Demigods » 1D + 5SOS

Chapter 20

Chapter 20

"I thought you said that we didn't have to camp out anymore," Michael whined as they walked away from the street.

"We didn't," Ashton said in slight annoyance. "Until I found out that you blew half of our money on food."

"We need food! You can't blame me for that!"

"Yeah, well, you can blame yourself for the fact that we need to camp out for the rest of our quest now."

"At least we don't have to walk so much," Calum said, shrugging. "We have enough money to take a plane to LA."

Ashton grimaced. "Yeah... I don't know about that."

"What? What are you talking about?"

"Percy told me that children of Poseidon really shouldn't fly. It makes Zeus upset."

"That's bullcrap!" the bassist exclaimed. "We've flown multiple times before, and we were fine!"

"That was before we found out that we were related to gods!" Ashton shot back. "That was before Zeus knew that I was a son of Poseidon. We have to be more careful from now on, okay? It's better to be safe than sorry."

"He has a point," Luke said quietly.

Calum groaned. "Ugh, fine. I guess that we'll just take a bunch of buses. Unless the god of buses has a problem with the children of Ares, too?"

"Huh, what?" Michael looked up at the mention of Ares, muffin crumbs falling out his mouth. "What about me?"

"Forget it, mate, I was just criticizing Ashton."

"Yeah, thank you," the drummer said sarcastically.

They found a clearing in the trees that could serve as a camping site. They cleared away any sticks and stones and pinecones scattered on the forest floor before spreading out their newly-bought sleeping bags.

"We probably shouldn't start a fire," Ashton suggested. "We don't want to attract any monsters to us."

"I guess," Calum said, breaking into the food supply.

Michael finished off his muffin, which reminded him of the three old ladies he had seen at the mall. His blood seemed to grow cold when he thought of them. They hadn't attacked him like a monster would, but they definitely weren't human. There was something off about them.

"Hey, guys...." he said slowly. "I need to tell you something."

"What is it?" Ashton asked absently, tossing Luke a handful of granola bars.

"While I was at the store--"

"Wasting half of our money on snacks."

"Shut up, Ash, this is important," the guitarist said sharply.

Ashton shrunk back a bit. Michael hardly ever snapped at him like that. He hardly ever did it at all. This was serious.

"There were these three old ladies," he continued. "And we were just... watching each other. They were knitting this giant quilt or something, and one of them held up this string of yarn. Then she picked up a pair of giant gold scissors and cut the string, and I just... I don't know. It sounds stupid now, I know, but it was really... weird."

Michael didn't want to admit that it had scared him. There had been no reason for it to scare him, they were just three old ladies knitting a blanket and cutting string. Hell, for all he knew, they were normal mortals and didn't have anything to do with them.

However, the look on Ashton's face said differently.

"The Fates," he breathed.

"The whats?"