Chapter Text
CASSIA LOCKE WAS A BIG, FAT LIAR.
She hid the truth from her friends almost every day. It was for a reason. Cassia didn't want to lose her only normal friends.
How could she tell them that her dad was a Greek god? They knew that her brother had died last summer. But they didn't know that he'd been a traitor, and later a hero, in the war between the Titans and the gods. They didn't even know there was a war.
No. Cassia would keep the world of Greek mythology away from her friends at the Wilderness School. Piper and Leo gave her a glimpse of what her life would be like if she weren't a half-blood.
Cassia wouldn't risk that for anything.
The first thing Cassia registered when she woke up was a piercing headache.
Then, the fact that her head was resting on Leo's shoulder.
Cassia blinks the sleep from her eyes. In her peripheral vision, she can see Leo fidgeting with something in his hands. A fond smile tugs at her lips. Leo couldn't sit still for anything. And yet, he'd somehow managed not to wake Cassia up. It was endearing, she thought, just how thoughtful he was.
Looking back, Cassia wished she'd closed her eyes and gone back to sleep. It wouldn't have changed anything, but at least she would've gotten a few more minutes of peace.
The bus rumbled along a bumpy road. Out the windows, desert rolled by under a bright blue sky. Leo, finally noticing that she's awake, shoots her a lopsided grin. He reaches out and brushes a strand of auburn hair from her face
He opens his mouth, about to say some stupid joke, when he's interrupted.
At the front of the bus, Coach Hedge shouted, "Alright, cupcakes, listen up!"
Cassia liked Coach Hedge well enough. He knew she was a half-blood, and she knew he was a satyr. It was nice to know she had someone on her side if anything happened. No one else took him seriously, probably because he was the same height as Cassia — five feet zero. When he stood up, someone called, "Stand up, Coach Hedge!"
"I heard that!" Coach scanned the bus for the offender. His gaze softens slightly when he sees Cassia, turns suspicious when it lands on Leo, and then his eyes fix on someone behind them, and his scowl deepens.
A jolt went down Cassia's spine. She didn't trust anything that made Coach Hedge scowl like that.
She turns around, eyes catching on Piper talking to some guy in a purple shirt. Cassia frowns, trying to think if she'd ever seen him before. But when she tries, her headache comes back with a vengeance. She manages to catch the end of Piper's sentence.
"—where the kids are the animals."
Cassia furrows her brows. Why would Piper be saying their inside joke to some random stranger?
"This is some kind of a mistake," the guy said. "I'm not supposed to be here."
Leo turns around and laughs, "Yeah, right, Jason. We've all been framed! I didn't run away six times. Cassia isn't a kleptomaniac. Piper didn't steal that BMW."
Did everyone know this guy but her?
"I didn't steal that car, Leo!"
"Oh, I forgot, Piper. What was your story? You 'talked' the dealer into lending it to you." He raised his eyebrows at Jason.
Cassia rolls her eyes. She knew how much it upset Piper that no one believed her. Cassia did, though. It definitely wasn't the most outrageous thing she'd heard. Besides, it would explain why Coach Hedge was at the Wilderness School. There was always a chance Cassia was just looking too much into things, but she wanted to hope that Piper was a demigod too.
She tunes back to the conversation just as Coach Hedge yells, "Leo Valdez! Problem back there?"
Leo winked, "Watch this." He turned to the front. "Sorry, Coach! I was having trouble hearing you. Could you use your megaphone please?"
Coach Hedge grunted like he was pleased to have an excuse. He unclipped the megaphone from his belt and continued giving directions, but his voice came out like Darth Vader's. The kids cracked up. The coach tried again, but this time the megaphone blared: "The cow says moo!"
The kids howled, and the coach slammed down the megaphone. "Valdez!"
Piper stifled a laugh. "My god, Leo. How did you do that?"
Leo slipped a tiny Phillips-head screwdriver from his sleeve. "I'm a special boy."
"You're incredible," Cassia says, forgetting about the Jason crisis for a moment.
"Guys, seriously," Jason pleaded. "What am I doing here? Where are we going?"
Piper knit her eyebrows. "Jason, are you joking?"
"No! I have no idea—"
"Aw, yeah, he's joking," Leo said. "He's trying to get me back for that shaving cream on the Jell-O thing, aren't you?"
