Chapter Text
Percy counted out the coins carefully before beaming at the convenience store clerk. It was very clearly a cyclops, but he figured if he didn’t bring it up, nothing would happen.
The cyclopes grunted. “Thank you for shopping at Monster Donut.”
He took his prizes and walked out of the store, quick enough to feel more comfortable leaving the nest, but slow enough that his speed didn’t draw the eye.
He ripped open the pack of gum first. The sugar free mint flavoring was the closest he’d come to brushing his teeth in months, ever since the last time he managed to get enough money at once to stay in a motel for a few nights. The rest of the food, mostly jerky and some assorted fruit and a very tiny packet of ambrosia, he tucked away.
It was the last of Percy’s ill-gotten golden drachma, but he really only used it for the nests that popped up, so he wasn’t worried.
He checked another pocket of his bag as he walked, shifting the duffle bag to the side and ignoring the clink of metal so he could better dig into the deep recesses of the backpack. It was a little frayed, but it was also waterproof, so there was no way he was giving it up any time soon. He dug out the pencil pouch and unzipped it, counting the crumpled bills. For mortal money, he didn’t keep as many of the coins, because as it turned out, if you picked up every nickel and dime you saw, the weight would add up, and considering he already had an entire duffle bag full of metal to lug around, he didn’t exactly feel like adding more unnecessary weight. Anyway, he had just under forty dollars. Not bad. Could probably get him one cheap, shitty room. Access to an actual shower with soap and toiletries he could steal should not be passed up. On the other hand, he didn’t know where he’d find money next, so he’d probably end up spending it on food.
He wove through the streets of the outskirts of Minneapolis, dodging pedestrians and chewing on the gum. He blew a bubble. He only had fifteen sticks, he could probably stretch that to four weeks if he was lucky.
“Perseus Jackson!”
He spun, letting his sword meet her claws with a clang. He smirked reflexively. “Kelli! That was shorter than usual.”
She rolled her eyes. “I couldn’t stand to listen to Serephone bitch anymore. Cut her into less pieces next time, Jackson, or she’ll take out her complaints on us.”
He cooed. “Aww, sibling trouble? Can’t relate.”
She snapped her fingers with a sneer at the screaming pedestrians. “You forgot to practice.”
He winced. “In my defense, Silenia gave me another lecture on her lord and savior, Mother of Monsters-”
Kelli groaned, and he barely dodged her fire, absently dousing it with the snowmelt. “‘Oh Perssseussss, she’ssss wonderful,’” Kelli said with a high pitched hiss, “‘truly it’ssss shameful to hide from the puny mortalsssss!’ Okay, but also consider: they’re annoying.”
He ducked under her claws and swung for her metal leg, but she snorted and kicked with her donkey one, forcing him to pull back. “No, I hear you. But also this is my first time in a city in… what’s it been, a month?”
She shrugged and tried to bite him. “I guess. That's no excuse to not practice, Percy, what if another clear sighted mortal catches a glimpse of you and calls the cops? It took you four months to get them off your trail before you figured out the Mist.”
He winced. “Okay, I will admit, I didn’t do a very good job of convincing Rachel to not call the cops, but that one’s more on the fact that I don’t know how to talk to people when I’m not trying to kill them and less on my inability to manipulate the Mist. Besides, Rachel’s my friend now!”
Kelli huffed. “I sure hope so, since you gave her one of my legs.”
“She’s clear sighted! What if she sees something and they notice and try to kill her?!”
“You’re a bleeding heart!”
“Actually,” he smirked, “there’s not a drop of blood on me!”
He cut off her metal leg at the hip and she rolled her eyes as he propped her up as she slowly turned to dust.
“Why do you even need another leg,” she muttered, “I heard your bag clanking around from here.”
He shrugged with the arm that wasn’t holding her. “More Monster Donuts have been popping up around here. I’m pretty sure there’s a demigod around.”
She pouted. “Aww, no fresh meat for me? Whatever. See you in a few weeks?”
He grinned. “Definitely. Bye, Kelli!”
She finally crumbled into golden dust and he brushed himself off, sticking his sword back into his belt. He sighed as the dust seemed to cling to him before swirling some icy cold snowmelt over himself, collecting most of it and leaving him only slightly glittery.
He stretched and chewed his gum for a few more seconds before picking up the celestial bronze leg and propping it on his shoulder. Kelli’s manipulation was still holding, since no one gave him a second glance, so he took his time looking around before he found a hotel. He slipped around the back and jimmied the lock to the employee entrance open, cocking his head briefly to ensure he couldn’t hear anyone. He followed his feelings to locate the boiler room and sighed in the heat. It might have been March, but the northern states were still fighting off winter, having not gotten the memo that spring was in . He slipped off his duffle bag and backpack, tucking the backpack closer to the door and opening the duffle bag.
Several bronze blades gleamed up at him and he smiled before carefully digging past them for his hammer. It used to be a regular mortal hammer, but he’d been gifted one in celestial bronze from one of the kids he’d helped, a boy in Colorado. He slipped on the garden gloves that were getting a little too tight after the past two years and pressed the leg against the metal of the boiler.
A few hours later, he admired the blade starting to take shape. It was crude since he wasn't actually forging it, just shaping and cutting the metal like all of his swords, but it was definitely sharp and serviceable. He almost never got a full leg out of her, so this sword might be a bit too long to put in the bag, but he wrapped the bronze handle with some strips from a thrifted leather jacket he’d long since turned into scraps for his projects. The rest of the metal scraps he’d shaved off a bit at a time to get the edge got shoved into the side pockets of the duffle bag and he situated himself again. With the backpack on his back and the duffle bag straps cutting into his shoulders where it sat under the backpack, anyone looking at him might think he was just a backpacker in the scenic area of the Twin Cities as long as they couldn’t see the short sword swinging against his leg.
He slipped out of the hotel with no one the wiser, avoiding the eyes of any mortal that might look his way. He didn’t want anyone to recognize him.
After all, Percy Jackson, at age twelve, had been missing for four and a half years.
He heard them before he saw them, and the kid was already screaming.
Percy swore under his breath and broke into a sprint, sword already pulled free.
“Hey,” he called as the laestrygonians came into view, “room for one more?”
The cannibal giants immediately turned to him and chuckled.
“Free food,” one cried, “I love it!”
He rotated his wrist. Kelli hadn’t noticed, but she’d managed to burn him slightly before he could fully dodge it, and he hadn’t noticed until he’d left the boiler room. Unless it was the boiler room? He really needed to find some new gloves. Hopefully the minor pain wouldn’t slow him down.
He swept into battle like a hurricane, cutting two giants down before they could blink, and tossed the longsword to the boy that smelled like the boiler room himself, all warm metal and heat. “Fight back,” he yelled, “there’s too many for just me!”
The boy, who looked to be a few years older than Percy, looked startled, but then nodded, wrapping his hands around the leather bands Percy had glued down just a few hours ago. He felt a swell of satisfaction before he focused more fully on the fight. The problem with going further north as the weather warmed is that there were way more laestrygonians, and they almost always traveled in groups. Kelli hated them because they were all ugly brutes; her words, but Percy had to agree.
