Chapter 21

Percy's Point of View

We were standing in a sopping wet bathroom. We might have accidentally forgotten about Annabeth when I exploded the plumbing, or perhaps some part of us had wanted to get back at her a little for her questioning about our parents. Either way, she had ended up just as wet as the other girls that had been trying to stick our head down the toilet. Admittedly, Annabeth hadn't been knocked to the floor under the force of the water like the others, but that was a minor detail.

Annabeth was staring at us in shock, long after the other girls had taken a strategic retreat, vowing vengeance. As we walked towards her I banished the water from under our feet so that our shoes wouldn't get wet.

"How in Hades did you…" Annabeth said. I winked at her.

"A wizard never reveals his secrets, madam."

Before the blond could reply, we walked outside and were met with a group of gawking campers. Clarisse was out there, growling at anyone who so much as looked at her. Her dripping hair hung in matted locks and her camo jacket stunk of sewage. At the sight of us she put on a death glare. I don't think we'd ever received a more hate-filled look, not even from the Gryffindors.

"You're dead, Newbie, you hear me? You are dead."

Unperturbed, we raised an eyebrow at her. "Once you've quite finished with the death-threats, may we have a formal introduction?"

A few of the campers laughed at the dumb-struck look on Clarisse's face. She utterly shocked that we actually wanted to know who she was. Annabeth walked up behind us, giving us a curious and puzzled look. She also looked frustrated, like she couldn't quite work us out.

"I'm Clarisse La Rue, daughter of Ares, God of War. Now your number one enemy in camp. Well done, newbie, you just annoyed the one cabin that you really don't want to annoy." Clarisse announced with a small smirk.

We smiled pleasantly. "Nice to meet you, Clarisse. I'm Percy Potter. And unfortunately for you, we have a water affinity. Next time try trapping us in a pit. It might actually work for a small amount of time."

Clarisse grinned at the idea. Then she laughed, hitting us on the back. We stumbled forward under the heavy blows. "You know, Potter, I might just come to like you."

Annabeth led us away from the crowd, showing us a few more places, such as the metal shop (where you could forge your own sword!), the arts-and-crafts room (where we discovered a group of satyr's sandblasting a massive statue of a goat-man - Pan), and the climbing wall (which could both throw boulders and spray lava at you while it shook violently as you attempted to scale it. So awesome!)

Apparently word spread quickly round camp, because we received a lot of pointing fingers and heard several murmurs about toilet water. The other option was that they were just staring at a soaked Annabeth, but we very much doubted that.

We were abandoned at the canoe lake by Annabeth, who claimed she had training to do.

"Dinner's at seven-thirty. All you need to do is follow your cabin down to the mess hall."

With those delightful parting words, Annabeth ran off, leaving us staring into the clear, clean waters of the lake. At the bottom of the lake we noticed several teenage girls sitting cross-legged under the pier. They wore blue jeans and green T-shirts. Their long brown hair floated around their shoulders as they wove baskets. One of them noticed us looking at them, and grinned, waving at us as if we were long-lost-friends. Curious about them, we jumped straight in off the pier, and sat down among them. We summoned a bubble round our mouth in an imitation of the bubble-head charm.

"Hello." I grinned and Harry smiled mentally at them. "How are the baskets coming along?"

"Not bad, thanks." The nymph who had waved at us replied. "Are you Percy and Harry Potter?"

We nodded shyly. The nymphs grinned delightedly at us, abandoning their baskets in favour of forming a circle round us. I counted four of them, watching us avidly.

"Our friend from Scotland, Nerissa, mentioned you to us. She said you'd be coming here soon, Lords." Another nymph told us.

"Hold on, you know Princess Nerissa? How do you keep in touch with Merfolk who live thousands of miles away?" Harry demanded, his thirst for knowledge coming out to play. Again, the nymphs laughed.

"Iris messages. You make a rainbow and throw in a drachma as a donation to Iris, then request a person and where they are."

'That is so cool!' I exclaimed to Harry, who smiled back at me.

'It is as well. And it means you don't need a phone or fireplace to talk to people. Just some water and light.' Harry mused. 'It's a shame wizards can't use it.'

Vibrations shock the water. They were small at first, barely noticeable, but slowly getting slightly stronger. We ducked out of sight from above, right under the pier where there was no chance of us being seen. The nymphs gave us a funny look.

"We're hiding from everyone else." Harry explained. "They've been giving us funny looks ever since we blew up the plumbing in the girls' toilets. Clarisse was trying to shove our head into a toilet bowl. Charming girl, that one."

