"I have love in me the likes of which you can scarcely imagine and rage the likes of which you would not believe. If I cannot satisfy one, I will indulge in the other."

-Mary Shelley, Frankenstein

II

I didn't even remember how I managed to continue the lesson. I felt so angry that tears had started to form in the corner of my eyes. Keeping my head down most of the lesson did not stop Cleo's worried quips as she whispered in my ear, or the eyes of a fallen angel from never straying from my face. I could feel it when he was looking at me.

When the bell rang signalling the end of the class, I was one of the first people out. Choking out a quick goodbye to Cleo, I rushed past people into the hallway, away from Perseus Jackson.

As soon as I had escaped his presence, embarrassment flooded me. Rushing to the bathroom, I knew I had five minutes until Economics but I had to calm myself down.

What's wrong with me? I thought, looking into the mirror of the bathroom. There is no logic behind my hatred for him. I've never met him before, I definitely would have remembered.

Releasing a huge sigh, I splashed my face with water, hoping that my mind would clear itself. Maybe I was sick, that could be the only resolution to my problem. Yet, I couldn't stop the embarrassment that engulfed me.

I had no right to feel this unwarranted revulsion; he hadn't done anything to me, I've never met him before in my life. Yet I reacted so strongly there was no denying the intensity of my feelings.

"Oh, sorry."

My head snapped up to the intruding figure, my eyes narrowing on themselves. I could see that the person had shrunk back from my glare, and I felt an almost sorry for the girl.

She must have been the one female transfer. I don't think I had seen anyone quite like her in my years at Aetheria. Her hair fell in uneven, chestnut layers, as if they had been chopped with kitchen shears yet they warped around her shoulders in impeccable waves, as if they all had a purpose. The strands, which on anyone else would have looked tatty and ill fitting, gave the girl character. And her eyes, a doe shape that most would kill for, and I couldn't determine the colour; they seemed to change with every glance towards them.

Her cheeks rushed a vibrant red as I continued to observe her. I couldn't help the warmth that spread through my body, as I dropped my head back to the mirror, embarrassment seeping through me.

Well done, Annabeth. First you have an unwarranted animosity to a guy you barely know and now you're staring someone down as soon as they speak to you. Great manners. I groaned internally, turning the tap in hope that the noise would make things less awkward.

"It's okay." I mumbled, not looking up from the interesting speck of chipped paint at the side of the bathroom mirror. The girl stood awkwardly beside me, reaching for the soap to wash her hands. As it turned out, the soap dispenser on her right was out of order, meaning she had to reach over me for the soap on my left.

I stepped back, allowing her to thoroughly wash her hands. As I wiped my wet hands on my jeans, I gripped my backpack about to walk away.

"I'm Piper, by the way." Her voice was as unique as her appearance. It seemed like honeysuckle, the sound you heard on the radio as you drove on a road trip during spring break. "I just transferred here."

"I guessed that." I almost winced at how snarky I sounded. "I meant, Aetheria doesn't usually get new students. I'm Annabeth." Could you be anymore socially inept? I berated myself.

"Yeah, I probably should realise that." She laughed awkwardly, tugging the strands of her hair. "I just had Calculus, and Mr Jones is a witch in disguise I swear. Is he always so uppity?"

I shrugged, almost grinning at the girl. "I had him last year. Apparently, his wife ran away with a younger, Spanish model to Mexico in the summer. He's been like that ever since."

"I could see why she left." Piper muttered, inciting a chuckle from me. "You don't have him this year then?"

I shook my head, "No, I dropped Calculus after he said, 'Your never going to amount much to anything in my class, Miss Chase'. I take Statistics instead."

"Ouch." Piper groaned. "I wouldn't even be here if it wasn't for the impending wa-" her voice stopped short. I took in her wide eyes as her hand came to cover her mouth.

"Wasn't for what?" Impending didn't connate to anything good.

