BLOOD OF OLYMPUS

xiii
Nico
THE LAST THING NICO HEARD was Coach Hedge grumbling, ‘Well, this isn’t good.’
He wondered what he’d done wrong this time. Maybe he’d teleported them into a den of Cyclopes,
or a thousand feet above another volcano. There was nothing he could do about it. His vision was
gone. His other senses were shutting down. His knees buckled and he passed out.
He tried to make the most of his unconsciousness.
Dreams and death were old friends of his. He knew how to navigate their dark borderland. He sent
out his thoughts, searching for Thalia Grace.
He rushed past the usual fragments of painful memories – his mother smiling down at him, her face
illuminated by the sunlight rippling off the Venetian Grand Canal; his sister Bianca laughing as she
pulled him across the Mall in Washington, D.C., her green floppy hat shading her eyes and the splash
of freckles across her nose. He saw Percy Jackson on a snowy cliff outside Westover Hall, shielding
Nico and Bianca from the manticore as Nico clutched a Mythomagic figurine and whispered, I’m
scared. He saw Minos, his old ghostly mentor, leading him through the Labyrinth. Minos’s smile was
cold and cruel. Don’t worry, son of Hades. You will have your revenge.
Nico couldn’t stop the memories. They cluttered his dreams like the ghosts of Asphodel – an
aimless, sorrowful mob pleading for attention. Save me, they seemed to whisper. Remember me. Help
me. Comfort me.
He didn’t dare stop to dwell on them. They would only crush him with wants and regrets. The best
he could do was to stay focused and push through.
I am the son of Hades, he thought. I go where I wish. The darkness is my birthright.
He forged ahead through a grey-and-black terrain, looking for the dreams of Thalia Grace, daughter
of Zeus. Instead, the ground dissolved at his feet and he fell into a familiar backwater – the Hypnos
cabin at Camp Half-Blood.
Buried under piles of feather comforters, snoring demigods nestled in their bunks. Above the
mantel, a dark tree branch dripped milky water from the River Lethe into a bowl. A cheerful fire
crackled in the fireplace. In front of it, in a leather armchair, dozed the head counsellor for Cabin
Fifteen – a pot-bellied guy with unruly blond hair and a gentle bovine face.
‘Clovis,’ Nico growled, ‘for the gods’ sake, stop dreaming so powerfully!’
Clovis’s eyes fluttered open. He turned and stared at Nico, though Nico knew this was simply part
of Clovis’s own dreamscape. The actual Clovis would still be snoring in his armchair back at camp.
‘Oh, hi …’ Clovis yawned wide enough to swallow a minor god. ‘Sorry. Did I pull you off course
again?’