A/N: BTW the past seven chapters were actually the first two chapters in the actual book. Sorry if u guys dont find this interesting, or if you don't think this is original because it's already a book, but I like it and that's what matters. Again, please review and comment. I do not own Percy jackson or HoO. This is the last time I am making this comment. Thanks!
Chapter 8: Peter
After a morning of storm spirits, goat men, and flying girlfriends, Peter should've been losing his mind. Instead, all he felt was dread.
It's starting, he thought. Just like the dream said.
He stood in back of the chariot with Lee and Jane, while the other girl, Blaire, handled the reins, and the blond guy, Arthur, adjusted a bronze navigation device. They rose over the Grand Canyon and headed east, icy wind ripping straight through Peter's jacket. Behind them, more storm clouds were gathering.
The chariot lurched and bumped. It had no seat belts and the back was wide open, so Peter wondered if Jane would catch him again if he fell (not that he would want her to. It might harm his guy-cred).
That had been the most disturbing part of the morning—not that Jane could fly, but that she'd held him in her arms, and yet didn't know who he was.
All semester he'd worked on a relationship, trying to get Jane to notice him as more than a friend. Finally he'd gotten up the courage to kiss her. The last few weeks had been the best of his life. And then, three nights ago, the dream had ruined everything—that horrible voice, giving him horrible news. He hadn't told anyone about it, not even Jane .
Now he didn't even have her. It was like someone had wiped her memory, and he was stuck in the worst "do over" of all time. He wanted to scream. Jane stood right next to him: those sky blue eyes, close-cropped blond hair, that cute little scar on her upper lip. Her face was kind and gentle, but always a little sad. And she just stared at the horizon, not even noticing him.
Meanwhile, Lee was being annoying, as usual.
"This is so cool!" She spit a pegasus feather out of her mouth. "Where are we going?"
"A safe place," Arthur said. "The only safe place for kids like us. Camp Half-Blood."
"Half-Blood?" Peter was immediately on guard. He hated that word. He'd been called a half-blood too many times—half Cherokee, half white—and it was never a compliment.
"Is that some kind of bad joke?"
"He means we're demigods," Jane said.
"Half god, half mortal."
Arthur looked back. "You seem to know a lot, Jane. But, yes, demigods. My mom is Athena, goddess of wisdom. Blaire here is the daughter of Iris, the rainbow goddess."
Lee choked. "Your mom is a rainbow goddess?"
"Got a problem with that?" Blaire said.
"No, no," Lee said. "Rainbows. Very intimidating."
"Blaire is our best equestrian," Arthur said. "She gets along great with the pegasi."
"Rainbows, ponies," Lee muttered.
"I'm gonna toss you off this chariot," Blaire warned."
"Demigods," Peter said. "You mean you think …you think we're—"
Lightning flashed. The chariot shuddered, and Jane yelled, "Left wheel's on fire!"
Peter stepped back. Sure enough, the wheel was burning, white flames lapping up the side of the chariot.
The wind roared. Peter glanced behind them and saw dark shapes forming in the clouds, more storm spirits spiraling toward the chariot—except these looked more like horses than angels.
He started to say, "Why are they—"
"Anemoi come in different shapes," Arthur said.
"Sometimes human, sometimes stallions, depending on how chaotic they are. Hold on. This is going to get rough."
Blaire flicked the reins. The pegasi put on a burst of speed, and the chariot blurred. Piper's stomach crawled into her throat. Her vision went black, and when it came back to normal, they were in a totally different place.
A cold gray ocean stretched out to the left. Snow-covered fields, roads, and forests spread to the right. Directly below them was a green valley, like an island of springtime, rimmed with snowy hills on three sides and water to the north. Peter saw a cluster of buildings like ancient Greek temples, a big blue mansion, ball courts, a lake, and a climbing wall that seemed to be on fire. But before he could really process all he was seeing, their wheels came off and the chariot dropped out of the sky.
Arthur and Blaire tried to maintain control. The pegasi labored to hold the chariot in a flight pattern, but they seemed exhausted from their burst of speed, and bearing the chariot and the weight of five people was just too much.
