[crescente luce]

For a project that could decimate humanity, Project Maelstrom was quite the enigma. There were no files left in the library, no notes, no other slips from Kane when he and Dale interacted to feed her mental dossier on the matter. All Dale knew that it was dangerous, it was still being developed, and it was going to be implemented very, very soon if she couldn't stop it.

It was all rather nauseating, really.

Dale cursed for the umpteenth time that day, kicking at the bookshelf she'd spent the last hour searching through fruitlessly. Even the guards posted around the room—Kane's measures, to no doubt halt her searching for the passageway—offered no signs of Dale encroaching on their plans. Then again, from what she knew about the Masks, they didn't act until told to act. Regardless, they were pretty terrible librarians if you asked Dale.

With a spiteful glance over the other bookshelf, Dale retired to one of the sofas in the sunken portion of the library. She cradled her head in her hands, trying to think through any other places that could yield information. The library was a bust, Kane was a steel trap, and Adhara didn't know enough about Project Maelstrom either, so she was out.

"You look like you have quite the headache," A voice chimed, and Dale's heart panged in equal parts fear and hatred. She looked up and saw Luke walking towards her, hands stuffed into the pockets of his khakis, a sheepish smile on his otherwise charming face.

Dale blinked, unsure of what to say, or do. She hadn't seen the leader of the Masks since his outburst in his room the other night, when his eyes had glowed and he'd looked to be in terrible pain. And now, he was standing right in front of her, looking as if nothing had happened.

"You're a terrible actor," Dale managed, getting to her feet.

Luke quirked an eyebrow. "I was acting? I didn't know I was."

Dale huffed a wry laugh. "You know, just when I think I have you figured out, you throw another curveball at me." She folded her arms. "Some gracious host."

Luke smiled, mirroring her posture. He eyed her with a new interest, like she was a puzzle and he couldn't find the missing piece. "Part of being an evil villain, Dale."

"Then maybe you shouldn't try to get close to the hero that's trying to escape your clutches," Dale countered challengingly.

Luke put his hands up in surrender, his expression shifting to one of innocence. "I should have been clearer. I came in to apologize for what you had to witness the other night. It wasn't very...flattering of me."

Dale watched him carefully. What she'd seen had practically singed into her memory, such that she saw phantoms of that Luke over the one standing right before her. "What did I see?"

Luke looked down, shifting his weight. "You remember how I told you about the difference between Aether and I? Well, when it's time for me to...assume the position, per se, there's a process I have to go through."

"What kind of process?" Dale questioned, her heart beginning to pound like she was a bloodhound that had caught the scent of her target. "I thought you couldn't control when Aether takes you over."

Luke met her gaze, a twinkle in his eyes that Dale couldn't read. "Most of the time, I can't. But given the incoming war, I've been needing Aether's power more than ever. There's a tonic I have to take on the day of an Enlightening or another mission, and it basically links me up to Aether."

"And then your eyes start to glow and you look like you're about to die," Dale finished with a nod. "Got it."

Luke chuckled. "I suppose so. But the silver glowing eyes bit is actually not Aether's doing. It's a curse, placed on me by the goddess that incited this mess."

Dale's eyes widened fractionally. "What goddess could that be?"

"Artemis," Luke said simply with a slight shrug of his shoulders. "She cursed me when I was a baby, or so the story goes. Whenever I get too powerful, my eyes start to glow and the power dies down."

Dale made as much of a mental note on this as possible. "Why's that?"

Luke opened his mouth to speak, but something dawned on him. "I'm not going to say," He smiled softly. "Now, there's something else I need to talk to you about. I made you a promise that I would help you train to control your power, and I plan to maintain that promise."

A laugh withered in Dale's throat. "Do I really want to take lessons from the person who kidnapped me?"

Luke held up a finger. "Actually, I didn't capture you. That was the Masks' doing. And Kane's. You'll have to take that up with him. But at any rate, yes, you do want to take lessons from me because I'm the only one that can help you."

Dale watched him skeptically. "What do you have in mind?"

