Things were much too weird for Octavian if he was being honest.

He kept glancing at Livia's bracelet as they trekked across the wasteland of an anthropomorphic body of the actual pits of hell. They were tracing the route of the Phlegethon as they approached the storm front of darkness. Every so often they stopped to drink firewater, which kept them alive, but none of them were happy about it.

He found comfort in the three around him, holding Jason's hand, and every so often he would glance over and smile. Percy would nudge his shoulders every now and then when he was walking on the side of him, and if they switch places during their walk, then Annabeth would give him a smile and squeeze his hand.

It felt... nice. A bit hopeful.

It reminded him of when Annia and Augustus were still alive, as they walked around New Roma, and the slightest bit of hope that settled in their bones that they may be able to live as long as their parents... as long as their grandparents... that the curse wouldn't... but Annia had died that year and Augustus died a year later... and Octavian was so alone.

The grief settled on his shoulders, and a part of him wanted to break.

He was alone.

The curse was gone, and he was alone.

If he managed to somehow survive hell, he'd be going back to a place with no mother, no father, no aunts or uncle, no grandparents, no cousins, and no sisters. Rosalyn hadn't even been a year old. Actius and Arcas will never be born. A weight settled on his chest. He was alone. Octavius Verus; a living legacy of a history long gone. He wanted to cry, but he couldn't afford to. Not at that moment.

He tensed; eyes flashing a sickly gold.

"Hit the ground," he yelled, yanking Jason to the ground with him. He heard Percy and Annabeth do the same as something flew over their heads. Each of them rolled across the ground, lifting their heads when they came to a stop. Above them looked like a hoard of giant mosquitoes, and Octavian did not have any raid.

Never mind. He didn't think raid would work against fire-breathing mosquitoes.

Octavian yelped as fire soared over his head. This shit was not fair.

"What are these things," Percy yelped as he dodged a wad of fire. The four of them had pulled out their weapons, but they were mainly useless against flying bugs that breathe fire.

"Pyrallis," Jason grunted, pulling Octavian into the air with him. They dodge a spray of fire, letting it fall onto one of the other monsters. "Heads up. OFF! doesn't work on them."

"How did you defeat it," Percy asked.

"We got it away from the fire," Octavian called out. "Kind of inconvenient for us to do that now."

"Percy," Annabeth called out in warning as she dived to the side. Octavian glanced at Livia's bracelet, tugging on the bow charm. A glistening imperial gold bow with images of various sea creatures carved into the mixture of metal and wood appeared in his hands. After what happened with the sword, he certainty believed that he was holding the power of all seven seas in his hands. He immediately began to shoot, aiming for the joints of the wings while Jason played keep away with them.

Then a shadow fell across them. A deep war cry bellowed from somewhere above, echoing across the plains of Tartarus, and a Titan dropped onto the battlefield.

Jason dropped them immediately beside Percy and Annabeth. Octavian had to be hallucinating. Maybe the fire water burned his brain cells. It just wasn't possible that a huge silvery figure could drop out of the sky and stomp the dragonflies flat, trampling them into a mound of monster dust.

But that's exactly what happened.

The Titan stood at about ten feet, with wild hair that he looked like those pictures of Einstein, and eyes so silver that Octavian knew that he could get at least three thousand dollars from just one pupil. His ripped-up blue janitor's uniform clung to him, showing off his rippling muscles that flexed every time he moved his massive push broom.

His name tag, incredibly, read BOB.

The four of them crouched together, hands clenching nervously around their weapons, but Bob and the push mop wasn't interested in them. He turned to the other insects, before pulling out a fly squatter of all things.

'SWAT!' The Titan grinned with delight and did a victory dance. 'Swat, swat, swat! Pyrigonos, swat!'

The four of them stared as he slammed the fly squatter onto the bugs and they slammed into the ground, breaking into dust. Over and over until only three were left and flying their little wings off to the blood-red clouds.

'H-how ...?' Annabeth stammered, shuffling backwards until she brought them all down to the ground in her shock.

'Percy called me!' the janitor said happily. 'Yes, he did.'

Annabeth crawled a little further away. 'Called you? He – wait. You're Bob? The Bob?'

'I am Bob, Percy's friend!' Bob declared, his eerie silver eyes crinkling with pleasure.

I want to go home, Octavian thought.

'Uh ... yeah,' Percy managed. 'Thanks for the help, Bob. It's really good to see you again.'

'Yes!' the janitor agreed. 'Bob. That's me. Bob, Bob, Bob.' He shuffled around, obviously pleased with his name. 'I am helping. I heard my name. Upstairs in Háidēs' palace, nobody calls for Bob unless there is a mess. Bob, sweep up these bones. Bob, mop up these tortured souls. Bob, a zombie exploded in the dining room.'

Annabeth gave Percy a puzzled look, but he had no explanation.

'Then I heard my friend call!' The Titan beamed. 'Percy said, Bob!'

He grabbed Percy's arm and hoisted him to his feet.

'That's awesome,' Percy said. 'Seriously. But how did you –'

'Oh, time to talk later.' Bob's expression turned serious. 'We must go before they find you. They are coming. Yes, indeed.'

'They?' Annabeth asked.

They all scanned the horizon. He saw no approaching monsters – nothing but the stark grey wasteland. He wasn't going to risk using his gift of sight again that was for sure.

'Yes,' Bob agreed. 'But Bob knows a way. Come on, friends! We will have fun!'

If the monsters didn't kill them on this stupid journey, neither would the poisonous atmosphere, nor the treacherous landscape with its pits, cliffs and jagged rocks. He was going to die from overstimulation of weird bullshit straight out of a Stephen King novel and a dungeon and dragons' game. They followed Bob through the wasteland, tracing the route of the Phlegethon as they approached the storm front of darkness. Every so often they stopped to drink firewater, which kept them alive, and he was getting really tired of it. He wasn't even sure if he had tonsils anymore.

The others had to be just as scared and miserable as he was, but they were still trying to make the most of it if the way that Percy kept giving them reassuring smiles was any indication.

'Bob knows what he's doing,' Percy promised.

'You have interesting friends,' Annabeth murmured.

'Bob is interesting!' The Titan turned and grinned. 'Yes, thank you!'

The big guy had good ears.

'So, Bob ...' Annabeth said, her voice scratchy yet friendly. 'How did you get to Tartarus?'

'I jumped,' he said, like it was obvious.

'You jumped into Tartara,' Octavian said slowly. Someone need better hobbies and new destinations for extreme parkour, 'because Percy said your name?'

'He needed me.' Those silver eyes gleamed in the darkness. 'It is okay. I was tired of sweeping the palace. Come along! We are almost at a rest stop.'

Octavian blinked.

A rest stop.

In Tartara.

Talk about things that he never thought he'd hear, but he guessed even monsters had to rest sometime.

They hobbled along, trying to ignore the rumble in their stomachs.

Octavian glanced at Jason as they followed Bob. The titan was leading them towards the wall of darkness, now only a few hundred yards away. His blue janitor's coveralls were ripped between the shoulder blades, as if someone had tried to stab him. Cleaning rags stuck out of his pocket. A squirt bottle swung from his belt, the blue liquid inside sloshing hypnotically.

