A/N: So I thought about this for the longest time…and I decided to write a third book in my Daughter of the Lost god series! This one is about Penelope…as a god…doing godly stuff. No I'm just j-k'ing No Penelope falls in love with another guy, she's haunted by the memory of Phoenix and blah, blah, blah you know Penelope mopey-mary-sue-like
Sunlight spilled onto the bright towers of Olympus. Horns sounded in the distance as I lifted my head off of my pillow. Beautiful notes of music floated through my open arched window, I looked out of the small castle and onto a great sea. Ivy had snuck its way up the walls and into crevices, down below the sea clashed against the rock. I didn't live in New York, I preferred Greece. It was peaceful quiet. I was most the time, alone.
Apollo solemnly rode past the window with a dash of light; he hadn't smiled in almost two years. I knew why. I knew why the great sun god had finally stopped flirting. I knew why most days across the world were overcastted and gray. My heart twisted with the sick pain of knowing. Even the bright sunshine of Apollo was still not enough to mend it. To erase what had happened a year ago…
The Romans… Reyna had killed him… She had…killed him. Stuck a knife through his strong chest, until he was gone… He had been selfish, but he had saved my life. And now the last thing I could think about was, why?
"My goddess!" Lilac sailed in her long blond hair braided into one long braid down her back, twigs of lilac and flowers were twisted around her forehead like a crown. "You are sad my lady… What's the matter?" She was so sweet and innocent, why should I sully her beautiful spirit. She was a loyal servant that didn't disserve to hear of my same-old stories of old.
"Nothing my sweet Lilac, would you braid my hair little one?" The small girl's eyes lit up with excitement. She nodded and leaped upon my bed, pushing aside all the arrays of pillows and blankets twisted in an untidy order. She combed out my long brown hair, which reached down to nearly my butt now. I closed my eyes and breathed in the salty air of the ocean and felt the comforting touch of Lilac behind my head. She gently tugged and pulled in directions. Her hands worked furiously, as if to prove her skill.
There was a knock on the door, I quickly opened my eyes and waved my hand. The door opened automatically and Jordyn came trotting in. Her long bronze hair was twisted and untamed. I laughed at her sweet sleepy expression, "Come here little one." She ran to me and laid her head on my shoulder, Lilac giggled at Jordyn. The two ran off together, chasing one another around the room.
Marcus followed in after Jordyn, I smiled at him. "Hullo goddess." He swiftly bowed and grabbed Jordyn up with his strong arms and swung her around. She laughed with delight; I smiled despite my sorrowful mood. Lilac started weaving pieces of petals and flowers into my hair since her playmate was busy at the moment.
"Marcus! Put me dooowwwwnnnnn!" She screamed, a wide smile shining on her round small face. How Jordyn still smiled after her father's own death I wasn't sure. Her father had asked me to protect her, Zeus soon after that killed him. He had been a good friend and a fellow fallen warrior in the battle between the Romans and the Greeks. The "mini" Trojan, as some would call it.
The horns in the distance grew louder, "Lilac I have a council meeting, thank you for you kind touch." Lilac's cheeks blushed a delicate shade of lavender. She curtsied and disappeared in a cloud of sweet smelling purple. Jordyn sat upon my bed and Marcus studied me for a long moment.
"You look lovely my goddess." I blushed; I smiled and shook off his compliment.
"Thank you Marcus, but I do not want to look appealing. More of a-just-rolled-out-of-bed-thing, you know?" Marcus laughed,
"Then you will look as you say." His English was improving immensely; Jordyn had taken it under her own hand to teach him. I took my leave after a small wave and walked out of the castle. A few minor gods ran by chasing after a beautiful girl, who could only be a naiad. I walked along the rocky, uneven trail to the grand monument that sat in the morning sunlight. The Council of the Gods. Godly characters waved to me as they passed, Hermes gave me a letter on his way rushing to the counsel building.
