BIG NEWS. THIS STORY HAS REACHED THE 40,000 WORD MARK. IT IS NOW CLASSIFIED AS A NOVEL.

I can't believe it's been almost a year since I updated. I worked really hard on this chapter in the last few weeks, though, if that makes it any better. I am inspired again, which is a good thing.

I've redone the whole story (again) so if you're interested in reading a novel- can you believe it?!- that has grown and improved since I began it at age thirteen, quite a while ago now, go back to the first chapter and refresh your memories!

So remember how I promised a big plot twist? Yeah forget about it being this chapter. I changed a few things. Just forget about everything I promised a year ago. Just read the story and be cool.

ENJOY this mega- chapter of 10998 words.

January, 2010

"You keep that seaweed- brained son of yours away from my daughter!"

"It's your foolish daughter who keeps seeking him out!"

"Well—"

"Silence!" hollered the youngest son of Kronos, the high and mighty king of the gods.

Zeus. His colossally boundless essence concentrated into one giant human form which was still nonetheless undoubtedly majestic as he rose up onto legs as long as skyscrapers are high and his powerful voice reverberated throughout the whole of the Olympic haven.

"My brother, my daughter, sit down and behave in a civil manner! You accuse man kind of foolish deeds and here you act like immature mortal siblings bantering over a toy!"

The Sea God Poseidon crossed his arms and glared stonily at the floor, unable to deny his brother's sovereignty but still reluctant to obey.

"Father," Athena bowed her head to her king to show respect. But the goddess of wisdom would not be silenced with such ease. "Forgive me for my evidentially palpable maternal instinct, but my daughter's life is not a mere toy. She is barely out of childhood and has been severely mislead by Poseidon's filthy fish spawn! I demand—" at Zeus's hardened glare, the goddess thought a change of wording would sit better with the arrogant king, "I implore for you to end this nonsense before an even more sordid curse is laid by the Sea Mother!"

"What would you have me do, daughter?" Zeus demanded, training that intense gaze on his daughter. "Slay Poseidon's child for your own child's safety? The boy is innocent. It would be just as simple to slay your daughter. Perseus is the heir to an entire kingdom. Just recently, your daughter tried to take the gift of life that she was so generously granted at birth! So tell me, Pallas Athena, what would you have me do?"

Athena was speechless; from the use of her ancient true name, and the fact that Zeus was right. Why not take from Annabeth what she had been so willing to throw away herself?

She glowered at Poseidon from across the room, and he scowled back. What an impossible situation.

I may have failed my daughter as a mother, but I shall not fail as her protector.

Zeus began pacing, his footsteps echoing thunderously across the realm of Olympus, as he worded his thoughts aloud.

"The curse was laid in the first place because it was impossible to determine who the next pair of ill- fated Lovers would be. Now that we are sure of their identities and exact locations, there is really no reason to keep them apart as long as we can monitor their relationship. Are you worried for the world when you bid me slay my brother's child, Pallas Athena, or for your own child's well- being?"

"A father would have no clue of anything," Athena mumbled to no one in particular. "Olympus forgive me for caring."

Zeus deliberately ignored her.

"I therefore decree we do nothing," Zeus's verdict caused a collective murmur to resound throughout the pantheon of gods and goddesses that were gathered in the Great agora. "Despite our prodigious efforts in the last five millennia to keep the Lovers apart, they have still managed to find each other. It is in the Fates' hands now."

From across the hall, Poseidon mouthed a single word, the name of their infamous sister at her.

Aphrodite.

For once, the goddess of wisdom was in agreement with the god of the Sea.

This is Aphrodite's doing, Athena thought with a burning abhorrence for the goddess of love. She manipulated the Fates' tapestry to somehow bring Poseidon and I together at the head of a delicate situation. But why would she connive like that? For her own personal entertainment? Or for once, does Aphrodite have an agenda larger than her own amusement?

Still, in her endless well of pride, Athena could not let go of her ancient grudge towards Poseidon.

"Well," she said, her clear enunciation slicing through all vague murmurs of the gathered assembly of minor and major gods and goddesses, nymphs and muses. "While you and your kingdom sit on their hands and refuse to take action against this crime, Father, I'm afraid I'll have to kill him myself."

As she turned to leave the agora with her head held high, her mind alight with a fire of burning hatred for the boy who had hurt her daughter, a warm hand grasped her arm tightly, and her nose revolted as it was assaulted with a waft of brine.

Athena turned to meet the eyes of her assailant, nostrils flaring.

"Get your slimy hands off me, you—"

"If you lay a finger on my son, your daughter won't be spared. I'll release my full power on her and her little family. I'll make sure she will forever be reminded of her mother's mistake." The voice was low and threatening, laced with traces of a growing darkness.

"ENOUGH!" Zeus roared so loud that it might have even been heard in the mortal world as a clap of thunder. "I will give one final ruling and if either one of you bothers me with this imprudence again in the next century…" he trailed off before finishing the sentence, but the message was clear.

Poseidon relinquished his grip on Athena and they both sobered before their respective brother, father, king.

Zeus addressed the entire assembly. "If either demigod dies as result of any god's interference, whether intentional or accidental, that god will be stripped of their power, title and domain!"

Thunder rumbled dangerously in the distance to seal his promise and for a dramatic exit, Zeus's material form evaporated into a cascade of condensed steam as a glorious lightning bolt struck the spot where he stood.

June, 2010

"Come on, sweetie," Nurse Angelica encouraged gently. "If you don't try at anything, you'll waste away to nothing. You will, slowly and surely, die."

Wouldn't that be a relief, Annabeth sighed internally as she gazed vacantly up at the stark white ceiling, unresponsive, as usual, to the soft chidings of the nurses. Though I'll probably die of boredom before anything else.

The nurse sighed, not surprised in the least. Since the day almost six months ago that Annabeth had been incarcerated into the hospital program for suicidal teens at the recommendation of her father and step mother, she had remained stoic and indifferent to various treatments, psychologists and therapies.

The staff were at a loss for what to do for the girl. Something was blocking her inner rationality. Something so huge had happened to her that the memory of it was keeping her from focusing on getting better while it still plagued her.

Sometimes Nurse Angelica watched her sleep. She was restless, always squirming and muttering. Often the nurse caught the name 'Percy' on the girl's tongue. She wondered if he was a brother, or a friend.

"Your parents are coming in today," the nurse offered, trying to get any sort of reaction out of the girl.

Annabeth turned her head away. "Sue is not my mother."

Familiar with Annabeth's emotional patterns and tells, Nurse Angelica left the room, sensing that Annabeth had said her lot of sourdough for the day.

July, 2010

"They're taking me away," Annabeth whispered to the blackness.

And then from the blackness emerged… a light.

