Annabeth's POV

I was on a dark hillside, shrouded in fog. It almost seemed like the Underworld, because I immediately felt claustrophobic and I couldn't see the sky above—just a close, heavy darkness, as if I were in a cave.

I struggled up the hill. Old broken Greek columns of black marble were scattered around, as though something had blasted a huge building to ruins.

"Thorn!" I cried. "Where are you? Why did you bring me here?"

After jumping over that cliff, we seemed to have teleported to wherever we were now before hitting the water below. I didn't know how. But as soon as we arrived, the manticore Thorn had disappeared, leaving me alone.

I scrambled over a section of broken wall and came to the crest of the hill.

I gasped.

There was Luke. And he was in pain.

He was crumpled on the rocky ground, trying to rise. The blackness seemed to be thicker around him, fog swirling hungrily. His clothes were in tatters and his face was scratched and drenched with sweat.

"Annabeth!" he called. "Help me! Please!"

I ran forward.

I had tears in my eyes. I couldn't take seeing any of my friends in pain, especially Luke. I reached down to touch his face, but at the last second I hesitated.

"What happened?" I asked.

"They left me here," Luke groaned. "Please. It's killing me."

I couldn't see what was wrong with him. He seemed to be struggling against some invisible curse, as though the fog were squeezing him to death.

"Why should I trust you?" I asked. My voice was filled with hurt. After our last couple of encounters, trying to kill me and my friends. He didn't deserve anything from me. I knew I had to be careful around him.

"You shouldn't," Luke said. "I've been terrible to you. But if you don't help me, I'll die."

Then the darkness above Luke began to crumble, like a cavern roof in an earthquake. Huge chunks of black rock began falling. I rushed in just as a crack appeared, and the whole ceiling dropped. I held it somehow—tons of cold rock. It was the heaviest thing I'd ever felt, as if I were being crushed under a thousand trucks. I wanted to black out from the pain, but I breathed deeply. I kept it from collapsing on me and Luke just with my own strength. It was impossible. I shouldn't have been able to do that.

Luke rolled away, gasping. "Thanks," he managed.

"Help me hold it," I groaned.

Luke caught his breath. His face was covered with grime and sweat. He rose unsteadily.

"I knew I could count on you." He began to walk away as the trembling blackness threatened to crush me.

"HELP ME!" I pleaded.

"Oh, don't worry," Luke said. "Your help is on the way. It's all part of the plan. In the meantime, try not to die."

Every muscle in my body turned to fire. My bones felt like they were melting. I wanted to scream, but I didn't have the strength to open my mouth. The ceiling of the darkness began to crumble again, pushing me against the ground.

Jasmine's POV

Percy sat bolt upright in bed, clawing at the sheets, almost knocking me off in the process. There was no sound in the cabin except the gurgle of the saltwater spring. The clock on his nightstand read just after midnight.

"Percy?" I asked. "What's wrong? Bad dream?"

He nodded. "Annabeth . . . and Luke."

He said Luke's name with vile. I couldn't blame him. He's tried to kill him too many times already. Even me and Annabeth, his supposed little girls.

I narrowed my eyes. "Show me."

I touched my hand to his forehead and activated my powers, and he showed me his dream.

I was angry with what I saw. To sum it all up: Annabeth was in terrible danger. And Luke was responsible.

The next morning after breakfast, Percy told Grover and Will about his dream. We sat in the meadow watching the satyrs chase the wood nymphs through the snow. The nymphs had promised to kiss the satyrs if they got caught, but they hardly ever did. Usually the nymph would let the satyr get up a full head of steam, then she'd turned into a snow-covered tree and the poor satyr would slam into it headfirst and get a pile of snow dumped on him.

When Percy told Grover and Will his nightmare, Grover started twirling his finger in his shaggy leg fur.

"A cave ceiling collapsed on her?" Will asked.

"Yeah," Percy said. "What the heck does that mean?"

Grover shook his head. "I don't know. But after what Zoë dreamed—"

"What do you mean?" I asked.

