BLOOD OF OLYMPUS

‘Don’t call me water boy.’
Leo pointed across the field. The walls had shifted, revealing one of the Nikettes about thirty yards
away, standing with her back to them. Hazel must be doing her thing – manipulating the maze to
isolate their targets.
‘I distract,’ Leo said, ‘you attack. Ready?’
Percy nodded. ‘Go.’
He dashed to the left as Leo pulled a ball-peen hammer from his tool belt and yelled, ‘Hey, Bronze
Butt!’
The Nikette turned as Leo threw. His hammer clanged harmlessly off the metal lady’s chest, but she
must have been annoyed. She marched towards him, raising her barbed-wire laurel wreath.
‘Oops.’ Leo ducked as the metal circlet spun over his head. The wreath hit a wall behind him,
punching a hole straight through the bricks, then arced backwards through the air like a boomerang.
As the Nikette raised her hand to catch it, Percy emerged from the trench behind her and slashed with
Riptide, cutting the Nikette in half at the waist. The metal wreath shot past him and embedded in a
marble column.
‘Foul!’ the victory goddess cried. The walls shifted and Leo saw her barrelling towards them in
her chariot. ‘You don’t attack the Nikai unless you wish to die!’
A trench appeared in the goddess’s path, causing her horses to balk. Leo and Percy ran for cover.
Out of the corner of his eye, maybe fifty feet away, Leo saw Frank the grizzly bear jump from the top
of a wall and flatten another Nikette. Two Bronze Butts down, two more to go.
‘No!’ Nike screamed in outrage. ‘No, no, no! Your lives are forfeit! Nikai, attack!’
Leo and Percy leaped behind a wall. They lay there for a second, trying to catch their breath.
Leo had trouble getting his bearings, but he guessed that was part of Hazel’s plan. She was causing
the terrain to shift around them – opening new trenches, changing the slope of the land, throwing up
new walls and columns. With luck, she would make it harder for the Nikettes to find them. Travelling
just twenty feet might take them several minutes.
Still, Leo hated being disoriented. It reminded him of his helplessness in the House of Hades – the
way Clytius had smothered him in darkness, snuffing out his fire, possessing his voice. It reminded
him of Khione, plucking him off the deck of the Argo II with a gust of wind and shooting him halfway
across the Mediterranean.
It was bad enough being scrawny and weak. If Leo couldn’t control his own senses, his own voice,
his own body … that didn’t leave him much to rely on.
‘Hey,’ Percy said, ‘if we don’t make it out of this –’
‘Shut up, man. We’re going to make it.’
‘If we don’t, I want you to know – I feel bad about Calypso. I failed her.’
Leo stared at him, dumbfounded. ‘You know about me and –’
‘The Argo II is a small ship.’ Percy grimaced. ‘Word got around. I just … well, when I was in
Tartarus, I was reminded that I hadn’t followed through on my promise to Calypso. I asked the gods to
free her and then … I just assumed they would. With me getting amnesia and getting sent to Camp
Jupiter and all, I didn’t think about Calypso much after that. I’m not making excuses. I should have