Chapter 3

Hecate conjured a futon for him to sleep on. Percy slept on the ground floor, and while sleep didn't come easy to him, he did wake up feeling refreshed. He didn't have any dreams last night, but something told him that won't always be the case.

"Get in here Jackson!" Percy heard Hecate call out for him from the kitchen. Percy grumbled as he got up and walked to the kitchen finding Hecate hunched over a pot boiling something. She noticed him and smiled, "the water started working."

"Thank the Gods," Percy yawned, "what are you doing?"

"Making a potion," Hecate the snapped her fingers summoning what looked like a twig with red leaves. She took the twig and carefully plucked and poured the leaves into the boiling water.

"What is it?"

"It's something that will help you with studying," Hecate informed him as she turned off the stove and summoned two ceramic cups. She then dipped the cups into the pot and took out the boiling water offering it to Percy.

Percy nodded curiously as he took the cup, "thanks, what is it?"

"Tea," Hecate smiled as she drank the liquid, "with a little bit of betel leaves. Just to give a little oomph for your drink."

"That isn't a potion."

"Oh? And what is it then?"

"It's tea, not magic."

"Well we can agree to disagree then."

Percy shrugged, he sipped the tea and found he quite liked it's bitter taste. "So what time is it?" Percy yawned as he looked outside seeing that it was still very early.

"It's around 6," Hecate shrugged as she and Percy walked pack to the main hall and sat in the lounge chairs, "perfect time for magic."

Percy nodded, "so today is when we finally start training yes?"

Hecate nodded, "yup."

"Well how exactly are we going to do that? Since you know, I don't have a wand?" Percy glared by the goddess simply shrugged his glare off.

"There are many wizarding arts that doesn't require a wand," Hecate told Percy, "most of them are just theory though."

Percy groaned, "oh come on? Really?! I get to learn magic, but first I have to read it off of a stupid book?!"

"Why? Do you have something against books?" Hecate asked surprised.

"Their okay, but I most often learn better when I actually do something. Like one time I tried to learn physics of current but I couldn't understand shit, but then Annabeth helped me out by showing me physically how an electron would move."

Hecate looked impressed, "amazing, so I should take the practical aproach you say?"

Percy shrugged, "I would learn better that way."

"I see…..you're still not getting a wand."

"Oh come on!"

"Sorry kiddo, but until I'm sure you can handle it, no wand for you."

"Fine," Percy grumbled, "so what are we going to start with?"

"Well I was thinking a lecture on the different types of magic," Hecate smiled, "should be fun!"

Percy groaned, "Gods kill me now."

"Right, so let's begin. What's the difference between divine magic and mortal magic?"

Percy sighed, "ah, I don't know?"

"Well, guess."

"Hm...mortal magic is weaker than divine magic?"

"Correct, but why?"

"Because...well divine magic is godly magic, and if magic comes from a person's soul, then obviously godly magic is more powerful because it comes from the soul of a god and not a mortal."

Hecate smiled, "correct. And you said you hated theory."

"Well you didn't make it boring, so yeah."

Hecate nodded, "I think I'm beginning to understand that the best way to teach you is through interactive methods. Should be easy. Now, you are correct, magic comes from the soul, mortal magic is thereby much less powerful. But did you know that gods don't have souls?"

"What? Seriously?"

"Yes, they don't have souls. A soul would imply that a person could somehow die once that soul is damaged. But a God, well Gods can't die now can they? They can fade, yes, but that isn't the same as dying."

"What's the difference?"

"Well you see when I person dies they lose control of their soul. Meaning the soul begins to wander off, essentially going to heaven or hell, or even staying back as a ghost."

"A ghost?! Ghosts exist?!"

"Yup! Don't worry, they are harmless," Hecate smiled, "now, back to topic, humans lose control of their souls after death. Gods however don't have souls, they just are, they are the very domains they control. In essence, they are nature itself given sentience, hence their magic doesn't just flow from them, but from their domain."

Percy was amazed, "okay...but what about me? A demigod? Half man half god? I have a soul right? And last I checked I can't draw power from domains."

