The Heroes of Olympus: The Complete Series

by Rick Riordan

  The ghost led Nico to another public square, anchored at one end by a large square church with whitewashed walls and limestone arches. The ghost passed through the portico and disappeared inside.

  Nico hesitated. He had nothing against churches, but this one radiated death. Inside would be tombs, or perhaps something less pleasant …

  He ducked through the doorway. His eyes were drawn to a side chapel, lit from within by eerie golden light. Carved over the door was a Portuguese inscription. Nico didn’t speak the language, but he remembered his childhood Italian well enough to glean the general meaning: We, the bones that are here, await yours.

  ‘Cheery,’ he muttered.

  He entered the chapel. At the far end stood an altar, where the fiery wraith knelt in prayer, but Nico was more interested in the room itself. The walls were constructed of bones and skulls – thousands upon thousands, cemented together. Columns of bones held up a vaulted ceiling decorated with images of death. On one wall, like coats on a coat rack, hung the desiccated, skeletal remains of two people – an adult and a small child.

  ‘A beautiful room, isn’t it?’

  Nico turned. A year ago, he would’ve jumped out of his skin if his father suddenly appeared next to him. Now, Nico was able to control his heart rate, along with his desire to knee his father in the groin and run away.

  Like the wraith, Hades was dressed in the habit of a Franciscan monk, which Nico found vaguely disturbing. His black robes were tied at the waist with a simple white cord. His cowl was pushed back, revealing dark hair shorn close to the scalp and eyes that glittered like frozen tar. The god’s expression was calm and content, as if he’d just come home from a lovely evening strolling through the Fields of Punishment, enjoying the screams of the damned.

  ‘Getting some redecorating ideas?’ Nico asked. ‘Maybe you could do your dining room in mediaeval monk skulls.’

  Hades arched an eyebrow. ‘I can never tell when you’re joking.’

  ‘Why are you here, Father? How are you here?’

  Hades traced his fingers along the nearest column, leaving bleached white marks on the old bones. ‘You’re a hard mortal to find, my son. For several days I’ve been searching. When the sceptre of Diocletian exploded … well, that got my attention.’

  Nico felt a flush of shame. Then he felt angry for feeling ashamed. ‘Breaking the sceptre wasn’t my fault. We were about to be overrun –’

  ‘Oh, the sceptre isn’t important. A relic that old, I’m surprised you got two uses out of it. The explosion simply gave me some clarity. It allowed me to pinpoint your location. I was hoping to speak to you in Pompeii, but it is so … well, Roman. This chapel was the first place where my presence was strong enough that I could appear to you as myself – by which I mean Hades, god of the dead, not split with that other manifestation.’

  Hades breathed in the stale dank air. ‘I am very drawn to this place. The remains of five thousand monks were used to build the Chapel of Bones. It serves as a reminder that life is short and death is eternal. I feel focused here. Even so, I only have a few moments.’

  Story of our relationship, Nico thought. You only ever have a few moments.

  ‘So tell me, Father. What do you want?’

  Hades clasped his hands together in the sleeves of his robe. ‘Can you entertain the notion that I might be here to help you, not simply because I want something?’

  Nico almost laughed, but his chest felt too hollow. ‘I can entertain the notion that you might be here for multiple reasons.’

  The god frowned. ‘I suppose that’s fair enough. You seek information about Gaia’s hunter. His name is Orion.’

  Nico hesitated. He wasn’t used to getting a direct answer, without games or riddles or quests. ‘Orion. Like the constellation. Wasn’t he … a friend of Artemis?’

  ‘He was,’ Hades said. ‘A giant born to oppose the twins, Apollo and Artemis, but, much like Artemis, Orion rejected his destiny. He sought to live on his own terms. First he tried to live among mortals as a huntsman for the king of Khios. He, ah, ran into some trouble with the king’s daughter. The king had Orion blinded and exiled.’

  Nico thought back to what Reyna had told him. ‘My friend dreamed of a hunter with glowing eyes. If Orion is blind –’

  ‘He was blind,’ Hades corrected. ‘Shortly after his exile, Orion met Hephaestus, who took pity on the giant and crafted him new mechanical eyes even better than the originals. Orion became friends with Artemis. He was the first male ever allowed to join her Hunt. But … things went wrong between them. How exactly, I do not know. Orion was slain. Now he has returned as a loyal son of Gaia, ready to do her bidding. He is driven by bitterness and anger. You can understand that.’

