chapter ten

─── vehicles and i just really don't get along

          𝔓acking had never been my strong point. So, trying to pack to meet the Lord of the Dead was horrible. I didn't know what to take.

I settled on an extra change of clothes (the shirt belonging to Brooke, the jeans to Puck and everything else was hand me downs from Eleven), a toothbrush, pads and some deodorant. I'd managed to find a dagger, and a bow (because apparently there was no such thing as a well balanced sword in this stupid camp).

The blond son of Hermes had joined me, walking in silence with a stony glare on his face. He wasn't for this idea at all, but supposedly it had been the best of a bad lot. He had a pair of converses strung around his bag, and a sword strapped to his waist.

So subtle.

Chiron had already given the two of us a canteen of nectar and a Ziploc bag of ambrosia squares to be used in emergencies.

Annabeth was bringing her magic Yankees cap, which she told me had been a twelfth-birthday present from her mom. She carried a book on famous classical architecture, written in Ancient Greek, to read when she got bored, and a long bronze knife, hidden in her shirt sleeve, which was definitely more subtle than Luke's sword.

Grover wore his fake feet and his pants, to pass as a human. His green beanie was back on his head and he had enough tin cans, scrap metal and apples to snack on for the remainder of the trip.

We waved good-bye to the other campers, took one last look at the strawberry fields, the ocean, and the Big House, then hiked up Half-Blood Hill to the tall pine tree that used to be Thalia, daughter of Zeus.

Chiron was waiting for us in his wheelchair. Next to him stood the surfer dude I'd seen when I was recovering in the sick room. According to Grover, the guy was the camp's head of security. He supposedly had eyes all over his body so he could never be surprised. Today, though, he was wearing a chauffeur's uniform, so I could only see extra peepers on his hands, face and neck.

"This is Argus," Chiron told me. "He will drive you into the city, and, er, well, keep an eye on things."

I heard footsteps behind us.

Brooke and Puck appeared, both of them grinning and panting.

"Glad we caught you," Brooke gave Brooke a shove, as if to blame him for almost being late. "Came to wish you good luck and Puck thought..."

"We got you some going away gifts." Puck finally stepped forward, holding a pair of shoes out towards us. Luke finally cracked a smile, patting the man's shoulder.

"Thanks, Puck. Are they for Andromeda?"

"Yeah." Puck nodded, before going back to stand by his sister and Luke passed the shoes to me. I watched them, before turning back to Brooke with a raised eyebrow.

"What do they do?" Brooke laughed, before tapping the soles a few times as little runes began to appear.

"They tell you when dangers near," My eyebrows went wide in surprise, before I whistled. "Puck made them for you and I did the rune work on the bottom."

I examined them before grinning at the pair. "Thanks!"

"You'll do great, Jackson, I'm sure," She embraced me tightly, before saluting Luke and Grover and ruffling Annabeth's hair. "Puck, want to say anything?"

The teen came forward, awkwardly giving me and Luke a quick hug, before retreating to Brooke's side once more.

"See you!" They waved, before the four of us headed off towards the bottom of the hill, where a white SUV waited. Argus followed, jingling his car keys.

Before I could follow, Chiron caught my arm. "I should have trained you better, Andromeda," he said. "If only I had more time. Hercules, Jason—they all got more training."

"That's okay. I just wish—" I didn't want to sound like a whiny brat so I stopped talking, watching the road at the bottom of the hill.

"What am I thinking?" Chiron cried. "I can't let you get away without this."

He pulled a pen from his coat pocket and handed it to me. It was an ordinary disposable ballpoint, black ink, removable cap. Probably cost thirty cents.

"Thanks?" I examined it, confusion racing through me. Did he want me to practice my handwriting on the quest or something?

"Andromeda, that's a gift from your father. I've kept it for years, not knowing you were who I was waiting for. But the prophecy is clear to me now." I remembered the field trip to the Metropolitan Museum of Art, when I'd vaporised Mrs. Dodds. Chiron had thrown me a pen that turned into a sword.

I took off the cap, and the pen grew longer and heavier in my hand. In half a second, I held a shimmering bronze sword with a double-edged blade, a leather-wrapped grip, and a flat hilt riveted with gold studs.

It was the first weapon that actually felt balanced in my hand.

