Camp Half-Blood Journal of Patrick Ryan

Camp Half-Blood Journal of Patrick Ryan

Book One:

Doom of the Centaur CABINS

Zeus: Jane, Martin.

Poseidon: Percy, Ben.

Demeter: Miranda, Katie.

Ares: Clarisse, Mark, Sherman.

Athena: Annabeth, Malcolm.

Apollo: Will.

Hephaestus: Leo, Me (Patrick), Nyssa, Shane, Christopher, Harley.

Aphrodite: Piper, Drew, Mitchell, Lacy.

Hermes: Travis and Connor.

Dionysus: Pollux, Matthew.

Hades: Nico, Hannah.

Iris: Butch. CHAPTER ONE: THE DAUGHTER OF PERSEPHONE So...mysterious title, huh? I thought of it myself.

Fine. My half-brother at the Poseidon cabin, Ben, thought of it. Actually, the Oracle had made a prophecy including those words, so he just ripped off Rachel Dare.

Anyways, hey. I'm Patrick, a son of Hephaestus and the lieutenant of my cabin (also, I'm a fire user). I'm fourteen. My half-brother, Ben, a son of Poseidon, is thirteen. But I have no clue how that happened. All I know is that my mom had three kids with three gods; first with Hephaestus, resulting in me; secondly with Poseidon, resulting in Ben; thirdly with Dionysus, resulting in my little brother, Matthew. Part of me was devoted to figuring out how this family fiasco happened.

It was a regular camp day. Ben was canoeing in the lake, using his water powers to impress onlooking campers. Matthew was practicing his Dionysus powers in the strawberry fields while his dad talked with him. As for me, I was in the forges, working on my invention: Dragonmints. I had named them that because when you ate one you developed fire-breathing powers. But soon I had discovered that afterwards you get this smoky aftertaste that leaves you sneezing ashes for the following thirty minutes. I was working hard with my fellow Hephaestus cabin member, Leo Valdez. You've probably heard of him from The Heroes of Olympus series by the camp scribe, Rick Riordan.

"Maybe if we just dip them in ice water to cool down before eating," Leo mused.

"No, because then it would put out the pressurized lava inside the mint," I argued. "And lava is the key ingredient. I was actually thinking that we could invent a spray medicine that you spray in your mouth once you begin to sneeze the smoke."

Just then, another Hephaestus camper, Nyssa, burst into the forges, red-faced and breathing heavily. "Come quickly," she panted. "Chiron has had a vision."

"A vision?" Leo asked doggedly. "What about?"

"Questions later!" Nyssa urged. "Chiron needs help. He collapsed, and he's in pain."

Chiron was kneeling (or as close as you could kneel when you're half horse) just outside of the porch on the Big House. Almost every camper was crowded around him. I pushed to the front.

"No, no!" Chiron moaned. "It can't be...not him! Go away from me, Hades!"

"Hades?" I muttered to Leo, who was staring intently at the pained centaur.

Suddenly, the centaur dissolved into yellow light. It reminded me of the time I read about how Percy Jackson's mother was sent to the Underworld by the Minotaur.

"Chiron was stolen by Hades!" yelled Percy. "Someone...do something!"

A ghostly figure rose from the exact spot where Chiron dissolved. It was shapeless black energy, and it made me feel like I should bow down to this mass of blackness. I felt scared, like this thing was about to kill me.

"I have taken your precious teacher," snarled the misty figure. "If you want him back, you must return to me Persephone, my queen!"

The campers started muttering things like, ''What happened to Persephone? Is she lost? How can we find her?''

The mist disappeared just like how Chiron dissolved. A few moments of stunned silence filled the air, until Annabeth shrieked, "Rachel! Are...are you okay?"

Next to me, a redhead had collapsed. Her face was pale and she looked like she was about to vomit. Then her eyes glowed green and she stood up, poker-straight.

"The Forge, the Ghost, and the Flower shall rise and crush the earth,

Along the way they fight a goddess in her turf, 

A crucial demigod they shall meet with a heavy burden,

And one shall perish in the beautiful garden."

After that, the Oracle passed out. I was frozen with shock until Percy Jackson walked up onto the porch, where Dionysus was playing solitaire like nothing had just happened. The son of Poseidon took one look at the god of wine and then announced, "Okay, everyone. It's clear that a quest of three half-bloods should be issued a quest in order to save Persephone and rescue Chiron. Now...the forge. That's the symbol of Hephaestus, right?" He looked over to me and Leo. Leo seemed pepped up because as senior camper of Cabin Nine, he could volunteer for a quest, but since I was his second-in-command, I could, too.

