(Author's note: This is set after the war, forgetting that ToA exists.

Also, all the characters and settings belong to Rick Riordan.)

It was a hot feeling. Almost painful. A weight in her stomach. An ache. A desire.

Love? Maybe. Even as an Aphrodite girl, she sometimes had trouble telling. She wasn't used to it being this strong, this...overpowering.

Even if it was love, Drew would never admit it.

It was all too familiar, too hard, too painful.

But no matter what she did, every time she saw that stupid face or heard that stupid voice, the feeling returned threefold.

And there it was again, that strong, mature voice that made her stomach hurt.

"Piper, you know I can win."

"Yeah, so think of it as a training session."

"What, so that I'll let you win? I don't think so."

"Oh, come on, Reyna. How will I ever learn if you just keep beating me?"

Reyna laughed, "Well, maybe if you actually kicked the ball..."

"I broke my toe, that's not my fault!"

"It's definitely your fault that you kicked the wall instead of the soccer ball."

"Jason moved it at the last second!"

Reyna laughed again, sending shivers through Drew's body.

The Aphrodite girl stood up. She should leave, it was creepy to stalk.

She headed to the forest, checking her freshly manicured nails to make sure her poisoned darts were intact. Maybe she could fight out her feelings.

No one saw her slip into the forest. Even if they had, they wouldn't recognize her. She was dressed in grey and black camouflage, wearing a black hoodie to hide her face. Not very fashionable at all.

A little way into the forest she found a monster: a hellhound.

It was kind of beautiful, in a ferocious, man-eating way.

Its slick black fur sucked in all the light around it, its black eyes seemed to hold the universe. Drew would have felt bad about killing it if it weren't for the blood that covered its mouth.

It growled when it saw her, preparing to spring.

Drew held out one hand, "Oh, you wouldn't want to hurt me, would you?" She applied layer after layer of charmspeak to her voice.

The hound relaxed slightly, but it mostly just looked confused.

"Poor, misunderstood monster," She wasn't sure why she didn't just kill it, but for whatever reason, she couldn't, "Everyone just sees you as evil, but you just want love, don't you?"

The hellhound nuzzled her outstretched hand, unsure.

"Don't worry, I won't-"

"What in Pluto are you doing?"

Drew jumped back in surprise, startling the hellhound into anger.

It was pouncing on her, when a figure leapt out of the forest and collided with it, knocking it off course.

The hound fell to the side, but it was only going to be down for a moment.

The figure turned around, and Drew's suspicions were confirmed.

It was Reyna.

Damn.

The older girl drew her gold sword, then turned to Drew. "You can't tame a hellhound, kid. Not unless you have certain...skills. This hound here? It was only pretending to listen to you."

Drew wasn't sure she agreed. "You don't know that. I was working on it, and it might have worked if you hadn't startled it."

Reyna shook her head, "I don't know who you are, but I've only ever met one tame hellhound, and she was tamed by a genius."

Oh, so Reyna didn't recognize her in this outfit. Convenient.

But the hellhound was getting up now, and Drew was pretty sure she had no hope of taming it anymore.

Reyna readied her sword and Drew pulled a small dagger out of her hoodie pocket.

The hellhound growled at Reyna. Drew crept around it, keeping light on her feet so as to make as little sound as possible.

Reyna saw her doing this and nodded.

She swung her sword expertly, drawing the dog's eyes toward it. She stabbed at the hound a couple times, but the wounds barely seemed to affect it. It kept trying to attack Reyna back, but she dodged and rolled with expert skill.

Drew had trouble not stopping to watch her, she was so skilled, so beautiful.

At one moment Reyna nodded, almost imperceptibly, and Drew jumped onto the hellhound's back. She walked across its spine with the balance of an acrobat, then, before the dog even noticed the weight on its back, she had straddled its neck. With a frown, she stabbed her fingers into its neck and shot the poisoned darts in.

The hellhound froze for a moment. Drew jumped off of its back, rolling back onto her feet. It disintegrated before it hit the ground.

"Drew...Tanaka?"

Ah. Her hood had fallen off. She smiled at Reyna' s shocked face, "That was great and all, but next time, please don't interfere with my taming."

Reyna nodded slowly, her look of shock slowly being replaced by one of grudging respect.

She turned to leave.

"Oh, and Reyna," Drew called after her, "Please don't tell anyone about this."

"I won't."

As soon as Reyna was out of sight, Drew sunk to the ground. That was the most she had ever said to her, and it wasn't even nice.