a.n. I'm rebooting this story! Please review!

Finding Home

Chapter 6

Thalia glanced behind at her companion, he was walking quickly; feet making no sound and Thalia became suddenly conscious of the sucking noises that erupted whenever she placed a boot into a swampy patch of earth. Although he seemed deep in thought, he had an easy grin on his face. Abruptly, he noticed her watching him and instead of smiling wider as she had come to expect, a scowl darkened his expression. Thalia faced ahead of her again, feeling slightly hurt that he already seemed to regret asking her with him. It had only been twenty minutes for Zeus' sake!

She looked back to see how Luke was handling the muddy-ground that was becoming more and more like quicksand every step only to find that he was no longer there.

Blinking in confusion that quickly turned to worry Thalia was about to start walking back the way she had come. Maybe he'd fallen into the marsh, or he might have just lost his way.

Was that even possible for a son of Hermes? Thalia made a mental note to ask, once Luke seemed to be in a better mood. Twisting her body free of the bog, she began to turn around fully when a voice from the direction that she had been heading in made her jump.

"Where are you going?" Luke was lounging by a pitifully bark-less tree his clothes were barely soiled at all. Thalia scanned her own clothes; there wasn't an inch of black to be seen, in less than five minutes she had turned into a swamp monster.

Luke seemed to be in a better mood already, apparently showing off made him happy.

She would have to deal with that soon, but for now she could wait until she was out of the mud. Thalia estimated the distance between her and the edge of the marsh, about an arms' length away, she looked at Luke and his self-satisfied smirk and using her best cutesy voice asked:

"Could you help me out, please?" Luke blinked at her, once then twice in apparent astonishment. Then he grinned and pulled something out of his bag. It was small and thin and wrapped in some sort of shiny covering, she watched as Luke peeled of the wrapper with glee and had to stop herself from cursing as he held a Snickers bar teasingly above his mouth.

"The chance of me helping you out of that swamp on the scale of one to ten would be around the chance of me giving you this amazing, amazing Snickers bar." Luke scratched his head, glancing from her to the chocolate; he smiled and popped the candy in his mouth, chewing slowly. "Oh, that is good. Sorry, it looks like you're stuck." Thalia watched incredulously as Luke flopped down and drew his sword. "It looks like Molly and I are going to be having some quality time together."

"Molly?" Thalia spluttered through a gulp of dirt. It didn't taste as good as the chocolate Luke was eating, in fact it didn't taste good full-stop. "You named your sword, Molly?" She wasn't sure what surprised her more, the fact that her new companion seemed to have mood swings or that he had named his sword possibly the most un-frightening name ever.

"Is something wrong with the name, Molly?" Luke asked, his voice sounded dangerous, as if he'd had this conversation before and it hadn't ended well for the other party.

"No," Thalia said through gritted teeth. "Molly's a lovely name." Luke wiped a sleeve over the sword's celestial bronze blade, almost lovingly.

"Flantly was the other name I was considering." Luke mused thoughtfully and Thalia coughed up mud again. She was absolutely incredulous. Was this boy so stupid, so adolescent-like that he couldn't spot when someone needed help?

And 'Molly vs. Flantly'?

Thalia shuddered and not because some mud had just seeped its way up her trouser leg, although that wasn't a particularly nice experience either. She felt Luke's curious gaze on her and smiled at him winningly. He had a thoughtful expression on his face, which vanished as he noticed her watching.

Thalia struggled another mud-lagged step forwards and barely stopped herself from freaking as the mud was suddenly up to her waist. This sludge was a little too much like quicksand for comfort. Abruptly, Thalia decided that she had had enough.

"Luke, get your lazy butt down here and pull me out of this swamp before I order a lightning bolt to kick it." She had tried civility and now she had moved onto plan b: vulgarity and threats. Luke grinned at her and leapt from the tree root, where he had been apparently setting up camp for the evening, to the edge of the marsh. He held out a hand and motioned for Thalia to grab onto him. Thalia stared at him in disbelief, "You ignore me when I ask politely, but help the second I become an insufferable kid?"

"You sounded more like an inexperienced but tough pre-teenager." Luke mused, "And I suppose I could always go back to my tree root if you want to be polite again." Thalia rolled her eyes.

"Just get me out of this mud, Luke."

