Disclaimer: I don't own Percy Jackson

A/N: Okay, I know Apollo is supposed to be laid back, over-confident, and all those other big words that I can't think of right now. But I'm assuming he knows how to be serious when the situation calls for it so… sorry if I totally butcher his good nature. I don't mean to. I really don't. Hope you enjoy anyways!

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I stood there, in awkward silence, for a moment not quite sure what to do with myself. Apollo removed one of his earbuds and said, "Why don't you sit down." while gesturing with a wave of his hand. The chair across from him slid out from underneath the table by itself.

I looked back at the door. Dan was stilling blocking it. Like a bodyguard. He stood there, his arms crossed, his face forward, no expression or emotion coming through.

I didn't think I had much of a choice.

Repressing a sigh, I walked over slowly and sat down. It was weird being this close to a god, especially my… biological father. The only thing separating us was about a two-foot wide table. (Between you and me, if I wasn't related to him in any way or in this situation I would've told you Apollo was hot, and not because he's the sun god…. That sounds creepy anyway, doesn't it?)

"What's this all about?" I finally dared to ask, breaking the tense silence.

"I think you know exactly what this is about, Victoria." he answered. And I did. At least, I thought so.

"You can call me Tori, Apollo." I told him, meeting his gaze, as I absentmindedly reached up to feel that thin chain underneath my shirt. Except this time, it wasn't there. For a second I panicked and then realized I forgot to put it on this morning. But, I figured, because of the predicament I was in right now, that was a good thing.

"That's Lord Apollo to you, Victoria." he replied evenly.

"You can't expect me to call you what you want if you don't call me what I want." Apollo's eyes flashed and for a second I thought I knew what it felt like to be Percy, getting on people's bad sides.

Then, for about a half a second I thought I saw slight admiration as he said, "Touché." and then it disappeared. "Zeus wanted me to come and deliver a message." he continued like nothing had happened.

"I thought that was Hermes's job." I interrupted.

"Yes, well, Hermes is very busy at the moment so Zeus sent his second best." he said.

For some reason that made me absolutely enraged. So infuriated that I almost said, "You know what I think? That you and Zeus both know that I'm your daughter and he sent you down here just to spite me."

Almost.

But I decided at the last moment that would give Zeus permission to turn me into a plant or something. I didn't want to be a plant. (But, boy, if things continued like this I probably wouldn't mind being a plant.)

I simply waited, gritting my teeth, for him to tell me what he needed to tell me.

"From now on," Apollo started, "you will be watched by one of my sons, and one of my daughters."

I gaped. "Whoa, wait a second. Why do I get the special treatment? Annabeth knew Luke too! Bunches of people hung out with him. Why am I the only one who has to have…" I trailed off and looked to my left and right. Dan, and Brooke had appeared out of thin air beside me. "Bodyguards and they don't?" I asked.

"Because you're the only one who had an intimate relationship with Luke." Apollo stated. I looked down, clasping my hands together, and chewing my lip. "Is that not true?" he challenged. I didn't answer. "Is that, or is that not true, Tori?"

"Yes, okay, yes it's true!" I yelled over his voice looking up at him.

"Is that why you kept his secret." It was a question, but he certainly didn't make it sound like a question.

"Yes." I admitted quietly looking back down.

"And you believed him?" He asked this quietly, and calmly.

I looked back up. "I beg your pardon?" Was he saying what I thought he was saying?

"How is he trying to raise the titan lord?" he continued on, ignoring my question.

"I-I don't know. He didn't tell me." I mumbled keeping my head down.

"Do you even know where he is right now?"

"No, I don't. The last time I saw him was the last day at camp, before he tried to kill Percy."

"Why didn't he take you with him? He claimed to love you, didn't he?"

My head snapped up again. "What are you saying?"

"Luke doesn't love you, Tori." Apollo said.

I looked back down yet again. But this time because I didn't want him to see that I was trying not cry. "That's not true." I murmured, swallowing hard.

"He's using you." Apollo's tone had softened a bit. "He only said he loved you so you'd keep his secret. He doesn't care about you."

"If he doesn't care about me, then why do I need guards?" I asked in a low voice, keeping my head down.

"A precaution. In case, you are working for him and he decides to contact you or you decide to contact him." he explained.

"But… I'm just… a camper. I don't even know where he is." I whispered. "I'm not a threat."

