I'm going to start off by saying, welcome to hell. Being a demigod is as awful as you can imagine. You get hunted by monsters, ignored by your godly parent, never get to have a normal life… But, hey, I'm getting ahead of myself. Why don't I start at the beginning, my twelfth birthday.

"Mom, Jeanie is being mean again," I whispered quietly under the park pavilion.

My mother knelt down beside me. She looked so much like me that no one had to question our relation. I had her silver eyes and pale skin, but I didn't have her light brown hair. I had dark black hair from my father, whom I had never met. She was kind, loving, my best friend. On the weekends I got to stay up watching tv as long as I could and eat almost anything I wanted. On my birthday I could do whatever I wanted, which meant no school.

"I'll talk to her, my little blossom," she whispered back with the biggest smile.

She had left me for a few minutes and when she came back Jeanie was in a chair with her arms crossed. I had a paper written up for my English teacher about who I thought was my hero. It was my mother.

"All good, little blossom," she smiled as she grabbed my hands and spun around with me.

I giggled as she spun around out into the sunlight. It felt warm and beautiful on her face. Everything was perfect, everything.

"Well, well, well," said a terribly cold and… beautiful voice. "Isn't this nice?"

"Get… away," said her mother forcefully.

I didn't see where the voice came from, my mother hugged me so tightly to her that I couldn't turn my head to see. The way she talked to this person made me think that we were somehow in danger. I wanted to move, but she still held me tight. I wanted to scream, I felt like I could scream, but my voice didn't work. I didn't want to cry, but tears slid silently down my face.

"Aw, poor mommy," chuckled the voice. "Don't you know it's not healthy to be a helicopter parent?"

"Stay… away," my mother hissed.

"No," growled the voice. "Normally I like playing with my food, but we empousa don't want another incident with another powerful-"

"Enough!" yelled my mother.

I could hear the questions of my friends and their parents asking why my mom was yelling at a cheerleader. That did seem strange…

"She doesn't know what she is, does she?" said another equally beautiful but empty voice.

"Or who she is…" added yet another.

I could feel my mother's heart racing so fast I feared it would stop from exertion. I finally wrapped my arms around her and held onto her tight.

"Sisters, enough. Let's have some fun," ordered the first one.

"Gladly!" giggled the other two.

I heard screams. They said a fire had started. I couldn't feel a fire.

"Now, let's take care of this one," growled the first voice with amusement. "I normally don't go for females but I feel like a certain someone should feel pain for what he did to my sisters!"

I felt a grab. I was yanked away from my mom. I screamed for her, I screamed so much.

"Lexa!" my mother screamed back.

I saw a clawed hand shoved her hard. She finally hit the ground hard but she wasn't moving. I was panicking, I felt my chest tighten too much for my lungs and heart. This wasn't happening. Mom told me when I was younger that there were no such things as monsters and if there were she would use her mom powers to make them go away.

I was swung in front of this older girl harshly. I heard a creaking… from a metal leg. Her other was a hoofed leg. I struggled hard against her grip.

"Let's stop that now," she said more to herself than me.

I felt something pierce my lower chest and groaned. A shaking came from the ground. I heard explosions from far away, a rush of water.

"No!" the monster hissed.

After that I blacked out. When I woke up I was in the hospital with bandages on my stomach. Everything felt blurred… I didn't remember quite everything but I remembered the monster.

The room was white, an awful color, the sheets were a pale yellow-also awful-and they felt scratchy. There was a curtain cutting off half the room. It had blue spots on it.

"Mom," I called out with a crack in my voice.

"She's in the bed next to you," said a woman as she came in.

She pushed back the curtain to reveal my mom sleeping in a bed similar to mine. It was a nurse. Nurses could be trusted. She didn't have metal legs or hooves.

"She insisted on being in the same room as you," she sighed. "Normally we don't do patient requests, but she was fighting us every step of the way so the doctor was convinced it would just be easier to do what she says."

