EVENING MUSTER WAS NEVER anything special for Camilla. Even with the new recruit joining the legion that night, she doubted tonight would be any different.
She winced in sympathy as Hazel ran down the middle of the legion to reach her place, the eyes of the legion watching with varying expressions of annoyance and amusement. She slipped into her place between Frank and Camilla, just barely making it before Dakota called her name on the roll call.
The new recruit, Percy, was standing off to one side with a few guards, and Hazel's half-brother, Nico di Angelo, joined him. Percy looked pretty uncomfortable, which Camilla understood—she still remembered the terror of being introduced to the legion and waiting with baited breath for someone—anyone—to stand for her. She still had nightmares about the solid twenty seconds of complete and utter silence before Jason stood for her.
Once the Lares settled into their places (a feat in and of itself), Octavian the augur shouted, "Colors!"
The standard-bearers stepped forward. They wore lion-skin capes and held poles decorated with each cohort's emblems. The last to present his standard was Jacob, the legion's eagle bearer. He held a long pole with absolutely nothing on top. The job was meant to be a big honor, but Jacob hated it—for good reason. Even though Reyna insisted on following tradition, every time the eagle-less pole was raised, Camilla could feel the embarrassment rippling through the legion.
Reyna brought her pegasus, Scipio, to a half.
"Romans!" she announced. "You've probably heard about the incursion today. Two gorgons were swept into the river by this newcomer, Percy Jackson. Juno herself guided him here, and proclaimed him a son of Neptune."
Camilla bit her lip against the stupid tears that tried to come to her eyes.
After five years, she should have been over it. She should have accepted the fact that her godly parent—whoever they were—was never going to claim her. But it still stung to see someone be claimed within minutes of arriving at camp.
She felt Hazel tap her arm, giving her roommate a comforting smile. Camilla smiled back, thankful for the gesture.
Some of the kids in the back rows craned their necks to see Percy, like he was a spectacle instead of just a boy. He raised his hand and said a simple, "Hi."
"He seeks to join the legion," Reyna continued. "What do the auguries say?"
"I have read the entrails!" Octavian announced, as if he'd killed a lion with his bare hands rather than simply ripped up some poor stuffed animal. "The auguries are favorable. He is qualified to serve!"
The campers gave a shout: "Ave!" Hail!
Frank was a little late with his "ave," so it came out as a high-pitched echo. The other legionnaires snickered.
Reyna motioned the senior officers forward—one from each cohort. Octavian, as the most senior centurion, turned to Percy.
"Recruit," he asked, "do you have credentials? Letters of reference?"
Camilla remembered this from her own arrival at eleven years old. Some kids brought letters from older demigods in the outside world—adults who were veterans of the camp. Some recruits had rich and famous sponsors. Some were third- or fourth-generation campers. A good letter could get you a position in the better cohorts, sometimes even special jobs like legion messenger, which made you exempt from the grunt work like digging ditches or conjugating Latin verbs.
Percy shifted. "Letters? Um, no."
Octavian wrinkled his nose.
Camilla felt bad for the recruit. She remembered coming to camp with nothing but the tattered clothes on her back. It didn't seem fair that Percy carrying a goddess into camp wasn't enough of a recommendation, but Octavian's family had been sending kids to camp for over a century. He loved making recruits think they were beneath him.
"No letters," Octavian said regretfully. "Will any legionnaires stand for him?"
"I will!" Frank stepped forward. "He saved my life!"
Immediately, there were shouts of protest from the other cohorts. Reyna raised her hand for quiet and glared at Frank.
"Frank Zhang," she said, "for the second time today, I remind you that you are on probatio. Your godly parent has not even claimed you yet." Camilla inwardly winced at that. "You're not eligible to stand for another camper until you've earned your first stripe."
Frank looked like he might die of embarrassment.
Camilla wasn't sure what it was—whether it was wanting to get the negative attention off of one of her only friends, or seeing Percy stand where she had five years ago with no recommendations or sponsors, or simply a sixth sense. Whatever it was, it made her step forward. "I will stand for Percy Jackson."
Just about everyone looked surprised at that. She swore she saw a few campers from the higher cohorts looking at her like they were trying to figure out who she even was, and others muttering to themselves. Camilla had been a full member of the legion for over four years now, after completing a fairly uneventful first year of service, but the fact that her godly parent had yet to claim her made the campers who remembered who she was wonder if she even belonged in the legion.