"The sword has a long and tragic history that we need not go into," Chiron told me. "Its name is Anaklusmos."

"Riptide." The name fit the sword.

"Use it only for emergencies," Chiron said, "and only against monsters. No hero should harm mortals unless absolutely necessary, of course, but this sword wouldn't harm them in any case."

I looked at the wickedly sharp blade. "What do you mean it wouldn't harm mortals? How could it not?"

"The sword is celestial bronze. Forged by the Cyclopes, tempered in the heart of Mount Etna, cooled in the River Lethe. It's deadly to monsters, to any creature from the Underworld, provided they don't kill you first. But the blade will pass through mortals like an illusion. They simply are not important enough for the blade to kill. And I should warn you: as a demigod, you can be killed by either celestial or normal weapons. You are twice as vulnerable."

"Love it."

"Now recap the pen."

I touched the pen cap to the sword tip and instantly Riptide shrank to a ballpoint pen again. I tucked it in my pocket, a little nervous, because I had a thing for losing anything that came into contact with me (if any of you think about saying 'huh, like you're mother' I'll deck you).

"You can't," Chiron said.

"Can't what?"

"Lose the pen," he said. "It is enchanted. It will always reappear in your pocket. Try it."

I was wary, but I threw the pen as far as I could down the hill and watched it disappear in the grass.

"It may take a few moments," Chiron told me. "Now check your pocket."

Sure enough, the pen was there.

"Okay, that's cool." I admitted. "But what if a mortal sees me pulling out a sword?"

Chiron smiled. "Mist is a powerful thing, Andromeda."

"Mist?"

"Yes. Whenever divine or monstrous elements mix with the mortal world, they generate Mist, which obscures the vision of humans. You will see things just as they are, being a half-blood, but humans will interpret things quite differently. Remarkable, really, the lengths to which humans will go to fit things into their version of reality."

I put Riptide back in my pocket. For the first time, the quest felt real. I was actually leaving Half-Blood Hill. I was heading west with no adult supervision (Luke didn't count), no backup plan (who needs one really?), not even a cell phone (Chiron said cell phones were traceable by monsters; if we used one, it would be worse than sending up a flare).

"Chiron..." I said. "When you say the gods are immortal...I mean, there was a time before them, right?"

"Four ages before them, actually. The Time of the Titans was the Fourth Age, sometimes called the Golden Age, which is definitely a misnomer. This, the time of Western civilization and the rule of Zeus, is the Fifth Age."

"So what was it like...before the gods?"

Chiron pursed his lips. "Even I am not old enough to remember that, child, but I know it was a time of darkness and savagery for mortals. Kronos, the lord of the Titans, called his reign the Golden Age because men lived innocent and free of all knowledge. But that was mere propaganda. The Titan king cared nothing for your kind except as appetisers or a source of cheap entertainment. It was only in the early reign of Lord Zeus, when Prometheus the good Titan brought fire to mankind, that your species began to progress, and even then Prometheus was branded a radical thinker."

"But the gods can't die now, right? I mean, as long as Western civilization is alive, they're alive. So...even if I failed, nothing could happen so bad it would mess up everything, right?"

I didn't want to start a war.

Chiron gave me a melancholy smile. "No one knows how long the Age of the West will last, Andromeda. The gods are immortal, yes. But then, so were the Titans. They still exist, locked away in their various prisons, forced to endure endless pain and punishment, reduced in power, but still very much alive. May the Fates forbid that the gods should ever suffer such a doom, or that we should ever return to the darkness and chaos of the past. All we can do, child, is follow our destiny."

"Cryptic."

"Relax," Chiron told me. "Keep a clear head. And remember, you may be about to prevent the biggest war in human history."

"Relax," I said. "I'm so relaxed."

When I got to the bottom of the hill, I looked back. Under the pine tree that used to be Thalia, Chiron was now standing in full horse-man form, holding his bow high in salute. What had my life come to?!

∘☽༓☾∘

Argus drove us out of the countryside and into western Long Island. It felt weird to be on a highway again, Luke was sitting next to me, with Annabeth and Grover opposite, as if we were normal carpoolers. After two weeks at Half-Blood Hill, the real world seemed like a fantasy. I found myself staring at every McDonald's, every kid in the back of his parents' car, every billboard and shopping mall.

