[A/N: Just to show you all I'm still alive :).]

Chapter 3

We Play Tag with Scorpions

The next morning there was a lot of excitement at breakfast.

Apparently around three in the morning an Aethiopian drakon had been spotted at the borders of camp. I was so exhausted I slept right through the noise. The magical boundaries had kept the monster out, but it prowled the hills, looking for weak spots in our defenses, and it didn't seem anxious to go away until Lee Fletcher from Apollo's cabin led a couple of his siblings in pursuit. After a few dozen arrows ledged in the chinks of the drakon's armor, it got the message and withdrew.

"It's still out there," Lee warned us during announcements. "Twenty arrows in its hide, and we just made it mad. The thing was thirty feet long and bright green. Its eyes—" He shuddered.

"You did well, Lee." Chiron patted him on the shoulder. "Everyone stay alert, but stay calm. This has happened before."

"Aye," Quintus said from the head table. "And it will happen again. More and more frequently."

The campers murmured among themselves.

Everyone knew the rumors: Luke and his army of monsters were planning an invasion of the camp. Most of us expected it to happen this summer, but no one knew how or when. It didn't help that our attendance was down. We only had about eighty campers. Three years ago, when I'd started, there had been more than a hundred. Some had died. Some had joined Luke. Some had just disappeared.

"This is a good reason for new war games," Quintus continued, a glint in his eyes. "We'll see how you all do with that tonight."

"Yes…" Chiron said. "Well, enough announcements. Let us bless this meal and eat." He raised his goblet. "To the gods!"

We all raised our glasses and repeated the blessing.

Tyson and I took our plates to the bronze brazier and scraped a portion of our food into the flames. I hoped the gods liked raisin toast and Froot Loops.

"Poseidon," I said. Then I whispered, "Help me with Nico, and Luke, and Gretel's problem…"

There was so much to worry about I could've stood there all morning, but I headed back to my table.

Once everyone was eating, Chiron and Gretel came over to visit. Gretel's cheeks were stained with chlorophyll. She slid her plate onto the table and slumped next to me.

Tyson shifted uncomfortably. "I will go...um...polish my fish ponies."

He lumbered off, leaving his breakfast half eaten.

Chiron tried for a smile. He probably wanted to look reassuring, but in centaur form he towered over me, casting a shadow across the table. "Well, Perci, how did you sleep?"

"Uh, fine." I wondered why he asked that. Was it possible he knew something about the weird Iris-message I'd gotten?

"I brought Gretel over," Chiron said, "because I thought you two might want to, ah, discuss matters. Now if you'll excuse me, I have some Iris-messages to send. I'll see you later in the day." He have Gretel a meaningful look, then trotted out of the pavilion.

"What's he talking about?" I asked Gretel.

Gretel chewed her eggs. I could tell she was distracted, because the leaves on her arms were turning brown, falling off, and regrowing again. "He wants you to convince me," she mumbled.

Somebody else slid next to me on the bench: Anthony.

"I'll tell you what it's about," he said. "The Labyrinth."

It was hard to concentrate on what he was saying, because everybody in the dining pavilion was stealing glances at us and whispering. And Anthony was right next to me. I mean right next to me.

"You're not supposed to be here," I said.

"We need to talk," he insisted.

"But the rules…"

He knew as well as I did that campers weren't allowed to switch tables. Satyrs and nymphs were different. They weren't really demigods. But the half-bloods had to sit with their cabins. I wasn't even sure what the punishment was for switching tables. I'd never seen it happen. If Mr. D had been here, he probably would've strangled Anthony with magical grapevines or something, but Mr. D wasn't here. Chiron had already left the pavilion. Quintus looked over and raised an eyebrow, but he didn't say anything.

"Look," Anthony said, "Gretel is in trouble. There's only one way we can figure to help her. It's the Labyrinth. That's what Clarisse and I have been investigating."

I shifted my weight, trying to think clearly. "You mean the maze where they kept the Minotaur, back in the old days?"

"Exactly," Anthony said.

"So...it's not under the king's palace in Crete anymore," I guessed. "The Labyrinth is under some building in America."

