Chapter Two: My friend is a goat…huh?
The next afternoon as she was leaving the three-hour-long Latin exam, her brain drowning in Greek and Roman names, Mr. Brunner called her back inside. She had half a mind to ignore him and keep going. But despite the man being a centaur in disguise, she still respected him enough to return to the class. She immediately regretted it as soon as he opened his mouth.
"Sera," he said. "Don't be discouraged about leaving Yancy. It's … it's for the best."
His tone was supposed to be kind, but it was hard to see it that way since he was still being loud enough for everyone to hear. She didn't care all that much, considering she had absolutely no problem with leaving, but having everyone hear what should've been a personal conversation was a bit demeaning. Nancy Bobofit smirked at Saber and made sarcastic little kissing motions with her lips. Saber held up a hand to stop Mr. Brunner and grabbed the iron sphere he kept on his desk. "Sorry about this, sir." She turned and threw it, the orb smashing into Nancy's face with a crunch, knocking her out of her chair with a thud as she hit the floor. The class was reminded right then and there why she was considered the most dangerous person in the school and all went back to minding their own business. She turned back to a shocked Brunner (if that was actually his name. Mythos' tended to change their names when in hiding) and grinned.
"Sorry," she said, not really meaning it. "I've been waiting to do that since I got here. Nancy there has a bad habit of poke a sleeping dragon in the eye." She smirked as she referenced the nickname Kalie had given her the first time she saw her fight a Drakon in Central Park. "And since I'm leaving already, I don't have to worry about getting in trouble anymore. Don't sweat it Mr. Brunner. This place wasn't for me anyways. I'm not much of a school girl. Too different." With that, she turned on her heel and headed out the door.
Last day of term, she was happily stuffing her clothes into her duffle bag. Everyone else was talking about their summer plans. Some guy was going hiking in Switzerland. Another was cruising the Caribbean for a month. They were all rich, money wise. Her summer would consist of simultaneously hunting monsters, trying to puzzle out who was mad at her and why, all why avoiding the Child Services. Fun times. The only person she dreaded saying goodbye to was Grover. She had long since forgiven him for lying, seeing as he seemed to be trying to look out for her. But as it turned out, she didn't have too.
He had booked a ticket to Manhattan same as her on the same Greyhound bus, so they ended up sitting together as they headed to the city. She knew it wouldn't last long, she was heading to Central Park to visit Kalie before she headed west, and he was probably going to wherever he lived. The whole ride he kept glancing around nervously, almost as though he was waiting for something bad to happen. Being honest, she was too due to her eternal bad luck but she really didn't stress over it. At the school, she had assumed it was because he was worried about being picked on, but that had been before she figured he was some kind of forest Mythos. Finally, she couldn't handle his constant twitching.
"Looking for Kindly Ones?" she half sneered, surprising herself with how angry she sounded. Guess I'm not as over it as I thought. "That is what you call monsters right? Kindly Ones?" she scoffed at the name. There was nothing kind about the monsters of the ancient world, she had learned that the hard way.
Grover paled. "Wha—what are you talking about?"
She snarled, causing the scraggly boy to flinch. "Don't play games with me, Grover. I've been dealing with monsters since I was six-years-old. I know what a Fury is. I also know what the Mist is and the Gods, not that I like them all that much." She explained about how she had listened in on him and Mr. Brunner, who she ousted as a centaur. "It was a nice touch, trying to make me think I'm going crazy by using the Mist to make everyone forget Mrs. Dodds ever existed. Would've worked if I was anyone else."
With every accusation, Grover winced, looking very much ashamed at the words the shaggy haired girl was hissing out.
"It's bad enough you think I'm helpless, but you seem to think me an idiot as well!" she finished with a snap.
He hung his head and she looked out the window, fuming silently as she tried to rein in her anger. She'd have to get to Kalie for a massage. That always helped her loosen up a bit. She was interrupted form her heated musings as there was a huge grinding noise under their feet. Black smoke poured from the dashboard and the whole bus was filled with the smell of rotten eggs. The driver cursed loudly and carefully pulled over to the side of the road. As soon as the bus pulled to a stop and the doors opened, Saber was out on the side of the road, her dark red baseball cap pulled low over her eyes.
