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FIC: The Necklace of Harmonia, chpt 29
Title: The Necklace of Harmonia (Daughter of Wisdom 3)
Author: shiiki
Rating: PG-13
Characters/Pairings: Annabeth Chase, Thalia Grace, Percy Jackson, Luke Castellan, Chiron, Clarisse La Rue, Chase family, OCs, various others, Gen with slight Percy/Annabeth
Fandom: Percy Jackson
Summary: After an eventful summer, Annabeth Chase is on her way to boarding school for the first time. With her friends Thalia and Percy close by, she's looking forward to spending the year in New York. But soon, she finds herself dealing with unfathomable dreams, tangled plots, and a mysterious necklace that keeps finding its way back to her. Worse still, her father wants her to move to the most dangerous city in the country. The choices Annabeth faces this year will have her questioning the meaning of friendship, loyalty, and family. And most of all, just what it means to keep a promise. An alternate PoV retelling of Percy Jackson and the Titan's Curse. Part 3 of the Daughter of Wisdom series.
In this chapter
Chapter Title: I Snare A Fox
Rating: PG-13
Characters: Annabeth Chase, Grover Underwood, Hephaestus, OCs
Word Count: 4,945
Chapter Summary: Annabeth confronts Kitsune at last.
Notes: I hope it's become clear by now why I chose the title of this fic! The challenge with writing Annabeth's story in this book was finding something to tie it all together-her family struggles, the Hunters' offer, her increasing dilemma as she's caught between Percy and Luke, her 'kidnapping' at winter break, her involvement with the Labyrinth … And the Necklace of Harmonia fit so well thematically, with its association with broken families, trials and misfortune, and tainted love. Not to mention a convenient 14-year-old character who could step in as the Hunter scout I needed.
By now the myth should be clear enough-this enchanted necklace was wrought by Hephaestus and gifted to his 'daughter' Harmonia, but cursed to bring misfortune to its owners. It conveniently follows the House of Thebes and a bunch of intriguing (and tragic) stories that come from there. Kitsune is entirely fictional, but her provenance was thanks to the realisation that the Teumessian Fox was a terror of Thebes as well. Initially I was going to draw upon that fox as a villain, but I struggled to make it fit. And then The Dark Prophecy came out and it seems RR has some other ideas for the Teumessian, so I decided to take a different route. And Kitty stepped up beautifully.
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Figuring out who could break the curse on the Necklace of Harmonia was one thing. Finding him was another. Gods didn't exactly come with handy location services.
Fortunately, Percy, Thalia, and Grover's adventure in December gave me a hint.
I would have IM-ed Percy, except our last message hadn't gone so well. If his mom hadn't yet told her boyfriend we were demigods, I didn't want to accidentally spring the knowledge on him. My new cell phone might have been an option, but I needed Percy's home number. (I made a mental note to ask him for it this summer.)
So instead, I directed Iris to Grover at Camp Half-Blood.
The woods at the edge of the strawberry fields came up in the rainbow. Then the holographic image wavered and a pleasant female voice came out of the rainbow: 'No Grover Underwood at Camp Half-Blood! Can I try a different location?'
At first, I was mystified. Then I realised he was probably off searching for Pan again. Where was it that he'd intended to go? He'd mentioned coffee, and a wild pig, and …
'New Mexico!'
'One moment, please!'
Fluffy cloud patterns drifted across the rainbow. A soft voice crooned, 'Somewhere over the rainbow …'
It took two verses of the song before the rainbow image zoomed in on a mossy stone barn under a wide, open sky. Grover's back was to me, bent over a water trough by the barn entrance. He wasn't wearing his rasta cap, so his horns were fully visible, curving up through his curly hair. They'd grown about an inch or so since March.
'Grover!'
His horns perked up. 'Hey sweetie!' he said, turning around with a bright smile that faded the moment he saw me. It was replaced by a look of chagrin. 'Oh, it's you. Um, not that I'm not happy to see you. I mean …' He twisted his rasta cap in his hands.