See? It only took me a few years to figure things out. I knew that important places moved around with Western Civilization, like Mount Olympus being over the Empire State Building, and the Underworld entrance being in Los Angeles. I was feeling pretty proud of myself.

Anthony rolled his eyes. "Under a building? Please, Perci. The Labyrinth is huge. It wouldn't fit under a single city, much less a single building."

I thought about my dream of Nico at the River Styx. "So...is the Labyrinth part of the Underworld?"

"No," Anthony frowned. "Well, there may be passages from the Labyrinth down into the Underworld. I'm not sure. But the Underworld is way, way down. The Labyrinth is right under the surface of the mortal world, kind of like a second skin. It's been growing for thousands of years, lacing its way under Western cities, connecting everything together underground. You can get anywhere through the Labyrinth."

"If you don't get lost," Gretel muttered. "And die a horrible death."

"Gretel, there has to be a way," Anthony said. I got the feeling they'd had this conversation before. "Clarisse lived."

"Barely!" Gretel said. "And the other guy—"

"He was driven insane. He didn't die."

"Oh, joy. That makes me feel so much better."

"Whoa," I said. "Back up. What's this about Clarisse and a crazy guy?"

Anthony glanced over toward the Ares table. Clarisse was watching us like she knew what we were talking about, but then she fixed her eyes on her breakfast plate.

"Last year," Anthony said, lowering his voice, "Clarisse went on a mission for Chiron."

"I remember," I said. "It was secret."

Anthony nodded. Despite how serious he was acting, I was happy that he wasn't looking lost anymore. And I, for one, am glad that I was no longer mad at him. And I kind of liked the fact that he'd broken the rules to come sit next to me.

"It was secret," Anthony agreed, "because she found Chris Rodriguez."

"The guy from the Hermes cabin?" I remembered him from two years ago. We'd eavesdropped on Chris Rodriguez aboard Luke's ship, the Princess Andromeda. Chris was one of the half-bloods who'd abandoned camp and joined the Titan army.

"Yeah," Anthony said. "Last summer he just appeared in Phoenix, Arizona, near Clarisse's mom's house."

"What do you mean he just appeared?"

"He was wandering around the desert, in a hundred and twenty degrees, in full Greek armor, babbling about string."

"String," I said.

"He'd been driven completely insane. Clarisse brought him back to her mom's house so the mortals wouldn't institutionalize him. She tried to nurse him back to health. Chiron came out and interviewed him, but it wasn't much good. The only thing they got out of him: Luke's men have been exploring the Labyrinth."

I shivered, though I wasn't sure exactly why. Poor Chris...he hadn't been that bad a guy. What could've driven him mad? I looked at Gretel, who was wiping her green-stained eyes.

"Okay, why were they exploring the Labyrinth?" I asked.

"We weren't sure," Anthony said. "That's why Clarisse went on a scouting expedition. Chiron kept things hushed up because he didn't want anyone panicking. He got me involved because...well, the Labyrinth was always been one of my favorite subjects. The architecture involved—" His expression turned a little dreamy. "The builder, Daedalus, was a genius. But the point is, the Labyrinth has entrances everywhere. If Luke could figure out how to navigate it, he could move his army around with incredible speed."

"Except it's a maze, right?"

"Full of horrible death traps," Gretel agreed. "Dead ends. Illusions. Psychotic nature-killing monsters."

"But not if you had Ariadne's string," Anthony said. "In the old days, Ariadne's string guided Theseus out of the maze. It was a navigation instrument of some kind, invented by Daedalus. And Chris Rodriguez was mumbling about string."

"So Luke is trying to find Ariadne's string," I said. "Why? What's he planning?"

Anthony shook his head. "I don't know. I thought maybe he wanted to invade camp through the maze, but that doesn't make any sense. The closest entrances Clarisse found were in Manhattan, which wouldn't help Luke get past our borders. Clarisse explored a little way into the tunnels, but...it was very dangerous. She had some close calls. I researched everything I could find about Daedalus. I'm afraid it didn't help much. I don't understand exactly what Luke's planning, but I do know this: the Labyrinth might be the key to Gretel's problem."

