𝐌𝐚𝐫𝐢𝐚𝐧𝐚 𝐓𝐫𝐞𝐧𝐜𝐡 // 𝐏𝐞𝐫𝐜𝐲 𝐉𝐚𝐜𝐤𝐬𝐨𝐧

i. Newcomer

Maybe the other campers wouldn't be as... unique as Annabeth Chase. Ha! A boy can dream.

• • •

— ONCE PERCY HAD recovered from the shock of finding out his Latin teacher was a horse, the tour around Camp Half-Blood was actually quite nice.

Only now revealed to Percy, eyes watched his every move. "That's him," one would say. "The one who killed the Minotaur."

Percy was never a shy person by nature, but the stares made him nervous. The majority of the campers were older than him, bigger, too. However, the eyes of demigods weren't the only stares burning holes through his clothes. He questioned Chiron, the recently revealed centaur, who insisted there was nothing to fear. "Somebody lives there?" asked Percy, on the topic of the Big House's attic. "No," said Chiron with finality. "Not a single living thing."

The pair continued forward, through the strawberry fields and the thickest woods Percy had ever experienced. The boy asked what they were for, why the centaur had used to word "stocked" to describe it. Chiron replied with: "You'll see. Capture the flag is Friday night. Do you have your own sword and shield?"

"My own-"

"No," Chiron said. "I don't suppose you do. I think a size five will do. I'll visit the armoury later."

Finally, Percy was shown the cabins. Twelve buildings nestled in the woods by the lake he had seen only minutes earlier. They were arranged in a U shape, with two at the base and five in a row on either side. They were the most bizarre group of buildings Percy had ever seen.

Other than the large brass numbers above the doors (odds on the left, evens on the right), they looked absolutely nothing alike.

Cabin nine had smokestacks like a small factory. Number four had tomato vines coiling around the walls and the grass roof. Seven seemed to be crafted from solid gold, gleaming so brightly in the sunlight it was practically impossible to see. The boy inspected cabins one and two, the pair appearing like his-and-hers mausoleums. "Zeus and Hera?" guessed Percy.

"Correct," answered Chiron. "Their cabins look empty," Percy pointed out. Chiron replied promptly. "Several of the cabins are. That's true. No one ever stays in one or two."

'Okay,' Percy thought. 'So each cabin has a different god, like a mascot. Twelve cabins for the twelve Olympians. But why would some be empty?'

However, cabin three caught his eye. With its walls of rough, grey stone studded with seashells and corals, as if the slabs had been hewn straight from the ocean floor. He attempted to peek inside before Chiron said, "Oh, I wouldn't do that!"

The centaur placed his hand on the boy's shoulder, noticing the longing look in his forest green eyes. Percy turned away, his attention consumed by what stood before him and his ex-Latin teacher.

Cabin number five. A bright red building with one nasty paint job, as if the paint had been slapped on by buckets and fists. Barbed wire lined the roof. Why? Percy had no clue. A stuffed wild boar's head hung over the doorway, it's eyes seeming to follow you like the Mona Lisa. Inside, Percy saw several kids. Mean and tough and built like juvie veterans. They arm wrestled and argued over the blaring rock music shaking the ground beneath them.