𝐓𝐇𝐔𝐍𝐃𝐄𝐑𝐎𝐔𝐒 𝐎𝐂𝐄𝐀𝐍 ━ 𝐣𝐚𝐬𝐨𝐧 𝐠𝐫𝐚𝐜𝐞

𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐋𝐎𝐒𝐓 𝐇𝐄𝐑𝐎 | 𝐔𝐍𝐖𝐄𝐋𝐂𝐎𝐌𝐄 𝐕𝐈𝐒𝐈𝐎𝐍

I coughed. "Uh, no."

Annabeth almost managed a smile. "Actually, her family has a luxury condo in Queens, and she goes to a finishing school in Connecticut. But when she's here at camp, yeah, she lives in the cave. She's our oracle, tells the future. I was hoping she could help me—"

"Find Percy," I said without a doubt.

All the energy drained out of Annabeth, like she'd been holding it together for as long as she could. She sat down on a rock, and her expression was so full of pain, my heart hurt too. I missed Percy badly, though I only knew of his disappearance for about twenty minutes.

I sat beside her and tried to think of something to say. "Just know that he's not gone, Annabeth. Just lost. Either we'll find him, or he'll find us."

Her shoulders drooped. She rubbed her face and took a shaky breath. "I know, Angelique. I'm just so very tired."

"How long, and how did it happen?" I asked.

"I've been searching for him for about three days, six hours, and about twelve minutes. We were so excited because we both started winter break early. We met up at camp on Tuesday, figured we had three weeks together. It was going to be great. Then after the campfire, he—he kissed me good night, went back to his cabin, and in the morning, he was gone. We searched the whole camp. We contacted his mom. We've tried to reach him every way we know how. Nothing. He just disappeared."

"Why didn't you contact me?" I asked, trying not to sound accusing.

"Chiron told me to let you focus on your mission. I- I should have told you anyways."

"He's right," I sighed. "I had a job to do. If you told me... I would have come running. I would have been reckless."

Piper was pursing her lips, she seemed to be thinking about something. "How long were you guys together?"

"Since August," Annabeth said. "August eighteenth. Percy's birthday. And seven days before Angelique's birthday, which is August twenty-fifth."

I wasn't going to pretend to be surprised. Annabeth remembered just about everything. She was a good friend that way.

"Almost exactly when I met Jason," Piper said. "But we've only been together a few weeks."

Annabeth looked even more tired. She glanced at me, silently pleading me to tell Piper.

I held in a wince. "Piper... take a seat."

She seemed to know where this was going. Half of me expected her to cover her ears and start singing la-la-la very loudly. The things mist does... it's scary sometimes.

"Look, I know Jason thought—" Piper was talking rapidly before I could stop her, "he thought he just appeared at our school today. But that's not true. I've known him for four months. "

"Piper," I said slowly. "It's the Mist. M-i-s-t. It's a kind of veil separating the mortal world from the magic world. Mortal minds—they can't process strange stuff like gods and monsters, so the Mist bends reality. It makes mortals see things in a way they can understand —like their eyes might just skip over this valley completely, or they might look at that dragon and see a pile of cables."

Piper swallowed. "No. You said yourself I'm not a regular mortal. I'm a demigod."

"The mist can affect even demigods," I said. "Especially demigods who don't know they are one yet. Some memories you have of me may not be real too."

Piper insisted. "My memories aren't fake. They're so real. The time we set Coach Hedge's pants on fire. The time Jason and I watched a meteor shower on the dorm roof, you even helped us sneak out, and I finally got the stupid guy to kiss me..."