Kathreen POV

After we finished with the tour, we returned to the Big House where Chiron was waiting for me. There was no one else around except for a group of demigods playing volleyball. Or at least pretending to play volleyball. As soon as Nico and I showed up they stopped playing and started gawking at me.
"So Kathreen," Chiron said. "What do you think of our camp?" I didn't say anything. Truthfully, I thought the camp was amazing, but I didn't belong here. We could never belong here.
Chiron frowned slightly at my unwillingness to answer, but he quickly covered it up.
"Well, I've been talking to the campers in the Hermes cabin, and they've promised that they will respect you as a guest and that you are welcome to stay with them."
"No!" I blurted without thinking. It shocked both Chiron and Nico, and the volleyball players who been listening to the conversation while they played dropped their ball and stared. Frantically, I held my hands in apology. "I'm sorry! I didn't mean to offended the cabin, or Lord Hermes, it's just . . . I'd rather not stay with a bunch of demigods." I looked at Nico. He looked like what I'd said had personally offended him. "No offense." I'm half monster, I added in my head. Our parents try to kill your kind. We shouldn't mix.
"It's fine," Chiron said. "Even though I know next to nothing about you, I guessed this might happen, considering what you are." What I am . . . Yes, exactly. I'm a what. "There are a few spare rooms in the Big House, you're welcome to stay in one of them." I bit my lip.
"That'd be great, thanks."

I looked around the room they'd given me. It was very sparsely furnished, with a bed by the window and a nightstand with a lamp set on it. I had twenty minutes before dinner, they'd told me but I didn't want to go back out there. Oh, what I wouldn't give to have my journal with me. A wild thought popped into my head suddenly. I ran over to the nightstand and pulled it open. Yes! The drawer contained a pack of stationary and some pens. I'd paste it into my journal when I got the chance, I decided. I grabbed a piece of paper and a pen and wrote until the conch that apparently meant dinner sounded.

Nico POV

              Kathreen showed up late to dinner. Dinner was about to start when she came running to dinner from the opposite direction of the Big House. Every demigod in camp turned to stare at her and she blushed bright red, looking like she would like nothing better than to be out of this situation. She stood there for a while, obviously wondering where she should sit, after all she was entirely unique here. Luckily, Chiron waved her over to the head table before it got too awkward.
When everyone went to sacrifice some of their food to the gods, I was worried it was going to be another awkward moment, but she surprised me. Kathreen dumped some of her food in and whispered two names, Zeus and Demeter. Zeus I could understand. She's half storm spirit, he's the God of the sky. Also, if you didn't have a godly parent Zeus was kind of like the default god considering he's king. Demeter however, that made no sense. No sense at all.
Then Kathreen did something no one could understand. She walked over to the campfire, which was flickering softly, and dropped a strawberry into it. The fire blazed up gold momentarily, then went back to normal. When Kathreen turned around she was faced with over a hundred staring faces. She blushed, and walked back her seat to eat.

After dinner, while everyone was preparing for the evening program I asked Kathreen about her odd sacrifices. She jumped when I tapped her on the shoulder, and I got hit by her good wing as it flew out on what I assumed to be instinct. It was like sticking you hand over one of those super powerful fans. Her wing was air, but it was solid, and cold. There was something else as well, but I couldn't place it. Anyway, like before, having only one wing left her off balance and she tilted to the side. Luckily I caught her before she fell over. She turned around to face me as she fixed her wing.
"Don't scare me like that!" She said, staring me down. Standing this close to her I noticed things that wouldn't have been visible from far away. Her storm gray eyes were constantly shifting, as though they were filled with storm clouds, occasionally lightning would even seem to flash. Her hair as well was constantly moving, fluttering and quivering as though caught in some unknown breeze.
"Do you have something to ask me?" Kathreen demanded, and I realized, to my horror, that I'd been staring at her.
"Yes, I was curious, why did you sacrifice to Demeter? And what was with the campfire thing?" She blushed bright red when I mentioned this. I realized it might have been something rather personal. "You don't need to tell me if you don't want to." She hesitated, then sighed, and spoke.
"I don't mind telling you, it's just hard to explain. We live on a sort of rock shelf suspended above the abyss. We don't truly live in Tartarus, but we might as well be. Half of us are orphans, our parents think we're freaks, demon spawn." I blinked, most half blood parent issues were with our godly parent. Our human parents never seemed to have an issue with us being half god. Who wouldn't? But if you weren't half god . . . If your magical parent was the opposite . . . How might your mom or dad react to that?
"Are you one of those?" I asked. She shook her head.
"I'm one of the lucky ones. The half of us who have a parent who cares usually spend the weekend with our parents, the rest is spent at Camp T."
"Camp T?"
"Inside joke. It's short for Camp Tartarus. Anyway, since we all live at camp, we have to pay for food, clothing, shelter, and all that stuff. The parents we have send us money monthly for their kid, and we get donations from older . . . people like us, but it's a tight budget.
"So about thirty years ago the people living at camp got together a bunch of money, and built a green house where we can grow vegetables."
A green house? In Tartarus? "I see that look on your face, no it wasn't easy. It still isn't. We have to pay for the UV bulbs lighting the place, the carbon dioxide and oxygen tanks, the water, the soil. We've made it easier over the years, but we need all the help we can get. That's what the sacrifice to Demeter was for. We sacrifice to her, and in return she sends us money and other gifts." I nodded.
"And the campfire?" I asked.
"Hestia. The campfire is your hearth." She gave me a look like that should be obvious. It wasn't. When I continued to look confused she groaned.
"We practically live in hell, Nico. It could hardly feel like a home. Hestia is the goddess of hearth and home. Everyday we don't go crazy is something worth thanking her for." With that, she got up and left.

Hello, I think this is my longest chapter yet. Yay for me! Any way, I'm doing some editing to fix grammar mistakes and stuff. Some things might change so feel free to reread! And please comment!