Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Sally ran as fast as her feet were willing to carry her, rain and tree branches pelting her face, her crying five-year-old son in her arms. Yes, he had warned her that horrors she couldn’t even imagine would be hunting her son, but she didn’t think that they would come so soon! She’d taken Percy to New Jersey as a special trip for his birthday, just the two of them, but now she was running through a forest she didn’t even know existed, trying to keep her only child away from what looked like a woman with leathery bat wings.

“Hand over the forbidden child, mortal. It will be much less painful for you if you comply!”

The bat-woman-thing kept yelling at her. Yes, he had warned Sally that this is what her child would be; forbidden. He didn’t explain a lot of things to her, but he did explain that even amongst children like him, he would be considered an outcast. There were no others like him, Percy himself shouldn’t even exist apparently!

“We can make this so much easier if you just hand over the child, mortal!”

So focused on trying to get away, Sally tripped over a rock, landing face first in the mud but still holding on tight to little Percy, barely even registering that she had crash landed outside of what looked like a small shop. She turned around and tried to scramble to her feet, looking the bat-woman in the eye. The bat-woman sneered at her, seemingly about to go for the kill, when she paused, looking at something behind Sally with what could only be described as fear. Sally turned around. She was now face to face with yet another woman, her face covered by a large sunhat, a pleasant smile on her lips.

“Chasing down mortals now, are we, Alecto?”

The stranger spoke calmly to the bat-woman, Alecto, who was now glowering down at the ground, clearly not wanting to make eye contact with the stranger.

“Mortal woman, what might your name be?”

Sally looked up at the stranger, who was now smiling pleasantly at her.

“Sally, Sally Jackson. And my son, Percy.”

“Well Sally, why don't you follow me inside where you and your son can warm yourselves up, I’ll be back out to deal with Alecto in just a few minutes.”

Desperately wanting to get out of the freezing rain, Sally was more than eager to accept the strange woman’s offer. She followed her inside the shop, and was immediately greeted by the largest table of food that she had ever seen, laden with cakes and cookies and tarts and everything in between.

“You two just stay there. Help yourself to anything you want, I’ll be back in just a moment.”

The strange woman stayed true to her word, and returned in just a couple of minutes, taking a seat across from Sally and Percy, the latter of whom had stopped crying and was now smearing a chocolate cupcake across his face.

“Well, now that that’s all sorted out, I must ask, what’s a young mortal woman and her half-blood son doing in the middle of the woods in this sort of weather?”

Sally froze.

“How did you-?”

“How did I know that he was a demigod? My dear, it was obvious for me. I could smell him from a mile away!”

Sally’s breath became shaky as she made to flee again with her son at the nearest opportunity.

“Oh no, my dear Sally, you’re mistaken. I have no intention to hurt you or your son. Quite the contrary. I only wish to help. That monster back there, Alecto, she was a fury. Quite horrible things honestly. I can help you protect young Percy from other monsters like her”

The mortal relaxed slightly, but only slightly.

“Who- who are you?”

The strange woman smiled.

“My name’s Medusa. It’s a pleasure to make your acquaintance, Sally Jackson.”

Chapter Text

Two years later

Luke tentatively opened the shop door, causing a small bell to chime.

“Hold on, I’ll be with you in a minute.”

As a demigod, yes, Luke knew that it probably wasn’t the brightest idea to just waltz into some random statue store in the middle of a forest in New Jersey, but he didn’t really have a choice until he could find a way to regroup with Annabeth, Thalia and Grover. The half-blood moved over towards the counter, trying not to collapse due to his injuries, where he was eventually greeted by a young mortal woman… and a seven year old boy?

“Hello there, how can I… oh gods, what happened to you?”

Before Luke could answer, the woman had asked her son to fetch some cookies from the kitchen whilst she rummaged underneath the counter for first aid supplies. Before he left, the boy turned back and grinned cheekily at Luke.

“I’ll bring a whole plate through. You’ll love them, Momma makes them blue.”

Why on earth the cookies would be blue, Luke had no idea, but he just sat down in an empty chair as the woman walked over to him with bandages and…

“Is this ambrosia?”

“Mhmm.”

“But you’re mortal?”

“That’s right.”

“So how-?”

The woman laughed slightly.

“I can see through the mist, it also means that if I focus, I can tell the difference between regular mortals, like myself, and half-bloods, like you.”

Luke nodded, taking a bite out of the ambrosia square, almost instantly feeling that familiar  wave of relief rush over his wounds.

“And your son?”

“Oh, he’s a demigod too. Em’s kept us safe here for a couple of years now.”

As if on cue, the small boy wandered back into the room, carefully holding a plate of giant, blue, chocolate chip cookies with both of his hands.

“Here you go mister!”

The boy held out the plate to Luke, that cheeky grin still plastered all over his face. Luke took one off of the plate, took a bite and… gods.

“Damn, that’s a good cookie Mrs…?”

“Jackson. Sally Jackson. And this is my son, Percy.”

Somehow, Percy’s grin grew even wider.

“Momma’s blue cookies are the best in the world! I’ve never met anyone who doesn’t like them!”

Sally laughed again.

“Thank you Percy, now could you go and fetch Auntie ‘Em and let her know we’ve got a guest?”

Percy nodded enthusiastically before making his way back into the kitchen, and Luke turned towards Sally.

“Thank you, Mrs Jackson, truly, but I really can’t stay long.”

“Oh, and why’s that, may I ask?”

Luke began to fidget with the cookie and ambrosia square in his hands.

“I kind of got separated from some of my friends, we were being chased by a monster and got split up. I really need to find them, especially since one of them, Annabeth, she’s only seven, so around the same age as your son, I suppose, she can barely wield the knife I leant her, I just, I need to find them so that we can get to camp. At least that’s what Grover says.”

Despite her smile, Sally looked at Luke with sadness in her eyes.

“Yes, Percy’s father told me about this camp a good few years ago. It’s a safe haven for half-bloods, am I correct?”

“Yes, but, wait. If you knew about it, why haven’t you sent Percy there? Why hide in a shop in the woods? He surely can’t be safe here?”

Sally looked down at the floor and began playing with the cuffs of her blouse.

“I fear that even at camp half blood, Percy won’t be safe.”

“Why’s that, Mrs Jackson?”

“Because,”

Another woman, this time in a knee-length white dress with a giant, veiled sun hat covering her face, entered, carrying little Percy on her shoulders.

“As the son of the sea god, Percy here is a forbidden demigod.”

Luke was confused.

“A what? And did you just say that Poseidon’s his father?”

Sally and the woman nodded.

“Not too long after the second world war, Hades, Poseidon and Zeus came to the conclusion that their children were too powerful to be created anymore. So the three of them swore on the Styx never to reproduce again. As I’m sure you know, young demigod, it’s a death sentence to break an oath made on the river Styx, but since god’s cannot die, their children must suffer the consequences by being hunted down by monsters for the rest of their lives. Unfortunately, that will be the fate that befalls Percy if he ever leaves here. It’s actually how he and Sally wound up on my doorstep around two years ago, they were being chased through this very forest by the fury, Alecto.”

Luke wasn’t really listening to that last part though. He was more focused on something else which he had only just remembered.

“Thalia!”

Percy, Sally and the other woman looked rather surprised at his outburst.

“Who?”

“My friend, Thalia Grace. She’s one of the ones I got separated from; her, Annabeth Chase and Grover Underwood. She’s the daughter of Zeus. That must be why there’s been so many monsters chasing after us! If what you’re saying is true then I need to go find her. And you know, now that I think about it, Grover was panicking a lot after she got, what’s the word? Claimed.”

Sally and the other woman shared an extremely concerned look.

“What’s your name, boy?”

“Luke. Luke Castellan. Son of Hermes”

“Well Luke, my name’s Medusa. Feel free to stay here as long as you need until we find your friends.”

Before Luke had time to react, (gods he felt stupid. Auntie ‘Em. Auntie M. Medusa. How did he not see it before?) The front door of the shop burst open, and they were all face to face with Grover Underwood, Annabeth Chase, who had to hold her knife with two hands, and Thalia Grace, spear and Shield at the ready.

Just Great. 

Luke thought. 

This is exactly the sort of situation we needed to get ourselves into.

Chapter Text

As soon as she saw him, Annabeth moved as if to run straight towards Luke.

“Luke!”

“Annabeth, don’t!”

Luke’s hand flew out in a gesture for the little girl to stop in her tracks.

“Be careful. It’s Medusa.”

Annabeth gasped and nodded in understanding, shrinking back behind Thalia, who in turn moved in front of their youngest counterpart, whilst Grover was quite interested in staring down at the floor. Meanwhile, Percy and Sally became quite confused and frankly a little bit scared.

“Uhh, Em, should we..?”

Sally trailed off, taking her son off of the gorgon’s shoulders and into her own arms.

“Oh no, Sally. It’s quite alright. This is just a typical reaction from young demigods when they find out who I am.”

She turned back to Thalia, Annabeth and Grover, who were all determined not to make eye contact with Medusa.

