Page 128

Shadows.

Shadows were darting between the skeleton trees and cacti.

Something was following them.

Nico tried not to panic. They were on a fairly fast-moving river, and it was also wide enough that most creatures wouldn’t be able to access the boat without plunging into the deep waters. But …

They were about to lose their advantage.

As the boat floated towards the next pass, the walls of the mountains rose high above them. Nico recalled Percy’s stories of facing Scylla and Charybdis with Clarisse La Rue, and he knew thatthispredicament was far worse.

This river was in a narrow canyon, and the Acheron thinned to a width only slightly larger than the boat’s. Anything that wanted to ambush them could do so now.

Nico looked back one last time.

He thought he saw something lurking behind the trunk of a cactus.

He wasn’t sure, and that was a million times worse.

‘Just stay alert,’ Nico whispered to himself.

His left arm was looped around his boyfriend, his fingers interlocked with Will’s. But his right hand now crept towards his sword, and his fingers grazed the pommel.

The boat entered the mountain pass.

Nico kept his eyes on the steep inclines, dancing from one side to the other. There were jet-black scrub plants growing on the sides, as well as bushes with sickly brown leaves shaped like long needles. The stone of the mountains glistened, and Nico was sure that if he reached out and touched it, it would be wet and sticky.

Like an organ.

Like something that was alive.

He pulled out his sword and brought his right arm around so the blade was now resting just over Will’s body.

He heard a splash behind him.

It was small. Nothing too large, then. And, to Nico’s left, a few pebbles rolled down the mountain and softly plunked into the Acheron.

He glanced up, gripped his sword tighter.

The eyes were small and glowed in the yellow hue of Tartarus. There weren’t many of them tucked up behind the needle plants, but they were there. Watching. Waiting.

Waiting for what, Nico did not know.

But they didn’t attack the boat. The river surged, and they picked up speed, twisting through a sheer gorge before the Acheron sloped down.

Nico held Will tightly as the boat bounced along the river, and then they returned to a slow drift once the Acheron straightened. Behind him, the short rapids petered out until they were a dull roar, and then … nothing. The canyon was deathly silent.

‘I really hate this,’ Nico whispered aloud.

The tension was unending. Nico wasn’t sure if he was imaginingthe sound of something entering the water behind him, but he also didn’t want to risk taking a look back and leaving himself vulnerable to an attack from either mountainside. Every so often he’d catch a creature hiding in the shadows, its small, beady eyes glowing as it watched them, but nothing made a move.

Meanwhile, Will began to stir in Nico’s arms. He wasn’t waking but struggling in the midst of a dream. Nico wished he could pull the nightmares from his boyfriend’s mind and take them on himself so that Will could sleep restfully. He needed it.

You need it, too, said the river.Why don’t you join us? Why don’t you rest forever?

Nico inhaled deeply, trying to still his racing heart.

Soon, though, the twisting, turning canyon gave way to an opening. Anending. The stone walls on either side no longer towered over the boat. It was only once they’d passed the other end of the canyon that Nico allowed himself to look back.