The House of Hades (The Heroes of Olympus #4)(92)

He was so busy thinking about that, he didn’t notice when the girl stopped. He ran into her.

“Gah!” She turned and grabbed his arms to keep from falling in the surf. Her hands were strong, as though she worked with them for a living. Back at camp, the girls in the Hephaestus cabin had had strong hands like that, but she didn’t look like a Hephaestus kid.

She glared at him, her dark almond eyes only a few inches from his. Her cinnamon smell reminded him of his abuela’s apartment. Man, he hadn’t thought about that place in years.

The girl pushed him away. “All right. This spot is good. Now tell me you want to leave.”

“What?” Leo’s brain was still kind of muddled from the crash landing. He wasn’t sure he had heard her right.

“Do you want to leave?” she demanded. “Surely you’ve got somewhere to go!”

“Uh…yeah. My friends are in trouble. I need to get back to my ship and—”

“Fine,” she snapped. “Just say, I want to leave Ogygia.”

“Uh, okay.” Leo wasn’t sure why, but her tone kind of hurt…which was stupid, since he didn’t care what this girl thought. “I want to leave—whatever you said.”

“Oh-gee-gee-ah.” The girl pronounced it slowly, as if Leo were five years old.

“I want to leave Oh-gee-gee-ah,” he said.

She exhaled, clearly relieved. “Good. In a moment, a magical raft will appear. It will take you wherever you want to go.”

“Who are you?”

She looked like she was about to answer but stopped herself. “It doesn’t matter. You’ll be gone soon. You’re obviously a mistake.”

That was harsh, Leo thought.

He’d spent enough time thinking he was a mistake—as a demigod, on this quest, in life in general. He didn’t need a random crazy goddess reinforcing the idea.

He remembered a Greek legend about a girl on an island.… Maybe one of his friends had mentioned it? It didn’t matter. As long as she let him leave.

“Any moment now…” The girl stared out at the water.

No magical raft appeared.

“Maybe it got stuck in traffic,” Leo said.

“This is wrong.” She glared at the sky. “This is completely wrong!”

“So…plan B?” Leo asked. “You got a phone, or—”

“Agh!” The girl turned and stormed inland. When she got to the footpath, she sprinted into the grove of trees and disappeared.

“Okay,” Leo said. “Or you could just run away.”

From his tool belt pouches he pulled some rope and a snap hook, then fastened the Archimedes sphere to his belt.

He looked out to sea. Still no magic raft.

He could stand here and wait, but he was hungry, thirsty, and tired. He was banged up pretty bad from his fall.

He didn’t want to follow that crazy girl, no matter how good she smelled.

On the other hand, he had no place else to go. The girl had a dining table, so she probably had food. And she seemed to find Leo’s presence annoying.

“Annoying her is a plus,” he decided.

He followed her into the hills.

“HOLY HEPHAESTUS,” LEO SAID.

The path opened into the nicest garden Leo had ever seen. Not that he had spent a lot of time in gardens, but dang. On the left was an orchard and a vineyard—peach trees with red-golden fruit that smelled awesome in the warm sun, carefully pruned vines bursting with grapes, bowers of flowering jasmine, and a bunch of other plants Leo couldn’t name.

On the right were neat beds of vegetables and herbs, arranged like spokes around a big sparkling fountain where bronze satyrs spewed water into a central bowl.

At the back of the garden, where the footpath ended, a cave opened in the side of a grassy hill. Compared to Bunker Nine back at camp, the entrance was tiny, but it was impressive in its own way. On either side, crystalline rock had been carved into glittering Grecian columns. The tops were fitted with a bronze rod that held silky white curtains.

Leo’s nose was assaulted by good smells—cedar, juniper, jasmine, peaches, and fresh herbs. The aroma from the cave really caught his attention—like beef stew cooking.

He started toward the entrance. Seriously, how could he not? He stopped when he noticed the girl. She was kneeling in her vegetable garden, her back to Leo. She muttered to herself as she dug furiously with a trowel.

Leo approached her from one side so she could see him. He didn’t feel like surprising her when she was armed with a sharp gardening implement.

She kept cursing in Ancient Greek and stabbing at the dirt. She had flecks of soil all over her arms, her face, and her white dress, but she didn’t seem to care.

Leo could appreciate that. She looked better with a little mud—less like a beauty queen and more like an actual get-your-hands-dirty kind of person.

“I think you’ve punished that dirt enough,” he offered.

She scowled at him, her eyes red and watery. “Just go away.”

“You’re crying,” he said, which was stupidly obvious; but seeing her that way took the wind out of his helicopter blades, so to speak. It was hard to stay mad at someone who was crying.

“None of your business,” she muttered. “It’s a big island. Just…find your own place. Leave me alone.” She waved vaguely toward the south. “Go that way, maybe.”