BROOKLYN WAS IN her room, finally putting on clothes that weren't pajamas, which was a black, long sleeved shirt and a matching skirt along with a Yankees cap she found in her room. She was getting ready by spraying a shit ton of perfume on her, starting her usual makeup routine when someone knocked on her door and then Jason was poking his head in.

"Can I come in?" he asked.

"Yeah, sure," she said, waving him inside. "I'm not helping you craft up an apology, though. I'm horrible at apologizing."

"Noted," he muttered as he looked around. "You've made this place look like home."

She really hasn't; just kept her closet open so that people could see all of her clothes to take up more space. That's what Annabeth said, anyway.

"Annabeth put a lot of my clothes in here," Brooklyn shrugged. "And not a lot else. Probably because I didn't have any fucking furniture in the Zeus cabin. That statue was too big." She shivered thinking about it. "I do have cards if you want to play, though?"

Jason frowned. "I never learned how to play card games."

She gasped loudly. "Really? No way. You're a fucking sheltered child."

"Thanks," he drawled.

"After I finish my makeup, I'm teaching you about five million card games," she declared, leaning closer to her mirror so she could do her eyeliner. "Tell me about something, Jason."

She could see him frown in the reflection in the mirror. "About what?"

"I don't know," she shrugged. "Anything. I literally know nothing about you, and you're my brother, come on."

So they played Poker for hours, him talking to her about a lot of shit, and when he ran out of things to talk about, she gave him some more things to talk about. At least, until Piper yelled his name from the mess hall.

"That's me," he apologized, laying down the cards gently in front of him before standing up. "Sorry."

"You're a busy guy," she shrugged. "She seems like she keeps you real busy, anyway. But we'll hang out soon, yeah?"

He smiled at her. "Yeah," he promised. "I'll come by soon. Although, if you're sleeping with Percy again—"

"Do not," she groaned, reaching out to smack his leg. "You owe me. I'll be jumping on your back for piggyback rides now whenever I want."

"No you're not."

"Annabeth can lift me. You can too, J Dog."

Jason's nose wrinkled. "I'll do it if you never call me that again."

"Pinky swear?" Brooklyn offered him her pinky.

He stared at it for a second, before linking his pinky with hers. "Okay. Deal."

"Cool, J Money, now off you go!" she grinned at him, pushing him out of her room and shutting the door before he could protest.

Brooklyn was playing solitaire because she wanted to, and it made her smarter, when she heard heavy footsteps stomp outside her door and Frank's voice gasp loudly: "Where's Leo? Take off! Take off!"

"Where's Percy?" Brooklyn heard Annabeth demand. "And the goat?"

"On deck. They're fine. We're being followed!"

Brooklyn heard multiple footsteps going up the stairs, so she exited her room and bounded up the stairs after them. Percy and Hedge lay on the deck, looking exhausted. Hedge was missing his shoes. He grinned at the sky, muttering, "Awesome. Awesome." Percy was covered with nicks and scratches, like he'd jumped through a window. Brooklyn totally didn't know what that felt like. He didn't say anything, but he grasped her hand weakly as if to say, Be right with you, as soon as the world stops spinning.

Leo, Piper, and Jason came rushing up the stairs.

"What? What?" Leo cried, holding a half-eaten grilled cheese sandwich. "Can't a guy even take a lunch break? What's wrong?"

"Followed!" Frank yelled again.

"Followed by what?" Jason asked.

"I don't know!" Frank panted. "Whales? Sea monsters? Maybe Kate and Porky!"

Brooklyn snickered. Annabeth just sighed and said, "That makes absolutely no sense. Leo, you'd better get us out of here."

Leo put his sandwich between his teeth, pirate style, and ran for the helm.

Soon the Argo II was rising into the sky. Brooklyn leaned over the railing a couple of times to look out at tue view, and she saw no sign of pursuit by whales or otherwise, but Percy, Frank, and Hedge didn't start to recover until the Atlanta skyline was a hazy smudge in the distance.

