When Kassandra was thirteen almost fourteen Luke had stolen Zeus' master bolt and the gods were ready to go to war. It was the first summer of Percy Jackson, the first summer that she was spending in the Apollo cabin. The skin had turned dark, a storm brewing outside their border so powerful that the forces of weather had begun to creep their way into camp, the lake had flooded over with water from the rain and the nearby river creating waves that should have been otherwise impossible. The sky was so dark that they hadn't seen the sun in days.

None of it was compared to the hurricane that beginning to form around Percy, the water from melted snow whipping and twisting around his feet. Water splashed behind her and she whirled around to see the waves reseed back only to come crashing forward once more. Even with the distance, he had such an expert command over the water.

"What's wrong?" she asks, stepping closer to him and further away from the lake that was still boiling.

"You knew?" he asks, tone impossibly low.

Kassandra looks him over, taking in Nico behind him edging away from the water. She jerks her hand, motioning for him to back up away. She eyes the volatile water.

"You were eavesdropping?" she retorts, gaping at him stupidly. She takes a tense step forward.

"You knew about Annabeth and the cliff and you just didn't do anything!?" he accuses, angrily moving toward her. Her clothes quickly began to soak through, thin streams whipping at her exposed skin. 

Nearly staggering under the accusation, heat ripples over her skin, a curse on the tip of her tongue and she has to force herself to try and appease her angry friend instead of responding to his anger.

(Because he had just lost Annabeth too, had just watched her disappear over the edge of a cliff with no way of knowing if she was truly okay, with no way of knowing if they would get the chance to see her again regardless of lady Artemis' reassurances.)

(And Kassandra had apparently blown up a helicopter in her grief, had screamed until she felt numb, because she had thought that she could make a difference -- be the difference to hold her back.)

When she had left Percy to the manticore, it was under the assumption that the others were right behind him, that they would fight together in that room instead of leaving that damned school.

"I had a dream months ago," she says. "I didn't think all that much of it. I didn't even expect for you to need to leave the school."

He moves like waves, fluidly getting into her space, and it's like he trembles, rumbling just beneath the surface.

Her heart shutters, dropping to her stomach as she forces herself to stand still.

"It's your fault that she's gone," he hissed. "You could have stopped her."

"Stoped her? The Hunters were about to finish him! She didn't need to move at all but he was targetting you and Thalia and Annabeth just moved to your defence," she seethed, unable to help herself from pressing into his space. "I tried to stop her! I ran for her but I couldn't--"

Percy scoffs. "Maybe if you weren't always trying to just prove yourself--"

"Prove myself? We agree on that plan to split up. You practically boasted that it would only take you a few minutes to wrap up, or are you Big Three Kids really not what you crack up to be?"

Water swirled around her, breezing across her cheeks. She wondered idly if it was moving fast enough to cut her.

"At least it only took me a week to be claimed," he taunts, nastily. "It took you like three years, didn't it?"

Rage burns through her, that deep well finally cracking with the force of the sun as she seethes with her anger, ripping apart with flames and glowing. Kassandra smashes a fist into his face, feeling the cartilage break under bare skin and she knows that she broke his nose.

Water bursts over her and for a moment she can't breathe as it drowns her, soaking her through and pressuring over her shoulders. Percy clutches his nose in one hand, gaze raging with destruction and green toxicity.

Lifted off the ground, she lashes out with a foot, catching him off guard to catch his hip hard with her second kick.

Then she drops to the ground coughing out water, a hand already on the dagger in her jacket lining.

"What the Hades' are you two doing?" Thalia demands, stomping down the path towards them. 

Shoving to her feet, she mutters a hymn darkly under her breath, cursing Percy only to speak in rhyming couplets for as long as she could possibly curse a person to do so (she does not pray to her father, not when he probably knew that Percy was listening to them and had just allowed it to happen, had just wanted her to be at odds with the boy).

"She started--"

"Leave it, Thalia," she interrupts, shoving by him, stopping next to his shoulder to lean closer and whisper, "I might not have warned anyone about something I didn't even think was really going to happen, but at least I didn't sit there doing nothing as she fell saving me."

