Disclaimer: I only own the plot and my OCs. Anything you recognize as not mine belongs to Rick Riordan, Greco-Roman mythology, and/or their otherwise respective owners.

Author's Notes: Hi, everyone! Sorry about the later update today. I got behind again, so I was scrambling to finish this up. But I like it very much, and yes there'll be a part 3. There's some things we still need to wrap up with this segment.

There's a lot of Ancient Greek in this chapter. I glossed most of it – there's a part of it that I'm a little unsure about, so I didn't gloss that, but the translation occurs right after it.

Also, kudos to you if you can figure out the movie I didn't realize I was subconsciously inspired by until this chapter. It's an old one, so idk if most of you will get it, but if you do, it's my favorite movie with that actor in it. Even better than the ones he's traditionally known for, imo.

Anyways, hope ya'll enjoy. Until next week,

~TGWSI/Selene Borealis

Ἆρ' οὺ ἡλιωμένα κτᾶσθε? – Do you all not get sunburnt?

Ἲτε! – Go!

Κλισμός – Type of Ancient Greek chair

Χλαμύς – A short cloak

Μυριάς – 10,000

~The Finding Home Saga~

~Finding Home~

~Chapter 40: We Find Unexpected Sanctuary Pt. 2~

The rest of the day passed by without much fanfare.

Unlike Cleisthenes, Glaphyra and Herais accepted us without any hesitation, like Euthymia and the rest of her family. They came in to the house for lunch, which again was something light, before they went to go back outside. "You guys don't get sunburns?" I asked them. To be fair, we were outside a lot of the time at camp too, and I never really burned thanks to my complexion, but I knew some of the campers like Silena's half-sisters Laurel and Lacy had to be diligent with their sunscreen because they did.

They had no idea what I was talking about as they stared at me blankly over the table, not until their mother cut in with a translation: "Ἆρ' οὺ ἡλιωμένα κτᾶσθε?"

The two girls became amused by the question. "Ἣκιστα," said Glaphyra, giggling. "Τῶν Νήσων Ἡλιαδῶν ἐσμεν. Εἰ γὰρ τὶ ἡμᾶς?"

"Uh..."

"No. We are of the Heliades Islands. For why would that we?" Euthymia translated, almost word-for-word. She frowned. "Glaphyra, you know what I told you."

Glaphyra smiled sheepishly. "Sorry, ὦ μᾶτερ," she said. She looked back at me and Bianca. "And I am sorry to you. My English is not very well."

"Good," Herais corrected her, grinning.

Glaphyra told her something in Ancient Greek that I wasn't quite able to understand completely, but I got the gist of. She was basically telling her off for being a show-off.

"Glaphyra! Herais!" Euthymia scolded them. She picked up their empty plates. "You're finished with the meal, are you not? Perhaps you both should go outside."

Herais pouted. "What about schooling?"

"School can wait another day," her mother responded. She shooed them out the door with her hands, almost placing her hands on their lower backs to push them. "Ἲτε!"

Their sunburnt-impervious skin wasn't the only thing that was special about the Heliades, though. As Bianca and I quickly learned by watching Euthymia's kids, their bones were...it was hard to describe. They were bendy, almost like rubber. It was uncanny to watch them casually bend their arms while they were playing in such a way that it would certainly be a broken bone for me and her, but of course for them was no big deal. This, I learned, was also why my leg still felt funny despite being healed: Euthymia's healing practices were for her people, not ours. She'd done the best she could, but with our bones being rigid, it wasn't quite the same. "It should clear up in a few days," she told me.

When I asked her about what else she and her children could do, her lips curled upwards. "Not anything else that you can't do," she said. "Long ago, our ancestors could have two separate conversations at once. Their tongues were split, and they had..." She gestured to her throat as she thought of the term that she was looking for. "Vocal cords! Yes. But we lost this biology in our moves. First to the ocean near your Iberia, now to here."

I wasn't sure what exactly to say to that. "Oh...that sucks."

She laughed bittersweetly, shifting her position in her wicker chair in the courtyard as she supervised the schooling of Erasmos, Sostrate, and Phaedra, courtesy of Bianca – which was going slow, since she didn't know Ancient Greek that well and they didn't know English.