He remembered what Percy had told them earlier about meeting the Titan, but Jason was much more interesting to study than the absolute shitshow of their lives. Even in the dinginess of Tartara, his blond hair seemed to be every hue from white-spun sun to golden browns to the breaking of new daylight, seemingly to bring more golden sunshine into the world. Even in hell, he seemed to radiate a heavenly glow, and those soulful blue eyes as bright as any glacier yet so very warm when he looked at Octavian.

They picked their way across the ashen wasteland as red lightning flashed overhead in the poisonous clouds. Just another lovely day in the dungeon of creation. Octavian couldn't see far in the hazy air, but the longer they walked, the more certain he became that the entire landscape was a downward curve.

He was also pretty sure that he was going to need glasses.

He remembered reading about the various descriptions of Tartara. It was one of his most important reads because everything he had done in the name of his curse and the betterment of Roma would surely get him on the first class dive into Hell.

Ironic how he broke his curse and saved Roma, and was still there.

The Ancient Greeks thought of it as a bottomless pit. Virgil claimed that it was a fortress surrounded by brass walls. Later authors said it was nothing but an endless void.

One story described it as the inverse of the sky – a huge, hollow, upside-down dome of rock. That seemed the most accurate, Octavian mused. He wondered if this was an ancient version of the water cycle considering that they had been flat earthers so that would mean that both flat and round earthers were right.

Still, that wasn't the full, horrible truth …

Octavian knew exactly what they were walking on, and he hoped the others didn't come to those conclusions, but he knew that they were smart. If Terra had a body and Caelus had a body, then it only seemed right that the personification of Hell had one too.

They passed a blister in the ground – a writhing, translucent bubble the size of a minivan. Curled inside was the half-formed body of a drakon. Bob speared the blister without a second thought. It burst in a geyser of steaming yellow slime, and the drakon dissolved into nothing.

Bob kept walking.

Gross.

If that god noticed them walking across his skin, like fleas on a dog ... Enough. No more thinking.

'Here,' Bob said.

They stopped at the top of a ridge. Below them, in a sheltered depression like a moon crater, stood a ring of broken black marble columns surrounding a dark stone altar.

"Hērmês' shrine,' Bob explained.

Percy frowned. 'A Hermes shrine in Tartarus?'

Bob laughed in delight. 'Yes. It fell from somewhere long ago. Maybe mortal world. Maybe Ólumpos. Anyway, monsters steer clear. Mostly.'

'How did you know it was here?' Annabeth asked.

Bob's smile faded, the look in his eyes vacant. 'Can't remember.'

'That's okay,' Percy said quickly.

Octavian grimaced. He had been Megamedes before he was Bob. Unlike what Hesiod had claimed, the titans had not been set free after the Olympians' rule over the cosmos had been secured with no further challenges. They had continued to be imprisoned in the depths of Tartara for aeons. Of course he knew his way around. If he remembered this shrine, he might start recalling other details of his old prison and his old life.

That would not be good.

They climbed into the crater and entered the circle of columns. Annabeth collapsed on a broken slab of marble, too exhausted to take another step. Percy stood over her protectively, scanning their surroundings. The inky storm front was less than a hundred feet away now, obscuring everything ahead of them. The crater's rim blocked their view of the wasteland behind. They'd be well hidden here, but if monsters did stumble across them they would have no warning.

'You said someone was chasing us,' Annabeth said as Jason eased Octavian to sit at her side. His ribs were mended like welded metal, but damn did it still hurt. 'Who?'

Bob swept his broom around the base of the altar, occasionally crouching to study the ground as if looking for something. 'They are following, yes. They know you are here. Giants and Titans. The defeated ones. They know.'

The defeated ones …

Octavian looked to Jason, and for the first time in his life… he felt complete and utter fear. He felt as if he was standing in the presence of the Divine Sons of Mars; Metus and Pavor. How many monsters had they fought over the years? How many had they sent straight to hell without a second thought?

Each one had seemed like an impossible challenge at the time, but they prevailed time and time again. If all of them were down there in Tartara, and if they were actively hunting Jason and Octavian… Gods, he hadn't even accounted for the ones that would be after Percy and Annabeth ...

'Why are we stopping, then?' she said, a little hysterically but Octavian was kind enough to not point that out. 'We should keep moving.'

'Soon,' Bob said. 'But mortals need rest. Good place here. Best place for ... oh, long, long way. I will guard you.'

Octavian wanted to laugh. Yeah, right.

'You sleep,' Percy told them. 'Jason and I will keep the first watch with Bob.'

Bob rumbled in agreement. 'Yes, good. When you wake, food should be here!'

'Percy, wake me for second watch," Annabeth said. Octavian didn't waste the energy to speak; he just gave Jason a glare to show that he meant business. "Don't be a hero.'

Percy smirked at her, and Jason mimicked his expression as he looked at Octavian. 'Who, me?'

Jason kissed him, soft and gentle, and Octavian's heart skipped a beat happily. "Sleep," he murmured, and his body turned to lead as if the son of Iovis was utilizing spoken charm. He curled up on the ground, and closed his eyes. His dreams offered him no understanding. He found himself hovering in a throne room. The sight of it took his breath away, but it was the beings within that stopped his heart.

The Dii Consentes.

Then he realized it was their greek forms once he saw all the greek armor around the room.

'This is the most critical time,' said a goddess with fair grey eyes. Octavian mentally stuck a middle finger up at her the moment he recognized just who was dressed in armour and a frankly oversized helmet. "They must take control of the Doors or Gaía's forces will never be beaten."

"Hmph.' The god that could only be Árēshuffed, as he sat back and crossed his arms. He looked very much like his Roman counterpart. 'I wish they'd get on with it, then. I have twenty golden drachma riding on this. My son shall lead the way."

"That is so callous,' the god Hērmês for who else would hold a staff with snakes wrapped around it and a golden band with wings around his head chided. 'Besides, it's thirty drachmas, and I gave you very good odds.' He pulled out a leather-bound notepad and a pencil. 'Any final bets, people?'

'Stop,' Ζεύς rumbled and Octavian felt his spike straighten. He looked absolutely nothing like Jason, but Octavian got the same feeling that he did whenever Jason got serious. The god was dressed in a sombre black three-piece suit, as if on his way to a funeral. His shaggy black beard was freshly combed and oiled. His eyes flickered with subdued lightning though there was a concerned frown on his face. 'We must wait for the final battle. The worst is yet to come.'

'Hasn't he proved himself already?" demanded a young girl of about thirteen, wearing black leggings and a silver tunic, her dark hair pulled back in a ponytail. She glanced at a frankly beautiful man with golden curls that fell around his shoulders like a halo. Apóllōn. He was looking at the image as if he was viewing it but not seeing it though Octavian could tell that he was watching if the way his hands clenched anytime one of his kids or Drew got too close to being hurt. 'He's suffered so much in his life! Father, we must retrieve them from Tártara as soon as possible!"

Ζεύς glowered. 'You do not understand all the forces at work here, Daughter. The children must close doors, and as much as it pains me to say, Octavius must learn the true meaning of being a part of a legacy."

Hḗphaistos sat forward in his mechanical recliner, adjusting his leg braces because Octavian knew no other god that was crippled. 'And, if he fails, what then? Did you forget that your son is there also? They would die trying to close the doors.'

'It could work,' Athḗnē said.

'Don't you start!' Poseidón snapped and Percy looked like his Father's twin. Livia looked just like him. "Your daughter is down there also, but I suppose you never cared about the children that you fostered! You just needed cannon fodder to do your dirty work!"

