All rights belong to Rick Riordan

Delos

(Harmony)

As we arrived on the almost lifeless island of Delos, I took an almost nostalgic deep breath of salty sea air. After all, this barren little rock in the middle of the Aegean was where I had been born several thousand years before. Back then though the island had been teeming with life of all varieties. Now rather than fields of wild flowers and woods all that remained was the over-powering scent of the sea.

Despite my infant body, I would end up spending my first few hours of life not showered with attention and love. Like my older siblings on my fathers side had been. But instead helping my pained mother, to give birth to the annoyance, which was my twin brother.

In hindsight maybe I should have been a little less gentle with him. Introduced him to the school of hard knocks immediately; he might have turned out a little more… tolerable in the long run. However my attention at the time was more focused on helping my pained long overdue mother to recover than worrying about my sibling. Most pregnancies of immortals like mortals was nine months, Leto had been pregnant for almost five years due to Hera hounding her across the land.

Still the absence of any form of massive serpent intent on devouring me and my mother now was a massive improvement. Albeit that was the only improvement the island had, not that it wouldn't be fun to see just how much of its tail a snake can be forced to devour before it dies, like some form of twisted Ouroboros.

"Wow it is so… boring." Tania complained first, suddenly several of the other hunters hurriedly moved away from her. As if they were expecting some form of repercussion from me towards her.

"Relax all of you she is right, this island died so I might live after all. If you came expecting some sort of paradise of woodland, animals and flowers you are on the wrong island. No Delos suffered Hera's wrath because nowhere else was willing." I said whilst reaching down and pushing my fingers into the arid rocky soil.

"What happened to everything here?" Jacqueline asked as I stood up, the small patch of dry grass I had managed to scoop up quickly losing cohesion and falling through my fingers.

"Hera cursed the nymphs that lived here for allowing my mother shelter. The spring dried up, the tree's withered and died and the animals starved. Those that could left in pursuit of better pickings on other islands nearby that remained unaffected." I explained as I remembered what this island had looked like for the first few days of my life, still breaming with life back then.

Perhaps it was back then that my interest in the wild had first been kindled as I walked amongst it all. However it was not to last. As the days of my infancy went by, it began to wither and die around me.

Maybe, that too had a profound effect on the young Artemis too, it taught me that any happiness was transitory and could be lost, whilst I was powerless to act or do anything about it.

But now, I was no longer that powerless young goddess who could do nothing about what was happening around me, due to the whims of someone more powerful than me. My children would not be forced to crawl on the dirt floor due to some perceived insult as a result of simply existing.

"Lady Harmony!" Zoe shouted snapping me out of my musing as I suddenly noticed that with the exception of the Demi-Titan the rest of the Hunters were on the floor desperately trying to avoid losing consciousness. Even then Zoe too was forced down onto a knee. I quickly realised that I had let me emotions overcome my need to dial back on the power I exuded.

The only one seemingly unaffected at least for the short term was the golden lioness who was looking at me directly with her body tensed before sitting down and licking her Adamantium claws once I returned everything to normal.

Mentally kicking myself, for my own stupid mistake as I hurriedly got my emotions under control. I was only able to take solace in the fact that both Percy and Thalia hadn't been around to witness it. Because neither would be likely to let me live it down for a while.

Due to some unexpected 'exertions' over the last few hours, I had been forced to leave the Titan Lord at home to babysit my younger sister, who after her little growth spurt had suddenly found herself needing a new wardrobe. And even I did not have a stock of clothing that would properly fit the young woman now. So seeing as she was currently not a member I did not see any issue with her doing as she pleased albeit under the supervision of the Titan Lord. That way she could keep out of trouble.

Most Hunters across history after all were generally between eleven and sixteen with a few that went a few years either way. Now between Thalia, Reyna, the twins and I guess myself, we were actually getting very heavily shifted towards the latter end of the spectrum. Even then it was only really Marina and Jacqueline that were actually possible to describe as actually young, because the others had all undergone puberty before joining the hunt.

