Chapter 2 – Thoughts and questions

All afternoon we greeted friends (and fans) and caught up with their lives the past year. Annabeth and Daisy, daughter of Aphrodite, were virtually joined at the hip. At some point reddish brown hair merged into blonde but other than that they could have been some stunning, over-excitable, two-headed camp councillor. And of course we were tackled by Grover, the best half-barnyard animal to ever trot the Earth, and my dear cousin Nico who had grown about a foot and a half into something now resembling a nineteen-year-old. Was he really that old? Time flies when you're not counting the years until you either save or destroy Western civilisation.

Speaking of prophecies, I was disappointed to find out Rachel was on a six month skiing program in the Swiss Alps. I hoped she'd fly out when she heard our news, but seeing as the gods, Dr. and Mrs. Chase and my mom and Paul were the only ones who knew so far, I didn't think it was likely.

Unfortunately, I didn't get the death promised by Annabeth in the car. She was far too busy helping Chiron, teaching a beginners Greek class and getting stalked by a group of small wannabe-heroes. One of them turned out to be her half-sister, Noah, who had been claimed a week before we arrived, was six years old and only spoke French. Annabeth fell in love with her instantly and held her on her hip the whole time I was thrashing Will Solace at sword-fighting. It had never occurred to me before that Annabeth would make a good mom. Sure she was great with my half-sister Emilia, calling her nicknames and playing silly seven-year-old games. But I'd always thought it was for my sake. I could just imagine her rolling her eyes and saying "Well somebody has a big sense of their own self-importance!"

After dinner, everyone made their way down to the campfire for a sing-along. I told Annabeth to meet me there and ran back to our basement room in the big house. This is it, I thought, the biggest decision of my entire life. No pressure, but you have got to get this right. Thanks brain, now I'm really calm, I thought. Am I going to do this now? I thought.

In that split second I grabbed the blue box from the front pocket of my suitcase and ran out the door. I am going to do this...

Now.