Percy Jackson The Complete Collection (98 page)

Okay, really stupid question but, hey, I was nervous.

Annabeth looked disappointed, but she nodded.

‘My dad wanted to take me to Greece this summer,’ she said wistfully. ‘I’ve always wanted to see –’

‘The Parthenon,’ I remembered.

She managed a smile. ‘Yeah.’

‘That’s okay. There’ll be other summers, right?’

As soon as I said it, I realized it was a bone-headed comment. I was facing the ‘end of my days’. Within a week, Olympus might fall. If the Age of the Gods really did end, the world as we knew it would dissolve into chaos. Demigods would be hunted to extinction. There would be no more summers for us.

Annabeth stared at her inspection scroll. ‘Three out of five,’ she muttered, ‘for a sloppy head counsellor. Come on. Let’s finish your reports and get back to Chiron.’

On the way to the Big House, we read the last report,
which was handwritten on a maple leaf from a satyr in Canada. If possible, the note made me feel even worse.

‘
Dear Grover
,’ I read aloud. ‘
Woods outside Toronto attacked by giant evil badger. Tried to do as you suggested and summon power of Pan. No effect. Many naiads’ trees destroyed. Retreating to Ottawa. Please advise. Where are you? – Gleeson Hedge, protector.
’

Annabeth grimaced. ‘You haven’t heard
anything
from him? Even with your empathy link?’

I shook my head dejectedly.

Ever since last summer when the god Pan died, our friend Grover had been drifting further and further away. The Council of Cloven Elders treated him like an outcast, but Grover still travelled all over the East Coast, trying to spread the word about Pan and convince nature spirits to protect their own little bits of the wild. He’d only come back to camp a few times to see his girlfriend Juniper.

Last I’d heard he was in Central Park, organizing the dryads, but nobody had seen or heard from him in two months. We’d tried to send Iris-messages. They never got through. I had an empathy link with Grover, so I hoped I would know if anything bad happened to him. Grover had told me one time that if he died, the empathy link might kill me too. But I wasn’t sure if that was still true or not.

I wondered if he was still in Manhattan. Then I thought about my dream of Rachel’s sketch – dark clouds closing on the city, an army gathered around the Empire State Building.

‘Annabeth.’ I stopped her by the tetherball court. I knew I was asking for trouble, but I didn’t know who else to trust. Plus I’d always depended on Annabeth for advice. ‘Listen, I had this dream about, um, Rachel …’

I told her the whole thing, even the weird picture of Luke as a child.

For a while, she didn’t say anything. Then she rolled up her inspection scroll so tight she ripped it. ‘What do you want me to say?’

‘I’m not sure. You’re the best strategist I know. If you were Kronos planning this war, what would you do next?’

‘I’d use Typhon as a distraction. Then I’d hit Olympus directly, while the gods were in the west.’

‘Just like in Rachel’s picture.’

‘Percy,’ she said, her voice tight, ‘Rachel is just a mortal.’

‘But what if her dream is true? Those other Titans – they said Olympus would be destroyed in a matter of days. They said they had plenty of other challenges. And what’s with that picture of Luke as a kid –’

‘We’ll just have to be ready.’

‘How?’ I said. ‘Look at our camp. We can’t even stop fighting each other. And I’m supposed to get my stupid soul reaped.’

She threw down her scroll. ‘I knew we shouldn’t have shown you the prophecy.’ Her voice was angry and hurt. ‘All it did was scare you. You run away from things when you’re scared.’

I stared at her, completely stunned. ‘
Me?
Run away?’

She got right in my face. ‘Yes, you. You’re a coward, Percy Jackson!’

We were nose to nose. Her eyes were red, and I suddenly realized that when she called me a coward maybe she wasn’t talking about the prophecy.

‘If you don’t like our chances,’ she said, ‘maybe you should go on that vacation with Rachel.’

‘Annabeth –’

‘If you don’t like our company.’

‘That’s not fair!’

She pushed past me and stormed towards the strawberry fields. She hit the tetherball as she passed and sent it spinning angrily around the pole.

I’d like to say my day got better from there. Of course, it didn’t.

That afternoon we had an assembly at the campfire to burn Beckendorf’s burial shroud and say our goodbyes. Even the Ares and Apollo cabins called a temporary truce to attend.

