Title Of Mohawk Braids and Thieves
Rating M
Warnings Violence, language, mental health issues, psychological torture, underage drinking, and some questionable humor.
Disclaimer See chapter one.
Notes There is an important note at the bottom, be sure to read it.
A huge thanks to jymmie00, AFireflyInSerenity, KaguyaVulpes, Amandla123, Tashio, and AureliaPhoenixAnastasia for reviewing and following. You guys are awesome!
Chapter Eleven
my wings are clipped and burned, can my fate ever be turned
The grass was a lovely shade of green, the air smelled sweet and refreshing, and there were flesh-eating sheep. Solara wanted to know why someone had created flesh-eating sheep. Sheep were not supposed to eat flesh.
"I think I would have preferred another hydra," she muttered, "Or the Winter Soldier... There might actually be a chance of survival with one of them... I doubt that we can beat a flock of carnivorous beasts."
"Winter Soldier?" Annabeth asked.
"You are such a nerd," Percy said with a grin.
"Takes one to know one," she shot back, "Especially since you knew what I was talking about."
Annabeth shook her head at them both, and covered Percy's mouth with her hand when he went to speak again. "Guys!" she said in exasperation, "We don't have time for this! We need to make a plan."
"Well, you aren't going up there on your own," Solara said nodding to the tree the fleece was laying in. "Anything could happen, the sheep could sense you somehow, or another guardian shows up."
"My hat can turn me invisible," Annabeth argued.
Percy reached up and moved Annabeth's hand from his mouth. "Sure," he said, "But if you run into trouble, what are we supposed to do? Watch you die? No, we find another way, and we do this together."
"I agree," Solara added when she glanced her way.
Annabeth sighed. "Okay then," she said, "Then we need to find a way of sneaking up there without risk of detection."
"The cliffs," Solara said, "We can climb up the cliffs."
"Sounds fun," Percy said sarcastically, "Let's do it."
"It's insane," Annabeth said, "But it's also the best chance we've got."
Percy nodded and directed the ship to sail around to the back of the island.
Solara grabbed Annabeth and dragged her back below deck. "We need to change," she said to the confused looks that she was getting. At that Percy and Annabeth realized that Solara and Annabeth were still in the dresses they had put on back on Circe's island. She snickered at their embarrassed looks, and she'd bet anything that both were thankful that the material of Annabeth dress was think enough to not end up see-through after getting thoroughly drenched.
Once below deck Solara dug through her bag to get their clothes back out. She tossed Annabeth her jeans and t-shirt, but told her not to put them on yet. She dug through her bag for a couple of more minutes before she pulled out what she had been looking for. She grinned and tossed a pair of leggings and a long-sleeved shirt to Annabeth.
"Put those on underneath," she said as she pulled out her own set.
"It's eighty degrees out," Annabeth protested.
"I know," Solara said and slipped out of her dress. She stuffed it into her bag and began to get dressed. "They aren't for keeping warm. Besides the runes on them will help to regulate your body temperature."
Annabeth looked skeptical, but she put them on anyway. "Is it some type of armor?" she asked.
"Yep," Solara said, and began to braid her hair back, "It won't do any good against anything sharp, and it won't protect your head, neck, hands, or feet, but it will provide some protection against blunt force trauma." Solara grinned at Annabeth's shocked look. "What?" she said, "It pays to make friends with children of Hecate, and to do favors for Hecate herself. You never know what you might get out of it."
"You really are from another universe," Annabeth muttered in awe.
Solara snorted. "You say that like it's the coolest thing since sliced bread... It really isn't."
Annabeth flinched at her tone as she handed over her dress to be put into Solara's bag. "Sorry," she said softly, "I didn't mean for it to sound like that. I can't even imagine what you've been through. I was just thinking about all of the opportunities I guess."
Solara frowned at that. "I've lived a long life compared to other demigods," she said slowly, "But it hasn't been an easy life, and I recently found out that the person that I had wanted to save the most, I can't save. I'm going to have to watch him die again, and that, is probably the worst thing that I'm going to have to endure, and Annabeth, I've been to Tartarus, not much is worse than that."
Annabeth looked shocked by her last statement, then she got the look on her face that she usually did when she was trying to figure something out. "I'll tell Percy to not tell anyone about you."