  Nico wanted to yell, Like you know what I feel?

  Instead he asked, ‘How do we stop him?’

  ‘You cannot,’ Hades said. ‘Your only hope is to outrun him, accomplish your quest before he reaches you. Apollo or Artemis might be able to slay him, arrows against arrows, but the twins are in no condition to aid you. Even now, Orion has your scent. His hunting pack is almost upon you. You won’t have the luxury of more rest from here to Camp Half-Blood.’

  A belt seemed to tighten around Nico’s ribs. He’d left Coach Hedge on guard duty with Reyna asleep. ‘I need to get back to my companions.’

  ‘Indeed,’ Hades said. ‘But there is more. Your sister …’ Hades faltered. As always, the subject of Bianca lay between them like a loaded gun – deadly, easy to reach, impossible to ignore. ‘I mean your other sister, Hazel … she has discovered that one of the Seven will die. She may try to prevent this. In doing so, she may lose sight of her priorities.’

  Nico didn’t trust himself to speak.

  To his surprise, his thoughts didn’t leap first to Percy. His primary concern was for Hazel, then for Jason, then for Percy and the others aboard the Argo II. They’d saved him in Rome. They’d welcomed him aboard their ship. Nico had never allowed himself the luxury of friends, but the crew of the Argo II was as close as he’d ever come. The idea of any of them dying made him feel empty – like he was back in the giants’ bronze jar, alone in the dark, subsisting only on sour pomegranate seeds.

  Finally he asked, ‘Is Hazel all right?’

  ‘For the moment.’

  ‘And the others? Who will die?’

  Hades shook his head. ‘Even if I were certain, I could not say. I tell you this because you are my son. You know that some deaths cannot be prevented. Some deaths should not be prevented. When the time comes, you may need to act.’

  Nico didn’t know what that meant. He didn’t want to know.

  ‘My son.’ Hades’s tone was almost gentle. ‘Whatever happens, you have earned my respect. You brought honour to our house when we stood together against Kronos in Manhattan. You risked my wrath to help the Jackson boy – guiding him to the River Styx, freeing him from my prison, pleading with me to raise the armies of Erebos to assist him. Never before have I been so harassed by one of my sons. Percy this and Percy that. I nearly blasted you to cinders.’

  Nico took a shallow breath. The walls of the room began to tremble, dust trickling from the cracks between the bones. ‘I didn’t do all that just for him. I did it because the whole world was in danger.’

  Hades allowed himself the faintest smile, but there was nothing cruel in his eyes. ‘I can entertain the possibility that you acted for multiple reasons. My point is this: you and I rose to the aid of Olympus because you convinced me to let go of my anger. I would encourage you to do likewise. My children are so rarely happy. I … I would like to see you be an exception.’

  Nico stared at his father. He didn’t know what to do with that statement. He could accept many unreal things – hordes of ghosts, magical labyrinths, travel through shadows, chapels made of bones. But tender words from the Lord of the Underworld? No. That made no sense.

  Over at the altar, the fiery ghost rose. He approached, burning and screaming silently, his eyes conveyin
g some urgent message.

  ‘Ah,’ Hades said. ‘This is Brother Paloan. He’s one of hundreds who were burned alive in the square near the old Roman temple. The Inquisition had its headquarters there, you know. At any rate, he suggests you leave now. You have very little time before the wolves arrive.’

  ‘Wolves? You mean Orion’s pack?’

  Hades flicked his hand. The ghost of Brother Paloan disappeared. ‘My son, what you are attempting – shadow-travel across the world, carrying the statue of Athena – it may well destroy you.’

  ‘Thanks for the encouragement.’

  Hades placed his hands briefly on Nico’s shoulders.

  Nico didn’t like to be touched, but somehow this brief contact with his father felt reassuring – the same way the Chapel of Bones was reassuring. Like death, his father’s presence was cold and often callous, but it was real – brutally honest, inescapably dependable. Nico found a sort of freedom in knowing that eventually, no matter what happened, he would end up at the foot of his father’s throne.