The chairs, since I was sitting next to Euthymia, weren't like the chairs in her kitchen, which she called κλισμοί; they were more modern-looking, but still distinctly ancient. Not like something you would get at a furniture store today.

"We lost much in the moves," Euthymia said softly. "Our people did not just move with the changing of Olympus' location; our islands did as well. They were originally located in the ocean of India. To go to such a different climate than what we were used to...it was hard for us to adjust. Many of us perished due to famine, and also disease. But the few of us that didn't adapted, which is how my family has been able to exist." She looked out towards the sky, like she was staring into the past itself. "I thank the gods every day that we are here. And when the gods move again, we will adapt again. This, I know."

...Wow. She wasn't upset at all her people had gone through because of the gods? The pain, the suffering, the death? She was thankful for them? That didn't make sense to me. Don't get me wrong, I continued to not believe that the gods were all that awful, my experience with Demeter, my dad, Hades, and Despoina spoke to the otherwise...but, wow. I wasn't sure if I could have the same mindset as her if I was one of the Heliades myself, after all they had been through.

"You don't understand," she said knowingly, looking right through me. Euthymia picked up her glass of wine on the table next to her, taking a sip of it. "Many of you think the gods are bad, yes?"

"...I wouldn't say that," I answered cryptically. When she arched an eyebrow, I expanded further. "Most of our people...they don't believe in the gods. They're myths. Legends. The ones of us that do are either clear-sighted – meaning they can see through the Mist," I added when she looked confused. It seemed that was another ability the Heliades had: clear-sightedness. Interesting, "or are...demigods. We're hunted down by monsters pretty regularly. I don't think the gods are that bad, I'm the champion of one of them actually, but some of my friends..."

"They are the ones currently against the gods." It wasn't a question.

"Yes."

She reached over to place her hand on my arm comfortingly. "Don't fret, young Percy. Your friends will realize eventually that the gods are better than they seem. I have personally seen them do many wonders."

I wetted my lips. "Thanks." Then, in a whisper I was sure only I could hear, I said, "I hope so."

Dinner was shortly before sundown. It consisted of marinated olives, cheese, and pita bread, like breakfast, but also had panfried fish caught by Cleisthenes with a side salad of arugula and a lemon and oil dressing. It was all really good, better than even the food they served at camp. The seven children of Euthymia had a fun time, talking and laughing with each other in their native language. The younger siblings even got Cleisthenes to break out of the shell he'd been around us a little, as he chatted with them and smiled. He had a nice smile, I couldn't help but think, with a slight dimple on the right side of his face.

After dinner the siblings all played games in their equivalent of a living room while Euthymia and Bianca cleaned up. I tried to help them, but Euthymia booted me out of the kitchen. "I shouldn't even let her be helping me," she said. "You are a boy, it is not your job to be in the kitchen, unless that is the life you wish to choose for yourself because of your parentage."

I was confused. "Huh? What do you mean by that?"

She seemed surprised, then shook her head. "Nothing. Relax, young Percy. Find something else to do, like playing with my children."

I wasn't really feeling like doing that and I was also tired, so I went up to the room that had been allotted for me instead. Except, when I changed into my clothes, which had been washed while I'd been asleep and placed on the one chair in the room, I couldn't sleep. I tossed and turned, and stared at the ceiling as it became darker and darker outside, unable to keep my eyes closed for very long.

This place was strange. The people, the customs, how they seemed to be isolated from the rest of the world. Heck, I would even go so far as to say that they reminded me of the Hasidic Jews who lived in New York City. People who didn't really fit in with the modern world, not because they couldn't, but because they didn't want to. They were happy with their religious traditions and way of life.

But they weren't bad people, I decided as I finally felt sleep drag at my eyelids, pulling them shut.

No, they most certainly weren't bad. Not even Cleisthenes.

The next morning, as sunlight filtered into my room through the windows, I woke up determined and adamant.

"What can I do?" I asked Euthymia at the end of breakfast, when Glaphyra and Herais went out to take care of the vineyard and garden and Cleisthenes was getting ready to do the same with the sheep, wiping at his mouth with a handkerchief. "How can I help?"

Euthymia took my plate as she went around the table, picking up the others. Her younger children were clambering outside, and Bianca was following after them, curious. "There is nothing you need to do, Percy. You are our guest."