"Well, you're a trained demigod, so there's not much to do aside from help you conquer your dark side," Luke spoke, beginning to circle the sunken den. "And to do that requires a field mission."

This time, Dale couldn't fight her surprise. Her golden eyes widened, her air of defensiveness blew away. "I'm leaving the mansion."

"Don't get your hopes up," Luke chided, a certain amount of venom in his words. "You'll be coming back. But yes, this mission does take place elsewhere."

Dale averted her gaze for a moment, already one step ahead of Luke. If, on this mission, she could get more information to her friends...She looked back to Luke, trying her best to look interested. "Where?"

Luke grinned, and a chill ran down Dale's spine. "Oh, you'll find out. You've been there before, so your task should be...simple."

Dale fought the urge to stamp her foot on the ground in frustration. "What's my task?"

"You'll find out more later today," Luke waved his hand lazily, heading towards the grand doors of the library. "Kane will come find you when it's time to leave."

The blond boy had just reached the doors when he stopped in his tracks, turning around. "Oh, I almost forgot. You'll need this for tonight." He dug into his pocket and tossed Dale something small and shiny.

Dale caught it in midair, and a rush of relief ran through her at seeing her knife, in its dormant form as a tube of lipstick. She looked back up to try and get more out of Luke, but by the time she did, the leader of the Masks was gone.

~~

The rest of the day was excruciatingly bland. Dale confined herself to her room, mentally going over everything that she could try and do on this training mission. She ran through possible locations, possible tasks, but each was more outlandish than the next. And somehow, this oblivion was worse than the possible alternative.

Now that she had her knife back, Dale passed the time doing target practice in her room. It began as making sure there were no enchantments on her knife, preventing it from functioning the way it normally did, but eventually turned into Dale throwing it at the painting on the far wall. So far, she'd landed a direct hit on the painting of some mythological figure four times.

When the door opened that evening, Dale was mid-strike. The sound of the door opening threw her off guard, and her knife clattered to the marble floor. She hurried to pick it up, and expected to see Kane glowering at her when she looked up, but instead found Adhara, sashaying towards her like the devil was on her heels.

"What's wrong?" Dale asked, target practice forgotten.

Adhara looked spooked to say the least. She kept glancing around the room, like she was expecting someone to pop out of nowhere. For once, she wasn't in a gown, but rather dark pants and a type of jacket that belonged to a supervillain—leather, short in the front, and cape-like in the back. Her thick dark hair was twisted up, and her violet eyes were almost bloodshot.

"I've got some good news and bad news," Adhara said, her tone clipped. "Which do you want first?"

"Good news," Dale responded hurriedly.

Adhara nodded, taking a breath. "I relayed the information to Camp Half-Blood today, and we were able to determine a strike point for the Masks. Their endgame is the Garden of the Hesperides. Everyone's working on a strategy as we speak."

Dale nodded, relief welling in her chest. "That's good. Great, even."

"I wasn't finished," Adhara winced. "And I'm afraid there's a lot more bad news than there is good news."

"What is it?"

"It's a long shot," Adhara reported. "Entrance into the Garden of the Hesperides is granted, but through a very slim window at sunset. If they can't get their armies through, they won't stand a chance and neither will we."

Dale chewed on her lip. "What can I do?"

Adhara shook her head, raising a hand in a frantic, helpless gesture. "I'm not sure, but you've gotta pull your weight. Has Luke said anything to you about training?"

Dale nodded. "Any minute now, Kane will be coming to take me to a training mission."

Adhara blinked at the news, and her eyes took on a faraway quality. "This changes things. Dale, after today, a lot of things will change."

Dale was still getting used to Adhara's odd prophetic moments, but took them with a grain of salt. "Like what?"

Adhara squinted, like she was trying to see something through a veil of fog. "Your power will grow. Luke will gain more trust in you, offering you more opportunities to undermine his establishment. However, after today, you will lose a part of yourself that you might never get back."

Dale, taken aback, waited for Adhara to spew any other fortunes for her. The daughter of Nemesis sighed, coming out of her daze, and pinned Dale with an intense violet stare. "You need to be careful. Do things right today, and this could buy our camps a fighting chance."

