The Mark of Athena hoo-3

by Rick Riordan

“Wonderful!” Ephialtes cried. He stood at his control panel about sixty feet to Percy’s left. “We’ll consider this a dress rehearsal. Shall I unleash the hydra onto the Spanish Steps now?”

  He pulled a lever, and Percy glanced behind him. The cage he had just been hanging from was now rising toward a hatch in the ceiling. In three seconds it would be gone. If Percy attacked the giant, the hydra would ravage the city.

  Cursing, he threw Riptide like a boomerang. The sword wasn’t designed for that, but the Celestial bronze blade sliced through the chains suspending the hydra. The cage tumbled sideways. The door broke open, and the monster spilled out—right in front of Percy.

  “Oh, you are a spoilsport, Jackson!” Ephialtes called. “Very well. Battle it here, if you must, but your death won’t be nearly as good without the cheering crowds.”

  Percy stepped forward to confront the monster—then realized he’d just thrown his weapon away. A bit of bad planning on his part.

  He rolled to one side as all eight hydra heads spit acid, turning the floor where he’d been standing into a steaming crater of melted stone. Percy really hated hydras. It was almost a good thing that he’d lost his sword, since his gut instinct would’ve been to slash at the heads, and a hydra simply grew two new ones for each one it lost.

  The last time he’d faced a hydra, he’d been saved by a battleship with bronze cannons that blasted the monster to pieces. That strategy couldn’t help him now…or could it?

  The hydra lashed out. Percy ducked behind a giant hamster wheel and scanned the room, looking for the boxes he’d seen in his dream. He remembered something about rocket launchers.

  At the dais, Piper stood guard over Nico as the leopards advanced. She aimed her cornucopia and shot a pot roast over the cats’ heads. It must have smelled pretty good, because the leopards raced after it.

  About eighty feet to Piper’s right, Jason battled Otis, sword against spear. Otis had lost his diamond tiara and looked angry about it. He probably could have impaled Jason several times, but the giant insisted on doing a pirouette with every attack, which slowed him down.

  Meanwhile Ephialtes laughed as he pushed buttons on his control board, cranking the conveyor belts into high gear and opening random animal cages.

  The hydra charged around the hamster wheel. Percy swung behind a column, grabbed a garbage bag full of Wonder bread, and threw it at the monster. The hydra spit acid, which was a mistake. The bag and wrappers dissolved in midair. The Wonder bread absorbed the acid like fire extinguisher foam and splattered against the hydra, covering it in a sticky, steaming layer of high-calorie poisonous goo.

  As the monster reeled, shaking its heads and blinking Wonder acid out of its eyes, Percy looked around desperately. He didn’t see the rocket-launcher boxes, but tucked against the back wall was a strange contraption like an artist’s easel, fitted with rows of missile launchers. Percy spotted a bazooka, a grenade launcher, a giant Roman candle, and a dozen other wicked-looking weapons. They all seemed to be wired together, pointing in the same direction and connected to a single bronze lever on the side. At the top of the easel, spelled in carnations, were the words: HAPPY DESTRUCTION, ROME!

  Percy bolted toward the device. The hydra hissed and charged after him.

  “I know!” Ephialtes cried out happily. “We can start with explosions along the Via Labicana! We can’t keep our audience waiting forever.”

  Percy scrambled behind the easel and turned it toward Ephialtes. He didn’t have Leo’s skill with machines, but he knew how to aim a weapon.

  The hydra barreled toward him, blocking his view of the giant. Percy hoped this contraption would have enough firepower to take down two targets at once. He tugged at the lever. It didn’t budge.

  All eight hydra heads loomed over him, ready to melt him into a pool of sludge. He tugged the lever again. This time the easel shook and the weapons began to hiss.

  “Duck and cover!” Percy yelled, hoping his friends got the message.

  Percy leaped to one side as the easel fired. The sound was like a fiesta in the middle of an exploding gunpowder factory. The hydra vaporized instantly. Unfortunately, the recoil knocked the easel sideways and sent more projectiles shooting all over the room. A chunk of ceiling collapsed and crushed a waterwheel. More cages snapped off their chains, unleashing two zebras and a pack of hyenas. A grenade exploded over Ephialtes’s head, but it only blasted him off his feet. The control board didn’t even look damaged.

