chapter  VI

🌷  The next few days were torture, just like Tantalus wanted. He put her whole cabin on the worst chores for the rest of the week, and forced Daphne to clean out the pegasi stables every single night, on her own. The Hermes cabin glared at her every time she came in, obviously blaming her for their misfortune, and she avoided their gazes self-consciously.

It felt like everybody was mad at her right now apart from Percy. She hadn't spoken to Annabeth about Tyson, trying to keep the peace until they both burst. When Daphne got the time between her different chores, their conversations were clipped and short.

Finally, there was an afternoon away from her work. Kitty noticed how stretched thin she was and offered to clean the stables for her, leaving Daphne a few hours to relax by the canoe lake with Percy and Annabeth. She was laying on the blanket as the other two sat cross-legged, studying a plan for the chariot races Annabeth had started to doodle.

It was relatively quiet for a while, considering Annabeth had been micro-managing the sketches as per usual. Daphnes head was nestled into her arms, eyes fluttered closed. Between all the chores she had been forced to take up and her continuous sword fighting training, the little amount of time she got to sleep was spent laying rigid in her mattress on the ground, afraid to fall asleep and face her nightmares. Daphne was pretty sure she was cranky, and it showed. Percy had given her a very concerned look when she joined them and slumped over, giving them no explanation.

She wondered if she had dozed off for a second, because before she knew it, a couple of Aphrodite kids had stopped beside their blanket and she was looking at three pairs of expensive designer shoes.

"Hey, Percy," one of the girls giggled. "Do you need to borrow some of my waterproof eyeliner for your eye? Oh, sorry... I mean eyes."

Her brothers guaffed as they walked away laughing. Daphne sighed and opened her eyes, lazily looking at the lake before them. Percy had been teased mercilessly after Tyson was claimed - it was obvious his past days had been as torturus as hers.

Annabeth grumbled, "Just ignore them, Percy. It isn't your fault you have a monster for a brother."

"He's not my brother!" he snapped. "And he's not a monster, either."

Annabeth raised her eyebrows. "Hey, don't get mad at me. And technically, he is a monster."

"You know what he means, Annabeth." Daphne shot at her, chin resting on her forearms. "Stop being horrible."

"Well, you're the one who gave him permission to enter the camp." Annabeth said shortly.

"To save mine and Percys life!" Daphne snapped, pushing herself to sit up. The tense air surrounding them had been really annoying Daphne. What right did Annabeth have to still be annoyed at her? "Would you rather I let us get crushed?"

"Of course not! But you know how much I hate them. Cyclopes are the most deceitful, treacherous-"

"He is not! What have you got against Cyclopes, anyway?" Percy snapped.

Annabeth's ears turned pink. He got the feeling there was something she wasn't telling him - something bad.

Whatever it was, Daphne must've known, at least a little part of it. She was glaring at Annabeth in a way he'd never seen before. They'd only been close friends in his eyes, cuddling on the zoo express and huddling together in the nights of their quests. But today they were staring at each other reproachfully, like they were waiting for something to defend themselves for.

"Just forget it," Annabeth mumbled, averting her eyes. "Now, the axle for this chariot-"

"You're treating him like he's this horrible thing!" Daphne interrupted. "He saved my life, something which you couldn't even muster the courage to do!"

Annabeth seemed to have had enough. She threw down her pencil and stood, glaring at both of them. "Then maybe you should go and design a chariot with him instead!"

"Maybe we will!" Daphne flamed.

"Fine!" Annabeth shouted.

"Fine!" Daphne had stood now, facing Annabeth as they screamed at each other.

A few seconds passed where the two girls were staring each other down violently. Then, Annabeth turned and stormed away, all the way down to her cabin.

Percy watched them, stunned. He didn't really understand what had just happened.

"Umm-" he started. Daphne wiped at her tears ferociously and grabbed her bag, woven from seaweed. The naiads had taught her how to do it last year, and she kept it with her around the camp when she was preparing herself for a busy day.

She almost hit Percy with it as she swung it over her shoulder.

"Hey!" he protested. Daphne turned, eyes challenging him.

He faltered. "Aren't we gonna work on the chariot?" Percy said stupidly.

