Hatred

[ Thalia pov ]

It had been a while since they had arrived at Luke's house. Christina was sleeping on the couch while Annabeth and her had already healed their wounds, eating small ambrosia squares that Luke's mother had. Right now Thalia was sitting on the living room with Christina's head resting on her lap, Annabeth was sitting next to them, eating slightly burnt cookies Luke's mother gave them.

"And on his first day of school he went to say hello..." Luke's mother kept on telling them stories about Luke's childhood, however neither Thalia nor Annabeth were too focused on them. Thalia's attention was split between Christina, who despite having eaten a cube of ambrosia that healed her leg wound was still suffering from fever, and Luke, who went upstairs a while ago after hearing the loud voice and still hadn't come back down. Annabeth on the other hand was more focused on Christina, Luke said he was fine so he must be fine, Christina however was not fine, so it was important to pay attention to her.

While Luke's mother kept on talking, narrating Luke's childhood, Christina started squirming in her sleep, making both Thalia and Annabeth completely focus on her.

While Christina's movements intensified and her expression grew more and more desperate, the conversation Luke was having upstairs was getting more heated.

Thalia wasn't sure what to do, so she tried waking Christina up before going upstairs to check on Luke, this however proved difficult, as Christina, despite clearly being in pain, didn't react.

Suddenly, Christina woke up while screaming, bringing Thalia's and Annabeth's attention to her, and even making Luke's mother go silent.

"Hey hey, it's alright, I am here." said Thalia while hugging Christina, who wasn't paying attention to her words and instead was grabbing her arms and feeling them.

"Better now?" asked Thalia once Christina calmed down.

"Yes... sorry." said Christina. "I had a nightmare and it felt way too real."

"It's fine." said Thalia while caressing her hair.

While they were having the conversation, Luke came downstairs, clearly angry. Upon seeing Christina awake, he went to her direction and smiled, though it was evident to Thalia that the smile was slightly forced. "Hey there, feeling better?" he asked.

Thalia noticed the clear concern in his voice, most likely he heard the screams from upstairs and came down, leaving behind what must have surely been an important conversation, after all only something serious would have caused him such anger.

"Yes..." replied Christina while letting him ruffle her hair. "I am fine now."

"I see..." said Luke as his smile turned less forced and kinder. "Sorry to not let you rest right now, but we need to leave."

"Where are we?" asked Christina.

"We will tell you along the way." replied Thalia while looking at Luke, who upon noticing his gaze nodded his head, indicating that it would be better, much better, for them too get out of here now.

"Okey." replied Christina.

Annabeth simply stood up and went to grab their stuff, getting ready to leave. To be honest Luke's mother scared her a bit, there was just something... unsettling about her, a thought with which Thalia agreed.

[ Luke pov ]

As they made their way out of the house, Luke was feeling terribly angry. He had been talking to his father, and only excuse as to why he abandoned him, as to way he never answered his calls or prayers, was that he knew Luke's fate, yet when Luke asked him about it, he replied nothing and choose to remain silent.

Trying to get his thoughts away from his father, he began thinking about the good news, Christina had finally woken up and was now fine. Her fever disappeared and her wounds healed, leaving behind nothing but a scar on her leg.

Annabeth's and Thalia's wounds were also healed thanks to the ambrosia his mother had... ambrosia his father must have given her. Thinking about it made him angry again, his father never showed up when he was in the house, but once he left he returned and gave his mother ambrosia, the very same ambrosia for which he prayed for, the same ambrosia he never received when he needed it, the same ambrosia he only managed to get from Halcyon because the gods ignored all of his pleas.

He already lost count of how many times they prayed to the gods for help, each one of the four had prayed to their own parents over and over again, yet an answer never came, help never came, the only thing that actually came was monsters, endless hoards of monsters always trying to devour them.

.

[ Hermes pov ]

"What do you think you are doing?" asked Hermes slightly angry.

"That is none of your business." replied a beautiful woman.

"I asked, what were you doing in my son's house?!" asked Hermes once again, this time his voice turning more serious.

"And I said that it is none of your business!" replied the woman, her voice raising as well.

"You went after the girl didn't you?" asked Hermes. "Even though the Fates told you not to."

"Hey, I had to!" said the woman angrily. "Or did you expect me to ignore the insult he made?"

"Messing with the Fates' warnings never ends well, you should know that." said Hermes while his expression went from angry to slightly disappointed as he shacked his head. "Besides, he was just drunk and bitter at the time... he usually is just bitter when he... catches you and he normally doesn't drink, so I doubt he did it on purpose."

"The Fates told me not to kill her and I didn't." replied the woman. "Also, shut up. Being drunk or bitter is no excuse, so I will show him just how cruel love is!"

Hermes sighed at this, he too wished he could mess with the Fates, at least enough to help his son... "Well, I won't keep talking about this, but do be careful, Aphrodite."

*

*

*

Author note:

The conversation between Aphrodite and Hermes will be more developed later on, and keep in mind that when I say later on I mean really later on, not sure which chapter number it will be but based on the outline I made it will end up around chapter 150 perhaps, maybe a bit sooner. So yeah if you are curious about the 'insult', then you will have to stay curious muahahaha.

I think it is pretty obvious by now who Christina's father is but whatever.