Death and Madness|| Nico di Angelo

Annabeth gets jealous (but she won't admit it)

We didn't talk much in the van. Argus never spoke, probably because he had eyes all over his body, including—so I'd heard—at the tip of his tongue, and he didn't like to show that off.

Annabeth looked queasy, as if she'd slept even worse than me.

"Bad dreams?" Percy asked at last.

She shook her head. "An Iris-message from Eurytion."

"Eurytion! Is something wrong with Nico?" I spoke up. Clearly louder than I meant too. Percy and Annabeth stared at me, and I felt heat rising to my cheeks. 

"He left the ranch last night, heading back into the maze."

"Nico was gone before he woke up. Orthus tracked his scent as far as the cattle guard. Eurytion said he'd been hearing Nico talk to himself the last few nights. Only now he thinks Nico was talking with the ghost again, Minos."

"He's in danger," I said.

"No kidding. Minos is one of the judges of the dead, but he's got a vicious streak a mile wide. I don't know what he wants with Nico, but—"

"That's not what I meant," I said. "I had this dream last night..." I told her about Luke, how he'd mentioned Quintus, and how his men had found a half-blood alone in the maze.

Annabeth's jaw clenched. "That's very, very bad."

"So what do we do?"

She raised an eyebrow. "Well, it's a good thing Percy has a plan to guide us, huh?"

---

It was Saturday, and traffic was heavy going into the city. We arrived at Percy's mom's apartment around noon. When she answered the door, she gave him a hug only a little less overwhelming than having a hellhound jump on you.

"I told them you were all right," his mom said, but she sounded like the weight of the sky had just been lifted off her shoulders. She was super nice about everything.

She sat us down at the kitchen table and insisted on feeding us her special blue chocolate-chip cookies while we caught her up on the quest. Percy tried to water down the frightening parts (which was pretty much everything), but somehow that just made it sound more dangerous.

When he got to the part about Geryon and the stables, his mom looked like she was going to strangle him. "I can't get him to clean his room, but he'll clean a hundred tons of horse manure out of some monster's stables?"

Annabeth and I laughed. 

"So," my mom said when I was done with the story, "you wrecked Alcatraz Island, made Mount St. Helens explode, and displaced half a million people, but at least you're safe." 

"Yep," Percy agreed. "That pretty much covers it."

After that Sally told us just about everything that had ever happened in Percy's life. Somewhere along the way she stopped mentioning Alexandra, her youngest daughter and I didn't want to be rude by asking. 

"I wish Paul were here," she said, half to herself. "He wanted to talk to you."

"Oh, right. The school."

"What did you tell him?" I asked.

As Percy and his mom continued the conversation, I looked around their apartment. It wasn't that big or luxurious. But it was a home. Far better than mine had been. The walls were covered with pictures of mainly three people. 

Two kids, one of which was undoubtably Percy. And the other- a girl looked like his twin- Alexandra. They had a lot of pictures together, one at the aquarium, one at the local zoo, one in an apartment, both grinning widely with missing teeth. 

But after a few pictures, Alexandra had vanished. Now there was only Percy and his mom. Percy's face getting sadder, the older he got. 

I decided I would ask him about his sister later. 

---

We arranged a meeting in Times Square. We found Rachel Elizabeth Dare in front of the Marriott Marquis, and she was completely painted gold.

I mean, her face, her hair, her clothes—everything. She looked like she'd been touched by King Midas. She was standing like a statue with five other kids all painted metallic—copper, bronze, silver. They were frozen in different poses while tourists hustled past or stopped to stare. Some passerby threw money at the tarp on the sidewalk.

The sign at Rachel's feet said, URBAN ART FOR KIDS, DONATIONS APPRECIATED.

Annabeth, Percy and I stood there for like five minutes, staring at Rachel, but if she noticed us she didn't let on. She didn't move or even blink that I could see. Being ADHD and all, I could not have done that. Standing still that long would've driven me crazy. She looked like a statue of somebody famous, an actress or something. Only her eyes were normal green.

"Maybe if we push her over," Annabeth suggested.

After another few minutes, a kid in silver walked up from the hotel taxi stand, where he'd been taking a break. He took a pose like he was lecturing the crowd, right next to Rachel. Rachel unfroze and stepped off the tarp.