"You should have thought of that before you decided to keep Luke's secret. This could have ended as soon as you found out." Apollo stood. "Dinner is ready. You should head down to the pavilion."

I looked up at him. "But I didn't hear the—"

Apollo tilted his head slightly, a smile forming on his lips just as the horn sounded.

"Just wait on the porch, I need to talk to Dan and Brooke for a moment." he said gesturing to the door.

I nodded and slowly backed off. Chewing on my lip I stepped out into the warm, summer night air. It was still pretty light out. I walked up to the railing and buried my head in my hands. I wanted to cry. But I couldn't, not now. I wasn't going to let anyone see my weak side. I hated that.

"Ready?" Brooke's voice came. I turned as they came out of the Big House.

"Yeah." I muttered walking down the steps and toward the pavilion. As we walked over, this awful feeling overwhelmed me though. It came close to stopping me in my tracks. I didn't want to go into the pavilion. I didn't want to be seen, at all.

"Keep moving." Dan muttered shoving me forward slightly. Oops, I guess I had stopped. I took a deep breath and tried to get my stomach to stop doing flip-flops as I continued walking.

As I got closer I heard talking, murmuring, more like, but when I appeared it all stopped. I'm being totally serious. They all stopped talking. Some turned to look at me with accusatory gazes. No wonder I didn't want to come. But why were they acting this way? Looking at me like that? It couldn't be because they knew I had helped Luke last summer. I thought that was between me and the gods (and maybe Dan and Brooke too), but that was it!

I think they'd be nice enough to keep my personal life out of the limelight. So, who could've told—

Of course, why didn't I think about it before? Tantalus. No doubt someone like him would go and blab about what happened. Now the whole camp hated my guts.

Great. My life just gets better and better.

Dan and Brooke headed off to the Apollo table. Trying to ignore the hard, acidic stares of just about everyone else, I slowly made my way to the Hermes table, chewing my lip and crossing my arms over my stomach. They all looked down at their food when I came over. I didn't sit down because there was no room for me.

I didn't know what else I was supposed to do, so I stood there and waited to see if one of them would find the heart to at least move over a little bit so I could eat (even if I didn't quite feel like eating at the moment).

"Now, campers," Tantalus chided. "Make room for the traitor." It was like I was being sliced by a sword. Just that singular word hurt more than anything on this entire planet. No one moved. "You heard me! Move!" he barked. With grumbles they moved over slightly to make room for me. I slowly sat down next to Travis. He left a good two inches between us, like I was poisonous.

This was going to be a very long summer.

In those few short minutes yesterday my life took a sharp turn. When people weren't talking about the chariot races—which had been postponed for unknown reasons and were going to stay postponed until further notice—or making fun of Percy and Tyson, they were glaring at me or talking about me when they "thought" I couldn't hear them. Everyone avoided me like I was some kind of infection. If they got too close they'd catch it and die.

Travis and Connor Stoll (I think I've mentioned them once. They were both tall and thin, with a mess of brown hair that hung in their eyes. They looked a lot like Hermes, and they were probably the most mischievous) were put in charge of the Hermes cabin. I was always situated at the back of line. I was pushed into a small little corner in the cabin itself. I was basically shunned by the cabin; shunned by the whole camp, really. It was a terrible feeling.

I felt like breaking out into tears every day, but held them back, waiting until I was officially alone. I didn't want to look like a crybaby or a martyr.

The stares were the worst part, though. Percy's especially. When he wasn't glaring at all the other campers he was glaring at me. It was probably the most murderous, death-glare I'd seen him make before. Way worse than what he was giving the others. And it only made me feel more and more guilty. He'd saved my life and this was how I repaid him.

Another con to this whole thing: the guards. They were the second worst. They had to be around me almost 24/7. They wouldn't talk to me and they always had these blank faces (except for when they were talking with friends). They reminded me of those guards protecting the Queen of England's castle—at least when they were with me. No matter how hard you tried you couldn't make them laugh, or even smiled. Not even a twitch of the lips. Nothing!

Oh, and did I mention no one wanted to train with me, let alone be with me during an activity. So, I'd do archery by myself, arts and crafts by myself, the climbing wall by myself. I wasn't even allowed to practice my swordsmanship because they didn't trust me with a sword. I guess they thought I was going to go all ax-murder on them and kill everyone at camp. That was an option, but it wouldn't help the situation. (I'm joking, if you didn't know.)

