Percy Jackson The Complete Collection (95 page)

Kronos hesitated.

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, I prayed. The pain in my arm was so bad now I could barely stand.

‘Open his bag,’ Kronos ordered.

One of the giants ripped the explosives satchel from Beckendorf’s shoulders. He peered inside, grunted and turned it upside down. Panicked monsters surged backwards. If the bag really had been full of Greek fire jars, we would’ve all blown up. But what fell out were a dozen cans of peaches.

I could hear Kronos breathing, trying to control his anger.

‘Did you, perhaps,’ he said, ‘capture this demigod near the galley?’

Ethan turned pale. ‘Um –’

‘And did you, perhaps, send someone to actually CHECK THE ENGINE ROOM?’

Ethan scrambled back in terror, then turned on his heels and ran.

I cursed silently. Now we had only minutes before the bombs were disarmed. I caught Beckendorf’s eyes again and asked a silent question, hoping he would understand:
How long?

He cupped his fingers and thumb, making a circle.
ZERO.
There was no delay on the timer at all. If he managed to press the detonator button, the ship would blow at once. We’d never be able to get far enough away before using it. The monsters would kill us first, or disarm the explosives, or both.

Kronos turned towards me with a crooked smile. ‘You’ll have to excuse my incompetent help, Percy Jackson, but it
doesn’t matter. We have you now. We’ve known you were coming for weeks.’

He held out his hand and dangled a little silver bracelet with a scythe charm – the Titan lord’s symbol.

The wound in my arm was sapping my ability to think, but I muttered, ‘Communication device … spy at camp.’

Kronos chuckled. ‘You can’t count on friends. They will always let you down. Luke learned that lesson the hard way. Now drop your sword and surrender to me, or your friend dies.’

I swallowed. One of the giants had his hand around Beckendorf’s neck. I was in no shape to rescue him and, even if I tried, he would die before I got there. We both would.

Beckendorf mouthed one word:
Go.

I shook my head. I couldn’t just leave him.

The second giant was still rummaging through the peach cans, which meant Beckendorf’s left arm was free. He raised it slowly – towards the watch on his right wrist.

I wanted to scream,
NO!

Then down by the swimming pool one of the
dracaenae
hissed, ‘What isss he doing? What isss that on hisss wrissst?’

Beckendorf closed his eyes tight and brought his hand up to his watch.

I had no choice. I threw my sword like a javelin at Kronos. It bounced harmlessly off his chest, but it did startle him. I pushed through a crowd of monsters and jumped off the side of the ship – towards the water thirty metres below.

I heard rumbling deep in the ship. Monsters yelled at
me from above. A spear sailed past my ear. An arrow pierced my thigh, but I barely had time to register the pain. I plunged into the sea and willed the currents to take me far, far away – fifty metres, a hundred metres.

Even from that distance, the explosion shook the world. Heat seared the back of my head. The
Princess Andromeda
blew up from both sides, a massive fireball of green flame roiling into the dark sky, consuming everything.

Beckendorf
, I thought.

Then I blacked out and sank like an anchor towards the bottom of the sea.

Demigod dreams suck.

The thing is they’re never just
dreams.
They’ve got to be visions, omens and all that other mystical stuff that makes my brain hurt.

I dreamed I was in a dark palace at the top of a mountain. Unfortunately, I recognized it: the palace of the Titans on top of Mount Othrys, otherwise known as Mount Tamalpais in California. The main pavilion was open to the night, ringed with black Greek columns and statues of the Titans. Torchlight glowed against the black marble floor. In the centre of the room, an armoured giant struggled under the weight of a swirling funnel cloud – Atlas, holding up the sky.

Two other giant men stood nearby over a bronze brazier, studying images in the flames.

‘Quite an explosion,’ one said. He wore black armour studded with silver dots like a starry night. His face was covered in a war helm with a ram’s horn curling on either side.

‘It doesn’t matter,’ the other said. This Titan was dressed in gold robes, with golden eyes like Kronos. His entire body glowed. He reminded me of Apollo, god of the sun, except the Titan’s light was harsher, and his expression crueller. ‘The gods have answered the challenge. Soon they will be destroyed.’

