Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Perseus Jackson

••♆••

Percy was miserable.

Completely miserable in a body he hated but at one point in time had thought it was what he wanted, what he thought everyone wanted and expected, that it would make them, and himself, happy. And it had... For a while.

Percy had been born an omega. And he had never cared or had any problems with it. Until he started school and his mom had married Smelly Gabe. He was bullied and picked on for being a male omega.

They were rare and, he knew from extensive googling, highly sought after especially in the gay community because it meant that Alphas who preferred males could still have children.

But children themselves and Neanderthals like Smelly Gabe just saw a freak. A weak, sissy boy who liked to be pretty, soft, and feminine.

So he decided at age 10 to start taking hormones to make him more like an alpha. He would never fully be an alpha, wouldn’t have a knot, but his scent would change, he could gain muscle mass and grow taller.

And then he found out about being a Demi-God. A son of Poseidon and about the great prophecy that foretold the fall of Olympus. All he could do was soldier on.

So he did.

He saved Olympus and started dating Annabeth who honestly wasn’t even his best friend anymore. He had initially liked hanging out with her because they bonded over quests and her bossiness eased the omega instincts he still had (would always have).

And as a beta she didn’t care about his orientation as much as another omega or alpha would. But she slowly began pulling away from him after everything they’d been through together. She spent more and more time with Piper, a daughter of Aphrodite, and in the end, dumped him in front of the entire camp to start dating her.

It was one of the most humiliating moments of his life.

It didn’t matter that he wasn’t in love with her, he was honestly happy that she found someone she loved so completely but the way she did it. Completely uncaring of how it would look, how he would feel, broke something inside of him.

And Aphrodite herself seemed to hate him as well. Shortly after this Nico Di Angelo actually came back to camp. He had fought in the war and been a key point in their victory with the army of the dead he had summoned but he’d disappeared just as quickly after and Percy hadn’t even really seen him.

Percy wasn’t sure he had any blood in his body after how hard he blushed when he finally saw him properly for the first time in years. Nico sure wasn’t an adorable 12-year-old alpha anymore.

He had fully grown into an amazingly attractive alpha. He was incredibly tall at around 6 foot 3 with broad shoulders and muscles wrapped in delicious olive-toned skin. Percy was sure his cheekbones and jaw line could cut diamonds and his thick black curls were still utterly adorable even with the edgy undercut.

One look had been all it had taken for Percy to know that he’d be happy to fall into those deep dark eyes for the rest of his life. It was as if Eros had hit him with one of his arrows.

And then Nico had noticed him and headed his direction. He didn’t expect the gorgeous son of Hades to suddenly declare that he was completely over his crush on Percy (Nico had a crush on him?!) before stating he wasn’t even his type.

He had been crushed before he’d even had a chance.

••♆••

Which is what led him to be where he was right now.

 Completely miserable and in a body he hated. No prospects for his now non-existent love life because Nico had completely taken over his mind and heart.

After that complete rejection, all he had been able to do was watch Nico and he had slowly but surely fallen head over heels for him. Nico was just so kind. Always ready to lend a hand with rebuilding or anything that was needed.

Sure, he wasn’t suddenly all sunshine and rainbows, he was still snarky and sarcastic and overall dark and a tad gloomy, but he still helped. And seemed to have a never-ending string of omegas and betas trailing after him.

He didn’t date any of them, but he definitely made it no secret that he was fully open and okay with some casual sex. None of the female omegas interested him of course but all the beta boys he took to bed had no problems spreading rumors all over camp just how talented and well-endowed the son of Hades was.

Percy sighed morosely while dangling his feet into the shallow water that came right up to his cabin. Gods he even hated his feet. He missed being pretty the way he was when he was younger. He had no idea why he’d been allowed to take hormones so young.

Oh yeah, he’d begged and pleaded with him mom that it would be safer for him to get her to sign off on the treatment.

Worst mistake of his life.

“I’m glad we both agree on that.”

Percy let out a very omega-like shriek and nearly fell into the water. He whipped his head towards the voice and saw a stunningly beautiful woman with pink hair and blue eyes in a sundress that fluttered around her knees.

It didn’t take a genius to figure out who it was.

“Lady Aphrodite...” Percy murmured when his heart rate went back to normal after a few moments of silence.

“Perseus.” She replied airily before moving forward to sit next to him. To his surprise, she also began swishing her toes in the water.

She had beautiful feminine feet, well a beautiful feminine everything, and Percy was struck with fierce jealousy over the fact that he wasn’t.

“No need to make that face darling. I’m here to help after all.” Aphrodite said with a chuckle as she felt his emotions and saw his face scrunch up.

“Help? Help with what?” Percy asked softly, not having the energy to deal with his jealousy or cryptic gods.

“Why with your love life of course!” Aphrodite replied with a sunny smile that nearly blinded him.

Percy gave her the most deadpan look he could manage and she did seem to actually notice as she toned down on the glowing and appeared a bit more demure.

“The biggest regret you have, young Perseus Jackson...” She murmured softly while turning her gaze to the water. “Is that you did not stay true to yourself and because of that it ended up costing you the greatest love you could have had. Do you know why?” She asked.

Percy let out a bitter laugh.

“Of course I do. I turned myself into this mangled Alpha/Omega mess because I was too scared to be an omega. I’m obviously not Nico’s type because of it.” And that’s what hurt the most.

None of this would have happened if he hadn’t tried to mess with his biology. He knows he would have been a cute, adorable, omega because of how he looked now.

Even with the hormone treatment he was still only 5 foot 5 and had what everyone called a ‘Baby Face’. If he had simply let himself be, he wouldn’t be this tall. With odd facial hair and overly bulky muscles. He’d be Nico’s type then.

“That’s exactly it and I’m going to give you a chance to fix that.” Aphrodite said softly.

“The love you and Nico could have shared would have been a love for the ages and I refuse to have it pass you by.”

Percy stared transfixed as the water shimmered and swirled with pink and gold before images started to appear in the water. An image of himself. How he was supposed to be and oh he was lovely.

His hair was long and fell to his butt with cute bangs that went just past his eyebrows, his large ocean eyes were framed with thick lashes and his lips were plump and pink. His face overall was softer, more delicate, almost kitten-like.

He was wearing a blue sweater dress with knitted black knee-high socks. He’d paired it with a simple shoulder bag and gold earrings that had hearts dangling from delicate chains.

He stared, transfixed, and his smile in the water brightened even more before he started moving towards someone with his arms outstretched. The angle changed suddenly, and he could see Nico.

Devastatingly gorgeous, dark Nico accepted his hug and cupped his face before pulling him in for a demanding kiss.

And then the images were gone, and he was just staring at the water again.

“How can you fix it? You can fix me? Make me the omega I was supposed to be?” Percy asked desperately, turning towards Aphrodite with an almost manic gleam in his eye.

“I’ll be doing even more than that. I’m sending your soul back to when you first made the decision to start taking Alpha hormones.” Aphrodite responded with glee as her eyes seemed to glow even brighter.

“How? Isn’t that usually not... allowed?” Percy hedged while his body betrayed his excitement with small tremors.

To be able to go back! To do all of this again the right way. To not fall for Luke when he said he didn’t care about how he looked or what he had chosen to do.

To avoid Annabeth like the plague so he wouldn’t have to deal with all of the hurt and pain she liked to cause.

To save Bianca...

“I’ll have my memories won’t I?” Percy asked rapidly as the thought occurred to him that he may not remember anything.

“Of course you will! I can’t interfere like this very often but when I do, I do it right.” Aphrodite scoffed, shooting him a look that said, ‘Just what do you take me for’.

“You must be sure, Perseus Jackson, that this is what you want. There is no going back again if you change your mind.” Aphrodite said seriously, so out of character for the flirty goddess of love.

Percy didn’t even have to really think about it.

“Yes! I want this please! To have another chance... to do everything right... It’s more than I ever hoped for.” Percy replied, just as serious as the goddess.

“Then I wish you luck Perseus Jackson. I look forward to the love your future holds.” Aphrodite said and she gently tapped his forehead with her pointer finger.

He couldn’t even reply before pink and gold began to swirl around him and then he was falling... falling further than Tartarus before everything went black.

Chapter Text

Percy gasped as he shot up, falling out of his narrow bed with a spectacular amount of noise. He was disoriented for several minutes before he heard a soft knock on his door.

“Percy are you alright?” His mother, Sally, called from the other side of his door. The door to the horrible grubby bedroom that was his when his mom was still married to Smelly Gabe.

“Percy?” His mom called again sounding more worried.

“I– I’m fine! Just fell off the bed.” He called back so she wouldn’t be worried. “I’m going to shower okay mom.”

“Alright honey, breakfast will be ready soon so don’t be too long!” He could hear the smile and love in her voice and it had been so long since he could enjoy it.

There was just so much distance after the war that was hard to bridge. As much as he loved her, she couldn’t really understand everything that had happened and she had her own life with Paul. To have it be just them again was... Bliss.

He hastily turned to the closet in the small room and began rummaging through all the clothes he had. He hoped he had something he actually wanted to wear.

Thankfully, it seemed Aphrodite had sent him back to when he was just beginning to think about the hormone treatment because there was plenty of feminine omega clothes, though the newer clothes were obviously much more boyish.

Luckily, he hadn’t cut his hair yet either he thought happily as he pushed his long locks behind his ear as he quickly selected a cute pair of denim capris and a baby blue tank top with pretty white lace straps that he could tie into bows. He easily found his favorite jelly ballet flats as well.

Clothing obtained he cautiously opened the door and peered out into the short hallway. Seeing that the coast was clear he scurried to the bathroom as quietly as possible.

Getting rid of Gabe would be the first thing he was going to do, and it would be easy as well. He only really started struggling with school after he switched from his current one and started the treatments. No one expected omegas to be the brightest crayon in the box and generally graded on a curve as well.

The teachers were always so nice and helpful as well. All he would need to do was make Gabe angry enough to leave some bruises and just not hide them the way he used to. Abuse of omegas, especially male omegas, would see the bastard locked away for a long time.

After starting the water so it could heat up, Percy took a deep breath and slowly turned to the mirror so he could see himself properly.

And he was... cute. He looked like the omega he remembered, small and dainty. With black hair that flowed to just below his chin and his eyes looked even bigger than he remembered.

Oh he still looked like a child of course, with no curves to speak of but he could easily see how he would grow into the beautiful omega Aphrodite had shown him at Camp Half-Blood.

And he wasn’t going to do anything to screw it up this time either.

••♆••

Percy smiled at his mom as he came into the cramped kitchen/living room combo after a quick 15-minute shower. He had turned on the blow dryer as well and simply removed the water from his hair before sliding a blue headband into his hair to keep it out of his face.

“Morning mom!” Percy chirped moving to her side and wrapping his arms around her waist in a quick hug.

“Morning! What’s got you so...” Sally began before turning around and actually seeing him.

“...Happy this morning. Oh Percy...” She finished with a little wobble in her voice as she took in his clothes and soft, happy expression.

“I’m really sorry I’ve been such a brat lately mom. I don’t even know why I was! A– And boys’ clothes! Was there something wrong with me?”

Percy apologized while also making sure to let his mom know he was over the whole ‘Alpha’ thing.

“Oh honey, No! I think it may have just been a bit of a hormone upheaval. It’s perfectly normal to have a bit of a rebellious stage at your age.” Sally assured him quickly, though he could hear the relief in her voice at the fact that he was accepting his sub-gender again.

“Oh... I’m still sorry though. I know I haven’t been the easiest to deal with lately and I know you don’t need that with Gabe...”

Percy trailed off and wrinkled his nose when he had to say Gabe’s name.

“Percy you don’t need to worry about that. Now! Why don’t you help me with the pancakes? I’ve missed having you in the kitchen with me.” Sally said with a beaming smile.

“I’ve missed it too.” Percy replied smiling just as happily. He’d enjoy this peace with his mom, but he was going to get rid of Gabe as soon as he possibly could.

••♆••

As it turns out, getting rid of Gabe came sooner rather than later.

The disgusting man just couldn’t help himself and barely two days later he drank himself into a sorry state while his mom was at work and soon he turned his anger onto Percy.

“You little bitch! I told you to get me another beer!” Gabe roared as he advanced on Percy where he’s cowered in the corner like he always used to when he got like this.

“I– I’m sorry but there’s not anymore!” Percy squeaked convincingly while making his eyes dart around.

“WHAT?! I JUST BOUGHT A CASE THIS MORNING!” Was all he got in response. Gabe then paused, which was unusual for him, and stared at him with rheumy eyes.

“You started wearin’ them bitch clothes again!” Gabe shouted before advancing on him and grabbing his arm harshly.

Percy didn’t have to fake his yelp as a stinging pain shot up his arm before Gabe promptly dragged him over to his armchair before he plopped into it and gave him a disgusting grin. Percy was horrified to see the lust in his small beady eyes.

“If you’re wearin’ them clothes again it means you’ve accepted bein’ a bitch n’ a whore like that mom o’ yours. I’ll give you what you need and get something out of it too.” Gabe grinned nastily and unbuckled his jeans while keeping a fistful of Percy’s hair.

‘Nonononono!! This can’t be happening!’ Percy’s mind screamed before a thought popped into his head.

Mom had always told him before camp that his dad had died and was an angel watching over them. He could use this to send a direct prayer to Poseidon.

As Gabe began yanking his head forward he broadcast his thoughts as hard as he could.

‘Dad?! If you’re an angel and protecting us like mom said then please please Help Me!’

••♆••

Poseidon nearly fell off his chair in the dining room of Atlantis as the terrified prayer of his only Demi-God child ripped through his mind.

He quickly used his powers to see what had caused Percy so much fear he’s beg a supposedly dead father for help.

What he saw made his blood run cold.

He stood up so quickly that he sent the chair he was in flying.

Amphitrite and Triton both gave him odd looks, but he completely ignored them and instead disappeared in a swirl of water and blinding light. He reappeared directly behind Perseus where that disgusting mortal was trying to force His Son to do such a vile act.

The man jolted back and started shouting but he wasn’t paying any attention to the man. Instead, he was looking down into the wide Sea green eyes so much like his own.

He watched as thankfulness turned to confusion before he opened his mouth and said one simple word. “Dad?”

••♆••

When Sally returned from her shift at the candy shop she was surprised to see it surrounded by police cars.

She slowed down slightly as she tried to see what was going on before she froze as she saw Percy, her precious baby, in an ambulance with paramedics fussing around him.

“What’s going on?! That’s my son!” She shouted as she pushed her way through the gathered crowd. A police officer swiftly raised the yellow caution tape for her before escorting her over to the ambulance.

“The child’s mother is here now.” He stated professionally to the paramedic before turning towards her.

“The officer that was here first will be over in a moment to explain what’s going on but we thought you’d like to know that he’s alright.” He said kindly before walking away.

“What’s going on?! Is Percy alright?” Sally asked frantically after climbing in to check him over.

“Physically yes he’s fine.” The paramedic said, just as kindly as the other officer. “He’s had a horrible scare is all and he’s just sleeping now. We’ve been monitoring him to be safe.”

“Horrible scare...?” Sally murmured and moved to question more before a new voice called out her name.

A voice she’d heard before.

“Mrs. Jackson I’ll explain if I could have a few moments.” Poseidon said calmly though sally could see the tense muscles in his jaw twitching.

“Oh, yes, yes of course.” Sally mumbled, slightly dazed before she was led over to the steps of the apartment building.

“What is going on?!” Poseidon all but hissed at her as soon as they were far enough away before he could make it so no one would be able to hear.

“What do you mean? I want to know what’s going on? Why are you here?! What are all these police doing here?!” Sally hissed back just as forcefully as her eyes strayed beyond his shoulder to keep Percy in her sight.

“I’m here because our son was terrified enough to pray for his angel father to help him! That disgusting man you seem to call a husband was trying to force himself onto Percy!” Poseidon all but roared back, completely at his wits end with everything happening.

Sally sank onto the steps like a marionette with its strings cut.

“What...? I know he wasn’t the nicest man, but he keeps Percy safe. Monsters can’t find him. H– How did I miss this?!” What had started off as a whisper ended in a wail as Sally buried her face in her hands and began sobbing.

Poseidon shifted uncomfortably for a moment as all his anger drained away. He knew in his heart of hearts that there was no way Sally could have known what was going on and from the terror he’d felt from Percy this was likely the first time as well.

“This isn’t your fault Sally. I’m sorry I yelled at you but I was just shocked. I’m going to make sure he’s taken care of and that you and Percy are provided for.” Poseidon said resolutely.

Typically, he couldn’t do anything to help his Demi-God children but after this, for Percy, he’d find a way.  

Hades would probably help him.

Sally’s head jerked up and she looked ready to protest but one look at Poseidon’s face had her wilting like a daisy and simply nodding.

She was done with not accepting help.

••♆••

Sally knew that help from Poseidon would come quickly but not this quickly. Not even a week after Gabe was arrested and all of the questioning was over with she received a call from a lawyer informing her that her Uncle James had passed away and left his home and life savings to her and his nephew as ‘Women and Omegas need looking after’.

She’d never had an Uncle James, her parents had passed away in a plane crash when she was five and she’d been raised by her Uncle Rich until he died, but she just thanked the lawyer for informing her and set up a date and time in a few days to look over the estate and make sure the house was in order.

And in order it was. It was absolutely charming.

The house was a single-story 3 bedroom, 2 bath cottage-style house. The exterior was a pale grey-blue stone and there was a large flower garden under each of the bay windows that could be seen from the front. There was a cobblestone driveway connected to a path to the front door.

It was a Dutch door that was painted a cheerful blue. The inside of the home was even lovelier. The same stone as the exterior was inside as well and it looked wonderful with the dark wood flooring. The kitchen was large with an island and the blue theme continued here as well in the cabinetry and the appliances.

In fact, the whole house seemed to be a blue and ocean-themed cottage house straight out of a fairy tale. And Percy was loving every single moment of it.

When he prayed for help from Poseidon he didn’t expect this much. He just wanted Gabe to be gone so he and mom could be happy. He knew they could have stayed in the same apartment as his mom was the one paying the bills anyways and they could have finally cleaned it and kept it clean without Smelly Gabe.

But this was even better. Dad had arranged such a lovely house for them and even money to make any changes they wanted as well due to ‘Uncle Richard’ being wise with his money. He’d had almost $200,000 to his name when he ‘died’ and he even had a small blue Volkswagen beetle.

Mom wouldn’t have to kill herself working anymore, oh he knew she wouldn’t stop, and they’d be able to afford new clothes and redecorate their rooms.

Poseidon had definitely investigated their tastes when arranging this, but it couldn’t be too on the nose he supposed. The master bedroom was obviously a mans and the guest bedroom plain, with the third room being a small office/library.

Percy was going to enjoy setting up his room and actually getting good quality clothes for himself and his mom.

••♆••

And enjoy it he did.

He went all out with his ocean-themed bedroom. He found beautiful tapestries with ocean themes of coral reefs and beautiful shallow beaches with mermaids to cover the stone walls and he found the most perfect bed as well.

A beautiful, round blue–velvet bed shaped like a seashell.

He found a matching bedroom set that came with a long dresser, a vanity with drawers, and two bedside tables all in a pale cream color decorated with blue and cream seashell motifs.

His mom went a bit simpler as she couldn’t bring herself to splurge too much but she still got a very nice matching bedroom set in a pretty cherrywood with swirling designs and pretty pink linens to go with it.

They both enjoyed shopping for new clothes though.

 They’d both been shopping at goodwill and the bargain bins for so long that they both enjoyed the spending and choosing for that.

Of course, nearly everything Percy purchased for himself was blue.

••♆••

School started up again soon.

Since they’d moved to a nice neighborhood in New York, far away from their old apartment, this meant a new school as well. One he recognized.

Yancy Academy.

It was going to be different this time. This time Percy wasn’t here because he got kicked out of his old school. He was in a proper uniform and had fully accepted being the omega he was.

This time he was dropped off by his mom near the front doors. An older alpha held the door for him with a charming smile that Percy returned with a shy one of his own.

There was only one alpha for him but there was no sense in making his life harder than he had to.

The receptionist was very nice and so was the beta girl who showed him where to go. He was introduced in all his classes and acted sweet enough that his new teachers only smiled at him indulgently when he had trouble reading.

He could practically hear the thought; ‘What a cute omega! Trying so hard.’ Running through their head but unlike before it didn’t bother him and made his life much easier.

It took all of Percy’s self-control not to make a face at seeing the ginger menace that had tormented him at this school the first time around, but her reaction surprised him.

Nancy looked... Jealous. Hideously jealous the first time they met in English class.

And he honestly doesn’t even know why he was shocked by that. Since he wasn’t taking the hormones this time he was slowly coming into his omega body.

He had taken extra care of his appearance today.

His uniform was clean and neat and the same as everyone else’s, but he had decided to wear a pair of knitted white thigh-highs (he’d really started to love them and sweater dresses after the vision Aphrodite had shown him) and paired it with a pair of baby blue heeled booties as well as making sure his hair looked nice with a pretty blue headband glistening in the dark locks.

This along with his natural looks obviously made him that much lovelier next to Nancy Bobofit with her curly red hair, orange freckles that looked like they were sprayed on with liquid cheese, and crooked teeth.

Deciding to twist the knife just a bit more, Percy adopted his prettiest smile and perkily introduced himself.

“Hi! I’m Perseus but everyone calls me Percy! I’m looking forward to getting to know you better.” He chirped while holding out his hand, with his perfectly manicured blue French tips (thanks mom!), for her to shake.

And just like he knew she would, she couldn’t resist being a bitch.

“Not likely! Everyone knows omegas are just sluts and I don’t want to catch anything!” She sneered loudly before turning away.

Percy put on his most hurt look and even managed to get some tears to gather in the corner of his eyes that he wiped away before slowly turning to the front of the room where the teacher was staring at her in shock.

“Ms. Bobofit! Detention after school today for such language!” He sputtered once he’d moved past the shock of someone being so obvious in their dislike for a sub-gender.

“What?!” She all but shrieked. “You can’t do that!”

“I assure you I can.” He retorted coldly. “Now everyone! Let’s open our books to page 27.”

Percy smiled to himself as the class proceeded smoothly from there.

••♆••

The next year and a half passed in roughly the same way. Classes were easy enough because the teachers thought he was the ‘sweetest, most polite omega’ they’d ever met.

Nancy Bobofit wasn’t even able to bully anyone as much because Mr. Brunner had undoubtedly told the other teachers what she’d said on his first day.

He knew he’d be going to Camp Half-Blood soon though because he had just turned twelve and Grover Underwood had just transferred to Yancy Academy. As well as Alecto who was once again posing as a Pre-Algebra teacher.

••♆••

And just like they had before Grover had instantly become Percy’s friend. Although he’d been the one to approach him as he was surprisingly popular this time around.

Grover was just the same as before, just like Chiron had been. He was tall with curly brown hair, brown eyes, small horns that he was currently hiding, a wispy beard, and hairy brown goat legs.

Not that Grover knew that Percy knew that as he was currently wearing his fake feet and using his crutches.

Those had been his excuse to approach him.

He had offered to help carry his lunch tray when he saw him struggling. Grover had been shell-shocked for a few moments before blushing hotly and stammering that he didn’t need to.

“I know I don’t need to. I want to.” Percy laughed before leading him over to his usual table where several alphas and betas were sitting. All trying to get him to go out with them.

As if that would ever happen.

“So Grover right? Why did you transfer so late in the school year?” Percy asked with a smile as Grover nervously began fiddling with his napkin.

“O– Oh just moved recently and this was the only place that would take me.” He said nervously and Percy seriously can’t believe he never noticed the near ‘Baaa’ sounds the boy released.

All in all it was, once again, the start of a beautiful friendship.

Chapter Text

I hoped the trip would go better this time but twenty-eight kids and two teachers on a yellow school bus, heading to the Metropolitan Museum of Art, with one of those teachers being Alecto, was a special kind of torture.

Nancy Bobofit was the one on probation this time at least so we didn’t have to suffer her lobbing bits of peanut butter and ketchup sandwiches at us.

Mr. Brunner led the museum tour just like last time.

He rode up front in his wheelchair, guiding us through the large galleries, past marble statues and glass cases full of black-and-orange pottery. It still amazed me that these pieces of history had survived.

Especially since gods weren’t exactly the gentlest.

He gathered us around a thirteen-foot-tall stone column with a sphinx on the top, told us how it was a grave marker, a stele, for a girl about our age.

He told us about the carvings on the sides. The other kids were being obnoxiously loud but they listened when I shushed them gently and crowded around me asking if I really like this kind of thing.

Mrs. Dodds/Alecto still glared at me every chance she got but I just smiled angelically anytime she did.

She was still a mean-looking older woman in her 50s with a leather jacket but she wasn’t as awful to me this time around because Nancy had made herself the problem child with how she acted my fist day at Yancy academy.

He’d secretly whispered to Grover that ‘Mrs. Dodds’ was so mean she couldn’t possibly be human and he’d given the same serious look. “You’re absolutely right.”

Finally, Nancy Bobofit snickered about the naked guy on the stele, and I turned around and said kindly; “I think it’s beautiful but would you mind being quiet? I’m trying to listen to Mr. Brunner.”

“Mr. Jackson.” Said teacher asked. “Did you have a comment?”

“No, sir. I was just asking Nancy to be a bit quieter so I could hear you.” I chirped brightly.

Mr. Brunner pointed to one of the pictures on the stele. “Perhaps you’ll tell us what this picture represents?”

“That’s Kronos eating the Olympian gods right?”

“Yes” Mr. Brunner said, before continuing. “And he did this because...?”

“He did it because he was afraid his kids would overthrow him one day but his wife gave him a rock to eat instead of Zeus and when he grew up he tricked the Titan into throwing up his other kids and they beat him right?” He asked, tilting his head curiously.

Behind me, Nancy Bobofit mumbled to a friend, “Like we’re going to use this in real life. Like it’s going to say on our job applications, ‘Please explain why Kronos ate his kids’.”

“And why, Mr. Jackson.” Brunner said. “To paraphrase Miss Bobofit’s excellent question, does this matter in real life?”

“Busted.” Grover muttered.

“Shut up.” Nancy hissed, her face even brighter than her hair.

“Mmmm... I think it’d teach me to trust.” I said slowly and Mr. Brunner blinked before smiling.

“And why is that Mr. Jackson?”

“Well... Kronos was killed because he didn’t trust his family. If he had never eaten his kids they wouldn’t have hated him enough to do that. So... it’s a learning moment I guess...?” I finished with a sheepish smile, fiddling with a lock of hair.

“I see.”

Mr. Brunner looked incredibly pleased instead of disappointed this time and I beamed.

“And on that note; it’s time for lunch. Mrs. Dodds, would you lead us back outside?” He asked politely as the other kids immediately headed that way without waiting.

Grover and I were about to follow when Mr. Brunner said, “Mr. Jackson.”

I knew that was coming.

I told Grover to keep going. Then I turned toward Mr. Brunner. “Sir?”

“That was very well said Mr. Jackson. These may seem like just legends but you can learn valuable information from them if you pay attention.” Mr. Brunner said softly, intense brown eyes boring into mine.

“Yes sir. My mom likes to quite the lion king a lot.” I said with a laugh to ease the seriousness and he blinked before smiling at me.

“Oh?”

“Yeah. Rafiki says; ‘The Past Can Hurt. But The Way I See It, You Can Either Run From It Or Learn From It.’ And it’s true. I try to never make the same mistake twice.”

“Wise words.” He said softly, turning to give one long sad look at the stele and I didn’t know for sure but I was pretty certain he had gone to her funeral.

He told me to go outside and eat my lunch.

The class gathered on the front steps of the museum, where we could watch the foot traffic along Fifth Avenue.

Overhead, a huge storm was brewing, with clouds blacker than I’d ever seen over the city.

The Lightning Bolt had already been stolen at Christmas and Zeus’ anger showed. We’d had massive snowstorms, flooding, wildfires from lightning strikes.

The mortals didn’t notice.

Some of the guys were pelting pigeons with Lunchables crackers. Nancy Bobofit was trying to pickpocket something from a lady’s purse, and, of course, Mrs. Dodds/Alecto wasn’t seeing a thing.

Grover and I sat on the edge of the fountain, away from the others after I waved them off when they started asking to eat lunch.

“Want my Apple Grover? I’m not feeling super hungry today. Talking about someone barfing up their own kids kinda ruins your appetite.” I joked and the Satyr took it easily but glanced at me nervously still.

“What’s up?” I asked, unwrapping my sandwich and taking a small bite. He opened his mouth to answer when Nancy and the one goon she still had this time around stomped up and dumped her lunch in his lap.

“Oops.” She grinned, crooked teeth on display while her friend snickered nasally.

I hid my smile and stood up angrily instead.

“What do you think you’re doing?” I hissed, intentionally making the water in the fountain froth and ripple.

I clocked Grover, Mr. Brunner and Mrs. Dodds eyes locking on it immediately.

I let all the old anger I felt for my middle school bully well up and the next thing I knew Nancy was sitting on her butt in the fountain, screaming; “Percy pushed me!”

Mrs. Dodds materialized next to us.

Some of the kids were whispering: “Did you see-”

“-the water-”

“-like it grabbed her-”

I let myself flush in embarrassment and hunched my shoulders slightly.

As soon as Mrs. Dodds was sure poor little Nancy was okay, promising to get her a new shirt at the museum gift shop, etc., etc., Mrs. Dodds turned on me. There was a triumphant fire in her eyes, as if I’d done something she’d been waiting for all semester. “Now, honey-”

“I’m sorry! I-I didn’t push her I promise!” I said, cutting her off intentionally because she always used that as an excuse to punish someone.

Kids with ADHD couldn’t exactly control their mouths.

“Come with me.” Mrs. Dodds said.

“Wait!” Grover yelped. “It was me. I pushed her.”

“It’s okay Grover.” I said, sending him a weak smile while Mrs. Dodds/Alecto glared at him so hard his whiskery chin trembled.

“I don’t think so, Mr. Underwood.” She said coldly.

“But-”

“You-will-stay-here.” She hissed, and seriously how had he missed her eyes flashing like that before.

Grover looked at me desperately.

“It’s really okay.” I insisted.

“Honey.” Mrs. Dodds barked at me. “Now.”

Nancy Bobofit smirked but I just smiled at her and her face soured instantly.

I giggled to myself and turned to see Mrs. Dodds/Alecto at the top of the museum stairs and just giggled a bit more. She was bad at acting human now that he knew what to look for.

Halfway up the steps, I glanced back at Grover. He was looking pale, cutting his eyes between me and Mr. Brunner, like he wanted Mr. Brunner to notice what was going on, but Mr. Brunner was ‘absorbed’ in his novel.

I easily followed ‘Mrs. Dodds’ back to the Greek and Roman section of the museum.

Just like last time it was deserted and she was growling low in her chest, standing with her arms crossed in front of in front of a marble frieze of the Greek gods.

“You’ve been giving us problems, honey.” She said, shrugging out of her leather jacket. “Did you really think you would get away with it?”

I made a show of gulping nervously and taking a step back.

“I-I really don’t know what happened Mrs. Dodds... I didn’t push Nancy.” I stuttered, glancing around at the weapons displayed in glass cases. I could use them in a pinch.

Thunder shook the building.

“We are not fools, Perseus Jackson.” Mrs. Dodds said. “It was only a matter of time before we found you out. Confess, and you will suffer less pain.”

“W-what are you talking about?” I said, sounding appropriately confused.

“Well?” She demanded.

“Ma’am, I don’t...”

“Your time is up.” She hissed, eyes burning like coals as her jacked melted into large, leathery wings. In seconds she’d gone from an old woman to a hag with bat wings and claws and a mouth full of yellow fangs.

I screamed loudly and moved to turn when Mr. Brunner appeared in his wheelchair. He really had the best timing.

“What ho, Percy!” He shouted, and tossed the pen through the air.

Mrs. Dodds lunged at me and I dived out of the way, narrowly missing her claws and snatched the pen out of the air, gasping as it turned into Anaklusmos. Into Riptide.

I still can’t believe Mr. Brunner used it as a school prop but now wasn’t the time to think about that because Alecto spun toward me with a murderous look in her eyes and snarled; “Die honey!”

I reacted purely on instincts as she lunged at me.

I swung riptide and the metal blade hit her shoulder and slide through her like a hot knife through butter and she exploded into golden dust leaving nothing but the smell of sulfur and a dying screech and a chill of evil in the air, as if those two glowing red eyes were still watching me.

Then riptide shrunk into it’s dormant form; Mr. Brunners ballpoint pen and I made my way back outside calmly, no sense in acting all confused if no one was here to see it.

It had started to rain and the water felt wonderful but then; it always did.

Grover was sitting by the fountain, a museum map tented over his head. Nancy Bobofit was still standing there, soaked from her swim in the fountain, grumbling to her ugly friends. When she saw me, she said, “I hope Mrs. Kerr whipped your butt.”

“Who?” I asked, head tilting.

“Our teacher. Duh!”

I blinked at her and she just rolled her eyes and turned away.

I asked Grover where Mrs. Dodds was.

“Who?” He asked but he was still a bad actor and he’d paused and refused to meet my eyes.

“Grover.” I said desperately. “This is serious!”

Thunder boomed overhead and I saw Mr. Brunner sitting under his red umbrella, reading his book, as if he’d never moved.

I went over to him.

He looked up, a little distracted. “Ah, that would be my pen. Please bring your own writing utensil in the future, Mr. Jackson.”

“Yes sir...” I mumbled dazedly, biting my lip. “Mr. Brunner... where’s Mrs. Dodds?”

He stared at me blankly. “Who?”

“The other chaperone. Mrs. Dodds. The pre-algebra teacher.”

He frowned and sat forward, looking mildly concerned. “Percy, there is no Mrs. Dodds on this trip. As far as I know, there has never been a Mrs. Dodds at Yancy Academy. Are you feeling alright?”

••♆••

Just like before none of the mortals remembered Mrs. Dodds. Their memory altered and adjusted by the mist. Only Grover still reacted anytime I hesitantly brough it up but he stayed tight lipped about.

I let my grades slip a bit and was nervous and jumpy when I needed to be. The teachers were all worried and letters had been sent to his mom but she just frowned worriedly whenever she got them or he tried to explain again what had happened.

So all in all everything was going exactly the way it should which made him significantly less nervous about going back to camp half-blood this summer.

When Mr. Brunner asked Grover to stay behind I lagged back to see if their conversation changed.

“...worried about Percy, sir.” Grover bleated and I smiled, Grover really would always be one of his best friends.

“...alone this summer.” Grover was saying. “I mean, a Kindly One in the school! Now that we know for sure, and they know too-”

“We would only make matters worse by rushing him.” Mr. Brunner said. “We need the boy to mature more.”

“But he may not have time. The summer solstice deadline-”

“Will have to be resolved without him, Grover. Let him enjoy his ignorance while he still can.”

“Sir, he saw her...”

“His imagination.” Mr. Brunner insisted. “The Mist over the students and staff will be enough to convince him of that.”

“Sir, I... I can’t fail in my duties again.” Grover’s voice was choked with emotion. “You know what that would mean.”

“You haven’t failed, Grover.” Mr. Brunner said kindly. “I should have seen her for what she was. Now let’s just worry about keeping Percy alive until next fall-”

I purposefully dropped one of my notebooks as loud as possible and they went silent so I started moving back as quietly as I could as Mr. Brunners shadow holding a bow and arrow slid across the door.

I opened the nearest door and slipped inside. I could hear his hooves clopping on the linoleum tile as a large, dark shape paused in front of the glass, then moved on.

Somewhere in the hallway, Mr. Brunner spoke. “Nothing.” He murmured. “My nerves haven’t been right since the winter solstice.”

“Mine either.” Grover said. “But I could have sworn...”

“Go back to the dorm.” Mr. Brunner told him. “You’ve got a long day of exams tomorrow.”

“Don’t remind me.”

The lights went out in Mr. Brunner’s office and I waited until they were gone before heading directly to Grovers dorm.

I was a day student this time around but mom was fine with me staying late to hang out with friends as long as I was home by dinner.

Grover was lying on his bed, studying his Latin exam notes like he’d been there all night.

“Hey.” He said, bleary-eyed. “You going to be ready for this test?”

I didn’t answer.

“You look awful.” He frowned. “Is everything okay?”

“Yeah... yeah everything’s fine.” I said after a small pause. “Just worried about the exams. You know how awful my spelling is.”

••♆••

The next afternoon, as I was leaving the three-hour Latin exam, Mr. Brunner called me back inside and he started talking about Yancy not being the right place for me and me not being normal.

I laughed and thanked him with a cheerful smile before heading out to catch the bus home. Dodging Alphas inviting me to ski in Switzerland or visit the Caribbean.

Grover was on the same greyhound as me back into the city. I was used to the hour and a half long ride but it was fun chatting with Grover instead of listening to music or reading Greek books.

Just like before, during the whole bus ride, Grover kept glancing nervously down the aisle, watching the other passengers and my lips twitched as I tried not to smile.

“Looking for Kindly Ones?” I asked softly.

Grover nearly jumped out of his seat. “Wha-what do you mean?”

I confessed about eavesdropping on him and Mr. Brunner the afternoon before the exam.

Grover’s eye twitched. “How much did you hear?”

“Oh... not much. What’s the summer solstice deadline?” I asked, tilting my head curiously.

He winced. “Look, Percy... I was just worried for you, see? I mean, hallucinating about demon math teachers...”

“Grover-”

“And I was telling Mr. Brunner that maybe you were overstressed or something, because there was no such person as Mrs. Dodds, and ...”

“Grover, you’re a really, really bad liar.” I said, cutting him off with a flat look.

His ears turned pink and he fished out his grubby business card. “Just take this, okay? In case you need me this summer.”

The card was in fancy script, still murder on my eyes with it being in English...

Grover Underwood

Keeper

Half-Blood Hill

Long Island, New York

(800) 009-0009

“What’s Half-” I started to ask but got cut off. Seems like a trend.

“Don’t say it aloud!” He yelped. “That’s my, um... summer address.”

“Okay!” I laughed. “Don’t take my head off. Is this a secret summer camp or something?”

Grover blushed right down to his Adam’s apple and chewed his lip nervously.

“Look Percy... the truth is I-I kind of have to protect you.”

I stared at him for several minutes and he fidgeted under my stare.

“Grover.” I said slowly. “What exactly are you protecting me from?”

Before he could even open his mouth to answer a huge grinding came from the bottom of the bus and black lack smoke poured from the dashboard that smelled like rotten eggs. The driver cursed and limped the Greyhound over to the side of the highway.

After a few minutes clanking around in the engine compartment, the driver announced that we’d all have to get off. Grover and I filed outside with everybody else.

We were on a stretch of country road-no place you’d notice if you didn’t break down there. On our side of the highway was nothing but maple trees and litter from passing cars. On the other side, across four lanes of asphalt shimmering with afternoon heat, was an old-fashioned fruit stand.

My eyes lowered slightly as I stared at the Moirai sitting in rocking chairs in the shade of a maple tree, knitting a ridiculously large pair of socks.

The Moirai on the right knitted one of them. The Moirai on the left knitted the other. The Moirai in the middle held an enormous basket of electric-blue yarn.

All three women looked ancient, with pale faces wrinkled like fruit leather, silver hair tied back in white bandannas, bony arms sticking out of bleached cotton dresses.

Just like before they stared back at me and there was a knowing look in their eyes this time. Figures the fates would know mine was changed.

I looked over at Grover to say something about this and saw that the blood had drained from his face. His nose was twitching.

“Grover?” I said. “You okay-”

“Tell me they’re not looking at you. They are, aren’t they?”

“Uhm yeah?” I answered, glancing back at them. “You think they need help with that?”

“Not funny, Percy. Not funny at all.” He bleated.

The Moirai in the middle took out a huge pair of scissors-gold and silver, long-bladed, like shears. I heard Grover catch his breath and start tugging my arm, muttering about going back on the bus but I just frowned at him.

“Grover it’s way too hot in there.” I protested as open the door and climbed inside, trying to pull me with him but I refused to budge.

Across the road, the old ladies were still watching me. The middle Moirai cut the yarn, and I knew I was actually hearing the sound of her cutting the yarn across four lanes of traffic.

At the rear of the bus, the driver wrenched a big chunk of smoking metal out of the engine compartment. The bus shuddered, and the engine roared back to life.

The passengers cheered.

“Darn right!” Yelled the driver. He slapped the bus with his hat. “Everybody back on board!”

Once we got going, got that same feverish feeling and Grover didn’t look much better. He was shivering and his teeth were chattering.

“Grover?”

“Yeah?”

“What are you not telling me?” I demanded.

He dabbed his forehead with his shirt sleeve. “Percy, what did you see back at the fruit stand?”

I stared him down for several minutes before answering.

“I saw three little old ladies knitting the biggest pair of socks I’d ever seen but... they felt kinda like... Mrs. Dodds but not really mean like her...” I mumbled.

Grover seemed even more serious this time around.

“Just tell me what you saw.”

“The middle lady took out her scissors, and she cut the yarn.”

He closed his eyes and made a gesture with his finger. That same ancient movement.

“You saw her snip the cord.” He said.

“Yeah... And...?”

“This is not happening,” Grover mumbled. He started chewing at his thumb. “I don’t want this to be like the last time.”

“What last time?” I asked.

“Always sixth grade. They never get past sixth.”

“Grover!” I said, pulling him to a stop. “What’s going on? You’re freaking me out.”

“Let me walk you home from the bus station. Promise me.”

“Yeah... that’s fine.” I said, nodding easily and his shoulders relaxed a bit.

“Grover... her cutting the yarn. Does that mean someone’s going to die? Like- like the Greek fates Mr. Brunner told us about?” I asked softly, already knowing the answer.

He looked at me mournfully, like he was already picking the kind of flowers I’d like on my coffin.

Chapter Text

Confession time: I still ditched Grover as soon as we got to the bus terminal.

I didn’t want to but I wanted to keep the timeline as close to the same as possible just to be safe. I didn’t want to cause some kind of butterfly effect that made things worse.

Whenever he got upset, Grover’s bladder acted up, so I wasn’t surprised when, as soon as we got off the bus, he made me promise to wait for him, then made a beeline for the restroom. Instead of waiting, I grabbed the first taxi I could and headed home.

His mom wasn’t there when he got back so he took a quick shower and changed into a comfortable pair of lounge pants with a tank top and curled up in the living room to wait for her.

“Sweetie!” Sally said as she walked in, dropping her keys in the decorative seashell on the entryway table. “Are you home?”

“I’m in here!” I called back and she smiled as she walked in, still wearing her red-white-and-blue Sweet on America uniform which still smelled like the best things in the world; chocolate, licorice, and all the other stuff she sold at the candy shop in Grand Central.

She curled up next to me on the couch and we chatted and talked about how my final exams went, not well but neither of us really worried, and I told her about the Moirai and how weird Grover had been acting.

Her blue eyes turned sad and she pursed her lips. At least this time I knew why but then she shook her head slightly and smiled at me.

“I have a surprise for you.” She said. “We’re going to the beach.”

My eyes widened. “Montauk?”

“Three nights-same cabin.”

“When?”

She smiled. “As soon as I get changed.”

I squealed and hugged her before rushing off to pack, though I did make sure to pack a couple changes of clothes, with plenty of underwear, and my tablet in a small backpack.

We both finished getting ready quickly and I loaded the two suitcases into the trunk of the car. When I turned back I saw her watching me with that same anxiety/fear as Grover. I was getting older and she knew it was time but she was afraid.

“Once we get to Montauk, we’ll talk more about... everything that’s happened okay sweetie?”

Our rental cabin was on the south shore, way out at the tip of Long Island. It was a little pastel box with faded curtains, half sunken into the dunes. There was always sand in the sheets and spiders in the cabinets, and most of the time the sea was too cold to swim in.

