Chapter Text
Fate is not fickle.
Or at least, Sena Strand does not think it is. She has lived too strangely, too many times, to believe that fate is something as incidental or willful as fickle. For that implies that they chose loyalties to one person or another, and from her own experience, The Moirai had only ever made choices for the order of their own determination. What that is, she hasn’t quite figured out. Whether it be a grand plan, whether it be Chaos or all of that she does not know. One does not deter or change fate, however. That is folly. For fate is a combination of weaving threads of will, and chance. The Moirai weave the strands of lives with the intent of the others, the order of the universe, with a dash of chaos… Maybe. That just might be her biased opinion.
It is that chaos that caused… Well.
Her .
And she thinks it is because of the chaos and the order of the universe that she meets Percy Jackson when they are both twelve years old.
Or maybe its because she rarely feels comfortable in camp, in her cabin space, and feels suffocated in Luke Castellan's dark, sharp gaze. His behavior as of late is escalating, and her only recourse is dodging him anytime they don’t have mandatory lessons. He has been poking and prodding, more and more about her godly parent. Rude and insensitive at best, at worse, dangerous and alarming. Of the fact that she has been in camp longer than anyone- nearly all twelve years of her life, found on the beachside of the camp, ‘wandering’ the sand dunes with naked but the pearls woven around her, all of four years old. That she is ‘unclaimed’, does she not feel sad, little Sena, does she not feel angry?
He has been paying attention to her now that he had not paid before, giving her smiles and warm touches on her shoulder, tugging at her hair- Annabeth's glares growing with each fond touch, the teasing press of his lips to her forehead… Trying, trying to carve himself into her heart.
Her mother is Love , after all, even if she has not ‘claimed’ her, and she can feel how he is trying to coax her to feel something other than respect for her Cabin Head.
She feels it. Feels how he has already weaved and charmed such a spell over several other campers- To a startling degree. And it worries her. It’s almost Charmspeak- not as potent as her sibling's work, but enough to send a shiver down her spine. Worries her heart desperately, because she cannot counter it as her siblings do. Especially since it is not a healthy love, neither philia nor storge, it is mania, it is heavy and cloying and makes her skin itch. No one else seems to feel it- But then, not even most of her siblings feel Love as clearly as she does. They can weave it, and form it, but they do not feel as she does.
They are not touched by their godly siblings. They are not Blessing and loved by Aphrodite and her beloved Erotes. Because her Mother and her godly siblings love her. Love her with an ache and desperation, the heavy way that all the gods love. Possessive. All consuming. Jealous and perhaps, cloying and too much. Godly love is not easy to hold, to have, it is a heavyweight, a heavy price upon her shoulders.
It is both a privilege and duty to have the love of her godly mother, and her godly siblings, and Sena takes things like that seriously.
Because once, she had studied and studied creatures like them in another life. She who died, who lived and worshiped the Hellenistic Pantheon, but, oh, oh, had she loved Aphrodite and her brood the most. Her memories of the first life, Doctor Dove Little are a little vague- distant as the stars. But she remembers enough and she knew too many stories of Aphrodite and her brood, of her connections to several goddesses, every changing and adaptable across time and landmasses. She was Ishtar, she was Ianna, she was Astarte, she was Aphrodite, she was Venus- She was beauty and war and love, she is brilliant and made the other gods kneel as nothing else did . She was one of the only female deities that acted the same as the King of the Gods and absolutely reveled in it.
Petty and caprice, generosity and gentleness, beauty, love and war, all of it made her Mother .
And she is both dangerous and brushed aside, both feared and dismissed. Caged and corralled into a space of meaninglessness in a combination of male scholars and eons of people twisting and warping her to be as frivolous as possible. They only see her beauty, her avarice, and do not see her Power .
Or when they do, they do all they can to have it, or suppress it- Perhaps that is why Luke is trying so hard with her. He senses it, senses that fraction of power simmering in Sena’s skin. That comes from her ever-changing eyes like a physical weight… Because her powers- her powers are very different from most of her mortal siblings.
