𝐕𝐄𝐍𝐔𝐒──𝘱𝘦𝘳𝘤𝘺 𝘫𝘢𝘤𝘬𝘴𝘰𝘯

[ VII. manhattan ]

Zehra loved New York. You could pop out of the Underworld in Central Park, hail a taxi, head down Fifth Avenue with a giant hellhound loping along behind you, and nobody even looks at you funny.

Of course, the Mist helped. People probably couldn't see Mrs. O'Leary, or maybe they thought she was a large, loud, very friendly truck.

Zehra took the risk of using Percy's mom's cell phone to call Annabeth for the second time. She had called her once from the tunnel but only reached her voice mail. This time, Annabeth picked up.

"Hey," Zehra breathed. "You get my message?"

"Zehra, where have you been? Your message said almost nothing! We've been worried sick!"

Percy yanked the phone from Zehra's grasp and hit the speaker button. "I'll fill you in later," he said, though how he was going to do that Zehra had no idea. "Where are you?"

"We're on our way like you asked, almost to the Queens—Midtown Tunnel. But, Percy, what are you planning? We've left the camp virtually undefended, and there's no way the gods—"

"Trust me," Percy said. "I'll see you there."

Percy hung up. His hands were trembling. Zehra wasn't sure if it was a leftover reaction from his dip in the Styx or anticipation of what they were about to do. It was late afternoon when the taxi dropped the kids off at the Empire State Building. Mrs. O'Leary bounded up and down Fifth Avenue, licking cabs and sniffing hot dog carts. Nobody seemed to notice her, although people did swerve away and look confused when she came close.

Zehra whistled for her to heel as three white vans pulled up to the curb. They Delphi Strawberry Service on the side, which was the cover name for Camp Half-Blood. In all her years of living at camp, Zehra had never seen all three vans in the same place at once.

The first van was driven by Argus, the many-eyed security chief. The other two were driven by harpies, who are basically demonic human/chicken hybrids with bad attitudes. The camp used the harpies mostly for cleaning the camp, but they did pretty well in midtown traffic too.

The doors slid open. A bunch of campers climbed out, some of them looking a little green from the long drive. Zehra was glad so many had come: Pollux, Silena Beauregard, the Stoll brothers, Michael Yew, Jake Mason, Katie Gardner, and Annabeth, along with most of their siblings.

Chiron came out of the van last. His horse half was compacted into his magic wheelchair, so he used the handicap lift. The Ares cabin wasn't here, but Zehra tried not to get too angry about that. Clarisse was a stubborn idiot. End of story.

Percy did a quick headcount and muttered. "Forty." Forty campers in all. Not many to fight a war, but it was still the largest group of half-bloods Zehra had ever seen gathered in one place outside camp. Everyone looked nervous, and Zehra understood why. They were probably sending out so much demigod aura that every monster in the northeastern United States knew where they were.

As Zehra looked at their faces—all these campers she had known for so many years—a nagging voice whispered in her mind: One of them is a spy.

But she couldn't dwell on that. They were her friends. She needed them.

Annabeth came up to Zehra and Percy. She was dressed in black camouflage with her Celestial bronze knife strapped to her arm and her laptop bag slung over her shoulder—ready for stabbing or surfing the Internet, whichever came first.

She frowned. "What is it?"

"What's what?" Percy asked.

"You look... different."