Author's Note: Soooo…. Re-reading Son of Neptune… HOW DID I MISS FRANK BEING SEVERAL MONTHS OLDER THAN JASON?! What?! I thought he was 15! What the Hades…. I'm a bad fangirl… Apollo-gies. Sorry, I'll just - *Points to door* *Walks away* *Walks into door frame* - go.

Piper felt like shrinking into her strange wizard robe. It was bad enough that her and the others were constantly being stared at, but then her and Jason had been made to stand up in front of everyone. It was awful. And it got worse. The reason they'd been asked to stand was so that every single person would know that they weren't seventeen yet and that an exception was being made for them. And then, the headmaster of the school had said her full name. She saw the looks of comprehension on some of the other kids' faces, heard the whispers from friend to friend. They'd finally figured out why she looked familiar.

She wanted to disappear.

After they sat down, Jason squeezed her hand under the table and the nerves evaporated. She had Jason; it didn't matter what people thought of her with him around. It was the same with the rest of the seven. With them, her confidence skyrocketed; they'd saved the world for the gods sake.

Dumbledore finished his speech and sent them to bed. All the kids around them - including Harry what's-his-face who they were there for - got up from the table and started making their way out, all with a destination.

"Where are we sleeping?" Jason asked. "Jules is gone with the car."

As the words left his mouth, Chiron sped past in his wheelchair. "Follow me, young heroes!"

They scrambled to catch up with him. He kept his speed consistent, nearly plowing over kids from the three other schools. "Come on!" He called through the loud hum of voices. "Keep up!"

"Gods, he's annoying."

"I heard that, Mr. Jackson!"

Percy sighed and walked faster, Annabeth laughing at him. He shot her his signature troublemaker grin. It made Piper's heart happy to see them like that.

Chiron stopped so suddenly that Jason, who was leading the pack, nearly fell over the old centaur.

"What the Hades…" Percy muttered.

Annoyed, Piper grabbed the handles of Chiron's wheelchair, determined to see what was going on that caused the traffic to stop. "Excuse me!" she called. "Wheelchair, coming through!"

The students cleared a path quickly, but that didn't stop the mutters and stares that they were getting. It probably just made it worse.

In the front of the jam, was none other than supposedly famous, Harry Potter, and the Headmaster of Durmstrang, Karkaroff. And of course, the commotion was about Harry's famous scar. Chiron had called it a 'mark of Zeus' which seemed crazy to Piper because Zeus had no part in the way Harry had gotten it. He just liked taking credit for everything.

The Durmstrang students were looking at Harry in amazement. Their Headmaster looked as if he'd seen a ghost.

"Yeah, that's Harry Potter," said a growling voice from behind. A man was now behind Karkaroff. He was big, muscular, a bit like an ogre, Piper thought. His nose reminded her of that of Hephaestus: misshapen, like it had been broken one too many times. He had a weird blue eye that looked everywhere, occasionally rolling back into his head. It made Piper recoil.

Karkaroff clearly knew the strange man. His face drained of all colour. "You!"

"Me," said the man. "And unless you've got anything to say to Potter, Karkaroff, you might want to move. You're blocking the doorway."

It took him a second, but Karkaroff was able to peel his eyes off Harry and direct his students back to their giant boat.

"Finally," Piper said. "Where to, C- Mr. Brunner?"

Hermione stood in the doorway of her dorm. Her, Lavender, and Parvati's beds were untouched, their luggage where it always was. However, the other two girls whom they'd shared with since first year's trunks were nowhere to be found. Instead, by their beds were two completely alien cases. They were bright orange, one with an owl painted on the top, the other, a dove.