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- Luke, her brother
It is a cold autumn night, but the fire is cozy and the three of them are huddled together close to it. It isn’t yet time to sleep, the sun having set mere hours ago and making it only early evening, so they decide to tell stories and entertain themselves. Further traveling could be saved for tomorrow, when the day would be joined by light and warmth.
Annabeth counts in her head and reaches the conclusion that it is their third camp since they left Luke’s house with only a foggy idea of getting as far away as possible. They had succeeded in that goal of leaving the home of a haunted woman. So far, the discussions of their next destination have been ambiguous. The three of them are simply content to continue to travel from place to place without too much thought, at least for the time being.
The fire is oh so warm, putting Annabeth’s mind at ease and making the impulses of her curiosity stronger. It is a rarity for any conversation of theirs to near the edges of talking about family, but this one does and gets close to it. Without careful consideration, Annabeth hesitantly asks during a pause in Thalia’s telling them a story. She asks Thalia of her family, of the mortal mother the older girl has never spoken of but surely must exist.
The question leaves Annabeth’s lips, itching to know some sort of answer. Young Annabeth realizes moments too late her mistake.
Thalia freezes like a deer in headlights. Her once joyful, carefree expression from the story she had been telling grows stormy, in a very similar way to the one Annabeth had grown to fear. Her dad had inadvertently taught her that. A few too many questions when he was busy with work would lead to the shutting down of any excitement. She had learned her curiosity did her little good. The reaction reminds her all over again of a very similar night many months ago, when she had learned that Thalia had been the first person to really preen Luke’s wings. Luke had basically stormed off after she asked about it.
“I’m sorry for asking,” Annabeth blurts, frightened. Her small wings shift anxiously, ready to take off.
Annabeth realizes, with awareness that is certainly far too grown for someone her age, she had been terribly bold. There is an unspoken, but very known, fact that the three of them had each suffered, one way or another, in the places they should have been able to call home. A unanimous truth between them that life before they found each other had been one that lacked any good—one made abundantly more clear on Luke’s part after their recent visit to his once home.
So, she darts for the skies immediately, almost like a hummingbird. Her panic makes her miss the cry that follows her abrupt leave. Annabeth couldn’t bear to stick around a moment longer. Not after she messed up again. Thalia and Luke couldn’t leave Annabeth behind—not if she left them first.
The city grows farther and farther away the higher she flies, and fear begins to creep in.
She has no idea where she is going to go, what she is going to do. She didn’t take anything with her, just shooting up into the air in hopes of getting away. It was a dumb, impulsive decision she made, driven by her worries. She wonders if her mother would answer if she called out for her now.
“Annabeth!” Someone shouts, voice carried by the wind. “Annabeth!”
It’s Luke, and Annabeth knows she should turn around, but she can’t. She won’t. She couldn’t face his anger either.
But whether or not she turns to face him is pointless, because he is right behind her in mere seconds. His large, brown wings cut through the air effortlessly while Annabeth has to flap her own spotted wings ten times harder in an attempt to get away. The difference makes her mad, and she wonders why she had to have been born with such small wings.
A hand clamps down on her shoulder, and she flinches at the contact, fighting both the urge to lean into the touch and the instinct of getting away. Luke hovers in mid-air in front of her, now with both of his hands resting on her shoulders.
“Hey,” he says. Concerned eyes peer down at her, searching her face for answers. “What’s wrong?”
Annabeth’s mouth instantly pulls into a frown. “…You aren’t mad?” she whispers. She looks down at the city below them instead of him. She can hear the distant sounds of traffic and people milling the streets.
“Annabeth,” Luke says lightly, “why would I be mad?”
She raises her head at that, surprised. “Because I made Thalia upset? Isn’t she mad, too? I asked such a dumb question.”
The older boy’s face softens even more and he shakes his head lightly. “We aren’t mad. Not even a little bit.”
“Are you sure?” she mumbles.
Luke withdraws his hands from her shoulders. “We were more worried and scared than anything else when you took off,” he tells her. “Thalia isn’t mad at you, I promise. Her anger was towards her mother. It made her remember some… not so pleasant things. But, she isn’t mad at you, alright?”
Annabeth blinks up at him, taking in the explanation. “Oh.”