She was certainly a demigod, seeing as one of Lupa's wolf had sniffed her out when she was eleven and brought her to the Wolf House, but that didn't stop people from wondering what she was even doing at camp.
She knew she wasn't doing Percy any favors by standing for him—if anything, she was just bringing him down. But she couldn't stand to see anyone standing up there, waiting for support, waiting for someone to care.
Reyna wrinkled her nose slightly, but she turned to Octavian. The augur smiled and shrugged, like the idea amused him.
"Very well," Reyna announced. "Camilla, you may stand for the recruit. Does your cohort accept him?"
The other cohorts started coughing, trying not to laugh. Camilla could guess what they must have been thinking: Another loser for the Fifth.
Frank pounded his shield against the ground, Hazel close behind. The other members of the Fifth followed his lead, though only Hazel and Frank seemed enthusiastic. Their centurions, Dakota and Gwen, exchanged pained looks, like: Here we go again.
"My cohort has spoken," Dakota said. "We accept the recruit."
Reyna looked at Percy with pity. "Congratulations, Percy Jackson. You stand on probatio. You will be given a tablet with your name and cohort. In one year's time, or as soon as you complete an act of valor, you will become a full member of the Twelfth Legion Fulminata. Serve Rome, obey the rules of the legion, and defend the camp with honor. Senatus Populusque Romanus!"
The rest of the legion echoed the cheer.
Reyna wheeled her pegasus away from Percy, like she was glad to be done with him. "Centurions," Reyna said, "you and your troops have one hour for dinner. Then we will meet on the Field of Mars. The First and Second will defend. The Third, Fourth, and Fifth will attack. Good fortune!"
A bigger cheer went up—for the war games and for dinner. The cohorts broke ranks and ran for the mess hall.
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Hazel and Frank walked Camilla over to where Percy was getting his probatio nameplate. He strung it onto a leather necklace he wore with strange clay beads.
"Percy, this is Camilla," Hazel introduced.
Percy waved. "Hi," he said. "Thanks for standing for me... um, what exactly does that mean, anyway?"
"I guarantee your good behavior," Camilla explained. "I teach you the rules, answer your questions, make sure you don't disgrace the legion."
"And... if I do something wrong?"
Camilla held back her wince. "Then I get killed along with you. So, um... please don't do anything bad."
Hazel patting Camilla's shoulder, grinning up at Percy. "Hungry? Let's eat."
The quartet headed to the mess hall, which looked like a delicious hurricane. Wind spirits blew plates and cups around quickly, which would have been incredibly deadly if most demigods didn't have fast reflexes. Though, that didn't stop the occasional legionnaire from getting smacked with a flying plate of French fries.
Camilla got a plate of shrimp egg rolls and a goblet of lemonade that reminded her of one of the few decent foster homes she'd lived in when she was little. Hazel got the shrimp gumbo she tended to eat when she was having a bad day (rooming with someone made you pick up on their habits). Percy got a cheeseburger and a bright blue soda. Camilla didn't really understand, but Percy tried it and grinned.
"This makes me happy," he said. "I don't know why... but it does."
Camilla smiled in amusement.
Just for a moment, one of the aurae became visible—an elfin girl in a white silk dress. She giggled as she topped off Percy's glass, then disappeared in a gust.
The mess hall was especially noisy tonight. Laughter echoed off the walls. War banners rustled from cedar ceiling beams as aurae blew back and forth, keeping everyone's plates full. The campers dined Roman style, sitting on couches around low tables. Kids were constantly getting up and trading places, spreading rumors about who liked whom and all the other gossip.
As usual, the Fifth Cohort took the place of least honor. Their tables were at the back of the dining hall next to the kitchen. Camilla's table was always the least crowded. Tonight it was her, Hazel, and Frank, as usual, with Percy, Nico di Angelo, and their centurion, Dakota, who Camilla figured only sat with them because he felt obligated to welcome the new recruit.
Dakota reclined glumly on his couch, mixing sugar into his drink and chugging it. "So." He burped, waving his goblet around. "Welcome to the Percy, party." He frowned. "Party, Percy. Whatever."
"Um, thanks," Percy said, but his attention was focused on Nico. "I was wondering if we could talk, you know... about where I might have seen you before."
Camilla frowned, though she figured it wasn't any of her business. Still, it was strange Percy had arrived at camp with amnesia—she'd never heard of something like that happening before.