Cassia frowns. Shaving cream on Jell-O? Leo did that to her.
"No, I think he's serious." Piper tried to take his hand, but he pulled it away.
"I'm sorry," he said. "I don't—I can't—"
"That's it!" Coach Hedge yelled from the front. "The back row has just volunteered to clean up after lunch!"
"That's a shocker," Leo muttered.
Piper turns to talk to Jason, which allows Cassia to voice her confusion to Leo.
"Did I miss something? Who's Jason, and how do you and Piper know him?"
Leo laughs, "Very funny, Cassia. I'm surprised Jason got you to play along."
Cassia frowns, about to retort, before her head throbs again. She had a feeling that something was messing with her head, and that it had something to do with Jason.
── .✦
The bus dropped them in front of a big red stucco complex like a museum, just sitting in the middle of nowhere. A cold wind blew across the desert. Cassia's large, brown denim jacket didn't shield her as much as she'd like. She found herself wishing she were back in her dorm, curled under some blankets with Piper and talking about anything that came to mind.
"So, a crash course for the amnesiac," Leo said, in a helpful tone that Cassia knew was not going to be helpful. "We go to the 'Wilderness School'"—Leo made air quotes with his fingers. "Which means we're 'bad kids.' Your family, or the court, or whoever, decided you were too much trouble, so they shipped you off to this lovely prison—sorry, 'boarding school'—in Armpit, Nevada, where you learn valuable nature skills like running ten miles a day through the cacti and weaving daisies into hats! And for a special treat, we go on 'educational' field trips with Coach Hedge, who keeps order with a baseball bat. Is it all coming back to you now?"
"No," Jason answers, looking around.
Piper and Cassia share a worried look, though for different reasons.
Leo rolled his eyes. "You're really gonna play this out, huh? Okay, so the four of us started here together this semester. We're totally tight. You do everything I say and give me your dessert and do my chores—"
"Leo!" Piper snapped. Cassia hides her smile behind her hand.
"Fine. Ignore that last part. But we are friends. Well, Cassia is clearly infatuated with me, and Piper's a little more than your friend, the last few weeks—"
"Leo, stop it!" Piper's face turned red, and so did Jason's. Cassia just throws her head back and laughs, "You wish."
"He's got amnesia or something," Piper said. "We've got to tell somebody."
Leo scoffed. "Who, Coach Hedge? He'd try to fix Jason by whacking him upside the head."
"I think Coach could help," Cassia argues. Piper sent her a grateful look.
The coach was at the front of the group, barking orders and blowing his whistle to keep the kids in line, but every so often he'd glance back at Jason and scowl.
"Leo, Jason needs help," Piper insisted. "He's got a concussion or—"
"Yo, Piper." One of the guys dropped back to join them as the group was heading into the museum. He wedged himself between Jason and Piper and knocked Leo down. "Don't talk to these bottom-feeders. You're my partner, remember?"
Cassia scowls, hand going to her pocket where the deck of cards her dad had given her last year was. Dylan. There was something off about him. He was just a bit too much. His teeth were too white, his smile too wide, and his ego too big. He had to be a monster.
"Go away, Dylan," Piper grumbled. "I didn't ask to work with you."
"Ah, that's no way to be. This is your lucky day!" Dylan hooked his arm through hers and dragged her through the museum entrance. Piper shot one last look over her shoulder like, 911
Cassia sends her an apologetic look in return. Leo got up and brushed himself off. "I hate that guy. 'I'm Dylan. I'm so cool, I want to date myself, but I can't figure out how! You want to date me instead? You're so lucky!'"
"Leo," Jason said, "you're weird." Cassia snorts at that. She'd concluded that Jason wasn't dangerous, just confused. But if that changed... her hand reaches for her playing cards again.
"Yeah, you tell me that a lot." Leo grinned. "But if you don't remember me, that means I can reuse all my old jokes. Come on!"
Jason glanced over at Cassia, who shrugged. They followed Leo into the museum and walked through the building, stopping here and there for Coach Hedge to lecture them with his megaphone, which alternately made him sound like a Sith Lord or blared out random comments like "The pig says oink."
Leo kept pulling out nuts, bolts, and pipe cleaners from the pockets of his army jacket and putting them together. Cassia was fascinated by the way he could create something out of random stuff like that.
