THE HOUSE OF MEMORIES [J. GRACE]

TWENTY-FOUR

ˏˋ°•*⁀➷ THE HOUSE OF MEMORIES ༉‧₊˚.[THE HEROES OF OLYMPUS]

P I P E R
chapter twenty-four: turns out piper might be a traitor, and chandler is definitely suspicious. meanwhile, jason, and leo have been put under a charm so all they wanna do is shop until they drop while chandler, and piper scramble to figure out who their enemy is, and how to stop her, and that's what you missed on the house of memories

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PIPER CORNERED the princess the first chance she got.

jason, and leo had went off to check out the living fur coats, and chandler had tagged along under the pretense of supervising them when in fact, piper heard her murmur under her breath about how really fucking cool the store  was despite how much the princess, and owner sucked.

"so, what," piper put on her most intimidating stare, and giving her voice some bass as she pressed the princess. she was doing anything in her power to channel chandler, and annabeth when she had first meant them. she only hoped it carried over well to the princess. "you want them shopping for their deaths?"

the princess offered nothing much more than a half interested hum as she blew dust off a display case of swords. "i'm a seer, my dear. i know your little secret," she said, not really catering to her absolute costumer service ability. it seemed as if she only reserved that for the boys as she'd even dropped the sugared, sweet tone. "but we don't want to dwell on that, do we? the boys are having such fun."

leo laughed as he tried on a hat that seemed to be made from enchanted raccoon fur. its ringed tail twitched, and its little legs wiggled frantically as the hephaestus boy walked. chandler was sorting through the armor, looking at the more feminine stuff, but still being picky on color, and design like any other teenaged girl. jason was ogling the men's sportswear, and occasionally stealing glances at chandler like a middle school crush, or something. boys interested in shopping for clothes? a definite sign they were under an evil spell.

piper glared at the princess, getting plenty sick of the little goose chase that seemed to be trying to figure out who in the world she was. she was pretty adamant about the customers in her store not knowing her by name. it was utterly annoying. "who are you?"

"i told you, my dear. i'm the princess of colchis."

"okay, then where's colchis?" piper tried again, forcing some charmspeak into her tone, and making her voice hard.

the princess's expression turned a little sad "where was colchis, you mean. my father ruled the far shores of the black sea, as far to the east as a greek ship could sail in those days. but colchis is no more, lost eons ago."

"eons?" piper echoed, the shock evident in her tone. the princess looked no more than fifty, but a bad feeling started settling over the aphrodite girl, something king boreas had mentioned back in quebec. "how old are you?"

the princess laughed, her hand coming up to rest on her chest as if she hadn't laughed that hard in a while. it was an elegant movement, like one of an old, southern belle. "a lady should avoid asking, or answering that question, dear." she said this to piper as if the girl should've been taking note, storing the thought for another time. "let's just say the, ah, immigration process to enter your country took quite a while. my patron finally brought me through. she made all this possible." the princess swept her hand around the department store.

piper's mouth tasted like metal. "your patron..."

"oh, yes. she doesn't bring just anyone through, mind you. only those who have special talents, such as me. and really, she insists on so little; a store entrance that must be underground so she can, ah, monitor my clientele, and a favor now, and then. in exchange for a new life? really, it was the best bargain i'd made in centuries."