And then she continues up the path, passing the daughter of Zeus with a sharp nod. She doesn't say another word as she heads straight for her cabin and she definitely doesn't look back as she starts to cry.

Winter at camp was very different than the summer, but not so much that she couldn't hope to recognize it. She had spent two full years at camp, after all, constantly training and learning the place from top to bottom, enjoying herself with whoever was up to messing around that day.

It was very relaxed in the winters, even if they had to attend lessons thought by the occasional satyr or Athena kid instead of Chiron -- for the centaur sometimes went out himself for the very serious cases, not that she would ever blame him for leaving them at the mercy of the satyrs or cabin 6.

The cabin was empty at the moment, but she already knew who was here based on which bunks looked most lived in at the moment and the letters that she would receive from the siblings that liked to keep in touch the most throughout the year.

Will had gone home sometime in November after he had gotten into contact with his mom. She missed him and wanted to know if he was willing to spend some time with her in Austin. Naomi Solace was a country singer that toured the south but he was free now and missed her son and had been trying to get him to come home to visit for a while, apparently.

Austin, Gracie and Victoria always went home, and Arthur came and went depending on his relationship with his step-mom, but Lee was always here, his bunk sorted in his uniquely messy style of his, and so were Michael and Christa.

It wasn't as bright as it would normally be and the plants that hung around the inside of the cabin looked a little sad, a little down.

She touched their leaves gently as she pulled her boots off at the door and left them on the plain black matt that they had left by the door. The single pot of red and purple hyacinths that they had by the window was standing tall and proud in the daylight, preening under the sun's attention. She kissed its petals, breathing in the scent of it as if it was going to ease her growing anger.

It didn't.

She trudged to the shower and back feeling as if she was housing a hive of bees beneath her skin, itching her as she slammed the door to her cabin and dropped herself dramatically on the bed -- a clean bed because her siblings were nice and were likely told that she was going to be coming and got her clean linen.

Kassandra laid there, twisting her flute agitatedly in her hands as she propped up her feet on the bunk above hers. She wiggled her toes in the socks that she had stolen from Michael's things and brought her flute to her lips to blow an angry shrieking sound. She hoped that everyone knew that she was in a bad mood before she started to play actual music (the latest piece that had bewitched her mind was Prokofiev's sonata for flute because it at least proved to be a slight challenge).

Her siblings found her in this miserable state, climbing into the cabin one after the other. Lee was quick to yank the flute from her hands.

"You're making everyone sad," he grumbles, tossing it back gently onto the mattress.

"No one here appreciates good music," Christa grumbles, flopping onto the bed to wrap her arms around Kassandra. She clings to her, pressing her face into her middle. "I'm very happy to see you."

Lee and Michael squeeze their way onto the bed with her and she's certain that for a moment that they're going to break the bed or that she's going to explode with her fury.

(She knows that if she shows him this darkness that's hidden in her chest, the burning plague of the sun that can scorch nations and spread flames, then she risked marring away their brightness, their goodness.)

She sighs, giving them the basics of what occurred that night, skipping a few details and finishing it off with her rather terrible fight with Percy.

"He tried to drown you?" Michael asks in disbelief.

She shrugs. "I broke his nose."

"He started it with the water. Neither of your should have said the things that you did but he took things too far," Lee said, eyes darkening as if clouded. "He deserved more than a broken nose and a rhyming curse."

"We should curse him to have a runny nose!" Christa yells. "That'll teach him."

"I don't want to teach him anything. He's my friend and we had a terrible fight so everything should be fine," she says, surprised that she actually believes the words enough to say them. She never had had a fight with a friend like this before, not with people that she had believed were close enough (and no, she didn't count traitors, she wasn't as stupid enough to consider them friends when she wanted to rip them apart and wear their teeth as a necklace). "I've never had to fight a demigod like him before, though. It was sort of intense."

"Intense? That boy hasn't seen intense yet," Michael says darkly. "If he wants a fight with someone another cabin then so be it."