I loved the place, and my mom did too. It was the same beach and cabin where she met my dad. We got there at sunset, opened all the cabin’s windows, and went through our usual cleaning routine.

We walked on the beach, fed blue corn chips to the seagulls, and munched on blue jellybeans, blue saltwater taffy, and all the other free samples my mom had brought from work.

The blue food still made me smile.

She and Gabe had a fight long before he was arrested that blue food didn’t exist and ever since, my mom went out of her way to eat blue. She baked blue birthday cakes. She mixed blueberry smoothies. She bought blue-corn tortilla chips and brought home blue candy from the shop.

When it got dark, we made a fire. We roasted hot dogs and marshmallows. Mom told me stories about when she was a kid, back before her parents died in the plane crash. She told me about the books she wanted to write someday, when she had enough money to quit the candy shop.

“Mom...” I said hesitantly. “Can you tell me about dad?”

Her eyes went all misty. I figured she would tell me the same things she always did, but I never got tired of hearing them.

“He was kind Percy.” She said. “Tall, handsome, and powerful. But gentle, too. You have his black hair, you know, and his sea-green eyes.”

Mom fished a blue jellybean out of her candy bag. “I wish he could see you, Percy. He would be so proud.”

“I know he’s proud of me.” I told her, cuddling into her side and she hugged me back. “Am I going to stay at Yancy for another year? Grover and Mr. Brunner were acting so weird this year...”

“I don’t know, honey.” Her voice was heavy. “I think... I think we’ll have to do something.”

“Because I’m not normal?” I asked, meeting her eyes.

She met my eyes, and a flood of memories came back to me-all the weird, scary things that had ever happened to me, things I’d never forget.

During third grade, a man in a black trench coat had stalked me on the playground. When the teachers threatened to call the police, he went away growling, but no one believed me when I told them that under his broad-brimmed hat, the man only had one eye, right in the middle of his head.

Before that- a really early memory. I was in preschool, and a teacher accidentally put me down for a nap in a cot that a snake had slithered into. My mom screamed when she came to pick me up and found me playing with a limp, scaly rope I’d somehow managed to strangle to death.

“I’ve tried to keep you as close to me as I could.” My mom said. “They told me that was a mistake. But there’s only one other option, Percy- the place your father wanted to send you. And I just... I just can’t stand to do it.”

“Dad wanted me to go to a special school?” I said, doubt coloring my tone.

“Not a school.” She said softly. “A summer camp.”

“Summer Camp?” I parroted. “Like for special kids?”

“I’m sorry Percy.” She said, seeing the look in my eyes. “But I can’t talk about it. I-I couldn’t send you to that place. It might mean saying good-bye to you for good.”

“For good? But if it’s only a summer camp...”

She turned toward the fire, and I knew from her expression that if I asked her any more questions she would start to cry so I just hugged her tightly and changed the subject.

••♆••

I dreamed that night.

It was storming on the beach, and two beautiful animals, a white horse and a golden eagle, were trying to kill each other at the edge of the surf. The eagle swooped down and slashed the horse’s muzzle with its huge talons.

The horse reared up and kicked at the eagles wings. As they fought, the ground rumbled, and a monstrous voice chuckled somewhere beneath the earth, goading the animals to fight harder.

I ran toward them, knowing I had to stop them from killing each other, but I was running in slow motion. I knew I would be too late. I saw the eagle dive down, its beak aimed at the horse’s wide eyes, and I screamed, No!

I woke with a start and groaned softly.

Sometime my dad being the god of prophesies before Apollo was born was a real pain in the ass.

Outside, it really was storming, the kind of storm that cracks trees and blows down houses. There was no horse or eagle on the beach, just lightning making false daylight, and twenty-foot waves pounding the dunes like artillery.

With the next thunderclap, my mom woke. She sat up, eyes wide, and said, “Hurricane.”

“But it’s too early in the season!” I protested and over the roar of the wind, I heard a distant bellow, an angry, tortured sound that made my hair stand on end.

The minotaur.

Then a much closer noise, like mallets in the sand. A desperate voice-someone yelling, pounding on our cabin door.

My mother sprang out of bed in her nightgown and threw open the lock.

Grover stood framed in the doorway against a backdrop of pouring rain. But he wasn’t... he wasn’t exactly Grover.

“Searching all night.” He gasped. “What were you thinking?”

My mother looked at me in terror-not scared of Grover, but of why he’d come.

“It’s time isn’t it?” She asked, vice choked with emotion and tear in her eyes.

“Mom? Grover?” I said, scrambling out of bed. “What’s going on?”

“O Zeu kai alloi theoi!” He yelled. “It’s right behind me! Didn’t you tell her?”

“Grover!” I squealed. “You shouldn’t say that and what happened to your legs?!”

Because Grover wasn’t wearing his pants and fake feet. His furry brown goats’ legs and cloven hooves were on full display.

My mom didn’t say anything else but threw my rain jacket at me and I grabbed by backpack and headed towards the car with Grover close behind her.

••♆••

We tore through the night along dark country roads. Wind slammed against the beetle. Rain lashed the windshield. I didn’t know how my mom could see anything, but she kept her foot on the gas.

I glanced between her and Grover in the backseat.

“You and my mom know each other?” I asked at last.

Graver’s eyes flitted to the rearview mirror, though there were no cars behind us. “Not exactly.” He said. “I mean, we’ve never met in person. But she knew I was watching you.”

“Watching me?”

“Keeping tabs on you. Making sure you were okay. But I wasn’t faking being your friend.” He added hastily. “I am your friend.”

“I know that!” I said with a laugh. “But does this have to do with why Mrs. Dodds suddenly didn’t exist and the ladies at the fruit stand? And what are you?”

“Yes and that’s not important right now.” He said.

“Not important? You’re a goat from the waist down! You look like a Satyr from Mr. Brunners myths!” I said indignantly.

“Were those old ladies at the fruit stand a myth, Percy? Was Mrs. Dodds a myth?”

“So you admit there was a Mrs. Dodds!”

“Of course.”

“Then why-”

“The less you knew, the fewer monsters you’d attract.” Grover said, and this time I knew it was the most obvious thing in the world. “We put Mist over the humans’ eyes. We hoped you’d think the Kindly One was a hallucination. But it was no good. You started to realize who you are.”

“Who I-wait a minute, what do you mean?”

The weird bellowing noise rose up again somewhere behind us, closer than before. Whatever was chasing us was still on our trail.

“Percy.” My mom said. “There’s too much to explain and not enough time. We have to get you to safety.”

“Safety from what? Who’s after me?” I asked nervously playing with my hair. “Is it another creepy man with one eye?”

“Oh, nobody much.” Grover said, obviously still miffed about the donkey comment. “Just the Lord of the Dead and a few of his blood-thirstiest minions.”

“Grover!”

“Sorry, Mrs. Jackson. Could you drive faster, please?”

“Lord of the dead?! Blood thirsty?!” I yelled, turning around to face him. “Please just tell me what’s going on!”

My mom made a hard left. We swerved onto a narrower road, racing past darkened farmhouses and wooded hills and Pick Your Own Strawberry signs on white picket fences.

“Where are we going?” I asked.

“The summer camp I told you about.” My mother’s voice was tight; she was trying for my sake not to be scared. “The place your father wanted to send you.”

“The place you didn’t want me to go.”

“Please, dear.” My mother begged. “This is hard enough. Try to understand. You’re in danger.”

“I understand that mom! You wouldn’t be so scared if I wasn’t but in danger from what?” I asked. “What’s so scary about old ladies cutting yarn?”

“Those weren’t old ladies.” Grover said. “Those were the Fates. Do you know what it means-the fact they appeared in front of you? They only do that when you’re about to... when someone’s about to die.”

“You said ‘You’, as in I’m about to die.” I said flatly, eyes narrowed.

“No I didn’t. I said ‘someone’.”

“You meant ‘you’. As in me.”

“I meant you, like ‘someone’. Not you, you.”

“Boys!” My mom said.

She pulled the wheel hard to the right, and I got a glimpse of a figure she’d swerved to avoid-a dark fluttering shape now lost behind us in the storm.

“What was that?” I asked.

“We’re almost there.” My mother said, ignoring my question. “Another mile. Please. Please. Please.”

Outside, nothing but rain and darkness-the kind of empty countryside you get way out on the tip of Long Island and I waited for the minotaur to catch up, bracing myself as much as possible.

The hair rose on the back of my neck. There was a blinding flash, a jaw-rattling boom, and our car exploded. At least that’s what it felt like.

We’d swerved into a ditch. Our driver’s-side doors were wedged in the mud. The roof had cracked open like an eggshell and rain was pouring in.

“Percy!” My mom said desperately, hands fluttering around me. “Are you okay?”

“I’m okay.” I wheezed, the crash had still knocked the breath out of me. “Is Grover okay?”

We both twisted around as much as possible to see him slumped over in the backseat with blood trickling from the side of his mouth. I hurriedly unbuckled my seatbelt and scrambled back there, shaking him gently. “Grover! Wake up!”

“Food...” He bleated weakly and I couldn’t help the laugh that bubbled up my throat.

“Percy.” My mother said. “We have to ...” Her voice faltered.

I looked back. In a flash of lightning, through the mud-spattered rear windshield, I saw a figure lumbering toward us on the shoulder of the road and I still felt a shiver run down my spine.

The Minotaur had finally caught up.

“Percy.” My mother said, deadly serious. “Get out of the car.”

My mother threw herself against the driver’s-side door. It was jammed shut in the mud. I tried mine. Stuck too. I looked up desperately at the hole in the roof. It might’ve been an exit, but the edges were sizzling and smoking.

“Climb out the passenger’s side!” My mother told me. “Percy- you have to run. Do you see that big tree?”

Another flash of lightning, and through the smoking hole in the roof I saw the tree she meant: a huge, White House Christmas tree-sized pine at the crest of the nearest hill.

“That’s the property line.” My mom said. “Get over that hill and you’ll see a big farmhouse down in the valley. Run and don’t look back. Yell for help. Don’t stop until you reach the door.”

“I’m not leaving you here!” I said stubbornly.

Her face was pale, her eyes as sad as when she looked at the ocean.

“No!” I shouted. “You’re coming with me. Help me carry Grover.”

“Food!” Grover moaned, a little louder and I glanced frantically between her, Grover and the Minotaur. I knew I had to leave, knew she would be okay but I didn’t want to!

“He doesn’t want us.” My mother told me. “He wants you. Besides, I can’t cross the property line.”

“But...”

“We don’t have time, Percy. Go. Please.”

I stared at her for a minute before puffing my cheeks out and climbing over Grover to push his door open and crawling out into the rain.

“You’re helping me with Grover.” I said stubbornly.

I didn’t wait for her answer and just pulled Grover from the backseat easily. He was still surprisingly light, but I couldn’t have carried him very far and I was happy my mom came to help me again.

Together, we draped Grover’s arms over our shoulders and started stumbling uphill through wet waist-high grass and I glanced over my shoulder.

The Minotaur was still as intimidating large as always with coarse brown hair leading up to his enormous head, which had a snout as long as my arm, snotty nostrils with a gleaming brass ring, cruel black eyes, and horns-enormous black-and-white horns with Razor-sharp points.

“M-mom... T-that’s...” I stuttered, turning to look at her with huge eyes.

“Pasiphae’s son.” My mother said. “I wish I’d known how badly they want to kill you.”

“But he’s the Min-”

“Don’t say his name.” She warned. “Names have power.”

I swallowed and nodded, looking back again to see him sniffing the wreckage before he bellowed in rage. He raised the car over his head and threw it down the road. It slammed into the wet asphalt and skidded in a shower of sparks for about half a mile before coming to a stop. The gas tank exploded.

“Percy.” My mom said. “When he sees us, he’ll charge. Wait until the last second, then jump out of the way- directly sideways. He can’t change directions very well once he’s charging. Do you understand?”

“How do you know all this?”

“I’ve been worried about an attack for a long time. I should have expected this. I was selfish, keeping you near me.”

“Keeping me near you? But-”

Another bellow of rage, and the bull-man started tromping uphill. We were so close to the boundary. But not close enough.

Just like before my mom took Grover and we split up just as he roared again and began running towards us.

I sprinted to the left, turned, and saw the creature bearing down on me. His black eyes glowed with hate. He reeked like rotten meat. He lowered his head and charged; those razor-sharp horns aimed straight at my chest but I he was easy pickings compared to Titans and Gods.

I dodged out of the way at the last second and he stormed past like a freight train, then bellowed with frustration and turned towards my mom and my heart stuttered in my chest.

We’d reached the crest of the hill. Down the other side I could see a valley, and the lights of a farmhouse glowing yellow through the rain. A beacon, but the Minotaur grunted, pawing the ground.

He kept eyeing my mother, who was now retreating slowly downhill, back toward the road, trying to lead the monster away from Grover.

“Run, Percy!” She told me. “I can’t go any farther. Run!”

I stayed still and squeezed my eyes shut as the monster charged her. She tried to sidestep, as she’d told me to do, but the monster had learned his lesson. His hand shot out and grabbed her by the neck as she tried to get away. He lifted her as she struggled, kicking and pummeling the air.

“Mom!”

She caught my eyes, managed to choke out one last word: “Go!”

And then his hand tightened and she dissolved into golden mist, melting into light, before she was gone in a blinding flash of light.

Logically I knew she was safe. That Hades had her in the underworld but rage still made my blood boil and I surged forward.

“Hey!” I screamed over the rain as the Minotaur hunched over Grover, slimy nostrils quivering. My shout drew his attention right away and he turned towards me and charged.

I dodged to the right with a small leap and grabbed onto one of his horns as he blew past me and used the momentum to pull with all his might and a sickening crack rang through the air as the horn snapped and the Minotaur bellowed in pain and threw him to the side.

He was too close to avoid the swing and he went flying and smacked his head hard on a rock. Grover was groaning about food nearby but the Minotaur was focused solely on him.

He pawed at the ground and charged bit I was ready. Even with my head swimming I rolled to the side and trust the broken horn into his furry side, right under his rib cage.

He bellowed in pain and began clawing at his chest but it was too late. He was already dissolving into golden sand, returning back to the depths of Tartarus, until he reformed.

My head was throbbing but I still hauled Grover up and dragged him past Thalia’s tree to the big house and collapsed onto the familiar wooden porch, looking up at a ceiling fan circling above me, moths flying around a yellow light.

Mr. Brunner familiar bearded face hovered over me as well as Annabeth’s, her blond hair still curled like a princess’.

“He’s the one.” She said, scowling down at me. “He must be.

“Silence, Annabeth.” Mr. Brunner said. “He’s still conscious. Bring him inside.”

Chapter Text

I floated in and out of consciousness for a few days already and he remembered seeing Annabeth smirking while feeding him Ambrosia at some point and Argus sat in the corner watching over him with all one hundred bright blue eyes.

Anytime he opened his eyes Annabeth pressed him for information about the Summer Solstice but he didn’t bother trying to even answer her questions this time around.

••♆••

When I finally came around for good I was sitting on a familiar deck chair with a pillow behind my head and a blanket draped over my legs. A tall glass of nectar was on the table next to him with a green straw and a paper parasol stuck through a maraschino cherry.

My hand was so weak I almost dropped the glass once I got my fingers around it.

“Careful.” Came Grovers familiar voice.

Grover was leaning against the porch railing, looking like he hadn’t slept in a week. Under one arm, he cradled a shoe box and had my blue backpack slung over his shoulder. He was wearing blue jeans, Converse hi-tops and a bright orange T-shirt that said Camp Half-Blood.

“Grover...” I said, letting tears well up in my eyes. “My M-mom...?”

He looked down and shuffled nervously.

“You saved my life.” Grover said. “I... well, the least I could do... I went back to the hill. I thought you might want this and I grabbed your bag too.”

Reverently, he placed the shoe box in my lap and there was the Minotaur horn, the base jagged from being broken off, the tip splattered with dried blood. I let the tears fall when I saw it.

“I’m sorry.” Grover sniffled. “I’m a failure. I’m-I’m the worst satyr in the world.”

He moaned, stomping his foot so hard it came off. I mean, the Converse hi-top came off. The inside was filled with Styrofoam, except for a hoof-shaped hole.

“Oh, Styx!” He mumbled.

Thunder rolled across the clear sky, and I blinked back the tears.

“It wasn’t your fault.” I said softly.

“Yes, it was. I was supposed to protect you.”

“Did my mom ask you to protect me?”

“No. But that’s my job. I’m a keeper. At least... I was.”

“But why...” I suddenly felt dizzy, my vision swimming and I groaned. This concussion was worse than he remembered. I wished I could just heal myself with water.

“Don’t strain yourself.” Grover said. “Here.” He helped me hold my glass and put the straw to my lips and I drank eagerly. Nectar still tasted like cookies- my mom’s homemade blue chocolate-chip cookies, buttery and hot, with the chips still melting. Drinking it, my whole body felt warm and good, full of energy.

“Was it good?” Grover asked.

I nodded.

“What did it taste like?” He asked wistfully and I still wished he could taste it.

“Like my moms chocolate chip cookies... What was that?” I asked, staring at the empty glass.

He sighed and didn’t answer. “How do you feel?”

“Physically I feel better.” I mumbled and he winced.

He took the empty glass from me gingerly, as if it were dynamite, and set it back on the table. “Come on. Chiron and Mr. D are waiting.”

I just nodded and held onto his arm since my legs still felt wobbly and weak. He helped me walk down the wrap around porch and I let him carry the horn this time around but I slipped my backpack over my shoulders.

As we came around the opposite end of the house, the view still took my breath away.

We were on the north shore of Long Island and the valley marched all the way up to the water, which glittered about a mile in the distance. Between here and there, the landscape was dotted with buildings- an open-air pavilion, an amphitheater, a circular arena- that all looked brand new, their white marble columns sparkling in the sun.

In a nearby sandpit, a dozen high school-age kids and satyrs played volleyball. Canoes glided across a small lake. Kids in bright orange T-shirts like Grover’s were chasing each other around a cluster of cabins nestled in the woods. Some shot targets at an archery range. Others rode horses down a wooded trail, some of them Pegasi.

Down at the end of the porch, Mr. Brunner-Chiron and Mr. D were sitting across from each other at a card table with Annabeth leaning on the railing next to them.

Mr. D was still small and porky with a red nose, big watery eyes, and curly hair so black it was almost purple and was still wearing the ugliest tiger-pattern Hawaiian shirt I’d ever seen.

“That’s Mr. D.” Grover murmured to me. “He’s the camp director. Be polite. The girl, that’s Annabeth Chase. She’s just a camper, but she’s been here longer than just about anybody. And you already know Chiron...”

“Mr. Brunner!” I gasped.

The Latin teacher turned and smiled at me. His eyes had that mischievous glint they sometimes got in class when he pulled a pop quiz and made all the multiple choice answers B.

“Ah, good, Percy.” He said. “Now we have four for pinochle.”

He offered me a chair to the right of Mr. D, who looked at me with bloodshot eyes and heaved a great sigh. “Oh, I suppose I must say it. Welcome to Camp Half-Blood. There. Now, don’t expect me to be glad to see you.”

“Umm... thank you?” I said, settling into the chair easily. I didn’t bother scooting away because even though Mr. D looked drunk as a skunk he was currently, unwillingly, sober.

“Annabeth?” Mr. Brunner called lightly.

She came forward and Mr. Brunner introduced us. “This young lady nursed you back to health, Percy. Annabeth, my dear, why don’t you go check on Percy’s bunk? We’ll be putting him in cabin eleven for now.”

“Sure, Chiron.” She said before turning to me.

And the Beta was still startlingly pretty. She was a couple of inches taller with her blonde curls pulled into a ponytail and tan skin. Her eyes were still a piercing intelligent grey, like storm clouds, analyzing the best way to take me down in a fight.

“You drool in your sleep.” She said before sprinting off down the lawn, her blond hair flying behind her.

“Ooookay...” I said slowly, drawing out the vowel. “So you um... work here Mr. Brunner?”

“Not Mr. Brunner.” The ex-Mr. Brunner said. “I’m afraid that was a pseudonym. You may call me Chiron.”

“Sure Mr. Brun- Chiron.” I said, correcting myself before turning large eyes on Mr. D. “If he’s Chiron... Umm wait... I’m not supposed to say the names right?”

Mr. D stopped shuffling the cards and looked at me shrewdly. “That would be correct. Names are powerful things. You don’t just go around using them for no reason.”

“Ah... Yes sir.” I said, nodding seriously but he’d already gone back to the cards.

“I must say Percy.” Chiron broke in. “I’m glad to see you alive. It’s been a long time since I’ve made a house call to a potential camper. I’d hate to think I’ve wasted my time.”

“House call?”

“My year at Yancy Academy, to instruct you. We have satyrs at most schools, of course, keeping a lookout. But Grover alerted me as soon as he met you. He sensed you were something special, so I decided to come upstate. I convinced the other Latin teacher to... ah, take a leave of absence.”

“Oh... that’s why Mr. Bletchley left?” I asked, vaguely remembering some of the older students mentioning another teacher but that he hadn’t stayed very long before Mr. Brunner arrived.

“You came to Yancy just to teach me?” I asked.

Chiron nodded. “Honestly, I wasn’t sure about you at first. We contacted your mother, let her know we were keeping an eye on you in case you were ready for Camp Half-Blood. But you still had so much to learn. Nevertheless, you made it here alive, and that’s always the first test.”

“Grover.” Mr. D said impatiently. “Are you playing or not?”

“Yes, sir!” Grover trembled as he took the fourth chair and I both understood his nervousness and didn’t. Yes Mr. D was a god but he couldn’t hurt us unless he wanted to stay Camp Director even longer.

“You do know how to play pinochle?” Mr. D eyed me suspiciously.

“I only know the basics sir.” I said honestly, and it was true. I’d never bothered to learn more since I only played it when he forced us.

“Well.” He said with a sniff. “It is, along with gladiator fighting and Pac-Man, one of the greatest games ever invented by humans. So I hope you learn more than that eventually.”

“I’m sure he will.” Chiron said.

“Please.” I said, glancing between the two of them. “What is this place? What am I doing here? Chiron- why would you go to Yancy Academy just to teach me?”

Mr. D snorted. “I asked the same question.”

The camp director dealt the cards. Grover flinched every time one landed in his pile.

Chiron smiled at me sympathetically, the way he used to in Latin class, as if to let me know that no matter what my average was, I was his star student. He expected me to have the right answer.

“Percy.” He said. “Did your mother tell you nothing?’

“She said... She told me she was afraid to send me here, even though my father had wanted her to. She said that once I was here, I probably couldn’t leave. She wanted to keep me close to her.” I said, voice small.

“Typical.” Mr. D snorted. “That’s how they usually get killed. Young man, it is your turn.”

I quickly bid and turned back to Chiron.

“I’m afraid there’s too much to tell.” Chiron said. “I’m afraid our usual orientation film won’t be sufficient.”

“Orientation film?” I asked, sighing internally at the thought of Annabeth’s annoyance at having to explain everything to him.

“No.” Chiron decided. “Well, Percy. You know your friend Grover is a satyr. You know–” He pointed to the horn in the shoe box. “That you have killed the Minotaur. No small feat, either, lad. What you may not know is that great powers are at work in your life. Gods-the forces you call the Greek gods-are very much alive.”

“She never told me but Satyrs and the name Chiron definitely let me know... She always supported how much I like the myths...” I trailed off sadly. “But gods? Greek gods are real? But they’re just stories, what people believed in before science.”

 “Science!” Mr. D scoffed. “And tell me, Perseus Jackson, what will people think of your ‘science’ two thousand years from now?”

Mr. D continued. “Hmm? They will call it primitive mumbo jumbo. That’s what. Oh, I love mortals- they have absolutely no sense of perspective. They think they’ve come so-o-o far. And have they, Chiron? Look at this boy and tell me.”

“Percy...” Chiron said. “You may choose to believe or not, but the fact is that immortal means immortal. Can you imagine that for a moment, never dying? Never fading? Existing, just as you are, for all time?”

“You mean, whether people believed in you or not.” I said.

“Exactly.” Chiron agreed. “If you were a god, how would you like being called a myth, an old story to explain lightning? What if I told you, Perseus Jackson, that someday people would call you a myth, just created to explain how little boys can get over losing their mothers?”

I let myself flinch at the mention of my mom and just reminded myself, again, that she was alive.

“I don’t think I’d like it very much...” I sighed, glancing up at the sky. “Umm... sorry if I offended anyone?”

“Hmph.” Mr. D muttered. “You’re taking this quite well.”

He waved his hand and a goblet appeared on the table, as if the sunlight had bent, just for a moment, and woven the air into glass. The goblet filled itself with red wine.

“Your restrictions Mr. D.” Chiron said warningly.

Mr. D looked at the wine and feigned surprise.

“Dear me.” He looked at the sky and yelled, “Old habits! Sorry!”

Thunder clapped warningly.

Mr. D waved his hand again, and the wineglass changed into a fresh can of Diet Coke. He sighed unhappily, popped the top of the soda, and went back to his card game.

Chiron winked at me. “Mr. D offended his father a while back, took a fancy to a wood nymph who had been declared off-limits.”

“Wood Nymph? Like Dryads?”

“Yes.” Mr. D confessed. “Father loves to punish me. The first time, Prohibition. Ghastly! Absolutely horrid ten years! The second time-well, she really was pretty, and I couldn’t stay away- the second time, he sent me here. Half-Blood Hill. Summer camp for brats like you. ‘Be a better influence.’ He told me. ‘Work with youths rather than tearing them down.’ Ha. Absolutely unfair.”

“And your father is Ze- Uhm...” I cut myself off and looked to Chiron and Grover. “What should I call them if I can’t say their names?”

“Whatever you like.” Chiron said kindly.

“Right...” I said, turning back to Mr. D. “So you’re the god of Wine?”

“Yes, child.” He said, turning and looking me in the eyes for the first time.

They burned with a purplish fire, a hint of his true nature. I saw visions of grape vines choking unbelievers to death, drunken warriors insane with battle lust, sailors screaming as their hands turned to flippers, their faces elongating into dolphin snouts.

I shivered slightly as the weight of his gaze bored into me. Mr. D had never cared for heroes and while he couldn’t kill them under Zeus’ rule, it didn’t mean he had to care.

Then the fire died and he turned back to the card game. “I believe I win.”

“Not quite, Mr. D.” Chiron said. He set down a straight, tallied the points, and said; “The game goes to me.”

He sighed and it was sigh born of the hundreds of times he’d lost to Chiron already, He got up, and Grover rose too.

“I’m tired.” Mr. D said. “I believe I’ll take a nap before the sing-along tonight. But first, Grover, we need to talk, again, about your less-than-perfect performance on this assignment.”

Grover’s face beaded with sweat. “Y-yes, sir.”

Mr. D turned to me. “Cabin eleven, Percy Jackson. And mind your manners.”

He swept into the farmhouse, Grover following miserably.

“Less than perfect performance?” I asked curiously.

Chiron nodded, though he looked a bit troubled. “Yes... he didn’t too particularly well in getting you here. Old Dionysus isn’t really mad. He just hates his job. He’s been... ah, grounded, I guess you would say, and he can’t stand waiting another century before he’s allowed to go back to Olympus.”

“Oh... but isn’t Olympus in Greece?”

“Well now, there’s Mount Olympus in Greece. And then there’s the home of the gods, the convergence point of their powers, which did indeed used to be on Mount Olympus. It’s still called Mount Olympus, out of respect to the old ways, but the palace moves, Percy, just as the gods do.”

“Wow... That’s so cool! So the gods are in America?”

“Correct. The gods move with the heart of the West.”

“The heart of the west? Is that like the belief you mentioned?”

“Yes, It’s a living force. A collective consciousness that has burned bright for thousands of years. The gods are part of it. You might even say they are the source of it, or at least, they are tied so tightly to it that they couldn’t possibly fade, not unless all of Western civilization were obliterated.” He explain and I nodded eagerly.

“The fire started in Greece. Then, as you well know- or as I hope you know, since you passed my course- the heart of the fire moved to Rome, and so did the gods. Oh, different names, perhaps- Jupiter for Zeus, Venus for Aphrodite, and so on-but the same forces, the same gods.”

“Amazing...” I breathed and Chiron smiled at me and I smiled back before letting it fade. “Chiron... Who- Who am I?”

“Who are you?” He mused. “Well, that’s the question we all want answered, isn’t it? But for now, we should get you a bunk in cabin eleven. There will be new friends to meet. And plenty of time for lessons tomorrow. Besides, there will be s’mores at the campfire tonight, and I simply adore chocolate.”

Then he rose out of his wheelchair.

It was always amazing watching what magic could do as a leg came out, long and knobby-kneed, with a huge, polished hoof. Then another front leg, then hindquarters, and then the box was empty, nothing but a metal shell with a couple of fake human legs attached.

I let myself stare for a minute before squealing and rushing forward to hug the startled centaur.

“You can walk!” I said, pulling back to give him a beaming smile.

“Indeed I can and what a relief.” He said. “I’d been cooped up in there so long, my fetlocks had fallen asleep. Now, come, Percy Jackson. Let’s meet the other campers.”

••♆••

The tour around Camp Half-Blood was nice. Nostalgic and I smiled easily, looking at everything and asking as many questions as possible.

We passed the volleyball pit. Several of the campers nudged each other. One pointed to the minotaur horn I was still carrying.

Another said; “That’s him.”

Most of the campers were older than me. Their satyr friends were bigger than Grover, all of them trotting around in orange Camp Half-Blood T-shirts, with nothing else to cover their bare shaggy hindquarters.

I looked back at the big house- it was the same sky blue house with white trim that looked more like upscale seaside resort than anything else.

I could see the Oracle move in the attic but I didn’t ask about it this time around and happily followed him to the strawberry fields where campers were picking bushels of berries while a satyr played a tune on a reed pipe.

Chiron told me the camp grew a nice crop for export to New York restaurants and Mount Olympus. “It pays our expenses.” He explained. “And the strawberries take almost no effort.”

He said Mr. D had this effect on fruit-bearing plants: they just went crazy when he was around. It worked best with wine grapes, but Mr. D was restricted from growing those, so they grew strawberries instead.

I tilted my head, watching a satyr playing his pipe. His music was causing lines of bugs to leave the strawberry patch in every direction, their abilities were so useful in the most practical ways.

“Grover won’t get in too much trouble, will he?” I asked Chiron quietly and the centaur sighed.

“Grover has big dreams, Percy. Perhaps bigger than are reasonable. To reach his goal, he must first demonstrate great courage by succeeding as a keeper, finding a new camper and bringing him safely to Half-Blood Hill.”

“Oh... I guess him bringing me didn’t really show that huh?” I said with a weak laugh and Chiron looked down at me sadly.

“The fate of your mother was very unfortunate Mr. Jackson and I am sorry for that.”

“Chiron... if gods are real... does that mean the underworld is too?” I asked softly, playing with the hem of the Camp Half-Blood T-shirt I’d been changed into.

“Yes, child.” He paused, as if choosing his words carefully. “There is a place where spirits go after death. But for now... until we know more... I would urge you to put that out of your mind.”

“Until we know more?” I whispered but he ignored it just like the first time.

“Come, Percy. Let’s see the woods.”

The woods were just as large as I remembered they took up at least a quarter of the valley, the trees tall and thick.

Chiron said, “The woods are stocked, if you care to try your luck, but go armed.”

“Stocked with what?” I asked. “Armed with what?”

“You’ll see. Capture the flag is Friday night. Do you have your own sword and shield?”

I just blinked up at him.

“Hmm no I suppose you wouldn’t... I’ll have to visit the armory later.” He said and then the tour continued.

We saw the archery range, the canoeing lake, the stables, the javelin range, the sing-along amphitheater, and the arena where Chiron said they held sword and spear fights.

“Ah and there’s the mess hall.” He said pointing to an outdoor pavilion framed in white Grecian columns on a hill overlooking the sea. There were a dozen stone picnic tables. No roof. No walls.

Finally, he showed me the cabins. There were twelve of them, nestled in the woods by the lake. They were arranged in a U, with two at the base and five in a row on either side. And they were still, without a doubt, the most bizarre collection of buildings I’d ever seen.

Except for the fact that each had a large brass number above the door, they looked absolutely nothing alike. Number nine had smokestacks, like a tiny factory.

Number four had tomato vines on the walls and a roof made out of real grass. Seven seemed to be made of solid gold, which gleamed so much in the sunlight it was almost impossible to look at.

They all faced a commons area about the size of a soccer field, dotted with Greek statues, fountains, flower beds, and even a couple of basketball.

In the center of the field was a huge stone-lined firepit. Even though it was a warm afternoon, the hearth smoldered. Hestia, in the form of a girl about nine years old was tending the flames, was poking the coals with a stick.

Zeus and Hera’s cabins were as large and obnoxious as they always were with their heavy columns in front. Cabin ones polished bronze doors shimmered like a hologram, so that from different angles lightning bolts seemed to streak across them.

Hera’s was more graceful somehow, with slimmer columns garlanded with pomegranates and flowers. The walls were carved with images of peacocks.

“The King and Queen of the gods?” I guessed easily, laughing when Chiron agreed.

I stopped in front of the first cabin on the left, cabin three.

It wasn’t high and mighty like cabin one, but long and low and solid. The outer walls were of rough gray stone studded with pieces of seashell and coral, as if the slabs had been hewn straight from the bottom of the ocean floor.

I smiled at the pull I could feel towards to cabin but turned away when Chiron kept moving, glancing at Cabin three one last time over my shoulder. I’d be back there soon.

We passed by cabin five which was as loud as ever. Clarisse was still the loudest of the bunch and of course she zeroed in on him with an ugly sneer but he just smiled back.

“You said your name was Chiron. Are you really...?”

He smiled down at me. “The Chiron from the stories? Trainer of Hercules and all that? Yes, Percy, I am.”

“But... How are you still here?” I asked and he frowned slightly.

“Many Eons ago the gods granted my wish. I could continue the work I loved. I could be a teacher of heroes as long as humanity needed me. I gained much from that wish... and I gave up much. But I’m still here, so I can only assume I’m still needed.”

“Doesn’t it ever get boring?”

“No, no.” He said. “Horribly depressing, at times, but never boring.”

“Why is it depressing sometimes?” I asked, my thoughts turning to his wife, Chariclo, who was bound to her mountain in Greece.

“Oh, look.” He said, pretending he hadn’t heard him. “Annabeth is waiting for us.”

Chapter Text

She was reading a book in front of the last cabin on the left, number eleven. It was a thick Greek book about architecture and she gave me a critical look when we got there.

“Annabeth,” Chiron said. “I have masters’ archery class at noon. Would you take Percy from here?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Cabin eleven.” Chiron told me, gesturing toward the doorway. “Make yourself at home.”

Cabin Eleven was as worn out and normal looking as always with it’s worn out threshold and peeling brown paint. Inside the cabin was packed with people, both boys and girls, way more than the number of bunk beds and sleeping bags were spread all over on the floor.

Chiron couldn’t come in but everyone stood and bowed respectfully when they noticed him.

“Well then.” Chiron said. “Good luck Percy. I’ll see you at dinner.”

He galloped away toward the archery range as I waved and then turned back to the kids were now staring at me, sizing me up and I just smiled, stepping inside easily.

“Percy Jackson, meet cabin eleven.” Annabeth announced.

“Regular or undetermined?” Somebody asked.

“Undetermined!” I chirped. “If you’re asking if I know who my other parent is.”

Everybody groaned and Luke stepped forward with that same charming smiling that used to make him weak in the knees.

He was still tall and muscular, with short-cropped sandy hair and a friendly smile. He wore an orange tank top, cutoffs, sandals, and a leather necklace with five different-colored clay beads. The only thing unsettling about his appearance was a thick white scar that ran from just beneath his right eye to his jaw.

I swallowed hard and I could see the corner of his lip twitch.

“This is Luke.” Annabeth said, and her voice sounded different somehow. I glanced over and could’ve sworn she was blushing. She saw me looking, and her expression hardened again. “He’s your counselor for now.”

“For now?” I asked.

“You’re undetermined.” Luke explained patiently. “They don’t know what cabin to put you in, so you’re here. Cabin eleven takes all newcomers, all visitors. Naturally, we would. Hermes, our patron, is the god of travelers.”

I looked around at the campers’ faces, some sullen and suspicious, some grinning stupidly, some eyeing me as if they were waiting for a chance to pick my pockets.

“How long will I be here?” I asked, setting the box with the Minotaur horn on the small section of floor he led me to.

“Good question.” Luke said. “Until you’re determined.”

“How long will that take?”

The campers all laughed.

“Come on.” Annabeth told me. “I’ll show you the volleyball court.”

“I’ve already seen it.” I protested.

“Come on.” She grabbed my wrist and dragged me outside. I could hear the kids of cabin eleven laughing behind me and I could definitely see why some people would deflect.

It wasn’t nice being unwanted enough to never be claimed or worse, have your parent claim you and still have to sleep on the floor of someone else’s cabin because they didn’t have one.

“Jackson, you have to do better than that.” Annabeth said, whirling around to face me once we were a few feet away.

“Excuse me?” I said, annoyed beyond belief with how arrogant she was. I really was blind the first time around.

“I can’t believe I thought you were the one...” She muttered under her breath and I huffed.

“What’s your problem with me?” I asked, folding my arms. “You’ve been hounding me since before I even fully woke up after almost getting killed.”

“Don’t talk like that!” Annabeth told me. “You know how many kids at this camp wish they’d had your chance?”

Some other campers were glancing at them and several people from cabin eleven had followed after they finished laughing.

“A chance for what!” I said, thinking of my mom and letting the tears fill my eyes. “To watch their mom die?!”

She flinched and jerked slightly before scowling deeply.

“To fight the Minotaur! What do you think we train for?”

“To stay alive?!” I cried. “I don’t care about killing the Minotaur! Besides he’s dead now anyways so it not like anyone else can.”

“Monsters don’t die, Percy. They can be killed. But they don’t die.” She scoffed.

“What does that mean?” I hissed, angrily wiping tears away.

“They don’t have souls, like you and me. You can dispel them for a while, maybe even for a whole lifetime if you’re lucky. But they are primal forces. Chiron calls them archetypes. Eventually, they re-form.”

I blinked at her and sniffled slightly.

“Oh great. That means Mrs. Dodds is going to try killing me again someday.”

“The Fur... I mean, your math teacher. That’s right. She’s still out there. You just made her very, very mad.”

“How did you know about Mrs. Dodds?” I asked, already worn out with talking to her.

“You talk in your sleep.” She said smugly and I huffed.

“What was she anyways? Do you know? Grover seemed really scared of her.”

“You shouldn’t call them by name, even here. We call them the Kindly Ones, if we have to speak of them at all.” She said seriously.

“I know that!” I snapped before sighing and slumping slightly. “Why do I have to stay in cabin eleven, anyway? Why is everybody so crowded together? There are plenty of empty bunks right over there.”

I pointed to the first few cabins, and Annabeth turned pale. “You don’t just choose a cabin, Percy. It depends on who your parents are. Or... your parent.”

“Well I don’t know who my parent is. The one person who could tell me is gone.” I finished in a whisper.

“I’m sorry about your mom, Percy. But you really don’t know who your other parent is?” She pressed. “No clue at all?”

“No. My mom never liked to talk about it. All I know is I look like him and they met on the beach.” I said and she opened her mouth again before she was interrupted by a husky voice yelling; “Well! A newbie!”

I looked over and there was Clarisse with her three lackeys, all in their matching camo jackets.

“Clarisse.” Annabeth sighed. “Why don’t you go polish your spear or something?”

“Sure, Miss Princess.” She said. “So I can run you through with it Friday night.”

“Erre es korakas!” Annabeth said. “You don’t stand a chance!”

“We’ll pulverize you.” Clarisse said scowling deeply before she turned to me. “Who’s this little runt?”

“Percy Jackson.” Annabeth said. “Meet Clarisse, Daughter of Ares.”

I blinked and let my mouth drop open. I knew how to deal with children of Ares pretty well at this point. A bit of flattery could go a long way and with my Omega status the Alpha daughter of Ares wouldn’t have any problems with him.

“Oh wow! He’s the god of war isn’t he?” I gasped. “That’s so cool!”

All four of the girls smirked haughtily and Annabeth looked at me like I was an idiot. Well two could play at that game.

“What’s that look for Annabeth?” I asked ‘innocently’. “It is cool! Their dads the best fighter out of all the Olympians!”

“Maybe you’re not such a bad little runt!” Clarisse said with a deep laugh, clapping a heavy hand on my shoulder that nearly sent me sprawling while Annabeth bristled.

“He is not! Athena is the greatest fighter and the most brilliant!” She hissed, grey eyes snapping.

That comment set off an epic screaming match between the girls that nearly ended in a brawl before Percy pulled Annabeth away with an apology to Clarisse, completely ignoring the blondes protests as he drug her away.

“What was that about!?” She hissed furiously, yanking her arm from his grip.

“What do you mean?” I replied, genuinely confused at her complete lack of common sense. “Why would I want to make an enemy of the meanest looking kids here? That’s not very smart.”

She gaped at him for several minutes, started several sentences before ultimately just scowling deeply at him and showing me a few more places: the metal shop (where kids were forging their own swords), the arts-and-crafts room (where satyrs were sandblasting a giant marble statue of Pan), and the climbing wall.

It consisted of two facing walls that shook violently, dropped boulders, sprayed lava, and clashed together if you didn’t get to the top fast enough.

Finally we returned to the canoeing lake, where the trail led back to the cabins.

“I’ve got training to do.” Annabeth said flatly. “Dinner’s at seven-thirty. Just follow your cabin to the mess hall.”

“Okay. Thanks for showing me around and sorry if I got you in trouble with Clarisse.” I apologizes, even though she was the one who picked the fight.

“Whatever.” She scoffed.

I stared after her for a moment before shrugging and plopping down at the end of the pier that led into the lake. I noticed two Naiads sitting cross-legged at the base of the pier, about twenty feet below. They wore blue jeans and shimmering green T-shirts, and their brown hair floated loose around their shoulders as minnows darted in and out.

I smiled and waved and they beamed back as if I were a long-lost friend. I seriously couldn’t believe how dense I was the first time around. Some things literally slapped me in the face about being a Son of Poseidon.

“Don’t encourage them.” Annabeth warned. “Naiads are terrible flirts.”

“...They literally just smiled at me.” I pointed out and she huffed again and I just shook my head before changing the subject. “So who’s your godly parent?”

“Cabin six.”

“Meaning?”

Annabeth straightened. “Athena. Goddess of wisdom and battle.”

“Ahhh... that’s why you got angry before.” I said with a laugh. “Any idea who mine is?”

“Undetermined.” Annabeth said. “Like I told you before. Nobody knows.”

“Except my mother. She knew.”

“Maybe not, Percy. Gods don’t always reveal their identities.”

“My dad would have. He loved her.”

Annabeth gave me a cautious look. She didn’t want to burst my bubble. “Maybe you’re right. Maybe he’ll send a sign. That’s the only way to know for sure: your father has to send you a sign claiming you as his son. Sometimes it happens.”

“...but sometimes it doesn’t.” I finished, thinking of all the unclaimed children in the Hermes cabin, teenagers who looked sullen and depressed, as if they were waiting for a call that would never come.

“So I’m supposed to stay here for the rest of my life?” I sighed, turning back to stare at the lake.

“It depends.” Annabeth said. “Some campers only stay the summer. If you’re a child of Aphrodite or Demeter, you’re probably not a real powerful force. The monsters might ignore you, so you can get by with a few months of summer training and live in the mortal world the rest of the year.” She explained, not patiently but less grumpy sounding for sure.

“But for some of us, it’s too dangerous to leave. We’re year-rounders. In the mortal world, we attract monsters. They sense us. They come to challenge us. Most of the time, they’ll ignore us until we’re old enough to cause trouble-about ten or eleven years old, but after that, most demigods either make their way here, or they get killed off. Some don’t even realize they’re demigods. But very, very few are like that.”

