Chapter Six

I woke to Peter's face close to mine, smacking foreheads with him as I shot up into a sitting position. Of course, I simply fell back down, groaning along with him and rubbing my head.

"What the-'' I grumbled, and remembered the man's hands on my waist, making me shudder. "What happened?" I finished about five minutes later, my hand going to my hair, which's ends had been fried.

Sighing, I pulled a dagger out of my now charred jacket and flicked it open, not giving my hair a second glance before I cut off the charred ends, making my hair to my shoulder and incredibly choppy cut. After finishing it off, I shut the knife and shoved it into my jacket, watching as the burns on my arms stopped hurting as much.

"You feed me ambrosia?" I guessed.

Peter nodded.

"So, we're just going to hang out on this roof? Or are we going to find some actual place to stay?" Paxton asked, looking slightly tousled.

"We shouldn't stay somewhere on a quest. It isn't safe. Unless it's in the middle of nowhere. And as you can see, I almost died inside that alley. One of your fire and two of a very creepy man who was attracted to me." I glared at him.

He shrugged, "You're fine now, or at least, on the exterior, maybe not on the interior maybe."

I snorted, "This is why I like you, weirdo. Because you have no care to say sorry."

I tried to ignore the jealous look Peter gave him for a moment.

"By the amount of names you've called me, I got the impression that you hated me, also by the amount of times you've hurt me, but who's counting?" Paxton asked.

"Oh, I hate you, don't worry. And I'm counting down the moments until I get to beat you up." I grinned.

He rolled his eyes.

"Alright, geniuses, let's go." I stood on the top of the roof and hopped off, probably being more stupid than I'd ever been.

I landed hard on the ground, luckily not breaking any bones.

Peter followed soon after, hitting the ground and squeaking at the same time, "Geez, August…"

"So you guys like jumping off roofs? I don't think that's the best idea, even if you guys have magic healing stuff." Paxton said, appearing behind us.

"To be fair, it's not me who likes it. Just August." Peter said, shrugging.

"So, where to now? I don't think we should stay in Augusta's almost grave." Paxton said.

"You can call me, August you know," I pointed out to him and grabbed my bag from Peter, who'd taken it down with him, and turned to the alleyway. "What time is it? If it's early, there's no point in stopping searching." Once again, I didn't mention that I may have found the monster.

"I'm not sure, and what if I called you Auggie?" Peter grinned widely and I punched him hard in the arm, ruffling my new short hair.

"Don't even think about it."

"Ouch." Peter rubbed his arm, though there was still a small grin on his face.

"Come on dorks. Let's go find a clock." I set off out of the alleyway, keeping a good distance from homeless people as I went in search of a clock of some sort.

"We could ask someone, you know, it's easier than wandering around trying to find a clock." Paxton said.

"Alright, Mr. Obvious, one thing: I don't trust these people and besides, look-" I pointed, where there was a storefront with a clock in it that told me it was only noon. "We still have time to search."

"Okay, but let's hope it shows up fast, I don't like it here. It keeps giving me the chills." Paxton rubbed his arms.

I nearly snorted. Nearly, "You REALLY think that we're going to get past a quest that easily?!"

He glared at me, "No, but I don't think it's a good idea to stay out in the open like this, isn't that how you usually get attacked?"

"Actually, it really doesn't matter where you are. You get attacked everywhere," Peter shrugged, "That's the life of a demigod for you."

He grunted, "Fine, doesn't mean I don't want to get out of the open, still." Paxton pursed his lips, making an awkward silence.

"This is where we all start dancing and break out into a song about 'how the demigods tough out their quesssttttt!" I sang as off-key as I could, striking a pose and causing many people to stare at us weirdly, not that I cared.

Paxton stared at me, "Like yesterday, please don't," then he muttered something that I could barely make out, "How did you survive in the mortal world?"

"For your information, I arrived at camp just before I turned four. I didn't have enough time to adjust." my face darkened but Peter began to break out into song again.

"OOOOOHHHH! His name's Parker! Just kidding it's Paxton! He's stuck with two weirdos, with bad singing voices who will destroy his sanniiittyyyyy!" hitting a horrible high note, he bowed, causing half the street to stare at us like we were trash cans wearing hats and dancing.

Paxton moved next to Peter and mocked him loud enough that only I could hear, "And Peter's going to stop singing or I will personally set his hair on fire," he snarled, backing up a little, "By the way, I don't have any sanity left for you to destroy, I did it all to myself when I set my neighborhood into flames and killed everyone."

I pulled my dagger out and picked the dirt out of my nails with it, because it was bothering me.

"Well… Nice job for killing another thing: the mood. I should call you BuzzKill from now on." I grinned and finished pulling the dirt out of my nails.

"HEY! I know! We should go do something fun while we're in Boston! Steal a nice car, go to a club maybe and pretend we're over eighteen!" Peter suggested.

Paxton raised an eyebrow and began to walk away. Peter almost followed but I grabbed his arm to keep him back.

"If he wants to go, just let him." I rolled my eyes, pulling my hand back and stuffing it into my pocket.

"Alright, fine. Let's go!" he grinned and began to walk off in the opposite direction of Paxton.

Before he could get too far, I grabbed his arm again and pulled him back.

"Well, Mr. Enthusiastic, you need to wait a little longer. We can't just ditch Paxton."

"Come onnn…" he begged, giving me his best puppy eyes.

"No."

"Come on… Who're you in love with? Me or Pax?"

I sighed, crossing my arms, scowling at him while he wiggled his eyebrows.

"Are you seriously asking me this?"

"Yeah."

"What if I said I loved Paxton? How would you react?"

"I-" he rolled his eyes when we were interrupted by Paxton.

"Uh, hello, sorry to interrupt, whatever was going on, but you might want to come see this."

"Augh. Fine. What is it?" I asked.

He gestured for us to follow and I unzipped my duffle bag, pulling out my scythes and ignoring the way I started to frost as Peter and I followed behind him. Frowning when we reached a door in the alley, I felt a strange pull from my scythes, dragging me toward it slowly. The more I tried to resist, the faster they went, though my hands were iced to the handle at that point, so I wasn't able to pull them off. Trying to speak, I found that I couldn't because my lips were frozen together.

I could feel the frost and ice creeping up my arms as I was dragged inch by inch toward the edge of the tunnel. Finally, I was able to break it off of my lips.

"H-Help-" I could barely get the word out, my lips freezing over almost immediately.

I could slightly hear movement around me, but everything on me was freezing over, making me a living ice sculpture. My eyes closed and I could feel the coldness reaching the rest of my face as the tunnel began to suck me in. I wasn't sure what happened after my face was completely frozen; all I remembered was the world going black.