“Wow,” he called when there were only three left, “ugly and stupid. Good thing I was here to clean up, huh?”
One snarled. “You reek of empousa. The life of a blood bag must be difficult if you run away and try to get killed!”
He cut down the last one. “Nah, I’m good.”
He breathed in the air that still had the crispness of winter and turned to the boy that was heaving for breath. “Hey there. You had some nice moves there.”
The boy flushed a little, wiping off sweat and smearing gold dust across his forehead. “Thanks. I was sort of just flailing, though.”
Percy shrugged. “We all start out that way. But hey, you didn’t die! Oh shit, that’s blood-”
He moved forward much faster, grabbing onto the boy’s arm and inspecting the scrape. “What’s your name,” he said idly, concentrating hard on the wound. Good, nothing nasty had gotten in it, so he could just close it up.
“Um, Jake… Mason?”
He tugged at the blood and made it harden over the scrape. Jake sucked in a breath and withheld a flinch, which Percy appreciated. “Nice to meet you. Okay, try not to open that and let anything get in there.”
“What are you?”
Percy beamed. “Demigod. You are too, if monsters were after you. We smell. Good luck, don’t die!”
“Wait-”
But Percy was already slipping out of the alley and into the city proper. Night was falling and the temperature was quick to follow, so he needed to find another place to hunker down. He spotted a brightly lit 24 hour laundromat and grinned, stepping into the damp warmth with a sigh. He glanced up at the security camera and did his best to twist the magic around it. He wasn’t as good as Kelli would like him to be, but he was good enough to not show up on tape when he didn’t want to. And in this case, he really didn’t want to. He pulled the duffle bag onto his lap and leaned his head against his backpack, pulling out the blue blanket he had inside and tucking himself into a corner. The laundromat was warm and smelled like detergent, so as soon as his eyes shut, he was asleep.
He dreamt of the horse and the eagle again.
“Welcome to camp,” Chiron the centaur said warmly as Jake Mason crossed the border at the top of the hill, the crotchety old satyr wheezing half a step behind him.
Jake stared at everything in amazement. The satyr, Linus, had told him about this, but to see it was… unreal.
“Hey,” one of the slowly gathering campers called, “he’s got a sword!”
Like a rallying cry, campers started pouring out of the woodworks and Jake took a step back.
“Hey,” a tall blond boy yelled, “don’t crowd him! Back up, back up…”
“Oh, come off it, Luke,” a girl rolled her eyes, “you’re only chill because you’re probably going to get the story first!”
“Um,” Jake swallowed, “story?”
Chiron tried his best to shoo the campers away with a disappointed stare, but while a few of them shrank back, most stood firm.
“Yes,” a younger blond girl folded her arms, eyeing him, “we want to know about your encounter with the wandering swordsman.”
Jake blinked. “Oh. Is he… well known?”
The campers snickered and Jake scratched the back of his head, other hand tightening on the leather hilt. After the week it had taken to cross the country after Linus had shown up out of the blue, the crude sword had only been used twice, but it fit in his hand now since he hadn’t really wanted to let go, just in case. “Well… I was getting attacked by laestrygonians, I think they’re called? I thought for sure I was going to die. Then this kid appears out of nowhere-”
“Kid,” someone called out, “that means younger. Pay up, Fletcher!”
“It doesn’t have to mean younger,” a boy argued, “I mean, I’d consider us all kids-”
“He was younger than me,” Jake interrupted, “I mean, probably. He was at least a foot shorter, anyway. He threw me this sword and then just started fighting the giants. Said something about room for one more. Then after, he saw I’d gotten a huge scrape and he… did something to make it scab over instantly.”
“Apollo,” a girl cried, “I told you!”
“Hey,” another girl barked, “Ares is all about blood! And no punk who isn’t one of ours is going to survive that long out there!”
“Now now,” a tall brown boy grinned, “we all know that he’s a Hephaestus kid.”
Instantly half the crowd was in an uproar and Chiron sighed. “Let us get you settled in,” he said kindly, “they do this every time and it never goes anywhere.”
Jake took one last glance at the arguing campers and hurried after the horseman. “So the kid’s… well known, then.”
Chiron sighed. “The wandering swordsman… we’ve known about him for almost three years now. Several of our campers have only made it to camp because they were provided with a weapon, crude though they are. He has fought many monsters in his time, but we cannot manage to find him. While it is common for demigods to go on the run, sometimes for years, it is not often that they are on their own, assisting others, and not even attempting to get to camp. It is always relieving to hear he has helped another, because it means he is still alive.”
Jake bit his lip. “He’s been out there on his own for three years? And no one knows anything about him?”
Chiron pursed his lips. “He’s never given anyone a name, nor does he stick around for the satyrs to find him. We have one out searching for him specifically, but so far, nothing. Where did you see him, if I might ask?”
“Oh, uh, Minneapolis.”
“Farther north than usual,” Chiron muttered, “the Athena campers will find that intriguing.”
Jake looked back at the campers who had devolved into wrestling, but most of them were grinning.
He hoped one day he’d see the kid again.
Eleven year old Percy Jackson glanced back and paused, but he still heard the running feet and calls for him to stop, so he took off again. His backpack was really full and it had some holes in it, so he’d have to get a new one soon. Luckily, the holes weren’t in places that swords could fall out of, because he only had two extra ones right now. He patted his hip where the first sword Kelli had helped him make rested.
‘Speaking of Kelli,’ he thought as he looked across the street.
As soon as she made eye contact she grinned evilly, but then her expression faltered. She must have caught his involuntary wince.
She squinted at him, then mouthed, ‘bad time?’
He nodded, then glanced back the way he came, bouncing on his feet. ‘Cops.’
She grimaced, then looked at her companions, saying something he couldn’t make out. Tammi was looking between the two of them, flabbergasted, but Lacey just rolled her eyes at the junior empousa. Kelli sent him a triumphant grin and shooed him down the street. He blinked, but went to the indicated bus stop, tucking himself inside. He heard Kelli’s fingers snap over the traffic and stood stock still.
“Damn,” one of the police officers sounded close, “we lost him. Call in it, that’s a bust.”
“No way,” another one protested, “he can’t have gotten far! This kid’s been just out of reach for hours, and we’re going to give up because he can blend into a crowd?”
“Someone will call in with a tip,” the first officer affirmed, “and everyone else is keeping an eye out. We have his description and what he’s wearing, he can’t get far.”
Percy tensed and shrugged his hoodie off, shoving it in his overfull backpack and ignoring how he shivered. It was only September, he’d be fine. He waited a few more minutes for the cops to really be gone before he stood up and made his way to the crosswalk, looking around.
Kelli was waiting for him on the other side and he looked up at her in trepidation.
“Are we gonna fight? Because I’ve been running for hours and I’m really tired-”
“We’re not going to fight,” Kelli said, ignoring Tammi’s noise of protest, “what the hell happened? And why are you in Hershey, I thought you said you were going to avoid major cities for a while?”
He shrugged. “There was this girl that I thought might have been a demigod but she, um, she called the cops on me when I offered her a sword. Turns out she’s also… rich? So they took it way more seriously than the cops usually do. And then they recognized me from the Amber Alert.”
