I do not own Percy Jackson or the Kane Chronicles.
Percy's PoV. ('bout time, right?)
Plus side to the rooms here: big beds. Downside to the rooms: no pillows. Instead they have wooden headrests. Yeah, not for me. Carter said that they help keep your soul from wondering off when you sleep, but I'm a demigod, there is no way to keep that from happening. It comes with the territory whether I like it or not. So goodbye headrest, it's needless to give myself a creak in the neck for something that won't do me any good.
It was almost midnight before I was able to get to bed. The older kids really did love to stay up late on the weekends. I don't think they respect the sanctity of sleep. At least there's no school on Sundays. Thank the gods for that.
Of course, I had a nightmare. I found myself back in Tartarus fighting the arai and I sliced through the demon that bit me and I felt the gorgon's blood running through my body once again, just as painful as the first time. Then the dream changed and I was at the Doors of Death with Annabeth and we were watching Bob, Small Bob, and Damasen and his pet drakon were fighting the god of the pit himself and the monster army. Annabeth disappeared from my side and Tartarus destroyed our friends before my eyes. My dream changed again and I found myself alone in a swamp. Sulfurous fog filled the dark air. I saw a clearing with a lone domed hut that was starting to look run down and an old oak tree growing at a 45 degree angle from the jaws of a drakon skull.
You are a poison, Perseus Jackson. The voice of Tartarus spoke. You are a frond. How long will it be before everyone else knows it too? You call yourself a hero but you couldn't even save yourself and you abandoned your friends to a fate worse than death. A fate you deserve more than any other.
Suddenly Tartarus was in front of me and I felt my soul beginning to be ripped apart and drawn toward him. Pain racked my body and I could feel myself being destroyed.
"Percy, wake up!" I awoke with a jolt as someone started shaking me. Sadie stood above me looking concerned but that quickly disappeared when she saw me open my eyes. "You do know it's dangerous to just let your ba wonder around the duat freely, right?"
"Croc bait might have mentioned it." I answered her. "What time is it?"
"Almost ten. I'm surprised you didn't wake up and come see what your brother was yelling about an hour or so ago. Anyone who had still been asleep was woken up by it. Including me." She answered as I sat up. Then I noticed something.
"How did my bed get this wet?" I asked surprised.
"I tried throwing a bucket of cold water on you to wake you up." Zia said from the foot of my bed and sure enough, there on the floor was a bucket with the telltale signs that it had held water. "Which didn't work any better than pounding on the door for fifteen minutes. How are you still dry?"
I looked back down at myself to find that as usual, my waterproofing still worked. Wish I could say the same for the bed. I just shrugged.
"Little trick I learned a while ago." I said as I swung my legs over the said of the bed. "So what was my brother shouting about that I missed?"
"You'll find out soon enough. That's why we came to get you. But…" Zia started to say but paused.
"But what?" I asked, worried.
"What where your dreaming about before we woke you up? You looked like you were in pain and you started crying." Sadie said, both of them looked concerned. I wiped my cheeks and found that I had indeed been crying in my sleep again. Great.
"Nothing you can do anything about." I told them quietly. "I'll be down in a few." I didn't wait for an answer as I stood and headed straight for the bathroom attached to my room and locked the door. For a minute I just stood there. Pull yourself together, I told myself, you're not there anymore. Unfortunately Tartarus doesn't seem to care as he still shows up in my dreams every time I try to sleep. It's been that way since I got out of that place. After a few deep breaths I got ready for the day and made my way downstairs.
At the bottom of the stairs I saw Zia and Sadie talking quietly with Carter and Walt. Carter saw me first.
"Hey Percy." He greeted.
"Hey." I greeted before yawning. "Where's TJ?"
"Balcony." Walt answered. "Jazz, Emily, Julian and Jeff are out there with him trying to calm him down. We had them go out there so we could clean up the mess." He gestured to the room and I looked around to see water everywhere and broken pipes sticking out of the walls, rubble littered the floor and most everyone was wet. They were all trying to clean up the water and fix the pipes and walls. The littlest kids were running around splashing in the puddles around the room. "It was worse an hour ago. It took thirty minutes to stop the water from gushing out of the pipes."
"Again, how did you not wake up? The whole house shook as the pipes blew up." Sadie added.
"TJ did this?" I asked, still looking at all the damage.
"Unintentionally, but, yeah. It was him." Carter said. "He told us before that he has problems controlling his magic. You could teach him how to control it better than we can. Since you know better than any of us what you're both capable of. He needs your help, Percy."