  Across the room, sandbags rained down around Piper and Nico. Piper tried to pull Nico to safety, but one of the bags caught her shoulder and knocked her down.

  “Piper!” Jason cried. He ran toward her, completely forgetting about Otis, who aimed his spear at Jason’s back.

  “Look out!” Percy yelled.

  Jason had fast reflexes. As Otis threw, Jason rolled. The point sailed over him and Jason flicked his hand, summoning a gust of wind that changed the spear’s direction. It flew across the room and skewered Ephialtes through his side just as he was getting to his feet.

  “Otis!” Ephialtes stumbled away from his control board, clutching the spear as he began to crumble into monster dust. “Will you please stop killing me!”

  “Not my fault!”

  Otis had barely finished speaking when Percy’s missile-launching contraption spit out one last sphere of Roman candle fire. The fiery pink ball of death (naturally it had to be pink) hit the ceiling above Otis and exploded in a beautiful shower of light. Colorful sparks pirouetted gracefully around the giant. Then a ten-foot section of roof collapsed and crushed him flat.

  Jason ran to Piper’s side. She yelped when he touched her arm. Her shoulder looked unnaturally bent, but she muttered, “Fine. I’m fine.” Next to her, Nico sat up, looking around him in bewilderment as if just realizing he’d missed a battle.

  Sadly, the giants weren’t finished. Ephialtes was already re-forming, his head and shoulders rising from the mound of dust. He tugged his arms free and glowered at Percy.

  Across the room, the pile of rubble shifted, and Otis busted out. His head was slightly caved in. All the firecrackers in his hair had popped, and his braids were smoking. His leotard was in tatters, which was just about the only way it could’ve looked less attractive on him.

  “Percy!” Jason shouted. “The controls!”

  Percy unfroze. He found Riptide in his pocket again, uncapped his sword, and lunged for the switchboard. He slashed his blade across the top, decapitating the controls in a shower of bronze sparks.

  “No!” Ephialtes wailed. “You’ve ruined the spectacle!”

  Percy turned too slowly. Ephialtes swung his spear like a bat and smacked him across the chest. He fell to his knees, the pain turning his stomach to lava.

  Jason ran to his side, but Otis lumbered after him. Percy managed to rise and found himself shoulder to shoulder with Jason. Over by the dais, Piper was still on the floor, unable to get up. Nico was barely conscious.

  The giants were healing, getting stronger by the minute. Percy was not.

  Ephialtes smiled apologetically. “Tired, Percy Jackson? As I said, you cannot kill us. So I guess we’re at an impasse. Oh, wait…no we’re not! Because we can kill you!”

  “That,” Otis grumbled, picking up his fallen spear, “is the first thing sensible thing you’ve said all day, brother.”

  The giants pointed their weapons, ready to turn Percy and Jason into a demigod-kabob.

  “We won’t give up,” Jason growled. “We’ll cut you into pieces like Jupiter did to Saturn.”

  “That’s right,” Percy said. “You’re both dead. I don’t care if we have a god on our side or not.”

  “Well, that’s a shame,” said a new voice.

  To his right, another platform lowered from the ceiling. Leaning casually on a pinecone-topped staff was a man in a purple camp shirt, khaki shorts, and sandals with white socks. He raised his broad-brimmed hat, and purple fire flickered in his eyes. “I’d hate to think I made a speci
al trip for nothing.”

  P ERCY HAD NEVER THOUGHT OF M R. D as a calming influence, but suddenly everything got quiet. The machines ground to a halt. The wild animals stopped growling.

  The two leopards paced over—still licking their lips from Piper’s pot roast—and butted their heads affectionately against the god’s legs. Mr. D scratched their ears.

  “Really, Ephialtes,” he chided. “Killing demigods is one thing. But using leopards for your spectacle? That’s over the line.”

  The giant made a squeaking sound. “This—this is impossible. D-D—”

  “It’s Bacchus, actually, my old friend,” said the god. “And of course it’s possible. Someone told me there was a party going on.”

  He looked the same as he had in Kansas, but Percy still couldn’t get over the differences between Bacchus and his old not-so-much-of-a-friend Mr. D.

  Bacchus was meaner and leaner, with less of a potbelly. He had longer hair, more spring in his step, and a lot more anger in his eyes. He even managed to make a pinecone on a stick look intimidating.