"So far so good," I stated. "Ten miles and not a single monster."

"Say that and a monster will show up," Luke replied, as Annabeth glared. I sighed, before spinning around to look at her. Best to get this conversation out of the way before things got really awkward.

"Right, why do you hate me and why do you keep glaring?" She froze, her eyes going wide.

"I don't hate you."

"Could've fooled me. We're going on this thing together, so it's probably best if we get along,"

She folded her cap of invisibility in her hands. "Look...we're just not supposed to get along, okay? Our parents are rivals."

"Are we our parents?"

"No..." Annabeth replied.

"Great, no reason to hate one another, problem solved, let's move on and deal with this quest. Yes?"

"Fine," Luke forced down laughter as I nodded, glad that I'd managed to get her to agree to be civil even if it was only for the quest.

Traffic slowed us down in Queens. By the time we got into Manhattan it was sunset and starting to rain. Argus dropped us at the Greyhound Station on the Upper East Side, not far from my mom and Gabe's apartment. Taped to a mailbox was a soggy flyer with my picture on it: HAVE YOU SEEN THIS GIRL?

I ripped it down before the others could notice, but Luke was watching me with narrowed eyes, like he knew something. Still, I said nothing.

Argus unloaded our bags, made sure we got our bus tickets, then drove away, the eye on the back of his hand opening to watch us as he pulled out of the parking lot.

Grover shouldered his backpack. He gazed down the street in the direction I was looking. "You want to know why she married him, Romy?"

I stared at him. "Is mind reading a new power of yours?"

"Just your emotions." He shrugged. "You were thinking about your mom and your stepdad, right?"

I nodded, wondering what else Grover might've forgotten to tell me.

"Your mom married Gabe for you," Grover told me. "You call him 'Smelly,' but you've got no idea. The guy has this aura...Yuck. I can smell him from here. I can smell traces of him on you, and you haven't been near him for a week."

"Thanks," I said. "Let me go and buy some bleach."

"You should be grateful, Romy. Gabe has been covering your scent for years. If you hadn't lived with him every summer, you probably would've been found by monsters a long time ago. Your mom stayed with him to protect you. She was a smart lady. She must've loved you a lot to put up with that guy—if that makes you feel any better."

It didn't. It only made me feel worse knowing that she'd stayed with that abusive asshole because of me.

"That's enough, Grover," Luke murmured, seeming to have picked up on my dark look. "Let's get on this bus and head off."

The rain kept coming down and if this wasn't pathetic fallacy at it's finest, I don't know what was. All the while, the prophecy kept repeating through my head as I struggled to lower my guard. I didn't know who was going to betray me.

We got restless waiting for the bus and decided to play some Hacky Sack with one of Grover's apples. Annabeth was unbelievable. She could bounce the apple off her knee, her elbow, her shoulder, whatever. I was terrible and Luke, as it seemed to be with everything, was unfairly good at it much like Annabeth.

The game ended when I tossed the apple toward Grover and it got too close to his mouth. In one mega goat bite, our Hacky Sack disappeared—core, stem, and all. Grover blushed. He tried to apologise, but the rest of us were too busy laughing our asses off.

Finally the bus came. As we stood in line to board, Grover started looking around, sniffing the air like he smelled his favourite school cafeteria delicacy—enchiladas.

"What is it?" I asked.

"I don't know," he said tensely. "Maybe it's nothing."

But I could tell it wasn't nothing. I started looking over my shoulder, too. I was relieved when we finally got on board and found seats together in the back of the bus. We stowed our back-packs. Annabeth kept slapping her Yankees cap nervously against her thigh, and it was making me nervous.

As the last passengers got on to the bus, Luke reached over to grab my hand, squeezing it gently.

"Andi," An old lady had just boarded the bus. She wore a crumpled velvet dress, lace gloves, and a shapeless orange-knit hat that shadowed her face. When she tilted her head up, her black eyes glittered, and my heart skipped a beat.

It was Mrs. Dodds. Older, more withered, but definitely the same evil face. I scrunched down in my seat, watching the shoes on my feet glow like they had LED lights in them. Puck's shoes were working and they were telling me one thing. DANGER.

