Of Magicians and Monsters

by BridgeInBetween

Summary:

It's the weeks after the war with Gaea that devastated both Camp Half Blood and Camp Jupiter, and all Percy Jackson wants is to spend time with his family, friends and girlfriend, take a break from the continuous monster attacks, and relax before his last year of high school. Unfortunately, fate has other plans.

Simon Lewis never expected a perfect night, but this double date with Clary and Jace has been steadily turning into a disaster all evening. It stands to reason that such a terrible night would end with even more terribleness: demons extremely determined to kill them all.

Set during the summer between Simon's first and second year at Shadowhunter Academy, which is also the summer of the war with Gaea. It is a Shadowhunters × Rick Riordan crossover and canon compliant. Remember the road trip Simon mentioned in Tales from Shadowhunter Academy? This is the story of that cross country journey where worlds clash. How long before heroes break?

Learnt my lesson last time so no posting schedule- updates as and when I finish writing. Subscribe to get the notifs! Do leave comments and kudos as they mean the world.

Chapter 1: Percy

Okay, I did not want to be writing this again.

See, I thought I would be safe for atleast a few weeks. Maybe until the second month of school, when inevitably some new monster like an ancient child of Echidna, or the gym teacher, would decide I was a tasty treat. I thought the war we fought barely a few days ago would be enough to scare off the bad guys for a little time atleast. Also, I promised Annabeth no more saving the world because that'll interfere with our college plans.

Apparently, I'm the problem. Demigods are like some sort of homing beacon for all the evil stuff in the world. And me being son of the sea god Poseidon, who is super powerful because he controls the oceans, makes me even more attractive to them. Yay, me. I could've been attractive to dogs, or cupcakes. But no, evil monsters it was. And to top it off, this time they were bigger, badder, incredibly more powerful, and more hellbent on destroying this world just when I wanted to stay home and inhale pizza. (Annabeth is reading this as I write it and wanted to let everyone know "badder" is grammatically wrong, to which I say, it's for the vibe! I will not change a thing.)

Okay, maybe we've gotten a bit off track and you're confused. Let me back up a little bit. My name is Percy Jackson, and this is the story of how I got my mind melted for the third time in a year- ie, fought new, more terrible monsters with the help of people that live in a different world to ours. I thought mythological gods were bad, my new friends have to face equally horrible yet completely different challenges. Now, this is supposed to be a super secret account that everyone pitched in to narrate. Chiron is holding on to it if, god forbid, the camp ever needs it, but in case a demigod ever has the misfortune to read it: good luck. You'll need it.

Don't say I didn't warn you.

Chapter 2: Simon and Percy

Simon- I've gone through my fair share of challenges. The pipeline of human to rat to human to vampire to human to aspiring Shadowhunter¹ would have taken its toll on anyone. Add to that, demon amnesia, a complicated dating life, and trying to turn my geeky unathletic body into a swole superhero in two years, and you've got yourself the poster boy for suffering. Like, my Endurance stats in any video game would be off the charts. But I think the worst thing I've ever endured is a double date with my best friend Clary and her boyfriend Jace, made worse by the fact that I PLANNED it.

See, I'm back in New York for the summer holidays from the Shadowhunter Academy (Address kept secret for obvious reasons. Consult Chiron to get in contact.) Isabelle (my girlfriend...I think. We haven't really defined it yet?) and I are still sorting through our feelings, because I sort of forgot all about her due to the aforementioned demon amnesia. And sometimes I feel like she wants the past version of me more than the current one who's just trying to keep up.

As I said, it's complicated. Anyway, you go and pair that tension with two people who are, like, in a disgusting amount of love, and you quickly realize you can start totally loathing your best friend if you're not careful enough.

Jace- digressing a bit there, aren't you buddy. Clary would be upset if she read that

Simon- shut up and let me write. I'm giving context. She knows how I meant it.

Anyway, Clary and Jace are very obviously, publicly, shamelessly into each other. And Isabelle and I just...aren't. First of all the vintage restaurant Clary chose is all the way in Long Island, because "they serve this great strawberry pie". Secondly, Isabelle showed up in this gorgeous tiered skirt and black top, and I was there in jeans and a band shirt that said "Come Get This Sweet Drum." Out of place much? Thirdly, Clary and Jace kept staring and whispering sweet nothings and, I think, playing footsie at one point. Meanwhile me and Isabelle were stumbling through forced conversation and lapsing into awkward silences where I tried desperately to figure out everything I was doing wrong and Isabelle stared at the tablecloth. To be fair, Jace and Clary did try their hardest to keep the conversation flowing, but as the time went on I just started feeling like everything was a disaster and I was better off moping over Izzy, alone and girlfriend-less.