"You see Percy demigods in general are the exception to every rule in the books," Heate told pleasantly, "they in fact have both types of magic, the soul of a human and the domain of a God. You yourself can control water through your father's domain, meaning you can draw magic from that powersource as well. And as you are also magical, your soul is also a viable source for magic."

"So the reason demigods are powerful is because we can use both types of magic?"

"Correct," Hecate sipped her tea, "but you see it's not just that. Your very soul is uniquely powerful as you are half devine. Hence you normal soul magic itself sets you apart from normal wizards, the domain magic you possess...well let's just call that a bonus."

Percy nodded in amazement, "wow….so is there a way for me to access them both?"

"Well your domain magic you can use already. That's essentially your control of water, though there is some added raw power in there as well. You soul magic though, well that is a bit tricky. For that you need a wand."

"So let's go get one!"

"Nope.

Percy sighed, "worth a try."

Hecate smiled. They quickly spoke more about magic and it's impact in the magical world. Percy was shocked to hear how wizards and witches treated other magical creatures. Percy never himself treated anyone like that, he loved magical creatures. Hell his best friend was a Stary! And his brother was a cyclops!

After their tea was finished Hecate brought Percy to the living room where she vanished the chairs and the futon Percy had used. She then summoned a wooden table and two chairs for them to use.

"Percy take out all that we bought yesterday," the goddess commanded and Percy obeyed.

Hecate looked at the objects and smiled. She quickly picked up the black and red cloak she brought and threw it at Percy, "put it on."

Percy nodded and did so feeling a wave of energy surround him as he did so, "what is this for?"

"It's called the cloak of the student, it's a charmed item that allows the person to gain knowledge faster, and it's connected to this," Hecate picked up the golden rod, "this is the rod of the teacher. My knowledge and experience will slowly trickle out of the rod and into the cloak. It's very effective, but only if the teacher is a very knowledgeable person. Which, lucky for you, I am."

Percy was impressed, "cool! So basically it's like sharing your memories with me?"

"Not quite, while you might gain some form of knowledge, but it will not be direct. You see we store information in a very direct way, sometimes that storing of information fails and we will be forced to relearn whatever we learnt in order to make it stick. A teacher who has found a way to do this will be able to help their student achieve something similar. Basically this rod and cloak will make it easier for you store any knowledge I pass on."

Percy nodded, "okay, got it. ….I think."

Hecate shrugged, "doesn't matter, soon you will be able to understand what I mean perfectly. But we aren't done yet my boy," she then opened a spectacle box revealing a delicate pair of glasses with feather for a frame, "this is the quick read glass. It will help you read faster. Usually it would take a lot of magic to power this thing and people are warned not to wear it for more than an hour at a time, but since you have a lot more magic than normal people I think you can probably wear this thing indefinitely."

Percy blinked, he took the offered set of glasses and looked them over, "you want me to wear this?"

"Problem?"

"Ah yeah, it's made out off feathers," Percy grumbled, "so uncool."

Hecate sighed as she snapped her fingers turning the spectacles into a common black square framed frame, "there, that better?"

Percy nodded, "much. Thanks." Percy wore them and suddenly he felt his eyes start to twitch. They they started moving from one corner to the next, it was like they were supercharged able to glide across the room in an instant. It was as if they shifted instantly from one point to another taking no time traveling the distance.

"Cool," Percy grinned.

"I know, and now for the last set," Hecate opened the last wooden box and levitated the silver blood band of knowledge out. Percy took the band and slipped it on his right hand. Suddenly the band squeezed down on him biting into his hand. Percy winced, when suddenly it let go.

The band then glowed red as the silver became corrupted turning black with red lines running across it's surface. Percy felt and saw a trickle of blood flow down his arm, but quickly it stopped.

"That was weird," Percy said wiping off the blood.

"That is a blood band, very dangerous, but very powerful. It uses your magic and blood to fuel itself giving you the ability to gain knowledge quickly. It's an equal exchange, the more magic you give the more knowledge it will provide. And considering you have a lot of magic, your reward will be equally good."

Percy nodded, "okay, now that we have officially finished dressing me up like a nerd, can we please begin learning about magic?"

