A Fire Burns Within Me (completed)

The Dream

I acted with out thinking, springing to my feet with out making a noise and climbing a tree nearby with out disturbing anything. I crouched in the tree branch, not holding my breath but making each breath small and light. If I held my breath then I would fall out of the tree.

"It is over here, Phoebe," a voice said, "I could have sworn I heard something."

Great, I thought, My screams drew some attention.

"Thalia, we need to get back," Phoebe called, sounding farther away than the first voice.

Thalia? I thought in panic. She can't find me, what if she convinces me to go back? I can't! I'm not ready to face her yet.

I pulled on the hood of my cloak, making sure that it was covering my face.

"Fine," Thalia relented, much to my great relief. "Let's go."

I followed them to where their camp was while keeping to the shadows and jumping nimbly from tree to tree with out making a sound.

Once they made it safely to camp, I took off in the direction of the nearest town. My mother sent me an image of a young girl being beat up by an unidentifiable shape. The image looked to be from the point of view of a fire pit, which made sense since my mother could only have sensed it if it were either near or in her domain. Or both.

I followed my gut, letting it tell me where to turn, letting my instincts take over. It wasn't until I was past the nicer parts of town that I started to slow down, feeling as though my destination was close. The part of town I found myself in was not in any way ideal. The streets were narrow and filled with trash and even rats. The sort of thing you would expect from the medieval age. The buildings were run down and looked like they were about to fall down. Dumpsters in the ally ways were being harvested by small children and even some adults. One or two of the allies I passed had some one being mugged. I didn't stop to help because I had to be somewhere that second or something bad will happen and Lady Artemis would have moved on.

I needed to hurry up. I could feel the anxiety flowing from my mother through our link via necklace. It was growing cold with worry and hot with anger. Don't ask me how that works because I do not know.

Finally I found it; two floors up and to the right one window. As I climbed I could hear the screams and whimpers of the young girl as she got punched and kicked. Now that I could see it clearly, with out the blurry edges of my mind, I could see that it was two big and ugly guys beating up a young girl around the age of seven.

No matter what I did, I could not prevent the image of a seven year old Annabeth running out of an ally with a hammer right into Luke and Thalia.

I shook my head, focusing on the task at hand.

I knocked down the window blocking my path to the ugly men and kept inside. I could feel the warmth of relief flow through the necklace and I smiled to myself.

"Who are you?" Ugly 1 sneered, "Come to be pummeled too?"

I rolled my eyes as Ugly 2 sneered as well and said, "Yeah." Obviously this guy was the follower.

Moving swiftly, I lunged and shoved my fist into Ugly 2's face, easily breaking his nose and bashing a few teeth out.

"Owwwww," Ugly 2 exclaimed, clutching his jaw and nose for dear life. The idiot probably thought I dealt a killing blow.

"You killed him!" Scratch that, Ugly 1 thought that.

I rolled my eyes and moved to stand in front of Ugly 1. I moved so fast that the guy had to take a double look before he realized that I wasn't on the other side of the room anymore. "All I did was punch him," I told him. "I bet that is what you thought you were doing to the p-young girl here." I almost said 'poor'. That would have been bad, no one wants pity and I could tell the girl was listening intently to our conversation. She still hasn't moved from her spot on the floor, curled up to avoid any blows directed her way.

"The b-"

"Careful," I interrupted. "You don't want to teach any young ears bad habits do you?"

"But-"

"Ah, ah, ah," I interrupted again, putting him in a choke hold that effectively cut off what ever he was going to say. "Young ears."

I waited until Ugly 1 was passed out before turning to Ugly 2. "What am I going to do with you?" I asked casually to the man holding his nose still and staring wide eyed at me.

He started to back away toward the window. The vermin thought he could get a clean get away did he? Let's fix that.

I started forward so fast, Ugly 2 hardly realized what was happening before I kicked his legs out from under him so that he fell and hit his head on the window pane. I flinched, that had to have hurt. Now Ugly 2 was covered in blood, on his face near his nose and on the back of his head where he hit the window. His hands and feet were covered in the red liquid too but I don't think that all of it was his.

I growled in anger as I realized this. Reaching down, I clutched the front of his shirt and mercilessly threw him out the window and onto the brick walk way out side.

Finished with that, I turned to the blonde girl on the floor in front of the fire place. Well that is convenient, now I don't have to pic her up and scare her even more. I can just heal her where she is right now.

Speaking soothing words, I crouched and started to crawl in her direction. I thought that if I lowered myself to her level she would calm down enough to let me close enough to heal her. She was sobbing so hard she started to hiccup. Moving slowly, I reached my hand into the dying fire and tapped into my healing and calming powers from my mother.

Putting my other hand slowly on the girl's foot, I sent the calm into her enough so that I can move even closer. Eventually the sobbing died down to just hiccups and I moved to pick her up, still speaking soothing words. Closeting my eyes, I concentrated. Her cuts and bruises started to heal and her eyes lit up, showing the hope that I helped boost a little.

"You're getting good at that," a voice said from behind me. It was a warm and soothing voice so I didn't jump in surprise and I knew immediately who it was.

"You think?" I asked my mother as she moved to kneel next to me.

"Indeed," she reassured me. "Someday, you will be able to spread out that hope to more than just one person at a time. You will be able to inspire crowds of people losing hope and save those who went too far."

I smiled as I gave the young girl to Hestia. She accepted her, holding her close as the blonde curled up and promptly went to sleep.

"I will take her to Artemis," Hestia said, standing up with me. "They almost caught you this morning."

I blushed a little. "Yeah," I admitted. "I had a bad dream last night."

"I thought they were getting better," my mother said, her brow furrowing with concern.

"They were," I told her. "This one wasn't a flash back." Alright I lied, but I didn't want her to worry too much. I thought back to the dream I had right after the normal flash back, so much darkness and bloodshed. I wouldn't know where to start to explain it. I did not understand it myself.

"Then what was it?" My mother asked.

"I don't know," I told her honestly.

See? I'm not a bad son.