Disclaimer: I do not own Rick Riordan, the Percy Jackson books, characters, series, movies, or anything else you may recognize.

Chapter Fourteen

Not What I Expected

"The sky is coming down

And time is running out

But I'm not leaving here without you now

They can say what they will do

I'm a fighter and a fool

But I'm not leaving here without you."

"No Matter What They Say" by Svrcina

I was resting in my cabin when I heard the explosion. I was on my feet and racing up to the deck in seconds, reading to find out what had happened and whose ass I needed to kick. No one would mess with this ship – not on my watch.

"Unacceptable!" I heard as I reached the deck. This came from a half-man, half-statue. That actually shocked me, which in itself was surprising because I had seen pretty much everything at this point. This guy was literally human from the waist up with muscular arms and a traditional white Roman toga. His bottom half was just a square marble pedestal. "I will not allow weapons inside the Pomerian Line, and I will absolutely not allow Greeks!"

"Well, that's prejudiced," Leo mumbled under his breath. He had a good point.

"Terminus, it's me! Jason Grace!" Jason said. Apparently he was used to half-human, half-statues. I did remember reading about Terminus, though. He was the Roman god of boundaries, and the protector of Rome's territory. Kind of a demotion having to protect a camp for teens, isn't it?

"Oh, I remember you, but I thought you had better sense than to consort with the enemy," Terminus said. Seeing as Leo called ahead to let them know that we were the ones on the giant warship heading towards their camp and that we didn't mean any harm (we even had a white flag flying to show that we came in pace), this guy showing up was a little rude.

This Terminus guy kept going on and on, getting more offensive as he went (there were a lot of mentions of how indecent the Greeks were) and I got very sick of it, very fast. I already wasn't fond of the Romans, and if this was how they welcomed visitors to their camp, well, I had some choice words for them.

"Hey, excuse me!" I said, calling his attention to me. "Hi, Andee le Fay, daughter of Apollo, granddaughter of Zeus and strategos of Camp Half-Blood. Leo called ahead and let the praetors know we were on our way. And the white flag means we aren't here to fight anyone."

"I do not care! There will be no weapons within the Pomerian Line!" he shouted.

"One, take it down a notch. We can all hear you just fine without you screaming in our faces. Two, what is the 'Pomerian Line'? Is that some sort of dance they do at dog shows?" Leo asked.

"The city limits!" Terminus burst, causing another explosion to go off near Leo. "There will be no weapons within the city limits ad this ship is a weapon! You cannot land!"

Annabeth and I looked at each other for a moment.

Are you thinking what I'm thinking? she asked.

Well, yeah, because I can literally hear your thoughts.

She gave me a look and rolled her eyes before saying, "Then we won't land." Everyone looked to her in shock. "Leo, stop the ship here and let it hover. Technically, it's not on Roman soil, see?"

"I do like technicalities…" Terminus said thoughtfully. Of course he did. All gods like technicalities, it seemed.

I looked down at the crowd that was forming in the valley below, and there were already about a hundred people heading our way. I scanned for the one face I knew better than anyone else's and found it in a heartbeat. Percy was in the crowd, wearing a purple cape like the one Jason had told us was the sign of a praetor. Which meant…wow, it meant Percy had been made a praetor. It made sense, really, because if he had been with us on this mission, I was sure he would have been made a strategos.

Percy had his arms around two other people like they were his best friends – a heavier set guy with a black buzz cut and a girl with super curly hair squished underneath a cavalry helmet.

I couldn't stop the grin stretching from ear to ear.

"And all of our weapons will be left on board the ship," Jason added. I looked to him in a moment of panic. That wasn't a good idea – if there was a fight, we all needed to be armed. I mean, we could probably do without, but seeing just how many people were down in the Roman camp, I would feel a lot safer if our campers were armed. "Andee, your weapons."

I gave Jason a wary look before stripping off my bag, dagger, quiver and bow, making a big show of dropping them on the deck. Leo would be staying on the Argo so at least I knew my stuff would be safe. "I guess it's lucky that I'm considered a lethal weapon, isn't it?" I said with a smirk to Terminus and before he could say anything, I started descending the ladder.

I had made absolute sure that all the cabin counselors from Camp Half-Blood knew how to fight without their weapons, but I knew they could be better. I had been training my entire life to fight the way I did, whereas most of the others had maybe a year of hard core hand-to-hand combat training. I still made sure that I was in the front of the group, because if a fight started, I would be the first and last person they attacked.

A girl with long dark hair tumbling over her shoulders, dark eyes and a purple cape marking her as a praetor made her way through the group of Roman demigods that was forming. Obviously this was the infamous Reyna that Jason had told Annabeth and me about. I signaled for the Greek demigods to stay where they were before walking up with Jason to meet Reyna partway.

"Jason Grace, my former…colleague," Reyna said, and the sexual tension was so thick I could cut it with my dagger. If I had my dagger. She turned to me and said, "I'm Reyna, daughter of Bellona and praetor of Camp Jupiter."

"Andee le Fay, daughter of Apollo, granddaughter of Zeus and strategos of Camp Half-Blood," I introduced. "First things first, as Leo said when he called ahead, we are here in peace – we have absolutely no intentions of starting a war."

"We do not wish for a war either, although some of the others at Camp Jupiter may disagree with me," Reyna said. She looked like she was only a little bit older than myself, but the way she spoke and held herself told me she was a lot older than she seemed. There were a lot of places where demigods could go and not age. Not places where anyone really wanted to go, but there were places that existed. "Greeks and Romans do not have a history of getting along, but I think it's time we change that."

