The Ties That Bind Chapter 11: Looking For You
If everything'd stop, I'd listen for your heart
To lead me right to you, yeah
- My Hands (David Archuleta)
As Thalia squeezed my hand she murmured a prayer to Artemis, and my vision seemed to fill with silvery light until it was almost too bright to see anything at all. Then my stomach shifted, like I was on a train that had suddenly started moving. Although I could see the outlines of things like trees and rocks and bushes, they seemed to be elongated and blurred, moving past us and standing still almost at the same time. It was definitely nothing like shadow traveling – more like moving on fast-forward. It was really disorienting, more like being on a giant treadmill as the world went by way too fast. I almost preferred the cool dark of the shadows when Nico pulled me through them.
Things suddenly shifted back into color and we found ourselves in the countryside beyond Camp Half-Blood's borders. There was pretty much nothing out here except for the occasional farmhouse, and we were actually standing in what looked like somebody's field, though there was nothing growing in it at the moment.
"Whoa," I said, as my stomach seemed to catch up with the rest of me. I felt pretty dizzy, but thankfully I didn't stagger or worse, puke. That would've been embarrassing. I still had one hand tangled in Mrs. O'Leary's dog collar, so I suppose that even if I'd tried to fall over, it probably wouldn't have worked.
Annabeth had dropped Serena's hand and was blinking furiously, like she was trying to figure out how we'd gotten here. The rest of the Hunters were standing around like they'd done this a million times. They probably had.
"Okay," Thalia said, her hand slipping out of mine. "This is far enough from camp that there shouldn't be any stray scents to confuse Mrs. O'Leary." She glanced at me, and I suddenly got the feeling I was going to be in charge of the dog for the duration of this trip. That was okay with me, though – we got along pretty well, after all. Mrs. O'Leary was really a good dog at heart. She was just a really big one, too.
I nodded, trying to disentangle my hand from her collar. "Okay, girl," I said, running one hand down her massive shoulder. "You know Nico, right?" I shrugged one arm out of my backpack's strap and unzipped it, pulling out a black t-shirt – Nico's black t-shirt. I felt a little dumb – seriously, everyone was watching me – but I tried to ignore it as I held it up for the hellhound to snuffle. "He smells like this. You remember him. You like him."
Mrs. O'Leary barked happily.
"We need to follow him," I said, watching the giant black hellhound as she paused for a moment, almost like she was considering my request. (I mean, not that she could really understand me... but then again, maybe she could. I'd really hoped that just sticking something Nico-smelling under her nose would be enough for her to get the idea.)
Then the giant black head turned sharply to the right, and I scrambled to grab for her collar with one hand and reach out for Thalia with the other. I wasn't sure how this was going to work, exactly, but if Mrs. O'Leary found a direction, I figured Thalia would want to use her Artemis Warp trick again to keep us all together.
The next thing I felt was a tugging sensation in my gut that was actually pretty familiar – shadow travel. I tightened my grip on Thalia's hand, hoping she'd get the picture and be able to pull the rest of the Hunters with us or we'd have to double back and try again.
What followed next can only be described as totally disorienting – even more than the first time, in fact. It felt like a combination of regular shadow traveling, which was already pretty disorienting even if I was kind of used to it, and the strange way Artemis had allowed Thalia to move the whole group outside the camp in the blink of an eye. I knew that Mrs. O'Leary couldn't take more than one or two passengers along when she shadow traveled, and that it made her tire easily. I guessed that was where the Hunters' special mode of transportation came in, boosting Mrs. O'Leary's range and allowing us all to go in one big group. That meant I could kind of see where we were going, but it was really hard to make sense of where we were or how fast we were moving. It felt like being on a roller coaster and in one of those centrifuge rides all at once. I was really glad I hadn't eaten a whole lot of breakfast.
The first time I blinked I recognized more of the countryside beyond Camp Half-Blood's borders; the second, third, and fourth times we were surrounded by more forest, unrecognizable. A fifth blink and we were at a gas station along a lonely strip of highway somewhere that looked like it could be somewhere in rural New York or Pennsylvania.
Every couple of shifts, we'd stop and let Mrs. O'Leary rest while the rest of us regrouped. It was hard to tell how long each jump took, but every time we stopped the sun had inched higher in the sky. It never felt like hours were passing, but apparently they were.
I wasn't the only one who realized it, either. By the fifth rest stop the sun was high overhead in the sky, and Annabeth frowned. "How long have we been traveling?"
Thalia squinted at the sky overhead. "A couple of hours, I think."