"The lake!" Arthur yelled. "Aim for the lake!"
Peter remembered something his dad had once told him, about hitting water from up high being as bad as hitting cement.
And then—BOOM.
The biggest shock was the cold. He was underwater, so disoriented that he didn't know which way was up.
He just had time to think: This would be a stupid way to die.
Then faces appeared in the green murk—girls with long black hair and glowing yellow eyes. They smiled at him, grabbed his shoulders, and hauled him up.
They tossed him, gasping and shivering, onto the shore. Peter glanced back into the water, only to see the mysterious lake girls whispering amongst themselves. When they noticed him looking at them, they waved flirtatious waves and winked at Peter.
Nearby, Blaire stood in the lake, cutting the wrecked harnesses off the pegasi. Fortunately, the horses looked okay, but they were flapping their wings and splashing water everywhere. Jane, Lee, and Arthur were already on shore, surrounded by kids giving them blankets and asking questions. Somebody took Peter by the arms and helped him stand. Apparently kids fell into the lake a lot, because a detail of campers ran up with big bronze leaf blower–looking things and blasted Peter with hot air; and in about two seconds his clothes were dry.
There were at least twenty campers milling around-
the youngest maybe nine, the oldest college age, eighteen or nineteen—and all of them had orange T-shirts like Arthur's. Peter looked back at the water and saw those strange girls just below the surface, their hair floating in the current. They waved like, toodle-oo, one more time,and disappeared into the depths. A second later the wreckage of the chariot was tossed from the lake and landed nearby with a wet crunch.
"Arthur!" A girl with a bow and quiver on her back pushed through the crowd.
"I said you could borrow the chariot, not destroy it!"
"Wilma , I'm sorry," Arthur sighed.
"I'll get it fixed, I promise."
Wilma scowled at her now broken chariot. Then she sized up Peter, Lee, and Jane.
"These are the ones? Way older than thirteen. Why haven't they been claimed already?""
"Claimed?" Lee asked.
Before Arthur could explain, Wilma said,
"Any sign of Paige ?"
"No," Arthur admitted.
The campers muttered. Peter had no idea who this girl Paige was, but her disappearance seemed to be a big deal.
Another guy stepped forward—tall, Asian, and dark hair with the perfect mixture of I-styled-my-hair-to-perfection and I-just-got-out-of-bed. Somehow he managed to make blue jeans and an orange T-shirt look hot. He glanced at Lee, fixed his eyes on Jane like she might be worthy of his attention, then curled his lip at Peter as if he were a week-old burrito that had just been pulled out of a Dumpster. Peter knew the type. He'd dealt with a lot of guys like this at Wilderness School and every other stupid school his father had sent him to. Peter knew instantly they were going to be enemies.
"Well," the boy said, "I hope they're worth the trouble."
Lee snorted. "Gee, thanks. What are we, your new pets?"
"No kidding," Jane said. "How about some answers before you start judging us—like, what is this place, why are we here, how long do we have to stay?"
Peter had the same questions, but a wave of anxiety washed over him.
Worth the trouble. If they only knew about her dream. They had no idea.…
"Jane," Arthur said, "I promise we'll answer your questions. And Drew"—he frowned at the glamour guy—"all demigods are worth saving. But I'll admit, the trip didn't accomplish what I hoped."
"Hey," Peter said, "we didn't ask to be brought here."
Drew rolled his eyes. "And nobody wants you, bruh. Does your hair always look like a dead badger?"
Peter stepped forward, ready to smack him, but Arthur said, "Peter , stop."
Peter did. He wasn't a bit scared of Drew, but Arthur
didn't seem like somebody he wanted for an enemy.
"We need to make our new arrivals feel welcome," Arthur said, with another pointed look at Drew.
"We'll assign them each a guide, give them a tour of camp. Hopefully by the campfire tonight, they'll be claimed."
"Would somebody tell me what claimed means?" Peter asked.
