Chapter 31

Percy's Point of View

We were standing in a clearing, breathing in the soft morning air as we watched the forest surrounding us. An emerald cloak swathed the forest in green, as bright sunlight filtered through the leaves to bath the woodland in a pretty green tinged light. We smiled as faeries flittered past us, several tugging a few lock of hair free from our head to add to their nests. A herd of unicorns grazed peacefully a few meters away, several pegasi mixed in among them. Wood nymphs watched us from the shade of their trees, and we waved happily at them.

A rabbit ran into the clearing, and froze when it spotted us, leg muscles tensed, ready to run. Its little nose twitched. Once. Twice. The rabbit then relaxed, deciding we weren't a threat, and hopped into the sunlight, nibbling on some of the grass.

A sudden wave of dizziness overcame us, and the happy scene shifted. A shadow passed over the sun. The unicorns bolted, and the pegasi fled to the sky. The wood nymphs disappeared into the thick of the forest. The faeries let out high squeaks as they too fled the scene. The rabbit froze once more. It sniffed the air again, then thumped one of its back legs hard against the ground, flashing its white tail as it sprinted to its burrow under the roots of a tree at the edge of the glade.

We looked up to the sky and saw dark clouds swirling ominously above, threatening to break and fall. A dark heavy presence hung over the place, and an evil laugh split the air like thunder. We flinched, our eyes flitting around frantically as we too ran, looking for somewhere, anywhere, we could hide. A glance up at the sky however had us freeze much like the rabbit.

There, in the swirling black sky, was a sickly green glow. A sign hung in the sky. A sign we had hoped never to see for a long as we may live. A skull, its jaw dropped open and a snake slithering out. The Dark Mark. His Mark…

Then we were falling, down, down, down into a soft warm darkness that seemed to embrace us fully, far away from the cold, suffocating dark presence and chilling laugh and eerie, glowing mark…

Our last thought before the darkness claimed us was a quote. A quote from a book we hadn't read in years; Watership Down: "All the world will be your enemy, Prince with a Thousand Enemies, and whenever they catch you, they will kill you. But first they must catch you, digger, listener, runner, prince with the swift warning. Be cunning and full of tricks and your people shall never be destroyed."

After a while the darkness faded away, and our dreams lost all meaning. We were back in the forest at Camp Half-blood, but Draco and Blaise and Theo were there. It was raining, but our friends were perfectly dry, and we were on fire. Our face was soaked with rain, but our body felt like it was burning to a crisp. We pulled at our clothes, trying to free ourselves from the horrible heat, but they were too tight, to restricting, and we couldn't get them off.

Then Leo appeared, grinning his troublemaker grin as he set himself on fire too. Our vision kept blurring as flames seems to flare up over our face, and we heard frantic voices in the background. We vaguely recognised Annabeth and Luna's voice, as well as Chiron's and a son of Apollo whose name we couldn't quite place. The sweet taste of homemade blue cookies washed over our tongue and we signed.

"They can't take much more nectar. They've already had far more than I've ever given anyone! Much more and they'll start burning up." The Apollo cabin member was saying. His voice brought a recent memory to mind, and we smiled as it replayed in our dreams.

We were standing in the archery range, clutching a bow in our right hand as we pulled back the string with our left, closing our right eye to peer down the range. Chiron was standing behind us, correcting our position; slightly bend our right elbow, our back tilted slightly toward the target, the string pulled back to the corner of our mouth… Finally happy with our position, Chiron decided we were ready to shoot.

"Shoot at will."

We aimed for the yellow circle at the centre of the target, silently willing the arrow to go where we wanted it to. Just as we breathed out and let the arrow go, a movement behind us startled us, and we jolted back. Our shot misfired, and hit a blond Apollo camper, who yelped in surprise and annoyance.

Chiron chuckled, shaking his head. The camper was fine, as Chiron had removed the heads from our arrows for now, after seeing our first round of terrible shots.

"When I told you to shoot at will, I didn't literally mean, shoot at Will."

The camper grimaced. "Why, in the name of the gods, did my mom think that it was a good idea to call me, a son of Apollo, Will?"

The rest of his half-siblings burst out laughing, and even as our face blushed red with embarrassment, we couldn't quite help a giggle escaping us. The camper, Will, pouted for a moment before grinning as well.

