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The day started out as well as it could for Rory.
She had woken up tucked in the corner of the training arena.
It wasn't an uncommon occurrence — she often found herself unable to sleep and chose to train instead. Alone. Besides, she was strongest at night, due to her mother being the goddess of it.
She was woken up when two campers, a daughter of Ares and a son of Hephaestus, loudly entered the arena. They went quiet when they spotted her in the corner, rubbing the sleep from her eyes. The two slowly backed out, and, once they were outside, Rory heard them laugh and call her a "freak."
Breakfast was fine, as it was most mornings. The Hermes table was mostly empty — save for Rory, newly promoted joint head counselors Connor and Travis Stoll, Ethan Nakamura, and Cecil Markowitz. Children of Hermes and most undecided campers had the privilege of going home for the year — since they weren't that powerful monsters tended to leave them alone. Before a few months ago, Rory would never outwardly admit that she preferred the cabin being free from the rest of the campers, but now...
During the year, usually only around fifteen campers remained — and it was usually the same kids. So it was even more heartbreaking for Rory to find out that the campers she would say she knew the best, who she grew up with, had been blatantly avoiding her, talking about her, making fun of her. The only people who didn't seem to be scared of Rory were the Stolls, daughter of Ares Clarisse La Rue, and most of Apollo's cabin.
Gods, Rory missed her friends. Grover's been MIA on his quest for Pan and there was no way to reach out to him. She hadn't talked to Percy since Christmas and she only Iris-messaged Annabeth maybe once a month.
And whose fault is that? a voice in her head would remind her every time she felt lonely.
After breakfast she took a nap. She hadn't slept in three days and she was tired. She woke up around three o'clock when Clarisse barged into Cabin Eleven suited in a full set of battle armour, throwing a chestplate and helmet at her.
Rory expected her to laugh and taunt her, telling her to "rise and shine, Sleeping Beauty." But instead, Rory was met with a deadly serious expression.
"Border's down. We're under attack."
Rory's heart stopped. They had been fearing this for months.
At the end of last summer, the magical barrier around Camp Half-Blood had been failing. The very same barrier that kept mortals and monsters out and protected the demigods in camp. The barrier that was created by Zeus himself to prevent any half-bloods from dying the same way his own daughter, Thalia, did.
For months, Chiron, Mr. D, and even the campers had no idea why their barrier was no longer as strong as it was. Until one day a few weeks ago, they noticed the pine tree at the edge of camp starting to turn yellow, and its needles falling to the ground.
