The Son of Neptune (33 page)

“Y
OUR BOW!
” H
AZEL SHOUTED
.

Frank didn’t ask questions. He dropped his pack and slipped the bow off his shoulder.

Hazel’s heart raced. She hadn’t thought about this boggy soil—muskeg—since before she had died. Now, too late, she remembered the dire warnings the locals had given her. Marshy silt and decomposed plants made a surface that looked completely solid, but it was even worse than quicksand. It could be twenty feet deep or more, and impossible to escape.

She tried not to think what would happen if it were deeper than the length of the bow.

“Hold one end,” she told Frank. “Don’t let go.”

She grabbed the other end, took a deep breath, and jumped into the bog. The earth closed over her head.

Instantly, she was frozen in a memory.

Not now!
she wanted to scream.
Ella said I was done with blackouts!

Oh, but my dear,
said the voice of Gaea,
this is not one of your blackouts. This is a gift from me.

Hazel was back in New Orleans. She and her mother sat in the park near their apartment, having a picnic breakfast. She remembered this day. She was seven years old. Her mother had just sold Hazel’s first precious stone: a small diamond. Neither of them had yet realized Hazel’s curse.

Queen Marie was in an excellent mood. She had bought orange juice for Hazel and champagne for herself, and beignets sprinkled with chocolate and powdered sugar. She’d even bought Hazel a new box of crayons and a pad of paper. They sat together, Queen Marie humming cheerfully while Hazel drew pictures.

The French Quarter woke up around them, ready for Mardi Gras. Jazz bands practiced. Floats were being decorated with fresh-cut flowers. Children laughed and chased each other, decked in so many colored necklaces they could barely walk. The sunrise turned the sky to red gold, and the warm steamy air smelled of magnolias and roses.

It had been the happiest morning of Hazel’s life.

“You could stay here.” Her mother smiled, but her eyes were blank white. The voice was Gaea’s.

“This is fake,” Hazel said.

She tried to get up, but the soft bed of grass made her lazy and sleepy. The smell of baked bread and melting chocolate was intoxicating. It was the morning of Mardi Gras, and the world seemed full of possibilities. Hazel could almost believe she had a bright future.

“What is real?” asked Gaea, speaking through her mother’s face. “Is your second life
real
, Hazel? You’re supposed to be dead. Is it
real
that you’re sinking into a bog, suffocating?”

“Let me help my friend!” Hazel tried to force herself back to reality. She could imagine her hand clenched on the end of the bow, but even that was starting to feel fuzzy. Her grip was loosening. The smell of magnolias and roses was overpowering.

Her mother offered her a beignet.

No, Hazel thought. This isn’t my mother. This is Gaea tricking me.

“You want your old life back,” Gaea said. “I can give you that. This moment can last for years. You can grow up in New Orleans, and your mother will adore you. You’ll never have to deal with the burden of your curse. You can be with Sammy—”

“It’s an illusion!” Hazel said, choking on the sweet scent of flowers.

“
You
are an illusion, Hazel Levesque. You were only brought back to life because the gods have a task for you. I may have used you, but Nico used you
and
lied about it. You should be glad I captured him.”

“Captured?” A feeling of panic rose in Hazel’s chest. “What do you mean?”

Gaea smiled, sipping her champagne. “The boy should have known better than to search for the Doors. But no matter—it’s not really your concern. Once you release Thanatos, you’ll be thrown back into the Underworld to rot forever. Frank and Percy won’t stop that from happening. Would
real
friends ask you to give up your life? Tell me who is lying, and who tells you the truth.”

Hazel started to cry. Bitterness welled up inside her. She’d lost her life once. She didn’t want to die again.

“That’s right,” Gaea purred. “You were destined to marry Sammy. Do you know what happened to him after you died in Alaska? He grew up and moved to Texas. He married and had a family. But he never forgot you. He always wondered why you disappeared. He’s dead now—a heart attack in the nineteen-sixties. The life you could’ve had together always haunted him.”