Anyway for whatever reason I had decided to allow those two to remain behind and go shopping. Whilst I and the others came over before and set up camp on this dead rocky outcrop.

"Wow that sucks when that happens." Phoebe joked as she helped Atalanta to her feet. The daughter of Apollo like several of the others looking suddenly pale as the better faring daughter of Nike pulled her up.

"Has anyone got an aspirin?" Tania complained sitting on the floor as she massaged the bridge of her nose.

"I'm sorry everyone, I will try and keep my emotions in check." I apologised almost meekly out of embarrassment.

"So let's err… Pretend that didn't happen. What do we do now?" Reyna said attempting to take control of the situation in the absence of Thalia and me suddenly taking interest in my shoes.

"Right everyone follow me and I will show you where Lady Artemis was born." Zoe suddenly declared causing everyone to look at her with a mixture of expressions. As for me I was looking back at her red-faced with horror and embarrassment.

"Oh yeah this should be fun, I remember that place." Atalanta mused with amusement suddenly feeling better as I considered the betrayal of the two oldest hunters. It had been two millennia since I had last brought the Hunt here, of course those two would still remember. The difference now was the group was now generally a lot less formal than back in those days and I could be considered a lot more emotional.

"Not everyone gets to be born in a palace, like you two were!" I shouted bitterly at the former Hesperide and Arcadian Princess as they began to head in the direction of where I knew my birthplace to be about a quarter of a mile away.

"Did you really think that we would come here without being curious and wanting to take a look Milady?" Erika asked as I simply hung my head in resignation as the group as a whole began to follow the other two. For a short period of time it was just me, a pile of bags and equipment and the Lioness before I bit my lip and slowly trudged behind. I could of course have flown or flashed ahead of them but I was in no rush to get this over and done with.

We had been only been on the island ten minutes and I was already regretting my decision to come here.

(Thalia)

"So Seaweed Brain, what's the plan then?" I asked as I lounged across the arms of a copy of Percy's golden throne. The Titan Lord himself was across the room from myself face down on the goddesses bed.

Or more accurately one half of him was, the other was propped up against the wall in the corner of the room still thoroughly oblivious to the world.

"Can't I just lay down for a bit and rest? I have had a hard morning and I haven't slept properly in days." Percy complained pulling his face out of the pillow. Sure enough he looked absolutely exhausted, eyes narrow and bags under his eyes but after spending the equivalent of two years lying on the floor today I was full of energy.

That and a quick glance downwards and reminding myself that I was not dreaming, was making me feel really positive.

"Oh boo who, it must be so hard for you, getting to sleep with a goddess." I called across playfully.

"I wish I got to sleep. For the last week it has been nothing but Sex, Mystery, Fights, Kidnapping attempts, more sex, recapping, did I mention the sex? I am convinced it must be a hereditary condition at this point… oh god… why did I just remember that?" Percy groaned dry-heaving into the pillow.

I wanted to comment on how he could probably be the only person who could complain about sleeping with someone who looked like Harmony but my attention was distracted by the cringing and gagging Titan instead.

"Oh don't leave me hanging, what you could possibly see that could have be so bad. There isn't anyone else here anymore." I asked curiously sitting up on the chair and looking at him intently leaning forward intently as I did so.

"I saw your dad's Junk and Leto was…Ewwwww." Percy said trembling as I froze in place as my brain shut down.

'Nope…Nope…Nope…Delete everything I just heard… Sis come back right now and make me forget what I just heard… Nope that was not an image I wanted to imagine.'

Sure I was more than happy to imagine the possibilities of my own sister and cousin, doing all sorts of shenanigans in my mind. They were both attractive people, albeit one was so inhumanly beautiful she made everyone else of the same sex look boring. Sure I could even say I was jealous of my own sister, pre-puberty Percy was nothing special in terms of looks but now well… Besides if Harmony was telling the truth about him then…damn. Then again I had gained recent appreciation of how the passage of time could enhance a diamond in the rough into a true gem.