"It doesn't feel that way," Annabeth said. She glanced at her watch. "And my watch says it's only been twenty minutes.
It was obvious time had passed, but I wasn't sure why. "Shadow travel is instantaneous," I pointed out, glancing at Mrs. O'Leary. "At least, I think so." Nico had never worried about time passing strangely when he slipped through the shadows.
"But our way isn't," Thalia said, coming up beside me. "Even with a hellhound leading, it still takes time for Artemis to help us move us this far." She caught the look on Annabeth's face and shrugged. "Hey, it's faster than driving."
"Guess so," was all Annabeth could say to that.
I had to admit, I didn't like that it was taking so much time either. I wanted to be where Nico was now, because it was important to get to him and get him back to camp as soon as possible. But I'd promised to stick it out with the group, and Thalia was right, after all – so maybe we weren't instantaneously jumping from place to place like Nico could, but it was definitely easier than actually driving. And it cost less for gas.
Though we would, I realized, have to get a couple tens of bags of kibble for Mrs. O'Leary. Or maybe just find her a nice big restaurant dumpster to root around in. No one ever seemed to notice her, so as long as we didn't look like we were looting or anything it shouldn't be a problem...
But for now, we were still in the middle of nowhere. While Mrs. O'Leary dognapped, most of the Hunters set about making sure their weapons were in good condition. It seemed a little excessive to me – I mean, they'd just checked them this morning, which for us had been what, twenty minutes ago? – but I kind of got the vibe that it was more to give them something to do so they wouldn't have to deal with Annabeth and me. Well, fine – they didn't have to be my best friends, after all. They just had to help me find Nico and bring him back to camp.
So Annabeth and I just kind of stood around uneasily, checking and rechecking the contents of our backpacks until maybe ten minutes later, when Mrs. O'Leary rumbled deep in her chest and blinked open her eyes. Her tail wagged as she stood and looked right at me, cocking her head like she was waiting for me to be ready to go again. We took that as our signal to regroup, and only a minute later we were off again, traveling via that weird half-shadow travel, half-goddess-gifted travel that left my head spinning and staticky without too much room left for anything else.
*
When we finally halted for the day, it took me a minute to get my bearings – after all, it felt like my brain was rattling around inside my skull. We'd been stopping in wilderness for most of the afternoon, but as evening drew nearer it was clear we were getting closer and closer to civilization. Now we were standing in an alleyway in what looked like an industrial area of a large city. The two buildings flanking us were hulking blocks of concrete and I could see large cranes off in the distance. I could also smell water somewhere nearby – fresh water, and lots of it. I didn't have to look far – about a block away to the left, the street dropped off into a large mass of water. It wasn't the ocean, but it sure was a freaking huge lake.
"Ohhh," moaned Annabeth, putting one hand to her temple. "I don't think I can do that a whole lot more today."
Most of the Hunters looked just as bad – they all had their bows drawn and none of them was complaining, but I could tell by the way they were standing that they weren't feeling too hot, either. I just kept my grip on Mrs. O'Leary's collar, even as the dog snuffled around a bit, whined, and flopped over to nap, nearly squashing me in the process.
I frowned. "I think she lost the scent." That wasn't exactly reassuring, but I guessed that was what the Hunters were along for... right?
Thalia had dropped my hand and was looking around, one hand on her bow. "Where are we?"
Annabeth squinted at the skyline – there were just a few tall buildings visible in the distance. Finally, she hazarded, "Cleveland?" How she could tell based on a couple buildings I didn't know, but if anyone could tell a city based on its architecture, it would be Annabeth. I was pretty sure she'd studied every major city in the US, and then some.
Thalia made a face. "Cleveland?" she muttered. "What would he be doing here?" She glanced at me like maybe I had an answer, but I really didn't. I just shrugged.
"He's never even mentioned the place before."
Thalia frowned. "Hm."
"Perhaps he was just passing through," one of the Hunters suggested. "Or he was trying to dissuade anyone from following him. If the hound has lost his scent..."
"We're right on Lake Erie," Annabeth said quietly, which I supposed explained the huge-ass lake, then. She glanced at me, frowning. "You don't think he'd be..."
I realized what she was suggesting. I frowned. "No. If he was somewhere in the lake, I think I'd feel it." Even though Nico could survive just fine underwater, I didn't think he'd be able to hide from me there. I was still much better at water-based things than he was, just like I wasn't so great at his death tricks. I didn't think he'd have the energy to stay hidden from me at the bottom of even one of the Great Lakes for as long as it would take for us to move on.
"Wait," the girl named Serena said, glancing at Annabeth and then at me. "I thought you said he was the son of Hades."
