Well here we are on time once again, with chapter four. I have been up for twelve hours at this point so I am just glad I haven't fallen asleep on the keybord or forgotten yet.

To who ever invented alarms. I wouldn't have updated with out one because I would be asleep!

Four

Secret of the Silver Bow fun fact 4: No matter how seemingly random the fact that Shamrock has three alternate aspects is extremely important.

Key – The Wild

The Conscious

The Instinct

Shamrock

Las Vegas With A Bipolar Servant of My Mothers

Shamrock

All I have to say is how ever my mom met this guy I think she took pity on him and ended up befriending him. My mom takes pity on the weak, I didn't think this guy was weak, so much as he was gullible and his mood disorder made him difficult. He sang along to Party in the USA at least a million and six times. It drove me insane to a point where Grace noticed suggested we change the song to which Hippolytus responded by yelling at us that we didn't appreciate 'real' music. So I shut up.

I figured that I had put up with Apollo for nearly sixteen years I could put up with this for less than six hours. Or that's what I'd like to think. Instead after three hours of Party in the USA I was pretty close to jumping out the window. Grace saw the look on my face and gripped my hand tightly; She put on hand on my chest and pushed my down against the back of the soft seat.

"Calm down." She whispered to me, her voice stern, but calming at the same time. It told me that she had several hundred years' experience with the emotions of others.

I sighed and took to studying the interior, the seats were fabric and the car was obviously pretty old. There were three seats in the back and two up front. Lilly seemed to have taken to this guy, she was more of a people person then I was. The middle seat, where I was, was a bit higher than the other two, but that still only brought me up to the same height as Grace. The windows were rolled down and air flowed through. Which was nice, and as we passed into Flagstaff, I sighed and convinced Hippolytus to let us pull over for some coffee.

I went in with Grace and got us each a coffee. Grace discovered the beauty of a cream based Frappuccino instead of a coffee based one, the cream wouldn't make her, well loopy. Another incident like the one a couple of days ago was really the last thing I needed at that particular moment. Lilly and Annabeth went to use the bathroom and Hippolytus was sitting on the curb making shapes in the dust with his fingers. I handed him his coffee and Grace leaned over.

"That is decaf right?" She whispered.

"No, why?" I frowned, no one had said anything about the need for decaf.

"Caffeine makes his mood swings worse." She sighed.

We climbed back in the car and Hippolytus seemed fine, he still sang to Miley Cyrus but Lilly had convinced him to change the song. He must have really liked my sister because he agreed as long as we kept it on the same CD.

Grace didn't look too good, beads of sweat were running down her face even though the car was perfectly cool and her t-shit was damp. She was panting and pale.

"Are you okay?" I asked. She shook her head.

"I feel like I'm going to be sick." She whispered.

"You probably just drank the coffee too fast, it was cold, and if you drink something cold too fast on a day like this you could get sick." I said.

"Oh." She whispered. It was my turn to make her lean back against me. She willingly rested her head on my shoulder. I felt her relax and stop shaking, every muscle in her body loosened. I held her to me and Lilly looked back and took a picture.

"What?" Hippolytus turned. "Aw, now isn't that sweet?"

"The road!" Annabeth yelled, he whirled back around as though he had suddenly just remembered that he was driving.

"Right, sorry!"

I breathed a sigh of relief and tried to remember that had put up with Apollo, but I was starting to think that the Miley Cyrus singing was a lot worse than the rhyming, and the constant babble was worse than the lyre, and the mood swings were worse than the constantly trying to hook me up with one of his daughters (Which never worked)

We rolled into Las Vegas at around Six pm, and I woke Grace up. She looked around and scowled, it was the most 'Shamrock' thing I had ever seen her do. I was making an impression on her I suppose.

"Can't I just sleep here, I don't like this place." She yawned, still scowling.

"Sorry Grace it's too hot for you to do that." I said. She sighed and obliged to climbing out of the car. Hippolytus drug us to some hotel called Caesars Palace there was a huge fountain in the center.

