Previously:
One jar of dirt and three games of pool later (because Thanatos refused to give up trying to beat Hades) we were on our way to a stair case that Hades said would lead us to camp.

I just hadn't realized where exactly it would lead to.

We emerged from a hole in the ground in the middle of the pavilion.

"Percy!"

"I thought he was a virgin god," I whispered to Nico as people were still settling into their seats in the Big House.

Hecate and Thanatos were chatting quietly away in the corner. Lilith was on her father's shoulders, both she and her father looking too content for anyone to tell her to get down. The wizards and witches that followed me to camp sat in between the gods and I on one side of the ping pong table. Chiron sat at the head of the table, and Mr. D and Grover sat at the other end.

"Oh, gods, Percy, you can't just—" Nico groaned and dropped his head in his hands. I could see his ears turning pink despite his efforts to hide it.

"What?" I asked.

Nico cleared his throat and lifted his head to look me in the eye. I could still see some pink dusting his cheeks. "He sculpted her from clay," Nico said. "He suddenly wanted a child but not the...normal way."

"Oh," I said. I looked over at the two of them and smiled. "He's a surprisingly good father."

I realized that this way, he would be able to hang out with her more often because she wasn't technically a demigod. And yet she wasn't really a goddess either. She was somewhere in between.

Chiron cleared his throat, likely an attempt to get the meeting started. Although it could have just been an attempt to get me to shut up. Either way, it worked; those standing found a seat.

All through the meeting, I watched Harry and his friends carefully. When the news about Harry carrying a piece of Voldemort's soul was broken, they weren't as surprised as I thought they would be.

"That explains what Lilith said at lunch today," Harry said in realization. He made a face. "Why did it have to be Voldemort's?"

Thanatos looked down at his daughter proudly. "Your powers are growing, dear." He said. "Soon you might be able to help me as I reap souls."

Lilith smiled widely as Chiron moved us along in the conversation. An image of little Lilith following around Thanatos dressed as the Grim Reaper popped into my head. I couldn't decide if it was creepy or adorable. "How are we going to get this soul piece out of Harry?"

"Ah," Thanatos shifted in his seat uncomfortably. "That is where it gets a bit more complicated."

"Like it wasn't before?" Penny said from where she was leaning back in her seat. She had taken to leaning her chair back on it's hind legs. I think she got that from me during the school year because I have never seen her do that before.

Thanatos explained the different ways we would get the Horcrux out of Harry. Said wizard only looked at his hands as the god of death explained the consequences of each choice. No one liked the idea of any of the choices. Gathering the Horcruxes to call the one out of Harry would take too long. Becoming the Master of Death would mean a life potentially without his loved ones, and he could potentially still die as Voldemort killed him even though Thanatos almost guaranteed that it would just be the Horcrux that would catch the killing curse. Not to mention that someone else might kill Harry on accident before the Dark Lord gets to him or before they gathered the rest of the Horcruxes. Thanatos pressed that it had to be Voldemort firing the killing curse for it to work.

Harry and his friends sat shocked. I looked nervously at Ron and Ginny to see that they were verging on heartbroken. I wasn't blind to Ginny's feelings for the Boy Who Lived. Nor to Harry's growing reciprocating feelings. It was hard for me to watch as they realized that if they chose a life together, Harry could be in for a world of hurt despite the fact that Harry could choose to lay down the mantel whenever he wanted.  He was noble enough that he would want to make sure there was someone else competent to take over for him if he chose to do that. And considering how long it took for Thanatos to find the perfect person this time...who knows when that would be.

Hermione was asking her own questions, likely trying to find a loophole somewhere else. She wouldn't find one. Penny's already tried.

"Alright 'Mione, that's enough," Harry said, putting his hand gently on the table in front of her.

"But Harry, I thought that maybe—"

"No, I've made my choice." Harry said.

Thanatos' eyebrow rose in surprise, reflecting the feelings of all those there. "Already?"

Harry nodded nervously, though not without conviction. "I felt this was the right choice the moment you explained it." He said, avoiding eye contact with everyone but Thanatos. "I can't explain why but I know I need to become the Master of Death."

"Harry, are you sure?" Penny lowered her chair slowly to look more closely at his face. "The other choices may be harder but we can do them. Dumbledore is already looking for the other Horcruxes. We already have three of them. I know this seems like the easiest choice, but—"

"That's just it, Penny," Harry interrupted. "It's not the easiest choice." He sighed before looking at the rest of us in the eye. "The other choices are the easier ones but a lot more could go wrong with them. We don't have the luxury of waiting much longer if we want to end this war. Besides...I heard somewhere that it's better to take the harder right than the easier wrong."

A sense of pride swelled up in my chest, though it was hard to smile at him because I knew in part the life that awaited him if he followed through with this choice. It was something that I had feared myself when I was offered immortality before.

It seemed like Ginny couldn't take it anymore, however, because she shot up from her chair and left the building.

"Ginny, wait!" Harry called after her.

