𝗪𝗔𝗜𝗧 𝗙𝗢𝗥 𝗠𝗘 ━━ l. valdez

xxviii ━━ no one here's to blame (but what about your quiet treason?)

01. chapter twenty-eight

━━━━━━━━ ( 💫 ) ━━━━━━━━

WE WERE ABLE TO FIND a cave on the side of a mountain to reside in while we gathered our bearings.

jason somehow used the storm spirits and flew us all the way to colorado where we found pikes peak.

leo woke up from his gold coma pretty quickly once we arrived. he was pretty cold, shivering and what not. i gave him and blanket and he put it around the two of us unexpectedly. i was ready to protest, but his signature leo valdez grin shut me up quickly.

leo formed a campfire, turning the air sharp with smoke. firelight flickered against rock walls. outside, the wind howled. snow blew sideways.

but piper was a different story. once she was ungoldified, she was still unconscious and had really bad hypothermia.

that was probably my fault for turning her back using a freezing river behind midas's mansion.

"oh, god." piper said when she woke. "he turned me to gold!"

"you're okay now." jason leaned over and tucked a warm blanket around her.

"c-camille?" piper managed.

"here," i said. "sorry about the hypothermia and stuff... that was probably my fault. i used the river behind midas's house to turn you back."

"l-l-leo too?"

"present and un-gold-ified. i got the precious metal treatment too," he said. "but i came out of it faster. dunno why. we had to dunk you in the river to get you back completely. tried to dry you off, but... it's really, really cold."

"you've got hypothermia," jason said. "we risked as much nectar as we could. coach hedge did a little nature magic—"

"sports medicine. kind of a hobby of mine. your breath might smell like wild mushrooms and gatorade for a few days, but it'll pass. you probably won't die. probably."

"thanks," piper said weakly. "how did you beat Midas?"

jason and i told her the story, putting most of it down to luck.

the coach snorted. "they're being modest. you should've seen them. hi-yah! slice! boom with the lightning! dissolving the gold guy! whoosh with the river!"

"coach, you didn't even see it," i said. "you were outside eating the lawn."

but the satyr was just warming up. "then i came in with my club, and we dominated that room. afterward, i told them, 'cupcakes, i'm proud of you! if you guys could just work on your upper body strength—'"

"coach," said jason.

"yeah?"

"shut up, please."

"sure." the coach sat down at the fire and started chewing his cudgel.

jason put his hand on piper's forehead and checked her temperature. "leo, can you stoke the fire?"

"on it." leo summoned a baseball-sized clump of flames and lobbed it into the campfire.

"i'm never going to get used to that," i said. the heat of the fire felt nice and leo was way warmer than i was despite his dip in the river.

"says you, zombie river girl."

i scoffed and rolled my eyes.