Hermes had never told anyone, partly because it would somewhat negate the skill, but his most powerful ability was luck.

Today was not Hermes' lucky day.

Firstly, Hermes had manifested this morning on the mortal planes as a teenager. Athena liked to claim Hermes went young when he was tired because bratty kid was his natural state. Hermes miiiight have stuck his tongue out in response, and Apollo laughed and said that proved her point, then tried to make Hermes go to bed because if Hermes was too tired to be older, then he clearly needed sleep. A wrestling match ensued, Ares got involved, a pigeon may or may not have been set on fire. Aphrodite may have made threats of unrequited love in their futures. It was a whole thing. (The pigeon turned out to be a phoenix. It was fine. An epic quest ensued to get it home. 'Dite forgave them. Dad only grounded them for a year.). The point is, sometimes, for reasons unknown, Hermes goes smaller than he aims for.

Luckily, none of Hermes siblings were around when he descended straight from his temple in Olympus into Cabin 11 only to manifest, not as the fatherly figure he'd been aiming for, but as a sixteen-year-old. And Hermes, at sixteen, was neither a tall sixteen nor a buff sixteen. He was athletic, but his body type always favored the wirier build of a runner. He was the kind of sixteen-year-old that could get away with playing a tween in movies. If any of his siblings saw him arrive, they'd probably shove ambrosia down his throat and drag him to bed. And he wasn't that tired. Or hungry. Okay, he did stagger a big from doing such a big descension between planes, but it was a big jump. It would stagger most gods to do it.

No kids saw him either, because he wasn't stupid enough to risk blinding someone by descending without warning right in front of them. He had to aim for his cabin because the next nearest place he could jump straight to from Olympus was the crossroads far outside of Camp. If he went that far out, he might as well have gone the easier, but longer way. No, Cabin 11 it had to be. But he didn't have to aim for the middle of the cabin and risk the kids. In fact, he'd made sure to include a hidden alcove altar when his cabin was built that only a god could access for just such occasions. All his temples had one. And a good thing too; he could hear many kids' voices just beyond his alcove. Forget blinding, he might have burned one of them on entry.

Unfortunately, being almost completely alone did not shield him from a scolding. The danger, he supposed in having a godly symbol that could talk back.

'I told you we should take the chariot,' Martha said, either in response to the stagger or when she got a good look at his ridiculously youthful face. The alcove was dark but here, on his own altar in his own temple, he glowed with a godly light.

'You should eat more rats,' George agreed. Hermes had long ago given up on explaining that he never, in fact, at rats. Well…maybe when he manifested as a snake himself…but never in his mortal guise. He understood the sentiment anyway. It was the same sentiment that had Apollo trying to stuff an ambrosia square down his throat whenever they crossed path. The same sentiment that had Athena secretly adding nectar to his drink stash.

Unneeded, was what it was. He could feel his godly core humming with plenty of energy. And if his stomach did decide to rumble, well, that's a teenager's stomach for you. Nothing to do with his energy needs. And he slept last Tuesday. He was fine.

He didn't explain this to George and Martha. In the first place, it would be wasted breath because they were never going to leave off nagging him. They'd done it for millennia now, he could hardly imagine one quick discussion in a tiny alcove would do the trick. In the second place, the kids might hear him and that would ruin his grand entrance.

His grand entrance was already somewhat ruined by his stupidly small body, but eh, it's not like they would know it wasn't his choice. He could play it off as wanting to be more on their level. And since he'd been wearing one of his divine outfits, it had shrunk with him so all was good.

He wrapped his invisibility cloak about himself and silently stepped through the wall that for anyone else would have stayed completely solid. The usual chaotic array of children was present in a loud jumble of activities. For a moment Hermes just stood invisibly in their midst, soaking in the boost which came from activities of his realms occurring within one of his temples. There were kids playing cards, a couple wrestling over some candy, a teen reading a trashy romance, one of his sons pickpocketing one of his other sons. All over camp, kids were engaging in athletics, arguing, hiking, growing. It was glorious.

