When the gods of the winds were on your side, you could travel pretty fast. Fast enough that it felt like only minutes before I was feeling their influence weakening and the currents of air around us began to grow choppy and unpredictable, forcing Snowstorm to flap her wings and readjust her feathers in sporadic heartbeats just to remain aloft. The closer we got to Typhon, the more we had to fly ourselves until all at once, our assistance was gone and we were on our own. I sent a prayer of thanks to the wind gods, reminding them that I had promised them pizza and shakes before then turning my attention ahead of me. The winds howled and roared to the point they were almost screaming, snapping at us as they swirled and tried to knock us from the sky. "Land!" I shouted to Snow when I sensed something hurtling towards us and from the size of it, I wouldn't have been surprised if it was the top of a mountain or a house ripped up from the ground. Snow bolted into a nosedive and when we passed under the cover of some trees, the wind lessened but it was still harsh, battering against us as we took shelter behind the broadest tree she could find. I dismounted. "When we get there the gods will be fighting and they will probably be in their true forms. This means you can't look at them."
'But then how will I fly?'
"You'll have to see the way I do. Read the currents of the wind in order to fly with them. I know you can do it, only you can do it. You're the best pegasus around, right?" I said to her as I reached into one of the satchels and pulled out a bandage which I then used to bind around her eyes so that she would not be tempted to open them or look. "And I'll be here with you. We'll navigate together. I…I don't know what will happen or if this is the right thing to do, but Percy needs reinforcements. He needs the gods at Olympus. The longer they stay fighting Typhon, the more likely Kronos will succeed in winning the war. We kill Typhon, we end things sooner."
'But my lady, Typhon is far beyond our powers. Not even the gods can kill him easily. Are you certain this is the foe you are meant to face? What if it is Oceanus, so that your father may reach here and help?' This was my one fear, well at least one of the many fears that were currently screaming in my head. The indecision, the uncertainty. I didn't know at all if this was the right thing to do, but we were here now and there wasn't enough time to turn back. Sensing my unease, Snow hastily corrected herself. 'No, I am certain you are correct, and if the Oracle spoke that this was your destiny, then perhaps you will become the hero that slays Typhon and is granted eternal glory for your victory. We can do this, Lady Lily. Together.'
"You can't just call me Lily, just once?"
'Perhaps, if we defeat this fiend and survive.' Her joke made me feel better so I slipped my arms around her neck and held her tight, feeling her head tuck itself over my back as we embraced one another. I was so grateful that she was with me, and for a moment, I wondered if perhaps Poseidon had sent her to me at camp all that time ago and she had just never told me. Somehow it seemed right, but it didn't upset me at all. I felt a distant glow of contentment, now turning my attention upon the raging battle in the distance, where I could hear the crackling of thunder as it struck simultaneously with Zeus's lightning, the zip of arrows and booms of hammering weapons as the gods flew around Typhon whilst desperately trying to subdue him. My senses had now sharpened once more, deepening so that I could sense each figure even from this distance, though this was possibly also because of the power they radiated. They were intense balls of energy like miniature suns, however the presence of Typhon felt like a twisting black hole that drew everything towards it only to be lost into a never ending pit. How was I to compete with that? Prophecies really suck.
"Alright Snow. This is it. No turning back now." I breathed deeply as I mounted up once again. "Remember not to look, focus on your other senses and we'll be fine. Let's battle a hurricane." Snorting bravely, Snowstorm released her voice in a bright cry as she reared up and flared her wings in order to lift her spirits ready for battle. Then she charged ahead and leaped into the air in order to fly straight towards the twisting mass that made nightmares seem like pleasant dreams, her hooves skimming over the treetops. She struggled against the tide, often being blasted off course where she would strive to continue trying to fly straight until I called to her. "Don't fight it! Extend your wings and tilt, let the current carry you. It's circulating, so we'll just let it carry us in a spiral to get closer!" Immediately she followed my instructions and no longer had to struggle and lose her strength. We flew at such speeds that if we crashed into something we would have died upon impact, so whenever a stray tree or clump of rock seemed to come whistling towards us, I'd shout and Snowstorm would react. She was doing amazingly, as if she had become part of the wind itself as we moved closer and closer in a large circle towards Typhon. Around us the gods continued to fight but I felt one presence come close to us, speaking in my head.