"Well we will have to go through this obstacle!" He shouted and began to wade through the fountain, his long roman style tunic only added to the attention we were receiving, his shoulder length black hair grew into his blue eyes, under which they gave the impression of a mad man.

"Um Hippolytus how about we just go around the fountain." I said, he turned and looked at me.

"Well Shamrock my boy you are quiet like your mother, very resourceful!" He smiled like an idiot, waded back to where we were (Even though at this point just continuing through the fountain would have been the shorter route) climbed out of the fountain, and marched around it.

At the check in counter the woman looked Hippolytus up and down. He was wet to his knees and smiled. "Hello." He said. "We need a room."

I tuned him out and turned around Grace was standing a few feet away and these men were staring at her, and saying mean things to her. Grace looked terrified of them, and then they touched her. No one is allowed to touch Grace, even on the shoulder like he did. Still his motives were clear, too clear.

Then all hell broke loose, I heard a noise a feral growling, animal like sound that I only later realized was coming from me. I lunged and tackled the guy to the ground.

Grace

The scariest thing she had ever seen was Shamrock get all territorial like that, his teeth elongated, his pupils turned long like an animals, his eyes changed from green to burning silver, his voice became more of a snarling sound.

He punched the man that had touched her and she was pretty sure he had just bitten him. She turned, the hotel security was surrounding them but they were all too afraid of Shamrock, he hadn't killed anyone but so far two men had been knocked out and Sham had moved to the third one.

Hippolytus came over to Grace and backed her up slowly. "He's an energetic one isn't he?"

"He's gone psychotic you idiot!" Grace screamed, Shamrock turned a wild look in his eyes but before he could move his eyes rolled back into his head and he fell, in a flash of silver light he returned to human form. She ran over, closely followed by Lilly, Annabeth and Hippolytus.

"W-we have to get him out of Las Vegas." She said, Hippolytus bent over and picked him up.

"He's still breathing, Grace go get in the back of the car I'm going to lay him down and I want you to try and get some nectar in him, Lilly you and Annabeth will have to share the front seat I'll drive." Hippolytus ordered, carrying Sham out to the car.

"He's my brother!" Lilly protested.

"Yes and if I'm not mistake he was trying to protect this girl, now being a child of Artemis the connection between this girl and him could kill him and right now if she's not the first person he sees when he wakes up he could go psycho on us again." Grace slid into the back of the car and Shamrocks limp form slid in next to her. She pulled his head on to her lap and dug around in her bag for a bottle of nectar. She held it to his mouth.

The nectar dribbled down his chin and none got into his mouth "It won't go in." Hippolytus passed back a syringe.

"Fill that with nectar and inject it into his blood." He instructed.

"How do I do that?" She asked.

"Hold out his for arm." He instructed. She did. "Now Annabeth I need you to take a Sharpie and make a dot half way to between his elbow and his wrist right in the center make a dot."

Annabeth turned around and made the mark.

"Good, now Grace I want you to inject the nectar into the vain under that dot." Grace nodded and drove the needle into the arm and pressed down.

"There now what?" She asked.

"Well now, we pull into this Motel Seven, get a room and wait." Hippolytus said. Grace felt at Shamrocks neck for a pulse.

"Hey Annabeth where should the pulse be?" Grace asked. Annabeth reached back and gasped.

"Grace, there is no pulse."

Sham

I was floating in a room of white; it seemed to go on forever, no shadows, and no light just the white. A girl, the wild, was floating next to me. I looked at her, and she looked at me.

"Aren't you supposed to be in control?" I asked.

"Aren't you?" She raised her eyebrows.

"Point made." I acknowledged.

"Do you know why you are here?" She wondered.

"No."

"Then I'll tell you. You were fighting to protect Grace because of this bond, tell me now what went through your mind when you saw those men touching her?" She asked.

"I was instantly protective; no one touches Grace like that." I said.

"You were like a wolf, protecting its mate." She siad.

"Whoa! Mate? Where did this mate stuff come from? I'm sixteen she's fourteen we are not mates we are friends and I will do anything to protect my friends." I yelled.