I blinked. "You think Pan is underground?"

"It would explain why he's been impossible to find."

Gretel shuddered. "Nymphs and satyrs hate going underground. No searcher would ever try going in that place. No flowers. No sunshine. No coffee shops!"

"But," Anthony said, "the Labyrinth can lead you almost anywhere. It reads your thoughts. It was designed to fool you, to trick you and kill you; but if you can make the Labyrinth work for you—"

"It could lead you to the wild god," I said.

"I can't do it," Gretel hugged her stomach. "Just thinking about it makes me want to throw up my own stomach."

"Gretel, it may be your last chance," Anthony said. "The council is serious. One week or you'll be harvesting gardens!"

Over at the head table, Quintus cleared his throat. I got the feeling he didn't want to made a scene, but Anthony was really pushing it, sitting at my table so long.

"We'll talk later." Anthony squeezed my arm a little too hard. "Convince her, will you?"

He returned to the Athena table, ignoring all the people who were staring at him.

Gretel buried her head in her hands. "I can't do it, Perci. My searcher's license. Pan. I'm going to lose it all. I'll have to start a puppet theater."

"Don't say that! We'll figure something out."

She looked at me chlorophyll-eyed. "Perci, you're my best friend. You've seen me underground. In that Cyclops's cave. Do you really think I could…"

Her voice faltered. I remembered the Sea of Monsters, when she'd been stuck in a Cyclops's cave. She'd never liked underground places to begin with, but now Gretel really hated them. Cyclopes gave her the creeps, too. Even Tyson...Gretel tried to hide it, but Gretel and I could sort of read each other's emotions because if this empathy link Gretel had made between us. I knew how she felt. Gretel was terrified of the big guy.

"I have to go," Gretel said miserably. "Hammy's waiting for me. It's a good thing he finds cowards attractive."

After she was gone, I looked over at Quintus. He nodded gravely, like we were sharing some dark secret. Then we went back to cutting his sausage with a dagger.

In the afternoon, I went down to the pegasus stables to visit my friend Twilight.

Hey, Perci! She capered around in her stall, her black wings buffeting the air. You bring me some sugar cubes?

"You know those aren't good for you, Twilight."

Yeah, so you brought me some, huh?

I smiled and fed her a handful. Twilight and I went back a long way. I sort of helped rescue her from Luke's demon cruise ship a few years ago, and ever since, she insisted on repaying my with favors.

So we got any quests coming up? Twilight asked. I'm ready to fly!

I patted her nose. "Not sure, Twi. Everybody keeps talking about underground mazes."

Twilight whinnied nervously. Nuh-uh. Not for this horse! You ain't gonna be crazy enough to go in no maze, Perci. Are ya? You'll end up in the glue factory!

"You may be right, Twilight. We'll see."

Twilight crunched down her sugar cubes. She shook her mane like she was having a sugar seizure. Whoa! Good stuff! Well, Perci, you come to your senses and want to fly somewhere, just give a whistle. Me and my buddies, we'll stampede anybody for ya!

I told her I'd keep it in mind. Then a group of younger campers came into the stables to start their riding lessons, and I decided it was time to leave. I had a bad feeling I wasn't going to see Twilight for a long time.

That night after dinner, Quintus had us suit up in combat armor like we were getting ready for capture the flag, but the mood among the campers was a lot more serious. Sometimes during the day the crates in the arena had disappeared, and I had a feeling whatever was in them had been emptied into the woods.

"Right," Quintus said, standing on the head dining table. "Gather 'round."

He was dressed in black leather and bronze. In the torchlight, his gray hair made him look like a ghost. Mrs. O'Leary bounded happily around him, foraging for dinner scraps.

"You will be in teams of two," Quintus announced. When everybody started talking and trying to grab their friends, he yelled: "Which have already been chosen!"

"AWWWWW!" everybody complained.

"Your goal is simple: collect the gold laurels without dying. The wreath is wrapped in a silk package, tied to the back of one of the monsters. There are six monsters. Each has a silk package. Only one holds the laurels. You must find the wreath before the other teams. And, of course...you will have to slay the monster to get it, and stay alive."