"Agreed," Jason said. "There's no way we'll be able to survive what's to come if we're fighting each other and Her." He paused for a second, looking past Reyna before groaning. "And here we go."

I glanced at him in confusion before following his gaze to a skinny blonde guy coming towards us with three much larger guys right behind him. Reyna calmly turned around and said, "Octavian, return to the forum immediately."

"Someone here has to point out the obvious – this is a trick! It's the Trojan Horse all over again!" Octavian said.

"Last time I checked, the Trojan Horse was literally a giant wooden horse. We came in a warship," Jason pointed. "You'll soon find out that the Greek are a lot more subtle than that."

Octavian scoffed. "I mean you, Jason," he said angrily before turning back to Reyna. "Jason is the Trojan Horse – they take him in, brainwash him, and then come here acting like they want to make peace when really they're going to attack as soon as our guard is down." I looked at Jason and he rolled his eyes, telling me this was common behavior for this Octavian kid. "If we let these Greeks into our camp, they will attack! We need to protect New Rome and get rid of these intruders!"

I looked down at the guy's tattoo, knowing he would have one and saw that instead of an eagle like Jason's, he had a lyre. So he was definitely a descendant of Apollo, but not a child or grandchild – his psychic aura was much too weak for that.

"Who do you think you are, anyways?" I asked. I really was getting fed up with the Romans – the only two I liked so far were Jason and Reyna.

"Who do I think I am? I'm Augur of Camp Jupiter, Legacy of Apollo, and Centurion of the First Cohort! That's who I think I am," Octavian said.

"Legacy of Apollo?" I asked, looking at Jason. "Oh right, that means someone way down in your line was a son of Apollo. Way, way down. Interesting."

"Oh? And why is that so interesting?" Octavian asked.

"I just thought it was interesting that you would see fit to actually threaten your ancestor's one and only daughter," I pointed out.

He actually growled and leapt at me, apparently thinking I would be weak without a weapon. Well, boy was he wrong. As soon as he came close enough, I grabbed him by the wrist and flipped him over, pressing my foot to his neck just enough to immobilize him. "Dad's really not going to be happy about this," I told him and he grunted. The other three guys attacked me at once, and I blocked the first few blows, allowing them the chance to rethink what they were doing. But they didn't. With my foot still on Octavian's neck, keeping him in place, I went on the offense – punching, zapping and burning the trio of thugs.

I had just thrown my elbow into one of the bigger guys' faces when an all-too-familiar voice shouted, "Stop fighting! Everyone!"

I stepped back, freeing Octavian who scrambled to his feet and glared at me, rubbing his neck. "This lunatic attack us!" he shouted.

Percy made his way over to where we were and I could hardly believe it was him. After all this time, it was really him. "Everyone saw you attack her, Octavian – you're not fooling anyone. Now, get to the Forum and we will all discuss what needs to happen."

Wait, what?

What happened to our fairytale reunion? What happened to our eyes meeting and running and kissing and crying? He didn't even look at me!

Octavian and the other three Romans grumbled but still obeyed him. "I'm sure you still remember the way?" Reyna asked Jason, who nodded in response. He started leading the way for our campers, sending a sad look to me. Everyone followed Jason except for Annabeth and Lee who stayed with me.

I must've looked stunned because Annabeth said, "You knew this might happen, Dee. He probably just doesn't remember anything. He didn't acknowledge any of us."

"How can he remember me if he doesn't even look at me?" I asked. "No, he has to remember me. He has to."

Lee was about to say something more but I ignored him and started jogging to the front of the group, pushing people out of the way to try to find Percy. He was somewhere in the middle of the group, walking alone and staring straight ahead.

"Percy!" I called as I got close. "Percy, wait!"

He turned his head just a fraction but that was all I needed. I zoomed up beside him and touched his arm to make sure he stopped. "Hey."

"Hi."

"So…what? No 'oh my gods, Andee, I've missed you so much!' or even a hug or a wink or something?" I asked, trying to keep my tone playful, but it was starting to hurt. I just had to keep reminding myself that there would be a good reason – there had to be.

"I'm sorry, I don't know who you are."

Now, my lie-detecting abilities still weren't fully functioning since the whole Kronos mess and these bracelets, but I at least knew what to look for. And even though he made direct eye contact with me, there was a look in his eyes that was there for maybe a millisecond, but it was there.

He was lying.

"You're kidding, right? Because this really isn't funny."

"Look, I really am sorry, but I don't know you," he said, turning his back to me and walking away. All I could do was watch him as he left. I knew with all of my heart that he was lying about knowing who I was. So what was it – did he meet someone else at this camp and no want to face the consequences of me showing up? Did he just decide he was better off without me? Maybe I was too much. Maybe once he had some time away from me after everything that had happened, he realized that I was bad for hi, or that I was just bad in general. That's what I was starting to think, at least.

I stopped for a moment, closed my eyes and took a deep breath. I was on enemy territory right now. The Romans prized strength and discipline, so that was what I had to show. As much as I wanted to sob my heart out right now, that wasn't an option. They would see me as weak and as a strategos for Camp Half-Blood, that wasn't an option. I couldn't let them think that we were weak – we were anything but.

For now, I would be strong. There would be no tears over this. I had to set an example of the rest of the campers, show the Romans that the Greeks elected strong leadership.

So I put on my game face, sucked it up and headed to the forum where the others were meeting, and no one would be able to tell that my heart had shattered.