Rachel put her chin on her fist. “Really? Do tell.”
“Uh, what I meant to say: the Grove of Dodona is a benevolent force. It has helped heroes before. The masthead of the original Argo, for instance, was carved from a branch of the sacred trees. It could speak to the Argonauts and give them guidance.”
“Mm.” Chiron nodded. “And that’s why our mysterious Beast wants the grove burned.”
“Apparently,” I said. “And that’s why we have to save it.”
Meg rolled backward off the couch. Her legs knocked over the three-legged coffee table, spilling our Arizona tea and crackers. “Oops.”
I ground my mortal teeth, which would not last a year if I kept hanging around Meg. Rachel and Chiron wisely ignored my young friend’s display of Megness.
“Apollo…” The old centaur watched a waterfall of tea trickling from the edge of the table. “If you are right about Dodona, how do we proceed? We are already shorthanded. If we send search teams into the woods, we have no guarantee they’ll come back.”
Meg brushed the hair out of her eyes. “We’ll go. Just Apollo and me.”
My tongue attempted to hide in the depths of my throat. “We—we will?”
“You said you gotta do a bunch of trials or whatever to prove you’re worthy, right? This’ll be the first one.”
Part of me knew she was right, but the remnants of my godly self rebelled at the idea. I never did my own dirty work. I would rather have picked a nice group of heroes and sent them to their deaths—or, you know, glorious success.
Yet Rhea had been clear in my dream: finding the Oracle was my job. And thanks to the cruelty of Zeus, where I went, Meg went. For all I knew, Zeus was aware of the Beast and his plans, and he had sent me here specifically to deal with the situation…a thought that did not make me any more likely to get him a nice tie for Father’s Day.
I also remembered the other part of my dream: the Beast in his mauve suit, encouraging me to find the Oracle so he could burn it down. There was still too much I didn’t understand, but I had to act. Austin and Kayla were depending on me.
Rachel put her hand on my knee, which made me flinch. Surprisingly, she did not inflict any pain. Her gaze was more earnest than angry. “Apollo, you have to try. If we can get a glimpse of the future…well, it may be the only way to get things back to normal.” She looked longingly at the blank walls of her cave. “I’d like to have a future again.”
Chiron shifted his forelegs. “What do you need from us, old friend? How can we help?”
I glanced at Meg. Sadly, I could tell that we were in agreement. We were stuck with each other. We couldn’t risk anyone else.
“Meg is right,” I said. “We have to do this ourselves. We should leave immediately, but—”
“We’ve been up all night,” Meg said. “We need some sleep.”
Wonderful, I thought. Now Meg is finishing my sentences.
This time I could not argue with her logic. Despite my fervor to rush into the woods and save my children, I had to proceed cautiously. I could not mess up this rescue. And I was increasingly certain that the Beast would keep his captives alive for now. He needed them to lure me into his trap.
Chiron rose on his front hooves. “This evening, then. Rest and prepare, my heroes. I fear you will need all your strength and wits for what comes next.”
Armed to the eyeballs:
A combat ukulele
Magic Brazil scarf
SUN GODS ARE NOT GOOD at sleeping during the day, but somehow I managed a fitful nap.
When I woke in the late afternoon, I found the camp in a state of agitation.
Kayla and Austin’s disappearance had been the tipping point. The other campers were now so rattled, no one could maintain a normal schedule. I suppose a single demigod disappearing every few weeks felt like a normal casualty rate. But a pair of demigods disappearing in the middle of a camp-sanctioned activity—that meant no one was safe.
Word must have spread of our conference in the cave. The Victor twins had stuffed wads of cotton in their ears to foil the oracular voices. Julia and Alice had climbed to the top of the lava wall and were using binoculars to scan the woods, no doubt hoping to spot the Grove of Dodona, but I doubted they could see the trees for the forest.
Everywhere I went, people were unhappy to see me. Damien and Chiara sat together at the canoe dock, glowering in my direction. Sherman Yang waved me away when I tried to talk with him. He was busy decorating the Ares cabin with frag grenades and brightly decorated claymores. If it had been Saturnalia, he definitely would have won the prize for most violent holiday decorations.
Even the Athena Parthenos stared down at me accusingly from the top of the hill as if to say, This is all your fault.
She was right. If I hadn’t let Python take over Delphi, if I’d paid more attention to the other ancient Oracles, if I hadn’t lost my divinity—