𐌙/𐌍 Ᏽ𐌵𐌀𐌋𐌄 & 𐌕𐋅𐌄 Ᏽ𐌐𐌄𐌀𐌕 𐌌𐌙𐌕𐋅𐌔 ¹

Chapter 12

Twelve
𖧷

Snowboarding With Piggies

  We'd arrived on the outskirts of a little ski town nestled in the mountains. The sign said WELCOME TO CLOUDCROFT, NEW MEXICO. The air was cold and thin. The roofs of the cabins were heaped with snow, and dirty mounds of it were piled up on the sides of the streets. Tall pine trees loomed over the valley, casting pitch-black shadows, though the morning was sunny.

  Gummy flew around this time, gliding by my side and keeping up with our pace. By the time we reached Main Street, Gummy was happily chirping, but I didn't exactly know why. As we walked, I told Grover about my conversation with Apollo the night before–how he'd told me to seek out Nereus in San Francisco.

  Grover looked uneasy. "That's good, I guess. But we've got to get there first."

  I tried not to get too depressed about our chances. I didn't want to send Grover into a panic, but I knew we had another huge deadline looming, aside from saving Artemis in time for her council of the gods. The General had said Annabeth would only be kept alive until the winter solstice. That was Friday, only four days away. And he'd said something about a sacrifice. I didn't like the sound of that at all.

  We stopped in the middle of town. You could pretty much see everything from there: a school, a bunch of tourist stores and cafes, some ski cabins, and a grocery store.

  "Great," Thalia said, looking around. "No bus station. No taxis. No car rental. No way out."

  "There's a coffee shop!" said Grover.

  "Yes," Zoe said. "Coffee is good."

  "I agree with Zoe on this one," I said. "Coffee is great."

  "And pastries," Grover said dreamily. "And wax paper."

  Thalia sighed. "Fine. How about you two go get us some food with the crow. Percy, (y/n), Bianca, and I will check in the grocery store. Maybe they can give us directions."

  We agreed to meet back in front of the grocery store in fifteen minutes. Bianca looked a little uncomfortable coming with us, but she did.

  Inside the store, we found out a few valuable things about Cloudcroft: there wasn't enough snow for skiing, the grocery store sold rubcar rats for a dollar each, and there was no easy way in or out of town unless you had your own car.

  "You could call for a taxi from Alamogordo," the clerk said doubtfully. "That's down at the bottom of the mountains, but it would take at least an hour to get here. Cost several hundred dollars."

  The clerk looked so lonely, I bought a rubber rat. Then we headed back outside and stood on the porch.

  "Wonderful," Thalia grumped. "I'm going to walk down the street, see if anybody in the other shops has a suggestion."

  "But the clerk said—"

  "I know," she told me. "I'm checking anyway."

  I let her go. I knew how it felt to be restless. All half-bloods had attention deficit problems because of our inborn battlefield reflexes. We couldn't stand just waiting around. Also, I had a feeling Thalia was still upset over our conversation last night about Luke.

  Bianca and I stayed awkwardly with Percy playing drums with his pen. It felt weird to have Bianca right there after, what, two or three years? But now that she was standing in front of me, she just frowned like she did something wrong.