'Stop it, all of you.' The newest being to speak was someone that Octavian would have known even without seeing her face as she lifted her dark veil. Queen Hḗrē. Her eyes were red and swollen as if she had been crying, but she looked almost exactly as Jason had described her. 'This has gone on long enough. Too much loss. Too much pain. But, if my husband insists on seeing it through, the least you all can do is not talk about Jason or any of the children as if they are already dead!'

'Nonexistent,' Athḗnē amended. 'If they fail, their fates will be much worse than death. But, whatever happens, it begins now.'

They all leaned forward, staring at the vision in the flames as the ship began to descend.

Then Octavian awakened, looking up not at the gods, but at the faces of his friends. They were still in Tártara, at the shrine of Hērmês.

'It's okay,' Percy promised as he helped soothe Annabeth who cried out beside him. 'Bad dreams?'

'Is it – is it our turn to watch?' Octavian asked groggily.

'No, no. We're good. We let you sleep," Percy answered evenly and Octavian shot Jason a glare that the boy snickered at.

'Percy!'

'Hey, it's fine. Besides, I was too excited to sleep. Look.'

Bob the Titan sat cross-legged by the altar, happily munching a piece of pizza.

Octavian blinked, then pinched himself wondering if he was hallucinating. 'Is that ... pepperoni?'

'Burnt offerings,' Percy said. 'Sacrifices to Hermes from the mortal world, I guess. They appeared in a cloud of smoke. We've got half a hot dog, some grapes, a plate of roast beef and a package of peanut M&M's.'

'M&M's for Bob!' Bob said happily. 'Uh, that okay?'

Neither of them protested, and Octavian made a mental note to enforce more sacrificial food in New Roma. Who knew what other unlucky demigod would wind up in hell, and need something to eat?

Octavian and Annabeth wolfed down the plate of roast beef and the rest of the pizza. Gods, it wasn't Percival's Pizzeria in New Roma, but damn was it still just as good and greasy.

'I know,' said Percy, reading Annabeth's expression. Octavian blinked upwards, looking between them as Jason snorted, wiping the cheese from his face. 'I think it is from Camp Half-Blood.'

'Peanut M&M's,' Annabeth said, looking at the shrine thoughtfully. 'Connor Stoll always burned a pack for his dad at dinner.'

Percy put his hand on her shoulder as her eyes teared up. 'Hey, this is good. Actual food from home, right?'

Not his home, Octavian mused a bit bitterly, but Jason nudged his shoulder, and he smiled, leaning into his embrace.

They finished eating in silence.

Bob chomped down the last of his M&M's. 'Should go now. They will be here in a few minutes.'

'A few minutes?' Annabeth reached for her dagger.

'Yes ... well, I think minutes ...' Bob scratched his silvery hair. 'Time is hard in Tártaros. Not the same.'

Percy crept to the edge of the crater, peering back the way they'd come. 'I don't see anything, but that doesn't mean much. Bob, which giants are we talking about? Which Titans?'

Bob grunted. 'Not sure of names. Six, maybe seven. I can sense them.'

"Six or seven?' Octavian wasn't sure his pizza would stay down. 'And can they sense you?'

'Don't know.' Bob smiled. 'Bob is different! But they can smell demigods, yes. You two smell very strong. Good strong. Like ... hmm. Like buttery bread!'

'Buttery bread,' Annabeth said as Jason moved towards the crater, sniffing the air. There was his wolfboy. 'Well, that's great.'

Percy climbed back to the altar, careful to avoid knocking Jason over. 'Is it possible to kill a giant in Tartarus? I mean, since we don't have a god to help us?'

He looked at Annabeth as if she actually had an answer. Octavian felt bad for her because this was definitely out of their depths.

'Percy, I don't know. Traveling in Tartarus, fighting monsters here ... it's never been done before. Maybe Bob could help us kill a giant? Maybe a Titan would count as a god? I just don't know.'

'Yeah,' Percy said. 'Okay.'

"Well, yes," Octavian mused. "There's no real difference in Titans and Gods. They are considered titan-gods to separate them from olympian gods. For example, Trivia, who you would call Hecate, was born to two titans, and she is qualified as a titan. However, Venus, who you call Aphrodítē, was born to two primordials, as Ouranos is a primordial, and when his genitals hit the sea, they mixed with whom you call Thalassa, is also a primordial however you designate Aphrodítē as a goddess."

"Romans don't?"

"No, we consider Venus to be primordial. It's kind of a roundabout. Venus is the counterpart to the first Eros of greek mythos. The one that attended to her birth. Cupido is her son. Over the years alongside the romanization of many greek myths, it was presumed that the first Eros was her son when it's actually the second."

"We can compare notes later," Jason said, coming back over to them. "If I strain my ears hard enough, I can hear them."

"Don't do that," Octavian said obviously. The only person that was to have hearing problems was going to be him.

He and Annabeth stood, and Bob started cleaning up, collecting their trash in a little pile, using his squirt bottle to wipe off the altar.

'Where to now?' Annabeth asked.

Percy pointed at the stormy wall of darkness. 'Bob says that way. Apparently, the Doors of Death –'

'You told him?' Annabeth said a bit harshly. Jason and Percy winced.

'While you were asleep,' he admitted. 'Annabeth, Bob can help. We need a guide.'

'Bob helps!' Bob agreed. 'Into the Dark Lands. The Doors of Death ... hmm, walking straight to them would be bad. Too many monsters gathered there. Even Bob could not sweep that many. They would kill you four in about two seconds.' The Titan frowned. 'I think seconds. Time is hard in Tártara.'

'Right,' Annabeth grumbled. 'So is there another way?'

'Hiding,' said Bob. 'The Death Mist could hide you.'

'Oh ...' Octavian coughed. He eyed the titan, looking for weaknesses because he suddenly felt very small and very threatened. 'Uh, what is Death Mist?'

'It is dangerous,' Bob said. 'But if the lady will give you Death Mist it might hide you. If we can avoid Night. The lady is very close to Night. That is bad.'

'The lady,' Percy repeated.

'Yes.' Bob pointed ahead of them into the inky blackness. 'We should go.'

'Okay, then,' Percy said, glancing at Annabeth. 'I guess we'll see a lady about some Death Mist.'

'Wait,' Annabeth said, turning to stare at the altar.

'Annabeth?' Percy sounded concerned.

'Bob,' she said as she walked to the pile of trash and picked out a reasonably clean paper napkin. Octavian couldn't recall if the toolbelt had hand sanitizer, but he wasn't holding her hand again until he was sure, "offerings burned in the mortal world appear on this altar, right?'

Bob frowned uncomfortably, like he wasn't ready for a pop quiz. 'Yes?'

'So what happens if I burn something on the altar here?'

'Uh ...'

'That's all right,' Annabeth said. 'You don't know. Nobody knows, because it's never been done.'

'Annabeth?' Percy said again. 'You're planning something. You've got that I'm planning something look.'

'I don't have an I'm planning something look.'

'Yeah, you totally do. Your eyebrows knit and your lips press together and –'

'Do you have a pen?' she asked him.

'You're kidding, right?' He brought out Riptide. Octavian snickered.

'Yes, but can you actually write with it?'

'I – I don't know,' he admitted. 'Never tried.'