Solara grinned at her. "He may already know that," she said, "But thanks."
"You didn't say specifics, and you always do," Annabeth said as they made their way back up to the deck. "I figured that you can't tell anyone anything."
"Not without them swearing an oath to never share or use what I tell them," Solara agreed, "And not many people will do that."
"Who did?"
"My therapist."
"Oh."
They fell silent as they finally reached the deck. Once properly out of the hold they saw that Percy had gotten the ship as close to the cliffs as he possibly could. They wouldn't have to swim very far to get to the cliffs.
The three of them stood in a circle and looked at each other trying to think f something to say. Eventually getting tired of the awkward silence, Solara sighed and turned and climbed onto the railing. "Let's just get this over with," she said to Percy and Annabeth, and then dived into the ocean.
The climb was far from easy. Sure they'd all had their fair share at climbing the rock wall at camp, but this was higher, and there were actually people at the top that they needed to save. Not to mention the giant cyclops that they needed to steal from.
Solara was ridiculously happy once she made it to the ledge at the top of the cliff. She pulled herself over the edge and laid on the ground just breathing for a minute. Then she sat up and helped Annabeth and then Percy up and over as well. She already knew that Polyphemus, Grover, and Clarisse were just yards away, so she didn't bother to jump in surprise when she heard the yelling below them. She did shift around so that she was lying on her stomach, and shifted closer to the edge so that she could see what was happening below.
She rolled her eyes when Clarisse wouldn't shut up, and outed the fact that Grover was a satyr. That was typical of Clarisse, but she would eventually learn to keep her mouth shut. Her eyebrows flew up in surprise when Polyphemus decided to marry Clarisse instead of Grover. That part of the stories were never told, and she figured that either Percy and Annabeth took pity on Clarisse, or they were bribed or blackmailed into keeping their mouths shut. She couldn't wait to find out which is was.
She stayed up on the ledge when Percy and Annabeth climbed down to try and either move the boulder, impossible, or try and get a message to Grover and Clarisse, also impossible. It wasn't that she didn't want to help, but rather she was trying to think of a way to. She knew that she didn't have long to figure it out, so she tried to think as fast as she could. She knew for a fact that there was no way she was going to cling to the underside of a sheep, so she needed to figure out a way to help Annabeth out here. Problem was, she was pretty sure that she'd get caught sooner than Annabeth would. If only they had two invisibility hats.
Solara eyed the trees that were by the entrance to the cave. If she could jump from tree to tree, then she might have a chance. There was even a tall one right up next to the ledge that she was still laying on. If all else failed, she could hop back up onto the ledge, and then hide on the other side of the cliff. It was risky, but so was everything when it came to Polyphemus. No plan was really going to be a 'good' plan.
"I take it, you're putting yourself on 'distracting Polyphemus' duty with me," Annabeth said when she pulled herself up next to Solara.
"I'm allergic to wool," she said, "And that isn't a joke or an excuse to get out of Percy's predicament... I really am allergic."
"Guess you never had a choice then," Annabeth muttered.
"Nope," Solara agreed, "Life is just funny that way."
They stayed up on the ledge and watched for Polyphemus so that they knew when he was coming back. Once he was heading back to the cave, they scrambled off of the ledge and found places to hide. Granted Annabeth didn't really need to, but she did needed to stay out of the way until the sheep made it into the cave. They waited anxiously for most of the sheep to make it into the cave before they made their move.
"Hey ugly!" Annabeth shouted, getting Polyphemus's attention.
"Who said that?"
"Nobody!" Solara shouted, and grinned at Polyphemus's confused look. She was on the opposite side of the clearing as Annabeth after all.
"Nobody! I remember you!" he bellowed, and proceeded to forget to close up the entrance of the cave.
"No you don't," Annabeth shouted from a new location, "you're too stupid to remember anybody, much less Nobody."
Polyphemus roared and threw a boulder where Annabeth's voice had been.
"Pathetic," Solara called out from a new tree, "Your aim is as terrible as your eyesight." She quickly moved to a neighboring tree, and watched as another boulder knocked over the one that she had just vacated.
"Missed me!" Annabeth shouted next.