Kelli wrinkled her nose. “Still? It’s been like three years, don’t you humans like, grow, or whatever?”
He shrugged. “I probably haven't gotten that much taller, I’m going to be honest.” Mostly due to the lack of solid meals.
Kelli sighed. “Well, I don’t want to fight you right now, we were invited to this party in two days and I really want to go. Come on.”
He stepped in beside her, ignoring Lacey slapping Tammi’s reaching clawed hand down as they walked down the streets. “I was at Hershey Park,” he said sheepishly, “just to see.”
She hummed. “Looking for chocolate?”
“Something blue,” he muttered.
She glanced at him, but looked away. It was about that time of year, anyway. “Whatever,” she said, “now you’re gonna want to pay attention because I’m not gonna do this more than twice. But. You know the Mist right?”
He cocked his head. “You said it’s why mortals don’t freak out when a monster tries to rip my guts out in public.”
She snorted. “Yeah, that. That snapping thing I did? That was manipulating the Mist. Made people’s eyes just gloss right over you like you’re cherry flavored.”
He stared at her and she rolled her eyes. “Lip gloss, Percy.”
He blinked. “Oh, right. Sorry I haven’t tried out any of your make up suggestions, I was saving my money for food.”
She snickered at the sarcasm. “Just drink blood like we do. I promise you, demigod flesh is delicious.”
“Ew, cannibalism.”
“You never give me makeup tips,” Tammi pouted, blinking wide blue eyes up at Kelli. The lead empousa raised an eyebrow.
“Um, no,” she said slowly, “because you have the charmspeak. If Percy wants to manipulate people, he’ll need to do it the old fashioned way. Besides, you already have decent makeup.”
Tammi seemed to forget that there was a demigod right in front of her, beaming at the praise from her mentor. “Better than Percy?”
Percy smiled at her. “For sure.”
Lacey giggled. “Oh, there’s a smoothie place down the road that Brad says has awesome reviews! We should like, totally go!”
Kelli hummed. “Sure.”
Percy pivoted to follow Lacey as she hummed her way down the street, skirt swaying with her steps. People of all ages were staring at the three admittedly beautiful girls, but they obviously couldn't see the lower half of their bodies, the metal legs clanking and the hooves clopping with every step. “Who’s Brad?”
“The newest fuckboy,” Kelli said breezily, “he’s hooking up with like, seven girls without them knowing.”
“What an asshole.”
She grinned and ruffled his hair. “He’ll be dead by Saturday.”
When Percy was eight and had just ran away, the idea of murder probably would have alarmed him more, but after three years of being hunted across the country by monsters and mortals alike, he didn't mind. The only mortals the empousai went after these days were dicks anyway, the kind of people who would have fit right in with Smelly Gabe. As for demigods, Kelli didn’t really try unless it was Percy. He’d personally slighted her by killing her over and over, apparently, so she kept trying to get revenge.
They entered the smoothie shop and Percy dug around for his pouch of mortal money before a warm hand stopped him. He looked up at Lacey and saw her smile. “I got it!”
They sat at a table with their smoothies, and Percy cautiously took his bag off to be set at his feet.
“You’re not going to try and kill me out of the blue, are you?”
Tammi perked up, but Kelli waved him off. “No, not today. We’ll schedule a rematch for next week, mmkay?”
He grinned and took another sip. “I’m sure I can find a spot in my very busy schedule to pencil it in.”
She smirked. “Right. Well, back to the Mist. Demigods can manipulate it too. Not as much as us, of course, because we’re champions of Lady Hecate, but with enough practice and willpower, you can twist it to your advantage too.”
He perked up. “Like I twist blood!”
She leaned over to ruffle his hair again and he swatted her hand in protest. “Exactly,” she showed off her fangs in a wide grin, “like you can twist blood. How’s that going, by the way?”
He slurped at his rapidly dwindling smoothie and sighed at it a little despondently. “I saw Silenia again last week, and she was willing to let me test it. She still managed to bite me, but I got the venom out before it could do more than make me woozy.”
Kelli frowned and looked at Lacey. “Like, you got the venom out of the blood?”
He nodded.
Lacey tapped her lip. “Were you moving the blood with the venom, or just the venom?”
He thought back to the hazy memory before frowning. Now that she mentioned it… “Maybe the venom?”
Lacey’s eyes glittered and she clapped her hands. “How excellent! We should find you a manticore, see if you can move that poison too!”
He grimaced. The only time he’d seen a manticore, it had been pretty difficult to get away with his life, and that one had been a baby. Granted, he’d been nine, so he was kind of a baby too, but still. “Would you be teaming up with or against the manticore? Because I hate to say it but I think a manticore on its own could take me out.”
Kelli sneered. “Of course, you’re like, six.”
“I’m eleven.”
“You shouldn’t have ever gotten past eight,” Tammi grumbled. Kelli patted her protege on the back.
“Or we could find a hydra,” Kelli shrugged, “they’re pretty venomous. We’ll even sear the necks for you. The first few, I mean.”
“We will?!”
Lacey ignored Tammi, nodding. “We’ll leave you a few heads,” she reassured him, “because like, the adrenaline will help. And we can always cut off the other ones to give the poor thing more heads later, so it has a better shot.”
Percy winced internally. Not only did fighting a hydra sound like a terrible idea, but of course they wanted it to be back to fighting shape later.
“On second thought,” Kelli pouted, “maybe not. Once hydra’s get big enough, they’ll eat anything, and I’m way too cute to get eaten.”
Lacey’s face fell. “But the babies are so cute…”
Tammi huffed. “I still think we should let him fight it on his own.”
“Ew, no, he’d die.”
Percy scowled. “Thanks, Kelli.”
She shrugged. “You’re adorable if you think you can take on even a baby hydra at your age, Jackson. You do know they spawn with nine heads, right?”
He grimaced. “How big is a baby?”
Lacey shrugged. “The newborns are maybe… the size of a dracaena? They grow fast though!”
Her smile was attempting to be reassuring, which didn’t match at all what she was saying, but Lacey had always been enthusiastic about deadly things that shouldn’t be made into pets. It was how they’d bonded initially, since Bean had shown up when they first met.
“We’ll think about it before next week,” Kelli said, “are you planning on sticking around?”
He thought for a second, then remembered the cops. “Probably not,” he grimaced, “but I think I’m going to head south. I can be in northern Virginia next week, though?”
Kelli thought it out in her head, a long red nail tracing an imaginary map on the table. “Sure. Winchester?”
He frowned. “Probably going to try and follow the Potomac down to Chesapeake Bay. I’ll stick to the Virginia side, and if I get to the estuary, I’ll stop and wait for you.”
“Aww, but we made such memories in Winchester!”
“You burned my eyebrows off,” he deadpanned.
Kelli clicked her tongue. “They grew back.”
“Thank Hecate,” Tammi shuddered, “you looked so not cute.”
Percy shrugged. “How long until the cops see me again?”
Kelli smirked, showing off her fangs. “Oh, now.”
He stiffened in his seat and glanced worriedly out the window. Kelli shrugged. “Better hope you’re a fast learner” she taunted, “or you’ll get caught real quick, and then you’ll be a sitting duck for anyone who wants to eat you.”
