Chapter Text
The first day of junior year seemed like an appropriate descent into hell. After an hour-long assembly detailing Goode High School’s attendance policy, another ninety minute grade meeting to talk about the “upcoming trials” of standardized testing and college research, and finding out that she was named volleyball co-captain with Clarisse of all people, all Annabeth wanted to do when she got home was take a nap for the next nine months.
“How was school?” Her stepmother called, when Annabeth made her presence known by slamming the door and throwing her sports duffel unceremoniously onto the floor.
“Don’t even ask,” she groaned, dragging her feet past the open kitchen. Her stepmother, Sophie, furrowed her brow, but didn’t say anything. Sophie knew that Annabeth needed space. They could read each other much better now, compared to when she was little and hated her stepmom with every fiber of her being.
Annabeth ignored the waves from her stepbrothers as she passed by their room. They had just come back from their first day of first grade and no doubt, they would have plenty of stories to share about recess and pulling pigtails, but first, sleep. She did turn her head for just one second to check inside the study. Her father wasn’t home from the university yet, though his toy planes were strewn across his desk.
The walk from the front door to her bedroom seemed torturously long, despite the fact that, well, they lived in an apartment in New York City. For once, she regretted choosing the room at the back end of the house. But as soon as she opened the door, those regrets flew right out the window facing the striking Manhattan skyline.
The apartment didn’t face any sort of famous buildings that she had memorized from her dad’s and eventually her own architecture books, but that didn’t make the view any less worthy. The nameless skyscrapers—most of them office buildings and hotels—all gleamed in that late summer sun. Even if they weren’t architecturally renowned, they were still beautiful. It was this view that calmed her whenever she was angry at her parents or annoyed at her brothers or exhausted from school.
She sunk into her bed, fully aware that she was still disgustingly sweaty, but willing to sacrifice that for comfort. Annabeth closed her eyes, but voice inside her head buzzed, reciting a mental checklist that never seemed to end. She opened them again and stared at the ceiling, wanting to hit something. So this was it. The start of the hardest year in high school. If she was lucky, she would get through it alive.
Flopping over, she turned to face her bookshelf. There was no way she had enough energy to read, but there was something comforting about staring at the photos lining the side of her shelf. The majority of them were of her high school friends, especially Piper and Connor, the two she was closest to out of the whole group. Her volleyball team was featured heavily too- the team photos ruined by Clarisse's trademark scowl, last year's captain Silena leading the group in a huddle, a shot of her setting the ball.
Smack in the middle of the collage was the one photograph she had with Luke Castellan, the gorgeous counselor from her summer camp days back in middle school. It took eight weeks for her awkward, acne-ridden twelve-year-old self to muster up the courage to ask him to take the photo with her. Looking at the photo reminded her that she could do anything, including having a normal-ish interaction with an attractive member of the male sex.
As she stared at photo of her and Luke, her stomach twisted, and her eyes passed over to the photo beside it— five smiling, preteen kids sitting by the Long Island Sound. The camp was the official non-profit of her dad’s university, targeted towards underprivileged kids in New York. While her family was upper middle-class, the camp served as a perfect opportunity for her dad to get rid of her while he did his research. At first, she resented it, but the second she stepped onto the camp grounds, every bitter thought dissolved. The activities were fun to do, Luke was fun to look at, and the friends she made were fun in general.
They had taken this photo just before Rachel pushed Percy into the water, meaning it was just before Percy had grabbed Annabeth’s ankle and brought her in with him. She smiled at this memory, remembering how loudly she cussed and the vain attempt she made to pull Nico down with them. The only one she still kept in contact with was Rachel, even though the girl attended boarding school in New Hampshire. Grover stayed far away from the city in some rural area upstate. Nico’s address and contact changed constantly as he bounced around the foster system.
Percy didn’t have a phone number back then and she wasn’t active on social media. She knew he lived in the Lower East Side and sometimes, when she was explored the city with Piper and Connor, she hoped she might run into him. But Manhattan was huge and crowded and there was school and classes to take and volleyball matches to win. Camp was four years ago, but its quiet simplicity felt like a whole other life.
She missed it.
“Annabeth!” Her father’s voice brought her back to reality. It was strange of him to be home this early. Reluctantly detaching from her bed, she left her room.
“I’m right here,” she yawned, as she made her way back to the living room. “Hi Dad—wait, what?”
Her father was dressed in his teaching attire, thankfully without the aviator goggles that he loved so much. Next to him was a tall, brunette woman dressed in jeans and a t-shirt whom she had never seen before. She was wearing sunglasses under a New York Yankees cap and Annabeth guessed the ratty sneakers next to the door were hers. The woman seemed to be trying too hard to look normal, but there was no way to disguise those perfectly manicured nails.
