The Apprentice of Thanatos

Chapter 19: An Unpleasant Visitor

      "Oh, cool." Danny was absolutely okay with not seeing the wine dude for the rest of spring break, and he didn't think about it again as the lesson began.

      During their first private combat lesson, Danny showed Chiron two of his powers: intangibility and invisibility (he wasn't very comfortable with showing off his ecto-rays and other powers just yet.) Chiron seemed slightly disturbed by Danny's abilities, but he took the news in stride, and helped Danny to incorporate those skills into their training.

      After lunch, there was a tracking class. It was mostly for tracking animals and monsters, but Danny figured it could also be useful for ghost hunting. After that was cabin clean-up, but since Danny was not officially in the Hermes cabin (or any cabin, for that matter), he didn't have to help with it. So, he had more free time than the other campers.

      During his free time, Danny would go into the woods and explore (invisibly. He didn't need the nymphs telling Mr. D anything else.) He also hung out with Annabeth when she had free time. They talked more about Amity Park and life at camp, but they also did other activities. They did some more sparring, and they also spent some time in the rec room (with a bit of help from his telekinesis, Danny was a master at ping pong, much to Annabeth's chagrin.)

      On Tuesday, Danny had archery with Sunny, javelin throwing with one of the Ares' campers, and something the water nymphs taught called Ride the Rapids. On Wednesday, Danny helped Annabeth check inventory at the camp store (How did I not know this was here before?) and picked strawberries with some of the Demeter kids before lunch.

      After lunch, Danny found himself in the camp forge, learning the basics of blacksmithing. It was fun, but Danny was glad to get out of the workshop later that day to go chop wood for that night's campfire; it was far too hot in the forge for his liking.

      After dinner each day was a campwide activity: on Monday, it was volleyball; Tuesday, it was unarmed combat; and Wednesday was Archery Knockout. Danny did not participate in any of the events. Even though Danny and Annabeth were on good terms (he would even say they were friends), he didn't want to make her any more suspicious of him if he accidentally used his powers during one of the events again.

      At the campfire after Archery Knockout, Annabeth asked him why he hadn't participated in any of the activities. Danny told her that he wasn't very good at volleyball and that he had pretty poor aim (okay, that one was a bold-faced lie; his aim was as good as his mom's.)

      "Then why didn't you enter the unarmed combat tournament?" Annabeth countered.

      Danny shrugged with a smirk. "Didn't want to embarrass anyone."

      Annabeth shook her head with a grin. "Careful. I might just tell Clarisse you said that."

     "Please don't."

      If Danny was being honest, he kind of enjoyed the break from his ghostly hero duties. So, of course, something had to happen while he was at camp.

      On Thursday afternoon, Danny had wrestling class with Clarisse and her cabin. He was surprisingly good at the class, though that was likely because he had plenty of experience with hand-to-hand combat from ghost fighting. Clarisse was demonstrating a chokehold on one of her siblings when they suddenly heard a loud conch horn echo across the valley.

      Clarisse's expression turned serious and she stood to address the class. "Alright, training's over!" She shouted. "Camp is under attack, go to our cabin and await orders!" She then turned to Danny. "You, stay here and stay outta the way."