The nymphs laughed. We stayed and chatted about everything and nothing for a couple of hours. We talked about sea-politics and the other politics on Olympus. The nymphs, who I found out were called Nerida, Tulia, Mira and Morwenna, were more than eager to point out all the flaws in each of the different demigods from each cabin. Ares' children were bullies. Aphrodite's could shallow and selfish at times. Athena's could be incredible egotistical occasionally, believing nobody could do a better job than them.

When we finally came back up to the surface, it was starting to get dark as the sun descended for the night. It wouldn't properly set for another hour or so, but it was enough to make us worry. How long had we been sitting there? It must be dinner soon. Remembering our watch, I glanced at our wrist, a small smile tilting our lips at the sight of the beautiful time-piece. Dam! It was already seven twenty!

We reached cabin eleven just as its occupants were leaving. Luke gave us a look from narrowed eyes.

"Where've you been? Nobody has seen you in hours!"

We blushed, looking down at our shoes. "We found some Naiads, and got talking. Apparently our friend Nerissa told them about us and they wanted to meet us."

"How does your friend now some American naiads?" Luke asked sceptically, as if wondering whether or not to believe us.

Harry and I grinned. "Nerissa's one of the Merfolk that live in a lake we often go swimming in. Apparently they met at some meeting in Poseidon's realm and have kept in touch ever since."

Luke snorted, but didn't ask any more questions.

'I was thinking about what Hestia said.' Harry said randomly as we followed the rest of our cabin down to the mess hall.

'Yeah?' I asked.

Harry paused, as if contemplating what he wanted to say. 'Well, she's right. We shouldn't hide. I think we should talk to Chiron. He might be able to advise us on what to do.'

I smiled, having hated the idea of just being 'Percy Potter' as much as Harry had hated us being just 'Harry Potter' before the wizarding world found out we were twin souls. 'That would be nice. Maybe we could find him after dinner?'

'Yeah.' Harry agreed. 'Let's do it!'

The open aired pavilion was lit up by blazing torches, and a central fire burned merrily in a bronze brazier, filling the air with the musky scent of wood smoke. Each cabin had its own table adorned with a purple trimmed white cloth. Four of the tables were empty but, much like our cabin, Hermes' table was overflowing. As we lowest in our cabin's pecking order we had to squeeze onto the edge of a bench, half falling off it.

We spotted a familiar face sitting at table twelve with Mr D, a few satyrs and a couple of Mr D mini-mes. It was the boy who was with Chiron – Grover. Chiron himself stood to one side, the picnic table being too small for the white centaur. We blinked before remembering that we had been told that Grover was a satyr.

Annabeth was sat on table six, surrounded by other blond-haired, grey eyed serious-looking athletic kids. They seemed to be in a heated debate about something. We grinned. They all seemed to have exactly the same interests. It must be nice being able to relate to your siblings… our smile fell, and we frowned. Charles and Harry and I could have been like that, if we hadn't distanced ourselves…

Moving swiftly on, we caught sight of Clarisse sitting at Ares' table behind us, laughing and belching along with the rest of her siblings. Clearly she must have gotten over her shower of toilet water, if just for now.

Finally, Chiron hit the floor with one hoof. Everyone immediately stopped talking, turning to face their Camp Leader. He smiled at them and raised a glass. "To the gods."

The reply was thunderous as a hundred or so demigods raised their glasses turn and simultaneously repeated his toast. "TO THE GODS!"

Wood nymphs appeared shortly after, carrying plates of fruit, cheese, fresh bread and even barbeque! Our glass remained empty however, much to our dismay. Luke noticed our problem and grinned.

"Speak to it. Just ask for whatever you want – non-alcoholic, of course."

Harry and I grinned. At least we didn't have to leave behind our home comforts here. "Pumpkin juice."

Our glass immediately filled with the thick dull orange substance. Luke gave us an odd look, but then shrugged, assuming it was one of those 'weird British things' we must do. I was about to start to eat when Harry nudged me, pointing out how everyone was getting up and dropping a portion of their meals into the fire; the ripest strawberry, the juiciest slice of beef, the warmest, most buttery roll.

"They're burning offerings to the gods." Luke murmured in our ear. "Apparently they like the smell."

We gave him an 'are-you-kidding-us' look, but the look he sent us in reply warned us not to take this lightly. Still, we couldn't help but wonder why a god – an immortal, all-powerful being – would enjoy the smell of burnt food.