“Oh, indeed,” her brother chuckles. He pats her on the head. At her silence, he reassures her once more, “It’s okay. Really. Do you want to go back now, or stay out here for a little while longer?”
Annabeth feels silly and more than a little embarrassed. She isn’t sure if she could face Thalia at the moment.
“Can we go flying for a bit?” she asks meekly.
“Sure,” Luke agrees easily. “Not too long that Thalia gets even more worried though. We’ll have to return soon.”
She nods her assent, and Luke takes her hand to guide her.
They twist and spin, spiraling up into the sky almost like a firework. The cold wind of the night rushes past her ears as they ascend, accelerating with the speed of a hawk thanks to Luke. Most of Annabeth’s vision is covered by the sight of Luke’s beating wings, but when she looks down, she finds that the busy city beneath them is rapidly shrinking in view, becoming something like forgotten to them.
All the while, he tells her about the stars above them.
“Right there,” he announces, slowing the oscillating of his wings to keep himself afloat in the air. He picks out a bright star that glows a warm yellow from the clusters of stars in the night sky, pointing at it with the index finger of his free hand. “That one is the North Star. It’s called ‘Polaris’ in Latin.”
Annabeth stares at the star in awe despite the fact it hardly looks any different from the hundreds of others that accompany it. It did not matter to her, for it was still a beautiful sight, and one that she had rarely seen before in her hometown.
“Is that actually north? How did you just find it so easily? Is there a south star?” She gushes, bombarding Luke with questions.
Her older brother laughs. “Slow down! How can I answer all that at once?”
Annabeth shrinks, hyperaware about her excitement again. Luke holds her hand a little tighter when he feels her starting to pull away.
“Hey, no, it’s good to ask questions,” he reassures her. “Okay, so, yeah, the North Star is actually north. It always is. And there isn’t a south star, as far as I know.” Luke takes a deep breath. “…It’s an easy star to find, but I think I know it because of my dad.”
At that, she asks nothing. She knows she definitely shouldn’t push about family anymore. Instead, she observes the hesitance present in his face as he thinks of how to continue.
“He’s the patron god of travelers and people have always used the North Star for navigation since it points north,” Luke explains, narrowing his eyes as he gazes up at the stars. Annabeth notes that he is remarkably calm talking about his dad this time. “It’s like I just know it’s there. A constant guide.”
They are quiet for a while after that, content to just hover and gaze upwards at what they cannot reach, the inky sky with its spatters of glimmering stars. It’s an incredible sight, even if they are limited by their human eyes. Annabeth thinks it’s even more wonderful that there is more than she cannot see.
“Luke, can I ask you something?”
The older boy drags his gaze from the sky to meet her eyes. “What’s up?”
When she speaks, it is quiet. So, so quiet, her words nearly get lost with the wind. “You and Thalia… You both would never abandon me, right?”
Luke’s eyes widens before they fall to something sad. “We would never—will never—leave you, Annabeth. It’s like we said. We’re family,” he swears, promising from the deepest depths of his soul. Her hand still in his, Luke adjusts his hold to entwine his pinky around hers, sealing the promise with the childish gesture.
Annabeth almost wishes they were on solid ground because she has a feeling he would have embraced her tightly and wrapped his wings around her instead. Annabeth doesn’t know what to say, so she curls her pinky finger tighter. She is just so relieved to know she has a family that won’t leave her like her last, that she has a family that will choose her.
A few minutes later, she breaks her silence to hum Twinkle Twinkle Little Star, remembering the nights her dad would tuck her in for bed and sing to her. He has not tucked her in in a long, long time. She tries not to think too hard about that fact.
Luke looks at her curiously, and she is glad they are so high up and away from the hustle and bustle of the city that she can hear him quietly humming along with her too.
- Percy, her best friend
The moment she exits the Big House, Annabeth takes off into the air. Every flap of her wings are filled with purpose, lifting her further, higher up. She couldn’t stand to be at Camp at that moment, not when there was a certain idiot that had returned after going missing for two weeks with talks of bringing in a mortal girl into her quest.
The audacity of the plan has her simmering with indignation, and then the further suggestion of who exactly would be helping them had her absolutely seething.
