The House of Hades (The Heroes of Olympus #4)(84)

Last night, during her talk with Hazel, Piper had realized that the secret of charmspeak was a lot like using the Mist. In the past, Piper had had a lot of trouble making her charms work, because she always ordered her enemies to do what she wanted. She would yell Don’t kill us when the monster’s fondest wish was to kill them. She would put all her power into her voice and hope it was enough to overwhelm her enemy’s will.

Sometimes it worked, but it was exhausting and unreliable. Aphrodite wasn’t about head-on confrontation. Aphrodite was about subtlety and guile and charm. Piper decided she shouldn’t focus on making people do what she wanted. She needed to push them to do the things they wanted.

A great theory, if she could make it work.…

She stopped at the foremast and faced Khione. “Wow, I just realized why you hate us so much,” she said, filling her voice with pity. “We humiliated you pretty badly in Sonoma.”

Khione’s eyes glinted like iced espresso. She shot an uneasy look at her brothers.

Piper laughed. “Oh, you didn’t tell them!” she guessed. “I don’t blame you. You had a giant king on your side, plus an army of wolves and Earthborn, and you still couldn’t beat us.”

“Silence!” the goddess hissed.

The air turned misty. Piper felt frost gathering on her eyebrows and freezing her ear canals, but she feigned a smile.

“Whatever.” She winked at Zethes. “But it was pretty funny.”

“The beautiful girl must be lying,” Zethes said. “Khione was not beaten at the Wolf House. She said it was a…ah, what is the term? A tactical retreat.”

“Treats?” Cal asked. “Treats are good.”

Piper pushed the big guy’s chest playfully. “No, Cal. He means that your sister ran away.”

“I did not!” Khione shrieked.

“What did Hera call you?” Piper mused. “Right—a D-list goddess!”

She burst out laughing again, and her amusement was so genuine, Zethes and Cal started laughing too.

“That is très bon!” Zethes said. “A D-list goddess. Ha!”

“Ha!” Cal said. “Sister ran away! Ha!”

Khione’s white dress began to steam. Ice formed over Zethes’s and Cal’s mouths, plugging them up.

“Show us this secret of yours, Piper McLean,” Khione growled. “Then pray I leave you on this ship intact. If you are toying with us, I will show you the horrors of frostbite. I doubt Zethes will still want you if you have no fingers or toes…perhaps no nose or ears.”

Zethes and Cal spat the ice plugs out of their mouths.

“The pretty girl would look less pretty without a nose,” Zethes admitted.

Piper had seen pictures of frostbite victims. The threat terrified her, but she didn’t let it show.

“Come on, then.” She led the way to the prow, humming one of her dad’s favorite songs—“Summertime.”

When she got to the figurehead, she put her hand on Festus’s neck. His bronze scales were cold. There was no hum of machinery. His ruby eyes were dull and dark.

“You remember our dragon?” Piper asked.

Khione scoffed. “This cannot be your secret. The dragon is broken. Its fire is gone.”

“Well, yes…” Piper stroked the dragon’s snout.

She didn’t have Leo’s power to make gears turn or circuits spark. She couldn’t sense anything about the workings of a machine. All she could do was speak her heart and tell the dragon what he most wanted to hear. “But Festus is more than a machine. He’s a living creature.”

“Ridiculous,” the goddess spat. “Zethes, Cal—gather the frozen demigods from below. Then we shall break open the sphere of winds.”

“You could do that, boys,” Piper agreed. “But then you wouldn’t see Khione humiliated. I know you’d like that.”

The Boreads hesitated.

“Hockey?” Cal asked.

“Almost as good,” Piper promised. “You fought at the side of Jason and the Argonauts, didn’t you? On a ship like this, the first Argo.”

“Yes,” Zethes agreed. “The Argo. Much like this, but we did not have a dragon.”

“Don’t listen to her!” Khione snapped.

Piper felt ice forming on her lips.

“You could shut me up,” she said quickly. “But you want to know my secret power—how I will destroy you, and Gaea, and the giants.”

Hatred seethed in Khione’s eyes, but she withheld her frost.

“You—have—no—power,” she insisted.

“Spoken like a D-list goddess,” Piper said. “One who never gets taken seriously, who always wants more power.”

She turned to Festus and ran her hand behind his metal ears. “You’re a good friend, Festus. No one can truly deactivate you. You’re more than a machine. Khione doesn’t understand that.”

She turned to the Boreads. “She doesn’t value you, either, you know. She thinks she can boss you around because you’re demigods, not full-fledged gods. She doesn’t understand that you’re a powerful team.”

“A team,” Cal grunted. “Like the Ca-na-di-ens.”

He had to struggle with the word since it was more than two syllables. He grinned and looked very pleased with himself.