He uncapped the pen, and it sprang into a full-sized sword.

'What if you touch the cap to the other end of the sword?' Annabeth said. 'Like where you'd put the cap if you were actually going to write with the pen.'

'Uh ...' Percy looked doubtful, but he touched the cap to the hilt of the sword. Riptide shrank back into a ballpoint pen, but now the writing point was exposed.

'May I?' Annabeth plucked it from his hand. She flattened the napkin against the altar and began to write. Riptide's ink glowed Celestial bronze.

'What are you doing?' Percy asked.

'Sending a message,' Annabeth said. 'I just hope Rachel gets it.'

'Rachel?' Percy asked. 'You mean our Rachel? Oracle of Delphi Rachel?'

'That's the one.'

Oracles, Octavian breathed. They knew the actual oracle of Delphi. No matter how many times he heard it. He couldn't believe it. It was the one damn oracle that he couldn't utilize since his prophetic power came directly from his forefather.

'Now I just need to burn it,' she said. 'Anybody got a match?'

The point of Bob's spear shot from his broom handle. It sparked against the altar and erupted in silvery fire.

'Uh, thanks.' Annabeth lit the napkin and set it on the altar. She watched it crumble to ash, but Octavian kept his eyes on the titan. He did that a little too smoothly.

'We should go now,' Bob advised. 'Really, really go. Before we are killed.'

Octavian turned to stare at the wall of blackness in front of them. Somewhere in there was a lady who dispensed a Death Mist that might hide them from monsters – a plan recommended by a Titan, one of their bitterest enemies.

How marvelous.

After entering the storm front, they plodded on for what seemed like hours, relying on the light of their weapons, and on Bob, who glowed faintly in the dark like some sort of creepy janitor angel.

Be not afraid, his ass.

They could see about five feet in front of them. Rocks loomed out of nowhere. Pits appeared at their feet, and they barely avoided falling in. The only time they had the smallest amount of light was when they came across the man from his visions.

His screams were just as torturous, and his skin looked like molten waxed as he spun over and over and over again. Jason moved as if he was going to help, but stopped when he got a better look at him.

"That's Ixion," he murmured, taking in the details. "He was that king that tried to assault Mother, and when she told my Father, he formed a cloud to look like her…"

"And he slept with the cloud," Percy said slowly before scrunching his nose in confusion. "How does that even—"

"Okay," Annabeth said over him. "We can't free him so let's, uh, keep moving."

Octavian snickered, and they hurried to keep up with Bob, the angel of janitors.

Monstrous roars echoed in the gloom, but all he could be certain of was that the terrain was still sloping down. It didn't help that it was clearly overstimulating Jason whose head twitched in a different direction every other minute or so.

Down seemed to be the only direction allowed in Tártara, and it felt like gravity was increasing. Octavian wasn't the best at science so he couldn't even begin to understand how that worked.

Though assuming that the entire pit was the body of Tártaros, Octavian had a nasty feeling they were marching straight down his throat.

Someone needed a breath mint.

He really didn't want to know what it was going to be like going through his digestion system.

And then Annabeth stumbled over the second titan.

Literally.

Percy yelled, 'Whoa!'

Jason grabbed for her arm, but she was already falling. Fortunately, it was only a shallow depression. Most of it was filled with a monster blister. She had a soft landing on a warm bouncy surface, and then she was screaming bloody murder. Jason jerked back covering his ears while Percy helped Annabeth, who was screaming and flailing, toppling off the mound, to her feet.

'You okay?' Livia's biological brother asked. Octavian turned to look at what she fell on as he covered Jason's hands with his own.

Curled in the membrane bubble in front of them was a fully formed Titan in golden armour, his skin the colour of polished pennies. His eyes were closed, but he scowled so deeply he appeared to be on the verge of a bloodcurdling war cry. Even through the blister, Octavian could feel the heat radiating from his body.

'Hyperion,' Percy said. 'I hate that guy.'

'I thought Grover turned this guy into a maple tree.' Annabeth said.

'Yeah,' Percy agreed. 'Maybe the maple tree died, and he wound up back here?'

He looked ready to pop out at any moment and start charbroiling everything in his path.

Octavian glanced at Bob, heart sinking as he realized that the silvery Titan was studying Hyperion with a frown of concentration – maybe recognition. Their faces looked so much alike … Octavian inwardly cursed. He knew that expression. It was probably the same one that he wore when he first met Percy and saw the face of his long-deceased dead sister staring back at him.

Hyperion was his brother. Hyperion was the Titan lord of the east. Megamedes, Iapetus, Bob, whatever was the lord of the west. Take away Bob's broom and his janitor's clothes, put him in armour and cut his hair, change his colour scheme from silver to gold, and Iapetus would have been almost indistinguishable from Hyperion.

'Bob,' Annabeth said, 'we should go.'

'Gold, not silver,' Bob murmured. 'But he looks like me.'

'Bob,' Percy said. 'Hey, buddy, over here.'

The Titan reluctantly turned.

'Am I your friend?' Percy asked.

'Yes.' Bob sounded dangerously uncertain. 'We are friends.'

'You know that some monsters are good,' Percy said. 'And some are bad.'

'Hmm,' Bob said. 'Like ... the pretty ghost ladies who serve Persephónē are good. Exploding zombies are bad.'

'Right,' Percy said. 'And some mortals are good, and some are bad. Well, the same thing is true for Titans.'

'Titans ...' Bob loomed over them, glowering.

'That's what you are,' Percy said calmly. 'Bob the Titan. You're good. You're awesome, in fact. But some Titans are not. This guy here, Hyperion, is full-on bad. He tried to kill me ... tried to kill a lot of people.'

Bob blinked his silver eyes. 'But he looks ... his face is so –'

'He looks like you,' Percy agreed. 'He's a Titan, like you. But he's not good like you are.'

'Bob is good.' His fingers tightened on his broom handle. 'Yes. There is always at least one good one – monsters, Titans, giants.'

'Uh ...' Percy grimaced. 'Well, I'm not sure about the giants.'

'Oh, yes.' Bob nodded earnestly.

'We should go,' Jason urged. 'What do we do about ...?'

'Bob,' Percy said, 'it's your call. Hyperion is your kind. We could leave him alone, but if he wakes up –'

Bob's broom-spear swept into motion. If he'd been aiming at them, they would've been cut in half. Instead, Bob slashed through the monstrous blister, which burst in a geyser of hot golden mud.

Octavian wiped the sludge out of his eyes. He grimaced. Seriously, leave the eyes alone. They were already delicate.

Still, where Hyperion had been, there was nothing but a smoking crater.

"Huperī́ōn is a bad Titan,' Bob announced, his expression grim. 'Now he can't hurt my friends. He will have to re-form somewhere else in Tártaros. Hopefully it will take a long time.'

The Titan's eyes seemed brighter than usual, as if he were about to cry quicksilver.

'Thank you, Bob,' Percy said.

How was he keeping his cool? The way he talked to Bob left Octavian awestruck ... and maybe a little uneasy, too. If Percy had been serious about leaving the choice to Bob, then he didn't like how much he trusted the Titan. If he'd been manipulating Bob into making that choice ... well, then, Octavian was stunned that Percy could be so calculating.

He wondered what Livia would have done in his place, but the idea of his younger sister facing off against two different titans, one still asleep bothered him. Despite seeing what she could have looked like as a teenager, he could not get the sight of her as a kid out of his mind.

