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14: Disscusions and Prophecies and Flag Capturing. Oh My!

"So..." I longed out, really not wanting an upset horse yelling at me.

"Amanda, whatever you did is surely not the worst thin-"

"IwasforcedtosweartowatchNicoandeventhoughItry,mymomwontsayanything!"

"Woah, slow down!"

"Okay, okay," and I started on my story, explaining how I had agreed to Bianca's offer because I didn't want some mad goddess after me (I'm not like my brother who doesn't seem to care who's mad at him). I also explained my multiple Iris Messages to my mom.

"She won't budge. Maybe we could get Percy-"

"You know why we can't get Percy to do this."

"I know, I know. It would be so much easier if he knew, though."

"Amanda, I'm sorry. We can't tell him, not until you are both sixteen."

"Ugh! There is too much on my plate, I have two brothers and one hasn't even been claimed, my mom won't tell anyone which of us was born first, and I'm stuck with Artemis' brats-er, I mean hunters." I laughed sheepishly.

"You go and find your brother, he needs as much help as you do. If you help him, he will help you." I feel that ocean feeling, and I mentally cursed my idiot brother for being a... well idiot. "As for the DiAngelo thing. Just watch him and keep him safe."

"I got to go, Chiron. I need to find Nico. Bye." I ran out of the conference room and up the stairs, taking two at a time. I'd only done this once before, but I've never actually been inside. The trap door was open, so I stepped into the attic.

The room was dark and dusty and cluttered with junk, just like Percy told me. There were shields with monster bites out of them, and swords bent in the shapes of daemon heads, and a bunch of taxidermy, like a stuffed harpy and a bright orange python.

Over by the window, sitting on a three-legged stool, was the shriveled-up mummy of an old lady in a tie-dyed hippie dress. The Oracle. I knew the spirit of the Oracle was in here somewhere. I could feel a cold presence in the room, like a coiled sleeping snake.

I saw Percy walk toward her. He waited for something, but no luck.

"Hi," He said. "Uh, what's up?"

"Nothing much, just watching my twin brother act like a fool." I said. I swear Percy's head touched the ceiling. He jumped that high.

"Oh, hey Amanda. Wanna watch me act like a fool?"

"When do I not?" I asked, and he sighed.

"I have a question," he said a little louder to the Oracle. "I need to know about Annabeth. How can I save her?"

No answer. The sun slanted through the dirty attic window, lighting the dust motes dancing in the air.

He waited longer.

Then I got angry. We were being stonewalled by a corpse. "All right," I said. "Fine. We'll figure it out ourselves."

I turned and bumped into a big table full of souvenirs. That was not there a second ago. I heard Percy laugh at me, but I was focused on something else. I knew heroes stored all kinds of stuff in the attic: quest trophies they no longer wanted to keep in their cabins, or stuff that held painful memories. I knew Luke had stored a dragon claw somewhere up here-the one that had scarred his face. I remember him saying he didn't want it because it could fall and hurt me from it's mount. Gods, I miss the old Luke.

There was a broken sword hilt labeled:

This broke and Leroy got killed. 1999.

Then Percy noticed a pink silk scarf with a label attached to it. He picked up the tag and tried to read it out to me (dyslexia sucks guys):