“Uh, let’s continue,” Rachel urged nervously. She knew Percy, she’d even liked him at one point, and she knows how oblivious he can be. So she knows this can’t be good.
Annabeth was still looking at the hallway where her boyfriend disappeared. She reluctantly tore her eyes away and nodded.
“I want to do that,” she sighed.
“What?” I asked.
“Build something like that. You ever see the Parthenon, Percy?”
“Only in pictures.”
“Someday, I’m going to see it in person. I’m going to build the greatest monument to the gods, ever. Something that’ll last a thousand years.”
“Mission accomplished,” Thalia laughed looking at her friend.
Annabeth nodded happily thinking about her redesigned Olympus right now.
“What’d you rebuild?” Jason asked.
“You’ll see,” Rachel said.
I laughed. “You? An architect?”
“It is kind of funny if you think about it,” Connor thought.
His brothers and Leo nodded in agreement while trying not to laugh.
“Apparently Percy agreed with you,” Rachel mentioned.
“Why?” Leo wondered.
I don’t know why, but I found it funny. Just the idea of Annabeth trying to sit quietly and draw all day.
“Oh, now I get it,” Leo chuckled. His chuckles soon died down when he noticed Annabeth’s glare.
Her cheeks flushed.
“Oh my god! You’ve heard it! We have proof! Annabeth blushed because of Percy! Finally!” Connor cried happily.
Everyone but Jason, Leo, Piper, Frank, and Hazel laughed at a embarrassed Annabeth.
“I don’t get it,” Piper said confused.
“Annabeth . . . never . . . blushes,” Nico gasped holding his aching side from laughing so hard.
“It’s . . . a shock . . . if she . . . does,” Thalia agreed.
“Okay, then,” Piper mumbled quietly.
“Yes, an architect. Athena expects her children to create things, not just tear them down, like a certain god of earthquakes I could mention.”
“That was mean,” Tyson pouted.
“Oh, Ty, I’m sorry,” Annabeth apologized.
The young Cyclopes shook his head, crossed his arms, and refused to look at the daughter of Athena. He looked at the ground pouting.
“Harsh,” Frank said agreeing. “I am related to Poseidon as well.”
“Oh, come on guys,” Annabeth said. “That was before Percy and I were friends. I take it back now.”
Both relatives of Poseidon refused to look at Annabeth.
I watched the churning brown water of the Mississippi below.
“Sorry,” Annabeth said. “That was mean.”
“Can’t we work together a little?” I pleaded. “I mean, didn’t Athena and Poseidon ever cooperate?”
Annabeth had to think about it.
“They really don’t get along that often,” Jake commented.
“Yeah, it’s a lot like Artemis and Apollo,” Thalia added. “They never stop bickering.”
“Well, maybe if Artemis was a little less uptight then they’d get along,” Will jibed to Thalia.
“Or if Apollo wasn’t such a guy,” Thalia argued.
“If he wasn’t a guy I wouldn’t be here!” Will snapped.
“Good!” Thalia yelled.
“Shut up!” Everyone looked at Clarisse. “Now if you don’t shut up, I will personally give you a knuckle sandwich that’ll make you pass out for a month. Now stop.”
Thalia and Will did as told.
“Good,” Clarisse said sitting back down next to her boyfriend. “Continue Gingy.”
Rachel looked slightly offended but continued either way.
“I guess . . . the chariot,” she said tentatively. “My mom invented it, but Poseidon created horses out of the crests of waves. So they had to work together to make it complete.”
“Then we can cooperate, too. Right?”
We rode into the city, Annabeth watching as the Arch disappeared behind a hotel.
“I suppose,” she said at last.
We pulled onto the Amtrak station downtown. The intercom told us we’d have a three-hour layover before departing for Denver.
Grover stretched. Before he was even fully awake, he said, “Food.”
“What is with you and food?” Hazel asked. “Fauns are never that hungry.”
“In our defense, Satyrs do more work than Fauns,” Grover argued.
“Still,” Hazel sighed.
“Come on, goat boy,” Annabeth said. “Sightseeing.”
“Sightseeing?”
“The Gateway Arch,” she said. “This may be my only chance to ride to the top. Are you coming or not?”
Grover and I exchanged looks.
I wanted to say no, but I figured that if Annabeth was going, we couldn’t very well let her go alone.
“It’s a good thing we all went after all,” Grover said.
Annabeth nodded in agreement.
