This is just a little plotbunny that might possibly turn into an actual story. It's for Connor and Travis, whom I've always really liked, and I've incorporated some dryad stuff in, so... yeah! Enjoy!

Side note: This chapter takes place about a year before Percy came to camp. I'll put the general time frame at the top of the possible future chapters. Enjoy, and please comment.

Connor

Connor was really NOT in the mood for being tackled by a tree. In fact, he was in the mood for nothing other than possibly smacking Katie Gardener upside the head. And pranking. He was always in the mood for a nice practical joke.

Just as he was contemplating the possibility of booby-trapping the entrance to the Demeter cabin without being caught by Chiron, something smashed into him from the side.

He tumbled down, someone else falling with him. Together, they rolled down a small hill, into a conveniently placed mud puddle. Connor attempted to disentangle himself.

"Ow." Connor struggled, trying to get out of the human knot he had tied with his arms. Where did he/she come from, anyway? One moment it looked like he'd been walking next to a tree, the next, someone was crashing into him. He turned his head to better get out of his awkward position. "Who the... holy crap."

The person who was currently sitting on his stomach turned her head (yes, definitely a her) to glare down at him.

He had certainly never seen the girl at camp before. She had longish brown hair and her eyes were a dark color- green or brown, Connor couldn't tell. Her ears were pointed at the end, and her nose was slightly large and rounded. She had pale skin and an annoyed expression.

"What are you doing?" she demanded, as if she had caught him robbing a bank.

"Uh, I was... taking a walk?"

This did not seem to satisfy her. She continued to stare at him, and he wondered if there was something on his face.

"Er... could you please get off of me?"

The girl gave a start. "Oh. Sorry. I forgot."

Connor lurched to his feet and gave a lopsided shrug, shaking the mud off his clothes. "No problem. Um... was I the only one you knocked down a hill today? What did I do to be the lucky one?"

She looked at him as if it were completely obvious. "You were about to step on a bird."

"What? Where?"

She pointed, and he saw a tiny brown sparrow, flapping its wings pitifully. It was nestled into a small dip in the ground, and he would have crushed it if he'd taken another step. The girl gently lifted it up onto the branch of an overhanging pine. Then she turned to him with a slightly warmer expression.

"Oh. Well, thanks. That would have been hard to get off my shoe."

The girl looked horrified. "YOU-"

"Kidding! Just kidding! Not really! I would have felt terrible if I really killed it. I would be, like, a murderer. Seriously."

The fire in her eyes died down. "Oh. Well, if that's all." She turned to go, then looked back. "Next time, watch where you're stepping." She turned around again.

"Wait!" Connor interjected. "I never got your name."

She sighed, and there was a hint of sass in her dark eyes. "Alsêïda."

Connor grimaced. "I'm Connor. And... can I just call you Elsie?"

Alsêïda shrugged. "Okay."

Connor gave a tiny sigh of relief as she hurried back into the woods.

"Well... that was weird," he muttered to himself. Where was Elsie from? She came barreling out of the woods and then straight back into them. He'd never seen her at camp, but she seemed to know the place.

Was she a monster? A goddess in disguise?

Connor shook his head, but was unable to return to his fantasies of Katie Gardener's head covered in spiders.