Chapter Ten
Mia clutched onto my back as we flew through the sky. The fog was dense, with only the loud voices of Percy and his friends guiding us. When the fog clears, a huge, looming black fortress gleams in the distance. Mia shudders and observes, "This reminds me of those haunted mansions you see in the movies." I can't help but nod.
Down below, it seems as if Thalia had discovered her stalkers. Mia and I strained our necks to see Thalia, Percy, and his blonde friend Annabeth talking casually to a woman. The woman guides them inside, and we start to follow them. As we slink in the shadows, the woman shows the demigods the school dance. They thank her and stroll inside. Mia and I follow them stealthily.
The inside looks as medieval as the outside. In the dimly lit room, anyone could see that the walls were decorated with tapestries that depict imaginary feasts that kings have held and other whatnot. Realistic axes and other weapons are gleaming in the only few lights and an abundance of the protection are lodged in some animals' heads. Mia whimpered and whispered, "I hope those aren't real." I'm speechless.
Large group of girls and the occasional boy huddle in a large group. They seem to migrate from here to there, always surrounding a certain boy like bees around their beehive. The groups were extremely loud and would scamper away sniggering as the people they "attack" are sticky with kisses and look terribly ridonkulous with their new loose hair ribbons dangling down from their head. A majority of the boys in the room already looked like a Barbie makeover gone wrong.
I search the crowd for any signs of Thalia, but I stifle a scream when I see a hideous creature pace before her, Percy, and Annabeth. He has a lion body and scorpion tail that is dripping with dangerous looking spikes. The only human part of him, which is his face, looks odd with his two different eye colors. A manticore. Mia and I cautiously approach them while wary of the groups of girls.
"Hello. I have not seen you zree before. What brings you to zis school?" His words are drawled with thick French accent. We listen to their conversation closely and see a girl and a young boy doing the same. However, they do a much better job at covering up their eavesdropping. The girl was twirling the boy, who I assumed was her brother, and each time someone was facing the manticore, they would stare and listen intently.
I can immediately tell they were demigods by the way the manticore was looking hungrily at them. I tug Mia with me and we approach the two.
"A manticore," I say.
Even Mia looks confused. The boy looks at me, smiles, and digs around his pocket for something.
"Do you play Mythomagic?" he excitedly asks. He fingers through a number of cards he had fished out. "If so, I'm not sure picking the manticore to fight is a smart decision. You see, I have some really powerful ones, including Kronos (not to brag), who is like really strong and powerful and probably the best card. Now I also have Dionysus, but he's-" His sister silences him by shoving her hand against his mouth. The boy barely notices and keeps on ranting through muffled noises. "Dionushush, he's easili da weakes, don ever put HIM in a tournamen. Yool lose big time!" Mia giggles at his attempts to speak. I'm not amused.
"Listen. You two are special and I think that thing is trying to hurt you." I gesture to the manticore.
"Oh, him? That's our principal, Dr. Thorn. Whadiya mean, he's trying to hurt us?" the girl questions. Her brother has stopped talking and is inspecting the manticore, trying to see anything out of place.
"You mean, he's always part lion and scorpion?" I inquire.
The kids burst out laughing. After the boy pretends to wipe tears of laughter, he replies, "No, he's human. Strange, but human. Never would he be part animal. That would be cool, though."
It hit me. The Mist was probably hiding the manticore from broadcasting out his true powers. How the demigods couldn't see but I could was out of question.
"Okay… Anyways, your Dr. Thorn is actually a manticore and his kind try to hurt specific people like you two. Run with me and Mia while you can," I explain.
They look at each other and shrug. "We've traveled around and go to places. Why not go to a new one?" the girl says.
The boy nods and says, "Yeah, we'll come. I'm Nico di Angelo, by the way, and this is Bianca. She's my sister." We huddle against each other and walk out of the gym.
Suddenly, Mia screams. She turns around in a split second to show me the thorn lodged in her back. On my left, Nico yelps then he's on the ground. On top of him is Dr. Thorn, trying to tie Nico's failing arms. Bianca swears and tries to shove Dr. Thorn off her brother. He resists and grabs Bianca's collar so she faced him.
Mia has somehow taken out the thorn and throws her arms around Bianca to try to pull Bianca away. Mia screams for help but it comes out strangled and weak. I realize that I'm just standing in the chaos, and quickly try to help Nico, who's face was being squashed by Thorn's feet.
"Call… for… help…" Nico manages to cough out. Dr. Thorn swiftly clamps Nico's mouth, but Nico bravely chomps on it. Thorn draws it away on reflex, and Nico wriggles under the weight like a worm. I pull on his arm and get inspiration.
Before coming to Westover Hall, before being "reborn", before knowing anything about Percy Jackson and his world, I went to school. In kindergarten, we would garden with heavy shovels. I would swiftly jump on my shovelhead to push it down with my body's weight.
Thinking about that, I positioned my body so I was nearly horizontal. While keeping a firm grip on Nico, I swung my legs and stuck it to Dr. Thorn's body. I forced my weight onto my legs, slowly inching Dr. Thorn off of Nico. This had many beneficial results. I will get Dr. Thorn off Nico, hopefully break a few of his ribs, get a workout, and also know how to handle a shovel horizontally. While thinking about the positive outcomes, I didn't notice the rest of my friends get knocked out until Dr. Thorn punched me with his free hand.
Everything went black.