She looked as if she had swallowed something sour, before muttering "Nothing." Grabbing some paper towels, she wiped her hands dry before sending me a half, weak smile. "I should go, my boyfriend's probably having a fit waiting for me."

Boyfriend? Gods, is she going out with Percy?

Immediately, the thought sent my stomach into knots of unease. "Yeah, it was nice meeting you." I whispered, moving out of her way. My stomach didn't ease up at all, in fact, it seemed to get worse after she sent me a small wave.

I gripped the edge of the sink as my breath came out in harsh gaps. It felt like my stomach was on fire. A fire that soon reached my head. My temples seemed to pulse red, hot pain flooded through me. Trembling, I glanced at the mirror, seeing my reflection.

Numbness flooded through me. Three, hooded figures stood behind me in the reflection, their faces gaunt to the bone of their skull. A gasp escaped me as one lifted a bony figure towards me. Closing my eyes, I shook my head in fear, before opening it in shock. The three figures were gone, and in place was the face of a weary girl, her eyes bloodshot and face as pale as a ghost.

Swallowing deeply, I closed my eyes, trying to erase the image of the women. Unable to stand it anymore, I rushed out of the bathroom, making a beeline for the fire exit.

"Annabeth Chase!" a voice called out from the entrance. "I got a call from school saying you were absent for your last two lessons! What were you thinking playing hooky, young girl?"

I was trembling as pain still flooded my body. My clammy fingers gripped my head as I pulled myself tighter around myself. I just needed the pain to go away. I needed it to stop.

"Aunt Sophia," I managed to mumble out, gasping through the pain as best as I could.

"Annabeth!" I could hear Aunt Sophia rush towards me, just as I fell off my bed. My body felt as if it were convulsing, I was shaking so much.

"Make it stop." I seethed out of my clenched teeth. "Please." Tears began to stream down my eyes. "Make it stop. Please."

I almost sighed in relief when the pain finally stopped as my eyes rolled to the back of my head and darkness was lending it's helping hand.

Brown-gold eyes were the first things I noticed when I woke up. A damp washcloth lay against my forehead as I struggled up from my bed. Aunt Sophia protested, her hands pushing me further down onto my bed.

"I was so worried, Annabeth." Aunt Sophia softly tugged the end of my blonde curls, her voice thick with concern.

"What happened?" I croaked. My throat was sore, as if sensing this, Aunt Sophia handed me a bottle of water, and I gulped it as if I was a sea-bound man finding freshwater for the first time.

"You collapsed as soon as I found you. You had a really high fever, I picked up Mom, she's making her famous soup for you now."

"Nana's here?" Just the single thought of that frail woman made me feel better.

Aunt Sophia must have read my mind, because she chuckled quietly. Placing the back of her hand against my cheek, she removed the now warm towel. "You're fevers coming done already, so just drink plenty of water while I go get some aspirin. I need to call the school to tell them where you are." I nodded, too tired to protest as I sunk into the comfort of my bed.

Aunt Sophia sighed heavily, running her fingers over the top of my head. Pecking my cheek faintly, she exited the bedroom, leaving me to my thoughts.

I must have regained some sort of normality, although that could only be due to my head not being a beacon of pain. I remembered running out of the bathroom and escaping through a fire exit but after that, I didn't know how I got home. I couldn't remember anything. That was enough to scare me.

The bed beneath me vibrated. My body groaned in protest as I lifted myself up into a sitting position as I fisted my fingers beneath my pillow in search for the source of disruption.

My phone blared out as numerous text messages flashed across the screen.

Where are you?

Annabeth, please don't leave me at lunch all alone.

Where the hell are you?

ANNABETH CHASE, ANSWER YOUR GODDAMN PHONE!

Cleo told me what happened in History class, are you okay?