Behind her came two more old ladies: one in a green hat, one in a purple hat. Otherwise they looked exactly like Mrs. Dodds—same gnarled hands, paisley handbags, wrinkled velvet dresses. Triplet demon grandmothers.

They sat in the front row, right behind the driver. The two on the aisle crossed their legs over the walkway, making an X. It was casual enough, but it sent a clear message: nobody leaves.

The bus pulled out of the station, and we headed through the slick streets of Manhattan. "She didn't stay dead long," I said, trying to keep my voice from quivering. "I thought you said they could be dispelled for a lifetime."

"I said if you're lucky," Luke hissed, also ducking down as he tapped his fingers in a random pattern. "We're obviously not that lucky. But I'm not surprised. Two older demigods, a younger one and a Satyr."

"All three of them," Grover whimpered. "Di immortales!"

"It's okay," Annabeth said, obviously thinking hard. "The Furies. The three worst monsters from the Underworld. No problem. No problem. We'll just slip out the windows."

"They don't open," Grover moaned.

"A back exit?" she suggested, before Luke shook his head.

There wasn't one. Even if there had been, it wouldn't have helped. By that time, we were on Ninth Avenue, heading for the Lincoln Tunnel.

"They won't attack us with witnesses around," I said. "Or do they like killing children in front of people?"

"Mortals don't have good eyes," Annabeth reminded me. "Their brains can only process what they see through the Mist."

"They'll see three old ladies trying to murk us, won't they?"

Luke shrugged, chewing on his lip nervously, and I tightened my grip around his hand. "Hard to say. But we can't count on mortals for help. Maybe an emergency exit on the roof...?"

We hit the Lincoln Tunnel, and the bus went dark except for the running lights down the aisle. It was eerily quiet without the sound of the rain.

Mrs. Dodds got up. In a flat voice, as if she'd rehearsed it, she announced to the whole bus: "I need to use the restroom."

"So do I," said the second sister.

"So do I," said the third sister.

"Well, this is convenient," I hissed, as Annabeth chucked something at my face. My reflexes kicked in, catching it and my eyebrows furrowed as I saw what it was. Her hat?

"You're the one they want. Turn invisible and go up the aisle. Let them pass you. Maybe you can get to the front and get away."

"But you guys—"

"There's an outside chance they might not notice us," Luke replied, tightening his shoes with one hand, as he squeezed mine with the other. "You're a daughter of Poseidon. Your smell might be overpowering."

"I can't just leave you. I don't want to..."

"Don't worry about us," Grover said. "Go!"

My hands trembled. I felt like a coward, but I let go of Luke's hand and put the Yankees cap on. When I looked down, my body wasn't there anymore. I started creeping up the aisle. I managed to get up ten rows, then duck into an empty seat just as the Furies walked past.

Mrs. Dodds stopped, sniffing, and looked straight at me. My heart was pounding. Apparently she didn't see anything. She and her sisters kept going.

I was free. I made it to the front of the bus. We were almost through the Lincoln Tunnel now. I was about to press the emergency stop button when I heard hideous wailing from the back row.

The old ladies were not old ladies anymore. Their faces were still the same—I guess those couldn't get any uglier— but their bodies had shrivelled into leathery brown hag bodies with bat's wings and hands and feet like gargoyle claws. Their handbags had turned into fiery whips.

The Furies surrounded Luke, Grover and Annabeth, lashing their whips, hissing: "Where is it? Where?"

The other people on the bus were screaming, cowering in their seats. They saw something, all right.

Luke stood in front of the two younger ones, his eyes dark.

"She's not here," He growled. "She's gone!"

The Furies raised their whips, as my breath caught in my throat.

Luke drew his sword, as Annabeth grabbed her bronze knife. Grover grabbed a tin can from his snack bag and prepared to throw it.

What I did next was so impulsive and dangerous I should've changed my middle name to dumbass.

The bus driver was distracted, trying to see what was going on in his rear view mirror. Still invisible, I grabbed the wheel from him and jerked it to the left. Everybody howled as they were thrown to the right, and I heard what I hoped was the sound of three Furies smashing against the windows.

"Hey!" the driver yelled. "Hey—whoa!"

We wrestled for the wheel. The bus slammed against the side of the tunnel, grinding metal, throwing sparks a mile behind us.

