Hey guys, sorry it's been longer than usual since I update chapters. Hope this chapter is good, and hope you haven't lost interest. Bye! Oh, and my new username is MemberoftheHunt.

Chapter 6

Jacen and I strolled toward a small building with a sign on the door that said "Camp Store". We walked in and Jacen went up to the girl behind the counter who had brown hair in nasty looking braids. I just stood to the side, not sure what to do with myself. "Clarisse, I need a…" Jacen started, but then turned to me. He looked at me but then instantly looked back to Clarisse like he had quickly made up his mind about something. "I need a size small-" Heh heh. "-camp T-shirt with a sleeping bag, backpack, toiletries, you know what."

"Oh, do we have a new camper, now?" Clarisse sneered. She turned to me and looked me up and down. "Hmm… Well she won't be an Ares, that's for sure. She's too lean and whimpy looking. Bet she don't got any muscle." Oh yeah, sure, I don't have muscle. I'm on the freaking swim team and I'm one of the best ones there. "Don't say that, she does have muscle. I'm the one who carried her to the big house and she was wearing a t-shirt. She's got muscle."

"Yeah, okay then, sure." Clarisse retorted. She turned to me. "Take off your sweatshirt."

"What?" I asked, a little startled by her question.

"I wanna see if you actually have muscle!"

"I'm really sorry, but are we seriously arguing about this?"

"Do it."

"Okay, Clarisse," Jacen interrupted. "Just get her the supplies. You'll see it sooner or later, just be patient."

"Jacen!" I exclaimed, horrified by this entire situation. "What in the world, why are you two even caring about this! This is kinda ridiculous!" Jacen looked at me like I was stupid. "Well," he began. "You probably aren't in the Ares cabin, since you're too nice and I can't see you being aggressive and beating up a poor old satyr. The other cabins want to make a point that Ares isn't the only strong, tough cabin."

"Watch that plan go down the toilet," Clarisse muttered. She was carrying the supplies and was holding it out expectantly to Jacen. I got up from the chair and took the supplies from him while he paid Clarisse. He had taken out little gold coins, which I had never seen before. I couldn't see what was inscribed into them, but it looked like there was a tall building on one of the sides. We began to walk out, Jacen mumbling words of hatred towards Clarisse. "Bye, newbie. Have a good time!" She called sarcastically. As soon we got out of sight from the camp store Jacen grabbed the supplies from my hands and threw it to the ground and took a stick. What in the world. He saw my expression and straightened up. "Sorry about that, but Clarisse tends to hide stink bombs and other fun surprises in the new campers' bags."

"It's okay," I said, still confused. Jacen took the stick and began to poke around my stuff with it. He separated everything and began to investigate. He began to flip my shirt around and tried to get it to go inside out. Inside my shirt, there was this bluish paste that was spread all over it. "My gods, Clarisse," Jacen whispered in horror. He flipped my shirt to the side, away from everything else. He then investigated the sleeping bag with extreme caution. Barely touching the zipper, he pulled it down about halfway when millions of tiny spiders began to crawl out and scurry across the grass, away from us. Jacen jumped up with a small yelp and backed as far away as he could from the spiders. He waited until they were out of sight and slowly inched toward the sleeping bag. He took the stick, which was shaking in his hands and flipped it over a couple of times. Nothing came out, so Jacen muttered some intelligent words and kicked the sleeping bag onto the shirt.

"Okay, what's up with that?" I asked, scared what he would find next. "Okay," Jacen sighed, turning to me. "Clarisse does this every time a new camper comes, but this is the worse she's ever done. That blue paste on the inside of your shirt is something we use against monsters. We can put it on our swords to enhance the damage each blow gives. If you were to put on that shirt, you would've felt like you were burning to death. The spiders-" Jacen shuddered at the thought. "- are poisonous. If one were to bite you, it could've been fatal." I felt a little scared, but shrugged it off.

"Are you…" I said, trying not to laugh. "Afraid of spiders?"

"Very, very much. All children of Athena are. Ever since that Arachne incident, oooh. It's been bad. Really, really bad." He turned back and looked at my things with disgust. "I'm not even going to bother investigating this stuff. Gods knows what she did with the rest of it. Don't worry; I'll get you new supplies that haven't been….tampered with." Jacen smiled at the last part. "While I get you new supplies, I need to find someone that can get you to your cabin and such…" He looked around until he saw a camper who was already walking in their relative direction. "Grover!" Jacen exclaimed. "Can you show Dahlia her cabin and get her fitted with a weapon?" Once I got a full look of Grover, I was astounded. I saw those satyrs at the volleyball pits earlier, but seeing one up close was…. a little intimidating. I better not walk up behind him; he might kick me on accident…..

