𝐋𝐨𝐨𝐩𝐡𝐨𝐥𝐞
“Don’t be snarky with me, little girl.”
pairing: percy jackson x child of hecate!reader
words: 12,757
warnings: same old brujeria, mentions of potential death, uh, I think that's it
timeline: post sea of monsters
if you want to be tagged every time I update this story, click here
a/n: hi hi! this chapter was way overdue! I decided to just post it now because if i continue to edit this, you guys won't get it until the weekend. i hope you guys like it and that the length makes up for the month-long hiatus!
Part One Part Two Part Three Part Four Part Five Part Six Part Seven Part Eight Part Nine
A sharp gasp leaves your lips as you jolt up into a seated position. Your eyes scan your surroundings as they adjust to the darkness. Echoes of water dripping in the distance fill in the stillness of the giant cavern ahead of you. You notice the high ceilings and the wall behind you, giving you the only option but to go forward. Gravel digs into your palms as you move to stand, stumbling as your weak legs find the strength to hold you up.
"What? How-?"
"Hello.” A gravelly voice calls with the appearance of a tall, thin figure near the many curved entrances around you. Your pulse thumps loud in your ears, your senses heightening with your adrenaline. What was in front of you vaguely reminded you of Jack Skellington, a black suit and all but with features that attempted to appear human but are uncanny. Its face is long and slim with wide beady bulging eyes. A smile, where the ends of its mouth hike up too high on its cheek, is plastered, quite literally across its face. As its head tilts to the side with a creaky motion, you don’t notice your mouth hanging open, unable to find the words.
This could be no one else but Insammon. Perhaps, his description in the spellbook was empty because he was too creepy to draw, or you consider that no one made it out alive to be able to.
“Why, don’t look so surprised.”
You tense up at the sound of its voice, vaguely masculine, but its gruffness leaves no room for warmth, sends a spike of chills up your spine, and you force yourself to look away from him.
“I just wanted to talk. Perhaps, we can strike a deal.”
You furrow your eyebrows, a deal? A pit in your stomach forms, having a bad feeling about this. Whatever this deal was, you were well aware that you won’t have much say in it. You open your mouth to ask what he wanted, but you’re interrupted.
“You’re probably wondering what I want from you.” The wicked, wide grin remains on his face as if it was stuck while he begins to pace back and forth from the ends of the entrance. “I will be straightforward with you since I’m quite eager to get what I want. Would you like to know what that is?”
You gawk, too distracted at the clunky way he walks to say anything. With a slow nod of your head, he halts, arms crossed over his chest, and he stands taller than before. “I want you to make me a vessel.”
Your face scrunches in confusion; your mind too overwhelmed at the situation at hand. “Like a ship?” You ask, that being the first thing that came to mind. Why the hades does he need a ship?
“No, you imbecile!” He hisses, and you jump, his loud voice bouncing off the stone walls and through the empty hallways. “A body! A suit to host my spirit. I’m sick of hiding in the shadows,” he scoffs, shaking his head as his eyes look miles away. “It’s boring.”
The sudden softening of his tone took you aback. Was this demon pouting? You didn’t think you’d ever see that. “Boring?” You ask cautiously, his wide grin flipped into a long frown.
“Yes, boring! It makes my attack strategy so… limited!” He scoffs and rolls his eyes, which looked more like googly eyes, one eye turning in the opposite direction of the other. “I want slow-burn torture. I want to be perceived as a human, gaining the trust of you naive creatures before I attack,” he sighs, with a dreamy expression on his face.
You shake your head, his suggestion absurd. “I’m not making you a body. I-I’ve never done that before.”
“Oh, but you can,” he says confidently, and he steps closer in your direction, your legs instinctively stepping back to maintain the distance. “And you will.” He declares, his eyebrow bone raising, seemingly amused at your retreat.
“You see, you and your siblings weakened me for days after casting that pathetic protection spell. And then you put those awful little sigils all over the place. I couldn’t get in anywhere! I had to stay in that forest and recollect my powers,” he proclaims like a damsel in distress. “You’re more than powerful enough to make me that body, and if you refuse, I will simply take over yours.”
“But-”
“Though I do prefer more of a masculine appearance,” he sighs, eyes returning to bore into yours. “I could take over your brother’s body, that is, if he survives my presence.”
“What do you mean if he survives?” You ask, your heart sinking to your chest. The last thing you wanted was Atticus in trouble. If he were in this situation, you’d be freaking out for sure. You were much too protective of him, and though this situation sucks, you’d rather it be you than him.
“If he survives like you are right now,” he clarifies, his eyes looking you up and down with suspicion. “It’s quite impressive. I didn’t expect your fragile human body to be able to host me, but I figured it was worth a shot if I can get what I want.”
The crease between your eyebrows deepens as he continues to speak. You consider that you could have easily died if he had overtaken you, but why hadn’t you? You shake your head, pushing the thoughts to the back of your mind. You had more things to worry about right now.
“For something you deem as fragile, you seem quite determined to receive it,” you say through a clenched jaw, trying to remain unphased as he leans forward, his upper body extending like taffy. He halts once his face is inches away from yours, giving you no choice but to look into his bulging eyes as they study you.
He was trying to scare you so that the emotion could fuel his strength. You didn’t want to give him the satisfaction of scaring you, maintain your emotionless face but the pounding pulse from your neck gave you away.
“Don’t be snarky with me, little girl. Agree to make me a vessel, or I stay in yours. I’m willing to give up a masculine appearance if I can keep your sturdy body.”
You take a deep breath, your eyes faltering away from his face as you turn to look to the side. From this close, you notice his ghastly pale skin is like leather pulled tight over the structure of his features and how his grin reveals an empty mouth.
“I-” you open your mouth, but you close it. You didn’t want to give in, but what choice did you have? To overpower something like this on your own would be impossible. Besides, it’ll be even more work for Lou and Atticus. You knew if he officially took over your body, you may not survive the process of them casting him out.
Anyway, it was just a body…
You wipe your fidgeting hands on your shorts, your thoughts jumping around, trying to find a way out of this. One-half of you didn’t want to agree. How could you aid an entity like this to allow him to wreak more havoc on his victims? And then another part of you figured it wouldn’t matter to you because if you give in, he’ll leave the camp.
“It’s just a body,” Insammon whispers, fueling one side of the argument. He circles you, a bitter cold nipping at your skin as he remains close. Your arms wrap around your frame, and you swallow hard.
“Fine,” you utter through a clenched jaw.
“Good choice-”
“BUT,” you shout, your posture straightening as you find the courage to face him. If he wants it so bad, perhaps, you could get more out of this deal than him not possessing you. “Only on the promise that you will leave camp and never bother me, my family, or any half-blood ever again.”
A chuckle leaves his lips, standing up tall as if he was mimicking you. “Whatever,” he waves his hand as he begins to pace in front of you. “After I’m human, my pool of people to torture will broaden. I’ll take your silly terms.”
“Swear on the River Styx.”
“Oh. I guess you’re not as dense as I thought you were. The little girl knows how to make a deal,” he mocks, throwing his head back as he lets out a laugh, the sound so fabricated to sound human to the point where it sounded robotic.
“Swear on it.” Your fist clenches on your side, annoyed at his mocking.
“You have to swear to make my body first.”
“I have more to lose if I don’t make you the body, so you should go first,” you remark.
The way he lowers his glare and how his eyes manically brighten told you that he was well aware of the dilemma he has put you in.
