The House of Hades

books4u · 7 Tháng tư 2015

The House of Hades
Author : Rick Riordan
Category : Fantasy, Teen
Source : books4u.me/read/the-house-of-hades/8527.html

At the conclusion of The Mark of Athena, Annabeth and Percy tumble into a pit leading straight to the Underworld. The other five demigods have to put aside their grief and follow Percy’s instructions to find the mortal side of the Doors of Death. If they can fight their way through the Gaea’s forces, and Percy and Annabeth can survive the House of Hades, then the Seven will be able to seal the Doors both sides and prevent the giants from raising Gaea. But, Leo wonders, if the Doors are sealed, how will Percy and Annabeth be able to escape?
They have no choice. If the demigods don’t succeed, Gaea’s armies will never die. They have no time. In about a month, the Romans will march on Camp Half-Blood. The stakes are higher than ever in this adventure that dives into the depths of Tartarus.

books4u · 7 Tháng tư 2015

The House of Hades
Page 1

DURING THE THIRD ATTACK, Hazel almost ate a boulder. She was peering into the fog, wondering how it could be so difficult to fly across one stupid mountain range, when the shiprsquo;s alarm bells sounded.

ldquo;Hard to port!rdquo; Nico yelled from the foremast of the flying ship.

Back at the helm, Leo yanked the wheel. The Argo II veered left, its aerial oars slashing through the clouds like rows of knives.

Hazel made the mistake of looking over the rail. A dark spherical shape hurtled toward her. She thought: Why is the moon coming at us? Then she yelped and hit the deck. The huge rock passed so close overhead it blew her hair out of her face.

*****!

The foremast collapsedmdash;sail, spars, and Nico all crashing to the deck. The boulder, roughly the size of a pickup truck, tumbled off into the fog like it had important business elsewhere.

ldquo;Nico!rdquo; Hazel scrambled over to him as Leo brought the ship level.

ldquo;Irsquo;m fine,rdquo; Nico muttered, kicking folds of canvas off his legs.

She helped him up, and they stumbled to the bow. Hazel peeked over more carefully this time. The clouds parted just long enough to reveal the top of the mountain below them: a spearhead of black rock jutting from mossy green slopes. Standing at the summit was a mountain godmdash;one of the numina montanum, Jason had called them. Or ourae, in Greek. Whatever you called them, they were nasty.

Like the others they had faced, this one wore a simple white tunic over skin as rough and dark as basalt. He was about twenty feet tall and extremely muscular, with a flowing white beard, scraggly hair, and a wild look in his eyes, like a crazy hermit. He bellowed something Hazel didnrsquo;t understand, but it obviously wasnrsquo;t welcoming. With his bare hands, he pried another chunk of rock from his mountain and began shaping it into a ball.

The scene disappeared in the fog, but when the mountain god bellowed again, other numina answered in the distance, their voices echoing through the valleys.

ldquo;Stupid rock gods!rdquo; Leo yelled from the helm. ldquo;Thatrsquo;s the third time Irsquo;ve had to replace that mast! You think they grow on trees?rdquo;

Nico frowned. ldquo;Masts are from trees.rdquo;

ldquo;Thatrsquo;s not the point!rdquo; Leo snatched up one of his controls, rigged from a Nintendo Wii stick, and spun it in a circle. A few feet away, a trapdoor opened in the deck. A Celestial bronze cannon rose. Hazel just had time to cover her ears before it discharged into the sky, spraying a dozen metal spheres that trailed green fire. The spheres grew spikes in midair, like helicopter blades, and hurtled away into the fog.

A moment later, a series of explosions crackled across the mountains, followed by the outraged roars of mountain gods.

ldquo;Ha!rdquo; Leo yelled.

Unfortunately, Hazel guessed, judging from their last two encounters, Leorsquo;s newest weapon had only annoyed the numina.

Another boulder whistled through the air off to their starboard side.

Nico yelled, ldquo;Get us out of here!rdquo;

Leo muttered some unflattering comments about numina, but he turned the wheel. The engines hummed. Magical rigging lashed itself tight, and the ship tacked to port. The Argo II picked up speed, retreating northwest, as theyrsquo;d been doing for the past two days.

Hazel didnrsquo;t relax until they were out of the mountains. The fog cleared. Below them, morning sunlight illuminated the Italian countrysidemdash;rolling green hills and golden fields not too different from those in Northern California. Hazel could almost imagine she was sailing home to Camp Jupiter.

The thought weighed on her chest. Camp Jupiter had only been her home for nine months, since Nico had brought her back from the Underworld. But she missed it more than her birthplace of New Orleans, and definitely more than Alaska, where shersquo;d died back in 1942.

She missed her bunk in the Fifth Cohort barracks. She missed dinners in the mess hall, with wind spirits whisking platters through the air and legionnaires joking about the war games. She wanted to wander the streets of New Rome, holding hands with Frank Zhang. She wanted to experience just being a regular girl for once, with an actual sweet, caring boyfriend.

Most of all, she wanted to feel safe. She was tired of being scared and worried all the time.

She stood on the quarterdeck as Nico picked mast splinters out of his arms and Leo punched buttons on the shiprsquo;s console.

ldquo;Well, that was sucktastic,rdquo; Leo said. ldquo;Should I wake the others?rdquo;

Hazel was tempted to say yes, but the other crew members had taken the night shift and had earned their rest. They were exhausted from defending the ship. Every few hours, it seemed, some Roman monster had decided the Argo II looked like a tasty treat.

A few weeks ago, Hazel wouldnrsquo;t have believed that anyone could sleep through a numina attack, but now she imagined her friends were still snoring away belowdecks. Whenever she got a chance to crash, she slept like a coma patient.

ldquo;They need rest,rdquo; she said. ldquo;Wersquo;ll have to figure out another way on our own.rdquo;

ldquo;Huh.rdquo; Leo scowled at his monitor. In his tattered work shirt and grease-splattered jeans, he looked like hersquo;d just lost a wrestling match with a locomotive.

Ever since their friends Percy and Annabeth had fallen into Tartarus, Leo had been working almost nonstop. Hersquo;d been acting angrier and even more driven than usual.

Hazel worried about him. But part of her was relieved by the change. Whenever Leo smiled and joked, he looked too much like Sammy, his great-grandfatherhellip;Hazelrsquo;s first boyfriend, back in 1942.

Ugh, why did her life have to be so complicated?

ldquo;Another way,rdquo; Leo muttered. ldquo;Do you see one?rdquo;

On his monitor glowed a map of Italy. The Apennine Mountains ran down the middle of the boot-shaped country. A green dot for the Argo II blinked on the western side of the range, a few hundred miles north of Rome. Their path should have been simple. They needed to get to a place called Epirus in Greece and find an old temple called the House of Hades (or Pluto, as the Romans called him; or as Hazel liked to think of him: the Worldrsquo;s Worst Absent Father).

To reach Epirus, all they had to do was go straight eastmdash;over the Apennines and across the Adriatic Sea. But it hadnrsquo;t worked out that way. Each time they tried to cross the spine of Italy, the mountain gods attacked.

For the past two days theyrsquo;d skirted north, hoping to find a safe pass, with no luck. The numina montanum were sons of Gaea, Hazelrsquo;s least favorite goddess. That made them very determined enemies. The Argo II couldnrsquo;t fly high enough to avoid their attacks; and even with all its defenses, the ship couldnrsquo;t make it across the range without being smashed to pieces.

ldquo;Itrsquo;s our fault,rdquo; Hazel said. ldquo;Nicorsquo;s and mine. The numina can sense us.rdquo;

She glanced at her half brother. Since theyrsquo;d rescued him from the giants, hersquo;d started to regain his strength, but he was still painfully thin. His black shirt and jeans hung off his skeletal frame. Long dark hair framed his sunken eyes. His olive complexion had turned a sickly greenish white, like the color of tree sap.

In human years, he was barely fourteen, just a year older than Hazel, but that didnrsquo;t tell the whole story. Like Hazel, Nico di Angelo was a demigod from another era. He radiated a kind of old energymdash;a melancholy that came from knowing he didnrsquo;t belong in the modern world.

Hazel hadnrsquo;t known him very long, but she understood, even shared, his sadness. The children of Hades (Plutomdash;whichever) rarely had happy lives. And judging from what Nico had told her the night before, their biggest challenge was yet to come when they reached the House of Hadesmdash;a challenge hersquo;d implored her to keep secret from the others.

Nico gripped the hilt of his Stygian iron sword. ldquo;Earth spirits donrsquo;t like children of the Underworld. Thatrsquo;s true. We get under their skinmdash;literally. But I think the numina could sense this ship anyway. Wersquo;re carrying the Athena Parthenos. That thing is like a magical beacon.rdquo;

Hazel shivered, thinking of the massive statue that took up most of the hold. Theyrsquo;d sacrificed so much saving it from the cavern under Rome; but they had no idea what to do with it. So far the only thing it seemed to be good for was alerting more monsters to their presence.

Leo traced his finger down the map of Italy. ldquo;So crossing the mountains is out. Thing is, they go a long way in either direction.rdquo;

ldquo;We could go by sea,rdquo; Hazel suggested. ldquo;Sail around the southern tip of Italy.rdquo;

ldquo;Thatrsquo;s a long way,rdquo; Nico said. ldquo;Plus, we donrsquo;t havehellip;rdquo; His voice cracked. ldquo;You knowhellip;our sea expert, Percy.rdquo;

The name hung in the air like an impending storm.

Percy Jackson, son of Poseidonhellip;probably the demigod Hazel admired most. Hersquo;d saved her life so many times on their quest to Alaska; but when he had needed Hazelrsquo;s help in Rome, shersquo;d failed him. Shersquo;d watched, powerless, as he and Annabeth had plunged into that pit.

Hazel took a deep breath. Percy and Annabeth were still alive. She knew that in her heart. She could still help them if she could get to the House of Hades, if she could survive the challenge Nico had warned her about.hellip;

ldquo;What about continuing north?rdquo; she asked. ldquo;There has to be a break in the mountains, or something.rdquo;

Leo fiddled with the bronze Archimedes sphere that hersquo;d installed on the consolemdash;his newest and most dangerous toy. Every time Hazel looked at the thing, her mouth went dry. She worried that Leo would turn the wrong combination on the sphere and accidentally eject them all from the deck, or blow up the ship, or turn the Argo II into a giant toaster.

Fortunately, they got lucky. The sphere grew a camera lens and projected a 3-D image of the Apennine Mountains above the console.

ldquo;I dunno.rdquo; Leo examined the hologram. ldquo;I donrsquo;t see any good passes to the north. But I like that idea better than backtracking south. Irsquo;m done with Rome.rdquo;

No one argued with that. Rome had not been a good experience.

ldquo;Whatever we do,rdquo; Nico said, ldquo;we have to hurry. Every day that Annabeth and Percy are in Tartarushellip;rdquo;

He didnrsquo;t need to finish. They had to hope Percy and Annabeth could survive long enough to find the Tartarus side of the Doors of Death. Then, assuming the Argo II could reach the House of Hades, they might be able to open the Doors on the mortal side, save their friends, and seal the entrance, stopping Gaearsquo;s forces from being reincarnated in the mortal world over and over.

Yeshellip;nothing could go wrong with that plan.

Nico scowled at the Italian countryside below them. ldquo;Maybe we should wake the others. This decision affects us all.rdquo;

ldquo;No,rdquo; Hazel said. ldquo;We can find a solution.rdquo;

She wasnrsquo;t sure why she felt so strongly about it, but since leaving Rome, the crew had started to lose its cohesion. Theyrsquo;d be

books4u · 7 Tháng tư 2015

The House of Hades
Page 2

If Hazel woke up the rest of the crew every time they had a problem, theyrsquo;d just start arguing again, feeling more and more hopeless.

She had to make Percy and Annabeth proud of her. She had to take the initiative. She couldnrsquo;t believe her only role in this quest would be what Nico had warned her ofmdash;removing the obstacle waiting for them in the House of Hades. She pushed the thought aside.

ldquo;We need some creative thinking,rdquo; she said. ldquo;Another way to cross those mountains, or a way to hide ourselves from the numina.rdquo;

Nico sighed. ldquo;If I was on my own, I could shadow-travel. But that wonrsquo;t work for an entire ship. And honestly, Irsquo;m not sure I have the strength to even transport myself anymore.rdquo;

ldquo;I could maybe rig some kind of camouflage,rdquo; Leo said, ldquo;like a smoke screen to hide us in the clouds.rdquo; He didnrsquo;t sound very enthusiastic.

Hazel stared down at the rolling farmland, thinking about what lay beneath itmdash;the realm of her father, lord of the Underworld. Shersquo;d only met Pluto once, and she hadnrsquo;t even realized who he was. She certainly had never expected help from himmdash;not when she was alive the first time, not during her time as a spirit in the Underworld, not since Nico had brought her back to the world of the living.

Her dadrsquo;s servant Thanatos, god of death, had suggested that Pluto might be doing Hazel a favor by ignoring her. After all, she wasnrsquo;t supposed to be alive. If Pluto took notice of her, he might have to return her to the land of the dead.

Which meant calling on Pluto would be a very bad idea. And yethellip;

Please, Dad, she found herself praying. I have to find a way to your temple in Greecemdash;the House of Hades. If yoursquo;re down there, show me what to do.

At the edge of the horizon, a flicker of movement caught her eyemdash;something small and beige racing across the fields at incredible speed, leaving a vapor trail like a planersquo;s.

Hazel couldnrsquo;t believe it. She didnrsquo;t dare hope, but it had to behellip;ldquo;Arion.rdquo;

ldquo;What?rdquo; Nico asked.

Leo let out a happy whoop as the dust cloud got closer. ldquo;Itrsquo;s her horse, man! You missed that whole part. We havenrsquo;t seen him since Kansas!rdquo;

Hazel laughedmdash;the first time shersquo;d laughed in days. It felt so good to see her old friend.

About a mile to the north, the small beige dot circled a hill and stopped at the summit. He was difficult to make out, but when the horse reared and whinnied, the sound carried all the way to the Argo II. Hazel had no doubtmdash;it was Arion.

ldquo;We have to meet him,rdquo; she said. ldquo;Hersquo;s here to help.rdquo;

ldquo;Yeah, okay.rdquo; Leo scratched his head. ldquo;But, uh, we talked about not landing the ship on the ground anymore, remember? You know, with Gaea wanting to destroy us and all.rdquo;

ldquo;Just get me close, and Irsquo;ll use the rope ladder.rdquo; Hazelrsquo;s heart was pounding. ldquo;I think Arion wants to tell me something.rdquo;

HAZEL HAD NEVER FELT SO HAPPY. Well, except for maybe on the night of the victory feast at Camp Jupiter, when shersquo;d kissed Frank for the first timehellip;but this was a close second.

As soon as she reached the ground, she ran to Arion and threw her arms around him. ldquo;I missed you!rdquo; She pressed her face into the horsersquo;s warm neck, which smelled of sea salt and apples. ldquo;Where have you been?rdquo;

Arion nickered. Hazel wished she could speak Horse like Percy could, but she got the general idea. Arion sounded impatient, as if saying, No time for sentiment, girl! Come on!

ldquo;You want me to go with you?rdquo; she guessed.

Arion bobbed his head, trotting in place. His dark brown eyes gleamed with urgency.

Hazel still couldnrsquo;t believe he was actually here. He could run across any surface, even the sea; but shersquo;d been afraid he wouldnrsquo;t follow them into the ancient lands. The Mediterranean was too dangerous for demigods and their allies.

He wouldnrsquo;t have come unless Hazel was in dire need. And he seemed so agitated.hellip; Anything that could make a fearless horse skittish should have terrified Hazel.

Instead, she felt elated. She was so tired of being seasick and airsick. Aboard the Argo II, she felt about as useful as a box of ballast. She was glad to be back on solid ground, even if it was Gaearsquo;s territory. She was ready to ride.

ldquo;Hazel!rdquo; Nico called down from the ship. ldquo;Whatrsquo;s going on?rdquo;

ldquo;Itrsquo;s fine!rdquo; She crouched down and summoned a gold nugget from the earth. She was getting better at controlling her power. Precious stones hardly ever popped up around her by accident anymore, and pulling gold from the ground was easy.

She fed Arion the nuggethellip;his favorite snack. Then she smiled up at Leo and Nico, who were watching her from the top of the ladder a hundred feet above. ldquo;Arion wants to take me somewhere.rdquo;

The boys exchanged nervous looks.

ldquo;Uhhellip;rdquo; Leo pointed north. ldquo;Please tell me hersquo;s not taking you into that?rdquo;

Hazel had been so focused on Arion, she hadnrsquo;t noticed the disturbance. A mile away, on the crest of the next hill, a storm had gathered over some old stone ruinsmdash;maybe the remains of a Roman temple or a fortress. A funnel cloud snaked its way down toward the hill like an inky black finger.

Hazelrsquo;s mouth tasted like blood. She looked at Arion. ldquo;You want to go there?rdquo;

Arion whinnied, as if to say, Uh, duh!

Wellhellip;Hazel had asked for help. Was this her dadrsquo;s answer?

She hoped so, but she sensed something besides Pluto at work in that stormhellip;something dark, powerful, and not necessarily friendly.

Still, this was her chance to help her friendsmdash;to lead instead of follow.

She tightened the straps of her Imperial gold cavalry sword and climbed onto Arionrsquo;s back.

ldquo;Irsquo;ll be okay!rdquo; she called up to Nico and Leo. ldquo;Stay put and wait for me.rdquo;

ldquo;Wait for how long?rdquo; Nico asked. ldquo;What if you donrsquo;t come back?rdquo;

ldquo;Donrsquo;t worry, I will,rdquo; she promised, hoping it was true.

She spurred Arion, and they shot across the countryside, heading straight for the growing tornado.

THE STORM SWALLOWED THE HILL in a swirling cone of black vapor.

Arion charged straight into it.

Hazel found herself at the summit, but it felt like a different dimension. The world lost its color. The walls of the storm encircled the hill in murky black. The sky churned gray. The crumbling ruins were bleached so white, they almost glowed. Even Arion had turned from caramel brown to a dark shade of ash.

In the eye of the tempest, the air was still. Hazelrsquo;s skin tingled coolly, as if shersquo;d been rubbed with alcohol. In front of her, an arched gateway led through mossy walls into some sort of enclosure.

Hazel couldnrsquo;t see much through the gloom, but she felt a presence within, as if she were a chunk of iron close to a large magnet. Its pull was irresistible, dragging her forward.

Yet she hesitated. She reined in Arion, and he clopped impatiently, the ground crackling under his hooves. Wherever he stepped, the grass, dirt, and stones turned white like frost. Hazel remembered the Hubbard Glacier in Alaskamdash;how the surface had cracked under their feet. She remembered the floor of that horrible cavern in Rome crumbling to dust, plunging Percy and Annabeth into Tartarus.

She hoped this black-and-white hilltop wouldnrsquo;t dissolve under her, but she decided it was best to keep moving.

ldquo;Letrsquo;s go, then, boy.rdquo; Her voice sounded muffled, as if she were speaking into a pillow.

Arion trotted through the stone archway. Ruined walls bordered a square courtyard about the size of a tennis court. Three other gateways, one in the middle of each wall, led north, east, and west. In the center of the yard, two cobblestone paths intersected, making a cross. Mist hung in the airmdash;hazy shreds of white that coiled and undulated as if they were alive.

Not mist, Hazel realized. The Mist.

All her life, shersquo;d heard about the Mistmdash;the supernatural veil that obscured the world of myth from the sight of mortals. It could deceive humans, even demigods, into seeing monsters as harmless animals, or gods as regular people.

Hazel had never thought of it as actual smoke, but as she watched it curling around Arionrsquo;s legs, floating through the broken arches of the ruined courtyard, the hairs stood up on her arms. Somehow she knew: this white stuff was pure magic.

In the distance, a dog howled. Arion wasnrsquo;t usually scared of anything, but he reared, huffing nervously.

ldquo;Itrsquo;s okay.rdquo; Hazel stroked his neck. ldquo;Wersquo;re in this together. Irsquo;m going to get down, all right?rdquo;

She slid off Arionrsquo;s back. Instantly he turned and ran.

ldquo;Arion, waimdash;rdquo;

But hersquo;d already disappeared the way hersquo;d come.

So much for being in this together.

Another howl cut through the airmdash;closer this time.

Hazel stepped toward the center of the courtyard. The Mist clung to her like freezer fog.

ldquo;Hello?rdquo; she called.

ldquo;Hello,rdquo; a voice answered.

The pale figure of a woman appeared at the northern gateway. No, waithellip;she stood at the eastern entrance. No, the western. Three smoky images of the same woman moved in unison toward the center of the ruins. Her form was blurred, made from Mist, and she was trailed by two smaller wisps of smoke, darting at her heels like animals. Some sort of pets?

She reached the center of the courtyard and her three forms merged into one. She solidified into a young woman in a dark sleeveless gown. Her golden hair was gathered into a high-set ponytail, Ancient Greek style. Her dress was so silky, it seemed to ripple, as if the cloth were ink spilling off her shoulders. She looked no more than twenty, but Hazel knew that meant nothing.

ldquo;Hazel Levesque,rdquo; said the woman.

She was beautiful, but deathly pale. Once, back in New Orleans, Hazel had been forced to attend a wake for a dead classmate. She remembered the lifeless body of the young girl in the open casket. Her face had been made up prettily, as if she were resting, which Hazel had found terrifying.

This woman reminded Hazel of that girlmdash;except the womanrsquo;s eyes were open and completely black. When she tilted her head, she seemed to break into three different people againhellip;misty afterimages blurring together, like a photograph of someone moving too fast to capture.

ldquo;Who are you?rdquo; Hazelrsquo;s fingers twitched at the hilt of her sword. ldquo;I meanhellip;which goddess?rdquo;

Hazel was sure of that much. This woman radiated power. Everything around themmdash;the swirling Mist, the monochromatic storm, the eerie glow of the ruinsmdash;was because of her presence.

ldquo;Ah.rdquo; The woman nodded. ldquo;Let me give you some light.rdquo;

She raised her hands. Suddenly she was holding two old-fashioned reed torches, guttering with fire. The Mist receded to the edges of the courtyard. At the womanrsquo;s sandaled feet, the two wispy animals took on solid form. One was a black Labrador retrieve

books4u · 7 Tháng tư 2015

The House of Hades
Page 3

On either side of the crossroads, two dark metal torch-stands erupted from the dirt like plant stalks. Hecate fixed her torches in them, then walked a slow circle around Hazel, regarding her as if they were partners in some eerie dance.

The black dog and the weasel followed in her wake.

ldquo;You are like your mother,rdquo; Hecate decided.

Hazelrsquo;s throat constricted. ldquo;You knew her?rdquo;

ldquo;Of course. Marie was a fortune-teller. She dealt in charms and curses and gris-gris. I am the goddess of magic.rdquo;

Those pure black eyes seemed to pull at Hazel, as if trying to extract her soul. During her first lifetime in New Orleans, Hazel had been tormented by the kids at St. Agnes School because of her mother. They called Marie Levesque a witch. The nuns muttered that Hazelrsquo;s mother was trading with the Devil.

If the nuns were scared of my mom, Hazel wondered, what would they make of this goddess?

ldquo;Many fear me,rdquo; Hecate said, as if reading her thoughts. ldquo;But magic is neither good nor evil. It is a tool, like a knife. Is a knife evil? Only if the wielder is evil.rdquo;

ldquo;Mymdash;my motherhellip;rdquo; Hazel stammered. ldquo;She didnrsquo;t believe in magic. Not really. She was just faking it, for the money.rdquo;

The weasel chittered and bared its teeth. Then it made a squeaking sound from its back end. Under other circumstances, a weasel passing gas might have been funny, but Hazel didnrsquo;t laugh. The rodentrsquo;s red eyes glared at her balefully, like tiny coals.

ldquo;Peace, Gale,rdquo; said Hecate. She gave Hazel an apologetic shrug. ldquo;Gale does not like hearing about nonbelievers and con artists. She herself was once a witch, you see.rdquo;

ldquo;Your weasel was a witch?rdquo;

ldquo;Shersquo;s a polecat, actually,rdquo; Hecate said. ldquo;But, yesmdash;Gale was once a disagreeable human witch. She had terrible personal hygiene, plus extrememdash;ah, digestive issues.rdquo; Hecate waved her hand in front of her nose. ldquo;It gave my other followers a bad name.rdquo;

ldquo;Okay.rdquo; Hazel tried not to look at the weasel. She really didnrsquo;t want to know about the rodentrsquo;s intestinal problems.

ldquo;At any rate,rdquo; Hecate said, ldquo;I turned her into a polecat. Shersquo;s much better as a polecat.rdquo;

Hazel swallowed. She looked at the black dog, which was affectionately nuzzling the goddessrsquo;s hand. ldquo;And your Labradorhellip;?rdquo;

ldquo;Oh, shersquo;s Hecuba, the former queen of Troy,rdquo; Hecate said, as if that should be obvious.

The dog grunted.

ldquo;Yoursquo;re right, Hecuba,rdquo; the goddess said. ldquo;We donrsquo;t have time for long introductions. The point is, Hazel Levesque, your mother may have claimed not to believe, but she had true magic. Eventually, she realized this. When she searched for a spell to summon the god Pluto, I helped her find it.rdquo;

ldquo;Youhellip;?rdquo;

ldquo;Yes.rdquo; Hecate continued circling Hazel. ldquo;I saw potential in your mother. I see even more potential in you.rdquo;

Hazelrsquo;s head spun. She remembered her motherrsquo;s confession just before she had died: how shersquo;d summoned Pluto, how the god had fallen in love with her, and how, because of her greedy wish, her daughter Hazel had been born with a curse. Hazel could summon riches from the earth, but anyone who used them would suffer and die.

Now this goddess was saying that she had made all that happen.

ldquo;My mother suffered because of that magic. My whole lifemdash;rdquo;

ldquo;Your life wouldnrsquo;t have happened without me,rdquo; Hecate said flatly. ldquo;I have no time for your anger. Neither do you. Without my help, you will die.rdquo;

The black dog snarled. The polecat snapped its teeth and passed gas.

Hazel felt like her lungs were filling with hot sand.

ldquo;What kind of help?rdquo; she demanded.

Hecate raised her pale arms. The three gateways shersquo;d come frommdash;north, east, and westmdash;began to swirl with Mist. A flurry of black-and-white images glowed and flickered, like the old silent movies that were still playing in theaters sometimes when Hazel was small.

