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lake-lyn · 5 years

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ET’s exclusive excerpt of The Tyrant’s Tomb by Rick Riordan (1/2)

Chapter 1

There is no food here

Meg ate all the Swedish fish

Please get off my hearse

I believe in returning dead bodies.

It seems like a simple courtesy, doesn’t it? A warrior dies, you should do what you can to get their body back to their people for funerary rites. Maybe I’m old-fashioned. I am over four thousand years old. But I find it rude not to properly dispose of corpses.

Achilles during the Trojan War, for instance. Total pig. He chariot-dragged the body of the Trojan champion Hector around the walls of the city for days. Finally I convinced Zeus to pressure the big bully into returning Hector’s body to his parents so he could have a decent burial. I mean, come on. Have a little respect for the people you slaughter.

Then there was Oliver Cromwell’s corpse. I wasn’t a fan of the man, but please. First, the English bury him with honors. Then they decide they hate him, so they dig him up and “execute” his body. Then his head falls off the pike where it’s been impaled for decades and gets passed around from collector to collector for almost three centuries like a disgusting souvenir snow globe. Finally, in 1960, I whispered in the ears of some influential people, Enough, already. I am the god Apollo, and I order you to bury that thing. You’re grossing me out.

When it came to Jason Grace, my fallen friend and half bropppther, I wasn’t going to leave anything to chance. I would personally escort his coffin to Camp Jupiter and see him off with full honors.

That turned out to be a good call. What with the ghouls attacking us and everything.

Sunset turned San Francisco Bay into a cauldron of molten copper as our private plane landed at Oakland Airport. I say our private plane. The chartered trip was actually a parting gift from our friend Piper McLean and her movie star father. (Everyone should have at least one friend with a movie star parent.)

Waiting for us beside the runway was another surprise the McLeans must have arranged: a gleaming black hearse. Meg McCaffrey and I stretched our legs on the tarmac while the ground crew somberly removed Jason’s coffin from the Cessna’s storage bay. The polished mahogany box seemed to glow in the evening light. Its brass fixtures glinted red. I hated how beautiful it was. Death shouldn’t be beautiful.

The crew loaded it into the hearse, then transferred our luggage to the backseat. We didn’t have much: Meg’s back- pack and mine (courtesy of Marco’s Military Madness), my bow and quiver and ukulele, and a couple of sketchbooks and a poster-board diorama we’d inherited from Jason.

I signed some paperwork, accepted the flight crew’s condolences, then shook hands with a nice undertaker who handed me the keys to the hearse and walked away.

I stared at the keys, then at Meg McCaffrey, who was chewing the head off a Swedish fish. The plane had been stocked with half a dozen tins of the squishy red candy. Not anymore. Meg had single-handedly brought the Swedish sh ecosystem to the brink of collapse.

“I’m supposed to drive?” I wondered. “Is this a rental hearse?”

Meg shrugged. During our flight, she’d insisted on sprawling on the Cessna’s sofa, so her dark pageboy haircut was flattened against the side of her head. One rhinestone-studded point of her cat-eye glasses poked through her hair like a disco shark n.

The rest of her out t was equally disreputable: floppy red high-tops, threadbare yellow leggings, and the well-loved knee-length green frock she’d gotten from Percy Jackson’s mother. By well-loved, I mean the frock had been through so many battles, washed and mended so many times, it looked less like a piece of clothing and more like a deflated hot-air balloon. Around Meg’s waist was the pièce de résistance: her multi-pocketed gardening belt, because children of Demeter never leave home without one.

“I don’t have a driver’s license,” she said, as if I needed a reminder that my life was presently being controlled by a twelve-year-old. “I call shotgun.”

“Calling shotgun” didn’t seem appropriate for a hearse. Nevertheless, Meg skipped to the passenger’s side and climbed in. I got behind the wheel. Soon we were out of the airport and cruising north on I-880 in our rented black grief-mobile.