Beckendorf’s shroud was made out of metal links like chainmail. I didn’t see how it would burn, but the Fates must’ve been helping out. The metal melted in the fire and turned to golden smoke that rose into the sky. The campfire flames always reflected the campers’ moods, and today they burned black.

I hoped Beckendorf’s spirit would end up in Elysium. Maybe he’d even choose to be reborn and try for Elysium in three different lifetimes so he could reach the Isles of the Blest, which was like the Underworld’s ultimate party headquarters. If anyone deserved it, Beckendorf did.

Annabeth left without a word to me. Most of the other campers drifted off to their afternoon activities. I just stood there, staring at the dying fire. Silena sat nearby crying while Clarisse and her boyfriend Chris Rodriguez tried to comfort her.

Finally I got up the nerve to walk over. ‘Hey, Silena, I’m really sorry.’

She sniffled. Clarisse glared at me, but she always glares at everyone. Chris would barely look at me. He’d been one of Luke’s men until Clarisse rescued him from the Labyrinth last summer, and I guess he still felt guilty about it.

I cleared my throat. ‘Silena, you know Beckendorf carried your picture. He looked at it right before we went into battle. You meant a lot to him. You made the last year the best of his life.’

Silena sobbed.

‘Good work, Percy,’ Clarisse muttered.

‘No, it’s all right,’ Silena said. ‘Thank … thank you, Percy. I should go.’

‘You want company?’ Clarisse asked.

Silena shook her head and ran off.

‘She’s stronger than she looks,’ Clarisse muttered, almost to herself. ‘She’ll survive.’

‘You could help with that,’ I suggested. ‘You could honour Beckendorf’s memory by fighting with us.’

Clarisse went for her knife, but it wasn’t there any more. She’d thrown it on the ping-pong table in the Big House.

‘Not my problem,’ she growled. ‘My cabin doesn’t get honour – I don’t fight.’

I noticed she wasn’t speaking in rhymes. Maybe she hadn’t been around when her cabinmates got cursed, or maybe she had a way of breaking the spell. With a chill, I wondered if Clarisse could be Kronos’s spy at camp. Was that why she was keeping her cabin out of the fight? But, as much as I disliked Clarisse, spying for Titans didn’t seem like her style.

‘All right,’ I told her. ‘I didn’t want to bring this up, but you owe me one. You’d be rotting in a Cyclops’s cave in the Sea of Monsters if it weren’t for me.’

She clenched her jaw. ‘Any other favour, Percy. Not this. The Ares cabin has been dissed too many times. And don’t think I don’t know what people say about me behind my back.’

I wanted to say,
Well, it’s true.
But I bit my tongue.

‘So what – you’re just going to let Kronos crush us?’ I asked.

‘If you want my help so much, tell Apollo to give us the chariot.’

‘You’re such a big baby.’

She charged me but Chris got between us. ‘Whoa, guys,’ he said. ‘Clarisse, you know, maybe he’s got a point.’

She sneered at him. ‘Not you too!’

She trudged off with Chris at her heels. ‘Hey, wait! I just meant – Clarisse, wait!’

I watched the last sparks from Beckendorf’s fire curl into the afternoon sky. Then I headed towards the sword-fighting arena. I needed a break, and I wanted to see an old friend.

Mrs O’Leary saw me before I saw her, which was a pretty good trick considering she’s the size of a garbage truck. I walked into the arena and a wall of darkness slammed into me.

‘WOOF!’

The next thing I knew I was flat on the ground with a huge paw on my chest and an oversized Brillo-pad tongue licking my face.

‘Ow!’ I said. ‘Hey, girl. Good to see you, too. Ow!’

It took a few minutes for Mrs O’Leary to calm down and get off me. By then I was pretty much drenched in dog drool. She wanted to play fetch, so I picked up a bronze shield and tossed it across the arena.

By the way, Mrs O’Leary is the world’s only friendly hellhound. I kind of inherited her when her previous owner died. She lived at camp, but Beckendorf … well, Beckendorf
used
to take care of her whenever I was gone. He had smelted Mrs O’Leary’s favourite bronze chewing bone. He’d forged her collar with the little smiley face and crossbones nametag. Beckendorf had been her best friend next to me.

