the_blood_of_olympus_-_rick_riordan

Reyna didn’t answer. She preferred not to speak of her power for exactly this reason. She didn’t
want the demigods under her command to think she was controlling them, or that she’d become a
leader because she had some special magic. She could only share the qualities she already possessed,
and she couldn’t help anyone who wasn’t worthy of being a hero.
Coach Hedge grunted. ‘Too bad. Super-muscles would be nice.’ He went back to sorting through
his pack, which seemed to hold a bottomless supply of cooking utensils, survivalist gear and random
sports equipment.
Nico took another swig of unicorn draught. His eyes were heavy with exhaustion, but Reyna could
tell he was fighting to stay awake.
‘You stumbled just now,’ he noted. ‘When you use your power … do you get some sort of, um,
feedback from me?’
‘It’s not mind-reading,’ she said. ‘Not even an empathy link. Just … a temporary wave of
exhaustion. Primal emotions. Your pain washes over me. I take on some of your burden.’
Nico’s expression became guarded.
He twisted the silver skull ring on his finger, the same way Reyna did with her silver ring when
she was thinking. Sharing a habit with the son of Hades made her uneasy.
She’d felt more pain from Nico in their brief connection than she had from her entire legion during
the battle against the giant Polybotes. It had drained her worse than the last time she’d used her
power, to sustain her pegasus Scipio during their journey across the Atlantic.
She tried to push away that memory. Her brave winged friend dying from poison, his muzzle in her
lap, looking at her trustingly as she raised her dagger to end his misery … Gods, no. She couldn’t
dwell on that or it would break her.
But the pain she’d felt from Nico was sharper.
‘You should rest,’ she told him. ‘After two jumps in a row, even with a little help … you’re lucky
to be alive. We’ll need you to be ready again by nightfall.’
She felt bad asking him to do something so impossible. Unfortunately, she’d had a lot of practice
pushing demigods beyond their limits.
Nico clenched his jaw and nodded. ‘We’re stuck here now.’ He scanned the ruins. ‘But Pompeii is
the last place I would’ve chosen to land. This place is full of lemures.’
‘Lemurs?’ Coach Hedge seemed to be making some sort of snare out of kite string, a tennis racket
and a hunting knife. ‘You mean those cute fuzzy critters –’
‘No.’ Nico sounded annoyed, like he got that question a lot. ‘Lemures. Unfriendly ghosts. All
Roman cities have them, but in Pompeii –’
‘The whole city was wiped out,’ Reyna remembered. ‘In 79 C.E., Vesuvius erupted and covered the
town in ash.’
Nico nodded. ‘A tragedy like that creates a lot of angry spirits.’
Coach Hedge eyed the distant volcano. ‘It’s steaming. Is that a bad sign?’
‘I – I’m not sure.’ Nico picked at a hole in the knee of his black jeans. ‘Mountain gods, the ourae,
can sense children of Hades. It’s possible that’s why we were pulled off course. The spirit of
Vesuvius might have been intentionally trying to kill us. But I doubt the mountain can hurt us this far