“Why?” Jason asked.
“You’ll see,” Annabeth said simply.
Grover shrugged. “As long as there’s a snack bar without monsters.”
Thalia immediately burst out laughing. “The dam snack bar,” she choked out. Grover joined her laughing fest.
Everyone looked at the two of them weirdly.
“Uh, what?” Nico asked.
They both shook their head unable to stop laughing enough to explain it.
“Just continue,” Annabeth told Rachel knowing it would probably be a while before they stopped.
The Arch was about a mile from the train station. Late in the day the lines to get in weren’t that long. We threaded our way through the underground museum, looking at covered wagons, and other junk from the 1800s. It wasn’t all that thrilling, but Annabeth kept telling us interesting facts about how the Arch was built, and Grover kept passing me jelly beans, so I was okay.
Annabeth rolled her eyes at her boyfriend’s thoughts.
I kept looking around, though, at the other people in line. “You smell anything?” I murmured to Grover.
He took his nose out of the jelly-bean bag long enough to sniff.
“Jelly beans,” Grover murmured dreamily.
“Underground,” he said distastefully. “Underground air always smells like monsters. Probably doesn’t mean anything.”
But something felt wrong to me. I had a feeling we shouldn’t be here.
“Guys,” I said. “You know the gods’ symbols of power?”
Annabeth had been in the middle of reading about the construction equipment used to build the arch, but she looked over. “Yeah?”
“Well, Hade-”
Grover cleared his throat. “We’re in a public place. . . . You mean our friend downstairs?”
“Way, way, way, way, way downstairs,” Nico corrected.
“Um, right,” I said. “Our friend way downstairs. Doesn’t he have a hat like Annabeth’s?”
“You mean the Helm of Darkness,” Annabeth said. “Yeah, that’s his symbol of power. I saw it next to his seat during the winter solstice council meeting.”
“He was there?” I asked.
She nodded. “It’s the only time he’s allowed to visit Olympus-the darkest day of the year.
“Back then,” Nico said. “Now he’s allowed there whenever he wants because he has a throne.”
“When did Hades get a throne to Olympus?” Hazel asked.
“You’ll see,” Nico told her.
The newer demigods were really beginning to hate those words.
But his helm is a lot more powerful than my invisibility hat, if what I’ve heard is true. . . .”
“It allows him to become darkness,” Grover confirmed. “He can melt into shadow or pass through walls. He can’t be touched, or seen, or heard. And he can radiate fear so intense it can drive you insane or stop your heart. Why do you think all rational creatures fear the dark?”
“More people fear the dark when we’re kids rather than now,” Piper claimed. “I mean who’s afraid of the dark now?”
Grover, Leo, and Connor all raised their hands.
“Never mind,” Piper said.
“But then . . . how do we know he’s not here right now, watching us?” I asked.
Annabeth and Grover exchanged looks.
“We don’t,” Grover said.
“That’s comforting,” Katie shivered.
Will instinctively placed his arm around Katie to comfort her. She immediately melted into his side.
Travis narrowed his eyes at the couple.
“Thanks, that makes me feel a lot better,” I said. “Got any blue jelly beans left?”
I’d almost mastered my jumpy nerves when I saw the tiny little elevator car we were going to ride to the top of the Arch, and I knew I was in trouble. I hate confined places. They make me nuts.
“I didn’t know Percy was claustrophobic?” Nico questioned.
“Wait! Percy hates Santa Clause? How could he?!” Connor cried.
“Percy doesn’t hate Santa Clause,” Annabeth said watching Connor confused.
“But you said, Percy’s claustrophobic,” Connor said. “That means he hates Santa Clause.”
“Claustrophobic means that you hate being in small spaces,” Annabeth explained.
“Oh.”
Annabeth rolled her eyes at the son of Hermes.
We got shoehorned into the car with this big fat lady and her dog, a Chihuahua with a rhinestone collar.
“Isn’t he a charmer,” Rachel commented laughing.
A lot of the girls laughed in agreement.
I figured maybe the dog was a seeing-eye Chihuahua, because none of the guards said a word about it.
We started going up, inside the Arch. I’d never been in an elevator that went in a curve, and my stomach wasn’t too happy about it.
“I’d have to agree with him there,” Thalia murmured quietly. Heights were bad enough, but when you’re on a curve as well now that’s bad.
“No parents?” the fat lady asked us.
