For the first time in a long time, I am utterly terrified.

Well, that's not strictly true - I feel like demigods in general live in perpetual fear. It's not always noticeable, not always crippling, but it's there, like a word on the tip of your tongue. Or an empousa on your tail, hurling unflattering insults about your dress size from a mouth drenched in the bloody deposits of their broken nose.

The latter's more fitting, in my opinion.

For forty beautiful, miraculous seconds I ran, unscathed and brimming with the hope that Artemis might be able to track me and send in some much needed reinforcements before things got too dicey. Then my internal timer fell to zero and the empousai were on me.

They'd attacked without warning, coming under my fragile guard and lashing out with a combination of nail filers and jerky hooves that I only just managed to avoid with a tricky shoulder-roll maneuver - which ultimately had me tumbling head first into the broadside of a barn (it looked like a barn anyway, an imposing structure painted in a rusting red that exuded a strange scent of hay and dung).

The game of cat-and-mouse (more like vicious-bloodthirsty-tigers-and-pathetically-whimpering-demigod) spiraled disastrously from there, on a level so suckish it was only rivaled by my last stint as captain during a game of capture the flag (a really long story that's rather dangerous for my health, so I'll save it for another time). The empousai have cornered me dozens of times in the last few hours, peppering me with superficial wounds with more bark than bite before I could coax an opening from them and dash off for another unrealistic hiding place.

Which I've only just spotted through my haze of terror and adrenaline.

I careen into the intricately-carved doors, uncaring of the soaring architecture that unfurls before me as I stumble across the patchy, sound-swallowing carpet. Heaving in lungfuls of sweet, divine oxygen, I twist sharply on my heel (nearly throwing myself off balance enough to smack my head into an adjacent column) and slam closed the doors - right in the Miss American faces of those homicidal cheerleaders.

That's gonna hold them off about as long as me defending the flag from Percy, I think morosely as I slide the first suitable object I can find - the busted end of a candelabra, maybe - through the double doors' handles. And last time he knocked me unconscious for about ten minutes by accident.

My heart hammers in my chest, a familiar staccato beat that pulses in time with my ragged breathing and my sloppy, quickened steps across the dusty floor. Shadows fall from the rotted window frames fixed high above me, drowning out the feeble sunlight scattered haphazardly throughout the deadened space. Nothing stirs apart from the dust bunnies that sprint away from my drunken, wild steps.

I'm alone, and I am petrified, and I find myself wishing for someone to mockingly shout "Katniss" just so that I can turn my bow on them in a frenzied assault to work off these nerves prickling every available inch of skin on my body. Or maybe it's just me missing the sound of Jasper's superior tone. I don't know, nor do I have the time to sit and meditate on it. From the disheartening creaking sounds coming from behind me, I doubt I'd have even enough time to take down Will in an archery shoot-out (a notoriously easy feat for my brothers and sisters; Will's yet to win a single match against any of us, the poor boy).

The dark tinge to my vision clears slightly as the minutes wear away, and my surroundings come into sharper focus. I blink, looking around. Rows of oiled, wooden pews, the remnants of colorful glass in the broken window frames - and directly opposite the bulging doors, a man hammered to a cross.

I can't help it; I smile. The irony is too rich: A child of the gods taking refuge in God's house.

Thud.

I wince, forcing my aching feet forward again. Those doors sound like they'll give any minute... Gotta see if there's any place to hide... Not that it'll matter. Me and my useless bow against two pissed-off bionic vampire goats? Oh yeah, I'll just play a little Whack-a-Monster. That'll go well.

Right about now, Jasper would be condemning me for my frosty sarcasm and its counterproductive nature in times of crisis, even though he'd be arguing with his own lofty brand of mockery.

Oh gods, I miss him.

Him, Isaiah, Will, Percy, Annabeth - Hade's gyms shorts, I'd even endure Mr. D's torturous habit of calling me Lizzy if it meant I was seated around the mood-fire again, belting out some cheesy demigod campfire song and trying not to strangle Jasper while he ignores me in favor of his latest for-the-advancement-of-demigod-kind-that-is-so-totally-going-to-work-and-not-blow-up-in-my-face project.