And she knows it is irrational, knows it isn’t the case, yet she couldn’t help the knot in her heart she got when he had explained his idea, couldn’t help the indistinct impression of being replaced. If there were to be a single one thing that could cause Annabeth Chase’s heart to drop instantly, it was that—that feeling of being left behind, of being unneeded. It has happened to her before with her own dad, Thalia, Luke, and with Percy himself for the past few weeks. No matter how many times it happened to her, Annabeth doesn’t think she could ever get used to it.
The cool rush of wind against her face as she soars through the air makes her anger begin to recede, if only a little bit. The moment doesn’t last long, however, as Annabeth notices a distinctly familiar beat of wings approaching. The irritation burns through her once again as the current bane of her existence makes his presence known.
“What do you want?” Annabeth snaps, not bothering to turn around and face him.
“I just want to talk,” Percy says, placating.
He easily catches up to her and his flapping wings slow into a glide that matches her own. Annabeth resists the urge to fly ahead of him, knowing she wouldn’t get very far. He would probably just maneuver himself to use the wind to his advantage to reach her once again.
“And what is there to say, exactly?”
“Well, for starters, maybe how you spoke at my funeral?” Percy suggests, unable to hide his interest at that, “Or what you’ve been doing the last two weeks?”
“Not many people you were close enough to at Camp,” she responds curtly, “Sleeping, eating, and out of my mind with things to think about.”
She had been planning to spit the sentence out with venom, but it fails to come out as uncaring as she wanted it to be because of the way her voice cracks on the last word. It still manages to be a jab to Percy, judging by the way he flinches in her peripheral vision. He falters in the air for just a moment, before he regains his balance with a flap of his striking blue-tipped wings.
“I’m sorry,” he says, quietly. “For disappearing.”
Annabeth soldiers on without sparing him a glance, gliding through the air with swiftness.
“Look, I know you’re not happy with the plan since it’s your quest,” Percy begins, sounding something verging on desperate, “but this is for our own good. I swear this will work.”
“I don’t doubt your idea, dummy,” Annabeth murmurs, shaking her head to herself imperceptibly.
“What was that?”
“Nothing.”
He groans in annoyance. “Come on, Annabeth.”
“Fine. Whatever. What choice do we have anyway?” she grits out.
Percy accepts her response without any further comment.
Down below the two of them is Long Island Sound, a seemingly never ending stretch of blue that contrasts the sky. From here, she thinks she understands the rush that Icarus had felt beneath the sun’s rays and above the ocean’s waves. With every inhale of the sea’s breeze, she feels an urge, one she’s never had before, to ascend to meet the sun at its zenith.
“It’s nice up here, don’t you think?” Percy comments, pushing ahead slightly to try and meet her eye. It startles Annabeth briefly how the question aligns with her train of thought.
She lets her indignation stew for a while longer, but she finds that she cannot be mad at him for long and her anger dissipates. She avoids him still, and mumbles a belated “yeah.”
They fly together in a silence that teeters between comfortable and awkward for the duration of their flight, Percy a steady presence at her side.
Distantly, Annabeth hopes that they can go flying again like this in the future—in a time where there is no longer the threat of an upcoming battle looming over them; without this lingering something between the two of them they have currently yet to acknowledge; when they have things to chat about with joy instead of plans for a quest they may or may not return from.
And perhaps, flight will come easier and her wings won’t weigh as heavy.
Finally, Annabeth looks back at Percy, and when she does, she finds he has been waiting for her. His eyes, ever green as the sea itself, glimmer as she holds his gaze.
Perhaps he, too, hopes for the very same.
- Athena, her maker
It is the middle of the night and Annabeth cannot fall asleep.
As she stares into the wooden ceiling of Cabin Six with an arm slung across her forehead, she thinks. And thinks. And does a whole lot of thinking. In fact, too much of it. Annabeth wonders if overthinking is a child of Athena trait due to being born from thoughts.
She’s seriously sick of her emotions being amplified by tenfold during nighttime and, in turn, her mind running overtime. She’s sick of when her feelings get the better of her on random nights and she ends up crying as silently as she can manage in fear of waking her half-siblings with her sobs.
Tonight, Annabeth is tired of it all.
She’s tired of thinking and feeling. She wishes there were a pause button to hit to get her brain to stop going overboard in the thoughts and emotions department. She’s tired of all that she feels taking the reins of her life from her.
She’s also genuinely exhausted as well. She has never been a great sleeper—a chronic insomniac and night owl from the moment she was brought into the world. But the habits that were her lifestyle have become about a hundred times worse after the Giant War.
