~ ☼ ~

A few weeks went by without much change. Chiron never found out about our secret party, but we never got to have another one. Instead, we all trained. I was forced to spend time in the sword fighting ring, clanging Liakada against random kids' swords, and when I fought an Ares kid, I was nearly maimed. The feud was on fire now, literally - Michael had, stupidly, led some of our siblings to fire bomb the Ares Cabin. I was terrified when it had happened, and was now waiting for the Ares Cabin to come kill us all in our sleep at any given moment.

But at least Alec had stopped sneaking off to find the sickle. I guess he'd given up after I'd told him about Hemmings. What he was doing, weirdly enough, was training like me.

While I sword-fought and Riley shot archery, he was spending half of his time learning how to properly fight with a knife, occasionally giving me that beaming smile from the other side of the ring whenever he did something well. I would say they were nice to see, but it didn't feel right. None of this did.

~ ☼ ~

Then, Percy came back from a routine raid, this time on the Princess Andromeda, the yacht Luke Castellan used to run. Where Hemmings had escaped from. Percy was able to escape too as he blew it up, but Charlie Beckendorf wasn't. We had yet another funeral, and this time... it was basically the final straw.

If Silena was cheating on Charlie like the rumors said, we'd never know. Now, she was spending all her time crying. Plus Charlie's cabin, the same one that had lost Alexia earlier in the summer, was absolutely devastated. The feud got worse; Lacey kept shooting me glares every time she saw me; Alec, Riley, and I grew more distanced. War was coming. That much was clear.

Then, one day, Percy Jackson sent a message. Before we knew it, we were being gathered to go into Manhattan. Specifically to the Empire State Building. And I was terrified.

"Everyone into rank and file!" Chiron called out, as we gathered by the passenger vans to take us downtown. "Cabins 4 and 5 in Van 1, 6 and 7 in Van 2, and 9, 10, and 11 in Van 3!"

It wasn't everybody who was being called to the Empire State Building. A bunch of the pre-teens were left behind again, ostensibly to defend camp, but I wanted to believe it was because Chiron didn't feel good about sending them into war. That just made me feel worse. I eyed Will from afar, hoping the next time I saw him again we'd have good news to give him.

Then, we were shoved into Van 2.

To my chagrin, we were with the Athena cabin. Alec and I were placed together, though, and I watched Lacey walk by with little but a sneer my way. Alec glared back at her. Then we settled in for the long car ride to our certain doom.

"This is insane," Riley said, across the aisle from us. "I'm not ready."

"Neither am I," I said. "I can't do this."

"Yes, you can," Riley said, reaching over to pat me reassuringly on the hand. But it didn't help. With Liakada between my legs, I felt like I was going to explode. This wasn't right. I - I couldn't do this.

"No, I can't," I repeated. "Riley, I run a freaking 20 minute mile."

She made a face. "You're kidding."

"I am not!" I said. "This is wrong. I'm not going to be able do anything. I can't."

Her voice was growing more serious. "Well, you're going to have to. I'm sure nobody thinks they can, but here we are."

"The Ares Cabin does."

"Were you listening?" She frowned. "The Ares cabin isn't participating. They feel their honor has been damaged by Michael 'stealing' the chariot."

I blinked. You had to be kidding.

"I know," she said. "Trust me, I know."

"Gods," I said, putting my head in my hands. "This is so-"

"You know what, AJ? At least you freaking have powers. You could've brought your hypnotist violin, but you didn't, and now you're complaining."

I was taken aback. I'd never once seen Riley mad before; other than her anxiety about her powers, she spent most of her time in a serene mood. Then again, maybe that was only because she felt safe. And now she didn't.

"Riley..." I said, thinking of what the Titaness had said. That Riley had thought she'd known what was true, and now she'd had her entire life flipped upside down. And what had I done to help her? Pat her shoulder awkwardly.

"Forget it," she said, shaking her head. She tapped her seat partner, a very uncomfortable Brynn, and made them switch places so Riley could look out the window. I let my nostrils flare, then I did the same, turning towards Alec. Like we were a couple going to bed angry.

Ugh. Completely in character metaphor, AJ! You're a great person!!

Now, I hardly wanted to face Alec, but it didn't matter, because he wasn't even paying attention. This just made me more upset.

"Alec," I said. "Do you still dream of the woman?"

"What?"

"I asked if you still dream of the woman," I said. "You know who."

His face went shadowy. Then he said, "I don't want to talk about that."

"You're kidding." I sighed. "Alec, come on. It's kind of important. There's no better time to talk about-"

"It doesn't matter," he snapped. "Okay? It doesn't matter. Because we're us, and we're not on the Titans' side. it's some titan trying to manipulate us."

"Well, I want to know who it is."

"Why? In two days, hopefully they'll all be dead again anyway!"