"Leave her, Harry," Hermione put her arm on his shoulder. "I'll go after her. You and Thanatos do what you need to do...I'll—I'm—" she cut herself off as she tried getting a hold of herself. "—we'll make the best of this, Harry. You won't be alone for as long as—as long as you have us." Then, looking like she was holding back a sob, she ran after Ginny.

"Ron?" I prompted, watching him carefully.

He had been staring at the table with an intensity that rivaled a basilisk. He took in a deep breath and nodded. "Do it, Harry." He said, raising his head to stare him in the eye. "It feels right to me too. We'll deal with the rest—and Mum—later."

Another swell of pride filled my soul as I watched my brother support his closest friend. He's grown so much since I'd met him. Then I realized he was talking about Molly Weasley finding out about this and the blood rushed from my face.

- - -

The last few weeks we spent at Camp Half-Blood flew by so rapidly, I had hardly enough time to IM Molly to inform her that all her children (informally adopted or otherwise) were perfectly fine and healthy. I left out the part about Harry becoming the Master of Death. I thought that it might be best to tell her that particular update in person. Not to mention the fact that Ginny was getting along surprisingly well with Clarisse and her siblings. That wasn't worrying at all.

The first time I had an official conversation with Clarisse after getting back was uneventful in comparison to all other interactions with the daughter of Ares. She had apparently come around to the idea that I wouldn't be coming back permanently to camp and made no mention of it. She took Ginny under her wing and you wouldn't be able to see Ginny anywhere without soon seeing Clarisse.

As a result of my fellow wizards and witches learning magic from the children of Hecate, wandless magic became more frequent. I think they all realized that the Trace from the Ministry had no hold on wandless magic so they were working on getting better before they returned to Britain. The dueling became much more creative because of this and I know Harry and Hermione were planning on incorporating some of the things they learned into lessons for the DA.

Harry was now taking lessons from Thanatos to learn more about his duties and powers. There were a few incidents where he was overwhelmed with the sudden increase in magic and it...leaked out, for lack of a better term. Everyone learned to tread lightly around him for the next few weeks. Thanatos said that it would take a while for him to get used to having so much more power. He might still cause things to break when he goes back to Hogwarts. We would have to be careful.

Ron managed to drag me to the stables to say hi to Blackjack before too long. He forced me to translate whatever the black pegasus was saying and I managed to convince said equine to give my brother a ride.

"Where are you living now, boss?" Blackjack asked during one of my last visits.

"In the UK, Blackjack," I answered. "Ron is one of my new brothers. Ginny is my new sister."

"Do you think I can join you over there?"

I rose an eyebrow. "You would fly across the Atlantic Ocean to meet me at Hogwarts?"

"Sure," he said as if it was no problem. "I can probably beat you there if I go now."

The other eyebrow joined the first one higher on my face. "We're leaving tomorrow morning."

"Perfect," he said, flapping his wings in preparation. "I just need a quick bite and maybe a few more doughnuts to hold me over."

I watched in amazement as he finished the last of the dozen doughnuts I'd brought him and got a bite from his food bucket. Before leaving, he got a few gulps of water from the trough and threw a, "See ya later, boss!" over his shoulder.

He was a speck in the sky before Ron found me, probably hoping to say goodbye to Blackjack before we left.

"Where's Blackjack?" He asked, looking around the field as if the black pegasus was hiding.

"He's headed off to Britain," I answered, still in shock. I shook my head. "He doesn't even know where to go."

"He's coming to live with us?" Ron asked, his eyes brightening.

"Yep." I replied. "I'll have to go look for him before he startles any muggles or Statute of Secrecy obsessed wizards when we get there."

"Awesome!" Ron said. He had taken too quickly to the American slang here. "I'm gonna go tell Ginny!"

There was one last thing I needed to do before officially being ready to head back home.

"Hecate, how is the potion coming along?" I asked as I entered the Hecate cabin. She was in the corner leaning over a steaming cauldron. Her hair was getting a little frizzy and Lou Ellen was across from her, by all appearances, helping her out.

Hecate huffed in frustration. "This would be so much simpler if Athena just swallowed her dam pride and removed the curse from Medusa's gaze." Said monster had become very fond of her snake hair. "We don't even know when we're going to be able to get more of the dirt from the fields of Asphodel."

"Hecate, you forget that Harry can now travel to the Underworld whenever he wants." I pointed out.

The goddess of magic looked up in realization. "Oh," she said. "Well, this potion is a pain to make, no doubt about it. It's almost—"

"Is it almost done?" I asked.

Hecate turned a piercing glare on me. "Yes." She said flatly. "Though not without it's difficulties. I have written down the recipe for you to give to Medusa when you get to Hogwarts. Have you drawn up a lesson plan for the students who don't have time to learn a whole language?"

I sighed. "Yes, though I am hoping that they will take to it naturally since they are Greek in some small way."

"Fat chance of that," Lou Ellen snorted. "They had no idea what the spells they were using in Latin even meant."

"They likely had never thought about it," I tried defending. Now both Hecate and Lou Ellen turned the same look on me. I rose my hands in defense. "Alright, well excuse me for hoping my job will be a little easier than what we're expecting this year."

