Chapter 26- The Maenads
Percy's P.O.V.: -
Percy turned around to see whether Harry and Alyssa were following him or not, but instead he saw that Harry was blushing like a bright red tomato and Alyssa was apparently teasing him about something. Soon she left, and Harry ran in the direction of the forest to join Percy.
"What happened?" Percy asked him.
"I told Alyssa to go and inform Annabeth that we might have discovered the location of the formula," Harry told him.
"Okay… but why were you blushing?" Percy asked, feeling a little curious about it.
To his surprise, Harry blushed even more and said, "Never mind that now. We have got some work to do remember?" He then quickly pointed his wand towards the forest and muttered the summoning charm once again.
Percy watched, as the wand once again turned in his hand and pointed in a direction far deeper into the woods.
"The magical disturbance is much stronger than earlier. I can almost feel it," Harry remarked. He looked a little surprised by this, and Percy understood why. Harry was still not used to accepting the fact that his powers were increasing or that he was becoming incredibly sensitive to magic, so much in fact that he could detect stuff which even the children of Hecate couldn't.
"Let's get going," Harry said, staring at the path directed by his wand.
Percy simply nodded, deciding against commenting on Harry's increasing powers.
They were heading deeper and deeper into the forest and Percy's senses were becoming increasingly alert with every step they took. His eyes kept glancing towards the trees, or in some cases the wood nymphs and he began to wonder, why the Hades would Hufflepuff hide her formula in the forest? He felt that it didn't exactly suit the personality of a child of Pluto; Percy would rather put his Golden Drachmas on a child of Demeter doing something like this.
"You think Octavian could be somewhere nearby?" Harry asked, bringing his train of thoughts to a halt.
"Maybe," Percy answered slowly.
He could understand why Harry was so worried about Octavian being in search of the formula too. They all had a feeling that there was a traitor amongst them, someone, who might have helped the mortals in setting the fire at Camp Jupiter.
And at this moment, Octavian was there biggest suspect. Especially, after what Leo and Hermione had told them all, about him doing something suspicious in Chiron's cabin.
"I think Octavian must have…" but Percy stopped in mid-sentence as he heard some sort of a noise coming from a distance. It sounded like a group of drunken teenage girls were giggling or something.
"Is there someone else over here too?" Harry asked Percy in a low voice, as he seemed to have heard the giggling voices as well.
Percy and Harry walked in the direction of the voices, which were becoming increasingly louder with every step they took. Soon they reached a little clearing in the midst of the woods and to their extreme surprise they saw a group of teenage girls dancing and chirping happily and looking extremely drunk.
The girls were wearing tunic dresses of purple and red silk and were carrying large twisted wooden branches topped with giant pine cones and living snakes. They had bloodshot eyes, bright red lips and webbed skin with bright capillaries.
One of them was busy interrogating Octavian, who was caught in the middle of a circle formed by these girls around him, and he didn't seem to look too happy about all the attention that he was receiving from them.
"Oh no," Percy muttered, "They are the Maenads."
"What's a Maenad?" Harry asked sounding confused.
"They are, sort of, the relatives of the Naiads and Dryads. Though unlike their cousins, they are extremely violent and vicious. Oh, and they are also the followers of Dionysus, maybe that's why they love to remain drunk all the time," Percy finished.
"Is Dinonysus the God who created wine?" Harry asked, looking as though he was trying to remember whatever Percy and Tyson had taught him about the Greek myths.
"Yup. Though I don't get how they managed to return to the camp, I thought that Chiron had sent them to the Atlantic City," Percy muttered.
"Atlantic city?" Harry asked, clearly this was too much information for him to take in all at once.
"Yeah, however the Naiads had warned me, when I had gone to visit them in the lake, about the escape of the 'Raving Ones' from the Atlantic City. Though why they chose this particular time to escape is something that I don't get, because they are usually seen around the time of Christmas," Percy continued to speak.
"But why have they circled Octavian like that?" Harry asked him.