Not a light as such.

More like a… mirage.

Like something that Annabeth had often imagined.

Too often she found herself rubbing her eyes and pinching herself. Because how was this possible?

Short answer: it wasn't.

But there it was, there he was.

Percy.

Well, his face anyway, floating mid- air so casually.

"It's called an Iris Message," he had said calmly the first time his face had appeared in the water fountain at the hospital and she had almost made a scene, convinced she was losing her mind after long last. "You just throw a drachma into the mist and call for permission to Iris, the goddess of the rainbow. With luck, she'll hear you and carry your message."

"So why are you only contacting me now? I've been in here a whole month with no word from you!" Annabeth knew that this was the first time, in the staffs' eyes, that she probably truly belonged in the mental institution; she was one of the only patients who hadn't yet spoken to an inanimate object or replied to voices that no one else could hear.

She didn't care.

She was a teenage girl who was hurt, betrayed, lonely, longing for the impossible, and said 'impossible' had just appeared right before her face.

If they only saw her talking to the water fountain, that was their problem.

Percy sighed and stared into her eyes, his own full of pleas for her to try and understand.

"Annabeth," he said her name, his voice a soft caress wrapping delicately around the syllables, this unique combination of letters that held the personality and traits of the girl he loved. "For an Iris Message to be transmitted from the ocean to the land, from a godling to a demigod nonetheless, requires the power only a full moon or a king tide can provide. I literally couldn't contact you until today."

Annabeth stared at the image of the black haired, green eyed, seal tailed boy floating in her drinking water, and closed her eyes.

"How long do we have, Percy?" she asked as quietly as possible, noticing the staff becoming increasingly impatient watching her talk to the bubbler.

He had just opened his mouth to respond when his eyes widened in fright, and his face disappeared from the water in a puff of mist.

In the wake of Percy's face in the water, her heart very nearly stopped as she beheld the dark figure looming above her.

She whirled around to see The Dementor, named so for the fact that every patient who was called to his office remerged hours later drained, pale and void of Crazy, or, as a young man named Kev Banks with severe schizophrenia liked to call his illness, Real Personality.

The Head of the Psychology Unit took her arm with a firm grip. "I've been notified that you've been drinking at this particular water fountain for almost twenty minutes. Come to my office, young lady, and we'll have a chat about your sudden bout of thirst, and what we can do to slake it."

And the daughter of Athena was dragged from the one connection she had to Percy in this stark, frightening place of white walls, green gowns and disapproving frowns by the one person the others had warned her never to cross.

In the past few years, Annabeth had experienced things like the wind talking to her and the water moving like a living person; so, Percy's face appearing in the water she was about to drink was like yeah, whatever now.

"What do you mean?" Percy's voice said, equally as solemn as her own, breaking her from her reverie. "Taking you where?"

"To another hospital," Annabeth sighed, her voice forlorn. "I heard them talking outside my room when they thought I was asleep. They think I'm a 'lost cause' and a 'waste of bed space'."

Percy's cheeks flushed, and Annabeth imagined his fists were clenched. "If they lay even a finger on you, I swear they'll know the wrath of the sea!"

Annabeth laughed humourlessly and flopped back on her bed, trusting that her roommate, a severely schizophrenic middle aged black woman whom everyone called Kaz the Spaz, would understand Unknown Voice Problems, and pretend to still be asleep even if she was secretly awake.

"Do you know that I love you?" she simply asked, unsure of what to say to such a passionate outburst, but forcing a lighter tone into the lead weight of her voice.

She didn't look at his face, instead finding the ceiling much more sympathetic, for fear of having her worst nightmares confirmed: he no longer loved her, too much time had passed, he had moved on to one of the many beautiful sea Nereids he was surrounded by on a regular basis in his fairy- tale kingdom under the sea.

His millisecond of hesitation before replying, "And I love you too," inflamed the infectious doubts that buzzed like annoying bees through her head every second of every day she was away from him.

She restlessly sat up again from the bed, all of a sudden sweaty and hot from the synthetic blankets, but violent chills spread like an infection throughout her entire body as her heart radiated a dark cold. Because what did she have if she didn't have Percy?

Unable to look at him, the boy who would inevitably shatter her heart with all the explosive power of an atomic bomb and the pitiful, revolting kindness of a psychologist, she mumbled and stuttered her way through an apologetic 'hang up' of sorts. "Well, uh, you know, it's late, Percy, and I've— suddenly— become really tired and I really should go now…"

Percy was silent, which made Annabeth feel like a jerk for dismissing him straight after he'd said what she'd practically begged for, but she knew she'd feel even worse if they kept stumbling their way through a conversation that was going nowhere in the first place.

Is this the beginning of The End? She wondered. Or was this relationship doomed from the start, like everyone told us? If I let my own silly insecurities get in the way, will it be my fault that it went sour? Or would it be his fault for letting me become so insecure?

Or maybe it's not about fault. Maybe it's already Fate that Percy and I will never work.

Will I be relieved if- when?- it finally ends?

Maybe that's it then.

Maybe it's for the best.

I won't fight it.

What happens will happen and I can't change it.

You're being pathetic, another voice chimed in her head in response to the conversation she was having with herself. She wondered if this was what it was like to have schizophrenia.

I know, she responded to herself, feeling silly. I am.

"Annabeth," Percy said quietly. "I have something to tell—"

Annabeth interrupted him with an exaggerated fake yawn. "I'm tired, Percy. Like, really tired. I'll talk to you… sometime, okay?"

"The Iris Message only works during full moons and king tides," Percy reminded her, his beautiful face an almost comical mix of emotions; torn between being concerned and being hurt.

"I know." Annabeth said softly. She looked down into her lap, then back up, determined not to hear what would make her sad. She was so sick of being sad all of the time. "So I'll talk to you next month then. I love you, Percy. Goodbye."

She cringed inside as she thought over what she'd said: it had sounded like a permanent goodbye.

She didn't allow herself to think about how Percy might interpret it too much before swiping her hand through the mist.

Even before his face had faded away, the tears that she had managed to keep at bay for six months had already begun falling from her eyes, watering the barren deserts of her cheeks and once again filling the empty hollows beneath her eyes.

Annabeth sobbed for a good ten minutes, curled over the awful, aching pit in her chest, hands clutching the black hole where her heart had once upon a time beat healthily, a wholesome tattoo that she wore proudly on her sleeve and wasn't afraid to show the world.

Now, where once had been her pride lay her shame.

After ten minutes of relentless crying and sniffling and choking, Kaz the Spaz rolled over and with overly bright dark eyes that glinted madly in the sticky dark that seemed the consistency of glue, she watched Annabeth keenly until the sobs abated and she could breathe properly again.

