So there we were, standing awkwardly in the corridor of the Big House at five in the morning, thinking about what constitutes a miracle.
Want a recap? Here's what I had.
Luke poisoned the tree.
Right. Yes. Elder python venom. Pit scorpion. Deliberate.
The Fleece healed it.
Yes. That was the whole point of Clarise's entire summer.
The Fleece overshot.
Healed the poison and kept going. Healed the TREE. Healed what was IN the tree. Brought back a girl who has been a pine for seven years.
Which —
Hang on.
HANG ON.
For that to happen —
The tree had to be poisoned.
Which means Luke had to poison it.
Which means someone had to TELL Luke to poison it.
And that someone —
My brain, running very slow calculations at five in the morning, got there eventually.
That someone wins EITHER WAY.
Fleece doesn't come back: the tree dies, the boundary falls, camp is crippled going into a war.
Fleece DOES come back: tree healed, camp celebrates, everyone calls it a miracle —
And a daughter of Zeus who has been frozen at fifteen for seven years climbs out of it.
A daughter of Zeus.
Who hasn't turned sixteen yet.
Who is one of the eldest.
Who now exists in the world at exactly the moment a war is building that a very old, very patient someone has been engineering for years.
Oh, I thought.
Oh that is CLEVER.
Oh I hate that that is CLEVER.
"You have no idea how right you are," Chiron's face said, without Chiron's face moving at all.
Which was not, as it turns out, a comforting thing for a face to say at five in the morning.
Chirons Office
His office had the lamp on.
Outside, the camp was asleep like it had earned it. Which it had.
I had apparently not.
I sat in the chair across from Chiron's desk. The one with the short left leg. I'd been in this chair enough times to know to sit forward. You'd think after everything Chiron would have fixed the chair.
He hadn't fixed the chair.
"That wasn't a miracle," I said.
"No," Chiron said. "It wasn't."
"Luke poisoned the tree."
"Yes."
"The Fleece healed it."
"Yes."
"The Fleece overshot," I said. "Too thorough. It didn't just heal the poison — it healed everything the tree was holding." I looked at him. "That was planned."
Chiron's hands folded on the desk.
He said nothing.
"He wins if the Fleece doesn't come back," I said. "Tree dies. Boundary falls. Camp goes into the war crippled." I looked at him. "He wins if the Fleece DOES come back. Tree heals. Camp celebrates. And a daughter of Zeus who has been frozen at fifteen for seven years walks out of it." I stopped. "Two candidates for the prophecy instead of one. Two targets. Two problems for Olympus to manage. He wins either way."
Chiron looked at his hands.
"Yes," he said quietly. "He does."
"So this wasn't an accident."
"No."
"The overshoot wasn't a variable he missed."
"No."
"He built for it."
"...yes," Chiron said. With the weight of someone who has known this for longer than he wanted to.
He reached into the desk drawer.
Old paper. The kind with weight to it beyond what paper should have. He set it on the desk.
"The Great Prophecy," he said. "All of it."
I looked at it.
Then at him.
"Chiron—"
"Read it."
I picked it up.
Chiron's handwriting. Something about the ink made the letters sit heavier than letters had a right to, like they were pressing down on the page rather than sitting on it.
A half-blood of the eldest gods
Shall reach sixteen against all odds
And see the world in endless sleep
The hero's soul, the cursed blade shall reap
A single choice shall end his days
Olympus to preserve or raze
I read it.
Then read it again because I was fairly certain I'd misread something the first time.
I hadn't.
Set it down.
Eldest gods.
Okay. Big Three. Zeus. Poseidon. Hades. Fine. Normal. Moving on.
Shall reach sixteen.
I sat back. The chair rocked on the short leg. I didn't correct it.
Percy, I thought. Thirteen. Turning fourteen next month. Sixteen is — I did the maths — two full years away. Two YEARS.
"Percy," I said.
"Yes," Chiron said.
Two years. Right. Fine. Okay.
I looked at the paper again.
The hero's soul, the cursed blade shall reap.
I looked at that line for a moment.
Then looked up.
"Chiron," I said. "Who else is fifteen."
The room went very quiet.
"She was fifteen when she became the tree," Chiron said carefully. "Seven years and she's still—"
"Fifteen," I said.
"Yes."
I stared at him.
"She's been a TREE," I said.
"Yes."
"For SEVEN YEARS."
"Yes."
