Everyone in Camp Half-Blood hated the storms. It meant no bonfires, games, lessons or even sneaking to the kitchen for a midnight snack. It meant everyone stayed indoors at night and spoke until their voices fell on sleeping ears. It was, what the demigods would consider, boring.
It was Ciarda's favourite weather.
With beady brown eyes, she watched her brothers and sister, who snored to the blissful tune of singing metal and scorched wood—Ares cabin. Fires burned into the chimney of every wall, hoaxing the room into an orange hue. The smell of pine smoke was natural to the children who homed in that place.
"Fucking sleep," Clarisse, Ciarda's twin sister, mumbled as she handled her pillow with rough calloused hands. Fighters hands. "I know, just getting some water," Ciarda sighed, rubbing her eyes.
Perhaps the girls were nice to each other, but when they stepped out of that cabin, they were demigod monsters. The living daughters of the God of War. And they'd be damned if they weren't treated that way.
"Pissing rain," Eros cursed from his bed, the cold water dripping from a leak in the roof right onto the bare skin of his back which stretched across pure muscle. His dark hair fluffed by the pillow, which Ciarda realised he'd stolen from Eurytion, another of her elder brothers.
Pulling on her orange camp shirt, which was many sizes too big for her, and some checkered pyjama bottoms, she led her way into the blissful storm. Gods whispered in the wind.
...
Darkness was torrential, matching the rain which blistered down onto the slated roofs of Camp Half-Blood. Ciarda took her time in the outdoors kitchen, however, savouring the beads of water which ran down her tanned arms. They soaked into her collection of beaded bracelets easily, those which almost coated her forearms. One for every summer at Camp.
She ran a chipped glass under the rusted bucket sink, enjoying the sound of the thunder rumbling in the air. Perhaps Zeus was angry. Perhaps he'd been fucked over once more by his brothers. She didn't care.
The pettiness that the Gods held amused Ciarda, even if she never voiced those thoughts aloud - for fear of being vanquished by a lightning strike.
Finishing up with her water, Ciarda sat on the damp table, not minding as it soaked into her pyjamas. Eros' snoring could be heard from the small crack that Ciarda had left in her window. The edges of her lips perked up.
"HELP!" Hoarse screaming came from the forest, blistering the silence. It came from near the treeline. Ciarda's dark hair whipped her neck as she turned her head. It was horrifically ambiguous and equally merciless, letting goosebumps echo down her spine.
The distant flicker of headlights was obvious enough, hidden by the mass of moss-cloaked trees. She stood on the table, her bare feet gripping onto the edge of it for balance. "HELP!" Another scream, yet this time a feeling much worse trickled through the air. Knowing.
She'd been here before.
She knew that voice. "Grover?" She yelled - the girl always had had a lack of social awareness. "FUCK, PLEASE HELP!"
The cold white flame burst in Ciarda's chest and she set off running.
...
Mud coated her pyjamas as Ciarda raced through the trees. She dodged first as they neared her, sticks and brambles digging into the bare soles of her feet. Blood traced her arms and face in thin strokes as branches swiped at her. Regardless, she continued towards Grover's voice. "Grover? GROVER?"
A hesitant stutter of panic was loud enough for Ciarda to change her course. "Shit, CIARDA?" Grover's voice was confused, grinding of teeth hidden behind it. Pushing herself until her breath was burning in her lungs, Ciarda bolted towards the headlights. Moving silhouettes now became more present.
Flashbacks bombarded her like sharp punches, knocking about in the inside of her skull. The darkness. The rain. It was all so familiar.
When she reached the clearing, on the other side of which Grover was struggling with bleeding goat legs, Ciarda's breath was no longer. It ran away as a wisp of the wind.
In front of her was a boy holding a glowing orange sword. And a Minotaur.
She didn't think, but let her aggressive instincts take over. Imagined her father speaking to her while she yanked a low-hanging branch from its origin.
Rounding the circle of thick fir trees, water poured down on her. Her orange shirt stuck to her skin as she grabbed the underside of Grover's arms and pulled him behind a tree. His pained cries were secret with the wind, taken the moment they left the satyr's lips.
"We need to get to the tree line," He gasped, failing to spit out the water that filled his mouth. Cuts scattered his face. Everything was the same. His voice, his fear. It was like she'd never left the woods all those years ago.
Ciarda didn't have time to formulate a reasonable response before grabbing Grover's pocket knife, turning and flying towards the Minotaur.
The boy she didn't recognise was on the floor, dodging piles of mud and rock that the Minotaur dumbly threw in his direction. His glowing sword was nowhere to be seen, and his whole body was caked in pine needles and swarthy mud.
Ciarda's head spun as she heard voices, Luke's, Annabeth's. She ran blindly, trying to find them in the rain. When she smashed her shoulder into a tree, she came to her senses. They weren't here.
She flicked open Grover's knife, the rain making her work harder.
Somehow, in the poor visibility, she carved a sharp spear from her branch and put away the knife.
"Fucking monsters," Ciarda whistled loudly whilst she ground her bare, bleeding feet into the ground, preparing herself for impact. The Minotaur plundered towards the new sound.
Its textured horns smashed into her side, ripping her skin open like it was paper. She cursed out, the bark of the tree she was being forced up, pinging away into the rain-drenched floor.
Her arm quickly jammed the spear into one of the Minotaur's black eyes, deep indigo blood bursting from the socket. It drenched Ciarda, her girl's voice echoing a scream.
Thunder cracked and lightning roared. She pushed the blood from her eyes and spat it from her mouth. Pulling her foot up and placing it between the Minotaur's eyes, she kicked it with as much power as she could muster.
Her leg muscles did the trick, the Minotaur stumbling back, temporarily stunned. She ran across its long head, swinging on the cracked horns and propelling herself into the canopy of trees.
The Minotaur screeched, its roar so loud it must've woken the whole of Long Island. Eye socket still bleeding, the monster pulled out the spear - causing a more severe amount of blood to spurt from the puncture wound.
The warning bells of Camp Half-Blood rang out under the noise of rain pellets. Voices and the cracking of metal came from awoken soldiers. The ground shook, causing Ciarda to fall out of the tree, leaves covering her bloodied palms. Her shirt stuck to her side, blood staining it and rapidly spreading.
Grinding her teeth, she tried not to scream out when she pulled the shirt up, revealing a mass of blood and bone. Her head went light and black spots danced in her vision.
The new boy fought the Minotaur, gripping its horns. With all his might, Ciarda watched whilst he cracked off a Minotaur horn and slammed it into the skull of the monster. It incinerated into the air thick with rain.
The boy lay on the ground, unconscious, three feet away from the rain-soaked girl who lay in the pine needles. Her hair was slathered in mud, her face rippled with cuts.
Her feet numbed in the cold, but the sting of her feet still caught up with her. She coughed, everything hurting her ribs.
"Thalia," She stretched her hand out, trying to grab the unconscious figure she lay next to.
YOU ARE READING
𝐖𝐀𝐑 𝐎𝐅 𝐓𝐈𝐃𝐄𝐒 | percy jackson
Adventure"do i look like i give a shit if he's poseidons son?" water from the fountain splashed into her face, dripping from the dark ends of her hair "the fact she's ares daughter means shit all to me" and soon enough percy jackson was scanning the room as...