Ah, the Bay Area . . . I’d spent some happy times here. The vast misshapen geographic bowl was jam-packed with interesting people and places. I loved the green-and-golden hills, the fog-swept coastline, the glowing lacework of bridges and the crazy zigzag of neighborhoods shouldered up against one another like subway passengers at rush hour.

Back in the 1950s, I played with Dizzy Gillespie at Bop City in the Fillmore. During the Summer of Love, I hosted an impromptu jam session in Golden Gate Park with the Grateful Dead. (Lovely bunch of guys, but did they really need those fteen-minute-long solos?) In the 1980s, I hung out in Oakland with Stan Burrell—otherwise known as MC Hammer—as he pioneered pop rap. I can’t claim credit for Stan’s music, but I did advise him on his fashion choices. Those gold lamé parachute pants? My idea. You’re welcome, fashionistas.

Most of the Bay Area brought back good memories. But as I drove, I couldn’t help glancing to the northwest—toward Marin County and the dark peak of Mount Tamalpais. We gods knew the place as Mount Othrys, seat of the Titans. Even though our ancient enemies had been cast down, their palace destroyed, I could still feel the evil pull of the place—like a magnet trying to extract the iron from my now-mortal blood.

I did my best to shake the feeling. We had other problems to deal with. Besides, we were going to Camp Jupiter—friendly territory on this side of the bay. I had Meg for backup. I was driving a hearse. What could possibly go wrong?

The Nimitz Freeway snaked through the East Bay flatlands, past warehouses and docklands, strip malls and rows of dilapidated bungalows. To our right rose downtown Oakland, its small cluster of high-rises facing off against its cooler neighbor San Francisco across the Bay as if to proclaim We are Oakland! We exist, too!

Meg reclined in her seat, propped her red high-tops up on the dashboard, and cracked open her window.

“I like this place,” she decided.

“We just got here,” I said. “What is it you like? The abandoned warehouses? That sign for Bo’s Chicken ’N’ Waffles?”

“Nature.”

“Concrete counts as nature?”

“There’s trees, too. Plants flowering. Moisture in the air. The eucalyptus smells good. It’s not like . . .”

She didn’t need to finish her sentence. Our time in Southern California had been marked by scorching temperatures, extreme drought, and raging wild res—all thanks to the magical Burning Maze controlled by Caligula and his hate-crazed sorceress bestie, Medea. The Bay Area wasn’t experiencing any of those problems. Not at the moment, anyway.

We’d killed Medea. We’d extinguished the Burning Maze. We’d freed the Erythraean Sibyl and brought relief to the mortals and withering nature spirits of Southern California.

But Caligula was still very much alive. He and his co- emperors in the Triumvirate were still intent on controlling all means of prophecy, taking over the world, and writing the future in their own sadistic image. Right now, Caligula’s fleet of evil luxury yachts was making its way toward San Francisco to attack Camp Jupiter. I could only imagine what sort of hellish destruction the emperor would rain down on Oakland and Bo’s Chicken ’N’ Waffles.

Even if we somehow managed to defeat the Triumvirate, there was still that greatest Oracle, Delphi, under the control of my old nemesis Python. How I could defeat him in my present form as a sixteen-year-old weakling, I had no idea.

But, hey. Except for that, everything was fine. The eucalyptus smelled nice.

Traf c slowed at the I-580 interchange. Apparently, California drivers didn’t follow that custom of yielding to hearses out of respect. Perhaps they gured at least one of our passengers was already dead, so we weren’t in a hurry.

Meg toyed with her window controls, raising and lower- ing the glass. Reeee. Reeee. Reeee.

“You know how to get to Camp Jupiter?” she asked.

“Of course.”

“ ’Cause you said that about Camp Half-Blood.”

“We got there! Eventually.”

“Frozen and half-dead.”

“Look, the entrance to camp is right over there.” I waved vaguely at the Oakland Hills. “There’s a secret passage in the Caldecott Tunnel or something.”

“Or something?”