"You let Bianca help out last night," I pointed out. "Please, there has to be something." I needed something to do. With my ADHD, I couldn't just sit around and look pretty forever.

Euthymia bit her lip, her eyes darting over to her eldest son.

He immediately bristled. "Μᾶτερ," he warned.

"He needs something to do," she told him. "What else would you have him do? Clean the house like a slave or a μαλακοῦ?"

"It would suit him," he muttered darkly.

"Κλεισθένης!"

I was suddenly regretting I had ever spoken. "Really," I said, holding my hands up placatingly. "I don't have to..."

Euthymia brushed me off. "You wanted to help, so you will." She narrowed her eyes at me in speculation. "A χλαμύς would hide you well, I think. Cleisthenes, will you go get the one you wore last year?"

He huffed, getting up from the table. "As you wish."

When he came back a few minutes later, he was holding a cloak the same color as their clothes, but made of slightly denser material. "Here."

Euthymia and Cleisthenes both showed me how to put it on. They scrutinized me once I had. "It'll do," Euthymia decided. "Our neighbors may think your hair strange, but we can say you come from one of the other islands of the Heliades. They won't figure out who you are from afar."

"Come on, then," Cleisthenes grunted. "Let's go."

Hurriedly, I followed after him, because he didn't give me any other choice. "Κυψελέ!" he called out to the family dog, which came trotting after him – and me. Kypselos liked me very much, I'd learned, and his tail was wagging as he followed alongside me.

"Hello, Kypselos," I said, patting his head a couple of times.

He barked happily.

Cleisthenes took me to their large barn, which is where the sheep, two female goats, a cow, two horses stayed, along with several chickens. Glaphyra and Herais had already come in earlier to collect their eggs, so we didn't have to worry about them. He led the cow and horses out to their fenced-in pasture and fed them, before he let the sheep out of the barn entirely. They seemed smarter than the sheep everywhere else, because they didn't actually need much corralling by Kypselos. They saw the shepherd's staff in Cleisthenes' hands, and they instinctively knew to follow him, wherever he went.

He led them, and me, over to a part of the grass that they hadn't been at yesterday. The sheep settled down as he checked over them, running his hands through their wool as best as he was able to. He paid special attention to the lambs, making sure they hadn't been hurt during the middle of the night.

I tried to understand why as I sat down on another rock. "Are you afraid something got to them last night?"

He briefly glared up at me, but as he scratch a lamb's head between its ears, to which it let out a baa of happiness, he seemed willing to answer my question. Sure enough: "No. There are wolves and foxes here, but they rarely come this far. They know their place." He pointed to the woods on the other side of one of the neighbor's houses. "But sometimes the lambs get roughhoused by the older ones in the barnes, although it's always unintentional. I like to make sure I catch it as soon as I can."

"Ah." I cleared my throat. "I see."

He was unwillingly interested in this response, I could tell by the look in his eyes. "You've never been around sheep before, have you?"

I decided to play with him a little bit. "Did you seriously just ask me a question?"

"Am I not allowed to ask the βάρβαρος a question?" he scoffed.

The name stung at me more than I cared to admit. Euthymia hadn't meant anything bad by saying it yesterday, but he had. "I'm not a βάρβαρος."

"You do not speak Greek naturally."

"Actually, I'm a demigod. I do."

"You do not speak it conversationally," he corrected himself. He pointed his staff at me. "Just answer the question, βάρβαρος."

"Not really," I admitted.

"Well, they do not bite. Not these ones, anyways. Have one." Then he plopped the lamb he'd been checking in my lap.

I tried not to squawk too loud in surprise. Gently, I petted the lamb. Its wool was very soft, as short as it was. The lamb looked up at me and let out another baa. I laughed. "You're very cute," I told it.

But the lamb was no longer interested in me. It wriggled itself off of my lap, then bounded off after the sheep that I assumed was its mother.

Silence fell between us for a while. Kypselos did his job, keeping the one or two sheep on the outskirts that tried to go farther than he wanted in line. The rest of them didn't need the guidance, though. Again, smart sheep.

When I realized Cleisthenes wouldn't be in the mood for conversation anytime soon, I plucked a few pieces of grass myself. Arranging them in my lap, I began to weave them. They weren't wide enough to really do anything with the result, but it was a way to pass the time, so there was that.

