luke's eyebrows were sharply drawn together. He wasn't even watching where we were going, which wasn't like him.

"You okay?" I asked.

He blinked up at me. "Just…wondering how many Greek demigods found a common cause with monsters."

"Greek demigods kill monsters," Artemis said strongly from his vest, poking her head out. We learned the hard way that rabbit feet couldn't handle the pavement for very long.

"Herakles' Scythian Dracanae girlfriend," I said dryly and watched her ears flatten in embarrassment.

"Apollo would tell you that story," she muttered.

If you're wondering, Scythian Dracanae were human women from the waist up, but had snakes for legs. Watching them walk-slither on living skis can give you motion sickness.

No idea what Herakles was thinking.

Don't you 'but she stole his horse' me. They had three kids and they weren't triplets. He even left his bow and belt with them. Dude has super strength and Athena on speed dial. If he didn't wanna, he ain't gotta.

But he did.

"It is just…" Artemis lowered her head. "We have never allowed demigods to presume obligations upon us. Any such agreement will not have any authority beyond their own and with the Curse...."

"When given the choice, Olympus will always choose the jerk option." I nodded sagely.

Her ears popped up. "That is not true!"

"Really?"

"Yes!" She hissed back.

"You're right," I admitted and watched her rear back in surprise. "They also choose the horny option."

Her ears flattened again as she took a steadying breath. "My Hunters are open to all pantheons. It took decades, but I negotiated for that, precisely for the reasons you described."

"They just have to leave all the boys behind to die," Luke scoffed. Then he grunted, so I think she kicked him in the stomach.

"Your friend - "

I held up a hand. "Don't. It was her choice."

Maybe being bound to Selene's heir would have helped, but we'll never know.

I doubt it.

"The Celts gave their permission," the rabbit said quietly. "I would have welcomed her."

"Yeah, well," I shrugged. "Not your fault, but it kind of is your fault, you know? You killed her mother about eight years ago."

The rabbit froze and Luke almost tripped over a crack in the sidewalk.

"What?" Artemis sounded rattled and almost scared. "I - no, I - I would not have- "

"It was your job," I said. "Sometimes, the clear-sighted go rabid and have to be put down. It happens."

"...do you hold that against me?" She asked, sounding tired.

"No? Why?" I was honestly confused. It happens. I thought they would have more time is all. "Just…don't expect them to thank you for it?"

Luke opened his mouth. I remembered he said his mother could See and that it wasn't doing her any favors, but then his face shut down and he said nothing.

We kept walking.

I usually don't do well with silence, but this time, I found it easy to keep my mouth shut.

You'd think driving deeper into the Houston metropolis with a vampire and her thrall would be awkward.

You would be right.

It wasn't as awkward as it could have been though, because Aaron was the kind of guy that would take falling out of a plane calmly as long as he had his morning coffee. He definitely knew what she was, they're engaged to be married in December and enthusiastic murder walks at night were a fact of life.

Some people were just made for tweed jackets and glasses and it was a tragedy that he didn't have either.

We were taken to a downtown area where all the lights on the side of the tall buildings were reflecting off the glass like rave party rainbows. The pitch black sky just made it seem even brighter, but you could see the line where the light died. Where the reflections up the glass windows on the high rises on either side of us just stopped and it was dark the rest of the way. Luke was squinting as he looked around. It was pretty empty here too with pockets of people that were stubbornly keeping their eyes forward and pretending everything was fine. We got some looks, an older teenager with a rabbit and a younger kid wearing backpacks following a woman that looked like she was in Time's Fortune 500, but no one stopped us.

The bar we eventually got to was one of those classy looking part dance club places that you see in the movies all the time. It said it was closed with a Public Safety Reminder sign that I didn't even try to read, but there was a stick figure man sleeping and being woken up by an alarm clock every two hours. There was a symbol on the door though. It reminded me of one of those optical illusions of a never ending staircase or maybe a little of Rhea's quirky sandcastle before the crowbar and was lit up with something that wasn't light.

Luke cried out, stumbling backwards as he clapped a hand over his eyes.

"His eyes are not fully open yet?" Hiraya clucked her long tongue as she opened the door. "Not like you then."

"Uh, no," I said. "He's…normal," I finished lamely. She sounded like you could learn how to see through the Mist. I didn't know that was possible. "Is that going to be a problem?"

The vampire's lips pursed.

"Not here," she said eventually. "Give it a few days," she told Luke as he blinked carefully like he'd been flashbanged. Her voice was too amused to be sympathetic. "The Night does not tolerate half-measures for long."

"What - " I started, but she had already moved on.

"This is the worst idea a demigod has ever had," Luke said flatly. "Ever. Of all time." This son of a bitch was stealing phrases from me now. "Artemis?"

"Do not make me agree with you," the bunny mumbled.

So my Quest members were jerks.

"It's fine!"

I almost took it back when just past the second set of doors this pale screeching thing lunged for Luke.

We both had our swords out before it ran out of its iron chain leash, causing it to crash back onto the floor in a tangled pile of pale, skeletal thin limbs. It looked like a two foot tall tick partially transformed into a person with brittle looking claws tipping its gnarled hands and a blood red protruding stomach. Blind eyes were fixated on Luke as it struggled to get back to its feet, screaming before Hiraya stepped in front of it.

The creature shrunk away from her and went quiet. Luke turned to me with an eyebrow raised.

I sheathed Damocles and ignored him.

"It has been a while since you brought anyone to me," the lone man at the bar with a bottle and a shot glass said.

His back was to us, but he looked like he could be one of Dad's coworkers with a tailored suit, briefcase at his side and boring haircut. He talked like his mother never taught him to swallow before speaking. The wrought iron cage on his head looked like it was all the rage among prisoners on death row back in the 1400s.

"I bring them only for you to speed them on their way out of my city," Hiraya said, rolling her eyes. "Desert escort to California. I am under neutrality," she warned the man. "No debts."

"Hmm." He reached for his lit cigarette and tapped the ash off of it. "California. A long way. Who are my passengers?"

Was he eating something? What was in his mouth?

"Greek demigods of Fate and Thieves," I spoke up. "And rabbit."

Artemis was dead silent and still, ears pinned back and rigid as she stared at the man's back.

"Fate?" He turned half-way around in the swivel chair so he could look at us with a slight turn of his head.

And was just a person.

He looked like one of those soap opera stars on the show my grandmother loves to hate watching with wavy blond hair, sharp jawline, a smile of straight white teeth and dark green eyes that shone in the dim light. Not like they were lit from within, but like they were reflecting themselves with an odd diamond shaped sheen.

Like they echoed somehow.

"Have you the talent?" He asked, still sounding like he was speaking around a golf ball.

We wouldn't be on this Quest if I didn't. The 'oracle of Chthon' crap still sucked.

"Yeah."

He flashed another movie star grin at me. "A simple courier task and a reading will do for payment."

"We'll do the courier first," I said. "You have the details?"

As the man opened his briefcase, Luke caught my shoulder. "Perce…"

"Mercenary work. Demigods are good at that." I said. "It isn't uncommon for mortals to work with monsters either."

Nnnnoooot the best idea if you don't know what you are doing and can't see through the Mist, but cold hard cash will get even monsters pretty far.

"That is no mortal," Artemis murmured.

"That is going to get us out of here." I didn't see what the problem was. Okay sure, dude was a little odd. Anyone wearing a cage on their head was going to be a few french fries short of a Happy Meal. That was just how it is. "Look, I know this seems sketchy, but neutrality rules. He will help us and we leave with no debts. That's what we wanted."

Luke pulled back. His face was scrunched up unhappily.

"That's what we wanted," he repeated slowly.

"You show no hesitation," Artemis observed very quietly. "Do you not feel that?"

Feel what?

It was a little cold in here, I guess.

"I've been doing this since I was eight," I told them with a shrug. "True foresight is rare."

There was a reason why Oracles were usually hoarded in one location. Well, okay, so, Greek Oracles were usually in one place because someone or something inevitably fucks them over so they can't just pack up and leave, but that doesn't count.

"That's going to pay for most of it, the errand will be nothing."

Luke ground his teeth. His blue eyes darted around the room one last time, taking in Hiraya leaning against the wall in the dark corner behind us. The tick thing was huddled at her feet, twitching in Luke's direction just to flinch away immediately. There was a full-length mirror on the wall on the opposite side reflecting a completely empty bar. Luke looked into it and went rigid.

The man found whatever it was he was looking for with a soft 'ah ha.'

"As promised, a simple fetch quest." The man smiled to himself. "I had this one earmarked for mortals, but your kind tends to be more effective."

Because he was facing us directly this time as he spoke, I saw what was in his mouth.

Slimy, green-black tentacles with pale white suckers writhed behind his straight white teeth like his tongue had been replaced with a deep sea squid. I wondered if he had been human at one point, but it didn't matter. He held out the paper and I stepped forward to take it. I didn't hesitate because there was nothing to hesitate over. The paper was just as he said. A fetch quest with directions, details, dimensions of the package, everything. It didn't look too bad. 4-5 mortals because the safe was guarded, but Luke could probably do this with his eyes closed.

"Thanks, man. We'll be back soon." I said.

Sometimes the best way forward was through, you know. It was the Night.

If you freeze, you die.

 

[Shujin]

I apologize for the delay, got and still am very sick.​

An Undertow of Sand
A PJO Fanfiction​

"Wait," Luke said. He held up both hands. "Wait, wait, wait."

I sighed. "Where'd I lose you?"

I was pretty sure I lost him somewhere between Hiraya getting annoyed at her buddy for what she called 'his usual cryptic nonsense' and Aaron inviting us over while she did what he called 'her anal-retentive thing.' She was not amused, but hey. We got blueberry muffins out of it.

I'm never going to say no to free food!

That meant I lost him before we even got here and I don't think it was anything I actually said. It was all in one ear and out the other.

By 'here' I mean Aaron and Hiraya's home. The fancy underground garage we were in looked like it was lifted from a Beverly Hills mansion with the ramp down and nice wood paneling. Which was fair, because the Beverly Hills mansion right in the middle of Houston, TX was just above it. Remember when I said she looked like someone from the Fortune 500? Apparently, she's actually a Fortune 500 CEO, because people expect those to be sociopathic blood suckers.

Hiraya told us that.

I was hoping that didn't mean her Board of Directors knew too.

"Is it the monster house thing still?"

"...no?" Luke tried.

"There are communities where monsters and demigods live together, you know."

The closest one I knew of was called New Rome. It was in California.

Luke gave me a helpless look.

"My best friend is a monster," I shared. "Cliff. He's the one that made my phone for me to get around the Curse." Luke's eyebrows rose, then dropped. "We've had sleepovers."

His Mastiff-headed mom makes a mean goulash. If you leave dirty dishes around though, her bark will scare years off your life.

"Even cyclops can eventually figure out refinancing mortgages are a scam - "

"Cyclops homes are usually demigod traps," Artemis said moodily from on top of her sleek Porsche perch. She didn't get a muffin, but she did get some blueberries. She was still a sore loser about it. "Most monster homes are."

"But not all of them," I countered. "Even for Greeks." I raised an eyebrow at her. "And maybe if you guys cleaned up after yourselves - "

"The Ancient Laws - " she began and I raised my eyebrow harder. I knew for a fact Artemis' old Hunting Domain was an exception when it came to gods and monsters. She shrunk back. "It is not that simple. I cannot exterminate children of Poseidon without consequence, even if they are monsters. Or children of the Night. Or servants of my father. Or -"

"Politics, really?"

Her rabbit ears flattened before she said very sweetly, "And why am I a rabbit, Perseus?"

So.

I'm not a monster, but if everything else were the same, would Mom care about that technicality?

Would my father?

"Alright," I admitted grudgingly. "You got me with that one."

Luke snorted.

"It's not just monsters either." I moved on. "All the gods I know - " I turned back to the rabbit. "You have joined the 21st century too, right? You don't just have your palace on Olympus."

"There is nothing wrong with our palaces," Artemis said stiffly as Luke rolled his eyes. "Naturally they offer any appliance or amenity we wish."

"And they are all tied to your godhood," I pointed out.

They were dollhouses.

They weren't homes, meant to be lived in. They were places to show off with rooms of nothing but trophies or statues or housing sacred animals. No bathrooms, or closets or anything unnecessary, every inch of it dripping with power because immortal god. Apollo snuck me into his once. After Mom left.

It was the closest he ever came to blinding me.

"My Dad cosigned a condo for Apollo," I told her. "He's paying rent with real money and everything."

Complete with the freeloading cat he swears isn't his.

"You…" Artemis stared at me. "...is that why his temples have gone unused lately?"

I smiled at that.

So the Greek sun god doth protest too much about his condo's Homeowners Association.

"So?"

The bunny shuffled a little.

"A log cabin," she admitted in a near-whisper.

"...yup," I said after a moment. "Should've seen that coming."

"What did you think she'd have?" Luke asked curiously. "A treehouse? An RV?"

"Shut up."

I didn't actually think that far ahead when I asked.

The Norse had a luxury hotel. Saule had waterfront property whenever she was on this side of the pond, Mom adored our penthouse and Eva's Dad was fixing up a nice Colonial.

"Really isn't that big of a deal," I finished.

"I - " Luke looked around.

A plush speckled gray and maroon carpet lined the underground garage outside of the concrete center where the vehicles were parked in a large semicircle. The Night reached here too. The yellow lights in the ceiling weren't as bright as they should have been, casting a sick, eerie glow on everything. It still left super dark shadows like pools of ink in the corners and underneath the trucks and expensive looking cars. Luke had looked at the dark glass wall that was the entire side of the big house as we drove up and the cared for green lawn and the aging woman that fussed over us and gave us muffins the same way he'd looked around Rhea's place.

Like he'd found himself on another planet.

"This is…a lot," he said helplessly. He waved a hand around at everything. "Alliances with monsters, other pantheons and their monsters, the primordials. I'm trying, but…I'm overwhelmed right now," he admitted. He took another deep breath and then in a very small voice said, "Nothing is going how I thought it would. It makes me wish - " He stopped.

I didn't know what to say.

"Sorry," I said uncomfortably.

He looked away. "Just want something familiar, you know?"

I thought about how I'd be if Mom made Dad raise me alone. Maybe I wouldn't even know I was a demigod until a satyr like Grover found me. If Mom only showed up to Claim me after I already turned twelve and spent the summer at Camp Half-Blood and then sent me on this Quest…

Then I realized I didn't have to imagine what Luke was going through. He was feeling exactly what I had been feeling when Hermes showed up at my front door and I had no idea what Mom wanted me to do.

"Yeah," I said quietly. "I know what you mean."

Luke took a fortifying breath.

"So this is normal too," he said.

"Uh, no," I said. "Not the…uh, not the millionaire with a mansion thing, but she's really old so...makes sense?"

Luke looked constipated again. "Percy."

"Same difference." I insisted. "Sometimes gods don't live in palaces…"

"And sometimes monsters do," Luke finished. "I just - " His face twisted up unhappily as he watched the small group of mercenaries or soldiers huddled against an armored truck. The truck was the same kind you'd see on the streets of Manhattan transporting jewelry or blocks of cash for casinos or banks. Someone over there turned on the truck's radio and the song that came out immediately made me roll my eyes. It made the Top 100 billboards this year, which meant it was everywhere. That one month at Camp away from normal life was even better than I thought.

Luke's nose scrunched, but Artemis' ears stood up, rotated in their direction. I stared at her, more disgusted with anyone than I've ever been in my entire life. I didn't have to say anything, but I wasn't about to let this atrocity slide.

"I can't believe you like this crap."

"I do not!" Artemis denied, but her ears didn't lie so easily. "What is it?"

"The Backstreet Boys," I snarled.

"I knew someone that hated them too." Luke snorted again, but there was hurt in his eyes for a second. "Big Green Day fan. Was."

Artemis' nose twitched. "Those names are ridiculous."

I flapped a hand at her. "Yeah, okay, Ariste."

Her ears flattened again as Luke turned to her. "You named yourself 'the best?'"

"I did not Name myself!" She whined and I held up a finger.

"You literally did."

"No," she said snippily. "Apollo thinks I did and he is still jealous I managed it and he did not."

I squinted at her.

The bunny made her eyes go big and innocent looking, every inch of her furry face screaming 'believe me' as she stared back.

"I will get back to you on that one," I said, pointing at her. "By the way, do you still have your 'I'm Awesome' Okeanid choir you extorted your dad for way back when or did you fire everyone?"

"Please do not call it that," she muttered, scrunching a little like I'd just poked her in the stomach. I noticed she did not deny extorting Zeus. Not that she could deny it. Because that is literally what she did. At three years of age. Let's face it, everyone's a brat at that age. You'd want a choir singing your praises 24/7 if you could get away with it too. "I did not 'fire' them."

"So you still have them."

The rabbit looked shifty. "I did not say that."

"Oh, so they quit," I said. "All sixty of them."

Artemis' ears flattened, but she didn't say anything.

"They quit?" Luke asked. When she still didn't respond, he threw back his head and laughed.

He laughed long and loud like it was the funniest thing he'd ever heard. Luke was the kind of guy that would smirk or chuckle at things, but this was the first time I've seen him really let it go. The yellow light of the garage caught the dark blond stubble on his chin and he didn't look like his dad at all just then.

His mom probably laughs like that, I thought. He never really spoke of her.

Artemis stared at him for a few seconds. Then she turned away, actually thumping the hood of the Porsche as she huddled into an annoyed rabbit loaf.

"Glad you find my misfortune amusing."

"It is kind of funny," I needled her. "How'd long it take? A month? Two?"

"I am not talking to you anymore."

"They quit," Luke wheezed, wiping tears from the corner of his eyes. "They fucking quit." When he finally came back down, he kneaded his cheeks and then gave us a small, genuine smile. "I needed that. Thanks."

I grinned back. Mission accomplished. "No problem."

Artemis huffed.

"Alright!" Luke clapped his hands, energized. "What the Styx am I even stealing?"

"A piece of paper in an envelope," I said. "It's a page from some old book or something," I offered when he turned to stare blankly at me. I dug out the paper Cage-Head gave me and handed it over, because he could read it a lot better than I could. Times New Roman, size 12.

Not even once.

"On loan from Harvard for a bit."

"Harvard," Luke said. "As in the university?"

"Yeah?"

It was the school I was aiming for. I just got out of sixth grade, but according to Grandpa, it was never too early to start thinking about college. I have no idea what degree I wanted, but it was Dad's old school. I wanted to go too.

"Harvard has things the mythological world wants?" Luke said slowly. Then he shrugged. "Sure, okay, why not…"

"Maybe Harvard even knows," I said. "You get gods like Khione who want a degree or two. You think she bothered with all the paperwork?" I mean, maybe. That same maybe was practically stamped on Luke's forehead. "And it's not like a clear-sighted person can't tell anybody. There are millions of them."

"And be believed?"

I shrugged. "Academic types are a coin toss. Some won't no matter what, but some will."

"Sometimes this happens." Artemis volunteered. Oh, so she won't talk to me, but Luke was fine? What an ingrate. "The Mist cannot hide everything, but mortals have always been a curious lot."

Luke frowned at that.

"And sometimes it's just on accident.," I picked up. "We'll visit the Natural History museum in Manhattan sometime," I offered. "Mom took me to their dinosaur exhibit? Wild."

It made me wonder if there was anything to Dad's stories about his school years. It was probably nothing, right? But he never could remember what those Greek texts he was translating were. The ones that gave him headaches.

Then again, Dad was under a lot of stress at the time and Mom at the end of his last year really didn't help. It was probably nothing.

