DANIEL'S DAY WAS GOING PRETTY GOOD, at least in comparison to some of his worse days. But it didn't last.

History class ruined it all. But now when he thought about it, there were a lot worse things that could ruin your day than detention for a week and an unfair grade.

"I've finished grading your essays." Mr. Briggs, his history teacher said. "Most of you did quite poorly. The class average was much worse than the normal. Though a few people managed to improve or at least maintain a respectable grade. I'll be handing them back to you at the end of class."

Daniel slouched in his seat and groaned. This meant that he'd failed – again.

Not that he cared. As far as Daniel was concerned, history was useless and stupid – in other words, it was complete and utter rubbish. Who the hell cares about what happened during the War of 1812? It happened like almost two hundred years ago!

The only reason why he was upset about failing again, is because that would mean he was failing the course, and then he might have to repeat the grade, which would not make his mom happy. Money was already scarce, and she probably wouldn't be able to afford the tuition. Daniel got to attend Castle Heights Prepatory School on a grant for underprivileged youth. But if he failed the year, his mom would have to pay tuition for him to redo it – and she did not have the money for that. She barely had enough money to pay the rent and keep food on the table.

Daniel felt someone tap his back. He turned to find his one and only friend, Eddie, who said, "Dude, I'm totally busted."

"At least you probably passed."

"Hey man, don't worry."

"I can't afford to fail anymore subjects. I mean, I'm already busted in English, and there's no hope of improving in that, thanks to my stupid dyslexia. French isn't much better. Math is impossible and I'm failing in Geography too."

"At least you've got an A in Gym."

"Yeah, but that's like the only thing above a D on my progress report."

At that moment, Mr. Briggs cleared his throat and glared at them. "Mr. Martinez." He said sternly.

"Yes sir?" Daniel said politely. But in his mind, he was silently cursing the old bald freak.

"Why are you talking during my lesson?"

"Why are you teaching during my conversation?" Daniel shot back.

When Daniel realized it was a bad idea mouth off like that, it was too late. He shouldn't have made such a biting remark, but it's not like he could control it. Daniel had his ADHD to blame for that.

"Daniel, please report to the principal's office after class."

Eddie spoke up. "Mr. Briggs, it wasn't his fault. I started the conversa – "

"I know for a fact that you did, Mr. Woodbridge." Mr. Briggs interrupted. "Hmm, I think lunch detention for both of you for the rest of the week will do."

Asher snickered. He was the stereotypical popular jock of the seventh grade who also happened to be Daniel's archenemy. His groupies followed his cue. Asher was the reason why Daniel couldn't ever play basketball on the school team. He was the captain of the team every single year, mostly because he was rich and his dad knew the coach. Being captain meant that he always made the final decision of who was on the team and who wasn't. Asher had always thought of Daniel as a threat to his position of basketball team captain (a.k.a. most popular guy in the grade), so he never let him on the team. Daniel didn't care about any of the tags attached to being on the team. He didn't want the title of basketball team captain or popularity or girls. Daniel just wanted to play ball.

Eddie flopped back in his chair and stared at his feet. Daniel looked at him with a look that he hoped said 'thanks for trying' and 'I'm sorry', but he doubted that one glance could say that much. He'd just have to wait until the end of class. He really hoped that Eddie wasn't upset with him. He was the only friend Daniel ever had in his entire life and he didn't want to lose him.

Daniel couldn't care less about being sent to the principal's office. He went there at least once a week to report whatever mischief he'd gotten himself in the past few days.

The fifty minute class felt like a whole day to him, the clock going extra slow to tease him. When the bell rang Daniel almost forgot about the essay as he bolted for the door. Mr. Briggs was standing at the doorway, handing back the essays to the students lined up at the door.

"Remember to get them signed." He said as the first student walked out the door. "I'll be checking!"

Eddie came and lined up right behind him.

"Look, I'm sorry. I didn't want you to get stuck in detention for a week too. Thanks for trying though."

"It's ok. Anything for a friend."

Eddie said it in a strange way – like he really meant it. Like he'd do anything, even give up his life for him. Daniel shook off the idea, since it was completely absurd.

"Too bad Old Bald Head hates me." He whispered back.

Eddie chuckled.

When it was Daniel's turn to get the essay, he tensed up a bit. The assignment was worth a lot of the final grade. If he failed this...oh god, he didn't know what he'd do.

To his surprise, Mr. Briggs said, "Nice improvement. But unfortunately, I had to change the B to a C."