Maiden, why have you come here? Do you bring word for us? For a moment there was too much noise around me to be able to hear properly, but the further the voice spoke the quieter it felt whilst the voice remained clear and distinct.
Lady Artemis?
Yes maiden. Now, why are you come to this place? I told her then that I had received a prophecy from the Oracle and that I believed it meant I was supposed to come here, though she did not sound convinced. Brave as you are, what can a mere mortal do that we gods cannot? Leave now, before it is too late. This is not the place for demigods and horses. You will be torn apart in moments if you get too close to Typhon's wrath. But I refused. The closer I got to Typhon, the stronger the feeling that I was in the right place became. I couldn't leave, not now, so I just leaned forwards and told Snowstorm to get me to the open ground as close to Typhon as possible. This is madness! Artemis cried but Snowstorm dove away from her and the goddess did not follow. Typhon continued with each step and every time his foot pressed down, the earth trembled beneath him for his sheer size and weight. Pressure was now building inside me as I choked down my feet and drew Amaryllis, comforted to have her in my grasp. The moment Snow touched the ground, I thrust the trident deep into the earth and instantly a horrific image was conjured in my mind.
It was so intense and vast that it could not even fit, the ripples of vibrations that relayed a sensory image running out so that all I saw were a pair of giant feet and legs up to the knees creating new craters in the earth. I didn't even want to consider the height of the rest of him. However, with Amaryllis buried deep, I called to the earth and bade it quake, to rattle and shift with all the strength it could until I felt it respond. It pays to be the daughter of the Earth-shaker, I guess. The following earthquake was enough that it would have levelled a city, which frightened me more than the fact that I was facing down a Titan of biblical proportions. From Snowstorm's instinctive bearings, she told me that Typhon had made a great deal of headway and we were nearing the Hudson River, which would mean soon enough Typhon would cross into New York and everything would be over. I had to fight, I had to do something. More energy pummelled the ground and as the crust of the earth shifted and cracked like splintering wood, Typhon stumbled.
He was pushed off balance and wavered, halting briefly which the gods took as an opening to hammer against him with all their might, Zeus's thunderbolts striking with power greater than that of atomic bombs. I could hear them all in their chariots as I retrieved Amaryllis, feeling suddenly heavy and drained like I had not slept in months. Well done, it was a good strategy. A new voice spoke to me, and I could only imagine it was Athena, Annabeth's mom. But you are out of your league here, half-blood. Go back! You are not wanted here. Now this just mad me mad. Not wanted? The great and powerful gods who could barely even put a dent in Typhon, whereas I had stopped him in his tracks longer than their combined efforts, did not want my help? I felt a surge of indignant outrage and spite, thinking that perhaps I would just leave them to their fate and be done with it. They always looked down on us demigods and even the mortals, they thought that we were beneath them. They were no better than the Titans in that respect. I wanted to rage at them, to curse them to Typhon's wrath, but I held myself in check and remembered the words of the prophecy. 'Only through forgiveness shall she meet her foe, and stand amongst those she would refuse to know.' I was meant to stand with them, though I wasn't sure why.
Snowstorm suddenly twisted and arched upwards, avoiding some debris in the hurricane as I lunged to clutch onto her mane and hold on, both of us screaming as we lost control and went tumbling, caught in the wild winds of Typhon's creation. My mind became empty for fear, feeling the confusion of senses being jumbled and thrown around me until Snowstorm somehow managed to pull herself into a straight line and corrected her flight pattern, snorting and whinnying fearfully but not abandoning our task. My heart thundered in my chest, my entire body was frozen and aching, but in that moment where I was tired beyond imagination, I felt this sort of…weightlessness, as if my own mind was letting go. Yes, the gods were jerks, but weren't we all? I realised then that my anger towards them for their flaws was somewhat unfair, because I was just as flawed as they were. The words of the Sirens filled my head as if I were back on the ship and sailing past their island, hearing them loud and clear. They had listed off every negative thing about me, telling me things that I didn't even realise were true until they had spoken them out loud. I was greedy and shallow, resentful and spiteful, jealous and obstinate. All those things and more, and these words could also be used to describe the gods. If I hated them, then why did I not hate myself?