This only seemed to anger Daphne more. "Boys are idiots," she declared angrily, storming past him and making sure to bump her knee into his shoulder. He recoiled, left alone on the picnic blanket. Daphne had flown to the opposite end of the camp where Annabeth had headed, leaving an equally upset Percy in the middle.

He ripped out the page Annabeth had been drawing on and scrunched it up. Somehow, he was the bad guy between their argument.

The days passed with an awkward tension between the three. Annabeth avoided them by sticking with her siblings, and Daphne made sure to hang around with the Hermes cabin. Percy was left with Tyson to design their chariot.

But as time went on, it was almost as though the camp was getting sicker and sicker.

Daphne would find herself sitting at the top of Half-Blood Hill and watching the dryads come and go, singing to the dying pine tree. Satyrs brought their reed pipes and played nature magic songs, and for a while the pine needles seemed to get fuller. The flowers on the hill smelled a little sweeter and the grass looked greener. But as soon as the music stopped, the sickness crept back into the air. The whole hill seemed to be infected, dying from the poison that had sunk into the tree's roots. The longer she sat there, the angrier she got.

The morning of the race was hot and humid. Fog lay low on the ground like sauna steam. Millions
of birds were roosting in the trees - fat grey and white pigeons, except they didn't coo like regular pigeons. They made this annoying metallic screeching sound that reminded Daphne of submarine radar.

The racetrack had been built in a grassy field between the archery range and the woods. Hephaestus's cabin had used the bronze bulls, which were completely tame since they'd had their heads smashed in, to plow an oval track in a matter of minutes.

There were rows of stone steps for the spectators: Tantalus, the satyrs, a few dryads, and all of the campers who weren't participating. Mr. D didn't show, because he never got up before ten o'clock. Daphne wasn't too torn up about it.

"Right!" Tantalus announced as the teams began to assemble. A naiad had brought him a big platter of pastries, and as Tantalus spoke, his right hand chased a chocolate eclair across the judge's table. "You all know the rules. A quarter-mile track. Twice around to win. Two horses per chariot. Each team will consist of a driver, an instructor and a fighter. Weapons are allowed. Dirty tricks are expected. But try not to kill anybody!"

Tantalus smiled at them like they were all naughty children. "Any killing will result in harsh punishment. No s'mores at the campfire for a week! Now ready your chariots!"

Beckendorf led the Hephaestus team onto the track. Daphne had found a friend in him, despite all of their extremely obvious differences. He was twice her size and big and burly, but he was extremely kind. He was currently fashioning Daphne a new weapon per her request, usually being the first guy everybody went to for help with crafting.

The Hephaestus cabin had a sweet ride made of bronze and iron - even the horses, which were magical automatons like the Colchis bulls. She had no doubt that their chariot had all kinds of mechanical traps and more fancy options than a fully loaded Maserati.

The Ares chariot was blood red and pulled by two grisly horse skeletons. Clarisse climbed aboard with a batch of javelins, spiked balls, caltrops, and a bunch of other nasty toys.

Apollo's chariot was trim and graceful and completely gold, pulled by two beautiful palominos. Their fighter was armed with a bow, though he had promised not to shoot regular pointed arrows at the opposing drivers.

Hermes's chariot was green and kind of old-looking, as if it hadn't been out of the garage in years. It didn't look like anything special, but it was manned by the Stoll brothers, and Daphne shuddered to remember what dirty tricks they'd schemed up as they whispered to each other in the dead of night.

That left two chariots: one driven by Annabeth with beautiful gilded and architecturally sound silver, and the other by Percy.

Daphne looked at both of them in turn. Each of them had a free space available, the position of the instructor. It wasn't against the rules for them to race without a full team, as long as they had two members.

For a second, Annabeth caught her eye, but she turned away so fast it was like Daphne imagined it. For some reason, this really annoyed her.

She strode right past Annabeth and over to Percy and Tyson. Their chariot was undoubtedly pretty, being blue and white with wave designs on the sides and a trident painted on the front. It was certainly crafted with the intent of serving the Poseidon cabin, but Daphne didn't care.

She stopped next to Percy. "Hi."

He was startled by her. "Daphne?"

"I'm on your team now." she told him. It wasn't a question, but he was still confused by it. Most of the things she had been saying recently read to him like a math question at the back of the paper which he couldn't decipher for the life of him.