I had been feeling like bursting out into tears a lot more lately, and no matter how hard I tried, no matter how much I worked, I always felt like sobbing and it was killing me. I wanted to cry, I really did, it would relieve so much of this stress that was weighing down on me, but with these bodyguards I couldn't have a private moment. I didn't want to cry while everyone else was sleeping because odds were—with my luck—someone would wake up and notice.

But, finally, my chance came. I was practicing my archery, shooting my arrows with as much force as I possibly could, when thunder boomed overhead. At first, I ignored it because it never rained here unless we wanted it to. But with the border of the camp dying and all…. Let's just say that there were a lot of screams and squeals when the rain started pouring down on us.

I lowered my bow, not feeling the wet or the biting cold of the rain. I looked up at the darkened sky, reaching up and feeling that thin chain of the necklace underneath my shirt (I hadn't forgotten to put it on since that fateful meeting with Apollo). I looked back down and went to grab the arrows lodged in the target. I took my time. I knew that Brooke and Dan would probably hate me for this, but they couldn't control my decisions, I still made them.

Everyone had scurried into their cabins and now had their gazes trained on me through the windows as I walked past. I put the arrows away and went over to the Big House steps, placing my bow beside me. Dan and Brooke stepped over me and sat in some chairs underneath the cover of the porch, huddled in towels to dry off and keep warm.

Have you ever heard that one quote you see all the time about life, or, to be more specific, the rain? If memory serves it went something like: "I like the rain because no one can see your tears."

That's what I did. I cried. I didn't sob, I didn't weep, I didn't yell, or scream. I sat on the third step, stared at one spot on the ground, let the tears well up in my eyes, and let them role down my cheeks when I blinked. I did that until it stopped raining.

I did feel slightly better, but I still had more tears to spare. When the sun poked its head out of the clouds that were now thinning and blowing away with the warm, but slightly cold at the same time, breeze I stood up with my bow in hand. I walked back to the cabins again and this time went inside to get a new change of clothes. All the talking that had been going on before I opened the door stopped. It was deadly silent, the only noise, my shoes making a squishing sound on the floor as I walked over to my bag.

I wanted to sleep that night, but I couldn't. This was getting to me already. I needed to get up and move. I couldn't sit still for very much longer, I'd wake everyone up with me and they probably wouldn't appreciate that. They already hated me enough.

Finally, I grabbed my bow, stole some arrows from the armory (what? When you spend six years in the Hermes cabin you learn a few things… that or you get bored and ask the Stoll brothers, or Luke, to teach you how to pick a lock) and went down for target practice. Which was really just shooting arrows at one target. The great thing about being one of the daughters of Apollo was my archery. I didn't miss the target—or bull's eye—once. Well, I suppose it also comes with practice as well.

"Should you really be doing that?" someone asked coming up next to me. I pulled another arrow out of my quiver and shot at the target again without missing a beat.

"They can make new ones." I said continuing to shoot. I hit the bull's eye each time, which split the other arrow clean in half. By now I'd shot about ten or so.

"Won't you get in trouble?" he asked.

I shrugged and let another arrow fly. "Compared to what I've been through these past few days? Cakewalk." I told him.

"What about the harpies?"

I sighed and pulled out another arrow. "Why are you even talking to me?"

"Oh, I see how it is. I'll leave you to this, then. Sorry." he muttered.

I sighed again and lowered my bow-and-arrow.

"Percy, I simply mean that you were the one giving me the worst of all the glares. Everyone else hates me, I know you hate me with a passion. Why are you suddenly talking to me?"

There was a long pause on his end. "I… don't really… know." he told me honestly.

I nodded. "All right then." I turned back to what I was doing. I wasn't sure if Percy left or not but it got silent, so I assumed he'd gone off somewhere.

"You're pretty good at that." he said startling me. It was a good thing I'd already let go of the arrow.

I smiled and chuckled without humor. "Well, my father's known for it." I told him letting go of another arrow.

"Wait… Hermes? But I thought—"

I laughed again. "Do I look like Hermes?" I asked letting another arrow go.

"Well, no, but—"

I readied another arrow. "I never said my father was Hermes, Percy." I let go and, like all the others it sliced right through and hit the bull's eye.

Percy's expression was priceless. He was thoroughly confused. I reached for another arrow but realized I was out. Darn, that was fun.