"You are correct you are much too young to be mates, that was an incorrect analogy." She frowned. "My point is that you feel a strong connection to her, one that might not go away, one that could possibly get you and her killed." Wild cocked her head. "Knowing you it will get the both of you killed at some point, but I can at least hope you'll make it past the solstice."

"I-I can't l-love people it's impossible." I managed. Something called my name it was faint.

"Oh but of course" She rolled her eyes. "Shamrock someone is calling we will continue this conversation later, but be warned you are not alone in this world, you are not the only child or Artemis in pain. You do have a sister and she is possibly in a worse state then you. Goodbye Shamrock, you must go now. Go take control."

Oddly enough when I woke up and was tackled by Grace my first thought wasn't what happened? It was Why is every metaphysical being I know so damn poetic?

I looked up at Grace, she was shaking violently and her breathing was coming in short scared breaths. "What happened?" I asked her.

"You nearly died on us." She whispered and leaned down to hug me. "If you ever do that again I'll tell your mother."

"No dying, got it." I said weakly.

"Hippolytus got your heart started again but next time I want Thalia to jump start you." Grace said.

"Why?" I asked wearily.

"Hippolytus did the heart pump thing, and mouth to mouth." Grace said. I scowled and Grace gave me a watery smile and a small laugh.

"Never let him do that again." I said.

"I won't. The others will be back soon they went to get some dinner." She got off of me and I sat up.

"Remind me to watch my temper." I rubbed the back of my head.

I looked around the hotel room, there was one bed, that I occupied, a dingy brown couch that I wouldn't sleep on unless my life depended on it, the wall paper was peeling uncovering a plaster wall, and a lamp sat in a dusty corner. There were two doors, the one next to my bed I guessed went to the bathroom and the one near the couch probably led to the hall. There was shag carpet on the floor and it was lime green, I'm not kidding. Lime Green.

"Sham." Grace drug me out of my thoughts.

"Yeah?" I whispered, she was so close to me.

"Why did you do it?" She breathed.

"For you, they were touching you and you were obviously uncomfortable with that so I did what I had to do to keep you safe." I said.

"Oh. Thank you." She leaned closer to me; I could feel her breath and smell the Lilac shampoo. Then, the door banged open.

"Hello!" Hippolytus' voice rang out in the room and Grace fell backwards off the bed in surprise, landing with an undignified 'umph' on the lime green carpet below. "Ah, Shamrock you're awake!"

"Yes I am." I sighed, reaching over to pull Grace up.

"So what have you been up to?" Lilly raised her eyebrows.

"Well I just woke up and found out Hippolytus gave me mouth to mouth, does anyone have a tooth brush?" I asked.

"No, sorry." Annabeth said. I climbed out of bed and stretched, I stretched my toes and yawned, Grace giggled.

"What?" I asked.

"Oh it's just Apollo has this picture of you as a baby Sham, and you were doing the same thing in your crib. It's an adorable picture, to be honest its right up there with the picture of you sitting in the bathtub with a unicorn horn made of soap and your hair on your head, in cuteness levels." Grace said.

"You saw a picture of me when I was little in the bath!" I said.

"Shamrock, I had six little brothers, a twin brother and you were two." She said. "Besides it was a bubble bath I couldn't see anything."

She made a point but that didn't stop me from blushing, it was weird to think of a girl, especially Grace, having seen that picture. It was the one that I had tried to hide the most. I wondered if Grace had any baby pictures of herself.

"Do you have any pictures of yourself from before the hunt?" I Asked.

She looked at her feet "No. I only have the one of my whole family, and a couple of me and my sisters, but other than that I'm not in them at all." She said.

"Well let's stay here tonight and leave tomorrow." I said. The others nodded. Hippolytus slept in the bed, Annabeth on the couch, Lilly in front of the couch and Grace and I slept in the only unoccupied space. It was very narrow and we were stuck between the wall and the bed. Grace had absolutely no room for her sleeping bag so we unzipped mine and used it like a blanket, she was eager to keep her distance from me and slept as close to the bed as physically possible, I turned around to face her, she was watching me.