"Charleston," Percy said, hobbling around the deck like an old man. He still sounded pretty shaken up. "Set course for Charleston."

"Charleston?" Jason said the name as if it brought back bad memories. "What exactly did you find in Atlanta?"

Frank unzipped his backpack and starting bringing out souvenirs. "Some peach preserves. A couple of T-shirts. A snow globe. And, um, these not-really-Chinese handcuffs."

Annabeth pinched the bridge of her nose. "How about you start from the top — of the story, not the backpack."

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!"

At least the coach seemed to have forgotten about Percy and Brooklyn falling asleep in the stable the night before. But judging from his story, she had worse problems to worry about than being grounded.

When he explained about the captive sea creatures in the aquarium, she understood why he seemed so upset.

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

"We will help them," Percy promised. "In time. Maybe by breaking them out. But I have to figure out a better reason, Brooks. 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. "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," she said. "But a map to what?"

"The Mark of Athena." Brooklyn realized, then she looked cautiously at Annabeth, who just shrugged. Jesus Christ, that woman was intimidating.

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

"The giants' bane," Hazel added.

Percy nodded. "And in my dream, 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?"

Jason glanced uneasily at Piper, though Brooklyn wasn't sure why. Did he not tell her something during their, like, three hours together? Rude.

"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. "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?"

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. "Like sometimes we're too suspicious. And we speak without thinking."

Hazel stared at him. Slowly it seemed to dawn on her that he was apologizing.

Jason elbowed Leo.

"Ow!" Leo yelped. "I mean, yeah . . . bad choices. Like not trusting people's brothers who, you know, might need saving. Hypothetically speaking."

Hazel pursed her lips. "Fine. Back to Charleston. Are you saying we should check that submarine again?"

Jason shrugged. "Well . . . I can think of two places in Charleston we might search. The museum where they keep the Hunley — that's one of them. It has a lot of relics from the Civil War. A map could be hidden in one. I know the layout. I could lead a team inside."

"I'll go," Leo said. "That sounds cool."

Jason nodded. He turned to Frank, who was trying to pull his fingers out of the Chinese handcuffs. "You should come too, Frank. We might need you."

Frank looked surprised. "Why? Not like I was much good at that aquarium."

"You did fine," Percy assured him. "It took all three of us to break that glass."

"Besides, you're a child of Mars," Jason said. "The ghosts of defeated causes are bound to serve you. And the museum in Charleston has plenty of Confederate ghosts. We'll need you to keep them in line."

Frank gulped. Brooklyn remembered Percy's comment about Frank turning into a giant goldfish, and she resisted the urge to smirk. She would never be able to look at the guy again without seeing him as a koi.

"Okay." Frank relented. "Sure." He frowned at his fingers, trying to pull them out of the trap. "Uh, how do you—?"

Leo chuckled. "Man, you've never seen those before? There's a simple trick to getting out."

Frank tugged again with no luck. Even Hazel was trying not to laugh. Brooklyn was already laughing.

Frank grimaced with concentration. Suddenly, he disappeared. On the deck where he'd been standing, a green iguana crouched next to an empty set of Chinese handcuffs.

"Well done, Frank Zhang," Leo said dryly, doing his impression of Chiron the centaur. "That is exactly how people beat Chinese handcuffs. They turn into iguanas."

Everybody busted out laughing. Frank turned back to human, picked up the handcuffs, and shoved them in his backpack. He managed an embarrassed smile.

"Anyway," Frank said, clearly anxious to change the subject. "The museum is one place to search. But, uh, Jason, you said there were two?"

Jason's smile faded. Whatever he was thinking about, Brooklyn could tell it wasn't pleasant.

"Yeah," he said. "The other place is called the Battery — it's a park right by the harbor. The last time I was there . . . with Reyna . . ." He glanced at Piper, then rushed on. "We saw something in the park. A ghost or some sort of spirit, like a Southern belle from the Civil War, glowing and floating along. We tried to approach it, but it disappeared whenever we got close. Then Reyna had this feeling — she said she should try it alone. Like maybe it would only talk to a girl. She went up to the spirit by herself, and sure enough, it spoke to her."

