Sorry for cliffhanger. Also, that note at the end of Chapter 3 was a lie. Sorry.

It felt wrong, to say the least.

I lay on my bed, which was outfitted with bedding already. This was good, as I hadn't brought a sleeping bag. It was very cozy. I had hung sheets from the upper bunk, so my bunk was its own little room. I could hear Nico snoring in the bed next to me.

I had figured there would be some kind of magical connection with my siblings. I didn't feel it with Nico. Either it didn't exist, or I had been misclaimed. I wished my dad would, like, send me an Iris-message or something and reveal himself, or just talk. For the first time in my life, I felt really lonely. I began to sing Maybe from the 2014 remake of Annie quietly. It was and still is one of my go-to songs for when I'm sad.

"Maybe far away; or maybe real nearby..."

I didn't even realize Nico had woken up until he spoke.

"Wow, Emily. That was..."

"Thanks," I said.

"I'm serious," he said. "You have an incredible voice."

"Thanks," I repeated, my face burning. To me, my voice sounded average for a girl my age. I didn't usually sing when people could hear, for exactly this reason. I don't really like to be the center of attention.

"You know," Nico said. I yanked down one of the sheets to be able to see him. "I don't think you're my sister. There's no aura of death around you like there... um, never mind. But I think I would know if we were related."

"I was thinking that, too. Maybe I was misclaimed. Like, there's another daughter of Hades here and maybe Hades wasn't really paying attention, like, he was on Candy Crush or something-"

"Candy Crush?"

"Yeah. Maybe he accidentally claimed me instead of his real daughter," I said.

Nico blinked. "Candy Crush."

"Hey, Candy Crush is fun,"

"Well, I always thought Dad would be more of a Mythomagic guy."

"Mytho-what?"

"Mythomagic. It's a card game I used to like. It's like Pokémon, except with – er, whatever. Should we tell Chiron?" he asked.

"That would be good," I said through a yawn. "How about in the morning, though? It's, like, 11 p.m."

"True," Nico replied. "Goodnight, Emily."

"'Night," I said and flopped over, not even bothering to put the sheet back up. "See you tomorrow."

I learned something about myself that next day: I am in no way, shape or form a morning person.

Nico woke me up around 6:30, saying we had about an hour until breakfast. He looked really tired, and his hair was all crazy, sticking up all over the place. It was kind of cute.

Almost involuntarily, my hand rose to my head. I felt hair about three inches from my scalp, which was not good. "Is my hair as frizzy as it feels?" I asked.

"Yeah," Nico replied. "It looks like a giant bird's nest."

"Thought so. I hope Mom packed my hairbrush. See you in five minutes." I lay down again and waited until I was a little less tired, then got up and rummaged through my bag. Luckily, my light pink Wet Brush was at the bottom. Mom, you're a lifesaver! I thought. Oh – Mom. I hadn't thought about her since I had left the Big House. Had she gone back to New York, or even back home? Had she spent the night at the Big House? I would ask Chiron before breakfast. Cursing myself for being such a terrible daughter, I headed for the bathroom. Whoever had built this cabin was very nice for including a private restroom. It would be quite embarrassing to go outside with my hair situation.

Speaking of which, let's take a moment to admire the incredible qualities of the marvelous Wet Brush. If your hair is longer than six inches and you don't own one already, Google it. You may thank me later.

Fifteen minutes and one broken bathroom door (long story) later, Nico and I were ready to go. We headed toward the Big House, stopping briefly at the Aphrodite cabin to ask about Cooper.

"Oh, the poor dear is still asleep," the oldest of the girls cooed. "He had trouble getting to sleep last night. Don't worry, we'll get him up before breakfast. Oh, and by the way," she whispered, "everyone's pretty positive he has a crush on you. He kept saying your name in his sleep."

I thought Nico stiffened at that. I hoped not. My weekend had been crazy enough already, and I did not need to be in a love triangle. Maybe in a few years.

The girl grinned at Nico and winked at me. Then she spun on her heel and walked to the back of the cabin, shoving a girl around my age out of the way. She opened the bathroom door with a flourish and a "Move your behind, Lacy. It's my bathroom time!"

"That's Drew Tanaka," Nico explained as we continued our mission. "You do not want to get on her bad side. She can curse – the magical kind – like you would not believe, and something about her voice... I've heard it's an Aphrodite thing. She can trick you into doing anything."

I shuddered. "Advice taken."

By the time we had gotten to the creek, most of the campers were up and about. Nico and I hopped over – well, I hopped. Nico just took a couple large steps. Booooring.

Chiron was sitting on the porch in wheelchair form, playing a card game with three invisible people. He set down his cards when he noticed us.

"Good morning, Emily. Morning, Nico. Nice to see you about. What brings you here?" he asked.

Nico and I looked at each other. "You first," I said.

Nico didn't take long explaining. "With... Bianca, I knew she was a daughter of Hades. There was an aura of death surrounding her, like there is with me. I can't feel that with Emily. We're thinking she might have been misclaimed."

