Woohoo! Aren't you all proud of me? I not only updated just a week after my previous update, but I reached 10k words! Yay! Okay, I know that's not that much, but still.

In celebration of this feat, I would like to give a few shout-outs. Feel free to skip over them. Or not.

The Stolen Scepter by kamira1214: my real-life friend's first fic. It's quite well-written. From what she's been telling me, I've got to say it'sss the most inventive PJO fic ever. The main character is an OC but definitely not a Mary-Sue.

Capitol Girl by daenerysbellagirl: Hunger Games. It's the story of how Effie became a District Mentor. It's very good; daenerysbellagirl is a wonderful writer.

Dark Phoenix by Lightningscar: Some of you may know this one. It's one of my absolute favorite fics ever. It's a Nico goes to Hogwarts fic, but it's very well-written. Just saying, it's quite dark, and shows a Nico very up-to-date with HoH on the sanity level.

Death God Alliance by Asilda: Okay, you all know this one. Enough said.

I WON, I WON, NEENER NEENER NEENER by All-Knowing Alien 2: A LOTR AU Mary-Sue parody-ish thing that is an absolute riot. ANother of my absolute favorites.

Replies to reviews:

Blob: awesomeness! Da reference made me facepalm, but it was EPIC! Keep up the good work! :D

Why, thank you! I'll try!

44Lefty: Not bad. A little spooky, though.

Thanks, I try. Spooky isn't bad, right? :P And yes, Artemis is allies with the LEP, but Trouble in particular has always detested him.

0o0o0o0o0o0o

It wasn't exactly Frank's idea of a wonderful day. They'd survived an airplane crash (mainly with his and Jason's help), stumbled upon some vampire-guy whose house made Hazel's gem-sensor go crazy, been attacked by a giant man-eating horse, been shot at with golden arrows, and to finish it all off it was night-time, and they were somewhere in the Irish country-side with people trying to kill them.

Not your standard vacation.

And then there was Nico who had shown up- Nico, who had left both the Greeks and the Romans and hadn't been seen since the war. What was he doing in Ireland anyway? And how did he get the taxi? And, now that he came to think of it, where the heck (Frank contentiously censored his swearwords, even in the privacy of his own mind) was he? Shouldn't he have reported by now?
Frank rubbed a hand through his hair. Blasted son of Hades.

He trotted up to Hazel, who was at the front of the party with Annabeth.
"Have you seen Nico?" he asked worriedly. Hazel turned to him, stumbling slightly on a rut in the ground.

"No..." his girlfriend replied. "But he'll be fine. And anyway, we're technically not on their property anymore, this is a public road, so they don't have any claim for trespass or anything. Right, Annabeth?"

The blonde girl glanced around, then muttered something in Hazel's ear too quietly for Frank to hear. Hazel frowned.

"What? But... he let us use that room, so..."

"Exactly," said Annabeth, slightly more loudly than before. "He seemed to trust us enough to do that, and yet he spied on us." She peered into the gloom, trying to make out the footpath. It probably didn't help, Frank reflected, that the trail was covered in long weeds. Long weeds, and the occasional wildflower, but absolutely no sign of the Ghost King.

"He'll catch up eventually," Annabeth assured Frank.

"Yeah."

But for some reason Frank got the feeling that they wouldn't be seeing Nico di Angelo for quite a bit longer than the others thought.

0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o

The old shed by the garage was, as previously mentioned, old. The walls cracked. There was a steady dripdripdrip from the ceiling. The only reason the Fowls hadn't gotten around to fixing it was because it was used for nothing and extremely difficult to get to (it was pinned between the electric, spiky fence and a bed of very thorny holly bushes).

It had a use now. Or at least, a temporary use. It was home to one of the most bizarre conversations in the history of bizarre conversations.

"All right," Butler heard his sort-of-captor say. "Why were you spying on the... teenagers?"

"How do you know about that?" Butler asked, his eyes narrowing.

"I have my ways," the voice replied. Rather cliché, Butler thought.

"That's fair enough," he said aloud. "And if you are at liberty to keep your secrets, I think I'll keep mine, thank you very much."

I think I can get out of here un-injured, Butler thought, but better to play helpless and try to find out what the hell is going on.