But the concept of considering my father wearing anything less than a full suit was something I did not ever want to think about. Now despite my sexual preferences going the other way, for the most part. Some older guys did look good for their age, but imagining my father as any form of attractive to anyone was just an impossibility for me. That was not even because of the whole incest thing, I could freely admit that Apollo and Percy were good looking attractive guys despite them being my own brother and cousin. One was just really annoying to be within a half mile of and the other was now complaining about fucking my sister, (his own cousin as well) too much.

"So anyway were the pair of you doing it whilst he was still in the room." I asked mischievously pointing to the sleeping figure of Pride in an attempt to change the subject off of the potential image of my father's unmentionables. Without even pausing he simply nodded in affirmation as I sat there with my mouth open, honestly not expecting that.

"You think that is bad we did it with both her parents in the room… oh and can't forget Apollo was there too." He announced with a sigh of resignation as I sat there struggling to comprehend that announcement. Now I didn't know the specifics of the circumstances but that was a whole new level of brazenness.

"Remember when Artemis was the goddess of Virginity." I finally said at last with a chuckle.

"I do, I used to get sleep and my hips didn't hurt." He laughed back wearily.

"Fine I get the hint, I will leave you on your own for a few hours." I said before quickly pushing myself off the chair and back onto my feet. Despite the fact my height hadn't really changed only an inch or so, my centre of balance had done so dramatically almost causing me to fall straight on face before I luckily corrected my impetus.

"That was close, luckily you have airbags now Pinecone Face." Percy remarked watching my actions through one eye as I naturally blushed deeper due to my current almost white skin tone.

Despite me bothering him for last twenty minutes that was the first time he had remarked upon my change. Harmony had told me before leaving that he did not approve of what we had done in his absence without his consultation.

"I think we can both agree that the passage of time has treated us rather kindly, unfortunately we are both taken now." I said blushing before turning around and cursing myself for admitting my attraction to him.

"Don't give Harmony ideas. I don't want to have a hip transplant by the time I turn twenty." He complained as I practically ran out of the room.

'Dear gods, that was so embarrassing, what the hell was I doing?' I questioned internally screaming as I stopped and leaned my head against a wall.

It was like just being around him was putting my imagination in heat, despite everything that was wrong with that scenario in terms of our relationship with each other and those that we loved respectively.

'I need a shower, a very cold one ideally.' I thought to myself as I went off hunting around the palace to find the room in question.

(Percy)

'Well that was awkward.' I thought to myself as I watched the younger daughter of Zeus basically run out of the room. By default my open eye had watched Thalia's backside automatically comparing it that of Harmony's before I struck myself in the temple in an attempt to get my mind off that subject quickly.

Thalia was now very beautiful now and I could admit to that, quite freely. But the thing was I was engaged to Artemis/Diana/Harmony and the fact was even as good as she may have looked. There was no comparison between the two. The goddess just ticked all my boxes despite me not knowing what those boxes were supposed to be. Plus the extra seven inches of height between the two made making out with Harmony a lot easier and meant I would not need to bend down.

Besides I was not going to be like the other Olympians and especially our fathers. Long ago I had been told my fatal flaw was loyalty and I intended to stand by the women I loved no matter what.

Not just because I was convinced the ring on my finger had some form of listening gear on it that told her everything I said and did. And would likely have resulted in me potentially getting struck by an inter-continental-ballistic-arrow, fired at Mach 25, from some inconspicuous Greek island. If I should so much have thought of having touched her inappropriately.

"Girls are crazy." I finally thought with a shake of my head as I closed my eyes and enjoyed this short deserved break I had earned over the last week or so.

(Zoe)

In the past even I would have described my current actions as uncharacteristic of myself. I would never have gone out of my way to place the goddess in an uncomfortable position and certainly never mocked her in any way.

