Hey, Everyone!

So, I realized that most of my action scenes are kind of wimpy. Sorry about that. They're a little harder to write than you'd think.

Enjoy!

Chapter 44

Hazel

Hazel wasn't holding off very well.

Frank was unconscious, but breathing. But Clytius was no amateur fighter.

He swung at her with his huge sword and she ducked and ran at him again. The best way to defeat him would definitely have been long distance. But Frank was the archer out of the two of them. And now…

She shook her head. She needed to stay focused on the fight. She'd save Frank later

She had been able to keep Frank behind her so far, backing Clytius up a little bit every time she rushed him. She wasn't going to let Frank die simply because he couldn't defend himself.

Clytius swung again and Hazel lurched forward and fell to the ground, but she could feel the sword had nicked part of her upper back, and more than likely some of her hair.

Hazel jumped to her feet and she ran at him again. She stabbed at his leg and he recoiled in pain as the area crumbled to sand.

But it quickly started to reform as she continued to try to fight him.

Nothing was helping.

She was losing.

He swung at the left side of her head, but she blocked with her sword and pushed him away, and they turned a little bit.

After a little while of this back and forth action between the two of them, they had switched sides of the cave. He was facing the exit and she was facing…

Frank.

Crap. He'd forced her to the other side of the cave.

Her hands started to sweat.

He smiled. "You realized your mistake, didn't you, little demigod? I wish I could say it was a pleasure meeting the boy, but…it just wasn't. You don't call a giant stupid. You'll learn that lesson today, won't you?"

He jumped backward, and he turned to look down on Frank. His smile was vicious as he cocked his head to the side and raised his sword high over his head.

"No!" Hazel screamed as she rushed forward.

But she was too far away. She knew that. She would never reach them in time.

Hazel tripped on a rock and went flying until her chin hit the ground, and she tasted blood. She watched her sword skidded across the cave floor, far away from her.

She looked up at Clytius and Frank just in time to see him swing his arms down.

There was a loud cracking sound, a big ball of something shot past Hazel and hit Clytius's hands.

He cried out and his sword flung against the cave wall and landed next to Frank with a bunch of loud clattering, which echoed throughout the cave and only made it louder.

Clytius hissed as he looked up by the cave entrance.

Hazel looked over her shoulder and saw Leo and Piper in the doorway, Leo with a new ball or fire already in open hand, with his hammer in the other, and Piper with her dagger drawn.

"Didn't like that, did you?" Leo asked tauntingly. "There's more where that came from, don't you worry."

Clytius snarled. "Another fire-user. I'll just have to take care of you first."

Hazel dived for her sword and then scampered to her feet as Clytius rushed Leo.

"LEO, HE DIED BY FIRE!" Hazel shouted.

Leo's eyes lit up. "Oh, this is the easiest challenge of the day."

His hammer ignited and he shot his fire ball straight at Clytius's body.

It hit him square in the chest and he went flying backward.

Hazel crawled over to Frank. She touched his forehead and looked for damages.

He probably had some broken bones, hopefully no internal bleeding.

He was going to survive this. Because Leo and Piper had found them. Someone had found them.

"You useless demigods!" Clytius spat. "I will not be sent back because of the likes of you."

"Too bad," Leo replied cockily, and another fire ball shot through the air, lighting the cave with a harsh whizzing sound.

Hazel kissed the top of Frank's head and stood up with her sword. She turned to see the backside of Clytius. She stabbed her sword straight into his lower back.

He roared as his back arched from the pain. Hazel wrenched her sword out of his back and he staggered forward a couple steps.

Another streak illuminated the cave, and then Clytius stumbled backward the steps he had staggered forward.

And then he fell to his knees as his wound slowly crumbled to sand. It spread across his back and finally he was nothing but a pile of worthless sand.

Hazel kicked the sand around a lot, and then turned to Leo and Piper. "Thank the gods you showed up when you did!"

"Yeah, I know," Piper said. "We saw what was about to happen."

"Can you help me get him back to the ship? We need nectar, and ambrosia, and we need to wake him up," Hazel said.

They ran across the cave to her and they all helped haul him out of the cave and they started their way through the maze.

"Do you remember at all where you guys went?" Leo asked.

"It was the other entrance each time," she recalled. "Like, if we went left the first time, we went right the second time, then left the third, and so on."

"Okay. So which one do we start with?" Leo asked.

"Which ever one is in front of us," Hazel replied.

"Let's hope we make it out alive. The Doors are still open, remember?" Piper said.

"Yeah. Let's go a little faster," Leo replied.

Thanks for Reading!