"Sure," Nico said quickly. "The thing is, I spend most of my time in the Underworld. So unless I met you there somehow—"
Dakota belched. "Ambassador of Pluto, they call him. Reyna's never sure what to do with this guy when he visits. You should have seen her face when he showed up with Hazel, asking Reyna to take her in. Um, no offense."
"None taken." Nico seemed relieved to change the topic. "Dakota was really helpful, standing for Hazel."
Dakota blushed. "Yeah, well... She seemed like a good kid. Turned out I was right. Last month, when she saved me from, uh, you know."
"Oh, man!" Frank looked up from his fish and chips. "Percy, you should have seen her! That's how Hazel got her stripe. The unicorns decided to stampede—"
"It was nothing," Hazel said.
"Nothing?" Frank protested. "Dakota would've gotten trampled! You stood right in front of them, shooed them away, saved his hide. I've never seen anything like it."
Hazel bit her lip, looking visibly uncomfortable. Camilla thought about trying to change the subject, but it seemed Percy had that covered.
"Did you and Nico grow up together?" he asked Hazel.
"No," Nico answered for her. "I found out Hazel was my sister only recently. She's from New Orleans. There aren't many of us, so we have to stick together. When I found Hazel—"
"You have other sisters?" Percy asked, almost like he already knew the answer.
Camilla furrowed her brow. Did Nico and Percy know each other?
"One," Nico admitted. "But she died. I saw her spirit a few times in the Underworld, except that the last time I went down there..." Nico cleared his throat, though his voice was still hoarse as he continued, "She was gone. She used to be in Elysium—like, the Underworld paradise—but she chose to be reborn into a new life. Now I'll never see her again. I was just lucky to find Hazel... in New Orleans, I mean."
Dakota grunted. "Unless you believe the rumors. Not saying I do."
Camilla scowled a little. She knew the rumors about her roommate, namely that Hazel had come from the Underworld. That seemed a little too wild to be true, though of course, Camilla couldn't say for sure—Hazel wasn't too forthcoming about her past, not that Camilla had any room to judge.
She didn't like to talk about her own childhood, either—one full of crowded foster homes and mean siblings and neglectful parents. A childhood spent wondering who her parents where, what had happened to them, why monsters only she could see kept chasing her off of the playground at school.
Suffice to say, she understood not wanting to talk about your past.
"Rumors?" Percy asked.
From across the room, one of the fauns—Don, Camilla remembered—yelled, "Hazel!"
The faun made his way toward their table, grinning at everybody, sneaking good off plates, and pointing at campers: "Hey! Call me!" A flying pizza smacked him in the head, and he disappeared behind a couch. Then he popped up, still grinning, and made his way over.
"My favorite girl!" He leaned over their couches and checked out their food. "Say, new kid, you going to eat that?"
Percy frowned. "Aren't fauns vegetarian?"
"Not the cheeseburger, man! The plate!" He sniffed Percy's hair. "Hey... what's that smell?"
"Don!" Hazel scolded. "Don't be rude."
"No, man, I just—"
Their house god, Vitellius, shimmered into existence, standing half-embedded in Frank's couch. "Fauns in the dining hall! What are we coming to? Centurion Dakota, do your duty!"
"I am," Dakota grumbled into his goblet. "I'm having dinner!"
Don was still sniffing around Percy. "Man, you've got an empathy link with a faun!"
Percy leaned away from him. "A what?"
"An empathy link! It's real faint, like somebody's suppressed it, but—"
"I know what!" Nico stood suddenly, startling Camilla, who sat next to him. "Hazel, how about we give you, Camilla, and Frank time to get Percy oriented? Dakota and I can visit the praetor's table. Don and Vitellius, you come too. We can discuss strategies for the war games."
"Strategies for losing?" Dakota muttered.
"We might win," Camilla murmured, though she doubted anyone heard her optimistic quip.
"Death Boy is right!" Vitellius said. "This legion fights worse than we did in Judea, and that was the first time we lost our eagle. Why, if I were in charge—"
"Could I just eat the silverware first?" Don asked.
"Let's go!" Nico stood and grabbed Don and Vitellius by the ears.
Nobody but Nico could actually touch the Lares. Vitellius spluttered with outrage as he was dragged off to the praetor's table.
"Ow!" Don protested. "Man, watch the 'fro!"
"Come on, Dakota!" Nico called over his shoulder.
The centurion got up reluctantly. He wiped his mouth—a pointless endeavor, since it was permanently stained red. "Back soon." He shook all over, like a dog trying to get dry. Then he staggered away, his goblet sloshing dangerously.