Everyone waited.

"What did it say?" Brooklyn asked.

"Reyna wouldn't tell me," Jason admitted. "But it must have been important. She seemed . . . shaken up. Maybe she got a prophecy or some bad news. Reyna never acted the same around me after that."

"A girls adventure, then," Annabeth said. "Brooks, Piper, and Hazel can come with me."

They all nodded, though Hazel looked nervous. No doubt her time in the Underworld had given her enough ghost experiences for two lifetimes. Piper's eyes flashed defiantly, like anything Reyna could do, she could do. Brooklyn was just happy to be there.

Then she realized that if six of them went on these two quests, it would leave Percy alone on the ship with Coach Hedge, which was maybe not a situation a decent girlfriend should put him in. She met his eyes, raising his eyebrows. He nodded as if to say, Yeah. It'll be fine. He took her hand and linked their pinkies together, and she felt her lips involuntarily pull into a smile.

"So that's settled." Annabeth turned to Leo, who was studying his console, listening to Festus creak and click over the intercom. "Leo, how long until we reach Charleston?"

"Good question," he muttered. "Festus just detected a large group of eagles behind us — long-range radar, still not in sight."

Piper leaned over the console. "Are you sure they're Roman?"

Leo rolled his eyes. "No, Pipes. It could be a random group of giant eagles flying in perfect formation. Of course they're Roman! I suppose we could turn the ship around and fight—"

"Which would be a very bad idea," Jason said, "and remove any doubt that we're enemies of Rome."

"Or I've got another idea," Leo said. "If we went straight to Charleston, we could be there in a few hours. But the eagles would overtake us, and things would get complicated. Instead, we could send out a decoy to trick the eagles. We take the ship on a detour, go the long way to Charleston, and get there tomorrow morning—"

Hazel started to protest, but Leo raised his hand. "I know, I know. Nico's in trouble and we have to hurry."

"It's June twenty-seventh," Hazel said. "After today, four more days. Then he dies."

"I know! But this might throw the Romans off our trail. We still should have enough time to reach Rome."

Hazel scowled. "When you say should have enough . . ."

Leo shrugged. "How do you feel about barely enough?"

Hazel put her face in her hands for a count of three. "Sounds about typical for us."

Annabeth nodded. "Okay, Leo. What kind of decoy are we talking about?"

"I'm so glad you asked!" He punched a few buttons on the console, rotated the turntable, and repeatedly pressed the A button on his Wii controller really, really fast. He called into the intercom, "Buford? Report for duty, please."

Frank took a step back. "There's somebody else on the ship? Who is Buford?"

A puff of steam shot from the stairwell, and a table climbed on deck.

It was a three-legged, moving table with a mahogany top. Its bronze base had several drawers, spinning gears, and a set of steam vents. It was toting a bag like a mail sack tied to one of its legs. It clattered to the helm and made a sound like a train whistle.

"This is Buford," Leo announced.

"You name your furniture?" Frank asked.

Leo snorted. "Man, you just wish you had furniture this cool. Buford, are you ready for Operation End Table?"

Buford or whatever spewed steam. It stepped to the railing. Its mahogany top split into four pie slices, which elongated into wooden blades. The blades spun, and Buford took off.

"A helicopter table," Percy muttered. "Gotta admit, that's cool. What's in the bag?"

"Dirty demigod laundry," Leo said. "I hope you don't mind, Frank."

Frank choked. "What?"

"It'll throw the eagles off our scent."

"Those were my only extra pants!"

Leo shrugged. "I asked Buford to get them laundered and folded while he's out. Hopefully he will." He rubbed his hands and grinned. "Well! I call that a good day's work. I'm gonna calculate our detour route now. See you all at dinner!"