Annabeth's POV
Even before we heard the heart crunching scream of pain I knew this wasn't going to work. I could hear the panic in Hazels mind as she felt the knife touch her skin. I could feel Leo's mind not change in the slightest to become clouded with desire. It all went in the completely wrong direction.
We waited outside the door, listening to the agonising screams. We were crouched on the floor, Percy, Frank, Sophia, Lucy and I. Poor Frank could hardly bare it and had his head between his knees and his hands clasping the little amount of hair he had on his scalp, his knuckles turning White, and I swear there was blood, he was rocking like a poor child who had lost their family member.
"Will it ever end?" Percy whispered, I squeezed his hand tight as Lucy winced.
"I should have gone against the fates." She whispered to herself. "I should never have made them do this." I could feel Lucy's regret, it pouring out of her and attacked herself like a whirlpool, choking her and making her so scared she could hardly breath.
"No Lucy, you did what was best." I whispered as I heard Hazel scream again. "You can go against the fates."
Lucy cried in her hands as Taylor held her. "Jason was right." I looked at Lucy, she looked so vulnerable, so guilty. I felt myself stiffen at Lucy's next words.
"I am selfish. So selfish for wanting my sister back I let you all hurt. I am just like Gaia, I am like my sister."
Lucy cried harder. We were all silent for a second, and Taylor looked at his broken and vulnerable soulmate in his arms, too taken aback for words.
"H-he said that?" Percy asked, barely above a whisper.
Taylor stood up abruptly. "I'll kill him! He doesn't deserve to live! A menace like that doesn't deserve happiness! He doesn't deserve friends, or people willing to mate with him! He-" Taylor was cut off as the screaming stopped.
The whole room seemed to freeze. Nothing moved. No one breathed. Nothing changed.
Then the whole thing shattered like a church window. Leo came out first and the look on his face was that of a haunted child, he stumbled and tripped. He looked so broken it was unreal, the dagger was still in his hands, covered in blood. Then Hazel stumbled out, flopping like a fish out of water, she tripped, stumbled, fell, collapsed, you name it. She couldn't stay in her feet as she looked round, deer eyed, distraught and pained. She seemed to look at everything as if for the first time.
I hadn't even realised Percy had pulled me onto his lap until his head came down to my neck. He started shaking uncontrollably. Then I realised how hard this was for him, this so easily could have happened to us, he could have hurt me like this. I gripped his hand and let my love flow over him in his mind, let my hope and happiness cloud everything, and most of all I showed him how I was never scared, how I had confidence in us. In him.
Lucy and Taylor had helped Hazel to her feet, but she was still shaking. Then I saw the scar. Ripe, red flesh was still visible and bleeding down her back, there was no Markon her neck, nothing. Her skin looked so pale it was unreal. Frank volunteered to bring Hazel to her room and he gently picked Hazel up and slowly walked to her room.
Leo was gripping the pedestal to the nearest statue, which was of a girl with flaming red hair, with eyes like coal and skin so pale I could have thought she was a vampire, with purple coloured lips and wearing leather all over. She had one knee on the floor and had a silver sword resting on the other knee. Her hands seemed to grip the sword at both ends with remorse.
Lucy sighed and put her hand over Leo's the other on the Statue's giant, leather-booted-foot. "It seems Adele could not help us this day."
"That's Adele?"
