COME WHAT MAY — we're not in kansas... no wait, we are
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Rory took a deep breath.
"One more time," she said. "Tell me again exactly what happened."
Leo slumped against the mast. He held his head, where there was now a nasty bruise, courtesy of Rory. All around them, the beautiful ship he spent months building was in shambles. The aft crossbows were piles of kindling. The foresail was tattered. The satellite array that powered the onboard Internet and TV was blown to bits, which had really made Coach Hedge mad. The bronze dragon figurehead, Festus, was coughing up smoke like he had a hairball, and some of the aerial oars had been knocked out of alignment or broken off completely, which explained why the ship was listing and shuddering as it flew, the engine wheezing like an asthmatic steam train.
Leo choked back a sob. "I don't know. It's fuzzy."
Rory felt bad grilling him with an audience — Annabeth, who stared at him (and though Rory was used to it, her stormy grey eyes scared the Hades out of almost everybody); Coach Hedge, who was tapping his baseball bat against the ground like he was itching to hit someone with it; and Percy's friend Frank.
Rory wasn't quite sure what to make of Frank. He was very nice down in the Forum, and just looking at him, he didn't seem very dangerous — but he also had turned into a full-blown dragon. He was Roman, but if Percy trusted him, then Rory did too.
Annabeth crossed her arms. "You mean you don't remember?"
"I..." Leo swallowed. "I remember, but it's like I was watching myself do things. I couldn't control it."
Coach Hedge tapped his bat against the deck again. In his gym clothes, with his cap pulled over his horns, he looked just like a stereotypical PE teacher from Rory's favorite seventies movies. The way the old satyr was glowering, Rory almost wondered if the coach was going to order Leo to drop and give him twenty.
"Look, kid," Hedge said, "you blew up some stuff. You attacked some Romans. Awesome! Excellent! But did you have to knock out the satellite channels? I was right in the middle of watching a cage match."
"Gleeson," Rory said, "why don't you make sure all the fires are out?"
"But I already did that."
"Check again."
The satyr trudged off, muttering under his breath. Rory knew he wouldn't defy her orders or talk back to her in front of everybody — at camp, she outranked him. Plus, he had known Rory since she was a toddler. He trusted her as much as he did Clarisse.
Annabeth knelt next to Leo. Her grey eyes were as steely as ball bearings. Her blonde hair fell loose around her shoulders like a princess.
"Leo," she said calmly, "did Octavian trick you somehow? Did he frame you, or—"
