¹On This Spring Day, percy jackson & the olympians

014.

ON THIS SPRING DAY
━━━━━ chapter fourteen

━━━━━ VIOLET CAN'T SAY she enjoyed flying on the shoulder of a bronze statue. And it certainly wasn't the most comfortable place to sleep, either. Yet, Violet managed to fall asleep.

And what she saw was certainly weird.

She saw a blonde woman battling with a sword as dark as midnight. And not only was she battling with a sword as dark as midnight, she was in clothing not from Violet's time; she was wearing a green top with frills galore, paired with a dark skirt that went down to her ankles. Not the most practical clothes to fight in, of course, but Violet respected the girl's ability to dress nicely, even when fighting for her life.

The blonde shivered, looking at the snowy ground around her. A black jacket lay torn twenty feet away, blood staining the pearly snow. She was coated in blood, ruining her clothing. She was cut in several places, blood trickling down her face, her arms, her hands. Her teeth chattered as she glared at the monster before her.

"I will never," she snarled. Her voice was hard to place, but Violet knew for sure she did not have any modern accent from the Americas.

The monster shifted, struggling to pick a form. It was shrouded with darkness, maybe because of Violet's dream or to conceal themself. "You have no choice." Its voice was crackling, as if a broken walkie-talkie.

"Yes, I do."

Before Violet could do anything, the blonde stabbed the sword into the ground, and a fissure opened. Her vision shook, the monster wailed, and the blonde screamed in pain.

Violet woke up with a start, her eyes stinging. A voice was yelling at her, breaking through the whistling wind, "We are in the Sierras!" It was Zoë. She and Grover were hanging from the arms of the second statue. "I have hunted here before. At this speed, we should be in San Francisco in a few hours."

The daughter of Eros shivered, and look at the ground below her. A range of snowy mountains was zipping by. The dream flashed in her mind, her mind latching onto the monster's voice. It was so bitter, which shouldn't have been shocking. They were monsters, after all. They were bitter creatures, cursed to live immortally as something to be feared.

But don't go thinking Violet felt pity for them, they still try to kill her a lot.

Still, the monster's voice rang in her mind. It was weird. She had heard it before.

"Hey, hey, Frisco!" the angel holding Violet, Thalia, and Percy said. "Yo, Chuck! We could visit those guys at the Mechanics Monument again! They know how to party!"

"Oh, man," the other angel, Chuck, said. "I am so there!"

"You guys have visited San Francisco?" Percy asked.

"We automatons gotta have some fun once in a while, right?" their statue said. "Those mechanics took us over to the de Young Museum and introduced us to these marble lady statues, see. And—"

"Hank!" Chuck cut in. "They're kids, man."

"Oh, right." If bronze statues could blush, Violet swore Hank did. "Back to flying."

Violet smiled lightly to herself, looking over to Percy and Thalia. The daughter of Zeus had her eyes sealed closed, clinging to Hank's arm like it was the most important thing in the world. Violet swore the girl's lips were moving in a silent prayer to whoever would listen. Percy locked eyes with her and mouthed, Heights.