"What was that about?" Percy asked. "And what's wrong with Dakota?"
Frank sighed. "He's okay. He's a son of Bacchus, the wine god. He's got a drinking problem."
Percy's eyes widened. "You let him drink wine?"
"Gods, no!" Hazel said. "That would be a disaster. He's addicted to red Kool-Aid. Drinks it with three times the normal sugar, and he's already ADHD—you know, attention deficit/hyperactive. One of these days, his head is going to explode."
Percy looked over at the praetor's table. Most of the senior officers were in deep conversation with Reyna. Nico and his two captives, Don and Vitellius, stood on the periphery. Dakota was running back and forth along a line of stacked shields, banging his goblet on them like they were a xylophone.
"ADHD," Percy said. "You don't say."
Camilla smiled, amused. "Most demigods are diagnosed with it. Or dyslexia. Our brains are wired differently than most other mortals."
"Like you," Hazel said. "You said you had trouble reading."
"Are you guys that way too?" Percy asked.
"I don't know," Hazel admitted. "Maybe. Back in my day, they just called kids like us 'lazy.'"
Percy frowned. "Back in your day?"
Before Hazel could explain, Frank spoke up: "I wish I was ADHD or dyslexic. All I got is lactose intolerance."
Percy grinned. "Seriously?"
Frank's shoulders slumped. "And I love ice cream, too..."
Camilla giggled, Percy and Hazel joining in her laughter.
"Okay, so tell me," Percy said, "why is it bad to be in the Fifth Cohort? You guys are great." Camilla was pretty sure he was just talking about Hazel and Frank, since they'd only just met, but she didn't dwell on it.
"It's... complicated," Hazel said. "Aside from being Pluto's kid, I want to ride horses."
"That's why you use a cavalry sword?" Percy asked.
Hazel nodded. "It's stupid, I guess. Wishful thinking. There's only one pegasus at camp—Reyna's. The unicorns are just kept for medicine, because the shavings off their horns cure poison and stuff. Anyway, Roman fighting is always done on foot. Cavalry... they kind of look down on that. So they look down on me."
"Their loss," Percy said. "What about you, Frank?"
"Archery," he muttered. "They don't like that either, unless you're a child of Apollo. Then you've got an excuse. I hope my dad is Apollo, but I don't know. I can't do poetry very well. And I'm not sure I want to be related to Octavian."
"Can't blame you," Percy said. "But you're excellent with a bow—the way you pegged those gorgons? Forget what other people think."
Frank's face turned as red as Dakota's Kool-Aid. "Wish I could. They all think I should be a sword fighter because I'm big and bulky." He looked down at his body, like he couldn't quite believe it was his. "They say I'm too stocky for an archer. Maybe if my dad would ever claim me..."
Camilla bit her lip. Gods, she knew that better than anyone.
Percy looked at Camilla. "What about you?"
"I've been at camp for five years and I still don't know who my godly parent is," she said quietly. "The only reason I know I'm a demigod is because Lupa told me I was. I don't even know if my godly parent's my mom or my dad. And I don't have any special skills or talents to point me in the right direction." She shrugged, trying to make it seem like she wasn't as torn up about it as she actually was. "Some people think my godly parent must be super obscure and minor, or they just don't care about me. They're probably right."
"I'm sure that's not true, Cam," Hazel said reassuringly.
"Five years..." Percy frowned. "That's a long time. Do you have any idea of who it could be?"
Camilla shook her head slightly. "It's probably a minor god no one's ever heard of."
She thought about the day under the mid-May sun, over a year ago, where Jason had told her his theories of who her godly parent was, the memory making her want to smile. She pushed it away—reminiscing only ever ended up hurting nowadays.
"You asked about the Fifth," Camilla said after a moment. "Why it's the worst cohort. That started long before us." She pointed to the back wall, where the legion's standards were on display. "See the empty pole in the middle?"
"The eagle," Percy said.
Hazel looked stunned. "How'd you know?"
Percy shrugged. "Vitellius was talking about how the legion lost its eagle a long time ago—the first time, he said. He acted like it was a huge disgrace. I'm guessing that's what's missing. And from the way you and Reyna were talking earlier, I'm guessing your eagle got lost a second time, more recently, and it had something to do with the Fifth Cohort."
Camilla raised an eyebrow. Clearly the recruit was smarter than he let on.
"You're right," Hazel said. "That's exactly what happened."
"So what is this eagle, anyway?" Percy asked. "Why is it a big deal?"