"Hey, Percy." She grinned. "Good timing! Let's get some coffee."

We walked down to a place called the Java Moose on West 43rd. Rachel ordered an Espresso Extreme. Annabeth and Percy got fruit smoothies, while I drank grape juice. And we sat at a table right under the stuffed moose. Nobody even looked twice at Rachel in her golden outfit.

"So.. new friend" she said looking at me. 

"Violet Keen" I introduced myself. 

"You really like the colour purple don't you" She said, and that was when I realised how decked out I was in purple. My camp half blood t-shirt was dyed purple by one of the twins and my jeans was a dark violet, my shoes were lilac and my socks were purple too. I smiled sheepishly. Rachel turned to Annabeth, "it's Annabell, right?"

"Annabeth," Annabeth corrected. "Do you always dress in gold?"

"Not usually," Rachel said. "We're raising money for our group. We do volunteer art projects for elementary kids 'cause they're cutting art from the schools, you know? We do this once a month, take in about five hundred dollars on a good weekend. But I'm guessing you don't want to talk about that. You're a half-blood, too?"

"Shhh!" Annabeth said, looking around. "Just announce it to the world, how about?"

"Okay." Rachel stood up and said really loud, "Hey, everybody! These two aren't human! They're half Greek god!"

Nobody even looked over. Rachel shrugged and sat down. "They don't seem to care."

"I like her" I grinned, but stopped when Annabeth glared at me.

"That's not funny," she said. "This isn't a joke, mortal girl."

"Hold it, you two," Percy said. "Just calm down."

"I'm calm," Rachel insisted. "Every time I'm around you, some monster attacks us. What's to be nervous about?"

"Look," Percy said. "I'm really sorry about the band room. I hope they didn't kick you out or anything."

"Nah. They asked me a lot of questions about you. I played dumb."

"Was it hard?" Annabeth asked.

"You want some bread with that jelly Annie?" I intervened, Annabeth glared at me but said nothing. "Rachel, we've got a problem. And we need your help."

Rachel narrowed her eyes at Annabeth. "You need my help?"

Annabeth stirred her straw in her smoothie. "Yeah," she said suddenly. "Maybe."

Percy and I told Rachel about the Labyrinth, and how we needed to find Daedalus. I told her what had happened the last few times we'd gone in.

"So you want me to guide you," she said. "Through a place I've never been."

"You can see through the Mist," Percy said. "Just like Ariadne. I'm betting you can see the right path. The Labyrinth won't be able to fool you as easily."

"And if you're wrong?"

"Then we'll get lost. Either way, it'll be dangerous. Very, very dangerous."

"I could die?"

"Yeah, but you'll die doing something cool" I said.

"I thought you said monsters don't care about mortals. That sword of Percy's—"

"Yeah," he said. "Celestial bronze doesn't hurt mortals. Most monsters would ignore you. But Luke...he doesn't care. He'll use mortals, demigods, monsters, whatever. And he'll kill anyone who gets in his way."

"Nice guy," Rachel said.

"He's under the influence of a Titan," Annabeth said defensively. "He's been deceived."

"Annie, we both know that's not true" I sighed. "He was good once, but now he's corrupt, driven by revenge"

Rachel looked back and forth between us. "Okay," she said. "I'm in."

I hadn't figured it would be so easy. "Are you sure?"

"Hey, my summer was going to be boring. This is the best offer I've gotten yet. So what do I look for?"

"We have to find an entrance to the Labyrinth," Annabeth said. "There's an entrance at Camp Half-Blood, but you can't go there. It's off-limits to mortals."

She said mortals like it was some sort of terrible condition, but Rachel just nodded. "Okay. What does an entrance to the Labyrinth look like?"

"It could be anything," Annabeth said. "A section of wall. A boulder. A doorway. A sewer entrance. But it would have the mark of Daedalus on it. A Greek Δ, glowing in blue."

"Like this?" Rachel drew the symbol Delta in water on our table.

"That's it," Annabeth said. "You know Greek?"

"No," Rachel said. She pulled a big blue plastic hairbrush from her pocket and started brushing the gold out of her hair. "Let me get changed. You'd better come with me to the Marriott."

"Why?" Annabeth said.

"Because there's an entrance like that in the hotel basement, where we store our costumes. It's got the mark of Daedalus."