*This chapter was written by Metal Pen with some minor edits by me

Chapter 5 – A Dragon's Honour

Artemis was inside her own little personal 'bubble' of air that was following her body perfectly. Percy on the other hand, was gracefully floating about the beautiful blue depths of the lake with expert precision and skill. Under the water his body seemed to have adopted a soft green aura about him which didn't surprise Artemis at all, everything about him was somehow tied to that colour.

Percy finally let his gaze make it's way to Artemis and that was the exact moment that she saw it. His eyes were still the same emerald colour and just as piercing as ever but they had changed into narrow slits the same as any Dragon she'd ever encountered. They reminded her of the sheer intelligence that they all had in common, the cold analytical mind that was constantly processing everything at a million miles an hour.

"Down here, Azazel cannot smell our scent." He told her when he popped his head into her air bubble. So far she'd been rendered completely speechless by him. How had this even all started? She'd found her girls being hunted by the thing they were hunting. That was it, so how was she now under a lake without the danger of drowning, staring into the most beautiful pair of eyes that she'd ever found herself looking at, was entirely beyond her.

"Erm," She started before coughing, surely she could come up with a better response than that but if Percy had noticed her immensely obvious blunder, then he was politely choosing to ignore it. "I can only assume that's because of the water clouding our scent? What will happen when we leave the lake?" She asked him. She was worried about the prospects of this Dragon turning out to be as tenacious as she'd heard them to be and if that was the case then it was more than likely going to be waiting for the two of them to emerge from their hiding place so that it could pick up their scent once more.

"By the time we leave the lake, we'll already have a plan to deal with Azazel, I mean, I DID have a plan but when I expertly constructed said plan I didn't have a Goddess willing to take me to the very centre of my target area. He must have sensed the power you used to transport us because the very instant that we arrived he was suspicions and started to smell us out. That was when he caught my scent." He shrugged briefly before donning a carefree expression and moving back into the water, content with swimming around her bubble aimlessly while she desperately tried to figure out a solution to the problem.

"So, how long will it take for Azazel to pick up our scent when we're out of the water?" She decided that if she had to fight against an Ancient Dragon then having one with the same power would actually help her to formulate a worthy plan.

Percy shrugged though which didn't help her at all, "After having found your scent once, I'll always know where you are whenever you're within a few miles of me, that's just how Dragons work though to me you mean more than simply prey so that might have an adverse effect on it. It would be safer to assume that Azazel will be able to find both of us pretty quickly." Percy had stopped aimlessly swimming and instead was lying there with his hands across the back of his head, just casually relaxing under a lake that may well have been besieged upon by a Dragon.

Artemis couldn't open her mouth after that. Every time Percy answered one of her questions, his phrasing would give her two more that she simply couldn't ask. Did he even mean ANYTHING by saying that she meant more to him than simply prey!? This was the first time in her thousands of years living that she was genuinely feeling like nothing more than prey.

"I've got it!" Percy interrupted her train of thought once again, "If we ask him REALLY nicely to lie down, close his eyes and count to ten million, then maybe, just maybe, we can get through this without offending any of the other Dragons. You know, offending them more than I already have." Percy laughed to himself when he saw the completely dead-panned gaze that Artemis gave him. She was unamused to say the least.

"Are all Dragons this bad with their jokes?" She huffed slightly, awaiting an answer from the one before her who just scoffed at her question. All Dragons? How ridiculous!

"Artemis, there are like, seven or eight Dragons EVER that can even speak some broken level of English. I'm likely the only one that will ever tell you a knock knock joke." He told her with a slight degree of incredulity attached to his tone, almost as if she should have known that already.

"Then how are you even able to converse with them?" She pointed out. Her eyes were wide with wonder and she looked like a curios child shrouded in sheer innocence. Percy couldn't help but find it cute, he wanted to point it out to her and tell her that she looked adorable but he also liked living without being shot in the genitals multiple times so he decided rather wisely to keep his comments about Artemis' level of cuteness to himself.

"Did you not hear me earlier? Dragons are old, so very old. We speak in Dragon tongue, a very old language made for the Dragons by the Dragons. Huh, that sounded like an infomercial, awesome." Percy muttered slightly before returning his wonderful eyes towards Artemis, "Let's go, I'm going to return us to the surface, there's not going to be a much more effective plan for taking Azazel's head other than to just approach him gun's blazing." Percy told her confidently. His happy and cheery expression was gone and he had changed into full war mode. She wanted to see him transform, she wanted to see the true power he held but after he'd told her that he couldn't control it, she knew that the chances of her seeing a Dragon that she could fight beside were incredibly slim.

"We don't have any guns." Artemis told him casually. The two of them started to rise towards the surface and Percy let out an audible sigh at Artemis' lack of mortal knowledge.

"It's a Human phrase, we don't have to have guns to go in gun's blazing. It basically just means that we're going to take everything on head first." By the time Percy had finished explaining his choice of metaphor, they had reached the point where the water rippled around them. Percy watched with intense focus at the swirling mass of dark clouds that were gathering overhead, that was sure to keep the mortals away from them at least. High above the end of the valley there was a blotch of the purest black that Artemis had ever seen, the thing was the same size as her fist because of the distance.

"Bok los nau mu! Azazel, I will bring you down just as I did to Mirroth!" Percy's voice was so loud that Artemis wasn't certain but she could have sworn that she saw the vibrations of it in the air as they echoed down the valley all the way. Within seconds, the black spot in the horizon had unfurled some humongous wings that were at least three times the length of the body either side. It dropped from it's perch and glided towards them.