They were on a stretch of country road, the kind of place you wouldn't notice if you didn't break down there. Behind her was nothing but trees and litter from passing cars. Her face twisted into a snarl. She hated litterers. Considering her best friend was a Dryad, she was very picky about people putting their trash in trash cans. On the other side of the road was an old-fashioned fruit stand. The stuff on sale looked great: blood red cherries and apples, walnuts, apricots and jugs of cider in a claw-foot tub of ice. There were no customers, just three old ladies knitting a pair of socks that could fit a Hyperborean Giant. The lady in the middle held a massive ball of electric-blue yarn, while the two on the ends knitted the actual socks.
The women themselves looked ancient, faces wrinkled like fruit leather, silver hair tied back in white bandanas, and bony arms sticking out of bleached cotton dresses. She sighed in exasperation and waved at the three old ladies. They'd met before. The Three Fates. The lady in the middle smiled as warmly as the three ancients were capable of and went back to focusing on her sisters as they knitted. Saber turned to Grover, who had come to stand next to her, to see him pale faced and twitching nose.
"T-they're looking at you? You know the Fates!?" Grover sounded as though he were about to have a heart-attack. Saber only nodded and looked back to the Three Fates. Her blood froze in her veins as the middle Fate pulled out a pair of shears made of gold and silver – The Shears of Fate. Saber watched as the old woman kept staring directly at her and cut the yarn. She could hear the snip from four lanes away. The old woman's smile faded a bit and the three women methodically put the yarn away. Despite the heat, Saber quickly moved back into the bus. She knew she was stronger than the average demigod, both due to her heritage on both sides of her family and due to her unusual ability to call upon ancient and powerful weapons once wielded by Heroes and Villains alike. But the Fates were the type of creatures you couldn't pay Saber to fight. Nothing could defeat them, and she and the Ancients had had an iffy relationship since that day in LA.
She sat down with a shudder. She hadn't died when the cord was cut, so either it wasn't her time to die just yet or she wasn't the one going to die. She'd have a hand in their death, but it wouldn't be her. Didn't make her feel all that better. It was always disturbing on incomprehensible levels, watching those Ancients cut the cord. It had only happened twice before, but it always made her feel cold inside, almost as though her power over the seas had turned to ice. She shook herself to clear her head to clear it. She dimly heard the driver exclaim in triumph as he fixed the bus, barely noticed Grover muttering to himself as the bus took off again. I seriously need to go see Kalie.
Confession time: Saber may or may not have ditched Grover at the bus terminal. Whether or not it was rude, she couldn't handle his worrying on top of trying to puzzle out whether or not it was her that was going to die or someone else. The Mythos-in-disguise's bladder acted up when he got upset, so as soon as he headed to the bathroom at the terminal, Saber had grabbed her bag and hopped in a taxi headed to Central Park. Her mind was still racing from what had happened with the Fates. She needed to talk to Kalie.
First thing to know about Kalie. She was Dryad. Second thing to know: she was the second kindest person Saber had ever met. And the only person who could get away with calling her Sera without making the girl uncomfortable. The Dryad was always helping the homeless around the Park, her green hair and bright smile brightening everyone's day. The cops couldn't evict her, since anytime they got close, she would simply melt back into her oak tree. She was also the reason Saber knew that not all creatures hidden by the Mist were evil, murdering bastards. Saber had been hunting a group of Dracaena; Snake-Women; through Central Park when she was about eight-years-old. She had cornered them after three days of tracking only to find that it was a trap. A trap made even worse when she had tried to summon Arondight, sword of the Knight Lancelot. The pain that had lanced through her from attempting to use such a powerful weapon she hadn't been familiar with had forced the girl to her knees.
She had barely managed to summon a nameless black longsword before the snake-women had been on top of her, slashing with their claws, scimitars and spears. It had been a hard fight, but she managed to kill them all, though not without being severely injured herself, having been slashed along the ribs by a set of razor talons. After she had passed out sitting against an oak tree, Kalie had found her in a pool of her own blood. The tree had happened to be her tree, so she had taken offense to blood on it until she had seen the eight-year-old slowly bleeding out. When Saber had woken up, she had found herself in a small cave with her wounds dressed and bandaged. And had promptly almost took the dryad's head off as she entered to check on the injured girl. It had taken a couple of months of being on the mend in the tree spirit's care to slowly realize that not all the creatures hidden by the Mist were monsters wanting to kill her. Since then, they had been the closest of friends, almost sisters.