The images in the fire were hard to make out: storms, buildings crumbling, mortals screaming in terror.

‘I will go east to marshal our forces,’ the golden Titan said. ‘Krios, you shall remain and guard Mount Othrys.’

The ram-horn dude grunted. ‘I always get the stupid jobs. Lord of the South. Lord of Constellations. Now I get to babysit Atlas while
you
have all the fun.’

Under the whirlwind of clouds, Atlas bellowed in agony. ‘Let me out, curse you! I am your greatest warrior. Take my burden so I may fight!’

‘Quiet!’ the golden Titan roared. ‘You had your chance, Atlas. You failed. Kronos likes you just where you are. As for you, Krios: do your duty.’

‘And if you need more warriors?’ Krios asked. ‘Our treacherous nephew in the tuxedo will not do you much good in a fight.’

The golden Titan laughed. ‘Don’t worry about him. Besides, the gods can barely handle our first little challenge. They have no idea how many others we have in store. Mark my words, in a few days’ time, Olympus will be in ruins, and we will meet here again to celebrate the dawn of the Sixth Age!’

The golden Titan erupted into flames and disappeared.

‘Oh, sure,’ Krios grumbled. ‘He gets to erupt into flames. I get to wear these stupid rams’ horns.’

The scene shifted. Now I was outside the pavilion, hiding in the shadows of a Greek column. A boy stood next to me, eavesdropping on the Titans. He had dark silky hair, pale skin and dark clothes – my friend Nico di Angelo, the son of Hades.

He looked straight at me, his expression grim. ‘You see,
Percy?’ he whispered. ‘You’re running out of time. Do you really think you can beat them without my plan?’

His words washed over me as cold as the ocean floor, and my dreams went black.

‘Percy?’ a deep voice said.

My head felt like it had been microwaved in tinfoil. I opened my eyes and saw a large shadowy figure looming over me.

‘Beckendorf?’ I asked hopefully.

‘No, brother.’

My eyes refocused. I was looking at a Cyclops – a misshapen face, ratty brown hair, one big brown eye full of concern. ‘Tyson?’

My brother broke into a toothy grin. ‘Yay! Your brain works!’

I wasn’t so sure. My body felt weightless and cold. My voice sounded wrong. I could hear Tyson, but it was more like I was hearing vibrations inside my skull, not the regular sounds.

I sat up and a gossamer sheet floated away. I was on a bed made of silky woven kelp, in a room panelled with abalone shell. Glowing pearls the size of basketballs floated around the ceiling, providing light. I was underwater.

Now, being the son of Poseidon and all, I was okay with this. I can breathe underwater just fine, and my clothes don’t even get wet unless I want them to. But it was still a bit of a shock when a hammerhead shark drifted through the bedroom window, regarded me and then swam calmly out the opposite side of the room.

‘Where –’

‘Daddy’s palace,’ Tyson said.

Under different circumstances, I would’ve been excited. I’d never visited Poseidon’s realm, and I’d been dreaming about it for years. But my head hurt. My shirt was still speckled with burn marks from the explosion. My arm and leg wounds had healed – just being in the ocean can do that for me, given enough time – but I still felt like I’d been trampled by a Laistrygonian rugby team in studs.

‘How long –’

‘We found you last night,’ Tyson said, ‘sinking through the water.’

‘The
Princess Andromeda
?’

‘Went ka-boom,’ Tyson confirmed.

‘Beckendorf was on board. Did you find …’

Tyson’s face darkened. ‘No sign of him. I am sorry, brother.’

I stared out of the window into deep blue water. Beckendorf was supposed to go to college in the fall. He had a girlfriend, lots of friends, his whole life ahead of him. He couldn’t be
gone.
Maybe he’d made it off the ship like I had. Maybe he’d jumped over the side … and what? He couldn’t have survived a thirty-metre fall into the water like I could. He couldn’t put enough distance between himself and the explosion.

