The Tyrant’s Tomb by Rick Riordan

Hamster ball of death

Spare me your fiery doom

I’m not feeling it

OH, BOY, A SPECIALjob!

The anticipation was killing me. Or maybe that was the poison in my veins.

As soon as I returned to the coffee shop’s attic, I crashed on my cot.

Meg huffed, “It’s still light outside. You slept all day.”

“Not turning into a zombie is hard work.”

“I know!” she snapped. “I’m sorry!”

I looked up, surprised by her tone. Meg kicked an old paper latte cup across the room. She plopped onto her cot and glared at the floor.

“Meg?”

In her flower box, irises grew with such speed that their flowers crackled open like corn kernels. Just a few minutes ago, Meg had been happily insulting me and gorging on jelly beans. Now…Was she crying?

“Meg.” I sat up, trying not to wince. “Meg, you’re not responsible for me getting hurt.”

She twisted the ring on her right hand, then the one on her left, as if they’d become too small for her fingers. “I just thought…if I could kill him…” She wiped her nose. “Like in some stories. You kill the master, and you can free the people he’s turned.”

It took a moment for her words to sink in. I was pretty sure the dynamic she was describing applied to vampires, not zombies, but I understood what she meant.

“You’re talking about Tarquin,” I said. “You jumped into the throne room because…you wanted to save me?”

“Duh,” she muttered, without any heat.

I put my hand over my bandaged abdomen. I’d been so angry with Meg for her recklessness in the tomb. I’d assumed she was just being impulsive, reacting to Tarquin’s plans to let the Bay Area burn. But she’d leaped into battle for me—with the hope that she could kill Tarquin and erase my curse. That was even before I’d realized how bad my condition was. Meg must have been more worried, or more intuitive, than she’d let on.

Which certainly took all the fun out of criticizing her.

“Oh, Meg.” I shook my head. “That was a crazy, senseless stunt, and I love you for it. But don’t beat yourself up. Pranjal’s medicine bought me some extra time. And you did, too, of course, with your cheese-grating skills and your magical chickweed. You’ve done everything you could. When we summon godly help, I can ask for complete healing. I’m sure I’ll be as good as new. Or at least, as good as a Lester can be.”

Meg tilted her head, making her crooked glasses just about horizontal. “How can you know? Is this god going to give us three wishes or something?”

I considered that. When my followers called, had I ever shown up and granted them three wishes? LOL, nope. Maybe one wish, if that wish was something I wanted to happen anyway. And if this ritual only allowed me to call one god, who would it be—assuming I could even choose? Perhaps my son Asclepius would be able to heal me, but he couldn’t very well fight the Roman emperors’ forces and the hordes of undead. Mars might grant us success on the battlefield, but he’d look at my wound and say something like Yeah, rough break. Die bravely!

Here I was with purple lines of infection snaking down my arms, telling Meg not to worry.

“I don’t know, Meg,” I confessed. “You’re right. I can’t be sure everything will be okay. But I can promise you I’m not giving up. We’ve come this far. I’m not going to let a belly scratch stop us from defeating the Triumvirate.”

She had so much mucus dripping from her nostrils, she would’ve made Buster the unicorn proud. She sniffled, wiping her upper lip with her knuckle. “I don’t want to lose somebody else.”

My mental gears weren’t turning at full speed. I had trouble wrapping my mind around the fact that by “somebody else,” Meg meant me.

I recalled one of her early memories, which I’d witnessed in my dreams: she’d been forced to gaze upon her father’s lifeless body on the steps of Grand Central Station while Nero, his murderer, hugged her and promised to take care of her.

I remembered how she’d betrayed me to Nero in the Grove of Dodona out of fear of the Beast, Nero’s dark side, and how horrible she’d felt afterward, when we reunited in Indianapolis. Then she’d taken all her displaced anger and guilt and frustration and projected it onto Caligula (which, to be honest, was a pretty good place to put it). Meg, being unable to lash out at Nero, had wanted so badly to kill Caligula. When Jason died instead, she was devastated.

Now, aside from all the bad memories the Roman trappings of Camp Jupiter might have triggered for her, she was faced with the prospect of losing me. In a moment of shock, like a unicorn staring me right in the face, I realized that despite all the grief Meg gave me, and the way she ordered me around, she cared for me. For the past three months, I had been her one constant friend, just as she had been mine.

