Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter. I do not own any of the Percy Jackson series or anything relating to it.
Prologue
My name is Castor Phoenix Jackson, I'm eight years old and my pronouns are he/him and she/her. I know that's confusing, but I promise you'll understand. I was born with the ability to switch back and forth between one gender and the other. Yes my mother was quite confused and I'm sure between my brother and I, we drove her nuts. She and my brother took my gender fluidity very well considering most societal norms.
My brother is four years older than me, his name is Perseus Jackson, though he prefers Percy. He's the best. When we were younger he used to have problems with telling which gender I had decided to be that day, so he convinced our mom, Sally Jackson, to get me an interchangeable bracelet, red for girl and blue for boy, so he didn't misgender me that day. Mom adored the idea and I adored that my older brother went out of his way to make sure he didn't make me uncomfortable.
Because of my ability to reassign my gender whenever I felt like it, mom couldn't keep our half-blood status a secret from us. She never told us who our father was, but she did admit that he was a Greek god, that he had dark black hair and blue-green eyes, that he loved them all but couldn't stay due to the laws of the gods, that he couldn't interact or interfere in their lives.
Mom told me once when I was maybe four years old that our father offered to make her his queen, offered to give her everything she ever wanted, but she couldn't do it. She loves him still to this day but my mom is a very independent woman. She didn't want everything handed to her, she didn't want to be a queen. She just wanted a simple life with her family and all the trials and tribulations that came with it.
Our father couldn't give her a simple life, he was too important, too powerful. The best he could do was stay away from them, and send child support payments and little gifts through the mail without the senders name and address. Even that was enough to set our mom on edge though and when we were younger she refused to use the money, claiming it was far too much for just child support.
After watching our mother exhausting herself over paying bills and babysitters by herself, Percy yelled at her that he hated that our father had abandoned us and forced her to raise us and pay bills all by herself. I stayed quiet, while my brother raged about his growing dislike for our father. When mom came in to tuck me in that night, I told her that I wouldn't let my brother hate our father just because she was too stubborn and independent to accept help from someone who was supposed to help in the first place.
Our mom took us to the bank the next day where she deposited every check in her account, before then setting up a checking and savings account for both of us. She admitted to Percy that our father sent two separate checks for both of us every month, that her exhaustion came from the fact that she was just being stubborn and trying to do everything on her own, that she hadn't wanted to depend on our father's money. That she had forgotten that her pride and independence wasn't the most important thing, the most important thing was raising us and doing right by us.
From then on our mom only worked a part time job when we were in school and was there every time when we got home. There was no more babysitters, no more long hours were we didn't see our mom, and no more worrying about the bills and how she was going to pay them. She paid what she could from her paycheck, paid the rest from the money our father sent, and then whatever was left she put in our accounts.
When we needed clothes or wanted something, she'd used our specific cards for it, showing us how to use our bank cards and teaching us about financial responsibility at the same time. I'll admit I only used my bank card for books, clothes, and painting.
My brother's interests were a little more expensive, useful no doubt, but still expensive. My brother and I both had ADHD and dyslexia. Where I decided to fight my dyslexia by forcing myself to read whatever I could get my hands on, my brother decided his ADHD was more of an issue and signed himself up for any and every martial arts and self-defense class he could.
After finding out my brother somehow managed to dust a mythical monster, with a trashcan lid, that had tried to kill us on our way home, my mom signed me up for a couple as well, though she reimbursed Percy's account and started paying for both our lessons telling us that our needs were our parents jobs to provide for while we were children and this was apparently something we both needed that she didn't take into account.
My brother went a bit paranoid after that and started looking into other ways of protecting us or weaponizing ourselves. Our mom did not approve of a six and ten year old carrying a pocket knife. Collapsible staffs, however were another story. They weren't exactly durable though so Percy had us both carrying a couple at a time. Combat steel toe boots and tactical cargo pants became a thing for my brother.
