Disclaimer: I do not own the Harry Potter series or the Percy Jackson series. All recognizable fictional characters are the intellectual property of J.K. Rowling and Rick Riordan. This statement stands for this entire work.
The cover image is also not my property. I found it on Pinterest, and I managed to trace it back to totul pen trunoi .com (no spaces...but it kept getting erased otherwise), but the website was in a different language, so I can't give a full citation.
As for anything relating to Greek mythology, I am trying to be as accurate as I can. If you spot something that I have seriously messed up, please let me know!
Chapter One: Found
April, 1980
Hekate stared down at the sleeping mortal woman. This was for the best. She could not see as Apollo does, predicting the far off futures that have been decided by the Fates. No, her sight was restricted to metaphorical crossroads, to decisions. Say yes or say no, turn left or turn right. She could see what awaits you at the end of each path.
And her child, her precious immortal daughter, needed her to do this. Turn left, and her daughter would grow up immortal, strong but ultimately irrelevant to the future of the world. The Fates would see Hekate's daughter with no domain of her own to rule over, forever cursed to rely on the power of her parents; and when the two of them faded from existence, she would die with them.
Turn right, and the Titaness's daughter would be born mortal, as vulnerable as a normal demigod. She would be chased by monsters and forced to fight for her life constantly. But if she survived these trials and fulfilled her destiny, the Fates would see her reborn as a true goddess with her own domain over which to reign. She would be powerful, and her life would be her own, to live and to fade in her own time.
Yes, Hekate nodded to herself, this was the right choice. The threat of an early death was far outweighed by the possibility of independence. She would not rob her child of that freedom.
Reaching out, the Titaness gently placed her right hand upon the young witch's rounded stomach and focused her power. Slowly her hand disappeared, sinking into Lily Potter's abdomen, and when Hekate pulled her arm back out, she was holding the soul of a six-month-old unborn child. She passed the young spirit to her faithful hound, sending the little one back to the underworld to await rebirth.
Now came the hard part. Ignoring the discomfort that came with such an action, Hekate reached into her own womb and grasped her baby's immortal soul. Unlike the mortal infant that she had just sent to the underworld, her child's spirit was strong, already capable of fighting back, and her daughter did not want to detach from her real body. The spirit was even less willing to bind itself to the still-developing mortal fetus within Lily Potter, but eventually, the fully-realized goddess prevailed.
The mortal witch now carried the soul of a goddess within her. In three months she would give birth, though the child would resemble neither of her human parents, the spirit twisting its new body to take on the appearance of its natural form. Of course, the wizarding world would never realize this fact. The witches and wizards of the British magical community would see dark hair and haunting green eyes, and they would declare her to be the spitting image of James Potter, with Lily's eyes.
Satisfied with her work, Hekate leaned down to press a kiss to Lily's brow, bestowing a blessing upon the mortal woman. In the coming months, the Potter's investments would pay off spectacularly, their vaults nearly tripling in size.
With a last lingering look at the witch's pregnant stomach, the Titaness disappeared, the muted sound of baying hounds echoing in her wake.
July, 1995
Maira Lily Potter lay hidden behind the hydrangea bushes in her aunt's garden, the large white and blue flowers providing ample cover for her spying. Due to the heat wave that England had been suffering under for the past two weeks, her Uncle Vernon had taken to opening the windows in the vain hope of a nice breeze.
Maira was taking advantage of this new habit, resting outside and listening to the news that her uncle was playing on the telly. Her relatives would never let her sit in the room to watch—heaven forbid she voluntarily pay attention to current events—so instead she was having to sneak around.
During a ritual that took place at the end of the Tri-Wizard Tournament six weeks ago, Voldemort had used Maira's blood to resurrect himself, killing Cedric Diggory in the process. While she hadn't known the seventh year champion very well, his death had shaken her. Cedric's prone form and unseeing eyes featured in her nightmares almost as frequently as Voldemort's horrific naked body rising from a steaming cauldron did.
She checked the Daily Prophet every morning, trying to figure out the Dark Lord's plans, but for whatever reason, they were not reporting on Voldemort's return. Either the newspaper didn't believe her about the resurrection, or Riddle was doing a remarkable job of working under the radar, or maybe both were true. The other option, and one that Maira found highly probable, was that the Death Eaters were only targeting muggle areas at the moment, and the wizarding world simply didn't care enough to investigate.