He swallowed, glancing out the window for any signs that someone had noticed him. “But not you, right?” He sounded nervous even to his own ears. “I mean, where would be the fun in that? The challenge? The satisfaction?”
Kelli leaned across the table to pat his cheek. “You’re going to be a heartbreaker in a few years,” she cooed, “now get out of here. The cashier already called in the tip two minutes ago.”
He scrambled to his feet, grabbing his backpack. “And you couldn’t have told me that two minutes ago?!”
She shrugged, sipping her smoothie while Lacey giggled behind her hand and Tammi snickered at him.
“Have fun at your party,” he said sarcastically as he booked it out the door, ignoring the calls to stop.
“We will!”
He got two streets away before a cop spotted him and he tried snapping his fingers a few times, but Kelli’s brief explanation had apparently not been enough.
“Di immortales,” he swore, and he kept running.
Kelli held up his latest dagger. “I can’t believe this used to be my foot.”
Percy sighed. “You’ve seen a dozen of my weapons. They have to all look the same by now.”
She rolled her eyes. “They come from my leg, I can look at them if I want to.”
He threw the stick for Bean again and he bounded after it. Percy’s throwing arm was really good after all this time, but no matter how far he got it, it only took the hellhound a few bounds to grab the stick and come prancing back, tail wagging.
“You know,” she said suddenly, “I don’t think I ever told you why I kept coming back for you.”
He glanced at her out of the corner of his eyes, suspicious. “Pretty sure you did. Because I killed you.”
She waved her hand. “Yes and no. Did you know,” she smirked at him, “you were the first hero to kill me in over a thousand years?”
He startled. “What?”
She nodded sagely, looking back at the valley they were sitting over. “Yep. So like, naturally I had to see if it was a fluke. So I went back to you to challenge you again. Turns out, it was.”
“Hey!”
She snickered. “I’m right. Baby you shouldn’t have been able to get the drop on me like that. I put it down to not being able to see you.”
He was gaping and she giggled. “You were tiny, Jackson, you can’t even deny it.”
Percy rolled his eyes and threw the stick again.
“But,” he frowned suddenly, “if you were so much better than me, why didn’t you kill me the second time we met?”
She shrugged. “I might be a monster, but I only go after demigods who actively try to ruin my hair or my lair. Imagine, you’re minding your own business, planning to drain some idiots dry and make out with some other idiots, and this tiny, pint sized hero freaks out because he’s too young to effectively be charmed and he accidentally skewers you with his too-big sword in his random flailing. It was mortifying! So obviously I had to fix that.”
“By… dying over and over?”
She grinned. “I was pretty proud of being undefeated for so long. I had to train you up, make sure you could beat everyone and not just me. And you grew on me after a while. You’re adorable, and one day you’re going to be like, so hot. It’s not like you would actively seek monsters out, either. If we leave you alone, you leave us alone. It just so happens that to most of us you smell pretty good.”
He huffed. “So you… don’t want to drain my blood?”
She smirked. “Not yet.”
“Oh, awesome, I’m counting down the days.”
“You have at least another two years before Tammi starts realizing you’re hot.”
“Tammi hates me!”
Kelli snickered. “I mean, she is supposed to be my trainee. Right now that just means following you around and trying to kill you. Oh, she does actually try by the way. You’re paying it forward by training her too.”
“Amazing.”
They sat in silence for a moment, enjoying the nice May weather.
“So,” Kelli said slowly, and Percy groaned.
“Hey,” she snarled, “I haven’t even said anything yet!”
“You have that cajoling tone where you think you have a great idea,” he accused, “and that means you’re about to make a terrible suggestion!”
She stared at him, offended. “When have I ever had a terrible suggestion?”
“The Rhode Island party.”
She sputtered. “That wasn’t my fault! Serephone’s the one who fucked that one up, we had Rachel’s dad fucking cornered!”
“You almost drowned an entire boat of people!”
She scoffed. “It wasn’t that bad.”
“I could tell that yacht was holding on by thoughts and prayers,” he snorted, “I’m surprised we made it back to port.”
“Maybe if you’d figured out how to move the alcohol faster-”
“It was the first time I’d tried moving booze!”
She rolled her eyes. “Fine. Maybe that was a bad idea. But that’s once!”
“Gatorland.”
She snorted. “That harpy definitely deserved it. How couldn’t it smell the alligator on its ass?”
“Salt Lake.”
“The exorcism was not my fault! And the bison threw me off!”
“Cincinnati.”
She paused. “Okay,” she snickered, “I forgot about Cincinnati.”
Percy waved his hand. “There we go. And all of those times you had that exact same tone. What am I supposed to think?”
“This one’s a good idea,” Kelli protested, “and I mean a really good idea! Once in a lifetime opportunity here!”
Percy sighed, scratching Bean behind the ears for a moment before hurling the slobbery stick again. “Alright, I know you’re not going to let this go until you tell me,” he groaned, “so lay it on me.”
“I think you should go visit your mom.”
He sat straight up and turned to her with a deadly expression. “Excuse me?!”
She put her hands up, eyeing where his hand had a white knuckled grip on his sword. Bean came back and growled, crushing the stick between his jaws, and Percy shifted slightly to keep the hellhound in sight.
“It’s not a threat,” Kelli said slowly, trying to placate him, “like, why would I bother? I just mean that the gods are super distracted. There’s no better time to go back to New York than now.”
Percy slowly untensed, Bean calming down as he did, but he eyed the hellhound warily anyway. If Bean decided that playtime was over, he had to be fast on the draw. The last time he hadn’t expected the attack… well, he still had the raised lines on his shoulder, even if they counted as an old scar at this point.
“The gods have been distracted ever since New Years,” he grumbled, “and that was five months ago. Why now?”
She spared a single glance for the hellhound before focusing on him again. “They’re getting worse. I bet you could walk right up to the Empire State and they wouldn’t notice you. Probably. But all that godly energy might mask your scent as well. I mean, you already pretty much smell like me because you have multiples of my leg, but still. It’s been four years, Perce. I don't want you to get mopey in October again this year, okay? Which means seeing her. And killing that dick if he’s still around.”
Percy flinched slightly at the mention of Gabe. It had been four years, but that didn’t matter.
“What if she doesn’t want to see me?”
Kelli looked at him askance, having caught his whisper even if he hadn’t really meant to say it. “Perseus Jackson, has every story you told me about your mom been a lie?’
“…No.”
“Then she’ll want to see you,” the vampire scoffed, “she sounds like a fucking saint. Not the Catholic kind, the metaphorical kind. The good kind.”
He fiddled with Bean’s ear, which the dog allowed. “What if she moved?”
“Don’t mortals have ways of finding each other?”
He scrunched up his nose. “How should I know?”
She blew her bangs out of her face. “Then just wander around for a few days. I bet with your luck you’ll find… something.”
He slowly shook his head, even as his heart panged. “It’s too risky. You know that monsters like big cities more. And you already said I’m getting stronger.”
Kelli beamed with pride for half a second before her face fell into a disinterested sneer she’d long since perfected. “Duh. Ugh, fine. Don’t then. But you can’t be a mopey bitch in October.”
