orenda [leo valdez]

xxxi. Jason Hates Wonder Bread

He stepped to the middle of the room.

Instantly, green and blue light rippled across the walls. Piper heard the sound of a fountain, but there was no water. There didn't seem to be any source of light except for Percy's and Jason's blades.

"Do you smell the ocean?" Percy asked.

Percy always smelled like the ocean, so she hadn't even realized it until he mentioned it.

"An illusion?" Piper asked.

"I don't know," Percy said. "I feel like there should be water here—lots of water. But there isn't any. I've never been in a place like this."

Jason moved to the row of niches. He touched the bottom shelf of the nearest one, which was just at his eye level. "This stone...it's embedded with seashells. This is a nymphaeum."

Kira felt her mouth get drier.

"A what?" Piper asked.

"We have one at Camp Jupiter," Jason said, "on Temple Hill. It's a shrine to the nymphs."

The alcove was studded with cowries, conches, and scallops. The seashells seemed to dance in the watery light. They were ice-cold to the touch.

Jason stepped back and examined the row of alcoves. "Shrines like this were all over the place in Ancient Rome. Rich people had them outside their villas to honor nymphs, to make sure the local water was always fresh. Some shrines were built around natural springs, but most were man-made."

"So...no actual nymphs lived here?" Piper asked hopefully.

"Not sure," Jason said. "This place where we're standing would have been a pool with a fountain. A lot of times, if the nymphaeum belonged to a demigod, he or she would invite nymphs to live there. If the spirits took up residence, that was considered good luck."

"For the owner," Percy guessed. "But it would also bind the nymphs to the new water source, which would be great if the fountain was in a nice sunny park with fresh water pumped in through the aqueducts—"

"But this place has been underground for centuries," Piper guessed. "Dry and buried. What would happen to the nymphs?"

The sound of water changed to a chorus of hissing, like ghostly snakes. The rippling light shifted from sea blue and green to purple and sickly lime. Above them, the nine niches glowed. They were no longer empty.

Standing in each was a withered old woman, so dried up and brittle they reminded Kira of mummies—except mummies didn't normally move. Their eyes were dark purple, as if the clear blue water of their life source had condensed and thickened inside them. Their silk dresses were tattered and faded. Their hair were disheveled and dry as straw.

"What would happen to the nymphs?" said the creature in the center niche. Her back was hunched like the handle of a pitcher. Her skeletal hands had only the thinnest papery layer of skin. On her head, a battered wreath of golden laurels glinted in her roadkill hair.

She fixed her purple eyes on Piper. "What an interesting question, my dear. Perhaps the nymphs would still be here, suffering, waiting for revenge."

Kira glanced at the doorway nervously, but of course it had disappeared. She hefted her sword.

"Who are you?" Percy demanded.

The central nymph turned her head. "Ah...names. We once had names. I was Hagno, the first of the nine!"

"The nine," Jason repeated. "The nymphs of this shrine. There were always nine niches."