I wake up to streams of ghoulish, sickly green rays of light streaming through my ebony window frame, leaking through the black curtains and into my squinting eyes. Screams of pain and agony act as my alarm clock each and every morning, although, since I don't go to school, I don't really appreciate the wake up call. Sure, call me an ingrate, but how would you like it if every day, yes, that includes weekends, you wake up to howls of the tortured souls surrounding your house?

Yeah, you heard me. Tortured souls. Outside of my house. Maybe it would help you understand if you got to know me better. My name is Kaydence Cathel, but I prefer to be called Kayde. Some hobbies I enjoy are drawing, sketching, singing, tanning and reading on the banks of the River Styx, and horseback riding. Of course, the horses I ride are skeletal...

So, yeah. My name's Kayde, or Kayden, both short for Kaydence, and I live in Hades. You know, the Greek underworld? Yep, that's the one. I'm what you would call a demigod, but I'm kind of an exception. Most demigods live in the mortal world, running for their lives, getting slaughtered by mythical monsters, and dying in unusual, painful, and cruel ways. But sadly I have to miss out on all of those fun activities. My mom, Cecile, died of a heart attack when I was merely a toddler, so my dad swooped in and decided to save me from a life of foster parentage and running from home to home. But the life I have now is... Well, in a word, unique.

My dad, who had completely ignored me until my mother died, was Hades, King of the Underworld, ruler and punisher of all despicable souls, etc., etc. So that meant I had to come down to the underworld, where the only people to socialize with are dead people and my dad's servants, who are, big surprise, dead.

That's pretty much my life so far. A teenage girl stuck in the gloomy underworld, with nothing to do but watch shadowy souls graze the Fields of Asphodel. Not exactly movie worthy, is it? No thrilling journeys, no sensational quests, no real fun.

I decide to get my lazy arse up and out of bed. Sitting up, I rub my eyes and shake off my charcoal sheets and step onto my gray carpeted floor. Another downside of living in Hades: everything is in shades of black and white. Yipee. Sarcasm intended. With my mental complaints pushed aside, I continue my daily morning routine. I take in my reflection in the mirror. Unkempt dark chocolate curls cascade down my shoulders, stopping near the bottom of my spine. My olive skin was tan from hours of basking in the ghoulish green rays of artificial sunlight on the rocky banks of the Styx. Eyes the color of amber stare back at me with a fierceness that only a girl raised alongside a bunch of monsters would have. My 5' 6" body was fragile looking, but I was actually stronger than some of my dad's soldiers.

"Gah!" I grunted as my charcoal cardigan caught on my tangled hair, sending me stumbling blindly around my room, finally collapsing on my bed again. I take the time it takes to detangle myself from my shirt (wow, I never thought I would have to say that) to loosely schedule my plans for the day. Gasping faintly, I remember what tomorrow is.

Tomorrow was my fifteenth birthday, and my dad always gave me some kind of gift that gave me another way to interact with things in the underworld. For example, for my thirteenth birthday I got my very own horse. She was the dead soul of this really fast race horse who was murdered by her owner. For my tenth birthday I got an actual living guinea pig! He, well, he died of the poison in the air... That wasn't my best birthday. Is it possible to be anxious about something that will almost surely end up being a disaster? Because, if it is, that is precisely the emotional state I am currently in.

After a couple of silent minutes spent pondering what my father would decide to bestow upon me tomorrow, I get up and trudge quietly outside after stopping to greet my dad. The landscape was as gloomy as could be, with its glowering mountains, artificial green skies, and black clouds of poison air that hang over the hills of dead grass that the shades, more commonly know as souls or spirits, roamed day after endless day. That reminds me, I recall. I planned a picnic today!

I run back inside of my fathers mansion, into the kitchen, and grab my picnic basket and cloth from the island counter. Then I sprint back to the Fields of Asphodel and jump the barbed wire fence, a skill I had mastered in my twelve years in Hell.

It isn't hard to find my hiding spot. The great oak tree I refer to as my escape is one of the few trees that has survived the rough conditions of Hades, and out of all of them, it is obviously the tallest and most lucious. I go through my lunch routine, swinging the table cloth over my shoulder and hanging the basket on a branch as I boost myself up onto the tallest tree branch. Crouching, I spread the table cloth out so it's covering almost the entire branch. Finally, I can relax.

Normally the silence is soothing, but it almost seems too quiet, as if the it were holding its breath in anticipation. A rustling in the tree alerts me of another presence. I decide that I need to find out what is spying on me.

So, in conclusion, I threw a twig at the other side of the tree. The results were catastrophic.

First, I heard a yelp, then saw and heard the loud crash as a blur of black tumbled through the branches of the tree and thudded onto the ground.

Quick as lightning, I swing to ground to catch sight of the intruder before they can escape. But what I saw, laying on the ground gasping for breathe, changed my life forever in a matter of seconds.

Okay HI GUYS! I'm Becca and my editor/beta is Megan and we are... THEFAULTINOURDUCKS! okay, anyways, please don't hate on us just because it isn't a traditional fanfiction. I know that it's normally supposed to be about the ACTUAL book characters but... whatever. My fanfiction, my rules. LOVE YOU (PERCY)!

~thefaultinourducks~

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