Feeling awkward and strangely naked, Annabeth finally snapped, "What?" to the older woman.

Kaz leant up on one elbow, and her wild dark hair tumbled forward to cover half her face. She looked almost beautiful, with the scars covered up and her thin lips curled slyly. Her beauty was jarringly off- kilter. As if she were a pretty picture on the wall, hung slightly crookedly.

Kaz the Spaz (Annabeth hated the thought of anyone being picked on, so from here on she decided to just call her Kaz and drop the Spaz bit)— Kaz, down one side of her face, sported three ugly, white scars, one of which cut through the corner of her left eye, and the corner of her mouth. The longest one stretched beyond her hair line, and curled beneath the corner of her jaw like a sly cat.

If you looked at them objectively, they didn't mar her natural beauty— they enhanced it, broadened her air of mystery.

Everyone wondered privately, and some insensitive souls very publicly, what awful thing this compelling, attractive woman had done to make someone destroy her face so crudely so that she could never assimilate comfortably back into society.

Annabeth, and a few select others, thought secretly that Kaz had done it to herself. She didn't earn the nickname Kaz the Spaz for no reason.

Either way, being the only patient who would tolerate the older woman long enough to share a room with her indefinitely made Kaz a bit softer of tongue towards Annabeth.

Which was why, at this late hour at night, Kaz the Spaz did not scream irately at Annabeth for bawling her eyes out like she'd lost her favourite toy, but instead began… dare I say… offering her advice?

"Have they been yabbering at you again, girl?" Kaz asked in a soft, melodic voice one seldom heard emitted from that frightening mouth.

Annabeth thought that perhaps that voice was a remnant from Kaz's past, reminiscent of happier times— the times that one would involuntarily think of when melancholy, the times that most people say will make you feel better when you are down, but, in truth, only make you angrier.

The harsh, gruff tone Kaz reserved for people she didn't like, namely, the entire Mental Health ward at St Francis Memorial Hospital except for Annabeth, was gone, replaced by this new (or, perhaps, old, as in, from before, the time also known as The Past, when one didn't require the services of the St Francis Memorial Hospital) foreign voice.

Have they been yabbering at you again, girl? Kaz had asked, the first vaguely useful question she had been asked in her six months at this hospital that smelled of mildew and piss and served food that tasted vaguely of the same.

Annabeth didn't know how to answer a question like that, when, in the eyes of normal people, 'they' were non- existent.

Except I think I've more than proved that my 'imaginary' demons exist, she thought grumpily to herself.

Kaz didn't give her a chance to answer. "You don't listen to them, alright? You don't listen to no one but yourself and you'll be fine."

"Kaz," Annabeth said suddenly, not believing she was about to do this, but not caring either. For once, her inner voice had nothing to say about her actions. "Is that even your real name?"

Annabeth felt that this conversation was strangely akin to that of two girls chatting late into the night on a school camp, trying to keep their voices down lest a cranky teacher heard them and gave them holiday homework.

Kaz laughed into the blackness, and Annabeth shot a wary look at the open door, dim light spilling in from the hallway. Guttural cries, beeping monitors and the sounds of gossiping nurses from the down the hallway leeched into the room, but they couldn't pierce the thick darkness, the eerie blanket of calm that had settled over the room in the wake of Percy's presence.

"What's in a name, darlin'? Is the name your parents gave you defined as your 'real name'? I believe we control everything about ourselves, and we make our own way. Ain't no such thing as destiny, nope."

It seemed as if Kaz was speaking straight to Annabeth's heart, screaming the truth at her.

"And besides, maybe I don't want to go back to my first name. The past should stay in the past. I am Kaz. Kaz is my real name." To Annabeth, it sounded like the woman was trying to convince herself.

"But maybe it'll change tomorrow. Maybe I'll call myself Spaz tomorrow and put it out in the open. I know people certainly aren't shy about it behind my back."

Annabeth could have bitten her tongue off to put the words back in her mouth, but they were already out there before she'd even realised she was going to say anything. "What happened to you, Kaz? Why did you leave behind your, uh… first name?"

Silence.

It was something one got accustomed to in a mental institution.

But beneath the thin veneer of silence was a constant vibration, a hum of activity in the air.

It was beyond the distant sounds of human interaction…

Something was stirring.

That feeling was back, the feeling that defined Annabeth, the reason that she was a demigod and not a mortal… the trait she had inherited from her infamous mother.

The need for knowledge.

The Hunt for information.

Annabeth knew when she was onto something, and that carnal instinct inside of her had awoken, and she wouldn't, couldn't fight it because, as much as she was loathe to admit it, she loved it.

"Well," Kaz seemed stunned that somebody had actually asked the million dollar question to her face, rather than speculating behind her back.

"I won't tell anyone," Annabeth promised, then laughed to herself. Not that I'd have anyone to tell, anyway.

"Well…" Kaz tried to start again, but her tongue seemed tied. Annabeth allowed time for Kaz to gather her thoughts, though her toes were curled in anticipation.

The consistency of the air seemed to change again in the cruel game of waiting. Thicker than glue, more like… like a cheap floral perfume.

Annabeth struggled to breathe, and told herself it was all in the head.

I control everything about myself. I make my own way.

Annabeth heard Kaz open her mouth in the silence. "I suppose it began… with a girl named Venus."

February, 2010

"Perseus."

The half- blood son of the Sea God purposely turned away from the sound of his father's voice.

But for the first time in two months, father reached out to son.

Percy froze when he felt his father's fingers wrap firmly around his bicep.

"This has to stop." Poseidon's voice was firmer than his grip. When Percy pulled away, Poseidon's hand fell from his son's arm, but his gaze still held him tight. "Perseus—"

The momentary spell Poseidon held over his son was broken. "My name is Percy," the boy snapped, and once again attempted to depart the fray.

A snide thought briefly crossed Percy's mind: I wish to the gods that I had a door to slam into his face.

"No!" Poseidon roared and Percy stopped. "You are a Prince of the Sea, an heir to the kingdom, and your behaviour is absolutely appalling. You are a disgrace to the Sea, to my name, but mostly to yourself.

"The Merfolk are beginning to talk, Perseus. Don't you know it takes five millennium to build a decent reputation and five seconds to destroy it? As my son, you are in the eye of the storm. The Mer are judging you, have been judging you from the day you were born and will judge you until the day you cease to exist."

After this remarkable oration, Poseidon's face softened. "And… Percy, I… miss your presence at my side. You're not as demanding as my wife, nor as arrogant as Triton. Your human blood dilutes your tendency to indulge in the easily bruised pride of the Mer. Which is why I have officially chosen you, and not Triton, as my heir for the Sea Kingdom."

Percy whirled around. Poseidon was momentarily relieved that something he'd said had gotten through to his son, until Percy opened his mouth.