Sena knows why . She is not bitter at her Mother for this difference, for this show of her devotion and her love in her difference. She worshiped her mother in ways her other siblings did not, could not, would not and so she was gifted as her other siblings weren’t. She cannot, does not feel shame in it, because she knows she lives a dangerous balance in her second life.
She is a cosmic mistake.
A Choas Gift, my Lord Brother had called me, with love in his ancient, wild eyes.
But she is seriously, jealously loved and she is protected, despite, or even perhaps because of this mistake.
“ Chaos Gift ,” a voice calls her in a croon, a flash of something ancient and older than even Mother in it that makes her visibly, physically start at the sound.
Sena’s heart beats viciously in her chest, a bird, trapped against bars in a cage, her breath hitches, and strangles in her throat, and her palms are slick and cold. Her knees shake at his voice, deep, but somehow boyish, and it takes her more than she can say to turn towards it. A man, or perhaps a boy on the cusps of being a man, stands on the windowsill in her room, tall, silhouetted by the gauzy curtains that her father had chosen.
He smiles, his eyes glowing a vivid, brilliant red.
Slowly, he floats into the room, and she realizes upon his back are large, gorgeous wings of the purest white. They beat, once, twice, and she feels a wind on her face. It- the scent is heady, woodsy, and a hint of something dark and sweet. Sena does not flinch, even as the god- and she knows he is a god- lands delicately in front of her.
He towers.
He looms.
She feels Power. On her tongue, in her beating heart, and she can only look up and in awe. The god reaches for her with a smooth, tanned hand. He touches her hair, with a delicate hand, and runs it through the glorious mane of black curls, spun like the finest silk. Curls like his own, and she realizes as he looks up at him that his lips, full and cupid, are hers, as are his cheekbones, as are the set of his lovely brows… Better, more defined, as it is in a young adult, but also perfect, as a god should look.
“My son,” her Mother says, serious and urgent, voice melodic wail, “No one- no one can know of her. They will take her back . Or worse, throw her into the maw of Tartrous for her very defiance of the natural order! Yet she is innocent! And mine! My son, we are in need of help. We must protect her!”
In the other room, Sena’s father slumbered on. He would not wake, Sena knew, until her Mother was gone. He never did. It has been nearly two years since Aphrodite, the goddess of love and beauty had begun to visit her. She had been a toddler, young enough and pleasing enough for Aphrodite to dote on- and Sena had finally reached the courage to tell her of true her predicament just moments before.
Her Mother-
Her Mother had stilled, eyes wide, and nearly dropped her from her arms in her surprise.
Instead, she had placed her delicately on her feet and began to pace, furiously, her breath hitching into sobs as she went. She has not realized that she had started to be loved by the goddess- had only clung to the only proof she is not insane after her rebirth to her presence, so obviously supernatural. With her revelation, Aphrodite was wroth and distressed.
Sena ached .
So, Sena touched gently at Aphrodite’s supple, tan hand. Very much aware of the god who was still running a hand through her hair.
“But I am a mistake,” she tells them, voice gentle, and slightly startling for its highness and coherency, “I remember my past life and Elysusim. I should go back, Mother. I should. I will not cause you harm, or blame for me.”
Something flashed in Mother’s eyes. Something dark sounded like the gurgle of blood and sea in Sena’s ears. It screamed of lion snarls and the furious beats of doves’ wings. The flash of Venus’ light shined in the depths of those ever-changing eyes. Sena could taste seafoam and copper on her tongue.
Sena did not fear, did not flinch.
She only marveled in sheer awe, lips parting at the emotion she invoked on Aphrodite.
“Oh, no, no, I cannot, will not give you back . You were given to me . I do not share with those of the dead if I can help it, little one.”
Sena blinks.