However, I was no longer the same nymph I had been back then and she was certainly not the same goddess from back then. For the last few thousand years Artemis's sense of humour was basically non-existent after all. As a result it could be said that the whole group of us had become a lot more light-hearted recently, combined with the fact that we were not always in perpetual danger due to the ferocious feline that was our real guardian now. It felt like we could afford to be more free spirited.

Well that and the fact the goddess and her lover had disappeared for a week deserved some form of payback.

So whilst this was obviously not the first time that the Hunt had returned to Delos, far from it back when Olympus was actually on Mount Olympus we had come here every decade or so to pay respects to the birthplace of our goddess. The thing was Artemis herself hated coming here, she would suddenly decide that then was the perfect time to go hunting on her own. Leaving us to take a boat from the nearby Greek Island of Mykonos to get here ourselves.

The reason being that even when she was rather emotionally stunted in the past. She had still regarded her birth place as somewhat embarrassing, despite Leto's rather desperate situation at the time.

As we climbed the climbed the last fifty meters of the dry hill slope, it was easy to see why. Tucked out of the way between two boulders was a narrow crevice about three feet wide by eight feet in height leading into the hillside.

"Wow it's even smaller than I remember." Atalanta joked slapping her palm against the left hand stone as the others caught up and looked at the entrance to the cave in front of them. Bringing up the rear slowly was the goddess herself who looked like she wanted to be anywhere but here.

"Well then everyone for all of you who have never been here before, I present to you the birthplace of the goddess Artemis… And Apollo for anyone other than Atalanta who is actually interested in that fact." I said waving my hands towards the cave entrance ushering them to take a look, stepping aside to let them through before smiling towards the glaring goddess.

"I would point out that though I may have started out in a cave, I soon got myself a palace. You were born in a palace and yet I found you in a cave." Harmony muttered bitterly. The frowns on her face not sitting well with her natural beauty.

"Be that as it may Milady, but last I checked there was likely more decoration and signs of life in this cave than there was in your palace until recently." I retorted cheerfully even as I watched her open her mouth as if to make a comeback but then stop as she was unable to do so.

"Now I can see why Thalia and Percy do this, it is fun." I joked as she took a deep breathe.

"Not another one, I get enough of that from them." Harmony complained with a weary sigh. It was probably the most amusing thing about this whole situation with Harmony. She was now almost seemingly impossibly powerful even when compared to her normal self, but she dealt with stress so much worse. Either with outright aggression towards the offender or by taking out her frustration sexually on the poor Titan Lord, we had left behind.

The number of Hunters that actually believed the full story of what the pair of them had been doing for the last week could be counted on one hand, basically the youngest and most naïve. We had after all discussed the story over the last few hours in our new bedrooms, whilst the pair had disappeared again. That was the difference between 'my' Hunt and the current one. With the exception of me, Atalanta, Phoebe and technically Morganna, all of the hunters were born in the late twentieth-century. Hades Jacqueline was born in this century and Marina wasn't much older than her. Then there was the strange pair of Thalia and Reyna who were older than they appeared by other means but still not significantly older in the grand scheme of things compared to the elder group.

Of course we had different opinions on Percy based upon our prejudices of men in general. Despite this it was not hard to notice that certain members of the Hunt were interested in him. Of course they would all deny it if asked, but you could see the looks that Thalia, Reyna and the twins shot him when he or the goddess was not looking. But it was clear that he had zero intentions towards any of the Hunters and was solely infatuated with the goddess.

For my own part I was personally indifferent to Percy's presence in the Hunt, yet I was deeply against the male gods and most heroes. He had earned my respect in my first life and from what I had learned since my return, he had volunteered to take up the hardship that was dealing with our group for zero return in exchange. As from what I could understand Artemis had not even offered to pay him. He had done so simply because he could do something to help those in need.