"Of course," Luke tugged at her arm and Thalia felt herself shift and the mud retract from around her waist, she breathed out in relief, and then the mud was around her shoulders and Luke's hand was no longer in hers. "Thalia!" Luke called, he sounded panicked as if he hadn't just shoved her into the mud and teleported her somewhere, as he must have done, Thalia thought crossly.

She looked around her and frowned, she didn't recognise this part of the marsh. "Thalia? This isn't funny," she heard some rustling to her left, Luke must have used his teleporting ability to try and scare her.

"I know, Luke." Thalia spat out some grunge and wiped her tongue around her teeth, yuck. "This isn't funny at all, so get me out of here before I make good on my promise of electrocution!" Squelching footsteps from ahead of her almost made her jump and until she heard Luke's cussing voice from there. Strange, he must have teleported back… but, if he was ahead of her, what was that rustling sound from her left?

Thalia suddenly wanted to be out of the swamp for a bigger reason than that it was dirty and wet.

"Thalia? Marco!" Thalia gave up trying to haul herself out of the bog and shouted back:

"Luke over here!" The rustling got closer and was it just her, or did it seem to be coming from behind her too? Luke's squelching footsteps got closer.

"Marco!"

"Polo!" Thalia yelled back; yup, the noise was coming from behind her and from her right too. "Polo, polo! Luke, help me!" Thalia struggled desperately as the rustling closed in around her. She closed her eyes, not wanting to see what it was.

"Thalia?" Luke sounded barely a metre away. "Marco?"

"Polo," Thalia coughed, the mud was in her mouth and something was dragging at her ankles in an uncomforting way. Luke burst through the undergrowth and Thalia somehow between being grabbed and floundering in the muck managed to experience a satisfied feeling as she realised that he too had mud splattered up his trousers, although he seemed to be able to walk on the swamp. It must be a son of Hermes thing; Thalia shrugged it off and extended an arm from the gloop. She fully expected Luke to help her out and was therefore surprised when he leapt over her, sword drawn.

Thalia slowly turned, peering around Luke's legs to see what he had deemed more important than rescuing her. Her eyes widened as she found the source of the rustling sound. The strong scent of apples washed over her as she stared at the gruesome, warped girls.

They were green-skinned with leaves sprouting from their heads instead of hair. Creepers were wrapped around their bodies and violet eyes darted disconcertingly from her to Luke. They hissed at the sight of the celestial weapon, but instead of drawing back as most nymph-like beings would; they edged closer, flicking vine-like tongues.

"Back off," Luke said, he voice dark. "I can and I will kill you all." The plant-like creatures formed a circle around them and Thalia turned to face the front so that she could keep an eye on the ones Luke couldn't see.

"A daughter of Zeus," one of them murmured. "And a son of Hermes." The loop became quiet. "The boy threatens us, should we let them go sisters?" She wore a flower crown on her head. Boos jeered from the crowd and the leader smiled, showing pointed teeth. Thalia watched bated breathed as one vicious nymph stepped forward.

"I will vouch for the son of Hermes; he is, after all, a very handsome boy." She licked her lips. The leader nodded:

"And will anyone speak for the daughter of Zeus?" There was silence. Thalia felt a hand touch the back of her neck and barely concealed a yelp before realising that it was Luke reaching for her jacket hood. He slowly began to pull her out of the mud, using her coat as a sort of leaver.

Thalia felt her legs pop free of the swamp with twin sucking noises just as she began to speak again. "Son of Hermes, you are free to go." Luke pulled Thalia into a standing position and precipitously a warning shriek sounded from one of the things on her side. It was the most painful noise Thalia had ever heard, like the loudest highest sound that could operate on human frequency and Thalia swore she could feel her ear-drums pop. It was probably just her imagination, she reasoned after a second of experimental thinking, as she could still hear the pitchy racket.

Then it stopped and Thalia spent a few seconds checking that her brain was still working.

"… Miriam," the leader was saying when Thalia tuned back into the conversation. "And you," she jabbed a finger in Luke's direction. "We were going to let you go, but now we'll have to reconsider that decision."

She paused for a split-second. "I've thought about it; sisters ATTACK!" She screamed a battle cry and Thalia could feel tears in her eyes at the sheer elevation of the scream. It seemed to pierce her brain and force any rational thoughts from her head with dogged vigour.