"And she still COUNTS—"
"The prophecy," Chiron said, with the patience of someone who has explained impossible things to teenagers for three thousand years, "does not particularly care about extenuating circumstances."
I looked at the paper.
Looked at Chiron.
"Two candidates," I said.
"Two candidates," Chiron confirmed.
"Both alive. Both Big Three. Both reaching sixteen."
"Yes."
"One of them JUST WOKE UP FROM BEING A TREE."
"Also yes."
"And she already knows," I said. "About the prophecy. That it's about Big Three children."
"She does. Yes."
I sat with that.
"Does Percy know any of this?"
"No."
I looked at the paper one more time.
The hero's soul, the cursed blade shall reap.
"One of them dies," I said. Not a question.
Chiron didn't answer.
Which was answer enough.
"Luke is somewhere out there with an army and now there are two Big Three children who could be the one this prophecy lands on." I turned. "And the prophecy has been known for a long time. Long enough for someone to build a war around shaping it. Bending it. Making it serve the fall of Olympus instead of Olympus's survival." I looked at Chiron. "Luke. Chosen because he's Hermes' son. Not the eldest. Doesn't qualify. The perfect weapon — powerful enough to do real damage, completely outside the prophecy's reach."
"Yes," Chiron said. With the weight of someone who has known this longer than I have been alive.
"That's not recruitment," I said. "That's engineering."
Silence.
Then Chiron looked at me.
"I'm going to tell you about Luke."
The Backstory
A boy, maybe nine years old. A mother driven mad by a divine connection she never asked for — Hermes, god of messengers and thieves and roads and many things, who had looked at a mortal woman, made choices, and left the consequences entirely with her. A child who grew up watching his mother receive visions meant for someone else, watching her mind come apart from it, watching his father never come.
Not fail to reach out.
Never come.
Nine years old. Already carrying that.
Then the streets. The running. Thalia — daughter of Zeus, twelve years old, furious and electric and already half-mythic. Annabeth — seven years old, running from her stepfamily, arriving at this boy's side like the universe had flung her there.
Three kids. No adults. Every monster on the eastern seaboard smelling divine blood.
"They lasted two years," Chiron said. "Running. Surviving. Luke was the oldest. Had been on his own the longest. He kept a seven year old and a twelve year old alive through things that should have killed all of them."
I didn't say anything.
"Thalia died on that hill so the other two could reach the barrier," Chiron said. "Annabeth got to camp. Luke got to camp." He stopped. "Luke walked through those gates knowing Thalia had stayed so they could leave."
The lamp. The dark outside.
"He quested at seventeen," Chiron said. "His father gave him a task. The garden of the Hesperides. Retrieve one of the golden apples. A real quest — the first proper one in years." A pause. "Ladon nearly killed him. He has the scar on his face from it. Came back empty-handed anyway. And his father—" Chiron stopped. "His father said nothing. Not hard words. Not disappointment. Nothing. The silence of a god who had already moved on to something else."
The scar.
I had noticed it. Of course I'd noticed it. You didn't spend time at camp with someone and miss the scar that ran nearly the full length of his face. I'd assumed battle. I hadn't assumed this.
"That was the crack," Chiron said. "Not ideology. Not ambition. Just — a boy who kept faith for years in a father who never came, who nearly died completing a task that father gave him and received nothing back. Not even acknowledgment." He looked up. "I believe the ancient one found him not long after. Didn't offer power. Offered a reason. A framework where everything that had happened to Luke made sense. Where the gods were not absent fathers but a broken system. Where the anger had somewhere to go."
I sat with that.
The lamp flickered.
"I'm not asking you to forgive him," Chiron said. "What Luke has done is real and the cost of it is real and the people who died at Alcatraz are real." He looked at me steadily. "But I want you to understand the full shape of it. Because you will encounter him again."
I looked at the paper on the desk.
A single choice shall end his days.
"Luke's in there," I said.
Chiron said nothing.
"Backbiter," I said. "Celestial bronze and steel. Kills gods and mortals both. The cursed blade."
Chiron said nothing.
Answer enough.
I stood up.
"I want to go after him," I said.
"The score between us—"
"I know."
"Alcatraz—"
"I know," Chiron said. Steady. "And no."
I opened my mouth.
"You don't know where he is," Chiron said. Not unkindly. Like someone going through a prepared checklist. "No intelligence on position. No information on what he has around him. Say you found him somehow — tracked him— Then what?"
"Then—"
"At Alcatraz," Chiron said, "there were two hundred monsters. And Perses."