"He is," I confirmed.
"Then why," she asked, tilting her head in the direction of the docks, "would he be in a lake?"
"I... uh. Because I can – so he... " I floundered, feeling completely ridiculous. My face was getting really hot. Finally the best I could come up with was, "Look, I told you he was my boyfriend!"
I realized Thalia's cheeks were turning slightly pink too, and she quickly cut in, saying, "Well now that we know he has access to water travel as well, we'll have to be extra-thorough." She glanced around, her eyes landing on the sleeping form of Mrs. O'Leary. "Either way, it looks like we'll have to pick up the trail ourselves – in the morning. We'll have to give Mrs. O'Leary another chance to rest, and it's safer if we don't travel at night, either."
It turned out that bunking down with the Hunters wasn't going to be as bad as I'd first thought. I mean, I'd always thought that the Hunters usually camped, so I admit I was a little confused when we finally managed to herd a sleepy hellhound into the back parking lot of the Holiday Inn Select-City Center on Lakeside Avenue (thank you, Annabeth's laptop and Google Maps). Apparently the Hunters weren't averse to using a Platinum Rewards Visa card in the name of Diane Luna to get a handful of rooms for the night. When Thalia nonchalantly explained to the girl behind the front desk that they were in town for a cheerleading competition (while I hid at the back of the group), her eyes pretty much just glazed over. She swiped the card and didn't even ask for a signature when she forked over a handful of room keys.
Of course, I got my own room – none of the girls would be caught dead sharing with me and even though I'd shared plenty of small, cramped spaces with Annabeth before, she opted to stay with Thalia. I guess I wasn't really surprised; things were still a little weird between me and Annabeth, and I realized they might be for a while. But at least we were on the way to getting things back to the way they'd been, and that was good enough for me for now.
But even though I had a pretty sweet deal – my very own hotel room with a shower and a toilet and free HBO (hey, these were things you don't usually get on your average quest), I still felt uneasy as we settled down for the night – because it meant another night without Nico, and another night for the trail to go cold. But I'd promised Thalia I wouldn't go off alone, and so I flipped on the weather channel and hoped it would lull me to sleep so I wouldn't have to worry about where Nico was spending the night.
That night when I dreamed, it wasn't the watching-TV-like sort of eavesdropping dream that half-bloods sometimes have, but there was plenty to be disturbed about nonetheless. When I opened my eyes to the pale light coming in through the half-drawn curtains, all I could remember were vague images of darkness and blood, and someone far away, screaming.
The clock next to the bed read 05:10 in glowing red numbers. I groaned and rolled over, thinking about going back to sleep. But I was still disturbed by the dreams that I could only half-remember, and after about ten minutes I gave up on trying to sleep any more. I dragged myself out of bed and, pocketing my room key and Riptide, pulled on my shoes and took the elevator down to the lobby.
The girl who'd checked us in the night before had said there'd be a continental breakfast, but the guy there this morning said it didn't start until six. My stomach grumbled in protest, but he didn't appear particularly moved by its plight. I wasn't sure what to do until breakfast started – I could go back up and see if Annabeth or Thalia was awake, but I didn't really feel like talking to them right now. Talking to any of the other Hunters was totally out of the question, and when I wandered out into the back parking lot of the hotel, Mrs. O'Leary was snoozing happily between the hotel dumpster and a white minivan (no one appeared to have noticed her at all).
I wandered back through the hotel and out the front door this time, feeling that we were close to the lake and thinking that maybe spending a little time near the water could help clear my head. I wasn't sure if my dream meant anything or if it was just a nightmare for nightmare's sake, but either way I couldn't get the feeling of dread out of the pit of my stomach. I was pretty sure Annabeth would chew me out for wandering off, but it wasn't like I was planning to go far. Besides, I could take care of myself. It wasn't like she was my mom, and even she let me wander around New York on my own. (Half-blood quests across the country aside.) And I was going to come back. Wandering off for a little alone time near the water was totally different than hijacking a hellhound and going after Nico alone, I reasoned.
I didn't even have to ask for directions – I could feel the tug of the water somewhere in my gut. I followed the feeling west down Lakeside Avenue, looking for a cross street that would take me to the lake. East 9th Street took me over a highway and out towards the water. The road ended on a chunk of concrete with a parking lot and an obviously-manmade patch of grass with a sign that read "Voinovich Park".
