Bloodshed ✷ Heroes of Olympus. ²

I

1. MAYFAIR

Mayfair awoke at noon. And she was not happy to find herself face-to-face with a roaring grizzly bear.

"Frank!" she yelled over the guttural bellow, rubbing her eyes. "Gods, your bear breath is awful. Quit waking me up like this."

In a blink, the bear was gone, replaced by a demigod with about the same size in stature. Frank shrugged. "Leo said you never unsubscribed from his Leonidas Wake-Up Calls. Since he's on morning duty, he told me to take over the waking-you-up aspect of it all in any way I saw fit. This was how I saw fit."

May ran a hand down her face. Ever since Percy and Theo had been gone, Leo had been working almost non-stop, acting even angrier and more driven than usual. Taking the morning shift wasn't out of the ordinary for him, but May knew they would end up adding up, and he had already taken at least two back-to-back morning and night shifts. May couldn't even be sure when the last time he slept was.

"Are we over the Apennines yet?" she asked Frank, trying her best not to sound too hopeful. She flopped her bed covers over and climbed out of bed.

"Not yet," he said, turning around as she changed pants—though she'd fought off adversaries in them before, hot pink cheetah-print P.J. pants were not her ideal fashion choice for quests. Frank twirled his bow on the ground like a spinning top, watching it whirl. "Hazel thinks it's her and Nico's fault, that the numina monatum can sense them because of their father. I think they're wrong. Leo keeps trying anyway."

Mayfair scowled to herself as she changed. These numina montatum were really growing on her nerves.

The mountain gods, sons of Gaea, were obviously not going to let the Argo II pass over their land peacefully; not since the six demigods were on their way to defeat their mother, anyway. But the path really should have been simple: to reach Epirus, all they had to do was go straight east – over the Apennines and across the Adriatic Sea. But it hadn't worked out that way. Each time they tried to cross the spine of Italy, the mountain gods attacked. Mayfair had faced three of their battles, and each ended in a ruined mast and a fuming Leo. Literally. He had been the cause of a wildfire spanning the lower levels of the Apennine mountains.

For the past two days, Leo had skirted the ship north, hoping to find a safe pass, with no success. Today was the third day, and May decided the numina monatum were really pushing their luck.

"I suggested we take another path," Frank informed Mayfair in a know-it-all kind of voice, like he wanted validation from the child of the goddess of planning. "I thought it was a good idea. Right?"

May zipped her jacket and picked up her dagger, her hair tied into a messy ponytail for the time being. She couldn't remember the last time she'd washed it. She scrunched her brow together. "What, like go by sea instead of land? That's a long way. And we don't have... you know, our sea expert."