I grinned wickedly. 'Who did you think I was?'
'Uh, that's not … I was expecting … she was gonna …' Grover's face was bright red. 'Fine, if you must know-I'm dating Juniper.'
'Juniper? The tree nymph?'
'Yeah.' A dreamy look washed over Grover's face. 'She's so amazing … smart, and pretty, and so natural …'
I shouldn't have been surprised. Grover had obviously been attracted to her during our tussle with the Maenads. Still, Grover with a girlfriend … Was he even old enough? Sure, he was technically about twice my age, but satyrs aged half as fast, so it'd be like me or Percy getting together with … with someone.
I snapped my fingers to get Grover's attention back. (No, it was not to distract myself from the image that popped unbidden into my head, of Percy gazing at me with Grover's moony-eyed look. Really.) 'Okay, good for you, Goat Boy. But can we focus? I need your help.'
I explained about the Necklace of Harmonia. 'When you guys went on the quest last winter, Percy said you passed through Hephaestus's junkyard.'
Grover's face drained of its colour. 'That's where we lost Bianca.'
'It's the only place I can think of that's linked to Hephaestus. I have to go. Zoë's last request was for me to break the curse on the necklace. So I need to know where this junkyard is.'
Grover was quiet for a while. I could tell he was weighing the decision in his head. If he told me where to find the junkyard, he'd feel responsible if I got into trouble there. But if he refused, he'd be the reason I couldn't break the curse. Finally, he said, 'It's in Arizona. Near Gila Claw.'
I drew in a sharp breath. That was less than a hundred miles from me, just over the Superstition Mountains running down the centre of the state. It felt like a sign-it had to be the right place.
'Thanks, Grover. Don't worry, I'll be careful. I won't touch anything-I need to get rid of something there.' I tipped the clasp of the necklace out of my pocket.
'You know what?' Grover took a deep breath. 'I'm coming with you. I'm right on the state border. I can meet you at Gila Claw.'
'What? No, Grover, you don't have to-'
'I'm your friend, Annabeth,' Grover insisted. 'If you're doing something dangerous, I can't let you do it alone.' He looked me dead in the eye. 'I know you think I'm not as powerful, or as good a friend-'
'What? No, Grover, that's not …' I winced. It wasn't entirely false that I'd have preferred Percy or Thalia, but Grover had plenty of great qualities going for him, too. 'You are my friend. And you got us out of a lot of tight spots. If you're really okay to come, I'm glad to have you. I'll need a guide.'
Grover beamed. 'And my tracking's gotten loads better. I'll be your Sacagawea!'
'My what?'
'Your guide, duh. You know, like on the western frontier. Don't you learn about Lewis and Clark in school?' He looked like he was about to go into a long lecture on nature exploration and wilderness survival, so I cut him off quickly.
'Yeah, perfect! I'll see you in Gila Claw.'
+++
Hephaestus's junkyard was larger than I expected. Acres upon acres of it stretched towards the horizon, a sea of metal piled up in rolling waves. There was just about any invention you could think of, from old Antikytheras to Apple iMacs.
'Whoa,' I said, 'look at all this stuff!'
It was all broken, though. Bronze gears hung limply out of the ancient Greek computers. The Mac screens were smashed in. Among the mountains of cars, weapons, electronics, and household appliances, I spotted a totalled chariot, a television set missing a screen, and a wrecked guitar hanging out of a refrigerator without a door. Smaller objects littered the ground-dented shields, split containers, cracked jewellery.
I picked up a golden necklace. It looked suspiciously like the one I had in my pocket, except there were hollow spaces where the jewels should have been, and the snake-head clasps were twisted and misshapen.
I turned the fake necklace over in my hands. 'Some of these must be prototypes. The stuff that didn't come out right and got discarded.'
Grover looked around edgily, like he was worried one of the appliances might spring to life and bite us.
'Don't take anything with you,' he said. 'That's why Talos came after us.'
