Chapter 16: A new arrival
We returned to camp half-blood later that night. We said our goodbye's and went our separate ways. I walked back to my shadowy cabin with a broad smile on my face. Sophie had done that too me. I couldn't remember the last time I felt the pain of such a smile. It was a pain in my jaws that I missed. I walked into the dark Erebus cabin and changed into Jogging trousers and a slightly too wide t-shirt before I laid myself to rest. I closed my eyes and fell into a deep sleep with my lips still curved into a smile.
In the maintain Luke Ford was having a much less peaceful night. He was laying in bed with his eyes wide open. He had been waiting for every single noise to fade before he could sneak out. He needed to be outside right now. He had so much energy that he couldn't release in the forge or around others. He needed to be alone. He got out of bed and put on his armour. He put the watch he got from his father around his right wrist and strapped his unnamed shield around his bronze arm. Before he left cabin nine he kissed Maria's cheek leaving her to sleep alone tonight. He tried to make little noise as he made his way to the woods. He knew where he needed to go to get what he wanted. He found a small group of Dracanae near Zeus' fist in the woods, so that's where he was going. It was a small group, nothing the entire first line of defence had to worry about. Even if it was he wanted to do this alone. He had to. When he reached the rock that people called Zeus' fist he changed his bronze pinky in a sharp sword. He was still proud of the hand that he forged so long ago. He forged it together with his brother when he lost his hand to Mack. The hand he had lost had definitely been traded for something useful.
Luke walked further passed the tree's towards the spot where he had found the Dracanae. At the time he decided to leave them alone but now he wanted them dead. Now that he needed to unleash the strength he had been given. It had changed him, Luke knew that. But it was worth it. He had never been this tough, never been this strong. He had made a deal that he didn't regret, of course he hadn't kept himself to his part of the deal yet. Maybe once he had he would change his mind. For now though, it was great. When the Dracanae finally spot him he felt no fear. He was never a coward but there was fear. He imagined everyone felt that way. There was always a chance that he made a mistake and got killed. How many demigods had died like that? Luke didn't want to think of an exact number. But now he had abandoned all fear. He knew that these pathetic creatures had no chance. There were four of them and he charged at them without a second thought. With ruthless brutality and strength he cut through the first Dracanae that attacked him. Using his shield for both defence and offence he ruthlessly cut through his opponents. With a smile on his face he cut through the last Dracanae which screamed in pain. The strength he possessed amazed him every time. Looking at the piles of dust that had appeared he smiled. Another few monsters send to hell. He walked on looking for his next victims.
I woke up earlier then I had hoped. I knew that once I did I wouldn't sleep any more so I decided to get up and get dressed. I dressed as usual. A t-shirt, jeans and my leather jacket. I walked out thinking it was going to be just another day but something was up. I knew that as soon as I saw Alex Jones and Hectar Garner run up to me yelling my name.
"Angel!" Hectar yelled when he saw me come out of the cabin. Honestly I didn't feel like these two idiots. They were still kids but I owed them. Even though I still thought they were always biting off more than they could chew they did good. They were real heroes whether they were the smartest lads or not. One thing was sure, they were braver than most demigods their age. They jumped right into any battle without thinking twice about it. It was stupid as well as brave, but I had to give them props for it. "There's a kid up on the hill. We found him this morning. Adele is up there but we need someone that can get him to the infirmary." I was surprised that instead of trying to do something themselves they came looking for help. It was unlike them but it was a sign that they were growing a bit more responsible which was a good thing. I just nodded and followed them up the hill. I wondered who this Adele actually was. I had heard about her, she was the daughter of Zeus if I remembered right. But as far as I knew I never met her before. At least I thought I hadn't until I saw her. I recognized her immediately. Straight red hair and about dwarf size compared to my six foot 2. I was almost the tallest person at camp, only a few Ares kids beat me in height. Luke and Max came pretty close but neither of them were taller while both were older. Adele was only about 5 feet which put her underneath Alex and Hectar who were both about 14 years old. I met her during the fight at the big house. She had been wounded then, she had been one of the surviving members of the second line of defence. I didn't know anyone who was part of that group. Everyone I knew was part of the first line, the one that Luke was in charge of.
