Remembering

Chp 6: Eavesdropping

Percy squinted his eyes at the table covered with random assortments. "Is this really necessary?"

"It's a memory table, Percy! Inspired loosely by a tactile table, a table for those lacking a certain sense. For you, immersing yourself in these objects will hopefully-"

"Yeah, yeah. I don't need an essay." Annabeth rolled her eyes and looked at the table. There was his Camp Half-Blood necklace, a red seashell pendant he had given her when they started dating, a square of ambrosia, and yes, the picture of them she taped back together. A pair of brown eyes in the distance stared at the table in disdain.

Percy fingered the necklace, studying the beads. They felt uncomfortably familiar, but he couldn't place a finger on them.

"They represent each year you spent at Camp Half-Blood," Annabeth said softly. The first bead was black with a turquoise trident. "It's to show a son of Poseidon going down to the Underworld and making it out alive."

"I went to the Underworld?" Percy asked dumbly.

Annabeth hesitated. This would probably bring dreadful memories back. "When you first arrived at camp, you were being chased by a minotaur. Well, you, your mom, and your guardian satyr. Grover, the satyr, and you made it back to camp, but your mom..."

"My mom's dead!" Percy shrieked. He didn't remember the woman, but it hurt him all the same. The brown eyes softened in sympathy.

"No no! The three of us went on a quest to the Underworld to get your mom back up. It was because of that we first met, actually. We were in the infirmary, and you just woke up, and I said-"

"You drool in your sleep."

Annabeth gaped at him. "You remember!!" Percy grinned. Energized now, she started talking about the other beads. The second one was adorned with the golden fleece hanging from Thalia's pine tree. "We had a quest to Polyphemus' Island to save Thalia's pine tree from poisoning."

"And," Annabeth said through snorts, "you turned into a hamster..." The faraway brown eyes widened.

Percy raised his eyebrows, "On the island?"

"Yes! Circe's Island!"

"What?" Reyna's brown eyes furrowed in confusion, then widened in alarm. She had been listening to their conversation from behind a tree in the distance, and now, they knew.

"Reyna?" Percy asked, looking around. Reyna's heart leaped. He recognizes my voice?

Emboldened, she stepped from her vantage point to face him, but Annabeth frowned at her. "You were listening to our conversation?"

Reyna frowned back. "You think I would participate in such a vulgar act of eavesdropping? A Roman would never."

But a Greek would. The jab hit Annabeth square on the jaw. Her eyes narrowed.

"So...what were you saying about Circe's Island, Annabeth?" Percy said quickly, smothering the flames in Annabeth's eyes.

Circe's Island. The reason Reyna stepped out in the first place. "I was a servant on Circe's Island."

Percy and Annabeth looked at her dumbly.

"We went to Circe's Island to escape from my father. We ended up on Circe's Island in the Sea of Monsters. We knew what Circe did was wrong but-"

"Wait hold up," Percy interjected. "Who's we?"

"Me and my sister, Hylla."

"Hylla!" Annabeth exclaimed. "I know her! She was the girl who signed us in. She had a clipboard."

Reyna smiled. The way her past and Percy's past connected...she couldn't help but feel a connection. It was so perfectly laid out-almost like fate. Annabeth started talking about where she first saw Hylla and how she checked them in...but Reyna was lost in her plan. She would show Venus. She would show that stupid goddess that she could get a boyfriend. Jason had backfired, but Percy would not.