So sorry about the long absence of updates here. Some stuff happened in my life and I had a hard time writing for this story. Though I will say that the story is not abandoned. I love the story too much to do that to you guys.
Also for those of you that haven't picked up on it yet, the story is called Violet's Playlist for a reason. All the chapters will be titled after songs that I feel represent the fell of that chapter. So with that I will open things up for suggestions on songs that you may want to see in the story.
Also, again, this portion of the story, that is the history of Thalia, Luke, and Annabeth should last for two more chapters before I start to heavily introduce HP items into the story. So please a bit more continued patience is greatly appreciated.
One last thing here, Myself and Ethan found a timeline for the PJO books and we are going to use that for the dates in this story. So for the HP portions of the story the years will be moved forward roughly 9 years. Hope that doesn't cause any misunderstandings with the time frame for the HP parts of this story. So with that in mind I have updated the previous two chapters to include the years and months that each scene takes place in.
Alright that's it for the long AN, so please enjoy Chapter 3 of Violet's Playlist.
Chapter 3
Chasing Pavements
Violet reached out her hand for the handle of the door. Her fingers closed around the knob and gave it an experimental twist. The knob didn't move at all. Removing her hand she looked to Luke with a small grin on her face. "Hey Luke, can you do the thing?" She asked the older boy.
Luke shook his head slightly and pulled out two bobby pins from his pocket. Stepping up to the door, he put both bobby pins in, one towards the top and the other towards the bottom. His fingers began to glow slightly as he moved the pins in the correct way to click each tumbler into place. Within seconds there was an audible click as the door unlocked. Stepping back, he pulled his golf club from off his back pack. He had lost his sword a few months ago and they had run out of arrows for the sole bow they had between the three of them. They had not found a weapon cache for a while, so Luke had switched to the golf club he was holding. After stepping away from the door he gestured for Thalia to enter first. It was something they had decided on when they couldn't find another Celestial Bronze weapon for Luke, Thalia would enter first then Luke would go in and Violet would cover their rear. Thalia stepped up to the door and turned the knob and slowly pushed open the door. As the door opened further the three of them were assaulted by a wave of stale air that smelled of dust and mold. Screwing up her face a bit, as if to ward off the smell, Thalia walked into the house her spear held ready in her hands. Once she was in, Luke stepped in and after him. Violet went backwards into the house, looking around making sure nothing was about to ambush them from the yard. As soon as Violet had stepped past the door it swung closed and clicked lock again. All three of the demigods jumped as the door slammed shut.
"Shit," Thalia swore as she immediately went to try and open the door again. When she stepped in front of the door, it shimmered away, that left a wall as plain as the rest of the room. The three of them began to frantically look around the room for any means of escape. Violet got her head first and made a dash for the nearest window. As she reached the window, the drapes came to life, and started to encircle and trap her. Violet managed only a single shriek before the drapes tangled around her throat and began to strangle her. Hearing her shriek, both Thalia and Luke sprang to action to try and aid their friend. Thalia thrust her spear hoping to tear the curtain but everytime her spear got close the curtain moved out of the way of her strikes. It failed to move out of the way of Luke's golf club swing. Thalia started pulling Violet free, as Luke's golf club continued batting the curtain away. . As soon as Violet was free from the curtain, Thalia pulled her to the middle of the room. Luke followed closely, as his eyes darted around for other things that had the potential to attack. Once in the middle of the room, Violet collapsed to the floor coughing and gasping for air. Thalia and Luke stood protectively around her as she got her breath back. Getting back on her feet Violet looked around for her trident.
"Hey Squirt," Luke said once Violet was back on her feet. "Looking for this?" She turned to face him as he held out her trident.
"Thanks Luke," Violet said, still wheezing slightly. She took her trident back, the shaft clinking against her charm bracelet, now holding four charms beside the charm her trident becomes. She had found a new charm waiting for her each year on her birthday. The bracelet now held a seashell, a shark, a horse and a piece of jade adorning her bracelet. Standing in the middle of the living room, the three demigods looked around the room trying to figure out where to go next. After exploring around the first floor and finding the kitchen, where they resupplied a bit, as well as a bathroom, they decided to finally head to the second floor.
