July 18 2013
Dear diary,
Earlier I was walking back to my cabin at our camp after teaching Pegasus-back riding lessons to Percy Jackson. All of us are demigods here, which means that one of our parents is a Greek god and the other a mortal. My godly mother is Aphrodite, the Greek goddess of love. All of a sudden, behind me, I heard someone whisper, "Selena…Selena…" I turned around to find myself face to face with Luke. His blue eyes and smile radiated mischief, which I guess came from his dad, who was Hermes, the god of thieves. "Selena," he said "I have something to ask of you." I of course knew that Luke had tried to destroy the world three years ago, but he seemed so much his old self, so kind and charming, that I found myself saying, "Yes?"
"Selena," he said, "have you ever been mad at your mother, Aphrodite?" Well sure everyone gets mad at their mom or dad sometime, even if (and especially if) your mom is the goddess of love.
"Uhh,"I said," I guess..." He smiled. "You could join Kronos' army and help us take over from our parents, the gods." He said. I shook my head," Luke, you want to destroy civilization, I- I c-cant-"
"Here-" he pushed a silver charm into my hand- a scythe; the symbol of Kronos, the evil Titan that Luke was trying to raise, to defeat the gods.
"You be a spy for us, and you'll be rewarded beyond measure. You be a spy for us and you'll be saved. You're fighting a losing battle Selena, and you know it."
"But my friends..."
"Support the gods, and they will be destroyed. Do you want to follow them? Think about it Selena." Then he ran into the woods.
I made my way back to the cabin pondering what Luke had said. I wish I was brave like Percy, or smart like Annabeth. They would have had the strength to say no. I have about as much strength as a wilted flower petal, I thought angrily. I looked at the charm clearly for the first time. It was beautifully made, from silver and gold, and celestial bronze. It glowed with an unnatural light, as if it was sculpted from moonlight and fire. It had a small gold cursive SB engraved in it. My initials! It was meant for me; how could I refuse it! It was just the sort of thing that a daughter of Aphrodite would swoon over, and I knew that as soon as I said no to Luke it would disappear…It had a pull on it, almost magical - actually considering who Luke was, it probably was magical. Ohhhh! I simply couldn't let it go. I would think about it for the rest of my life.
I got to my cabin just as the horn sounded to signal dinner time. I stood outside my cabin and all my half brothers and sisters filed in behind me. They were an wide assortment of teens. We were all around the same age but some of us had brown blonde black and even red hair (there were other colors too, but none natural), our eyes were brown to blue to grey to green or all of these all at once! We walked to the dining pavilion, and sat down at the Aphrodite table. Chiron (our camp activities director) stepped up and said some stuff about the activities that would be going on this summer. A cheer went up from the Ares table when he mentioned the dates for the capture the flag games, but I wasn't really listening. I once again took out the scythe charm. It was so beautiful! All my girlfriends would be so jealous! I was jolted out of my thoughts by one of my half-sisters saying, "don't you think so Selena?" I had missed what she said, so I said, "what?" She started giggling with the person next to her so I guessed it was some silly question about if I thought some boy was cute. I ignored her. Everyone around me had started eating so I looked at my plate. I said, "Cesar salad with blue cheese". It immediately appeared. I tried it. It was good, but I wasn't really hungry. I looked at my cup and said, "lemonade." It appeared too. It was good too.
After dinner we sat around the camp fire, and sang silly songs. I wasn't in the mood for singing, but I joined in a few melodies (if you can call them that) and it made me feel better. As we went back to the cabins, and settled back into my bunk, I took out the charm once more, and thought about what I would do if I had the scythe charm taken away. I couldn't bear to think of it. I knew it was some sort of spell (as I said before), but with its beautiful golden framing, moonlight-silver metal work and delicate celestial bronze grooves, my lips acted of their own accord, saying, " Luke Castellian, I have accepted your offer." nobody but me saw the golden light that seemed to flow in tendrils out the windows and into the night.