I delicately opened and found the letter nestled between the two pieces of paper. I flipped it open inside was Percy's sloppy hand writing. I smiled, I missed my old friend. He was now almost a senior in high school. He addressed how everyone was doing back at camp; his last words were that he missed me. Perhaps I would take the trek down the mountain to see my old friends at Camp Half Blood.
Upon entering the council building I was greeted by a startling shriek.
"PENELOPE!" Then something heavy impelled me in the chest toppling me over onto the marble floor. "WHERE HAVE YOU BEEN?" I laughed; the screaming voice was none other than my best friend, Pearl. Half nyrad, half-god.
"I've been sitting on Olympus playing the lyre and sipping wine with Dionysus. My dear friend! I've been busy, people feel the sudden urge in this day of age to start randomly burning down forest and killing off satyrs!" I disgustedly bit down hard on my lip, Pearl burst out laughing.
"Ah, Penelope stop acting all godly. You're starting to talk like a character right out of Shakespepper these days. 'Thou shalt naught lay down thee sleeping body of thee dracon.' Ug, he was annoying even when he wasn't talking. He actually offered me the actual part of Julio in the play, uhhh… Homeo and Julio." I had a hard time believing from that explanation that Pearl had been even been part of that play. For one Pearl was a horrible liar and two, she didn't even know Shakespeare's name.
"Right." I said and continued on down the Persian rug, my Grecian-style dress flowing right along with the carpet. As I neared the counsel my heart beat began to get louder, I was going to see an empty chair once more where Phoenix had once sat. I would have smiled at him and laughed because of the bored expression on his face. I would miss him terribly… I didn't even know how I could once more try to regain composure. My little brother Jake, now a "god-in-training" sat next to his father, Eros and our mother sat next to Demeter our grandmother.
"Well about time you showed up. I knew you weren't ready to have your own castle yet…" My mother tsked in disapproval; I rolled my eyes and lounged lazily across my own chair. Soon the doors of the great council building flew open as Zeus marched across the large floor, Earth slowly circling inside. He sat down on the chair his face was incredibly angry. Two things could have happened; one Zeus was an over-dramatic man who probably just got the wrong order of coffee at Starbucks. Or something bad really happened.
"Poseidon!" Zeus yelled, his brother looked up with only milled interest.
"Yes Zeus, what did I do this time? Did I steal your Lightening
Bolt, or perhaps I was in with Hera last night. Maybe I actually just had a thing for one of your daughters, or could it have been Percy almost massacring Olympus when we both know it's indestructible. WHAT COULD I HAVE POSSIBLY DONE WRONG?" Zeus stared at Poseidon for a minute and then shook his head,
"All I was going to say was, if you wanted a cappuccino or a vanilla latte! BUT OBVIOSLY I BLAME YOU FOR EVERYTHING!" The two of them went off on each other, I could only watch with bane interest. We only had these counsel meetings once every year in Greece and yet they couldn't get their acts together.
"MY LORDS!" Hermes spoke up; he twirled the calculus in his hand. Both members of the Big Three stared at him. He finally seemed to notice when Zeus cleared his throat that they were paying attention to him, "Oh yes, well I was just reminding you that today, is in fact one year," He pulled out a Ipad and touched it a few times, "yup exactly one year since Penelope's coronation." I covered my face in my hands, oh gods.
"Well indeed it is. My sweet granddaughter, your no longer just a goddess. You're a full powered member of the Council! You actually have your name in a textbook, look!" Demeter exclaimed, although I didn't want to, I did. It was just a casual drop of my name, but it was in there. A small sentence about me, but it was there! I actually had my name in a textbook. Clapping started and I turned away, I hated attention.
"Well that means the Penelope you get your own symbol and flag." Zeus waved his hand a dark green forked flag rolled out right next to my mother's, a small sapling of something was beginning to rise out of the dirt on mine. I blushed, it was actually very pretty. Gold lined the flag and the plant actually seemed to move as if alive.
"Thank you sire." I said and looked to Mom. She gave me a proud smile. The day was getting better; maybe it wouldn't be so bad. Zeus and Poseidon griped for a few more hours about finances and petty human things, and then finally got around the planning of the winter solstice.
