Hi all! :D 

So, I updated early because I won't be able to this weekend... this is more of a filler chapter, but I hope you like it! :D

And I'm still working out the details of Thea's age- she'll either be thirteen or fourteen... Idk hahaha.

Enjoy!

~Edit~

Me!

Chapter Forty

~Thea's POV~

Kyle drags me out of the tent the next morning, even though I'm still half asleep. Literally, he drags me: he grabs my legs and hauls me out as I kick and yowl, Kyle seemingly thoroughly enjoying the process. He dumps me rather unceremoniously underneath an overhanging tree, next to Jack, who, unlike me, looks bright-eyed and bushy-tailed.

"I HATE YOU, KYLE!"

He walks away, laughing, his green eyes glittering.

"Morning Thea!" says Jack cheerfully. He's happily crunching on some sort of granola bar.

I glare at him, then break off a bit of the granola, "Hmph."

"Hey, that's mine!"

"Now it's mine," I say, popping it in my mouth.

Jack gives me a rather sassy look, tilting his head and raising one eyebrow authoritatively. I smile demurely at him.

Rolling his eyes, he asks, "How are you feeling?"

"Fine," I say, which is mostly true. I had slept moderately well last night, which was nice, and although my head still throbs occasionally, on the whole, I'm doing pretty well.

"Thea, could you come with me and Barton and get some water from the stream?" Kyle calls from the tent, which he has been helping Steve dismantle, "Oh wait, I don't even know why I'm asking, I'm telling you that you're going with me and Barton to get water."

"Why would I help you?" I demand, taking another bite of Jack's granola bar (he looks at me through puppy-dog eyes that I find hard to resist).

"Because you're a sweet, angelic girl who loves helping me, of course."

"Sweet and angelic?" asks Loki, who has appeared from the forest with Archer and Thor. The three of them have some sort of wild fowl thrown over their shoulders; they must have been hunting, "I don't believe those adjectives even belong in the same sentence in relation to Thea."

"I agree," says Kyle as I glare at a rather smug looking Loki. Kyle is wiping some sweat from his black hair- it's humid now that the sun is out, "I was actually being sarcastic."

"In that case," says Loki, who is still smirking at me, "I agree wholeheartedly."

In the end, I do, in fact, go with Kyle and Barton, mostly because I don't have any other choice. Reluctantly, I grab some of the canisters that Jane and Steve have set out and follow the two men into the forest.

"So," says Kyle as he walks behind me along the path that has been somewhat cut-out from us treading back and forth from the stream, "About that song last night- where did you learn how to play guitar?"

Oh, so that's why you wanted me to come with you to get water. And having Clint, the silent fighter, along would guarantee that you would have plenty of time to talk to me.

"I learned when I was around six," I say smoothly, paying more attention to the water canisters in my hands than to Kyle, still wanting to roll my eyes at his sneaky move. I should have known: Kyle is an expert in that field. If I stick around him long enough, he might actually rub off on me long enough so that I could potentially outsmart Loki.

"Yeah, that tells me who old you are, not where you learned," Kyle retorts.

I hesitate ever so slightly, "I learned at home."

He rolls his eyes, "Okay, Thea, do I need to spell everything out for you?"

"You asked me where I learned," I say stiffly, "And I told you."

The amount of facetiousness in Kyle's voice has reached the maximum, "Okay, because that's exactly what I meant."

I shrug.

"So who taught you?"

I shrug again.

"C'mon, this isn't a difficult question. I need to talk to them about your technique. Or lack thereof."

I glare at the ground.

"Okay, now you're just being stubborn."

I continue not to look at him, which has gotten more difficult because he has passed me up and is now walking backwards in front of me.

"Thea, for the love of heaven, if you could just answer-"

"I already told you where I learned!" I growl, finally snapping, "And for the record, you can't talk to 'them' about my sucky technique because he's dead. My brother taught me, you annoying prick."

The silence is so loud, it's deafening.

"Thea," begins Kyle, sympathy and regret apparent in his voice.

"No," I snap, "Just shut up."

And I toss the canisters to him and stalk back to camp, tears not of anger threatening to spill, but tears of grief.

*

Getting back at Kyle is not hard.

"All right," says Steve as we gather around near the remains of the camp, which has long since been dismantled, "You all know why we're moving- it's not safe to stay in one area, particularly because there could be...others...around." He pauses, glancing briefly at me. He doesn't exactly need to elucidate.
"So we're going to be walking around the far edge of the lake," Steve points roughly south, "And make camp there tonight. If all goes well, we should be able to go down to the mermaid lake tonight.

"We have a stroke of luck. When Archer was out last night, he came upon a herd of...er...parabi...I believe that's what they're called?" He glances at Archer, who has gotten more and more pale over the past couple days. Archer nods, and Steve continues, "All right. They're about half a mile away, and should take us down some of the steep embankment we have to cross."

"What are they?" asks Jack.

"I think they resemble horses, but apparently are more...otherworldly. They're hard to tame, but if there are some experienced riders around here, we should be able to pair up and manage the task."

