Callie Jackson, The Redemption

Chapter IV

Noah's POV

  We gazed upon the great house on the hill. Callie was standing in between Malcolm and I, looking like she had just seen the house. I looked back at it. It was at least three stories tall, with moss growing up the sides and Greek poles holding up a porch. Malcolm was grinning.
  "Wicked." He whispered. "The architecture is amazing! It has to be from Victorian times, or maybe even before!"
  "But I-I don't understand! When I found it it was just a tiny shack! Now it's a huge home." She said.
  "Let's just go in. We need to sleep." I told them. We walked through the uncut grass, up the hill, and onto the porch. Callie walked up to the big, rounded door. She twisted the handle, then threw herself against it. She whispered an Ancient Greek curse under her breath.
  "Locked." She said, backing up. "What now?" Malcolm walked up to it.
  "Maybe there's someone inside." He said.
  "Oh, don't be ridiculous." She said, but he had already knocked. Slowly, the door creaked open.
  "Can we...?" Malcolm faded away.
  "Let's go." I said, trying to be braver than I felt. We trudged into the house, looking around.
  "It looked big on the outside..." Malcolm said. He was, as usual, right. There were only three rooms: a bathroom, the living room, and the kitchen. We walked through the the kitchen, and instantly, Callie started digging through the cabinets.
  "Nothing. Nothing in there but cobwebs." Callie grumbled, slamming a door, and causing the knob on the front to bounce onto the floor. Malcolm tensed when she talked about the cobwebs, but soon relaxed.
"Well." I told her. "The only thing in here to sleep in is a couch. You get it, water woman." I smirked at her. She pointed a finger at me, with a dead serious expression, and squirted me with water.
"No." She said, still pointing her finger at me. "Do not call me that." She then started laughing as I wiped the water from my face. We all plopped down on the couch, still laughing. She was forming figures of people and scenes with the water now, all ending with someone embarrassing themselves, it getting funnier by the second. Finally, she stopped and tried to lay down. I looked down at her.
"How are we all going to sleep on this couch?" I asked her. She took her feet out of Malcolm's lap and sat up
"I lay on you, Malcolm lays on me, you lay on the arm of the couch. Happy camping." She said, plopping her head down on my shoulder. Malcolm silently, and slowly laid down on her back. I sat my head back on the couch, careful not to move and disturb them. I soon fell asleep to Malcolm's quiet snores, and Callie wetting my shirt with a little drool. (I'm sorry I had to. This isn't like the Percabeth moment, trust me.)

  "Noah!" I heard someone shouting, and shaking me. "Noah Springfield,  get up! Now!" I wiped my eyes and looked up. Callie, with her hair falling in her face and her matted braids slinging into mine, had pulled me to my feet by the sleeve of my shirt.
  "Come on!" She yelled at me.
  "What? Huh, wha's wrong?"
  "Malcolm!" She yelled. "He's gone! Vanished!" She said, letting go of my sleeve and storming around the kitchen. "And get this, the house got bigger! Magically! Oh Noah, what if he's up there?" She whispered the last part, her voice quivering with fear, but her eyes showing confidence.
"What's so wrong about upstairs?" I asked.
"It just doesn't feel right, Springfield. Did Chiron teach you nothing? Houses don't just gain a whole floor over night." She told me.
"Well, he didn't teach us that." I muttered. "We weren't three year olds, you know." But I got back on subject. "We need to go look for him. Up there." I said, pointing at the roof.
  "Alright." She whimpered, balling her hands into fists. "Let's go." She said, more loudly and confidently. We walked over to the staircase, and, even though we both agreed to go upstairs, we stopped in front of it. It went with the Victorian theme of the house; painted white with beautiful rails lining it. As we walked side by side, the steps creaked under our light weight. As we reached the top step, we looked down the corridor. It seemed as though it went on forever, way further than the house had. And lining the walls, were solid red doors with small brass plates on them. Callie walked down the corridor slowly, running her hands over the doors.
"What in Hades are you doing?" I asked her. She held her hand up, then looked at me.
"Let's try this one." She said.
  "Why?" I asked.
