The Battle of the Labyrinth (33 page)

He smells like dead people!
The Pegasus complained.
Hey now,
Blackjack said.
Come on, Porkpie. Lotsa demigods smell weird.
It ain’t their fault. Oh—uh, I didn’t mean you, boss.

“Go without me!” Nico said. “I don’t want to go back to that camp anyway.”

“Nico,” I said, “we need your help.”

He folded his arms and scowled. Then Annabeth put her hand on his shoulder.

“Nico,” she said. “Please.”

Slowly, his expression softened. “All right,” he said reluctantly. “For
you
. but I’m not staying.”

I raised an eyebrow at Annabeth, like,
How come all of a sudden Nico
listens to you?
She stuck her tongue out at me.

At last we got everybody on a Pegasus. We shot into the air, and soon we were over the East river with Long Island spread out before us.

* * *

We landed in the middle of the cabin area and were immediately met by Chiron, the potbellied satyr Silenus, and a couple of Apollo cabin archers. Chiron raised an eyebrow when he saw Nico, but if I expected him to be surprised by our latest news about Quintus being Daedalus, or Kronos rising, I was mistaken.

“I feared as much,” Chiron said. “We must hurry. Hopefully you have slowed down the Titan lord, but his vanguard will still be coming through. They will be anxious for blood. Most of our defenders are already in place. Come!”

“Wait a moment,” Silenus demanded. “What of the search for Pan? You are almost three weeks overdue, Grover Underwood! Your searcher’s license is revoked!”

Grover took a deep breath. He stood up straight and looked Silenus in the eye. “Searcher’s licenses don’t matter any more. The great god Pan is dead. He has passed on and left us his spirit.”

“What?”
Silenus’s face turned bright red. “Sacrilege and lies! Grover Underwood, I will have you exiled for speaking thus!”

“It’s true,” I said. “We were there when he died. All of us.”

“Impossible! You are all liars! Nature-destroyers!”

Chiron studied Grover’s face. “We will speak of this later.”

“We will speak of it now!” Silenus said. “We must deal with this—”

“Silenus,” Chiron cut in. “My camp is under attack. The matter of Pan has waited two thousand years. I fear it will have to wait a bit longer. Assuming we are still here this evening.”

And on that happy note, he readied his bow and galloped toward the woods, leaving us to follow as best we could.

* * *

It was the biggest military operation I’d ever seen at camp. Everyone was at the clearing, dressed in full battle armor, but this time it wasn’t for capture the flag. The Hephaestus cabin had set up traps around the entrance to the Labyrinth—razor wire, pits filled with pots of Greek fire, rows of sharpened sticks to deflect a charge. Beckendorf was manning two catapults the size of pickup trucks, already primed and aimed at Zeus’s Fist. The Ares cabin was on the front line, drilling in phalanx formation with Clarisse calling orders. Apollo’s and Hermes’s cabins were scattered in the woods with bows ready. Many had taken up positions in the trees. Even the dryads were armed with bows, and the satyrs trotted around with wooden cudgels and shields made of rough tree bark.

Annabeth went to join her brethren from the Athena cabin, who had set up a command tent and were directing operations. A gray banner with an owl fluttered outside the tent. Our security chief, Argus, stood guard at the door. Aphrodite’s children were running around straightening everybody’s armor and offering to comb the tangles out of our horsehair plumes. Even Dionysus’s kids had found something to do. The god himself was still nowhere to be seen, but his two blond twin sons were running around providing all the sweaty warriors with water bottles and juice boxes. It looked like a pretty good setup, but Chiron muttered next to me. “It isn’t enough.”

I thought about what I’d seen in the Labyrinth, all the monsters in Antaeus’s stadium, and the power of Kronos I’d felt of Mt. Tam. My heart sank. Chiron was right, but it was all we could muster. For once I wished Dionysus was here, but even if he had been, I didn’t know if he could do anything. When it came to war, gods were forbidden to interfere directly. Apparently, the Titans didn’t believe in restrictions like that. Over at the edge of the clearing, Grover was talking to Juniper. She held his hands while he told her our story. Green tears formed in her eyes as he delivered the news about Pan.

