𝐒𝐔𝐍𝐃𝐀𝐍𝐂𝐄 | 𝐏𝐉 𝟐

𝟎𝟎𝟒.𝟐

Percy stared at death. He'd once again fallen off a cliff, classic of him, defeated a giant with his friends, unchained death and was now getting presented to a new fact. He was lying on a glacier down a cliff on his back staring up at death who was looking down at him boredly going through his iPad.

"Can you find her name a little faster?" He asked in irritation, the first question he had asked death, as soon as he had spotted him was about Juliet, he wasn't about to lose her again.

"Juliet Alexander's name is not on the list and she won't be dying again," Thanatos drawled before looking down at Percy with curiosity, "What oath did you make?"

Percy's mind went to the words he had sworn on styx, under his and Juliet's name, the weight of those words now pulled him, gods had he been the one necromancing his girlfriend?

"To follow Juliet," then he paused for a second, "Even in death."

Thanatos stared at Percy with an assessing glance before speaking, "The fates brought her back, because it is not your time yet, Perseus, you could not follow her in death, so you pulled her back to the mortal realm. Thankfully for you, her name hadn't been written in Hades's list, she is free as a mortal."

Relief, pure relief. That's what Percy felt at those words but then Thanatos opened his mouth again and ruined it, "Though the prophecy in her name still lives, meaning I might be meeting her again."

"You'll be meeting my fist that's what's gonna happen, If I see you anywhere near my- where the fuck are you going?!" Thanatos didn't bother listening to Percy's rant and disappeared in a cloud of smoke leaving him down on the glacier to yell in frustration, "Fucking gods!"

Thunder boomed above and Percy held up his middle finger before finally deciding to get to his feet. He had to go back up, Percy groaned in exhaustion before harnessing his powers again. 

He used water to propel him upwards, when he stood back up at the cliff, he waited there for his friends fuming in anger.

Percy stood at the edge of the glacier, leaning on the staff with the golden eagle, gazing down at the wreckage he'd caused: several hundred acres of newly open water dotted with icebergs and flotsam from the ruined camp.

The only remains on the glacier were the main gates, which listed sideways, and a tattered blue banner lying over a pile of snow-bricks. When his friends ran up to him, Percy said, "Hey," like they were just meeting for lunch or something.

"You're alive!" Frank marveled.

Percy frowned. "The fall? That was nothing. I fell twice that far from the St. Louis Arch."

"You did what?" Daphne asked.

"Never mind. The important thing was I didn't drown."

"So the prophecy was incomplete!" Hazel grinned. "It probably said something like: The son of Neptune will drown a whole bunch of ghosts."

Percy shrugged. He was still looking at Frank like he was miffed. "I got a bone to pick with you, Zhang. You can turn into an eagle? And a bear?"

"And an elephant," Hazel said proudly.

"An elephant." Percy shook his head in disbelief. "That's your family gift? You can change shape?"

Frank shuffled his feet. "Um...yeah. Periclymenus, my ancestor, the Argonaut—he could do that. He passed down the ability."

"And he got that gift from Poseidon," Percy said, his tone getting whiny. "That's completely unfair. I can't turn into animals."

Frank stared at him. "Unfair? You can breathe underwater and blow up glaciers and summon freaking hurricanes—and it's unfair that I can be an elephant?"

Percy considered. "Okay. I guess you got a point. But next time I say you're totally beast—"

"Just shut up," Frank said. "Please."

Percy cracked a smile, despite the fury still burning through his veins.

"If you guys are done," Hazel said, "we need to go. Camp Jupiter is under attack. They could use that gold eagle."

Percy nodded. "One thing first, though. Hazel, there's about a ton of Imperial gold weapons and armor at the bottom of the bay now, plus a really nice chariot. I'm betting that stuff could come in handy...."

It took them a long time—too long—but they all knew those weapons could make the difference between victory and defeat if they got them back to camp in time.

Hazel used her abilities to levitate some items from the bottom of the sea. Percy swam down and brought up more. Even Frank helped by turning into a seal, which was kind of cool, though Percy claimed his breath smelled like fish. Daphne was the one incharge of collecting all the gold, which was proving a little hard with how slippery Frank was making it.

It took all four of them to raise the chariot, but finally they'd managed to haul everything ashore to a black sand beach near the base of the glacier. They couldn't fit everything in the chariot, but they used Daphne's rope to strap down most of the gold weapons and the best pieces of armor.

"It looks like Santa's sleigh," Frank said. "Can Arion even pull that much?"

Arion huffed. 

"Hazel," Percy said, "I am seriously going to wash your horse's mouth with soap. He says, yes, he can pull it, but he needs food."

Hazel picked up an old Roman dagger, a pugio. It was bent and dull, so it wouldn't be much good in a fight, but it looked like solid Imperial gold.

"Here you go, Arion," she said. "High-performance fuel."

The horse took the dagger in his teeth and chewed it like an apple. Frank made a silent oath never to put his hand near that horse's mouth.

"I'm not doubting Arion's strength," he said carefully, "but will the chariot hold up? The last one—"

"This one has Imperial gold wheels and axle," Percy said. "It should hold."

"If not," Hazel said, "this is going to be a short trip. But we're out of time. Come on!"

Frank, Daphne and Percy climbed into the chariot. Hazel swung up onto Arion's back.

"Giddyup!" she yelled.

Percy sighed in irritation, he was about to fight in another war. Again.