Thus her snooping outside of windows. If you knew what to listen for, you could figure out a lot about the state of the magical community by listening to the muggle news. Unexplained gas line explosions, fires that were unusually resistant to any attempt at putting them out, and bridges that collapsed for seemingly no reason could all be attributed to magic. Even murders with no apparent cause of death could act as a giant blinking sign to those in the know. None of these things had happened yet, but the Girl-Who-Lived was just waiting for the day.
She listened anxiously as the newscasters droned on, but it wasn't long before she was sighing with relief. It seemed they had had another day of relative peace. After all, if the Death Eaters had struck, surely it would be headliner news. The young witch stopped paying attention completely after the broadcast diverged into talk about a condom truck that had tipped and spilled its load all over the highway. Somehow, Maira doubted Voldemort was behind that.
She turned her attention instead to her homework, or what was supposed to be her homework. Really it was more a sheet of parchment with numerous doodles scrawled across the surface. At the moment she was focusing on perfecting her signature, trying to copy Dumbledore's beautiful calligraphy. She had almost gotten the "M" in Maira just right.
Maira, the Old Greek name of the Dog Star, after her godfather Sirius, though she had only realized that at the end of her third year. Considering she was a celebrity in the wizarding world, it honestly surprised her how often people mispronounced her name. It had been a constant irritation during her first year, always having to tell people that it was pronounced MY-rah, not MARE-ah, and it was still sometimes a problem outside of school.
Hearing her uncle's bellows nearing the window, Maira decided it was probably time to abandon her hiding place. She wasn't getting any work done anyways. Standing with her back pressed to the wall to avoid being seen by her Uncle Vernon, Maira brushed the dirt off of her jean shorts and oversized red t-shirt before putting her books back into her leather satchel.
Unlike everything else she was currently wearing, the satchel was of high quality and something Maira had bought for herself. Crafted from the hide of a beautiful bronze dragon, it was adorned with polished gold accents. Her shirt was a hand-me-down of Dudley's and over three sizes too large for the petite girl. At least the shorts fit. Her Aunt Petunia was far too concerned with appearances to let her niece walk around with pants that were constantly falling off.
As soon as she heard Vernon lumber away, most likely towards the kitchen, Maira slipped out from behind the bushes and took off down the street towards the park. Grumbling to herself, Maira thought with frustration that she wouldn't have to hide in the foliage to get news if her so-called friends would write to her.
Their letters had been few and far between, and whenever they did deign to send her a response, the letters always said things that hinted at secret meetings and important information, but of course, those hints were always followed up with words about how it was simply "too dangerous" to put more in a letter. And it was clear that Ron and Hermione, and even Sirius, were all somewhere together. Why she was condemned to the Dursley's while they all joined the war effort, Maira couldn't say, but it infuriated her.
She was the one Voldemort was after. She was the one who had faced him last year, who had seen Cedric die, not Ron and Hermione. She had faced him four times now. She deserved to be included, not Ron and not Hermione! And Sirius was her godfather. She should be the one living with him, not her friends! Didn't Sirius say he wanted her? Surely he hadn't changed his mind.
Half the time she was tempted to simply not respond to any of them, and the other half of the time, she wanted to reply with a scathing message, condemning them all for abandoning her, but she knew deep down that she was being unfair.
Still, Maira couldn't help but to feel resentful. She wondered if she would still be stuck in this isolated corner of Hell on her birthday in two weeks. If she was, she might just kill somebody.
By this point, she had reached the park, and she trotted over to the rickety old swing set and sat down. This couldn't go on. Surely there had to be some other way for her to get information. The wizarding world couldn't truly be oblivious to all of Voldemort's schemes. Witches and wizards across England must be talking, passing intelligence on by word of mouth. If only she wasn't stuck here, she could just sit back and eavesdrop as she so often did at Hogwarts.
Suddenly, Maira realized that there was nothing stopping her from doing just that. She had her invisibility cloak with her—Moody may have turned out to be a fraud, but his frequent screams of "Constant Vigilance!" had still managed to sink in—and she had enough money for a train ticket into London. Besides, the Dursleys would hardly care if she was missing for the rest of the day.
Decided, Maira headed towards the train station, and in less than an hour, she was rumbling along towards the heart of London. She arrived with no problems, and after purchasing an Oyster Card, it was only a short ride in the Tube before she reached Charring Cross.
Grinning, Maira ducked into a hidden alcove to don her invisibility cloak before moving to wait outside the door of the Leaky Cauldron. She would just need to wait for someone to enter before she could pass through to Diagon Alley, after all, even in the wizarding world, door that opened on their own were suspicious.
