The Missing Hero

The Missing Hero Episode 6

Piper stepped forward, ready to smack her, but Annabeth said, “Piper, stop.”

Piper did. She wasn’t a bit scared of Drew, but Annabeth didn’t seem like somebody she wanted for an enemy.

“We need to make our new arrivals feel welcome,” Annabeth said, with another pointed look at Drew. “We’ll assign them each a guide, give them a tour of camp. Hopefully by the campfire tonight, they’ll be claimed.”

“Would somebody tell me what claimed means?” Piper asked.

Suddenly there was a collective gasp. The campers backed away. At first Piper thought she’d done something wrong. Then she realized their faces were bathed in a strange red light, as if someone had lit a torch behind her. She turned and almost forgot how to breathe.

Floating over Leo’s head was a blazing holographic image —a fiery hammer.

“That,” Annabeth said, “is claiming.”

“What’d I do?” Leo backed toward the lake. Then he glanced up and yelped. “Is my hair on fire?” He ducked, but the symbol followed him, bobbing and weaving so it looked like he was trying to write something in flames with his head.

“This can’t be good,” Butch muttered. “The curse—” “Butch, shut up,” Annabeth said. “Leo, you’ve just been claimed—”

“By a god,” Jason interrupted. “That’s the symbol of Vulcan, isn’t it?”

All eyes turned to him.

“Jason,” Annabeth said carefully, “how did you know that?” “I’m not sure.”

“Vulcan?” Leo demanded. “I don’t even LIKE Star Trek.

What are you talking about?”

“Vulcan is the Roman name for Hephaestus,” Annabeth said, “the god of blacksmiths and fire.”

The fiery hammer faded, but Leo kept swatting the air like he was afraid it was following him. “The god of what? Who?”

Annabeth turned to the guy with the bow. “Will, would you take Leo, give him a tour? Introduce him to his bunk-mates in Cabin Nine.”

“Sure, Annabeth.”

“What’s Cabin Nine?” Leo asked. “And I’m not a Vulcan!” “Come on, Mr. Spock, I’ll explain everything.” Will put a

hand on his shoulder and steered him off toward the cabins.

Annabeth turned her attention back to Jason. Usually Piper didn’t like it when other girls checked out her boyfriend, but Annabeth didn’t seem to care that he was a good-looking guy. She studied him more like he was a complicated blueprint. Finally she said, “Hold out your arm.”

Piper saw what she was looking at, and her eyes widened.

Jason had taken off his windbreaker after his dip in the lake, leaving his arms bare, and on the inside of his right forearm was a tattoo. How had Piper never noticed it before? She’d looked at Jason’s arms a million times. The tattoo couldn’t have just appeared, but it was darkly etched, impossible to miss: a dozen straight lines like a bar code, and over that an eagle with the letters spqr.

“I’ve never seen marks like this,” Annabeth said. “Where did you get them?”

Jason shook his head. “I’m getting really tired of saying this, but I don’t know.”

The other campers pushed forward, trying to get a look at Jason’s tattoo. The marks seemed to bother them a lot—almost like a declaration of war.

“They look burned into your skin,” Annabeth noticed.

“They were,” Jason said. Then he winced as if his head was aching. “I mean … I think so. I don’t remember.”

No one said anything. It was clear the campers saw Annabeth as the leader. They were waiting for her verdict.

“He needs to go straight to Chiron,” Annabeth decided. “Drew, would you—”

“Absolutely.” Drew laced her arm through Jason’s. “This way, sweetie. I’ll introduce you to our director. He’s … an interesting guy.” She flashed Piper a smug look and led Jason toward the big blue house on the hill.

The crowd began to disperse, until only Annabeth and Piper were left.

“Who’s Chiron?” Piper asked. “Is Jason in some kind of trouble?”

Annabeth hesitated. “Good question, Piper. Come on, I’ll give you a tour. We need to talk.”

PIPER SOONREALIZED ANNABETH’S HEART wasn’t in the tour.

