I feel like my chapters haven't been long enough. Are you guys okay with the length?
Liam
Liam answered the door with a scowl on his face until he saw who it was.
"Hey, Beckendorf," he said, stepping aside so that the blacksmith/tinkerer could enter the house.
It had been three days since the funeral, and Liam's mood had gotten progressively worse. First, he had found out that he had failed his Pre-Calc test, which meant that he would have to retake it. Then, he had discovered that all of his woodworking tools had rusted, and he didn't have the money to replace them. Oh, and the number that Alex had carved on the bottom of the pine tree carving had tortured him for the past seventy-two hours.
Beckendorf held up a six pack of root beer. "I brought help."
Liam closed the door behind him and brought Beckendorf to the living room. Liam's mother was at work and Jasmine was working in her room, so he basically had the house to himself. The living room wasn't really anything special; just a mismatched series of furniture and a brown carpet that used to be white.
Liam cracked open one of the root beers with a sigh as Beckendorf did the same. They set the six pack between them on the couch.
"How you holding up?" Beckendorf asked.
Liam shrugged, and he felt the pine tree move in his pocket. "About as well as expected."
Beckendorf took a long sip out of his can. "I miss her too, Liam."
Not as much as I do, Liam thought before he could stop himself. It was a stupid thought. Who cared which of her friends missed her the most? She was still gone, and she wasn't coming back.
Liam stared at his can without responding.
Beckendorf sighed. "Any insights on that tree?" Liam looked up sharply, making Beckendorf laugh. "Yeah, you're not the only one who saw that. Why didn't you tell any of the others?"
Liam shrugged. "I don't know. It could be nothing, but…"
"It could also be a message," Beckendorf finished.
"Yeah," Liam agreed.
"So what does it say?"
He pulled the pine tree out of his pocket. It looked just as plain and ordinary as before. "Nothing except the number twelve."
"And you have no idea what it means?" Beckendorf asked. Liam could already see the gears in his head turning.
"It could be the number of major gods, the number of months, or the number of Starbucks near her house. So in other words, no."
Beckendorf took the pine tree and examined the bottom, where the number 12 was carved. "Could it be a time?"
Liam frowned. "A time? It…"
He paused. It couldn't be that easy, could it? Maybe he had just been overthinking it because she had some Athena blood in her as well.
He checked the clock over the mantle. It wasn't yet noon. "Well, there's only one way to find out. Feel like going for a walk?"
x x x
They arrived at Central Park at 11:57 in the morning. It was pretty busy, with some people doing yoga in one corner and a group of kids playing football in the other. Between the two groups, people were trying to capture pictures. So, a typical day. It was easy to see how Alex could have lived in one of the trees for four years. Nobody was even looking up at the pine trees.
Liam and Beckendorf came to a stop at the base of a large pine tree. The only feature that distinguished it from the rest was the small pile of six weathered stones at the base of its trunk.
"So this is where she lived," Beckendorf said, examining the tree.
"Yeah," Liam said, running his hand over the bark. "She took me here once."
He remembered it very clearly. It had been a clear summer day, right before sophomore year ended. They'd gone for a walk, and somehow they had ended up at the base of her tree. It was the first time she'd told him that she loved him. He'd walked on clouds (literally for about five minutes) for the rest the day.
Liam wiped away a tear at the memory. He couldn't afford to lose his cool in the middle of the park.
A clocktower in the distance chimed as it turned noon.
Liam and Beckendorf stepped back, watching the tree in anticipation. For a moment, nothing happened. Then another. And another, and another, until Beckendorf's watch read 12:30.
"Well," Beckendorf said, patting Liam on the shoulder. "It was just an idea. I'm sure there's some other reason for the number. We can think of something else."
"Yeah," Liam said, staring up at the tree. "Something else."
x x x
ZAP!
Liam woke with a start, accidentally sending a bolt of lightning into his alarm clock.
"Great," he muttered, rolling out of bed and searching blindly for his cane. His foot was killing him. It felt like Phoebe had severed his Achille's tendon all over again. Add the fact that he'd just had one of his worst nightmares ever and that he'd just barbecued his alarm clock, and he was about ready to blow a hole in the roof.
He'd done that once. His mother had not been pleased.
Finally, his hands landed on his cane and he stumbled to his feet. Whenever his foot ached like this, his therapist told him to walk it off. But Liam found it worked better to fly it off. He grabbed his glasses and opened his window, feeling the night air on his skin. Liam wasn't sure what time it was because of his recently broken alarm clock, but he was sure it was somewhere around midnight. Overhead, the moon shone brightly through the clouds. He hadn't seen Artemis at her daughter's funeral, but if he had any doubt that the goddess was mourning, seeing the sky lit up so brightly like that erased it.
Liam hooked his cane into his belt and clumsily climbed out of his window, not caring that the cool air made his skin turn into gooseflesh. He wasn't wearing anything but shorts and a t-shirt.
For a while, Liam just flew around aimlessly. He hadn't had a nightmare about his older brother Jake's death in several years. What did it mean that he'd had one now?
