CHAPTER EIGHT

G E S T U R E  W I T H O U T  M O T I O N

• • •

Annabeth was avoiding Esperanza.

That wasn't entirely accurate; after she began to feel sick, Drew and Chris insisted that she take time to rest, and she had been trapped in bed for a full day. Drew had approached her, several hours ago, and told her that Esperanza was wondering if she could visit. Annabeth had said no. She hesitated before saying it, though that did not make her feel much better. The guilt slithered around in her chest.

It didn't make sense. Esperanza had been the only person she had cared about up until a handful of days ago. Esperanza had been her entire world, and it was so unfair for Annabeth to refuse to see her. She knew that, logically.

But she was scared. Esperanza's eyes had been so knowledgeable and certain that it unnerved Annabeth, deep to her core. Not for the first time, Annabeth began to wonder what, exactly, Esperanza was; these people were children of mythical gods, so what did that make Esperanza? No one else seemed to know and they were all wary of the young child, content to give her a wide berth.

So, Annabeth was avoiding Esperanza for the time being, content to lay in a bed that did not belong to her and sleep without fear of waking up back in the cellar. (That was a lie, but maybe if she keeps repeating it, then the fear will go away.)

The sky outside her window was dark, but she couldn't see the stars. The majority of the sky was blotted out with smoke, which billowed from an unknown source. Drew's mouth was a tight line every time she looked at it, but Annabeth had insisted that the curtains remain open; she had gone years without seeing the sky, and she was never going to choose to look away from it ever again. According to Drew, smoke meant burning, which meant that whatever monsters had taken over the world were continuing to wreak destruction over a nearby city. According to Drew, there were weeks where the sky was hidden behind a shroud of smoke, weeks where the Sun was unable to shine. The thought of that made Annabeth shiver beneath the many blankets that were piled on top of her.

A knock sounded at the door, startling Annabeth from her thoughts. She sat up as the door carefully opened, revealing Cameron to be standing sheepishly on the other side.

"Hi," he said with an awkward wave, "I was just seeing if you wanted some company."

To Annabeth's surprise, she nodded. She had spent enough time alone to reject any offer of company, and she was interested in Cameron. He smiled hesitantly and was careful when he sat at the very edge of the bed.

"How are you feeling?" he asked.

"Better," Annabeth responded honestly. The strange feeling that had accompanied her memory had long since vanished, but Drew had still been worried enough to enforce a full day in bed.

"That's good," Cameron said earnestly, "we were all a little worried."

The air grew thick with an awkward tension, one that made Annabeth cringe. She had survived years trapped in hell, but she couldn't endure a few minutes of awkward silence?

"How's Esperanza?" Annabeth found herself asking, if only to escape the painful silence.

She didn't miss the wince flash over Cameron's face. "She's good. I think she fell asleep not too long ago. She was really worried about you, you know."

Annabeth nodded wordlessly as he spoke. She wanted to talk to the girl, it just felt so complicated now.

"Do you... uh... know what she is?" Cameron stammered, steadfastly looking anywhere but at Annabeth. 

She frowned. "What do you mean?"

"It's just...it's obvious enough that she's different than most six-year-old girls," Cameron began, "and she seemed to know more about you than you did, and it didn't seem like you knew that, either. So I guess I'm just...curious," he finished lamely.

"I'm not sure," Annabeth answered honestly. "I was so focused on surviving and keeping her safe that I never asked her where she came from or really who she was. Back in the cellar," she swallowed past the ugly word, forcing down all the memories associated with it, "whenever we were left together, we mostly spent it in silence. Everyone was listening; it was dangerous to talk so much. But..."

Annabeth hesitated. Cameron's eyes were wide and honest, and Annabeth knew that she should trust him. He had helped rescue her; he was keeping her and Esperanza safe. He had never given her a reason to not trust him, but survival habits are not so easy to break. Drew has already told him this, she reassured herself.

"When we were escaping, Esperanza did this thing. Someone had stopped us, and Esperanza just made her stop breathing with nothing more than moving her hand." Annabeth clenched her hand into a fist. "I had never seen anything like that, not during the whole time we were there together."