“Well,” Sophie coughed too transparently. “I’m going to go check on Matthew and Bobby.”
By now, the woman took off her sunglasses and Annabeth instantly understood why the lady had gone overboard with the get-up. She had seen those grey eyes and stern, aquiline features everywhere, especially these last few weeks. On the television, in the newspapers, sprinkled throughout her dad’s history books about Europe. But she never imagined that the woman that face belonged to would be standing there, at her front door, wearing a Yankees cap.
Her father started. “Annabeth, this is—”
“Queen Athena of Parthenos,” she finished, breathless. For a moment, she wondered whether she should bow or curtsy or kowtow, but her brain was too fried by an actual head of state standing in her living room. “Wait. What? Why are you here? How do you know— Dad?”
He opened her mouth to answer, but the Queen raised her hand and he deferred into silence. “Annabeth. We have much to talk about.”
It turned out that junior year was going to be a lot more difficult than she’d anticipated.
“Shut up.”
“Excuse me?”
Apparently queens of small island countries in the Adriatic Sea did not take too kindly to those words.
“No, I’m sorry, Your Majesty.” Annabeth spluttered. Should she have said Mom? Mother? Neither of those words felt right. She had always referred to Sophie by name, dreaming that the first time she said those words would be when she met her birth mother face-to-face. She forgot to take into account what would happen if her mother turned out to be freaking royalty. “But, this has got to be a practical joke right? Where’s Connor? He’s behind this.”
Though, even she knew that Connor wasn’t able to get a queen to fly over the Atlantic and walk into her apartment.
“It’s not a joke,” Dad said, quietly. They were sitting at the dining room now. The queen took her coffee with a two sugars. The Queen.
Her mom.
Now that she thought about it, it made too much sense. Their study was stacked with books about Parthenos and she assumed it was just to feed Dad’s interest in European history. He was a sucker for war movies, but maintained a random softness for Roman Holiday that she never understood until now.
“Were you ever going to tell me?” She thought she said the words at an acceptable volume, but Sophie poked her startled head out of the boys’ room.
“Legally, he was bound by oath not to. You weren’t exactly … legitimate.” The queen said, a patient smile on her face as if that was supposed to make it any better. The truth about half her heritage was reduced to a contract.
“Great. Thanks.” Annabeth mumbled. She wanted to quip something like, feels so good to know I was a bastard, but that didn’t feel appropriate in front of a woman who topped Gallup polls and ran tiny country with one of the world’s best militaries. “So, why tell me now?”
“Have you been reading the news lately?” The queen studied her.
“Yeah. I … oh.” Three weeks ago, the crown prince of Parthenos had died in a car crash. His funeral had hogged news coverage for the tail end of summer. Now that she thought about it, she couldn’t remember if she saw this woman—the queen, her mother—cry in the aftermath at all. “The Prince.”
“Yes.” The queen affirmed. “You know him by his public name, but in our family, we called him Quintus. The fifth in the house to bear that name.”
Our family. The words seared into her mind. This was crazy.
“I’ve no other kids and as you can see, I’m not exactly at a childbearing age anymore. So when I die, the throne will go to one of my extended family.” Athena sniffed in disgust. Annabeth remembered a book she read on the royal families of Europe, how their family tree tangled and mixed, roots and branches. If this woman really was her mother, that meant she was distantly related both the Swedish and English thrones. “A distant uncle. He’s not too keen on the job, I fear. And I’m not exactly too keen on having him take it.”
With a sinking feeling, Annabeth realized why her mother had sought her out. Not to pop in after sixteen years and say surprise! here I am! I love you!, but because she needed a job filled. “You want me to succeed you?”
“Yes.” Athena declared this with such confidence that Annabeth was afraid to argue.
“But I thought I wasn’t legitimate. You signed an oath.” She tossed her dad an accusing look.
At this, the queen scoffed. “Please, after everything the British went through in the last century, this is barely scandalous. Quintus was raised to succeed me, but I think you and he are very similar, even without a royal upbringing.”
“Wasn’t he some sort of genius that graduated from Princeton when he was twenty?”
“Yes, but your father never hesitates to tell me how talented you are—”
So they kept in touch. This would have made her angry if not for every other possible emotion in the human spectrum of mood hitting her at the same time.
“—In running to be valedictorian, captain of the volleyball team and mathletes, student body president—”
“Ex-student body president.” She corrected.
The queen ignored her. “With proper training, you’ll be more than capable for the job.”
“Wait, who said anything about training?” This came from Dad and for once, Annabeth felt like they were on the same page.
