Chanel Hastings & The Treasures of Aphrodite Book 1: The Magic Girdle

Chapter 15: Kitty Claus Hosts Us For Christmas

OOTD: Same as before, but now with a sprinkle of snow and fur.

Makeup: Not wearing any.

Hairstyle: My signature messy bun!

Fragrance: Exhaustion. Also, the lingering smell of Axe. 

Dear Diary,

Three days.

Apparently, when the Astomoi had knocked us out at the bus station, Tharika, Mikhailo, and I had been unconscious for nearly three whole days.

We discovered this shocking information when our demigod group emerged from the storage room into the underground concourse with all our belongings. We were all starving and thought of looking for the food court, only to learn that the concourse was minutes from closing up early for Christmas Eve...which was almost three days after we'd first arrived in Philly.

No wonder we felt so weak and hungry!

Tharika collapsed on the bench of the bus stop after we got to the ground level and exited the department store. "I can't believe this," she murmured. "We really lost three whole days? It felt like we were only asleep for a few hours!"

Kamal sighed. "It was the aroma. When the Astomoi use the strongest dose of it, they can knock demigods out cold for days. That's how they capture them for the auctions."

The demigod girl from the rescue group groaned and said, "Ugh, what awful creatures! Who do they think they are?"

"Not all the Astomoi are like them," Kamal revealed. When all of us looked at him in surprise, he explained, "I've met some friendly ones on the West coast. They're usually really calm, and spend most of their time making flower crowns and cultivating their plants." He stared at his feet in shame. "That's how my previous group and I got trapped. I made the mistake of thinking all Astomoi were friendly."

I patted his shoulder. "Don't be too hard on yourself, Kamal. You found the courage to keep fighting, and you were able to save these friends and avenge your other ones. You avenged Antheia too. I'm sure she'd be proud."

He looked up at me gratefully, and the other three demigods put their arms around him. I smiled at the touching scene, and then turned to Mikhailo and Tharika.

"So now what? Do we head back to the station?"

"There's no point," Mikhailo said. "The buses don't run this late on Christmas Eve. And everything else will be booked up by people traveling home for the holidays."

"So what then? We just stay here?" I asked.

He shook his head. "With all the monsters coming after you, we'll be vulnerable if we stay in one place. We'll just have to travel by foot and camp on the road until the buses start running again on Thursday."

Fabulous. Sleeping outdoors in the chilly winter air was just what I wanted.

Accepting my fate, I turned to Kamal and the other demigods. "What about you guys?"

"I think we're gonna heading back to Camp Half-Blood," said one of the boys. "It's not a successful rescue mission until we bring the rescued home!"

"Agreed," laughed Kamal. "But first, I'd like to stop at my mom's sacred garden, the one the Astomi destroyed."

"What are you going to do there?" I asked him.

Kamal produced a large back of seeds from the stolen bag that he'd recovered from the stock room. They were labelled 'Forget-me-not's'.