20 days until the war.
"Come on." I grabbed Elymas' arm and pulled him toward the pegasi.
"What? Where are we going?"
"We need to go. Now." I jumped on Emma and Elymas climbed onto his pegasus.
"Where are we going?" He repeated.
"Home, but we need to make a few stops first." I sighed.
"Okay." Elymas shrugged.
"When we get into the air, a passageway is going to open, don't avoid it. I'll explain once we get through."
"Deal."
I sped off into the sky, Elymas on my tail. Almost instantly a giant door opened up in front of us.
We appeared on Long Island, close to Camp Half Blood but not close enough that we could be seen. I grabbed one of the two notes I had written and tied it to an arrow. If I aimed it correctly then Chiron would get it, no one else.
Around the back of the Big House there was a single window that was always open, I would use that.
After shooting it through the window I headed back into the sky, Elymas asking me questions the whole time.
"Stop yelling or you'll give away our location!" I hissed and he fell silent.
Finally after we were a safe distance away from Camp Half Blood, I signalled to Elymas that it was okay to speak.
"What was that place? And where are we going?"
"That place is called Camp Half Blood, they just declared war on my home, soon to be yours too. We're going to another place that just declared war also."
"Why are you shooting at them?"
"I'm not shooting at them, I'm sending them a note. Since we don't have time to stop home then we'll go straight to the meeting spot."
"Meeting spot?"
"That's what the note's about, I'm trying to stop the war before it starts, either that or try to lessen the number of bodies that pile up."
"Why did they declare war?"
"Apparently they think we have someone of theirs."
"Do you?"
"...Uhm..." I wondered if I should tell him that somehow Neptuna, or Courtney, had showed up on the quest, "Kind of but they think we kidnapped her. No one's sure how she got there."
"What's her name?"
"N— Courtney."
"Wait, I know that name... Courtney... Courtney Louderback?"
"How?"
"I'm not sure, but I know I've heard it before." He spoke just as another passageway opened, this one leading to Camp Jupiter.
Finally I found a spot where no one would notice an arrow fly toward Reyna.
Wow, I just realized, they're so lucky I'm not an assassin. She looked pretty surprised when an arrow imbedded into her desk. Of course, why wouldn't she? It's an arrow! Hopefully she read the note before sending a group of her campers to hunt me down.
"Let's go." I motioned for Elymas to follow me back into the sky before anyone had the chance to spot us.
"What even is this place?" Elymas questioned once we were alone in the meeting spot, our pegasi hidden in the forest around it.
"It's the meeting place, it's enchanted to make sure no one can spy. It's best if you just stay quiet and watch."
"Okay." He sighed and sunk deeper into the chair next to me.
Not five minutes later Reyna stormed in, her hand clutching my arrow.
"What in Hades, Carrie!" She yelled.
"I should be asking you the same question!" I yelled back and crossed my arms.
"You shot into the Forum! You shot at me!" She slammed the arrow onto the table, fuming.
"If I did shoot at you then you wouldn't be standing here!"
"I-I..." She fell silent, almost dictating her next moves until she brought out a dagger and aimed it at me, "How did you find my camp? We had a deal!"
"That deal was broken when Chiron and you declared war!" I growled, not at all scared that she had a dagger pointed at my throat, she didn't have the guts to kill me.
"Both of you calm down!" Chiron boomed, he rolled in covered in full armor.
"Why?" I yelled.
"This is no time for—"
"Not that! Why did you declare war?"
"Percy believes—"
"That's not a reason! You could've stopped him! We don't need to fight! We don't need to slaughter anyone!"
"I couldn't stop him." Chiron sighed.
"Don't you lie to me." I growled then turned back toward Reyna, "Put that away or I will shoot."
She slowly lowered her knife but didn't put it away. She eyed me, waiting for my next move.
Instead of attacking, I sat down.
"No one kidnapped anyone." I finally spoke, "The one you speak of, Courtney. There is no one by that name at my Camp."
"Liar!" Someone yelled.
I turned just in time to see Perseus Jackson storming toward me, his sword, Riptide, in hand, his eyes aflame with anger.
"Get out." I jumped up, my bow ready and pointed at him, "This is not a place for campers, just leaders."
"I'm a better leader than you'll ever be, you kidnapping, conniving little—"
"Leave or I'll shoot." I growled once again.
"Percy, do it." Reyna stared at the point where my bow was aimed.
Perseus Jackson had been stupid enough to come without armor.
"I'm not a coward." He locked eyes with me, his sword still ready.
"I didn't want to do this but..." I shot Perseus with a stunning arrow in the shoulder, he shuddered and fell to the ground, stiff as a board.
"What—" Reyna started.
"Don't worry, it's just a stunning arrow." I sat back down and my bow disappeared, "Now let's get back to business, shall we?"
"How can we be sure Courtney isn't at your Camp?" Chiron eyed me, out of all of the heroes he's train he's never been able to figure me out, I think of that as a trophy.
"You can't, you both must take my word for it." I shrugged.
"I think it's already proven we don't trust you." Reyna laughed, her eyes full of a certain sadness.
"Well, that's unfortunate but neither of you are coming to my camp."
Reyna and Chiron threw a glance at each other. Immediately I knew they were planning something.
"And I regret to inform you that any camper found trying to find the location of my camp will immediately be imprisoned. But if it will help lessen the battle then I would be happy to send a group to look for this Courtney."
Silence fell upon us, both Chiron and Reyna were eyeing me, trying to detect if I was lying. Sadly, Reyna's dogs hadn't come with her so they were forced to decide for themselves.
"If you still don't believe me then let the war commence, goodbye and I wish both of your camps the best of luck, trust me you will need it." I stood, Elymas mirroring my action, and together we walked out of the room.
"Who were they?" Elymas asked in a hushed voice after he reunited with Marshmallow and once we were away from the building, leaning against the pegasi.
"The leaders of the places we visited."
"They seemed really... angry."
"Yeah, they were, now let's go before they come out."
"Where are we going?"
"Home."
"Why do they care so much about the Courtney girl? Is she important?"
"Have you ever heard of Poseidon?"
"Yeah?"
"She's his only demigod daughter. She's also the boy I shot's sister."
"Woah."
"Yeah. Let's get going, so they can't follow us."
"Aren't we going through one of those portal thingies?"
"Yes but we won't be flying through, they wouldn't be too happy about that." I patted the pegasi and whispered to them, "You both can go back to my place, you'll be safer there."
"Aren't the portals in the sky, though?"
"Not this one."
"Oh, okay." He shrugged as the pegasi went running off in another direction.
"After you." I motioned to the passageway that I had just created.
Elymas stepped through and I followed.
I breathed in the fresh and unpolluted mountain air.
"Come on, this way." I had to pull Elymas toward my cabin to stop him from gaping at the view.
"You live here?" He whispered, still amazed.
"Kind of..." I pulled him into my cabin without anyone spotting us.
"Carrie!" Someone exclaimed.
I whipped around and Juventas gave me a great hug.
"Good afternoon Juventas." I laughed and accepted her embrace, though it felt strange.
"Who's this?" Juventas finally let me go and smiled at Elymas, occasionally throwing confused glance at Marshmallow wrapped on his neck.
"Hi I'm Elymas." He smiled awkwardly.
Juventas looked toward me, almost confused.
"He's a demigod."
"Ah! That clears things up." She nodded.
I walked over to my desk, grabbed one of the leftover dog tags from the ceremony and threw it to Elymas.
"Welcome to Camp Ops."
He gaped at the dog tag as if he had never had anything special to him, I smiled and sat in my chair.
"Welcome home."