“So... you’re a year-rounder?”

Annabeth nodded. From under the collar of her T-shirt she pulled a leather necklace with five clay beads of different colors. It was just like Luke’s, except Annabeth’s also had a gold college ring strung on hers. Her fathers ring.

“I’ve been here since I was seven.” She said. “Every August, on the last day of summer session, you get a bead for surviving another year. I’ve been here longer than most of the counselors, and they’re all in college.”

“I see...” I murmured. “So I could leave? If I wanted?”

“It would be suicide, but you could, with Mr. D’s or Chiron’s permission. But they wouldn’t give permission until the end of the summer session unless...”

“Unless?” I prompted.

“You were granted a quest. But that hardly ever happens. The last time...” She trailed off and I knew she was thinking of Luke’s quest. It hadn’t ended well.

“You asked me something about the summer solstice when I was recovering. What was that about?” I asked, already tired of this conversation.

Annabeth’s shoulders tensed. “So you do know something?”

“Not really.” I denied, shaking my head. “I heard Chiron and Grover talking about it at Yancy academy, but they just said they didn’t have much time because of the deadline.”

She clenched her fists. “I wish I knew. Chiron and the satyrs, they know, but they won’t tell me. Something is wrong in Olympus, something major. Last time I was there, everything seemed normal.”

“You’ve been to Olympus?”

“Some of us year-rounders- Luke and Clarisse and I and a few others- we took a field trip during winter solstice. That’s when the gods have their big annual council.”

“But... how did you get there?”

“The Long Island Railroad, of course. You get off at Penn Station. Empire State Building, special elevator to the six hundredth floor.” She looked at me like she was sure I must know this already. “You are a New Yorker, right?”

“Yeah but last I checked there were only 102 floor in the empire state building.” I said, tone flat and she glared at me a little bit.

“Right after we visited.” Annabeth continued. “The weather got weird, as if the gods had started fighting. A couple of times since, I’ve overheard satyrs talking. The best I can figure out is that something important was stolen. And if it isn’t returned by summer solstice, there’s going to be trouble. When you came, I was hoping... I mean- Athena can get along with just about anybody, except for Ares. And of course she’s got the rivalry with Poseidon. But, I mean, aside from that, I thought we could work together. I thought you might know something.”

I just stared at her blanky but she was mostly talking to herself now. She had a habit of ignoring other people anyways.

“I’ve got to get a quest.” Annabeth muttered to herself. “I’m not too young. If they would just tell me the problem...”

“Well... good luck with that.” I said, standing and stretching. “But I can smell dinner and I’m starving so I’m going to head back to cabin Eleven. Bye Annabeth.”

She waved me away, told me she’d catch me later. I left her on the pier, tracing her finger across the rail as if drawing a battle plan.

••♆••

Back at cabin eleven, everybody was talking and horsing around, waiting for dinner. And I looked around fondly, happy to see the mischievous children of Hermes and all the other minor gods or unclaimed children. The war had been hard so it was nice to see everyone so carefree.

Thankfully, nobody paid much attention to me as I walked over to my spot on the floor and plopped down with my minotaur horn and little backpack.

Luke came over and handed me a sleeping bag and a bag of toiletries with a wink and a charming smile. I shuddered internally but smiled back with a forced blush. Luke may have redeemed himself somewhat by overcoming Kronos but it didn’t change everything he did.

He smiled as he pulled out his tablet and propped it up against the box holding the Minotaur horn and started watching some Ever After High before they all left for dinner with a plan in mind.

The entire cabin descended into dead silence before chaos broke out.

“What?! What’s going on?” Percy squeaked at the same time Luke roared for the entire cabin to shut up before he stalked forward.

“Demi-Gods can’t use cellphones. They broadcast where we are. So turn that off!” Luke explained gently bur forcefully.

Percy just blinked. “...But my tablet doesn’t have cell service. My mom never let me have a cellphone because she said it was dangerous, so we compromised, and I got the tablet. It has an app that lets her track me and I can download movies and music on it.” He explained.

There was a collective sigh of relief before everyone started muttering some form of apology.

“Wait if you can’t use cell phones how do you guys keep in contact with each other?” Percy asked.

“We use rainbows and drachmas!” A girl in a top bunk said cheekily as she peered down at him.

“Rainbows?” Percy asked.

“Yeup! An Iris Message is kinda like facetime. You have to create a rainbow with mist and throw a drachma in it before saying ‘Oh Iris, goddess of the Rainbow, please accept my offering’ and then saying who you want to talk to. I’m Lou Ellen by the way but I just go by Lou!” She responded.

“I’m Perseus but I go by Percy but you probably already knew that.” He said with a smile.

“But seriously you have to find or make a rainbow? Why not just create something yourself? Like the MirrorNet.” Percy replied gesturing to his still playing show.

“MirrorNet?” Lou asked and several other campers came crowding over as well, even Luke, looking interested.

“Yeah it’s something they created in this show. It’s basically a magically powered version of cell service using mirrors instead of electronics.” Percy explained.

“But Iris is the messenger of the gods. I don’t think she’d like her offerings being taken away.” A mischievous-looking brunette offered hesitantly.

“Well, maybe you could make the logo a rainbow? Surely an immortal goddess doesn’t need drachmas. Maybe when you could just offer prayer instead? Oh! How about monthly plans just like cell phones? A drachma a month for unlimited calls!” Percy said enthusiastically.

Everyone was talking about it now. Mentioning how the Hephaestus cabin could easily make the mirrors they needed and even take design requests, while the children of Hecate could enchant them or they could ask Lady Iris to bless them for them to work.

Everything ground to a halt though as a light flashed above Percy’s head causing everyone to gasp.

Percy tilted his head up just in time to see a gorgeous rainbow shimmering above him before it disappeared.

“Well looks like Iris approves of that!” Luke said with a laugh before everyone began scrambling for pens and paper to start making designs.

Percy hid a smug smile as a horn sounded in the distance.

Luke yelled; “Eleven, fall in!”

The whole cabin, about twenty of us, filed into the commons yard. We lined up in order of seniority, so of course I was dead last. Campers came from the other cabins, too, except for the three empty cabins at the end, and cabin eight, which had looked normal in the daytime, but was now starting to glow silver as the sun went down.

We marched up the hill to the mess hall pavilion. Satyrs joined us from the meadow. Naiads emerged from the canoeing lake and wood Nymph literally melted out of the trees.

At the pavilion, torches blazed around the marble columns. A central fire burned in a bronze brazier the size of a bathtub. Each cabin had its own table, covered in white cloth trimmed in purple.

Four of the tables were empty, but cabin eleven’s was way overcrowded. I didn’t bother trying to cram myself onto the bench and happily sat on the floor. I got some amused looks for it but nobody complained.

I saw Grover sitting at table twelve with Mr. D, a few satyrs, Castor and Pollux. Chiron stood to one side, the picnic table being way too small for a centaur.

Annabeth sat at table six with a bunch of serious-looking athletic kids, all with her gray eyes and honey-blond hair. Clarisse was at the table behind us, belching and laughing with the rest of the Ares kids.

Finally, Chiron pounded his hoof against the marble floor of the pavilion, and everybody fell silent. He raised a glass. “To the gods!”

Everybody else raised their glasses. “To the gods!”

Wood nymphs came forward with platters of food: grapes, apples, strawberries, cheese, fresh bread, and thick slices of brisket.

I waited until someone else spoke to their glass and followed suit.

“Here you go, Percy.” Luke said, handing me a platter of smoked brisket and I took it with a smile and loaded my plate before standing with everyone else.

“What’s everyone doing?” I whispered to Luke.

“Burnt offerings for the gods. They like the smell.” He murmured in my ear and I couldn’t control the shiver that worked it’s way down my spine and the blonde smirked a bit but still gave me a warning look not to take this lightly.

Luke approached the fire, bowed his head, and tossed in a cluster of fat red grapes. “Hermes.”

I was next.

“Thank you for guiding me safely Lord Hermes and... I hope my mom isn’t suffering Lord Hades.” I whispered, sliding the thickest piece of brisket into the fire.

The smoke smelled nothing like burning food. It smelled of hot chocolate and fresh-baked brownies, hamburgers on the grill and wildflowers, and a hundred other good things that shouldn’t have gone well together, but did.

Everybody laughed and chatted as they ate and word about the goddess Isis’ blessing and my idea spread like wildfire.

I could tell Annabeth and her siblings were itching to interrogate me but they had to stay at their table.

After everyone finished eating, Chiron pounded his hoof again for our attention.

Mr. D got up with a huge sigh. “Yes, I suppose I’d better say hello to all you brats. Well, hello. Our activities director, Chiron, says the next capture the flag is Friday. Cabin five presently holds the laurels.”

A bunch of cheering rose from the Ares table.

“Personally.” Mr. D continued. “I couldn’t care less, but congratulations. Also, I should tell you that we have a new camper today. Peter Johnson.”

Chiron murmured something.

“Er, Percy Jackson.” Mr. D corrected. “That’s right. Hurrah, and all that. Now run along to your silly campfire. Go on.”

Everybody cheered. We all headed down toward the amphitheater, where Apollo’s cabin led a sing-along. We sang camp songs about the gods and ate s’mores and joked around, and I basked in the feeling of rightness.

The feeling of home.

Later in the evening, when the sparks from the campfire were curling into a starry sky, the conch horn blew again, and we all filed back to our cabins. I collapsed in a sleepy heap on my designated sleeping bag and fell asleep almost instantly.

Chapter Text

The camp was buzzing the next morning. Children of Athena and Hephaestus were moving around like crazy, and Percy was barely finished with breakfast before he was accosted by Annabeth and Charles ‘Charlie’ Beckendorf.

“How did you manage to come up with an idea like this when the Athena cabin has never even considered it?!” Was the first question she threw at him, Charlie winced in sympathy.

“Uhm... I didn’t?” Percy replied with a confused tilt of his head. “It’s from a TV show based on fairy tales.”

The look on Annabeth’s face at his response was absolutely hilarious.

“Can you give us more details about it?” Charlie asked before Annabeth could start grilling him again.

So Percy took the time to explain the concept of how Magic Mirrors were used in the show as a substitute for cell phones before repeating what he’d said the night before and that he apparently had the Goddess’ approval.

“I have a mirror I’d like turned into a Mirror Phone already if you’re taking requests?” Percy asked shyly but Charlie just laughed.

“As soon as we figure out how to get it working you’ll get it back if you can drop it off at cabin 9!” He replied with a smile that Percy returned before he hurried off to the Hermes cabin to grab said mirror.

••♆••

It didn’t take long for them to figure out how to get it working.

Surprisingly, it was Mr. D who helped point them in the right direction by mentioning that some of the campers had already been toying with something similar.

The children of Hecate had been trying for quite a while to figure out the same thing and they already had several spells in the works.

They’d asked to borrow his Tablet so they could magically connect the Mirrors to things like the internet and the app store and work in requesting a blessing from Iris to their spell work.

Once the spell was completed the Mirrors were nearly identical to a modern phone or tablet with a stylized rainbow appearing on the back of them.

You could download apps, make calls, and even text!

All you needed to do to set it up was say the usual Iris message request followed by a request to tether your name to the mirror and of course toss a Drachma at the mirrors logo to complete the process.

From there once a month you’d see a message on the screen requesting another Drachma to keep the connection active. And Percy got his Mirror back first of course.

He’d picked it out just for this. It was a small rectangular mirror that was a bit smaller than the average smartphone, but it fit better in his hands.

It was a beautiful sea blue color and decorated with small pearls and pretty mother of pearl pieces shaped like seashells.

He had a matching one the same size as his tablet that he was going to have enchanted after everyone else had theirs set up.

••♆••

Aside from getting that taken care of he settled into a routine pretty quickly.

Each morning he had Ancient Greek lessons from Annabeth, and they talked about the gods and goddesses and she seemed annoyed by the fact that I had no trouble reading and muttered under her breath that she was wasting her time.

The rest of the day, I’d rotate through outdoor activities, looking for things I was good at.

I was still awful at archery but Chiron didn’t complain when he had to untangle an arrow from his tail but with the experience I had this time around the other activities were a breeze.

Foot racing? I wasn’t as fast as the wood-nymph instructors but I wasn’t too far behind and kept pace easily without getting winded.

Clarisse still pulverized me in wrestling but only when she could get a good grip on me since I focused more on dodging than brute strength.

The only activity I truly excelled at though was still canoeing which, since I knew I was a Son of Poseidon, wasn’t surprising at all. Being on the water was as easy and natural as breathing.

All in all it was more along the lines of what the other campers expected to see from the Omega kid that defeated the minotaur.

I knew the senior campers and counselors were watching me, trying to decide who my dad was, but they weren’t having an easy time of it.

While I showed good general athleticism, I wasn’t as strong as the Ares kids, or as good at archery as the Apollo kids. I didn’t have Hephaestus’s skill with metalwork or- gods forbid- Dionysus’s way with vine plants.

Luke suggested I might be a jack of all trades yet master of none like the children of Hermes but I knew now he didn’t really mean it and I definitely didn’t have the right look.

Thursday afternoon, three days after I’d arrived at Camp Half-Blood, I had my first sword fighting lesson. Everybody from cabin eleven gathered in the big circular arena, where Luke would be our instructor.

We started with basic stabbing and slashing, using some straw-stuffed dummies in Greek armor.

Unlike the first time I knew what I was doing, though the swords still sucked. Either they were too heavy, or too light, or too long. Luke tried his best to fix me up, but he agreed that none of the practice blades seemed to work for me.

We moved on to dueling in pairs and Luke announced he would be my partner, since this was my first time.

“Good luck.” One of the campers told me. “Luke’s the best swordsman in the last three hundred years.”

“Maybe he’ll go easy on me.” I chirped and he snorted.

Luke didn’t hold back at all but neither did I.

Every thrust I blocked or dodged. Every parry and shirled block didn’t catch me off guard or make me stumble. I saw his attacks coming. I countered. I stepped forward and tried a thrust of my own.

Luke deflected it easily, but I saw a change in his face. His eyes narrowed, and he started to press me with more force and I suppressed a smirk before using the same disarming technique he was going to show the cabin after.

My blade hit the base of Luke’s and I twisted, putting my whole weight into a downward thrust.

Clang!

Luke’s sword rattled against the stones. The tip of my blade was an inch from his undefended chest. The other campers were silent.

“Ahh... I- I’m sorry.” I stammered, lowering the too heavy sword.

For a moment, Luke was too stunned to speak.

“Sorry?” His scarred face broke into a grin. “By the gods, Percy, why are you sorry? Show me that again!”

We sparred a bit longer and while I disarmed him again I let him disarm me as well and I let the heavy sword weigh me down and I tapped out after another twenty minutes.

Luke wiped the sweat off his brow. He appraised me with an entirely new interest.

“I wonder what you could do with a balanced sword...” He mused lightly.

••♆••

Friday afternoon, I was sitting with Grover at the lake, watching the naiads do underwater basket-weaving, until I got up the nerve to ask Grover how his conversation had gone with Mr. D.  His face turned a sickly shade of yellow.

“Fine.” He said. “Just great.”

“So your career’s still on track?”

He glanced at me nervously.

“Chiron t-told you I want a searcher’s license?” He stuttered, a nervous bleating tone to his voice.

“Not exactly... he said you had big dreams... and that you needed credit for completing a keeper’s assignment. So did you get it?”

Grover looked down at the naiads.

“Mr. D suspended judgment. He said I hadn’t failed or succeeded with you yet, so our fates were still tied together. If you got a quest and I went along to protect you, and we both came back alive, then maybe he’d consider the job complete.”

“Well, that’s not so bad, right?” I said cheerfully.

“Blaa-ha-ha! He might as well have transferred me to stable-cleaning duty. The chances of you getting a quest... and even if you did, why would you want me along?”

“Of course I’d want you along!” I protested hotly.

Grover stared glumly into the water. “Basket-weaving... Must be nice to have a useful skill.”

I tried to reassure him that he had lots of talents, but that just made him look more miserable. We talked about canoeing and swordplay for a while before I finally decided to ask about the empty cabins.

“Number eight, the silver one, belongs to Artemis.” He said. “She vowed to be a maiden forever. So of course, no kids. The cabin is, you know, honorary. If she didn’t have one, she’d be mad.”

“Okay... But the other three, the ones at the end. Are those for the Big Three?”

Grover tensed. We were getting close to a touchy subject.

“No. One of them, number two, is Hera’s.” He said. “That’s another honorary thing. She’s the goddess of marriage, so of course she wouldn’t go around having affairs with mortals. That’s her husband’s job. When we say the Big Three, we mean the three powerful brothers, the sons of Kronos.”

“Zeus, Poseidon, Hades.”

“Right. You know. After the great battle with the Titans, they took over the world from their dad and drew lots to decide who got what.”

“Zeus got the sky.” I remembered. “Poseidon the sea, Hades the Underworld.”

“Uh-huh.”

“But Hades doesn’t have a cabin here.”

“No. He doesn’t have a throne on Olympus, either. He sort of does his own thing down in the Underworld. If he did have a cabin here…” Grover shuddered. “Well, it wouldn’t be pleasant. Let’s leave it at that.”

I couldn’t help but frown at that statement.

“Why wouldn’t that be pleasant? He protects us when we’re gone and he’s one of the Big Three. He has just as much right to a cabin. Especially since Lady Artemis and Hera have cabins... it’s not fair.” I said sadly before continuing. “And why are the other two empty? I thought they had lots of kids in the myth?”

Grover shifted his hooves uncomfortably.

“I know it’s not really fair but it’s just the way it is and as for why their cabins are empty well... about sixty years ago, after World War II, the Big Three agreed they wouldn’t sire any more heroes. Their children were just too powerful. They were affecting the course of human events too much, causing too much carnage. World War II, you know, that was basically a fight between the sons of Zeus and Poseidon on one side, and the sons of Hades on the other. The winning side, Zeus and Poseidon, made Hades swear an oath with them: no more affairs with mortal women. They all swore on the River Styx.”

Thunder boomed.

“That’s the most serious oath you can make.”

Grover nodded.

“And the brothers kept their word-no kids?” Grover’s face darkened. “Seventeen years ago, Zeus fell off the wagon. There was this TV starlet with a big fluffy eighties hairdo-he just couldn’t help himself. When their child was born, a little girl named Thalia... well... the River Styx is serious about promises. Zeus himself got off easy because he’s immortal, but he brought a terrible fate on his daughter.”

“But it wasn’t her fault!” I cried, heart aching at the thought of her being a tree just because of that.

Grover hesitated.

“Percy, children of the Big Three have powers greater than other half-bloods. They have a strong aura, a scent that attracts monsters. When Hades found out about the girl, he wasn’t too happy about Zeus breaking his oath. Hades let the worst monsters out of Tartarus to torment Thalia. A satyr was assigned to be her keeper when she was twelve, but there was nothing he could do. He tried to escort her here with a couple of other half-bloods she’d befriended. They almost made it. They got all the way to the top of that hill.”

He pointed across the valley, to the pine tree where I’d fought the minotaur.

“All three Kindly Ones were after them, along with a horde of hellhounds. They were about to be overrun when Thalia told her satyr to take the other two half-bloods to safety while she held off the monsters. She was wounded and tired, and she didn’t want to live like a hunted animal. The satyr didn’t want to leave her, but he couldn’t change her mind, and he had to protect the others. So Thalia made her final stand alone, at the top of that hill. As she died, Zeus took pity on her. He turned her into that pine tree. Her spirit still helps protect the borders of the valley. That’s why the hill is called Half-Blood Hill.”

I stared at the pine in the distance. The story made me feel hollow and I stared sadly at the large pine tree in the distance.

“So… a satyr is always assigned to guard a demigod?”

“Not always. We go undercover to a lot of schools. We try to sniff out the half-bloods who have the makings of great heroes. If we find one with a very strong aura, like a child of the Big Three, we alert Chiron. He tries to keep an eye on them, since they could cause really huge problems.”

“And you found me. Chiron said you thought I might be something special.”

Grover looked as if I’d just led him into a trap.

“I didn’t… Oh, listen, don’t think like that. If you were-you know-you’d never ever be allowed a quest, and I’d never get my license. You’re probably a child of Hermes. Or maybe even one of the minor gods, like Nemesis, the god of revenge. Don’t worry, okay?”

“I’m not.” I said simply and Grover relaxed a bit at my easy tone and relaxed posture. “I don’t really think I’m a child of Hermes though.”

“Blaa-ha-ha! I think you’re right!” He agreed and we both laughed.

••♆••

That night after dinner, there was a lot more excitement than usual.

At last, it was time for capture the flag.

When the plates were cleared away, the conch horn sounded and we all stood at our tables.

Campers yelled and cheered as Annabeth and two of her siblings ran into the pavilion carrying a silk banner. It was about ten feet long, glistening gray, with a painting of a barn owl above an olive tree.

From the opposite side of the pavilion, Clarisse and her buddies ran in with another banner, of identical size, but in a deep red, painted with a bloody spear and a boar’s head.

“Those are the flags?” I called over the din, looking at Luke next to me.

“Yeah.”

“Ares and Athena always lead the teams?”

“Not always.” He said. “But often.”

“So, if another cabin captures one, what do you do- repaint the flag?”

He grinned. “You’ll see. First we have to get one.”

“Whose side are we on?”

He gave me a sly look, as if he knew something I didn’t. The scar on his face made him look almost evil in the torchlight. “We’ve made a temporary alliance with Athena. Tonight, we get the flag from Ares. And you’re going to help.”

The teams were announced. Athena had made an alliance with Apollo and Hermes, the two biggest cabins. Apparently, privileges had been traded-shower times, chore schedules, the best slots for activities- in order to win support.

Ares had allied themselves with everybody else: Dionysus, Demeter, Aphrodite, and Hephaestus.

From what I’d seen, Castor and Pollux were actually good athletes, but there were only two of them. Demeter’s kids had the edge with nature skills and their ability to control plants but they weren’t very aggressive.

Aphrodite’s sons and daughters I wasn’t too worried about. They would put in a token effort but fighting wasn’t their strength. There were only four of Hephaestus’s kids but they were big and burly from working in the metal shop all day. And of course, Ares’s cabin; a dozen of the biggest, meanest kids on Long Island.

Chiron hammered his hoof on the marble.

“Heroes!” He announced. “You know the rules. The creek is the boundary line. The entire forest is fair game. All magic items are allowed. The banner must be prominently displayed, and have no more than two guards. Prisoners may be disarmed, but may not be bound or gagged. No killing or maiming is allowed. I will serve as referee and battlefield medic. Arm yourselves!”

He spread his hands, and the tables were suddenly covered with equipment: helmets, bronze swords, spears, oxhide shields coated in metal.

I looked over them doubtfully and Luke gave me a weird look so I explained before he could even open his mouth.

“I don’t know if any of these will work for me.” I said, frowning a bit. “All the ones from training never felt right.”

Luke nodded slowly before shrugging. “Well... Unless you want to get skewered by your friends in cabin five. Here— Chiron thought these would fit. You’ll be on border patrol.”

My shield was the size of an NBA backboard, with a big caduceus in the middle. It still felt like it weighed about a million pounds but I’d dealt with worse so I just hefted it up. My helmet, like all the helmets on Athena’s side, had a blue horsehair plume on top. Ares and their allies had red plumes.

Annabeth yelled, “Blue team, forward!”

We cheered and shook our swords and followed her down the path to the south woods. The red team yelled taunts at us as they headed off toward the north.

I caught up with Annabeth’s fast-paced march easily.

“So what’s the plan?” I asked. “Any magic items I should watch out for?”

“Just watch Clarisse’s spear.” She said. “You don’t want that thing touching you. Otherwise, don’t worry. We’ll take the banner from Ares. Has Luke given you your job?”

“Border patrol.” I chirped.

“It’s easy. Stand by the creek, keep the reds away. Leave the rest to me. Athena always has a plan.”

She pushed ahead and I let her, scowling slightly at her back before muttering, “Yeah plans that always put others in danger... But as long as it gets the job done then nobody cares.”

It was a warm, sticky night. The woods were dark, with fireflies popping in and out of view. Annabeth stationed me next to a little creek that gurgled over some rocks, then she and the rest of the team scattered into the trees.

I was left standing by the creek but I didn’t feel like an idiot this time though the sword still felt wrong in my hand. Like all the swords except Riptide, it seemed balanced wrong. The leather grip pulled on my hand like a bowling ball.

Far away, the conch horn blew. I heard whoops and yells in the woods, the clanking of metal, kids fighting. A blue-plumed ally from Apollo raced past me like a deer, leaped through the creek, and disappeared into enemy territory.

I tensed when I heard a Hellhound growl nearby and I raised my shield; I had the feeling something was stalking me but this time around I knew who it actually was.

On the other side of the creek, the underbrush exploded. Five Ares warriors came yelling and screaming out of the dark.

“Cream that punk!” Clarisse screamed, though instead of mean mugging me this time she gave me a look that just said; ‘Sorry kid’.

She brandished a five-foot-long spear, its barbed metal tip flickering with red light. Her siblings had only the standard-issue bronze swords— they’d be easy pickings.

They charged across the stream. There was no help in sight, big surprise, so I just gripped the wrong sword tightly and slid into a ready stance.

They surrounded me, and Clarisse thrust at me with her spear. My shield deflected the point, but I felt that all too familiar painful tingling all over my body. My hair stood on end as the electricity raced through me from my arm but I grit my teeth and smoothly batted it away before disarming her brother that tried to slam into my chest. He went sprawling back and Clarisse used the opportunity to strike my other arm.

More painful electricity.

I let them surround me again and I did a good job of deflecting and acting tired. One of the Ares boys stabbed me in the back this time.

“No maiming!” I gasped out, winded from the blow and thankful for the armor.

“Oops.” He sneered. “Guess I lost my dessert privilege.”

He followed that up with a kick to the back that sent me sprawling into the creek. I felt the tension and pain ease immediately and smiled as bubbles floated around me while I waited patiently.

Clarisse and her cabinmates came into the creek to get me, but I stood to meet them. I knew what to do. It would be just as easy the first time in the water. I swung the flat of my sword against the first guy’s head and knocked his helmet clean off. I hit him so hard I could see his eyes vibrating as he crumpled into the water.

Ugly Number Two and Ugly Number Three came at me. I slammed one in the face with my shield and used my sword to shear off the other guy’s horsehair plume. Both of them backed up quick. Ugly Number Four didn’t look really anxious to attack, but Clarisse kept coming, the point of her spear crackling with energy. As soon as she thrust, I caught the shaft between the edge of my shield and my sword, and I snapped it like a twig.

“Ah!” She screamed. “You idiot! You corpse-breath worm!”

She definitely would’ve said worse, but I smacked her between the eyes with my sword-butt and sent her stumbling backward out of the creek.

Then I heard the yelling, the elated screams, and I saw Luke racing toward the boundary line with the red team’s banner lifted high. He was flanked by a couple of Hermes guys covering his retreat, and a few Apollos behind them, fighting off the Hephaestus kids. The Ares folks got up, and Clarisse muttered a dazed curse.

“A trick!” She shouted. “It was a trick.”

They staggered after Luke, but it was too late. Everybody converged on the creek as Luke ran across into friendly territory. Our side exploded into cheers. The red banner shimmered and turned to silver.

The boar and spear were replaced with a huge caduceus, the symbol of cabin eleven. Everybody on the blue team picked up Luke and started carrying him around on their shoulders. Chiron cantered out from the woods and blew the conch horn.

The game was over. We’d won.

I was about to join the celebration when Annabeth’s voice, right next to me in the creek, said, “Not bad, hero.”

I pretended to be startled and swung my sword in the direction of her voice. She shrieked and her baseball cap flew off as she fell into the water, red swirling around her from a slash on her arm. Everyone stopped and stared.

“What the hell?!” Anabeth shrieked.

“Why would you sneak up on me and whisper in my ear!” I shouted back.

Luke came and heled her stand up when a rumbling howl split the air and everyone froze.

There on the rocks just above us was a black hound the size of a rhino, with lava-red eyes and fangs like daggers.

 It was looking straight at me before it lunged. It leaped over Annabeth and Luke— an enormous shadow with teeth— and just as it hit me, as I stumbled backward and felt its razor-sharp claws ripping through my armor, there was a cascade of thwacking sounds, like forty pieces of paper being ripped one after the other. From the hound’s neck sprouted a cluster of arrows. The monster fell dead at my feet.

Chiron trotted up next to us, a bow in his hand, his face grim.

“Di immortales!” Annabeth said. “That’s a hellhound from the Fields of Punishment. They don’t... they’re not supposed to...”

“Someone summoned it,” Chiron said. “Someone inside the camp.”

“It’s all Percy’s fault! Percy summoned it!” Clarisse shouted spitefully, still sore over her loss. “Be quiet, child.” Chiron told her.

We watched the body of the hellhound melt into shadow, soaking into the ground until it disappeared.

I sank into the water with an exhausted sigh, watching my blood mix with flowing clear water. Waiting for what I knew would happen next.

. I could feel the cuts on my chest closing up. Some of the campers gasped. I didn’t bother talking this time and just looked up to see the shimmering ocean blue trident above my head.

“Your father,” Annabeth murmured. “This is really not good.”

“It is determined.” Chiron announced.

All around me, campers started kneeling, even the Ares cabin, though they didn’t look happy about it.

“Poseidon.” Said Chiron. “Earthshaker, Stormbringer, Father of Horses. Hail, Perseus Jackson, Son of the Sea God.”

Chapter Text

The next morning, Chiron moved me to cabin three.

Last time it had been miserable. He’d felt yanked away from yet another place he’d finally started to feel comfortable but now it just felt like coming home.

I happily unpacked my few belongings and ignored all the nervous and scared chattering from the other cabins.

Nobody mentioned the hellhound, but I knew they were all talking about it. The attack had scared everybody. It sent two messages: one, that I was the son of the Sea God; and two, monsters would stop at nothing to kill me. They could even invade a camp that had always been considered safe.

The other campers steered clear of me as much as possible. Cabin eleven was too nervous to have sword class with me after what I’d done to the Ares folks in the woods, so my lessons with Luke became one-on-one.

He pushed me harder than ever, just like before, and wasn’t afraid to bruise me up in the process when he could but I just soldiered through it.

“You’re going to need all the training you can get.” He promised, as we were working with swords and flaming torches. “Now let’s try that viper-beheading strike again. Fifty more repetitions.”

Annabeth still taught me Greek in the mornings, but she was distracted. Every time I said something, she scowled at me, as if I’d just personally offended her but I shrugged it off and ignored her mutterings.

After lessons, she would walk away muttering to herself: “Quest... Poseidon?... Dirty rotten... Got to make a plan...”

Clarisse was still sore about her magic spear but it wasn’t as bad this time around since I made a point of apologizing but I did point out it could have been anyone and you never know what could happen.

That mollified her a bit and she ruffled my hair gruffly but didn’t do anything to stop the others from trying to pick on me.

Someone still snuck a copy of the New York Times into my cabin, probably Luke honestly, and the article was the same but different. At least smelly Gabe hadn’t been around to frame him as violent this time.

Boy and Mother Still Missing After Freak Car Accident

By Eileen Smythe

Sally Jackson and son Percy are still missing one week after their mysterious disappearance. The family’s badly burned blue Volkswagen Beetle was discovered last Saturday on a north Long Island road with the roof ripped off and the front axle broken. The car had flipped and skidded for several hundred feet before exploding.

Mother and son had gone for a weekend vacation to Montauk, but left hastily, under mysterious circumstances. Small traces of blood were found in the car and near the scene of the wreck, but there were no other signs of the missing Jacksons. Residents in the rural area reported seeing nothing unusual around the time of the accident.

Police would not say whether there were any suspects, but they have not ruled out foul play. Below are recent pictures of Sally Jackson and Percy. Police urge anyone with information to call the following toll-free crime-stoppers hotline.

The phone number was again circled in black marker.

I threw it away and went to bed but I wasn’t planning on letting it go this time. I turned down the lights and prepared myself for a prophetic dream.

I was running along the beach in a storm. This time, there was a city behind me. Not New York. The sprawl was different: buildings spread farther apart, palm trees and low hills in the distance.

About a hundred yards down the surf, two men were fighting. They looked like TV wrestlers, muscular, with beards and long hair. Both wore flowing Greek tunics, one trimmed in blue, the other in green. They grappled with each other, wrestled, kicked and head-butted, and every time they connected, lightning flashed, the sky grew darker, and the wind rose.

I had to stop them. I didn’t know why. But the harder I ran, the more the wind blew me back, until I was running in place, my heels digging uselessly in the sand.

Over the roar of the storm, I could hear the blue-robed one yelling at the green-robed one, Give it back! Give it back! Like a kindergartner fighting over a toy.

The waves got bigger, crashing into the beach, spraying me with salt.

I yelled, ‘Stop it! Stop fighting!’

The ground shook. Laughter came from somewhere under the earth, and a voice so deep and evil it turned my blood to ice.

‘Come down, little hero...’ The voice crooned. ‘Come down!’

The sand split beneath me, opening up a crevice straight down to the center of the earth. My feet slipped, and darkness swallowed me.

I woke up, feeling like I was falling.

I was still in bed in cabin three. It was morning, but it was dark outside, and thunder rolled across the hills. A storm was brewing. I hadn’t dreamed that. I threw back the covers and waited.

I heard a clopping sound at the door, a hoof knocking on the threshold.

“Come in, Grover!”

Grover trotted inside, looking worried. “Mr. D wants to see you.”

“Why?” I sighed, already knowing the answer.

“He wants to kill... I mean, I’d better let him tell you.”

I shooed Grover put while I got dressed and followed Grover the Big House.

Over Long Island Sound, the sky looked like ink soup coming to a boil. A hazy curtain of rain was coming in our direction. I asked Grover if we should grab an umbrella, gesturing to the storm.

He glanced uneasily at the sky. “It’ll pass around us. Bad weather always does.”

I nodded but still kept a wary eye on the black clouds. Being a child of Poseidon always made me leery of storms and this one was huge.

At the volleyball pit, the kids from Apollo’s cabin were playing a morning game against the satyrs. Dionysus’s twins were walking around in the strawberry fields, making the plants grow. Everybody was going about their normal business, but they looked tense. They kept their eyes on the storm.

Dionysus picked up a playing card, twisted it, and it became a plastic rectangle. A credit card? No. A security pass.

He snapped his fingers.

The air seemed to fold and bend around him. He became a hologram, then a wind, then he was gone, leaving only the smell of fresh-pressed grapes lingering behind.

Chiron smiled at me, but he looked tired and strained. “Sit, Percy, please. And Grover.”

We did.

Chiron laid his cards on the table, a winning hand he hadn’t gotten to use.

“Tell me, Percy.” He said. “What did you make of the hellhound?”

Last time I had said I was scared.

This time I looked him straight in the eyes and said, “The minotaur was worse to me but it definitely wasn’t fun. I would’ve been dead if you hadn’t shot it.

“You’ll meet worse, Percy. Far worse, before you’re done.”

I sighed and glanced at Grover who was crossing his fingers.

“I guessing you mean before I’m done with my quest?”

“If you accept it.” He said calmly.

“And what is my quest?” I asked softly.

Chiron grimaced. “Well, that’s the hard part, the details.”

Thunder rumbled across the valley. The storm clouds had now reached the edge of the beach. As far as I could see, the sky and the sea were boiling together.

“My father and Zeus.” I said. “They’re fighting over something valuable... something that was stolen, aren’t they?”

Chiron and Grover exchanged looks.

Chiron sat forward in his wheelchair. “How did you know that?”

“The weather since Christmas has been weird, like the sea and the sky are fighting. Annabeth also said something had been stolen when I first got here. She kept pressing me about it actually. And... I’ve also been having these dreams.”

“I knew it.” Grover said.

“Hush, satyr,” Chiron ordered.

“But it is his quest!” Grover’s eyes were bright with excitement. “It must be!”

“Only the Oracle can determine.” Chiron stroked his bristly beard. “Nevertheless, Percy, you are correct. Your father and Zeus are having their worst quarrel in centuries. They are fighting over something valuable that was stolen. To be precise: a lightning bolt.”

Since I’d already proven I knew my Greek Mythology/History I didn’t hide how pale I went under my tan.

“Not... The Lightning Bolt... Right?” I whispered.

“Zeus’s master bolt.” Chiron said, nodding grimly. “The symbol of his power, from which all other lightning bolts are patterned. The first weapon made by the Cyclopes for the war against the Titans, the bolt that sheered the top off Mount Etna and hurled Kronos from his throne; the master bolt, which packs enough power to make mortal hydrogen bombs look like firecrackers.”

“And it’s missing?”

“Stolen.” Chiron said.

“By who?”

“By whom,” Chiron corrected. Once a teacher, always a teacher. “By you.”

My mouth fell open.

“At least”—Chiron held up a hand—”that’s what Zeus thinks. During the winter solstice, at the last council of the gods, Zeus and Poseidon had an argument. The usual nonsense: ‘Mother Rhea always liked you best,’ ‘Air disasters are more spectacular than sea disasters,’ et cetera. Afterward, Zeus realized his master bolt was missing, taken from the throne room under his very nose. He immediately blamed Poseidon. Now, a god cannot usurp another god’s symbol of power directly—that is forbidden by the most ancient of divine laws. But Zeus believes your father convinced a human hero to take it.”

“But I didn’t—” I started hotly.

“Patience and listen, child.” Chiron said. “Zeus has good reason to be suspicious. The forges of the Cyclopes are under the ocean, which gives Poseidon some influence over the makers of his brother’s lightning. Zeus believes Poseidon has taken the master bolt, and is now secretly having the Cyclopes build an arsenal of illegal copies, which might be used to topple Zeus from his throne. The only thing Zeus wasn’t sure about was which hero Poseidon used to steal the bolt. Now Poseidon has openly claimed you as his son. You were in New York over the winter holidays. You could easily have snuck into Olympus. Zeus believes he has found his thief.”

“But I didn’t even know I was a Demi-God then! He’s insane if he thinks I stole it!”

Chiron and Grover glanced nervously at the sky. The clouds didn’t seem to be parting around us, as Grover had promised. They were rolling straight over our valley, sealing us in like a coffin lid.

“Er, Percy...?” Grover said. “We don’t use the I-word to describe the Lord of the Sky.”

“Perhaps paranoid,” Chiron suggested. “Then again, Poseidon has tried to unseat Zeus before. I believe that was question thirty-eight on your final exam...” He looked at me expectantly and I sighed.

“But my father has tried to de-throne him before.” I said miserably. “He teamed up with Hera and some other gods and trapped him in that golden net until he promised to be a better ruler right?”

“Correct.” Chiron said. “And Zeus has never trusted Poseidon since. Of course, Poseidon denies stealing the master bolt. He took great offense at the accusation. The two have been arguing back and forth for months, threatening war. And now, you’ve come along— the proverbial last straw.”

“But I’m just a kid!”

“Percy.” Grover cut in. “If you were Zeus, and you already thought your brother was plotting to overthrow you, then your brother suddenly admitted he had broken the sacred oath he took after World War II, that he’s fathered a new mortal hero who might be used as a weapon against you... Wouldn’t that put a twist in your toga?”

“But I didn’t do anything. My dad—he didn’t really have this master bolt stolen, did he?”

Chiron sighed. “Most thinking observers would agree that thievery is not Poseidon’s style. But the Sea God is too proud to try convincing Zeus of that. Zeus has demanded that Poseidon return the bolt by the summer solstice. That’s June twenty-first, ten days from now. Poseidon wants an apology for being called a thief by the same date. I hoped that diplomacy might prevail, that Hera or Demeter or Hestia would make the two brothers see sense. But your arrival has inflamed Zeus’s temper. Now neither god will back down. Unless someone intervenes, unless the master bolt is found and returned to Zeus before the solstice, there will be war. And do you know what a full-fledged war would look like, Percy?”

“Definitely not good.” I said.

“Imagine the world in chaos. Nature at war with itself. Olympians forced to choose sides between Zeus and Poseidon. Destruction. Carnage. Millions dead. Western civilization turned into a battleground so big it will make the Trojan War look like a water-balloon fight.”

“Right.” I agreed flatly.

“And you, Percy Jackson, would be the first to feel Zeus’s wrath.”

It started to rain. Volleyball players stopped their game and stared in stunned silence at the sky. I had brought this storm to Half-Blood Hill. Zeus was punishing the whole camp because of me. I was just as furious as last time.

“So I have to figure out who stole it, get it from them and return it to Zeus.” I said, eyes as turbulent as the ocean during a hurricane.

“What better peace offering,” Chiron said, “than to have the son of Poseidon return Zeus’s property?”

“If Poseidon doesn’t have it, where is the thing?”

“I believe I know.” Chiron’s expression was grim. “Part of a prophecy I had years ago... well, some of the lines make sense to me, now. But before I can say more, you must officially take up the quest. You must seek the counsel of the Oracle.”

“Why can’t you tell me where the bolt is beforehand?”

“Because if I did, you would be too afraid to accept the challenge.”

“Not likely since it couldn’t be worse than being smote out of existence.” I said.

“You agree then?”

I looked at Grover, who nodded encouragingly.

“I don’t really have much of a choice do I?” I murmured, before straightening my shoulders. “It’s better than being turned into a dolphin.”

“Then it’s time you consulted the Oracle.” Chiron said. “Go upstairs, Percy Jackson, to the attic. When you come back down, assuming you’re still sane, we will talk more.”

Four flights up, the stairs ended under a green trapdoor.

I pulled the cord. The door swung down, and a wooden ladder clattered into place.

The warm air from above smelled like mildew and rotten wood and something else... a smell I remembered from biology class. Reptiles. The smell of snakes.

I took a breath and climbed into the familiar attic. It

 was filled with Greek hero junk: armor stands covered in cobwebs; once-bright shields pitted with rust; old leather steamer trunks plastered with stickers saying Ithaka, Circe’s Isle, and Land of the Amazons.

One long table was stacked with glass jars filled with pickled things— severed hairy claws, huge yellow eyes, various other parts of monsters. A dusty mounted trophy on the wall looked like a giant snake’s head, but with horns and a full set of shark’s teeth. The plaque read, Hydra Head #1, Woodstock, N.Y., 1969.

By the window, sitting on a wooden tripod stool, was the most gruesome memento of all: a mummy. Not the wrapped-in-cloth kind, but a human female body shriveled to a husk. She wore a tie-dyed sundress, lots of beaded necklaces, and a headband over long black hair.

The skin of her face was thin and leathery over her skull, and her eyes were glassy white slits, as if the real eyes had been replaced by marbles; she’d been dead a long, long time.

Looking at her still sent a chill up my back. She sat up on her stool and opened her mouth. A green mist poured from the mummy’s mouth, coiling over the floor in thick tendrils, hissing like twenty thousand snakes.

I didn’t try to run this time and just waited placidly. Inside my head, I heard a voice, slithering into one ear and coiling around my brain: I am the spirit of Delphi, speaker of the prophecies of Phoebus Apollo, slayer of the mighty Python. Approach, seeker, and ask.

She felt like the Moirai: ancient, powerful, and definitely not human. But not particularly interested in killing me, either.

I asked simply, “What is my destiny?”

The mist swirled more thickly, collecting right in front of me and around the table with the pickled monster-part jars.

Unlike last time when it was smelly Gabe and his buddies speaking, this time it was Nancy Bobofit.

Nancy turned toward me and spoke in the rasping voice of the Oracle: You shall go west, and face the god who has turned.

Her friend on the right looked up and said in the same voice: You shall find what was stolen, and see it safely returned.

The girl on the left who was filing her nails then said: You shall be betrayed by one who calls you a friend.

Finally, Susan, her best friend and the one who hated me almost more than she did, delivered the worst line of all: And you shall fail to save what matters most, in the end.

The figures began to dissolve. My mouth was set in a grim line, the prophecy hadn’t changed at all, as the mist retreated, coiling into a huge green serpent and slithering back into the mouth of the mummy.

