Percy leaned back against the tent in the dim light of the- was it morning? He wondered. The sun hasn't risen yet, so maybe it was dawn? Or was it dusk? I always mix those up-- Pay attention! He mentally scolded his ADHD.

He was keeping watch in case of another attack. Recently, certain monsters have been growing restless, even more so than usual. Like when Gaea was awaking, and they all seemed to find demigods easier. As if triggered by his thoughts, a low growl was heard.

Instantly, Riptide was in sword form in his hand. A mass of black fur launched itself at him and tackled him, a  growl emitting from the hellhound. Knocked to the ground in surprise, Percy struggled to lift his arm, which was pinned between the ground and him. Percy kicked at his doggy ribs and pushed the hellhound up while arching his back- just enough to slice the monster in half. It disappeared with a howl into golden dust.

"Huh." Percy capped Riptide and brushed himself off. Just as he sat back down, Nico burst out of the tent flap, wielding his sword. When he saw Percy, he lowered the weapon.

"Percy!" Nico ran to his cousin.

"It's not your turn yet, Nico." Then the sun burst out in all its glory. "Well, now it is."

"Death! I felt- I thought- maybe... I don't know! It was strong. And a death by magic. Definitely magic. I could sense it" Nico rambled, his eyes darting around nervously.

"Nico, calm down!" Percy edged away cautiously. Nico was freaking him out. Maybe he was drunk. Again.

"It was strong" he insisted again. "Dark. Strong. Magic. Bad. Very evil."

"Dude! You sound like Ella now. Speak English."

The other demigods shuffled out of the tent, yawning. Only then did Percy realize how much noise they'd made.

"Why," Jason grumbled. "Did you wake us up at five in the morning?"

"You felt it too?" Hazel asked Nico.

He nodded. "Dark magic," they said together.

Frank turned to Hazel. "I thought you were Pluto's side? Riches?"

Hazel nodded. "I specialize in gems, but recently I've found it a lot easier to sense death. Not as much as Nico yet, but it's getting stronger. But I only sense the dark ones. The ones with dark magic. And I feel stronger. Summoning gems is a lot easier."

Piper nodded. "My charmspeak is a lot stronger. And it feels like I have a constant adrenaline rush. You know?"

"Me too. It's like our powers are better" Thalia nodded.

Annabeth had her I'm-thinking-really-hard-so-don't-distract-me face on. "Maybe the magic in the air is enhancing our powers somehow? Or maybe- since Hazel's been sensing a disturbance in magic- the magic waves are stronger, asking for help, calling to our demigod side?"

"And it's probably making our powers stronger, to cope with the darkness. Like adrenaline" Frank said, snapping his fingers.

"But then why now? We had normal strength our first 3 years here" Thalia wondered.

Hazel responded thoughtfully. "Like Annabeth said, it probably has to do with the disruption of magic. I'm pretty sure that whatever threat is rising for the wizarding world, it's getting major bursts of power now."

"Lovely" Jason grumbled. "Now we have a magical threat shooting waves of evil which is getting bursts of power."

Piper nudged her boyfriend. "Look on the bright side, Sparky. At least we're enhancing our power."

Percy was suddenly struck by a thought. "Oh no. No no no. This is bad. This is very bad."

Annabeth turned on Percy, concerned. "What?"

Percy gulped audibly, his face draining of blood. "If our powers are enhanced, now Annabeth's going to be even smarter!"

Everyone gasped and Annabeth just rolled her eyes.

"Seaweed Brain" she muttered. Then all their eyes turned as a light gray ball of fuzz streaked across the ever-brightening sky.

"What in the world is that?" Piper muttered, her eyes squinting in an attempt to see it better.

"That was Pig," Annabeth said, puzzled. "But... none of the Weasleys are up yet. Right?"

Wrong. From the kitchen window, a very sleepy Ron poked his head outside, checking to see if Pig had made it out. Then his gaze caught on the demigods, and he waved excitedly.

"DAD GOT THE TICKETS," he bellowed up the hill. "I JUST MAILED HARRY."

"WE NOTICED," Percy yelled back. "WHY DID YOU HAVE TO SEND PIG AT FIVE IN THE MORNING?"

"WE JUST FOUND OUT," Ron's voice cracked a bit from all the yelling. "THE MAIL JUST ARRIVED."