Almost like Spider-Man, I sensed the exact second Cleisthenes decided he wanted to talk to me again. I heard him inhale a breath, and when I glanced up, I saw that he was looking at me again. "You live in the city, don't you?" he questioned. "That is why you have not had much experience with sheep before?"

"Most of my people don't have experience with sheep. We're not really a...farming-based society," I told him. He was intrigued by the notion. "But yes, I live in the city. One of the largest cities in the entire world, actually."

His mouth opened slightly. "How many people?"

"Μυριάς is the plural of 10,000, right?" I knew the word from reading Homer, but I wanted to make sure.

He nodded.

"Try about 760 of that."

Cleisthenes' eyes just about fell out of his head. "Μὰ θεούς," he breathed. He ran a hand through his hair. "I know it's been said by our elders that the world is full of people, but I was not expecting it to be...that full."

"Oh, that's just my city," I informed him cheerfully. "The actual population of the world is around 100 of that."

He almost fell off of the rock he was sitting on. "How do you calculate that number?" he cried.

"Uh..." I was not the person to ask this question to. I wasn't even that good at math. "I think it's just an estimate? I'm not completely sure, though. There's not people going around counting people like that, I assure you."

"Even so," he said. He paused, before asking, "What is the city like?"

Nobody had ever asked me that before. Everyone I knew was either from the city, or a demigod. Since pretty much every single demigod had to go through New York City to get to camp, they all knew what it was like.

"It's...nice," I answered. "There's not a lot of green there, as there's lots of buildings. Some of them are really tall. The tallest has 102 stories, which are around nine to eleven feet tall. Well," I had to amend myself, "there is some green. Central Park is the best example of that. It's located in Manhattan, one of the five...smaller cities that make up New York, which is the name of the city. The state that it's located in two." I could see that I was quickly overwhelming him at all the information I was giving him. I decided to change tactics. "The people who live in the city come from all over the world. My grandmother was originally from Iceland, for instance. It's a country really far north."

He nodded in understanding. "Like Thule."

I'd never heard of the place before. "Uh...I don't know."

"It, too, was a country very far north." He pointed his staff towards the direction. "The people who lived there worshipped different gods. One of their gods' names was Wodan."

The name sounded familiar, albeit it was different than the one I presumed he was trying to say. "You mean Odin?"

"Maybe, maybe not. I do not know. I only read it in Pytheas," he replied. He rapped his hands against his staff thoughtfully. "Maybe I should reread him soon. He is a very good author..."

My leg was starting to feel funny again from sitting down for so long, so I stood up and brushed the dirt off of the cloak. As I did, I went to him, "Why do you want to know so much stuff about my people, anyways? I thought you hated us. Or were you secretly thinking about moving one day...?"

His cheeks reddened. "Not at all," he spat. "I don't like your people. Your city is probably very dirty, with all those living there! I would not want to do the same. I like it here. Here is my home, and all I will ever need." His gaze hardened towards me. "Besides, I am the man of this house. My duty is here, not to chase after the world of you murderous βάρβαροι."

That, I think it goes without saying, pretty much ended our conversation right there. We sat in silence until it was time for lunch, which he knew by the path of the sun across the sky. Then we went inside to eat the meal. When it was over, before I could get a chance to get up from the table, he marched out of the room without a look back.

Euthymia pursed her lips at this, but she said nothing about it.

Look, I hadn't expected to be with Euthymia's family for this long.

According to her and Bianca, dinner that night was officially forty-eight hours since we had washed up on the shore of the island. That was officially forty-eight hours that Clarisse, Silena, Annabeth, and Alabaster hadn't come to pick us up for. I couldn't help but be nervous about it as Euthymia finished up cooking, and I knew Bianca had the same problem. Her face was pale as we looked at each other over the table, the younger children oblivious to our problems.

Cleisthenes was not. "Your friends have still not contacted you, have they?" he snorted.

"...No," Bianca said reluctantly. She fidgeted her hands underneath the table. "I tried getting an IM with them earlier, but it didn't work."