"What?" I whispered, in the moonlight her skin seemed to glow and her hair stuck out even more.

"I just don't want you to die on me." She muttered, her eyes probing me, like she was making sure I was still there.

I shifted uncomfortably under her gaze. "I won't."

"Prove it." She muttered. I sighed and avoided her eyes, they were unnerving.

"I can't prove it at least not now, but I'll make it, and if I don't I'll find a way to come back." I whispered.

"You died back there Sham, your heart stopped." She whispered.

"I'm not dead now am I? You didn't really think you would get rid of me that easily did you?" I grinned.

"Oh great now I'm stuck with you aren't I?" She rolled her eyes. Grace had a sense of humor, which was good. I liked a sense of humor, it made everything so much easier than people who have none with people who have no sense of humor I can't use all my amazing sarcasm.

"Yeah you are." I joked.

Her smile disappeared. "Thanks Shamrock."

"For what?"

"Giving me something to count on." She said, suddenly her eyes grew wide.

"What?" I frowned.

"Shamrock, your eyes, they aren't green anymore." She gaped.

"What do you mean?" I wondered.

"Well when you went savage your eyes changed from green to silver, and I just realized they never went back to green." She said.

"Is this a huge deal?" I honestly didn't care what color my eyes were, though I'll admit I had gotten rather attached to their particular shade of green over the last few months. It was kind of like my trade mark, the piercing green-silver eyes.

Don't be so dramatic!

Fine, fine I'll stop with the dramatics!

"I liked your greenish-silver eyes." She frowned, then she closed her eyes, soon her breathing became even and she was asleep. This time though Grace didn't snuggle against me for warmth, I admit it I was a little disappointed.

I knew I was tired but I didn't want to sleep, eventually I gave in to my exhaustion and fell asleep. Only to have my peace interrupted by yet another conscious shaking dream

This time there was a faint green glow coming from the kitchen, Apollo was standing there, the baby in his arms, this time the infant was asleep. Apollo was on the phone talking in a language I didn't recognize but it certainly wasn't Greek. It seemed too new to be any dialect of Greek, it was still old though.
He seemed worried about something; he looked down at the baby who was glowing green. I was pretty sure it wasn't natural or healthy for children to glow that shade of green. She was snoozing comfortably though. It was the first time I noticed how tiny she was.

I had seen a premature infant before but this one didn't look premature, just small. She stretched and I noticed she couldn't be longer than ten to twelve inches. It was strange to see anything this tiny. Apollo hung up the phone and walked out of the kitchen, carrying both the baby and my dream with him...

This time it was Lilly bending over me, not as quite a welcoming sight as Grace, especially considering that she had woken me for the last two months. She wasn't saying anything; her green eyes were just staring at me, which was her favorite 'Wake Shamrock up' technique. It was a little creepy but that's the point, and if I rolled over to go back to sleep she would grin demonically which sealed the deal and woke me up.

I sighed and she stopped staring and offered a hand to help me up. I sighed and took it. I looked down at Grace, who rubbed her eyes and sat up.

"Morning Sham." She yawned and stood up next to me.

"Morning Grace." I smiled. Hippolytus rolled over.

"Well off we go then, come, come; Annabeth is waiting in the car!" Hippolytus flew out the door, having slept in his clothes, thus leaving the three of us to pack quickly and run after him. Annabeth was already in the backseat, her nose buried in an architecture book written in Greek.

Grace and I slid into the car next to her and Lilly into the passenger seat. Hippolytus drove off quickly and for the first time I noticed it was five thirty in the morning. "Whoa, slow down we have all day until we need to be in the Underworld, we'll be fine."

"No we only have until noon, then Hippolytus returns to the underworld and we're left in the middle of nowhere." Annabeth informed us, not looking up from her architecture book, as though she was taking in not only what she was reading but also the conversation we were having. It was kind of too creepy and Athena like for my liking.

"Oh, well why do we have to be in the Underworld today?" I asked.

"Because, your mother instructed me to bring you all safely to her, there for I must bring you there or I would have failed!" He smiled back at us in the rearview mirror. I noticed he was good at smiling at the wrong times.