'We'd better keep going,' Jason said, bringing Octavian back to the present, and they followed Bob with Annabeth and Percy, the golden mud flecks from Hyperion's burst bubble glowing on his janitor's uniform.

They marched along, following Bob, listening to the monotonous slosh of liquid in his cleaning bottle. From time to time, Jason took his hand, tapping morse code into his skin using the same codes that they learned at camp. Octavian could tell that the dark landscape was getting to him as well. His eyes had a dull sheen – like his spirit was being slowly extinguished.

The boy was a child of aether; the heavens was where his soul was form.

He fell into Tártara to be with you, said a voice in his head. He didn't belong here. If he dies, it will be your fault.

'Stop it,' Annabeth said aloud.

Percy frowned. 'What?'

'No, not you.' She tried for a reassuring smile, but she couldn't quite muster one. 'Talking to myself. This place ... it's messing with my mind. Giving me dark thoughts.'

Octavian gave her a knowing glance. He was sure that he had an inkling of those dark thoughts.

The worry lines deepened around Percy's sea-green eyes. 'Hey, Bob, where exactly are we heading?'

'The lady,' Bob said. 'Death Mist.'

Octavian rolled his eyes. 'But what does that mean? Who is this lady?'

'Naming her?' Bob glanced back. 'Not a good idea.'

Names had power, and speaking them here in Tartarus was probably very dangerous.

And yet… He glanced at Jason.

The son of Iovis, champion of Iuno, named after the favored hero of Hḗrē… whose name meet healing.

'Can you at least tell us how far?' she asked.

'I do not know,' Bob admitted. 'I can only feel it. We wait for the darkness to get darker. Then we go sideways.'

'Sideways,' Annabeth muttered. 'Naturally.'

Suddenly Jason and Bob stopped. The titan raised his hand: Wait.

'What?' Percy whispered.

'Shh,' Bob warned. 'Ahead. Something moves.'

Octavian strained his ears, summoning Livia's sword to hand. From somewhere in the fog came a deep thrumming noise, like the idling engine of a large construction vehicle.

He could feel the vibrations through his shoes.

'We will surround it,' Bob whispered. 'Each of you, take a flank.'

For the millionth time, he and Jason crept left, Annabeth and Percy went right. His eyes strained, but he moved just a few steps behind Jason, further to his left.

Bob took the middle, his spearhead glowing in the fog.

The humming got louder, shaking the gravel at their feet. The noise seemed to be coming from immediately in front of them.

'Ready?' Bob murmured.

Annabeth crouched, preparing to spring. 'On three?'

'One,' Percy whispered. 'Two –'

A figure appeared in the fog. Bob raised his spear.

'Wait!' Annabeth shrieked.

Bob froze just in time, the point of his spear hovering an inch above the head of a tiny calico kitten.

'Rrow?' said the kitten, clearly unimpressed by their attack plan. It butted its head against Bob's foot and purred loudly. It seemed impossible, but the deep rumbling sound was coming from the kitten. As it purred, the ground vibrated and pebbles danced. The kitten fixed its yellow, lamp-like eyes on one particular rock, right between Annabeth's feet, and pounced.

The cat could've been a demon or a horrible Underworld monster in disguise.

Annabeth picked it up and cuddled it. Octavian found that he couldn't blame her and wondered if it was one of the kitten's powers. The little thing was bony under its fur, but otherwise it seemed perfectly normal. A tactic to get their guards down before devouring them?

'How did ...?' Annabeth couldn't even form the question. 'What is a kitten doing ...?'

It must be powerful.

The cat grew impatient and squirmed out of her arms. It landed with a thump, padded over to Bob and started purring again as it rubbed against his boots.

Percy laughed. 'Somebody likes you, Bob.'

Jason cracked a smile.

'It must be a good monster.' Bob looked up nervously. 'Isn't it?'

"Yeah, Bob," Jason said softly. "It's a good kitty."

He turned to look at Octavian as the elder blond made his way back to his side, and he knew what the other was thinking. Seeing the huge Titan and this tiny kitten together, it seemed that everything was insignificant compared to the vastness of Tártara. This place had no respect for anything – good or bad, small or large, wise or unwise. Tártara swallowed Titans and demigods and kittens indiscriminately.

What were their problems in comparison?

Bob knelt down and scooped up the cat. It fitted perfectly in Bob's palm, but it decided to explore. It climbed the Titan's arm, made itself at home on his shoulder and closed its eyes, purring like an earthmover. Suddenly its fur shimmered. In a flash, the kitten became a ghostly skeleton, as if it had stepped behind an X-ray machine. Then it was a regular kitten again.

Octavian knew he let his guard down too early!

Annabeth blinked. 'Did you see –?'

'Yeah.' Percy knitted his eyebrows. 'Oh, man ... I know that kitten. It's one of the ones from the Smithsonian.'

'That's one of them?' Annabeth asked. 'How did it get here?'

Percy spread his hands helplessly. 'Atlas told his servants to take the kittens away. Maybe they destroyed the cats and they were reborn in Tartarus? I don't know.'

"And for the people that weren't there," Octavian asked, looking at Bob and the kitten.

"'It's cute,' Bob said, as the kitten sniffed his ear.

'But is it safe?' Annabeth asked as Percy explained how Annabeth got captured by the titans some years back. Percy and Jason's sister Thalia had led a quest to rescue her. Along the way, they'd watched Atlas raise some skeleton warriors from dragon teeth in the Smithsonian Museum. Trying to work out when that would have been for them was giving him a headache, so he ignored it, and turned back to Bob and the cat; the animal appeared because the first attempt to bring back Spartoi went wrong.

The Titan scratched the kitten's chin. Octavian didn't know if it was a good idea, carrying around a cat grown from a prehistoric tooth, but obviously it didn't matter now. The Titan and the cat had bonded.

'I will call him Small Bob,' said Bob. 'He is a good monster.'

End of discussion. The Titan hefted his spear, and they continued marching into the gloom. Yeah, well if Small Bob got any ideas, Octavian was cooking up some cannibal meat.

'Here,' Bob announced, stopping so suddenly that Annabeth almost ran into him.

Bob stared off to their left, as if deep in thought.

'Is this the place?' Annabeth asked. 'Where we go sideways?'

'Yes,' Bob agreed. 'Darker, then sideways.'

The air did seem colder and thicker, as if they'd stepped into a different microclimate. He squinted into the mass before Jason's hand clamped down over his face.

Bob struck off to the left. They followed. The air definitely got colder. He pressed against Jason for warmth, and the boy put his arm around him. If he tried hard enough, he could imagine that they were in New Roma, but he couldn't relax so that imagine could never settle.

They'd entered some sort of forest. Towering black trees soared into the gloom, perfectly round and bare of branches, like monstrous hair follicles. The ground was smooth and pale.

This better not be the armpit!

Someone needed some serious case of nair if that was the case.

Jason tensed, and Octavian saw Annabeth resting her hand on the trunk of the nearest tree.

'What is it?' Percy raised his sword.

Bob turned and looked back, confused. 'We are stopping?'

Annabeth held up her hand for silence.

"Something's moving around us," Jason murmured. Octavian's hand tightened on Livia's sword.

"Above us," Annabeth whispered. 'Gather up.'

They closed ranks with her, standing back to back.

