The Death God Alliance

chapter 7

Bast went on ahead to get them a car. Carter, Sadie, and Percy began walking to the cemetery's edge, with Percy carrying Nico piggy-back style. Carter was glad to be spared that task. He remembered how hard it had been carrying Nico in Central Park, like the kid's aura was sucking the life out of him. Apparently demigods were more resilient than normal humans, and even magicians. Carter had been impressed with how Percy had batted the House of Life magicians' fireballs aside with his bare hand, like he was resistant to fire. He guessed that demigods had some sort of magic immunity, or at least that Percy did. Carter remembered what Anubis had told him about Nico's powers being linked to death, which was what made the Ribbons of Hathor so dangerous to him. He guessed that Percy would have fared better against them.

"So which god is your father?" Carter asked Percy asked they walked. "Zeus or Poseidon? Or is your mother a goddess, like Hera or Demeter? Or are you and Nico actually second cousins, rather than first cousins? Because if I remember right, there's a lot more options that way."

"My father's Poseidon," said Percy. "God of the Seas. So that makes Nico and I first cousins, technically speaking."

"Technically speaking?" asked Sadie. "If your fathers are brothers then that makes you cousins in any way of speaking. That's what cousins are. People whose parents are your parents' siblings."

"It doesn't exactly work that way for demigods," Percy tried to explain. "Our gods don't have DNA. So if you gave Nico and I a blood test it would show us as unrelated. We usually don't refer to other demigods whose god-parent is a sibling to our god-parent as our cousins, or acknowledge any sort of family bond."

"Then . . . why are things different with you and Nico?" asked Carter. "If you don't mind me asking.

Percy paused to hoist Nico higher onto his back so that the boy wouldn't fall. Nico's head rested on his shoulder, but Percy didn't seem to mind, probably because Nico didn't seem to be drooling. "We've been through a lot together," said Percy at last. "We're friends, first. Acknowledging that we're cousins makes things easier in the outside world a lot of the time. And . . . well, I owe Nico."

"Do not." Nico's voice was muffled since he was speaking against Percy's shoulder, but his words were able to be understood.

"I thought you were sleeping," said Percy, looking surprised.

"Why would you think you owed me?" asked Nico. "I owed you, remember? You said so at the Styx. Styx . . . Cerberus likes sticks. He likes to chew on them. I bet he likes to chew on jackals too. Ha ha."

"Why don't you try to take a nap, Nico?" suggested Percy.

"But you said I owed you. You don't remember?" asked Nico. "Maybe it's because you're ADHD. I'm not though. At least I was never diagnosed as that by a shrink. At least I don't think I was. They didn't have that when I was growing up."

"You still are growing up. And you made up for what you owed me by showing up at Olympus with your father and your undead army."

"That was fun," said Nico. "Best party invitation I ever got. But why would you owe me if that made up for what I owed you?"

Carter guessed that Nico was being like Cerberus with a stick about that owing thing, but he was interested to hear the answer. And interested to hear more about this party involving Olympus, Hades, and an army of undead, but he figured now wasn't the best time to ask about that.

"I owe you for breaking my promise," said Percy. It sounded like he was trying to keep his voice down so that Carter and Sadie wouldn't hear, or maybe just so they'd know that he didn't want them hearing and they weren't welcome to ask questions.