True Blue ✷ Leo Valdez.

22: Wolf House.

   IT WAS HARD to stay calm when thick sheets of sleet were pelting the window sheild. Frost was building up around the edges of the glass pannel and slushy waves of ice blotted out of their veiw.

  "An ice storm?" Piper shouted over the engine and the harsh winds. "Is it supposed to be this cold in Sonoma?"

  Blaire was no genius— but she was almost sure it wasn't. And it was clear Piper knew that as well. Something was off about this storm. It was like some malicious force had brewed it only to take them out.

  Jason woke up quickly. He crawled forward, grabbing their seats for balance. "We've got to be getting close."

  Beside him, Piper too was gripping Leo and Blaire's seats for dear life, to stabilize herself.

  Leo appeared to be struggling with the gears of the copter, struggiling to control the large machine. It's movements were jerky and sluggish. The whole machine shuddered against the icy air current and the Hephaestus boy looked paniced.

  Below them, the ground was a dark quilt of trees and fog. The ridge of a hill loomed in front of them and Leo yanked the stick, just clearing the treetops.

  The sudden movements, sharp and miscalculated made Blaire feel sick, her stomach wavered madly.Though, it probably wasn't mere motion sickness fueling her naseua, but instead, nerves. For, a small valley opened up before them, with the murky shape of a building in the middle. The wolf house.

  Leo aimed the helicopter straight for it. All around them were flashes of light that reminded Blaire of the tracer fire at Midas's compound. Trees cracked and exploded at the edges of the clearing. Shapes moved through the mist. Combat seemed to be everywhere.

   He set down the helicopter in an icy field about fifty yards from the house and killed the engine. They were all ready to relax when they heard a whistling sound and saw a dark shape hurtling toward them out of the mist.

  "Out!" Leo commanded, not without urgency.

   In the knick of time, they leapt from the hellicopter, hardly skimming the roots before a massive BOOM shook the ground, knocking Blaire off her feet and coating her and the others in a sheet of icy sludge— snow.

  When she rose shakily, stunned but not injured by the impact, she saw that a large chunk of ice, almost like a snowball had flattened the machine.

  Leo joined her side— he too looked fine— cold, but fine. "Blaire, are you OK?" His eyes surveyed her for any injuries, and he seemed joyed upon finding none.

  She nodded breathlessly. Then, Piper and Jason limped over, speckled in snow and dirt.

  Leo shivered, wrapping his arms snugly around his frame. "Guess we owe that ranger lady a new helicopter."

  Piper pointed south. "Fighting's over there." Then she frowned. "No ... it's all around us."

  She was right. The sounds of combat rang across the valley. The snow and mist made it hard to tell for sure, but there seemed to be a circle of fighting all around the Wolf House.

  Behind them loomed Jack London's dream home—a massive ruin of red and gray stones and rough-hewn timber beams. Blaire could imagine how it had looked before it burned down—a combination log cabin and castle, like a billionaire lumberjack might build. But in the mist and sleet, the place had a lonely, haunted feel. She could totally imagine the ruins being cursed. Not only by the supposed wolves, but also by the haunting narrative of Jack's past life.

  "Jason!" a familiar girl's voice called.

  Thalia appeared from the fog, her parka caked with snow. Her bow was in her hand, and her quiver was almost empty. She ran toward them, but made it only a few steps before a six-armed ogre—one of the Earthborn—burst out of the storm behind her, a raised club in each hand.