Brighter Than the Sun

Chapter Twenty-Seven

We stopped in Edison, New Jersey, and managed to slip away without any of the station workers seeing us. I stuffed the sleeping bags I'd conjured into my duffle (I would've Vanished them but I wasn't quite there yet with magic -- we weren't supposed to start Vanishing until fifth year), and we headed out to find breakfast.

As it turned out, Annabeth and Thalia loved donuts, so we tried to find someplace to get those.

"There's always a Monster Donut somewhere," Thalia said.

My blood went cold. "Oh, no. We're not going to Monster Donut."

"Why?" Luke joked. "More into Krispy Kreme?"

I frowned at him. "No. Well, yes. But that's not the only thing. There's a reason it's called Monster Donut. We'd better stay away from it."

The three exchanged looks, but didn't say anything else. We found a much better, monster-free Krispy Kreme on the other side of town and Annabeth and Thalia stuffed themselves with chocolate-glazed donuts to their hearts' content. Thalia burped loudly and patted her stomach. She would get along with Ron; they both liked to eat.

"Sorry about Thalia, she's a little rough around the edges," Luke said, sending a strange look at the Daughter of Zeus, who was trying to cram as many donut holes into her mouth as possible.

I shrugged. "Table manners don't really matter when you're running from monsters. Besides, I'm used to it. Ron always eats like he'll never see another meal again."

"Who's Ron?" Annabeth asked with a bit of chocolate icing on the corners of her mouth.

I took a napkin to her face. "He's a friend of mine from school. Loves food."

"Who are your other friends?" Annabeth asked. "What are their names? Are they funny? Do they like food, too?"

"Woah, hold up," I laughed. "One at a time. Okay, let's see. I have a bunch of other friends like Dean, Seamus, Lavender, Parvati -- but my best friends are Harry, Ron and Hermione. Yes, they're funny -- sometimes, though. I guess the funniest friends I have are Fred and George, Ron's older brothers. I guess they like food, but Hermione's more into books, and Harry's more into Quidditch."

"What's Quidditch?" Thalia asked.

I'd forgotten that I hadn't told her or Annabeth about the Wizarding World -- they'd been asleep during my conversation with Luke.

"It's a sport, played on brooms," I said.

"Brooms?" Thalia repeated.

"She's a witch, Thalia," Luke said. "She can do magic and stuff."

"So that's what the stick is for," Thalia said. "Can I see?"

"When we're not in public," I said. "It'd be best if people didn't know I was a witch -- they wouldn't leave me alone. That's why the Wizarding World is kept a secret."

"So your friends are all magic, too?" Thalia asked. "Cool. I wanna meet 'em."

"They're all in England," I said. "Well, except for Seamus, I think he lives in Ireland. But there are a few Hecate kids at camp, you can meet them."

"Cool," Thalia said again.

"So, what's the plan from here?" Luke asked. "We're still short by -- what, thirty miles?"

"Just about, yeah," I agreed. "And that's just to get to New York City. We'll need to hail a cab from there to Camp."

"Maybe another train?" Annabeth suggested.

"Worth a shot," I said. We packed up the rest of the donuts and headed back to the train station.

But there weren't any trains to New York City for the rest of the day. Neither of us were ready for a bus again, so our only options were walking or finding a taxi, and it was looking like it was going to be the former. Either way, we had to get moving -- the longer we stayed in Edison, the more monsters we'd attract.