"What?" he said. Daphne acted like she didn't hear him, instead stepping closer to him (woah) and fixing the clasp to the arm of his armour. It was askew and she was sure it might've come undone if he was thrown from the chariot, which couldn't have been good for his internal organs.

"I know most of Travis and Connor's secrets," she told him, oblivious about his sudden shyness. "I snuck into the Apollo cabin and stole a few of their tipped arrows. I cut the tips off and got them onto the tops of a few spears," she pointed to the duffel bag she had been carrying with her, "and they'll do a bunch of weird things. I haven't managed to test them all, but they're pretty gnarly."

She finished fixing his armour, but her hand lingered. They stared at each other for a moment. Daphne stepped back from him, cheeks a little pink as she realised how close she seemed to him.

She looked at him expectantly. "So?"

"Uhh, what?"

"Can I join your team?"

Percy opened his mouth to reply, but was quickly cut off by the sharp call of a satyr blowing a conch horn.

"Charioteers!" Tantalus called. "To your mark!"

"I'm taking it as a yes!" Daphne sung. She grabbed her hair and combed it backwards, pulling the mane of furious dark curls into a ponytail. She didn't want to bother brushing it, knowing that it would just turn her hair into a matted mess.

Now, Daphne quickly found out that Greek chariots were built for speed, not safety or comfort. It was basically a wooden basket, open at the back, mounted on an axle between two wheels. The driver stands up the whole time, and you can feel every bump in the road. The carriage is made of such light wood that if you wipe out making the hairpin turns at either end of the track, you'll probably tip over and crush both the chariot and yourself.

She grinned in excitement. Oh yeah, this was gonna be fun. She swung the duffel bag onto the side of the chariot and clipped it onto the luckily placed hook on the side, securing it from falling.

Percy took the reins and maneuvered the chariot to the starting line. He gave Tyson a ten-foot pole and told him that his job was to push the other chariots away if they got too close, and to deflect anything they might try to throw at them. It was Daphne's job to act as a guard in case anything came hurling towards Percy, or to command where Tyson should aim in case they were attacked by two chariots at once.

"No hitting ponies with the stick," Tyson insisted. Daphne almost melted - he was so sweet. How could Annabeth call this innocent guy a monster?

"No," Percy agreed. "Or people, either, if you can help it. We're going to run a clean race. Just keep the distractions away and let me concentrate on driving."

"We will win." He beamed.

We are so going to lose, Percy thought to himself.

Tyson turned to her. "Don't hurt the ponies? Pretty please?"

She smiled warmly at him. "I promise, Tyson."

His grin was wide and ugly, but Daphne managed not to recoil from his monstrous gaze.

As the chariots lined up, more shiny-eyed pigeons gathered in the woods. They were screeching so loudly the campers in the stands were starting to take notice, glancing nervously at the trees, which shivered under the weight of the birds. Tantalus didn't look concerned, but he did have to speak up to be heard over the noise.

"Charioteers!" he shouted. "Attend your mark!"

He waved his hand and the starting signal dropped.

Go, she readied herself.

With a sudden vigour, the chariots roared to life. Hooves thundered against the dirt and the crowd erupted in cheers.

Daphne grasped onto the side of the chariot and refused to let go. The rumbling of the ground was thrilling, her gut jumping into her throat every so often almost feeling excited.

Almost immediately there was a loud nasty crack. She looked back in time to see the Apollo chariot flip over. Daphne hadn't had time to talk to Lee recently, so she was slightly worried that he would've been part of the wreckage. The Hermes chariot had rammed into it-maybe by mistake, maybe not. The riders were thrown free, but their panicked horses dragged the golden chariot diagonally across the track.

The Hermes team, Kitty, Travis and Connor, were laughing at their good luck - but not for long. The Apollo horses crashed into theirs, and the Hermes chariot flipped too, leaving a pile of broken wood and four rearing horses in the dust.

Two chariots down in the first twenty feet. Daphne didn't have to think about it for too long to know that she loved this sport.

Percy turned his attention back to the front as Daphne surveyed the sides. They were making good time, pulling ahead of Ares, but Annabeth's chariot was way ahead of them. She was already making her turn around the first post, her javelin man grinning and waving at them, shouting: "See ya!"

