Annie Chain and the Olympians: The Anomaly of the Sky

Chapter 10: I Find A Golden Plant

When we resume walking the next morning after breakfast, I fill Grover and Peter in on the dream I'd had.

Grover looks concerned. Peter looks confused.

"Wouldn't destroying Olympus cause my mother to fade too? Met- Err, my grandmother, would lose the daughter she's been so angry over not getting to raise." Peter said.

I looked at Grover.

"I don't know. Maybe because Athena's near Othrys, and her mother is a Titaness, she'll be protected. Or maybe the lightning will be targeting specific deities." Grover shrugged. "Maybe Former-Queen has a different lightning for each fading task she gives the Anomaly."

In case you're wondering why we aren't saying Metis' name, I'll explain it. Names have power. If you're not careful, you could accidentally summon the deity or monster who's name you've said. Considering we don't like Metis much, we were trying to avoid getting her attenion. Hence the nicknames.

"We've gotta keep going." Grover eventually decided, after we fell in silence.

He continued walking along. I glanced at Peter, then continued as well. Peter jogged beside me until he fell into step with Grover and therefore with me.

"So, we need to figure out how to 'restore' Hades." I muttered when I couldn't keep quiet any longer.

"Maybe we need some sort of spell or magic herb..." Grover suggested. "I would suggest the Golden Fleece, but I'm sure the Olympians already tried that. We keep it right at camp."

"So what then?" Peter asked. "What's more healing than the Golden Fleece?"

"Maybe it isn't about healing. The prophecy said restoring. We have to restore Hades. So maybe that means restoring his power. When a deity fades, their power fails. So to save Hades, we have to restore his power. There are herbs that can do that. We just have to find one." Grover realized.

I perked up. "So it is possible?"

Grover grinned. "Very."

I smiled back in relief. That was incredibly good news.

"Where's a good place to look?" Peter wondered.

"We can search in some of the divine fields on the way to California." Grover offered. "There are a ton of them all over America from Demeter, Persephone, Artemis and other nature divinities. I'm sure there will be something there."

I felt the beginnings of hope bubbling in my chest. I had half a mind to smash it down, crush it, stop it from taking root. But....sometimes you need hope to take root in order to succeed. So I let it. I let myself hope.

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I won't bore you with the details of myself, Peter and Grover tirelessly searching for some herb unsuccessfully in seventeen different fields along the way to California. You don't need to hear about that. And truthfully, our efforts were weak. We didn't know what to search for. So our search was essentially me touching each plant Grover told me wasn't dangerous and hoping I would somehow know that it was the one.

I didn't. We tried in seventeen different divine fields and met nothing at each. Occasionally a monster would come to try and eat us. We turned it to golden dust each time, leaving each field feeling more defeated and being more banged up.

Nothing happened until we were crossing the border to California. Grover led us to another divine field, Peter and I both silently following. Grover walked ahead of us, leaving me and my friend to talk.

"So..." Peter mumbled.

"So..." I repeated.

"How are you holding up?" Peter asked, looking at me.