LOVERS ROCK | L.V.

004

Adrianna's tour with Clarisse was going pretty good. Clarisse was a daughter of Ares, the war god. So she said she wasn't scared of Adrianna. She also asked for her last name, so she could use that. Adrianna knew immediately her and Clarisse would get along.

She talked about all this amazing stuff the camp offered-magic archery, pegasus riding, the lava wall, fighting monsters. She pointed out the open-air dining pavilion that overlooked Long Island Sound. Clarisse explained how Camp Half-Blood was mostly a summer camp, but some kids stayed here year-round, and they'd added so many campers it was always crowded now, even in winter.

She said since Nyx was a primordial goddess, Adrianna would attract a lot of monsters. And that she's incredibly lucky she hasn't died already. So she should most likely be a year-rounder.

Adrianna wondered who ran the camp, and how they'd known she and her friends belonged here. She wondered if she'd be any good at the activities. Could you flunk out of monster fighting? A million questions bubbled in her head, and she asked all of them.

By the time all her questions were answered Adrianna felt... nauseous. She was the daughter of a Goddess, she was half god. But more importantly, she was right. Back at the Grand Canyon, she had guessed this, and now she knew she was right.

As they climbed a hill at the edge of camp, Adrianna almost jumped out of her skin she was so scared. Curled around a tree was a dragon a real life dragon. And hanging from the the branches of the tree was- the golden fleece?!

"Oh yeah." Clarisse shrugged. "That's Peleus, he sleeps most of the time. He guards the golden fleece."

"The Golden Fleece?!"

Clarisse nodded but her mind seemed elsewhere, so Adrianna decided to drop it. She turned and got an amazing view of the valley-a big stretch of woods to the northwest, a beautiful beach, the creek, the canoe lake, lush green fields, and the whole layout of the cabins-a bizarre assortment of buildings arranged like a Greek omega, Ω, with a loop of cabins around a central green, and two wings sticking out the bottom on either side. She counted twenty cabins in all. One glowed golden, another silver. One had grass on the roof. Another was bright red with barbed wire trenches. One cabin was black with fiery green torches out front. They had already toured most of the cabins, but seeing them all together was what Adrianna could only describe as stunning.

"Will I get a sword?" Adrianna asked, thinking back to Jason's gold coin/sword.

Clarisse stopped. Something clicked in her head, and she started marching in the other direction, back to where they had just come from. Adrianna followed, quickening her pace and groaning as she walked down the hill.

"Where are we going?" Adrianna asked, but Clarisse just muttered something to herself. Eventually, they stopped at the forges.

"NYSSA!" Clarisse boomed. "Do you still have that, uh, necklace?" She hesitated on the word necklace.

They stepped through the doorway, and a dozen guys and girls working on various projects all froze. The noise died down to the roar of the forge and the click-click-click of gears and levers.

The forge looked like a steam-powered locomotive had smashed into the Greek Parthenon and they had fused together. White marble columns lined the soot-stained walls. Chimneys pumped smoke over an elaborate gable carved with a bunch of gods and monsters. The building sat at the edge of a stream, with several waterwheels turning a series of bronze gears. Adrianna heard machinery grinding inside, fires roaring, and hammers ringing on anvils.

"Adri?" Leo asked from further in the forge. He stuck out like a sore thumb. All the kids shared a sad kind of seriousness. Their shoulders slumped as if life had beaten them down hard. Several looked like they had been physically beaten up, too. Adrianna counted two arm slings, one pair of crutches, an eye patch, six Ace bandages, and about seven thousand Band-Aids.