“Stop it!” Hazel screamed. “
You
took that from me!”

“And you can have it again,” Gaea said. “I have you in my embrace, Hazel. You’ll die anyway. If you give up, at least I can make it pleasant for you. Forget saving Percy Jackson. He belongs to me. I’ll keep him safe in the earth until I’m ready to use him. You can have an entire life in your final moments—you can grow up, marry Sammy. All you have to do is let go.”

Hazel tightened her grip on the bow. Below her, something grabbed her ankles, but she didn’t panic. She
knew
it was Percy, suffocating, desperately grasping for a chance at life.

Hazel glared at the goddess. “I’ll never cooperate with you! LET—US—GO!”

Her mother’s face dissolved. The New Orleans morning melted into darkness. Hazel was drowning in mud, one hand on the bow, Percy’s hands around her ankles, deep in the darkness. Hazel wiggled the end of the bow frantically. Frank pulled her up with such force it nearly popped her arm out of the socket.

When she opened her eyes, she was lying in the grass, covered in muck. Percy sprawled at her feet, coughing and spitting mud.

Frank hovered over them, yelling, “Oh, gods! Oh, gods! Oh, gods!”

He yanked some extra clothes from his bag and started toweling off Hazel’s face, but it didn’t do much good. He dragged Percy farther from the muskeg.

“You were down there so long!” Frank cried. “I didn’t think—oh, gods, don’t
ever
do something like that again!”

He wrapped Hazel in a bear hug.

“Can’t—breathe,” she choked out.

“Sorry!” Frank went back to toweling and fussing over them. Finally he got them to the side of the road, where they sat and shivered and spit up mud clods.

Hazel couldn’t feel her hands. She wasn’t sure if she was cold or in shock, but she managed to explain about the muskeg, and the vision she’d seen while she was under. Not the part about Sammy—that was still too painful to say out loud—but she told them about Gaea’s offer of a fake life, and the goddess’ claim that she’d captured her brother Nico. Hazel didn’t want to keep that to herself. She was afraid the despair would overwhelm her.

Percy rubbed his shoulders. His lips were blue. “You—you saved me, Hazel. We’ll figure out what happened to Nico, I promise.”

Hazel squinted at the sun, which was now high in the sky.

The warmth felt good, but it didn’t stop her trembling. “Does it seem like Gaea let us go too easily?”

Percy plucked a mud clod from his hair. “Maybe she still wants us as pawns. Maybe she was just saying things to mess with your mind.”

“She knew what to say,” Hazel agreed. “She knew how to get to me.”

Frank put his jacket around her shoulders. “This
is
a real life. You know that, right? We’re not going to let you die again.”

He sounded so determined. Hazel didn’t want to argue, but she didn’t see how Frank could stop Death. She pressed her coat pocket, where Frank’s half-burned firewood was still securely wrapped. She wondered what would’ve happened to him if she’d sunk in the mud forever. Maybe that would have saved him. Fire couldn’t have gotten to the wood down there.

She would have made any sacrifice to keep Frank safe. Perhaps she hadn’t always felt that strongly, but Frank had trusted her with his life. He believed in her. She couldn’t bear the thought of any harm coming to him.

She glanced at the rising sun.…Time was running out. She thought about Hylla, the Amazon Queen back in Seattle. Hylla would have dueled Otrera two nights in a row by now, assuming she had survived. She was counting on Hazel to release Death.

She managed to stand. The wind coming off Resurrection Bay was just as cold as she remembered. “We should get going. We’re losing time.”

Percy gazed down the road. His lips were returning to their normal color. “Any hotels or something where we could clean off? I mean...hotels that accept mud people?”

“I’m not sure,” Hazel admitted.

She looked at the town below and couldn’t believe how much it had grown since 1942. The main harbor had moved east as the town had expanded. Most of the buildings were new to her, but the grid of downtown streets seemed familiar. She thought she recognized some warehouses along the shore. “I might know a place we can freshen up.”