“Fair enough.” He clears his throat. “I swear on the River Styx that I will leave you, your family, and any half-blood at this camp,” he whines obnoxiously in an attempt to mimic your voice, his hands thrown upon his side dramatically. “if you make me my body,” he adds quickly in his normal tone. “Your turn.”
You weren’t sure where the exit to the outside was, but you were still able to hear a roaring of thunder, binding him to his words officially. You swallow hard, a bunch of worries filling your head. You’ve never sworn on the River Styx before. What if you weren’t powerful enough to do the spell? Will you be punished for your lack of ability to fulfill the promise?
Insammon waits for you to speak your promise, his hands making a motion as if to hurry up.
“I swear on the River Styx that I will make you a body,” you mutter, cringing as the thunder rolls again. Now, failing to keep your promise is not an option for you anymore. You may be motivated by false confidence, but you decide that you can and will do the spell. You have to.
Faintly, the distant chanting of Atticus and Lou Ellen rings in your head, and you groan, simultaneously crouching forward as Insammon growls.
“That stupid spell,” he snarls, his long fingers rolling into a fist. You blink erratically, your vision suddenly going blurry and your head becoming too heavy on your shoulder. As he approaches you slowly, you whimper, dropping to your hands and knees as the world feels like it's spinning
“When I leave your body, you stop them. Do you understand? If you don’t, I will repossess you,” he articulates carefully, and you can only lift your head just enough to see the fronts of his dress shoes.
The ringing drowned out his voice in your ears, and you felt nauseous as the pressure in your head felt like someone was squeezing your skull.
“DO YOU UNDERSTAND?” You whine, startled at the booming of his voice that sounds over the ringing in your ears with ease.
“Yes,” you whisper, your arms giving out on you, and you lay on your back, eyes straight up at the blurry cave ceiling before Insammon hovers over you. The haze of your surroundings turns white, casting a halo around his face and he gives you one last empty mouthed grin.
“Good. Now brace yourself, little girl. This is going to hurt.” A cackle leaves his lips before the white overtakes his face, and the ringing in your ears grows incredibly loud.
☆’.・.・:★:・.・.’☆
Percy watches Atticus and Lou Ellen draw a pentagram in the middle of the cabin with salt. Their movements are hasty, words sparse as they eagerly prepare the spell to get this thing out of you. He bites on the skin of his bottom lip; the longer you remain unconscious, the tenser he and your siblings become. Percy had asked if he could help with anything, but Lou and Atticus shook their heads and insisted that he remained at your side, which didn’t make him feel partially useful. But he complied, considering it was best to stay out of the way, and though they didn’t ask him to, his shaky fingers rested gently on the side of your wrist, making sure that your pulse continued to thump against his fingertips.
A grumble from Ambrose catches his attention, and he finds himself looking back at your face. You hadn’t moved at all in the last hour or so, and you started to pale; your shallow breaths and faint pulse are the only sign of life you gave off.
“Okay, we’re ready,” Atticus gulps as he holds a spellbook open in his hand. Lou Ellen exchanges a look with Atticus, the two nodding at each other before she looks over at Percy,
“You should probably stand with us. I don’t know what its choice of departure will be.”
Percy furrowed his eyebrows, unsure what that meant, but he figured he’d find out regardless. He nods, focusing on your pulse one last time. Though shallow, your pulse remained steady. He was no doctor, but he considered that a good sign. After establishing that you were still alive, he stands up, stepping over your body and walking over to Lou and Atticus, who quickly move to stand in front of him.
“Ready?” Atticus croaks with a shaky voice, his eyes glancing over the words of the spell as Lou Ellen stands tall and nods,
“Ready.”
It was quiet for a moment, Percy shifting on his feet as Atticus raised one finger at a time until he reached his third. After a deep breath, they chanted,
“Exorcizamus te, immundus spiritus, malignus potestas, incursio infernalis adversarii, omnis legio, omnis congregatio et secta diabolica…”
As they got through the first stanza of the spell, Percy could hear the gradual loss of confidence in both Lou Ellen and Atticus’s voices. He could tell from the way her violet aura and Atticus’s blue one had flickered as it shrunk into their bodies.
He wasn’t sure how an actual exorcism worked, but if it was like the movies, he was bracing himself for some floating, a scary voice that isn’t yours to come from your mouth, and some thrashing. But none of that happened as your siblings recited the spell further; you just remained still.
Dread fills Percy’s core, and he frowns, “Come on, y/n,” he mutters to himself, eyes searching for some movement before he found it.
Your eyes flung open, wide and alert, and with a sharp gasp, your back arched as the black vapor escaped from where it had penetrated you in the chest like a thick control stream of smoke. Percy winces as a strained cry of agony leaves your lips, your eyes watering as they’re fixed right at the ceiling.
Atticus’s voice becomes strained, hand flying up to clutch his chest as his heart feels like it’s being wrung out like a towel. The pain is so intense that he can’t even imagine how much you feel, but he persists, keeping his focus on the spell.
Soon, the vapor finally leaves your body, forming the familiar figure in the corner of the room.
You sob, the burning in the chest so potent that your vision still blurred white. You turn to your side, barely able to lift your head from Ambrose's body, let alone your body.
“Stop,” you command weakly, your tears dripping on the floor as you attempt to lift your upper body. The chanting of Atticus and Lou drowns out your voice, the two more focused on casting Insammon away.
Your eyes meet Percy’s as he peers over Lou Ellen’s shoulder to look at you. He couldn’t hear what came out of your mouth, but he could tell you needed to stay something.
“Guys,” he calls softly, afraid to interrupt them as the look on your face grows more panicked. He wasn’t sure if they had heard him, but if they did, they didn’t pay any mind.
You needed to get them to stop, Insammon growling even louder, and you try not to sob at the idea of doing this possession thing again. Your pulse thumped erratically in your ears, and you let out a weak breath, gathering the last bit of energy you had left. “STOP!”
Your voice bellowed louder than you had expected, effectively silencing your siblings. You had to blink a few times before you were able to stop seeing six instead of three.
“What do you mean stop?” Atticus snaps, eyebrows furrowed in confusion along with Lou. Your eyes flicker to Insammon standing in the corner of the room before returning to your siblings and Percy.
“We…” your shaky arm manages to pull yourself up despite the world still fuzzy around you. “we’ve made a deal,” you croak, moving to stand up from the floor a little too fast.
As you stumble onto your feet, still pale and disoriented, Percy rushes over and grabs your arm, catching you before you tipped over. You groan as you lean your side against him, your eyes closing in hopes that when you open them, everything will be back to normal.
“What?” Lou Ellen asks, quickly pulling the chair away from Percy’s desk and placing it behind your knees before you plop down into it.
“What deal?” Atticus urges, refusing to sit even though his legs felt weak.
You take a second to compose yourself, trying to figure out how you can explain it to them without sounding insane. Just by looking at Lou Ellen’s eager expression, you were expecting her to protest.
“He took my subconscious somewhere, and we spoke…” you say cautiously, focusing on your fiddling hands.
“And?”
“He said he’d leave us alone on the agreement that I…” your voice falters, “on the agreement that I build him a body.”
“WHAT?” You jump as Atticus and Lou Ellen shout at the same time.
“Are you insane?”
You just might be.
You snap your gaze, eyes switching between Lou and Atticus. “I had no choice! If I disagreed, he was just going to stay in mine, and… and you know what the chances of surviving an exorcism are,” you point out. Lou Ellen and Atticus freeze, their faces darkening as they run the situation at hand through their heads. Insammon hisses in the corner as if he was laughing, and you roll your eyes, glaring at him,
“I’m glad you find this funny.”
