Lea followed after Ethan, both of them taking notes from what Drew learned from Apóllōn.
She wondered if she should have called for exemption due to being Hermes' "blessing".
(Something that Lea still side eyed. Like seriously, Leaneira Jackson did not believe in soulmates. And also, their whatever was a bit... something. Not romantic but not purely platonic either. Not something she wanted to think about because then she had to wonder if she was actually being groomed and then her thoughts turned to Trent and then she got all sad and mad at the same time and it was not a good feeling.)
(Dammit. She was going to have to see a damn therapist to make sure that she wasn't being groomed. It was hard trying to find a therapist that didn't let the undertones of their faith shine through.)
It was still light when they got into the woods, but the shadows from the trees made it feel like midnight. It was cold, too, even in summer.
She could hear the Stolls tripping around the woods and cursing. Moreso cursing about the fact that they had to make noise because they tended to be completely noiseless when it came to stealth. It was an ironic thing Hermes had told her: he was the god of thieves, but his children were about as stealthy as buffaloes.
They passed by Annabeth and Percy over at what she learned was called Zeus' fist. Admittedly, it did look like a fist from the air, but from down below, not so much. They kept it moving.
About ten minutes in, Ethan started laughing.
"What's funny?"
"It's just..." he interrupted himself to laugh. "We're in the west woods. You're a witch." He broke off into snickers and Lea, unfortunately, already knew where he was going with that line of thought. "You're the Wicked Witch of the West."
She stared at him, but even she couldn't stop her lips from twitching into a smile. Forget that Twice-Blessed crap that Maia, the mother-in-law to beat all mothers-in-law, had said. Lea wanted that to be her new title. Morella Leaneira of the West (even though she lived on the east coast.)
They were silent after that, continuing to search the woods like conspiracy theorist looking for Big Foot. After a while they stopped, and she leant against a tree to flip through her grimoire. Ethan was shifting on his feet, eyes darting around for their enemies.
"What do you think," he started. "About all of this?"
"Hmm?"
"The attack. Luke. The upcoming war. What do you think about it?"
"I think it's all a waste of time," she admitted. "I mean they've been teasing a movie about Thor, and I haven't seen it yet. Not to mention, Iron Man 2 has been rumored to come and if Luke thought he was going to keep me from watching that, then he was out of his damn mind. And honestly, a war just doesn't fit into my wellness plan."
"Lea, be serious." He looked stress, fiddling with the bracelet around his wrist. "I'm worried, you know. And Drew is..." He swallowed thickly. "Is any of this worth it on either side? Why can't there be compromises? And Drew... she's his champion now. That... that makes her target and... We're supposed to choose between either side and none of it really matters in the end, does it? We're just cogs in a machine of who is in control of the world. We don't make a real difference. "
"I..." Lea pursed her lips. This was so not a conversation that she had ever in all her fourteen years of living had ever thought to have. Lea had never trusted anyone except Percy and her Mother and even then, she looked at them sideways on the occasion.
(And yes, she cared about the people in the Heights, and they were like a family to her, but she didn't trust them to have such conversations with.)
Lea never cared about who was in control of the world or well, the United States because she never saw herself leaving the country. Everything was just an "it is what it is" type of thing. The rich people were rich and assholes and the poor people were divided against each other by the rich people to never change the status quo. And the people in the middle were content because they didn't have all frustration that the rich people faced but they didn't have the struggle that the poor people lived either.
And honestly, Lea hadn't cared about anything outside of her bubble. She would live. She would die. And the world would still turn. Like Ethan said, she was just a cog in the machine. A really small part that held no actually use but was still there to be there.
(And now she was learning that she was bit more than just a cog. Hell, she and Percy were kind the pieces that could self-destruct said machine and blow it all up for everybody.)
"If you would have asked me this before last winter, I would have agreed with you wholeheartedly. I would have even joined up with you to make our own separate group outside of Titans and Olympians. A Team Free Will so to speak, but..."
"But?"