  ‘I will see you again,’ Hades promised. ‘I will prepare a room for you at the palace in case you do not survive. Perhaps your chambers would look good decorated with the skulls of monks.’

  ‘Now I can’t tell if you’re joking.’

  Hades’s eyes glittered as his form began to fade. ‘Then perhaps we are alike in some important ways.’

  The god vanished.

  Suddenly the chapel felt oppressive – thousands of hollow eye sockets staring at Nico. We, the bones that are here, await yours.

  He hurried out of the church, hoping he remembered the way back to his friends.

  XV

  Nico

  ‘Wolves?’ Reyna asked.

  They were eating dinner from the nearby pavement café.

  Despite Hades’s warning to hurry back, Nico had found nothing much changed at the camp. Reyna had just awoken. The Athena Parthenos still lay sideways across the top of the temple. Coach Hedge was entertaining a few locals with tap dancing and martial arts, occasionally singing into his megaphone, though nobody seemed to understand what he was saying.

  Nico wished the coach hadn’t brought the megaphone. Not only was it loud and obnoxious but also, for no reason Nico understood, it occasionally blurted out random Darth Vader lines from Star Wars or yelled, ‘THE COW GOES MOO!’

  As the three of them sat on the lawn to eat, Reyna seemed alert and rested. She and Coach Hedge listened as Nico described his dreams, then his meeting with Hades at the Chapel of Bones. Nico held back a few personal details from his talk with his father, though he sensed that Reyna knew plenty about wrestling with one’s feelings.

  When he mentioned Orion and the wolves that were supposedly on their way, Reyna frowned.

  ‘Most wolves are friendly to Romans,’ she said. ‘I’ve never heard stories about Orion hunting with a pack.’

  Nico finished his ham sandwich. He eyed the plate of pastries and was surprised to find he still had an appetite. ‘It could have been a figure of speech: very little time before the wolves arrive. Perhaps Hades didn’t literally mean wolves. At any rate, we should leave as soon as it’s dark enough for shadows.’

  Coach Hedge stuffed an issue of Guns & Ammo into his bag. ‘Only problem: the Athena Parthenos is still thirty feet in the air. Gonna be fun hauling you guys and your gear to the top of that temple.’

  Nico tried a pastry. The lady at the café had called them farturas. They looked like spiral doughnuts and tasted great – just the right combination of crispy, sugary and buttery – but when Nico first heard fartura he knew Percy would have made a joke out of the name.

  America has dough-nuts, Percy would have said. Portugal has fart-nuts.

  The older Nico got, the more juvenile Percy seemed to him, though Percy was three years older. Nico found his sense of humour equal parts endearing and annoying. He decided to concentrate on the annoying.

  Then there were the times Percy was deadly serious: looking up at Nico from that chasm in Rome – The other side, Nico! Lead them there. Promise me!

  And Nico had promised. It didn’t seem to matter how much he resented Percy Jackson; Nico would do anything for him. He hated himself for that.

  ‘So …’ Reyna’s voice jarred him from his thoughts. ‘Will Camp Half-Blood wait for August first, or will they attack?’

  ‘We have to hope they wait,’ Nico said. ‘We can’t … I can’t get the statue back any faster.’

  Even at this rate, my dad thinks I might die. Nico kept that thought private.

  He wished Hazel was with him. Together they had shadow-travelled the entire crew of the Argo II out of the House of Hades. When they shared their power, Nico felt like anything was possible. The trip to Camp Half-Blood could’ve been done in half the time.

  Besides, Hades’s words about one of the crew dying had sent a chill through him. He couldn’t lose Hazel. Not another sister. Not again.

  Coach Hedge looked up from counting the change in his baseball cap. ‘And you’re sure Clarisse said Mellie was okay?’

  ‘Yes, Coach. Clarisse is taking good care of her.’

  ‘That’s a relief. I don’t like what Grover said about Gaia whispering to the nymphs and dryads. If the nature spirits turn evil … that’s not going to be pretty.’

  Nico had never heard of such a thing happening. Then again, Gaia hadn’t been awake since the dawn of humanity.

