Being obnoxious, it was easy for Cassidy and Percy to ditch Grover at the station. They rushed off when he went to the bathroom Instead of waiting for him they got their suitcases, slipped outside, and caught the first taxi uptown.

"East One-hundred-and-fourth and First," Percy told the driver and they quietly hurried to Percy's home. They were both so shaken by Grover and what had happened they didn't chat, but Cassidy had this feeling that he was about to kill someone. He had managed to guess a lot from Percy's comments about his home life that it was not great. Little details that stuck out and made him hate the idea of letting Percy be alone when he went home.

Proof of this started the moment they entered Percy's apartment. Gabe, as Percy had described him was in the living room, playing poker with his buddies. The television blared ESPN. Chips and beer cans were strewn all over the carpet.

Hardly looking up, he said around his cigar, "So, you're home."

"Where's my mom?" Percy said

"Working," he said. "You got any cash? Who the hell is this fag?"

Cassidy felt ice in his veins, and without hesitating, he approached Gabe. "Nice to meet you, I'm Cassidy." He said and grabbed his hand squeezing so hard the man's bone ground together, making Gabe call out but he did not stop. "Sorry, I have a condition that makes my adrenal glands overreact. I always am at peak strength. I could probably lift a car like a mother saving her babies." He squeezed harder and Gabe's grunt turned into a terrified scream. The man's hand was turning purple, his eyes wide and shaking. Turning, Cassidy smiled winningly at Gabe's friends. "Nice to meet you all, would you like to shake my hand?" They all shook their heads. "Now, what did I hear about you asking a twelve year old for cash?" He leaned in, Gabe threw a fast fist trying to clock Cassidy, but he just caught it. "Two handshakes, so kind of you." He squeezed the fist and the man screeched as the bones started to crack under the pressure. "Pulling him in close, he snarled at Gabe. "Touch him or Sally, and you lose your arms. I don't mind going to Juvie for snapping your ugly neck." Throwing him back with enough force to send Gabe into a wall, he turned to the others and smiled. "It was so unfortunate how Gabe fell, isn't it?"

They all nodded, shaking. "Yessir."

"Ahh, so respectful. Now you are going to clean this apartment top to bottom, all of you, or I will show you what kickboxing taught me. I promise, if you call the cops, I will give them a reason to arrest me. Several, mostly your dead bodies hanging from the stairwell outside."

And like that, he turned on heel and marched away with Percy to his room. Percy broke out into deep laughter. "God you are scary."

"I didn't mind the fag comment I look like a girl I am used to it but the rest... that bothered me. I figured he was abusive to you, Perc, I don't tolerate that. Tell me if he breathes around you wrong and I will kill him happily." Frowning, he saw the state of Percy's room. There were muddy boots on the windowsill, it reeked of nasty cologne and cigars and stale beer.

"Percy?" They both jumped at that moment, turning to face a stunningly beautiful woman. Her eyes sparkled and change color in the light. Her smile is as warm as a quilt. She's got a few gray streaks mixed in with her long brown hair, but she oozed youth. Cassidy swore he felt something in his chest at the sight of her, it wasn't romantic, but he almost felt the love she held for Percy as a tidal wave that crashed through him.

"Oh, Percy." She hugged him tight. "I can't believe it. You've grown since Christmas!" Then she turned to Cassidy and yanked him into a big hug. "You must be Cassidy, my baby told me all about you, how you helped him to pass, stopped bullies and so on. You are always welcome in my home... so... what did you do to Gabe? He and his friends are scouring the apartment?"

He grabbed her hand and squeezed, lightly, making her gasp. "I am really, really strong. I hate abusers, which is what you married ma'am. He responds to shows of strength. So I showed him that I can and will kill him. He was easily moldable after that. " Leaning in, he grabbed her face and gave her to coldest, warmest expression, a mix of the two that he felt as natural as could be as someone with bipolar could get. "Ma'am, why would you get with a man that hurts you, that hurts your baby? If you are trapped, I understand. My parents were like that too... If you need help, I will help you."

He was shocked to see fear in her eyes, and pain that he related to as much as could be.

She sighed. "It is complicated... " She whispered. "I literally cannot get help for this..."

"Yes, you can. There is almost always a way out, but you have to be the one to reach for it."

She sighed again, expelling pain and fear all at once before turning to Percy. "I have a surprise for you," she said. "We're going to the beach."

Percy's eyes widened. "Montauk?"

"Three nights-same cabin."

"When?"

She smiled. "As soon as I get changed... and Cassidy is going with us. I already asked his foster parents."

"How?" Cassidy frowned.

Percy let out a laugh. "My mom wanted your number, to ask your foster parents if you could hang out during the summer... I guess she used it."

Sally nodded. "You are Percy's best and closest friend, I had to have you around." She smiled, then sighed once more. "Once we get to Montauk, we'll talk more about... whatever you've forgotten to tell me, okay? Both of you."

::::

Gabe was a good little, terrified boy and said not a damn word as they left the apartment in his Camero. It was so sweet, that Cassidy was glaring at him daring him to make a move clearly had no bearings on the situation. None at all really.

The rental cabin was on the south shore, way out at the tip of Long Island. It was a little pastel box with faded curtains, half sunken into the dunes. They got there at sunset, opened all the cabin's windows, and went through a cleaning routine.