"Angel, what are you doing here?" She asked me. I simply shook my head towards Alex and Hectar and figured she would understand that they got me to go to the hill. After I stopped running I felt how my lungs burned. My stamina really was horrible. I looked down at the wounded kid that lay on the ground. He was about 13 maybe 14. He had dark blonde hair, a boyish face and intense grey eyes. I recognized him immediately as Seth Marston.
"Seth? How on earth did you get here?" I asked him. He didn't answer, he just stared past me, never looking anyone in the eye. Only now I saw the wound he had. Something had cut him across his torso and it looked pretty bad.
"You know this kid?" Adele asked me. I just nodded at first trying to think of a way to get him out of there. I didn't want to risk shadow travel as it tended to be a bit unstable at daylight. I didn't know what would happen if I carried a wounded kid into the darkness. Carrying him to the infirmary was the most logical way of course but it could make the wound a lot worse. It was the only thing we could do though.
"I met him in Los Angeles, he came a long way." I told Adele. I wished Galia was there, she was a daughter of Apollo and was probably a lot more useful in this situation. If this was a life or death situation there were things I could do to save his life but I didn't want to do it so close to camp. I could stitch him up or close the wound in various more painful ways but we were only a hill away from magical healing food and drink. I cursed myself for not taking any with me when Hectar and Alex picked me up.
"Nothing around Addy." I heard a gruff voice coming from behind the tree line. The heavy Scottish accent made me think of Davey for a second but it couldn't be him. I didn't see the source of the voice till a muscular satyr popped out of the bushes. I had never really interacted with satyrs but I had seen enough of them to know that this was an odd one. He was very buffed up which was something that you didn't see with many satyrs. He wore heavy black boots and army camouflaged jeans. Around his neck he wore a soldiers dog tags, one simply said: Colonel. While the other had 'Up yer Kilt!' engraved in it. This Satyr was definitely something else.
"Thanks Colonel." Adele said. The Satyr saluted before turning his attention to Seth which was good. He needed it more. "There's no chance that you ran into any children of Apollo is there?" The Colonel shook his head almost making the camo cap he was wearing fall off.
"Ran into no one." He said. "I can't believe it, we get cross country without a problem but we get attacked right on our doorstep." The colonel said still with the Scottish accent that kept reminding me of Davey. Now the Satyr looked at me. "Ye're the biggest here lad, ye carry him down." I simply nodded and was happy that I knew Davey else his Scottish accent would mess me up. Davey tried too suppress it to make himself understandable to everyone but this guy seemed to make it extra thick. "Come on lad get a move on!"
I lifted Seth on my back and started to get down the hill as fast as I could. I could feel my lungs burn before we got half way down but I kept running, I had to for Seth's sake. No one else seemed to have any trouble at all. I wondered if they actually trained their stamina or if mine was just rotten because of the smoking. I think it was a little bit of both, or a lot. I made it down the hill before my lungs were really aching. I was breathing heavily and I felt Seth's body slipping away.
"Come on ye! Ye fair puckled already!" I had no idea what he was talking about but I figured it was something around the lines of me having no stamina whatsoever. Since I couldn't leave Seth to die and didn't like the old goat taunting me I kept running trying to keep it together to the best of my abilities. I was close to passing out because of lack of oxygen when I finally reached the infirmary.
"He's not going to make it much longer if we don't get him some help. I don't even think nectar and ambrosia can heal this before it kills him." Adele said. Looking at the deep cuts I agreed. We needed someone who knew about healing.
"Hectar, Alex, go see if you can find any children of Apollo lurking around. And get Luke and Max over here" I said. They both nodded and ran off. I didn't know if there was anything they could do for Seth. Not long after they left the cabin I started making my way to the door.