The crowd started murmuring excitedly. The task sounded pretty straightforward. Hey, we'd all slain monsters before. That's what we trained for.

"I will now announce your partners," Quintus said. "There will be no trading. No switching. No complaining."

"Aroooof!" Mrs. O'Leary buried her face in a plate of pizza.

Quintus produced a big scroll and started reading off names. Beckendorf would be with Silena Beauregard, which Beckendorf looked pretty happy about. The Stoll brothers, Travis and Connor, would be together. No surprise. They did everything together. Clarisse was with Lee Fletcher from the Apollo cabin—melee and ranged combat combined, they would be a tough combo to beat. Quintus kept rattling off the names until he said, "Perci Jackson with Anthony Chase."

"Nice," I said.

"Your armor is crooked," was his only comment, and he redid my straps for me.

"Gretel Underwood," Quintus said, "with Tyson."

Gretel just about jumped out of her soil. "What? B-but—"

"No, no," Tyson whimpered. "Must be a mistake. Tree girl—"

"No complaining!" Quintus ordered. "Get with your partner. You have two minutes to prepare!"

Tyson and Gretel both looked at me pleadingly. I tried to give them an encouraging nod, and gestured that they should move together. Tyson sneezed. Gretel started chewing nervously on her gold-and-green vine whip.

"They'll be fine," Anthony told me. "Come on. Let's worry about how we're going to stay alive."

It was still light when we got into the woods, but the shadows from the trees made it feel like midnight. It was cold, too, even in summer. Anthony and I found tracks almost immediately—scuttling marks made by something with a lot of legs. We began to follow the trail.

We jumped a creek and heard some twigs snapping nearby. We crouched behind a boulder, but it was only the Stoll brothers tripping through the woods and cursing. Their dad was the god of thieves, but they were about as stealthy as water buffalos.

Once the Stoll brothers had passed, we forged deeper into the west woods where the monsters were wilder. We were standing on a ledge overlooking a marshy lond when Anthony tensed. "This is where we stopped looking."

It took me a second to realize what he meant. Last winter, when we'd been searching for Nico di Angelo, this is where we'd given up hope of finding him. Gretel, Anthony, and I had stood on this rock, and I'd convinced them not to tell Chiron the truth: that Nico was a son of Hades. At the time it seemed the right thing to do. I wanted to protect his identity. I wanted to be the one to find him and make things right for what had happened to his sister. Now, six months later, I hadn't even come close to finding him. It left a bitter taste in my mouth.

"I saw him last night," I said.

Anthony knit his eyebrows. "What do you mean?"

I told him about the Iris-message. When I was done, he stared into the shadows of the woods. "He's summoning the dead? That's not good."

"The ghost was giving him bad advice," I said. "Telling him to take revenge."

"Yeah...spirits are never good advisers. They've got their own agendas. Old grudges. And they resent the living."

"He's going to come after me," I said. "The spirit mentioned a maze."

He nodded. "That settles it. We have to figure out the Labyrinth."

"Maybe," I said uncomfortably. "But who sent the Iris-message? If Nico didn't know I was there—"

A branch snapped in the woods. Dry leaves rustled. Something large was moving in the trees, just beyond the ridge.

"That's not the Stoll brothers," Anthony whispered.

Together we drew our swords.

We got to Zeus's Fist, a huge pile of boulders in the middle of the west woods. It was a natural landmark where campers often rendezvoused on hunting expeditions, but now there was nobody around.

"Over there," Anthony whispered.

"No, wait," I said. "Behind us."

It was weird. Scuttling noises seemed to be coming from several directions. We were circling the boulders, our swords drawn, when someone right behind us said, "Hi."

We whirled around, and the satyr Hamilton yelped.

"Put those down!" he protested. "Satyrs don't like sharp blades, okay?"

"Hamilton," Anthony exhaled. "What are you doing here?"

"My buddies call me Ham. This is where Gretel lives."

I lowered my sword. "In the boulders?"

