"Just write a book" they said. "It'll be easy," they said, "Everyone gets published these days." Yeah, well, it's a little harder when your editors are gods that will turn you into a gecko and use you as a ping pong ball if you don't write them exac...
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YEAH, YOU READ THAT RIGHT. Note to demigods: don't go shopping on quests. A lot of monsters use those things as covers.
But I'm getting a head of myself. We didn't even have a way to Los Angeles yet. I was standing there in a daze, trying to write my will, when Annabeth somehow got an idea for that. She hailed a taxi and loaded us into the back as if we already had money.
"Los Angeles, please," she said.
The cabbie chewed his cigar and sized us up. I guess we didn't pass his money check, because he said, "That's three hundred miles. For that, you gotta pay up front."
"You accept casino debit cards?" Annabeth said.
He shrugged. "Some of 'em. Same as credit cards. I gotta swipe 'em through first."
Annabeth handed him her green LotusCash card. The man looked at it skeptically. I crossed my fingers that that actually worked, and it wasn't somehow magically tied to the casino. That sounded like something evil mind control people would do. Just to make you regret leaving.
With her prompting, the man swiped the card. The meter machine started rattling. The lights flashed. It tore through numbers so fast it was a blur, before settling on an infinity symbol.
The cigar fell out of the driver's mouth. He turned to us, his eyes about to pop out of his head. "Where to in Los Angeles...uh, Your Highness?"
Oh boy. That wasn't going to do good for Annabeth's ego. She was already starting to preen herself.
"The Santa Monica Pier," she said, like she very please with being called 'Your Highness.' I would definitely tease her about that later. "Get us there fast, and you can keep the change."
That sounded cool...for about five seconds. The guy took full advantage of Annabeth saying get us there fast and not get us there alive, and promptly tore through the Mojave Desert. I don't think the speedometer ever went below ninety-five.
♆
DESPITE DRIVING AT TOP SPEEDS, WE STILL HAD PLENTY OF TIME TO TALK. Between the mist and his determination to get his tip, I'm pretty sure we could have started plotting actual crimes and the driver wouldn't notice.
Percy and I took the chance to explain our latest dream to our friends. About the servant and their plan for revenge. About how they'd thought I would be "sympathetic to their cause" (Percy scoffed so hard the driver asked if he was okay, which I'm still proud of) and seeing ourselves crowned by the dead. About – most importantly – the servant calling the voice in the pit something other than "my lord." A special name, or title.