Cameron was frowning. "I've never heard of anything like that before. And she's so young, that kind of thing would take years of training to accomplish, if she had the right godly parent."

"She also knows things," Annabeth found herself whispering, "she told me the Great Prophecy before we escaped. How would she know that?"

Cameron's eyes grew as cloudy as the night sky. "I don't know. I'll talk to the others, see what they think."

Annabeth felt her heart rate pick up at his words. She felt that same sense of panic that had been her constant companion in the dark cellar. Years of pleading and convincing and sacrificing were easier to slip on than the shirt Drew had lent her. "Don't hurt her."

Cameron blinked in surprise, then his gaze softened. "Oh, Annabeth, we would never do anything to hurt either of you. I'm just going to see if the others have any ideas as to who her godly parent is. But we wouldn't hurt her."

Annabeth nodded, but it was an empty gesture. Cameron seemed nice enough, but no one could be fully trusted, not until they revealed their ulterior motives. It might have been dangerous to trust him with everything that she had told him, but part of her felt lighter, like she had removed a heavy burden from her chest. But that lightness did nothing to alleviate the newfound heavy air that remained between the two demigods.

"Esperanza seemed to think the knife I saw in my memory is important," Annabeth said carefully, "do you think she's right?"

There was a moment of silence before Cameron spoke again, and Annabeth witnessed the internal battle that he seemed to fight before settling on the right words to say. "I think that there's something going on that is much larger than us, and I think that Esperanza has a way of knowing this. If this is the first memory that your mind has recovered, then I do believe that it's important in some way, even if we don't know what that way is right now."

There was another gap of silence, and Annabeth allowed the words to settle over her like a blanket. Cameron's voice was gentle and soothing to listen to, even if he didn't sound certain of all the words. There was something nagging her, from the back of her mind, a childish question that seemed foolish to ask.

But she asked it nonetheless. "Do you think I'll get all my memories back? Do you think that one day, I'll remember everything?"

There was no hesitation in Cameron's nod. "The gods use us in all sorts of ways; Percy and Jason had their memories erased at the start of this war by Hera, but they regained all their memories. I'm sure this is just part of one of the gods' plans for you."

Annabeth couldn't help but release a huff of frustration. "Don't you ever get tired, being the pawn of someone else?"

Cameron laughed lightly. "The way I see it, we're special enough to even make it on the chessboard. Not everyone gets that, so we should just be happy that we do."

Annabeth nodded along to his words. She wasn't sure if she agreed with the sentiment quite yet (she doubted she would ever respect and forgive someone that put her through those hellish years) but it was nice to see that Cameron still had hope, and still used that hope to drive himself forward. It was refreshing, that hope.

"So," Cameron said, sounding much more cheerful, "do you want to hear about the time that Drew used her Charmspeak to get Clarisse to stay silent for a whole day?"

Annabeth found that she very much did.

• • •

In the middle of the sea, rocks jutted out of the waves like clawed fingers extended towards the sky. The rocks surrounded a beach littered with stones and sea glass, and it was the only piece of land to be seen for miles.

A lone figure stood on the rocky shore, staring out at the midnight sea. The water was an inky black that threatened to consume the tiny island, but somehow, the island had resisted it for centuries and would continue to resist. But the sole person standing at the edge of the waves cared very little about the battle between land and water; he was more concerned with finding a way off the island.

"What are you doing?" a voice asked from behind him.

If he had turned around, he would have found a beautiful girl standing there, illuminated by the fire from the torch she carried. He would have seen the way her brown eyes squinted with concern, the way her shoulders sagged as if she was carrying a heavy burden upon them. But the boy did not turn around; his gaze remained fixed on the invisible horizon, the place where the line between the night sky and black sea became blurred.

"Go back to sleep," he said finally, when it became clear that the girl wasn't going to leave him alone.

"Sounds like some good advice," she said while walking towards him, carefully stepping to avoid the sharp pieces of rock and glass that littered the sand, "maybe you should consider taking it yourself."

"Can't sleep," he muttered darkly.