The only other person who might have come close was Peaches, Meg’s fruit-tree spirit minion, and we hadn’t seen him since Indianapolis. At first, I’d assumed Peaches was just being temperamental about when he decided to appear, like most supernatural creatures. But if he had tried to follow us to Palm Springs, where even the cacti struggled to survive…I didn’t relish a peach tree’s odds of survival there, much less in the Burning Maze.

Meg hadn’t mentioned Peaches to me once since we were in the Labyrinth. Now I realized his absence must have been weighing on her, along with all her other worries.

What a horribly insufficient friend I had been.

“Come here.” I held out my arms. “Please?”

Meg hesitated. Still sniffling, she rose from her cot and trudged toward me. She fell into my hug like I was a comfy mattress. I grunted, surprised by how solid and heavy she was. She smelled of apple peels and mud, but I didn’t mind. I didn’t even mind the mucus and tears soaking my shoulder.

I’d always wondered what it would be like to have a younger sibling. Sometimes I’d treated Artemis as my baby sister, since I’d been born a few minutes earlier, but that had been mostly to annoy her. With Meg, I felt as if it were actually true. I had someone who depended on me, who needed me around no matter how much we irritated each other. I thought about Hazel and Frank and the washing away of curses. I supposed that kind of love could come from many different types of relationships.

“Okay.” Meg pushed herself away, wiping her cheeks furiously. “Enough of that. You sleep. I’m—I’m going to get dinner or whatever.”

For a long time after she left, I lay in my cot staring at the ceiling.

Music floated up from the café: the soothing sounds of Horace Silver’s piano, punctuated by the hiss of the espresso machine, accompanying Bombilo singing in two-headed harmony. After spending a few days with these noises, I found them soothing, even homey. I drifted off to sleep, hoping to have warm, fuzzy dreams about Meg and me skipping through sunlit fields with our elephant, unicorn, and metal greyhound friends.

Instead, I found myself back with the emperors.

On my list of places I least wanted to be, Caligula’s yacht ranked right up there with Tarquin’s tomb, the eternal abyss of Chaos, and the Limburger cheese factory in Liège, Belgium, where stinking gym socks went to feel better about themselves.

Commodus lounged in a deck chair, an aluminum tanning bib around his neck reflecting the afternoon sun directly onto his face. Sunglasses covered his scarred eyes. He wore only pink swim trunks and pink Crocs. I took absolutely no notice of the way the tanning oil glistened on his muscular bronzed body.

Caligula stood nearby in his captain’s uniform: white coat, dark slacks, and striped shirt, all crisply pressed. His cruel face looked almost angelic as he marveled at the contraption that now took up the entire aft deck. The artillery mortar was the size of an aboveground swimming pool, with a two-foot-thick rim of dark iron and a diameter wide enough to drive a car through. Nestled in the barrel, a massive green sphere glowed like a giant radioactive hamster ball.

Pandai rushed around the deck, blanket ears flopping, their furry hands moving at preternatural speeds as they plugged in cables and oiled gears at the base of the weapon. Some of the pandai were young enough to have pure white fur, which made my heart hurt, reminding me of my brief friendship with Crest, the youthful aspiring musician who’d lost his life in the Burning Maze.

“It’s wonderful!” Caligula beamed, circling the mortar. “Is it ready for test-firing?”

“Yes, lord!” said the pandos Boost. “Of course, every sphere of Greek fire is very, very expensive, so—”

“DO IT!” Caligula yelled.

Boost yelped and scrambled to the control panel.

Greek fire. I hated the stuff, and I was a sun god who rode a fiery chariot. Viscous, green, and impossible to extinguish, Greek fire was just plain nasty. A cupful could burn down an entire building, and that single glowing sphere held more than I’d ever seen in one place.

“Oh, Commodus?” Caligula called. “You might want to pay attention to this.”

“I am fully attentive,” Commodus said, turning his face to better catch the sun.

Caligula sighed. “Boost, you may proceed.”

Boost called out instructions in his own language. His fellow pandai turned cranks and spun dials, slowly swiveling the mortar until it pointed out to sea. Boost double-checked his readings on the control panel, then shouted, “U¯nus, duo, tre¯s!”