Luke rubbed the bridge of his nose.

"Think of it this way," I said. "Do you really think the gods wouldn't leave random important crap around for just anyone to get their hands on?"

The tension in Luke's shoulders abruptly disappeared.

"You're right," Luke said in wonder as his eyebrows jumped. "Why should demigods be the only ones stumbling over it? That'd mean they have to be responsible. That's actually not weird at all. It's obvious."

Artemis grumbled wordlessly.

He started reading the mission dossier. His eyebrows started rising again as he drifted over the page. "...this is a lot of security for a library."

"Secret library," I corrected him.

"Sorry, secret library." Luke rolled his eyes. Artemis' ears wiggled as she raised her head curiously. "Why is this piece of paper worth stealing though?"

"That's a good question!" A cheerful female voice chirped and we all turned. "Careful asking those."

One of the (maybe) humans in the underground garage with us had wandered over. 'Incomplete' by the Backstreet Boys had blissfully ended and now it was Shakira. Don't ask me what song it was and don't ask me how I know that (Cliff. It's Cliff). I know a lot of things because I have a very good memory and sometimes it's a curse.

The woman was wearing a long sleeved red shirt under a ballistic vest with cargo pants and boots I was sure were steel-toed. She was a tall short haired brunette, which just made the tactical vest she was wearing carrying two pistols and some grenades stand out.

"Uh, hi," I said.

"Hello!" She said back happily. "Tell me you are a small fourteen year old. Please."

"You ain't police." Luke stepped in front of me. His accent was rough again. "Back off."

She held up her hands in surrender and took a step back. "Just wondering if you know what you're getting him into."

Luke gave her a narrow-eyed look. "Nun of yer business."

She tried to look over his shoulder at me, but Luke cut her off. "Right, right. Rule one!" She said loud enough to carry, like she was signaling the others. "No questions."

At the back of the room, the elevator lights lit up as the doors started opening.

"No, no, no!" One of the men behind her called back, waving a pack of Skittles as he leaned against the armored truck. "The first rule is don't be good at what you don't wanna do!"

"What was that?" Hiraya's snarl cut through the air as she stepped out of the elevator.

The woman grimaced, hurrying back to where the small human group scrambled to look somewhat professional. The joker cringed and hid behind a taller man who was standing at military rest with a small scowl and a half-eaten Kit Kat bar.

"Nothing!" He squeaked.

The tall man turned his head and straightened even more. Even though he was dressed the most casually with a short-sleeved shirt, jeans and sneakers with a baseball cap, he still looked like a professional soldier.

"Boss?"

The vampire glanced over us before her purple eyes turned on the mercenaries (?). "The demigods come first, understand?"

The soldier nodded. "Boss."

"They're not coming with us?" Luke said in alarm.

Hiraya raised one eyebrow.

"And why not?" She asked mildly as she threaded around a Jeep towards us, kicking off her shoes to lean against her black Hummer. "I do not know you. If I trust in your success just because you are a demigod, that would make me negligent."

Luke and I both turned to look at Artemis. The rabbit shrunk down on her Porsche perch.

"So," Luke began. "A monster can figure that out - "

"I know!" The rabbit hissed back as her ears dropped. "I know."

Hiraya eyed the rabbit thoughtfully. "If I did not ensure the Bishop did not price gouge you, that would betray your trust, making me dishonest." She flashed a small fanged grin. "And if I turned down the opportunity to observe you for future reference, that would make me an idiot."

Dude.

I know Mandurugos don't do well against blades, but, like…does that even mean anything with this one? She saw our swords. My confidence in that mattering is now in the negatives.

Have I mentioned not fighting her yet?

I don't think I have.

Luke was giving the vampire a thoughtful look. "You take this seriously."

"Force of habit," she answered simply, but the purple in her eyes brightened for a second. "I do not know how things here usually are, but where I come from a demigod may be meat like any other human. Or they may be a Hindu."

I winced.

"Yes," she said. "That is a mistake one will never make again."

That would be like if Hermes decided to bully Mom when he ticketed her, because Zeus' favorite son could get away with actual murder. And then Ananke was the one who got tired of his shit. Hindus were Matryoshka dolls and they got real good at hiding it. The one guy you thought was just a mortal demigod?

Maybe not so much.

Hiraya's lips pursed as she looked me over. "I have yet to decide which you are."

Huh?

"Just a demigod," I said brightly.

"Hmm." I don't think she believed me. "Regardless, your blood is very valuable. I would also prefer no debts."

My blood was valuable? I…did not know that.

Huh.

Sweet.

"Kapwa remains important, of course." She waved off our curious looks. "Interpersonal relationships are resources, use them or lose them. And you were polite," she added as an afterthought. "I do like that." Before I could wrap my head around the mystical powers of manners, she clapped her hands to get the mercenaries' attention. "Go time, people!"

When she walked off, Luke turned to me. "I don't like this."

He was eyeing the humans warily.

"What was that about? Earlier?" I asked him. "You were okay with Corey."

"Corey could See," Luke said sourly. "People like him, like us, don't have a choice about the mythological world. They're part of it. People like them." He sneered. "It's all a game or a profitable secret. Something they can just put down and forget whenever they want. Something to play with. To exploit. It's not real to them." He looked down at me. "They'll say they'll believe it, but they don't. They can't see it."

"You cannot see it either," Artemis said bluntly. "Not truly."

Luk's blue eyes cut to her angrily, before his eyes dropped.

"Not yet," he whispered. He looked back at me. "Mortals like them are unreliable. You can't trust them, not when it counts. That's what no lasting consequences do to people."

I looked back at the armored truck. Luke was making a lot of sense. I looked at them and saw a fact of reality I learned about in case I needed to use it. Luke looked at them and saw pretenders. Their jobs they chose to do were ideal for adult demigods that had nothing else.

If they lived that long.

"Oh," I said quietly.

"Looks like I can still teach you stuff, huh?" He gave me a weak smile. "Just…" Luke sighed. "Keep an eye on them. I'd rather rely on the vampire."

"Really? The vampire?" I couldn't stop the smug. And I didn't want to. "So you admit it was a good idea!"

He didn't even look at me.

"I can't," was all Luke said and just started walking towards the truck.

"Stop doubting me." I said to his back as I grabbed our rabbit and followed. "I know a lot of things!"

At least three people snorted at me.

I was never going to get any respect on this Quest.

I give up.

Riding in an armored vehicle with a bunch of professionals with pistols, grenades and actual assault rifles felt a little weird. The inside of the truck reminded me of those war movies that showed off the inside of carrier jets. Two rows of seats facing each other on opposite sides of the truck with harnesses instead of seatbelts and hard cushions. I buckled in, because Safety First, but I was too short. My harness was really uncomfortable.

Luke's words were still rattling in my head.

Unreliable.

My Celtic foster-brother had never been shy about involving mortals. I think it was how he met Eva's mom, but I really only knew of them. Apollo hired people to make his movies, but I don't think they knew what he was. Mortals working for monsters or gods and aware of it existed.

Somewhere.

Now they were right in front of me, double checking their wrap around sunglasses, night vision goggles and guns in case anything went wrong.

Well.

"Oh, you're adorable."

Most of them were.

"Who's a gorgeous wittle bunny?" The joker from earlier was a grown ass man with a Wildcats beanie on and a big box between his feet cooing over Artemis.

His short sleeved shirt showed off his biceps and a tattoo of the same pyramid you see on the back of a dollar bill with some dude in a chariot with winged horses flying around the top. The rabbit shrunk away, burrowing in the small space between me and Luke.

The man just grinned. "How old? Looks about five - six months?"

"Six," Luke guessed uncomfortably.

My stomach sank a little. That was why she was so small. If rabbits were anything like cats or dogs, they weren't fully grown until they were at least a year old. Artemis used to look like a girl my own age and now she was a young rabbit.

"Trace," the man introduced himself. "It's a code name, don't ask."

Luke and I both nodded.

Code names were a smart idea. Names matter to mortals too.

You didn't think it was a coincidence that Iris could just find my father behind divine wards with just his name? Or that all I needed to call Corey was his name? Some guys out there could really make you regret giving your name away.

"Is demigod official?" Trace asked curiously. "Like, you call yourselves that? And not like metahuman or halfa or anything."

I perked up. "Halfa?"

Trace nearly bounced in his seat as the woman next to him rolled her eyes. "Daughter's a big Danny Phantom fan," he explained. "Don't have the heart to tell her that's not how it works."

"Technically - " I started but Luke clapped a hand over my mouth.

"No," he hissed at me. "They don't need to know." I pouted. Fine. Unreliable. I'll try to shut up. He raised his voice to speak to the mercs. "Please don't encourage him."

Artemis protested being squished with a squeak, making Trace go all gooey again. The short haired happy woman on their team laughed while the other just snorted.

'Cross' was the bubbly one with a nice sleeve tattoo of horses and other farm animals that you could only see when she rolled her sleeve up. Otherwise just the edge of it peaked out above her collar. 'Torus' was a quiet pale pony-tailed brunette that looked at us like she was taking us apart in her mind. 'Rabbit' was ironically the soldier guy with the submachine gun and Air Jordan sneakers. He was driving and was the leader of the small team. They belonged to an actual private military company called Carcosa Security Solutions, like Blackwater if you know them, but for our side of the world.

"It's not really money laundering," Cross said.

I wondered about that. Maybe she was right? It's not like getting paid by mythological beings was illegal, right? And half the time what they did wasn't illegal either and as long as it was reported for taxes…

You know?

I think this is the first time in my life that I need to ask my father a question about how the mythological world works.

"The contracts are real, we just can't tell anyone else who hired us. The money is real too."

"Kind of," Trace said.

"Not even kinda," Cross snipped back primly. "Gold is gold. It's not going to disappear."

"Yet," Trace mock-whispered. "It hasn't disappeared yet." Cross hit him. "Ow! I'm just saying, all this Harry Potter shit is cool, but magic money? Come on, at least we get paid in cash."

"It's not magic money," I couldn't help saying. Luke twitched and I knew why. Trace was someone who didn't really believe. "Look."

I dug into my backpack, found my wallet and pulled out a gold Drachma. I tossed it to the guy and watched him lift his eye protection to boggle at it.

"Is this - ?" He nibbled on it and then examined the teeth marks. "Well. Shit."

"Why are you slobbering all over his money - " Cross snatched the coin from him when he went to chew on it more, wiped it off with her shirt and tossed it back. "You could have just used your fingernails," she told him. "I apologize for him. He was dropped on his head a few times as a baby."

"Wrong!" He said cheerfully. "However, I might have exploded myself a few times." He nodded down at his box. "You need demolitions, I'm your guy!"

"It's a university," Luke said. The unasked question 'Why would I need to blow anything up?' was clear in his voice.

"It's one of those private, fancy ones that opened after it's namesake got murdered," Trace said in a theatrical spooky voice. Fingers wiggling at us and everything. "I - " He stopped. "I was about to ask if you believe in ghost stories, but wow, I'm stupid."

Luke rolled his eyes.

"I won't need your help," he said with a small sneer.

Cross' eyebrows jumped. "That confident, huh?"

"There's a billion alarms," Trace cut in. "Motion sensors, cameras, infrared lasers - "

"The local police are real serious about any goings on," Cross said grimly. "Always have been since the place was founded."

Luke turned to the window where the bright lights of a city trying to fight back against the darkness blurred past in a constant stream of color.

"My father is a god of Thieves," he said softly. "I'll be fine."

The mercenaries all exchanged looks until the quiet woman, Torus, inclined her head.

"Sure, kid," Cross said gently and Luke bristled, but he didn't say anything. "We'll be ready though, just in case."

"I'll be fine," Luke snapped stubbornly.

About a ten minute drive later, Luke was looking a lot less fine.

We all stared at abandoned long tables with a blue and white banner hanging from it congratulating recent graduates. Rice University had a really medieval look, more like a castle of red brick than a school. The main campus was in a square with little towers rising in the corners of long, stately buildings boxing in a simple courtyard. The main building in the center looked like it was just missing a portcullis and maybe some archers with boiling oil to be ready for an invading dragon. The school even had a medieval coat of arms.

Three white Athenian owls on a blue shield glared back at us from the banner.

Actual Athenian owls, no joke. Like the ones you find on coins from Greece's Classical period. Suddenly, this place having super rare books or pages monsters wanted didn't seem so weird.

"So, uh," Trace said quietly from behind us. "I can spare a couple of bombs."

Then he yelped, so I think someone kicked him.

Luke palmed his face.

"Stealing from gods," he muttered as he dragged his hand down, pulling at his cheeks. "This is just my life now."

I opened my mouth.

"No," he said.

"Oh come on!" I threw up my hands.

"If it helps," Artemis ventured quietly at his feet. We all ignored Trace squealing 'Disney rabbit!' "This was likely just dedicated to her and not anything close to a sacred site. She is also very busy right now."

Luke looked constipated.

"It's practice," he said eventually, convincing himself. "For California." He turned back to the mercs. "I could…use a few grenades," he said hesitantly. "And a smoke one, if you have it."

"We gotcha, kid," Cross said.

I inspected the school.

There were wards.

I could feel them. They felt like they were sleepy. The kind of half-awake dozing off when you want to say you're looking out for trouble but don't expect anything to actually happen. That could change really quickly though.

The crunch of boots on the pebbly ground of the massive courtyard told me one of the mercs was approaching. When I looked, it was Torus.

"Feel them?" She said quietly.

"Yeah?"

"Sensitive," she observed. I didn't have to see her eyes through the eye protection to feel her look through me. It felt a lot like how Athena looked at me. I was pretty sure she wasn't a god, but I was going to trust my gut. And my gut said something was off about her. I thought that maybe she was a demigod, but they've never had enough power to stand out before.

Some other kind of half-blood?

"Why do you feel them?"

"Sensitive," was all she said.

At some point, the team gave up on Luke's pockets and just shoved him into one of their tactical vests. He was twisting around, rolling his shoulders and getting used to how it affected his movement when one of the doors into the school opened up in a side building. He froze but Cross held out a hand.

"The Bishop arranged for one of the current students to let you into the buildings," she said quietly as the tall figure in a white and blue blazer over a dark hoodie jogged towards us. "Something about the protections on the place."

"You will be on your own after you get in," Trace warned.

Luke nodded.

The student was the type of guy who could audition for every football jock in every Disney show that ever existed with brown hair, eyes and a square jaw. He looked at us nervously. I don't think he knew what to make of a SWAT team dressed like they were at a backyard BBQ under their gear, a middle schooler, a rabbit and Luke.

"The moneh?" He shoved his hands into his blazer pockets, hunched over. He had a softer Texan accent than J.D had.

Rabbit held up his cellphone, making Luke shuffle away from him like it was contagious. "Sent."

His head bobbed. "Who am I takin'?"

"Me." Luke stepped forward.

I watched him disappear into the building.

"I don't like this," Trace said, which did not help the sinking feeling in my stomach. At all. "We've been planning for three weeks."

"He said he didn't need help," Cross said, but she was just as unhappy.

"A lot of those traps are lethal - "

"Trace."

"We still don't know how to get around that recording - "

"Trace."

He went quiet, but only for a second. "Rabbit. Back me up here."

The soldier grunted. "...should have cut power."

Cross groaned. "Not you too."

Rabbit grimaced. "And given him the floor plans. NVG. Walkie talkie."

"Radios would bring down monsters," I cut in because the Curse was stupid like that.

It's why my phone was made by Cliff instead of getting a regular cell phone from my parents like normal kids. It was Hera's last laugh. The Curse affected all Olympic demigods, but monsters were suspiciously sensitive to a demigod messing with air or electricity or both and it didn't age well.

"We've got reports of some perro negros in there," Trace said flatly. "I don't think that matters."

Okay.

So.

Spanish hellhounds were slightly more concerning.

"He can take them," I said, but I bit my lip.

He can. They were nothing compared to Ladon, but if he was expecting them to fight like their Greek counterparts just because they looked similar…Artemis nudged my ankle. She didn't complain when I sat down on the gravelly courtyard next to her and straightened her jacket. And rubbed her ears a little.

She was very fluffy.

"Hermes is proud of his son for a reason," she said quietly. "Have faith."

But if anything went wrong, we wouldn't hear anything.

The Night dragged on.

I don't know how long I sat there waiting. Maybe it was a little over a half hour? Or maybe a full hour and a little bit? All I knew was that my ass was beyond numb. I was cold, my stomach had finally settled somewhere in my big toe and I was going crazy.

There are only so many times you can play rock, paper, scissors with a rabbit before you want to break your own fingers.

The first sign something was happening was when Torus' head turned.

Then an explosion blew out the wall way down at the end of a side building opposite from where Luke entered. It was nothing more than a quiet 'whump' sound, but the bricks blowing out with billowing dark smoke told the whole story.

I don't remember the run. I must have gotten up and started sprinting before everyone else reacted. That's how getting from Point A to Point B works. I dove right into the smoke. My eyes started burning immediately. There was this smell, like rotting garbage left out in the hot sun for a few hours. There was this thing on the ground. What I could see of it looked like a twisted, starving werewolf mid-transformation, but it was missing its head. I opened my mouth to shout when my Spidey Sense screamed.

My arms shook as I blocked Luke's shining Celestial Bronze sword with Damocles. "Uh, Luke?"

I'm hoping this was Luke and he was just jumpy.

Luke wouldn't hurt me.

I don't know what I'd do if it wasn't him at the wheel.

He blinked cloudy blue eyes at me.

"Oh hey, Percy," Luke said with a wide, almost manic grin. He stopped trying to kill me. That was appreciated. "You came out of nowhere."

"Yeah, sure." I said. I didn't lower my sword until he did, but I kept it drawn. "You good?"

"This ring." Luke held up his hand, not noticing that I was still pointing my sword at him. "Air flow!" Luke laughed out loud. "I could see things before I entered the room! And my lighter!" He waved his sword around.

I leaned back out of his reach. "Can we - can we not."

I was starting to wonder where he found the Red Bull.

"Percy." Luke said very seriously. "I can explode things!"

Or the drugs.

Maybe he blew up a few blocks of some professor's cocaine stash and breathed in the smoke because his pupils were dilated. He couldn't seem to stop smiling. He dug into his vest and pulled out a squashed manilla envelope "I got it."

"Okay," I said slowly. "Can we get out of here?"

He blinked again. "Oh. Right."

He tripped on a few of the bricks, before he seemed to realize that the ground wasn't flat anymore because of the debris. He coughed once as he stumbled clear of the smoke.

"Are you okay?"

"Great!" He exclaimed as he whirled back towards me, hands flung out to his sides like a conquering general. A shining sword in one of his hands with the threads of adamantine in it almost glowing and the other clutching the envelope. "I missed this!"

Behind him, the mercenaries were just catching up at a jog. I vaguely registered Artemis running up too and the relief on Cross' face as she said something, Rabbit on his phone, but my world had already shrunk down to Trace. Some ADHD hyperfocus thing, or maybe it was just the adrenaline still going from the explosion. Because joking, concerned Trace -

Trace was pulling out his pistol.

I want to say that I reacted like a stone cold badass. Someone pulled a gun on me a couple feet away?

No problem.

But the truth is my mind went something like this: WAGLBLARGHWAGHGUN!

Twelve year old Arnold Schwarzenegger with cerebral palsy.

I charged him, sword out. The moment his target switched from Luke to me shivered down my neck. I didn't see the bullet, but I must have felt it. My arms snapped up. The impact vibrating through the hilt was almost gentle and then I was on him.

