Before you throw me into Tartus for the long wait, I want to apologize and explain. So put your swords down for a sec, ok?

I have midterms, but that's not the problem. I don't know how I feel about this chapter. I tried, but I couldn't get it exactly the way I wanted it. I finally decided on this version, and I hope it lives up to both standards and expectations, though it is slightly shorter. Anyway, thanks for the continued support! Sorry again!

Percy kept staring at the sky in disbelief. The whole school was silent, shocked at what had just occurred. Nothing could be heard for a moment except for Brian's anguished cries. Then, like someone had flicked a switch, a babble of noise broke out. Yells and screams covered the few girls who were sobbing. However, most of the demigods were still staring at the sky, frozen in place. As a thunderclap sounded, people seemed to shake themselves out of their stupor.

"This is your fault!" someone screamed, and suddenly all of the Roman demigods were either yelling or defending Percy.

"How can it—"

"—son of Neptune—"

"—Cam—"

"—Jupiter wants to—"

"—not after—"

"—on the River Styx—"

"—but it was—"

"—how could—"

"—but we were—"

"—all alone—"

"—after him—"

"—ventus—"

"—take him where—"

"—a storm spirit—"

"—curse the gods—"

"—tell Lupa—"

"—kill the Greek—"

"—can't hand him over—"

"—give him back—"

"—don't know where—"

"—I don't care—"

"—Greek or Roman—"

"—you don't understand—"

"— just shut up—"

"SILENCE!" Lupa's voice, loud and commanding, was heard over the crowd. Everyone looked up and saw their leader standing upon the hill. They descended into silence.

"Lupa…" Brian whispered.

"Do not fret, my child," Lupa said, "we shall get him back."

"How?" one Venus' children asked, and this was quickly followed by more questions.

"Who was he taken by?" Hannah asked.

"Where could they have taken him?" a child of Apollo added.

"Why were they after Percy?" a Vulcan child questioned.

"And—" someone else began, but they were cut off by Lupa.

"Cease," Lupa ordered. Everyone listened to their leader, though many still were clearly bursting with questions.

"Tell us how to get him back Lupa," Brian pleaded, and the rest of the Mercury nodded profusely in agreement.

"What we need," Lupa began, "is—" an explosion cut off the rest of Lupa's sentence. All of the heads whipped around to see smoke rising into the sky.

"Styx," Percy swore under his breath; this night could not get any worse.

Another explosion sounded, and more smoke rose into the night sky. Even Lupa was worried at this point.

"Grab your armor and weapons," she testily told those assembled, "and follow me."

Immediately, the demigods were shaken out of their surpirse and they fell into order. Percy, of course, had no idea where he was supposed to go, so he planned on following the Mercury Cabin.

Lupa ran and took and flying leap over a boulder, and once she hit the ground, continued at her fast pace, with all the demigods trying to keep up with her.

"What have you done now?" a voice from the shadows asked Percy. He whirled around to find Lilly looking at him and biting her lip.

"I haven't done anything," he began to explain, but Lilly held up a hand.

"Percy," she said, "I know you didn't do this, what I said was more of a rhetorical question. But…" she trailed off, and bit her lower lip again.

"But what…" Percy prodded her, curious as to what she was going to say.

Lilly looked over at the demigods disappearing over the hill and then back at Percy. She seemed to be having an intense internal debate about something. She finally came to a decision; unfortunately it was not the one Percy wanted.

"I'll tell you later," Lilly told him at last. Percy groaned to himself. "Right now," Lilly continued, "we have much bigger problems on our hands."

Percy nodded a bit reluctantly, but quickly began to follow Lilly. She started to race towards where the smoke was coming from, and Percy silently followed her.

"Oh Styx…" she whispered as she entered into the main clearing. Two of the cabins were on fire, and many of the Roman demigods were trying to take down a dragon-woman hybrid. The top half of the body was one of a woman, but the lower half was one or a dragon or snake. Lilly and Percy arrived just in time to witness the monster whipping her tail and sending the demigods surrounding her flying.

"What in Hades is that?" Percy demanded.

Lilly swore rapidly under her breath, muttering some very foul things. "That," she began, "is Delphyne."

"Who?"

"She's a horrible creature. Short version of what she's done: At one point, Typhon severed Jupiter's hands and feet, and Delphyne guarded them."

"She guarded his hands and feet? That's just gross! How did he…never mind, I don't want to know."

"Yeah, please don't go there." Lilly said as she was looking around trying to find a plan to defeat it. "Anyways, with a little help from Mercury and the god Pan, Jupiter got his body parts back, and Delphyne left. She went on to Delphi, guarding a fountain. She was eventually killed by Apollo when he decided that he wanted his Oracle stationed at Delphi. But she hasn't been seen since then. Styx, this is really, really, bad." Lilly again bit her lower lip.