Chiron considered this for a moment. "I was suspicious of that. About 80 years ago, a son of Hades was claimed here, and the symbol wasn't anything like the one I saw over your head. And more recently, the first time I talked to her, Bianca told me about a symbol similar to the one from 1934 that appeared over her head."

Nico looked hurt. "She never told me about that."

"Percy told me about her reaction when Thalia told her about the gods. She may have simply been trying to protect you."

"Well, she didn't do a very good job," Nico muttered.

"Um, anyway. Who do you think my dad might be?" I asked.

"I don't know. I've really never seen a symbol like that before, except... well, no matter. Simply stay in the Hades cabin for now. Breakfast is soon. We can discuss this matter after breakfast," Chiron said.

"I did find Julia Chisolm's bedroom, under the amphitheater. There was a note saying to ask you about her."

He was silent for a second. "I will tell you about her... later. We have but ten minutes until breakfast. You'd best get ready."

It was obviously useless to argue, so we went over to the dining pavilion. They could have designed camp a little better – it took us eleven of our ten minutes to get there. And I didn't even play in the creek this time.

Breakfast was a lot more relaxed than dinner. There was a line up at the front, so you could pick what you wanted. People wandered around or sat at other people's tables. A few younger kids were having a Fruity Pebbles fight. Nico and I lined up behind a girl from the Aphrodite cabin. I recognized her as Lacy from last night, the one Drew had shoved.

She glanced back at us and whispered, "You better hope Cooper was misclaimed. Drew hates him. She didn't even wake him up while the rest of us were at the bathrooms. He had, like, ten minutes to get ready."

"I'm getting the impression that Drew is not the nicest person here," I replied.

"Oh, she's worse than Clarisse," Lacy said. I noticed that she sat down at the Hermes table, not the Aphrodite table.

I was delighted to find out that they had Cocoa Puffs. Maybe my bowl was a little too full, but I had to have some to sacrifice.

Nico laughed at me when I poured myself so much. I laughed at him when he got even more than me. It was nice to have a brother, even if he wasn't really. I'd just enjoy it while I could.

Cooper and Isabella sat with us at the Hades table. "Who's Julia Chisolm?" Nico asked. I think he was asking me, but that didn't really matter to Bella.

"She was a female satyr," she said. "She died looking for Pan a few years ago. My mom knew her. She was really cool. We found her bedroom under the amphitheater yesterday."

Nico nodded.

"Who's Bianca? You've been talking about her, but you haven't told me anything," I said.

Nico frowned at his cereal. "She was my older sister. She was a Hunter of Artemis. She died on her first quest. She was 12." Then he shut up and wouldn't talk anymore. I got the feeling it had been a bad idea to ask about Bianca.

Eventually Cooper broke the silence. "EmCay, how does it feel to have a brother?"

"That's the thing," I said. "We're pretty sure he's not. We being me, Nico, and Chiron. Chiron said he'd never seen a child of Hades claimed with the symbol that was used for me."

"It's hard to imagine it being much else. I mean, maybe Demeter, but I'm pretty sure her symbol is different," Isabella said between bites of a Diet Coke can. I now understood why her Sprite can on the plane had had a chunk missing – she had eaten it.

"It doesn't feel right," Nico said finally. "With Bianca, I knew she was my sister. There was an aura of death around her. There's one with me, too. You've seen how much the satyrs like me." He glanced at Isabella. "No offense."

"None taken," she replied. "Maybe your dad's a minor god, EmCay. I can't think of any that use a scythe, but there's probably one out there somewhere."

"Maybe," I said. The minor god theory was the most likely story, but I thought back to when we'd met the Kindly One.

Two attacks in a day, Isabella had said. You and Cooper must really be special.

By then everyone had finished. At Camp Half-Blood, they do classes by cabin. Isabella went off to teach the Aphrodite and Hermes cabins Latin. Nico and I went to archery class, which was fun. It turned out I wasn't as amazing as I thought I was, but I'm blaming that on my lack of experience with recurve bows – I'm used to compounds. (If you don't know what that means, the Internet may help. Unless you're a demigod. In that case, you should probably use a dictionary.)

Nico, however, sucked. He couldn't hit inside the second ring even after I bet a s'more. It was pretty funny. He paid more attention to the instructor than anyone else, but he never even held the bow right. Will Solace, the instructor, had to keep coming over and correcting him.

During a break, we were sitting on a bench drinking Gatorade. Nico didn't like it, but Will had insisted, as he apparently didn't have any water on hand. "How long have you been taking these classes?" I asked.

"A couple years," he replied. "Why?"

"I hate to say this, but you suck." I paused as something dawned on me. "Almost like you were doing stuff wrong on purpose. You don't have a crush on Will, do you?" I teased. He blushed and stared at the ground.

"Oh, my god, you do?"

He glared. The grass around his feet turned yellow and shriveled. "If you tell anyone, I will personally –"

"Message taken," I said, raising my hands in surrender. "But he's, like, three years older than you."

"It doesn't matter to adults," he muttered. I decided to drop the subject.

I have a couple other stories that could use some attention, so I may not update this one for a little while.