She was too distracted to pay attention to the exhibits, between keeping an eye on Jason and Leo, but they were about the Grand Canyon and the Hualupi tribe, which owned the museum.
In the corner of her eye, she could see Isabel and her lackeys glancing over and snickering at Piper and Dylan. Cassia clenched her jaw. Those girls were tacky, and yet, they dared to make fun of Piper.
"Hey, Piper, does your tribe run this place? Do you get in free if you do a rain dance?" Isabel said.
The other girls laughed. Even Piper's so-called partner Dylan suppressed a smile. Piper's snowboarding jacket sleeves hid her hands, but Cassia got the feeling she was clenching her fists.
"My dad's Cherokee," she said. "Not Hualapai. 'Course, you'd need a few brain cells to know the difference, Isabel."
Isabel widened her eyes in mock surprise, so that she looked like an owl with a makeup addiction. "Oh, sorry! Was your mom in this tribe? Oh, that's right. You never knew your mom."
Piper charged her, but before a fight could start, Coach Hedge barked, "Enough back there! Set a good example or I'll break out my baseball bat!"
The group shuffled on to the next exhibit, but the girls kept calling out little comments to Piper.
"Good to be back on the rez?" one asked in a sweet voice.
"Dad's probably too drunk to work," another said with fake sympathy. "That's why she turned klepto."
Piper didn't try to fight any of them again. She catches Cassia's eye and slightly shakes her head. Given the word, Cassia would punch them for Piper. But Piper was capable of fighting her own battles.
Jason must've been thinking the same thing as Cassia, because she hears Leo tell him to calm down.
"—Besides, if those girls found out the truth about her dad, they'd be all bowing down to her and screaming, 'We're not worthy!'" Leo said.
Jason tilts his head, "Why? What about her dad?"
Leo laughed in disbelief. "You're not kidding? You really don't remember that your girlfriend's dad—"
"Look, I wish I did, but I don't even remember her, much less her dad."
Leo whistled. "Whatever. We have to talk when we get back to the dorm."
"Piper and I better be invited," Cassia interrupted.
"Of course," Leo replies with a lopsided smile. "You guys are always welcome."
They reached the far end of the exhibit hall, where some big glass doors led out to a terrace.
"All right, cupcakes," Coach Hedge announced. "You are about to see the Grand Canyon. Try not to break it. The skywalk can hold the weight of seventy jumbo jets, so you featherweights should be safe out there. If possible, try to avoid pushing each other over the edge, as that would cause me extra paperwork."
The coach opened the doors, and they all stepped outside. The Grand Canyon spread before them, live and in person. Extending over the edge was a horseshoe-shaped walkway made of glass, so you could see right through it.
"Man," Leo said. "That's pretty wicked."
The canyon was bigger and wider than you could appreciate from a picture. They were up so high that birds circled below their feet. Five hundred feet down, a river snaked along the canyon floor. Banks of storm clouds had moved overhead while they'd been inside, casting shadows like angry faces across the cliffs. Red and gray ravines cut through the desert like one of the gods had gone crazy and taken a knife to it.
Cassia snapped out of her thoughts when she heard Leo ask if Jason was okay. She frowned seeing the paleness of his face.
"I'm fine," Jason said. "Just a headache."
He obviously wasn't, but Cassia didn't question him.
Thunder rumbled overhead. A cold wind almost knocked her sideways.
"This can't be safe." Leo squinted at the clouds. "Storm's right over us, but it's clear all the way around. Weird, huh?"
Seeing the storm, the dread Cassia's been feeling came to a crescendo. A dark circle of clouds had parked itself over the skywalk, but the rest of the sky in every direction was clear.
"All right, cupcakes!" Coach Hedge yelled. He frowned at the storm like it bothered him too. "We may have to cut this short, so get to work! Remember, complete sentences!"
Cassia rolls her eyes, but tries to start on the worksheet.
"Dang, is that gold?" Leo asked. "You've been holding out on us!"
Glancing up, she spots a gold coin in Jason's hand. The familiar itch to snag anything shiny rises. She squashed it down, turning back to the boring worksheet. Leo, seeing her expression, changes the conversation.
"Come on," he said. "Dare you to spit over the edge."