"Whoa," Percy said. "Zoë had a dream like that?"

"I . . . I don't know, exactly," Grover said. "About three in the morning she came to the Big House and demanded to talk to Chiron. She looked really panicked."

"Wait, how do you know this?"

Grover blushed. "I was sort of camped outside the Artemis cabin."

I smirked and shook my head.

"What for?" Percy asked.

"Just to be, you know, near them?" Grover said.

"You're a stalker with hooves," Will said.

"You totally are," I agreed.

"I am not!" Grover protested. "Anyway, I followed her to the Big House and hid in a bush and watched the whole thing. She got real upset when Argus wouldn't let her in. It was kind of a dangerous scene."

I tried to imagine that. Argus was the head of security for camp—a big blond dude with eyes all over his body. He rarely showed himself unless something serious was going on. I wouldn't want to place bets on a fight between him and Zoë. Or maybe I did.

"What did she say?" Percy asked.

Grover grimaced. "Well, she starts talking really old-fashioned when she gets upset, so it was kind of hard to understand. But something about Artemis being in trouble and needing the Hunters. And then she called Argus a boil-brained lout . . . I think that's a bad thing. And then he called her—"

"Whoa, wait," Will interrupted. "How could Artemis be in trouble?"

"I . . . well, finally Chiron came out in his pajamas and his horse tail in curlers and—"

"He wears curlers in his tail?" Percy asked.

"Seriously?" I laughed. "I've known him for seven years now, and I never knew that until now."

Grover covered his mouth.

"Sorry," Percy said. "Go on."

"Well, Zoë said she needed permission to leave camp immediately. Chiron refused. He reminded Zoë that the Hunters were supposed to stay here until they received orders from Artemis. And she said . . ." Grover gulped. "She said, 'How are we supposed to get orders from Artemis if Artemis is lost?'"

"What do you mean lost?" Will asked.

"Like she needs directions?" Percy asked.

I chuckled. "For a goddess who travels all over the country for hunts, I doubt she needs directions for anything."

"No," Grover said. "I think she meant gone. Taken. Kidnapped."

"Kidnapped?" Percy tried to wrap his mind around that idea. "How would you kidnap an immortal goddess? Is that even possible?"

I laughed. "Uh, yeah, it's quite possible."

"Well, yeah," Grover agreed. "I mean, it happened to Persephone."

"But she was like, the goddess of flowers," Percy said.

Grover looked offended. "Springtime."

"Whatever. Artemis is a lot more powerful than that."

"Who could kidnap her?" Will asked. "And why?"

Grover shook his head miserably. "I don't know. Kronos?"

"He can't be that powerful already," Percy said. "Can he?"

The last time we'd seen Kronos, he'd been in tiny pieces. Well . . . we hadn't actually seen him. Thousands of years ago, after the big Titan-God war, the gods had sliced him to bits with his own scythe and scattered his remains to Tartarus, which is like the gods' bottomless recycling bin for their enemies. Two summers ago, Kronos had tricked us to the edge of the pit and almost pulled us in. Then last summer, aboard Luke's demon cruise ship, we'd seen a golden coffin, where Luke claimed he was summoning the Titan Lord out of the abyss, bit by bit, every time someone knew joined their cause. Kronos could influence people with dreams and trick them, but I didn't see how he could physically overcome Artemis if he was still like a pile of evil bark mulch.

"There's no way," I said.

"I don't know," Grover said. "I think somebody would know if Kronos had re-formed. The gods would be more nervous. But still, it's weird, you having a nightmare the same night as Zoë. It's almost like—"

"They're connected," Percy said.

Over in the frozen meadow, a satyr skidded on his hooves as he chased after a redheaded tree nymph. She giggled and held out her arms as he ran toward her. Pop! She turned into a Scotch pine and he kissed the trunk at top speed.

"Ah, love," Grover said dreamily.

Will smirked at me.

"Sure . . ." I said.

"I've got to talk to Zoë," Percy said.

"Good luck with that," I replied sarcastically.

