The light when I opened my eye's was soft yet it hurt. I could hear soft chattering in the distance. I try sit up, someone's hand gently pushes me back down.
"You shouldn't sit up, you'v got a nasty wound on you waist. Just lay and rest." Someone whispered in my ear.
My vision begins to clear. I'm in a creamish colored tent, there's a heater in one of the corners, A group of girls huddled in the other corner, there's a boy with black hair standing in the doorway of the tent. Wait! A boy with black hair? I try to twist to see his face better, a sharp pain jolts through my right arm. It' almost to much pain to take, I gasp, The girls stop chattering and all turn their attention on me.
"She's awake!" Squealed one of them.
"Hush Izzy-" A girl with short black hair with blue streaks, walks towards me. "I'm Thalia Grace. You must think your going insane. But trust me your not. We're the hunters of Artemis." She pointed to the group of girls. They all waved. "That boy over there in Nico." She pointed to The boy in the doorway.
"She's a mortal, she's doesn't need to be told my name." He snapped.
His voice! he steps into the tent and I get a clear look at his face. It's the boy from before!
"You." I say in a raspy voice.
"What do you mean you?" He asked.
"It's you, from before, you killed that thing in my house. You left before I could ask you too explain, you-" My head started filling with information and I got woozy, My head started to hurt. I sit up, my waist protested in pain, I lean over the edge of the bed and barf. I black out again.
I'm back in the woods, The air was icy, every breath I drew in felt like someone was stabbing my lungs with an Icicle. All around me were beast of imaginable existence. They surrounded me. "We have been expecting you, you shall do our biding. If you refuse you will die." They all seemed to talk in unison.
"I refuse!"I cry.
"Then so it be!" They all seemed to rush at me, One bit down on my waist, another scratching my face, A third ripping through my thigh.
I wake up screaming and spring up, I feel a rip in my side, I cough up something red and warm in my hand. I throw my hand to the left side of my waist. I pull my hand away from a slick piece of fabric, It's covered in red-ish stuff. I cringe, my body starts to shutter. I pull up my shirt to my waist. There's a bandage but there is blood quickly spreading through the white fabric turning it red.
"What are you doing?!" Yelled Nico. He had walked into the tent.
I raise my hand to him, He see's the blood and his eye's widen.
"You tore the stitches didn't you? Great as soon as they leave, you wake up and you hurt yourself more. What do I do?! I don't know how to do stitches." He said.
"I'm sorry, I had a nightmare and when I woke up I flew up and tore them." I whisper.
He seemed lost in thought. "You just lay down, ah lay on your right side, I'm going to have to redo the stitches." he wandered to a table and picked up a bowl and a needle and some string. "I don't have any sedatives, Your going to have to white-knuckle it." He said his voice more alarmed, then angry.
He set the bowl down on a table next to the bed. He began to ready the needle he placed the string through the hole at the top and tied a knot. He started to reach out but then stopped. "Um...Would you mind lifting your shirt to your waist so I can do you stitches?" He sounded uncomfortable. Clearly I was because I hesitated.
I hesitated then raise my shirt and he begin to remove the now blood soaked bandage and throws it out. He begins to tug at the broken string of stitches, I can feel each one he pulls out. I can feel his hand shutter, unfortunately he was pulling out the broken string and when his hand shuttered, it sent a world of pain through my waist. I hear him take in a breath. I can't see what he's doing but he puts something cold on my side.
"I'm you using a washcloth to wipe away some of the blood. Calm down." He sighs.
"I am calm. Your the one who, shuttered."
"Really? Your the one who scrunched up when I put the wash cloth to your wait." He scoffed.
Next thing I know he's began the stitches, The pain doesn't come at first but with each stitch he does, the pain grows. I count each one. When he's finally done, I had counted Twenty five stitches. He puts a new clean bandage on my waist and gets up.
"You didn't pass out?!"
I shake my head, As i'm pulling my shirt back down, my right shoulder gives out. I cry out in pain.
"Crap, did you tear the stitches in your shoulder too?!" He wailed.
I put my hand to my shoulder, and check, there's no blood. I show him my clean hand and he proceeds to clean up, He threw away the blood soaked bandages. He brings me a bowl of something brown that smelled of cinnamon and vanilla, and a wet rag. He was about to dump the bowl of misty red water.
"The rag is to wipe all that blood off yourself, then eat what's in the bowl, it's just soup." He went and was about to dump the bowl.
A girl comes bursting into the tent. Her hair brown hair in a french braid, silver string was braided into her hair. She look around at the bowl of bloody water that was in Nico's hands and the blood on the table and my hands.
"Nico, what happened here?!" She squealed.