That was the scene. You can imagine my state of mind when everything went to hell. And I can say that because I've apparently been to Hell once. There we were, having a bad night, and in roughly fifteen minutes I was wishing we could go back. NOTE- izzy- simon, less about our former relationship troubles, more about the story

The restaurant door opened, and two teens about our age walked in. They were followed by someone lugging a bunch of boxes so high they obscured the person's face, and they walked with a limp. One of the teens, a girl with blonde curls, scanned the room before locating the door to the kitchen.
The way she and the black-haired guy with her stood and moved were oddly familiar to me, but also sort of out-of-place. I couldn't really figure out why and found myself staring as they crossed the dining area and disappeared into the kitchen.

Clary caught me staring. She turned around and caught the same last sight I did- the back of box-carrying guy's head disappearing into the kitchen. Her forehead creased. From inside, there came a clatter as someone dropped something, before the door shut. Izzy and Jace picked up on Clary's face and the noise fast. They're both excellent Shadowhunters. Very casually, they both angled their gazes to the same spot.

"What is it?" Jace asked, tensing up. One hand rested casually on his thigh, within access of approximately a dozen weapons. Izzy had inched closer, like she was protecting me. "Something about the way they were walking...." Clary said, a hint of confusion in her voice. Then she shook her head. "It felt strange to see them. Like something that wasn't supposed to happen."

Another clang, much louder, sounded from the kitchen. A few people turned to stare as my sense of unease grew. There was a beat of silence, and then an almighty sound reverberated through the room, like all the countertops had been ripped out and thrown to the floor.

I was out of my chair before I even realized it, muscle memory kicking in. Someone screamed from inside, and my New Yorker side that wanted to keep my head down warred with the Shadowhunter instinct to jump headfirst into danger. Eventually the second part won, and clearly all those torturous morning pushups and runs with -redacted- had apparently been worth something, because I had no problem barreling across the room like a kid hopped up on sugar.

I could hear things being thrown around in there. The door still remained locked, but I reached out to twist it open- before it shattered outward. A damn wood fragment lodged in my forearm as I threw it up to block my eyes. The rest of them thankfully missed , but I stumbled backwards. Maybe even screamed.

Hey, I'm still human. I don't have the superfast Shadowhunter reflexes, nor can I bear runes² yet. It was a manly scream of terror, especially because I wasn't only screaming at the door exploding but also the giant demon sitting on the countertop.

I'm not proud to say what I did next. I fell over. Scooted backwards on my butt. Screamed a bit more until my hand found a sharp shard of wood and flung it like a dagger at the monster. It batted it away. I stared in disbelief.

The thing was the size of a huge dog or a lion. It was a dark brown and had a ring of horns all around its face like a mane, and when it set its eyes on me and growled, I saw not the white gleam of teeth, but a metallic shine. I've studied a lot of demons at the Academy from a lot of parts of the world, but this was one I'd never ever heard of. Behind me, I could hear people scream and start running, probably clocking the demon as some escaped zoo animal or something.

Something moved behind the counter. The blonde girl moved into sight, her eyes darting between me and the demon. Oh, God, there were mundanes in this kitchen. I expected her to be hyperventilating, but she seemed calm, so there was probably a glamour-

"It's alright," she said to me, voice steady and persuasive. "It's just a dog. There's nothing to be scared of."

What?

Isabelle leapt between me and the thing silently. Her whip snaked out from one hand, a dagger in her other. She'd never looked more deadly. She raised the dagger and pointed it at the girl. "I've been around enough Fair Folk³ to know when they speak with magic. If this demon is yours, faerie, consider yourself not only foolish but dead."

The girl's expression narrowed. She opened her mouth to speak, but the black haired guy came up behind her. His eyes were a startling blue-green, and there was something in his eyes that made me think, 'this is a skater kid you do NOT want to piss off.' "Kitchen staff are gone. The one who screamed was a bit resistant, but we convinced her she hasn't had enough sleep and was seeing things. Grover's taking them away." He looked at me and Isabelle and went from focused to unsettled. "More humans? Oh god, we forgot about the front side, the dining area." He moved forward. "It's fine. It's just someone's escaped dog. You don't have to worry." Then he saw Isabelle's whip and stopped talking in those glamoured tones again. His expression turned wary, and his gaze darted to the girl. "Who is this, Annabeth, and why is she carrying weapons?"

"I don't know who they are and they talk very strangely," Annabeth said, fixing me with a look that promised she'd find out everything about me and use it to burn down my life. "But I think they see the monster. And they want to kill it?" The last sentence was a question she addressed to us.

Isabelle sized her up and nodded without speaking. I looked at the demon. It was looking back at me directly, and there was violence promised in those beady little eyes. "Sorry to interrupt," I said, "but the demon is staring at me like it wants to eat me and can we please have a catching-up after killing it?" The demon growled like it agreed.

