The Burning Maze (The Trials of Apollo #3)

‘So Macro committed suicide instead?’ Hedge asked. ‘What a moron. Why’s he working for this emperor again, if the guy wanted him killed?’

I wiped the sweat from my eyes. Honestly, why did mortal bodies have to sweat so much? ‘I imagine the emperor brought him back to life, gave him a second chance. Romans have strange ideas about loyalty.’

Hedge grunted. ‘Speaking of which, where’s Grover?’

‘Halfway back to the Cistern, if he’s smart.’

Hedge frowned. ‘Nah. Can’t believe he’d do that. Well …’ He pointed ahead, where sliding glass doors led out to the parking lot. The coach’s yellow Pinto was parked tantalizingly close – which is the first time yellow, Pintos and tantalizingly have ever been used together in a sentence. ‘You ready?’

We charged the doors.

The doors did not cooperate. I slammed into one and bounced right off. Gleeson hammered at the glass with his croquet mallet, then tried a few Chuck Norris kicks, but even his Iron-Goat-waxed hooves didn’t leave a scratch.

Behind us, Macro said, ‘Oh, dear.’

I turned, trying to suppress a whimper. The manager stood twenty feet away, under a whitewater raft that was suspended from the ceiling with a sign across its prow: BOATLOADS OF SAVINGS! I was beginning to appreciate why the emperor had ordered Macro arrested and executed. For such a big man, he was much too good at sneaking up on people.

‘Those glass doors are bombproof,’ Macro said. ‘We have some for sale this week in our fallout shelter improvement department, but I suppose that wouldn’t do you any good.’

From various aisles, more yellow-vested employees converged – a dozen identical automatons, some covered in bubble wrap as if they’d just broken out of storage. They formed a rough semicircle behind Macro.

I drew my bow. I fired a shot at Macro, but my hands shook so badly the arrow missed, embedding itself in an automaton’s bubble-wrapped forehead with a crisp pop! The robot barely seemed to notice.

‘Hmm.’ Macro grimaced. ‘You really are quite mortal, aren’t you? I guess it’s true what people say: “Never meet your gods. They’ll only disappoint you.” I just hope there’s enough of you left for the emperor’s magical friend to work with.’

‘Enough of m-me?’ I stammered. ‘M-magical friend?’

I waited for Gleeson Hedge to do something clever and heroic. Surely he had a portable bazooka in the pocket of his gym shorts. Or perhaps his coach’s whistle was magic. But Hedge looked as cornered and desperate as I felt, which wasn’t fair. Cornered and desperate was my job.

Macro cracked his knuckles. ‘It’s a shame, really. I’m much more loyal than she is, but I shouldn’t complain. Once I bring you to the emperor, I’ll be rewarded! My automatons will be given a second chance as the emperor’s personal guard! After that, what do I care? The sorceress can take you into the maze and do her magic.’

‘H-her magic?’

Hedge hefted his croquet mallet. ‘I’ll take out as many as I can,’ he muttered to me. ‘You find another exit.’

I appreciated the sentiment. Unfortunately, I didn’t think the satyr would be able to buy me much of a head start. Also, I didn’t like the idea of returning to that kind, sleep-deprived cloud nymph, Mellie, and informing her that her husband had been killed by a squad of bubble-wrapped robots. Oh, my mortal sympathies really were getting the better of me!

‘Who is this sorceress?’ I demanded. ‘What – what does she intend to do with me?’

Macro’s smile was cold and insincere. I had used that smile myself many times in the old days, whenever some Greek town prayed to me to save them from a plague and I had to break the news: Gee, I’m sorry, but I caused that plague because I don’t like you. Have a nice day!

‘You’ll see soon enough,’ Macro promised. ‘I didn’t believe her when she said you’d walk right into our trap, but here you are. She predicted that you wouldn’t be able to resist the Burning Maze. Ah, well. Military Madness team members, kill the satyr and apprehend the former god!’

The automatons shuffled forward.

At the same moment, a blur of green, red and brown near the ceiling caught my eye – a satyr-like shape leaping from the top of the nearest aisle, swinging off a fluorescent light fixture and landing in the whitewater raft above Macro’s head.

Before I could shout Grover Underwood! the raft landed on top of Macro and his minions, burying them under a boatload of savings. Grover leaped free, a paddle in his hand, and yelled, ‘Come on!’

The confusion allowed us a few moments to flee, but with the exit doors locked we could only run deeper into the store.

‘Nice one!’ Hedge slapped Grover on the back as we raced through the camouflage department. ‘I knew you wouldn’t leave us!’

‘Yes, but there’s no nature anywhere in here,’ Grover complained. ‘No plants. No soil. No natural light. How are we supposed to fight in these conditions?’

‘Guns!’ Hedge suggested.

‘That whole part of the store is on fire,’ Grover said, ‘thanks to a Molotov cocktail and some ammo boxes.’

‘Curses!’ said the coach.

We passed a display of martial arts weapons, and Hedge’s eyes lit up. He quickly exchanged his croquet mallet for a pair of nunchaku. ‘Now we’re talking! You guys want some shurikens or a kusarigama?’

‘I want to run away,’ Grover said, shaking his boat paddle. ‘Coach, you have to stop thinking about full-frontal assaults! You have a family!’

‘Don’t you think I know that?’ Coach growled. ‘We tried settling down with the McLeans in LA. Look how well that turned out.’

I guessed there was a story there – why they had come from LA, why Hedge sounded so bitter about it – but while fleeing from enemies in a surplus store was perhaps not the best time to talk about it.

‘I suggest we find another exit,’ I said. ‘We can run away and argue about ninja weapons at the same time.’

This compromise seemed to satisfy them both.

We sped past a display of inflatable swimming pools (How were those military surplus?), then turned a corner and saw in front of us, at the far rear corner of the building, a set of double doors labelled EMPLOYEES ONLY.

Grover and Hedge charged ahead, leaving me gasping in their wake. From somewhere nearby, Macro’s voice called, ‘You can’t escape, Apollo! I’ve already called the Horse. He’ll be here any minute!’

The horse?

Why did that term send a B-major chord of terror vibrating through my bones? I searched my jumbled memories for a clear answer but came up empty.

My first thought: maybe ‘the Horse’ was a nom de guerre. Perhaps the emperor employed an evil wrestler who wore a black satin cape, shiny spandex shorts and a horse-head-shaped helmet.

My second thought: why did Macro get to call for backup when I could not? Demigod communications had been magically sabotaged for months. Phones short-circuited. Computers melted. Iris-messages and magical scrolls failed to work. Yet our enemies seemed to have no trouble texting each other messages like Apollo, my place. Where U @? Help me kill him!

It wasn’t fair.

Fair would have been me getting my immortal powers back and blasting our enemies to tiny pieces.

We burst through the EMPLOYEES ONLY doors. Inside was a storage room/loading bay filled with more bubble-wrapped automatons, all standing silent and lifeless like the crowd at one of Hestia’s housewarming parties. (She may be the goddess of the family hearth, but the lady has no clue about how to throw a party.)

Gleeson and Grover ran past the robots and began tugging at the rolling metal garage door that sealed off the loading dock.

‘Locked.’ Hedge whacked the door with his nunchaku.

I peered through the tiny plastic windows of the employee doors. Macro and his minions were barrelling in our direction. ‘Run or stay?’ I asked. ‘We’re about to be cornered again.’

‘Apollo, what have you got?’ Hedge demanded.

‘What do you mean?’

‘What’s the ace up your sleeve? I did the Molotov cocktail. Grover dropped the boat. It’s your turn. Godly fire, maybe? We could use some godly fire.’