When Luke reached the fire he tossed a bunch of fat grapes into the fire, muttering, "Hermes."

When we approached we dropped a roll into the fire. "For Hestia. Thank you."

We murmured our pray, too low for anyone else to hear. The expecting clogging stench of burnt food was replaced with that of warm chocolate chip cookies and the fresh smell of baking bread, just like the smells in the kitchen back home. We let a smile flit over our face as we moved to sit back down and begin eating.

Harry took over from me as we joined in the conversation. A lot of it seemed to be firing questions at us, which we answered a truthfully as we could. Some of these questions included: "Is your school really a castle?" "What's England like?" "Does it really rain all year?" and "How did you explode the plumbing?" Of course, we skimmed over the details of some of these questions (aka, anything to do with our control over water), not wanting to explain about the wizarding world just yet.

Once everyone had finished eating, Chiron called for everyone's attention for another announcement before we all left. Mr D go up with a huge self-suffering sigh. "I suppose I'm expected to say hello to all you brats. Well, hello. As you may know, tonight is Capture the Flag, according to our activities director, Chiron. Cabin 5 currently hold the laurels, I believe."

A huge cheer started up from behind us, as the Ares' campers banged on their table and cheered their achievement.

"Personally," Mr D continued in a bored voice, "I couldn't care less, but congratulations. Oh, and we also have a new camper today – Peter Potts."

We sighed and shook our head. Then, Mr D shook his head, just as Chiron was about to say something.

"No, er… Percy Potter." Mr D corrected himself. A few hushed mutters sprung up. Apparently he didn't do that very often. "Hurrah and all that. Now go run along to your little game and don't kill yourselves. Paperwork is bad enough as it is."

Everyone cheered and we all ran off back to our cabins to go get our armour fitted on. Luke lent us some from the little weaponry shed. It was far too big, as we were rather small, but it fit us enough. We refused the heavy, un-balanced swords that Luke showed us, rather getting out our Goblin-silver sword and golden dagger, which we had stolen off Lily before we came. We were also given a blue plumed helmet and a large Greek shield.

When everyone arrived back at the pavilion a conch horn sounded. We frowned. How did we know that was a conch shell being blown? Before we could dwell on the matter, however, Annabeth and her siblings ran in carrying a large silk banner. It was maybe three metres long, and had an embroidered barn own sitting on an olive tree on a grey background. From the opposite side of the pavilion, Clarisse and her buddies ran in, carrying a blood-red flag, depicted with a boar's head and a spear.

"Those are the flags." Luke told us, having to yell over the loud cheers. "Athena and Ares don't always lead the teams, but they often do. We're allied with Athena tonight."

"So what happens if a different cabin captures a flag?" Harry asked curiously.

Luke grinned slyly. "You'll see. But first, we have to get one."

The teams were announced. Athena had made an alliance with Apollo and Hermes. From what we had gathered, the alliance had been brought by trading privileges – shower times, the best slots for activities, chores… Despite only consisting of three cabins, our team was large, as Apollo and Hermes were the largest cabins.

Ares had an alliance with everybody else: Hephaestus, Demeter, Aphrodite and Dionysus. From what the naiads had told us earlier, Mr D's kids were good athletes, despite their slightly chubby appearance, however there was only two of them. Demeter's kids were brilliant with nature skills and outdoor stuff, however they weren't really aggressive. Aphrodite's sons and daughters… they didn't sound like anything to be worried about. Apparently they just sat out activities checking their reflections in the lake and redoing their hair as they gossiped. As for Hephaestus' kids… They weren't exactly pretty, but all four of them were big and burly from working in the metal shop day-in day-out. They could be a problem. A big problem. Which finally left Ares' cabin: a dozen of the biggest, meanest and probably ugliest kids to be found anywhere on the planet. And also the one cabin we had managed to insult during the six short hours we had been here. Brilliant.

In a movement that was becoming rather familiar, Chiron bashed his hoof the marble floor and announced the rules. "Alright Heroes! You should all know the rules by now. The creek is the border line; all magic items are allowed. The banner has to be prominently displayed, and no more than two guards are permitted to guard it. No gagging or binding prisoners, although you may of course disarm them. And I must firmly enforce this next rule – no maiming or killing! I will be on site to serve as referee and battlefield medic, however you better hope I'm not needed."

As soon as the rules had been laid down, we headed off on Annabeth's order; "Blue team, move out!"