Treading carefully up the stairs weary of another attack they came to the second floor stepping into a hallway. Going down the right side they find a study as well as what appears to be a small library. Moving back to the stairs and then down the left side of the hallway finding only a single door. Stepping up quietly to the door Thalia and Violet flanked each side while Luke crouched down in front of the door. Placing his picks on the knob but his magic wasn't activitaing and so he placed his hand on the knob and turned. The door opened slowly and as the door opened he peered into the room beyond. In the room there appeared to be a desk with a man sitting behind it, on the wall that Luke could see there was a bookshelf that was filled with numerous books, even more on that one shelf than what they found in the library. As Luke was about to close the door and inform Thalia and Violet when a voice cut through the silence.
The three demigods jumped, as they heard a voice behind them say,"Ah you are finally here, please come in." Spinning around, they found themselves face to face with two creatures. They were thin and had short brown fur and piercing red eyes. One of the creatures opened its mouth and the same voice from before came out. "Please come into the room now." Thalia, not trusting the monsters or the man in the room, raised her spear and lunged forward at the one of the monsters. The spear tip hit the monster square in the shoulder but instead of piercing into the monster it simply bounced off. Moving faster than any of them could keep up with, the other one jumped at Thalia and racked its claws down her right arm. Crying out in pain, Thalia clutched at her now bleeding arm with her good arm. She held her spear in a death grip with her bad arm. Deciding that it was probably safer in the room with the unknown man, Violet and Luke grabbed Thalia and dragged her into the room. Slamming the door shut, Luke pushed his body against it as he tried to hold it closed. Violet threw off her backpack, quickly rifled through it, and pulled out a small thermos and a roll of bandages. Pulling out her silver hunting knife, Violet cut off the remains of Thalia's ruined sleeve. She opened the thermos, and poured the little bit of Nectar they had left over Thalia's wounds. Thalia gave a sharp his of pain . After she poured the Nectar over the wounds Violet unrolled the bandages and carefully wrapped Thalia's arm up. With Thalia's arm now bandaged and the monsters seemingly not trying to break into the room, the three of them were able to take a look around the rest of the room and rest easy for a moment. After catching their breaths, all three demigods turned to the man that still sat behind the desk. Grabbing her trident from where it rested beside her Violet leveled it at the man.
"Who are you?" she asked, a slight hesitation in her voice. Although she had fought numerous monsters over the last four years she had yet to truly fight another human, outside of the occasional spar against either Thalia or Luke. Though in a situation like the one they found themselves in now she felt she could do what needed to be done to protect her family.
The man gave a sigh and opened his mouth to speak before he closed it again and a voice echoed into the room from the other side of the door. "I'm sorry, it seems that the three of you will be the latest victims of my curse."
Luke's face twisted up into an angry scowl at the man's words. "The hell do you mean?!" Luke nearly shouted at the man.
The man let out a quiet sigh at Luke's angry exclamation. "My name is Halcyon Green, I am a child of Apollo." Halcyon's voice, the three of them assumed, continued from the other side of the door. "I was gifted with the ability to see into the future by my father. I was told to never speak of the future to anyone, however I saw the fate of one girl who was going to die and I told her of her fate." At this his voice paused as Halcyon reached into a drawer in his desk pulling out a bronze dagger and placing it on the desk. "The girl gifted me this dagger, as thanks for saving her life. My father, on the other hand, was very angry with me for going against his word. And so I was cursed to never be able to leave this place, my boyhood home, as well as to only be able to speak through the mouths of my guards, with my only purpose to guard a treasure my father left in my care." Again the voice outside the door paused as Hal reached into another drawer and pulled out a lock box and placed it on the desk next to the dagger. "Many demigods have come into this place trying to claim this treasure but all have fallen to the leucrota when the time comes for them to feed, which is a mere 5 hours away." He finished off his speech with a glance at the watch he wore.
"Are you serious?" Violet asked, fear slipping into her voice. She didn't want it all to end here. She didn't want to lose Luke or Thalia, she hadn't reunited with her other family yet. Gripping her trident tighter she made up her mind. It wouldn't end here, it couldn't. Thalia picked herself up off the ground favoring her left arm and turned to face Halcyon.
"We aren't going to die here, we've been in worse spots than this and came out of it." Thalia said with resolve. She turned to Luke then. "Hey if that box is locked you think you could do your thing on it?" she asked him. Luke gave a questioning look. "What? If Amaltheia led us here then it was probably because of whatever that treasure is, so we might as well grab it while we're here." Luke nodded his head at that. Thalia made a good point, Amaltheia had always led them to something important.