Now Daniel knew he should be happy that he didn't fail, but he couldn't. Not when he knew he could have done better.

"But why, sir?"

"I specifically requested for the essay to be printed in size 12 font. However, you used size 14."

"But Mr. Briggs...I don't understand."

"What is there not to understand? You did not follow my explicit instructions about what I expected, so therefore, you lose marks."

"But a whole grade level for a font size? Isn't that a bit much?"

"I am the teacher! What I say goes! I do not need you two cents! Now off to the office and don't forget that you have detention after that."

Daniel shot a dirty look at the despicable excuse for a teacher and stormed out the door, not even bothering to wait for Eddie.

"Wait up, man!" Eddie yelled as he hobbled through the crowded hallway.

Daniel just ignored him and quickened his pace to the point where he was practically jogging. Eddie managed to catch up with Daniel by manoeuvring his wheelchair through the crowded hallway. He felt a hand grab his arm and stop him. He turned around to see Eddie with a look of confusion.

"Why are you so upset?" Eddie asked. "You didn't fail, right?"

"Yeah, but it's not fair!" Daniel complained. "He gave me a C when I clearly deserved a B!"

"Calm down, dude! Just chillax." Eddie said, patting him on the back. "No need to get so worked up over it."

"I mean what difference does it make if I printed it in size 12 or size 14?"

Eddie eyed him questioningly. "Why did you print in size 14 in the first place?"

"To make it look longer so that he'll think I did more work and give me a higher mark." Daniel said. "Duh!"

"So you didn't actually write 1000 words?"

"Of course not! You think I'd waste my time doing that when I could be shooting hoops? Anyways, it's not like he was going to sit down and count the number of words I wrote."

Eddie chuckled like Daniel's irritation amused him. "No wonder your brilliant plan backfired."

"I have to go."

Daniel headed off to the principal's office as Eddie wheeled away. He walked straight past the secretary and entered the office. Mr. Matthews, the principal, was already waiting at his desk, mostly likely informed by Mr. Briggs that Daniel was on his way down. The principal gestured for Daniel to sit down.

Once they were settled in, Mr. Matthews began his usual grilling. "So Daniel, what trouble have you caused this time?"

"Mr. Briggs sent me here because I was talking during his lesson."

"I see." The principal replied. "And may I ask why you were talking during his lesson?"

"Because it was boring." Daniel said bluntly. "Anyways, we were talking about school, so I don't get what the big deal was."

The principal looked at him sceptically and said, "Mmmhmm. What else?"

"I got yelled at by Mrs. Doyle on Tuesday for getting another F on a test."

"Why did you fail the test?" Mr. Matthews asked.

"Because I didn't know the answers." Daniel said simply.

Mr. Matthews looked slightly annoyed. "Right. Next?"

"I got kicked out of the cafeteria yesterday for throwing my meatloaf at Asher's face."

"Why did you throw meatloaf at Asher's face?"

"It fell on the floor. I wasn't going to eat it!" Daniel explained. "Anyways, the annoying prick deserved it."

At that moment, the phone on the principal's desk rang. Mr. Matthews picked it up and answered the call. After the conversation was over, he let out an exasperated sigh and said, "I have to go deal with an incident. Just sit quietly and please try not to break anything."

"No promises." Daniel replied quietly.

By the time the principal was back, Daniel had succeeded in jamming the principal's stapler and knocking over and shattering a porcelain vase full of flowers. Hopefully it wasn't an antique.

Mr. Matthews gave a disapproving look and said, "You're more trouble than you're worth."

Daniel started fiddling around with a rubix cube on the principal's desk. He was never going to be able to solve it, but it was a good distraction to shut out whatever Mr. Matthews was going to say next.

"What to do about you, Mr. Martinez?" The principal said as he paced back and forth in front of the desk. "You have caused too much trouble at this school. You've disrupted the peace. And you've have caused much financial damage to school property." Mr. Matthews paused and turned to face Daniel. "I'm afraid to say that if you don't get you act together, as much as I dislike this option, we'll have to take away your scholarship and expel you."

Daniel nearly fell backwards off his chair. He pulled himself together, placed the rubix cube back on the desk, and managed to stutter, "B-but sir, this is my last chance. If I blow this, my mom won't have anywhere else to put me."

"Then it is in your best interest not to waste it." Mr. Matthews replied coldly as he made his way out the door. "Now if you will excuse me, I have a staff meeting to attend."