“Children, why don’t you come inside? As you can see here, your friend Luke is quite unharmed. And if you need further proof, Sally and Percy have been living under my roof for around two years now. And unless I’m mistaken, they don’t seem to be statues. Please, children. I’m only trying to help.”

The three standing outside the doorway all looked at each other, seemingly having a silent discussion, before Thalia looked up, still not quite looking directly at where Medusa’s eyes would be.

“Okay, we’re going to trust you. But if you try anything at all,”

Thalia raised her spear threateningly to get her point across, while Medusa just chuckled.

“I expected nothing less. Now, come inside and have one of Sally’s cookies. As I’m sure Mr Castellan can confirm, they’re quite something. He’s just been telling us about you three.”

“You told her about us?”

Thalia whisper-shouted over to Luke, to which he replied:

“I didn’t know she was Medusa at the time!”

Sally moved to pull up a few extra chairs, but Medusa shook her head.

“Don’t worry about it, Sally dear. Why don’t we all move through to the dining room? It'll be much less cramped there.”

Sally nodded, shifting her son onto her shoulders and gesturing for the children to follow her. Noticing that Luke was struggling to stand slightly, since the ambrosia still hadn’t taken effect, Grover and Thalia each slung one of his arms over their shoulders to share the weight, and Annabeth curiously walked in front of them. The four of them stopped in their tracks, however, when they were met with possibly the largest spread of baked goods they had ever seen in their lives. For some reason, an awful lot of it was a vibrant shade of blue.

“Please, sit.”

Sally smiled at the demigods, offering them a plate of blue chocolate chip cookies. Grover immediately snatched one off of the plate, repeatedly speaking his gratitudes towards Sally, and Thalia and Annabeth looked at him incredulously.

“You can’t really blame him,”

Luke mumbled, helping himself to another cookie.

“They’re really good cookies.”

Thalia sighed and shook her head, turning to the women at the opposite end of the table.

“So, how much did Big Mouth here tell you?”

“Big Mouth? Really? Don’t you think that’s a little insulting?”

“Shut up, Big Mouth.”

Medusa looked up towards the ceiling thoughtfully.

“Well he mentioned that he got separated from you three after being chased down by a monster and that he really needed to get back to you. He was especially worried about the little one, Annabeth, I think he said your name was.”

She smiled down at the child of Athena, who was apparently not having any of it whatsoever. Her silver-grey eyes wide and her mouth agape, clearly offended by the insult that she had just faced.

“I’m not little, I’m a whole seven years old! Besides, if I was little, I wouldn’t have been able to run away from home, would I?”

Sally looked from Annabeth to Luke to Thalia and back to Annabeth, a clear look of concern for the little girl plastered all over her face.

“Ran away? What about your mortal parents? Surely they’re worried about you?”

Annabeth scoffed.

“They don’t care. My step-mom and step-brothers hate me, and my dad’s too busy to even notice I’m there! They probably don’t even know I’m gone.”

Sally leaned back in her seat, massaging her temples.

“And you three,”

She pointed to Thalia, Luke and Grover.

“I don’t suppose I want to know what’s going on with your mortal side.”

Two of the three of them laughed.

“She’s an alcoholic.”

“Went insane.”

“Dead probably. Also they're not mortals. I'm a satyr.”

Medusa and Percy both looked at Sally with growing concern, as Thalia quite abruptly stood up.

“Look, I’m still really confused as to why you haven’t tried to kill us yet, but I’m not taking any more chances. We need to leave and get to camp, right Grover?”

“Wha?”

Grover mumbled through a mouthful of strawberry tart.

“Well, if you must.”

Medusa smiled at the small group of half-bloods. If they could see her eyes, they would see an air of warmth and compassion about them.

“But I will warn you, as I have warned Mr Castellan, the path ahead of you will only grow more dangerous. Especially for you, Miss Grace.”

Thalia raised an eyebrow.

“And why might that be?”

“Because of who your father is. It’s Zeus, is it not? King of the gods, lord of the sky and god of lightning.”

The girl bit the inside of her cheek to keep from screaming at Luke.

“Did you seriously tell her who my dad is?”

“Again, I didn’t know that she was Medusa at the time. Also, she and Sally were explaining to me that Percy over there is a Poseidon kid, and apparently you guys aren’t supposed to exist, because of some stupid oath your dads and Hades made decades ago. It kinda just came out.”

Thalia froze.

“What oath? What do you mean I’m not supposed to exist? Grover? Did you know about this?”

The satyr smiled sheepishly.

“I tried to tell you.”

“Oh gods, so- so what does this mean? Am I gonna die or something?”

Sally walked over to the young demigod and placed a comforting hand on her shoulder.

“You’re going to be fine, Thalia. It just means that there’s going to be a lot more monsters coming after you. I was only able to keep Percy safe because Medusa saved us from Alecto the Fury and took us in.”

Annabeth cocked her head to the side.

“Wait, Medusa’s been hiding a forbidden child here?”

The gorgon laughed.

“Well I’d hardly call it hiding, Miss Chase. He’s just been under my protection.”

“Doesn’t matter. But, if Percy’s been here for two years, then that means he’s been completely out of harm's way from monsters full stop!”

The daughter of Athena turned to face her companions, eyes wide, and with a huge grin on her face.

“Guys, what if we just stayed here?”

Chapter Text

“Annabeth, what?”

Grover, Thalia and Luke were all staring at the seven year old girl with identical looks of disbelief.

“What if we just-”

“Yeah, we heard you the first time. But what in Zeus’s name gave you the idea that staying here would be better than staying in camp?”

Annabeth was now standing on her seat, bouncing up and down excitedly.

“Just think about it! We already know how to fight a little bit so the camp instructors won’t need to train us as much, we could probably even train Percy a bit if his Mom lets us,”

No one noticed it at the time, but Percy’s eyes immediately lit up at the sound of being able to fight with a sword.

“And no more monsters will be able to attack us, since they’re all afraid of Medusa apparently! If we have to leave, we’re only going to get attacked more often, and one of us might even die.”

Thalia, Luke and Grover all sighed, looking at each other in that ‘silent discussion’ way again.

“Alright, how about this, Annabeth.”

Luke looked from Annabeth to Medusa and Sally.

“If Medusa and Mrs Jackson are alright with it, we can maybe trial this for a week or so, and if we like it here, we can stay.”

He looked at the two women opposite him, silently asking if Annabeth’s request was okay in their books.

“Well, if Em’s alright with it, I think it would be quite lovely if you four stayed here, even if it’s just for a little while. Besides, I think Percy might appreciate the company.”

Percy’s smile widened even more at the prospect of having a few friends around, and Medusa chuckled lightly.

“I don’t mind in the slightest. In fact I’d be more than glad to have a few more children around the place. If you want I can set up a few sleeping bags in Percy’s room until you decide if you want to stay or leave.”

“Wait, so, are they staying here? With us?”

Percy questioned from his mother’s lap.

“For now, Percy. It might not be for a very long time.”

Percy didn’t care. He was still ecstatic that there were going to be more people around the place.

“Yay! And we can maybe get more people like me to live here too, and they can all help out with the shop and the bakery, and we’ll never have to worry about dying because Auntie Em’s gonna turn all the bad guys into stone, and I’m gonna get a sword, and I can fight all the bad guys as well, and then-”

“Percy,”

Sally smiled down at her son, who was speaking so fast that he’d actually forgotten to breathe.

“You’re doing it again. Remember what we spoke about, slow down, take a breath, it’s like we said. This arrangement is only temporary until Luke, Annabeth, Thalia and Grover decide they want to get to their camp, okay?”

“Okay!”

:::::::::::::::::

The group had been staying with the Jacksons and Medusa for almost a week now, and during the last few nights of their stay, Annabeth found herself getting very little sleep. Tonight was one of those nights, where she lay in her sleeping bag on the floor of her new friend’s room, staring at the ceiling, vaguely registering Grover’s snores. She’d known for a while that her mother was Athena, who had also happened to be the one to turn Medusa into a gorgon, so wanting to continue living under said gorgon’s roof should be an idea entirely rejected by Annabeth’s mind, but for some reason, it wasn’t. Logically, it made perfect sense, considering that the son of Poseidon had been living here for years. From what Sally and Medusa had said, monsters were usually too afraid to even come near here, and the ones that did quickly learned why they shouldn’t. But despite how much it made sense for them to stay, Annabeth could tell how much her friends were wanting to get to this camp that Grover kept going on about. Well, it was mostly Grover. Luke and Thalia seemed pretty indifferent. So that was why, when they would decide if they were wanting to stay or leave, Annabeth was going to stay. No matter what the rest of her friends thought. Besides, even though she’d argued with Medusa and Sally many times about how she wasn’t little, she had a sneaking suspicion that she was just holding up the rest of the group, just because she was the youngest. She got tired and hungry more quickly, she couldn’t run very fast, and she could barely hold the knife that Luke had given her, even with both hands. She knew that she was probably just a hindrance, so if her friends wanted to go to camp when she was wanting to stay here, she wasn’t going to stop them. Besides, she’s become really close with Percy, and his mother wasn’t exactly keen on letting him leave just yet, so Annabeth knew that he’d probably need a friend that wasn’t a gorgon or his mother. She’d tell everyone about her decision in the morning, but for now, she was going to try and get to sleep.