  Ephialtes’s spear quivered. “You—you gods are doomed! Be gone, in the name of Gaea!”

  “Hmm.” Bacchus sounded unimpressed. He strolled through the ruined props, platforms, and special effects.

  “Tacky.” He waved his hand at a painted wooden gladiator, then turned to a machine that looked like an oversized rolling pin studded with knives. “Cheap. Boring. And this…” He inspected the rocket-launching contraption, which was still smoking. “Tacky, cheap, and boring. Honestly, Ephialtes. You have no sense of style.”

  “STYLE?” The giant’s face flushed. “I have mountains of style. I define style. I—I—”

  “My brother oozes style,” Otis suggested.

  “Thank you!” Ephialtes cried.

  Bacchus stepped forward, and the giants stumbled back. “Have you two gotten shorter?” asked the god.

  “Oh, that’s low,” Ephialtes growled. “I’m quite tall enough to destroy you, Bacchus! You gods, always hiding behind your mortal heroes, trusting the fate of Olympus to the likes of these.”

  He sneered at Percy.

  Jason hefted his sword. “Lord Bacchus, are we going to kill these giants or what?”

  “Well, I certainly hope so,” Bacchus said. “Please, carry on.”

  Percy stared at him. “Didn’t you come here to help?”

  Bacchus shrugged. “Oh, I appreciated the sacrifice at sea. A whole ship full of Diet Coke. Very nice. Although I would’ve preferred Diet Pepsi.”

  “And six million in gold and jewels,” Percy muttered.

  “Yes,” Bacchus said, “although with demigod parties of five or more the gratuity is included, so that wasn’t necessary.”

  “What?”

  “Never mind,” Bacchus said. “At any rate, you got my attention. I’m here. Now I need to see if you’re worthy of my help. Go ahead. Battle. If I’m impressed, I’ll jump in for the grand finale.”

  “We speared one,” Percy said. “Dropped the roof on the other. What do you consider impressive?”

  “Ah, a good question…” Bacchus tapped his thyrsus. Then he smiled in a way that made Percy think, Uh-oh. “Perhaps you need inspiration! The stage hasn’t been properly set. You call this a spectacle, Ephialtes? Let me show you how it’s done.”

  The god dissolved into purple mist. Piper and Nico disappeared.

  “Pipes!” Jason yelled. “Bacchus, where did you—?”

  The entire floor rumbled and began to rise. The ceiling opened in a series of panels. Sunlight poured in. The air shimmered like a mirage, and Percy heard the roar of a crowd above him.

  The hypogeum ascended through a forest of weathered stone columns, into the middle of a ruined coliseum.

  Percy’s heart did a somersault. This wasn’t just any coliseum. It was the Colosseum. The giants’ special effects machines had gone into overtime, laying planks across ruined support beams so the arena had a proper floor again. The bleachers repaired themselves until they were gleaming white. A giant red-and-gold canopy extended overhead to provide shade from the afternoon sun. The emperor’s box was draped with silk, flanked by banners and golden eagles. The roar of applause came from thousands of shimmering purple ghosts, the Lares of Rome brought back for an encore performance.

  Vents opened in the floor and sprayed sand across the arena. Huge props sprang up—garage-size mountains of plaster, stone columns, and (for some reason) life-size plastic barnyard animals. A small lake appeared to one side. Ditches crisscrossed the arena floor in case anyone was in the mood for trench warfare. Percy and Jason stood together facing the twin giants.

  “This is a proper show!” boomed the voice of Bacchus. He sat in the emperor’s box wearing purple robes and golden laurels. At his left sat Nico and Piper, her shoulder being tended by a nymph in a nurse’s uniform. At Bacchus’s right crouched a satyr, offering up Doritos and grapes. The god raised a can of Diet Pepsi and the crowd went respectfully quiet.

  Percy glared up at him. “You’re just going to sit there?”

  “The demigod is right!” Ephialtes bellowed. “Fight us yourself, coward! Um, without the demigods.”

  Bacchus smiled lazily. “Juno says she’s assembled a worthy crew of demigods. Show me. Entertain me, heroes of Olympus. Give me a reason to do more. Being a god has its privileges.”

  He popped his soda can top, and the crowd cheered.