Thinking about that made me sad all over again, but I threw the shield a few more times because Mrs O’Leary insisted.

Soon she started barking – a sound slightly louder than an artillery gun – like she needed to go for a walk. The other campers didn’t think it was funny when she went to the bathroom in the arena. It had caused more than one unfortunate slip-and-slide accident. So I opened the gates of the arena and she bounded straight towards the woods.

I jogged after her, not too concerned that she was getting ahead. Nothing in the woods could threaten Mrs O’Leary. Even the dragons and giant scorpions ran away when she came close.

When I finally tracked her down, she wasn’t using the facilities. She was in a familiar clearing where the Council of Cloven Elders had once put Grover on trial. The place didn’t look so good. The grass had turned yellow. The three topiary thrones had lost all their leaves. But that’s not what surprised me. In the middle of the glade stood the weirdest trio I’d ever seen: Juniper the tree nymph, Nico di Angelo and a very old, very fat satyr.

Nico was the only one who didn’t seem freaked out by Mrs O’Leary’s appearance. He looked pretty much like I’d seen him in my dream – an aviator’s jacket, black jeans and a T-shirt with dancing skeletons on it like one of those Day of the Dead pictures. His Stygian-iron sword hung at his side. He was only twelve, though he looked much older and sadder.

He nodded when he saw me, then went back to scratching Mrs O’Leary’s ears. She sniffed his legs like he was the most interesting thing since rib-eye steaks. Being the son of Hades, he’d probably been travelling in all sorts of hellhound-friendly places.

The old satyr didn’t look nearly so happy. ‘Will someone
– what is this
Underworld
creature doing in my forest!’ He waved his arms and trotted on his hooves like the grass was hot. ‘You there, Percy Jackson! Is this your beast?’

‘Sorry, Leneus,’ I said. ‘That’s your name, right?’

The satyr rolled his eyes. His fur was dust-bunny grey and a spider web grew between his horns. His belly would’ve made him an invincible bumper car. ‘Well, of course I’m Leneus. Don’t tell me you’ve forgotten a member of the council so quickly. Now call off your beast!’

‘WOOF!’ Mrs O’Leary said happily.

The old satyr gulped. ‘Make it go away! Juniper, I will not help you under these circumstances!’

Juniper turned towards me. She was pretty in a dryady way, with her purple gossamer dress and her elfish face, but her eyes were green-tinted with chlorophyll from crying.

‘Percy,’ she sniffled. ‘I was just asking about Grover. I
know
something’s happened. He wouldn’t stay gone this long if he wasn’t in trouble. I was hoping that Leneus –’

‘I told you!’ the satyr protested. ‘You are better off without that traitor.’

Juniper stamped her foot. ‘He is not a traitor! He’s the bravest satyr ever and I want to know where he is!’

‘WOOF!’

Leneus’s knees started knocking. ‘I – I won’t answer questions with this hellhound sniffing my tail!’

Nico looked like he was trying not to crack up. ‘I’ll walk the dog,’ he volunteered.

He whistled and Mrs O’Leary bounded after him to the far end of the grove.

Leneus huffed indignantly and brushed the twigs off
his shirt. ‘Now, as I was trying to explain, young lady, your boyfriend has not sent
any
reports since we voted him into exile.’

‘You
tried
to vote him into exile,’ I corrected. ‘Chiron and Dionysus stopped you.’

‘Bah! They are
honorary
council members. It wasn’t a proper vote.’

‘I’ll tell Dionysus you said that.’

Leneus paled. ‘I only meant – Now see here, Jackson. This is none of your business.’

‘Grover’s my friend,’ I said. ‘He wasn’t lying to you about Pan’s death. I saw it myself. You were just too scared to accept the truth.’

Leneus’s lips quivered. ‘No! Grover’s a liar and good riddance. We’re better off without him.’

I pointed at the withered thrones. ‘If things are going so well, where are your friends? Looks like your council hasn’t been meeting lately.’

‘Maron and Silenus … I – I’m sure they’ll be back,’ he said, but I could hear the panic in his voice. ‘They’re just taking some time off to think. It’s been a very unsettling year.’

‘It’s going to get a lot more unsettling,’ I promised. ‘Leneus, we
need
Grover. There’s got to be a way you can find him with your magic.’