And then my brother added fingerless black leather gloves and a thick chain that hung from his belt loops, because he had to behead a monster with a bike chain. The bike chain dug into both his hands while he was choking the monster with it. It was our first big injury since finding out that mythological monsters wanted to hunt and eat us or just kill us. It was terrifying to see my brother covered in his own blood like that. I helped my brother home and when we came through the door, our mom took us straight to the bathroom and forced my brothers hands underneath the running faucet. We all watched in awe as his hands first stopped bleeding, then sealed themselves up and then finally leaving only a pale pink line through the middle of both of his hands.
Our mom signed us up for first aid classes and swimming classes and demanded we carry at least a canteen of water in our backpacks and refill it as much as possible. After we both passed our first aid classes, she took us to go get personalized first aid kits that we were to keep in our backpacks as well, mine was far more equipped than Percy's but only because I was more suited to healing than he was. A fact that my mother seemed to be greatly relieved by and Percy encouraged me to learn as much as I could about it but also to look into a long to mid-range weapon.
I started having nightmares not long after my seventh birthday, of Percy dying to these mythological monsters, of another life where both my parents died to a deranged man with the ability to use magic with a stick. When I told mom of the first one, she suggested I start meditating or do something that keeps me calm. It was the second set of nightmares that she was more worried about. She told me that when good souls die they go to Elysium, a place of rest for the dead who had lived righteous lives, but it was the Isle of the Blessed, a place where only the best souls who had lived three righteous lives in a row could retire to after their third death, that everyone strived for.
She told me that most souls who allow themselves to be reincarnated have their memories wiped so that those memories don't interfere with their new life, it is only those souls who have been touched or marked by too many gods or goddesses or souls who are too powerful that regain their memories of their past lives.
I asked her if this was why I had so many birthmarks. She gave me a strange look and told me that she couldn't see the marks, but perhaps that was because these marks were hidden so that others could not see them for my protection. She pulled one of her mythology books from her shelf and asked me to look through it to see if any of the symbols look familiar. Three of the four were.
Hestia's hearth and fire was in full color on my left bicep. Hestia was the virgin goddess of the hearth, home and family.
Hecate's wheel was in black and white on my right bicep. Hecate was the goddess of magic, the Mist, crossroads, necromancy, the night and the moon.
Artemis' bow and arrow was black on the top of my right hand. Artemis is the virgin goddess of the hunt, the moon and chastity.
The last mark was one I couldn't find, it was also one of the most simple designs. A line bisecting a circle within a triangle, it was black on the top of my left hand. Mom tells me that my right hand has always been cold but that she had never figured out why. She says it must have something to do with the mark. She tells me that most demigods who project cold auras are children of gods whose domain has something to do with death. She also warns me that those children are always judged more harshly among other demigods.
I start wearing my brothers spare fingerless black leather gloves the next day and my brother takes that as a sign to get me a pair of steel toed combat boots. I liked them but something felt off about wearing them. When I told Percy that something felt off about them, he presented me with another pair of boots but with a two inch heel on them. I adored them and wore them everywhere no matter which gender I was or what I was wearing. It also made me adore my brother even more for how accepting he was of every aspect of me.
Early this morning Grover Underwood, Percy's best friend from Yancy Academy, burst through our cabin door at Montauk beach, yelling about Percy leaving without him when he was supposed to protect him. Our mom is frantic when she asks Percy what he hasn't told us, which is strange. Our mom is usually a lot more calmer about our issues with monsters because we've learned how to deal with them. So I didn't understand why she was freaking out now just because Grover says we needed to leave now because something is after Percy.
And then Grover turns out to be a satyr, a protector sent by a demigod camp director in order to specifically protect my brother because his scent is growing too strong to ignore anymore. Percy's scent has begun to draw the attention of more powerful monsters and recently he has drawn the attention of the gods, so Percy was now in danger and needed to go to Camp Half-Blood.
Mom bundled us both into the car and we raced for the camp. Just before we can reach the borders though, the car is struck by lightning and I lose consciousness.
Read and Review Please. I'd like to know if this is worth continuing.