The Demigod Files(22)

‘I won’t!’ he screamed. ‘No, no, no!’ Then he launched into a string of swear words in several different languages. If I’d had one of those jars where you put a quarter in for each bad word, I would’ve made around five hundred dollars.

He started to walk away from the boulder, but after three metres he lurched backwards, like some invisible force had pulled him. He staggered back to the boulder and started banging his head against it.

‘All right!’ he screamed. ‘All right, curse you!’

He rubbed his head and muttered some more swear words. ‘But this is the last time. Do you hear me?’

Nico looked at us. ‘Come on. While he’s between attempts.’

We scrambled down the hill.

‘Sisyphus!’ Nico called.

The troll guy looked up in surprise. Then he scrambled behind his rock. ‘Oh, no! You’re not fooling me with those disguises! I know you’re the Furies!’

‘We’re not the Furies,’ I said. ‘We just want to talk.’

‘Go away!’ he shrieked. ‘Flowers won’t make it better. It’s too late to apologize!’

‘Look,’ Thalia said, ‘we just want –’

‘La-la-la!’ he yelled. ‘I’m not listening!’

We played tag with him round the boulder until finally Thalia, who was the quickest, caught the old man by his hair.

‘Stop it!’ he wailed. ‘I have rocks to move. Rocks to move!’

‘I’ll move your rock!’ Thalia offered. ‘Just shut up and talk to my friends.’

Sisyphus stopped fighting. ‘You’ll – you’ll move my rock?’

‘It’s better than looking at you.’ Thalia glanced at me. ‘Be quick about it.’ Then she shoved Sisyphus towards us.

She put her shoulder against the rock and started pushing it very slowly uphill.

Sisyphus scowled at me distrustfully. He pinched my nose.

‘Ow!’ I said.

‘So you’re really not a Fury,’ he said in amazement. ‘What’s the flower for?’

‘We’re looking for someone,’ I said. ‘The flower is helping us find him.’

‘Persephone!’ He spat in the dust. ‘That’s one of her tracking devices, isn’t it?’ He leaned forward, and I caught an unpleasant whiff of old-guy-who’s-been-rolling-a-rock-for-eternity. ‘I fooled her once, you know. I fooled them all.’

I looked at Nico. ‘Translation?’

‘Sisyphus cheated death,’ Nico explained. ‘First he chained up Thanatos, the reaper of souls, so no one could die. Then when Thanatos got free and was about to kill him, Sisyphus told his wife not to do the correct funeral rites so he couldn’t rest in peace. Sisy here – May I call you Sisy?’

‘No!’

‘Sisy tricked Persephone into letting him go back to the world to haunt his wife. And he didn’t come back.’

The old man cackled. ‘I stayed alive another thirty years before they finally tracked me down!’

Thalia was halfway up the hill now. She gritted her teeth, pushing the boulder with her back. Her expression said, Hurry up!

‘So that was your punishment,’ I said to Sisyphus. ‘Rolling a boulder up a hill forever. Was it worth it?’

‘A temporary setback!’ Sisyphus cried. ‘I’ll bust out of here soon, and when I do they’ll all be sorry!’

‘How would you get out of the Underworld?’ Nico asked. ‘It’s locked down, you know.’

Sisyphus grinned wickedly. ‘That’s what the other one asked.’

My stomach tightened. ‘Someone else asked your advice?’

‘An angry young man,’ Sisyphus recalled. ‘Not very polite. Held a sword to my throat. Didn’t offer to roll my boulder at all.’

‘What did you tell him?’ Nico said. ‘Who was he?’

Sisyphus massaged his shoulders. He glanced up at Thalia, who was almost at the top of the hill. Her face was bright red and drenched in sweat.

‘Oh… it’s hard to say,’ Sisyphus said. ‘Never seen him before. He carried a long package all wrapped up in black cloth. Skis, maybe? A shovel? Maybe if you wait here, I could go look for him…’

‘What did you tell him?’ I demanded.

‘Can’t remember.’

Nico drew his sword. The Stygian iron was so cold it steamed in the hot, dry air of Punishment. ‘Try harder.’

The old man winced. ‘What kind of person carries a sword like that?’

‘A son of Hades,’ Nico said. ‘Now answer me!’

The colour drained from Sisyphus’s face. ‘I told him to talk to Melinoe! She always has a way out!’

Nico lowered his sword. I could tell the name Melinoe bothered him. ‘All right. What did this demigod look like?’

‘Um… he had a nose,’ Sisyphus said. ‘A mouth. And one eye and –’

‘One eye?’ I interrupted. ‘Did he have an eye patch?’

‘Oh… maybe,’ Sisyphus said. ‘He had hair on his head. And –’ He gasped and looked over my shoulder. ‘There he is!’

We fell for it.