I dropped the necklace, but it was hard to leave the piles of junk alone. A little way in, I came across a set of adjustable architect scales that could not only switch between measurement units, but also expanded and contracted flexibly to measure around tight spaces. Although its hinges were stiff and rusty, and some of the markings were scratched through, I bet it would still work.
Grover clung to me as we clambered over the mountains of discarded inventions, jumping at every sudden noise.
'Relax, Grover, it's just the wind,' I said. It was rustling through the junk heaps with a strange whistling noise, almost like birdsong.
'No, did you see that? Look-there!'
My heart leapt as I saw it, too: something darting between a rickety rocking chair and an upturned washing machine. The chair creaked back and forth.
'I don't like this,' Grover muttered. 'It stinks of monsters.'
The mound of stuff we were standing on rumbled. Pieces of junk were thrown about, like someone was rifling through it. Grover and I skated down the side of the junk hill, our arms flailing, to find a thick-set man in a blacksmith's smock poking around at the bottom. He was sorting stuff into new piles, muttering, 'No, not that … that's gotta be destroyed … oh, that can be re-used.'
Grover and I exchanged a wide-eyed look.
'Um, sir? Hephaestus?' I said tentatively.
The god turned. He was bald and burly, like you'd expect Hephaestus to look, but something about his appearance was off. Wasn't Hephaestus supposed to be crippled because he'd been thrown off Olympus as a baby? This god-if he was one-was straight-backed and strong.
'Huh. You don't look like defects. Go stand with the re-usables.' He pointed towards a little heap of less-broken bronze appliances.
'We're not machines,' Grover said.
'Don't be ridiculous. Everything here's a machine.'
Something about the jerky, robotic quality of his movements rang a bell in my head. 'You're not Hephaestus! You're an automaton!'
Hephaestus's automaton stopped what he was doing to look at us properly. 'That's Hephaeston to you! I'm his automated proxy.' His face twisted into a ferocious scowl. 'You ain't judging the quality of my animus, now? You got a problem with machines?'
'No!' I said quickly. 'It's just that we really need to find Hephaestus.'
'Well, he's busy. Wars need weapons, you know. That's why I'm up here. Gotta sort out the old scraps.'
'I thought everything here was supposed to be-well, junk!' Grover said.
'Yeah, the gods throw stuff away all the time.' Hephaeston reached back into the junk heap and flung a dented bronze discus onto his recycling pile. 'Nothing lasts forever. But everything can always be re-used.'
'We need to throw something out, too.' From my pocket, I drew out the Necklace of Harmonia. 'It's been around long enough.'
Hephaeston's eyes narrowed. 'That looks familiar.'
'If you're Hephaestus's proxy, can you break his curses?'
'That's up to him.' Hephaeston sighed and crossed his arms. 'I can't take you to him, but I can get him on speed dial.'
A little flap popped open at the top of his bald head. We watched in astonishment as out popped a headset with an antenna and mouthpiece. Hephaeston settled it over his ears and closed his top flap. The centre pocket of his smock flattened and elongated into a blank LCD screen. With the antenna sticking up above his head and the screen over his belly, he resembled a bizarre, muscular Tellytubby.
The screen flickered to life. A gnarled face appeared in it.
'What's the trouble?' Hephaestus growled, sounding strikingly like his automaton. Or I guess it was his automaton that sounded like him, since he'd animated Hephaeston. 'Not computers again? I told you, no more PC's. I only want the Mac OS's.'
'No, I trashed the PC's. It's a demigod and a satyr looking for you. Something about a cursed necklace.' Hephaeston motioned for me to hold the necklace up to the screen.
There was a long pause.
'Ah,' Hephaestus said at last.
'Lord Hephaestus,' I said, 'I know it caused you a lot of grief over the years. But it's hurt a lot of people now, people who didn't have anything to do with your w-I mean, Aphrodite, or Ares. And the Titans are trying to use it in the war. Can you-could you break the curse? Please? I'll, um …' I floundered for an appropriate sacrifice. The only things left in my pockets were my faithful dagger and my invisibility cap.
It was a wrench, but I retrieved them. 'These are my most precious magical items,' I offered, swallowing hard.