“Well, I haven’t actually ever driven to Camp Jupiter,” I admitted. “Usually I descend from the heavens in my glorious sun chariot. But I know the Caldecott Tunnel is the main entrance. There’s probably a sign. Perhaps a Demigods Only lane.”

Meg peered at me over the top of her glasses. “You’re the dumbest god ever.” She raised her window with a final Reeee. SHLOOMP!—a sound that reminded me uncomfortably of a guillotine blade.

We turned west onto Highway 24. The congestion eased as the hills loomed closer. The elevated lanes soared past neighborhoods of winding streets and tall conifers, white stucco houses clinging to the sides of grassy ravines.

A road sign promised CALDECOTT TUNNEL ENTRANCE, 2 MI. That should have comforted me. Soon, we’d pass through the borders of Camp Jupiter into a heavily guarded, magically camouflaged valley where an entire Roman legion could shield me from my worries, at least for a while.

Why, then, were the hairs on the back of my neck quivering like sea worms?

Something was wrong. It dawned on me that the uneas- iness I’d felt since we landed might not be the distant threat of Caligula, or the old Titan base on Mount Tamalpais, but something more immediate . . . something malevolent, and getting closer.

I glanced in the rearview mirror. Through the back window’s gauzy curtains, I saw nothing but traffic. But then, in the polished surface of Jason’s coffin lid, I caught the reflection of movement from a dark shape outside—as if a human-size object had just own past the side of the hearse.

“Oh. Meg?” I tried to keep my voice even. “Do you see anything unusual behind us?”

“Unusual like what?”

THUMP.

The hearse lurched as if we’d been hitched to a trailer full of scrap metal. Above my head, two foot-shaped impressions appeared in the upholstered ceiling.

“Something just landed on the roof,” Meg deduced.

“Thank you, Sherlock McCaffrey! Can you get it off?”

“Me? How?”

That was an annoyingly fair question. Meg could turn the rings on her middle fingers into wicked gold swords, but if she summoned them in close quarters, like the interior of the hearse, she a) wouldn’t have room to wield them, and b) might end up impaling me and/or herself.

CREAK. CREAK. The footprint impressions deepened as the thing adjusted its weight like a surfer on a board. It must have been immensely heavy to sink into the metal roof.

A whimper bubbled in my throat. My hands trembled on the steering wheel. I yearned for my bow and quiver in the backseat, but I couldn’t have used them. DWSPW, driving while shooting projectile weapons, is a big no-no, kids.

“Maybe you can open the window,” I said to Meg. “Lean out and tell it to go away.”

“Um, no.” (Gods, she was stubborn.) “What if you try to shake it off?”

Before I could explain that this was a terrible idea while traveling fifty miles an hour on a highway, I heard a sound like a pop-top aluminum can opening—the crisp pneumatic hiss of air through metal. A claw punctured the ceiling—a grimy white talon the size of a drill bit. Then another. And another. And another, until the upholstery was studded with ten pointy white spikes—just the right number for two very large hands.

“Meg?” I yelped. “Could you—?”

I don’t know how I might have finished that sentence. Protect me? Kill that thing? Check in the back to see if I have any spare undies?

I was rudely interrupted by the creature ripping open our roof like we were a birthday present.

Staring down at me through the ragged hole was a withered, ghoulish humanoid, its blue-black hide glistening like the skin of a house y, its eyes filmy white orbs, its bared teeth dripping saliva. Around its torso uttered a loincloth of greasy black feathers. The smell coming off it was more putrid than any dumpster—and believe me, I’d fallen into a few.

“FOOD!” it howled.

“Kill it!” I yelled at Meg.

“Swerve!” she countered.

One of the many annoying things about being incarcerated in my puny mortal body: I was Meg McCaffrey’s servant. I was bound to obey her direct commands. So when she yelled “swerve,” I yanked the steering wheel hard to the right. The hearse handled beautifully. It careened across three lanes of traffic, barreled straight through the guardrail, and plummeted into the canyon below.