"Where do ye think yer goin?" The colonel asked me. I had one more person in mind that could help. I needed to get there quickly, but not before I got a good pun in.
"I'm off to see the wizard." Gotta love the wizard of Oz.
I walked into Jaeden's quarters without knocking. Yes that was rude but I was in a hurry. I figured when lives were at stake manners didn't really matter. If they did, well then screw manners. This was more important than leaving a good impression. Luckily I wasn't interrupting anything, Jaeden just sat there peacefully drinking his tea. For a second I wondered if he was the only American who drank tea before saying what happened. After telling what happened through my heavy breathing (running really wasn't good for me) he finished his cup of tea and got up.
"What are we waiting for then?" He asked me. The two of us went to the infirmary as quickly as we could. We didn't speak a word although that was partially because I was pretty much out of breath before we were halfway. There were more people when we arrived at the infirmary. Max, Luke and Colin had joined us. Both Luke and Max glared at me, obviously they weren't happy that I brought Jaeden into this but I didn't see a problem. Jaeden helped before and he seemed to be willing to do it again. If they didn't trust Jaeden, that was their issue. For me he hadn't done a thing to raise my suspicion.
"I'll need some time alone with the boy, please." Jaeden said to the three of us standing in the room. The others were all outside. It was never good to crowd around someone that was already on the brink of death. I was reluctant about leaving Jaeden alone with Seth though. I wanted to have someone keep an eye on him. I trusted Jaeden but I wanted to know what was going on. Obviously Jaeden noticed that we were reluctant and he seemed to deal with it well. "One of you can stay if it makes you feel more secure." He sounded slightly annoyed which I could understand. We showed that we didn't trust him completely while he was trying to help. Me of all people understood what that felt like.
"I'll stay." Adele volunteered. If she hadn't I would have but I trusted Adele to look out for Seth in case what Jaeden did went too far. I gave her a nod before walking out together with the colonel.
Outside I was greeted by two angry faces. Colin and the colonel started talking and I was left with Luke and Max. I honestly didn't feel like fighting with them about this. Max and I hadn't left things well and Luke and I had just stopped fighting. I did what I thought was right, whether they agreed or not wasn't my problem. "Why did you bring the sorcerer into this?" Max asked me. He used the same title when we first met Jaeden and he didn't use it with a kind tone in his voice. He had something against Jaeden, I wondered why.
"I figured he could help. I didn't know where you or any children of the Apollo campers were and he needed help quickly. I dealt the way I thought was best." I felt like I was explaining my actions to some kind of general in the army. These were my friends but there seemed to be a sort of distance between us. The last year and recent events had done a lot of damage to our bond. All of us noticed that but didn't acknowledge it which made it it even worse.
"Well next time don't! Who knows why he's here, what he's planning! We allow him to stay here because we owe him for saving our hides but the further he stays away from us the better." Again Luke showed aggression he never possessed. He had changed a lot in the last few days. I knew something was wrong, I just didn't know what and it didn't seem like he was going to tell me.
"What was I supposed to do? Let the kid die?" Luke seemed to calm down after I said that. Whatever got into Luke even that couldn't change the fact that he felt responsible for every single demigod at camp. Right now he was pissed for asking Jaeden's help but if I hadn't done everything I could he would have killed me.
"I get that you think that you did what you had to do but let me tell you this Angel:" Max said. He knew that Luke and me arguing wouldn't get us anywhere. Luke and him seemed to see eye to eye for different reasons. Truthfully Max's seemed more valid than Luke's. "Phthonos used to work with quite a few sorcerers and there are two things I'm certain of. One, none of them, NONE of them have good intentions. Secondly, I have never seen one do what Jaeden did that night. He's very powerful, more powerful than any child of Hecate that has been born in the last century." Max said. Honestly what he said disturbed me slightly. I knew that he was powerful but if he was stronger than children of the goddess of magic it meant that he was powerful. Part of me started to realize why Max and Luke felt threatened but another part of me was happy to hear it. It meant that Jaeden wasn't lying about what he had offered Angel. All he needed in return was a favour. I wondered what it could be. He hadn't told me any specifics yet which worried me. Still though, Angel was pretty sure that it was worth it because the reward was more valuable than words could possibly express.