Daniel stormed out the principal's office and practically shoved people aside in the hallway as he made his way to his locker. Maybe if he hurried, he could still get to his next class on time. Eddie was waiting in his wheelchair next to Daniel's locker. When he saw Daniel approach, he asked, "How did it go?"

Daniel didn't answer. He opened the lock in one yank, threw his books in, and slammed the door so hard that it recoiled and hit him in the face.

That was the last straw. His day had gone from good to awful in less than an hour. His boiling anger flowed over the edge and he took it out by punching the metal locker door. It hurt, but he felt satisfied once he saw the dent in the metal.

Eddie stood there, staring at him in shock. Daniel knew he got angry often, but never so much that Eddie couldn't cool him down. "W-what was that?"

"I got angry, ok? My day hasn't been so good."

"You still didn't tell me what happened in the principal's office. What did Mr. Matthews say?"

That was when Daniel realized that what he'd just done was the exact thing Mr. Matthews had told him to refrain from doing – if he wanted to stay in this school that is.

"Nothing other than the usual lecture." Daniel lied.

Eddie looked at Daniel suspiciously, obviously not believing him. If Eddie truly had any doubts about what Daniel had said, he didn't make them known. Nothing about the incident had been mentioned again, and Daniel was thankful for that.

"Just try to stay out of trouble for the rest of the day, ok?" Eddie told him.

Now you see, whenever anyone told Daniel to stay out of trouble, something bad always ended up happening. It was like those words were jinxed. He avoided doing anything that might be stupid or dangerous, but things still went wrong. For Eddie's sake, he agreed. Daniel was pretty confident that this time, he wasn't going to get into trouble.

He was so wrong about that.

You see, bad things always happened to him when he least expected them to. Like the time in the last year when they were working with chemicals in a science lab session. Somehow, Daniel had gotten his hands on some 'off limits' chemicals and accidentally mixed the wrong substances, creating a huge explosion that demolished the classroom. And the year before, in the fifth grade, when his social studies class went to a museum for a field trip, he somehow made a tree in the parking lot fall over and it crushed the school bus. It wasn't exactly his fault, but they expelled him anyways.

Sucks to be him, right?

And now he was once again on the verge of getting expelled, or at least earning himself another suspension. But being suspended – or even expelled – was nothing compared to the mess he was about to get into.

At lunch, in detention, Daniel was bored out of his mind. He hated that he couldn't even talk to Eddie even though they were in the same room and with Mr. Briggs watching him like a hawk, he wouldn't be able to discreetly pass a note. He turned to his right to find that there was a bookshelf with a row of identical textbooks. He took one out and tried to make out the title.

Ancient Greek Mythology: A Beginner's Guide to deities, Heroes, and creatures

Since he didn't have anything better to do, Daniel started to read the book. Sure it wasn't easy, and he had to wrestle with his dyslexia to understand the words, but the book had plenty of pictures in it. Surprisingly, he found that he already knew some of it from what he'd learned in school. After an hour, he was completely absorbed in the book. He read about the Olympian gods and goddesses, adventures of famous Greek heroes, and the monsters they fought. It wasn't until he heard a knock on the door of the classroom that his eyes left the pages.

The door opened and two girls stepped in. Daniel knew them. Camille and Natalie, they were both new students. They'd only come about a month ago. Both girls had their plaid uniform skirts hiked up so high, that they could barely be considered skirts anymore. As the girls walked into the room, they waved and smiled at him. This was the first and only time anyone at school – besides Eddie – had been friendly to him.

Camille, the brunette, walked towards Daniel and took a seat at the desk next to his. Daniel's nose wrinkled when he realized she smelled like a horse mixed with designer perfume. He hated horses and they hated him. It was a mutual hate-hate relationship. "Hey, Daniel!" She said in her sugary voice.

Thinking back, he should've got up and bolted from the room that very moment.

Instead, Daniel replied, "Hi Camille." Then he hesitated before asking, "What are you doing here?"

"Oh, we're just here to help Mr. Briggs with some work." She replied sweetly, turning to the grouchy history teacher. "Isn't that right, sir?"

Suddenly, Daniel felt some sort of disruption in the air. It was hard to explain exactly what it was, but a strange feeling was definitely there.

Eddie shot him a nervous look. Daniel didn't understand what was going on.

The expression on Mr. Briggs' face morphed from crabbiness to confusion to friendliness. "Of course, certainly."

