Chapter 1; Adriana

Prolog;

My fifth school in two years—humans are so arrogant. You save the world and they reward you with explosion. I mean what's the deal with that? It's not like I didn't expect it, I mean it's been happening to me since second grade. Humans don't like what they don't understand. I'm human and I even admit that that is one of my fatal flaws. I hate not understanding things. It takes away some of the control that you have left on your life and humans are all about control.

Principle Morgan was furious with me but she's stupid anyway. Our discussion was short and sweet—to the point. I've been through enough of these conversations in my life time. She never understood me from the first time I stepped into the school wearing a black jump suit. She gave me "special attention," which really means freak watch. She thought that she could change me. Huh. She thought that she could comb me over and make me one of her perfect little students. Then I burned the library down to ruins.

"Ms. Lee." She nodded at me as I took a sit on one of her uncomfortable seats. As long as she's going to expel me I'd take advantage of being badass. I put my combat boot feet up on her desk and leaned back casually. "Adriana." She ignored my feet because I had something over all of the other kids in this school. They all feared me. I had that aura that naturally kept people away from me. Even my gang back at home didn't have the same intimidation that I had.

"You're expelled." She said with a smooth face. The vision of a cougar and a stallion flashed through my head. She may think that she's all high and mighty until the cougar decides to leap.

I expected nothing else both those two words. I never get away unnoticed like the monsters do. They are overlooked because they have the same intimidation as I have but they don't even look semi-normal so the human brain rejects any possibility of abnormality.

Everything is happy here.

See we're all smiling.

It's all an act.

"Yeah I figured." I muttered looking up at the old cracked ceiling. I swung my legs back down from her desk and stood.

All of my school processions were in my bag and zipped away. I turned in my lock this morning—I knew that this was coming. When Mrs. Morgan called me down to her office from World History everyone stared and I waved to them and called 'good bye.'

No one made those stupid 'oohing' noises like they did to everyone else. They were afraid to say anything so they only stared. Staring. That was a bigger part of my life then the blood is.

"I hope you survive when I'm gone." I smirked because I knew that they probably won't. Well not all of them will. Those who are slightly educated will have a chance but the others will disappear and they will blame each other. They'll call it gang behavior or psychos on the loose.

"I think we'll manage." Her thin lips draw a straight line.

She was an ugly old hag. Hawk like eyes that looked big with her large glasses, like the bottoms of glass bottles. Everything about her just said bird, her big pointy nose like a beak and her frail little body that I could break so easily.

No, I was wrong about the stallion comparison, she is not as honorable as a horse. She is a crow and the cougar is sitting in the tree just waiting for her to land. Of course such a little crow wouldn't be appetizing to the cougar so it ignores ii. It's not even worth her time.

"Have a nice life." I mumbled bitterly even though I meant it. I hoped that her life would be long and nice and not be interrupted by those vile things that I dedicated myself to hunting.

"Good-bye ingrates." I whispered to myself. Everyone stared but I didn't give them a second glace. Staring was part of the job, they would all be telling stories when I'm gone. When a new kid shows up they'll tell them about the last new kid that stayed here for a total of three months before being expelled. They'll say how she was part of a dangerous gang and, you know what, they'll be right.

I slammed the oak door shut on school number five.

Things need explaining like why I'm so terribly messed up. I haven't always been like this heartless monster with the pretty face and the deadly hands. Once I was a little girl with a big brother and a dad. My mom was never in the picture. After I was born she sort of just never showed up and I was too young to ask any questions.

My dad was brining me and my brother on a cruise. I could ride for free because I was three and kids under four could ride for free. We were celebrating my birthday since I was officially four years old tomorrow. It was my last day of being three so it would be my last day of being free to ride the big ship.

It wasn't one of those Caribbean cruises, we weren't that wealthy. It was a short cruise around the water near New York City. They showed us the Statue of Liberty then went out into the sea to look for marine life.

My brother is a whole year older then I am. He was a big kid with big friends and got to ride the big yellow bus everyday—almost. He looked like I was but he had black hair like my dad while as I had brown hair that caught the sunlight like blond hair does or like how the moon reflects the sunlight. He didn't like having his little sister hanging around him all the time like most big brothers and like most little sisters I thought he was the best thing in the whole world.

The man on the dock asked how old I was and before my dad could respond I answered.

"I'm four years old." I held up a whole hand with my thumb down to show him how many fingers that was. It was almost my whole right hand.

He looked at my father for conformation. He shook his head no. "She's four tomorrow." His smile was bright. He loved annoying people with loopholes.

