"you could be the king, but watch the queen conquer"
-
Rosalyn Carter is the daughter of Aphrodite and the last thing Percy expected to find at Camp Half-Blood.
But he wouldn't want to fight deadly battles with anyone else.
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The entire way down, Rosalyn prayed furiously under her breath, holding tightly to Percy. He was yelling over the sound of the wind, directly into her ear.
As the river raced toward them, Rosalyn felt the fear in her grow. It was getting hard to breathe as the rushing air around them tried to rip the breath straight from her lungs. The girl's hands ached from the grip she had on the son of Poseidon.
That's probably why his shirt slipped from her fingers the second they hit the surface of the water.
Save him, she begged desperately to the river before she lost the ability to form coherent thoughts.
It felt like she'd been hit by a truck. Her chest was on fire, trying to accommodate the pressure of the fall and the dark water surrounding her. Rosalyn couldn't see anything, and her head was beginning to pound. She realized then that she was running out of air, but her body was too weak to even try to swim for the surface.
Several feet away, Percy Jackson was gently floating to the river bottom. He was alive, and he was dry.
The boy looked around the water in amazement, spotting a man-sized catfish swimming through the murk. Standing up slowly in the mud, he realized he was breathing underwater. Normally as ever.
"Um... thanks," he muttered, unsurely. "Thank you... Father."
There was no response. There was only a fump-fump-fump of a riverboat paddlewheel. The silt around him stirred, revealing his sword sticking out of the mud.
"Percy, take the sword. Your father believes in you."
He startled at the sound of a woman's voice under the water.
"Where are you? Mom?"
A ghost-like woman appeared in the water, floating just above Riptide.
"No, child. Only a messenger," the woman whispered into the current. "Though your mother's fate is not as hopeless as you believe. Go to the beach in Santa Monica. It is your father's will."
"But... who- how did you-?"
"I cannot stay, brave one. Go to Santa Monica! And, Percy, do not trust the gifts."
He had little time to ponder what possible gifts she was talking about, because a flash of color in the corner of his eye claimed his attention.
Red hair was floating in the currently lifelessly five feet away. Ripping his sword from the mud, he waded in the direction of the girl who'd jumped out of the St. Louis Arch with him.
The one who couldn't breathe underwater.
"Rosie?" Percy choked, grabbing ahold of the girl's arm. Her eyes were closed, and she looked like she was sleeping.
