We Find Some Dead Guys
Things went downhill when we encountered Athena.
At first, we were having a nice evening walk through Astoria with our demonic puppy (though he definitely needed training on the leash). The
storefronts were all decorated for Halloween. The trees were dropping their yellow leaves. Cooking smells from a dozen different restaurants scented
the air.
Astoria may be a famously Greek neighborhood, but in New York that just means more tavernas than usual mixed in with the taquerias, ramen joints,
and sushi bars. You never get just one kind of thing in this city. It’s always every flavor all the time. That’s why I love it.
I was feeling a little wistful about this as we walked. I wondered whether
the Bay Area would ever feel as much like home … and if I would live long enough to find out.
Grover interrupted my reverie. “Over there. I smell something.”
“Nope!” the puppy agreed. He started straining on his new leash (well, his hand-me-down Hecuba leash) like he really wanted to cross the street.
On the north side of 30th Avenue was a tree-lined park. It wasn’t nearly as big as Gramercy Park—just a plaza with statues and benches, flanked on
one side by a playground structure and the other side by a basketball court.
After my wrestling contest with a cranky god in Washington Square Park last month, I didn’t want to visit any more playgrounds. This time, I’d probably be forced to play a pickup game of HORSE with the god of lost dogs. I’d probably fail at that, too.
Annabeth slipped her hand into mine. “It’ll be okay. I know this place. Let’s go.”
In front of the park, a sign read ATHENS SQUARE.
Nope didn’t care about that, but he thought the iron fence was really interesting. He sniffed all the pee messages from the other dogs, then lifted his leg and hit reply.
The plaza was dark and empty. Always a good sign when you’re looking for trouble. Greeting us near the entrance was a statue of the goddess of
wisdom herself—Athena in her battle armor. She had one arm extended, palm up, as if demanding, Am I a joke to you?
“Hi, Mom,” Annabeth said. “Just looking for a hellhound.”
I waited for the statue to smack me upside the head, but it remained motionless. On Olympus, Athena probably found it more amusing to keep me in suspense.
Nope tugged harder on his leash, dragging me farther into the plaza.
Once he was full-grown, he was going to be a lot of fun to walk, probably way too much for the meager powers of Alley Boy.
The central courtyard was tiled in gray and white diamond-shaped stones that made me feel dizzy looking at them. At the far end stood three Greek columns, very on-brand, and two statues of dudes in robes who I assumed (wild guess) were probably ancient Greeks. In front of the columns was a circular dais tiled like a compass rose. This was probably where the locals had events in the summertime, but to me, the whole place screamed human sacrifice.
I’d been offered up as a human sacrifice too many times in my life already. That wasn’t what I wanted to go trick-or-treating as this year.
Nope pulled me toward the dais. As we got closer, I saw a large dark stain splashed across the compass rose, like someone had tossed a bucketful of ink on it.
“Whoa, boy,” I said, tugging him back. “Maybe we shouldn’t.”
Nope didn’t listen, and neither did Annabeth. She ran ahead to check out the stain of liquid evil.
Nope thought it smelled amazing. It bubbled and hissed around the edges, reminding me of Hecate’s shadow portal on the W train. I was afraid the goddess might pop out and demand Transylvanian pastries.
Grover sniffed the darkness. “Hecuba made this, definitely. She was either shadow-trailing here or shadow-traveling out. I’m not sure which.”
In the distance, someone screamed. A familiar howl echoed through
neighborhood—the war cry of a dog, but much too deep and loud for any
earthly canine.
“I’m going to guess Hecuba’s still around,” I said. We raced toward the sounds of terror.
Across the street from the basketball court was a kebab joint called Sal’s Souvlaki.
From half a block away, we could see diners rushing out of the restaurant, screaming and stumbling over one another, holding pointy kebab sticks even though their moms had probably told them not to run with sharp objects.
“Rats!” one yelled as he ran past us. “Huge rats!”
“Oh, great,” I muttered. When mortals look through the Mist and see rats, you can be pretty sure they’re not actually rats. As Nope towed me along, I fished my pen-sword out of my pocket, because I too love to run with sharp objects.
Grover trotted beside me. “If Hecuba’s inside,” he said, “maybe we can coax her out with—OH, NO!”
He slammed on the brakes. (Imagine his hooves had brakes.) Annabeth grabbed my arm and pulled me back, almost snapping me like a wishbone between her and the eager pup.
“Hecuba’s not inside,” said Annabeth. “Look.”
She pointed toward the fifth-story roofline. Looming over Sal’s Souvlaki, looking like a proper superhero and not some knockoff alley-dwelling sidekick, was Hecuba herself, her front paws planted on the coping stones, her eyes glowing balefully, her fangs bared. She seemed to be sniffing the fear in the air and enjoying herself immensely.
