AN: Kind of longerish Author's Note at the bottom... I hope you'll read it.
My jaw hung slightly open as Nico and I stared dumbfounded at Hecate. What did she mean Pirithous was going to try to marry Persephone? Was he crazy? Did he want the fury of the gods upon him? The sound of eruptions of laughter was almost lost on my ears. Almost. I looked back at the stage and saw Annabeth was now out of control. Even from where we sat I could see her eyes were full of tears, her face was beet red.
"Come on, stop it," I said through gritted teeth. With a small pout Hecate snapped her fingers and Annabeth disappeared from the stage in a poof of smoke, replaced by a grumpy looking man holding a clipboard.
"Where did she go?" I asked. Hecate spun with a flourish and moved to the deep red curtain that surrounded our section.
"Tada!" she said with a wide smile as she pulled the curtain back. Annabeth stood behind it. I'm pretty certain I hadn't seen her that mad in… well in a long while.
"How dare you!" Annabeth hissed as she stomped away from the curtain. "I have never been that embarrassed in my entire life!" Hecate made a "tut-tut" sound and reached to pat Annabeth on her head.
"You're young," she replied with a slightly malicious grin. Annabeth turned to me, her eyes blazing.
"I told you it we shouldn't have come here. But oh no, we had to see a magic show," she said angrily.
"Well it hasn't been a complete waste of time. We found out some stuff," Nico pointed out. Poor kid. He obviously didn't know when to keep quiet around an angry woman.
"Oh? And what was that? That I'm not a tap-dancer?" Annabeth spat.
"I personally think you did rather well," Hecate said nonchalantly as she inspected her nails. I grabbed Annabeth around the waist, holding her back before she could pounce on the goddess. Hecate glanced up and giggled, rolling her eyes at us.
"You demigods, always ready to pounce whenever a tiny joke is played on you. But no matter. I urge you to find Persephone before she's forced to marry," Hecate said, her joking manner disappearing. Annabeth went still in my arms.
"What do you mean, force to marry? She can't be forced to marry since she's already married," she said. Hecate seemed to ignore her as she stared intently at me.
"Remember what I said. Find out what Pirithous is up to. I don't think the world could stand it again if Demeter lost Persephone again. Hades only keeps her for six months; Pirithous would keep her all year," Hecate warned. She walked to the curtain and pulled it back, shooting a glance over her shoulder.
"You could always ask one of my kids," she said, giving us a wink. When she was gone we all stood in silence, matching dumb looks on our faces. I noticed that Nico's face was turning pink.
"What's wrong?" I asked.
"That girl from the Hecate cabin… Do you think she knows her name?" he asked. I gave him a "you're crazy" look before turning back to Annabeth. She seemed to have on her thinking cap, which I'm sure never really left her head. I swear I could see the wheels turning in there.
"Her children? Why would she mention her children?" she muttered. Just then, it was like lightening had hit us all at once as we realized just who her children were. Well, one of them anyway.
"Circe," I said.
It was an hour later before any of us spoke. We were sitting on a bench in the middle of a park when Annabeth stood up.
"This is pointless! We're not going back to see Circe," she said.
"What's so wrong with her?" Nico asked. I had forgotten we hadn't met him yet when we first met Circe. Annabeth scowled.
"Did you not see what Hecate did to me in there? Imagine what her children can do," she said.
"Circe turned me into a guinea pig and gave Annabeth a spa treatment," I explained. Nico raised an eyebrow at Annabeth before snickering.
"I can see why she hates her," he chuckled. I struggled to hide a smile before glancing at Annabeth. As someone who hated to be pampered and dress up I imagine being tortured with beauty supplies probably wasn't too great for her. Annabeth's scowl grew scarier as she glared at Nico. I sighed.
"Annabeth, what choice do we have? We don't have any other clues. Clearly we're at a dead end," I said. Annabeth's face changed from a scowl to a frown. I could tell she was giving in.
"Alright, fine, we'll go. But how do you suggest we get there? Do you even remember what happened last time?" she asked. I chewed on the inside of my mouth. Yeah, I did remember what happened last time. Scylla and Charybdis. Exploding ships. Nearly dying. Yeah, I did remember.
"We don't even have a ship," she pointed out.
"Wait a minute!" I said. I grabbed my backpack and began digging through it. My fingers brushed across the soft, slightly slimy surface of the keychain my dad had given me. I pulled it out, jingling the keys slightly. "
We have a boat," I said proudly.
"Yeah, but where is it?" Nico asked. Crap. Since when did he become the logical one of the group?