Before, when Annabeth was truly a child, all there was to worry about were spiders she feared were hiding in dark corners plotting to attack her, and fitting in at Camp to no longer be an outsider. Now—when Annabeth is a teenager who has quite literally gone through hell and back—she is afraid of spiders in a way she never had been before, and there is Tartarus everywhere.
It is there in the shadowy figures that appear in the corner of her vision when her eyes move too quickly and her brain decides to fill in the blanks of what she cannot see. It is there in each ache of her bones, in every movement. It is there in the way she’s been unable to find joy in the things she used to love. It is there in her inability to wrack her brain of any creative ideas for architecture plans.
It is there with her in every waking and non-waking moment, in the recesses of her scarred mind.
Now there is waking up in the middle of the night and screaming like she’s being stabbed, because that was exactly what she dreams about in vivid and clear colors, almost like the things she saw never left her eyes, and the same foul smells almost like they never left her nose.
She dreams of tartarus like it never left her senses, like she never left at all.
But tonight, a rare one that she simultaneously finds more peace and more stress in, Tartarus is actually the least of Annabeth’s worries for once. Tonight, there are dozens of different worries and thoughts clinging to her that Tartarus is pushed to the very back of her mind.
Annabeth curses in her head and decides she’s had enough thinking for one night.
As quietly as she can, the daughter of Athena kicks off her blanket and begins to descend down the ladder of her bunk. She snags the Yankees cap laying on her messy desk—which she really had to tidy up sometime soon, because it was a continuous nightmare to attempt working with mountains of clutter surrounding her—out of habit really because it was strange to be without it, and perhaps she wants one bit of familiarity and comfort with her, and heads for the door.
With every step Annabeth takes, she is cautious of the creaky boards in the floor, having lived in the cabin for the last ten years of her life. Annabeth carefully slips out the door and silently closes it behind her as she steps out into the darkness.
She does not even realize she had been holding her breath until she breathes in the crisp air of the night and feels instant relief settle into her bones. She had not realized how suffocated she had felt, tossing and turning on her bunk surrounded by her half-siblings in the stuffy cabin, until she left.
Annabeth allows her wings to snap open as a late-summer breeze passes by. It feels good to let the wind pass between her feathers, so she stands there with her eyes closed and wings spread, relishing in the silence that nighttime brings.
Suddenly, she realizes can’t recall the last time she went flying for the sake of it. The recognition of how much she’s been itching to fly follows shortly. She supposes that one flight wouldn’t hurt; you could not keep a bird chained to the ground after all.
She lifts her wings and twirls up into the night sky.
With every flap of her wings she takes, she wonders why she doesn’t go flying as often as Percy does. He seems to love it, as does most people, and she can see why.
Tonight, the sky is mostly clear, save for the few dark clouds that linger around to say that there may be light showers the next day. Tonight, the moon is bright and clear, and Annabeth feels as though she may be able to count its craters. Moonlight shines down, casting a soft glow on everything below. She passes a quick prayer to Selene in appreciation of it all.
Tonight, Annabeth is flying out of Camp Half-Blood borders with no particular destination in mind, just wanting to clear her mind.
The freedom of being so high up and away from everything else is exhilarating. There are no responsibilities, expectations, nor nightmares in the sky.
She feels beyond free.
Annabeth wonders if that is even possible, to feel freer than free.
She glides, embracing the rush of cutting through the night sky and the wind that pushes against her. The serenity of it all distracts her, dulling her usually sharp instinct in senses—the ones she had honed to the deadliest, farthest extent she could in Tartarus. It takes her a long moment for her to realise she is not flying alone anymore.
Annabeth snaps her head to the side at the strong, but clearly suppressed, presence beside her.
“Do not fret, child. It is only me.”
There, in diminished glory, flies Athena.
Her godly, imposing air is lighter than the previous times Annabeth has seen her. The goddess is without the imperial gold armor that Annabeth last saw her in, but dressed in a similar white robe to the one she wore during their battle against the Giants. The gaze of Athena’s stormy grey eyes, darker and sharper than Annabeth’s, is homed in on her.
“Hello, Mother,” Annabeth greets, neither welcoming nor hostile. A formality.
“How have you been, Annabeth?” asks Athena, almost how a real mother would.
“I have been well.”