It was that connection with the dryad that brought a smile to Saber's face as she spotted her surrogate sister's leaf green hair bobbing between different homeless people under one of the many bridges in the Park, the dryad passing out food, blankets and jackets with a bright smile. Saber waited with a patience reserved only for the green haired girl, watching with a warm smile as the girl moved back and forth, exchanging niceties with the homeless. Of course, even that brought back memories of her mother Sally. She had been everything Saber had hoped to be when she grew up, before the giant Lion had killed her. Warm, compassionate, generous and patient as the mountain. The only time she had ever seen Sally yell was that day on the beach when she screamed at Poseidon for hours on end. She shook her head as her friend made her way over to her, smile fading ever so slightly at the melancholy look on the dark-haired girl's face.
Her questioning look was waylaid as Saber shook her head, reaching out to hug to dryad.
"Just old memories is all, sis." She said with a small smile as she pulled away and put her right arm over the dryad's shoulder. "That and a whole lot of crazy."
Kalie's bright green eyes widened and she nodded. "Alright, come on." The dryad led the way to her massive oak tree. At the base of the roots was the entrance to the cave where Kalie and Saber spent most of their time together. It was a quaint little hovel, decorated with mementos from the people Kalie had helped over her time in Central Park, little rocks the dryad had found interesting and a few of the trophies Saber had collected from the less dangerous, less profitable monsters. The small bed in the back of the cave was covered in colorful sheets and blankets, much to Saber's irritation. One of the few things the girls couldn't agree on was the bedsheets. Kalie liked lots of color, Saber preferred dark gray, black or dark red.
Saber set her bag down with a groan as her stiff muscles stretched. Kalie, being the ever-observant friend, almost forced Saber to pull her jacket and tank top off and lay down so she could get to the massage. Saber had groaned in satisfaction as the dryad began working her fingers and elbows into her warrior's tense muscles.
"So, what exactly happened at Yancy Academy to get you this tense?" asked the tree spirit as she worked her friend's muscles.
"Mostly just an idiot girl with no survival instinct pushing my buttons. Right up until our field trip to the Art & History Museum…"
Saber began to lay out everything, from the Fury attacking her, the conversation Mr. Brunner had with Grover and the Fates snipping the cord at the fruit stand.
By the end of her tale, Kalie was staring at Saber with fear in her eyes, her normally tan face bone white. They sat side by side on the bed, Kalie sitting in silence while Saber leaned against the headboard, throwing a bouncy ball at the wall. After several minutes, Kalie spoke.
"Sera," she started, leaf green eyes looking to Sera's sea-green. "The gods are mad about something. Ever since the Winter Solstice, Zeus has been beyond angry. Poseidon as well, though not nearly as much. And now you say a Fury was hunting you? That says that Hades thinks you did something to seriously piss him off."
Saber scoffed. The Lord of the Dead, she could never tell with him, since she had only dealt with the god three times in the past. Zeus on the other hand, there was no telling with that Drama king. Poseidon was as unpredictable as the ocean. Saber was the same way. One second, she could be as calm as could be. But like the sea, piss her off and here comes the storm. But that was beside the point. She kept bouncing the ball.
Kalie snatched the ball out of the air to grab her friend's attention. "This is serious, Sera." She said, glaring at the black-haired girl. "If the Big Three are all angry, especially at each other, that could mean a civil war between the gods! A battle of that magnitude could level the whole country."
Saber shook her head. "You're over reacting, Kalie. The gods fight over every little thing. They wouldn't go to war, it would threaten all the little mortals they rely on for their power." The gods were fickle creatures. She'd only met a couple, those couple being Athena and Artemis. Both of which she respected, for the most part. She didn't exactly like Athena, the woman was too haughty and arrogant, not to mention she cursed a certain young woman when the Half-Blood's bastard of a father had raped the poor girl. Artemis on the other hand, Saber kind of liked. The virgin goddess had led her Hunters for millennia, ignoring the mandates of her father Zeus. Saber had been invited to join the Hunters once, though she had turned the offer down. She didn't want to live forever. She wanted to do her best to achieve her dream, then she'd die with a smile on her face and go see her mother once more. She had long since accepted her eventual fate.