She had beady eyes; pointy coffee-stained teeth; a floppy denim hat, and a denim dress that bulged so much, she looked like a blue-jean blimp.
“I’m really starting to hate how he describes things,” Nico commented.
“They’re below,” Annabeth told her. “Scared of heights.”
“Oh, the poor dears.”
The Chihuahua growled. The woman said, “Now, now, Sonny. Behave.” The dog had beady eyes like its owner, intelligent and vicious.
I said, “Sonny. Is that his name?”
“No,” the lady told me.
She smiled, as if that cleared everything up.
“It doesn’t,” Hazel said.
Back in the bedroom, Percy said, “Okay, Reyna, what’s going on? You’ve been acting weird since we got here.”
“I’ve been acting weird!” Reyna exclaimed. “What about you?”
“What about me?”
“You’ve been acting different since we got here!”
“No, I haven’t,” Percy denied.
“Yes, you have,” Reyna insisted.
“Well, I can’t help it,” Percy justified. “I’m different here because I’m with my friends. I’m with the people I grew up with. I’m with my family.”
Reyna glared at him half-heartedly. “And what about us? Are we just replacements to your perfect life?”
“What? No! Reyna, what is with you? You’ve never acted like this before,” Percy sounded conflicted. A part of him wanted to figure out what was wrong, and the other part wanted to get the Hades out of there.
“Maybe because I’ve never felt so hurt before,” Reyna told him in a small voice.
Percy immediately felt sympathy for her. “Reyna,” he moved forward and pulled her into a hug. Reyna smiled lightly and leaned into him. She couldn’t resist but breathe in his breezy sea smell. “What’s wrong? Is it about Jason and Piper?”
Percy felt Reyna shake her head in the crook of his neck.
“Then what’s wrong?” Percy asked. Percy pulled away so they were arms-length from each other. Reyna immediately missed the closeness. Percy placed his hand on her arm in a comforting gesture. “Talk to me, Reyna. What’s bothering you?”
Reyna didn’t say anything as she looked up at Percy. All of a sudden, Percy felt Reyna’s lips against his. His eyes widened and he pulled away at the exact moment someone said, “What the Hades is going on here!”
Percy jumped away to find Thalia Grace in the doorway.
Thalia went to leave the room, but Percy jumped forward before she could get far. He wrapped his arms around her waist tightly and dragged her back into the bedroom.
“Reyna, leave now!” Percy’s voice was hard and unforgiving.
“Oh, yeah, protect your girlfriend!” Thalia spat.
Reyna stood there unmoving.
“Now!”
Reyna jumped shocked at the harshness of Percy’s voice.
“Sorry,” she murmured quietly before leaving the room.
Percy move forward to lock the door before Thalia could. He stood in front of the closed door blocking Thalia’s exit.
“I can’t believe you’d do this!” Thalia snapped. “Annabeth is my best friend! How could you do that to her?!”
“It wasn’t my faul-”
“Oh, it wasn’t your fault? Really, Percy. You’re gonna use that line! You just cheated on your girlfriend!”
“I-I didn’t cheat!” Percy argued. “Reyna kissed me! I didn’t kiss her back!”
“And why should I believe that?!”
“Because I’m your friend! You know me Thalia. You know my flaw! You know I’d never do anything to purposely hurt Annabeth,” Percy took a deep breath, his voice level lowering slightly. “You know I’d never cheat on her.”
“So what happened? Did you and Reyna date before you got your memory back or something?” Thalia asked. She was still angry but her anger was slowly dissipating.
He shook my head. “No. She asked me to, but I never forgot Annabeth, so I immediately told her no. I guess she liked me more than she let on.”
“Or you were just being your regular Kelp Headed self,” Thalia chided, with a small smile.
Percy snorted nodded. “I need to work on that.”
“Yeah, you may want to work a little harder,” Thalia rolled her eyes. “You are going to tell Annabeth, aren’t you?”
“Yeah, I just don’t know how. We just got back together . . . I don’t want to lose her again,” Percy admitted.
“But if you don’t tell her then eventually she may find out from someone else and she’ll really hate you then,” Thalia told him.
“I know. I’ll tell her,” he decided, “but I’ll do it when the time is right. I will tell her though.”
“Good, because if you don’t I will.”
“I know.”
They both moved to leave the room.
“Hey, Thalia,” Percy spoke up in the hall.
“What?”
“Thanks.”