She snorts, shaking her head at her siblings. She didn't want them fighting with Percy, not when she should have been the one to keep her cool. She knew that he was angry when she approached him, she knew she should have been much more careful when keeping her cool.

(And for some reason she cared about what he thought much more than she probably ever would. had he been anyone else, she would have tried much harder than to leave him with a broken nose.)

"We aren't going to start a war against Poseidon's son," she murmurs, head tilting toward the door at the sound of someone approaching.

Lee was there before they could knock, leaning his shoulder against the frame with his arms crossed. Form around her brother, she can catch glimpses of the boy as he approached.

He had two black eyes but his nose was straight. She guessed that they had sent him to get healed by the Apollo cabin instead of getting ambrosia. It made her wonder if they knew that she was the one to break his nose. They likely did but Mr. D would never actually care.

He shifts uncertainly when he gets to the door. He grumbled out a rhyme about capture the flag against the Hunters and something about him and thalia being co-captains.

Christa giggled quietly at his predicament. Kassandra couldn't help but smirk herself.

Lee nods, his back tense. "That's nice. We won't be turning up unless you've made amends," he says and slams the door in the boy's face.

She blinks at her brother, finding herself quite pleased with the outcome even if there was a small part of her that felt bad (not really, though, she hoped that they lost with cabin 7, that they couldn't find a way to counter without those that were always relied on most for defence).

"He didn't take things too far, but he also disrespected our father by eavesdropping on a conversation that very clearly didn't involve him," Lee announces. "He apologizes or they're on their own."

"He better work on that apology then," Michael says, stretching out on her to make himself comfortable. "We're the only ones here that can rival the archery of the Hunters."

"Oh, you should have seen the glorious shots that they were making, and lady Artemis herself! Gods she was amazing!" she gushed, playfully miming a bow and arrow very badly. "And they're so united! Zoe had them all so in sync before..."

A hand touches the top of her head. "Annabeth will come back. If Lady Artemis herself promised to find her, then she will be found."

"Yeah, you're right," she sighs. "But that doesn't mean that I don't want to go and help find her myself. We shouldn't have left without even trying to look for her."

"Trust that she'll come back," Lee advises. "In the meantime, try to relax a bit. You're on winter break, right?"

Kassandra rolls her eyes. "Some break it's turning out to be."

Michael shoves her off the bed and she catches herself on her hands, pushing to her feet. "There was a basketball game going on that we can probably get in on," he says. "Or maybe we can rope some nymphs in for a snowball fight."

She turns her gaze to her brother and drags in out of her bed. "I can go for some basketball. It's always fun to win."

"I'm sure the Ares cabin doesn't quite enjoy when we beat them out."

They chuckle, grabbing hoodies and sneakers -- her extra pair of camp sneakers in her case that she kept with the siblings that stayed year-round so that they could make sure that she didn't get them thrown out. The way that they only had a bit of snow and their inability to get cold easily allowed them to go without jackets was blessedly advantageous when they planned to be active, even if they did bundle Christa up a little, just in case.

The rest of the day passed with her spending time with her siblings and catching up on camp gossip. She spoke to the Stoll brothers about their antics, caught up with the Ares kids and learned that Clarisse MIA, found a minute to speak with the other people that she knew briefly, and even had a moment to introduce Christa to the Hunters.

(They were much friendlier now that there were no boys around. Zoe spoke her condolence for Annabeth, reminding her to keep her trust with the Lady Artemis. They spoke a bit of the Hunters' adventures, entertaining Christa with the stories.

And Kassandra didn't mind in the slightest when her little sister spoke of how cool they were, only warning her that she might want to be a little older if she wanted to go making any lifelong oaths and commitments.)

(The Hunters were much more fun to sit with as opposed to Bea Fallow. The Aphrodite girl could be nasty in an entertaining way normally, but with her counterparts of Paris and Carter -- her siblings and partners in crime -- away for the off-season, she found the girl just spiteful and mean, bored out of her mind, likely, with having to spend her time with Drew now that Selena was busy 'oggling that burly Hephaestus boy'.)

