Goodnight Moon ↣ P. Jackson + A. Chase

1.15

There's no sunshine when Kassandra wakes in the morning, the sky cloudy and dark with impending storm and she wonders if Mr. D will allow it to rain to inconvenience the campers or if she would get to enjoy it like she really wants to.

Somehow, she knew that this was her fault. She couldn't help the small nugget of guilt that she felt for ruining the day for everyone (because Apollo was dramatic enough to revoke the sun out of punishment).

If the dream was real as she thought that it was.

It was early, though, early enough for Lee to have woken and be missing from his place at her side, remains of bandages on a tray next to her with the scissors that he had used. He must have run off in the middle of changing them.

Kassandra stretched, sitting up slowly as if scared that her side would explode in pain, and stretched her arms above her head hesitantly. When no pain came, she swung her legs over the side, holding her breath waiting for the wound at her side to burn. It was tight, sort of ridiculously tender, but nothing that limited her movements. It wasn't restricting, almost comfortably healed and she awed at it.

There was a diagonal scar, be of pink and silver and impossible traces of gold, that went directly through her left side. It showed where the full width went through her and out the other side is not a hole that went through one end and out the other, but had done that halfway but ripped through her side as well. She couldn't see the back fully, couldn't really twist all that much without feeling her muscles spasm, but she could look down clearly and trace a feathery touch over the sensitive skin.

She hardly looks up when the door opens, too busy examining her side to care. This didn't make sense even if all of her siblings had combined their abilities to heal her together. She was practically fully healed -- perfectly so in a sense that she would be able to let the muscles that had been severed heal on their own as she eased them back into proper shape.

"Kass! You're awake," Lee exclaims, coming to stand at her side. His hair was a mess, clothes rumpled.

Will and Chiron were with him, and while she knew that her brother had plans to join her today, she figured that Lee had run off to get the centaur.

"You're almost fully healed," Will remarks, examining her side with great interest. "When did you get that mark?"

"What mark?"

The mark in question looked like an odd mixture of birthmark, henna, and tattoo as it was almost bruise-like on the surface level with darker marking in brown and added bits of colour that looked like a healed tattoo in the colours of the sunset -- all in the shape of a stylized, yet classy sun on her ribs just above the scar.

She angled the mirror in her hand to get a better look, gaping stupidly at the admittedly beautiful picture on her skin.

"It seems Lord Apollo blessed you with a speedy recovery," Chiron notes bent to get a close look. "He has taken your healing into his own hands."

"He heard our prayers," Lee says it like it's the greatest source of relief in his life. "I can lecture you properly know."

"You can give her a couple of shifts teaching archery," Will adds helpfully with the sneakiest grin that she's ever seen in her life.

Her brothers continue to conspire as Chiron reminds her to make sure that she still takes it easy and gets some rest.

She would take whatever 'punishment' they come up with for putting the fear of Hades into them with the way that she arrived, and it wasn't like instructing was the worst thing when they all had to do so once in a while anyway. As begin naturally gifted at archery, one of the Apollo kids would stay on the fields most of the time to assist the other campers when it was needed.