Ivy Pittaluga had always made a solemn vow to keep her distance from Percy Jackson, determined to keep her world separate from the camp hero.
However, she realizes that fate has a mischievous plan in store for her. Suddenly thrown together as unlik...
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Percy and I followed the River Phlegethon, stumbling over glassy black terrain, jumping crevices, and hiding behind rocks whoever the vampire girls slowed in front of us. It was tricky to stay far enough back to avoid getting spotted but close enough to keep the empouasi in our eyesight in the dark hazy air.
The heat of the river baked my skin. Every breath I took was still acidic. When we needed a drink, the best we could do was sip the spicy liquid fire. As we traveled on I pulled my hair into a ponytail to keep it out of my face with the elastic I had around my wrist. I was surprised it was still there and not broken.
Time was impossible to judge with no rising and setting sun to keep track of. We trudged along, following the river as it cut through the harsh landscape. Luckily, the empousai weren't fast walkers as they continued to hiss and fight with each other. They appeared to be in no hurry to get to the Doors of Death.
Once, the vampire demons sped up with excitement and swarmed something that looked like a beached carcass on the riverbank. I couldn't tell what it was from the distance we kept away from them. Whatever it was, the empousai attacked it with relish.
When they moved on, Percy and I reached the spot and found nothing except a few splintered bones and glistening stains drying in the heat of the river. A pit grew in my stomach when I thought about how empousai most likely ate demigods the same way.
"Come on." Percy slipped his hand in mine and gently led me away. My eyes drifted from the remains to his face. "We don't want to lose them."
"Right." I slowly nodded.
A few more miles, the empousai disappeared over a ridge. When we caught up, we found ourselves at another massive cliff. The River Phlegethon spilled over the side in jagged tiers of fiery waterfalls. The empousai were picking their way down the cliff, jumping from ledge to ledge as if they were mountain goats.
My stomach dropped. The landscape below was bleak, ash-gray plain bristling with black trees. The ground was pocked with blisters. Every once in a while, a bubble would swell and burst, disgorging a monster. All the newly formed monsters were crawling and hobbling in the same direction-toward a bank of black fog that swallowed the horizon like a storm front. The Phlegethon flowed in the same direction until halfway across the plain, where it met another river of black water. The two floods combined in a steaming, boiling cataract and flowed on as one toward the black fog
The longer I stared into the storm of darkness, the less I wanted to climb down the cliff. It could be hiding anything from a bottomless pit to an army of monsters. But if the Doors of Death were in that direction, it was our only chance of getting out of here and going home.
"Wish we could fly." Percy peered over the edge of the cliff.
I glanced upward to see dark winged shapes spiraled in and out of the blood-red clouds.
"Maybe not a good idea." I pointed above us.
"Furies?" Percy wondered.
"Or some other kind of monster." I shrugged. "Tartarus has thousands."
