Chapter 8
The issue with walking down to Tartarus through a broken volcano from the surface was that it took nine days to fall that same distance at terminal velocity.
Their trek along the small path that wound down and around the volcano's walls was undeniably not at terminal velocity.
"When we get down there, what's the plan?" Leo's voice asked from somewhere ahead of Annabeth, breaking through the awkward silence that had descended as they all tried not to follow Annabeth's initial example in tripping and nearly falling into the depths far below them. "How do we find Percy?" Leo asked. "I know we said we find that Hermes Shrine, but if that doesn't work?"
"I vote we ask for directions," Thalia suggested. "I'm sure some monsters down there will be able to point us in his general direction." Annabeth winced as she watched Thalia skirt dangerously close to the massive drop down into the earth. Thalia herself seemed entirely unperturbed, aside from an uneasy glance into the depths beside them.
"Good idea," Clarisse said with a loud laugh. "I heard they started running from you recently – got quite a reputation amongst monsters now."
"Running and just killing themselves if we try to get them alive," Thalia said with a sigh. "Since they just get to reform in Tartarus. Phoebe's been helping, but we're not gods and there's only so much we can do."
Annabeth herself didn't particularly approve of the monster-torturing to find information about Percy, thinking that it was just asking for trouble if they sunk down to the level of their enemies in using torture, they were no better than them. Thalia had always simply said it was worth it to find anything out about Percy, not that many leads had ever come up. In the end, Thalia was a Hunter and understandably picked her own battles.
It was sometime later and after a short break for snacks that Nico's quiet curse filtered back to Annabeth, the path having grown thinner as they'd gone down, trekking down past the former level of magma within the old volcano. Annabeth grimaced as she caught sight of the body, old and decaying with a degrading pack beneath it.
"They fell," Thalia murmured. The former mortal must've fallen straight against a rock, their body remaining a distance away from the path towards the centre of the former volcano.
"Be careful, everyone watch your footing even more now. It looks like it's getting steeper," Jason said, his gaze grim. "We don't want to lose anyone on this quest," he added firmly, gaze rising to the pinprick of disappearing light above them.
"We haven't got much further to go down," Nico said, peering over the ledge. Annabeth did the same, realising that she could see the bottom of the magma chamber now.
Thalia was frowning at the wall next to them, her fingers tracing along giant grooves carved in the side in haphazard, twisting lines. "Lightning," she murmured, her voice low.
"Typhon," Annabeth breathed, slowly raising her head and catching sight of the other similar marks across the inside of the volcano.
Leo let out a low whistle. "I've seen the old videos and all," he said. "But… it's different seeing it."
Of course, when Typhon ripped his way out of the volcano three centuries prior, he'd destroyed the volcano's flanks himself, leaving only rubble and mounds of debris where they once stood. Their descent into the volcano had been from close to ground level already. The volcano itself was beginning to grow larger again in the chamber which they'd entered, the second former magma chamber of Mt. St. Helens and by far the largest of the two.
There were more scratches and marks along the path and up the walls, evidence of various different monsters using the volcano to leave Tartarus. Annabeth noted that it looked like a drakon had even been able to leave through the volcano too, judging by the scale marks diagonally up the chamber.
Annabeth recalled hearing in passing that the caverns and caves now exposed beneath Mt. St. Helens had been found to have linked to the Labyrinth and once they reached the passage that twisted away from Mt. St. Helens and saw the giant cavern which stretched out before them, she could believe it. Leo's body flickered, a flame gently surging to life around his palm. "Where are we going, Ghost Boy?" Leo asked as Annabeth's gaze lingered on the shattered remains of the giant, heavy-duty Stygian Iron chains that had bound Typhon himself and seemed as if forged from the stars above, now lying abandoned across the volcano. The volcano itself continued further down still, but their path would now take them all away from it.
Nico frowned at Leo before returning to scanning the dark cavern. He pointed his Stygian Iron sword into the darkness after a few seconds. "That way," he said.
Annabeth felt the cold chill that sank into her bones as they walked through the dark, the cavern lit only by Leo's fire. There were more bodies of mortals now. Some mere skeletons that had teeth and claw marks on them, scavenged by starving monsters free from reforming in the Pit. Some looked as if they'd been torn into before death and Annabeth grimaced.