Before Percy could answer however, they heard Octavian yelling loudly, "Don't you silly girls get it? I am not Bacchus or Dionysus, or whatever you call the wine god over here!" The Maenads seemed to get extremely angry upon hearing this and glared at Octavian.
"Percy," Harry whispered staring at his wand, "The formula is located somewhere beyond these girls and Octavian."
Percy sighed, if they had to reach the formula than they would have to face these Maenads. Just as he was trying to formulate a plan to escape from them, he saw that one of the Maenads was staring right towards him and Harry.
"Is either one of you Lord Dionysus?" she asked them in a drunken voice.
Octavian saw them too, and exclaimed in a slightly relieved tone, "Oh yes! The spectacled boy over there is Dionysus!"
"What?! That's nonsense Octavian!" Harry yelled at him, "I am not Dionysus!" he exclaimed.
"Lord Dionysus!" the Maenads chirped in unison, gathering around Harry and staring at him in a mesmerized manner.
"Hey, stay away from him!" Percy exclaimed, pulling out his Riptide.
Just then, he saw Octavian taking advantage of the momentary distraction and running further into the forest, apparently in the direction of the formula.
"Hey! That blonde boy is escaping! We need to catch him Babette!" one of the Maenads screamed.
The one named Babette replied, "Oh, forget about him, Buffy. Lord Dionysus is more important for us. We won't let him escape from us this time."
She then eyed Harry and whispered in a dangerous tone, "But I hope that you are the real Dionysus. Last time, a really cute but slightly scrawny boy had tried to impersonate our beloved wine god and it won't be nice for you if you repeat the same act."
Harry seemed to be more confused rather than intimidated by this threat. Percy though, understood what the leader of the Maenads was talking about, as he had heard about Leo, Piper and Jason's little encounter with these nymphs when the three of them were searching for a table named 'Buford' and were trying to bring it back to Bunker 9.
"Isn't there any way to get away from these girls?" Harry asked him in a whispered tone.
"Well, I guess we should just distract them, and escape while we can," Percy replied. Since they were Dionysus' followers he didn't wanted to take the risk of accidently killing one of them or something. Also, he felt that they would be losing some really precious time if they had to fight with these Maenads, especially when Octavian was already ahead of them inside the forest. He saw Harry staring in the direction pointed by his wand, and an idea occurred to him,
"Okay, listen Maenads, Harry isn't Dionysus, but we know where the real Dionysus is and we can take you up to him" Percy said suddenly.
"Where?" Almost the whole group of Maenads asked him in chorus.
"And why exactly should we believe you?" the one named Buffy, asked him in a menacing tone.
"Because we can lead you up to him if you just follow us," Percy replied, trying to sound a little sincere and convincing.
He threw a meaningful glance in Harry's direction, who seemed to understand his plan, as he too joined in and said, "Yeah, my wand will be able to guide us and we will find him in no time."
With great difficulty they finally managed to convince the Maenads, although Buffy was still staring at the two of them a little suspiciously.
Soon they were half-walking and half-running in the direction shown by the wand, while the Maenads followed them getting increasingly restless and impatient. Percy wasn't sure, but he thought that a few of them had suddenly grown white talons in place of their fingernails.
Harry seemed to have noticed those white talons too, as his face grew a little pale and he whispered to Percy, "Maybe I should have stunned them while we had the chance."
Percy simply shook his head. He knew that Harry would get angry upon hearing this, but the truth was that Percy knew that Harry was still not able to control his powers properly. And he didn't wanted Harry to accidently use a killing curse or something on those Maenads and thereby suffer from Dionysus's wrath.
After some time, they reached a place really deep into the forest where the trees were as tall as skyscrapers and the thick canopy of leaves hardly allowed any of the sunrays to reach the ground, which made their surroundings considerably dark.
A stream was flowing in front of them, and a sudden gasp escaped from Percy's throat when he noticed a limestone cliff, about a hundred feet tall, just visible beyond the stream.
"What happened Percy?" Harry asked, as he seemed to have noticed his sudden gasp. Following Percy's gaze, Harry turned to stare at the limestone cliff too.
"Er, that looks like some sort of a dead-end," Harry muttered.
