The Blood of Olympus (The Heroes of Olympus, Book 5)

THE FIGHT WAS GOING GREAT – until he got stabbed.

Jason slashed his gladius in a wide arc, vaporizing the nearest suitors, then he vaulted onto the table and jumped right over Antinous’s head. In midair he willed his blade to extend into a javelin – a trick he’d never tried with this sword – but somehow he knew it would work.

He landed on his feet holding a six-foot-long pilum. As Antinous turned to face him, Jason thrust the Imperial gold point through the ghoul’s chest.

Antinous looked down incredulously. ‘You –’

‘Enjoy the Fields of Punishment.’ Jason yanked out his pilum and Antinous crumbled to dirt.

Jason kept fighting, spinning his javelin – slicing through ghosts, knocking ghouls off their feet.

Across the courtyard, Annabeth fought like a demon, too. Her drakon-bone sword scythed down any suitors stupid enough to face her.

Over by the sand fountain, Piper had also drawn her sword – the jagged bronze blade she’d taken from Zethes the Boread. She stabbed and parried with her right hand, occasionally shooting tomatoes from the cornucopia in her left, while yelling at the suitors, ‘Save yourselves! I’m too dangerous!’

That must have been exactly what they wanted to hear, because her opponents kept running away, only to freeze in confusion a few yards downhill, then charge back into the fight.

The Greek tyrant Hippias lunged at Piper, his dagger raised, but Piper blasted him point-blank in the chest with a lovely pot roast. He tumbled backwards into the fountain and screamed as he disintegrated.

An arrow whistled towards Jason’s face. He blew it aside with a gust of wind, then cut through a line of sword-wielding ghouls and noticed a dozen suitors regrouping by the fountain to charge Annabeth. He lifted his javelin to the sky. A bolt of lightning ricocheted off the point and blasted the ghosts to ions, leaving a smoking crater where the sand fountain had been.

Over the last few months, Jason had fought many battles, but he’d forgotten what it was like to feel good in combat. Of course he was still afraid, but a huge weight had been lifted from his shoulders. For the first time since waking up in Arizona with his memories erased, Jason felt whole. He knew who he was. He had chosen his family, and it had nothing to do with Beryl Grace or even Jupiter. His family included all the demigods who fought at his side, Roman and Greek, new friends and old. He wasn’t going to let anyone break his family apart.

He summoned the winds and flung three ghouls off the side of the hill like rag dolls. He skewered a fourth, then willed his javelin to shrink back to a sword and hacked through another group of spirits.

Soon no more enemies faced him. The remaining ghosts began to disappear on their own. Annabeth cut down Hasdrubal the Carthaginian, and Jason made the mistake of sheathing his sword.

Pain flared in his lower back – so sharp and cold he thought Khione the snow goddess had touched him.

Next to his ear, Michael Varus snarled, ‘Born a Roman, die a Roman.’

The tip of a golden sword jutted through the front of Jason’s shirt, just below his ribcage.

Jason fell to his knees. Piper’s scream sounded miles away. He felt like he’d been immersed in salty water – his body weightless, his head swaying.

Piper charged towards him. He watched with detached emotion as her sword passed over his head and cut through Michael Varus’s armour with a metallic ka-chunk.

A burst of cold parted Jason’s hair from behind. Dust settled around him, and an empty legionnaire’s helmet rolled across the stones. The evil demigod was gone – but he had made a lasting impression.

‘Jason!’ Piper grabbed his shoulders as he began to fall sideways. He gasped as she pulled the sword out of his back. Then she lowered him to the ground, propping his head against a stone.

Annabeth ran to their side. She had a nasty cut on the side of her neck.

‘Gods.’ Annabeth stared at the wound in Jason’s gut. ‘Oh, gods.’

‘Thanks,’ Jason groaned. ‘I was afraid it might be bad.’

His arms and legs started to tingle as his body went into crisis mode, sending all the blood to his chest. The pain was dull, which surprised him, but his shirt was soaked red. The wound was smoking. He was pretty sure sword wounds weren’t supposed to smoke.

‘You’re going to be fine.’ Piper spoke the words like an order. Her tone steadied his breathing. ‘Annabeth, ambrosia!’