"Whoa! Whoa!" Trace yelped as he tried to spin away. He was too slow. The only thing that saved him was his bullet proof vest cracking under Damocles' edge.

Get the gun, I thought. I lashed out with a hand. He was fast for a human. I missed the fingers I was aiming for, but when I closed on his forearm I could feel it give under my fingertips. He cried out and dropped the pistol anyway. I kicked it away, but my neck was still screaming. I brought my sword around immediately and the steel blade of a Ka-Bar knife in his other hand shattered on the silver-gold rippled edge. I thought I was doing really good until he dropped that too to jab me in the face. I felt my nose break under his knuckles as stars exploded in my eyes.

Note to self: Spidey Sense is only for shit that will kill me.

Trace couldn't follow up on it, throwing himself backwards on the ground to avoid Luke. The Celestial Bronze of Reclaim would pass right through a normal person, but Trace didn't need to know that.

"Now, that wasn't very nice," Luke said slowly. He was still smiling as he lazily spun his sword in his hand, but it had that mean edge I'd only seen a few times before. He looked around at the stunned faces of the other mercs. "I thought we were all in this together."

In a second, they realized what had happened.

Trace went for his dropped gun, but Rabbit stomped on his hand and he shouted, "Torus!"

Fuck -

I was already moving, lunging towards her when a brilliant flash of light swept over me.

I froze.

Not by choice. My body stopped moving, like I had gotten caught by Weird Girl's voice back at Camp again. I tried to fight against it. It felt like trying to break handcuffs when your muscles wouldn't even respond.

My stomach did.

A low vibration, like it was rumbling with hunger.

Be at peace, whoever was in Torus spoke with a genderless voice. Her eye protection was gone, showing eyes of fractal patterns like a cut gemstone. Mom's black diamond, but each facet was a different color as they turned in increments, grinding against each other like gears in a clock.

I am not here for you, abomination.

You think I give a shit? I thought as I kept trying to move. I was trying to do something with my power, but my stomach was still stitched shut. I was caught like a fly in a spider web as Torus walked through the frozen mercenaries, over Artemis towards Luke. Even Trace was still on the ground, teeth still bared in the 's' sound of 'Torus.' The whole world, or maybe just our little slice of it, was frozen in time.

She passed me and I had horrid thoughts of Luke being killed right behind me while I sat here, unable to do anything. I just needed to move!

I blinked.

My heart leapt. I didn't try to say anything. My stomach felt like it was starting to cramp, but I didn't care. My brother said I had the key, right? I needed this door open. Right now.

My raised foot was inching towards the ground when Torus sighed.

Authentic. Good.

Then it was over.

I nearly fell forward onto my face. My stomach hurt like I had too much ice cream. Time stops are bullshit. I hoped I wasn't going to throw up.

"Pers - " Artemis had started to cry out, tripping over her own paws as she was suddenly in motion again.

"What the fuck - " that was Cross.

Trace snarled at all of us like a cornered animal. "Fiat lux!"

Rabbit's gun spoke for him. It was a muted crack. Someone stepped on a Lego and broke it. Then Trace slumped over onto the ground, a bloody hole in his head.

"What just happened?" Cross yelled. Rabbit just shot the body a second time before turning back to his cellphone. I spun around to check on Luke. He looked unhurt, but was staring at his empty left hand where a manilla envelope used to be.

"Luke?" I asked.

"What happened?" He whimpered and I got worried, stepping closer. Was he hurt? Did Torus do something to him?

"I think a god interfered."

"I was robbed?" Luke murmured. "By a - a god robbed me?"

Yeah, no.

He's fine.

"Looks like it?"

He sounded way more offended at being robbed of the thing he just stole than worried or hurt. I let myself relax. We're fine. Threat was gone.

And if it showed up again, I was going to eat it.

"Do you know who that was?" I asked Artemis as she bounded up.

The rabbit shook. "No. I was trapped. Completely."

So I was the only one who saw anything.

Unless her code name was a clue, all we had was Trace. But he was left behind and if he knew his accomplice was a god, he wouldn't have needed to pull a gun on us, right? So maybe he didn't know. Two traitors in a small team of four would have the element of surprise.

But she was...

Something.

"And you!" Luke derailed my train of thought, pointing at me incredulously. "Did you just deflect a bullet? From ten feet away?"

I think I remembered that being a thing that happened. I fiddled with my sword pendant necklace.

"I think so?"

"Nice," Luke said appreciatively. "Don't do it again."

"You'd rather I be shot?"

"I'd rather you dodge."

Alright.

That was fair.

"You sound like my father," I complained anyway, crossing my arms, because fuck you, blocking a bullet was awesome.

I was absolutely going to do it again.

"I am your Camp Counselor," Luke reminded me. "I can ground you too."

"No, you can't."

"Yes, I can."

"Chiron would never let you."

"You think I care what Chiron thinks?" I opened my mouth. Luke raised an eyebrow. I closed my mouth. "Good boy."

"Oy."

Luke shook his head and smiled a little. "Want to hear about the theft?"

"Hell yeah."

Artemis let out a wheezing bunny sigh.

"Shake a leg!" Cross yelled at us. "ETA on police is five minutes!"

We all scrambled after the mercenaries. This time Cross claimed shotgun in the passenger side as Rabbit tossed Trace's corpse into the back with us. A roar of the engine and crunching of the tires on the gravely pavement, then a harsh bump as I tried to buckle my harness. Artemis huddled in the small space between me and Luke again and I could feel her trembling.

Luke hunched over in his seat, elbows on his knees. His lighter in one hand. He flicked the flame on and then turned it off. The city lights streamed by in the small windows of the truck. Eventually, he clenched his empty hand into a fist trembling with rage.

"When I find out who that was - do we know who that was?"

"No."

There was Latin involved. Which didn't actually mean anything.

Everyone and their grandmothers thought the Romans were cool.

"When I find out who that was - " Luke continued, like he hadn't stopped to ask. "I will be the biggest pain in their ass - "

"Please do not declare war on foreign gods during this Quest," Artemis murmured. "I am begging you, Zoë." I felt the bunny immediately stiffen as Luke's head whipped towards her. "Luke. I meant, Luke."

Too bad Luke was not interested in letting her get away with anything.

"What did you just call me?"

"It was an accident!" The bunny sounded shaken. "You are just…similar. Nothing was meant by it. It - It is a compliment."

"Like Hades it is," Luke snarled at her. "Being compared to one of your people is the second to last - "

"You are protective of Perseus," the bunny said loudly. "You have thrown yourself into situations that should have killed you without hesitation. You are constantly getting on my nerves, but you are still helping me and your rage scares me. I do not want you to declare war on foreign gods because I am very sure you will actually do it!"

Luke's mouth opened and then he closed it.

I had to close my mouth too.

I knew about him getting on her nerves. It wasn't like that was subtle, but I didn't think she really noticed him beyond that.

"How do you know that I will?" Luke said softly.

"Perseus told me about the boon," she said meekly. "And you told me that I was a disappointment. My throne only fit to be ground to dust."

Luke took a deep breath.

"Since then, you have nearly died for it, but you have not complained. You do not hesitate. Even Perseus has hesitated." Artemis shrunk into a little ball. "I know you despise me. I am not stupid. You still do not hesitate. Do you know how terrifying that is?"

So this was awkward.

"And Zoë…" Artemis went quiet. She shuddered once. "Only two of my former Hunters were made monsters. She made me stop." Her voice drifted. "She made it all stop. By being the person who came the closest to killing me since my father."

"Ballsy," my mouth said ahead of my brain. "Isn't she mortal?"

I remembered the Persian princess look-alike with the fractured nebula swirling in her eyes. I especially remember the sneer she pinned me with for the crime of volunteering while male before handing a small bunny rabbit to Luke.

"Yes," the rabbit said almost fondly. "She has always been a very brave girl."

"Zoë?" Luke said incredulously. "Zoë Nightshade, your lieutenant. Tried to kill you."

"It - it was a long time ago," Artemis sighed. Her voice picked up with a bit of humor. "At one point, I was fending off assassination attempts from her every day for about three weeks."

"What did you do?"

And just like that, the humor died.

"Was myself." Artemis tucked her face underneath her paws. "I am my father's favorite daughter, because I - I was just like him. In every…single…way."

Did she mean...?

Yikes.

"Past tense?" Luke said evenly.

The bunny trembled. "I hope so, but it does not matter. It is too late."

"Don't give up," I told her. Apollo said she had changed and even if she remained a rabbit, a rabbit with a Name was a lot less dead weight. "We'll figure out something."

We all ignored the corpse on the floor of the truck as we sped through the streets of Houston. I didn't feel any kind of way about it. Maybe he had a life insurance policy, or maybe the kid he mentioned was made up. It was just like Luke said and he tried to kill me. Don't get me wrong, I'm not going to just let myself get murdered, but if you tried and then said you were sorry and you meant it, we just might get along. I don't hold murder attempts against people.

Betrayals are a different story.

 

[Shujin]

Being sick is not fun, at all. Sorry for the delay.​

An Undertow of Sand
A PJO Fanfiction​

Trace's body hit the concrete with a heavy thud.

"Great googly moogly." Aaron's eyebrows shot all the way up before coming back down. "It all went to shit."

He was barefoot with a silver Gameboy Advance, curled up on the hood of the red Porsche behind his fiancée like he was five years old gaming in a corner. In front of Hiraya with a corpse at our feet and Luke at my back felt just like standing in front of the principal of my last school with my father, waiting to get expelled.

By the way.

'Disturbed child' my ass.

I drew some pictures of my classmates' ghosts, so what? Who thought a loaded and armed cannon any idiot could set off in the front yard of an elementary school was a good idea?

Not me.

"Mission failed successfully," Rabbit deadpanned. He nudged Trace's body with his sneaker. "Operation FUBAR'd, associates secured."

"Foobar?" I whispered, leaning towards Luke.

Luke huffed, a little exasperated, a little amused. He bumped my shoulder with his elbow.

"Fucked up beyond all recognition," he said back just as softly.

"Two traitors," Cross rushed ahead. "They were after the mission objective for an unknown benefactor from the beginning." The woman was cringing. "Our only clue was - was a Latin phrase…" Cross swallowed. "I think it was from the Bible?"

Technically, 'fiat lux' is found in the Roman translation of it and Romans are the mythological world's Hot Topic.

Hiraya frowned. "But you did retrieve the package?"

"Um, not exactly?" Cross was making her six foot frame as small as possible. You could tell she wanted to be anywhere but an underground garage lined up in front of a disappointed Filipino vampire.

Which, same.

Cross was jumpy because Hiraya was her blood sucking employer. I was nervous because I felt like the gold bead 'coin' of my deal was burning a hole in my pocket. It's been a while since we were at Camp, but do you remember when I told Athena I've never done readings for other people?

Yeah.

I had my visions, but I couldn't control when I got them. Apollo figured out I could read cards by accident while teaching me Poker (Prophecy and Probability don't get along). I don't know how that works either. Trying to bluff might not be a good idea.

I was an Oracle now, so I can probably figure it out!

Eventually.

"You said the demigods were a priority so…" Cross nodded down at the body. "Trace was human, Torus was…" She hesitated and looked around at the rest of us. "Not?"

"Not," Luke agreed. His face dropped into a scowl. "And she robbed me."

I elbowed him. Hard. "Will you let that go al - "

"No," he snarled back.

"Her file said she was a half-blood, no pantheon or type specified. Might have been a magic user too," Rabbit mused thoughtfully, rubbing his chin. "Those are always a bitch." Soldier boy was talking like a normal person with full sentences and everything. All it took was discussing who or what just fucked us over. "Can't be a monster, da?"

"She wasn't. Definitely a god, one hundred percent," I said, but then I thought about it. "Well, okay, maybe she was possessed - "

'Possessed?' Luke mouthed, confused.

"So more like fifty-fifty?" Rabbit concluded as Cross' blue eyes ping ponged between us. "Sixty-forty?"

"Ninety-ten," I denied. "Come on, you were planning for three weeks. She should have burned up unless she -

"Could have been a spy and only offered to be a vessel for the actual mission - "

"...what?" Hiraya croaked as she stared at us with this bewildered, horrified expression. It was a rare kind of monster that wanted gods to look anywhere in their general direction.

"Divine asshole jumped us for an exam cheat sheet," I clarified for her. "We got nothin'."

Aaron snorted.

dun-dun-dun-DUN-DUN-DUN!

The airy MIDI tones of the Pokémon Emerald theme rang out from his silver Gameboy Advance before he muted it.

"Sorry," he said sheepishly, stubbornly staring at his screen, holding his Gameboy up like it was a shield.

Luke started to laugh, but it turned into a gurgle when the vampire cut us this look. My hair stood on end and it had nothing to do with my Spidey Sense.

"Not our fault!" I blurted out.

"What he said!" Luke said just as quickly.

Artemis just squeaked and hid behind us.

"A god intervened," Hiraya said slowly. She was giving me a considering look. "Are you sure?"

"Yeah." I shrugged. "Pretty sure. Not many can pull off a casual time stop and their eyes were - "

"You saw them?" Artemis interrupted from behind me.

"Yeah?" I twisted around to look down at the bunny. "I couldn't really do anything though?" And that was still annoying. "But they said they weren't after us - " Where do they get off calling me an abomination? Rude. "And that the page was authentic and - "

"Stop." Hiraya looked pained. "Stop." Her purple eyes slowly moved between the quiet mercenaries, then me and Luke (totally innocent), the cringing small bunny on the floor before finally rolling towards the ceiling.

"Hoping you can tell us what the fuck is going on this time," Rabbit said shortly and then let out a delayed, "Boss."

"...I do not know," Hiraya admitted. She looked down at Trace's body uneasily. "There was no indication that the package was of particular importance…"

It was just a page from some book.

"Intel was wrong," Rabbit concluded.

"Yessss," Hiraya hissed softly. "Ignorance or did someone lie?" Cross took a step back at the flash of the vampire's fangs. "The usual post-mission details apply." The monster said flatly. "You will be paid the full amount as agreed."

"Really?" Cross blurted out and Rabbit twitched as Hiraya knelt down. The vampire hooked a finger in the back of Trace's bulletproof vest and easily hauled the body up to look him in the face. At least two hundred pounds, balanced on a pinky finger. His glasses had fallen off. Trace looked just like one of my ghosts: dried blood down the side of his slack face, waxy looking skin and his eyes were still open.

"You're still paying us?" Cross continued. I think Rabbit's increasingly obvious twitching was some kind of signal to shut up, but she kept going. "Just like that?"

"She's a good boss," Aaron said defensively, glancing up from his quest to be the very best. "She's not going to punish you for something that's not your fault." He sounded very reasonable as he pointed his Gameboy at the corpse his fiancée was inspecting. I was impressed. Even Dad would be a bit disgruntled. "So relax."

"And I'm only paying two people and not four," Hiraya murmured absently. She raised her free hand to Trace's face as the purple in her eyes seemed to glow. I felt Damocles jump around a bit on my necklace. "Competent help is hard enough to - "

(Looking back, it's scary how quickly my luck could turn on a dime.)

My Spidey Sense screamed.

"Down now!"

I didn't recognize my own voice.

"Wha - " Cross started.

Time slowed to a crawl.

My vision tilted as I fell, Luke pulling me down with him. I saw Hiraya react even faster than we did, throwing Trace's body back into the armored truck. His face was just starting to swell up with cracks of light breaking through his skin when the doors closed on him. Even in slow motion, the vampire was just a dark blur bursting out of her skin. I could see the shock on Aaron's face as he was yanked right off the hood of the Porsche onto the ground before they were both enveloped in large blood red wings.

Rabbit hit the ground beside us. Artemis dove for Luke's side. Cross turned.

The truck exploded.

My world was still spinning. I felt like I was at the top of the drop slide at the water park. Just starting to slip. I looked up and I was underwater, watching the explosion rip the boat apart. I felt my stomach sink and from the corner of my eye I saw my step-nephew look at me. The skulls in his eyes chattered, grinning. I felt the pressure ripple through the water to wash over me. I couldn't tell if the shrapnel that bounced off my hip as I turned away was just the vision or not. I felt around with my hands trying to ground myself.

The cold concrete pressing back and a rough sea floor my fingers sunk into mixed sensations, making me feel a little sick. I squeezed my eyes shut. The water around me made it easy to think of an endless ocean just like Apollo taught me.

Sapphire waves stretching all the way back to a distant horizon.

A fire alarm screeched and the vision broke. The ocean surrounding me was just the ice cold drops of water from the fire suppression pouring down on us.

"Stay down," Luke hissed at me. I could hear him shift and look around. A second later, a wet rabbit was shoved into my arms. "Okay," he murmured. Artemis whimpered. "Careful."

I rolled over onto my side. The armored truck we had just come out of had four or five steaming vents peeling off the vehicle, half-melted and charred along the edges. Like a hotdog or a burrito put in the microwave for too long. The blast had melted a hole right through the drooping back doors, scorching the Porsche and cracking its windshield. The small bulletproof windows had completely blown out.

Rabbit was already up, kneeling over Cross. He pulled back with a slight shake of his head. I looked over her body too. Rabbit glanced over at me. I thought he was going to tell me to look away, but he didn't.

"She's dead?" I asked, but I already knew she was. I could feel it in the pit of my stomach. You couldn't really tell what killed her, the shrapnel or the fire.

Rabbit inclined his head. "She hesitated."

I swallowed, hard. "Because I'm a kid?"

"Hoped she'd have the time to really understand," Rabbit said shortly. I thought there might have been a bit of regret in his voice. "You're only half-human."

"You get it." Luke nodded in approval, but there was a mean curl to his mouth as he glanced over Cross' body. "Just half."

The fire alarms were still blaring, making a headache pulse behind my eyes. Artemis' wet nose burrowed into my neck. I shifted my grip on her as I stood up. Luke bounded up and peered into the truck, waving away some of the acrid smoke.

"Just ash," he reported.

I hugged Artemis closer. She was still shaking. She was murmuring something in Greek into my collar. It sounded like some kind of prayer. I don't know to who, because my ears were still ringing.

"You okay?" I whispered to her. I remembered something about rodents getting heart attacks and dying from fear.

Going through all this trouble only for her to keel over from stress would be lame.

"I hate all of this," Artemis muttered. "Hate it."

"Boss?" Rabbit called out. He had a hand on his gun as he looked around the garage. "Orders?"

The leathery cocoon by the Porsche shuddered. It was badly burned, dripping black blood around bubbling, crispy sores. A clicking, melodic chirping sound came from everywhere, like it was being bounced off every corner in the room. It was the kind of sound that trickled down your back.

'I absolutely despise -' The wings unfurled in a spiral like a flower as Hiraya stood. 'Overly thorough enemies!'

If you're wondering what Mandurugo look like when they're not hiding? Bride of Dracula, from back when the movies were still in black and white.

The pointy ears, gray skin, the flat bat-like nose, and sharp cheekbones. She still had her long, dark hair. There was a bloody cleft splitting her bottom lip and running all the way down her chin. She had a mouth full of fangs with a gap between the middle teeth just big enough for her barbed tongue. Her clawed bird feet shredded her heels.

She had wings. Four of them.

Alright, so…

Look.

I am not gonna lie.

She was kind of pretty like this? Her eyes were a shifting translucent purple in shadow with pupils the shape of a slowly spinning four armed galaxy. Her blood red wings were just cool.

Guess I have to stop questioning Aaron's sanity.

"Damn it," Luke muttered.

I glanced over at him. He was digging the heels of his palms into his eye sockets like he was trying to blind himself.