  "It's the only one not vibrating. Come on." She said, gesturing me in. I opened the door and it slowly creaked. Callie and I went through the door at the same time. Literally. We didn't even have to squeeze through it. There was a bed, flowing lace curtains around a door instead on a window, and a Chester drawer. The room was also solid white. The walls, the painter drawers, the bed clothes, and now, the nightgown of the girl sitting on the twin mattress. She had long, flowing, silvery blonde hair, and watery, light blue eyes. The door suddenly slammed behind us, and the girl smiled deeply. Callie was reaching behind me, trying to twist the door handle, and slamming her weight against the door. The girl, only about 16, said through her smile and a giggle "hello children, I, am Lyssa." I turned around to start helping Callie open the door, throwing my weight against it like she did. Yet when I turned around to look at the girl, she wasn't there. In fact, the room, the door, and everything else had disappeared. All I heard was the small sound of water and of kids laughing. I walked around the trees in front of me, to see a large river, and two blond kids sitting on the back. They were throwing rocks in the quick coursing water. In the back round, I could see a small white house. The kids seemed to be about 13 and maybe 7, though I didn't know. The older one then stood up, ripped his shirt over his head, and dove into the rushing water. No. I knew what this was.
"Brent!" I screamed. "No!" I rushed into the water, pulling the laughing boy up, but he didn't move. I seemed as though I was a ghost. Suddenly, I saw him go under and rush away, his head bobbing up and down. The little boy, me, I was was screaming and crying, running after him, doing the same as an older human now.
  "No! My my brother!" I yelled, but this wasn't the end. I remember finding his body.
  "Yeah." Boomed a voice in my head, but it wasn't my own. "She was driven mad." I remembered hearing this. Nico DiAngelo was talking to Will one night, and I overheard. I was remembering the conversation willingly. "Eveline Wright gave in to Lyssa, she drove her mad. Those memories are powerful. Eventually, Eveline died. I remember her spirit. She was a total snob." His voice wavered away, and I saw my seven year old self again. I closed my eyes.
"This isn't real Lyssa." I told myself. And Lyssa. "This doesn't define or scare me. You will not overpower me." I purred. The scene flickered between the creek behind my old house and the white room. "You'll never win." I thought. Finally, after tons of comments like that, the white room was fully in picture, and Lyssa was lying on the floor, her silvery hair sprawled, her watery eyes closed. There was a white mist swirling around, filling the entire room. It looked like fog, but I knew better than that. This was a very heavy Greek  mist, and it was what Lyssa was using. I looked over at Callie. Her big, bright, sea green eyes were filled with terror, and she was on her hands, scooting back, and screaming. The mist was swirling heavily above her, and she was scooting away from it. Suddenly, she fell to the floor, passed out. "No!" I thought. I did the only thing that came to mind: I picked her up under her knees and behind her back, and started running towards the door on the other side. Stupid ADHD. I tried to open the door. Locked. Finally, I did the only thing I could think of: I slammed my body against it. It furled open, causing me to fall with Callie in my arms. I grabbed her by her shoulders and shook her.
  "Callie!" I said. "Come on!" I shook her harder. "We need to find Malcolm!" She didn't make a sound. I cupped her face in my hands.
  "Callie please wake up!" I yelled, getting scared. She stirred. "I shook her head gently in my hands. "Please, we need to go. This quest needs you." I told her. She opened her eyes slowly.
  "Oh thank the gods." I whispered, taking my hands off her face.
  "What happened?" She asked.
  "You passed out. What did you see in Lyssa's mist. What you saw last."
  "Huh?" She said.
  "Lyssa was torturing you with your own memories. There was a figure over you. Do you know how it was?" I asked her quietly.
  "Tartarus. He tried to kill me. Like in our battle. I never want to see that again Noah." She whispered, her brilliant eyes filled with tears.
  "I'm sorry. You never will. Not fighting beside me." I told her. I helped her up.
  "Look!" She said, pointing. There was a message on the door.
Convert the color of the room to a 1 digit number
"What?" I asked her. "That means what exactly?"
  "The color white to a one digit number. Uh, maybe the letters equal numbers, but what numbers?" She asked, pacing the hall.
