"To each their own. Specially in terms of loyalty"
"Demigod's out of bed! Snacks for the harpies!" A few harpies raced around the camp borders chuckling gleefully before they morphed into a one eyed being, a cyclops, clutching a tattered dress. The cyclops was growling, the words lost in the sheer sound of waves. Soon she was waist deep in water before a wave dragged her under the sea. When she regained proper thought she was inside a hamster wheel desperately running away from a glowing golden eye.
Estelle gasped awake, her heart beating wildly in her chest. "Gods!" she hissed to herself, the dream far more realistic than she'd like to see. What with the disappearance of Percy Jackson and co happening no earlier than a day before, the dream felt more like a premonition and less like a figment of her imagination. Dawn was just creeping in based off how Paulina, the daughter of Hemera who slept next to her, had already gotten out of her sleeping bag and tidied herself up.
The spectacled girl cast her a look, "you alright?"
"Sí, sólo tuve un mal- I mean," she shook her head trying to mask her words, "just had a weird dream about flying unicorns"
Paulina gave a light chuckle and ruffled Estelle's hair like she was still a toddler with a wild imagination. The moment was awkward but comforting and soon Paulina had left Estelle in the Hermes cabin staring at the wall while the sunlight barely filtered in through the curtains. It took some contemplation before Estelle dragged herself off the bed, eager to be anywhere but in the cabin, in her sleeping bag right next to Gideon as his button eyes glared at her. Gideon was a stuffed toy Pollux had given to her when he'd first become obsessed with crocheting and surprisingly his last because the creation of the dragon had drained him of all his creative juices. Shoving the purple dragon into her sleeping bag and ungracefully wrapping it up to shove in yet another corner under Nakoa's bed she left the cabin.
Outside the sky was a faint shade of grey with pink streaks just starting to make its mark. It was too early but suddenly she felt motivated to train. Picking up her pace she jogged to the training grounds, noticing how some of the campers were also there by then. Tantalus was thankfully not there, watching them in sadistic pleasure. She hated the man and his orange prison jumper. Mostly though, she was just haunted by the way he was perfectly fine with campers being attacked during the Stymphalian bird incident seeing as she'd been one of them.
She grabbed a set of throwing knives, the only kind of weapon with a blade she could handle for the moment. Most of the time you couldn't train without a trainer or a chaperone but she decided that if worse came to worst she'd just say hi to Michael at the infirmary.
She stepped a bit further into the woods, reminiscent of the trail that led her to an unconscious Percy Jackson an year ago. She'd been exploring the newfound home when she stumbled upon the conversation between Luke and Percy. Luke probably heard her since he didn't wait to finish the job and fled which helped the son of Poseidon to return unscathed. For better or for worse she'd returned back the same trail a few months later to search for a place to practice throwing. Estelle found a fairly rotting tree trunk from which the nature spirit had escaped or abandoned and had ended up hanging up a few sacks for the first months of practice. Now that she'd perfected her throw, not without a few trips to the infirmary with her toes constantly on the verge of falling off, she'd moved to a stiffer target, a relatively hardy tree. The dryad agreed to give her the tree after she offered them some of Connor's secret brew of coffee beans which she hadn't managed to replicate yet.
Gripping her Faka like she would to a hammer she tested her grip, adjusting if she found necessary based off her previous failed or successful attempts. Aiming for a half turn she threw the knife hearing the satisfying thump as it hit the rotting tree. It was like a warmup as she practiced the relatively easier techniques before attempting to do a full turn to a normal tree bark. This one would be somewhat harder seeing as she was yet to nail the force behind a throw. Occasionally the leather grip would bug her and she'd spend a good amount of time trying to pry it off before giving up and reclaiming her only two steel knives. Whenever a knife failed to hit the mark and fell into the dewy grass she'd pick it up immediately, not willing to risk having to search for it for hours on end. Not after the time she searched the premise for an entire day before finding the knife.
She repeated the process for about two hours before she realized that the dining pavilion was probably open by now. This prompted her to pack up her knives and head to the Armory. She quickly brought a bowl of hot water and cleaned the knives carefully before leaving them out to dry, mentally giving herself a reminder to wipe them off one more in the afternoon before storing it in the Armory. With the idea of having a quick shower before breakfast Estelle headed to her cabin to get a change of clothes.
Nakoa was perched near the windowsill, his face clouded as he stared out the window. He was talking to Jae who was busy wiring an electric alarm.
"I can't believe that retired cannibal actually chased out the Demintors"
Jae nodded humming as she fiddled with a screwdriver, "true"
Demintors was the weirder term someone in the Aphrodite cabin had coined from the word Demigod Mentors as an insult which ended up sticking with the entire camp. The four adult demigods, a few of their generation who survived, ended up coming to camp half-blood
every summer to tach what they knew when they could take a short break from work. The Athena kids ended up picking up the more theoretical knowledge and the children of Apollo stuck to the medical ones. Ares kids picked up battle tactics and the three cabins basically took over teaching duties when the adults left. Thankfully, this ended up preparing the demigods as much as they could for the real world... or so they said. All this was typically governed by Chiron and now that he was no longer the activities director, Tantalus held all governing power after Mr. D.
Estelle slipped in and grabbed an orange camp t-shirt and loose pants, noticing Nakoa's slight head bob of greeting before she left to shower. When she came back after the shower, Jae and Nakoa were still there while Jae fixed a calculator she'd gotten from who-knows-where.
"Finally!" Nakoa jumped off the sill with an exaggerated sigh, "Jae kept correcting me about how Tantalus isn't a cannibal and I swear to gods he is"
"Agreed," Estelle said squeezing the water out her hair as she stood at the entrance. "Are we going to get breakfast now or later?"