The old satyr’s eye twitched. ‘I’m telling you I’ve heard nothing. Perhaps he’s dead.’

Juniper choked back a sob.

‘He’s not dead,’ I said. ‘I can feel that much.’

‘Empathy links,’ Leneus said disdainfully. ‘Very unreliable.’

‘So ask around,’ I insisted. ‘Find him. There’s a war coming. Grover was preparing the nature spirits.’

‘Without my permission! And it’s not
our
war.’

I grabbed him by the shirt, which seriously wasn’t like me, but the stupid old goat was making me mad. ‘Listen, Leneus. When Kronos attacks, he’s going to have
packs
of hellhounds. He’s going to destroy everything in his path – mortals, gods, demigods. Do you think he’ll let the satyrs go free? You’re supposed to be a leader. So LEAD. Get out there and see what’s happening. Find Grover and bring Juniper some news. Now GO!’

I didn’t push him very hard, but he was kind of top-heavy. He fell on his furry rump, then scrambled to his hooves and ran away with his belly jiggling. ‘Grover will never be accepted! He will die an outcast!’

When he’d disappeared into the bushes, Juniper wiped her eyes. ‘I’m sorry, Percy. I didn’t mean to get you involved. Leneus is still a Lord of the Wild. You don’t want to make an enemy of him.’

‘No problem,’ I said. ‘I’ve got worse enemies than overweight satyrs.’

Nico walked back to us. ‘Good job, Percy. Judging from the trail of goat pellets, I’d say you shook him up pretty well.’

I was afraid I knew why Nico was here, but I tried for a smile. ‘Welcome back. Did you come by just to see Juniper?’

He blushed. ‘Um, no. That was an accident. I kind of … dropped into the middle of their conversation.’

‘He scared us to death!’ Juniper said. ‘Right out of the shadows. But, Nico, you
are
the son of Hades and
all. Are you sure you haven’t heard anything about Grover?’

Nico shifted his weight. ‘Juniper, like I tried to tell you … even if Grover died, he would reincarnate into something else in nature. I can’t sense things like that, only mortal souls.’

‘But if you
do
hear anything?’ she pleaded, putting her hand on his arm. ‘Anything at all?’

Nico’s cheeks got even brighter red. ‘Uh, you bet. I’ll keep my ears open.’

‘We’ll find him, Juniper,’ I promised. ‘Grover’s alive, I’m sure. There must be a simple reason why he hasn’t contacted us.’

She nodded glumly. ‘I hate not being able to leave the forest. He could be anywhere, and I’m stuck here waiting. Oh, if that silly goat has got himself hurt –’

Mrs O’Leary bounded back over and took an interest in Juniper’s dress.

Juniper yelped. ‘Oh, no you don’t! I know about dogs and trees – I’m gone!’

She went
poof
into green mist. Mrs O’Leary looked disappointed, but she lumbered off to find another target, leaving Nico and me alone.

Nico tapped his sword on the ground. A tiny mound of animal bones erupted from the dirt. They knitted themselves together into a skeletal field mouse and scampered off. ‘I was sorry to hear about Beckendorf.’

A lump formed in my throat. ‘How did you –’

‘I talked to his ghost.’

‘Oh … right.’ I’d never get used to the fact that this twelve-year-old kid spent more time talking with the
dead than the living. ‘Did he say anything?’

‘He doesn’t blame you. He figured you’d be beating yourself up, and he said you shouldn’t.’

‘Is he going to try for rebirth?’

Nico shook his head. ‘He’s staying in Elysium. Said he’s waiting for someone. Not sure what he meant, but he seems okay with death.’

It wasn’t much comfort, but it was something.

‘I had a vision you were on Mount Tam,’ I told Nico. ‘Was that –’

‘Real,’ he said. ‘I didn’t mean to be spying on the Titans, but I was in the neighbourhood.’

‘Doing what?’

Nico tugged at his sword belt. ‘Following a lead on … you know, my family.’

I nodded. I knew his past was a painful subject. Until two years ago, he and his sister Bianca had been frozen in time at a place called the Lotus Casino. They’d been there for like seventy years. Eventually a mysterious lawyer rescued them and checked them into a boarding school, but Nico had no memories of his life before the casino. He didn’t know anything about his mother. He didn’t know who the lawyer was, or why they’d been frozen in time or allowed to go free. After Bianca died and left Nico alone, he’d been obsessed with finding answers.

