Hello to all who may be reading. Sorry this update took so long to come about, I'm sorry to say that I realy don't think I'll have time to publish new chapters during the week. I'll try and put up two or three chapters over the weekend to make up for that though. So sorry about that. Please read and review! Criticism is especially welcome.

Chapter 7: In Which We Get an Idea of What Happened to Erik

Varro lived in a welcoming-looking little house off a dirt road. Lydia and I walked up to the door and rang the bell, with Croesus standing behind us and trying not to look threatening. Something he was not exactly good at. My sword was sheathed and slung along my belt, and my shield was in its wrist-band form, but I was still clutching an eight-foot long spear. Lydia had two knives in her belt, and the hilt of Croesus's broadsword, along with the ends of his arrows and the tip of his bow, stuck out over his shoulder. We were, all in all, not your typical house guests.

A thin woman of medium height with long, braided black hair opened the door. Her face was starting to show signs of age, and her hair was streaked with silver in many places, but there was a fire and determination in her dark brown eyes that told me she could still be dangerous.

"Ah-hello." I said awkwardly, holding out my hand for her to shake. She ignored it, staring me down. "Um, yeah. We're looking for Marcus Varro."

The woman sighed, and part of her hostility seemed to evaporate. "He's in the back." she said. "Come on in. And try not to kill any of the kids." she added, glaring at our weapons.

I glanced at Croesus, and he shrugged, so I followed the woman, careful to keep my spear away from the furniture, and the two little kids who came running into the living room, but stopped when they saw us.

Varro was out in the back yard, sitting in a lawn chair on the patio. "Bring them over, dear." he said rather distractedly, sipping from a glass.

"Take a seat," the woman, who I presumed to be Varro's wife, said. "I'll bring you three something to drink." By now she sounded almost fond of us.

I sat to Varro's left, and nearly fell backwards out of my chair. A wicked series of scars snaked down the left side of his face, like something had clawed him, or tried to rip his head off. Three lines of brilliant white-scarred flesh crawled down his face, nearly parallel, starting on his left temple and stretching down over his left eye and then across his mouth and to his throat.

I caught myself before I truly fell over, but my reaction was obvious, and Croesus winced as he sat down, shaking his head and peering at Varro to gauge his reaction.

The scarred Roman just laughed. "That was not the worst I have seen when people first lay eyes on me my Greek friend. They have fainted, fled, tripped over themselves. Everything. I learned early not to take offense, not to make an enemy of he who may prove a staunch friend."

I sat; face reddening, as Croesus spoke. "Winter doesn't ever really come to Missouri does it, Mr. Varro?" he said jokingly, gesturing to the warm weather and sunshine around us.
Varro chuckled, but his eyes darted back and forth, didn't meet ours, and he looked as though caught in a great dilemma.

"Please, call me Marcus." he said, and Croesus nodded his acceptance.

"Marcus, then." he said. "We need your help. We're looking for-"

"Erik." Varro sighed, and then looked directly at each of us in turn. His left eye was a milky white, a stark contrast to the brilliant yellow-gold of his right one. I realized that he was blind in the left eye, as well as scarred.

"You may be interested to know," Marcus said slowly, "that the praetor Titus has issued an edict forbidding any Roman, active member of the legion or no, to assist any Greek demigod in any way. My duty to Rome requires that I withhold any assistance, and further, that I detain you and secure your transport to Camp Jupiter for questioning as to the whereabouts of the missing praetor."

The silence was oppressive. I resisted the urge to unsheathe my sword and conjure my shield. Croesus, however, leaned forward. At the surface level he looked at ease, but his eyes were hardened, and there was a tightness to his face that suggested barely controlled anger.

"Yet you are not going to attempt such a thing." he said, his voice deathly quiet and extremely dangerous.

Marcus looked him dead in the eye and held his gaze, but before the situation could devolve into a pointless staring contest, Lydia intervened.

"Please, Marcus." she said calmly, "We're trying to help both camps. If you could just...ignore the edict for an hour or so, we promise to be out of here by then."

It worked. Varro turned his gaze from Croesus to Lydia, and his face softened. "You remind me of my sister." he said softly, a tear rolling down his cheek. "You have the same eyes. Such brilliant blue eyes." By now the man looked to be on verge of sobbing. But he cleared his throat and regained his composure.

"I am no longer a man of Rome, my friends. Everything I have, my wife, my house, my kids, is because of the Greeks. I got this" he said pointing to his scar, "in a battle for Camp Jupiter. I would've been a dead man, but your friend Percy Jackson saved my life. When the Giant War was over and I was discharged from the legion, he set me up here. Found me a house, taught me how to lay low. No Roman did any of that for me. I will give you what help I can."

I tried to stifle my sigh of relief, but I'm not sure it worked to well. Croesus sat back in his chair, looking relaxed, but I could tell by the clenching of his arms that he was all too ready to draw that sword of his. Lydia glared at Croesus as Varro went on;

"Erik and his party left here early in the morning. I provided them with supplies, and secured an old car for them. They were heading east, towards New York. I went with them in my car as far as Fairfield, Illinois."

He paused as his wife came in with a tray of lemonades. She set one in front of each of us, and we thanked her before he disappeared back into the house.

Marcus waited until she was back inside before continuing. "We got to the outskirts of the city around three in the afternoon," he said, "and I offered to book a motel in the town for them. Erik declined, saying they were going to sleep in the ruins of old Fort Hadrian about a mile east of the city. Try as I might, I couldn't dissuade him."

"What's so bad about the fort?" I asked, curious. "What could be there that should keep away a group of demigods?"

Varro actually shuddered at the thought. "The Algea." he whispered. "The Algea made the fort their home years ago."

Lydia gasped, and Croesus's face paled. I, however, was still confused.

"Sorry, but who are the Algea?" I asked, trying not to sound like a complete idiot.

Lydia stepped in. "Spirits of pain and suffering. Three siblings, Achos, Ania, and Lupe. Not the nicest immortal beings. Infamous for killing demigods in the old days, but I thought they hadn't been seen in America since the Second World War"

Marcus shook his head. "Fort Hadrian used to be a pride of Camp Jupiter. Based near the center of the continental USA, it was a place where demigods could find shelter and supplies on quests. Mortals couldn't find it, and the power of Rome kept most monsters away. Until the Algea. No one knows exactly what happened, but one day a party of ten demigods stopped at the fort. They found the garrison dead and mangled, and left in a hurry to report to Camp. Only one made it out, and he was practically insane. What I just said was all that he managed to convey before he died."

"And Erik decided to sleep overnight there, in full knowledge of this?" Croesus asked incredulously.

Marcus nodded. "He thought that they might have moved on. The fort fell more than thirty years before the Giant War, more than sixty from this year, and he reasoned that with no demigods, and no immortals of any sort, the Algea would be gone. I offered to stay with them, but Erik insisted I return to my family. That was six months ago, and the last time I, or anyone else, ever saw him."

Lydia shivered and I struggled not to fidget or look uneasy at all. Only Croesus seemed calm. He reclined back in his chair, completely at ease. "Then we need to check out this Fort Hadrian." he said.

Hope you liked it! Please review and let me know what you think.