Well, it wasn't exactly a beach (or the ocean), but at least it was water and the sound of it lapping up against the concrete struts below made me feel a little better. There was an airport less than half a mile away, but all the planes lined up on the tarmac just off the runway were small and no one seemed to be keen to fly just after dawn. I went right up to the chain barrier at the edge of the concrete and pulled off my sneakers, sitting with my bare feet dangling over the edge so my toes could try and catch the spray.
It wasn't as relaxing as being on a real beach near the ocean, but it was definitely better than nothing. I closed my eyes, shivering in the barely-dawn sunlight even though I was wearing a sweatshirt. It really was getting into fall, I thought. I wondered idly if Nico could spend Christmas with me and my mom.
It was a stupid thought, sure. But I mean, was it really all that bad to hope that things would be okay enough for me to bring my boyfriend home for Christmas? Okay, so Mom didn't know Nico was my boyfriend... but maybe I should think about telling her. I really didn't know how she'd react, but if I'd learned anything it was that people seemed to get more angry with me for not telling them things, rather than the other way around. So maybe she'd be okay with it. Maybe she'd even make Nico some of her famous blue eggnog – no, you don't want to know how she managed that, but all I can tell you is that it tastes awesome and you're better off not knowing what went into it.
As I sat there resting against one of the stone supports that connected the chains around the perimeter, the feel of the even the weak sun on my face and the wind on my cheeks lulled me almost back to sleep. After all, I hadn't slept well last night – or most of the nights before that, really. Wearing myself out so that I slept through the night had only worked once, and since then my dreams had been like last night's – jumbled and full of images that I couldn't remember clearly once I woke.
But sitting here, I didn't feel disturbed at all. Even the chill in the air slid away until I felt quiet, comfortable, and the only thing that was missing was Nico beside me. If I reached out my hand I felt like he was almost there, like if I could just sit still enough and listen hard enough I could hear him right next to me. I wished I had a link with him the way I had with Grover – maybe it wasn't always useful, but at least I'd be able to tell if he was okay. Maybe it would've been able to lead me to him and we wouldn't have had to send this big search party in the first place.
I breathed in and out, matching my breaths with the lapping of the water, and tried to clear my mind of whatever remained of my dream. It wasn't too hard, since I didn't remember anything specific, but it was still difficult to get rid of the ever-present feeling of got to go, right now that I'd had pretty much ever since Nico left. I felt antsy and nervous, and I admit that part of me was hoping that if I could concentrate just right, I would be able to pick up the trail where Mrs. O'Leary had lost it. Sure, that was what the Hunters were here to do, but something in me wanted me to be the one to find the way to Nico, and not them. Somehow I felt like I should just know where he was, where he'd gone. The rest of me wished that maybe he'd left a clue, some way that I could follow him, like a way to show me that he wanted to be found.
"Hello?"
I started, almost falling over the edge and into the water as my eyes flew open at the voice. I clutched at the stone support next to me and looked around wildly for the source of the voice. "Wha?"
Two voices answered my distress, mostly by laughing at it. There was no one standing behind me on the concrete, and I realized as my eyes found the last place I hadn't looked that it was because the two girls who were now staring at me were looking up from their place in the water below me.
They were peering up at me from the lake below, pale faces with dark blue eyes and hair that seemed to change color with the way the sunlight hit the surface of the water. Limnades, I realized – Naiads who lived in freshwater lakes.
I swallowed, trying to calm my racing heart. They seemed more amused than anything, and I didn't think they were exactly here to kill me (though I suppose you can never be too careful). "Um," I said. "Hi?"
They giggled again, exchanging a glance with each other. "We didn't mean to scare you," one said.
"Much," added the other.
"We were just curious," the first went on, nudging her friend with one shoulder. "You're the second boy who's come here to try and commune with the lake this week. It's a bit odd, you know."
My ears perked up at that – the second? We knew Nico had been in the city – maybe he still was. Had he been here, too, trying to find peace? Had he been thinking about me? My heart started racing all over again, but I tried to play it cool as I asked, "What was the first one like?"
The limnades exchanged another look before the first one said, "Tall. Dark. Handsome. You know."
I found myself nodding – I did know. Because clichéd as the description was, it did kind of fit Nico pretty perfectly.
"He was weird, though," the second one put in, obviously the more practical (if less tactful) of the two. "He smelled like death." She wrinkled her nose. "And he kept muttering to himself, jerking around. He started yelling at nothing. He threw rocks at us."
Now I frowned. That didn't sound good – in fact, it sounded like Nico had gotten worse, not better. Forgetting things and being moody was one thing. Yelling at thin air was another. It only increased the feeling of anxiousness in my gut, which doubled as I asked, "Do you know where he went?"