Hephaestus's coal-black eyes seemed to be X-raying the objects through the screen. His face was so twisted and wrinkled, it made his expression impossible to read. Finally, he said gruffly, 'Keep your trinkets, girl.'
I wasn't sure whether to be relieved that he didn't want my knife and cap, or worried that I had nothing left to offer him. Or maybe insulted that he'd referred to my prize possessions as 'trinkets'. I stowed them back in my pocket and clasped the necklace tightly in both hands, biting my lower lip. Grover gave me a worried sideways glance.
'Lord Hephaestus, I could-' He pulled out his precious reed pipes.
'Grover, you can't!' I gasped.
'I won't take your gifts,' Hephaestus said. 'I have no use for them. Or I should say, you have more use for them than I.'
'Then you won't remove the curse?'
'I ask instead for a favour.'
'Name it!'
Hephaestus raised his eyebrows. 'Eager, aren't you? Very well. My workshop lies beneath this junkyard. Orders are piling up from Olympus, and how Zeus expects me to keep up when Poseidon has a monopoly on Cyclops labour … now, if only I still had the Hekatonkheires … but that's neither here nor there. Point is, my slack tub empties too quickly, and I haven't got enough workers to refill it quickly.' The screen image shifted to a large stone basin, in which several swords and a shield lay cooling in water. 'So if you want a favour, you do me one. Build me something to keep the slack tub full … and I'll consider your request.'
The screen went black. Hephaeston tucked his headset and antenna back into his head flap.
'You heard the god,' he said. 'Plenty of scrap material here to start you off.' He waved us away and returned to his recycling.
'Build something,' Grover moaned. 'That sounds really hard! Couldn't he have asked us to, like, grow something? I could've made him a nice potted cactus for his workshop.'
'It'll be fine,' I said. 'I'm a daughter of Athena, remember? I can do this!' I searched in my backpack for my sketch pad. 'Okay.' I drew a crude outline of Hephaestus's stone basin. 'We need something to keep that filled. And it's under us, so if we can get water up here and connect it all the way down …' I drew a pipe extending upwards from the slack tub.
Grover studied my sketch. 'A water catcher? It'll fill when it rains, and-'
He stopped. We looked at the bright, cloudless sky, and then at each other.
'We're in the desert,' I said slowly. 'It doesn't rain here.'
Grover slapped his rasta cap against his thigh. 'What are we going to do?'
If only Percy were here. Then again, I guess even the son of a sea god would have a hard time finding water in the middle of a desert.
Grover and I wandered around the junk piles, hoping to be inspired. I got the sense that someone was watching us as we sifted through the various inventions. Probably Hephaestus, wondering if we'd manage to complete the task after all. I bet he had spy cams all over the place.
After about an hour of this, Grover and I collapsed under the sparse shade of an acacia tree. By then, I didn't just want water for Hephaestus's slack tub. My mouth was uncomfortably dry. The desert heat made my throat scratchy.
I wrung the sweat from the hem of my t-shirt. If only I could send that to Hephaestus's workshop.
Grover reached up and plucked a few leaves off the tree. He handed some to me and sucked on his own. 'It's not much, but I'm parched. I'll take what we can get.'
The leaves were mostly dry and tasteless, but he was right. If you sucked hard enough, you could get the tiniest bit of moisture out of the leaves.
Then it hit me.
'Grover, the plants!' I sprang to my feet, staring around at the sparse vegetation that popped up in isolated patches among the junk hills. 'They have to get their water from somewhere!'
Grover dropped his leaves. 'Lord of the Wild, you're right! There must be a water table under here.'
'A what?'
'You know, with groundwater …'
'Oh, like underground reservoirs? We learned about those in geography.' California drew on the greatest source of groundwater of all the states. Unfortunately, we'd never discussed Arizona in class.
'Yeah, even deserts have them.' Grover ran over to the nearest junk pile and rummaged through it, searching for something. 'They're harder to find, of course, but if the plants are drawing on it, we just need to trace it.' He burrowed under a broken television set and emerged with a crooked, two-pronged metal wand-a dowsing rod.
