HONESTLY, VAL DIDN'T want to meet Hermes.

Sure, he's the father of some of Val's best friends — Connor, Travis, Chris — but the information that Thanatos had given her about her curse set her on guard.

"Hello, Percy." Hermes's brow furrowed.

Percy bowed awkwardly. "Lord Hermes."

"Hello, George," he said immediately after. "Hey, Martha."

Travis and Connor gaped from beside Val. This was their dad.

"Um, Hermes," Percy said. "We need to talk to Zeus. It's important."

Hermes's eyes were steely cold. "I am his messenger. May I take a message?"

"You guys," Percy said. "Why don't you do a sweep of the city? Check the defenses. See who's left in Olympus. Meet Annabeth and me back here in thirty minutes."

Silena frowned. "But—"

"That's a good idea," Annabeth said. "Val, stay here with us. Connor and Travis, you two lead."

Val faltered, frowning and pointing to herself. "Are you sure?"

"Yeah," Annabeth nodded, looking back at Travis and Connor. "Go."

"We're on it!" Travis said. They herded the others out of the throne room, leaving Annabeth, Percy, and Val with Hermes.

"My lord," Annabeth said. "Kronos is going to attack New York. You must suspect that. My mother must have foreseen it."

"Your mother," Hermes grumbled. He scratched his back with his caduceus. "Don't get me started on your mother, young lady. She's the reason I'm here at all. Zeus didn't want any of us to leave the front line. But your mother kept pestering him nonstop, 'It's a trap, it's a diversion, blah, blah, blah.' She wanted to come back herself, but Zeus was not going to let his number one strategist leave his side while we're battling Typhon. And so naturally he sent me to talk to you."

"But it is a trap!" Annabeth insisted. "Is Zeus blind?"

Thunder rolled through the sky.

"I'd watch the comments, girl," Hermes warned. "Zeus is not blind or deaf. He has not left Olympus completely undefended."

"But there are these blue lights—"

"Yes, yes. I saw them. Some mischief by that insufferable goddess of magic, Hecate, I'd wager, but you may have noticed they aren't doing any damage. Olympus has strong magical wards. Besides, Aeolus, the King of the Winds, has sent his most powerful minions to guard the citadel. No one save the gods can approach Olympus from the air. They would be knocked out of the sky."

Percy raised his hand. "Um . . . what about that materializing-slash-teleporting thing you guys do?"

"That's a form of air travel too, Jackson. Very fast, but the wind gods are faster. No, if Kronos wants Olympus, he'll have to march through the entire city with his army and take the elevators! Can you see him doing this?"

Hermes made it sound pretty ridiculous — hordes of monsters going up in the elevator twenty at a time, listening to "Stayin' Alive." Honestly, Val believed that they could. Even if she didn't want to believe it, but she had to stay positive.

"Maybe just a few of you could come back," Val suggested.

Hermes shook his head, but then softened when he looked at her. The gods were giving her pity. "Valentina, Typhon is our greatest enemy."

"I thought that was Kronos." Percy interjected.

The god's eyes glowed after he'd spoken. "No, Percy. In the old days, Olympus was almost overthrown by Typhon. He is the husband of Echidna—"

"Met her at the Arch," Percy muttered. "Not nice."

"—and the father of all monsters. We can never forget how close he came to destroying us all; how he humiliated us! We were more powerful back in the old days. Now we can expect no help from Poseidon because he's fighting his own war. Hades sits in his realm and does nothing, and Demeter and Persephone follow his lead. It will take all our remaining power to oppose the storm giant. We can't divide our forces, nor wait until he gets to New York. We have to battle him now. And we're making progress."

"Progress?" Percy said. "He nearly destroyed St. Louis."

"Yes," Hermes admitted. "But he destroyed only half of Kentucky. He's slowing down. Losing power."

It sounded like Hermes was trying to convince himself.

In the corner, the Ophiotaurus mooed sadly.

"Please, Hermes," Annabeth said. "You said my mother wanted to come. Did she give you any messages for us?"

"Messages," he muttered. "'It'll be a great job,' they told me. 'Not much work. Lots of worshippers.' Hmph. Nobody cares what I have to say. It's always about other people's messages."