He pointed toward the edge of the clearing. "Near the juniper tree. Duh. That was her aunt's old tree, that died out when she was killed by a gorgon."

It made sense, and I felt kind of stupid. I'd been hanging around dryads for years, but I never really talked to them much, besides Gretel. She lived in a tree where her Aunt Juniper lived, probably as a memory as far as I could guess. I knew dryads couldn't go very far from their tree, which was their source of life. Gretel, however, was the only exception from every dryad I'd met. She was trained in a satyr's woodland magic, so obviously she could go across the country without her tree with her nature magic protecting her life force, as long as her tree was still standing.

"Are you guys busy?" Ham asked.

"Well," I said, "we're in the middle of this game against a bunch of monsters and we're trying not to die."

"We're not busy," Anthony said. "What's wrong, Ham?"

Ham sniffled. He chewed on a piece of celery. "It's Gretel. She seems so distraught. All year she's been out looking for Pan. And every time she comes back, it's worse. Her tree keeps losing its leaves, like she's abandoning her woodland magic."

"What?" I asked. "How could she abandon her magic?"

"You've known her longer than anyone, Perci. The Council of Cloven Elders were reluctant to actually teach a wood nymph the ways of the satyr. They finally gave her the chance when her aunt persuaded them. But after that meeting, she's beginning to feel like all of those years of training in satyr's magic was a waste of time."

Anthony made a look of understanding. He looked at me. "He's right." He said gravely. "If Gretel's grows more depressed, she'll grow weaker and weaker until she's nothing but a simple dryad again...and she won't be able to go on any more quests again."

I was completely stunned. I had absolutely no idea how serious Gretel's problem was. "But that's totally unfair!" I protested.

"There's no question about that, Perci. The Elders can't rid of her magic by force, but she can by her own will. And to be honest, they're probably doing this on a strict basis for Gretel. They hate it when a nature spirit outsmarts a goat."

Anthony turned back to Ham. "Ham," he said, "Gretel is just stressed out about her searcher's license."

"She can't go underground!" he protested. "You can't let her."

Anthony looked uncomfortable. "It might be the only way to help her; if we just knew where to start."

"Ah." Ham wiped the tears off his eyes. "About that…"

Another rustle in the woods, and Ham yelled, "Hide!"

Before I could ask why, he trotted into the woods in a hurry.

Anthony and I turned. Coming out of the woods was a glistening amber insect, ten feet long, with jagged pincers, an armored tail, and a stinger as long as my sword. A scorpion. Tied to its back was a red silk package.

"One of us gets behind it," Anthony said, as the thing clattered toward us. "Cuts off its tail while the other distracts it in front."

"I'll take point," I said. "You've got the invisibility hat."

He nodded. We'd fought together so many times we knew each other's moves. We could do this, easy. But it all went wrong when the other two scorpions appeared from the woods.

"Three?" Anthony said. "That's not possible! The whole woods, and half the monsters come at us?"

I swallowed. One, we could take. Two, with a little luck. Three? Doubtful.

The scorpions scurried toward us, whipping their barbed tails like they'd come here just to kill us. Anthony and I put our backs against the nearest boulder.

"Climb?" I said.

"No time," he said.

He was right. The scorpions were already surrounding us. They were so close I could see their hideous mouths foaming, anticipating a nice juicy meal of demigods.

"Look out!" Anthony parried away a stinger with the flat of his blade. I stabbed with Riptide, but the scorpion backed out of range. We clambered sideways along the boulders, but the scorpions followed us. I slashed at another one, but going on the offensive was too dangerous. If I went for the body, the tail stabbed downward. If I went for the tail, the thing's pincers came from either side and tried to grab me. All we could do was defend, and we wouldn't be able to keep that up for very long.

I took another step sideways, and suddenly there was nothing behind me. It was a crack between two of the largest boulders, something I'd probably passed by a million times, but…

"In here," I said.

Anthony sliced at a scorpion then looked at me like I was crazy. "In there? It's too narrow."

"I'll cover you. Go!"