That he eventually fell in love with our goddess and she in return, was something even now I was still processing. Once upon a time I too had become infatuated with someone and it eventually ended tragically as was well known, this is what shaped me for the next few thousand years. Artemis had naturally started off disliking males from the very start, from what I had learned from my predecessor Hunters was that since the very beginning her dislike of men was always there and almost unnaturally so. It was this natural dislike that shaped the hunt as a whole, the original hunters had not hated men, they simply swore to remain a maiden and so would not do anything against men if they met them. In fact passing mortal hunters who worshipped the goddess and made sacrifices for good luck were treated rather well and often given part of the spoils of our own hunt.

Over time we would eventually end up recruiting girls who had underwent trauma at the hands of men, like me of course and as the elder Hunters eventually died this change in ratio would end up defining the groups perception to the outside world.

With her transformation into Harmony and Percy's explanation of why he believed it had happened. I was beginning to think Artemis's behaviour all this time was actually written into her fate intentionally to preserve those seals they had spoken of with The Fates. Now that they had been broken the difference in her emotions was both jarring and yet fun to notice. This was why even I chose to provoke her like this just to see how she would react compared to her stoic way of the past.

In the past, hunters who back-chatted or offended her were likely to suffer some form of punishment immediately. Either really bad chores, being turned into animals for a period, getting transported several miles away and forced to return with zero help in blizzard conditions, things like this. As Lieutenant I was good at acting as an intermediary between the hunters and the goddess, able to raise their concerns without offending the goddess.

Clearly Thalia did not act the same way and freely offended the goddess and Percy, with mixed results in terms of response. However she had the benefit of being the only remaining demigod child of Zeus and Percy's closest remaining friend.

However something was currently odd with my successor, there had been very little explanation as to why she had not come with us. Harmony and to a lesser extent Reyna simply said she needed to do some things and she would come across with Percy later on. In fact no one apart from those three had seen her since we had been dismissed after the story.

"Wow it's so tiny." Suzie said in curious surprise as she poked her head inside the crevice.

It was true the inside of the cave was only about a hundred square feet, for comparison it was less than a quarter of the size of my new room in her palace. Likewise the ceiling was low enough that even the relatively short Titaness Leto would have had to bend down to enter inside back then. Hades if anything it surprising that she along with her inevitable two infant children could all fit in here together.

No wonder Artemis was so keen to spend time outside after such cramped origins.

One by one the other girls all got closer and began to look inside and even step a few feet inside, making comments to each other as they did so. None of which was to positive or endearing to be honest.

As such it was interesting to watch the goddesses face as she continued to hear us talking about her birthplace. Though she held her tongue, the red look on her face clearly showed that she was having regrets about coming back here now.

"Oh look there is a little shrine at the back." Suzie called out from inside where she had been pushed in furthest.

"There is?" I asked surprised, not remembering any sort of monument here, albeit it had been several centuries since we were last here.

"No there isn't." Harmony outright declared suddenly as she made her way through the group. Following on behind closely even I had to admit my interest was piqued.

"Yes there is look there is a little carved figure of a hunter, bones and some arrowheads." Suzie explained before the goddess was suddenly behind her and looking at the items herself. Even as I stood close by to Harmony it seemed that her sudden interest had sparked everyone piling into the small space out of curiosity.

"This is impossible, mortals cannot find this place, the mist hides it. The only people who would know are gods, Mother, the nymphs and Hunters. It certainly isn't the last two and no god would care to visit…" Harmony started rambling to herself under her breath pacing around in a small circle giving me a quick view past her at the small shrine.

Sure enough it was exactly as described by Suzie. A small wooden figure about six inches in height carefully carved out in such detail that she appeared to be holding a small bow all made out of one solid piece. All polished smooth as if by constant holding and rubbing the amount of care required to carve something so intricate must have have been terrifying. That however was the first sign something was wrong, wooden goods should have long since perished in the millennia since anyone lived here on the island. The second however was most alarming that even I moved past the goddess and took up one of the discarded broken bronze arrows lying in front of the statue. They appeared to be ones where the cast metal had failed with use loosing the point actual points and therefore there use as a weapon.

