The Demigod Files(21)

I glanced at Thalia. She didn’t seem too enthusiastic about the whole track-a-thief-with-a-flower thing. Then I looked at Nico. Unfortunately, I recognized the expression on his face. I knew what it was like wanting to make your dad proud, even if your dad was hard to love. In this case, really hard to love.

Nico was going to do this, with or without us. And I couldn’t let him go alone.

‘One condition,’ I told Persephone. ‘Hades will have to swear on the River Styx that he will never use this sword against the gods.’

The goddess shrugged. ‘I am not Lord Hades, but I am confident he would do this – as payment for your help.’

Another petal fell off the carnation.

I turned to Thalia. ‘I’ll hold the flower while you beat up the thief?’

She sighed. ‘Fine. Let’s go catch this jerk.’

The Underworld didn’t get into the Christmas spirit. As we made our way down the palace road into the Fields of Asphodel, it looked pretty much like it had on my previous visit – seriously depressing. Yellow grass and stunted black poplar trees rolled on forever. Shades drifted aimlessly across the hills, coming from nowhere and going nowhere, chattering to each other and trying to remember who they were in life. High above us, the cavern ceiling glistened darkly.

I carried the carnation, which made me feel pretty stupid. Nico led the way since his blade could clear a path through any crowd of undead. Thalia mostly grumbled that she should’ve known better than to go on a quest with a couple of boys.

‘Did Persephone seem kind of uptight?’ I asked.

Nico waded through a mob of ghosts, driving them back with Stygian iron. ‘She always acts that way when I’m around. She hates me.’

‘Then why did she include you in the quest?’

‘Probably my dad’s idea.’ He sounded like he wanted that to be true, but I wasn’t so sure.

It seemed strange to me that Hades hadn’t given us the quest himself. If this sword was so important to him, why had he let Persephone explain things? Usually Hades liked to threaten demigods in person.

Nico forged ahead. No matter how crowded the fields were – and if you’ve ever seen Times Square on New Year’s Eve, you’ll have a pretty good idea – the spirits parted before him.

‘He’s handy with zombie crowds,’ Thalia admitted. ‘Think I’ll take him along next time I go to the shopping mall.’

She gripped her bow tight, like she was afraid it would turn into a honeysuckle vine again. She didn’t look any older than she had last year, and it suddenly occurred to me that she would never age again now that she was a huntress. That meant I was older than her. Weird.

‘So,’ I said, ‘how’s immortality treating you?’

She rolled her eyes. ‘It’s not total immortality, Percy. You know that. We can still die in combat. It’s just… we don’t ever age or get sick, so we live forever, assuming we don’t get sliced to pieces by monsters.’

‘Always a danger.’

‘Always.’ She looked around, and I realized she was scanning the faces of the dead.

‘If you’re looking for Bianca,’ I said quietly, so Nico wouldn’t hear me, ‘she’d be in Elysium. She died a hero’s death.’

‘I know that,’ Thalia snapped. Then she caught herself. ‘It’s not that, Percy. I was just… never mind.’

A cold feeling washed over me. I remembered that Thalia’s mother had died in a car crash a few years ago. They’d never been close, but Thalia had never got to say goodbye. If her mother’s shade was wandering around down here – no wonder Thalia looked jumpy.

‘I’m sorry,’ I said. ‘I wasn’t thinking.’

Our eyes met, and I got the feeling she understood. Her expression softened. ‘It’s okay. Let’s just get this over with.’

Another petal fell off the carnation as we marched on.

I wasn’t happy when the flower pointed us towards the Fields of Punishment. I was hoping we’d veer into Elysium so we could hang out with the beautiful people and party, but no. The flower seemed to like the harshest, evillest part of the Underworld. We jumped over a lava stream and picked our way past scenes of horrible torture. I won’t describe them because you’d completely lose your appetite, but I wished I had cotton wool in my ears to shut out the screaming and the 1980s music.

The carnation tilted its face towards a hill on our left.

‘Up there,’ I said.

Thalia and Nico stopped. They were covered with soot from trudging through Punishment. I probably didn’t look much better.

A loud grinding noise came from the other side of the hill, like somebody was dragging a washing machine. Then the hill shook with a BOOM! BOOM! BOOM! and a man yelled curses.

Thalia looked at Nico. ‘Is that who I think it is?’

‘Afraid so,’ Nico said. ‘The number-one expert on cheating death.’

Before I could ask what he meant, he led us to the top of the hill.

The dude on the other side was not pretty, and he was not happy. He looked like one of those troll dolls with orange skin, a pot belly, scrawny legs and arms and a big loincloth/diaper thing around his waist. His ratty hair stuck up like a torch. He was hopping around, cursing and kicking a boulder that was twice as big as he was.