The Shadow Summoner | Book Three - PJO Universe

eight

LOVELY SEWERS

Single file, they crawled towards the centre of the crane like a line of bedraggled ants. Ariana tried not to look at the carcasses of the dead bulls below, but she could feel the malevolent gaze of the other silvestres as they tracked their progress.

Ariana had a sneaking suspicion they were placing bets on which of them would fall first.

At last they reached the crane's central mast. Ariana and Nico led them down the rungs of the ladder.

By the time they reached the ground, Apollo felt wobbly and nauseated. Nico didn't look much better.

Above them, around the rim of the pit, the tauri watched in silence, their blue eyes gleaming like a string of angry Hanukkah lights.

Meg studied them warily. "Ari, Nico, how soon can you shadow us out?"

"Catch ... my ... breath ... first," he said between gulps of air.

"Please," Will agreed. "If he's too tired, he might teleport us into a vat of Cheez Whiz in Venezuela."

"And it's not a good idea to travel with an exhausted child of Hades." Ariana agreed. "Even if it's just me summoning the shadows, If Nico is tired it'll still drain more energy."

"Okay.." said Nico. "We didn't end up in the vat."

"Pretty close," Will said. "Definitely in the middle of Venezuela's biggest Cheez Whiz processing plant."

"That was one time." Nico grumbled.

"Uh, guys?" Rachel pointed to the rim of the pit, where the cows were becoming agitated.

They jostled and pushed each other forward until one - either by choice or with pressure from the herd - toppled off the edge.

Watching it fall, kicking its legs and torquing its body, Ariana remembered the time Ares dropped a cat from Mount Olympus to prove it would land on its feet in Manhattan.

Athena had teleported the cat to safety, then beat Ares with the butt of her spear for putting the animal in danger, but the fall had been terrifying to witness, nonetheless.

The bull was not as lucky as the cat. It landed sideways in the dirt with a throaty grunt. The impact would have killed most creatures, but the bull just flailed its legs, righted itself and shook its horns.

It glared at them as if to say, Oh, you're gonna get it now.

"Um.." Will edged backwards. "It's in the pit. So why isn't it choking on its rage?"

"I - I think it's because we're here?" Apollo's voice sounded like he had been sucking helium. "It wants to kill us more than it wants to choke to death?"

"Great," Meg said. "Nico, shadow-travel. Now."

Nico winced. "We can't take all of you at once, if I am tired! Two plus me is pushing it. Last summer, with the Athena Parthenos ... That almost killed me, and I had Reyna's help."

The bull charged.

"Take Will and Rachel," Apollo said.

"Apollo's right!" Meg said. "Go!"

The moment Nico had left, Ariana couldn't believe how stupid everyone was around her. She grabbed Apollo's and Meg's shoulder, willing the shadows towards her.

*•*

"Did you all just suddenly forget I am nicknamed the shadow summoner?"

Ariana had no actual idea of how the nickname came about, her best guess was that it had started on the gods social media and made it way around.

The six of them sat in a sewer, which was something Apollo had grown accustomed to. Meg seemed to be bouncing back quickly from her shadow-travel sickness, thanks to Will's timely administration of nectar and Kit Kat bars.