“We’ve never made a body before, Y/n and… how are we going to hide that?!” Atticus points over to the amused shadow in the corner, and you frown, noticing his messy hair from running his fingers through it so much as he looks at you with wide eyes, filled with concern.
“He’ll lay low in the meantime. He can’t get into any of the cabins because of the sigils. We’ll cleanse Perce’s cabin and put up the sigils on his door, so he’ll have nowhere to go but the forest,” you explain. A knot formed in your throat, neither of them looking convinced.
“In Alabaster’s black magic book, there’s a spell to make a body out of wax…” you turn around, grabbing the book from the desk. Your fingers hastily flip through your pages before landing on the instructions of the spell. You lift it, opening it wide in their direction so that they can see it for themselves. “With all of our powers together, we can do it.”
Lou Ellen furrows her eyebrows, her eyes scanning over the Latin quickly. You were sure you had her convinced before she pulls away, tsking softly. “We need a body of water to host it.”
You bite your lip, turning the book to read it for yourself. “We…” your voice falters. Schist. You didn’t think that far. Where are you even going to host the body? It's not like you can grow it in the lake.
After some silence, you grow nervous under the expectant stares of your siblings, your leg bouncing as you rack your mind for possibilities. Maybe you could host it in a tub in the forest. No, that would take too long, and not only would you need the help of a Hephaestus camper, but a monster might also destroy it, or even worse, the nymphs might see it. Too many people involved. In the showers? No. Obviously not.
“The bathtub in the big house,” Percy blurts out, and you snap your gaze over to him.
“That… that could work,” your face brightens, feeling a little relieved. Your excitement falters as you glance at Lou Ellen and Atticus’s knitted eyebrows and frowns. Even a groan comes from Ambrose, making you feel even more discouraged. Even your familiar is having doubts. Great.
“That could not work! It’s right in the big house! One person uses that bathroom, and we’re dead!” Lou argues, and you throw your head back and groan. You didn’t think it would be this complicated.
“No one uses the bathroom upstairs,” Percy mentions, and you shift, perking up again. At least Percy seemed to be on your side.
“Exactly! Everyone only uses the bathroom downstairs. Chiron doesn’t sleep in the big house, and he’s definitely not using the bathroom there, and Mr. D doesn’t use the bathroom at all. He’s a god!”
“It’s in plain sight,” Atticus emphasizes, and your shoulders hunch forward, looking for a solution.
“Lou can use the mist,” you propose after some time, half expecting another argument, but as Lou Ellen halts with a half-opened mouth, you know you’ve succeeded. She shifts on her feet, looking down at the floor.
“You’ve been practicing, right?” You ask though you already know the answer. She’s been reading about the mist and practicing since the beginning of the summer. Alabaster was teaching her how to hide items, starting small and gradually building her way up. The other day, as a prank to cheer you up, she hid all of Connor’s shoes, sending him into a frantic search for his shoes all morning. It was hilarious watching Connor accusing all of his siblings of taking his sneakers, resulting in them bickering back and forth about how they didn’t have his shoes. All this arguing and almost tearing half of the cabin apart looking for his shoes, just for Lou Ellen to make them reappear as if they were never tampered with.
“Yeah, I mean, I can try?” Lou looks down at her feet, her tone unconfident, but you nod, having fate that she’d be able to do it.
“Great!” You hop up on your feet, a little too fast for your weakened state. Atticus gives you a disapproving look, holding your arm to keep you standing. You look around at their nervous faces, but you don’t let that discourage you.
Behind Atticus, you notice the yellow hue of the sunrise beginning to seep through Percy’s blue curtains. “Lou, you have to sneak back into the cabin before anyone wakes up. Atticus and I will cleanse Percy’s cabin and put sigils on the doors. We’ll make sure he-” you point over at the expecting figure in the corner, listening attentively to your conversation. “goes into the forest. At breakfast, we’ll tell Chiron we succeeded. We can sneak into the big house after lunch. After doing the spell, Lou Ellen will use the mist to hide the body, and… everything should go smoothly,” you declare, chin high with confidence.
You give them a wide smile, satisfied even if Percy is the only one to return the smile, though it was hesitant and weak. Lou and Atticus exchange a look before Lou scoffs and shakes her head,
“This is insane,” she grumbles, and you refrain from frowning. You don’t say anything, helping them gather their materials before Lou Ellen leaves. As you cleanse the cabin while Atticus carves the sigils on the doorframe outside, you look over at Percy sweeping up the salt from the floor. Your eyes unexpectedly meet his as he averts his gaze from the floor, and he frowns,
“You really think everything is gonna work out?” He asks the question genuinely. He didn’t know all the ins and outs of what you had to do, and he decides that your opinion is worth more than everything he’s learned from just observing.
You bite the inside of your cheek. Things should go as planned. At this point, you weren’t even worried if you three were powerful enough to cast a spell that will hold. It was getting caught that you were the most nervous about.
“Yeah, I think everything will be fine,” you smile softly, concealing the anxiety that’s festering in your core.
☆’.・.・:★:・.・.’☆
The bathroom floor tile is cool under your bare thighs, contrasting the wax that is almost too warm in your hands as you carefully sculpt the figure. The upstairs bathroom of the big house is tidy and untouched, though a little dusty, which proved Percy’s claim of the bathroom being vacant.
“Broad shoulders and tall, he demanded of me,” you roll your eyes, making Atticus and Lou snicker under their breaths.
“Is he serious?” Lou asks as she kneels next to the bathtub, throwing the necessary herbs for the spell into the water.
“Yeah, completely serious. He has a list of preferences, as you can see,” you point at the piece of paper laid in front of you filled with the features that he desired to have. “Tall, broad, and blonde,” you recite.
“Is Johnny Bravo his inspiration?” Atticus jokes, and you giggle, shaking your head.
“I don’t know, but I might make his body proportions the same," you play along, making the two of them laugh as you continue to form his legs.
“Did he ask for a…” Atticus trails off, and you look up, knowing what he had hesitated to say, and you cringe,
“Ew. He didn’t, but even if he did, I’m not sculpting that.” The sounds of Lou Ellen and Atticus’ laughter make you crack a smile. It was nice that you guys can joke, easily looking past the mutual anxiety you guys held for the situation.
“So he’s going to be flat like a barbie?” Lou sits on the edge of the bath, and you press your lips together and nod,
“Yup.”
Atticus snorts, shaking his head as he lays out the spell books in front of you, and you pull away from the wax sculpture you’ve been working on for almost an hour now. You nod, eyes scanning to make sure you didn’t leave out the essentials. Eyes, mouth, ears, and nose? Check. Eyebrows? Check. Two arms and legs and 20 fingers in total? Check. You furrow your eyebrows and hum,
“Should I give him… nipples? A belly button?”
“Might as well if you aren’t giving him a, you know,” Atticus says as he flips through the book in front of him, and you giggle as Lou cringes.
“Might as well,” you agree, grabbing more wax and your sculpting tools to do the last finishing touches. You sigh, your eyes scanning over it one last time before deciding you were satisfied with it, and you hope he’ll be satisfied too. You agreed to make him a body; you never said it would be a perfect one. “Okay, let’s get this thing started. The game could end any minute now."
You get up on your feet, looking over at the window on your left. You peeked through the blinds, double-checking that the camp courtyard was still empty to confirm that everyone was still in the forest playing capture the flag.
You were worried that you wouldn't be excused from the game since you've had a lot of passes this summer, but all it took was a short complaint about being tired from staying up all night and over-exhausting your powers, and you were excused. It wasn’t a complete lie, though. You were still queasy from Insammon leaving your body, and Atticus was still recovering from feeling it as well. Lou Ellen just escaped from the game to join you guys. The Hermes cabin was playing on the same side as the Ares cabin, so it’s not like she was given an important role anyway. They wouldn’t even notice she had left.