"I think, son of Poseidon, your talents lie elsewhere."

We blushed deeper, but nodded in agreement.

We wouldn't be able to tell you how long we drifted in and out of dreams, occasionally almost surfacing and reaching consciousness before falling back into the Hypnos' realm. But when we finally did wake, it was night. Cool and silent night.

We glanced to our right, and almost smiled when we saw a mass of blond hair curled up asleep but our side. Annabeth and Luna were sitting on a chair, bent over a bed in what looked like a very uncomfortable position. We carefully swung out of bed, gritting our teeth against the wave of dizziness and slowly, carefully, picked up Annabeth and Luna and placed our friend on a nearby empty bed. They wouldn't want to have to train with stiff muscles tomorrow. We knew from past experience how painful that could be.

After moving our blond friend, we couldn't quite bring ourselves to go back to bed, and so sat on a nearby window seat, staring up at the large full moon, that hung in the sky like a silver sickle, its light burning its way through the light cloud cover with ease. We couldn't help but think that, in another continent, half way round the world, our Uncle Moony would be preparing for his monthly transformation, probably staring up at the sky, just as we were, waiting for the moon to appear and his night of torture to begin… We shook our head. There thoughts weren't going to help us.

A spike of pain from the centre of our palm drew our gaze from the sky to our hand. It was wrapped tightly in bandages, but we had no qualms about removing them. As the red stained bandages fell away a furious red circular cut in the centre of our hand. We winced, whispering a small healing charm, and let out a low sigh as the red swelling reduced, and the infection started to clear up at an accelerated rate.

It wasn't until after we had cast the healing spell that we realised our palm had lit up with a silver glow as we cast the spell. Our glamour we had cast over our hand to hide the unicorn blood stain/tattoo thing had apparently been ripped apart by the pit scorpion. The markings were currently in the shape of a trident, with delicate decorations of fish and waves decorating the mighty weapon. We quickly tried to recast the glamour, but it didn't stick, so we eventually gave up.

Having dealt with the worst of our wound, we sat on that window seat, watching the sky until the warm light of dawn spread her rosy fingers across the sky. We heard hoof-falls on the stone floor, and smiled to ourself as they stopped short, and a small noise of alarm passed Chiron's lips.

'Should we say hello?' I asked Harry with a small smile.

'Nah,' Harry grinned, 'not yet.'

"Annabeth! Annabeth!" Chiron called and we heard the rustle of covers as he shook her.

"Chiron?" She mumbled blearily. "What's going on?"

"Where's Percy and Harry?"

She sighed. "Right her-"

Annabeth cut her reply short, and the bed squeaked as she abruptly sat up. Again we grinned to ourself as we peered round the wall.

"Looking for someone?"

We heard a thunder of footsteps, and saw a rush of blond hair before sharp pain exploded over our cheek. We looked up at her, hurt.

"What was that for?"

"Idiots! You utter idiots! Don't scare us like that ever again!" She demanded, pulling us into a tight hug.

"Understood." We replied, our voice muffled by her shoulder.

Chiron pried Annabeth and Luna off us a few moments later, and picked up our hand to inspect. He raised an eyebrow when he saw how the infection had disappeared and the swelling had gone down. He gave us a knowing look as he commented on it.

"Your hand was in a much worst condition last night."

We looked at him with wide innocent eyes. "Well… we do have a habit of healing quickly when we set our minds to it…"

Chiron chuckled. "I'd say. But I doubt it was just your minds you put too it. I mean, it has healed up miraculously. Like magic, I'd say."

We burst out laughing, winking at Annabeth and Luna. "Wandless magic can't be tracked. The trace is on our wand, and when accidental magic is used a large percent of the magic soaks into the surroundings, making it very easy for the Ministry to pick up with their machines. Wandless magic, however, is much more precise and controlled, so it's perfectly safe for us to use."

Shaking their head, our blond friend smiled at us. "You little rouges! Deceiving your Ministry like that. Are you sure it's legal?"

I widened our eyes to a comical size as Harry replied with a little too much innocence in his voice. "You mean that circumventing laws is illegal?"

We burst out laughing at Annabeth's disapproving stare, and Chiron's amused smile.

"What's with the mark on your hand, by the way?" Annabeth said suddenly. "I'd never seen it before."