And there was Jesima, the reason for his visit, sitting quietly in the corner on top of a ratty old sleeping bag, eyes wide and cautious. She was new to the cabin, so new he hadn't gotten her a welcome packet, yet. So new she was still on guard for monsters, even in the safety of the cabin.

She wasn't one of his. She didn't have a cousin or niece feel to her, either. At a guess, he'd say one of the lesser gods was her father. She could have a goddess for a mother, but after Percy's insistence that half-bloods be claimed, most unclaimed kids in his cabin were fathered by a god, if only for the simple reason that mothers know when they have a child. Fathers, not always. It wasn't just hubris that made gods wait for their children to do something spectacular before they claimed them. Sometimes, it took the child drawing from their father's realm for the father to notice they existed.

Jesima wasn't one of his, but she was a guest in his cabin and Hermes took that seriously. Hospitality was part of his realm. Well, also part of Zeus's and Hestia's realm, but the children of the camp were neither strangers (being their own children) nor at home (though some might come to feel otherwise), and travelers fell to Hermes. So when the young child, only nine, hesitantly shared her food and a small prayer with the only god she really knew about, the one whose cabin she was staying in, he listened.

Hermes intended to go up to her, invisibly, and bless her with luck, as he did every child who passed through his cabin. He tended to offer invisible blessings to those going on quests as well: good travel, anti-theft, extra luck. Jesima shouldn't need those things in camp, though. Besides, it felt unfair to his own children to bless everyone with anti-theft. He would then go to the center of the cabin and throw off his cloak, revealing himself to all for a day of fun and mayhem. Ha, maybe it wasn't such a bad idea going with teenager!

He took maybe two steps, tangled his legs up in his own cloak, and went sprawling to the ground with an undignified yelp in an almighty crash as he took the card table with him. He only just managed to avoid landing right on top of his own staff. He could hear the snakes' cries of alarm as his caduceus clattered across the floor.

For one long moment, there was utter silence in the cabin as everyone stared at the overturned table.

No, to Hermes growing embarrassment, not at the table. At him. His cloak had been torn right off his body in the fall and was now tangled about his feet, not lending invisibility in the slightest. Trying desperately to play it off, Hermes pulled himself to his feet and offered the room at large a cheery smile.

"Hello!" he exclaimed, then looked over at where Jesima, who was staring at him in wide-eyed awe. Okay, also confusion and a bit of fear, but if he ever retold this later, it was all awe. "Happy birthday, Jesima!"

She did not respond in any way, but that was fine. Hermes did not need accolades for taking time from his very busy schedule to visit and rain down gifts on his cabin. Just being there was reward enough from the energy alone. And he liked kids. He liked getting to see his kids. Besides, Jesima probably just needed time to realize how awesome he was. Or she was just super shy. He could work with that.

"Dad?!" cried the voice of Hermes' son, sounding more shocked than pleased to see his father, and maybe that was a little bit upsetting but, well, he had surprised everyone on purpose. He should expect shock after that.

Hermes smiled benevolently and looked up at Connor. Unless it was Travis. Okay, that sounds bad, not recognizing his own kid, but, see, Hermes could feel a familial connection to his kids but that didn't tell him which kid he was feeling. And the change in perspective, looking up instead of down, was throwing him from recognizing his usual tells.

All around, those kids who had caught on that there was an actual god in their midst were hesitantly bowing. Well, all but Hermes own kids. And Jesima, who was still staring with wide eyes of wonder. Wonder, fear, shock, wide eyes anyway.

"Why are you so small?" asked one of his daughters, not reverential in the slightest. Nor, he couldn't help but notice, did she sound thrilled to get a visit from her dad. He couldn't help it if he pouted, just a little bit. It didn't make him juvenile, no matter what Athena said.

Also, she was one to talk. He was still taller than her.

"I felt like going young," Hermes answered simply and humbly, or possibly a wee bit defensively.

