Home|| Leo Valdez

15

—They landed in what must have been the penthouse suite; but the place had been hit by a flash freeze. The entry hall had vaulted ceilings forty feet high, huge draped windows, and lush oriental carpets. A staircase at the back of the room led up to another equally massive hall, and more corridors branched off to the left and right . But the ice made the room's beauty a little frightening. 

When Alex slid off the dragon, the carpet crunched under her feet. A fine layer of frost covered the furniture. The curtains didn't budge because they were frozen solid, and the ice-coated windows let in weird watery light from the sunset. Even the ceiling was furry with icicles. 

"Guys," Leo said, "fix the thermostat in here, and I would totally move in."

"Not me." Jason looked uneasily at the staircase. "Something feels wrong. Something up there..."

Festus shuddered and snorted flames. Frost started to form on his scales.

"No, no, no." Zethes marched over "The dragon must be deactivated. We can't have fire in here. The heat ruins my hair."

Festus growled and spun his drill-bit teeth.

"'It's okay, boy." Alex turned to Zethes. "The dragon's a little touchy about the whole deactivation concept. But Leo's got a better solution."

"Destroy?" Cal suggested.

"No, man. You gotta stop with the destroy talk. Just wait."

"Leo," Piper said nervously, "what are you-"

"Watch and learn, beauty queen. When we were repairing Festus last night, I found all kinds of buttons. Some, you do not want to know what they do. But others... Ah, here we go."

Leo hooked his fingers behind the dragon's left foreleg. He pulled a switch, and the dragon shuddered from head to toe. Everyone backed away as Festus folded like origami. His bronze plating stacked together. His neck and tail contracted into his body. His wings collapsed and his trunk compacted until he was a rectangular metal wedge the size of a suitcase.

Leo tried to lift it, but the thing weighed about six billion pounds. "Um... yeah. Hold on. I think-aha."

He pushed another button. A handle flipped up on the top, and wheels clicked out on the bottom.

"Ta-da!" he announced. "The world's heaviest carry-on bag!"

"That's impossible," Jason said. "Something that big couldn't-"

"Stop!" Zethes ordered. He and Cal both drew their swords and glared at Leo.

Leo raised his hands. "Okay... what'd I do? Stay calm, guys. If it bothers you that much, I don't have to take the dragon as carry-on-"

"Who are you?" Zethes shoved the point of his sword against Leo's chest. "A child of the South Wind, spying on us?"

"What? No!" Leo said. "Son of Hephaestus. Friendly blacksmith, no harm to anyone!"

Cal growled. He put his face up to Leo's,. "Smell fire," he said. "Fire is bad."

"Oh." Leo's heart raced. "Yeah, well... my clothes are kind of singed, and I've been working with oil, and-"

"No!" Zethes pushed Leo back at sword point. "We can smell fire, demigod. We assumed it was from the creaky dragon, but now the dragon is a suitcase. And I still smell fire... on you."

"It's just because he's a son of Hephaestus" Alex assured Zethes.

"Zethes?" Piper tried her dazzling smile again, though she looked a little too nervous and cold to pull it off. "We're all friends here. Put down your swords and let's talk."

"The girl is pretty," Zethes admitted, "and of course she cannot help being attracted to my amazingness; but sadly, I cannot romance her at this time." He poked his sword point farther into Leo's chest. Alex's fingers curled into a fist, but she didn't want to make the situation worse.

"Destroy him now?" Cal asked his brother.

Zethes nodded. "Sadly, I think-"

"No," Alex and Jason said at the same time. Jason sounded calm enough, but Alex figured he was about two seconds away from flipping that coin and going into full gladiator mode. "Leo's just a son of Hephaestus. He's no threat. Piper here is a daughter of Aphrodite. Alex is a daughter of Poseidon. I'm the son of Zeus. We're on a peaceful.."

Jason's voice faltered, because both Boreads had suddenly turned on him.
"What did you say?" Zethes demanded. "You are the son of Zeus? And she's the daughter of Poseidon?"

"Um...yeah," Jason said. "That's a good thing, right? My name is Jason."

Cal looked so surprised, he almost dropped his sword. "Can't be Jason," he said. "Doesn't look the same."

Zethes stepped forward and squinted at Jason's face. "No, he is not our Jason. Our Jason was more stylish. Not as much as me-but stylish. Besides, our Jason died millennia ago."

"Wait," Jason said. "Your Jason... you mean the original Jason? The Golden Fleece guy?"

"Of course," Zethes said. "We were his crewmates aboard his ship, the Argo, in the old times, when we were mortal demigods. Then we accepted immortality to serve our father, so I could look this good for all time, and my silly brother could enjoy pizza and hockey."

"Hockey!" Cal agreed.

"But Jason-our Jason-he died a mortal death," Zethes said. "You can't be him."

"I'm not," Jason agreed.

"So, destroy?" Cal asked. Clearly the conversation was giving his two brain cells a serious workout.

"No," Zethes said regretfully. "If he is a son of Zeus, and she's the daughter of Poseidon they could be the one we've been watching for."

"Watching for?" Leo asked. "You mean like in a good way: you'll shower them with fabulous prizes? Or watching for like in a bad way: they're in trouble?"

A girl's voice said, "That depends on my father's will."

Alex looked up the staircase. Her heart nearly stopped. At the top stood a girl in a white silk dress. Her skin was unnaturally pale, the colour of snow, but her hair was a lush mane of black, and her eyes were coffee brown. She focused on all of them with no expression, no smile, no friendliness. But it didn't matter. Alex was practically drooling.