"Fair enough," the other said. "So if I turn on the light you'll tell me?"

"What?"

"If I show you who I am will you tell me? By your method, a secret for a secret."

"That's hardly an even secret," Butler growled back. "For all I know, you could be wearing some sort of disguise."

There was a moment of silence, as though the other person was debating something.

"Fine," they said finally. "I swear on the river Styx that I am not wearing a disguise, yada yada yada."

"What?" said Butler for the second time in as many minutes.

"An unbreakable vow," the person across the rickety table clarified, sighing. "Then again, I could be lying about that too, so you might as well just trust me."

"Trust you," said Butler slowly. "After you threatened me?"

A silence descended which conveyed very effectively the other's exasperation.

I have a feeling I'm going to regret this, but...

"Alright. A secret for a secret, as you say. Turn the light on."

There was no sound from the person opposite Butler, but the old lamp on the wall flickered to life, revealing a sallow-faced, pale, dark-haired teenager.

Holding a sword.

"You're one of them?" was Butler's first reaction. The boy gave a smirk similar to Artemis'.

"Who did you expect?"

"It doesn't matter to you," Butler said. Probably best not to let the egoistical, if his similarities to Artemis were anything to go by, teenager know that Butler had thought he was a hardened criminal.

"All right. Why were you spying on us?" the boy asked.

I don't see much harm in telling him, Butler thought.

"Our cellars are pretty secure," he said aloud, "Do you catch my drift?"

"Perfectly. Sorry, but I can't tell you how we did that."

"You admit to having purposefully trespassed into our cellars?" Butler knew the answer, but it always paid to get a clear confession from the suspect.

"Oh, yes."

Butler tilted his head, ignoring the splatter of a drop of water on his penknife-holding hand.

"You're not ashamed. Or scared. Don't you realize what we would have done to you had you not revealed yourselves?"

The boy- what was his name again? Percy? That was the only name Butler remembered from the group of abnormal teenagers- shrugged.

"I doubt anything you could do would be worse than what some of us have been through."

Butler remembered what maybe-Percy had said about seeing Hell. Still...

"Don't be too sure," he said darkly. Always best to seem dangerous.

Probably-Percy sighed.

"Listen. I don't know who- or, possibly, what- you are, and I highly doubt you have any idea who I am, and I would like to keep it that way."

Interesting, Butler mused, the kid refers to himself and not his group. And he's the goth boy that came later- Nico! That's it! Now that is interesting.

"My employer may have some secrets, and I can sympathize that you do too, but while you would prefer secrecy on all sides, I can assure you that my employer will not. He... what to say... searches for answers. Voraciously. And trust me, you do not want him on your case. He is quite merciless when it comes to- oh, hell, he's merciless all the time. I don't know what you want, but I know that he wants to know who you are and what you can do. Part of which he's probably already deduced."

Nico regarded him for a moment.

"Just leave us alone," he said at length. "I needed to talk to you- to warn you. You don't know what you're dealing with."

Inwardly, Butler sighed. This kid reminded him slightly of Holly- dramatic, confident, and a rebel. Despite his affection for the Captain, he felt Nico needed to be taught a lesson.

He stood up suddenly, sweeping one leg under the table and hooking Nico's chair leg with his foot. The old chair lurched, but the boy didn't lurch with it. He was in a fighting stance in the blink of an eye.

They regarded each other warily for a moment. Then Butler spun and delivered a round-house kick to the air where Nico was a moment ago. The boy was now on the opposite side of the room. The shadows around him seemed to be thickening.

Suddenly Butler realized all Nico needed to do to win this fight was to turn off the light. Clearly he could see well in the dark, whereas Butler did not have that advantage. He needed to take care of Nico now before the boy realized it.

Butler knew better than to glance at the light-switch, but his not-quite-as-surreptitious-as-he-could-have-hoped rotation to get in between Nico and the wall did not go unnoticed by his opponent.

The boy's eyes narrowed, and Butler could tell he was putting one and one together. Butler would have to make his move quickly or not at all.

Just as Nico lunged for the light socket, Butler swung around and hit him on the head with the blunt side of the pen-knife.