"Um, before you do . . ." Grover took something out of his coat pocket. It was a three-fold display travel brochure. One I recognized. "You remember what you said—about how it was weird the Hunters just happened to show up at Westover Hall? I think they might've been scouting us."

"Scouting us?" Will asked.

"What do you mean?" I asked.

He gave Percy the brochure. It was about the Hunters of Artemis. The front read, A WISE CHOICE FOR YOUR FUTURE! Inside were pictures of young maidens doing hunter stuff, chasing monsters, shooting bows. There were captions like: HEALTH BENEFITS: IMMORTALITY AND WHAT IT MEANS FOR YOU! and A BOY FREE TOMORROW!

I rolled my eyes

"I found that in Annabeth's backpack," Grover said.

We stared at him.

"I don't understand," Percy said.

"What?" I asked in disbelief.

"Well, it seems to me . . ." Grover said, "maybe Annabeth was thinking about joining."

I'd like to say I took the news well. Of course, I didn't.

Percy didn't either. He wanted to strangle the Hunters of Artemis one eternal maiden at a time. And I would've helped too. I just couldn't understand . . . why? The rest of the day I tried to keep busy with Percy, but we were worried sick about Annabeth. We went to javelin-throwing class, but the Ares camper in charge chewed Percy out after Percy got distracted and threw the javelin at the target before he got out of the way. Percy apologized for the hole in his pants, but he still sent him packing. Despite that, it was still hilarious, and I wish I got it on tape.

We visited the pegasus stables, but Silena Beauregard from the Aphrodite cabin was having an argument with one of the Hunters, and we decided we'd better not get involved. But he and I secretly betted on Silena.

After that, we sat in the empty chariot stands and sulked. Down at the archery fields, Chiron was conducting target practice.

Percy looked the other direction. At the top of Half-Blood Hill, Dionysus and Argus were feeding the baby dragon that guarded the Golden Fleece.

Then, suddenly, Percy ran to the Big House.

"Where are you going?" I asked, running to catch up to him.

"Come on!" was all he replied.

We got inside and took the stairs to the attic. I'd only done this once before, Percy too. But my experience with the Oracle wasn't anything like his. I knew he still had nightmares about it. Percy opened the trap door and we stepped into the attic.

The room was dark and dusty and cluttered with junk, just like I remembered. There were shields with monster bites out of them, and swords bent in the shapes of daemon heads, and a bunch of taxidermy, like a stuffed harpy and a bright orange python.

Over by the window, sitting on a three-legged stool, was the shriveled-up mummy of an old lady in a tie-dyed hippie dress. The Oracle.

We made ourselves walk toward her.

"Hi," Percy said. "Uh, what's up?"

I raised my eyebrow at him. He winced, probably because of how stupid that sounded. Not much could be "up" when you're dead and stuck in the attic. But I knew the spirit of the Oracle was in there somewhere. I could feel a cold presence in the room, like a coiled sleeping snake.

"I had a question," Percy said a little louder. "I need to know about Annabeth. How can we save her?"

No answer. The sun slanted through the dirty attic window, lighting the dust motes dancing in the air.

We waited longer.

Then Percy got angry. We were being stonewalled by a corpse.

"All right," he said. "Fine. We'll figure it out ourselves."

He turned and bumped into a big table full of souvenirs. It seemed more cluttered than the last time I was here. Heroes stored all kinds of stuff in the attic: quest trophies they no longer wanted to keep in their cabins, or stuff that held painful memories. I knew Luke had stored a dragon claw somewhere up here—the one that scarred his face. There was a broken sword hilt labeled: This broke and Leroy got killed. 1999.

Then we noticed a pink silk scarf with a label attached to it. Percy picked up the tag and tried to read it.

SCARF OF THE GODDESS APHRODITE

RECOVERED AT WATERLAND, DENVER, CO.,

BY ANNABETH CHASE, JASMINE SATURDAY, AND PERCY JACKSON

We stared at the scarf. We both had totally forgotten about it. Two years ago, Annabeth had ripped this scarf out of Percy's hands and said something like, Oh, no. No love magic for you!

