When we arrived in New York it was snowing, Dad had been silent and sad since his reunion with his sister, often lowering his eyes and drawing into himself whenever the bus journey to camp with him was totally silent bar the engine, everyone on the bus noticed his mood, and was totally silent. When we reached Camp, Dad left without a word, appariting away without a word.
Almost immediately Chiron summoned Alice, and myself into his office, "earlier today I received an Iris message from Grover, he's found two demigods, and they are very powerful, however, this does mean that there are more than likely monsters already in the school. I would like you two to go to the Westover School in Bar Harbour, it is up to you five to go to this school, and secure the safety of these two demigods, and bring them back to Camp, he has already contacted Percy, so I am sure he will be there as well."
"Right then," I said, "when do we go get them?"
"Today," Chiron said, causing some surprised looks, "the school is having its annual dance this evening, and Grover believes that will be enough of a distraction to get them out."
"Okay then, let's go," Percy said smiling, probably happy to see Grover again.
"You have three hours to prepare until the dance starts, good luck, and may the Gods be with you."
Alice, and I went off to Hermes' cabin, "what do we need to take?" Alice asked.
"Well, I'd guess easily disguisable weapon, check, our wands, check, that mood ring I gave you." Alice reached into her bunk, and pulled out a bag containing a mood ring, she put it on, it did not light up, meaning there were no monsters nearby, "check. I guess changing into more suitable clothing would be a good idea." I said looking down at my purple shirt, a dark blue shorter than knee-length skirt, and brown shoes, Alice was wearing her usual bright colours, her shirt was a very luminous green, and her trousers were white, covered in stripes of bright colours.
"Nah," Alice said dismissively, "I think our clothing will be fine, it's not a ball, it's a school dance, we look about normal."
"I think you might want to rethink your clothing colours, they are not exactly the right colours for sneaking about at night, anyway, I'm going to get a shower," I grabbed a towel, and clothes, and headed for the shower block.
Ten minutes later I returned to find Alice in some more muted colours, a red top and green trousers, "well then," Alice said, I smiled, and turned to my portkey, a piece of paper on the floor.
"Porto," I said, creating the portkey, "ready?" Alice nodded, "on one, three, two, one," we grabbed the piece of paper, the portkey pulled us all the way to Bar Harbour, and dumped us in the middle of a snowstorm.
We were at the foot of a black stone castle which balancing precariously on the edge of a cliff, it looked like the home of an evil knight, with all its tall walls and ghostly turret, light spilling out the narrow arrow slits. I reached out with legilimency and found no-one watching. "We're alone," I said.
"And I'm freezing," Alice said with chattering teeth, "how are you not freezing?"
"Elemental, remember, here," I created a small fireball for her to heat herself from, then I cleared the snow around us, then I set up a ward to deflect the wind and snow around us, and finally I pulled the water out of Alice's clothing, "nice and warm."
"Thanks Janet, you're the best," she said grinning at me.
"I have my moments," I said with a shrug.
We made our way to the giant wooden double doors when we heard a car drive up, we froze as the car parked, I reached out with legilimency, it was Percy, Thalia and Annabeth, "friendlies." I said to Alice who was drawing her wand, I handed her a bracelet, "in case you need a sword, remember to hold it in your left hand or it will be a shield." We continued up the path, I wanted to get inside, the sustained magic was going to draw attention, "come on, I want to find Grover," I pulled Alice to the door.
"Do we knock on the door?" Alice asked, I reached out and pushed the door with magic, "or magic the door." We stepped inside, allowing me to lower the spells I was using to shield us, I shut the door.
"Right then, that car has Percy, Annabeth, and Thalia in, we can wait here for them, or we go find Grover before the monster gets tipped off that we're here," I heard footsteps down the corridor, I turned to see a man and a woman walking down the corridor, he was a tall man, but then again everyone is tall to me, she was short, she was a bit shorter than Alice, they walked like they were officers on parade, he was clean shaven with a day's worth of stubble, she had a very distracting wispy moustache. They both had grey buzzcuts, and black military uniforms with red trim, he was heterochromatic, he had one green eye, and one brown eye, she had brown eyes. He looked weirdly familiar, like I had seen him before someone.
"What are you doing here?" The lady asked.
I snapped my fingers, bending the Mist to my will, "you know us, we are students here, I am Janet, and this is Alice." The man narrowed his eyes, 'dammit, he's clear sighted.'
"Do you know these two Mrs Gottschalk?" He asked in a French accent. 'Mrs Got Chalk, is that a joke?'
She hummed as she woke from the trance, "oh, of course Dr Thorn, now I remember, yes. They're in Mrs Fearnow's class," her eyes narrowed as she realised we were infringing on a rule, "you're not meant to be here, return to the dance."
"Of course Mrs Gottschalk," I said as I grabbed Alice's hand and dragged her to the dance, "let's go find Grover," I said under my breath, I felt a prickling between my shoulder blades, I turned, Dr Thorn was glaring at me, I smiled at him, he turned and returned to his Marching.
The dance was exactly how I imagined it, all the boys were talking and mucking about with the decorations on one side, all the girls were giggling on the other. In between the two groups a few couples were dancing, there were also groups of girls wondering about giving unfortunate guys makeovers. I never understood the need some girls had for dressing up, but most of the girls were in spaghetti tops that looked uncomfortable, jeans so tight they must have been cutting off blood supply to the feet and shoes that looked more like the aftermath of an accident in a torture device factory than they did shoes. Grover was standing with his back to us, I snuck up behind him, "don't you think you'd look great in ribbons?" He jumped and turned to face us.
"Oh, thank goodness," he said nervously as he looked around the room, trying to find any trace of a monster, "I take it Chiron sent you."
"Naturally, so which ones are the demigods?" Grover pointed at two siblings sitting in the bleachers.
"Nico and Bianca di Angelo, siblings, arrived this year, keep to themselves, dead mum, dead or absent dad, so it could be either. Be careful, I think I smelt a trace of monster earlier, so, I called for backup from Chiron."
I nodded, "by the way, Percy, Annabeth and Thalia arrived a little while ago, I reckon they probably encountered hall patrol out there by now," Grover squeaked and ran out as quickly as he could on crutches.
"Well, let's go meet our latest recruits," Alice said as we made our way up the bleachers. The siblings both had black silky hair and olive skin, they both had a tendency towards expressive hand gestures. He was shuffling cards whilst she was telling him off, or complaining, she was shouting at him, that is all I could tell. They were both wearing black shirts with writing on, which I could not read, both had jeans on, Bianca was wearing a floppy green cap.