Calypso had sent messages at regular intervals that corresponded with the breaks at Aetheria, albeit the last one was most defiantly sent when Calypso should have had Calculus (who unfortunately hadn't been able to switch to the other maths class as she was abysmal at statistics and therefore her only option had to be to continue with Mr Jones). Flashing the phone again, I realised that it was well into the evening, almost being seven o'clock.

Sighing, I rubbed my temples, before sending a quick text to Calypso.

I'm sick. I've literally slept as soon as I got back home. According to Aunt S, I fainted as soon as I came home.

She replied in a heartbeat.

Oh no, are you going to be okay?

I rolled my eyes, before dispatching a text to her, the brightness of the phone making my eyes blurry.

Yeah, I'm probably exhausted that's all. On the bright side, Nana's come to visit. She's making me food as we speak.

I shouldn't have expected a different answer.

I'll be there in fifteen minutes.

True to her word, fifteen minutes later, Calypso was in sitting by the breakfast bar as I sat opposite Nana.

"Eat up, girl. Your so thin, it's no wonder why you're collapsing." Nana was like an Oreo, hard shell but soft centre, and all sweetness. I grinned up at her, practically inhaling the soup in front of me.

"I'm feeling better now that you're here."

"Stop with the flattering. Just because your sick doesn't mean I won't still kick your ass at Just Dance."

"Mom!" Aunt Sophia blushed, hiding behind her hands. Calypso laughed beside me, whooping as Nana stood up and danced towards Aunt Sophia.

Just the thought of moving made my stomach turn. Maybe I wasn't all that better. "Calypso will destroy you. Your on, old lady."

"Who are you calling old lady?" Nana grinned, sashaying to the living room as Calypso followed her, not before sending a wink my way.

"Gosh, she's so embarrassing!" Aunt Sophia groaned, piling plates away into the dishwasher.

I giggled at the reaction. Nana was the most awe-inspiring woman in the world; nothing would be able to change that. Not even her tendency to mortify Aunt Sophia and myself.

"How are you feeling?"

I smiled softly at her, before replying "Much better. I don't have a headache, but I don't think I'll be able to stomach anything heavy anytime soon."

"Good," She rested her hand against my cheek, her golden brown hair pulled back into a messy braid.

"You know," She moved her hand to my hair, gently running her fingers through the tendrils. "You remind me a lot of Fredrick."

My face went pale, and I could tell Aunt Sophia noticed. "You dad had a brilliant mind, Annabeth, just like you. And I know he loved you very much."

"He wouldn't have abandoned me if he did, Aunt Soph."

"That's not true." Aunt Sophia's voice had hardened. "He loved you so much, he had to protect you. And the only way was to send you to me. It must have been destiny. If you were still with him…" She shuddered at the thought.

Fate would have it, that a week after he had sent me to live with Aunt Sophia, he had been killed in a fatal car accident on the Golden-Gate Bridge. I was five years old when I lost my father.

I realised it was irrational, the way I felt about him. I had hardly known Fredrick Chase before he had shipped me off to Aunt Sophia, my memories of him all but fading. But he was all I had known in my short five years, my mother was a no-show, disappearing before Fredrick had even known she was pregnant, leaving only me in a bundled blanket, hidden inside a woven basket. He had stated terms in a letter to Aunt Sophia, how he couldn't handle having me, how it was too much work. I couldn't help but feel abandoned by him; he had been the only constant figure in my life since the day I was born, albeit a very absent figure.

"Aunt Sophia?" I hesitated before speaking. But logically, I couldn't find the answer. "Have you ever hated someone as soon as you saw them?"

Aunt Sophia grinned, "Of course I do, the mailman when he purposely leaves next door's mail on our doorstep. I don't want to talk to the Matheson's, let alone have to deliver them their mail every week. Hmm, let's see, my boss at the office, he's a right bitch sometimes I swear. Oh, and that clerk at Walmart who kept giving me the stink eye because I took more than one free sample."

"You took like fifteen, Aunt Sophia."

"Hey, they were free."

