Daughter of Pluto | Wattys2017

V

JASON, AIMEE ,AND THE REDHEAD, WHO INTRODUCED herself as Rachel, put Piper on the couch while Annabeth rushed down the hall to get a medkit. Piper was still breathing, but she wouldn't wake up. She seemed to be in some kind of coma.

"We've got to heal her," Jason insisted. "There's a way, right?"

Seeing her so pale, barely breathing, Aimee knew that Jason felt a surge of protectiveness.He didn't really know her. Maybe she wasn't his girlfriend. But they'd survived the Grand Canyon together. They'd come all this way. They'd left her side for a little while, and this had happened.

Chiron put his hand on her forehead and grimaced. "Her mind is in a fragile state. Rachel, what happened?"

"I wish I knew," she said. "As soon as I got to camp, I had a premonition about Hera's cabin. I went inside. Annabeth and Piper came in while I was there. We talked, and then—I just blanked out. Annabeth said I spoke in a different voice."

"A prophecy?" Chiron asked.

"No. The spirit of Delphi comes from within. I know how that feels. This was like long distance, a power trying to speak through me."

Annabeth ran in with a leather pouch. She knelt next to Piper. "Chiron, what happened back there—I've never seen anything like it. I've heard Rachel's prophecy voice. This was different. She sounded like an older woman. She grabbed Piper's shoulders and told her—"

"To free her from a prison?" Aimee guessed announcing her presence.

Annabeth stared at her. "How did you know that?"

Chiron made a three-fingered gesture over his heart, like a ward against evil.

"Aimee, tell them. Annabeth, the medicine bag, please."

Chiron trickled drops from a medicine vial into Piper's mouth while Aimee explained what had happened when the room froze—the dark misty woman who had claimed to be the patron of Jason and Aimee.

When she was done, no one spoke, which made her more anxious.

"So does this happen often?" Jason asked. "Supernatural phone calls from convicts demanding you bust them out of jail?"

"Your patron," Annabeth said. "Not your godly parent?"

"No, she said patron. She also said that our fathers had given her our lives."

Annabeth frowned. "I've never of heard anything like that before. You said the storm spirit on the skywalk—he claimed to be working for some mistress who was giving him orders, right? Could it be this woman you saw, messing with your mind?"

"I don't think so," Aimee said. "If she were my enemy, why would she be asking for my help? She's imprisoned. She's worried about some enemy getting more powerful. Something about a king rising from the earth on the solstice—"

Annabeth turned to Chiron. "Not Kronos. Please tell me it's not that."

The centaur looked miserable. He held Piper's wrist, checking her pulse.

At last he said, "It is not Kronos. That threat is ended. But ..."

"But what?" Annabeth asked.

Chiron closed the medicine bag. "Piper needs rest. We should discuss this later."

"Or now," Aimee said pushing her way past Jason. "Sir, Mr. Chiron, you told us the greatest threat was coming. The last chapter. You can't possibly mean something worse than an army of Titans, right?"

"Oh," Rachel said in a small voice. "Oh, dear. The woman was Hera. Of course. Her cabin, her voice. She showed herself to them at the same moment."