For some reason, this made her bubble with fury. She readied one of her spears to chuck at the back wheel.

The Hephaestus chariot was starting to gain on them. Beckendorf pressed a button, and a panel slid open on the side of his chariot.

"Sorry, guys!" he yelled. Three sets of balls and chains shot straight toward their wheels. They would've wrecked them completely if Tyson hadn't whacked them aside with a quick swipe of his pole. He gave the Hephaestus chariot a good shove and sent them skittering sideways while Percy pulled them ahead. Before the son of Poseidon could take them too far, Daphne's hand tightened around one of her spears as she chucked it like a javelin over to their chariot.

It met their left wheel and set it aflame. The driver started yelling as the chariot bobbled and Daphne grinned, fistpumping the air.

"Nice work!" Percy yelled, grinning back at her.

"Thanks!" Daphne shouted over the chaos, excitement and adrenaline still coursing through her blood. This was what her Greek blood lusted for.

"Birds!" Tyson cried, interrupting them.

"What?" They shouted back in unison.

They were whipping along so fast it was hard to hear or see anything, but Tyson pointed toward the woods where Daphne caught a glimpse of what he was worried about. The pigeons had risen from the trees. They were spiraling like a huge tornado, heading toward the track.

No big deal, she told herself. They're just pigeons.

She tried to concentrate on the race, threatening other chariots away from them with another load of spears hurled towards them.

They made their first turn, the wheels creaking under them, the chariot threatening to tip. Daphne let Percy's driving skills go however, as they were now only ten feet behind Annabeth. If he could just get a little closer, Tyson could use his pole... she could chuck that spear...

Annabeth's fighter wasn't smiling now. He pulled a javelin from his collection and took aim at them. He was about to throw when they heard the screaming.

The pigeons were swarming. Thousands of them dive-bombing the spectators in the stands, attacking the other chariots. Beckendorf was mobbed. His fighter tried to bat the birds away but he couldn't see anything. The chariot veered off course and plowed through the strawberry fields, the mechanical horses steaming.

In the Ares chariot, Clarisse barked an order to her fighter, who quickly threw a screen of camouflage netting over their basket. The birds swarmed around it, pecking and clawing at the fighter's hands as he tried to hold up the net, but Clarisse just gritted her teeth and kept driving. Her skeletal horses seemed immune to the distraction. The pigeons pecked uselessly at their empty eye sockets and flew through their rib cages, but the stallions kept right on running.

The spectators weren't so lucky. The birds were slashing at any bit of exposed flesh, driving everyone into a panic. Now that the birds were closer, it was clear they weren't normal pigeons. Their eyes were beady and evil-looking. Their beaks were made of bronze, and judging from the yelps of the campers, they must've been razor sharp.

"They're Stymphalian birds!" Annabeth yelled. She slowed down and pulled her chariot alongside theirs, looking at Daphne meaningfully. "They'll strip everyone to bones if we don't drive them away!"

Daphne lowered her right arm which she'd been squinting to aim at Annabeths chariot. "Like from Grover's story?"

She nodded feverishly.

Daphne hesitated, but finally dropped her weapon. Percy, who had been too focused on the road in front of them, shouted out, "Daphne, what's going on?"

"Turn it around." she said immediately.

Percy frowned. "But-"

"Trust me," she implored with him.

Then, Percy didn't hesitate.

"Tyson," Percy said, "we're turning around!"

"Going the wrong way?" he asked cluelessly.

"Always," he grumbled, but steered the chariot toward the stands.

Annabeth rode right next to them. She shouted, "Heroes, to arms!" But Daphne wasn't sure it was going to good use - surely, nobody could hear her over the screeching of the birds and the general chaos.

Percy held the reins in one hand and managed to draw Riptide as a wave of birds dived at his face, their metal beaks snapping. He slashed them out of the air and they exploded into dust and feathers, but there were still millions of them left. One nailed Percy in the back and he almost jumped straight out of the chariot.

Daphne tried her hardest to spear them out of the air, almost like a bird kebab stick. More often than not, she was protecting Percy as he tried to lead their chariot into the line of fire. She slashed the air around him, sure to miss piercing his skin.