Octavian strained his eyes, trying to see above them in the dark, but nothing moved. Then the first monster dropped to the ground only five feet away.

His first thought: The Tenebrae.

Then the second thought made him understand that these looked almost as hideous as the tenebrae but were clearly something different. Where those chubby demons were pug-nosed, with furry fangs, bulging eyes, shriveled arms, claws, leathery wings, and stubby bowed legs; this creature looked like a wrinkled hag with bat-like wings, brass talons and glowing red eyes. She wore a tattered dress of black silk, and her face was twisted and ravenous, like a demonic grandmother in the mood to kill.

Bob grunted as another one dropped in front of him, and then another in front of Percy. Soon there were half a dozen surrounding them. More hissed in the trees above.

This must be their ugly stepsisters.

"What are you?' Annabeth demanded.

The arai, hissed a voice. The curses!

Like he didn't have enough issues with curses already.

He tried to locate the speaker, but none of the demons had moved their mouths. Their eyes looked dead; their expressions were frozen, like a puppet's. The voice simply floated overhead like a movie narrator's, as if a single mind controlled all the creatures.

'What – what do you want?' Annabeth asked, trying to maintain a tone of confidence.

The voice cackled maliciously. To curse you, of course! To destroy you a thousand times in the name of Mother Night!

'Only a thousand times?' Percy murmured. 'Oh, good ... I thought we were in trouble.'

Was this like the House of Night book series that Lilith liked?

Before he asked aloud, the circle of demon ladies closed in. Octavian wasn't liking their odds. Five against several dozen alongside the fact that he knew exactly what the arai were.

Bitter bitches.

They chased after his family for years.

'Back off.' Percy jabbed Riptide at the nearest shrivelled hag, but she only sneered.

We are the arai, said that weird voice-over, like the entire forest was speaking. You cannot destroy us.

Annabeth pressed against his shoulder. 'Don't touch them,' she warned. 'They're the spirits of curses.'

'Bob doesn't like curses,' Bob decided. The skeleton kitten Small Bob disappeared inside his coveralls.

Smart cat.

"Yeah, me either, big guy," Octavian said, switching the sword out for Livia's warhammer.

The Titan swept his broom in a wide arc, forcing the spirits back, but they came in again like the tide.

We serve the bitter and the defeated, said the arai. We serve the slain who prayed for vengeance with their final breath. We have many curses to share with you.

'I appreciate the offer,' Percy said. 'But my mom told me not to accept curses from strangers.'

The nearest demon lunged. Her claws extended like bony switchblades. Percy cut her in two, but as soon as she vaporized the sides of his chest flared with pain. He stumbled back, clamping his hand to his rib cage. His fingers came away wet and red.

'Percy, you're bleeding!' Annabeth cried, which was kind of obvious at that point. 'Oh, gods, on both sides.'

It was true. The left and right hems of his tattered shirt were sticky with blood, as if a javelin had run him through.

'Geryon,' Percy said. 'This is how I killed him ...'

The spirits bared their fangs. More arai leaped from the black trees, flapping their leathery wings.

Yes, they agreed. Feel the pain you inflicted upon Gēryoneús. So many curses have been levelled at you, Percy Jackson. Which will you die from? Choose, or we will rip you apart!

Octavian shifted a bit nervously, eyeing the spirits. Decapitation was one of his favored methods, and he liked his head right where it was.

'I don't understand,' Percy muttered, swaying on his feet. Luckily, the blood stopped spreading. Unluckily, the boy looked as if was about to pass out though he had been looking like that since they arrived in the pit, so it was kind of hard to tell.

Bob's voice seemed to echo from the end of a long tunnel: 'If you kill one, it gives you a curse.'

'But if we don't kill them ...' Annabeth said.

'They'll kill us anyway,' Jason guessed.

Choose! the arai cried. Will you be crushed like Kampê? Or disintegrated like the young telkhines you slaughtered under Mount St Helens? You have spread so much death and suffering, Percy Jackson. Let us repay you!

Octavian wondered if he should feel guilty with how pleased that he was that they were focusing on Percy. And then, Jason spun on his foot, striking as fast as lightning to the demon that tried to get him from behind. He dropped to the ground in pain, curling into himself and yet his arms and legs still seemed to flop lifelessly.

"Jason…"

The curse of Kerkúōn, the arai cried. Do your bones hurt as his did when you crushed them! You and Percy are nearly equal in the misery you spread!

Octavian grimaced. If decapitation was his signature move, then crushing bones was Jason's. He had defeated a number of their enemies by wrestling them to the ground and turning their limbs into paste.

The winged hags pressed in, their breath sour, their eyes burning with hatred.

If they really embodied the dying curses of every enemy they had ever destroyed ... then they were in serious trouble. They'd faced a lot of enemies.

Jason staggered to his feet, but the phantom ache of broken bones was clearly wearing on him.

One of the demons lunged at Annabeth. Instinctively, she dodged. She brought her dagger down on the old lady's head and broke her into dust.

Annabeth dropped her weapon and cried in alarm.

'I can't see!' She touched her face, looking around wildly. Her eyes were pure white.

Percy ran to her side as the arai cackled. Octavian's heart skipped a beat.

That was a fate worse than death to him.

Polyphēmos cursed you when you tricked him with your invisibility in the Sea of Monsters. You called yourself Nobody. He could not see you. Now you will not see your attackers.

Octavian didn't blame her. It was self-defense, and just like he was doing as he slammed the hammer into Mrs. Voorhees and her friend Minnie Castevet.

Ahhh we cannot forget you, Son of Troia. The arai cackled. A millennium worth of curses is stapled in your blood.

Octavian wished that he could pay attention to that, but his insides were coming outside, and his blood seemed to be boiling.

Specialized curses of your family members! Ariadnê poisoned an entire fleet of Akhaioí and dear Liviana boiled her opponents alive using their own blood!

'I've got you,' Jason promised, holding Octavian gently and using his shirt to dab at the blood spewing from his mouth.

A dozen demons leaped from every direction, but Bob yelled, 'SWEEP!'

His broom whooshed over Percy's head. The entire arai offensive line toppled backwards like bowling pins. More surged forward. Bob whacked one over the head and speared another, blasting them to dust.

The others backed away.

Oh, thank the titan!

They held his breath, waiting for their Titan friend to be laid low with some terrible curse, but Bob seemed fine – a massive silvery bodyguard keeping death at bay with the world's most terrifying cleaning implement.

'Bob, you okay?' Percy asked. 'No curses?'

'No curses for Bob!' Bob agreed.

The arai snarled and circled, eying the broom. The Titan is already cursed. Why should we torture him further? You, Percy Jackson, have already destroyed his memory.

Bob's spearhead dipped.

'Bob, don't listen to them,' Annabeth said. "They're evil!"

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Octavian did not find it fair that he got out of curses because "he is already cursed", but Octavian had to deal with curses from 1000-year-old losers. At least he had proof that the Curse of Athḗnē was gone.

Time slowed.

Bob turned. His wild white hair looked like an exploded halo. 'My memory ... It was you?'

Curse him, Titan! the arai urged, their red eyes gleaming. Add to our numbers!

"Bob, it's a long story," Percy said, and Octavian winced as Jason led him over to the other two. That was like an admittance of guilt. "I didn't want you to be my enemy. I tried to make you a friend.'

