XIV
PERCY
As they started down the cliff, Percy concentrated on the challenges at hand: keeping his footing, avoiding rockslides that would alert the empousai to their presence and of course making sure he and Annabeth didn’t plummet to their deaths.
About halfway down the precipice, Annabeth said, ‘Stop, okay? Just a quick break.’
Her legs wobbled so badly, Percy cursed himself for not calling a rest earlier.
They sat together on a ledge next to a roaring fiery waterfall. Percy put his arm around Annabeth, and she leaned against him, shaking from exhaustion.
He wasn’t much better. His stomach felt like it had shrunk to the size of a gumdrop. If they came across any more monster carcasses, he was afraid he might pull an empousa and try to devour it.
At least he had Annabeth. They would find a way out of Tartarus. They had to. He didn’t think much of fates and prophecies, but he did believe in one thing: Annabeth and he were supposed to be together. They hadn’t survived so much just to get killed now.
‘Things could be worse,’ Annabeth ventured.
‘Yeah?’ Percy didn’t see how, but he tried to sound upbeat.
She snuggled against him. Her hair smelled of smoke, and if he closed his eyes he could almost imagine they were at the campfire at Camp Half-Blood.
‘We could’ve fallen into the ,’ she said. ‘Lost all our memories.’
Percy’s skin crawled just thinking about it. He’d had enough trouble with amnesia for one lifetime. Only last month, Hera had erased his memories to put him among the Roman demigods. Percy had stumbled into Camp Jupiter with no idea who he was or where he came from. And a few years before that he’d fought a Titan on the banks of the Lethe, near Hades’s palace. He’d blasted the Titan with water from that river and completely wiped his memory clean. ‘Yeah, the Lethe,’ he muttered. ‘Not my favourite.’
‘What was the Titan’s name?’ Annabeth asked.
‘Uh … . He said it meant the Impaler or something.’
‘No, the name you gave him after he lost his memory. Steve?’
‘Bob,’ Percy said.
Annabeth managed a weak laugh. ‘Bob the Titan.’
Percy’s lips were so parched, it hurt to smile. He wondered what had happened to Iapetus after they’d left him in Hades’s palace … if he was still content being Bob, friendly, happy and clueless. Percy hoped so, but the Underworld seemed to bring out the worst in everyone – monsters, heroes and gods.
He gazed across the ashen plains. The other Titans were supposed to be here in Tartarus – maybe bound in chains, or roaming aimlessly, or hiding in some of those dark crevices. Percy and his allies had destroyed the worst Titan, Kronos, but even his remains might be down here somewhere – a billion angry Titan particles floating through the blood-coloured clouds or lurking in that dark fog.
Percy decided not to think about that. He kissed Annabeth’s forehead. ‘We should keep moving. You want some more fire to drink?’
‘Ugh. I’ll pass.’
They struggled to their feet. The rest of the cliff looked impossible to descend – nothing more than a crosshatching of tiny ledges – but they kept climbing down.
Percy’s body went on autopilot. His fingers cramped. He felt blisters popping up on his ankles. He got shaky from hunger.
He wondered if they would die of starvation, or if the firewater would keep them going. He remembered the punishment of , who’d been permanently stuck in a pool of water under a fruit tree but couldn’t reach either food or drink.
Jeez, Percy hadn’t thought about Tantalus in years. That stupid guy had been paroled briefly to serve as director at Camp Half-Blood. Probably he was back in the . Percy had never felt sorry for the jerk before, but now he was starting to sympathize. He could imagine what it would be like, getting hungrier and hungrier for eternity but never being able to eat.
Keep climbing, he told himself.
Cheeseburgers, his stomach replied.
Shut up, he thought.
With fries, his stomach complained.
A billion years later, with a dozen new blisters on his feet, Percy reached the bottom. He helped Annabeth down, and they collapsed on the ground.
Ahead of them stretched miles of wasteland, bubbling with monstrous larvae and big insect-hair trees. To their right, the Phlegethon split into branches that etched the plain, widening into a delta of smoke and fire. To the north, along the main route of the river, the ground was riddled with cave entrances. Here and there, spires of rock jutted up like exclamation points.
Under Percy’s hand, the soil felt alarmingly warm and smooth. He tried to grab a handful, then realized that, under a thin layer of dirt and debris, the ground was a single vast membrane … like skin.
He almost threw up, but forced himself not to. There was nothing in his stomach but fire.
He didn’t mention it to Annabeth, but he started to feel like something was watching them – something vast and malevolent. He couldn’t zero in on it, because the presence was all around them. Watching was the wrong word, too. That implied eyes, and this thing was simply aware of them. The ridges above them now looked less like steps and more like rows of massive teeth. The spires of rock looked like broken ribs. And if the ground was skin …
Percy forced those thoughts aside. This place was just freaking him out. That was all.
Annabeth stood, wiping soot from her face. She gazed towards the darkness on the horizon. ‘We’re going to be completely exposed, crossing this plain.’
About a hundred yards ahead of them, a blister burst on the ground. A monster clawed its way out … a glistening telkhine with slick fur, a seal-like body and stunted human limbs. It managed to crawl a few yards before something shot out of the nearest cave, so fast that Percy could only register a dark green reptilian head. The monster snatched the squealing telkhine in its jaws and dragged it into the darkness.
Reborn in Tartarus for two seconds, only to be eaten. Percy wondered if that would pop up in some other place in Tartarus, and how long it would take to re-form.
He swallowed down the sour taste of firewater. ‘Oh, yeah. This’ll be fun.’
Annabeth helped him to his feet. He took one last look at the cliffs, but there was no going back. He would’ve given a thousand golden to have Frank Zhang with them right now – good old Frank, who always seemed to show up when needed and could turn into an eagle or a dragon to fly them across this stupid wasteland.
They started walking, trying to avoid the cave entrances, sticking close to the bank of the river.
They were just skirting one of the spires when a glint of movement caught Percy’s eye – something darting between the rocks to their right.
A monster following them? Or maybe it was just some random baddie, heading for the Doors of Death.
Suddenly he remembered why they’d started following this route, and he froze in his tracks.
‘The empousai.’ He grabbed Annabeth’s arm. ‘Where are they?’
Annabeth scanned a three-sixty, her grey eyes bright with alarm.
Maybe the demon ladies had been snapped up by that reptile in the cave. If the empousai were still ahead of them, they should’ve been visible somewhere on the plains.
Unless they were hiding …
Too late, Percy drew his sword.
The empousai emerged from the rocks all around them – five of them forming a ring. A perfect trap.
Kelli limped forward on her mismatched legs. Her fiery hair burned across her shoulders like a miniature Phlegethon waterfall. Her tattered cheerleader outfit was splattered with rusty-brown stains, and Percy was pretty sure they weren’t ketchup. She fixed him with her glowing red eyes and bared her fangs.
‘Percy Jackson,’ she cooed. ‘How awesome! I don’t even have to return to the mortal world to destroy you!’