I'd just assumed she'd thrown it away. It would have found its way back to Aphrodite somehow. And yet here it was. She'd kept it all this time? And why had she stashed it in the attic? I made eye contact with Percy and I could tell he was wondering the same thing.

He turned to the mummy. She hadn't moved, but the shadows across her face made it look like she was smiling gruesomely.

He dropped the scarf and tried to run toward the exit. I followed closely behind.

That night after dinner, we were seriously ready to beat the Hunters at capture the flag. It was going to be a small game, only thirteen Hunters, including Bianca di Angelo, and about the same number of campers.

Zoë Nightshade looked pretty upset. She kept glancing resentfully at Chiron, like she couldn't believe he was making her do this. The other Hunters didn't look too happy, either. Unlike last night, they weren't laughing or joking around. They just huddled together in the dining pavilion, whispering nervously to each other as they strapped on their armor. Some of them even looked like they'd been crying. I guess Zoë had told them about her nightmare.

On our team, we had Beckendorf and two other Hephaestus guys, a few from the Ares cabin (though it still seemed strange that Clarisse wasn't around), the Stoll brothers and Nico from Hermes cabin, and a few Aphrodite kids. It was weird that the Aphrodite cabin wanted to play. Usually they sat on the sidelines, chatted, and checked their reflections in the river and stuff, but when they heard we were fighting the Hunters, they were raring to go.

"I'll show them 'love is worthless,'" Silena Beauregard grumbled as she strapped on her armor. "I'll pulverize them!"

I laughed and helped her straighten her armor.

That left Thalia, Will, Percy, and me.

"I'll take the offense," Thalia volunteered. "You take defense."

"Oh." Percy hesitated. I had a feeling he had been about to say the exact same thing, only reversed. "Don't you think with your shield and all, you'd be better defense?"

Thalia already had Aegis on her arm, and even our own teammates were giving her a wide berth, trying not to cower before the bronze head of Medusa. I got it, but in this case, it was just a picture, people!

"Well, I was thinking it would make better offense," Thalia said. "Besides, you've had more practice at defense."

I wasn't sure if she was teasing him. He'd had some pretty bad experiences with defense on capture the flag. His first year, Annabeth had put him out as bait, and he'd almost been gored to death with spears and killed by a hellhound. Good job, Annabeth.

"Yeah, no problem," he lied.

"Cool," Thalia said.

I smiled at him with sympathy. I thought he would've been better at offense than defense too.

Thalia turned to help some of the Aphrodite kids, who were having trouble suiting up their armor without breaking their nails. Nico di Angelo ran up to Percy with a big grin on his face.

"Percy, this is awesome!" His blue-feathered bronze helmet was falling in his eyes, and his breastplate was about six sizes too big. I wondered if I had looked that ridiculous when I first played Capture the Flag. I probably did. And just like him, I was still adorable.

Nico lifted his sword with effort. Toothless helped by putting his nose under Nico's elbow. "Do we get to kill the other team?"

"Well . . . no," Percy replied.

"But the Hunters are immortal, right?"

"That's only if they don't fall in battle. Besides—"

"It would be awesome if we just, like, resurrected as soon as we were killed, so we could keep fighting, and—"

"Nico, this is serious. Real swords. These can hurt."

He stared at Percy, a little disappointed. I glared at Percy. I think he just realized that he'd just sounded like his mother. Not a good sign.

He patted Nico on the shoulder. "Hey, it's cool. Just follow the team. Stay out of Zoë's way. We'll have a blast."

"Sure we will," I said sarcastically.

Chiron's hoof thundered on the pavilion floor.

"Heroes!" he called. "You know the rules! The creek is the boundary line. Blue team—Camp Half-Blood—shall take the west woods. Hunters of Artemis—red team—shall take the east woods. I will serve as referee and battlefield medic. No intentional maiming, please! All magic items are allowed. To your positions!"

"Sweet," Nico whispered to Percy. "What kind of magic items? Do I get one?"

He was about to break it to him that he didn't, when Thalia said, "Blue team! Follow me!"