I knew in my gut he was dead. He’d sacrificed himself to take out the
Princess Andromeda
, and I had abandoned him.

I thought about my dream: the Titans discussing the explosion as if it didn’t matter, Nico di Angelo warning me that I would never beat Kronos without following his plan – a dangerous idea I’d been avoiding for over a year.

A distant blast shook the room. Green light blazed outside, turning the whole sea as bright as noon.

‘What was that?’ I asked.

Tyson looked worried. ‘Daddy will explain. Come, he is blowing up monsters.’

The palace might have been the most amazing place I’d ever seen if it hadn’t been in the process of getting destroyed. We swam to the end of a long hallway and shot upward on a geyser. As we rose over the rooftops, I caught my breath – well, if you can catch your breath underwater.

The palace was as big as the city on Mount Olympus, with wide courtyards, gardens and columned pavilions. The gardens were sculpted with coral colonies and glowing sea plants. Twenty or thirty buildings were made of abalone, white but gleaming with rainbow colours. Fish and octopi darted in and out of the windows. The paths were lined with glowing pearls like Christmas lights.

The main courtyard was filled with warriors – mermen with fish tails from the waist down and human bodies from the waist up, except their skin was blue, which I’d never known before. Some were tending the wounded. Some were sharpening spears and swords. One passed us, swimming in a hurry. His eyes were bright green, like that stuff they put in glow sticks, and his teeth were shark teeth. They don’t show you stuff like that in
The Little Mermaid.

Outside the main courtyard stood large fortifications – towers, walls and anti-siege weapons – but most of these had been smashed to ruins. Others were blazing with a strange green light that I knew well – Greek fire, which can burn even underwater.

Beyond this, the sea floor stretched into gloom. I could see battles raging – flashes of energy, explosions, the glint
of armies clashing. A regular human would’ve found it too dark to see. Heck, a regular human would’ve been crushed by the pressure and frozen by the cold. Even my heat-sensitive eyes couldn’t make out exactly what was going on.

At the edge of the palace complex, a temple with a red coral roof exploded, sending fire and debris streaming in slow motion across the furthest gardens. Out of the darkness above, an enormous form appeared – a squid larger than any skyscraper. It was surrounded by a glittering cloud of dust – at least I thought it was dust until I realized it was a swarm of mermen, trying to attack the monster. The squid descended on the palace and swatted its tentacles, smashing a whole column of warriors. Then a brilliant arc of blue light shot from the rooftop of one of the tallest buildings. The light hit the giant squid and the monster dissolved like food colouring in water.

‘Daddy,’ Tyson said, pointing to where the light had come from.

‘
He
did that?’ I suddenly felt more hopeful. My dad had unbelievable powers. He was the god of the sea. He could deal with this attack, right? Maybe he’d let me help.

‘Have you been in the fight?’ I asked Tyson in awe. ‘Like, bashing heads with your awesome Cyclops strength and stuff?’

Tyson pouted, and immediately I knew I’d asked a bad question. ‘I have been … fixing weapons,’ he mumbled. ‘Come. Let’s go find Daddy.’

I know this might sound weird to people with, like, regular parents, but I’d only seen my dad four or five times in my life, and never for more than a few minutes. The Greek
gods don’t exactly show up for their kids’ basketball games. Still, I thought I would recognize Poseidon on sight.

I was wrong.

The roof of the temple was a big open deck that had been set up as a command centre. A mosaic on the floor showed an exact map of the palace grounds and the surrounding ocean, but the mosaic moved. Coloured stone tiles representing different armies and sea monsters shifted around as the forces changed position. Buildings that collapsed in real life also collapsed in the picture.

Standing around the mosaic, grimly studying the battle, was a strange assortment of warriors, but none of them looked like my dad. I was searching for a big guy with a good tan and a black beard, wearing Bermuda shorts and a Hawaiian shirt.