"Why did you have to tell me about Herakles and monsters?" He moaned.

Because Artemis was wrong? Why was he bringing that up now?

"You asked?"

"I said I was wondering about it, not asking!"

Another screech of the fire alarm made Hiraya flinch. She held out a clawed hand.

Aaron handed her his Gameboy without another word. Damocles danced as she snapped it in half and all of the fire alarms died with ringing pops and sparks. There was a grinding sound and then the water cut off too.

Oh, she's a sorceress.

That's -

Well, fuck.

Wish I'd known the vampire had this reality's Konami Code before I gave her my blood. Bad news was, after this Quest, Hiraya was gonna own my ass. No wonder she was being so nice.

Good news? That's a problem for Future Percy.

Who was not me, Present Percy, protected by Amaterasu. I'm sure Future Percy will figure something out, because he's awesome like that. The guy just can't lose!

In my defense, no one likes True Magic users.

There are whole pantheons that have been trying to wipe them out for centuries, okay? What are the fucking odds? Somewhere in my peanut sized hyperactive brain, I knew monsters could have magic too, but I -

I forgot.

Hello, twelve year old demigod with ADHD here. I can't think of everything, give me a break.

"Soooo…" I began.

A near-murdered experience when you don't know who to kill back?

Do not recommend.

"What now?"

Aaron raised his hand like he was in math class.

"Can you guys do that hypnosis thing?" He asked us curiously.

"It's called Mist manipulation," Luke said in his best impression of a brat of Athena (don't tell Annabeth I said that) as he crossed his arms. "And yeah, I can."

"Good at lying?"

Luke tilted his head. "Decent. Why?"

"Great." Aaron grinned with false cheer and shook water out of his dark hair like a dog. "Let's go make some false statements to the police."

"The police?"

"So we can make insurance pay for this?" Aaron looked at us like it was obvious before heading for the elevator. Luke reluctantly followed him. "They won't do anything without a paper trail, it's crazy."

I was back to questioning his sanity.

"Hn." Hiraya spat a glob of black blood onto the floor. She frowned as she looked around her absolute mess of a garage. I blinked, so I missed it when she shifted to look human again. The burns on her wings transferred to the right side of her body, but they were fading really fast. Ugly blackened skin becoming pinkish scars and then flawless in seconds.

She was a vampire. Stabbing or staking with something sharp was the way to go.

She burns to death, I remembered. I looked back at Cross' body and Thanatos' grinning skull eyes came to mind again. It was probably just the vision, but I found myself wondering. Rabbit and his team had been planning for three weeks. They would have gone with the traitors, unaware.

What would have happened if we hadn't been here?

"Boss?" Rabbit ventured, cautious.

Which, same.

Her garage floor was soaked. The carpet lining the walls had darkened to a muddy brown color. The front of her Porsche was half-melted and some shrapnel had taken out her Hummer's front light and side mirror. The BMW looked okay from behind the bombed out shell of the armored truck. She was going to have to replace all her fire alarms and probably the sprinklers. Trace was a pile of ash, Torus was missing, Cross was dead, her boyfriend nearly died, our hands were empty and she had a sun goddess making sure she didn't back out of her deal that had already cost her a lot.

For her, this might be the event that sours the rest of your decade.

For us, uh, I think today was Thursday?

It might be Wednesday.

Wednesdays suck.

"I stand corrected," Hiraya replied slowly.

Her eyes darted over to him. They were still a radiant purple as she quirked an eyebrow.

"I am only paying one."

---

We bunked down in Hiraya and Aaron's living room out of an unspoken agreement to remain paranoid.

Their house was one of those hub homes where the living room was huge and tall and the rest of the house was arranged around it with the second floor being a balcony running along the ring. The only wall was completely made out of glass facing the driveway so we could see if we were going to get any more nasty surprises. Rabbit was still checking the perimeter obsessively.

We ended up taking a blow dryer to Artemis.

"Gods, I hope your idea for getting back her godhood works." Luke powered down the blow dryer as he grinned at the resigned ball of auburn puff on Hiraya's coffee table. She looked like a fluffy toy twice her size.

"So I can never live this down?" Artemis said miserably. Luke just grinned wider in a good mood as he held up his rabbit comb and wiggled it at her. The bunny groaned. "Just kill me." She had her paws over her eyes again. "End it, please."

You almost couldn't tell Luke had spent the last fifteen minutes talking circles around some police officers. They came to check on the wealthy couple and their grandmother's nephew's neighbor's second cousins and their rabbit that were visiting when they nearly got blown to kingdom come.

Gas mains are deadly.

"You don't mean that," I said, glancing up from the Gameboy Colors I was balancing on my lap with a link cord between them. Aaron had a Seadra Pokémon with a Dragon Scale and I'm not passing that up.

Don't judge me.

"Enough bitching, more brainstorming."

"There is no one, I am telling you," Artemis sighed as Luke ran the comb over her forehead and ears. "Everyone I can think of with a Name I could use, there is either no point to asking or I am too scared to ask."

Luke raised an eyebrow. "Too scared?"

"Is that so surprising?" she asked quietly. "Even if I were whole, I would hesitate. And I am decidedly not."

"Archery - " I started.

"Not changing my mind," she cut me off.

I rolled my eyes. "Wilderness?"

Her mouth fell open a little. "No one even knows where Pan is."

Wait, really?

Huh.

"Okay, uh, Hunting?"

"My nephew Aristaeus would not be able to afford it and my uncle…" Artemis went quiet.

"Your uncle?" I prodded.

"Is unavailable," she said shortly.

It took me a minute or two to figure out who she was talking about.

Lelantos, the Titan of Moving Unseen, Leto's twin brother? I must have read about him because Mom only remembered her Chosen and I can't remember Apollo even mentioning the guy. Then again, Zeus got a hold of the twins early and Lelantos was a second generation Titan.

Olympus tended to be unhealthy for second generation Titans.

And for first generation Titans.

And at least half of the third generation, honestly.

Maybe he was imprisoned? I don't think he was imprisoned. Odds are, he didn't like his sister getting Zeus' pimp hand, tried to do something about it and it didn't end well for him.

Dude.

Artemis really was like her father.

Both of them were professionals at screwing people over thousands of years down the line, including themselves.

"Maidens?" I tried weakly.

"Hera."

Luke and I both winced.

I was getting tired of this rabbit having a point.

"You do not understand what you are asking." She sighed again. "It has been millennia since we have reached equilibrium. We are no longer worshiped across civilizations. To ask someone to give up a Name…"

"Big ask?"

"Monumental," she whispered. "I have taken enough from my brother already. I will not do it." She shrunk into herself. "And I am not so loved that I could expect others to make that sacrifice for me."

Luke nudged me with his shoulder and caught my eye. He made an exaggerated grimace and I copied him. It turns out, the problem with being an asshole is that no one likes you. Who could have possibly seen that one coming?

That didn't leave Artemis with a lot of options.

'Not a lot' didn't mean 'none' though.

"If you are too scared to ask," I said. "Then let me."

"...if you insist." Artemis looked up at me with wide silver eyes. "I suppose you do come by your irreverence honestly," she said quietly. "That could only help."

"Um, what?"

"It - nothing," she changed her mind. "You are worth more than me. Your words will at least be heard, is all." Luke nudged her. Artemis' ears went flat as she narrowed her eyes at him. He wiggled the comb again and loomed over her.

"You can ruuu-uun," he sing-songed.

With a sigh, Artemis reluctantly presented her other flank for brushing. "I hate you."

"That gives me joy," Luke said unrepentantly.

Selene was gone, but the Greek pantheon still had two goddesses of the Moon. Artemis inherited the Pale Moon. I opened my mouth to ask about the Dark Moon when my Gameboy chimed.

I was now the proud owner of an adorable Kingdra Water-Type Pokémon.

"Awesome."

"Let me see," Luke said as he leaned over. He had the same soft half-smile he had when us younger Campers pulled off a sword move he'd been teaching us. Or when we were trying to get out of trouble even though Chiron caught us red-handed trying to put sawdust in the horse-pigeon feed because they deserved it.

"Almost makes me wish I had the time for videogames," he said wistfully as I showed my new Pokémon off. "And…batteries. And electricity. And money." He thought about it as he brushed the rabbit. "And demigod proofing."

"From breaking?" The demigod proofing had to be really thorough. Moni(que) in Cabin 11 could make metal rust by looking at it wrong. "Or from stealing?"

Luke conceded that with a nod of his head. "Can't have any of the portable stuff. Nail everything down."

"Maybe a game room in the Big House?" I pitched the idea, getting a bit into it. "Can you imagine making Zeus pay for some game consoles and a flat screen TV for Camp? Or Hera?"

Luke huffed a laugh as he cleaned his comb of rabbit fur.

"In her capacity as Queen of Olympus?" I said in my best obnoxious voice.

The rabbit honked softly.

I messed around in my game a little. Aaron had a leveled Haunter and I was really tempted to nab it. I think Luke found brushing the rabbit relaxing.

Then, to our surprise, she hesitantly spoke up. "Is…the Camp really that bad?" As Luke blinked down at her, she rushed out, "I know - I know Hermes has complained a few times, but on the train, the way you both were talking about it…"

"What do you think Camp Half-Blood is like for us?" Luke said sharply. His anger boiled up just enough to singe.

Artemis shrunk a little.

"I…honestly do not know," she admitted.

If she wouldn't even save her own half-sister and niece from monsters, why would she care about how her family treated their random demigods? All the kids she would ever bother with were the ones that would swear to follow her forever.

"My Hunters complain, but they - "

"Are never there long," Luke growled. "That's the problem."

I had a hard time trying to put it into words how everything was not quite big enough, not quite good enough, not quite enough. Annabeth trying to raise herself and all her siblings was wrong. Maybe Olympus was strong enough that their demigods didn't have to worry about the other pantheons and their monsters, but when Olympic demigods aren't even taught about their own pantheon…

At some point, Camp Half-Blood's ignorance crossed the line from neglect to something almost cruel.

"It's a fun summer camp," I said quietly. Because it was. The three weeks I had with Castor, Pollux, Annabeth, Clovis, Ethan and Luke were great. I could see myself rushing home after school let out next year, excited to see my friends again.

But I had a home to come back to. "Summer camps are for the summer, not forever."

"We could make due," Luke said just as quietly. "If we just knew someone gave a shit."

The rabbit's ears drooped. "I see."

"Do you?" Luke said bitterly. He smashed the loose auburn fur he combed off into a little ball and went back to brushing her.

Soldier boy Rabbit drifted in and out of the room, but not before giving Luke a business card.

"Great benefits," was all he said as he looked out the big window. "Training, equipment, elite teams are the best of the best." Under his eye protection, his eyes were a bright amber color. "The Yellow takes care of its own. If you're interested."

Luke flipped the card over and over in his free hand. It was fancy looking, a silver framed holographic card. It vanished up his sleeve when he had to clean off his comb again.

"Maybe," Luke said softly.

Artemis wasn't very happy about it. Something about how Greek demigods were never supposed to need to become mercenaries, only for Luke to shoot back,

"Apparently, I'm supposed to just die."

She didn't say anything after that.

I don't do well with silence. I wondered what was being done about Cross' body and then I wondered if it would be a good idea to call Rhea and ask if Aura was there yet. Or maybe I should just focus on getting us across the wasteland of desert between here and San Francisco where the Mist got thinner and thinner the further West you went because one of the Doors to the Underworld was right there.

It was only going to get worse.

I didn't want to think about it.

"Hey, Luke, have you ever heard of Mythomagic?" I asked as I reached for my backpack.

"A little," he perked up. "Collectible card game, right?"

"That's right." I saved my game and unhooked the Gameboys. I swapped my own Gameboy Color for the embossed aluminum card tin in my bag. It felt weird in my hands, like I haven't held it in forever and now it was heavier than I remembered. I opened the tin and flipped over the first card.

Moros, the God of Doom.

A little shiver went down my spine. It was the same card Hecate had given me. I hurriedly flipped over the next one.

Poseidon, the God of the Seas.

Oh, nevermind.

"You okay?" Luke asked.

"Yeah. It was nothing." I guess I just put Hecate's card back into the tin and never reshuffled?

"Are you certain?" Artemis asked next. "When my brother was young, he could not even throw a stick without it being some sign or portent."

"He's, like, an actual god of Prophecy though? No way I'm that bad." I showed her the cards.

Then I had a horrible thought.

"But I swear to God if you screwed over your Uncle P, tell us now because the Gulf is right there - "

"Not…that badly?" Artemis said weakly. She raised a pleading paw and then dropped it. "My father did worse?"

Luke and I both groaned.

Luke picked the rabbit up and looked her right in the face, nose to nose. "Stop. Being. Terrible."

Artemis squirmed. "I did!"

"It's probably nothing." I cut in before they got into an argument. Again.

And I just want to say, honestly, if Artemis thought she wasn't terrible anymore because she was comparing herself to Zeus, that explained a lot.

"Look, if I just shuffle these…" One smooth blackjack shuffle later (Apollo would be proud), I flipped the first card.

Moros, the God of Doom.

"Huh," I said.

"I hate prophecies," Luke muttered.

Considering what he's been through?

Fair.

"Not a prophecy," I grumbled. "Just some weird coincidence."

At least the next card was different. Triton, the Messenger of the Seas.

I sighed in relief. "See?"

"Whooooo wants a mug of hot chocolate?" Aaron padded through the doorway to the dining room carrying a tray. He was a young looking guy, maybe a few years older than Luke, an inch taller with pianist's fingers. "You better, because I made three mugs at once and now the microwave is a mess."

"Thanks, man." I put my cards down and held up his black Gameboy Color with the gray Pokemon Silver cartridge in it. "For this too."

Aaron shrugged. "You saved my life speaking up like you did, that's gotta be worth a Pokevolve or two."

Aaron put down the tray. There were two mugs for me and Luke and one for him and they were perfectly, painstakingly spaced on the crisp white doily. There were even some meticulously complicated folded napkins with a stick of biscotti next to each mug. It looked like some OCD French chef had gotten a hold of his kitchen which was completely at odds with how the drinks had been nuked during World War 2 and the marshmallows had just fucking surrendered. Aaron's hot chocolate looked like my first attempt at copying Dad's cocoa recipe when I was younger. It was pitch black with crusty trails down the sides and the vague balls of white foam were still bubbling. I could almost hear their screams.

Luke peered into his mug suspiciously.

Maybe he doesn't like chocolate.

"Hiraya's a bit upset actually," Aaron said calmly. The dude was the Filipino ideal of a British stiff upper lip. "I can tell. You probably saved her too. Thank you."

"No problem, man." I waved it off. "Didn't want to break her streak. She hasn't survived this long being easy to kill."

"You're right, she hasn't," he said with a small smile. "Still, I'm grateful. I'd give you a wedding invitation, but that might be weird."

"A little."

"Oh well," he sighed. "Got any ideas for working off my debt?" He made an okay sign with his right hand. "Money is no object."

I almost waved it off again, but then I realized that I actually really wanted him to owe me. "Okay, just to make super sure, Hiraya's magic is innate, right?" At her man's nod, I swallowed. "So I'm hoping her specialty isn't blood curses?"

Because that was Mom's and you really don't want to be on the wrong end of one.

"What?" Luke blurted out. "Blood curses?"

"She's a witch," I muttered. "That blood bag? Nooooot a Capri Sun. Sorry."

Luke made that constipated expression I was just going to call his God, Why from now on.

"Percy, why?"

I blinked. "Why what?"

Luke directed the God, Why at the rabbit.

Artemis' ears shrugged at him. "I do not have anything to lose and Perseus seems to know what he is doing."

"I totally know what I'm doing," I lied. "We're all acting in good faith here."

"That's right." Aaron ducked his head, smiling. "All in good faith. She's a necromancer - " Thank God. " - but good with sympathetic magic too."

Crap.

Sympathetic magic was basically voodoo. That was how she was able to break his Gameboy to break his fire suppression. One electronic 'belonging' being swapped for another.

And she had our blood -

"Wait, necromancy?" I thought back to the garage and the minute before the explosion. "So she was going to reanimate Trace? To ask questions?"

Aaron nodded. "He was booby trapped."

"Does that mean someone was prepared for that?" Luke asked, sounding worried.

"Or just prepared," Aaron said with a strange quirk to his lips. "It's the only thing Hiraya will ever take personally: being overly thorough."

"Riiiight," I said slowly. "We gave her some of our blood, so I was wondering…"

"Don't want anything nefarious happening to it?" Aaron's head rocked back as he gave me this slow, almost too wide smile. The kind that narrowed his eyes to slits. The change in lighting hitting his brown eyes made them look rust colored.

"I got you."

Phew. One crisis averted. "Thanks."

"I got a question though."

"Shoot."

"How come you know a lot more than those other demigods?"

"Those other demigods?" Luke said dumbly.

"You don't act like them either," Aaron said happily, flashing me a thumbs up. "They were always so panicky and got scared too easily. Too normal." He sounded disappointed. "You know some can't even defend themselves? Only a couple even had powers."

Aaron leaned forward eagerly looking like he just saw his next science fair project and couldn't wait to get started. Luke tensed up for some reason, holding his mug like he was a second away from turning it into a knuckle duster. Artemis was hunched down too.

"Are Greeks just built different?"

"We're lucky," I told him. "Our parents give a shit." I went to take a sip of my hot chocolate, but Luke stole my mug right out of my hands. "Um."

A door opened loudly up on the second balcony.

The vampire walked into sight from deeper in the house and casually hopped over the second floor railing. She had ditched the tattered clothes, now in slim jeans and a jean jacket. She said a rapid fire something that was probably Tagalog and then paused. Her eyes fell on the mugs, then she sighed and finished tying her hair back.

"Aaron, no. They're leaving."

"Aww." His shoulders slumped. "But I just made them hot chocolate. You sure we can't keep them?"

Hiraya smiled slyly. "We can't."

I made a grab for my mug, but Luke lifted it out of my reach. "And it was great," he said casually. He put both mugs down on the coffee table and tugged me into standing. "But we're on a deadline, so we really should get going."

"Nice touch with the marshmallows," I offered. I don't know what Luke had against hot chocolate all of the sudden. It didn't look that bad (okay, maybe it did). I stuffed my cards back into its tin and threw it into my backpack. Luke grabbed our rabbit. "Wish we could stay longer, but you know how it is."

Aaron nodded sadly. "Alright. Don't die."

"Great advice," I told him. "Can't go wrong with that one."

As we headed out the door, I whined under my breath. "But hot chocolate?"

"It was probably poisoned," Luke muttered back.

I frowned at him.

"Just…" Luke palmed his face. "He's marrying a vampire. Trust me on this one."

There was a glint on the roof of the mansion of Rabbit's stake out. Or a sniper's nest. His hand popped into view to wave at us. "So," I started when we caught up to Hiraya beside her singed BMW. The yellow headlights glared. "Are we just going to ask for another errand?"

"You are not," she said sharply. "I am going to get answers from the Bishop." Understandable. "You are coming in case I need to kill him."

"Whoa, okay," I mumbled.

That escalated quickly.

"What is he?" Luke asked. "The better informed we are, the better we can help you," he continued smoothly. "Wouldn't you agree?"

"I would," Hiraya turned back to us from the car. "We have always called him the Bishop. He is a priest." A chill ran down my back. A Priest. I knew she didn't mean that he was a Methodist or something. "A supplicant of some old god at sea."

Luke glanced at me out of the corner of his eye. "A god at sea."

My stomach was sinking.

"Uh, how old?" I asked.

