Wildflowers, Percy Jackson ₁

044, you can't just say perchance

CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR

₊˚࿐࿔ 𖥧‧₊⚘ ❀༉. 𓏲｡

The metal door was half hidden behind a laundry bin full of dirty hotel towels. Sylvie didn't see anything strange about it, but Rachel showed them where to look, and Sylvie recognized the faint blue symbol etched in the metal.

"It hasn't been used in a long time," Annabeth said.

"I tried to open it once," Rachel said, "just out of curiosity. It's rusted shut."

"No." Annabeth stepped forward. "It just needs the touch of a half-blood."

Sure enough, as soon as Annabeth put her hand on the mark, it glowed blue. The metal door unsealed and creaked open, revealing a dark staircase leading down.

"Wow." Rachel looked calm, but Sylvie couldn't tell if she was pretending or not. Rachel had changed into a ratty Museum of Modern Art T-shirt and marker-colored jeans, her blue plastic hairbrush sticking out of her pocket. Her red hair was tied back, but she still had flecks of gold in it, and traces of the gold glitter on her face. "So... after you?"

"You're the guide," Annabeth said with mock politeness. "Lead on."

The stairs led down to a large brick tunnel. It was so dark Sylvie couldn't see two feet in front of them, but Sylvie, Percy, and Annabeth had restocked on flashlights. As soon as they switched them on, Sylvie and Rachel yelped.

A skeleton was grinning at them. It wasn't human. It was huge, for one thing—at least ten feet tall. It had been strung up, chained by its wrists and ankles so it made a kind of giant X over the tunnel. But what really sent a shiver down Sylvie's back was the single black eye socket in the center of its skull.

"A Cyclops," Sylvie exhaled. "It's old. It's not... anybody we know."

It wasn't Tyson, she meant. But she couldn't say it, because it didn't make her feel much better. Sylvie still felt like it had been put here as a warning. Whatever could kill a grown Cyclops, Sylvie didn't want to meet.

Rachel swallowed. "You have a friend who's a Cyclops?"

"Tyson," Sylvie said. "Percy's half brother."

"His half brother?"

"Hopefully we'll find him down here," Percy said. "And Grover. He's a satyr."

"Oh." Her voice was small. "Well then, we'd better keep moving."

She stepped under the skeleton's left arm and kept walking. Sylvie looked to see Percy and Annabeth exchange looks. Annabeth shrugged, then Percy looked Sylvie's way. Sylvie just turned her head from him. They followed Rachel deeper into the maze.

After fifty feet they came to a crossroads. Ahead, the brick tunnel continued. To the right, the walls were made of ancient marble slabs. To the left, the tunnel was dirt and tree roots.