Daughter of Wine

Piper

Calli and I are crouched in the bushes, our eyes on the enemy flag. It's in the middle of a clearing in the woods, on top of a small hill, with nowhere to hide within about fifteen feet around the flag. There are five Athena kids guarding it. They don't look especially large or strong, but I know from training with Annabeth to not underestimate them. In all honesty, the Athena kids scare me more than the Ares kids do. 

"How confident do you feel?" Calli whispers, just barely loud enough for me to hear. 

"On a scale of one to ten, I'd say a four." I admit. 

She glances back at the flag. "They expect you to charmspeak. They'll take you down quick. They won't let you speak." She frowns, her gaze intensifying the way it does when she's thinking. "We need a different plan, they'll overpower us if we go with Plan A. There's too many of them." 

Calli and I have gotten pretty close since we got back to camp. She has this magnetic aura to her, and her constant good mood seems to radiate off of her with a hundred-yard radius. I can tell why everyone likes her. 

She perks up. "Ensalada plan?" 

"What?" I have to ask. She's making no sense. 

She rolls her eyes, as if expecting me to know what she's talking about. "When we fought the giant. The boys were the distraction, while we tried to sneak around and rescue your dad." 

It's times like these that I'm reminded that she has Athena in her bloodline too. Most of the time, Calli seems like a free-spirited, carefree, daughter of Dionysus. But in certain moments, her Athena comes out. "Who's going to be the distraction?"

"I was hoping you." She admits. 

"And I was hoping you." I counter. 

"Rock, paper, scissors?" She offers. 

We raise our hands. I pull rock, she pulls scissors. 

"Damn." She mutters. "Okay, you sneak around the bushes. I'll distract them so that they don't see you. When you're on the other side, I'll come out, and you grab the flag and run like the wind."

I nod. "Okay." Then, a thought crosses my mind. "Why don't you just make them all crazy?"

She rolls her eyes again, this time with annoyance. "Chiron said I can't do that for a while. Last time, one of the Apollo kids went a little too nuts and ran into a tree. He was concussed for a week. Chiron grounded me." 

"He grounded you?"

She nods, clearly bothered. "It's not my fault he took it too seriously."

I'd tell her that it is, in fact, her fault, but now is not the time.

I make my way around the treeline. What sounds like a tree cracking and falling to the ground echoes from the other side of the clearing. That must be her way of keeping them from hearing me. It's pretty effective. 

I crouch down on the other side of the bushes. A small strawberry plant grows at my feet. She knows I'm here. I suddenly wonder if she can feel all the plant life in the forest. 

"Okay, good spot!" Her voice calls out. She doesn't emerge yet, but she has their attention. "I have to admit, with five of you guarding the flag, you're making it hard. That's what she said. I mean, you're making it difficult." 

The Athena campers draw their swords, but Calli is throwing her voice, so it's hard to tell where it's coming from. It's quite impressive how good she is at it. 

"Unfortunately for you, I want that flag." She continues. "So, I'm afraid I'll have to destroy you!" 

"Calli!" One of the guards yells. "Come on, where are you! Let's just fight!" 

Calli laughs. "Come on, let me have my fun!"

The guard that spoke yelps and falls, being dragged into the woods like a scene from a horror movie. 

The four remaining guards all group together, linking arms around the flag. 

"Aw, come on!" Calli yells. "No fair!" She emerges from the bushes, her thyrsus raised. "Now I have to do this the hard way." 

The Athena kids point their weapons at her nervously. I know they're afraid of her, but not afraid enough to leave the flag. 

Calli walks towards them, waving the thyrsus. "You're so lucky I'm grounded." She tells them. She swings the weapon, and the guards move to action. Somehow, she manages to hold off all four of them, moving incredibly quickly, 

She pulls them away from the flag slowly, as to not draw attention to the fact that she's doing so. I sneak out of the bushes, but the guards are so focused on her, they don't even notice me. 

Calli fights like a pro. She dodges, counters, and blocks like second nature, while taunting the guards into keeping attention on her. 

"Come on, you swordfight like Clovis. You should really try harder. Is that all you got? Did you get enough sleep last night? Do you bench-press tissues? I thought your mom was Athena! More like A-weak-na! Knock-knock! Who's there? Your sucky fighting!"

I grab the flag easily and sprint into the woods. I make a wide arc around their clearing, hoping they don't see me. 

"The flag!" One of them yells behind me. 

"There!" Another yells. 

"That's not your flag!" Calli tries. "That's just... That's just a drakon. Don't worry about that." 

I continue to sprint, passing multiple demigods locked in sword fights. 

I nearly trip and fall when Calli teleports beside me, already in a full sprint. 

"Calli!" I gasp for breath. "Take the flag and go!" 

"No! It's your win!" She insists. "You take it! Cross the creek! That's the border!" 

"I won't make it!" I admit, already losing speed. I can hear more red-team campers behind us. I make the mistake of turning around and see twenty or so campers clad in armor with swords gaining on me. "I'm serious! Take it and run!"

Calli glances behind us too and frowns. "Yeah, okay." 

She takes the flag from my hands and sprints off, her stamina way better than mine. I'm overrun by the red team almost immediately. They grab me and carry me as they run, immediately covering my mouth to keep me from charmspeaking. 

A few moments later, I hear cheering through the woods. When we catch up, I see Calli is hoisted up on the shoulders of the Apollo cabin, the flag in her hand, on the other side of the creek. The flag changes from Athena gray to a deep purple color, with a grape vine design. 

The one Dionysus kid I can name, Pollux, looks astonished. 

Annabeth jogs up beside me. She looks genuinely upset. "Wow. Dionysus campers haven't had a win in a long time."

I turn to her, just now managing to catch my breath. "I thought Calli won a lot." 

Annabeth frowns. "She usually gives the win to someone else."

"Oh," I sigh. "She tried to get me to do it." 

Annabeth looks distraught. "If Calli is holding the flag, it's going to be hard for Athena to get it back."

"Why is that?" I ask. 

"Because," Annabeth sighs. "Calli is weirdly good at this."

The Hephaestus cabin comes barreling out of the woods led by Leo, followed by the Ares campers. From what I gather, it's been a long time since Athena and Ares have been on the same team in capture the flag, but we still managed to beat them. Calli had rounded up almost every other possible cabin to her side with the promise of some party. Apollo cabin has a hold on the other flag. So, next game, it'll be Dionysus versus Apollo. I already know which side I want to be on.