12 chapter 12

Harry was relaxing on his back porch beside the fire pit, watching the ocean swell from the storm outside the transparent wards, when Hades arrived in a flurry of shadows and wrath.

The gorgon froze, hand stilling in the process of bringing one of his special cigarettes to his lips, gaze tracking the irate God as he paced from one end of the porch to the other several times in an effort to calm himself.

Slowly, he lowered the cigarette and got up to make a bee-line to the alcohol in the upper kitchen shelves when the God finally threw himself down into his favoured lounging chair with a huff.

Harry paused as he looked over his stock, eventually grabbing a long, curled, gold-capped horn of Asgardian mead Loki had left behind one night and a glazed clay urn done in sunset colours, gifted by Amaterasu-no-mikami, full of Eight Purification Sake.

The Sake urn went into the ashes of the fire-pit to warm up and the horn was offered to the Wealthy God.

It was nearly an hour later that Hades managed to growl out what had him in such a snit.

"Someone stole my Helm of Darkness at the Summit. Along with Zeus' Bolts."

The fire flared bright from the Sake that flew across the flames as Harry choked and spat the liquid across the room, pounding his chest when it went down the wrong tube.

Sitting upright, Harry's mind went in several different directions at the same time.

"Suspects? As in, actual suspects and not blind conjecture based on personal dislike?"

Hades gave him a cranky look. "Poseidon has, apparently, broken the vow and had a son, Perseus Jackson. There is quite a bit of finger-pointing in his direction because of his lineage and because Poseidon still has his Trident. However, the boy is only twelve and is, as far as I can tell, unaware of his father's true identity."

"But Zeus will chase that boy regardless of how irrational his suspicions are." Harry finished, rubbing his forehead in mounting frustration.

Hades grunted in agreement.

"Do you have his address or what school he attends? I'll send some of Richard's pack out to see him and, most probably, bring him back to Home. Maybe see if Triton is willing to go along."

The God made a sound of harsh disbelief.

Harry privately agreed. Greek/Roman Gods rarely got along with their same-gender siblings, or illegitimate siblings or illegitimate step-children. Unless they thought they could have sex with them, which was a whole other kettle of fish.

"The Camp children were there for the Solstice, right? Did you have Apollo go through and question all of them?"

Hades made a sound of frustration and irritability that Harry took as 'No'.

The gorgon scratched his claws lightly against the skin between his snakes like other people would scratch their head.

"If you can convince Poseidon to present the Trident, I can probably make something that can track an object's 'origin' and find anything associated with that 'origin'. Shouldn't be too hard."

There was a shift and Pluto peered at him over the ornate drinking horn hovering in front of his lips.

"Have I ever mentioned," The Wealthy God murmured, voice smoother than Hades' and his inky-black eyes sharper. "Just how completely broken your ability to Create is?"Harry chuckled and waved it off, not letting himself be distracted from the subject at hand. "It would probably do you well to keep tabs on Athena and Ares/Mars, if war truly is the end-goal of this affair. They may not be directly involved, themselves, but their Authorities will affect their behaviour the closer to war it gets."

Pluto leant back into his chair to finally relax now that he had a rational plan.

And he would never, ever let Harry know of the scrapped plan he'd had regarding Perseus Jackson.

(space)

Triton scratched his beard awkwardly, looking anywhere but at the hopeful face of the Immortal in charge of Home.

He was honestly a little unsure of his feelings towards Harrier, but it was somewhere between dear friend, favourite relative and helpless crush. And it was currently hard to tell if Harrier was being deliberately provocative or if he wasn't aware he was doing it; it was also difficult to tell if he was being sexy provocative or shy provocative.

Uncle Hades, with whom he now shared a fairly good relationship with thanks to the shorter Immortal, actually smirked at him from where he was lounging in the doorway of Calli's cottage.

And in the half-second he'd glanced away, Triton's twins, Adrien and Julian, had sidled up beside Harry and were staring up at their father with pleading blue-green eyes, having already volunteered that they would like to meet their mortal uncle.

"Fine." He finally choked out. "I will go and meet this… Percy Jackson."

The two children whooped and danced around, Calli smiled and Hades laughed at him softly.

Harry just nodded, satisfied.

(space)

The look on Hades' face was amusing when Harry dropped a leathery, wiggly, grunting little creature into his arms.

It looked a bit like a tiny, tail-less ankylosaur with all the agility and pleasant personality of an English Bulldog puppy. Its skin was thick and leathery, but soft, completely devoid of hair, with osteoderm plates across its wide back like a crocodile, but would grow into low rocky spikes as it aged. Its face was broad and flat, like an ankylosaur's, with a wide cow-like mouth, beady but adoring brown eyes and huge nostrils, frames by four bony protrusions that jutted from its cheekbones below the eyes and from just above the temples.

The little creature was one of eight little creatures, all female and all 'born' pregnant to eight pups which would start to grow when their mother reach adult size and who would, in turn, all be female and pregnant to eight pups. The population numbers, however would not go past one hundred and sixty as the collective reproductive cycles of the creatures would go dormant until a full eight of the creatures had been killed and, even then, only one would give birth to her litter. They could also only give birth once, so the ones who had given birth already would protect those who hadn't.