For the next minute they played a dangerous game of taunting Polyphemus, but it had to end sometime. Solara had run out of cover, and she had just pulled herself up onto the ledge again when she was spotted. She barely had time to register the pain of the boulder crashing into her side before the force of it pushed her over the edge. She saw the water rushing towards her, and she screamed from the pain, and the fear. She was falling again, and like last time, she wasn't sure if she'd survive the fall. There was so much more pain that she knew she was going to experience, and she prayed that someone would save her. This time, they actually could.
She hit the water with so much force that she was sure that most of her bones had shattered on impact. She was quite happy to pass out after that.
*~S~*
"Did I finally die?" she asked when she became aware again. Then the pain hit her again and she groaned. "Never mind, I'm pretty sure that death doesn't feel like this."
"If I have my way," a familiar voice said above her, "You won't die for a very long time."
Solara opened her eyes, and she wasn't very shocked by how much effort that it took. "Triton," she said.
Triton frowned down at her, and then she realized that they were on the deck of the ship that she, Percy, and Annabeth had stolen back on Circe's island. "By all accounts," he said regaining her attention, "You should be dead."
"Guess the clothes came in handy after all," she joked.
"And the fall used all of the magic that they had," Triton said, and he didn't look amused in the slightest, "Honestly Solara, the boulder itself should have killed you, never-mind falling two hundred feet." He shook his head and sighed. "I healed you as best I could," he said, "But you're still pretty hurt."
"Yeah, I feel like shit," Solara agreed. She closed her eyes and muttered a prayer to her father, hoping that it was possible for her to heal herself when she was this injured. She could heal herself when it came to broken bones and stab wounds, but she had never tried to heal herself when half of her bones were shattered. She just counted herself lucky that it wasn't her head that hadn't been hit by that boulder, or had been one of her body parts that had hit the water first.
The pain receded a bit, but not a whole lot. She sighed and opened her eyes again. "How bad is it?" she asked.
Triton sighed. "Pretty bad," he said, "Almost all of your ribs are broken, your collar bone was shattered, but I got it to heal until it was at least only in four parts." He shook his head. "Solara, can you feel your legs at all?"
"Yeah," she said, "Everything hurts, including my legs... Before you ask, I'll try to move them." She took a deep breath and shifted one leg at a time. It hurt like all hell, but they moved. She smiled up at him. "I'll be fine," she said, "Once all of this heals up."
"Do you have any ambrosia?" he asked, "I used the water to heal you, so unless your own healing interacts badly with it, you can still have some."
"It's in my bag," she said, and tried to sit up, but the pain in her body flared so sharply at the movement that she stopped and rested against the deck. She closed her eyes and breathed deeply, willing the wave of nausea to pass.
"Don't move," Triton snapped, "I'll get it for you, just tell me where it is."
"Front pocket," she said through gritted teeth, "Have I already given you permission to go through my bag?"
"Yeah," he said, and he pulled over her bag and began to look in the pocket that she said had ambrosia in it. A second later he pulled out the Ziploc baggie that had the stash of ambrosia in it. He opened it and broke off a square for her. "Here," he said and held it to her lips.
She took it with her teeth and just let it dissolve in her mouth. While it was still melting the boat began to sail around the island. "Guess they need a quick get-away," she muttered.
"Probably," Triton agreed with a sigh, "I have to go though. I could only interfere to save you, but I can't do anything else."
"It's okay," she said, "I know more about those laws than they do. I get that you can't help us."
He gave her a tired smile, and leaned over to kiss her forehead before he disappeared.
She sighed after he left. She might understand, but she certainly didn't have to like it. Her spine was still pretty damaged, but she sat up and pulled out another small piece of ambrosia. It was pushing what was safe for her to eat, but with all of her broken bones, she needed it to heal enough to move without passing out from pain. As the second piece dissolved in her mouth, she just tried to enjoy the taste of her mother's peanut butter cookies.
She sighed in relief when she could move her arms and legs with only needing to wince. She could still feel that her spine and pelvis were still pretty messed up, but as long as she didn't need to walk for another few hours, she'd be fine. Her ribs and collar bone hadn't healed at all, but she had focused her own healing on her arms and legs, and ambrosia always targeted the worst damage to heal. A demigod could live with a broken arm, but a stab wound in their gut would kill them, so the ambrosia would heal the stab wound over the broken arm every time.