I chuckled quietly, not speaking for a while. Aunt Sophia nudged me, "Come on, owl eyes, spill."

"Well, there's this new… guy."

Aunt Sophia groaned quietly; I swear I heard her mumble 'isn't there always'. She gestured for me to carry on.

"He didn't do anything wrong to me, Mr Brunner introduced him into class and I just hated him." I couldn't help the venom from seeping out of my voice. Aunt Sophia seemed surprised at the ferocity of my words.

"It's not like the mild irritation, it is full on anger. I was almost crying when I left the classroom from clenching my fists for so long in class. I don't know what's wrong with me to feel this way; he hasn't done anything to me. I've never met him before in my life, it was almost like it was instinctual." I revealed, sighing as I sifted my fingers into my curls.

I could see Aunt Sophia flinch at the word, "I think you should stay away from him Annabeth. Sometimes, you need to trust your instincts."

"But he hasn't done anything wrong. It's irrational. Illogical."

Aunt Sophia chucked. "Some things can't be explained by logic, Annabeth. Maybe it was just you being sick, you said you got sick as soon as you left History. You met him today right? See how it goes tomorrow and maybe you'll find that it was a one-off thing."

As Lady Gaga filled the house and Calypso began squealing as Nana rode ahead of her in Just Dance, Aunt Sophia rolled her eyes, escaping to the living room to keep the two in check. A sense of foreboding filled me. My heart seemed to stutter, as a strangled gasp escaped my lips. I swore I saw the same three, cloaked figures in my kitchen, but with a blink of my eyes, all that I saw the empty kitchen.

I couldn't breath.

Where am I?

Every inhalation brought smoke through my lungs. A strangled gasp left my body as searing pain flooded through my left arm.

Everywhere I looked, there was fire. Every step I took, I hissed in pain. Looking down, I saw that I was in the nightgown I wore to bed, the edges were tatted with dark soot and I could say the hemline was fraying.

Cradling my arm harshly to my body, I could already see the blisters start to form. Thick fumes surrounded me, making me close my eyes tightly to prevent the sharp stabs at the corner of my eyes. Tears burned through my eyelids as a stifled gasp left my lips.

I stumbled around, feeling my way through with my eyes shut closed. The walls seemed to be made up of a rough material, stone if I made a guess. The floorboards felt hot, like tiles that had been warmed up by the flame. I knew that if the flames hadn't already burnt my feet, the temperature would have injured me. As it was, my whole body seemed to become numb by the experience.

Using my hand to guide my way, the temperature decreased rapidly. My eyes opened as I took a deep breath of fresh air. I was in a cave of some sort, my eyes adjusting to the sudden transport from blinding light to darkness. As my pupils dilated, a rough gasp escaped my lips.

Bones. Bones everywhere. With a frightful stammer, my knees collapsed beneath me as I fell to the ground, body shaking.

"Child of Wisdom." A plethora of whispers surrounded me, their icy voices breaking through me. The bones of the dead seemed to be beaming at me, skulls lined up against each other in a mass grave. I gripped the edge of my nightdress, my hands shaking.

"What? What are you talking about? Where am I?" I almost winced as my voice broke at the end, not as threatening as I had hoped I sounded.

"Child of Wisdom. Child of Wisdom, the source of the world's destruction, the ruin of Olympus, the cause of the War of the Gods." Disturbing cackles sounded through the flames. I was finding it harder to breath. From all corners, I felt surrounded, feeling harsh grabs pulling at my arms and legs.

"Where are you? Come out and fight me instead of hiding in the shadows!" I screamed, swatting at the bony hands that seemed to be coming from everywhere, my throat hoarse as I turned widely around.

Darkness seemed to cover me, as more hands gripped my shoulders, hands and waist. A loud scream escaped my body, as I shoved my way past. Fingers grasped my hair, tugging me back with a painful jerk.

