Wildfires, Heroes of Olympus ₂

015, your honor they're tweaking

CHAPTER FIFTEEN
FINLEY        BRIGGS

₊࿐࿔✸⋆｡° ⚘༉ . ⊹

For a heartbeat, Finn was just as stunned as the karpoi. Then Frank and Percy burst into the open and began to massacre every source of fiber they could find. Frank shot an arrow through Barley, who crumbled into seeds. Percy had picked up Finn's gun, and used that instead of Riptide to shoot through Sorghum and take out Millet and Oats. Finn and Hazel jumped down and joined the fight.

Within minutes, the karpoi had been reduced to piles of seeds and various breakfast cereals. Wheat started to re-form, but Percy pulled a lighter from his pack and sparked a flame.

"Try it," he warned, "and I'll set this whole field on fire. Stay dead. Stay away from us, or the grass gets it!"

Frank winced like the flame terrified him. Finn didn't understand why, but she shouted at the grain piles anyway: "He'll do it! He's crazy!"

The remnants of the karpoi scattered in the wind. Frank climbed the rock and watched them go.

Percy extinguished his lighter and grinned at Finn.

"I have got to get myself one of these," he said, handing Finn her gun back to her. The gleam in his eyes almost looked as crazy as Finn's. "Thanks for yelling, by the way. We wouldn't have found you otherwise. How'd you two hold them off so long?"

Finn pointed at the rock. "A big pile of schist."

"Excuse me?"

"Guys," Frank called from the top of the rock. "You need to see this."

Finn, Percy and Hazel climbed up to join him. As soon as Finn saw what he was looking at, her eyebrows rose. Hazel gasped.

Down below them, an army was on the move.

The field dropped into a shallow ravine, where a country road wound north and south. On the opposite side of the road, grassy hills stretched to the horizon, empty of civilization except for one darkened convenience store at the top of the nearest rise.

The whole ravine was full of monsters—column after column marching south, so many and so close.

Finn, Percy, Hazel, and Frank crouched against the rock. They watched in disbelief as several dozen large, hairy humanoids passed by dressed in tattered bits of armor and animal fur. The creatures had six arms each, three sprouting on either side, so they looked like cavemen evolved from insects.

"Gegenes," Hazel whispered. "The Earthborn."

"You've fought them before?" Percy asked.

She shook her head. "Just heard about them in monster class at camp."