Sorry this took so long. Shout out to StephLopez for being the only reviewer. YOU ARE AWESOME!
StephLopez: Probably :P I can't give you an answer more definite than that so I hope it's enough :3.
It took us a total of five minutes to realize that we had no plan and nowhere to start. l had tucked Dad's necklace in my pocket; it's presence was the only thing that kept me going. He would have had at least some kind of plan though, right?
"Where are we even going?" Vaz sounded exasperated. We hadn't been walking long, and I had already seen her cringe at least five times. Her back must have been hurting. To be honest, my shoulder wasn't feeling to hot either.
"We're going...somewhere," I replied. The beach seemed endless, and who knew how much farther we had to go. She glared at me.
"Look, I know you're trying to be like your parents, but for your information they usually at least had a prophecy to use as a starting point. We are literally just setting off in a random direction. Maybe we should get help from..."
"From who?" I asked, turning to look at her only to find that she had stopped five feet back and was staring at something in the sand, a stupid look on her face. "What?"
"Look..." she bent to pick up a bow that I hadn't seen. It looked like it was made of shadows. When she touched it, she cursed loudly and pulled her hand back. "It burnt me"
"What is that?" I wondered aloud, getting closer to it. It seemed to draw me in.
"Luke, stay back," Vaz took out her sword. "I'm getting rid of this thing."
She brought the blade down, but neither of us were expecting what happened next. As soon as the metal touched the shadow-y wood, a screech rang out. I clamped my hands to my ears, jarring my arm and making me gasp involuntarily. When I looked down at the bow, it was completely intact. A jagged line of black ran through Vaz's weapon in a lightning bolt shape; we both stared.
"That does it. I'm picking it up."
"Are you crazy?" the daughter of Hecate hissed. "It just damaged perfect celestial bronze."
I shrugged. "Nothing ventured, nothing gained." My swimming teacher said that a lot. I cast any thoughts of getting burnt aside and bent. When my hand touched the bow, there was nothing. I picked it up completely—it was like it weight nothing. The shadows on it retreated away from my hand to reveal black wood underneath. There was something written in Greek, but I couldn't decipher it.
"Read this," I shoved the bow at Vaz, who recoiled.
"I'm not getting near that thing again, and I don't think you should either. Let's just put it down and continue on our way."
"This could be the bow of whatever was shooting at us," I insisted. The expression on her face told me that she hadn't considered that. "Please, it could be a clue."
"Oh, alright, but don't let it touch me," she huffed. When she bent over, her brows furrowed. "All it says is: 'never the prey,' and I have no idea how that will help us. That could point to monsters, demi gods, Hunters…"
"Hunters?" I looked back in the direction of Camp Half-Blood. "That might lead us somewhere."
"No, that's too obvious. Honestly, this shadow stuff looks like something that would connect to Hades."
"You want us to go all the way down to the Underworld and ask the Lord of the Dead about a bow we found on the beach? No way, you're crazy."
"I'm sorry, oh mighty Quest master. Please, do tell where we should go then." I swear, if this girl was any more sarcastic…
"I think…"
I was interrupted by the bow. It yanked at my hand, dragging me a couple of feet.
"What are you doing?" Vaz scolded. "Stop messing around."
"I'm not doing anything!" I call back at her. The bow is speeding up, and I dig my feet in the sand in an attempt to stop. I could let it go, but this was our only lead.
Vaz ran to catch up with me and grabbed me around the waist, pulling me back. With our strength combined, the bow was forced to stop. It was still pulling at my arm, but I gritted my teeth and didn't let it move me.
"What's happening?" the girl behind me sounded incredulous.
I had a theory. "Well, I think it's like Percy's sword. You know, how it always returns to him? Maybe the bow is trying to go back to its master."
"Percy's sword is magic," Vaz argued. "It doesn't physically return, it just appears back in his pocket."
"I didn't say it was Percy's sword, I said it was like Percy's sword," I replied, almost falling forward with a particularly hard yank coming from the bow.
"If you're right, that's brilliant. If you're wrong, we will be following around an inanimate object uselessly running around in circles until we die of hunger. Does that sound like a good thing to you?"
