SAFE . . . reyna ramirez-arellano

87 - the movie star

THE WOMAN LOOKED . . . interesting. Her dress was a flowery green-and-red wraparound, like the skirt of a Christmas tree. She had colorful plastic bangles on her wrists. Her hair was an over-teased corona of blonde curls and her scent of lemons and aerosol.

Her eyes were blue like Jason's, but they gleamed with fractured light, like she'd just come out of a bunker after a nuclear war – hungrily searching for familiar details in a changed world.

"Dearest." She held out her arms.

Jason's Mist disguise burned off. His posture straightened. His walking stick turned back into an Imperial gold gladius.

"Mom?" Jason choked out. Briar's breath stopped. Jason had never talked about his mom a lot, even at Camp Jupiter, and she'd never pressed him. ( Well, that was a lie. When they were younger, she asked him about it all the time )

But seeing Jason's mom . . . it made Briar feel uneasy. Whether that was because of her parent issues or because Jason's mom was using charmspeak, she didn't know.

"Yes, dearest." Jason's mother's image flickered. "Come, embrace me."

"You're – you're not real." Jason stammered.

"Of course she is real." Michael Varus said, sounding like he was enjoying this. "Did you think Gaia would let such an important spirit languish in the Underworld? She is your mother, Beryl Grace, star of television, sweetheart to the king of Olympus, who rejected her not once but twice, in both his Greek and Roman aspects. She deserves justice as much as any of us."

Jason stared ahead of him unblinkingly, and Briar's brain finally woke up. She'd been in this situation enough with him, Piper, and Reyna to know that she needed to do something.

"Jason, look at me," Briar charmspoke.

She straightened, forcing herself to look powerful as her best friend made eye contact with her. "That isn't your mother. Her voice is working some kind of magic on you – like charmspeak, but more dangerous. Can't you sense it?"

"She's right." Annabeth climbed onto the nearest table. She kicked aside a platter, startling a dozen suitors. "Jason, that's only a remnant of your mother, like an ara, maybe, or –"

"A remnant!" His mother's ghost sobbed. "Yes, look what I have been reduced to. It's Jupiter's fault. He abandoned us. He wouldn't help me! I didn't want to leave you in Sonoma, my dear, but Juno and Jupiter gave me no choice. They wouldn't allow us to stay together. Why fight for them now? Join these suitors. Lead them. We can be a family again!"

"You left me," Jason told his mother. "That wasn't Jupiter or Juno. That was you."

Beryl Grace stepped forward. The worry lines around her eyes, the pained tightness in her mouth reminded Briar of Jason's sister, Thalia.

"Dearest, I told you I would come back. Those were my last words to you. Don't you remember?"

Jason nodded imperceptibly. Briar didn't know what to do in this situation.

Across the table, Antinous raised his goblet. "So pleased to meet you, son of Jupiter. Listen to your mother. You have many grievances against the gods. Why not join us? I gather these two serving girls are your friends? We will spare them. You wish to have your mother remain in the world? We can do that. You wish to be a king –"

"No." Jason shook his head quickly. "No, I don't belong with you."

Michael Varus regarded him with cold eyes. "Are you so sure, my fellow praetor? Even if you defeat the giants and Gaia, would you return home like Odysseus did? Where is your home now? With the Greeks? With the Romans? No one will accept you. And, if you get back, who's to say you won't find ruins like this?"

Briar felt like her gut was being punched. How long had she spent, not believing that she belonged to Camp Half-Blood? How long had she spent being insecure of herself as a demigod, not knowing who she was?

She's been thinking lately about how she didn't have a home. She's not fit for Camp Half-Blood, but being a legionnaire at Camp Jupiter also didn't feel right. She just wanted to live her own life without any expectations on her shoulders.

"You were a legion officer," Jason told Varus. "A leader of Rome."

"So were you," Varus said. "Loyalties change."

"You think I belong with this crowd?" Jason asked. "A bunch of dead losers waiting for a free handout from Gaia, whining that the world owes them something?"

Around the courtyard, ghosts and ghouls rose to their feet and drew weapons.

"Beware!" Briar yelled at the crowd. Reacting to a sword drawn at her was a skill she'd mastered. "Every man in this palace is your enemy. Each one will stab you in the back at the first chance!"

She spoke the truth, and the crowd believed her. They looked sideways at one another, hands clenching the hilts of their swords.

Jason's mother stepped towards him. "Dearest, be sensible. Give up your quest. Your Argo II could never make the trip to Athens. Even if it did, there's the matter of the Athena Parthenos."

Jason's face paled. "What do you mean?"

"Don't feign ignorance, my dearest. Gaia knows about your friend Piper and Nico the son of Hades and the satyr Hedge. To kill them, the Earth Mother has sent her most dangerous son – the hunter who never rests. But you don't have to die."

The ghouls and ghosts closed in – two hundred of them facing Jason in anticipation, as if he might lead them in the national anthem.

The hunter who never rests.

Briar didn't know who that was, but she had to warn Piper and Nico.

Which meant she had to get out of here alive.

Jason looked at Annabeth and Briar. Briar kept a hand on her knife, giving him a nod.

"What do you want?" Jason asked, turning to his mother. "What brought you here?"

"I want life!" she cried. "Youth! Beauty! Your father could have made me immortal. He could have taken me to Olympus, but he abandoned me. You can set things right, Jason. You are my proud warrior!"

"You're a mania," Jason decided. "A spirit of insanity. That's what you've been reduced to."

"I am all that remains," Beryl Grace agreed. Her image flickered through a spectrum of colours. "Embrace me, son. I am all you have left."

"No," Jason croaked. He glanced at Annabeth and Briar. "My loyalties haven't changed. My family has just expanded. I'm a child of Greece and Rome." He looked back at his mother. "I'm no child of yours."

He made the ancient sign of warding off evil – three fingers thrust out from the heart – and the ghost of Beryl Grace disappeared with a soft hiss, like a sigh of relief.

The ghoul Antinous tossed aside his goblet. He studied Jason with a look of lazy disgust. "Well, then," he said, "I suppose we'll just kill you.

All around Briar, the enemies closed in.