"But now, I still agree somewhat. There are no right or wrong answers. There are some very shitty people on the gods' side." Drew had told her all about her fuckass half-brother, Eros. And that was without mentioning the minor gods that Hermes was telling her about. The ones that were switching sides because they couldn't find respect with the gods (and subsequently, the ones that stayed on the gods' side because apparently, she reawakened the respect for them. Some of them even came back from nearly fading away. Talk about pressure.) "And there are a lot of shitty people on the Titans' side." Looking at the asshole Atlas and well obviously, Trent, Luke, and Kronos.
"Then what's the point?"
"Aliens' above, this is going to sound so cheesy, but the fact of the matter is... there is no wrong or right side. Both sides believe that they're doing the right there." Even if she still thought Luke and now Trent were dumbasses. She could admit that they went with the only choice that they thought they had. "Okay, a small thing can lead to an even bigger problem. Like, okay. Let's look at Norse myths. Everybody likes blaming Loki for everything. And even when he's helping them, the second anything goes wrong. It's his fault. And man, if I thought that the Olympians needed therapy, they ain't got nothing on the norse but let's get into this."
Ethan was looking at her a bit confused but completely focused.
"Loki was a jǫtunn. Well, technically, he was half-jǫtunn because his Mother was Laufey and Laufey is listed among Ásynjar. Anyway, he represents chaos. And there is debate around his name Lopt, which is generally considered derived from Old Norse lopt meaning 'air', and therefore points to an association with the air."
Never let it be said that Lea didn't do her research.
"And just about every other jǫtunn that's mention represents another force of nature." And if Lea thought living on the body of a planet was bad, she didn't walk to think about living on the corpse of one. Poor Ymir. "The etymology for jǫtunn meant to eat, greedy, consuming, and gluttonous. Logi was the god of fire. Kári, the wind. Ægir, the sea. Hell, all nine of Ægir's daughters represented the sea. Hela was death. Nótt was Night. Loki spent his time with Æsir. He helped them and tricked them. He was something that didn't align with their beliefs to be so straight forward and narrow. He didn't fit in with status quo. Thats something I can admire."
Which said a lot about her and the company she kept.
(Said a lot about her being mated to Hermes who could arguably be the counterpart to Loki and Odin, but she didn't care for that stuff bastard.)
"In Prose Edda, it says: 'There is yet one who is numbered among the asas, but whom some call the backbiter of the asas. He is the originator of deceit, and the disgrace of all gods and men. His name is Loki, or Lopt'."
"Where are you going with this?"
"Give me a second will ya?" She gave him an irritated look. "Anyway, the thing about Norse mythology is that they fall to the sense of self fulling. Odin gets a völva, a priestess, to tell him about Ragnarǫk. She tells him that the kids of Loki were all instrumental in starting the end. And when the gods hear about the kids, they take them away. Hel is cast away to the land of the dead to rule over them. The wolf is chained until the end of the world. And the serpent was cast into the sea."
"What do the wolf and serpent represent?"
"Well, the serpent is thought to be a representation of the circle of life. He grew so big that he could bite his own tail. Where the beginnings meet the end. And the wolf is similar as he represents destiny. All three of his children mean the end of something. Just like the common thought that the world was brought to order from chaos. And he is chaos. The norse gods all represent some form of civilization. Fertility. War. Wisdom. Love. If we thought the greek myths were how they explained world, then the norse kind of have us beat on that. Like you have Odin who is the figurehead of Norse. He's the head of the estate. The father of so many kings back then that pushed for the civilization of mankind. He and his brothers though there was speculation that it was he, Loki, and another dude made the first humans. He's civilization and then he sleeps with Jord, jǫtunn of earth. And then Thor is born. The god of rain and lightning and fertility. And he marries Sif who is a goddess of earth and a lover in a jǫtunn of fire. All things needed for the progression of civilization that lived in harmony with nature."
"So why get rid of Loki and his kids?"
"Geez, you're making me into a historian, and I don't like that," Lea pouted. "But like I said, Loki and his kids represent the end of something and taking the world back into a state of chaos. The gods don't like that. Thats what they want to stop. But as you said, why can't we come to compromises? They didn't and in doing so, they fulfilled their own prophecy. By treating his kids as shit, they ensured that Loki's heart hardened against them. Hel was good. Everything was going to come to her even Odin and Thor because after they killed in Ragnarǫk, where else could they go? Odin was dead so he couldn't take them back to Valhalla. I mean I guess they could go to Freyja's afterlife, but would she accept them? Her brother died for them. The aesir had taken them hostage. Would she really accept them in her lands when she could go back to the Vanir with her father? No one ever talks about what happens to everybody that dies in Ragnarok so who knows. But anyway, they didn't make compromises. They threw Hel and the serpent away. They raised the wolf. Loved and cared for him but when he got too big, they chained him down and put a damn sword through his muzzle."
