Page 30 of The Court of the Dead (The Nico di Angelo Adventures #2)

N ico had no dreams.

He found the silent sleep even more unsettling. When he woke for lunch, he felt like he’d risen from the dead rather than from his bunk—and Nico knew what rising from the dead was like better than most people.

He worried that the lack of voices in his nightmares meant his unknown enemies were done with threats.

Now they simply intended to act. He would have preferred to believe that Asterion had overpowered the mythic-nappers.

Maybe the bull-man had knocked their heads together, stabbed them with knitting needles, tied them up in yarn, and was now heading home with Arielle and Quinoa.

Nico suspected that was too much to hope for.

As Will and Nico traversed the Via Principalis, they found that the mood of the legion had shifted dramatically overnight.

They saw no graffiti, no troublemaking or dark glances.

They heard no whispered complaints or snide comments about monsters.

All five cohorts had turned out in full armor.

They hustled through camp, reinforcing the battlements, stockpiling harpoons for the ballistae, preloading catapults, and making sure there was plenty of boiling oil.

The Romans really knew how to welcome visitors, and they obviously did not like someone threatening one of their praetors.

Outside the First Cohort’s barracks, Centurion Terrence was giving his soldiers a pep talk.

Standing next to him was Johan and a legionnaire who looked like…

Nico had to do a double take. Yes, that was the kid who’d tried to prank Johan and gotten himself frozen with the dodecahedron a few days before.

Now he stood with his hand on Johan’s shoulder/forehead, nodding along with his centurion’s speech like he was serving as a character witness for the blemmyae.

“An unknown intruder came into our territory !” Terrence bellowed. “Stole our guests from their beds!”

The legionnaires yelled for vengeance, banging their spears against their shields.

“Our honor as hosts, as Romans, as demigods has been tarnished!” Terrence continued. “The mythics deserve better! We will let no more harm befall them!”

Legionnaires hooted and shouted in agreement. The former prankster next to Johan raised his fist. “I, Lucius Silver, son of Mercury, pledge my life to protect this blemmyae! He shall not be harmed while I draw breath. Who is with me?”

The entire cohort cheered. Johan looked stunned by the commotion and also moved to tears. He sniffled and wiped his enormous eyes, mumbling his thanks, and made a heart shape with his hands to show the cohort. If the blemmyae had had a throat, Nico imagined there would’ve been a lump in it.

“That’s encouraging,” Will observed as they walked on.

Nico nodded. He felt salty that it had taken the disappearance of three mythics and a threat against Hazel to change the legion’s mind, but he supposed it was better late than never.

He was glad he had Will to remind him of the bright side.

Nico tended to daydream about the side where he summoned an army of skeletons to smack a little sense into the Romans.

For some reason, Will considered that idea “too dark.”

Orcus was enjoying a similar surge in popularity.

The tiny griffin held court outside the coffee shop, recounting the story of last night’s abduction to an assembly of Lares, wolves, eagles, and fauns.

In this version, though, Orcus had fallen asleep valiantly, struggling to keep his eyes open as he crawled toward the unseen intruder, determined to claw their eyes out and save Asterion, but alas, to no avail.

Maynard Thee Faun worked the crowd, holding out a hat for donations for “the defense of New Rome,” despite the fact that none of the crowd had pockets or used money.

“Little dude is a hero!” Maynard shouted. “Give it up for Orcus!”

The griffin preened. As far as Nico could tell, he didn’t fart once.

Nico and Will had lunch at the officers’ table as planned, though there really wasn’t much else they could do to prepare.

Even Semele agreed the plan was solid, though coming from a wisp of smoke, Nico wasn’t sure what that meant.

He realized how hard it was to read the eidolon’s emotions without being able to read her body language.

Still, he chose to believe that her approval was a good thing, especially since she had to have seen a lot in her centuries of existence.

The rest of the camp seemed ready for the worst. Yazan, Deion, Savannah, and the kid from the First Cohort, Lucius, had volunteered (nay, demanded) to stand sentry outside the principia’s entrance all night, each gingerly holding a Cocoa Puff.

They said it was the least they could do for the mythics.

Frank would be inside the praetors’ office as a second line of defense.

He’d already called dibs on the cacodemon Anger because he felt like they’d work well together.

Will and Nico would be downstairs in the vault with the mythics and Hazel. Again, everyone would have a Puff, which would serve as their canaries in the proverbial coal mine. Semele didn’t understand that reference, so Will launched into a ten-minute explanation of the phrase.

Nico knew Will was deeply nervous like the rest of them because he was talking a mile a minute.

Will also pointed out that there might be more than one mythic-napper.

They’d heard two different voices now—one low and gravelly, the other a high-pitched, singsongy ball of threats—so they couldn’t be sure how many people might be working together.

Nico kindly asked Will to stop bringing up facts that made everyone feel worse .

“Okay,” he relented. “I’m just saying this whole thing stinks like Mr. D’s feet on his pedicure days.”

Nico wrinkled his nose. “Dude, that was…so unnecessary.”

“But you know I’m right.”

Hazel let out a long sigh. “If this is what your conversations are going to be like, it’s gonna be a long night.”

Frank smiled. “Almost makes me glad I’ll be upstairs, but I’d still rather be at your side.”

“I know,” Hazel said. “I’ll be fine. The intruder won’t catch me off guard again.”

“I hope you are right,” said Semele next to Nico’s shoulder.

Nico dropped his grilled-cheese sandwich in alarm. He had forgotten the eidolon was there. He really needed to figure out how to explain “personal space” to a non-corporeal being.

“You are still learning to control the Mist,” Semele continued. “You will be facing an entity who likely has been using it for millennia.”

“Hazel can do it,” said Will. “Her powers are growing fast.”