"Lady Harmony this was a Hunter's arrow." I said turning around and holding the item in front of me.

The thing was we Hunters had followed the passage of technology quite well including the change in arrow technology. The weapons we used now were far superior to what we used in the past. What remained of the arrowhead I held would have been a common type everywhere across the region for us… during the time of the Trojan War.

Somewhat focusing the goddess stopped and took the item out of my hand, passing it between her fingers even as her golden eye focused before suddenly opening as she almost tossed it away, luckily it being caught by Phoebe who was standing in that direction. The goddess meanwhile was now almost hyperventilating as her eyes were wide open and she looked in shock.

"Everyone get out and wait outside!" I ordered quickly taking control of the situation even as I forcibly grabbed the goddess and pushed her back onto the very same rock she had been born on millennia ago. Behind me I could hear the others hurriedly getting out of the room and potential danger, this was after all not the first time recently that she had lost her cool and we did not have Percy around to calm her down… or fight her off. Not that I was sure even Percy could fight Harmony if she went all out.

"Harmony calm down, what is going on?" I asked kneeling in front of the goddess, both her heterochromatic eyes were wide open and yet unfocused. It seemed clear that even then she was not hearing me either as she seemed frozen in shock.

So I did the stupidest thing I have done in my four thousand plus years of life, I slapped what was arguably the most powerful being in existence.

Whilst I was 'pulling my punches' so-to-speak it was still hard enough to knock her over onto her side where she then banged her head on the rock, causing me to panic myself for a second before she suddenly shot back upright with eyes suddenly focused on me.

'So this is how I die this time. Not sure I will be coming back from this one.' I thought to myself as I sat face to face with the walking WMD.

"Zoe, you hit me?" The surprised goddess holding her hand to her cheek said clearly in shock.

"I'll do it again if you don't calm down." I told her firmly even as I was still holding my own breath.

"Strange, that is the second time someone has slapped me today, under wildly different circumstances and that wasn't my face…" Harmony said suddenly seemingly off tangent before my own eyes suddenly shot open in understanding.

"Harmony what you and Percy get up to I don't care, but keep me out of it and the details to yourselves. What is going on here and why did you freak out?" I demanded realising that my beloved goddess was getting infected with the notorious cognitive degenerative disease known as being a 'Seaweed Brain'. I guess it was a matter of time since she got the Tides domain, exposure to Percy must have hastened it.

"Oh right… the arrow." She said pausing in between words.

"It's one of ours right? But very old…"

"The head is, but what is left of the shaft is much newer, that tree was felled around seventy years ago." She said losing emotion in her words seemingly back on shocked autopilot, albeit co-operating at least and not endangering everyone.

'What on earth is a three-thousand year old celestial bronze arrowhead doing on a relatively recent shaft? Located in a place that very few people might know about, in front of an improvised shrine to the same goddess, that would have gifted the arrow in the first place in her very birth place.

"Harmony, do you know whose arrow that was originally?" I asked forcibly grabbing her shoulders and looking her in the eyes. After a second her head stopped tipping from side to side where I had shook her inadvertently before suddenly nodding twice.

"Milady whose was it?" I inquired softly.

"Delia." She said simply as I myself fell back on my backside in shock.

That was impossible; Delia was one of the original Hunters back when the group had first been founded shortly after Artemis's arrival on Olympus. In fact she had been the group's second Lieutenant and therefore my direct predecessor to the role.

As such even though she was like me a simple nymph by heritage, she had been incredibly skilled as a hunter. Often going off with just the goddess herself or even alone to go hunting more dangerous monsters.

It was during one of these solo hunts about forty years after I enlisted that she stopped reporting back. After searching for her ourselves by every means available, eventually we were forced to give her up for dead. After months of searches all across Greece and Anatolia were over, I was promoted to her role and we moved onwards as we had done before.

