TERRIFIED . . . annabeth chase

thirty three.

THE NEXT MORNING Val woke to a different ship's horn — a blast so loud it literally shook her out of bed.

Which was an impressive state. Leo didn't make her do any chores, thank the gods, so she slept. For that entire time, yes. She might've wasted the whole day, but that didn't matter.

The horn boomed again. It sounded like it was coming from several hundred yards away — from another vessel.

She rushed to get dressed, which wasn't hard when it was just a dress. By the time she got up on deck, the others had already gathered — all hastily dressed except for Coach Hedge, who had pulled the night watch.

Frank's Vancouver Winter Olympics shirt was inside out. Percy wore pajama pants and a bronze breastplate, which was an interesting fashion statement. Hazel's hair was all blown to one side, as though she'd walked through a cyclone; and Leo had accidentally set himself on fire. His T-shirt was in charred tatters. His arms were smoking.

About a hundred yards to port, a massive cruise ship glided past. Tourists waved at them from fifteen or sixteen rows of balconies. Some smiled and took pictures. None of them looked surprised to see an Ancient Greek trireme. Maybe the Mist made it look like a fishing boat, or perhaps the cruisers thought the Argo II was a tourist attraction.

The cruise ship blew its horn again, and the Argo II had a shaking fit.

Coach Hedge plugged his ears. "Do they have to be so loud?"

"They're just saying hi," Frank speculated.

"WHAT?" Hedge yelled back.

The ship edged past them, heading out to sea. The tourists kept waving. If they found it strange that the Argo II was populated by half-asleep kids in armor and pajamas and a man with goat legs, they didn't let on.

"Bye!" Leo called, raising his smoking hand.

"Can I man the ballistae?" Hedge asked.

"No," Val said through a forced smile.

Annabeth raised an eyebrow at her. "Finally awake?"

"I wasn't sleeping for that long." Completely false, but it seemed like the right thing to say.

"You slept for nearly twenty four hours. Nonstop."

Val pouted. "I was tired. Besides, my clear vision because of my sleep could let me see the gorgeousness out here."

Without the cruise ship blocking their view, she saw a mountain jutting from the sea less than half a mile to the north. The massive fist of blinding white rock thrust into the sky reminded her of her crew, somehow. On one side, the limestone cliffs were almost completely sheer, dropping into the sea over a thousand feet below, as near as Val could figure. On the other side, the mountain sloped in tiers, covered in green forest, so that the whole thing reminded her of a colossal sphinx, worn down over the millennia, with a massive white head and chest, and a green cloak over its back.

"The Rock of Gibraltar," Annabeth said in awe. "At the tip of Spain. And over there—" She pointed Val's fingers south, to a more distant stretch of red and ochre hills, which made her tingle from the contact. "That must be Africa. We're at the mouth of the Mediterranean."

"What now?" Piper asked. "Do we just sail in?"

"Why not?" Leo said. "It's a big shipping channel. Boats go in and out all the time."

Not triremes full of demigods, Val thought.

Annabeth gazed at the Rock of Gibraltar. Val recognized that brooding expression on her beloved's face. It almost always meant that she anticipated trouble.