The Blood of Olympus (The Heroes of Olympus, #5)(60)

Their father had done everything he could to make the centuries-old hacienda feel like a modern home. He’d added the skylights, painted everything white to make it brighter and airier. But he’d only succeeded in making the place look like a well-groomed corpse in a new suit.

The trapdoor had opened into the massive fireplace. Why they even had a fireplace in Puerto Rico, Reyna had never understood, but she and Hylla used to pretend the hearth was a secret hideout where their father couldn’t find them. They used to imagine they could step inside and go to other places.

Now, Hylla had made that true. She had linked her underground lair to their childhood home.

‘Hylla –’

‘I told you, we don’t have time.’

‘But –’

‘I own the building now. I put the deed in my name.’

‘You did what?’

‘I was tired of running from the past, Reyna. I decided to reclaim it.’

Reyna stared at her, dumbfounded. You could reclaim a lost phone or a bag at the airport. You could even reclaim a hazardous waste dump. But this house and what had happened here? There was no reclaiming that.

‘Sister,’ Hylla said, ‘we’re wasting time. Are you coming or not?’

Reyna eyed the balconies, half expecting luminous shapes to flicker at the railing. ‘Have you seen them?’

‘Some of them.’

‘Papa?’

‘Of course not,’ Hylla snapped. ‘You know he’s gone for good.’

‘I don’t know anything of the sort. How could you come back? Why?’

‘To understand!’ Hylla shouted. ‘Don’t you want to know how it happened to him?’

‘No! You can’t learn anything from ghosts, Hylla. You of all people should realize –’

‘I’m leaving,’ Hylla said. ‘Your friends are a few blocks away. Are you coming with me, or should I tell them you died because you got lost in the past?’

‘I’m not the one who took possession of this place!’

Hylla turned on her heel and marched out of the front door.

Reyna looked around one more time. She remembered her last day here, when she was ten years old. She could almost hear her father’s angry roar echoing through the main room, the chorus of wailing ghosts on the balconies.

She ran for the exit. She burst into warm afternoon sunlight and found that the street hadn’t changed – the crumbling pastel houses, the blue cobblestones, dozens of cats sleeping under cars or in the shade of banana trees.

Reyna might have felt nostalgic … except that her sister stood a few feet away, facing Orion.

‘Well, now.’ The giant smiled. ‘Both daughters of Bellona together. Excellent!’

Reyna felt personally offended.

She had worked up an image of Orion as a towering ugly demon, even worse than Polybotes, the giant who had attacked Camp Jupiter.

Instead, Orion could have passed for human – a tall, muscular, handsome human. His skin was the colour of wheat toast. His dark hair was undercut, swept into spikes on top. With his black leather breeches and jerkin, his hunting knife and his bow and quiver, he might have been Robin Hood’s evil, better-looking brother.

Only his eyes ruined the image. At first glance, he appeared to be wearing military night-vision goggles. Then Reyna realized they weren’t goggles. They were the work of Hephaestus – bronze mechanical eyes embedded in the giant’s sockets. Focusing rings spun and clicked as he regarded Reyna. Targeting lasers flashed red to green. Reyna got the uncomfortable impression he was seeing much more than her form – her heat signature, her heart rate, her level of fear.

At his side he held a black composite bow almost as fancy as his eyes. Multiple strings ran through a series of pulleys that looked like miniature steam-train wheels. The grip was polished bronze, studded with dials and buttons.

He had no arrow nocked. He made no threatening moves. He smiled so dazzlingly it was hard to remember he was an enemy – someone who’d killed at least half a dozen Hunters and Amazons to get here.

Hylla drew her knives. ‘Reyna, go. I will deal with this monster.’

Orion chuckled. ‘Hylla Twice-Kill, you have courage. So did your lieutenants. They are dead.’

Hylla took a step forward.

Reyna grabbed her arm. ‘Orion!’ she said. ‘You have enough Amazon blood on your hands. Perhaps it’s time you try a Roman.’

The giant’s eyes clicked and dilated. Red laser dots floated across Reyna’s breastplate. ‘Ah, the young praetor. I admit, I’ve been curious. Before I slay you, perhaps you’ll enlighten me. Why would a child of Rome go to such lengths to help the Greeks? You have forfeited your rank, abandoned your legion, made yourself an outlaw – and for what? Jason Grace scorned you. Percy Jackson refused you. Haven’t you been … what’s the word … dumped enough?’

Reyna’s ears buzzed. She recalled Aphrodite’s warning, two years ago in Charleston: You will not find love where you wish or where you hope. No demigod shall heal your heart.

She forced herself to meet the giant’s gaze. ‘I don’t define myself by the boys who may or may not like me.’

‘Brave words.’ The giant’s smile was infuriating. ‘But you are no different from the Amazons, or the Hunters, or Artemis herself. You speak of strength and independence. As soon as you face a man of true prowess, your confidence crumbles. You feel threatened by my dominance and how it attracts you. So you run, or you surrender, or you die.’