The Daughter of Artemis (A Percy Jackson/Heroes of Olympus Fanfiction)

Chapter One - Connor Deserves to be Spat At

I'm still alive, mind you.

It's been like, what, a year now?

You've probably already forgotten who I am by now. Just to ring a bell and jar you back to reality; I'm Astra Windlass. Daughter of Artemis. Left with two stars before I die and I'm freaking out. Should I write an autobiography to remind you?

Nah.

Since I'm too lazy to do so, I'll just recap you on what you've missed.

In the past year, there has been a very hazy interaction between our world and Ouranos'. There were a couple incidents, such as the toilet paper caper and the attempted candy kidnapping; both involving children from Camp Iniquitous. Not exactly head-on battles with weapons and such, but from when we first saw them, they have definitely grown since then. In height, and in strength.

No one, not even Chiron knows how capable they are. We can only hope that the impending war we all assume will happen won't end in any lives lost.

I haven't had any dreams like the one last year; where Ouranos told me to kill Chiron. Of course, I haven't made any attempts of assassination at my mentor; he's like a father figure to me. No murdering on my watch.

Anyways, Camp Half-Blood has slowly been preparing for another war against the Titans. Training regiments were getting tougher, Clarisse's punishments were getting smellier; the environment overall was so tense, you could cut it with a Celestial blade. After all, it was only a couple of years after the fight with Gaea, and now it was her husband's turn to rain his wrath onto New York. Yay.

It began on a nice, July afternoon. Nice, as in scorching hot and it felt as if the flesh was going to melt off of my bones. Apparently, during the winter, Apollo had turned into a human and was sent to Camp, had run-ins with some ghosts, blah blah blah, and I'm not even sure where he is right now. Probably frolicking with the dryads. I didn't really talk to him; he seemed so much weirder than when he was a god. I was worried his disease of teenage puberty and acne was going to spread to me.

Percy was in college, so he hardly had time to check up on us until now. Same goes for Annabeth, although I think she mentioned some problems with a cousin named Margo or Marcus or something. Us uneducated and procrastinating kids, like Lance and I, merely stayed at camp year round to make sure nothing goes wrong. They haven't stopped Iris-messaging us though; they always said if there was any major news, to let them know immediately.

And poor Jason; he's been so out of it ever since Piper disappeared. He's gone on small quests to find her, yet always came back alone. Iris-messages failed every time he tried to contact her, like static. We've all assumed that she's with the rest of the Aphrodite cabin, but the question constantly arises: Why did the Aphrodite cabin disappear, but not Venus' in Camp Jupiter?

There's Lance... I don't know what he's been up to. He's been with Jason on a couple of those quests, worked in the strawberry fields, and lead poetry circles with the Apollo cabin. We haven't had much time to talk, as due to our disorganized lives in the fight against Ouranos. Granted, my feelings for him are still a jumbled ball of I-have-no-idea, so that was alright, but it was sort of lonely without him. Shh, don't tell him I said that!

And finally, Austin.

I haven't seen him ever since the necklace incident at Camp Iniquitous. His screams still ring in my head to this day; what in Hades did he mean by not leaving him alone? Will had mentioned Austin acting strangely in the past, like an illness of sorts. I never noticed with the time I had with him; maybe back at their cabin?

I shake the thought out my head. This was not the time to get dragged down. I held up my sword and block an oncoming swing in front of me. "Lean your weight into your attack," I say while patting my shoulder as emphasis. "That makes it harder for your opponent to block."