"Dad!" he yelled. "I never wanted to be king! Triton's the one who should have it. It's always been his dream, and you know it. I never wanted godhood, or immortality or… Plus he's a true son of the Sea. I'm only a half breed, and everyone knows it."

Poseidon, torn between being angry, offended and disappointed, only pursed his lips before saying carefully, "It's the girl, isn't it?"

Percy was sick of lying to his father to make him happy. He would never be the son his father desired, and it was time he clarified that once and for all. "The only life I crave, Father, is a life spent with Annabeth. I don't care where. I don't care whether I'm a demigod or half Mer or whatever! I just want to be with her." Percy paused, and deemed it safe to go on when his father's face remained stoic and expressionless. "She makes me happy, dad. I don't know her well. But I want to. I've loved her since I was seven. Almost ten years, which I know is nothing to a god like you, but that's more than half my life."

"Percy, as your father, it is my duty to inform you of when you are acting like a fool. And as your father, you must understand that it would be a remarkably difficult task for me to successfully carry out without hurting your feelings. Alas, you've been warned fair many times. Aphrodite will be your undoing. The tragedy of the ship Titanic proves that the Sea will always, always win over Love."

Percy resisted the urge to point out that he hadn't even been alive when the famous Jack Dawson's frozen corpse had drifted lazily to rest on the ocean floor and eventually to be covered by a layer of silt and sand, his watery grave.

However, Percy had heard numerous stories of the man's lover's cries and screams. He had even laid eyes on the infamous diamond that had belonged to Rose Dawson, and in his life time had been returned to its rightful place under the sea.

"As a son of the Sea, my son, it is your responsibility to sacrifice your personal agendas and put your kingdom before your immature whims."

"You have the hide to accuse me of immaturity, Father, but you don't see it in yourself. You refuse to accept my feelings. You run away from your problems and hide behind some bullshit about sacrifice."

Poseidon's face closed. Like the calm before the storm, his voice was deadly quiet as he said, "Explain." The word was sharp and short as a bullet.

While Poseidon could use many different weapons against his son, Percy had only one which he fully intended to use like a whip if he had to.

"I want to know about my mother."

February, 1997

Kassandra Jacobs. That was her name. She was Kassandra Marie Jacobs, and she was in love.

Venus was beautiful. Beyond stunning. That was the initial attraction.

But it was more than that. Venus made her feel like no man ever had before.

When she was with Venus, she was powerful. She was beautiful. She was strong. She was someone.

Kassandra did not care that there was an eight year gap between them, and while Venus was a young flower of twenty one, she was nearly thirty.

She did not care that Venus was intelligent and witty and glamorous, and she was a simple Negro from some dirt- poor family of bums whose ramshackle, lilting house was the drug central of California.

She did not care that she had moved halfway across the country, following a woman who everyone knew was way, way out of her league.

She was in love.

So it seemed.

Three years.

Three years of her life, she followed Venus. She would have followed the girl to the ends of the earth.

All in vain.

Because after stealing first her heart, then three years of her life, Venus also stole her sanity when the young girl broke her heart, all the while wearing that devastatingly beautiful smile that could have set the world on fire.

You are sick, Venus had spat, only disgust in her mesmerising kaleidoscope eyes.

Your idea of love is twisted. You are an abomination and a thorn on the face of the earth.

Women don't love women, and women certainly don't make love to women.

You will go to hell, and I won't follow.

And the girl Kassandra had imagined she would spend the rest of her life with stalked away, stilettos clicking and long hair swinging.

And in her anguish, Kassandra had clawed the skin from her face, the despicable face that Venus had once touched, that Venus had once kissed, that Venus had called beautiful.

For three years, Kassandra did not realise that she had been staring into the infamous Face that had launched a thousand ships.

The face of the spiteful love goddess.

June, 2010

Annabeth lay silently on her thin hospital mattress after Kaz had finished her tragic story of unrequited love and the callousness of humanity.

"Her name was Venus." Annabeth stated dully, her lethargic mind ticking.

Kaz rolled over and buried her face in her pillow, obviously having had enough of conversation for the night.

It's too much of a coincidence, Annabeth thought. Is it sick for it to be comforting to me that I'm not the only one the love goddess has ruined?

Time passed too quickly, or not quickly enough. Once a month, Annabeth and Percy spoke to each other, but it wasn't the same.

Annabeth could feel it. The dynamics of their relationship were changing.

Oh, how she loathed that word and what exactly it entailed.

Change.

The longing was fading. The pain was giving way to an ever- expanding empty hole in her chest. The arduous light she had cast her memories of their few interactions in was dimmed from a zealous, blinding glow to the pathetic wavering of a sputtering candle in a dark room.

She did not remember the exact colour of his eyes. She did not remember the fervency of her yearning for him. She did not remember why he had ever mattered in the first place.

She did not remember, and she did not care.

She was imprisoned in this hospital, and he had broken his promises to her.

I'll always love you.

I'll always save you.

I'll always be there.

He was not there, and while he had saved her from the arms of Death before, the St Francis Memorial Hospital was probably too big of a rescue mission for a boy with a tail and a god's legacy to inherit.

So she lay in her bed, day in and day out, unresponsive as ever.

Docile. Blank faced.

Broken.

January, 2010

Aglaophonos.

Gushy. Percy had refused to kiss her hand upon meeting her, as propriety demanded, on account of her obsessive fawning. Nereids like her had not even bothered to acknowledge his existence before his legs had fused into the muscular, thick skinned, sleek seal's tail that began just below his navel, the last remaining evidence that he had been conceived within a human's womb.

The Nereid did not want him.

She wanted the glory he represented, and the throne upon which he would one day sit.

February, 2010

Himeropa.

Beautiful, as all Nereids were.

Nasal of voice. Dry of conversation. Pampered, above all.

Her name was quickly forgotten in the search for the perfect bride for Percy.

March, 2010

Raidne.

Endlessly, she chatted about what 'she said' and 'he said' and 'they did'.

Percy's eyes glazed over, and he didn't even remember her departure from the throne room.

As with all of them, he was asleep within a few moments of learning their names.

April, 2010

Ligea.

He remembered her frilly bodice of woven, exotic sea flowers, the extraordinarily vibrant violet shock of her hair, and not much else.

May, 2010

Leucosia.

Polite. Quiet. Standoffish and slightly aloof.

Percy could sympathise with her.

It was obvious that she wanted to be in this room, with these people, in this situation, about as much as he did.

He farewelled her with more apology than he had her sisters.

It was Leucosia that had opened his mind to the possibility that other people could be just as unhappy with their lot in life as he was.

June, 2010

Lyssianassa.