I thought of my father then, how I blamed him for abandoning us and not protecting my mom, how he had failed to protect me from Zeus who cursed me out of fear for a prophecy, despite the fact he already had a kid of his own. He was a hypocrite, sure, but then I guess being the King of the Gods makes you a little jumpy about things. That position had a bad history with Kronos and then Ouranos before him. It was no excuse, but I could understand. Besides, they had done some good things too, and Hermes had always been kind to me in particular. If it weren't for him and his gifts, both Percy and I probably would have died before even reaching the Sea of Monsters. It was always subtle, it seemed, their influence on our fates, their interventions, bending the rules so that they could watch over us. I remembered Hermes telling me how all gods loved their children, and my father was no exception. Had I perhaps been holding onto a grudge that I had no right to? I mean, I'd had a tough life, but I had Percy and mom. Others had had it way worse than me, but still they were fighting against Kronos and the Titans, even if it meant siding with the gods in a temporary truce. We had hated them for so long, maybe it was just something we had drilled so deeply into ourselves that we couldn't really remember the actual source, which in truth stemmed from the desire to be loved and acknowledged. The curse of all demigods. Always we strove to earn the pride of our parents, and so few ever managed to grasp it. It was a tragic fate, but that also was a risk for all demigods. At the end of the day, all we wanted was our parents' love.
But I had mom who loved me and Percy more than anything, enough to stomach living with a guy who hit and abused her for years before getting what he deserved, just to hide our smell from the monsters. With love like that, who needs anything else? Plus there was Percy, and we loved each other probably more than any mortal siblings ever could because we were so tightly connected through our father and the fact that we had fought and trained together side by side. There was Tyson, sweet and lovable Tyson who had burst into tears when he found out he had a big brother and sister and hugged us almost to death. There was Chiron, the closest and most present father figure we ever had, always giving us counsel and advice, training us so that we could protect ourselves in the outside world. There was Snowstorm, who even now was battling the torrential winds in order to help me fight a demonic monstrosity in the hope of saving the world, loyal and devoted. The list carried on, images and voices whispering in my head of my friends and loved ones, and I came to the conclusion then that I had more than enough love to fill any void that I carried that had previously been empty from the lack of presence of my father. Soon it was rising like the swell of an ocean wave, completely filling me up to the core as I remembered everyone I was fighting for.
For them, I could do this. Who cares about the gods anyway? We half-bloods are the backbone of their kingdom, the source of their powers and the lifeblood that flowed through them. They needed us. We did not necessarily need them. Now, they were going to see for themselves exactly why. I thought it pointless to hold onto any grudges and resentment with a war going on that threatened to tear apart the fabric of reality, and I felt that hollowness starting to gradually close within me, like a crevasse that was steadily sealing itself shut. I forgave them their faults, because I was not without my own. I even forgave Zeus for blinding and cursing me, because he had inadvertently given me a gift, to see in ways that no one else could. It opened up a whole new world to me, and now it was this blindness that was going to be my salvation, as through forgiveness, I accepted that I was in fact a demigod, a half-blood child of Poseidon. The tenseness in the pit of my gut that I always suppressed suddenly burst free like water crashing through a broken dam, and all at once I felt my body become so immeasurably powerful and strong that it had hurt.
Everything throbbed and my heart was racing so much it practically hummed and vibrated in my chest as strength renewed me from my exhaustion as if it had never been there in the first place. Amaryllis grew warm in my hand and lighter than ever, almost singing with joy as I lifted myself up in order to face Typhon as he took his first step into the Hudson River. My mind was reeling, barely able to keep up with the pulses of energy that were fluctuating all over my body as it seemingly rewired itself from a cursed, broken child to a powerful demigod. If this was what it felt like to be half god, then I could only imagine what it felt like to be an immortal goddess. My senses became so acute and perceptive that it didn't even matter I couldn't see. I could feel everything. The moisture in the air became my extended sense, everything it touched and blanketed telling me exactly where things were, their shape, size and distance away from us. Typhon was even taller than I expected, but for the first time I felt no fear, as if all the heroes of the past were rising through me and extending me their courage as I manoeuvred Snowstorm higher in order to climb above the storm where the air stilled and became eerily calm. I needed to think and plan, however even as I started to conjure up some strategy, the sound of a conch horn rose from the depths of the water, and before I even could guess what it was, a second army rose from the depths and burst into the open, where Poseidon, god of the sea, rose in challenge against Typhon. My father.