Kalie shook her head. "Not this time. Zeus is very angry. Angrier than he's been in nearly two hundred years. This could very well become a war."
Saber mulled it over in her head, but there was too much. She needed the sea. She stood. "I need some time to think. I'm heading to Montauk to clear my head for a bit. I'll see you in a few days, but then I'm heading west. I've got a few contacts who might be able to tell me more about what's got the gods all riled up."
The dryad nodded. She knew the Daughter of the Sea god needed the ocean to think clearly after something like this. It was in her blood. "Be careful, Sera. I don't want to hear from my cousins that you got yourself killed without saying a proper goodbye." The dryad tried to joke, but Sera knew that she was genuinely scared. She reached over and pulled the dryad girl into a tight hug, letting the girl hold her as tight as possible for a few minutes.
After ten minutes, Saber pulled away and wiped the dryad's face, for the girl had been crying out of fear. "I'm too stubborn to die just yet. I'll be fine. See you in a few days."
Montauk. Sally had bought the small cabin on the beach during their short time in New York when her daughter was no old than three. After Saber had become a bounty hunter, she had used her money to buy the beach front property and had it repaired. It had long-since become a place for the girl-warrior to relax by the ocean and clear her head. She often had small bonfires, went night-swimming and trained at the place, all to clear her head and give her a tiny bit of peace in her crazy life. Tonight, was all about clearing her head. To do that, Saber sat just beyond the tide's reach and closed her eyes, reaching deep into herself and far into the past for another weapon to unlock. It was a complicated process, one that Saber didn't entirely understand herself.
From what she could tell, her mind and soul essentially reached backwards through time in search of powerful weapons, scanning them and placing them in her Unlimited Blade Works for later use and alteration.
Hours passed, with the only movement from the girl being her breathing and locks of her dark hair swaying in the ocean breeze. By the time she opened her eyes, it was dark, maybe eleven at night. She grinned as she called forth the massive drill-like blade she had unlocked. Caladbolg: The Rainbow Sword. The weapon of the Irish Hero, Fergus mac Róich. By summoning the weapon, she had unlocked her ability to make the copy that doubled as an arrow the instant she had called forth the drill-like sword. She couldn't wait to test it out.
She sighed in relief as she let the spiral weapon fade away, looking up to the sky with a smile. Despite knowing that the dead went to the Underworld, she always preferred to think that her mother was up above, watching her from the stars. It made her happy. With a shake of her head, she pushed herself up from the sand, wiped off her pants and went inside the cabin, quickly changing and going to sleep. That night, she had a dream, vivid as the real world.
A storm was in the air, the screaming wind tearing at the ocean and sand. On the beach, two beautiful animals battled. A white horse with ocean colored eyes and a golden eagle with electric blue eyes were trying to kill each other on the edge of the surf. The eagle swooped and screeched as it slashed at the horse's muzzle with its huge talons. The ground rumbled as they fought, a monstrous voice laughing malevolently from deep beneath the ground, goading the animals into further battle. She ran toward them, trying to summon something, anything to try and separate the two, but her powers weren't working. She moved in slow motion, knowing she had to stop them, but not sure how she knew. She knew she was going to be too late as she watched the eagle swoop down, its claws aimed for the horse's wide eyes. She screamed. NO!
She bolted upright in bed, her hand occupied by the white falchion, Bakuya, which she had unlocked a year before hand. Her chest heaved as sweat ran down her face and back. Letting the blade vanish, her head fell into her hands. Outside, it was truly storming, lightning flashing and twenty-foot waves hitting the dunes like artillery fire. Her brow furrowed. It was a hurricane. It made no sense. Even if Poseidon was angry, a hurricane this far north at this time of year should've been impossible. She shook her head and quickly moved to the bathroom, where she washed her face and dressed, an apprehensive feeling in her gut. Something was coming and she intended to be ready. Over the roar of the wind, she heard a distant bellow, an angry, tortured sound that made her hair stand on end. Whatever it was, it was big, angry and something she hadn't come across before.