#ttt #the tyrants tomb #the tyrant’s tomb #rick riordan #meg mccaffrey

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beauregardance · 6 years

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Post-The Burning Maze. five stages of grief. ao3.

He’s not dead. He can’t be dead. Not after everything they’ve gone through with Gaea and the giants – he can’t end up dead with a spear embedded in his back and a megalomaniac god-emperor standing over his prone arrow-struck body with a bored expression on his face.

Oh gods.

She vaguely hears Caligula giving orders to kill her, and she thinks that this is it. She draws her knife, ready to go down fighting even if the pandai can shoot faster than she can think. Apollo steps in front of her and suddenly she wants to scream at him where were you for Jason? Then, a cold gust of wind swirls around her, lifting her off her feet and whisking her away from the scene so fast that she can barely breathe.

He can’t be dead over a pair of shoes. A pair of stupid shoes.

Apollo says that he’s dead. Even Meg doesn’t argue.

Apollo, the god of healing, can’t heal him – won’t heal him.

She never wants to see Apollo again.

ii.

A wound to the back, just like how Caligula did it.

She feels the rush of adrenaline even before she stabs Medea, the fire coursing through her blood and giving her an extra rush. She’s not sure if it’s all hers, or a part of it is Helios, the Titan of the sun giving her his strength. Her knife hits the mark and she twists it upon entry into its fleshy target. The sorceress makes a sound like a choked off gasp, turning to look at Piper with wide, shocked eyes, reaching out to grab her.

Piper only shoves her dying body away from her. That was for Jason.

Now that she is lying on the ground, blood forming at the side of her lip, the sorceress doesn’t look so powerful. Her eyes are wild, flickering between her and the army that Piper had cleverly gathered before heading into this mission like she knew that she had lost. Piper kneels down beside Medea, staring at her broken body, and wondering how much destruction she could have prevented if she had mustered up the courage to kill her back when they first met in the department store. Turning her over, she yanks the Katoptris out without gusto. The dark red that decorates her blade is the most vibrant colour that Piper has seen all week.

She stares at Medea’s dying body and feels compelled to speak. “One good stab in the back deserves another,” she finds herself saying, lips curled in a sneer. It’s with a vindictive pleasure that leads Piper to kiss her on the cheek, pressing her unaffectionate lips onto Medea’s smooth skin. “I’d tell you to say hello to Jason for me, but he’ll be in Elysium.” She smiles sweetly at the dying sorceress when she delivers the next words. “You…won’t.”

Medea’s eyes blink rapidly, and Piper thinks with satisfaction that she can detect a note of fear before Medea’s lights flicker out.

She lets go out the breath that she doesn’t realize that she’s been holding. It’s the first time Piper has felt such pure exhilarating enjoyment out of someone’s death, and she could get used to this feeling.

iii.

She keeps thinking about the Physician’s Cure.

It’s been months into her stay in Oklahoma, and she’s getting used to the quietness. The loneliness. Sure, there are occasional monsters knocking on her door, but nothing she can’t handle on her own after all she’s been through.

If only she’d had the Physician’s Cure somehow… If only she’d had something at the time.

She rolls over in her bed, catching sight of her knife on the desk beside her. The Katoptris gleams golden in the dim moonlight. A glimpse of a vision, maybe. She picks it up, tilting it so she can see her own reflection staring back at her. She waits for something to show up: another way to bring Jason back, even months after his death or an image to confirm her own guilt. Her own bloody, inert hands.

But there’s nothing. She holds the knife a little longer before she gives up, placing it down on the desk.

She knows. She’s not stupid. She knows that there are some wounds that can’t be healed, no matter how far she searches.

But the knowledge doesn’t stop her chest from aching, and until she has hit a dead end, she won’t stop looking.

iv.

She doesn’t know why she breaks when she returns to camp in the summer.

Piper has been okay for the past while, if she said so herself. But now she pauses, drinking in the sight of the rolling green meadows, the dragon curled around the pine tree, the orange figures in the background, and the sound of laughter and shouting in the distance. And suddenly, she feels disorientated, like Medea herself has picked her up and thrown her into a wall.