‘So how did it go?’ I asked. ‘Any luck?’

‘No,’ he murmured. ‘But I may have a new lead soon.’

‘What’s the lead?’

Nico chewed his lip. ‘That’s not important right now. You know why I’m here.’

A feeling of dread started to build in my chest. Ever
since Nico first proposed his plan for beating Kronos last summer, I’d had nightmares about it. He would show up occasionally and press me for an answer, but I kept putting him off.

‘Nico, I don’t know,’ I said. ‘It seems pretty extreme.’

‘You’ve got Typhon coming in what … a week? Most of the other Titans are unleashed now and on Kronos’s side. Maybe it’s time to think extreme.’

I looked back towards the camp. Even from this distance, I could hear the Ares and Apollo campers fighting again, yelling curses and spouting bad poetry.

‘They’re no match for the Titan army,’ Nico said. ‘You know that. This comes down to you and Luke. And there’s only one way you can beat Luke.’

I remembered the fight on the
Princess Andromeda.
I’d been hopelessly outmatched. Kronos had almost killed me with a single cut to my arm, and I couldn’t even wound him. Riptide had glanced right off his skin.

‘We can give you the same power,’ Nico urged. ‘You heard the Great Prophecy. Unless you want to have your soul reaped by a cursed blade …’

I wondered how Nico had heard the prophecy – probably from some ghost.

‘You can’t prevent a prophecy,’ I said.

‘But you can fight it.’ Nico had a strange, hungry light in his eyes. ‘You can become invincible.’

‘Maybe we should wait. Try to fight without –’

‘No!’ Nico snarled. ‘It has to be now!’

I stared at him. I hadn’t seen his temper flare like that in a long time. ‘Um, you sure you’re okay?’

He took a deep breath. ‘Percy, all I mean … when the
fighting starts, we won’t be able to make the journey. This is our last chance. I’m sorry if I’m being too pushy, but two years ago my sister gave her life to protect you. I want you to honour that. Do whatever it takes to stay alive and defeat Kronos.’

I didn’t like the idea. Then I thought about Annabeth calling me a coward, and I got angry.

Nico had a point. If Kronos attacked New York, the campers would be no match for his forces. I had to do something. Nico’s way was dangerous – maybe even deadly. But it might give me a fighting edge.

‘All right,’ I decided. ‘What do we do first?’

His cold, creepy smile made me sorry I’d agreed. ‘First we’ll need to retrace Luke’s steps. We need to know more about his past, his childhood.’

I shuddered, thinking about Rachel’s picture from my dream – a smiling nine-year-old Luke. ‘Why do we need to know about that?’

‘I’ll explain when we get there,’ Nico said. ‘I’ve already tracked down his mother. She lives in Connecticut.’

I stared at him. I’d never thought much about Luke’s mortal parent. I’d met his dad, Hermes, but his mom …

‘Luke ran away when he was really young,’ I said. ‘I didn’t think his mom was alive.’

‘Oh, she’s alive.’ The way he said it made me wonder what was wrong with her. What kind of horrible person could she be?

‘Okay …’ I said. ‘So how do we get to Connecticut? I can call Blackjack –’

‘No.’ Nico scowled. ‘Pegasi don’t like me, and the feeling
is mutual. But there’s no need for flying.’ He whistled, and Mrs O’Leary came loping out of the woods.

‘Your friend here can help.’ Nico patted her head. ‘You haven’t tried shadow-travel yet?’

‘Shadow-travel?’

Nico whispered in Mrs O’Leary’s ear. She tilted her head, suddenly alert.

‘Hop on board,’ Nico told me.

I’d never considered riding a dog before, but Mrs O’Leary was certainly big enough. I climbed onto her back and held her collar.

‘This will make her very tired,’ Nico warned, ‘so you can’t do it often. And it works best at night. But all shadows are part of the same substance. There is only one darkness, and creatures of the Underworld can use it as a road, or a door.’

‘I don’t understand,’ I said.

‘No,’ Nico said. ‘It took me a long time to learn. But Mrs O’Leary knows. Tell her where to go. Tell her Westport, the home of May Castellan.’