Jae set aside the calculator, now fully restored, "I'm coming"
Nakoa snickered, "you didn't jus-"
Estelle dragged her two friends away.
"Dude!" she hissed at Nakoa as his gaze strayed away, his sandwich half eaten and forgotten as he stared at the Aphrodite cabin table
He didn't turn his head, "yeah?"
"Who are you even staring at? The sandwich is basically on the floor now," she said looking over his shoulder to make eye contact with an African girl, her braids pulled back as she focused on her food. She briefly looked up and Estelle made eye contact and she was certain her eyes changes color because now it looked closer to a forest green when before he could have sworn they were a chocolatey brown. "Oh she's pretty"
"Uh huh," he nodded barely registering her words as he stared past who Estelle had locked gazes with. Lunar, whom Estelle was looking at leaned back to reveal her twin Skylar. The two of them were in a hushed discussion before being interrupted by their siblings. A flash of irritation passed across Lunar's face while Skylar smiled amiably.
Nakoa leaned closer to Estelle and asked, "what do you think they're talking about?"
"Does it matter?"
The twins stood up from the table, Skylar giving a rushed goodbye as Lunar dragged him away. It wasn't even a second before Nakoa too stood up, grabbing his sandwich as well, and left. Estelle looked at the boy disappear, flabbergasted and confused at his sudden interest. Okay.. maybe not so sudden seeing as he had been curious about Skylar since before. Nevertheless it was weird for Nakoa, the most unserious person she knew, to be so hellbent on finding where the twins went. She finished the last of her flatbread and followed after Nakoa once more into the woods she'd exited not too long ago. The trail in this direction was different and was near the places where the influx of monsters were increasing. Of course, there was no way to guarantee that but the scrapped up bark and the lack of nature spirits spoke for itself. The woods were shadowed contrasting to the bright sunlight.
Estelle crouched down to inspect the somewhat sodden ground. Her mind traveled to Henry's offhanded remarks he'd given her when they met up every so often about spotting monsters, and people, specially in the undergrowth. Needless to say most of what he said went in one ear and out the other to her. What she did pick up was related to the way the blades of grass would bend, and the fact that most lost people tend to walk in circles. Luckily for her, there were extremely faint foot prints and an occasional broken twig she could follow to mostly find the way. The longer she followed the less certain she became about the path. Or so she thought.
"-you know there's no other way than joining him," Lunar, Estelle presumed, spoke
There was an exasperated sigh from Skylar, "you know you're putting both of us in danger right? No one would think you'd leave without me"
"Oh please," Lunar gave a snort, "you just want to stay here and fuck around with your 'boyfriend'"
"That's besides the point," he muttered something softly. Estelle inched closer to listen. "It's far too early to ma-" a twig snapped underneath her feet.
Immediately she dodged to the side, taking cover behind a tree. The twins twisted their heads to look at the direction of the sound. Lunar squinted her eyes stepping a bit closer to where Estelle had previously been.
"Hello?," her voice came out non-threatening, like she didn't look murderous enough to rip you to pieces.
A few beats of Estelle's heart passed.
"Is someone there? Me and Skylar were scouting around here. If you stop hiding we can help you back to camp?," when Lunar spoke again the honeyed tone was intensified and she was sincere.
Estelle was sure now, how could she even imagine Lunar being evil or sneaky or anything related. She was so nice. Nodding to herself Estelle stepped out. She almost stepped out into the open before Nakoa pulled her down next to some bushes. He'd been hiding there it seemed and he was very insistently telling her to cover her ears.
Lunar turned to Skylar and made a gesture of 'OK'. With that the conversation restarted.
Skylar started to talk with a grim look, "back to what I was talking about. You can't just go and join Luke!"
Estelle stifled a gasp and shared a look with Nakoa. He shook his head crestfallenly.
"Excuse me?!" Lunar made a sound of outrage, "this is the only way to do what you want to do. What I want to do. To set the record straight"
Her twin pushed his hair back in frustration. He didn't say anything but his body language conveyed everything Estelle needed to know about it. It was one of anxious acceptance, but acceptance nonetheless.
"I IM-ed them," Lunar said once she saw her unresponsive brother. Iris messaging, the process of throwing a coin to a rainbow was the only safe way to contact people as a demigod. Admittedly Estelle didn't know who 'them' was but it seemed Nakoa knew. His tanned skin paled at the revelation.
"Luke?," Skylar filled in the gap for himself, "you called him here?"
"Them," Lunar emphasized, "the Dracaena. Them"
From the distance emerged two snake women, ones identical to the serpentine creature that had come after Estelle. Her heart pounded, making her feel like the same girl she was 11 years ago. Sure, she hadn't changed much but she at least had more combat experience now.
"Child of Aphrodite," the Dracaena hissed, "you brought company?"
Lunar obviously thought this was a hint to her brother while the Estelle and Nakoa feared for their lives. If the Dracaena had noticed they would be captured back, or worse killed.
"He knows of the plan. He'll be our spy," Lunar said with certainty while Skylar's face tensed at the sentence
The second Dracaena stepped forward, "Sssso you say, but we have no need for him. He is one of many amongst ours at camp." The Dracaena was probably more starved than anything as her snake legs flicked forward and she captured Skylar's chin in her grip. "Those of no use will make a plentiful meal"
Skylar held her gaze, though his hands were clenched into fists. "I won't make a very good meal," he smiled as if he was just a waiter at a random diner helping a customer choose their order.
Lunar pushed the Dracaena back as she placed herself between the two and Skylar. She gave a glare and said through gritted teeth, "Luke wouldn't like it either." The second Dracaena gave a disgruntled look to her sister and moved away.
Lunar clapped her hands together as if the matter was resolved, "now, ladies. I hope you can lead the way."