You pull away from the window, walking over to the tub, and gently placing the wax figure in the water. The three of you grab each other’s hands, exchanging looks before chanting the spell.
I invoke the power of the elements
I beg, accept our sediment
Air, Fire, Water, Earth
Bring us a great storm of mirth
Our origins; the pillars of vitality
Conjure a suit of mortality
Gift me a figure as alive as the land and sea
So mote it be
Your auras mingle around your intertwined hands, yours and Atticus’s making a cyan color as yours forms a dark brown with Lou Ellen’s. Closing your eyes, the three of you set your intentions on the spell as you chant it in unison three times. You feel that familiar tug in your gut as you channel your energy while repeating it one last time. You open your eyes the same time as Lou and Atticus, and the three of you gawk at the murky crimson of the water that was once clear.
“Its blood,” you shift, letting go of their hands. “... at least we know it worked?” Atticus nods slowly, too enthralled at the water to look away.
“I think it caught well,” Lou says, rubbing her sweaty palms on her jean shorts. “Everything should thicken and come together in a week, right?”
You nod, “It said it could be earlier if the spell caught on well. We might get lucky and get this over with by the weekend.” You sigh softly, hoping that you guys will get lucky this time. The burden of this promise was starting to weigh heavy on your shoulders.
The shouting of victory from campers as they return to their cabins catches your attention, and you curse under your breath. “Let’s clean up, hide this thing with the mist and go before we get caught,” you instruct, already reaching to collect your materials.
☆’.・.・:★:・.・.’☆
“Do you think we should stay?”
Your eyes flutter open, your hand coming up to shield them from the bright sun hovering overhead. A sigh leaves your lips, turning your head toward Atticus, who’s laid beside you on the sand, and you notice his hopeful expression begins to falter. Last summer, he had mentioned staying all year round, but the both of you had decided otherwise.
“After everything that’s happened this summer. I just want to go home,” you admit, and Atticus frowns, considering your point. This summer was way too eventful for you, and you had found yourself missing your neighborhood and the comfort of your home and your father. The communal showers and sleeping arrangements were things you couldn’t see yourself deal with any longer than you had to.
“Yeah…” Atticus sighs, and you scan his face, feeling the disappointment radiating off of him. You mimic his sad facial expression, reaching over to push his hair out of his eyes. As much as Atticus wants to stay all year round, he wouldn’t stay if you weren’t with him.
“Don’t you miss dad? You know how he’ll feel if we stayed all year,” you point out. In the many letters and care packages your father had sent you too, it was clear that he was counting down the days of your return. Without you guys, the house was empty, just him and whatever activity he chose to occupy himself with.
“I do miss him! It’s just- I really don’t want to go back to school,” he groans dramatically, and you laugh, nudging the other’s shoulder.
“Yeah, because our father, the professor with two Ph.D. 's, is going to let you drop out of school.” Your tone is sarcastic, and you scoff.
“You’re right. There’s no point in staying. He would be bang on the borders to get us,” Atticus grunts.
“He’s probably bored out of his mind. What do you think he's doing right now?" You shift on your side to face your brother, Atticus smiling as he does the same. His eyes falter to the side as he thinks about the question. After a while, he shrugs,
"Probably, reading?" You laugh, assuming the same thing before Atticus has said so. "Maybe writing another textbook? I don't know. He must be bored out of his mind."
"He for sure is. That's kinda what happens when two 13-year-olds are your only friends," you joke, and Atticus shake his head,
“Dude, Dad needs a girlfriend. He shouldn’t have to depend on us as his main source of entertainment.” A giggle bubbles in your chest, and you agree.
Your father’s life has revolved around you guys and his work for so long. He had a few fellow scholars that he went to dinner with once and a while, and he went to conventions for his specialty often, but that was the extent of his social life. You didn’t think much of it until you noticed your grandmother constantly bickering with him about finding a wife and getting married. Sometimes you wonder if he got lonely.
"We should pray to Aphrodite about that," you suggest, and Atticus gives you a wide grin.
"Good idea. We can make some offerings for her when we get home.” You nod, already devising a plan for it in your head. You don’t get to dwell on it as Atticus speaks again. “Do you think the last time he dated was when he was with mom?"
"Probably. He was in love with her.” Your smile turns sad at the reminder of your mother. She’s so fondly spoken of by your father, and it made you want to meet her even more. Their time was short, about five months, but your father had a lot of stories about her. "It's been 13 years, though; I think it's time to move on."
"Yeah…” Atticus says sadly, and you furrow your eyebrows in concern. “I would like dad to find someone. Sometimes, I-I get worried."
"Why?"
"Because what if something bad happens to us? What would he do?" Your heart sinks in your chest at his question. The possibility of you living long enough to make it past being a teenager was low, and you were well aware of that. But you refrained from thinking about what would happen to your father. You couldn’t imagine the grief he’d go through. A few times, you’ve thought about the reversed situation, and you couldn’t conceptualize how you would be able to handle that much pain.
"I don't know,” you whisper, your brother's expression filled with sorrow. “But I'm sure he's thought about it.”
When you were younger, you didn’t quite understand why your father was always so anxious. You remember the panic in his voice when you wandered to play with the neighbor’s dog down the street instead of being in the front yard where he could see you. Or the time you lost Atticus for a few seconds at the giant Toys R Us in Times Square, only to find him gawking at the massive wall of action figures at the end of the aisle.
“You guys are my gifts.” That’s what he always says with a fond smile. “And when you have a gift so precious like the two of you, you want to protect it.” You could practically feel your father’s fingers patting the top of your head affectionately and the kiss he’d press on you and Atticus’s forehead when he would tuck you guys in bed as young children.
Sometimes you wished you could go back in time and be six again. When the only thing you knew was your father's tender adoration for you and Atticus and none of this goldy parent stuff.
"It's okay, though,” you chime in as you let the memory escape you. “Everything is fine right now, so let's not worry about that, alright?" You give Atticus a soft smile, hoping to lift the mood. Atticus nods, but his expression is still sad.
“Anyways…” You clear your throat, wanting to change the topic. It wasn’t worth dwelling on the future when things were okay now. Well, kind of okay, if you excuse the promise with a demon thing and the betrayal of your siblings. You shake your head as if it would shake those thoughts away too.
“Who are you asking to the party this weekend?”
Atticus sighs, quiet for a moment as if he was debating what to say. "I want to ask Annabeth, but she's probably going to say no.”
You jerk your head back, not expecting him to want to ask her. They barely talked, at least from what you’ve seen. "Annabeth? You like her?"
"... I didn't say I like her. I just said I wanted to ask her to the party,” Atticus stammers a bit, and you squint your eyes. Now it was time for you to call him out using the advantage of feeling his emotions.
"Well, you're asking her because you like her, right?"
"Wrong," Atticus says bluntly, and you press your lips together, amused that he was trying to deny it. Even without feeling his emotions, you were sure you would be able to tell. His crush didn’t surprise you that much.
"Atticus, there's no point in hiding how you feel about her. She's so your type," you turn on your back, feeling Atticus stare at the side of your face.
"As if you know my type," he scoffs and moves to sit up, leaning back on his hands.
"I do."
"Oh, really? what is it?"
"Hermoine Granger," you answer, looking up to see his reaction. You couldn’t see his reaction as he looked out at the lake.
"What?"