Hecte sighed, "kids these days. No patience. Fine, let's begin, first things first, potions."

Percy was surprised, "wait, I don't need my wand for this?"

"No, you do, but not for everything. For now I'll help you out with the wand stuff, you are going to learn about potions, how to make them, spot them and if need by create an antidote for them."

"Now the first thing you should learn is about the different types of herbs you will find. You see when making a potion the ingredients you add will have different effects, both magical and physical. The ingredient we use usually have the effect we desire. For example wolf's bane is harmfull for wolves, and we use it to make the wolfsbane potion that allows a werewolf to maintain their consciousness when transformed. So you see the wolfsbane is a very important ingredient, but it is lethal. We don't want that. So we add other ingredients to tune the potions towards the effect we desire. Got it so far?"

Percy felt the band pinch his hand, his brain started spinning, and suddenly he realised he understood exactly what Hecate was talking about. Percy nodded, "surprisingly, I think I do."

The goddess nodded, "good, that means the band and cloak are working. Now let's continue. I'm going to show you different ingredients and tell you their properties, here," she snapped her fingers summoning a note and what looked like a quill and inkpot, "use these to take notes."

"Ah Hecate, this is a quill," Harry pointed at the white writing instrument, "what am I supposed to do with that?"

"Oh, didn't I tell you? In the magical world everyone uses only quills."

"What?! Why?!"

"Because it allows them to transfer their magic into their writing, that way it will be difficult to forge someone's signature. Quite smart really, though the constant refilling of ink is a pain."

"Magic is amazing, but I swear these wizards are idiots," Percy grumbled as he took the quill and unplugged the inkpot. He dipped the quill in it and carefully opened the book and wrote his name to test out the quill. To Percy's surprise he found his handwriting neat, there wasn't any botched ink spots like he had feared, it looked very clean.

"Not bad," Percy shrugged as quickly he and Hecate fell into a pattern. She would first hold up a potion ingredient from the many they had bought the day before and described what it did, what it was mainly used for, and what type of effect it had on a potion.

Percy quickly found out that he could categorize the potions and their effects. There were five categories. The first being extremely effective, basically these were ingredients that had a lot impact on a potion, ether by effect or because they would explode if not treated properly. This included things like lion's teeth and frog eyes.

Then there were the mildly reactive items, things that would react well with any potion, but won't necessarily push it's effects into a potion. These were mainly used to make a potion more bubbly, give things a kick start if you will. This mostly included herbs and other greenery items.

Then came the basic items, items that didn't really do anything expect support other things. This included things like water or coffee beans. Yes, for some reason coffee beans were potion ingredients. Hecate mentioned something about making them taste better.

The fourth type were submissive ingredients. These were the most common as they were the most well used. They were very reactive and were used to dilute or reduced the reaction rate of other items. They also however pushed their own magical properties into a potion, this made them useful, kind of like a wild card.

And the last type were unreactive ingredients. They basically had a lot of magical potential, but to get to them you basically had to burn them with acid or cause a near explosion for anything to happen.

Hecate quickly looked over Percy's notes and nodded looking impressed, "I'm amazed Jackson, I thought you told me you were an idiot."

Percy shrugged, "blame the band. Usually I'm not good at this kind of thing, but I think the band is pushing me far."

"Then it's a good thing we got it then," Hecate nodded, "now let's continue."

The goddess continued to drill Percy with the basics of potion ingredients throughout the day. Upon his request Hecate summoned a pizza for Percy's lunch and ordered chinese takeout for dinner. And soon the day was over.

The next day Percy found himself in front of Hecate again. "Alright Jackson yesterday we covered around 1/4 of all existing ingredient. And today we are going to have a test," she snapped her fingers summoning a giant pile of paper with questions on them. "Good luck."

Percy groaned. He was about to begin when Hecate stopped him, "wait, take off the band and the cloak before you begin."

Percy raised an eyebrow, "you want me to fail?"

"Relax Jackson, you'll do fine. The cloak only works when you are learning something and the band will only serve as a crutch. You need to be able to trust yourself without it's help. So, take it off."

