Percy Jackson Back in Time

Chapter 6

Chapter 6

Chiron gave me a tour around camp, though I was careful not to act familiar with anything when we walked past anything. I had to hold my hand to keep myself from waving at everyone that I knew. I almost asked if anyone needed help with anything like I usually did when I wasn't doing anything, but that would have given something away, or made me very suspicious.

We passed the volleyball pit and I noticed several campers from Apollo and Hermes cabins were playing a competitive match between their two cabins, but they stopped playing their game and nudged each other. One of them pointed to the minotaur horn I forgot that I was carrying. and started to whisper to each other ‘That's him.’

It kinda made me uncomfortable, but I was used to it so I kept my face blank and pretended I didn't hear them.

I looked back at the farmhouse. It was a lot bigger than I remembered, probably because I shrunk. I checked out the window of the attic gable and waited  for the shadow I remembered that I saw last time and saw a clearer picture of what moved the curtain. Just for a second, I saw a withered hand and I knew it must have come from the oracle. It made so much sense.

Chiron looked up and squinted his eyes at the window and I knew he must have caught me looking. His smile quickly faded. 

“That's just the attic, there's not a single living thing. Come along now, Percy," Chiron said, his lighthearted tone now forced. "Lots left to see."

We walked through the strawberry fields, where campers were picking bushels of berries while a satyr played a tune on a reed pipe.

Chiron told me the camp grew a nice crop for export to New York restaurants and Mount Olympus. "It pays our expenses," he explained. "And the strawberries take almost no effort."

He said Mr. D had this effect on fruit-bearing plants: they just went crazy when he was around. It worked best with wine grapes, but Mr. D was restricted from growing those, so they grew strawberries instead.

I still didn't see why they couldn't just grow normal grapes, though I would never say that to anyone. 

Mr. D was restricted from growing wine grapes, not normal grapes. Plus he’s not really restricted from wine grapes, just wine. I didn't see the point of making his life completely miserable just because he wasn't allowed to have wine.

I watched the satyr playing his pipe. His music was causing lines of bugs to leave the strawberry patch in every direction, like refugees fleeing a fire. I wondered if Grover could work that kind of magic with music. I wondered if he was still inside the farmhouse, getting chewed out by Mr. D.

"Grover won't get in too much trouble, will he?" I asked Chiron. "I mean ... he was a good protector. Really." I said hoping to help Grover even if it won't affect anything that much.

Chiron sighed. He shed his tweed jacket and draped it over his horse's back like a saddle. "Grover has big dreams, Percy. Perhaps bigger than is reasonable. To reach his goal, he must first demonstrate great courage by succeeding as a keeper, finding a new camper and bringing him safely to Half-Blood Hill."

"But he did that! Plus you said that he was supposed to show great courage as a keeper. Being successful isn't courageous. It just means he's successful, so technically he already showed great courage when we were getting away from Pasiphae's son." (who agrees with this?)

"I might agree with you," Chiron said. "But it is not my place to judge. Dionysus and the Council of Cloven Elders will decide. The council will question whether Grover showed any real courage on his part especially when you faced the bull alone, he was unconscious, he never helped you.”