"Guided by a circle of their own foresight?" Repeated Chiron thoughtfully after Percy had recited the prophecy.

"Yep," Percy answered, staring at the wet handprints he had left on the table from his previous outburst. Apparently, he had coated everything his skin touched in hoarfrost, which had now melted. Was this his life now? Prophecies and freaky things and family drama?

They were sitting at the picnic table again, joined by an enthused Annabeth. A warm breeze swept through the valley, smelling strongly of ripe strawberries. Shouts and ringing thumps came from the volley ball pit, where the Apollo and Demeter cabins were engaged in a fierce sportly battle. Faint clanks emanated from down the hill where the Hephaestus cabin was hammering out new swords, and the Aphrodite and and Ares cabins were arguing about the use of eye shadow by the archery range. A normal day at camp—normal for everyone except the freak of the litter, Percy thought darkly.

"Okay, so let's break it down," suggested Annabeth across the table, her fingers drumming rapidly on the wood and her eyes shining with delight. Percy fought down a surge of annoyance; she was enjoying this insanity. His innocence, his life, maybe, depended on the success of this. And she looked like a toddler in a candy store. To her, Percy was just some specimen, just some project or puzzle she wanted to solve.

"A half-blood, journeying at the word of this seer...alright, pretty straightforward. You're going somewhere." She chattered at a million miles and hour.

"More importantly, 'the realm of terror and fear'..." Chiron sighed heavily, passing a hand over his weathered face. "That must mean that Hades is the thief. Unfortunately, it makes sense."

At this point, it wasn't even news to Percy. He was just getting more mad with every passing second, like he was a ticking bomb. It wasn't fair. It just wasn't freaking fair. As childish as it sounded, Percy repeated the deafening mantra over and over in his head. So what? So what?

"Guided by a circle of their own foresight'...a circle..." Annabeth's head suddenly shot up. "...oh!" She cried. "That could mean—"

"Anything at all," interrupted Chiron, probably noticing the way the thin spirals of frost were seeping out from Percy's clenched fists that lay on the table. "We do not have to do this now. Percy, you can choose two other campers to go with you."

Annabeth's back straightened, and Percy couldn't help but glare at her.

She glared back. "What?" She snapped, sounding annoyingly superior. "Do you want to die or let me come?" Percy snorted but didn't decline. He knew that she was smarter than him in this area, and he needed all the help he could get.

Chiron nodded. "And I suppose you would want Mr. Underwood with you as well?"

Percy just bobbed his head in assent.

Chiron cantered down the hill to find Grover and Annabeth scuttled off to her cabin, most likely to gloat to her siblings about being chosen for the quest, leaving Percy alone.

Again.

Gods, he thought, resting his forehead on the too-warm wood. His life was so messed up.

—•—•—

Leo was about ready to set the sleazy gang leader on fire.

Yeah, okay, not really. Leo wasn't a killer. But he was getting pretty heated—and in more ways than one. Part of his brain was worried that if he got too mad, the crumpled wad of cash in clenched fist would combust from his freaky fire powers. That would be bad, seeing as this was all the money he had.

"Okay..." The guy drawled, cigarette smoke dribbling upward from the foul-smelling, glowing cancer-on-a-stick he held in his hands. "You get half of what you asked for. One box of croutons. No twinkies."

"Dude!" Leo pleaded, "Come on!" Desperate, he switched on his best puppy dog eyes and hid his hands behind his back to conceal the thin wisps of smoke trailing from his fingers as he bottled his frustration. "I'm just—"

"Yeah, you're a runt," the guy snorted, his eyes glinting cruelly. "And I don't like back talkers. Now, get out!"

Leo could have done something about it. He could have raised his hand and turned the jerk into a flamesicle like a freaking firebender.

But he didn't. He didn't posses the courage.

Instead, Leo took the less-than-subtle hint and scampered away through the twisting, dingy alleys of Houston until the guy was outta sight.

It wasn't such a bad life, this. If you were smart enough. And it's not like Leo had chosen this, either; his Dad had apparently skipped town before Leo was born, and his loving, brilliant mother had been killed in a fire that started in her mechanic shop when Leo was seven. He'd bounced around foster homes for a year, trying to be good while simultaneously, unwittingly being a magnet for trouble. After twelve months of periodically being locked in closets and deprived of dinner, Leo couldn't take it anymore. He followed in Daddy's footsteps and escaped from his Alcatraz.

He'd been living in this rough part of Texas for the fourteen months, surviving off what he could pickpocket and glean from sympathetic strangers. Not much, considering he's a super-shady drowned rat of a nine year old in a trench coat that's at least two sizes too big.