Frank looked around to make sure no one was eavesdropping. "It's the symbol of the whole camp—a big eagle made of gold. It's supposed to protect us in battle and make our enemies afraid. Each legion's eagle gave it all sorts of power, and ours came from Jupiter himself. Supposedly Julius Caesar nicknamed our legion 'Fulminata'—armed with lightning—because of what the eagle could do."
"I don't like lightning," Percy said.
"Yeah, well," Hazel said, "it didn't make us invincible. The Twelfth lost its eagle the first time way back in ancient days, during the Jewish Rebellion."
"I think I saw a movie like that," Percy said.
Camilla shrugged. "Probably. There are lots of books and movies about legions losing their eagles. Unfortunately, it happened quite a few times. The eagle was so important... well, archaeologists have never recovered a single eagle from ancient Rome. Each legion guarded theirs to the last man, because it was charged with power from the gods. They'd rather hide it or melt it down than surrender it to an enemy."
"The Twelfth was lucky the first time," Hazel said. "We got our eagle back. The second time..."
"You guys were there?" Percy asked.
All three of them shook their heads.
"I'm almost as new as you." Frank tapped his probatio plate. "Just got here last month. But everyone's heard the story. It's bad luck to even talk about this. There was this huge expedition to Alaska back in the eighties..."
"That prophecy you noticed in the temple," Hazel continued, "the one about the eight demigods and the Doors of Death? Our senior praetor at the time was Michael Varus, from the Fifth cohort. Back then the Fifth was the best in the camp. He thought it would bring glory to the legion if he could figure out the prophecy and make it come true—save the world from storm and fire and all that. He talked to the augur, and the augur said the answer was in Alaska. But he warned Michael it wasn't time yet. The prophecy wasn't for him."
"But he went anyway," Percy guessed. "What happened?"
"Almost the entire Fifth Cohort was wiped out," Camilla explained. "Most of the legion's Imperial gold weapons were lost, along with the eagle. The survivors went crazy and refused to talk about what had attacked them."
"Since the eagle was lost," Frank continued, "the camp has been getting weaker. Quests are more dangerous. Monsters attack the borders more often. Morale is lower. The last month or so, things have been getting much worse, much faster."
"And the Fifth Cohort took the blame," Percy guessed. "So now everyone thinks we're cursed."
Hazel sipped a spoonful of her gumbo. "We've been outcasts in the legion since... well, since the Alaska disaster. Our reputation got better when Jason became praetor—"
"The kid who's missing?" Percy asked.
Camilla bit her lip. "Yeah," she murmured. "He was a great leader—the Fifth Cohort basically raised him, and he stood for me when I came to camp. He didn't care what people thought about us. He started to rebuild our reputation. Then..."
Hazel squeezed Camilla's shoulder, providing a small comfort.
"Then he disappeared," Frank told Percy, shooting Camilla a sympathetic look.
"Yeah," Camilla whispered.
"Which puts us back at square one," Hazel said bitterly. "Made us look cursed all over again."
Camilla grimaced. "Now you know what you've gotten yourself into," she said. "Sorry for dragging you down with us."
Percy sipped his blue soda and gazed thoughtfully across the dining hall. "I don't even know where I come from... but I've got a feeling this isn't the first time I've been an underdog." He gave Camilla a small smile. "Besides, joining the legion is better than being chased through the wilderness by monsters. I've got myself some new friends. Maybe together we can turn things around for the Fifth Cohort, huh?"
Camilla admired his optimism—he almost sounded like her on her good days. But, more than that, he sounded like Jason. Full of ambitions to pull the Fifth Cohort back into the light and rebuild their reputation, to prove everyone who looked down on their cohort wrong.
A horn blew at the end of the hall. The officers at the praetor's table got to their feet—even Dakota, his mouth vampire-red from Kool-Aid.
"The games begin!" Reyna announced. The campers cheered and rushed to collect their equipment from the stacks along the walls.
"So, we're the attacking team?" Percy asked over the noise. "Is that good?"
Hazel shrugged. "Good news: we get the elephant. Bad news—"
"Let me guess," Percy said. "The Fifth Cohort always loses."
Frank slapped Percy on the shoulder. "I love this guy. Come on, new friend. Let's go chalk up my thirteenth defeat in a row!"
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oooooh camilla's unclaimed... wonder what that's about... who do y'all think her godly parent is? it'll be a while before the reveal, so let me know your guesses ;)
see you next week!