“Yeah, yeah, yeah. Just don’t make me regret it.”
Please don't hate me!
Annabeth was still looking at the hallway where her boyfriend disappeared. She reluctantly tore her eyes away and nodded.
“I want to do that,” she sighed.
“What?” I asked.
“Build something like that. You ever see the Parthenon, Percy?”
“Only in pictures.”
“Someday, I’m going to see it in person. I’m going to build the greatest monument to the gods, ever. Something that’ll last a thousand years.”
“Mission accomplished,” Thalia laughed looking at her friend.
Annabeth nodded happily thinking about her redesigned Olympus right now.
“What’d you rebuild?” Jason asked.
“You’ll see,” Rachel said.
I laughed. “You? An architect?”
“It is kind of funny if you think about it,” Connor thought.
His brothers and Leo nodded in agreement while trying not to laugh.
“Apparently Percy agreed with you,” Rachel mentioned.
“Why?” Leo wondered.
I don’t know why, but I found it funny. Just the idea of Annabeth trying to sit quietly and draw all day.
“Oh, now I get it,” Leo chuckled. His chuckles soon died down when he noticed Annabeth’s glare.
Her cheeks flushed.
“Oh my god! You’ve heard it! We have proof! Annabeth blushed because of Percy! Finally!” Connor cried happily.
Everyone but Jason, Leo, Piper, Frank, and Hazel laughed at a embarrassed Annabeth.
“I don’t get it,” Piper said confused.
“Annabeth . . . never . . . blushes,” Nico gasped holding his aching side from laughing so hard.
“It’s . . . a shock . . . if she . . . does,” Thalia agreed.
“Okay, then,” Piper mumbled quietly.
“Yes, an architect. Athena expects her children to create things, not just tear them down, like a certain god of earthquakes I could mention.”
“That was mean,” Tyson pouted.
“Oh, Ty, I’m sorry,” Annabeth apologized.
The young Cyclopes shook his head, crossed his arms, and refused to look at the daughter of Athena. He looked at the ground pouting.
“Harsh,” Frank said agreeing. “I am related to Poseidon as well.”
“Oh, come on guys,” Annabeth said. “That was before Percy and I were friends. I take it back now.”
Both relatives of Poseidon refused to look at Annabeth.
I watched the churning brown water of the Mississippi below.
“Sorry,” Annabeth said. “That was mean.”
“Can’t we work together a little?” I pleaded. “I mean, didn’t Athena and Poseidon ever cooperate?”
Annabeth had to think about it.
“They really don’t get along that often,” Jake commented.
“Yeah, it’s a lot like Artemis and Apollo,” Thalia added. “They never stop bickering.”
“Well, maybe if Artemis was a little less uptight then they’d get along,” Will jibed to Thalia.
“Or if Apollo wasn’t such a guy,” Thalia argued.
“If he wasn’t a guy I wouldn’t be here!” Will snapped.
“Good!” Thalia yelled.
“Shut up!” Everyone looked at Clarisse. “Now if you don’t shut up, I will personally give you a knuckle sandwich that’ll make you pass out for a month. Now stop.”
Thalia and Will did as told.
“Good,” Clarisse said sitting back down next to her boyfriend. “Continue Gingy.”
Rachel looked slightly offended but continued either way.
“I guess . . . the chariot,” she said tentatively. “My mom invented it, but Poseidon created horses out of the crests of waves. So they had to work together to make it complete.”
“Then we can cooperate, too. Right?”
We rode into the city, Annabeth watching as the Arch disappeared behind a hotel.
“I suppose,” she said at last.
We pulled onto the Amtrak station downtown. The intercom told us we’d have a three-hour layover before departing for Denver.
Grover stretched. Before he was even fully awake, he said, “Food.”
“What is with you and food?” Hazel asked. “Fauns are never that hungry.”
“In our defense, Satyrs do more work than Fauns,” Grover argued.
“Still,” Hazel sighed.
“Come on, goat boy,” Annabeth said. “Sightseeing.”
“Sightseeing?”
“The Gateway Arch,” she said. “This may be my only chance to ride to the top. Are you coming or not?”
Grover and I exchanged looks.
I wanted to say no, but I figured that if Annabeth was going, we couldn’t very well let her go alone.
“It’s a good thing we all went after all,” Grover said.
Annabeth nodded in agreement.
“Why?” Jason asked.
“You’ll see,” Annabeth said simply.
