The Blood of Olympus (The Heroes of Olympus, #5)(43)

She was glad for the work. It kept her from dwelling on her conversation with her mother the night before – that bleak glimpse of the future Aphrodite had made her promise not to share …

Meanwhile, Piper’s biggest challenge in Pylos was the ads plastered all over town for her dad’s new movie. The posters were in Greek, but Piper knew what they said: TRISTAN MCLEAN IS JAKE STEEL: SIGNED IN BLOOD.

Gods, what a horrible title. She wished her father had never taken on the Jake Steel franchise, but it had become one of his most popular roles. There he was on the poster, his shirt ripped open to reveal perfect abs (gross, Dad!), an AK-47 in each hand, a rakish smile on his chiselled face.

Halfway across the world, in the smallest, most out-of-the-way town imaginable, there was her dad. It made Piper feel sad, disoriented, homesick and annoyed all at once. Life went on. So did Hollywood. While her dad pretended to save the world, Piper and her friends actually had to. In eight more days, unless Piper could pull off the plan Aphrodite had explained … well, there wouldn’t be any more movies, or theatres, or people.

Around one in the afternoon, Piper finally put her charmspeak to work. She spoke with an Ancient Greek ghost in a Laundromat (on a one-to-ten scale for weird conversations, definitely an eleven) and got directions to an ancient stronghold where the shape-shifting descendants of Periclymenus supposedly hung out.

After trudging across the island in the afternoon heat, they found the cave perched halfway up a beachside cliff. Frank insisted that Piper wait for him at the bottom while he checked it out.

Piper wasn’t happy about that, but she stood obediently on the beach, squinting up at the cave entrance and hoping she hadn’t guided Frank into a death trap.

Behind her, a stretch of white sand hugged the foot of the hills. Sunbathers sprawled on blankets. Little kids splashed in the waves. The blue sea glittered invitingly.

Piper wished she could surf those waters. She’d promised to teach Hazel and Annabeth someday, if they ever came out to Malibu … if Malibu still existed after 1 August.

She glanced up at the cliff’s summit. The ruins of an old castle clung to the ridge. Piper wasn’t sure if that was part of the shape-changers’ hideout or not. Nothing moved on the parapets. The entrance of the cave sat about seventy feet down the cliff face – a circle of black in the chalky yellow rock like the hole of a giant pencil sharpener.

Nestor’s Cave, the Laundromat ghost had called it. Supposedly the ancient king of Pylos had stashed his treasure there in times of crisis. The ghost also claimed that Hermes had once hidden the stolen cattle of Apollo in that cave.

Cows.

Piper shuddered. When she was little, her dad had driven her past a meat-processing plant in Chino. The smell had been enough to turn her into a vegetarian. Ever since, just the thought of cows made her ill. Her experiences with Hera the cow queen, the katoblepones of Venice and the pictures of creepy death cows in the House of Hades hadn’t helped.

Piper was just starting to think, Frank’s been gone too long – when he appeared at the cave entrance. Next to him stood a tall grey-haired man in a white linen suit and a pale yellow tie. The older man pressed a small shiny object – like a stone or a piece of glass – into Frank’s hands. He and Frank exchanged a few words. Frank nodded gravely. Then the man turned into a seagull and flew away.

Frank picked his way down the trail until he reached Piper.

‘I found them,’ he said.

‘I noticed. You okay?’

He stared at the seagull as it flew towards the horizon.

Frank’s close-cropped hair pointed forward like an arrow, making his gaze even more intense. His Roman badges – mural crown, centurion, praetor – glittered on his shirt collar. On his forearm, the SPQR tattoo with the crossed spears of Mars stood out darkly in the full sunlight.

He looked good in his new outfit. The giant warthog had slimed his old clothes pretty badly, so Piper had taken him for some emergency shopping in Pylos. Now he wore new black jeans, soft leather boots and a dark green Henley shirt that fitted him snugly. He’d been self-conscious about the shirt. He was used to hiding his bulk in baggy clothes, but Piper assured him he didn’t have to worry about that any more. Since his growth spurt in Venice, he’d grown into his bulkiness just fine.

You haven’t changed, Frank, she’d told him. You’re just more you.

It was a good thing Frank Zhang was still so sweet and soft-spoken. Otherwise he would’ve been a scary guy.

‘Frank?’ she prompted gently.

‘Yeah, sorry.’ He focused on her. ‘My, uh … cousins, I guess you’d call them … they’ve been living here for generations, all descended from Periclymenus the Argonaut. I told them my story, how the Zhang family had gone from Greece to Rome to China to Canada. I told them about the legionnaire ghost I saw in the House of Hades, urging me to come to Pylos. They … they didn’t seem surprised. They said it’s happened before, long-lost relatives coming home.’

Piper heard the wistfulness in his voice. ‘You were expecting something different.’

He shrugged. ‘A bigger welcome. Some party balloons. I’m not sure. My grandmother told me I would close the circle – bring our family honour and all that. But my cousins here … they acted kind of cold and distant, like they didn’t want me around. I don’t think they liked that I’m a son of Mars. Honestly, I don’t think they liked that I’m Chinese, either.’