“Yet you fly in the middle of the night to escape your thoughts?”
Annabeth says nothing to that—has nothing to say in response, in fact. She observes how Athena is flying without wings, for they are a weakness that the gods cannot afford. It appears like the goddess is floating, but Annabeth knows it couldn’t be quite as simple as that. She does not ask.
Her question is unspoken, yet Athena blinks in faint amusement, plucking the passing thought from Annabeth’s mind.
“We, gods, do not need wings. Instead, we call upon our own abilities to fly as you do.”
“I see.”
“Annabeth,” the goddess calls softly.
She looks back, and it surprises her to see Athena’s grey eyes gleaming with warmth.
“You have done well, Daughter.”
Annabeth falters at that, nearly falling out of the gods-damned sky in surprise. It takes a moment for her to steady herself, but Athena waits patiently.
“What?” she chokes out, caught off guard at the sudden praise.
Athena goes on, “You have gone through so much— too much for a mortal, in fact. And I have failed you when you have needed me most.”
It nearly sounds like an acknowledgment of Annabeth’s time in Tartarus, something almost like an apology and an admission of her own wrongs.
“I understand you were warring with your own mind against your Roman counterpart,” Annabeth says. She catches the way Anthena’s appearance flickers for a second at the mention of Minerva.
“I’m afraid it does not excuse the way I have acted towards you, dear daughter.”
Annabeth’s face morphs into weary confusion. She is far too tired of the gods for any more of their antics and superficial words.
In the blink of an eye, her Yankees cap, that had been tucked away in her pocket, appears in Athena’s hand. “This, one of my very first gifts to you, was… overridden.”
The daughter of Athena’s eyes widen, having an idea of where this was going. The hat shimmers with a glow before it dims. Her mother passes it over to her, and Annabeth accepts it cautiously.
Athena says, delicately, “I believe that was long overdue.”
Annabeth peers down at the cap in shock, finding herself speechless at the gesture.
“Rest well, Annabeth. You deserve it, and so much more.”
When she lifts her head back up, about to voice her gratitude, she finds that the goddess has disappeared. Vanished, like she had not been there just a few seconds ago. But the zephyr that comes by shortly after is all the confirmation she needs. The cool wind caresses the side of her face lightly, and weaves its way through her braids and feathers, and lingers longer than a normal breeze would.
Annabeth flutters through the sky with the Yankees cap pressed to her chest. She flies long enough that she can see the rising sun peeking from the horizon by the time she is ready to return to Camp.
Worn out from her night adventure, she slips back into her cabin with less caution than she would normally, and falls into a content sleep the moment her head touches her pillow.
For once, Annabeth does not dream of Tartarus. Instead, she dreams of kind, warm gusts of wind.
And later, Annabeth will not startle herself into waking. She will not burst from the realm of dreams and find herself springing up in her bed, blankets pooling at her waist, and gasping for breath. Instead, she will be able to sleep in until noon—with none of her siblings waking her, all of them happy to see her sleeping well—and open her eyes to cheerful sunshine streaming in from the cabin windows.
+1. Herself
Today, Annabeth is flying. Unlike other times, it is not out of any necessity. The purpose is not to run away from any problems, or to escape her own mind, but because she wants to. She has cut a slice of time in her day’s busy schedule specially for this, pushing duties to the very back of her mind for the moment.
It feels so, so good to just enjoy the experience—to not have any burden on her shoulders and be able to appreciate the simple joys of flight, of the little things of life itself, to longer hold herself back in distaste at what is part of her.
In the sky, she feels untouchable. She cannot fathom why she had robbed herself of this so many times in the past.
As she lowers her wings and dips in the air, words from over a decade come back to her in an instant as if she heard them yesterday.
“But it’s up to us what we do with their so-called gift. Wings are a part of us, and that’s something we can’t change. They’re something we can appreciate and make the best of.”
Annabeth can’t help the wide smile that comes on, thinking back on her first encounter with Silena. She wonders if the girl would be proud of her today if she were still around.
Like a bird freed from its cage, she soars higher into the sky, spinning. Annabeth hopes that even from Elysium Silena could see her flying without a care in the world.
“I think I’ve done it, Silena,” Annabeth whispers with conviction, to an audience of none but the forest.
The trees below her wave in synchrony, swaying back and forth at the wind’s beck and call.