𝙢𝙖𝙙𝙚 𝙤𝙛 𝙢𝙖𝙜𝙞𝙘 || 𝘱𝘦𝘳𝘤𝘺 𝘫𝘢𝘤𝘬𝘴𝘰𝘯 𝘹 𝘰𝘤

x - ᴛʜᴇ ᴛᴜɴɴᴇʟ ᴏꜰ ʟᴏᴠᴇ (ᴏᴏᴏ!!)

——THE TUNNEL OF LOVE (OOO!!)

AS THEY ARRIVED AT the water park, the sun was already starting to set. the sign in front of them said: WAT R A D. lilith figured it was supposed to spell: WATERLAND.

everything about the water park was something from lilith's dreams. the main gait was padlocked and had barbed wire on top of it. inside, there was dry water slides and pools and tubes and pipes. everything was curled around each other. vintage tickets and advertisments were scattered everywhere and blew with the wind. with everything combined, lilith thought it was the coolest place on earth.

"if ares brings his girlfriend here for a date," percy said, looking at the barbed wire, "i'd hate to see what she looks like."

lilith made a sharp inhale. annabeth paused for a minute.

"percy..." lilith warned, "be mindful of what you say."

"what? i thought you didn't want to help ares?"

"he's still a war god." annabeth said, "and his girlfriend is very temperamental."

"you don't want to insult her looks." grover added.

"who is she? echidna?" percy joked.

"no, aphrodite." grover said, a little dreamily.

"goddess of love, beauty, war." lilith added, "you do not wanna be on her bad side."

"i thought she was married to somebody." percy stated.

"hephaestus." lilith said.

"what's your point?" grover asked.

"oh." percy said in a small voice.

they stood in silence before percy asked, "so how do we get in?"

grover shouted, "maia!"

his winged shoes activated and he was lifted off the ground. he did an unintentional somersault midair and then finally stumbled to a landing on the opposite side of the fence.

as percy and annabeth started to climb the fence, lilith got an idea. she ran over to some shaded area about ten feet away from the fence.

"what are you doing?" annabeth shouted.

lilith ignored her. she found a place with enough shadows to do what she needed. she took a deep breath and focused her thoughts to the other side of the fence.

normally, she wouldn't use shadow travel just for any normal occasion, but she viewed this as an opportunity to practice and to ease herself back into using magic daily after that whole period of not using any. she deemed this as a good experience.

she had shadow traveled before. she mostly practiced going from the woods to the hermes cabin. she vowed she would practice going even longer distances, but she was nervous.

as she started to shadow travel, her body seeped into the shadows. she couldn't see anything, her vision was filled with darkened. wind woodshed around her, but other than that, she heard whispers of faraway voices in her ears. she felt cold shivers go up her spine. gods, she felt so relaxed.