The tail of the mist snake disappeared into the mummy’s mouth. She reclined back against the wall. Her mouth closed tight, as if it hadn’t been open in a hundred years. The attic was silent again, abandoned, nothing but a room full of mementos.

My audience with the Oracle was over.

“Well?” Chiron asked me.

I plopped into a chair at the pinochle table. “She said I would retrieve what was stolen.”

Grover sat forward, chewing excitedly on the remains of a Diet Coke can. “That’s great!”

“What did the Oracle say exactly?” Chiron pressed. “This is important.”

My ears were still tingling from the reptilian voice. “She... she said I would go west and face a god who had turned. I would retrieve what was stolen and see it safely returned.”

“I knew it.” Grover said.

Chiron didn’t look satisfied. “Anything else?”

I looked down and his frown deepened. I wasn’t going to keep secrets this time.

“She said someone I call a friend would betray me.” I said finally.

Grover jerked and the half-eaten soda can fell out of his mouth. Chiron looked grim.

He studied my face. “Very well, Percy. But know this: the Oracle’s words often have double meanings. Don’t dwell on them too much. The truth is not always clear until events come to pass.”

“Okay.” I said quietly. “So where do I go? Who’s this god in the west?”

“Ah, think, Percy.” Chiron said. “If Zeus and Poseidon weaken each other in a war, who stands to gain?”

The answer was obvious and I thought about my dreams, the voice that had spoken from under the ground and knew this time without prompting. “Hades.”

Chiron nodded. “The Lord of the Dead is the only possibility.”

Grover looked even more gobsmacked than before. “Whoa, wait. W-what?”

“A Fury came after Percy.” Chiron reminded him. “She watched the young man until she was sure of his identity, then tried to kill him. Furies obey only one lord: Hades.”

“Yes, but— but Hades hates all heroes,” Grover protested. “Especially if he has found out Percy is a son of Poseidon...”

“A hellhound got into the forest.” Chiron continued. “Those can only be summoned from the Fields of Punishment, and it had to be summoned by someone within the camp. Hades must have a spy here. He must suspect Poseidon will try to use Percy to clear his name. Hades would very much like to kill this young half-blood before he can take on the quest.”

“Great.” I muttered. “That’s two major gods who want to kill me.”

“But a quest to...” Grover swallowed. “I mean, couldn’t the master bolt be in some place like Maine? Maine’s very nice this time of year.”

“Hades sent a minion to steal the master bolt.” Chiron insisted. “He hid it in the Underworld, knowing full well that Zeus would blame Poseidon. I don’t pretend to understand the Lord of the Dead’s motives perfectly, or why he chose this time to start a war, but one thing is certain. Percy must go to the Underworld, find the master bolt, and reveal the truth.”

Grover was trembling. He’d started eating pinochle cards like potato chips.

He needed to complete a quest with me so he could get his searcher’s license, but he obviously didn’t want a quest like this.

“And I’m guessing Zeus and my dad can’t do anything about it even though they suspect?”

“Suspecting and knowing are indeed not the same.” Chiron said with an approving nod. “Besides, even if the other gods suspect Hades— and I imagine Poseidon does— they couldn’t retrieve the bolt themselves. Gods cannot cross each other’s territories except by invitation. That is another ancient rule. Heroes, on the other hand, have certain privileges. They can go anywhere, challenge anyone, as long as they’re bold enough and strong enough to do it. No god can be held responsible for a hero’s actions. Why do you think the gods always operate through humans?”

“So I’m being used?”

“I’m saying it’s no accident Poseidon has claimed you now. It’s a very risky gamble, but he’s in a desperate situation. He needs you.”

My dad needs me.

Just like before that sent a whirlwind of emotions through me but I knew what I felt this time. I knew what my father had sacrificed for me and how much he loved me so it filled me with warmth.

I looked at Chiron. “You’ve known I was Poseidon’s son all along, haven’t you?”

“I had my suspicions. As I said... I’ve spoken to the Oracle, too.”

I knew he was holding something back but if the Oracle had wanted me to know she would’ve told me and I trusted Chiron more than almost anyone so I just nodded.

“That’s right.” Chiron said. “Two companions may accompany you. Grover is one. The other has already volunteered, if you will accept her help.”

“Gee.” I said, sarcastically before looking directly at where Annabeth had been the whole time. “Who else would be stupid enough to volunteer for a quest like this?”

The air shimmered behind Chiron and Annabeth appeared, stuffing her Yankees cap into her back pocket.

“I’ve been waiting a long time for a quest, seaweed brain.” She said. “Athena is no fan of Poseidon, but if you’re going to save the world, I’m the best person to keep you from messing up.”

“I’m perfectly capable of not messing up on my own.” I said tartly. “Athena is wise and though there’s bad blood between them you can’t deny that Poseidon isn’t an idiot. He’s eons older and was the god of many things before the first Olympians began having children.”

Her cheeks colored. “Do you want my help or not?”

“Chiron said I could take two people and you and Grover are my only volunteers so it looks like I don’t have a choice.”

“Excellent.” Chiron said. “This afternoon, we can take you as far as the bus terminal in Manhattan. After that, you are on your own.”

Lightning flashed. Rain poured down on the meadows that were never supposed to have violent weather.

“No time to waste.” Chiron said. “I think you should all get packing.”

Chapter Text

It didn’t take me long to pack. I changed into a comfortable pair of jeans, a loose-fitting seafoam green t-shirt and a pair of sturdy boots.

I stuffed my mirror and a few changes of clothes into my little bag and I was as ready as I could be.

The camp store loaned me one hundred dollars in mortal money and twenty golden drachmas. They were beautiful as always, coins as big as Girl Scout cookies that had images of various Greek gods stamped on one side and the Empire State Building on the other.

The ancient mortal drachmas had been silver, Chiron told us, but Olympians never used less than pure gold. Chiron said the coins might come in handy for non-mortal transactions— they definitely would.

He gave Annabeth and me each a canteen of nectar and a Ziploc bag full of ambrosia squares, to be used only in emergencies, if we were seriously hurt. It was God food, Chiron reminded us. It would cure us of almost any injury, but it was lethal to mortals. Too much of it would make a half-blood very, very feverish. An overdose would burn us up, literally.

Annabeth was bringing her magic Yankees cap, which she told me had been a twelfth-birthday present from her mom. She carried a book on famous classical architecture, written in Ancient Greek, to read when she got bored, and a long bronze knife, hidden in her shirt sleeve.

Grover wore his fake feet and his pants to pass as human. He wore a green rasta-style cap, because when it rained his curly hair flattened and you could just see the tips of his horns. His bright orange backpack was full of scrap metal and apples to snack on.

In his pocket was a set of reed pipes his daddy goat had carved for him, even though he only knew two songs: Mozart’s Piano Concerto no. 12 and Hilary Duff ‘s “So Yesterday,” both of which sounded pretty bad on reed pipes.

Luke came running up the hill, carrying a pair of basketball shoes.

“Hey!” He panted. “Glad I caught you.”

Annabeth blushed, the way she always did when Luke was around and I barely managed to not roll my eyes.

“Just wanted to say good luck,” Luke told me. “And I thought... um, maybe you could use these.”

He handed me the sneakers, which looked pretty normal. They even smelled kind of normal.

Luke said, “Maia!”

White bird’s wings sprouted out of the heels, I pretended to be startled and dropped them where they flapped around on the ground until the wings disappeared.

“Awesome!” Grover said.

Luke smiled. “Those served me well when I was on my quest. Gift from Dad. Of course, I don’t use them much these days...” His expression turned sad.

His expression made my heart twinge as I remembered how he had done the right thing in the end but it didn’t change everything else he’d done and was still going to do by the looks of it but I smiled at him.

“Thanks Luke.” I said warmly. “These will definitely come in handy.”

“Listen, Percy...” Luke looked uncomfortable. “A lot of hopes are riding on you. So just... kill some monsters for me, okay?”

I nodded and he ruffled my hair with a sunny smile. Luke patted Grover’s head between his horns, then gave a good-bye hug to Annabeth, who looked like she might pass out.

After Luke was gone, I told her, “You’re hyperventilating.”

“Am not.”

“You let him capture the flag instead of you, didn’t you?”

“Oh... why do I want to go anywhere with you, Percy?”

She stomped down the other side of the hill, where a white SUV waited on the shoulder of the road. Argus followed, jingling his car keys.

I just giggled before picking up the shoes. I let my smile slip before turning to Chiron. “I can’t use these can I?”

He shook his head. “Luke meant well, Percy. But taking to the air... that would not be wise for you.”

I nodded before turning to Grover with a smile. “Hey, Grover. You want a magic item?”

His eyes lit up. “Me?”

Pretty soon we’d laced the sneakers over his fake feet.

“Maia!” He shouted.

He got off the ground okay, but then fell over sideways so his backpack dragged through the grass. The winged shoes kept bucking up and down like tiny broncos.

“Practice.” Chiron called after him. “You just need practice!”

“Aaaaa!” Grover went flying sideways down the hill like a possessed lawn mower, heading toward the van.

Before I could follow, Chiron caught my arm. “I should have trained you better, Percy,” he said. “If only I had more time. Hercules, Jason—they all got more training.”

“That’s okay. I just wish—” I paused, thinking of how I had felt before. Feeling like a brat wishing for something from my dad but I shook that thought away. “I do wish I had something from my dad though.”

“What am I thinking?” Chiron cried. “I can’t let you get away without this.”

He pulled a pen from his coat pocket and handed it to me. It was an ordinary disposable ballpoint, black ink, removeable cap. I smiled.

“This is the pen I used at the museum right?” I asked.

I took off the cap, and the pen grew longer and heavier in my hand. In half a second, I held a shimmering bronze sword with a double-edged blade, a leather-wrapped grip, and a flat hilt riveted with gold studs. It was the first weapon that actually felt balanced in my hand.

“The sword has a long and tragic history that we need not go into.” Chiron told me. “Its name is Anaklusmos.”

“Riptide.” I translated, surprised the Ancient Greek came so easily.

“Use it only for emergencies.” Chiron said, “and only against monsters. No hero should harm mortals unless absolutely necessary, of course, but this sword wouldn’t harm them in any case.”

I looked at the wickedly sharp blade and smiled. “Because celestial bronze doesn’t hurt mortals.”

Chiron looked pleased again.

“Correct. Celestial Bronze is forged by the Cyclopes, tempered in the heart of Mount Etna, cooled in the River Lethe. It’s deadly to monsters, to any creature from the Underworld, provided they don’t kill you first. But the blade will pass through mortals like an illusion. They simply are not important enough for the blade to kill. And I should warn you: as a demigod, you can be killed by either celestial or normal weapons. You are twice as vulnerable.”

“Good to know!” I said cheerfully, capping the sword and watching it turn back into a pen.

“You won’t be able to lose it either. It’s enchanted. It will always reappear in your pocket.”

“That’s even better, I’m horrible at losing things.” I said. “But won’t people notice me using a sword?”

Chiron smiled. “Mist is a powerful thing, Percy.”

“Mist? Grover said you used that to make everyone forget about Mrs. Dodd.”

Mist, which obscures the vision of humans. You will see things just as they are, being a half-blood, but humans will interpret things quite differently. Remarkable, really, the lengths to which humans will go to fit things into their version of reality.”

I put Riptide back in my pocket.

“Chiron...” I asked slowly. “When you say the gods are immortal... I mean, there was a time before them, right?”

“Four ages before them, actually. The Time of the Titans was the Fourth Age, sometimes called the Golden Age, which is definitely a misnomer. This, the time of Western civilization and the rule of Zeus, is the Fifth Age.”

“So what was it like... before the gods?”

Chiron pursed his lips. “Even I am not old enough to remember that child, but I know it was a time of darkness and savagery for mortals. Kronos, the lord of the Titans, called his reign the Golden Age because men lived innocent and free of all knowledge. But that was mere propaganda. The Titan king cared nothing for your kind except as appetizers or a source of cheap entertainment. It was only in the early reign of Lord Zeus, when Prometheus the good Titan brought fire to mankind, that your species began to progress, and even then Prometheus was branded a radical thinker. Zeus punished him severely, as you may recall. Of course, eventually the gods warmed to humans, and Western civilization was born.”

“But gods can still die. Or at least be locked away, or worse they could go to war and almost destroy the earth in the process.” I said glumly.

“Relax.” Chiron told me. “Keep a clear head. And remember, you may be about to prevent the biggest war in human history.”

I shook my head and nodded firmly.

When I got to the bottom of the hill, I looked back. Under the pine tree that used to be Thalia, daughter of Zeus, Chiron was now standing tall, free of his wheelchair, holding his bow high in salute.

I smiled and waved good-bye.

••♆••

Argus drove us out of the countryside and into western Long Island. It still felt a little odd anytime I left camp but I wasn’t staring at every modern thing in surprise. Annabeth and Grover were relaxed too.

I decided to bite the bullet and make a comment like last time.

“So far so good.” I told Annabeth. “Ten miles and not a single monster.”

She gave me an irritated look. “It’s bad luck to talk that way, seaweed brain.”

“Remind me again—why do you hate me so much?”

“I don’t hate you.”

“Could’ve fooled me.”

She folded her cap of invisibility. “Look... we’re just not supposed to get along, okay? Our parents are rivals.”

I gave her the most deadpan stare I could manage and she sighed.

“There’s so many reasons.” She insisted, going off on the same rant as last time. “One time my mom caught Poseidon with his girlfriend in Athena’s temple, which is hugely disrespectful. Another time, Athena and Poseidon competed to be the patron god for the city of Athens. Your dad created some stupid saltwater spring for his gift. My mom created the olive tree. The people saw that her gift was better, so they named the city after her.”

“Woooowww...” I drawled sarcastically and she glared at me. “Look he’s my godly parent but how your mom handled my dad meeting Medusa in her temple wasn’t cool.” I pointed out coldly.

Grover let out a startled bleat and Annabeth’s mouth dropped open. “Second, yes they found her gift to be more practical but millions of people a year come to see that ‘stupid saltwater fountain’. If the gifts had been offered today, in a time where there’s plenty of food, they’d probably pick my dads gift.”

In the front seat, Argus smiled. He didn’t say anything, but one blue eye on the back of his neck winked at me.

Annabeth was sitting with her jaw hanging open while Grover nervously looked between us. I ignored them both for the time being.

Traffic slowed us down in Queens. By the time we got into Manhattan it was sunset and starting to rain.

Argus dropped us at the Greyhound Station on the Upper East Side, not far from our old apartment with smelly Gabe. Taped to a mailbox was a soggy flyer with my picture on it: HAVE YOU SEEN THIS BOY?

“Great.” I sighed, pulling it down and showing it to Grover before wadding it up and tossing it in a nearby trashcan.

Argus unloaded our bags, made sure we got our bus tickets, then drove away, the eye on the back of his hand opening to watch us as he pulled out of the parking lot.

I gazed down the street to that old apartment, frowning slightly in the drizzling rain.

Grover shouldered his backpack. He gazed down the street in the direction I was looking. “You want to know why she married him, Percy? Before all that happened a few years ago?”

I stared at him. “Were you reading my mind or something?”

“Just your emotions.” He shrugged. “Guess I forgot to tell you satyrs can do that. You were thinking about your mom and your stepdad, right?”

I nodded, wondering what else Grover might’ve forgotten to tell me.

“Your mom married Gabe for you.” Grover told me. “You call him ‘Smelly,’ but you’ve got no idea. The guy has this aura... Yuck. I can still smell traces of it on some of your oldest things and it’s been years.”

“Ew.” I said, wrinkling my nose. “Tell me what they are when we get back and I’ll throw them out.”

“You should be grateful, Percy. Your stepfather smells so repulsively human he could mask the presence of any demigod. As soon as I smelt that in your house the first time, I knew: Gabe had been covering your scent for years. If you hadn’t lived with him every summer until a few years ago, you probably would’ve been found by monsters a long time ago. Your mom stayed with him to protect you. She was a smart lady. She must’ve loved you a lot to put up with that guy— if that makes you feel any better.”

“It doesn’t really. He was a horrible, abusive man to both of us.” I replied idly.

I felt no guilt this time around about not being honest with this. Just like before his main goal with this quest was to save his mom. Getting the bolt back for Zeus and stopping that conflict was just a bonus.

All I cared about was my mom. Hades had taken her unfairly, and Hades was going to give her back.

You will be betrayed by one who calls you a friend, the Oracle whispered in my mind. You will fail to save what matters most in the end.

The rain kept coming down.

We got restless waiting for the bus and decided to play some Hacky Sack with one of Grover’s apples. Annabeth was as good as ever but I did a lot better this time around.

The game ended when I tossed the apple toward Grover and it got too close to his mouth. In one mega goat bite, our Hacky Sack disappeared— core, stem, and all.

Grover blushed. He tried to apologize, but Annabeth and I were too busy cracking up.

Finally the bus came. As we stood in line to board, Grover started looking around, sniffing the air like he smelled his favorite school cafeteria delicacy—enchiladas.

“What is it?” I asked.

“I don’t know.” He said tensely. “Maybe it’s nothing.”

I knew what he was smelling though and mentally sighed.

I was still relieved when we finally got on board and found seats together in the back of the bus. We stowed our backpacks. Annabeth kept slapping her Yankees cap nervously against her thigh.

As the last passengers got on, Annabeth clamped her hand onto my knee. “Percy.”

An old lady had just boarded the bus. She wore a crumpled velvet dress, lace gloves, and a shapeless orange-knit hat that shadowed her face, and she carried a big paisley purse. When she tilted her head up, her black eyes glittered, and I huffed a sigh through my nose.

It was Mrs. Dodds. Older, more withered, but definitely the same evil face.

Behind her came two more old ladies: one in a green hat, one in a purple hat. Otherwise they looked exactly like Mrs. Dodds—same gnarled hands, paisley handbags, wrinkled velvet dresses.

They sat in the front row, right behind the driver. The two on the aisle crossed their legs over the walkway, making an X. It was casual enough, but it sent a clear message: nobody leaves.

The bus pulled out of the station, and we headed through the slick streets of Manhattan. “She didn’t stay dead long.” I commented idly. “I thought you said they could be dispelled for a lifetime.”

“I said if you’re lucky,” Annabeth said. “You’re obviously not.”

“All three of them.” Grover whimpered. “Di immortales!”

“It’s okay.” Annabeth said, obviously thinking hard. “The Furies. The three worst monsters from the Underworld. No problem. No problem. We’ll just slip out the windows.”

“They don’t open.” Grover moaned.

“A back exit?” She suggested.

There wasn’t one. Even if there had been, it wouldn’t have helped. By that time, we were on Ninth Avenue, heading for the Lincoln Tunnel.

“They won’t be afraid to attack.” I murmured, eyes fixed on them.

“Mortals don’t have good eyes,” Annabeth agreed. “Their brains can only process what they see through the Mist.”

“They’d have to notice something... right?”

She thought about it. “Hard to say. But we can’t count on mortals for help. Maybe an emergency exit in the roof...?”

We hit the Lincoln Tunnel, and the bus went dark except for the running lights down the aisle. It was eerily quiet without the sound of the rain.

Mrs. Dodds got up. In a flat voice, as if she’d rehearsed it, she announced to the whole bus: “I need to use the rest-room.”

“So do I.” Said the second sister.

“So do I.” Said the third sister.

They all started coming down the aisle.

“I’ve got it,” Annabeth said. “Percy, take my hat. You’re the one they want. Turn invisible and go up the aisle. Let them pass you. Maybe you can get to the front and get away.”

“But you guys—” I protested even as I grabbed it.

“There’s an outside chance they might not notice us.” Annabeth said. “You’re a son of one of the Big Three. Your smell might be overpowering.”

I nodded firmly and pulled the cap on. When I looked down, my body wasn’t there anymore.

I started creeping up the aisle. I managed to get up ten rows, then duck into an empty seat just as the Furies walked past.

Mrs. Dodds stopped, sniffing, and looked straight at me but I knew she didn’t see anything. She and her sisters kept going.

I made it to the front of the bus. We were almost through the Lincoln Tunnel now. I was about to press the emergency stop button when I heard hideous wailing from the back row.

The old ladies were not old ladies anymore. Their faces were still the same—I guess those couldn’t get any uglier— but their bodies had shriveled into leathery brown hag bodies with bat’s wings and hands and feet like gargoyle claws. Their handbags had turned into fiery whips.

The Furies surrounded Grover and Annabeth, lashing their whips, hissing: “Where is it? Where?”

The other people on the bus were screaming, cowering in their seats. They saw something, all right.

“He’s not here!” Annabeth yelled. “He’s gone!”

The Furies raised their whips.

Annabeth drew her bronze knife. Grover grabbed a tin can from his snack bag and prepared to throw it.

Still invisible, I grabbed the wheel from him and jerked it to the left. Everybody howled as they were thrown to the right, and I heard what I hoped was the sound of three Furies smashing against the windows.

“Hey!” The driver yelled. “Hey— whoa!”

We wrestled for the wheel. The bus slammed against the side of the tunnel, grinding metal, throwing sparks a mile behind us.

We careened out of the Lincoln Tunnel and back into the rainstorm, people and monsters tossed around the bus, cars plowed aside like bowling pins.

Somehow the driver found an exit. We shot off the highway, through half a dozen traffic lights, and ended up barreling down one of those New Jersey rural roads where you can’t believe there’s so much nothing right across the river from New York. There were woods to our left, the Hudson River to our right, and the driver seemed to be veering toward the river.

I hit the emergency brake.

The bus wailed, spun a full circle on the wet asphalt, and crashed into the trees. The emergency lights came on. The door flew open. The bus driver was the first one out, the passengers yelling as they stampeded after him. I stepped into the driver’s seat and let them pass.

The Furies regained their balance. They lashed their whips at Annabeth while she waved her knife and yelled in Ancient Greek, telling them to back off. Grover threw tin cans.

I pulled Riptide out of my pocked and took off the invisible cap. “Hey!”

The Furies turned, baring their yellow fangs at me. Mrs. Dodds stalked up the aisle, just as she used to do in class. Every time she flicked her whip, red flames danced along the barbed leather.

Her two ugly sisters hopped on top of the seats on either side of her and crawled toward me like huge nasty lizards.

“Perseus Jackson.” Mrs. Dodds said, in an accent that was definitely from somewhere farther south than Georgia. “You have offended the gods. You shall die.”

“I liked you better as a math teacher,” I told her.

She growled.

Annabeth and Grover moved up behind the Furies cautiously, looking for an opening.

I uncapped it and Riptide elongated into a shimmering double-edged sword.

The Furies hesitated.

Alecto had felt Riptide’s blade before. She obviously didn’t like seeing it again.

“Submit now.” She hissed. “And you will not suffer eternal torment.”

“Sure, I believe that.” I said sarcastically.

“Percy, look out!” Annabeth cried.

Alecto lashed her whip around my sword hand while the Furies on the either side lunged at me.

My hand felt like it was wrapped in molten lead, but I didn’t drop Riptide. I stuck the Fury on the left with its hilt, sending her toppling backward into a seat. I turned and sliced the Fury on the right. As soon as the blade connected with her neck, she screamed and exploded into dust. Annabeth had Alecto in a wrestler’s hold and yanked her backward while Grover ripped the whip out of her hands.

“Ow!” He yelled. “Ow! Hot! Hot!”

The Fury I’d hilt-slammed came at me again, talons ready, but I swung Riptide and she broke open like a piñata.

Alecto was trying to get Annabeth off her back. She kicked, clawed, hissed and bit, but Annabeth held on while Grover got her legs tied up in her own whip. Finally they both shoved her backward into the aisle. Alecto tried to get up, but she didn’t have room, so she kept falling down.

“Zeus will destroy you!” She promised. “Hades will have your soul!”

“Libet videre conantur!” I yelled. I didn’t say what I said before. I wasn’t a pre-teen this time pretending to be an Alpha. I would like to see them try.

Thunder shook the bus. The hair rose on the back of my neck.

“Get out!” Annabeth yelled at me. “Now!”

We rushed outside and found the other passengers wandering around in a daze, arguing with the driver, or running around in circles yelling, “We’re going to die!” A Hawaiian shirted tourist with a camera snapped my photograph before I could recap my sword.

“Our bags!” Grover realized. “We left our-”

BOOOOOM!

The windows of the bus exploded as the passengers ran for cover. Lightning tore a huge crater in the roof, but an angry wail from inside told me Alecto was not yet dead.

“Run!” Annabeth said. “She’s calling for reinforcements! We have to get out of here!”

We plunged into the woods as the rain poured down, the bus in flames behind us, and nothing but darkness ahead.

Chapter Text

In a way, it’s nice to know there are Greek gods out there, because you have somebody to blame when things go wrong.

For instance, when you’re walking away from a bus that’s just been attacked by monster hags and blown up by lightning, and it’s raining on top of everything else, most people might think that’s just really bad luck; when you’re a half-blood, you understand that some divine force really is trying to mess up your day.

So there we were, Annabeth and Grover and I, walking through the woods along the New Jersey riverbank, the glow of New York City making the night sky yellow behind us, and the smell of the Hudson reeking in our noses.

Grover was shivering and braying, his big goat eyes turned slit-pupiled and full of terror. “Three Kindly Ones. All three at once.”

The explosion of bus windows still rang in my ears but I shook it away. Annabeth kept pulling us along, saying: “Come on! The farther away we get, the better.”

“All our money was back there.” I reminded her. “And our food and clothes.”

“Well, maybe if you hadn’t decided to jump into the fight—”

“What did you want me to do? Let you get killed?” I asked, shocked at her audacity.

“You didn’t need to protect me, Percy. I would’ve been fine.”

“Sliced like sandwich bread.” Grover put in, “but fine.”

“Shut up, goat boy.” Annabeth snapped.

Grover brayed mournfully. “Tin cans... a perfectly good bag of tin cans.”

We sloshed across mushy ground, through nasty twisted trees that smelled like sour laundry.

After a few minutes, Annabeth fell into line next to me. “Look, I ...” Her voice faltered. “I appreciate your coming back for us, okay? That was really brave.”

“If you say so. It’s not like I could just stand there and do nothing.”

She was silent for a few more steps. “It’s just that if you died... aside from the fact that it would really suck for you, it would mean the quest was over. This may be my only chance to see the real world.”

The thunderstorm had finally let up. The city glow faded behind us, leaving us in almost total darkness. I couldn’t see anything of Annabeth except a glint of her blond hair.

“You haven’t left Camp Half-Blood since you were seven right?” I asked her.

“No... only short field trips. My dad—”

“He’s a history professor right?” I asked distractedly, trying to keep the conversation going.

“Yeah. It didn’t work out for me living at home. I mean, Camp Half-Blood is my home.” She was rushing her words out now, as if she were afraid somebody might try to stop her. “At camp you train and train. And that’s all cool and everything, but the real world is where the monsters are. That’s where you learn whether you’re any good or not.”

This time I definitely heard doubt in her voice.

“You’re pretty good with that knife.” I said.

“You think so?”

“Not everyone is brave enough to jump on the back of a fury.” I pointed out.

“You know.” she said. “Maybe I should tell you... Something funny back on the bus...”

Whatever she wanted to say was interrupted by a shrill toot-toot-toot, like the sound of an owl being tortured.

“Hey, my reed pipes still work!” Grover cried. “If I could just remember a ‘find path’ song, we could get out of these woods!”

He puffed out a few notes, but the tune still sounded suspiciously like Hilary Duff.

Instead of finding a path, I nimbly dodged a tree that had sprung out of nowhere and shot Grover a look.

After tripping and cursing and generally feeling miserable for another mile or so, we started to see light up ahead: the colors of a neon sign. I could smell food.

At  Half-Blood Hill, where we lived on grapes, bread, cheese, and extra-lean-cut nymph-prepared barbecue. It was delicious and honestly the smell of the grease was making me a bit queasy.

We kept walking until I saw a deserted two-lane road through the trees. On the other side was a closed-down gas station, a tattered billboard for a 1990s movie, and one open business, which was the source of the neon light and the smell of food.

Aunty Em’s loomed on the other side of the road. It looked the same as before. The main building was a long, low warehouse, surrounded by acres of statuary. The neon sign above the gate was still impossible for me to read but I knew what it said anyways.

To me, it looked like: Antyu Mes Gderan Gomen Meprouim.

Grover translated for us without prompting: “Aunty Em’s Garden Gnome Emporium.”

Flanking the entrance, as advertised, were two cement garden gnomes, ugly bearded little runts, smiling and waving, as if they were about to get their picture taken.

We crossed the street, following the smell of the hamburgers.

“Hey...” Grover warned.

“The lights are on inside.” Annabeth said. “Maybe it’s open.”

I nodded but let my steps slow and shared an uneasy glance with Grover.

“Are you crazy?” Grover said. “This place is weird.”

Annabeth ignored him and I felt a stab of guilt about how I’d acted the first time around. Completely entranced by Medusa’s thrall. Children of Poseidon were weak to it.

The front lot was a forest of statues: cement animals, cement children, even a cement satyr playing the pipes, which gave Grover the creeps.

“Bla-ha-ha!” He bleated. “Looks like my Uncle Ferdinand!”

We stopped at the warehouse door.

“Don’t knock.” Grover pleaded. “I smell monsters.”

“Your nose is clogged up from the Furies.” Annabeth told him. “All I smell is burgers. Aren’t you hungry?”

“Meat!” He said scornfully. “I’m a vegetarian.”

“The food at camp is probably better than what this smells like but I don’t like the feel of this place…”

Grover nodded before pleading; “Come on. Let’s leave. These statues are... looking at me.”

Then the door creaked open, and standing in front of us was a tall Middle Eastern woman—wearing a long black gown that covered everything but her hands, and her head was completely veiled.

Her eyes glinted behind a curtain of black gauze, but that was about all I could make out. Her coffee-colored hands looked old, but well-manicured and elegant. I shivered at the memory of them turning green and scaly with long talons.

Her accent sounded vaguely Middle Eastern, too. She said, “Children, it is too late to be out all alone. Where are your parents?”

“They’re... um...” Annabeth started to say.

“We’re orphans.” I put in quickly.

“Orphans?” The woman said. The word sounded alien in her mouth. “But, my dears! Surely not!”

“We got separated from the field trip but when it crashed during the storm.” I continued simply. No way was I going with that ridiculous circus story again. “Anyway, we’re lost. Is that food I smell?”

“Oh, my dears.” The woman said. “You must come in, poor children. I am Aunty Em. Go straight through to the back of the warehouse, please. There is a dining area.”

We thanked her and went inside.

Annabeth muttered to me, “Orphan field trip?”

“Always have a strategy, right?” I shot back.

“Your head is full of kelp.” She muttered and I just rolled my eyes. She hadn’t thought of anything this time or in the first time line but she still picked on anyone who did.

The warehouse was filled with more statues— people in all different poses, wearing all different outfits and with different expressions on their faces. I sent a silent prayer for their souls. They didn’t deserve that fate.

Nobody did.

I noticed Grover’s nervous whimpers much more easily this time, and the way the statues’ eyes seemed to follow me.

The click of the lock as Medusa shut the door behind us was clear as a bell.

The dining area was at the back of the warehouse, a fast-food counter with a grill, a soda fountain, a pretzel heater, and a nacho cheese dispenser. There were a few steel picnic tables out front.

“Please, sit down.” Aunty Em said.

“…Thank you.” I murmured, perching on the edge of the bench.

“Um.” Grover said reluctantly. “We don’t have any money, ma’am.”

Medusa only said, “No, no, children. No money. This is a special case, yes? It is my treat, for such nice orphans.”

“Thank you, ma’am.” Annabeth said.

Medusa stiffened, from what he knew was a centuries long grudge, but she relaxed just as quickly. I tried catching Annabeth’s eye but she was still under her thrall for the most part.

“Quite all right, Annabeth.” She said. “You have such beautiful gray eyes, child.”

I opened my mouth to ask how she knew her name but she disappeared behind the snack counter and started cooking. Before we knew it, she’d brought us plastic trays heaped with double cheeseburgers, vanilla shakes, and XXL servings of French fries.

Annabeth slurped her shake.

But Grover and I only picked at the fries, while he eyed the tray’s waxed paper liner, but he was too nervous to eat.

“What’s that hissing noise?” He asked.

I tilted my head bur Grover’s ears were still better than mine so even when I tried I couldn’t hear it. Annabeth shook her head.

“Hissing?” Medusa asked. “Perhaps you hear the deep-fryer oil. You have keen ears, Grover.”

“I take vitamins. For my ears.”

“That’s admirable.” She said. “But please, relax.”

Medusa ate nothing. She hadn’t taken off her headdress, even to cook, and now she sat forward and interlaced her fingers and watched us eat.

“So, you sell gnomes…” I said casually, staring at her unblinkingly.

“Oh, yes.” She said. “And animals. And people. Anything for the garden. Custom orders. Statuary is very popular, you know.”

“A lot of business on this road?”

“Not so much, no. Since the highway was built... most cars, they do not go this way now. I must cherish every customer I get.”

I turned, and looked at the statue of the girl holding an Easter basket. Her face was still wrong with her face. She looked startled, verging on terrified.

“Ah.” Aunty Em said sadly. “You notice some of my creations do not turn out well. They are marred. They do not sell. The face is the hardest to get right. Always the face.”

“Hmmm...” I hummed, trying to decide when the best time to strike would be.

“Oh, yes. Once upon a time, I had two sisters to help me in the business, but they have passed on, and Aunty Em is alone. I have only my statues. This is why I make them, you see. They are my company.” The sadness in her voice sounded so deep and so real that I couldn’t help feeling sorry for her.

Annabeth had stopped eating. She sat forward and said, “Two sisters?”

“It’s a terrible story.” Aunty Em said. “Not one for children, really. You see, Annabeth, a bad woman was jealous of me, long ago, when I was young. I had a... a boyfriend, you know, and this bad woman was determined to break us apart. She caused a terrible accident. My sisters stayed by me. They shared my bad fortune as long as they could, but eventually they passed on. They faded away. I alone have survived, but at a price. Such a price.”

She was laying on the enchantment thickly, I could feel the pressure behind my eyes.

“Percy?” Annabeth was shaking me to get my attention. “Maybe we should go. I mean, we still have to find a way back to the orphanage.”

She sounded tense. Grover was eating the waxed paper off the tray now while Medusa kept talking.

“Such beautiful gray eyes.” She told Annabeth again. “My, yes, it has been a long time since I’ve seen gray eyes like those.”

She reached out as if to stroke Annabeth’s cheek, but Annabeth stood up abruptly.

“We really should go.”

“Yes!” Grover swallowed his waxed paper and stood up. “Let’s find a way back now that we’re not so hungry.”

I didn’t want to leave. I felt full and content. Aunty Em was so nice. I wanted to stay with her a while.

“Please, dears.” Medusa pleaded. “I so rarely get to be with children. Before you go, won’t you at least sit for a pose?”

“A pose?” Annabeth asked warily.

“A photograph. I will use it to model a new statue set. Children are so popular, you see. Everyone loves children.”

Annabeth shifted her weight from foot to foot. “I don’t think we can, ma’am. Come on, Percy—”

“Sure we can.” I said. I glanced at her, hoping she caught my drift but she was just glaring at me.

“Yes, Annabeth.” Medusa purred. “No harm.”

Annabeth allowed Medusa to lead us back out the front door, into the garden of statues.

She had us sit at the park bench next to the stature of Grover’s uncle. “Now.” She said. “I’ll just position you correctly. The young girl in the middle, I think, and the two young gentlemen on either side.”

“Not much light for a photo.” I remarked, my hand slipping into my pocket and closing around Riptide.

“Oh, enough,” Aunty Em said. “Enough for us to see each other, yes?”

“Where’s your camera?” Grover asked. I jumped up immediately.

“Let me grab it for you.” I said cheerfully, walking towards her quickly.

Medusa took a startled step back and began protesting; “Now really dears that isn’t necess-”

She didn’t get to finish her sentence as I uncapped Riptide and neatly sliced her head off in one swift motion before there was a hiss like wind rushing out of a cavern— the sound of a monster disintegrating.

Something fell to the ground next to my foot. I could feel warm ooze soaking into the sole of my boot, little dying snake heads tugging at my shoelaces.

“Oh, yuck.” Grover said. His eyes were tightly closed, but I guess he could hear the thing gurgling and steaming. “Mega-yuck.”

I quickly grabbed one of the little ornamental balls and double checked that her head was covered by her veil. Thankfully it was.

“It’s safe to look.” I called out.

Annabeth came up to me an shakily picked it up. It was still dripping green juice.

“Are you okay?” she asked me, her voice trembling.

“Yeah.” I sighed, looking at the dripping head. “I guess the head is my spoil? Like the Minotaur horn?”

“Yes, but don’t unwrap the head. It can still petrify you.” She warned. I gave her a look that said, ‘I’m not an idiot’ but she ignored.

Together, the three of us went back to the warehouse.

We found some old plastic grocery bags behind the snack counter and double-wrapped Medusa’s head. We plopped it on the table where we’d been sitting and sat around it, too exhausted to speak.

Finally I said, “So we have Athena to thank for this monster?”

Annabeth flashed me an irritated look. “Your dad, actually. Don’t you remember? Medusa was Poseidon’s girlfriend. They decided to meet in my mother’s temple. That’s why Athena turned her into a monster. Medusa and her two sisters who had helped her get into the temple, they became the three gorgons. That’s why Medusa wanted to slice me up, but she wanted to preserve you as a nice statue. She’s still sweet on your dad. You probably reminded her of him.”

I glared at her. “Like I said before; the way your mom handled that could’ve been better! She didn’t have to turn her into one of the most feared monsters!”

Annabeth straightened. Her face flushed and eyes snapping grey sparks but I cut her off before she could say anything.

“Forget it.” I said. “It’s over and done with.”

“You’re insufferable.”

“You’re—”

“Hey!” Grover interrupted. “You two are giving me a migraine, and satyrs don’t even get migraines. What are we going to do with the head?”

I stared at the thing. One little snake was hanging out of a hole in the plastic. The words printed on the side of the bag said: We appreciate your business!

I decided to still do what I did last time. Mom didn’t need to turn smelly Gabe into a statue this time but I wasn’t always going to be young enough to thumb my nose at the gods and get away with it.

I got up. “I’ll be back.”

“Percy.” Annabeth called after me. “What are you—”

I went straight to Medusa’s office and found the Underworld’s billing address. DOA Recording Studios, West Hollywood, California. I folded up the bill and stuffed it in my pocket.

In the cash register I found twenty dollars, a handful of drachmas, and some packing slips for Hermes Overnight Express, each with a little leather bag attached for coins. I grabbed everything and picked up a box.

I went back to the picnic table, packed up Medusa’s head, and filled out a delivery slip:

The Gods

Mount Olympus

600th Floor,

Empire State Building

New York, NY

With best wishes,

Percy Jackson

“They’re not going to like that.” Grover warned. “They’ll think you’re impertinent.”

I poured some golden drachmas in the pouch. As soon as I closed it, there was a sound like a cash register. The package floated off the table and disappeared with a pop!

“I am impertinent.” I said with a cheeky smile.

I looked at Annabeth, daring her to criticize.

She didn’t. She did glare at me but there wasn’t anything she could do. It was my spoil and I could do what I wanted with it. “Come on.” She muttered. “We need a new plan.”

••♆••

We camped out in the woods again, a hundred yards from the main road, in a marshy clearing that local kids had obviously been using for parties. The ground was littered with flattened soda cans and fast-food wrappers.

We’d taken some food and blankets from Aunty Em’s, but we didn’t dare light a fire to dry our damp clothes. The Furies and Medusa had provided enough excitement for one day. We didn’t want to attract anything else.

We decided to sleep in shifts. I volunteered to take first watch.

Annabeth curled up on the blankets and was snoring as soon as her head hit the ground. Grover fluttered with his flying shoes to the lowest bough of a tree, put his back to the trunk, and stared at the night sky.

“Go ahead and sleep.” I told him. “I’ll wake you if there’s trouble.” He nodded, but still didn’t close his eyes. “It makes me sad, Percy.”

“What does?”

“This makes me sad.” He pointed at all the garbage on the ground. “And the sky. You can’t even see the stars. They’ve polluted the sky. This is a terrible time to be a satyr.”

I nodded. “I feel the same way about the Sea. Rivers and lakes too. Never understood why seeing dirty water bothered me soi much but I guess it makes sense now.”

He nodded morosely. “Your species is clogging up the world so fast... ah, never mind. It’s useless to lecture a human. At the rate things are going, I’ll never find Pan.”

“Pan? The God of the Wild?”

“Yes!” He cried passionately. “The great god Pan! It’s what I want my searchers license for!”

A strange breeze rustled through the clearing, temporarily overpowering the stink of trash and muck. It brought the smell of berries and wildflowers and clean rainwater, things that might’ve once been in these woods.

I breathed in deeply, to savor the scent of the wild while I could.

“Tell me about the search.” I said.

Grover looked at me cautiously, as if he were afraid I was just making fun. I gave him a small glare and he gave me a sheepish look back.

“The God of Wild Places disappeared two thousand years ago.” He said. “A sailor off the coast of Ephesos heard a mysterious voice crying out from the shore, ‘Tell them that the great god Pan has died!’ When humans heard the news, they believed it. They’ve been pillaging Pan’s kingdom ever since. But for the satyrs, Pan was our lord and master. He protected us and the wild places of the earth. We refuse to believe that he died. In every generation, the bravest satyrs pledge their lives to finding Pan. They search the earth, exploring all the wildest places, hoping to find where he is hidden, and wake him from his sleep.”

“And you want to be a searcher.”

“It’s my life’s dream.” He said. “My father was a searcher. And my Uncle Ferdinand... the statue you saw back there—”

“I’m sorry.” I said sincerely.

Grover shook his head. “Uncle Ferdinand knew the risks. So did my dad. But I’ll succeed. I’ll be the first searcher to return alive.”

“The first?”

Grover took his reed pipes out of his pocket. “No searcher has ever come back. Once they set out, they disappear. They’re never seen alive again.”

“Not once in two thousand years?”

“No.”

“And your dad? You have no idea what happened to him?”

“None.”

“But you still want to go.” I said, amazed.

“Every searcher does. Finding him is the only thing that keeps us from despair when we look at what humans have done to the world. I have to believe Pan can still be awakened.”

I stared at the orange haze of the sky and listened to the breeze rustling the leaves.

“You’ll be the one to find Pan Grover.” I said firmly. “I know it.”

Grover almost fell off his branch at what I said but he smiled at me anyways.

“How are we going to get into the Underworld?” I asked him, changing the subject to something not necessarily less heavy but more immediate. “I mean, what chance do we have against a god?”

“I don’t know.” He admitted. “But back at Medusa’s, when you were searching her office? Annabeth was telling me—”

“Will she have another plan that involves me being maimed or leaving you to die?”

“Don’t be so hard on her, Percy. She’s had a tough life, but she’s a good person. After all, she forgave me....” His voice faltered.

“Forgave you for what?” I asked. Suddenly, Grover seemed very interested in playing notes on his pipes.

“Wait a minute,” I said. “Your first keeper job was five years ago. Annabeth has been at camp five years. She wasn’t... You said your first assignment that went wrong—”

“I can’t talk about it.” Grover said, and his quivering lower lip suggested he’d start crying if I pressed him, not that I ever would. “But as I was saying, back at Medusa’s, Annabeth and I agreed there’s something strange going on with this quest. Something isn’t what it seems.”

“I am getting blamed for stealing a thunderbolt that someone else stole.” I pointed out.

“That’s not what I mean,” Grover said. “The Fur— The Kindly Ones were sort of holding back. Like Mrs. Dodds at Yancy Academy... why did she wait so long to try to kill you? Then on the bus, they just weren’t as aggressive as they could’ve been.”

“That’s true...” I murmured.

Grover nodded. “They were screeching at us: ‘Where is it? Where?’”

