Disclaimer: I do not own Rick Riordan, the Percy Jackson books, characters, series, movies, or anything else you may recognize.
Chapter Eight
Visions and Snooping
"While the floors underneath our feet are crumbling
The walls we built together tumblin'
I still stand here holdin' up the roof
'Cause it's easier than telling the truth."
"The Truth" by Kris Allen
Jason, Piper and Leo left as soon as Leo assured everyone that the dragon – who he named Festus (which was funny not only because it was Latin for 'happy' but also because it was the ending of Leo's father's name) – was safe. Apparently he had caught the dragon and rewired the hard-drive in its brain. Personally, I was wondering how he had done it without getting fried to a crisp, but no one else seemed to really care at that point.
My brain was probably just in overdrive, trying to process and figure everything out.
Annabeth was leaving the next morning to continue looking for Percy. She didn't know where she was going, but apparently she was going to search some of the places they had gone on their previous quests before, to see if anyone in the area saw him there. I guess it was better than nothing.
Annabeth stood in front of me, a worried look on her face. "Don't do anything stupid while I'm gone, okay?" Annabeth said, readjusting her backpack as we walked to the camp borders.
"Keep your mind open to me and we won't have a problem," I said, smiling innocently at her.
"You know I had to do that," Annabeth said. "If you had seen he wasn't there, you would've gone and tried to find him yourself."
"Gods, it would be just horrible if I went searching for my boyfriend," I said, my voice heavy with sarcasm.
"We're just trying to keep you and everyone else safe," Annabeth said. I glared at her. "I love you, Andee. You're my sister and I'm trying to my best to help you, and of course, Percy."
"I know," I said, hugging her tightly. "I love you too. Be safe and let me check in. I care want to know that you're safe too."
"I will," Annabeth sad quietly, still hugging me. "I'll see you soon."
"See you soon." We never said goodbye to each other. Goodbyes are saved for death, and neither of us planned on dying any time soon (well, I might but it wouldn't be permanent). Goodbye was too permanent a thing to be used every day.
I watched as Annabeth walked away and made the decision that even though Jason, Piper and Leo were on a quest to free Hera (blehk) and Annabeth was off to find Percy, and most of my close friends were gone. I had to keep trying to live life as normally as I could. I couldn't let this completely ruin my summer. We'd find Percy and bite this Prophecy of Nine in the ass.
So that's what I did. The first day went by like it was nothing. I taught archery and hand-to-hand combat to the newer demigods and sparred with the older ones, improving their technique and stamina. Hand-to-hand combat had never been taught to the campers at Camp Half-Blood until I came and Chiron saw how well it had helped me protect myself.
The younger ones were always easier to teach because their minds and bodies were blank slates, ready to absorb the information and commit it to their muscle memory. The older demigods, however, had already learned their own ways of fighting out of necessity, which made it a lot harder to re-teach them. Most of them managed, but there were always little things they did out of habit.
The other good thing was that they could all fight me to the full extent of their abilities without worrying about hurting me or possibly killing me. It gave me a good work-out, it gave whoever I was fighting a good work-out while helping them get stronger and faster, and I didn't get mortally wounded. No one had even killed me, mostly because no one was good enough to get close.
Annabeth and Percy were the only ones who could.
When I wasn't fighting or training, I was inside the Apollo cabin. When the cabins were being added and remodeled, my brothers had asked for their cabin to be expanded. Why? To fill it with all the instruments they possibly could, which was why I spent so much time in there. The range of instruments allowed me to do a lot of songwriting. My songs were mostly about Percy, about missing him and wanting more than anything find him.
I didn't have many breaks that first day, or on the second day. But the night of the second day was when things started to get interesting.
I walked into my cabin and locked the door, stripping out of my clothes and putting on one of the many t-shirts Percy had forgotten at camp last year. I pulled it up to my nose and inhaled his scent, smiling a little. He always smelled like the ocean – like a clean ocean – and it was the best smell in the world.