"It's a good thing if I'm right, and I am, so let's go. Besides, you want to go to the Underworld, right? If we die of hunger, we'll be there!"
She didn't seem to like that idea at all, but she let go of me and let the bow pull me forward. My pack was getting increasingly heavy, and my bad arm was killing me, but I didn't let it show. I wondered how she was holding up.
"What are we going to do when we do find this archer?" I asked as we half jogged, half walked. Vaz didn't seem in the mood to talk, but she gave in after a couple minutes of silence.
"It's probably a monster, and monsters need to be killed. I can take care of that."
"Are you saying that I couldn't kill the monster?"
"I'm saying that judging on how you handed the last attack, you wouldn't last two seconds."
"I resent that."
"You represent that."
I glared at her. I could see why my sister would like being friends with Vaz, but she was a little mouthy for my taste. I missed Matthew and Dawn… hopefully I would go back 'home' soon and life would return to being boring. If being a demi god meant constantly losing people you love, I didn't want any part of it.
"Stop." Vaz whispered after a couple more minutes. We were past the beach now, along the road where Dad had first come to Camp Half Blood with a Minotaur on his heels. I had heard the story a thousand times, but it never got old. There was the forest on our right, and when I looked hard, I saw something move.
Together we were able to haul the bow with us as we took cover behind a tree. I did not expect to see what we saw next.
The person before us was a teenage girl. She had really curly black hair and appeared to be a little taller than Vaz but at least three inches shorter than me. I couldn't tell her age, but it was given that she was starving. Her clothes hung loosely on her body and there was no color in her cheeks. She was poking at a fire, grumbling something. A quiver of arrows was splayed on the ground a couple feet away, obviously tossed there. There was no bow in sight.
Vaz and I looked at each other and nodded. Making little to no sound, we both took out our weapons and set our packs as gently on the ground as we could. I put the bow in my backpack and tied the pack to the tree, hoping it would contain the weapon. "On the count of three," I mouthed.
1..2..3..
"Aha!" we jumped out from behind the tree and ran at the girl. She tried to run, but we had caught her by surprise. It only took a couple of seconds before I had her arms behind her back and Vaz had her sword up to the stranger's throat.
"Why were you shooting at us?" Vaz growled. She looked pretty fierce; the firelight glinting in her eyes. It was dusk, and the trees cast menacing shadows all around us.
"I…shooting…what?" the girl spluttered. She didn't seem too phased that a blade was two inches from ending her life. "I would never shoot at a demi god! What do you take me for?"
"How do you know she's a demi god?" I asked.
"You can just tell. Celestial bronze. Bad attitude. It's all just typical." Whoever this was, she was not getting on Vaz's good side. "Either way, I didn't shoot at you guys."
"Oh really?" my companion didn't seem convinced, and I didn't blame her. "We have your bow, and it led us straight to you."
"I have a full quiver of arrows, and I don't know whose bow you have, but it's not mine. My bow is right over there," the girl gestured as best she could with her head towards where she had been sitting before. There, unseen by Vaz or I at first, was a shabby looking bow that was painted some kind of greenish color.
I released her. The story checked out to me, and Vaz apparently agreed. She put her sword away, albeit reluctantly. "So what are you, a daughter of Ares?"
"Ha! No, I'm Faith. I'm not exactly a demi god; my father was a son of Apollo. My mom's a mortal, though. She died when I was little," the girl's expression didn't change. "Mom wanted to go to Camp Half Blood and train like my Dad did so she could protect me. On the way there, she was attacked by a couple of Furies, and that was the end of that. Dad was never the same… either way, you don't need to know any of this. I was just minding my own business before you attacked me."
"Sorry about that," I said sheepishly. "Let me give you some rations."
Faith seemed a lot more friendly at the aspect of getting food. "It's the least you can do."
I went to get my backpack and was happy to find the bow had not ripped it from the tree. It was still tugging and pulling when I untied it, and it took a little more effort than I liked to get back to the fire where Vaz and Faith were. I opened the pocket just enough to grab a package of ham before retying the backpack to a different tree right behind me.