W
HEN THEY GOT INTO TOWN
,
Hazel followed the same route she’d used seventy years ago—the last night of her life, when she’d come home from the hills and found her mother missing.

She led her friends along Third Avenue. The railroad station was still there. The big white two-story Seward Hotel was still in business, though it had expanded to twice its old size. They thought about stopping there, but Hazel didn’t think it would be a good idea to traipse into the lobby covered in mud, nor was she sure the hotel would give a room to three minors.

Instead, they turned toward the shoreline. Hazel couldn’t believe it, but her old home was still there, leaning over the water on barnacle-encrusted piers. The roof sagged. The walls were perforated with holes like buckshot. The door was boarded-up, and a hand-painted sign read:
ROOMS—STORAGE
—AVAILABLE.

“Come on,” she said.

“Uh, you sure it’s safe?” Frank asked.

Hazel found an open window and climbed inside. Her friends followed. The room hadn’t been used in a long time. Their feet kicked up dust that swirled in the buckshot beams of sunlight. Mouldering cardboard boxes were stacked along the walls. Their faded labels read:
Greeting Cards, Assorted Seasonal.
Why several hundred boxes of season’s greetings hadwound up crumbling to dust in a warehouse in Alaska, Hazel had no idea, but it felt like a cruel joke: as if the cards were for all the holidays she’d never gotten to celebrate—decades of Christmases, Easters, birthdays, Valentine’s Days.

“It’s warmer in here, at least,” Frank said. “Guess no running water? Maybe I can go shopping. I’m not as muddy as you guys. I could find us some clothes.”

Hazel only half heard him.

She climbed over a stack of boxes in the corner that used to be her sleeping area. An old sign was propped against the wall:
GOLD PROSPECTING SUPPLIES
. She thought she’dfind a bare wall behind it, but when she moved the sign, most of her photos and drawings were still pinned there. The sign must have protected them from sunlight and the elements. They seemed not to have aged. Her crayon drawings of New Orleans looked so childish. Had she really made them? Her mother stared out at her from one photograph, smiling in front of her business sign:
QUEEN MARIE’S GRIS-GRIS—CHARMS SOLD, FORTUNES TOLD
.

Next to that was a photo of Sammy at the carnival. He was frozen in time with his crazy grin, his curly black hair, and those beautiful eyes. If Gaea was telling the truth, Sammy had been dead for over forty years. Had he really remembered Hazel all that time? Or had he forgotten the peculiar girl he used to go riding with—the girl who shared one kiss and a birthday cupcake with him before disappearing forever?

Frank’s fingers hovered over the photo. “Who…?” He saw that she was crying and clamped back his question. “Sorry, Hazel. This must be really hard. Do you want some time—”

“No,” she croaked. “No, it’s fine.”

“Is that your mother?” Percy pointed to the photo of QueenMarie. “She looks like you. She’s beautiful.”

Then Percy studied the picture of Sammy. “Who is that?”

Hazel didn’t understand why he looked so spooked. “That’s…that’s Sammy. He was my—uh—friend from New Orleans.” She forced herself not to look at Frank.

“I’ve seen him before,” Percy said.

“You couldn’t have,” Hazel said. “That was in 1941. He’s…he’s probably dead now.”

Percy frowned. “I guess. Still…” He shook his head, like the thought was too uncomfortable.

Frank cleared his throat. “Look, we passed a store on the last block. We’ve got a little money left. Maybe I should go get you guys some food and clothes and—I don’t know—a hundred boxes of wet wipes or something?”

Hazel put the gold prospecting sign back over her mementos. She felt guilty even looking at that old picture of Sammy, with Frank trying to be so sweet and supportive. It didn’t do her any good to think about her old life.

“That would be great,” she said. “You’re the best, Frank.”