I'd been there with her when she'd done it. Her face had been so hopeful – and mine probably had been, too – only to fail when the connection once again hadn't established. She hadn't cried, but there'd been tears in her eyes as she'd clenched her hands into fists. "It's not fair," she'd said. "Where are they? Why can't we contact them?"

I was wondering the same thing myself.

"Tomorrow it happens," I whispered, my throat tight. "Polyphemus will marry Katie, and then..."

Euthymia bustled around the kitchen. "Well, we can't have that." She gestured to me. "Come, come here."

"Uh...okay." She was putting tonight's main food, roasted lamb that Cleisthenes had harvested himself (not of the lamb I had been holding earlier, don't worry), on its plate. "What do you want me to do?"

She took out another plate from the cabinet above her and put a heaping amount of the roasted lamb, what looked like the best part of it may I add, onto it. "Go to the fire, and sacrifice this," she told me, pointing to the fire, still going. She'd just been about to put it out. "Pray to the gods. They will answer you."

I tried giving the plate back to her when she handed it to me. "This is a lot," I protested. "I don't want to take away from you..."

Euthymia patted my cheek. "You will not, don't worry. We have plenty here. Too much, in fact. It is why Kypselos was given so much to eat."

"And why I already sacrificed some of it to the gods," Cleisthenes pitched in. "Do not worry, βάρβαρος."

"...Alright." I held up the plate. "Bianca, do you want to help me?"

Euthymia ordered her children out of the room. The younger ones protested, anxious to see what was going to happen, but with a quick lashing in Ancient Greek, they were gone, though their curious eyes remained on us as they were led away. Euthymia closed the door behind her, leaving Bianca and I in the kitchen alone.

"Come on," I said. "Let's do this."

The daughter of Hades and I threw the pieces of lamb into the fire together. We prayed as we always did at camp: saying the god's name we wanted to pray to, then the rest of our prayer in silence. "Hades," Bianca said, without question.

I wasn't too sure who I wanted to pray to at first. Poseidon was probably out of the question; he was my dad, but if memory served correctly, he was also the father of Polyphemus, too. He probably didn't want to be caught in a squabble between two of his sons. I couldn't pray to Demeter, either, not for this. She was my patron goddess, but Katie was her daughter, and the ancient laws wouldn't allow her to directly interfere with her fate. There was Hermes, but I didn't really want to pray to him. He was Luke's father, and Luke was the entire reason why we were in this mess in the first place...

Suddenly, it hit me.

"Despoina," I spoke. Bianca gave me a weird look for it, but I didn't care. "And Dad and milady, too."

Despoina, I need your help, I prayed silently. I know you've seen what's been going on with us, and Katie. Please, dosomething. I know you can. You got us to Luke's ship with the yacht, and you blessed me with a...with a kiss. I beseech you, stall Polyphemus for one more day. Just one, please.

Bianca stiffened as the smell of crocus flowers suddenly breezed in through the window, snuffing out the fire, but I didn't mind.

I heard a giggle inside my head. "All you had to do was ask, sugar," Despoina told me. "I was waiting for you, in fact."

I wasn't the only one who could hear her. "Who – who is that?" Bianca gasped, swiveling her head around, looking for the source.

"I'm Despoina, pretty Bianca," my half-sister crooned. "Anyways, I think I can stall Polyphemus for two more days, not just one. He's a fairly predictable guy."

With relief, I nearly fell to my knees. "Thank you, Despoina," I breathed. "Oh, thank you, thank you, thank you..."

The breeze moved specifically past my face, like it was cupping my cheek. "Oh, I'm not done yet, sugar," Despoina said. "Your friends are on their way. Two days, hence why I'm gonna do the best I can with ol' Poly. It'll be a tight squeeze, but I think it'll work." She laughed again. "I was right to bless you. Nobody's prayed to me in ages. I like you very much. You're my favorite mortal half-brother of all time now, I think."

I huffed from amusement. "Thank you, Despoina."

"Two days," she repeated whimsically. "Good luck on the rest of your quest, Percy. Toodaloo."

Minutes later, when Euthymia and the rest of her family came back into the room, she gave me a knowing look. "Did it work?"

"Yes." I nodded eagerly. "Thank you."

"No," she amended me with a beam. "Thank the gods."

Word Count: 4,162

Next Chapter Title: We Find Unexpected Sanctuary Pt. 3