“That’s right,” Nico said. “If my little Care Bear here can learn archery, Hazel can out-magic a minor god.”

That got Frank’s attention. “Archery, huh?”

Will blushed, clearly uncomfortable with the conversation’s detour. “Yeah. I’m overdue…. Like, a lifetime overdue.”

“How’s it going?”

“Despite being so tired, I sneaked in a good training session this morning with one of your Lares—guy named Marcus?”

Frank nodded. “He was part of the auxilia in ancient times, from a famed battalion of Roman archers. You’re getting a lesson from one of the best archers ever. You should be an expert by, like…tomorrow.”

Will laughed nervously. “Don’t know about that, but I am getting better! I can hit the bull’s-eye more often now. On purpose, even!”

Nico waved off his comment. “You’re a child of Apollo. It’s clearly coming naturally to you. Besides, we all have to start somewhere, right?”

“Haven’t I used that exact logic on you before?” Will asked.

“And now I’m weaponizing it,” Nico said with a smirk. “How does it feel?”

“Oh my gods!” Hazel’s voice broke through their conversation. “Are you two going to be this sickeningly cute tonight?”

They both glanced at her.

“Deal with it,” said Nico.

Frank started to laugh. “Definitely glad I’m going to be outside,” he said.

The legion’s vault would not have been Nico’s first choice for a slumber party.

The marble floor was hard. The arched ceiling glowed with harsh white light that couldn’t be adjusted.

Rows of freestanding mahogany shelves marched down the center of the long room—some filled with books, others with boxes of artifacts or glass display cases.

If a fight broke out in here, Nico worried all those shelves would fall like dominos, crushing them under an avalanche of antique magic weapons and battle trophies.

The only exit was a circular metal staircase that led back up to the praetors’ office.

The trapdoor at the top was now sealed from both sides with magic and mechanical locks.

Nico had never been afraid of being underground, but after his experience as a prisoner in a bronze jar, he didn’t love enclosed spaces.

Also, it was musty. Orcus spent the first half hour sneeze-farting, while Johan apologized that he hadn’t brought a feather duster and complained that no self-respecting archivist would leave a collection in this condition.

“I will fix it,” he promised. “Assuming we don’t have to flee the camp. And assuming we are not abducted and brutally killed.”

“Please stop assuming.” Orcus sneezed so hard that he molted a blizzard of down.

Nothing happened for hours . Hazel sat cross-legged against the far wall, in front of a display of old battle standards.

She looked like she was meditating, though that must have been difficult with a cacodemon rolling around in her lap.

She’d insisted on choosing Guilt because she thought it would keep her focused on not failing again.

Semele drifted restlessly through the stacks.

She was the only one who couldn’t hold a cacodemon, and it seemed to make her uneasy.

Every time she came across a row of manuscripts, she fumigated them, seeping between the pages and apparently absorbing what was written there.

Nico wondered if this was the eidolon version of flipping through old magazines in a waiting room.

Will had unrolled his sleeping bag next to Nico’s. He lounged on his side like a true Roman, absently scratching Grief’s antlers while the cacodemon cooed with approval. By the end of the night, Nico figured, either Will would be overcome by grief, or Grief would be overcome by Will.

As for Nico, he’d chosen his old buddy Loneliness. The one-eyed urchin-like blob was now sprawled belly-up on Nico’s sleeping bag, blissfully chewing on its drawstring.

This wasn’t the first time Nico had done a stakeout, but he found it hard to relax. Maybe that was just as well. He couldn’t afford to fall asleep.

Will tried to engage him in a rambling conversation, which Nico was thankful for, because it was the only thing that pulled his mind away from the unknown.

So many unknowns. Who was sneaking into Camp Jupiter? Why had they kidnapped Asterion, Arielle, and Quinoa? And what was this court the voice had mentioned last night?

Nico had so little to go on, and it was in these undefined areas that his mind loved to imagine the worst: His new friends were dead. More were going to be kidnapped. Nico and Hazel wouldn’t be able to stop it.

He glanced at Loneliness, who was chewing his drawstring into a frayed, soggy mess. You’re not actually alone right now , he reminded himself. You’re not going to mess this up .

He fiddled with his tessera pendant, which Savannah had gotten operational again after last night’s meltdown. “Frank,” he said.

Immediately, a glowing rainbow sphere blazed to life. Frank’s floating head scowled out of it.

“What?” he snapped, and then immediately caught himself. “Sorry. Anger and I are getting in touch with our feelings.” He took a deep breath and continued in a calmer voice, “What’s going on down there?”

“Nothing much,” Nico said. “You?”

“All quiet,” Frank reported. “We had a brief freak-out because Yazan swore he heard an intruder tunneling under the principia’s front steps. Turned out to be a family of raccoons.”

Will grinned. “You gotta keep an eye on those raccoons.”

“Hrmph,” Frank grumbled. “Long as no one else disappears tonight. Thanks for the update.”

The Iris-message went dark.

Nico glanced down the length of the room. The mythics had disappeared somewhere in the stacks, though he could hear an occasional sneeze from Orcus.

“Semele?” he called. “All good down there?”

After a brief silence, Semele’s muffled voice replied, “Everyone is accounted for.”

Nico wondered if he’d interrupted her while she was trying to smoke a good book.

He gave Will a shrug. “Guess we just wait, then.”

But his nerves did not calm down. Blood pulsed in his ears.

“This is getting to you, isn’t it?” asked Will.

“A little bit.”

Will reached across the sleeping bags and laced his fingers through Nico’s.

“Just breathe,” he whispered. “I’m right here. So is Hazel. We got this.”

Nico remembered the exercises Mr. D had taught him. He tried his best to calm his breathing.

They waited.

And waited.

And waited.