They cheered and followed. We had to run to catch up. Percy tripped over somebody's shield, so he didn't quite look much like a co-captain. More like an idiot. But a cute one!

We set our flag at the top of Zeus's Fist. It's this cluster of boulders in the middle of the west woods that, if you look at it just the right way, looks like a huge fist sticking out of the ground. If you look at it from any other side, it looks like a pile of enormous deer droppings, but Chiron wouldn't let us call the place the Poop Pile, especially after it had been named for Zeus, who we all know doesn't have much of a sense of humor.

Anyway, it was a good place to set the flag. The top boulder was twenty feet tall and really hard to climb, so the flag was clearly visible, like the rules said it had to be, and it didn't matter that the guards weren't allowed to stand within ten yards of it.

Toothless took to the skies to keep an eye on everyone as an immediate flight emergency as he usually does. Percy set Nico on guard duty with Will, Beckendorf and the Stoll brothers, figuring he'd be safely out of the way.

"We'll send out a decoy to the left," Thalia told the team. "Silena, you lead that."

"Got it!"

"Take Laurel and Jason. They're good runners. Make a wide arc around the Hunters, attract as many as you can. I'll take the main raiding party around to the right and catch them by surprise."

Everybody nodded. It sounded good, and Thalia said it with such confidence you couldn't help but believe it would work. Just like Annabeth . . .

Thalia looked at Percy. "Anything to add, Percy?"

"Um, yeah. Keep sharp on defense. We've got five guards, two scouts. That's not much for a big forest. I'll be roving. Yell if you need help."

"And don't leave your post!" Thalia said.

"Unless you see a golden opportunity," Percy added.

Thalia scowled. "Just don't leave your post."

"Right, unless—"

"Percy!" She touched his arm and shocked him. I mean, everybody can give static shocks in the winter, but when Thalia does, it hurts. I guess it's because her dad is the god of lightning. She's been known to fry off people's eyebrows.

I pushed her hand off of him.

"Sorry," Thalia said, though she didn't sound particularly sorry. "Now, is everybody clear?"

Everybody nodded. We broke into our smaller groups. The horn sounded, and the game began.

Silena's group disappeared into the woods on the left. Mine and Thalia's group gave it a few seconds, then darted off toward the right.

We were good at first. Silena's group led away most of the Hunters, but we still caught some others attention. After a few minutes, we reached their base, with a couple Hunters on our tail. But what we found instead was Bianca sprawling in the snow, yelling for help, and their flag missing.

About ten yards away, towards the boundary line, we caught a figure running with the Hunters flag in his hands.

ZIP! A silver cord raced across his ankles and fastened to the tree next to him. A trip wire, fired from a bow! Before he could even think about stopping, he went down hard, sprawling in the snow.

"Percy!" Thalia yelled. "What are you doing?"

Before we reached him, an arrow exploded at our feet and a cloud of yellow smoke billowed around our team. The smell was horrid—the horrible smell of sulfur. We started coughing and gagging.

"No fair!" Thalia gasped. "Fart arrows are unsportsmanlike!"

Toothless flew down and fanned the smell away from us with his wings.

Percy got up and started running again. Only a few more yards to the creek and we had the game. More arrows whizzed past his ears. A Hunter came out of nowhere and slashed at him with her knife, but he parried and kept running.

I heard yelling from our side of the creek. Will, Beckendorf, and Nico were running toward Percy. I thought they were coming to welcome Percy back, but then I saw they were chasing someone—Zoë, racing toward him like a cheetah, dodging campers with no trouble. And she had our flag in her hand.

"No!" Percy yelled and poured on the speed.

He was two feet from the water when Zoë bolted across to her own side, slamming into Percy for good measure. The Hunters cheered as both sides converged on the creek. Chiron appeared out of the woods, looking grim. He had the Stoll brothers on his back, and it looked as if both of them had taken some nasty whacks to the head. Connor Stoll had two arrows sticking out of his helmet like antennae.

"The Hunters win!" Chiron announced without pleasure. Then he muttered. "For the fifty-sixth time in a row."