The guy took out a pen from his pocket and uncapped it. It elongated until he was holding a bronze, glowing sword. I stared again. I'd never seen weapons glow. Witchlights⁴, sure, but a weapon? Isabelle was right, these were faeries, and even though the Cold Peace⁵ forbade us from dealing with them, we had to work together to kill this thing.

But then, why would a faerie not seem to recognize a Shadowhunter? We were their number one enemies currently.

The demon snarled. I realized I was still on the floor and rose to my feet in, I'd like to say, a dignified way. There was a movement out of the corner of my eye as the blonde girl reached slowly into a backpack and drew out a faded baseball cap. On my other side, Isabelle gestured to me to look at her. While the demon swished its tail, (did I mention it had a barbed tail?) she pulled out a folding spear and threw it to me.

I grimaced. Not my preferred weapon, but I'd trained with spears with-

"Where are Jace and Clary?" I asked Izzy. She was moving incrementally toward the side of the countertop, setting up a triangle that pinned it in. "Probably evacuating the other guests," she answered. "There were too many humans here to risk it."

The black-haired boy was closing in from the other side, sword held high, and the girl- the girl had disappeared. I felt a sudden spasm of unease, because no doors had opened or closed in the past minute. Then the demon smashed a paw into the counter and I stopped thinking about her. I stopped thinking about anything, really, because before any of us could so much as blink, in the space of a microsecond, the demon had lunged at me.

***

Percy-

Yup, I'm taking over the narration for a while. My buddy Simon tells a story pretty well, but unfortunately when the monster lunged at him, it landed on his chest and made his head hit the floor, after which the poor guy got knocked out immediately. Ouch.

The black haired girl- Isabelle- she roared and charged. I have to say, she's extremely fast. Her whip glittered as she swung it through the air sinuously and there was a smack as it slammed into the monster's back. But that's the thing- it was a smack sound, because the whip did nothing. The monster's skin was impenetrable from that.

But maybe not from Celestial Bronze.⁶

While Isabelle had the monster focused on her, I sneaked up from behind. Its tail was swishing back and forth. I brought Riptide down-

Clang.

The thing's skin was like metal. It reminded me of Hercules' lionskin cloak. I'd defeated that lion once....Unfortunately, I did not have time to peruse this line of thought, as the monster hissed and turned towards me.

"Annabeth," I said as calmly as I could with a pair of death eyes trained on me. "Now would be a good time to materialize."

Nothing. I heard a slight scraping along the floor. Isabelle spared a split second to stare at Simon's unconscious body being dragged along the floor before I said, "That's Annabeth, she's getting him to safety." She nodded once. The monster growled low in its throat and made to follow. I had to think fast to keep its attention on me.

Look, in weird situations, you panic, okay? Like when you have to really pull all the attention in a room in a split second.

I....started singing the national anthem of the USA.

The monster looked at me like I had two heads. Isabelle stared like I had four. I quit after three lines because my singing voice seemed like it was gonna anger it even more and started making kitty noises.

"Nice kitty," I whispered. "Good boy. Or girl. You're such a cutie pie!" The monster hissed, but it seemed interested. I took that as a good sign.

There was a sound behind me. The door was opening, bringing the fragrant New York City patented garbage-and-cat-pee smell. The monster cocked its head to the side and swished its tail. There was something almost anticipatory in its gaze. I did not like that look.

The sound of hooves. Grover was here. The monster reared back, and I suddenly understood that it was preparing to jump. "Grover, DUCK," I yelled as I leapt to the side. To his credit, Grover didn't even question me, just hit the floor immediately as the monster roared and lunged. It soared over his body into the alleyway beyond the door. There was a sound of plastic tearing, and then a series of thumps decreasing in volume.

Isabelle swore fluently. I think she threw in a couple curse words in, like, German or something, too, because it didn't sound familiar. Grover was wincing as he got to his feet. "Gods, I don't remember Annabeth being so verbally-" and then he caught sight of Isabelle. His eyes grew huge. She looked back defiantly. "So I was right. You are faeries trying to cause trouble while literally being sanctioned for causing trouble. The Clave⁷ is going to be pissed."

"Um..." Grover started backing away slowly. "I don't know what you're talking about."

"Liar!" Isabelle snarled. "You're a satyr, and a powerful one at that. I can feel the wild magic on you." She advanced, a dagger pointed toward poor Grover, who just stood there in his camo pants and white delivery⁸ shirt, throwing me panicked glances. I was edging slowly towards the door, trying to find and get Annabeth. Isabelle seemed...well, I don't want to say unstable, but she was definitely a little trigger happy.

Grover held up his hands. "Satyr, yes. Wild magic, yes. Liar, no. Judging by those tattoos we might need to sit down and have a long conversation, but I can assure you we don't want that monster around any more than you do."

