Chapter 2

13 0 0
                                    

When I woke up, my first thought was, Wow, that girl is hot. No, no, no. Evil voice will be back any minute now, I've got to get out of here.

I lunged out of my chair, fuelled by adrenaline, anticipation and fear. But since I didn't know where the exit was, all I managed to do was stumble around desperately for a few seconds.

Finally, I registered all the people in the room with me.

There were two boys — one around 20, with black hair, green eyes, and he was vaguely familiar, and another around 18, Latino, who was fiddling with some sort of clockwork machine. He had a cheeky aura about him, and he seemed ultra-ADHD, which was saying something. I was pretty ADHD myself.

There was also a girl, around 19, with choppy brown hair. She was looking at me like I was a puzzle she had to figure out. She was also extremely pretty.

"Is Nico here? Because look who rose from the dead!" The ADHD guy said laughingly. But I had spotted the door, and was already halfway through it when the first guy grabbed my wrist.

I slapped his hand away. "Who are you? Where am I?" I asked the three of them harshly.

The second guy said, "Wow, she must've really been out cold. I wonder how long she had been..."

"She is right here. And I don't have time for this! Something's after me!" I growled.

The girl put her hand on the first guy's shoulder and dragged him away from me. "Look, you're safe here." 

The way she said it... I felt myself relaxing. I was safe here.

No, Lizzy! I snapped out of it. "What was that?" I crouched low, ready to fight.

The first guy finally spoke. His voice was soft, but it seemed to fill the room, as if he carried a sort of power. "You don't have to be scared. Piper's right, you're safe here. Whatever monsters were chasing you — they can't get here."

This one can. I wanted to tell them that, but the pretence of safety was too strong of a temptation. I had been running for so long. The voice hadn't talked to me yet while I'd been here... maybe it was gone for good.

"Here." The girl — Piper, what a pretty name — handed me a thermos. "Drink this — wait! Not all of it."

I drank hesitantly. It tasted like the honey cakes her mum used to bake for me when I was little. But also, as I drank, I felt my aches fade a bit, as if they had partially healed.

"What was that?" I asked. "Nectar. It's... healing. But it can be deadly in large amounts." The first boy said. At the word 'deadly', I quickly put the thermos down. They were trying to kill me!

"Tell me where I am, how I got here, and who you are. Right now." I felt trapped.

Piper cringed. "Sorry. I'm Piper, daughter of Aphrodite. This is Leo, son of Hephaestus, and Percy, son on Poseidon. Yes, the Greek gods are real. Yes, you are half god. We can go over this with Chiron when he gets back. What's your name, by the way?"

Throughout the speech, my emotions went: from desperation, to confusion, then to disbelief, to shock, then back to confusion. "My name is Lizzy." I said, still nervous.

"Wait, Piper, you forgot to ask her something," Leo finally spoke up.

Piper turned to him with irritation. "No, I think that about sums it up! What is it?"

He turned to look straight at me, and said with a straight face, "Do you want to come see a camp full of kids with weapons?"

I took an 'uhm, what—' moment to think about his offer, as Piper snorted and scolded Leo, "You don't think we should keep her here until Chiron is back?"

The Shadows Between UsWhere stories live. Discover now