A year ago, the girl would have left him alone out of pity. She would have left him to his thoughts and moody brooding. But there was only so much pity that could be given before she was unable to tolerate it.

"So you decided a more productive use of your time would be to come down here and keep watch?"

Her words were as sharp as the broken bits of glass on the beach, but the boy didn't so much as flinch. He was like the sand that rested at the top of the beach, where it began to bleed into dirt; he was eroded.

"No one is coming," she said, this time more gently. "No man finds Ogygia twice, and it's dangerous to think that someone might just stumble upon this place and rescue us."

The boy gave a wry grin that was devoid of any humor. "And yet, here I am."

The girl rolled her eyes. "I think everyone knows you're not like most men, Percy Jackson. Besides, I'd call you being here more of a cosmic fluke."

Percy shrugged. "Cosmic fluke or not, I'm trapped here just like you."

His gaze was full of sorrow, sorrow that did not belong on a face as young as his. When Calypso had seem him last, he had been almost five years younger. He had been less sad, but still so young to carry that much grief and regret in his eyes that looked so much like the ocean. When Percy had first appeared on her island all those years ago, she had looked up at the moon and prayed to Artemis.

Protector of all children, she had prayed to the moon's full face, please take care of this child and ease his burdens. He's too young to carry all of this; he's just a boy.

When Percy had left Ogygia, Calypso had been certain that Artemis had listened to her prayer, that she had intervened to help this war-child and bring him peace. But Percy had done that impossible task and returned to Ogygia, and when he had, Calypso knew that Artemis had never listened to her. His eyes were so heavy upon his return; he didn't stop crying for days, calling out that name that had sparked such jealousy the last time Percy had visited: Annabeth. Sometimes, it was said with tender desperation. Others, it was screamed agonizingly into the night. But more often than not, the hero that had slain countless monsters and Titans whimpered her name between choked sobs.

There was nothing Calypso could do to heal a broken heart except be there for all of Percy's needs. She never turned him away, not even after he attacked her a few months into his exile, demanding that she provide him a means to escape. More than anything, Calypso yearned to, but the raft simply never arrived. Calypso had held him afterwards, when he broke down into sobs. He was older, but still far too young. Sometimes, Calypso managed to forget her own old age, but she always remembered it when she held Percy. He was much taller than her, and much stronger, but he never failed to fit into her arms.

Annabeth was dead. That was the truth that Percy had been forced to accept, but Calypso knew he would never fully accept it, not until he saw her body. Some days, she was scared that he would find a way to break into the Underworld and demand that Hades tell him what happened to her. Some days, she was scared that she would wake up and find him dead by his own doing. But every day, she stayed with him, and in return, he stayed with her.

"I've spent thousands of years here," Calypso said to him playfully, "surely you're not bored already?"

Percy shook his head, but it was absent of a smile or any recognition of her joke. "It's not the boredom I'm worried about."

Gods above, Calypso half wanted to storm into the Underworld herself, just to force any gods hiding down there to see what they had done to this boy, who was once full of light and hope. Can't you see what you've done? she yearned to scream at them.

But Calypso never got what she wanted, so she swallowed down her frustration. "Nothing is going to change overnight," she said simply, "so let's go back to sleep before the Sun comes up, okay?"

Percy said nothing, but the exasperated sigh sounded enough like affirmation for Calypso to take him by the hand and lead the son of Poseidon away from the water and back towards the place that they had been forced to carve into a home.

The gods must be laughing at us, she thought later as she watched Percy feign sleep, his back turned towards the door, just two people drowning in their own misery, unable to save the other from themself.

But if there were any gods laughing, their laughter was as silent as the midnight sea. So, Calypso had to be content with glaring at the moon through the open door.

When does a child stop being a child and start being a warrior? she asked the distant silver Moon. He's been fighting for so long, doesn't he deserve to rest?

The gods had never been keen on providing answers, so Calypso had to drift off to sleep, the Moon silently mocking her in the sky.

author's note
i hope you enjoyed! there's only two more chapters until the end of the first part of this story, and that's where things are going to start getting good.