Sea Green Eyes

Chapter 45

Things went wrong immediately.

The giants vanished in twin puffs of smoke. They reappeared halfway across the room, each in a different spot. Percy sprinted toward Ephialtes, but slots in the floor opened under his feet, and metal walls shot up on either side, separating him from his friends.

The walls started closing in on him like the sides of a vice grip. Percy jumped up and grabbed the bottom of the hydra's cage. He caught a brief glimpse of Piper leaping across a hopscotch pattern of fiery pits, making her way toward Nico, who was dazed and weaponless and being stalked by a pair of leopards.

Jason took up Percy's task of charging at Ephialtes while Cressida was unarmed as she stood before Otis, and she began spinning. She was on one leg as she did pirouette after pirouette and Otis copied her movements as if they were seeing who could hold out the longest.

Percy knew that she was a good dancer, but he had no idea that she could do ballet or anything like that as she flourished her leg with each turn. He also had no idea how she wasn't dizzy. She had no idea either.

Percy registered all this in a split second, but there wasn't much he could do about it. The hydra snapped at his hands. He swung and dropped, landing in a grove of painted plywood trees that sprang up from nowhere. The trees changed positions as he tried to run through them, so he slashed down the whole forest with Riptide.

"Wonderful!" Ephialtes cried, Jason recovering from where he'd been knocked to the side. He stood at his control panel about sixty feet to Percy's left. "We'll consider this a dress rehearsal. Shall I unleash the hydra onto the Spanish Steps now?" He pulled a lever, and Percy glanced behind him. The cage he had just been hanging from was now rising toward a hatch in the ceiling. In three seconds it would be gone. If Percy attacked the giant, the hydra would ravage the city.

Cursing, he threw Riptide like a boomerang. The sword wasn't designed for that, but the Celestial bronze blade sliced through the chains suspending the hydra. The cage tumbled sideways. The door broke open, and the monster spilled out—right in front of Percy.

"Oh, you are a spoilsport, Jackson!" Ephialtes called. "Very well. Battle it here, if you must, but your death won't be nearly as good without the cheering crowds."

Percy stepped forward to confront the monster—then realized he'd just thrown his weapon away. A bit of bad planning on his part. He rolled to one side as all eight hydra heads spit acid, turning the floor where he'd been standing into a steaming crater of melted stone.

"He may be a spoilsport," bellowed Cressida's voice from where she stood on top of Otis as she pulled her spear from his belly. In the midst of their pirouette-off, he'd been more concerned with winning while she'd been more concerned with distracting him. Otis had been losing his battle against dizziness when Cressida's spear shot out like a missile as it knocked him off his feet, falling backwards before she climbed atop him to twist the spear, the giant crying out as he tried to swipe at her, but she ducked. "But he's mine," she said as fire engulfed her hand. "Madness," she said to it before shooting it straight for the hydra and one of its heads began turning on the rest.

Cressida pulled her spear free before she jumped off Otis and onto the floor, her pinecone now covered in ichor as it transformed from spear form and she banged it on the ground, the sound echoing as she got the leopard's attention. Her eyes flamed, signalling to the creatures who her father was. "Serve me," she ordered, and the cats bowed as Piper visibly relaxed.

Cressida lifted her pinkies to her mouth as she let out a summoning whistle and the leopards charged at Otis who was coming for her as he clambered to his feet. He let out pained sounds as the cats clawed at him, Piper seeming a little more relieved from where she was guarding Nico.