Heroes with Wands

Chapter 35

Annabeth

I woke up to jumping on my bed. I opened my eyes to Piper, Hazel, and Thalia jumping on my bed. "GET UP GET UP GET UP!" yelled Thalia. "IT'S CHRISTMAS!"

A huge grin spread over my face. I threw off my covers and we ran from my room to the boys'. I threw open Percy's door and laid beside him. He opened a groggy eye and smiled. "Annabeth...."

I screamed, "PERSEUS JACKSON IT'S CHRISTMAS GET OFF YOUR BUTT AND COME ON!"

He jerked up and almost knocked me onto the floor. If not for his quick instincts, I would have. He caught me and we raced from the ship to the Gryffindor common room.

Hermione and Ginny were dragging Harry and Ron to the huge Christmas tree. There were a million presents under the tree.

Our presents, the nine demigods and four wizards, were pushed to the side of the tree. We sat in a circle around them.

"This is our first Christmas together," Jason realized. "Let's make the most of it." We got hot chocolate that just appeared on a table in the common room, around the tree, smiling.

"I wanna hand out mine first," Piper said. She fumbled for three large pink bags. She handed one to the four wizards, one to Jason, Thalia, Leo and I, and one to the others.

Jason, Thalia, Leo and I dug through the bag and pulled out our gifts. Mine was a long rectangular box-shape. I looked at Piper and grinned. She smiled back.

I tore off the wrapping paper. A note covered the present. I read it out loud, "You stink. I hate you. Love, Piper." I laughed.

Then I removed the note and gasped. A book lay there. It was the one I'd wanted from the Hogwarts library: Architecture of Magical and Muggle World.

I tackled Piper in a hug. "Thank you! How did you get it?"

She laughed. "Let's just say some people here are scared of the children of the gods." We all cracked up.

Hazel passed out hers. She'd gotten me an owl stuffed animal with (uncursed) gems decorating the eyes and feathers. It was so cute!

Leo got me something I knew was from Calypso's island. It was a smooth gray rock (Percy got blue, Piper got pink, etc) with a bird on it. The second it touched my palm, the bird flapped around.

I jerked, surprised. Leo said, "They're enchanted to lead you in the direction you need to go if you're lost," he said. "It's like a compass. For example, if you were at the River Styx and you needed to get to Tartarus, it would lead you to it." He'd gotten Frank a bag of fireproof cloth for his firewood, too.

Jason had decided to give me a jar of yellow M&Ms with ten drachmas inside. Hey-I liked chocolate. And ten drachmas could buy me new armour. Plus he handed out everyone reindeer antlers, Santa hats, halos, stuff like that for the Christmas spirit.

Frank handed us all something bronze. "Leo helped me make them," he said sheepishly. "I'm not good with making things. But it was my idea." When we gave him blank looks, he gasped. "Oh! Right. They're monster-proof phone cases."

"Are you serious?" Ginny asked. She looked at hers in amazement. Monsters could still sense wizards, since Gaea was working with Voldemort. "This is awesome!" I couldn't agree more.

Nico got everyone candy and soda. He wasn't exactly a people person, and I didn't think he really knew how to shop.

Thalia got me something that made me cry. It was a picture frame of photo booth photos of us two and Luke when we were on the run. I was so little, and that was the only fun thing we'd gotten to do in weeks.