She talked about all this amazing stuff the camp offered—magic archery, pegasus riding, the lava wall, fighting monsters —but she showed no excitement, as if her mind were elsewhere. She pointed out the open-air dining pavilion that overlooked Long Island Sound. (Yes, Long Island, New York; they’d traveled that far on the chariot.) Annabeth explained how Camp Half-Blood was mostly a summer camp, but some kids stayed here year-round, and they’d added so many campers it was always crowded now, even in winter.

Piper wondered who ran the camp, and how they’d known Piper and her friends belonged here. She wondered if she’d have to stay full-time, or if she’d be any good at the activities. Could you flunk out of monster fighting? A million questions bubbled in her head, but given Annabeth’s mood, she decided to keep quiet.

As they climbed a hill at the edge of camp, Piper turned and got an amazing view of the valley—a big stretch of woods to the northwest, a beautiful beach, the creek, the canoe lake, lush green fields, and the whole layout of the cabins—a bizarre assortment of buildings arranged like a Greek omega, Ω, with a loop of cabins around a central green, and two wings sticking out the bottom on either side. Piper counted twenty cabins in all. One glowed golden, another silver. One had grass on the roof. Another was bright red with barbed wire trenches. One cabin was black with fiery green torches out front.

All of it seemed like a different world from the snowy hills and fields outside.

“The valley is protected from mortal eyes,” Annabeth said. “As you can see, the weather is controlled, too. Each cabin represents a Greek god—a place for that god’s children to live.”

She looked at Piper like she was trying to judge how Piper was handling the news.

“You’re saying Mom was a goddess.”

Annabeth nodded. “You’re taking this awfully calmly.”

Piper couldn’t tell her why. She couldn’t admit that this just confirmed some weird feelings she’d had for years, arguments she’d had with her father about why there were no photos of Mom in the house, and why Dad would never tell her exactly how or why her mom had left them. But mostly, the dream had warned her this was coming. Soon they will find you, demigod, that voice had rumbled. When they do, follow our directions. Cooperate, and your father might live.

Piper took a shaky breath. “I guess after this morning, it’s a little easier to believe. So who’s my mom?”

“We should know soon,” Annabeth said. “You’re what—fifteen? Gods are supposed to claim you when you’re thirteen. That was the deal.”

“The deal?”

“They made a promise last summer … well, long story… but they promised not to ignore their demigod children anymore, to claim them by the time they turn thirteen. Sometimes it takes a little longer, but you saw how fast Leo was claimed once he got here. Should happen for you soon. Tonight at the campfire, I bet we’ll get a sign.”

Piper wondered if she’d have a big flaming hammer over her head, or with her luck, something even more embarrassing. A flaming wombat, maybe. Whoever her mother was, Piper had no reason to think she’d be proud to claim a kleptomaniac daughter with massive problems. “Why thirteen? ”

“The older you get,” Annabeth said, “the more monsters notice you, try to kill you. ’Round thirteen is usually when it starts. That’s why we send protectors into the schools to find you guys, get you to camp before it’s too late.”

“Like Coach Hedge?”

Annabeth nodded. “He’s—he was a satyr: half man, half goat. Satyrs work for the camp, finding demigods, protecting them, bringing them in when the time is right.”

Piper had no trouble believing Coach Hedge was half goat. She’d seen the guy eat. She’d never liked the coach much, but she couldn’t believe he’d sacrificed himself to save them.

“What happened to him?” she asked. “When we went up into the clouds, did he … is he gone for good?”

“Hard to say.” Annabeth’s expression was pained. “Storm spirits … difficult to battle. Even our best weapons, Celestial bronze, will pass right through them unless you can catch them by surprise.”

“Jason’s sword just turned them to dust,” Piper remembered.

“He was lucky, then. If you hit a monster just right, you can dissolve them, send their essence back to Tartarus.”

“Tartarus?”

“A huge abyss in the Underworld, where the worst monsters come from. Kind of like a bottomless pit of evil. Anyway, once monsters dissolve, it usually takes months, even years before they can re-form again. But since this storm spirit Dylan got away—well, I don’t know why he’d keep Hedge alive. Hedge was a protector, though. He knew the risks. Satyrs don’t have mortal souls. He’ll be reincarnated as a tree or a flower or something.”

Piper tried to imagine Coach Hedge as a clump of very angry pansies. That made her feel even worse.