Haunted || Leo Valdez

96 - Where Did All These Wolves Come From? Smh

"Wolves?" Reyna asked.

They were eating dinner from the nearby pavement café.

Despite Hades's warning to hurry back, Rebecca had found nothing much changed at the camp. Reyna had just awoken. The Athena Parthenos still lay sideways across the top of the temple. Coach Hedge was entertaining a few locals with tap dancing and martial arts, occasionally singing into his megaphone, though nobody seemed to understand what he was saying.

Even though it had been almost a year, Hedge still hadn't figured out how to reverse the adjustments Leo had made to it the day they'd visited the Grand Canyon. It still blurted out random lines from Star Wars in Darth Vader's voice and spouted random farm animal noises, followed by "THE COW GOES MOO!" And when it wasn't acting up, it was just plain loud and obnoxious.

As the three of them sat on the lawn to eat, Reyna seemed alert and rested. She and Coach Hedge listened as Nico described his dreams and Rebecca recounted their meeting with Hades at the Chapel of Bones. Rebecca held back a few personal details from her talk with her father, though she knew that Reyna knew plenty about wrestling with one's feelings.

When she mentioned Orion and the wolves that were supposedly on their way, Reyna frowned.

"Most wolves are friendly to Romans," she said. "I've never heard stories about Orion hunting with a pack."

Nico finished his ham sandwich and eyed the plate of pastries like he was surprised to find he still had an appetite. "It could have been a figure of speech: very little time before the wolves arrive. Perhaps Hades didn't literally mean wolves. At any rate, we should leave as soon as it's dark enough for shadows."

Coach Hedge stuffed an issue of Guns & Ammo into his bag. "Only problem: the Athena Parthenos is still thirty feet in the air. Gonna be fun hauling you guys and your gear to the top of that temple."

"Will Camp Half-Blood wait for August first, or will they attack?" Reyna asked.

"We have to hope they wait," Rebecca said. "We can't... I can't get the statue back any faster."

Even at this rate, my dad thinks I might die, she added in her head.

Coach Hedge looked up at Nico from counting the change in his baseball cap. "And you're sure Clarisse said Mellie was okay?"

"Yes, Coach. Clarisse is taking good care of her."

"That's a relief. I don't like what Grover said about Gaia whispering to the nymphs and dryads. If the nature spirits turn evil... that's not going to be pretty."

Rebecca had never heard of such a thing happening. Then again, Gaia hadn't been awake since the dawn of humanity.

Reyna took a bite of her pastry. Her chain mail glittered in the afternoon sun. "I wonder about these wolves... Is it possible we've misunderstood the message? The goddess Lupa has been very quiet. Perhaps she is sending us aid. The wolves could be from her – to defend us from Orion and his pack."

The hopefulness in her voice was as thin as gauze.

"Maybe," Nico said. "But wouldn't Lupa be busy with the war between the camps? I thought she'd be sending wolves to help your legion."

Reyna shook her head. "Wolves are not front-line fighters. I don't think she would help Octavian. Her wolves might be patrolling Camp Jupiter, defending it in the legion's absence, but I just don't know..." She crossed her legs at the ankles, and the iron tips of her combat boots glinted. "There's something else," she added. "I haven't had any luck contacting my sister, Hylla. It makes me uneasy that both the wolves and the Amazons have gone silent. If something has happened on the West Coast... I fear the only hope for either camp lies with us. We must return the statue soon. That means the greatest burden is on you two."