"No kidding this is bad," Percy said, still absorbing the information he had just received, "we have to defeat a monster that Apollo has killed. Did I mention that Apollo is a god and we are mortals?"

"No, but it makes me feel so much better that you did," Lilly replied sarcastically, rolling her eyes. "Wait…" she seemed to have come up with an idea.

"You're invincible, right?" she asked. Percy internally groaned again. He didn't exactly want a plan where he was monster munchies. But he was invulnerable, so maybe it wasn't a bad idea after all.

"Well, I have my Achilles' heel spot, but other than that, yeah," he replied, while dodging a stray arrow that had come his way.

"Perfect," Lilly breathed a sigh of relief. "Apollo killed this with his arrows. I think we have poison in the Main House—"

"What? Why?" Percy interrupted, clearly shocked.

Lilly shrugged. "Erm…some on the not so lethal stuff was confiscated from certain cabins, and some is so we can learn for training, and the rest, I'm not so sure. Anyway, as I was saying, we probably have some type of poison in the Main House that we can dip our arrows in to kill this monster. You distract it, I'm going to grab Hannah, get to the Main House, give the poisons to the Apollo cabin, and then they can let their arrows fly. How does that sound?"

"Well, I got nothing, so I'm all for it," Percy told her. Lilly nodded.

"Great. Here goes nothing. And good luck." With those words she shadow-traveled over to Hannah, grabbed her, and then the two of them vanished.

"Here we go," Percy muttered to himself before uncapping Riptide and throwing himself into the battle. Delphyne was a lot more gruesome up close. She was taller than the average woman and something about the lower half of her body just made her look weird; Percy didn't know whether to laugh or be frightened of the monster's appearance.

"Ahh…Perseus Jackson," the monster hissed. "I was told you would be gone. But no matter. Now I can destroy you." She launched towards and Percy swung his sword. She managed to claw him, which would have hurt if he could feel pain. Riptide missed the main part of her body, but nicked her dragon half, and Delphyne howled in pain.

"I shall destroy you, you cursed hero!" she screeched. Percy stood his ground. She lunged for Percy again, mouth opened in an ear-piercing shriek, arms in front of her, ready to pummel him to the ground. However, she never got another chance to touch him. At Reyna's command, numerous arrows were shot and pierced the Delphyne's skin. The poison had spread quickly, and the amount of arrows had done a lot of harm to the monster. She cried out in pain, then fell to the ground, lying on the Earth for mere seconds before it dissolved.

The Romans looked around, both gratefully and wary. They were all on edge, expecting another attack.

"Lilly?" Lupa's voice came across the eerie silence.

"I do not sense anymore," Lilly responded as the shadows around her move and twitched.

Lupa nodded. "And Perseus, if you could attend to those fires."

Percy looked around and realized that the two cabins were still burning slightly. The demigods had tried to put them out, but were more concerned about Delphyne.

"Of course," Percy told Lupa, as he concentrated and swept his hand toward to two burning cabins. The water from the river doused the fire. As the smoke cleared and Percy realized with a sickening jolt, which two cabins had be set on fire. The Neptune and Jupiter cabins.

Percy walked over to his cabin slowly. He couldn't believe that someone had attacked the camp, trying to get to him. Why was he so important?

He saw scroll on the ground right next to his cabin. It read, "You have been warned."

Out of the corner of his eye his noticed Lilly and Reyna making their way over to the Jupiter Cabin. Reyna's eyes were puffy; Percy didn't know if that was from fight or because she was upset about what happened to Jason; for what he gathered they were "extremely close."

Lilly bent over and picked something off of the ground. It was another scroll. She cleared her throat and read out "The lost hero."

Her statement was met with lots of murmurings and questions.

"Is that all?" Bobby called. Lilly and Reyna nodded in affirmation.

"Children," Lupa said as the wolf made her way over to where Lilly and Reyna were standing, "I would like to continue what I was saying before. Because of the situations that have aroused, we have but one option."

All of the demigods waited with bated breath. Lupa looked at those assembled before continuing.

"Percy Jackson, will you lead a quest?"

Yeah, so, like I said, not my favorite chapter. Oh well!

To address a few things/mistakes :)

-Hannah-Cha pointed out that in Ch 8 I said the both Uther and Mars were Arthur's father. I meant to put quotations around word father for Uther. He's Arthur's "father" in the sense that that's what the people think.

-And ilikefanfiction pointed out that Nico said that Jason was Thalia's sister, it was supposed to be brother. I'll fix those when I get a chance, hope I didn't confuse to many people.

Anyway, final request- PLEASE REVIEW! Thanks, and as always, I love ya!