'Then we just have to figure out how to redirect the water to Hephaestus's forge!' That was still a challenge, but at least we'd figured out where we were going to get the water.
I stared at the acacia tree. For some reason, my old teacher at St Catherine's, Mrs Carlson, popped into my head. Something about the pictures on her office walls. The Frank Lloyd Wright building … architecture imitating nature …
'Grover, how do plants draw water from the soil?'
'Seriously?' Grover paused in his dowsing. 'Through their roots.' He looked like he was biting back a duh!
'I know that. I mean how do root systems actually work? Like, they have to suck water up, right?'
'Oh. It's osmosis-you know, when stuff goes through little gaps 'cause there's less of it on one side than the other. That's how water gets into the roots. Then the stems have these really skinny tubes so the leaves can suck it up, like when you drink your soda through a straw.' The dowsing rod jerked in his hand, but from excitement, rather than the presence of an underground water source. 'Are you gonna build something that does that?'
'Exactly,' I said, slamming my sketchbook shut. 'You find the water source. I'm going to build us a root system.'
+++
As I worked on our contraption, I felt again like there were eyes on me. It wasn't benign or curious, but a sinister prickle in the air that a hostile glare can sometimes produce. I was beginning to think it had nothing to do with Hephaestus.
Grover, who was sitting next to me, handing me tools and materials out of the little pile I had amassed, noticed my hands pause over the roots-inspired water pump I was constructing. 'What's wrong? Do you want the mesh instead?'
I shook my head. I'd already finished with the absorption tube, which I'd lined with a fine, silver mesh. Once we sent it down the spot where Grover's dowsing rod had twitched wildly, it should start sucking in water.
'Do you feel something strange?'
Grover leaned in close. 'I told you there was something weird. I felt it as soon as we got here.'
I took the wrench Grover handed to me and screwed a connecting pipe in place. It formed a U-shape at the top of the pump. 'Maybe it's more automatons. Hephaeston said there were others around.'
'He said everything here was a machine,' Grover corrected. He took my wrench and handed me a set of pliers. 'But we're here, and we aren't machines.' He cast a furtive look around and let out a little gasp. 'I saw something!'
'What?' I didn't dare look up from the bronze tube I was inserting into the U-pipe. It had to fit just right.
'It's … I don't know. It was really fast. But I definitely saw something with orange fur, and a tail.'
A shiver ran through me in spite of the desert heat. 'How many tails did you see?'
'Just one … why?'
'Are you sure?'
'Positive.'
'I think it's her.' I finished inserting the tube. The water pump was ready, but with Kitsune lurking nearby, I wasn't in the mood to celebrate. If she got to the Necklace of Harmonia before we could get Hephaestus to remove the curse …
'Who?' Grover looked really spooked now.
'The fox,' I whispered. 'The one who's been passing the curse on from person to person. But she has more than one tail. Unless …' My hand flew to my mouth. 'If she's down to a single tail, she'll be really desperate to get the necklace back!'
'I don't get it …'
'Each one of her tails represents a life-she collected them from the people the necklace killed. But she's lost them and she's down to her last one.'
And if that was the case, maybe we could finally end this. The curse, and its bearer, too.
But we would have to be really careful. I knew how fast Kitsune could move. One miscalculation and all of this-our journey here, my painstaking effort over the water pump-it would all be for nothing.
I wrote out the plan for Grover. Sharp as Kitsune's hearing undoubtedly was, she couldn't eavesdrop on a non-existent conversation. Grover looked terrified with his role in my plan, but he nodded firmly and ate the evidence before heading off into the junk heaps.
I started drilling into the earth, sending the roots of my water pump underground.
It was several minutes before Grover returned, sprinting as fast as his goat legs would carry him. Kitsune bounded into view behind him, her single tail whipping back and forth. Grover let out a terrified whimper as Kitsune's teeth clamped down on his shirt. As soon as she jerked him back, he flung the necklace he was clutching against his chest towards me. I leapt up and caught it, holding it high so that the gold caught the sunlight.
