"What happened to you?" gasped Carter, eyes widening as one of those Stoll boys, I forget which, wandered into our sights.

"That little kindergartner, Shelby," he answered in a daze. His hair was rumpled, one side sticking out at ninety degree angles from his head, the other half plastered to his skull. His T-shirt was ripped, the orange brown with mud. "Did you know that she can make her drawing come to life?" he questioned.

"Oh, yes," I responded. "You should've been there the day she drew a fire. It burned half of the living room furniture before we could put it out. Not that we can't handle her, of course."

"Of course," he murmured. As he walked away, he shook his head, muttering something about carnivorous, fire-breathing lilies.

Walt and I exchanged glances before bursting into laughter. "I wonder what she did to him," I mussed. "He's usually so…"

"Loud?" Walt suggested. "Upbeat?"

"Downright hyper," I said.

Zia shook her head at us. "Laugh all you want, but we cannot afford to offend anyone," she admonished. With that, she stood, dragging Carter up with her. "How do you feel about doing some damage control?" she asked him.

Carter voiced his consent, albeit reluctantly, and the two disappeared in the direction that the Stoll boy had come.

In the last week or so, things had been surprisingly quiet. After the initial shock of meeting us wore off, the campers had accepted us fairly quickly. I suppose that for a demigod, few things are truly unsettling enough to change someone's world view. Some of us were sleeping in the Hermes Cabin, but there was not enough space there for everyone to fit, so the majority of us were bunked inside the Big House.

Sean was staying in the cabin, which was dangerous business, given how quickly he'd taken to their prankster ways.

I'd seen Lacy a couple of times, but she'd always disappeared before I got a chance to talk to her. But it seemed that my friend wasn't the only one suffering-just last night, I'd watched Annabeth order a goblet of blue cherry coke from her glass at dinner, only to stare at the liquid as if her heart was broken.

My arms ached and throbbed from all off the archery Will Solace had made me do, and I longed for the easy days of fighting with a wand.

Yet thing overall had been too still, too silent. Seeing the damage that Shelby had caused was a sign that everything was about to change; and much sooner than we could imagine.

Leo stood up proudly in front of the Hephaestus table, his hands and face covered with grime and grease. All around the diving pavilion, campers and magicians alike put down their (absolutely delicious) barbeque and turned to stare at the disheveled boy.

"The ship is done," he announced simply, which lead to an explosion of cheering loud enough to startle several nymphs out of their trees momentarily.

As the celebration died down, Annabeth rose from her seat, a grim expression on her face. "Good job, Leo," she congratulated her friend before focusing in on the important information. "We're delayed already by almost a month. Today and tomorrow morning we ready everything to leave. Ready or not, we're sailing by tomorrow afternoon. Piper, Leo, Jason, pick up anything that you might need, we might not be back for a long time."

The atmosphere grew grim and determined, all earlier merriment forgotten. As the appointed questers gathered together at Jason's empty table to discuss their preparations, however, a quiet murmur of noise began to rise, eventually regaining its earlier level of noise and lightheartedness. At the overcrowded Hermes table, noise returned the loudest. Connor Stoll had returned to his usual state, earlier problems with Shelby's drawings all but forgotten. He and his brother were having a brilliant time teasing some unclaimed kid, sneaking food from his plate only to make it "reappear" later.

His confusion made it instantly obvious to everyone that he was not a child of Hermes, though that only made the Stoll brothers laugh harder. Walt and I shared a pitying look above the table before turning back to our meals, the food too delicious to ignore for long.

When everyone's plates were empty, the campers and magicians made their way to the bonfire, which was burning a sickly greenish-white with anticipation and fear for tomorrow's quest. Annabeth, Leo, Piper and Jason were nowhere to be seen, and the nightly sing-along was cut short, as few people could be bothered to sing at all.

We sat in increasingly awkward silence as the flames flickered in front of us. A few people dared to speak, their voices unnaturally loud in the silence. Somewhere in the distance, a howl sounded from the woods. Across the clearing, I saw Zia sit up, eyes owlishly wide. Slowly, she leaned back against Carter, returning to her original position. The remained like that for a while longer before wandering away from the brilliance of the fire.

One by one, the campers got up and left, abandoning half-eaten s'mores left and right on the ground and logs.

Out of the corner of my eye, I watched Lacy take off behind a flock of brightly made up Aphrodite campers. Briefly, I considered following her, but I changed my mind when I felt Walt's hand tighten around mine. [Yes, I know, Carter, I'm a horrible person – now could we please for the love of everything get back to the story?]

Within another fifteen minutes, the area around the fire pit was almost entirely empty. With a small whoosh, the magical flames died into a small pile of smoldering embers. Leaning against Walt, I watched the red coals shimmer ever darker, until at last only a smoldering redness remained behind my eyelids.

I'd settled into a half-asleep daze when I felt Walt shaking me awake. The two of us were completely alone, sitting together on a well-worn log under the moonless, star filled sky.

Slowly, I got to my feet, noting how my neck had become stiff from the unnatural pose. Walt reached for my hand and I took it quickly, my vision dipping into the Duat momentary, rewarding my vision with a flash of Anubis's smiling face.

The two of us (or was it three? I still couldn't figure it out) made our way back to the large blue-painted house silently. A sudden screech ripped through the still Long Island air. Much to my chagrin, I shrieked.

Walt might have smiled, although it was too dark to tell. Honestly, I was too rattled to care. After several moments of blank horror, I managed to recall what the sound was created by – harpies that patrolled the camp after hours.

"They're not dangerous, are they?" I questioned my boyfriend after briefing him on what the sound was.

"Err…" he mumbled. "I think I heard something about them eating campers who weren't where they were supposed to be."

"Oh, how lovely. Let's run, shall we?"

Nodding his consent, Walt and I took off, running as if the voracious harpies were only inches away from us, rather than hidden in the darkness. Our footsteps pounded against the dirt-packed path thunderously loud.

Tree branches flashed by, coming eerily close to hitting us in the face.

At last, the Big House came into view, the blue paint glowing softly in the moonlight. Walt and I leaned against the porch railing, our breath coming in heavy pants. Now that we were safe from the harpies, the entire situation seemed so ridiculous that we couldn't help but laugh.

The two of us remained on the deck for a while longer, watching as the faint glimmer of the crescent moon fell below the dark cover of trees and hills, plunging the night into even deeper darkness.

"I suppose that we ought to get inside," I finally said, pulling Walt's had and heading towards the door, and the guest room where the others were waiting.