"Well, I dunno. It's got to be somewhere though," I said, shrugging slightly. Annabeth's forehead scrunched up.
"Let me see them," she said, holding her hand out. I handed them to her and she started turning them over, inspecting them it looked like.
"So what was it like being a guinea pig?" Nico asked. I scowled.
"Not one of my better moments, let's just leave it at that," I replied. Even now I still sometimes got a little sick at the smell of cedar chips.
"Pier 70," Annabeth said suddenly.
"Huh?" Nico and I both said. Annabeth held up the keys, jingling them slightly.
"The boat. It's at Pier 70," she said proudly.
"And you know this because…" I trailed off. There was no way she could have deducted that from a slimy set of keys. I don't care who her mom is.
"It says it on the key chain," she said. I grabbed them from her. Printed in slightly scraped off blue lettering was "Triton: Pier 70."
"So we need to go find this boat?" Nico asked. I glanced at Annabeth. As usual the cogs in her brain were spinning. Her face changed from a scowl to a frown back to a scowl before falling with a sigh.
"Yes, I guess we need to. I don't know what Circe could possibly tell us, but as you said Percy: we don't have any other clues," she said.
Annabeth paid the cab driver as we stepped out of a smelly yellow taxi. Apparently taxis were just as bad in San Francisco as they were in New York City. I stood at the entrance to Pier 70. In the dim evening light it looked, well, creepy. Old buildings lined the street, rusted over slightly. In the water there were huge ships, cranes, all sorts of things.
"Why would anyone have a boat here?" Nico asked. I shrugged.
"Hopefully one of those out there isn't Dad's," I said, pointing to the huge liners that were docked.
"Come on," Annabeth said, walking past us and pulling the hood of her jacket over her head. We followed her down the dock, which looked pretty questionable, until we were over the water. I could hear the wood beneath us groaning from our weight. I instinctively grabbed Annabeth's arm, pulling her to me. I half expected a frown, but she held my hand tightly.
"Look there!" she cried, pointing in the distance. A small yacht-like boat bobbed in the water, tied to a pylon in the water. I squinted at it; painted in dark blue on the back was the word "Triton."
"So how are we going to get it?" Nico asked. I judged the distance from the dock to the boat. I could make it, easily. Just hop in the water, climb on the boat, no problem. A loud splash caught my attention. Glancing at it I saw a fish tail. No, make that two tails.
"What was that?" Annabeth asked, pointing at the ripples in the water. We stared at the water for several long moments but nothing seemed to appear.
"Maybe it's gone," I said.
"So how are we getting the boat?" Nico asked again.
"I've got it," I said, kicking off my shoes. I jumped in and began swimming towards the boat. Thank goodness the water doesn't bother me; I'd hate to walk around in icy wet clothes the rest of the day. I was feet away from the boat when I felt something brush against my foot. Stopping, I turned, dunking under and searching the dark water. From behind me I felt a rush of water pass me and spun myself around to see nothing.
I kicked up, breaking through the surface of the water. I waved back at Annabeth and Nico, hoping they wouldn't worry, when something clamped around my foot. Before I could pull away I was being dragged underwater, deeper than I was before. I struggled to pull my foot away but whatever had me was refusing to let go.
I looked down and saw an eerie green arm held my foot. Familiar black hair floated in the water. With a swift kick, my other foot landed on the arm, knocking it away. The arm's body, half man, half fish, swam up to me, staring me in the eye with a scowl. I glanced down and saw his two tails. I scowled back at him. This was not my favorite person.
"Hello, little brother," he said. "Come to steal my boat?"
AN2: Can I just say how AWESOME you all are for all of your great reviews? Some of them are really funny, too! Couple of questions a few people had that I wanted to answer though, in case others are wondering the same thing.
Hecate isn't necessarily BAD... but as you can see from the previous chapter she's not exactly the nicest goddess out there. After researching her some - well, researching Persephone really - I found out that she was supposed to be Persephone's friend and that Hades had let her be a permanent guest... or something like that. It also was supposedly Hecate who told Demeter (Persephone's mom) that her daughter had been stolen... but only AFTER the fact. So I wanted to use her as a good character... but who wasn't very nice.
No... I am NOT Rick Riordan's son... considering I'm a girl. But I'm glad you think I'm able to write similarly to him! Makes me happy. Major kudos to me! :-)
Also, can I just point out how much MORE I enjoy writing fanfiction than my own book? It's so much easier to write about already developed characters/worlds/situations/whatever. I swear... I've probably written and rewritten my book a bajillion times! Argh! It's frustrating!
Anyway, hope you enjoy! Lotsa love to my readers!