"THAT'S GREAT," Percy roared, grinning. "CAN'T WAIT UNTIL HARRY GETS HERE!"

"WILL YOU BOTH SHUT UP?" Percy Weasley's voice came from one of the upper stories in the Burrow. "I'M TRYING TO DO SOMETHING HERE!"

"SORRY PERCE," Ron shouted. "WE'LL TRY AND KEEP IT DOWN."

Percy Weasley's response was him slamming his window shut.

"OF COURSE, THE KEY WORD THERE WAS TRY," Percy bellowed, his face cracking into a grin at the frustrated grunt that came from Percy Weasley's upstairs bedroom. It wasn't the last time in thirty six hours Percy Weasley would make that exact noise. The following day, a quarter hour after Fred, George, Ron, and Mr Weasley left to fetch Harry, they returned (minus Mr. Weasley) covered in white powder that Annabeth identified as plaster, and all laughing their heads off.

"Did he eat it?" Fred asked excitedly.

"Yeah," Harry choked back. "What was it?"

"Ton-Tongue Toffee," George replied brightly. "Fred and I invented them, and we've been looking for someone to test them on all summer..."

From the kitchen table, next to Bill and Charlie, the older Weasley brothers, Percy Weasley stood and huffed indignantly. "You gave one of your... inventions to a muggle?" He asked in an extremely loud voice. "He could've died!"

But Percy's annoyance was nothing to the red-faced rage of Mr. Weasley. "That wasn't funny, Fred!" He shouted as he popped out of the fireplace. "What on earth did you give that Muggle boy?"

"I didn't give it to him--" Fred protested, his face in an evil grin. "I just dropped it.... It was his fault he went and ate it, I never told him to."

"You dropped it on purpose!" Mr. Weasley roared. "You knew he'd eat it, knew he was on a diet--"

"How big did his tongue get?" George asked eagerly.

"It was four feet long before his parents would let me shrink it!"

They couldn't help themselves, and the entire kitchen burst out into another round of laughter.

"It's not funny!" Mr. Weasley shouted. "Just wait until I tell your mother--"

"Tell me what?" A voice said from the stairs. Mrs. Weasley's eyes were narrowed in suspicion, but then she spotted Harry and smiled widely. "Oh hello, Harry, dear," she said. Then her eyes snapped back to her husband. "Tell me what, Arthur?"

Mr. Weasley hesitated. Percy could see that, however angry he was at Fred and George, he wasn't really planning on ratting them out to Mrs. Weasley. There was a lingering silence as Mr. Weasley eyed his wife nervously. Then two girls emerged behind Mrs Weasley from the stairs-- Hermione and Ginny.

"Tell me what, Arthur? If this has anything to do with Weasley's Wizard Wheezes--" Mrs. Weasley began.

"Oh hey, why don't we go show Harry where he's going to sleep?" Nico said suddenly, edging towards the stairway.

"He knows where he's sleeping--" Ron began, but Thalia jammed her heel into his toe.

"We can all go," Hermione said with a pointed look at Ron. Ron, who had bitten his tongue to prevent a scream, nodded with watery eyes.

"A jolly good idea," George said, sidestepping towards the stairway. "I'll come along."

"You stay where you are," Snarled Mrs. Weasley, and George froze.

"C'mon." The others, not banned from freedom, slipped upstairs.

"What are the Weasley's Wizard Wheezes?" Harry asked as they all squished in the stairway in an attempt to get away from the kitchen as fast as possible.

They all laughed, though Hermione shook her head in disapproval.

"Mum found this stack of order forms when she was cleaning their room," Ginny explained quietly from where she was pressed between Annabeth and the wall.

"Great long price lists for stuff they've invented. Joke stuff, you know. Fake wands and trick sweets, loads of stuff. It was brilliant," Ron added with relish.

"I mean, their room always seemed to explode, but we always thought they just liked the noise," said Thalia with a small smirk.

"Anyways, Mrs. Weasley was furious," Annabeth said. "And no wonder, some of the stuff was actually dangerous. She burned all of the order forms-- they were planning on selling them to Hogwarts for money."

"She was mad at them already," Jason explained. "They didn't get as many O.W.L.s as she hoped."

"Then there was this big argument," Piper said with a small smile. "Mrs. Weasley wants them to go work in the Ministry like Mr. Weasley, but they said all they wanted to do was go open a joke shop."

