Percy Jackson and the Olympians: The Chalice of the Gods

As I swam downstream, I heard a faint strand of music drifting through the air: Grover’s panpipes, somewhere far across the cavern. He’d given up on Duran Duran. Now he was playing the Beatles’ “Help!” I took this as a subtle message that he was getting tired of leading the snake parade.

I grabbed Iris’s staff and swam back to Annabeth and Elisson. I was hoping that Annabeth might throw me the rope and help me up, but she didn’t look like she was in any hurry to say good-bye to the river god. In fact, she had pulled out her thermos and was pouring him a hot beverage.

“So this is a nice rose hip–chamomile blend,” she told him. “I think you’ll find it soothing.”

Elisson sipped the tea. “Lovely.”

“What is going on?” I asked.

I wasn’t really expecting an answer, which was good, since I didn’t get one.

“How often a day?” Elisson asked Annabeth.

“Oh, I’d try morning and evening,” she said. “Also, anytime you want to meditate. Here.” She handed him a couple of extra packets. “No caffeine. I’d stay away from that green tea. It’s stressing you out.”

“I suppose you’re right,” the god sighed. “So, for a new schedule . . . perhaps we could reserve every other Saturday for demigods to clean sacred objects. Is—is that fair?”

“More than fair,” Annabeth said.

“Totally,” I agreed. “But right now, we’ve got a friend being chased by snakes.”

Annabeth frowned, like I was ruining a nice moment, but Elisson drained his teacup and handed it back to her. “Of course. Good luck saving your friend. And, uh . . .” He swallowed nervously. “If you were serious about a whale yoga course at Poseidon’s palace . . .”

“Oh, I never kid about whale yoga,” I promised him. “I’ll put in a word with my dad.”

Elisson wiped his nose. “Thank you, Percy Jackson. And, Annabeth Chase, you’ve been very kind.”

Then, clutching his packets of herbal tea, Elisson liquefied and spilled over the side of the cliff. I moved out of the way because I didn’t want to get rained on by his runoff.

Once I was fairly sure he was gone, I looked up at Annabeth. “You brought tea? While I’m down here getting tossed around, you’re literally drinking tea?”

She shrugged. “Iris told us he was into yoga. I figured herbal tea might be a good offering.”

She said this as if her line of reasoning made perfect sense, like of course x = 2yz3 where x is yoga and y is tea.

“Sure,” I said. “Got anything else in there that might help us rescue Grover?”

“Bien s?r,” she said, which I think is French for What do you think, Seaweed Brain? She dug a paper bag from her backpack and shook the contents. “Snake treats. The guy at the store recommended hamster flavor.”

“I have so many questions.”

“We should get going. We’re wasting time.”

“You sure we don’t have time for another cup of Meditation Magic? How about you throw me that rope.”

“Not necessary.” She got to her feet. “Just swim downstream. I’ll turn invisible. . . .” She pulled out her magic New York Yankees cap—her favorite get out of jail free fashion accessory. “I’ll go east and find Grover, distract the snakes with these treats, and get him out of danger.”

“While I head west and make myself a new target,” I guessed.

“Exactly,” she said. “Once the snakes are following you, we’ll circle back and rendezvous with you at the cave entrance.”

“And, uh, do I get hamster-flavored Snakie Bakies?”

“You won’t need them.”

“Then what am I supposed to distract them with? And more importantly, how do I get away from them once I’ve gotten their attention? Because, you know, those are the kinds of details I like to have covered.”

Annabeth’s smile told me I was going to hate her reply almost as much as I hated getting pushed off ledges. “You’ve got Iris’s staff. You’ve got the best job of all.”





I can now cross skipping through a field while making rainbows off my bucket list.

By the time I got out of the river, a few hundred yards downstream, Grover was playing his song of last resort. Distant strains of “YMCA” echoed through the cavern. I knew this was a signal that he was running out of energy and breath. Because when somebody plays “YMCA,” it is almost always a cry for help.

Annabeth had instructed me to skip through the fields while holding Iris’s staff. She was pretty sure this would create a beautiful rainbow, which would draw the serpents’ attention with a high level of Ooh, pretty. Meanwhile, she would turn invisible, find Grover, and escort him to safety, tossing Snakie Bakies as needed to keep the serpents away from them.

“And if I can’t get the staff to work?” I asked.

“I have faith,” Annabeth said.

I was pretty sure she was trying not to laugh.

“And if I can’t lose the serpents once they’re following me?”

“Just shut off the rainbow,” she said. “Once you go dark, you should be fine. And whatever you do, don’t stop skipping, Skippy.”

Being a good soldier, I did what she told me. As soon as I trudged out of the river, I put on my shoes and socks—which had washed up in a nearby clump of reeds—and started skipping through the grass.

That lasted about ten feet. Then I realized Annabeth must have been trolling me.

I could run a lot faster than I could skip. I doubted the staff would care. I took off across the fields. Sure enough, after only a few steps, the staff began to glow.

Shimmering ribbons of light unfurled from the Celestial bronze headpiece, glowing brighter the longer I ran. Soon I was trailing a fifty-foot gossamer rainbow, making the fields glow all the colors of a crayon box.

I had a flashback to when I was a kid—like actually a kid, not last week at Hebe Jeebies. My mom had taken me to the East Meadow in Central Park to fly a kite for the first time. I remembered running across the field, grinning with delight as my big blue nylon octopus rose into the air. It kind of made me sad thinking about how long ago that was—and also how the kite had gotten zapped by lightning (in the middle of a sunny day) as soon as it was airborne. Even back then, before I knew I was a demigod, Zeus had been watching me. Because that’s what you do when you’re the king of the gods. You spend your valuable time being as petty as possible, frying forbidden kids’ kites out of the sky for fun.

Anyway, it felt good to have another chance. I sprinted on, holding up the staff, filling the cavern with my one-man rainbow parade. It wasn’t long before I heard the sounds of rustling and hissing in the grass behind me. Snakes—lots of them—were closing in, excited to follow theOoh, pretty and eat whatever was causing it.

That thought helped me run faster.

After another hundred yards or so, I made the mistake of glancing back. The entire field was crashing toward me like a surfer’s wave, the grass collapsing under the weight of thousands of slithering serpents.

Somewhere in the distance, Grover’s music faltered to a stop on theY of “YMCA.” I hoped that meant he was safe and Annabeth was now escorting him out of the cave. If I could just keep running for a while longer, I could shut off the rainbow and veer back toward the mouth of the cave. . . .

Hold on. Where was the mouth of the cave?

A bit too late, I realized I’d lost my bearings. I was up to my eyeballs in grass with no other landmarks in sight. All I could hear was the rumbling of the Horned Serpent Battalion behind me. I assumed I was still heading west, directly away from the river, but I couldn’t be sure. The rainbow light was playing tricks on my eyesight. And my growing sense of panic wasn’t helping me think.

I started veering right, hoping I could lead the snakes in a wide arc back toward the river. I didn’t factor in how tired I was, though. Exploding the River Elisson had taken a lot of energy. My legs were getting heavy. My lungs burned.

I was losing speed. The snakes were closing in.

So naturally, I chose that moment to trip on a rock.