He cracked half a smile and stood, sensing Bean was getting restless. “Deal.”
Kelli also got up, stretching as she walked away to lean against a rock. “Go on, murder your dog again.”
Percy rolled his eyes, keeping his gaze on where Bean was shaking himself out. “He’s just not fully… house trained yet.”
Bean’s glowing red eyes locked onto Percy and his lips peeled back in a snarl even as his tail was wagging still, and Percy’s hand flexed on his sword.
“House trained,” Kelli snorted and muttered under her breath, “you haven’t lived in a house in years and haven’t squatted in one in months.”
Percy briefly considered hitting her with the evil warding sign, but in that moment Bean leapt and he slashed through the air.
“Aww, good boy,” he cooed, “you almost got me!”
Bean huffed as he dissolved into dust, tail still wagging fiercely.
“You’re a fucking weirdo,” Kelli snorted, and then they turned to their own fight.
Percy shivered and huddled further under the drooping awning. The shop was abandoned, tucked in a back Chicago alley, but it was too boarded up for Percy to consider trying to break in and he couldn’t see two feet in front of him with the downpour. He huddled further under the awning and tried not to let the chill get to him. He swallowed and his neck twinged from the massive handprint shaped bruise.
He clutched the glowing bronze sword, knuckles white from the grip. His heart still pounded in his chest even though it had been over an hour since he’d… since he’d killed those two. He thanked whatever must have been watching over him that they’d decided to play with him before eating him, letting him grab a sword to “give him a fighting chance” and “make it more fair.” Well, joke was on them; he might have gotten lucky, but they were still the ones who’d turned to dust in the end. He didn’t know why they hadn’t left corpses like things were supposed to when you killed them, but he wasn’t complaining if it got rid of the smell.
He heard a growl and his head snapped up. When had he lowered his gaze? He swallowed again, but couldn’t feel the bruise over his pulse.
“Um,” he croaked, “nice doggy?”
He quickly looked around for something that wasn’t a sword. It was different when things were actively trying to kill him, but this was just a stray dog, he didn’t want to slice it in half. He didn’t want to kill anything, and if he’d known that running away from Smelly Gabe would have put him on this path, he might have been willing to stick around. Maybe. He noticed one of the boards on the shop door was hanging on by a single rusted nail and carefully propped the sword against the side of the building before ripping off the board. The growling stopped.
He took a deep breath. “Okay,” he said, “go fetch!”
He tossed the board into the gloom, quickly losing it, but if he squinted, he could see a dark shape hesitate for a moment before bounding after it, and he breathed a sigh of relief. He really didn’t want to kill anything else.
He opened his backpack and took out the beef jerky he’d stolen back in Toledo as he’d made his way west. He was glad that the two… creatures hadn’t destroyed his bag, even if it only had a few good supplies in it. It barely had anything that’d he’d left New York with just over two weeks ago, but it was the backpack his mom had gotten for him to celebrate going to a new school and it had a few packaged snacks. He’d run out of money two days in, and most of his clothes were gross. He briefly thought he could wash them in the rain that was still coming down in torrents, but he was a little shaky and he didn’t want his clothes to literally wash away. He mechanically chewed the jerky when a shape loomed out of the dark and he flinched back.
The wooden board clattered to the ground at his feet, a foot or so outside the awning’s reach.
He stared at the dark shape. This dog was as big as he was. It boofed at him.
He slowly reached out a hand for the board and the dog growled. He pulled back. The dog whined.
“Okay,” he said in a huff, “I can’t take the board if you don’t let me take the board.”
He slowly reached out again but the dog growled, so he retreated again. The dog whined again.
“No,” Percy said sternly, “let’s try this again. If you want to play fetch,” the shadowy outline of the dog visibly perked up at that word, “then I need the board.”
He reached for the board one more time and the dog stayed frozen. Very slowly, he grabbed the board and picked it up. The dog didn’t move and didn’t growl.
“Good dog,” Percy said shakily, “okay, now. Fetch!”
He threw the board again and heard it clatter. It hadn’t really gone all that far, but the dog shape disappeared again.
He ate some more jerky, staring with wide eyes into the downpour, and brushed his soaked hair away from his forehead. He was dripping, since the dog hadn’t come any closer.
The dog brought back the board.
Percy eventually got the dog to stop even the initial growling, praising them every time he could pick up the board, and slowly relaxed as he played fetch for probably a good ten minutes before the dog visibly started getting agitated.
“I’m going to name you Bean,” Percy declared, “because Chicago has that bean thing. And I’m too tired to think of anything else about Chicago other than the fact that it’s really rainy right now and it snows a lot in the winter. And the pads of your feet are called toe beans. So yeah.”
The dog shifted again and when Percy reached out for the board, growled. He flinched back.
“Bean? I can try to think of another name if you-”
The dog snarled and leapt at him.
He had only a moment to see the dog’s glowing red eyes before he grabbed the sword and swung wildly, feeling it connect. The dog yelped in pain and his breath hitched and tears welled up in his eyes, but not enough to not see the dog dissolve into more of that golden dust.
He sobbed for a few minutes, shaking under the awning.
“I really really hope this isn’t a magic sword that turns things into dust,” he mumbled to himself.
As the rain let up and the clouds parted to reveal the moon, Percy thought about the things he’d turned to dust already and shuddered.
First, don’t trust the men with one eye.
Second, avoid the big dogs with red eyes.
Third… never let go of the sword.
His eyes slipped closed and he fell into an uneasy sleep.
“YOU!”
Percy’s head perked up and he grinned wide. “Gleeson! It’s been so long!”
The satyr waved his cudgel. “Come down here, monster spawn, and face me like a man!”
He snickered from the top of the wall, waving at the little girl who was with the satyr. “No can do, Coach. Who’s the girl?”
“Don’t even think about trying to eat her!”
The girl squeaked and Percy sighed. “Hedge, we’ve had this conversation a thousand times. I’m not actually a monster, I just smell like one because I have many monster parts on me. Have you ever seen a male empousa?”
“First time for everything, cupcake!”
He rolled his eyes, but he was still smiling as he fully looked at the girl. She smelled like a sweet fruit perfume, but she was far enough away that he couldn’t pick out which fruit or fruits. “Hi there. Did Coach manage to scrounge up a weapon for you?”
“ARE YOU SAYING I CAN’T PROTECT ONE-”
She looked between the two of them with wide eyes and he mentally placed her age at maybe nine. Maybe. He pulled his duffle bag around and unzipped it, eyeing her critically. The perfumy kids usually did better with smaller or long range weapons, but he’d never been able to make a bow, and his one attempt at a spear had been… lackluster at best. His eyes fell on one other experimental weapon and he hummed, but then took them out anyway, tossing them at her feet.
“Try that,” he suggested, “I’m not sure how well they’ll work for you, but they’re pretty sharp. What’s your name?”
“Don’t tell him,” Gleeson insisted, “who knows what he’ll do with it?!”
The girl eyed him, but then looked back at Percy. “Lacy.”
He blinked. “With an e?”
“Um, no.”