Thalia launched herself into action, back to back with Luke, as if they had been fighting together for years instead of a fluke attack against a Dragon, where either one of them had been unconscious at alternative moments. She swung her spear determinedly at the plant-like monsters, beheading a couple of them in the first few instants before reverting back to the self-taught, jab and stab method.

Luke's style was far more sophisticated, he swiped and thrust with a kind of grace that Thalia assumed he had learnt through some kind of lessons, but Thalia wasn't really interested in style; how many monsters you killed was a more important time-consumer/hobby in her opinion to learning how to fight with elegance.

ADHD was usually a good thing to have in a fight, being able to keep track of your enemy's motions and fight, although sometimes if too much was on a demigod's mind, it just made them vulnerable to off-license attacks.

This was why, when Thalia began to wonder how her foes kept their leaves so shiny; one monster took advantage of the distraction and before Thalia's head got back to the swing, she had a jagged rock to her throat. Usually, being threatened with a rock would have made Thalia laugh, but there was a sickening looking purple liquid dripping from the edge.

The nymph-creature laughed.

"You are quite right to stay still, daughter of Zeus. This stone, whilst not as simply dangerous as you blade; has Mandrake venom in its apertures." She pressed the stone to her throat and Thalia felt one of its spiky ledges rub away at her sensitive skin at her collarbone. "One wrong move and you'll know nothing more, sister."

"Why do you want to kill me?" Thalia grabbed hold of a life-line in the form of the monster complaining about injustice, if she could stall for long enough, maybe she could get to her spear.

"As if you don't know," huffed the nymph and her mauve eyes widened as Thalia shook her head and she launched into story mode. "It was all Father's fault; we used to be beautiful, with ivory skin and proper trees to live in. We had the most wonderful voices known to… well… everyone. Even the Mer and Sirens had nothing on us and our melodies." She wiped away a tear and Thalia wriggled a hand towards her spear.

It was knocked away by a flailing hand of the crying plant-monster. "Then Pomonie, curse her wicked soul, became besotted by one the Mer. She traded her legs for a tail using a potion given to her by the Titan traitor, Hecate and was allowed three days to make the Mer-man fall in love with her, she failed. When we found out, we ran to Hecate and gave up our beautiful voices in exchange for our sister's safe return. All she had to do was kill the Mer she loved, she didn't do it; she died and our voices were lost!" she wailed. Thalia saw Luke's eyes narrow as he looked over and saw her current position. He slashed impatiently at a couple more monsters and drove several back into the surrounding wooded area.

"… We planned an attack on Hecate, for our voices to return as Pomonie had not returned to her home after she refused to repay us. We almost succeeded in sending her to the pits of Tartarus too, but Father Zeus intervened."

Thalia interrupted: "Father Zeus?"

"Father Zeus," she said with a scowl, eyes narrowed. "He told us that we were to be cursed for attacking a Goddess and he cast us away, Hecate gave us voices, but not our beautiful ones, instead we have the cry of the extinct Griffin," she gave a bone rattling cry, "or Vociferationis Alesequus. And to make matters worse, when we returned we found that our reflections had changed and that by attacking a Goddess we had aligned ourselves against Aphrodite who took away the last of our beauty."

She spat on the ground. "Curse the Gods," Thalia waited for a rumble, but none came; apparently the Gods were used to this treatment from these… things. "We are known as Mandrakes now," finished the Mandrake dejectedly, wiping away some chlorophyll-green tears.

"If it makes you feel better, Zeus doesn't seem to like me either." Thalia offered, maybe if she played her cards right…

"Really?" the Mandrake perked up slightly. "Has he cursed you too?"

"No," Thalia said truthfully.

"Has he cut off all your beautiful hair?" She nodded towards Thalia's (admittedly messy) hair.

"No," Thalia wondered whether she should feel insulted or grateful that she was still alive, she decided on an emotion somewhere between the two. "It's more that he hasn't done anything." The Mandrake nodded understandingly.

"Olympians aren't the best parents in the world-" she began, but was cut off abruptly by a celestial bronze sword stabbing through her arm. "Hey!" She began to disintegrate.

Luke dogged the rock she hurled at him.

"That was quite an interesting story you were telling," he said.