"Didn't he kill someone?"
"Well, yeah. He killed Baldr. He was basically the Apóllōn of the norse gods. Everybody loved him. He was also the Ahkilles since his Mother, Frigga, did everything to protect him which ironic because Apóllōn hated Ahkilles. Anyway, Loki did to them what they did to his son. Once he learned that mistletoe was the only thing that could harm him just like only one kind of chain could hold the wolf down. And then they had some big shot dinner that Loki was thrown out of because he killed a man, but when he comes back, they're all talking shit about him. He goes into dinner and no one left him a seat and his bff, Odin, was drinking without him even though he swore an oath to never do so. Loki goes on to insult all of them. Says that just about every woman was a whore. The men were cowards. That one lady married the dude that killed her brother. Said that he slept with Sif which really, its understandable as to why he cut her hair off. Viking women that got caught cheating got their hair cut off or put to death. Though one of the gods said it was harmless for a woman to have a lover or 'someone else' beside her husband. I guess Thor thought the same because he stayed with her and made Loki get her some new hair."
"What would do if Hermes cheated on you?"
"I would have to be in a relationship with Hermes to care if he cheated or not. Anyway," she sniffed. "Dammit. Will you let me get to the point? Anyway, after he pisses everybody off while boldly reminding them that he was the mastermind to kill Baldr, he tries to go into hiding but this one woman was like, 'Hey, remember how you killed my dad? You just reminded me of it like not even thirty minutes ago? I'm a good hunter.'. So, he gets captured. Loki was bound with the entrails of his son, and his son changed into a wolf. Daddy's girl placed a venomous snake over Loki's face, and from it poison dripped. Loki's wife sits beside him and catches the poison but when its full, she carries it away and poisons drops onto him, causing him to writhe with such violence that all of the earth shook from the force, resulting in what are now known as earthquakes. Which should technically make him a god of earthquakes but also connects him back to being the god of chaos because looking at it scientifically, if he shakes the earth hard enough to come apart then the pieces of earth would fly into the orbit and back into the 'void' of chaos."
"You know a lot of norse myths."
"When I saw Iron Man, I fell in love and decided that I needed to know more so Hermes got me the comic books which meant that I learned about the avengers which meant I learned about Thor and Loki, but Hermes said that Marvel wasn't correct in the norse myths and started bringing me stuff on it. I think he knows more than what he says but he won't admit to it."
"Alright, now what does this have to do with your point?"
"Right," she nodded sharply. "They did all that to Loki, so it wasn't surprising that Loki led the jǫtunn against the gods. All of it was pieces to a puzzle... cogs in a machine that led to a natural conclusion. The End of the World. And you know, some people that clearly didn't read Hesiod's Theogony and apparently, something changed from the time that Theogony was written to now, was that the All-Daddy's Daddy had been freed to rule over the Isle of the Blessed but I suppose it also makes sense because Hesiod wrote about the Five Ages of Men and in the Iron Age, humans would forget all the good things that the gods taught them and just be horrible people and lead themselves to ruin and the gods wouldn't help them. Another sort of self-fulfilling role. Humans need to extort control by making the wild and its occupants submissive in the eyes of man. We march our way to our own destruction. Man, if the Planet of the Apes actually happens then I want off this planet!"
She tilted her head to look at the sky. "Do you hear me, Hermes? If Apes and Gorillas gain enough intelligence, you take me back to the Planet of the Gods! I'm not staying here with them."
"So, you think whatever actions we take now is just fate?"