The sound of mallets on the sand emanated from the outside. Shortly after, someone pounded on her front door. Summoning Jack the Ripper's daggers, she pulled open the door quickly, raising the crimson blades in defense. She needn't have bothered, since it was only Grover. Though he wasn't the Grover she knew.
"Searching all night," he gasped, even as his wide eyes stared at the knives in her hands. She dismissed the blades with a thought, causing his eyes to widen even more. "What were you thinking?"
Okay, so she ditched him after promising him that she'd stay close, but in her defense, she had crossed her fingers behind her back. Okay so that wasn't much of an excuse, but still. She was a prideful person, having the cripple kid insinuate that he could protect her better than seven years of combat experience could ticked her off a fair bit.
She was too busy staring at his lower half to answer. He had goat legs…she slapped her forehead. He's a fracking Satyr.
"O Zeu kai alloi theoi!" he yelled. "It's right behind me! What were you thinking!?"
She scowled at him. "I was thinking that I've been killing monsters since I was six years old and you, a formerly crippled kid, assumed that I needed you to stay alive. I'm a prideful person, Grover. I don't appreciate being called weak."
He made a bleating sound and grabbed her arm. "Never mind that, we need to go now!"
He pushed her toward what appeared to be a 1978 orange Camaro. She would've pulled away if she hadn't heard the bellow again. It made her skin crawl. So, instead of resisting him, she pulled him along. Pulling down the seat, she pushed him into the back and got behind the wheel. She turned the key and pressed the gas even as she took the car out of 'Park'. The wheels spun on the sand for a moment before the car took off.
They tore through the night, Grover shouting directions that Saber followed without question, since he knew the area a bit better than her. Wind slammed against the sides of the car, while rain lashed the wind-shield. Saber was thankful for her Reinforcement skills, since without them, she wouldn't have been able to see anything. Her eyes kept flitting to the rear-view mirror, searching for whatever was chasing them, but she saw nothing.
"So, how long have you known I was a demigod?" she called into the back seat.
"Me? How long have you known? How have you survived for so long?" he asked back, staring out the back window.
"Since I was an infant. Monsters kept coming after us. Seven years ago, my mom and I were in LA when they cornered us. Killed everyone in sight to get to us. Mom sacrificed herself to protect me from a big ass cat. I managed to kill the Lion with my summoning skills. I've been on my own while hunting monsters ever since." She said quickly, taking a sharp turn that had the sports car skidding across the wet ground. I should've listened to Kalie, but nooo, I'm too damned stubborn. She grumbled as she got the car under control again.
Grover turned to look at her in the rear-view mirror "I was assigned to be your protector. Wasn't expecting you to be so powerful so soon. I didn't expect the monsters to stay away for as long as they did, but now you're being hunted."
"What exactly is chasing us, Grover?" she asked as he ordered another turn.
"Just the Lord of the Dead and a few of his blood-thirstiest minions."
"Oh, joy. I am really starting to hate Hades!"
"Could you please drive faster, we're almost there." He almost ordered. She nodded, putting the pedal to the metal as the car raced down the darkened road. After a few minutes of silence, she went to ask Grover about Mr. Brunner when the hair rose on the back of her neck. No, don't you dare you – she thought, her thoughts interrupted by the world turning white, a jaw-rattling boom! and the car exploded.
She went weightless, like she was being crushed, burned and hosed down all at once. A sensation she had felt only once before. Zeus had just tried to kill her.
She slowly peeled her head off the steering wheel, her forehead pouring blood from a gash just above her right eye. She groaned. "Fracking…bastard," she grumbled, cursing Zeus in Ancient Greek and Latin.
She slowly turned around, searching for Grover. Her heart stopped as she spotted him. He'd been thrown from the car and wasn't moving. No…not again.
With an almighty kick, the driver side door flew off its hinges. She scrambled out, her head still spinning from the crash as she stumbled toward her friend. I'm not losing you too. Don't you dare be dead. She silently begged as she fell to his side. Pressing a finger to his neck, she sighed in relief as she felt a pulse. She grimaced as she picked him up, the scraggly boy even lighter than she'd been expecting, and threw him over her shoulder in a fireman's carry. With a grunt, she started uphill, toward the surge of magic and Mist. Somehow, she knew they'd be safe there. However, the huffing of an animal had her turning around to see the monster that had been chasing them. Her heart stopped again. Anymore and I'll be having a heart attack. She thought numbly.