"Why are you wearing a suit?" his other daughter asked.

"To be fancy!" he answered. "It's a birthday party!" And he grinned again at Jesima and conjured up her present from where he'd stashed it in his alcove. He took a step to give it to her, discovered his legs were still firmly wrapped in his cloak, and basically fell flat on his face. No one tried to catch him. In fact, Hermes was fairly certain he saw several kids jumping backwards out of the way, which, rude, but whatever.

Just falling flat on his face, actually, would probably have been better than what happened when he tried to catch himself. The real problem was the cards currently scattered about from the overturned table. Hermes might be falling, but he was used to moving fast and his mind worked very quickly. He tossed the gift in Jesima's direction (it was not breakable, a new pair of shoes, not the flying kind though they had a generic 'sure-footed' blessing over them) and put his hands out and, if he played it right, he'd manage to push himself back up and make it look like he'd done the whole thing on purpose.

His right hand landed perfectly for him to spring himself up. His left should have landed perfectly, but he had not anticipated the cards. The hand hit the cards, slid out from under him, and the next thing he knew he was face down on the floor, half twisted, while various parts of his body went 'ow, ow, ow'.

There was another long silence, and then, "Dad?" from several astonished and worried sounding voices.

'Hermes?' Martha asked and he felt her slithering along his back, George somewhere to his side. There were also muffled giggles. Hermes himself had to admit it probably looked pretty funny. He'd laugh if he saw, say, Ares take a dive to the floor. The worried hushes of others were probably less to do with common decency in not laughing at someone getting hurt and more to do with knowing how a god might respond to being laughed at. They were in luck. Hermes was one of the few gods who appreciated a good laugh. Even at his expense. Okay, he hated it, but they were children, and he understood. And that was actually better than the worry. He was their patron god, he should be worried over them, not the other way around.

"'M fine," he said into the ground. He slowly started to pull himself back up once Martha reached his shoulder. Maybe he could untangle his cloak, turn invisible, escape, and pretend that none of this had ever happened. Or party so hard with the cabin that they'd all forget how it started. Anyway, it's not like he was going to die of embarrassment. Unfortunately.

Getting up turned out more difficult than he expected. Right arm supported him just fine. Trying to move the left tore a pained scream from his lips that he'd deny to his dying day. Which meant forever because he had no dying day. There was something seriously wrong going on with his arm. Arm, shoulder, ankle, knee, face in general all had been radiating a vaguely sickening but bearable throb of painpainpain, but actually using his hurt arm had sent a sensation like hot coals from wrist to shoulder.

Hands surrounded him and he tolerated it because they vibed family, while child voices shouted over each other in various amounts of alarm.

"What happened?"

"What do we do?"

"Someone get Chiron!"

"Someone get an Apollo kid!"

At that, Hermes quickly tried to intervene.

"What, nope, no, no thank you, I'm fine," he insisted, despite the fact that he was only sitting up at all because Travis (unless it was Connor) was propping him up. Seriously, there was no way he was letting anyone outside of Cabin 11 know about this. Especially his brother's kids. It would be the talk of Olympus in no time.

"Your nose is dripping gold stuff," Julia pointed out.

"It's called ichor," some curly haired blond kid pointed out. "It's how gods bleed."

"I think your arm is out of its socket," Alice added, face wrinkled in disgust. "I didn't even know that could happen to a god."

"It's not a problem," Hermes explained. "I'll just heal myself and we can get on with the party." At that, he got a lot of very incredulous stares, including from George and Martha, which, rude. He was a god. Of course he could heal himself. Okay, maaaybe it would take a bit of energy, what with being on the mortal plane even if he was in his own temple. Maybe it would have been easier if he had some ambrosia or nectar. But they didn't just hand that out to kids or let them keep it in their cabin. Substance that tastes like their favorite thing ever left unsupervised among young children with impulse control difficulties? Terrible idea. Technically, Hermes could conjure up some…but he couldn't create it from nothing, and he'd forgotten to replenish his stash on the mortal plane. Taking it from Olympus would take so much energy he'd probably pass out, if he succeeded at all. He couldn't see that helping.