"Perses is under rubble—"
"Perses is a Titan. Titans don't stay under rubble. And if not Perses, something else." He looked at me steadily. "Do you genuinely believe Luke Castellan is unprotected?"
Silence.
"Alcatraz worked because you had the element of surprise," Chiron said. "Even on the Andromeda—The Party Ponies. Multiple pieces hitting simultaneously. Percy's end as distraction. All of that and we STILL barely got them out." He let that sit. "And you want to go alone. Against a prepared position. Against someone who has had months to rebuild and is specifically expecting you."
He was right.
I hated it with everything I had and he was completely, structurally, unarguably right.
"The camp is still recovering," Chiron said. Quieter now. Not the trainer. Something older. "And so are you, whether or not you'll admit it. You have been running at full capacity since the day you arrived. Three nights on a guard post. New York before that. The quest before that." He looked at me. "You will burn yourself hollow and then make a catastrophic mistake because you were empty when it mattered. I would very much prefer not to lose you."
I looked at him.
He meant it. The three thousand years of it sat plainly on his face.
I opened my mouth.
"I will ban your training," Chiron said pleasantly, "and take the sword."
My mouth closed.
We looked at each other.
"Good," he said, and reached for something on his desk like we hadn't just spent an hour discussing the shape of an entire war.
I stared at him.
He was making a note.
An actual note. With a pen. On paper. Calm as anything.
"Now," he said. "Are you staying after summer or returning to the city?"
I opened my mouth.
Closed it.
"I — what?"
"After summer," Chiron said patiently. "Staying at camp or returning to the city. It's a straightforward question."
"You just told me someone is going to DIE—"
"Yes."
"The PROPHECY—"
"Still there, yes."
"And you're asking me about my SUMMER PLANS?"
"It's a relevant logistical question," Chiron said. Completely unbothered. Making another note.
I stared at him for three full seconds.
"Staying," I said. "Obviously staying."
"Good." He nodded. "Thalia is newly returned. Fifteen. Strong. Seven years of pine tree would make her rusty — she'll need someone at a comparable level to train against." He looked at his paper. "You'd serve well as a whetstone."
Silence.
"...a whetstone," I said.
"Mm." He made another note. Very focused on the note.
"Chiron."
"Yes?"
"A WHETSTONE."
"It's an important—"
"YOU CALLED ME A ROCK."
"I called you a—"
"A WHETSTONE IS A ROCK. You looked at me — ME — after everything — the Alcatraz, Perses, New York, ALL of it — and you thought: you know what that boy is? GEOLOGY."
"That's not quite—"
"I have a SWORD. I have DIVINE ARMOUR. I fought a TITAN—"
"And you'd make an excellent whetstone," Chiron said pleasantly.
"I — you—" I stopped. Breathed. "She was a TREE."
"She was."
"FORTY MINUTES AGO she was a TREE."
"Approximately, yes."
"And I'm the WHETSTONE—"
"A valued—"
"DO NOT SAY VALUED WHETSTONE—"
"I was going to say valued asset—"
"YOU WERE NOT—"
"You're right," Chiron said serenely. "I was going to say valued whetstone."
I stood up.
Sat back down.
Stood up again.
"I cannot," I said. "I genuinely cannot. You drop the Great Prophecy on me, tell me someone's going to die, threaten to take my sword, and then — WHETSTONE. Like that's a normal sentence. Like that's a thing a person says."
"It is a thing I said," Chiron confirmed.
"WHY ARE YOU LIKE THIS—"
"Get some sleep," he said. "Breakfast in three hours." He nodded toward the window. "The arena will be useful today."
I looked at him for a long moment.
Then I walked out.
The door closed behind me.
I stood on the Big House porch in the last dark before morning and made a solemn, binding, eternal vow.
Never again, I thought. Not one on one. Not in that office. NEVER. The man is a MENACE. You go in there with a completely legitimate strategic concern and you come out having been informed that you are a sharpening implement for someone who was WOOD forty minutes ago. He tells you about a prophecy where someone dies and asks about your summer plans in the same breath. He threatens to confiscate your sword — YOUR sword, the one Beckendorf made, the one that split the practice post clean through — and then has the audacity to call you GEOLOGY and sit there looking like a distinguished immortal educator while you malfunction in real time. Three thousand years old. Three THOUSAND. And he's in there right now making NOTES. About WHETSTONES. I need to lie down.
I went and slept for two hours.
Then I went to the arena.