"Thank you, I suppose." The Mandrake growled; "Although, I find it more tragic."

"It sounds a little like an alternate more violent version of 'The Little Mermaid'," Luke dropped to clang a pebble from his blade and Thalia grabbed her spear.

"Don't mention that movie to me; Athena was being entirely malicious when she gave one of children that idea!"

"So did that other one you don't like-"

"Pomonie,"

"Yes, her. Did she fall in love with King Triton or something?"

"No!" screamed the Mandrake, tearing out clumps of leaves in despair, "she fell in love with the mighty Mer Bill!"

"Bill?" Luke sounded incredulous as Thalia stabbed the Mandrake in the leg. She whirled around, screaming an ear-splitting exclamation of hatred as she suddenly realised that she was the only Mandrake left.

Thalia was about to dodge her strike by darting left, when she realised that her feet couldn't move from the ground. Thick, twining vines were holding her legs in place. Thalia felt a rock press against the side of her face again but before it could penetrate her skin, Luke swiftly cut of the Mandrake's head and instantly she became a pile of dust on the floor. The deadly rock seemed to hang in the air next to Thalia's neck for an extra second, before falling.

Luke cut the vines wrapped around her legs quickly and together they ran. It began to rain as they sprinted past some willow trees that seemed to groan a warning.

Sludge grappled at her boots and Luke was muttering about stupid Gods, which made the sky thunder. He grabbed her hand, and before Thalia could blink, they were out of the marsh, Luke's backpack by her feet.

"Urrgh," Luke's eye-lids were fluttering as if he was unsure whether he could trust Thalia to not get kidnapped by some other random relatives. The reality of the encounter hit home hard, her Father had cursed his own daughters because they wanted to defend a sister who had fallen for the wrong guy.

"I'll take first watch," Thalia said, her brain protested wildly. She wanted to sleep, but Thalia knew that it wouldn't be fair to make Luke stay up first. He had taken out a load of evil relatives and teleported them both away from the marsh, also; his eyes had purple bruises around them stating clearly that he hadn't slept well for a while.

Luke nodded and closed his eyes fully. As his breathing slowed, Thalia pulled out his bag and rummaged through it until she uncovered a Snickers bar. She peeled off the wrapper and was about to take a bite of the delicious chocolaty and peanut treat when a protesting voice sounded from beside her.

"Just because you're taking first watch doesn't mean you can eat my candy!" Luke didn't really sound annoyed, just resigned.

"I thought you were asleep!" Thalia knew that she wasn't helping her cause, but her mouth was running away without her brain, again.

"I know when someone's stealing my stuff, a useful son of Hermes thing," Luke said grudgingly. "Anyway, you're still about to eat my Snickers."

"I'll owe you one," Thalia popped the candy in her mouth, savouring the calorific treat that would have horrified her Mother.

"You owe me, like, twenty." Luke agreed and Thalia shrugged. "I was having a really strange dream -"

"You'd only just closed your eyes!" Thalia protested.

"So, my dreams are like little movies, the credits come up first. Doesn't that happen to you?" Thalia's disbelieving gawp was all the answer he needed. "No? Well, the title had just come up…"

"Yeah, yeah," Thalia mumbled around a mouthful of chocolaty goodness. "Now go to sleep, before I do."

"Don't you dare, anyway… sleep!" Luke curled up and grinned at Thalia who gawked at him in disbelief.

"I don't know you," she declared. "Now go to sleep before I knock you out, you insane boy!" Luke grinned.

"Night," and he was off, his breathing slowed instantaneously and Thalia seriously wondered whether he had an off switch or something, which allowed him to go from awake to comatose in the space of half a second. She brushed a strand of golden-blond hair from his forehead in a sisterly manner before turning back to the darkness.

Luke looked peaceful in sleep, like he had the same dreams a five-year-old would, and Thalia wasn't going to let anything disturb him when he was so serene and quiet.

Resting she spear against her leg, Thalia tapped her fingers on the bark of the tree behind her; keeping still wasn't a skill that came naturally to her. She needed a distraction.

Something closed around her fingers, Luke's hand. Thalia twisted her wrist so that she could hold his hand easier and rested her back against the tree with a sigh. Suddenly she was acutely aware of every little movement Luke made, from a twitch of a toe to a flicker of his eyes.

It looked like she had found her distraction.