Hey guys! Happy New Year's! Thank you so much for the amazing feedback! You guys rock! I hope your year does too :)

So this chapter is based off of real things that happened to real girls, and not only in France like today's hunter. We learn about it at school every single year in the dang curriculum, so I thought it might be around time I put that knowledge to some use, meaning fanfiction. Enjoy!

Disclaimer: I don't own the real hunters who appear, Rick Riordan's portrayal of their leader, or the PJO world.


Chantale Descoteaux

1603

She was a beauty- with blue black ringlets, bright blue eyes, a clever mind and a smile worth a million sunny days. People talked about Chantale Descoteaux valiantly; she was selfless. She even stopped and spoke with the men who spoke to nobody, and she chatted to those who slept on street corners. She was strong minded, but her soft side put people in front of herself.

But she had a beast to go with the beauty.

He wasn't such a beauty- inside or out. Greedy, old, stuffy, alone for the last few years… But in Paris 1603, he had what counted. Money. Status.

And that made him the perfect husband.

Murphy's law, thought Chantale. I don't care for him.

But caring and marrying were two different sides of the scale, and what counted was raised higher; so marriage it was for Chantale.

She'd done the math and between her 14 years and his 45, there was a 31 year difference. Her parents saw no problem with that, but Chantale did. Oh she saw it so crystal clear…

"Chantale?" A voice said at the door. She turned around to see her mother standing in the door in her very best dress, her hair tied up at its best. Just like Chantale.

"He's here, my love."

"I wish I wasn't." Chantale said, putting the book she'd pulled from a shelf closed. Mother's blue eyes dimmed in disappointment.

"Chantale, you know that-"

"Yes, I know." Chantale snapped. "I know everything that there is to tell me about this stupid marriage!"

"Chantale!" Mother snapped back.

Chantale didn't listen. Her mother had no rights on her. And if she did; she'd probably sell those off too.

But she did follow her Mother into the dining room. Her father was seated to the left of a big man, with broad shoulders. His beard and hair were long, neat and proper. His eyes were green but cold and plain. There was nothing good to say about them; they weren't like emeralds or twinkling with life or any of that.

"Chantale," her mother urged in a whisper. Chantale bit down on her lips.

"I apologise for being late." She said, curtsying, bringing up the edges of her dress. It was her best dress, and she yet did not understand why it had to come out right now.

"Not a problem, my dear." Father said. "You can sit beside Mr De Savoir." He said gesturing towards the guest. If Chantale had been in any other frame of mind she would have refused, but Jeanne and Marie watched; her two little sisters. Both were dressed alike in blue dresses, both had their blond hair put up nicely, and both had their set of sparkling blue eyes on Chantale.

She couldn't disappoint them, or show them bad manners no matter how bad she thought of the situation. They looked up at her like a hero, and she owed them more than that.

So she sat down and the meal started.

She watched him like a hawk. She looked out for gluttony, bad manners, bad speak, a word against the king… Anything Chantale could use against him and convince her parents he was a disgusting creature that lived in its own sweat and slime.

But that didn't happen. He wasn't any of those things. He spoke well with a French vocabulary as big as her tutor's. He was polite and he had perfect etiquette and a million other things that didn't really strike Chantale as 'mildly attractive'.

Chantale was despaired by the time he left the manor.

"You see, my love?" Her mother said, pushing her bangs back. "He is perfect. Charming, educated…"

"Rich and socialite?" Chantale sniped in. Her mother frowned and pursed her lips.

"Chantale, some things must be done for family. For those you love."

Chantale's face twisted in horror.

"You even admit it. I'm just married off to exchange money between families, or to bring the family to a higher status and honour. Mother: that's was merchandise is." Chantale said. "I'm a person!" She yelled. "I'm a real person who wants to do things and who doesn't want this!"

"Chantale - that is enough!" Her mother snapped. "You are going to marry this man. Okay?"

"No, it's not okay. I'll be in my room."

She hiked up the stairs, and pushed away Marie and Jeanne's offers to play doll more roughly than she ever had, but she couldn't take it. She slammed the door in the mist poorly behaved and unladylike fashion, didn't care, and collapsed her bed.

She would have yelled in the pillow if she hadn't learned that the walls were like paper a few days ago (when she'd done the same thing). But nobody could hear the thoughts in her head.

Chantale was a person. Didn't anybody see that? Did the mother who had raised her and told her she'd become beautiful and happy really want beautiful and happy to be in the arms of an old man? Did she think that was possible?