Percy sighed, but did what the goddess asked. He took off the band and found two red slits dug into his skin. The band had drained him slowly, funny thing was he didn't even feel it. He then threw his cloak and band to the side and began his exam.

It took the better part of the morning, but by noon Percy was done. He sighed as he took off his quick read glasses and handed it to Hecate, "how did I do?"

The goddess looked through the paper and snapped her fingers. The paper glowed gold and a number spread over the stack, '60%' Hecate shrugged, "not bad. You got 60% of them right Percy."

Percy sighed, "oh thank the Gods."

"Right, now, time to cover the rest of them," Percy groaned and Hecate grinned.

And like that the week passed by. Percy spent most of it learning sets of potion ingredients and then having Hecate test him on them. Hecate also taught him the basic concepts of potions, what tools to use, why the were used and such. She even went in depth to why it was needed to be specific when stirring clockwise or anti-clockwise.

It took a long time and Percy had to do a lot of essays on their effects and such, but luckily the blood band worked. Percy's ability to learn skyrocketed.

It was now one week since Percy traveled back in time, and he had just completed the latest test Hecate had prepared for him.

"Please let this be the last one," Percy groaned as he passed the paper to Hecate who started her correction charm on it.

It took a moment but eventually Percy's score popped up, '98%'. Hecate looked impressed, "good job Jackson. Your first step to becoming a full fledged wizard has been achieved. I still have a few issues, but we can get to that later. Now, let's get to the fun stuff."

Percy groaned, "more potions?! I swear if I ever see another plant I swear I will kill someone!"

"Relax sea brain, this part you are going to actually like," Hecate quickly brought out a cauldron and walked into the kitchen. She put the cauldron on the stove and turned to Percy, "now, fill it with water."

Percy looked surprised but did as she asked. He reached into the pipes and slowly turned the tap in the sink on. But before he could do manipulate the water Hecate stopped him, "no, not with that. Use your powers to draw the water out of the air. Use the moisture in the atmosphere."

"What? Why?"

"Why don't you answer that yourself? I covered the basics, what makes a potion powerful?"

"Well...it's because of the magic the maker unconsciously drips into the potion," Percy answered and then frowned, "so if I gathered water using my magic the potion created will be more powerful, as even the water I use will be coated with magic."

"Excellent! Five points to you Jackson!"

"I'm sorry what?"

"Oh right, you don't know. Never mind, I'll get to it later, now chop chop, water," Hecate pointed at the cauldron.

Percy sighed, he quickly gathered water from the air around them and poured the collected water into the cauldron. He smiled, the pot was almost half full. He turned to the goddess, "alright, what do you want me to do now?"

"Make me a potion that can...help me cure boils."

Percy frowned, "well… I mean you could just use lionfish scales for that. Make it into a paste, it's a pretty mild substance, very effective over the direct effected area."

"Good Percy, I see you actually know what you are talking about, but that's not I want. I want you to make a potion, and I want it to react quickly and all over my body. So...what do you use to make such a potion?"

Percy hummed, "well then I would first use some Rike seeds, for the quick reaction. And of course you could have horklump juice for the whole body effect. Plus it has healing property, so it could couple with the lion scale's positive effects. But the potion might become a little unstable, rike seeds don't mix well with horklump juice, so maybe I can heat the potion up and mix in some gulf? Maybe a few clockwise spins to neutralise the whole thing."

Hecate raised an eyebrow, "you confident about your little potion recipe?"

Percy looked curiously at the goddess but nodded, "yeah, I am."

Hecate shrugged, "alright, get to it. Impress me."

Percy sighed, he quickly got to work. Hecate had transferred all of the potion ingredients he listed to the counter for easy access by Percy. Percy first quickly opened the window for proper air circulation, don't want to choke on the rike seeds reacting with the horklump juice.

He added the horklump juice first and then mixed in lionfish scale giving the potion a green hue. Percy then began to heat the whole potion up and quickly crushed the rike seeds removing the seed out of it's husk obtaining the pure brown seed within. Percy then crushed the seeds once more until they were dust and poured the dust in with the now boiling potion.