He hummed. “I have a friend who’s Lacey with an e. Neat. Nice to meet you, Lacy. Remember, stick the business end of those in any monster that tries to eat you. Coach Hedge is a pretty good protector, so they probably won’t get close, but just in case, you know?”
She inspected the weapon for a moment sliding them on, the metal covering just past her knuckles. She flexed her fingers and they clinked, the slightly jagged claws catching the light. She looked up at him with an awed expression and he grinned.
“I hope they work well for you,” he almost sounded bashful, gosh, “but they were a bit experimental, so… Good luck!”
“GET BACK HERE YOU MONSTER SPAWN-”
“Not today, Coach,” he laughed back, “maybe you’ll get me next time!”
“Persssseusssssss!”
Percy was torn between wincing and perking up and settled on making some sort of face. Silenia didn’t seem to mind as she slithered over on her two tails… legs? Percy had never asked and he wasn’t planning on it.
The eight year old swallowed. “Are you… going to try to kill me?”
The snake lady’s tongue flicked out as she blinked in bewilderment. “No? Oh, isssss thisss becaussse I attacked you lasssst time? Forgive me, Persssseussssss, I wasssss very hungry. But you are ssssstrong! And if you do not attack me, I won’t attack you either. Unlessssss you want me to?”
He shook his head rapidly. They’d only met twice, but any monster he didn’t have to fight was good in his books.
She beamed in pride. “You’re a very nicsssssse godling! Almost as nicsssssse as our Lady Echidna!”
His nose wrinkled. “The… anteater?”
“NO,” the dracaena screeched, “DO NOT SSSSSSSAY SSSSSSSUCH THINGSSSSSSSSS! BLASSSSSPHEMER!”
She lunged at him, incensed, and he scrambled to draw his sword. “I thought we weren’t fighting?! What happened to not fighting?!”
“NO ONE INSSSSSSULTSSSSSS MY MISSSSSTRESSSSSSS AND GETSSSSSSSS AWAY WITH IT! NO ONE!”
“I’m sorry, I didn’t know!”
(The third time they met, he wondered if suffering through her long lecture on her Lord and Savior, Lady Echidna, Mother of Monsters, was a better or worse fate than just fighting her. With each meeting, he realized that it depended on how well rested he was. Silenia didn’t mind if he fell asleep while she was lecturing.)
He stood on the beach, facing the sea.
He felt like crying, avoiding looking back to see the pastel walls of the small cabin, sticking out of the sand and looking sea-worn. It’d been years since he’d been here. The water was cold as it brushed his bare toes, but each little kiss of the waves that seemed to stretch to touch him was like a spark that traveled right up his spine.
He took a shuddering breath and spun on his heel, picking up his duffle bag and backpack, his scraggly shoes tied to the backpack and swinging with every step, threatening to expel the socks he’d stuffed inside. With muscle memory, he reached under the rickety step into the little divot made by where the wood slats met the supports and brushed past cobwebs and sand to touch the cool metal of the key. He told himself his fingers didn’t shake as he fit it into the lock and quietly clicked the door open.
He set his bags down on the table after giving it a bare minimum wipe and cracked his knuckles. There were old cleaning supplies under the sink and he was also fairly adept at moving both them and the water around, picking up sand and dust and spiders until the cabin was cleaner. He hesitated at the bed, but in the end left the old sheets on. Were they full of sand? Undoubtedly. But he didn’t think he could stomach sleeping on that bed.
He opened the closet and found the faded blue and purple quilt they’d left there when he was five. He pulled it out and wrapped it around himself, sitting on the couch in the fading evening light. He breathed in the scent and tried to convince himself that it still smelled like detergent, but he could only smell salt and old cotton.
It started raining as night fell, the almost perpetual storm over the east coast breaking violently with the last of the sun’s feeble rays, and soon it was thundering. He didn’t turn any of the lights on, just sat in the window and watched the storm and sea rage, waves crashing against the beach like the thunder above.
It was loud enough that he almost didn’t notice the sound on the other side of the door.
Instantly tense, he risked ten seconds to grab his stuff, thankful that he’d never really unpacked, and looked mournfully at the quilt left carelessly on the couch. But he heard the key turning in the lock and couldn’t stay when the monster showed up, corrupting this one place, or maybe it was someone who’d rented the cabin-
He was halfway out the window when the choked voice stopped him in his tracks.
“Percy?”
He froze and glanced back. The sky helpfully lit up with lightning so he could see her face, stricken.
She looked just like he remembered, if a little weathered. The real difference was in her expression. He didn’t think he’d ever seen her look so sad.
He swallowed. “Mom?”
She threw herself across the cabin, tears streaming down her face, and tugged him back inside, heedless of the rain working its way over the window sill, leaving drips. He mindlessly flung all the rain off of him so he didn’t get her wet, but something was still adding water.
She pushed herself back and cupped his face in her hands.
“Oh my boy,” she breathed, “you’re here. You’re alive.”
Oh, he thought numbly, of course he’d been getting more wet. They were both crying.
Percy broke into ugly sobs and buried his arms around his mother, bags carelessly strewn around him. It had been almost five years since he’d last seen her, but she was here.
“You came to Montauk,” she shook, “have you- have you been here every summer?”
He shook his head. “No, I haven’t been back to New York. It… it was too close. I just got here today. Kelli said…”
His mom let out a breathless laugh, a smile taking over her face. “This is the first time I’ve come back since… since you left,” she admitted, “but to think we get here on the same day… it must be fate.” Her happy expression quickly changed. “Where have you been, Perseus Achilles Jackson?!”
He cringed back at her worried, stern, miserable tone.
“I’m sorry,” he whispered, “I didn’t mean to…” Stay away? Run in the first place?
She briefly walked away from him and he cringed until he realized she was closing the window. She noticed, in that way only moms can, and immediately wrapped him in another warm hug. He got rid of the rest of the rain water, putting it in the sink, with barely a twitching thought. She froze before forcefully relaxing.
“Neat trick,” she said.
Instantly, panic filled Percy. Regular mortals couldn’t do that, what if she thought he was a freak of nature-
“I guess that means you know?”
“Know… what?” He couldn’t help but mutter the words into her sweater. She smelled like candy.
“That your father was a god.”
He reluctantly nodded. “Kelli told me. We’re pretty sure we know which one, considering…”
She snorted. “Considering. Now, who’s this Kelli? You’ve mentioned her twice now.”
He scrunched his nose, pulling back. “You should probably sit down,” he grumbled, “if you want to know everything.”
She easily settled him back on the couch before she started to assemble the firepit. He tried to get up but she sternly tucked the quilt around him and made him sit with just a look. He instantly obeyed, hopeless against her.
“Well,” he said, “Kelli is… my friend? Older sister? Mentor?”
Sally paused briefly, but continued tucking the newspaper beneath the small and large chunks of driftwood. “One of your father’s other children?”
“No,” he said rapidly, “she’s… an empousa.”
The fire flared to life and his mother looked up at him. “She’s a monster?”
He shrugged. “Will you be mad if I say yes?”
“Does she… hurt you?”
“Not really.”
She sat beside him and he eagerly moved the quilt so they could share it. She tucked him against her side and they both looked at the fireplace, but he could feel her sneaking glances at him, drinking him in.
