~The Children of Fate, Wisdom, and Mischief~

Chapter 9: I Have a Secret

"What?" Was Ethan's very intelligent response to Nate's question.

"What happened, E." He asked again, moving Ethan's bangs to look at his stitches. Nate frowned and Ethan felt guilty for not being able to tell him the truth. "You were gone for three days and then come back with stitches in your head."

"I went to go see my dad and I fell down the stairs, okay?" He said, thinking up a quick lie. Nate nodded and turned back around to look at the front of the class, Ethan let out a breath that he didn't know he was holding. This was going to be a long day.

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Nate and I were standing underneath the bleachers after school. We were waiting for track practice to start and we were both anti-social. "Hey are you sure you want to run with stitches? What about the sweat?" Nate asked me.

"Yeah. I'll be fine." I responded, messing with my hair. I heard a branch fall inside the treeline, as our track field was right next to the forest.

Nate and I both looked towards the trees, my hand clenching into a fist ready for a fight, I was going to try and avoid showing Nate my true self. I saw two girls exit the forest and at first I thought it was my sisters, though soon I saw their faces.

I closed my eyes and tried to sense their aura. I cursed in my head when I realized who they were. I opened my eyes and turned to Nate, "Hey. Maybe we should go warm up."

"What if they need help? They look older than us. Maybe they're lost." he said, trying to be able to help people. It was Nate's blessing and his curse.

I looked back at the girls and realized that they were walking towards us. I looked through the bleachers and saw that our track time was still stretching a good ways away. I tried to pull Nate away but the girls finally spoke.

"Son of Persephone."

I took a deep breath and steeled my nerves. "Nate. Listen to me. Run, go get Coach Anderson. Now. Don't come back."

"Ethan... what's going on? Do you know them? They know your mom's name. Ethan-" I pushed him away from me as I turned back to the girls.

"Son of Persephone." They repeated.

"Daughters of Aphrodite." I sneered to Drew and Valentina. "What are you doing here? This is a place beyond the Gods."

"We're tasked with killing you." They said in unison.

"Well, that's not creepy at all." I said, putting up my fists, ready to fight.

The two girls rushed me but I was able to jump over them and kick Drew in the back of the knees, making her fall face first in the mud. You see, Phe and Zoë may have gotten mom's wings, but I can catch the wind and use it to jump really high, to a point where it's basically flying.

Valentina turned back to me and I threw the fist punch, she however, caught said punch. She twisted my arm and kicked my in the stomach. I went flying towards the treeline.

When my vision finally cleared I saw that I had landed in a small clearing, Drew and Valentina were standing a few feet away, my vision must have not cleared yet because it looked like there were three of them.

Wait... Nate!

I stood up on shaky legs and wiped blood out of my eye, my stitches had opened. "You can have me... leave him out of this!" I yelled over to them as Drew put a dagger to his throat and drew a little line of blood.

"Why would we believe you, Son of Persephone?" Valentina asked me, brandishing a celestial bronze sword. I looked back at Nate, who was staring at me wide-eyed. He probably saw me jump.

I looked back at Valentina and saw that she was ready for a fight.

But so was I.

I held my hand to the side and created a spear out of ice. I looked back at the boy I loved, "I'm sorry, Nate."