ARENA
Here is what the arena contained at full morning:
Percy Jackson — son of Poseidon, thirteen years old, flagbearer of a prophecy he didn't know existed yet.
Clarisse La Rue — daughter of Ares, carrier of a spear, and a personal philosophy that could be summarised as hit first, establish dominance, hit first again just to be sure.
And me.
The Fates' least favourite administrative error. Still technically classified as a whetstone. Running on the knowledge that the entire shape of a war had been explained to me before sunrise and there was absolutely nothing I could do about any of it before breakfast.
I walked in.
Nobody looked concerned.
I decided not to be the one to bring it up.
Percy was at the central ring doing footwork drills. Clarisse was across from him, spear out, watching his footwork with the expression of someone identifying specific problems they intended to fix violently.
I went to the equipment wall.
Clarisse saw me.
"Oh WONDERFUL," she said. "The sun decided to rise twice today."
"Morning, Clarisse," I said. "You look like you slept in your armour again."
"I sleep PERFECTLY—"
"The indent on your cheek says otherwise—"
"THAT IS A BATTLE SCAR—"
"From WHAT, the pillow?"
"I will END you—"
"You say that every morning—"
"ONE DAY I WILL MEAN IT—"
"You mean it every morning too—"
Percy, still doing footwork, not looking up: "It's 8 AM."
Neither of us acknowledged this.
"Those chariot spikes yesterday," I said. "Very tasteful. Very subtle. Really captured the spirit of friendly competition."
Clarisse's eyes went dangerous. "Those spikes were REGULATION—"
"Regulation for WHAT, a siege—"
"TRACK RULES—"
"That you wrote—"
"I CONTRIBUTED to the writing of the rules, there is a PROCESS—"
"The process being that you wrote them and made Silena sign them—"
"Silena has EXCELLENT judgement—"
"Silena will agree with anything if you look at her long enough—"
"THAT IS CALLED LEADERSHIP—"
Percy, quietly, to nobody: "I just wanted to do footwork drills."
Clarisse pointed the spear at me.
Not threateningly. Just — pointed it. The way you point at something you've made a decision about.
"You," she said. "Ring. Now."
I looked at my sword. Looked at the ring. Looked at Clarisse.
"No Kavach," I said.
She paused.
"Just the sword. You get spear and shield. Straight fight."
Something shifted in her face. The thing that happened when something was actually interesting to her.
"Fine," she said.
We both looked at Percy.
Percy looked back at us.
"No," he said.
"Percy—"
"I'm not officiating—"
"Someone has to count the touches—"
"I'm TRAINING—"
"Percy," Clarisse said. "Officiator. Now."
"I don't want to—"
"PERCY."
"This always ends with someone bleeding and me having to explain it to Chiron—"
"Then don't explain it to Chiron," I said reasonably.
"That's not—"
"Percy," Clarisse said. "If you don't officiate I will tell everyone about the Apollo cabin incident."
Percy's mouth closed.
He walked to the edge of the ring.
"First to three touches," he said, with the energy of a man accepting his fate. "No Kavach, no armour—"
"Real blades," Clarisse said.
"Real blades," I agreed.
Percy looked at both of us.
"I want it on record," he said, "that I objected."
"Noted," I said.
"Overruled," Clarisse said.
Percy pinched the bridge of his nose.
We went to the ring.
Clarisse settled into her stance across from me.
Spear forward. Shield up. The grip she used when she wasn't messing around — knuckles white, elbow in, weight balanced.
I had the sword.
We looked at each other.
"You know," I said conversationally, "for someone who spent yesterday pouting over your loss, you look remarkably confident."
"That was a CHARIOT RACE—"
"BEGIN," Percy said, with the tone of someone who had given up.
I moved first.
The overhead came down HARD — full commitment, both hands, the kind of swing that didn't ask questions. Clarisse's spear came UP to block it and the CLANG rang across the entire arena like a bell.
Her arms buckled.
Both of them. Visibly. Her back foot skidded in the dirt and she went back six inches just from the force.
She held.
But only just.
"Huh," I said.
Clarisse's eyes said several things. None of them polite.
"New sword," I said helpfully. "Beckendorf made it. Lovely weight."
"I NOTICED," she said, through her teeth, already resetting.
"You're welcome for the demonstration—"
She came.
FAST.
The spear drove at my throat in a short diagonal and then pulled and came AGAIN at my left side before I'd finished tracking the first and then AGAIN at my knee — rapid-fire, each thrust a completely different angle, not the patterns I'd mapped from watching her train, something rawer and faster and MEANER—
I scrambled.