"Gods, Lyra, what in Hades is wrong with you? You're being counterproductive again, somehow. Be positive, stay in the present." I rub furiously at my eyes with a clenched hand. "Heh. Death by crazy chicken might not earn you a spot in Elysium, but tragic encounter with two empousai probably will." On that upbeat note, the war that's been raging in my superficially wounded legs abruptly ceases, and my knees give out, sending me diving for the floor, pounds and pounds of KO'd dust bunnies shooting up on impact.

I stare unblinkingly at the vaulted ceiling, wondering just how cruel the Fates really are, to have me die here of all places, as far away from my Grecian roots as possible. Far away from my friends, my siblings, far, far, far from the family I barely know. The family I still want to know.

Well, if I'm gonna die, might as well say goodbye. I just hope it works when I'm not calling for backup... I fish out the lone drachma I swiped from Jasper and hold it at arm's length. A snippet of sunlight catches its golden edges and flares like a misguided halo, making me squint and sneer to keep back the black spots threatening to eclipse my view.

Another smile crawls across my lips, dredging them up from their melancholic curves. I haven't talked to Mom in ages.

Not ten feet away from me is a patch of sunlight and shadow imbued with all the colors of the rainbow, courtesy of a quarter of a lamb's face that's remained intact for however many years this place has been abandoned. It's not a real, prismatic rainbow formed with a kiss of misty spray, but it's all I've got, and I pray to ever benign god and goddess that I can think of that Iris accepts my offering.

"O Goddess," I croak, swallowing a cough as some fine silt sneaks up my nose during an inhale, "please, accept this offering and... and let me talk to Samantha Cithara - er, unless it's Samantha Daniels now... oh whatever her name is! I just want to talk to my mom!"

For an excruciating moment after I've flicked the gold coin into the glittering shadow, nothing happens, and my brief rush of hope fades to a dull throb of resign, just behind my heart.

Then, miraculously (more irony, considering who and where I am), a rather vapory version of my old family room shimmers into existence.

But it's not my mother whose face next greets me - it's two identical ones I haven't seen in years.

"Lyra!"

"Ly-Ly!"

"Oh, hey, Freddy, Amy," I greet weakly. I can distantly hear the empousai's whining catcalls, but it sounds as though someone's shoved socks in their mouths, muffling the venom.

Frederick and Amelia - my younger twin brother and sister - smile some kind of symmetrical grins, pressing as close as they dare to their own watery mirror-gate. "Where ya been, Ly-Ly?" Freddy asks serenely. My scrapes and bruises must be too indistinct for them to make out with this crappy reception, because neither twin looks any more than absolutely pleased to be seeing me.

"Here, there," I reply as nonchalantly as my hyperactive, fear-addled brain can manage, "I even went somewhere a little while ago. Real fun, somewhere. Lots of weird people, though."

They giggle in unison and my heart constricts with a fierceness that momentarily shuts down my respiratory system.

They look like Mom, I realize, now that they've grown into those chubby cheeks of theirs. Bright blue eyes, a single dimple on their right cheeks, curly blonde hair that looks sturdy enough to survive a weedwhacker. We barely resemble each other besides the glossy cerulean hue of our eyes. I take after Dad, apparently, though I've never seen him myself to confirm it. I've asked Percy on ocassion if it's true, that I'm like Apollo, but all he's ever said in response is variations on "Gods no, you're nothing like your dad!"

Once he even added, "I mean, your poetry isn't that bad."

He misunderstood; it's a frequent problem with the children of Poseidon, I've noticed.

"Are you coming home soon, Lyra?" Amy pipes up, startling me, as she's suddenly thrust her inquisitive face much closer to the indefinable barrier between us.

My throat swells up, but I force the words off my uncooperative tongue nonetheless. "Yeah. 'Course I am. Why d'ya think I'm calling?" The lies taste bitter, a far-cry from the sweet bliss of my stolen ambrosia.

And just as I think I can't take it anymore, seeing their exuberant faces, hearing the whoops of delight that must have the neighbors banding on the adjoining wall, that I can't let them see me collapse in tears - they're gone. Brushed away like an artist painting over a piece he can't quite stand to look at any longer, replaced by a face... that looks almost disturbingly like mine.

"Hey, daughter o' mine! You look like you're in a tight spot. Want me to recite a haiku detailing my awesomeness to lift your spirits?"

Oh hello, Daddy.
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This chapter is written by Arctic_Sky (P.s. this is the last chapter she wrote so the next one and everyone after that will be by me. But if she does want to write one I'll let her and make sure she gets acknowledged!