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THREE, gods above
❀ ✿ ❀ ✿
GOSSIP HAD ALWAYS SPREAD pretty easily at Camp Half-Blood, and the bathroom incident was no different. Wherever Annabeth, Aster, and Percy walked, the campers stared and whispered something about toilet water. They also could have just been gawking at Aster and Annabeth because they were soaking wet, but who knows.
Aster and Annabeth finished off the tour by showing Percy the most important parts of camp that Chiron hadn't quite gotten to: the metal shop, the arts-and-crafts room, and the climbing wall. He looked pretty nervous looking at the giant cliff dripping with lava, and Aster grinned wildly.
"Looks pretty cool, doesn't it?" she said cheekily.
"Not really," Percy muttered, his face having gone pale.
"You'll get used to it. You're looking at one of its champions."
Percy raised an eyebrow, but he said nothing, and they moved on. Their last stop was to the canoeing lake, where the trail would go back to the horseshoe of cabins.
"We've got training to do," Annabeth said. Aster nodded, combing her fingers through her still-wet hair so it wouldn't knot. "Dinner's at seven-thirty. Just follow your cabin to the mess hall."
Percy had a look of remorse when he turned to them. "Aster, Annabeth, I'm sorry about the toilets."
"It's fine," Aster said while Annabeth muttered, "whatever."
"It wasn't my fault," he said, but Aster just stared back at him skeptically. As far as she could tell, it was him who had caused that, unless Clarisse had pissed off a whole bunch of water naiads. The gears in Aster's head had been turning since the incident, but she couldn't come up with any sane reason as to how Percy had caused it. Unless . . .
"You need to talk to the Oracle," Aster insisted. Annabeth gave her a strange look, her head snapping towards the other girl.
"Who?"
"Not who. What. The Oracle. I'll ask Chiron," Aster explained.
Percy just stared into the lake distractedly. Two naiads were sitting at the bottom, dressed in blue jeans and shimmering green t-shirts, brown hair floating loose around their shoulders as minnows darted in and out of the spaces they created. They smiled and waved at Percy, and he returned the gesture. Aster scowled. "Don't encourage them," she warned, "naiads are terrible flirts."
"Naiads," Percy repeated, staring at his own reflection in the lake. He sounded completely overwhelmed. "That's it. I want to go home now."
Annabeth frowned. "Don't you get it, Percy? You are home. This is the only safe place on earth for kids like us."
Percy gave her a funny look. "You mean, mentally disturbed kids?"
Aster rolled her eyes. "She means not human. Not totally human, anyway. Half-human."