Thirty minutes later, Maira's enthusiasm was fading. Either this was a particularly slow business hour or most of the Leaky Cauldron's patrons did not enter the establishment through the muggle doorway. Times like these, the Girl-Who-Lived really hated her fame. If she wasn't so well known, she could have just walked straight through; but Maira had one of the most recognizable faces in magical Britain. She didn't know anyone who looked even remotely like her.
Maira had always had distinctive features. With large green eyes sitting over high cheek bones and a petite nose, the girl looked like a china doll. Her dark brown, nearly black hair hung in thick, wild waves down to her butt—her aunt had tried on numerous occasions to chop it all off, but it always grew back overnight—and her olive skin tended to almost glow in moonlight.
Unfortunately, her thick, round glasses, which were held together only by a judicious amount of tape, obscured her beautiful face, serving to make her even more instantly identifiable. But the glasses were not even her most distinguished characteristic. No, that trophy went to the famous lightning bolt scar located high on her left cheek near the corner of her eye.
The majority of the scar zigzagged across Maira's right palm, as though baby her had tried to shield herself from the killing curse. She supposed she was rather glad she had tried to stop the spell with her hand, as only the small tail end of the lightning bolt managed to mark her face.
Still, although the scar was relatively small, combined with all of her other features, there was no way Maira could walk undisguised through the Leaky Cauldron without drawing massive amounts of unwanted attention. Spying was so difficult when everyone was watching to you.
Finally, after nearly forty-five minutes of not so patient waiting, a wizard dressed in a mismatched muggle suit brushed past her and opened the door. Slipping in behind him, Maira quickly walked to the entryway to Diagon Alley, careful to avoid running in to anyone. After a discreet check to ensure no one was in the backroom with her, she tapped out the correct pattern on the bricks and entered the alley.
To her surprise, the shopping center was packed. She would have thought with the return of Voldemort that people would be a little warier, but everyone around her seemed to be going about their business as usual. They didn't even look mildly cautious! Small children were huddled around Quality Quidditch Supplies admiring the newest broom, and not a single adult was watching them. Woman were gathered in small circles gossiping with smiles on their faces, and men were shouting out greetings to their friends. It was so normal that it was almost surreal.
Spying a group of three middle-aged women looking at a Daily Prophet, Maira moved close enough to eavesdrop on their conversation, hoping that, since they were obviously discussing the news, she might overhear something worthwhile.
"It's unfortunate really, growing up with so much fame, it's gone to the girl's head. People like that, they start to crave attention. It's like an addiction," one of the greying woman tutted.
"Yes, or maybe the curse messed her up. No one else has ever survived it. Who knows what kind of effects such dark magic might have on a growing mind!" the second lady replied, and Maira realized with a start that they must be referring to her.
"Please. If that was the case, I'd expect the girl to want to take over for You-Know-Who. She hardly seems violent to me! Maybe tapped in the head, but surely not violent."
"Lying like she is for attention, it's only a matter of time before she starts getting violent. The ministry should lock her up before she hurts someone else!" the third lady exclaimed.
"Honestly, Mildred," the first woman sighed, "the girl is a glory hound, not a murderer."
"I wouldn't be so sure," Mildred rejoined, "what about that poor Diggory boy? Dropped dead on his own, did he? There should be an inquiry."
Maira backed away, shaking slightly with rage. These people thought she was deranged, that she had killed Cedric. That Mildred woman wanted her locked up! With a horrible, sinking feeling, Maira realized that these people did not believe her about Voldemort's return. Everyone thought she was a liar, just as everyone had thought her a cheater last year.
Maybe she should have been paying closer attention to the Daily Prophet if this was the kind of story they were writing. She'd just skimmed the headlines, sure that anything worth reading would be immediately apparent, but if they were spreading rumors like this about her, she should have known. It was never a good idea to be oblivious to a smear campaign. She could have been mobbed upon reentrance into the wizarding world and never even seen it coming.
Quickly making her way back to the Leaky Cauldron, Maira ran back out into muggle London, uncaring about the door that would have seemingly opened by itself. She wished fervently that she could just leave, flee the country and get away from all of these people. Her friends were keeping their distance, her name was being dragged through the mud, and the threat of Voldemort lingered everywhere she went.
Ducking into a side alley, Maira leaned against the wall and tipped her head back in an effort to stop her tears from falling. Her form was blocked from view by the large dumpster she had hidden behind, so when she lost the battle with her emotions, no one saw the young witch cry.