"So," Natalie, the blonde one said, "What are you reading?"

A part of Daniel wondered why these two very pretty, and quite popular girls were talking to a loser like him. At this school, where everyone looked like an Abercrombie model and was on their way to Harvard since preschool, Daniel didn't stand a chance at being accepted into the 'popular' group or even be considered normal. The other part of him (the shallow part) was like 'time to score!'

"A book on Greek mythology." Daniel replied.

"How interesting." She said glancing down at the page he turned to.

"I have to go run off some photocopies...I think." Mr. Briggs said as if he were unsure about it. "I'll be back in a few minutes...probably."

As Mr. Briggs left the classroom, Eddie became even more anxious and began rolling his wheelchair back and forth. Daniel didn't get what Eddie was so tense about. He was glad that Mr. Briggs had left so that they could finally have some fun in here.

"We have to go too." Eddie said quickly, as he tugged on Daniel's sleeve. "Our time is over. It's been an hour."

"Oh, no." Camille said. "You can't leave yet." Daniel noticed that she looked a bit paler than usual.

"It's too soon." Natalie agreed. "We haven't even had a chance to enjoy ourselves yet."

Daniel shrugged Eddie's arm off his shoulder. "Yeah dude. Let's stay a while. It's not like we have anything better to do."

Looking back, Daniel felt like slapping himself. Maybe, if he'd listened to Eddie, and left when he was told to, he could have avoided all the pain and toil that he had gone through. But at that time, all Daniel cared about was the fact that for the first time in his life, two extremely attractive girls were flirting with him.

"Daniel, you don't under – "

Natalie cut Eddie off. "How about we get started with the party?"

"Certainly." Camille almost hissed in agreement. Something about her voice made Daniel feel uncomfortable. The two girls had an almost insane glint in their eyes – a bloodthirsty hunger.

Their hair began to change to the colour of rust, the smell of horses got stronger. Daniel noticed that their right legs got hairy and their left legs were started to shine as if they were made of some kind of precious metal.

Natalie, the blonde, came forward and grabbed him by the shirt. Daniel grabbed the edge of the desk behind him, leaning as far away from the girl as possible.

He'd got a very bad feeling in his gut – an instinct of dread and doom to come.

"Actually, I just remembered that I uh...I have to go um – "

"Do not try to evade me, half-blood!" Natalie rasped. "You will not escape...alive."

Daniel shot Eddie a panicked look.

His friend mouthed one word in response – run.

Daniel wished more than anything that he could, but he was in no situation to be able to do that. Camille was starting to approach him as well. He looked helplessly at Eddie, begging for help now that he realized that there was something truly dark and evil about the girls. But Eddie wasn't any more capable of doing something than Daniel was.

Then Eddie spoke four words that saved Daniel's life. "Look in your pocket."

Daniel desperately searched through his pocket and found...a Sharpie. So that was it. A permanent marker. The object of immense power that would get him out of this alive. What was he supposed to do with it? Ink them to death?

Natalie reached out, trying to grab the marker. Daniel pushed her away. She stumbled and crashed into a desk.

Clang.

Her leg made a hollow, metallic sound.

Suddenly, the girls' hair combusted spontaneously, burning so hot that Daniel could feel the searing heat despite not being in contact with the flames. He looked at down their legs to find that one was the leg of some sort of barnyard animal, and the other was made of polished bronze. He looked back up to see their chalk white faces, razor sharp fangs, and blood-red eyes.

Daniel looked at Eddie who was slowly backing away from the demons. The frightened expression on his face was enough to tell Daniel that Eddie was seeing the same thing he was.

"You have no idea how long we've been waiting." Camille hissed.

"But now," Natalie said, her voice harsh and rough. "We will feast on your blood."

"B-back off." He stuttered.

"Tsk, tsk." Camille chided. "How rude, being so hostile, when all we wanted to do was have a little fun."

Then, without hesitation, Daniel did the only thing that made any sense – he uncapped the marker. To his utter shock, it grew to a metre long blade of shiny bronze – a sword.

Natalie's form shimmered as she inched closer. Switching between pretty popular girl and demon monster. It was difficult to keep focus. "Now, now, let's not go to such extremes. How about a kiss instead?"

Daniel was so terrified, he almost wanted to agree, but one look from Eddie told him that cooperation wasn't an option. He backed away, holding the Sharpie sword out in front of him defensively.