“Your lover as Ishtar or Ianna,” the memory comes the easiest, more so than with the people she had loved, the face she had worn, the life she vaguely remembers she had lived, “Or in the case of this form of you, your lover and your fight for him with-”
A careful hand over her mouth. Aphrodite’s eyes glimmer with love. They shimmer and pull her in. Sena is not scared- she, after all, has eyes like her mother. They shimmer and pull as well. In Aphrodite, it is more potent, more true, and Sena sighs softly in awe and her own love. Aphrodite smiles gently. Her eyes are shining, and she realizes with a start they are all colors, a spectrum around her pupil, with perhaps pink being the strongest color.
“Names have power, little one,” her accent shifts, and her face grows tanner and different, but no less beautiful, Aphrodite sighs, or perhaps she is instead Ishtar, or always all of them, Ishtar, Ianna, Astarte, Aphrodite, and Venus. Shimmering and shifting between all forms of herself as her eyes shifted, “You know of me .”
She seems pleased at the prospect. Sena tells the truth, because what else could she do for her Mother?
“I was a scholar. I wished to uncover more of your origins and was infuriated how much love and beauty was twisted and bent to suit the needs of men that thought to own you when it was you who owned them . Who could destroy them and their ugliness… Fuck the scholarship of the -Ath- inventors of Democracy . Sparta, Rome- now they worshipped you as you should be. ”
Aphrodite sighed again, lovely and sweet. Stroked at Sena’s face. She beamed.
“Oh, I remember you. Eros. The scholar of love, how much we loved her and she is back and mine-”
“Oh yes, I remember her. Doctor Dove Little. You adored her. I adored her.”
Eros’s eyes gleam.
“And you, Sena, loved us. Worshiped us trying to write of us. We read many of your papers, your devotion of us.”
Sena flushes, and shuffles a touch. She remembers that even if she cannot even remember the color of her eyes. Now her eyes shift in touches of pink and lavender.
“You are part of love and beauty and war. How could I not ?”
Aphrodite beamed.
“So I defy the dead again, brought you to me, if perhaps unconsciously. That makes you mine, little one, and I will not let you go. My love is a jealous and possessive one.”
Another stroke down her face.
Her brother, her brother Eros of love, comes closer to her. His wings flare slightly, and his eyes are intent on her. Sena cannot stop her awed breath, even as he reaches into her space again. His long hand cups her face, carefully, delicately, and she watches as his white wings flex, just as their mother steps aside, hand on her shoulder. Telegraphing her movements, she cups his hands that envelope her face in return. She squeezes gently in complete and utter reverence. She is trembling as the god of love and desire holds her.
He smiles. Glowing, quite literally.
“Beautiful Dove, beautiful Sena ,” he says softly.
She barely breathes.
“I call mighty holy lovely and sweet Ǽrohs,
valiant archer, bearing wings. On your flaming footpath, you strike quickly,
as you play with Gods and mortal men;
Skillful, two-formed, you hold the keys to everything,
of the upper aithír, of the sea, and of the earth, and as much as mortals
are nurtured by the all-generating winds of Dimítir,
and as far as wide Tártaros and throughout the thunderous sea;
for you alone have command of all these things.
But, happy one, bring pure motivation to the initiates.
And cast out our vulgar desires,” she breathes back, licking her lips.
He beams and kisses her gently on the forehead.
“You must share this Chaos Gift, Mother. I cannot bear the thought of erasing her from my mind,” he looks back to their mother, “She will reach the age where she will be forbidden to you. But never to me. I am not her parent. I am her brother. I call myself her patron.”
Aphrodite smiled, wide and bright.
“Oh, with you my son, of course. Perhaps your other siblings in time… But first- We must set to protect our Sena. She is in danger, and mortal, yet.”
Sena swallowed. ‘Yet’. She knew what that meant. She did not give much thought to immortality, but she would file that away for ‘future-Sena’ to deal with.
“May I say goodbye to Father?” she asks, gently.
“Of course, sweet one, of course.”