“They weren’t asking; ‘Where is he’.” I said.

“Right... Annabeth and I, we both got the feeling they weren’t asking about a person. They said ‘Where is it?’ They seemed to be asking about an object.”

“Lord Hades doesn’t have the Bolt either.” I said flatly.

“I think we’ve misunderstood something about this quest, and we only have nine days to find the master bolt....” He looked at me like he was hoping for answers, I had them but I knew it would be a disaster to say anything.

“I haven’t been honest with you.” I said bluntly. “I don’t care about the master bolt. I agreed to go to the Underworld so I could bring back my mother.”

Grover blew a soft note on his pipes. “I know that, Percy. But are you sure that’s the only reason?”

“I am happy about my father being alive...” I admitted.

Grover gazed down from his tree branch. “I know Percy, I’m not as smart as Annabeth. I’m not as brave as you. But I’m pretty good at reading emotions. You’re glad your dad is alive. You feel good that he’s claimed you, and part of you wants to make him proud too. That’s why you mailed Medusa’s head to Olympus. You wanted him to notice what you’d done.”

“A little.” I said with a small laugh. “It’s also not everyday I can do something to get back at them for this stupid quest.”

Grover grinned at me before looking at the night sky, like he was thinking about that problem. “How about I take first watch, huh? You get some sleep.”

I wanted to protest, but he started to play Mozart, soft and sweet, and I turned away, my eyes stinging. After a few bars of Piano Concerto no. 12, I was asleep.

Chapter Text

In my dreams, I stood in a dark cavern before a gaping pit. Gray mist creatures churned all around me, whispering rags of smoke that I somehow knew were the spirits of the dead. They tugged at my clothes, trying to pull me back, but I felt compelled to walk forward to the very edge of the chasm.

Looking down made me dizzy.

The pit yawned so wide and was so completely black, I knew it must be bottomless. But I could feel Kronos trying to rise from the abyss, something huge and evil. ‘The little hero…’ An amused voice echoed far down in the darkness. ‘Too weak, too young, but perhaps you will do.’

His voice felt ancient— cold and heavy. It wrapped around me like sheets of lead. ‘They have misled you, boy.’ It said. ‘Barter with me. I will give you what you want.’

A shimmering image hovered over the void: my mother, frozen at the moment she’d dissolved in a shower of gold. Her face was distorted with pain, as if the Minotaur were still squeezing her neck. Her eyes looked directly at me, pleading: Go!

I didn’t bother trying to make a sound.

Cold laughter echoed from the chasm.

An invisible force pulled me forward. It would drag me into the pit unless I stood firm. ‘Help me rise, boy. The voice became hungrier. Bring me the bolt. Strike a blow against the treacherous gods!’

The spirits of the dead whispered around me, No! Wake!

The image of my mother began to fade. The thing in the pit tightened its unseen grip around me.

It wasn’t interested in pulling me in. It was using me to pull itself out. ‘Good.’ It murmured. ‘Good.’

Wake! the dead whispered. Wake!

Someone was shaking me.

My eyes opened, and it was daylight.

“Well.” Annabeth said. “The zombie lives.”

I was trembling from the dream. I could still feel the grip of Kronos around my chest. “How long was I asleep?”

“Long enough for me to cook breakfast.” Annabeth tossed me a bag of nacho-flavored corn chips from Aunty Em’s snack bar. “And Grover went exploring. Look, he found a friend.” My eyes had trouble focusing.

Grover was sitting cross-legged on a blanket with something fuzzy in his lap, a dirty, unnaturally pink stuffed animal.

No. It wasn’t a stuffed animal. It was a pink poodle.

The poodle yapped at me suspiciously. Grover said, “No, he’s not.”

I blinked. “Are you... talking to the poodle Grover?”

The poodle growled.

“This thing.” Grover said cheerfully. “Is our ticket west. Be nice to him.”

“You can talk to animals?” I asked, tilting my head.

Grover ignored the question. “Percy, meet Gladiola. Gladiola, Percy.” I stared at Annabeth, figuring she’d crack up at this practical joke they were playing on me, but she looked deadly serious.

“Well Good Morning Gladiola.” I chirped, the poodle was still growing so I just looked at Grover helplessly.

Grover explained that he’d come across Gladiola in the woods and they’d struck up a conversation. The poodle had run away from a rich local family, who’d posted a $200 reward for his return. Gladiola didn’t really want to go back to his family, but he was willing to if it meant helping Grover.

“How does Gladiola know about the reward?” I asked.

“So we turn in Gladiola.” Annabeth explained in her best strategy voice, “We get money, and we buy tickets to Los Angeles. Simple.”

I thought about my dream— the whispering voices of the dead, Kronos in the chasm, and my mother’s face, shimmering as it dissolved into gold. All that might be waiting for me in the West.

“Not another bus at least.” I sighed.

“No.” Annabeth agreed.

She pointed downhill, toward train tracks we hadn’t been able to see last night in the dark.

“There’s an Amtrak station half a mile that way. According to Gladiola, the westbound train leaves at noon.”

••♆••

We spent two days on the Amtrak train, heading west through hills, over rivers, past amber waves of grain.

We weren’t attacked once, but I didn’t relax.

I tried to keep a low profile because my name and picture were splattered over the front pages of several East Coast newspapers. The Trenton Register-News showed a photo taken by a tourist as I got off the Greyhound bus. I still had a wild look in my eyes. My sword was a metallic blur in my hands. It might’ve been a baseball bat or a lacrosse stick.

The picture’s caption read:

Twelve-year-old Percy Jackson, Disappeared in Long Island with his mother two weeks ago, is shown here fleeing from the bus where he was accosted by elderly female passengers. The bus exploded on an east New Jersey roadside shortly after Jackson fled the scene. Based on eyewitness accounts, police believe the boy may be traveling with two other teenagers.

A number for an information hotline was listed below

“Don’t worry.” Annabeth told me. “Mortal police could never find us.” But she didn’t sound so sure.

The rest of the day I spent alternately pacing the length of the train (because I had a really hard time sitting still) or looking out the windows.

Once, I spotted a family of centaurs galloping across a wheat field, bows at the ready, as they hunted lunch. The little boy centaur, who was the size of a second-grader on a pony, caught my eye and waved. I looked around the passenger car, but nobody else had noticed. The adult riders all had their faces buried in laptop computers or magazines.

Towards evening, I saw something huge moving through the woods. I knew it was the Nemean Lion and I was glad I wouldn’t be facing it for awhile. Its fur glinted gold in the evening light. Then it leaped through the trees and was gone.

Our reward money for returning Gladiola the poodle had only been enough to purchase tickets as far as Denver. We couldn’t get berths in the sleeper car, so we dozed in our seats. My neck got stiff but I tried to sleep through it. I didn’t care if I drooled in front of Annabeth.

Grover kept snoring and bleating and waking me up. Once, he shuffled around and his fake foot fell off. Annabeth and I had to stick it back on before any of the other passengers noticed.

“So.” Annabeth asked me, once we’d gotten Grover’s sneaker readjusted. “Who wants your help?”

“What do you mean?”

“When you were asleep just now, you mumbled, ‘I won’t help you.’ Who were you dreaming about?”

I refused to say anything this time and just gazed out the window. Annabeth stared at me for several minutes before turning away.

I thought about what Grover had told me, that the Furies on the bus seemed to have been looking for something.

Where is it? Where?

At least I knew what it was this time. Hades Helm of Darkness. Missing along side the Master Bolt. Not that he said anything.

Maybe Grover sensed my emotions. He snorted in his sleep, muttered something about vegetables, and turned his head.

Annabeth readjusted his cap so it covered his horns. “Percy, you can’t barter with Hades. You know that, right? He’s deceitful, heartless, and greedy. I don’t care if his Kindly Ones weren’t as aggressive this time—”

“This time?” I asked. “You mean you’ve run into them before?”

I knew she had, when she was traveling with Thalia and Luke

Her hand crept up to her necklace. She fingered a glazed white bead painted with the image of a pine tree, one of her clay end-of-summer tokens. “Let’s just say I’ve got no love for the Lord of the Dead. You can’t be tempted to make a deal for your mom.”

“What would you do if it was your dad?” I asked, knowing the answer already but giving her the chance to talk. As much as she disliked me she did enjoy talking.

“That’s easy.” She said. “I’d leave him to rot.”

“You’re not serious?” I asked flatly.

Annabeth’s gray eyes fixed on me. She wore the same expression she’d worn in the woods at camp, the moment she drew her sword against the hellhound.

“My dad’s resented me since the day I was born, Percy.” She said. “He never wanted a baby. When he got me, he asked Athena to take me back and raise me on Olympus because he was too busy with his work. She wasn’t happy about that. She told him heroes had to be raised by their mortal parent.”

“I guess you wouldn’t be born in a hospital...” I remarked.

“I appeared on my father’s doorstep, in a golden cradle, carried down from Olympus by Zephyr the West Wind. You’d think my dad would remember that as a miracle, right? Like, maybe he’d take some digital photos or something. But he always talked about my arrival as if it were the most inconvenient thing that had ever happened to him. When I was five he got married and totally forgot about Athena. He got a ‘regular’ mortal wife, and had two ‘regular’ mortal kids, and tried to pretend I didn’t exist.”

I stared out the train window. The lights of a sleeping town were drifting by. Nothing I could say or do would make her feel better, not really but…

“You should try reaching out. I know it may seem like he doesn’t care but you’d be surprised how much your parent can love you.”

Annabeth didn’t say anything and kept worrying at her necklace. She was pinching the gold college ring that hung with the beads. She didn’t really hate her father, her keeping his ring all these years showed that.

“He doesn’t care about me.” She said. “His wife— my stepmom— treated me like a freak. She wouldn’t let me play with her children. My dad went along with her. Whenever something dangerous happened—you know, something with monsters—they would both look at me resentfully, like, ‘How dare you put our family at risk.’ Finally, I took the hint. I wasn’t wanted. I ran away.”

“When you were Seven.”

She nodded.

“But... you couldn’t have gotten all the way to Half-Blood Hill by yourself.”

“Not alone, no. Athena watched over me, guided me toward help. I made a couple of unexpected friends who took care of me, for a short time, anyway.”

Annabeth was lost in sad memories. I listened to the sound of Grover snoring and gazed out the train windows as the dark fields of Ohio raced by.

Toward the end of our second day on the train, June 13, eight days before the summer solstice, we passed through some golden hills and over the Mississippi River into St. Louis.

Annabeth craned her neck to see the Gateway Arch, Architect obsessed as always.

“I want to do that.” She sighed.

“What?” I asked.

“Build something like that. You ever see the Parthenon, Percy?”

“Only in pictures.” I shrugged

“Someday, I’m going to see it in person. I’m going to build the greatest monument to the gods, ever. Something that’ll last a thousand years.”

I laughed. “You? An architect? The idea of Annabeth trying to sit quietly and draw all day is a weird one.”

Her cheeks flushed. “Yes, an architect. Athena expects her children to create things, not just tear them down, like a certain god of earthquakes I could mention.”

I watched the churning brown water of the Mississippi below.

“Sorry.” Annabeth said. “That was mean.”

“My father created things to.” I said coldly. “Horses for one. If he hadn’t then your mothers Chariot wouldn’t have even worked. Why don’t we work together like they did and you stop picking fights with me?”

Annabeth had to think about it. We rode into the city, Annabeth watching as the Arch disappeared behind a hotel.

“I suppose.” She said at last. I rolled my eyes at her reluctance.

We pulled into the Amtrak station downtown. The intercom told us we’d have a three-hour layover before departing for Denver.

Grover stretched. Before he was even fully awake, he said, “Food.”

“Come on, goat boy.” Annabeth said. “Sightseeing.”

“Sightseeing?”

“The Gateway Arch.” She said. “This may be my only chance to ride to the top. Are you coming or not?”

Grover and I exchanged looks.

I wanted to say no so I did.

“You really think me going that high into the sky is a good idea.”

Annabeth’s eyes looked troubled but the stubborn set of her jaw stayed the same.

Grover shrugged. “As long as there’s a snack bar without monsters.”

The Arch was about a mile from the train station. Late in the day the lines to get in weren’t that long.

We threaded our way through the underground museum, looking at covered wagons and other junk from the 1800s. It wasn’t all that thrilling, but Annabeth kept telling us interesting facts about how the Arch was built, and Grover kept passing me jelly beans, so I  just waited patiently for the hammer to fall.

“You smell anything?” I murmured to Grover.

He took his nose out of the jelly-bean bag long enough to sniff. “Underground.” He said distastefully. “Underground air always smells like monsters. Probably doesn’t mean anything.”

But just like before it felt wrong to me. I had a feeling we shouldn’t be here. At least this time I knew why.

“Guys.” I said. “You know the gods’ symbols of power?”

Annabeth had been in the middle of reading about the construction equipment used to build the Arch, but she looked over. “Yeah?”

“Well… Our friend… downstairs…”

Grover cleared his throat nervously at the mention of Hades.

“He has his Helm of Darkness right? Where he can become invisible?”

Annabeth nodded. “Yeah, that’s his symbol of power. I saw it next to his seat during the winter solstice council meeting.”

“He was there?” I asked.

She nodded. “It’s the only time he’s allowed to visit Olympus— the darkest day of the year. But his helm is a lot more powerful than my invisibility hat, if what I’ve heard is true...”

“It allows him to become darkness.” Grover confirmed. “He can melt into shadow or pass through walls. He can’t be touched, or seen, or heard. And he can radiate fear so intense it can drive you insane or stop your heart. Why do you think all rational creatures fear the dark?”

“Then... how do we know he’s not here right now, watching us?” I asked.

Annabeth and Grover exchanged looks.

“We don’t.” Grover said.

I just frowned worriedly and sighed when I saw the tiny car to take us to the top of the Arch. I still hate confined places.

We got shoehorned into the car with this big fat lady and her dog, a Chihuahua with a rhinestone collar. I moved as far away from her as possible in the tiny car. I knew I couldn’t avoid the fight but I didn’t want it to start in here.

We started going up, inside the Arch.

“No parents?” The Mother of Monsters asked. Her beady eyes looking over me greedily; her teeth were still pointy and coffee-stained. She wore the same floppy denim hat and denim dress that bulged so much, she looked like a blue-jean blimp.

“They’re below.” Annabeth told her. “Scared of heights.”

“Oh, the poor darlings.”

The Chihuahua growled. The woman said, “Now, now, sonny. Behave.” The dog had beady eyes like its owner, intelligent and vicious. I said nothing.

At the top of the Arch, the observation deck reminded me of a tin can with carpeting. Rows of tiny windows looked out over the city on one side and the river on the other.

The view was okay, but if there’s anything I like less than a confined space, it’s a confined space six hundred feet in the air. I was ready to go pretty quick.

Annabeth kept talking about structural supports, and how she would’ve made the windows bigger, and designed a see-through floor. She probably could’ve stayed up there for hours, but luckily for me the park ranger announced that the observation deck would be closing in a few minutes.

I steered Grover and Annabeth toward the exit, loaded them into the elevator with two other passengers.

The park ranger said, “Next car, sir.”

“We’ll get out.” Annabeth said. “We’ll wait with you.”

I just smiled. “It’s okay. I’ll see you guys at the bottom.”

Grover and Annabeth both looked nervous, but they let the elevator door slide shut. Their car disappeared down the ramp.

Now the only people left on the observation deck were me, a little boy with his parents, the park ranger, and the fat lady with her Chihuahua.

I smiled at Echidna. She smiled back, her forked tongue flickering between her teeth before her Chihuahua jumped down and started yapping at me.

“Now, now, sonny.” The lady said. “Does this look like a good time? We have all these nice people here.”

“Doggie!” Said the little boy. “Look, a doggie!”

His parents pulled him back.

The Chihuahua bared his teeth at me, foam dripping from his black lips.

“Well, son.” The fat lady sighed. “If you insist.”

She rolled up her denim sleeves, revealing that the skin of her arms was scaly and green. When she smiled, I saw that her teeth were fangs now. The pupils of her eyes were sideways slits, like a reptile’s.

The Chihuahua barked louder, and with each bark, it grew. First to the size of a Doberman, then to a lion. The bark became a roar.

The little boy screamed. His parents pulled him back toward the exit, straight into the park ranger, who stood, paralyzed, gaping at the monster.

The Chimera was now so tall its back rubbed against the roof. It had the head of a lion with a blood-caked mane, the body and hooves of a giant goat, and a serpent for a tail, a ten-foot-long diamondback growing right out of its shaggy behind.

The rhinestone dog collar still hung around its neck, and the plate-sized dog tag was now easy to read: Chimera— Rabid, Fire-Breathing, Poisonous— If found, Please call Tartarus— Ext. 954.

The snake lady made a hissing noise that might’ve been laughter. “Be honored, Percy Jackson. Lord Zeus rarely allows me to test a hero with one of my brood. For I am the Mother of Monsters, the terrible Echidna!”

I stared at her.

“Not very smart to out the Lord of the Skies like that. He’s not supposed to interfere with Mortals.” I pointed out.

She howled, her reptilian face turning brown and green with rage. “How dare you! For that, Percy Jackson, my son shall destroy you!”

The Chimera charged, its lion teeth gnashing. I managed to leap aside and dodge the bite.

I ended up next to the family and the park ranger, who were all screaming now, trying to pry open the emergency exit doors.

I couldn’t let them get hurt. I uncapped my sword, ran to the other side of the deck, and yelled, “Hey, Chihuahua!”

The Chimera turned and before I could do anything, it opened its mouth, emitting a stench like the world’s largest barbecue pit, and shot a column of flame straight at me.

I dove through the explosion. The carpet burst into flames; the heat was so intense.

Where I had been standing a moment before was a ragged hole in the side of the Arch, with melted metal steaming around the edges.

Riptide was now a shining bronze blade in my hands, and as the Chimera turned, I slashed at its neck. I knew what would happen but my best bet would still be to fall into the Mississippi.

The blade sparked harmlessly off the dog collar. I staggered regain my balance, and even though I could see it, I let serpent tail wrap around my leg and sank its fangs into my calf.

My whole leg was on fire and the serpent tail wrapped around my ankles and pulled me off balance, and my blade flew out of my hand, spinning out of the hole in the Arch and down toward the Mississippi River.

I managed to get to my feet, but I knew I had lost. I was weaponless. I could feel deadly poison racing up to my chest. Chiron said that Anaklusmos would always return to me, but it hadn’t yet.

I backed into the hole in the wall. The Chimera advanced, growling, smoke curling from its lips. The snake lady, Echidna, cackled. “They don’t make heroes like they used to, eh, son?”

The monster growled. It seemed in no hurry to finish me off now that it thought I was beaten.

My whole body was on fire. My head felt dizzy. I hated poison.

“If you are the son of Poseidon.” Echidna hissed. “You would not fear water. Jump, Percy Jackson. Show me that water will not harm you. Jump and retrieve your sword. Prove your bloodline.”

The Chimera’s mouth glowed red, heating up for another blast.

“You have no faith.” Echidna told me. “You do not trust the gods. I cannot blame you, little coward. Better you die now. The gods are faithless. The poison is in your heart.”

I down at the water. I remembered the warm glow of my father’s smile when I was a baby. He had come to see me. He saved me from Gabe. I knew from everything that had happened in the previous time line that he loved me

“Die, faithless one.” Echidna rasped, and the Chimera sent a column of flame toward my face.

“Who said I was faithless?” I asked with a smile before falling backwards and plummeting to the water below.

Chapter Text

The river raced toward me at the speed of a truck. Wind ripped the breath from my lungs. Steeples and skyscrapers and bridges tumbled in and out of my vision.

And then: Flaaa-boooom!

A whiteout of bubbles. I sank through the murk and was still thankful my impact with the water hadn’t hurt. I was falling slowly now, bubbles trickling up through my fingers. I settled on the river bottom soundlessly. A catfish the size of my stepfather lurched away into the gloom. Clouds of silt and disgusting garbage— beer bottles, old shoes, plastic bags— swirled up all around me.

I scowled at how disgusting the water was and stood for a few minutes in the thigh-deep mud before sighing a stream of bubbles.

A woman’s voice, a voice that sounded a bit like my mother floated through the water; Percy, what do you say?

“Thanks dad...” I said with a smile. My voice still sounded strange underwater. Like listening to a recording.

There was no response. Just the dark drift of garbage downriver, the enormous catfish gliding by, the flash of sunset on the water’s surface far above, turning everything the color of butterscotch.

Fump-fump-fump. A riverboat’s paddlewheel churned above me, swirling the silt around.

And not five feet in front of me, was my sword, its gleaming bronze hilt sticking up in the mud.

I heard that woman’s voice again: Percy, take the sword. Your father believes in you. Her words seemed to come from everywhere, rippling through the water like dolphin sonar.

“Where are you?” I called aloud.

Then, through the gloom, I saw her— a woman the color of the water, a ghost in the current, floating just above the sword. She had long billowing hair, and her eyes, barely visible, were green like mine.

“You look like my mom...” I sad with a wobbly smile.

I am sorry, child, only a messenger, though your mother’s fate is not as hopeless as you believe. Go to the beach in Santa Monica.

“What?”

It is your father’s will. Before you descend into the Underworld, you must go to Santa Monica. Please, Percy, I cannot stay long. The river here is too foul for my presence.

“But...” I protested. I wanted to ask more but I knew what she would tell me and she couldn’t stay long.

I cannot stay, brave one, the woman said. She reached out, and I felt the current brush my face like a caress. You must go to Santa Monica! And, Percy, do not trust the gifts....

Her voice faded.

“Gifts?” I asked. “What gifts? Wait!”

She made one more attempt to speak, but the sound was gone. Her image melted away.

Your father believes in you, She had said. She’d also called me brave...

I felt braver this time only because I knew what would happen. I waded through the mud and grabbed Riptide.

I capped my sword, stuck the ballpoint pen in my pocket. “Thanks dad.” I said again to the dark water.

Then I kicked up through the muck and swam for the surface.

I came ashore next to a floating McDonald’s.

A block away, every emergency vehicle in St. Louis was surrounding the Arch. Police helicopters circled overhead.

A little girl said, “Mama! That boy walked out of the river.”

“That’s nice, dear.” her mother said, craning her neck to watch the ambulances.

“But he’s dry!”

“That’s nice, dear.”

I couldn’t help but smile at the little girl and she hid behind her mom.

A news lady was talking for the camera: “Probably not a terrorist attack, we’re told, but it’s still very early in the investigation. The damage, as you can see, is very serious. We’re trying to get to some of the survivors, to question them about eyewitness reports of someone falling from the Arch.”

I was still pleased about the survivors and I turned to listen to the other reporter hoping what he was saying was different than my first life.

“...an adolescent Omega.” He was saying. “Channel Five has learned that surveillance cameras show an adolescent Omega being attacked by what looks to be a large dog after which they show him falling through the observation deck after an explosion. Hard to believe, John, but that’s what we’re hearing. Again, no confirmed fatalities...”

I smiled when a familiar voice bleated, “Perrr-cy!”

I turned and got tackled by Grover’s bear hug— or goat hug. He said, “We thought you’d gone to Hades the hard way!”

Annabeth stood behind him, trying to look angry, but even she seemed relieved to see me. “We can’t leave you alone for five minutes! What happened?”

“Sorry that the big guy in the sky sent the Mother of Monsters after me and I had to jump off the arch?” I offered sarcastically.

“Percy! Six hundred and thirty feet?”

Behind us, a cop shouted, “Gangway!” The crowd parted, and a couple of paramedics hustled out, rolling a woman on a stretcher. I recognized her immediately as the mother of the little boy who’d been on the observation deck. She was saying, “And then this huge dog, this huge fire-breathing Chihuahua—”

“Okay, ma’am.” The paramedic said. “Just calm down. Your family is fine. The medication is starting to kick in.”

“I’m not crazy! This boy jumped out of the hole and the monster disappeared.” Then she saw me. “There he is! That’s the boy!”

I turned quickly and pulled Annabeth and Grover after me. We disappeared into the crowd.

“Tell us everything!” Annabeth demanded.

I told them the whole story of the Chimera, Echidna, my high-dive act, and the underwater lady’s message.

“Whoa.” Said Grover. “We’ve got to get you to Santa Monica! You can’t ignore a summons from your dad.”

Before Annabeth could respond, we passed another reporter doing a news break, and I almost froze in my tracks when he said, “Percy Jackson. That’s right, Dan. Channel Twelve has learned that the Omega who may have been attacked on the Arch may be running from something more serious after he was also attacked on a New Jersey buss not two weeks after his mother disappeared after a fatal car crash. For our viewers at home, here is a photo of Percy Jackson.”

We ducked around the news van and slipped into an alley.

“First things first.” I told Grover. “We’ve got to get out of town! I don’t need to be ‘helped’ by mortal police right now.”

Somehow, we made it back to the Amtrak station without getting spotted. We got on board the train just before it pulled out for Denver. The train trundled west as darkness fell, police lights still pulsing against the St. Louis skyline behind us.

••♆••

The next afternoon, June 14, seven days before the solstice, our train rolled into Denver. We hadn’t eaten since the night before in the dining car, somewhere in Kansas. We hadn’t taken a shower since Half-Blood Hill, and I was sure that was obvious.

“Let’s try to contact Chiron.” Annabeth said. “I want to tell him about your talk with the river spirit.”

“We lost our Mirror Phones when the bus got electrocuted but we have those Drachmas from Medusa’s Emporium so lets try to find a place to make a rainbow.” I said before adding, “And lets hope it’s somewhere we can shower.”

We wandered through downtown for about half an hour. The air was dry and hot, which felt weird after the humidity of St. Louis. Everywhere we turned, the Rocky Mountains seemed to be staring at us.

Finally we found an empty do-it-yourself car wash. We veered toward the stall farthest from the street, keeping our eyes open for patrol cars. We were three adolescents hanging out at a car wash without a car; any cop worth his doughnuts would figure we were up to no good.

“It’s seventy-five cents.” He grumbled. “I’ve only got two quarters left. Annabeth?”

“Don’t look at me.” She said. “The dining car wiped me out.”

I fished out my last bit of change and passed Grover a quarter, which left me two nickels and a handful of drachma

Grover pointed the nozzle in the air and water hissed out in a thick white mist and late afternoon light filtered through the vapor and broke into colors.

Annabeth held her palm out to me. “Drachma, please.”

I dropped it into her waiting palm.

She raised the coin over her head. “O goddess, accept our offering.”

She threw the drachma into the rainbow. It disappeared in a golden shimmer.

“Half-Blood Hill.” Annabeth requested.

For a moment, nothing happened.

Then I was looking through the mist at strawberry fields, and the Long Island Sound in the distance. We seemed to be on the porch of the Big House. Standing with his back to us at the railing was a sandy-haired guy in shorts and an orange tank top. He was holding a bronze sword and seemed to be staring intently at something down in the meadow.

“Luke!” I called.

He turned, eyes wide. I could swear he was standing three feet in front of me through a screen of mist, except I could only see the part of him that appeared in the rainbow.

“Percy!” His scarred face broke into a grin. “Is that Annabeth, too? Thank the gods! Are you guys okay? We were worried when we couldn’t get in touch with you guys.”

“We’re... uh... fine.” Annabeth stammered. She was madly straightening her dirty T-shirt, trying to comb the loose hair out of her face. “We thought— Chiron— I mean—”

“He’s down at the cabins.” Luke’s smile faded. “We’re having some issues with the campers. Listen, is everything cool with you? Is Grover all right?”

“I’m right here.” Grover called. He held the nozzle out to one side and stepped into Luke’s line of vision. “What kind of issues?”

Just then a big Lincoln Continental pulled into the car wash with its stereo turned to maximum hip-hop. As the car slid into the next stall, the bass from the subwoofers vibrated so much, it shook the pavement.

“Chiron had to— what’s that noise?” Luke yelled.

“I’ll take care of it!” Annabeth yelled back, looking very relieved to have an excuse to get out of sight. “Grover, come on!”

“What?” Grover said. “But—”

“Give Percy the nozzle and come on!” She ordered.

Grover muttered something about girls being harder to understand than the Oracle at Delphi, then he handed me the spray gun and followed Annabeth.

I readjusted the hose so I could keep the rainbow going and still see Luke.

“Chiron had to break up a fight.” Luke shouted to me over the music. “Things are pretty tense here, Percy. Word leaked out about the Zeus–Poseidon standoff. We’re still not sure how— probably the same scumbag who summoned the hellhound. Now the campers are starting to take sides. It’s shaping up like the Trojan War all over again. Aphrodite, Ares, and Apollo are backing Poseidon, more or less. Athena is backing Zeus.”

In the next stall, I heard Annabeth and some guy arguing with each other, then the music’s volume decreased drastically.

“So what’s your status?” Luke asked me. “Chiron will be sorry he missed you.”

I told him pretty much everything, including my dreams. It felt so good to see him, despite everything I knew would happen because this was the person Luke could’ve continued to be.

“I wish I could be there.” Luke told me. “We can’t help much from here, I’m afraid, but listen... it had to be Hades who took the master bolt. He was there at Olympus at the winter solstice. I was chaperoning a field trip and we saw him.”

“But Chiron said the gods can’t take each other’s magic items directly.”

“That’s true.” Luke said, looking troubled. “Still... Hades has the helm of darkness. How could anybody else sneak into the throne room and steal the master bolt? You’d have to be invisible.”

We were both silent, until Luke seemed to realize what he’d said.

“Oh, hey.” He protested. “I didn’t mean Annabeth. She and I have known each other forever. She would never... I mean, she’s like a little sister to me.”

I couldn’t help the small laugh at how Annabeth’s face would’ve twisted if she’d heard that.

In the stall next to us, the music stopped completely. A man screamed in terror, car doors slammed, and the Lincoln peeled out of the car wash.

“You’d better go see what that was.” Luke said. “Listen, are you wearing the flying shoes? I’ll feel better if I know they’ve done you some good.”

“Haven’t had much of a chance to use them.” I lied easily, not a drop of guilt in my heart. “But I know they’ll be a big help in the 9th hour.”

“Really?” He grinned. “They fit and everything?”

The water shut off at just the right time The mist started to evaporate.

“Well, take care of yourself out there in Denver.” Luke called, his voice getting fainter. “And tell Grover it’ll be better this time! Nobody will get turned into a pine tree if he just—”

But the mist was gone, and Luke’s image faded to nothing. I was alone in a wet, empty car wash stall.

Annabeth and Grover came around the corner, laughing, but stopped when they saw my face. Annabeth’s smile faded. “What happened, Percy? What did Luke say?”

“Wea talked a bit about Hades maybe being the one who stole the Bolt and he asked about Grover’s flying shoes.” I said before turning to Grover. “It did get cut off but he said to tell you it’ll be better this time and no one will get turned into a tree?”

Grover visibly seemed to deflate a bit so I quickly changed the subject. “Let’s go find a place to eat.”

Finally the waitress came over. She raised her eyebrow skeptically. “Well?”

I said, “We, um, want to order dinner.”

“You kids have money to pay for it?”

Grover’s lower lip quivered. Annabeth looked ready to pass out from hunger.

I just smiled at the waitress when a rumble shook the whole building; a motorcycle the size of a baby elephant had pulled up to the curb.

All conversation in the diner stopped. The motorcycle’s headlight glared red. Its gas tank had flames painted on it, and a shotgun holster riveted to either side, complete with shotguns. The seat was leather—but leather that looked like... well, Caucasian human skin.

Ares was seated on it and still looked big enough to bench press a tank. He was dressed in a red muscle shirt and black jeans and a black leather duster, with a hunting knife strapped to his thigh. He wore red wraparound shades, and he had the cruelest, most brutal face I’d ever seen— handsome, I guess, but wicked—with an oily black crew cut and cheeks that were scarred from many, many fights. Clarisse looked a lot like him I mused absently.

As he walked into the diner, a hot, dry wind blew through the place. All the people rose, as if they were hypnotized, but the biker waved his hand dismissively and they all sat down again. Everybody went back to their conversations. The waitress blinked, as if somebody had just pressed the rewind button on her brain. She asked us again, “You kids have money to pay for it?”

Ares said, “It’s on me.” He slid into our booth, which was way too small for him, and crowded Annabeth against the window.

He looked up at the waitress, who was gaping at him, and said, “Are you still here?”

He pointed at her, and she stiffened. She turned as if she’d been spun around, then marched back toward the kitchen.

Ares turned to me and his stare still made me itch for a good fight.

He gave me a wicked grin. “So you’re old Seaweed’s kid, huh?”

“Nice to meet another family member Uncle.” I said easily. “Clarisse looks a lot like you.”

Ares grinned and took off his shades. Where his eyes should’ve been, there was only fire, empty sockets glowing with miniature nuclear explosions. “That’s right, punk. I heard you broke Clarisse’s spear.”

I shrugged. “It was capture the flag and we didn’t know it yet but taking on a child of Poseidon standing in water? She was asking for it.”

“Probably. That’s cool. I don’t fight my kids’ fights, you know? What I’m here for—I heard you were in town. I got a little proposition for you.”

The waitress came back with heaping trays of food— cheeseburgers, fries, onion rings, and chocolate shakes.

Ares handed her a few gold drachmas.

She looked nervously at the coins. “But, these aren’t...”

Ares pulled out his huge knife and started cleaning his fingernails. “Problem, sweetheart?”

The waitress swallowed, then left with the gold.

“You shouldn’t threaten people with knives you know. It’s illegal.” I commented idly, sipping at my milkshake. Annabeth almost choked o her fries.

Ares laughed. “Are you kidding? I love this country. Best place since Sparta. Don’t you carry a weapon, punk? You should. Dangerous world out there. Which brings me to my proposition. I need you to do me a favor.”

“What favor could I do for a god?”

“Something a god doesn’t have time to do himself. It’s nothing much. I left my shield at an abandoned water park here in town. I was going on a little... date with my girlfriend. We were interrupted. I left my shield behind. I want you to fetch it for me.”

“What do I get in return?” I asked, blinking up at him with large eyes. “You can’t get something for nothing you know.”

The fire in his eyes seemed to glow a bit brighter.

“Why don’t I turn you into prairie dog and run you over with my Harley? Because I don’t feel like it. A god is giving you an opportunity to prove yourself, Percy Jackson. Will you prove yourself a coward?” He leaned forward. “Or maybe you only fight when there’s a river to dive into, so your daddy can protect you.”

“I fight just fine outside of water.” I replied, sass dripping from my tone. “And either way we’ve already got a quest, so... not interested.”

Ares’s fiery eyes made me see things I didn’t want to see— blood and smoke and corpses on the battlefield. “I know all about your quest, punk. When that item was first stolen, Zeus sent his best out looking for it: Apollo, Athena, Artemis, and me, naturally. If I couldn’t sniff out a weapon that powerful...” He licked his lips, as if the very thought of the master bolt made him hungry. “Well... if I couldn’t find it, you got no hope. Nevertheless, I’m trying to give you the benefit of the doubt. Your dad and I go way back. After all, I’m the one who told him my suspicions about old Corpse Breath.”

“You told him Hades stole the bolt?” I asked flatly. If the water spirit had been able to stay longer she would’ve warned me fully but I was prepared this time around.

“Sure. Framing somebody to start a war. Oldest trick in the book. I recognized it immediately. In a way, you got me to thank for your little quest.”

“Thank you very much, Lord Ares.” I said, sounding innocent as a kitten. “I do appreciate the gods giving a Half-Blood like my chance the chance to prove myself.”

Ares grinned.

“Hey, I’m a generous guy. Just do my little job, and I’ll help you on your way. I’ll arrange a ride west for you and your friends.”

“What kind of help?” I asked, not pretending for a second we were doing fine this time around. I’d been to war, fought and led one, his powers didn’t affect me nearly as much.

Annabeth and Grover were watching warily, neither one brave enough to speak out in front of thew God of War.

“Help me out, and maybe I’ll tell you something you need to know. Something about your mom.”

“My mom?” I whispered, letting a hint of my past desperation seep into my tone.

He grinned. “That got your attention. The water park is a mile west on Delancy. You can’t miss it. Look for the Tunnel of Love ride.”

“Alright.” I agreed easily but I couldn’t resist taking a jab at him. “What interrupted your date? Something scare you off ?”

Ares bared his teeth, but I’d seen his threatening look before on Clarisse. There was something false about it, almost like he was nervous.

“You’re lucky you met me, punk, and not one of the other Olympians. They’re not as forgiving of rudeness as I am. I’ll meet you back here when you’re done. Don’t disappoint me.”

Ares vanished as if he’d never been there but Grover and Annabeth’s faces told me he had been.

“Not good.” Grover said. “Ares sought you out, Percy. This is not good.”

“Either way it’s a situation we’re stuck with.” I pointed out. “Lets finish eating and head to the water park.”

“But why would he need us?” Grover pressed.

“Maybe it’s a problem that requires brains,” Annabeth said. “Ares has strength. That’s all he has. Even strength has to bow to wisdom sometimes.”

“But this water park... he acted almost scared. What would make a war god run away like that?” Grover all but bleated.

“Probably his girlfriends husband.” I replied.

Annabeth and Grover glanced nervously at each other before she spoke.

“I’m afraid we’ll have to find out.”

Chapter Text

The sun was sinking behind the mountains by the time we found the water park. Judging from the sign, it once had been called Waterland, but now some of the letters were smashed out, so it read Watrad.

The main gate was padlocked and topped with barbed wire. Inside, huge dry waterslides and tubes and pipes curled everywhere, leading to empty pools. Old tickets and advertisements fluttered around the asphalt. With night coming on, the place looked sad and creepy.

“So how do we get in?” I said with false cheer.

“Maia!” Grover’s shoes sprouted wings.

He flew over the fence, did an unintended somersault in midair, then stumbled to a landing on the opposite side. He dusted off his jeans, as if he’d planned the whole thing. “You guys coming?”

Annabeth and I had to climb the old-fashioned way, holding down the barbed wire for each other as we crawled over the top.

The shadows grew long as we walked through the park, checking out the attractions. There was Ankle Biter Island, Head Over Wedgie, and Dude, Where’s My Swimsuit?

No monsters came to get us. Nothing made the slightest noise.

We found a souvenir shop that had been left open. Merchandise still lined the shelves: snow globes, pencils, postcards, and racks of—

“Clothes.” Annabeth said. “Fresh clothes.”

“Good idea.” I agreed quickly.

We both grabbed several items. Annabeth grabbed everything she could find that fit and walked out after a few minutes in Waterland flower-print shorts, a big red Waterland T-shirt, and commemorative Waterland surf shoes. A Waterland backpack was slung over her shoulder, obviously stuffed with more goodies.

I barely held back my snort and took the time to pick through everything including the way pricier stuff, and way less obnoxious stuff, behind the old register.

I found a beach cover dress that could be worn on its own that was bright blue with a white seashell and starfish pattern all over it that only had the Waterland logo stitched in bright red embroidery at the bottom and some matching flip-flops that only had Waterland printed on the inside. I grabbed the other three dresses in my size and two extra pairs of flip flops, I made sure to stuff my boots in my bag too.

Grover had gone with Annabeth’s idea and just grabbed what fit first.

Soon, all three of us were decked out like walking advertisements for the defunct theme park. Annabeth did shoot me a sour look but I just ignored it.

We continued searching for the Tunnel of Love. I got the feeling that the whole park was holding its breath.

“So I guess Ares and Aphrodite are still seeing each other then?” I threw out, trying to break the suffocating silence.

“That’s old gossip, Percy.” Annabeth told me. “Three thousand-year-old gossip.”

“Kinda why I’m surprised they’re still together.” I retorted. “Besides didn’t Hephaestus catch them in a net and invite everyone else to laugh at them? I wouldn’t want to be in that position a second time.”

“Hephaestus is always trying to embarrass them.” She agreed reluctantly. “That’s why they meet in out-of-the-way places, like...”

She stopped, looking straight ahead. “Like that.”

In front of us was an empty pool that would’ve been awesome for skateboarding. It was at least fifty yards across and shaped like a bowl.

Around the rim, a dozen bronze statues of Cupid stood guard with wings spread and bows ready to fire. On the opposite side from us, a tunnel opened up, probably where the water flowed into when the pool was full. The sign above it read; Thrill Ride O’ Love: This is not your parents’ tunnel of Love!

Grover crept toward the edge. “Guys, look.”

Marooned at the bottom of the pool was a pink-and-white two-seater boat with a canopy over the top and little hearts painted all over it. In the left seat, glinting in the fading light, was Ares’s shield, a polished circle of bronze.

“Too easy...” I murmured.

“There’s a Greek letter carved here.” She said. “Eta. I wonder...”

“Grover.” I said. “You smell any monsters?”

He sniffed the wind. “Nothing.”

“And we’re not underground this time.” I said, nudging him in the ribs with my elbow. “I’m going down there.”

“I’ll go with you.” Grover didn’t sound too enthusiastic, but I got the feeling he was trying to make up for what had happened in St. Louis.

“No.” I said. “You should stay up here just in case. With Luke’s shoes you could be a good Ace in our hand if something goes wrong.”

Grover puffed up his chest a little. “Sure. But what could go wrong?”

“A lot.” I said flatly. “This is way too easy and feels like a trap...”

I trailed off before groaning and dropping my head. At least I could use some of my future knowledge this time.

“What?” Annabeth snapped.

“It is a trap.” I said, lifting my head. “That’s why Ares didn’t come himself. Hephaestus set a trap here. To catch them like he did in the net. That’s why Ares looked scared.”

Annabeth and Grover both paled.

“Alright.” I sighed, standing up and dusting off my dress. “I’ll get it myself.”

“You can’t go by yourself!” Annabeth hissed, grabbing my wrist.

“Look it’s a waterpark.” I pointed out. “Hephaestus is good with his hands and clever, chances are the trap has something to do with water and if that’s the case I’ve got the best chance.”

She didn’t look happy but reluctantly let me go and I carefully started down into the pool.

The shield was propped on one seat, and next to it was a lady’s silk scarf. I glanced around and rolled my eyes as I saw myself reflected back in dozens of mirrors again.

I picked up the scarf. It shimmered pink, and the perfume was indescribable— rose, or mountain laurel. It smelled wonderful and I tucked it into the Waterland bag I’d grabbed for myself.

I took a deep breath before reaching for the shield.

The moment I touched the shield my hand broke through the thin strands that had been connecting it to the dashboard. It was some kind of metal filament, so fine it was almost invisible. A trip wire.

Noise erupted all around me, of a million gears grinding, as if the whole pool were turning into one giant machine. I groaned.

“Percy!” Grover yelled while Annabeth looked worried.

Up on the rim, the Cupid statues were drawing their bows into firing position. They fired at each other, across the rim of the pool. Silky cables trailed from the arrows, arcing over the pool and anchoring where they landed to form a huge golden asterisk. Then smaller metallic threads started weaving together magically between the main strands, making a net.

I grabbed the shield and ran, trying to make it up the sides of the pool but it was just as difficult as last time.

“Come on!” Grover shouted.

He and Annabeth were trying to hold open a section of the net for me, but wherever they touched it, the golden threads started to wrap around their hands.

The Cupids’ heads popped open. Out came video cameras. Spotlights rose up all around the pool, blinding us with illumination, and a loudspeaker voice boomed: “Live to Olympus in one minute... Fifty-nine seconds, fifty-eight...”

I’d almost made it to the rim when the row of mirrors opened like hatches and thousands of tiny metallic spiders poured out.

Annabeth screamed.

“Spiders!” Annabeth said, scrambling away from the edge and letting go of the net. “Sp—sp— aaaah!”

It was still just as shocking to see her scared of spiders but I turned back and scrambled down to the boat.

The spiders were coming out from all around the rim now, millions of them, flooding toward the center of the pool, completely surrounding me.

“Thirty, twenty-nine.” Called the loudspeaker.

The spiders started spitting out strands of metal thread, trying to tie me down. The strands were easy enough to break when there were only a few but the more they covered me in the harder it was to break lose.