"Old."

Coming from a vampire that called us 'hemitheos,' that meant real old. "Oh."

The vampire inclined her head. "I don't know the Name of his patron and I never asked."

Sea gods are fickle. Probably a good idea.

"And it doesn't matter," Hiraya snarled, her fangs glinting in the smothered light. "I don't believe he wouldn't know what he asked for my people to retrieve and he saw fit not to inform me. I will have answers from his mouth or his corpse."

Sea gods are fickle. Probably not a good idea.

"Well maybe we all can just skip the guy - "

"You agreed to an exchange of favors," the vampire said coolly. I winced. Like with everything, there were rules. She was definitely old enough to know them. "If he is innocent, does he not deserve to hear of the failure from you?"

"I'll send him a letter."

"Perseus," Artemis said worriedly and the tight feeling in my stomach got worse.

"Our priority is the Quest," I said eventually. "Look, maybe it's breaking faith with Cage-Head." I glanced over at Luke and to my relief, he just looked thoughtful. "But you said it yourself." I turned back to Hiraya. "Something is fishy and letting him break faith first in his territory sounds risky."

She raised a hand and the weak yellow light of the high beams shattered around her fingers. "I would be compelled to defend you."

"Yeah, and you burn," I snapped back without thinking.

The vampire's purple eyes studied me.

"I - I mean…" I trailed off. "That's…that's how you die and Trace…"

I don't know how my cards worked. Maybe drawing Moros twice with two sea deities was a coincidence. Sometimes probability was like that. Prophecies mean what we think they mean. I could just think it really was nothing. Would that work?

Did I want to risk it?

I looked at Luke.

"Oh, now you'll listen to me?" The jerk raised an eyebrow. I scowled at him.

"We will make another enemy," Artemis cautioned. "But then, that is nothing new."

"And whose fault is that?" Luke couldn't resist.

"I said I was sorry!"

Mom? I asked. A sign?

The feeling I got from her prickled over my scalp. It was cold, it was black, it was thoughtful and it was proud. The feeling settled on the bridge of my nose, spreading both ways to my temples like a blindfold. I was so used to wearing them, of not wanting to know, that I forgot it was a power I could use.

I took off my glasses.

Oh.

"Before you agreed to help us, your Fate was to burn to death, Hiraya." I stood as tall as I could, which wasn't very tall, looking her right in the eyes. "And it has changed." Her ghost stared right back at me, bloated, anguished. I could just faintly see a shadow of something behind her. "Now you drown."

The Bishop was a Priest of a sea god.

Hiraya sucked in a breath.

The silence was almost painful.

I half-expected her to demand her coin back and toss our blood back in our faces, but then she turned away from us and gestured towards the backdoors of her car. We hesitantly clambered into the back seats. I made sure to buckle in. Safety First.

"You will follow my lead and not speak unless spoken to," Hiraya said coldly from the front seat. Her eyes bored into my forehead through the rear view mirror. "And if you are spoken to, you will be polite. Do not hide your eyes. You - the blond one - "

"My name is Luke." There was a hard edge to his voice.

"Do not show fear, do not ask questions and do not get separated from the dark boy. In any circumstances, by any means necessary."

Luke's eyes widened.

"If you have to, you will say you are valuable and belong to the dark one."

"Where are you taking us?" Luke's voice shook a little.

"California."

The vampire smiled joylessly.

"That is what you wanted?"

The vampire went to the same driving school my mother did. Dad calls it the You Only Live Forever Academy. Speed Limits were more like Speed Suggestions. Luke stared out of the window. Artemis paced for the first couple of minutes, working herself up only to then fall asleep quickly, curled up into a little ball on the middle seat. She was in a six month old body. All kids need to sleep.

"She should be okay to sleep," I said to myself. "She knows. She remembers."

I don't know where we are going. That worried me.

"You really think getting back her godhood is going to work?" Luke said softly, so he didn't wake her up. I looked at him, but he was still looking out the window, like he didn't want to be caught showing Artemis any concern over anything.

"I hope so," I answered. "I can't know for sure, but she keeps arguing about it. Like she doesn't want it to work or is afraid of it working - "

"Or like she refuses to let herself hope it will work?" Luke asked, like he knew the answer already. "You ever get the feeling she thinks she's made her peace with dying, but it just looks kind of suicidal instead?"

I stared at him, confused.

I had godly eyes, but I felt like I was still fucking blind. Artemis noticed Luke right under my nose and he noticed her right back. He looked down at his lap and the lighter he was turning over and over in his hand. "If she could, she'd rather go out in a reckless blaze of glory just to affirm her existence?"

Okay, dude. Getting a little deep there.

"How'd you - "

"Know?" He gave me a wry smile. "It might be a daughter of Zeus thing." His smile shrunk as he finally dragged his eyes just a few inches further to the sleeping moon rabbit. I felt my chest clench. He sighed. "Let me handle her."

Uh, what?

I grimaced. "But, you hate her?" I tried. "Really obviously?"

"That just means when I tell her to pull her head out of her ass," Luke almost growled. "She won't think I'm doing it just to be nice."

"Thalia?" I regretted asking as soon as it came out. Me and my big mouth. It was Zeus and Hades and everyone caught in the middle, but it started with my sisters and their Prophecy.

I watched Luke's expression shutter closed.

I wondered what it was like for them, for all of them. Luke, Thalia and Annabeth, just trying to make it to Camp, to safety with an army of monsters at their heels. I imagined Grover trying to tell them that if it was just a little farther - if she could just make it to the top of that hill…I don't know what she looked like. Black hair, maybe, like her dad. Electric eyes. Camp Half-Blood didn't have the barrier back then. The whole Camp would have had to fight off the monsters the daughter of Zeus led right to them.

Athena said she died with the intent to sacrifice.

I imagined the realization flashing over her face and then it flashing over Luke's when she planted her feet and turned around.

"Like I said," Luke said quietly. "Daughter of Zeus thing."

"Sorry," I mumbled.

"It's okay," he sighed. He lifted his lighter so that the weak light from the windows splashed all over the shining bronze in rainbow. "I spent - gods, I don't know how long, thinking about the what ifs afterwards. If I trained Annabeth better, if I was just better, if we got any other satyr, if I wasn't so angry…at the gods, at my father."

Click.

The smokeless brilliant yellow flame of his lighter was bright enough to burn away some of the darkness.

"I don't know what's worse yet," he whispered. "Thinking my father abandoned me, or knowing he didn't. That he wanted to help me so bad, it didn't matter that Brandon and Chloe died for me. Then I get back to Camp and it's just like, that's it. You had your chance. Ride's over, have a nice life. Which is worse?"

I couldn't answer him.

Luke snapped the lighter shut. "If he just said - "

But Hermes couldn't.

Luke didn't continue. He went back to his window. I pulled out my card tin. Still don't know how this works, but we could really use a hint, so maaaaaybeeee?

I breathed out and flipped the first card.

Chiron, Trainer of Heroes.

Maybe not?

I know why you wanted me to use Granddad's power so much now, I sent in my mother's general direction. It's because your powers suck.

Her response was shocked and indignant.

I was probably going to pay for that.

The lights of Houston were as bright as ever, flashing past my window in streams of color against a pitch black sky.

 

[Shujin]

An Undertow of Sand
A PJO Fanfiction
​

"Be quick," Hiraya hissed as she stopped the car.

"Sorry," Luke muttered as he unbuckled.

"You too, dark boy." The vampire glanced out her window a little nervously, back towards where the small pod of jellyfish the size of whales floated over the highway. We left the main road about ten minutes ago and I could still see their bioluminescent blue light strobing down their bodies and the shadows of their tentacles searching the ground below them.

Nope.

"Might not get another chance," I said quickly as I unbuckled. Dying was bad, but getting killed with a full bladder was just the worst. "Gotcha."

"Wait!" Artemis called out right before I left the car to hit the rest stop too. "I - um. I need your help, Perseus. Please." The moon rabbit looked up at me with big, wet silver eyes, looking absolutely miserable. She raised a paw to pathetically point at the darkened restroom signs. "I also need to use the bathroom…"

I looked at the women's bathroom sign too.

"You need…help," I said numbly.

The rabbit nodded quickly.

I heard the vampire let out an amused huff as she fiddled with the same kind of expensive flip phone my Dad had. Who knows what the reception was like out here.

"Uh." I stared at Artemis for a moment. "Sure."

A few minutes later, I caught up to Luke outside the boy's room. This rest stop was a lot smaller than the last one. No food court, just a hallway of vending machines and a small gift shop with a wall dedicated to maps and brochures. It was also completely abandoned with all the lights off and no one around. I found Luke eyeing the keyhole on the soda vending machine thoughtfully with what looked like a keyring full of lockpicks in his hand.

"You actually had to break out the tools?"

He jumped, flashing me in the face with his light before flicking it away.

"Don't - don't do that." He breathed out slowly and pocketed his key ring. "And, yeah, security was still on. Didn't want to make a mistake," he said like lockpicks just work for electronic alarms too, duh? He pushed the door open to the men's bathrooms. "Should've turned on the lights, didn't know you were coming too."

"Was a little held up," I said.

Confession time:

I tossed the rabbit into a fucking bush.

Maybe that makes me the asshole this time, I know!

But come on. If you actually thought I was going to sit there, in the little girl's room, in the dark, helping the bunny take a dump so she didn't drown in the toilet?

You don't know me very well.

It was a nice bush, a short dash to the car, but still out of the way. Lots of privacy. I didn't go full Greek! I'm pretty sure I would regret actually helping her more.

Because this place was giving me the creeps.

The building still had electricity, but when we turned the lights on, what should have been bright fluorescent light came out as a really dim, flickering gleam. It just made the dark shadows look like they were moving. This high pitched whining sound started coming from the ceiling when Luke flushed.

Have you ever tried to pee while starring in a horror movie?

It -

It doesn't work.

Luke started almost violently when he looked up into the mirror after turning off the water faucet. He almost lunged for his lighter.

"Don't." I tugged on his vest. "Just dry your hands."

"I thought - in the reflection?" He breathed out shakily. "I thought I saw - "

"You did," I admitted.

I grabbed some paper towels and shoved a bunch into his hands. Rhea must have done something to our flashlights, because their light was untouched by shadows. Luke's electronic torch was far brighter than the lights in the ceiling. It was lighting up the pale blue tiling on the wall. Facing the wrong way, but enough of it reflected back at us to make his eyes shine weirdly.

"He's harmless, as long as you don't stare. Let's go."

The disappointed specter haunting the mirror with hollow eyes and gaping mouth mournfully watched us leave the bathroom.

"Wait, wait - " Luke pulled up short. "I need - I have to - "

I turned around and watched as Luke almost frantically mugged the soda vending machine for a Dr. Pepper and all of its lunch money.

"Um."

"I know," he said shortly. He shoved a handful of quarters into his pocket to clink around with his lighter.

I shuffled my feet uncomfortably. "I didn't say anything," I mumbled.

"I don't need the money," Luke muttered, like he was trying to convince himself. "You're loaded. I don't need it. I don't. It's just - " He folded up the stolen dollar bills to put in his back pocket and then tossed me a Coke can. "Sometimes I just need to steal something." He moodily stared at the open guts of the machine. "And I didn't get to keep the last thing I stole."

"Yeah," I muttered, just as bummed. "That kinda sucked."

"Kinda," Luke growled.

"Still mad?"

"Furious."

"Alright."

And I thought Apollo was bad. This dude knows how to hold a grudge.

Luke rummaged around in the machine, coming up with a Sprite and a Mountain Dew Live Wire - hold up, they brought that back this summer too?

Sweet!

I motioned for one and we both stuffed our ill gotten gains into our backpacks. Cracking them open later was going to be a mess, but that was half the fun of it.

"So, kleptomania?"

Luke almost flinched. "It's…"

"Hermes' thing?" That explained a lot about the Stolls' sticky fingers.

"I hate it," Luke said. He angrily zipped up his bag. "Hated it. I don't know."

"Hey, it's not something to be ashamed of," I told him. "We can't help what we inherit. I had to be trained out of biting people."

Some kids need hot sauce so they stop sucking on their thumbs and some kids need shock collars to keep their teeth to themselves.

Sam learned the hard way that this random toddler in the Dreamlands will bite him back. The tail pulling upgraded me from 'demented kitten' to 'absolute fucker.' Dad still has some teeth marks on his shins. Nana gave me my bronze sheep (only the best for teething demigods) so I wouldn't nibble on her. I gnawed on Apollo too.

Luke's head turned a little. "Where'd that come from?"

"My - " I had to stop myself from saying 'my mother.'

Because I don't think it did anymore.

I don't remember ever biting my mother. I do remember her laughingly comparing me to my older brother Aether. Now I know what she really meant. I thought about my grandfather, Chaos and the picture my mother had shown me. A creature within the void, mindlessly devouring stars.

"Granddad."

Luke started to nod and then froze.

"Your grandfather," he said flatly. "As in…?" I nodded. His eyebrows then scrunched together. "Right. Okay. I did not know inheriting from divine grandparents was possible."

"Why not?" I said, confused as I followed him out the door. "They're family too?"

"Gods don't have genes," Luke snarked and then he stopped dead right outside. He stood like a statue in front of the trash bin on the curb with the overflowing ashtray on top. He slowly turned to look at me as I let the door swing shut behind us.

I watched his face go from alarm to nauseated to dread, like he just realized something he'd rather not.

"That wasn't a question," he said quickly. He waved a hand and the lock clicked shut. "Don't. Say. Anything."

I smiled innocently. Luke cringed.

Confession time #2:

I have no idea if he's right or not. I never asked. I just finished sixth grade, which means I know how to play Tic Tac Toe with hair colors and what DNA is made of.

I'll put it on the list.

Luke turned on a heel and started walking. I hurried to catch up to him.

"You sure you don't want to know?"

"Very."

"What happened to 'I must ask questions' a few days ago?"

"No."

"You scared of the answer?" He didn't reply. I bent my arms into wings and flapped them. "Bwak bwak."

Hiraya glanced up from her phone as we crossed the parking lot back towards the car. "Good," she said curtly as soon as we got within hearing distance. She looked relieved. "We're not leaving until - "

"If you got to go, bathrooms are haunted." I offered, trying to be helpful.

"What - " She blinked. "Why would you - no, never mind - "

"What is that smell?" Luke asked no one, his steps faltering closer to the car.

"Bathroom's. Haunted." I repeated slowly. "Mirror wraiths." There were a bunch of different types. They were the reason why so many belief systems around the world were dead fucking sure that mirrors could mess with your soul if you weren't careful.

And they were dead fucking right.

"They suck."

Hiraya paused, glancing over at the dark rest stop before her nose wrinkled in an almost offended expression for a second. Mandurugo were monsters. Vampires, but that didn't mean undead. She could burn. She could drown.

She had a soul too. It just wasn't a mortal one.

"Noted," she drawled dryly, turning back to me. "Now, your rabbit. Fix it."

Fix my rabbit?

Uh oh.

We rounded the car and stumbled right into a scene of disaster.

The humiliated bunny stared down at the pavement unmoving and silent, wet rabbit poop caked on the back of her hindlegs. The smell was horrendous. You could tell at a glance this rabbit did not have enough fiber in her diet. She was way too small for all that shit. Had she been holding it?

…she has, hasn't she. I didn't even think about how often she was going. I assumed she'd tell us, but now that I think about it…

Does she even realize what having to go to the bathroom means?

…

Luke and I were the worst bunny parents to ever exist in all time.

"Not it!" I said immediately. "You said you wanted to handle her."

Luke's head snapped towards me. "Wait, no - "

"So I'm letting you handle her, good luck!" I tried to escape, but Luke was just too fast. I nearly choked when he caught the back of my collar, and I stumbled back into the car. "You said - !"

"I'm still your Camp Counselor," Luke snarled. "Which means you are helping me!"

"What am I supposed to do!"

"You have tissues, don't you!?"

I learned the hard way that wet rabbit poop soaks right through toilet paper. Those cheap public restroom towels aren't worth (literal) shit either.

I regret living.

I shouldn't have tossed her into the bush.

(oh God)

(I went full Greek!)

We broke into the rest stop again. Where there are public bathrooms, there were cleaning supplies somewhere. I didn't know if they were going to be too harsh on her skin. Luke didn't care, planning on just giving her a cube of ambrosia if she got burned.

I am not ashamed to admit that I called Rhea for help.

She's old as hell.

She has to know if Lysol works on fur.

"Ugh - fine!" I snapped as my first cousin laughed helplessly at me in the flickering rainbow. She got maybe two and a half words out about Aura before she started cackling. "May your cats get fleas and you step on a Lego!"

I'm not calling Cliff.

I'd be hearing about that time my rabbit shit itself forever. He already had enough dirt on me from when I shit myself. I don't know how long it took cleaning her up and then cleaning the floor up, cleaning ourselves up and throwing away all the used paper towels and rags.

I turned off the water and inspected my jacket carefully.

It looked okay.

I sniffed it.

Smelled okay.

…Artemis can keep wearing this, I don't need it. It's fine.

When I got back to the foyer we were using as our headquarters, I found Luke sprawled all over the floor on his back with an arm flung over his eyes. Artemis was huddled underneath an advertisement sign for cigarettes by the vending machine for candy and chips.

"That could have gone worse," I said.

Luke lifted his arm. "How?"

"She could have let it rip in your vest."

He snorted. "μαλάκα."

Malakia. That was Greek for 'jerk off.' In a friendly way.

"I thought I was a koala."

"You're that too."

I kicked his leg.

I tossed my jacket over the rabbit. It shrunk into a little winter coat instead of the hoodie, ending far above her haunches with a fluffy collar and a white rabbit frolicking on the back. I guess even my jacket didn't want to deal with that shit again.

"How're you feeling, Arty?" I bit my tongue as soon as I said it. "Artemis."

"...fine," she said very quietly. "Thank you."

Luke lifted his hand. "We'll bury your dignity out back, don't worry about it. We won't tell if you don't."

"Yeah, I'm taking this one to my grave," I admitted.

I really felt for Artemis here. If I could mindwipe my school mates of my 'whoopsie,' I'd do it in a heartbeat.

Not looking forward to next school year.

"Just…tell us next time," Luke muttered.

He sounded just like Masayuki after that vicious horse-pigeon dragged me out of the stables. A little wondering, a little resigned and all realizing Mom wasn't going to smite him for treating me just like everyone else.

Luke never had to learn that with me, but it felt like he had learned something about our rabbit.

"You should have said something about the chafing on the horse. You should have said you needed to go. And…" He rubbed at his face and sighed, staring at the ceiling. "Look, you're like, six months old or something right now, right?"

She nodded jerkily.

I had to stop myself from giving Luke a confused look when his voice softened. "You get hungry more often than we do?"

She took too long to respond.

The mocking note came back to Luke's voice, "Arty?"

"Yes," she whispered.

Luke sighed. "C'mere."

He dug out the bag of hay from his bag. I made a water run, washing out and cobbling together a small bucket of water for her. Luke surprised us both by revealing that he had bought a small bag of rabbit treats.

He shrugged it off. "I had no idea what to buy. Grabbed it first before the lady came over to help me. I couldn't just toss it back. I told her I adopted a pet bunny." He looked hunted. "Would be weird to not get treats?"

I snickered.

Luke scowled at me, but his lips twitched.

The rabbit stared at the offerings for a long moment.

"Wait." He dug his Dr. Pepper right back out of his backpack and opened it. He let it fizzle a bit on the floor (we just cleaned that) before he seated himself against the wall. He was wedged between a cigarette advertisement stand and the gutted vending machine like he was bunkering up with a soda and a candy bar.