"Okay, but I am perfectly capable of getting us to the underworld." I said.

"Your mother told me you would say that, and when you did she told me to give you this." He reached into the glove compartment and pulled out an envelope, addressed to me.

Shamrock,

I know what you're going to say 'I am perfectly capable of getting us all to the underworld.' I sent Hippolytus because you have come close to destroying yourself and others many times during these quests and I want to keep you as safe as possible. I trust him and you should to.

Mother

P.S. He's bipolar, be careful about what you say.

I sighed, figures, only now he bothers to give me the letter. My mother knew me way too well, she knew what I would say and how I would react. "Fine, you win." Grace looked at me and raised her eyebrows, her eyes staring quizzically at me.

You should ask her about the infant and Apollo

Why would I do that?

Because she cares about you.

What does that have to do with anything?

It does, trust me. She might not know what it's about but getting the weight off your shoulders might help.

Why would I tell her that if she can't help?

She cares about you, and I know you won't admit it, but its okay to trust others with things that bother you.

Need I remind you that I trusted you three but you still kept my memories from me for a week?

Five days, and that's different.

Not really.

I didn't get a response from Wild though. How was that any different than them keeping my memories from me? I was sure I should tell someone about these dreams but I didn't want to, it was something that I felt I should keep to myself until I figured it out.

Grace was still studying me closely like she was worried about me, she probably was, everyone seemed worried about me lately. Well I did fall off a cliff three months ago, and last month I accidently burned down three tents. Then Last week I fell head first in a lake and, well you get the idea. Grace was now muttering under her breath in Gaelic to herself. I hated it when she did that, it was unnerving, and made me think that she was talking about me, which she probably was

Annabeth was still reading, though she was muttering to herself in Greek about the Parthenon and how they should build a replica of it in its full glory for the camp. Personally I thought that was ridiculous, I like my mom and all but the temple of Diana was huge at one point, to rebuild it in its full glory would make it about twice the size of the Big House.

Hippolytus was singing along to Miley Cyrus, something about her 'just being Miley'. The music was so loud it was a wonder that we hadn't crashed, or driven off a bridge yet. Though with my luck on our side we probably would at some point.

Lilly was reading her book, Percy Jackson and the Olympians; the Lightning Thief by some guy called Rick Riordan. So that was the guy who Chiron had gotten to write this all down to help recruit demi-gods, I did wonder about him…

I was the only one who was at war with three aspects of my personality, I usually am the only one who was at war with them. Can't most people just live in harmony with the three metaphysical beings in their heads. Then again most people don't have three metaphysical beings in their head. I didn't even know if Lilly had these three voices.

Lilly

I was really worried about my brother, something about him was different about him. Not just his eyes were different, they were now silver but that wasn't my biggest concern. My biggest concern was that he seemed to be at war with himself, I could see the emotional conflict in his eyes. It got worse when he looked at Grace, she was worried about him too, we all were, he hadn't been himself since he returned from 2001.

He had become more temperamental, and a lot more easily aggravated, last month I had put his socks on the wrong side of the drawer. Shamrock usually does his own laundry, so it wasn't my fault, besides couldn't he just switch the places?

Then only a week after that we were clearing things out of my house in Forks and he got in this huge fight with Jake about Renesme. Something about it being sick and wrong that he was in love with a ten year old. Then they both went wolf on each other, Jake is much bigger than Shamrock but that didn't stop Sham from attacking. Long story short we learned that demi-gods have one less chromosome then the average human and we spent the night under the watchful eye of Carlisle.

Once we got back to the hunt he spent a week in his tent sulking because Jake had rendered his bow arm useless. It took a week to heal and during that time I am fairly sure he devised six hundred diabolical ways of getting him and the rest of his pack back. Why do I think this? Well the bear trap and the stuffed wolf labeled 'Jacob' hanging upside down from a tree was a pretty big hint.