"Don't fucking touch me!" I screamed, twisting on the balls of my feet, and shoving my elbow in what I hoped was my attackers stomach. I heard someone's sharp intake of breath, before I stabbed my barefooted heel into where I assumed the attacker's foot was. Their grasp on my body loosened enough for me to free myself, and I took off running into the opposite direction of my attackers. I could hear footfalls behind me, recognising I was being chased.

As I ran, the darkness seemed to light up, only to be illuminated by more flames. I saw it now. Crimson was all I could see. Crimson flames, crimson rocks, crimson blood. A cliff was up ahead, flames licking the sides of it. From below I could see what seemed to be a torrent of oceans and waves, crashing against the Cliffside. Howls of grief and sorrow filled the place, as body after body drowned in the waves, being snapped away by the currents.

With a gasp, I realised that there was nowhere else for me to go.

"CHILD OF WISDOM!"

I could see it up ahead. Those three cloaked figures, their skeleton hands pointing towards the sea with a definite tone in their message.

Do not get caught, child. You must never get caught. Their voices were like a harmony of different tones that merged together to create a chorus. I had no idea how I knew it was they that spoke, and my gut told me not to trust them. Looking back, I could see the shadowy figure of my attacker coming closer. I closed my eyes, fingers curling into a fist. I made my decision.

Without any hesitation, I took a deep breath and jumped.

I threw the covers of my bed off before running towards the bathroom, heaving up last nights supper into the toilet. I could hear footsteps rushing behind me, and felt weathered hands pull my hair away.

My body gasped for air, as I continued to throw up anything that was in my stomach. My throat ached as I clutched the edge of the sink in a deathly grip.

Nana's voice came through the fog, "Breath, Annabeth. Breath." I followed her soothing voice, until the upheavals slowed to a stop. Another voice joined into the crowded bathroom. "Maybe it's a stomach bug." Aunt Sophia's hands were warm as she gripped my upper arm. My legs felt like jelly, like I would collapse at any moment.

I could still smell the scent of burning flesh. Immediately, my stomach tossed and I turned back towards the sink again.

"I'll call in the school." Nana's comforting hand left my back. "Sophia, you go to work. I'll look after her."

"It's fine, Nana." My fingers clawed at the edge of my dress. "Could you get me some water, please?" I managed to choke out.

I could hear the footfalls of people rushing down the stairs. Gripping the wall to steady my footstep, I pulled myself to the sink, rinsing my mouth as thoroughly as I could. My fingernails were covered in ash.

Ash…

Snapping my eyes up towards the mirror, a strangled gasp escaped me. Blackened grime smothered the sides of my face and my hands were covered in blister-like burns. A strangled noise rose through my throat, as I twisted the tap on hurriedly, dousing my arms in cold water. I washed my face and hands thoroughly, lifting my feet to cover as quickly as I could. There was little I could do about my pyjamas. The pale blue shorts had been burned at the hemline, fraying at the end. I looked around the bathroom and grasped the bathrobe that lay on the hook, tightening it around my body.

"Annabeth…" Nana's voice filtered through behind the door. With a startled gasp, I rested my hand against my chest, feeling the unhealthy beating of my heart.

"Yeah?" I stammered, slipping out of the door and meeting her in the hallway. She handed me the glass, and I gulped the water down, my dry throat feeling like sand had run down it.

"Will you be okay on your own for a bit? Sophia's had to run to open up the shop and I have to pick up your Grandfather. He's come back from that ridiculous fishing convention, but he's staying with us before we head back to San Francisco."

I nodded slowly, the pounding in my head becoming more prominent. "That's okay Nana, I'm just going to go back to sleep."

Nana nodded her head, resting a hand on my cheek. I internally winced as pain shot through me; I could already feel a bruise starting to form there. Oh god, I'm going to look like a panda and I have no explanation as to why except for a creepy ass dream where I may or may have not died.

Fuck, this week could not get any worse.