:::::::::::::::::

“Everyone, I have something I want to say.”

It was breakfast the next day, and all eyes were on Annabeth as she suddenly stood up on her chair, facing Luke, Thalia and Grover.

“I’ve decided that I want to stay here instead of going to camp, and if you want to keep going, then I’m not coming with you. I’m staying here. With Sally and Medusa and Percy.”

The two older demigods and the satyr all looked at each other, Thalia smirking, and very much not trying to hide it.

“So, who’s gonna tell her?”

Annabeth looked confused.

“Tell me what?”

She demanded, looking around the dining room, still standing on her chair, when Sally spoke up.

“Annabeth, dear, I’m afraid that a decision has already been made.”

“What?”

The daughter of Athena looked slightly affronted that she hadn’t been included in any of the discussions.

“Yes, Annabeth.”

Said Medusa.

“Your friends have already decided what they want to do, but I think I’ll just let you tell you themselves.”

Luke turned to the seven year old, clasping her small hand between both of his.

“Annabeth, like Medusa and Sally have said, we did have a few discussions, and the decision we made was largely based on how eager you were to stay here, and the fact that Thalia would probably be safe here, but also that Grover needs to get someone to camp to get his searcher’s licence,”

Of course. The searcher’s licence. Grover needed one of those to be able to carry out the dream of most satyrs, and try to seek out Pan, the god of the wild who had been missing for millenia. Annabeth had completely forgotten about that.

“So,”

Luke continued.

“We think we’ve been able to come to a compromise.”

Annabeth’s silver eyes immediately lit up, a smile beginning to form on her lips.

“You and Thalia can stay here for as long as you want, if it turns out that you want to come to camp in the future then that’s fine too, and I’ll go with Grover to camp so that he can get his licence, but I can still stay here for most of the year. Apparently most campers only stay for the summer, so I can try and make that arrangement for myself, and Grover can maybe come and visit if he passes by in his travels. Does that sound okay?”

Annabeth’s smile was now wider than Percy’s normally was, which was really saying something.

“OH MY GODS YES THANKYOUTHANKYOU THANKYOU!”

Chapter Text

The next day, Grover and Luke left Medusa’s for camp half blood. And despite what she had previously said about wanting to stay with Medusa, Percy and Sally Annabeth found herself missing them quite considerably.

“They won’t be gone long,”

Thalia assured her.

“There’s only a few weeks left in the summer break, so Luke should be back soon, and Grover promised that he’d stop by whenever he could.”

That did make Annabeth feel a little bit better, but she knew that her friends not being there would take some getting used to, even if it was only for two or three weeks. She began fidgeting with her hands and playing with her hair, which she always did when she was feeling upset or nervous. It was something Thalia had picked up on when she first met Annabeth, so she was quick to tell Sally and Medusa about it, so when she was the little girl fidgeting with her hair, Medusa was struck with an idea.

“You know, Annabeth,”

The gorgon crouched down to Annabeth’s level, taking the girl’s hands into her own so that she didn’t accidentally rip her hair out.

“Thalia and Luke have told me that you have an interest in architecture,”

Annabeth’s eyes immediately lit up.

“And something that Sally and I have come to realise, is that Percy’s room is getting a little bit crowded with all of you staying in there, so how would you feel about potentially designing an extension for my shop? Almost like a hotel for you, your friends, or even other demigods, if you will.”

Annabeth immediately began squealing and jumping around before she dashed off to go find the notebook and glitter gel pens that Luke had ‘bought’ for her a few weeks prior, whilst Thalia smiled up at Medusa.

“Good luck. She’ll have about eight different ideas fully formed by the next day, and each of them are probably going to have a half hour long presentation with cue cards and everything.”

“Oh I think I can handle that,”

Medusa laughed.

“You’ve never heard Percy’s ramblings about how sunfish are some of the largest fish in the world, or how male seahorses are the ones who give birth instead of the females.”

“Oh if that’s the case then they’re either going to be best friends or absolute worst enemies.”

The two of them smiled fondly, before Medusa spoke up again.

“You must really care about that little girl then.”

“Of course I do,”

Thalia subconsciously cracked her knuckles.

“She’s like a little sister to me. It’s honestly been really nice to have someone to take care of like that. I’ve been missing that feeling ever since…”

Thalia trailed off, her fond smile turning into one of sadness.

“Ever since what, Thalia?”

Medusa questioned.

“No, no. It’s nothing.”

“Here, take a seat, I’m here if you need to talk.”

The gorgon took Thalia’s hands into her own, just like she’d done with Annabeth just a few moments prior. The daughter of Zeus squeezed her eyes shut and took a deep breath in, before slowly exhaling.

“When I was around nine years old, my little brother, Jason, went missing. He was only two years old, and it wasn’t like my mother was any help. She just kept going on and on about wolves and how it was our father’s wishes, which makes no sense because as far as I’m concerned we never even had the same father.”

There was a moment of silence, lasting around seven seconds.

“Oh, Thalia, Dear. That’s awful, to have lost someone close to you, a younger sibling no less, and at such a young age.”

“No don’t- don’t worry about it, Em.”

Thalia was looking down at her lap, her smile completely faded now.

“I know it’s stupid, but I still have this feeling that Jason’s out there somewhere. But, in the meantime, I have Annabeth. In some ways, she reminds me of him. Same hair, same attitude, they’d probably even be  around the same age, now that I think about it.”

Before Medusa could say anything in response, they were interrupted by a hyper Annabeth, racing back down the stairs.

“I have so many ideas! Where’s Sally and Percy? I want to show them too!”

Most of the rest of the morning, as well as a little bit into the afternoon, was spent listening to Annabeth rant about her ideas for a hotel-extention-thing that could be added to the shop, whilst devouring brownies with blue chocolate chips. 

Thalia had been wrong. In less than half an hour, Annabeth had managed to produce twelve different prompts and colourful, sparkly sketches, all of them labelled and colour coded of course, and managed to talk about them non stop for the next three hours.

:::::::::::::::::

“Luke, is it weird that I’m already missing the girls?”

Grover and Luke had been travelling through New Jersey for around two hours now, trying to find a bus or a train that could take them to New York City. Already, they’d seen a significant drop in the amount of monsters chasing after them, which was most likely due to thalia’s absence.

“No, I don’t think so. It does feel strange without them here, doesn’t it?”

“Yeah, it does.”

They walked in silence for a little while longer, before Grover blurted out something that had been on his mind for the past week or so.

“Do you have a crush on Thalia?”

“Dude, WHAT?!”

Despite the tone of denial in Luke’s response, Grover still managed to notice his friend’s face turning slightly red.

“Holy Hera you do! Don’t you? You have a thing for Thalia!”

Grover’s jaw dropped slightly, even though he’d suspected it, he never thought that Luke properly fancied their friend.

“I- I mean, she’s just really cool, and badass, and her eyes are kind of pretty, and-”

“Dude, stop.”

“What?!”

“I mean, Thalia, I know that she’s cool and all but, really? Thalia? Of all people, you chose the punky short tempered girl with a pokey stick.”

“Hey, don’t talk about her spear that way! And it seems to me that you just don’t appreciate badass women with spiky hair and leather jackets… with Green Day merch as well.”

“Since when have you ever listened to Green Day?”

“I’m actually surprised you know who Green Day are! Don’t you like, exclusively listen to Hillary Duff and Mozart.”

“I listen to other people as well! They’re just the only things I can play on the pan pipes! And you know what? Just because of that I’m gonna try and learn Green Day on the pan pipes.”

“Really?”

“Uh huh.”

“Alright then, name three of their songs.”

“Erm, American idiot… basket case, and… uhh…”

“Exactly.”

“Alright then, if you’re so sure, then you name three songs. And they can’t include the one’s I’ve already said.”

“Uhh…”

“That’s what I thought.”

“Oh, shut up.”

“Imagine how thalia feels knowing you can’t name three songs from one of her favourite bands.”

“I SAID SHUT UP, GROVER!”

Chapter Text

A year later

“This is ridiculous!”

Athena slammed her hands down, her silver-grey eyes glowing with sheer fury.

“Not only are there two forbidden children currently alive and breathing, but they’re being ‘cared for’ by a monster! Medusa, no less!”

Ever since Hermes had discovered that the gorgon Medusa had taken in a mortal woman and three demigod children, two of them being forbidden, mount Olympus had been in uproar, trying to decide what should happen. A meeting had been orchestrated between all twelve of the Olympians, and given the circumstances, Hades, to ensure that he was at least still keeping up his end of the deal.

“I mean, are we really surprised?”

Ares asked, slouching back in his throne.

“It was only really a matter of time before Zeus decided he couldn’t keep it in his pants any longer, Poseidon though, I wasn’t really expecting you to break the vow.”

The sea god’s eyes flashed, clearly showing his displeasure, both at what Ares had just said to him, and that his young son was staying with possibly the one woman who resented him the most.

“And anyway, Athena, I’dve thought that you’d be more concerned about your little brat, staying with Snake face.”

Athena glowered.

“Trust me, Ares, I’m not going to be forgetting about that in a hurry.”