I slitted my eyes at him. That was a strange choice of words. Almost as if he....knew what she was.

The door to the seating area creaked open. There was no movement for two seconds, and then Isabelle yelled and dropped her dagger. Annabeth materialized behind her a monent later. "Quit threatening us," she said quietly. "We're not evil, like you clearly think we are. Let's just take a breather and ....compare some notes, as it were. Your boyfriend is fine, by the way, just had a nasty blow to the head. He'll recover, I put him in one of the booths." Isabelle narrowed her eyes, stepped backward, and shouted, "Jace! Clary!" through the door.

There was the sound of running feet, and a pair of people burst into the room. One of them was a tall, blond, very muscly person with the same tattoos as Isabelle, and he skidded to a stop next to her with insane speed and grace. Following him was a girl with red hair, whose face I didn't even register until she'd reached Isabelle.

"Rachel?" I asked, disbelief colouring my voice. Rachel was supposed to be at camp, and she didn't have tattoos all up and down her arms, last I checked. Then the girl shook her hair out of her face and I realized she wasn't Rachel, just looked extremely like her. "My name is Clary. Wait, did you just call me Rachel? Like, Rachel Dare?" The girl asked.

I shared a glance with Annabeth. "How do you know Rachel?" Annabeth asked mildly. Clary shrugged. "I met her at an art show once. Everyone thought we were twins. Rachel is pretty cool. If you know her...."

"Clary, they're faeries," Isabelle warned. "We're not supposed to talk to them. We need to call Mom or Magnus or someone...'

"Again, we aren't faeries," Grover interjected. "Your laws don't apply to us." He shrugged at mine and Annabeth's twin looks of surprise. "Sorry, guys. There's some things you don't share when you're Lord of the Wild.⁹ Not even with your best friends." He looked at the trio, and there was something suddenly ancient in his eyes. He looked...powerful. "There has been some trouble with the Courts, I know. Even if you think every magical creature comes under fey jurisdiction, not all of us answer to them. We are not fey even if you classify us as such." He nodded to Jace, who had crossed his arms and was surveying the scene with a sort of forced casualness that I immediately disliked. He could try all he wanted to look non-threatening, the guy was jacked and the same kind of trigger-happy as Isabelle.

Rach-no, Clary, stepped forward, palms up. "Sure. Can we discuss this with less violence?" She poked Jace in the arm and whispered something to him. I heard something like "refuge city" and "promised ourselves." His expression eased up a bit, and he repeated the same thing to Isabelle. Her eye twitched, but she let go of her military posture to say something back and then vanish through the door.

Jace held out a hand to Grover, who shook it. "Details to follow, but I think we can agree on the fact that the demon needs to be stopped as soon as possible?" We nodded. "Great, just making sure we weren't breaking any laws. I spend too much time on my hair to waste it in some jail cell." Annabeth snorted, for which she received a crooked smile in return. "Anyway, priority one is hunting the damn thing." Jace sounded excited about this. I, for one, was not. This was supposed to be a quick strawberry delivery before heading to Mom's for dinner. I sent up a silent prayer to Dad and whatever other gods might be listening in to let me have a break.

"My name is Grover," Grover said, interrupting my internal monologue. "This is Percy, and that's Annabeth. We're trained in hunting monsters."

"So are we," Clary said carefully, as if she was weighing how much information to give us. It reminded me of when the Greeks had met the Romans, dislike and distrust all around. That hadn't ended well. Against my better judgement, I capped Riptide and stepped forward. "The thing is indestructible. When we find it, we have to make sure we can kill it."

There was the sound of footsteps as Isabelle returned. With her was Simon, wincing and clutching his head. Her eyes gleamed. "I know a place we can go to discuss next steps and make a plan."

 

Notes-

Percy- Sorry I I talked about you so distrustfully, Isabelle. First impressions and all.

Izzy- it's cool. hey does anyone else think Percy and Simon talk alike

Grover- Totally

Annabeth- you're supposed to use this space to- nevermind, I'm the last proofreader before handing this in to Chiron anyway. Whatever.

 

Glossary Guide for The Unfortunate Demigods/Shadowhunters Reading This:

1- a unique kind of monster-slayer, not born of the godly pantheon.
2- a shadowhunter symbol
3- magical creatures associated with the shadowhunter world, with some overlap with ours
4- magical glowing stone as a source of light
5- a political treaty
6-a material to make weapons, unique to the demigod world
7- shadowhunter government
8- the demigod world runs a real business called Delphi Strawberry Service. If any such shirts seen while in distress, do not hesitate to ask for help.
9- a political position, or authority of power, in the demigod world

Notes:

If you like this story, please please pretty please comment and give kudos, I am a one person show who is not immune to flattery and will provide updates more quickly if i am given feedback