Of all of them, she reminded him most of Annabeth. The golden gleam of her hair, the intelligence in her teal blue eyes. The delicate way in which she moved her hands as she spoke, accentuating particular syllables.

She was a girl he could grow to love, because she reminded him so much of the girl he'd lost, and this was why, within three days of his reluctant, tired answer of 'yes' to the Nereid's proposal, he found himself holding her hand before his father and the entire kingdom of the Mer, reciting the ancient words that would bind them together in sacred matrimony, with the ocean and its people as witnesses.

Percy tried very hard not to think of Annabeth rotting in a prison of concrete walls and crazy humans as he leant in and kissed the Nereid's forehead, and the nymph overseeing the ceremony tied their wrists together with a ribbon of woven vines, symbolising the bonding of their mortal bodies, the final steps in this ceremony that could not be annulled after completion.

He tried very hard, and he failed. Because he would always, always think of her, even as Lyssianassa fluttered her eyelashes at him, her mouth curled in a small, self- satisfying smirk that she had succeeded where so many of her sisters had failed.

She had tamed the wild, half- human sea prince.

Tamed, and broken.

July, 2010

Almost a year since she had stepped off of that cliff into thin air and laid herself down at the mercy of the ravenous ocean.

And how merciful it had turned out to be. In her time of greatest crisis, it had sent her Percy.

Except Annabeth wasn't sure whether it had been a mercy or further torment.

A year since she had kissed him, since she had said goodbye, and still his presence plagued her.

Six months since she had been incarcerated into the Program for Suicidal Teens.

Six months of rotting in a hospital bed, petrifying into cold, emotionless stone.

Six months of stilted conversations with a boy whose significance was slowly fading.

And now, she was free.

Free.

They had decided to release her, finally, on the grounds that they could do nothing more for her.

'She's as good as she's going to get.'

It was a miserable thing to ponder.

Annabeth didn't care.

She was free.

Free.

Free of St. Francis Hospital, but still shackled by the same old curse.

Free.

It was a joke.

She would never be free, and the Fates cackled in delight over her shoulder.

July, 2010

"So you're back home?" Percy asked, mustering enthusiasm for Annabeth's sake.

She was sitting on the beach, with her arms wrapped tightly around her knees. Through the screen of water, Percy could see that she was pale in contrast to the liveliness of the day. The sun was shining, the wind was singing, but Annabeth's lanky hair barely shifted from where it rested listlessly on her shoulders, like it had forgotten the steps to a dance it had once known beautifully.

"Yeah."

Silence ensued.

It had become a regular component in their monthly Iris Message conversations.

Percy took a deep breath, as if he was readying himself to say something difficult.

"Annabeth, you should know something."

"If it involves anything to do with hospitals, don't bother."

Percy didn't laugh. He knew he had to just spit it out.

Her name was on the tip of his tongue.

Lyssianassa.

But staring into the face of the girl with blond hair and grey eyes, the face he had yearned for for so many years and literally ached for in the last few months, he couldn't do it.

"My father has named me as the Heir of the sea," he eventually said.

She raised one eyebrow, but that was the only sign that she had heard what he said. "Good for you."

Her apathy was beginning to annoy him. Not that he'd ever wanted to be the Heir, but to a mere human— and he was reluctantly beginning to associate that word with the abhorrence and taboo that the Mer did— it should have been a bigger deal than, 'Good for you.'

"Does that mean that we're officially enemies now?"

"Because I now have a title?" Percy said, and they could both hear the words left unsaid: and you don't.

That's right, I'm nothing. No mother. No friends. No life.

Nothing.

Annabeth's grip on her knees tightened, and she could not feel the heat of the sun on her back.

Only cold.

Cold as rock.

Hard as stone.

Strong as bone.

The wind no longer shared its secrets with her. It blew insistently, but her ears were deaf to the symphonies that her emotions had once conducted.

She felt a hollow sense of loss.

There had once been so much.

And now there was nothing.

March, 2010

"You know what I think?" Percy said into March's Iris message after a lingering silence.

"Tell me," Annabeth sighed.

"It's people like us that give the love goddess her power."

Annabeth flopped onto her stomach on the hospital bed, resting her face in her cupped hands and kicking her fuzzy sock covered feet up into the air. She gave him a puzzled look. "How do you figure that?"

"Have you ever heard of something called a… a Token?"

"A thing serving as a visible or tangible representation of a fact, quality, or feeling," Annabeth recited automatically, having put her mind to the tedious task of memorising the dictionary in all the free time she had in the hospital. She'd been stuck there for three months so far, and she was starting to go a little bit stir- crazy. For once, her photographic memory— courtesy of Athena— had come in handy for something other than cheating on exams.

Besides, if she had nothing else, she would have words.

"That's the human definition," Percy explained. "The word Token has the closest meaning in your language, but there is no direct translation. A Token is a sort of… souvenir, I guess, from a powerful love story."

"You've lost me." Annabeth cocked her head to the side.

Percy frowned, trying to think of a way to explain it so that she would understand. "Think of a Token as anything that meant something to a couple that was really in love. It embodies the power of their love, and Aphrodite draws her power from this essence. For humans Tokens could be their wedding rings, or something else like that. For Jack and Rose Dawson, it was the Heart of the Ocean."

Annabeth scoffed. "Jack and Rose didn't exist. That was a fictional story based on a manmade disaster."

Percy shook his head at her words and grinned crookedly. "Behind every myth is a hint of truth."

Deep in the trenches of the ocean, a silver chain and locket sinks, chain flailing in the currents, to the murky sea floor, littered with objects lost long ago.

No light filters through the dense water. None of the various objects has seen a wisp of light in a millennia, but somehow, the locket flashes erratically as it sinks.

It seems to call a name, lamenting the shape of its syllables into the shadowy depths, over and over again.

A call that will never be answered.

Annabeth. Annabeth. Annabeth.

The golden goddess of love and beauty, born of the blood of Heaven and the foam of the sea, giggled.

July, 2010

In her dreams, Annabeth saw an owl.

She reached a small pudgy fist, the hand of a child, out to stroke the soft feathers.

The owl's head turned. Unnervingly large, unblinking eyes stared at her.

Grey eyes.

The sea prince lies.

Annabeth flinched.

The voice was quiet, piercing, monotonous.

It was hard and cold and indifferent.

It was her mother's.

The owl gazed indifferently at her, like it was bored with her presence.

The sea prince lies.

Annabeth shook her head violently, her golden curls bouncing like little slinkies.

"No!" she yelled, her voice high and childish… like that of a seven year old's.

He lies.

She slapped her hands over ears.

Lies. He lies.

"Stop!" she begged, voice breaking.

The sea prince lies.

"Not Percy!" she cried.