She checked my stats and I stared at her the whole time, perhaps wondering if she'd transform into a monster. Naturally the nurse seemed to think my staring was strange so she hurried up her work so she could leave.

"My mom," I started before she left, "… she'll be okay?"

The nurse nodded with a small smile. "She's just sleeping. The doctor's gave her something to relax."

It felt like forever as she stared at her mother before succumbing to sheer exhaustion. She drifted into consciousness with the voices talking to her mother.

"No, it wasn't fire, it was a wild animal," she heard her mother say. "Or it could have been both. I'm sorry, it was all pretty hectic and I got hit in the head."

Lexa opened her eyes. "It was a monster, mom. Remember?" I whispered. "It had a donkey leg and a metal one… The thing had claws. It looked kinda like a cheerleader, but it wasn't."

"Child's imagination," her mother said to the policeman standing next to her.

Lexa found it strange that her mother dismissed her like that. Her mother never dismissed anything she said, no matter what it was. Lexa's eyebrows came close in confusion.

Her mother looked at her with an alien look in her eyes. "If you'll give me a minute with my daughter, officers?"

"Of course, Ms. Romanos," one of them said before they both exited.

"It was all your imagination, my little blossom," she said softly. "Sleep now."

"But, mom, it was real," I insisted.

"It was just you coping with the stress of the situation, my blossom, nothing more," she told me. "There are no such things as monsters. I promise."

"But-"

"No buts," she said in her mom voice. "Now go to sleep. Everything will be alright…"

"I am still tired," I mumbled.

"Then sleep."

The next morning I woke up even more groggily than the day before. I remembered my party… then being in the hospital… a nurse… but nothing else…

"Mom!" I exclaimed.

"I'm right here, blossom," she soothed.

I whirled my head to her. "What happened?"

I had no memory of what happened past being swung out of the pavilion. I didn't know why I had bandages on my stomach, I didn't know why my mom was in the bed next to me. It was an awful feeling not knowing.

"A wild pack of dogs attacked and we were injured," she said with a reassuring smile. "Everything is alright now."

I nodded. My mom would never lie to me. She loved me. When we got out of the hospital and were well enough mom quit her job at the bank and moved us far away. I thought it was because she couldn't stand to stay there…

… I was wrong.

Whatever happened to us at my twelfth birthday party changed my mom. She became more and more distant with each move she made with us. It was… hard. She turned colder, harsher, you would hardly recognize the same Delilah Romanos from my twelfth birthday with the one I lived with three years later. She was constantly telling me I wasn't doing enough, being enough… It was… demeaning, horrible. I had everything I could ever need besides the mother I knew… All I had was a dictator who acted like Adolf Hitler without the mass murder. But I had a plan to make that all change.

I was walking home from school-alone. I didn't have friends anymore. My last one let me down. Besides, moving around every six months made it difficult to cultivate relationships. I climbed up the fire escape of an apartment complex. When I reached my window I took out my switchblade from the pocket of my school bag and used it to open my window so I could quietly climb in.

She was home from work and I didn't want her to know I was home. I pulled everything out of my bag so I could shove clothes and necessities in it. Then I climbed up onto my bed to get the money I stashed in the vent above it.

"Looking for something?" said a tired and emotionless voice behind me.

I turned around slowly, my long braided hair barely moving, I was going so slow. She held my rubber banded wads of cash in her hand. She knew, I didn't know how, but she knew. Or did she? I better not tip my hand, I should still play dumb, I thought to myself.

"Now what were you thinking of doing with all this money?" she asked coyly before sitting languidly on a chair in the corner at the end of my bed. She already knew the answer to that-perhaps.

My room didn't have much. Just a bed, desk, small bookshelf, and the chair she was occupying. There weren't any distinctive pictures, paintings, nothing. If you move around so much why bother putting anything up?

"Nothing," I shrugged indifferently.

"Really?" she sighed with annoyance. "I beg to differ. You're packing, sneaking into your own room… Running away, perhaps?"

