§Jason§

We ran down the hallways, half-panting, deciding where we should search for Lord Malum. After about half an hour of no success, we sat down in the hallway, dejected.

"What do we do now?" asked Percy, kicking a marble column a little too hardly with his sneaker, then yowling in and hopping in circles on one foot. I bit my tongue to keep from laughing. Just then, we heard a scream. I couldn't recognize it, but Harry jumped up, drawing his wand. "Ginny!" he cried, blood draining out from his face, leaving it pale as one of a lemur. Before we could stop him, he raced down the hall. We exchanged worried glances, then hurried after him. Her screaming stopped just as abruptly as it started. We stopped, puzzled. Then, another scream filled the air. This one I knew. Percy and I yelled at the same time.

"Annabeth!"

§Harry§

Leaving Percy and Jason behind, I charged towards Ginny's voice. Uncontrollably I imagined various scenarios: her being ambushed by some of Lord Malum's followers, attacked by monsters, breaking her neck. I heard her shriek again and I pumped my arms harder, increasing my speed. Another girl's scream alternated with hers- Annabeth? The two voices grew louder as I neared the end of a hallway, and I stopped, actually skidding a bit on the marble floor from my sprint. Almost inaudible from the screams I heard heavy breathing, and Percy and Jason joined me in front of the group of doors we faced.

"Where's Annabeth?" said Percy anxiously.

"Here," yelled Jason, who had been frantically listening at the thick wooden doors. He tested the handle as we crowded around him to find it unlocked. We stormed into the room as one. It was considerably drab other than a wall of bookshelves, a simple candelabra lit on the ceiling, and a tall wardrobe, but the girls were nowhere to be seen. I had started to become suspicious when the door swung shut behind Jason and a click resonated through the room. Something had locked us in. I turned to the others.

"Jason, save me." another voice said from behind the bureau. Jason looked confused.

"Piper? But you're at Camp Half….." he gasped as the shadows shifted. The wardrobe toppled over, revealing not Ginny, Annabeth, or the Piper girl but two monsters. They had gray, saggy skin, and in instead of two eyes, only one glared at us from the middle of their faces.

"Harry! I'm over here!" mimicked the smaller of the two in a perfect imitation of Ginny.

Percy gulped. "Cyclopes!"

The bigger, hairier one smirked. "Ah, Percy Jackson-" his voice changed to that of Annabeth- "we have awaited your arrival."

"Where's Ginny?" I demanded, not taking my eyes off the creatures.

"Cyclopes… can impersonate any sound," responded Jason from my right. He still seemed somewhat dazed.

"And you fell for it!" the smaller one beamed like a child at his birthday party. "And now we get to kill!"

Percy took out his magic pen. "Don't be so sure," he grunted, uncapping it dramatically. Nothing seemed to happen, but I felt a change- like the air around the pen had shifted. The monsters must have seen something, though, because they took the smallest step back when they glanced at it. But then they chuckled in a gruff voice and charged towards us.

§Ron§

One thing I learned in the past five minutes: getting to know Annabeth didn't make her any less annoying or bossy.

"I think I know where we have to go. I am going to be so ebullient and overwrought when we find him." Jeez. Half the time, I didn't even know what she was saying. We came to a circular room and Annabeth walked even faster towards the other end, muttering to herself about inversion and convection. I considered telling her to shut up, but then all of my thoughts were lost. Annabeth stopped so abruptly, I ran into her. She let out a small noise, and I saw our obstacle. What looked like millions of spiders, assorted sizes, swarmed at the door on the far side. I grabbed her hand and headed back the direction we had come from, but quickly stopped. I stared. Where the door had been was quickly being melded over by what seemed like threads of the same stone the walls surrounding it were made of. We were trapped. I turned back from the door, and shuddered in unison with Annabeth. I glanced sideways at her.

"You're scared of spiders too?" I asked.

She nodded. "I was hoping you wouldn't be."

"We're doomed."

Annabeth shook her head. "Let me handle this, okay? I know what I'm doing." I shrugged and took a step away from the advancing spiders. Annabeth reached for her belt and grabbed something I couldn't really make out. With a battle cry she struck it on one of the bigger spiders in the front. The spider dispersed into a pile of dust. "I knew they were monsters," muttered Annabeth proudly. "But then what is their-" her musing was cut off as she shrieked. The dust that had been sitting on the ground a moment before was rapidly whirling around Annabeth. It settled all over her body and I watched, transfixed, as it sunk into her skin and her clothes. She fell to the floor, writhing.

"Annabeth!" I ran to her and tried to pull her away from the army of spiders. I felt her tense, and she jumped up.

"They must be cursed to attack their killer. What are we going to do?" she moaned.

I thought for a moment. We couldn't kill the spiders, and both of us were deathly afraid of them. Afraid. I had a sudden flashback to a dimly lit staffroom, a disembodied, bloody hand shifting into a gigantic spider as soon as I stood in front of it. The only way to overcome a fear was to laugh at it. And I knew what we had to do.

"Annabeth, I know what to do." She gaped at me, and we both retreated back a meter from the spiders before I continued. "Maybe we're not supposed to defeat the spiders by killing them. Maybe we're not supposed to defeat them at all."

"But-" Annabeth interrupted. She bit her tongue. "Okay, so what do you say we do?"

"I think these spiders have only appeared for us because we are afraid of spiders. If we were afraid of heights, though, this room would have turned into the roof of a high building." I paused to see whether Annabeth followed. She looked doubtful, but I could tell that she understood. "We need to face our fear, which doesn't mean getting rid of it." I needed to prove my point. I took a step towards the spiders. With shaking hands, I bent down and picked up a tiny one, then walked back to Annabeth. We watched as it explored my palm for a few seconds, then turned into dust. I froze, bracing myself for whatever torture Annabeth had experienced, but it didn't come. I turned my palm and the dust spilled onto the floor.

"Do you understand what we have to do?" I asked gently. Annabeth nodded nervously, and together we walked straight into the blanket of spiders.