(Not that she was much better a companion with the stifling burning of anger, spite and. pettiness that crawled through her throughout most of the day. It was pathetic that she could become so pathetic when she was so lonely missing both wise girl 'let me jump on the back of a monster' Annabeth and seaweed brain 'I think I'm too good to take partial blame' Percy.)

(When Kassandra was thirteen, a few months after having been claimed, she had accepted an invitation from Ariel to go for ramen after school. It was a normal, typical day until her best friend had died.

And it sort of felt like that now, like losing Ariel, being betrayed by Luke and Chris and being stabbed, and hating her dad -- that's what it was like to fight with Percy and have not only Annabeth missing, but Clarisse as well.)

Dinner didn't make much of a difference, not that she didn't enjoy eating in the pavilion, but because it was tense.

They had heard Thalia and Percy yelling on their way up, had heard her screaming at him about getting on cabin 7's bad side and possibly pissing off another god as if he had a death wish. They had been yelling about Annabeth as well, her name getting tossed about until the daughter of Zeus had told him to find a way to fix things in time for tomorrow.

It had given the barbeque and pizza a bitter taste that she didn't want to let ruin her meal enough for her to skip eating -- especially when she hadn't eaten since yesterday like an idiot.

The tables were mostly silent as well, mostly empty, but the silence came from a lack of people, not from a lack of trying. It had been a while since she had been here for the winter break since she was eleven and her parents were still worried that she might be in danger if she stayed too long in one place.

Table 8 was quite lively in comparison with Zoe sitting at the head like a mother duck watching her little ducklings with pride. They were laughing and joking together -- Bianca trying to arm-wrestle Kelly, the big girl that had apparently been picking fights with the Ares kids.

"You think they would be up for a friendly competition between sibling cabins?" Michael murmured, casting a glance to the girls.

"I'm sure they would like any chance to try and show up Apollo's kids," Kassandra says, picking up her pizza and taking a bite crust first. "You know how they hate him. They'd never pass up the chance."

"We should be on their team for capture the flag," Christa says around a mouthful of chicken wings.

"They might let you and Kass if you ask," Lee tells the younger girl. "Would you ditch your poor brothers though? The poor brothers that look after you?"

Christa sniffs, swallowing heavily and turns her nose up at the boy. "Patrice would look after me. I can spend the winter with Patrice and visit Kass on weekends."

Seven-year-olds were a riot.

"You can stay with me whenever you want, Christa, but I'm way meaner than Lee will ever be."

The little girl pouts. "I'll just go and stay with Will, then. He's so nice to me."

Michael rubs his knuckles on the girl's head. "Will's too nice. If you stay with Will then you'll never be cool like Kass."

She laughs. "You say that like you had any say in how I turned out."

"I taught you how to shoot a bow," Lee interrupts, the only one of them to be anywhere close to finished.

"I would have figured it out on my own," she mutters, ripping off another mouthful of crust.

Her brothers rolled their eyes.

"Don't worry, Kass," Christa says with all the wisdom that came with her age. "I'll teach you archery if you ever need it."

When we'd finished eating, Chiron made the customary toast to the gods and formally welcomed the Hunters of Artemis. The clapping was pretty halfhearted (not from cabin 7, no, Kassandra made sure that they were properly welcomed by the children of their Lady's twin). Then he announced the "good will" capture-the-flag game for tomorrow night, which got a lot better reception.

They filled out after that, with Christa leading the way demanding that she get to pick the before bed music because Kassandra being home doesn't mean she gets to mess up the schedule.

They were passing the softly smoking hearth, the gently burning embers left absent as the Lady Hestia wasn't there to tend to it, when Percy approached her.

(Honestly, she had been painfully aware of his attention on her throughout the entirety of the meal, the loneliness that radiated from table three nearly baffling as she avoided turning his way, forcing herself to remain indifferent to his woes.)

(She hoped that it was because he wanted to apologize and not because he wanted to continue a fight because she wasn't opposed to duking it out with real intention this time because if he thought that just staring at her would make her crack and apologize then he would need to learn a thing or two.)