Grover shrugged. “As long as there’s a snack bar without monsters.”
Thalia immediately burst out laughing. “The dam snack bar,” she choked out. Grover joined her laughing fest.
Everyone looked at the two of them weirdly.
“Uh, what?” Nico asked.
They both shook their head unable to stop laughing enough to explain it.
“Just continue,” Annabeth told Rachel knowing it would probably be a while before they stopped.
The Arch was about a mile from the train station. Late in the day the lines to get in weren’t that long. We threaded our way through the underground museum, looking at covered wagons, and other junk from the 1800s. It wasn’t all that thrilling, but Annabeth kept telling us interesting facts about how the Arch was built, and Grover kept passing me jelly beans, so I was okay.
Annabeth rolled her eyes at her boyfriend’s thoughts.
I kept looking around, though, at the other people in line. “You smell anything?” I murmured to Grover.
He took his nose out of the jelly-bean bag long enough to sniff.
“Jelly beans,” Grover murmured dreamily.
“Underground,” he said distastefully. “Underground air always smells like monsters. Probably doesn’t mean anything.”
But something felt wrong to me. I had a feeling we shouldn’t be here.
“Guys,” I said. “You know the gods’ symbols of power?”
Annabeth had been in the middle of reading about the construction equipment used to build the arch, but she looked over. “Yeah?”
“Well, Hade-”
Grover cleared his throat. “We’re in a public place. . . . You mean our friend downstairs?”
“Way, way, way, way, way downstairs,” Nico corrected.
“Um, right,” I said. “Our friend way downstairs. Doesn’t he have a hat like Annabeth’s?”
“You mean the Helm of Darkness,” Annabeth said. “Yeah, that’s his symbol of power. I saw it next to his seat during the winter solstice council meeting.”
“He was there?” I asked.
She nodded. “It’s the only time he’s allowed to visit Olympus-the darkest day of the year.
“Back then,” Nico said. “Now he’s allowed there whenever he wants because he has a throne.”
“When did Hades get a throne to Olympus?” Hazel asked.
“You’ll see,” Nico told her.
The newer demigods were really beginning to hate those words.
But his helm is a lot more powerful than my invisibility hat, if what I’ve heard is true. . . .”
“It allows him to become darkness,” Grover confirmed. “He can melt into shadow or pass through walls. He can’t be touched, or seen, or heard. And he can radiate fear so intense it can drive you insane or stop your heart. Why do you think all rational creatures fear the dark?”
“More people fear the dark when we’re kids rather than now,” Piper claimed. “I mean who’s afraid of the dark now?”
Grover, Leo, and Connor all raised their hands.
“Never mind,” Piper said.
“But then . . . how do we know he’s not here right now, watching us?” I asked.
Annabeth and Grover exchanged looks.
“We don’t,” Grover said.
“That’s comforting,” Katie shivered.
Will instinctively placed his arm around Katie to comfort her. She immediately melted into his side.
Travis narrowed his eyes at the couple.
“Thanks, that makes me feel a lot better,” I said. “Got any blue jelly beans left?”
I’d almost mastered my jumpy nerves when I saw the tiny little elevator car we were going to ride to the top of the Arch, and I knew I was in trouble. I hate confined places. They make me nuts.
“I didn’t know Percy was claustrophobic?” Nico questioned.
“Wait! Percy hates Santa Clause? How could he?!” Connor cried.
“Percy doesn’t hate Santa Clause,” Annabeth said watching Connor confused.
“But you said, Percy’s claustrophobic,” Connor said. “That means he hates Santa Clause.”
“Claustrophobic means that you hate being in small spaces,” Annabeth explained.
“Oh.”
Annabeth rolled her eyes at the son of Hermes.
We got shoehorned into the car with this big fat lady and her dog, a Chihuahua with a rhinestone collar.
“Isn’t he a charmer,” Rachel commented laughing.
A lot of the girls laughed in agreement.
I figured maybe the dog was a seeing-eye Chihuahua, because none of the guards said a word about it.
We started going up, inside the Arch. I’d never been in an elevator that went in a curve, and my stomach wasn’t too happy about it.
“I’d have to agree with him there,” Thalia murmured quietly. Heights were bad enough, but when you’re on a curve as well now that’s bad.
“No parents?” the fat lady asked us.
She had beady eyes; pointy coffee-stained teeth; a floppy denim hat, and a denim dress that bulged so much, she looked like a blue-jean blimp.
