²𝐆𝐑𝐄𝐄𝐊 𝐓𝐑𝐀𝐆𝐄𝐃𝐘✸ percy jackson

XXVIII.

ΉӨЦƧΣ ӨF ΉΛDΣƧ

LUCIA'S DRESS WAS TORN AND TATTERED. As she walked, she made sure not to observe around her too much, afraid of what she could see... or what this place could trick her into seeing. They walked and walked, getting in about half a mile deeper into Tartarus.

She already felt wrong and out of place. She wasn't meant to be underground or in the darkness. Her father's specialty was the sun, the sky. This was something completely different, and it made it almost impossible for her to stay positive...

When she stayed focused for too long or got lost in her thoughts, she swore as if she were walking atop something alive. She felt grumbling at her feet, the sound of exhales in her ears. It caused shivers to run up her spine. Everything about this place was just not for her.

Gods, I'm miserable.

She walked with Percy's hand tight in her grip, assuring they wouldn't get separated. Their hands were now clammy after walking for so long, but she didn't care. She couldn't risk him slipping away and them being lost to each other in any way. He also didn't seem to mind, often rubbing circles to remind her he was there. She loved him for that.

She trudged along, in a stupor. It was hard to think with her stomach growling and her throat aching.

The fiery water of the Phlegethon may have healed her and given her strength, but it didn't do anything for hunger and thirst. The river wasn't about making you feel good, it only allowed you to survive so you could endure more excruciating pain.

Her head started to droop with exhaustion. Then she heard them—female voices having some sort of argument and she was instantly alert.

She whispered, "Percy, down!"

She pulled him behind the nearest boulder, wedging herself so close against the riverbank that the white lace-up Oxfords she was made to wear almost touched the river's fire. On the other side, in the narrow path between the river and the cliffs, voices snarled, getting louder as they approached from upstream.

Lucia tried to steady her breathing. The voices sounded vaguely human, but that meant nothing. She assumed anything in Tartarus was an enemy. She didn't know how the monsters could have failed to spot them already.

Monsters could smell demigods—especially ones like Percy, a son of Poseidon. A child of the big three...Lucia doubted that hiding behind a boulder would do any good when the monsters caught their scent.

Still, as the monsters got nearer, their voices didn't change in tone. Their uneven footsteps didn't get any faster.

"Soon?" one of them asked in a raspy voice.

"Oh my gods!" said another voice. This one sounded much younger and more human, like a teenage mortal girl. She sounded familiar to Lucia. "You guys are totally annoying! I told you, it's like three days from here."

Percy squeezed Lucias's hand. He looked at her with alarm, as if he recognized the girl's voice too.

There was a chorus of growling and grumbling. The creatures—it sounded like a group of them, Lucia guessed they had paused just on the other side of the boulder, but still they did not pounce or show any indication that they'd caught the demigods' scent.

Lucia wondered if demigods smelled the same in Tartarus, or if other scents here were so powerful, that it masked their scent.

"I wonder," said a third voice, gravelly and ancient like the first, "if perhaps you do not know the way, young one."

"Oh, shut your fang hole, Serephone," said the mall girl. "When's the last time you escaped to the mortal world? I was there a couple of years ago. I know the way! Besides, I understand what we're facing up there. You don't have a clue!"