"Kass, do you have a moment to sit? I have a few words I'd like to spit," Percy rhymes miserably, head hung low and green eyes sad pools.

"Oh? You want to spit your words? That doesn't sound very nice," she says airily. "Maybe you should try speaking clearly."

He scowls at her. She nods to her siblings, sending them on their way. She tilts her head at him, looking him over.

"You know what I mean, right? I don't want to start another fight."

She groans. "Oh, gods, your rhymes are worse than Apollo. I really didn't think that one through," she mutters to herself, rubbing a hand down the side of her face.

"I said some terrible things, I just wanted them to pack some stings."

"No, what you said was true. At least that's what you think on some level," she says softly, not wanting to even admit as much to herself.

Percy ducks his head, shuffling a few steps closer. He looks at her with stormy green eyes, tired and sad, and almost pleading as he hesitantly reaches for her hand.

"I know that you might not agree," he says. "But I ask again if you'll trust me."

Kassandra closes her eyes with a sigh. "Percy, you can't just say things like that and ask me to trust you. I could have drowned."

"I can only be confident when I say it was an accident."

"That's not the point! I can understand why you would have gotten angry at me, but you weren't the only one that lost her. Don't you think I already felt terrible over what happened?" she demanded quietly. "Bad enough that I asked Apollo, of all people in the world, for help in figuring out if I could have helped her?"

"I'm not doing this because Thalia made me," he says, face twisting. "But I'm asking you not to hate me."

"I don't hate you, Percy, I'm just not happy with you. Neither are my siblings. They think you listening in on our conversation was not only offensive to me, but disrespectful to Apollo," Kassandra says, shrugging a shoulder. "I doubt I could ever hold a grudge against you."

"I'm so sorry for my impulsiveness. I am asking for forgiveness."

Kassandra rolls her eyes, crossing her arms over her chest. "Yeah, sure, but I'm still going to be angry with you for a while. I might demand a chance to kick your ass in order to restore my honour," she says. "And you have to make amends with my siblings and possibly appease a god while you're at it."

He groans. "Is there anything that I can do, because I'm not really sure I know how to."

"Sorry, man, but that's all you."

"Thanks for the chance to keep performing, but I should have received a forewarning," Percy grumbles, looking completely done with the rhymes. "I should have seen how your temper grows before I got a broken nose."

She winced. "I guess they were right about warning people when they got to camp about how I break noses. Yo need any help with that?"

He shakes his head, touching at the slightly swollen nose that had been straightened into place but nothing more.

"Did someone set that for you or did you do it yourself?" she asks, touching at it carefully. "Come by the cabin to get it set properly before it starts to heal crooked. You can try and get my siblings to lay off before tomorrow. I don't want to miss the game and they're serious about sitting out until you make things up to all of them."

"I'm surprised how easy it was to gain your forginess," Percy says, letting her lead him along. "Especially here without a witness."

"Did you want it to be harder? I can make you rhyme longer and have you beg in front of everyone. I am a very nice person, Percy, but not when I'm angry," Kassandra says, digging her nails into the delicate skin at his wrist. He winces but doesn't pull away from her leading touch.

"I know that you might have bust me," he teases. "But I know that you'll always trust me."

"Always? Don't sound so confident," she says, rolling her eyes.

(She hated how true his words rang out, as if he knew, without a doubt, that it would always be the case. As if she hadn't felt that way before about people who left and still didn't think that way from time to time, still didn't think that maybe Luke was right, that Chris was still a good person -- that she was still a good person that could be trusted.)

"Yeah, yeah, I trust you, Princess Prissy."

Percy twists his wrist and captures her hand in his, pulling her to a stop so that she could look at him. Sea green eyes were gleaming with silent laughter.

"I might just be a big ass," Percy says. "But I really do trust you, Kass."

The girl snorts. "I'm an ass, too, Percy. Now, come on and talk to my siblings before lights out. Hopefully, this rhyming shit will wear off by morning."

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^^my interpretation of bb kass

unedited

written: 2021-02-07

posted: 2021-04-05