He ducked behind me and started squeezing between the two boulders. Then he yelped and grabbed my armor straps, and suddenly I was tumbling into a pit that hadn't been there a moment before. I could see the scorpions above us, the purple evening sky and the trees, and then the hole shut like the lens of a camera, and we were in complete darkness.

Our breathing echoed against stone. It was wet and cold. I was sitting on a bumpy floor that seemed to be made of bricks.

I lifted Riptide. The faint glow of the blade was just enough to illuminate Anthony's frightened face and the mossy stone walls on either side of us.

"Wh-where are we?" Anthony said.

"Safe from scorpions, anyway." I tried to sound calm, but I was freaking out. The crack between the boulders couldn't have led into a cave. I would've known if there was a cave here; I was sure of it. It was like the ground had opened up and swallowed us. All I could think of was the fissure in the dining pavilion, where those skeletons had been consumed last winter. I wondered if the same thing had happened to us.

I lifted my sword again for light.

"It's a long room," I muttered.

Anthony gripped my arm. "It's not a room. It's a corridor."

He was right. The darkness felt...emptier in front of us. There was a warm breeze, like in subway tunnels, only it felt older, more dangerous somehow.

I started forward, but Anthony stopped me. "Don't take another step," he warned. "We need to find the exit."

He sounded really scared now.

"It's okay," I promised. "It's right—"

I looked up and realized I couldn't see where we'd fallen in. The ceiling was solid stone. The corridor seemed to stretch endlessly in both directions.

Anthony's hand slipped into mine. Under different circumstances I would've been embarrassed, but here in the dark I was glad to know where he was. It was about the only thing I was sure of.

"Two steps back," he advised.

We stepped backward together like we were in a minefield.

"Okay," he said. "Help me examine the walls."

"What for?"

"The mark of Daedalus," he said, as if that was supposed to make sense.

"Uh, okay. What kind of—"

"Got it!" he said with relief. He set his hand on the wall and pressed against a tiny fissure, which began to glow blue. A Greek symbol appeared: ∆, the Ancient Greek Delta.

The roof slid open and we saw night sky, stars blazing. It was a lot darker than it should've been. Metal ladder rungs appeared in the side of the wall, leading up, and I could hear people yelling our names.

"Perci! Anthony!" Tyson's voice bellowed the loudest, but others were calling out too.

I looked nervously at Anthony. Then we began to climb.

We made our way around the rocks the rocks and ran into Clarisse and a bunch of other campers carrying torches.

"Where have you two been?" Clarisse demanded. "We've been looking forever."

"But we were only gone a few minutes," I said.

Chiron trotted up, followed by Tyson and Gretel.

"Perci!" Tyson said. "You are okay?"

"We're fine," I said. "We fell in a hole."

The others looked at me skeptically, then at Anthony.

"Honest!" I said. "There were three scorpions after us, so we ran and hid in the rocks. But we were only gone a minute."

"You've been missing for almost an hour," Chiron said. "The game is over."

"Yeah," Gretel muttered. "We would've won, but a Cyclops sat on me."

"Was an accident!" Tyson protested, and then he sneezed.

Clarisse was wearing the gold laurels, but she didn't even brag about winning them, which wasn't like her. "A hole?" she asked suspiciously.

Anthony took a deep breath. He looked around at the other campers. "Chiron...maybe we should talk about this at the Big House."

Clarisse gasped. "You found it, didn't you?"

Anthony bit his lip. "I—Yeah. Yeah, we did."

A bunch of campers started asking questions, looking about as confused as I was, but Chiron raised his hand for silence. "Tonight is not the right time, and this is not the right place." He stared at the boulders as if he'd just noticed how dangerous they were. "All of you, back to your cabins. Get some sleep. A game well played, but curfew is past!"

There was a lot of mumbling and complaints, but the campers drifted off, talking among themselves and giving me suspicious looks.

"This explains a lot," Clarisse said. "It explains what Luke is after."

"Wait a second," I said. "What do you mean? What did we find?"

Anthony turned toward me, his eyes dark with worry. "An entrance to the Labyrinth. An invasion route straight into the heart of the camp."