ENTRAPPED ₂

116

IN ALL OF HER LIFE, MADELEINE HAD NEVER THOUGHT SHE WOULD DIE LIKE THIS.

There had been many incidents over the years that she had unfairly survived. Her father had been gored to death while she had been protected. She had been dragged halfway to Tartarus and been miraculously saved by Percy, Annabeth, and Grover. She had traveled the Sea of Monsters. She had been attacked by Luke so many times over the years that she had lost count. She had been jumping in front of knives ever since Zoe's death. She had traveled through Tartarus, for fuck's sake.

Getting killed by a bunch of giants just because the gods had failed her seemed so... pathetic. After everything she had ever been through, here she stood with some of her closest friends in the world, and she was expected to just lay down and die. It was so unfair it made her want to fucking scream her head off.

Just as Madeleine was about to tell her friends she loved them and say her goodbyes to the mortal realm, just as she was mentally apologizing to Ethan and Drew and Lee and Connor and Castor, just as she was imagining what it would be like to see Beckendorf again, just as she lowered her knives with aching arms, the clouds parted above them. And instead of blue skies, Madeleine saw black space etched with stars, the palaces of Mount Olympus gleaming silver and gold in the background. An army of gods charged down from on high.

It was too much to process. And it was probably better for her health that she didn't see it all. Only later would Madeleine be able to remember bits and pieces.

There was supersized Zeus riding into battle in a golden chariot, a lightning bolt the size of a telephone pole crackling in his hand―once, in the Underworld, Madeleine had seen that lightning bolt in Percy's hands. Pulling Zeus's chariot were four horses made of wind, each constantly shifting from equine to human form, trying to break free. For a split second, they took on the forms of gods. One had an icy visage, the next a swirling crown of fire and steam, a third a smug lazy smile. Zeus had bound and harnessed the four wind gods themselves.

On the underbelly of the Argo II, the glass bay doors split open. The goddess Nike tumbled out, free from her golden net. She spread her glittering wings and soared to Zeus's side, taking her rightful place as his charioteer.

"MY MIND IS RESTORED!" she roared. "VICTORY TO THE GODS!"

At Zeus's left flank rode Hera, her chariot pulled by enormous peacocks, their rainbow-colored plumage so bright it made Madeleine dizzy.

Ares bellowed with glee as he thundered down on the back of a fire-breathing horse. His spear glistened red.

In the last second, before the gods reached the Parthenon, they seemed to displace themselves, like they'd jumped through hyperspace. The chariots disappeared. Suddenly Madeleine and her friends were surrounded by the Olympians, now human-sized, tiny next to the giants, but glowing with power.

Jason shouted and charged Porphyrion. Madeleine turned to Hippolytos―the giant she had fought on her quest with Percy, Hazel, and Frank―and sprinted toward him, her knives held high. Her other friends joined in the carnage.

The fighting ranged all over the Parthenon and spilled across the Acropolis. Out of the corner of her eye, Madeleine saw Annabeth fighting Enceladus. At her side stood a woman with long dark hair and golden armor over her white robes―Athena. The goddess thrust her spear at the giant, then brandished her shield with the fearsome bronzed visage of Medusa. Together, Athena and Annabeth drove Enceladus back into the nearest wall of metal scaffolding, which collapsed on top of him.

On the opposite side of the temple, Frank and Ares smashed through an entire phalanx of giants―Ares with his spear and shield, Frank (as an African elephant) with his trunk and feet. The war god laughed and stabbed and disemboweled like a kid destroying pinatas.