With a grunt, Leo wrapped his skinny arms around the old rain gutter and began to heave himself up. The ancient aluminum creaked and groaned dangerously even under Leo's a scrawny weight; but he didn't pay attention. With a grunt, he finally heaved himself over onto the roof as the shadows lengthened across Houston.

Yay. Saltines for dinner tonight.

—•—•—

That night, Leo had the dream again.

It was always the same: he watched a little girl with brown hair and brown eyes skate on a frozen lake with an older boy who looked like her brother. The two were dressed weirdly, though—like they were pioneers or something. The little girl was unsteady and unsure at first, but the older boy—Jack, she called him—never ceased to guide her, always careful and cheerful. Leo always felt a pang; what would it have been like of he had an older brother or even sister? He'd seen this dream so often that he now knew the two children like they were his friends. He almost liked it when he had this dream (every night)...except it ended like—

"Jack!" The girl suddenly yelped, and Leo's heart sank at the harsh sound of cracking ice. No change, then.

The boy froze, and his face paled. He opened his mouth, but no words came out.

"Jack!" The girl pleaded again, sounding on the verge of tears. "I'm scared."

"I know, I know," Jack said quickly, as if he just needed words to fill the silence. "It's okay, it's okay. Don't look down, just—just look at me. You're not gonna fall in, uh—"

The ice creaked ominously.

"We're gonna have a little fun instead!" He said in a brave attempt at humor.

"No!" The girl seemed on the edge of hysteria. "We're not!"

"C'mon," Jack encouraged. "Would I trick you?"

Almost against his will, Leo mouthed along silently as the girl wailed. "Yes! You always play tricks!"

An absurd chuckle fell out of Jack's mouth as if he totally agreed. "Okay. Okay. Well, not-not-not this time," he stuttered, the faintest cracks in his veneer. "I promise, I promise, you're gonna be...you're gonna be fine."

After dozens of times watching this scene play out, Leo had come to recognize the finality in Jack's last sentence, as if he knew what he had to do and accepted it.

"Hey! You wanna play a game? We'll play hopscotch, like we play every day! It's just, one..." He took a careful step over. "Two..." Another step. The ice splintered dangerously under his heel, but Jack passed it off as a silly unbalance. "Three!" With one quiet leap, he was back on safe ground. "Okay," he said, as if he was psyching himself up. "Now it's your turn."

The girl looked as terrified as Leo knew Jack felt, but took a step.

"One..." Jack muttered.

Another step.

"Two."

Another step—

"Three!" Jack grunted, and hooked the crook of his shepherd staff around her middle and swung her out of danger—but inadvertently fell onto the thin ice. Leo had learned to stop trying to warn them as Jack stood triumphantly, grinning at the girl who giggled back. "See! I told you, Emma!" He crowed. He tried to step towards her—

With a sound like bones breaking that made Leo wince even now, Jack plunged into the freezing pond.

But then something changed.

Leo had always thought he was seeing things from the little sister's point of view, watching her scream and cry as her brother fell where neither could see him. But this time, Leo WAS Jack, plunging into water so cold it burned like knives. Leo gasped, feeling like he was drowning to!

But then he realized what he was seeing. In the dim light, Jack was floating limply, his eyes shut.

Dead.

Leo blinked as a white color seeped over Jack's messy hair like frost creeping over tree bark. The water seemed charged with energy and then Jack opened his eyes—

They were blue—

Leo awoke with a gasp, never more grateful for Houston's smoggy, smoker-worthy air.

He ran a hand through his messy hair, ignoring the aches in his back from laying on the cement roof all night.

Why had it changed? What did it mean?

With a grunt, Leo heaved himself to his feet. It was time to infiltrate the library. He had research to do.

His stomach rumbled.

Okay, breakfast first. Research later.

—•—•—

'Resurrection' had turned up a load of crap. He might have spelled it wrong.

'Frozen lake Jack' turned nothing (literally. Google gave up).

After an hour of other useless phrases and no results, Leo did something he'd wanted to do for a long time, hacking into and looking up his lineage (he was good with mechanics. Like, scary good. If you understood how it worked, then anything was possible). He'd traced back the Valdez to his mother's grandparents—his great grandfather's name was Samuel Valdez.

His grandmother's maiden name was Violet Overland.

He traced her line back until he found something that froze his heart solid and stole his breath. In 1712, a town newspaper said that one Jackson Overland had saved his younger sister, Emma, from falling into a frozen lake. And he had paid the price.

So why was he having dreams of long dead relatives? What did Jack and Emma Overland, his great-great...whatever grandmother and uncle, have to do with him?

FRICK. IM SORRY GUYS. I WANTED TO GIVE YOU SOMETHING BEFORE SCHOOL STARTED!

Review!