"I remember very clearly you saying that if you ever met a girl or guy like Hermoine Granger, you'd want to marry them.” You move to sit up beside him, noticing how his face remains expressionless.
“You cannot tell me, Annabeth isn't exactly like her, besides the magic and the British accent.” The silence that falls between the two of you makes you smile, knowing that you left him without words.
"It doesn't matter! Either way, she's gonna say no," he says, suddenly defensive, and you laugh at his frown.
"You could try?"
"No point. I asked my pendulum if she'd go with me, and it said no. I don't need to be Apollo to know that she's definitely going to reject me," he grumbles, and you sigh, shifting as you fold your legs to cross them.
"Well… we can just hang out together?" You offer, upset that Atticus had felt discouraged. You hadn't thought about the party. It didn’t occur to you that anyone would ask you to go with them either, so you had planned just to drop by and leave early.
Atticus side-eyes you, “just because I'm not asking Annabeth doesn't mean I'm going alone.” His tone was mocking, and your jaw dropped. You can’t believe you just got rejected by your own brother.
"Wow, okay. I'll just go with Lou Ellen then," you stick your tongue out at him, and Atticus smirks,
"Can't. Cecil asked her this morning."
You slouch at the news, and a grunt leaves your lips. You had planned to go alone anyway, so you shrug. "Well then, I'll just go alone.”
"I'm sure someone will ask you. I mean, you're not ugly," Atticus says, not too convincingly, putting his arms up when you narrow your gaze at him.
“Wow, thanks.”
“Guys!” You glance over at the direction of the call, Lou Ellen holding her sneakers in her hands as she rushes over to you. “You wanted to check on the body today, right? We should go now. Mr. D is at the strawberry fields with Pollux and Castor, and I saw Chiron in the stables,” She whispers once she’s close enough. Right. You momentarily forgot about your last obstacle.
“Yeah, let’s go.” Your tone filled with dread as you stand up, patting the sand off your legs.
☆’.・.・:★:・.・.’☆
“Gross,” Lou Ellen mutters as you close the door slowly behind you. You scrunch your face at the sight before you. The figure has fully grown, but its flesh and hair were missing in chunks.
“I mean, it’s growing…” you point out, looking off at the blue-tiled wall beside you.
“Faster than we thought, too,” Atticus adds, gawking at the tub, and he walks over, grimacing at how the red water turned black and thick. “You know, I thought this wasn’t going to work, but we’re actually pulling this off,” he says proudly, and you giggle,
“Don’t speak too soon.”
It was as if the universe had heard your self-praise and decided to pull a joke on you because the moment you finished your sentence, you almost jump out of your skin as the bathroom door swings open, revealing a familiar blonde. You gasp, the three of you lunging from three different corners of the room and huddle close together to block the view of the tub.
Annabeth’s eyes fix on the three of you, not sure what she just saw in the bathtub before you three jump to stand in front of you.
“Hey,” you greet weakly, waving at her, and Annabeth furrows her eyebrows, a look of suspicion taking over her features.
“What is that?” She asks, leaning to the side to try and look past you. You lean to continue blocking her view, along with Atticus and Lou Ellen beside you.
“Nothing! We were just uh, gonna give Harvey a bath!” Atticus says, the ferret squealing on his shoulder as if he was vouching for him. Annabeth doesn’t look convinced, though, your body language telling her that you three were up to something, and she was determined to find out. She steps forward, forcibly cutting through you and Atticus, and you close your eyes in anticipation as you hear her breath get caught at the back of her throat.
“What…” she trails off, not exactly sure what she was looking at. She backs away, her vision shifting from the three of you, and she shakes her head, eyes glazed over in disbelief, “CHIR-”
“SHUSH!” You leap over, covering her mouth, Annabeth’s eyes wide before they cloud over. Before she could strike you, Lou Ellen grabs her arms behind her back, binding her wrists and feet with magic while Atticus flicks his fingers to shut the door and locks it with his telekinesis.
“I’m so sorry,” you apologize hastily, your hand effectively muffling her string of curses. “Incantare: Labia Sigillum,” you recite as she flails her body, trying to get out of the binds with no success.
☆’.・.・:★:・.・.’☆
“We just need you to listen, okay?” You ask Annabeth as she sits on the toilet lid, glaring at you with stormy eyes. You hope she calms down after you explain everything to her. You actually liked Annabeth; she showed you around camp when you had arrived and helped you pick out your dagger. The last thing you needed was to get on her bad side. Because if you did, you knew she wouldn’t go easy on you like Percy when it came to sword fighting.
Lou paces behind you, biting on her fingernails, “We’re so dead. She’s going to tell Chiron!”
Atticus shakes his head, “No, she won’t. Right?” He asks Annabeth. Her persistent glare doesn't make you feel too confident in his assumption. You did not doubt in your mind that Annabeth would go to Chiron if you didn’t have her hostage in the bathroom right now.
“Look, you remember the demon thing we had to cast out of Percy’s cabin… the demon we told Chiron that’s already gone?”
You wait for a response, but you only receive a rolling of her eyes. You take that as a yes, so you continue, “when we tried to cast it away, it possessed me and made me make a deal with him. The deal is if I make him a body, he’ll leave all of us alone; which explains that.” You point to the half wax, half-human sitting up in the tub
Annabeth hesitantly looks over at it before returning her gaze to you. A series of grunts and groans leave her throat as if she’s trying to tell you something.
“If I take the spell off of you, do you promise not to call Chiron?” You ask nervously, and though Annabeth nods, you didn’t quite believe her, but you decide to undo it anyway. Maybe, being the child of the wisdom goddess, she could help you out. Perhaps, give some words of advice.
“Incantare: Contrarium,” you say softly, pointing at her lips. Her dark stare remains as her lips return to normal, the three of you still as you wait for her to speak.
“All of you are idiots,” she snaps after some silence. So much for wise words.
You shift on your feet, opening your mouth to say something, but she cuts you off, “Are you really going to let that thing out into the world?”
“I mean, it’s going to terrorize people regardless,” you trail off as Annabeth gives you a look, telling you you needed to consider everything you’ve been worried about. Of course, you didn’t want to let him loose with a body that opened new possibilities for him. You bite the inside of your cheek as you come to terms with your moral code that’s been bothering you for a few days now.
“I- I can’t back out now! I swore on the River Styx that I’d give him this body,” you tell Annabeth as she shakes her head, the daughter of Athena pondering for a second.
“What did you swear to exactly?”
“I swore that I’d make the body,” you say, and Annabeth squints at you.
“That’s it?”
“Yes...?” You shift under her gaze, her expression unamused and impatient.
“You didn’t promise not to destroy it,” Atticus chimes in, and Annabeth’s eyes flicker over to him.
“Oh, look. He has a brain.” Annabeth smiles sarcastically, and Atticus nods, smiling wide and proud,
“You bet, Goldilocks. I’m actually pretty smart.” The side of your mouth curls at the interaction between the two, finding it funny as Annabeth’s face drops straight.
“Mhm,” Annabeth hums slowly before returning her gaze to you. “Your brother has your solution. Destroy it.”
“But-” you halt, thinking for a second. You couldn’t destroy it now. He’s still in the borders. If he found out that you ruined his body, he’ll quickly take over your body with or without protection. “We’d have to trick him.”
Lou perks up, “we can let him take over the body when it’s ready. We’ll escort him out of camp, and the moment he walks across the border, we can attack him from the other side.”
You turn around, considering her plan, before nodding. “Yeah, yeah! Though it looks like flesh, in its core, it’s still wax. Together we could form a beam of energy hot enough to melt him.”