Tyson helped the Hephaestus kids prepare the defenses. He picked up boulders and piled them next to the catapults for firing.

“Stay with me, Percy,” Chiron said. “When the fighting begins, I want you to wait until we know what we’re dealing with. You must go where we most need reinforcements.”

“I saw Kronos,” I said, still stunned by the fact. “I looked straight into his eyes. It was Luke…but it wasn’t.”

Chiron ran his fingers along his bowstring. “He had golden eyes, I would guess. And in his presence, time seemed to turn to liquid.”

I nodded. “How could he take over a mortal body?”

“I do not know, Percy. Gods have assumed the shapes of mortals for ages, but to actually become one…to merge the divine form with the mortal. I don’t know how this could be done without Luke’s form turning into ashes.”

“Kronos said his body had been prepared.”

“I shudder to think what that means. But perhaps it will limit Kronos’s power. For a time, at least, he is confined to a human form. It binds him together. Hopefully it also restricts him.”

“Chiron, if he leads the attack—”

“I do not think so, my boy. I would sense if he were drawing near. No doubt he planned to, but I believe you inconvenienced him when you pulled down his throne room on top of him.” He looked at me reproachfully. “You and your friend Nico, son of Hades.”

A lump formed in my throat. “I’m sorry, Chiron. I know I should’ve told you. It’s just—”

Chiron raised his hand. “I understand why you did it, Percy. You felt responsible. You sought to protect him. But, my boy, if we are to survive this war, we must trust each other. We must…”

His voice wavered. The ground underneath us was trembling. Everyone in the clearing stopped what they were doing. Clarisse barked a single order: “Lock shields!”

Then the Titan lord’s army exploded from the Labyrinth.

* * *

I mean I’d been in fights before, but this was a full-scale battle. The first thing I saw were a dozen Laistrygonian giants erupting from the ground, yelling so loudly my ears felt like bursting. They carried shields made from flattened cars, and clubs that were tree trunks with rusty spikes bristling at the end. One of the giants bellowed at the Ares phalanx, smashed it sideways with his club, and the entire cabin was thrown aside, a dozen warriors tossed to the wind like rag dolls.

“Fire!” Beckendorf yelled. The catapults swung into action. Two boulders hurtled toward the giants. One deflected off a car shield with hardly a dent, but the other caught a Laistrygonian in the chest, and the giant went down. Apollo’s archers fired a volley, dozens of arrows sticking in the thick armor of the giants like porcupine quills. Several found chinks in armor, and some of the giants vaporized at the touch of celestial bronze. But just when it looked like the Laistrygonians were about to get overwhelmed, the next wave surged out of the maze: thirty, maybe forty
dracaenae
in full battle armor, wielding spears and nets. They dispersed in all directions. Some hit the traps the Hephaestus cabin had laid. One got struck on the spikes and became an easy target for archers. Another triggered a trip wire, and pots of Greek fire exploded into green flames, engulfing several of the snake women. But many more kept coming. Argus and Athena’s warriors rushed forward to meet them. I saw Annabeth draw a sword and engage one of them. Nearby, Tyson was riding a giant. Somehow he’d managed to climb onto the giant’s back and was hitting him on the head with a bronze shield—
BONG! BONG! BONG!

Chiron calmly aimed arrow after arrow, taking down a monster with every shot. But more enemies just kept climbing out of the maze. Finally a hellhound—not Mrs. O’Leary—leaped out of the tunnel and barreled straight toward the satyrs.

“GO!” Chiron yelled at me.

I drew Riptide and charged.

As I raced across the battlefield, I saw horrible things. An enemy halfblood was fighting with a son of Dionysus, but it wasn’t much of a contest. The enemy stabbed him in the arm then clubbed him over the head with the butt of his sword, and Dionysus’s son went down. Another enemy warrior shot flaming arrows into the trees, sending our archers and dryads into a panic.

A dozen
dracaenae
suddenly broke away from the main fight and slithered down the path that led toward camp, like they knew where they were going. If they got out, they could burn down the entire place, completely unopposed.