Sighing, I walked over to the target to take out the destroyed arrows (at least one was still intact). Percy followed.

"Apollo?" he asked.

"Do you know another god that's good at archery?"

"Just making sure." he muttered defensively. I started walking back to the armory and cabins.

"So, how do you know who your godly parent is, but he doesn't?"

"You sure ask a lot of questions." I told him avoiding that particular one. "Why are you out here anyway?" I queried.

"I could ask you the same thing." he countered. Boy wasn't as slow as I originally ascertained.

I shrugged. "Couldn't sleep."

He grimaced. "Same here." he muttered.

I closed the door to the armory and re-locked it.

"I'm sorry, Percy." I murmured, still facing the door. I turned around when he didn't say anything for a long time. He looked flustered, his face slightly red. Jeez, he didn't take that like I thought he would.

"W-what for?" he stuttered.

I let out a heavy sigh and rolled my eyes. "For the whole… Luke thing."

Percy looked down. "Oh."

"Yeah." More silence occurred. "Well, we'd both better get going before we get eaten." I mumbled taking a few steps away from the armory.

Percy chuckled rubbing the back of his neck. "Yeah, sounds like a painful way to die."

"Yeah…. Well, goodnight, Percy." I waved as I slowly backed up. He waved back and I turned around and quickly headed to the Hermes cabin.

The next day, feeling much more confident, I decided to talk to Tantalus about my not-being-able-to-train dilemma. The only thing dampening my confident mood was the fact that he had to call me "traitor" instead of my real name. That was his new name for me now: Traitor. (At least I still kept my initials the same.)

"What is it you want, Traitor?" he asked smiling cruelly at me, knowing that I hated it when he called me that.

"I want privilege to my weapons again and to the arena." I demanded in an even tone.

"Oh, would you, now?" he asked. "And give me one good reason, why I should let a traitor, like yourself, carry weapons?"

"You let me carry a bow-and-arrow." I pointed out. "And I haven't hurt anyone accidentally or otherwise."

Tantalus waved his hand. "Yes, yes, but I don't consider a bow-and-arrow to be a lethal weapon." he said his voice bored.

He clearly didn't know what he was talking about, but I wasn't about to jeopardize my only chance to get sword fighting back.

"I'd also like to request that someone—as in a real person from camp—train with me… while we're at it."

Tantalus's smile got wider. Oh boy, I was sure in for it now. But not in the way I thought.

"All right then. How about we go find a training partner for you right now?" he asked gesturing to someone behind me. It was Dan. He came up and roughly grabbed my upper forearm, yanking me out of my seat.

"Jeez! Lighten up. I think I can get out of a seat by myself, thank you very much." I spat wrenching my arm out of his hand. He glared at me. "Oh, don't give me that."

"Come, come, Traitor." Tantalus called from the Big House door. I took a deep breath and tried to restrain myself from hitting him in the back of the head with something heavy that I could find.

"Move." Dan ordered shoving me forward. I took another deep breath and started forward. I'd need a lot of heavy things for all the people I wanted to smack upside the head right about now.

We went out onto the front porch and someone blew the conch horn. Great. Public humility. Why did I ask again? Oh, yeah, that's right, because I was feeling over-confident with myself.

All the campers gathered around the front porch. Tantalus made sure that I was in the spotlight where everyone could see me. Now I knew what it felt like to be Tyson. Except I think everyone hated me a lot more than a Cyclops who really wasn't going to harm anyone. Tyson was a very sweet Cyclops, I thought.

"I bet you're wondering why I brought you here." Tantalus started. "This, traitor, right here"—he patted my shoulder; I tried not to swat his hand away—"wants a fighting partner. Who would like to volunteer?" No one raised their hand or spoke. Not even the people from the Ares cabin. "No; no one? Oh, come on, now." Still nothing. Tantalus turned toward me with a triumphant smile. I gave him the dirtiest look I could possibly summon. "I guess you'll just go without train—"

He broke off just as someone from the crowd called, "I will."

He spun around to see who it was. I looked too, shocked anyone would, actually, volunteer.

"Percy?" I asked in disbelief just as Tantalus yelled, "Percy!"

"What a wonderful match." our activities director said when he'd composed himself. "A traitor"—he smiled at me—"and a troublemaker." He turned back to look at Percy. Then he turned to me again. "Very well, I will give you permission. But if anything happens you'll be sorry." he warned getting into my face. I tried not to gag; his breath was rancid. Talking had broken out among the audience. Annabeth was yelling at Percy.

