Chapter 19

Shelton

Ben and I were attempting not to be noticed while Amber and Uncle Harrold argued. It wasn't too difficult since everyone was focused on the argument, but if my parents caught sight of us I was sure that we'd end up in the hot seat next.

Look, the Virals have done dangerous things. Like, a lot of dangerous things. I'm not saying my parents know about all of them, but they probably should have expected that if a dead girl showed up on our front lawn my friends and I were going to end up getting involved. They're smarter than me. That wouldn't stop them from grounding me for life, but they really should have expected it.

'This is actually kind of impressive,' Ben said. 'I don't think they've stopped to breathe once.'

'Sure. Impressive.' I realized I was tugging on my earlobe and made an effort to keep both my hands away from my head. Hey, I know what my nervous habits are.

"We had two children of Hades," Amber said. "The ghosts were under control."

Mom interrupted Uncle Harrold's retort. "Ghosts?"

Amber and Uncle Harrold turned to look at her. Amber blinked.

"We are all on the same page about the 'the gods are real and they have kids and those kids have issues' thing, right?" Amber asked after a moment. "Because if we aren't, can we table all of this until after we've all gotten some sleep? I don't think the stars I'm seeing are a magic thing."

No one got a chance to answer. Sapphire, who'd fallen asleep around the time the argument had started getting repetitive, suddenly woke and sat bolt upright.

"Follow the wolves," Sapphire said. "Demigod dream. Father said to follow the wolves."

"Helpful," Nico said. "What wolves?"

Sapphire shrugged. "Whisper's pack?"

"Montana?" Amber suggested with a grimace. The demigods in the room mimicked her expression.

'Could be us,' Ben said.

It was my turn to grimace. Given our luck, Hades was probably talking about the Virals.

Leo rubbed his forehead. "So, the usual cryptic stuff. Great."

Nico muttered something in Italian (?) that I was pretty sure wasn't polite. "I agree with Amber. We need sleep."

"You should have thought about that before going to summon ghosts in the middle of the night." Aunt Mariko sighed. "Go to bed. We'll finish this conversation in the morning."

Ben and I wasted no time in escaping to the third floor. Richie was already asleep, sprawling on the inflatable mattress that was meant to be able to hold two people. That wasn't a surprise. Leo and I had been sleeping in sleeping bags on the floor because Richie wouldn't take up less space.

"We've got another sleeping bag," I said quietly.

Ben grunted and passed out on my sleeping bag. Thanks, buddy. Real helpful.

Leo and Nico didn't join us until after I'd gotten the third sleeping bag out and had been staring at it for a least a minute. The thing that I was sure I'd forgotten became obvious when I realized that there were only two available sleeping bags.

"We've slept in worse places," Leo said when I offered to sleep on the floor. "Get some rest, Shelton. We're in the home stretch now."

You know how people say things will look better after a good night's sleep? They're not wrong. By the time I got downstairs in the morning, Mom, Dad, Uncle Harrold and Aunt Mariko were sitting at the kitchen table calmly discussing the security measures of the Underworld with Nico.

Okay, it was still an argument, but it was a calm argument. That was better than last night.

"What's that about werewolves?" I asked.

Nico scowled. "Human-monster hybrid spirits are the worst. We're not letting any of them out of the Underworld. End of discussion."

I blinked. "Okay. Is there coffee?"

"There'd better be coffee," Amber grumbled. She pushed past me and made a beeline for the coffee maker. Lucky for all of us, it was half full.

"What wolves could your father have been talking about?" Uncle Harrold asked.

"Metaphorical wolves?" Nico suggested. "You couldn't have been any less cryptic, Dad? I'm this close to wishing for a prophecy."

"Let's not," Amber said. "Morning, Saph."

Sapphire grumbled wordlessly and eyed Amber's cup of coffee. I handed her the bowl of Lucky Charms I'd poured for myself. I didn't want to see what happened if she got her hands on coffee. Sapphire gave another grumble that might have been a thank you.

"You're welcome," I said.

It was another fifteen minutes until everyone was mostly awake and eating breakfast. Sapphire kept nearly falling asleep in her cereal, but she'd upgraded from grumbles to full words.

"So, have we got a plan?" Leo asked.

"Do we ever have a plan?" Amber retorted.

"No plan survives first contact," Sapphire said.

Nico looked up from the single piece of toast on the plate in front of him. "Find Asher's warehouse. Hopefully he's there or he left something behind that we can use."

Leo added another piece of toast to Nico's plate. "And then?"

Nico said something in Ancient Greek. He looked back at his plate and frowned.

Aunt Mariko cleared her throat. "What's that for those of us who don't speak a dead language?"

"We catch him and lock him in Father's dungeon," Sapphire said. "Percy's the only person who's escaped from there, and that's because Nico broke him out."

None of the demigods mentioned anything about killing Asher. I kept my mouth shut. On the other side of the kitchen, Ben did the same. That was definitely something none of the parents in the room needed to learn about.

"Percy?" Mom asked.

"Our cousin," Nico said. He was still frowning at his doubled breakfast.

"The greatest hero of our generation," Leo said. "There was a vote."

I did a double take. "Was there actually a vote?"

Leo nodded. "Year-round campers get bored quickly."

I had no trouble believing that. Leo had three tiny wind-up metal dogs in front of him that he'd made over the course of one meal. The campers probably ran low on things to do after a month.

"Tory and Hi are here," Sapphire said. "Oh, and Cooper. Canine souls are weird." The doorbell rang ten seconds after she spoke. Handy, that.

Ben and I went to answer the door in case Tory or Hi had something to tell us that they didn't want to share outside the pack. It was a good thing that we didn't make bets on it, because Tory would have lost me five bucks. She barely waited for the door to close.

"I know where the warehouse is," Tory said.

"Please tell her we're not going after the demigod serial killer," Hi begged.

Ben raised an eyebrow. "Why would I waste my time doing that?"

Hi's shoulders slumped. "We're going after the demigod serial killer, aren't we?"

"Probably," I said.

Hi groaned. "Why is this my life?"