Then there was the time only a week ago he fell head first into a lake. He had been standing on one of the lower branches of a tree while the rest of us were swimming then all we heard was a scream and a splash. About ten seconds later a coughing, spluttering Shamrock popped up, his Auburn hair hanging in his eyes and his tunic clinging to him.

Then we had the caffeine incident and that made things rocky for a couple of days, but that seemed to have blown over, by now. Honestly knowing Shamrock I expected that to go on much longer than necessary, he could be so melodramatic sometimes. I studied my brother in the rearview mirror and I noticed how is features had changed.

His eyes were silver and they were always darting around, his mop of auburn hair was tangled, he looked more like mom then he had a while ago. I was sure of it. His jaw was set, and his nose was twitching around like he was nervous. It wasn't natural, well I'm not actually sure just how natural either of us is but that's not the point. Wait had he grown? No never mind that was just the seating arrangement.

He's so jumpy around Grace now, and the social stuff hasn't gotten better, the other day while I was changing he just walked right in to our tent and he didn't get why he couldn't do that. Yet he seemed to be worried about his appearance around Grace, always straightening his dress (Which he swears is a tunic, but newsflash no one on the planet worn tunics in like three thousand years, at least not guys.) I've tried to get him to dress like a normal guy but he doesn't like the way Jeans rub him, but he wears them higher than his waist so obviously they are going to rub him in certain places if he wears them that high!

He also seemed a little hurt about Orion being our dad, well more so about never having been told that our father was the only man Artemis had ever loved. I had been hurt at first but Orion was a great guy, one who I was glad to have for a father. I was more upset that I hadn't been told that Artemis was my mom too until after Shamrock had fallen off a cliff, but Artemis loved me. I still had a hard time calling Artemis mom, so I just called her Artemis.

I glanced back at Sham who was fiddling around with Orion's belt, it was as though he felt odd wearing it, like it didn't belong to him, or was some kind of foreign disease. Grace put her hand on his arm. It was simple enough but it sent a clear message 'everything will be okay' He rubbed her hand a silent 'I know.' Their means of communication were odd.

That was the final piece to the puzzle he looked more like rugged, more wild, more like dad too, almost as though he was the perfect combination of the two of them. Rugged like he spent time in the forest like dad, but softer skin tone like Artemis, his features were much shaper like dads but his sharp darting eyes like Artemis. I overall looked more like dad but when people say we're identical twins they are wrong, not just because of height and eye color, but because of me looking like dad and Shamrock being a blend of the two.

I saw Shamrock raise his eyebrows at me, I turned back around and faced forward. Hippolytus was singing along to Miley Cyrus. His blue eyes had a moderately insane look to them, and his curly black hair was wild, as though it hadn't been brushed in years. Even though he was now ,dressed in modern clothes you could still tell he wasn't from around here, the jeans were held up with a piece of rope, the T-shirt didn't match what he was wearing very well.

I guess I could see Artemis making friends with someone like this; you couldn't help but take pity on him. His moodiness made him difficult, we had only been in the car for about an hour and he'd already had an outburst when I tried to turn the music down so I had decided that it was best if we didn't even ask to turn it off.

The Underworld

So the bikers had done well intimidating Grace, thus making Shamrock protective. Everything was falling into place, it would all be perfect. He looked into the glass ball and saw that they were now speeding towards LA. Within four hours they would be here. The boy, Sean, rushed into the room.

"You called my lord?" Sean bowed hastily.

"Yes boy I did, they will arrive in the underworld soon. Once they are in the Palace of Hades we must make sure everything goes according to plan. If one step goes wrong then our plan will be ruined. Do you understand me?" He growled.

"Yes sir. Hades must agree to let Orion go with Artemis then we must get Apollo to show himself at the council on Olympus." Sean answered.

"Yes, yes my boy, you are catching on." The figure smiled a cold, evil smile, and nodded at Sean before shooing him away. The boy ran out of the room and he turned back to the crystal ball. "Soon, very soon, my plan will become clear and you will feel my full wrath. Just as I felt the wrath of your mother."

Well there we go another chapter out of the way, just two more to go until we reach the end of this part of Shamrock's journey.