Love & Chaos 2: A New Pharaoh for Egypt

Chapter 6

A Promise and A Goodbye

Liz Jackson.

She sat in her room alone while the others talked above decks. They were heading to Novi, which filled her with both sadness and excitement. But more than anything, the vision was on her mind. Not every vision over took her like that, but the ones that did always meant trouble. After seeing that, she was going to have nightmares for years.

On the bright side, Holly and some other Amazon girl... Nadia Long, she believed was her name, would be coming to help. She wished that Holly could be on the whole quest with her, but at the same time, she didn't want either of them to get side tracked. Holly would save her ass when necessary, and Liz would continue to lead the quest, as foretold by the Prophecy of Love and Chaos. Love and Chaos. A reoccurring theme, it would seem. Love to save them, chaos to destroy. Chaos to defeat, Love to be saved by them... who even knew anymore.

But after her vision... nothing seemed the same. For maybe the millionth time, she wondered who she loved, if ever anyone. Love wasn't an emotion, it was this selfless sacrifice, this enduring promise, a fight, a passion... Too many strong things that Liz felt too young to understand. Then she would think of anything happening to any one of her quest members (skip Octavian, perhaps...), and she felt the need to stand in front of them and take whatever was supposed to hit them, harder than it would've been originally. Maybe that was just loyalty, though. Love must have been something different.

She didn't know if she could stand at her own grave. It would be like looking down and going, "Hello, empty casket full of lies. You are not that special, actually. I plan on doing this at least once more - escaping certain death, that is. And no one can know, just like this time, except on a much larger, more dramatic scale. Oh, and here is my friend Alex. He's in love with me but doesn't know I'm me because he thinks me from the past is in you. Pleasant, right?"

She walked into her bathroom and looked in the mirror. Her hair was getting to Rapunzel lengths, but she wasn't keen on cutting it quite yet. It was still red, but less strawberry, and more fire orange. It looked like a natural color, at least. Not that she didn't like what Sadie had done, of course, but as she'd known from the start, the color was a one time affair.

Her eyes were usually bright, even if it was a false light, but since earlier that day, they were dark. They weren't blue or green, or even a dancing grey, but looked like storm clouds over head, about to let lightning and thunder rain down on the earth. Sunken into her face, her cheeks hollow, she didn't feel like a beautiful, strong, and/or fierce warrior. She felt like a scared little girl with too much responsibility.

At least she had makeup with her. If she couldn't summon the brave face herself, she would just have to paint one on. The foundation hid the surface darkness, and the blush revived the appearance of her cheeks. Some eye shadow, liner, and mascara gave a bit of light to her eyes, and after applying red lipstick and smiling her best fake smile, she felt ready to talk to them again. She grabbed her map and laptop, and headed out to the upper decks.

"Hey, Liz," greeted Cammie, smiling at her.

"Hi," Liz replied. Pain struck her temples as she remembered what she saw in her vision once more, but she pushed her tongue to the roof of her mouth to keep from cringing and continue smiling.

"Fish princess, you don't fool me one bit." She jumped at Leo's remark. "I know that you're still jittery about that vision. You can't hide anything from me, you know."

She looked away. "I'll be fine."

"Well, I see you have a map. What's our approach?"

She laid the map on the floor, everyone gathering around it. "Okay. Get the reinforcements on the line, and let's do this." Holly, the mortals in Novi, and the demigods in Camp Half - Blood were called, Leo handed her a pen, and she circled the graveyard. "Walt, I will need you with myself and Alex over here. And by Walt, I mean Anubis. You'll have the most potential there, correct?" she double checked.