"Oh." We scratched the back of our neck. "We were healing this unicorn, and the blood stained our hands. It lights up when we use magic, and keeps shifting shape, so we cast a glamour over it. Only… The glamour was destroyed by the pit scorpion, and we failed to recast it…"

Before anymore could be said on the matter, however, our Apollo medic walked into the infirmary. He stopped short when he saw us out of bed and on our feet, and narrowed his eyes dangerously.

After being in Madam Pomphrey's care, we knew exactly how dangerous angering a medic could be, and ducked behind Annabeth and Luna, using them as a shield from our furious doctor. He didn't look much older than fourteen, but by the gods was he just as scary as Hogwarts' Mediwitch when you get in her bad books.

"What do you think you're doing out of bed?" The Apollo camper demanded. "I spent the majority of two days patching you up, and for what? For you to just get out of bed and chit-chat when you should be resting?"

We paled when we heard two days had past. "What day is it?"

Our healer's eyes narrowed further, but Chiron interrupted before he could speak. "Calm down, Lee. I checked their hand as soon as we found him. It's practically healed. Harry and Percy are fine. Today is the 30th of July. Why?"

We groaned, covered our face with our hands. "We have to go home tomorrow."

"What?!" Lee exclaimed, looking even angrier. "Don't you even think about leaving, do you hear me? You two are going to stay here, in my care, until I judge you fit!"

"It… doesn't work like that." Harry explained in a small voice. "James – our dad - gave us an international portkey. It's set to take us home on July 31st, for our birthday. We need to get everything ready for next year at school as well so… Anyway, we can't change the day it's going to take us home. International portkeys are tricky to get hold of, and even if they weren't, Lily and James would get worried if we didn't show up."

"Humph!" Lee looked sceptical, but we could tell he was no longer angry with us.

Annabeth touched our arm. "You know, most people would be happy that tomorrow is their birthday, and they get to go home for it."

"Annabeth, Luna…" We shook our head. "Look, you know we love England, and we love our friends there. But our birthdays have never been good days, and besides, we'd rather stay here a while longer."

"Alright then." Annabeth nodded. "We'll just have to make this last day count then, now won't we?"

'Making this last day count' consisted of several things. Firstly, escaping Lee and getting out of the infirmary. Second was teaching us how to shoot properly, which didn't go so well, to say the least. We ended up shooting anywhere and everywhere but the target. Will Solace, the Apollo camper we had managed to shoot before, had come along to help, and ended up just laughing at us in amazement of how badly we were doing.

Eventually giving up on the archery, we decided to arrange a small game of capture the flag with maybe twelve other campers. We were on a team with Annabeth and Luna, Leo, Will along with Beckendorf and his girlfriend Silena. The remaining two of our team were Malcolm (one of Annabeth and Luna's siblings) and Grover. The opposing team was led by Clarisse, and consisted of several campers we didn't know too well.

It was good match, as our skills were rather evenly spread. In the end however, I ended up having a one-to-one fight with Clarisse as she 'fought for her father's honour'. But, disputes aside, by the time capture the flag had finished both Clarisse, and Harry and I were on stable terms. We at least knew she wasn't going to murder us when we returned next year, which was good.

A lunchtime we took our meal to the edge of the lake, and chatted quietly together as we ate. After lunch, we had a game of water polo (which we rocked at, of course).

By the time the sun was dipping on the horizon we were exhausted, but happy. Annabeth's idea of making this last day count had been brilliant. We grinned as we laid in bed, thinking back on it.

'How many times did we have to flee from Lee?' I pondered with a yawn.

Harry considered. 'Five or six? By Apollo, that boy is persistent.'

'To be fair, we were under his care. And Chiron's…' I shrugged. 'He was only doing what he thought to be the right thing, I suppose.'

'Yeah. I can't wait to return next year. Hopefully it'll be a little less hectic…'

I burst out laughing. 'Harry, we have no chance of that! But honestly, how dull must some people's lives be?'

'True.' Harry agreed with a smile.

Soon we were wrapped in Hypnos' embrace, far too exhausted to dream. This was our last night in our little cabin for a year. We thanked every Greek God under the sun and moon for making it a good one. Tomorrow we'd have to face returning home, and Charles and our birthday. With a bit of luck, it would be a good one.