THE HEALER| Heroes of Olympus

III

I might have liked Venice if it hadn't been summertime and tourist season, and if the city wasn't overrun with large hairy creatures. Between the rows of old houses and the canals, the stone pavements were already too narrow for the crowds jostling one another and stopping to take pictures.

The monsters made things worse. They shuffled around with their heads down, bumping into mortals and sniffing the ground.

One seemed to find something it liked at the edge of a canal. It nibbled and licked at a crack between the stones until it dislodged some sort of greenish root. The monster sucked it up happily and shambled along.

"Well, they're plant-eaters," I said. "That's good news."

Jasper slipped his hand into mine. "Unless they supplement their diet with demigods. Let's hope not."

I pleased to be holding his hand, the crowds and the heat and the monsters suddenly didn't seem so bad.

Nico stopped. "There."

We turned onto a smaller street, leaving the canal behind. Ahead of us was a small plaza lined with five-story buildings. The area was strangely deserted – as if the mortals could sense it wasn't safe. In the middle of the cobblestone courtyard, a dozen shaggy cow creatures were sniffing around the mossy base of an old stone well.

"A lot of cows in one place," Jasper said.

"Yeah, but look," Nico said. "Past that archway."

 At the far end of the plaza, a stone archway carved with lions led into a narrow street. Just past the arch, one of the town houses was painted black – the only black building I'd seen so far in Venice.

"La Casa Nera," Jasper guessed.

My grip tightened on his fingers. "I don't like that plaza. It feels ... cold." 

Something I was able to do as the daughter of the sun god was sense things like that. That place felt like the opposite of sunlight.

Nico nodded. He studied the town-house windows, most of which were covered with wooden shutters. 

"You're right, Eliana. This neighborhood is filled with lemures."

"Lemurs?" Jasper asked nervously. "I'm guessing you don't mean the furry little guys from Madagascar?"

"Angry ghosts," Nico said. "Lemures go back to Roman times. They hang around a lot of Italian cities, but I've never felt so many in one place. My mom told me ..." He hesitated. "She used to tell me stories about the ghosts of Venice."

"Your mom was Italian, right? Wasn't she from Venice?" I asked. 

Nico nodded reluctantly. "She met Hades here, back in the 1930s. As World War Two got closer,she fled to the U.S. with my sister and me. I mean ... Bianca, my other sister. I don't remember much about Italy, but I can still speak the language." 

"Must've been hard on your mom," Jasper said. "I guess we'll do anything for someone we love."

Nico stared at the cobblestones. "Yeah," he said bitterly. 'I guess we will."

I wasn't sure what Nico was thinking. I had a hard time imagining Nico di Angelo acting out of love for anybody, except maybe Hazel, or maybe someone very special.

I decided I'd gone as far as I dared with the personal questions.

"So, the lemures ..." I swallowed. "How do we avoid them?"

"I'm already on it," Nico said. "I'm sending out the message that they should stay away and ignore us. Hopefully that's enough. Otherwise ... things could get messy."