7 Years: Annabeth's Story

7 Years: Part 6

I always had that dream, like my daddy before me, so I started writing songs, I started writing
                                                                                             stories

She was on top of the world and Luke's death didn't sting as much as it should have, because Percy had looked back at her and said no to immortality, to becoming a god, just for her. Thalia was at her side and she hadn't lost them this time. The three of them stood there and she looked up at the gods. She had saved them. She was a hero of Olympus.
Her name would never be forgotten.
And then her mother had beckoned her over with a smile and the next few moments, she only remembered a haze and feeling overwhelmed. Percy had changed his gift, but Annabeth wouldn't trade hers for anything else in the world. She knew that the discovery of architecture had been a gift from her mother, and now she was being rewarded, once again.
"You will be the architect for the new Olympus," and Annabeth might have screamed but she couldn't remember (you thought the world was yours, didn't you? It wasn't). She had so many ideas and it felt like a flood in her brain except this time she was flying above it. Drowning was a thing of the past.
It was a challenge. Annabeth took well to challenges. She met with gods- oh, how the other campers had envied her constant traveling to Olympus (but now she would give anything to have never met a god in her life). They told her what they wanted and she spent hours pouring over sketches, trying to create the greatest temples they had ever seen. Make her mother proud, make her not regret this reward.
Percy watched her most of the time. He loved the look of concentration on her face, the way she scrunched it when a problem arose. He made sure she took care of herself and when he could, he'd drag her away from her work and they'd spend the day at the beach together (they still did, but she wished they didn't have the weight of the world on the shoulders now), laughing and enjoying a picnic Sally made (laughter is hard to come by- she should have laughed more when she had the ability).
There was happiness, a happiness she'd never known. Her dreams were coming true before her eyes and she'd found love she never dared to believe she would get.
Chiron watched her and his sad eyes weren't as sad. He had been worried about all of them, but Annabeth especially. A war was not something you recovered for (and now she realized she never had) and Annabeth had never dealt well with grief (she still didn't but now she was older and more numb). It seemed she was doing okay and Chiron sent a thankful prayer up to the Fates that she was.
The Fates must have laughed and laughed at those prayers as they watched her directing building on Olympus or hugging Percy tightly, or roaming the woods when Thalia came to visit and then looked at the threads of her life and the darkness that was to come (she knew they couldn't have stopped it but she blamed them anyway). Or maybe they felt bad they were about to ruin the only peace she would ever have (Annabeth didn't believe that for a second. Gods didn't care about demigods).
But any moment of happiness was something she wouldn't trade anything for. Those moments (they had dragged her out) were her favourite ones (and she held onto them as she cried and prayed to have moments like that again).