Luke looked at me.

"What?"

He pointedly looked at Artemis' food and soda.

Oh.

I got out my Snickers.

"You ever gonna say why you don't want a Name?" Luke started.

The rabbit started a little. She looked up at us. "...I do want it. I want - " her voice broke. "I want it so badly, but…" She dropped her nose. "Not even the gods fight Fate," she whispered. "I am afraid. That I would only be setting myself up for an even worse torment for defiance. That it wouldn't work. That it would be twisted. I - "

She sniffled.

"I am always afraid…" Her mouth moved with no sound coming out for a moment. "And everything I do is always wrong."

We didn't know what to say to that. Not even Luke, who looked almost betrayed. The awkward silence made her shrink into herself and I found myself opening my mouth.

"Apollo says - " I faltered, but pressed on. "The most important part of the shot is intent. Was he wrong?"

Artemis blinked. "...no. For once."

I reached over and bopped her nose.

"So what happens," Luke caught on to what I was getting at. Which was good, because I had no idea where I was going with it. "If you make the shot scared, or depressed or…" It was hard to tell with the light so dim, but I thought I saw the blood drain from Luke's face as he murmured, "Angry?"

"...you miss," Artemis said quietly. "Even if it hits, it will always be a bad shot."

Her little shoulders dropped.

"...I understand."

"Do you?" Luke said tightly. "If Percy's idea works, you can help us, to get the Bolt, to - to do something for Camp Half-Blood. And do you know how - bad it feels - you don't know what it's like to be Claimed right away and see kids you just know are your siblings not even be acknowledged so they have to sleep on the floor."

Oof.

Luke smiled at me bitterly. "A year at Camp and I got these shoes - " he raised a foot to show off his white Sneakers. "On my birthday. My father remembered my birthday and just…ignored everyone else."

Artemis gasped then, sharp and hurt.

I thought about how much Apollo always brushed it off, whenever it came up just how badly he was the unfavorite child.

"If that's our parents…"

"I - I will help you," Artemis said in a small voice. "I will - I swear it," she blurted out. "By earth and sky, Styx as my witness."

Done! The ancient river let out a thunderous boom.

Woah.

"Alright," Luke breathed with wide eyes. "I didn't - I mean - " For a second he looked lost, looking at me.

I just stared at her.

An oath on the Styx.

A true one.

"You can't break that," I said helplessly. "You can't - that's too open ended, even if you got your immortality back - Artemis - "

"Good," she said simply.

Luke and I exchanged glances.

Don't look at me, I thought.

She's lost her mind.

"Alright," Luke repeated softly. He looked at her thoughtfully. Calculating. "Maybe you're worth something, after all."

"I - thank you." Artemis told the boy she left to monsters four years ago. "And I - I am so sorry."

"Yeah," Luke murmured softly. "I am too." He looked away from both of us. "Eat up."

Artemis ate as we talked about random shit, mostly about Camp. It was safe. Not like talking about what we were going to do about the Night, or what if the Bolt wasn't in California or who we were going to ask for a Name for our rabbit, or anything.

Nothing important.

"...you're fucking with me."

"Nah, pretty sure. The Syrian form. Lion goddess of Hunting, Horses, Chariots and Warfare."

Luke's eyes closed as he leaned his head back.

I waited.

"Aphrodite's from another pantheon," Luke finally said.

"Uh, yeah." From a lot of pantheons. "Mesopotamian, with Names from all over."

Or maybe it would be more accurate to say she became Names from all over? I'm not sure. I didn't say anything about her being broken though, so Athena can't be mad at me.

"So that's why Silena's footwork sucks!" Luke suddenly burst out, with an almost wild laugh. "She keeps acting like the ground is supposed to move or like she has four legs instead of two!"

I grinned a little. "She'd be mean on a chariot."

"Sure, if you can get her on one," Luke snorted, eyes still closed. "But she's a sitting duck on her own two feet. That'll get her killed one day."

"It won't," I said confidently. "Because we won't let it."

Luke smiled, but there was something sad about it. "You're right."

Artemis let out a shaking, watery sigh, like she was trying not to burst into tears.

---

Hiraya let out a long hiss as she parked her car, like someone stuck her with a pin and was squeezing the air out of the vampire balloon.

"We're here," she said softly.

I looked out the window.

I don't know what I expected, but all I saw when looking out was a regular looking roadside diner.

There were a few dingy looking cars parked in the huge parking lot next to us in front of the long building that looked like any other diner from the southern US. Square windows with closed blinds were lit up with dim yellow light, brown siding and a friendly sign on the front door that looked like 'Wee'r Oepn!' when I squinted.

The only thing weird was that it didn't have a name.

"So, this is it?" Luke muttered. He stared up at the diner. Artemis looked around from his vest. Her nose twitched rapidly and her ears were straight up and alert. We were on the outskirts of some small town, right before the speed limit was slashed for the third time to 25mph so the local police department could pay their bills with ticket money.

You know I'm right.

The town looked abandoned. Dim street lights flickered, half of them burnt out and not a soul around. The windows of all the squat buildings nearby were dark, even the gas station.

Hiraya snatched the sunglasses off my face. "Remember the rules, dark boy" she stated simply as she tossed them back to me.

I tried to frown at her. "Now?"

Her ghost was no longer drowning. It stared into my eyes thoughtfully, as if considering something. It made me uncomfortable, because hers was the third ghost of hundreds I've seen that felt like they were seeing me at the moment of their death. Luke's was bad enough.

Cliff's was worse.

"Yes, now," she drawled, crossing her arms. "As soon as we get through that door, be on your guard. All here are civilized," she sneered. Her lips curled back from her sharp teeth. "But sometimes seeing weakness gets the better of us."

Her ghost's four wings splayed out behind it proudly as if to draw attention. Its eyes darted to the side as it said something. The answer it got turned its eyes back, a brief triumphant smile, then it lunged in a blur, pushing something or someone out of the way and then -

Her ghost vanished.

"And mortals are so very weak."

Out of the corner of my eye, Luke's ghost stared at me, pleading as the dark claw was pulled back through his chest. Artemis' ghost flailed for a moment, then flattened into a bloody pulp of fur and bone. The BMW was a stripped down car frame missing all its wheels and looking like something had taken a bite out of the front. The pavement under our feet was crumbled and overgrown, most of the curb was gone. The town itself went from empty to a ruin like a tornado or tidal wave swept through it. Trash and debris everywhere, telephone poles snapped like twigs and hollowed out broken buildings.

Hiraya's ghost was gone.

I don't know what that means, but I knew I didn't like it.

Hiraya's living form raised an eyebrow at me. "What now?"

"Not much." I lied as I hooked my sunglasses onto the collar of my shirt. My stomach scrunched into a little ball once and then slowly relaxed. "You won't drown anymore."

"Tch." Hiraya sounded annoyed, but she looked a little relieved as she turned away and waved for us to follow.

"Wait," I blurted out. "When you mean, follow your lead - "

"I mean pretend a little less that you don't have fangs, hemitheos." The vampire's purple eyes glowed as she glanced back at me. "And stay close."

My mind raced as I trudged behind her.

This was reminding me of that one time I crashed a monster den with Eva, because I was a dumb kid clinging to what I thought I was supposed to be like. A mortal half-blood. And then she got grounded for taking me and then she was gone.

Mom?

Her attention sparkled, curious.

Distant.

I was on my own.

Hiraya glanced over us as she reached for the door handle, avoiding my eyes in favor of watching Luke stuff a rabbit down his vest. She brushed some of her dark hair behind her ear and tilted her head, listening to the inside.

I couldn't hear anything through the closed door, but I could smell something.

Blood.

Pretend I have fangs.

The door opened.

I'll be honest.

"I - huh."

I was expecting a monster fight club and got Mesoamerican IHOP.

As soon as Luke saw the place, he stumbled backwards with a shout.

"Fu - !" He clamped his lips shut, growling the rest of it through his nose like a bull.

His eyes darted everywhere, taking in the leather seats at the edges for when the seating area was full. There was a sign with a stick person sitting and some kind of writing I could almost read. The walls were a cool mix of dark wood and black tile. The ceiling was dominated by a huge circular stone tablet. An Aztec calendar. The Northern symbols of Death and Jaguar were glowing. Artemis poked her head out of Luke's vest, took one look at the ceiling, whimpered and ducked back out of sight.

I raised my hand.

"Didn't you guys all die?"

Hiraya glared at me.

Oh, right. The rules.

Oops.

The woman behind the small front counter with a cup full of pens and menus beside her marked her page with a bright yellow bookmark. She was wearing a very colorful wool poncho shirt covered in square patterns and a white eye patch covering her left eye. She looked up at us with a dark hazel eye, flecked with gold.

"And what is death?" She asked back as she closed her book. Her ghost could have been peacefully slumbering. "But the sleep of the gods?"

"That's fair," I admitted.

The entire back wall behind her was a fleshy growth covered in human eyes.

There were blues, greens, browns, hazelsl, grays and even the pinks of albinos looking in all directions. Some were cloudy with cataracts or old injuries. Some were bloodshot, some had pink eye, some had the whites tinged yellow, some looked infected, torn up and bleeding, swollen, had two pupils and all kinds of issues. It was like looking at a tapestry made up of a sample of every human eye in the world. A mummy was in the center, coming out of the wall like she was behind the wall and just put her torso through like it was a pane of plastic wrap. The skin was pulled tight around the skeleton and she had one hand reaching out. It reminded me of the Oracle of Delphi, both were desiccated corpses. Felt kind of like her too, but sharp and thirsty.

The mummy had one empty eye socket.

The other one stared at us with a fresh dark hazel eye, flecked with gold.

"Welcome, brother," the Aztec Oracle murmured, looking at me curiously.

Yup.

Oracle of Chthon crap still sucked.

The Aztec had thirteen of them. Had. As far as Apollo knew, the Spanish burned the last one on a pyre. Not that he blamed them, because half the Aztecs were 'creepy, sadomasochistic basketball jocks' from the dimension next door.

But Oracle spirits are hard to kill.

She might be the Sun Voice. I was basing that on the effigy of eyes, because I wasn't about to ask her which one she was.

In case she thought I actually knew what I was doing.

Both of her eyes shifted to look at Hiraya. "Kulam." The vampire stiffened. "I told you last time that you would not return."

"It seems you were mistaken," Hiraya said tightly.

Telling the vampire about her death…she never said anything or even hinted at it, but it must have meant a lot for her to risk coming back here, to defy an Oracle's word like this. If this went bad, there was nothing any of us could do.

The long tense silence was filled with dread.

The effigy's hazel eye found me again as its host then smiled at us. "It seems I was. You will find what you are after here. Let it come to you." The knot of tension in Hiraya's shoulders eased. "How is the heart?"

"Fine."

The woman slid off her seat with a boneless grace. "Seating for two?"

It was my turn to stiffen.

"He's not food," I said coldly. Even Khione wasn't this bad. She at least acknowledged him. "He's with me. Seating for three."

The Sun (?) Voice didn't look offended or embarrassed as she picked up a third menu. "Of course. Any preferences for seating?"

"Got a - " Then I realized I was definitely not following a certain someone's lead anymore.

I turned to Hiraya.

I turned away from Hiraya.

The look on her face scared me.

"Got a booth?"

It turned out there was a free booth.

"Perce," Luke hissed into my ear.

"I know."

Something pretending to be a regular human woman was at a small table with a coffee and a newspaper. I could see the shape of this squiggly thing behind her half in and half out of our reality, tendrils burrowed into her back. The koosh ball monster wiggled at me, a crooning, watery call burbled against the inside of my skull.

Uh.

Hi. I nodded at it. Nice to meet you too.

"They are all monsters!"

"Yeah."

"Be quiet!" Artemis squeaked.

"Yes," Hiraya said evenly from behind us. "We can hear you."

A very tall, very thin, very pale man in a black top hat and clothes with long fingers and no eyes delicately cut into his dessert, but I could feel him looking at us. There were evil looking werewolf creatures with three heads in the corner tearing into bloody meat and the bartender was a ben síde, a banshee, with stropy scars down her face like she tried to tear her deep black eyes out. The back of my neck was a constant buzz of danger. I knew just from looking around why Hiraya was worried about losing sight of Luke. She was worried about never getting him back. The place smelled like a butcher's shop and the meat wasn't just from animals.

My stomach growled.

A 'customer' roughly bumped me in their rush back to their table. I had a flash of blinding fear when I felt Luke's grip on my shoulder loosen.

I turned, lashing out with a hand to grab onto one spindly arm and twisted.

"Ah! Hey, hey, hey, you little fuck - " The monster was all limbs, almost like a Hollywood Gray alien except instead of a head, there was just a gray eyestalk with a huge orange eye. The pupil was a long rectangle like a goat's turned sideways. Its mouth was in the center of its chest, a bloody diamond hole lined with sharp suckers.

It also sounded like Mr. D with an accent straight out of New Jersey.

"Oh shit," it warbled as it stared at me. "Oh fuck."

I felt the growl build in my chest as Luke stepped behind me.

"Watch where you're going," I snapped. I felt like there was a pile of pebbles in the back of my throat. "Or I'm taking your eye."

"Yes!" It yelped as it tugged on the arm I had trapped. I let it go and it fell over in a scramble of six limbs. "Sorry, man! Sorry - uh, Great Dude?"

I stared after it for a second.

Great Dude?

Shit.

I really didn't want to actually like the guy.

Not that it mattered. He stumbled into someone else in a panic, something that looked like a man sized praying mantis and he lost his eye anyway.

"Thanks," Luke whispered shakily. "Everyone else was watching."

It was like Hiraya said. Waiting for weakness.

Our one eyed waitress politely stepped over what looked a lot like the remains of a human leg that had fallen off the table where a family of ghouls were eating. An actual family, with a papa ghul in a stained business suit, a mama ghula in desert rags and a diseased looking vulture pecking at the meat alongside a baby ghoul. They were gray-skinned with bulging eyes, mouths full of needle-like teeth and slits for noses.

Papa Ghul sniffed. "Blood sucker."

Hiraya sneered. "Corpse eater."

He sniffed again. Luke's grip on my shoulder was starting to hurt as hungry eyes turned on us. The monster's ghost looked like he would really piss someone off in the future.

The cruel, toothy grin from my childhood settled easily onto my face.

"Meat," I drawled.

He only met my eyes for a second, before turning back to his meal, muttering something. How were we supposed to find help here? Everywhere we looked, there were creatures of dark legends or beings that didn't belong on Earth at all feasting in their version of Ruby Tuesday.

Except for this one human schmuck at the bar in sweatpants and white T-shirt petting a huge black dog with an eye-searing pink collar.

"Here we are," the Sun Voice (?) said as she led us to an open booth seating across from the bar. Hiraya subtly motioned for me to take a seat first. I didn't bother opening my menu, no matter how much my stomach clenched unhappily. Luke sat on the other side like he had a rod up his butt. He stiffened further when Hiraya sat next to him and then scooted away.

"I'm fine," the vampire told the Sun Voice, jerking a thumb at him.

The Oracle smiled blandly. "Should you change your mind, I will know."

"You use your fortune telling powers to take orders?" I asked.

"Why not?"

She had me there.

"Are you not going to order?" Hiraya gave me a look once we were left alone. Unfriendly eyes bored into the back of my head. I didn't turn to see who was staring. "I heard your stomach."

I clenched my jaw.

"I'm not really hungry," I lied. That Snickers didn't last long. "It's just habit."

Mom didn't know any better before she told my grandparents I existed.

The vampire gave me a knowing look that I hated. It reminded me of when I was eight the week Mom came back. The awkward silences and probing questions like my mother was trying to figure out what was wrong with me.

I ignored her. "You okay, Luke?"

He looked like he really wanted to take out his dad's lighter and start blowing everything up.

I just wasn't sure if it was before or after he threw up.

"Fine," he said tightly. He was eyeing the lizardmen businessmen sucking down slimy gray eggs in the booth in front of us. The bulge in his vest shivered. I was more worried about the big black dog with an eye-twitchingly pink collar that had started sniffing the air before burning red eyes focused on us.

Not us.

Me.

That's a fucking Greek hellhound.

It was only twice the size of a Great Dane instead of twice the size of a truck, which meant it was a Greek hellhound puppy.

Its owner glanced up from his notebook. He was just a dude. Looked like he was in his late forties with graying hair and a short beard. His storm gray eyes swept over us then he looked back down.

He froze.

His eyes snapped up in a double take.

His dog let out a chilling howl.

I stood up, not sure if I was going to retreat in front of all these monsters, or if I was going to fight in front of all these monsters. I had a moment to think, Nemesis, you absolute bitch, before it was on me.

I fell under three hundred pounds of barking dog, desperately groping for its snapping jaws or for Damocles or both. The stink of brimstone breath and the last Happy Meal it ate burned my nostrils as I tried not to be the next one on the menu.

Luke was yelling. Artemis was yelling. The man was yelling. The bartender let out a piercing, painful whistle silencing everyone: "Half of ye are mortal, don't make me - "

" - don't kill her! Don't kill her, please! She's just playing!" The man begged.

Playing?

I froze for a second.

It cost me the battle.

The dog's jaws closed on my arm, fangs as long as steak knives. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw the old guy go down under an angry vampire and then I realized that my Spidey Sense had been silent the entire time.

I held my breath as I felt its teeth press down on my forearm.

"Grrr!" The hellhound growled and shook its head back and forth. I stared as it grinned back at me with a dopey dog grin as it gently shook my arm again, not even breaking the skin. "Grrrr!"

"I - okay," I said.

"Grrrll?"

"This was not the best idea you've ever had."

Luke's head tentatively poked over the monster's shoulder, disbelievingly. "You're not dead."

"You can sound happier about that."

"I told you," the man rasped under Hiraya's claws at his throat. "She's harmless. Please."

He had a bronze sword stabbing the vampire in the stomach. It wasn't going very far, shedding just a few drops of black blood. She didn't seem to notice, teeth bared, disguise gone with her wings touching the ceiling. He briefly glanced down at the sword like he was willing it to work.

Hiraya tilted her head. Then she smiled, all of her sharp teeth on display as her barbed, black tongue licked her lips. "Are you in yet?"

I watched his face go from mildly frustrated to absolutely terrified.

His dog slobbered all over the sleeve of my tunic as it settled down, trapping my legs under its bulk. Hiraya rolled her eyes and pulled off the idiot dog lover. He immediately rubbed at his neck, pulling the collar of his shirt higher.

"We're fine," she told the banshee watching us with black eyes. She shifted back to human, the small wound disappearing under her blouse.

The man stared at her from the ground. "That's not fair."

Took the words right out of my mouth.

Her answering smile was mean.

He pouted and turned towards me. "You are alright, yes?"

I peered at the guy. He looked completely human. The relieved smile on his face matched the one on his ghost, before it went transparent revealing shining bronze wires and gears under the skin slowly tick tick ticking to a halt.

"So this is awkward," the man began as his ghost turned into a gray statue and then crumbled into ash. He sat up.

He gulped as Reclaim settled right on his collar bone.

"I bet," Luke said coldly. He eyed the guy's bronze sword. It was shaped like a xiphos, but I knew from experience that Celt swords looked like that too. "Get it off him."

"Her," he corrected Luke peevishly. "Mrs. O'Leary, come on, girl." He patted his knee. "Get off him."

She growled at him.

"Sorry," the man said, wisely backing off. "She's usually not like this, I swear - I have no idea why she likes you so much."

