THE HEALER| Heroes of Olympus

t h r e e

I was on an island. 

It wasn't a familiar island. I had never seen anything like it before. But yet it felt like I had been here before. 

"Eliana." A voice called from behind me. I knew that voice. I'd heard it before. 

I turned around and looked at the man before me. He was extremely beautiful, probably the most beautiful god I'd seen. He has long, golden hair, beardless face and hairless body. His body is neither soft nor overly muscular, but is in perfect proportions. If there was an icon of ideal male beauty, he would be it. He had tanned skin and bright blue eyes. 

Wait I knew those blue eyes.  They were Will's eyes. 

"Dad?" I asked unsure. He'd never visited me before. 

"I don't have much time, Eliana." He said, "I've managed to stay in my Greek form long enough to talk to you." 

I didn't know if I should be appreciative of the gesture. 

"This will be your last vision." He said. 

"What?" I was surprised. "Why-" I paused, the Oracle. Juno had said something about the Oracle. 

"I have lost my gift of prophecy." He said, "Until it is returned neither you or Octavian will be able to glimpse into the future." He didn't sound particularly happy when he said Octavian's name. 

He stepped toward me. "You must find me Eliana. Come to this Island. Until then the future will be a mystery to you."

I looked around. "I don't know where you are. How am I-" 

Apollo cried out in pain. His Greek toga flicker and his form nearly changed. One moment he his hair was long and wavy and the next it was cut short like the military would wear it. He was crowned with laurel, his garments and sandals shining with gold. He flickered again and he was back to how he looked before. 

"I must go." He said quickly. "You must find me Eliana. You must find me and face our fear."

Our fear? What was he talking about. 

"I-"

Apollo stepped back. "Octavian," he said. "he will save Camp Jupiter."

What does that even mean? Where was he? How was I supposed to find him? What did he mean I won't be getting visions anymore? Questions ran through my mind. 

The dream started to fade. 

"Wait!" I called out to him as he disappeared as a shimmer of light. 

***

The nine of us ate breakfast together in the mess hall. It had been a long time since we could all do this together. 

Percy was eating a huge stack of blue pancakes (what was his deal with blue food?) while Annabeth chided him for pouring on too much syrup.

"You're drowning them!" she complained.

"Hey, I'm a Poseidon kid," he said. "I can't drown. And neither can my pancakes."

To their left, Frank and Hazel used their cereal bowls to flatten out a map of Greece. They looked over it, their heads close together. Every once in a while Frank's hand would cover Hazel's, just sweet and natural like they were an old married couple, and Hazel didn't even look flustered, which was real progress for a girl from the 1940s. Until recently, if somebody said gosh darn, she would nearly faint.

At the head of the table, Jason sat uncomfortably with his T-shirt rolled up to his ribcage as Nurse Piper changed his bandages. She told me I could take the morning off as I had spent hours fixing him up after we got back to the ship.