"Sure, but I gotta hurry," he said hastily. "I'm going on a date with Juniper in an hour, and I've still gotta get ready, too."

"That's fine; just make sure the other kids don't eat her. She's been getting some…. Unwanted attention."

"Okay, okay, but let's get going!" Grover grabbed my hand and began to trot towards the cabins nestled in the woods.

"Bye Dahlia!" Jacen yelled, waving with a smile on his face. We were already going over a hill and nearly tripped, I was so startled by his sudden goodbye. I turned around and it looked like he was trying not to laugh.

"Bye Jacen!" I called back with a weak smile, for I was slightly embarrassed.

Going down that hill was scary as heck. Or should I say: "Going down that hill was scary as hades." Once we got down the hill I was so surprised by what I saw. From the house it looked like regular old camp cabins, but painted different colors. Well I was wrong. Each cabin was each unique and amazing. They were in a U shape and had numbers on each cabin, odd numbers on one side, even on the other. Lowest numbers were at the middle of the base of the U. There were twelve cabins, one had great greek architecture, another looked just like a regular old cabin. One had peacock feathers on the door; another had coral around the base that was glittering in the sun.

I was looking at all of the cabins when I saw one that I instantly knew was my favorite. It was silver and had a buck's antlers above the door, with pictures of trees, leaves, moose, deer, and other wild animals engraved in wood around the base of the cabin. On the door there was a small crack where in the center of it, there was a golden arrow. The golden arrow held up a sign that read "NO BOYS". I couldn't help but laugh when I saw it. I wonder which cabin that was…. I started to go through the gods in my head and finally figured it out. Artemis. Goddess of the hunt, moon, and fertility. Forever a maiden. Forever…twelve. And the cabin wasn't for her children, for she had none. It was for her huntresses. How I wish I could be one of them…. I dream of it all the time. Me running through the woods, with a bunch of girl's my age. Packing with animals and hunting monsters. A never ending camping experience. Amazing. A-ma-zing. Amazing.

I must've been staring at the cabin for quite a while because Grover began shaking my shoulder. "Dahlia. I'm sorry I know Lady Artemis truly is mystical," he said dreamily. Then his thoughts came back to reality. "But if we leave now, we can have thirty minutes to suit you with armor. Then I can get ready for my-" but Grover stopped, as if trying to make himself say the word. "date," He pushed the word out, grinning in success at himself. I giggled to myself then made myself get my act together. "Okay, that's fine, let's go." We walked into the woods for quite a while until we found a large arena, and I wondered to myself if I could see it if I stood on top of the Big House's roof and find it in the trees.

We walked in and I was in wonder. It looked like a football field, but five times the size and width and made of sand. Sort of. There were spectator seats and the set up was just like a football field. As soon as the seats ended, there would be what looked like a large track around the inside perimeter and there was a start/finish line. Then, in the very center of this whole mess, was a little fighting ring, with a fence around it that was lined with carts of weapons.

We began rifling through the carts and I tried out swords. All of them were too heavy or too light and just when I found the right one… Long story short, we both learned that swords are not my forte. We went through the daggers and I was okay at it. Then we went through spears and I pretty good and targeting. But then, there were the bows and arrows. I was most excited to do these. Grover set up a target and I began to test it out. The first time I shot, I totally missed. But after a while I started to get the hang of it. I got closer and closer to the bulls-eye, and I was getting giddy. I turned to Grover, having run out of arrows.

"This is it. This is my weapon of choice." I found an arrow on the ground that I must've dropped and got into position to shoot it. Just as I was about to let go, I had a strange, flash of a vision. I saw a girl about my age in the exact position as me. Her auburn hair was cascading down her back and she looked magnificent. Her eyes were a piercing color of the moon, it was startling. She wore a greek tunic and a circlet of flowers around her head. Where her bow was, directly behind it, in the exact shape, was a crescent moon. Then another flash came and I suddenly let go of the arrow. It shot forward and I hit a bulls-eye. "Amazing," I whispered in wonder.

Hey guys, I'm sorry this one took sooo long. I had a lot of stuff happening on the weekend and yesterday was Halloween so… ya. Hope you all liked this chapter!