I heard a faint knock on the cabin door. Now, normally I don't open doors in the middle of the night to anybody.. but this is Camp Half Blood. There's nothing bad here. I stood up quietly and remembered that Tyson had gone back to dad's palace so I resumed my regular walk. When I opened the door, I saw Annabeth standing on the step. She looked like she had been crying and I couldn't read her eyes. Without speaking, she fell into my chest and started crying. I picked her up and sat her down on my bed.
"Annabeth. Hey, don't cry. C'mon Annabeth. What happened?"
She didn't answer me. Her beautiful blonde curls were in a tangled mess and her startling grey eyes had turned a sullen black. She moved over to sit on my lap and we sat there hugging for a few seconds before she spoke.
"It's Luke.."
Her voice was broken and weak whisper. Now, Luke had tried to kill me multiple times, so I wasn't all that fond of the guy. Regardless, he was a hero and he had saved the world last month when he sacrificed himself to kill Kronos. I knew that Annabeth thought the world of him, so I was very sensitive to her about him.
"Do you think... Percy, do you think that he made it... into Elysium I mean?"
I had never seen Annabeth in such a horrible state. Of course he had made it into Elysium. He killed himself to stop Kronos, what better could a hero of done?
"He was a traitor, Percy. He went with Kronos and he resented his father. He killed so many people. Charles... have you ever thought about Charles, Percy? Charles and Silena and what could've been?"
"He was a hero, Annabeth. He stopped Kronos singlehandedly. He-"
"But do you ever think about who he killed in the process? Do you ever think about what he did to Chris?" She sounded like it hurt to say that Luke was a bad person, which I know it did.
To tell you the truth, I had thought about it. I revisited the day Charles died many times in my mind. I felt awful. I remember Silena's face. I remember how scared and frail she looked taking on the drakon. It was all caused because of Luke. No, it was Kronos. Luke was a good guy. It was Kronos who took over him.
"Annabeth, it wasn't the Luke you knew. Kronos brainwashed him just like he tried to brainwash me. He had Luke try to put me in Tartarus and he had Luke have a scorpion bite me. Luke was under Kronos's influence when he did all of the bad things Annabeth. When he did the things that count, like rescuing you, he was himself. In his final moments, he was himself. He was a hero, Annabeth. No less than a true hero."
She turned to face me and looked me straight in the eyes.
"Percy.. when they asked you to become a God, why didn't you take the offer?" I could tell she was feeling better. She loved to ask this question because she always knew the answer.
"Because I love you, Annabeth. I always will."
She smiled and kissed me full on the lips. I got the exhilarating that always came when Annabeth kissed me. We sat on my bed in silence hugging until she fell asleep. We weren't allowed to be alone in the cabins together let alone sleep in the cabins together, and I honestly couldn't care less.