LOVE THE WAY YOU LIE . . . hoo

XX.

MIA LOVED FLYING.

It was probably bad for her considering she's Persephone's daughter, but what was she supposed to do about it? Nothing now. Besides, technically her other three teammates were at more risk than she was, so she was good.

She fiddled with the flower that was in her hair, braiding it into her hair as Frank and Hazel talked. Hazel was reassuring Frank that he'd done everything he could for his grandmother. Frank had saved them from the Laistrygonians and gotten them out of Vancouver. He'd been incredibly brave.

Frank kept his head down like he was ashamed to have been crying, but Mia didn't blame him. The poor guy had just lost his grandmother and seen his house go up in flames. As far as she was concerned, shedding a few tears about something like that didn't make you any less of a man, especially when you had just fended off an army of ogres that wanted to eat you for breakfast.

Besides, Mia had been in that exact situation before. Except for the fact that her house didn't burn down. Or at least, she hoped it hasn't. The point was, she felt for Frank. She knew what he was feeling right now.

He refused to explain exactly what his "family gift" was, but as they flew north, Frank did tell them about his conversation with Mars the night before. He explained the prophecy Juno had issued when he was a baby — about his life being tied to a piece of firewood, and how he had asked Hazel to keep it for him.

Some of that, Mia had already figured out. Hazel and Frank had obviously shared some crazy experiences when they had blacked out together, and they'd made some sort of deal. It also explained why even now, out of habit, Frank kept checking his coat pocket, and why he was so nervous around fire. Still, Mia couldn't imagine what kind of courage it had taken for Frank to embark on a quest, knowing that one small flame could snuff out his life.

"Frank," Percy said, "I'm proud to be related to you."

"And I'm proud to be on this quest with you," Mia agreed, checking her hair in her pocket mirror, though she gave Frank a smile.

Frank's ears turned red. With his head lowered, his military haircut made a sharp black arrow pointing down. "Juno has some sort of plan for us, about the Prophecy of Eight."

"Yeah," Percy grumbled. "I didn't like her as Hera. I don't like her any better as Juno."

Hazel tucked her feet underneath her. She studied Percy with her luminescent golden eyes. Sometimes, Mia wondered how Hazel could be so calm. She was the youngest one on the quest, but she was always holding them together and comforting them. Now they were flying to Alaska, where she had died once before. They would try to free Thanatos, who might take her back to the Underworld. Yet she didn't show any fear. Mia knew that she had seen potential in Hazel. And . . . some remnants of Sophia in her, though Mia tried not to compare her to Sophia.

"You're a son of Poseidon, aren't you?" Hazel asked. "You are a Greek demigod."

Mia froze, midway through putting her mirror down. But that only lasted for a moment before her facade went back up, shoving her mirror into her backpack.

Percy gripped his leather necklace. "I started to remember in Portland, after the gorgon's blood. It's been coming back to me slowly since then. There's another camp — Camp Half-Blood."

Gods, Mia hadn't heard those words in months. She and Nico avoided talking about camp as much as possible, because they isolated themselves from that camp for a reason. Still, she had flashbacks to when life was actually good — staying up late at the campfires, talking to her cabinmates, hanging out with her friends . . . Mia missed those days. She missed all of her friends. But they weren't her friends anymore.