She is reading- a hard feat for a demi-god. But she is nothing if not persistent. She may not remember all of the details of her first life, the Lethe had done that much but, she has retained her love of reading. In this life, it is all the harder. Her eldest brother, Eros is generous, he often gifts her with various tomes in various topics, all in ancient Hellenistic Greek. It’s easier for her, at least. Currently, she is reading a rebuttal of some scholars against her first life’s last paper. She frowned, leg jiggling as she sits at the foot of Thalia’s tree. She is leaning in her roots when the rain begins. She huffs, but she refuses to move. Red pen moving in ancient Greek against the paper in front of her.
She doesn’t want to see Luke’s face.
Not yet. She can avoid him now. She is upset. Annabeth spitted words of jealousy over his encouragement at their shared spear lessons with Athena’s cabin had… Had hurt . The head of Athena’s cabin was supposed to be her friend. Where was loyalty to philla, to storge? All for her fleeting infatuation! He had cupped her face with a small smile, and she had watched as Annabeth’s face had grown steadily redder at his actions. From a cupped face to a fleeting forehead kiss that had made a shiver run down her spine… She sends an earnest prayer to her Brother. Please, please, let not my heart be swayed, Brother, he frightens me in his own mania. She receives an answer.
She always does.
Never, little Bless. Her Eldest Brother is her loophole- he is not her godly parent, so he may interfere with her all he likes, claiming himself her patron god, even if it was done on the sly. The less attention Olympus had on her, the better her mother and her brood think.
Her mother and her godly siblings viciously exploited the loophole.
Lightning crosses the sky.
Thunder roars mere seconds afterward. The rain turns into a storm, even if Sena is quite safe underneath the brought of Thalia’s limbs. She presses her fingertips to her fellow demi-god's bark and soothes a hand down the roughness of her trunk. The Sky King is in an ill mood, ever since his master bolt had been stolen. Her Brother Eros had told her as much, to keep her head down, to look the other way to the quest that will probably pop up. Be not seen, Sena Strand, had been his exact words.
And demi-god she may be, but Sena Strand is quite content to stay away from such a quest.
But of course, chaos.
She was startled away from her book when there was an explosion. A boom that shook Thalia’s roots, that rattled Sena’s teeth. A large flash of light- A car skids across the foot of Half-Blood Hill.
Lightning flashed as she peek around her fellow half-blood’s tree, mouth gaping.
"GET TO THE BOUNDARY LINE!"
Sena jerks. Drops her book, automatically hiking her backpack up onto her shoulders. Her hand moves to her long bracelet, turning to a bow of celestial bronze as quick as breathing. Her heart beats viciously. She sends more prayers, to her Mother and the Erotes that were her beloved siblings. Her blood is singing as she looks carefully. Their alarm is muted, but present in her head.
{Don't do anything stupid, little Bless,} that is her eldest goldly sibling, Eros of love and chaos and desire.
His wife, Psyche, goddess of the soul, says to her, { Be calm, little Bless.}
Himeros, the god of sexual desire, twin of Eros, said. { You will destroy dear, Blessing. }
{Kick ass, little Bless, you’ll do really well,} cheered Hedylogus, the god of sweet-talk and flattery.
{Be safe,} Hermaphroditus, the god of effeminacy and androgyny chorused their voice a double-chorus, feminine, and masculine together, begged her gently.
Anteros, the god of mutual love and love returned fretted, wordlessly alarmed.
Pothos, the god of yearning and desire, also said nothing, but his sent-back prayer felt like a tug at her heart.
I will do my best to be unharmed, she prayed to her siblings and Mother alike.
There are three people crawling up the hill.
Two strangers and Grover . She sucks in a breath. Grover had been the one to find her at the beach, naked and stunned, barely above a child himself. She loved him he was familial love, strong and true. He is being half dragged by the older woman and the boy. Unconscious, or dead, and her heart nearly stops as she sees what is behind them.
The Monster of the Labyrinth.
"Oh no," she mummers.