Now this could all be coincidental and someone had just found one of her arrows and then made a new shaft for it, found this place and created the shrine. Was it not for one coincidence too far. Delia was the nymph originally of the glade here on Delos, the island was named after her. She had joined the Hunters because she like her two sisters was cursed by Hera. Protected by Artemis's blessing, Hera could not do anything further to her begrudgingly albeit the damage to the islands ecosystem was almost complete anyway by that point.

However the island still bore a little albeit very limited life in the form of desert grasses and weeds. Which meant only one possible thing to me.

"Lady Harmony, is it possible Delia is still alive?" I demanded firmly before getting another albeit uncertain nod.

'Percy where are you when I need you?' I thought to myself as I stood up and walked towards the exit with a sense of purpose. Looking back inside the goddess had rolled onto her side with her arms to the side of her head.

Whilst I could say that in my time as Lieutenant I was the closest Hunter to Artemis and the one best at being able to understand what she wanted from us. In that role I liked to think I did a very good job.

But all of us back then knew that Delia was special to the goddess, not just for her role in her birth.

She was the first and possibly only person beside Percy, Artemis ever called her friend.

(Reyna)

It was a tense few minutes that we all waited, before collectively we all took a sigh of relief as we watched Zoe walk out of the cave and make her way towards us. However there was no sign of the goddess following behind her.

"Zoe what in hades is wrong with her now. If it isn't one thing at the moment it is another. I have never seen her freak out like that. She looked like she had seen a ghost." Atalanta demanded running up to the demi-Titan before the other girl simply leaned down and whispered something short in her ear. It could have only been a single word or two but almost instantly the Greek girl stopped arguing, hands fell down to her side.

"Listen everyone I am sure you all have a lot of questions about what just happened. But at the moment I cannot answer them, whilst I have some ideas about what has is going on. I have no real evidence to back up my theory…"

"Bullshit." Tania shot back and I think for possibly the first time several of us actually agreed with the daughter of Ares. The former lieutenant was clearly hiding something important.

"Listen I am trying to be respectful to our goddess who as you may have noticed is undergoing a bit of a crisis. All I will say is that it is linked to one of the oldest and greatest mysteries of the Hunters. For the moment focus your energies on setting up camp, we came here for a reason after all. However if this is possibly anywhere close to what I think this involves we may be for some time."

"I hope not this island is dead, there's nothing here." Amy responded quickly.

"That's the thing though it isn't, Delos has been dying for thousands of years ever since Artemis's birth but it has never actually died completely and it makes no sense. You have to understand Hera used a seriously potent and horrible curse on this island for going against her wishes. This island should only be a loose collection of rocks with zero signs of life at all. Yet still things struggle to survive here, something is keeping this place going. Something that shouldn't be any longer."

"What like the bad kind of lost evil being that should have stayed forgotten, or the good kind like Pan. That we all kind of forgot about." Phoebe joked nervously as probably for the first time she would not understand something her best friend did.

"Nothing near that extreme but deeply personal to Lady Harmony nonetheless." I explained holding my hand up reassuringly.

"Oh thank the gods I was almost worried that you were going to say Gaia was involved. We would have had to speed dial the Human tic-tac to get swallowed again." Erika said alluding to Percy's now infamous method of killing the Earth Mother. Were it so easy to get in contact with him though, as far as I was aware both he and the goddess were still blocked from receiving Iris Messages for the rest of the month.

"Can't believe I am saying this but I actually wish he was here. That idiot at least has a habit of getting out of trouble without everything going to shit." Tania complained kicking a pebble a good way down the hill slope.

"Remember Vegas." I retorted almost instinctively. Generally she was correct, but that little escapade courtesy of Perseus was a recent memory. None of us signed up to undertake rescue operations from Primordials.

"Oh yeah."

(Zoe)

"Listen everyone, let's set up camp nearby. After a few hours Percy and Thalia will have arrived and he can deal with her, because none of us are going to be able to move her without the world's biggest crowbar." I told them with a sigh.

