It's actually pretty easy being nice to a bitter boy like him
So I got myself a citrus friend
But soon his bittersweet started to rub off on me

Lemon Boy  -  Cavetown

DAHLIA REMEMBERED THE DAY SHE entered Camp Half-Blood for the first time all too well.
She was 15 when she first met Luke Castellan in the Hermes cabin and quickly took a liking for the boy.
Luke was 17 and a son of Hermes, while Dahlia was unclaimed. She remembered too well the days of them getting into mischief and practicing sword fight. Luke was incredibly talented and she admired him for his abilities.
A few weeks had passed since then, when they played Capture the Flag.

She ran through the forest, two girls from the Athena cabin at her heels. She could feel her hand sweating as she held the red flag of the other team in it.
The girl had Meg, a daughter of Demeter, at her side, cursing under her breath.

"Give me the flag!" Meg yelled and Dahlia did as she was told. She threw the flag to the girl, when Meg suddenly turned and took a different path.
Dahlia looked behind her and was startled by how close the two girls of the opposed Team behind them had come.
She looked ahead again to avoid tripping over any roots or branches.

She saw 'Zephyros Greek' in front of her, the narrow body of water that crossed the forest and separated it into two parts. It marked the border, across which they had to carry the flag to win the game.
Evie didn't understand why Meg had taken a different route until she saw the bridge that crossed the river. Two boys with red helmets stood in front of it, ready to intercept the girl.

"Damn it!" Dahlia cursed and followed Meg. Her hand on the hilt of her sword. She heard the sound of metal clanging and saw Meg, sword raised in one hand and the flag in the other, fighting a warrior from the opposing team.

Dahlia didn't think twice and drew her sword to defend Meg. She fought the boy she thought was from the Apollo Cabin and at the same time saw the two girls who had followed them running towards her. The boys, who had probably been standing by the bridge earlier, joined them and Dahlia knew they couldn't stand up to the majority. She looked at the flowing water beside her and then at Meg.

"Meg!" she yelled. Meg tossed her the flag and the blonde caught it with her left hand. Now that Meg had both hands free, she went for the two boys. Dahlia fought the Apollo boy, when she got cornered by him.

"Give it up Kiddo!" he said provocatively. Dahlia flashed him a cheeky grin as she threw her sword at him.

The blade fell at his feet with a thud and he looked down at it in confusion. Then he looked back at the girl, who took a step to the side, turned to Zephyros Greek and jumped in it with the flag.

She felt the cold water soak her armor and the roar of the river in her ears. She felt the strong current, which she had greatly overestimated, sweep her body and pulled her helmet off her head so that she could see. With the flag in her hand, she swam ahead, sideways against the stream. Her lungs inflating and her brain gasping for oxygen supply.

She dove to the surface and gasped as she broke through it. She looked back and realized how far the river had already carried her. Her now wet hair stuck to her face as she swam with all her strength to the other side of the water.

She finally saw the bank ahead of her and clung to a ledge. She placed the flag on the ground and then lifted her body, heavy from the armor and drenched in water, out of the river.
She let herself fall flat on her stomach and breathed heavily.

Her eyes found the flag in front of her when she heard loud cheering.
Members of her crew came running towards her and pulled the girl up by her arms.

"WE WON!"

Dahlia got dragged along with them towards the beach. The girl saw the other campers gathering when the boys stuck the flag into the sand.
They lifted Dahlia on their shoulders and danced with the girl in a circle. Then they put Dahlia down and her eyes met Luke's.
He nodded at her appreciatively and smiled proudly.
Then the Hermes boy came up to her and put his arms around the girl's shoulders.

„Good job, Dahlia!"

"I jumped in the river!" she told him, still breathing fast.

"I saw it!" He said with a chuckle.

"Lost my helmet though." the girl said and started to get out off the heavy armor

"Congratulations Team Blue is the
winner!" Chiron called and the Team of Dahlia again began to roar. She broke away from Luke and joined in with the others. People congratulated her and asked her how she managed to swim through the river. The girl shrugged it off even though she was pretty proud of herself for getting her team to win.

"Meg and I were a great team!" She then said and pulled the red head towards her side.

"Mhm! We kicked their ass!" Meg yelled and their team again started to cheer.

Suddenly the crowd around Dahlia fell silent and the girl wondered if she still had water in her ears. She saw the people strangely staring at her, when they started whispering.
She turned around and saw Luke staring at something above her head, just like all the other campers.
She then looked up and saw a gold shining sickle with a few sheathes of wheat above her head.

"YOU'VE BEEN CLAIMED BY DEMETER!" Chiron's voice rang over their heads.