Then they walked on the beach, fed blue corn chips to the seagulls, and munched on blue jelly beans, blue saltwater taffy, and all the other free samples Sally had brought from work. She made a point of including Cassidy into every conversation, asking him about his life, his interests, and squeed about his cute he was. It was really, really nice and he could not help but deeply love her. She was all a parent should be, and he felt like her very aura was hugging his. If that made any sense to anyone but Cassidy.

When it got dark, they made a fire. They roasted hot dogs and marshmallows and vegetarian meats that Sally somehow knew to buy! Sally told them stories about when she was a kid, back before her parents died in the plane crash. She told them about the books she wanted to write someday when she had enough money to quit the candy shop.

Eventually, Percy got up the nerve to ask about his father and Sally's eyes went all misty.

"He was kind, Percy," she said. "Tall, handsome, and powerful. But gentle, too. You have his black hair, you know, and his green eyes." Sally fished a blue jelly bean out of her candy bag. "I wish he could see you, Percy. He would be so proud."

"How old was I?" Percy asked. "I mean ... when he left?"

She watched the flames. "He was only with me for one summer, Percy. Right here at this beach. This cabin."

"But... he knew me as a baby."

"No, honey. He knew I was expecting a baby, but he never saw you. He had to leave before you were born." She sighed then turned to Cassidy. "So tell me about your parents, Cassidy?"

"Well, Dad and mom were abusive. Dad more so, they split up a few years back and Dad went to far so I went into foster care. I don't talk to either, but I am open to talking to mom. Her mistakes were more from being young when she had me, not much older than I am now. We are a lot alike, so much it is scary. I get my bipolar from her mother, and I look just like her. The same complexion, same high cheekbones, same curly hair. I used to have her blue eyes when I was a baby, then my eyes turned this greenish grey as I got older. We both love to read fantasy, like most of the same food, and just are a lot alike. I miss her sometimes, really I do." Then he frowned. "I was almost adopted though when I was a baby, this lady tried to adopt me. June Castors. Dad told me about her, I was sick as a baby and she took care of me when my parents could not. She is paying for me while I am in foster care, even to this day. She sent me care packages at Yancy, she got me into therapy for my temper and meds for my bipolar. My parents could not pay for them, well dad could but chose not to. I guess she is my third parent but at a distance."

Sally's eyes were wide and filled with something he could somehow read. It was a mark of... not pain but something similar. "You know... that... Percy's father had a sister who was sometimes called June... and she looked a little like him. The Same black hair though hers was curly..."

The conversation deviated from there and none of them really spoke much for the rest of the night.

That night Cassidy had a vivid and very odd dream. It wasn't like he was participating in the dream, but watching it from above.

It was storming on the beach, and two beautiful animals, a white horse and a golden eagle were trying to kill each other at the edge of the surf. The eagle swooped down and slashed the horse's muzzle with its huge talons. The horse reared up and kicked at the eagle's wings. As they fought, the ground rumbled, and a monstrous voice chuck-led somewhere beneath the earth, goading the animals to fight harder.

Percy was there, and he ran toward them, but he was running in slow motion.

As the eagle dived down, its beak aimed at the horse's wide eyes, he screamed, No! And the dream shattered,

Together, he had Percy woke with a start.

Outside, it really was storming, the kind of storm that cracks trees and blows down houses. There was no horse or eagle on the beach, just lightning making false daylight, and twenty-foot waves pounding the dunes like artillery.

With the next thunderclap, Sally woke. She sat up, eyes wide, and said, "Hurricane."

Over the roar of the wind, Cassidy heard a distant bellow, an angry, tortured sound that made his heart ache. It was the sound of something that hated the world. That had seen the world's ugliness and had never been given help. It was a sound his heart had made a thousand times.

Then a much closer noise, like mallets in the sand. A desperate voice-someone yelling, pounding on their cabin door. Sally sprang out of bed in her nightgown and threw open the lock.

Grover stood framed in the doorway against a backdrop of pouring rain. But he wasn't... he wasn't exactly Grover.

"Searching all night," he gasped. "What were you thinking?"

Sally looked at them in terror-not scared of Grover, but of why he'd come.

"Percy," she said, shouting to be heard over the rain. "What happened at school? What didn't you tell me?"

Percy was frozen, looking at Grover. It took Cassidy a second to realize why, but after a moment he saw it too.

"O Zeu kai alloi theoi!" he yelled. "It's right behind me! Didn't you tell her?"

Cassidy was stunned, his brain was too shocked to register that Grover had just cursed in Ancient Greek, and he'd understood him perfectly.

Sally looked at them sternly and talked in a tone she'd never used before: "Percy. Tell me now!" Percy stammered something about the old ladies at the fruit stand, and Mrs. Dodds, and Sally mom stared at him her face deathly pale in the flashes of lightning. She grabbed her purse, tossed both boys their rain jackets, and said, "Get to the car. All three of you. Go!"

Grover ran for the Camaro-but he wasn't running, exactly. He was trotting, shaking his shaggy hindquarters, and suddenly his story about a muscular disorder in his legs made sense. Cassidy understood how he could run so fast and still limp when he walked.

Because where his feet should be, there were no feet. There were cloven hooves.

And Cassidy's brain exploded, a thousand things made sense. Stories upon stories, the weird man he had seen as a boy with eyes all over his body ( People said they had to be tattoos) and the chicken ladies he saw in the sky, or the pretty lady smiling at him from the Rainbow when he was six...

Percy and he were Demigods or something to that effect... and Grover was a freaking Saytr. Which really made no sense given that not only was Cassidy not an only child but none of his full blooded siblings had powers, were super strong or anything like that.

Something was weird and damn it he would figure it out.