The potion began to boil violently, Percy however didn't panic as he quickly added some gulf and took a stirring spoon stirring the pot clockwise until the potion settled down. Percy then waited until the potion turned from green to red, indicating that the rike seeds had reacted properly. Percy turned off the stove and poured the potion into a vial presenting it to the goddess.

Hecate looked at the potion and frowned, "do you know what you have done?"

Percy gulped, "did I do something wrong?"

Hecate looked up from the potion and meet his eyes. She didn't display any sign of her emotional state as she snapped her fingers smoothing a piece of parchment, "this is the proper recipe for the potion I asked you to make."

Percy took the paper and read it. His eyes shot open, the recipe was nearly identical to what Percy had suggested, only here they told to add a few extra clockwise rotations and a clove of pixe flower for added strength.

"The pixie flower is useless, just used to make the potion seem better to drink. And the extra clockwise spins actually dilutes the potion," Hecate picked up the potion and examined it under the light, "the colour for a normal potion is purple, for master grade is maroon red, what you have created surpasses even that due to the extra magic you pushed in by conjuring your own water base. Congrats Percy, you have the makings of a potion genius."

"Woah, seriously?" Percy asked in awe, "holy shit this is awesome! I actually did it! I made a potion!"

Hecate grinned as Percy started dancing throwing his hands up in joy, "you felt it didn't you? That joy in creation?"

"Yeah, it felt...it felt so amazing! Like everything I learnt coming together for one purpose," Percy smiled, "of gods I fell so many new ideas running through my head! Lion tail, it is a symbol of bravery, I can make an elixir of bravery with that! Oh, and a basilisk's venom, I can use that to create a cure for paralysis! All I would have to do is reduce to lethality rate of the venom and make it so that it jump starts the drinker's nervous system!"

"Slow down there Jackson, don't get ahead of yourself," Hecate smiled, "I'll admit you have talent, but there is still a lot you don't know, and a lot I need to teach you."

Percy grinned, "bring it magic queen."

"Oh I like that. Don't forget, you asked for this."

And for the next week and a half Percy was tortured mercilessly by Hecate. But now it wasn't all just boring note taking. Percy was actually making potions he could use for a day to day basis.

He created a dream away potion, his creation, that used coffee beans to keep himself awake and alert. This way he could stay awake longer and get more work done. And then there was also the '3 hour relax' drink that helped Percy sleep for 3 hours but feel as if he had rested for 7. It was one of the more advanced potions he made, with the help of Hecate of course.

"Alright then, it's been two week since we started and dare I say you might be good enough to take you OWLs in potions," Hecate said one morning.

"I'm sorry, OWLs?"

"Oh, right, it's like the SAT'S in America, except it's in UK and it's for wizards. It's called the ordinary wizarding levels, or OWLs for short. It's essentially everything you need till the fifth year of Hogwarts, which is what we are aiming for."

"So basically we need to get me us to speed until I'm good enough to be OWL level?" Percy asked.

"Yup!"

"Huh, okay, so now that potions is done, what's next?"

"Runes and Arithmancy," Hecate grinned.

"Oh what do they do?" Percy asked excited, potions started out interesting but quickly became a driving force for Percy's studies into magic. He hoped this would be the same.

"Well runes is essentially magic spells and words given a written form. It's very powerful, if you know how to use it. And arithmancy is the study of magic and spells using numbers to quantify everything from the amount of magic used to the spell movements needed."

Percy's shoulders dropped, "really? …..really?"

"What's wrong? Sounds too boring for you?" Hecate teased.

"Yes! Gods be damned woman I have been stuck in this house for two weeks!" Percy roared as he started pacing, "at the beginning was fun, I got to learn about magic and made potions! But damn, I need to go out! I'm not an inside person in case you don't know!"

Hecate frowned, "well I suppose you are right."

Percy sighed, "thank you."

"Alright, fine, you can have the day off," Hecate grumbled, "but tomorrow you are hitting the books!" Hecate snapped her fingers and summoned a wad of pounds handing it to Percy, "don't spend it all at once, I will not give you more, got that?"

Percy grinned, "yes ma'am!" Percy quickly ran up stairs where he kept all of his clothes and quickly changed to something nice. They still didn't have furniture in the house, and frankly Percy didn't mind. He didn't like this house, all he ever did was study there, and he might be old fashioned, but one should not live where they study.