Because she is going to do something stupid. Forgive me, my siblings, Mother. Their muted alarm turns furious. Sena raises her bow, breathing. May my aim be as true as yours, Lord Eros. May my hunt be fruitful, Lady Astarte. May you all bless me, my beloved Erotes. Arrow after arrow flew. Licking her lips as she looks at the runners, even as she kept a steady stream of arrows.
Draw. Aim. Release.
The woman is mortal, the boy is half, and judging by the expression, wild and confused, he has been protected in ignorance. Draw. Aim. Release . The celestial bronze of her bow and arrows shimmers in the dim light. Draw. Aim. Release . She is not as gifted as her Brother with the bow, nor her mother in her Astarte form. Draw. Aim. Release . Not even near them. But she is not a god. Draw. Aim. Release. Simply god adjacent, so what she lacks in talent she has made up for in dedication and stubbornness. Draw. Aim. Release .
When she lets the arrows fly, they hit . Draw. Aim. Release . The Bull screams in wordless fury. It begins stomping up the hill toward her. She dodges back. Draw. Aim. Release . Nimbly staying across the boundary line, back and forth to taunt his bad sight. Draw. Aim. Release . Even as the woman grabs Grover with her son and starts dragging them in the opposite direction of her as she distracts the monster. Draw. Aim. Release .
She is soaked in seconds. Draw. Aim. Release . Her bare toes squish into the grass as she grips for traction. Draw. Aim. Release.
"Hurry! PAST Thalia's Tree! The big pine one!" She screams.
The Monster was big, his muscles thickly corroded, unless she got a shot into his eyes, her arrows were little more than an annoyance. Draw. Aim. Release. But it would surely piss him off and cause him to follow her as she dodged back and forth from the boundary line. Then she realized her mistake as she dodged back one last time.
The woman was mortal.
She couldn't enter the camp. She would be stuck on the other side with the Bull. She seems to know that. The older woman flings her son and Grover over the line.
"GO!!" She bellowed, even as the Bull turned towards her.
No.
Sena acted. Stupidly. She crossed the boundary line just as the Bull charged for the woman. Draw. Aim. Release. War sang in her blood. Lions snarled in her chest, and sea foam frothed in her mouth with a hot copper taste. She bared her teeth. Draw. Aim. Release .
“MOM!” A scream from the other half-blood.
He crossed the boundary line again. Sena swore as he gave a single, stupid running leap toward the Minator to defend his poor mother. He jumped atop of the bull. The Bull bucked, he roared. The boy held to the horns.
Draw. Aim. Release .
"Your name!" she screeched, to the woman.
Draw. Aim. Release . Draw. Aim. Release .
A gamble. She doesn't know if this will work. She runs to the woman, even as she neatly sidesteps the Bull last moment.
"Sally Jackson!"
"I give permission for Sally Jackson to enter Camp Half-Blood!"
Sena grabbed her arm and yanked.
The woman passed the Wards. Sena nearly sobbed in relief as they skidded past Thalia. Thank you, Thalia Grace, thank you. She turned to Ms. Jackson's son as he yelled. The Bull slammed into the Boundary line just in front of him, roaring as his head smashed, the boy still holding on to his horns. She breathed in another swear.
She ran forward, arrows flying. Draw. Aim. Release . Careful, careful, trying very hard not to get the boy impaled by the celestial bronze.
“ Själ! ” She yelled, loudly.
The wings of her backpack, ‘decorative’ sprout out, a flurry of scales turning real at her command. Butterfly’s wings, because her brother is not subtle in his love, and she feels her bare feet lift off the ground. Quickly, she adjusts, flying high and fast. She is still shooting arrows, flitting about the Bull with as much grace as she can. She has never fought a monster. Her Mother and Siblings had made sure of it. She wonders if they will find it charming or infuriating that the first of her monsters is the Monster of Crete, only made possible by Eros’ actions.