Grover hovered above the pool in his flying sneakers, trying to pull the net loose, but it wouldn’t budge.

“Grover!” I yelled. “Get into that booth! Find the ‘on’ switch!”

“But—”

“Do it!” It would be another wild ride. I hid a smile at how fun it would still be. Without Annabeth clinging to me and screaming her head off it wouldn’t be so embarrassing to have it broadcast to Olympus.

Grover was in the controller’s booth now, slamming away at the buttons.

“Five, four—”

Grover looked up at me hopelessly, raising his hands. He was letting me know that he’d pushed every button, but still nothing was happening.

I closed my eyes and thought about waves, rushing water, I pulled deep on the water I could feel just waiting out of sight.

“Two, one, zero!”

Water exploded out of the pipes. It roared into the pool, sweeping away the spiders. I fastened my seat belt just as the tidal wave slammed into our boat, over the top, whisking the spiders away and dousing me completely, but not capsizing us. The boat turned, lifted in the flood, and spun in circles around the whirlpool.

The water was full of short-circuiting spiders, some of them smashing against the pool’s concrete wall with such force they burst.

Spotlights glared down at me. The Cupid-cams were rolling, live to Olympus.

But I just concentrated on the water and keeping the boat from capsizing. I smiled when it responded eagerly to me. It spun around one last time, the water level now almost high enough to shred me against the metal net. Then the boat’s nose turned toward the tunnel and I rocketed through into the darkness.

I held tight, laughing as the boat shot curls and hugged corners and took forty-five degree plunges past pictures of Romeo and Juliet and a bunch of other Valentine’s Day stuff.

Then I was out of the tunnel, the night air whistling through my hair as the boat barreled straight toward the exit.

If the ride had been in working order, I would’ve sailed off a ramp between the golden Gates of Love and splashed down safely in the exit pool. But that was the problem.

The Gates of Love were chained. Two boats that had been washed out of the tunnel before us were now piled against the barricade— one submerged, the other cracked in half.

I waited for just the right moment.

Crack!

I sailed through the air and over the gate, heading directly for solid asphalt below before Grover’s hands grabbed me by my ribcage.

“You’re too heavy!” Grover said. “We’re going down!”

We spiraled toward the ground, Grover doing his best to slow the fall.

We smashed into a photo-board, Grover’s head going straight into the hole where tourists would put their faces, pretending to be Noo-Noo the Friendly Whale while I tumbled to the ground, banged up but alive. Ares’s shield was still on my arm.

I breathlessly thanked Grover and helped him out of the photo-board.

A hundred yards away, at the entrance pool, the Cupids were still filming. The statues had swiveled so that their cameras were trained straight on us, the spotlights in our faces.

“Show’s over!” I called with a cheery wave. “Thank you! Good night!”

The Cupids turned back to their original positions. The lights shut off. The park went quiet and dark again, except for the gentle trickle of water into the Thrill Ride of Love’s exit pool.

Annabeth came jogging up, still looking shaken and jumpy. As if she expected more spiders to come pouring out from every direction. She stuttered the story of Arachne while Grover and I sorted ourselves out.

I hefted the shield on my arm and turned back to them. “We need to have a little talk with Ares.”

••♆••

The war god was waiting for us in the diner parking lot.

“Well, well.” He said. “You didn’t get yourself killed.”

“You knew it was a trap.” I said.

Ares gave me a wicked grin. “Bet that crippled blacksmith was surprised when he netted Poseidon’s pretty Omega kid. You looked good on TV.”

I shoved his shield at him. “You’re such a jerk.”

Annabeth and Grover caught their breath.

Ares grabbed the shield and spun it in the air like pizza dough. It changed form, melting into a bulletproof vest. He slung it across his back.

“See that truck over there?” He pointed to an eighteen-wheeler parked across the street from the diner. “That’s your ride. Take you straight to L.A., with one stop in Vegas.”

The eighteen-wheeler had a sign on the back, which I could read only because it was reverse-printed white on black, a good combination for dyslexia: Kindness International: Humane Zoo Transport. Warning: Live Wild Animals.

“Great.” I drawled sarcastically.

Ares snapped his fingers. The back door of the truck unlatched. “Free ride west, punk. Stop complaining. And here’s a little something for doing the job.”

He slung a blue nylon backpack off his handlebars and tossed it to me. Inside were fresh clothes for all of us, twenty bucks in cash, a pouch full of golden drachmas, and a bag of Double Stuffed Oreos.

“Thank you, Lord Ares.” Grover interrupted, giving me his best red-alert warning look. He could probably feel my annoyance about to bubble over. “Thanks a lot.”

Reluctantly, I slung the backpack over my shoulder. I knew what was in it and how much trouble it was going to cause but there was nothing I could do about it.

“You owe me one more thing.” I told Ares, trying to keep my voice level. “You promised me information about my mother.”

“You sure you can handle the news?” He kick-started his motorcycle. “She’s not dead.”

“I already knew that.” I snapped, patience finally wearing thin. “Mortals don’t usually erupt into golden mist when they die.”

He laughed. “Oh yeah? Guess you know everything then kid.”

“You’re pretty smug, Lord Ares, for someone who sent an Omega kid on an errand because he was afraid of a net.”

Behind his sunglasses, fire glowed. I felt a hot wind in my hair. “We’ll meet again, Percy Jackson. Next time you’re in a fight, watch your back.”

He revved his Harley, then roared off down Delancy Street.

Annabeth said, “That was not smart, Percy.”

“I don’t care.” I shrugged

“You don’t want a god as your enemy. Especially not that god.”

“Hey, guys.” Grover said. “I hate to interrupt, but...”

He pointed toward the diner. At the register, the last two customers were paying their check, two men in identical black coveralls, with a white logo on their backs that matched the one on the Kindness International truck.

“If we’re taking the zoo express.” Grover said. “We need to hurry.”

Annabeth and I nodded. We ran across the street and climbed in the back of the big rig, closing the doors behind us.

The trailer was dark inside until I uncapped Anaklusmos. The blade cast a faint bronze light over a very sad scene. Sitting in a row of filthy metal cages were three of the most pathetic zoo animals I’d ever beheld: a zebra, a male albino lion, and an antelope.

Someone had thrown the lion a sack of turnips, which he obviously didn’t want to eat. The zebra and the antelope had each gotten a Styrofoam tray of hamburger meat.

The zebra’s mane was matted with chewing gum, like somebody had been spitting on it in their spare time. The antelope had a stupid silver birthday balloon tied to one of his horns that read Over the Hill!

Apparently, nobody had wanted to get close enough to the lion to mess with him, but the poor thing was pacing around on soiled blankets, in a space way too small for him, panting from the stuffy heat of the trailer. He had flies buzzing around his pink eyes and his ribs showed through his white fur.

“This is kindness?” Grover yelled. “Humane zoo transport?”

He probably would’ve gone right back outside to beat up the truckers with his reed pipes, and I would’ve helped him, but just then the truck’s engine roared to life, the trailer started shaking, and we were forced to sit down or fall down.

Grover talked to the animals in a series of goat bleats, but they just stared at him sadly. Annabeth was in favor of breaking the cages and freeing them on the spot, but I pointed out it wouldn’t do much good until the truck stopped moving.

I found a water jug and refilled their bowls, then used Anaklusmos to drag the mismatched food out of their cages. I gave the meat to the lion and the turnips to the zebra and the antelope.

Grover calmed the antelope down, while Annabeth used her knife to cut the balloon off his horn. She wanted to cut the gum out of the zebra’s mane, too, but we decided that would be too risky with the truck bumping around. We told Grover to promise the animals we’d help them more in the morning, then we settled in for night.

I broke the silence.

“Now that we have a second... what did Luke mean by no one would get turned into a Pine Tree?”

In the dim bronze light of the sword blade, it was hard to read their expressions.

Grover let out a mournful bray.

“I should’ve told you the truth from the beginning.” His voice trembled. “I thought if you knew what a failure I was, you wouldn’t want me along.”

“You were the satyr who tried to rescue Thalia, the daughter of Zeus.”

He nodded glumly.

“And following that logic...” I looked at Annabeth. “You and Luke were the two Half-Bloods with her.”

She put down her Oreo, uneaten. “Like you said, Percy, a seven-year-old half-blood wouldn’t have made it very far alone. Athena guided me toward help. Thalia was twelve. Luke was fourteen. They’d both run away from home, like me. They were happy to take me with them. They were... amazing monster-fighters, even without training. We traveled north from Virginia without any real plans, fending off monsters for about two weeks before Grover found us.”

“I was supposed to escort Thalia to camp.” He said, sniffling. “Only Thalia. I had strict orders from Chiron: don’t do anything that would slow down the rescue. We knew Hades was after her, see, but I couldn’t just leave Luke and Annabeth by themselves. I thought... I thought I could lead all three of them to safety. It was my fault the Kindly Ones caught up with us. I froze. I got scared on the way back to camp and took some wrong turns. If I’d just been a little quicker...”

“Stop it.” Annabeth said. “No one blames you. Thalia didn’t blame you either.”

“She sacrificed herself to save us.” He said miserably. “Her death was my fault. The Council of Cloven Elders said so.”

“Because you wouldn’t leave two other half-bloods behind?” I said. “That’s not fair.”

“Percy’s right.” Annabeth said. “I wouldn’t be here today if it weren’t for you, Grover. Neither would Luke. We don’t care what the council says.”

Grover kept sniffling in the dark. “It’s just my luck. I’m the lamest satyr ever, and I find the two most powerful half-bloods of the century, Thalia and Percy.”

“It’s not luck that you found Thalia and me, Grover. You’ve got the biggest heart of any satyr ever. You’re a natural searcher. That’s why you’ll be the one who finds Pan.”

I heard a deep, satisfied sigh as Grover fell asleep. I just rolled my eyes fondly at how he could always sleep before settling down to sleep. I didn’t care about talking with Annabeth about her beads or her relationship with her dad.

I fell into an uneasy sleep.

Chapter Text

My nightmare started out as something I’d dreamed a million times before.

I was being forced to take a standardized test while wearing a straitjacket. All the other kids were going out to recess, and the teacher kept saying, ‘Come on, Percy. You’re not stupid, are you? Pick up your pencil.’

Then the dream strayed from the usual.

I looked over at the next desk and saw a girl sitting there, also wearing a straitjacket. She was my age, with unruly black, punk-style hair, dark eyeliner around her stormy eyes, and freckles across her nose. Somehow, I knew who she was. She was Thalia, daughter of Zeus.

She struggled against the straitjacket, glared at me in frustration, and snapped, ‘Well, Seaweed Brain? One of us has to get out of here.’

‘She’s right.’ My dream-self thought. ‘I’m going back to that cavern. I’m going to give Hades a piece of my mind.’

The straitjacket melted off me. I fell through the classroom floor. The teacher’s voice changed until it was cold and evil, echoing from the depths of a great chasm. Kronos.

‘Percy Jackson.’ It said. ‘Yes, the exchange went well, I see.’

I was back in the dark cavern, spirits of the dead drifting around me. Unseen in the pit, the monstrous thing was speaking, but this time it wasn’t addressing me. The numbing power of his voice seemed directed somewhere else.

‘And he suspects nothing?’ It asked.

Another voice, Luke’s, answered at my shoulder. ‘Nothing, my lord. He is as ignorant as the rest.’

I looked over, but no one was there. He was invisible. Or I just couldn’t see him.

‘Deception upon deception.’ Kronos mused aloud. ‘Excellent.’

‘Truly, my lord, said the voice next to me, you are well-named the Crooked One. But was it really necessary? I could have brought you what I stole directly —’

‘You? the monster said in scorn. You have already shown your limits. You would have failed me completely had I not intervened.’

‘But, my lord—’

‘Peace, little servant. Our six months have bought us much. Zeus’s anger has grown. Poseidon has played his most desperate card. Now we shall use it against him. Shortly you shall have the reward you wish, and your revenge. As soon as both items are delivered into my hands... but wait. He is here.’

‘What?’ The invisible servant suddenly sounded tense. ‘You summoned him, my lord?’

‘No.’ The full force of Kronos’ attention was now pouring over me, freezing me in place. ‘Blast his father’s blood—he is too changeable, too unpredictable. The boy brought himself hither.’

‘Impossible!’ Luke cried.

‘For a weakling such as you, perhaps.’ Kronos snarled. Then its cold power turned back on me. ‘So... you wish to dream of your quest, young half-blood? Then I will oblige.’

The scene changed.

I was standing in a vast throne room with black marble walls and bronze floors. The empty, horrid throne was made from human bones fused together. Standing at the foot of the dais was my mother, frozen in shimmering golden light, her arms outstretched.

I tried to step toward her, but my legs wouldn’t move. I reached for her, only to realize that my hands were withering to bones. Grinning skeletons in Greek armor crowded around me, draping me with silk robes, wreathing my head with laurels that smoked with Chimera poison, burning into my scalp.

The evil voice began to laugh. ‘Hail, the conquering hero!’

I woke with a start.

Grover was shaking my shoulder. “The truck’s stopped.” He said. “We think they’re coming to check on the animals.”

“Hide!” Annabeth hissed.

She had it easy. She just put on her magic cap and disappeared. Grover and I had to dive behind feed sacks.

The trailer doors creaked open. Sunlight and heat poured in.

“Man!” One of the truckers said, waving his hand in front of his ugly nose. “I wish I hauled appliances.” He climbed inside and poured some water from a jug into the animals’ dishes.

“You hot, big boy?” He asked the lion, then splashed the rest of the bucket right in the lion’s face.

The lion roared in indignation.

“Yeah, yeah, yeah.” The man said.

Next to me, under the turnip sacks, Grover tensed. For a peace-loving herbivore, he looked downright murderous.

The trucker threw the antelope a squashed-looking Happy Meal bag. He smirked at the zebra. “How ya doin’, Stripes? Least we’ll be getting rid of you this stop. You like magic shows? You’re gonna love this one. They’re gonna saw you in half!”

The zebra, wild-eyed with fear, looked straight at me.

I heard it say: ‘Free me, lord. Please.’

There was a loud knock, knock, knock on the side of the trailer.

The trucker inside with us yelled, “What do you want, Eddie?”

A voice outside— it must’ve been Eddie’s—shouted back; “Maurice? What’d ya say?”

“What are you banging for?”

Knock, knock, knock.

Outside, Eddie yelled; “What banging?”

Our guy Maurice rolled his eyes and went back outside, cursing at Eddie for being an idiot.

A second later, Annabeth appeared next to me. She must’ve done the banging to get Maurice out of the trailer. “This transport business can’t be legal.”

“No kidding.” Grover said. He paused, as if listening. “The lion says these guys are animal smugglers!”

‘That’s right.’ The zebra’s voice said in my mind.

“We’ve got to free them!” Grover said. He and Annabeth both looked at me, waiting for my lead.

The zebra said, ‘Open my cage, lord. Please. I’ll be fine after that.’

Outside, Eddie and Maurice were still yelling at each other, but I knew they’d be coming inside to torment the animals again any minute. I grabbed Riptide and slashed the lock off the zebra’s cage.

The zebra burst out. It turned to me and bowed. ‘Thank you, lord.’

Grover held up his hands and said something to the zebra in goat talk, like a blessing.

Just as Maurice was poking his head back inside to check out the noise, the zebra leaped over him and into the street. There was yelling and screaming and cars honking. We rushed to the doors of the trailer in time to see the zebra galloping down a wide boulevard lined with hotels and casinos and neon signs. We’d just released a zebra in Las Vegas.

Maurice and Eddie ran after it, with a few policemen running after them, shouting, “Hey! You need a permit for that!”

“Now would be a good time to leave.” Annabeth said.

“The other animals first.” Grover said.

I cut the locks with my sword. Grover raised his hands and spoke the same goat-blessing he’d used for the zebra.

“Good luck.” I told the animals. The antelope and the lion burst out of their cages and went off together into the streets.

Some tourists screamed. Most just backed off and took pictures, probably thinking it was some kind of stunt by one of the casinos.

“Will the animals be okay?” I asked Grover. “I mean, the desert and all—”

“Don’t worry.” He said. “I placed a satyr’s sanctuary on them.”

“Meaning?”

“Meaning they’ll reach the wild safely,” he said. “They’ll find water, food, shade, whatever they need until they find a safe place to live.”

“That’s great!” I said, smiling.

 “Come on. Let’s get out of this filthy truck.” Annabeth said.

We stumbled out into the desert afternoon. It was a hundred and ten degrees, easy, and we must’ve looked like deep-fried vagrants, but everybody was too interested in the wild animals to pay us much attention.

We passed the Monte Carlo and the MGM. We passed pyramids, a pirate ship, and the Statue of Liberty replica.

We wandered around looking for a place to get out of the heat for a few minutes, find a sandwich and a glass of lemonade, make a new plan for getting west but I was antsy to be inside the Lotus Casino.

To maybe see Nico and Bianca… even for just a second.

And just like that we found ourselves standing in front of the Lotus Hotel and Casino. The entrance was a huge neon flower, the petals lighting up and blinking. No one was going in or out, but the glittering chrome doors were open, spilling out air-conditioning that smelled like flowers— like lotus blossom.

The doorman smiled at us. “Hey, kids. You look tired. You want to come in and sit down?”

I nodded immediately. I knew it was a trap but one I was actually happy to fall into for once. Inside, we took one look around, and Grover said, “Whoa.”

The whole lobby was a giant game room. And I’m not talking about cheesy old Pac-Man games or slot machines. There was an indoor waterslide snaking around the glass elevator, which went straight up at least forty floors. There was a climbing wall on the side of one building, and an indoor bungee-jumping bridge.

There were virtual-reality suits with working laser guns. And hundreds of video games, each one the size of a widescreen TV. Basically, you name it, this place had it. There were a few other kids playing, but not that many. No waiting for any of the games. There were waitresses and snack bars all around, serving every kind of food you can imagine.

“Hey!” A bellhop said. At least I guessed he was a bellhop. He wore a white-and-yellow Hawaiian shirt with lotus designs, shorts, and flip-flops. “Welcome to the Lotus Casino. Here’s your room key.”

Annabeth stammered, taken off guard. “Um, but...”

“No, no.” He said, laughing. “The bill’s taken care of. No extra charges, no tips. Just go on up to the top floor, room 4001. If you need anything, like extra bubbles for the hot tub, or skeet targets for the shooting range, or whatever, just call the front desk. Here are your LotusCash cards. They work in the restaurants and on all the games and rides.”

 He handed us each a green plastic credit card.

Grover asked, “How much is on here?”

His eyebrows knit together. “What do you mean?”

“I mean, when does it run out of cash?”

He laughed. “Oh, you’re making a joke. Hey, that’s cool. Enjoy your stay.”

We took the elevator upstairs and checked out our room. It was a suite with three separate bedrooms and a bar stocked with candy, sodas, and chips. A hotline to room service. Fluffy towels and water beds with feather pillows. A big-screen television with satellite and high-speed Internet.

The balcony had its own hot tub, and sure enough, there was a skeet-shooting machine and a shotgun, so you could launch clay pigeons right out over the Las Vegas skyline and plug them with your gun. The view over the Strip and the desert was amazing.

“Oh, goodness.” Annabeth said. “This place is...”

“Sweet.” Grover said. “Absolutely sweet.”

There were clothes in the closet, and they fit me. I didn’t bat an eye at it this time. I took a shower, which felt awesome after a week of grimy travel. I changed clothes, ate a bag of chips, drank three Cokes, and came out feeling better than I had in a long time.

I came out of the bedroom and found that Annabeth and Grover had also showered and changed clothes. Grover was eating potato chips to his heart’s content, while Annabeth cranked up the National Geographic Channel.

“I’ll be right back.” I told them

“I feel good.” Grover said. “I love this place.”

Without his even realizing it, the wings sprouted out of his shoes and lifted him a foot off the ground, then back down again.

“So what now?” Annabeth asked. “Sleep?”

Grover held up his green plastic LotusCash cards.  “Play time!”

I laughed and waved them off before setting off in search of a pair of Italian siblings. I’d need to time it right to make sure we didn’t stay too long but I should be able to manage.

I knew Hades had them well taken care of so I took an elevator to the top floor.

I peeked into every room that wasn’t locked and when I reached the last suite and poked my head around the large door; I saw them.

Nico was sitting cross-legged on the floor and happily sorting his Mythomagic cards while chattering to Bianca who was sprawled on a chair nearby reading a book and offering little ‘Uh-huhs’ every so often.

I drank them in for several minutes before swiftly pulling back and shutting the door when the slightly open door caught his eye.

I hid behind a large potted plant when he came out and looked down the hallways for a second before shrugging and shutting the door.

I smiled at how cute 10-year-old Nico was before shaking my head and heading off to find Grover and Annabeth.

••♆••

I found Annabeth building a city.

“Come on.” I told her. “We’ve got to get out of here.”

No response.

I shook her. “Annabeth?”

She looked up, annoyed. “What?”

“We need to leave.”

“Leave? What are you talking about? I’ve just got the towers—”

“This place is a trap.”

She didn’t respond until I shook her again. “What?”

“Listen. The Underworld. Our quest!”

“Oh, come on, Percy. Just a few more minutes.”

“Annabeth, there are people here who have never aged. You check in, and you stay forever.”

 “So?” She asked. “Can you imagine a better place?”

I grabbed her wrist and yanked her away from the game.

“Hey!” She screamed and hit me, but nobody else even bothered looking at us. They were too busy.

I made her look directly in my eyes and said, “Spiders. Large, hairy spiders.”

That jarred her. Her vision cleared. “Oh my gods.” She said. “How long have we—”

“I don’t know, but we’ve got to find Grover.”

We went searching, and found him still playing Virtual Deer Hunter.

“Grover!” We both shouted.

He said, “Die, human! Die, silly polluting nasty person!”

“Grover!”

He turned the plastic gun on me and started clicking, as if I were just another image from the screen.

I looked at Annabeth, and together we took Grover by the arms and dragged him away. His flying shoes sprang to life and started tugging his legs in the other direction as he shouted, “No! I just got to a new level! No!”

The Lotus bellhop hurried up to us. “Well, now, are you ready for your platinum cards?”

“We’re leaving.” I told him.

“Such a shame,” he said, and I got the feeling that he really meant it, that we’d be breaking his heart if we went. “We just added an entire new floor full of games for platinum-card members.”

He held out the cards.

Grover reached for the card, but Annabeth yanked back his arm and said, “No, thanks.”

We walked toward the door, and as we did, the smell of the food and the sounds of the games seemed to get more and more inviting. I shook away the thoughts about our room upstairs. We could just stay the night, sleep in a real bed for once...

Then we burst through the doors of the Lotus Casino and ran down the sidewalk. It felt like afternoon, about the same time of day we’d gone into the casino, but something was wrong. The weather had completely changed. It was stormy, with lightning flashing out in the desert.

Ares’s backpack was slung over my shoulder, which wasn’t odd this time because I knew they needed me to have it.

I ran to the nearest newspaper stand and read the year first. Showing Annabeth and Grover that it was at least the same year. Annabeth sighed in relief until we read the date: June twentieth.

We had been in the Lotus Casino for five days.

We had only one day left until the summer solstice. One day to complete our quest.

Chapter Text

Annabeth loaded us into the back of a Vegas taxi as if we actually had money, and told the driver, “Los Angeles, please.”

The cabbie chewed his cigar and sized us up. “That’s three hundred miles. For that, you gotta pay up front.”

“You accept casino debit cards?” Annabeth asked.

He shrugged. “Some of ‘em. Same as credit cards. I gotta swipe ‘em through first.”

Annabeth handed him her green LotusCash card. He looked at it skeptically.

“Swipe it.” Annabeth invited.

He did.

His meter machine started rattling. The lights flashed. Finally an infinity symbol came up next to the dollar sign.

The cigar fell out of the driver’s mouth. He looked back at us, his eyes wide. “Where to in Los Angeles... uh, Your Highness?”

“The Santa Monica Pier.” Annabeth sat up a little straighter. I could tell she liked the ‘Your Highness’ thing. “Get us there fast, and you can keep the change.”

The cab’s speedometer never dipped below ninety-five the whole way through the Mojave Desert.

On the road, we had plenty of time to talk. I told Annabeth and Grover about my latest dream, but the details got sketchier the more I tried to remember them.

The Lotus Casino still affected memory even though I knew what it was. The servant had called the monster in the pit something other than ‘my lord’ but I couldn’t tell them what.

“The Silent One?” Annabeth suggested. “The Rich One? Both of those are nicknames for Hades.”

“Maybe...” I said doubtfully.

“That throne room sounds like Hades’s.” Grover said. “That’s the way it’s usually described.”

I shook my head. “Something’s wrong. The throne room wasn’t the main part of the dream. And that voice from the pit... I don’t know. It just didn’t feel like a god’s voice.”

Annabeth’s eyes widened.

“What?” I asked.

“Oh... nothing. I was just— No, it has to be Hades. Maybe he sent this thief, this invisible person, to get the master bolt, and something went wrong—”

“Like what?”

“I—I don’t know.” She said. “But if he stole Zeus’s symbol of power from Olympus, and the gods were hunting him, I mean, a lot of things could go wrong. So this thief had to hide the bolt, or he lost it somehow. Anyway, he failed to bring it to Hades. That’s what the voice said in your dream, right? The guy failed. That would explain what the Furies were searching for when they came after us on the bus. Maybe they thought we had retrieved the bolt.”

I knew why he was so pale. She knew who was in the Pit. Knew who would want to entice the Gods to war. I eyed her shrewdly.

“But if I’d already retrieved the bolt.” I said, playing along. “Why would I be traveling to the Underworld?”

“To threaten Hades.” Grover suggested. “To bribe or blackmail him into getting your mom back.”

I laughed. “You have evil thoughts for a goat.”

“Why, thank you.”

“But the thing in the pit said it was waiting for two items.” I said. “If the master bolt is one, what’s the other?”

Grover shook his head, clearly mystified.

Annabeth was looking at me as if she knew my next question, and was silently willing me not to ask it.

“You have an idea what might be in that pit, don’t you?” I asked her bluntly. “I mean, if it isn’t Hades?”

“Percy... let’s not talk about it. Because if it isn’t Hades... No. It has to be Hades.”

Wasteland rolled by. We passed a sign that said; California Stateline, 12 Miles.

I’m glad it wasn’t as confusing this time. Thinking about my quest didn’t give me a headache because I knew all the missing pieces Annabeth was puzzling together.

Kronos was trying to rise. And he had help.

We were hurtling toward the Underworld at ninety-five miles an hour, betting that Hades had the master bolt (I knew he didn’t. We already had it) but to Grover and Annabeth if we were wrong... The solstice deadline would pass and war would begin.

“The answer is in the Underworld.” Annabeth assured me. “You saw spirits of the dead, Percy. There’s only one place that could be. We’re doing the right thing.”

She tried to boost our morale by suggesting clever strategies for getting into the Land of the Dead, but I just let her talk without really listening. None of it was useful anyways.

The cab sped west. Every gust of wind through Death Valley sounded like a spirit of the dead.

At sunset, the taxi dropped us at the beach in Santa Monica. It looked exactly the way L.A. beaches do in the movies, only it smelled worse. There were carnival rides lining the Pier, palm trees lining the sidewalks, homeless guys sleeping in the sand dunes, and surfer dudes waiting for the perfect wave.

Grover, Annabeth, and I walked down to the edge of the surf.

“What now?” Annabeth asked.

The Pacific was turning gold in the setting sun. I thought about how long it had been since I’d stood on the beach at Montauk, on the opposite side of the country, looking out at a different sea.

I stepped into the surf.

“Percy?” Annabeth said. “What are you doing?”

I kept walking, up to my waist, then my chest.

She called after me, “You know how polluted that water is? There’re all kinds of toxic—”

That’s when my head went under.

I didn’t bother holding my breath this time.

I walked down into the shoals. I could sense the rolling texture of the bottom. I could make out sand-dollar colonies dotting the sandbars. I could even see the currents, warm and cold streams swirling together.

I felt something rub against my leg. Sliding along beside me was a five-foot-long mako shark.

It was nuzzling me. Heeling like a dog. I smiled, stroking over its dorsal fin. It bucked a little, as if inviting me to hold tighter. I grabbed the fin with both hands. It took off, pulling me along. The shark carried me down into the darkness.

It deposited me at the edge of the ocean proper, where the sand bank dropped off into a huge chasm. It was like standing on the rim of the Grand Canyon at midnight, not being able to see much, but knowing the void was right there.

The surface shimmered maybe a hundred and fifty feet above. Any normal human or even other Demi-Gods would’ve been crushed by the pressure.

Then I saw something glimmering in the darkness below, growing bigger and brighter as it rose toward me. A woman’s voice called: “Percy Jackson.”

As she got closer, her shape became clearer. She had flowing black hair, and a dress made of green silk. Light flickered around her and the stallion-sized sea horse she was riding.

She dismounted. The sea horse and the mako shark whisked off and started playing something that looked like tag. The underwater lady smiled at me. “You’ve come far, Percy Jackson. Well done.”

I smiled and bowed. “You’re the woman who spoke to me in the Mississippi River.”

“Yes, child. I am a Nereid, a spirit of the sea. It was not easy to appear so far upriver, but the naiads, my freshwater cousins, helped sustain my life force. They honor Lord Poseidon, though they do not serve in his court.”

“And... you serve in Poseidon’s court?”

She nodded. “It has been many years since a child of the Sea God has been born. We have watched you with great interest.”

Suddenly I remembered faces in the waves off Montauk Beach when I was a little boy, reflections of smiling women. Like so many of the weird things in my life, I’d never given it much thought before.

“I know my father loves me.” I said with a small laugh, adding a bit petulantly. “But still... I wish he would come see me himself.”

A cold current rose out of the depths.

“Do not judge the Lord of the Sea too harshly.” The Nereid told me. “He stands at the brink of an unwanted war. He has much to occupy his time. Besides, he is forbidden to help you directly. The gods may not show such favoritism.”

“Even to their own children?”

“Especially to them. The gods can work by indirect influence only. That is why I give you a warning, and a gift.”

She held out her hand. Three white pearls flashed in her palm.

“I know you journey to Hades’s realm.” She said. “Few mortals have ever done this and survived: Orpheus, who had great music skill; Hercules, who had great strength; Houdini, who could escape even the depths of Tartarus. Do you have these talents?”

“Definitely not.” I said shaking my head.

“Ah, but you have something else, Percy. You have gifts you have only begun to know. The oracles have foretold a great and terrible future for you, should you survive to manhood. Poseidon would not have you die before your time. Therefore take these, and when you are in need, smash a pearl at your feet.”

“What will happen?”

“That.” She said. “Depends on the need. But remember: what belongs to the sea will always return to the sea.”

“What about the warning?”

Her eyes flickered with green light. “Go with what your heart tells you, or you will lose all. Hades feeds on doubt and hopelessness. He will trick you if he can, make you mistrust your own judgment. Once you are in his realm, he will never willingly let you leave. Keep faith. Good luck, Percy Jackson.”

She summoned her sea horse and rode toward the void.

“Good-bye, young hero.” she called back, her voice fading into the depths. “You must listen to your heart.” She became a speck of glowing green, and then she was gone.

I wanted to follow her down into the darkness. I wanted to see the court of Poseidon. But I looked up at the sunset darkening on the surface. My friends were waiting. We had so little time...

I kicked upward toward the shore.

When I reached the beach, my clothes dried instantly. I told Grover and Annabeth what had happened, and showed them the pearls.

Annabeth grimaced. “No gift comes without a price.”

“They were free.”

“No.” She shook her head. “‘There is no such thing as a free lunch.’ That’s an ancient Greek saying that translated pretty well into American. There will be a price. You wait.”

On that happy thought, we turned our backs on the sea.

With some spare change from Ares’s backpack, we took the bus into West Hollywood. I showed the driver the Underworld address slip I’d taken from Aunty Em’s Garden Gnome Emporium, but he’d never heard of DOA Recording Studios.

“You remind me of somebody I saw on TV.” He told me. “You a child actor or something?”

“Oh... I’m a body double... for a lot of child actors.”

“Oh! That explains it.”

We thanked him and got off quickly at the next stop.

We wandered for miles on foot, looking for DOA. Nobody seemed to know where it was. It didn’t appear in the phone book.

Twice, we ducked into alleys to avoid cop cars.

I froze in front of an appliance-store window because a television was playing an interview with somebody who looked familiar— one of my neighbors, an elderly beta who had a soft spot for him. He was talking to Barbara Walters— She was interviewing her in front of our house.

A tear glistened on her cheek. She was saying, “Honest, Ms. Walters, those people didn’t deserve whatever happened to them. Sally was such a caring woman, doted on her little boy, and Percy is such a sweet Omega. Always helped me up the steps and with my groceries.”

“There you have it, America.” Barbara Walters turned to the camera. “A mother missing. An adolescent Omega likely scared for his life. Let me show you, again, the last known photo of this poor young Omega, taken a week ago in Denver.”

The screen cut to a grainy shot of me, Annabeth, and Grover standing outside the Colorado diner, talking to Ares.

“Who are the other children in this photo?” Barbara Walters asked dramatically. “Who is the man with them? Is Percy Jackson in danger from a terrorist, or perhaps the brainwashed victim of a frightening new cult? When we come back, we chat with a leading child psychologist. Stay tuned, America.”

“C’mon.” Grover told me. I walked away, reeling a bit from how different it was. I wasn’t a delinquent on the run this time. I was a poor child running scared after his mom disappeared.

It got dark, and hungry-looking characters started coming out on the streets to play. I wasn’t scared but this definitely wasn’t New York.

L.A. was spread out, chaotic, hard to move around. It reminded me of Ares. It wasn’t enough for L.A. to be big; it had to prove it was big by being loud and strange and difficult to navigate, too.

We walked past gangbangers, bums, and street hawkers, who looked at us like they were trying to figure if we were worth the trouble of mugging.

As we hurried passed the entrance of an alley, a voice from the darkness said, “Hey, you.”

I didn’t bother stopping this time but the gang of kids still came out of the alley, following us and catcalling.

“Run!” I hissed at Annabeth and Grover.

We all broke into a sprint and raced down the street, not knowing where we were going. We turned a sharp corner.

“There!” Annabeth shouted.

Only one store on the block looked open, its windows glaring with neon. The sign above the door said something like Crstuy’s Watre Bde Alpace.

“Crusty’s Water Bed Palace?” Grover translated.

 We burst through the doors, ran behind a water bed, and ducked. A split second later, the gang kids ran past outside.

“I think we lost them.” Grover panted.

A voice behind us boomed, “Lost who?”

We all jumped.

Standing behind us was a guy who looked like a raptor in a leisure suit. He was at least seven feet tall, with absolutely no hair. He had gray, leathery skin, thick-lidded eyes, and a cold, reptilian smile. He moved toward us slowly but I knew he could move way faster.

His suit might’ve come from the Lotus Casino. It belonged back in the seventies, big-time. The shirt was silk paisley, unbuttoned halfway down his hairless chest. The lapels on his velvet jacket were as wide as landing strips. The silver chains around his neck— I couldn’t even count them.

“I’m Crusty.” He said, with a tartar-yellow smile.

“Sorry to barge in.” I said politely. “We were just, um, browsing.”

“You mean hiding from those no-good kids.” He grumbled. “They hang around every night. I get a lot of people in here, thanks to them. Say, you want to look at a water bed?”

I didn’t even have the chance to say no, when he put a huge paw on my shoulder and steered me deeper into the showroom.

I rolled my eyes internally, for what felt like the millionth time, at how obvious and heavy-handed most monsters were.

There was every kind of water bed you could imagine: different kinds of wood, different patterns of sheets; queen-size, king-size, emperor-of-the-universe-size.

“This is my most popular model.” Crusty spread his hands proudly over a bed covered with black satin sheets, with built-in Lava Lamps on the headboard. The mattress vibrated, so it looked like oil-flavored Jell-O.

“Million-hand massage.” Crusty told us. “Go on, try it out. Shoot, take a nap. I don’t care. No business today, anyway.”

“I don’t think...” I hedged, trying to back away.

“Million-hand massage!” Grover cried, and dove in. “Oh, you guys! This is cool.”

“Hmm.” Crusty said, stroking his leathery chin. “Almost, almost.”

“Almost what?” I asked.

He looked at Annabeth. “Do me a favor and try this one over here, honey. Might fit.”

Annabeth said, “But what—”

He patted her reassuringly on the shoulder and led her over to the Safari Deluxe model with teakwood lions carved into the frame and a leopard-patterned comforter. When Annabeth didn’t want to lie down, Crusty pushed her.

“Hey!” She protested.

Crusty snapped his fingers. “Ergo!”

Ropes sprang from the sides of the bed, lashing around Annabeth, holding her to the mattress.

Grover tried to get up, but ropes sprang from his black-satin bed, too, and lashed him down.

“N-not c-c-cool!” He yelled, his voice vibrating from the million-hand massage. “N-not c-cool a-at all!”

The giant looked at Annabeth, then turned toward me and grinned. “Almost, darn it.”

I tried to step away, but his hand shot out and clamped around the back of my neck. “Whoa, kid. Don’t worry. We’ll find you one in a sec.”

“Let my friends go.”

“Oh, sure I will. But I got to make them fit, first.”

“What do you mean?” I asked warily, already knowing what but asking anyways.

“All the beds are exactly six feet, see? Your friends are too short. Got to make them fit.”

Annabeth and Grover kept struggling.

“Can’t stand imperfect measurements,” Crusty muttered. “Ergo!”

A new set of ropes leaped out from the top and bottom of the beds, wrapping around Grover and Annabeth’s ankles, then around their armpits. The ropes started tightening, pulling my friends from both ends.

“Don’t worry.” Crusty told me. “These are stretching jobs. Maybe three extra inches on their spines. They might even live. Now why don’t we find a bed you like, huh?”

“Percy!” Grover yelled.

“Your real name’s not Crusty, is it?” I asked.

“Legally, it’s Procrustes.” He admitted.

“The Stretcher.” I sighed. I remembered the story: the giant who’d tried to kill Theseus with excess hospitality on his way to Athens.

“Yeah.” The salesman said. “But who can pronounce Procrustes? Bad for business. Now ‘Crusty,’ anybody can say that.”

“You’re right. It’s got a good ring to it.” I said, voice syrupy sweet with flattery. It’d worked just fine the first time.

His eyes lit up. “You think so?”

“Oh, absolutely.” I said. “And the workmanship on these beds? Fabulous!”

He grinned hugely, but his fingers didn’t loosen on my neck. “I tell my customers that. Every time. Nobody bothers to look at the workmanship. How many built-in Lava Lamp headboards have you seen?”

“Not too many.”

“That’s right!”

“Percy!” Annabeth yelled. “What are you doing?”

“Don’t mind her.” I told Procrustes, waving a flippant hand. “She’s impossible.”

The giant laughed. “All my customers are. Never six feet exactly. So inconsiderate. And then they complain about the fitting.”

“What do you do if they’re longer than six feet?”

“Oh, that happens all the time. It’s a simple fix.”

He let go of my neck, but before I could react, he reached behind a nearby sales desk and brought out a huge double-bladed brass axe. He said, “I just center the subject as best I can and lop off whatever hangs over on either end.”

“Ah.” I said, eyeing the sharp edges. “Sensible.”

“I’m so glad to come across an intelligent customer!”

The ropes were really stretching my friends now. Annabeth was turning pale. Grover made gurgling sounds, like a strangled goose.

“So Crusty...” I said, keeping my voice light. I glanced at the sales tag on the valentine-shaped Honeymoon Special. “Does this one really have dynamic stabilizers to stop wave motion?”

“Absolutely. Try it out.”

“Yeah, maybe I will. But would it work even for a big guy like you? No waves at all?”

“Guaranteed.”

“No way.”

“Way.”

“Show me.”

He sat down eagerly on the bed, patted the mattress. “No waves. See?”

I snapped my fingers. “Ergo.”

Ropes lashed around Crusty and flattened him against the mattress.

“Hey!” He yelled.

“Center him just right.” I said.

The ropes readjusted themselves at my command. Crusty’s whole head stuck out the top. His feet stuck out the bottom.

“No!” He said. “Wait! This is just a demo.”

I uncapped Riptide. “A few simple adjustments...”

“You drive a hard bargain.” He told me. “I’ll give you thirty percent off on selected floor models!”

“I think I’ll start with the top.” I raised my sword.

“No money down! No interest for six months!”

I swung the sword. Crusty stopped making offers.

I cut the ropes on the other beds. Annabeth and Grover got to their feet, groaning and wincing and cursing me a lot.

“You look taller.” I joked.

“Very funny.” Annabeth said. “Be faster next time.”

I ignored her and looked at the bulletin board behind Crusty’s sales desk. There was an advertisement for Hermes Delivery Service, and another for the All-New Compendium of L.A. Area Monsters— Under that, a bright orange flier for DOA Recording Studios, offering commissions for heroes’ souls. “We are always looking for new talent!” DOA’s address was right underneath with a map.

“Come on.” I said, grabbing the flyer.

“Give us a minute.” Grover complained. “We were almost stretched to death!”

“Then you’re ready for the Underworld!” I said cheerfully. “It’s only a block from here.”

Chapter Text

We stood in the shadows of Valencia Boulevard, looking up at gold letters etched in black marble: DOA Recording Studios.

Underneath, stenciled on the glass doors: No Solicitors. No Loitering. No Living.

It was almost midnight, but the lobby was brightly lit and full of people. Behind the security desk sat a tough-looking guard with sunglasses and an earpiece.

“Okay. You remember the plan.” I asked.

“The plan.” Grover gulped. “Yeah. I love the plan.”

Annabeth said, “What happens if the plan doesn’t work?”

“Don’t be a Negative Nancy.” I said.

“Right.” She said. “We’re entering the Land of the Dead, and I shouldn’t think negative.”

I took the pearls out of my pocket, the three milky spheres the Nereid had given me in Santa Monica. They didn’t seem like much of a backup in case something went wrong.

Annabeth put her hand on my shoulder. “I’m sorry, Percy. You’re right, we’ll make it. It’ll be fine.”

She gave Grover a nudge.

“Oh, right!” He chimed in. “We got this far. We’ll find the master bolt and save your mom. No problem.”

I looked at them both and smiled.

It was still hard to look at Annabeth and she annoyed the living Hades out of me but only a few minutes before, they’d almost gotten stretched to death on deluxe water beds, and now they were trying to be brave for my sake, trying to make me feel better.

I slipped the pearls back in my pocket. “Let’s go. We’ve got this.”

We walked inside the DOA lobby.

Muzak played softly on hidden speakers. The carpet and walls were steel gray. Pencil cactuses grew in the corners like skeleton hands. The furniture was black leather, and every seat was taken. There were people sitting on couches, people standing up, people staring out the windows or waiting for the elevator.

Nobody moved, or talked, or did much of anything. Out of the corner of my eye, I could see them all just fine, but if I focused on any one of them in particular, they started looking... transparent. I could see right through their bodies.

The security guard’s desk was a raised podium, so we had to look up at him.

He was tall and elegant, with chocolate-colored skin and bleached-blond hair shaved military style. He wore tortoiseshell shades and a silk Italian suit that matched his hair. A black rose was pinned to his lapel under a silver name tag.

I read the name tag, then looked at him in bewilderment. “Your name is Charon?

“What a precious young lad.” He had a strange accent— British, maybe, but also as if he had learned English as a second language. “It’s pretty rare for people to get that right.”

“I’m glad I got it right, Charon.”

“Mr. Charon.”

“Mr. Charon.” I parroted.

“Well done.” He sat back. “And now, how may I help you little dead ones?”

“We want to go to the Underworld.” Annabeth chimed in.

Charon’s mouth twitched. “Well, that’s refreshing.”

“It is?” She asked.

“Straightforward and honest. No screaming. No ‘There must be a mistake, Mr. Charon.’” He looked us over. “How did you die, then?”

I nudged Grover.