The floorboards creaked under his feet. “Well…I’m the only one not completely covered in mud, anyway. Be back soon.”

Once he was gone, Percy and Hazel made temporary camp. They took off their jackets and tried to scrape off the mud. They found some old blankets in a crate and used them to clean up. They discovered that boxes of greeting cards made pretty good places to rest if you arranged them like mattresses.

Percy set his sword on the floor where it glowed with a faint bronze light. Then he stretched out on a bed of
Merry Christmas 1982.

“Thank you for saving me,” he said. “I should’ve told you that earlier.”

Hazel shrugged. “You would have done the same for me.”

“Yes,” he agreed. “But when I was down in the mud, I remembered that line from Ella’s prophecy—about the son of Neptune drowning. I thought. ‘This is what it means. I’m drowning in the earth.’ I was sure I was dead.”

His voice quavered like it had his first day at Camp Jupiter, when Hazel had shown him the shrine of Neptune. Back then she had wondered if Percy was the answer to her problems—the descendant of Neptune that Pluto had promised would take away her curse someday. Percy had seemed so intimidating and powerful, like a real hero.

Only now, she knew that Frank was a descendant of

Neptune, too. Frank wasn’t the most impressive-looking hero in the world, but he’d trusted her with his life. He tried so hard to protect her. Even his clumsiness was endearing.

She’d never felt more confused—and since she had spent her whole life confused, that was saying a lot.

“Percy,” she said, “that prophecy might not have been complete. Frank thought Ella was remembering a burned page. Maybe you’ll drown someone else.”

He looked at her cautiously. “You think so?”

Hazel felt strange reassuring him. He was so much older, and more in command. But she nodded confidently. “You’re going to make it back home. You’re going to see your girlfriend Annabeth.”

“You’ll make it back, too, Hazel,” he insisted. “We’re not going to let anything happen to you. You’re too valuable to me, to the camp, and especially to Frank.”

Hazel picked up an old valentine. The lacy white paper fell apart in her hands. “I don’t belong in this century. Nico only brought me back so I could correct my mistakes, maybe get into Elysium.”

“There’s more to your destiny than that,” he said. “We’re supposed to fight Gaea together. I’m going to need you at my side way longer than just today. And Frank—you can see the guy is crazy about you. This life is worth fighting for, Hazel.”

She closed her eyes. “Please, don’t get my hopes up. I can’t—”

The window creaked open. Frank climbed in, triumphantly holding some shopping bags. “Success!”

He showed off his prizes. From a hunting store, he’d gotten a new quiver of arrows for himself, some rations, and a coil of rope.

“For the next time we run across muskeg,” he said.

From a local tourist shop, he had bought three sets of fresh clothes, some towels, some soap, some bottled water, and, yes, a huge box of wet wipes. It wasn’t exactly a hot shower, but Hazel ducked behind a wall of greeting card boxes to clean up and change. Soon she was feeling much better.

This is your last day,
she reminded herself.
Don’t get too comfortable.

The Feast of Fortuna—all the luck that happened today, good or bad, was supposed to be an omen of the entire year to come. One way or another, their quest would end this evening.

She slipped the piece of driftwood into her new coatpocket. Somehow, she’d have to make sure it stayed safe, no matter what happened to her. She could bear her own death as long as her friends survived.

“So,” she said. “Now we find a boat to Hubbard Glacier.”

She tried to sound confident, but it wasn’t easy. She wished Arion were still with her. She’d much rather ride into battle on that beautiful horse. Ever since they’d left Vancouver, she’d been calling to him in her thoughts, hoping he would hear her and come find her, but that was just wishful thinking.

Frank patted his stomach. “If we’re going to battle to the death, I want lunch first. I found the perfect place.”

Frank led them to a shopping plaza near the wharf, where an old railway car had been converted to a diner. Hazel had no memory of the place from the 1940s, but the food smelled amazing. While Frank and Percy ordered, Hazel wandered down to the docks and asked some questions. When she came back, she needed cheering up. Even the cheeseburger and fries didn’t do the trick.

