ABOVE THE GODS

ELEVEN

TO SAY THE TRIP to get limestone and celestial bronze for the ship was boring would be wrong. In fact, Veronica was having an amazing time drowning in the awkward feeling in the air between Leo and Hazel, and Leo and herself. The tension from both seemed to stem from Leo and Leo alone, which was a laughable offense in itself. Leo sat behind Hazel, one arm wrapped around her middle. Veronica called upon Jason's old Pegasus, Basil, who was the only other Pegasus in Camp Jupiter besides from Reyna's Pegasus Scipio.

Trailing several feet behind Arion, Veronica made it her job to keep a lookout for any nearby monsters or rouge gods that might want to take them out while they were on land. Luckily, the three of them made it to the beach in record time, no problems whatsoever. Veronica would knock on wood right now if there was any around. She lands behind where the two have stopped, dismounting from Basil quickly.

Arion was pawing at the sand when Veronica finally made her way over, just in time to hear Hazel explain that Arion needed to eat.

"He likes gold, but-"

Leo cut her off with an astounded voice, "Gold?"

"He'll settle for grass," Hazel answered. "Go on, Arion. Thanks for the ride. I'll call you."

Then the horse was gone, having run across the water leaving Veronica to give the horse an approving look as if he could still see her. She turned to Basil, "You best be off as well. You know the signal, stay close."

Basil nudged Veronica's cheek before taking off, leaving the three of them watched as Basil took off in the opposite direction of Arion to find his own food.

"Fast horse," Leo commented, "and expensive to feed."

"Not really," Hazel said, a faraway look in her eyes. "Gold is easy for me."

Veronica could tell Leo had a river of questions to ask, but she elbowed him in the stomach. He doubled over in pain, leaving Veronica to wonder if she had used too much strength. "Sorry about that, but where's the limestone and the bronze?"

Leo bent down and cupped a handful of the sand, "You're standing on it." Veronica nodded, taking in the beach.

"The whole beach?" Hazel asked him curiously.

"Yeah, it's not really sand. It's calcium carbonate," Leo explained, taking a Ziploc bag out of his tool belt and started to fill it. He froze and Veronica frowned, nudging him with her leg. "You good, dude?"

Leo slowly nodded, "Yeah, I'm fine."

Veronica's frown deepened before she nodded and let the topic flow into the next, which just so happened to be the root of all awkwardness for this trip.

"We should've brought some things to dig with, like a shovel and bucket," Veronica complained, feeling herself melt under the sun. She added as an afterthought, "We could've made a sand castle."

Two voices spoke up next, "A lime castle."

Veronica looked away as Hazel and Leo locked eyes for a second too long. Hazel was the first to break up eye contact, "You are so much like-"

"Sammy?" Leo made an estimated guess. Veronica took the Ziploc bag from Leo and continued to fill it up. She considered leaving this excursion early, but then remembered that they still needed the celestial bronze. So, she did the next best thing. She tuned them out.

Sometimes, if she tuned people out well enough, she could connect with the radio waves coming from one of her houses to see if a demigod had entered one of them. That's how she managed to be at the correct house when she needed to. That and the fact that her bedroom was connected to all of the houses. On the topic of her houses, Veronica wondered if Leo would be willing to help her construct a house in Louisiana as a just in case.