Percy practically ran out of the house as he took a deep breath and calmed himself. Today was the 5th of March, Percy quite frankly was excited. Today was the first day he could spend without all the magic and learning BS, and he intended to make the most out of it. Obviously Hecate hadn't informed him that Hogwarts was a boarding school.

Little whinging was a big town, Percy honestly had no idea where he should go or what he should do. He continued walking down the road until he reached what looked like a local park. Percy walked in and strolled along the place.

The park had a small pond in the middle with ducks and geese flying around the area. Percy found a bench near the water body and sat down content to enjoy the view.

"Get him!" Percy turned around and saw a gang of teenagers chase down what looked like a little boy. They were on the other side of the park and were quickly running towards Percy. The boy looked around 10 years old and scared as hell. He kept running and running, but the gang of older boys were quickly catching up with him.

Percy sighed, 'don't be a hero. Don't be a hero. Don't be a hero...sigh, why do I even bother? Of course I'm going to be a hero.'

Percy got up and slowly walked in front of the boy's path. He let the boy pass by him without an issue, but when the teenagers approached him Percy stood his ground.

Percy raised an eyebrow, "can I help you?"

"Yeah you bloody yanky! Move!" the leader, a boy was fat, he had three chins and seemingly three bellies as well. His clothes were tight, but very expensive looking, all branded items.

His friends on the other hand were all thin, but had a raggedy look about them. Their eyes were darkened, their hands a little shaky. Percy didn't need to be wearing a blood band of knowledge to know what was happening. There were junkies, or atleast trying to be.

"Yanky huh? Is that supposed to be an insult? Because I kind of feel insulted," Percy pouted.

"Yes it was!" the fat leader yelled, "now move!" He tried to push past Percy, but the demigod quickly hooked his hand around fat boy's waist and push the boy back with a simple jerk of his hand.

The boy landed on his ass and looked up in surprise, "how did you do that?!"

Percy shrugged, "simple, I'm stronger than you," Percy then turned around just in time to see the little boy they were chasing run out of the park. "Alright then, sorry about standing in your way. I'll be going."

The group was surprised as Percy quickly walked away from them towards the park's exit, he didn't' want to stay here any longer.

"Hey! Get back here!" the fat boy was up once again.

Percy sighed, 'somehow I knew this would happen,' he groaned and turned around, "look kiddos I don't have time for this. So how about we avoid any...unpleasant events. Yes?"

"You let Wrapper get away you cunt!" a boy to the right yelled out, "he owed us money!"

Percy raised an eyebrow, "really? Why?"

"We don't need to answer to you!" the fat boy yelled, before he grinned, "but it's okay, since you let him go you are just going to have to cover his expenses."

Percy raised an eyebrow, "really? Me?" Percy snorted, the demigod stood at six feet while the kids around here were barely five foot and a half.

"Really," the fat boy stepped up cracking his knuckles, "now hand over your cash and I won't hurt you, much."

Percy smiled, "wow, you really have that intimidating bully thing down pat huh?"

"Give me your money asshole!"

"Or what?"

"Or I'll beat it out of you!"

Percy laughed, "please! You don't look like you can beat yourself out of a paper bag!"

"ARGH!" the fat boy roared as he charged at Percy and swung his fist forward clipping Percy's jaw. The moment he made impact however his fleshy hand felt like it hit something hard. Before he could stop himself, his hand pushed into Percy's jaw, the pressure was too much, the boy's wrist snapped.

Krack!

"AHHH!" the boy yelled as he held his wrist in pain.

Percy raised an eyebrow, "huh, neat," Percy smiled, he had nearly forgotten about the curse of Achilles that he had. The curse made him invulnerable to any physical attack, least of all from a mortal.

"Big D!" the boy next to boy cried out as they helped their friend out. "What's wrong?!"

"He broke my fucking wrist!" Dudley cried out as he held his hand in pain.

"Shit man!" the boys looked horrified as they turned to Percy, "what are you?!"

"Me? Oh, I'm nothing special, I suggest you get your friend to a hospital though, he doesn't look too good." Percy smiled.

