Haunted || Leo Valdez

36 - Apparently Rebecca Getting Scary Is Becoming a Regular Thing

Leo pulled a reliable trick. From his tool belt, he grabbed a flask of oil and splashed it in an arc in front of him, dousing the Maenads. He summoned fire into his hands and set the oil ablaze.

A wall of flames engulfed the nymphs. Jason, Rebecca, Anne, and Piper did a one-eighty and ran. Leo was right behind them.

Rebecca expected to hear screaming from the Maenads. Instead, she heard laughter. She glanced back and saw the Maenads dancing through the flames in their bare feet. Their dresses were smoldering, but the Maenads didn't seem to care. They leaped through the fire like they were playing in a sprinkler.

"Thank you, unbeliever!" Babette laughed. "Our frenzy makes us immune to fire, but it does tickle! Trixie, send the unbelievers a thank-you gift!"

Trixie skipped over to the pile of boulders. She grasped a rock the size of a refrigerator and lifted it over her head.

"Run!" Piper said.

"We are running!" Jason picked up the speed.

"Run better!" Leo shouted.

"Such wisdom!" Anne yelled at him with stifling sarcasm.

"Shut up!" Rebecca shrieked at both of them.

They reached the edge of the clearing when a shadow passed overhead.

"Veer left!" Leo yelled.

They dove into the trees as the boulder slammed next to them with a jaw-rattling thud, missing Leo by a few inches. They skidded down a ravine until Leo lost his footing. He plowed into Rebecca, Anne, Jason, and Piper so they ended up rolling downhill like a demigod snowball. They crashed into Brooke's stream at the bottom. Rebecca landed sprawled across Leo's chest, their noses inches apart.

"Hi," Leo said breathlessly. His face was bright red.

"Your breath stinks," Rebecca replied before stumbling to her feet and helping him up, pretending she wasn't flustered by how close they'd been. Anne grinned at her and wiggled her eyebrows. Rebecca didn't have time for this. She flipped Anne off with both hands, earning a snort from the former queen.

They ran deeper into the woods. Behind them, Rebecca heard the Maenads laughing and shouting, urging Leo to come back so they could rip him to shreds.

Jason pulled them behind a massive oak tree, where they stood gasping for breath. Piper's elbow was scraped up pretty badly. Jason's left pants leg had ripped almost completely off, so it looked like his leg was wearing a denim cape. Rebecca's hair was hopelessly tangled with sticks and leaves. The knees of Anne's skinny jeans were ripped and stained brown with dirt. Somehow, they'd all made it down the hill without killing themselves with their own weapons, which was a miracle.

"How do we beat them?" Jason demanded. "They're immune to fire. They're super strong."

"We can't kill them," Rebecca said.

"There has to be a way," Leo said.

"No. We can't kill them," Anne agreed. "Anyone who kills a Maenad is cursed by Dionysus. People who kill his followers go crazy or get morphed into animals or... well, bad stuff."

"Worse than letting the Maenads rip us to shreds?" Jason asked.

"Much worse," Rebecca answered.

"That's just great," Jason said. "So we have to stop them without killing them. Anyone got a really big piece of flypaper?"

"As you would say, 'fresh out,' " Anne said.

"We're outnumbered four to one," Piper said. "Plus..." She grabbed Leo's wrist and checked his watch. "We have twenty minutes until Bunker Nine explodes."