"I'm going to buy camping supplies," I snorted. "A girl at school asked me to go camping with her. I was packing some clothes for the trip."

She didn't seem convinced. "Go on…"

I jumped off my bed in my black combat boots. "It's Friday."

"The reason for breaking into your room?" she asked, clearly-and stupidly-satisfied with my answers so far.

"I saw it on a video, thought it'd be cool to try," I shrugged again. "Whatever, I won't do it again."

She tossed the cash on the bed. "Good. I'll expect a full report of your activities once you come back."

"Whatever," I replied.

She looked at me with a cold metal in her eyes. "Not 'whatever,' Alexandria," she corrected before leaving.

I glared at the door. "Whatever."

She made my life hell on Earth. I didn't know what she wanted from me and when I asked, all she said was, "I just need more." As if I could understand that. I was through with staying here. I was running away, but I had gotten so good at lying that she couldn't tell what was a lie and what was a truth.

People wondered why I hated my mother so much. She came to every parent teacher conference, every school game even though I wasn't in any of them, and she made me go to every single one. For me it seemed a bit strange, almost alien for her to do that. I felt something else too… I felt… like… she was watching me… like a rat stuck in a cage. Well now this rat was leaving her cage and never coming back.

Picking up the money she shoved in the bag with everything else. Time to go. I climbed out the window again as quietly as I could. I nearly tripped as I tried to climb down the fire escape quickly. I cursed in Japanese-which she spoke fluently due to her love of art and its affiliation with manga.

I ran to a nearby, newly empty taxi cab and hopped in. "Bus station, now," I told the cab driver.

He looked quizzical at her, debating if he should help. I repeated the command and he just shrugged. He was getting paid either way, I suppose he thought.

"Step on it, please," I sighed.

The driver complied but traffic was awful. I stared out the window watching people go about their day. An elderly woman with her grandson, two guys sharing a smoothie, a woman late for something. Normal life…

It didn't take her long to get a ticket for a bus. She picked a nice beach town far… far… away. She noticed some police officers stopping the bus just before the driver pulled out of park.

"What's the problem?" asked the bus driver with a sigh. It seemed like he had been through this more than once and didn't care for the repetition.

"We have a runaway we're looking for," said one of the police officers.

"Black hair, not very tall," said the other one.

The driver scoffed. "Well, that's specific."

I took out my beanie and wireless earbuds so I could pretend to listen to music as I continued to look out the window. Look inconspicuous, look distracted, and you won't draw attention to yourself, I repeated in my mind.

"We have a picture," the first one said.

"Be my guest and look around," sighed the driver.

"Have you seen her?"

"Buddy, I don't pay attention to anyone unless they don't have a bus pass."

My heart skipped every other beat. Look inconspicuous, look distracted, and you won't draw attention to yourself… Look inconspicuous, look distracted, and you won't draw attention to yourself…

They walked through the aisle. I was sitting near the back. They came closer. I forced myself to stare out the window and mess with my MP3 player. They came even closer… Stay calm… Stay calm…

They stopped next to the seat empty of anything but my belongings. Out of the corner of my eye I saw they were holding up the reference picture. They tapped my shoulder. I pretended to play dumb as I took out one earbud.

"Have you seen this girl?" one asked.

She looked at the girl. There was a resemblance to her, but this girl's hair was pixie style and her eyes were a shade or two darker than her own. "No, I haven't seen her. Sorry," I shrugged.

"Alright, let's leave and go to the next bus," sighed the other one.

It didn't take long for me to fall asleep. I felt relieved that I didn't have my mother as a parent anymore. She was hell… literal hell. When my stop came up another passenger had to wake me. I quickly grabbed my stuff and ran off the bus. I felt a pull to waters so I walked along the beach. It was strange to see it so empty… Why was it so empty?

I stopped. I went closer to the water. I heard something. A voice. No… voices…

Hmm, a demigod… one voice said.

I whipped around. Who was talking?

We were, said another. Strong demigod…

I looked around and no one was there. "Where are you?"