“I have a brilliant daughter, who has the potential to take on one of the hardest and most rewarding jobs that there is.” Athena declared and Annabeth couldn’t help feeling a certain pride at the word brilliant. “She deserves a chance to fully explore that opportunity and decide for herself. It’s her birthright. Well, technically.”
“You said decide,” Annabeth seized on the word. “That implies I have a choice in the matter.”
“Every May, the Parthenian Consulate in New York hosts a ball to celebrate our Independence Day. I think ten months worth of lessons would inform you enough to decide if you want to accept your royal title as Princess of Parthenos. The ball would serve as your formal introduction.”
“And what if I decide not to?”
“Then you resume your normal life and I suppose I’ll have to outlive my uncle.” Athena said with a wicked gleam in her eye. “But, from what I’ve heard about you, I do believe the queendom something you could do and do very well. Consider the offer.”
“I—” Annabeth could have hit herself for stuttering, but the queen stood up (prompting Dad to stand up as well) and with a gracious smile, returned to the doorway, slipping her feet into her sneakers.
“And Annabeth,” the queen opened the door and Annabeth was shocked to see a man standing right outside it, as if he was guarding it. He was wearing ordinary clothes, but she caught the glimpse of a gun in a holster strapped to his belt. “I’m not going to make you sign a legal document like your father, but I believe you are smart enough to know not to share this information with just anybody.”
“Right. Okay. Sure.”
Athena closed the door behind her leaving a stagnant silence in the air between Annabeth and her father.
“Anna—” he began.
“Nope.” She held up her hand, similar to what her mother had just done. Dad acquiesced as he did with Athena, but with much more hesitation. “I’m still mad you didn’t tell me. You just need to … I just need to … bye.”
She marched off to the room and slammed the door behind her. And there was still calculus homework to do.
She spent all that night searching up her family tree, reading their Wikipedia biographies. Her mother, the widowed ruler of Parthenos, a Mediterreanean island famous for its olives and insanely deadly army. Her deceased half-brother, the Crown Prince, twelve years older: inventor, statesman, scientist, Princetonian. From pictures she found of Google, the view of the capital city’s streets left the one outside her window far in the dust. They were beautiful buildings with Neo-Classical exteriors of fine Corinthian columns and Hellenic facades.
Parthenos seemed wonderful, the way it valued education and culture. There was something admirable about the way the country strove to be self-sufficient despite limited resources. They channeled all their efforts into helping their citizens grow and be as educated and capable as possible. Parthenians valued everything she valued. She was starting to see the familial resemblance.
Within a few hours, she read every possible public detail there was about her family, but the truth seemed like a surreality. The next morning, she woke up, looked over to the photos lining her shelf, and muttered, “I’m a princess.”
If only Luke Castellan had known.
“I just feel like it’s too tempting,” Sophie was saying to Dad in the living room, as Annabeth tiptoed out of her room. “She’s sixteen and brilliant. Every brilliant sixteen year old wants to save the world. It’s a golden opportunity, but I’m afraid she won’t see the cost.”
Annabeth froze in her tracks.
“She’s a smart girl.” Dad replied. “I’m sure, she’ll think it through and come to the right decision.”
“Hello, parents!” She announced with a cough, strolling into the kitchen with as much casual confidence as she could muster. This was too much. It was over the top. They knew she had overheard them.
“So, Anna,” Sophie said, cutting to the chase, “I take it you thought about the queen’s offer?"
“Yeah.” Annabeth quieted. She had already made up her mind, but somehow it didn’t feel right to tell them just yet. “But I haven’t decided. Just let me make a pro-con list first.”
This seemed to assuage them. Anyways, a list wouldn’t hurt. It helped with impulse control and kept her ADHD in check. And for something this big, well, her dad was right. She would have to be absolutely positive that she was going to make the right decision.
There was nothing to kick her back down to the real world than the second day of school. Clarisse had stormed up to her locker and raged for a full minute about how their new coach wanted to switch from the 5-1 formation to the 6-2.
“As if we’re a bunch of middle school kids!” She snarled. “You’re the only good setter we have anyways. Kayla doesn’t have enough power.”
“Uh-huh,” Annabeth muttered. The shock of finding out she was royalty was just a little more than the shock of Clarisse complimenting her.
“Dude! What are we going to do?”
Annabeth closed her locker and spun the dial to confound the lock. She bit her lip, the thoughts swarming her head condensing into as neat of a plan as she could strategize. “Wait until practice. The coach doesn’t know what he’s talking about. He’ll see how bad we are at 6-2 and change it. You can even tell the girls to fake their setting skills to make it more convincing.”
“He better.” Clarisse’s voice was gruff. She stormed off in the other direction as the bell rang. Annabeth swallowed a breath and made her way to study hall at Mr. D’s room.
