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—LEO would have totally protested against the giant horse-man taking Savannah away from the dining pavilion ( a.k.a. away from him, his mind interjected ), but she needed to get away from the fire, and Chiron could probably explain what just happened better than he could. He'll pick a fight with a half man-half horse guy another day, though he doubted his odds in a match like that.
The boy watched them leave as Savannah was carried on the horse-man's back. She still wouldn't lift her head for the other campers to see her face, but Leo knew she was crying. He'd only seen her cry on two other occasions, both of them having been happy tears. A letter from her father saying rehab was going well, and when he, Jason, and Piper planned a miniature party for her birthday. Leo liked it when she cried like that, but not like this, never like this.
"Dude, is she okay?" Christopher asked, nudging him.
Distracted, Leo nodded. "Yeah, um — fire ... isn't really ... her thing."
His half-brother ( that was strange to think about ) scoffed. "Ironic then, isn't it? You and her?"
"What's that supposed to mean?" Leo finally turned away from where Savannah was led.
"Well, you know, she doesn't like fire — you're going to be around fire twenty four-seven in the forges. I think your relationship is kind of strange."
"Relationship?" Leo repeated quietly as Christopher walked away. But then he thought deeper into what the boy had told him. Fire and Savannah never mixed well, he knew that. She wouldn't even roast her own marshmallow that one time the Wilderness School allowed them to have a bonfire. What did that say about their relat — whatever they had?
He stared at his hands, thinking of what they could do and thinking about how many times he's held her hand. If only she knew.
—SAVANNAH really didn't belong here.
At least, that's what she was thinking the whole time Chiron mumbled to himself on the way to a big blue house — like three stories, plus attic and probably a basement big. The guy was muttering about vows and oaths, and how the gods were being very rebellious this century. Savannah couldn't understand any of it.
Once inside the house, Chiron set Savannah down on a couch and left to a different room and when he came back, he was half his size and in a wheelchair ... Savannah's only conclusion was magic.
He wouldn't look at her and it was making her incredibly nervous, more so than she already was. Savannah looked down again, thinking she'd let this man down somehow and in doing so, let down all of the campers. Her new friends. Her old friends.