It was a sight she was used to now, the dead and decaying corpses of humans and demigods.
The demigods had fallen into a respectful silence as they passed them, the unfortunate mortals whom explored the wrong cave or encountered the wrong monster.
The cavern plunged down into an incline again.
In the light of Leo's fire, Annabeth warily eyed the damp walls and the water trickling down by their feet in grooves eroded into the ground. One of the patches of water dripping down the walls looked suspiciously milky, horribly similar to the River Lethe. Others gleamed with an inky darkness, reflecting Leo's flames along the walls.
As they still descended further down through the caverns, Annabeth felt a cold chill in the air that Lou Ellen's spells dampened and helped to counter. Though a demigod's magic wouldn't be nearly enough as they approached the Pit and Annabeth grimaced as the air began to thicken slightly, a sickly weight caressing along her shoulders that made her flinch.
"Stop," Nico abruptly said, his voice firm and echoing through the cavern. He lifted his Stygian Iron sword slightly, eyes narrowed into the darkness ahead of them. As Annabeth watched, Frank and Thalia both nocked arrows and aimed them down the incline. "Hellhound," Nico warned. A low growl rippled through the darkness, answered by several more a second later. "Four of them," Nico corrected.
Annabeth was sharply relieved for Nico's ability to pick out monsters which lingered in the shadows, even more so when he turned abruptly as Leo's shadow frothed and slashed through the side of a hellhound's face in mid-lunge for Leo's back. Gold dust glimmered in Leo's hair as he cursed.
Several pairs of red eyes darted out of the darkness towards them, far too close already. Thalia's arrow shot between Nico and Leo and pierced the first hellhound's eyes and it dissolved before it could snarl, Frank's arrow zipping through the cloud of golden dust and clattering into the cave's roof immediately after. The third hellhound had its face melted off before it got close to Leo and Nico was quick to stab the fourth up through its jaw as it tried to jump over him to get to the fire-wielder.
Both Nico and Leo spluttered and tried to wipe golden dust off themselves. "Urgh, nasty," Leo grumbled as he shook it out of his hair.
Thalia held another arrow in her hand still, eyes lingering on the darkness stretching out before them. She cast a brief, smug glance in Frank's direction. "We'll see if we can find Frank's misfired arrow on the way through," the Hunter said.
"Good shooting," Nico said. "Thanks for getting that one both of you," he said diplomatically.
Thalia's lips twitched. "Frank, why don't you go for the second monsters instead of the first ones?" She asked.
"Thalia," Annabeth sighed as Clarisse snickered.
"I'll get the first ones," Thalia continued, "that way we don't waste arrows between us."
Leo was quick to nod in agreement. "We don't have many of those special arrows I made for you," Leo said. "It's a good idea."
Frank to his credit only nodded slightly, accepting Thalia's taunting with grace. Jason was frowning in Thalia's direction, but she ignored him and followed after Nico and Leo who'd started off into the darkness again.
It was Piper who spotted Frank's arrow and handed it back to him, some of the feathering broken and bent. Hazel walked at Frank's side with Jason, the three looking particularly odd in their orange Camp Half-Blood shirts.
Even Annabeth couldn't entirely hold back a faint smile in the face of their obvious unease with the colour switch. Their rivalry was long and fraught with the American Civil War and various confrontations that had happened between them both before and after. Even in the last three hundred years, there had been some more minor situations – nothing on the scale of pitched battles, but some smaller confrontations which had left only a few wounded. Despite the war against Gaea and their brief moment of working together during it, there was still lingering resentment that couldn't be removed so easily, mostly from those who weren't involved in the leadership or on the Argo II. The standard Legionnaire of the Roman Legion knew little about what else had occurred other than the vicious and bloodthirsty Greeks sailing to them with a giant flying warship and attacking New Rome entirely unprompted. Admittedly, as much as he had been a pain in the ass, the Greeks firing Octavian – the former Pontifex Maximus, as self-proclaimed as it had been – into the atmosphere with one of his own onagers had also not been helpful in that regard. Naturally, the Legion even now considered Greeks as rivals at best and as full-blooded enemies at worst, despite the best efforts of Reyna, Jason, Frank and Hazel to persuade them otherwise. It was simply easier to have minimal contact and with that, their own friendship with the Greeks had also splintered and the Seven had grown apart.
