My ears were still ringing, and my head was pounding, but it was my heart that ached the most right about now.
"He really left without me," I whispered, unable to keep the shock and hurt out of my voice.
I watched as Leo and Jason flew through the air and descended onto the streets of Bologna. The mortals on the ground seemed undisturbed by the pair of demigods who just landed or the huge trireme floating overhead. But disturbed was the perfect word to describe how I was feeling.
Leo hadn't even stopped to see if I was okay. Sure, I was fine, but he didn't know that, and he didn't seem to care either. To me, it seemed like he couldn't wait to get as far away from me as possible. That's how he was acting a lot lately, and I didn't know why. But I did know one thing.
I was pissed.
"Frank!" Hazel's panicked shouts pulled me from my spiraling thoughts. "Frank, wake up."
I glanced over and sighed deeply. Hazel was currently busy trying to stir a two hundred kilo silverback gorilla back into consciousness. The rest of the deck was a complete mess. Piper and Coach Hedge were still tied up and scattered among the few things those damn dwarfs hadn't pilfered from the ship.
Naturally, I'd have to be the one to clean this mess up. I reached for the dagger on my thigh and approached the captives. When Hedge saw me coming, his beady eyes widened, and he thrashed against his duct tape bonds.
"Hmm! HMMMhmmmm!" Coach Hedge's pigtails bounced in fear.
I chuckled at his reaction as I carefully cut him free. "Just be still, ya old goat."
After a few minutes, the satyr and the daughter of Aphrodite were free once more. Piper looked like she wanted to squeeze the life out of those monkey dwarfs with her bare hands, but they were long gone by now.
"I just hope Leo and Jason avenge me," she said, kaleidoscope eyes flashing darkly.
At the mention of his name, I scowled.
That son of Hephaestus was sending me nothing but mixed signals. One second I'm like the apple of his eye, and the next I'm chopped centaur liver. It was hard not to be confused and irritated. Despite my annoyance, the sight of gruff and agitated Coach Hedge having to sit still as Piper pulled pink pigtails from his hair managed to make me crack a smile.
Frank appeared to be coming to as well, and he had successfully transformed back into his adorable baby sumo wrestler self. He was rubbing his head and sporting a dazed expression, but otherwise back to normal. Hazel was trying to get him to eat some ambrosia, but what else is new with that girl.
I grimaced at my own salty disposition. Although we'd been through a lot together, I still felt a weird spike of jealousy occasionally around those two.
Maybe I wanted what they had.
I shook my silly thoughts from my brain. Coach Hedge was right; teen hormones are evil. It was beyond stupid to be worried about things like that when all of our lives were at risk.
And yet.
"I'm headed to the engine room," I told the others, but I doubted that anyone cared.
When I entered the engine room this time, I wasn't planning on working on the ship. No, I had way too much pent up energy, and I really needed to let it out on something, anything.
I got a brilliant idea and pushed all the unused work tables against the walls and stacked them, creating a huge amount of empty floor space. I placed an array of weapons nearby on the work tables. After combining a rusty old training dummy with a poorly drawn caricature of Gaea, I grinned wickedly at my new victim. It wasn't a very flattering picture of the earth goddess, but I was especially proud of the speech bubble by her head that said "I am a dirty poopy faced BITCH". The nuns back at St. Mary's would be very unhappy.
After the preparations were complete, I outstretched my hands and closed my eyes. Magical energy buzzed from my fingertips, and I opened my eyes in time to see a Celestial Bronze sword fly from the table and into my right hand. An Imperial Gold sword flew from the table on the other side into my left hand.
"Okay, that was dope," I murmured in awe.
There was more than a little surprise in my tone before a knowing smile grew on my face. It seemed like whenever I lost one trick, that I managed to discover another. My magic poured into the swords eagerly and they rapidly grew to twice their original size with an audible shink!
"Oh yeah, that'll do," I bounced on the balls of my feet with excitement. "That'll do just fine."
I twirled the blades masterfully before unleashing a flurry of attacks on the Gaea Dummy. I was nothing more than a whirlwind of gold and bronze, hacking and slashing without restraint. I practiced exchanging weapons while simultaneously pulling my energy from one, back into my own body, then into the next weapon. It was difficult at first, but after a while I was interchanging magically imbued weapons as easily as I would change my clothes. My anger melted away with each strike, stab, blow.
It also helped that each hit to the dummy would go right to Gaea's stupid dirt face.
It was many hours later before I returned from belowdecks. Jason and Leo had came back, but Festus had notified me of that a while ago. I didn't feel any compulsion to leave the engine room until the dinner bell sounded. My stomach growled ferociously as if it had just remembered I'd only eaten omurice today.