"Do you know the theory about how the multiverse exists where one little choice made all the difference? Like say, Odin didn't imprison Loki's kids? Then Ragnarok goes from purposeful to accidental. Menelaus manages to kill Paris and Hector gives Helen back to her people? Then Troy isn't destroyed by the Greeks. Caesar doesn't get jumped by a bunch of dudes in bedsheets? Then he becomes the first emperor instead. The British never started invading other countries? Then white people wouldn't act like their God left them in charge. No, I don't think it's fate. I think we have the choice to make our own fate. Many people thought that I was supposed to jump for joy learning that I was Hermes' soulmate and here I am, two years later still telling all of them to kiss my ass."
Ethan was quiet and before he could make her go on another philosophical rant (and man, did she have a headache. She needed a nap.): A branch snapped in the woods. Dry leaves rustled. Something large was moving in the trees, just beyond the ridge.
Together, they withdrew weapons.
Scuttling noises seemed to be coming from several different directions. Coming out of the woods were three glistening amber insects, ten feet long, with jagged pincers, armored tails, and stingers as long as Lea herself. The scorpions. Tied to their backs were red silk packages.
"Think you can get the packages," Lea asked.
"Yeah," Ethan nodded, "But El...look at the one in the middle."
It looked just the same as the others until she realized that the stinger was dripping venom in an aesthetically pleasing way. That had to be magic. But it very much dribbled into the star of sign of Scorpios.
"That better not be what I think it is..."
"The scorpion that killed Orion? Yeah."
Wonderful.
The scorpions scurried toward them, whipping their barbed tails like they'd come here just to kill the two of them.
Great.
They were so close Lea could see their hideous mouths foaming, anticipating an ice juicy meal of demigods.
"Look out!" Ethan parried away a stinger with the flat of his blade. Lea eeped, waving her ring around. She yelled, "Take this beast, before I end her. Ship her back, return to sender."
The staff lit up in her hands blasting the scorpion away to tear through like a dozen of trees. The package snagged onto a fallen branch before her mageia swirled around it and sent it somewhere. Hopefully, to hell.
Ethan was doing his best against the other one while Mr. October Sign came for Lea.
It was because she was a Leo, wasn't it. The best sign of the zodiacs and she will not hear any slander.
Lea watched it calmly, hands tightening around the staff that was clearly magical and that she was so going to study more. Tyson did his thing with it.
"Alright, big guy. It's you and me," she grumbled. "Call your friend off and let's shoot the fair."
It moved around her and Lea sort of regretted not paying much attention to Percy's fighting lessons. But she knew enough to know that if she went for the body, the tail stabbed downward. If she went for the tail, the thing's pincers came from either side and tried to grab her.
Lea waved the staff and fluttery green shield appeared between the scorpions and the demigods.
Ethan was breathing heavily as he came to her side. "Any ideas?"
Lea shook her head. "Grab my grimoire and search for a spell. I need to keep fueling the shield." A little hard thing to do with such a blow in her confidence in regard to her mageia. She could see the scorpions moving around looking for a hole in the defenses.
It was probably a good thing that they were backed against the trees because their backs were unprotected like the gap of a hospital gown.
"An explosion spell?" Ethan asked. "Wait, why do you have fifty of these things?"
Ignoring the second question, Lea shook her head. "I don't want scorpion guts all over me!"
"Another banishing spell."
"What does it say?"
"'Here I sit, a humble beseecher, rid us of this infernal teacher!' Dude what teacher were you trying to get rid of?"
Geez, nosey much.
"Lea..." Well, she didn't like that tone of voice. "Why do you have a killing spell?'
The shield flickered down.
Good because she didn't want to answer that question.
Bad because those things lunged.
In a panic, Lea stumbled back, dropping her staff and throwing her hands up. Instead of another green shield, a giant wave of water appeared from literally nowhere. It served as a barrier against the creatures that pushed at it like a tongue in a wad of gum.
What in the entire fuck.
"Lea, quick do a spell!"
She turned wide disbelieving eyes onto Ethan. A spell? When she was dealing with... whatever this was. Percy was supposed to be the one with water powers like he was the last waterbender and whatnot.
"Leaneira!"
The scorpion of Orion lashed out with its tail. Lea didn't know how it thought it was going to get to her as it was getting ragdolled, but the venom was looking a little too venomy for comfort.
"By Asteria and Persês: Open sky and do your worst!"
She only had one moment to think aw, crap before a clap of thunder boomed over the entire Long Island Sound.