“And even though his body will be destroyed, he still has to keep his promise,” Atticus adds.
You exchange looks with Lou and Atticus as you smile widely. Though you still held the burden of hiding the body, you felt lighter. At least you didn’t have to keep the guilt of letting him roam free, disguised as a human.
“Congrats! Now, can you let me go?” Annabeth cuts in, and you turn around.
“Oh right, but… you promise not to tell Chiron, right?”
“I won’t tell anyone about this; I promise,” Annabeth says sincerely, and you nod, not seeing any reason to make her swear on the River Styx. You undo the binding spell, Annabeth standing up the moment she was free. She sighs, looking at the three of you one last time before she opens the bathroom door.
“You know, I liked you more than your brother, but now you guys are on the same level,” she narrows her eyes at you, and you frown.
“Sorry," you giggle nervously, catching Atticus’s offended expression,
“Hey!”
☆’.・.・:★:・.・.’☆
You look around, making sure there weren’t any wood nymphs watching you. You had seen them at the farm and in the kitchens making dinner for tonight, but you had to double-check for your peace of mind. Insammon had found a small crevice under Zeus’ fist to hang around in the meantime, and he insisted that while he waited for his body, he needed to be fed. It was like having a pet you didn’t ask for. You just hoped that the wood nymphs don’t take inventory because you’ve been taking whole chickens to Insammon almost every day.
Carefully, you approach the back of the fist, dumping raw chicken out of the plastic supermarket bag right in front of the entrance.
“There,” you grimace before Insammon’s long pale fingers with black nails appear from under the rock and snatch the meat under the stones.
“What’s the status?” He whispers.
“It’s almost done. It’s fully grown, but its flesh hasn’t covered the wax completely. It’s in patches.” The sound of gummy chewing of raw meat suddenly stops before his long face sticks out from under the rocks.
“What do you mean it’s in patches,” he snarls. “You said it would be done in four days!”
“I said it might be done in four days, but it’ll most likely take a week,” you emphasize, annoyed at his impatience.
“You better not be playing games with me, little girl,” he narrows his eyes at you, and your fist clenches at your side.
“Look, I don’t know what to tell you. Spells like this take time. If I could make this process faster, trust me, I would,” you roll your eyes, looking away for a second. You do a double-take as you catch Connor walking in the distance. You bite your lip, throwing the last bits of raw meat you were carrying, along with the bag at Insammon. He hisses at you as a drumstick bounces off his head, but you disregard his reaction. “Look, I have to go,” you tell him hastily. “I’ll come back tomorrow.”
“Whatever,” Insammon growls, too hungry to argue with you, and he swiftly returns into his little cave to enjoy his lunch. You speed walk away from the rocks, not wanting Insammon to hear if Connor called your name. Once you get a good distance, you stroll through the forest as usual. Just as you expected, Connor notices you, and with a call of your name, he is already jogging in your direction.
“Hey Con,” you smile, shoving your hands in your pockets. You look down at the giant black plastic bags in his hands, and you squint. “You’re sneaking contraband into the camp?” You ask, shaking your head as if you disapproved.
“Hey, don’t look at me like that. May I remind you that some of these things are for you?” He teases, pulling out one of the snacks you paid him to get for you.
“Right, I forgot about that," you admit, and Connor chuckles as you take the bag of chips from his hands and open them up.
"You know, I was gonna go look for you," he says, and you tilt your head a little to the side as you munch on the chips in your mouth.
"I'm not pulling another prank with you." You didn't take Connor admitting to looking for you as a good thing. The last thing you wanted was to be a part of his schemes.
Connor laughs, and you’re still wary as he nudges you playfully. "That's not why I was going to look for you.” You squint at him, not too convinced, but as his expression left no traces of his usually mischievous grin, you consider that it was the truth. "I was looking for you because I wanted to ask you if you wanted to go to that party with me on Friday."
You freeze, surprised at his question. You didn't think you'd get asked, especially not from Connor, and you weren't exactly sure what this meant. Connor notices your confusion, and he clears his throat, feeling shy all of a sudden.
"As friends!" He suddenly adds, his hand rubbing the back of his neck sheepishly. "I was going to ask someone else, but she had a date already, and Atticus mentioned you didn't have a date yet. So I thought I'd ask you…”
You nod slowly, feeling a little relieved that he had cleared that up. Connor was like a brother to you; you couldn’t see him any other way.
“But I don't want you to feel like a second choice!” He explains hastily, taking your lack of expression as if he offended you. “And you know, I don't see you like that, and we’re just friends. You're not my type… BUT that's not because you're not pretty. You're really pretty, and I'm surprised no one has asked you yet-"
"Connor, I'll go with you," you agree, amused at his rambling. You giggle at his wide eyes as he processes what you said for a moment. He huffs out shakily, cracking a smile at how nervous he suddenly was around you.
“Oh, great!” He perks up, and you reach over, pushing at his shoulder lightly.
"I know you weren't flirting, but if you got that nervous asking me to a party, you must be wreck around a girl you actually like," you tease, watching Connor’s mouth drop open at your assumption.
He scoffs, "I'm very good at flirting, but thanks for your concern.”
"If you say so," you say sarcastically, and you laugh as he jumps at the opportunity to defend himself.
☆’.・.・:★:・.・.’☆
You switch the sweaty solo cup from one hand to another, sitting on the stone steps of the amphitheater. Social events like these are fun, but after a while, you become drained and eventually need some time to regroup. Ambrose’s head rests on your knee, snorting as you scratch the back of his ear.
“Hm, should we take a walk?” You ask your familiar, placing the solo cup of soda beside you, and you stand up. His wagging tail told you that he didn’t mind a walk right now, so you begin making your way to the exit. Before you leave, you look over and find Connor laughing with his brothers, teasing Travis, who’s talking to Katie Gardner.
Con mentioned that Travis had a little crush on Katie, and you can imagine that he was talking to her now under the persuasion of Connor, of course. You giggle, watching the boys laugh for a moment before turning around and walking with Ambrose.
“Should we go to the docks?” You ask Ambrose, thinking perhaps you could hang out there before you decided to call it a night. The hound beside you barks, and you take that as yes as you change your direction to the water.
Your mind wanders off to what Atticus would say if he saw you ditch the party to sit on the docks. He’d probably tell you that you’re boring.
“Would you really rather stare at water than dance or talk to people?” You could hear his voice asking. To answer that question, yeah, sometimes you would prefer to stare at water than be at a party. Though, it wasn’t like you were miserable. For the first few hours, you were hanging amongst your friends, and you danced with Connor and a few other people, but you eventually went off to sit by yourself as Connor got swept up in the festivities.
When you arrive at the water, you take off your shoes, letting your feet sink in the sand. A cool breeze hits your skin, and you smile, closing your eyes as you take a moment to enjoy it.
You had thought you were alone until you walked along the sand, looking up at seeing Percy sitting at the edge of the dock, eyes fixed at the sky. Your eyes may have lingered at the sight for too long, admiring the way the moonlight illuminates off of Percy’s skin. His lips move as if he was talking to someone, and you assume that he’s praying. You didn’t intend to get his attention, deciding you’d probably sit on the sand for a little before calling it a night. That is until Ambrose barks and rushes over to Percy.
You were just as startled as he was, smiling nervously as his gaze snaps over. As Ambrose’s tail wags erratically, you shake your head amused. Though Ambrose was hostile to Percy at first, it didn’t take long for him to warm up to him, especially after staying over in his cabin. If Ambrose could touch him, he’d probably be all over him, especially as he jumps up only for his paws to go right through Percy’s body.
