We Both Walk Among the Dead: A Percy Jackson Fanfiction

Final Chapter

Hey guys, here it finally is: THE END!!! :P I'd like to announce that this chapter is dedicated to all my readers who have been patiently (and impatiently) waiting, and just thanks so much for your support :) Enjoy :D

            There was a tall oak tree outside my window. Up high, almost hidden by all the others, was a thick long branch. I could almost imagine the silhouette of a girl sleeping there, the reason why she wasn’t in the bed beside me.

            I blinked, and suddenly was staring at the bed. That happened often. I’d be outside, training or talking, and suddenly – I’d just wake up, staring at something, while memoires tore at my sanity and my chest felt like it was going to explode from pressure.

            The bed was dusty. The covers were smooth, unwrinkled, unused. The dappled shadows from the tree outside decorated the undisturbed bed, and as I watched the wind outside blew a single crimson red leaf into the room, landing on the bed. My throat got painfully tight when I looked at it.

            It was the colour of her hair.

            And then I was forced back in time, seeing her face everywhere, hearing her voice, her laugh, inhaling the smell of her scarlet hair, feeling her kiss, her small waist in my arms, the cold wet blood drying in her dead hand –

            “CALEB!!!”

            I blinked again, coming to. The bed was still there, untouched as ever. I felt the chasm inside me, an abyss Tartarus wasn’t even big enough to fill. The leaf taunted me, tugged by the wind to mimic movements she should have been making herself.

            My blade cut through it cleanly, ripping the cover of the bed as well. I stood breathing heavily beside it, the wind from the open window now playing with the large rips of the blanket.

            More frantic knocking came from the door. I didn’t bother sheathing my sword as I walked slowly to open it, letting the wind inside the room propel it fully open because I didn’t think I could do it myself. I wasn’t surprised at Ree’s tired face, eyes puffy like they had been for the past two weeks. I recalled dimly that Carson had mentioned, over the eternity since she’d been gone, that Ree had been crying herself to sleep at night. Sometimes the realization that she was hurting too made its way to me, and I’d feel my stomach clench because I could be helping her and wasn’t. But then I’d see a black shroud disappearing into the ground, and I’d blank out.

            “Cale?” I looked past Ree’s red eyes to see Candice’s pure green ones locked on my face. All I did was stare at her, since it was responsive enough for me.

            “You agreed to come training today,” she whispered, her voice cracking at the end. She turned her head roughly away, but not before I saw her bottom lip tremble ominously.

            We both knew that it was exactly two weeks today since she’d died. And I couldn’t bring myself to even step outside of my cabin, because I didn’t care about anything anymore.

            I moved numbly outside of the cabin, not noticing that I was still wearing the clothes I’d been wearing for the past four days. Since my last attempt out in the forest at 2 am, digging hole after hole and lining it with food from the picnic tables. But it was useless. Just as always, she never appeared, nothing happened. Ever since my father had appeared the first time, telling me gently I needed more time before I could summon her, nothing had ever happened.

            The sunshine outside hurt my eyes. I shielded them with my hand, and walked blindly along the path to the amphitheatre. I stumbled, but my friends around me made sure I didn’t fall. They knew as well as me that it had been four days since I’d stepped back outside, so I hadn’t quite accustomed to the bright fall sunshine.