Maybe this was it – maybe this was the clue I needed, my chance to find where Nico was all on my own. (Or, well, with some help – but I was pretty sure that the limnades wouldn't have talked to anyone but me. So that counted, right?)
"Maybe," said the second girl, and that certainly made me sit up and pay attention. The two exchanged a look, as though they were trying to remember something Nico had said. I wanted to ask, but I forced myself to stay quiet and let them think.
"He was muttering an awful lot," the first one mused, putting one hand to her chin like she was trying hard to remember. "He said something about..."
"West," the second one chimed in. "He said he had to go west, remember?" She poked her friend. "To the mountain."
My stomach dropped right through the concrete and kept on falling. "The mountain?" I echoed hollowly, but it only took a few seconds for me to understand exactly what that meant.
West to the mountain – there was only one mountain that could mean. Mount Othrys, which was now located in California on Mount Tamalpais. It was the place where I'd seen Kronos rise from his horrific golden sarcophagus, reborn into Luke Castellan's body. It was there that Nico had inadvertently shown Kronos that he was the son of Hades, by raising a wall of black rock to help us escape. I didn't know if it was where Kronos had retreated to after we'd beaten his forces in Boston, but it had been his base of operations at some point and all I could think was that Nico had done the unthinkable – he'd gone after Kronos. Alone.
Just as suddenly as my heart felt like it had stopped, it started up again, double-time. I scrambled for my shoes, pulling on my socks all wrong and cursing as my cold fingers failed to tie my laces on the first try. I glanced down at the two girls in the water, now watching me like they thought I was crazy, and as I pushed myself off the ground I managed to mutter something that came out pretty much like, "ThanksIhavetogonowbye."
And then I was off, running back up 9th Street towards the hotel. I didn't want to think about all the scenarios running through my head, so I concentrated on getting back to Thalia's room as fast as I possibly could. I flew through the lobby, pounding on the button for the elevator and trying valiantly to throw myself into it before the doors had fully opened. I bounced on the balls of my feet as I punched the button for the seventh floor repeatedly even as the elevator started rising.
When I finally arrived at the end of the hall, hand raised to pound on Thalia and Annabeth's door, I was almost disappointed to see it propped open with the luggage stand from the closet. Just as I was about to open my mouth to call into the room, Thalia's head popped out of the bathroom door and she said, "Oh, there you are. Annabeth's pissed, you know."
I glanced around the room, still wound up but the mention of Annabeth's name made me pause. "Where is she?" Angry or not, I knew she'd want to hear this as well. She'd know what it meant.
Thalia tilted her head towards the open backpack sitting in the entryway of the room. "She went down to the lobby for breakfast and free internet. Don't worry," she added, "Most of the Hunters are down there, too. I told her you were probably just wandering around, especially since Mrs. O'Leary's still here." At my incredulous look, she shrugged. "You promised me, Percy. I know you'll keep that promise."
"Right," I said, and swallowed. "Thanks." But then the reason I'd come up here resurfaced, and I pushed myself past the luggage stand and pulled it behind me, letting the door swing shut. "Thalia, look. I know where Nico's gone."
Immediately Thalia's expression turned serious, and she motioned me further into the room. "How do you know?" she asked.
"I was down by the lake," I explained quickly, gesturing in the general direction with one arm. "I didn't sleep really well so yeah, I just went down there to think until breakfast." I realized that I'd completely lost my appetite, but that didn't matter right now. "I met a pair of limnades there, they said they'd seen Nico." My stomach churned as I remembered the way they'd described him – honestly, he'd sounded pretty crazy. "They said he was muttering, yelling at nothing... but that he said something about going west." I swallowed. "To the mountain."
Thalia's bright blue eyes clouded over, and I could tell she understood what that meant as well as I had. "The mountain," she echoed quietly, and turned towards the room's window, pulling the crisp white curtains aside to look at the city spread out beyond, the bright sunlight contrasting starkly with the way I felt inside right now. I felt like a cloud of darkness had descended over me, eating me up from the inside out. I felt like I was running out of time. I didn't know how long it would take Nico to get to Mount Tam, or if he was already there. I figured if something big had already gone down, we'd know about it. But that didn't make me feel a whole lot better. After all, I didn't know how long it would take us to get to Mount Tam, either. I just knew that I really, really didn't want to be too late.
Thalia turned around, watching me carefully as she said, "You know what that means, don't you?"
It wasn't really a question – just her way of making sure that I understood the gravity of the situation. She hadn't needed to ask – I did. I nodded, wishing I didn't but knowing that wouldn't change a thing. "Mount Tam," I said. "Kronos."
