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The two demigods laughed as they turned the corner of the alley, carrying bags of stolen goods in their hands. They paused in the deserted side-road, trying to catch their breath. Blue eyes met, and Thalia felt as if her face was about to be split into two by her grin. She didn't have the same propensity for trouble that Luke did, but she wouldn't deny that the adrenaline rush of trying not to be caught in the midst of a crime was something that she enjoyed.
Luke leaned against the opposite wall, hunched over, wheezing, but with a smile on his face. His eyes gleamed with the satisfaction of a plan well executed, and even though he was missing a shoe from when the shop assistant almost caught him before he climbed over the wall, he seemed unbothered by the fact. "We make a good team, Thals." He grinned crookedly. Only Luke called her Thals. No one else knew her name, really. Her mother only ever called her 'girl!' or maybe 'YOU!' when she was drunk, and Jason used to call her Thalia. She'd run into Luke two weeks ago, when she'd used Aegis to save him from an empousa. They'd been on the run together ever since.
She chuckled. "The look on his face when you told him to look at the corner and then punched him and ran away- priceless." She sank to the ground. "Why didn't we do this earlier?"
"I wasn't sure Miss Hotshot here would be able to pull it off." He teased. "I mean, bratty rich punk girl-"
Thalia threw a bag of chips at him. "Shut up."
"How refined." He commented as he caught the packet. He walked over to her and held out a hand. "Come on, we can't stay here, someone might find us."
Annabeth, Thalia decided, was definitely a permanent addition to this little family. She reminded her a little of Jason, except for the fact that Jason had been openly trusting of everyone, while her experience had given Annabeth a slightly cynical outlook. She was smart, as all Athena kids were, and sometimes when she prattled off entire paragraphs from books she had read Thalia had to remind herself that she was barely seven years old. She looked her age now, dozing peacefully in a sleeping bag.
Thalia walked over to where Luke was standing against the wall of the abandoned warehouse they'd converted into a safehouse for themselves. He was looking at the window, lost in thought. He probably didn't even notice her until she was right beside him. "Penny for your thoughts?"
He bit his lip and turned to her, eyes distant. "Nothing. Nothing at all."
"Are you all right?"
"How many, Thals?" He suddenly looked angry. "How many kids are out there on the streets like us? Like Annie? I mean- at least we're a bit older. Look at her! She's a child! She's supposed to be going to school and playing with friends and coming back home to a warm bed, but here we are in this-" he gestured wildly with his hands, "-this place."
Thalia squeezed his shoulder. "It will be okay. Everything will work exactly as it is supposed to."
He narrowed his eyes at her. "Can we at least not lie to each other?"
Thalia looked down. He was right. They could make all the promises they wanted in front of Annabeth, but they had to be honest with each other.
And there was no way that she could promise everything would turn out 'okay'.
"Get some sleep." He told her as he moved to the entrance of the warehouse. "I'll take first watch."
Five years.
She had been a tree for five years.
Too many things had changed.
She was a legend people gawked at.
Annabeth was older.
Luke was gone.
Not dead. But gone all the same.
And it was all right when she zapped Percy for calling her Pinecone Face and then ran away before he could spray her with water, or when Annabeth dragged her to all her favorite places in the camp, or when all the campers gathered to sing by the campfire, but-
But eventually the day ended.
The sun set, and she returned alone to her cabin, with no one for company.
If she was being honest, she wished sometimes that they were back on the streets.
They hadn't been safe, they hadn't been full, but they had been happy.
Happiness, Thalia had learned, was a rare and valuable commodity.
They had fought before.
They had trained against each other, and on occasions when their tempers got the best of themselves, they'd even descended to fighting like alley cats.
But not like this. Never like this.
She had never been so enraged with him.
He'd poisoned her. He'd kidnapped Annabeth. He'd betrayed all of them.
And somewhere, deep within her heart, what he did made sense to her.
"He's a traitor! A traitor!"
She didn't hate him for being who he was. She hated him because he had accepted the anger she had always felt but would never act on.
"Is that what you want, Thalia? To go back to Olympus in triumph? To please your dad?"
A moment of hesitation.
Just a moment.
She pushed him off the cliff.
Running.
Always running.
She had run away again.
Even as she accepted Artemis's offer, she wanted to turn to Percy, to say she was sorry, to ask his forgiveness for shoving on his shoulders the burden that should have been hers.
But she only bowed her head and nodded to Artemis's words.
He came to meet her.
She didn't know how he found her, but there he was, standing in front of her, looking for all purposes as if he'd never left.
He looked different now: he was thinner, his hair longer, and he looked desperate, like a traveler wandering through the desert.
Let's leave. Run away. I know where no one can find us.
Please. You can save me.
Kill me, then. You won't get a second chance.
Screw you, Thalia Grace. Annabeth wouldn't have refused.
An emergency Iris message to a certain blonde ensured that she wasn't unprepared for who was coming.
She warned Percy against assuming that Annabeth would be okay with fighting Luke.
"She'll do fine." He looked annoyed.
She won't. Thalia knew. Because even I am not.
The funeral was joke.
The only people who looked affected in the slightest were Annabeth and Hermes, and to a certain extent, Percy and Grover, though she suspected that it was more guilt than grief for the two of them.
The rest mostly looked happy that he was dead, or relieved, or cast angry glances at the shroud.
He wasn't always like this! She wanted to scream. He was one of the kindest and gentlest people I knew!
But it wasn't as if anyone would care.
It wasn't as if she should care either.
And yet here she was.
She wasn't supposed to be here. The Hunters were very strict about their rules. She should not have been mourning a boy who was not her family.
But they had been family, hadn't they?
Hadn't they?
Right?
Maybe she had loved him. Maybe she hadn't. But she had definitely been fond of him. No matter what he had done. No matter how hard she tried no to be.
As she walked away (more like hobbled away on her crutches), there was only one thing she could remember, a single memory in her mind's eye, Annabeth on her shoulders, hands reaching out to the sky, trying to compete with Luke in height, and Luke laughing and gripping her hands to keep the little blonde from falling down, nothing but blue skies and clasped hands, three children in an abandoned street, living only for the moment.