Heroes of Olympus: Thirteen Years Later

Chapter 2

Leo's POV
"Man, this is coming together nicely. The engines are working, the control panels are installed, just need to finish the paint job." I whistled away.

"Dear, dinner's ready! Come eat with Leon!" Calypso shouted.

"In a minute, Sunshine!"

Leon and I headed for the dining room. On the table were roast beef, vegetables, and potato wedges. Calypso makes the best dishes.

"Yay! Yummy food!" Leon said with excitement, "Mom, the RV's almost done."

"Good! You've been such a helpful little guy, haven't you?"

"Yeah, he is...," I agreed, "how's the food prep coming along?"

"I'm almost done too."

We ate for 15 minutes, then Calypso went to put Leon in his bed. I went back to the workshop and continued working.

Piper's POV
I was at the weapon shed with Nico and Reyna. We were all making sure our weapons were in tip-top shape.

"Percy has Riptide, that's not gonna break anytime soon, we just cleaned Annabeth's dagger, my dagger, and Jason's gladius." I listed off.

"My Stygian iron sword and Will's Celestial bronze sword are all good. I've also filled 4 quivers with arrows." Nico continued.

"Leo always has something in that belt of his, my sword's cleaned, and I've prepared the extra swords for the kids or if we lose ours. Everyone brings their own armor, so the only things left were shields." Reyna noted.

"Okay, so let's go grab 'em!"

We barely just grabbed the final shield when we heard a racket outside. We looked, and saw a girl, no more than 13, furiously casting magic. Next to her was a boy of about 9, manipulating Mist. Behind them were monsters: 3 dracaeneae, a cyclops, a hellhound, and a telkhine. The girl then summoned a ring of fire and burnt the dracaeneae to a crisp. The boy created a Mist barrier. He willed Celestial bronze arrowa to rain, which vaporized a cyclops and telkhine.

However, the hellhound had shadow-traveled dangerously close to the pair. Nico instantly shadow-traveled and told it to go back to the Underworld. The hellhound obeyed, frightened by the intimidating Son of Hades. But exactly then a hoarde of dracaeneae and telkhines attacked. Reyna and I jumped into the fight.

I swung my dagger to the right, vaporizing 2 telkhines and 3 dracaeneae. Reyna stabbed 6 of them, while Nico summoned 2 skeletons to help him. A telkhine would have gotten me if it weren't for the girl's vaporizing spell. With one final spell, the boy trapped the rest in Mist and rained arrows on them. They were done, finished, gone.

"Hi, what's your name?" Nico asked, his voice impossibly tender.

"I'm Josephina, and this is my younger brother Zane."

"My name is Nico. This is Piper and Reyna.
We're demigods, and I'm guessing you are too. Children of Hecate, I'd say." Nico introduced us to them.

"Yeah! Our mom appeared in our dreams, she sent us here and taught us how to use our powers." Zane replied.

"We better get you inside Camp Half-Blood, it isn't safe out here." Reyna said.

As soon as the siblings stepped inside, Hecate officially claimed them.

"I'll go tell Chiron about this. You guys take them to their cabin," I told Nico and Reyna, "Lou Ellen SHOULD still be up."

I ran to the big house and told Chiron about the two newly claimed demigods. He smiled.

Nico's POV
"You know, Josephina, I used to have a sister who's just like you. She died valiantly as a Hunter of Artemis, 17 years ago." I told Josephina.

"Oh... poor you."

"I've learnt to live with it..." I replied, silently shedding a tear or two.

We arrived at the front door of the Hecate Cabin. Reyna yelled as loud as she could.

"LOU ELLEN!!"

"Yeah, what is the problem?", Lou's voice came from inside, "Let me guess, new Hecate camper?"

"Yup!"

The siblings walked inside. I waved them goodbye and we returned to the shed.

Suddenly the bushes near us rustled. Reyna instinctively prepared to draw her sword, and I got ready to summon in skeletons.

"BOO!" Piper jumped out of the bushes. She was laughing her head off seeing out part annoyed, part shocked faces. I tried getting angry, but I couldn't.

"Piper! Not funny." Reyna and I sputtered, trying not to laugh. I tell you, we failed miserably.

"Okay, now back to work... just kidding, let's go home," Piper yawned, "too tired to even carry a small dagger."

"I'll shadow-travel us home. Just give me some strength and don't tell Will anything."