'Mine!' Kitsune shifted into teacher-form without letting go of Grover. But she was no longer the neat, pencil-skirted Ms Seunis. Her flame-coloured hair, freed of its previous tight bun, was wild and frizzy. The long, manicured nails that replaced her claws shook as they clenched around the collar of Grover's shirt. Fire danced in her eyes, which darted between me and the necklace. Their crazed desperation told me I was right-she was down to her last tail, her final life. I could almost see the ghost of it still waving behind her human form.
This was her last chance.
'Curse you,' she snarled. 'I knew you were a troublemaker from day one!'
'So put me in detention,' I retorted. My eyes flickered to the pressure gauge on my water pump. There wasn't enough yet … I had to keep her talking while it built up.
'I have your friend the satyr.' Kitsune's nails dug sharply into Grover's neck, making him yelp. She shook him like an errant puppy. 'He doesn't need to die. You just need to hand over that necklace … and yourself along with it. You're already under its curse-your life is forfeit.'
'You're wrong. The curse doesn't bring death. It's about betrayal. It destroys families.'
Kitsune snorted. 'Who cares what the manner of death is? As long as I can strip the lives off you pathetic mortals. I've done plenty … Agave … Jocasta … Polynices …'
There was a trend to the lives Kitsune had claimed. Agave had murdered her own son. Jocasta had committed incest. Polynices had killed his brother. Their actions stood in contrast to the misfortunes that had befallen some of the other owners of the necklace. Harmonia had fallen afoul of her dad's temper. Izzy had lost her family. Zoë had died on her home ground.
And I'd been betrayed by someone I loved.
Kitsune was partly responsible for the way the curse had compounded over the years. But if I was right, she didn't have a lock on all the victims of the necklace.
'The necklace made their lives miserable, but you goaded them into betraying their families, didn't you? That's how you had power over them. That's why you could take their lives. But only theirs. You weren't able to collect every life that the necklace ruined.' I thought of Zoë's spirit, breathed into the stars by Artemis herself. 'You didn't get Zoë Nightshade.'
'The cursed Hunter was under Artemis's protection! I was cheated!' Kitsune tossed her head. 'And so what if a few puny mortals escaped me? I got enough lives to keep me going for centuries!'
'But they're gone now. You're down to your last life. That's why you're here now. If you don't get this back-' I twirled the necklace on my index finger, 'the next person to kill you is going to send you back to Tartarus where you belong!'
The reddening of her face confirmed yet again that I was right.
'What does that matter, when you shall contribute my next life? I know that cursed half-blood pet of the Titan lord was protecting you. But he won't be paying attention now, not with Lord Kronos's plans for him. I'll just unravel that protection and your life will be mine-as it should have been from the start!'
I was so stunned, I nearly forgot about the plan. 'What-are you talking about Luke?'
She smirked. 'Wouldn't you like to know?'
'What do you mean, Luke was protecting me? He never knew about the necklace … did he?'
Her lips curled wickedly. 'Bring me the necklace and I'll tell you.'
'Annabeth!' Grover's eyes were fixed on the flashing pressure gauge on the water pump. My pipes were full. I forced myself to return to the plan.
'If you want it so much, take it!'
And I flung the necklace towards the acacia tree.
Kitsune dropped Grover and dove towards the flying necklace. Immediately, I twisted the knob at the base of my pump and aimed its nozzle at her. At the same time, Grover brought his reed pipes to his lips.
In the shade of the acacia, Kitsune took a moment to examine the necklace. Her head snapped up in outrage when she realised it was not, in fact, the Necklace of Harmonia, but the fake I'd picked up earlier, which I'd sent Grover to retrieve.
Then my water pump, filled and pressurised while I'd kept her talking, blasted its contents straight at her. The jet slammed her into the tree trunk. Roots emerged from the ground, growing in time to Grover's melody, and ensnared Kitsune. She tried to shift her shape, but the acacia roots held fast. She screamed, shaking her head wildly against the onslaught of water.
