A couple people asked how Percy got stuck with the Titan's Curse. I'll answer that next chapter!

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Chapter 15

Five Shall Go West

Reyna tried not to look too pleased when Chiron asked Thalia and Annabeth to take the disgusting, creepy mummy back to the Big House instead of her, but she likely failed, if the glare the other two girls shot her was any indicator. Meanwhile, the rest of them were herded back towards the cabins so the counselors could have a meeting to discuss the new prophecy, which was why Reyna was surprised when she was stopped by Zoë. "Wait, Reyna, I would like for you to join us."

Everyone gave the Hunter strange looks for that, but none said anything.

Reyna had a feeling she knew what this was about, so she said, "I'm not sure what help I'll be, but if you're positive you want me there..."

Zoë nodded as if the matter was settled.

The council gathered around a ping-pong table in the rec room. They waited until Annabeth and Thalia returned from the attic before beginning. Mr. D waved his hand and supplied a variety of snacks, though Chiron had to remind him that wine was rather inappropriate, considering most of them were underage, so he changed it into Diet Coke. Nobody drank that either.

Mr. D and Chiron, compacted into his magical wheelchair, sat at one end of the table. Zoë and Reyna took the other end. Thalia, Annabeth, and Grover sat along one side, and the other was filled by Beckendorf, Silena, and the Stoll brothers. There was supposed to be a representative of the Ares cabin, too, but they had all 'accidentally' received broken limbs during capture the flag, courtesy of the Hunters, and were now resting in the infirmary.

"This is pointless," Zoë started.

Reyna couldn't help but agree. The prophecy had been fairly clear about what they needed to do.

"Cheez Whiz!" Grover gasped. He scooped up crackers and ping-pong balls and sprayed them with topping.

"There is no time for talk," Zoë continued, ignoring Grover. "My lady needs her Hunters. We must leave immediately."

"And go where?" Chiron asked.

"Where the Titan's Curse leads," Reyna stated. "West."

"Artemis is being held hostage!" Zoë said. "We must find her and free her!"

"And who will you take?" Chiron asked.

"I shall pick four Hunters and go."

Reyna frowned at that. Why had Zoë asked her to attend this meeting if she wasn't going to be included in the quest?

"You're missing something, as usual," Thalia said snidely. "'Campers and Hunters combined prevail.' We're supposed to do this together."

Ah, Reyna realized, so that was Zoë's goal. She was riling Thalia up so she did something stupid and embarrassed herself, somehow. Reyna wasn't sure what history there was between the two girls, but they were being quite petty about it.

Zoë gave Thalia a cold look. "The Hunters do not need thy help."

"Your," Thalia grumbled. "Nobody has thy in, like, three hundred years, Zoë. Get with the times."

"Yerrr," Zoë said with a slight mocking undertone. "We do not need yerrr help."

Reyna bit back a laugh.

Thalia didn't seem to notice the same, however, and rolled her eyes. "Forget it."

"I fear the prophecy says you do need our help," Chiron interrupted, bringing them back on subject. "Campers and Hunters must cooperate."

"Or do they?" Mr. D mused, swirling his Diet Coke under his nose. "'To disunity fail… Forged by betrayal…' That sounds rather nasty, doesn't it? What if you fail because you try to cooperate?"

"Mr. D," Chiron sighed, "with all due respect, whose side are you on?"

Mr. D raised his eyebrows. "Sorry, my dear centaur. Just trying to be helpful."

"We're supposed to work together," Annabeth said stubbornly. "Percy needs our help, too."

The table quieted instantly, as if a cloud of darkness had settled over them. Reyna saw Zoë's eyes flick to her for a brief moment.

"We must not delay," Chiron warned, breaking the uncomfortable silence. "Today is Sunday. This very Friday, December twenty-first, is the winter solstice."

"Oh, joy," Mr. D muttered. "Another dull annual meeting."

"Artemis must be present," Zoë said. "She has been one of the most vocal, arguing for action against the Titan Lord's forces. If she is not there, the gods will decide nothing and we will lose another year of war preparations."

Something about the way Zoë phrased that caught Reyna's attention. She said 'another year,' which meant she knew that Zeus had been cowering since last summer and didn't approve of it.

"Are you suggesting that the gods have trouble acting together, young lady?" Mr. D asked.