As it turns out, the parabai are even closer to us than we had thought. I first spot one creeping out from the brush, and jump, running into Jack.

Steve is right- the parabai have a distinctly ethereal air about them. They're taller than normal horses, with spindle legs and long manes that reach the ground. They are all black, and have bright blue eyes that look translucent. They prance nervously about- there's about six or seven of them-, and only begin to calm as Archer murmurs strange words to the largest one, that has a white spiral around its forehead. As one of them snaps its mouth at another, I realize that their teeth are sharp. They're carnivorous.

Jane looks hesitant, although enamored, "You're sure these things are safe?"

Archer nods, "They're just spirited."

Jane clearly wants to argue with Archer, but doesn't have the heart.

Jack, in the meanwhile, looks eager, "Thea and I call that one," he says, pointing to a particularly rambunctious horse near the edge of the herd. It's a bit smaller than the rest.

"No way," says Steve, "The two of you are going separate."

"What?" Jack and I wail simultaneously.

Steve ignores us, looking around at the herd and then around us. "Nat, Clint, Thor, Loki, Max, and Kyle are going to be the riders. Tony's going to be in the suit, so everyone else can just hop aboard with someone."

It takes a few minutes to collect the parabai. Thor tames his first; it's a larger one with a bigger build and feathers on its hooves. He saddles it with equipment that Loki makes appear from thin air- evidently snatched from the abandoned ruins of Archer's palace and stored only a mile or so from here, in distant fields- and pulls it forward. "There," he says, his blue eyes filled with excitement, "That wasn't so hard!"

Loki rolls his eyes, then walks forward. In moments, he has a rope around another parabai- this one is thinner and one of the more skittish of the herd. It snorts and dances around, but allows Loki to lead it forward relatively pleasantly.

Eventually, all the parabai are saddled and snorting, ready to move.

"All right," says Steve, "Everyone else go ahead and pick one to get on. We want to get started now- that's a big lake we have to get around."

"You ready, Miss Thea?" asks Kyle, who turns his parabai around sharply, towards me.

My eyes narrow, and I ignore him, then turn my back on him. Before I know exactly I am doing, I have approached Loki, who is trying to calm his skittish beast, "Let me up," I say sharply.

He looks down at me through squinted eyes, "Ask nicely, kitten."

"No. Let me up," I say, wanting to get this over with.

He rolls his eyes at me, but then leans down and swings me up and over the parabai, behind him. "You really need to learn manners."

"No thanks," I say, looking coolly at Kyle, who is looking at me with an expression of half contempt, half remorse. I feel the teeniest pain of exacting my revenge on him in this way, but I ignore the urge.

Meanwhile, Jane has (naturally) hopped behind Thor, after making certain that Leah is secure with Max. Instead of riding behind her partner like the most of us, Leah is in front of Max- the better to keep ahold of her, I suppose. Clint is with Natasha, Bruce is with Steve, and Jack has jumped up on Kyle's parabai. This leaves Archer by himself, which he doesn't seem to mind- he seems to be content to stroke his mount, which is now significantly calmer than the rest of the herd.

In far contrast, it appears that Loki's parabai is the most restless. It is skittering around the copse of trees, moving in a haphazard motion so that it often runs into others of its herd. Loki is having a difficult time controlling it, and I say, "Could you have picked a more skittish horse?"

He ignores me, mostly because he is pulling the parabai back, away from Steve's- it had nearly pummeled it with its sharp hooves.

*

Eventually, the parabai settles down enough to be a reasonably reliable mount, although Kyle, who is riding right in front of us, often twists around in his saddle to look at me, possibly to glare at me. I later find out that he was just making sure I was okay.

Okay, I probably hadn't been the nicest to him- after all, I had picked to ride with Loki, which is the person Kyle dislikes the most- but I was still really upset with him. He had sort of pushed me, and even though I knew he hadn't meant to hurt me, he had. Kyle and I have had our spats, but this one had put me over the edge.

I'm also pretty sure Loki knows exactly what happened, or else something like that, because he's being unusually quiet around me. Basically, he's not bossing me around or snapping at me.

"Thea, stop leaning against me so much, you're being irksome!"

Never mind.

*

~Nobody's POV~

As it turns out though, Thea falls asleep against Loki, leaning against his back, her arms halfway wrapped around his chest and halfway falling to the side, lulled to sleep by the rhythm of the parabai. Once he realizes that she is sleeping, Loki stops snapping at her and, instead, occasionally turns his arm to make sure she doesn't fall off.

The path through the forest is rocky and occasionally steep, as it's below the mountainside, making for slow progress. Without the parabai, the task would have been practically impossible, not to mention dangerous.

When the sun reaches the peak of the sky, Steve signals for the riders to pull the parabai off to the side, in the middle of a field with tall grasses. "All right. We can stop for lunch and rest up. Archer, will these creatures stay put?"

Archer shrugs, "If I ask them to."

Steve nods, apparently assuming that Archer will do this without any more prodding.

"All right Thea," says Loki, prodding her, "Wake up."

"Nnnn..." she mutters, not moving a single muscle.