Sending messages sounds cool. Val liked that job.

"Quiet, both of you," Hermes grumbled.

The god looked at Annabeth, who was doing her big-pleading-gray-eyes thing. Val would've been convinced if she'd given her that look. She always was.

"Bah," Hermes said. "Your mother said to warn you that you are on your own. You must hold Manhattan without the help of the gods. As if I didn't know that. Why they pay her to be the wisdom goddess, I'm not sure."

"Anything else?" Annabeth asked.

"She said you should try plan twenty-three. She said you would know what that meant."

Annabeth's face paled. Obviously she knew what it meant, and she didn't like it. "Go on."

"Last thing." Hermes looked at Percy. "She said to tell Percy: 'Remember the rivers.' And, um, something about staying away from her daughter."

Val felt like she was about to throw up. Hermes looked toward her and summoned a trash can. She promptly took it from him and the flowers poured out of her. Sighing, she poked her head out and gave him a thumbs up, and the trash can faded.

Annabeth was so looking at her, but Val couldn't care in this moment. "Thank you, my lord," she said quietly. "I appreciate it."

"I am truly sorry," he said to her, and she could feel the concern in him. "That you were cursed so young."

What was it with these gods and her curse? Nonetheless, she gave him a small smile. "It's — it's okay," she got out. "I'm used to it, my lord. And I wouldn't trade the love I feel for anything else."

"You have my blessing," Hermes told her solemnly. "For as long as you live."

Val nodded, curtsying and turning to smile at someone — she didn't know who she was aiming her smile at, but it went to Annabeth.

"Thank you, Hermes," Annabeth said, turning back to the god. "And I . . . I wanted to say . . . I'm sorry about Luke."

The god's concerned expression hardened like he'd turned to marble. "You should've left that subject alone."

Annabeth stepped back nervously. "Sorry?"

"SORRY doesn't cut it!"

The caduceus, which shimmered and changed into something that looked suspiciously like a high-voltage cattle prod.

"You should've saved him when you had the chance," Hermes growled at Annabeth. "You're the only one who could have."

Percy tried to step between them. "What are you talking about? Annabeth didn't—"

"Don't defend her, Jackson!" Hermes turned the cattle prod toward him. "She knows exactly what I'm talking about."

"Maybe you should blame yourself!" Percy snapped. "Maybe if you hadn't abandoned Luke and his mom!"

Hermes raised his cattle prod. He began to grow until he was ten feet tall.

But as he prepared to strike, Val stepped in front of Percy and Annabeth.

"You swore I had your blessing," Val looked up at the ten foot god. Her neck probably hated her, for looking at her dad then Hermes. "And that will have no use if you kill them now."

If Annabeth died, then the curse would take over Val, and she'd die too.

Hermes clenched his teeth. He lowered the cattle prod, and it turned back to a staff.

"Valentina—" he said, but then stopped and turned to Percy. "You will never speak to me like that again. You have no idea how much I have sacrificed, how much—"

His voice broke, and he shrank back to human size. "My son, my greatest pride . . . my poor May . . ."

He sounded so devastated Val didn't know what to say. One minute he was ready to vaporize Percy and Annabeth. Now he looked like he needed a hug.

"Look, Lord Hermes," Percy said. "I'm sorry, but I need to know. What happened to May? She said something about Luke's fate, and her eyes—"

Hermes glared at him, and Percy's voice faltered. The look on his face wasn't really anger, though. It was pain. Deep, incredible pain.

"I will leave you now," he said tightly. "I have a war to fight."

He began to shine. Val turned away and put her hands over her eyes.

Hermes glowed with the light of a supernova. Then he was gone.

Annabeth sat at the foot of her mother's throne and cried. Val sat next to her and opened her arms, and Annabeth fell into them, sobbing into Val's jacket.

"Annabeth," Percy said, "it's not your fault. I've never seen Hermes act that way. I guess . . . I don't know . . . he probably feels guilty about Luke. He's looking for somebody to blame. I don't know why he lashed out at you. You didn't do anything to deserve that."

Annabeth wiped her eyes. She stared at the designs on Val's jacket.

Percy shifted uneasily. "Um, you didn't, right?"