The thing was seven feet tall and was covered in bulging muscle and straining, vein webbed skin, it was a sight to behold. He wore no clothes except for bright white Fruit of the Looms underwear, a sight that would've made her laugh at any other time. Coarse brown hair stared at midway down his stomach and got thicker as it moved up his body to his shoulders. His neck was a mass of muscle and fur leading to his enormous head, which was made up of a snout as long as her arm, snotty nostrils with a gleaming brass ring, cruel black eyes that she'd seen in only the most dangerous of monsters. The top of his head was topped with massive black-white horns with points needle thin.
The Minotaur… she realized in horror. This was one monster she had no intention of tangling with anytime soon. As powerful as she had become over the last seven years, she was dead meat if she faced him in her current condition. She did the only thing that made sense: she turned and ran as fast as she could up the muddy hill. As if sensing she wasn't in the car, the bull-man grabbed the Camaro by the undercarriage and lifted it above her head. With an almighty heave, the car went flipping end over end before crashing several dozen meters away.
Saber sped up as much as she could, but Grover decided to start coming to just then.
"Foooood!" he moaned, and Saber cursed as she heard the Minotaur turn towards her. They were only a few meters from the magic barrier. She almost sighed in relief when she heard the rapid stomping. He was charging. Her brow furrowed, her teeth clenched. They wouldn't make it at their current speed, and Grover couldn't fight in his condition. She did the only thing she could. She threw Grover as hard as she could, sending him flying through the magic barrier with a shimmer of light. Turning on her heel and pouring her energy into her arms and legs, Reinforcing them as she threw her most powerful left hook. Her fist collided with the Minotaur's. The ground shattered, the air splitting like a crack of thunder. Her arm exploded in pain and she went flying back, colliding with a large pine tree. She hit the ground hard, and cried out in pain. Her left arm was bleeding, the bones shattered inside the flesh. If I hadn't Reinforced my arm, the bones would've been nothing more than dust…as it stands, shards of bone hurts way more. She thought as she pushed herself up. The Minotaur was pushing himself up, apparently having been knocked down by the impact.
Even as she swayed on the spot, the bull-man righted himself and charged. If her arm was at full strength rather than the bones being shattered, she would've jumped to the side and summoned one of her many blades to kill the monster. However, in her current condition, she had only one choice. She jumped straight up, going over the bull and grabbing hold of his horn with her one good arm. He began to buck and twist like a rodeo bull. She held on tighter, pulling back hard. With an almighty pull, even as the muscles in her arm began to tear, there was a snap! And she fell to the mud, the tip of the bull's horn in her hand. She grimaced as she forced herself into a kneeling position, her energy fading quickly. One last attack, gotta make it count.
The bull turned once more and charged, intent on crushing her under foot. As he approached, she rolled to the left, screaming as her shattered arm hit the ground, and drove the horn up under his ribs as she came up from the roll. He roared in agony, but Saber didn't let up and instead released the horn only to rear her right arm back before punching it forward, her fist colliding with the ragged end of the broken horn, driving the bone deep into the monster's chest, piercing his heart. Like many a monster before him, the Minotaur slowly turned to dust at the hands of Saber. The horn fell to the ground, covered in dark red blood. She left it were it lay as she stood carefully, stumbling towards Grover. She wasn't quite sure how she put him over her shoulder with one arm out of commission, but soon she was staggering down into the valley below, calling for aid.
The last thing she remembered was collapsing on a wooden porch, staring up at the ceiling fan circling above her as moths fluttered around yellow lights. The stern faces of oddly familiar faces stared down at her, that of a familiar-looking bearded man and a pretty blonde girl, her blond hair curling around her head, framing hauntingly familiar gray eyes. They both looked down at the broken, bleeding girl and unconscious satyr.
"She's the one. She must be," the girl said in a voice that seemed to make Saber's blood sing.
Silence, Annabeth," the man said, making Saber's brow furrow. "She's still conscious, a feat all of its own. Bring her inside."
Her will finally giving out, Saber faded into Morpheus's realm.