"I get why you did what you did Angel. But don't trust him, be smarter than that." Luke said. I was happy that he agreed with my, whether he thought Jaeden should be trusted or not he agreed that it was necessary. He didn't want anyone to die if there was still a way to save that person. I had someone on my side which made this argument much easier for me. Honestly I didn't want to argue with my friends but lately none of us had been seeing eye to eye. I didn't know why, but it just wasn't the same any more. We had grown apart and now we were dogs fighting over the same bone, that applied to pretty much everything now.
"I thought you were with me on this Luke?" Max said. Obviously he didn't like the fact that Luke acknowledged that asking Jaeden to save Seth wasn't completely stupid. He seemed to have some kind of hate against him and he wasn't going to abandon that any time soon. "I guess it doesn't matter what I say, you two just insist on saving lives using the wrong means. But trust me on this, Jaeden isn't who he seems to be." Max said before walking off. He didn't seem angry, indifferent was a better description. When Max said he gave up he really meant it. A second ago he seemed to be dead set on explaining to me why Jaeden shouldn't be trusted and now he didn't seem to care.
"Well now that that's out of the way, how was your date with Sophie?" Luke asked. He seemed to be right back to his normal self, the way he was the last time I saw him. His mood changed so quickly these days. He could always get pissed, we both had a temper but that wasn't strange for guys like us. But there was something about the aggression he showed lately, that was something new. I wanted to ask about it, but I didn't. I figured it was better to leave it be. I figured he was a bit stressed and had to relieve it somehow. But still, it bothered me.
"It wasn't a date." I protested. I knew that was pointless although I wondered if Luke actually believed it was a date or if he simply liked annoying me. Neither would surprise me. "But we had fun." I told him the truth. Although I still wasn't happy that Sophie got me on that karaoke stage, and the fact that I ended up in a brawl with my cousin, it had been fun. There were still things I was wondering about though...especially the things Aphrodite said. Who was this granddaughter of hers?
"You like her don't you?" This time Luke was serious. We liked to joke around about stuff like that but when there was something real there were no jokes. We were serious about important stuff, and this was important, at least to me it was. It was good to know that we could be serious when we needed to be. To me it meant that he would be there covering my back when I needed it. He proved that long ago but with our clashes lately I wondered if that was still the same.
"Yeah...yeah I do." I said honestly. If he was trying to be serious I wasn't going to bullshit around this. He saw it before and now he was either sure or he wanted to be sure. Last time I denied it but now I figured it was best to just tell him the truth. "But you know, it doesn't matter now. Colt's back which pretty much ruined my chances of being with anyone like that. And anyway we have other things to worry about." The dracanae were on my mind. They were everywhere, and it was about time we found out why. "They're everywhere Luke, even in Los Angeles. Has there been anything like this before?"
"Once, a couple of hundred years back." Luke said. It still amazed me how Luke knew stuff like that. If he wasn't a son of Hephaestus he would have easily been a child of Athena when it came to knowledge. Wisdom...not really sure. He had the same jump in and think about what you're doing later mentality that I had. "Ever hear of the Salem witch hunt?" Luke asked. I wasn't big on history but I heard about it.
"I have, but what does that have to do with the Dracanae?" Honesly I didn't see the connection. The Dracanae and the prosecution of innocents because of superstition had no connection to me.