He said this loud enough that a few people overheard; when they shot him suspicious looks, he quickly said, "We're talking about the Titans."

"What are you trying to figure out?" asked a child of Athena, having overheard.

"Nothing," Alec said. "It's nothing."

I was thankful we were on the same page there, because I sure as heck didn't want anybody else to be involved. They didn't need to know that we had a titan communicating with us. That just put a target on our back, made us seem special...

"Oh," I whispered again, now that no one was paying attention to us anymore. "That's why you're upset. Because - you think it's because of you."

"It's obviously because of me," he snapped. "I'm the demi-titan."

"That doesn't mean anything. She hasn't said anything to me about you, or your father, or anything-"

"She's his wife," he said, and a chill ran down my spine.

I didn't know what to say.

"You figured out who she was?"

He was looking out the window again. We were hardly out of the north end of Long Island, but I didn't know geography well enough to say where that was. I just hoped we got to Manhattan before the titans took over and locked us out.

And I thanked the Gods that my parents had only vacationed there for the weekend after they'd dropped me off.

"Yeah," Alec said, after a moment. "The night after the party, I snuck into the Athena cabin and stole some of their books on titans. I figured it out. I was focusing too hard on the star aspect, but the clear answer was there all along. Clear. Ha."

He shook his head, then wiped sweat from his forehead. I watched as he leaned down to grab something from his bag, and noticed a few bags of ambrosia and nectar in there. Then they were gone as he zipped it up.

He had a note pad and pen, and most of the pages were already covered in scrawl, I assume relating to stuff from the infirmary. He flipped to an open page, then wrote one thing down. A name.

Theia.

The name rang in me like a bell. I knew, instantly, he was right, for a reason I couldn't say. It just fit her. Theia.

"Who is she?" I whispered.

"It doesn't matter," he whispered back.

"Yes, it does," I said. "Don't keep the information from me."

"It doesn't matter," he said, through grit teeth. "Okay? Just freaking forget about it. She's my step-mom."

"Well, she's been haunting me more than she's ever haunted you," I snapped. "For my friend that's about to head into battle with me, you're being really freaking evasive."

Then, with tears suddenly springing to my eyes, I stood. Alec watched me, surprise instantly coming to his face, but I didn't care. I needed to be alone, like I was back home. I just needed a moment. So I stormed to the back of the van. That was technically illegal, but, you know, so were child armies.

I found a single seat by myself and plopped down in it, my heart racing. I knew why he was keeping it to myself, but when he knew I wanted the information so badly, I didn't understand why he was keeping it from me. It hurt. For all his talk about it being the three of us, he wasn't exactly committed to the bit.

"Tough luck," said someone. "I know what it's like."

Gods above A&*!$NGFE(%!

Lacey took a seat beside me, here to taunt me as always. She smelled like her floral perfume, and had leather armor strapped to her chest like the rest of us. Her dark hair was tied back in a braid. She reminded me so much of him it hurt my chest, but at this point, all of my crush on him was gone. This meant I was less willing to let her walk over me.

Or so I thought.

"How's the sword?" she asked.

"Good," I grumbled.

Then she leaned forward to touch it, and I quickly pulled away. "What is your problem?"

She leaned back, raising a finely tuned eyebrow. "I don't know what you're talking about. I don't have any problem."

"You just tried to touch my sword!"

"I'm just curious," she said. She simpered, then said, "I don't have a sword, just a dagger. I just want to see how heavy it is."

She gave me puppy dog eyes, and, you know. They were a child of Athena's.

"Can I see?"

"Fine," I said. Reluctantly, I gave it to her, and relaxed as she examined it. With both hands holding it like they were scales, she weighed it.

Then she looked at me, and said, "You couldn't have used this to save him?"

My heart shattered.

"I- I tried," I said. "I- he died to save someone else. I didn't have time to do anything. I swear."

I yanked Liakada back from her, but my hands were weak. It clattered to the floor, and tears came to my eyes. I could hardly hold myself up, leaning my head against the cloth-covered seat back.

I felt Lacey tense.

"Who'd he die to save?"

"I'm not going to tell you that," I said. "You'll just bully her, too."

I looked away, sniffling. A moment later, I felt her get up from the seat beside me and go back to where she'd been before. I hardly had the energy to rejoice. I just picked up Liakada and held it close to me like it was a teddy bear.

When I was relying on a gift from Apollo for comfort, that's how you know I was doing really bad.

I felt pathetic. Everyone was mad at me or dead. The only people who weren't were my parents, but they didn't know I'd witnessed murder. They didn't know I was going to war. 15 years old. Frick. This was so stupid. I was so stupid.

I pulled my knees up to my chest and leaned my head against the window, wishing Argus was driving, so I could at least hear some music.

~ ☼ ~

A/N: These chapters are so short that they're giving Maximum Ride