The Capture

LIONA

Like most places, Liona hated Camp Jupiter.

The first thing she hated was the tattoo burned into her forearm. The second thing she hated was the uniformity, the lack of any forms of joy, the complete misnomer that was 'Camp'. The third thing she hated was speaking Latin.

The Camp Jupiter banquets could last hours, and they were insufferable. The speeches were the worst, but she hated the socialisation most. Her and Nico were almost always there together, keeping to themselves and reminding them that their actions had deep impacts on the Underworld, how far low they expanded their borders and how their complete lack of respect for Pluto would mean their heroes had less chance of going to Elysium.

But now, her brother was gone. About a week ago, he had 'important work' and needed to go somewhere for something. He wouldn't tell her a thing, and she loathed him for it. From Hazel, Liona knew that he'd made a stop for two days at camp Jupiter, but left on June 20th. June 20th. That made it twenty two days since seeing him, five since Hazel had. She hated being apart from him.

Liona di Angelo wasn't particularly skilled at making friends, but she had a few at Camp Half-Blood. A few. She hated most demigods. They didn't want to be around the daughter of death, and with very good reason. Before the Battle of Manhattan, she'd told them where they'd be most likely to die. They didn't listen. But she was right, every time. They didn't like it.

The wariness continued to new campers – namely Leo, Piper and Jason, none of whom had tried to particularly get to know her. Annabeth was a fellow strategist, nothing more, and Percy was the biggest waste of space in the country. The crew of the Argo II was joined by Liona's half-sister, Hazel, Frank Zhang, objectively the most bearable one at the table, Reyna, who had never liked her, and the only person who could rival her hate for Percy – Octavian.

After a sufficiently awkward toast to friendship, the stories flew out. It was all very run-of-the-mill demigod business, until Octavian broke in. "Impossible!" he spluttered. "That's our most sacred place! If the giants imprisoned a goddess there..."

"Chiudi la bocca," Liona muttered. Suddenly, all the shadows and reflections around Octavian flew together, pulsated in and out around his head and shattered back to their original positions. The legacy of Apollo let out a very unmanly yelp.

Reyna sighed, suppressing a smile. Breaking the uncomfortable silence that ensued, Leo said: "Wait, who did that?"

From across the table, Liona smiled and wiggled her fingers at him, and Hazel exploded into laughter. Liona was trying very hard not to make eye contact with anyone at the table and Frank snorted, repressing a grin. No doubt they'd seen this before.

The stories continued, and although she nodded along to Percy's recount of the quest to free Thanatos, Hazel continued to wheeze into Liona's side, until the conversation broke out once more, and Octavian started talking.

"Octavian," Liona said delicately. "We all know this is a problem, but we have much more important issues, in case you haven't noticed. I'd have for you to followed around by ghosts of augur past. That'd be simply awful, would it not?"

Reyna starred pointedly at the ground, Octavian turning as purple as the SPQR t-shirts. "I'll step aside for Jason," Percy said evenly. "It's no biggie."

Octavian looked as if he had been slapped, and was clearly about to start talking, until he caught Liona's sickly sweet smile and shut his trap.

Jason and Percy exchanged a few words, until Annabeth spoke to the table. "We should talk about the Great Prophecy. It sounds like the Romans are aware of it too?"

"We call it the Prophecy of Seven. Octavian, you have it committed to memory?" Reyna asked. "Recite it, please. In English, not Latin."

Octavian looked as if he'd like to object, but merely sighed. "Seven half-bloods shall answer the call. To storm or fire the world must fall—"