The Burning Maze (The Trials of Apollo #3)(28)

I gazed at the row of greenhouses – their silhouettes barely visible against the red-black night sky. Phillip McCaffrey had obviously been a talented man. Perhaps a botanist? Definitely a mortal favoured by the goddess Demeter. How else could he have created a house like Aeithales, in a place with such natural power? What had he been working on, and what had he meant when he said his family had been doing the same research for thousands of years? Humans rarely thought in terms of millennia. They were lucky if they even knew the names of their great-grandparents.

Most important, what had happened to Aeithales, and why? Who had driven the McCaffreys from their home and forced them east to New York? That last question, unfortunately, was the only one I felt I could answer.

‘Caligula did this,’ I said, gesturing at the ruined cylinders on the hillside. ‘That’s what Incitatus meant when he said the emperor took care of this place.’

Meg turned towards me, her face like stone. ‘We’re going to find out. Tomorrow. You, me, Grover. We’ll find these people, Piper and Jason.’

Arrows rattled in my quiver, but I couldn’t be sure if it was the Arrow of Dodona buzzing for attention, or my own body trembling. ‘And if Piper and Jason don’t know anything helpful?’

Meg brushed the dust from her hands. ‘They’re part of the seven, right? Percy Jackson’s friends?’

‘Well … yes.’

‘Then they’ll know. They’ll help. We’ll find Caligula. We’ll explore this mazy place and free the Sibyl and stop the fires and whatever.’

I admired her ability to summarize our quest in such eloquent terms.

On the other hand, I was not excited about exploring the mazy place, even if we had the help of two more powerful demigods. Ancient Rome had had powerful demigods too. Many of them tried to overthrow Caligula. All of them had died.

I kept coming back to my vision of the Sibyl, apologizing for her terrible news. Since when did an Oracle apologize?

I would spare you if I could. I would spare her.

The Sibyl had insisted I come to her rescue. Only I could free her, though it was a trap.

I never liked traps. They reminded me of my old crush Britomartis. Ugh, the number of Burmese tiger pits I’d fallen into for the sake of that goddess.

Meg swung her legs round. ‘I’m going to sleep. You should too.’

She hopped off the wall and picked her way across the hillside, heading back towards the Cistern. Since she had not actually ordered me to go to sleep, I stayed on the ledge for a long time, staring down into the strawberry-clogged chasm below, listening for the fluttering wings of ill omen.





12


O, Pinto, Pinto!

Wherefore art thou puke yellow?

I’ll hide in the back





Gods of Olympus, had I not suffered enough?

Driving from Palm Springs to Malibu with Meg and Grover would have been bad enough. Skirting wildfire evacuation zones and the LA morning rush hour made it worse. But did we have to make the journey in Gleeson Hedge’s mustard-coloured 1979 Ford Pinto coupé?

‘Are you kidding?’ I asked when I found my friends waiting with Gleeson at the car. ‘Don’t any of the cacti own a better – I mean, another vehicle?’

Coach Hedge glowered. ‘Hey, buddy, you should be grateful. This is a classic! Belonged to my granddaddy goat. I’ve kept it in great shape, so don’t you guys dare wreck it.’

I thought about my most recent experiences with cars: the sun chariot crashing nose-first into the lake at Camp Half-Blood; Percy Jackson’s Prius getting wedged between two peach trees in a Long Island orchard; a stolen Mercedes swerving through the streets of Indianapolis, driven by a trio of demon fruit spirits.

‘We’ll take good care of it,’ I promised.

Coach Hedge conferred with Grover, making sure he knew how to find the McLean house in Malibu.

‘The McLeans should still be there,’ Hedge mused. ‘At least, I hope so.’

‘What do you mean?’ Grover asked. ‘Why would they not be there?’

Hedge coughed. ‘Anyway, good luck! Give Piper my best if you see her. Poor kid …’

He turned and trotted back up the hill.

The inside of the Pinto smelled like hot polyester and patchouli, which brought back bad memories of disco-dancing with Travolta. (Fun fact: in Italian, his surname means overwhelmed, which perfectly describes what his cologne does.)

Grover took the wheel, since Gleeson trusted only him with the keys. (Rude.)

Meg rode shotgun, her red sneakers propped on the dashboard as she amused herself by growing bougainvillea vines around her ankles. She seemed in good spirits, considering last night’s share session of childhood tragedy. That made one of us. I could barely think about the losses she’d suffered without blinking back tears.

Luckily, I had lots of room to cry in privacy, since I was stuck in the back seat.

We started west on Interstate 10. As we passed by Moreno Valley, it took me a while to realize what was wrong: rather than slowly changing to green, the landscape remained brown, the temperature oppressive, and the air dry and sour, as if the Mojave Desert had forgotten its boundaries and spread all the way to Riverside. To the north, the sky was a soupy haze, like the entire San Bernardino Forest was on fire.

By the time we reached Pomona and hit bumper-to-bumper traffic, our Pinto was shuddering and wheezing like a warthog with heatstroke.