The Lost Hero (The Heroes of Olympus #1)(5)

THE STORM CHURNED INTO A MINIATURE HURRICANE. Funnel clouds snaked toward the skywalk like the tendrils of a monster jellyfish.

Kids screamed and ran for the building. The wind snatched away their notebooks, jackets, hats, and backpacks. Jason skidded across the slick floor.

Leo lost his balance and almost toppled over the railing, but Jason grabbed his jacket and pulled him back.

“Thanks, man!” Leo yelled.

“Go, go, go!” said Coach Hedge.

Piper and Dylan were holding the doors open, herding the other kids inside. Piper’s snowboarding jacket was flapping wildly, her dark hair all in her face. Jason thought she must’ve been freezing, but she looked calm and confident—telling the others it would be okay, encouraging them to keep moving.

Jason, Leo, and Coach Hedge ran toward them, but it was like running through quicksand. The wind seemed to fight them, pushing them back.

Dylan and Piper pushed one more kid inside, then lost their grip on the doors. They slammed shut, closing off the skywalk.

Piper tugged at the handles. Inside, the kids pounded on the glass, but the doors seemed to be stuck.

“Dylan, help!” Piper shouted.

Dylan just stood there with an idiotic grin, his Cowboys jersey rippling in the wind, like he was suddenly enjoying the storm.

“Sorry, Piper,” he said. “I’m done helping.”

He flicked his wrist, and Piper flew backward, slamming into the doors and sliding to the skywalk deck.

“Piper!” Jason tried to charge forward, but the wind was against him, and Coach Hedge pushed him back.

“Coach,” Jason said, “let me go!”

“Jason, Leo, stay behind me,” the coach ordered. “This is my fight. I should’ve known that was our monster.”

“What?” Leo demanded. A rogue worksheet slapped him in the face, but he swatted it away. “What monster?”

The coach’s cap blew off, and sticking up above his curly hair were two bumps—like the knots cartoon characters get when they’re bonked on the head. Coach Hedge lifted his baseball bat—but it wasn’t a regular bat anymore. Somehow it had changed into a crudely shaped tree-branch club, with twigs and leaves still attached.

Dylan gave him that psycho happy smile. “Oh, come on, Coach. Let the boy attack me! After all, you’re getting too old for this. Isn’t that why they retired you to this stupid school? I’ve been on your team the entire season, and you didn’t even know. You’re losing your nose, grandpa.”

The coach made an angry sound like an animal bleating. “That’s it, cupcake. You’re going down.”

“You think you can protect three half-bloods at once, old man?” Dylan laughed. “Good luck.”

Dylan pointed at Leo, and a funnel cloud materialized around him. Leo flew off the skywalk like he’d been tossed. Somehow he managed to twist in midair, and slammed sideways into the canyon wall. He skidded, clawing furiously for any handhold. Finally he grabbed a thin ledge about fifty feet below the skywalk and hung there by his fingertips.

“Help!” he yelled up at them. “Rope, please? Bungee cord? Something?”

Coach Hedge cursed and tossed Jason his club. “I don’t know who you are, kid, but I hope you’re good. Keep that thing busy”—he stabbed a thumb at Dylan—“while I get Leo.”

“Get him how?” Jason demanded. “You going to fly?”

“Not fly. Climb.” Hedge kicked off his shoes, and Jason almost had a coronary. The coach didn’t have any feet. He had hooves—goat’s hooves. Which meant those things on his head, Jason realized, weren’t bumps. They were horns.

“You’re a faun,” Jason said.

“Satyr!” Hedge snapped. “Fauns are Roman. But we’ll talk about that later.”

Hedge leaped over the railing. He sailed toward the canyon wall and hit hooves first. He bounded down the cliff with impossible agility, finding footholds no bigger than postage stamps, dodging whirlwinds that tried to attack him as he picked his way toward Leo.

“Isn’t that cute!” Dylan turned toward Jason. “Now it’s your turn, boy.”

Jason threw the club. It seemed useless with the winds so strong, but the club flew right at Dylan, even curving when he tried to dodge, and smacked him on the head so hard he fell to his knees.

Piper wasn’t as dazed as she appeared. Her fingers closed around the club when it rolled next to her, but before she could use it, Dylan rose. Blood—golden blood—trickled from his forehead.

“Nice try, boy.” He glared at Jason. “But you’ll have to do better.”

The skywalk shuddered. Hairline fractures appeared in the glass. Inside the museum, kids stopped banging on the doors. They backed away, watching in terror.

Dylan’s body dissolved into smoke, as if his molecules were coming unglued. He had the same face, the same brilliant white smile, but his whole form was suddenly composed of swirling black vapor, his eyes like electrical sparks in a living storm cloud. He sprouted black smoky wings and rose above the skywalk. If angels could be evil, Jason decided, they would look exactly like this.

“You’re a ventus,” Jason said, though he had no idea how he knew that word. “A storm spirit.”

Dylan’s laugh sounded like a tornado tearing off a roof. “I’m glad I waited, demigod. Leo and Piper I’ve known about for weeks. Could’ve killed them at any time. But my mistress said a third was coming—someone special. She’ll reward me greatly for your death!”