Rolling his eyes, Loki slides off the parbai, making certain Thea does not slip. Then, with a flick of his arm, he lets her fall. Her shriek comes to a sudden stop as, in a split second before she hits the ground, Loki swoops her up and sits her back on the ground.

"Are you regretting riding with me?" he smirks as she glares up at him, her hair mussed and her eyes still slightly glassy from sleep, reminding of Loki of a cat that had been sprayed with too much water.

"I regretted it as soon as I got on the horse," she snaps.

"Ooo, so feisty, kitten. Perhaps, then, you should have chosen some other outlet for your revenge."

Thea is not pleased, and stomps on his foot before walking away towards Jack. Loki shakes his head, but lets the matter pass.

Jack and Thea grab some of the sandwiches they had packed in their bag and sit, their legs crossed, a little ways away from the hullabaloo. The grasses are so tall, Thea's head is completely hidden, and the top of Jack's is scarcely poking out.

"It's like a little fort!" says Thea jubilantly. Afraid of losing her in the grasses, Max had made her promise that she would stick next to the much taller Jack ("And don't roll your eyes," he had added). Leah hadn't been allowed much farther than the temporary lunch camp.

"So," yawns Thea, leaning back on the ground  after she finishes her sandwich, "What do you think we're going to do? Run off into the forest?"

"It's not like we have the best track record," points out Jack, having finished his first sandwich and moving on to his second.

Thea rolls her eyes, "Oh c'mon, but there's nothing we want right now."

"You make us sound like a bunch of Slytherins."

"Hey, don't hate on the Slytherins! You're being stereotypical."

Jack looks at her shrewdly. "You took the Pottermore quiz, didn't you?"

She looks slightly abashed, "Yes."

"And you got Slytherin."

"Maybe."

Jack snorts, "You're so predictable."

"Evidently not," she says, "Because I got put in Slytherin."

"Yeah, because you're a sneaky devil."

She glares at him, "Like you're one to talk. Who's the one who infiltrated the security cameras last year?"

"Oh that," Jack waves the concern away with a shake of his hand, "That was just a bit of fun." He pauses, then adds, "And blimey, that was a long time ago."

"About six months."

"Six months is a long time."

"Technically not, but it seems like it has been," says Thea, "Six months ago sounds like a lifetime."

There's another pause. Then, Thea adds, "You got Slytherin too, didn't you?"

He smirks, "Nope. Gryffindor."

Thea's lip curls, "You did not."

"I did so! Ask Kyle, he was there when I took it last summer!"

"I was where?"

Kyle appears from the direction of camp, out from the cluster of bushes. He greets Thea with a raised eyebrow, then says to Jack, "I heard my name. Were you talking about the list of the hottest guys on the planet?"

"No," says Jack, "We were talking about the most annoying."

Kyle rolls his eyes.

"Was Jack sorted into Gryffindor?"

He looks at Thea and the two exchange looks. Evidently, the question proves that Thea has forgiven Kyle enough to carry on a conversation, and that Kyle has forgiven her for her temporary act of betrayal.

Then, Kyle says casually, as if nothing had happened, "Yeah, he did."

Thea looks irritated, "You're lying."

Kyle snorts, "No I'm not."

"I suppose you got Slytherin."

"Actually," Kyle says with a smirk, "I was in Gryffindor. And I don't need to bother asking which one you got put in."

Thea doesn't bother to reply to the fact that Kyle knew she had been put in Slytherin. "Well what about Max?"

"Gryffindor," says Jack triumphantly.

"I suppose that makes Kyle out to be Sirius Black," she says stiffly.

"Oh yeah, I could see that," says Jack wisely, "You know, black hair, loves girls, gets into loads of trouble, thinks he's God's gift to everything."

Kyle punches Jack in the arm, "So you're Pettigrew?"

"No," says Jack, wrinkling his nose, "I'd be either Fred or George. Or Ron, I guess."

"Where would Tony go?" muses Thea.

"Oh Ravenclaw definitely," says Jack, "And so would Bruce. And probably Jane"

"Nat would be Slytherin," says Thea.

Kyle stretches out on the ground next to her, "And where would Clint go?"

"Hufflepuff," says Thea immediately. 

"Are you bloody joking?" demands Jack, "He's not Hufflepuff!"

"Then where would he be?" asks Kyle.

"Er...I don't know, Gryffindor. It's a family thing."

"Well Leah's in Hufflepuff," says Thea, opening a can of water and letting the delicious liquid pour down her throat.

"I think all little kids are," says Kyle, ignoring Thea's rolled eyes, "Steve would be Hufflepuff."

"No, he'd be Gryffindor," argues Jack.

"Naw," says Kyle, stretching, "Hufflepuff."

"I'd say Gryffindor," votes Thea, putting her hand up, her voice echoey from behind in the cannister of water.

"And Thor would be Gryffindor too, most likely," says Jack, starting on his fourth sandwich.

"And that would make Loki, Snape," says Kyle.

Thea chokes on her water.

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Have a great day, love y'all lots!

~Sierra