Annabeth stirred. ‘Yeah. Yeah, I got it.’ She ripped through her supply pouch and unwrapped a piece of godly food.

‘We have to stop the bleeding.’ Piper used her dagger to cut fabric from the bottom of her dress. She ripped the cloth into bandages.

Jason dimly wondered how she knew so much first aid. She wrapped the wounds on his back and stomach while Annabeth pushed tiny bites of ambrosia into his mouth.

Annabeth’s fingers trembled. After all the things she’d been through, Jason found it odd that she would freak out now while Piper acted so calm. Then it occurred to him – Annabeth could afford to be scared for him. Piper couldn’t. She was completely focused on trying to save him.

Annabeth fed him another bite. ‘Jason, I – I’m sorry. About your mom. But the way you handled it … that was so brave.’

Jason tried not to close his eyes. Every time he did, he saw his mom’s spirit disintegrating.

‘It wasn’t her,’ he said. ‘At least, no part of her I could save. There was no other choice.’

Annabeth took a shaky breath. ‘No other right choice, maybe, but … a friend of mine, Luke. His mom … similar problem. He didn’t handle it as well.’

Her voice broke. Jason didn’t know much about Annabeth’s past, but Piper glanced over in concern.

‘I’ve bandaged as much as I can,’ she said. ‘Blood is still soaking through. And the smoke. I don’t get that.’

‘Imperial gold,’ Annabeth said, her voice quavering. ‘It’s deadly to demigods. It’s only a matter of time before –’

‘He’ll be all right,’ Piper insisted. ‘We’ve got to get him back to the ship.’

‘I don’t feel that bad,’ Jason said. And it was true. The ambrosia had cleared his head. Warmth was seeping back into his limbs. ‘Maybe I could fly …’

Jason sat up. His vision turned a pale shade of green. ‘Or maybe not …’

Piper caught his shoulders as he keeled sideways. ‘Whoa, Sparky. We need to contact the Argo II, get help.’

‘You haven’t called me Sparky in a long time.’

Piper kissed his forehead. ‘Stick with me and I’ll insult you all you want.’

Annabeth scanned the ruins. The magic veneer had faded, leaving only broken walls and excavation pits. ‘We could use the emergency flares, but –’

‘No,’ Jason said. ‘Leo would blast the top of the hill with Greek fire. Maybe, if you guys helped me, I could walk –’

‘Absolutely not,’ Piper objected. ‘That would take too long.’ She rummaged in her belt pouch and pulled out a compact mirror. ‘Annabeth, you know Morse code?’

‘Of course.’

‘So does Leo.’ Piper handed her the mirror. ‘He’ll be watching from the ship. Go to the ridge –’

‘And flash him!’ Annabeth’s face reddened. ‘That came out wrong. But, yeah, good idea.’

She ran to the edge of the ruins.

Piper pulled out a flask of nectar and gave Jason a sip. ‘Hang in there. You are not dying from a stupid body piercing.’

Jason managed a weak smile. ‘At least it wasn’t a head injury this time. I stayed conscious the entire fight.’

‘You defeated, like, two hundred enemies,’ Piper said. ‘You were scary amazing.’

‘You guys helped.’

‘Maybe, but … Hey, stay with me.’

Jason’s head started to droop. The cracks in the stones came into sharper focus.

‘Little dizzy,’ he muttered.

‘More nectar,’ Piper ordered. ‘There. Taste okay?’

‘Yeah. Yeah, fine.’

In fact the nectar tasted like liquid sawdust, but Jason kept that to himself. Ever since the House of Hades when he’d resigned his praetorship, ambrosia and nectar didn’t taste like his favourite foods from Camp Jupiter. It was as if the memory of his old home no longer had the power to heal him.

Born a Roman, die a Roman, Michael Varus had said.

He looked at the smoke curling from his bandages. He had worse things to worry about than blood loss. Annabeth was right about Imperial gold. The stuff was deadly to demigods as well as monsters. The wound from Varus’s blade would do its best to eat away at Jason’s life force.

He’d seen a demigod die like that once before. It hadn’t been fast or pretty.

I can’t die, he told himself. My friends are depending on me.