Thalia being so obviously at odds with Jason wasn't helping to dampen any of that mistrust.
The joking atmosphere swiftly vanished as they continued down into the depths of the earth. Annabeth cast a glance towards Thalia and Jason, both of whom looked uneasy with being so far underground now and away from their father's domain. Thalia had never quite gotten over her understand concern about Hades and his domains. Annabeth didn't know how Jason faired in Hades' realm underground, but she doubted he found the experiences particularly enjoyable.
The cave's walls were taking on a ridged and bumped quality, subtly shifting away from rock towards something far more fleshy that had Annabeth keeping away from them. The cave abruptly levelled out, the quest emerging out into a giant cavern with weapons drawn.
Annabeth couldn't see the far end in the darkness, despite Leo's fire lighting the way.
"Is… is this it?" Leo asked, tense as he eyed the cavern around them.
Nico was frowning, his Stygian Iron sword attracting the shadows as he scanned the open expanse around them. Annabeth slowly shook her head. "It can't be," she murmured. "We haven't gone far enough yet."
"If this route is like the Labyrinth, who knows how far we've gone," Hazel said, stepping up to Nico's side with her spatha drawn.
"It feels like it could be," Nico slowly said.
The presence pressed heavily down on their shoulders. The demigods advanced further through the cavern. A spire of fleshy rock seemed to appear before them in the darkness, Annabeth eying it uneasily before she continued on.
The weight in this cavern made it feel like a long-forgotten tomb, a resting place for some ancient god. A deathly chill filled the air, fortunately warded off by Lou Ellen's magic on their shirts. Their breaths still steamed in the cold.
"What is this place?" Thalia asked stiffly.
"Over here," Jason's voice called to them, not from behind them.
Annabeth whipped around to see that Frank and Jason had gone. She swore lowly under her breath.
"You should all come and see this," Jason added.
Clarisse led the way with her spear ready in case it was a monster imitating Jason's voice, but when they found him he was off to the side, behind and between the first two pillars. Frank's face was pale as he turned to look at them.
"Don't just walk off," Thalia hissed at Jason, concern making her frown at him.
Jason raised an eyebrow at her, before he gestured to the wall next to him. "Βριαρεως," Jason said.
Annabeth jerked slightly at the odd inflection in Jason's voice as he spoke Greek. It wasn't Jason's natural language, but it certainly made sense that the son of Jupiter would've put time and effort into learning it. It was the name that he'd said that had Annabeth more surprised, even more so when she read it engraved into the fleshy wall. "Briareôs," Annabeth murmured. Naturally, since the Greeks had come around long before the Romans, it was written in Ancient Greek.
Briares.
The wall along the side of the cavern next to her flexed and pulsed rhythmically with the breath of a Primordial god, making Annabeth's heart seize in her chest.
"Shit," Nico breathed from behind them, turning to look at the two closest spires. His tone was tight. "It is part of the Pit," he said, his jaw clenched.
"Briares is one of the Hekantonkheires, isn't he?" Frank asked.
"Yes," Annabeth said. She hadn't seen him in centuries and his name brought back memories of the Titan War, of finding him in Alcatraz. "Full-blooded brother of the Titans. After his birth… his father, Ouranos, sentenced him to – to the Pit with five others. Three were the Hekantonkheires and three were the Kyklôpes, the Elder Cyclopes."
"This must be where they were imprisoned," Thalia murmured. She pressed a hesitant hand against one of the spires which ascended into darkness above them, craning her head back to follow the giant column up above them. "Where they were tortured by Kampê," she added with a fierce scowl. Clarisse snickered and Thalia turned to glare in her direction, Artemis' blessing to her Lieutenant letting her see Clarisse despite the darkness. "Something funny?" Thalia asked fiercely.