Demeter raised a hand, not waiting for permission before asking her question.

“But isn’t there also the matter of the great prophecy? That could involve one of those children. Wouldn’t it be safer just to leave them be and see what happens?”

The gods all began to argue, shouting, interrupting and speaking over each other, until Artemis spoke up.

“Look, my hunters are heading up north to camp as we speak, and occasionally they’ll stop by at Medusa’s whilst they’re in New Jersey,”

“You let your girls stay with Medusa?”

Apollo looked at his sister incredulously, but none of the other gods were all that surprised. Among her titles as goddess of the moon, the hunt, archery, and maidenhood, Artemis also served as a patron and protector of women who were survivors, so naturally she and her hunters would want to protect a woman like Medusa, even if she was a monster, given her history.

“Yes, Apollo, anyway, as I was saying, my hunters occasionally stop by Medusa’s, and at the rate they’re travelling now they’ll probably arrive there in two weeks. I can go with them and check in on the forbidden children, and confirm whether or not they might be of any real danger to us.”

There were several murmurs and nods of agreement.

“Very well,”

Zeus thundered.

“Artemis, you go with your hunters to New Jersey and check in on this situation, and report your findings back to us when you can.”

“Thank you, Father.”

The meeting seemed to be concluded, but despite all that had been said, not much of it had been acknowledged by Hades. All he heard was that there was not only somewhere for forbidden children to remain safe, but to also be able to grow up and live a normal life without being persecuted. Bianca and Nico couldn’t stay in the Lotus Casino forever, they’d already been stuck in that time warp for around sixty years. It was time that they had the chance to live their lives and be able to grow up. It was time for them to be around other demigods like them.

:::::::::::::::::

Luke had been back at Medusa’s for around a week now, and Percy and Annabeth, as always, had been very eager to hear about what he’d gotten up to at camp, though they’d been a little downhearted when they found out that Grover was travelling too far south to be able to visit them any time soon. Annabeth was also particularly excited, since the extension-hotel-building-thing that she’d designed was finally finished, and she and Thalia had already gone about customising their rooms, whilst also showing Luke to his room: a completely blank canvas for him to decorate as he wished. A nice change from the bustle and clutter of the Hermes cabin. He couldn’t do much with it at the moment though, as the paint he had just put on the walls was still drying, and he was far too impatient to try and wait for it to dry. Instead, he wandered over to Thalia’s room, knocked on the door, and didn’t bother to wait for a reply before entering. Inside, Annabeth was helping put up My Chemical Romance and Foo Fighters posters, there were already ones up for Green Day and Linkin Park, whilst Thalia was sitting on the end of her bed, showing Percy her CDs.

“So these ones are by a band called Guns’n’Roses, you’ll probably know their song ‘sweet child ‘o mine’, and then this one is Linkin Park, and these ones are-”

“Led Zeppelin!”

Percy exclaimed.

“Yeah, I love them! The first one I ever listened to was ‘Stairway to Heaven’! Or was it the Immigrant song?”

Luke coughed to let the other’s know that he was in the room, and everyone’s heads turned to him, all except Annabeth, who was trying to get the MCR poster stuck up.

“Why won’t it just stay straight?! Why is it going all crooked?”

“It’s fine, just leave it Annabeth!”

Thalia called over.

“I like them crooked anyway. It adds character.”

She turned back to Luke.

“What do you want anyway?”

“I dunno. I’m bored. My walls are taking forever to dry.”

“And that’s my problem, how?”

Luke shrugged.

“I was gonna see if you guys wanted to go steal a few snacks from the kitchen.”

Percy’s head immediately snapped towards Luke, his eyes almost popping out of his head, his smile so wide that it looked like it was starting to hurt his face. Annabeth and Thalia both looked at each other and shrugged.

“Yeah, I could eat.”

The four of them made their way back into the kitchen, Percy acting as though he’d already eaten an entire box of blue cookies for breakfast, making Luke and Thalia question whether or not he should be eating any more sugar. When they entered the room, Medusa and Sally were already there, Sally popping a loaf of bread in the oven, Medusa piping multicoloured icing onto an array of cupcakes.

“Oh, hi guys!”

Sally turned towards the children just as she was closing the oven door.

“You hungry? I’ve just tried a new raspberry macaron recipe and I need taste testers. And before you ask, Percy, yes they are blue.”

Percy and Annabeth both snickered whilst Thalia took a macaron from the plate that Sally had offered to them.

“Wow, Mrs Jackson. You’ve outdone yourself again.”

“Yeah, seriously. These are incredible.”

Before Sally could thank the young demigods, there was a sharp knock at the front door, and the mortal woman and the gorgon exchanged a look.

“‘Em, we aren’t expecting anyone, are we?”

Medusa shook her head.

“Not that I know of. I’ll go have a look. You all stay here and help yourself to anything you like.”

She walked out into the main lobby for the shop, before peeking her head back in to say

“Don’t only eat sweets though. You’ll make yourselves sick.”

Percy clearly chose not to listen to Medusa’s advice, as he immediately began to indulge in his mother’s macarons. Annabeth, Luke and Thalia, on the other hand, tried to eavesdrop on the conversation happening outside. It was difficult to make out, but they did hear a series of words that they couldn’t quite string together.

“..Hades..” “..Gods..” “..Forbidden..” “..Lotus..” “..I see..” “..fortnight..” “..Hunters..” “..Artemis..” “..Check in..” “..Stay..” “..yes, of course..”

As soon as they heard the front door shut, the trio immediately went to join Percy in his sugar feast, which they were absolutely going to regret letting him have in a few hours. A few moments later, Medusa reentered the kitchen, followed by… two children? A boy and a girl, the girl looked to be the oldest, standing at around seven years old, whereas the boy seemed to be around five. When he saw the amount of people in the room, the little boy shrunk behind the girl, who was presumably his sister.

“Everyone,”

Medusa clapped her hands together to get everyone’s attention, not that she didn’t already have it.

“This is Nico, and this is Bianca. They’re going to be staying here with us for some time.”

Chapter Text

To say that Percy was ecstatic would be an understatement. The moment he was told that he would have two new friends, he quite literally bounced off of the walls with excitement, though that may partly have been due to the fact that he was already a very hyperactive eight year old with ADHD who had just consumed a metric fuck ton of sugar.

“Ohmygodhi!Myname’sPercymyfavouritecolour’sblueIlovecookiesandfishandmydad’sPoseid-onsoIcandoreallycoolstuffwithwaterand-”

Little Nico seemed to be very overwhelmed by Percy, as he crept further behind his sister, something which Sally noticed.

“Uhm, Annabeth, why don’t you, Luke and Thalia get Nico and Bianca settled whilst I try and calm Percy down. I’ll be through with some food in just a moment.”

Annabeth nodded, smiling at Bianca and holding out a hand for her to take. Bianca smiled back and turned to her brother.

“Come on, Neeks. These guys seem really nice.”

Nico nodded and followed the group, still clutching onto his sister’s arm. When the five kids left the kitchen, they all heard Medusa say something along the lines of:

“I thought I told them not to eat only sugar.”

Annabeth led the siblings through the hallway and into her own room; a space the same size as Thalia’s, with light grey walls, a large bookshelf filled with dyslexia friendly books and reading aids, and a wooden desk covered in drawings of building designs which, much like her design of the extension, were all colour coded and annotated. Once everyone was inside the room, Annabeth pulled out the chair from her desk and sat down, whilst Bianca and Nico sat down on her bed, Thalia plonked herself down on the floor, and Luke leaned against the wall. Annabeth smiled over at the two siblings.

“Bianca and Nico, was it?”

They nodded.

“Yeah.”

“Cool! I’m Annabeth! Nice to meet you! That’s Thalia, that’s Luke, and the boy who’s over in the kitchen is Percy.”

Bianca smiled softly in acknowledgement, and Nico slowly raised his hand.

“Uhm, Percy said that his dad was Poseidon. Did he actually mean it?”

Luke, Thalia and Annabeth all nodded.

“Yeah, little dude. Percy’s the son of Poseidon. We’re all kids of other gods as well.”

Thalia explained.

“My dad’s Zeus, Annabeth’s mom is Athena, and Luke’s old man is Hermes.”

In an instant, Nico’s nerves and shy demeanour evaporated.

“No way! So you’re all actual demigods! That’s so cool! So do you guys have cool powers and stuff? Do you know how to fight monsters? Do you- oh my god! Is that a knife? But you only look a year older than Bi’! And you know how to use a knife?”

“You’ll have to excuse Nico.”
Bianca put a hand on her brother’s shoulder to quiet him down.

“He’s always had an interest in Greek and Roman mythology. I think at the moment his favourite god is Hades, you know, the god of death?”

“God of the dead.”

Nico answered before any of the others could.

“The god of death was Thanatos.”

Bianca looked at the others, gesturing at her younger brother, in a ‘you see what I mean?’ kind of way. At the same time, Annabeth couldn’t help but frown in curiosity.

“But, aren’t you two demigods yourselves? Why else would you have been brought here?”

Bianca shook her head.