Her eyes filled with tears, and with nowhere to go, they trickled down her cheeks, dripping off her chin.

Her head was filled with echoes.

The sea prince.

Lies.

Lies.

The owl blinked once, innocently.

And with an indignant rustle of its mahogany feathers, it spread its wings and took off into the night.

April, 2010

"So, I've always wondered," Annabeth began into the April Iris Message, folding her hands behind her head and staring up at the ceiling with exactly seventeen random stains of all different sizes, six cracks, one mysterious hole and, for some reason, a smudged sneaker tread mark, like somebody had stood upside down on the ceiling.

That's what cabin fever does to you, she thought wryly. Turns you into an obsessive counting freak.

"Where did your people— The Mer— where did they come from? Your— someone once said to me that humans evolved from the Mer. So… do you know?"

"Well, I should probably know this," Percy said sheepishly. "My rabbei—my teacher— has drilled the story into me from a young age."

"So you don't actually know?" Annabeth said, disappointed.

"I'm the sea prince, Annabeth, not a damn genius. But I know the basic story. Everyone does. The Mer are a very proud people, and what's there to be more proud of than your heritage?" He paused, as if he were unsure of himself.

"Go on," she encouraged, curious now, despite herself.

He coughed, seemingly uncomfortable. "The Mer are descendants of the offspring of… Aphrodite and Poseidon." Aphrodite. The goddess of love and beauty, and the bane of Annabeth's existence. "That's why humans find us attractive, and why there are so many stories of 'mermaids' who have enticed sailors to leave their lives on land. The sailors always fell in love with the mermaids because of their relation to the love goddess."

Annabeth was silent, her mind ticking. Something, some lost bit of information, was knocking at the back door of her brain…

"Another thing is that humans often associate us with our sister race, the Fae, who are descendants of Hermes and Hecate. Just for the record, yes, I can touch iron, and I can lie. Probably too easily, actually. The Mer, like the Fae, love playing word games. I'm only half Mer, but I must have enough blue blood in me that—"

"When the Mer die," Annabeth blurted out, not caring that she had interrupted Percy's mindless babbling, "do they turn into sea foam?"

Percy looked surprised, like he hadn't expected her to know that. "Yeah. How'd you know that? It's supposed to be this big secret, one of those things that everyone knows about but that we don't mention."

"Is that to do with the fact that Aphrodite supposedly rose out of the sea in a seashell?"

"Something like that." Percy closed his eyes dramatically and recited monotonously, as if he had done it many times, "Our blood mother was born of the ocean's blood, so shall we become its blood when our time is done."

Another blank space in Annabeth's mental jigsaw puzzle had been filled, a space that had been unwittingly created when her father had told her that bedtime story so long ago.

The First Mermaid. Had he known, even on a subconscious level, that he had not made up a story to please a little girl, but had spoken the forbidden truth? Was the story a metaphor for Aphrodite's own birth?

Behind every myth is a hint of truth, was what Percy had said a month ago. His words had not failed yet.

When his eyes again opened, Percy found Annabeth looking at him like she had never looked at him before. "What?" he asked defensively.

"Nothing," Annabeth shook her head, one side of her mouth curled up in a small smile that the human male part of is brain wanted to kiss. "You just… surprise me sometimes."

Percy flashed that crooked grin. "I do have my moments."

July, 2010

Annabeth woke abruptly. Her cheeks were wet, her pillow drenched.

How she wished she could not remember that horrible dream. The owl's cool, indifferent gaze with her other's eyes, her own eyes, still pierced her to the core.

And that voice.

The sea prince lies.

She refused to believe it.

Lies.

She wouldn't believe it.

Rubbing her sore eyes, she sat up and squinted into the dark shadows, disorientated. For a moment, she panicked.

Have they moved me? She wondered, squinting into the dark shadows of the unfamiliar room.

"Kaz?" she questioned hesitantly, to which came no response.

And then her eyes came sharply into focus, and she gasped quietly.

She remembered now. She was home. In her own bed.

Gone were the fluorescent lights that spilled their light in from an ever slightly jarred door. Gone were the seventeen random stains of all different sizes, six cracks, one mysterious hole and the smudged sneaker tread mark on the ceiling. Gone was the constant barrage of noise from the long, narrow corridors. The screams, the grunts, the moans, the sobs.

The silence was daunting.

But a relief.

There was the same old paint splattered wall, and the same old pictures taped around the frame of her mirror.

There was that same jagged hole in the wall that she had punched in fury after she had returned home from the beach, hungover from her rebellious drinking marathon on New Year's.

She could have kissed the door for still having the same blessed book quotes blue tacked haphazardly wherever they fit, and hugged her bookshelf for standing so still and steadfast, her favourite books smiling soothingly down at her from their perches.

The possessions, the memorabilia, they all cried out that this was her room, this was her space, this was her home.

She threw off the covers, and leapt excitedly in her favourite fuzzy socks across the familiar wooden floor, avoiding the creaky floorboards without a second thought, and stopped breathlessly at the arching picture window, hands braced on the windowsill.

Taking one more gulp of air, she yanked the window up, wincing at the shriek it made. It probably hadn't been opened in the six months she had been absent, and it was not agreeable to this sudden exercise.

But Annabeth was the daughter of Athena, and she would not be bested by a stubborn window.

It was stuck, and she was struggling and sweating and swearing, and then, with an abrupt release, it was up, and the wind was in her hair, and the symphony was deafening in its roaring crescendo of welcome.

The briny breeze danced in her hair, and stung her suddenly wet cheeks with its early morning chill.

It seemed to call her name. It summoned her.

She didn't resist the tug of the ocean as she climbed up onto the sill, perching precariously like a bird on a thin, swaying branch, and dropped one leg out, searching for the first rung of the trellis.

Oh gods, the déjà vu. It struck her like a blow to the face.

She had been eight when she had packed her teddy bear and toothbrush into her pillow case and jumped out of the window in her nightgown, intending to walk down the beach and never come back. Then, her little legs had not been able to reach the trellis, and her resulting fall had permanently jarred her wrist so that when she moved it a certain way, the bones clicked.

She had been fourteen when she had worn nothing but the singlet and shorts on her back when she had warily manoeuvred her way down the side of her house, having escaped out the window yet again. Except, that time, she had not packed a bag because she knew that she would not be going anywhere except the bottom of the sea, and maybe to hell. One doesn't need any earthly possessions when they're bound for exit 666 on the highway to hell.

Now here she sat, nearly sixteen, and still alive despite the tragic saga of her life.

This windowsill was the gateway to her freedom, and the threshold of her anguish.

Tonight, she chose freedom.

Tonight, she planned to come back.

Tonight, she had a family waiting for her on land and a lover waiting for her in the sea.