No answer. Nothing. I whirled around several times more before I think to myself that I was just imagining it so I just continued walking. The wind whipped my long braid in the air. The sand was a bit cold on my bare feet and the air smelled… like home.

"Heeeeree," someone breathed on my neck lowly..

I stopped cold and dropped my stuff. I shouldn't have turned around but I did. It looked like a dragon but with only two clawed arms. Its scales were like liquid ink, its horns similar to that of red coral-hard and sharp. The other monster was a woman in green scales with two snake trunks for legs. She had armor and a long spear for a weapon.

"What…?"

"Not many people can speak with us," rumbled the scaly beast while circling me. "I wonder…"

"Enough talk," snapped the woman monster. She gnashed her sharp teeth at me like an animal looking at its food.

"Patience…" chuckled the dragon-like thing. "Do you know what we're going to do to you?"

I stood very still and very quiet. The beast continued to circle me with thought.

"We're going to pull you apart and eat you… alive… for as long as you will be alive…" he said. "We'll leave nothing behind, no bones, no blood… no meat… You're nothing but food, and you will be eaten. You won't be missed by anyone either," he chuckled. "The Mist will take care of your existence somehow."

I breathed hard, my chest beat erratically. The dragon-like beast snorted at the ocean, growling. The woman slithered closer.

"What iss iit?" she asked.

"Him," he growled. "Let's hurry this up…"

I felt the winds pick up, the air smelled saltier and stung my skin. I didn't realize what was happening. I didn't know how to respond. I just shrunk in fear all the way to the ground.

"We may not have time, I knew thiss wass a bad idea!" the snake woman exclaimed. "She smeeellss too powerful!"

"I don't care," he replied with a threat.

She tapped him with her spear tip. "Apparently ssomeone elssse doesss…"

I looked very slowly where they were looking. A huge wave was coming towards us at a rapid pace. I tried to get up and run but the snake woman threw her spear which made me trip. I stumbled through sand as I fell being cut by shells or broken litter. I winced.

"Wait!" said the male beast. "We have no time!"

The air grew thick and dangerous. I heard the wave and the snake woman's screams. I screamed myself as the wave crashed into me and I blacked out. When I floated back into consciousness I didn't open my eyes, I felt too weak, but I could hear someone… a man… four footsteps, fast walking footsteps… Voices…

"Chiron, here!" said a loud voice, a girl's voice. It sounded hard…

A sudden stop in the hooves. "Annabeth! Someone said you found…"

"Her," she said.

"I brought Will and some others," replied this Chiron. "They are bringing a stretcher, they aren't far behind."

"I was walking along the beach and I found her," Annabeth explained.

"Has she moved, said anything?" asked Chiron.

"No."

After that my consciousness drifted out. It was horrible… I relived my twelfth birthday, but not like how I remembered it. Monsters? How? My scars… they were supposed to be from… I didn't remember what from. But the monster from this dream… she stabbed me… She couldn't have given me my scars… "Monsters weren't real," reverberated in my mind in my mother's voice over and over again.

My eyes slowly opened… I felt sore, but not as sore as I was expecting. I inhaled and bolted upright. A blonde girl was speaking to a man with many eyes on his body. It freaked me out-not another monster! I jumped out of bed and ran for the exit. I heard a shout for me to stop but I didn't. I was a bit wobbly but I kept going.

I nearly ran over other people as I finally found an exit. After reaching it I stopped in horror. There were half-goat men-satyrs, I remembered from my books, green women, people in Greek armor, pegasi flying in the sky. This was… a dream, right? It had to be!

Dream or not I was getting the hell out of here. I ran into another person-stupid! The person held me upright so I wouldn't fall.

"Whoa, there…" said a male voice. It was calm, fluidic… It seemed… familiar? "You don't look so good. Are you new? Welc-"

I punched this person in the face to make him let me go and ran for it. The nearby strawberry field that I spotted seemed like a good place to get lost so that was where I ran.