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“And when I return, if everything isn’t just as I left it…”

“Oh, don’t worry!” I said. “Worrying ismyjob. I am excellent at worrying.”

No lies detected, obviously.

Hecate laughed. “Onward, then!”

She disappeared in an implosion of darkness, leaving behind her bag of candy corn, as if I needed another threat.

When I got back to Gramercy Park, Grover’s first comment was “Is that candy corn?”

“Yeah.” I handed him the bag. “It’s gross. Enjoy.”

As Grover chowed down, I joined him and Annabeth on the great-room floor and told them about my terrible, horrible, no-good, very-bad goddess-butt-dial day. Hellpuppy Nope curled up in Annabeth’s lap and listened.

When I was done, Annabeth said, “I’m jealous. Chironneversubstitutes at School of Design. You are so lucky.”

I imagined the centaur rolling up to Advanced Dressmaking with a sparkly tie, rhinestone glasses, and sequins on his wheel rims. He could have totally pulled it off.

“Nope!” offered Nope.

“I know,” Grover told him. “But I don’t think Percy will like that name.”

“Excuse me?” I asked.

Grover shifted anxiously, like someone might take away his candy bag. “Nope made up names for all of us. Annabeth is Mom.”

Annabeth beamed. “What a good dog!”

“I’m Chew Toy,” Grover said. Then, before I could laugh, he added, “You’re Alley Boy.”

Annabeth kept a straight face. “It’s perfect.”

“Seaweed Brain is bad enough,” I grumbled. “Alley Boy sounds like some sort of D-list superhero sidekick.”

“The Adventures of Mom, Chew Toy, and Alley Boy,”Annabeth mused. “We should pitch that to Hollywood.”

I wasn’t sure if she was kidding, which always made me nervous.

“Anyway,” I said, “I managed to buy us a few more hours. Hecate won’t be back until Saturday morning.”

“That’s good.” Grover gazed forlornly around the damaged house. He’d done what he could to clean up the debris. The front door was covered with a plastic shower curtain. The knockers had been wrapped in paper towels and tucked in a cardboard box. Most of the broken furniture had been cleared away. But there wasn’t much he could do to hide the broken stained-glass windows and the massive goat-hoof craters in the walls. “Maybe if we find some duct tape…”

“One thing at a time,” Annabeth reminded him. “Tonight, our mission is Hecuba. She’s the biggest, most dangerous pet. If Chiron is right, she’ll be out there hunting Greeks as soon as the sun goes down.”

She turned to me. “I spent all day in the library, and I learned…well, pretty much what Chiron told you. Which is annoying, since I had to translate most of the information from Greek and Latin.”

“On the bright side,” I said, “you didn’t turn into a flaming purple armadillo.”

“Not yet,” she agreed. “Though some of the books in that room…” She shook her head in amazement. “I could swear they were calling to me, urging me to read them.”

“I’m glad you didn’t,” I said. “I fear Hecate may be tempting us to make bad choices.”

I told them what I’d been thinking about the strawberry concoction, the library, and the torches. I wasn’t sure if the moray eels were supposed to be a temptation—unless they were a temptation for me to strangle a moray eel. In which case, well played, Hecate.

Grover sniffled. “I appreciate you saying all that, Percy. But this is still my fault. I was weak!”

“Hey.” I patted his knee. “One thing at a time, G-man, like Annabeth said. Let’s get over to Astoria. Lots of Greeks there for Hecuba to terrorize. Maybe we’ll get lucky.”