She didn't answer.

"Percy," she said. "What did you mean about Luke's mother? Did you meet her?"

Percy nodded. "Val, Nico, and I visited her. She was a little . . . different." Percy described May Castellan, and the weird moment when her eyes had started to glow and she talked about her son's fate. Val nearly shuddered thinking about it.

Annabeth frowned. "That doesn't make sense. But why were you visiting—" Her eyes widened. "Hermes said you bear the curse of Achilles. Hestia said the same thing. Did you . . . did you bathe in the River Styx?"

"Don't change the subject."

"Percy! Did you or not?"

"Um . . . maybe a little."

Percy told her the story about Hades and Nico, and how he'd defeated an army of the dead.

Annabeth shook her head in disbelief. "Do you have any idea how dangerous that was?"

"I had no choice," Percy said. "It's the only way I can stand up to Luke."

"You mean . . . di immortales, of course! That's why Luke didn't die. He went to the Styx and . . . Oh no, Luke. What were you thinking?"

"So now you're worried about Luke again," Percy grumbled.

Annabeth stared at him. "What?"

"Forget it," Percy muttered.

"He was good back there, Annie," Val smiled softly. "Don't underestimate him."

"What were you doing with them?" Annabeth turned to her, suddenly. "You and Percy aren't friends at all."

"We could be," Val shrugged. "But seriously, it was nothing. Nico wanted me to come with him to hang out, and I did. It wasn't a big deal."

"But you weren't with them in the Underworld . . ." Annabeth trailed off. "Were you?"

Val stiffened. "I was — I was, um . . . talking with my dad."

"Tina, he gave you the curse," Annabeth frowned at her. "Why did you—"

"He didn't give me it," Val said quietly. "Aphrodite did."

She looked at Percy, for him to get her out of this situation, before she burst out crying or something.

"The point is that we found the Styx," Percy said, absolutely saving Val, thank the gods. "And I didn't die. Now I have to face Luke. We have to defend Olympus."

Annabeth turned to him, sighing. "I guess you're right. My mom mentioned—"

"Plan twenty-three."

She rummaged in her pack and pulled out Daedalus's laptop. The blue Delta symbol glowed on the top when she booted it up. She opened a few files and started to read.

"Here it is," she said. "Gods, we have a lot of work to do."

"One of Daedalus's inventions?"

"A lot of inventions . . . dangerous ones. If my mother wants me to use this plan, she must think things are very bad." She looked at Percy. "What about her message to you: 'Remember the rivers'? What does that mean?"

Percy shook his head.

Just then the Stoll brothers ran in to the throne room.

"You need to see this," Connor said. "Now."

Val hopped on his back and they ran out of the throne room.

The blue lights in the sky had stopped, so at first she didn't understand what the problem was.

The other campers had gathered in a small park at the edge of the mountain. They were clustered at the guardrail, looking down at Manhattan. The railing was lined with those tourist binoculars, where you could deposit one golden drachma and see the city. Campers were using every single one.

Val looked down at the city. She could see almost everything from here — the East River and the Hudson River carving the shape of Manhattan, the grid of streets, the lights of skyscrapers, the dark stretch of Central Park in the north. Everything looked normal, but something was wrong. She felt it in her bones before she realized what it was.

"I don't . . . hear anything," Annabeth said.

That was the problem.

Even from this height, Val should've heard the noise of the city — millions of people bustling around, thousands of cars and machines — the hum of a huge metropolis. You don't think about it when you live in New York, but it's always there. Even in the dead of night, New York is never silent.

But it was now.

"What did they do?" Percy's voice was tight and angry. "What did they do to my city?"

Jake Mason offered Val his binoculars. She grinned at him and looked through it.

In the streets below, traffic had stopped. Pedestrians were lying on the sidewalks, or curled up in doorways. There was no sign of violence, no wrecks, nothing like that. It was as if all the people in New York had simply decided to stop whatever they were doing and pass out.

"Are they dead?" Silena asked in astonishment.

Val remembered Grover's story about meeting the god Morpheus in Central Park. You're lucky I'm saving my energy for the main event.

"Not dead," Percy said. "Morpheus has put the entire island of Manhattan to sleep. The invasion has started."