Tonight, she had the best of both worlds, and she would not let the storm cloud of depression put a damper on her rare good spirits.

She found a secure foothold on the trellis, and, feeling no need to look back on her room because she was coming back, she did not see her father lounging in the doorway of her room, watching her sadly.

But she heard his voice when he said softly, "Haven't you had enough of windows? Why not just take the front door?"

January, 2010

Annabeth's inhumane shrieking still rang in Frederick's ears as he stared down at his eldest child, shackled to the metal bars of the hospital bed, restrained by buckles over her chest, and unconscious from the tranquiliser she'd been given.

She did not resemble the Annabeth he loved in the slightest. She was a shadow, a ghoul from the realms of the Underworld, an empty shell of his daughter.

She lay on her back with her arms hanging limply from the handcuffs, wrists turned out. Blue veins protruded starkly against her papery, transparent skin, and they made Frederick uncomfortable. Only old people and sick people had veins like that, and Annabeth was neither.

Her chest rose and fell mechanically, and there was nothing human in the small movements.

Her legs were sprawled unflatteringly, and her hips slightly rotated.

Her head rested on the pillow, upturned and to one side, so that he could see all the way up her nostrils. The random thought crossed his mind that he wished he could see all the way past her nasal cavity, into her skull. How he wished he could read her mind, and understand what the freaking hell went on in there that such a bright, imaginative, lively, precocious child became this lifeless husk on the bed in front of him.

Thick, golden hair covered her tilted face, and the carelessness in which her body had been positioned made her seem dead.

It was not like a hospital scene in a movie. This was real, and it was absolutely terrifying because that was his daughter lying there— Annabeth's chest rose again with breath, but it didn't reassure Frederick.

Frederick stood, pushing his chair roughly back, and took his daughter's limp, cold hand in his own, before gently smoothed the hair from her face. Her cradled her cheek in his free hand, and moved her head to a position that wouldn't leave her with a crook in her neck when she woke up.

And she would wake up, she would.

Someone who needed two strong tranquilisers and a shot of morphine before conking out completely, and even as she was passing out, managed to keep screaming defiant profanities, wouldn't allow this dim hospital room and the indifferent, blank- faced nurses to curb her spirit and keep her unresponsive in this creaky, unaccommodating cot.

He waited there for two days, and by the time Annabeth blearily opened her eyes and blinked the rust out of them, his hand was cramped from holding hers, and his hair was a tangled birds' nest from combing his fingers agitatedly through it so many times. Their eyes met, and though hers were glazed with drugs and sleep and disorientation, and his were glazed with tears and relief, the room filled with unsaid words that needed to be said, and Annabeth thought, It's time.

And indeed, it was finally time.

Words long overdue were exchanged, and tears long overdue were shed, and stories long overdue to be told bubbled over unclamped, uncensored lips and tongues with matching urgencies.

They talked about the elephant that had been standing in their room for so long that it had growing pains in its legs and dust balls collecting in the wrinkles of its leathery hide: her mother.

Annabeth told of the encounter she'd had with her mother in July last year, which had been blocked from her mind until she'd painfully and realistically relived it last August, the night she'd tried to kill herself, but instead found Percy, and then lost him again, this time to a curse even more cruel than that of the Fates— that of a different species. Love could transcend time and distance, and even dimensions, as the movie Interstellar would one day teach the world, but species? The idea of a Mer and a human ever mating was as ludicrous as a cat and a dog mating.

Frederick told of the similar encounter he'd had with the elusive wisdom goddess in his office that same night.

Thinking about the Greek tragedy his life had become, Frederick, for the first time, considered the idea that Annabeth's imaginary world of friends in the sea might not be so imaginary after all.

Because if this world was crazy enough that he had unwittingly married Athena, then surely it wouldn't be so crazy if his daughter was in love with the son of Poseidon.

After a whirlwind few hours of story telling and getting interrupted by the nurses' routine checks, and Annabeth falling asleep suddenly, still under the influence of the strong tranquilisers, to waking abruptly, they were all caught up. Annabeth had never talked so much in her life, and never had she felt so light.

Sometime in the early hours of the morning, when conversation had become sparse, and Annabeth's eyes were fluttering, she surprised her father by asking in a half- asleep, childish voice that she hadn't used in years, "So when do I get to leave?"

Frederick didn't know how to answer her question without causing her to snap again, but she looked so innocent and sweet and young, lying there with her skinny wrists shackled, and her hair in two braids, and grey eyes fluttering tiredly.

"Two weeks at the most, honey," Frederick said reassuringly, and leant forward to kiss her forehead. "Now get some sleep."

Annabeth didn't need further encouragement. She was snoring before Frederick had even begun to unpack her bags into the closet by her bedside.

July, 2010

"Haven't you had enough of windows? Why not just take the front door?"

Annabeth nearly fell out the window.

"Dad!" she yelped, at a loss for words.

He was in his boxer shorts, singlet, and favourite stripy bathrobe. The singlet did nothing to conceal his athletic frame. For a forty- something year old who'd dealt with a life of tragedy and stress, he had aged well.

A strange thought filtered through Annabeth's head.

I'm proud to call him my dad.

He rubbed a hand over his face and blinked tiredly. "Annabeth—"

"It's not what it looks like!" she defended before he could reprimand her or even think about sending her back to the St Francis Memorial Hospital, where Kassandra Jacobs was probably talking to her lost lover Venus, and Kev Banks, the schizophrenic class clown, was probably dying the mashed potatoes in the cafeteria purple or swatting at invisible flies.

Frederick slumped against the doorframe and combed his fingers through hair that curled around his ears and almost covered his eyes. Obviously, it was long overdue for a trim. "Tell me what it is, then, Annabeth. I'm tired of guessing where it concerns you."

"I wanted to see the beach," Annabeth explained, hopping down from the windowsill. Her valiant attempts at ignoring the sea's summons were failing, and she resisted the urge to grab her father by the shoulders and shove him out the door so that she could finally escape this room that was just another gilded cage.

She couldn't wait to feel the smooth sand shifting between her toes, feel the wind cheekily tango with stray strands of her hair, feel the silky water part gracefully in welcome, and wrap her in its briny embrace.

"I just— haven't seen the stars in a while, okay? I need some fresh air. I promise I'll be back by morning." Annabeth reached her father, and tilted her head to kiss him on his stubbly cheek, surprised that she no longer had to stand on her tip toes. Just how much had she grown in six months?

Window forgotten, Annabeth made her way down the staircase, and with an excited leap out the front door, she was on her way to the beach, the moonlight shaping a path for her and the reeds swaying serenely as she sprinted, her body revelling in the utter freedom of movement.

Frederick stayed in Annabeth's room for a while, staring at the rumpled sheets of her unmade bed.