“No, we can’t be, at least I don’t think so. We knew our mom, but she died a few months ago. That’s when the strange lady took us to the cool casino with all these games and chutes with water in them. We also saw our dad a few times, but he mom didn’t really let him see us much. The children at our old school say that they must have been div- dis- divo- ugh, what’s the word?”

“Divorced?”

Thalia suggested.

“Yeah, they said that they must have been divorced when Nico was born.”

Thalia and Luke shared a look. If they were guaranteed to be mortals, then the Di Angelo’s story would have made sense, but there was something about the siblings that felt… off. Annabeth also had similar concerns, but she also noticed something. She didn’t say it at the time, but she felt that Nico and Bianca shared an aura that was noticeably similar to Percy and Thalia’s. Before any of them could voice their concerns, Sally walked in, a plate of strawberries and bright blue snacks in one hand, as well as the hand of a considerably calmer Percy in the other.

“Good news, Grover was able to divert a strawberry delivery from camp, so we were able to get a fresh batch in just now!”

She placed the plate down on Annabeth’s nightstand and sat down on the floor.

“I also have some more news. The hunters of Artemis are stopping by in a fortnight, so we need to get a room ready for them to stay.”

“Just the hunters?”

Annabeth questioned, raising a hand, whilst Sally shook her head.

“No, I’m afraid not. Artemis herself as well. Orders of Zeus apparently.”

The atmosphere in the room immediately tensed, and all eyes were suddenly on Thalia and Percy.

“Wh- what?”

Thalia spluttered.

“H-how? They already know about us? What’s going to happen when Artemis shows up. Her hunters kind of already hate me since I didn’t join them when we met last year!”

“Oh I forgot that they tried to recruit you!”

Luke muttered, earning him a strong glare from Thalia.

“Anyway,”

She continued.

“Like I said. What’s going to happen? Are they gonna need to kill me and Percy or something?”

“Thalia,”

Sally placed a comforting hand on Thalia’s shoulder.

“Breathe. You’re doing it again.”

The mortal woman took the daughter of Zeus’s hands into her own, helping to guide her breathing before answering her question.

“As far as Medusa and I are aware, the hunter’s visit is just to confirm if you two are anything to be concerned about. You are only eight and fourteen, so we don’t think you two should be seen by the gods as dangerous… yet anyway.”

Thalia looked considerably more relaxed, but there was still an air of tension surrounding her.

“Even so, the hunters aren’t all that keen on me, especially their liutenant, Zoe Nightshade.”

After a few confused looks from the Jacksons and the Di Angelo siblings, Thalia explained what she meant.

“I kind of rejected them. It was just before we arrived here, and I was their target age group. I still am, actually. Zoe was really annoyed that I declined, Artemis not so much, but to the hunters I’d just turned down the offer of a lifetime, so they don’t really like me all that much.”

Sally nodded and smiled.

“Well, we have two weeks for us not to worry too much about that, and in the meantime, we need to get these two settled.”

She gestured to Bianca and Nico.

“So, Annabeth, why don’t you go pick out two rooms for Bianca and Nico, and help them out with anything they might need that falls into your department, okay?”

At the sound of that, Annabeth was practically buzzing, and immediately grabbed one of her notebooks off of her desk to take notes on what her new friends wanted in their rooms. Bianca grabbed hold of her brother’s hand, the two of them smiling at each other. Neither of them quite knew why yet, but this was the first time in months, that they finally felt like they were at home.

Chapter Text

Once all of the children were busy, Sally left to find Medusa, who was still baking in the kitchen.

“Em, did you feel like something was… off, about the new kids.”

Medusa looked up curiously.

“I’m not surprised that you feel that way, Sally. The two of them are children of the underworld.”

“Excuse me?”

Medusa nodded curtly.

“Children of Hades, to be precise. Their father wanted them to stay here once he found out that we were demigod friendly.”

Sally folded her arms and frowned.

“Do the children know?”

“Not yet, their father doesn’t want them to know for the time being.”

“Probably for the best. They’re both so young, poor things.”

“I know, but in the meantime we need to prepare for the hunters’ visit. I don’t believe you’ve met them yet, have you?”
Sally shook her head.

“No, I haven’t. Do you know if they’re going to be any… sympathetic towards our situation?”

“I imagine that they will get on fine with Bianca and Annabeth. They might be somewhat tolerant of Thalia, though they may be tricky, seeing as she rejected their recruitment offer. Nico and Percy are both too young for them to find any issues with, and I wouldn’t be surprised if they just completely ignored Luke altogether.”

“I see. Well I suppose that we’d best be getting on then.”

:::::::::::::::::

The emporium was a madhouse over the course of the next fourteen days, what with preparing rooms for not only Bianca and Nico, but also Artemis and all of the hunters. Just in case they decided to stay and not sleep in tents. Annabeth mostly took charge of helping the siblings settle in, whilst Percy decided to try and be of more use to his mother and ‘aunt’ in the kitchen, and Luke and Thalia made themselves busy with ironing sheets and making about two dozen beds for the hunters, though they had a sneaking suspicion that twenty four might not be enough. Soon enough, two weeks had passed, and everyone was bracing themselves for when the hunters would arrive. 

Despite her previously calm demeanour, Sally was frequently found pacing the main lobby of the store, nervously playing with her hair, clearly anxious for her son and his friends.

“Okay, we’ll be okay. Just so long as Percy or Thalia don’t draw too much attention to themselves then-”

It was at that moment that a sharp knocking could be heard at the door, and the room went completely silent. Medusa was the one to open the door, having had the most experience with the hunters out of everyone.

“Lady Artemis.”

“Medusa. I assume that you’re already aware of the reason for my visit.”

“Yes I am, Lady Artemis.”

“Very well. And I do apologise for the intrusion.”

Following behind Medusa were a large group of teenage girls, all wearing silver parkas, though they seemed to be being led forward by two in particular standing at the front.

The first looked only around twelve, but she had that sort of divine energy surrounding her that told everyone that she was much older, and was dressed the most ‘ancient Greek’. Behind her auburn ponytail was a silver bow, carved to look like antlers, slung onto her back, alongside a quiver of silver arrows sitting on her hip.  .

She had to be Artemis.

The second looked maybe a few years older, dressed in the same silver parka as the rest of the girls, with a silver ringlet-style tiara resting on her forehead beneath her long, black hair that gave her the look of a Persian princess. 

All of the girls had quivers of silver arrows at their hips and bows on their backs, though the designs of those were considerably more simplistic than Artemis’. And Thalia and Luke had been right. There were definitely more than twenty four hunters.

Artemis looked around the room expectantly, searching for Percy and Thalia.

“Come on Percy.” Mumbled Thalia, tugging on the little boy’s hand, signalling him to move forward towards the group of girls. Halfheartedly, Percy complied, nervously shuffling forward, looking down at his shoes. Artemis looked at the two of them for an agonisingly long fifteen seconds, before clapping her hands and smiling.

“Well, that all seems to be in order. I can’t see any threat that you two might pose to Olympus.”

Everyone looked up at the goddess in shock. Particularly Thalia.

“Wh-what? Seriously?”

Artemis nodded.

“Yes, seriously, Thalia was it? I trust Medusa enough to believe that she’s not convincing you two to conspire against us gods or each other. I can safely say that I’ll be informing my father that you two are free to live. Don’t you agree, Zoë?”

The girl with the tiara, Zoë, nodded curtly.

“As much as I be not fond of the child of Zeus, I too can see that neither of these demigods pose any sort of threat.”

Sally, Percy, Thalia, Annabeth, and Luke all breathed a collective sigh of relief, whilst Bianca and Nico peeked over from behind the table curiously. Unsurprisingly, their aura of death did not escape the attention of Artemis. She cast a glance Sally’s way, but the latter shook her head and briefly cast her eyes to the side as if to say ‘we’ll explain in a moment when the kids aren’t with us.’ Medusa, thankfully, cut through the silence before any tension could build in the air.

“Well, you girls have travelled all this way, and it’s getting quite late. Why don’t we get you something to eat, and Luke and Thalia have set up some rooms in case you need to stay the night.”

:::::::::::::::::

That night, whilst the hunters were all introducing their hunting dogs to all of the demigods, minus Luke and Thalia, Artemis and Zoë approached Sally and Medusa.

“Those two children are children of Hades, aren’t they?” Artemis asked, looking over at Bianca and Nico.

“Straight to the point I see.” Medusa smiled. “And yes, they are. Although they aren’t aware of it yet as far as we’re concerned. We think it’s a move by their father to protect them.”

The goddess frowned curiously.

“Is that so? Well in that case I’ll hold off of telling the other olympians for now, at least until Hades makes it known to the rest of them.”

They stood in silence for a while, as Artemis’s gaze drifted towards Thalia, who was busy chatting away to Luke in a corner.

“In all honesty, I am a little bit disappointed that she didn’t accept our offer. I’m sure Thalia would have made a wonderful hunter.”

“Try not to hold it against her.” Medusa smiled softly. “Like all demigods, Thalia hasn’t had it easy. Her brother disappeared when she was nine and her mother was an alcoholic. I think she blames her mother for Jason's disappearance honestly.”

Artemis and Zoë looked at each other, their eyebrows furrowed.

