The Tower of Nero (The Trials of Apollo #5)(18)

The back-door lock popped up. I held the door open for Meg.

She grinned. “Who do they like now?”

I mouthed, Tell you later.

Inside, we strapped ourselves in with black chain seat belts. The bench was about as comfortable as a beanbag stuffed with silverware.

Behind the wheel, the third sister, Anger, grumbled, “Where to?”

I said, “Camp—”

Anger hit the gas. My head slammed into the backrest, and Manhattan blurred into a light-speed smear. I hoped Anger understood I meant Camp Half-Blood, or we might end up at Camp Jupiter, Camp David, or Campobello, New Brunswick, though I suspected those were outside the Gray Sisters’ regular service area.

The cab’s TV monitor flickered to life. An orchestra and a studio audience laugh track blared from the speaker. “Every night at eleven!” an announcer said. “It’s…Late Night with Thalia!”

I mashed the OFF button as fast as I could.

“I like the commercials,” Meg complained.

“They’ll rot your brain,” I said.

In truth, Late Night with Thalia! had once been my favorite show. Thalia (the Muse of comedy, not my demigod comrade Thalia Grace) had invited me on dozens of times as the featured musical guest. I’d sat on her sofa, traded jokes with her, played her silly games like Smite that City! and Prank Call Prophecy. But now I didn’t want any more reminders of my former divine life.

Not that I missed it. I was…Yes, I’m going to say it. I was embarrassed by the things I used to consider important. Ratings. Worshippers. The rise and fall of civilizations that liked me best. What were these things compared to keeping my friends safe? New York could not burn. Little Estelle Blofis had to grow up free to giggle and dominate the planet. Nero had to pay. I could not have gotten my face nearly chopped off that morning and thrown Luguselwa into a parked car two blocks away for nothing.

Meg appeared unfazed by my dark mood and her own wounded leg.

Deprived of commercials, she sat back and watched the blur of landscape out the window—the East River, then Queens, zipping by at a speed that mortal commuters could only dream of…which, to be fair, was anything above ten miles an hour. Anger steered, completely blind, as Wasp occasionally called out course corrections. “Left. Brake. Left. No, the other left!”

“So cool,” Meg said. “I love this cab.”

I frowned. “Have you taken the Gray Sisters’ cab often?”

My tone was the same as one might say You enjoy homework?

“It was a special treat,” Meg said. “When Lu decided I’d trained really well, we’d go for rides.”

I tried to wrap my mind around the concept of this mode of transportation as a treat. Truly, the emperor’s household was a twisted, evil place.

“The girl has taste!” Wasp cried. “We are the best way around the New York area! Don’t trust those ride-sharing services! Most of them are run by unlicensed harpies.”

“Harpies!” Tempest howled.

“Stealing our business!” Anger agreed.

I had a momentary vision of our friend Ella behind the wheel of a car. It made me almost glad to be in this taxi. Almost.

“We’ve upgraded our service, too!” Tempest boasted.

I forced myself to focus on her eye sockets. “How?”

“You can use our app!” she said. “You don’t have to summon us with gold coins anymore!”

She pointed to a sign on the Plexiglas partition. Apparently, I could now link my favorite magic weapon to their cab and pay via virtual drachma using something called GRAY RYYD.

I shuddered to think what the Arrow of Dodona might do if I allowed it to make online purchases. If I ever got back to Olympus, I’d find my accounts frozen and my palace in foreclosure because the arrow had bought every known copy of Shakespeare’s First Folio.

“Cash is fine,” I said.

Wasp grumbled to Anger, “You and your predictions. I told you the app was a stupid idea.”

“Stopping for Apollo was stupider,” she muttered back. “That was your prediction.”

“You’re both stupid!” snapped Tempest. “That’s my prediction!”

The reasons for my long-standing dislike of the Gray Sisters were starting to come back to me. It wasn’t just that they were ugly, rude, gross, and smelled of grave rot. Or that the three of them shared one eye, one tooth, and zero social skills.

It wasn’t even the awful job they did hiding their celebrity crushes. In ancient Greek days, they’d had a crush on me, which was uncomfortable, but at least understandable. Then—if you can believe it—they got over me. For the past few centuries they’d been in the Ganymede Fan Club. Their Instagod posts about how hot he was got so annoying, I finally had to leave a snarky comment. You know that meme with the honey bear and the caption honey, he gay? Yes, I created that. And in Ganymede’s case, it was hardly news.

These days they’d decided to have a collective crush on Deimos, the god of fear, which just made no romantic sense to me. Sure, he’s buff, and he has nice eyes, but…

Wait. What was I talking about again?

Oh, right. The biggest friction between the Gray Sisters and me was professional jealousy.

I was a god of prophecy. The Gray Sisters told the future, too, but they weren’t under my corporate umbrella. They paid me no tribute, no royalties, nothing. They got their wisdom from…Actually, I didn’t know. Rumor had it they were born of the primal sea gods, created from swirls of foam and scum, so they knew little bits of wisdom and prophecy that got swept up in the tides. Whatever the case, I didn’t like them poaching my territory, and for some inexplicable reason, they didn’t like me back.