Across the table from her sat an older skinny boy with curly brown hair—Connor Stoll, I deduced, though I’d never been able to tell him apart from his older brother, Travis. Despite the darkness, Connor wore sunglasses, no doubt to protect his eyes from a repeat poking. I also noted that he wisely kept his hands away from Meg’s mouth.
In the entire pavilion, I counted nineteen campers. Most sat alone at their respective tables—Sherman Yang for Ares; a girl I did not know for Aphrodite; another girl for Demeter. At the Nike table, two dark-haired young ladies who were obviously twins conversed over a war map. Chiron himself, again in full centaur form, stood at the head table, sipping his bug juice as he chatted with two satyrs, but their mood was subdued. The goat-men kept glancing at me, then eating their silverware, as satyrs tend to do when nervous. Half a dozen gorgeous dryads moved between the tables, offering food and drink, but I was so preoccupied I couldn’t fully appreciate their beauty. Even more tragic: I felt too embarrassed to flirt with them. What was wrong with me?
I studied the campers, hoping to spot some potential servants…I mean new friends. Gods always like to keep a few strong veteran demigods handy to throw into battle, send on dangerous quests, or pick the lint off our togas. Unfortunately, no one at dinner jumped out at me as a likely minion. I longed for a bigger pool of talent.
“Where are the…others?” I asked Will.
I wanted to say the A-List, but I thought that might be taken the wrong way.
Will took a bite of his pizza. “Were you looking for somebody in particular?”
“What about the ones who went on that quest with the boat?”
Will and Nico exchanged a look that might have meant, Here we go. I suppose they got asked a lot about the seven legendary demigods who had fought side by side with the gods against Gaea’s giants. It pained me that I had not gotten to see those heroes again. After any major battle, I liked to get a group photo—along with exclusive rights to compose epic ballads about their exploits.
“Well,” Nico started, “you saw Percy. He and Annabeth are spending their senior year in New York. Hazel and Frank are at Camp Jupiter doing the Twelfth Legion thing.”
“Ah, yes.” I tried to bring up a clear mental picture of Camp Jupiter, the Roman enclave near Berkeley, California, but the details were hazy. I could only remember my conversations with Octavian, the way he’d turned my head with his flattery and promises. That stupid boy…it was his fault I was here.
A voice whispered in the back of my mind. This time I thought it might be my conscience: Who was the stupid boy? It wasn’t Octavian.
“Shut up,” I murmured.
“What?” Nico asked.
“Nothing. Continue.”
“Jason and Piper are spending the school year in Los Angeles with Piper’s dad. They took Coach Hedge, Mellie, and Little Chuck with them.”
“Uh-huh.” I did not know those last three names, so I decided they probably weren’t important. “And the seventh hero…Leo Valdez?”
Nico raised his eyebrows. “You remember his name?”
“Of course! He invented the Valdezinator. Oh, what a musical instrument! I barely had time to master its major scales before Zeus zapped me at the Parthenon. If anyone could help me, it would be Leo Valdez.”
Nico’s expression tightened with annoyance. “Well, Leo isn’t here. He died. Then he came back to life. And if I see him again, I’ll kill him.”
Will elbowed him. “No, you won’t.” He turned to me. “During the fight with Gaea, Leo and his bronze dragon, Festus, disappeared in a midair fiery explosion.”
I shivered. After so many centuries driving the sun chariot, the term midair fiery explosion did not sit well with me.
I tried to remember the last time I’d seen Leo Valdez on Delos, when he’d traded the Valdezinator for information….
“He was looking for the physician’s cure,” I recalled, “the way to bring someone back from the dead. I suppose he planned all along to sacrifice himself?”
“Yep,” Will said. “He got rid of Gaea in the explosion, but we all assumed he died too.”
“Because he did,” Nico said.
“Then, a few days later,” Will continued, “this scroll came fluttering into camp on the wind….”
“I still have it.” Nico rummaged through the pockets of his bomber jacket. “I look at it whenever I want to get angry.”
He produced a thick parchment scroll. As soon as he spread it on the table, a flickering hologram appeared above the surface: Leo Valdez, looking impish as usual with his dark wispy hair, his mischievous grin, and his diminutive stature. (Of course, the hologram was only three inches tall, but even in real life Leo was not much more imposing.) His jeans, blue work shirt, and tool belt were speckled with machine oil.