A Thousand Thrones

Thirteen

Thirteen

Monday morning, it felt weird being back in the swing of things, especially with school.  Molly, Lee, and I all went back home the day before.  Tom and Wendy welcomed me back home with smiles as Sammy jumped into my arms and asked how our trip to Los Angeles was.

I didn’t know what to say. 

Apparently Damon had Molly call them and say that we’d gone on a spur of the moment road trip.  They had been a little iffy at first, but then they just told us to have fun.

“It’s your senior year,” Tom said when I’d gotten home and they asked me about it.  “You’ve got to be a little crazy before the hard stuff starts.  You only live once.”

So the next morning, Sammy was there to wake me up bright and early to get to school.  After getting ready and eating breakfast, I headed out the front door to walk to school, only to be surprised to see Lee’s truck sitting in our driveway.

“What are you doing?” I asked through the open passenger side window. 

"What's his name told me that I needed to drive you to and from school, for safety.  But after what happened Friday night, I was going to do it anyway," he said.  He looked a little disgruntled and because of that I had to laugh.

"His name happens to be Damon," I said, opening the door and getting inside.

I fastened my seatbelt and he backed out of the driveway.  "Damon, what's his name, Hades...they're all the same in my book," he grumbled.

"You know, we never really got to talk about who you really are back at the house," I said, watching him as he drove toward the school.

He stole a glance at me before looking back toward the road.  "I'm still the same Lee.  There's nothing different between us."

"Only that you're a demigod and I'm a goddess who's almost three thousand years old.  Yeah, nothing different at all."

Lee chuckled.  "Well, there's that."

"So you're still going to be my friend, even though the truth has come out about both of us?"

He grimaced at the word 'friend' like I knew he probably would.  "Yeah," he said.  "I'm here to protect you, no matter what.  I’ll always be here for you."

I nodded, looking back toward the road. 

"So do you have that dagger still?" he asked. 

My eyes went to my lap.  My knee length white skirt hid where it was strapped to my thigh.  Damon had given it back to me before I left to go back home and the sheath that could be readjusted to fit around my arm or thigh.

"Yep," I said, nodding.

"Where did you put it?" he asked, glancing over at me.

I grinned back at him.  "If I told you, then I'd have to kill you with it."

That earned me an eye roll. 

When we got closer to the school, the traffic was a little bit heavier than it usually was.  But once we got closer, the yellow caution tape around the part of the back parking lot closest to the tree line explained it all. 

"So I wonder what the story is," I said as we drove slowly past it.  The crushed cars were gone, but the pavement had practically been turned into rubble. 

"My mom told me that they said a gas pipe underneath exploded.  That's the official story on the news.  It's going to take about three weeks for them to fix it, though."