Annabeth wasn't having much better luck on her side. Daphne guessed that her half brother had leapt for it considering she was manning the chariot on her own. The closer they got to the stands, the thicker the cloud of birds became.

One of the birds dove straight for Percy's eyes. It would've scratched them out, too, if Daphne hadn't batted them away. The creatures seemed to be pulling mouthfuls of hair away with them.

Some of the spectators were trying to fight back. The Athena campers were calling for shields and the archers from Apollo's cabin brought out their bows and arrows, ready to slay the menace; but with so many campers mixed in with the birds, it wasn't safe to shoot.

"Too many!" Percy yelled to Annabeth. "How do you get rid of them?"

She stabbed at a pigeon with her knife. "Hercules used noise! Brass bells! He scared them away with the most horrible sound he could-"

Daphnes eyes got wide. She halted stabbing at the bird which was trying to peck at her hair. "Guys... Chiron's collection!"

Annabeth and Percy looked back at her in realisation. Chirons terrible collection of 60s music which was always playing.

"You're a genius, Daphne," Annabeth said sincerely.

He understood them instantly. "You think it'll work?"

Annabeth threw the reins to the side and leaped from her chariot into theirs. She stumbled and almost fell, but Daphne was there to grab her hand and pull her up. "To the Big House! It's our only chance!"

Clarisse has just pulled across the finish line, completely unopposed, and seemed to notice for the
first time how serious the bird problem was.

When she saw them driving away, she yelled, "You're running? The fight is here, cowards!" She drew her sword and charged for the stands.

Percy urged their horses into a gallop. The chariot rumbled through the strawberry fields, across the
volleyball pit, and lurched to a halt in front of the Big House. Annabeth and Daphne ran inside as Percy tried to calm down the horses, tearing down the hallway to Chiron's apartment.

His boom box was still on his nightstand. So were his favorite CDs. Daphne grabbed the most repulsive one she could find, Annabeth snatched the boom box, and together they ran back outside. They didn't speak between it, but worked in unison despite being quite angry at each other.

Down at the track, the chariots were in flames. Wounded campers ran in every direction, with birds shredding their clothes and pulling out their hair, while Tantalus chased breakfast pastries around the stands, every once in a while yelling, "Everything's under control! Not to worry."

They pulled up to the finish line. Annabeth got the boom box ready and Daphne prayed the batteries weren't dead.

She pressed PLAY and started up Chiron's favorite - the All-Time Greatest Hits of Dean Martin. Suddenly the air was filled with violins and a bunch of guys moaning in Italian.

The demon pigeons went nuts. They started flying in circles, running into each other like they wanted to bash their own brains out. Then they abandoned the track altogether and flew skyward in a huge dark wave.

"Now!" shouted Annabeth, pointing up towards the birds. "Archers!"

With clear targets, Apollo's archers had flawless aim. Most of them could nock five or six arrows at once. Within minutes, the ground was littered with dead bronze-beaked pigeons, and the survivors were a distant trail of smoke on the horizon.

The camp was saved, but the wreckage wasn't pretty. Most of the chariots had been completely destroyed.

Almost everyone was wounded, bleeding from multiple bird pecks. The kids from Aphrodite's cabin were screaming because their hairdos had been ruined and their clothes pooped on.

As it turns out, Lee wasn't riding the chariot with his siblings. He rushed over to Daphne when the rest of the birds were shot to the ground, dropping his bow and quiver behind him.

"Are you okay?" he asked her worriedly, looking her over for any massive injuries. When he saw that she wasn't dying, his face turned stoney. "What were you thinking getting on that chariot?"

"Bravo!" Tantalus shouted, but he wasn't looking at Daphne or Annabeth. "We have our first winner!"

He walked to the finish line and awarded the golden laurels for the race to a stunned-looking Clarisse without giving her enough time to push them away.

Then he turned and smiled at where they were stood, bloody and tired. "And now to punish the troublemakers who disrupted this race."

౨ৎ ˖ ࣪⊹ 𝒂𝒖𝒕𝒉𝒐𝒓'𝒔 𝒏𝒐𝒕𝒆
🌷🪷🌊

ʚɞ didn't realize it had been so long since I updated wow!!!! Sorry loves, been ill <3