The Legacy of a Demigod

An Old Buddy??

[Leo's POV]

The dwarves didn't try very hard to lose him, which made Leo suspicious. They stayed just at the edge of his vision, scampering over red-tiled rooftops, knocking over window boxes, whooping and hollering and leaving a trail of screws and nails from Leo's tool belt, almost as if they wanted Leo to follow.

He jogged after them, cursing every time his pants fell down. He turned a corner and saw two ancient stone towers jutting into the sky, side by side, much taller than anything else in the neighborhood, maybe medieval watchtowers? They leaned in different directions like gear shifts on a race car.

The Kerkopes scaled the tower on the right. When they reached the top, they climbed around the back and disappeared. Had they gone inside? Leo could see some tiny windows at the top, covered with metal grates; but he doubted those would stop the dwarfs.

He watched for a minute, but the Kerkopes didn't reappear. Which meant Leo had to get up there and look for them. "Great," he muttered. No flying friend to carry him up. The ship was too far away to call for help.

He could jury-rig the Archimedes sphere into some sort of flying device, maybe, but only if he had his tool belt, which he didn't. He scanned the neighborhood, trying to think. Half a block down, a set of double glass doors opened and an old lady hobbled out, carrying plastic shopping bags.

A grocery store? Hmm...

Leo patted his pockets. To his amazement, he still had some euro notes from his time in Rome. Those stupid dwarfs had taken everything except his money. He ran for the store as fast as his zipperless pants allowed.

Leo scoured the aisles, looking for things he could use. He didn't know the Italian for Hello, where are your dangerous chemicals, please? But that was probably just as well. He didn't want to end up in an Italian jail.

Fortunately, he didn't need to read labels. He could tell just from picking up a toothpaste tube whether it contained potassium nitrate. He found charcoal. He found sugar and baking soda. The store sold matches, bug spray, and aluminum foil. Pretty much everything he needed, plus a laundry cord he could use as a belt.

He added some Italian junk food to the basket, just to sort of disguise his more suspicious purchases, then dumped his stuff at the register. A wide-eyed checkout lady asked him some questions he didn't understand, but he managed to pay, get a bag, and race out.

He ducked into the nearest doorway where he could keep an eye on the towers. He started to work, summoning fire to dry out materials and do a little cooking that otherwise would have taken days to complete.

Every once in a while he sneaked a look at the tower, but there was no sign of the dwarfs. Leo could only hope they were still up there. Making his arsenal took just a few minutes, he was that good, but it felt like hours.

Jason didn't show. Maybe he was still tangled at the Neptune fountain, or scouring the streets looking for Leo. No one else from the ship came to help. Probably it was taking them a long time to get all those pink rubber bands out of Coach Hedge's hair.

That meant Leo had only himself, his bag of junk food, and a few highly improvised weapons made from sugar and toothpaste. Oh, and the Archimedes sphere. That was kind of important. He hoped he hadn't ruined it by filling it with chemical powder.

He ran to the tower and found the entrance. He started up the winding stairs inside, only to be stopped at a ticket booth by some caretaker who yelled at him in Italian. "Seriously?" Leo asked. "Look, man, you've got dwarfs in your belfry. I'm the exterminator."