7/14/20

Got struck by inspiration, enjoy!

All characters belong to Rick Riordan.

Wordcount: 1778

The Lady of the Night

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Camp Half-Blood POV:

Campers rushed around the valley, carrying weapons and arrows. Hammers rung out from the forges, the Hephestus campers making arrowheads, swords, axes, and all the other weapons of war. Ares and Athena campers were placing mines, barbed wire, and other traps on the hill, while Demeter campers worked on growing thorns and stinging nettle. The woods were already loaded with traps. Deadfall traps, pits filled with Lethe water (From the Hypnos cabin), swinging logs covered in spikes, trip wires hooked up to greek fire, and other nasty traps littered the woods. They were not going to go quietly.

Chiron sat on the Porch of the big house, watching the Campers go to and fro. He was worried. While only half the campers were veterans, having survived the Titan war, and, while outnumbered nearly 2:1, they held every other advantage. The Legion, while strong and well trained, was under-equipped. Spies had reported nearly half the Legion lacked proper armor, and several soldiers were forced to carry steel swords. They were also being constantly harassed. When night fell, two small creatures would sneak into the Roman camp, stealing weapons, armor, and anything else they considered valuable.

The legion would be marching right into a massacre, yet their leader, a skinny, blond-haired boy, pushed them on.

But, that was not what Chiron was worried about. He was worried because Dionysis had been on Olympus for nearly two days now. He had been relatively unbothered by the Greek-Roman schism, based solely on the fact he spent every waking hour at Camp Half-Blood. He had mention something about Percy before leaving, which worried Chiron immensely.

A bright light appeared in front of Chiron, and he averted his eyes. The light died down and Chiron turned back. Dionysis sat down on the couch, and a glass of wine appeared in his hands.

"Mr. D, your restrictions," Chiron gently reminded him, but Dionysis didn't appear to hear. "What happened at the meeting?" Dionysus looked up, and Chiron finally met his eyes. His eyes held an emotion he had only seen once before, after the battle of the labyrinth.

"Jackson got himself killed." Chiron nearly choked on his spit, and his heart sank into his gut. Percy had been his favorite student, behind Annabeth, who as he had found out the other day, had been taken as well. He hoped she was doing ok. Chiron was devastated, but this way simply the way of things. Heroes would mess up once, and wouldn't have a chance to learn from their mistakes. All that could be done was to move on and let them live o in your memory.

"Has he?" Chiron asked, and Dionysus nodded, "The council is going to accompany the quest. We leave in the morning." Chiron nodded, and Dionysus stood, "Well, I must prepare," Dionysus raised his glass, full of wine, and downed it in one gulp.

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Percy POV:

Percy had been in the presence of all the olympian council before, but even that didn't compare to the amount of raw power that emanated off the being in front of him. His knees went weak and he almost fell over, but he managed to stay standing.

She was looking directly at him, her eyes black as the void behind him. She was still clapping as she stared at him. His grip on his sword tightened as he stared right back at her. She began to move forward, with each step growing smaller until she was around his height, and standing right in front of him.

"I have been watching you for a long time, Perseus," she spoke, and Percy flinched at the use of his full name, but he still muttered, "Stalker much?" Nyx merely raised an eyebrow, as if amused.

"You first caught my attention when you blew up Mt. Saint Helens," she ran a finger down the scar marring his face, causing shivers to run down his spine, "The gods crafted his bonds to be able to withstand the might of all but the mightiest of blows. Even Zeus master bolt would have a hard time breaking them, but for a 15-year-old demigod to break his chains alone? The power required…" she trailed off, and her eyes gained a faraway look.

Now, he knew he had released Typhoon, but he had been lead to believe that he was barely contained, able to break free at a moments notice. But, apparently, he was tightly secured. No wonder Hephaestus had praised him on Ogygia. No wonder half the council wanted him dead.

"I healed you after your encounter with the Arai, I convinced Tartarus himself to spare you. Had I not intervened, Typhoon would have hunted you down the moment he sensed your presence," Percy's mouth went dry at the thought. He had seen the carnage Typhoon had caused, only falling due to the combined might of the entire olympian council. The fact that he would have hunted him down terrified him. The only thing stopping him from certain death was the figure in front of him, Nyx, "You are in my debt, son of Poseidon"

Now, being in debt to a god was bad enough. You could ask them to open a pickle jar and in exchange, they thought they owned your soul. Now, being in debt to a primordial was definitely worse.

