The Chronicles Of The Secret Warriors

Chapter 2: Monsters walk the earth

I stand there confused. I’m what? I look at him, he looks back. The determination in his eyes is a little scarry. “I...Im sorry.” I say “I don’t remember any of that.” He looks at me for a moment then says “Okay, so if you don’t remember that, then you won't remember that I am a son of Hephaestus.”  My face must have given away my confusion because he continues “Hephaestus the God of forge and metal work.”  He looks back to the house.
“Come on,” he says “I'll explain later.”
He starts up the stairs taking them two at a time. I watch him a moment then look down to Riot. I think she’s waiting for me to start up the stairs so she can follow. I tilt my head slightly towards them not entirely sure why, but as soon as I do she starts up them. As if my permission was all she needed. As I put my foot on the first step a small sense of calm takes over me and as I climb it gets stronger and I get more peaceful.
The doors are a heavy wood oak, I think to myself as I push them open. The hinges creak softly under the weight of the doors. But it's so soft and quiet I barely notice. The boy… Castle is waiting in the kitchen for me. When I enter he points and says “Up there's your room, go change while I look for your parents.”
I nod and turn to start up another flight of stairs. And as Castle starts down the other end of the hallway, something tells me he won't find who he’s looking for. Riot is on my heals the whole way up to my room. Castle didn't say which room it was so I opened the first door on the right to find the bathroom. I close that door and open the one on the other side of the hall, storage closet. The third door I open shows a room with a bed suspended eight feet in the air by four legs and connected to the wall, which is covered in posters and drawings. I enter, Riot brushing past me.
As I look around I notice that the whole room is covered in drawings, posters and pictures of people. There is a map under the bed and the name under it says ‘The State of Montana.’ I walk over to a dresser with a picture of a man and a girl who is much younger than he is. I pick it up and look at it. The man has light brown hair and a firm jaw line. His eyes are bright green and go very well with the green button down shirt he is wearing. He looks like he is in his late twenties or early thirties. The girl he is laughing with has my auburn brown hair. Her eyes are a deep blue like the ocean. Her ears come to a slight but evident point and that is very cute. She's no older than seven or eight and is smiling just as happily as the man above her.
I flip the picture frame over and on the back is a note:
One of the happiest days of my life.
I will forever and always look back on this day
with the memory of you carefree smile and real laugh
I will hope that you always stay this happy
But life has a way to mess things up
Anyway I just wanted to say that I will always love you sweet bug
To the core and back.
Love Dad.
As I set the picture down on the dresser I think back to Castle's words on the lawn, ‘Just been awhile since you have smiled like that.’ What happened to me? I pull one of the drawers out and look. The clothes inside consist of tight blue jeans {some ripped}, black tank tops, dark blue shirts or deep blood red shirts. All neatly folded and placed separate from each other. So if this was my room three things that I have learned about myself control freak, organised and I love dark colors. I grab the tank top and a pair of non ripped jeans. I walk down the hall to the bathroom and close the door.
I turn from the door to look at the mirror and see the deep blue ocean eyes of the girls in the photo. That kid was me, and the man was my father. The werewolf, I guessed. For the first time Castle's explanation really sinks in. My father's wolf and my mother is an elf.  I look at my ears and they come to a slight point at the tips. I change into the new clothes from my room and take one last look at myself in the mirror. I have a deep tan on my arms and face that seems to stop about the spot where a short sleeve shirt would rest. My nose is round and soft, my lips are full and red. There's a small scar on my left cheek that starts at the base of my eye socket and stops about an inch down. My jaw is firm like the man from the photo.
I close the bathroom door and start down back to my room. As I close the bedroom door I notice the long black coat hanging from the back of it. It looked like some sort of trench coat but the bottom half that gave the coat its length had been sewn on by hand. Red thread was sewn into the coat and seemed to glow slightly. I pull it down and let it rest in my hands. I was heavy, heavier than it should have been, like it had been weighted. I flipped it over to see a sweatshirt that had been fitted into the sleeves of the coat, that explained the weight of it a little. I run the fabric through my fingers, it's soft but very durable at the same time. The end of the coat is caked in mud and is stained.