“Hey, buddy,” you hear Percy say as you walk over, his eyes meeting yours once you step on the dock.
“Fancy seeing you here,” you say playfully, and Percy smiles,
“I’m starting to think you’re following me,” he jokes. Amongst your first meeting, you’ve had a couple of other run-ins with him at night on the docks. There were always coincidences. But you did find yourself hoping that you would see him there on the nights you decided to hang out there.
You giggle and shake your head, sitting beside him at the end of the dock. “You’ve caught me,” you say sarcastically, making a soft chuckle come from Percy. Leaning back on your hands, you look out at the crescent moon in the sky.
“Sorry if Ambrose interrupted anything. He was excited to see you, obviously,” you giggle as Ambrose breathes heavily, his head in between your bodies as he looks at Percy with cheerful eyes.
“It’s okay.” Percy laughs at Ambrose, finding him to be cute after looking past him resembling a baby bear at times. His eyes scan over Ambrose’s features, and he hums, “I wish I could touch him, though.”
“I mean, I could make that happen,” you mention, and Percy perks up with interest. “I just need something from your body to offer it to his soul.”
“Like a shirt?”
“More like blood or hair,” you clarify, Percy’s expression flashing with shock, which sends your chest bubbling with laughter.
“Really?” He gawks at you, not sure if you were joking or not.
“Yeah, it’s a commitment, so you should probably think about it. You shouldn’t give your blood or hair to just anyone, especially not a witch,” you joke, and he scrunches his face.
“You’re scaring me,” he says with a slight smile on his face. “Will you hex me? Make a voodoo doll?”
“Only if you give me a good enough reason to. But in the meantime, I’d just put it on Ambrose’s little altar. After I do, he’ll be able to touch you like a normal dog. It's your choice.”
“I’ll think about it, but I think petting Ambrose would be worth it.” Percy nods, watching Ambrose as the hound lays his head on your shoulder.
“The slobber is a bonus. You’d be crazy to give it up.”
Percy’s eyes glint at your sarcasm. “You’re right. You might get a piece of my hair soon, firefly.”
You smile, head tilting a little to the left as you take notice of the nickname he had given you.
“Firefly?”
“Yeah, when you do magic, you glow. It’s cool,” Percy nudges you, and you scoff. “What? Do you not like it? Are you jealous that it’s more creative than water boy,” he teases.
Your jaw drops open, eyes bright as he insults your nickname for him. His nickname was better than yours, but you couldn’t admit that out loud. “Please, I could come up with a better nickname for you if I wanted to.”
“Oh really? Then what would it be?” He challenges. You’re still for a second as you try to think of another nickname for him. Percy’s amused stare is hard to ignore, his smile so bright you swore it glowed in the moonlight. The longer you’re silent, you press your lips, refusing to give in to how contagious his smile is.
“Puddles,” you blurt out, surprised when Percy bursts into laughter.
“Where did that even come from?” He chokes out, and you shift, suddenly feeling defensive.
“Anything that has to do with water seems like an appropriate nickname for you- why are you laughing?!” Percy’s face turns pink as his laughter echoes into the distance, and you couldn’t help but join him.
“No-nothing! It was just the last thing I’d expect you to say. I thought you were going to say something like Aquaman or Captain Saltwater.” The side of your lip curls into a smirk, and you shrug,
“I mean, I could call you Captain Saltwater.”
“Call me that, and I’ll call you the necromancer,” Percy threatens playfully, and you scrunch your nose, shaking your head at the nickname.
“Fair enough, puddles,” you say, trying not to focus on the butterflies in your stomach as he nods,
“Good choice, firefly.”
“I’m glad that you’re spending time flirting with your boyfriend instead of making my body,” a voice cuts in, and you gasp, turning around and seeing Insammon standing at the beginning of the pier.
“Woah,” Percy mutters, the hair on his arms sticking up as his mind can hardly process Insammon’s exaggerated human features. Ambrose growls, his body alert, and you quickly stand up, Percy doing the same. You move in front of him, annoyed that Insammon would dare to show himself out in the open like this.
“I told you already. Spells like this take time-”
“That was two days ago. I’m bored!” He complains, his bulging eyes roll, and your fist clenches, eyes averting to make sure no one else is around. To your relief, you three were alone.
“Too bad! I need at least another day or two!”
“Two?” Insammon asks with a chuckle, but it wasn’t from amusement. His legs clank as he begins to approach you, Ambrose’s growl grows louder and more threatening. “Listen, little girl.” His tone deepens as he narrows his gaze at you. “I am not a force to be reckoned with. I want that body now or else. Should I remind you what’s at stake?” He asks, not waiting for your answer as black vapor begins to swallow him whole. You feel goosebumps rise on your skin as he surrounds his body and shrinks into a ball as it did the night you tried to cast him away.
“Protego rotundus!” You shout, everything going in slow motion as Insammon contracts in a ball of vapor and shoots himself toward you. A sinking feeling fills your gut, worrying that you had cast the spell too late but the white translucent dome forms around you and Percy fast, deflecting Insammon as it sends him flying backward. The cloud of vapor crashes back where he stood before dispersing and revealing Insammon’s true form again.
A feral snarl leaves his mouth, his eyes bulging so much out of his head that you half expected it to pop out and roll on the floor. You gulp as a shrill laugh come from his lips,
“So quick-witted. I must admit I admire it, but I’m still impatient,” Insammon growls.
“I already told you! It’s not finished!” You argue, holding the dome for as long as you could.
“Fine! Then I’ll need to quench my boredom. Should I perhaps attack one of your friends in the Amphitheater? Most of them don’t have those fancy domes,” he points out before turning around, eyes looking in the direction of the Amphitheater. “... what do you think?”
“You can’t!”
“I can’t?”
“No, you’ll break your promise,” you say, and he furrowed his eyebrows,
“I said I would leave everyone you know alone on the agreement that I get a body from you,” he explains with a clenched jaw.
“No, it was on the agreement that I make a body for you. I’ve already started making it so you’ll be pushing the terms,” you protest, and he squints at you, thinking for a second.
“It’s not completely made yet.”
“It wasn’t specified that you’d keep your promise after it was completely made. But sure, would you like to challenge the terms? You’ll probably only get thrown into Tartarus for a few thousand years.” You cross your arms over your chest. “Who knows? I may have saved you by casting this spell.”
Insammon scoffs, shifting uncomfortably as he considers your point. “Tomorrow. That’s the longest I’m willing to wait.”
“Fine. If you want to walk amongst the mortals with half a face, then who am I to argue?” You watch as his face clouds wickedly, and he points a finger at you.
“You’re pushing it, little girl,” he warns as the vapor takes over his body again, and he disappears right before your eyes.
The white dome retracts, your eyes scanning the area to see if he had left for real. “You know…” You cut through the silence that fell after his departure. “Maybe the necromancer is a good nickname for me,” you comment, looking over at a pale Percy.
“Yeah,” he chuckles nervously, still shaken from what he had seen. “Seems like they like you.”
☆’.・.・:★:・.・.’☆
“I don’t like it.”
“What do you mean, you don’t like it?!” You shout, Insammon standing in front of the tub with his arms crossed and his face contorts into a pout.
“Dude, it has everything you asked for,” Atticus argues, pointing at the body in the tub.
“I just don’t like it!”
“Well, too bad! Get into it and get out. We don’t have time for this,” Lou Ellen whispers, opening the bathroom door and peeking into the hallway to see if the lights of the big house were still turned off. The three of you cut dinner to take Insammon to the big house while everyone was in the dining pavilion. You had hoped you could get back before anyone noticed you were gone.
