In Between Two Worlds (HP/PJO Crossover)

Chapter 23:The Truth Comes Out.

We were the first heroes to return alive to Half-Blood Hill since Luke, so of course, everybody treated us as if we'd won some reality-TV contest. According to camp tradition, we wore laurel wreaths to a big feast prepared in our honor, then led a procession down to the bonfire, where we got to burn the burial shrouds our cabins had made for us in our absence.

Annabeth's shroud was so beautiful—gray silk with embroidered owls—Percy told her it seemed a shame not to bury her in it. She punched him and told him to shut up.

My shroud was gorgeous, I was a little sad I had to burn it. It was hand-embroidered with an amazing sunset and musical notes all over it. I was also glowing a little so I figures they added a little bit of sunlight to the weaving.

Since Percy was the only child of Poseidon, the Ares cabin volunteered to make his. It looked like an old sheet with the word LOSER on it in red marker. It also had a guy with the eyes crossed out. I could tell he had fun burning it.

My cabin led the sing-along and passed out s'mores, I was surrounded by my old Hermes cabin mates, my new Apollo cabin mates, Annabeth's friends from Athena, and Grover's satyr buddies, who were admiring the brand-new searcher's license he'd received from the Council of Cloven Elders. The council had called Grover's performance on the quest "Brave to the point of indigestion. Horns-and-whiskers above anything we have seen in the past."

The only ones not in a party mood were Clarisse and her cabin mates, whose poisonous looks told me they'd never forgive Percy for disgracing their dad.

I didn't think that he would lose too much sleep about it.

Even Dionysus's welcome-home speech wasn't enough to dampen my spirits. "Yes, yes, so the little brats didn't get themselves killed and now they'll have even bigger heads. Well, huzzah for that. In other announcements, there will be no canoe races this Saturday...."

As for Sally, she had a chance at a new life. Her letter arrived a week after we got back to camp. She told us Gabe had left mysteriously—disappeared off the face of the planet. She'd reported him missing to the police, but she had a funny feeling they would never find him.

On a completely unrelated subject, she'd sold her first life-size concrete sculpture, entitled The Poker Player, to a collector, through an art gallery in Soho. She'd gotten so much money for it, she'd put a deposit down on a new apartment and made a payment on her first semester's tuition at NYU. The Soho gallery was clamoring for more of her work, which they called "a huge step forward in super-ugly neorealism."

But don't worry, she wrote. I'm done with sculpture. I've disposed of that box of tools you two left me. It's time for me to turn to writing.

At the bottom, she wrote a P.S.: Percy, I've found a good private school here in the city. I've put a deposit down to hold you a spot, in case you want to enroll for seventh grade. You could live at home. But if you want to go year-round at Half-Blood Hill, I'll understand.

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On the Fourth of July, the whole camp gathered at the beach for a fireworks display by cabin nine. Being Hephaestus's kids, they weren't going to settle for a few lame red-white-and-blue explosions. They'd anchored a barge offshore and loaded it with rockets the size of Patriot missiles. According to Annabeth, who'd seen the show before, the blasts would be sequenced so tightly they'd look like frames of animation across the sky. The finale was supposed to be a couple of hundred-foot-tall Spartan warriors who would crackle to life above the ocean, fight a battle, then explode into a million colors.

As Annabeth, Percy, and I were spreading a picnic blanket, Grover showed up to tell us good-bye. He was dressed in his usual jeans and T-shirt and sneakers, but in the last few weeks, he'd started to look older, almost high-school age. His goatee had gotten thicker. He'd put on weight. His horns had grown at least an inch, so he now had to wear his rasta cap all the time to pass as human.