AN: I want to thank everyone who has reviewed so far and I hope you all like this chapter. It's a little shorter than the others but the next chapter will be a bit longer. I hope you all enjoy this chapter though.
The Sea's Daughter: The Lightning Thief.
Chapter 3: The Fates; More Then Harbingers.
"You know the plan?" Chiron asked her two days later, after the disastrous field trip.
Melinda nodded, sweeping her bangs from in front of her eyes.
"Follow Percy and Grover in animagus form," Melinda said. "We've been over it a thousand times."
Chiron raised an eyebrow and she smiled lightly and shrugged.
"Okay, so more like three times, but it felt like a thousand," Melinda said, watching as the buses all pulled out from the window she stood in front of.
"He's lucky to have you," Chiron said suddenly and she looked over at him with question.
"Percy, he's lucky to have a sister who cares," he clarified.
Melinda smiled.
"I have my flaws," she said, "but family is very important to me."
Chiron smiled. He had taught a lot of heroes but none quite like the daughter of Poseidon.
"You should go, you'll have to catch up with them at this rate," he said.
Melinda nodded, opened the window and jumped up onto the ledge. Looking back at Chiron she nodded and jumped, transforming mid fall and flying away towards the bus her brother was on.
For a while nothing odd happened, and she kept a steady pace with the large bus. Eventually they came upon a stretch of road where she could easily make out a fruit stand and three old ladies which made her scar tingle.
The sudden tingle jolted her so sharply she nearly fell from the sky as the bus suddenly broke down. Melinda gave a cry, the sharp cry of a gyrfalcon and swooped down to perch on the sign of the fruit stand.
This gave her a great view of both the three ladies knitting their large socks and her brother who had exited the bus with Grover and the other students.
"...on the bus, Percy," she caught Grover say, trying to pull her brother onto the bus.
Percy was stubborn and stayed back, staring at her and the three ladies . Melinda then took time to notice the yarn and how one old lady had sheers out. Large and silver, gleaming in the sun.
Melinda let out a sharp cry as the lady – the fates she realized with fear and shiver- cut the electric blue thread and began rolling the rest up.
Melinda looked back to her brother with fear but he seemed fine for now. As the bus roared back to life and drove off she leaped from the sign and returned to human form.
The three old ladies didn't leave. They, one by one, looked at her with silvery-white eyes.
"How can we help you, Mistress of Thanatos," one of them said in a low, unearthly voice. It almost looked like she hadn't spoken to her at all.
The lady's words confused her at first, but she supposed calling her the Mistress of Thanatos was just the same as calling her the Mistress of Death, just more formal.
"Clotho," the one with the sheers scolded. "We do not answer to even being as powerful and unpredictable as she."
Melinda could just tell this must be Atropos. That meant the last one was Lachesis.
"I do not wish to demand anything of you...but I must ask. Will my brother die?"
Atropos looked at her as if appraising her.
"Mortals do no understand our roll in their lives. They never have," the wisest of the fates began. "They think we control everything in their life when in reality we simply create the choices they are given. The road they travel is of their own making. Like your gods we can not interfere."
"One day he will die, but it will not be today or in the near future. Could you not feel that, Mistress of Death?" Lachesis said, taking over for her sister.
"It doesn't work like that," Melinda said, blinking.
Clotho smiled eerily.
"Exactly," she said. "But you understand our roll in the lives of mortals, don't you Melinda Potter?"
"You know my name," she said, not asked.
It would have been a stupid question if she had asked.
"Of course," Atropos said and suddenly she held a nearly glowing silvery-green thread and there was a basket with thread the same color.
Melinda's breath caught in her throat.
"We have cut your thread before," Atropos said and frowned. "Yet your fate, your life was not over."
"Once when you were a year old," Clotho said pointing to a part of the thread which was duller than the rest. "Saved by a sacrificed life of one who could have lived."
"And again as the Mistress of Death. Now, we have a hard time controlling your life thread," Clotho finished.
Melinda frowned.
"What do you mean my ladies?"
Lachesis nearly giggled.
"You are the Mistress of Death, in a way that includes your own. We could cut your cord a thousand times but until it is your time to leave life as a mortal it would simply..."
Melinda watched in horror as Atropos cut her life thread. The snip ricocheted in her head and she felt a sick feeling before she saw it spring back up and mend back together.
"Comes back together," Atropos finished for Lachesis.
Melinda was pale, the feeling of someone walking over her grave slowly ebbing away.
"I can't die as long as I'm in possession of the hallows?" she asked, still not quite understanding.
"Hardly," Lachesis said. "We just don't decide when your fate is done. To those lives you meddle in we have no choice but to rewrite...at least assuming you make the choice."
Once again Melinda blinked, beginning to wonder if she'd ever get a straight answer.
"What choice?" she asked.
The three fates didn't answer, they simply disappeared. Leaving Melinda with more questions then answers.
"Great, thanks for the talk," she muttered.
Turning, Melinda quickly transformed and headed to catch up with the bus. Thankful that she was a fast and strong flier in her animagus form. Even if it wasn't Percy's life thread the fates had cut earlier, she still had to protect him.
xXx
"Grover," Melinda said as she saw the lone Satyr standing and looking ready to pull his hair out of his hair. "What's going on, where is Percy?"
Grover bayed and looked up at her with wide eyes, and she was sure any moment he'd probably fall over in a faint.
"I'm a failure," he said. "I lost him. I went to the bathroom and when I returned..gone!"
Melinda felt a ball of dread drop into the pit of her stomach and she grabbed Grover's shoulders and shook the Satyr back into attention.
"Grover, snap out of it!" she exclaimed. "Now tell me where he is, slowly."
Grover took a deep breath and than nodded.
"I'm sorry Mel, I should have kept a closer eye on him. I had to use the bathroom, and he saw the fates earlier. He's in danger!"
Melinda stood straight and ran a hand through her hair.
"He's in danger but we'll just have to intercept anything," Melinda said. "Any idea where he is?"
"Home, most likely," he said.
She nodded.
"Alright, I'll fly over and keep watch. You follow on foot..or hoof, whatever."
Grover nodded and took off.
Looking around Melinda duck behind a wall away from loads of people and transformed yet again.
She was thankful the animagus transformation was such a natural bit of magic it wasn't tiring, and flew off as fast as she could towards the Jackson residence.
She'd have to remember to explain to Percy the importance of not ditching protectors in the future. But than, hadn't she been the same when she was around his age?