Well, that had been her case, so she saw no problem in this, but still- was Chantale not the only one totally blind in this?

She knew she was crying, and she heard the door open. She was about to yell at whoever to go away, but two small bodies cuddled up on either side of her.

"Chantale are you okay?" Marie asked. Chantale tilted her head to see Marie's face, her eyes wide with questions and worry.

"I'm okay, Marie." She said.

"Why are you crying?" Jeanne asked. She turned her head to the other side, to see an identical face with an identical look of worry.

She couldn't tell her sisters the truth. It wouldn't be fair. They were easily influenced little girl; they'd looked up at Chantale their whole lives. If she gave them the idea that getting sent off for marriage was bad, they'd think so too. It'd just hurt more when the exact same thing would be done to them.

"They're happy tears," Chantale lied.

"I'm happy you're happy." Jeanne said.

"Thank you." Chantale said choked. She flipped onto her back and wrapped her arms around both sisters. For some reason, the two little girls didn't bounce up to go play or read or dance around in their rooms. They stayed with her and fell asleep.

Chantale barely closed an eye.


Paris was blind that morning- heavy fog and mist hung all over the city, giving it ominous looks. Chantale walked them anyways. They felt a lot like what she felt inside, and the cracks in the stone road, Seine River, open shop windows and early morning delivery carts seemed like excellent places to throw the stupid wedding ring.

She'd had to get away from home. She couldn't stand being under a roof that had raised her for this.

She hadn't been allowed to dream in the first place; she knew that. No higher education, no world-wide travels; she knew only a handful of girls ever got that. She'd only been told that she'd marry and have a beautiful family.

The hope of a beautiful family was crushed now, because beautiful implied 'love' and 'happiness'. Chantale was stubborn, the bane of the perfect girl for marriage. She wouldn't be happy if she was pushed into something with her heels digging in the ground.

And that was as much as she was doing. Protesting against her being merchandise, thrown left and right for whatever use she might be, to whatever man might find her pretty.

A group broke the empty stillness. Chantale noticed that they were all girls, the eldest her age, the youngest a few years older than Marie and Jeanne.

Maybe they're filles du Roy, Chantale thought. Those orphans or homeless girls shipped to New France to marry the men and birth the population there...

The girl in the lead stopped and looked at Chantale fixed. Her eyes flowed silver. Not grey- silver. But not metallic like coins, silver like moonlight.

"We do not marry. And certainly not by order." She told Chantale, as if reading her mind. Chantale tried not to look blown out of her mind by this. "We are free. We are people after all."

Free. No orders. People after all.

"I'd like that," Chantale found herself saying out loud. She bit her lip, had that been spoken out loud? But she found that the girls weren't starring at her with shun, like 'you shouldn't say that'. They looked at her like they… They all understood in their own way.

She found herself pulling off the wedding ring.

"Please take me with you." Chantale asked. It was a risky request. People took girls like her into the night all the time. But this… Chantale could feel it was different. Chantale felt good about it.

"You are already promised," the girl with moonlight eyes told Chantale, nudging her head at her left hand.

"And I'd do anything not to be. I'd do anything to be like you. A real person, after all." Chantale said.

"It's not that simple," Moonlight eyed girl said.

"My reasons are. I want out and I want to make my own choices."

The girl looked at Chantale, and she wondered if she'd gone a little too far. She was known to be a lot of things, and stubborn was a side that she tried not to show, but had come out more than once in the last little why.

"Girls- Paris is yours for the next two hours. Zoë, stay with me. We have someone to talk to." She said.

The girls took off in cliques and talked, wandering down the streets while Moonlight eyed girl and the handmaiden she'd called Zoë explained everything to Chantale until everything was simple.

"It's like a world in a world. My goodness- is this real?" Chantale said.

"Yes," Artemis said. "Do you take back rash words now, or are you serious?"

Chantale looked at the cliques who had stayed around the Seine's banks with them. Chantale looked from them to Paris- to the ring- to the Seine- to the ring.

"I'm serious," Chantale said. Mother and Father would worry, Marie and Jeanne would cry, the beast would get upset. But Chantale would be happy and free and purposeful. And maybe she did need to show that to Marie and Jeanne. Maybe she did owe them the show that they were people and some people would consider them that.

"I pledge myself to the goddess Artemis.

I turn my back to the company of men, accept eternal maidenhood, and join the hunt."

And Chantale would not be merchandise.


Next Chapter

-As a son of Aphrodite, he knew how to make her fall in love...