“Her brother was bid Jason?” Zoë asked. And am I correct 'i saying that her surname is Grace?”

Medusa nodded slowly, her lips gradually curling into a frown.

“Yes, why?”
Artemis sighed, chewing on the inside of her cheek.

“You are aware of camp half blood, correct?” Medusa and Sally both nodded. “Well, camp half blood is solely for the children of our Greek variants. The gods have split personalities you see, a Greek version and a Roman version, and it’s not just our Greek versions who choose to sire with mortals. There is another camp in California, Camp Jupiter, and that one is for the children of our Roman variants. My hunters visit there from time to time if we need a place to stay overnight. And during one of our more recent stays, I believe that we may have met young Thalia’s brother.”

Chapter Text

To say that Sally and Medusa were stunned would be an extreme understatement.

“Lady Artemis, are you sure?”
The goddess sighed, crossing her arms over her chest and staring down at the ground

“I could be wrong, but I’m fairly certain that Thalia’s brother is currently residing at camp Jupiter.”

Before anyone else could say anything, she turned around to see two hunters sneaking up behind Thalia and Luke.

“Elsbeth! Marilynn! I’ve already warned you two about ambushing Miss Grace and any men we might encounter during our stay! We’re guests at the moment, and you can go back to stabbing people and monsters alike as soon as we leave, okay?”

Elsbeth and Marilynn hung their heads and trudged back to the rest of their group, whilst one muttered to the other.

“Why’s it matter anyway? Phoebe can just fix them up afterwards.”

“I apologise about those two, they were claimed as children of Hermes before they joined our ranks, so they have a slight tendency for rather intense pranks. Unfortunately, with them being somewhat immortal they’ve forgotten just how badly regular humans and demigods might react to being stabbed in the arm. Now, where were we? Ah, right. Jason Grace.”

“I remember that boy well,”

Zoë said.

“From what the praetors at the Roman camp told us, he had arrived at camp Jupiter when he was barely three years of age. The child was apace claimed as a son of Jupiter and caught on to the way things were run there most swiftly.”

Medusa was listening to Zoë’s recollection rather intensely, whereas Sally seemed lost in thought, not in the way that Annabeth could often be found, thinking about the best solution to a structural problem in one of her designs, but more so in the way that told everyone that she was a mother figure, looking out for her unofficial adoptive child.

“How are we going to tell Thalia? Should we even tell Thalia? I wouldn’t want to get her hopes up, but she misses Jason so much. It’s been six years since she’s seen the poor kid and even just the confirmation that he’s alive and well would put her mind at ease.”

Although many people might think that Sally had a good point, the moon goddess simply shook her head, rather dejectedly.

“If we tell Thalia, then she’ll want to go searching for Jason herself, and… Ayla! No you cannot teach a seven year old how to shoot a longbow! Especially not inside a bakery!”

Another hunter, presumably named Ayla, pouted slightly, letting go of Bianca’s shoulders after an attempt at showing her a good competition shooting stance. 

“Anyway, I think we all know how that will probably end up. For either of them.”

Sally, to put it lightly, was disheartened with Artemis’s response. Even though she’d barely known them a year, these children were like a second family to her, and seeing any of them upset and grieving just shattered her heart.

“Well, isn’t there anything else we can do instead? I mean, I’m mortal. I won’t be at risk. Or-”

“Sally!”

Artemis raised her voice suddenly, startling the mortal woman.

“Mrs Jackson, as much as I admire your dedication to these children, I wouldn't advise you to seek out camp Jupiter. The entrance is hidden to mortals, and even if you can see through the mist, it’s constantly guarded by two roman demigods, so there’s no way you’d be able to get in without a good reason.”

Sally sighed, pushing a strand of hair that had fallen loose from her ponytail behind her ear.

“It’s just so infuriating. Jason wouldn’t even have to stay here long term, maybe just every other Christmas or Easter or Thanksgiving, just so he can see his sister. With the way Annabeth designed the dormitories, we’re not exactly low on vacancies.”

The mortal woman kept rambling on, until Medusa placed a comforting hand on her shoulder, and Artemis and Zoë looked at each other, frowning, seemingly deep in thought.

“Miss Jackson, Medusa. We may just have a proposition for the both of you.”

Artemis turned over to the gaggle of girls sitting with the hunting dogs.

“Reyna, could you come over here for a moment?”

A little girl, maybe seven years old, stood up from the group and made her way over to the four women.

“Ladies, this is Reyna Ramirez-Arellano.”

The little girl smiled up at Medusa and Sally, bouncing forwards onto her tiptoes.

“Hello!”

Zoë smiled fondly down at the girl before offering up an explanation.

“Thou are aknown of the tale of the witch Circe, is’t thou not?”

Medusa nodded, as Sally wiggled her hand in a ‘so so’ kind of way.

“Well, instead of living  'i  a palace, Circe now runs a spa resort within the sea of monsters, what be now located  'i  the bermuda triangle.”

“Oh yes, Circe did mention that in her last letter!”

Medusa piped up.

“From what she told me, it does sound like a lovely place.”

“After fleeing from a… difficult family situation, shall we say for now, Reyna and her sister, Hylla, ended up on Circe’s island.”

Artemis continued.

“From what I believe, Hylla is still on that island, and is very content there, but Reyna grew rather restless, desperately seeking out some sort of adventure. Since Circe and the hunters share similar… ideologies, she requested that we take Reyna in. Under normal circumstances I would, but Reyna’s considerably younger than our target demographic. Since she’s a child of the Roman goddess, Bellona, we were originally going to bring her to camp Jupiter. However…”

The goddess looked down at Reyna, and looked back towards where Annabeth, Percy, Bianca and Nico were all sitting with the hunters.

“Zoë and I couldn’t help but notice how… happy she seems here. If it’s okay with you two, would you mind if we left Reyna in your care? If it doesn’t work out we can always continue with the original plan and take her to Camp Jupiter.”

Before either the mortal or the gorgon could respond, Zoë spoke up once again.

“We understand that this is a large bid, so  'i  return, we are content to see if we can transport jason over from camp jupiter, e'en if 'tis only for a week or twain. Does that seem fair to thee?”

:::::::::::::::::

The next day, the ever growing household bid their farewells to the hunters. In that short space of time though, Elsbeth and Marilynn did manage to steal a considerable amount of blue cookies from the kitchen, and Ayla had promised Bianca that she would give her proper archery lessons during their next visit, albeit with a smaller and more manageable bow. There were quite a large number of the hunters who were sad to say goodbye to Reyna, but as Artemis frequently reiterated, they would be back to visit at some point in the near future. Especially since they were planning on setting course to California to retrieve Jason Grace from his respective camp.

“It will probably take us around two and a half weeks for us to return with Jupiter’s boy,”
Artemis had told Sally and Medusa, making sure that she was just out of earshot of Thalia.

“I know it’s tempting to tell her, but Thalia shouldn’t know that her brother’s coming until he arrives, just in case something happens and she becomes too hurt, or she sets off to find him herself.”

Medusa and Sally had both understood and acknowledged Artemis’s instructions. Sally had even offered to swear on the river Styx not to let Thalia know until the time came, but Artemis shut that idea down immediately.

“I trust you both enough to know that you won’t tell her. Now, we best be off.”

As the hunters left, Percy, Sally, Medusa, Annabeth, Thalia, Luke, Nico, Bianca, and now Reyna, all waved them off. 

“They were a lot more tolerable than they were the last time.”

Luke noted.

“Less pushy to try and get someone to join their ranks.”

“That’s probably because I’d already rejected them, and Bianca and Annabeth are both too young at the moment.”

Said Thalia.

For a brief moment, she thought she saw Artemis look back at her, smile, and wink. But no. It was probably just her mind playing tricks on her. For now, she would be left to ponder where on earth they would be travelling to next.

Chapter Text

The last thing that Jason Grace was expecting to happen that day was for the hunters of Diana, alongside Diana herself, to take him to the other side of the country. However, despite his expectations for his day, the moon goddess and her hunters had shown up right in the middle of round three of death paintball and requested that Jason travel with them to New Jersey for the foreseen future.

“But, Lady Diana,”

One of the praetors, a son of Fides (goddess of faith and loyalty) named Oliver, protested.

“Jason is young, and he lacks experience. Even with your hunters, he may not be able to defend himself during a monster attack.”

“Art thou questioning Lady Diana’s authority?”

Diana’s lieutenant, Zoë Nightshade asked, danger laced throughout her voice.

“Stand down, Zoë, she means well.”

Diana waved a hand to calm the rest of her hunters as well.

“I can tell that you have great concern for the boy, son of Fides, and it is not wrong of you to worry for him, but I can assure you that the son of Jupiter will be in good hands.”

Oliver didn’t look completely reassured, but he didn’t want to keep arguing with a goddess and potentially get smited or fed to her wolves.

All through the crowd, Jason could hear murmurs of things such as: 

What does Diana want with a boy anyway?

Yeah, and an eight year old at that.

Forget about that, what would she want with someone from the fifth cohort?

The mumbling stopped, all of a sudden, when Diana clapped her hands twice, sending a deafening boom through the field.