Lea officially hated her powers.
Did Lea mention that she hated her powers?
As soon as the scorpions heard the thunder and got struck by lightning while taking their swim, they scurried off back into the woods, the packages and all.
Lea had slumped to the ground in pure exhaustion while Ethan collected the one package that they did manage to secure. None of that mattered in regard to the rainstorm that was still going around them two hours later.
They shouldn't have even been still in the woods!
Drew and her teammate had won already.
(Somehow, her best friend made looking covered in mud look good and Lea needed to know the science behind that immediately.)
But no. They were still here because those dipshits lost her brother and Annabeth. Somehow.
Her mageia was still a bit wild considering that the storm she summoned had combined itself and was now spreading throughout the first thirteen states.
Woohoo!
Lea couldn't even risk a spell to find her brother.
(But she wasted energy on Trent? Trent who betrayed her. Trent who tried to kill her and her brother. Fuck him. She hoped he died and that it was painful even in death!)
Alabaster had taken charge of it using the obvious blood connection that the twins had to search for them because it was obvious that where one went then the other wasn't too far behind. He wasn't getting any feedback. It was like magical static. So, Lou Ellen joined and then another sibling joined and then it was up to the point where everyone that were magically inclined was touching some part of Lea that wasn't inappropriate to feel around for them.
It brought them back near Zeus' fist, but that was about it. Wherever they were... whatever happened to them was in that area. Lea could feel a bit of malevolent energy around and she swore... she swore if someone else was targeting them, Lea might actually let her powers do what she was afraid of.
"There's something here," Alabaster murmured. "I can sense them but its like a wall."
"Do you think they can hear us from wherever they are," one of Annabeth's siblings asked. All eyes moved to Chiron since he was the oldest one there. "Like a sort of guiding voice?"
"It would not hurt to try," Chiron mused.
With those words, everyone began to call out their names.
"Percy! Annabeth!" Tyson's voice bellowed the loudest, but others were calling out too.
Please, Lea thought. Don't make me have to tell Mom that you're missing or worse, dead.
It seemed like forever had passed before they heard Clarisse's voice.
"Where have you two been?" she demanded. "We've been looking forever."
"But we were gone only a few minutes," came the familiar voice of her brother. Lea shook the hands off of her before throwing herself at him. His arms came around her automatically.
That was it.
It was no longer up for discussion. She was placing a tracking spell on him.
Chiron trotted up, followed by Tyson and Grover.
"Percy!" Tyson said. "You are okay?"
"We're fine," Percy said. "We fell in a hole."
A hole? They fell in a hole for two whole hours and didn't to come out? Especially one with magical interference?
On his bellybutton, she decided. A tracking spell linked to her on his belly button.
"Honest!" Percy said. "There were three scorpions after us, so we ran and hid in the rocks. But we were only gone a minute."
"You've been missing for over two hours," Chiron said. "The game is over."
"Yeah," Grover muttered. "We would've won, but a Cyclops sat on me."
"Was an accident!" Tyson protested, and then he sneezed.
"A hole?" Clarisse said suspiciously.
Annabeth took a deep breath. She looked around at the other campers. "Chiron...maybe we should talk about this at the Big House."
Clarisse gasped. "You found it, didn't you?"
Annabeth bit her lip. "I—Yeah. Yeah, we did."
A bunch of campers started asking questions, but Chiron raised his hand for silence. Lea didn't raise her head from where she burrowed it into Percy's neck. "Tonight is not the right time, and this is not the right place." He stared at boulders as if he'd just noticed how dangerous they were. "All of you, back to your cabins. Get some sleep. A game well played, but curfew is past!"
There was a lot of mumbling and complaints, but the campers drifted off, talking among themselves.
"This explains a lot," Clarisse said. "It explains what Luke is after."
Absently, the pieces clicked into place in Lea's mind. If she wasnt so exhausted and coming down from the emotional high of worry—
"Wait a second," Percy said. "What do you mean? What did we find?"
Annabeth turned towards them, her eyes dark with worry. "An entrance to the Labyrinth. An invasion route straight into the heart of the camp."
— she'd wonder if the labyrinth was where Trent was hiding.