"Is this really for me?" Jesima asked, holding the present, wrapped in sparkly green paper, still with the wide eyes. "You heard me?"

"Of course!" Hermes said, beaming at her until the Connor shifted slightly, reawakening every nerve ending to pain and leaving him wincing and willing the tears forming in his eyes to not fall. Natural reaction to pain or not, things were embarrassing enough as it was.

"If you're healing yourself, shouldn't we see something healing?" Julia asked doubtfully.

"It's not instant," Hermes explained. And okay, it was actually going incredibly slowly even by his own standards. His nose was no longer actively bleeding, but the pain still radiated up and down his body. It wasn't an active skill, either; he couldn't will himself to heal faster. Usually it just happened, though the less energy he had, the slower it went. Maybe he should have rested a bit? Nah.

This was fine. Totally fine. No need to involve others. It would heal. He glanced at his own arm, then away, feeling slightly ill at its wrongness.

"Don't you need to pop it back in before you can heal?" Alice asked.

"Er…" said Hermes, who had never had this exact situation happen before. He'd had dislocated shoulders before, broken bones, too, but usually in situations where someone was around to instantly pop it in for him. He glanced at his arm again, winced, and decided to ignore it.

"It'll be fine," he insisted. "I always heal."

'Fine?' George demanded. 'Fine?! Hermes, you cannot just…'

"It's fine," Hermes said firmly, glaring down at him. George reared back, as if he were seriously considering biting him, and children pulled nervously away.

'Don't mind Hermes, George,' Martha said, wrapped about Hermes' shoulders. 'He's just a bit stupid sometimes, is all. Go on dears, someone fetch help.'

"What, no," Hermes said, trying to back his words with a glare that promised smiting to anyone who left to fetch help.

Thankfully, the children were wary of disobeying him even when he looked like a teen and was sitting in his own son's arms, face wet with ichor, with his body being a seriously annoying pain. In fact, the pain was getting so bad that he was actually reconsidering how bad it would be if his family found out about this. Maybe it was a bit worse than it had first felt like. His whole body felt a bit off. A bit sparky, and the pain was only growing. With every slight jostle his shoulder and arm screamed in pain and it was all he could do to not voice it. Why couldn't his stupid body just heal itself already?

"Er…I learned a bit of first aid…" offered the blond kid who had known about ichor. "I don't think we should try to relocate it ourselves."

"That's a great idea!" Hermes agreed. "One of you needs to pop my arm back how it should be. Go on kid."

"What, but that's the opposite of what I just said," the kid objected, but nonetheless he did move closer and went as far as to gently touch Hermes' hurt arm.

Hermes hissed, whole body tensing up even though the gentle touch didn't actually make things worse. In fact, a warm, soothing glow enveloped him. Not unlike Apollo, actually, when he went into healing mode.

"Oh," said Hermes, "That's not too…" which is the exact moment his arm suddenly swung itself back into its correct location, even though all the kid was currently doing was wrapping his fingers gently around his wrist and that shouldn't have shifted anything.

Later, Hermes' kids would insist that what happened was this. Jack, the blond kid, was doing his thing and he made Hermes arm return to its socket. Hermes screamed so loud that Connor needed nectar to heal his own hearing and slumped over in a dead faint. (It was Connor, it turned out. Travis was at college. Which Hermes knew. He gave him a car and everything as a graduation gift. Of course he knew. Connor had no right to look so annoyed over a momentary slip up). After Hermes screamed and fainted, Jack slumped over in a faint as well, because healing a god was a bit much for a baby half-blood. Julia and Alice helpfully unwrapped Hermes' cloak from around his ankles. They said so that Connor could lay Hermes on top of it, though Hermes had his doubts.

"Wow, should feet be at that angle?" someone asked when the cloak was removed.

