ONE LAST TIME . . . heroes of olympus

81

"HOLY HEPHAESTUS." LEO gaped.

"You can say that again," agreed Kat, whistling under her breath.

The path opened into one of the nicest gardens Kat had ever seen. She's seen better, but this was the best she's seen from a single person. On the left was an orchard and a vineyard — peach trees with red-golden fruit that smelled awesome in the warm sun, carefully pruned vines bursting with grapes, bowers of flowering jasmine, and a bunch of other plants Kat probably couldn't name. She wasn't well-versed with flowers. Don't blame her.

On the right were neat beds of vegetables and herbs, arranged like spokes around a big sparkling fountain where bronze satyrs spewed water into a central bowl.

At the back of the garden, where the footpath ended, a cave opened in the side of a grassy hill, reminding Kat of that Oracle's cave in camp, but more impressive. On either side, crystalline rock had been carved into glittering Grecian columns. The tops were fitted with a bronze rod that held silky white curtains.

Kat's nose was assaulted by good smells — cedar, juniper, jasmine, peaches, and fresh herbs. The aroma from the cave really caught his attention — like beef stew cooking.

Leo started toward the entrance, and Kat sighed and followed him. They stopped when he noticed the girl. She was kneeling in her vegetable garden, her back to them. She muttered to herself as she dug furiously with a trowel.

Leo approached her from one side so she could see him. Kat tried to make her footsteps louder, but they were eternally cursed to be silent. Sometimes a blessing, sometimes a curse. It surely wouldn't help if the girl came at her with a sharp gardening implement.

She kept cursing in Ancient Greek and stabbing at the dirt. She had flecks of soil all over her arms, her face, and her white dress, but she didn't seem to care. Kat wasn't that type of person, personally, but to each their own.

"I think you've punished that dirt enough," offered Leo.

She scowled at him, her eyes red and watery. "Just go away."

"Leo, let's go," Kat said, attempting to urge him away.

"Listen to your girlfriend," the girl agreed.

Kat and Leo looked at each other and snickered. "That's the most hilarious thing ever," Leo snorted. "Me? You? Dating?"

"We did once," Kat shrugged. "And that didn't go well at all. But now I'm happily taken, so it all worked out. Meanwhile he's still depressingly single."

"Hey, what do you mean depressingly—"

"Either way," the girl interrupted. "It's a big island. Just . . . find your own place. Leave me alone." She waved vaguely toward the south. "Go that way, maybe."

"So, no magic raft," said Leo. "No other way off the island?"

"Apparently not!"

"What are we supposed to do, then? Sit in the sand dunes until we die?"

"That would be fine . . ." The girl threw down her trowel and cursed at the sky. "Except I suppose they can't die here, can they? Zeus! This is not funny!"

Can't die here?

"Hold up." Leo blurted, looking over at Kat. The gears were turning in her head. Those two brain cells between them were really putting in the work right now.

"I'm going to need some more information here," he said. "You don't want us in your face, that's cool. I don't want to be here either. Kat probably couldn't care less, but she'd get cooped up and want to leave." Hey, it was true. "But what we're not going to do is go die in a corner. We have to get off this island. There's got to be a way. Every problem has a fix."