"I'll go," I said. "I think I'll be pretty useful on this quest, what with my Dragonmints and my pyrokinesis powers."

Percy nodded. "Okay. The first quest member is set. Now, the ghost...that's like Hades, right? Yeah, that would make sense, since Hades is the one who took Chiron. Nico?" He nodded at a tall and thin son of Hades, who grinned.

"I guess I'll go," Nico said. "I'm like the only one who can calm my dad down, anyway."

"But who's the flower?" Annabeth wondered.

Just then, a satyr rushed over to the crowd of demigods, accompanied by a kid I'd never seen before. She had long, lush golden-brown hair the exact color of wheat, and a very pretty face, like a nymph. Her deep hazel eyes glittered.

"Whoa," she said. "You guys all have swords and stuff. Do you kill each other at this camp?"

"Close," I replied, cracking a smile. I held out my hand and she shook it warily. "I'm Patrick, a son of Hephaestus, the god of fire and blacksmiths, and the lieutenant of Cabin Nine."

"Nice to meet you," the girl answered. She looked maybe my age--mid-teens. "I'm Katie Flora. This boy-goat thing says that I'm a demigod like in the Greek myths." She looked at me like, Can you believe it?

I grinned again and said, "Well, you wouldn't be here if you weren't. So, welcome to Camp Half-Blood. We were just deciding who would go on the quest to rescue the goddess of springtime and save our centaur teacher at the same time by bartering with the King of the Underworld, Hades."

She stared at me. "Is that some kind of joke?"

"Not really, no," I said.

Then suddenly, a symbol appeared above Katie's head: a sunflower. I had never seen that before. I would've said it was the symbol of Demeter if the symbol of Demeter hadn't been a stalk of wheat, but in that moment, I knew which god was her parent.

I bowed down dramatically, and all the other campers followed my lead. "All hail Katie Flora, daughter of Persephone, Queen of the Underworld and goddess of springtime."

CHAPTER TWO: THE GOD OF THE SUN TALKS TO US 

So, even though Katie had literally just arrived at Camp Half-Blood, it was pretty clear that she was the third quest member. The group of campers had split apart and headed back to their cabins.

"It's okay, I got this," I told Leo after he stepped forward to the bewildered Katie. "You take the Hephaestus campers back to the cabin."

He looked unhappy, but he did. I turned to Katie and said, "Well, since we're starting on our quest tomorrow, I'd better teach you how to fight."

We went over to the forge first so that I could make her a weapon. I asked her what she would like to use after giving her a list of possible weapons, and she decided that the bow and arrows would best suit her style. In fifteen minutes, I had crafted her an excellent bow and a quiverfull of top-notch arrows. Afterwards, I took her to the Apollo cabin, which had the best archers. Will Solace, the senior camper for Cabin Seven, said that he'd have Katie shoot with perfect accuracy in three hours.

I sat there and watched Will instruct Katie. We talked as she fired arrows.

Katie fired an arrow. It hit the target dead-on. "So...my mom is Persephone?"

Will nodded. "Yep."

"I think I've heard about her," she said. "Like in the myths, she was abducted by Hades and made the Queen of the Underworld."

"You got it," I agreed. "But we've never had a daughter of Persephone at this camp before."

"I've got an idea," Will said. "I'll go ask Nico if he can summon up some undead builders to build a Persephone cabin. She can be cabin thirty-one."

Oh, by the way, we've added ten cabins since The Lost Hero. Now we have the cabins of gods like Morpheus, Aeolus, Boreas, Hercules, Melinoe, and tons of others.

"Good idea," I approved. "You can go speak with the Hades cabin. I'll stay here."

Will left.

A few more minutes passed. Katie's accuracy improved with each shot. Then she muttered, "I don't belong here."

"Nonsense," I said. "New demigods come here all the time. You'll fit right in. It's not a big problem. In fact, I think you even have some powers."

That got her attention. "Powers? Cool. Like what?"

I thought for a while before telling her, "Well, since you're the daughter of the goddess of springtime, you may have some control over plants and stuff."

Katie held out her hand and a bunch of ivy vines sprung up from the ground, twisting around. "Sweet," she breathed.

"And I think Persephone is also the goddess of curses and necromancy, because she's the queen of the Underworld and all. I don't know what kind of powers that can give you, but hey, whatever it is, it'll be useful."

"Do you have any powers?" she asked, firing an arrow.

"Well, yeah," I replied proudly.

"Your dad is Hephaestus, the god of fire," Katie reminded me. "So do you have like fire powers or something?"