Luke walked carefully up to the desk, keeping an eye on Halcyon in case he tried anything. He pulled out his bobby pins and placed them inside the lock for the box. After a second his hands took on a slight glow as they began to move on their own. Within a minute the box opened with a soft click. Opening the box Luke reached inside and pulled out the only thing in it, a simple silver bracelet. Luke was confused when he saw the bracelet, it looked to be ordinary leather nothing special about it.
However, once Thalia saw the bracelet she felt a pull towards the bracelet. Almost as if it was calling out or singing to her. She moved forward and reached out her hand to the bracelet. Luke had a curious look on his face as he watched Thalia move forward and as she got close to him he held the bracelet out to her. Grabbing the bracelet from Luke, Thalia placed it on her left wrist. Once it was on her wrist the bracelet glowed slightly before transforming into a shield. The shield was a simple round leather shield that was a little under three feet wide. As the shield appeared on Thalia's wrist, Luke jumped back in shock and fear as he saw the front of the shield. The front of the shield was a depiction of a woman with a snarling expression and snakes on her head in place of her hair.
"Holy shit! That looks way too real!" Luke exclaimed, catching his breath and calming down slightly. It was Halcyon who was the most surprised upon seeing the shield. For the first time in their meeting he spoke, through his own mouth.
"That is the Aegis, or even a replica." The three other demigods all looked at Halcyon with surprise painted across their faces. Halcyon had talked to them in the room, instead of through the door. Halcyon also did a slight double take at his voice coming from himself for the first time in decades. Quickly composing himself he explained to them what the Aegis was.
"So my dad sent Amaltheia to me so that I could get this." Thalia said quietly. She gazed down at her wrist, now again adorned with the leather bracelet. After messing with the shield, she had managed to switch it back to the bracelet. Looking back up to Halcyon she had a determined look in her eyes. "Ok, so now that it looks like your curse is lifted we are getting out of here." Thalia said as she looked at each person in the room. Violet had felt a swell of confidence after hearing what exactly the Aegis was. However that swell of confidence was gone once Halcyon spoke again.
"Unfortunately the leucrota can not be harmed by any metal, be it mortal or divine, as well they are incredibly fast predators and will attack anything outside this room and even in this room once it is time for them to feed. It is only after their feeding time that the door will reappear."
No one spoke after that statement. None of them could. They couldn't help but let sorrow start to take hold of their hearts. It seemed that this would be the end of their journey. Seeing the faces of the children who had helped to free him, at least partially, from his curse Halcyon couldn't let them fall into despair. Tapping on a small rectangular shape on his desk Halcyon caught the attention of the three demigods. "There may be another way to deal with the leucrota." He said clearly, hoping to bring back the conviction they had only a few moments before.
"How? You said they couldn't be harmed by any weapon." Violet asked him, her voice hesitant but some hope slipped in to it.
"No. I said no metal could harm them, not no weapon." Halcyon corrected her gently. Luke's eyes lit up at what Halcyon was saying.
"So we just have to find a weapon that isn't made of metal, and we would be able to fight them off. That's genius Hal!" Luke said. Halcyon seemed a little perplexed at Luke's apparent change of heart towards him.
Luke, ever observant, noticed Hal's curious look so decided to elaborate. "You were cursed by the gods, just because you chose to save a girl from death. And we thought that you were doing all this for kicks and not because you were forced to. So I want to say I'm sorry for how we acted before." He gestured to himself, Thalia and Violet, who both nodded along with what Like was saying. "So now, if you can help us get out of here we will help you get out as well."
Halcyon held back a sad chuckle at Luke's words. In the decades he had been cursed every demigod whom he had told his story, none had empathized with him and had only scorned and cursed him till their last breath. Now it seemed that these three would help him escape.
"Very well then. We need to start looking for the solution to our problem, we only have about 4 hours now before sundown." Halcyon said as he opened the rectangular object on his desk. As a light emanated from the object, the three other occupants of the room gathered around him to see what the object was. Hal suppressed a small smile at the wonder on each of their faces. "This was a gift from a man named Quintus. He said that it would function similarly to the computers the mortals have created but he had also included a database of many thousands of books and other items he had collected. So if there is anything that could kill the Leucrota, it should be found in this." The four of them set to work to try and figure out a way to kill the monsters blocking their escape. As the minutes ticked by and multiple dead ends were found, it seemed like their Hope's were in vain until Violet noticed a passage on one of the pages they were looking at.
