Apollo's Wolves

Chapter Sixteen -- Delta

As I watched Amari leave the mess hall with that guy, Jake leaned over to me and cleared his throat. "So ... uh ... what changed?" he asked.

My gaze turned to steel as I looked at him. "What do you mean?"

"You and Amari. Everyone's wondering what happened between you two."

"It's none of your business, that's what happened!" I snapped. Jake leaned back, startled, and for the first time, I saw that my outburst had hurt him somehow. I took a deep breath and tried again, pushing past my automatic defense and choosing to answer calmly. "We talked. About our parents and our childhoods. Turns out that neither of us really had great upbringings emotionally. She had Dad, but he basically didn't exist for her. I had Mom, but she was always trying to get Amari back. She had a foster family, but they were killed by monsters when she was eleven. I had the pack, but Lyacon hated me. So we're kinda the same, me and her." I shrugged. "I guess we're more twins than we realized."

Jake smiled. "I'm glad you two could come to some kind of understanding. Does this mean ..." He stopped.

"That I don't want to kill her anymore?" I finished for him. I shrugged again. "Yeah. I guess I don't. I mean, I didn't when we were locked up together, and I easily could have."

He looked down at my left leg. "Uh, are you OK?"

I looked down, too, noticing for the first time the burn that circled my ankle. "Must've been from the silver manacle. It'll heal up in a few days."

"Here." He turned to dig around in his pack, which he'd brought to breakfast with him, and pulled out a square of ambrosia. "It'll help."

For once, I didn't argue. "Thanks." After I finished the square, I asked a little bit louder, "So, who's the guy Amari took off with?"

Annabeth smiled. "His name is Brindin, and he used to be at Camp Half-Blood. He's one of Demeter's sons. I think the story goes that one day he was tending the garden outside of the Demeter cabin, and Amari walked by. She smelled the flowers he was growing, and picked out her favorite one in the mix, the boat orchid. She stopped to compliment him, and they became friends. They started dating not long after that. All of us were kind of surprised when they broke up right before the war, right before we left for the ancient lands" – I resisted the urge to growl at that – "and he left when the treaty between the camps was formed. Amari was pretty upset, and as far as I know, they hadn't spoken to each other. Wonder why he wants to talk to her now."

Percy stood up. "Excuse me while I relieve myself. Coffee, you know?"

"Percy!" Annabeth reached up and punched his arm, and it looked like it was a pretty hard hit.

"Ow!" He rubbed the spot. "What was that for?" He glared at his girlfriend.

"You know what." She glared back. He left the mess hall quickly.

OK, what did I not get? I got up, too, feeling some emotion I wasn't familiar with. "I need to take a quick walk, excuse me." Leo chortled to himself, then sobered when he saw me looking at him. "What?"

"Nothing," he told me quickly.

"No, what?"

"You wouldn't like it. It's kinda derogatory, anyway." He looked down, seeing a tad embarrassed.

I rolled my eyes. "Out with it already!"

"You're going for a walk, right?"

"Yeah ..."

"And you're part werewolf, right?"

"Yeah ..."

"Which can be seen as a type of dog, right?"

"Leo!"

"OK, OK, OK! I was going to make a joke about you walking yourself." His face turned bright red.

I had to exercise large amounts of self-control to not fly at him and forced a strained smile onto my lips. "That's actually not bad; I'd use that as an insult if I were in a fight with another werewolf."

He seemed to relax slightly. "Thanks ... thanks for not hurting me."

"Trying to turn over a new leaf."

"Well ... I commend you!"

I left the mess hall, going in the opposite direction than I'd seen Percy go in. There were some trees nearby, so I headed for them, seeking the comfort and solitude they provided. A rustling from behind startled me, and I whirled around. Jake was there, trying to sneak up and failing. I cracked a smile. "You really don't know how to be quiet in the woods, do you?"

He shook his head. "I work in the forge all day; I don't deal with living stuff." He came over, snapping twigs underfoot and treading heavily. "What's on your mind?"

I sighed and sank down to the base of the tree I was beside. "Just thinking about Amari again."

"Delta, you're not-"

"No, I'm not contemplating killing her again!" I took a deep breath. "When Annabeth was talking about this ... this Brindin guy, I felt some kind of emotion, and I don't know what it was, so I decided to come out here and clear my head before I burst."

Jake sat down next to me. "You want to talk it out?"

I shrugged. "I'm not really used to doing that."

"Well, it's never too late to start."

I sighed again. "Well ... I felt ... some kind of longing. Like a deep, painful longing in my chest. And I felt something towards Amari ... like she has something I never have."

Jake chuckled. "Sounds like a case of jealousy to me."

My brow wrinkled. "Jealousy? Really?"

He nodded. "Happens a lot when people hear about others in relationships. A lot of Hephaestus's kids feel it when we get burned by Aphrodite kids."

"Does that happen often?"

"Apparently just because Aphrodite burns Hephaestus, her kids think they can, and should, do the same."

"That's ... that's unkind."

He smiled. "Now that's a Delta I haven't seen before."

I ducked my head. "Yeah, well, she doesn't come out very often." I redirected the conversation. "So you think I'm jealous of Amari?"

"Pretty sure you are."

I sighed a third time. "How do I get rid of it?"

"Well, either you accept it, or you find a love of your own." The last part sounded wistful. "I mean, there's tons of demigods around here."

"Yeah, and they're all afraid of me."

"I'm not." It was almost too quiet for me to hear, but I heard it.

My stomach growled right then, reminding me that my breakfast was only half-eaten. "Let's go back to the mess hall," I suggested, standing up. "My stomach's growling."

He stood up beside me. "Good idea." There was a note in his voice that sounded different, but I couldn't quite place it. We walked back toward the mess hall together.