I wiped the sweat from my brow and put away most of the weapons save for my sword and dagger. It didn't feel right to bring the whole arsenal to dinner, but I also wasn't comfortable being completely unarmed. As I headed out the engine room door, a part of me wondered sadly if I'd ever be able to conjure my own weapons again.
What if they were never mine to summon in the first place?
Whoa, there's Peri's deep thought for the day.
I was so lost in the trenches of my own mind that I bumped into someone on my way to the stairs. Their hand gripped my forearm tightly, preventing me from stumbling backwards.
"You okay, chíca?"
Ugh, I would look uncoordinated as fuck in front of him after being a complete badass not even five minutes ago!
"Yeah, I'm fine," I pulled myself from Leo's grasp, my fragile ego bruised badly. I pointedly ignored the fact that I could somehow still feel the warmth of his fingertips on my skin through my shirt. I knew he was hot, but damn— really brain? Not now.
"Mhmm..." Leo's eyes roamed up and down my form unabashedly, and he looked like he wanted to say something before changing tact. He nodded to the engine room, biting his lip ever so slightly. "Doing repairs?"
My mind reeled, and I didn't know if I was flushed right now because of the way he so openly ogled my body... or because I wanted his hands everywhere his eyes had just been. I had to restrain my gaze from wandering down to his lips; the way he was nibbling on his bottom lip was tempting. It was suddenly hot in the quiet hallway, and I wondered absently if one of the engine pipes had sprung a leak.
And what the hell was he going to say before?
"No, just a bit of sword practice," I could barely hear my voice over the sound of my own pounding heart.
Why is this happening? We're just talking!
It became painfully obvious to me that I was quickly losing control over the situation. Looking back it may have been a bit childish, but I decided to focus on being angry with the son of Hephaestus rather than come to terms with my unstable attraction to him.
So, like the absolute psychopath that I am, I snapped at him. "You've got some nerve to try and butter me up after treating me like I don't even exist for the past couple days."
Leo rubbed the back of his neck sheepishly. "I'm sorry, seriously, I don't know what came over me. I just got so mad and all I could think about was chasing down those pesky dwarfs. But hey, I got our stuff back! The Archimedes sphere and—"
"Holy Hera, enough about that stupid Bronze basketball!" I threw my hands up, and I felt my anger bubbling in the form of my powers.
I just wanted to scream: what about me?!
The sword at my hip and the dagger at my thigh trembled, and I had to will them to stay sheathed. Leo took a step back from me. I took a few deep breaths to calm myself until the magic humming beneath my skin stilled.
Okay, so maybe anger wasn't the right tactic.
"I know that there's a lot on everyone's minds right now," I started, but I had no idea what I was trying to say. "But I just thought that... you and I... we..." I trailed off weakly.
Was there even a we?
"Just forget I said anything." I truly had a talent for putting my foot in my mouth, but boy did it jump out whenever I was around this cute curly haired pyrotechnic.
I rushed upstairs as warmth bloomed up my neck and cheeks, cursing the first day I ever learned to speak. If I was lucky, a mountain god would launch a boulder right at my head and put me out of my misery. Unfortunately, I wasn't assassinated before I made it to the ship's dining area (ha, as if you could kill a bad bitch like me so easily).
Most of the other demigods had already gathered at the table, and Hazel gestured for me to sit beside her. She had a big bowl of seafood gumbo in front of her, and the inviting aroma made my stomach growl once more. I teased Frank about his choice of American Chinese food, and he laughed between bites of egg roll. By the time my plate was full of Chicago style deep dish pizza, Leo was taking his seat at the table across from me. His thick brows were furrowed, and his expression was one of deep thought. He mumbled his order, and his golden plate magically filled with an assortment of Tex-Mex barbecue, but Leo picked at his ribs half heartedly.
I chewed my lip and stared at my reflection swirling back at me in my goblet of water. Guilt filled the pit of my stomach, negating the last of my appetite. I pushed my half eaten plate of pizza away and snuck a glance at Leo from beneath my lashes. There was a light chattering of voices, but it felt like the two of us were in our own separate bubbles of silence. I wasn't sure if it was better to pop those bubbles or let them be. My thoughts were a swirling storm cloud of doubt and confusion. I wasn't the brightest, but it was unlike me to be this unsure of myself.
Before I realized it, the others were finished eating and rising from their seats. I dumped my food scraps into the fire before making my way to the deck. The warm summer air was humid, and I fanned myself for some sort of relief. The night sky was beautiful, though many of the stars were concealed behind thick herds of fluffy clouds. The Argo was flying so fast that the clouds swirled and raced by—
WHOOM!
I hit the deck just as an angry flurry of air surged right at me, crackling with static energy so close to my face that my hair puffed up like a cat. I rolled to my feet just as another bundle of wind and electricity charged at me. I unsheathed my sword in time to slash at a third as more and more surrounded me.