In the western doorway, Roman and Greek demigods in full armor fought one another on a hillside under a large pine tree. The grass was strewn with the wounded and the dying. Hazel saw herself riding Arion, charging through the melee and shoutingmdash;trying to stop the violence.

In the gateway to the east, Hazel saw the Argo II plunging through the sky above the Apennines. Its rigging was in flames. A boulder smashed into the quarterdeck. Another punched through the hull. The ship burst like a rotten pumpkin, and the engine exploded.

The images in the northern doorway were even worse. Hazel saw Leo, unconsciousmdash;or deadmdash;falling through the clouds. She saw Frank staggering alone down a dark tunnel, clutching his arm, his shirt soaked in blood. And Hazel saw herself in a vast cavern filled with strands of light like a luminous web. She was struggling to break through while, in the distance, Percy and Annabeth lay sprawled and unmoving at the foot of two black-and-silver metal doors.

ldquo;Choices,rdquo; said Hecate. ldquo;You stand at the crossroads, Hazel Levesque. And I am the goddess of crossroads.rdquo;

The ground rumbled at Hazelrsquo;s feet. She looked down and saw the glint of silver coinshellip;thousands of old Roman denarii breaking the surface all around her, as if the entire hilltop was coming to a boil. Shersquo;d been so agitated by the visions in the doorways that she must have summoned every bit of silver in the surrounding countryside.

ldquo;The past is close to the surface in this place,rdquo; Hecate said. ldquo;In ancient times, two great Roman roads met here. News was exchanged. Markets were held. Friends met, and enemies fought. Entire armies had to choose a direction. Crossroads are always places of decision.rdquo;

ldquo;Likehellip;like Janus.rdquo; Hazel remembered the shrine of Janus on Temple Hill back at Camp Jupiter. Demigods would go there to make decisions. They would flip a coin, heads or tails, and hope the two-faced god would guide them well. Hazel had always hated that place. Shersquo;d never understood why her friends were so willing to let a god take away their responsibility for choosing. After all Hazel had been through, she trusted the wisdom of the gods about as much as she trusted a New Orleans slot machine.

The goddess of magic made a disgusted hiss. ldquo;Janus and his doorways. He would have you believe that all choices are black or white, yes or no, in or out. In fact, itrsquo;s not that simple. Whenever you reach the crossroads, there are always at least three ways to gohellip;four, if you count going backward. You are at such a crossing now, Hazel.rdquo;

Hazel looked again at each swirling gateway: a demigod war, the destruction of the Argo II, disaster for herself and her friends. ldquo;All the choices are bad.rdquo;

ldquo;All choices have risks,rdquo; the goddess corrected. ldquo;But what is your goal?rdquo;

ldquo;My goal?rdquo; Hazel waved helplessly at the doorways. ldquo;None of these.rdquo;

The dog Hecuba snarled. Gale the polecat skittered around the goddessrsquo;s feet, farting and gnashing her teeth.

ldquo;You could go backward,rdquo; Hecate suggested, ldquo;retrace your steps to Romehellip;but Gaearsquo;s forces are expecting that. None of you will survive.rdquo;

ldquo;Sohellip;what are you saying?rdquo;

Hecate stepped to the nearest torch. She scooped a handful of fire and sculpted the flames until she was holding a miniature relief map of Italy.

ldquo;You could go west.rdquo; Hecate let her finger drift away from her fiery map. ldquo;Go back to America with your prize, the Athena Parthenos. Your comrades back home, Greek and Roman, are on the brink of war. Leave now, and you might save many lives.rdquo;

ldquo;Might,rdquo; Hazel repeated. ldquo;But Gaea is supposed to wake in Greece. Thatrsquo;s where the giants are gathering.rdquo;

ldquo;True. Gaea has set the date of August first, the Feast of Spes, goddess of hope, for her rise to power. By waking on the Day of Hope, she intends to destroy all hope forever. Even if you reached Greece by then, could you stop her? I do not know.rdquo; Hecate traced her finger along the tops of the fiery Apennines. ldquo;You could go east, across the mountains, but Gaea will do anything to stop you from crossing Italy. She has raised her mountain gods against you.rdquo;

ldquo;We noticed,rdquo; Hazel said.

ldquo;Any attempt to cross the Apennines will mean the destruction of your ship. Ironically, this might be the safest option for your crew. I foresee that all of you would survive the explosion. It is possible, though unlikely, you could still reach Epirus and close the Doors of Death. You might find Gaea and prevent her rise. But by then, both demigod camps would be destroyed. You would have no home to return to.rdquo; Hecate smiled. ldquo;More likely, the destruction of your ship would strand you in the mountains. It would mean the end of your quest, but it would spare you and your friends much pain and suffering in the days to come. The war with the giants would have to be won or lost without you.rdquo;

Won or lost without us.

A small, guilty part of Hazel found that appealing. Shersquo;d been wishing for the chance to be a normal girl. She didnrsquo;t want any more pain or suffering for herself and her friends. Theyrsquo;d already been through so much.

She looked behind Hecate at the middle gateway. She saw Percy and Annabeth sprawled helplessly before those black-and-silver doors. A massive dark shape, vaguely humanoid, now loomed over them, its foot raised as if to crush Percy.

ldquo;What about them?rdquo; Hazel asked, her voice ragged. ldquo;Percy and Annabeth?rdquo;

Hecate shrugged. ldquo;West, east, or southhellip;they die.rdquo;

ldquo;Not an option,rdquo; Hazel said.

ldquo;Then you have only one path, though it is the most dangerous.rdquo;

Hecatersquo;s finger crossed her miniature Apennines, leaving a glowing white line in the red flames. ldquo;There is a secret pass here in the north, a place where I hold sway, where Hannibal once crossed when he marched against Rome.rdquo;

The goddess made a wide loophellip;to the top of Italy, then east to the sea, then down along the western coast of Greece. ldquo;Once through the pass, you would travel north to Bologna, and then to Venice. From there, sail the Adriatic to your goal, here: Epirus in Greece.rdquo;

Hazel didnrsquo;t know much about geography. She had no idea what the Adriatic Sea was like. Shersquo;d never heard of Bologna, and all she knew about Venice was vague stories about canals and gondolas. But one thing was obvious. ldquo;Thatrsquo;s so far out of the way.rdquo;

ldquo;Which is why Gaea will not expect you to take this route,rdquo; Hecate said. ldquo;I can obscure your progress somewhat, but the success of your journey will depend on you, Hazel Levesque. You must learn to use the Mist.rdquo;

ldquo;Me?rdquo; Hazelrsquo;s heart felt like it was tumbling down her rib cage. ldquo;Use the Mist how?rdquo;

Hecate extinguished her map of Italy. She flicked her hand at the black dog Hecuba. Mist collected around the Labrador until she was completely hidden in a cocoon of white. The fog cleared wit

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The House of Hades
Page 4

ldquo;Buthellip;rdquo; Hazel looked at the cat. She knew it was actually Hecuba, the black Labrador, but she couldnrsquo;t convince herself. The cat seemed so real. ldquo;I canrsquo;t do that.rdquo;

ldquo;Your mother had the talent,rdquo; Hecate said. ldquo;You have even more. As a child of Pluto who has returned from the dead, you understand the veil between worlds better than most. You can control the Mist. If you do nothellip;well, your brother Nico has already warned you. The spirits have whispered to him, told him of your future. When you reach the House of Hades, you will meet a formidable enemy. She cannot be overcome by strength or sword. You alone can defeat her, and you will require magic.rdquo;

Hazelrsquo;s legs felt wobbly. She remembered Nicorsquo;s grim expression, his fingers digging into her arm. You canrsquo;t tell the others. Not yet. Their courage is already stretched to the limit.

ldquo;Who?rdquo; Hazel croaked. ldquo;Who is this enemy?rdquo;

ldquo;I will not speak her name,rdquo; Hecate said. ldquo;That would alert her to your presence before you are ready to face her. Go north, Hazel. As you travel, practice summoning the Mist. When you arrive in Bologna, seek out the two dwarfs. They will lead you to a treasure that may help you survive in the House of Hades.rdquo;

ldquo;I donrsquo;t understand.rdquo;

ldquo;Mew,rdquo; the kitten complained.

ldquo;Yes, yes, Hecuba.rdquo; The goddess flicked her hand again, and the cat disappeared. The black Labrador was back in its place.

ldquo;You will understand, Hazel,rdquo; the goddess promised. ldquo;From time to time, I will send Gale to check on your progress.rdquo;

The polecat hissed, its beady red eyes full of malice.

ldquo;Wonderful,rdquo; Hazel muttered.

ldquo;Before you reach Epirus, you must be prepared,rdquo; Hecate said. ldquo;If you succeed, then perhaps we will meet againhellip;for the final battle.rdquo;

A final battle, Hazel thought. Oh, joy.

Hazel wondered if she could prevent the revelations she saw in the Mistmdash;Leo falling through the sky; Frank stumbling through the dark, alone and gravely wounded; Percy and Annabeth at the mercy of a dark giant.

She hated the godsrsquo; riddles and their unclear advice. She was starting to despise crossroads.

ldquo;Why are you helping me?rdquo; Hazel demanded. ldquo;At Camp Jupiter, they said you sided with the Titans in the last war.rdquo;

Hecatersquo;s dark eyes glinted. ldquo;Because I am a Titanmdash;daughter of Perses and Asteria. Long before the Olympians came to power, I ruled the Mist. Despite this, in the First Titan War, millennia ago, I sided with Zeus against Kronos. I was not blind to Kronosrsquo;s cruelty. I hoped Zeus would prove a better king.rdquo;

She gave a small, bitter laugh. ldquo;When Demeter lost her daughter Persephone, kidnapped by your father, I guided Demeter through the darkest night with my torches, helping her search. And when the giants rose the first time, I again sided with the gods. I fought my archenemy Clytius, made by Gaea to absorb and defeat all my magic.rdquo;

ldquo;Clytius.rdquo; Hazel had never heard that namemdash;Clai-tee-usmdash;but saying it made her limbs feel heavy. She glanced at the images in the northern doorwaymdash;the massive dark shape looming over Percy and Annabeth. ldquo;Is he the threat in the House of Hades?rdquo;

ldquo;Oh, he waits for you there,rdquo; Hecate said. ldquo;But first you must defeat the witch. Unless you manage thathellip;rdquo;

She snapped her fingers, and all of the gateways turned dark. The Mist dissolved, the images gone.

ldquo;We all face choices,rdquo; the goddess said. ldquo;When Kronos arose the second time, I made a mistake. I supported him. I had grown tired of being ignored by the so-called major gods. Despite my years of faithful service, they mistrusted me, refused me a seat in their hallhellip;rdquo;

The polecat Gale chittered angrily.

ldquo;It does not matter anymore.rdquo; The goddess sighed. ldquo;I have made peace again with Olympus. Even now, when they are laid lowmdash;their Greek and Roman personas fighting each othermdash;I will help them. Greek or Roman, I have always been only Hecate. I will assist you against the giants, if you prove yourself worthy. So now it is your choice, Hazel Levesque. Will you trust mehellip;or will you shun me, as the Olympian gods have done too often?rdquo;

Blood roared in Hazelrsquo;s ears. Could she trust this dark goddess, whorsquo;d given her mother the magic that ruined her life? Sorry, no. She didnrsquo;t much like Hecatersquo;s dog or her gassy polecat, either.

But she also knew she couldnrsquo;t let Percy and Annabeth die.

ldquo;Irsquo;ll go north,rdquo; she said. ldquo;Wersquo;ll take your secret pass through the mountains.rdquo;

Hecate nodded, the slightest hint of satisfaction in her face. ldquo;You have chosen well, though the path will not be easy. Many monsters will rise against you. Even some of my own servants have sided with Gaea, hoping to destroy your mortal world.rdquo;

The goddess took her double torches from their stands. ldquo;Prepare yourself, daughter of Pluto. If you succeed against the witch, we will meet again.rdquo;

ldquo;Irsquo;ll succeed,rdquo; Hazel promised. ldquo;And Hecate? Irsquo;m not choosing one of your paths. Irsquo;m making my own.rdquo;

The goddess arched her eyebrows. Her polecat writhed, and her dog snarled.

ldquo;Wersquo;re going to find a way to stop Gaea,rdquo; Hazel said. ldquo;Wersquo;re going to rescue our friends from Tartarus. Wersquo;re going keep the crew and the ship together, and wersquo;re going to stop Camp Jupiter and Camp Half-Blood from going to war. Wersquo;re going to do it all.rdquo;

The storm howled, the black walls of the funnel cloud swirling faster.

ldquo;Interesting,rdquo; Hecate said, as if Hazel were an unexpected result in a science experiment. ldquo;That would be magic worth seeing.rdquo;

A wave of darkness blotted out the world. When Hazelrsquo;s sight returned, the storm, the goddess, and her minions were gone. Hazel stood on the hillside in the morning sunlight, alone in the ruins except for Arion, who paced next to her, nickering impatiently.

ldquo;I agree,rdquo; Hazel told the horse. ldquo;Letrsquo;s get out of here.rdquo;

ldquo;What happened?rdquo; Leo asked as Hazel climbed aboard the Argo II.

Hazelrsquo;s hands still shook from her talk with the goddess. She glanced over the rail and saw the dust of Arionrsquo;s wake stretching across the hills of Italy. She had hoped her friend would stay, but couldnrsquo;t blame him for wanting to get away from this place as fast as possible.

The countryside sparkled as the summer sun hit the morning dew. On the hill, the old ruins stood white and silentmdash;no sign of ancient paths, or goddesses, or farting weasels.

ldquo;Hazel?rdquo; Nico asked.

Her knees buckled. Nico and Leo grabbed her arms and helped her to the steps of the foredeck. She felt embarrassed, collapsing like some fairy-tale damsel, but her energy was gone. The memory of those glowing scenes at the crossroads filled her with dread.

ldquo;I met Hecate,rdquo; she managed.

She didnrsquo;t tell them everything. She remembered what Nico had said: Their courage is already stretched to the limit. But she told them about the secret northern pass through the mountains, and the detour Hecate described that could take them to Epirus.

When she was done, Nico took her hand. His eyes were full of concern. ldquo;Hazel, you met Hecate at a crossroads. Thatrsquo;shellip;thatrsquo;s something many demigods donrsquo;t survive. And the ones who do survive are never the same. Are you sure yoursquo;remdash;rdquo;

ldquo;Irsquo;m fine,rdquo; she insisted.

But she knew she wasnrsquo;t. She remembered how bold and angry shersquo;d felt, telling the goddess shersquo;d find her own path and succeed at everything. Now her boast seemed ridiculous. Her courage had abandoned her.

ldquo;What if Hecate is tricking us?rdquo; Leo asked. ldquo;This route could be a trap.rdquo;

Hazel shook her head. ldquo;If it was a trap, I think Hecate wouldrsquo;ve made the northern route sound tempting. Believe me, she didnrsquo;t.rdquo;

Leo pulled a calculator out of his tool belt and punched in some numbers. ldquo;Thatrsquo;shellip;something like three hundred miles out of our way to get to Venice. Then wersquo;d have to backtrack down the Adriatic. And you said something about baloney dwarfs?rdquo;

ldquo;Dwarfs in Bologna,rdquo; Hazel said. ldquo;I guess Bologna is a city. But why we have to find dwarfs therehellip;I have no idea. Some sort of treasure to help us with the quest.rdquo;

ldquo;Huh,rdquo; Leo said. ldquo;I mean, Irsquo;m all about treasure, butmdash;rdquo;

ldquo;Itrsquo;s our best option.rdquo; Nico helped Hazel to her feet. ldquo;We have to make up for lost time, travel as fast as we can. Percyrsquo;s and Annabethrsquo;s lives might depend on it.rdquo;

ldquo;Fast?rdquo; Leo grinned. ldquo;I can do fast.rdquo;

He hurried to the console and started flipping switches.

Nico took Hazelrsquo;s arm and guided her out of earshot. ldquo;What else did Hecate say? Anything aboutmdash;rdquo;

ldquo;I canrsquo;t.rdquo; Hazel cut him off. The images shersquo;d seen had almost overwhelmed her: Percy and Annabeth helpless at the feet of those black metal doors, the dark giant looming over them, Hazel herself trapped in a glowing maze of light, unable to help.

You must defeat the witch, Hecate had said. You alone can defeat her. Unless you manage thathellip;

The end, Hazel thought. All gateways closed. All hope extinguished.

Nico had warned her. Hersquo;d communed with the dead, heard them whispering hints about their future. Two children of the Underworld would enter the House of Hades. They would face an impossible foe. Only one of them would make it to the Doors of Death.

Hazel couldnrsquo;t meet her brotherrsquo;s eyes.

ldquo;Irsquo;ll tell you later,rdquo; she promised, trying to keep her voice from trembling. ldquo;Right now, we should rest while we can. Tonight, we cross the Apennines.rdquo;

NINE DAYS.

As she fell, Annabeth thought about Hesiod, the old Greek poet whorsquo;d speculated it would take nine days to fall from earth to Tartarus.

She hoped Hesiod was wrong. Shersquo;d lost track of how long she and Percy had been fallingmdash;hours? A day? It felt like an eternity. Theyrsquo;d been holding hands ever since they dropped into the chasm. Now Percy pulled her close, hugging her tight as they tumbled through absolute darkness.

Wind whistled in Annabethrsquo;s ears. The air grew hotter and damper, as if they were plummeting into the throat of a massive dragon. Her recently broken ankle throbbed, though she couldnrsquo;t tell if it was still wrapped in spiderwebs.

That cursed monster Arachne. Despite having been trapped in her own webbing, smashed by a car, and plunged into Tartarus, the spider lady had gotten her revenge. Somehow her silk had entangled Annabethrsquo;s leg and dragged her over the side of the pit, with Percy in tow.

Annabeth couldnrsquo;t imagine that Arachne was still alive, somewhere below them in the darkness. She didnrsquo;t want to meet that monster again when they reached the bottom. On the bright side, assuming there was a bottom, Annabeth and Percy would probably be fla

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The House of Hades
Page 5

Still, this wasnrsquo;t fair. Shersquo;d gone through so much to retrieve that statue of Athena. Just when shersquo;d succeeded, when things had been looking up and shersquo;d been reunited with Percy, they had plunged to their deaths.

Even the gods couldnrsquo;t devise a fate so twisted.

But Gaea wasnrsquo;t like other gods. The Earth Mother was older, more vicious, more bloodthirsty. Annabeth could imagine her laughing as they fell into the depths.

Annabeth pressed her lips to Percyrsquo;s ear. ldquo;I love you.rdquo;

She wasnrsquo;t sure he could hear hermdash;but if they were going to die she wanted those to be her last words.

She tried desperately to think of a plan to save them. She was a daughter of Athena. Shersquo;d proven herself in the tunnels under Rome, beaten a whole series of challenges with only her wits. But she couldnrsquo;t think of any way to reverse or even slow their fall.

Neither of them had the power to flymdash;not like Jason, who could control the wind, or Frank, who could turn into a winged animal. If they reached the bottom at terminal velocityhellip;well, she knew enough science to know it would be terminal.

She was seriously wondering whether they could fashion a parachute out of their shirtsmdash;thatrsquo;s how desperate she wasmdash;when something about their surroundings changed. The darkness took on a gray-red tinge. She realized she could see Percyrsquo;s hair as she hugged him. The whistling in her ears turned into more of a roar. The air became intolerably hot, permeated with a smell like rotten eggs.

Suddenly, the chute theyrsquo;d been falling through opened into a vast cavern. Maybe half a mile below them, Annabeth could see the bottom. For a moment she was too stunned to think properly. The entire island of Manhattan could have fit inside this cavernmdash;and she couldnrsquo;t even see its full extent. Red clouds hung in the air like vaporized blood. The landscapemdash;at least what she could see of itmdash;was rocky black plains, punctuated by jagged mountains and fiery chasms. To Annabethrsquo;s left, the ground dropped off in a series of cliffs, like colossal steps leading deeper into the abyss.

The stench of sulfur made it hard to concentrate, but she focused on the ground directly below them and saw a ribbon of glittering black liquidmdash;a river.

ldquo;Percy!rdquo; she yelled in his ear. ldquo;Water!rdquo;

She gestured frantically. Percyrsquo;s face was hard to read in the dim red light. He looked shell-shocked and terrified, but he nodded as if he understood.

Percy could control watermdash;assuming that was water below them. He might be able to cushion their fall somehow. Of course Annabeth had heard horrible stories about the rivers of the Underworld. They could take away your memories, or burn your body and soul to ashes. But she decided not to think about that. This was their only chance.

The river hurtled toward them. At the last second, Percy yelled defiantly. The water erupted in a massive geyser and swallowed them whole.

THE IMPACT DIDNrsquo;T KILL HER, but the cold nearly did.

Freezing water shocked the air right out of her lungs. Her limbs turned rigid, and she lost her grip on Percy. She began to sink. Strange wailing sounds filled her earsmdash;millions of heartbroken voices, as if the river were made of distilled sadness. The voices were worse than the cold. They weighed her down and made her numb.

Whatrsquo;s the point of struggling? they told her. Yoursquo;re dead anyway. Yoursquo;ll never leave this place.

She could sink to the bottom and drown, let the river carry her body away. That would be easier. She could just close her eyes.hellip;

Percy gripped her hand and jolted her back to reality. She couldnrsquo;t see him in the murky water, but suddenly she didnrsquo;t want to die. Together they kicked upward and broke the surface.

Annabeth gasped, grateful for the air, no matter how sulfurous. The water swirled around them, and she realized Percy was creating a whirlpool to buoy them up.

Though she couldnrsquo;t make out their surroundings, she knew this was a river. Rivers had shores.

ldquo;Land,rdquo; she croaked. ldquo;Go sideways.rdquo;

Percy looked near dead with exhaustion. Usually water reinvigorated him, but not this water. Controlling it must have taken every bit of his strength. The whirlpool began to dissipate. Annabeth hooked one arm around his waist and struggled across the current. The river worked against her: thousands of weeping voices whispering in her ears, getting inside her brain.

Life is despair, they said. Everything is pointless, and then you die.

ldquo;Pointless,rdquo; Percy murmured. His teeth chattered from the cold. He stopped swimming and began to sink.

ldquo;Percy!rdquo; she shrieked. ldquo;The river is messing with your mind. Itrsquo;s the Cocytusmdash;the River of Lamentation. Itrsquo;s made of pure misery!rdquo;

ldquo;Misery,rdquo; he agreed.

ldquo;Fight it!rdquo;

She kicked and struggled, trying to keep both of them afloat. Another cosmic joke for Gaea to laugh at: Annabeth dies trying to keep her boyfriend, the son of Poseidon, from drowning.

Not going to happen, you hag, Annabeth thought.

She hugged Percy tighter and kissed him. ldquo;Tell me about New Rome,rdquo; she demanded. ldquo;What were your plans for us?rdquo;

ldquo;New Romehellip;For ushellip;rdquo;

ldquo;Yeah, Seaweed Brain. You said we could have a future there! Tell me!rdquo;

Annabeth had never wanted to leave Camp Half-Blood. It was the only real home shersquo;d ever known. But days ago, on the Argo II, Percy had told her that he imagined a future for the two of them among the Roman demigods. In their city of New Rome, veterans of the legion could settle down safely, go to college, get married, even have kids.

ldquo;Architecture,rdquo; Percy murmured. The fog started to clear from his eyes. ldquo;Thought yoursquo;d like the houses, the parks. Therersquo;s one street with all these cool fountains.rdquo;

Annabeth started making progress against the current. Her limbs felt like bags of wet sand, but Percy was helping her now. She could see the dark line of the shore about a stonersquo;s throw away.

ldquo;College,rdquo; she gasped. ldquo;Could we go there together?rdquo;

ldquo;Y-yeah,rdquo; he agreed, a little more confidently.

ldquo;What would you study, Percy?rdquo;

ldquo;Dunno,rdquo; he admitted.

ldquo;Marine science,rdquo; she suggested. ldquo;Oceanography?rdquo;

ldquo;Surfing?rdquo; he asked.

She laughed, and the sound sent a shock wave through the water. The wailing faded to background noise. Annabeth wondered if anyone had ever laughed in Tartarus beforemdash;just a pure, simple laugh of pleasure. She doubted it.

She used the last of her strength to reach the riverbank. Her feet dug into the sandy bottom. She and Percy hauled themselves ashore, shivering and gasping, and collapsed on the dark sand.

Annabeth wanted to curl up next to Percy and go to sleep. She wanted to shut her eyes, hope all of this was just a bad dream, and wake up to find herself back on the Argo II, safe with her friends (wellhellip;as safe as a demigod can ever be).

But, no. They were really in Tartarus. At their feet, the River Cocytus roared past, a flood of liquid wretchedness. The sulfurous air stung Annabethrsquo;s lungs and prickled her skin. When she looked at her arms, she saw they were already covered with an angry rash. She tried to sit up and gasped in pain.

The beach wasnrsquo;t sand. They were sitting on a field of jagged black-glass chips, some of which were now embedded in Annabethrsquo;s palms.

So the air was acid. The water was misery. The ground was broken glass. Everything here was designed to hurt and kill. Annabeth took a rattling breath and wondered if the voices in the Cocytus were right. Maybe fighting for survival was pointless. They would be dead within the hour.

Next to her, Percy coughed. ldquo;This place smells like my ex-stepfather.rdquo;

Annabeth managed a weak smile. Shersquo;d never met Smelly Gabe, but shersquo;d heard enough stories. She loved Percy for trying to lift her spirits.

If shersquo;d fallen into Tartarus by herself, Annabeth thought, she would have been doomed. After all shersquo;d been through beneath Rome, finding the Athena Parthenos, this was simply too much. She wouldrsquo;ve curled up and cried until she became another ghost, melting into the Cocytus.

But she wasnrsquo;t alone. She had Percy. And that meant she couldnrsquo;t give up.

She forced herself to take stock. Her foot was still wrapped in its makeshift cast of board and Bubble Wrap, still tangled in cobwebs. But when she moved it, it didnrsquo;t hurt. The ambrosia shersquo;d eaten in the tunnels under Rome must have finally mended her bones.

Her backpack was gonemdash;lost during the fall, or maybe washed away in the river. She hated losing Daedalusrsquo;s laptop, with all its fantastic programs and data, but she had worse problems. Her Celestial bronze dagger was missingmdash;the weapon shersquo;d carried since she was seven years old.

The realization almost broke her, but she couldnrsquo;t let herself dwell on it. Time to grieve later. What else did they have?

No food, no waterhellip;basically no supplies at all.

Yep. Off to a promising start.

Annabeth glanced at Percy. He looked pretty bad. His dark hair was plastered across his forehead, his T-shirt ripped to shreds. His fingers were scraped raw from holding on to that ledge before they fell. Most worrisome of all, he was shivering and his lips were blue.

ldquo;We should keep moving or wersquo;ll get hypothermia,rdquo; Annabeth said. ldquo;Can you stand?rdquo;

He nodded. They both struggled to their feet.

Annabeth put her arm around his waist, though she wasnrsquo;t sure who was supporting whom. She scanned their surroundings. Above, she saw no sign of the tunnel theyrsquo;d fallen down. She couldnrsquo;t even see the cavern roofmdash;just blood-colored clouds floating in the hazy gray air. It was like staring through a thin mix of tomato soup and cement.

The black-glass beach stretched inland about fifty yards, then dropped off the edge of a cliff. From where she stood, Annabeth couldnrsquo;t see what was below, but the edge flickered with red light as if illuminated by huge fires.

A distant memory tugged at hermdash;something about Tartarus and fire. Before she could think too much about it, Percy inhaled sharply.

ldquo;Look.rdquo; He pointed downstream.

A hundred feet away, a familiar-looking baby-blue Italian car had crashed headfirst into the sand. It looked just like the Fiat that had smashed into Arachne and sent her plummeting into the pit.

Annabeth hoped she was wrong, but how many Italian sports cars could there be in Tartarus? Part of her didnrsquo;t want to go anywhere near it, but she had to find out. She gripped Percyrsquo;s hand, and they stumbled toward the wreckage. One of the carrsquo;s tires had come off and was floating in a backwater eddy of the Cocytus. The Fiatrsquo;s windows had shattered, sending brighter glass like frosting across the dark beach. Under the crushed hood lay the tattered, glistening remains of a giant silk cocoonmdash;the trap that Annabeth had tricked Arachne into weaving. It was unmistakably empty. Slash marks in the sand made a trail downriver

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The House of Hades
Page 6

He gave Annabeth an embarrassed look, as if realizing he wasnrsquo;t helping team morale. ldquo;Or maybe shersquo;s badly wounded, and she crawled away to die.rdquo;

ldquo;Letrsquo;s go with that,rdquo; Annabeth agreed.

Percy was still shivering. Annabeth wasnrsquo;t feeling any warmer either, despite the hot, sticky air. The glass cuts on her hands were still bleeding, which was unusual for her. Normally, she healed fast. Her breathing got more and more labored.

ldquo;This place is killing us,rdquo; she said. ldquo;I mean, itrsquo;s literally going to kill us, unlesshellip;rdquo;

Tartarus. Fire. That distant memory came into focus. She gazed inland toward the cliff, illuminated by flames from below.

It was an absolutely crazy idea. But it might be their only chance.

ldquo;Unless what?rdquo; Percy prompted. ldquo;Yoursquo;ve got a brilliant plan, havenrsquo;t you?rdquo;

ldquo;Itrsquo;s a plan,rdquo; Annabeth murmured. ldquo;I donrsquo;t know about brilliant. We need to find the River of Fire.rdquo;

WHEN THEY REACHED THE LEDGE, Annabeth was sure shersquo;d signed their death warrants.

The cliff dropped more than eighty feet. At the bottom stretched a nightmarish version of the Grand Canyon: a river of fire cutting a path through a jagged obsidian crevasse, the glowing red current casting horrible shadows across the cliff faces.

Even from the top of the canyon, the heat was intense. The chill of the River Cocytus hadnrsquo;t left Annabethrsquo;s bones, but now her face felt raw and sunburned. Every breath took more effort, as if her chest was filled with Styrofoam peanuts. The cuts on her hands bled more rather than less. Annabethrsquo;s foot, which had been almost healed, seemed to be reinjuring itself. Shersquo;d taken off her makeshift cast, but now she regretted it. Each step made her wince.

Assuming they could make it down to the fiery river, which she doubted, her plan seemed certifiably insane.

ldquo;Uhhellip;rdquo; Percy examined the cliff. He pointed to a tiny fissure running diagonally from the edge to the bottom. ldquo;We can try that ledge there. Might be able to climb down.rdquo;

He didnrsquo;t say theyrsquo;d be crazy to try. He managed to sound hopeful. Annabeth was grateful for that, but she also worried that she was leading him to his doom.

Of course if they stayed here, they would die anyway. Blisters had started to form on their arms from exposure to the Tartarus air. The whole environment was about as healthy as a nuclear blast zone.

Percy went first. The ledge was barely wide enough to allow a toehold. Their hands clawed for any ***** in the glassy rock. Every time Annabeth put pressure on her bad foot, she wanted to yelp. Shersquo;d ripped off the sleeves of her T-shirt and used the cloth to wrap her bloody palms, but her fingers were still slippery and weak.

A few steps below her, Percy grunted as he reached for another handhold. ldquo;Sohellip;what is this fire river called?rdquo;

ldquo;The Phlegethon,rdquo; she said. ldquo;You should concentrate on going down.rdquo;

ldquo;The Phlegethon?rdquo; He shinnied along the ledge. Theyrsquo;d made it roughly a third of the way down the cliffmdash;still high enough up to die if they fell. ldquo;Sounds like a marathon for hawking spitballs.rdquo;

ldquo;Please donrsquo;t make me laugh,rdquo; she said.

ldquo;Just trying to keep things light.rdquo;

ldquo;Thanks,rdquo; she grunted, nearly missing the ledge with her bad foot. ldquo;Irsquo;ll have a smile on my face as I plummet to my death.rdquo;

They kept going, one step at a time. Annabethrsquo;s eyes stung with sweat. Her arms trembled. But to her amazement, they finally made it to the bottom of the cliff.

When she reached the ground, she stumbled. Percy caught her. She was alarmed by how feverish his skin felt. Red boils had erupted on his face, so he looked like a smallpox victim.

Her own vision was blurry. Her throat felt blistered, and her stomach was clenched tighter than a fist.

We have to hurry, she thought.

ldquo;Just to the river,rdquo; she told Percy, trying to keep the panic out of her voice. ldquo;We can do this.rdquo;

They staggered over slick glass ledges, around massive boulders, avoiding stalagmites that wouldrsquo;ve impaled them with any slip of the foot. Their tattered clothes steamed from the heat of the river, but they kept going until they crumpled to their knees at the banks of the Phlegethon.

ldquo;We have to drink,rdquo; Annabeth said.

Percy swayed, his eyes half-closed. It took him a three-count to respond. ldquo;Uhhellip;drink fire?rdquo;

ldquo;The Phlegethon flows from Hadesrsquo;s realm down into Tartarus.rdquo; Annabeth could barely talk. Her throat was closing up from the heat and the acidic air. ldquo;The river is used to punish the wicked. But alsohellip;some legends call it the River of Healing.rdquo;

ldquo;Some legends?rdquo;

Annabeth swallowed, trying to stay conscious. ldquo;The Phlegethon keeps the wicked in one piece so that they can endure the torments of the Fields of Punishment. I thinkhellip;it might be the Underworld equivalent of ambrosia and nectar.rdquo;

Percy winced as cinders sprayed from the river, curling around his face. ldquo;But itrsquo;s fire. How can wemdash;rdquo;

ldquo;Like this.rdquo; Annabeth thrust her hands into the river.

Stupid? Yes, but she was convinced they had no choice. If they waited any longer, they would pass out and die. Better to try something foolish and hope it worked.

On first contact, the fire wasnrsquo;t painful. It felt cold, which probably meant it was so hot it was overloading Annabethrsquo;s nerves. Before she could change her mind, she cupped the fiery liquid in her palms and raised it to her mouth.

She expected a taste like gasoline. It was so much worse. Once, at a restaurant back in San Francisco, shersquo;d made the mistake of tasting a ghost chili pepper that came with a plate of Indian food. After barely nibbling it, she thought her respiratory system was going to implode. Drinking from the Phlegethon was like gulping down a ghost chili smoothie. Her sinuses filled with liquid flame. Her mouth felt like it was being deep-fried. Her eyes shed boiling tears, and every pore on her face popped. She collapsed, gagging and retching, her whole body shaking violently.

ldquo;Annabeth!rdquo; Percy grabbed her arms and just managed to stop her from rolling into the river.

The convulsions passed. She took a ragged breath and managed to sit up. She felt horribly weak and nauseous, but her next breath came more easily. The blisters on her arms were starting to fade.

ldquo;It worked,rdquo; she croaked. ldquo;Percy, yoursquo;ve got to drink.rdquo;

ldquo;Ihellip;rdquo; His eyes rolled up in his head, and he slumped against her.

Desperately, she cupped more fire in her palm. Ignoring the pain, she dripped the liquid into Percyrsquo;s mouth. He didnrsquo;t respond.

She tried again, pouring a whole handful down his throat. This time he spluttered and coughed. Annabeth held him as he trembled, the magical fire coursing through his system. His fever disappeared. His boils faded. He managed to sit up and smack his lips.

ldquo;Ugh,rdquo; he said. ldquo;Spicy, yet disgusting.rdquo;

Annabeth laughed weakly. She was so relieved, she felt light-headed. ldquo;Yeah. That pretty much sums it up.rdquo;

ldquo;You saved us.rdquo;

ldquo;For now,rdquo; she said. ldquo;The problem is, wersquo;re still in Tartarus.rdquo;

Percy blinked. He looked around as if just coming to terms with where they were. ldquo;Holy Hera. I never thoughthellip;well, Irsquo;m not sure what I thought. Maybe that Tartarus was empty space, a pit with no bottom. But this is a real place.rdquo;

Annabeth recalled the landscape shersquo;d seen while they fellmdash;a series of plateaus leading ever downward into the gloom.

ldquo;We havenrsquo;t seen all of it,rdquo; she warned. ldquo;This could be just the first tiny part of the abyss, like the front steps.rdquo;

ldquo;The welcome mat,rdquo; Percy muttered.

They both gazed up at the blood-colored clouds swirling in the gray haze. No way would they have the strength to climb back up that cliff, even if they wanted to. Now there were only two choices: downriver or upriver, skirting the banks of the Phlegethon.

ldquo;Wersquo;ll find a way out,rdquo; Percy said. ldquo;The Doors of Death.rdquo;

Annabeth shuddered. She remembered what Percy had said just before they fell into Tartarus. Hersquo;d made Nico di Angelo promise to lead the Argo II to Epirus, to the mortal side of the Doors of Death.

Wersquo;ll see you there, Percy had said.

That idea seemed even crazier than drinking fire. How could the two of them wander through Tartarus and find the Doors of Death? Theyrsquo;d barely been able to stumble a hundred yards in this poisonous place without dying.

ldquo;We have to,rdquo; Percy said. ldquo;Not just for us. For everybody we love. The Doors have to be closed on both sides, or the monsters will just keep coming through. Gaearsquo;s forces will overrun the world.rdquo;

Annabeth knew he was right. Stillhellip;when she tried to imagine a plan that could succeed, the logistics overwhelmed her. They had no way of locating the Doors. They didnrsquo;t know how much time it would take, or even if time flowed at the same speed in Tartarus. How could they possibly synchronize a meeting with their friends? And Nico had mentioned a legion of Gaearsquo;s strongest monsters guarding the Doors on the Tartarus side. Annabeth and Percy couldnrsquo;t exactly launch a frontal assault.

She decided not to mention any of that. They both knew the odds were bad. Besides, after swimming in the River Cocytus, Annabeth had heard enough whining and moaning to last a lifetime. She promised herself never to complain again.

ldquo;Well.rdquo; She took a deep breath, grateful at least that her lungs didnrsquo;t hurt. ldquo;If we stay close to the river, wersquo;ll have a way to heal ourselves. If we go downstreammdash;rdquo;

It happened so fast, Annabeth would have been dead if shersquo;d been on her own.

Percyrsquo;s eyes locked on something behind her. Annabeth spun as a massive dark shape hurtled down at hermdash;a snarling, monstrous blob with spindly barbed legs and glinting eyes.

She had time to think: Arachne. But she was frozen in terror, her senses smothered by the sickly sweet smell.

Then she heard the familiar SHINK of Percyrsquo;s ballpoint pen transforming into a sword. His blade swept over her head in a glowing bronze arc. A horrible wail echoed through the canyon.

Annabeth stood there, stunned, as yellow dustmdash;the remains of Arachnemdash;rained around her like tree pollen.

ldquo;You okay?rdquo; Percy scanned the cliffs and boulders, alert for more monsters, but nothing else appeared. The golden dust of the spider settled on the obsidian rocks.

Annabeth stared at her boyfriend in amazement. Riptidersquo;s Celestial bronze blade glowed even brighter in the gloom of Tartarus. As it passed through the thick hot air, it made a defiant hiss like a riled snake.

ldquo;Shehellip;she wouldrsquo;ve killed me,rdquo; Annabeth stammered.

Percy kicked the dust on the rocks, his expression grim and dissatisfied. ldquo;She died too easily, considering how much torture she put you through. She deserved worse.rdqu

books4u · 7 Tháng tư 2015

The House of Hades
Page 7

Annabeth nodded, still in a daze. The yellow dust dissipated on the rocky shore, turning to steam. At least now they knew monsters could be killed in Tartarushellip;though she had no idea how long Arachne would remain dead. Annabeth didnrsquo;t plan on staying long enough to find out.

ldquo;Yeah, downstream,rdquo; she managed. ldquo;If the river comes from the upper levels of the Underworld, it should flow deeper into Tartarusmdash;rdquo;

ldquo;So it leads into more dangerous territory,rdquo; Percy finished. ldquo;Which is probably where the Doors are. Lucky us.rdquo;

THEYrsquo;D ONLY TRAVELED a few hundred yards when Annabeth heard voices.

Annabeth plodded along, half in a stupor, trying to form a plan. Since she was a daughter of Athena, plans were supposed to be her specialty; but it was hard to strategize with her stomach growling and her throat baking. The fiery water of the Phlegethon may have healed her and given her strength, but it didnrsquo;t do anything for her hunger or thirst. The river wasnrsquo;t about making you feel good, Annabeth guessed. It just kept you going so you could experience more excruciating pain.

Her head started to droop with exhaustion. Then she heard themmdash;female voices having some sort of argumentmdash;and she was instantly alert.

She whispered, ldquo;Percy, down!rdquo;

She pulled him behind the nearest boulder, wedging herself so close against the riverbank that her shoes almost touched the riverrsquo;s fire. On the other side, in the narrow path between the river and the cliffs, voices snarled, getting louder as they approached from upstream.

Annabeth tried to steady her breathing. The voices sounded vaguely human, but that meant nothing. She assumed anything in Tartarus was their enemy. She didnrsquo;t know how the monsters could have failed to spot them already. Besides, monsters could smell demigodsmdash;especially powerful ones like Percy, son of Poseidon. Annabeth doubted that hiding behind a boulder would do any good when the monsters caught their scent.

Still, as the monsters got nearer, their voices didnrsquo;t change in tone. Their uneven footstepsmdash;scrap, clump, scrap, clumpmdash;didnrsquo;t get any faster.

ldquo;Soon?rdquo; one of them asked in a raspy voice, as if shersquo;d been gargling in the Phlegethon.

ldquo;Oh my gods!rdquo; said another voice. This one sounded much younger and much more human, like a teenaged mortal girl getting exasperated with her friends at the mall. For some reason, she sounded familiar to Annabeth. ldquo;You guys are totally annoying! I told you, itrsquo;s like three days from here.rdquo;

Percy gripped Annabethrsquo;s wrist. He looked at her with alarm, as if he recognized the mall girlrsquo;s voice too.

There was a chorus of growling and grumbling. The creaturesmdash;maybe half a dozen, Annabeth guessedmdash;had paused just on the other side of the boulder, but still they gave no indication that theyrsquo;d caught the demigodsrsquo; scent. Annabeth wondered if demigods didnrsquo;t smell the same in Tartarus, or if the other scents here were so powerful, they masked a demigodrsquo;s aura.

ldquo;I wonder,rdquo; said a third voice, gravelly and ancient like the first, ldquo;if perhaps you do not know the way, young one.rdquo;

ldquo;Oh, shut your fang hole, Serephone,rdquo; said the mall girl. ldquo;Whenrsquo;s the last time you escaped to the mortal world? I was there a couple of years ago. I know the way! Besides, I understand what wersquo;re facing up there. You donrsquo;t have a clue!rdquo;

ldquo;The Earth Mother did not make you boss!rdquo; shrieked a fourth voice.

More hissing, scuffling, and feral moansmdash;like giant alley cats fighting. At last the one called Serephone yelled, ldquo;Enough!rdquo;

The scuffling died down.

ldquo;We will follow for now,rdquo; Serephone said. ldquo;But if you do not lead us well, if we find you have lied about the summons of Gaeamdash;rdquo;

ldquo;I donrsquo;t lie!rdquo; snapped the mall girl. ldquo;Believe me, Irsquo;ve got good reason to get into this battle. I have some enemies to devour, and yoursquo;ll feast on the blood of heroes. Just leave one special morsel for memdash;the one named Percy Jackson.rdquo;

Annabeth fought down a snarl of her own. She forgot about her fear. She wanted to jump over the boulder and slash the monsters to dust with her knifehellip;except she didnrsquo;t have it anymore.

ldquo;Believe me,rdquo; said the mall girl. ldquo;Gaea has called us, and wersquo;re going to have so much fun. Before this war is over, mortals and demigods will tremble at the sound of my namemdash;Kelli!rdquo;

Annabeth almost yelped aloud. She glanced at Percy. Even in the red light of the Phlegethon, his face seemed waxy.

Empousai, she mouthed. Vampires.

Percy nodded grimly.

She remembered Kelli. Two years ago, at Percyrsquo;s freshman orientation, he and their friend Rachel Dare had been attacked by empousai disguised as cheerleaders. One of them had been Kelli. Later, the same empousa had attacked them in Daedalusrsquo;s workshop. Annabeth had stabbed her in the back and sent herhellip;here. To Tartarus.

The creatures shuffled off, their voices getting fainter. Annabeth crept to the edge of the boulder and risked a glimpse. Sure enough, five women staggered along on mismatched legsmdash;mechanical bronze on the left, shaggy and cloven-hooved on the right. Their hair was made of fire, their skin as white as bone. Most of them wore tattered Ancient Greek dresses, except for the one in the lead, Kelli, who wore a burned and torn blouse with a short pleated skirthellip;her cheerleaderrsquo;s outfit.

Annabeth gritted her teeth. She had faced a lot of bad monsters over the years, but she hated empousai more than most.

In addition to their nasty claws and fangs, they had a powerful ability to manipulate the Mist. They could change shape and charmspeak, tricking mortals into letting down their guard. Men were especially susceptible. The empousarsquo;s favorite tactic was to make a guy fall in love with her, then drink his blood and devour his flesh. Not a great first date.

Kelli had almost killed Percy. She had manipulated Annabethrsquo;s oldest friend, Luke, urging him to commit darker and darker deeds in the name of Kronos.

Annabeth really wished she still had her dagger.

Percy rose. ldquo;Theyrsquo;re heading for the Doors of Death,rdquo; he murmured. ldquo;You know what that means?rdquo;

Annabeth didnrsquo;t want to think about it, but sadly, this squad of flesh-eating horror-show women might be the closest thing to good luck they were going to get in Tartarus.

ldquo;Yeah,rdquo; she said. ldquo;We need to follow them.rdquo;

LEO SPENT THE NIGHT WRESTLING with a forty-foot-tall Athena.

Ever since theyrsquo;d brought the statue aboard, Leo had been obsessed with figuring out how it worked. He was sure it had primo powers. There had to be a secret switch or a pressure plate or something.

He was supposed to be sleeping, but he just couldnrsquo;t. He spent hours crawling over the statue, which took up most of the lower deck. Athenarsquo;s feet stuck into sick bay, so you had to squeeze past her ivory toes if you wanted some Advil. Her body ran the length of the port corridor, her outstretched hand jutting into the engine room, offering the life-sized figure of Nike that stood in her palm, like, Here, have some Victory! Athenarsquo;s serene face took up most of the aft pegasus stables, which were fortunately unoccupied. If Leo were a magic horse, he wouldnrsquo;t have wanted to live in a stall with an oversized goddess of wisdom staring at him.

The statue was wedged tight in the corridor, so Leo had to climb over the top and wriggle under her limbs, searching for levers and buttons.

As usual, he found nothing.

Hersquo;d done some research on the statue. He knew it was made from a hollow wooden frame covered in ivory and gold, which explained why it was so light. It was in pretty good shape, considering it was more than two thousand years old, had been pillaged from Athens, toted to Rome, and secretly stored in a spiderrsquo;s cavern for most of the past two millennia. Magic mustrsquo;ve kept it intact, Leo figured, combined with really good craftsmanship.

Annabeth had saidhellip;well, he tried not to think about Annabeth. He still felt guilty about her and Percy falling into Tartarus. Leo knew it was his fault. He should have gotten everyone safely on board the Argo II before he started securing the statue. He should have realized the cavern floor was unstable.

Still, moping around wasnrsquo;t going to get Percy and Annabeth back. He had to concentrate on fixing the problems he could fix.

Anyway, Annabeth had said the statue was the key to defeating Gaea. It could heal the rift between Greek and Roman demigods. Leo figured there had to be more to it than just symbolism. Maybe Athenarsquo;s eyes shot lasers, or the snake behind her shield could spit poison. Or maybe the smaller figure of Nike came to life and busted out some ninja moves.

Leo could think of all kinds of fun things the statue might do if he had designed it, but the more he examined it, the more frustrated he got. The Athena Parthenos radiated magic. Even he could feel that. But it didnrsquo;t seem to do anything except look impressive.

The ship careened to one side, taking evasive maneuvers. Leo resisted the urge to run to the helm. Jason, Piper, and Frank were on duty with Hazel now. They could handle whatever was going on. Besides, Hazel had insisted on taking the wheel to guide them through the secret pass that the magic goddess had told her about.

Leo hoped Hazel was right about the long detour north. He didnrsquo;t trust this Hecate lady. He didnrsquo;t see why such a creepy goddess would suddenly decide to be helpful.

Of course, he didnrsquo;t trust magic in general. Thatrsquo;s why he was having so much trouble with the Athena Parthenos. It had no moving parts. Whatever it did, it apparently operated on pure sorceryhellip;and Leo didnrsquo;t appreciate that. He wanted it to make sense, like a machine.

Finally he got too exhausted to think straight. He curled up with a blanket in the engine room and listened to the soothing hum of the generators. Buford the mechanical table sat in the corner on sleep mode, making little steamy snores: Shhh, pfft, shh, pfft.

Leo liked his quarters okay, but he felt safest here in the heart of the shipmdash;in a room filled with mechanisms he knew how to control. Besides, maybe if he spent more time close to the Athena Parthenos, he would eventually soak in its secrets.

ldquo;Itrsquo;s you or me, Big Lady,rdquo; he murmured as he pulled the blanket up to his chin. ldquo;Yoursquo;re gonna cooperate eventually.rdquo;

He closed his eyes and slept. Unfortunately, that meant dreams.

He was running for his life through his motherrsquo;s old workshop, where shersquo;d died in a fire when Leo was eight.

He wasnrsquo;t sure what was chasing him, but he sensed it closing fastmdash;something large and dark and full of hate.

He stumbled into workbenches, knocked over toolboxes, and tripped on electrical cords. He spotted the exit and sprinted toward it, but a figure loomed in front of himmdash;a woman in robes of dry swirling earth, her face covered in a veil of dust.

Where are you going, little hero? Gaea asked. Stay, and meet my favorit

books4u · 7 Tháng tư 2015

The House of Hades
Page 8

Leorsquo;s hands burst into flame. He blasted the giant, but the darkness consumed his fire. Leo reached for his tool belt. The pockets were sewn shut. He tried to speakmdash;to say anything that would save his lifemdash;but he couldnrsquo;t make a sound, as if the air had been stolen from his lungs.

My son will not allow any fires tonight, Gaea said from the depths of the warehouse. He is the void that consumes all magic, the cold that consumes all fire, the silence that consumes all speech.

Leo wanted to shout: And Irsquo;m the dude thatrsquo;s all out of here!

His voice didnrsquo;t work, so he used his feet. He dashed to the right, ducking under the shadowy giantrsquo;s grasping hands, and burst through the nearest doorway.

Suddenly, he found himself at Camp Half-Blood, except the camp was in ruins. The cabins were charred husks. Burned fields smoldered in the moonlight. The dining pavilion had collapsed into a pile of white rubble, and the Big House was on fire, its windows glowing like demon eyes.

Leo kept running, sure the shadow giant was still behind him.

He wove around the bodies of Greek and Roman demigods. He wanted to check if they were alive. He wanted to help them. But somehow he knew he was running out of time.

He jogged toward the only living people he sawmdash;a group of Romans standing at the volleyball pit. Two centurions leaned casually on their javelins, chatting with a tall skinny blond guy in a purple toga. Leo stumbled. It was that freak Octavian, the augur from Camp Jupiter, who was always screaming for war.

Octavian turned to face him, but he seemed to be in a trance. His features were slack, his eyes closed. When he spoke, it was in Gaearsquo;s voice: This cannot be prevented. The Romans move east from New York. They advance on your camp, and nothing can slow them down.

Leo was tempted to punch Octavian in the face. Instead he kept running.

He climbed Half-Blood Hill. At the summit, lightning had splintered the giant pine tree.

He faltered to a stop. The back of the hill was shorn away. Beyond it, the entire world was gone. Leo saw nothing but clouds far belowmdash;a rolling silver carpet under the dark sky.

A sharp voice said, ldquo;Well?rdquo;

Leo flinched.

At the shattered pine tree, a woman knelt at a cave entrance that had cracked open between the treersquo;s roots.

The woman wasnrsquo;t Gaea. She looked more like a living Athena Parthenos, with the same golden robes and bare ivory arms. When she rose, Leo almost stumbled off the edge of the world.

Her face was regally beautiful, with high cheekbones, large dark eyes, and braided licorice-colored hair piled in a fancy Greek hairdo, set with a spiral of emeralds and diamonds so that it reminded Leo of a Christmas tree. Her expression radiated pure hatred. Her lip curled. Her nose wrinkled.

ldquo;The tinkerer godrsquo;s child,rdquo; she sneered. ldquo;You are no threat, but I suppose my vengeance must start somewhere. Make your choice.rdquo;

Leo tried to speak, but he was about to crawl out of his skin with panic. Between this hate queen and the giant chasing him, he had no idea what to do.

ldquo;Hersquo;ll be here soon,rdquo; the woman warned. ldquo;My dark friend will not give you the luxury of a choice. Itrsquo;s the cliff or the cave, boy!rdquo;

Suddenly Leo understood what she meant. He was cornered. He could jump off the cliff, but that was suicide. Even if there was land under those clouds, he would die in the fall, or maybe he would just keep falling forever.

But the cavehellip; He stared at the dark opening between the tree roots. It smelled of rot and death. He heard bodies shuffling inside, voices whispering in the shadows.

The cave was the home of the dead. If he went down there, he would never come back.

ldquo;Yes,rdquo; the woman said. Around her neck hung a strange bronze-and-emerald pendant, like a circular labyrinth. Her eyes were so angry, Leo finally understood why mad was a word for crazy. This lady had been driven nuts by hatred. ldquo;The House of Hades awaits. You will be the first puny rodent to die in my maze. You have only one chance to escape, Leo Valdez. Take it.rdquo;

She gestured toward the cliff.

ldquo;Yoursquo;re bonkers,rdquo; he managed.

That was the wrong thing to say. She seized his wrist. ldquo;Perhaps I should kill you now, before my dark friend arrives?rdquo;

Steps shook the hillside. The giant was coming, wrapped in shadows, huge and heavy and bent on murder.

ldquo;Have you heard of dying in a dream, boy?rdquo; the woman asked. ldquo;It is possible, at the hands of a sorceress!rdquo;

Leorsquo;s arm started to smoke. The womanrsquo;s touch was acid. He tried to free himself, but her grip was like steel.

He opened his mouth to scream. The massive shape of the giant loomed over him, obscured by layers of black smoke.

The giant raised his fist, and a voice cut through the dream.

ldquo;Leo!rdquo; Jason was shaking his shoulder. ldquo;Hey, man, why are you hugging Nike?rdquo;

Leorsquo;s eyes fluttered open. His arms were wrapped around the human-sized statue in Athenarsquo;s hand. He must have been thrashing in his sleep. He clung to the victory goddess like he used to cling to his pillow when he had nightmares as a kid. (Man, that had been so embarrassing in the foster homes.)

He disentangled himself and sat up, rubbing his face.

ldquo;Nothing,rdquo; he muttered. ldquo;We were just cuddling. Um, whatrsquo;s going on?rdquo;

Jason didnrsquo;t tease him. Thatrsquo;s one thing Leo appreciated about his friend. Jasonrsquo;s ice-blue eyes were level and serious. The little scar on his mouth twitched like it always did when he had bad news to share.

ldquo;We made it through the mountains,rdquo; he said. ldquo;Wersquo;re almost to Bologna. You should join us in the mess hall. Nico has new information.rdquo;

LEO HAD DESIGNED the mess hallrsquo;s walls to show real-time scenes from Camp Half-Blood. At first he had thought that was a pretty awesome idea. Now he wasnrsquo;t so sure.

The scenes from back homemdash;the campfire sing-alongs, dinners at the pavilion, volleyball games outside the Big Housemdash;just seemed to make his friends sad. The farther they got from Long Island, the worse it got. The time zones kept changing, making Leo feel the distance every time he looked at the walls. Here in Italy the sun had just come up. Back at Camp Half-Blood it was the middle of the night. Torches sputtered at the cabin doorways. Moonlight glittered on the waves of Long Island Sound. The beach was covered in footprints, as if a big crowd had just left.

With a start, Leo realized that yesterdaymdash;last night, whatevermdash;had been the Fourth of July. Theyrsquo;d missed Camp Half-Bloodrsquo;s annual party at the beach with awesome fireworks prepared by Leorsquo;s siblings in Cabin Nine.

He decided not to mention that to the crew, but he hoped their buddies back home had had a good celebration. They needed something to keep their spirits up, too.

He remembered the images hersquo;d seen in his dreammdash;the camp in ruins, littered with bodies; Octavian standing at the volleyball pit, casually talking in Gaearsquo;s voice.

He stared down at his eggs and bacon. He wished he could turn off the wall videos.

ldquo;So,rdquo; Jason said, ldquo;now that wersquo;re herehellip;rdquo;

He sat at the head of the table, kind of by default. Since theyrsquo;d lost Annabeth, Jason had done his best to act as the grouprsquo;s leader. Having been praetor back at Camp Jupiter, he was probably used to that; but Leo could tell his friend was stressed. His eyes were more sunken than usual. His blond hair was uncharacteristically messy, like hersquo;d forgotten to comb it.

Leo glanced at the others around the table. Hazel was bleary-eyed, too, but of course shersquo;d been up all night guiding the ship through the mountains. Her curly cinnamon-colored hair was tied back in a bandana, which gave her a commando look that Leo found kind of hotmdash;and then immediately felt guilty about.

Next to her sat her boyfriend Frank Zhang, dressed in black workout pants and a Roman tourist T-shirt that said CIAO! (was that even a word?). Frankrsquo;s old centurion badge was pinned to his shirt, despite the fact that the demigods of the Argo II were now Public Enemies Numbers 1 through 7 back at Camp Jupiter. His grim expression just reinforced his unfortunate resemblance to a sumo wrestler. Then there was Hazelrsquo;s half brother, Nico di Angelo. Dang, that kid gave Leo the freaky-deakies. He sat back in his leather aviator jacket, his black T-shirt and jeans, that wicked silver skull ring on his finger, and the Stygian sword at his side. His tufts of black hair stuck up in curls like baby bat wings. His eyes were sad and kind of empty, as if hersquo;d stared into the depths of Tartarusmdash;which he had.

The only absent demigod was Piper, who was taking her turn at the helm with Coach Hedge, their satyr chaperone.

Leo wished Piper were here. She had a way of calming things down with that Aphrodite charm of hers. After his dreams last night, Leo could use some calm.

On the other hand, it was probably good she was above deck chaperoning their chaperone. Now that they were in the ancient lands, they had to be constantly on guard. Leo was nervous about letting Coach Hedge fly solo. The satyr was a little trigger-happy, and the helm had plenty of bright, dangerous buttons that could cause the picturesque Italian villages below them to go BOOM!

Leo had zoned out so totally he didnrsquo;t realize Jason was still talking.

ldquo;mdash;the House of Hades,rdquo; he was saying. ldquo;Nico?rdquo;

Nico sat forward. ldquo;I communed with the dead last night.rdquo;

He just tossed that line out there, like he was saying he got a text from a buddy.

ldquo;I was able to learn more about what wersquo;ll face,rdquo; Nico continued. ldquo;In ancient times, the House of Hades was a major site for Greek pilgrims. They would come to speak with the dead and honor their ancestors.rdquo;

Leo frowned. ldquo;Sounds like Día de los Muertos. My Aunt Rosa took that stuff seriously.rdquo;

He remembered being dragged by her to the local cemetery in Houston, where theyrsquo;d clean up their relativesrsquo; gravesites and put out offerings of lemonade, cookies, and fresh marigolds. Aunt Rosa would force Leo to stay for a picnic, as if hanging out with dead people were good for his appetite.

Frank grunted. ldquo;Chinese have that, toomdash;ancestor worship, sweeping the graves in the springtime.rdquo; He glanced at Leo. ldquo;Your Aunt Rosa wouldrsquo;ve gotten along with my grandmother.rdquo;

Leo had a terrifying image of his Aunt Rosa and some old Chinese woman in wrestlersrsquo; outfits, whaling on each other with spiked clubs.

ldquo;Yeah,rdquo; Leo said. ldquo;Irsquo;m sure they wouldrsquo;ve been best buds.rdquo;

Nico cleared his throat. ldquo;A lot of cultures have seasonal traditions to honor the dead, but the House of Hades was open year-round. Pilgrims could actually speak to the ghosts. In Greek, the place was called the Necromanteion, the Oracle of Death. Yoursquo;d work your way through different levels of tunnels, leaving offerings and drinking special potionsmdash;rdquo;

ldquo;Special potions,rdquo; Leo muttered. ldquo;Yum.rdquo;

Jason flashed him a look l

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The House of Hades
Page 9

ldquo;Some pilgrims found nothing,rdquo; Nico said. ldquo;Some went insane, or died after leaving the temple. Others lost their way in the tunnels and were never seen again.rdquo;

ldquo;The point is,rdquo; Jason said quickly, ldquo;Nico found some information that might help us.rdquo;

ldquo;Yeah.rdquo; Nico didnrsquo;t sound very enthusiastic. ldquo;The ghost I spoke to last nighthellip;he was a former priest of Hecate. He confirmed what the goddess told Hazel yesterday at the crossroads. In the first war with the giants, Hecate fought for the gods. She slew one of the giantsmdash;one whorsquo;d been designed as the anti-Hecate. A guy named Clytius.rdquo;

ldquo;Dark dude,rdquo; Leo guessed. ldquo;Wrapped in shadows.rdquo;

Hazel turned toward him, her gold eyes narrowing. ldquo;Leo, how did you know that?rdquo;

ldquo;Kind of had a dream.rdquo;

No one looked surprised. Most demigods had vivid nightmares about what was going on in the world.

His friends paid close attention as Leo explained. He tried not to look at the wall images of Camp Half-Blood as he described the place in ruins. He told them about the dark giant, and the strange woman on Half-Blood Hill, offering him a multiple-choice death.

Jason pushed away his plate of pancakes. ldquo;So the giant is Clytius. I suppose hersquo;ll be waiting for us, guarding the Doors of Death.rdquo;

Frank rolled up one of the pancakes and started munchingmdash;not a guy to let impending death stand in the way of a hearty breakfast. ldquo;And the woman in Leorsquo;s dream?rdquo;

ldquo;Shersquo;s my problem.rdquo; Hazel passed a diamond between her fingers in a sleight of hand. ldquo;Hecate mentioned a formidable enemy in the House of Hadesmdash;a witch who couldnrsquo;t be defeated except by me, using magic.rdquo;

ldquo;Do you know magic?rdquo; Leo asked.

ldquo;Not yet.rdquo;

ldquo;Ah.rdquo; He tried to think of something hopeful to say, but he recalled the angry womanrsquo;s eyes, the way her steely grip made his skin smoke. ldquo;Any idea who she is?rdquo;

Hazel shook her head. ldquo;Only thathellip;rdquo; She glanced at Nico, and some sort of silent argument happened between them. Leo got the feeling that the two of them had had private conversations about the House of Hades, and they werenrsquo;t sharing all the details. ldquo;Only that she wonrsquo;t be easy to defeat.rdquo;

ldquo;But there is some good news,rdquo; Nico said. ldquo;The ghost I talked to explained how Hecate defeated Clytius in the first war. She used her torches to set his hair on fire. He burned to death. In other words, fire is his weakness.rdquo;

Everybody looked at Leo.

ldquo;Oh,rdquo; he said. ldquo;Okay.rdquo;

Jason nodded encouragingly, like this was great newsmdash;like he expected Leo to walk up to a towering mass of darkness, shoot a few fireballs, and solve all their problems. Leo didnrsquo;t want to bring him down, but he could still hear Gaearsquo;s voice: He is the void that consumes all magic, the cold that consumes all fire, the silence that consumes all speech.

Leo was pretty sure it would take more than a few matches to set that giant ablaze.

ldquo;Itrsquo;s a good lead,rdquo; Jason insisted. ldquo;At least we know how to kill the giant. And this sorceresshellip;well, if Hecate believes Hazel can defeat her, then so do I.rdquo;

Hazel dropped her eyes. ldquo;Now we just have to reach the House of Hades, battle our way through Gaearsquo;s forcesmdash;rdquo;

ldquo;Plus a bunch of ghosts,rdquo; Nico added grimly. ldquo;The spirits in that temple may not be friendly.rdquo;

ldquo;mdash;and find the Doors of Death,rdquo; Hazel continued. ldquo;Assuming we can somehow arrive at the same time as Percy and Annabeth and rescue them.rdquo;

Frank swallowed a bite of pancake. ldquo;We can do it. We have to.rdquo;

Leo admired the big guyrsquo;s optimism. He wished he shared it.

ldquo;So, with this detour,rdquo; Leo said, ldquo;Irsquo;m estimating four or five days to arrive at Epirus, assuming no delays for, you know, monster attacks and stuff.rdquo;

Jason smiled sourly. ldquo;Yeah. Those never happen.rdquo;

Leo looked at Hazel. ldquo;Hecate told you that Gaea was planning her big Wake Up party on August first, right? The Feast of Whatever?rdquo;

ldquo;Spes,rdquo; Hazel said. ldquo;The goddess of hope.rdquo;

Jason turned his fork. ldquo;Theoretically, that leaves us enough time. Itrsquo;s only July fifth. We should be able to close the Doors of Death, then find the giantsrsquo; HQ and stop them from waking Gaea before August first.rdquo;

ldquo;Theoretically,rdquo; Hazel agreed. ldquo;But Irsquo;d still like to know how we make our way through the House of Hades without going insane or dying.rdquo;

Nobody volunteered any ideas.

Frank set down his pancake roll like it suddenly didnrsquo;t taste so good. ldquo;Itrsquo;s July fifth. Oh, jeez, I hadnrsquo;t even thought of that.hellip;rdquo;

ldquo;Hey, man, itrsquo;s cool,rdquo; Leo said. ldquo;Yoursquo;re Canadian, right? I didnrsquo;t expect you to get me an Independence Day present or anythinghellip;unless you wanted to.rdquo;

ldquo;Itrsquo;s not that. My grandmotherhellip;she always told me that seven was an unlucky number. It was a ghost number. She didnrsquo;t like it when I told her there would be seven demigods on our quest. And July is the seventh month.rdquo;

ldquo;Yeah, buthellip;rdquo; Leo tapped his fingers nervously on the table. He realized he was doing the Morse code for I love you, the way he used to do with his mom, which would have been pretty embarrassing if his friends understood Morse code. ldquo;But thatrsquo;s just coincidence, right?rdquo;

Frankrsquo;s expression didnrsquo;t reassure him.

ldquo;Back in China,rdquo; Frank said, ldquo;in the old days, people called the seventh month the ghost month. Thatrsquo;s when the spirit world and the human world were closest. The living and the dead could go back and forth. Tell me itrsquo;s a coincidence wersquo;re searching for the Doors of Death during the ghost month.rdquo;

No one spoke.

Leo wanted to think that an old Chinese belief couldnrsquo;t have anything to do with the Romans and the Greeks. Totally different, right? But Frankrsquo;s existence was proof that the cultures were tied together. The Zhang family went all the way back to Ancient Greece. Theyrsquo;d found their way through Rome and China and finally to Canada.

Also, Leo kept thinking about his meeting with the revenge goddess Nemesis at the Great Salt Lake. Nemesis had called him the seventh wheel, the odd man out on the quest. She didnrsquo;t mean seventh as in ghost, did she?

Jason pressed his hands against the arms of his chair. ldquo;Letrsquo;s focus on the things we can deal with. Wersquo;re getting close to Bologna. Maybe wersquo;ll get more answers once we find these dwarfs that Hecatemdash;rdquo;

The ship lurched as if it had hit an iceberg. Leorsquo;s breakfast plate slid across the table. Nico fell backward out of his chair and banged his head against the sideboard. He collapsed on the floor, with a dozen magic goblets and platters crashing down on top of him.

ldquo;Nico!rdquo; Hazel ran to help him.

ldquo;Whatmdash;?rdquo; Frank tried to stand, but the ship pitched in the other direction. He stumbled into the table and went face-first into Leorsquo;s plate of scrambled eggs.

ldquo;Look!rdquo; Jason pointed at the walls. The images of Camp Half-Blood were flickering and changing.

ldquo;Not possible,rdquo; Leo murmured.

No way those enchantments could show anything other than scenes from camp, but suddenly a huge, distorted face filled the entire port-side wall: crooked yellow teeth, a scraggly red beard, a warty nose, and two mismatched eyesmdash;one much larger and higher than the other. The face seemed to be trying to eat its way into the room.

The other walls flickered, showing scenes from above deck. Piper stood at the helm, but something was wrong. From the shoulders down she was wrapped in duct tape, her mouth gagged and her legs bound to the control console.

At the mainmast, Coach Hedge was similarly bound and gagged, while a bizarre-looking creaturemdash;a sort of gnome/chimpanzee combo with poor fashion sensemdash;danced around him, doing the coachrsquo;s hair in tiny pigtails with pink rubber bands.

On the port-side wall, the huge ugly face receded so that Leo could see the entire creaturemdash;another gnome chimp, in even crazier clothes. This one began leaping around the deck, stuffing things in a burlap bagmdash;Piperrsquo;s dagger, Leorsquo;s Wii controllers. Then he pried the Archimedes sphere out of the command console.

ldquo;No!rdquo; Leo yelled.

ldquo;Uhhh,rdquo; Nico groaned from the floor.

ldquo;Piper!rdquo; Jason cried.

ldquo;Monkey!rdquo; Frank yelled.

ldquo;Not monkeys,rdquo; Hazel grumbled. ldquo;I think those are dwarfs.rdquo;

ldquo;Stealing my stuff!rdquo; Leo yelled, and he ran for the stairs.

LEO WAS VAGUELY AWARE OF HAZEL SHOUTING, ldquo;Go! Irsquo;ll take care of Nico!rdquo;

As if Leo was going to turn back. Sure, he hoped di Angelo was okay, but he had headaches of his own.

Leo bounded up the steps, with Jason and Frank behind him.

The situation on deck was even worse than hersquo;d feared.

Coach Hedge and Piper were struggling against their duct tape bonds while one of the demon monkey dwarfs danced around the deck, picking up whatever wasnrsquo;t tied down and sticking it in his bag. He was maybe four feet tall, even shorter than Coach Hedge, with bowed legs and chimp-like feet, his clothes so loud they gave Leo vertigo. His green-plaid pants were pinned at the cuffs, and held up with bright-red suspenders over a striped pink-and-black womanrsquo;s blouse. He wore half a dozen gold watches on each arm, and a zebra-patterned cowboy hat with a price tag dangling from the brim. His skin was covered with patches of scraggly red fur, though ninety percent of his body hair seemed to be concentrated in his magnificent eyebrows.

Leo was just forming the thought Wherersquo;s the other dwarf? when he heard a click behind him and realized hersquo;d led his friends into a trap.

ldquo;Duck!rdquo; He hit the deck as the explosion blasted his eardrums.

Note to self, Leo thought groggily. Do not leave boxes of magic grenades where dwarfs can reach them.

At least he was alive. Leo had been experimenting with all sorts of weapons based on the Archimedes sphere that hersquo;d recovered in Rome. Hersquo;d built grenades that could spray acid, fire, shrapnel, or freshly buttered popcorn. (Hey, you never knew when yoursquo;d get hungry in battle.) Judging from the ringing in Leorsquo;s ears, the dwarf had detonated the flash-bang grenade, which Leo had filled with a rare vial of Apollorsquo;s music, pure liquid extract. It didnrsquo;t kill, but it left Leo feeling like hersquo;d just done a belly flop off the deep end.

He tried to get up. His limbs were useless. Someone was tugging at his waist, maybe a friend trying to help him up? No. His friends didnrsquo;t smell like heavily perfumed monkey cages.

He managed to turn over. His vision was out of focus and tinted pink, like the world had been submerged in strawberry jelly. A grinning, grotesque face loomed over him. The brown-furred dwarf was dressed even worse than his friend, in a green bowler hat lik

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The House of Hades
Page 10

The brown-furred dwarf jumped onto the projectile like it was a skateboard, and his friend shot him into the sky.

Red Fur pranced over to Coach Hedge. He gave the satyr a big smack on the cheek, then skipped to the rail. He bowed to Leo, doffing his zebra cowboy hat, and did a backflip over the side.

Leo managed to get up. Jason was already on his feet, stumbling and running into things. Frank had turned into a silverback gorilla (why, Leo wasnrsquo;t sure; maybe to commune with the monkey dwarfs?) but the flash grenade had hit him hard. He was sprawled on the deck with his tongue hanging out and his gorilla eyes rolled up in his head.

ldquo;Piper!rdquo; Jason staggered to the helm and carefully pulled the gag out of her mouth.

ldquo;Donrsquo;t waste your time on me!rdquo; she said. ldquo;Go after them!rdquo;

At the mast, Coach Hedge mumbled, ldquo;HHHmmmmm-hmmm!rdquo;

Leo figured that meant: ldquo;KILL THEM!rdquo; Easy translation, since most of the coachrsquo;s sentences involved the word kill.

Leo glanced at the control console. His Archimedes sphere was gone. He put his hand to his waist, where his tool belt should have been. His head started to clear, and his sense of outrage came to a boil. Those dwarfs had attacked his ship. Theyrsquo;d stolen his most precious possessions.

Below him spread the city of Bolognamdash;a jigsaw puzzle of red-tiled buildings in a valley hemmed by green hills. Unless Leo could find the dwarfs somewhere in that maze of streetshellip;Nope. Failure wasnrsquo;t an option. Neither was waiting for his friends to recover.

He turned to Jason. ldquo;You feeling good enough to control the winds? I need a lift.rdquo;

Jason frowned. ldquo;Sure, butmdash;rdquo;

ldquo;Good,rdquo; Leo said. ldquo;Wersquo;ve got some monkey dudes to catch.rdquo;

Jason and Leo touched down in a big piazza lined with white marble government buildings and outdoor cafés. Bikes and Vespas clogged the surrounding streets, but the square itself was empty except for pigeons and a few old men drinking espresso.

None of the locals seemed to notice the huge Greek warship hovering over the piazza, or the fact that Jason and Leo had just flown down, Jason wielding a gold sword, and Leohellip;well, Leo pretty much empty-handed.

ldquo;Where to?rdquo; Jason asked.

Leo stared at him. ldquo;Well, I dunno. Let me pull my dwarf-tracking GPS out of my tool belt.hellip; Oh, wait! I donrsquo;t have a dwarf-tracking GPSmdash;or my tool belt!rdquo;

ldquo;Fine,rdquo; Jason grumbled. He glanced up at the ship as if to get his bearings, then pointed across the piazza. ldquo;The ballista fired the first dwarf in that direction, I think. Come on.rdquo;

They waded through a lake of pigeons, then maneuvered down a side street of clothing stores and gelato shops. The sidewalks were lined with white columns covered in graffiti. A few panhandlers asked for change (Leo didnrsquo;t know Italian, but he got the message loud and clear).

He kept patting his waist, hoping his tool belt would magically reappear. It didnrsquo;t. He tried not to freak, but hersquo;d come to depend on that belt for almost everything. He felt like somebody had stolen one of his hands.

ldquo;Wersquo;ll find it,rdquo; Jason promised.

Usually, Leo would have felt reassured. Jason had a talent for staying levelheaded in a crisis, and hersquo;d gotten Leo out of plenty of bad scrapes. Today, though, all Leo could think about was the stupid fortune cookie he had opened in Rome. The goddess Nemesis had promised him help, and hersquo;d gotten it: the code to activate the Archimedes sphere. At the time, Leo had had no choice but to use it if he wanted to save his friendsmdash;but Nemesis had warned that her help came with a price.

Leo wondered if that price would ever be paid. Percy and Annabeth were gone. The ship was hundreds of miles off course, heading toward an impossible challenge. Leorsquo;s friends were counting on him to beat a terrifying giant. And now he didnrsquo;t even have his tool belt or his Archimedes sphere.

He was so absorbed with feeling sorry for himself that he didnrsquo;t notice where they were until Jason grabbed his arm. ldquo;Check it out.rdquo;

Leo looked up. Theyrsquo;d arrived in a smaller piazza. Looming over them was a huge bronze statue of a buck-naked Neptune.

ldquo;Ah, jeez.rdquo; Leo averted his eyes. He really didnrsquo;t need to see a godly groin this early in the morning.

The sea god stood on a big marble column in the middle of a fountain that wasnrsquo;t working (which seemed kind of ironic). On either side of Neptune, little winged Cupid dudes were sitting, kind of chillinrsquo;, like, Whatrsquo;s up? Neptune himself (avoid the groin) was throwing his hip to one side in an Elvis Presley move. He gripped his trident loosely in his right hand and stretched his left hand out like he was blessing Leo, or possibly attempting to levitate him.

ldquo;Some kind of clue?rdquo; Leo wondered.

Jason frowned. ldquo;Maybe, maybe not. There are statues of the gods all over the place in Italy. Irsquo;d just feel better if we ran across Jupiter. Or Minerva. Anybody but Neptune, really.rdquo;

Leo climbed into the dry fountain. He put his hand on the statuersquo;s pedestal, and a rush of impressions surged through his fingertips. He sensed Celestial bronze gears, magical levers, springs, and pistons.

ldquo;Itrsquo;s mechanical,rdquo; he said. ldquo;Maybe a doorway to the dwarfsrsquo; secret lair?rdquo;

ldquo;Ooooo!rdquo; shrieked a nearby voice. ldquo;Secret lair?rdquo;

ldquo;I want a secret lair!rdquo; yelled another voice from above.