Never before had she felt quite this alone, not even when she was little and the Dursleys had locked her in her cupboard with no food for days on end. The weight of the world was pressing down on her shoulders, and it seemed as if all of society had abandoned her.
Well, it was their loss then, she decided, anger replacing depression. She would be vindicated when Voldemort made his move, and he would strike eventually. It was inevitable. And all of those sheep would know that she had been telling the truth all along.
If none of them would help her, she'd just have to help herself, and if her friends wanted to get back in her good books, they had better prepare themselves to do some groveling. She had forgiven Ron, and to a lesser extent Hermione, for their attitude last year, but they had clearly not learned their lesson. Either they had to start acting like best friends should, or she would abandon them.
Resolute, Maira turned towards the main street, wiping her eyes dry, and promptly jumped backwards. There, standing before her, was a giant crab, and it was growing rapidly. She watched in stunned fear as the three foot crustacean quickly expanded to block the entire path back to the main road. Glancing behind her, Maira cursed as she realized she had picked a dead-end alley to have her meltdown.
Backing away slowly as the enormous sea creature began to click its pinchers, Maira pulled out her wand and pointed it at the animal. "Please be a dream and go away. Go away, go away, go away," she chanted, and to her tentative delight the crab backed away from her slightly. Then it gave a full-body tremor, almost like it was shaking off some invisible force, and charged.
"Incendio!" she cried, using the first spell to enter her mind. In her desperation, she poured more magic than was strictly necessary into the charm, and the result was a large ball of fire that exploded upon impact with the giant crab, killing the creature instantly. Maira had always been good with fire charms; she supposed it might have something to do with the phoenix feather core in her wand. However, she had not expected this result.
She stared at the charred husk of the crustacean for a moment, honestly rather impressed with herself, before a wave of confusion washed over her. The crab was dissolving into golden dust, something that had never happened to any of the other beasts she had killed. This was just bizarre. Come to think of it, what was a giant crab doing in the middle of London anyways? She supposed Voldemort could have released it to attack unsuspecting muggles, but it didn't sound like any tactic he had ever used in the first war.
Even so, Maira figured it was best to get out of here. She wasn't too concerned about having used magic outside of school as it was allowed in life or death situations, but she was worried about the possibility of Voldemort or his Death Eaters being in the area. As an added safety precaution, Maira decided it was probably a good idea to put her invisibility cloak back on.
Just as she disappeared under the cloak, she heard a panicked voice call out, "Wait!"
Turning, she saw a young girl with riotously curly auburn hair running towards her. Well, more like hobbling. The girl was supporting herself forearm crutches, which probably meant she was permanently disabled.
"Please stop with the invisibility. I know you're still here." Cautiously obeying, Maira removed her cloak.
"Where are you going?" the girl inquired.
"Um," Maira wasn't really sure how to respond to this odd girl, but eventually she settled on saying, "home."
"Yes, but where?" Beginning to get a little freaked out, this girl could be a polyjuiced Death Eater after all, Maira began to walk away, careful not to let the kid out of her sight.
"Wait! Sorry, I'm being rude. My name's Valia," the girl said, sticking her hand out to shake. Not wanting to be rude, Maira grasped her hand before quickly releasing it. When it became obvious Maira wasn't going to respond further, Valia continued, "What's your name?"
"You mean you don't already know?" Maira inquired, both curious and angry. The girl was clearly not fazed by invisibility, which could only mean she was magical. If this was a trick, Maira was determined not to fall for it.
"I wouldn't have asked if I already knew it," Valia replied nervously.
Maira narrowed her eyes. She was becoming surer by the second that this was a Death Eater in disguise. What the end game was with this charade, she had yet to deduce, but "Valia's" supposed ignorance seemed fishy.
"Look, you obviously know about magic," she started, pleased to note that Valia showed no signs of surprise at that pronouncement, "so I'm not buying the ignorance. Who are you?" she asked, bringing her wand up to point it at the girl.
"I told you; my name's Valia," she bleated in reply. Maira took a threatening step forward and pushed a small amount of her magic into her wand, just enough to make the tip glow red, and Valia quickly continued, "I saw you battling the Karkinos, and knew you had to be a demigod, then I smelled you and I was sure!"
"You smelled me?" Maira deadpanned before the rest of Valia's explanation registered. "And the what? You mean the giant, murderous crab?"
"Yes and yes. Karkinos is the name of the crab, and of course I smelled you. You are rather old to have gone so long undiscovered," the odd girl leaned in closer and sniffed at Maira, before bleating nervously and grabbing a tin can from the dumpster to eat. "How you've survived so long with a scent that strong!"
