𝐌𝐎𝐓𝐇𝐄𝐑'𝐒 𝐃𝐀𝐔𝐆𝐇𝐓𝐄𝐑, luke castellan

𝐜𝐡𝐚𝐩𝐭𝐞𝐫 𝐞𝐥𝐞𝐯𝐞𝐧

Life at Camp Half-Blood outside the summer season was much duller than Luke thought it could be.

Of course, he didn't expect the campfires among all the cabins at night, and he didn't pretend to have fun playing Capture The Flag only with the few campers who remained during that time. All the activities they did were routine: cleaning the stables, helping Nik in the forge, and organizing the cabin since there weren't as many campers around. Sometimes, Luke missed a bit the excitement of fighting monsters and the adrenaline of living on the streets. However, that feeling quickly dissipated when he passed by the hill where Thalia's tree stood, a stark reminder that, despite being more boring, his life at camp was safer for both him and Annabeth.

Only one thing kept him entertained: training in the Sword Fighting Arena. With Fred absent, it was Nik who had taken up the task of training him.

Keira had been an excellent teacher, demanding but effective. During their training time together, Luke had learned a lot, even though he would never admit it out loud.

Fred had been acceptable, perhaps a bit less communicative and with less ease in explaining, but friendlier. His training sessions were lighter than the blonde's.

Nik, undoubtedly, was a good guy.

Maybe Luke was improving quite quickly in his art, and Nik might not be the most skilled swordsman, or perhaps Nik's strength lay in forging swords rather than wielding them.

Either way, even if Luke wasn't learning too much from Nik, their training sessions served him well. He was already at a level where he didn't need constant corrections, but rather time and practice, and Nik, even if not the most skilled swordsman, was useful for that. Luke still felt that he had progressed in the use and handling of the sword.

On the other hand, Annabeth was more bored than during the summer as well. Her friends of her age had all left the camp, and the few campers remaining were older. However, she had Luke, and that made her happy. When she worried too much about how her friends or even sometimes her father would be doing, she would take Keira's necklace in her hands, which she always wore around her neck, and hold onto it tightly.

Annabeth was perfecting the art of using her knife, a gift that Luke had given her when they first met, to replace the old hammer she used while living on the streets. When Luke gave it to her, he told her that only the fastest and cleverest of warriors could wield the weapon, so she felt proud to be learning to use it correctly. It was Luke himself who took care of helping her learn how to use the weapon.

One afternoon, during the first days of December, Luke and Annabeth found themselves in a canoe on Canoe Lake, enjoying the autumn sun and the outdoors. Luke was making all the effort to move the canoe through the water, but he had let Annabeth use one of the canoe paddles so that she felt she was doing something useful and was actually moving the canoe herself.

"And then Bill came and said my knife was better than his, but he preferred a bow and arrow," Annabeth commented, annoyed. Bill was an unclaimed guy two years older than her who was at Camp and usually trained with them.

"And what do you think?" Luke asked, smiling. He enjoyed listening to Annabeth's dramas; they distracted him from his daily chores and reminded him that they were still kids.

"Me?" Annabeth asked, dropping the paddles to gesture. "I think my knife is the best in the world, but I wouldn't mind learning archery."

"Hey, Anne, don't drop your paddles; you'll leave me doing all the work to move this," he joked, laughing. The girl grabbed the paddles back, her face visibly reddened. "If you want to learn archery, we can ask Jon," he offered, looking towards the shore, still smiling.