"That's a fair trade," Frank said. "I wonder if they can enchant the mythomagic cards for me."

"I'll buy Nico a pack," Percy teased as they entered Ron's room.

It was extremely cramped, more than normal since there were three new beds. On the shelf where Scabbers' cage once stood, an owl fluttered around excitedly.

"Shut up, Pig," Ron said as they squeezed onto the beds. "Sorry, it's cramped-- Fred and George are sharing with us because Bill and Charlie have their room."

"Why do you call that owl Pig?" Harry asked, not at all bothered by the close proximity they were all in.

"Because he's being stupid," said Ginny, rolling her eyes. "Its proper name is Pigwidgeon."

"Yeah, and that's not stupid at all," Ron said sarcastically. "Ginny named him," he explained to Harry. "She thinks it's sweet. And I tried to change it, but it's too late, he won't answer to anything else. So now he's Pig."

"Where's Crookshanks and Bianca?" Harry asked, looking around.

"They're chasing the gnomes in the garden," Hermione said as she peered out the window. "Never seen them before."

"So have you had a good summer, Harry?" Hazel asked. "You got everything?"

"Yeah, thanks a lot," Harry said enthusiastically. "They saved my life, those cakes."

"And have you heard from--" Ron trailed off at everyone's warning glances. Annabeth glanced at Ginny, who was looking slightly miffed at the fact that she was kept out of a secret. Again. Annabeth wanted to tell her, but the subject of Sirius was a very delicate subject, and Ron seemed to believe she was prone to blabbing everything. From Annabeth's experience, Ginny was a very shy and quiet girl, but it wasn't her secret to tell.

"I think they've stopped arguing," Piper said in an attempt to cover the awkward silence that followed. "Should we go down?"

They found Mrs. Weasley in a very delicate state-- on the verge of exploding.

"Those two," she fumed as they entered the kitchen. She madly waved her wand at the potatoes and, instead of just becoming chopped, turned completely into mashed potatoes. "I don't know what I'm going to do about them. No ambition, unless you count making as much trouble as they possibly can-- we're eating in the garden by the way-- It's not as though they haven't got brains, but they're wasting them, and unless they pull themselves together soon-- could you help with the table settings, girls? And you boys with the food when it's done-- unless they pull themselves together soon, they'll be in real trouble. Oh, for heaven's sakes!" She exploded as she tried picking her wand back up, only to have it burst into a rubber duck. "One of those fake wands again! I keep telling them--"

The girls backed gratefully out of the kitchen with plates. Thalia grinned at Nico's disgruntled face as Mrs. Weasley waved her wand, sending random kitchen implements into place. Frank narrowly dodged a fork that went flying towards the salad.

"I hope she calms down soon," Annabeth said as she glanced backwards.

"Likely not, if she sees what her other sons are doing," Piper said, a laugh spreading onto her face. Bill and Charlie were apparently playing bumper tables, each trying to knock the other out of the sky. The tables collided over and over as they crashed at top speed. Bianca was below them, trying to catch the ever-moving tails of their robes, and Crookshanks had sat on top of a squirming garden gnome, looking extremely proud of himself. As they watched, Bill's table rammed into Charlie's, knocking a leg off it. Ginny dodged the falling wooden pole, laughing.

"WILL-- YOU-- KEEP-- IT-- DOWN?" Percy Weasley bellowed from his room in the Burrow.

"Sorry, Perce!" Charlie yelled back. "How's the cauldron bottoms coming along?"

"Very poorly," Percy Weasley said with a huff, slamming his window shut once more. Annabeth felt bad for the window.

"He's wound up tight these days," Bill commented as he repaired Charlie's table and added table cloths with a flick of his wand.

"Since when has he not been?" Thalia asked. Bill grinned at her.

"True."

Dinner had broken out into smaller chatter over the homemade food and the warm summer air. Percy finished his blue strawberry ice cream contentedly as the sky darkened. He was too at peace to worry about the bursts of dark magic Hazel and Nico had felt earlier. It was a great day, they were surrounded by friends, the weather was amazing, and he was eating blue ice cream next to his girlfriend. What could go wrong?

Cue the trumpets: book 4 is up and running! I'll try and stick with my normal schedule, Saturdays and Wednesdays, but I might not get one up tomorrow. I'll also try to get another chapter for the divergent and hunger games books since I'm pretty sure I have a free day tomorrow. Hope you guys like this!