I sighed and laid my head back. I was probably getting old blood in my hair. "The Night is my great-aunt, aunt, first cousin, sister and sister-in-law. Depending on who you ask," I offered reluctantly. "And half of those simultaneously."

Usually, that means her monster kids want me to not be a thing really bad.

Don't ask me why.

Sometimes the family loves you, sometimes the family would love to murder you.

"Oh, I see," he muttered. The man's eyebrows were within invading distance of his hairline. "You're Greek."

The vampire snorted so hard she started choking.

Actually struggling to breathe.

Luke sighed, lowering his sword. "He's not wrong."

Hiraya raised a hand, still coughing, pointing with one finger to ask for a minute to let her stop dying.

"Is it over?" Artemis whimpered from under the table.

"Yup." When did she get under there? Did Luke just chuck her underneath as soon as the dog jumped on me? "False alarm. His dog is just malfunctioning."

"D'noh," the idiot dog lover scoffed. "She's adorable and very sweet and just wanted to make friends."

"She will be the size of a tank full grown." Think a black Mastiff form of Cujo, huge, big teeth, big claws and glowing red eyes. "...I didn't know they even come in puppy form anymore?" I suddenly realized what was wrong with this picture.

What was more wrong with this picture.

As a species, hellhounds were thousands of years old. "Is Night still fucking Cerbe - um, never mind."

Our vampire let out a beautiful sounding startled laugh as I shuddered.

"Forget I asked." That was Erebus' problem. I don't wanna know.

I don't wanna know.

"Hellhounds aren't pets." Luke tried.

"Hellhounds are usually not pets," the idiot dog lover corrected him again as he futilely attempted to move the three hundred pound dog again. "He's not going anywhere, let him up, O'Leary, please."

"So I gotta ask," I started. "What's with - um - "

"The hellhound pet?" He grinned a little. "Long story, involving many close calls with a death and quite a few giant chew toys."

"I meant the name, actually," I said, shaking off a weird sense of deja vu.

Wait a minute.

A death?

"Oh," he said. "Well, we met in Chicago."

"...okay?"

He sighed and turned back to his dog. "Meaningless trivia to remind myself that I am clever."

"Here," Hiraya said. Her voice was still a little raspy. "Let me."

Before she could throw it off me the dog finally had enough of my sleeve and slowly, as if to make sure we knew she was moving because she wanted to, started chewing on my backpack. I took the chance to escape immediately and wiggled out from under the oversized paw. I stood up, ran a hand through my hair and glared around at the dining room.

I dug into my stomach. It felt like I stuck an electrified fork in my belly button as I snapped,

"What?"

My voice resonated.

Everyone turned back to their meal.

Except for the koosh ball monster who had his meat puppet giggle at me.

Hiraya looked me up and down.

I had been chewed on by a giant dog and I looked like it. My right sleeve was a complete write off. There were just wet tatters below the elbow and a giant puddle of dog drool on my chest. There were small tears where its claws caught on the threads. Rhea and Khione both pitched in to fix it on this Quest, but it was looking like a hellhound pup was my tunic's last straw.

"You have magic, right?" I asked her desperately.

"I'm not fixing that," she said flatly.

"I am terribly sorry." The guy actually looked sad as he eyed my sleeve. "I certainly wasn't expecting…" He waved a limp hand at us. "...I hope you have an idea for saving your bag, because I am coming up blank."

Luke let out a frustrated sound. "It's your dog!"

"It's fine," I jumped in before Luke gave up and stuck Mrs. O'Leary in the rump with Reclaim anyway. I sat back down in my seat and resisted the urge to slump. "She's not hurting anything."

I called it my Bag of Holding for a reason. It's not actually physical storage.

No don't - don't chew on the straps!

"Got a name?" I said snidely. "Because I'm calling you 'idiot dog lover' in my head."

He looked offended. "Quintus, mortal son of Intellect."

"You're a half-blood." Luke was surprised. He bit his lip as he looked at the guy with his graying hair and beard. He turned away and bent down to coax Artemis out of hiding. "...Luke, son of Thieves."

"Percy," I offered. "Son of Fate."

We all looked towards the vampire.

"No." Hiraya said as she threw herself back into her seat.

I thought about pulling an Aaron and saying it anyway.

Artemis crawled out from underneath the table. She looked ashamed, ears hanging down as she slowly inched around the hellhound.

"And youuuuu'rrrre…" Quintus trailed off as he looked between me and Luke, like he lost confidence in his guess half way through. He glanced around at the dining room full of monsters. "When you say Fate, what exactly…"

"The Fates are my siblings."

Quintus blinked and then looked delighted. He grabbed a random empty chair and dragged it over to our table. He sat on it backwards, arms crossed over the back of the chair as he rested a hand on his dog's massive head.

"Remarkable. That explains your eyes, I imagine."

I squinted at him. "Yeah, I guess."

"His eyes?" Luke wondered out loud and I realized that I never told him what was behind my sunglasses. Cliff could see them just fine. Luke never asked and it just never came up.

"No pupils, wider than normal iris radius, no sign of physical muscle structure, the northern lights among a sea of stars," Quintus said like he was diagnosing me. "And a dash of vertigo."

"Oh, there's a feeling too?" I didn't know that.

The way the vampire gave me an incredulous look made me think I was supposed to know that.

How?

Either you could see it, and it didn't matter, or you couldn't and it didn't matter.

"Mild," Quintus reassured me. "Although it does get worse the longer you look."

"The Mist is hiding it," Luke said miserably. He looked like he just got handed a report card full of Ds and Fs. "I never noticed."

"You can learn to See it," Quintus reassured him too. "It takes a bit of time, but can be done."

"Time?" Luke said mockingly.

"Some of us do live to adulthood," the guy said, exasperated. "You're almost there yourself."

"Not by visiting places like this they don't," Hiraya interrupted. "I'm surprised you live still. A lone mortal coming here without a beast like yours is coming to die." Her eyes narrowed. "And even with it, a hellhound is no true deterrent."

I wasn't sure whether or not I wanted to call him on his ghost. He could be telling the truth. You could be a half-blood of anything, and nothing said you had to keep your original body to count.

Divinity was soul deep.

"Yes, well. The owner knows me." He looked sheepish. Did he mean the Sun Voice or something else? "I called in a favor. Needs must and all that."

Luke and I both looked him over.

Along with the bronze sword, he had a side bag, a dagger and his notebook. Sweatpants and sneakers. Not even any armor.

"A Quest?" Luke said dubiously, also sitting.

"Yes." Quintus nodded firmly. "A Quest to keep my damn dog." He pointed at Mrs. O'Leary's eye-watering pink collar. I did not like looking at it. "Besides, aren't you ones to talk?" He continued, looking smug. It was probably the storm gray eyes that was making me think he looked like Masayuki or Annabeth. "I didn't think many of you even knew about this waystation - "

"Waystation?" Artemis interrupted, ears up.

Quintus squinted at her. "...that voice. Do I know you?"

Luke's warning look could have stripped a rabbit bald.

"No!" Artemis squeaked.

"She's some kind of nature spirit that got cursed by the gods," Luke said easily. "We don't know her name yet, but have been calling her Arty."

"Yes, they do that," Quintus gave the rabbit a look of pity.

Artemis wilted.

"They are looking for a way across the desert," Hiraya offered and my ears rang.

We will find what we are after here.

Let it come to us.

"Oh!" Quintus lit up. "So am I!" Hiraya sat up straight from her slouch like she had been stung. "I mean, I was. I mean, I found one already. That's why I'm here, waiting for them."

"Can you, please," Hiraya sounded very close to begging. "Take them with you."

"We'll visit," I told her.

"Don't."

Was it too much to hope that Future Percy was off the hook by virtue of being more trouble than he was worth?

Luke cracked a grin. "It wasn't all bad, now you know about that Priest guy and if some demigods were to ask you for help tomor - "

"No," Hiraya said immediately. "I am never doing this again."

"Sorry," I mumbled. I remembered her ghost.

Liar.

I was low key hoping she never helps anyone ever again too.

"Of course," Quintus said softly. "It was as formal an arrangement as I could make due to the whole…" He waved a hand.

"The Night," I said.

"That," he said sourly. "It's made a real mess of things. My usual methods are - " His face darkened. "Unreliable. I set up everything. Part protection, part transportation and part smuggling."

What?

"Ah," Hiraya said. "Rome closed the border, hm?"

Quintus shot us a panicked look and I realized Quintus was Roman. I should have known from the name. I wonder which one he meant by Intellect? And I thought their demigods were still being brainwashed into believing Greeks didn't exist?

Guess not.

"We already know about the other pantheons," Luke said and I felt a pang in my chest.

Other pantheons.

The Romans.

That conversation was going to suck. I could feel it in my bones.

"Really." Quintus looked like he didn't quite know what to do with that information. Or maybe more like he had too many ideas on what to do with that information. "Then, yes, by the order of Mars the dogs have been let out to play," Quintus muttered. "Another demigod or two…I can justify that, easily. Besides, we half-bloods should stick together. We can only rely on each other, and," He looked embarrassed. "My dog likes you."

Hiraya breathed a sigh of relief.

My gut scrunched into a ball.

This was it.

I dug out the shining gold bead stamped with a symbol from my pocket. It was warm.

We were getting out of here.

I should have known better than to relax.

As soon as Hiraya snatched her token out of the air, a loud, rowdy noise rose from the front of the restaurant. We didn't have to wait long for a group of bikers to swagger in with leather jackets, buckles, bandanas, skulls and bones and flame iconography and everything.

Monster bikers.

"Right on time," Quintus said to the feel of my heart dropping out of my ass as a huge headless guy carrying his own head in a motorcycle helmet turned towards our table. "That's them."

The floor shook as the nine foot tall Dullahan stalked towards us. You've heard of those monsters. They're Celt, just like the banshee. The Headless Horseman had his fifteen minutes of fame a while ago.

Quintus stood up quickly as a low growl came from Mrs. O'Leary. One of the bikers fidgeted, sniffing the air and then broke, a thin pale man turning into a slavering hairy creature as he lunged. He didn't get far, the massive gloved hand yanking him back by his throat, throwing him on the ground. Burning gold eyes opened within the dark visor of the motorcycle helmet.

The monster didn't even have time to scream before he was ash.

So this motherfucker has Penance Stare.

"I said," the headless rider said in a pitch black voice. "Don't touch the cargo."

His crew went silent.

I felt his attention fall on me.

"Cé hiad do thuismitheoirí?" Ghost Rider asked me.

I stared for a second.

Irish Gaelic.

I understood that. I was still learning. I still had my flashcards for 'Where is the bathroom' on my nightstand still, but I understood him.

Flawlessly.

Like it was Greek.

Who are your parents?

I looked down at my ruined ocean blue Celtic tunic Mom had made for me. I remembered putting it on at Camp, wondering if it was enchanted, thinking it wouldn't hurt to wear.

"Morrígu." My accent felt clumsy in my mouth.

"The fifth?" Ghost Rider continued.

"That's us," Quintus nodded. He looked a bit curious, but unfazed, like he put his life in the hands of monsters all the time. "The three of us. Will that be a problem?"

"No. In fact," the golden flame eyes winked out as the monster chuckled. He ground his boot into the pile of ash on the floor.

"I just made some room."

I looked across the table. Artemis looked terrified. Luke looked resigned.

Hiraya shrugged. "Bye."

Here we go.

I guess.

Aura was right behind us. We didn't have a choice.

Out of the fire, into the frying pan.

 

[Shujin]

A voice in my head
I didn't do nuthin' wrong
Crisis awaits me

Gah!

Who the - what the Hades are you? How'd you - why are you - this shouldn't be happening.

"Greek!"

Give me a second.

"How kind of you to notice through that squint of yours, Chinese."

What?

Oh. No.

I'm not being racist.

I am being an asshole. It's a subtle, but important difference. The former is being an idiot because bigot. The latter is because I'm Greek, Xihe is not here and I'm this close to doing something unwise to Taiyang's face.

It's been a long four days.

"So you all gotta hold the fort, Prophecy is acting up like whoa! Saule, darling, can you - great. It shouldn't take too long, five minutes? Five minutes, might be five decades, you know how it is. Ciao!"

Whew.

Did I get clear?

Don't answer that. You better not have any way of knowing and we are talking about gods here. A spiteful, contrary bunch. I should know!

I think I'm good, no one likes it when Prophecy Domains act up.

No one.

It's like a steaming wet turd dropped in the middle of the dance floor. It stinks up the whole place. You can't ignore it, because you might put your foot in it and then it'll get everywhere and if you just leave it to dry, you'll never get it out of the carpet so someone's gotta clean it up.

So.

Let's talk.

Well, you're pretty funny looking, aren't you…you haven't, perhaps, maybe, possibly dislodged yourself from this bizarre young little proto-demigod hybrid I-don't-know-what-he-is-person-thing?

Perseus Stele?

Crap.

I wanted to be wrong. I wanted to be wrong and I'm not and I don't know how to feel about that.
I bet he just rolled with it too. Because that boy wouldn't know normal if it actually bit him in the ass annnnnnd you shouldn't be here, but you are, which means something has gone very wrong somewhere!

And I have no idea what or when!

Fuck.

Story of my life.

Alright.

Fine.

Since I have decided against burning you out of my divinity…

Hi.

Whoever and whatever you are.

Don't tell me.

If I don't know by now, I'm not supposed to. That's how this works. I am the great, powerful, handsome and awesome Phoebus Apollon! Tremble before my glory! The Greek god of the Sun and a bunch of other things that aren't important right now.

Except Prophecy.

That one's important.

Unfortunately.

Hold on. That gives me an idea.

You're coming along, of course. How'd Percy do this? Since you're…you.

…I can do that.

There is nothing I love talking about more than myself!

---

My next stop was on my grandmother's front door step.

It was somewhere in Mississippi, I don't know exactly where. I can barely tell the difference between Manhattan and Queens. And I live in that city. Don't give me that - The Sun Sees All and the Sun also has a Terrible Sense of Geography, do I look like Hermes to you? I am much more handsome. And the geopolitical realities of what piece of land on a single planet belongs to what made up country or is named whatever to which government or the longitude and latitude coordinates - that matters to Travelers.

The "geography" crammed into my skull is on a more interstellar scale.

I raised my hand to knock on the normal looking front door, but it opened before I could touch it.
There, standing before me in all her polka dot bathrobe and pink slippers glory was the former Queen of the Gods of Mt. Othrys.

You don't know how weird this is.

I always imagined my grandmother to be like a female version of my father. Her husband was evil, five of her kids had been eaten and when all was said and done, she pulled a Switzerland with Okeanos and stayed out of the way. I'd give this woman good odds on a solo assault on Olympus itself and she did nothing with that strength. My father and my uncles loved her, but her daughters were noticeably cooler on the subject. I imagined this incomprehensible, arrogant, powerful distant figure with Uncle Sea's eyes, my father's face and Hera's sneer. Instead, I got Flower Power, lessons on strategic drug use and the really unfortunate knowledge that the elder Olympians had a step-father in Bob Marley.

"Well," my grandmother Rhea blinked owlishly at me. I think she could see you. "Shit."

She can definitely see you.

"Help." I was not begging, but it was a close call.

"Yeah." She sounded - and looked - despondent. It was a familiar kind of misery. The one where you hoped you were wrong about something and had to admit that you weren't. It wasn't actually a Prophecy thing, but it might as well be.

"Motherfucking - I hate her," Rhea muttered as she turned right around and went back into her house. For lack of better options, I followed. "I fucking hate her - I was done. I'm asleep."

"I'm sorry?" I didn't want to admit I had no idea what was going on, but, well. If I said otherwise, I'd be lying. Can't do that, I'm the God of Truth!

That was a lie.

I can lie, but I don't like doing it. That's the Honest to Me Truth.

I don't like apologizing either, but when confronted with someone that can splatter me like a bug on a windshield with an ounce of concentration I found saying my condolences much easier to do.
I'm a golden immortal, but some things not even I want to test the limits of.

"This is Her fault." You could hear the capital H as Rhea puttered around her house like an over-caffeinated mouse. I was starting to think the 'her' was Percy's mother. Which was fair, honestly, I'm not about to pretend I haven't cursed Her Name once or twice. Even us gods could feel like ants under a microscope sometimes. Shocking, I know.

Rhea's pride of lions lazed about, watching the goddess blow through her house, finding her car keys, grabbing her purse. I don't know why she was bothering physically getting the items. I never did if I could get away with it. Perks of godhood, never losing your car keys for more than five seconds.

"I should have known," she grumbled. "I should have burned those fucking trees the second time around - argh!"

"Whoa!" I jumped back with my divine reflexes as a piece of pottery whipped past me to shatter against the wall. I knew from the way the pottery broke and not the state of Mississippi that she was still restraining herself. I was reminded of the many, many temper tantrums of my siblings whenever we were ordered around. I was always dignified about it, as I am with everything I do, but being bossed around by someone you knew didn't care much beyond their orders and not being able to do anything about it was, as Percy would say:

It sucks.

"I don't understand," I risked saying. "What's the problem exactly?"

Every lion in the room turned their deadpan cat stares onto me.

"Aside from everything."

Rhea snorted. She ran a hand through her hair that was currently a platinum blonde color I've only seen on her daughters Hera and Demeter before. In a blink of an eye, the hungover free loving hippie was replaced by a hungover snowbird who looked like she was hating her retirement years.

"The problem is that she fucking got me."

That explained absolutely nothing.

Neither did being dragged halfway across the country with a grumpy lion cub, a potted bonsai tree and the Beatles' music in the passenger seat of a Greek Mystery Machine. It was god travel, obviously, so instead of taking hours it only took a couple of seconds to travel hundreds of miles.

I can confidently say, with 100% certainty, that I have no idea what's going on.

Being confidently wrong is one of my many talents!

Our destination was all the way back to the East Coast and somewhere in the North East. I only recognized where we were by the echoes of our first failed attempt at moving to the Americas with Olympus.

"Washington, D.C?"

"Close," my grandmother grunted. "Takoma Park."

"And we're here…why?"

"To shut my goddamn trees up." She winced like a bugle horn was blowing right into her ear, making me remember that she wasn't just my grandmother, ex-wife of the one of the Worst Dads in History, but also the patron of the Grove of Dodona. The fifth Greek Oracle spirit, possessing a bunch of trees and completely out of my control. I don't think even The Fates controlled it, but I wasn't going to say so out loud. I turned around in my seat to give the potted bonsai tree a suspicious look.

The confirmation that we were following vague Prophecies did not fill me with good feelings. I've been on the wrong end of those more than once and had the unenviable job of telling others they were on the wrong end of one, even if they always tried to test my word, or never believed me. Some of them, my own children.

I got tired of that.

True Sight was not something I passed on to my mortal children anymore. It was a fine line to walk. If I invested too much, they always had the prophetic talent, no matter what I did.

Kassandra had the last laugh in the end, a cruel and beautiful one, just like her. She was no Helen of Troy, Nur Jahan or Beyonce, but Cleopatra proved that you didn't have to be the prettiest woman in the room to ruin everything.

I looked out of the window. There beyond the Mystery Machine was a boring suburb dominated by large, classical houses arranged in a half-circle facing the cul de sac. Rhea didn't seem to be in any hurry now that we were here, and it became obvious why not as the front door to one of the homes opened. A girl no older than fourteen came out, walking right towards us with quick, agitated steps. I could see that she was a redhead with shining green eyes. I recognized the endless reflection within those eyes. Hard not to, I had a half-brother with eyes like those and for far too long, my twin did too.

