The Tower of Nero

CALL ME SUPERSTITIOUS. IF YOU’RE GOING to hail a chariot, you should at least try for one that doesn’t have damnation right there in the name.

Meg’s coin hit the pavement and disappeared in a flash. Instantly, a car-size section of asphalt liquefied into a boiling pool of blood and tar. (At least that’s what it looked like. I did not test the ingredients.)

A taxi erupted from the goo like a submarine breaking the surface. It was similar to a standard New York cab, but gray instead of yellow: the color of dust, or tombstones, or probably my face at that moment. Painted across the door were the words GRAY SISTERS. Inside, sitting shoulder to shoulder across the driver’s bench, were the three old hags (excuse me, the three mature female siblings) themselves.

The passenger-side window rolled down. The sister riding shotgun stuck out her head and croaked, “Passage? Passage?”

She was just as lovely as I remembered: a face like a rubber Halloween mask, sunken craters where her eyes should have been, and a cobweb-and-linen shawl over her bristly white hair.

“Hello, Tempest.” I sighed. “It’s been a while.”

She tilted her head. “Who’s that? Don’t recognize your voice. Passage or not? We have other fares!”

“It is I,” I said miserably. “The god Apollo.”

Tempest sniffed the air. She smacked her lips, running her tongue over her single yellow tooth. “Don’t sound like Apollo. Don’t smell like Apollo. Let me bite you.”

“Um, no,” I said. “You’ll have to take my word for it. We need—”

“Wait.” Meg looked at me in wonder. “You know the Gray Sisters?”

She said this as if I’d been holding out on her—as if I knew all three founding members of Bananarama and had not yet gotten Meg their autographs. (My history with Bananarama—how I introduced them to the actual Venus and inspired their number one–hit cover of that song—is a story for another time.)

“Yes, Meg,” I said. “I am a god. I know people.”

Tempest grunted. “Don’t smell like a god.” She yelled at the sister on her left: “Wasp, take a gander. Who is this guy?”

The middle sister shoved her way to the window. She looked almost exactly like Tempest—to tell them apart, you’d have to have known them for a few millennia, which, unfortunately, I had—but today she had the trio’s single communal eye: a slimy, milky orb that peered at me from the depths of her left socket.

As unhappy as I was to see her again, I was even more unhappy that, by process of elimination, the third sister, Anger, had to be driving the taxi. Having Anger behind the wheel was never a good thing.

“It’s some mortal boy with a blood-soaked bandana on his head,” Wasp pronounced after ogling me. “Not interesting. Not a god.”

“That’s just hurtful,” I said. “It is me. Apollo.”

Meg threw her hands up. “Does it matter? I paid a coin. Can we get in, please?”

You might think Meg had a point. Why did I want to reveal myself? The thing was, the Gray Sisters would not take regular mortals in their cab. Also, given my history with them, I thought it best to be up-front about my identity, rather than have the Gray Sisters find out halfway through the ride and chuck me out of a moving vehicle.

“Ladies,” I said, using the term loosely, “I may not look like Apollo, but I assure you it’s me, trapped in this mortal body. Otherwise, how could I know so much about you?”

“Like what?” demanded Tempest.

“Your favorite nectar flavor is caramel crème,” I said. “Your favorite Beatle is Ringo. For centuries, all three of you had a massive crush on Ganymede, but now you like—”

“He’s Apollo!” Wasp yelped.

“Definitely Apollo!” Tempest wailed. “Annoying! Knows things!”

“Let me in,” I said, “and I’ll shut up.”

That wasn’t an offer I usually made.

The back-door lock popped up. I held the door open for Meg.

She grinned. “Who do they like now?”

I mouthed, Tell you later.

Inside, we strapped ourselves in with black chain seat belts. The bench was about as comfortable as a beanbag stuffed with silverware.

Behind the wheel, the third sister, Anger, grumbled, “Where to?”

I said, “Camp—”

Anger hit the gas. My head slammed into the backrest, and Manhattan blurred into a light-speed smear. I hoped Anger understood I meant Camp Half-Blood, or we might end up at Camp Jupiter, Camp David, or Campobello, New Brunswick, though I suspected those were outside the Gray Sisters’ regular service area.

The cab’s TV monitor flickered to life. An orchestra and a studio audience laugh track blared from the speaker. “Every night at eleven!” an announcer said. “It’s…Late Night with Thalia!”

I mashed the OFF button as fast as I could.

“I like the commercials,” Meg complained.

“They’ll rot your brain,” I said.

In truth, Late Night with Thalia! had once been my favorite show. Thalia (the Muse of comedy, not my demigod comrade Thalia Grace) had invited me on dozens of times as the featured musical guest. I’d sat on her sofa, traded jokes with her, played her silly games like Smite that City! and Prank Call Prophecy. But now I didn’t want any more reminders of my former divine life.

Not that I missed it. I was…Yes, I’m going to say it. I was embarrassed by the things I used to consider important. Ratings. Worshippers. The rise and fall of civilizations that liked me best. What were these things compared to keeping my friends safe? New York could not burn. Little Estelle Blofis had to grow up free to giggle and dominate the planet. Nero had to pay. I could not have gotten my face nearly chopped off that morning and thrown Luguselwa into a parked car two blocks away for nothing.

Meg appeared unfazed by my dark mood and her own wounded leg.

Deprived of commercials, she sat back and watched the blur of landscape out the window—the East River, then Queens, zipping by at a speed that mortal commuters could only dream of…which, to be fair, was anything above ten miles an hour. Anger steered, completely blind, as Wasp occasionally called out course corrections. “Left. Brake. Left. No, the other left!”

“So cool,” Meg said. “I love this cab.”

I frowned. “Have you taken the Gray Sisters’ cab often?”

My tone was the same as one might say You enjoy homework?

“It was a special treat,” Meg said. “When Lu decided I’d trained really well, we’d go for rides.”

I tried to wrap my mind around the concept of this mode of transportation as a treat. Truly, the emperor’s household was a twisted, evil place.

“The girl has taste!” Wasp cried. “We are the best way around the New York area! Don’t trust those ride-sharing services! Most of them are run by unlicensed harpies.”

“Harpies!” Tempest howled.

“Stealing our business!” Anger agreed.

I had a momentary vision of our friend Ella behind the wheel of a car. It made me almost glad to be in this taxi. Almost.

“We’ve upgraded our service, too!” Tempest boasted.