Clarisse shook her head in amusement, only barely visible in the darkness to Annabeth. "Haven't seen a monster get under your skin like Kampê does for a long time," she said. "There's just something satisfying with knowing she picked you up and dropped you out into the ocean."
Nico laughed in agreement, Annabeth hiding her smile. "The daughter of Zeus… froze when she went flying," the son of Hades joked.
"Don't think I won't electrocute the both of you," Thalia said flatly.
"Thought you were over that fear?" Annabeth asked curiously.
"I am," Thalia said angrily. Lightning danced between her fingers. "It's just different between when it's myself flying and when a monster grabs me." She stormed off through the cavern. "You assholes coming or not?" Thalia demanded over her shoulder. "I can't wait to see Percy again. He wouldn't bully me over heights."
Annabeth raised an eyebrow because she was fairly sure she could remember Percy doing that exact thing more than once. Annabeth only smiled and followed after Thalia, grimacing slightly as she realised that the giant cavern they were trekking through had three sets of pillars on each side. The fleshy and uneven ground beneath their feet had claw marks and furrows gauged out of it from thousands of monsters traversing the same path.
Annabeth paused briefly as she noted unnatural streaks of ice like giant fingers trailed horizontally across some of the pillars, around twenty feet above the ground. A spear formed from ice had pierced through one of the fleshy pillars, a shattered point emerging from the other side, but the shaft still strangely solid and emanating a deep chill that misted the air. Shards of the spire had shot out from the point of impact and scattered at all angles. They crunched under Annabeth's shoes, some tainted with a dark, dried liquid that was neither mortal red nor godly gold, but rather something in between.
Scattered around the cavern were large scales that Annabeth recognised to be the same colour as Kampê's, remnants of an Ancient age long since ended alongside the forgotten pillars.
The quest left the cavern behind them, Annabeth starkly grateful to see the spires disappearing into the darkness behind them.
Nico and Leo took the lead again as the cave descended into a steep slope, the demigods cautiously continuing. Piper shouted in alarm as she slipped, Annabeth jerking around only to watch as Frank lurched out and grabbed her arm before Piper could tumble down the slope.
Piper quietly thanked Frank once she'd regained her footing, flushing slightly in embarrassment.
"You okay?" Annabeth called back to her.
Piper nodded slightly. "Fine," she reassured Annabeth.
Annabeth's heart hammered in her chest as she nodded back to Piper, returning her gaze to the slope she was following Nico and Leo down. A chill breeze whistled past Annabeth, vanishing into the depths before her.
It was shortly after that Thalia hesitated briefly. "Do you all feel that?" She asked.
"Feel what?" Annabeth asked sharply, hand reaching for the drakon bone sword at her side.
"It's… pulsing," Hazel slowly said.
Annabeth blinked. For a moment she wasn't sure what Hazel meant. Then Annabeth realised it wasn't her heart that was beating solidly enough to make the cavern pulse beneath her feet. Annabeth let out a long breath to steady herself.
Tartarus' heartbeat.
The breeze reversed, warmer air that smelt horribly of sulphur exhaling from the cavern that sloped away beneath them. The cavern pulsed regularly, a faint shift in air pressure with every ripple of the fleshy walls.
"The Pit," Nico said, his voice low and tense. He too was watching the walls like the rest of them. Next to him, Leo had pulled a face and was covering his mouth to shield himself from the smell of sulphur.
"It's even worse than some of the smells my cabin manages to make," Leo muttered as his nose crinkled. "Shame no one brought any air freshener with them."
Annabeth swallowed anxiously as the breeze hit their backs again, colder air being drawn in past them into the Pit. She stared at the darkness descending before them, feeling as if she was facing the gaping mouth of a giant monster.
The others were continuing on ahead of her. Clarisse turned and called back to Annabeth, "You're not going to just stay there, are you?" She asked. "We've got a Sea Princess to find."
Annabeth had had nightmares for centuries of the Pit's presence that Dionysus had eventually had to help her with, but still nothing could compare to the real thing. Annabeth took a deep breath and started forwards again, catching up to Jason and Clarisse first since they'd slowed to wait for her.