  P ERCY HAD FOUGHT MANY BATTLES. He’d even fought in a couple of arenas, but nothing like this. In the huge Colosseum, with thousands of cheering ghosts, the god Bacchus staring down at him, and the two twelve-foot giants looming over him, Percy felt as small and insignificant as a bug. He also felt very angry.

  Fighting giants was one thing. Bacchus making it into a game was something else.

  Percy remembered what Luke Castellan had told him years ago, when Percy had come back from his very first quest: Didn’t you realize how useless it all is? All the heroics—being pawns of the Olympians?

  Percy was almost the same age now as Luke had been then. He could understand how Luke became so spiteful. In the past five years, Percy had been a pawn too many times. The Olympians seemed to take turns using him for their schemes.

  Maybe the gods were better than the Titans, or the giants, or Gaea, but that didn’t make them good or wise. It didn’t make Percy like this stupid arena battle.

  Unfortunately, he didn’t have much choice. If he was going to save his friends, he had to beat these giants. He had to survive and find Annabeth.

  Ephialtes and Otis made his decision easier by attacking. Together, the giants picked up a fake mountain as big as Percy’s New York apartment and hurled it at the demigods.

  Percy and Jason bolted. They dove together into the nearest trench and the mountain shattered above them, spraying them with plaster shrapnel. It wasn’t deadly, but it stung like crazy.

  The crowd jeered and shouted for blood. “Fight! Fight!”

  “I’ll take Otis again?” Jason called over the noise. “Or do you want him this time?”

  Percy tried to think. Dividing was the natural course—fighting the giants one-on-one, but that hadn’t worked so well last time. It dawned on him that they needed a different strategy.

  This whole trip, Percy had felt responsible for leading and protecting his friends. He was sure Jason felt the same way. They’d worked in small groups, hoping that would be safer. They’d fought as individuals, each demigod doing what he or she did best. But Hera had made them a team of seven for a reason. The few times Percy and Jason had worked together—summoning the storm at Fort Sumter, helping the Argo II escape the Pillars of Hercules, even filling the nymphaeum—Percy had felt more confident, better able to figure out problems, as if he’d been a Cyclops his whole life and suddenly woke up with two eyes.

  “We attack together,” he said. “Otis first, because he’s weaker. Take him out quickly and move to Ephialtes. Bronze and gold together—maybe that’ll keep them from r
e-forming a little longer.”

  Jason smiled dryly, like he’d just found out he would die in an embarrassing way.

  “Why not?” he agreed. “But Ephialtes isn’t going to stand there and wait while we kill his brother. Unless—”

  “Good wind today,” Percy offered. “And there’re some water pipes running under the arena.”

  Jason understood immediately. He laughed, and Percy felt a spark of friendship. This guy thought the same way he did about a lot of things.

  “On three?” Jason said.

  “Why wait?”

  They charged out of the trench. As Percy suspected, the twins had lifted another plaster mountain and were waiting for a clear shot. The giants raised it above their heads, preparing to throw, and Percy caused a water pipe to burst at their feet, shaking the floor. Jason sent a blast of wind against Ephialtes’s chest. The purple-haired giant toppled backward and Otis lost his grip on the mountain, which promptly collapsed on top of his brother. Only Ephialtes’s snake feet stuck out, darting their heads around, as if wondering where the rest of their body had gone.

  The crowd roared with approval, but Percy suspected Ephialtes was only stunned. They had a few seconds at best.

  “Hey, Otis!” he shouted. “The Nutcracker bites!”

  “Ahhhhh!” Otis snatched up his spear and threw, but he was too angry to aim straight. Jason deflected it over Percy’s head and into the lake.

  The demigods backed toward the water, shouting insults about ballet—which was kind of a challenge, as Percy didn’t know much about it.

  Otis barreled toward them empty-handed, before apparently realizing that a) he was empty-handed, and b) charging toward a large body of water to fight a son of Poseidon was maybe not a good idea.

  Too late, he tried to stop. The demigods rolled to either side, and Jason summoned the wind, using the giant’s own momentum to shove him into the water. As Otis struggled to rise, Percy and Jason attacked as one. They launched themselves at the giant and brought their blades down on Otis’s head.

  The poor guy didn’t even have a chance to pirouette. He exploded into powder on the lake’s surface like a huge packet of drink mix.