Antinous’s words rang in his ears – about the giants in Athens, the impossible trip facing the Argo II, the mysterious hunter Gaia had sent to intercept the Athena Parthenos.

‘Reyna, Nico and Coach Hedge,’ he said. ‘They’re in danger. We need to warn them.’

‘We’ll take care of it when we get back to the ship,’ Piper promised. ‘Your job right now is to relax.’ Her tone was light and confident, but her eyes brimmed with tears. ‘Besides, those three are a tough group. They’ll be fine.’

Jason hoped she was right. Reyna had risked so much to help them. Coach Hedge was annoying sometimes, but he’d been a loyal protector for the entire crew. And Nico … Jason felt especially worried about him.

Piper brushed her thumb against the scar on his lip. ‘Once the war is over … everything will work out for Nico. You’ve done what you could, being a friend to him.’

Jason wasn’t sure what to say. He hadn’t told Piper anything about his conversations with Nico. He’d kept di Angelo’s secret.

Still … Piper seemed to sense what was wrong. As a daughter of Aphrodite, maybe she could tell when somebody was struggling with heartache. She hadn’t pressured Jason to talk about it, though. He appreciated that.

Another wave of pain made him wince.

‘Concentrate on my voice.’ Piper kissed his forehead. ‘Think about something good. Birthday cake in the park in Rome –’

‘That was nice.’

‘Last winter,’ she suggested. ‘The s’mores fight at the campfire.’

‘I totally got you.’

‘You had marshmallows in your hair for days!’

‘I did not.’

Jason’s mind drifted back to better times.

He just wanted to stay there – talking with Piper, holding her hand, not worrying about giants or Gaia or his mother’s madness.

He knew they should get back to the ship. He was in bad shape. They had the information they’d come for. But as he lay there on the cool stones, Jason felt a sense of incompleteness. The story of the suitors and Queen Penelope … his thoughts about family … his recent dreams. Those things all swirled around in his head. There was something more to this place – something he’d missed.

Annabeth came back limping from the edge of the hill.

‘Are you hurt?’ Jason asked her.

Annabeth glanced at her ankle. ‘It’s fine. Just the old break from the Roman caverns. Sometimes when I’m stressed … That’s not important. I signalled Leo. Frank’s going to change form, fly up here and carry you back to the ship. I need to make a litter to keep you stable.’

Jason had a terrifying image of himself in a hammock, swinging between the claws of Frank the giant eagle, but he decided it would be better than dying.

Annabeth set to work. She collected scraps left behind by the suitors – a leather belt, a torn tunic, sandal straps, a red blanket and a couple of broken spear shafts. Her hands flew across the materials – ripping, weaving, tying, braiding.

‘How are you doing that?’ Jason asked in amazement.

‘Learned it during my quest under Rome.’ Annabeth kept her eyes on her work. ‘I’d never had a reason to try weaving before, but it’s handy for certain things, like getting away from spiders …’

She tied off one last bit of leather cord and voilà – a stretcher large enough for Jason, with spear shafts as carrying handles and safety straps across the middle.

Piper whistled appreciatively. ‘The next time I need a dress altered, I’m coming to you.’

‘Shut up, McLean,’ Annabeth said, but her eyes glinted with satisfaction. ‘Now, let’s get him secured –’

‘Wait,’ Jason said.

His heart pounded. Watching Annabeth weave the makeshift bed, Jason had remembered the story of Penelope – how she’d held out for twenty years, waiting for her husband Odysseus to return.

‘A bed,’ Jason said. ‘There was a special bed in this palace.’

Piper looked worried. ‘Jason, you’ve lost a lot of blood.’

‘I’m not hallucinating,’ he insisted. ‘The marriage bed was sacred. If there was any place you could talk to Juno …’ He took a deep breath and called, ‘Juno!’

Silence.

Maybe Piper was right. He wasn’t thinking clearly.

Then, about sixty feet away, the stone floor cracked. Branches muscled through the earth, growing in fast motion until a full-sized olive tree shaded the courtyard. Under a canopy of grey-green leaves stood a dark-haired woman in a white dress, a leopard-skin cape draped over her shoulders. Her staff was topped with a white lotus flower. Her expression was cool and regal.