"There!" She exclaimed pointing to a section in the passage. "Greek fire, a fire that will burn regardless of where it is and will not stop burning until everything around it is consumed. That sounds like it could work." She looked to the other three for their opinions. Luke nodded in agreement, Thalia gave a soft hum for her agreement and Halcyon moved the cursor over the highlighted word and clicked on it.
"Hm, it does give the recipe for the fire here and I have most of the ingredients in this room but we are missing the most crucial one, lightning." He said in a tired tone. It would seem, to him, that their final hope for escape was gone.
"Well if we need lightning, I could make some." Thalia said, to the surprise of Hal. Seeing his look Thalia shrugged. "My dad is Zeus and I've been working on making lightning for the last couple years. It's still not great but I can make a few small bolts."
"No, that's perfect. According to the recipe we do not need a lot, just enough to charge all the ingredients." Hal said as he got up from his desk and went about his room grabbing the ingredients listed on the recipe. Soon enough Hal held a small glass jar with a slightly dark green liquid inside of it. He turned to Thalia and gave her the jar. "Now all we need is for you to put a small bit of lightning through the jar so that everything can be mixed and charged." Hal told her as she took the jar.
Holding the jar, Thalia gained a look of concentration as she tried to will a small bit of lightning from her hands and into the jar. The next few minutes passed agonizingly slow as they waited to see if their final plan for escape would work. Soon though a small flash of light and a crack of thunder resounded through the room. When the light died down the liquid in the jar had changed from a still, dark green substance into a bright green and swirling substance. Hal let out a mighty laugh, which prompted the other three to laugh as well realizing their plan could work and that they would survive the day. After calming down Hal glanced at his watch and noticed the time. They only had 10 minutes before sundown.
Glancing at each of the kids before him Hal saw glimpses of each of their futures. Luke, in a throne room fighting with a scythe against a black haired teenager, Thalia reuniting with lost family after many years, and Violet finding a family she never knew she lost. It saddened him but at the same time resolved him into the course he was about to take. The three children who had helped to free him from his curse, gave him hope for a better future would not meet their ends here, he would make sure of it. Moving over to his desk one final time he picked up the knife that he had pulled out hours ago. Walking up to Luke he held the knife out to him, hilt first. "I have already told you that this knife was a gift from the young woman whom I saved. I want you to take this and remember me." Hal said as Luke closed his hand around the hilt.
"Wait, remember you? Aren't you coming with us?" Violet asked as Hal positioned himself near the door to the room.
Hal gave a sad smile as he said, "No, there isn't much time left before the leucrota break into this room and feed on everyone in here. So,I'm going to lure them away while the three of you escape."
"But why?" Luke asked him.
Hal smiled a bit at the question. "I'm old. And I've made too many mistakes, so I am hoping that this will at least atone for some of them. Besides the three of you are young and have your whole lives ahead of you, so let this old man act as a hero should one last time."
"But-" Violet began but stopped when a hand was put on her shoulder. Violet looked back and saw Thalia shaking her head.
"Good luck, Hal. Hope you make it out." Thalia said as she handed him the jar of Greek Fire.
Hal took the jar from Thalia, as he prepared to open the door and lead the leucrota to their doom. After giving one last look to the three that freed him from his curse, he steeled himself and threw open the door sprinting into the hallway with a cry. Instantly the leucrota began to chase him, and as he and the monsters disappeared inside one of the rooms a small explosion was heard. At that the three demigods made a dash for the living room and hopefully the door outside. Making it into the living room the three of them found the door had once again reappeared. Violet reached the door first and wrenched the door open as Luke and Thalia rushed past her. Making it outside the three of them had to take a minute to catch their breath. Turning back towards the house the three of them saw green flames licking at the windows of the upper floor of the house. The three of them stood there in a moment of silence, paying their respects to the man they had initially hated for getting them trapped in a death trap but they came to respect him for sacrificing himself so they could survive and escape. In the distance though they could hear sirens in the distance.
