When Wand and Sword Collide || Percy Jackson/ Harry Potter

The Gods Blow Wind

"Luth is dead."

Fresh bouts of tears flowed freely down Lou Ellen's red face. Harry didn't know what to say – he'd hardly spoken to his supposed half-brother, but he didn't deserve death and the grief it caused Lou. She covered her face with her hands, shaking her head side to side.

"I'm so sorry," she mumbled, "I was supposed to contact you with a nice message, ask how your quest was going, but this news is just..." She trailed off, stifling a huge sob.

"I'm sorry," Harry began, unsure how to comfort her. "What happened? Are you unharmed?"

"Y-Yes," she began shakily, "I'm fine; I'm a little injured, but nothing to worry about... Luth, my friend and I were tracking the half-blood to here, Maryland. B-But we were attacked, by..."

She lost her train of thought again. Harry wanted to reach out and hold her shoulder, comfort her, but she was merely a mound of spray that had collected into a figure-shape. Iris-Messaging messed with his head. Death, however, he understood, familiar to him like an old friend.

"If it's too difficult to tell me, that's fine—"

"No," she cut through, shaking her head, "No, you have to hear it. It was so weird that I don't even think you'll believe me." She inhaled deeply before looking up, her bright eyes staring at Harry with concern. "We were wandering through Calvert Cliffs State Park, just r-relaxing after a hard day of searching, having a bit of fun... then, everything changed when a g-group of flying people attacked."

Harry couldn't tell if she was being serious or not. The idea of flying people seemed so farfetched that his first instinct was to laugh and ask her to tell the truth. But her tear-stricken features said it all – she wasn't lying.

"Flying people?" Harry couldn't help but cock an eyebrow. "What do you mean?"

"T-they didn't even come near us. But they had these... these laser things, I don't know how else to describe them, sh-shooting at us and... and we ran, we just kept on running. We reached the cliff edge and... L-Luth got hit and fell..."

She let out a loud wail once again and Harry gave her a few seconds to compose herself.

"W-We couldn't see him once he fell. The flying people just left us alone after that. They... they just disappeared! Then we spent hours looking for Luth but we couldn't find him anywhere!"

"What did they look like? Anything you recognise?"

Lou shook her head, avoiding his eye contact. "They were dressed in black cloaks with black hoods, but... it was out-stretched like a covering – the back of the cloak, that is. I don't know, I think they were sitting on something."

"I see..." But he didn't.

She glanced to her side, wiping her face, "Luth must have drifted into the sea... Oh gods, it's so awful! I feel so helpless!"

"Maybe he's alive," he suggested, hoping, for Lou's sake, that Luth was.

Lou just shook her head. "No, it's impossible. The water would have killed him by now if the... the laser didn't..."

The big question on Harry's mind was: who in Merlin's name were these flying people? And what did they have against Luth? He wasn't the most pleasant person to be around but he was hardly worth the trouble, was he?

"I just d-don't understand..." whispered Lou, finally wiping tears off her face, "I just don't understand why anyone would want to kill him..."

Harry had a thought. "Did he have any enemies?"