Forbidden Quests

Chapter 21

Annabeth

I decided to take the serpent closest to me.

I ran, front flipped over the first serpent, slashing downward in mid air, cutting the back of the snake. When I came out of my landing roll, I dodged the second serpent's bite, then attempted to cut the ophidian's eye. I only succeeded in barely wounding it, though.

Before I went in for another attack, I glanced back to check on Percy. He was currently eluding a fang, then he pivoted and slammed his sword into the side of the assaulting serpent.

The snake writhed and hissed, but before it could recover, Percy thrusted once more, this time in the throat. The fatal strike caused the viper to shriek in pain. The horrible noise made me to sink to a knee and cover my ears, in fear of getting my eardrum blasted out.

When the uproar subsided, then faded into oblivion, I looked back to see Percy grimacing with a hand over one of his ears. There was no remains of the deceased serpent other than a pile of dust.

For a moment, the fellow snakes paused, staring at their dead companion, but then they resumed their ferocious attack, but they seemed more determined now. Yippee. (sarcasm should be detected)

I barely managed to evade a blade-like tooth snapping at me by rolling to the left. Unfortunately, rolling to the left put me right in front of the second serpent.

I stood, frozen, staring at those blond eyes. I was thrown out of my stupor when the snake gnashed at me. I sidestepped, then stabbed it in the side with my trusty dagger. But that wasn't enough, it only made the viper angrier.

I ran around, barely registering Percy, who was trying to kill the other snake to no avail. The snake that was after me kept chasing me.

Using my speed, I jumped, twisting in the air to face the serpent, my feet landing on a sturdy tree branch, and using my momentum, I pushed off the wood, somersaulting twice in the air, and landing behind the confused serpent. Twice I swung, and twice I succeeded in hitting the snake's tail. It turned around as fast as it could, but that just brought it into my whirling dagger.

Prepared, I covered my ears, shielding myself from that awful screech. When I saw the monster wilt and fall to the ground, bunched into a ball, I knew I had sent that monster to where it belongs: Tartarus.

One more snake, I thought.

I turned to see the last snake attempting a brave fight, but it had no chance. About five skeletons were hacking away at it's scales, thanks to Nico. Nonstop arrows were hitting chinks in the armor-like scales as well, and the occasional arrow hit the serpent's mouth when it opened to hiss. I spotted the archer, Thalia, perched in a tree nearby. Percy was agilely avoiding strikes and bashing it's head with Riptide.

Seeing as they were covered, I turned to look at the hydra attack, and see what was going on.

It wasn't pretty. Yeah, those three words pretty much summed up the fight with the hydra. The drakon was still hiding somewhere, but right now, we should be praising the gods for that much, for the hrydra by itself was a handful.

Most of the archers were running around, scrambling for arrows, seeing as they had used up theirs. Some had magical restocking quivers, but facing a hydra wasn't exactly a calm attack, and the ones with arrows were too frantic to shoot straight.

The seven-headed creature had managed to come back out of the pit once more, and this time, nothing could get it back in. I counted at least five arrows in five different heads, but it didn't do much.

I knew they needed help, and we could spare a few people.

"FRANK! HAZEL! LEO! HELP THE OTHERS!" I yelled at the top of my lungs, hoping the three would hear me.