"Adhara," Dale said, a stupid smile growing on her face.

"What?" Adhara looked from side to side.

"You said 'our camps'," Dale smirked. "You're thinking about coming back, aren't you?"

Adhara pursed her lips, no doubt trying to deny Dale's claim. "I'll do what I have to do to make sure that balance is intact."

"Whatever you say, Adhara," Dale chuckled, and even Adhara fought a smile at that.

However, the moment was fleeting. Dale's bedroom doors flew open, and Kane stood in the hallway, his familiar sour expression on his face.

"What're you doing here?" He jerked his chin at Adhara.

Adhara straightened her posture, violet eyes flicking over to Kane with disdain. "Giving Dale some last minute reminders for her mission."

Kane scoffed, then averted his gaze to Dale. "It's time."

Dale inclined her head, taking a deep breath. She didn't dare risk Adhara's exposure with a supportive look, so she sheathed her knife and started for the hallway. Adhara emerged shortly after, heading off in the opposite direction as Dale and Kane.

"Where's she going?" Dale asked as they rounded a corner.

"Don't know, don't care," Kane said with an irritated sigh. "Now, this mission is imperative to our cause. You'll be watched at all moments, so don't get any ideas about trying to escape. Because should you try, we'll take someone else prisoner."

Dale snorted. "You think I'm afraid of that?"

Kane fixed her with a steely sideways look. "I think you should be. Because from now on, there are no prisoners. Only Masks."

And with that, he continued on down the hall. Dale, shaken, hurried to catch up. "Where am I going?"

Kane, pointedly, ignored her. They continued walking, until Kane led her downstairs and into the grounds of the Mansion. Standing near a fountain was Luke, dressed like he wasn't about to escort Dale on some deadly mission. However, Dale took this as a good sign, seeing as he wasn't Aether.

"Thank you, Kane," Luke nodded to his right hand man, who peeled off and stood beside him. "Are you ready, Dale?"

"Considering I have no idea what I'm about to get myself into, sure," Dale said spitefully.

Luke smiled. "Your task is to retrieve intelligence and bring it back without anyone seeing you. We've already sent a distraction in, led by Vinny Maxwell and Matthew Baines, so the roads will be clear for you to get what we need."

Like frost creeping over a lake, a bad feeling began to encroach over Dale's gut. "Where am I going?"

"Camp Jupiter," Kane chimed, a maniacal look in his eyes. "The intel we want is in the Principia, so you should have no problem getting it for us."

Dale felt her heart sink to her stomach. "What am I looking for?"

"A copy of Kaden Gray's praetorian report on the New Rome Earthquake," Luke explained. "It's somewhere in the Principia, so hopefully, with our distraction, you'll be able to find it."

Dale shut her eyes. What was she getting herself into? Stealing stuff from underneath her friends' noses? Working for the bad guys? Never in a million years did she think she'd be a pawn in such a way, but it seemed that if she wanted to help her friends, she'd have to hurt them just this once.

"Send me in."

~~

The skies were darkening over Camp Jupiter, but that didn't stop the Twelfth Legion from acting. From where Dale stood just outside the valley, legionnaires were darting back and forth, engaged in battle with what looked like miniature tornadoes. Battle cries filled the air, and Dale could only imagine what kind of distraction Vinny and Matthew were implementing.

Dale marched into the valley, careful to avoid any contact with the Romans. Frankly, she wasn't sure what she'd do if someone saw her and recognized her. What if it was one of her friends? What would she say?

Focus, Alcander, Dale chided herself as she snuck down an unguarded trail. Familiarity flooded her as she ran down the trail, taking her deeper and deeper into camp and her memories, when things weren't as complicated as they were now. She could almost remember coming to Camp Jupiter for the first time when she was seventeen, worried about Mark. And now, the tables had turned.