"Well of course Artemis will speak, as always." Zeus gave his daughter a shining smile. She winked at him. "Uh…yeah well that's all there is to it." That's it? Nothing for the victims of the Roman and Greek war? Nothing?
"Lord Zeus, what about…" I swallowed the lump in my throat, "What about the demigods lost in combat for our kingdom? What about them? What about…what about the gods…" I felt a tear slipping down my cheek, "What about the brave son of Apollo who gave his life for me at the battle?" Zeus bit his lip, Apollo looked up. His eyes layered with the same sadness as my own. We shared something in our look, hate, love, and loss.
Zeus regarded me with a look of implication. He acknowledged the tears that were now swiftly running down my face with a concerned face and then, "Very well Penelope. But if it is to be done, we need a planner. Athena! My dear you go ahead and do your thing." Athena gave Zeus a glare, and then nodded. "Well if that is all, the meeting of the gods is dismissed." Zeus waved a hand and he disappeared in a mini storm of lightening.
I got up from my chair, only to find Pearl hugging me. I saw tears were in her own eyes, I had forgotten a time ago Phoenix had been her boyfriend. It was just as hard on me as it was for her. "Oh Pearl." I said into her collar bone, "What are we going to do?" She shook her head,
"Pen, keep your head up." She shook my shoulders, "You hear me? We're stronger then this!" I smiled and pushed a tear off her rosy cheek.
"Strong and courageous." She laughed and took my hand and we walked out of the council room. Her long brunette hair had grown to a longer length; her features looked some-what sharper. The sea had begun to take her as its own, seaweed grew up her arms, and starfishes stuck to her short mini-skirt. "It's weird not seeing you everyday, you know?" Pearl looked at me her sea-green eyes shimmered with nostalgia.
"Yeah… I miss you a lot Pen. Sometimes when I'm all alone, Carlina's out doing some super cool thing or whatever, I just think of all the good times we used to have. Percy, me, you, Phoenix, and sometimes Grover and Rodney." I smiled at the thought of the quest last year, finding the lost god, meeting the spirit of my father, finding the last wild place on Earth. Everything was still picture perfect I could remember literally everything.
"I always think of him… I-I feel like the hole he left in me is getting bigger every single day… I can't stop thinking of him. Pearl, it's as if my whole world's on fire. I mean Jordyn's there and so is Marcus, but I mean… I can't-I wish I could take it all back. Our break up…just everything. I wish I could've held onto him longer, felt him longer, just everything I wish…" I trailed off; there was nothing more I could say.
"We all go through it Pen. Everyone does, it doesn't matter who we are… It happens to each and every single one of us. There was something I never told you. When I was little,"
"You mean ten thousand years old little? Or really little?" She gave me a sad smile,
"I mean like little, little. Anyway I was only like three years old. My mom's name was Li, she was a nryad. You knew that though, well you know that Kraken, that like ate that princess, what's-her-face? Well it killed my mom…Poseidon thought that I was dead when it killed her. So…for fourteen thousand years I stayed alive, but there was always this horrible grief in my stomach. Some where deep inside of me… I-I guess I just wanted to end my life. Then I met Percy… Gods that idiot really changed my life, got under my skin quite a few times if you remember, but I loved that son of a bitch." She smiled and I knew she truly meant it. "He made me want to keep fighting, keep doing my thing you know? So I did, I plan to stick around for another fourteen thousand years." I hugged her once more,
"Good because I think I'm going to need you." She smiled and we walked down the rocky path of the cliff. Pearl told me everything of what she had been up to the past year, it turns out Poseidon was facing some pretty bad stuff down at the bottom of the ocean. A new character in ancient Greek mythology was rising, a guy named Levus. Pearl said Carlina and Triton were doing their best to help their dad out, but it was pretty impossible when the guy was only the size of Poseidon in godly form. I couldn't help but wonder what other horrible things were waiting for me this summer.
