forest green ● jason grace

two

The smell of coffee made Daria want to cry.

She had never been one to drink coffee; it made her hands shaky and her mind unpredictable. She preferred hot chocolate, with extra whip and cinnamon on top. She liked it too sweet and too hot for anyone else to steal. 

But Jason was the opposite. He lived on the coffee from their morning run, and the one after lunch, and the one after their sparring practice. There would be days where the stress of being praetor made him miss meals, a habit that Daria disapproved of immensely, but without fail, he had his three cups of coffee.

She supposed Percy Jackson was looking for an explanation as to why she was glaring at his espresso. She didn't give him one.

She didn't know how to feel about him. Juno called him "Son of Neptune", which meant that his mother was mortal (unless he was a god. Which, judging by his performance at the river was a possibility). Daria didn't remember much about her childhood but she remembered her father vividly, which had to mean they were cousins.

There were some similarities between the two of them. They had the same brown skin tone, the same unruly black hair, the same determined look in their eyes, but that was about it. Percy was nearly six feet tall whereas Daria only stood at 5 foot 3 inches; his eyes were sea green and hers were the color of the forest.

Regardless, Percy Jackson was right. She had to figure out why he was here before she did anything dramatic...Or at least that's what the woman inside her head had been saying.

"The Bath House," she heard Hazel say, "We'll get you in there before dinner, hopefully. You haven't lived until you've had a Roman bath." Percy sighed with anticipation. Then his gaze turned to her.

"You have questions," Daria recognized, "And I'm sorry, normally I'd be of some help. But well, dude, who the hell are you?."

Percy snorted, "I was hoping you could tell me." He scratched the back of his head, "I don't remember having a sister."

"Well you don't remember much of anything at the moment, do you?" She raised an eyebrow. "Sorry, that was harsh. All I know for sure is that I can't be your sister, my father's a mortal. So either we just happen to have the same last name..." Percy looked like he thought that was about as unlikely as fauns flying, "or I'm your cousin."

"But how do you know that he's mortal? If you've been here since you were like, one," he protested. Daria's lip twitched. It had been a long time since anyone questioned her like this.

"Since I was three," she corrected. "But I hope Neptune's not my father. I met him on Olympus once – he wasn't very friendly. And besides, a child of Neptune in the First Cohort?"

"Daria is the Primus Pilus," Hazel said earnestly. "She's the centurion of the best cohort in New Rome."

Percy's sea-green eyes focused on her intensely, "But numbers don't mean anything," she said. "Some of the best people I know are from the Fifth." Like Jason. "Let's keep walking."

"You guys are divided into different cabins?" he asked.

"Sort of." They ducked as a Drew, riding a giant eagle, swooped overhead. "We have five cohorts of about forty kids each. Each cohort is divided into barracks, like roommates, kind of."

"You're telling me there's two hundred kids at camp?"

"Roughly," said Hazel.

"And all of them are children of the gods? The gods have been busy."

Hazel laughed. "Not all of them are children of major gods. Plus, a lot of the campers are legacies — second or third generation. Maybe their parents were demigods. Or their grandparents."