The Lost Hero

―Oh, god.‖ Piper turned pale. ―Boreas said something about this—the earth yielding up horrors. ‗When
monsters no longer stay in Tartarus, and souls are no longer confined to Hades.‘ How long do you think we
have?‖
Leo thought about the face that had formed in the ground outside—the sleeping woman who
was definitely a horror from the earth.
―I don‘t know,‖ he said. ―But we need to get out of here.‖
JASON DREAMED HE WAS WRAPPED in chains, hanging upside down like a hunk of meat. Everything
hurt—his arms, his legs, his chest, his head. Especially his head. It felt like an overinflated water balloon.
―If I‘m dead,‖ he murmured, ―why does it hurt so much?‖
―You‘re not dead, my hero,‖ said a woman‘s voice. ―It is not your time. Come, speak with me.‖
Jason‘s thoughts floated away from his body. He heard monsters yelling, his friends screaming, fiery
explosions, but it all seemed to be happening on another plane of existence —getting farther and farther away.
He found himself standing in an earthen cage. Tendrils of tree roots and stone whirled together, confining
him. Outside the bars, he could see the floor of a dry reflecting pool, another earthen spire growing at the far
end, and above them, the ruined red stones of a burned-out house.
Next to him in the cage, a woman sat cross-legged in black robes, her head covered by a shroud. She
pushed aside her veil, revealing a face that was proud and beautiful—but also hardened with suffering.
―Hera,‖ Jason said.
―Welcome to my prison,‖ said the goddess. ―You will not die today, Jason. Your friends will see you
through—for now.‖
―For now?‖ he asked.
Hera gestured at the tendrils of her cage. ―There are worse trials to come. The very earth stirs against us.‖
―You‘re a goddess,‖ Jason said. ―Why can‘t you just escape?‖
Hera smiled sadly. Her form began to glow, until her brilliance filled the cage with painful light. The air
hummed with power, molecules splitting apart like a nuclear explosion. Jason suspected if he were actually
there in the flesh, he would‘ve been vaporized.
The cage should‘ve been blasted to rubble. The ground should‘ve split and the ruined house should‘ve
been leveled. But when the glow died, the cage hadn‘t budged. Nothing outside the bars had changed. Only
Hera looked different—a little more stooped and tired.
―Some powers are even greater than the gods,‖ she said. ―I am not easily contained. I can be in many
places at once. But when the greater part of my essence is caught, it is like a foot in a bear trap, you might say.
I can‘t escape, and I am concealed from the eyes of the other gods. Only you can find me, and I grow weaker
by the day.‖
―Then why did you come here?‖ Jason asked. ―How were you caught?‖
The goddess sighed. ―I could not stay idle. Your father Jupiter believes he can withdraw from the world,
and thus lull our enemies back to sleep. He believes we Olympians have become too involved in the affairs of
mortals, in the fates of our demigod children, especially since we agreed to claim them all after the war. He
believes this is what has caused our enemies to stir. That is why he closed Olympus.‖
―But you don‘t agree.‖
―No,‖ she said. ―Often I do not understand my husband‘s moods or his decisions, but even for Zeus, this
seemed paranoid. I cannot fathom why he was so insistent and so convinced. It was … unlike him. As Hera, I
might have been content to follow my lord‘s wishes. But I am also Juno.‖ Her image flickered, and Jason saw
armor under her simple black robes, a goatskin cloak—the symbol of a Roman warrior—across her bronze
mantle. ―Juno Moneta they once called me—Juno, the One Who Warns. I was guardian of the state, patron of
Eternal Rome. I could not sit by while the descendants of my people were attacked. I sensed danger at this
sacred spot. A voice—‖ She hesitated. ―A voice told me I should come here. Gods do not have what you might
call a conscience, nor do we have dreams; but the voice was like that—soft and persistent, warning me to come
here. And so the same day Zeus closed Olympus, I slipped away without telling him my plans, so he could not
stop me. And I came here to investigate.‖
―It was a trap,‖ Jason guessed.
The goddess nodded. ―Only too late did I realize how quickly the earth was stirring. I was even more
foolish than Jupiter—a slave to my own impulses. This is exactly how it happened the first time. I was taken
captive by the giants, and my imprisonment started a war. Now our enemies rise again. The gods can only
defeat them with the help of the greatest living heroes. And the one whom the giants serve …she cannot be
defeated at all—only kept asleep.‖
―I don‘t understand.‖