With a mighty boom, the mortar fired. The entire boat shuddered from the recoil. The giant hamster ball rocketed upward until it was a green marble in the sky, then plummeted toward the western horizon. The sky blazed emerald. A moment later, hot winds buffeted the ship with the smell of burning salt and cooked fish. In the distance, a geyser of green fire churned on the boiling sea.

“Ooh, pretty.” Caligula grinned at Boost. “And you have one missile for each ship?”

“Yes, lord. As instructed.”

“The range?”

“Once we clear Treasure Island, we’ll be able to bring all weapons to bear on Camp Jupiter, my lord. No magical defenses can stop such a massive volley. Total annihilation!”

“Good,” Caligula said. “That’s my favorite kind.”

“But remember,” Commodus called from his deck chair, having not even turned to watch the explosion, “first we try a ground assault. Maybe they’ll be wise and surrender! We want New Rome intact and the harpy and Cyclops taken alive, if possible.”

“Yes, yes,” Caligula said. “If possible.”

He seemed to savor those words like a beautiful lie. His eyes glittered in the green artificial sunset. “Either way, this will be fun.”

I woke up alone, the sun baking my face. For a second I thought I might be in a deck chair next to Commodus, a tanning bib around my neck. But no. The days when Commodus and I hung out together were long gone.

I sat up, groggy, disoriented, and dehydrated. Why was it still light outside?

Then I realized, judging from the angle of the sun coming in the room, it must have been about noon. Once again, I’d slept through the night and half a day. I still felt exhausted.

I pressed gently on my bandaged gut. I was horrified to find the wound tender again. The purple lines of infection had darkened. This could only mean one thing: it was time for a long-sleeved shirt. No matter what happened over the next twenty-four hours, I would not add to Meg’s worries. I would tough it out until the moment I keeled over.

Wow. Who even was I?

By the time I changed clothes and hobbled out of Bombilo’s coffee shop, most of the legion had gathered at the mess hall for lunch. As usual, the dining room bustled with activity. Demigods, grouped by cohort, reclined on couches around low tables while aurae whisked overhead with platters of food and pitchers of drink. Hanging from the cedar rafters, war-game pennants and cohort standards rippled in the constant breeze. When they’d finished eating, diners rose cautiously and walked away hunched over, lest they get decapitated by a flying plate of cold cuts. Except for the Lares, of course. They didn’t care what sort of delicacies flew through their ectoplasmic noggins.

I spotted Frank at the officers’ table, deep in conversation with Hazel and the rest of the centurions. Reyna was nowhere in sight—perhaps she was catching a nap or preparing for the afternoon’s war drills. Given what we were facing tomorrow, Frank looked remarkably relaxed. As he chatted with his officers, he even cracked a smile, which seemed to put the others at ease.

How simple it would be to destroy their fragile confidence, I thought, just by describing the flotilla of artillery yachts I’d seen in my dream. Not yet, I decided. No sense spoiling their meal.

“Hey, Lester!” Lavinia yelled from across the room, waving me over as if I were her waiter.

I joined her and Meg at the Fifth Cohort table. An aura deposited a goblet of water in my hand, then left a whole pitcher on the table. Apparently, my dehydration was that obvious.

Lavinia leaned forward, her eyebrows arched like pink-and-chestnut rainbows. “So, is it true?”

I frowned at Meg, wondering which of the many embarrassing stories about me she might have shared. She was too busy plowing through a row of hot dogs to pay me any mind.

“Is what true?” I asked.

“The shoes.”

“Shoes?”

Lavinia threw her hands in the air. “The dancing shoes of Terpsichore! Meg was telling us what happened on Caligula’s yachts. She said you and that Piper girl saw a pair of Terpsichore’s shoes!”

“Oh.” I had completely forgotten about those, or the fact that I’d told Meg about them. Strange, but the other events aboard Caligula’s ships—getting captured, seeing Jason killed before our eyes, barely escaping with our lives—had eclipsed my memories of the emperor’s footwear collection.

“Meg,” I said, “of all the things you could have chosen to tell them, you told them about that?”

“Wasn’t my idea.” Meg somehow managed to enunciate with half a hot dog in her mouth. “Lavinia likes shoes.”

“Well, what did you think I was going to ask about?” Lavinia demanded. “You tell me the emperor has an entire boatload of shoes, of course I’m going to wonder if you saw any dancing ones! So it’s true, then, Lester?”