“Demigods, I understand how confusing this must be for all of you, but you all must understand that this is the way that fate has decided to play out. I do not know when young Jason will return here, but know that he will at some point. Now, if you’ll excuse us, we must be off. Come, son of Jupiter. You are safe with us.”

Hesitantly, Jason crept towards Diana, his sword transforming back into a golden coin, and his too-large imperial gold helmet slipping over his eyes as he left camp Jupiter alongside the hunt, left to ponder why on earth they were taking him to New Jersey.

:::::::::::::::::

Thalia wasn’t sure why, but over the course of the past week and a half, Medusa and Sally had been acting… strange. Well, as strange as you can get for a gorgon and a mortal woman who had essentially adopted six demigod children, alongside a child of her own… and also a satyr. Every so often, Thalia would walk into the kitchen or another room where the two women were, only for them to abruptly stop their conversion, which more often than not was being held in hushed whispers. She’d tried bringing up this situation with Luke, but he’d always just shrugged and said that they were probably just planning her a surprise fifteenth birthday party, even though her birthday wasn’t until December. Another thing that Thalia had noticed recently was that Luke also seemed more distracted than usual. He always seemed half asleep, and each day the dark circles beneath his eyes were becoming more and more prominent. Again, Thalia had tried asking him about this, but he always just waved it off, mumbling something about ‘bad dreams’ and telling her not to worry about it. Easier said than done. It was more concerning for Thalia seeing as Luke was probably the most talkative person staying at Em’s (Next to Percy and Nico), so she definitely knew that something was up with her friend. Still, she tried her best to take her mind off of it by helping out in the bakery and garden shop, as well as helping Annabeth with the Di Angelo’s rooms, which for some reason they had wanted to design in a way that Thalia could only describe as mid-war 1940s. But again, she had a little too much on her plate at the moment, especially since the hunter’s visit, so she tried her absolute best not to think about it. Instead, she tried to spend most of her time getting Reyna situated and comfortable, sometimes even offering to spar with her. The ever growing family had quickly realised that the girl had a knack for direct combat, which made sense seeing as she was the daughter of Bellona.

That was another thing which had confused Thalia initially, seeing as she had never heard of a goddess called ‘Bellona’, however, Medusa was once again more than happy to explain. Finding out that the gods had Roman variants and counterparts had come as a surprise to the small group, with Annabeth being the most confused, seeing as Minerva, the Roman equivalent of the goddess Athena, had completely sworn off of having children all together, rather than having, as Luke liked to call it, ‘brain babies’. By that point, someone had brought up Erichthonius, son of Hephaestus, and technically speaking Gaia, who had essentially been adopted by Athena, and the whole conversation had spiralled into complete and utter chaos.

Even with all of the confusion surrounding godly parents and Roman counterparts, taking care of Reyna had acted as a good distraction for Thalia, and over the course of the past fortnight, they’d even organised a few Iris messages between Reyna and her sister, Hylla, who was apparently a student of the witch Circe on an island in the sea of monsters/the Bermuda triangle. The younger girl had also become quite close with Bianca, which Thalia definitely wasn’t complaining about. As much as she could tell Bianca loved Nico, she quite obviously needed a break from looking after him all of the time, especially since her brother had opened up considerably since finding out that the Greek and Roman gods were real, so Thalia found that Bianca’s friendship with Reyna had provided her with a much needed rest from her hyperactive younger brother, whilst Thalia had offered to keep an eye on him in Bianca’s stead. And in all honesty, Thalia didn’t mind one bit. She’d missed having a younger brother to take care of, and genuinely started to think of Percy and Nico as she’d have thought of Jason. As such, she was careful not to let them near any staplers unsupervised. 

She found it nice that taking care of the younger children had been a helpful distraction from everything. Jason, Luke acting strange, unpleasant memories of her mother, and of course, Medusa and Sally’s strange behaviour recently.

Of course, soon enough, Thalia would find out the reason behind them acting so oddly.

:::::::::::::::::

On the second Saturday after the hunt had visited, Thalia had been helping out in the kitchen, trying to help prepare today’s lunch: Chicken, ham and leek soup with homemade tiger bread, when there had been a sharp knock at the front door. 

“Are we expecting anyone today?”

Thalia asked, looking towards the two women confusedly. Medusa and Sally both smiled at each other knowingly before the latter turned back to Thalia.

“You just wait here, dear. We’ll go get it.”

Soon enough, Thalia was left alone in the kitchen with her chopping board, the door left open just a smidge. Enough, however, that she could hear glimpses of the conversation outside.

“This him?...Excited…Roman…stay?...have lunch…others…stay here, we’ll be back.”

A short moment later, Medusa and Sally reentered the kitchen, grinning like kids in a candy store.

“Thalia,” Said Medusa. “Come with us. We have a surprise.”

Curious, the daughter of Zeus followed the two women out into the front of the shop, where she once again saw the hunters of Artemis standing outside. Once again, Artemis stood at the very front of the group of girls, alongside her Lieutenant. But there was someone else this time. Holding onto Artemis’s hand, was a small, blond boy, around Percy and Annabeth’s age, with piercing blue eyes, and a small scar on his lip.

Thalia froze for a moment, and spoke without even realising or bothering to restrain herself.

“Jason?”

Chapter Text

Thalia couldn’t believe it. Wouldn’t believe it! Jason? Here? With the hunters? How!? A million and one thoughts were racing through her head at the moment, all of them interrupting and talking over each other. All of them were completely cut off, however, by the five words that Jason spoke next.

“I’m sorry, who are you?”

Five words, that was all it took to completely shatter Thalia’s heart.

“Jason, what do you mean? It’s me, Thalia.”

Jason shook his head, confused.

“No, I don’t know any Thalia’s.”

Thalia was about to say something back, tears threatening to fall past her eyelids, when Sally placed a gentle hand on her shoulder, smiling comfortingly.

“It’s okay, Thalia. We can take this from here.”

The mortal woman approached Jason, smiling softly at him, before kneeling down to look him in the eye, offering out a hand to him.

“Jason, my name’s Sally. My friend over there is Medusa, and as you know, this young lady is Thalia.”

Jason moved to take Sally’s hand, paused, and looked up towards Artemis with a silent plea for guidance. The goddess simply nodded, trying to encourage the boy to approach the women further, which he eventually did.

“Uhm, Miss Sally, can I ask you a question?”

Sally nodded, hand still held out in front of her.

“Of course, Jason. I’m sure this must all be so confusing at the moment.”

Jason’s eyes kept flicking between Sally, Medusa and Thalia, trying to think about how exactly to word what he wanted to ask.

“Is it true that there’s more demigods here? More people like me?”

Medusa was the one to nod this time, smiling behind her veiled hat.

“Why yes! You’ve met Thalia, her father is the Greek king of the gods, Zeus. But we also have a few others here. There’s Sally’s son, Percy, Thalia’s friends Annabeth and Luke, sometimes their friend Grover comes by to visit, he’s a satyr. Although I suppose you’d call him a faun. There’s also Bianca and Nico Di Angelo, though they keep assuring us that they’re mortal. Not to mention Reyna Ramirez Arellano. Daughter of Bellona.”

Jason nodded a few times, slowly, chewing the inside of his cheek as the cogs in his head were visibly whirring.

“So… Thalia called me her brother because my father is the Roman version of her father? Is that right?”

“Almost,” Sally assured him. “Yes, you share variants of the same father, but you both come from the same mother as well.”

The interaction was clearly a lot for Jason, as he was now looking pretty close to tears.

“How- how come I don’t remember mom then? Or Thalia?”

Thalia sighed, looking like she was about to start crying herself.

“You were sent away when you were really little, Jace. You were only around two. Mom had taken us on a vacation to Wine country, insisting on showing us to a park. She’d asked me to go get a picnic basket and to meet you two by the fancy house on top of the hill, but when I got there, you were gone, and she was crying. I didn’t know where you were for six years, Jace.” Thalia stopped herself just as the tears began streaming. “This is probably a lot for you. I’ll be inside. Thank you, Lady Artemis, ‘Em. Thanks a billion.”

She turned on her heel, wiping her tears away with the cuff of her leather jacket as Jason watched on, eyes wide, scarred lip trembling. He felt a hand on his shoulder, and saw Sally looking at him with her brilliant, kind eyes.

“You all must be so hungry. We have cookies and other treats waiting in the dining room, if you would care to join us. Besides, Bianca’s been wanting to learn proper shooting techniques. She hasn’t shut up about it since your last visit, and Reyna’s just been dying to see you all again.”

Artemis smiled at Sally, nodding.

“We’d all be delighted, Sally, thank you.”

Almost immediately after she said that, the moon goddess turned to her huntresses, not saying anything, but letting her eyes do the talking:

‘If any of you kill or maim any of these residents and get us banned, you’re scrubbing dried blood out of the dog’s claws for the next decade. These are some of the best brownies I’ve ever had and I’ll be damned if we get banned.’

There was a collective nod from the hunters at that, and Sally let out a small laugh before turning back to Jason.

“You come inside too. I have a feeling that you’re going to get along with Percy very well.”