There was nobody like that. One guy was a merman with two fish tails instead of one. His skin was green and his armour studded with pearls. His black hair was tied in a ponytail and he looked young – though it’s hard to tell with non-humans. They could be a thousand years old or three. Standing next to him was an old man with a bushy white beard and grey hair. His battle armour seemed to weigh him down. He had green eyes and smile wrinkles around his eyes, but he wasn’t smiling now. He was studying the map and leaning on a large metal staff. To his right stood a beautiful woman in green armour with flowing black hair and strange little horns like crab claws. And there was a dolphin – just a regular dolphin, but it was staring at the map intently.

‘Delphin,’ the old man said. ‘Send Palaemon and his legion of sharks to the western front. We have to neutralize those leviathans.’

The dolphin spoke in a chattering voice, but I could understand it in my mind:
Yes, lord!
It sped away.

I looked in dismay at Tyson, then back at the old man.

It didn’t seem possible, but … ‘Dad?’ I asked.

The old man looked up. I recognized the twinkle in his eyes, but his face … he looked like he’d aged forty years.

‘Hello, Percy.’

‘What – what happened to you?’

Tyson nudged me. He was shaking his head so hard I was afraid it would fall off, but Poseidon didn’t look offended.

‘It’s all right, Tyson,’ he said. ‘Percy, excuse my appearance. The war has been hard on me.’

‘But you’re immortal,’ I said quietly. ‘You can look … any way you want.’

‘I reflect the state of my realm,’ he said. ‘And right now that state is quite grim. Percy, I should introduce you – I’m afraid you just missed my lieutenant Delphin, god of the dolphins. This is my, er, wife, Amphitrite. My dear –’

The lady in green armour stared at me coldly then crossed her arms and said, ‘Excuse me, my lord. I am needed in the battle.’

She swam away.

I felt pretty awkward, but I guess I couldn’t blame her. I’d never thought about it much, but my dad had an immortal wife. All his romances with mortals, including with my mom … well, Amphitrite probably didn’t like that much.

Poseidon cleared his throat. ‘Yes, well … and this is my son Triton. Er, my
other
son.’

‘Your son and heir,’ the green dude corrected. His double fishtails swished back and forth. He smiled at me, but there was no friendliness in his eyes. ‘Hello, Perseus Jackson. Come to help at last?’

He acted like I was late or lazy. If you can blush underwater, I probably did.

‘Tell me what to do,’ I said.

Triton smiled like that was a cute suggestion – like I was a slightly amusing dog that had barked for him or something. He turned to Poseidon. ‘I will see to the front line, Father. Don’t worry.
I
will not fail.’

He nodded politely to Tyson. How come I didn’t get that much respect? Then he shot off into the water.

Poseidon sighed. He raised his staff and it changed into his regular weapon – a huge three-pointed trident. The tips glowed with blue light and the water around it boiled with energy.

‘I’m sorry about that,’ he told me.

A huge sea serpent appeared from above us and spiralled down towards the roof. It was bright orange with a fanged mouth big enough to swallow a gymnasium.

Hardly looking up, Poseidon pointed his trident at the beast and zapped it with blue energy.
Ka-boom!
The monster burst into a million goldfish, which all swam off in terror.

‘My family is anxious,’ Poseidon continued, as if nothing had happened. ‘The battle against Oceanus is going poorly.’

He pointed to the edge of the mosaic. With the butt of his trident, he tapped the image of a merman larger than the rest, with the horns of a bull. He appeared to be
riding a chariot pulled by crawfish, and instead of a sword he wielded a live serpent.

‘Oceanus,’ I said, trying to remember. ‘The Titan of the sea?’

Poseidon nodded. ‘He was neutral in the first war of gods and Titans. But Kronos has convinced him to fight. This is … well, it’s not a good sign. Oceanus would not commit unless he was sure he could pick the winning side.’

‘He looks stupid,’ I said, trying to sound upbeat. ‘I mean who fights with a snake?’

‘Daddy will tie it in knots,’ Tyson said firmly.

Poseidon smiled, but he looked weary. ‘I appreciate your faith. We have been at war almost a year now. My powers are taxed. And still he finds new forces to throw at me – sea monsters so ancient I had forgotten about them.’