"I can see that, but I can only teach him curtain things. He'll have to learn the rest by himself." I turned back to them. Just then Emily ran in from the balcony.
"TJ's magic is acting up again. Philip and Steve had to get out of the pool." She informed us. "He's getting really panicked."
"Great, that will just make it worse." I said and headed outside and they fallowed close behind. What I saw was the pool throwing up waves and mini cyclones. Once or twice I saw a whirlpool appear. Jazz and the two boys were talking to my brother trying to get him to calm down but weren't having much success. I made my way over to them.
"TJ, please. You need to calm down." Jazz was trying to say as Jeff said, "You need to pull this under control."
"I can't." TJ said, although I couldn't tell if he was telling that to Jazz or to Jeff. Most likely both. He clutched his head in his hands as though he has a migraine and he was pacing.
"Dude, you have to stop this." Julian told him.
"I can't!" my brother shouted and he fell to his knees. Tears started to run down his face. "I can't, I can't, I can't." The balcony started to shake slightly and I could tell that if TJ wasn't distracted in the next minute there won't be a balcony any more.
"You know, I would not want to be a ship caught in a storm like that. Though I could probably sail through it, especially if I have my ship."
"You have a ship?" Carter asked shocked. The others noticed us. "And what does that even have anything to do with this?"
"It has absolutely nothing to do with this and I don't have it anymore. But believe me, she was a beauty. Three masts, an awesome figurehead, the canons which I'm pretty sure were still functional even after three hundred years." The pool started to settle so I took that as a sign that my plan was working. "She got up to 15knots under my control, and for a sailing ship like that, that's pretty darn fast. I miss that ship, and if I'm ever in that area again I would love to try and raise her from the depths that claimed her four years ago."
"You could sail a three hundred year old ship at thirteen?" TJ asked quietly.
"Yup, and by myself even. If I didn't have any reasons to stay here I would love to spend my life on the ocean." He looked up at me with tear filled eyes. "Don't worry; I'm not going anywhere anytime soon." I held my hand out to him to help him up.
"What was the point of that story?" He asked me, guarded.
"The point was to distract you." I saw the confusion in his eyes. "Judging from the fact that the balcony is no longer in immediate danger of destruction, I'd say it worked." He and the others looked at the pool for the first time since I started speaking and they saw that it was calm again and the crocodiles were already climbing back in. instead of taking my hand he just sat back facing the pool with his knees pulled up to his chest.
"Was I really about to destroy the balcony too?" he asked sounding desperate.
"Don't think about it, you'll only work yourself up again and make my distraction go to waste." I sat down next to him. "So what pissed you off so much that you decided to blow up the Great Room?"
"I didn't decide to blow up anything." He glared at me and I just raised an eyebrow at him. "I don't think I did, anyway. How'd you how I was angry? You weren't even there."
"Sadie told me that you were yelling about something earlier when she and Zia woke me up. Then they told me that you…"
"OK, I get it." I heard him grumble and he looked back towards the pool where their pet crocodiles were splashing around.
"Hey, we could use some extra hands in here." Alyssa called from the doors leading inside.
"You guys can go. I'll keep TJ from destroying anything else for now." I told the others. They nodded before leaving.
"If it makes you feel better I've unintentionally messed with pluming a few times because I was pissed off." I told TJ as soon as we were alone.
"And how long ago was the last time that's happened?" he wouldn't look at me.
"End of July, this year. That just goes to show that no human ever has complete control over what they do." He didn't say anything to that. We just sat in silence for a few minutes.
"He kept the truth from me, Percy." The whisper broke the silence between us. I didn't interrupt when he continued to speak. "He never told me… My life isn't even my own. Anubis is the one that's keeping me alive, I'm not healed of anything other than my ignorance to this. If I ever betray or try to leave the House I'll lose the life I don't have. And to top this all off I have the blood of an immortal, but you probably already knew that." By the end he was sobbing. "Mr. Masterrsyn never told me any of this."
"Easy to see why you got so mad."
"H-how can we h-have immortal b-blood?" his voice stuttered. "And what does it h-have to do with who our f-father is?" he looked at me pleadingly and the broken and lost look in his eyes almost made me tell him the truth right then and there but I knew I couldn't.
"Giving you the answers will make those answers invalid. If your path is to mean anything you have to find the answers yourself. I may not be able to give you the answers you want but I will be here for you. Never doubt that." He threw his arms around my neck and cried on my shoulder. "Never forget that."