"I hope that wasn't a euphemism Zoe." Reyna joked causing most of the group to laugh.

However that at last finally seemed to spur them into action, not very enthusiastically but they understood they were not going to be getting any more answers for the time being. Finally they all began to climb back down the hill towards where we arrived from to fetch their gear, leaving just me and Atalanta behind.

"Are you sure about this, Delia?" She asked quietly once they were all out of ear shot.

"She confirmed it was one of hers, think about it, it makes the most sense. All the evidence points to her still being alive somehow. Artemis never noticed anything odd because she would actively avoid coming back here."

"But we did, however that shrine is new, it wasn't here when we were last here."

"That was seven hundred years ago, Olympus was back in Italy then, Venice."

"She would still have been missing for over fifteen hundred years by that point. No one disappears without a trace that well without being seen by someone. Besides how on earth would Artemis herself not noticed she had an additional hunter still on the 'books'.

"The first generation's oath was different to what came after that binds all of us. It never had the bit about forsaking the company of men, it was simply taken as a gesture of good faith back then they would do so. It was only after the first Lieutenant went astray and incidents of girls getting 'friendly' with one another that she started putting extra wordings and enchantments into the oath to keep an eye on all of us. Even if Artemis had wanted to ask Delia to renew her vow, she would have had to release her from it first before swearing the new one. Which would have meant the curse would have killed her and what was left of this island." I explained the more I thought about this situation the more I was convinced I was correct in my analysis.

"If that is right though, why is Harmony having a mental breakdown rather than trying to find her?"

"If I had to guess, guilt. She is the goddess of the Hunt and yet she gave up on the one arguably closest to her without any form of confirmation one way or the other of her actual fate. She simply buried her emotions and moved on. We all did, however none of us actually bothered to check the simplest method of a Nymphs life sign. In my old life if someone had destroyed the garden of the Hesperides I would have died regardless of me being disowned. Likewise some small patch of it would have been affected when I died, though I am sure my sisters were quick to dig it out and replace it." I explained, sure enough I was still supposed to visit my father at some point but he had left New Rome after the War Game with the goddess of Storms. As such I still had a full suit of armour amongst my meager belongings that I needed to return.

"This place is not exactly a sprawling expanse of life though, the first gen dryads were unable to even leave Greece for long without someone digging up there origin plant and moving it, if she is still alive she must be somewhat close by." She explained and she was right, but that did not mean that she had to be on Delos, she could have been hidden on any of a hundred nearby Aegean islands.

"Anything is possible but I don't think we are going to be leaving until we have found some answers."

"Hopefully then before she gives birth, imagine if she ends up having her own children in that tiny little cave." She joked quietly, suddenly very remembering that the goddess in question was still an angry hormonal wreck most of the time, and an emotional wreck the rest of the time.

"Let's go join the others before you get us all killed."

"You know no one ever asked what we were supposed to eat on this island, there is not exactly much to hunt and cook here obviously."

"We have a daughter of Triton don't we, why don't we let her hunt in her own domain. Show us what she can do." I joked before walking down the hill towards the others.

AN. Well this might have taken a bit longer than expected. Mostly because the move took forever to sort out in the end and this left me not in the mood to get on with it until I was settled in properly. So please accept my apologies for the delay since September, as a side note due to me splitting off Percy and Thalia's next section as a separate chapter which is almost finished, the next chapter should be up after the weekend once I have finished and annotated it.

I would also like to thank TriainaMoon for their name suggestion for Delia, which honestly was frankly the easiest and most sensible name I could require for the character considering the backstory I have given her. However I still haven't decided on the Lamia Hunter so now is the last chance to make your suggestions known before I actually get to her.

As powerful as Harmony is, she actually basically needs Percy around at all times like a comfort blanket otherwise if something unexpected happens she doesn't know how to respond properly as you have seen here. This is part of her very nature, she would naturally want a boring world where nothing happens.

Anyway let me know what you think and I will upload the next chapter in a few days.