Sunburn- phoebus apollo

- vii. Percy gets his ass beat while sword-fighting

RHEA QUICKLY SETTLED into a routine that felt somewhat normal. Well, if you don't count that fact that she was getting lessons from satyrs, nymphs and a centaur. Each morning she had Ancient Greek lessons from Annabeth, talking about the gods and goddesses in present tense. Turns out, Annabeth was right about her dyslexia: Ancient Greek wasn't that hard to read.

The rest of the day, Rhea would rotate through outdoor activities, looking for something that she was good at. Lee Fletcher had tried to teach her archery, and had handed her a pair of wooden bow and arrows.

When Rhea went to grab them, Apollo had the worlds worst godly hissy fit that the girl had even witnessed. She ended up yanking off the necklace, letting the stunning pair of golden bow and arrows appear in her hand.

Safe to say, everyone within eye distance from her jaw's dropped to the underworld floor, eyes popping out. Rhea had ignored them, taking an arrow and notching it just like that night when fighting the Minotaur and shot at the target, hitting bullseye.

When she lowered her bow, she glanced to her right to see Lee staring at her, thunderstruck. The wooden bow he had tried to give to her was now on the floor.

"er, sorry," she shuffled her foot around. She really wanted to say "your father was having a hissy fit that I was using another pair of bow and arrows" but she didn't.

Lee blinked owlishly at her before spluttering, "is that dad's?"

"yeah," she murmured. "It's a long story."

"Holy shit," Lee gasped. "Apollo's kid?"

At that, she shook her head vigorously. "Don't think so. Have you seen the way my brother shoots?"

At that, Lee let out a snort. "Right. Jackson shot Chiron in the tail."

Rhea's jaw dropped. "No way." She giggled. "I would've paid to see that."

There was no way that Apollo was her dad, as her hitting bullseye wasn't even her doing. It was just the magic bow that Apollo had enchanted.

Foot racing? Ew. The wood-nymph instructors left her in the dust. The only good thing was that they were nice about it and told her not to worry, and that they had centuries of practice from running away from lovesick gods.

And wrestling? No way. Forget it. Every time Rhea got on the mat, Clarisse would pulverize her. Guess this is her way of pay-back from the toilets.

"There's more where that came from, punk." she'd mumbled into Rhea's ear.

The only thing she really excelled at was canoeing, and that apparently wasn't the kind of heroic skill people expected to see from the kid who had beaten the Minotaur. The only reason why they haven't said anything about it was because of her "show-down" at the archery range, which wasn't even her doing. It was kind of relieving to know that Percy was also in the same boat.

She knew that the senior campers and counselors were watching her and Percy, trying to decide who their dad was, but they weren't having an easy time of it. They had originally guessed Apollo, but was quickly overruled by Rhea's constant denial, pointing out the fact that her brother sucked at archery.

She wasn't as strong as the Ares kids, or good at archery as the Apollo kids (the magical bow doesn't count. She knows that she'd suck ass just like her brother without it). She didn't have Hephaestus's skill with metalwork or - gods forbid- Dionysus's way with vine plants. Luke told her that she might be a child of Hermes, a kind of jack-of-all-trades, master of none. But she got the feeling he was just trying to make her feel better. He really didn't know what to make of her either.

Despite all that, Rhea liked camp. She got used to the morning fog over the beach, the smell of hot strawberry fields in the afternoon, and even the weird noises of monsters in the woods at night. She and Percy would eat dinner with cabin eleven, scrape part of her meal into the fire, giving offerings of cherries to Apollo and pleading to find her dad.

*********************

Thursday afternoon was the sword-fighting lesson. Everybody from cabin eleven gathered in the big circular arena, where Luke was the instructor.

It started off with basic stabbing and slashing, using some straw-stuffed dummies in Greek armor. Rhea was partnered up with Lee, and she could obviously tell that he was going easy on her. She wasn't complaining at all, glad that she wasn't getting her body slammed to the mat for once.

After that warm-up fight, she already decided that sword-fighting wasn't her thing. For starters, she couldn't find blade that felt right in her hands. Either they were too heavy, or too light, or too long. Nothing that Luke or Lee did would help the problem. In the end, Rhea decided that she would stick with shooting arrows instead.

good choice.

Rhea rolled her eyes at that, already knowing that she made his ego inflate.

They moved onto dueling pairs and Luke announced that he would be Percy's partner. At that, the girl gave her brother a sympathetic at on the back, and Percy looked as if he'd rather face the Minotaur again then be here.

Luke showed some thrusts and parries and shield blocks the hard way. With every swipe, Percy got a little more battered and bruised. Rhea winced. "Keep your guard up, Percy," Luke said, then whapped him in the ribs with the flat of his blade. He kept on giving him instructions, trying to correct his mistakes as they went.

Everyone swarmed the drinks cooler when Luke called for a break. Percy came staggering his way over to Rhea, who cringed away when he set a sweaty arm on her shoulder in exhaustion. "Ew," she cringed away from the water droplets that had bounced off of Percy as he poured the water over his head.

"Okay, everybody circle up!" Luke ordered. "If Percy doesn't mind, I want to give you a little demo."

Percy immediately cringed at that, making her snicker. "Good luck, buddy."

Everyone gathered around. He told everybody he was going to demonstrate a disarming technique: how to twist the enemy's blade with the flat of your own sword so that he had no choice but to drop his weapon.

"This is difficult," he stressed. "I've had it used against me. No laughing at Percy, now. Most swordsmen have to work years to master this technique."

He demonstrated the move in slow motion and sure enough, the sword clattered out of his hand.

"Now in real time," he said, after Percy had retrieved his weapon. "We keep sparring until one of us pulls it off. Ready, Percy?"

He nodded, and Luke lunged. Rhea was greatly surprised that her twin had managed to block his every move. It was like he saw his attacks coming. Percy tried the disarming maneuver.

Clang.

Luke's sword rattled against the stones. The tip of Percy's blade was a couple of centimeters from his undefended chest.

Everyone went silent, and Rhea's jaw dropped.

Percy lowered his sword. "Um, sorry."

For a moment, Luke was too stunned to speak. "Sorry?" His scarred face broke into a grin "By the gods, Percy, why are you sorry? Show me that again!"

Rhea could tell that Percy didn't want to, but Luke insisted. This time, there was no contest. The moment their swords connected, Luke hit Percy's hilt and sent his weapon skidding across the floor.

After a long pause, somebody in the audience said, "beginners luck?"

Luke wiped the sweat off his brow, looking at Percy in an entirely new interest. "Maybe," he said. "But I wonder what Percy could do with a balanced sword...."