"Come on, we need to get out of here." Luke said, his voice clouded with grief and something else neither Thalia or Violet could detect. Though they knew that Luke was right, it was hard for the two girls to walk away from the mansion. They had only known Hal for a short while but it wasn't fair that he died for them to escape. After another prompt from Luke though, both of them did realize that they needed to leave or they would have to answer questions they couldn't answer in a reliable manner. So it was that the three demigods walked away from the burning mansion, tears fell from their eyes as the smoke and flames rose into the sky. They had walked for a while after that, the sky had opened up and rain had started to fall. It soaked them down, the chill from the rain adding into the slight cold the breeze had brought to them. They had walked for about twenty minutes from the mansion before Violet came to a stop. Thalia and Luke continued on for a few steps before they realized Violet had stopped. The two of them turned back towards where Violet had stopped. "Hey Bubbles you alright?" Luke called out to her. His use of her nickname brought Violet out of the slight stupper she had been in.
Violet turned to Luke and Thalia, confusion on her face. "I felt something coming from down this way." She said raising a hand to point down the alleyway she had been looking into. This statement caused the other two demigods to reflexive tense. Whenever any of them had felt something they all took it as a sign of danger.
Thalia moved up to the edge of the alleyway and peered into it. She could see clearly to the other end of the alleyway and couldn't see anything that might have set off Violet. However upon close inspection Thalia noticed a small crevice in the side of one of the walls. Giving a sign to Luke, Thalia began to move down the alleyway slowly. Close behind her Luke and Violet both followed her. Once the three of them were close to the crevice all three of them stopped. The crevice seemed to be covered partially with a few bits of chain and other metal things. Sharing a glance between the three of them, it was decided they would kill whatever was in the crevice if it was hostile. If it turned out not to be hostile, they would just move on. They quickly positioned themselves around the crevice and prepped themselves. Thalia had her spear and new shield out, Violet held her trident in front of her and Luke had his knife at the ready. The three of them had just barely gotten into position when a sudden yell tore through the almost silent alleyway. A small yellow and red blur shot out of the crevice and towards Violet. As the blur moved towards Violet she braced herself to impale the blur but her instincts screamed at her to lower her trident. Almost against her own will, her trident lowered and instead of impaling the blur she instead took a blow to her stomach from a hammer. Violet doubled over clutching at her stomach as she tried to catch her breath.
"Hey!" Thalia shouted as she rushed up and grabbed the girl who had struck Violet by the wrist, forcing her to drop the hammer she was holding.
"No! No more monsters!" The girl screamed out. She began to struggle against Thalai's hold.
"Hey, it's okay. We're not monsters." Luke said as he came up behind Thalia and the girl. The girl began to calm down as she looked to Luke.
"You're not?" The girl asked. Luke laughed a bit at the innocent look on the girl's face.
"Yeah, I'm Luke, the girl you hit with your hammer is Violet, and the girl next to you is Thalia."
The girl looked down as Luke introduced each of them. "I'm Annabeth." The girl said shyly.
"Where's your family?" Thalia asked, though she figured she knew the answer based on where they found Annabeth.
"They don't want me. So I ran away." Annabeth told them. Violet had recovered by this point and she looked up to Thalia and Luke. A silent conversation passed between the three of them. Finally it was Luke who spoke again.
"Well how about we become your new family, because we're just like you. We don't have families anymore either." Annabeth looked up at Luke, her eyes seemed to fill with hope.
"Really?" She asked him. All three of them laughed a little at Annabeth's actions. Even as Annabeth frowned at the laughs, Thalia answered her question.
"Yeah, really. We'll look after you and you won't have to be alone anymore." At that statement Luke had a small revelation. Kneeling down so he was eye level with Annabeth, he pulled out the knife that Hal had given him just a short while ago.
"If you're going to come with us, you're going to need a real monster slaying weapon." Luke said as he held the knife out to Annabeth. Her eyes widened at the sight of the knife. "But this can only be used by the smartest of fighters and something tells me you are pretty smart, aren't you?" Nodding her head as Luke continued to speak. "Alright then. As long as you have this knife I promise that we won't ever let you down like your family did. Okay?" Once more Annabeth nodded her head.
"Alright then," Thalia said. "Now that we have another mouth we should get some food and find a place to sleep tonight." Luke and Violet looked at Thalia and nodded their heads. Though at Thalia's words Annabeth looked to Thalia with a question on her face. Seeing her questioning look Thalia kneeled down to Annabeth. "What's up?"
"Can we get chocolate?" Annabeth asked. The three others all had a smile on their faces at the question. Violet stepped up to Annabeth and offered her hand to the girl, who gladly took it in her own smaller hand.
"Let's see what we can find." Violet said as she began to walk out of the alleyway with Thalia and Luke following behind. As they continued to walk the sky began to clear as the final rays of the setting sun shone down on the now group of four demigods.