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Percy likes camp.
He likes the action, the way he’s able to spar and run. He likes hearing people talk about their days and likes the warmth of the summer sun against his skin. Percy likes Grover and Grover’s foster sister Annabeth and Luke, their childhood best friend.
Luke is unclaimed too. He and Annabeth came to camp at the same time. Annabeth was claimed within the first twenty-four hours, her father Hephaestus wrapping his power around her and showering onlookers with red sparks.
It’s been five years and Luke still hasn’t been claimed. Percy wonders if Luke knows who he’s pushing his food into the fire for too or if they care about him. He hopes so. Everyone deserves to be cared about. Everyone deserves to have a home.
-
“Annabeth?” Percy asks.
“Mm?” Annabeth responds absentmindedly. She’s twirling curly dark hair around one finger as she writes in rapid, messy Ancient Greek on a notepad that shimmers bronze as it catches the light.
“Annabeth,” Percy says.
Annabeth looks at him, her iron-grey eyes sharp but not cold. “What?” She asks, annoyed.
Percy silently points to the smoke rising around her tapping foot. Annabeth pales and swipes her hand through the smoke. It seeps into her fingertips like water into a sponge. She looks like she’s been caught, a child with her fingers in the cookie jar.
“I didn’t see anything,” Percy says innocently. “I was just going to tell you your shoe is untied.”
Annabeth is wearing fluorescent blue foam Crocs, melted around the toe.
She smiles.
-
“What side are we defending again?” Percy asks.
“The far side,” Annabeth says, stomping through the forest. “I think it’s the easier side, personally, but don’t let down your guard.”
Percy nods. He’s not sure how he feels about being so far away from the heart of camp. He’s most comfortable in Camp Half Blood’s center.
Percy takes a step and feels lightheaded, like he’s moved much too fast.
“I can’t go any further.” He says suddenly.
“What?” Annabeth says, “Why? It’s not far. You don’t even really need to do the fighting if you don’t want to this first time. You’ll enjoy watching.”
“No,” Percy says, “You don’t get it. It’s a really bad idea. I can’t go any further. I think the property ends here.”
“It does,” Annabeth says slowly, “It’s fine, it’s not like you’re trespassing. Besides, mortals get confused a mile from here. This is just the forest; it doesn’t belong to anybody.”
It doesn’t belong to anybody, which means this ground is home to no one. Thunder cracks in the distance and Percy takes a large step backward into Camp. He still feels ill.
“Annabeth,” Percy says. “I mean it.”
Annabeth looks at Percy, an engineer making calculations. A friend picking up social clues. They’ve only known each other for two weeks, but Percy is better friends with her than he is with some of his classmates he’s shared desk space with for years. Her gaze makes him feel a little raw.
“Percy,” Annabeth asks carefully, “Do you know who your godly parent is?”
Percy’s stomach drops out from under him. He takes another step back into camp.
“I can’t talk about it,” Percy says quickly. “I definitely can’t talk about it here.”
“Gods,” Annabeth says, “Is your dad one of the Big Three or something? How did you find out? Have you ever met him?”
“I don’t have a dad,” Percy says and feels the hair on the back of his neck stand up.
Annabeth turns, her hand on her dagger.
A shape moves in the trees, not even ten feet from where Percy now knows the property ends. It’s huge, twenty feet tall, with horns that curl into dangerous points and blood-red eyes. Percy feels like the fact that it’s only wearing underwear should add some levity to the situation, but it just makes him feel more unsettled.
“Annabeth,” Percy breathes, “You need to run and get help.”
“I can’t leave you here,” She hisses, “Besides, if anybody is going to run it should be me. You’re new and I outrank you.”
“It’s here for me,” Percy says, “And you’re faster. Please.”
The please does it. Annabeth squeezes Percy’s shoulder and runs, her light feet making almost no noise.
Almost no noise is very different than no noise. The monster turns in Annabeth’s direction.
“Hey, Ground Beef!” Percy yells loudly, “I’m over here! Come and get me Stupid!”
The balance is difficult to manage. Percy feels safer and stronger in camp, but the Minotaur can’t be set loose on the other campers. Percy swings and connects, his sword getting stuck in the monster’s shoulder. He has to leave it behind. Percy gets backed up into a tree and he feels the panic settling in his stomach, cold and chaotic.
Percy sets his shoulders, grits his teeth, and moves .
Going backward, farther into camp is not an option. There is no physical wall behind him, but he feels backed into a corner.
He has to go up.
He jumps, higher than he ever has before, and uses a tree as a push point to vault himself on top of the Minotaur. With his sword unavailable, Percy doesn’t really know what he’s going to do up here, so he turns his brain off and pulls.
Percy breaks off a horn and shoves it into the Minotaur’s face in one swift motion.
There’s pressure and then Percy falls, the Minotaur dissolving under him in sand.
He doesn’t wait to catch his breath before scrambling back over the property line back into camp. He immediately feels safer, the wards of home wrapping around him. Percy breathes heavily before dropping to his knees, covered in monster dust and clutching a jagged horn in a white-knuckled grip. Help finds him that way, exhausted and bruised, hands anchored into the ground, glowing gold.
-
Somebody blabs that Percy knows what he’s doing.
It’s not Annabeth, who smells more strongly of ash and oil every time she gets asked why she left Percy alone or if she saw anything strange. It’s also not Grover, casually holding Percy’s hands with grass-stained fingers to ground him to the present.
Chiron and some of the other senior campers whisper about claiming events, about godly parents, about what it means to be claimed without the symbol of a god.
Mr. D is notably absent from this discussion.
“Why does it matter who my parents are?” Percy asks, “I don’t understand why you care so much.”
“It’s important,” A senior camper Percy hasn’t met yet says. There’s never a better answer than it’s important.
Percy thinks of his parents, dancing in their kitchen, of the way Hestia can make Sally smile with a whispered word and a laugh. He thinks of baking bread with hands that ignore the scorch, tearing open a fresh loaf with his fingers while Hestia watches with pride. She keeps a spare pair of reading glasses for Sally and EpiPen for Percy on her person at all times. He has twelve years of homework, of movie nights, of snuggling after nightmares, and babying whenever he felt sick or scared to defend here. That’s important too.
Percy squeezes Grover’s hand and looks at Annabeth, her rage turning into determination, before looking Chiron dead in the eye.
“Fine,” Percy says, “I do know. I’m just not going to tell you.”