𝙻𝚘𝚟𝚎𝚕𝚢 || 𝙿𝚒𝚙𝚎𝚛 𝙼𝚌𝙻𝚎𝚊𝚗

𝕋𝕛𝕦𝕖 𝕗𝕖𝕞

Chapter twenty five

(I posted this chapter about 20 minutes later than I planned.
That's the fun fact of today)

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Thalia ran uphill through the snow, hugging a tiny little path on the side of the mountain. Ally - surprisingly - was right behind her with no problem in keeping up. She and Phoebe seemed to be mid conversation as they ran, which surprised Thea as Ally ahd barely said a word since Midas.

Herself and Piper was not far behind, but still in front of the coach and the boys.

"Come on, Valdez!" The satyr yelled. "Pick up the pace! Let's chant. I've got a girl in Kalamazoo-"

"Let's not," Thalia snapped.

So they ran in silence.

The moved so that she was further from the edge and closer to the brunette she was running beside.

"You okay? No more hypothermia and passing out?" Thea asked, a playful tone in her voice.

Piper just smirked as she jumped over a rock that was in the way. "Last time I checked, you are the one that keeps on passing out."

"Touche."

Eventually they stopped, and Leo - who looked to have been deep in thought - slammed into Thalia and nearly sent them both down the side of the mountain the hard way. Fortunately, the Hunter was light on her feet. She steadied them both, then pointed up.

"That," Leo choked, "is a really large rock." They stood near the summit of Pikes Peak.

Below them, the world was blanketed in clouds. The air was so thin, Thea could hardly breathe. Night had set in, but a full moon shone and the stars were incredible. Stretching out to the north and south, peaks of other mountains rose from the clouds like islands - or teeth.

But the real show was above them. Hovering in the sky, about a quarter mile away, was a massive free-floating island of glowing purple stone. It was hard to judge its size, but Leo figured it was at least as wide as a football stadium and just as tall. The sides were rugged cliffs, riddled with caves, and every once in a while a gust of wind burst out with a sound like a pipe organ blast. At the top of the rock, brass walls ringed some kind of a fortress. The only thing connecting Pikes Peak to the floating island was a narrow bridge of ice that glistened in the moonlight.

Then she realised the bridge wasn't exactly ice, because it wasn't solid. As the winds changed direction, the bridge snaked around - blurring and thinning, in some places even breaking into a dotted line like the vapour trail of a plane.

"That thing looks like it's more unstable than me," Thea muttered, only being heard by Leo who'd decided she was less scary than Thalia.

"We're not seriously crossing that," the boy said.