"GODDESS OF AGRICULTURE AND FERTILITY! GODDESS OF THE SEASONS AND NOURISHMENT!" Dahlia looked at the old centaur, when his dark eyes had already fixed themselves on her. She looked again at the symbol above her head, excitement flooding through her whole body.

"DAHLIA GREEN! Daughter of Demeter!" He called and the other campers started bowing before her.

The other children from Demeter had taken the girl in and explained everything to her.

How they had shifts in the gardens and fields. How they regularly met for picnics in the strawberry fields and how they had sworn not to make anyone down or feel bad about themselves, for children of Demeter were kind and generous.
They explained their rules and traditions to the blonde girl, and a few girls offered to show her their best recipes. Dahlia couldn't help but feel at home in their group immediately.

She walked towards the Hermes cabin, took a deep breath and stepped inside. She walked towards her sleeping spot next to Luke's bed and began packing her things. When she had everything, she stood up and swung her bag over her shoulder.

"What, don't I get a good-bye?" Luke asked behind her as she turned to face him.

"I'll just be a few cabins away, we won't be separated." she said with a smile, but a sad feeling spread through her as she had to leave the boy.

"Still, you won't be living here anymore," the brunette said crossing his arms.

"You'll get over it." she responded as she approached him. Luke looked down at her a little as her eyes came up to his nose.

"I hope you feel comfortable in your new home.. with your siblings." he said. Dahlia nodded happily.

"It's gonna be fine. I'll miss you too though." she answered smiling at him.

"You wanna meet at the big fire tomorrow? After you settled in, so you can tell me about all of it?" he suggested shrugging his shoulders.

"Yeah I will!" she said nodding. Luke gave her a high-five and a hug, before she left the cabin and headed towards her new one.

The Demeter-Cabin, which stood between Hera's and Athena's cabin, had tomato vines growing on the walls and wild flowers growing on the porch.

The cabin color was a light shade of brown and Inside was a grassy floor. An oak tree in the middle of the room that held up the ceiling and Dahlia remembered staring at it in amazement. It was the most beautiful house she had ever seen.

"STEVE THAT WAS MY FAVORITE SHIRT!" she could hear a girl with dreadlocks yelling at a blonde boy. A large red stain was spread across her face and over her yellow T-shirt, which looked suspiciously like tomato juice.
The blonde boy didn't even try to hold his laugh and held his stomach in pain.

"It was an accident I swear!" he said, when the girl held a tomato in her hand, ready to throw it at him.

"What did I tell you about not throwing food at each other?!" another girl yelled and Dahlia was slightly intimidated by her sharp voice.

"This happens 24/7, 365 days a year. Welcome to my nightmare!" Meg, her friend from capture the flag suddenly stood at her side. Dahlia smiled at her.

"Come on, let me show you around!" she then said, reaching for the girl's hand.
They walked past the large oak tree, towards a bed.

"This is where you sleep, believe me you have one of the privileged places. I have to sleep between the two morons back there, Steve and Helen.
Steve snores and Helen has nightmares about mutant bees!" Meg said and Dahlia couldn't help but laugh.
She put her bags down next to her bed and then followed Meg to the big oak tree.

"That's our oak tree, we call it Elvis," she said.

"Elvis? Why Elvis?" asked Dahlia.

"Don't tell me you're an Elvis Presley hater?" said Meg, but she didn't let the blonde girl get a word in edgewise.

"Sometimes we have squirrels that live in Hotel Elvis so you better not leave your jewelry lying around. They love things that sparkle!" Dahlia nodded to show her that she understood.

The red-haired girl showed her the strawberry fields and the wildflowers outside the door. She showed her her personal favorite spot by the window as the sun set and the whole cabin was tinted a beautiful orange.

When Meg's tour was over, Dahlia met the head-councilor Miranda Gardiner. The girl that yelled at the two kids, Steve and Helen. She had dark curls that embraced the sharp features of her face and her skin had a soft glance, even in the low light of the cabin. Dahlia wondered that she wasn't a child of Aphrodite because she was definitely one of the prettiest girls she had ever seen.

After curfew, they all sat together, after bringing the smaller campers to bed and talked for a while. They told Dahlia story's about when they had competitions to see who could grow the biggest fruit without almost every time at least one person ending up covered in fruit juice, as the fruit often tended to burst. Deliah laughed a lot at their story's.

Later, as she lay in her new bed, she looked to the side and thought about Luke. It was the first night she'd spent at this camp without him. She still grinned at the stories she'd heard and decided to embrace the change, since there was nothing she could do about it anyway.

Thinking of her mother Demeter, who she wondered if she was proud of her for her victory in Capture the flag, the girl finally fell asleep.

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