  "They equal their place in the alphabet!" I told her. "Like, a equals one, b equals two, like that!"
"Brilliant Noah!" She said. "The room was white, so add up w, h, i, t, and e."
"I knew to do that Callie." I told her. "It equals 60. But that's not one digit." I said, wishing Malcolm was here.
"Well, if zero equals nothing, maybe it's just six?"
"Ok. That might be it. So, let's find a door that starts with six." I told her. We got up and started walking down the hall. There were hundreds of doors, starting at 39, because we had went in to 38, that went to I don't know what. We finally got to 600, and she started running her hands along the blood red wood. I tried to help her, but honestly, I didn't hear or feel anything. She finally stopped, brought her hand down the wood, and said.
"This is it." I looked at the number. 609. She grabbed my hand. On any other circumstance, I would have been embarrassed to hold Callie's hand, but I knew she didn't mean it in a romantic way. She wanted to know there was something here besides mist. Her hand was shaking, and she had her dagger held out with the other. I opened the door, took a shaky breath, and stepped in with Callie. The door, like last time, slammed behind us, but we didn't turn away. Callie kept a dead stare at the man in the middle of the room. He was wearing a flowing white toga, splotched with what seemed like blood, a bronze war helmet covered his head, and he was carrying a long, bronze spear.
"I see you've met my great-aunt." He said. "Lousy room, if you ask me. You've already lived those things." He snapped his fingers, and he traveled from the middle of the room, right into Callie's face. She narrowed her eyes, and kept her lip steady, staring dead into the bronze war helmet. I had never noticed how scary she looked when she was mad. That wasn't the same girl I met on the pier last summer.
"I terrorize you." He said smiling. He snapped his fingers again. Callie fell to her knees and screamed, grabbing her head and swinging it back and forth, like she was saying no. I fell down beside her and cupped her head in my hands, just like I had moments ago.
"Callie, it's not real! That's Deimos, he's just trying to scare you. Don't give in, please, don't give in." I whimpered the last part. I looked up at him. Deimos was standing above us smirking. His smirk fell as he looked at me. Callie was still shaking and clutching her head, but she had stopped screaming. I wrapped my arms around her.
"Would you like to join her?" He asked.
"If it keeps you from killing her." I whispered. Suddenly, the room was spinning. I struggled to keep my eyes open through the blur. I finally landed on a beach, but I noticed something different. Callie was slowly walking in front of me, her hands brought up to her mouth. I ran up to her, grabbing her shoulder.
"Hey." I said. She was choking, tears streaming down her face. I looked over at the beach. Washing out of the water were three figures. She ran to them. I tried to get in front of her, to stop her, but I had taken my form like last time. A ghost. She fell to her knees over the only girl. I recognized her. It was a soaking wet Kat, her mouth open, her eyes closed, and her hair sprawled over her shoulders. Then I noticed: she wasn't breathing. Callie clutched the dead Kat to her chest, sobbing on her. She swept a piece of hair out of Kat's face. The scene flickered. I saw Deimos laughing, but he stopped.
"How? How do you see me?" He yelled at me. I remembered: this wasn't just her fear, it was mine too. I let it go back to the scene with the crying Callie. She was now bending over Malcolm, his grey eyes wide with forever dead shock. I thought to myself.
'The river. My the old white house. Alabama. Home.
Soon, the beach was just a blur like before. I went with Callie, as we landed on our butts on the bank. The water trickled over the rocks. We sat on the bank that I had sat on with my brother for so many years, where I last talked to him, where I witnessed him jump to his death. I tried to calm my breathing. Callie smiled at me. She bent over the bank and let the water wet her fingers. She then made four figures, two Boys and two girls. Us, Malcolm, and Kat. There was one running, two chasing after it, and another sitting back, and doing what looks like laughing. Her smile faded.
"It's us. We look normal." The figures fell back into the water. "Like mortals."
"We wouldn't have met each other if we weren't demigods." I said. "I'm glad we're different." We started laughing. The river vanished, and we were bad with Deimos. The door opened on the other side, and before Deimos could say or do anything, I grabbed Callie's wrist and ran out the door.