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︶꒦꒷♡꒷꒦︶
katherine wished she had an appetite, because the Romans knew how to eat.
Sets of couches and low tables were carted into the forum until it resembled a furniture showroom. Romans lounged in groups of ten or twenty, talking and laughing while wind spirits—aurae—swirled overhead, bringing an endless assortment of pizzas, sandwiches, chips, cold drinks, and fresh-baked cookies. Drifting through the crowd were purple ghosts—Lares—in togas and legionnaire armor. Around the edges of the feast, satyrs trotted from table to table, panhandling for food and spare change. In the nearby fields, the war elephant frolicked with Mrs. O'Leary, and children played tag around the statues of Terminus that lined the city limits.
The whole scene was so familiar yet so completely alien that it gave Katherine vertigo.
Katherine just wanted to be left alone with Jason, who had promised her that he would show her around, but she knew they had to first make friends with Roman.
Reyna and a few of her officers (including the blond kid Octavian, freshly back from burning a teddy bear for the gods) sat with Katherine and her crew. Percy joined them with his two new friends, Frank and Hazel.
Reyna called a toast to friendship.
After introductions all around, the Romans and Katherine's crew began exchanging stories. Jason explained how he'd arrived at Camp Half-Blood without his memory, and how he'd gone on a quest with Piper, Katherine and Leo to rescue the goddess Hera from imprisonment at the Wolf House in northern California.
"Impossible!" Octavian broke in. "That's our most sacred place. If the giants had imprisoned a goddess there—"
"They would've destroyed her," Piper said. "And blamed it on the Greeks, and started a war between the camps. Now, be quiet and let Jason finish."
Octavian opened his mouth, but no sound came out. Katherine really loved Piper's charmspeak, she hold back her laugh while Jason send her a playful eyes. Although she also noticed Reyna looking back and forth between Jason and Katherine, her brow creased, as if just beginning to realize the two of them were a couple.
Percy also frowned but say nothing. "So," Jason continued, "that's how we found out about the earth goddess Gaea. She's still half asleep, but she's the one freeing the monsters from Tartarus and raising the giants. Porphyrion, the big leader dude we fought at the Wolf House: he said he was retreating to the ancient lands—Greece itself. He plans on awakening Gaea and destroying the gods by...what did he call it? Pulling up their roots."
Percy nodded thoughtfully. "Gaea's been busy over here, too. We had our own encounter with Queen Dirt Face."
Percy recounted his side of the story. He talked about waking up at the Wolf House with no memories except for one name—Annabeth.
Percy told them how he'd traveled to Alaska with Frank and Hazel—how they'd defeated the giant Alcyoneus, freed the death god Thanatos, and returned with the lost golden eagle standard of the Roman camp to repel an attack by the giants' army.