By stealing your life, the arai said. Leaving you in the palace of Háidēs to scrub floors!

Annabeth gripped Percy's hand in her right and Octavian's in her left.

'Which way?' she whispered. 'If we have to run?'

He understood. If Bob wouldn't protect them, their only chance was to run – but that wasn't any chance at all.

'Bob, listen,' Percy tried again, 'the arai want you to get angry. They spawn from bitter thoughts. Don't give them what they want. We are your friends.'

You see his face? the arai growled. The boy cannot even convince himself. Did he visit you, after he stole your memory?

'No,' Bob murmured. His lower lip quivered. Was he about to cry? Oh, come on, Jackson! Even he didn't make a titan cry. "The other one did.'

'The other one?' Percy said slowly.

'Nico.' Bob scowled at him, his eyes full of hurt. "Nico visited. Told me about Percy. Said Percy was good. Said he was a friend. That is why Bob helped.'

'But ...' Percy's voice trailed off.

The arai attacked, and this time Bob did not stop them.

They broke into a sprint. Octavian found himself dragging Annabeth, switching back out for Livia's sword and slicing through the arai to clear a path. Gusts of wind flew around them as Jason used his powers to blow the curses back, giving them time to regroup but it was so many that it didn't matter.

He probably brought down a dozen curses on himself, but he didn't feel them right away, so he kept running.

The pain in his chest flared with every step. He weaved between the trees, leading Annabeth at a full sprint despite her blindness. Octavian would marvel at her trust later on, but for the moment, he needed to keep going and inwardly curse his ancestors for being so brutally brilliant.

Leathery wings beat the air above them. Angry hissing and the scuttling of clawed feet told him the demons were at their backs.

As they ran past one of the black trees, he saw Percy slashed his sword across the trunk. He heard it topple, followed by the satisfying crunch of several dozen arai as they were smashed flat.

If a tree falls in the forest and crushes a demon, does the tree get cursed?

Not the time for philosophy, he inwardly scolded.

Percy slashed down another trunk, then another. It bought them a few seconds, but not enough. On the other side, Jason was doing the same, sending arcs of electricity through the wood and barbecuing the demon grandmas.

Suddenly the darkness in front of them became thicker.

Thankfully, Jason was paying attention because he yanked Octavian's arm to keep him and Annabeth from charging off the side of the cliff. Percy came to a stop beside them, looking around tense.

'What?' she cried. 'What is it?'

'Cliff,' he gasped. 'Big cliff.'

'Which way, then?'

Octavian grimaced, now that he wasn't running for his life he could feel the full effect of the curses. His throat felt as if it were burning, and he remembered choking the life out of Nate, Annia's ex-boyfriend. His hands and feet felt as if they were being stabbed, and he remembered pinning the boy to the table like he was being crucified.

"Octavian…?"

He gritted his teeth, attempting to push through the pain. He tried to focus on the cliff, but he couldn't see how far the cliff dropped. How was he the one with the best sight, and it wasn't even worth a damn when he needed it! It could be ten feet or a thousand. There was no telling what was at the bottom. They could jump and hope for the best, but he doubted 'the best' ever happened in Tártaros.

So, two options: right or left, following the edge.

His chest got overwhelmingly hot as if he was gargling Phlegethon water and ghost chili peppers, and he remembered choking and setting Caligula on fire. Should have choked that bastard with a Viagra. A stab point between his shoulders and making home in his ribs, bleeding because of Nero.

He really couldn't regret that one. He'd do it again.

A winged demon descended in front of him, hovering over the void on her bat wings, just out of sword reach.

Did you have a nice walk? asked the collective voice, echoing all around them.

They turned, watching as the arai poured out of the woods, making a crescent around them. One grabbed Annabeth's arm. Annabeth wailed in rage, judo-flipping the monster and dropping on its neck, putting her whole-body weight into an elbow strike that would've made any pro wrestler proud.

Jason certainly looked proud, and Octavian didn't think he should considering the curse that had happened to him earlier.

The demon dissolved, but when Annabeth got to her feet, she looked stunned and afraid as well as blind.

'Percy?' she called, panic creeping into her voice. "Octavian? Jason?"

'I'm right here.' Octavian said, reaching for her hand, but she wasn't there.

He blinked.

"Annabeth," Percy said, but when they looked around, she was several feet away. All three of them reached out for her, but it was like trying to grab something in a tank of water, with the light shifting the image away.

'Percy!' Annabeth's voice cracked. 'Why did you leave me?'

'I didn't!' He turned on the arai, his arms shaking with anger. 'What did you do to her?'

We did nothing, the demons said. Your beloved has unleashed a special curse – a bitter thought from someone you abandoned. You punished an innocent soul by leaving her in her solitude. Now her most hateful wish has come to pass: Annabeth feels her despair. She, too, will perish alone and abandoned.

'Percy?' Annabeth spread her arms, trying to find him. The arai backed up, letting her stumble blindly through their ranks.

'Who did I abandon?' Percy demanded. 'I never –'

He paused.

'She wouldn't,' he mumbled. 'She'd never curse me.'

"Percy…?" Octavian asked.

"Calypso. She…"

Octavian gave a bark of laughter. "Innocent?! That rapist bitch isn't innocent!"

"What," Percy breathed, a small amount of anger flickering in his eyes. "She was imprisoned for supporting her dad. I asked the gods… I asked them to free her. She wasn't…"

"She trapped Odysseus on her island for seven years, desperate to make him her husband," Octavian shot back. "He didn't want her. She forced himself onto him every night and during the day, he cried on the banks of her stupid island. When Hērmês arrived to free him, she insulted and cursed the gods because she wasn't allowed to keep a man that was fated to return home to his wife and son!"

"She was cursed to fall in love with everyone that came on the island."

"That curse was added after she continuously insulted them," Jason added softly. "If she was innocent, Percy, then she would have let them go instead of trying to force them to stay because if she loved them enough…"

He didn't say anymore, but it was clear that their words were getting to him. Octavian kept mum, keeping his eye on Annabeth as she wandered among the demons, desperately calling his name. He wanted to run to her, but he knew the arai wouldn't allow it. The only reason they hadn't killed her yet was that they were enjoying her misery.

He saw the change before it happened, and it was only because he had seen it once before on a much smaller face.

Percy roared in fury and defiance, and then he attacked.

Riptide cut through the arai as though they were made of powdered sugar. One panicked and ran face-first into a tree. Another screeched and tried to fly away, but Percy sliced off her wings and sent her spiralling into the chasm.

Octavian stared in shock before he fell for the same damn trick that Annabeth did. One grabbed his arm, and he was instinctively flipping them over his shoulder, digging his elbow into their stomach before slamming them into the ground.

The demon dissolved, but Octavian never got back to his feet. He fell to the ground, screaming in pain.

It felt as if he was on fire. The heat that had been boiling under his skin in his blood courtesy of his ancestor seemed to have grown so hot until he could see, hear, taste, and feel nothing more. The burning grew—rose and peaked and rose again until it surpassed anything he had ever felt.

He screamed and thrashed about, and some distant part of him remembered flinging Phaéthōn; the son of Sol, into the sacred flames of his father after he had attacked him.

He couldn't hear or see the way that Jason and Percy mowed through the arai. He couldn't see how they took on curse after curse or the way that Annabeth stumbled around mindlessly searching for them. He couldn't even hear her call out their names, begging them to not leave her, to come back for her, and plead of how sorry she was for whatever reason or another.