"Let's get out of here!" the boys yelled as they grabbed their large friend and quickly ran away from Percy.

The demigod chuckled, 'well that was new,' he quickly walked out of the park, he didn't think he could relax anymore in that place.

He quickly walked into the commercial heart of town and spotted several stores all around him. There was a clothing store, a furniture place, a couple of dinners and even a theater.

Percy quickly went into a pizza parlor called 'Habit's pizza' and got himself a slice. He then walked around the small town enjoying the sights. After the pizza Percy decided it would be best to see a movie, he looked inside and unfortunately he saw that the only movies playing were old timely movies.

'Seriously? Why are all these movies so old? Don't these people have anything after the year 2000?' Percy wondered, and then he realised that he was not exactly in modern times. Meaning all the 'old' movies he saw playing in the theater was actually just recently released, meaning to them they were brand new.

'Oh my Gods, I won't be able to see new movies until 2009!' Percy realised in horror, 'not only that I won't' be able to see anything entertaining at all! I know every movie that is going to come out for the next 15 years! Well the good ones anyway, and now I'm stuck with this!'

Percy slumped his shoulder, "fuck my life."

Eventually Percy ended up seeing a movie he was already familiar with, Ace Ventura: Pet Detective. The movie was okay, though it felt like watching a rerun on CBS. After the movie Percy couldn't help overhear other people talking about how great the movie was, and how Jim Carrey seemed like he would do well in comedy. Percy couldn't help laughing, they had no idea.

Percy had a nice day, there wasn't anything extraordinary about the day, other than that little fight he had with those boys. The demigod enjoyed the little break he took, it was exactly what he needed.

That night Percy was sleeping on his comfy futon yet again. But suddenly he felt someone shove him back and forth shaking him awake.

Percy yawned as he got up rubbing his eyes, he looked up to see Hecate standing above him, "what do you want?"

"Get up Percy, we have work to do."

"What?" Percy said groggily, "what do you mean?"

"Get up, now," Hecate kicked his shin making Percy wince in pain. "I'll be upstairs, come quickly or the next kick will be between your legs."

Percy grumbled, "stupid gods."

"What was that?"

"Nothing!"

Hecate took Percy to the smallest bedroom in the house and opened the window letting the cold night air inside. Percy shivered for a moment before his body quickly adapted to the cold, Percy was surprised, he never had this power before. But he just chalked it up to one of the man bonuses of the curse of Achilles.

"Okay, so what exactly are we doing here? It must be what? Midnight? I need my sleep you know."

"Oh shut up," Hecate snapped her fingers summoning a bronze telescope from thin air. She pushed the telescope to the window and looked through it, "and for your information we are here because I decided now that you finished potions, maybe you can start learning a little bit about the stars as well."

Percy raised an eyebrow, "wait, so astronomy is a magical subject?"

"You bet," Hecate adjusted the scope before removing herself from the eye piece, "you see magic has a connection to everything. It is most attuned with Earth, the very planet we live on. But you see the other celestial bodies out there, the planets and the stars, they also have an effect on us."

"But wait, how is that even possible? I mean they are so far away."

"Tell me Percy, how do we know that the sun if hot?"

"Ah, well the light from the sun travels through space and….oh, okay, got it. But wait, how can they influence magic? Do they have some form of magic? Like is there some form of magic in Jupiter that is different then our brand of magic?"

"All good questions Percy, but unfortunately we will never know. We can't exactly travel there can we?"

"What about the moon? We can travel to the moon, plus it's the closest celestial body to us, doesn't that mean it also has the strongest effect on us?"

Hecate smiled, "that my young padawan, is why we undertake the study of Astronomy. To research and understand these question. Come, I want you to look at this."

Percy stepped up to the telescope and smiled at his teacher, "you called me your padawan, does that mean I can have a light saber?"

"No."

"That's okay, I'll settle for a wand instead."

"Hm...I'll see what I can do about that lightsaber."

Percy chuckled as turned to look through the telescope. He stared into the eyepiece and saw a small red dot in the end of the black tunnel. "Is that Mars?" Percy asked.