"You just sniffed me," Maira mumbled incredulously. Then, watching the girl munch on the soda can like it was candy, she exclaimed, "What are you?"
"I'm a satyr," Valia said proudly, lifting her pants leg to display a furry goat appendage, "It's my job to find heroes and bring them back to camp!"
"A satyr," Maira echoes, wondering if she had ever seen such a being in her magical creatures text books. It sounded somewhat familiar. "So what, you just wander around waiting for someone to do something heroic, then offer them a place at your satyr camp?"
Honestly, it sounded pretty farfetched to Maira. She knew for a fact that the centaurs would never invite a human to live in the woods with them, nor could she think of any other magical being that would actively seek out the company of humans.
"No, no. I seek out Heroes, with a capital 'H'! The children of gods!"
"The children of gods." Maira was starting to feel like a parrot with how often she was repeating Valia's words, but everything the little goat-girl was saying sounded fantastical, and that was coming from someone who spent most of the year in the magical world!
"Yep," Valia said, grinning as she gained confidence, "one of your parents, either your mom or your dad, is actually a god."
"I'm sorry, but you must be mistaken," Maira hissed, suddenly cold. "Both of my parents are dead. If one of them was actually a god, why have they never come for me?"
Valia suddenly looked very sympathetic, almost pitying, and Maira hated it, hated feeling pitied for being an orphan. "It's forbidden," the auburn haired girl replied, shaking her head sadly. "The gods are not allowed to raise their mortal children."
"So whoever it was, my mom or my dad, they just abandoned me? Left me to rot with the Dursleys?" All of Maira's previous feelings of abandonment were coming back, and they were hitting her twice as hard now. All this time, she'd thought her parents loved her.
Then an image of the graveyard came to her. She had seen both her mother and her father come out of Voldemort's wand. Both James and Lily were dead. Could it be that she wasn't related to one of them? Even if that was so, James and Lily had died for her. They had loved her. The two of them were her true parents, not some fickle god who would leave her to grow up in Hell.
"It's the law," Valia murmured softly, then continued more strongly, "But now that I've found you, you need to come with me to Camp Half-Blood."
"And why do I need to do that?"
"So you can be trained of course. Some demigods of less powerful parents are fine out here on their own. Their scent is too weak to attract any of the really bad monsters, but you, you're scent is way too strong for that. It's a miracle you've survived this long without preparation!"
Training. She'd need that if she was going to survive in the fight against Voldemort, and it sounded like she may just need it to live through everyday life. If this camp routinely drilled demigods so that they could defeat monsters, surely they could teach her how to win against a wizard. It was an opportunity too good to pass up.
"How do I get to this Camp Half-Blood?"
"It's in New York. Do you have a passport?"
Disappointment swelled within Maira, shocking her. Until this moment, she had not realized how much she wanted to go to this camp, and now the opportunity was gone. "No," she answered despondently.
"Hmmm, well I guess I can Iris message to get you one. One second," Valia said, pulling a spray bottle, a flashlight, and an odd gold coin out of her backpack. Handing the bottle to Maira, she instructed the newly found demigod to keep spraying until she said to stop, then she shined her flashlight on the mist, creating a small rainbow. Throwing the golden coin, which Maira would later find out was called a drachma, into the rainbow, Valia called out, "Chiron!"
What followed next was a bizarre but short conversation which consisted of many "Are you sure's" on Chiron's part, frequent gloating on the part of Valia, and finally a request for a passport and some money for a plane ticket. A few minutes later, a package with small white wings attached to it flew into the alley.
Snagging the small bundle and quickly eating the box, Valia whistled, "Someone up there favors you!"
"What makes you think that?" Maira inquired, intrigued by the delivery process.
In response, Valia held up a three black credit cards, an Amex, a Visa, and a MasterCard. "You know, in case one runs out or something," the satyr commented sarcastically.
Grinning, Maira reached out and took the three unlimited cards. Maybe her parent was trying to win back some of her favor. While whoever it was would never be able to buy her forgiveness, providing her with unlimited resources was certainly a start.
"What do I need to bring to this camp?" Maira asked, already planning to buy everything here in London, or perhaps she could get some things in New York. No need to go back to the Dursleys after all, Hedwig could find her anywhere. She'd call her relatives on a payphone to inform them that she would be back to pick up her school stuff at the end of the summer.
Catching her meaning, Valia smiled. Looked like they'd be having a shopping trip before heading to camp.