"Well there was a lot going on there that not many people know about, like a lot in history. Believe it or not the people killed were actually sorcerers. Heavy set Hecate worshippers who actually had some power. As the story goes Zeus and Poseidon got a bit nervous about it, thinking that they were becoming too powerful. They sent a load of demigods to hunt them down and kill them. Only half of the clan was officially killed. History doesn't mention the rest. Anyway, these sorcerers found a spell to bind the Dracanae. Salem, Ipswich, Andover, they were crawling with these things." Luke said. Before I processed the entire story I asked myself again how he knew all this stuff. I had never seen him reading not did he have a lot of friends in the Athena cabin. I understood that he would be able to know exactly when and where a weapon or tool was made but things like this, I had no clue.
"That's why you don't trust Jaeden?" Knowing what he knew I understood him better. I still didn't think bringing him in was a bad idea but I realized why Luke had something against Jaeden. Luke just nodded, I knew that he would answer yes when I asked the question. "Do you think he could have done this?"
"Alone? No way. He's powerful but every member of that coven was and it took all of them to bind the Dracanae. I doubt there's any sorcerer that could do it alone." Luke answered. If he said so I believed him. That could mean one of two things though. Either Jaeden had nothing to do with the Dracanae attacking, or he wasn't alone.
When Adele walked out of the infirmary with a slight smile I hoped that it meant that Seth was alive. If not I would have started wondering if Jaeden had something to do with that but if Jaeden had done nothing Seth would have died, probably slower. But I kept holding onto the smile hoping that Seth was still breathing.
"He's fine." I let out a sigh of relief. I didn't know how Jaeden did it or what his intentions were and it didn't matter. Seth was alive and at that moment nothing else was more important than that. Jaeden had saved his life and even though Luke and Max didn't like to put Seth's life in his hands at least he was alive now. It was a lot better than the alternative.
Jaeden went back to his room without a word. I tried to thank him but he either didn't hear or didn't react. Seth was still breathing but he wasn't awake. So I waited, I wouldn't be sleeping that night anyway. Late at night I thought I would be the only one awake but there was still a fire burning in the forges. Luke decided to take it easy tonight. It would mean there would be more Dracanae to slay the day after.
"Luke, is that you?" Max spoke from the only spot in the forge that wasn't lightened by the fire. He seemed to live in the shadows more than I did. Maybe that was because he had been doing it all his life, he didn't even know who he was before he had to. He only recently found out that he wasn't the person who he thought he was which left a even greater question mark on his past.
"What are you doing here Max?" Luke asked. Max rarely came to the forge, unless there was trouble. Truth was he rarely showed himself unless there was trouble what he did when he wasn't warning us or pulling me to some random farm house was a mystery. We knew he didn't stay at camp. The Hermes cabin had been missing him for months and the Phobos cabin was uninhabited. No one knew anything about him or talked to him other than Luke and I. Sometimes I wondered if he ever felt lonely, if he even knew what that felt like. A long time I wondered if he knew any emotions at all. He was always cool, never lost his temper and he rarely smiled. Max was a mystery to all of us, and to himself.
"I need your help, there's something wrong with my...handicap." Max said. He had been using the chain engraved in his arm simply because he rather used it as a weapon than let it stop him, but that didn't mean he was happy about it. He had been practising day and night to become as strong as he used to be even with a permanent chain in his arm, but still it weighed on him every day.
"You've been noticing changes haven't you? What did Phobos do to it?" Luke seemed more curious than eager to help. He was fascinated by it, just like he was fascinated by Shadow-edge and its weird behaviour. He was a son of Hephaestus, it wasn't strange that he was interested in weapons that were more than just bronze or steel.
"Like Phobos said I would." Max nodded. Luke wanted to see but Max's long sleeve covered it. "It changes, at a thought it becomes exactly what I want to, any material, any length. Sometimes I'm not even in control of it." Max said. He pulled off his shirt finally showing the chain. To any other person it would have looked the same as it had before, but Luke saw the subtle differences. He had worked for weeks to make the chain usable as a weapon and now it was definitely different. It seemed more...tainted. There was a frightening aura around it, definitely the influence of the god of fear. Then there was the chain itself which seemed older. Luke used shining new bronze to make the lethal part of the chain but now it seemed like it had been made in the old days. Luke saw more than the easy ones though. Tiny engravings, how the metal seemed to change a little bit each second and the most unbelievable one. It wasn't just the front of the chain that had changed. Luke couldn't work with the parts that were actually stuck in his arm but now that had been affected too.