He didn't even realize where he had gone until it was too late and he was standing barefoot in front of Alex's pine tree.
But something was wrong. The light from the moon seemed to be lighting up the tree like it was a glow stick.
For a moment, Liam just gaped at it. Then he checked his watch. 12:00. It had been a time! They had just come twelve hours too soon!
Liam glanced around Central Park to make sure that nobody was watching. Then he began to climb the tree.
It was nowhere near as easy as Alex had described it to be. Even though he was a Son of Zeus, the Lord of the Sky, climbing a tree that tall was no easy feat, especially with his foot being messed up. Eventually, he gave up and just floated himself upwards. He stopped when he saw a branch. The branch.
It was glowing more than any other part of the tree. Liam sat himself on the branch, one leg hanging off either side. Soon, he realized the source of the glow.
It was her initials.
The letters AC were glowing so brightly that Liam had to shield his eyes. He scooted forward, feeling the carvings in the wood with his hands. After a moment, something popped off and into his hands. The glow faded.
Liam peered at the object in his hand. It appeared that the piece of bark that held her initials had been transformed into a lid of some sort.
He felt his chest fill with pride. He was the one who had taught her how to make a compartment like this.
Liam thrust his hand into the shallow compartment and dug around. His fingers closed around two rolled up pieces of parchment and a thrill of excitement ran through him. She had left a message!
He brought the two scrolls out and almost opened one before he realized two things: one, that the light in the tree had probably served as a beacon for every monster in a three-mile radius, and two, that there wasn't enough light to read by.
Liam hugged the two scrolls to his chest and took off into the night sky, ignoring the small scratches he received from the branches in the tree.
When he reached his house, he practically crashed through his open window. He landed in a heap on the floor and hastily dragged himself to his feet, ignoring the throbbing in his crippled foot.
He clicked on his light and opened the first scroll, recognizing Alex's handwriting.
I've been looking into The Syndicate, it read, and it doesn't look good.
Just in case I forget, TS is the bounty hunter organization that Lindsay is associated with—the daughter of Apollo who was hunting Chelsea.
Anyway, TS has been around since the beginning of humanity, ever since the gods began running around having kids with mortals. At first, they did actually start out as your average bounty hunter association—hunting monsters, making sure demigods got home before dark, stuff like that. Then things got worse.
The Syndicate began focusing on money to pay for expenses in hunting monsters and protecting half-bloods. But they figured out that they were over-extending themselves, so they started to expand. They started protecting shipments, protecting regular mortals, stuff like that. But then they started demigod trading, just like Frederick had. They made a ton of money this way, but they lost sight of what they were originally created to do. They even started hunting other demigods.
Eventually the other demigods stood up to them—a group of maybe seven of the most powerful half-bloods at the time. They totally kicked the crap out of TS, and the organization slunk into the shadows. Nobody ever heard from them again, and most people assumed that the bounty hunters had given up or died off or something.
Then after the Civil War—once the gods had moved to America, I think—The Syndicate reemerged. They engaged in more reserved activities, closer to what they had been created to do. But of course, corruption set in, and they became even worse than before.
And now they're here, in New York. I think that the black crossbow bolt at Christmas that almost skewered me was one of theirs. Zeus had put a bounty on my head, a rather large one. TS wanted to collect. But then he removed it when we got the Aetherium Crown and stopped Phoebe, and I think they decided to leave me alone.
Liam's hands were shaking, but he opened the next scroll. Alex's handwriting had become sloppier, like she had been writing in a hurry. The ink looked more recent as well.
I take it back. The Syndicate DID NOT lose interest in me.
I think they've been keeping tabs on me for the past two years. The other day, Liam and I were on a date at the zoo when I noticed some guy in sunglasses and a trench coat—really? A trench coat?—and I realized that I recognized the stalker. He had been at the drive-in movie theater for my first date with Liam, the adoption ceremony for Bobby. He was even at the concert that Liam took me to!
I confronted him an hour ago. He was a monster—some kind of cyclops that I've never seen before. I killed him, but not before he said that my days were "numbered." I didn't even know that cyclopes knew what the word "numbered" meant!
I've been keeping the others out of this for their own safety, but I think it's time I tell them about what I've discovered. Tomorrow, I'll tell Liam on our anniversary. I hope he'll understand. I hate keeping things from him.
A droplet of water dripped onto the page, and Liam quickly wiped his eyes. He wanted to curl up in a ball and never move again, but anger quickly replaced that urge.
If he had any doubt before, this confirmed it. Alex hadn't been killed by a monster.
A demigod had killed her.
Okay, I feel like that was obvious, but Liam is a little thick, alright?
Have I mentioned these great things called REVIEWS? They're very beneficial, especially to the authors of stories like this one who would like feedback. Jackie (AKA me) needs your help! YOU can HELP with a REVIEW!
(Was that clear? I feel like that was clear.)
This next joke is for all you science nerds out there.
Two atoms are walking down the street together. The first atom turns and says, "Hey, you just stole an electron from me!"
"Are you sure?" asks the second atom.
To which the first atom replies, "Yeah, I'm positive!"
