The Tower of Nero

“Nobody’s that lucky. I think your godly powers are starting to come back more. Like, a lot more.”

“Yay!” My knees buckled. “Where’s Rachel?”

Nico grunted, trying to keep me on my feet. “She was fine last I saw her. She’s the one who sent me here to get you—she’s been having visions like crazy for the last day now. She’s with the trogs.”

“We have trogs! Whee!” I leaned my head against Nico’s and sighed contentedly. His hair smelled like rain against stone…a pleasant scent.

“Are you smelling my head?” he asked.

“Um—”

“Could you not? You’re getting nose blood all over me.”

“Sorry.” Then I laughed again.

Wow, I thought distantly. That kick to the face must have rattled my brain loose.

Nico half dragged me down the corridor as he briefed me on their adventures since the trog encampment. I couldn’t concentrate, and I kept giggling at inappropriate moments, but I gleaned that, yes, the trogs had helped them disable the Greek-fire vats; Rachel had managed to summon help from Camp Half-Blood; and Nero’s tower was now the world’s largest urban-warfare play structure.

In return, I told him that Lu now had silverware for hands.…

“Huh?”

She had gone to get Nero’s fasces from a leontocephaline.…

“A what-now?”

And I had to get to the southeast corner of the residence wing to find Meg.

That, at least, Nico understood. “You’re three floors too low.”

“I knew something was wrong!”

“It’ll be tough getting you through all the fighting. Every level is, well…”

We’d reached the end of the hallway. He kicked open a door and we stepped into the Conference Room of Calamity.

A half dozen troglodytes bounced around the room fighting an equal number of mortal security guards. Along with their fine clothing and hats, the trogs all wore thick dark goggles to protect their eyes from the light, so they looked like miniature aviators at a costume party. Some guards were trying to shoot them, but the trogs were small and fast. Even when a bullet hit one of them, it simply glanced off their rock-like skin, making them hiss with annoyance. Other guards had resorted to riot batons, which weren’t any more effective. The trogs leaped around the mortals, whacking them with clubs, stealing their helmets, and basically having a grand old time.

My old friend Grr-Fred, Mighty of Hats, Corporate Security Chief, leaped from a light fixture, brained a guard, then landed on the conference table and grinned at me. He’d topped his police hat with a new baseball cap that read TRIUMVIRATE HOLDINGS.

“GOOD COMBAT, Lester-Apollo!” He beat his tiny fists against his chest, then ripped a speakerphone from the table and threw it in the face of an oncoming guard.

Nico guided me through the chaos. We ducked through another doorway and ran straight into a Germanus, whom Nico impaled with his Stygian iron blade without even breaking stride.

“The Camp Half-Blood landing zone is just ahead,” he told me as if nothing had happened.

“Landing zone?”

“Yeah. Pretty much everybody came to help.”

“Even Dionysus?” I would’ve paid real drachma to watch him turn our enemies into grapes and stomp on them. That was always good for a laugh.

“Well, no, not Mr. D,” Nico said. “You know how it is. Gods don’t fight demigod battles. Present company excepted.”

“I’m an exception!” I kissed the top of Nico’s head in delight.

“Please don’t do that.”

“Okay! Who else is here? Tell me! Tell me!” I felt like he was guiding me toward my own birthday party, and I was dying to know the guest list. Also, I felt like I was dying!

“Um, well…”

We’d arrived at a set of heavy mahogany sliding doors.

Nico dragged one open and the setting sun nearly blinded me. “Here we are now.”

A wide terrace ran along the entire side of the building, providing multimillion-dollar views of the Hudson River and New Jersey cliffs beyond, tinged burgundy in the sunset.

The scene on the terrace was even more chaotic than the one in the conference room. Pegasi swooped through the air like giant seagulls, occasionally landing on the deck to unload new demigod reinforcements in orange Camp Half-Blood shirts. Nasty-looking Celestial bronze harpoon turrets lined the rails, but most of them had been blown-up or crushed. Lounge chairs were on fire. Our friends from camp were engaged in close-quarters fighting with dozens of Nero’s forces: a few of the older demigod kids from Nero’s Imperial Household, a squad of Germani, mortal security guards, and even a few cynocephali—wolf-headed warriors with nasty claws and rabid, slavering mouths.

Against the wall stood a line of potted trees, similar to in the throne room. Their dryads had risen up to fight alongside Camp Half-Blood against Nero’s oppression.

“Come, sisters!” cried a ficus spirit, brandishing a pointy stick. “We have nothing to lose but our potting soil!”

In the center of the chaos, Chiron himself clopped back and forth, his white stallion lower half draped with extra quivers, weapons, shields, and water bottles, like a combination demigod soccer mom and minivan. He wielded his bow as well as I ever could have (though that comment should be considered strictly off the record) while shouting encouragement and directions to his young charges. “Dennis, try not to kill enemy demigods or mortals! Okay, well, from now on, then! Evette, watch your left flank! Ben—whoa, watch out there, Ben!”

This last comment was directed at a young man in a hand-powered wheelchair, his muscular upper body clad in a racing shirt, his driving gloves studded with spikes. His wild black hair flew in every direction, and as he turned, blades jutted from the rims of his wheels, mowing down anyone who dared to get close. His last one-eighty had almost caught Chiron’s back legs, but fortunately the old centaur was nimble.

“Sorry!” Ben grinned, seeming not sorry at all, then he wheeled himself straight into a pack of cynocephali.

“Dad!” Kayla came racing toward me. “Oh, gods, what happened to you? Nico, where’s Will?”

“That’s a great question,” Nico said. “Kayla, can you take Apollo while I go look?”

“Yeah, go!”

Nico raced off while Kayla dragged me to the safest corner she could find. She propped me in the only intact chaise longue and began rummaging through her med pack.

I had a lovely view of the sunset and the carnage in progress. I wondered if I could get one of Nero’s servants to bring me a fancy drink decorated with a tiny umbrella. I started to giggle again, though what was left of my common sense whispered, Stop it. Stop it. This is not funny.

Kayla frowned, clearly worried by my mirth. She dabbed some menthol-scented healing ointment on my busted nose. “Oh, Dad. I’m afraid you’re going to have a scar.”

“I know.” I giggled. “I’m so glad to see you.”

Kayla managed a weak smile. “You, too. Been a crazy afternoon. Nico and those trogs infiltrated the building from below. The rest of us hit the tower on several levels at once, overwhelmed their security. The Hermes cabin disarmed a lot of the traps and turrets and whatnot, but we’ve still got fierce fighting pretty much everywhere.”