Solara stuffed the ambrosia back into her bag, and zipped the pocket shut again. She made sure that every zipper was closed before she looped a strap around her arm and laid back down. There really wasn't anything else she could do, so she rested while she could. Her eyes drifted closed and she focused on her hearing. When she heard Polyphemus yelling in the distance, she knew that things were about to speed up for her again.
She heard a loud splash and sighed again. Then she heard some of the others climbing up the side of the ship. She opened her eyes in time to Annabeth pulling herself over the side with the fleece wrapped around her. Clarisse was right behind her, and she pulled herself over the edge quickly and steadied Annabeth when she swayed a bit. Grover pulled himself up and over next, and when he caught sight of her, he blinked in surprise.
She grinned and struggled to sit up again. "I know," she said, causing Clarisse and Annabeth to jerk in surprise, "I look good for someone who should be dead."
"How?" Annabeth gaped for a second before she realized what must have happened. "Triton," she said, and limped over towards her with help from Grover, "And the enchanted clothes."
"Yes to both," Solara said, and she only just managed to suppress the sigh of relief when Annabeth sat next to her and threw one end of the fleece over her so that both of them could heal. "Thanks," she said.
Then all three of them jumped when Clarisse began to yell back at Polyphemus. Solara attempted to lurch to her feet, but all she did was cry out in pain, and then fall back to the deck. Both actions had jarred her ribs, spine, pelvis, and collar bone, and now all she could focus on was the pain that moving too quickly and falling had caused.
The vibration of the next boulder slamming into the hull of the ship made her groan. She didn't even bother to try and fight against the wild tilting of the ship as it began to fill with water and sink. She and Annabeth were separated, but she didn't care. She could live just fine without the fleece healing her the rest of the way, Annabeth couldn't.
Solara slammed into something hard, but she wasn't quite sure what it was. A couple of minutes later, they were all underwater anyway. She made sure to take a deep breath in before she was fully submerged, but it didn't last long. Her ribs were screaming in pain from being expanded the way they were, and her collar bone protested the weight of her bag on her shoulders and her attempts to swim towards the surface. She knew that they were going to be saved, but with how crappy she felt, she wondered if she'd even stay conscious until then.
She let her breath go. It hurt too much to keep a hold of it anyway. She watched as the bubbles streamed from her mouth, and just as she was about to give in and breathe in water, she felt something or someone grab he bag and drag her towards the surface. She gasped for air when her head was back above the water.
Looking over she saw that it had been Rainbow that had dragged her to the surface. She grinned at the hippocampus and pulled herself up onto it. It sped off towards where Percy and Tyson were. Another hippocampus carrying Annabeth was a few feet in front of her, and both hippocampi stopped in front of Percy and Tyson long enough for them to climb on before they sped off again.
Despite the smooth ride over the water, Solara was in pain from sitting the way she was. She lasted a few minutes before she slumped backwards and passed out again.
*~S~*
Solara woke up a few hours later. Her pelvis and collar bone had healed for the most part, and her spine and ribs were still damaged in places, but not bad enough to make standing or walking difficult. Riding the hippocampus still hurt like all hell, but it was better than before. They hadn't quite made it to Florida yet, but she guessed that they were close. She said another prayer to her father to try and heal her spine a little more, but it barely worked.
She sighed in irritation, but didn't bother to do more than that.
"I'm fine," she said when Tyson asked if she was alright, "I'm pretty beat up, but I'm healing." She didn't go into specifics. She didn't want anyone to worry about her, and maybe that was a little messed up, but she wasn't used to so many people caring about her.
Neither talked again until they reached the harbor in Miami.
Solara swallowed her groans of pain as they all swam to shore. Her ribs hated the movement, and she hated the fact that her ribs were refusing to heal faster than they were. She was happy to walk again once they were back on land.
She hung to the back of the group as they walked through the harbor and made their way to the main streets. She'd been here before, but it had been years, she had forgotten how crazy it was. The tourists alone were bad enough, but the locals weren't helping matters by rushing across their path every few feet, and arguing with each other in Spanish.