── .✦
They didn't try very hard on the worksheet. Jason seemed to be distracted by the storm while Leo was building a helicopter out of pipe cleaners.
Cassia wasn't of much help either. She nervously shuffled her playing cards. She traced the celestial bronze edges as a way to calm herself.
"Check it out," Leo said. He launched the copter. If anyone else built it, it would've plummeted, but the pipe-cleaner blades actually spun. The little copter made it halfway across the canyon before it lost momentum and spiraled into the void.
"How'd you do that?" Jason asked.
Leo shrugged. "Would've been cooler if I had some rubber bands."
Cassia shakes her head, amazed, looking down and trying to see if she could still see the helicopter
Seriously," Jason said, "are we friends?"
"Last I checked."
"You sure? What was the first day we met? What did we talk about?"
"It was ..." Leo frowned. "I don't recall exactly. I'm ADHD, man. You can't expect me to remember details."
"But I don't remember you at all. I don't remember anyone here. What if—"
"You're right and everyone else is wrong?" Leo asked. "You think you just appeared here this morning, and we've all got fake memories of you?"
Cassia shifted awkwardly. She'd told Leo her concerns, but he'd thought she was joking.
Take the worksheet." Jason handed Leo the paper. "I'll be right back."
After a moment's hesitation, Cassia followed. She grabbed Jason's arm. "For the record, I believe you. I've never seen you before today."
Jason looks at her bewildered before smiling gratefully.
The two walk up to Coach Hedge, who was leaning on his baseball bat, studying the storm clouds.
"Did you do this?" the coach asked Jason.
Jason took a step back. "Do what?" It sounded like the coach had just asked if he'd made the thunderstorm.
Coach Hedge glared at him, his beady little eyes glinting under the brim of his cap. "Don't play games with me, kid. What are you doing here, and why are you messing up my job?"
"You mean...you don't know me?" Jason said. "I'm not one of your students?"
Hedge snorted. "Never seen you before today."
"Look, sir, I don't know how I got here. I just woke up on the school bus. All I know is I'm not supposed to be here."
"Got that right." Hedge's gruff voice dropped to a murmur, like he was sharing a secret. "You got a powerful way with the Mist, kid, if you can make all these people think they know you; but you can't fool me. I've been smelling monster for days now. I knew we had an infiltrator, but you don't smell like a monster. You smell like a half-blood. So—who are you, and where'd you come from?"
Cassia raises her eyebrows. So Jason was a half-blood.
"I don't know who I am. I don't have any memories. You've got to help me," Jason answered.
Coach Hedge studied his face as if he were trying to read Jason's thoughts.
"Great," Hedge muttered. "You're being truthful."
"Of course I am! And what was all that about monsters and half-bloods? Are those code words or something?"
Hedge narrowed his eyes. "Look, kid, I don't know who you are. I just know what you are, and it means trouble. Now I have to protect four of you rather than three. Are you the special package? Is that it?"
"What are you talking about?"
Hedge looked at the storm. The clouds were getting thicker and darker, hovering right over the skywalk.
"This morning," Hedge said, "I got a message from camp. They said an extraction team is on the way. They're coming to pick up a special package, but they wouldn't give me details. I thought to myself, Fine. The ones I'm watching are pretty powerful, older than most. I know they're being stalked. I can smell a monster in the group. I figure that's why the camp is suddenly frantic to pick them up. But then you pop up out of nowhere. So, are you the special package?"
"I think Dylan's the monster," Cassia says.
Coach Hedge doesn't answer, too busy catching Jason. "Whoa, there, cupcake. You say you got no memories, huh? Fine. I'll just have to watch you, too, until the team gets here. We'll let the director figure things out."
"What director?" Jason said. "What camp?"
"Just sit tight. Reinforcements should be here soon. Hopefully nothing happens before—"
Lightning crackled overhead. The wind picked up with a vengeance. Worksheets flew into the Grand Canyon, and the entire bridge shuddered. Kids screamed, stumbling and grabbing the rails.
"You just had to say something," Cassia grumbled. Hedge bellowed into his megaphone: "Everyone inside! The cow says moo! Off the skywalk!"
"I thought you said this thing was stable!" Jason shouted over the wind.
"Under normal circumstances," Hedge agreed, "which these aren't. Come on!"