  Reyna took a bite of her pastry. Her chain mail glittered in the afternoon sun. ‘I wonder about these wolves … Is it possible we’ve misunderstood the message? The goddess Lupa has been very quiet. Perhaps she is sending us aid. The wolves could be from her – to defend us from Orion and his pack.’

  The hopefulness in her voice was as thin as gauze. Nico decided not to rip through it.

  ‘Maybe,’ he said. ‘But wouldn’t Lupa be busy with the war between the camps? I thought she’d be sending wolves to help your legion.’

  Reyna shook her head. ‘Wolves are not front-line fighters. I don’t think she would help Octavian. Her wolves might be patrolling Camp Jupiter, defending it in the legion’s absence, but I just don’t know …’

  She crossed her legs at the ankles, and the iron tips of her combat boots glinted. Nico made a mental note not to get into any kicking contests with Roman legionnaires.

  ‘There’s something else,’ she said. ‘I haven’t had any luck contacting my sister, Hylla. It makes me uneasy that both the wolves and the Amazons have gone silent. If something has happened on the West Coast … I fear the only hope for either camp lies with us. We must return the statue soon. That means the greatest burden is on you, son of Hades.’

  Nico tried to swallow his bile. He wasn’t mad at Reyna. He kind of liked Reyna. But so often he’d been called on to do the impossible. Normally, as soon as he accomplished it, he was forgotten.

  He remembered how nice the kids at Camp Half-Blood had been to him after the war with Kronos. Great job, Nico! Thanks for bringing the armies of the Underworld to save us!

  Everybody smiled. They all invited him to sit at their table.

  After about a week, his welcome wore thin. Campers would jump when he walked up behind them. He would emerge from the shadows at the campfire, startle somebody and see the discomfort in their eyes: Are you still here? Why are you here?

  It didn’t help that immediately after the war with Kronos, Annabeth and Percy had started dating …

  Nico set down his fartura. Suddenly it didn’t taste so good.

  He recalled his talk with Annabeth at Epirus, just before he’d left with the Athena Parthenos.

  She’d pulled him aside and said, ‘Hey, I have to talk to you.’

  Panic had seized him. She knows.

  ‘I want to thank you,’ she continued. ‘Bob … the Titan … he only helped us in Tartarus because you were kind to him. You told him we were worth saving. That’s the only reason we’re alive.’

  She said we so easily, as if she and Percy were intercha
ngeable, inseparable.

  Nico had once read a story from Plato, who claimed that in the ancient times all humans had been a combination of male and female. Each person had two heads, four arms, four legs. Supposedly, these combo-humans had been so powerful they made the gods uneasy, so Zeus split them in half – man and woman. Ever since, humans had felt incomplete. They spent their lives searching for their other halves.

  And where does that leave me? Nico wondered.

  It wasn’t his favourite story.

  He wanted to hate Annabeth, but he just couldn’t. She’d gone out of her way to thank him at Epirus. She was genuine and sincere. She never overlooked him or avoided him like most people did. Why couldn’t she be a horrible person? That would’ve made it easier.

  The wind god Favonius had warned him in Croatia: If you let your anger rule you … your fate will be even sadder than mine.

  But how could his fate be anything but sad? Even if he lived through this quest, he would have to leave both camps forever. That was the only way he would find peace. He wished there was another option – a choice that didn’t hurt like the waters of the Phlegethon – but he couldn’t see one.

  Reyna was studying him, probably trying to read his thoughts. She glanced down at his hands, and Nico realized he was twisting his silver skull ring – the last gift Bianca had given him.

  ‘Nico, how can we help you?’ Reyna asked.

  Another question he wasn’t used to hearing.

  ‘I’m not sure,’ he admitted. ‘You’ve already let me rest as much as possible. That’s important. Perhaps you can lend me your strength again. This next jump will be the longest. I’ll have to muster enough energy to get us across the Atlantic.’

  ‘You’ll succeed,’ Reyna promised. ‘Once we’re back in the U.S., we should encounter fewer monsters. I might even be able to get help from retired legionnaires along the eastern seaboard. They are obliged to aid any Roman demigod who calls on them.’

  Hedge grunted. ‘If Octavian hasn’t already won them over. In which case, you might find yourself arrested for treason.’