"Perseus Jackson!" Thalia yelled, storming toward him. She was so mad that blue sparks flickered on her armor. Everybody cringed and backed up because of Aegis. But Percy managed not to cower.

"What in the name of the gods were you THINKING?" she bellowed.

He balled his fists. "I got the flag, Thalia!" He shook it in her face. "I saw a chance and I took it!"

"I WAS AT THEIR BASE!" Thalia yelled. "But the flag was gone. If you hadn't butted in, we would've won."

"Oh, please, Thalia," I argued. "He was a hell of a lot closer than we were."

"You had too many on you!" Percy agreed.

"Oh, so it's my fault?" Thalia asked.

"I didn't say that."

"Argh!" Thalia pushed him, and a shock went through his body that blew him backward ten feet into the water. Some of the campers gasped. A couple of the Hunters stifled laughs.

"Percy!" I called.

"Sorry!" Thalia said, turning pale. "I didn't mean to—"

A wave erupted from the creek, blasting Thalia in the face and dousing her from head to toe.

Percy stood up. "Yeah," he growled. "I didn't mean to, either."

Thalia was breathing heavily.

"Enough!" Chiron ordered.

But Thalia held out her spear. "You want some, Seaweed Brain?"

That seemed to make him angrier. "Bring it on, Pinecone Face!"

"Uh-oh," I muttered.

Percy raised Riptide, but before he could even defend himself, Thalia yelled, and a blast of lightning came down from the sky, hit her spear like a lightning rod, and slammed into his chest.

He sat down hard. His clothes were burning.

"Thalia!" Chiron said. "That is enough!"

Percy got to his feet and willed the entire creek to rise. It swirled up, hundreds of gallons of water in a massive icy funnel cloud.

"Percy!" Chiron pleaded.

I stood between them and activated my powers, a hand extended towards both of them. I was not going to have them continue this.

Just as Percy was about to hurl it at Thalia and get me soaked in the process, he suddenly stopped and looked off toward the woods, losing his anger and concentration all at once. The water splashed back into the creekbed. Thalia and I were so surprised we turned to see what he was looking at.

Someone . . . something was approaching. It was shrouded in a murky green mist, but as it got closer, the campers and Hunters gasped.

"This is impossible," Chiron said. I'd never heard him sound so nervous. "It . . . she has never left the attic. Never."

And yet, the withered mummy that held the Oracle shuffled forward until she stood in the center of the group. Mist curled around our feet, turning the snow a sickly shade of green.

None of us dared move. Then her voice hissed inside my head. Apparently, everyone could hear it, because several clutched their hands over the ears, like Annabeth would do when she had a vision.

I am the spirit of Delphi, the voice said. Speaker of the prophecies of Phobos Apollo, slayer of the mighty Python.

The Oracle regarded Percy with its cold, dead eyes. Then she turned unmistakably toward Zoë. Approach, Seeker, and ask.

Zoë swallowed. "What must I do to help my goddess?"

The Oracle's mouth opened, and green mist poured out. I saw the vague image of a mountain, and a girl standing at the barren peak. It was Artemis, but she was wrapped in chains, fettered to the rocks. She was kneeling, her hands raised as if to fend off an attacker, and it looked like she was in pain. The Oracle spoke:

Five shall go west to the goddess in chains,

One shall be lost in the land without rain,

The bane of Olympus shows the trail,

Campers and Hunters combined prevail,

The Titan's curse must one withstand,

And one shall perish by a parent's hand.

Then, as we were watching, the mist swirled and retreated like a giant green serpent into the mummy's mouth. The Oracle sat down on a rock and became as still as she'd been in the attic, as if she might sit by this creek for a hundred years.

Sorry about the long updates. Life has been quite a bitch lately. But I've done some changes that, more or less, should open some extra time, every once in a while. But I can't promise a regular time, obviously. I just finished writing a chapter I've been working on for too long.

Please review, and please check out my Discord server! at discord . gg / bMFV9g6 (no spaces). Make sure you let me know who you are!