There's no romance this time! (Fortunately, unless you'd like to hear about May Castellan getting frisky with Armin o.o)
Sometimes, he swore he could hear her shrill voice; sometimes he dreamed of her graying hair, the wild look in her eyes, how sickeningly nice she'd been to him. The name that would spill past her lips; as if she were playing a memory on repeat. Luke. Luke. Luke. Luke.
She'd call him Luke and treat him like a phantom from her past just as in his dreams she'd be his own. At times, she'd be lucid enough to notice the differences between him and Luke. She'd ask him how his hair had gotten so long, but it didn't get any further than that. To her, the blonde and blue eyed kid who'd appeared on her front porch was her son, back home once and for all. It didn't matter if he tried to correct her because at the end of the day, she'd still be clinging to him as if he was her Luke.
But the worst wasn't that. It was that whenever he'd try to leave, she'd catch him by the arm; her nails sinking into his pale flesh, and she'd ask him where he was going. She didn't seem to understand that she'd been hurting him, but she'd still encase him in her arms and attempt to comfort him with soothing words. Perhaps, because she didn't want Luke to leave a second time, despite the fact that he was not Luke and would never be.
She would tell him that she loved him, over and over again. She'd say that his father hadn't abandoned him, she'd tell him how much of a good boy he was and that he would certainly be proud of him. Yet, it was not him who needed to hear those words. It would have been Luke and now, the woman herself. He, just a child who'd appeared on her front door, was someone who'd already mourned whom he had needed to mourn. But she...she was someone whose wounds had yet to close. The loss of a son, who'd run away never to come back alive or dead, was something he doubted she'd ever surpass. In fact, he doubted she wouldn't cling to the memory of Luke until her deathbed.
It was still impossible for him to feel the slightest sorry for the woman, however. Not even when he'd learned her full story, after he'd escaped her clutches and reached the safety of Camp Half-Blood. If he did so, he would just be as mad as she was, after all. She'd never given him any room to breath, much less to pity her and her tragic fate (which he believed could have been avoided if she weren't so ambitious). Not even he, an orphan with a need for love, would have accepted to live out her fantasies after what he'd been through; even if it had been for the sake of her long lost sanity.
The fact that he'd been but a mere prisoner- someone caught in her own shackles, although completely innocent- was simply something he could not forgive; though not even at the time did he wish her anything so cruel as death.
Luke Castellan was, after all, the worst punishment she could ever receive. A traitor of his own blood, but someone who died to repent himself; the death of a hero. Which was worse for a mother to know, to hear? If only May Castellan had been sane enough to understand what had become of her son, her true son and not any of the kids she'd imprisoned in his place.
(Armin Arlert did, however, silently thank her sometimes. Particularly, when he'd hear about other demigods journeys, was when he'd lived with the insane mortal, he hadn't had the need to worry about being attacked by monsters. He did not know how, but the home of the once lover of Hermes had some sort of protection that kept monsters at bay. The blond did suspect that it had something to do with the Messenger of the Gods himself, though.
But, his experience with the woman, whose name he'd never dare to pronounce again, did have some consequences on his own health. Such as the fact that he would never be able to stand even the smell of Peanut Butter again. Too bad that Percy Jackson's Cyclops of a brother just seemed to have some kind of affinity for it.)
Phew! Second Chapter is finally here. I had actually two other ones to post before this chapter, but I lost one of them and I haven't finished revising the other, sorry. I just can never seem to be happy enough with my writing.
Also thank you for the review Panda ^^ I thought about Eren as a son of Poseidon before too, I guess his anime looks do make him seem like one :o Though I ended up going with Ares because of his whole 'Kill all the titans' thing, as it reminded me of bloodshed and such, which is what Ares presides over (Athena bearing the strategical aspect when it comes to war).