Legends, Percy Jackson

iv. yer a demigod, nina.

     Percy blinked. "Um . . . okay," he said finally. Very intelligent, ten points to him.

     Grover gasped loudly, kneeling and bowing his head unnecessarily low. "Thank you, Lady Artemis!" he babbled. "You're so . . . you're so . . . Wow!"

     "Get up, goat boy!" the black haired girl snapped. "We have other things to worry about! Annabeth is gone!"

     Nina raised her hand. Everyone turned to her. She was pretty sure they had all forgotten that her, Bianca and Nico were even there. The trio stood, Bianca on the left, Nico in the middle, and Nina on the right. Bianca had a hand clasped on her brother shoulder, while Nico himself was staring awestruck at Artemis. Nina was standing, one hand raised in the air like she was answering a question in class, the other clamped on her bleeding ear.

     "Um, I have a question," she said.

     Artemis nodded. "Go on."

     "What," she started, gesturing out with her hand, "and I can't stress this enough, the fuck is happening right now?"

     Bianca looked like she was about to add on to that, but Nico stepped forward, hands shaking a bit in excitement as he began to ramble. "This is like a Mythomagic fight! Oh man, this is just like when we played last week, Nina, remember? Nina, remember? Except I used the Nemean lion, not the manticore, and you used Apollo, not Artemis, but it's basically the same! Artemis has more front line attack points though, so━!"

     Bianca and Nina turned to him in sync, "Nico!"

     "This isn't like Mythomagic!"

     "This isn't about that stupid game, Nico!"

     "Well, it's not stupid━"

     "Nina!"

     "Right."

     Nico pulled a card from his sleeve, because of course he did. "Okay, one, it's not stupid, and two, it's exactly like Mythomagic, Nina. How did you kill the lion? You shot it with arrows. How did they kill the manticore? They shot him with arrows!"

     Nina reached forward and put a hand over Nico's mouth to keep him from talking. "This isn't like Mythomagic because it's real life, Nico! Like the girl who fell," she reminded him, ignoring the grimaces going around the others. "This is dangerous. I've been poisoned. I could totally go not-alive right now. This is serious."

     Nico licked her hand in retaliation.

     Nina squealed, letting him go and shoving the smug little shit away. She rubbed a hand on her skirt, gross out. "Ew! I cannot believe━Bianca! He licked me!" She turned back to the boy. "You shouldn't lick people, Nicodemo, you'll give them rabies."

     Nico gasped in affront. "Stop calling me that! I told you my full name in confidence! And I won't━!"

     Bianca frowned. "That isn't how rabies works," she objected.

"Bianca," Nina said, holding out her hands. "What are you doing to me?"

Bianca mouthed 'sorry.'