There is no better word for it. I scrambled. Knocked the first aside, twisted from the second, jumped the third and the fourth caught the back of my calf and stung considerably.
"TOUCH," Percy said, sounding mildly surprised.
"ONE NIL," Clarisse announced.
"I NOTICED—"
"How's the calf?"
"FINE—"
"You sure? You're doing a little hop—"
"I AM NOT HOPPING—"
"It's okay," she said pleasantly. "Some people hop. When they get hit."
"I will—"
"What?" She was already resetting, spear up, the almost-smile doing something dangerous to her face. "Come on then, sunshine. Show me what Beckendorf's lovely new sword can do."
Percy, still quietly: "I genuinely cannot believe either of you."
I reset.
She wanted the overhead again. I could see it in the way she'd repositioned — shield angled slightly higher, weight shifted to absorb the force this time, spear arm already coiling for a sweeping counter. She'd felt the strength once and built a response to it in thirty seconds flat.
Ares' kid. Of course she had.
Fine.
I wound up.
BIG. Obvious. The kind of overhead that announced itself three steps out — shoulders dropping, both hands going back, everything telegraphing here it comes, here it comes, HERE IT—
Clarisse's spear came around in a wide sweeping arc, low and fast, aimed at my legs — not blocking the overhead, COUNTERING it, taking out my base while I was committed—
I dropped the swing.
Just — dropped it. Killed the momentum completely. Let gravity do the work instead, sword planting DOWN into the path of the sweeping spear.
CLANG.
The spear hit the blade and the impact drove both weapons toward the ground.
The spear kept going downward.
I moved my boot.
PLANTED it on the shaft.
Full weight. Right behind the head. The spear hit the dirt and I was already standing on it and Clarisse was still in the follow-through of her swing with nothing useful in hand and her balance slightly wrong and—
Sword came up.
Flat.
Her throat.
Silence.
Clarisse looked at the sword.
Looked at her spear under my boot.
Looked at me.
"ONE ALL," I said pleasantly. "How's the spear?"
A sound came out of Clarisse that was not quite a word.
"You're doing a little twitch," I said. "In the jaw. Is that new?"
"I'm going to—"
"What? You were going to say something earlier too and then you stabbed my calf four times instead, so I'm genuinely curious how this sentence ends—"
"REMOVE. YOUR. BOOT."
"In a moment. I'm comfortable."
"ADITYA—"
"The grip on your shield arm has gone white again," I observed. "That can't be good for circulation—"
"PERCY," Clarisse said, very controlled, very quiet. "Call. The. Touch."
Percy was staring at my boot on the spear.
He looked up.
"I—" He stopped. "How did you—"
"Percy."
"The overhead was a feint," Percy said, mostly to himself. "He dropped it and used the— and then the boot—" He blinked. "ONE ALL," he announced, with the slightly distant voice of someone still working through the geometry.
I removed my boot.
Clarisse retrieved her spear.
We looked at each other.
"Best of three," she said.
"That was already the agreement."
"I'm confirming it."
"Confirmed," I said.
We reset for the third bout.
One all. Deciding touch. The arena had gone properly quiet now — everyone had stopped pretending to train about thirty seconds into bout one and nobody had bothered resuming the pretence since. Fifteen campers standing around the ring with the specific energy of people who had cancelled their morning plans.
Clarisse rolled her shoulders. Adjusted her grip. Her jaw had stopped twitching which meant she was past the anger and into the cold place, the Ares-cabin place, the place where she got genuinely dangerous.
I rolled my wrist. Felt the sword settle.
Third bout. No feints this time. Just—
A sound.
From the arena entrance.
The sound of very large hooves on stone, moving with the casual confidence of something that went where it wanted and had never seriously entertained the concept of being told otherwise.
I turned.
Percy turned.
Clarisse turned.
Standing in the arena entrance — jet black, wings folded against his sides with the relaxed attitude of someone dropping by casually — was the most magnificent horse I had ever seen in my life.
He looked around the arena.
Found Percy.
The whole enormous head swung toward him with the focused devotion of a creature who had decided Percy Jackson was the most important being in the known world and was simply living in that truth.
Percy's face did something immediate and completely involuntary.
"Blackjack," he said.
And then Percy — son of Poseidon, candidate for the most important prophecy in a generation, the person who was responsible for a deciding touch — just. Walked out of the ring.
