The Mark of Athena (The Heroes of Olympus #3)(21)

Leo wished he could dismiss his feelings that easily. He couldn’t. Still, it wasn’t Hazel’s fault.

“We should keep going,” he said. “I wonder what Nemesis meant about finishing before dark.”

Hazel glanced at the sun, which was just touching the horizon. “And who is the cursed boy she mentioned?”

Below them, a voice said, “Cursed boy she mentioned.”

At first, Leo saw no one. Then his eyes adjusted. He realized a young woman was standing only ten feet from the base of the boulder. Her dress was a Greek-style tunic the same color as the rocks. Her wispy hair was somewhere between brown and blond and gray, so it blended with the dry grass. She wasn’t invisible, exactly, but she was almost perfectly camouflaged until she moved. Even then, Leo had trouble focusing on her. Her face was pretty but not memorable. In fact, each time Leo blinked, he couldn’t remember what she looked like, and he had to concentrate to find her again.

“Hello,” Hazel said. “Who are you?”

“Who are you?” the girl answered. Her voice sounded weary, like she was tired of answering that question.

Hazel and Leo exchanged looks. With this demigod gig, you never knew what you’d run into. Nine times out of ten, it wasn’t good. A ninja girl camouflaged in earth tones didn’t strike Leo as something he wanted to deal with just then.

“Are you the cursed kid Nemesis mentioned?” Leo asked. “But you’re a girl.”

“You’re a girl,” said the girl.

“Excuse me?” Leo said.

“Excuse me,” the girl said miserably.

“You’re repeating…” Leo stopped. “Oh. Hold it. Hazel, wasn’t there some myth about a girl who repeated everything—?”

“Echo,” Hazel said.

“Echo,” the girl agreed. She shifted, her dress changing with the landscape. Her eyes were the color of the salt water. Leo tried to home in on her features, but he couldn’t.

“I don’t remember the myth,” he admitted. “You were cursed to repeat the last thing you heard?”

“You heard,” Echo said.

“Poor thing,” Hazel said. “If I remember right, a goddess did this?”

“A goddess did this,” Echo confirmed.

Leo scratched his head. “But wasn’t that thousands of years…oh. You’re one of the mortals who came back through the Doors of Death. I really wish we could stop running into dead people.”

“Dead people,” Echo said, like she was chastising him.

He realized Hazel was staring at her feet.

“Uh…sorry,” he muttered. “I didn’t mean it that way.”

“That way.” Echo pointed toward the far shore of the island.

“You want to show us something?” Hazel asked. She climbed down the boulder, and Leo followed.

Even up close, Echo was hard to see. In fact, she seemed to get more invisible the longer he looked at her.

“You sure you’re real?” he asked. “I mean…flesh and blood?”

“Flesh and blood.” She touched Leo’s face and made him flinch. Her fingers were warm.

“So…you have to repeat everything?” he asked.

“Everything.”

Leo couldn’t help smiling. “That could be fun.”

“Fun,” she said unhappily.

“Blue elephants.”

“Blue elephants.”

“Kiss me, you fool.”

“You fool.”

“Hey!”

“Hey!”

“Leo,” Hazel pleaded, “don’t tease her.”

“Don’t tease her,” Echo agreed.

“Okay, okay,” Leo said, though he had to resist the urge. It wasn’t every day he met somebody with a built-in talkback feature. “So what were you pointing at? Do you need our help?”

“Help,” Echo agreed emphatically. She gestured for them to follow and sprinted down the slope. Leo could only follow her progress by the movement of the grass and the shimmer of her dress as it changed to match the rocks.

“We’d better hurry,” Hazel said. “Or we’ll lose her.”

They found the problem—if you can call a mob of good-looking girls a problem. Echo led them down into a grassy meadow shaped like a blast crater, with a small pond in the middle. Gathered at the water’s edge were several dozen nymphs. At least, Leo guessed they were nymphs. Like the ones at Camp Half-Blood, these wore gossamer dresses. Their feet were bare. They had elfish features, and their skin had a slightly greenish tinge.

Leo didn’t understand what they were doing, but they were all crowded together in one spot, facing the pond and jostling for a better view. Several held up phone cameras, trying to get a shot over the heads of the others. Leo had never seen nymphs with phones. He wondered if they were looking at a dead body. If so, why were they bouncing up and down and giggling so excitedly?

“What are they looking at?” Leo wondered.

“Looking at,” Echo sighed.

“One way to find out.” Hazel marched forward and began nudging her way through the crowd. “Excuse us. Pardon me.”

“Hey!” one nymph complained. “We were here first!”