Warriors || Leo Valdez [2]

14

They gathered on the quarterdeck so Leo could hear the conversation as he navigated. Percy and Frank took turns relating what had happened at the Georgia Aquarium, with Coach Hedge interjecting from time to time: "That was awesome!" or "Then I kicked her in the head!"

When Percy explained about the captive sea creatures in the aquarium, Alex frowned. Percy nodded toward her as if to tell her he understood.

"That's terrible," she said. "We need to help them."

"We will," Percy promised. "In time. But I have to figure out how. I wish..." He shook his head. "Never mind. First we have to deal with this bounty on our heads."

Coach Hedge had lost interest in the conversation-probably because it was no longer about him-and wandered toward the bow of the ship, practicing his roundhouse kicks and complimenting himself on his technique.

Annabeth gripped the hilt of her dagger. "A bounty on our heads... as if we didn't attract enough monsters already."

"Do we get WANTED posters?" Leo asked, but Alex didn't meet his eyes, she was much too embarrassed. "And do they have our bounties, like, broken down on a price list?"

Hazel wrinkled her nose. "What are you talking about?"

"Just curious how much I'm going for these days," Leo said. "I mean, I can understand not being as pricey as Percy or Jason, maybe... but am I worth, like, two Franks, or three Franks?"

"Hey!" Frank complained.

"Knock it off," Annabeth ordered. "At least we know our next step is to go to Charleston, to find this map."

Piper leaned against the control panel. She'd done her braid with white feathers today, which looked good with her dark brown hair.

"A map," Piper said. "But a map to what?"

"The Mark of Athena." Percy looked cautiously at Annabeth, like he was afraid he'd overstepped.

"Whatever that is," he continued. "We know it leads to something important in Rome, something that might heal the rift between the Romans and Greeks."

"The giants' bane," Violet added.

Percy nodded. "And in our dreams, the twin giants said something about a statue."

"Um" Frank rolled his not-exactly-Chinese handcuffs between his fingers. "According to Phorcys, we'd have to be insane to try to find it. But what is it?"

Everyone looked at Annabeth.

"I-I'm close to an answer," she said. "I'll know more if we find this map. Jason, the way you reacted to the name Charleston.. have you been there before?"

"Yeah," he admitted. "Reyna and I did a quest there about a year ago. We were salvaging Imperial gold weapons from the C.S.S. Hunley."

"The what?" Piper asked.

"Whoa!" Leo said, his eyes lighting up and a wide smile on his face. "That's the first successful military submarine. From the Civil War. I always wanted to see that."

"It was designed by Roman demigods," Jason said. "It held a secret stash of Imperial gold torpedoes-until we rescued them and brought them back to Camp Jupiter."

Hazel crossed her arms. "So the Romans fought on the Confederate side? As a girl whose grandmother was a slave, can I just say... not cool?"

Alex had to agree. Jason put his hands in front of him, palms up. "I personally was not alive then. And it wasn't all Greeks on one side and all Romans on the other. But, yes. Not cool. Sometimes demigods make bad choices." He looked sheepishly at Hazel and Violet "Like sometimes we're too suspicious. And we speak without thinking."