All he could do was concentrate on how it seemed as if the flames were pushing its way to and through his heart simultaneously, spreading from the tip of his fingers and toes and down to his to the split ends of his hair follicles. All he could do was fall into the fiery depths, drenched, slowly becoming a puddle that will eventually evaporate in all this heat.

His throat felt parched and his eyes; gods his eyes, it didn't even feel as if he had them anymore. It was like someone was breaking every bone in his body over and over again and molding them together with the fire that burned his soul.

This was way worse than the river of fire, and he should have drowned that piece of shit!

He couldn't hear how he screamed and begged and pleaded for death to come. He wanted out of the fiery torture, he wanted away from the heat licking through him, and he scrambled away from it to find some sweet relief, but it pulled him under over and over.

Was this how his family felt when their house came down on them? Was this how Livia felt as the ceiling cave on her? His mother crying in pain as she desperately looked for her daughters and her husband? His father as he made it to the door of the nursery, but was too late as the smoke took the last of his oxygen?

It burned, it burned everywhere. The heat was all-consuming, too overwhelming.

Everything hurts. It hurts so badly.

A hand pressed against his forehead, and it's like being wrapped in a cooling cloth, and he unconsciously seeks it out, desperately trying cling to the person touching him and taking in all of the blessed cool they have to offer.

All at once the fire was snuffed out, and Octavian relaxed.

Oh, good. He still had his eyes.

Oh, wow. He did not need to see Bob that up close.

He turned his head in exhaustion as the titan bounded towards Annabeth and scooped her up. She yelled and kicked, pummelling Bob's gut, but Bob didn't seem to care. He carried her over to Octavian, and oh, there was Jason and Percy and put her down gently.

Octavian would laugh if he wasn't so exhausted.

He couldn't even muster up strength to be horrified by the sight of Jason on the ground looking as if he was one second away from seizing.

The Titan touched her forehead. 'Owie.'

Annabeth stopped fighting. Her eyes cleared. 'Where – what –?'

'What's wrong with them?' she cried, falling to their sides. 'What happened?'

She cradled Percy's shoulders and wept into his scalp. The moment she tried to touch Jason, the boy hissed in pain, so she quickly stopped touching him. Octavian wondered which curse that was.

Annabeth helped Octavian sit up, leaning his weight onto her, pulling Jason close to them despite his whimpers before she cradled Percy's face, running her fingers through his hair.

It could have been worse, Octavian mused as he looked up at the red-clouded sky. He could have lost his head.

Bob loomed over them; his broom planted like a flag. His face was unreadable, luminously white in the dark.

'Lots of curses,' Bob said. 'Percy and Jason have done bad things to monsters.'

Yeah, well those monsters would have done worse to them big guy.

'Can you fix him?' Annabeth pleaded. 'Like you did with my blindness? Fix them!'

Bob frowned. He picked at the name tag on his uniform like it was a scab.

Annabeth tried again. 'Bob –'

"Iapetós,' Bob said, his voice a low rumble. 'Before Bob. It was Iapetós.'

The air was absolutely still.

'I like Bob better.' Annabeth's voice was surprisingly calm. 'Which do you like?'

The Titan regarded her with his pure silver eyes. 'I do not know any more.'

He crouched next to her and studied Percy. Bob's face looked haggard and careworn, as if he suddenly felt the weight of all his centuries.

'I promised,' he murmured. 'Nico asked me to help. I do not think Iapetós or Bob likes breaking promises.' He touched Percy's forehead.'Owie,' the Titan murmured. 'Very big owie.'

'Bob cannot cure this,' Bob said as he turned to Jason, pressing his finger to his forehead. Jason immediately sagged into the ground, and Octavian held him tightly, pressing gentle kisses to his skin. 'Too much poison. Too many curses piled up.'

'What can we do, Bob?' Annabeth asked. 'Is there water anywhere? Water might heal Percy. The River of Fire could probably heal Jason.'

'No water,' Bob said. "Tártaros is bad, and the Danaïdes water is no good.'

'No,' Octavian insisted. 'No, there has to be a way. Something to heal them.'

"Tártara kills demigods,' Bob said as he placed his hand on Percy's chest. 'It heals monsters, but you do not belong. Tártaros will not heal them. The pit hates your kind.'

"Yeah well I ain't feeling too kindly about him either, but there has to be someplace there can rest," Octavian snarled as he helped Jason tightly to him.

'Exactly' Annabeth said. 'There has to be some kind of cure he can take. Maybe back at the altar of Hermes, or –'

In the distance, a deep voice bellowed – a voice that Octavian recognized, unfortunately.

'I SMELL HIM!' roared the giant. 'BEWARE, SON OF POSEIDÓN! I COME FOR YOU!'

Octavian wanted to yell back, but he had more important things to worry about.

"Polyvotis,' Bob said. 'He hates Poseidón and his children. He is very close now.'

They struggled to their feet, and Jason groaned, head dipping in pained exhaustion.

Both of the boys could barely stand.

'Bob, we're going on, with or without you,' Annabeth declared. 'Will you help?'

The kitten Small Bob mewed and began to purr, rubbing against Bob's chin.

Bob looked at Percy, and Octavian wished he could read the Titan's expression. Was he angry or just thoughtful? Was he planning revenge, or was he just feeling hurt because Percy had lied about being his friend?

'There is one place,' Bob said at last. 'There is a giant who might know what to do.'

Annabeth almost dropped Percy. 'A giant. Uh, Bob, giants are bad.'

'One is good,' Bob insisted. 'Trust me, and I will take you ... unless Polyvotis and the others catch us first.'

WORD COUNT: 11278

THINGS TO KNOW:

1A) Pyrausta or pyrallis (πυραλλίς) (also called in Greek pyrigonos) is a mythological insect from Cyprus. It is a four-legged insect with filmy wings. It lived in the fire like a salamander and died if it went away from the fire. Janssens identifies it with the Melanophila acuminata.

2) The keres were female spirits (daimones) of violent or cruel death, including death in battle, by accident, murder or ravaging disease.

2A) In Roma, they are known as Tenebrae.

3) Kerkúōn aka Cercyon is a figure in Greek mythology. He was a notorious King of Eleusis, famous for his cruelty towards his daughter, Alope, and anyone who refused to fight with him. Cercyon was described also as a very strong man.

3A) Cercyon was said to have treated strangers wickedly, especially in wrestling with them against their will. He stood on the roads around Eleusis and challenged passers-by to a wrestling match. Other writers identified Cercyon as a robber who operated around Eleusis. The loser (always the passer-by) was murdered, though Cercyon promised his kingdom to anyone who won. In his fifth labour, journeying from Troezen, Theseus eventually beat and killed Cercyon when he lifted him up and dashed him to the ground. Theseus won owing to his skill, rather than superiority in brute physical strength. With this, Theseus started the sport of wrestling.

COMMENTS FROM AUTHOR:

1) Hḗrē, Poseidón, Athḗnē, are all unnerved about their kids being in Tártara even if Athḗnē isnt showing it. Ζεύς and Apóllōn are also worried but as leaders of fate, they have to focus on that first, but best believe, that Apóllōn is ready to box Athḗnē up! He blames her completely.

1A) And as you can tell, Apóllōn and Ártemis have not been forced to flee the mountain yet.