:::::::::::::::::

As it turned out, ‘very well’ was the most dramatic understatement of the century. The moment they came into contact with each other, Percy Jackson and Jason Grace got on like a house on fire, talking about their favourite foods, types of music, their own demigod powers. At one point, Percy had said something about finding someone who could control fire and someone who could control rocks so that they could recreate Avatar: the last airbender , and was completely aghast when Jason didn’t understand the reference. So much so that he dragged him up to his room to talk him through the lore, read through the comics, and binge the entire first season. (on a completely legally acquired Hephaestus made, demigod safe TV)

“They won’t be coming down for days. ” Annabeth groaned. Not because she didn’t like the series, but because it meant that she wouldn’t be able to design Jason’s room as quickly as she’d have liked.

Luke had laughed at this and ruffled her hair, laughing.

“Are you even finished designing Reyna’s yet? You had so many ideas for hers I find it hard to believe that you managed to condense it all down into one already.”

Annabeth just grumbled and swatted his hand away, muttering something about ‘stupid ADHD’

Before Luke could say anything in response, he noticed Nico lurking close by, not with his sister at the moment, as Ayla the hunter had managed to get permission to teach Bianca how to shoot a smaller, much less powerful bow outside in the forest where there weren’t as many people or fragile objects. He seemed extremely fidgety, and was drumming his fingers against a pack of cards he had in his hand. Upon closer inspection, Luke and Annabeth could see that the front of the box read ‘mythomagic’.

“Hey little dude,” Luke said smiling, causing the five year old to look up at him. “Whatcha got there?”

“This,” Nico said, not fully making eye contact with either of them, holding up the cards. “I got these when we were still in the hotel, but I never learned how to play with them.”

Annabeth looked a bit closer at the cards in the little boy’s hand, pursing her lips.

“Sorry, Nico. I’ve never heard of them before. Luke?”

“...I think someone from the Apollo cabin at camp had a pack of these. I didn’t get to use them myself but I think I can remember how they were using them. Let me deal us in.” 

He passed an even number of cards around to the three of them as they all sat down in a circle. It took a while for him to remember everything, but after a moment the trio got quite engrossed in the game. It also helped teach Nico a bit more about all of the different Greek gods and monsters.

Around halfway through their fifth match, just after Nico had completely wiped out half of Annabeth’s hydra army with his Hades card, he looked towards the stairs leading to Percy’s room curiously.

“That boy, Jason. He has a really powerful soul.”

Annabeth cocked her head to the side at that, and Luke raised an eyebrow.

“What do you mean by that, Nico?”

Nico paused for a moment, thinking.

“I don’t really know. He just seems really powerful. He gives off this sort of energy that I think is coming from his soul. Everyone has it, but Jason’s is really strong. Same with Percy.”

Annabeth and Luke both looked at each other, frowning, before Luke shrugged, signalling that it was a question for another day.

“Whatever you say, Little Dude. Now, prepare yourself… I use Hermes’ flying sandals to dodge your fireball attack!”

Chapter Text

Almost all of the year rounders were busy outside that day, running around and laughing as the chill of the October air stung their cheeks. Well, all except for little William Solace. That summer had been his very first at camp half blood, and to say that he loved it would be the understatement of the century. He’d enjoyed it so much so, in fact, that he downright refused to go back to Texas once the summer had ended. After about a week though, he had begun to regret that decision. As it turned out, his healing abilities weren’t needed as much when there were only thirteen other campers there, not to mention most of them were around ten years older than him. Since he wasn’t required to be useful anymore, he quickly found himself feeling understimulated, and so, so incredibly bored.

At the moment, he was laying on his bunk, staring up at his Star Wars poster on the ceiling, fiddling with his mythomagic starter pack and bouncing his feet up and down. He had debated going out to the archery range, but had eventually opted out after remembering that, despite being the child of the god of archery, most of the bows were much too heavy for him to lift just yet. So for now, he was almost content with continuing to stare at Luke Skywalker’s face and flick through the most basic cards in Mythomagic’s existence. Almost. 

After around fifteen minutes though, a knock on the cabin door yanked Will out of his stupor. Without waiting for a response, the person on the other side of the door pushed it open and trudged inside. 

Oh. 

It was just Mr. D.

Will sat up on his bunk, still slouching over his cards as Dionysus grumbled.

“Walker Scobell,”

“Will Solace.” Will corrected, though Mr. D. just ignored him.

“Liam Felt’s-” That must be Lee.  “-been telling me and horse legs that you’ve just been cooped up in here for the past couple of days.” Will didn’t say anything and just waited for the camp director to carry on speaking. “Now, I wasn’t gonna do anything about it, but Chiron keeps yapping about how ‘it’s not healthy for a five year old’ and ‘I need to intervene because I’m camp director’ and other crap like that.”

If Will could have raised an eyebrow, he would.

“So, Wally,”

“Will,”

“Whatever, I have a proposition for you.”

Looking up in curiosity, he sat just a little more upright and set down his cards.

“How would you feel about heading to New Jersey to stay with some other demigods your age?”

Almost instantly Will’s face lit up, though he did have a few questions.

“Wait, why’re they in New Jersey and not here? Is it even safe?”

Mr D rolled his eyes.

“I dunno, kid! From what I’ve been told they just don’t want to come. But according to Artemis none of them have died yet so that probably has to count for something.” He sighed and pinched the bridge of his nose, squeezing his eyes shut. “Anyway, if you’re interested then someone’s gonna come by in a few days to pick you up, and if you hate it, you can either come back here or we can make arrangements for you to head back to Texas. What do you think?”

Dionysus’s suggestion was instantly met with enthusiastic nodding from Will, but just then, the god snapped his fingers and his eyes burst open, as if he were just remembering something important.

“There is one small catch though, you’ll be living with Medusa.”

About A Month Earlier

“Say, Artemis, you wouldn’t happen to be stopping by New York soon, would you?”

It had been another one of the hunters’ visits, and as expected, it had gone exactly the same as all the times before.

A small group of them had tried to play ‘harmless’ pranks on Thalia and Luke, Bianca was once again being taught how to string a bow, though Reyna was joining in this time, and Percy, Annabeth, Nico and Jason were all sitting in a circle, playing mythomagic.

Much to Medusa and Sally’s delight, Jason had slowly been warming up to his older sister. The pair had frequently been seen chatting away together, sparring outside and helping out in the kitchen. At one point, Sally had walked in on them showing each other different tricks that they could do with their powers. The two women were incredibly proud to say that progress was certainly being made.

But anyway, back to business.

The moon goddess pursed her lips, thinking.

“I suppose we might pass through it at some point in the foreseeable future, the monster we’ve been tracking has mostly been sticking to the North East of the country anyway. Why, may I ask?”

“We were just wondering if you wouldn’t be willing to pass on a message to the camp director for us,” Sally smiled.

“No, that should be doable,” Artemis said after a moment of thought. “Might I ask what the message is?”

The gorgon and the mortal grinned at each other.

“Would you please let Dionysus know that we’d be willing to open our doors to demigods who feel that they either don’t want , or are unable to, return to their own homes after the summer.”

Artemis seemed genuinely taken aback by that statement.

“Would you mind elaborating?”

“Gladly.” Medusa responded. “Think of it as an alternative option for housing for kids like Luke or Annabeth or even Percy, once summer has ended. They can stay at camp half blood, or come here. If they want they might even be able to go back and forth between spaces.”

“And in exchange,” Sally continued, “ We give Dionysus our good wine.” The mortal woman winked, causing both Artemis and Medusa to laugh out loud.

“I’m sure Dionysus will be glad just to be rid of the kids.” The moon goddess chortled. “I’ll pass on the proposal to see what he and Chiron think. I’m sure that there’s some demigods that will be eager to try this.” Her eyes widened suddenly, as she remembered an important detail. “You will have to make sure that the wine’s non alcoholic though. Either that or Dionysus will need to find a way to sneak over here to get ‘the good stuff’. He’s been barred from drinking as a part of his punishment.”

There was a moment of silence, until it was broken by Sally.

“I don’t even want to know.”

“Anyway, if you would be so kind as to pass along that message, Artemis. It would be much appreciated from the both of us.”

"It's not a problem, M. Really. Besides, my girls are always looking for new excuses to come here."

Chapter Text

Hello, my lovely readers.
Unfortunately, I don't have a chapter for you all today, and am instead using my account to talk about something much more serious.
As those of you who read my post chapter notes know, I am not from the United States, but that does not mean that I'm not hugely disgusted by the outcome of the 2024 US presidential election.
If you're here and you're from the US, I know that many of you will be scared right now, many of you won't know what to do, and as a neurodivergent teenage girl, and as someone who has friends who are a part of the LGBTQ+ community, I know that if I was in the same situation as many of you, I would be absolutely fucking terrified.
Please know that this is a safe space for all of you who feel affected by the outcome of this election. If you feel like you don't have anyone you can safely talk to in your personal lives, feel free to vent in the comments and I'll try and do my best to try and provide you with some comfort. No one should have to deal with fear alone.
I don't know when the next chapter of any of my works will be released, but until then, stay strong. Please remember that you don't have to suffer alone.
Sincerely,
Silver_Sunbeam <3