“I’ll trap you again to make sure I get a new one,” Insammon proclaims, pointing a finger at you.
You roll your eyes, picking up the clothes you stole from Mr. D’s room off of the counter. “We’ll wait for you outside of the door. Rinse yourself off and put this on.”
“THIS?”
You and Atticus exchange a look before you shove the outfit into Insammon’s chest. “Yes, this!” Insammon makes a sound close to a gag as he holds the outfit away from him as if it were toxic.
“A Hawaiian shirt and… KHAKIS? I’m offended that you dare demand that I put this on!”
“Well, you can change into better clothes when you’re out of here.” You give him a fake smile before grabbing Atticus’s hand. “So hurry up,” you urge before the three of you funnel out of the bathroom and close the door behind you.
Lou Ellen paces in front of the bathroom, and you bite your lip, furrowing your eyebrows at how silent it became in the bathroom. For the past 10 minutes, you heard an array of noises; the water from the shower, some bumps, and bangs as Insammon clumsily washes himself off and figures out how to put his clothes on. You tap your foot, wondering why he was so quiet, and lift your arm to knock on the door before you hear a loud groan.
“Ugh! I look like an American tourist,” he proclaims dramatically, and you roll your eyes, realizing the reason why he was so quiet was because he was checking himself out in the mirror.
“Who knew demons cared so much about self-image,” Lou Ellen grumbles as finally, after what felt like forever, Insammon opens the door, revealing himself with his new body. You preferred this appearance better than his true form.
“You do look like an American tourist,” Atticus snorts, and both you and Lou Ellen send him a glare, making him put his arms up in defense. “He said it first!”
“Just get me out of here. The faster I leave, the sooner I get better clothes. If you can even call these clothes,” he rolls his eyes and pushes past you.
Atticus slaps his hand over his mouth, and you press your lips together as you watch the other walk. The clanky walking turned into a wide step with knees too bent and feet turned out. A whimper leaves Lou Ellen’s throat as she refrains from laughing, especially as he halts at the stairs.
“How do you walk on such a thing?” He asks, pointing at the stairs, and you exchange looks with your siblings, hoping that teaching him how to get down the stairs isn’t going to take too long.
Long story short, Insammon marked a significant milestone as a human: he took his first fall. As his body plummeted down the stairs after missing a step, you, Atticus, and Lou Ellen lost your breath in silent laughter. The three of you had tears in your eyes as you attempted to conceal your laughter as a groaning Insammon clumsily got back on his feet.
“You regret being a human now?” Atticus comments as he walks down the rest of the stairs, you and Lou Ellen following close behind him.
“Shut up,” Insammon snaps. “Get me out of this glorified daycare. I’m tired of being here.”
You roll your eyes, leaning him out of the back door of the big house and making your way straight into the forest. The commute was uncomfortably quiet, the three of you not wanting to be suspicious. Even though you had discussed your plan before he had arrived, you were still nervous about it.
“So, what are your plans once you get out there?” Atticus asks, attempting to make some small talk, and Insammon hums, contemplating his choices now that he was a human.
“I will find new clothing first,” he declares, still bothered at what he was wearing. “But after that, I will find my next target,” he smiles wickedly.
“Sounds like a good time,” Atticus says, and you make eye contact with the other, immediately sensing his anxiety as it added to your own. He smiles softly, though, silently communicating to you that everything will be fine, and you hesitantly return the smile as you eventually arrive at the camp entrance.
Insammon walks across and turns around, looking at the three of you. You, Lou Ellen, and Atticus make sure to remain within the camp borders just as planned. “Well, this is where we leave you. Just keep walking straight, and you’ll reach the road,” you explain while giving him a fake smile.
“I refuse to thank you for your service since you did a horrible job. I will not miss you, nor do I care about you, so I will simply say, hmm, goodbye,” he proclaims, and you press your lips together, nodding your head,
“Uh... okay.”
He gives you a satisfied look before facing the rest of the forest. Your pulse thumped loud in your ears, and you grabbed Lou Ellen and Atticus’s hand. Together, you took a deep breath, your auras seeping out of your bodies and fusing into a giant orb right in front of you. You bite your lip, getting the sphere almost as big as Insammon’s body while the other mindlessly walks into the forest, too busy making sure he doesn’t trip over the tree roots and branches. But as the orb grew and the colors swirled wildly amongst themselves, the light illuminated further and further, catching Insammon’s attention right before it was done.
“What is this? What are you-?!”
“NOW!” You shout, releasing the tug in your core, and with your will, you send the beam right into Insammon. He fails to lunge out of the way in time, his reflexes slow as he’s still unadjusted to his new body. A scream of agony and anger, mostly anger, cuts through the stillness of the night as the heat of your orb engulfs him, melting right into the wax, and soon he topples over, his screams ceasing as the orb of light fades. It was quiet for a moment; the only sound you could hear was your pulse, and you opened your mouth to say something before Insammon suddenly appeared in his true form.
“How dare you, you little brat!” He shouts, stomping right to you. “I will possess you again, not to take over your body but to KILL YOU!” You step back, flinching as Insammon collides with the borders of the camp. He growls in frustration, banging on the wall with his lanky arms, a blue ring forming around every hit.
“You’ll die trying,” you remind him. “But if you’re so keen on going to Tartarus, we could send you there ourselves.” You’re unphased at the strained face of anger that flashed over his features. The bulged eyes, the wide mouth, the way his pale skin has turned a tint of pink.
The adrenaline of your success kicks in as your siblings begin to chant the banishing spell, and you chant with them—Insammon, too eager to get to you, kicks and growls against the borders.
You knew he was too weak to shift into his shadow self. He hadn’t fed off anyone’s fears in a week, and possessing that body and yours took a lot of strength. You couldn’t help but smile as you approached the end of your chant, watching as he began to shrink, using his last bit of energy to bang on the borders and yell threats that he’d never be able to fulfill.
“Bye-bye,” you kneel in front of him, your smile genuine this time.
“Curse you,” he strains as your siblings yell the sentence that ends all of your spells.
“So mote it be,” you join, watching as he disperses into ash with one last scream, and you sigh in satisfaction before standing back up.
It was silent for a moment, and you turned to your siblings with a smile on your face. Atticus stretches out both of his arms, and hands clenched into fists, “Pound it!” He shouts, and you and Lou Ellen giggle, pounding your knuckles into his.
“Now that that’s over, let’s go see if Percy saved us food,” Lou giggles, and you nod,
“Gah, I hope so. I’m starving.” Atticus nods in agreement, and you circle your arms around both of them, pulling them close to your side.
“That was pretty awesome,” Atticus says, the three of you beaming now that that whole ordeal was solved.
“Ha! I know! I told you we’d get this sorted out!” Lou Ellen declares.
“Actually, Y/n said everything would work out. You were the pessimistic one,” Atticus points out, and Lou Ellen scoffs,
“I’m not pessimistic! I’m just cautious!”
“You weren’t very cautious when you almost singed my eyebrow hairs when we were practicing our beams earlier this summer!”
“You were in the way!”
“I was behind you! I couldn’t have been more out of your way!”
You giggle as you listen to the two bickers back and forth. While walking with them side by side back to camp, you find your mind faltering to all of your worries a few weeks ago and your grief towards losing your guides in your magic. As you take in Lou Ellen and Atticus, you realize that your fear of being lost had been foolish. The three of you were more than capable, working as one to cast spells that you’ve never done before with ease. And with the relief of getting rid of Insammon comes the comfort of you accepting that you, Lou, and Atticus will be just fine without your brothers.
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