"Wha- what do you need me to do?" Percy managed to stutter out. Nyx tilted her head and a small smile graced her lips, as if she found Percy's nervousness amusing.

"Simple. Become my champion."

If Percy had been drinking anything, he surely would have spit it out. "C-come again?"

"Become my champion, spread fear and awe in the name of the House of Night."

"B-but why me?" Percy questioned, mind still reeling from the fact that a primordial wanted to bless him.

"Simple, you are the most powerful demigod in history. It is not every day that a mortal duels with Kronos and lives. You carry more than just his weapon, hero. Kronos imbued you with the remainder of his power before he faded, making you the new embodiment of time. You are as close as a being can be without being an immortal."

Percy was speechless. He knew Kronos had given him the rest of his power, but to make him the embodiment of time? Not even Apollo would have seen that coming.

Percy blinked, and he focused back onto Nyx, who was watching him curiously, "Well, will you accept my offer?" Percy thickly swallowed, "Uh, yeah, sure."

Nyx grinned, as he had just made her day, "Just be warned, this might hurt a bit." Percy blinked, "What will?"

Just as soon as the words had made their way out of his mouth, Nyx pus her hand on his right bicep and his arm erupted in white-hot pain. It reminded him of when he got his tattoo from the legion, but cranked up to 100.

He felt his teeth grow longer and sharper in his mouth. His hair grew longer, reaching half-way down his neck. His muscles grew stronger and leaner. Nyx removed her hand and Percy collapsed to his knees, panting. His upper arm still felt numb, and his whole body ached.

When the pain finally subsided, Percy stood on shaky legs. He glanced at Nyx, and she had a strange expression on her face as she looked at him. Percy glanced down, and just now remembered he had used his shirt for rags quite a while ago. He blushed, but it wasn't like he could just materialize a shirt out of thin air to put on. As he was looking down, something caught his eye. On his right bicep, covering his whole upper arm, was a new tattoo.

Putting it into words would be doing the tattoo an injustice. It was an hourglass, but instead of sand, it was water, and shadows curled around the hourglass, like vines. His mom was going to kill him.

Nyx averted her eyes and cleared her throat, "Sorry about that. I haven't exactly done this before. Anyways, I refuse to let you spread the word of the house of Night in such an," she gestured to his barely clothed self, " inappropriate state. I have decided to give you a gift." She waved a hand and the shadows around them condensed, before flying right at Percy.

His vision went black as they span around Percy, covering him like a burial shroud. The shadows slowly condensed, until he felt fabric brush against his skin, and the cool bite of metal on his head. His vision slowly came back, and the sight in front of him almost made him reach for his sword.

Standing in front of him was a heavily armored man. He wore classical greek armor, not unlike what they gave out at camp. The man's armor in front of his was black, and it seemed to suck in the light around it. Chainmail sat under the main armor, just in case a stray slice hit a chink in his armor. The scariest part was definitely the helmet. The helmet was also a standard greek helmet, and the horsehair plume dyed blood red. The eye holes emitted a harsh gold out of one eye and a sea-green out of the other.

The man standing in front of him was him. He reached up and pulled off his helmet. Normally, wearing a helmet restricted the wearer's vision and hearing quite substantially, but he couldn't tell any difference with this one. The armor was also light, almost impossibly so.

The mirror disappeared, and Nyx stepped out of the shadows, "If you think about wearing it, it will appear on you, and if you think about taking it off, it will disappear into your tattoo. I have taken this opportunity to give you a spare set of clothes, but I cannot give you any more than that. My husband is also watching you, and he is far less diplomatic than I. I can give you advice, however. There is an old friend waiting near the doors of death. Now I must go, know when you wake you will be close to the Doors themselves. Be careful, my champion."

And with that, she waved her hand and Percy fell into the first dreamless sleep he had since he became a demigod.

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Had fun writing this one. I had been planing Nyx blessing for a long time, and I think I got it right. Please leave a review!