They came in shades of mottled grey, bronze and gold and wouldn't get any bigger than a large Bulldog. Like all of Harry's creatures, they ate metal and anything they didn't use was smelted in the belly, separated into layers and came out the other end in 'nuggets'.Their primary function was tracking things associated with the 'Origins' and 'Myths' of whatever they were presented with, with the tenacity of a hungry mother honey badger. They had a multi-faceted sense of smell that allowed them to track things from dozens of miles away. Normal scent-concealing spells would never work because they tracked the contrarily ephemeral and eternal scent of energy and 'concept' after their 'prey'. When their 'prey' was found, they would shriek with a sound combining something between an elk's bellow and a hippo's grunts.

The idea to track by smelling magic and the idea of origins and concepts had come to Harry when he was relaxing with Thalia and Annabeth while they watched their favourite series, 'Fate/Stay Night' and started looking at others from the Fate series online out of curiosity.

They were 'born' only half-grown, so it would be a good two weeks before they would be ready to hunt.

Hades raised an eyebrow at the little creature, impressed by Harry's resourcefulness and innovative nature when the gorgon explained what the little creature was.

"So what are you gonna call them?" Harry queried, giddy and bouncy with the endorphins from presenting his project to his friend.

The little creature wiggled, paws flailing in the air with joy as she rolled on her back in her Master's arms, grunting and squeaking joyfully.

"Well, Ankyliya sounds like a good name. Homage to their origin of concept, so to speak." Hades' lips quirked

Harry laughed and rubbed the little Ankyliya's belly.

(space)

Triton sighed and knocked on the apartment door, already breathing shallowly through his mouth from the stench lingering in the hallway.

The door opened and the God had to work not to flinch from the wave of rank stench rolling of the… Triton was hesitant to call the creature a man.

"Whattaya want?" The… thing demanded, wiping a hand across its chin to smear away the dip that was clinging to it. There was something nasty and petty in its little squinty eyes.

"I am looking for Sally and Percy Jackson." He responded coolly.

The sound of someone moving in what was probably the kitchen ceased.

The little humanoid's eyes flickered up and down Triton's designer suit and curled his lip. "Who's asking?"

Blinking once, Triton stepped over the hagfish flopping around in the doorway, oozing slime and waved a hand to clear the room of the majority of the stench from the apartment while Jackie nudged the writhing creature to the side as she and a pair of twin sons of Bellona, Mike and Mack, followed her in. Daphne, glamoured into looking almost human, hovered curiously in the doorway

The only other person in the apartment was a rather beautiful, motherly woman with a few grey strands in her hair.

"Sally Jackson?" Triton inquired politely.

The woman nodded hesitantly.

Smiling in what he hoped was a calming, comforting manner, he introduced himself. "I am Triton. An incident has occurred and we need to move you and Perseus to a safe place."

The woman, Sally, let out a breath and marginally relaxed. "You're going to take him to Camp Half-Blood? I was under the impression that normal humans weren't able to enter the grounds."Actually," Jackie broke in from beside the door, "We're gonna be taking you and your son to a place called Home. It's a pretty new place set up a few years ago for Demi-Gods who can't protect themselves or don't want to have to continue fighting every day of their lives. Because it's set up in a Marble Reality, Monsters and Gods can't get in without going through one of the Gates, which are heavily guarded and cannot be forced open. These days, most of the so-called 'Lesser' or 'Minor' Gods and Goddesses send their children and lovers straight there or ask the Wardens, like us, to go collect them."

Triton folded his arms and nodded agreeably when Sally looked towards him for confirmation. "I currently have a lover and our twin sons living there. It is essentially a community where everyone able contributes, human and Demi-God. You will have three months to find a niche to fill, but it shouldn't be hard for you. You seem like the kind of person who would settle in well."

Sally nodded thoughtfully. "Percy won't be back for another few hours since he's still in school. It's the end of the term and the exams are over, so I should be able to excuse him from the last few days."

Jackie smiled and clapped her hands. "Then let's get packing, shall we?"

(space)

It was nearly six o'clock before the Sun Gate opened and closed behind Sally and her stunned son.

The lowering 'sun' caste a soothing light over the town sitting on the lake edge, surrounded by mountains and the murmur of voices rolling through the lazy pre-evening air.

Over the other side of the lake, where it turned into a river leading into another, newer, lake, the pair could see what looked like endless plains of golden grass interspaced by what looked like reaching spires of polished red stone.

To the left was a range of tall, jagged granite mountains capped in snow and robed in green trees.

To the right were rolling hills that smoothed out into savannah and seemingly-natural orchards before seamlessly merging into the golden-grassed plains. Beyond the savannah was a sea of sand dunes that gave glimpses of a neon-blue ocean.

Behind them, on the other side of the hilltop where the circle of Gates opened, was a vast basin ringed in mountains so far away that the far side showed only a thin blue-grey ring. The basin opened onto the savannah to the right, and again a few mountains over on the other side of the gap where the vast inter-networking rivers in the basin bled into the ocean.

The basin, itself was laced with rivers and beaded with ponds where the lush, bright green jungle parted amidst the bright patches of trees in bloom. At the centre was a tall white tower like a porcelain orchid; a tower straight out of the Never-Ending Story, the Ivory Tower of the Childlike Empress.

Sally and Percy stood at the Lookout behind Eris' Shrine, breathing in the clear, clean air of a whole new world.

Percy looked at his mother. "Wow."

Sally laughed helplessly in agreement, tears of relief or confusion streaming down her cheeks.

Behind the duo, Triton smiled in sympathetic joy.