"Yes."

The wine god nodded. "Just checking. You're right, of course. Carry on."

Reyna gave him a disgusted look. Perhaps it was the Roman in her, but she found it disgraceful that an Olympian would be so nonchalant about the gods doing nothing useful when it was their duty to protect the world. They had stopped the Titans the first time five thousand years ago, but this time they seemed content, for the most part, to just sit back and let the world get destroyed.

No wonder Percy was so furious with them…

"I must agree with Zoë," Chiron said, bringing Reyna out of her thoughts. "Artemis's presence at the winter council is critical. We have only a week to find her, and possibly even more important: to discover what this 'Bane' is. Now, we must decide who goes on this quest."

"Isn't that obvious?" Reyna quirked an eyebrow. "Three and two."

Everyone stared at her.

"The quest calls for five," she reminded them. "There are two groups, so it's obvious that one of them is going to have higher numbers."

"It makes sense," Thalia said with obvious reluctance.

Zoë didn't look happy about agreeing with Thalia, but she said nothing. She picked up a ping-pong paddle and studied it like she was debating whether or not to hit someone – most likely Thalia.

"What's this 'Titan's Curse'?" Silena asked.

Chiron and Zoë exchanged a nervous look. Whatever they were thinking, though, they didn't share it with the rest of them.

Reyna had an idea, based on her dream last night of Percy holding up a ceiling and the prophecy directing them west, but she couldn't be certain without more information – information she had a feeling Zoë could provide her.

"We cannot say for certain," Chiron murmured after a moment. "However, this quest will be dangerous, we do know that much."

"Oh, goody!"

Everyone looked at Mr. D. He glanced up innocently from the pages of his wine magazine. "Ah, Pinot Noir is making a comeback. Don't mind me."

Reyna was, once again, disgusted by this poor excuse of an Olympian.

"So which campers will go?" Silena asked.

"I will," Reyna and Annabeth said at the same time. Annabeth glared at Reyna, but Reyna ignored her.

"That is two," Chiron said before a fight could break out – although Reyna was confident she would win, if it had gone that far. "Which Hunters will go?"

"I shall go, of course," Zoë said. "And I will take Phoebe. She is our best tracker."

"The big girl who likes to hit people on the head?" one Stoll brother asked cautiously. They weren't twins, but Reyna struggled to tell them apart, they looked so similar.

Zoë nodded.

"The one who put the arrows in my helmet?" the other added.

"Yes," Zoë snapped. "Why?"

"Oh, nothing," the first brother said. "Just, we have a t-shirt for her from the camp store." He held up a big silver t-shirt that read ARTEMIS THE MOON GODDESS, HUNTING TOUR 2002, with a long list of national parks and other information underneath. "It's a collector's item. She was admiring it. You want to give it to her?"

Zoë sighed and took the shirt. "As I was saying, I will take Phoebe, and I will take —"

"Me," Thalia interrupted. Zoë glared, but Thalia continued before she could say anything: "If Annabeth's going then so am I."

Zoë didn't look happy about that in the slightest, but Thalia's expression was one of unstoppable stubbornness. It was obvious to everyone that Thalia wasn't going to let anyone dissuade her from her overprotectiveness of Annabeth.

"Very well," Zoë said tightly.

"Excellent," Chiron smiled, though the look in his eyes suggested it was anything but. "Thalia, Annabeth, and Reyna will accompany Zoë and Phoebe. You shall leave at first light. And may the gods –" he glanced at Mr. D – "present company included, we hope – be with you."

The meeting dispersed and everyone went their separate ways. Dinner was soon, so most of them drifted off in the direction of the dining pavilion. Zoë stopped Reyna before she could go too far.

"May I speak with you?" the Hunter asked.

Reyna nodded and Zoë led her away from the campers. They walked until they reached the privacy of the Artemis cabin. The Hunters were somewhere else, and Reyna wasn't too bothered as to where so long as it wasn't here.

"You saw him in thy dreams." It wasn't a question. "You saw where he is."

"Holding up a cave's ceiling."

Zoë tossed the shirt from the Stoll brothers in a trash can. "Foolish boys," she scowled, "thinking that I would not recognize the scent of centaur blood."

Reyna stared.

"Centaur blood is very harmful," Zoë explained. "Not enough to be lethal, but it would have kept Phoebe from joining us on the quest, if she had worn that shirt."