“She’s strong,” he blurted out, suddenly desperate for his mom to approve of the weird thing he had going on with Kelli, “I killed her by accident the first time, and she’s… kind of mad about it, but mostly she keeps fighting me to make me stronger so I don’t get eaten early. She holds back and hasn’t actually injured me in ages. She pushes me to be stronger and without her I wouldn’t have survi- been this good.” His words switched when he felt her flinch against him.
“And it's not like she’s the only one,” he grumbled, “I run into Silenia every few months, and I kind of have a hellhound. His name’s Bean. He’s not… fully tame or anything, but sometimes we hang out for hours before he plays the murder game. I’m pretty sure at this point he thinks that trying to kill me is a game, and he listened that one time I told him to leave another demigod-”
“You’ve met some?”
He hummed, nodding. “I can see what Kelli says, though. We all kind of smell. It’s not a bad smell, but it does make me wonder what I smell like. Probably closest to the plant kids. They smell like petrichor for the most part.”
His mom hummed again. “That’s interesting. So you can… smell a demigod?”
Percy bit his lip. “It’s more reliable than just them being able to see through the Mist…”
His mom burst out laughing. “Oh,” she said, “you came across a few people like me, hmm? A clear sighted mortal?”
He slouched and scowled. “Yes. But she apologized for setting the cops on me! And we have this ongoing attempt to dethrone her dad. We’re allies!”
“Oh? She’s a princess, then?”
“Nah, Rachel’s just rich. She uses it for a good cause, though. Kelli and the girls just like her because she’ll get them into the really good parties.”
He rambled for a few hours before his eyelids started to grow heavy. His mom kept running her hands through his hair and never left his side, holding tightly to him. He would have fallen asleep right there on the couch in front of the dwindling fire if a flash of lightning hadn’t revealed the shape peeking in through a window.
He instantly tensed and carefully untangled himself from his mom. She jolted into wakefulness and he tried to give her a reassuring smile even as he grabbed for his sword.
“There’s something outside,” he said softly, “I’m just going to make sure it’s not a monster.”
There was fear in her eyes, and he knew that part of it was reflected in his (hours, he’d only had hours) but she nodded slightly.
It took a bit of concentration to connect to the water he wasn’t touching, but the rain gave him a bit of a ring around the cabin that he could see. The figure he’d seen in the window was making their way to the front door. He crept on silent feet, toe to heel, and wrapped a hand around the handle. The moment they raised their hand he wrenched the door open and pointed the sword directly at the person’s neck. They shrieked and stumbled back. He blinked and lowered his sword.
“Oh. You’re a satyr.”
The goat boy looked up at him with astonished eyes, hair plastered to his head. “I- yeah. Um. Are you the wandering swordsman?”
Percy’s face scrunched up. “Huh? Look, if you’re not going to kill me, you can leave.”
“Percy,” his mother said behind him, “let the poor boy in. He’ll catch a cold.”
Percy scowled, but stepped aside. The boy scrambled up on his legs and clopped inside, dripping. Percy rolled his eyes and flicked all the water out as he closed the door. The satyr jumped.
Percy walked past him back towards the firepit where his mom had restored life to the fire. “Come in and get warm,” she smiled, “and maybe you can tell me what brings a satyr to our door.”
“Th-thank you, ma’am,” he stuttered, “but I probably shouldn’t stay long. I… I’m Grover Underwood, keeper. I was sent out a few years ago to find… Percy. Does he… know?”
“That I’m half god? Yeah.”
Grover winced. “That makes sense, since you’ve been, you know, on the run. For four years.”
“Almost five!”
“Percy,” his mom scolded, “you’re scaring him half to death.”
Percy blinked, then winced. “Oh. I was doing the glare thing, wasn’t I?”
“I’m sure you looked just like Bean at his worst,” his mother confirmed dryly.
He gave her a sheepish grin. “Where d’you think I learned it from? But why were you looking for me?”
Grover startled. “Well, you’re a demigod. If you come to camp with me, you’ll be safe.”
Percy froze. “Safe?”
Grover looked at him with a complicated expression on his face. Percy could pick out guilt, grief, and fear. “You’ve fought monsters, right? They always seem to find you, no matter what you do?”
He nodded numbly. The one thing he could always count on.
“Well, there’s this Camp for demigods. I, uh. Chiron’ll probably tell you, but we’re pretty grateful for you, actually. You’re semi-famous. Half our recent demigods have come to camp with one of your weapons, and we’re pretty sure it's the only thing that’s saved some of their lives.”
He swallowed. “Then… isn’t it better if I’m out here? Wandering around and helping kids like me stay safe?”
His mom squeezed his hand. “Percy,” her voice shook slightly, “that’s not safe.”
“But I’m used to it,” he insisted, “they’re not! If I can keep people alive-”
“Your father might be going to war with your uncle!”
They both stopped at Grover’s outburst, and he winced, but pressed on. “The God of the Skies and the God of the Seas are… they’re on the verge of war. And, being who you apparently are, you might be the only one who can prevent it. So if it’s a question of keeping other demigods safe, coming to camp might be the only way. If you’ve figured out who your father is, then it’s only a matter of time before your uncles send worse monsters against you. Everything you’ve fought has been pretty tame, right?”
Percy’s mind flashed to the hydra, the manticore, and then Kelli herself if she decided to try. “Um.”
“Well, they’re going to get worse,” Grover was wringing his hands and looking like he was on the verge of tears, “and there’s going to be more of them. An army. I-I can’t lose another one. I guess you couldn’t help knowing your heritage at this point, but it’s going to be more dangerous for you.”
Her grip tightened on his hand to the point of pain. “More? He’s been on the run for years, because I made a terrible mistake and married the wrong man. And you’re saying… you’re saying he has to leave again?”
His heart seized. He just got his mom back, and now this random satyr he’d never seen before wanted him to leave her behind?
“But no one knows who my father is,” he said slowly, “right? You said “apparently.” Meaning it was news to you.”
Grover’s face twisted into a confused grimace. “I mean, yeah? Your godly parent has been hotly debated, but no one considered the Lord of the Seas. Which, well, of course they didn’t, they never would have thought…”
Percy squinted. “Who did they think was my parent?”
“Erm, well, the top three were Lord of Forges, Lord of War, or Lord of the Sun. Because you did sort of heal… people…”
Percy blinked. “Oh. No, I can move liquids. So blood, poison… most of the time I just twist the blood to dry it out and scab it over, as long as there’s nothing bad in it, obviously. I guess Lord of Forges makes sense, since I’m pretty sure one of his kids initially helped me,” (“that explains that brief period where the swords were weirdly good,” Grover muttered to himself,) “but everything I make is super crude. Lord of War, though?”
Grover shrugged. “A lot of people think you wouldn’t have survived without being a war child, since you fight monsters all the time. You’ve been doing this for years, after all. Look, maybe, um, keep your dad a secret for a while, okay?”
“Percy,” his mom cut in, “I think you should go. To camp.”
He turned to her, betrayed. “I-”
“No,” she cut him off, “I get it. But I can’t keep you safe. The last time I tried to keep you safe, I married Gabe, and you ran away for almost five years. I can’t do that again, Percy.”