I padded to my bed and under the covers, trying not to think about how big and empty the bed was without Percy. We weren't able to sleep together every night, but it was weird to be at Camp without him.
I eventually fell asleep and was immediately confronted by a vision. There was a lot of purple, and even more blood and war going on in the background. I couldn't focus on any one thing or person, which made me believe that I was supposed to see the overall picture. A voice said 'Aut vincere aut mori' and 'praetor'. Then the vision zoomed in closer to the fight going on. Wolves ran among what I guessed were demigods, and after really focusing I was able to catch a glimpse of a tattoo on one of the fighter's arms. It was similar to Jason's, but not quite the same.
I shot up in bed, now completely awake. "I need a pen and paper," I muttered. I looked over to my bedside where a notebook and pen were sitting. I always kept them nearby when I slept so I could write down any visions I had. It had been sitting there blank for a long time. I picked up the pen and started writing in-detail everything I had seen.
I was ecstatic – I had had a vision! They were finally coming back! Most people would say the timing was a coincidence, but as a demigod, there was no such thing. The fact that I got my visions back almost immediately after it was revealed that the Prophecy of Nine was happening, was for a very important reason.
I was going to need my visions to survive what was coming.
I went back to sleep and had normal dreams, and when I woke up, I felt completely refreshed, ready to start the day and start searching for some information.
Chiron came to my archery lessons with the younger campers to see how things were going, and ended up teaching them. It gave me the perfect opportunity to sneak away.
No one saw me as I slipped into the Big House, trying to decide where to start. There wasn't a library or any computer databases I could just look everything up on. There were a few bookcases scattered throughout the house, and that was it. If only there were Wi-Fi at camp, I could just look it up on my laptop.
Maybe I could escape to the nearest Starbucks. Everything's better with an iced caramel macchiato.
I started looking through all the bookcases I could find, going through every book. There were all the real stories of what happened back in Ancient Greece, all the Prophecies every given with dates, the person who the Prophecy was given to and what happened written below each one, and biographies on the gods.
Yes, someone actually wrote biographies on the gods and their lives.
When I came to the last bookshelf, I was stumped. I hadn't found anything useful but I knew there had to be something here. I had to figure out what Chiron knew and the Big House was Chiron's equivalent of a lair (if he were actually evil) – there had to be something here. If I were a centuries-old centaur, where would I hide all my secrets?
The Big House, despite its name, wasn't that big inside. I think it was called that just because it was three times the size of even the biggest cabins, and it looked like it belonged in the Old South on some heritage property. Like girls in their Sunday-best should be sitting on the porch, drinking lemonade on a humid day.
There was the rec room, which doubled as our war council headquarters. Nothing said war like a pool table and ping pong. A small kitchen was close to the deck, always stocked with snacks for the campers and a crap-ton of strawberry preserves. The top floor was off-limits because it was Chiron's apartment and office. Then there was the attic where the spoils of war were kept, and the basement where our supplies of nectar and ambrosia were kept, as well as more strawberry preserves.
You know, just in case the mortals looked into our camp for some reason.
Then it hit me. The second floor was off-limits because that was where Chiron's office and apartment was. Where he kept all of his private belongings. Like top-secret information regarding this Prophecy. I could get in a lot of trouble for going up there and snooping, but this might be my only chance to find out what the Hades was going on.
I looked out the closet window and tried to find Chiron, but there was no sign of him. Good.
I slipped into the office and looking through all of his personal bookcases. Most of the books were about different fighting techniques and Latin. There was, however, one small, unlabeled book that if I hadn't been looking for something, I never would have seen it.
I slid it out of the bookcase and held it in my hands for a minute, examining it. There were no identifying marks on it, and unlike the other books, it was perfectly clean. No dust and no spider webs like all the other books, which told me something had sparked Chiron's interest in it as of late.
I looked up to the ceiling and thought, Please, please let this book have the information I'm looking for, before cracking open the cover. When I finally gathered up the courage to read the pages, I was flabbergasted. "No. Freakin'. Way."