“Whoa, there!” Connor jumped out of nowhere and began walking alongside her. “Is that Annabeth Chase, late for class?”
“It’s study hall.” She gave him a friendly swat on the shoulder. “And it’s Mr. D, so. And really, Connor? It’s the second day of class and you’re already skipping. Remember what happened last year?”
He tossed a candy up from the pack of peanut M&Ms in his hand and caught it perfectly in his mouth. “Thank God for Piper. I don’t know what she said in her character witness, but it sure as hell charmed the disciplinary committee out of wanting to expel me and Travis.”
“With friends like these.”
“By the way, thirty-four. Sixty-five. Twelve.” She choked, wondering how exactly he had figured out her locker combination. “Don’t worry, after you nearly broke my arm last year, I know better than to put another spider in there. But, you know, in case I need some extra cash, just giving you a heads up. Thanks bestie!”
With that, Connor darted off again and Annabeth questioned why exactly she was best friends with a compulsive kleptomaniac. But compared to everything else, it seemed like the least of her problems.
Mr. D wasn’t even there to monitor study hall, which meant that exactly no one was studying. Drew Tanaka was gossiping in the back row with her clique. Next to them, Leo, one of Piper’s friends who Annabeth was friendly with but not all that close to, was looking for segues to enter their conversation. Other kids were folding paper airplanes and juggling apples. If Piper were here, she would do an uncanny impression of Mr. D. The only empty seat was in the front at the very right of the room.
She took the seat and opened her notebook, casting a furtive look around her to make sure nobody could see what she was about to write. Luckily, Michael Yew and Lee Fletcher were too engrossed in a player-by-player analysis of their archery team. Goode was a typical Upper East private school; fancy enough to have its own archery and equestrian team.
The seat next to her was occupied by a sleeping boy with a mop of black hair. He rested his face into the palm of his hand, so she couldn’t make out his features. All she could see was a little trail of spittle on the side of is chin. Gross, but at least it meant he wouldn’t bother her.
Annabeth uncapped her pen and divided her notebook into two columns.
Pro: Parthenos is amazing and I get the chance to actually do some good in the world
Con: Constant 24/7 public scrutiny of my life
Pro: No need to ever worry about unemployment
Pro: I can still attend high school and college in America.
Con: But do I have to live there forever after college?
Pro: If I’m stuck in a building all the time, then the Grand Parthenian Palace is a pretty beautiful building to be stuck in
Con: No freedom
Pro: Pretty dresses
Pro: It’s only lessons, I don’t have to make my final decision yet
Pro: The Queen thinks I’m capable with some training
Con: Do I even have time to do training?
Pro: ALL THE GOOD I COULD DO IN THE WORLD
A few years back, when she still fought with Sophie regularly, her stepmother always commented on her arrogance. “Stop acting like you know more than everyone else!” Sophie had shrieked once when Annabeth was thirteen.
“I’m sorry if I happen to be the smartest person in the room.” She had blurted out and instantly regretted.
There was truth to what Sophie had said to Dad earlier. While Annabeth had wanted to be an architect for as long as she remembered, there was something intoxicating about the idea of ruling a country. She was smart enough to understand the struggles that came with the job, but just hopeful enough to think that she could do it with just enough nerve. And to know that her own mother, beloved and respected Queen Athena, would face the public backlash of having an illegitimate child because she believed Annabeth was able…
In her reverie, her pen slipped out of her hand and landed on the tile floor with a plasticky sound.
This stirred Sleeping Beauty next to her and before she could bend down and grab it, he had already picked it up, his floppy black hair swishing to obscure her view of his face. “You dropped this.”
“Thanks.” She said, then noticed that he was looking straight at her notebook. She slid her binder and covered it so that only the column headings, PRO and CON in large black sharpie, stood out.
“A pro-con list?” His voice was strangely familiar, though she didn’t think she recognized the boy at all. “Man, that is so like—”
By now, he turned from the notebook to her face and finished his sentence. “Annabeth?”
Percy was taller than before. Well, this wasn’t exactly outrageous because they were twelve the last time she saw him. But he was tall— long, lean limbs couldn’t quite be contained by desk and chair. His green eyes were still as bright and expressive as they had been when he decided to pull her into the Long Island Sound with him. All his acne had been replaced by constellations of freckles. She almost thought she could map out the sky in them.
Puberty had treated him well.
“Percy.” She said, not offering it as a question. No matter how much they changed physically since the last day of camp, she would recognize his face anywhere. She just never expected it to be here. And it was the shock of it that caused her, valedictorian-in-the-making, princess of one of the most educated nations in the world, to say something intelligent like, “You drool when you sleep.”