Completely.
Just walked over to the pegasus like the bout wasn't happening. Like the ring didn't exist. Like Clarisse wasn't standing there with a spear and murder in her eyes.
"Hey, buddy," he said. Reached up. Started scratching behind the pegasus's ear.
The pegasus made a sound of pure contentment and leaned into it like a very large cat.
I stared.
The pegasus was jet black. Not dark brown, not dark grey — BLACK. The kind of black that made the morning light look like it was being absorbed. The wings were folded but you could see the span of them, the structure, the specific architecture of something built for actual flight rather than decoration.
Those eyes.
Dark. Intelligent. Completely unbothered by being in an arena full of people.
That, my brain said, going very quiet and very focused, is the single coolest thing I have ever seen.
I wanted one.
Immediately. Right now. With my entire being.
Who did you petition for a pegasus. Was that a Poseidon thing exclusively. Surely not. Surely there was a process. Dionysus seemed like he might be approachable, he was RIGHT THERE in the Big House—
Percy looked up.
Saw my face.
His eyes went from my face to Blackjack.
Back to my face.
Something shifted in his expression — the recognition of a specific kind of threat — and he straightened up and put both hands out to either side of the pegasus's neck. Not dramatically. Just. Positioned himself.
"No," he said.
"I haven't said anything—"
"You have the face."
"I don't have a face—"
"You have VERY MUCH a face right now—"
"I'm just looking—"
"You're looking at him the way Tyson looks at food—"
"That is completely—"
"He's MINE," Percy said. "Blackjack is mine. We have a bond. A specific bond. You cannot have him."
"I wasn't going to—"
"You were thinking about it."
"I was CONSIDERING the general concept of—"
"No."
"Percy—"
"No."
"I just want to know if there's a—"
"There isn't."
"You don't know what I was going to ask—"
"You were going to ask if there's a process for acquiring a pegasus and the answer is no, not for you, not this pegasus, not any pegasus in this immediate vicinity—"
"WHAT ABOUT NON-IMMEDIATE—"
"ADITYA."
"He's RIGHT THERE—"
"HE'S MINE—"
Blackjack looked between us with the calm interest of someone watching a discussion that didn't concern him.
I looked at Blackjack.
Blackjack looked at me.
I felt genuine betrayal.
"Fine," I said. "Fine. The BOUT—"
I turned back to the ring.
Clarisse was standing exactly where she'd been standing. Spear still up. Shield still positioned.
She had the expression of someone who had been ready for a deciding bout and had then watched it get derailed by a horse.
"PERCY," she said.
Percy, scratching behind Blackjack's ear again: "Yeah, one second—"
"PERCY."
"He just got here, Clarisse, I haven't seen him since—"
"I WILL COME OVER THERE—"
"You're welcome to try, he bites—"
"I don't care if he—"
"Clarisse," I said.
She looked at me.
I looked at the ring.
She looked at the ring.
We both looked at Percy, who was now having what appeared to be an actual conversation with the pegasus, in the quiet way Percy had conversations with things that shouldn't be able to talk.
"...Later," Clarisse said, with the exhausted certainty of someone rescheduling violence for logistical reasons.
"Later," I agreed.
"This doesn't count as a draw."
"Absolutely not."
"We finish this."
"Obviously."
Percy looked over. "Are you two done—"
Then he looked at Blackjack.
Blackjack looked at Percy.
Percy looked back at us.
"Right," he said. "I'm going to take him to the stables."
And he left.
Just like that.
Walked out of the arena with the pegasus like the deciding bout wasn't happening, like Clarisse wasn't standing there with a spear, like I hadn't been in the middle of an argument about pegasus acquisition rights.
Just. Left.
The arena was very quiet.
I stood in the ring.
Clarisse stood in the ring.
We both stared at the entrance where Percy and Blackjack had just been.
Neither of us said anything for a long moment.
"Did he just—" Clarisse started.
"Yeah," I said.
"In the middle of—"
"Yeah."
"With a HORSE—"
"Pegasus," I said.
"Don't," she said.
"Right," I said.
We stood there.
Two people with real blades and a deciding bout that had simply ceased to exist because Percy Jackson had seen his horse and made a choice.
"...Later," Clarisse said finally.
"Later," I agreed.
She walked off.
I stood in the empty ring for one more second.
Looked at the entrance.
Looked at my sword.
Decided not to think about it too hard.
Sheathed the blade and went for Breakfast.
END CHAPTER