Chapter 1- I laugh at a lot of death

I never wanted to be a demigod. I suppose you'll say that sounds like the book that Percy Jackson wrote. But my name is Nico Di Angelo. I'm ten years old, hate Percy with a passion, and this is my story, not his. He doesn't deserve his own story.

It starts rather simple, or it seemed simple at the time. Really it was far from that but I was young and had no idea how much pain in reality was being put in motion just by walking up a tall hill holding my sisters hand. Of course there was a before that too. Some I can't remember, in a strange groggy way. Some of it though, I remember better than I remember my name.

"Bianca, I'm tired." I complained to my older sister. She was holding my hand, another hand over her eyes so she can see better.

"See that tall building Nico? That's where we're going. That's our new school. Everything's going to be okay." I nod quietly, holding a couple of mythomagic cards, my favorites, the ones that I didn't want to get crushed in my backpack.

"What's it called again?" I asked, trying to think of the name, wondering, I don't remember my last school. I remember that nice hotel, and then the bus driver who was a ram (Bianca did NOT believe me), and those suspicious men... I wasn't even sure if I'd like school, though I doubted. I have a hard time reading and paying attention.

"Westover Hall." She said matter of fact, as we started up the hill.

"Will I like it there?"

"I don't know Nico. But we were told we had to go here, remember?" I remembered the lawyer who had gotten us out. He'd talked funny so I laughed at him, but Bianca was more cautious. See, here's one thing you should know about me when I was still ignorant. I laughed in the face of grave danger. Like at the ram man and the suspicious men and the Lawyer, and then, perhaps my worst mistake, Dr. Thorn.

We got into the school, which by the way is the definition of terrifying to a ten year old. Its disturbing that I was scared of the swords and weapons on the wall and not the beastly vice-principal who wanted to kill us. Of course, I had no clue. I just thought he was another mean adult who looked weird. So I laughed at him. His different colored eyes narrowed at me. Bianca sent me one of her "Nico Di Angelo you are SO going to get it" looks. We were given separate rooms and the separation made me uneasy as well. I'd NEVER been apart from my sister, and at risk of sounding like a complete baby, never really wanted to be. Bianca was all I knew. We'd never known our dad and our mom died awhile ago. I don't remember much about it, but Bianca, who remembered as much as I do but won't admit it, says she was a wonderful mother. I believe her. I always believed Bianca.

We started school, with stupid uniforms and Bianca clearly violating dress code by wearing her floppy green hat she got a bit before we went to the hotel. For a girl and my sister I guess Bianca was pretty. She had long black hair and the same skin as I do so I never really think anything of it unless we're standing right up next to anyone with skin that's simply white, not olive or whatever people call our skin tone. I was young to be at Westover. Ten when all the other students were at least Bianca's age. So everything about me stuck out. My skin tone, age, and strange last name. If it weren't for the uniforms nothing about me and the other students would be similar at all.

I have to tell you, I wasn't sure whether to be scared or not. At night I heard voices and creaking floor boards and when those stopped plaguing me the nightmares started. During the day I was so far behind in school I didn't even want to try. The names on my Mythomagic cards, THOSE made sense to me. But History, English, Spelling, those sort of things? The words floated in front of me like ghosts. That would have been fine if I'd been able to make out what the teacher said ever. But I'm ADD if not ADHD and I've always had trouble paying attention. There was a reason for that of course, but that's ahead of this part of the story. Every day I walked Westover's threatening hallways, gripping Bianca's hand whenever she'd let me. I was ten, I shouldn't be acting like a baby. But there it was. I simply could not help it. Ten year olds should be able to hold their sister's hands.

I digress.

Anway, day after day I walked those hallways. Always feeling like I was being watched. And I was. By the Vice Principal. He was a cruel man with an terrible accent. When he spoke out punishments to students he sounded like he was dishing out serious torture instead of detention or a week of cleaning black boards, or forcing us to scrub the bathroom floor with a tooth brush. He liked to dish out his cruelest punishments to Bianca and I, which, at the time, just made me feel sick because once again, I'd thought, here I am not fitting in. Things went that way for the longest time. I failed school, had nightmares, suffered under Dr. Thorn's terrible glare, and clung to Bianca and Mythomagic like they were my life lines. I had all the figurines and sometimes like an idiot I talked to them. I didn't say anything particularly impressive. Sometimes I recounted the day's terrifying (or so they seemed) events. Or acted out Greek myths with them. On occasion I wishfully wondered about what being a god would be like. Bianca left me in my room with my roommate- a twelve year old boy who acted like a zombie, he avoided me (why seek brains from the brainless?), he was boring, and he was just like everyone else- after classes each day and I wouldn't see her again until the next morning and maybe at dinner but probably not, because unlike me, Bianca had a few friends, well, two. So I talked to my figurines and wished, always wishing, I was anywhere but here.

But that was a wish I didn't really want to come true.

Enjoy!