The pandos winced. “Five days?”

“So you can have your work done in five days? Excellent! Carry on.”

Boost gulped, then scuttled away as fast as his furry feet could carry him.

Caligula smiled at his fellow emperor. “You see, Commodus? Soon Camp Jupiter will be ours. With luck, the Sibylline Books will be in our hands as well. Then we’ll have some proper bargaining power. When it’s time to face Python and carve up our portions of the world, you’ll remember who helped you…and who did not.”

“Oh, I’ll remember. Stupid Nero.” Commodus poked the ice cubes in his drink. “Which one is this again, the Shirley Temple?”

“No, that’s the Roy Rogers,” Caligula said. “Mine is the Shirley Temple.”

“And you’re sure this is what modern warriors drink when they go into battle?”

“Absolutely,” Caligula said. “Now enjoy the ride, my friend. You have five whole days to work on your tan and get your vision back. Then we’ll have some lovely carnage in the Bay Area!”

The scene vanished, and I fell into cold darkness.

I found myself in a dimly lit stone chamber filled with shuffling, stinking, groaning undead. Some were as withered as Egyptian mummies. Others looked almost alive except for the ghastly wounds that had killed them. At the far end of the room, between two rough-hewn columns, sat…a presence, wreathed in a magenta haze. It raised its skeletal visage, fixing me with its burning purple eyes—the same eyes that had stared out at me from the possessed ghoul in the tunnel—and began to laugh.

My gut wound ignited like a line of gunpowder.

I woke, screaming in agony. I found myself shaking and sweating in a strange room.

“You too?” Meg asked.

She stood next to my cot, leaning out an open window and digging in a flower box. Her gardening belt’s pockets sagged with bulbs, seed packets, and tools. In one muddy hand, she held a trowel. Children of Demeter. You can’t take them anywhere without them playing in the dirt.

“Wh-what’s going on?” I tried to sit up, which was a mistake.

My gut wound really was a fiery line of agony. I looked down and found my bare midsection wrapped in bandages that smelled of healing herbs and ointments. If the camp’s healers had already treated me, why was I still in so much pain?

“Where are we?” I croaked.

“Coffee shop.”

Even by Meg’s standards, that statement seemed ridiculous.

Our room had no coffee bar, no espresso machine, no barista, no yummy pastries. It was a simple whitewashed cube with a cot against either wall, an open window between them, and a trapdoor in the far corner, which led me to believe we were on an upper story. We might have been in a prison cell, except there were no bars on the window, and a prison cot would have been more comfortable. (Yes, I am sure. I did some research on Folsom Prison with Johnny Cash. Long story.)

“The coffee shop is downstairs,” Meg clarified. “This is Bombilo’s spare room.”

I remembered the two-headed, green-aproned barista who had scowled at us on the Via Praetoria. I wondered why he would’ve been kind enough to give us lodging, and why, of all places, the legion had decided to put us here. “Why, exactly—?”

“Lemurian spice,” Meg said. “Bombilo had the nearest supply. The healers needed it for your wound.”

She shrugged, like, Healers, what can you do? Then she went back to planting iris bulbs.

I sniffed at my bandages. One of the scents I detected was indeed Lemurian spice. Effective stuff against the undead, though the Lemurian Festival wasn’t until June, and it was barely April…. Ah, no wonder we’d ended up in the coffee shop. Every year, retailers seemed to start Lemurian season earlier and earlier—Lemurian-spice lattes, Lemurian-spice muffins—as if we couldn’t wait to celebrate the season of exorcising evil spirits with pastries that tasted faintly of lima beans and grave dust. Yum.

What else did I smell in that healing balm…crocus, myrrh, unicorn-horn shavings? Oh, these Roman healers were good. Then why didn’t I feel better?

“They didn’t want to move you too many times,” Meg said. “So we just kind of stayed here. It’s okay. Bathroom downstairs. And free coffee.”

“You don’t drink coffee.”

“I do now.”

I shuddered. “A caffeinated Meg. Just what I need. How long have I been out?”

“Day and a half.”

“What?!”

“You needed sleep. Also, you’re less annoying unconscious.”

I didn’t have the energy for a proper retort. I rubbed the gunk out of my eyes, then I forced myself to sit up, fighting down the pain and nausea.

Meg studied me with concern, which must have meant I looked even worse than I felt.

“How bad?” she asked.

“I’m okay,” I lied. “What did you mean earlier, when you said, ‘You too’?”

Her expression closed up like a hurricane shutter. “Nightmares. I woke up screaming a couple of times. You slept through it, but…” She picked a clod of dirt off her trowel. “This place reminds me of…you know.”

I regretted I hadn’t thought about that sooner. After Meg’s experience growing up in Nero’s Imperial Household, surrounded by Latin-speaking servants and guards in Roman armor, purple banners, all the regalia of the old empire—of course Camp Jupiter must have triggered unwelcome memories.

“I’m sorry,” I said. “Did you dream…anything I should know about?”

“The usual.” Her tone made it clear she didn’t want to elaborate. “What about you?”

I thought about my dream of the two emperors sailing leisurely in our direction, drinking cherry-garnished mocktails while their troops rushed to assemble secret weapons they’d ordered from IKEA.

Our deceased ally. Plan B. Five days.

I saw those burning purple eyes in a chamber filled with the undead. The king’s dead.

“The usual,” I agreed. “Help me up?”

It hurt to stand, but if I’d been lying in that cot for a day and a half, I wanted to move before my muscles turned to tapioca. Also, I was beginning to realize I was hungry and thirsty and, in the immortal words of Meg McCaffrey, I needed to pee. Human bodies are annoying that way.

I braced myself against the windowsill and peered outside. Below, demigods bustled along the Via Praetoria—carrying supplies, reporting for duty assignments, hurrying between the barracks and the mess hall. The pall of shock and grief seemed to have faded. Now everyone looked busy and determined. Craning my head and looking south, I could see Temple Hill abuzz with activity. Siege engines had been converted to cranes and earthmovers. Scaffolds had been erected in a dozen locations. The sounds of hammering and stone-cutting echoed across the valley. From my vantage point, I could identify at least ten new small shrines and two large temples that hadn’t been there when we arrived, with more in the works.

“Wow,” I murmured. “Those Romans don’t mess around.”

“Tonight’s the funeral for Jason,” Meg informed me. “They’re trying to finish up work before then.”

Judging from the angle of the sun, I guessed it was about two in the afternoon. Given their pace so far, I figured that would give the legion ample time to finish Temple Hill and maybe construct a sports stadium or two before dinner.