Somewhere along the way, the bull has realized that the arrows are from the sky now, blindly, as apparently, it has very poor vision, it thrusts its fists into the air. One glances off her right wing, and with a buckle, she is suddenly hurdling to the ground, off balance. A hand nearly wrenches her arm out of its socket when it grabs her, pulling her to the top of the bull’s head. She smashes against coarse fur, foul and smelling of animal and the storm. Her wings are still out, one bent awkwardly at an angle.
The boy had caught her mid-fall.
He screams. And with a mighty roar of anger, he rips a horn from the Minator’s head.
The Bull bellows.
The boy bellows louder.
“LEAVE HER ALONE!” He screams.
The horn is in the Bull’s neck. The boy twists it. Viciously, before he takes it out and stabs again.
Again.
And again.
Sena grips tightly at its spare horn as the blow proves deadly, even as the Bull bucks wildly and erratically in its death throes. I never thought I’d bull-ride! The Bull of Minos turns to gold monster dust. They fall nearly ten feet to the ground in an ungainly heap. She is touched when the boy reaches a trembling hand to her wrist. Fluttering at her pulse point. His chest is heaving, and she can hear how hard he is inhaling.
"We need to get in the boundary like Groover and your mother… It’s like a force field. But with magic," she explained, eying the stunned face of the son.
Somehow, they are on their feet. Automatically, the boy hooks his arm around her, and they stumble across the boundary one last time. She breathes easier. No more monsters- but if he’s fleeing Minos’s bull then he was safer in camp.
She nearly slipped on the wet grass as she wobbled towards Grover, dropping to her knees, hands shaking as she pressed herself into his space. Her wings fold back into her backpack, seemingly decorative once again, and she tsks as she realizes her gift is damaged. She’ll have to take it to the forge. She reached deep within herself. Pleading quietly for the aid of Astarte, healing blooming in her as she reached for her friend. Her hands glowed a soft pink that had the other boy gasping.
"Grover, buddy," she murmured, hand going across his pale face, " Please. "
She thinks something would die in her if Grover died. She loves him- steadily, easily. Storge , family, her brother if she could dare to claim him. He had found her, him barely twenty, her four. She had been wandering the dunes, more than a little stunned at how her Mother had upended her life. All for her own good, sure, but it was still a confusing time. He had looked at her, with his wide, wide eyes, and simply taken her hand and gently guided her to camp proper, not just within the boundaries… She thinks he is the closest thing she had to a friend her age, now that Annabeth is pulling away from her.
"Food," he mumbled, groaning, his eyes fluttering, “Oh. Sena, hi. You‘re looking horrible.”
Sena laughed. She felt like sobbing in relief.
"Fighting monsters will do that, Grover… I'll feed you enchiladas, I promise bud," she reached over and kissed him gently on the forehead.
“Cheese?”
“With that extra spicy salsa. I promise.”
“I failed,” he whimpered, soft.
She cupped his face.
“You’re here, your charge is here, as is his mother. You didn’t fail, buddy.”
"Erh- what's happening? Mom?"
"I didn't know mortals are allowed into camp," said Sally Jackson, and it's directed at her.
Sena frowned. But keeps her attention on Grover. Concussion, twisted hoof. Nothing life-threatening, but it would not look good for Grover’s attempt at a seeker’s license. She soothed her hand down his stubbly face. He leans against her palm.
"They generally aren't. But I figured if you can summon Monsters, Mortals would work the same way. Sorry. Ms. Jackson-"
"Call me Sally, dear. You just saved our lives."
"Mom-" desperation in the poor boy’s voice.
Sena sighs. Runs another hand soothingly down Grover's face. He would be fine… He just needed rest.
"My name is Sena Strand," she says, simply. Looking up.
She reaches. She carefully presses a hand against the boy's deeply tanned hand. When she meets his eyes-
Sena blinks.
His eyes are like the sea. She breathes. Oh.
"I-I’m Percy Jackson," he sounds a little stunned.
She smiles. She knows she’s pretty. Her mother wouldn’t allow anything but pretty in her children, but it is still flattering when someone reacts to her. She can’t remember if she had been pretty as Dove, but she can remember she had never been anything close to as beautiful , as she is now.