Dale sent a feeler of her power out as the trail came to an end, and after ducking into a doorway for a moment to let a troupe of soldiers pass, she hurried back out. Her heart pounded in her chest, but so far, things were going all right. The central battle was on the opposite side of camp, so maybe no one would see her at all.

She thought wrong.

Just as the Principia was rising over the horizon, so close Dale could almost taste it, someone gasped. Dale's eyes widened as she turned, facing a stunned camper. He was maybe about thirteen, too young to be plunged into the central battle, but he still recognized her in the way everyone recognized faces of the lost, the missing, the dead.

And right now, he'd just seen a ghost.

"You're her," He whispered. "The daughter of Demeter."

Dale tensed, unsure of what to do. She looked over her shoulder, expecting to see Luke or Kane standing there, watching and waiting for her to make a choice. She glanced back at the boy, and at the battle in the distance.

"I'm so sorry," She whispered to the boy.

And before Dale could rethink her decision, she stomped on the ground and set a shockwave through the earth, sweeping the boy up and away. Dale grit her teeth, taking a quick intake of breath, and then hurried for the Principia. The faster she got that file, the faster this was all over with.

Dale had just entered the courtyard when the heavy golden doors swung open, and Dale was forced to leap behind a series of bushes. She peaked over them, and what she saw cleaved her heart in two.

Walking out of the Principia were her friends: Kaden, Reese, Mark, Imogen, Kaya. Tessa was nowhere to be seen, which sent a flare of concern through Dale's heart, but she was frozen in her fear. She couldn't move now, or she'd risk exposure. And so with a heavy heart, Dale watched as her friends ran out of the Principia, weapons in hand, towards the battle in the distance.

"You're so close, Dale," She whispered to herself. "Get the file and this all ends."

Dale waited another moment to check her surroundings, but deemed the coast clear. She sprinted out of the hedges and to the immaculate Principia, flying up the steps two at a time. She entered the foyer, veering around the large statue of Alexander Deven towards the elevator in the back, that led to the Roman Headquarters.

Surprisingly, the basement was empty. Dale stepped out of the glittering elevator to face her familiar base of operations, with its gadgets and computers and files. However, the room was large and despite the battle raging on outside, Dale knew she was close to running out of time.

So she blitzed around the room, searching every cabinet and tabletop as fast as she could in search for Kaden's report. But Kaden hadn't been to Camp Jupiter in weeks, it seemed, and the Earthquake was three years ago. Who knew if the file was still even here?

Dale shut her eyes, praying for a sign. Her power was limited to the natural world, but what if what she needed was just a little push? A nudge in the right direction? If this was all a ploy to test Dale's power, then this was the moment that Luke and Kane were watching for.

And so, Dale extended her field of power. She waited...and then she felt it. A subtle tug towards a filing cabinet she'd missed the first time around. Dale leapt at it, tugging it open and rifling through the files until finally, she pulled out the one with Kaden's name on it.

"Dale?"

The daughter of Demeter whirled around to face Eli Allistairs, his electric blue eyes watching her in shock.

"Are you okay?" Eli asked, stepping towards her. "Everyone's been so worried!"

Dale shook her head slowly, stepping back. She hugged the file to her chest; it was now her lifeline. "Step away, Eli. I have what I need."

Eli's gaze averted to the file, to the cabinet from which she'd taken it from. "That's confidential information. How did you—"

Dale sent another wave of power, her heart twisting as she did it. Eli fell backwards, allowing Dale enough leeway to sprint into the elevator. The doors shut out Eli's bewildered exclamations, as well as Dale's muffled sobs of frustration. She swore she'd punch Luke the next time she saw him, which she assumed was very soon.

The doors hissed open, and Dale ran towards the entrance of the Principia. She wasn't sure what to do next, given that she'd retrieved the intel for Luke. Wasn't he supposed to pull her out of here by now?

The battle raged on in the distance, but Dale kept running. She rounded a bend, feeling like she was about to explode, when suddenly she was no longer in Camp Jupiter. She stood in the garden of Aether's mansion, like she'd never even left. The only sign of her mission was the file in her hands.

"Wonderful," Luke smiled, reaching for the file.