As soon as Nope sensed her presence, he whimpered, hid behind my legs, and started trembling violently. He was a smart puppy.
“So, if Hecuba’s up there,” I said, “what’s in the restaurant?”
I really needed to learn not to ask questions like that. As the last of the diners ran screaming into the night, the restaurant’s plate-glass window shattered, and half a dozen undead warriors tumbled onto the sidewalk.
They were rotting corpses with ancient armor, corroded swords, and glowing red eyes like Hecuba’s, as if they were all plugged into the same power source. They were definitely not rats.
“Trojan soldiers,” Annabeth grumbled.
“Did you know Hecuba could summon the dead?” I asked.
“No, but it’s just our luck.” She scowled up at the roof. “Hecuba, bad dog! Stop terrorizing these poor mortals!”
Hecuba snarled down at us. She turned and melted into shadows just as her minions attacked.
They say there’s a first time for everything. I had never tried hand-to-hand combat while holding a dog’s leash, and I would not recommend it.
My Celestial bronze blade worked just fine against the undead. No
complaints about that. I cut down the first reanimated corpse (while getting tangled in Nope’s leash, of course), then sliced another two undead into dust. Meanwhile, Annabeth launched herself at another dead guy, driving her dagger into his face, while Grover goat-kicked one right through the windshield of a parked Toyota.
“Sorry!” he yelled to no one in particular. “I can’t stop breaking things!”
Nope snarled and clamped his jaws around a Trojan’s ankle. The dead guy raised his sword, but I managed to turn at an awkward angle, still tangled in the leash, and stab him first.
Unfortunately, that left my back exposed. Two more corpses piled on top of me like they wanted a piggyback ride. They could’ve easily stabbed me, but
they didn’t seem interested in that. Instead, they each wrapped a cold, desiccated hand around my neck.
As soon as their flesh made contact, a flood of emotions washed over me.
I crumpled to my knees, sobbing uncontrollably, and slipped into a fever dream.
When I looked up, I was no longer in Queens. I knelt on a barren, battle- scarred hillside. To my right, the city of Troy was burning. The walls were cracking like eggshells. Towers crumbled into the inferno.
On the plain below me, Achaean troops were dragging enslaved Trojans toward their ships in the distance. I understood this would be my fate, too.
My ankles and wrists were bound with iron shackles. But I didn’t care about myself.
Lying in front of me was the broken body of my last son—my beautiful boy, whom the Greeks had slain like all my other children. They had taken everything from me: my husband, my family, my city, my hope.
My grief turned to rage. I snarled at my captors. I frothed at the mouth.
My eyes started to burn, flames singeing my eyebrows. My teeth elongated into fangs. The iron shackles slipped from my wrists as my hands narrowed into the paws of a black hound.
I was about to lunge at the nearest soldier when Annabeth’s voice broke through my nightmare. “Percy!”
“KILL THE GREEKS!” I yelled, sitting up in a daze.
The dreamscape was gone. Annabeth and Grover had dispatched the last of the undead warriors. Nope licked my face, trying to help, but rage and grief clung to me like a bad case of motion sickness.
“I … ugh.” I crawled to the curb and threw up, as you do when you’re a hero.
Even Nope didn’t want any part of that. He hid behind Annabeth’s legs. Grover put his hand on my shoulder. “You okay there, buddy?”
I shuddered. “Did we get them all?”
“The Trojans? Yeah. But Hecuba got away.”
“What happened to you?” Annabeth asked me. No judgment in her tone, just concern.
I told them what I’d seen and felt. “I was Hecuba,” I said. “I don’t think she’s trying to kill anyone. She just wants to make them feel her pain.”
Annabeth frowned. “Thousands of years of grief, thinking about how her children died. Poor Hecuba—”
“Who is presently terrorizing Queens,” Grover said. “And wasting perfectly good food.”
“You’re a vegetarian,” I reminded him.
He looked offended. “There are vats of innocent tzatziki sauce in that restaurant! Tzatziki sauce!”
I was too weak to argue. Annabeth and Grover helped me stand. Nope supportively peed on my shoe.
“So we failed,” I said. “We didn’t even get to try our cute puppy bait.” Nope whimpered. I guess he didn’t like the word bait.
“The night’s not over,” Annabeth said. “I get the feeling Hecuba won’t stop until she’s worn-out or—”
Right on cue, from a few blocks over, a new round of screaming shattered the evening calm.
“Can you walk?” Grover asked me.
I replied by running toward the screaming, as you do when you’re a hero and you’re done throwing up.
