The Watcher ❪ Book 1❫

Prologue

I watched from above on the mast, unseen, as Annabeth Chase paced the deck of the Argo ll. I watched as she checked and double-checked if the ballistae were locked down if the "We come in peace" flag was up (which caused me to hide more), and even encouraged Coach Gleeson Hedge, a violent satyr, to take the morning off--I swear that girl was so paranoid. And even if she were doing that stuff, it wouldn't have made a difference. The Argo ll was two hundred feet long, with a bronze-plated hull, mounted repeating crossbows fore and aft, a flaming metal dragon for a figurehead, and two rotating ballistae amidships that could fire explosive bolts powerful enough to blast through concrete. So yeah, it wasn't the friendliest looking of rides.

Earlier, Annabeth had asked Leo Valdez to send the Romans one of his inventions—a holographic scroll—to alert them not to attack them. I hope it worked because I'm on this ship, too, and I do not want to get blown up today.

Too late to turn back now.

The hull broke through the clouds letting the once hidden Oakland Hills be seen. Annabeth gripped one of the bronze shields that lined the starboard rail. Her three crewmates took their places.

On the stern quarterdeck, Leo rushed around like a whirlwind, checking his gauges and wrestling levers. You know, most helmsmen would've been satisfied with a pilot's wheel or a tiller, right? Wrong! Leo went all out. He had also installed a keyboard, monitor, aviation controls from a Learjet, dubstep soundboard, and motion-control sensors from a Nintendo Wii. He could turn the ship by pulling on the throttle and fire weapons by sampling an album or raising sails by quickly shaking his Wii controllers. How he got all that stuff, I do not know.

I turned my head and looked to the second girl on the crew, Piper McLean. Piper was pacing back and forth between the mainmast and the ballistae, practicing her lines.

"Lower your weapons," she murmured. "We just want to talk."

Her charm speak was powerful, I even saw it turn Annabeth's head a bit, but it wasn't enough to make me bat an eye. The mental block in my head that I had created years ago made her enchanting words useless.

For a child of Aphrodite, Piper tried hard to play down her beauty. Let me tell you; it wasn't working. Today she was dressed in tattered jeans, worn-out sneakers, and a white tank top with pink Hello Kitty designs. Piper braided her choppy brown hair down the right side with an eagle's feather.

Then I turned to where her boyfriend, Jason Grace, stood: at the bow on the raised crossbow platform, where the Romans could easily spot him. He looked calm and in control—just like a child of Jupiter should be—,but the death grip on his sword's hilt told another story. He wore jeans and an orange Camp Half-Blood T-shirt, under a toga and purple cloak—symbols of his old rank as praetor. He's grown up at Camp Jupiter, so hopefully, his familiar face would make the Romans hesitant to blow the ship out of the sky.

As I have said before, I'm on this ship too. Besides, I don't think combustion would be good for my health.

Jason was also part of Hera's forced "exchange program" to introduce the two camps. Her Majesty, Queen of Olympus, had convinced the other gods that their two sets of children—Roman and Greek—had to combine forces to save the world from the evil goddess Gaea, who was awakening from the earth, and her horrible children, the giants.

Without warning, Hera had taken Percy Jackson, Annabeth's boyfriend, wiped his memory and sent him to the Roman camp. In return, the Greeks had gotten Jason. I shifted. The thought made me think of Percy and that he was somewhere below.

In the beginning, Percy was my mission. Watch over him, make sure he was going down the right path, and that he was generally ok. Chiron assigned me to him; he even made me live next to him. I was never supposed to talk to him or meet him, but I broke that rule about a month after moving into the building. We became best friends, inseparable. But I never told him about me. He didn't know l followed him on his quests or that I had any part of his world. I kept it like that.