"Storm spirits!" I called out, magically ringing the ship's alarm bells.
The sounds of fighting broke out quickly, and I was thankful for having the foresight to practice my skills earlier. It was trickier to focus on the flow of energy during the heat of an actual battle, but before long I felt the familiar buzzing of magic at my fingertips.
Hazel was surrounded by a group of furious venti, and Frank had shape shifted into a bobcat to dodge the lightning strikes easier. Leo's hands were ablaze, and he swung wildly at any storm spirits that approached his precious Archimedes sphere. I growled and magic surged through the sword in my grasp. Somehow I locked eyes with Leo just as the blade was growing longer, and for the first time it dawned on me how suggestive this might look to someone else. I'd never realized how... phallic a sword was until now, and heat rushed to my face. It was just for a moment during this chaos ensuing all around us that we were still, eyes glued to each other, but it felt like so much longer. His Adam's apple bobbed, and his chest rose and fell deeply. Even now as we were under attack, Leo managed to find the time to undress me with his eyes. My blood was pounding in my ears, but I knew it wasn't because of the venti.
As much as I would've liked to stay rooted to that spot and ponder for hours what exactly that look in Leo's eyes meant, I simply couldn't. A storm spirit zapped me with electricity, literally jolting me to a start. I swung my massive blade, barely missing the speedy swirl of wind and lightning. The venti seemed to enjoy tormenting us, zipping and flying just out of range before zooming back to send a burst of electricity through our bodies.
"Over here you smelly gas clouds!" I ran back and forth across the deck and goaded the venti. I managed to get quite a few of them away from Hazel who had been quickly overwhelmed by their sheer numbers.
I did my best to distract as many storm spirits as I could, riling them up and using my huge sword to scatter their wind bods, but it was only temporarily. Jason was the only one who could really eliminate these more powerful venti, and the rest of the crew were pretty much just targets for their lightning darts. By the time the last of the venti were destroyed, my hair was almost as frizzy as Hazel's.
Everyone was exhausted, and the deck was a mess again. The air smelled of singed hair and skin, and it crackled with electricity (I couldn't tell if it was because of the venti or Jason). After returning my sword to its normal size and sheathing it, I slumped against the mast and sank to the floor breathing heavily. I closed my eyes to focus on bringing my heart rate down slowly, and my ears picked up on a few things. The rough bristles of a broom on the wooden floorboards. The hum of the ship's engine. Heavy footsteps approaching.
"Shift change, Peri!" My eyes opened to see Piper's choppy brown hair blowing in the wind. "Jason is getting in the shower now, so you can hop in next and then get some well earned rest, girl. You deserve it."
"That sounds great actually, thanks, Pipes." I gave her a grateful smile and lazily watched her walk to the helm beside Leo and Hazel, probably to relay a similar message.
The three of them talked animatedly for awhile, gesturing to the Argo's navigation console, map display, and the Archimedes sphere. I was too far to hear, but I supposed they were discussing the ship's course, and instructing Piper on the proper flight patterns. It was a pretty rough night last time it was her turn to steer with Jason, so hopefully she paid attention to their advice.
Leo raised his arms and stretched, his taut back muscles rippling beneath his torn work shirt capturing my attention. That heart rate that I was trying so hard to decelerate was starting to pick back up again. Even at this distance, I could see he was sweaty and wondered absently about what his masculine scent mixed with his natural musk would be like. When he pulled the bottom of his shirt up to wipe the sweat from his face, my jaw literally dropped. It had been a while since I'd seen his abdomen, but it seemed his lean bod still had a hold on me. His head turned my direction, so I quickly picked my jaw up off the floor and looked literally anywhere else. I tugged absentmindedly on my thigh high socks and stared up at the starry night sky. Footsteps approaching made my breath hitch.
"Hey, Peri, shower's ready for ya," Jason's voice surprised me as the blonde boy popped up beside me. The corner of his scarred lip upturned in a smile.
"Oh sweet thanks, Jason," I returned his smile and rose to my feet.
That shower sounded oh so good right about now, so I made my way down the stairs and popped into my room. I grabbed an oversized tee and a clean pair of undies to change into and entered the bathroom. I pulled my hair free of its updo before stepping inside the glass paneled shower. The steamy water was a soothing relief on my aching joints, and I sighed happily at the feeling.
Showering had become a therapeutic escape for me aboard the Argo since it was the only guaranteed time of peace and quiet all to myself. These days, I'd stand under the superheated water until I couldn't stand anymore— or like tonight, until I found myself falling asleep standing up. I blinked my eyes open and quickly lathered, rinsed, and repeated so that I could finish my shower and finally hop in the bed. I threw on my night clothes before going back into my room and crashing on my plush bed where I was snoring within minutes.