Melpomene (PJO)

6. A restless little dead girl

"I can't believe you didn't tell me!"

Will stuffed a tub of sixteen mini nectar bottles into Mari's yellow backpack. Ambrosia was amazing and all, but for some reason she had always preferred the liquid version. He was helping her pack, since last time Drew had basically done it for her so she didn't have any experience herself. Will had even less, but Mari was willing to admit that he had a lot more common sense. Case in point, three hours ago when she'd tried to sneak a pack of Jaffa Cakes into the front pocket of the backpack and he'd confiscated them (apparently non-perishables only was standard questing fare). At this point, Will was essentially packing her backpack for her.

"I mean, it's the labyrinth, Mari! The labyrinth!"

"I'm sorry." Mari nodded from her perch on the open window sill where she was letting the sun soak into her skin - she probably wasn't going to see it for a while. "I didn't exactly tell anyone. I wasn't-"

"Allowed to, I know." Will sighed. "I just wish you'd told me. You told Annabeth."

They were in cabin seven, where Lee had left Mari with a hug before leaving to blow off some steam at the lava climbing wall. It must have been bad if he was willingly going near that thing. Lee usually spearheaded the whole 'avoid the flaming rock wall of evil like the plague' movement. Will had been there already, reading something. He'd been... well, he'd been nothing short of horrified when Mari explained what had happened at the meeting, and what she'd known, but he'd instantly agreed to help her, so that was something.

"Chiron told Annabeth. And anyway, she figured it out. Will..." Mari said. "Are you... mad at me?"

"I don't know." Will folded a couple of orange shirts. "Not really. I think I'm more worried."

"Do you think that Naomi is going to be mad at me?" Mari asked. She wondered if she was crossing a line - Naomi had been nothing but kind, but she was not Mari's mother. Mari didn't have a mother, and she needed to remember that.

"No," Will said almost instantly. "But you should definitely tell her, because if you don't then she'll be mad."

"What did the prophecy say, again?" Will asked.

Mari pulled out the page she'd ripped from the back of her sketchbook. The first thing she'd done after leaving the sword-fighting arena (other than shrieking into her pillow so that nobody could hear) was scrawl the prophecy Annabeth had recited onto the paper, in messy penmanship. Mari read out,

"You will delve in the darkness of the endless maze,
The dead, the traitor and the lost one raise,
One shall break from what lies ahead,
To bury what's already dead.
You shall rise or fall by the ghost king's hand,
The child of Athena's final stand.
Dot dot dot... Destroy with a hero's final breath."

"What do you mean, 'dot dot dot'?" Will asked. "You didn't write down the whole prophecy?"

"Annabeth didn't remember the whole prophecy," Mari told him.

It was times like this when she really, really wished her father hadn't stolen the power of prophecy from her when she was just a baby. She hadn't even been given a chance to use it. She would have been good, she would have been responsible. She would have never misused it, even if she wanted to. Maybe, if she still had it, then she wouldn't have to rely on Annabeth. She could find out what the prophecy said all on her own. Or maybe she'd be just as in the dark as she was now. Mari didn't even know how this kind of thing worked, she'd been too young. And she probably never would. Her Dad had seen to that.

"She didn't remember?" Will was incredulous. "You could all end up... it's a dangerous quest and she didn't remember? She's Annabeth!"

"Look, this is everything I know, Will. I don't have anything else to go on, so I have to try and work with this." Mari glanced at the two packages Will was holding and made a face. "Ew, no. If the choice is dried Bananas or dried Cherries I choose death."