“I’m really starting to hate how he describes things,” Nico commented.
“They’re below,” Annabeth told her. “Scared of heights.”
“Oh, the poor dears.”
The Chihuahua growled. The woman said, “Now, now, Sonny. Behave.” The dog had beady eyes like its owner, intelligent and vicious.
I said, “Sonny. Is that his name?”
“No,” the lady told me.
She smiled, as if that cleared everything up.
“It doesn’t,” Hazel said.
Back in the bedroom, Percy said, “Okay, Reyna, what’s going on? You’ve been acting weird since we got here.”
“I’ve been acting weird!” Reyna exclaimed. “What about you?”
“What about me?”
“You’ve been acting different since we got here!”
“No, I haven’t,” Percy denied.
“Yes, you have,” Reyna insisted.
“Well, I can’t help it,” Percy justified. “I’m different here because I’m with my friends. I’m with the people I grew up with. I’m with my family.”
Reyna glared at him half-heartedly. “And what about us? Are we just replacements to your perfect life?”
“What? No! Reyna, what is with you? You’ve never acted like this before,” Percy sounded conflicted. A part of him wanted to figure out what was wrong, and the other part wanted to get the Hades out of there.
“Maybe because I’ve never felt so hurt before,” Reyna told him in a small voice.
Percy immediately felt sympathy for her. “Reyna,” he moved forward and pulled her into a hug. Reyna smiled lightly and leaned into him. She couldn’t resist but breathe in his breezy sea smell. “What’s wrong? Is it about Jason and Piper?”
Percy felt Reyna shake her head in the crook of his neck.
“Then what’s wrong?” Percy asked. Percy pulled away so they were arms-length from each other. Reyna immediately missed the closeness. Percy placed his hand on her arm in a comforting gesture. “Talk to me, Reyna. What’s bothering you?”
Reyna didn’t say anything as she looked up at Percy. All of a sudden, Percy felt Reyna’s lips against his. His eyes widened and he pulled away at the exact moment someone said, “What the Hades is going on here!”
Percy jumped away to find Thalia Grace in the doorway.
Thalia went to leave the room, but Percy jumped forward before she could get far. He wrapped his arms around her waist tightly and dragged her back into the bedroom.
“Reyna, leave now!” Percy’s voice was hard and unforgiving.
“Oh, yeah, protect your girlfriend!” Thalia spat.
Reyna stood there unmoving.
“Now!”
Reyna jumped shocked at the harshness of Percy’s voice.
“Sorry,” she murmured quietly before leaving the room.
Percy move forward to lock the door before Thalia could. He stood in front of the closed door blocking Thalia’s exit.
“I can’t believe you’d do this!” Thalia snapped. “Annabeth is my best friend! How could you do that to her?!”
“It wasn’t my faul-”
“Oh, it wasn’t your fault? Really, Percy. You’re gonna use that line! You just cheated on your girlfriend!”
“I-I didn’t cheat!” Percy argued. “Reyna kissed me! I didn’t kiss her back!”
“And why should I believe that?!”
“Because I’m your friend! You know me Thalia. You know my flaw! You know I’d never do anything to purposely hurt Annabeth,” Percy took a deep breath, his voice level lowering slightly. “You know I’d never cheat on her.”
“So what happened? Did you and Reyna date before you got your memory back or something?” Thalia asked. She was still angry but her anger was slowly dissipating.
He shook my head. “No. She asked me to, but I never forgot Annabeth, so I immediately told her no. I guess she liked me more than she let on.”
“Or you were just being your regular Kelp Headed self,” Thalia chided, with a small smile.
Percy snorted nodded. “I need to work on that.”
“Yeah, you may want to work a little harder,” Thalia rolled her eyes. “You are going to tell Annabeth, aren’t you?”
“Yeah, I just don’t know how. We just got back together . . . I don’t want to lose her again,” Percy admitted.
“But if you don’t tell her then eventually she may find out from someone else and she’ll really hate you then,” Thalia told him.
“I know. I’ll tell her,” he decided, “but I’ll do it when the time is right. I will tell her though.”
“Good, because if you don’t I will.”
“I know.”
They both moved to leave the room.
“Hey, Thalia,” Percy spoke up in the hall.
“What?”
“Thanks.”
“Yeah, yeah, yeah. Just don’t make me regret it.”
Please don't hate me!