We cheered, shaking our swords as we followed our leader down the path to the southern side of the creek, exchanging taunts with the red team as we went. One particular rule stuck in our mind, and we turned to Luke to ask about it.

"Chiron said we're allowed 'Magic Items'. Does that include wands?" I asked, fingering my invisible wand holster strapped to our right wrist. Luke laughed.

"A wand? Who do you think are you, a son of Hecate?" The older boy joked, his left hand absent-mindedly stroking the long scar on his cheek. "Magic items are objects blessed by the gods and gifted to their children. Though I suppose a wand could fit into that category."

I grinned. 'They are so dead.'

'Percy.' Harry cautioned. 'Only wandless magic. Don't reveal anything that might mark us out as wizards before we can talk to Chiron about it.'

I sighed and grumbled about over-cautious Slytherins, but still nodded at Harry, agreeing not to use my wand.

We suddenly tripped over out shield, and grunted in the effort to stay upright. "Are we really expected to be able to carry and fight with these?"

Another member of our cabin – Connor, I think – snorted. "Well, I hear cabin 5 wants your head, so unless you want to be skewered by one of them, I'd suggest you adapt quickly."

Luke chuckled. "Don't fret though, you'll be fine – I've seen you in action with that sword against the Minotaur. Anyway, you're on border patrol, so hopefully you'll be out of the way to watch tonight."

We nodded, but after catching the gleaming grey eyes of Annabeth as she looked back, we suddenly weren't so sure. Athena was well known for always having a plan. If Annabeth had put us on border patrol, then it was for a bigger reason that just keeping us out of the way.

The night was warm and sticky, and the woods were dark. Annabeth had stationed us next to the little chattering creek where some flat worn stones would make the crossing easy over the fast flowing current. The rest of the team scattered away into the trees after we had been placed, leaving us alone in the gloom, with only the sound of gurgling water to fill in the silence.

Far away, a conch horn blew. Another sound that was becoming more and more familiar. From all around us the still was broken by the sounds of clanging metal and yells as the battle began. A blue-plumed ally ran nimbly past us, leaping from stone to stone and disappearing into red territory.

Shortly after a deep canine growl sent shivers up our spin. We whipped around, searching for the source of the ominous sound, but the woods were still around us. The terrifying sensation of being stalked sunk into us, and we tightened our grip on our shield. I felt Harry slipping backwards, trusting me to take care of whatever it was. I sent his a silent thank you. For all his book knowledge, Harry was useless on a battle field.

Then, as suddenly as it had begun, the rumbling growl stopped, and the presence vanished. Before we had time to question why, the bushed opposite us on the other side of the stream parted to reveal five Ares' warriors, led by Clarisse. At the sight of us they grinned maliciously.

"Get him!" Clarisse yelled, screaming out a war cry as she charged us. Her glinting eyes glared at us through the slits of her helmet, making her look even scarier than usual. She brandished a two-meter long spear. I swallowed down our fear as the barbed metal tip pointed towards our chest. The air was crackling with static, and I had a sinking feeling that I knew where it was from.

'Holy Merlin, that's charged with electricity!' Harry cursed. 'Don't touch it. Try and trap it against the wood of the shield.'

'Got it!' I grinned in anticipation of the fight. We nimbly dodged out of Clarisse's way, then met the glowing bronze blades of her siblings. They were the standard-issued camp swords, heavy and unwieldy and I was confident that I could beat them. It was Clarisse's spear I was worried about.

Unfortunately a blow to the head caught me off guard and sent us tumbling into the stream. Spurred on by the jeers of her siblings, Clarisse grabbed our hair, using our own knife to cut a large section off. I tilted our head to one side.

"Planning on doing so messed up voodoo schist?" I asked calmly.

Clarisse laughed cutting of more of our hair. Rather than replying she sliced our cheek. I winced

"No maiming, remember?" I spoke between gritted teeth. Hair was easy to fix, but cuts? If we scarred I would kill her. I didn't want to have to answer the awkward questions from Draco and the others. Not to mention our family…

The other Ares' kids had backed off, having noticing the swirling water around us. Clarisse just ignored them, forcing our head underwater. I breathed normally, not even struggling. Instead, I used one foot to pull the girl's feet from under her, sending her crashing into the water. The other campers, enraged at their leader's humiliation, charged us. I summoned our sword out of the water, expertly countering their moves and knocking them unconscious by hitting their helmets hard with the flat of our blade.