"I know you're confused. And scared . But we have an injured Satyr whom I love very much, and an unauthorized Mortal in a mortal-free zone. We need to deal with those things. Okay?"
He blinks quickly. Slowly nods.
"Okay."
"You any good at pinochle?”
He blinked.
"No?"
She found his confusion adorable, if ill-advised. Her lips quirked.
"Pity. Sally, can you help carry Grover?"
She looked to the older, beautiful woman. She was breathtaking. And Sena felt warmth for her when she realized her eyes shifted colors. Just like her Mother and her’s did. She wondered if she was a legacy. A grand-niece. She was beautiful enough for it. She had this… Barring. Something more that all the children of Love held. The ‘it’ factor. She did not seem to be her sister, but perhaps she was. It wasn’t that odd for the children of Aphrodite to be overlooked, or overprotected in the world. Sena guessed that it was because Aphrodite had an appetite for powerful men, or at least men with some measure of wealth to protect their children.
Sally Jackson nodded.
“Percy,” she turns back to the boy of the sea.
His eyes scream of it. She is reminded of Lord Posiden in his gaze. The man that had looked at her and asked gently if she was a child of a naiad of the sea last Christmas. He had been very kind and spoken to her about various things, and she had shyly asked questions that she hoped hadn’t been too disturbing. It was stupid she had caught the attention of one of the Big Three while avoiding the other. She… She had known Hades, and Lady Persephone as Dove, and following her Mother’s urging, she had avoided the death deities and Lady Demeter just in case they recognized her to some degree. No need to rock that particular boat, her mother had warned.
It was why she looked at Percy’s eyes and kinda… Knew. She swallowed. A child of the Big Three was quiet… Problematic. Especially with the mess with the Sky Father’s missing master bolt. But so was she, as a reincarnated soul with too many memories of her first life, to her Mother and sibling’s true godly love, to the very accidental in-between state of her invoking not just her Helenestic Mother but her other aspects because of her memories of her first life.
“Yeah, uh, Sena?”
“We need to go to the Big House now. Long story short, Percy Jackson, Hellenistic or Greek mythology is real. The gods, the monsters, just like Minos’ bull. Don’t call any names unless you are directly invited to or want attention. Names have power, okay?”
“Um, okay.”
She smiled.
“You’re father is a Greek god, making you a half-blood, or a demi-god. Like the original Perseus or Helene of Troy. Like me. Okay?”
His eyes were wide. He looked desperately at his mother. She nodded quietly, tears dripping down her face.
“Okay,” his sea eyes were wide and processing. Sena leaned forward and squeezed his hand.
“Cool.”
She looked over to Sally. She licked her lips.
“Sally, I need you to eat and drink something from the camp, now. ”
Sally Jackson blinked, quickly.
“Okay, sweetheart.”
Sena reached for her backpack. She found a container of camp-grown strawberries and a camp flask of water. She handed them to Sally. The woman ate a single strawberry and sipped at the water. She gave the flask to her son, who gulped it down greedily. She knew the water would do the boy of the sea well, and this water tasted sweet and good.
“Ready?”
“Uh, no, but, well, let’s do this?”
She beamed.
“Yeah. Let’s do this. Help your mother with Grover, will you?”
Sena shouldered her backpack. She sent soothing prayers her Mother’s and brother’s way.
All safe, she murmured in her mind, I didn’t die.
Little Bless, I will utterly get you for this. That was reckless, growled her eldest brother.
Her godly siblings grumbled and cheered for her in a Chorus… And then a sweet trill of doves. Her siblings fell silent. Sena froze.
Good hunt, my little lioness, cooed her mother.
I didn’t kill anything, Mother Astarte, she replied, her lips quirking slightly.
Oh, dear lioness, you did well to assist. First blood. Atalanta did much the same against that silly Calydonian boar.
Percy picked up the horn, gingerly, looking a little bewildered. Gently, Sena smiled at him.
He blushed.
Sena pretends not to notice.