The answer was no, no they should not.

All Hermes remembered about the incident was that his shoulder got fixed, and he blinked, and someone was trying to tear his foot from his ankle. Okay, it turned out all they'd done was shift him about, but that's what it felt like.

It was not Hermes' fault that he woke up swinging. He didn't hit anyone, thankfully, because Connor, who was closest, had the sense to duck, and he only got one swing before Martha bit him. Hermes had maybe half a second to be indignant before her venom sent him tumbling down into a deep sleep. He supposed (later, obviously) that he should be grateful she chose that venom instead of the more toxic variety.

He woke up to the off-key, many-voiced rendition of 'Happy Birthday'. It was, he would eventually learn, nearly ten hours later, the day having jumped from morning to late afternoon without his input. He was still in Cabin 11, lying on one of the kid's bunks and…oh… no wonder they kept complaining. He would have to update these mattresses just as soon as his body stopped feeling like it weighed a million pounds. George and Martha were lying on top of him, seemingly asleep.

Hermes blinked slowly, having half a mind to go back to sleep, horrible mattress or no, but the cheering nearby drew him further into the waking world and, worse, his memories of what might have led him to sleeping in his son's bed slowly asserted themselves. Cautiously, he tested his body, braced for pain. There was none, beyond a general ache, the familiar kind that often came after a healing. Someone had fixed his foot, and whatever else he'd managed to do to himself.

The part of himself still in denial, the part that still hoped, thought maybe the blond-haired kid had managed it? Maybe no one else had been brought in, someone more adept at healing a god? Maybe he could still pull this off without his family teasing or nagging him for the next millennia?

He looked over at the ongoing party and all hopes were dashed to pieces. Despite that, he couldn't help but grin at the scene.

There were so many children gathered around the table that it was hard to make sense of it, especially with how low the bunk put him, but there was enough of a gap to understand that Jesima was in the place of honor before an enormous cake and the candles had just been blown out. Among the kids, Hermes saw his own brothers. Dionysus was not too big a surprise; he might grumble about having to babysit the camp, but parties were his realm; there was no way he'd resist joining in. Apollo was not really a surprise either, not with how fully Hermes had been healed, though he had hoped to have gone under his radar. The blond-haired kid was at his side, beaming up at him.

Obviously, the kid was one of Apollo's, and his little matter of somewhat healing a god had brought this fact to Apollo's attention. Apollo wasn't the type to abandon his kids, but he was the type to get caught up in a one-night affair and not know the result until it arrived in camp. The worst had been during the 60's; for a while Apollo had stopped by the cabin daily to try and pick out the ones that were his and his own cabin had been overflowing almost as bad as Cabin 11.

So…Apollo definitely knew.

There was another god in Cabin 11, besides his brothers. Hermes knew, of course, because it was his temple, and he always knew when another god visited his temple. They weren't making themself obvious, but after a moment of study, Hermes thought it might be the girl who had walked over to him, smiling benevolently.

"Lady Tyche?" he said, slowly pulling himself up to sitting. A part of him still kept expecting pain, but all that happened was his snakes grumbling as his shifting body woke them.

"Lord Hermes," she answered benevolently.

"Aren't you usually in the city?" he asked, squinching his face in confusion.

The goddess Tyche just laughed, and said, "Thank you for looking after my daughter, Lord Hermes. If you don't mind, I would prefer it if she stayed in your cabin."

Hermes blinked at her in confusion and glanced around. He loved his cabin, of course, but even he could understand the annoyed prayers he sometimes got about the overcrowding and sleeping on floors.

"You don't wish to claim her?"

"She is already claimed," Tyche corrected. "But me and mine…we aren't meant for solitude. She is my only half-blood child and I feel she would do better in a cabin that isn't so isolated. Unless it would be an imposition, Lord Hermes?"

"I mean…of course she can stay, if you both want that," Hermes quickly reassured her. "Everyone's welcome here." Then he looked at his brothers, frowned, and added, "Though some less than others."