"Yes, and this is how it looks when you activate the zooming charm," Hecate snapped her fingers and suddenly the image grew big enough to fill Percy's vision.

"Wow!" Percy exclaimed, the image was similar to some of the high quality images Percy saw from the year 2009! "This is amazing!"

"Indeed," Hecate smiled as she looked up to the sky, "every other night we will take astronomy class for you in here. Don't worry it won't be that tasking, just a few hours of observation and theory. Think you can manage that?"

"Sure, I'll try," Percy said, distracted by the crystal clear image of mars. That night Hecate started teaching him the basics of Astronomy, luckley Percy's mortal education was more than enough to cover over two semesters of material.

The next morning he sat with Hecate with a fresh mind and a rejuvenated spirit ready to tackle the mysteries of magic.

"Alright Jackson, let's begin," Hecate quickly piled up books upon books on the subject of runes and arithmancy.

"Alright, as I explained, runes are magic spells and words given a written form. And arithmancy is the study of magic and spells using numbers to quantify everything from the amount of magic used to the spell movements needed. Now, do you know why I am asking you to study these subjects?"

Percy shrugged, "I don't know. You hate me and this is the only way you can make me suffer?"

Hecate rolled her eyes, "if I had a galleon for every time I heared that...no Jackson, think."

Percy sighed as he closed his eyes and let his mind start to wander. He felt the blood band activate as he slowly began to think about several theories on why Hecate chose the particular subjects. Finally he smiled.

"This is a way to introduce me to magical spells," Percy said, "runes deal with the words used in a spell while arithmancy deals with the amount of magic and wand motions used."

Hecate smiled, "close, but still correct. Tell me Percy, before I began letting you brew potions, what did I do?"

"You made me study the ingredients, what they did and how to properly use them."

"Correct, I wanted you to understand every aspect of the potion making process before you actually started making potions. This is very much the same, except it deals with you learning about the aspects of a spell rather than a potion."

"So wait...what you're saying is if I learn this stuff you will finally let me have my own wand?!" Percy jumped up and down with a bright grin on his face.

Hecate sighed as she palmed her face, "yes Percy, if you do this you can have a wand. Gods it's like taking care of a child of a sugar rush."

Percy grinned as he quickly wore his student's cloak and quick read glasses, "alright, so what's first?"

Hecate smiled at his enthusiasm, she took out a book labeled 'Basic rune charts', "memories these and their meanings."

Percy took the book and found that it contained nothing but lists upon lists of runes and their their descriptions. Percy groaned, "Gods help me."

"Oh we aren't done yet Percy, not by a long shot," the goddess chuckled evilly as she handed him another book labeled, 'arithmancy numbers and their correlation,' "I also want you to learn these designated formulas."

Percy opened the book and was once flooded with tons upon tons of raw data. Each wand movement had a corrected formula, the twist motion was prescribed with the formula (M x 4) +number of inches in wand length, and if the number was below 50 then it's toal would be counted as one point.

Percy blinked, "Hecate, I don't even understand what I don't understand. Why am I learning this, how am I going to learn this?"

"Let's see...okay, remember how when you were young you were forced to learn your number's table?"

Percy nodded, "yeah."

"Well this is the same. It's a basic arithmetic number sequence that you have to learn in order to do anything useful. You learn this, you can essentially create your own spells."

"What?" Percy asked in wonder as he looked at the books in his lap.

"Magic isn't all colourful lights and explosions Percy, it's really hard work. And if you are willing to put in the efforts, I promise you the effects will blow your mind."

"Literally?"

"Well not literally, but I mean if you wanted too I suppose you could create a spell to blow people's heads off."

"That's stupid, why would I want to blow my own head off?"

"I don't know? Maybe it could be useful for suicidal witches and wizards?"

"Why would I even invent such a spell?"

"I...look we are get off topic here," Hecate sighed, "get to studying sea boy. The faster you learn these the faster you get a wand."

Percy nodded and returned back to his books. He worked hard, usually he hated doing school work, but this wasn't just any old school work, this was magic! Real magic! He was doing magical homework! He really didn't have any right to complain.

And so, just like that, another month passed by.