"You know," Natalie said. "We never wanted it to be this way. But due to your lack of enthusiasm we're going to have to...take some measures."

Daniel shuddered. To him, 'taking measures' sounded like an extremely painful torture. He was paralyzed in fear. Natalie reached up into the flames on her head and removed from it a ball of fire.

Now was the time. He had to do something. It was that or getting killed.

Daniel searched the room for Eddie, desperate for help. His friend had managed to wheel himself behind the teacher's desk.

"I can't help you" Eddie said. "Sorry."

Great. So he was alone. Outnumbered two to one, inexperienced, and completely petrified.

Apparently, his time to make a move was up. Natalie flung the fireball with surprisingly good aim. Daniel managed to dodge it. He felt a rush of adrenaline after being attacked. His senses heightened. Every movement was clearer, every sound was more defined. A sudden confidence crept into him. He charged at Natalie with his sword held out and eyes squeezed shut. He didn't know the monster was dead until he felt a sprinkling of a power-like substance on his face and a scream from Camille.

"You killed my colleague!" she bellowed. "You will pay for this treason!"

Camille was baring her fangs and growling the way an angry dog would. She looked almost comical as she clunked forward on those mismatched legs, still wearing the Castle Heights uniform. But Daniel couldn't laugh – not when he was facing imminent death.

"What do you want from me anyways?" Daniel asked shakily as the monster approached him. "I'll give you what you want if you let me live."

Camille stopped dead in her tracks. "A peace treaty? Hmm, I never thought of that as a possible approach. You see, what I and my decapitated ally want from you is information."

"About what?" Daniel asked.

"The Fates have informed me and all of Hecate's other minions that you are one of the demigods who hold the answer to why our mistress was kidnapped, where she is, and how to get her back."

"What the heck are you talking about?" Daniel said with disbelief. "The Fates? Hecate? Who's she? Who are you?"

"Hecate is the all-powerful Greek goddess of magic, and I am her devoted servant." Camille replied. "And I see that talking things out is obviously not going to work. So prepare you meet your end, half-blood!"

"That's not going to happen." Daniel barely believed himself as he said it. "I'm going to kill you first."

"Highly unlikely. Even if you do, it doesn't matter. I'll be back sooner or later to – "

Daniel took the opportunity to run her through with his sword. Camille exploded into dust like her colleague had earlier.

Daniel flopped down on a chair, exhausted. "Wow, she's a real big mouth."

"You okay?" Eddie asked, coming out of his hideout.

"Yeah. I'm pretty good." Daniel answered. "A few cuts, nothing too serious."

"I can't believe you managed to take both of them down."

"Neither can I." Daniel replied. "But I have to give them some credit for being incredibly stupid."

Eddie laughed but quickly stopped. "Daniel, you do know how serious this is, right? Those were empousai, servants of Hecate. They're incredibly dangerous. I'm surprised their charmspeak didn't affect you."

"Why are they after me?" Daniel asked, not quite sure about what all of this meant.

"Because you're a demigod." Eddie said.

Demigod. That was what Camille had called him. But demigods were the offspring of humans and gods. He couldn't be...

Daniel felt suspicion rise in him. "How do you know so much about the monsters?" he asked Eddie. "How do you know that I'm a – a – "

"Demigod?" Eddie offered. "Because...well...I think it would be better if I showed you."

Then, as if Daniel's day hadn't been weird enough, Eddie actually stood up from his wheel chair, and started taking his pants off.

"Woah, woah!" Daniel said waving his hands in front of him. "What the heck are you doing?"

"My job." Eddie replied casually as he unbuttoned his jeans.

"But you just..." Daniel was at a loss for words.

"Got out of my wheelchair which I definitely don't need anymore." Eddie slipped out of his pants revealing a pair of furry legs that resembled the kind that the empousai had.

Instead of giving an intelligible response, Daniel mumbled, "Wait? You're half-donkey?"

"No!" Eddie said, like he had just been gravely insulted. "I'm half-goat."

"And that means..."

The bell rang, signalling the end of lunch.

"It means I'm a satyr who has been sent to protect you. You're not hallucinating. This is all real." Eddie explained. "But we don't have time for lengthy explanations right now. I need to take you to camp."

"No. Just wait one second." Daniel held up a hand gesturing for Eddie to stop. "You're a what? And who sent you to protect me? And you need to take me where?"

Eddie sighed as he put on his pants and began limping (or clopping) to the door. "C'mon, Daniel. We need to talk to your mom."