Clarisse was up and moving again, and we ducked to avoid her spear not a moment too soon after knocking out the last of her siblings. Turning to face her I used Harry's earlier advice and trapped the spear against our shield with our sword before forcibly snapping it in one swift movement. The blast of energy that was release when the weapon broke sent both of us flying in opposite directions.

Clarisse screamed in annoyance, throwing our gold dagger at us. I caught it before it hit, making the enraged girl scream again. "Ah! You idiot! May Hades prey on your soul, your corpse-breath worm!"

Before she could charge at us again, however, Luke came charging out the bushes, followed by some of his siblings who were fending off the reds. As soon at the cabin eleven counsellor crossed the boundary our side erupted into cheers. The Ares kids got up, mumbling angrily.

"A trick!" Clarisse shouted, still seeing red. "It was a trick!"

The red banner seemed to shiver as the red morphed into silver, and a large caduceus took the place of the boar and spear.

The game was over. We'd won.

"Nice fight, Hero."

We glanced sharply to our left to where Annabeth was watching us with an amused expression, a New York Yankees cap in her hand. "Shame about your hair though."

I shook our head. "Doesn't matter. It'll be back to normal soon."

I replaced our dagger in its leather sheath in our belt, and dug shoved our sword into the sandy bank. I ran a hand through our hair, subconsciously pouring magic into our scalp to speed up the growth of the sheered of hair. Within seconds, it was our usual messy hairstyle. Annabeth gasped.

"How did you do that? And how did you heal your cheek?"

"What?" Harry ran a hand over our cheek. Sure enough, there was no sign of the cut Clarisse had given us. Just drying blood.

"Step out the water, Percy. Don't ask, just do it." Annabeth ordered, her face pale. Rolling our eyes, Harry did as he was bidden. A sudden wave of exhaustion fell over us. We staggered into a tree. It was weird. We'd never felt like this before. Not even after hours of swimming in the lake.

"Styx!" Annabeth cursed. "No, no… I always assumed it must be Zeus… It should have been Zeus!"

Before I could ask what the daughter of Athena meant a low growl thundered towards us, closer than last time. This time it was followed by a howl, too.

The cheering campers immediately fell silent, hands falling on their weapons as they readied themselves to fight. Chiron shouted orders in Ancient Greek, which our brain automatically translated for us.

Annabeth drew her sword, and we grabbed ours from where we had buried the tip in the sand.

The sound of claws on rocks drew our gaze upwards. There, on the rock above us was an enormous black hound, easily the size of a rhino, with dagger-like fangs and glowing red eyes. Glowing red eyes that were fixed on us.

Nobody moved, until the beast leapt. We jumped backwards into the stream, slicing at the hound's nose with our sword. It whimpered, its eyes dimming with pain. A strange feeling of concern for the poor dog ran through us, as our natural instincts to look after the hurt animal fought to take over.

The hound didn't attack again, it just licked our face with a long hot tongue. We shivered at the sight of the large teeth. Vaguely we could hear people shouting at us to run, but our legs couldn't move. We were frozen in place. I reached up with one hand to stroke the enormous canine, but before we could touch its furry head an arrow struck its flank, and it burst into yellow dust. We coughed, staring in dismay at where the hound had been.

"Percy… Why didn't you run?" Annabeth asked.

I turned to her with a blank look. "It wasn't trying to hurt us. I think… I think it wanted to play."

Luckily nobody else heard us, because Annabeth's startled look was enough to let us know that usually rhino-sized hounds didn't like to play with demigods. At least, not in the sense we were thinking of.

Angry shouts filled the air.

"Di immortals…" I heard one camper gasp. "That… that was a Hellhound. They're not supposed to leave the Fields of Punishment!"

"Someone summoned it." Chiron said. "Someone inside camp."

"Percy! Percy must have summoned it. It's all his fault!"

"Be quite child." Chiron warned her. "He didn't even know they were real before yesterday."

Suddenly, gasps filled the air. Everyone was staring at something above our head. We looked up. There, above our head, was a spinning green trident. I frowned at it, wondering if I was just seeing things.

Annabeth gave us a worried look. "Your father… this is bad. Really bad."

"Our father?" I shook our head in confusion. What did a glowing green trident have to do with James?

"Poseidon." Chiron announced as everyone started kneeling, even the unhappy Ares cabin. "Earthshaker, Stormbringer, Father of Horses."

The last words were spoken by all. "Hail, Perseus Potter, Son of the Sea God."