Son of Chaos: A Story from the world of Percy Jackson

The Letter and The Gift

The next day Erin was sitting in his cabin and thinking about the night before. He couldn't get over how abandoned he felt and how lonely he was. For the first time in his life, he'd finally acknowledged the fact that he was truly alone.
At this time of the day he had no training, so he decided to stay in his cabin until it was time for his mail. This particular day was the day everyone at camp got their letters, and he wasn't particularly ecstatic to get his, mostly because he rarely got anything, and if he did it was a small letter from Hermes saying something like:

Hey kid. Sorry, your mom can't send you a letter. She sends her best regards. Have a good day.

-Hermes, Mount Olympus.

This always pissed Erin off. Every time he got one of those he wanted to send a letter back with the most vile insults to Hermes in it. But it wouldn't do him any good.
He didn't really have much to do in his cabin. All he really had was his bed, his dresser, a wood nightstand with an old lamp, and his suit case. He also happened to have a large box of trinkets and all sorts of items from his mom stashed under the loose floorboard under his bed. He was bored. He wanted to find a way to keep himself entertained before he had to go get his mail within everyone else. He thought of experimenting with all the things he could do with his magic. He held his hand up in front of him and moved his fingers in a rhythmic motion and the gold strands of magic swirled around them with glints of gold sparks spewed out into more swirls that circled his hand as he turned it. He looked out of the right corner of his eyes and saw a on potted plant in the far corner of the room that hadn't gotten any sunlight in years. He squinted his eyes, then looked down at his hand with his magic swirling it, his palm facing toward him. He looked back at the plant and moved his arm toward it while rotating his wrist to have his palm facing down as the magic moved and swirled around more. With his hand slightly flexed up, he gestured his fingers to have his middle and ring fingers relaxed, his pinky slightly out, and his index finger up above the others. He then flexed his pointer finger and a strand of glittering magic swirled around it and came to glow on the top of his finger, some tiny sparks flashing out. With his mind having a set intention for his power, his eyes turned gold and he pointed his wrist down to the plant and a chaos bolt shot out of his finger and hit the plant. When the bolt struck, it seeped into the body of the wilting plant and shiny swirls of gold magic curled the plant with the spot the bolt struck started turning gold and the color spread outward to cover the entire plant. Within seconds the entire plant had been turned to solid gold, with tiny sparks and swirls still circling some of the wilted limbs. Staring at it, Erin then remembered a spell he'd read the day he got his mom's spell book. With his magic still swirling his hand, he faced his palm upward and he gestured his fingers to be ready to snap them. Yet again his eyes turned gold and two strands of the magic swirled around his thumb and middle finger with their tips glowing. He snapped his fingers and with a bright flash from them, the gold plant cracked with gold light and crumbled to pieces on the ground. Remembering he could do transmutation with his magic, he gestured his fingers with the middle finger curled in, the ring finger slightly so, and his pinky and index fingers pointed out yet slightly curved. His magic formed a bright light in his palm with sparks and tiny swirls coming out of it. He turned his palm downward and faced his hand to the broken crumbles of the gold plant. He pointed his wrist down to the with his index finger completely pointed and a chaos blot shot out and struck the crumbles. They light up with dozens of tiny sparks and swirls surrounding them and the crumbles' form shrunk in size and separated into tiny pieces on the ground. When the magic seeped into them, their new form was revealed to be many gold seeds. He smirked knowing what he could do with them. He lifted his other hand and used his magic to lift the floorboard under his bed and lift the lid of the large box. With his right hand he'd been using he then levitated the seeds into the air and moved them under the bed, into the open floor board, and set them to rest in the box. He let go of the floorboard and the box and heard a clank of the two. Yet again he was sat there with nothing to do. He then got an instant idea to be a little mischievous. He sat himself on his bed with his legs crossed and he centered himself and focused his mind. His eyes turned gold and he closed them. He used his magic in the field of chaos to scope out where Chiron had stashed his mom's spell book. As his mind wandered following the traces of his magic within the book throughout the mental terrain, his eyes physically wandered as they were closed. His hands had golden glows in the with tiny swirls around his fingers and the magic appeared at his temples to show the mental power being used. In his mind, he saw only a field of dark gold magic my ramped and rapid black energy running all through it and a small spark of bright glittering gold. The spark began to create an inconsistent line that formed a trail and quickly went in a specific direction. Given the familiarity he had with the camp grounds and the dirt trail that led from his cabin to the grand lodge. The trail in his mind went down the steps of his cabin and along the dirt trail. His mind followed it past the training ground and through the dining patio. It went down the main trail and came to the wood steps of the grand lodge. His mind followed it up the steps and into the back stain glass door. The trail went down the hallway and made a sharp turn to the left and went into a large room. The trail then went straight up off the flor, most likely going up the side of a desk, and went straight over the top of the desk and down into what was most likely a drawer. His mind felt the magic sink into an object. He then used his magic to focus the object into his mind's eye. The magic covered the object and a rectangular shape formed in his mind. It then revealed Greek letters etched in black with an intricate binding to their left. It was the spell book. He smirked. "Hm, there you are." He then used the magic in his hands and focused it on the spell book. With a snap of his fingers, a bright gold flash of light appeared in front of him and the spell book popped out of it and landed on his bed. He opened his eyes and let go of the spell he'd cast. He looked down at the book and smiled. He picked it up and saw the lock had been shut. "What a fool", he said to himself. He was talking about Chiron. He knew that Chiron was unaware that when he closed the book, the lock on it shut and bonded it with a magic seal only Eris or Erin could open. Erin saw that the sides of the top of the book had been slightly stretched out, likely from Chiron trying his darnedest to open it. Erin lifted his right index finger and a strand of magic swirled around it. He the pointed his finger toward the lock and a small chaos bolt shot out and entered the lock, causing it to glow and unlatch. The book then burst open with a flash of gold light and opened to the middle of its pages, gold specks and an aura coming out. With the book in his hand, he sat himself back on his bed's headboard and used his magic in his right hand and began flipping through the pages. Each page contained spells, hexes, jinxes, all kinds of old incantations, and all of it written in Ancient Greek. He kept flipping through the pages hoping to find something good. He'd already read through some of the spells and hexes, one or two jinxes, but they were nothing he hadn't seen his mom do before or tried himself. He kept flipping until he flipped to a particular page, one that when he moved the page, it had a different color magic coming out of it. The magic was a mixture of pink and red light. The pink light was dozens of little spheres that appeared like bubbles and faded away, and the red light was dozens of flowy strands that wiggled out and also faded. The page had a strange sound coming out of it. It sounded like the leftover sound of a high pitched bell without the banging of the chime accompanied with the sound of energy wiggling about. He read the words on the page as they revealed themselves in English: