Chapter Text
Nico leaned over the edge of the chasm, thrusting out his hand desperately, but he knew he was too far away to help.
Hazel was yelling for the others, but even if they heard her over all the chaos, they’d never make it in time.
Percy held onto a small ledge with one hand, the other gripping Annabeth’s wrist tightly. They both dangled at the edge of Tartarus and Nico knew there was nothing he could do to help them.
“Percy, let me go,” Annabeth croaked. “You can’t pull me up.”
She was right, a part of Nico realized. Percy couldn’t pull her up, nor could he keep them suspended for much longer. If he would let go of her hand, maybe—
“Never,” Percy told her.
Percy would never leave one of his friends like that. He was too good of a person, too loyal. If Nico was honest, he knew he wouldn’t have been willing to drop his friend to their death if he was in Percy’s position.
Percy looked up at Nico. His face was flushed red from the effort of hanging on to the ledge fifteen feet below. “The other side, Nico!” Percy called desperately. “We’ll see you there. Understand?”
Nico remembered what he had told the Argo II crew mere hours ago. We’d have to have a team fighting simultaneously on the Tartarus side, a team powerful enough to defeat a legion of monsters in their home territory. Nico’s eyes widened at Percy’s implication. “But—”
“Lead them there!” Percy shouted, his voice cracking. “Promise me! Promise me I’ll see you on the other side!”
“I—I promise,” Nico whispered.
Below them, a haunting voice laughed in the darkness. Sacrifices. Beautiful sacrifices to wake the goddess.
Percy let go of the tiny ledge, and he and Annabeth fell into the endless darkness.
Nico choked back a sob. He was gone. I had just got him back. And now he’s gone.
“Nico?” Hazel screamed. He heard her footsteps approaching, her cavalry sword swinging at her side. “They’re not—”
“They’re gone,” Nico said, his voice toneless.
He stared into the pit as he heard more footsteps approach.
“What happened?” Frank asked, out of breath.
“Where’s Percy? And Annabeth?” Jason asked.
“You’re too late!” Hazel snapped. “They fell. They’re…gone.”
Nico just took shallow, silent breaths. He had been a child of Hades in one of the deepest, darkest parts of the underworld, and he’d only barely survived.
“I can still— I can fly and go get them—”
“No,” Nico said, pulling himself to his feet. He raised his fist to his eyes discreetly to wipe away any tears. “They’re gone. You’ll just get sucked in too. We have to leave before the cavern collapses.”
“Nico’s right,” Hazel said. "There's nothing more we can do.”
Nico disappeared into the hull of the ship the second he boarded.
He needed to be alone.
He sat down on Percy’s bed in Percy’s cabin still wearing Percy’s navy shirt and blue jeans. He pulled Percy’s fluffy blue blanket around his shoulders. Percy was just here. Percy had just sat beside him on this very same bed. They had just been together hours ago. Percy had almost kissed him.
Percy had just fallen into Tartarus.
Nico flopped over on his side and pulled the blanket over his head. He fumbled around with Percy’s other things— the duvet, the comforter, the sheet— until he could wrap them securely around himself.
He lay face down on Percy’s pillow, blankets drawn tight, and allowed himself to cry.
He had finally gotten back to Percy. Finally admitted his true feelings. Finally been held in the arms of the boy he loved. Only for Percy to fall into Tartarus.
He tried not to think of the horrors he had experienced, tried not to apply those very same scenarios to Percy and Annabeth. Nyx, Wolves, Hellhounds, Titans, Giants. Nico hadn’t even escaped from Tartarus. He’d wandered, pathetic and alone, only to be caught by Ephialtes and Otis.
He had survived on the whim of a giant. The only reason he had survived was so he could be used as bait. If Percy and Annabeth got caught—
Nico broke out in a sob.
He should have jumped in after them. Maybe together, two sons of the big three and the daughter of Athena, maybe they could have fought their way to the doors. Maybe then Percy would be able to survive.
It’s all my fault.
Nico groaned and squeezed his eyes shut.
The cabin door creaked open. Nico hadn’t even realized he’d fallen asleep.
“Nico?” Hazel called. She exhaled sadly. “Oh, Nico…”
The bed creaked when she sat down beside him. She pulled the blankets away from Nico’s face.
“We’ve been looking all over for you for the past hour,” Hazel said. She brushed a strand of Nico’s hair behind his ear and dabbed at his eyes with a tissue. “We didn’t know where you went, we thought you had disappeared. Jason wasn’t even sure if you even boarded.”
“I just needed to be alone,” Nico said. He sat up, shucking the blankets off to the side, and swung his legs over the edge of the bed. “I’m fine now—”
“You can rest if you need. I already told Leo to sail towards Epirus, so we can find the Doors of Death—”
The Doors of Death.
The warning. Hades had given him a warning. He’d been so distracted by Percy, Percy, Percy that he’s forgotten to tell Hazel.
“The Doors of Death,” Nico exclaimed. He reached out and gripped her arm tightly like a man possessed. “We have to meet them there—”
“Yeah, I know, I told Leo—”
“No, no, listen to me. On our side, the doors will be guarded. A powerful sorceress and a giant bathed in shadows. They guard the doors,” Nico cautioned. “The same sorceress who breathed life into the Labyrinth. The giant, he— he—”
“Alright, we can go and tell the others—”
“No,” Nico hissed. His grip tightened. “You can’t tell the others. Not yet. Their courage is already stretched to the limit.”
“Nico—”
“Father warned me that only one of us, you or me, will be able to make it to the doors. Let it be me,” he pleaded. “Let me be the one to reach the doors. If anything happens to you—” I would never be able to forgive myself. I can’t handle losing another sister.
“Alright, alright,” Hazel said. “I promise. Just let go of my arm— your talons are scratching the shit out of me.”
Nico released her instantly. He hadn’t trimmed his nails since before Tartarus, and his ‘talons’ had grown quite long.
“Sorry,” he whispered.
“It’s okay, I know you’re taking the whole Percy thing harder than the rest of us,” Hazel said. She smiled encouragingly, like she was prompting him.
Nico just stared at her quizzically.
“You’ve known him longer than anyone else,” Hazel suggested. “And…”
“And?”
Hazel frowned.
“And… Percy showed me the letter you wrote?”
“Oh,” Nico said. The letter. The letter in which I confessed my undying love.
“I don’t think anyone else knows. He seemed real cagey about the letter, but he showed it to me while you were missing cause he thought it would help. I’m sorry for invading your privacy like that,” Hazel admitted.
“You’re okay with it?” Nico asked.
Hazel glared at him. “Of course I am.”
“Okay, it’s just that you’re from the forties and—”
“You’re from the forties," Hazel pointed out. “Are you okay with me being black?”
“Touche.”
Nico had been dodging rocks for days, and he was starting to get tired of these damn mountain gods. The numina montanum, as Jason had called them, seemingly fascinated, or ourae, in Greek, as Nico had countered.
“Hard to port!” Nico ordered from the foremast. Despite everything, he did enjoy putting his knowledge of pirating terms to good use.
Back at the helm, Leo yanked the wheel all the way to the left. The Argo II veered to the side, its aerial oars slashing through the clouds.
Nico didn’t calculate where the boulder would hit after the ship’s course had been altered.
CRACK!
The foremast collapsed—sending the sail, spars, and Nico all crashing to the deck. The boulder tumbled off into the fog, probably to be launched at them by another ourae.
“Stupid fucking rocks,” Nico growled as he started to pick himself up. He hated to sound like the octogenarian he was, but damn did his back hurt.
“Nico!” Hazel scrambled over to him as Leo brought the ship level.
“I’m fine,” Nico lied, kicking folds of grey canvas off his legs.
She helped him up, and they stumbled to the bow.
Nico peered into the distance, standing at the summit was a mountain god. He bellowed something and 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.
“Stupid rock gods!” Leo hollered. “That’s the third time I’ve had to replace that damn mast! You think they grow on trees?”
Nico frowned. “Masts are from trees,” he noted.
“That’s not the point!”
Leo snatched up one of his controls and spun it in a circle. A few feet away, a trapdoor opened in the deck from which a Celestial Bronze cannon rose. 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 angry roars of mountain gods.
“Ha!” Leo yelled. “That’ll teach ‘em!”
Nico yelled, “Get us out of here!” Celebrate later!
“Those stupid fucking rock losers know not to mess with Leo Valdez now,” he muttered as 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 they’d been doing for the past two days.
Nico pulled himself to his feet and began to pick mast splinters out of his arms.
Leo punched buttons on the ship’s console. “Well, that was fucking sucktastic,” he said. “Should I wake the others?”
“They need rest,” Hazel said. “We’ll have to figure out another way on our own.” She shook her head in exasperation.
“Another way,” Leo muttered. He tapped his index finger against his tool belt. “Do you see one?”
“It’s our fault,” Hazel said suddenly. “Nico’s and mine. The numina can sense us.”
Nico gripped the hilt of his Stygian iron sword. “Earth spirits don’t like children of the Underworld— we get under their skin, literally,” Nico admitted. “But I think the ourae could sense this ship anyway. After all, we’re carrying the Athena Parthenos. That thing is like a magical beacon.”
Leo traced his finger down the map of Italy, considering alternate routes. “So crossing the mountains is out. The problem is, they go a long way in either direction.”
“We could go by sea,” Hazel suggested. “Sail around the southern tip of Italy.”
“That’s really out of the way,” Nico said. “Plus, we don’t have…” His voice cracked. “You know…our sea expert, Percy.”
“What about continuing north?” Hazel asked. “There’s got to be a break in the mountains, or something.”
Leo fiddled with the bronze Archimedes sphere that he’d installed on the console—his newest and most dangerous toy. It conjured up a three-dimensional hologram of the mountain range. Hazel and Nico exchanged a look: modern technology.
“I dunno.” Leo pinched the hologram to zoom out. “I don’t see any good passes to the north. But I like that idea better than backtracking south. I’m fucking done with Rome.”
“Amen to that,” Hazel muttered.
“Whatever we do,” Nico said, “we have to hurry. Every day that Annabeth and Percy are in Tartarus…”
“Maybe we should wake the others. This decision affects us all.”
“No,” Hazel said. “We can find a solution.”
“We need some creative thinking,” she said. “Another way to cross those mountains, or a way to hide ourselves from the numina.”
Nico sighed. “If I was on my own, I could shadow-travel. But that won’t work for an entire ship. And honestly, I’m not sure I have the strength to even transport myself anymore.”
“I could maybe use this thing to rig up some kind of camouflage,” Leo said, “like a smoke screen to hide us in the clouds.” He didn’t sound very enthusiastic.
Nico couldn’t accept a loss. Percy needed him.
Dad, Hades, please, if you’re listening, I could really use a favor…
“Arion,” Hazel exclaimed.
“What?” Nico asked, following her gaze to a dust cloud speeding across the hillside.
Leo pumped his fist let out a happy whoop as the dust cloud grew near. He leaned eagerly over the railing and Nico was briefly worried that he might go overboard. “It’s her horse, man!” Leo exclaimed. “You missed that whole part. We haven’t seen him since Kansas!”
Hazel laughed at Leo’s antics. “We have to meet him,” she said. “He’s here to help.”
“Yeah, okay.” Leo scratched the back of his head nervously. “But, uh, we talked about not landing the ship on the ground anymore, remember? You know, Gaea wanting to destroy us and all that shit.”
“Just get me close, and I’ll use the rope ladder. I think Arion wants to tell me something.”
Hazel descended the rope ladder. Nico and Leo leaned over the edge of the ship as she climbed. They exchanged a worried glance.
“She has a horse?” Nico asked.
“Yeah, apparently she picked him up on her quest with Frank and Percy. He’s fast as hell and eats gold,” Leo explained.
“Well, Hazel has an endless supply of that,” Nico said.
He glanced back down at his sister, more than a hundred feet beneath him, cradling a horse's head in her arms.
She did say she liked horses. Nico recalled the tour of Rome they had been given when Hazel had graduated from Lupa’s wolf training. Praetor Jason Grace had given them a tour of the camp and the city, and Hazel had specifically requested to see the stables. She had never seen a Pegasus before— she was so excited. Nico had to wait outside. Living animals had never liked him much.
“What’s taking so long?” Leo asked him, after a few minutes of waiting.
“Hazel!” Nico called down from the ship. “What’s going on?”
“It’s fine! Arion wants to take me somewhere.”
Nico exchanged a nervous look with Leo.
“Uh…” Leo pointed north. “Please tell me he’s not taking you into that?”
Nico hadn’t even noticed the storm brewing on the horizon. A spiral touched down far off in the distance. Nico had never liked storms, they reminded him of his uncle, Zeus.
“I’ll be okay!” she called up to Nico and Leo. “Stay put and wait for me.”
“Wait for how long?” Nico asked. “What if you don’t come back?”
“Don’t worry, I will,” she promised. Nico hoped it was true. She spurred Arion, and they shot across the countryside, heading straight for the growing tornado.
Leo leaned on the railing casually and smiled at Nico. “So, come here often?” he asked.
Nico blinked. “What?”
Leo looked away. “Nevermind. Just messin’ with you.”
“Alright…”
Nico leaned over the edge of the ship, searching the horizon for Hazel and her horse. The storm still loomed and Nico’s stomach turned from knowing that Hazel was riding toward that, or worse, already inside.
Leo broke the silence.
“You’re more in tune with underworldy stuff than Hazel,” he started. “You don’t happen to know anything about Percy and Annabeth, do you?”
“They’re in Tartarus,” Nico stated bluntly, as if somehow Leo had missed that part. “It's out of my jurisdiction.”
“Can you tell if they’re… you know, alive?” Leo asked.
“No,” Nico admitted. He’d tried, concentrating on the shadows deep within Tartarus to find a mortal soul. He’d found nothing.
“Can you, like, send a zombie down after them as a messenger?” Leo asked.
“No,” Nico snapped. “I can’t do anything.” Nico took a deep breath, trying not to get too angry at his teammate. He’s only asking because he cares. “I can’t do anything but hope they can make it out.”
“Sorry for asking,” Leo muttered.
“It’s fine,” Nico replied, a bit too quickly.
They waited in anxious silence until Hazel returned.
“What happened?” Leo asked when Hazel finally climbed aboard the Argo II.
Her knees buckled as soon as she stepped foot on the deck. Nico and Leo grabbed her arms and guided her to the steps of the foredeck so she could sit for a moment.
“I met Hecate,” she managed.
Apparently, Hecate had informed Hazel of alternate paths to reach Epirus. Gaia’s forces expecting the crew to backtrack South to Rome, mountain gods destroying the ship should they cross the Apennines in the east, failure to stop Gaia should they take the statue West to America.
The fourth and preferred option: a secret Northern pass through the Apennine Mountains, pit stops in Bologna and Venice, and an extreme detour that could take them to Epirus. The only option where Percy and Annabeth survived.
“Hazel, you met Hecate at a crossroads,” Nico began, cautious. “That’s…that’s something many demigods don’t survive. And the ones who do are never the same. Are you sure you’re—”
“I’m fine,” she insisted. But she still had that spooked look in her eye. Something in her had changed, even if Hazel wasn’t aware of it.
“I’m only worried because I care about you,” Nico reminded her.
“I know,” she said.
“What if she's tricking us?” Leo pointed out. “This route could be a trap.”
“Everything is a trap to you,” Hazel sighed, jerking her head at Nico. Leo frowned and looked down at his boots. Hazel shook her head. “If it was a trap, she would’ve made the northern route sound tempting. Believe me, she didn’t.”
The northern route is tempting, Nico wanted to point out. I’m very tempted by anything that can get Percy back to me safely.
Leo pulled a calculator out of his tool belt and crunched the numbers. “That’s…at least three hundred miles out of our way to get to Venice. Then we’d have to backtrack down the East Coast of the Adriatic. And you said something about baloney dwarfs?”
“Dwarfs in Bologna,” Hazel said. “I guess Bologna is a city. But why we need to find dwarfs…I have no clue— Hecate mentioned some sort of treasure to help us with the quest.”
“Huh,” Leo said. “I mean, I’m all about treasure, but—”
“It’s our best option,” Nico asserted. “We have to make up for lost time, travel as fast as we can. Percy— and Annabeth’s— lives depend on it.”
“Fast?” Leo grinned, his eyes lighting up like a fireplace or a collapsing star. “I can do fast.” He hurried to the console and started flipping switches and pressing buttons.
Nico took Hazel’s arm and guided her out of earshot.
“What else did Hecate say?” Nico whispered hastily. “Anything about—” The Witch and The Giant?
“I can’t,” Hazel cut him off. “I’ll tell you later,” she promised, her voice trembling. “Right now, we should rest while we can. Tonight, we cross the Apennines.”
Nico, Leo, Hazel, Frank, and Jason all sat at the dining hall. Jason seated himself at the head of the table, with Leo on his right side. Hazel sat at the opposing head of the table, with Frank on her right side.
Nico slouched in the chair to Hazel’s left, across from Frank and beside Leo.
He was exhausted, and could hardly keep his eyes open. Earlier, after they had crossed the mountains, Nico had dozed off only to have troubling dreams about Percy and The House of Hades.
“So, now that we’re all here,” Jason announced. “I wanted to address the issue of the numina. We couldn’t keep following the mountainpass without sustaining serious damage to the ship. Hazel has started us on an alternate route, courtesy of Hecate.”
There was a slight bit of resentment in Jason’s words, likely as a result of being excluded from the decision.
“We’ll go through a secret mountain pass and loop around the southern tip of Italy,” Hazel explained. “It’s a bit out of the way but it's faster and safer than the other routes she showed me.”
“This, of course, will lead us to the next big problem: The House of Hades. Nico?” Jason prompted.
“I communed with the dead last night,” Nico announced, which wasn’t a total lie. He had talked to the dead— in his dreams. “I was able to learn more about what we’ll face. 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.”
“Sounds like Dia de los Muertos,” Leo noted, leaning his chair on its back legs and propping his feet up on the table. “My Aunt Rosa took that stuff crazy seriously. Dragged me to the spooky ass cemetery and shit. No bueno.”
Nico glared at him, not pleased with the close proximity between Leo’s nasty ass boots and Nico’s breakfast.
“Chinese culture has that too— ancestor worship, sweeping graves in the spring. Your Aunt would’ve gotten along with my grandmother," Frank said.
“Yeah,” Leo said, rolling his eyes. “I’m sure they would have been best buds.”
“Plenty of cultures have seasonal traditions to honor the dead,” Nico interrupted. “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. You’d work your way through different levels of tunnels, leaving offerings and drinking special potions.”
“Special potions?” Leo mumbled. “Sounds delish.”
Jason sighed, a slight smile on his face, like he couldn’t not find Leo’s jokes funny. “Nico, go on.”
“The pilgrims believed that each level of the temple brought you closer to the Underworld, until the dead would appear to you. If they were pleased with your offerings, they would answer your questions, maybe even tell you the future,” Nico said.
Frank raised his hand like an obedient schoolboy. “And… uh, hypothetically— if the spirits weren’t pleased?” He asked.
Nico shrugged noncommittally. “Some Pilgrims found nothing, some went insane or died after leaving the temple. Others lost their way in the tunnels and were never seen again. Fortunately, we are demigods, not pilgrims. ”
“The point,” Jason started, “is that Nico found some information that might help us.”
“The ghost I spoke to last night… he was a former priest of Hecate. He confirmed what Hecate told Hazel yesterday at the crossroads. In the first war with the giants, she fought for the gods. She slayed one of the giants— the one who’d been designed as her opposite,” Nico explained. “A giant named Clytius.”
“Tall, dark skin, quiet,” Leo guessed out loud. “Wrapped in shadows.”
“How did you know that?” Hazel asked.
“Kinda had a dream,” he replied casually.
Everyone waited. Then they gave Leo a pointed look when it became clear he wasn’t looking forward to sharing.
“Any chance I can skip my turn?” Leo joked. “It’s a bit too early in the morning for show and tell, you know.”
“Giant. Dream. Now,” Nico ordered.
“Sure thing, Donnie Darko,” Leo muttered sheepishly. The front legs of his chair made contact with the floor and Leo took his feet off the table. “I was running around camp half blood, as usual— takes a lot of exercise to maintain this bod— and I was getting chased by this Shadow Dude.”
Leo took a deep breath. “The camp was in ruins. Burnt cabins, burnt bodies, lots of burnt stuff. I ran into Octavian and Gaia spoke to me through him— my two least favorite people, not terribly fond of that compilation. I kept running and I reached Thalia’s tree. It was overlooking a cliff and there was this spooky woman who told me I had to choose between ‘the cave or the cliff.’ I told her she was crazy. And then Shadow Dude was about to punch me but I woke up.”
Everyone stared at him.
“Can I get a round of applause or something? I know I’m like super great at public speaking but the silence is eating at my enormous ego, so…”
“Do you ever take anything seriously?” Nico asked him.
“I am taking this seriously, Bela Lugosi,” Leo retorted.
“I’m going to take that as a compliment, for your sake,” Nico hissed.
“Did you actually get that reference?”
“So the ‘Shadow Dude’ is Clytius,” Jason interrupted. “I suppose he’ll be waiting for us, guarding the Doors of Death.”
“And the woman?” Frank asked.
“She’s my problem,” Hazel cut in. “Hecate mentioned a formidable enemy in the House of Hades— a witch who couldn’t be defeated… except by me, using magic.”
“Do you know magic?” Leo asked, excited.
“Not yet,” Hazel mumbled.
“Ah. Any idea who she is?”
“Only that… Only that she won’t be easy to defeat,” Hazel sighed.
“But there is some good news,” Nico announced. “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,” Nico explained. He looked pointedly at Leo. “In other words, it’s Leo’s problem.”
Leo sank down in his chair awkwardly, as though, for once, he did not enjoy being the center of attention. “Oh,” he said. “Okay. Awesomesauce.”
“It’s a good lead,” Jason encouraged. “At least we know how to kill the giant, so that’s one problem solved. And this sorceress…well, if Hecate believes Hazel can defeat her, then so do I.”
Hazel blushed at the compliment. “Now we just have to reach the House of Hades, battle our way through Gaea’s forces—”
“Plus a bunch of ghosts,” Nico interrupted. “The spirits in the temple won’t be friendly.”
“---and find the doors of death,” Hazel concluded. “Assuming we can arrive at the same time as Percy and Annabeth and rescue them.”
“We can do it,” Frank asserted. “They’re our friends: we have to save them.”
Leo glanced up, swallowed nervously, and took a deep breath.
“So, with this detour,” he started. “I’m estimating four or five days to arrive at Epirus— assuming no delays for, you know, monster attacks and stuff.”
“Yeah, those never happen,” Jason muttered.
“Hecate told you that Gaea was planning her big Wake Up party on August first, right?” Leo asked, looking at Hazel. “The Feast of Something-or-other?”
“Spes. The goddess of hope,” Hazel answered. “Talk about hopeless.”
“Theoretically, that leaves us enough time,” Jason concluded. “It’s only July Fifth. We should be able to close the Doors of Death, find the giants’ HQ in Greece, and stop them from waking Gaea before August first.”
Deadlines and obstacles. Was this how Percy felt when he had been searching for Nico?
“Theoretically. But I’d still like to know how we go through the House of Hades without going insane or dying.”
We’re worrying about going insane or dying in the House of Hades, while Percy and Annabeth are facing insanity incarnate and painful death every second in Tartarus…
“It’s July Fifth. Oh, jeez, I hadn’t even thought of that…”
Percy and Annabeth fell on July First. The Kalends of Juno. It’s been four days. Are they even alive? They might not have even survived the fall itself let alone the horrors awaiting them…
“Hey man, it’s cool, you’re Canadian, right. I didn’t expect you to get me a Fourth of July gift or anything…unless you wanted to. Wouldn’t be opposed to some firecrackers.”
Fire. The Phlegthon. Would they even realize that its burning water was the only thing that could sustain them? There is nothing down there to eat or drink. Except maybe, monsters, but no one is dumb enough to try and eat those…
“It’s not that. My grandmother… She always told me that seven was an unlucky number. It was a ghost number. She didn’t like it when I told her there would be seven demigods on our quest. And July is the seventh month.”
We’ve lost two of our seven members to Hell itself. That leaves five heroes, plus me and Coach Hedge. I’m too weak to do much of anything and the Coach is too unpredictable to be of much help. How are we possibly going to make it?
“Yeah, but… But that’s just a coincidence, right?”
Nothing in the life of a demigod is ever a coincidence. That's why we’ve lost two of our most valuable team members right when we needed them most. The fates are always toying with us…
“Back in China, in the old days, people called the seventh month the ghost month— that’s when the spirit world and the human world were closest. The living and the dead could go back and forth. Tell me it’s a coincidence we’re searching for the Doors of Death during the ghost month.”
Ghost month. Ghost ship. Ghost Heroes. We’re already dead without Percy and Annabeth, just counting down the seconds until Gaia murders us all…
“Let’s focus on the things we can deal with. We’re getting close to Bologna. Maybe we’ll get more answers once we find those dwarfs that Hecate—”
The ship lurched with a force that knocked Nico out of his thoughts and his chair. A burning pain thrashed the side of his skull. Had he hit his head on the dining table? What was that?
“Nico!” Hazel shouted, her voice aching with concern.
There were other voices too.
“What–?” “Look!” “Not possible.” “No!” “Piper!” “Monkey!”
He heard Hazel's voice, again, rather close by: “Not monkeys. I think those are dwarfs.”
“Stealing my stuff!” Leo protested.
Several footsteps stomped up the stairs quickly.
Hazel called after them: “Go! I’ll take care of Nico!”
Nico groaned, rubbing at the side of his head.
“I’m fine,” Nico lied.
Piper, Hazel, and Nico stood on the deck, awaiting their friends’ return. Coach Hedge had gone to take a shower to get all the duct tape residue out of his fur and Frank Zhang had gone to his quarters to quell the migraine brought on by a flash-grenade.
“What the hell happened to your pants?” Nico asked, when Leo boarded the ship.
“Nunya,” Leo snapped, tugging his jeans up to his waist with his left hand.
“His zipper got stolen by dwarfs,” Jason answered with a smile, gliding aboard the ship.
“Well, Jason got snagged by a nude statue of Poseidon,” Leo informed the crew, jerking his head in Jason’s direction.
“You got the tool belt back, at least,” Piper pointed out. “Did you manage to get my knife?”
“Yes,” Leo said. Jason passed the bronze blade to Piper. “And I got the treasure Hecate mentioned— the dwarfs lifted this book off of some minor god. In Venice.”
“And what’s that thing?” Hazel asked, gesturing at a strange mechanical device in Leo’s arms.
“Recompense,” Leo replied. “An apology for snatching my zipper.”
“But what is it?” Nico asked, curiously. It looked ancient. “Other than a hunk of junk, of course.”
“Ha, ha,” Leo mocked. “It’s mine is what it is. And you don’t even get to look at it.” Leo stuck his tongue out and hid the device behind his back. Unfortunately, hiding the device from Nico’s view required two hands, which meant he wasn’t able to hold up his pants.
Leo’s jeans fell to the ground, pooling around his ankles.
Instead of beholding a weird mechanical device, Nico got to behold something else: Leo’s blue Superman boxers.
“Motherfucker,” Leo groaned.
Memories of home washed over Nico as they docked in Venice. Though, he couldn’t seem to recall the concerning number of shaggy cows that occupied the streets.
“What are those things?” Hazel asked, frowning and scrunching her brow.
“The mortals think they’re stray dogs,” Jason noted.
“My dad shot a film in Venice once,” Piper said. “I remember him telling me there were dogs everywhere. He said Venetians love dogs.”
“But what are they?” Frank asked, repeating Hazel’s initial question. “They look like…starving brahmans with sheepdog hair.”
“Maybe they’re completely harmless,” Leo suggested. “They’re ignoring the mortals.”
“Harmless!” Gleeson Hedge laughed. “Valdez, how many harmless monsters have we met? We should just aim the ballistae and see what happens!”
“Let's not,” Leo said.
“We’ll have to walk through them and hope they’re peaceful,” Frank said. “It’s the only way we’re going to track down the owner of that book.”
Leo pulled the aforementioned book from his tool belt. It was a leather-bound manual that Leo had topped with a sticky note with the address the dwarfs in Bologna had given him. “La Casa Nera,” Leo read. “Calle Frezzeria.”
“What does that mean?” Frank asked.
“It means The Nera House, and Calle means street. I have no clue what a Freezer-ia is,” Leo explained.
“The Black House,” Nico translated, instinctively. “It’s Italian, not Spanish. Nera means Black. Frezzeria is the street.”
Frank jumped at Nico’s voice. Apparently Nico had snuck up on him.
“You speak Italian?” Frank asked.
Nico shot him a warning look. Now is not the time.
“Frank is right,” Nico admitted. “We have to find that house. And the only way to do so is to walk the city. Venice is a maze. We’ll just have to risk the crowds and those…whatever they are.”
“Maybe I should stay on board,” Jason suggested. “Lots of venti in that storm last night. If they decide to attack the ship… again…”
Coach Hedge grunted. “Well, I’m out, too. If you softhearted cupcakes are going to stroll through Venice without even whacking those furry things on the head, forget it. I don’t like boring expeditions.”
“It’s okay, Coach,” Leo grinned. “We still have to repair the foremast. Then I need your help in the engine room. I’ve got an idea for a new installation.”
“Well…” Piper shifted her feet. “Whoever goes should be good with animals. I, uh…I’ll admit I’m not great with cows.”
“I’ll go,” Frank volunteered.
Leo shoved the leather-bound book at him. “Awesome,” he said. “If you come across a hardware store, could you get me some two-by-fours and a gallon of tar?”
“Leo,” Hazel chided, “it’s not a shopping trip.”
“I’ll go with Frank,” Nico stated.
“Uh…you’re good with animals?” Frank asked him.
Nico smiled. “Not at all, most animals hate me. They can sense death. But there’s something about this city…Lots of death, restless spirits, stuff like that. If I go, I may be able to keep them at bay. Besides, as you noticed, I speak Italian.”
“Lots of death, huh?” Leo joked. “Personally, I’m trying to avoid even small amounts of death, but you do you!”
“I’ll go too,” Hazel decided. She slipped her arm through Frank’s and Nico’s, linking them like a chain. “Three is the best number for a demigod quest, right?”
Nico stared at the canals, pushing childhood memories of his mother and sister to the back of his mind. “All right, then. Let’s go find the owner of that book.”
If anyone asked, Nico would answer that he was navigating based on his memories of the city’s landscape, not in an effort to distance himself from the canal.
Nico turned onto a smaller street, successfully banishing the canal from sight. Ahead of them was a small plaza lined with five-story buildings. The area was strangely deserted except for a dozen shaggy cow creatures sniffing around an old stone well.
Nico stopped. “There,” he said, pointing.
“A lot of cows in one place,” Frank said.
“Yeah, but look,” Nico said. “Just past that archway.” At the far end of the plaza, a stone archway carved with lions led into a narrow street. Beyond the arch, one of the town houses was painted black.
“La Casa Nera,” Frank guessed.
“I don’t like that plaza,” Hazel mumbled. “It feels…cold.”
“That’s because this neighborhood is filled with lemures,” Nico explained.
“Lemurs?” Frank asked nervously. “I’m guessing you don’t mean the furry little guys from Madagascar?”
“Angry ghosts,” Nico said. “They go back all the way to Roman times. They hang around a lot of Italian cities, but I’ve never felt so many in one place. My mom told me…” He hesitated, not wanting to let the memories plague him. “She used to tell me stories about the ghosts of Venice.”
“Your mom was Italian?” Frank confirmed. “Was she from Venice?”
Nico nodded. “She met my dad, Hades, here, back in the late 1920s. As World War Two got closer, she fled to America with my sister and me. I mean… my other sister, Bianca. I don’t remember much about Italy,” he lied, “but I can still speak the language.”
“That must’ve been hard on your mom,” Frank said. “I guess we’ll do anything for someone we love.”
“Yeah,” Nico said bitterly. “I guess we will.” His childhood memories of his mother were swiftly replaced by memories of Percy. Meeting Percy at Westover Hall, eating birthday cake on Percy’s fire escape, taking Percy to the River Styx…
“So, the lemures…” Frank asked. “How do we avoid them?”
“Already on it,” Nico said. “I’m sending out signals that they should stay away and ignore us. Hopefully that’s enough. Otherwise…things could get messy.”
“Let’s get going,” Hazel suggested.
They were skirting the well in the middle of the square, trying to give the cows distance, when Hazel stumbled on a loose piece of cobblestone. Frank caught her, but several of the big shaggy grey beasts turned to look at them. The creatures made deep throbbing sounds in their throats like angry foghorns.
Mooooo yourself, Nico thought.
“Nice cows,” Frank murmured. He positioned himself slowly between Hazel and Nico and the monsters. “Guys, I’m thinking we should back out of here slowly,” he told them.
“I’m such a klutz,” Hazel whispered. “Sorry.”
“It’s not your fault,” Nico said. “Look at your feet.” Thick vines were emerging from the broken down grout and extending themselves toward Hazel’s feet.
“These roots seem to like demigods,” Frank noted.
Hazel’s hand drifted to her sword hilt. “And the cow creatures like the roots,” she agreed.
The entire herd was now looking in their direction, making ugly foghorn growls and stamping their enormous hooves.
“Don’t meet their eyes,” Frank warned. “I’ll distract them. You two back up slowly toward that black house.”
The creatures tensed, ready to attack. “Never mind,” Frank said. “Run!”
Nico and Hazel ran, Hazel grabbing Nico by the hand and sprinting toward the arch. Unfortunately, a pair of cows now stood beneath the arch. Nico raised his sword just as the cows raised their heads.
Hazel caught a faceful of green gas— she staggered back into Nico.
He pulled his sister behind him, and slashed at the monsters with his styngian iron blade. They fell easily, dissolving into masses of shadow that stained the walkway.
Hazel’s knees buckled. He tugged her limp body closer to the arch, propping her up against it. He felt her neck for a pulse— faint, but present.
When Nico glanced back at Frank, who was now a full-grown lion. He roared ferociously and sprang from the middle of the herd, landing on top of the old stone well.
“Frank! Frank!” Nico called desperately.
Frank ran toward them, shifting back into his human self, forgetting about the monster herd behind him. He rushed past Nico and grabbed Hazel’s shoulders. Her head slumped against her chest.
“She got hit by green gas— right in her face,” Nico said guiltily. He was vaguely aware of his own breathing: panicked and heavy. “I—I wasn’t fast enough.”
“We need to get her back to the ship,” Frank said. The cow monster herd prowled cautiously just beyond the archway. They bellowed and from nearby streets more monsters answered.
“We’ll never make it on foot,” Nico said. “Frank, turn into a giant eagle. Don’t worry about me. Get her back to the Argo II!”
“Your friends can’t help you,” a voice spoke. “They don’t know the cure.”
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.
“Can you cure her?” Frank asked.
“Of course,” the man said. “But you’d better hurry inside. I think you’ve angered every katobleps in Venice.” As soon as their host threw the bolts, the cow monsters bellowed and slammed into the door, making it shudder on its hinges. “Oh, they can’t get in,” the man promised. “You’re safe now!”
“Safe?” Frank demanded. “Hazel is dying!”
Their host frowned as if he didn’t appreciate Frank ruining his good mood. “Yes, yes. Bring her this way.”
Frank carried Hazel farther into the building.
“Set your friend here,” said the man. Frank placed Hazel gently on the bed. She was completely limp, her complexion slowly turning a greenish tint.
“What were those cow things?” Frank demanded. “What did they do to her?”
“Katoblepones,” said their host. “Singular: katobleps. In English, it means down-looker. Called that because—”
“They’re always looking down,” Nico interrupted. “Right. I remember reading about them.”
Frank glared at him. “Now you remember?” he growled.
“I, uh…used to play this stupid card game when I was younger. Mythomagic. The katobleps was one of the monster cards,” Nico explained, hurriedly.
Frank blinked. “I played Mythomagic. I never saw that card.”
“It was in the Africanus Extreme expansion deck,” Nico stated.
“Oh.”
Their host cleared his throat. “Are you two done, ah, geeking out, as they say?”
“Right, sorry,” Nico muttered. “Anyway, katoblepones have poison breath and a poison gaze. I thought they only lived in Africa.”
The man in denim shrugged. “That’s their native land. They were accidentally imported to Venice hundreds of years ago. You’ve heard of Saint Mark?”
Nico nodded.
“Saints? They’re not part of Roman mythology,” Frank said.
“Not the pagan mythology, no, but Saint Mark is the patron saint of this city. He died in Egypt, oh, a long time ago. When the Venetians became powerful…well, the relics of saints were a big tourist attraction back in the Middle Ages. The Venetians decided to steal Saint Mark’s remains and bring them to their big church of San Marco. They smuggled out his body in a barrel of pickled pig parts.”
“That’s…disgusting,” Frank said.
“Yes,” the man agreed with a smile. “The point is, you can’t do something stupid like that and not have consequences. They unintentionally smuggled something else out of Egypt—the katoblepones. They came aboard that ship and have been breeding like rats ever since. They love the magical poison roots that grow here—swampy, foul-smelling plants that creep up from the canals. It makes their breath even more poisonous! Usually the monsters ignore mortals, but demigods…especially demigods who get in their way—”
“Got it,” Frank snapped. “Can you cure her?”
The man shrugged. “Possibly.”
“Possibly?” Frank put his hand under Hazel’s nose. The readings must not have been good, because he looked at Nico. “Please tell me she’s doing that death-trance thing, like you did in the bronze jar.”
Nico grimaced. “I don’t know if Hazel can do that. Her dad is technically Pluto, not Hades, so —”
“Hades!” cried their host. He backed away, staring at Nico with distaste. “So that’s what I smell. Children of the Underworld? If I’d known that, I would never have let you in!”
Frank rose to his feet. “Hazel is a good person. You promised you would help her!”
“I did no such thing.”
“She’s my sister,” Nico growled, drawing his sword. “I don’t know who you are, but if you can cure her, you will, or I will—”
“Oh, blah, blah, blah!” The man waved his hand and Nico’s vision went dark.
He blinked, trying to force the darkness from his vision.
When his sight returned, he was graced with a flat-screen television hanging above a blazing fireplace.
He was sitting on a couch. A plastic blue bowl of Popcorn sat on the coffee table in front of him. Salty, buttery, smelling so sweet. There was an arm draped over his shoulder casually.
He glanced up at the person sitting beside him. He locked eyes with Percy. Percy.
“Percy,” Nico gasped, startled.
“Yeah, Neeks?” Percy responded cooly.
“You’re here,” Nico stated.
“I told you I wouldn’t let you get away from me again,” Percy laughed. “Did you not believe me?” Percy’s gaze wasn’t accusing, just fond, but it struck Nico as odd. Nico looked deep into Percy’s dark brown eyes.
“You’re not real,” Nico growled. He scrambled backward, trying to get away from what was most definitely not Percy. “You’re in Tartarus, or-or- already dead— this isn’t real!”
“Then pretend,” Percy suggested. His voice was free of any malice, not angry that Nico had called him a fake.
Percy reached for Nico’s arm, his cool hand grasping Nico’s wrist and drawing him closer. His other hand moved to cup Nico’s cheek
“We can have so much fun if you just pretend,” Percy promised him. Nico was amazed at how Percy could look so fond of him yet so utterly hollow; his words so genuine but so empty. “He’ll be here forever, you can have everything you want with him if you just pretend— just sink your roots deeper into my earth and you can have him—”
The television turned to static. Scratchy black, white, and red pixels flashed across the screen. The sound grated at his ears.
The hand that gently cradled Nico’s face moved lower, wrapping firmly around Nico’s throat.
“Percy,” Nico wheezed. The grip grew tighter, threatening to crush his windpipe.
Nico closed his eyes.
He felt himself falling backwards.
When he opened his eyes again, he was laying on the ground, gazing up at a burning sky. Clouds black as ash drifted over a bloody backdrop.
He panicked and tried to pull himself to his feet, only to realize that his arms were bound to his side and his legs were tied together. Thick coils of nautical rope dug into his arms and legs. Nico wiggled, desperate.
A chunk of soil fell on his forehead.
He checked his surroundings again.
He wasn’t laying on the ground, he was laying in the ground. Six feet deep.
Percy leaned over the edge of the grave, depositing another shovelful of blackened soil on top of Nico. The dirt landed on his chest and pressed down hard as if it was a ton of gravel.
“Percy,” Nico begged.
“Percy is not here, Nico di Angelo,” Percy said. Except it wasn’t his voice. The voice was feminine, ancient, and uncanny.
Nico opened his mouth to protest, but the dirt on his chest constricted his lungs far too much. Percy— Gaia, really— deposited another shovel’s worth of dirt right into Nico’s open mouth.
“You know he is doomed. You all are doomed. I will reclaim this earth and I will reclaim all of my children. Your flesh will rot and decay, your bones will return to me, your spirit will not linger. You will be one with the earth once more.”
Another mass of soil fell on his face, darkening his vision once again.
Then he was standing upright again, back in The Casa Nera.
Nico looked around in a panic. “I—I had the weirdest nightmare—” Nico cut himself off. He frowned at Frank. “Why are you taller?”
“Everything’s fine,” Frank promised, dodging the question. “Triptolemus was about to tell us how to survive the House of Hades. Weren’t you, Trip?”
Nico raised an eyebrow at Triptolemus menacingly.
“Fine,” Trip groaned. “When you arrive at Epirus, you will be offered a chalice to drink from.”
“Offered by who?” Nico asked.
“Doesn’t matter,” Trip snapped. “Just know that it is filled with deadly poison.”
Hazel shuddered. “So you’re saying that we shouldn’t drink it,” Hazel translated. She wasn’t too fond of most ‘deadly’ things given that she had died once.
“No!” Trip objected. “You must drink it, or else you’ll never be able to make it through the temple. The poison connects you to the world of the dead and lets you pass into the lower levels. But the secret to surviving the poison is barley.”
“Barley,” Frank echoed.
“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. Symptoms may include—”
“That’s it?” Nico demanded. “Hecate sent us halfway across fucking Italy so you could tell us to eat barley?”
“Good luck!” Triptolemus sprinted across the room and hopped in his chariot. “And, Frank Zhang, I forgive you! You’ve got spunk. If you ever change your mind, my offer is open. I’d love to see you get a degree in farming!”
“Yeah,” Frank muttered. “Thanks.”
The god pulled a lever on his chariot, bringing the monstrosity to life: the snake-wheels turned, the wings flapped, the garage doors rolled open.
“Oh, to be mobile again!” Trip cried. “So many ignorant lands in need of my knowledge. I will teach them the glories of tilling, irrigation, fertilizing!” The chariot lifted off and zipped out of the house. Triptolemus shouted: “Away, my serpents! Away!”
“That wasn’t strange at all,” Hazel observed sarcastically.
“The glories of fertilizing.” Nico brushed some corn silk off his shoulder, angry at the fact that he had been turned into a corn stalk and still spooked from seeing Percy in his nightmares. “Can we get out of here now?” He demanded.
Hazel put her hand on Frank’s shoulder. “Are you okay, really? You bartered for our lives. What did Triptolemus make you do?”
“Those cow monsters…the katoblepones that poisoned you…I had to destroy them,” he mumbled.
“That was brave,” Nico said tonelessly. “There must have been, what, six or seven left in that herd.” He wasn’t trying to be sarcastic or rude, but he knew his words landed hard and felt bad when Frank’s expression soured.
“No.” Frank cleared his throat. “All of them. I killed all of them in the city.”
Nico stared at him in stunned silence. No wonder he reeks of death.
Hazel stood up on her tiptoes and kissed Frank’s cheek.
“Well,” Nico said, breaking the tension, “does anyone know what barley looks like?”
Nico, Frank, and Hazel gathered in the kitchen with their bundle of barley. Hazel seated herself on the countertop, and Frank pulled a wooden stool to sit beside her. Nico leaned against the counter, glaring at the floor.
Hazel clutched a yellow sticky note on which she had written a simple three-ingredient recipe for making barley crackers. “The recipe calls for half a cup of barley flour…” Hazel trailed off, realizing the problem.
“We don’t have barley flour,” Nico pointed out sourly. “We have barley. Not even the seeds themselves. Just… The whole damn grain.”
“Then make it into flour,” Frank suggested.
Nico and Hazel stared at him. “How?” They asked in unison.
“Wait, there was pre-ground flour in the 1940’s?” Frank asked.
Nico and Hazel nodded.
“Okay, now you two are staring at me like I said something wrong,” Frank noted, his voice and his stool wavering slightly.
Nico shrugged.
“Do you know how to make flour?” Hazel asked.
“Not exactly, but I can probably figure it out,” Frank said. “We don’t happen to have a coffee grinder, do we? No, okay… what about a mortal and pestle?”
“Coming right up,” Nico said, reaching his hand into the nearest shadow.
Nico pictured his shadow like a dark and clammy school locker— complete with metal shelves and a coat hanger. He felt around in the darkness, searching for the smooth bowl and bulbous grinder. After a few seconds, he pulled his hand out of the shadow victoriously.
He passed the matte white bowl to Frank.
Frank stared down at it wearily. “Is this made of bone?” he asked, frowning.
“Why do you ask?” Nico countered.
“No reason,” Frank swallowed, clutching the bowl in his lap.
“Now what?” Hazel asked.
“Now we collect the seeds,” Frank said, nodding his head in the direction of the grain. “Break off the mass of seeds on the end of the stalk and rub the seed cluster between your hands. Over the bowl.”
Nico broke the seeds off as though he was snapping Triptolemus’s neck. He was, after all, still upset at being turned into a grain himself.
He steadied the clump between his hands and, as instructed, began to rub his hands back and forth so that the seeds broke loose and dropped into the bowl.
He looked up at Frank expectantly.
“Now we do that a hundred more times,” Frank said.
Nico groaned.