Amaurosis

VIII: Pain In My Asphodel

The distant hum of engines whirring vibrated through my body as I sat in the dining room, slouching over the edge of the splintered table. My stomach growled maddeningly, yet I couldn't bring myself to eat.

With the silver fork, I picked and pushed the overcooked eggs onto the charred toast, the tines scraping against the glass. I rested my head in the palm of my hand, watching the son of Poseidon play with his mini trident across from me. He was like a two-year-old playing with an airplane, making it fly through the air as he made motor sounds with his mouth.

"Are we going to pretend like we know what we're doing?" Annabeth asked, breaking the silence consumed with nothing but obnoxious chewing. "We can't sit here and act like we understand the prophecy that the Oracle foretold. It's a prophecy! It's meant to be confusing!" She fell back in her seat with a huff and all humanly noises ceased.

"Okay," Jason said awkwardly, unsure as he dragged the vowels. Slowly, he lowered his utensils until they rested securely on his plate. "We'll dissect it, take it apart word by word, like interpreting a poem. What's the first line?"

Jason turned to Piper as she stared intently into her blade, her hands cautiously wrapped around the dagger's neck. "To the Pillars of Hercules in the ancient West."

"Great," Percy gobbled, his mouth full of milk-less cereal grains-- I never understood how people can eat cereal without milk. It is incredibly dry and disgusting. "What does that mean?"

I sighed in disappointment and slowly opened my eyelids. "The Strait of Gibraltar," I told him as lifelessly as I could. I sounded like the computerized voice of Stephen Hawking's chair-- he's a demigod, too; a son of Apollo, I believe. "They want us to go to the Mediterranean Sea, the ancient West."

"Wonderful," Percy retorted, stuffing his face with more dry cereal. Why would anyone want to eat dry cereal when milk could be added?

"The next line is 'The seven must return for one final quest.'" Hazel piped up, pushing her plate to the center of the table-- signaling she was finished eating. "But that is clear as a reflection in a freshly polished sword. And we've already identified the meaning of the one that follows: Per the night wanderer and young Death. But why is Alex the night wanderer?"

Annabeth was quick to respond, "She doesn't sleep like we do." Just this alone set me on the edge of my seat. My heart began to thump in anticipation. I nudged her side, tight-lipped. "Well, at night, she likes to wander the grounds at Camp. Thus, night wanderer." Secretive glances were taken by the others, and it wasn't hard to discern that they weren't completely convinced.

"And finally, 'The man blinded by Wisdom will unveil the rest," Piper finished, literally her only contribution on any quest she's been on thus far, or so I've heard. From what I've seen at camp, she can barely point a sword at her opponent, much less actually fight said opponent. But most kids of Aphrodite would rather gaze at their reflection in the blade than get their sparkling pumps wet with mud.

"Wisdom?" Leo asked Annabeth, squinting half his face. "As in your mom?" She nodded. "So who did Athena blind?"

Annabeth furrowed her eyebrows and slumped her shoulders. "If I had Daedalus' Laptop, I could find something, but not off the top of my head."

Athena blinded somebody, I thought. I thought she was supposed to be one of the nicer Olympians.

Godly history was the one subject I hated from Camp Half-Blood. Dionysus never explained anything. He always sat in the front with a can of Coca-Cola in his hand complaining about how he didn't know, and I quote, "that Zeus had a thing with that nymph." He described everything in his perspective, never in an unbiased fashion. Apparently, everything was "so unfair."