"The lion lady," she breathed as soon as she was within earshot. She can talk. I revised my age estimate down a few years to a tall twelve. Or maybe an average twelve. I don't know. I have a bad frame of reference. Percy is a midget.

"Saw me coming, did you?" Rhea said in response. "Bet you saw a lot of things recently, right?"

What?

"What?" My voice came out bewildered and confused.

"What?" The girl said, taken aback. "You know about that? About the dreams? What they mean?"
Dreams?

Prophetic ones, if she could see us coming before I even knew what I was doing here. So she was that kind of clear-sighted. I was beginning to get an idea of what was going on here and I didn't like it.

"Excuse me." I raised my hand. "Who is she?"

The girl inclined her chin boldly. "Rachel Elizabeth Dare."

She said it like I was supposed to know the name, but what are random mortal names to me? Congratulations, maybe your life wasn't a complete waste of time?

What'd you want, a cookie?

"Does this have anything to do with the Pythia?" I asked my second and infinitely more vital question.

The horn honked as Rhea slammed a hand down on it. "Dammit, if you knew Pythia was gone, why didn't you - "

"Percy is - "

"Not an Oracle spirit," Rhea clicked at me and it was only my divine nature that let me understand what she was saying.

"But an Oracle still," I tried. I was a little spooked. "He ate it. And we're still getting Prophecies, which is the important part? Besides, Pythia belonged to the Fates and he's their brother and his mother is You-Know-Who and don't tell me he broke it," I finished quickly. I wanted to be wrong. "Tell me that snake is still in Tartarus too."

"I don't know," my grandmother said slowly. My heart sank. "But something has changed." She glanced out the window past me at the frizzy red haired girl staring at us with shining eyes. "I do know that there is much you don't know about what you're seeing. If you want to know - "

"I do," the girl blurted out. She bit her lip. It was adorable. "I want to know. Please."

Rhea jerked her head and then we were off again in the Mystery Machine. With a grumpy lion cub, a clear-sighted girl holding the potted bonsai in the back seat and an acoustic guitar. I really should question pubescent girls being willing to get into the back of a van with strangers based on some cryptic messages, but that was called being a responsible adult.

I have spent millennia trying to avoid that as much as possible.

I was trying something a bit new this century, but old habits were hard to break. I was too caught up in my own thoughts. My stomach felt like it was trying to eat itself. Out of my four, the Spirit of Delphi of Pythia was important. Not the least of which is the fact that I had a Name tied to it.

You know about Names, right?

Good.

Suffice to say, I had a vested interest in not losing it, never mind that every mortal within Olympus' sphere of influence also has a vested interest in my not losing it. It would not be pleasant for them either, but my anguish was much more important. Through absolutely no fault of my own, my Oracle of Delphi got herself nommed. Don't ask me what she was thinking poking at the mini-abomination, because I don't know. I only found out after it was already gone.

My great destiny, my reward for my epic defeat of the mighty Python had its remains flushed down the toilet of Camp Half-Blood approximately 11 hours after becoming a midnight snack for a demigod of Fate.

Humiliating.

Better her than me!

No one likes hearing a Prophecy, but believe you me, not hearing a Prophecy would be worse.
It's like a massive game of Minesweeper. The word of an Oracle is like a revealed space on the board. It might be terrible, it might be good, but at least you know about it. Without them, any move you make can trip over a Prophecy you didn't know was there, ready to blow just under the surface. Prophecies can be planned for, prepared for, perhaps even manipulated. A world with no Oracles was one with no say at all in their own Fate. You might as well not even have a future.

Just an End.

I thought we were going right back to Mississippi, but I was sadly mistaken. Instead, the van sputtered to a rolling stop in front of a place I knew very well.

The Penn Museum.

It was actually very clever of me. An Ancient Greece exhibit right in the middle of Philadelphia. Categorized and logged as just another exhibit was a certain clay jar holding the infamous Oracle of Cumae. Get it?

Philadelphia?

Don't believe any of the reviews on RateMyOracle, they are horribly biased and Sibyl's hotness rating was thousands of years out of date. I sent a more accurate one, but can you believe that it got curated out as being 'needlessly provocative?'

Her bone-dust-in-a-jar-ness was not my fault.

Okay, it was a little my fault, but she deserved it.

I may have overreacted a tad.

She hates my guts and I'm still bitter, but we were working on it. In fact, just last month, we had a nice chat where she told me that actually, she never liked my hair and I told her that I lied a few thousand years back. That favorite blue dress of hers was hideous and made her look fat. We had to clear the air, and being truthful is important. I had some hope. Sure, usually being cursed to Hades and back is a deal breaker, but she never got around to rejecting my proposal after the fact, so there's still a chance!

But it was starting to look like closing that chapter of my love life was going to have to wait, because there on the stand where the elaborate Grecian vase that used to house my Oracle was empty.
I made a high-pitched - but still manly - sound. "Someone stole her?"

"Alright," my grandmother said. She worried at her bottom lip. "This is bad."

"Thank you for stating the obvious!" I snapped back. I didn't even feel it happen. That was good, because that meant she was still around somewhere. I would know if she was destroyed, just like I felt it when Percy ate the Oracle of Delphi.

Somehow.

It was bad because the trail was cold. There wasn't a trace of divine energy other than ours around. I almost couldn't believe this was happening to me. My fortune turned on a dime.

"I can't even start looking!" I continued, aghast. "The Sun - "

"I'll handle it," Rhea interrupted me. Her human looking avatar was looking up at the ceiling, thoughtful, head tilted to the right like she was straining to hear a song or whisper from far away. "Delphi gets got and so does Cumae within the month? That's not a coincidence."

"It could be," I hoped.

"It ain't."

I could see where my sister got her lovely disposition at parties from.

"Then Trophonius - " I began.

"I'll protect him."

I'll be honest. I had almost literally forgotten he even existed the past thousand years. He's never been a successful prophetic franchise and success is what matters! No one was going to paint vases and commission clay action figures of an Oracle that has an 80% chance of driving the petitioner insane or worse. But at the end of the day, he's still all I have left of my son. I have been forced to acknowledge that should mean something to me. I blame the most uppity, presumptuous mortal I have ever met, Dorian Stele for the fact that it does mean something to me.

I'm not saying I care about what Dorian says, but I must admit he gives good advice from time to time.

Sometimes I wish I had a father like him growing up.

That usually lasts about five minutes.

But it happens.

Rhea's compound eyes turned a lovely monarch purple color. "How is the Sun holding up, by the way?"

"It's holding," I said sourly. Dozens of faces that I should have seen there, I don't. Because they were gone, because they were dead, because they were just too weak to contribute. "I should be getting back."

"Bless the girl first."

I am not ashamed to admit I nearly gave myself whiplash turning back around. "What? I don't - "

"She's clear-sighted." Rhea shrugged. "Really badly. Legacy of Selene." She waved a hand at me. "Legacy of Helios."

That was a bit of a stretch. You can't steal legacies.

...yeah, Percy doesn't know that bit, but he suspects. If you asked me a year ago, I would have denied it to my dying breath (and I'm immortal), but I can admit it. Just to you. I stole it. I'd do it again in a heartbeat. I wasn't willing to watch my sister suffer her inheritance alone. I understood what Hera was asking me to do. I thought she was telling me to try to make the girl - Rachel - one of my Oracles anyway, without a spirit and that wouldn't have ended well. I still wasn't sure about this, or that it would work, but I saw no real harm in trying.

"Don't push her," I warned the Titan Queen. I was completely aware that my Oracles - and me - were vastly more important than some mortal waif off the street, but that didn't mean I had to be an ass. If she could help, then there is no point in making it be an unnecessary sacrifice.

Artemis hated putting down the young.

There was no good way to tell my grandmother 'No' though.

Bug. Splat. Windshield.

To my relief, Rhea held up her hands in surrender. "I won't."

The blessing was simple enough. Once I got back to the Mystery Machine, it was just a question of concentration, separation and the fine delicate balance of not lighting the poor girl up like a Christmas tree. The blessing was all Sun. Rachel Dare gaped for a moment at the golden glow surrounding her. "I have no idea what it will allow you to do," I admitted. Mortals had this annoying tendency to be completely predictable until they weren't. "But it should help."

"It will," the girl said with such utter conviction it even made a shiver go down my spine. "There's someone else we need to get." She turned towards Rhea. "He's in Canada, I think in Montreal."

"Question." I had to speak up before I was dragged off on this wild goose chase. "Is this going to get this thing out of my head?"

Rachel shot me an alarmed look.

No offense, but you're weirding me out. I'm not exorcising you or anything, but I did not sign up for this and you're killing my groove just lurking in the background of my mind like this.

Why you little -

If you like Percy so much, why don't you go back to him?

"Probably not," Rhea admitted. Which was great. "But it's a symptom of the disease that hasn't struck yet, you dig?"

"No," I said. "No I don't dig."

"It's an echo," Rachel said quietly. "Something big is coming and this is our warning to prepare for it."

I sucked air in through my teeth.

And that was my cue to get out of this universe.

"Should I split attention?"

"Are you able to, man?" Rhea asked me curiously.

It was going to be hard. The last time I was able to, but that was millennia ago. It was bad enough singular, but I had two equally important responsibilities pulling me in different directions. I was the God of Prophecy. It was my Oracle that was missing, someone was moving against my pantheon and the only way this could get even more in my lane is if the Sun was involved in this nefarious scheme somehow.

But that just answered my own question.

You being in my head is a warning. One that I heeded. The Sun needs me right now.
Saule was covering for me.

"I can't," I realized sadly.

"Eh, don't sweat it," Rhea quipped with a lopsided smile. "I am now officially off my fucking ass. If something is after the Oracles, I don't want them to succeed. Because I am one."

There was that.

Some idiot with delusions of grandeur waking the Matriarch of Swarms, thinking the Grove of Dodona was just another Oracle spirit would doom us all to a live reenactment of Starship Troopers. It would be worse if they actually knew what she was and was trying to do it on purpose.

I hoped that wasn't true.

"If - if you need anything…" I trailed off. The Sun was holding for now, but it wouldn't hold indefinitely.

My grandmother studied me, the kind of look that could make a young god wonder if they accidentally misplaced a temple again or forgot to zip up their fly.

"Get going," she said softly. I wondered what she saw in me from that little staring contest, but staying to find out was a waste of time.

I got.

Everything is shit
The sun's a giant spaceship
This is Percy's fault

As soon as I started adding my strength to the Sun again, the burn started. It was a nice, soothing feeling of 'help, I fell into a pool of lava.'

Planet side, if you looked up at the sky you would see a whole lot of nothing. At all. How good you are at seeing through the Mist (or how bad the Mist is at hiding it) determines how much of that nothing you can see into, but that's about it.

From this side of things?

Boiling dark eyeball and gnashing mouth soup of black nothing chomping and chowing down on the Sun's radiance.

If it weren't for us Sun gods, the Sun would have ceased to exist in a couple of hours and I'm not entirely sure the very concept of Light itself wouldn't have followed. I want to say that's what will happen, but the Night doesn't operate on the same rules we do.

Things get really fuzzy when the two systems intersect.

I hurried back to my spot. That being on the North end of a massive chamber within the cocoon of our influence in the cold dark of space.

The sun's a spaceship. It's got shields, seven stories of personal rooms, windows and command center and all. One of the many vimanas made throughout history. The Sun has been through some shit, so we've got a whole system for how we do this. It's easier if you can sit in one spot and, well, meditate? Distract yourself from the pain without diminishing your contribution. Some of us are better at it than others.

I don't have ADHD.

No matter what anyone says. Gods don't get mortal disorders, it's just some vestigial hyperactive 13th sense inherited from Rhea seeking a hive mind, my intrinsic observant nature and the fact that my ass goes numb way too quickly and I hate it.

"Thank you," I whispered when I settled into my gold cloth cushion. Only the best for the cutest butt on Earth. I ignored the glares boring in me. It's not like I was lying. Prophecy was acting up. It still is!

"You are very welcome," Saule whispered back, shifting a bit in her chair in discomfort. I felt really bad for dumping the Greek share of the burden on her and it was doing something funny to my stomach that she didn't even try to complain about it. "Some were upset, but Amaterasu vouched for you." Absolutely gorgeous teal eyes, like the sun rising over an ocean horizon, sought mine out. I looked away. "Everything alright?"

"Nope." I cracked my neck. "But I'll manage."

"I have no doubt you will," she said warmly and I tried really hard not to let on how badly that affected me. "His birthday is coming up, isn't it? I haven't missed it?" I shook my head mutely. She hasn't actually seen Percy in years, but she never forgot him. "I should get him something."

She bit her lip, thinking and I nearly died.

Why am I like this? It's a funny story.

By funny, I actually mean pathetic.

Just the worst kind of second-hand embarrassment to make you cringe.

I, the great, mighty, popular, handsome Apollo, am currently crippled with indecision.

You'd never know it to speak of me, because I am just that much of a virile sex god and cultural icon, but I've made mistakes. Hurt people who didn't deserve it (that much). Let my emotions blind me to the flaws of people I cared about. But one thing I will never regret is pursuing love. My sister might tell you (and me) that it doesn't exist or that it doesn't last or that it isn't worth it, but I can't believe that.

I won't.

Which puts me in a bind.

A decade ago, I wouldn't have given the Baltic Sun goddess Saule the time of day.

Why should I?

I, the proud Greek, loved by everyone worth anything because I am awesome and she was some weird, foreign D-Lister spending all her time with the mortals and I've only actually spoken about 5 words to her before this decade.

They were 'hi,' 'no' and 'leave me alone.'

And then Percy just up and self-destructed over his mom dipping out.

I panicked.

What the Hades do I know about raising half-divine sprogs? Dorian was way out of his depth and drunk and angry (and I was genuinely afraid of Percy continuing the proud Greek tradition of patricide). My first option, Hestia, knew even less than I did. He's a boy, so my sister was right out. It was so bad, I even considered shoving him onto Hera.

Briefly.

Don't - don't look at me like that, I said briefly. Like, the five second dumb idea.

Maybe ten seconds.

I was panicking.

Demigod of Fate. I was confident the Queen of the Gods would treat him like he was made out of fine china made out of antimatter, but I wasn't going to risk the absolute circus exposing a young, vulnerable Percy would have made of Olympus. Every other god would have wanted a piece of him and then the others would complain 'but you said I was your favorite sibling/aunt/uncle/cousin five centuries ago!' and then it would be my problem all over again. So I had to make do with other pantheons I could trust as far as I could throw them. The Egyptians were not available, I'm not letting fucking Odin get his hands on him (I can't throw him very far) and there were only three kinds of Celts:

No Chill, Batshit and Both.

I was out of options.

I care about that kid. He grows on you. Like mold. I was trying not to mess him up any more than I had to and dumping him on any one of my family members would have done exactly that.
So would have dumping him on his own family.

The House of Night literally drives mortals insane and I'm not going anywhere near Tartarus if I could help it. Just thinking about calling up Chronos to hand over his step-son because his wife shacked up with a mortal and couldn't handle it gives me the Heebie Jeebies.

So I threw him at Saule.

Because she was a D-List goddess without a pantheon to support her in anything against a Greek god who wanted her to fix the issue and keep quiet.

She couldn't say no.

You see my problem?

A century ago, I don't think it would have made a difference, if I ever noticed her that way to begin with. If anything I would have been happy at the sure bet! Pretty little brunette with legs for days, what's not to like? Why wouldn't I go for it? I am awesome and everybody loves me! Now, every time I felt like saying something, I felt like a creep two seconds later. Eventually, someday, maybe I will have to admit that I am a fuck up and I can count who actually finds me loveable on one hand.

I know, I know.

Crazy talk.

Dorian Stele has ruined me.

I looked around the room, because I'd like not to get caught staring and the pain was -

A lot.

There were some gods no one looked at for too long. Old gods, some whose Names have been lost to history but their duty remained. The twisting, paradoxical wings and fiery sword of one was at the corner of my eye, no matter where I looked. To my immediate left was Saule. To my immediate right was an empty seat for Helios. The Norse Sunna was past that, making kissy faces at me because she's a jerk. Past her were empty seats belonging to Hathor, Sekhmet and Ra with a skinny, sick looking cat on Bast's seat. Don't know what that's about, don't care. On Saule's other side was Beiwe of the Sami. It went around in a circle, like the visage of the sun itself. With every seat occupied, by Taiyang or Unelanuhi, there were three or four that were empty or were covered by another like the Celtic Áine filling in for Lugh.

It was taxing her greatly. You could see it in the unsteady flares of white and yellow light leaking off her, the beading of silver blood instead of sweat and her tight features as she clenched her eyes shut, ground her teeth and bore it for the fourth day in a row. I hoped the Night wasn't going to last for too much longer. I didn't want to know if we could literally burn out trying to keep the Sun alive.
It was not uncommon for pantheons to have multiple sun gods.

It was even recommended.

Now some pantheons had none. I don't want to admit it, but the next time the Night falls, I'm not sure if the old gods still left will be enough. They have to be. They're still going strong.

I met Amaterasu's eyes.

If you can see the Sun in a god's eyes. They're a Sun god. It's a quick and dirty rule because Ammy's eyes were the glow of the accretion disk of a black hole.

This wasn't all of her. She didn't play by the same rules as the rest of us.

She grinned and tapped the side of her head.

Oh shit.

Quick, make yourself small and don't say anything!

What's up? I sent over the god wire. Being this physically close meant telepathy is actually an option.

I just witnessed the most interesting little thing today. She sent back. Her mental voice was coy, amused and felt like focusing on a small sunspot with the vast bulk of the sun shining just out of reach. I hope she can't see you. Because then I'd get blamed for airing Greek dirty laundry, because I wanted this to happen, obviously, and I'd never hear the end of it even after I saved the day. So you finally caved and started teaching your children about the wider world? Or just you.
I frowned. I'm…not entirely what you are referring to?

She rolled her eyes. A demigod called on me for a pact and I would recognize that atrocious accent anywhere.

Oh. Oh! I made sure I didn't fidget in my seat. Percy.

Touchy subject.

Some gods and pantheons wouldn't care about the son of Greek Fate running around.

Some would care a lot.

I don't know which one Ammy falls under. The gorgeous Japanese woman with sunlight in her hair, a great sense of humor and excellent taste in eye candy was a mask. We all knew it was one, but one does not just call out the wizard behind the curtain if he doesn't feel like revealing himself.

Because he's a wizard.

And for the record, I can speak flawless Japanese. That 'atrocious accent' was me purposefully getting on Tsukuyomi's nerves. And I taught it to Percy as a joke because kid doesn't know any better to call me out on it.

It's still funny.

Oh, of course. No, just - just me. The, ah, the kid Saule was helping me with a bit ago.

He must be important to you, her message was soft and warm.

I don't know how I'd live without him, I said honestly, because if he got murdered, we were fucked. My father is a moron. Bug. Splat. Windshield. I've known this, but the day Percy set out for this Quest is the day I felt it down to the bottom of my soul.

I rebelled against him more than once.

He sent my little sister and brother on a Quest.

...Athena still has her Title, you know.

He thinks outside of the box, carries himself well in combat and is decisive, she praised. Your Prophecy is almost blinding in him.

He takes after me, I bragged, smiling. Next you're going to say he's also good looking, just like his father. You're not telling me anything I don't already know.

Ammy's grin widened. The Pinoy vampire kept her word. He is on his way to California with the Sons of Silence right now.

Pinoy vampire. In America? The Sons of Silence? My smile withered.

Fucking what.

I take my eyes off that boy for two seconds -