"I would also like to announce!" Tantalus shouted over the crowd. They quieted down. "I would also like to announce, that the chariot races are going to take place in two days! I thank you for being patient, and apologize for keeping you waiting for so long." Wow, him apologizing? I could cross that off my bucket list. "You are all dismissed!"

The campers broke off back to their activities and whatever they were doing, talking and whispering about the chariot races, but mostly about Percy doing that. I, too, was dumbfounded. He was so confusing. One moment he wants to kill me and the next he's willing to help me train. Were all boys this confusing?

The only two people who hadn't walked off were Annabeth and Percy. They were still arguing. Then she let out a growl, shoved Percy back, and stormed off. He followed and, by the looks of it, tried to apologize to her.

I turned back to Tantalus and my guards.

"Brooke, would you be so kind and fetch our traitor's sword and switchblade?" Tantalus asked walking back inside. Brooke nodded and followed him. I gritted my teeth and clenched my hands into fists. I even raised one, shaking it, muttering to myself that it was a bad idea if I punched our activities director.

"Put the fist down, Victoria." Dan mocked. I spun on him.

"Shut up, Daniel." I shot back through my teeth. Brooke decided to come out then.

"Break it up you two." she warned handing me my weapons.

"Thank you." I nodded taking them from her open hands. It felt great to have them back in my possession.

Sword fighting with Percy was actually, really fun. He was a very, well-trained swordsman, but thanks to my training over the school year I was just as good (maybe even a little better, but don't tell Percy that).

"You'd better watch out. Just the other day I totally creamed the Apollo cabin." he told me on our first day.

I couldn't help the smile that broke out across my face. "Then… you wouldn't mind if… I asked you to go easy on me?" I hoped the smile wouldn't ruin my "plea."

Percy looked at me suspiciously but I looked back with wide, innocent eyes.

"Okay," he finally said.

The look on his face, as his sword went flying from his hand, was priceless.

"What was that?" he asked incredulously.

"I never said I wasn't going to go easy on you." I told him grinning and trying to hold back my laughs.

Our water break was a little more serious. We were just sitting there in one of the bleachers, I hadn't meant to say it, but it just came out. I don't even know where it came from because I hadn't been paying much attention to Percy's life.

"You shouldn't be so ashamed having Tyson as a brother, you know." I said. I felt his eyes turn to me, but I stared at a spot on the floor. He looked away.

"I can't help it. I just…" he shrugged. "I just do." I had a feeling that he didn't want to say anymore as to why.

I sighed.

"You know, I don't think you ever answered my question from last night." Percy finally said.

I smiled without amusement, but I didn't answer his queries about my past. "You're a lot luckier than you realize, Percy." I said standing up and brushing myself off. "Tyson has a sweet personality. He'd be a great brother. You shouldn't take that for granted." I sheathed my sword, secured it around my waist, and started out of the arena.

"But, wait!" Percy called. I turned back around. He had stood up. "You didn't answer my question."

I smiled. "I'll give you a hint." I paused. "Do I remind you anyone?" I asked my eyes flickering over to Dan for a second before going back to Percy. "I'll see you tomorrow, Percy." I called over my shoulder, heading up the rest of the steps.

Okay, so, I'd had my guards for about five or six days now, and my patience with them was wearing thin. They were getting on my very last nerve. Well, Dan was at least. Brooke kind of stayed under the radar of my scathing comments toward, mostly, Dan.

Today, somehow, I'd managed to lose my guards, or rather, they managed to lose me. I didn't mind. It was nice not to be followed around all the time and watched after being followed and watched for six days.

I didn't know where they went, but right now I was going down to the amphitheater. They'd be able to find me sometime, I'm sure. As I neared the entrance I heard arguing going on. I inched closer and poked my head in. It was Percy and Annabeth.

They were having such a heated argument that I was able to quench my curiosity and walk down the steps into earshot, and they didn't even notice me. So, I stood there, with my arms crossed, and listened.

Sorry for the abrupt break-off there, I like to keep my chapters relatively the same length (just some form of OCD I have). Also, I know what you're thinking, and you're wrong…. Hope you enjoyed!

.happiness.

~ See you at Camp Half-Blood!