"Very well." He took the green bills from my dad and moved out of the way for us to cross the big wooden plank. I felt like Wendy on Peter Pan. I looked at the green waves under my feet and wondered if I could fly like Wendy too. I didn't test it because I wasn't a stupid little girl.

The boat was big and loud. It moved slowly but me and Roger watched the boats pass us with their big engines. Roger was handsome and looked like my daddy. He had the same black hair and flashing green eyes.

He chased me around the boat pretending to be an ocean monster. I was afraid of monsters so I screamed as loud as I could. I ran away. I had dreams of monsters but in my dreams I wasn't afraid, I found them and scared them with my big knives. I was a hero in my own imagination.

"Ah! Roger!" I giggled and hid in a closet with orange jackets and a sign that said something that only big kids could read.

They were funny looking jackets so naturally I dressed myself in them. I had one around my neck and one around my waist. Now I looked like a monster and could scare Roger. He would be the one who would run away from me like the monsters in my dreams.

"Rawr." I growled when I stepped out of the closet. Alarms went off and people started screaming. I didn't mean to scare all of them, just Roger.

Strangers rushed past me and into the dress-up closet. They were concealing themselves in monster armor so they could scare me. It worked. They all looked so scary and the big smoking towers were flashing red with the shrill screaming of the alarms. A tear ran down my cheek. Where's my daddy?

"I'm not a monster." I assured them but they ignored me and kept pushing. "I'm not a monster I repeated when a man threw me into a boat and cut the ropes with a pretty silver knife. We fell and I only watched as the boat went into chaos because of me. Of course now I know that the boat was sinking and it was completely out of my control. But then I was wallowing in the guilt that I killed my own family.

The big ship that had Roger and daddy on it was disappearing under the waves and fast. It was like it was on a big sink hole like in my backyard when I step on the grass and the ground collapses only it was in the water. The man who saved me watched the ship dispassionately.

He did something with his hands and the ship sunk right down. A wave pushed us away quickly. He assessed me silently as big tears fell from my chin. His eyes seemed to like my tears. He watched them like they were diamonds instead of salty water.

"Dear girl. Where do you live?"

"My daddy…" I started crying harder. "You drowned him!" Even when I was at such a young age I understood. Imagination is acceptance and young children have a lot of imagination, that's what allows them to see the dreams of the gods and through the thick fog that keeps humans from seeing what really goes on under their noses.

"I am Poseidon, Neptune, Hagios Nikolaos, Yamm, what ever you prefer." He had strong pride in his rumbley voice that made the sea stir under our little life boat. "You must answer my question."

"Go away!" I shouted with the same power—just a different kind. I had the power of innocence taken away, security stolen; I had every right to hate this man.

I was alone in a blow up tube kind of boat in the middle of New York Harbor. Big ships carrying giant boxes passed me sending big waves at my little one. I did what every rational three—almost four—year old girl would do, I cried for my mommy—something I've never done before. Somehow I survived that without being harmed…on the outside.

I turned hard. It took me three years to google the name Poseidon. He's a god as is all the other names. He's the reason I'm an orphan. Being an orphan made it easy to boycott Christmas because there was never much money to but me gifts. I hated Christmas.

You might be wondering what—Christmas? It has nothing to do with Poseidon. You're wondering that aren't you? You are!

Poseidon was the reason Christmas came around…sort of. He was what Santa Claus was derived from. Over time the name Hagios Nikolaos turned into St. Nick and you know what that became. All the kids where talking about how excited they were for Santa coming so I told them flat out that he didn't exist and his muse is a rotten thief. I was put in time out for that part.

"Santa" did give me a present though. His mistake was that he armed me with two deadly weapons. He gave me isolation and reason for destruction. He was the reason I have to live in foster homes where I just happened to come across a demigod who told me everything I needed to know. Yes, they are very real.

I kill them. I kill monsters and I pray for the day that I get to give Poseidon a piece of my mind. He'll never forget this face—this angelic face with a demon underneath.

Adriana Lee.

But I'm not on my way to see the king of the sea I'm on my way to my sixth high school in Los Angeles. I was watching the buildings fly by. The bag that my hand rested on had weapons very illegal and dangerous. I wasn't one to be messed with. Too bad I was on my way to live with some weirdoes.

The McDurf family.

My ancient silver eyes stared back at me from the window of the train I was riding. My eyes that were like moons always looked lonely like the moon did. I always wondered if the reason wolves howled at the moon was because they were trying to tell the moon that it wasn't always lonely. I felt like that I was the moon and my gang was my wolves and now I was being sent away from them.

The moon never felt as lonely as I do.