We made a small detour before Annabeth and I followed Chiron down to the woods. Annabeth was totally nice to me. She got me some armor, a shield and sword and introduced me to people whose names I forgot instantly. Percy stayed by her side and put in his two-cents every so often. When we got to the field, there were more campers than I could have imagined. They were split into two teams with clear leaders- Percy and Annabeth on one side and a large girl with an electric spear on the other. It looked like teams were almost done being picked.
"That's Clarisse," Annabeth pointed to the big girl. “She’s a daughter of Ares. Try not to get on her bad side, or on the receiving end of her spear. It's best to stay clear of her for now.”
“No problem,” I muttered. I was surfer, not a fighter so the whole game just sounded like a bad idea for me.
It was at that point that I saw a pale boy with messy black hair, dark eyes, and equally dark clothes. It looked like Chiron was scolding him for something because the boy had his hands shoved in his pockets and his head down.
"Who's that?" I whispered to Annabeth.
She grinned at me. "That's Nico di Angelo. He's a son of Hades. He probably tried summoning the dead again or something like that. Chiron keeps telling him not to do that but he doesn’t listen."
"Summon the dead? That sounds... creepy."
She shrugged. "Not to Nico. He's used to being around the dead since he lives with his dad part of the years. Most of the rest of the time, he's here. Nico's a good guy for the most part."
"Which team is he going to be on?"
"I'm not sure. Nico doesn't like to play all that much. He thinks he's too cool and doesn’t like following any rules.” She cocked her head to the side and her pretty grey eyes darted from me to Nico and I could see them calculating before she turned to her boyfriend. “Percy, ask him to be on our team."
"Um, okay?” He hadn’t been listening to our little conversation and looked confused at Annabeth’s request but he turned in the direction of Nico di Angelo. “Hey, Nico, Annabeth wants you on our team."
Nico turned and his dark eyes locked on mine. He shrugged absently. "Sure, why not."
Annabeth devised a plan that seemed foolproof. The only thing that worried me was that Nico and I were left to actually guard the flag while the rest of the team went on the attack. I was unsure about it for two reasons: the first, most obvious being the fact that I honestly had no idea what I was doing. The second was being alone with Nico; he made me nervous for some reason. "Watch each other's backs," Percy instructed while he and Annabeth ran off. I nodded absently and fiddled with the awkward sword in my hand, trying to get the hang of it- my barrette/sword hadn’t been this difficult.
"So you're new here?" Nico asked.
I was so shocked that I dropped the stupid thing. My cheeks colored in embarrassment. "Um, yeah. I'm Naida Hale. Percy, Annabeth, and Grover just got me here today."
"Did you get attacked by anything?" He grinned like getting attacked by monsters was a rite of passage or something.
"Um, yeah. A few things but I don't remember what they were called. This is all pretty new to me and I never really put much stock in the myths when I'd heard about them."
"Any family?"
I bit at my lip, holding back tears. Seriously, what was with all the questions? "Uh, yeah. M-my mom. It's just been her and me since I was born. You?"
His dark eyes grew sad. "I had a sister but she died a few years back. I used see her every once in a while when I was with my dad but she was reincarnated. But there is Hades so I guess my father counts."
I plopped onto the ground. "At least you know who your dad is. No one will even give me a freakin' name."
Nico laughed. "I'm sure that you'll get claimed tonight at dinner. You just gotta wait out a little bit longer."
I shrugged. "I don't really care. I don't give a damn about it but it’s really annoying that everyone else seems to be in on the secret. It's really no biggie to me if I don-"
The sounds of screaming cut me off. Nico and I both drew swords and got ready to fight. My heart was pounding in fear. No less than five kids from the other team were storming our flag. I squealed when a sword came down on my and I blocked it with my own. Another attack from the electric spear came at me but I blocked it as well as the first. On the third attack, I wasn't so lucky. The metal cut through my side. The shock of it made me lose focus and more cuts appeared on my skin.
"Die!" a large boy with big, tattooed muscles yelled. His sword hit my shield with enough force that I fell one my butt in the creek. Considering that he was like twice as big as me and I was pretty petite I guess that wasn’t much of an accomplishment.
"Naida!" I heard Nico yell.
I shook my head, trying to get my thoughts in order. The water from the creek was cool and soothing. I felt myself getting stronger and the wounds from the sword were healing. "I'm fine," I yelled back to Nico as I blocked yet another attack. Not gonna lie, it was pretty cool being able to fight like I actually knew what the hell I was doing.
Nico and I fought side-by-side for several minutes before Percy and Annabeth crossed the creek with the other team's flag.
My eyes got a little wider. "We won!" I cheered jumping up and down. Other than swim meets or some surfing competitions I’d never won in any kind of sports.
I heard someone laugh and turned to find Nico smirking at me. "Not bad for a first-timer," he congratulated.
"Thanks," I smiled back.
Nico shrugged. "Sure. Well, I guess that I'll see you at dinner."
I watched him walk off. "Yeah, see you," I muttered into empty air.

Notes

shout out to Daughter of Poseidon123 and TheYoutubeGurrl