“Oh.” He said. “Um... drowned... in the bathtub.”

“All three of you?” Charon asked.

We nodded even though I wanted to hit my head against the wall.

“Big bathtub.” Charon looked mildly impressed. “I don’t suppose you have coins for passage. Normally, with adults, you see, I could charge your American Express, or add the ferry price to your last cable bill. But with children... alas, you never die prepared. Suppose you’ll have to take a seat for a few centuries.”

“Oh, but we have coins.” I set three golden drachmas on the counter, liberated from crusty’s office desk.

“Well, now...” Charon moistened his lips. “Real drachmas. Real golden drachmas. I haven’t seen these in...”

His fingers hovered greedily over the coins.

We were so close.

Then Charon looked at me. That cold stare behind his glasses seemed to bore a hole through my chest. “Here now...” He said. “You’re not dead. I should’ve known. You’re a godling.”

“We have to get to the Underworld.” I insisted.

Charon made a growling sound deep in his throat.

Immediately, all the people in the waiting room got up and started pacing, agitated, lighting cigarettes, running hands through their hair, or checking their wristwatches.

“Leave while you can.” Charon told us. “I’ll just take these and forget I saw you.”

He started to go for the coins, but I snatched them back.

“No service, no tip.” I said tartly.

Charon growled again— deep, blood-chilling sound. The spirits of the dead started pounding on the elevator doors.

“It’s a shame, too.” I sighed dramatically, placing a hand on my cheek. “We had more to offer.”

I held up the entire bag from Crusty’s stash. I took out a fistful of drachmas and let the coins spill through my fingers.

Charon’s growl changed into something more like a lion’s purr. “Do you think I can be bought, godling? Eh... just out of curiosity, how much have you got there?”

“A lot.” I said. “I bet Hades doesn’t pay you well enough for such hard work.”

“Oh, you don’t know the half of it. How would you like to babysit these spirits all day? Always ‘Please don’t let me be dead’ or ‘Please let me across for free.’ I haven’t had a pay raise in three thousand years. Do you imagine suits like this come cheap?”

“You deserve better.” I agreed easily. “A little appreciation. Respect. Good pay.”

With each word, I stacked another gold coin on the counter.

Charon glanced down at his silk Italian jacket, as if imagining himself in something even better. “I must say, lad, you’re making some sense now. Just a little.”

I stacked another few coins. “I could mention a pay raise while I’m talking to Hades.”

He sighed. “The boat’s almost full, anyway. I might as well add you three and be off.”

He stood, scooped up our money, and said, “Come along.”

We pushed through the crowd of waiting spirits, who started grabbing at our clothes like the wind, their voices whispering things I couldn’t make out. Charon shoved them out of the way, grumbling, “Freeloaders.”

He escorted us into the elevator, which was already crowded with souls of the dead, each one holding a green boarding pass. Charon grabbed two spirits who were trying to get on with us and pushed them back into the lobby.

“Right. Now, no one get any ideas while I’m gone.” He announced to the waiting room. “And if anyone moves the dial off my easy-listening station again, I’ll make sure you’re here for another thousand years. Understand?”

He shut the doors. He put a key card into a slot in the elevator panel and we started to descend.

“What happens to the spirits waiting in the lobby?” Annabeth asked.

“Nothing.” Charon said.

“For how long?”

“Forever, or until I’m feeling generous.”

“Oh.” She said. “That’s... fair.”

Charon raised an eyebrow. “Whoever said death was fair, young miss? Wait until it’s your turn. You’ll die soon enough, where you’re going.”

“We’ll get out alive.” I said easily, sure of our fate.

“Ha.”

We weren’t going down anymore, but forward. The air turned misty. Spirits around me started changing shape. Their modern clothes flickered, turning into gray hooded robes. The floor of the elevator began swaying.

Charon’s creamy Italian suit had been replaced by a long black robe. His tortoiseshell glasses were gone. Where his eyes should’ve been were empty sockets— like Ares’s eyes, except Charon’s were totally dark, full of night and death and despair.

He saw me looking, and said, “Well?”

“You have nice eyes.” I said.

I thought he was grinning, but that wasn’t it. The flesh of his face was becoming transparent, letting me see straight through to his skull.

The floor kept swaying.

Grover said, “I think I’m getting seasick.”

When I blinked again, the elevator wasn’t an elevator anymore. We were standing in a wooden barge. Charon was poling us across a dark, oily river, swirling with bones, dead fish, and other, stranger things— plastic dolls, crushed carnations, soggy diplomas with gilt edges.

“The River Styx.” Annabeth murmured. “It’s so...”

“Polluted.” Charon said. “For thousands of years, you humans have been throwing in everything as you come across— hopes, dreams, wishes that never came true. Irresponsible waste management, if you ask me.”

Mist curled off the filthy water. Above us, almost lost in the gloom, was a ceiling of stalactites. Ahead, the far shore glimmered with greenish light, the color of poison.

Annabeth grabbed hold of my hand. Under normal circumstances, I would’ve pulled my hand away, but I understood how she felt. She wanted reassurance that somebody else was alive on this boat.

The shoreline of the Underworld came into view. Craggy rocks and black volcanic sand stretched inland about a hundred yards to the base of a high stone wall, which marched off in either direction as far as we could see. A sound came from somewhere nearby in the green gloom, echoing off the stones— the howl of a large animal.

“Old Three-Face is hungry.” Charon said. His smile turned skeletal in the greenish light. “Bad luck for you, godlings.”

The bottom of the boat slid onto the black sand. The dead began to disembark. A woman holding a little girl’s hand. An old man and an old woman hobbling along arm in arm. A boy no older than I was, shuffling silently along in his gray robe.

Charon said, “I’d wish you luck, mate, but there isn’t any down here. Mind you, don’t forget to mention my pay raise.”

He counted our golden coins into his pouch, then took up his pole. He warbled something that sounded like a Barry Manilow song as he ferried the empty barge back across the river.

We followed the spirits up a well-worn path.

The entrance to the Underworld still looked like a cross between airport security and the Jersey Turnpike.

There were three separate entrances under one huge black archway that said: You are now entering Erebus. Each entrance had a pass-through metal detector with security cameras mounted on top. Beyond this were tollbooths manned by black-robed ghouls like Charon.

The howling of the hungry animal was really loud now, but I couldn’t see where it was coming from. The three-headed dog, Cerberus, who was supposed to guard Hades’s door, was nowhere to be seen.

The dead queued up in the three lines, two marked: Attendant on Duty, and one marked: EZ Death. The EZ Death line was moving right along. The other two were crawling.

“The fast line must go straight to the Asphodel Fields.” I commented.

Grover shuddered. “Imagine standing in a wheat field in Kansas. Forever.”

“Harsh.” I said.

“Not as harsh as that.” Grover muttered. “Look.”

A couple of black-robbed ghouls had pulled aside one spirit and were frisking him at the security desk. The face of the dead man looked vaguely familiar.

“He’s that preacher who made the news, remember?” Grover asked.

“Oh, yeah.” I did remember now. I’d forgotten him almost completely from the first timeline. He was this annoying televangelist from upstate New York who’d raised millions of dollars for orphanages and then got caught spending the money on stuff for his mansion, like gold-plated toilet seats, and an indoor putt-putt golf course. He’d died in a police chase when his ‘Lamborghini for the Lord’ went off a cliff.

I said, “What’re they doing to him?”

“Special punishment from Hades.” Grover guessed. “The really bad people get his personal attention as soon as they arrive. The Fur— the Kindly Ones will set up an eternal torture for him.”

The thought of the Furies made me shudder. I realized I was in their home territory now. Old Mrs. Dodds would be licking her lips with anticipation.

“But if he’s a preacher.” I said. “And he believes in a different hell...”

Grover shrugged. “Who says he’s seeing this place the way we’re seeing it? Humans see what they want to see. You’re very stubborn— er, persistent, that way.”

We got closer to the gates. The howling was so loud now it shook the ground at my feet, but I still couldn’t figure out where it was coming from.

Then, about fifty feet in front of us, the green mist shimmered. Standing just where the path split into three lanes was an enormous shadowy monster.

It was half transparent, just like the dead. Until it moved, it blended with whatever was behind it. Only its eyes and teeth looked solid. And it was staring straight at me.

The dead walked right up to him— no fear at all. The Attendant on Duty lines parted on either side of him. The EZ Death spirits walked right between his front paws and under his belly, which they could do without even crouching.

“I’m starting to see him better.” I muttered. “Why is that?”

“I think...” Annabeth moistened her lips. “I’m afraid it’s because we’re getting closer to being dead.”

The dog’s middle head craned toward us. It sniffed the air and growled.

“It can smell the living.” I said.

“But that’s okay.” Grover said, trembling next to me. “Because we have a plan.”

“Right.” Annabeth said, voice shaking. “A plan.”

We moved toward the monster.

The middle head snarled at us, then barked so loudly, my teeth rattled.

“Can you understand it?” I asked Grover.

“Oh yeah.” He said. “I can understand it.”

“What’s it saying?”

“I don’t think humans have a four-letter word that translates, exactly.”

I took a big red Waterland ball out of my backpack and marched straight up to Cerberus. I was borrowing a page from Annabeth’s book.

I shouted, “See the ball? You want the ball, Cerberus? Sit!”

Cerberus looked as stunned as we were.

All three of his heads cocked sideways. Six nostrils dilated.

“Sit!” I yelled again, more firmly.

Cerberus licked his three sets of lips, shifted on his haunches, and sat, immediately crushing a dozen spirits who’d been passing underneath him in the EZ Death line. The spirits made muffled hisses as they dissipated, like the air let out of tires.

“Good boy!” I praised and threw Cerberus the ball.

He caught it in his middle mouth. It was barely big enough for him to chew, and the other heads started snapping at the middle, trying to get the new toy.

“Drop it!” I ordered.

Cerberus’s heads stopped fighting and looked at her. The ball was wedged between two of his teeth like a tiny piece of gum. He made a loud, scary whimper, then dropped the ball, now slimy and bitten nearly in half, at my feet.

“Good boy.” I picked up the ball, ignoring the monster spit all over it.

I turned towards Grover and Annabeth. “Go now. EZ Death line— it’s faster.”

“But—” Grover protested.

“Now!” I hissed

She and Grover inched forward warily.

Cerberus started to growl.

“Stay!” I ordered. “If you want the ball, stay!”

Cerberus whimpered, but he stayed where he was.

“What about you?” Annabeth as she passed me.

“I know what I’m doing.” I muttered. “At least, I’m pretty sure...”

Grover and Annabeth walked between the monster’s legs.

They made it through.

“Good dog!” I praised.

I held up the tattered red ball knowing there’d be nothing left for another trick if I rewarded him.

I threw the ball anyway. The monster’s left mouth immediately snatched it up, only to be attacked by the middle head, while the right head moaned in protest.

While the monster was distracted, I walked under its belly and joined us at the metal detector.

“How did you do that?” She demanded.

“You have to be firm with dogs.” I replied.

“Never mind that.” Grover said, tugging at my shirt. “Come on!”

We were about to bolt through the EZ Death line when Cerberus moaned pitifully from all three mouths. Annabeth stopped.

We turned to face the dog, which had done a one-eighty to look at us.

Cerberus panted expectantly, the tiny red ball in pieces in a puddle of drool at its feet.

“Good boy.” I said, a bit sad actually. He really was a good dog

The monster’s heads turned sideways, as if worried about me this time.

“I’ll bring you another ball soon.” I promised. “Would you like that?”

The monster whimpered.

“Good dog. I’ll come visit you soon. I— I promise.” I said before turning away. “Let’s go.”

We pushed through the metal detector, which immediately screamed and set off flashing red lights. “Unauthorized possessions! Magic detected!”

Cerberus started to bark.

We burst through the EZ Death gate, which started even more alarms blaring, and raced into the Underworld.

A few minutes later, we were hiding, out of breath, in the rotten trunk of an immense black tree as security ghouls scuttled past, yelling for backup from the Furies.

Grover murmured, “Well, Percy, what have we learned today?”

“That three-headed dogs are actually very friendly?”

“No.” Grover told me. “We’ve learned that your plans really, really bite!”

I wasn’t a little offended at that. Even here in the Underworld, everybody— even monsters—needed a little attention once in a while.

I thought about that as we waited for the ghouls to pass. I felt my heart throb a bit as I listened to the mournful keening of Cerberus in the distance, longing for his new friend.

Chapter Text

Imagine the largest concert crowd you’ve ever seen, a football field packed with a million fans.

Now imagine a field a million times that big, packed with people, and imagine the electricity has gone out, and there is no noise, no light, no beach ball bouncing around over the crowd. Something tragic has happened backstage. Whispering masses of people are just milling around in the shadows, waiting for a concert that will never start.

If you can picture that, you have a pretty good idea what the Fields of Asphodel looked like. The black grass had been trampled by eons of dead feet. A warm, moist wind blew like the breath of a swamp. Black trees— Grover told me they were poplars— grew in clumps here and there.

The cavern ceiling was so high above us it might’ve been a bank of storm clouds, except for the stalactites, which glowed faint gray and looked wickedly pointed.

Annabeth, Grover, and I tried to blend into the crowd, keeping an eye out for security ghouls. I still couldn’t help glancing around the spirits of Asphodel, but the dead are hard to look at.

Their faces shimmer. They all look slightly angry or confused. They will come up to you and speak, but their voices sound like chatter, like bats twittering. Once they realize you can’t understand them, they frown and move away.

The dead still aren’t scary. They’re just sad.

We crept along, following the line of new arrivals that snaked from the main gates toward a black-tented pavilion with a banner that read:

Judgements for Elysium and Eternal Damnation

Welcome, Newly Deceased!

Out the back of the tent came two much smaller lines.

To the left, spirits flanked by security ghouls were marched down a rocky path toward the Fields of Punishment, which glowed and smoked in the distance, a vast, cracked wasteland with rivers of lava and minefields and miles of barbed wire separating the different torture areas.

Even from far away, I could see people being chased by hellhounds, burned at the stake, forced to run naked through cactus patches or listen to opera music. I could just make out a tiny hill, with the ant-size figure of Sisyphus struggling to move his boulder to the top. And I saw worse tortures, too— things I don’t want to describe.

I closed my eyes for a moment and looked away.

The line coming from the right side of the judgment pavilion was much better. This one led down toward a small valley surrounded by walls— a gated community, which was probably only happy part of the Underworld.

Beyond the security gate were neighborhoods of beautiful houses from every time period in history, Roman villas and medieval castles and Victorian mansions. Silver and gold flowers bloomed on the lawns. The grass rippled in rainbow colors. I could hear laughter and smell barbecue cooking.

Elysium.

In the middle of that valley was a glittering blue lake, with three small islands like a vacation resort in the Bahamas. The Isles of the Blest, for people who had chosen to be reborn three times, and three times achieved Elysium. I smiled, hoping that I would be worthy to call those Isles my eternal resting place... If I didn’t accept some form of godhood this time.

“That’s what it’s all about.” Annabeth said, like she was reading my thoughts. “That’s the place for heroes.”

But I thought of how few people there were in Elysium, how tiny it was compared to the Fields of Asphodel or even the Fields of Punishment. So few people did good in their lives. It was depressing.

We left the judgment pavilion and moved deeper into the Asphodel Fields. It got darker. The colors faded from our clothes. The crowds of chattering spirits began to thin.

After a few miles of walking, we began to hear a familiar screech in the distance. Looming on the horizon was a palace of glittering black obsidian. Above the parapets swirled three dark batlike creatures: the Furies. I got the feeling they were waiting for us.

“I suppose it’s too late to turn back.” Grover said wistfully.

“We’ll be okay.” I said stoutly.

“Maybe we should search some of the other places first.” Grover suggested. “Like, Elysium, for instance...”

“Come on, goat boy.” Annabeth grabbed his arm.

Grover yelped. His sneakers sprouted wings and his legs shot forward, pulling him away from Annabeth. He landed flat on his back in the grass.

“Grover.” Annabeth chided. “Stop messing around.”

“But I didn’t—”

He yelped again. His shoes were flapping like crazy now. They levitated off the ground and started dragging him away from us.

“Maia!” He yelled, but the magic word seemed to have no effect. “Maia, already! Nine-one-one! Help!”

Annabeth and I reached for Grover’s hands, but too late. He was picking up speed, skidding downhill like a bobsled.

We ran after him.

Annabeth shouted, “Untie the shoes!”

It was still a smart idea, but it’s not easy to do when your shoes are pulling you along feetfirst at full speed. Grover tried to sit up, but he couldn’t get close to the laces.

We kept after him, trying to keep him in sight as he zipped between the legs of spirits who chattered at him in annoyance.

Grover’s shoes veered sharply to the right and dragged him in the opposite direction. Towards Tartarus/

The slope got steeper. Grover picked up speed. Annabeth and I had to sprint to keep up. The cavern walls narrowed on either side, and I realized we’d entered some kind of side tunnel. No black grass or trees now, just rock underfoot, and the dim light of the stalactites above.

“Grover!” I yelled, my voice echoing. “Hold on to something!”

“What?” He yelled back.

He was grabbing at gravel, but there was nothing big enough to slow him down.

The tunnel got darker and colder. The hair on the back of my neck bristled. It smelled evil down here. It made me think of things I wished I could forget— blood spilled on an ancient stone altar, the foul breath of a murderer.

Then I saw what was ahead of us, and I picked up speed this time. The tunnel widened into a huge dark cavern, and in the middle was a chasm the size of a city block.

Grover was sliding straight toward the edge.

“Come on, Percy!” Annabeth yelled, running just a bit faster.

“That’s—”

“I know!” She shouted. “The place you described in your dream! But Grover’s going to fall if we don’t catch him.”

He was yelling, clawing at the ground, but the winged shoes kept dragging him toward the pit, and it didn’t look like we could possibly get to him in time.

Grovers hooves saved him again.

The flying sneakers had always been a loose fit on him, and finally Grover hit a big rock and the left shoe came flying off. It sped into the darkness, down into the chasm. The right shoe kept tugging him along, but not as fast. Grover was able to slow himself down by grabbing on to the big rock and using it like an anchor.

He was ten feet from the edge of the pit when we caught him and hauled him back up the slope. The other winged shoe tugged itself off, circled around us angrily and kicked our heads in protest before flying off into the chasm to join its twin.

We all collapsed, exhausted, on the obsidian gravel. My limbs felt like lead. Even my backpack seemed heavier, as if somebody had filled it with rocks.

Grover was scratched up pretty bad. His hands were bleeding. His eyes had gone slit-pupiled, goat style, the way they did whenever he was terrified.

“I don’t know how...” He panted. “I didn’t...”

“Wait.” I said. “Listen.”

I heard something— a deep whisper in the darkness.

Another few seconds, and Annabeth said, “Percy, this place—”

“Shh.” I said. “I know.”

The sound was getting louder, a muttering, evil voice from far, far below us. Coming from the pit.

Grover sat up. “Wh—what’s that noise?”

Annabeth heard it too, now. I could see it in her eyes. “Tartarus. The entrance to Tartarus.”

I uncapped Anaklusmos.

The bronze sword expanded, gleaming in the darkness, and the evil voice seemed to falter, just for a moment, before resuming its chant.

I could almost make out words now, ancient, ancient words, older even than Greek.

“Magic.” I said, backing away.

“We have to get out of here.” Annabeth said.

Together, we dragged Grover to his hooves and started back up the tunnel. Ares backpack weighed me down. The voice got louder and angrier behind us, and we broke into a run as a cold blast of wind pulled at our backs, as if the entire pit were inhaling.

For a single moment, I lost ground, my feet slipping in the gravel and I looked back at Tartarus with a glare, my hair whipping around my face in the unnatural wind. If we’d been any closer to the edge, we would’ve been sucked in.

We kept struggling forward, and finally reached the top of the tunnel, where the cavern widened out into the Fields of Asphodel. The wind died. A wail of outrage echoed from deep in the tunnel. Kronos was not happy we’d gotten away.

“What was that?” Grover panted, when we’d collapsed in the relative safety of a black poplar grove. “One of Hades’s pets?”

Annabeth and I looked at each other. I could tell she was nursing an idea, probably the same one she’d gotten during the taxi ride to L.A., but she was too scared to share it. Lucky for her I didn’t need her too to know what, or mor importantly who, that was.

I capped my sword and put the pen back in my pocket. “Let’s keep going.” I looked at Grover. “Can you walk?”

He swallowed. “Yeah, sure. I never liked those shoes, anyway.”

He tried to sound brave about it, but he was trembling as badly as Annabeth was. Kronos was nobody’s pet. He was unspeakably old and powerful.

I was actually relieved this time as we turned and headed towards Hades palace.

The Furies circled the parapets, high in the gloom. The outer walls of the fortress glittered black, and the two story-tall bronze gates stood wide open.

The engravings on the gates were still as morbid as ever— scenes of death. Some were from modern times— an atomic bomb exploding over a city, a trench filled with gas mask– wearing soldiers, a line of African famine victims waiting with empty bowls— but all of them looked as if they’d been etched into the bronze thousands of years ago.

Inside the courtyard was the strangest, but still one of the most beautiful, garden I’d ever seen. Multicolored mushrooms, poisonous shrubs, and weird luminous plants grew without sunlight.

Precious jewels made up for the lack of flowers, piles of rubies as big as my fist, clumps of raw diamonds. Standing here and there like frozen party guests were Medusa’s garden statues— petrified children, satyrs, and centaurs— all smiling grotesquely.

In the center of the garden was an orchard of pomegranate trees, their orange blooms neon bright in the dark. “The garden of Persephone.” Annabeth said. “Keep walking.”

I understood why she wanted to move on. The tart smell of those pomegranates was almost overwhelming. I had a sudden desire to eat them, but one bite of Underworld food, and we would never be able to leave. I pulled Grover away to keep him from picking a big juicy one.

We walked up the steps of the palace, between black columns, through a black marble portico, and into the house of Hades. The entry hall had a polished bronze floor, which seemed to boil in the reflected torchlight. There was no ceiling, just the cavern roof, far above. I guess they never had to worry about rain down here.

Every side doorway was guarded by a skeleton in military gear. Some wore Greek armor, some British redcoat uniforms, some camouflage with tattered American flags on the shoulders. They carried spears or muskets or M-16s. None of them bothered us, but their hollow eye sockets followed us as we walked down the hall, toward the big set of doors at the opposite end.

Two U.S. Marine skeletons guarded the doors. They grinned down at us, rocket-propelled grenade launchers held across their chests.

“You know.” Grover mumbled, “I bet Hades doesn’t have trouble with door-to-door salesmen.”

Ares backpack weighed a ton now. Zeus’ bolt growing heavier and heavier as the concealment broke away piece by piece..

“Well, guys.” I said, raising a hand. “Here goes.”

A hot wind blew down the corridor, and the doors swung open. The guards stepped aside.

“I guess that means entrez-vous.” Annabeth said.

The room inside looked just like in my dream, except this time the throne of Hades was occupied.

He was the third god I’d met, both in the original timeline and now, but he was still the first who really struck me as godlike.

He was at least ten feet tall, for one thing, and dressed in black silk robes and a crown of braided gold. His skin was albino white, his hair shoulder-length and jet black. He wasn’t bulked up like Ares, but he radiated power. He lounged on his throne of fused human bones, looking lithe, graceful, and dangerous as a panther.

Nico had the same deadly grace once he grew into himself. I shook those thoughts away. I needed to concentrate.

Hades’s aura was trying to affect me, just as Ares’s had. The Lord of the Dead resembled pictures I’d seen of Adolph Hitler, or Napoleon, or the terrorist leaders who direct suicide bombers. Hades had the same intense eyes, the same kind of mesmerizing charisma.

“You are brave to come here, Son of Poseidon.” He said in an oily voice. “After what you have done to me, very brave indeed. Or perhaps you are simply very foolish.”

Numbness tried creeping into my joints, tempting me to lie down and just take a little nap at Hades’s feet. Curl up here and sleep forever. I firmly chased the feeling away and stepped forward. I knew what I had to say. “Lord and Uncle, I have done nothing to you but I come with one request.”

Hades raised an eyebrow. When he sat forward in his throne, shadowy faces appeared in the folds of his black robes, faces of torment, as if the garment were stitched of trapped souls from the Fields of Punishment, trying to get out.

“Only one request?” Hades said. “Arrogant child but I suppose I was expecting two. As if you have not already taken enough. Speak, then. It amuses me not to strike you dead yet.”

I swallowed. This was going about as well as I’d feared.

I glanced at the empty, smaller throne next to Hades’s. It was shaped like a black flower, gilded with gold. I didn’t with Persephone were here this time. Yes she could calm his moods... if she chose too. But even after all this time she was still bitter about her lot in life so she often only made his volatile temper worse in fits of pique.

Thankfully, Persephone was above in the world of light with her mother, the goddess of agriculture, Demeter. Her visits, not the tilt of the planet, create the seasons.

“Lord Hades.” I said calmly. “I know you did not steal the bolt and in fact something was stolen from you.”

Annabeth and Grover looked startled, the Satyr even letting out a warbling bleat.

The throne room shook with a tremor so strong, they probably felt it upstairs in Los Angeles. Debris fell from the cavern ceiling. Doors burst open all along the walls, and skeletal warriors marched in, hundreds of them, from every time period and nation in Western civilization. They lined the perimeter of the room, blocking the exits.

Hades bellowed, “So you admit your crime, godling?”

“No.” I said firmly. “I may have the bolt now but it was only given to me. I did not take nor did I steal your Helm of Darkness.”

“But...” Annabeth blurted out. I could tell her mind was going a million miles an hour. “Lord Hades, your helm of darkness is missing, too?”

“Do not play innocent with me, girl. You and the satyr have been helping this hero— coming here to threaten me in Poseidon’s name, no doubt— to bring me an ultimatum. Does Poseidon think I can be blackmailed into supporting him?”

“No!” I said. “Poseidon didn’t have me take it nor your symbol of power. I knew nothing of the world of the Gods at the Winter Solstice.”

“I have said nothing of the helm’s disappearance.” Hades snarled. “Because I had no illusions that anyone on Olympus would offer me the slightest justice, the slightest help. I can ill afford for word to get out that my most powerful weapon of fear is missing. So I searched for you myself, and yet you knew. When I saw you coming to me yourself, I did not try to stop you.”

“You didn’t try to stop us? But—” Annabeth started but Hades was having none of it.

“Return my helm now, or I will stop death.” Hades threatened. “That is my counterproposal. I will open the earth and have the dead pour back into the world. I will make your lands a nightmare. And you, Percy Jackson— your skeleton will lead my army out of Hades.”

The skeletal soldiers all took one step forward, making their weapons ready.

“You’re as bad as Zeus.” I said, flatly. “You think I stole from you and even when you have no proof and I stand before you and speak honestly, you choose not to believe.”

Hades curled his lip. “How dare you— I wanted you brought before me alive so you might face every torture in the Fields of Punishment. Why do you think I let you enter my kingdom so easily?”

“Easily?” I returned sarcastically.

“Return my property!”

“I don’t have your helm. Again I only have the master bolt because someone else gave it to me.”

I slung the pack off my shoulder and unzipped it. Inside was a two-foot-long metal cylinder, spiked on both ends, humming with energy.

“Percy,” Annabeth said. “How—”

“Ares!” I snapped, shooting her a glare. Gods but she could be slow sometimes.

“You heroes are always the same.” Hades said. “Your pride makes you foolish, thinking you could bring such a weapon before me. I did not ask for Zeus’s master bolt, but since it is here, you will yield it to me. I am sure it will make an excellent bargaining tool. And now... my helm. Where is it?”

“Lord Hades.” I said. “I do not have it. This is all a mistake.”

“A mistake?” Hades roared.

The skeletons aimed their weapons. From high above, there was a fluttering of leathery wings, and the three Furies swooped down to perch on the back of their master’s throne. The one with Mrs. Dodds’s face grinned at me eagerly and flicked her whip.

“There is no mistake.” Hades said. “I know why you have come— I know the real reason you brought the bolt. You came to bargain for her.”

Hades loosed a ball of gold fire from his palm. It exploded on the steps in front of me, and there was my mother, frozen in a shower of gold, just as she was at the moment when the Minotaur began to squeeze her to death.

“Yes.” Hades said with satisfaction. “I took her. I knew, Percy Jackson, that you would come to bargain with me eventually. Return my helm, and perhaps I will let her go. She is not dead, you know. Not yet. But if you displease me, that will change.”

I thought about the pearls in my pocket. They would be able to free three of us.

“Ah, the pearls.” Hades said, and I rolled my eyes. So dramatic. “Yes, my brother and his little tricks. Bring them forth, Percy Jackson.”

I slipped my hand into my pocket and brought out the pearls.

“Only three.” Hades said. “What a shame. You do realize each only protects a single person. Try to take your mother, then, little godling. And which of your friends will you leave behind to spend eternity with me? Go on. Choose. Or give me the backpack and accept my terms.”

I looked at Annabeth and Grover. Their faces were grim.

“We were tricked... but why?” Annabeth asked. “And the voice in the pit—”

“I don’t know yet.” I said. “But I intend to ask.”

“Decide, boy!” Hades yelled.

“Percy.” Grover put his hand on my shoulder. “You can’t give him the bolt.”

“I know that.”

“Leave me here. Use the third pearl on your mom. I’m a satyr.” Grover said. “We don’t have souls like humans do. He can torture me until I die, but he won’t get me forever. I’ll just be reincarnated as a flower or something. It’s the best way.”

 “No.” Annabeth drew her bronze knife. “You two go on. Grover, you have to protect Percy. You have to get your searcher’s license and start your quest for Pan. Get his mom out of here. I’ll cover you. I plan to go down fighting.”

“No way,” Grover said. “I’m staying behind.”

“Think again, goat boy,” Annabeth said.

“Stop it, both of you!” I snapped. They had both been with me through so much. They had done nothing but save me, over and over, and now they wanted to sacrifice their lives for my mom. Annabeth may be arrogant and a horrible friend but she was a great Hero.

“I know what to do.” I said. “Take these.”

I handed them each a pearl.

Annabeth said, “But, Percy...”

I turned and faced my mother. I wanted to sacrifice myself and use the last pearl on her, but I knew what she would say. She would never allow it. I had to get the bolt back to Olympus and tell Zeus the truth. I had to stop the war. She would never forgive me if I saved her instead. I thought about the prophecy made at Half-Blood Hill, You will fail to save what matters most in the end. But I wasn’t really failing.

“I’m sorry.” I told her. “I’ll be back and it’ll be okay.”

The smug look on Hades’s face faded. He said, “Godling...?”

“I’ll find your helm, Uncle.” I told him. “I’ll return it but I know how Gods work at least. You can’t interfere directly and you definitely can’t kill a mortal before their time. The Moirai wouldn’t allow it.”

“Do not defy me—”

“And it wouldn’t hurt to play with Cerberus once in a while. He likes red rubber balls. Oh and Charon wants a raise.” I added.

“Percy Jackson, you will not—”

I smile, “I’ll return your Helm! Now!”

We smashed the pearls at our feet. For a scary moment, nothing happened.

Hades yelled, “Destroy them!”

The army of skeletons rushed forward, swords out, guns clicking to full automatic. The Furies lunged, their whips bursting into flame.

Just as the skeletons opened fire, the pearl fragments at my feet exploded with a burst of green light and a gust of fresh sea wind. I was encased in a milky white sphere, which was starting to float off the ground.

Annabeth and Grover were right behind me. Spears and bullets sparked harmlessly off the pearl bubbles as we floated up. Hades yelled with such rage, the entire fortress shook and I knew it was not going to be a peaceful night in L.A.

“Look up!” Grover yelled. “We’re going to crash!”

Sure enough, we were racing right toward the stalactites.

“How do you control these things?” Annabeth shouted.

“You don’t need to!” I shouted back.

The bubbles slammed into the ceiling and... Darkness.

Then we were going up, right through solid rock as easily as an air bubble in water. That was the power of the pearls, I realized— What belongs to the sea will always return to the sea.

For a few moments, I couldn’t see anything outside the smooth walls of my sphere, then my pearl broke through on the ocean floor. The two other milky spheres, Annabeth and Grover, kept pace with me as we soared upward through the water. And—swoosh!

We exploded on the surface, in the middle of the Santa Monica Bay, knocking a surfer off his board with an indignant, “Dude!”

I grabbed Grover and hauled him over to a life buoy. I caught Annabeth and dragged her over too. A curious shark was circling us, a great white about eleven feet long.

“Swim along, I can’t play now.” I said with a smile.

The shark turned and swam away morosely.

The surfer screamed something about bad mushrooms and paddled away from us as fast as he could.

I knew what time it was: early morning, June 21, the day of the summer solstice.

In the distance, Los Angeles was on fire, plumes of smoke rising from neighborhoods all over the city. There had been an earthquake, all right, and it was Hades’s fault. Such a temper.

I had to get to shore. I had to get Zeus’s thunderbolt back to Olympus. And I had to have a serious conversation with the god who’d tricked me.

Chapter Text

A Coast Guard boat picked us up, but they were too busy to keep us for long, or to wonder how three kids in street clothes had gotten out into the middle of the bay. There was a disaster to mop up. Their radios were jammed with distress calls.

They dropped us off at the Santa Monica Pier with towels around our shoulders and water bottles that said; I’m a Junior Coast Guard! And sped off to save more people.

Our clothes were sopping wet, even mine. When the Coast Guard boat had appeared, I willed myself to get soaked so it wouldn’t look suspicious that I was bone dry. I was also barefoot, because I’d given my shoes to Grover. Better the Coast Guard wonder why one of us was barefoot than wonder why one of us had hooves.

After reaching dry land, we stumbled down the beach, watching the city burn against a beautiful sunrise. My backpack was heavy with Zeus’s master bolt but my heart was light after seeing my mother. She would be okay.

“I don’t believe it,” Annabeth said. “We went all that way—”

“It was a trick.” I said. “A strategy worthy of Athena.”

“Hey!” She snapped warningly.

“You get it, don’t you?” I retorted.

She dropped her eyes, her anger fading. “Yeah. I get it.”

“Well, I don’t!” Grover complained. “Would somebody—”

“Percy...” Annabeth said. “I’m sorry about your mother. I’m so sorry...”

“Why are you sorry?” I asked. “Hades can’t kill her or he would have already but the prophecy was right.

Annabeth and Grover exchanged glances.

“‘You shall go west and face the god who has turned.’ But it wasn’t Hades. Hades didn’t want war among the Big Three. Someone else pulled off the theft. Someone stole Zeus’s master bolt, and Hades’s helm, and framed me because I’m Poseidon’s son. Poseidon will get blamed by both sides. By sundown today, there will be a three-way war. And I’ll have caused it by falling for a set-up.”

Grover shook his head, mystified. “But who would be that sneaky? Who would want war that bad?”

I stopped in my tracks, looking down the beach. “Gee, let me think.” I drawled sarcastically.

Ares was waiting for us, in his black leather duster and sunglasses, an aluminum baseball bat propped on his shoulder. His motorcycle rumbled beside him, its headlight turning the sand red.

“Hey, kid.” Ares said, seeming genuinely pleased to see me. “You were supposed to die.”

“You stole the helm and the master bolt.” I said simply.

Ares grinned. “Well, now, I didn’t steal them personally. Gods taking each other’s symbols of power— that’s a big no-no. But you’re not the only hero in the world who can run errands.”

“You didn’t use one of your won children, so who did you have do your dirty work.” I asked, Luke’s smiling face flashing in my minds eye.

He still looked amused. “Doesn’t matter. The point is, kid, you’re impeding the war effort. See, you’ve got to die in the Underworld. Then Old Seaweed will be mad at Hades for killing you. Corpse Breath will have Zeus’s master bolt, so Zeus’ll be mad at him. And Hades is still looking for this...”

From his pocket he took out a ski cap—the kind bank robbers wear—and placed it between the handlebars of his bike. Immediately, the cap transformed into an elaborate bronze war helmet.

“The helm of darkness.” Grover gasped.

“Exactly.” Ares said. “Now where was I? Oh yeah, Hades will be mad at both Zeus and Poseidon, because he doesn’t know who took this. Pretty soon, we got a nice little three-way slugfest going.”

“But they’re your family!” Annabeth protested.

Ares shrugged. “Best kind of war. Always the bloodiest. Nothing like watching your relatives fight, I always say.”

“You gave me the backpack in Denver.” I said. “The master bolt was in there the whole time.”

“Yes and no.” Ares said. “It’s probably too complicated for your little mortal brain to follow, but the backpack is the master bolt’s sheath, just morphed a bit. The bolt is connected to it, sort of like that sword you got, kid. It always returns to your pocket, right?”

I sighed, a god of war had to make it his business to know about weapons.

“Anyway.” Ares continued, “I tinkered with the magic a bit, so the bolt would only return to the sheath once you reached the Underworld. You get close to Hades... Bingo, you got mail. If you died along the way— no loss. I still had the weapon.”

“But why not just keep the master bolt for yourself ?” I said. “Why send it to Hades?”

Ares got a twitch in his jaw. For a moment, it was almost as if he were listening to another voice, deep inside his head. “Why didn’t I... yeah... with that kind of firepower...”

He held the trance for one second... two seconds...

I watched stone-faced as he wrested with Kronos’ magic.

Ares’s face cleared. “I didn’t want the trouble. Better to have you caught red-handed, holding the thing.”

“You’re lying.” I said. “Sending the bolt to the Underworld wasn’t your idea.”

“Of course it was!” Smoke drifted up from his sunglasses, as if they were about to catch fire.

“You didn’t order the theft either. Someone else sent a hero to steal the two items. Then, when Zeus sent you to hunt him down, you caught the thief. But you didn’t turn him over to Zeus. Something, or someone, convinced you to let him go. You kept the items until another hero could come along and complete the delivery. That thing in the pit is ordering you around.”

“I am the god of war! I take orders from no one! I don’t have dreams!”

“Who said anything about dreams?” I asked lightly, eyes wide and guileless.

Ares looked agitated, but he tried to cover it with a smirk.

“Let’s get back to the problem at hand, kid. You’re alive. I can’t have you taking that bolt to Olympus. You just might get those hardheaded idiots to listen to you. So I’ve got to kill you. Nothing personal.”

He snapped his fingers. The sand exploded at his feet and out charged a wild boar, even larger and uglier than the one whose head hung above the door of cabin seven at Camp Half-Blood. The beast pawed the sand, glaring at me with beady eyes as it lowered its razor-sharp tusks and waited for the command to kill.

I stepped into the surf. “Fight me yourself, Ares.”

He laughed, but I heard a little edge to his laughter... an uneasiness. “You’ve only got one talent, kid, running away. You ran from the Chimera. You ran from the Underworld. You don’t have what it takes.”

“Scared?”

“In your adolescent dreams.” But his sunglasses were starting to melt from the heat of his eyes. “No direct involvement. Sorry, kid. You’re not at my level.”

Annabeth said, “Percy, run!”

The giant boar charged.

I was done running from monsters.  Nothing I’d encountered held a candle to what I’d already been through and now, picking a fight with a god, I didn’t have to hold back.

As the boar rushed me, I uncapped my pen and sidestepped. Riptide appeared in my hands. I slashed upward. The boar’s severed right tusk fell at my feet, while the disoriented animal charged into the sea.

I looked into the calm waves, eyes glowing in the light of the sun. I didn’t have to say anything this time to control my power. The sea obeyed immediately, a wave surged up from nowhere and engulfed the boar, wrapping around it like a blanket. The beast squealed once in terror. Then it was gone, swallowed by the sea.

I turned back to Ares. “Are you going to fight me now?” I asked. “Or are you going to hide behind another pet pig?”

Ares’s face was purple with rage. “Watch it, kid. I could turn you into—”

“A cockroach.” I said. “Or a tapeworm. Yeah, I’m sure. That’d save you from getting your godly hide whipped, wouldn’t it?”

Flames danced along the top of his glasses. “Oh, man, you are really asking to be smashed into a grease spot.”

“If I lose, turn me into anything you want. Take the bolt. If I win, the helm and the bolt are mine and you have to go away.”

 Ares sneered.

He swung the baseball bat off his shoulder. “How would you like to get smashed: classic or modern?”

“Classic please.” I replied sweetly.

“That’s cool, dead boy.” He said. “Classic it is.” The baseball bat changed into a huge, two-handed sword. The hilt was a large silver skull with a ruby in its mouth.

“Percy.” Annabeth said. “Don’t do this. He’s a god.”

“He may be a god but he’s still a coward.” I told her.

She swallowed. “Wear this, at least. For luck.”

She took off her necklace, with her five years’ worth of camp beads and the ring from her father, and tied it around my neck.

“Reconciliation.” She said. “Athena and Poseidon together.”

“they do work well together when they put everything aside.” I said warmly.

“And take this,” Grover said. He handed me a flattened tin can that he’d probably been saving in his pocket for a thousand miles. “The satyrs stand behind you.”

“Grover...” I laughed. “Thank you.”

He patted me on the shoulder. I stuffed the tin can in my back pocket.

“You all done saying good-bye?” Ares came toward me, his black leather duster trailing behind him, his sword glinting like fire in the sunrise. “I’ve been fighting for eternity, kid. My strength is unlimited and I cannot die. What have you got?”

I’m a heck of a lot smaller, I thought, but I said nothing. I kept my feet in the surf, backing into the water up to my ankles. I thought back to what Annabeth had said at the Denver diner, so long ago: Ares has strength. That’s all he has. Even strength has to bow to wisdom sometimes.

He cleaved downward at my head, but I wasn’t there.

My body thought for me. The water seemed to push me into the air and I catapulted over him, slashing as I came down. But Ares was just as quick. He twisted, and the strike that should’ve caught him directly in the spine was deflected off the end of his sword hilt.

He grinned. “Not bad, not bad.”

He slashed again and I left the water to dodge. Ares seemed to know what I wanted. to get back to the water but he wasn’t letting that happen.

He outmaneuvered me, pressing so hard I had to put all my concentration on not getting sliced into pieces. I kept backing away from the surf. I couldn’t find any openings to attack. His sword had a reach several feet longer than Anaklusmos.

Luke was wrong about a lot of things but one thing he had right was swordsmanship. You have to get in close when you have the smaller blade.

I stepped inside with a thrust, but Ares was waiting for that. He knocked my blade out of my hands and kicked me in the chest. I went airborne—twenty, maybe thirty feet. I would’ve broken my back if I hadn’t crashed into the soft sand of a dune.

“Percy!” Annabeth yelled. “Cops!”

I was seeing double. My chest felt like it had just been hit with a battering ram, but I nimbly leapt to my feet.

I couldn’t look away from Ares or he’d slice me in half, but out of the corner of my eye I saw red lights flashing on the shoreline boulevard. Car doors were slamming.

“There, officer!” Somebody yelled. “See?”

A gruff cop voice: “Looks like that Omega on TV... what the heck...”

“That guy’s armed.” another cop said. “Call for backup.”

I rolled to one side as Ares’s blade slashed the sand.

I ran for my sword, scooped it up, and launched a swipe at Ares’s face, only to find my blade deflected again but that was fine. Ares seemed to know exactly what I was going to do the moment before I did it.

I stepped back toward the surf, forcing him to follow.

“Admit it, kid.” Ares said. “You got no hope. I’m just toying with you.”

My senses were working overtime. What mortal considered ADHD really being the heightened senses Gods passed down to their children. I was wide awake, noticing every little detail.

I could see where Ares was tensing. I could tell which way he would strike. At the same time, I was aware of Annabeth and Grover, thirty feet to my left. I saw a second cop car pulling up, siren wailing. Spectators, people who had been wandering the streets because of the earthquake, were starting to gather.

Among the crowd, I thought I saw a few who were walking with the strange, trotting gait of disguised satyrs. There were shimmering forms of spirits, too, as if the dead had risen from Hades to watch the battle. I heard the flap of leathery wings circling somewhere above.

More sirens.