Reyna rolled her eyes. "Idiots."

"Indeed." Zoë looked amused. Then her expression darkened when she asked, "Do you know where we are going?"

"I have an idea," Reyna admitted reluctantly. "The only place in the west that could actually cause problems for everyone right now…"

"Mount Tamalpais."

Reyna nodded grimly. "I was afraid it would be that."

Zoë gave her a strange look.

"What?" Reyna asked.

"I have been wondering," Zoë said slowly. "Where did you get thy sword?"

Reyna's hand instinctively went to her back pocket, where Percy's favored weapon was. She didn't know why she used Anaklusmos instead of her own sword during capture the flag; it had just sort of… happened. She had felt like she needed to use his sword in that game, and so she had.

"It's Percy's. Usually it returns to him, but it didn't, for some reason."

"That would be the magic of Mount Tamalpais," Zoë informed her. "If he were to lose it within the borders of the Mountain of Despair, then he would find no trouble in recovering it, but the boundaries prevent the sword from returning from across the divide."

Reyna frowned. "How do you know that?"

"I have experience with such magic," Zoë answered evasively. "But returning to my question, where did Perseus get that sword?"

"Why do you want to know?"

"Because I have seen it before, and I believed it to be lost until now."

Reyna pulled the pen out of her pocket and stared at it, wondering what history this weapon held that an old Hunter like Zoë would know of it.

"Chiron gave it to him," Reyna said. "Before his first quest."

Zoë nodded stiffly. "You should get some food and rest," she recommended in a tone that said as clear as glass that their conversation was over. "It will be a long day tomorrow, and we will all need to be refreshed and energized."

Reyna didn't need to be told twice. She left cabin eight without another word and made her way to the dining pavilion for dinner. She couldn't help but question one thing she had learned today, however.

Where did Zoë recognize Percy's sword from?

The barren cave was as black as night, the ceiling low and heavy above. Kneeling beneath the weight of a dark mass like a pile of boulders, the boy was too tired to even cry out. His dark hair was streaked with gray in several places. His legs trembled. Any second, he would run out of strength and the cavern ceiling would collapse.

"How is our favorite guest?" boomed a deep voice.

A second boy emerged from the shadows. He was tall and lean with sandy blond hair and a scar beneath his right eye, stretching to his jaw. He slowly approached the boy holding up the ceiling and knelt beside him, then looked back at the unseen man. "He is stronger than we first thought. He will survive longer than expected."

The deep voice chuckled. Then a meaty hand thrust someone forward into the light.

It was Artemis, her hands and feet bound in Celestial Bronze chains. Her silvery dress was torn and tattered, and her face and arms were cut in several places, dripping golden ichor – the blood of immortals.

"Will you take the burden for him?" asked the man in the shadows. "Or will you allow him to collapse, and with him the world? You have already put off this decision twice today, but you are running out of time."

The boy holding the ceiling glanced at Artemis, pain and exhaustion in his eyes.

Sea-green eyes.

He made a weak, indistinguishable sound. It was barely above a gasp.

"Free my hands," Artemis said coldly.

The blond boy took out his sword – one that gleamed half-bronze, half-steel. With one expert strike, he broke Artemis's handcuffs.

Artemis walked to Percy and knelt beside him. She whispered something to him, too quiet to hear, and took the burden from his shoulders. Percy collapsed on the ground and lay there, shaking and spasming violently. Artemis staggered, trying to support the weight of the black rocks.

The man in the shadows chuckled. "I knew you would give in eventually. You Olympians are as predictable as you are easy to beat."

Artemis's eyes flashed, but she said nothing, straining under her burden.

"Now you are out of the way, and our path to victory is that much clearer."

"You will never triumph," Artemis snarled.

"And that," the man said, "is where you are wrong."

The large hand emerged from the shadows again and gripped Percy around his neck. "Now, if you will excuse us, our young friend here needs more convincing to take his proper place." The hand pulled Percy into the shadows. "Come, son of Poseidon. Let us see if your inability to drown applies to your own blood."

The man laughed darkly. "In the meantime, Artemis can fret about her darling attendants playing directly into my hands by coming to find her. We have a long journey to make, if we are to greet the Hunters and ensure their quest is… challenging."