And Dale lost it. She sprang at Luke, knocking him to the ground. They rolled, and Luke struggled, but Dale fought her way on top of him, landing punch after punch. Luke twisted beneath her, and the next thing she knew, she was flying off of him. She hit something hard—a statue, maybe?—and slid to the ground.

"What the hell was that?" Dale demanded. "You wanted me to get information, fine, but why would you send me in there knowing I could get caught?"

"You're mad," Luke said, his blue eyes practically electric. "Use that."

"Will you shut up for five seconds and listen to me?" Dale roared. "I'm done with this! I'm done doing all of this, being your prisoner! You're going to lose!"

"Yes!" Luke exclaimed, like he was watching a sports game. "How mad are you, Dale? Do you want to fight me, hit me, kill me?"

Dale was breathing heavily, and then she felt something began to flow through her veins like adrenaline. It was a new rush of power, one that liked this anger, this fury. She didn't want it, but right now, she couldn't control it.

And Dale unleashed it all. She screamed, letting all of the emotion she'd bottled up since she'd been kidnapped out. She was a volcanic eruption, a tidal wave, an earthquake. She was every force of nature combined. A blast of green light shot up into the sky and around her, as the energy from the blast flattened the trees and bushes of the garden.

And then it faded. Dale staggered, feeling like she'd just drained every ounce of her power, which in a way, she probably had. And despite it all, Luke stood there, watching her carefully.

"How'd that feel?" Luke asked, his eyes shining.

Dale watched him like he was ridiculous. "What do you mean?"

"That burst of power," He pointed out. "All that dark energy you've been harboring, you've unlocked it now."

Dale caught her breath, watching Luke as he approached. He took the file from Dale's hands, handing it to Kane, who'd been watching tiredly nearby and then disappeared.

"That mission was indeed supposed to hurt you emotionally," Luke observed. "Being so close to your friends, unable to help them, tell them you're okay. You hurt that young boy. In fact, he might not survive from his injuries."

Dale felt the world slip out from under her. "What?"

"When you sent that shockwave at him?" Luke began, his hands clasped behind him. "He hit a pillar, and it crumbled on top of him. He's incredibly weak, if he'll survive at all. Thanks to that darkness of yours, Dale. Eli Allistairs is injured as well, though not as much. Pity."

Dale shook her head. "You're lying to me."

Luke fixed her with a stern look. "You want to know how to control this growing darkness of yours? Learn to accept the consequences when you unleash it. Your friends didn't, and that's cost them so very much. Do you want to add to their burden? To your own?"

"No!" Dale exclaimed. "I'm not hurting anyone else. I'm not playing your games anymore."

Luke tilted his head at her. "You're lying. You like having this power. For so long you were in the shadows of your friends, of Tessa. Don't you want to see your own victories? You could help me destroy that camp of hers, Dale."

"Enough," Dale snapped. She was breathing heavily again, shaken to her very core. She wouldn't help him. No way.

Luke opened his mouth to speak again, but his eyes glowed silver. His face fell, and he staggered. "What's...what's going on...?"

Dale watched in confusion and fury as Luke's eyes continued to glow, and he stumbled towards her. Then, the glimpse into Aether faded, and Luke caught his breath.

"What...what happened?" Luke looked around. "Where am I?"

Dale blinked, but never got the chance to say anything.

"Dale, whatever I said to you, do not listen. That was Aether speaking. I don't...I didn't take that tonic today, I didn't need to. Why was he controlling me?" Luke whispered to himself, a haunted look in his blue eyes.

As if knowing their master was in need, two Masks swept into the garden. They helped Luke away, leaving Dale to her own devices, but as Dale got her nerves under control and tried to consider what had happened, she spotted something lurking in the shadows.

And so she watched in silence as Kane emerged from the darkness, a smug look on his face. He didn't see Dale, he probably didn't think she was in a good condition to notice him, but she did. Why he'd hidden there with the file, Dale didn't know, but as he walked down the halls, deeper into the mansion, Dale wondered if there was more unfolding within this mansion than she'd realized.