A new purpose (pjo/ HoO fanfic)

Hogwarts 18

We had been training for almost 2 weeks now.
I had an army of archers, fighters and strategists. 2 weeks wasn't long enough to have them fighting with amazing skill and strategy, but they knew how to swing a sword or fire a bow straight.

Artemis and I had spent a lot of time together coming up with excuses. The most recent one was: 'we're scouting the area so we can start drawing up battle plans'. That seemed to fool everyone- apart from Thalia, apparently she had seen us at the lake the other night. Most of the time, we were in the woods or the bottom of the forest. I even found a near by cliff where we hung out on a lot. Sometimes, we slip up in front of people, being too friendly, it's sad that I can't tell anyone about her because of some stupid laws that everyone regretted making.

Harry was still trying to show me up, shooting spells at me with my back turned or tried I trip me as I walked down to my seat in the great hall.
After the 3rd time I had really ripped into him. I told him how firing at a man with his back turned is cowardly and dishonourable. Not to mention I didn't have a weapon drawn. To top it off, it was in front of everyone in the hall. My demigod instincts warned me every time so I deflected the spell before it hit me but still, how can I trust him in battle if he attacks me now?
He would definitely be a pain in the war. I fear that him trying to get to me would effect him in battle. What if he is too busy with what I'm doing and gets distracted? Or if I get hurt trying to protect him because he is being stupid?

The Weasleys were pretty good. Ron was good with the sword; Ginny picked up how to use hunting knives pretty quickly and Fred and George came down and learned a little with bows - they also supplied us with materials to use for traps.

I feel like the wizards are less scared of me now. I think they thought I could crush them in a second - I probably could- but now they saw me as the chilled, oblivious person I am.

"Percy?" A melodic voice rang out from my door.
"Yeah?" I called back to Artemis.
"The war meeting is starting in a minute, we should start making our way down. Also Hecate is going to be there" she told me walking over and sat next to me on the bed. I pecked her on the lips and then I did something she hated. "PERCY!" She half screamed, half laughed.

I was tickling her. Apparently she isn't ticklish but I proved her wrong. I found the spot just below her ribs that sent made her cry with laughter. "Percy! Stop" she begged half-heartedly. I laughed and stopped just as the hunters came rushing in with their knives drawn. Uh? What did I do.
"Milady? Did he touch you!?" Phoebe asked her anger boiling.
"No-" she started but was cut of by Phoebe as she began speaking again.
"We heard you yelling his name and saying stop" she said glaring at me and I looked to Artemis, who was bright red "we thought he was hurting you"
"Hunters. Percy was only playing. Thankyou for looking out for me but he was only catching me in a lie" but I cut her off- I know it's rude, specially to a goddess but around me, she dropped her titles and was just ordinary.
"Ha! So you admit it! You lied and I was right" I laughed and she laughed at me. It was hard to be right when your against Artemis.
"Whatever Percy" She said laughing aswell. "Come on, we don't want to be late." At that I shot up. I know I'm usually always late but this is war. Serious, leader Percy is coming out.

I saluted and marched out the room with Artemis giggling behind me and dismissed her hunters before chasing me the hall.
I stopped and said "3 2 1 go!" And raced off. She knew exactly what was happening and was ready run as I got to 2 so it was an even start- and she was winning. I slid down the banister while she jumped down whole flights of stairs. The great hall was in sight and she was till winning. I picked up my speed and court up to her before she won. I wrapped my arms around her waist from behind, I spun a quick 180 and placed her down behind me as she giggled and crossed the line into the great hall. I had won. At the realisation, she stopped giggling.
"You cheated!"
"Did not"
"Did too!"
"Not!"
"Did!"
"Not!"
Then someone cleared their throat. We stopped bickering and looked into the hall only to see the wizards with shocked faces and Lady Hecate holding in a laugh. I looked at Artemis and a smile lifted into our faces and then we burst out laughing. Hecate joined in and the wizards glanced around nervously.

When we gained our composer, Artemis and I sat at the table and everyone followed our example. The table was basically filled with people who were the leaders of the war.
Nico was here, aswell as the school teacher, some people for the ministry of magic and also Lady Hecate, even the head boy and girl were here. To no ones surprise, that was Hermione and Ron.

"So anyone wanted to ask anything about the war?" 
Ron raised his hands timidly.
"I didn't know you could laugh! But how could you laugh at a time like this?" He asked slightly angry.
I let out a huff and stood at the top of the table.

"In a war, its important to remember why you are fighting. If you forget then you loose your motivation, you'll want to give up. Yes it is important to train right now and be the best you can be, but you can not let all you focus turn to that. Take the time to talk and have fun with your friends, do not let your hearts turn to stone right now, I hate to be the one to say it but not everyone will come out of this alive, wether it's people from our side or there's, we are going to loose people and that will hurt.  When I was first offered the quest my first thought was 'I could prevent a lot of deaths' so I accepted. If you spend your last some-what peaceful months with blank faces and not being reminded everyday why you are fighting and not running away, then you have lost the war before it has started. Take this time to laugh and have fun with the ones you love because you don't know when they'll be taken away"

I said the last part fingerings the bead with everyone's names from the first Titan war that had died heroes.

" laugh and be happy. Make memories and make the war worth it. Remember that you are fighting for your future and your kids and grandkids future, you do not want to live and love in fear, you want to be happy and peaceful. This war would help insure that- yes there are other ways to go about doing this but your home is being threatened.
When my home was being threatened, I spent years trying to prevent the war and when it finally rolled around I protected my home and my family with everything I had, for their future. That was why I was fighting. Why are you fighting?"
I finished sitting down and waiting for them to talk. Artemis grabbed my hand under the table to calm me down.

The rest of the meeting was kind of out of mind. No ones heads were really into it. They were all thinking about what I had said and realised how true my words were. Anyway we decided that half the hunters would hide in the trees and balconies and provide air cover and the other half will be in direct battle. I would be running round, attacking everything in my path and helping people out. The wizards are going to focus on the other wizards.

I glanced around the room and Hecate's eyes snapped closed and when she opened them again she looked scared.
"Percy. We have a problem" she said looking at me with fear in here eyes- wait was there sympathy aswell?
"I just looked into the enemies minds. Take a look" she said. At first I was confused but then I realised she wanted me to read her mind and look at the picture.

I saw wizards around a long table with a man with long silvery blond hair at the head table. I recognised him as Draco's step-dad. He was the leader? They seemed to be planning something. I sieved through his thoughts and my eyes widened. How had he managed to get a Monster army that big? It was the size of the monster army I faced in Manhattan.

Something seemed wrong. I looked into the mans dreams. Things went down hill very very quickly. Kronos was stirring and putting thoughts into his head. I noticed he wouldn't wake yet- but winning this war suddenly become so much mor important. If the school is over run, Kronos would have a pretty powerful HQ. Not to mention that every person who's names were written in my head died in vain. He wasn't meant to awaken for a millennia, it had barely be 2 years. I couldn't let him rise. We all fought way to hard the first one round. We need to win this war.

I pulled out her mind and met her worried eyes.
I pushed my chair from the table as I stood up, I looked around at the confused faces. As I reached the door I said one sentence.
"Start preparations for plan B"