The storm churned into a miniature hurricane. The funnel clouds scattered notebooks, jackets, hats, and anything else that wasn't attached. Amoriel's black hair whipped across her face as she watched kids scream and run for the building doors.
"Mi alma!" Leo yelled. His arm reached out toward Amoriel. The wind caused him to lose his balance and almost topple over the railing, but Jason grabbed his jacket and pulled him back.
"Thanks, man!" Leo shouted as he made his way to Amoriel. Even through the mess of wind and hair, she could see the lines etched on his face. Leo's dark eyebrows were knit together; his usually mischievous grin had turned down into a frown. His arms wrapped around her waist, "We've got to go!"
She could have sworn that he felt warmer.
Piper and Dylan were holding the doors open, herding the other kids inside. The snowboarding jacket and jersey flapped wildly in the wind. Jason, Leo, Coach Hedge, and Amoriel all ran towards the surprisingly calm Piper.
"Come on!" Piper's warm smile radiating towards them, "Just a little bit further."
Easy for you to say. Amoriel wanted to quip back. When any of them were able to take a step forward, the wind pushed them three strides back. It was like the wind was fighting back.
The last of their classmates slipped through the doors. They watched in horror as Dylan slammed the door shut. He flicked his wrist toward Piper and she flew backwards. Amoriel heard Jason call out.
"Leo" Amoriel 's arm pulled the small boy behind her. Her right thumb still on her ring. She didn't know why or how - but she needed to keep Leo safe.
In the next heartbeat, Coach Hedge stood in front of them protectively. "Stay behind me" He ordered. "This is my fight. I've should've known that was our monster"
Amoriel's eyes narrowed on the Coach. The wind had blown away his baseball cap. Two bumps poked through his curly tuffs. The similar blazing burn of a knife sliced through her skull. She groaned. Not the time, she complained in her thoughts.
Her mind showed her an ancient painting of a man playing the pipes. Except he wasn't a man - not the bottom half at least. Hot, spiking tendrils radiated through out her brain and down her neck. The pain overwhelmed her nervous system.
"Amorie!" Leo called out. She felt the cool glass impact on her body. Leo's eyes flickering between Dylan standing off with Coach Hedge and his girlfriend laying on the sky walk.
Dylan blinding smile was directed to Coach Hedge, his eyes narrowing on the small frame. "Oh, come on Coach. You think you can protect four half-bloods at once, old man?"
Dylan raised his hands toward Leo and Amoriel. Again, he flicked his wrist.
"No!" Amoriel screamed. In a blink of an eye, Leo was gone. Her hand ripped a part of her charm bracelet off. The small silver trinket transformed into quiver with purple arrows in it. And the moment she pressed her ring it turned into a black bow.
Somehow Leo had managed to twist in midair and slammed sideways into the canyon wall. He skidded, clawing furiously for any handhold. He was finally able to grab hold of a thin ledge about fifty feet below the sky walk. He hung there by his fingertips.
Without thinking, without giving her time to react to the situation - Amoriel dashed to the exposed
canyon wall and she did the most reasonable thing in that situation.
She jumped over the railing.
♡◇♡◇
She didn't know who Leo was, but she knew he couldn't die. She turned in air and shot a perfectly aimed arrow with a thread tied at the end that connected to her bow. Maybe if she could have any other thoughts than- Don't die, don't die, Gods please don't die - she would have question where the thread had come from.
"Leo!" Amoriel yelled. Her feet pushed against the canyon wall in an attempt to stop.
"What are you doing?" Leo's eyes went wide. She wrapped one of her arms around his waist.
"Hold on!" she pressed a button that appeared on the side of her bow. And suddenly, Leo and Amoriel were reeled upwards. The cord returning back into the bow.
"How did-? Leo's question died in his throat as soon as they climbed over the railing. Amoriel get the cord off of the bow.
Piper lied unconscious on the floor. Dylan and Brody had sprouted black vaporous wings. Jason and Hedge were in the middle of fighting with floating Dylan. Amoriel cursed and pushed Leo behind her as Brody flew towards them.
The dark clouds illuminated. Lightning arced through the sky. Everything came to a halt. It felt as if space and time itself stilled itself. Jason was flat on his back, mouth open and clothes smoking. Amoriel heard, who she assumed was Piper, screaming. Dylan laugh thundered across the fracturing sky walk.
Jason rose unsteadily to his feet. "My turn"
Him breathing and standing was all it took for Amoriel to turn her attention back to Brody. Rain pelted down. She adjusted the bow in her hand and draw out an arrow and aimed directly at brody's heart. The sounds of Jason's battle faded into the background.
"Bad idea" Amoriel smirked. Her body tension melted away and any muscle aches she had washed away. The rain rolled across her body, "to mess with my boyfriend." She didn't know why she said it but she could tell the Venti (she definitely didn't know why or how she knew that's what they were called) floated a half step backwards, the dark look on her normally heavenly green eyes seemed like a nightmare to him . In a blink of an eyes she let the arrow lose and it stuck on the door behind him everything happened so fast he thought she had missed. But she didn't, she never misses. Brody turned into gold dust that floated down to the glass floor.
"You have no idea how many enemies you've awakened, half-bloods!" Dylan sneered at them, "My mistress will destroy all demigods. This is a war you cannot win."
Above them, the storm exploded into a full-force gale. Cracks expanded in the sky walk. A hole opened in the clouds - a swirling vortex of black and sliver. "The mistress calls me back!" Dylan shouted with glee, "and you will come with me!"