"I never thought I'd be saying this but now that I'm living through this exact experience, Dragons are truly terrifying." Artemis whispered, barely restraining herself from grabbing Percy and taking them both to the safety of Olympus. She had to mentally reprimand herself, she was a hunter, this is what they did. Percy was as content as ever to continue to stand tall against the oncoming threat of the massive Dragon that was flying straight towards him but then, he would be wouldn't he? This was what he did, Percy Jackson was a Dragon Slayer.

Seconds had passed before the ground rumbled and the trees shook all around them from the gargantuan force exerted where Azazel had landed with all fours on the ground. Percy held his sword by his side with no signs of raising it against Azazel. This was the first interactions of two Dragons.

"Fin graag draac!" Azazel's head made Mirroth's look like nothing, just the black Dragon's head was bigger than the baby Dragon Percy had killed previously whereas Mirroth's head was the size of Artemis' body.

"You're going to need a bigger plaque for this one." Artemis whispered to which she was ignored by Percy but it didn't prevent Azazel from glaring at her. It seemed that even if he couldn't speak the tongue, he understood it well enough.

"English Azazel? It would make this confrontation a lot easier." Percy cocked his head to the side as if struck by an off though, "A lot less exposition as well." He muttered under his breath. He knew for a fact that Azazel was ranked among the highest of the Ancient Dragons and over his lifetime before being sealed in Pandora's Box had become a master of many languages aside form the Dragon's own.

"As you wish green Dragon, but make no mistake, I will not hesitate to end you, I only gave you the honour of the Dragon's meet because I am not an unfair Ddraig. I can smell your scent, it is overwhelming, full to it's every component with incredible power and that is an undeniable sign of your true nature. You are a Dragon through and through, though some might dispute it because of your favoured form, the both of us here and now know for a fact that you are one of us." Azazel's voice was rich and deep yet well spoken if not a little bit slow. He hadn't used that language in a long time and wanted not to mess it up.

Percy was slightly taken back, for one titled as the black Dragon of Death, he had been nothing but respectful, he had granted Percy with the tradition of a Dragon's meet where the two would greet one another face to face peacefully before commencing battle.

"Very well, I thank you Lord Azazel for your respect. I believe you already know the reason that I have had my hand forced in upholding this disgusting duty and as such I will not only be taking your head," Percy slowly pulled out a vial on a chain around his neck that was glowing ominously with a blue light, "But I will also take your soul to add to the burden I have. I will respect your honour with some of my own and will fight you fairly, the Goddess will not intervene." Percy's words struck Artemis like a wrecking ball.

She was being forced to sit back and watch while Percy fought off the ridiculously large Dragon in front of them. "I was impressed with the hearsay that you toppled Mirroth, though a small Dragon she was tough and I suspect that blade on your back was your trophy from her. You surprise me even more so in the flesh, very well. I shall return to my perch, shout for me when you are ready to commence, it won't be hard to miss if you really are planning on fighting me as you should." With that, the grand black Dragon ripped through the air with his wings before turning tail and returning to the spot he'd been at before.

Artemis wanted to ask him about the necklace she'd seen but found that her mind was quickly derailed from her thoughts when she saw him taking his sword off of his back and the necklace off of himself before placing them in a pile next to her. "Per-"

"No. You, sit here, watch my sword and my souls and wait patiently for me to return, please and thank you." He told her confidently. She'd never, NEVER, been spoken to like that before, much less from a man. She didn't even know how to respond, should she shoot him? Should she do something that a virgin Goddess who had sworn to forgo the company of men definitely shouldn't do? So many thoughts raged through her mind.

Wait, what was that last one?

"He has shown me the respect from one Dragon to another so I shall do the same, besides, look at the size of him, I cannot defeat him with my sword as a Human. Man, I really didn't want to have to resort to this on my second Ancient Dragon but I guess I have you to rely on if I get out of control." He told her with a sigh before taking his leather jacket off, followed by his shirt. When he was done, to which Artemis had become greatly flustered by, he was standing in his boots and trousers with his lean upper body completely exposed. There was a small tattoo over his heart of a trident.

"No, but-" Artemis tried to get a word in but again she was interrupted by him. His soft gaze that he'd given her ever since they'd left his home had hardened in a split second and turned to a glare of steel. She was feeling even more like prey in the presence of the deadly hunter before her.

"Nothing will prevent me from going through with this Artemis but if it makes you feel any better, I have a plan for all of this which I'll tell you after I've finished my business here, I believe that Azazel has already figured out what I plan to do." Percy told her. His glare softened when he thought about being too hard on her. In the three years he'd been missing he'd risen well above the Gods but they weren't used to being treated as such and more importantly, he had come to care a great deal about her, or rather, his instincts screamed at him every single time he looked at her, he had to exercise extreme control whenever he was around her or she'd very quickly be trying to kill him if he went with it and tried to claim her as his mate.

"What do you mean?" The question hung in the air while Percy trudged towards the lake. The transformation he was going to undergo wasn't pretty and he'd rather spare Artemis from seeing him in such a state before returning how he planned.

"I mean that the Dragons, EVERY single Dragon that I've hunted down, none of them have exercised and evil will of their own. They're being forced to do the things that makes me have to slay them. Whoever stole Pandora's Box from Hestia and filled it up is the one who had set out to curse me in the first place. The Dragon's are innocent." Percy's words echoed around her mind while she watched him wade into the lake before being completely submerged. It had only taken a few minutes of tense silence before the entire lake bulged and exploded outwards from the centre, sending great waves crashing down on the shore.

She couldn't believe her eyes but right there in front of her, rising into the sky was an emerald green Dragon with sharp spines sticking out along it's back. He was easily the same size as Azazel if not larger with his huge arms that were tipped with talons the size of her arms. With a roar of defiance and power, the two Dragons flew towards one another. This was what she had wanted all along but she was about to see that the green Dragon was in a league of it's own.