"Exactly that," I told her. I bunched my hand into a fist and red-hot flames burst to life.

"That is so awesome!" Katie bubbled.

"Thanks." The fires died. "I can also build really cool stuff, since Hephaestus is the god of blacksmiths, too. It comes in handy."

Katie lowered her bow and sat with me on the bench. "Like my bow," she put in.

"Yeah."

I saw that she looked worried. Almost...afraid. She was probably scared of the quest she was going on. It was really unfair, giving her a quest when she hadn't been at camp for more than two minutes. "Listen, Katie," I began. "I was once like you. I came to Camp Half-Blood, and the first minute I got there, I was issued a quest to kill Medusa and bring her head to camp, because she was threatening to kill the campers here. It was scary, I won't lie. And I almost died like nine times. But you know why I didn't? Because I had two other campers, more experienced than me, with me. Together, we killed Medusa, and chopped off her head."

"What are you saying?" she said slowly.

"I'm saying it's okay to be afraid. Every demigod is, at some point. But we'll make it through this. I know we will. With my fire powers, and your plant powers, and with Nico's Underworld powers, we'll save your mom and Chiron." I gave her a winning smile.

She smiled back.

The next morning was very bright and happy. It was unfair that we had to leave camp when it was so amazing outside, but I felt that saving a goddess and the camp's activities director was more important. When I stepped outside, I saw Annabeth coming up to the entrance to Cabin Nine.

"We're having a meeting of senior counselors and their lieutenants at the Big House," she told me. "Bring Leo. We're discussing plans for the quest and after that, you're heading on your way."

The Big House was crowded. About sixty campers were there. I saw Travis and Connor Stoll from Hermes, Miranda and Katie from Demeter (who were talking with Katie Flora), Percy and Ben from Poseidon, Jane and Martin from Zeus, Nico and Hannah from Hades, Lou Ellen and Mark from Hecate, Jeremy and Maria from Hercules, Pollux and Matthew from Dionysus, Samantha and Joseph from Boreas, and many more I couldn't see.

The meeting began with Dionysus yelling, "Yes, yes. Settle down now, children. Let's get started with the council gathering."

"So," Annabeth began, "We all know that Patrick from Hephaestus is leading a quest alongside Nico from Hades and Katie from Persephone. They're going to try to save Persephone wherever she is and bring her back to the Underworld and exchange her for Chiron. Any ideas on how they can accomplish this?"

"Well, firstly we need to know where Persephone is," said Marvin from the Tyche cabin. "I think Nereus is our best bet."

"Or we could ask Apollo," suggested Joseph, the son of Boreas. "When Persephone was first captured by Hades, the Sun was the first one to know where she had gone."

"Good idea," agreed Annabeth. "We can Iris-Message Apollo." She turned to the senior counselor for the Iris cabin. "Butch, could you--"

Butch thrust out his hand and a miniature rainbow popped to life on the table. Annabeth fished out a drachma from her pocket and threw it into the shining mass of colors.

"O Iris, goddess of the rainbow, accept our offering," Annabeth said. "Apollo, wherever he is."

Suddenly an image of a good-looking teenager with sandy hair and a perfectly white smile appeared.

"Hey, what's up, kids?" Apollo asked us. "Want some lessons on archery?" Then he saw Will Solace, the senior counselor for the Apollo cabin, and grinned even wider, if it was possible. "Hey, Will, son," he said happily. "How's it going?"

We're doomed, I thought. Apollo never takes anything seriously.

So, five minutes later, Annabeth got Apollo calmed down and everything. Then she asked him if he knew where Persephone was.

"Hmm, that's a hard one," Apollo mused. "I think I did see her. But she hadn't been kidnapped. She was just walking along in the gardens, picking flowers and stuff. Well...she might have been kidnapped, because just then, a mass of darkness came up and swallowed her!" His eyes widened. "I know, as the god of prophecy, that something terrible is going to happen. An enemy worse than Gaea or Kronos will rise."

"How exciting," muttered Dionysus. "As if we didn't have enough enemies. Thank you, Apollo. You are excused." Dionysus waved his hand over the Iris-Message, which dissolved.

"What you need to do," Annabeth instructed, looking at me, "is go to the Underworld and grill Hades on the details on how Persephone was taken. It's summer, so Persephone shouldn't be ruling the Underworld, but I imagine Hades was still distraught. I don't really trust Apollo to give us every single detail straight." She cast a disdainful look where the Iris-Message had been. "It's now or never, guys. Good luck on your quest."

TO BE CONTINUED...