Jason stepped back, his sword ready. Leo almost got whiplash trying to look in two places at once. The red-furred dwarf in the cowboy hat was sitting about thirty feet away at the nearest café table, sipping an espresso held by his monkey-like foot. The brown-furred dwarf in the green bowler was perched on the marble pedestal at Neptunersquo;s feet, just above Leorsquo;s head.

ldquo;If we had a secret lair,rdquo; said Red Fur, ldquo;I would want a firehouse pole.rdquo;

ldquo;And a waterslide!rdquo; said Brown Fur, who was pulling random tools out of Leorsquo;s belt, tossing aside wrenches, hammers, and staple guns.

ldquo;Stop that!rdquo; Leo tried to grab the dwarfrsquo;s feet, but he couldnrsquo;t reach the top of the pedestal.

ldquo;Too short?rdquo; Brown Fur sympathized.

ldquo;Yoursquo;re calling me short?rdquo; Leo looked around for something to throw, but there was nothing but pigeons, and he doubted he could catch one. ldquo;Give me my belt, you stupidmdash;rdquo;

ldquo;Now, now!rdquo; said Brown Fur. ldquo;We havenrsquo;t even introduced ourselves. Irsquo;m Akmon. And my brother over theremdash;rdquo;

ldquo;mdash;is the handsome one!rdquo; The red-furred dwarf lifted his espresso. Judging from his dilated eyes and his maniacal grin, he didnrsquo;t need any more caffeine. ldquo;Passalos! Singer of songs! Drinker of coffee! Stealer of shiny stuff!rdquo;

ldquo;Please!rdquo; shrieked his brother, Akmon. ldquo;I steal much better than you.rdquo;

Passalos snorted. ldquo;Stealing naps, maybe!rdquo; He took out a knifemdash;Piperrsquo;s knifemdash;and started picking his teeth with it.

ldquo;Hey!rdquo; Jason yelled. ldquo;Thatrsquo;s my girlfriendrsquo;s knife!rdquo;

He lunged at Passalos, but the red-furred dwarf was too quick. He sprang from his chair, bounced off Jasonrsquo;s head, did a flip, and landed next to Leo, his hairy arms around Leorsquo;s waist.

ldquo;Save me?rdquo; the dwarf pleaded.

ldquo;Get off!rdquo; Leo tried to shove him away, but Passalos did a backward somersault and landed out of reach. Leorsquo;s pants promptly fell around his knees.

He stared at Passalos, who was now grinning and holding a small zigzaggy strip of metal. Somehow, the dwarf had stolen the zipper right off Leorsquo;s pants.

ldquo;Givemdash;stupidmdash;zipper!rdquo; Leo stuttered, trying to shake his fist and hoist up his pants at the same time.

ldquo;Eh, not shiny enough.rdquo; Passalos tossed it away.

Jason lunged with his sword. Passalos launched himself straight up and was suddenly sitting on the statuersquo;s pedestal next to his brother.

ldquo;Tell me I donrsquo;t have moves,rdquo; Passalos boasted.

ldquo;Okay,rdquo; Akmon said. ldquo;You donrsquo;t have moves.rdquo;

ldquo;Bah!rdquo; Passalos said. ldquo;Give me the tool belt. I want to see.rdquo;

ldquo;No!rdquo; Akmon elbowed him away. ldquo;You got the knife and the shiny ball.rdquo;

ldquo;Yes, the shiny ball is nice.rdquo; Passalos took off his cowboy hat. Like a magician producing a rabbit, he pulled out the Archimedes sphere and began tinkering with the ancient bronze dials.

ldquo;Stop!rdquo; Leo yelled. ldquo;Thatrsquo;s a delicate machine.rdquo;

Jason came to his side and glared up at the dwarfs. ldquo;Who are you two, anyway?rdquo;

ldquo;The Kerkopes!rdquo; Akmon narrowed his eyes at Jason. ldquo;I bet yoursquo;re a son of Jupiter, eh? I can always tell.rdquo;

ldquo;Just like Black Bottom,rdquo; Passalos agreed.

ldquo;Black Bottom?rdquo; Leo resisted the urge to jump at the dwarfsrsquo; feet again. He was sure Passalos was going to ruin the Archimedes sphere any second now.

ldquo;Yes, you know.rdquo; Akmon grinned. ldquo;Hercules. We called him Black Bottom because he used to go around without clothes. He got so tan that his backside, wellmdash;rdquo;

ldquo;At least he had a sense of humor!rdquo; Passalos said. ldquo;He was going to kill us when we stole from him, but he let us go because he liked our jokes. Not like you two. Grumpy, grumpy!rdquo;

ldquo;Hey, Irsquo;ve got a sense of humor,rdquo; Leo snarled. ldquo;Give me back our stuff, and Irsquo;ll tell you a joke with a good punch line.rdquo;

ldquo;Nice try!rdquo; Akmon pulled a ratchet wrench from the tool belt and spun it like a noisemaker. ldquo;Oh, very nice! Irsquo;m definitely keeping this! Thanks, Blue Bottom!rdquo;

Blue Bottom?

Leo glanced down. His pants had slipped around his ankles again, revealing his blue undershorts. ldquo;Thatrsquo;s it!rdquo; he shouted. ldquo;My stuff. Now. Or Irsquo;ll show you how funny a flaming dwarf is.rdquo;

His hands caught fire.

ldquo;Now wersquo;re talking.rdquo; Jason thrust his sword into the sky. Dark clouds began to gather over the piazza. Thunder boomed.

ldquo;Oh, scary!rdquo; Akmon shrieked.

ldquo;Yes,rdquo; Passalos agreed. ldquo;If only we had a secret lair to hide in.rdquo;

ldquo;Alas, this statue isnrsquo;t the doorway to a secret lair,rdquo; Akmon said. ldquo;It has a different purpose.rdquo;

Leorsquo;s gut twisted. The fires died in his hands, and he realized something was very wrong. He yelled, ldquo;Trap!rdquo; and dove out of the fountain. Unfortunately, Jason was too busy summoning his storm.

Leo rolled on his back as five golden cords shot from the Neptune statuersquo;s fingers. One barely missed Leorsquo;s feet. The rest homed in on Jason, wrapping him like a rodeo calf and yanking him upside down.

A bolt of lightning blasted the tines of Neptunersquo;s trident, sending arcs of electricity up and down the statue, but the Kerkopes had already disappeared.

ldquo;Bravo!rdquo; Akmon applauded from a nearby café table. ldquo;You make a wonderful piñata, son of Jupiter!rdquo;

ld

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The House of Hades
Page 11

ldquo;Eek!rdquo; The dwarf jumped free of the explosion, dropping the sphere and letting the pigeons fly.

ldquo;Time to leave!rdquo; Akmon decided.

He tipped his bowler and sprang away, jumping from table to table. Passalos glanced at the Archimedes sphere, which had rolled between Leorsquo;s feet.

Leo summoned another fireball. ldquo;Try me,rdquo; he snarled.

ldquo;Bye!rdquo; Passalos did a backflip and ran after his brother.

Leo scooped up the Archimedes sphere and ran over to Jason, who was still hanging upside down, thoroughly hog-tied except for his sword arm. He was trying to cut the cords with his gold blade but having no luck.

ldquo;Hold on,rdquo; Leo said. ldquo;If I can find a release switchmdash;rdquo;

ldquo;Just go!rdquo; Jason growled. ldquo;Irsquo;ll follow you when I get out of this.rdquo;

ldquo;Butmdash;rdquo;

ldquo;Donrsquo;t lose them!rdquo;

The last thing Leo wanted was some alone time with the monkey dwarfs, but the Kerkopes were already disappearing around the far corner of the piazza. Leo left Jason hanging and ran after them.

THE DWARFS DIDNrsquo;T TRY VERY HARD TO LOSE HIM, which made Leo suspicious. They stayed just at the edge of his vision, scampering over red-tiled rooftops, knocking over window boxes, whooping and hollering and leaving a trail of screws and nails from Leorsquo;s tool beltmdash;almost as if they wanted Leo to follow.

He jogged after them, cursing every time his pants fell down. He turned a corner and saw two ancient stone towers jutting into the sky, side by side, much taller than anything else in the neighborhoodmdash;maybe medieval watchtowers? They leaned in different directions like gearshifts on a race car.

The Kerkopes scaled the tower on the right. When they reached the top, they climbed around the back and disappeared.

Had they gone inside? Leo could see some tiny windows at the top, covered with metal grates; but he doubted those would stop the dwarfs. He watched for a minute, but the Kerkopes didnrsquo;t reappear. Which meant Leo had to get up there and look for them.

ldquo;Great,rdquo; he muttered. No flying friend to carry him up. The ship was too far away to call for help. He could jury-rig the Archimedes sphere into some sort of flying device, maybe, but only if he had his tool beltmdash;which he didnrsquo;t. He scanned the neighborhood, trying to think. Half a block down, a set of double glass doors opened and an old lady hobbled out, carrying plastic shopping bags.

A grocery store? Hmmhellip;

Leo patted his pockets. To his amazement, he still had some euro notes from his time in Rome. Those stupid dwarfs had taken everything except his money.

He ran for the store as fast as his zipperless pants allowed.

Leo scoured the aisles, looking for things he could use. He didnrsquo;t know the Italian for Hello, where are your dangerous chemicals, please? But that was probably just as well. He didnrsquo;t want to end up in an Italian jail.

Fortunately, he didnrsquo;t need to read labels. He could tell just from picking up a toothpaste tube whether it contained potassium nitrate. He found charcoal. He found sugar and baking soda. The store sold matches, and bug spray, and aluminum foil. Pretty much everything he needed, plus a laundry cord he could use as a belt. He added some Italian junk food to the basket, just to sort of disguise his more suspicious purchases, then dumped his stuff at the register. A wide-eyed checkout lady asked him some questions he didnrsquo;t understand, but he managed to pay, get a bag, and race out.

He ducked into the nearest doorway where he could keep an eye on the towers. He started to work, summoning fire to dry out materials and do a little cooking that otherwise would have taken days to complete.

Every once in a while he sneaked a look at the tower, but there was no sign of the dwarfs. Leo could only hope they were still up there. Making his arsenal took just a few minutesmdash;he was that goodmdash;but it felt like hours.

Jason didnrsquo;t show. Maybe he was still tangled at the Neptune fountain, or scouring the streets looking for Leo. No one else from the ship came to help. Probably it was taking them a long time to get all those pink rubber bands out of Coach Hedgersquo;s hair.

That meant Leo had only himself, his bag of junk food, and a few highly improvised weapons made from sugar and toothpaste. Oh, and the Archimedes sphere. That was kind of important. He hoped he hadnrsquo;t ruined it by filling it with chemical powder.

He ran to the tower and found the entrance. He started up the winding stairs inside, only to be stopped at a ticket booth by some caretaker who yelled at him in Italian.

ldquo;Seriously?rdquo; Leo asked. ldquo;Look, man, yoursquo;ve got dwarfs in your belfry. Irsquo;m the exterminator.rdquo; He held up his can of bug spray. ldquo;See? Exterminator Molto Buono. Squirt, squirt. Ahhh!rdquo; He pantomimed a dwarf melting in terror, which for some reason the Italian didnrsquo;t seem to understand.

The guy just held out his palm for money.

ldquo;Dang, man,rdquo; Leo grumbled, ldquo;I just spent all my cash on homemade explosives and whatnot.rdquo; He dug around in his grocery bag. ldquo;Donrsquo;t suppose yoursquo;d accepthellip;uhhellip;whatever these are?rdquo;

Leo held up a yellow-and-red bag of junk food called Fonzies. He assumed they were some kind of chips. To his surprise, the caretaker shrugged and took the bag. ldquo;Avanti!rdquo;

Leo kept climbing, but he made a mental note to stock up on Fonzies. Apparently they were better than cash in Italy.

The stairs went on, and on, and on. The whole tower seemed to be nothing but an excuse to build a staircase.

He stopped on a landing and slumped against a narrow barred window, trying to catch his breath. He was sweating like crazy, and his heart thumped against his ribs. Stupid Kerkopes. Leo figured that as soon as he reached the top, they would jump away before he could use his weapons; but he had to try.

He kept climbing.

Finally, his legs feeling like overcooked noodles, he reached the summit.

The room was about the size of a broom closet, with barred windows on all four walls. Shoved in the corners were sacks of treasure, shiny goodies spilling all over the floor. Leo spotted Piperrsquo;s knife, an old leather-bound book, a few interesting-looking mechanical devices, and enough gold to give Hazelrsquo;s horse a stomachache.

At first, he thought the dwarfs had left. Then he looked up. Akmon and Passalos were hanging upside down from the rafters by their chimp feet, playing antigravity poker. When they saw Leo, they threw their cards like confetti and broke out in applause.

ldquo;I told you hersquo;d do it!rdquo; Akmon shrieked in delight.

Passalos shrugged and took off one of his gold watches and handed it to his brother. ldquo;You win. I didnrsquo;t think he was that dumb.rdquo;

They both dropped to the floor. Akmon was wearing Leorsquo;s tool beltmdash;he was so close that Leo had to resist the urge to lunge for it.

Passalos straightened his cowboy hat and kicked open the grate on the nearest window. ldquo;What should we make him climb next, brother? The dome of San Luca?rdquo;

Leo wanted to throttle the dwarfs, but he forced a smile. ldquo;Oh, that sounds fun! But before you guys go, you forgot something shiny.rdquo;

ldquo;Impossible!rdquo; Akmon scowled. ldquo;We were very thorough.rdquo;

ldquo;You sure?rdquo; Leo held up his grocery bag.

The dwarfs inched closer. As Leo had hoped, their curiosity was so strong that they couldnrsquo;t resist.

ldquo;Look.rdquo; Leo brought out his first weaponmdash;a lump of dried chemicals wrapped in aluminum foilmdash;and lit it with his hand.

He knew enough to turn away when it popped, but the dwarfs were staring right at it. Toothpaste, sugar, and bug spray werenrsquo;t as good as Apollorsquo;s music, but they made for a pretty decent flash-bang.

The Kerkopes wailed, clawing at their eyes. They stumbled toward the window, but Leo set off his homemade firecrackersmdash;snapping them around the dwarfsrsquo; bare feet to keep them off balance. Then, for good measure, Leo turned the dial on his Archimedes sphere, which unleashed a plume of foul white fog that filled the room.

Leo wasnrsquo;t bothered by smoke. Being immune to fire, hersquo;d stood in smoky bonfires, endured dragon breath, and cleaned out blazing forges plenty of times. While the dwarfs were hacking and wheezing, he grabbed his tool belt from Akmon, calmly summoned some bungee cords, and tied up the dwarfs.

ldquo;My eyes!rdquo; Akmon coughed. ldquo;My tool belt!rdquo;

ldquo;My feet are on fire!rdquo; Passalos wailed. ldquo;Not shiny! Not shiny at all!rdquo;

After making sure they were securely bound, Leo dragged the Kerkopes into one corner and began rifling through their treasures. He retrieved Piperrsquo;s dagger, a few of his prototype grenades, and a dozen other odds and ends the dwarfs had taken from the Argo II.

ldquo;Please!rdquo; Akmon wailed. ldquo;Donrsquo;t take our shinies!rdquo;

ldquo;Wersquo;ll make you a deal!rdquo; Passalos suggested. ldquo;Wersquo;ll cut you in for ten percent if you let us go!rdquo;

ldquo;Afraid not,rdquo; Leo muttered. ldquo;Itrsquo;s all mine now.rdquo;

ldquo;Twenty percent!rdquo;

Just then, thunder boomed overhead. Lightning flashed, and the bars on the nearest window burst into sizzling, melted stubs of iron.

Jason flew in like Peter Pan, electricity sparking around him and his gold sword steaming.

Leo whistled appreciatively. ldquo;Man, you just wasted an awesome entrance.rdquo;

Jason frowned. He noticed the hog-tied Kerkopes. ldquo;What themdash;rdquo;

ldquo;All by myself,rdquo; Leo said. ldquo;Irsquo;m special that way. How did you find me?rdquo;

ldquo;Uh, the smoke,rdquo; Jason managed. ldquo;And I heard popping noises. Were you having a gunfight in here?rdquo;

ldquo;Something like that.rdquo; Leo tossed him Piperrsquo;s dagger, then kept rummaging through the bags of dwarf shinies. He remembered what Hazel had said about finding a treasure that would help them with the quest, but he wasnrsquo;t sure what he was looking for. There were coins, gold nuggets, jewelry, paper clips, foil wrappers, cuff links.

He kept coming back to a couple of things that didnrsquo;t seem to belong. One was an old bronze navigation device, like an astrolabe from a ship. It was badly damaged and seemed to be missing some pieces, but Leo still found it fascinating.

ldquo;Take it!rdquo; Passalos offered. ldquo;Odysseus made it, you know! Take it and let us go.rdquo;

ldquo;Odysseus?rdquo; Jason asked. ldquo;Like, the Odysseus?rdquo;

ldquo;Yes!rdquo; Passalos squeaked. ldquo;Made it when he was an old man in Ithaca. One of his last inventions, and we stole it!rdquo;

ldquo;How does it work?rdquo; Leo asked.

ldquo;Oh, it doesnrsquo;t,rdquo; Akmon said. ldquo;Something about a missing crystal?rdquo; He glanced at his brother for help.

ldquo;lsquo;My biggest what-if,rsquo;rdquo; Passalos said. ldquo;lsquo;Shouldrsquo;ve taken a crystal.rsquo; Thatrsquo;s what he kept muttering in his sleep, the night we stole it.rdquo; Passalos shrugged. ldquo;No idea what he meant. But the shiny is yours! Can we go now?rdquo;

Leo wasnrsquo;t sure why he wanted the astrolabe. It was obviously broken, an

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The House of Hades
Page 12

ldquo;Whatrsquo;s this?rdquo; He wagged it at the dwarfs, who were still teary-eyed from the smoke.

ldquo;Nothing!rdquo; Akmon said. ldquo;Just a book. It had a pretty gold cover, so we took it from him.rdquo;

ldquo;Him?rdquo; Leo asked.

Akmon and Passalos exchanged a nervous look.

ldquo;Minor god,rdquo; Passalos said. ldquo;In Venice. Really, itrsquo;s nothing.rdquo;

ldquo;Venice.rdquo; Jason frowned at Leo. ldquo;Isnrsquo;t that where wersquo;re supposed to go next?rdquo;

ldquo;Yeah.rdquo; Leo examined the book. He couldnrsquo;t read the text, but it had lots of illustrations: scythes, different plants, a picture of the sun, a team of oxen pulling a cart. He didnrsquo;t see how any of that was important, but if the book had been stolen from a minor god in Venicemdash;the next place Hecate had told them to visitmdash;then this had to be what they were looking for.

ldquo;Where exactly can we find this minor god?rdquo; Leo asked.

ldquo;No!rdquo; Akmon shrieked. ldquo;You canrsquo;t take it back to him! If he finds out we stole itmdash;rdquo;

ldquo;Hersquo;ll destroy you,rdquo; Jason guessed. ldquo;Which is what wersquo;ll do if you donrsquo;t tell us, and wersquo;re a lot closer.rdquo; He pressed the point of his sword against Akmonrsquo;s furry throat.

ldquo;Okay, okay!rdquo; the dwarf shrieked. ldquo;La Casa Nera! Calle Frezzeria!rdquo;

ldquo;Is that an address?rdquo; Leo asked.

The dwarfs both nodded vigorously.

ldquo;Please donrsquo;t tell him we stole it,rdquo; Passalos begged. ldquo;He isnrsquo;t nice at all!rdquo;

ldquo;Who is he?rdquo; Jason asked. ldquo;What god?rdquo;

ldquo;Imdash;I canrsquo;t say,rdquo; Passalos stammered.

ldquo;Yoursquo;d better,rdquo; Leo warned.

ldquo;No,rdquo; Passalos said miserably. ldquo;I mean, I really canrsquo;t say. I canrsquo;t pronounce it! Trmdash;trimdash;Itrsquo;s too hard!rdquo;

ldquo;Truh,rdquo; Akmon said. ldquo;Tru-tohmdash;Too many syllables!rdquo;

They both burst into tears.

Leo didnrsquo;t know if the Kerkopes were telling them the truth, but it was hard to stay mad at weeping dwarfs, no matter how annoying and badly dressed they were.

Jason lowered his sword. ldquo;What do you want to do with them, Leo? Send them to Tartarus?rdquo;

ldquo;Please, no!rdquo; Akmon wailed. ldquo;It might take us weeks to come back.rdquo;

ldquo;Assuming Gaea even lets us!rdquo; Passalos sniffled. ldquo;She controls the Doors of Death now. Shersquo;ll be very cross with us.rdquo;

Leo looked at the dwarfs. Hersquo;d fought lots of monsters before and never felt bad about dissolving them, but this was different. He had to admit he sort of admired these little guys. They played cool pranks and liked shiny things. Leo could relate. Besides, Percy and Annabeth were in Tartarus right now, hopefully still alive, trudging toward the Doors of Death. The idea of sending these twin monkey boys there to face the same nightmarish problemhellip;well, it didnrsquo;t seem right.

He imagined Gaea laughing at his weaknessmdash;a demigod too softhearted to kill monsters. He remembered his dream about Camp Half-Blood in ruins, Greek and Roman bodies littering the fields. He remembered Octavian speaking with the Earth Goddessrsquo;s voice: The Romans move east from New York. They advance on your camp, and nothing can slow them down.

ldquo;Nothing can slow them down,rdquo; Leo mused. ldquo;I wonderhellip;rdquo;

ldquo;What?rdquo; Jason asked.

Leo looked at the dwarfs. ldquo;Irsquo;ll make you a deal.rdquo;

Akmonrsquo;s eyes lit up. ldquo;Thirty percent?rdquo;

ldquo;Wersquo;ll leave you all your treasure,rdquo; Leo said, ldquo;except the stuff that belongs to us, and the astrolabe, and this book, which wersquo;ll take back to the dude in Venice.rdquo;

ldquo;But hersquo;ll destroy us!rdquo; Passalos wailed.

ldquo;We wonrsquo;t say where we got it,rdquo; Leo promised. ldquo;And we wonrsquo;t kill you. Wersquo;ll let you go free.rdquo;

ldquo;Uh, Leohellip;?rdquo; Jason asked nervously.

Akmon squealed with delight. ldquo;I knew you were as smart as Hercules! I will call you Black Bottom, the Sequel!rdquo;

ldquo;Yeah, no thanks,rdquo; Leo said. ldquo;But in return for us sparing your lives, you have to do something for us. Irsquo;m going to send you somewhere to steal from some people, harass them, make life hard for them any way you can. You have to follow my directions exactly. You have to swear on the River Styx.rdquo;

ldquo;We swear!rdquo; Passalos said. ldquo;Stealing from people is our specialty!rdquo;

ldquo;I love harassment!rdquo; Akmon agreed. ldquo;Where are we going?rdquo;

Leo grinned. ldquo;Ever heard of New York?rdquo;

PERCY HAD TAKEN HIS GIRLFRIEND on some romantic walks before. This wasnrsquo;t one of them.

They followed the River Phlegethon, stumbling over the glassy black terrain, jumping crevices, and hiding behind rocks whenever the vampire girls slowed in front of them.

It was tricky to stay far enough back to avoid getting spotted but close enough to keep Kelli and her comrades in view through the dark hazy air. The heat from the river baked Percyrsquo;s skin. Every breath was like inhaling sulfur-scented fiberglass. When they needed a drink, the best they could do was sip some refreshing liquid fire.

Yep. Percy definitely knew how to show a girl a good time.

At least Annabethrsquo;s ankle seemed to have healed. She was hardly limping at all. Her various cuts and scrapes had faded. Shersquo;d tied her blond hair back with a strip of denim torn from her pants leg, and in the fiery light of the river, her gray eyes flickered. Despite being beat-up, sooty, and dressed like a homeless person, she looked great to Percy.

So what if they were in Tartarus? So what if they stood a slim chance of surviving? He was so glad that they were together, he had the ridiculous urge to smile.

Physically, Percy felt better too, though his clothes looked like hersquo;d been through a hurricane of broken glass. He was thirsty, hungry, and scared out of his mind (though he wasnrsquo;t going to tell Annabeth that), but hersquo;d shaken off the hopeless cold of the River Cocytus. And as nasty as the firewater tasted, it seemed to keep him going.

Time was impossible to judge. They trudged along, following the river as it cut through the harsh landscape. Fortunately the empousai werenrsquo;t exactly speed walkers. They shuffled on their mismatched bronze and donkey legs, hissing and fighting with each other, apparently in no hurry to reach the Doors of Death.

Once, the demons sped up in excitement and swarmed something that looked like a beached carcass on the riverbank. Percy couldnrsquo;t tell what it wasmdash;a fallen monster? An animal of some kind? The empousai attacked it with relish.

When the demons moved on, Percy and Annabeth reached the spot and found nothing left except a few splintered bones and glistening stains drying in the heat of the river. Percy had no doubt the empousai would devour demigods with the same gusto.

ldquo;Come on.rdquo; He led Annabeth gently away from the scene. ldquo;We donrsquo;t want to lose them.rdquo;

As they walked, Percy thought about the first time hersquo;d fought the empousa Kelli at Goode High Schoolrsquo;s freshman orientation, when he and Rachel Elizabeth Dare got trapped in the band hall. At the time, it seemed like a hopeless situation. Now, hersquo;d give anything to have a problem that simple. At least hersquo;d been in the mortal world then. Here, there was nowhere to run.

Wow. When he started looking back on the war with Kronos as the good old daysmdash;that was sad. He kept hoping things would get better for Annabeth and him, but their lives just got more and more dangerous, as if the Three Fates were up there spinning their futures with barbed wire instead of thread just to see how much two demigods could tolerate.

After a few more miles, the empousai disappeared over a ridge. When Percy and Annabeth caught up, they found themselves at the edge of another massive cliff. The River Phlegethon spilled over the side in jagged tiers of fiery waterfalls. The demon ladies were picking their way down the cliff, jumping from ledge to ledge like mountain goats.

Percyrsquo;s heart crept into his throat. Even if he and Annabeth reached the bottom of the cliff alive, they didnrsquo;t have much to look forward to. The landscape below them was a bleak, ash-gray plain bristling with black trees, like insect hair. The ground was pocked with blisters. Every once in a while, a bubble would swell and burst, disgorging a monster like a larva from an egg.

Suddenly Percy wasnrsquo;t hungry anymore.

All the newly formed monsters were crawling and hobbling in the same directionmdash;toward a bank of black fog that swallowed the horizon like a storm front. The Phlegethon flowed in the same direction until about halfway across the plain, where it met another river of black watermdash;maybe the Cocytus? The two floods combined in a steaming, boiling cataract and flowed on as one toward the black fog.

The longer Percy looked into that storm of darkness, the less he wanted to go there. It could be hiding anythingmdash;an ocean, a bottomless pit, an army of monsters. But if the Doors of Death were in that direction, it was their only chance to get home.

He peered over the edge of the cliff.

ldquo;Wish we could fly,rdquo; he muttered.

Annabeth rubbed her arms. ldquo;Remember Lukersquo;s winged shoes? I wonder if theyrsquo;re still down here somewhere.rdquo;

Percy remembered. Those shoes had been cursed to drag their wearer into Tartarus. Theyrsquo;d almost taken his best friend, Grover. ldquo;Irsquo;d settle for a hang glider.rdquo;

ldquo;Maybe not a good idea.rdquo; Annabeth pointed. Above them, dark winged shapes spiraled in and out of the bloodred clouds.

ldquo;Furies?rdquo; Percy wondered.

ldquo;Or some other kind of demon,rdquo; Annabeth said. ldquo;Tartarus has thousands.rdquo;

ldquo;Including the kind that eats hang gliders,rdquo; Percy guessed. ldquo;Okay, so we climb.rdquo;

He couldnrsquo;t see the empousai below them anymore. Theyrsquo;d disappeared behind one of the ridges, but that didnrsquo;t matter. It was clear where he and Annabeth needed to go. Like all the maggot monsters crawling over the plains of Tartarus, they should head toward the dark horizon. Percy was just brimming with enthusiasm for that.

AS THEY STARTED DOWN THE CLIFF, Percy concentrated on the challenges at hand: keeping his footing, avoiding rockslides that would alert the empousai to their presence, and of course making sure he and Annabeth didnrsquo;t plummet to their deaths.

About halfway down the precipice, Annabeth said, ldquo;Stop, okay? Just a quick break.rdquo;

Her legs wobbled so badly, Percy cursed himself for not calling a rest earlier.

They sat together on a ledge next to a roaring fiery waterfall. Percy put his arm around Annabeth, and she leaned against him, shaking from exhaustion.

He wasnrsquo;t much better. His stomach felt like it had shrunk to the size of a gumdrop. If they came across any more monster carcasses, he was afraid he might pull an empousa and try to devour it.

At least he had Annabeth. They would find a way out of Tartarus. They had to. He didnrsquo;t think much of fates and prophecies, but he did believe in one thing: An

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The House of Hades
Page 13

She snuggled against him. Her hair smelled of smoke, and if he closed his eyes, he could almost imagine they were at the campfire at Camp Half-Blood.

ldquo;We couldrsquo;ve fallen into the River Lethe,rdquo; she said. ldquo;Lost all our memories.rdquo;

Percyrsquo;s skin crawled just thinking about it. Hersquo;d had enough trouble with amnesia for one lifetime. Only last month, Hera had erased his memories to put him among the Roman demigods. Percy had stumbled into Camp Jupiter with no idea who he was or where he came from. And a few years before that, hersquo;d fought a Titan on the banks of the Lethe, near Hadesrsquo;s palace. Hersquo;d blasted the Titan with water from that river and completely wiped his memory clean. ldquo;Yeah, the Lethe,rdquo; he muttered. ldquo;Not my favorite.rdquo;

ldquo;What was the Titanrsquo;s name?rdquo; Annabeth asked.

ldquo;Uhhellip;Iapetus. He said it meant the Impaler or something.rdquo;

ldquo;No, the name you gave him after he lost his memory. Steve?rdquo;

ldquo;Bob,rdquo; Percy said.

Annabeth managed a weak laugh. ldquo;Bob the Titan.rdquo;

Percyrsquo;s lips were so parched, it hurt to smile. He wondered what had happened to Iapetus after theyrsquo;d left him in Hadesrsquo;s palacehellip;if he was still content being Bob, friendly, happy, and clueless. Percy hoped so, but the Underworld seemed to bring out the worst in everyonemdash;monsters, heroes, and gods.

He gazed across the ashen plains. The other Titans were supposed to be here in Tartarusmdash;maybe bound in chains, or roaming aimlessly, or hiding in some of those dark crevices. Percy and his allies had destroyed the worst Titan, Kronos, but even his remains might be down here somewheremdash;a billion angry Titan particles floating through the blood-colored clouds or lurking in that dark fog.

Percy decided not to think about that. He kissed Annabethrsquo;s forehead. ldquo;We should keep moving. You want some more fire to drink?rdquo;

ldquo;Ugh. Irsquo;ll pass.rdquo;

They struggled to their feet. The rest of the cliff looked impossible to descendmdash;nothing more than a crosshatching of tiny ledgesmdash;but they kept climbing down.

Percyrsquo;s body went on autopilot. His fingers cramped. He felt blisters popping up on his ankles. He got shaky from hunger.

He wondered if they would die of starvation, or if the firewater would keep them going. He remembered the punishment of Tantalus, whorsquo;d been permanently stuck in a pool of water under a fruit tree but couldnrsquo;t reach either food or drink.

Jeez, Percy hadnrsquo;t thought about Tantalus in years. That stupid guy had been paroled briefly to serve as director at Camp Half-Blood. Probably he was back in the Fields of Punishment. Percy had never felt sorry for the jerk before, but now he was starting to sympathize. He could imagine what it would be like, getting hungrier and hungrier for eternity but never being able to eat.

Keep climbing, he told himself.

Cheeseburgers, his stomach replied.

Shut up, he thought.

With fries, his stomach complained.

A billion years later, with a dozen new blisters on his feet, Percy reached the bottom. He helped Annabeth down, and they collapsed on the ground.

Ahead of them stretched miles of wasteland, bubbling with monstrous larvae and big insect-hair trees. To their right, the Phlegethon split into branches that etched the plain, widening into a delta of smoke and fire. To the north, along the main route of the river, the ground was riddled with cave entrances. Here and there, spires of rock jutted up like exclamation points.

Under Percyrsquo;s hand, the soil felt alarmingly warm and smooth. He tried to grab a handful, then realized that under a thin layer of dirt and debris, the ground was a single vast membranehellip;like skin.

He almost threw up, but forced himself not to. There was nothing in his stomach but fire.

He didnrsquo;t mention it to Annabeth, but he started to feel like something was watching themmdash;something vast and malevolent. He couldnrsquo;t zero in on it, because the presence was all around them. Watching was the wrong word, too. That implied eyes, and this thing was simply aware of them. The ridges above them now looked less like steps and more like rows of massive teeth. The spires of rock looked like broken ribs. And if the ground was skinhellip;

Percy forced those thoughts aside. This place was just freaking him out. That was all.

Annabeth stood, wiping soot from her face. She gazed toward the darkness on the horizon. ldquo;Wersquo;re going to be completely exposed, crossing this plain.rdquo;

About a hundred yards ahead of them, a blister burst on the ground. A monster clawed its way outhellip;a glistening telkhine with slick fur, a seal-like body, and stunted human limbs. It managed to crawl a few yards before something shot out of the nearest cave, so fast that Percy could only register a dark green reptilian head. The monster snatched the squealing telkhine in its jaws and dragged it into the darkness.

Reborn in Tartarus for two seconds, only to be eaten. Percy wondered if that telkhine would pop up some other place in Tartarus, and how long it would take to re-form.

He swallowed down the sour taste of firewater. ldquo;Oh, yeah. Thisrsquo;ll be fun.rdquo;

Annabeth helped him to his feet. He took one last look at the cliffs, but there was no going back. He wouldrsquo;ve given a thousand golden drachmas to have Frank Zhang with them right nowmdash;good old Frank, who always seemed to show up when needed and could turn into an eagle or a dragon to fly them across this stupid wasteland.

They started walking, trying to avoid the cave entrances, sticking close to the bank of the river.

They were just skirting one of the spires when a glint of movement caught Percyrsquo;s eyemdash;something darting between the rocks to their right.

A monster following them? Or maybe it was just some random baddie, heading for the Doors of Death.

Suddenly he remembered why theyrsquo;d started following this route, and he froze in his tracks.

ldquo;The empousai.rdquo; He grabbed Annabethrsquo;s arm. ldquo;Where are they?rdquo;

Annabeth scanned a three-sixty, her gray eyes bright with alarm.

Maybe the demon ladies had been snapped up by that reptile in the cave. If the empousai were still ahead of them, they shouldrsquo;ve been visible somewhere on the plains.

Unless they were hidinghellip;

Too late, Percy drew his sword.

The empousai emerged from the rocks all around themmdash;five of them forming a ring. A perfect trap.

Kelli limped forward on her mismatched legs. Her fiery hair burned across her shoulders like a miniature Phlegethon waterfall. Her tattered cheerleader outfit was splattered with rusty-brown stains, and Percy was pretty sure they werenrsquo;t ketchup. She fixed him with her glowing red eyes and bared her fangs.

ldquo;Percy Jackson,rdquo; she cooed. ldquo;How awesome! I donrsquo;t even have to return to the mortal world to destroy you!rdquo;

PERCY RECALLED HOW DANGEROUS Kelli had been the last time theyrsquo;d fought in the Labyrinth. Despite those mismatched legs, she could move fast when she wanted to. Shersquo;d dodged his sword strikes and would have eaten his face if Annabeth hadnrsquo;t stabbed her from behind.

Now she had four friends with her.

ldquo;And your friend Annabeth is with you!rdquo; Kelli hissed with laughter. ldquo;Oh, yeah, I totally remember her.rdquo;

Kelli touched her own sternum, where the tip of the knife had exited when Annabeth stabbed her in the back. ldquo;Whatrsquo;s the matter, daughter of Athena? Donrsquo;t have your weapon? Bummer. Irsquo;d use it to kill you.rdquo;

Percy tried to think. He and Annabeth stood shoulder to shoulder as they had many times before, ready to fight. But neither of them was in good shape for battle. Annabeth was empty-handed. They were hopelessly outnumbered. There was nowhere to run. No help coming.

Briefly Percy considered calling for Mrs. Orsquo;Leary, his hellhound friend who could shadow-travel. Even if she heard him, could she make it into Tartarus? This was where monsters went when they died. Calling her here might kill her, or turn her back to her natural state as a fierce monster. Nohellip;he couldnrsquo;t do that to his dog.

So, no help. Fighting was a long shot.

That left Annabethrsquo;s favorite tactics: trickery, talk, delay.

ldquo;Sohellip;rdquo; he started, ldquo;I guess yoursquo;re wondering what wersquo;re doing in Tartarus.rdquo;

Kelli snickered. ldquo;Not really. I just want to kill you.rdquo;

That wouldrsquo;ve been it, but Annabeth chimed in.

ldquo;Too bad,rdquo; she said. ldquo;Because you have no idea whatrsquo;s going on in the mortal world.rdquo;

The other empousai circled, watching Kelli for a cue to attack; but the ex-cheerleader only snarled, crouching out of reach of Percyrsquo;s sword.

ldquo;We know enough,rdquo; Kelli said. ldquo;Gaea has spoken.rdquo;

ldquo;Yoursquo;re heading toward a major defeat.rdquo; Annabeth sounded so confident, even Percy was impressed. She glanced at the other empousai, one by one, then pointed accusingly at Kelli. ldquo;This one claims shersquo;s leading you to a victory. Shersquo;s lying. The last time she was in the mortal world, Kelli was in charge of keeping my friend Luke Castellan faithful to Kronos. In the end, Luke rejected him. He gave his life to expel Kronos. The Titans lost because Kelli failed. Now Kelli wants to lead you to another disaster.rdquo;

The other empousai muttered and shifted uneasily.

ldquo;Enough!rdquo; Kellirsquo;s fingernails grew into long black talons. She glared at Annabeth as if imagining her sliced into small pieces.

Percy was pretty sure Kelli had had a thing for Luke Castellan. Luke had that effect on girlsmdash;even donkey-legged vampiresmdash;and Percy wasnrsquo;t sure bringing up his name was such a good idea.

ldquo;The girl lies,rdquo; Kelli said. ldquo;So the Titans lost. Fine! That was part of the plan to wake Gaea! Now the Earth Mother and her giants will destroy the mortal world, and we will totally feast on demigods!rdquo;

The other vampires gnashed their teeth in a frenzy of excitement. Percy had been in the middle of a school of sharks when the water was full of blood. That wasnrsquo;t nearly as scary as empousai ready to feed.

He prepared to attack, but how many could he dispatch before they overwhelmed him? It wouldnrsquo;t be enough.

ldquo;The demigods have united!rdquo; Annabeth yelled. ldquo;Yoursquo;d better think twice before you attack us. Romans and Greeks will fight you together. You donrsquo;t stand a chance!rdquo;

The empousai backed up nervously, hissing, ldquo;Romani.rdquo;

Percy guessed theyrsquo;d had experience with the Twelfth Legion before, and it hadnrsquo;t worked out well for them.

ldquo;Yeah, you bet Romani.rdquo; Percy bared his forearm and showed them the brand hersquo;d gotten at Camp Jupitermdash;the SPQR mark, with the trident of Neptune. ldquo;You mix Greek and Roman, and you know what you get? You get BAM!rdquo;

He stomped his foot, and the empousai scrambled back. One fell off the boulder where shersquo;d been perched.

That made Percy feel good, but they recovered quickly and closed in again.

ldquo;Bold talk,rdquo; Kelli said, ldquo;for two demigods lost in Ta

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The House of Hades
Page 14

Percy wanted to hug Annabeth, she was so brilliant.

One of the other empousai growled. ldquo;Is this true, Kelli? Has our mistress made peace with Olympus?rdquo;

ldquo;Shut up, Serephone!rdquo; Kelli screeched. ldquo;Gods, yoursquo;re annoying!rdquo;

ldquo;I will not cross the Dark Lady.rdquo;

Annabeth took the opening. ldquo;Yoursquo;d all be better following Serephone. Shersquo;s older and wiser.rdquo;

ldquo;Yes!rdquo; Serephone shrieked. ldquo;Follow me!rdquo;

Kelli struck so fast, Percy didnrsquo;t have the chance to raise his sword. Fortunately, she didnrsquo;t attack him. Kelli lashed out at Serephone. For half a second, the two demons were a blur of slashing claws and fangs.

Then it was over. Kelli stood triumphant over a pile of dust. From her claws hung the tattered remains of Serephonersquo;s dress.

ldquo;Any more issues?rdquo; Kelli snapped at her sisters. ldquo;Hecate is the goddess of the Mist! Her ways are mysterious. Who knows which side she truly favors? She is also the goddess of the crossroads, and she expects us to make our own choices. I choose the path that will bring us the most demigod blood! I choose Gaea!rdquo;

Her friends hissed in approval.

Annabeth glanced at Percy, and he saw that she was out of ideas. Shersquo;d done what she could. Shersquo;d gotten Kelli to eliminate one of her own. Now there was nothing left but to fight.

ldquo;For two years I churned in the void,rdquo; Kelli said. ldquo;Do you know how completely annoying it is to be vaporized, Annabeth Chase? Slowly re-forming, fully conscious, in searing pain for months and years as your body regrows, then finally breaking the crust of this hellish place and clawing your way back to daylight? All because some little girl stabbed you in the back?rdquo;

Her baleful eyes held Annabethrsquo;s. ldquo;I wonder what happens if a demigod is killed in Tartarus. I doubt itrsquo;s ever happened before. Letrsquo;s find out.rdquo;

Percy sprang, slashing Riptide in a huge arc. He cut one of the demons in half, but Kelli dodged and charged Annabeth. The other two empousai launched themselves at Percy. One grabbed his sword arm. Her friend jumped on his back.

Percy tried to ignore them and staggered toward Annabeth, determined to go down defending her if he had to; but Annabeth was doing pretty well. She tumbled to one side, evading Kellirsquo;s claws, and came up with a rock in her hand, which she smacked into Kellirsquo;s nose.

Kelli wailed. Annabeth scooped up gravel and flung it in the empousarsquo;s eyes.

Meanwhile Percy thrashed from side to side, trying to throw off his empousa hitchhiker, but her claws sank deeper into his shoulders. The second empousa held his arm, preventing him from using Riptide.

Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Kelli lunge, raking her talons across Annabethrsquo;s arm. Annabeth screamed and fell.

Percy stumbled in her direction. The vampire on his back sank her teeth into his neck. Searing pain coursed through his body. His knees buckled.

Stay on your feet, he told himself. You have to beat them.

Then the other vampire bit his sword arm, and Riptide clattered to the ground.

That was it. His luck had finally run out. Kelli loomed over Annabeth, savoring her moment of triumph. The other two empousai circled Percy, their mouths slavering, ready for another taste.

Then a shadow fell across Percy. A deep war cry bellowed from somewhere above, echoing across the plains of Tartarus, and a Titan dropped onto the battlefield.

PERCY THOUGHT HE WAS HALLUCINATING. It just wasnrsquo;t possible that a huge, silvery figure could drop out of the sky and stomp Kelli flat, trampling her into a mound of monster dust.

But thatrsquo;s exactly what happened. The Titan was ten feet tall, with wild silver Einstein hair, pure silver eyes, and muscular arms protruding from a ripped-up blue janitorrsquo;s uniform. In his hand was a massive push broom. His name tag, incredibly, read BOB.

Annabeth yelped and tried to crawl away, but the giant janitor wasnrsquo;t interested in her. He turned to the two remaining empousai, who stood over Percy.

One was foolish enough to attack. She lunged with the speed of a tiger, but she never stood a chance. A spearhead jutted from the end of Bobrsquo;s broom. With a single deadly swipe, he cut her to dust. The last vampire tried to run. Bob threw his broom like a massive boomerang (was there such a thing as a broomerang?). It sliced through the vampire and returned to Bobrsquo;s hand.

ldquo;SWEEP!rdquo; The Titan grinned with delight and did a victory dance. ldquo;Sweep, sweep, sweep!rdquo;

Percy couldnrsquo;t speak. He couldnrsquo;t bring himself to believe that something good had actually happened. Annabeth looked just as shocked.

ldquo;H-howhellip;?rdquo; she stammered.

ldquo;Percy called me!rdquo; the janitor said happily. ldquo;Yes, he did.rdquo;

Annabeth crawled a little farther away. Her arm was bleeding badly. ldquo;Called you? Hemdash;wait. Yoursquo;re Bob? The Bob?rdquo;

The janitor frowned when he noticed Annabethrsquo;s wounds. ldquo;Owie.rdquo;

Annabeth flinched as he knelt next to her.

ldquo;Itrsquo;s okay,rdquo; Percy said, still woozy with pain. ldquo;Hersquo;s friendly.rdquo;

He remembered when hersquo;d first met Bob. The Titan had healed a bad wound on Percyrsquo;s shoulder just by touching it. Sure enough, the janitor tapped Annabethrsquo;s forearm and it mended instantly.

Bob chuckled, pleased with himself, then bounded over to Percy and healed his bleeding neck and arm. The Titanrsquo;s hands were surprisingly warm and gentle.

ldquo;All better!rdquo; Bob declared, his eerie silver eyes crinkling with pleasure. ldquo;I am Bob, Percyrsquo;s friend!rdquo;

ldquo;Uhhellip;yeah,rdquo; Percy managed. ldquo;Thanks for the help, Bob. Itrsquo;s really good to see you again.rdquo;

ldquo;Yes!rdquo; the janitor agreed. ldquo;Bob. Thatrsquo;s me. Bob, Bob, Bob.rdquo; He shuffled around, obviously pleased with his name. ldquo;I am helping. I heard my name. Upstairs in Hadesrsquo;s palace, nobody calls for Bob unless there is a mess. Bob, sweep up these bones. Bob, mop up these tortured souls. Bob, a zombie exploded in the dining room.rdquo;

Annabeth gave Percy a puzzled look, but he had no explanation.

ldquo;Then I heard my friend call!rdquo; The Titan beamed. ldquo;Percy said, Bob!rdquo;

He grabbed Percyrsquo;s arm and hoisted him to his feet.

ldquo;Thatrsquo;s awesome,rdquo; Percy said. ldquo;Seriously. But how did youmdash;rdquo;

ldquo;Oh, time to talk later.rdquo; Bobrsquo;s expression turned serious. ldquo;We must go before they find you. They are coming. Yes, indeed.rdquo;

ldquo;They?rdquo; Annabeth asked.

Percy scanned the horizon. He saw no approaching monstersmdash;nothing but the stark gray wasteland.

ldquo;Yes,rdquo; Bob agreed. ldquo;But Bob knows a way. Come on, friends! We will have fun!rdquo;

FRANK WOKE UP AS A PYTHON, which puzzled him.

Changing into an animal wasnrsquo;t confusing. He did that all the time. But he had never changed from one animal to another in his sleep before. He was pretty sure he hadnrsquo;t dozed off as a snake. Usually, he slept like a dog.

Hersquo;d discovered that he got through the night much better if he curled up on his bunk in the shape of a bulldog. For whatever reason, his nightmares didnrsquo;t bother him as much. The constant screaming in his head almost disappeared.

He had no idea why hersquo;d become a reticulated python, but it did explain his dream about slowly swallowing a cow. His jaw was still sore.

He braced himself and changed back to human form. Immediately, his splitting headache returned, along with the voices.

Fight them! yelled Mars. Take this ship! Defend Rome!

The voice of Ares shouted back: Kill the Romans! Blood and death! Large guns!

His fatherrsquo;s Roman and Greek personalities screamed back and forth in Frankrsquo;s mind with the usual soundtrack of battle noisesmdash;explosions, assault rifles, roaring jet enginesmdash;all throbbing like a subwoofer behind Frankrsquo;s eyes.

He sat up on his berth, dizzy with pain. As he did every morning, he took a deep breath and stared at the lamp on his deskmdash;a tiny flame that burned night and day, fueled by magic olive oil from the supply room.

Firehellip;Frankrsquo;s biggest fear. Keeping an open flame in his room terrified him, but it also helped him focus. The noise in his head faded to the background, allowing him to think.

Hersquo;d gotten better at this, but for days hersquo;d been almost worthless. As soon as the fighting broke out at Camp Jupiter, the war godrsquo;s two voices had started screaming nonstop. Ever since, Frank had been stumbling around in a daze, barely able to function. Hersquo;d acted like a fool, and he was sure his friends thought hersquo;d lost his marbles.

He couldnrsquo;t tell them what was wrong. There was nothing they could do, and from listening to them talk, Frank was pretty sure they didnrsquo;t have the same problem with their godly parents yelling in their ears.

Just Frankrsquo;s luck, but he had to pull it together. His friends needed himmdash;especially now, with Annabeth gone.

Annabeth had been kind to him. Even when he was so distracted hersquo;d acted like a buffoon, Annabeth had been patient and helpful. While Ares screamed that Athenarsquo;s children couldnrsquo;t be trusted, and Mars bellowed at him to kill all the Greeks, Frank had grown to respect Annabeth.

Now that they were without her, Frank was the next best thing the group had to a military strategist. They would need him for the trip ahead.

He rose and got dressed. Fortunately hersquo;d managed to buy some new clothes in Siena a couple of days ago, replacing the laundry that Leo had sent flying away on Buford the table. (Long story.) He tugged on some Levirsquo;s and an army-green T-shirt, then reached for his favorite pullover before remembering he didnrsquo;t need it. The weather was too warm. More important, he didnrsquo;t need the pockets anymore to protect the magical piece of firewood that controlled his life span. Hazel was keeping it safe for him.

Maybe that should have made him nervous. If the firewood burned, Frank died: end of story. But he trusted Hazel more than he trusted himself. Knowing she was safeguarding his big weakness made him feel bettermdash;like hersquo;d fastened his seat belt for a high-speed chase.

He slung his bow and quiver over his shoulder. Immediately they morphed into a regular backpack. Frank loved that. He never wouldrsquo;ve known about the quiverrsquo;s camouflage power if Leo hadnrsquo;t figured it out for him.

Leo! Mars raged. He must die!

Throttle him! Ares cried. Throttle everyone! Who are we talking about again?

The two began shouting at each other again, over the sound of bombs exploding in Frankrsquo;s skull.

He steadied himself against the wall. For days, Frank had listened to those voices demanding Leo Valdezrsquo;s death.

After all, Leo had started the war with Camp Jupiter by firing a ballista into the Forum. Sure, hersquo;d been possessed at the time; but still Mars demanded vengeance. Leo made things harder by constantly teasing Frank, and Ares demanded that Frank retaliate for every insult.

Frank kept the voices at bay, but it wasnrsquo;t easy.

On their trip

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The House of Hades
Page 15

Just another one of Leorsquo;s stupid jokes, but the comment hit a little too close to home. On the Argo II, Frank definitely felt like the LVPmdash;Least Valuable Player. Sure, he could turn into animals. So what? His biggest claim to helpfulness so far had been changing into a weasel to escape from an underground workshop, and even that had been Leorsquo;s idea. Frank was better known for the Giant Goldfish Fiasco in Atlanta, and, just yesterday, for turning into a two-hundred-kilo gorilla only to get knocked senseless by a flash-bang grenade.

Leo hadnrsquo;t made any gorilla jokes at his expense yet. But it was only a matter of time.

Kill him!

Torture him! Then kill him!

The two sides of the war god seemed to be kicking and punching each other inside Frankrsquo;s head, using his sinuses as a wrestling mat.

Blood! Guns!

Rome! War!

Quiet down, Frank ordered.

Amazingly, the voices obeyed.

Okay, then, Frank thought.

Maybe he could finally get those annoying screaming mini-gods under control. Maybe today would be a good day.

That hope was shattered as soon as he climbed above deck.

ldquo;What are they?rdquo; Hazel asked.

The Argo II was docked at a busy wharf. On one side stretched a shipping channel about half a kilometer wide. On the other spread the city of Venicemdash;red-tiled roofs, metal church domes, steepled towers, and sun-bleached buildings in all the colors of Valentine candy heartsmdash;red, white, ochre, pink, and orange.

Everywhere there were statues of lionsmdash;on top of pedestals, over doorways, on the porticoes of the largest buildings. There were so many, Frank figured the lion must be the cityrsquo;s mascot.

Where streets should have been, green canals etched their way through the neighborhoods, each one jammed with motorboats. Along the docks, the sidewalks were mobbed with tourists shopping at the T-shirt kiosks, overflowing from stores, and lounging across acres of outdoor café tables, like pods of sea lions. Frank had thought Rome was full of tourists. This place was insane.

Hazel and the rest of his friends werenrsquo;t paying attention to any of that, though. They had gathered at the starboard rail to stare at the dozens of weird shaggy monsters milling through the crowds.

Each monster was about the size of a cow, with a bowed back like a broken-down horse, matted gray fur, skinny legs, and black cloven hooves. The creaturesrsquo; heads seemed much too heavy for their necks. Their long, anteater-like snouts drooped to the ground. Their overgrown gray manes completely covered their eyes.

Frank watched as one of the creatures lumbered across the promenade, snuffling and licking the pavement with its long tongue. The tourists parted around it, unconcerned. A few even petted it. Frank wondered how the mortals could be so calm. Then the monsterrsquo;s appearance flickered. For a moment it turned into an old, fat beagle.

Jason grunted. ldquo;The mortals think theyrsquo;re stray dogs.rdquo;

ldquo;Or pets roaming around,rdquo; Piper said. ldquo;My dad shot a film in Venice once. I remember him telling me there were dogs everywhere. Venetians love dogs.rdquo;

Frank frowned. He kept forgetting that Piperrsquo;s dad was Tristan McLean, A-list movie star. She didnrsquo;t talk about him much. She seemed pretty down-to-earth for a kid raised in Hollywood. That was fine with Frank. The last thing they needed on this quest was paparazzi taking pictures of all Frankrsquo;s epic fails.

ldquo;But what are they?rdquo; he asked, repeating Hazelrsquo;s question. ldquo;They look likehellip;starving, shaggy cows with sheepdog hair.rdquo;

He waited for someone to enlighten him. Nobody volunteered any information.

ldquo;Maybe theyrsquo;re harmless,rdquo; Leo suggested. ldquo;Theyrsquo;re ignoring the mortals.rdquo;

ldquo;Harmless!rdquo; Gleeson Hedge laughed. The satyr wore his usual gym shorts, sports shirt, and coachrsquo;s whistle. His expression was as gruff as ever, but he still had one pink rubber band stuck in his hair from the prankster dwarfs in Bologna. Frank was kind of scared to mention it to him. ldquo;Valdez, how many harmless monsters have we met? We should just aim the ballistae and see what happens!rdquo;

ldquo;Uh, no,rdquo; Leo said.

For once, Frank agreed with Leo. There were too many monsters. It would be impossible to target one without causing collateral damage in the crowds of tourists. Besides, if those creatures panicked and stampededhellip;

ldquo;Wersquo;ll have to walk through them and hope theyrsquo;re peaceful,rdquo; Frank said, hating the idea already. ldquo;Itrsquo;s the only way wersquo;re going to track down the owner of that book.rdquo;

Leo pulled the leather-bound manual from underneath his arm. Hersquo;d slapped a sticky note on the cover with the address the dwarfs in Bologna had given him.

ldquo;La Casa Nera,rdquo; he read. ldquo;Calle Frezzeria.rdquo;

ldquo;The Black House,rdquo; Nico di Angelo translated. ldquo;Calle Frezzeria is the street.rdquo;

Frank tried not to flinch when he realized Nico was at his shoulder. The guy was so quiet and brooding, he almost seemed to dematerialize when he wasnrsquo;t speaking. Hazel might have been the one who came back from the dead, but Nico was way more ghostlike.

ldquo;You speak Italian?rdquo; Frank asked.

Nico shot him a warning look, like: Watch the questions. He spoke calmly, though. ldquo;Frank is right. We have to find that address. The only way to do it is to walk the city. Venice is a maze. Wersquo;ll have to risk the crowds and thosehellip;whatever they are.rdquo;

Thunder rumbled in the clear summer sky. Theyrsquo;d passed through some storms the night before. Frank had thought they were over, but now he wasnrsquo;t sure. The air felt as thick and warm as sauna steam.

Jason frowned at the horizon. ldquo;Maybe I should stay on board. Lots of venti in that storm last night. If they decide to attack the ship againhellip;rdquo;

He didnrsquo;t need to finish. Theyrsquo;d all had experiences with angry wind spirits. Jason was the only one who had much luck fighting them.

Coach Hedge grunted. ldquo;Well, Irsquo;m out, too. If you softhearted cupcakes are going to stroll through Venice without even whacking those furry animals on the head, forget it. I donrsquo;t like boring expeditions.rdquo;

ldquo;Itrsquo;s okay, Coach.rdquo; Leo grinned. ldquo;We still have to repair the foremast. Then I need your help in the engine room. Irsquo;ve got an idea for a new installation.rdquo;

Frank didnrsquo;t like the gleam in Leorsquo;s eye. Since Leo had found that Archimedes sphere, hersquo;d been trying out a lot of ldquo;new installations.rdquo; Usually, they exploded or sent smoke billowing upstairs into Frankrsquo;s cabin.

ldquo;Wellhellip;rdquo; Piper shifted her feet. ldquo;Whoever goes should be good with animals. I, uhhellip;Irsquo;ll admit Irsquo;m not great with cows.rdquo;

Frank figured there was a story behind that comment, but he decided not to ask.

ldquo;Irsquo;ll go,rdquo; he said.

He wasnrsquo;t sure why he volunteeredmdash;maybe because he was anxious to be useful for a change. Or maybe he didnrsquo;t want anyone beating him to the punch. Animals? Frank can turn into animals! Send him!

Leo patted him on shoulder and handed him the leather-bound book. ldquo;Awesome. If you pass a hardware store, could you get me some two-by-fours and a gallon of tar?rdquo;

ldquo;Leo,rdquo; Hazel chided, ldquo;itrsquo;s not a shopping trip.rdquo;

ldquo;Irsquo;ll go with Frank,rdquo; Nico offered.

Frankrsquo;s eye started twitching. The war godsrsquo; voices rose to a crescendo in his head: Kill him! Graecus scum!

No! I love Graecus scum!

ldquo;Uhhellip;yoursquo;re good with animals?rdquo; he asked.

Nico smiled without humor. ldquo;Actually, most animals hate me. They can sense death. But therersquo;s something about this city.hellip;rdquo; His expression turned grim. ldquo;Lots of death. Restless spirits. If I go, I may be able to keep them at bay. Besides, as you noticed, I speak Italian.rdquo;

Leo scratched his head. ldquo;Lots of death, huh? Personally, Irsquo;m trying to avoid lots of death, but you guys have fun!rdquo;

Frank wasnrsquo;t sure what scared him more: shaggy-cow monsters, hordes of restless ghosts, or going somewhere alone with Nico di Angelo.

ldquo;Irsquo;ll go too.rdquo; Hazel slipped her arm through Frankrsquo;s. ldquo;Three is the best number for a demigod quest, right?rdquo;

Frank tried not to look too relieved. He didnrsquo;t want to offend Nico. But he glanced at Hazel and told her with his eyes: Thank you thank you thank you.

Nico stared at the canals, as if wondering what new and interesting forms of evil spirits might be lurking there. ldquo;All right, then. Letrsquo;s go find the owner of that book.rdquo;

FRANK MIGHT HAVE LIKED VENICE if it hadnrsquo;t been summertime and tourist season, and if the city wasnrsquo;t overrun with large hairy creatures. Between the rows of old houses and the canals, the sidewalks were already too narrow for the crowds jostling one another and stopping to take pictures. The monsters made things worse. They shuffled around with their heads down, bumping into mortals and sniffing the pavement.

One seemed to find something it liked at the edge of a canal. It nibbled and licked at a ***** between the stones until it dislodged some sort of greenish root. The monster sucked it up happily and shambled along.

ldquo;Well, theyrsquo;re plant-eaters,rdquo; Frank said. ldquo;Thatrsquo;s good news.rdquo;

Hazel slipped her hand into his. ldquo;Unless they supplement their diet with demigods. Letrsquo;s hope not.rdquo;

Frank was so pleased to be holding her hand, the crowds and the heat and the monsters suddenly didnrsquo;t seem so bad. He felt neededmdash;useful.

Not that Hazel required his protection. Anybody whorsquo;d seen her charging on Arion with her sword drawn would know she could take care of herself. Still, Frank liked being next to her, imagining he was her bodyguard. If any of these monsters tried to hurt her, Frank would gladly turn into a rhinoceros and push them into the canal.

Could he do a rhino? Frank had never tried that before.

Nico stopped. ldquo;There.rdquo;

Theyrsquo;d turned onto a smaller street, leaving the canal behind. Ahead of them was a small plaza lined with five-story buildings. The area was strangely desertedmdash;as if the mortals could sense it wasnrsquo;t safe. In the middle of the cobblestone courtyard, a dozen shaggy cow creatures were sniffing around the mossy base of an old stone well.

ldquo;A lot of cows in one place,rdquo; Frank said.

ldquo;Yeah, but look,rdquo; Nico said. ldquo;Past that archway.rdquo;

Nicorsquo;s eyes mustrsquo;ve been better than his. Frank squinted. At the far end of the plaza, a stone archway carved with lions led into a narrow street. Just past the arch, one of the town houses was painted blackmdash;the only black building Frank had seen so far in Venice.

ldquo;La Casa Nera,rdquo; he guessed.

Hazelrsquo;s grip tightened on his fingers. ldquo;I donrsquo;t like that plaza. It feelshellip;cold.rdquo;

Frank wasnrsquo;t sure what she meant. He was still sweating like crazy.

But Nico nodded. He studied the town-house windows, most of which were covered with wooden shutters. ld

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The House of Hades
Page 16

Again Frank wondered about Nicorsquo;s past, but he was afraid to ask. He caught Hazelrsquo;s eye.

Go ahead, she seemed to be saying. Nico needs practice talking to people.

The sounds of assault rifles and atom bombs got louder in Frankrsquo;s head. Mars and Ares were trying to outsing each other with ldquo;Dixierdquo; and ldquo;The Battle Hymn of the Republic.rdquo; Frank did his best to push that aside.

ldquo;Nico, your mom was Italian?rdquo; he guessed. ldquo;She was from Venice?rdquo;

Nico nodded reluctantly. ldquo;She met Hades here, back in the 1930s. As World War Two got closer, she fled to the U.S. with my sister and me. I meanhellip;Bianca, my other sister. I donrsquo;t remember much about Italy, but I can still speak the language.rdquo;

Frank tried to think of a response. Oh, thatrsquo;s nice didnrsquo;t seem to cut it.

He was hanging out with not one but two demigods whorsquo;d been pulled out of time. They were both, technically, about seventy years older than he was.

ldquo;Mustrsquo;ve been hard on your mom,rdquo; Frank said. ldquo;I guess wersquo;ll do anything for someone we love.rdquo;

Hazel squeezed his hand appreciatively. Nico stared at the cobblestones. ldquo;Yeah,rdquo; he said bitterly. ldquo;I guess we will.rdquo;

Frank wasnrsquo;t sure what Nico was thinking. He had a hard time imagining Nico di Angelo acting out of love for anybody, except maybe Hazel. But Frank decided hersquo;d gone as far as he dared with the personal questions.

ldquo;So, the lemureshellip;rdquo; He swallowed. ldquo;How do we avoid them?rdquo;

ldquo;Irsquo;m already on it,rdquo; Nico said. ldquo;Irsquo;m sending out the message that they should stay away and ignore us. Hopefully thatrsquo;s enough. Otherwisehellip;things could get messy.rdquo;

Hazel pursed her lips. ldquo;Letrsquo;s get going,rdquo; she suggested.

Halfway across the piazza, everything went wrong; but it had nothing to do with ghosts.

They were skirting the well in the middle of the square, trying to give the cow monsters some distance, when Hazel stumbled on a loose piece of cobblestone. Frank caught her. Six or seven of the big gray beasts turned to look at them. Frank glimpsed a glowing green eye under onersquo;s mane, and instantly he was hit with a wave of nausea, the way he felt when he ate too much cheese or ice cream.

The creatures made deep throbbing sounds in their throats like angry foghorns.

ldquo;Nice cows,rdquo; Frank murmured. He put himself between his friends and the monsters. ldquo;Guys, Irsquo;m thinking we should back out of here slowly.rdquo;

ldquo;Irsquo;m such a klutz,rdquo; Hazel whispered. ldquo;Sorry.rdquo;

ldquo;Itrsquo;s not your fault,rdquo; Nico said. ldquo;Look at your feet.rdquo;

Frank glanced down and caught his breath.

Under their shoes, the paving stones were movingmdash;spiky plant tendrils were pushing up from the cracks.

Nico stepped back. The roots snaked out in his direction, trying to follow. The tendrils got thicker, exuding a steamy green vapor that smelled of boiled cabbage.

ldquo;These roots seem to like demigods,rdquo; Frank noted.

Hazelrsquo;s hand drifted to her sword hilt. ldquo;And the cow creatures like the roots.rdquo;

The entire herd was now looking their direction, making foghorn growls and stamping their hooves. Frank understood animal behavior well enough to get the message: You are standing on our food. That makes you enemies.

Frank tried to think. There were too many monsters to fight. Something about their eyes hidden under those shaggy maneshellip;Frank had gotten sick from the barest glimpse. He had a bad feeling that if those monsters made direct eye contact, he might get a lot worse than nauseous.

ldquo;Donrsquo;t meet their eyes,rdquo; Frank warned. ldquo;Irsquo;ll distract them. You two back up slowly toward that black house.rdquo;

The creatures tensed, ready to attack.

ldquo;Never mind,rdquo; Frank said. ldquo;Run!rdquo;

As it turned out, Frank could not turn into a rhino, and he lost valuable time trying.

Nico and Hazel bolted for the side street. Frank stepped in front of the monsters, hoping to keep their attention. He yelled at the top of his lungs, imagining himself as a fearsome rhinoceros, but with Ares and Mars screaming in his head, he couldnrsquo;t concentrate. He remained regular-old Frank.

Two of the cow monsters peeled off from the herd to chase Nico and Hazel.

ldquo;No!rdquo; Frank yelled after them. ldquo;Me! Irsquo;m the rhino!rdquo;

The rest of the herd surrounded Frank. They growled, emerald-green gas billowing from their nostrils. Frank stepped back to avoid the stuff, but the stench nearly knocked him over.

Okay, so not a rhino. Something else. Frank knew he had only seconds before the monsters trampled or poisoned him, but he couldnrsquo;t think. He couldnrsquo;t hold the image of any animal long enough to change form.

Then he glanced up at one of the town-house balconies and saw a stone carvingmdash;the symbol of Venice.

The next instant, Frank was a full-grown lion. He roared in challenge, then sprang from the middle of the monster herd and landed eight meters away, on top of the old stone well.

The monsters growled in reply. Three of them sprang at once, but Frank was ready. His lion reflexes were built for speed in combat.

He slashed the first two monsters into dust with his claws, then sank his fangs into the third onersquo;s throat and tossed it aside.

There were seven left, plus the two chasing his friends. Not great odds, but Frank had to keep the bulk of herd focused on him. He roared at the monsters, and they edged away.

They outnumbered him, yes. But Frank was a top-of-the-chain predator. The herd monsters knew it. They had also just watched him send three of their friends to Tartarus.

He pressed his advantage and leaped off the well, still baring his fangs. The herd backed off.

If he could just maneuver around them, then turn and run after his friendshellip;

He was doing all right, until he took his first backward step toward the arch. One of cows, either the bravest or the stupidest, took that as a sign of weakness. It charged and blasted Frank in the face with green gas.

He slashed the monster to dust, but the damage was already done. He forced himself not to breathe. Regardless, he could feel the fur burning off his snout. His eyes stung. He staggered back, half-blind and dizzy, dimly aware of Nico screaming his name.

ldquo;Frank! Frank!rdquo;

He tried to focus. He was back in human form, retching and stumbling. His face felt like it was peeling off. In front of him, the green cloud of gas floated between him and the herd. The remaining cow monsters eyed him warily, probably wondering if Frank had any more tricks up his sleeve.

He glanced behind him. Under the stone arch, Nico di Angelo was holding his black Stygian iron sword, gesturing at Frank to hurry. At Nicorsquo;s feet, two puddles of darkness stained the pavementmdash;no doubt the remains of the cow monsters that had chased them.

And Hazelhellip;she was propped against the wall behind her brother. She wasnrsquo;t moving.

Frank ran toward them, forgetting about the monster herd. He rushed past Nico and grabbed Hazelrsquo;s shoulders. Her head slumped against her chest.

ldquo;She got a blast of green gas right in the face,rdquo; Nico said miserably. ldquo;Imdash;I wasnrsquo;t fast enough.rdquo;

Frank couldnrsquo;t tell if she was breathing. Rage and despair battled inside him. Hersquo;d always been scared of Nico. Now he wanted to drop-kick the son of Hades into the nearest canal. Maybe that wasnrsquo;t fair, but Frank didnrsquo;t care. Neither did the war gods screaming in his head.

ldquo;We need to get her back to the ship,rdquo; Frank said.

The cow monster herd prowled cautiously just beyond the archway. They bellowed their foghorn cries. From nearby streets, more monsters answered. Reinforcements would soon have the demigods surrounded.

ldquo;Wersquo;ll never make it on foot,rdquo; Nico said. ldquo;Frank, turn into a giant eagle. Donrsquo;t worry about me. Get her back to the Argo II!rdquo;

With his face burning and the voices screaming in his mind, Frank wasnrsquo;t sure he could change shape; but he was about to try when a voice behind them said, ldquo;Your friends canrsquo;t help you. They donrsquo;t know the cure.rdquo;

Frank spun. Standing in the threshold of the Black House was a young man in jeans and a denim shirt. He had curly black hair and a friendly smile, though Frank doubted he was friendly. Probably he wasnrsquo;t even human.

At the moment, Frank didnrsquo;t care.

ldquo;Can you cure her?rdquo; he asked.

ldquo;Of course,rdquo; the man said. ldquo;But yoursquo;d better hurry inside. I think yoursquo;ve angered every katobleps in Venice.rdquo;

THEY BARELY MADE IT INSIDE.

As soon as their host threw the bolts, the cow monsters bellowed and slammed into the door, making it shudder on its hinges.

ldquo;Oh, they canrsquo;t get in,rdquo; the man in denim promised. ldquo;Yoursquo;re safe now!rdquo;

ldquo;Safe?rdquo; Frank demanded. ldquo;Hazel is dying!rdquo;

Their host frowned as if he didnrsquo;t appreciate Frank ruining his good mood. ldquo;Yes, yes. Bring her this way.rdquo;

Frank carried Hazel as they followed the man farther into the building. Nico offered to help, but Frank didnrsquo;t need it. Hazel weighed nothing, and Frankrsquo;s body hummed with adrenaline. He could feel Hazel shivering, so at least he knew she was alive; but her skin was cold. Her lips had taken on a greenish tingemdash;or was that just Frankrsquo;s blurry vision?

His eyes still burned from the monsterrsquo;s breath. His lungs felt like hersquo;d inhaled a flaming cabbage. He didnrsquo;t know why the gas had affected him less than it had Hazel. Maybe shersquo;d gotten more of it in her lungs. He would have given anything to change places if it meant saving her.

The voices of Mars and Ares yelled in his head, urging him to kill Nico and the man in denim and anyone else he could find, but Frank forced down the noise.

The housersquo;s front room was some sort of greenhouse. The walls were lined with tables of plant trays under fluorescent lights. The air smelled of fertilizer solution. Maybe Venetians did their gardening inside, since they were surrounded by water instead of soil? Frank wasnrsquo;t sure, but he didnrsquo;t spend much time worrying about it.

The back room looked like a combination garage, college dorm, and computer lab. Against the left wall glowed a bank of servers and laptops, their screen savers flashing pictures of plowed fields and tractors. Against the right wall sat a single bed, a messy desk, and an open wardrobe filled with extra denim clothes and a stack of farm implements, like pitchforks and rakes.

The back wall was a huge garage door. Parked next to it was a red-and-gold chariot with an open carriage and a single axle, like the chariots Frank had raced at Camp Jupiter. Sprouting from the sides of the driverrsquo;s box were giant feathery wings. Wrapped around the rim of the left wheel, a spotted python snored loudly.

Frank hadnrsquo;t known that pythons could snore. He hoped he hadnrsquo;t done that himself in python form last night.

ldquo;Set your friend here,rdquo; said the man in denim.

Frank placed Haz

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The House of Hades
Page 17

ldquo;Theyrsquo;re always looking down.rdquo; Nico smacked his forehead. ldquo;Right. I remember reading about them.rdquo;

Frank glared at him. ldquo;Now you remember?rdquo;

Nico hung his head almost as low as a katobleps. ldquo;I, uhhellip;used to play this stupid card game when I was younger. Mythomagic. The katobleps was one of the monster cards.rdquo;

Frank blinked. ldquo;I played Mythomagic. I never saw that card.rdquo;

ldquo;It was in the Africanus Extreme expansion deck.rdquo;

ldquo;Oh.rdquo;

Their host cleared his throat. ldquo;Are you two done, ah, geeking out, as they say?rdquo;

ldquo;Right, sorry,rdquo; Nico muttered. ldquo;Anyway, katoblepones have poison breath and a poison gaze. I thought they only lived in Africa.rdquo;

The man in denim shrugged. ldquo;Thatrsquo;s their native land. They were accidentally imported to Venice hundreds of years ago. Yoursquo;ve heard of Saint Mark?rdquo;

Frank wanted to scream with frustration. He didnrsquo;t see how any of this was relevant, but if their host could heal Hazel, Frank decided maybe it would be best not to make him angry. ldquo;Saints? Theyrsquo;re not part of Greek mythology.rdquo;

The man in denim chuckled. ldquo;No, but Saint Mark is the patron saint of this city. He died in Egypt, oh, a long time ago. When the Venetians became powerfulhellip;well, the relics of saints were a big tourist attraction back in the Middle Ages. The Venetians decided to steal Saint Markrsquo;s remains and bring them to their big church of San Marco. They smuggled out his body in a barrel of pickled pig parts.rdquo;

ldquo;Thatrsquo;shellip;disgusting,rdquo; Frank said.

ldquo;Yes,rdquo; the man agreed with a smile. ldquo;The point is, you canrsquo;t do something like that and not have consequences. The Venetians unintentionally smuggled something else out of Egyptmdash;the katoblepones. They came here aboard that ship and have been breeding like rats ever since. They love the magical poison roots that grow heremdash;swampy, foul-smelling plants that creep up from the canals. It makes their breath even more poisonous! Usually the monsters ignore mortals, but demigodshellip;especially demigods who get in their waymdash;rdquo;

ldquo;Got it,rdquo; Frank snapped. ldquo;Can you cure her?rdquo;

The man shrugged. ldquo;Possibly.rdquo;

ldquo;Possibly?rdquo; Frank had to use all his willpower not to throttle the guy.

He put his hand under Hazelrsquo;s nose. He couldnrsquo;t feel her breath. ldquo;Nico, please tell me shersquo;s doing that death-trance thing, like you did in the bronze jar.rdquo;

Nico grimaced. ldquo;I donrsquo;t know if Hazel can do that. Her dad is technically Pluto, not Hades, somdash;rdquo;

ldquo;Hades!rdquo; cried their host. He backed away, staring at Nico with distaste. ldquo;So thatrsquo;s what I smell. Children of the Underworld? If Irsquo;d known that, I would never have let you in!rdquo;

Frank rose. ldquo;Hazelrsquo;s a good person. You promised you would help her!rdquo;

ldquo;I did not promise.rdquo;

Nico drew his sword. ldquo;Shersquo;s my sister,rdquo; he growled. ldquo;I donrsquo;t know who you are, but if you can cure her, you have to, or so help me by the River Styxmdash;rdquo;

ldquo;Oh, blah, blah, blah!rdquo; The man waved his hand. Suddenly where Nico di Angelo had been standing was a potted plant about five feet tall, with drooping green leaves, tufts of silk, and half a dozen ripe yellow ears of corn.

ldquo;There,rdquo; the man huffed, wagging his finger at the corn plant. ldquo;Children of Hades canrsquo;t order me around! You should talk less and listen more. Now at least you have ears.rdquo;

Frank stumbled against the bed. ldquo;What did youmdash;whymdash;?rdquo;

The man raised an eyebrow. Frank made a squeaky noise that wasnrsquo;t very courageous. Hersquo;d been so focused on Hazel, hersquo;d forgotten what Leo had told them about the guy they were looking for. ldquo;Yoursquo;re a god,rdquo; he remembered.

ldquo;Triptolemus.rdquo; The man bowed. ldquo;My friends call me Trip, so donrsquo;t call me that. And if yoursquo;re another child of Hadesmdash;rdquo;

ldquo;Mars!rdquo; Frank said quickly. ldquo;Child of Mars!rdquo;

Triptolemus sniffed. ldquo;Wellhellip;not much better. But perhaps you deserve to be something better than a corn plant. Sorghum? Sorghum is very nice.rdquo;

ldquo;Wait!rdquo; Frank pleaded. ldquo;Wersquo;re here on a friendly mission. We brought a gift.rdquo; Very slowly, he reached into his backpack and brought out the leather-bound book. ldquo;This belongs to you?rdquo;

ldquo;My almanac!rdquo; Triptolemus grinned and seized the book. He thumbed through the pages and started bouncing on the balls of his feet. ldquo;Oh, this is fabulous! Where did you find it?rdquo;

ldquo;Um, Bologna. There were theserdquo;mdash;Frank remembered that he wasnrsquo;t supposed to mention the dwarfsmdash;ldquo;terrible monsters. We risked our lives, but we knew this was important to you. So could you maybe, you know, turn Nico back to normal and heal Hazel?rdquo;

ldquo;Hmm?rdquo; Trip looked up from his book. Hersquo;d been happily reciting lines to himselfmdash;something about turnip-planting schedules. Frank wished that Ella the harpy were here. She would get along great with this guy.

ldquo;Oh, heal them?rdquo; Triptolemus clucked disapprovingly. ldquo;Irsquo;m grateful for the book, of course. I can definitely let you go free, son of Mars. But I have a long-standing problem with Hades. After all, I owe my godly powers to Demeter!rdquo;

Frank racked his brain, but it was hard with the voices screaming in his head and the katobleps poison making him dizzy.

ldquo;Uh, Demeter,rdquo; he said, ldquo;the plant goddess. Shemdash;she didnrsquo;t like Hades becausehellip;rdquo; Suddenly he recalled an old story hersquo;d heard at Camp Jupiter. ldquo;Her daughter, Proserpinemdash;rdquo;

ldquo;Persephone,rdquo; Trip corrected. ldquo;I prefer the Greek, if you donrsquo;t mind.rdquo;

Kill him! Mars screamed.

I love this guy! Ares yelled back. Kill him anyway!

Frank decided not to take offense. He didnrsquo;t want to get turned into a sorghum plant. ldquo;Okay. Hades kidnapped Persephone.rdquo;

ldquo;Exactly!rdquo; Trip said.

ldquo;Sohellip;Persephone was a friend of yours?rdquo;

Trip snorted. ldquo;I was just a mortal prince back then. Persephone wouldnrsquo;t have noticed me. But when her mother, Demeter, went searching for her, scouring the whole earth, not many people would help her. Hecate lit her way at night with her torches. And Ihellip;well, when Demeter came to my part of Greece, I gave her a place to stay. I comforted her, gave her a meal, and offered my assistance. I didnrsquo;t know she was a goddess at the time, but my good deed paid off. Later, Demeter rewarded me by making me a god of farming!rdquo;

ldquo;Wow,rdquo; Frank said. ldquo;Farming. Congratulations.rdquo;

ldquo;I know! Pretty awesome, right? Anyway, Demeter never got along with Hades. So naturally, you know, I have to side with my patron goddess. Children of Hadesmdash;forget it! In fact, one of themmdash;this Scythian king named Lynkos? When I tried to teach his countrymen about farming, he killed my right python!rdquo;

ldquo;Yourhellip;right python?rdquo;

Trip marched over to his winged chariot and hopped in. He pulled a lever, and the wings began to flap. The spotted python on the left wheel opened his eyes. He started to writhe, coiling around the axle like a spring. The chariot whirred into motion, but the right wheel stayed in place, so Triptolemus spun in circles, the chariot beating its wings and bouncing up and down like a defective merry-go-round.

ldquo;You see?rdquo; he said as he spun. ldquo;No good! Ever since I lost my right python, I havenrsquo;t been able to spread the word about farmingmdash;at least not in person. Now I have to resort to giving online courses.rdquo;

ldquo;What?rdquo; As soon as he said it, Frank was sorry hersquo;d asked.

Trip hopped off the chariot while it was still spinning. The python slowed to a stop and went back to snoring. Trip jogged over to the line of computers. He tapped the keyboards and the screens woke up, displaying a Web site in maroon and gold, with a picture of a happy farmer in a toga and a John Deere cap, standing with his bronze scythe in a field of wheat.

ldquo;Triptolemus Farming University!rdquo; he announced proudly. ldquo;In just six weeks, you can get your bachelorrsquo;s degree in the exciting and vibrant career of the futuremdash;farming!rdquo;

Frank felt a bead of sweat trickle down his cheek. He didnrsquo;t care about this crazy god or his snake-powered chariot or his online degree program. But Hazel was turning greener by the moment. Nico was a corn plant. And he was alone.

ldquo;Look,rdquo; he said. ldquo;We did bring you the almanac. And my friends are really nice. Theyrsquo;re not like those other children of Hades yoursquo;ve met. So if therersquo;s any waymdash;rdquo;

ldquo;Oh!rdquo; Trip snapped his fingers. ldquo;I see where yoursquo;re going!rdquo;

ldquo;Uhhellip;you do?rdquo;

ldquo;Absolutely! If I cure your friend Hazel and return the other one, Nicholasmdash;rdquo;

ldquo;Nico.rdquo;

ldquo;mdash;if I return him to normalhellip;rdquo;

Frank hesitated. ldquo;Yes?rdquo;

ldquo;Then in exchange, you stay with me and take up farming! A child of Mars as my apprentice? Itrsquo;s perfect! What a spokesman yoursquo;ll be. We can beat swords into plowshares and have so much fun!rdquo;

ldquo;Actuallyhellip;rdquo; Frank tried frantically to come up with a plan. Ares and Mars screamed in his head, Swords! Guns! Massive ka-booms!

If he declined Triprsquo;s offer, Frank figured he would offend the guy and end up as sorghum or wheat or some other cash crop.

If it was the only way to save Hazel, then sure, he could agree to Triprsquo;s demands and become a farmer. But that couldnrsquo;t be the only way. Frank refused to believe hersquo;d been chosen by the Fates to go on this quest just so he could take online courses in turnip cultivation.

Frankrsquo;s eyes wandered to the broken chariot. ldquo;I have a better offer,rdquo; he blurted out. ldquo;I can fix that.rdquo;

Triprsquo;s smile melted. ldquo;Fixhellip;my chariot?rdquo;

Frank wanted to kick himself. What was he thinking? He wasnrsquo;t Leo. He couldnrsquo;t even figure out a stupid pair of Chinese handcuffs. He could barely change the batteries in a TV remote. He couldnrsquo;t fix a magical chariot!

But something told him it was his only chance. That chariot was the one thing Triptolemus might really want.

ldquo;Irsquo;ll go find a way to fix the chariot,rdquo; he said. ldquo;In return, you fix Nico and Hazel. Let us go in peace. Andmdash;and give us whatever aid you can to defeat Gaearsquo;s forces.rdquo;

Triptolemus laughed. ldquo;What makes you think I can aid you with that?rdquo;

ldquo;Hecate told us so,rdquo; Frank said. ldquo;She sent us here. Shemdash;she decided Hazel is one of her favorites.rdquo;

The color drained from Triprsquo;s face. ldquo;Hecate?rdquo;

Frank hoped he wasnrsquo;t overstating things. He didnrsquo;t need Hecate mad at him too. But if Triptolemus and Hecate were both friends of Demeter, maybe that would convince Trip to help.

ldquo;The goddess guided us to your almanac

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The House of Hades
Page 18

Trip nodded slowly. ldquo;Yes. I see. I know why Hecate sent you to me. Very well, son of Mars. Go find a way to fix my chariot. If you succeed, I will do all you ask. If notmdash;rdquo;

ldquo;I know,rdquo; Frank grumbled. ldquo;My friends die.rdquo;

ldquo;Yes,rdquo; Trip said cheerfully. ldquo;And yoursquo;ll make a lovely patch of sorghum!rdquo;

FRANK STUMBLED OUT OF THE BLACK HOUSE. The door shut behind him, and he collapsed against the wall, overcome with guilt. Fortunately the katoblepones had cleared off, or he might have just sat there and let them trample him. He deserved nothing better. Hersquo;d left Hazel inside, dying and defenseless, at the mercy of a crazy farmer god.

Kill farmers! Ares screamed in his head.

Return to the legion and fight Greeks! Mars said. What are we doing here?

Killing farmers! Ares screamed back.

ldquo;Shut up!rdquo; Frank yelled aloud. ldquo;Both of you!rdquo;

A couple of old ladies with shopping bags shuffled past. They gave Frank a strange look, muttered something in Italian, and kept going.

Frank stared miserably at Hazelrsquo;s cavalry sword, lying at his feet next to his backpack. He could run back to the Argo II and get Leo. Maybe Leo could fix the chariot.

But Frank somehow knew this wasnrsquo;t a problem for Leo. It was Frankrsquo;s task. He had to prove himself. Besides, the chariot wasnrsquo;t exactly broken. There was no mechanical problem. It was missing a serpent.

Frank could turn himself into a python. When hersquo;d woken up that morning as a giant snake, perhaps it had been a sign from the gods. He didnrsquo;t want to spend the rest of his life turning the wheel of a farmerrsquo;s chariot, but if it meant saving Hazelhellip;

No. There had to be another way.

Serpents, Frank thought. Mars.

Did his father have some connection to snakes? Marsrsquo;s sacred animal was the wild boar, not the serpent. Still, Frank was sure hersquo;d heard something once.hellip;

He could think of only one person to ask. Reluctantly, he opened his mind to the voices of the war god.

I need a snake, he told them. How?

Ha, ha! Ares screamed. Yes, the serpent!

Like that vile Cadmus, Mars said. We punished him for killing our dragon!

They both started yelling, until Frank thought his brain would split in half.

ldquo;Okay! Stop!rdquo;

The voices quieted.

ldquo;Cadmus,rdquo; Frank muttered. ldquo;Cadmushellip;rdquo;

The story came back to him. The demigod Cadmus had slain a dragon that happened to be a child of Ares. How Ares had ended up with a dragon for a son, Frank didnrsquo;t want to know; but as punishment for the dragonrsquo;s death, Ares turned Cadmus into a snake.

ldquo;So you can turn your enemies into snakes,rdquo; Frank said. ldquo;Thatrsquo;s what I need. I need to find an enemy. Then I need you to turn him into a snake.rdquo;

You think I would do that for you? Ares roared. You have not proven your worth!

Only the greatest hero could ask such a boon, Mars said. A hero like Romulus!

Too Roman! Ares shouted. Diomedes!

Never! Mars shouted back. That coward fell to Heracles!

Horatius, then, Ares suggested.

Mars went silent. Frank sensed a grudging agreement.

ldquo;Horatius,rdquo; Frank said. ldquo;Fine. If thatrsquo;s what it takes, Irsquo;ll prove Irsquo;m as good as Horatius. Uhhellip;what did he do?rdquo;

Images flooded into Frankrsquo;s mind. He saw a lone warrior standing on a stone bridge, facing an entire army massed on the far side of the Tiber River.

Frank remembered the legend. Horatius, the Roman general, had single-handedly held off a horde of invaders, sacrificing himself on that bridge to keep the barbarians from crossing the Tiber. By giving his fellow Romans time to finish their defenses, hersquo;d saved the Republic.

Venice is overrun, Mars said, as Rome was about to be. Cleanse it!

Destroy them all! Ares said. Put them to the sword!

Frank pushed the voices to the back of his mind. He looked at his hands and was amazed they werenrsquo;t trembling.

For the first time in days, his thoughts were clear. He knew exactly what he needed to do. He didnrsquo;t know how he would pull it off. The odds of dying were excellent, but he had to try. Hazelrsquo;s life depended on him.

He strapped Hazelrsquo;s sword to his belt, morphed his backpack into a quiver and bow, and raced toward the piazza where hersquo;d fought the cow monsters.

The plan had three phases: dangerous, really dangerous, and insanely dangerous.

Frank stopped at the old stone well. No katoblepones in sight. He drew Hazelrsquo;s sword and used it to pry up some cobblestones, unearthing a big tangle of spiky roots. The tendrils unfurled, exuding their stinky green fumes as they crept toward Frankrsquo;s feet.

In the distance, a katoblepsrsquo;s foghorn moan filled the air. Others joined in from all different directions. Frank wasnrsquo;t sure how the monsters could tell he was harvesting their favorite foodmdash;maybe they just had an excellent sense of smell.

He had to move fast now. He sliced off a long cluster of vines and laced them through one of his belt loops, trying to ignore the burning and itching in his hands. Soon he had a glowing, stinking lasso of poisonous weeds. Hooray.

The first few katoblepones lumbered into the piazza, bellowing in anger. Green eyes glowed under their manes. Their long snouts blew clouds of gas, like furry steam engines.

Frank nocked an arrow. He had a momentary pang of guilt. These were not the worst monsters hersquo;d met. They were basically grazing animals that happened to be poisonous.

Hazel is dying because of them, he reminded himself.

He let the arrow fly. The nearest katobleps collapsed, crumbling to dust. He nocked a second arrow, but the rest of the herd was almost on top of him. More were charging into the square from the opposite direction.

Frank turned into a lion. He roared defiantly and leaped toward the archway, straight over the heads of the second herd. The two groups of katoblepones slammed into each other, but quickly recovered and ran after him.

Frank hadnrsquo;t been sure the roots would still smell when he changed form. Usually his clothes and possessions just sort of melted into his animal shape, but apparently he still smelled like a yummy poison dinner. Each time he raced past a katobleps, it roared with outrage and joined the Kill Frank! Parade.

He turned onto a larger street and pushed through the crowds of tourists. What the mortals saw, he had no ideamdash;a cat being chased by a pack of dogs? People cursed at Frank in about twelve different languages. Gelato cones went flying. A woman spilled a stack of carnival masks. One dude toppled into the canal.

When Frank glanced back, he had at least two dozen monsters on his tail, but he needed more. He needed all the monsters in Venice, and he had to keep the ones behind him enraged.

He found an open spot in the crowd and turned back into a human. He drew Hazelrsquo;s spathamdash;never his preferred weapon, but he was big enough and strong enough that the heavy cavalry sword didnrsquo;t bother him. In fact he was glad for the extra reach. He slashed the golden blade, destroying the first katobleps and letting the others bunch up in front of him.

He tried to avoid their eyes, but he could feel their gaze burning into him. He figured that if all these monsters breathed on him at once, their combined noxious cloud would be enough to melt him into a puddle. The monsters crowded forward and slammed into one another.

Frank yelled, ldquo;You want my poison roots? Come and get them!rdquo;

He turned into a dolphin and jumped into the canal. He hoped katoblepones couldnrsquo;t swim. At the very least, they seemed reluctant to follow him in, and he couldnrsquo;t blame them. The canal was disgustingmdash;smelly and salty and as warm as soupmdash;but Frank forged through it, dodging gondolas and speedboats, pausing occasionally to chitter dolphin insults at the monsters who followed him on the sidewalks. When he reached the nearest gondola dock, Frank turned back into a human again, stabbed a few more katoblepones to keep them angry, and took off running.

So it went.

After a while, Frank fell into a kind of daze. He attracted more monsters, scattered more crowds of tourists, and led his now massive following of katoblepones through the winding streets of the old city. Whenever he needed a quick escape, he dove into a canal as a dolphin, or turned into an eagle and soared overhead, but he never got too far ahead of his pursuers.

Whenever he felt like the monsters might be losing interest, he stopped on a rooftop and drew his bow, picking off a few of the katoblepones in the center of the herd. He shook his lasso of poison vines and insulted the monstersrsquo; bad breath, stirring them into a fury. Then he continued the race.

He backtracked. He lost his way. Once he turned a corner and ran into the tail end of his own monster mob. He should have been exhausted, yet somehow he found the strength to keep goingmdash;which was good. The hardest part was yet to come.

He spotted a couple of bridges, but they didnrsquo;t look right. One was elevated and completely covered; no way could he get the monsters to funnel through it. Another was too crowded with tourists. Even if the monsters ignored the mortals, that noxious gas couldnrsquo;t be good for anyone to breathe. The bigger the monster herd got, the more mortals would get pushed aside, knocked into the water, or trampled.

Finally Frank saw something that would work. Just ahead, past a big piazza, a wooden bridge spanned one of the widest canals. The bridge itself was a latticed arc of timber, like an old-fashioned roller coaster, about fifty meters long.

From above, in eagle form, Frank saw no monsters on the far side. Every katobleps in Venice seemed to have joined the herd and was pushing through the streets behind him as tourists screamed and scattered, maybe thinking they were caught in the midst of a stray dog stampede.

The bridge was empty of foot traffic. It was perfect.

Frank dropped like a stone and turned back to human form. He ran to the middle of the bridgemdash;a natural choke pointmdash;and threw his bait of poisonous roots on the deck behind him.

As the front of the katobleps herd reached the base of the bridge, Frank drew Hazelrsquo;s golden spatha.

ldquo;Come on!rdquo; he yelled. ldquo;You want to know what Frank Zhang is worth? Come on!rdquo;

He realized he wasnrsquo;t just shouting at the monsters. He was venting weeks of fear, rage, and resentment. The voices of Mars and Ares screamed right along with him.

The monsters charged. Frankrsquo;s vision turned red.

Later, he couldnrsquo;t remember the details clearly. He sliced through monsters until he was ankle-deep in yellow dust. Whenever he got overwhelmed and the clouds of gas began to choke him, he changed shapemdash;became an elephant, a dragon, a lionmdash;and each transformation seemed to clear his lungs, giving him a fresh burst of energy. His shape-shifting became so fluid, he could start an attack in human form with his sword and finish as a lion, raking his claws across a katoblepsrsquo;s snout.

The monsters kicked with their hooves. They breathed noxious gas and glared straight at Frank with their poisonous eyes. He should have died. He shoul

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The House of Hades
Page 19

He didnrsquo;t understand why, but he kept fighting until there was only one monster left.

Frank faced it with his sword drawn. He was out of breath, sweaty, and caked in monster dust, but he was unharmed.

The katobleps snarled. It must not have been the smartest monster. Despite the fact that several hundred of its brethren had just died, it did not back down.

ldquo;Mars!rdquo; Frank yelled. ldquo;Irsquo;ve proven myself. Now I need a snake!rdquo;

Frank doubted anyone had ever shouted those words before. It was kind of a weird request. He got no answer from the skies. For once, the voices in his head were silent.

The katobleps lost patience. It launched itself at Frank and left him no choice. He slashed upward. As soon as his blade hit the monster, the katobleps disappeared in a flash of blood-red light. When Frankrsquo;s vision cleared, a mottled brown Burmese python was coiled at his feet.

ldquo;Well done,rdquo; said a familiar voice.

Standing a few feet away was his dad, Mars, wearing a red beret and olive fatigues with the insignia of the Italian Special Forces, an assault rifle slung over his shoulder. His face was hard and angular, his eyes covered with dark sunglasses.

ldquo;Father,rdquo; Frank managed.

He couldnrsquo;t believe what hersquo;d just done. The terror started to catch up to him. He felt like sobbing, but he guessed that would not be a good idea in front of Mars.

ldquo;Itrsquo;s natural to feel fear.rdquo; The war godrsquo;s voice was surprisingly warm, full of pride. ldquo;All great warriors are afraid. Only the stupid and the delusional are not. But you faced your fear, my son. You did what you had to do, like Horatius. This was your bridge, and you defended it.rdquo;

ldquo;Imdash;rdquo; Frank wasnrsquo;t sure what to say. ldquo;Ihellip;I just needed a snake.rdquo;

A tiny smile tugged at Marsrsquo;s mouth. ldquo;Yes. And now you have one. Your bravery has united my forms, Greek and Roman, if only for a moment. Go. Save your friends. But hear me, Frank. Your greatest test is yet to come. When you face the armies of Gaea at Epirus, your leadershipmdash;rdquo;

Suddenly the god doubled over, clutching his head. His form flickered. His fatigues turned into a toga, then a bikerrsquo;s jacket and jeans. His rifle changed into a sword and then a rocket launcher.

ldquo;Agony!rdquo; Mars bellowed. ldquo;Go! Hurry!rdquo;

Frank didnrsquo;t ask questions. Despite his exhaustion, he turned into a giant eagle, snatched up the python in his massive claws, and launched himself into the air.

When he glanced back, a miniature mushroom cloud erupted from the middle of the bridge, rings of fire washing outward, and a pair of voicesmdash;Mars and Aresmdash;screamed, ldquo;Noooo!rdquo;

Frank wasnrsquo;t sure what had just happened, but he had no time to think about it. He flew over the citymdash;now completely empty of monstersmdash;and headed for the house of Triptolemus.

ldquo;You found one!rdquo; the farmer god exclaimed.

Frank ignored him. He stormed into La Casa Nera, dragging the python by its tail like a very strange Santa Claus bag, and dropped it next to the bed.

He knelt at Hazelrsquo;s side.

She was still alivemdash;green and shivering, barely breathing, but alive. As for Nico, he was still a corn plant.

ldquo;Heal them,rdquo; Frank said. ldquo;Now.rdquo;

Triptolemus crossed his arms. ldquo;How do I know the snake will work?rdquo;

Frank gritted his teeth. Since the explosion on the bridge, the voices of the war god had gone silent in his head, but he still felt their combined anger churning inside him. He felt physically different, too. Had Triptolemus gotten shorter?

ldquo;The snake is a gift from Mars,rdquo; Frank growled. ldquo;It will work.rdquo;

As if on cue, the Burmese python slithered over to the chariot and wrapped itself around the right wheel. The other snake woke up. The two serpents checked each other out, touching noses, then turned their wheels in unison. The chariot inched forward, its wings flapping.

ldquo;You see?rdquo; Frank said. ldquo;Now, heal my friends!rdquo;

Triptolemus tapped his chin. ldquo;Well, thank you for the snake, but Irsquo;m not sure I like your tone, demigod. Perhaps Irsquo;ll turn you intomdash;rdquo;

Frank was faster. He lunged at Trip and slammed him into the wall, his fingers locked around the godrsquo;s throat.

ldquo;Think about your next words,rdquo; Frank warned, deadly calm. ldquo;Or instead of beating my sword into a plowshare, I will beat it into your head.rdquo;

Triptolemus gulped. ldquo;You knowhellip;I think Irsquo;ll heal your friends.rdquo;

ldquo;Swear it on the River Styx.rdquo;

ldquo;I swear it on the River Styx.rdquo;

Frank released him. Triptolemus touched his throat, as if making sure it was still there. He gave Frank a nervous smile, edged around him, and scurried off to the front room. ldquo;Justmdash;just gathering herbs!rdquo;

Frank watched as the god picked leaves and roots and crushed them in a mortar. He rolled a pill-sized ball of green goop and jogged to Hazelrsquo;s side. He placed the gunk ball under Hazelrsquo;s tongue.

Instantly, she shuddered and sat up, coughing. Her eyes flew open. The greenish tint in her skin disappeared.

She looked around, bewildered, until she saw Frank. ldquo;Whatmdash;?rdquo;

Frank tackled her in a hug. ldquo;Yoursquo;re going to be fine,rdquo; he said fiercely. ldquo;Everything is fine.rdquo;

ldquo;Buthellip;rdquo; Hazel gripped his shoulders and stared at him in amazement. ldquo;Frank, what happened to you?rdquo;

ldquo;To me?rdquo; He stood, suddenly self-conscious. ldquo;I donrsquo;thellip;rdquo;

He looked down and realized what she meant. Triptolemus hadnrsquo;t gotten shorter. Frank was taller. His gut had shrunk. His chest seemed bulkier.

Frank had had growth spurts before. Once hersquo;d woken up two centimeters taller than when hersquo;d gone to sleep. But this was nuts. It was as if some of the dragon and lion had stayed with him when hersquo;d turned back to human.

ldquo;Uhhellip;I donrsquo;thellip;Maybe I can fix it.rdquo;

Hazel laughed with delight. ldquo;Why? You look amazing!rdquo;

ldquo;Imdash;I do?rdquo;

ldquo;I mean, you were handsome before! But you look older, and taller, and so distinguishedmdash;rdquo;

Triptolemus heaved a dramatic sigh. ldquo;Yes, obviously some sort of blessing from Mars. Congratulations, blah, blah, blah. Now, if wersquo;re done herehellip;?rdquo;

Frank glared at him. ldquo;Wersquo;re not done. Heal Nico.rdquo;

The farm god rolled his eyes. He pointed at the corn plant, and BAM! Nico di Angelo appeared in an explosion of corn silk.

Nico looked around in a panic. ldquo;Imdash;I had the weirdest nightmare about popcorn.rdquo; He frowned at Frank. ldquo;Why are you taller?rdquo;

ldquo;Everythingrsquo;s fine,rdquo; Frank promised. ldquo;Triptolemus was about to tell us how to survive the House of Hades. Werenrsquo;t you, Trip?rdquo;

The farm god raised his eyes to the ceiling, like, Why me, Demeter?

ldquo;Fine,rdquo; Trip said. ldquo;When you arrive at Epirus, you will be offered a chalice to drink from.rdquo;

ldquo;Offered by whom?rdquo; Nico asked.

ldquo;Doesnrsquo;t matter,rdquo; Trip snapped. ldquo;Just know that it is filled with deadly poison.rdquo;

Hazel shuddered. ldquo;So yoursquo;re saying that we shouldnrsquo;t drink it.rdquo;

ldquo;No!rdquo; Trip said. ldquo;You must drink it, or yoursquo;ll never be able to make it through the temple. The poison connects you to the world of the dead, lets you pass into the lower levels. The secret to surviving isrdquo;mdash;his eyes twinkledmdash;ldquo;barley.rdquo;

Frank stared at him. ldquo;Barley.rdquo;

ldquo;In the front room, take some of my special barley. Make it into little cakes. Eat these before you step into the House of Hades. The barley will absorb the worst of the poison, so it will affect you, but not kill you.rdquo;

ldquo;Thatrsquo;s it?rdquo; Nico demanded. ldquo;Hecate sent us halfway across Italy so you could tell us to eat barley?rdquo;

ldquo;Good luck!rdquo; Triptolemus sprinted across the room and hopped in his chariot. ldquo;And, Frank Zhang, I forgive you! Yoursquo;ve got spunk. If you ever change your mind, my offer is open. Irsquo;d love to see you get a degree in farming!rdquo;

ldquo;Yeah,rdquo; Frank muttered. ldquo;Thanks.rdquo;

The god pulled a lever on his chariot. The snake-wheels turned. The wings flapped. At the back of the room, the garage doors rolled open.

ldquo;Oh, to be mobile again!rdquo; Trip cried. ldquo;So many ignorant lands in need of my knowledge. I will teach them the glories of tilling, irrigation, fertilizing!rdquo; The chariot lifted off and zipped out of the house, Triptolemus shouting to the sky, ldquo;Away, my serpents! Away!rdquo;

ldquo;That,rdquo; Hazel said, ldquo;was very strange.rdquo;

ldquo;The glories of fertilizing.rdquo; Nico brushed some corn silk off his shoulder. ldquo;Can we get out of here now?rdquo;

Hazel put her hand on Frankrsquo;s shoulder. ldquo;Are you okay, really? You bartered for our lives. What did Triptolemus make you do?rdquo;

Frank tried to hold it together. He scolded himself for feeling so weak. He could face an army of monsters, but as soon as Hazel showed him kindness, he wanted to break down and cry. ldquo;Those cow monstershellip;the katoblepones that poisoned youhellip;I had to destroy them.rdquo;

ldquo;That was brave,rdquo; Nico said. ldquo;There must have been, what, six or seven left in that herd.rdquo;

ldquo;No.rdquo; Frank cleared his throat. ldquo;All of them. I killed all of them in the city.rdquo;

Nico and Hazel stared at him in stunned silence. Frank was afraid they might doubt him, or start to laugh. How many monsters had he killed on that bridgemdash;two hundred? Three hundred?

But he saw in their eyes that they believed him. They were children of the Underworld. Maybe they could sense the death and carnage hersquo;d unleashed.

Hazel kissed his cheek. She had to stand on her tiptoes to do it now. Her eyes were incredibly sad, as if she realized something had changed in Frankmdash;something much more important than the physical growth spurt.

Frank knew it too. He would never be the same. He just wasnrsquo;t sure if that was a good thing.

ldquo;Well,rdquo; Nico said, breaking the tension, ldquo;does anyone know what barley looks like?rdquo;

ANNABETH DECIDED THE MONSTERS wouldnrsquo;t kill her. Neither would the poisonous atmosphere, nor the treacherous landscape with its pits, cliffs, and jagged rocks.

Nope. Most likely she would die from an overload of weirdness that would make her brain explode.

First, she and Percy had had to drink fire to stay alive. Then they were attacked by a gaggle of vampires, led by a cheerleader Annabeth had killed two years ago. Finally, they were rescued by a Titan janitor named Bob who had Einstein hair, silver eyes, and wicked broom skills.

Sure. Why not?

They followed Bob through the wasteland, tracing the route of the Phlegethon as they approached the storm front of darkness. Every so often they stopped to drink firewater, which kept them alive, but Annabeth wasnrsquo;t happy about it. Her throat felt like she was constantly gargling with battery acid.

Her only comfort was Pe

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The House of Hades

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