The only person anywhere near was Nico di Angelo. He stabbed a telekhine, and his black Stygian blade absorbed the monster’s essence, drinking its energy until there was nothing left but dust.

“Nico!” I yelled.

He looked where I was pointing, saw the serpent women, and immediately understood.

He took a deep breath and held out his black sword. “Serve me,” he called. The earth trembled. A fissure opened in front of the
dracaenae
, and a dozen undead warriors crawled from the earth—horrible corpses in military uniforms from all different time periods—U.S. Revolutionaries, Roman centurions, Napoleonic cavalry on skeletal horses. As one, they drew their swords and engaged the
dracaenae
. Nico crumpled to his knees, but I didn’t have time to make sure he was okay.

I closed on the hellhound, which was now pushing the satyrs back toward the woods. The beast snapped at one satyr, who danced out of its way, but then it pounced on another who was too slow. The satyr’s tree-bark shield cracked as he fell.

“Hey!” I yelled.

The hellhound turned. It snarled at me and leaped. It would’ve clawed me to pieces, but as I fell backward, my fingers closed around a clay jar—one of Beckendorf’s containers of Greek fire. I tossed it into the hellhound’s maw, and the creature went up in flames. I scrambled away, breathing heavily. The satyr who’d gotten trampled wasn’t moving. I rushed over to check on him, but then I heard Grover’s voice: “Percy!”

A forest fire had started. Flames roared within ten feet of Juniper’s tree, and Juniper and Grover were going nuts trying to save it. Grover played a rain song on his pipes. Juniper desperately tried to beat out the flames with her green shawl, but it was only making things worse.

I ran toward them, jumping past duels, weaving between the legs of giants. The nearest water was the creek, half a mile away…but I had to do something. I concentrated. There was a pull in my gut, a roar in my ears. Then a wall of water came rushing through the trees. It doused the fire, Juniper, Grover, and pretty much everything else.

Grover blew a spout of water. “Thanks, Percy!”

“No problem!” I ran back toward the fight, and Grover and Juniper followed. Grover had a cudgel in his hand and Juniper held a stick—like an old-fashioned whipping switch. She looked really angry, like she was going to tan somebody’s backside.

Just when it seemed like the battle had balanced out again—like we might stand a chance—an unearthly shriek echoed out of the Labyrinth, a sound I had heard before.

Kampê shot into the sky, her bat wings fully extended. She landed on the top of Zeus’s Fist and surveyed the carnage. Her face was filled with evil glee. The mutant animal heads growled at her waist. Snakes hissed and swirled around her legs. In her right hand she held a glittering ball of thread—Ariadne’s string—but she popped it into a lion’s mouth at her waist and drew her curved swords. The blades glowed green with poison. Kampê

screeched in triumph, and some of the campers screamed. Others tried to run and got trampled by hellhounds or giants.

“Di Immortales!”
Chiron yelled. He quickly aimed an arrow, but Kampê

seemed to sense his presence. She took flight with amazing speed, and Chrion’s arrow whizzed harmlessly past her head.

Tyson untangled himself from the giant whom he’d pummeled into unconsciousness. He ran at our lines, shouting, “Stand! Do not run from her!

Flight!”

But then a hellhound leaped on him, and Tyson and the hound went rolling away.

Kampê landed on the Athena command tent, smashing it flat. I ran after her and found Annabeth at my side, keeping pace, her sword in her hand.

“This might be it,” she said.

“Could be.”

“Nice fighting with you, Seaweed Brain.”

“Ditto.”

Together we leaped into the monster’s path. Kampê hissed and sliced at us. I dodged, trying to distract her, while Annabeth went in for a strike, but the monster seemed able to fight with both hands independently. She blocked Annabeth’s sword, and Annabeth had to jump back to avoid the cloud of poison. Just being near the thing was like standing in an acid fog. My eyes burned. My lungs couldn’t get enough air. I knew we couldn’t stand our ground for more than a few seconds.

“Come on!” I shouted. “We need help!”

But no help came. Everyone was either down, or fighting for their lives, or too scared to move forward. Three of Chiron’s arrows sprouted from Kampê’s chest, but she just roared louder.