The Demigod Diaries

Chapter 8- Into the Dark

Ok, first of all I'm so sorry I don't even think y'all know. I haven't updated in MONTHS because I've just had a lot of stuff going on in my life and it was hard to concentrate on other things such as this chapter. I'm still having problems concentrating on school work and it's really affecting my grades. PLUS, I've been having to study extra hard for a quiz team I didn't want to do very much. So I'm sorry that I haven't been updating and I will, for a fact, update more often just not too often because it's very difficult for me to get time to write a chapter. But, I would like to thank you all so very much for reading and voting and sticking with this story and it's bad updates! THAKNYOU and enjoy the chapter! Hopefully it helps you understand a lot more even though I did jump forward quite a bit! Have a great week and Halloween!(-:

••••••

Chapter 8- Into the Dark

The only sound in the long, narrow corridor was two pairs of feet, making their way down the stone stairs toward the land of the dead. I had to squint in order to see the figure in front of me, even if he were only a couple feet away.

I had tried to visit my dad two days earlier when I first left camp, but he was completely delusional and blew up three buildings when I told him I was his daughter. It was no use, he left me all alone to figure things out myself. I got attacked by a pack of wild harpies, got lost, and almost had a heart attack when a strange boy dropped right out of the shadows before me. As you could tell, I'd had a very fun couple of days.

"So, my dad sent me here to guide you but never explained why... He said you were a 'special case' and that I needed to protect you with all costs. But my question is why? Who are you that makes you so special and where are you even going?" My guide, Nico Di Angelo, asked curiously. I didn't want to tell this kid anything, but Hades told me I could trust my guide, which turned out to be his son. Things were getting way too complicated.

"It's a long story," Was all I could say to all of his questions. I didn't know where to start and I didn't necessarily want to explain my life to some sketchy death boy.

"I've got time." Well I don't, I thought to myself. I'm all out of time.

"Well, as far as I know, Athena and Poseidon got over their hate for each other for a while and actually started to have a thing or something. Then one day, I guess Athena liked him a little too much and had a little brainchild. Me. And from what Ares, Apollo and Hermes have told me I guess I was a little celebrity on Olympus for the short while of my early childhood. Then, as I got older, I became more powerful and the other gods began to worry. Zeus saw the danger of me living on Olympus when I grew up and decided to get rid of me. He took me to the River Lethe and wiped my memory. Then, He had Hecate make me a potion and gave it to Apollo to take care of. Apollo didn't have the guts to give me the potion and turn me completely mortal with no memory and no one there for me. So, he only gave me most of it and left some. So, as you can see I have the power of a demigod, I'm mortal, and I'm supposed to enter Tarturas and save Percy and Annabeth's life's. That would probably be why."

Nico was silent for a while, and I'd begun to think I'd lost him until I ran right into something cold and hard. "Ow! Watch it!" His cold voice hissed. I mumbled a sorry but he didn't acknowledge it. "And I would like to know the truth, not a stupid little lie."

"Bah!" I huffed angrily. He didn't believe me?! "I told you the truth! Now keep walking." I poked his bony back a couple of times until he took a step. "Death head," I mumbled under my breath.

"Did you just call me a meth head?" Nico Di Angelo stopped once again, and this time I only had a second to stop myself before we both went tumbling into darkness. Although I did find Nico quite annoying, I couldn't help laughing at what he heard.

"You do look like one," I joked, poking him in the back again to get him to start walking.

"Thanks." Nico tripped over a step and almost tumbled to his death, but I managed to grab in time.

Neither of us had noticed the sound of rushing water echoing against the stone, or the narrow stairway opening up into a massive cavern. I looked back up the steps, which now looked like a stairway to heaven from down here, and wondered if I would be missed back at Camp Half-Blood. It was the only place I'd ever fit in, however, I didn't completely fit in. I began to wonder whether I'd be missed on Olympus, and if my own father would remember me once the Greeks and Romans sorted things out. That is, if they did, and if any of us would live long enough for that. The weight on my shoulders was almost crushing me completely now. I knew it was all up to me to get Percy and Annabeth through Tarturas and to close the doors from the inside.

"Stella?" Nico's empty voice pierced through my thoughts.

"What? Huh?" I blinked at him. Was he saying something?

"I said thanks, again."

Right. "Oh, yeah of course. And I was kidding before by the way." I couldn't see his face, but I was positive he rolled his eyes and mouthed "sure".

I followed closely behind as Nico trudged along the dark shore of the River Styx, tripping over the occasional skull or bone. He stopped to rest in the sand near a part of the Styx that didn't have too fast of a current. I stood next to him and gave him a quizzical look.

"Why'd we sto-" My voice failed me as I saw a glowing Greek ghost. He was tall and buff with a cruel, scarred face and short, black hair. His pale green eyes glittered with bitterness. I would have thought he was just a random Greek warrior, but my eye caught a familiar sight; an arrow, sticking out of the man's left heel. I may have never learned anything about Greek myths, but I knew the greatest warrior of all time, and he stood only feet away from me.

"To get Percy and Annabeth through Tarturas, you will have to be invincible..." Nico's voice was small and careful. He knew I would back out if he'd told me before.

"No, I can't do this Nico. I won't."

"Listen to her, boy, it is a curse." Achillies warned Nico.

"She has to do it," Nico snapped. His voice was shaky with anger.

"I will warn you, as I must do to every hero, bathing in the River Styx will make you strong, invincible even, in combat, but your weakness will increase as well." The ghost of Achillies shimmered in the dark.

"Do you mean your heel?"

"The heel," Achillies nodded, "Is a weakness, yes. But it was my arrogance that killed me in the end. You will have to remember that, if you live."

The sound of my heartbeat roared in my ears, almost as loud as the river. I wondered if Nico could hear it too, or if he knew how afraid I was. Achillies was watching me closely, no bout deciding the sad way I would die if I even made it out of the Styx. It felt as if the entire sky were weighing down my shoulders, slowly crushing me as Katie had told me once did to Annabeth and Percy.

I turned to Nico an let the dreaded words spill out of my mouth. "Tell me what to do." And as Nico explained, I had a horrid feeling in my chest that my soul would be ripped from my body as soon as my toe touched the river. I was doomed, and there was no going back.