La Vie en Rose // Percy Jackson

xi. we check into c.c.'s spa & resort

There are reasons for the switch.

Percy's POV:

I woke up in a rowboat with a makeshift sail stitched of gray uniform fabric. Annabeth and Annie sat next to me, tacking into the wind.

I tried to sit up and immediately felt woozy.

"Rest," Annabeth said. "You're going to need it."

"Tyson...?"

Annie shook her head. "Percy, I'm really sorry."

We were silent while the waves tossed us up and down.

"He may have survived," she said halfheartedly. "I mean, fire can't kill him."

I nodded, but I had no reason to feel hopeful, and I could tell from their expressions that they didn't either. We'd seen that explosion rip through solid iron. If Tyson had been down in the boiler room, there was no way he could've lived.

He'd given his life for us, and all I could think about were the times I'd felt embarrassed by him and had denied that the two of us were related.

Waves lapped at the boat. Annabeth and Annie showed me some things they'd salvaged from the wreckage—Hermes's thermos (now empty), a Ziploc bag full of ambrosia, a couple of sailors' shirts, and a bottle of Dr Pepper. She and Milo had fished me and Liv out of the water and found our knapsacks, bitten in half by Scylla's teeth. Most of our stuff had floated away, but I still had Hermes's bottle of multivitamins, and of course I had Riptide. The ballpoint pen always appeared back in my pocket no matter where I lost it.

We sailed for hours. Now that we were in the Sea of Monsters, the water glittered a more brilliant green, like Hydra acid. The wind smelled fresh and salty, but it carried a strange metallic scent, too—as if a thunderstorm were coming. Or something even more dangerous. I knew what direction we needed to go. I knew we were exactly one hundred thirteen nautical miles west by northwest of our destination. But that didn't make me feel any less lost.

No matter which way we turned, the sun seemed to shine straight into my eyes. We took turns sipping from the Dr. Pepper, shading ourselves with the sail as best we could. And we talked about my latest dream of Grover.

By Annie and Annabeth's estimate, we had less than twenty-four hours to find Grover, assuming my dream was accurate, and assuming the Cyclops Polyphemus didn't change his mind and try to marry Grover earlier.

"Yeah," I said bitterly. "You can never trust a Cyclops."

Annabeth stared across the water. "I'm sorry, Percy. I was wrong about Tyson, okay? I wish I could tell him that."

Annie nodded. "I do too."

I tried to stay mad at her, but it wasn't easy. We'd been through a lot together. She'd saved my life plenty of times. Annie had too. It was stupid of me to resent them.

I looked down at our measly possessions—the empty wind thermos, the bottle of multivitamins. I thought about Luke's look of rage when I'd tried to talk to him about his dad.

"Annabeth, Annie, what's Chiron's prophecy?" I asked as though they were reading my mind.

Annie pursed her lips. "Percy, Annabeth and I shouldn't—"

"I know Chiron promised the gods he wouldn't tell me. But you two didn't promise, did you?"

"Knowledge isn't always good for you," Annabeth told me.

"Your mom is the wisdom goddess!"

"I know! But every time heroes learn the future, they try to change it, and it never works."