She exhales and walks through the magical barrier into Camp Half-Blood, and she continues walking onwards to the cabins. People greet her as they pass by, and she nods, her lips pulling politely into an automatic smile. She can’t bring herself to engage with anyone, even when she sees Annabeth. There’s an empty hole gnawing at her that grows bigger with each step that she takes. Is this what she had been nourishing, the whole time in Oklahoma? This vacuum, so sharp in its hollowness that she can feel it crawling up into her throat?

It’s only when she reaches the cabins that she realizes where her feet have been taking her. Cabin One stands alone and aloof in front of her. There are spiderwebs, she notices, on the windows. If she opens the door, she would be enveloped in dust. Thalia has probably come by since the event, and she must have collected all of his belongings. The cabin is most likely empty, devoid of the life it used to contain.

And that’s when she feels everything rising up at once, all the anger, the pain, the sadness, the regret, and she nearly collapses in front of the Cabin, sobbing freely into both palms of her hands.

She finds him on her way home from school, trudging the same path as she always has for the past school year. The image is astonishingly sharp: a young man dressed in all black, surrounded by the dying shades of the autumn trees. She wishes she could take a photograph to capture the moment, but she’s certain that he wouldn’t like it very much.

“Nico,” she greets when she nears him. “What are you doing here?”

He shrugs, both hands tucked in the pockets of his aviator jacket. “I’m on a quest,” he explains. “I was nearby, and I heard you were here so… I thought I would drop by.”

“Want to stop over at my place to eat?” Piper offers, wondering if he’s questing by himself. It wouldn’t be unusual for him, but it still doesn’t sound very safe.

“I’m good. Will and I just had something to eat. I just wanted to tell you…I saw Jason.”

Piper feels like her heart is going to stop. “What?” she asks, her voice lowering to a hush. Nico nods solemnly.

“We had to get through the Underworld. And that’s when I saw him. He was there – the River Lethe.”

She thinks she knows where this is going, and her throat feels dry. She doesn’t know what to say or what to think. From the look of it, Nico doesn’t look too sure of himself either.

Nico quickly clarifies his statement. “I didn’t see him. When someone decides to cross the river, they give up their form they had in life, so only their essence remains. That’s what I saw. I saw his essence – his soul. I felt his soul. Either way, it was Jason. And when he crossed, he was gone. I thought you deserved to know.” He’s rambling at this point, and Piper is reminded that it’s not just her and Leo that felt the crushing impact of his death. She knows that Nico was good friends with him too, and she can’t imagine what he had gone through when the news reached him.

“So, he’s chosen rebirth,” Piper says aloud, surprised by how startlingly…calm she feels about this. She had imagined that it would devastate her – knowing that he had gone onwards to somewhere she doesn’t know, somewhere that would complete the irreversibility that comes with death. But somewhere along the way, she thinks that she had already accepted that he was gone forever.

She’s silent for a while, feeling the permanence set into her body, and she realizes that she doesn’t feel so different from ten minutes ago. Sure, there’s a gentle nudge in her heart, like somewhere buried deep is the pain waiting for the perfect moment to resurface, but for now, she thinks she’s okay.

“Thank you,” she finally says, “for telling me.” There’s a truth ringing to her words, and she gives Nico a smile that he returns hesitantly.

They bid goodbye after that, and Piper continues the rest of the way home in quiet solitude. When she’s home, she reaches for the Katoptris resting demurely at the bottom of her backpack, wondering if it’s going to show her an image from Jason’s new life.

She flicks it around for a bit, but it remains stubbornly dull, and when Piper puts the knife away, she thinks that maybe after all, she’s okay with that – with not knowing anything about his whereabouts or his new life. After all, isn’t that what rebirth is for?

The dull pain twinges when she thinks about him. But, she thinks, she’s going to be okay.

#pjo #toa #piper mclean #fanfic #jason grace

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