The man's laughter echoed in the darkness, shaking the ground until it seemed the whole cavern ceiling would collapse.

Reyna woke with a start, her heart pounding against her ribs like a prisoner wishing to escape.

While it was a relief to know that Percy was still alive, that relief was quickly extinguished when she remembered that he was now being tortured in an attempt to sway him to the Titan's cause.

Percy was the strongest person Reyna knew, but she doubted he would be able to withstand that kind of treatment for very long before cracking or dying after bearing the Titan's Curse for nearly two days straight. Had he been healthy, she knew he would be able to take it, but now… she was terrified.

"Oh, Percy," she whispered to herself. "Why must it always be you?"

Reyna had thought she had been through a lot before she arrived at Circe's Isle, but hearing about everything Percy had experienced in less than two years made her feel grateful it hadn't been worse — Furies, the Minotaur, Medusa, the Chimera, Echidna, Ares, the Underworld, the Sea of Monsters, his training with Hades, and perhaps the biggest of all, his mother's death at the hands of the supposed god of justice and honor.

Not to mention the Great Prophecy that was supposed to happen when he turned sixteen, assuming it was him that the prophecy referred to, or even that he survived long enough to see sixteen years of age.

"Reyna?" a sleepy voice said quietly. "Are you awake?"

"Nico?"

"Uh-huh."

"What are you doing awake this early?" Reyna asked, bewildered. He was ten years old, he shouldn't be awake at… four-thirty in the morning? She nearly groaned. Reyna hated getting up any earlier than six, but it seemed her nightmares weren't going to let that happen today.

Nico was silent for a moment. "I don't… I don't sleep too well here."

Reyna could sympathize with that. She hadn't slept well during the summer, either, which was one of the reasons she had leapt at the chance to escape with Percy and be, well, anywhere other than here. That decision was helped by the fact that most of the campers annoyed her with their wild natures and disorganization.

Percy was far from being a stellar example of organization, too, but at least he made up for it with other, more positive qualities.

He had said that it was because she was a Roman in Greek territory; that her inborn instincts were telling her this place was dangerous. Reyna had been surprised to realize how true that was, but at least it had gotten easier to deal with as the days passed and she spent more time here.

"I don't either," Reyna told Nico. Then an idea struck her. "Let's go take a walk."

A few minutes later, the two of them were strolling around the quiet grounds of camp. They only had to sneak until five o'clock, then curfew was lifted and the harpy patrols returned to wherever they spent the day.

While they walked, Reyna asked – interrogated – Nico about what he could remember under the guise of actual interest in his life. And while, yes, Reyna did technically care about Nico because he was a little kid and Percy cared about him, she really could have done without learning so many details and intricacies of Mythomagic.

It hurt when he asked about Percy, though, and Reyna was quick to get off that particular topic.

On the bright side, Reyna learned that Nico remembered almost nothing from before his time in the Lotus Hotel and Casino. He had a vague memory of his mother singing to him, but other than that, there was very little.

They returned to the Hermes cabin just as the others were getting up and preparing for breakfast.

"There you are!" Bianca cried in relief.

"Sorry, Bianca," Reyna smiled. "We were just taking a walk."

Nico nodded quickly, grinning up at his sister.

The five occupants of cabin eleven made their way to the dining pavilion, where Zoë, Phoebe, Thalia, and Annabeth were already eating.

The quest group ate breakfast quickly and said their goodbyes before congregating at Half-Blood Hill, the very same hill where Thalia had once been a pine tree – a story that amused Reyna if she ignored the circumstances of the event – and went over last minute preparation details.

"It looks as if we have everything," Zoë said after ensuring they each had a backpack with a change of clothes, some money, and snacks for the road. "Let's go."

They boarded the white camp van, Zoë taking the driver's seat, and set off in the direction of the city.

Hopefully Percy would find the strength to hold out until they arrived.

AN: So there's that. This is going to be an interesting road trip, wouldn't you say?

Zoë and Thalia have drama, Reyna and Annabeth have drama, Phoebe hates the camper girls. Yeah, this is going to be fun.

No clue when next chapter will be up since I haven't started it yet, but I have about half of the one after that done (because I'm inconsistent like that). I'll try and have it done by Sunday, a week from today at the latest, but I can't guarantee anything. Life's been getting difficult lately.

THANKS FOR READING!