"Show me what it can do." Luke started looking around for things that weren't really important, anything that they could break really. Eventually he found a failed arm guard and a beat up shield. Obviously the forge of Hephaestus didn't have much failed wares. He threw up the arm guard and Max reacted. The chain shot forward and wrapped around the guard. It retracted back towards Max's arm until the arm guard was in his hand. "Not bad."
"That's not all, throw up the shield." Luke wanted to see what Max meant and threw up the shield. Again Max made the chain shoot forward towards its target but this time it didn't wrap around it like before. Instead the end of the chain turned into a deadly spike which went right through the shield. Again it retracted back to Max's arm with nothing but a thought.
"Now that's impressive."
There weren't any lights on in the infirmary. I preferred it that way and I doubted Seth would complain being K.O and all. I just waited in the dark hoping that he would wake up. I felt like I let him down. I should have brought him to camp when I found out. I knew there were Dracanae in Los Angeles and if they could already sense that he was a demigod that place was dangerous for him. If I had gotten him out of there he would have been fine but instead I left him there and he almost died while trying to get to camp half-blood. It was my fault that he was all beat up, that was the reason why he had to live through this no matter what. If he died because I turned my back on him I didn't know how I was supposed to forgive myself. I had too much blood on my hands already, I didn't think I could take any more.
"Still here?" I heard a girl's voice. Adele Frye had joined me in the infirmary. I had her and that strange Satyr to thank for Seth's safety as much as Jaeden. If they hadn't been there he would have definitely been killed in the woods and someone would have found his cold body. At least now he had a chance. He seemed fine, his wounds were gone and he was breathing but he wasn't awake yet so I was still in doubt. There were more than enough mortals in coma, I was sure that demigods could get into the same state if there was enough damage.
"Yeah, someone has to be here to explain what happened when he wakes up." I didn't want to use the word if. He was going to wake up, I tried not to doubt that although it got harder as the hours passed. Of course this could take days. I had been out for days at a time once or twice. I figured this is how the people waiting for me to wake up must have felt.
"Did you know he was a demigod?" Adele asked. For a second I thought about lying but that wasn't the right thing to do. I used to lie all the time to get out of anything really but these days I tried to be honest. I needed people to trust me when it mattered, if I lied all the time that trust would easily be destroyed.
"Yeah I knew. I thought he would be safe though. He had a life and he had never been attacked before he was there when I was. I figured he'd be safe for a little longer." I never had a normal life or a home to go to. Seth did and even though it would still be there home would never be the same once you gave in to being a demigod. I wanted him to be normal for a little longer, but in the end that almost cost him his life.
"I get why you did it. Honestly I don't know if it's the right thing to do. But I remember what it's like to have a normal life, if I could go back to that I would." She said. Honestly the normal life she talked about was foreign to me. It was something I had no experience with, which is why I could appreciate it more than most people. All demigods could.
"I wished he could have enjoyed it a little longer. But instead my choice nearly killed him." I said. Usually I didn't talk about stuff like this to anyone, especially to people I barely knew. I talked to Adele before but nothing big. I didn't know why but for some reason I just told her.
"We all live with that danger Angel. Seth won't be an exception no matter what. He'll make it out alive and then how he got here won't matter any more." I tried to believe her but in the back of my head the thought of 'what if he doesn't' was getting stronger. Luckily I was quickly relieved. I heard something, a yawn coming from Seth's bed. He sat up with a drowsy looking face.
"Michael? What are you doing here? Where am I?" He asked those were normal questions to ask in his situation, and I was going to answer them soon enough but for the first few seconds I was just happy. He was alive, that was all that mattered.