“I mean…yes. We saw a pair of—”

“Wow.” Lavinia sat back, crossed her arms, and glared at me. “Just wow. You wait until now to tell me this? Do you know how rare those shoes are? How important…” She seemed to choke on her own indignation. “Wow.”

Around the table, Lavinia’s comrades showed a mixture of reactions. Some rolled their eyes, some smirked, some kept eating as if nothing Lavinia did could surprise them anymore.

An older boy with shaggy brown hair dared to stick up for me. “Lavinia, Apollo has had a few other things going on.”

“Oh, my gods, Thomas!” Lavinia shot back. “Naturally, you wouldn’t understand! You never take off those boots!”

Thomas frowned at his standard-issue combat stompers. “What? They’ve got good arch support.”

“Yeesh.” Lavinia turned to Meg. “We have to figure out a way to get aboard that ship and rescue those shoes.”

“Nah.” Meg sucked a glob of relish off her thumb. “Way too dangerous.”

“But—”

“Lavinia,” I interrupted, “you can’t.”

She must have heard the fear and urgency in my voice. Over the past few days, I had developed a strange fondness for Lavinia. I didn’t want to see her charge into a slaughter, especially after my dream about those mortars primed with Greek fire.

She ran her Star of David pendant back and forth on its chain. “You’ve got new information? Dish.”

Before I could reply, a plate of food flew into my hands. The aurae had decided I needed chicken fingers and fries. Lots of them. Either that or they’d heard the word dish and taken it as an order.

A moment later, Hazel and the other Fifth Cohort centurion joined us—a dark-haired young man with strange red stains around his mouth. Ah, yes. Dakota, child of Bacchus.

“What’s going on?” Dakota asked.

“Lester has news.” Lavinia stared at me expectantly, as if I might be withholding the location of Terpsichore’s magical tutu (which, for the record, I hadn’t seen in centuries).

I took a deep breath. I wasn’t sure if this was the right forum for sharing my dream. I should probably report it to the praetors first. But Hazel nodded at me as if to say, Go on. I decided that was good enough.

I described what I’d seen—a top-of-the-line IKEA heavy mortar, fully assembled, shooting a giant hamster ball of green flaming death that blew up the Pacific Ocean. I explained that, apparently, the emperors had fifty such mortars, one on each ship, which would be ready to obliterate Camp Jupiter as soon as they took up positions in the bay.

Dakota’s face turned as red as his mouth. “I need more Kool-Aid.”

The fact that no goblets flew into his hand told me the aurae disagreed.

Lavinia looked like she’d been slapped with one of her mother’s ballet slippers. Meg kept eating hot dogs as if they might be the last ones she would ever get.

Hazel chewed her bottom lip in concentration, perhaps trying to extract any good news from what I’d said. She seemed to find this harder than pulling diamonds from the ground.

“Okay, look, guys, we knew the emperors were assembling secret weapons. At least now we know what those weapons are. I’ll convey this information to the praetors, but it doesn’t change anything. You all did a great job in the morning drills”—she hesitated, then generously decided not to add except for Apollo, who slept through it all—“and this afternoon, one of our war games will be about boarding enemy ships. We can get prepared.”

From the expressions around the table, I gathered the Fifth Cohort was not reassured. The Romans had never been known for their naval prowess. Last I’d checked, the Camp Jupiter “navy” consisted of some old triremes they only used for mock naval battles in the Colosseum, and one rowboat they kept docked in Alameda. Drilling to board enemy ships would be less about practicing a workable battle plan and more about keeping the legionnaires busy so they wouldn’t think about their impending doom.

Thomas rubbed his forehead. “I hate my life.”

“Keep it together, legionnaire,” Hazel said. “This is what we signed up for. Defending the legacy of Rome.”

“From its own emperors,” Thomas said miserably.

“I’m sorry to tell you,” I put in, “but the biggest threat to the empire was often its own emperors.”

Nobody argued.

At the officers’ table, Frank Zhang stood. All around the room, flying pitchers and platters froze in midair, waiting respectfully.

“Legionnaires!” Frank announced, managing a confident smile. “Relay activities will recommence on the Field of Mars in twenty minutes. Drill like your lives depend on it, because they do!”