The sight made him happy. Annabeth was home. Annabeth seemed to be getting better.

The curtain blew forlornly in the breeze from the open window, seemingly waving coyly to Frederick, as if it knew something he didn't.

July, 2010

It was glorious. Beautiful. Magnificent.

It was nothing, but it was everything.

The beach at night.

It took her back to nearly a year ago.

The serenity of the full moon, the peaceful light it cast on the skin of the ocean, a barely contained organism of ruthless mercy.

The tranquillity of the night was a severe oxymoron to the grim prospect of her careful plans.

Annabeth closed her eyes, and sighed as the wind whispered in her ears and caressed her face.

Gooseflesh rose on her arms, and her body tingled in the delight of being back on the beach.

She was truly home.

The moon slowly dipped lower and lower in the sky, making way for Her fiery brother who would soon embark on His journey across the sky.

Annabeth lay on the sand, eyes closed, hair fanned about her head, a golden halo for the angel that she was not.

A seagull cried out in the misty dawn, a hark to herald morning's arrival.

The hair on the back of Annabeth's neck arose.

She sat up, feeling unsettled. The mist had congealed to form a cage of thick fog. Mysterious, sly and silently daunting; it was a solid, unmoveable wall, and she felt the faint stirrings of claustrophobia.

Sand tumbled from her hair, and dusted every surface, dip and curve of her body, clinging to her sticky skin, damp in the humidity.

From the layers upon layers of curling, twisting, coyly smirking fog emerged a figure.

Male, tall, lanky, and dark haired, he approached her ominously on stealthy, silent feet.

Bare feet, Annabeth noticed.

He wore a simple white T- shirt, and faded blue denim cut- offs.

Closer, he came. Annabeth's heart pounded, a staccato beat to a suspenseful soundtrack.

She didn't know whether to run, or to stay and talk to him. What did he want? He looked human, but she had learned that looks could be very deceiving. Maybe she was jumping to conclusions. Maybe he was an ordinary fisherman whose boat had broken down on the sharp rocks that rimmed the cove's entrance that were another example of how very deceiving looks could be; if that were the case, he wouldn't be the first fisherman to turn up at her backdoor asking for refuge and a mobile phone after his boat had hit the rocks.

But as the boy— well, male, because he could have been anywhere between eighteen and twenty five— approached, Annabeth recognised something about him. Some subconscious aspect of his demeanour was immediately soothing to her, which was slightly disorientating and totally bizarre, considering that the expression on his face was anything but soothing, she realised as he came within ten feet of her.

His eyes— blue as the ocean on a clear, crisp day— shone with malice, and his shoulder, broad and rippling with muscle, moved with a definite purpose.

No, he was most definitely not a stranded fisherman.

"Good morning," he called, and his voice did not match the expression on his face. His tone was… friendly. He stopped a few feet away from her, and she couldn't stop the shiver that ran down her spine at the expression in his eyes. It wasn't angry, or spiteful… it wasn't even murderous.

No. His eyes were calm, normal. What was wrong with her? She was seeing things. Jumping to conclusions. He was just an ordinary… extremely built, handsome guy walking along her private beach at the ungodly hours of the morning.

An amicable smile spread across his handsome face as he said in that same tone, "Have you heard the news?" His voice was deep and pleasant, and there was an accent under it all that Annabeth couldn't quite place, but was appealing all the same. She could have listened to is voice forever. He went on, as if he somehow knew that, no, Annabeth had not heard the news. She laid back down on the sand, staring blankly up at him, as if in a daze.

"The sea prince's marriage. It's all anyone can talk about."

"Sea prince's…. marriage?" Annabeth could somehow not muster the energy to think too hard about what this beautiful, mesmerising stranger was saying. His shoulders were so… broad. And his mouth was… so soft looking…

Her brain felt like overcooked porridge, mushy and soft.

She was no stranger to compulsion magic. This man… this tall, dark and handsome man… no, this creepy early morning stranger… he was not human. That much she could tell.

In this moment of mental clarity, the words he'd said and she'd repeated felt heavy in her head and her heart with unparalleled meaning.

The sea prince's marriage.

The man went on gleefully, and Annabeth could now tell that his glee was not friendly. It was malicious, it was something terrible and self- fulfilling…

His eyes, kaleidoscopes of squid ink and a pearly luminescence, met hers, and her head filled with mercury again.

"Word has it that the moment he saw her, he fell madly in love with her."

"What is… her name?" Annabeth asked thickly, fighting the fog that had somehow entered her brain and turned her brain into a slowly turning cauldron of muggy ingredients that didn't work together.

The man's smile was a thing of dark, vicious beauty, and it jarred something in Annabeth enough that she was able to escape the creeping fog without his knowledge.

So she understood his words clearly when he said, "Lyssianassa, the blessed of Aphrodite. The most beautiful Nereid in the ocean."

There was a destitute desert wasteland in Annabeth's chest, tumbleweeds and bad Wild, Wild West soundtrack music and everything.

The seagull cried out again, a lonely plea in the silent morning. The ocean hushed, and the fog coiled, and Annabeth lay on the silky, shifty sand, curled around that wasteland that, with each new moon, widened and deepened and dried out.

The man laughed, as if he found great joy in Annabeth's slow, excruciating death.

"There is no place in a married sea prince's life for a pet human, little girl. You'd best move on, find some dull two- legger who at least would offer you the decency of breaking your heart in person."

Annabeth did not hear him after that. She lay on the sand as the sun peaking the eastern horizon above the ocean, and mused that it was not fair that the cove could experience beauty when such deceit and heartache had cursed and tainted it.

The man kicked sand over Annabeth before continuing his early- morning stroll down the shoreline, whistling merrily to himself as if he hadn't just torn a girl's heart out and left it on the dry sand to shrivel in the sun and become stained by the briny breeze.

"The sea prince lies, indeed," he muttered to himself before wading casually into the ocean, and disappearing underneath the waves until no trace of him not even his footprints remained in the human world except for the imprint of anguish he'd left in a human girl's photographic memory.

July, 2010

Overhead, the fading stars winked curiously from their almighty perches in the heavens.

Hold on, they seemed to whisper. It's not over yet.

It's too late, the ocean hissed back, seething. Too late.

A shooting star flashed by, a sign, a chance at redemption.

The girl on the beach with the blond hair and grey eyes did not see it.

For she had sided with the ocean, as she always would.

It was too late.

So... thoughts? Criticisms? Ideas?

By the way, I know Titanic was fictional. It just fit very well into this context as a story that happened.

Disclaimer: a Token is a reference taken from the Iron Fey series, for anyone who caught it.

I can't say when I'll next update: life is unpredictable.

But until next time, readers, I hope this chapter tides you!

- MPSB