The Forbidden Daughter | PJO Book One

twelve

GROVERS BLESSING

They had  arrived on the outskirts of a little ski town nestled in the mountains. The sign said WELCOME TO CLOUDCROFT, NEW MEXICO.

The air was cold and thin. The roofs of the cabins were heaped with snow, and dirty mounds of it were piled up on the sides of the streets.

Tall pine trees loomed over the valley, casting pitch-black shadows, though the morning was sunny.

Even with the lion-skin coat, Ariana was freezing by the time they got to Main Street, which was about half a mile from the train tracks.

As they walked, Percy and Ariana told Grover about their conversation with Apollo the night before how he'd told them to seek out Nereus in San Francisco.

Grover looked uneasy. "That's good, I guess. But we've got to get there first."

Ariana tried not to get too depressed about our chances. She didn't want to send Grover into a panic, but she knew they had another huge deadline looming, aside from saving Artemis in time for her council of the gods.

The General had said Annabeth would only be kept alive until the winter solstice. That was Friday, only four days away.

And he'd said something about a sacrifice. She didn't like the sound of that at all.

They stopped in the middle of town. You could pretty much see everything from there: a school, a bunch of tourist stores and cafes, some ski cabins, and a grocery store.

"Great." Thalia said, looking around. "No bus station. No taxis. No car rental. No way out."

"There's a coffee shop!" said Grover.

"Yes," Zoe said, "coffee is good."

"And pastries." Grover said dreamily. "And wax paper."

Thalia sighed. "Fine. How about you two go get us some food. Percy, Bianca, Ariana, and I will check in the grocery store. Maybe they can give us directions."

They agreed to meet back in front of the grocery store in fifteen minutes. Bianca looked a little uncomfortable coming with them, but she did.

Inside the store, they found out a few valuable things about Cloudcroft: there wasn't enough snow for skiing, the grocery store sold rubber rats for a dollar each, and there was no easy way in or out of town unless you had your own car.

"You could call for a taxi from Alamogordo." the clerk said doubtfully. "That's down at the bottom of the mountains, but it would take at least an hour to get here. Cost several hundred dollars."

The clerk looked so lonely, Percy bought a rubber rat. Then they headed back outside and stood on the porch.

"Wonderful." Thalia grumped. "I'm going to walk down the street, see if anybody in the other shops has a suggestion."

"But the clerk said-"

"I know." she told Percy. "I'm checking anyway."

He let her go. Ariana knew how it felt to be restless. All half-bloods had attention deficit problems because of their inborn battlefield reflexes.

They couldn't stand just waiting around. Also, she had a feeling Thalia was still upset over the conversation last night about Luke.

Bianca, Percy and Ariana stood together awkwardly. Ariana wasn't sure what to say, especially now that she was a Hunter and everything.

"Nice rat." Bianca said at last.

Percy set it on the porch railing. Maybe it would attract more business for the store.