She understood most of what they were saying to each other too, and she had to bite her lip more than once to stop herself from laughing out loud. None of it was anything she wanted to translate to the others, so she needed to keep her mouth shut.
They eventually found a place where they could just stand and talk to each other without someone yelling at them to move. Solara wasn't sure when Luke was going to show up, but she hoped that they could get Clarisse packed into a taxi soon, because standing around exposed like they were with the fleece, it wasn't their best idea ever.
"We've been away from camp for ten days!" Annabeth exclaimed when they found a newspaper that someone had dropped.
"That's impossible," Clarisse said.
"Not really," Solara muttered, and she was lucky that she hadn't been heard by anyone.
"Thalia's tree must be almost dead by now," Grover said, "We need to get the fleece back to New York tonight."
"How?" Clarisse snapped, "We're hundreds of miles away. We have no money, no ride, this is just like the Oracle said. This is all your fault Jackson, if you hadn't interfered –"
"Percy's fault?" Annabeth snapped, "Clarisse, how can you say that?"
"Stop it!" Solara and Percy shouted.
"Now is the time to be pointing fingers," Solara continued, "Now, Clarisse, please tell us what the Oracle said to you." she might have phrased it politely, but everyone heard the order in her tone. She wasn't in the mood to deal with the blame game, and they needed to get the fleece to camp.
Clarisse took a deep breath and then recited the prophecy that she had been given. "You shall sail the iron ship with warriors of bone, you shall find what you seek and make it your own, but despair for your life entombed within stone, and fail without friends, to fly home alone."
Solara winced. It really did sound bad. No wonder most sane people despised prophecies, they were possibly the vaguest thing that existed, and they foretold the future. As if the future wasn't a messy subject in itself.
"No," Percy muttered, "I think I get it... Does anyone have any cash?"
Solara swung her bag off of her shoulder and knelt down to dig through it. She heard Percy and Tyson talking next to her, and by the time she pulled out a roll of twenties, Tyson had also handed over a bag of cash from the bags that Hermes had packed for them in the beginning. She held out her money as well. "Here," she said, "There's at least three hundred here."
Percy nodded to her gratefully, and then he took both wads of money and stuffed it in the pocket of the jacket that the fleece had been disguised as. He handed it over to Clarisse and dragged her over to a taxi. "Come one, you have to go on by yourself. It's the only way to get you to camp in time."
"He's right," Solara said when Clarisse looked doubtful, "There's really only enough money for one ticket, and Percy, Tyson and I can't fly anyway. It has to be you. It was your quest, and your prophecy said that you'd fail without friends to get home."
Clarisse looked at both of them skeptically before she nodded and got into the taxi.
Solara grinned to herself as she watched the taxi speed away. She closed her bag again and swung it back up on her shoulders. She was happy that they had gotten the fleece, and that they had gotten Clarisse to trust them enough to not question why they were letting her take all of the credit.
"Percy," Annabeth said, "That was..."
"Generous?" Grover offered.
"Insane," Annabeth said instead.
"She can do it," Solara and Percy defended, "It was her quest anyway."
"Percy is nice," Tyson said with a big smile.
"Percy is too nice," Annabeth grumbled.
Solara snorted. "He's just the right amount of nice," she said while rolling her eyes at her.
"Come on," Percy said trying to change the subject, "Let's find another way home."
Solara and Percy turned around to see a sword point inches away from their throats. They froze and looked at Luke in shock. He hadn't even made any kind of noise while sneaking up on them, and they wondered how much he had heard. They traded looks, there was no way that this was going to end well.
"Hey cuz," Luke said with a sneer.
This definitely was not going to end well.
End Notes *cackles* Sorry I'm not sorry about that. It was just too good to resist though. XD
The chapter title is from the song 'Mockingbird' by Jonathan Thulin.
Please leave a friendly comment on your way out. (Or yell at me for the cliffhanger, I'll probably giggle over your flailing. :))
IMPORTANT NOTICE!
This story is going on temporary hiatus as of now. I don't have another chapter ready, and with how many hours I'm scheduled to work, I doubt I'd have another one by Thursday anyway. Things should calm down after the back-to-school rush is over, but until then, I'm barely keeping up with sleep, so more chapters are not going to happen for awhile.
Sorry about this. See you all when I can finish another chapter. :)