"Here," I said, throwing it to Faith. She caught it with ease.
"So what are you guys doing out here anyway?" she asked, helping herself to a slice. I wasn't sure if she was swallowing; it was clear she hadn't eaten in at least a day.
I didn't think that Faith was much of a threat, and so I ignored Vaz's warning glares and told her the story. I left out some of the details, and the fact that I wasn't a demi god; I just told the story like we were rescuing Percy and Annabeth, not my parents. When Faith finally looked up and into my eyes, I gasped. Her eyes were… purple.
"Don't worry, they're just contacts," she laughed at my expression.
Vaz appeared disgusted. "You put stuff in your eyes to change their color? Isn't that a little… superficial?"
Ouch. Something about Faith's expression shifted slightly before it returned to neutral. "I can see why you would think I was the archer, but since your little bow is still pulling you in a direction, shouldn't that make it obvious it's not me?"
I thought about that. It made so much sense; I was kind of embarrassed that neither Vaz nor I had thought of it.
"I guess," I said.
"So who are your guys' parents? Did you grow up in Camp Half Blood?"
"My Mom is Hecate and my dad… he doesn't matter," Vaz shrugged. "Camp Half Blood is the only home that really means anything to me." I looked away but Faith's gaze didn't waver. She turned her purple eyes on me and I knew that it was time for the truth.
"My parents are Percy and Annabeth Jackson," I sighed. "I grew up far away in a mortal high school so I wouldn't get hurt."
"High five!" Faith startled me by putting up her hand. "Screw all of the godly kids, us grandkids rule."
"Hey!" Vaz protested, but I laughed and gave the girl a high five. I liked how I finally knew someone who was like me… kind of.
"Do you mind if we crash here for the night?" I found myself asking. Vaz punched me in the thigh not-so-discretely but Faith just shrugged.
"If you want to. I don't have much for comfort."
"The fire is good enough," I replied. In the silence it became all too clear how much my arm was hurting me. I cringed as a particularly sharp wave of pain crashed through my body. When I looked at Vaz, she seemed to be going through the same thing.
"Oh yeah, you guys got shot by arrows and all of that." Faith got up and went to my backpack. She rummaged around before finding the package of ambrosia. "You'll probably need some of this."
I nodded and gestured for her to hand some to Vaz first. The daughter of Hecate smiled as she chewed softly on some.
"Should you…" Faith seemed hesitant with me. I shook my head up and down enthusiastically, knowing that I could take it in small portions. I nibbled on the end and tasted the chocolate cake that Mom made me the last birthday I had before I was sent off. In all honesty, that was so far away that I shouldn't be able to remember it, but there it was. I wanted to eat the whole square of ambrosia just so I could keep the warmth alive, but Faith snatched it from me after the fifth bite.
"You want to heal, not to combust," she scolded me, throwing the square off somewhere into the distance. I wondered what would happen if a bird tried to eat it or something.
"I know," I said wistfully, staring off into where the ambrosia had gone. "I know."
"We should probably sleep," Vaz said from the forest floor. I glanced over to see she had made a bed of leaves and who knew what else. "Goodnight, stupid."
It didn't take long for her breathing to deepen, but Faith and I stayed awake. We were lying next to each other with our heads propped on a log, staring up at the stars. It was cold, but the fire helped warm the area slightly.
"So I feel like there's something more to this quest than just saving Mommy and Daddy," Faith said in the silence.
I thought for a moment. "I guess you're right. I think that I'm hoping that by saving them, I'll finally prove that I'm not helpless. Just because I'm not the son of a god doesn't mean that I should have to be sent off, you know? I think I'm just hoping to finally get to stay at Camp Half Blood with my family. If we succeed, I think I'll finally be allowed to stay."
Faith was quiet for a minute before lifting her hand to trace a shape in the stars. "Each constellation is made up of different stars, but their only there because someone one day told others that they saw a shape. I believe that people can't tell you what to see, you have to see it yourself. If you look close you can see us, right now, laying right here talking about it. Do you see it?"
And I looked where her hand was and I saw she was right. "I see it," I said. "I see it…" and then I was asleep.