"I tried to get up and tore the stitches in my side. He had to redo them." He glared at me.
"She's right, she was being an idiot." He stormed out of the tent.
"Well, then we have an important question to ask you Miss." Said the girl.
"We?" I ask.
Another girl strides into the tent. She had auburn hair with a gold circlet and it was braided, which showed her fair skinned face. She had the most gorgeous eye's, like the color of the moon. She looked about twelve.
"The hunter's of Artemis, A group of maiden's who go around the world slaying monster's, and recruiting young maiden's." Said the girl with auburn hair.
"Of course you must give up a few things, like boy's. You can never fall in love with a boy , a demigod, a mortal, or monster. But you get to be immortal unless you fall in battle." Said the girl with brown hair.
"We are offering you to join us." The girl named Thalia came in the tent.
"All you have to do is pledge your loyalty to Artemis." Said the brown haired girl, she point to the girl with auburn hair.
"Thank you Isis. Delenn, I'm Artemis, goddess of the moon, maidens, and the hunt. I protect all the maiden's. Would you please consider joining my hunter's?" She said.
"Can I have times to think?" I ask.
"Of course." Artemis stood up, walked over to me kissed me on the head and left.
They all slowly walked out of the room.
"She's going to try to run. You do know that right?" Nico said.
Him and Thalia were standing just behind the tent.
"She won't, your just worried she'll join us, and not go with you to camp." She said with a smirk on her face.
"No, i'm not. She's going to try to run because she'll think shes just going insane. Try believing, that greek gods are real, and you watched you mother die. Shes going to try to run, and she won't come back." Nico insisted.
Thalia just laughed and said. "We've all been through having to understand greek gods are real and that we are demigods. Just maybe not witnessing your mother being murdered. She is definitely not a mortal either, that soup you gave her had nectar in it. She didn't burn up."
Nico's eye's widened."You know-" Nico was cut off by Isabelle. She came around the corner.
"Shes run away!" Said Isabelle, while huffing for air.
"I told you!" Nico quickly grabbed his sword and began running off to the woods.
"Nico, wait! We can make a search team, we'll have a better chance at finding her." Thalia called after him.
"She'll just keep running." He disappeared into the tree's.
I didn't have trouble tracking where she'd gone. The ground was covered in dead leaves and being in the state she was in, with her side all torn up, she hadn't gotten far. She must have been dragging her feet because there was line that snaked through the dead leaves where it looked like someone had dragged a stick through them.I couldn't hear the hunter's behind me, I figured they went off in the other direction. I figured she went this direction because that's the way the back of her tent was facing, easier to escape through the back then sneak around camp.
I stopped when I heard leaves crinkle. "I'm going insane, this is a dream. I can't be...My mom she can't be dead. These things that want me to do their bidding..I won't. I'll die before that happens." I could hear her murmuring.
I hid behind a tree, I poked my head out a little,I can see her silhouette, she's standing with her back against a tree. She's got one hand holding her waist.
"Got to get to someone's house, my side-" She coughed into what looked like her hand and cringed. "So much blood, Have to leave the woods. Mom doesn't like it when i'm out past dark in the woods." She picked herself up from leaning on the tree and began to walk/stumble away.
"Delenn, stop." I say.
She stops dead in her tracks and screams, "No, don't do that. Just come here." I say.
"No! Your not real! No of this is real!" She tried to move but collapsed.
I slowly come closer. "No! Go away! Leave me alone!" She tried to get up.
"I am real, this is real, your a demigod, your mother-" A lump hardens in my throat. "- she's dead. I need you to stop screaming. If there are any other monsters out here, you need to be quite. Will you just please listen? I swear on the river Styx, I will bring you home, and I will leave you alone, we all will." I whisper.
"You promise?" She whimpers.
"Yes, I promise."
She slowly nods her head. I finish waling towards her, I sit down beside her.
"Ok. You Delenn, your a demigod, your half human, half god. You saw your mothers body, she tried to fight off the hell hounds, the things that attacked you. She lost and they killed her. Because your a demigod, you have the choice to become a hunter or go to camp half-blood. I could bring you there or you could stay with that bunch of girls back there."
"Can't I just go home? You said I could go home."
"You can, but it'd be much safer at camp half-blood. Besides how would you take care of yourself? Your mom can't provide for you anymore." I say.
She hunched over and began sobbing. Me, not knowing how to comfort a girl wile she's crying just sat there like an idiot. There was rustling in the leaves behind me.
"Nico? Is that you?" Said a voice not to far off.
Delenn looked up terrified. I promised i'd bring her home, if the hunters found her she'd be brought back to camp. I pick her up in my arms and begin running.