Miss Quinn

114 ~ The War Council

Each day of the summer dragged on for Emma Quinn as she anxiously awaited Annabeth's IM telling her to come to Camp. While Emma was overjoyed to be spending time with her mother, the anticipation was slowly taking her over. She wrote to Venus everyday, detailing how she kept seeing Annabeth's face everywhere, as if her mind was playing tricks on her. Some days, Venus came to Emma's house through the Floo network, and talked with Emma while she paced about her home, preparing things, re-preparing things, and looking around constantly for Annabeth's face.

Emma tried to enjoy her summer. She and Venus visited Dean and Seamus a few times. Emma never seemed to stay focused on anything, and Dean was starting to notice. He asked Venus about his girlfriend one day after Emma had gone home. Venus said Emma was nervous because her father wasn't doing well, and she couldn't visit him until he got better. Yes, it was a huge lie. But it seemed to make Dean feel better. He'd been thinking that Emma wasn't interested in him anymore.

By the time August rolled around, Emma and her mother had gone to Diagon Alley to get new school supplies, and were preparing Emma's trunk to go back to school. Emma started to wonder if Annabeth's IM would ever come. She started exchanging letters with Draco Malfoy, the only person besides Venus that she could rant to about the lack of war. And it wasn't really that she wanted to go to war, it was that she couldn't stand knowing it would happen, but not knowing when.

Emma sat with her mother on the sofa, each with a mug of tea in their hands, working on a puzzle. The two had done plenty of puzzles in the past few weeks, since they were easy to do, and didn't take long. They'd played lots of board games, too. Emma was starting to realize why they were called board games.

As Emma was finishing the outer edge of the puzzle, she heard her name. Looking up, she saw Annabeth's stormy gray eyes, curly blonde hair, and determined expression. Emma blinked a few times, to make sure she wasn't imagining things.

"Annabeth!" she exclaimed, standing up so fast she spilled her tea onto her hands.

"Percy and Beckendorf blew up Luke's ship, the Princess Andromeda. Percy says Kronos seemed pretty confident in is victory over Olympus. And Poseidon told him he needs to hear the whole prophecy, which is where we're going right now." Annabeth said all this very fast. She seemed to spit out the important parts, and skip all the details.

"Do you need me?" Emma asked.

"How soon can you be here?"

Emma looked at her mother. Beatrice shrugged. "Twenty minutes?"

Annabeth's eyebrows rose. "How do you plan on traveling that fast?"

"I have my ways," said Emma, smiling. "I'll see you soon. Don't see the Oracle without me!" She waved her hand through the rainbow screen, happy as a clam.

Turning to Beatrice, she said, "Give me five minutes to get my stuff together, then we can go."

Beatrice smiled sadly at her daughter, and nodded. Emma dashed up the stairs to her room, and grabbed her Camp bag. She double-checked its contents, then found two spare pieces of parchment and scribbled messages to Venus and Draco, telling them that she was off to Camp, and may not return. To Venus she added an extra goodbye and a 'hope to see you soon'! To Draco's, she added nothing.

After folding the letters, she wrote each of their names on the front, and brought them downstairs. Emma pulled on her Converse, lacing them up tightly. Then she faced her mother once more.

"Can you send these when you get back?" Emma asked her.

"Yes. Do you have everything? Wand, ring, necklace? Toothbrush? Clothes?" Emma nodded to each. Beatrice sighed and pulled her into a hug.