Annabeth's Point of View

The Sea of Monsters - Desires

I shakily sat down on the boat as Percy somehow made the current follow his every desire, something I found seriously cool, but I didn’t say it out loud.

The shock of finding out Percy had been a Guinea Pig was wearing off a little, but the thought of me actually taking up Circe’s offer and leaving Percy to stay there for eternity scared me. Again, I would never say that out loud; Percy might never let me live it down. Of course, I still had blackmail on him; I’m guessing guys don’t think it’s cool to turn into small rodents.

I glanced at Percy, who looked deep in thought. I didn’t know what he thought about what happened at Circe’s Island, but I’m guessing nothing was positive.

The sky got steadily darker, and I was starting to feel guilty resting while Percy stood up all night steering the ship.

“I’ll be lookout for a while,” I told him, getting to my feet. “Move, Seaweed Brain.”

Percy didn’t argue, he probably knew better, and he stepped aside to give me the steering wheel. The boat noticeably slowed when Percy stopped using his sea powers to make it go faster, and the boat jerked a bit when the regular current attacked it.

Finally, after all those years at being good at everything at Camp Half Blood, I’ve found something I was terrible at. Percy watched with amusement as I tried to keep the wheel steady, but we wouldn’t be getting anywhere if the boat just kept going in circles.

After several minutes of struggling, I finally got tired of Percy smirking and snapped at him to take the wheel. He did so, but not without making a few ‘witty’ remarks that I ignored.  I left him to steer the boat while I rested in the hammock, and even though I was sea sick, I still managed to fall asleep.

When I woke back up, we were just passing but a volcano. The sea bubbled and steamed around the shore.

"One of the forges of Hephaestus," I said. "Where he makes his metal monsters."

"Like the bronze bulls?" Percy asked.

I nodded. "Go around. Far around."

Percy did as I said. We steered clear of the island, and soon it was just a red patch of haze
behind us. Percy looked at me with the same look he always did when he was going to ask a question he knew would bother me. I mentally braced myself. "The reason you hate Cyclopes so much ... the story about how Thalia really died. What happened?"

I felt my heart ache as I remembered Thalia’s face when she told us to keep running. She had looked fierce, determined, and there wasn’t an ounce of fear in her eyes. I had never seen anyone look so frightening before. I looked out of the side of the boat, away from Percy.

"I guess you deserve to know," I said after a strained silence. "The night Grover was escorting us to camp, he got confused, took some wrong turns. You remember he told you that once?"

I barely noticed Percy nodding his head. In my mind’s eye, I was seeing Grover’s pale face with the shadows of the night illuminating his features. He was scared, even at my mere age of seven I knew he was, and he was desperate to get us to camp.