Percy went rigid. “Smelly Gabe… was to keep me safe? How?!”
She smiled wearily. “You said it. He was smelly. He smelled so repulsively human that it would cover up your scent.”
Percy opened and closed his mouth for a moment. “I dunno how you could stand it,” he muttered, “he smelled like moldy garlic wrapped in gym shorts. Or hydra breath.”
Grover made a strangled noise and looked a little faint, but waved off their glances.
His mom chuckled a little. “He didn’t smell that bad. Just like beer and cigarettes and sweat.”
“No, I’m pretty sure he smelled like hydra breath. After they’ve found and eaten some helpless deer out in the woods. Topped off with some powdered donuts.”
She laughed, and the sound instantly made Percy want to relax, but the thunder rattled the cabin before he could sink back into the couch, and everyone’s faces turned serious.
“The sooner we get you to camp the better,” she swore, “come on, my car’s outside, it shouldn’t be that long of a drive. Grover, would you be able to give me directions?”
The satyr straightened minutely. “Yes ma’am!”
She smiled, and Percy hated the tinge of sadness. “Okay, let's get our stuff and go.”
“Wait,” Percy said, “I don’t want to! I never agreed to this! I haven’t seen you in years and you’re already trying to get rid of me?!”
“Percy,” she sounded agonized and he felt like the worst son in the world, “I can’t lose you again. At least there they can train you, and maybe… maybe you’ll want to go back out to help people, but I’d feel a hundred times better if you had some training about this whole thing instead of just being thrown into the deep end! Maybe you can learn how to actually forge swords, learn techniques, get supplies, just know that you have a place you can return to if you need it. And maybe… maybe you can come home.”
He jolted and thunder crashed. The thought electrified him and terrified him in the same breath. Home. It felt like a foreign concept.
He mechanically packed up the few things he had. His mom pressed the folded quilt into his hands and he felt something well up in him that he didn’t know how to name, so he shoved it down and the quilt into his backpack. It filled up the remaining space and he had to push the air out so it would zip shut.
Grover sat in the front of her beat up Nissan, letting Percy and his stuff take up the back, and they started the drive through the torrential rain. Percy was too dazed and unthinking to try and keep the car dry, not that it would really help, and they took things slow.
“One mile out,” Grover muttered, “we’re almost there.”
There was a roar behind them and the car jerked even as Percy’s head shot up.
“That’s not a sound I recognize,” he said even as his mother started to floor it, “but it sounded… far enough?”
“Let’s not test that theory,” Grover bleated nervously, “something must have caught your scent… but remind me again what roars it wasn’t?”
“Not hellhounds, hydras, or manticores. Not cyclopes probably, though they can kind of sound like anything, and not laestrygonians.”
“You recognize that many monsters by sound alone?!”
“It was more of a size thing, I’m going to be honest. Whatever it is sounds big and inhuman, which eliminates most of those one way or another.”
Grover whimpered. “So it’s something big.”
“And inhuman,” Percy pointed out oh-so-helpfully.
“Percy,” his mom said sharply, and he deflated into his seat a little.
“Sorry,” he muttered.
She passed a giant hill and pulled the car into a small parking lot where there were a few shadowed vehicles. “Okay,” she said, “we’re essentially there. Grab your stuff and let’s go.”
They all scrambled out of the car as fast as they could when they heard another roar over the pounding storm, much closer than before.
Across the small car park, down a short path, was a lit up house. He couldn’t make out any of the details since it was so dark and rainy, but there were three stories and a wrap-around porch, and it was a short run away.
“Come on,” Percy drew his sword and let the glow light his face up slightly, “we can get to the house!”
“I can't,” his mom yelled back, “I can’t cross the barrier!”
He gaped at her. “Wait, so I'm just supposed to leave you out here with some monster?! No!”
“It won’t want me,” she shook her head, pushing the two of them slightly, “now go!”
Percy stubbornly dug his feet in and swung his duffle bag around, unzipping it and pulling out two weapons at random. One, a regular sword, slightly longer than his own, the other, a curved sickle he’d tried because he couldn’t unbend the leg where he’d accidentally gotten it twisted. Kelly had almost been relieved when he’d relieved her of her calf after that accident. He offered both weapons to his companions and they exchanged a glance before slowly grabbing them. His mother took the sword, clutching it gratefully, and Grover held onto the sickle barely, nose wrinkling.
“Is this real leather?”
“No clue,” he shrugged, “I thrifted it.”
He bleated a little in annoyance, but whatever monster it was chose that moment to roar, alerting them to the fact that it had entered the car park, and he quickly rezipped the duffle bag and swung it back to where it was supposed to be, sitting right across the back of his upper thighs. Both his mom and Grover were holding their new weapons tightly now, staring at the shape.
“Go,” she hissed, “get to the house, I’ll be right behind you.”
She moved a bit away from them, and they walked slowly and carefully.
Percy squinted at the monster. It was indeed pretty tall, with a footballer’s build, all shoulders and meaty head. Everything about his top half was wide, making his bottom half look smaller in comparison, but he guessed that even one of this guy’s legs was the size of him, so that didn’t mean much in the grand scheme of things. Each of the guy’s arms was also as thick around as he was, and he could see hands like catchers’ mitts swinging at his sides.
His mom sucked in a breath. “Pasiphae’s son.”
Grover winced. “Ohhh no, oh no. That’s bad. Are you sure?”
Percy raised the hand that wasn’t holding a sword. “Hi, the only learning I did was on the job, which one is this?”
“The bull man.”
“From… King Minos and the Labyrinth?”
“Yes.”
“Oh,” he nodded his head, “oh that’s bad.”
“He relies mostly on smell,” Sally muttered, just in audible range as she continued to put space between them, “so the rain is helpful, but won’t last forever.”
As if on cue, the Minotaur roared again and she started sprinting away from them, waving her sword in the air like a glowing beacon.
“What are you doing,” Percy cried, ignoring Grover trying to pull him to the house, “come on!”
“I can’t cross the barrier!”
“Why-”
“I, Grover Underwood, give Sally Jackson the mortal permission to cross the barrier!”
She startled, but dove out of the way as the Minotaur charged her and impacted with a tree. Percy took a moment to preemptively ask forgiveness from any of the people who had cars here. They’d managed to avoid getting any of them destroyed so far, but he wasn’t holding his breath.
“Come on,” Grover yelled, “now we can all go, let’s just get out of here before we become roadkill!”
His mom wasted no time making her way back to them and pushing them to run faster until they crossed the barrier. The rain immediately cut off, making Percy stumble in bewilderment, but his mom kept pushing him. “Few more steps to the porch, Percy,” she said softly, “just a few more.”
He turned back, looking at the Minotaur as it passed and steamed outside the barrier, and gripped his sword tighter.
“You said this is where all demigods go? If they make it here?”
Grover looked at him, still holding the sickle in a tight and shaky grip as he heaved for air now that they were out of danger. “Yes. This is the only safe place for demigods.”
Percy smiled. “I’ll be right back.”
His mom turned around sharply. “Percy-”
He stepped back into the rain.
“Okay, meathead,” he said, “let’s dance.”