"That's not a dead-end. It's Bunker 9," Percy told him. Though Percy couldn't help wondering why their search for Hufflepuff's formula had brought them near Hephaestus's bunker. There was definitely no connection between the two things as far as he could tell.
"You mean it's that bunker where Leo invents his secret stuff?" Harry asked him slowly.
"Yeah, it actually has a hidden entrance over here. And to open it we have to…" Percy stopped suddenly, as he heard a noise from behind them.
He turned around and saw Octavian jumping out looking a little disheveled but nonetheless thrilled at finally finding the place. He glanced triumphantly at some sort of device in his hand, before his eyes fell on Percy and the others and the smile on his face got replaced with a scowl.
"How did he found out the correct place?" Percy asked Harry who was looking equally confused.
"Stop with all this chatting, and tell us where is Dionysus?" Babette suddenly asked them again in a threatening voice.
Octavian glanced once at the Maenads and once again at Percy and Harry, and he seemed to come up with some sort of a plan, as he said, "You two try to distract these silly Bacchus fangirls, I'll get the formula from the bunker."
"There is a little problem with your plan Octavian," Percy replied fixing him under a stern gaze, "It just happens to be that I and Harry don't trust you."
"And I don't trust this spawn of Gaia to begin with," Octavian started to reply angrily but was cut-off as the Maenad named Buffy yelled shrilly,
"Are you really going to take us to meet Lord Dionysus or not?"
Octavian gave both of them a pitiful stare and muttered, "Your problem. Handle them now," and sprinted past them in the direction of the bunker.
Percy and Harry made to follow him, but were blocked by the angry nymphs who encircled them, and looked as though they were ready to rip them apart with their long white talons and wolf-like fangs.
"So, you thought you could trick us and escape or something?" one of the Maenads asked angrily.
Percy was trying to think of some way of getting away from them but his mind was in a complete chaos right now. Before he could discuss anything with Harry however, Babette ordered her followers,
"Okay everyone, we have dealt with these boys for very long, now it's time to finish them once and for all! Attack!"
The raging Maenads attacked Harry and Percy from both the sides, looking extremely violent and dangerous.
Percy quickly drew out his Riptide and while he was being careful not to end up killing any of the Maenads (Well, he wasn't exactly on friendly terms with Dionysus to begin with), he tried to injure as many as possible and protect himself and Harry.
But the Maenads were too speedy, and it was a little difficult for him to concentrate on their moments, as they all seemed to attack at the same time from different directions.
"Protego!" Harry suddenly screamed, creating some sort of a shield between the two of them and the Maenads. Babette and a couple of others got deflected by the power of the shield and fell back on the ground.
"Harry, I'll handle them. You go inside the bunker and try to get the formula before Octavian does," Percy told him.
"But, I can't just leave you alone over here with these monsters," Harry protested, his eyes gleaming with worry and fear for Percy.
Percy sighed, and said, "Trust me Harry; I've faced worst monsters than these nymphs. I'll be able to deal with them; you go and get the formula."
"You can get the formula, and I'll handle these Maenads," Harry suggested.
Percy shook his head, "Nope, you can detect its location with your magic. Just go and get it Harry, I'll be alright, really."
Harry was just about to say something, but just then both of them realized that the shield charm was slowly fading away and the Maenads were preparing to attack them once again.
"Go!" Percy said urgently.
Harry seemed to want to argue back, but to Percy's great relief he decided to head towards the bunker. Mouthing a 'good luck' to Percy, he hurried to retrieve the formula, while Percy once again got ready to face the charging Maenads.
As Percy held Riptide tightly in his hand, a sudden thought occurred to him, 'How was Harry going to enter the Bunker?' Because Harry definitely didn't knew the method of opening and closing Bunker 9.
A.N.:- Sorry for the long wait everyone. I am just too busy these days. Really, I've got the whole story planned out in my head, but I just don't get the time to type it all out.
You all might be reminded of Leo's story about the Buford table from Demigod Diaries after reading this chapter, Lol.
I'll try to update the next chapter as soon as possible.
PLEASE REVIEW!