Dylan lunged at Jason. Piper tackled the storm spirit from behind. Even though he was made of smoke, she had somehow managed to make contact. Both of them went sprawling. Dylan screamed with rage. He let loose a torrent that knocked into all of them.
Amoriel slammed her bow into the sky walk. Cracks rang out through the glass. Her other arm wrapped itself around Leo's body - keeping them from flying over the railing again. Jason's sword skidded across the glass. Both him and Coach Hedge landed on their butts. Piper was thrown off Dylan's back and hit the railing, tumbling over the side.
Jason rushed over the side of the railing and jumped.
"I'll settle for this one!" he grabbed Amoriel's arm. She took another arrow from her quiver.
"Think again!" She snarled and stabbed it to his shoulder. It tore through his smoking form and he let her go with a groan. The coach launched himself at the spirit. Dylan rose himself and Hedge into the air, gaining speed.
Amoriel rushed over to the railing. From what she could see they didn't look to be falling. If anything, they looked like they were getting closer. Dylan never came back down, and rain slowly stopped. She took off her quiver and twirled her bow in her hand trice. While her quiver turned back to its charm version the black bow shrunk back down into a small ring.
She had barley slipped the ring back to her finger when Leo attached himself to her. His warm arms wrapped themselves around her body, enveloping her. Leo's face nuzzled into the crook of her neck, breathing deeply. Their wet clothes squelching together. She might have no idea who he was but she couldn't deny the feelings that stirred within her.
The storm completely dissipated. The other kids from the Wilderness School were staring out the glass door in horror. Security guards were working on the locks now, but they didn't seem to be having any luck. Amoriel could hear Leo mumbling in Spanish against her neck and hair.
Her arms wrapped around his body too. The muscles that had stiffened his body slowly began to relax.
"What happened?" her neck muffling Leo's question. "The tornado guy, the gold sword, the black bow...I hit my head. That's it, right? I'm hallucinating?"
Amoriel pulled away from Leo enough to look at Jason. Their eyes bore into one another in silence. Leo's arms loosened their hold to her. There was a brittle sound like dry twigs snapping. The cracks in the skywalk began to expand.
"We need to get off this thing," Jason said. "Maybe if we -"
"Are those...flying horses?" Leo said in disbelief. Amoriel didn't have a chance to look. Leo had fully reattached himself to her. As if, all he needed to do was hold onto her and she would be safe and hidden in his arms. Not like she had just save him. Yet, she didn't want to pull away. At the moment only thing she wanted to do was getting lost in his warmth.
"Reinforcements" Jason said. "Hedge told me an extraction squad was coming for us."
"Where are they extracting us to?" Piper asked.
Amoriel could barley hear the sounds and voices of the new arrivals over Leo's rapid Spanish.
"Leo" She halfheartedly attempted to pull away from his warmth. He tightened his arms around her.
"Mi alma." Leo's voice cracked, "I can't lose you...I should have been the one protecting you...how...how did you do that?" He turned his back to the new group of people.
A blonde girl wearing jeans and an orange T-shirt with shields tossed over her back jumped down from the chariot.
"Where is he?" She demanded.
"Where's who?" Jason asked.
Amoriel slowly raised her line of sight. The girl's gray eyes were fierce and a little startling.
"What about Gleeson? Where is your protector, Gleeson Hedge?" Annabeth demanded.
Leo cleared his throat behind Amoriel, "He got taken by some...tornado things"
"Venti" Jason said. "Storm spirits."
The blonde girl arched an eyebrow. "You mean anemoi thuellai. That's the Greek term. Who are you, and what happened?"
Jason did his best to explain, but he seemed to look anywhere but directly at the girl's eyes. About halfway through the story the other guy from the chariot came over. He was heavily built and had a shaved head. He stood there glaring at Them, his arms crossed. Amoriel interjected Jason's stories with her own detail every so often.
"Annabeth" The bald guy grunted. "Check it out." He pointed at Jason's feet.
Amoriel looked over at Jason. She hadn't noticed that he lost a shoe in the fight. She instantly looked down at her own feet. Both Leo and she seemed to have all of their clothes.
"The guy with one shoe," said the bald dude. "He's the answer."
"No, Butch" Annabeth insisted. "He can't be. I was tricked." She glared at the sky as though it had done something wrong. "What do you want from me?!" She glared at the sky as though it had done something wrong "What have you done with him?!"
The sky walk shuddered, and the horses whinnied urgently.
"Uh honey are you ok?" Asked Amoriel with worry. The girl, Annabeth turned to snap at her but she froze all of a sudden. Amoriel guessed this was a common thing. How couldn't it? she was stunning.
"Annabeth," Butch said, "we gotta leave. Let's get the these four to camp and figure it out there. Those storm spirits might come back."
Annabeth stopped staring to the black haired beauty and fumed for another moment. "Fine." She fixed Jason with a resentful look. "We'll settle this later." Annabeth turned on her heels and marched toward the chariot.
Piper shook her head. "What's her problem. What's going on?"
"Seriously," Leo grumbled. Butch size up the small Latino elf. His eyes narrowed on him as if he were deciding whether or not to leave him behind.
"I'm not going anywhere with her" Jason gestured toward the blond. "She looks like she wants to kill me."
Butch gave Leo one last glare before turning back to the rest of the group. "Annabeth's okay. You gotta cut her some slack. She had a vision telling her to come here. To find a guy with one shoe. That was supposed to be the answer to her problem."