We careened out of the Lincoln Tunnel and back into the rainstorm, people and monsters tossed around the bus, cars ploughed aside like bowling pins.

Somehow the driver found an exit. We shot off the highway, through half a dozen traffic lights, and ended up barreling down one of those New Jersey rural roads where you can't believe there's so much nothing right across the river from New York. There were woods to our left, the Hudson River to our right, and the driver seemed to be veering toward the river.

Another great (read:idiotic) idea: I hit the emergency brake.

The bus wailed, spun a full circle on the wet asphalt, and crashed into the trees. The emergency lights came on. The door flew open. The bus driver was the first one out, the passengers yelling as they stampeded after him. I stepped into the driver's seat and let them pass.

The Furies regained their balance. They lashed their whips at Luke and Annabeth while they lunged at them with their swords. Grover threw tin cans.

I looked at the open doorway. I was free to go, but I couldn't leave them there. I took off the invisible cap. "Oi!"

The Furies turned, baring their yellow fangs at me, and the exit suddenly seemed like an excellent idea. Mrs. Dodds stalked up the aisle, as my hands started to tremble. Every time she flicked her whip, red flames danced along the barbed leather.

Her two ugly sisters hopped on top of the seats on either side of her and crawled toward me like huge nasty lizards.

"Andromeda Jackson," Mrs. Dodds said, in an accent that was definitely from somewhere further south than Georgia. "You have offended the gods. You shall die."

"I liked you better as sand," I told her.

She growled.

Luke, Annabeth and Grover moved up behind the Furies cautiously, looking for an opening. I took the ballpoint pen out of my pocket and un-capped it. Riptide elongated into a shimmering double-edged sword.

The Furies hesitated. Mrs. Dodds had felt Riptide's blade before. She obviously didn't like seeing it again.

"Submit now," she hissed. "And you will not suffer eternal torment."

"How about no?" I told her.

"Andi, look out!" Luke yelled.

Mrs. Dodds lashed her whip around my sword hand while the Furies on the either side lunged at me. My hand felt like it was wrapped in molten lead, but I managed not to drop Riptide. I stuck the Fury on the left with its hilt, sending her toppling backward into a seat. I turned and sliced the Fury on the right. As soon as the blade connected with her neck, she screamed and exploded into dust. Luke got Mrs. Dodds in a wrestler's hold and yanked her backward while Grover ripped the whip out of her hands, and Annabeth held onto her legs

"Ow!" he yelled. "Ow! Hot! Hot!"

The Fury I'd hilt-slammed came at me again, talons ready, but I swung Riptide and she broke open like a piñata.

Mrs. Dodds was trying to get Luke off her back. She kicked, clawed, hissed and bit, but he held on while Grover and Annabeth got Mrs. Dodds's legs tied up in her own whip. Finally they both shoved her backward into the aisle. Mrs. Dodds tried to get up, but she didn't have room to flap her bat wings, so she kept falling down.

"Zeus will destroy you!" she promised. "Hades will have your soul!"

"Get fucked." I cursed in response, before wincing at the knowledge that the children had heard me swear.

Thunder shook the bus. The hair rose on the back of my neck.

"Get out!" Annabeth yelled at me. "Now!" I didn't need any encouragement.

We rushed outside and found the other passengers wandering around in a daze, arguing with the driver, or running around in circles yelling, "We're going to die!" A Hawaiian-shirted tourist with a camera snapped my photograph before I could recap my sword.

"Our bags!" Grover realised. "We left our—"

The windows of the bus exploded as the passengers ran for cover. Lightning shredded a huge crater in the roof, but an angry wail from inside told me Mrs. Dodds was not yet dead.

"Run!" Luke said. "She's calling for reinforcements! We've got to go!"

We plunged into the woods as the rain poured down, the bus in flames behind us, and nothing but darkness ahead. Let's hope the insurance for the bus covers lightning strikes.

∘☽༓☾∘

Hiya,

So, Brooke and Puck are sweethearts and I love them dearly. Also, Luke and Andi are cuties as well, Andi calling Annabeth out brings me some life and otherwise they're just cute! But Andi doesn't actually trust that many of them because of the Oracle.

Let me know what you think,

Love Li xx