‘My heroes,’ said the goddess.

‘Hera,’ Piper said.

‘Juno,’ Jason corrected.

‘Whatever,’ Annabeth grumbled. ‘What are you doing here, Your Bovine Majesty?’

Juno’s dark eyes glittered dangerously. ‘Annabeth Chase. As charming as ever.’

‘Yeah, well,’ Annabeth said, ‘I just got back from Tartarus, so my manners are a little rusty, especially towards goddesses who wiped my boyfriend’s memory, made him disappear for months and then –’

‘Honestly, child. Are we going to rehash this again?’

‘Aren’t you supposed to be suffering from split-personality disorder?’ Annabeth asked. ‘I mean – more so than usual?’

‘Whoa,’ Jason interceded. He had plenty of reasons to hate Juno, but they had other issues to deal with. ‘Juno, we need your help. We –’ Jason tried to sit up and immediately regretted it. His insides felt like they were being twirled on a giant spaghetti fork.

Piper kept him from falling over. ‘First things first,’ she said. ‘Jason is hurt. Heal him!’

The goddess knitted her eyebrows. Her form shimmered unsteadily.

‘Some things even the gods cannot heal,’ she said. ‘This wound touches your soul as well as your body. You must fight it, Jason Grace … you must survive.’

‘Yeah, thanks,’ he said, his mouth dry. ‘I’m trying.’

‘What do you mean, the wound touches his soul?’ Piper demanded. ‘Why can’t you –’

‘My heroes, our time together is short,’ Juno said. ‘I am grateful that you called upon me. I have spent weeks in a state of pain and confusion … my Greek and Roman natures warring against each other. Worse, I’ve been forced to hide from Jupiter, who searches for me in his misguided wrath, believing that I caused this war with Gaia.’

‘Gee,’ Annabeth said, ‘why would he think that?’

Juno flashed her an irritated look. ‘Fortunately, this place is sacred to me. By clearing away those ghosts, you have purified it and given me a moment of clarity. I will be able to speak with you – if only briefly.’

‘Why is it sacred … ?’ Piper’s eyes widened. ‘Oh. The marriage bed!’

‘Marriage bed?’ Annabeth asked. ‘I don’t see any –’

‘The bed of Penelope and Odysseus,’ Piper explained. ‘One of its bedposts was a living olive tree, so it could never be moved.’

‘Indeed.’ Juno ran her hand along the olive tree’s trunk. ‘An immovable marriage bed. Such a beautiful symbol! Like Penelope, the most faithful wife, standing her ground, fending off a hundred arrogant suitors for years because she knew her husband would return. Odysseus and Penelope – the epitome of a perfect marriage!’

Even in his dazed state, Jason was pretty sure he remembered stories about Odysseus falling for other women during his travels, but he decided not to bring that up.

‘Can you advise us, at least?’ he asked. ‘Tell us what to do?’

‘Sail around the Peloponnese,’ said the goddess. ‘As you suspect, that is the only possible route. On your way, seek out the goddess of victory in Olympia. She is out of control. Unless you can subdue her, the rift between Greek and Roman can never be healed.’

‘You mean Nike?’ Annabeth asked. ‘How is she out of control?’

Thunder boomed overhead, shaking the hill.

‘Explaining would take too long,’ Juno said. ‘I must flee before Jupiter finds me. Once I leave, I will not be able to help you again.’

Jason bit back a retort: When did you help me the first time?

‘What else should we know?’ he asked.

‘As you heard, the giants have gathered in Athens. Few gods will be able to help you on your journey, but I am not the only Olympian who is out of favour with Jupiter. The twins have also incurred his wrath.’

‘Artemis and Apollo?’ Piper asked. ‘Why?’

Juno’s image began to fade. ‘If you reach the island of Delos, they might be prepared to help you. They are desperate enough to try anything to make amends. Go now. Perhaps we will meet again in Athens, if you succeed. If you do not …’

The goddess disappeared, or maybe Jason’s eyesight simply failed. Pain rolled through him. His head lolled back. He saw a giant eagle circling high above. Then the blue sky turned black, and Jason saw nothing at all.