The next morning we had planned on leaving at 6:30am. Because of packing and getting Ron to wake up, it was pushed back to 7:30. Then because Grover, Conner, Chiron, Nico, Rachel, Lilith, Lou Ellen, and even Clarisse wanted to say their last goodbye, it was pushed back another thirty minutes. At this rate, we won't get there until it's night time. I was hoping to get some shopping done in Diagon Alley and to see the twins' new shop before it was nightfall.

"Okay, is that everyone? We have everything? No one else is going to pop out of nowhere to say goodbye?" I looked around but didn't give anyone a chance to answer. "Right, then, everyone grab the Portkey, we're going home."

Turns out I wasn't going to make it to Diagon Alley today anyways. Molly insisted on feeding us right when we got back despite it being a little late for lunch and having us all tell her what had happened. Of course that meant that the news about Harry becoming the Master of Death was revealed so she ended up berating me for the remainder of the day. (That's not to say that she didn't end up becoming very proud of Harry somehow). Halfway through our retelling, Fleur Delacour gracefully flew into the room from who knows where.

"'Arry," she said. "Eet 'as been too long!" Then she caught sight of me. "Ah! Monsieur Percy, it is a pleasure to see you again as well!"

"Madame Delacour!" I said in surprise. "I had not expected to see you here!"

"Yes, she and Bill are getting married." Molly said, looking as if she were about to swallow a lemon.

"Well, congratulations!" I exclaimed happily.

The rest of the day was spent catching up. I quickly learned that Molly did not like Fleur very much and Ginny and Hermione quickly followed in her footsteps. Ron, on the other hand, tried defending her at every turn. Penny was withholding judgement for the time being. I think she was waiting for something, though I didn't know what. I had no problem with her so we got on great.

When it became nightfall, Albus showed up asking if Harry would help him in recruiting one of Hogwarts' old potion teachers. Horace Slughorn. That prompted an early meeting for this year that included Harry this time. I had to pull Hecate away from a meeting with Athena, where the goddess of wisdom was yelling at her about helping Medusa. So really I was saving her. She so owes me.

"So what has happened this summer?" Albus asked.

I let out a long breath. "What hasn't happened?" I started. "We went to Camp, heard a prophecy, went on a quest, went to the Underworld, found out Harry was one of Voldemort's Horcruxes, he became the Master of Death, we made a potion to cure Medusa of her stone gaze, somehow convinced Blackjack to come live here with us, won Capture the Flag with us against the camp, and...what else?"

"You forgot to mention that Harry is no longer a Horcrux," Penny added helpfully.

"Oh, right!" I snapped my fingers. "There's that too."

Albus sat stunned for quite some time.

"So what's happened with you?" I asked.

"I have discovered a location for another Horcrux." He said. "And I have been attempting to convince Horace to come teach at Hogwarts again. I think he may have a clue as to how many Horcruxes Voldemort created. And I have run out of applicants for the Defense position. I am going to have Severus teach Defense and Horace teach potions. But I dare say that my summer has not been nearly as productive as yours has been."

"Harry is going to need an outlet for his magic when he gets to Hogwarts," Penny started. "Is there something you think would work?"

"I think we could work something out." Albus said thoughtfully. "I think that the Room of Requirement could meet any requirements that we may need. Harry, you must be familiar with it's qualities by now?" His eyes twinkled.

Harry grinned. "Yeah, I could use that."

"Where is the location of the Horcrux you suspect?" Hecate asked.

"In a cave off the shores some distance away," Albus answered. "If you would like to join me, my lady, I'm sure we could overcome whatever obstacles there are."

Hecate considered that for a moment. "I think that would be fine." She said. "We can go tomorrow morning just to get it out of the way."

"Very well." Albus said. "Now, Harry are you willing to go with me to meet with Horace? I think that you would be very helpful as we attempt to change his mind."

Harry shrugged. "Sure," he said. "Are we going now?"

"I'm afraid so," Albus said, standing up. "We will be back a bit late, Molly, don't stay up for us."

I rolled my eyes. Of course she would stay up for them. But I wasn't going to say anything. I had a long day ahead of me tomorrow so I looked longingly up the stairs. "If you don't mind, mum, I'm going to head to bed. I still have a lot to do to get ready for the start of the school year."

"Of course dear, it is probably a good idea everyone else gets to bed as well." And with that, Molly shooed everyone up the stairs and into bed, despite protests that they weren't tired.

-            -            -

"Nico!" The very familiar voice made the son of Hades freeze in his tracks.

"Thalia?" He answered uncertainly.

"You said Percy was going to be here, where is he?"

"You missed him, Thals, he went back. I told you about him being here weeks ago."

"I couldn't convince Lady Artemis to let me come until now," Thalia groaned. "Does that mean I'll have to go over to Hogwarts to see him?"

"He said he might come next summer."

"That's too long," she complained. Then she straightened up. "That's it, I'm going to Hogwarts again. It just might take more convincing Lady Artemis to let me go. But when I do, you're coming too."

"What? Why?" Nico was taken aback.

"Because. Why do you need an answer to everything?" Thalia demanded before storming back out of camp.