The Battle of the Labyrinth (Percy Jackson and the Olympians #4)(16)

Before I could ask why, she went poof into green mist.

Annabeth and I turned. Coming out of the woods was a glistening amber insect, ten feet long, with jagged pincers, an armored tail, and a stinger as long as my sword. A scorpion. Tied to its back was a red silk package.

“One of us gets behind it,” Annabeth said, as the thing clattered toward us. “Cuts off its tail while the other distracts it in front.”

“I’ll take point,” I said. “You’ve got the invisibility hat.”

She nodded. We’d fought together so many times we knew each other’s moves. We could do this, easy. But it all went wrong when the other two scorpions appeared from the woods.

“Three?” Annabeth said. “That’s not possible! The whole woods, and half the monsters come at us?”

I swallowed. One, we could take. Two, with a little luck. Three? Doubtful.

The scorpions scurried toward us, whipping their barbed tails like they’d come here just to kill us. Annabeth and I put our backs against the nearest boulder.

“Climb?” I said.

“No time,” she said.

She was right. The scorpions were already surrounding us. They were so close I could see their hideous mouths foaming, anticipating an ice juicy meal of demigods.

“Look out!” Annabeth parried away a stinger with the flat of her blade. I stabbed with Riptide, but the scorpion backed out of range. We clambered sideways along the boulders, but the scorpions followed us. I slashed at another one, but going on the offensive was too dangerous. If I went for the body, the tail stabbed downward. If I went for the tail, the thing’s pincers came from either side and tried to grab me. All we could do was defend, and we wouldn’t be able to keep that up for very long.

I took another step sideways, and suddenly there was nothing behind me. It was a crack between two of the largest boulders, something I’d passed by a million times, but…

“In here,” I said.

Annabeth sliced at a scorpion then looked at me like I was crazy. “In there? It’s too narrow.”

“I’ll cover you. Go!”

She ducked behind me and started squeezing between the two boulders. Then she yelped and grabbed my armor straps, and suddenly I was tumbling into a pit that hadn’t been there a moment before. I could see the scorpions above us, the purple evening sky and the trees, and then the hole shut like the lens of a camera, and we were in complete darkness.

Our breathing echoed against stone. It was wet and cold. I was sitting on a bumpy floor that seemed to be made of bricks.

I lifted Riptide. The faint glow of the blade was just enough to illuminate Annabeth’s frightened face and the mossy stone walls on either side of us.

“Wh-where are we?” Annabeth said.

“Safe from the scorpions, anyway,” I tried to sound calm, but I was freaking out. The crack between the boulders couldn’t have led into a cave. I would’ve known if there was a cave here; I was sure of it. It was like the ground had opened up and swallowed us. All I could think of was the fissure in the dining room pavilion, where those skeletons had been consumed last summer. I wondered if the same thing had happened to us.

I lifted my sword again for light.

“It’s a long room,” I muttered.

Annabeth gripped my arm. “It’s not a room. It’s a corridor.”

She was right the darkness felt…emptier in front of us. There was a warm breeze, like in subway tunnels, only it felt older, more dangerous somehow.

I started forward, but Annabeth stopped me. “Don’t take another step,” she warned. “We need to find the exit.”

She sounded really scared now.

“It’s okay,” I promised. “It’s right—”

I looked up and realized I couldn’t see where we’d fallen in. The ceiling was solid stone. The corridor seemed to stretch endlessly in both directions.

Annabeth’s hand slipped into mine. Under different circumstances I would’ve been embarrassed, but here in the dark I was glad to know where she was. It was about the only thing I was sure of.

“Two steps back,” she advised.

We stepped backward together like we were in a minefield.

“Okay,” she said. “Help me examine the walls.”

“What for?”

“The mark of Daedalus,” she said, as if that was supposed to make sense.

“Uh, okay. What kind of—”

“Got it!” she said with relief. She set her hand on the wall and pressed against a tiny fissure, which began to glow blue. A Greek symbol appeared: Δ, the Ancient Greek Delta.

The roof slid open and we saw night sky, stars blazing. It was a lot darker than it should’ve been. Metal ladder rungs appeared in the side of the wall, leading up, and I could hear people yelling our names.

“Percy! Annabeth!” Tyson’s voice bellowed the loudest, but others were calling out too.

I looked nervously at Annabeth. Then we began to climb.

***

We made our way around the rocks and ran into Clarisse and a bunch of other campers carrying torches.

“Where have you two been?” Clarisse demanded.

“We’ve been looking forever.”

“But we were gone only a few minutes,” I said.

Chiron trotted up, followed by Tyson and Grover.