I stepped farther into the water, but Ares was fast. The tip of his blade ripped my sleeve and grazed my forearm.

A police voice on a megaphone said, “Drop the guns! Set them on the ground. Now!”

The mist was making them see what they could understand.

Ares turned to glare at our spectators, which gave me a moment to breathe. There were five police cars now, and a line of officers crouching behind them, pistols trained on us.

“This is a private matter!” Ares bellowed. “Be gone!”

He swept his hand, and a wall of red flame rolled across the patrol cars. The police barely had time to dive for cover before their vehicles exploded. The crowd behind them scattered, screaming.

Ares roared with laughter. “Now, little hero. Let’s add you to the barbecue.”

He slashed. I deflected his blade. I got close enough to strike, tried to fake him out with a feint, but my blow was knocked aside. The waves were hitting me in the back now. Ares was up to his thighs, wading in after me.

I felt the rhythm of the sea, the waves growing larger as the tide rolled in, and suddenly I had an idea. Little waves, I thought. And the water behind me seemed to recede. I was holding back the tide by force of will, but tension was building, like carbonation behind a cork.

Ares came toward, grinning confidently. I lowered my blade, as if I were too exhausted to go on, glancing up at him from underneath my lashes.

Wait for it, I told the sea. The pressure now was almost lifting me off my feet. Ares raised his sword. I released the tide and jumped, rocketing straight over Ares on a wave.

A six-foot wall of water smashed him full in the face, leaving him cursing and sputtering with a mouth full of seaweed. I landed behind him with a splash and feinted toward his head, as I’d done before. He turned in time to raise his sword, but this time he was disoriented, he didn’t anticipate the trick. I changed direction, lunged to the side, and stabbed Riptide straight down into the water, sending the point through the god’s heel.

The roar that followed made Hades’s earthquake look like a minor event. The very sea was blasted back from Ares, leaving a wet circle of sand fifty feet wide.

Ichor, the golden blood of the gods, flowed from a gash in the war god’s boot. The expression on his face was beyond hatred. It was pain, shock, complete disbelief that he’d been wounded.

He limped toward me, muttering ancient Greek curses.

Something stopped him.

It was as if a cloud covered the sun, but worse. Light faded. Sound and color drained away. A cold, heavy presence passed over the beach, slowing time, dropping the temperature to freezing, and making me feel like life was hopeless, fighting was useless.

The darkness lifted.

Ares looked stunned.

Police cars were burning behind us. The crowd of spectators had fled. Annabeth and Grover stood on the beach, in shock, watching the water flood back around Ares’s feet, his glowing golden ichor dissipating in the tide.

Ares lowered his sword.

“You have made an enemy, godling.” He told me. “You have sealed your fate. Every time you raise your blade in battle, every time you hope for success, you will feel my curse. Beware, Perseus Jackson. Beware.”

His body began to glow.

“Percy!” Annabeth shouted. “Don’t watch!”

I turned away as the god Ares revealed his true immortal form. If I looked, I would disintegrate into ashes.

The light died.

I looked back. Ares was gone. The tide rolled out to reveal Hades’s bronze helm of darkness. I picked it up and walked toward my friends.

But before I got there, I heard the flapping of leathery wings. Three evil-looking grandmothers with lace hats and fiery whips drifted down from the sky and landed in front of me.

The middle Fury, the one who had been Mrs. Dodds, stepped forward. Her fangs were bared, but for once she didn’t look threatening. She looked disappointed.

“We saw the whole thing,” she hissed. “So... it truly was not you?”

I tossed her the helmet, which she caught in surprise.

“Return that to Lord Hades,” I said. “Tell him the truth. Tell him to call off the war.”

She hesitated, then ran a forked tongue over her green, leathery lips. “Live well, Percy Jackson. Become a true hero. Because if you do not, if you ever come into my clutches again...”

She cackled, savoring the idea. Then she and her sisters rose on their bats’ wings, fluttered into the smoke-filled sky, and disappeared.

I joined Grover and Annabeth, who were staring at me in amazement. “Percy...” Grover said. “That was so incredibly...”

“Terrifying!” Said Annabeth. “Cool!” Grover corrected.

“Did you guys feel that... whatever it was?” I asked. They both nodded uneasily. “Must’ve been the Furies overhead.” Grover said. I shook my head, something had stopped Ares from killing me, and whatever could do that was a lot stronger than the Furies.

I looked at Annabeth, and an understanding passed between us. She and I both knew what was in the Pit, what had spoken from the entrance of Tartarus.

I reclaimed my backpack from Grover and looked inside. The master bolt was still there. Such a small thing to almost cause World War III.

“We have to get back to New York.” I said. “By tonight.”

“That’s impossible,” Annabeth said, “unless we—”

“Fly.” I agreed. She stared at me. “Fly, like, in an airplane, which you were warned never to do lest Zeus strike you out of the sky, and carrying a weapon that has more destructive power than a nuclear bomb?”

“Basically.” I said. “Come on.”

Chapter Text

It’s funny how humans can wrap their mind around things and fit them into their version of reality. Chiron had told me that long ago.

I knew to appreciate his wisdom now.

According to the L.A. news, the explosion at the Santa Monica beach had been caused when a crazy kidnapper fired a shotgun at a police car. He accidentally hit a gas main that had ruptured during the earthquake.

This crazy kidnapper (Ares) was the same man who had abducted me and two other adolescents in New York and brought us across country on a ten-day odyssey of terror.

Poor little Percy Jackson. He’d caused a commotion on that Greyhound bus in New Jersey trying to get away from his captor (and afterward, witnesses would even swear they had seen the leather-clad man on the bus—”Why didn’t I remember him before?”).

The crazy man had caused the explosion in the St. Louis Arch. After all, no kid could’ve done that. A concerned waitress in Denver had seen the man threatening his abductees outside her diner, gotten a friend to take a photo, and notified the police.

Finally, brave Percy Jackson had stolen a gun from his captor in Los Angeles and battled him shotgun-to-rifle on the beach. Police had arrived just in time.

But in the spectacular explosion, five police cars had been destroyed and the captor had fled. No fatalities had occurred. Percy Jackson and his two friends were safely in police custody.

The reporters fed us this whole story. We just nodded and acted tearful and exhausted (which wasn’t hard), and played victimized kids for the cameras.

“All I want.” I said, choking back tears. “Is to go home. To find my mom.” The police and reporters were so moved that they passed around the hat and raised money for three tickets on the next plane to New York.

There was no choice again but to fly and I still hated it.

Takeoff was a nightmare. Every spot of turbulence was scarier than a Greek monster.

I didn’t unclench my hands from the armrests until we touched down safely at La Guardia. The local press was waiting for us outside security, but we managed to evaded them thanks to Annabeth, who lured them away in her invisible Yankees cap, shouting, “They’re over by the frozen yogurt! Come on!” Then  she rejoined us at baggage claim.

We split up at the taxi stand. I told Annabeth and Grover to get back to Half-Blood Hill and let Chiron know what had happened. They protested, but I reminded them that this was my quest. I had to be the one to return the Master Bolt.

I hopped in a taxi and headed into Manhattan.

Thirty minutes later, I walked into the lobby of the Empire State Building.

I didn’t look much better this time around but I ducked into the public bathroom and slipped on one of the spare Waterland dresses I still had, this one in navy, and used the sinks to clean up as much as I could.

Afterwards, I went up to the guard at the front desk and said, “Six hundredth floor.”

He was reading a huge book with a picture of a wizard on the front and it took a good minute for him to look up from it.. “No such floor, kiddo.”

“I have an audience with Zeus.”

He gave me a vacant smile. “Sorry?”

“You heard me.”

I knew he was no regular mortal so I just waited. Then he said, “No appointments, no audiences listed kiddo. Lord Zeus doesn’t see anyone unannounced.”

“Oh but he is expecting this to be delivered.” I slipped off my backpack and unzipped the top.

The guard looked inside at the metal cylinder, not getting what it was for a few seconds. Then his face went pale. “That isn’t...”

“Yes, it is.” I promised. “If we could hurry that’d be great.”

“R-right!” He scrambled out of his seat, fumbled around his desk for a key card, then handed it to me. “Insert this in the security slot. Make sure nobody else is in the elevator with you.”

I did as he told me. As soon as the elevator doors closed, I slipped the key into the slot. The card disappeared and a new button appeared on the console, a red one that said 600. I pressed it and waited, and waited. Muzak played. “Raindrops keep falling on my head...”

Finally, ding. The doors slid open. I stepped out and I was standing on a narrow stone walkway in the middle of the air. Below me was Manhattan, from the height of an airplane. In front of me, white marble steps wound up the spine of a cloud, into the sky.

My eyes followed the stairway to its end, where the top of the clouds rose the decapitated peak of a mountain, its summit covered with snow. Clinging to the mountainside were dozens of multileveled palaces—a city of mansions—all with white-columned porticos, gilded terraces, and bronze braziers glowing with a thousand fires.

Roads wound up to the peak, where the largest palace gleamed against the snow. Precariously perched gardens bloomed with olive trees and rosebushes. I could make out an open-air market filled with colorful tents, a stone amphitheater built on one side of the mountain, a hippodrome and a coliseum on the other. It was an Ancient Greek city, except it wasn’t in ruins. It was new, and clean, and colorful, the way Athens must’ve looked twenty-five hundred years ago.

My trip through Olympus wasn’t a daze this time. I’d seen it all before so I took it in serenely. I passed some giggling wood nymphs who threw olives at me from their garden. Hawkers in the market offered to sell me ambrosia on-a-stick, and a new shield, and a genuine glitter-weave replica of the Golden Fleece, as seen on Hephaestus-TV.

The nine muses were tuning their instruments for a concert in the park while a small crowd gathered— satyrs and naiads and a bunch of good-looking teenagers who might’ve been minor gods and goddesses. Nobody seemed worried about an impending civil war. In fact, everybody seemed in a festive mood. Several of them turned to watch me pass, and whispered to themselves.

I climbed the main road, toward the big palace at the peak. It was a reverse copy of the palace in the Underworld.

There, everything had been black and bronze. Here, everything glittered white and silver.

Hades had built his palace to resemble this one. He wasn’t welcomed in Olympus except on the winter solstice, so he’d built his own Olympus underground. I still felt sorry he had to suffer that fate. To be banished from the home he’d helped create. From his family. It would make anybody bitter.

Steps led up to a central courtyard. Past that, the throne room.

Room really isn’t the right word. The place made Grand Central Station look like a broom closet. Massive columns rose to a domed ceiling, which was gilded with moving constellations.

Twelve thrones, built for beings the size of Hades, were arranged in an inverted U, just like the cabins at Camp Half-Blood. An enormous fire crackled in the central hearth pit. The thrones were empty except for two at the end: the head throne on the right, and the one to its immediate left. I didn’t have to be told who the two gods were that were sitting there, waiting for me to approach.

The gods were in giant human form, as Hades had been. Zeus, the Lord of the Gods, wore a dark blue pinstriped suit. He sat on a simple throne of solid platinum. He had a well-trimmed beard, marbled gray and black like a storm cloud. His face was proud and handsome and grim, his eyes rainy gray.

As I got nearer to him, the air crackled and smelled of ozone.

The god sitting next to him was his brother, without a doubt, but he was dressed very differently. He reminded me of a beachcomber from Key West. He wore leather sandals, khaki Bermuda shorts, and a Tommy Bahama shirt with coconuts and parrots all over it.

His skin was deeply tanned, his hands scarred like an old-time fisherman’s. His hair was black, like mine. His face had that same brooding look that had always gotten me branded a rebel. But his eyes, sea-green like mine, were surrounded by sun-crinkles that told me he smiled a lot, too.

His throne was a deep-sea fisherman’s chair. It was the simple swiveling kind, with a black leather seat and a built-in holster for a fishing pole. Instead of a pole, the holster held a bronze trident, flickering with green light around the tips.

The gods weren’t moving or speaking, but there was tension in the air, as if they’d just finished an argument.

I approached the fisherman’s throne and knelt at his feet. “Father.” I murmured. I could feel the energy emanating from the two gods. If I said the wrong thing (and I still had a habit of doing that) The could erase my very existence.

To my left, Zeus spoke. “Should you not address the master of this house first, boy?”

I kept my head down, and waited.

“Peace, brother.” Poseidon finally said. His voice stirred my oldest memories: that warm glow I remembered as a baby, the sensation of this god’s hand on my forehead. “The child defers to his father. This is only right.”

“You still claim him then?” Zeus asked, menacingly. “You claim this child whom you sired against our sacred oath?”

“I have admitted my wrongdoing,” Poseidon said. “Now I would hear him speak.”

Wrongdoing. It still twinged a bit to hear him say that but I know he didn’t think I was a mistake.

“I have spared him once already,” Zeus grumbled. “Daring to fly through my domain... pah! I should have blasted him out of the sky for his impudence.”

“And risk destroying your own master bolt?” Poseidon asked calmly. “Let us hear him out, brother.”

Zeus grumbled some more. “I shall listen.” He decided. “Then I shall make up my mind whether or not to cast this boy down from Olympus.”

“Perseus,” Poseidon said. “Look at me.”

I did, and his face was unreadable in the presence of the other gods. It was like looking at the ocean: some days, you could tell what mood it was in. Most days, though, it was unreadable, mysterious.

“Address Lord Zeus, Perseus.” Poseidon told me. “Tell him your story.”

So I told Zeus everything, just as it had happened. I took out the metal cylinder, which began sparking in the Sky God’s presence, and laid it at his feet.

There was a long silence, broken only by the crackle of the hearth fire.

Zeus opened his palm. The lightning bolt flew into it.

As he closed his fist, the metallic points flared with electricity, until he was holding what looked more like the classic thunderbolt, a twenty-foot javelin of arcing, hissing energy that made the hairs on my scalp rise.

“I sense the boy tells the truth.” Zeus muttered. “But that Ares would do such a thing... it is most unlike him.”

“He is proud and impulsive,” Poseidon said. “It runs in the family.”

“Lord?” I asked.

They both said, “Yes?”

“Ares didn’t act alone. Someone else— came up with the idea.”

I described my dreams, and the feeling I’d had on the beach, that momentary breath of evil that had seemed to stop the world, and made Ares back off from killing me.

“In the dreams.” I said. “The voice told me to bring the bolt to the Underworld. Ares hinted that he’d been having dreams, too. I think he was being used, just as I was, to start a war.”

“You are accusing Hades, after all?” Zeus asked.

“No.” I said simply. “Lord Zeus, this... being felt older. Much older and I don’t want to imagine which of the ancient beings in the Pit of Tartarus could do something like this.”

Poseidon and Zeus looked at each other. They had a quick, intense discussion in Ancient Greek. I only caught one word.

Father.

Poseidon made some kind of suggestion, but Zeus cut him off. Poseidon tried to argue. Zeus held up his hand angrily.

“We will speak of this no more.” Zeus said. “I must go personally to purify this thunderbolt in the waters of Lemnos, to remove the human taint from its metal.”

He rose and looked at me. His expression softened just a fraction of a degree. “You have done me a service, boy. Few heroes could have accomplished as much.”

“I had help, sir.” I said honestly. “The Satyr who guided me and a daughter of Athena.”

“To show you my thanks, I shall spare your life. I do not trust you, Perseus Jackson. I do not like what your arrival means for the future of Olympus. But for the sake of peace in the family, I shall let you live.”

“Thank you, sir.”

“Do not presume to fly again. Do not let me find you here when I return. Otherwise you shall taste this bolt. And it shall be your last sensation.”

Thunder shook the palace. With a blinding flash of lightning, Zeus was gone as were the other Gods.

I was alone in the throne room with my father.

“Your uncle.” Poseidon sighed. “has always had a flair for dramatic exits. I think he would’ve done well as the god of theater.”

I snorted out a short laugh. I wasn’t so shell-shocked this time I couldn’t appreciate my dads lame jokes.

“Father.” I said seriously after I stopped giggling. “It is Kronos, isn’t it? The king of the Titans.”

Even in the throne room of Olympus, far away from Tartarus, the name Kronos darkened the room, made the hearth fire seem not quite so warm on my back.

Poseidon gripped his trident.

“In the First War, Percy, Zeus cut our father Kronos into a thousand pieces, just as Kronos had done to his own father, Ouranos. Zeus cast Kronos’s remains into the darkest pit of Tartarus. The Titan army was scattered, their mountain fortress on Etna destroyed, their monstrous allies driven to the farthest corners of the earth. And yet Titans cannot die, any more than we gods can. Whatever is left of Kronos is still alive in some hideous way, still conscious in his eternal pain, still hungering for power.”

“He’s healing.” I said. “He’s coming back.”

Poseidon shook his head. “From time to time, over the eons, Kronos has stirred. He enters men’s nightmares and breathes evil thoughts. He wakens restless monsters from the depths. But to suggest he could rise from the pit is another thing.”

“That’s what he intends, Father. That’s what he said.”

Poseidon was silent for a long time.

“Lord Zeus has closed discussion on this matter. He will not allow talk of Kronos. You have completed your quest, child. That is all you need to do.”

I didn’t think about arguing. They would learn soon enough. “As you wish, Father.”

A faint smile played on his lips. “Obedience does not come naturally to you, does it?”

“Yes and No.” I demurred, a smile playing at the edges of my mouth.

“I must take some blame for that, I suppose. The sea does not like to be restrained.” He rose to his full height and took up his trident. Then he shimmered and became the size of a regular man, standing directly in front of me. “You must go, child. But first, know that your mother has returned.”

I perked up. “Really?”

“You will find her at home. Hades sent her when you recovered his helm. Even the Lord of Death pays his debts.”

“I wish you could come with me to see her.” I said honestly.

Poseidon’s eyes took on a little sadness. “When you return home, Percy, you must make an important choice. You will find a package waiting in your room.”

“A package?”

“You will understand when you see it. No one can choose your path, Percy. You must decide.”

I nodded, I knew what he meant and luckily this time there wasn’t a difficult choice to make. No smelly Gabe.

“Your mother is a queen among women,” Poseidon said wistfully. “I had not met such a mortal woman in a thousand years. Still... I am sorry you were born, child. I have brought you a hero’s fate, and a hero’s fate is never happy. It is never anything but tragic.”

“Not every hero.” I reminded him. “Why do you think my mother named me Perseus. I don’t mind.”

“Not yet, perhaps.” He said. “Not yet. But it was an unforgivable mistake on my part.”

“I’ll leave you then.” I said, I knew he didn’t mean I was the mistake but that he regretted the fate my birth gave me. “I won’t bother you again.”

I was five steps away when he called, “Perseus.”

I turned.

There was a different light in his eyes, a fiery kind of pride. “You did well, Perseus. Do not misunderstand me. Whatever else you do, know that you are mine. You are a true son of the Sea God.”

As I walked back through the city of the gods, conversations stopped.

The muses paused their concert. People and satyrs and naiads all turned toward me, their faces filled with respect and gratitude, and as I passed, they knelt, deferring to me as a hero.

One who had stopped a war on the Eve of the first battle.

••♆••

Fifteen minutes later I was back on the streets of Manhattan.

I caught a taxi to our house, rang the doorbell, and there she was— my beautiful mother, smelling of peppermint and licorice, the weariness and worry evaporating from her face as soon as she saw me.

“Percy! Oh, thank goodness. Oh, my baby.”

She crushed the air right out of me. We stood in the doorway as she cried and ran her hands through my hair. I openly cried with her.

She told me she’d just appeared at the house that morning, and she scared the neighbor half to death by banging on her door. She didn’t remember anything since the Minotaur, and couldn’t believe it when she told her I was kidnapped, traveling across the country, blowing up national monuments. She’d been going out of her mind with worry all day because she hadn’t heard the news.

We went inside and I told her my own story. I tried to make it sound less scary than it had been, but that wasn’t easy. I was just getting to the fight with Ares when knocking on the door interrupted us.

It was Mrs. Johnson, the neighbor from across the street who had been on the news, she saw me and wanted to make sure we were both alright after my mom had scared her so much this morning.

We chatted for several minutes and assured her we were both fine before she shuffled off back to her house.

We talked and just reconnected for a few hours before I went to my room. It was the same as it had been and my mom had obviously been cleaning out of worry because there wasn’t a speck of dust.

 A familiar package appeared on my bed.

It was a battered cardboard box about the right size to fit a basketball. The address on the mailing slip was in my own handwriting:

The Gods

Mount Olympus

600th Floor,

Empire State Building

New York, NY

With best wishes,

Percy Jackson

Over the top in black marker, in a man’s clear, bold print, was the address of our house, and the words: Return to Sender.

I smiled. I didn’t have to make a choice this time. As distant as he had to be when other gods were watching, Poseidon had proven his love and solved the problem for us in a way my mom would accept.

I moved the box to my desk and grabbed a suitcase to start packing some clothes, I'd take it to camp with me so Chiron could store it safely. My mom appeared in the doorframe.

She looked pale, but resigned. “Where are you going, Percy?”

“Half-Blood Hill.”

“For the summer... or forever?”

“Just for the summer mom, so I can learn more on how to protect us.” I said, smiling when she walked up with a wobbly smile.

She kissed my forehead. “You’ll be a hero, Percy. You’ll be the greatest of all.”

I took one last look around my bedroom and smile again. She had no idea.

Chapter Text

We were the first heroes to return alive to Half-Blood Hill since Luke, so of course everybody treated us as if we’d won some reality-TV contest. It was just as jarring as last time.

According to camp tradition, we wore laurel wreaths to a big feast prepared in our honor, then led a procession down to the bonfire, where we got to burn the burial shrouds our cabins had made for us in our absence.

Annabeth’s shroud was so beautiful— gray silk with embroidered owls. I complimented her cabin on the fine job they did.

Being the son of Poseidon, I didn’t have any cabin mates, so the Ares cabin had volunteered to make my shroud. They’d taken an old bedsheet and painted smiley faces with X’ed-out eyes around the border, and the word Loser painted really big in the middle.

Unlike last time, where I had fun burning it, I just looked at all the other campers with doleful eyes. They all had the grace to look guilty because if I had died that burial shroud would’ve caused that cabin some serious problems with my Godly parent.

As Apollo’s cabin led the sing-along and passed out s’mores, I was surrounded by my old Hermes cabinmates, Annabeth’s friends from Athena, and Grover’s satyr buddies, who were admiring the brand-new searcher’s license he’d received from the Council of Cloven Elders. The council had called Grover’s performance on the quest “Brave to the point of indigestion. Horns-and-whiskers above anything we have seen in the past.”

The only ones not in a party mood were Clarisse and her cabinmates, whose poisonous looks told me they’d never forgive me for disgracing their dad.

That was okay with me. I had hoped to keep things civil between us this time around but I was fine if they weren’t. Clarisse and her siblings weren’t anything I couldn’t handle.

Even Dionysus’s welcome-home speech wasn’t enough to dampen my spirits. “Yes, yes, so the little brat didn’t get himself killed and now he’ll have an even bigger head. Well, huzzah for that. In other announcements, there will be no canoe races this Saturday...”

I moved back into cabin three, and happily basked in the peace and quiet. I had my friends to train with during the day. At night, I lay awake and listened to the sea, knowing my father was out there. Cabin 9 got all of us new mirrors right away and we had a blast talking about the trap I’d gotten caught in at Waterland.

As for my mother, she’d picked up the moment I’d called and we spoke every day. Now that I was older and going to ‘summer camp’ she was going to college to get her degree. She also let me know that after everything with Yancy Academy she found a better private school for me to go too for seventh grade.

On the Fourth of July, the whole camp gathered at the beach for a fireworks display by cabin nine. Being Hephaestus’s kids, they weren’t going to settle for a few lame red-white-and-blue explosions. They’d anchored a barge offshore and loaded it with rockets the size of Patriot missiles.

According to the year-round campers, who’d seen the show before, the blasts would be sequenced so tightly they’d look like frames of animation across the sky. The finale was supposed to be a couple of hundred-foot-tall Spartan warriors who would crackle to life above the ocean, fight a battle, then explode into a million colors.

As I was spreading a picnic blanket to sit with Lou Ellen, I actually had gotten pretty close with the daughter of Hecate, Grover showed up to tell us good-bye. He was dressed in his usual jeans and T-shirt and sneakers, but in the last few weeks he’d started to look older, almost high-school age. His goatee had gotten thicker. He’d put on weight. His horns had grown at least an inch, so he now had to wear his rasta cap all the time to pass as human.

“I’m off.” He said. “I just came to say... well, you know.”

I was truly happy for him. After all, it wasn’t every day a satyr got permission to go look for the great god Pan. It was still hard saying good bye but I knew this was something he needed to do and we’d see each other again.

I stifled a laugh at the thought of seeing him in a wedding dress again and asked him where he was going to search first.

“Kind of a secret.” He said, looking embarrassed. “I wish you could come with me, guys, but humans and Pan...”

“I get it.” I replied. “You got enough tin cans for the trip?”

“Yeah.”

“And you remembered your reed pipes?”

“Jeez, Percy.” He grumbled. “You’re like an old mama goat.”

But he didn’t really sound annoyed.

He gripped his walking stick and slung a backpack over his shoulder. He looked like any hitchhiker you might see on an American highway— nothing like the little runty boy I used to defend from bullies at Yancy Academy.

“Well.” He said. “Wish me luck.”

He gave me another hug, then headed back through the dunes.

Fireworks exploded to life overhead: Hercules killing the Nemean lion, Artemis chasing the boar, George Washington (who, by the way, was a son of Athena) crossing the Delaware.

“Hey, Grover.” I called.

He turned at the edge of the woods.

“Wherever you’re going— I know you’ll find what you’re looking for!”

Grover grinned, and then he was gone, the trees closing around him.

“We’ll see him again.” Annabeth said, jogging up to me from where she’d been with her siblings.

I knew I would but the fact that no searcher had ever come back in two thousand years... She was trying to make sure I was okay.

July passed.

I spent my days devising new strategies for capture-the-flag and making alliances with the other cabins to keep the banner out of Ares’s hands. I regularly whooped all the other campers at sword-fighting, the climbing wall, and of course canoeing.

From time to time, I’d walk past the Big House, glance up at the attic windows, and think about the Oracle, knowing what was coming.

Before I thought she meant Ares, he’d pretended to be my friend, then betrayed me.

But reality was worse and I wasn’t looking forward to it.

••♆••

The last night of the summer session came all too quickly. The campers had one last meal together. We burned part of our dinner for the gods. At the bonfire, the senior counselors awarded the end-of-summer beads.

I got my own leather necklace, and when I saw the bead for my first summer, I smiled. The familiar pitch black bead, with a sea-green trident shimmering in the center made me feel nostalgic.

“The choice was unanimous.” Luke announced. “This bead commemorates the first Son of the Sea God at this camp, and the quest he undertook into the darkest part of the Underworld to stop a war!”

The entire camp got to their feet and cheered. Even Ares’s cabin felt obliged to stand. Athena’s cabin steered Annabeth to the front so she could share in the applause.

I smiled in contentment. I’d found a family, people who cared about me and thought I’d done something right. Aside from my mom there were so few people I genuinely thought of as family, and in the morning, most of them would be leaving for the year.

••♆••

The next morning, I found a form letter on my bedside table. I knew Dionysus filled it out, because he stubbornly insisted on getting every campers name wrong:

Dear Peter Johnson,

If you intend to stay at Camp Half-Blood year-round, you must inform the Big House by noon today. If you do not announce your intentions, we will assume you have vacated your cabin or died a horrible death. Cleaning harpies will begin work at sundown. They will be authorized to eat any unregistered campers. All personal articles left behind will be incinerated in the lava pit.

Have a nice day!

Mr. D (Dionysus)

Camp Director, Olympian Council #12

So summer was over. I’d already told my mom that I’d be coming back home and to finish signing me up for school because I’d miss her too much and I wouldn’t be happy at camp all year.

I’d miss cooking and baking together, taking the bus to her job and just knocking around the city. The real world is where the monsters are but I knew I was plenty good to take care of anything that came my way.

The campgrounds were mostly deserted, shimmering in the August heat. All the campers were in their cabins packing up, or running around with brooms and mops, getting ready for final inspection. Argus was helping some of the Aphrodite kids haul their Gucci suitcases and makeup kits over the hill, where the camp’s shuttle bus would be waiting to take them to the airport.

I made my way to the sword-fighters arena, knowing Luke would be there and he’d seek me out for some reason or another if I didn’t go to him.

His gym bag was plopped at the edge of the stage. He was working solo, whaling on battle dummies with a sword I’d never seen before. It was that horrible sword he’d had made, half celestial bronze and half steel, because he was slashing the dummies’ heads right off, stabbing through their straw-stuffed guts.

His orange counselor’s shirt was dripping with sweat and his expression was so intense, anyone else would think he was really in danger. I watched, eyes blank and emotionless, as he disemboweled the whole row of dummies, hacking off limbs and basically reducing them to a pile of straw and armor.

He really was an incredible fighter. So much potential wasted because he was bitter and resentful. Not that he didn’t have some valid reasons but it didn’t excuse what he did. What he was still planning on doing.

Finally, he saw me, and stopped mid-swing. “Percy.”

“Hey.” I said, lifting a hand half-heartedly. “I just—”

“It’s okay.” He said, lowering his sword. “Just doing some last-minute practice.”

“Those dummies won’t be bothering anybody anymore.” I said, eyeing the piles of straw warily.

Luke shrugged. “We build new ones every summer.”

Now that his sword wasn’t swirling around, I could see it was that disgusting blade.

Luke noticed me looking at it. “Oh, this? New toy. This is Backbiter.”

“Backbiter?” I asked.

Luke turned the blade in the light so it glinted wickedly. “One side is celestial bronze. The other is tempered steel. Works on mortals and immortals both.”

“I didn’t know we could make weapons like that.” I hedged.

“They probably can’t.” Luke agreed. “It’s one of a kind.”

He gave me a tiny smile, then slid the sword into its scabbard. “Listen, I was going to come looking for you. What do you say we go down to the woods one last time, look for something to fight?”

I hesitated. I knew what would happen but I didn’t want to feel that sting of poison, or betrayal, again. But he would find a way to get me alone so I just went with it.

“Sure. I’m not staying for the year anyways so might as well.” I chirped with false cheer.

“Awesome.” He rummaged in his gym bag and pulled out a six-pack of Cokes. “Drinks are on me.”

I stared at the Cokes and smiled, walking forward and following him.

We walked down to the woods and kicked around for some kind of monster to fight, but it was too hot, even for them.

We found a shady spot by the creek where I’d broken Clarisse’s spear during my first capture the flag game. We sat on a big rock, drank our Cokes, and watched the sunlight in the woods.

After a while Luke said, “You miss being on a quest?”

“Yes and no.” I replied.

Luke raised an eyebrow.

“I miss being out there and proving myself but not showering for a week or so at a time and no consistent food? I don’t miss that. Do you miss it?”

A shadow passed over his face.

Luke was, and still is, a very handsome Alpha, but at the moment, he looked weary, and angry, and not at all handsome. His blond hair was gray in the sunlight. The scar on his face looked deeper than usual.

“I’ve lived at Half-Blood Hill year-round since I was fourteen.” He told me. “Ever since Thalia... well, you know. I trained, and trained, and trained. I never got to be a normal teenager, out there in the real world. Then they threw me one quest, and when I came back, it was like, ‘Okay, ride’s over. Have a nice life.’”

He crumpled his Coke can and threw into the creek. I ignored it even though the nymphs and naiads would be angry. I’d fish it out later.

“The heck with laurel wreaths.” Luke said. “I’m not going to end up like those dusty trophies in the Big House attic.”

“You make it sound like you’re leaving.”

Luke gave me a twisted smile. “Oh, I’m leaving, all right, Percy. I brought you down here to say good-bye.”

He snapped his fingers. A small fire burned a hole in the ground at my feet. Out crawled something glistening black, about the size of my hand. A scorpion.

I stayed perfect still this time.

“That’s smart, Percy.” Luke commented. “Pit scorpions can jump up to fifteen feet. Its stinger can pierce right through your clothes. You’ll be dead in sixty seconds.”

You will be betrayed by one who calls you a friend.

“You.” I said sadly.

He stood calmly and brushed off his jeans.

The scorpion paid him no attention. It kept its beady black eyes on me, clamping its pincers as it crawled onto my sandal.

“I saw a lot out there in the world, Percy” Luke said. “Didn’t you feel it— the darkness gathering, the monsters growing stronger? Didn’t you realize how useless it all is? All the heroics— being pawns of the gods. They should’ve been overthrown thousands of years ago, but they’ve hung on, thanks to us half-bloods.”

“Luke... those are our parents.” I said.

He laughed. “That’s supposed to make me love them? Their precious ‘Western civilization’ is a disease, Percy. It’s killing the world. The only way to stop it is to burn it to the ground, start over with something more honest.”

“You’re crazy.” I murmured. “And being used. Just like Ares.”

His eyes flared. “Ares is a fool. He never realized the true master he was serving. If I had time, Percy, I could explain. But I’m afraid you won’t live that long.”

The scorpion was crawling up my leg now.

“I know who you serve.” I said. “Kronos.”

The air got colder.

“You should be careful with names.” Luke warned.

I ignored him.

“Kronos got you to steal the master bolt and the helm. He spoke to you in your dreams.”

Luke’s eye twitched. “He spoke to you, too, Percy. You should’ve listened.”

“He’s brainwashing you, Luke.”

“You’re wrong. He showed me that my talents are being wasted. You know what my quest was two years ago, Percy? My father, Hermes, wanted me to steal a golden apple from the Garden of the Hesperides and return it to Olympus. After all the training I’d done, that was the best he could think up.”

“That’s not an easy quest.” I said. “Hercules barely managed it.”

“Exactly.” Luke said. “Where’s the glory in repeating what others have done? All the gods know how to do is replay their past. My heart wasn’t in it. The dragon in the garden gave me this.”

He pointed angrily at his scar.

“And when I came back, all I got was pity. I wanted to pull Olympus down stone by stone right then, but I bided my time. I began to dream of Kronos. He convinced me to steal something worthwhile, something no hero had ever had the courage to take. When we went on that winter-solstice field trip, while the other campers were asleep, I snuck into the throne room and took Zeus’s master bolt right from his chair. Hades’s helm of darkness, too. You wouldn’t believe how easy it was. The Olympians are so arrogant; they never dreamed someone would dare steal from them. Their security is horrible. I was halfway across New Jersey before I heard the storms rumbling, and I knew they’d discovered my theft.”

The scorpion was sitting on my knee now, staring at me with its glittering eyes. I ignored it for now. “So why didn’t you bring the items to Kronos?”

Luke’s smile wavered. “I... I got overconfident. Zeus sent out his sons and daughters to find the stolen bolt— Artemis, Apollo, my father, Hermes. But it was Ares who caught me. I could have beaten him, but I wasn’t careful enough. He disarmed me, took the items of power, threatened to return them to Olympus and burn me alive. Then Kronos’s voice came to me and told me what to say. I put the idea in Ares’s head about a great war between the gods. I said all he had to do was hide the items away for a while and watch the others fight. Ares got a wicked gleam in his eyes. I knew he was hooked. He let me go, and I returned to Olympus before anyone noticed my absence.”

Luke drew his new sword. He ran his thumb down the flat of the blade, as if he were hypnotized by its beauty.

“Afterward, the Lord of the Titans... h-he punished me with nightmares. I swore not to fail again. Back at Camp Half-Blood, in my dreams, I was told that a second hero would arrive, one who could be tricked into taking the bolt and the helm the rest of the way— from Ares down to Tartarus.”

“You summoned the hellhound, that night in the forest.”

“We had to make Chiron think the camp wasn’t safe for you, so he would start you on your quest. We had to confirm his fears that Hades was after you. And it worked.”

“The flying shoes were cursed,” I continued. “They were supposed to drag me and the backpack into Tartarus.”

“And they would have, if you’d been wearing them. But you gave them to the satyr, which wasn’t part of the plan. Grover messes up everything he touches. He even confused the curse.”

Luke looked down at the scorpion, which was now sitting on my thigh. “You should have died in Tartarus, Percy. But don’t worry, I’ll leave you with my little friend to set things right.”

“Thalia gave her life to save you.” I said, staring up at him sorrowfully. “And this is how you repay her?”

“Don’t speak of Thalia!” He shouted. “The gods let her die! That’s one of the many things they will pay for.”

“You’re being used, Luke. You and Ares both. Don’t listen to Kronos.”

“I’ve been used?” Luke’s voice turned shrill. “Look at yourself. What has your dad ever done for you? Kronos will rise. You’ve only delayed his plans. He will cast the Olympians into Tartarus and drive humanity back to their caves. All except the strongest— the ones who serve him.”

“If you’re so strong, fight me yourself.” I taunted, knowing he wouldn’t but trying anyways.

Luke smiled. “Nice try, Percy. But I’m not Ares. You can’t bait me. My lord is waiting, and he’s got plenty of quests for me to undertake.”

“Luke—”

“Good-bye, Percy. There is a new Golden Age coming. You won’t be part of it.”

He slashed his sword in an arc and disappeared in a ripple of darkness.

The scorpion lunged.

I swatted it away with my hand and uncapped my sword. The thing jumped at me and I cut it in half in midair.

I still got stung but it was all I could do. My palm had a huge red welt, oozing and smoking with yellow guck.

My ears pounded. My vision went foggy. I stumbled to the creek and let myself fall into the creek, but nothing seemed to happen. The poison was too strong. My vision was getting dark. Sixty seconds, Luke had told me.

My legs felt like lead and my forehead was burning but I forced myself out of the water and toward the camp. The nymphs stirred from their trees.

“Help.” I whimpered. “Please...”

Two of them took my arms, pulling me along. I remember making it to the clearing, a counselor shouting for help, a centaur blowing a conch horn.

Then everything went black.

••♆••

I woke with a drinking straw in my mouth. I was sipping something that tasted like liquid chocolate-chip cookies. Nectar.

I opened my eyes.

I was propped up in bed in the sickroom of the Big House, my right hand bandaged like a club. Argus stood guard in the corner. Annabeth sat next to me, holding my nectar glass and dabbing a washcloth on my forehead.

“Here we are again...” I said.

“You idiot!” Annabeth snapped. “You were green and turning gray when we found you. If it weren’t for Chiron’s healing...”

“Now, now.” Chiron’s voice said. “Percy’s constitution deserves some of the credit.”

He was sitting near the foot of my bed in human form, which was why I hadn’t noticed him yet. He smiled, but his face looked weary and pale, the way it did when he’d been up all night grading Latin papers.

“How are you feeling?” He asked.

“Like my insides have been frozen, then microwaved.” I said.

“Apt, considering that was pit scorpion venom. Now you must tell me, if you can, exactly what happened.”

Between sips of nectar, I told them the story.

The room was quiet for a long time.

“I can’t believe that Luke...” Annabeth’s voice faltered. Her expression turned angry and sad. “Yes. Yes, I can believe it. May the gods curse him... He was never the same after his quest.”

“This must be reported to Olympus.” Chiron murmured. “I will go at once.”

“They won’t talk about Kronos.” I said tiredly. “Zeus declared the matter closed.”

“Percy, I know this is hard. But you must not rush out for vengeance. You aren’t ready.”

I still didn’t like that much but Chiron was right. I had a long recover ahead of me. “Chiron... your prophecy from the Oracle... it was about Kronos, wasn’t it? Was I in it?”

Chiron glanced nervously at the ceiling. “Percy, it isn’t my place—”

“You’ve been ordered not to talk to me about it, haven’t you?”

His eyes were sympathetic, but sad. “You will be a great hero, child. I will do my best to prepare you. But if I’m right about the path ahead of you...”

Thunder boomed overhead, rattling the windows.

“All right!” Chiron shouted. “Fine!”

He sighed in frustration. “The gods have their reasons, Percy. Knowing too much of your future is never a good thing.”

“We can’t just sit back and do nothing.” I said.

“We will not sit back.” Chiron promised. “But you must be careful. Kronos wants you to come unraveled. He wants your life disrupted, your thoughts clouded with fear and anger. Do not give him what he wants. Train patiently. Your time will come.”

“I’m guessing it won’t be for a while based on everything.”

Chiron put his hand on my ankle. “You’ll have to trust me, Percy. You will live. But first you must decide your path for the coming year. I cannot tell you the right choice...”

I knew he had a very definite opinion, and it was taking all his willpower not to advise me. “But you must decide whether to stay at Camp Half-Blood year-round, or return to the mortal world for seventh grade and be a summer camper. Think on that. When I get back from Olympus, you must tell me your decision.”

Despite knowing everything I still wanted to ask him more questions. But his expression told me there could be no more discussion; he had said as much as he could.

“I’ll be back as soon as I can.” Chiron promised. “Argus will watch over you.”

He glanced at Annabeth. “Oh, and my dear... whenever you’re ready, they’re here.”

“Who’s here?” I asked.

Nobody answered.

Chiron rolled himself out of the room. I heard the wheels of his chair clunk carefully down the front steps, two at a time.

Annabeth studied the ice in my drink.

“What is it?” I asked her.

“Nothing.” She set the glass on the table. “I... just took your advice about something. You... um... need anything?”

“Yeah. Help me up. I want to go outside.”

“Percy, that isn’t a good idea.”

I slid my legs out of bed. Annabeth caught me before I could crumple to the floor. A wave of nausea rolled over me.

Annabeth said, “I told you...”

“I know. I’m fine.” I said.

I managed a step forward. Then another, still leaning heavily on Annabeth. Argus followed us outside, but he kept his distance.

By the time we reached the porch, my face was beaded with sweat. My stomach had twisted into knots. But I had managed to make it all the way to the railing.

It was dusk. The camp looked completely deserted. The cabins were dark and the volleyball pit silent. No canoes cut the surface of the lake. Beyond the woods and the strawberry fields, the Long Island Sound glittered in the last light of the sun.

“What are you going to do?” Annabeth asked me.

I told her I got the feeling Chiron wanted me to stay year-round, to put in more individual training time, but I wasn’t going to hide away at camp. I was going to go home and that I was only sorry she was going to be stuck here with Clarisse.

Annabeth pursed her lips, then said quietly, “I’m going home for the year, Percy.”

I blinked at her. “To your dad’s?”

She pointed toward the crest of Half-Blood Hill. Next to Thalia’s pine tree, at the very edge of the camp’s magical boundaries, a family stood silhouetted— two little children, a woman, and a tall man with blond hair. They seemed to be waiting. The man was holding a backpack that looked like the one Annabeth had gotten from Waterland in Denver.

“I wrote him a letter when we got back... I didn’t know his number.” Annabeth said. “Just like you suggested. I told him... I was sorry. I’d come home for the school year if he still wanted me. He wrote back immediately. We decided... we’d give it another try.”

“That took guts.”

She pursed her lips. “You won’t try anything stupid during the school year, will you? At least... not without calling me first?”

I laughed. “I won’t go looking for trouble. I usually don’t have to.”

“When I get back next summer.” She said. “We’ll hunt down Luke. We’ll ask for a quest, but if we don’t get approval, we’ll sneak off and do it anyway. Agreed?”

“Sounds like a plan worthy of Athena.”

She held out her hand. I shook it. I hoped Annabeth could at last be a good friend this time. I didn’t really think so if I was being honest but hope springs eternal.

“Take care, Seaweed Brain.” Annabeth told me. “Keep your eyes open.”

“You too, Wise Girl.”

I watched her walk up the hill and join her family. She gave her father an awkward hug and looked back at the valley one last time. She touched Thalia’s pine tree, then allowed herself to be lead over the crest and into the mortal world.

I looked out at Long Island Sound and I remembered my father saying, The sea does not like to be restrained.

I made my decision.

I knew, if Poseidon were watching, that he approve of my choice.

“I’ll be back next summer.” I promised him. “I’ll survive until then. After all, I am your son.” I then asked Argus for help, to take me down to cabin three, so I could pack my bags for home.

••♆••

A Love That Defies Time - The Lightning Thief Ebbok