Suddenly there was a collective gasp. The campers backed away. At first Peter thought he'd done something wrong. Then he realized their faces were bathed in a strange red light, as if someone had lit a torch behind her. He turned and almost forgot how to breathe.
Floating over Lee's head was a blazing holographic image—a fiery hammer.
"That," Arthur said, "is claiming."
"What'd I do?" Lee backed toward the lake. Then she glanced up and yelped. "Is my hair on fire?" She ducked, but the symbol followed her, bobbing and weaving so it looked like she was trying to write something in flames with her head.
"This can't be good," Blaire muttered. "The curse—"
"Blaire, shut up," Arthur said.
"Lee, you've just been claimed—"
"By a god," Jane interrupted.
"That's the symbol of Vulcan, isn't it?"
All eyes turned to her.
"Jane," Arthur said carefully, "how did you know that?"
"I'm not sure."
"Vulcan?" Lee demanded.
"I don't even LIKE Star Trek. What are you talking about?"
"Vulcan is the Roman name for Hephaestus," Arthur said, "the god of blacksmiths and fire."
The fiery hammer faded, but Lee kept swatting the air like she was afraid it was following her. "The god of what? Who?"
Arthur turned to the girl with the bow.
"Wilma, would you take Lee, give her a tour? Introduce him to his bunk-mates in Cabin Nine."
"Sure, Arthur."
"What's Cabin Nine?" Lee asked. "And I'm not a Vulcan!"
"Come on, Madam Spock, I'll explain everything." Wilma put a hand on her shoulder and steered her off toward the cabins.
Arthur turned his attention back to Jane . Usually
Peter didn't like it when other guys checked out his girl, but Arthur didn't seem to care that she was a good-looking gal. He studied her more like she was a complicated blueprint. Finally he said, "Hold out your arm."
Peter saw what he was looking at, and his eyes widened.
Jane had taken off her windbreaker after her dip in the lake, leaving her arms bare, and on the inside of her right forearm was a tattoo. How had Peter never noticed it before? He'd looked at Jane's arms a million times. The tattoo couldn't have just appeared, but it was darkly etched, impossible to miss: a dozen straight lines like a bar code, and over that an eagle with the letters SPQR.
"I've never seen marks like this," Arthur said. "Where did you get them?"
Jane shook his head. "I'm getting really tired of saying this, but I don't know."
The other campers pushed forward, trying to get a look at Jane's tattoo. The marks seemed to bother them a lot—almost like a declaration of war.
"They look burned into your skin," Arthur noticed.
"They were," Jane said. Then she winced as if her head was aching. "I mean…I think so. I don't remember."
No one said anything. It was clear the campers saw Arthur as the leader. They were waiting for his verdict.
"She needs to go straight to Chiron," Arthur decided. "Drew, would you—"
"Absolutely." Drew laced his arm through Jane's. "This way, dear. I'll introduce you to our director. He's…an interesting guy." He flashed Peter a smug look and led Jane toward the big blue house on the hill.
The crowd began to disperse, until only Arthur and Peter were left.
"Who's Chiron?" Peter asked. "Is Jane in some kind of trouble?"
Arthur hesitated. "Good question, Peter . Come on, I'll give you a tour. We need to talk."
A/N:
Ta-da! Eighth chapter is finished. I don't know if u guys noticed this before, but I'm not actually changing any of the genders of the mortal parents or the gods/goddesses cause that would make it too complicated. I'm also not going to change the genders of any of the mythological things, such as Chiron, or any other myth
*thunder/lightning*
*at sky* Oops. Sorry Zeus!
I forgot that they hate being called the m word.
Well! Thanks for sticking with me if you have read this far. Also, this chapter is so far my longest chapter. The chapter in the book was pretty short, so I didn't have to split it into multiple chapters. This entire chapter was actually only chapter three!
Waaaaiiiiiiittt.
Does this mean that if there is, like, fifty-plus chapters in each book that I will have to make at least one hundred chapters?!
Well, I will do it for you guys who are still reading through this really long author's note. Sorry about that by the way. Gotta get back to writing!