"You alright?" Jason asked lowly. He himself was eying the walls warily, as if only then realising what they were actually doing – descending into Tartarus itself, the all-consuming abyss where monsters and immortals reformed and the Primordial which terrified even Zeus.
Nine demigods descending into the Pit itself.
"What are we doing?" Annabeth asked, her voice hoarse and struck with terror.
Jason paused briefly. Clarisse shrugged. "Something stupid, but that's just normal at this point."
The Roman glanced to Clarisse with a faint frown. He returned his attention to Annabeth, blue eyes sharp and intense. "We're going down there, and we're getting Percy out," he firmly said. "And we're not doing it for ourselves, we're not doing it for Olympus or for the gods. We're doing it for Percy, because we owe it to him after this long. If not for what you and him did, the Doors of Death would've never been closed, we would've never stopped her without you and Percy." Jason pressed his lips together. "We owe it to him," he repeated. "It's part of the reason we were all made half-immortal, to make sure other demigods have their own chances too… Percy included."
"That's sweet," Clarisse mused. "Didn't think you had it in you, Imperator."
Annabeth rolled her eyes and Jason frowned even fiercer at Clarisse, his jaw clenching tightly. Jason was used to Clarisse's own brand of insults and humour, but even then he certainly didn't appreciate being called a Dictator.
"Clarisse," Annabeth sighed.
Clarisse just smirked and continued on after the fading speck of light that was Leo's fire. "Don't take too long talking you two, otherwise I'll have to tell the others that you're making out back there."
Jason grimaced, running a shaking and sparking hand through his blonde hair. "How about you don't do that," he said tiredly, an edge of frustration in his voice as he stared after Clarisse. Jason shook his head slightly, taking a deep breath and his gaze uneasy as he watched the walls pulse and ripple around them. "I know you and Nico both said what it's like down there, but…" Jason trailed off, looking rattled and uneasy. "Well, down here. But I didn't think it would feel like this."
Annabeth knew what he meant. The thick, heavy presence that made her skin crawl. Annabeth didn't tell Jason that it was likely to get a lot worse when they reached the actual cavern that was the Pit, with this passage down being on the outskirts. "At least we don't have to worry about the temperature changes," Annabeth offered.
Jason nodded slightly. "At least there's that," he muttered. Jason glanced back to where the others had continued on.
"We should catch them up," Annabeth said. It was getting too dark with Leo in the distance and if they left it much longer they'd be unlikely to be able to follow without falling headfirst down the path. The Roman nodded again and the two continued on together towards Leo's fading fire.
It wasn't long before the passageway opened up before them and Annabeth's breath caught in her throat at the sight of a glow of fire on the horizon, the River Phlegethon in the distance. Closer to the demigods, the ground abruptly dropped away before them in a steep cliff and was littered with boulders and crevices cutting through the uneven, fleshy ground. Blood-red Mist hung suspended above them, clinging to the ceiling over their heads.
"This isn't the upper level," Annabeth murmured, her gaze on the cliff face that stretched up and vanished into the blood Mist.
Nico's eyes were grim when he dragged them away from a scan of the giant cavern before them, nodding slightly at Annabeth in acknowledgement. "Welcome to the Pit, everyone," he said, his voice low and wary. "Now let's go find Percy and get out of here."
So, I have an excuse for the long wait this time!
On 31st December, I broke 2 lower ribs on the left side and also the left side of my body was apparently shunted out of alignment (work accident, fun). It has been painful and a long recovery but things are finally beginning to get a little better and I'm finally able to start moving around again now... so my mental health is also naturally getting better - which is why I got the motivation to finish this chapter off.
Will I have been injured and not able to do much, I've been in the Discord server a lot - stJvYshE9t is the server link for anyone who wants to join in.
Prissy Jackson: nah, the pairing's not going to change, don't worry.
Blue runes: it can be annoying, yeah! Thanks!
Riptide (chapter 1): I could? Unfortunately, the issue is that after a lot of chapters I find myself repeating chapter titles sometimes... I'll see if I can work something out.
Anaklusmos: the pairing will be the same, yes.
James Birdsong: thanks!
Guest: Percy will have a fun entrance when it comes, don't worry!