“We’re in trouble,” she said. “I tried to get a boat. But…I miscalculated.”

“No boats?” Frank asked.

“Oh, I can get a boat,” Hazel said. “But the glacier is farther than I thought. Even at top speed, we couldn’t get there until tomorrow morning.”

Percy turned pale. “Maybe I could make the boat go faster?”

“Even if you could,” Hazel said, “from what the captains tell me, it’s treacherous—icebergs, mazes of channels to navigate. You’d have to know where you were going.”

“A plane?” Frank asked.

Hazel shook her head. “I asked the boat captains about that. They said we could try, but it’s a tiny airfield. You have to charter a plane two, three weeks in advance.”

They ate in silence after that. Hazel’s cheeseburger was excellent, but she couldn’t concentrate on it. She’d eaten about three bites when a raven settled on the telephone pole above and began to croak at them.

Hazel shivered. She was afraid it would speak to her like the other raven, so many years ago:
The last night. Tonight
. She wondered if ravens always appeared to children of Pluto when they were about to die. She hoped Nico was still alive, and Gaea had just been lying to make her unsettled. Hazel had a bad feeling that the goddess was telling the truth.

Nico had told her that he’d search for the Doors of Death from the other side. If he’d been captured by Gaea’s forces,

Hazel might’ve lost the only family she had.

She stared at her cheeseburger.

Suddenly, the raven’s cawing changed to a strangled yelp.

Frank got up so fast that he almost toppled the picnic table. Percy drew his sword.

Hazel followed their eyes. Perched on top of the pole where the raven had been, a fat ugly gryphon glared down at them. It burped, and raven feathers fluttered from its beak.

Hazel stood and unsheathed her
spatha
.

Frank nocked an arrow. He took aim, but the gryphon shrieked so loudly the sound echoed off the mountains. Frank flinched, and his shot went wide.

“I think that’s a call for help,” Percy warned. “We have to get out of here.”

With no clear plan, they ran for the docks. The gryphon dove after them. Percy slashed at it with his sword, but the gryphon veered out of reach.

They took the steps to the nearest pier and raced to the end. The gryphon swooped after them, its front claws extended for the kill. Hazel raised her sword, but an icy wall of water slammed sideways into the gryphon and washed it into the bay. The gryphon squawked and flapped its wings. It managed to scramble onto the pier, where it shook its black fur like a wet dog.

Frank grunted. “Nice one, Percy.”

“Yeah,” he said. “Didn’t know if I could still do that in Alaska. But bad news—look over there.” About a mile away, over the mountains, a black cloud was swirling—a whole flock of gryphons, dozens at least. There was no way they could fight that many, and no boat could take them away fast enough.

Frank nocked another arrow. “Not going down without a fight.”

Percy raised Riptide. “I’m with you.”

Then Hazel heard a sound in the distance—like the whinnying of a horse. She must’ve been imagining it, but she cried out desperately, “Arion! Over here!”

A tan blur came ripping down the street and onto the pier. The stallion materialized right behind the gryphon, brought down his front hooves, and smashed the monster to dust.

Hazel had never been so happy in her life. “Good horse!
Really
good horse!”

Frank backed up and almost fell off the pier. “How—?”

“He followed me!” Hazel beamed. “Because he’s the best—horse—EVER! Now, get on!”

“All three of us?” Percy said. “Can he handle it?”

Arion whinnied indignantly.

“All right, no need to be rude,” Percy said. “Let’s go.”

They climbed on, Hazel in front, Frank and Percy balancing precariously behind her. Frank wrapped his arms around her waist, and Hazel thought that if this was going to be her last day on earth—it wasn’t a bad way to go out.

“Run, Arion!” she cried. “To Hubbard Glacier!”

The horse shot across the water, his hooves turning the top of the sea to steam.