Lady Tyche laughed at that, too, and said, "I see you have been having a bout of bad luck, Lord Hermes."

"Not your doing, I assume?" Hermes asked, though he did give her an assessing look. Her domain was luck and fortune, particularly to do with cities. It overlapped his own, (and Apollo, and Hestia) which was partly how he recognized her so easily. He recognized all the gods and goddesses who overlapped his realms. She'd have the power to turn his luck, too, though he couldn't figure out the motive.

She laughed, but not a cruel laugh, and he found himself smiling with her.

"No," she agreed, "Not my doing. Nor my daughters, before you ask. In fact, you will find this was your doing, Lord Hermes."

"What? No, why would I flip my own luck to bad?" Hermes demanded.

"Did you not bless the children of this cabin with your luck?" she asked, with another laugh. "If their good luck means your bad then the luck will flip. You did this to yourself."

Hermes considered this, then threw his head back with a soft groan. "Who?" he asked, sounding resigned as he accepted that, if anyone understood how luck worked, it would be the goddess Tyche.

"Apollo's boy, Jack," she answered. "He wanted very badly to be claimed. And suddenly, here is his father, called urgently after he passed out while healing his father's brother! Of course Apollo recognized him immediately. How lucky that circumstances allowed their meeting. I think you should know that Apollo helped Jack first, and then healed you."

"…And how angry was Apollo with me for accidentally draining his son?"

Tyche just laughed. Hermes groaned and tried to pull his blanket over his head, only he had to stop when George and Martha protested the movement.

"Hermes!" Apollo called, having noticed he was awake at last. Hermes stopped trying to hide and chanced a peek at Apollo's face, trying to judge exactly how angry he might be. He didn't look angry. He was holding a piece of cake and had his teasing smile on. "My very little brother. Might it be that you have been stretching yourself a bit thin lately?"

"I chose to be sixteen," Hermes explained. "To fit in with the kids."

"You're sixteen?!" one of the kids asked. "I thought you were, like thirteen at most."

"Yes, Travis, I am sixteen," Hermes insisted through clenched teeth.

"Travis is at college, Dad," his kid answered, actually sounding a bit concerned more than upset. "You dropped him off. Are you sure he's okay now, Uncle Lord?"

"Ah," said Apollo, staring at Connor in confusion over the appellation, then, "Yes, he's fine. I mean, he still needs more sleep, probably some food wouldn't go amiss, but otherwise he's all healed up."

"I'm a normal size for sixteen," Hermes insisted to the room at large. "Everyone just thinks teenagers are bigger now because of how TV shows cast twenty-year-olds to play them."

"Sure, Dad," Connor said, smirking. "Whatever you say." Belatedly, Hermes remembered that Connor was about sixteen himself, and scowled. Next kid he had, he was making sure they got short genes.

"Is this a party or not?" Julia asked, waving her own plate of cake around.

"I get cake, right?" Hermes said, sitting up while automatically rearranging George and Martha to hang around his neck. They automatically entangled themselves together as they would his staff and went back to sleep. Or seemed to. Hermes frowned, and lightly poked Martha. They needed to have words about her biting him.

"Ah, ah, wait a moment!" Apollo exclaimed when Hermes pulled himself about to plant his feet on the floor.

"What, what is it?" Hermes asked, staring at him in confusion, but waiting anyway. He glanced down at himself and noticed he was no longer wearing his fancy suit, but camp pajamas, and felt his cheeks growing warm.

"Nothing," Apollo said, "I just wanted to make sure we cleared the floor around you of tripping hazards."

"Oh, ha ha," Hermes grumbled while his own kids snickered. He could see Dionysus smirking too, not even trying to hide it behind his slice of cake.

At least Hermes got cake too. And Apollo was not as sneaky as he thought he was, slipping the ambrosia onto Hermes' plate. Still, it was a party. It was fun.

He was never, ever going to live this one down.