I pull my eyes away from the coat and look around the room again and see three pairs of shoes over in one corner two pairs of boots one pair are laced and the other are some kind of work boots, and a pair of gym shoes. Under the bed is what looks to be a minicher arsenal, four kinds of bows, a sword that looks to be handmade, a machete and about a dozen knives. I look down at my still bare feet and head over to the shoes at the corner of  the room. I stop at the dresser. Set the coat down on it and open a drawer to look for socks. I find a pair and start again for the shoes. I reach them and sit down on the floor. I put the socks on and study them, the lace less pair of boots is deep brown leather with thick rubber soules, the pair of boots with laces are straight black leather and cloth with a zipper down the side. The gym shoes are dark red with black highlights.
I reach out and grab the black boots and unzip the sides then slip them over my feet zip the sides back up and start lacing and tying the boots and I stand walking around the room feeling how the boots feel. At this moment Castle comes into the room the look on his face says that he didn't find what or who he was looking for. “I look all over the ranch, he says “Your parents are not here. Which is weird because all the horses are in the field and the cars are in the driveway.”
KKRAKK!! The sound of something coming from the woods draws our attention to the window. I slide the window open and we both stick our heads out. The tops of the trees are shaking and a few are draping to the ground with shuddering thuds. As we continue to watch the top of a head appears and then a body. The only problem is that the head was attached to a man that was at least thirty feet tall. As we watch he reaches down, grabs a tree at the base and rips it out of the ground. With the hand not holding the tree he runs it down the trunk knocking all the branches off making himself a club.
“Okay, okay.” Castle turns and starts to the weapons under the bed. “You grab the keys on the frame of your bed and whatever else you want to and head outside.”  He grabs two of the bows, three quivers of arrows, the sword, the machete and four or five knives. I find the keys, grab them and head for the coat then remember the photo on the dresser. I take it off the dresser and go back to coat and stuff it in one of the pockets. I pick it up and follow Castle out the door and down the stairs, out the front door. He points to a black GMC truck that had to be ten years old. “Hope in and start it, we've got to go!”
I open the door and throw the coat in, then hope in myself. I feel the truck rock as Castle throws the things in the back and jumps in. He pulls out a gold and silver hammer from thin air, then some scraps of metal and starts hammering. I put the keys in the ignition and turn them down. The truck starts and I pull the gear shift down to the D and hit the long thin pedal. The truck revs and lurches forward. Castle pulls out what looks like a stun gun and points towards the giant that is barreling towards us. At least the thing left the house alone. Castle points and pulls the trigger. A small ping from the gun is all I can hear.
The growling of the truck is very calming for some reason and starts to make my head hurt. Most likely with memories that were serprested or stolen from me. The thoughts running through my head are depressing me so I push them to the back of my mind and think of the task at hand. Castle has turned the stun gun into a hunting rifle. I'm very confused as to how he is doing this then I remember, ‘I'm a son of Hephaestus.’ That's what he had to told me. The god of the forge and metal work. A shadow falls over the truck than a builder the size of the truck falls onto the road in front of us. I pull the wheel to the left and swerve around the builder. More rocks continue to fall from the sky.
I look back over the seat and see that Castle is pointing and telling me to pull over. I pull the truck over to the shoulder of the road. He hopes down and runs into the trunk screaming for me to go. I floor the gas and the truck takes off down the road. I ask him “I know this probably is not the right time to ask you this but I don’t have any memory at all so how old are we?” He looks at me like he’s ready to kill me. “Seriesly? That's what you're worried about? A mountain giant is on our tail and you're worried about how old you are?” “Well,” I say back to him, “ I don't want to die after losing my memory and my family and not know that little detail.”
He looks back to the monster that is following us, sighs , looks back at me and says “Fine, you just turned seventeen and I am eighteen.”
Seventeen. I'm seventeen and have no memory of those years. The boulders had stopped falling from the sky, so I risked a look behind me through the review window. I couldn't see anything behind us but that didn't bring me comfort. I was still looking back when a crunch from in front of us stole my attention. “HIT THE BRAKES!!” Castle screamed at me. A large truck with a big rectangular box at the end of it was in the way of the road. I slammed both feet on the second peddle and the tires screamed in protest on the blacktop. The truck just barely stopped right before hitting the cargo box. “Oh, crap.” Castle was looking out the passenger side window, his face slack with fear.