a story as endless as the ocean . pjo / allie jackson

1.2 swimming with sirens

1.2 The Worst Part Isn't the Dream; It's the Fact that a Dream is All it Will Ever Be

Save for sword fighting, nothing had ever come to me so naturally before. It was almost as second-nature to me as breathing underwater.

The Queen Anne's Revenge responded to my every command. I knew which ropes to hoist, which sails to raise, which direction to steer. We plowed through the waves at what I figured was about twenty-five knots. I even understood how fast that was. For a sailing ship, pretty damn fast. In fact, if I hadn't been on it, the old ship would have broken into a million pieces from the strain of moving so quickly.

It all felt perfect— the wind in my face, the waves breaking over the prow.

But now that we were out of danger, all I could think about was how much I missed Tyson, and how worried I was about Grover.

And I couldn't get over how badly I'd messed up on Circe's Island. Yes, I had saved Luke, but at what cost? I thought of Reyna and Hylla, and how I'd just destroyed their lives and their homes, all in one day. I doubted they knew how to fight properly. Even if they were demigods, you still needed a certain amount of training to overcome strong opponents. What would the pirates, the worst crew to ever sail, do to a pair of pretty young girls? The dark thoughts ran through my mind, and I forced myself to concentrate on controlling the ship instead of Circe's island.

We sailed all through the night. Luke fell asleep after a few hours, but the energy I got from the sea kept me wide awake. I watched the horizon. More than once I spotted monsters, bracing myself to be attacked each time. I stayed at the very front of the ship, the wind blowing my dress and legs getting sprayed by saltwater every so often.

A plume of water as tall as a skyscraper spewed into the moonlight. A row of green spines slithered across the waves— something maybe a hundred feet long, reptilian. I didn't really want to know.

Once I saw Nereids, the glowing lady spirits of the sea. I tried to wave at them, because I genuinely liked water spirits, regardless of Silena's feud with them. But they disappeared into the depths of the ocean, leaving me unsure of whether or not they had seen me.

Sometime after midnight, Luke woke up again. We were just passing a smoking volcano island. The sea bubbled and steamed around the shore.

"One of the forges of Hephaestus," Luke said, pointing at it and effectively scaring the shit out of me. "Where he makes his metal monsters."

"Automatons?"

He nodded. "Go around. Far around."

I didn't need to be told twice. We steered clear of the island, and soon it was just a red patch of haze behind us.

I looked at Luke, who was already staring at me, making me blush. "The reason you hate Cyclopes so much... the story about how Thalia really died. What happened?"

It was hard to see his expression in the dark. But I knew Luke, and I knew how he got when it came to his taboo subjects, so I could give a pretty good guess.

"I guess you deserve to know," he said finally. "When Grover was taking us to camp, he got confused, ended up taking some wrong turns. You remember he told you that once?"

I nodded, staying silent.

"Well, the worst wrong turn was into a Cyclops's lair in Brooklyn."

"Damn," I said frankly. I thought his lips might have twitched slightly, but it was hard to tell in the dark.

"No kidding, but anyway. This Cyclops, he tricked us. He managed to split us up inside this maze of corridors in an old house in Flatbush. And he could sound like anyone, Allie. Just like Tyson did aboard the Princess Andromeda. He lured us, one at a time. Thalia thought she was running to save me. I thought that I heard Annabeth scream for help. And Annabeth... she was alone in the dark. She was seven years old. None of us could find the exit."