'How do you like being the one caught in a trap?' I advanced on her with my dagger. Her eyes narrowed when she saw it.
'Cursed blade,' she spat, but her eyes were wide and fearful at the sight of the celestial bronze.
I wanted to make her explain everything she had said about Luke. But Grover was almost going blue with the effort of playing continuously on his pipes.
We had one chance to kill the fox. It would be folly to waste it.
'It's going to stop you from cursing anyone else,' I agreed. And I plunged my dagger between the roots, into Kitsune's heart.
Kitsune gave a final scream of despair. She seemed to burn up from the top down, the flames of her hair consuming the rest of her body until all that was left was a pile of glowing ash and a single orange tail that crumbled into fine hairs.
Grover put down his pipes. The acacia roots retreated into the ground.
I stared into the ashes, wondering what Kitsune had meant about Luke's protection. Had he made some bargain with Kronos? Did Kronos even have the power to overturn a curse like this? Or had Luke somehow split its tragic bad luck between us? His fall from Atlas's mountain should have been fatal, just as the sky should have crushed me to death. Although I hadn't seen or even dreamt of Luke in months, the threads of Fate seemed to pull tight around us again. My dagger tingled in my fingers, as if it were trying to warn me that important had just transpired … but I had no clue what it was.
Grover touched my arm lightly. He had a funny expression on his face, as though he knew exactly what I was thinking about.
'Well,' said a deep voice, 'I guess that pump'll do.'
Hephaeston's head appeared over the crest of the nearest junk pile. He surveyed my water pump with appreciation. It had now drained to a light trickle.
'You'll break the curse, then? I mean, Hephaestus will?'
Hephaeston held his hand out in reply. I brought out the real Necklace of Harmonia and handed it over. The screen on his smock crackled to life.
'I'll take care of the necklace.' Hephaestus's voice was tired. 'But remember this: the curse of Harmonia wasn't laid down out of nowhere. It was seeded by choices and enabled by the actions of men. Our choices can hurt one another just as badly as a curse.'
It didn't seem fair to name the curse after Harmonia, who hadn't been the one to hurt Hephaestus with her actions. But I guess that was sort of the point. Innocent people got hurt by selfish, irresponsible decisions.
'What goes out into the world can never be taken back,' Hephaestus warned. 'Think about that the next time you have a choice to make.'
I was about to ask if Hephaestus knew anything about Luke. But the smock-screen image was already fading. The entire junkyard spun, like we'd been shoved into one of the broken washing machines. When it stopped, Grover and I were in the middle of the open desert. The only thing in sight was my Sopwith Camel.
'I guess that's it,' I said.
'Thank Pan,' Grover sighed.
'Thank you. Grover, you were amazing. I couldn't have done this without you.'
Grover blushed and patted his pipes. 'I've been practising.'
'Well, I'm really glad you were with me. And …' I touched the first bead on my camp necklace, the one from our first summer together. Our choices can hurt one another. 'You're still the bravest satyr I know. Don't let anyone tell you otherwise, okay?'
We hugged each other tight. Then I climbed into the Camel and turned my plane towards home.
Chapter 30
Author: shiiki
Rating: PG-13
Characters/Pairings: Annabeth Chase, Thalia Grace, Percy Jackson, Luke Castellan, Chiron, Clarisse La Rue, Chase family, OCs, various others, Gen with slight Percy/Annabeth
Fandom: Percy Jackson
Summary: After an eventful summer, Annabeth Chase is on her way to boarding school for the first time. With her friends Thalia and Percy close by, she's looking forward to spending the year in New York. But soon, she finds herself dealing with unfathomable dreams, tangled plots, and a mysterious necklace that keeps finding its way back to her. Worse still, her father wants her to move to the most dangerous city in the country. The choices Annabeth faces this year will have her questioning the meaning of friendship, loyalty, and family. And most of all, just what it means to keep a promise. An alternate PoV retelling of Percy Jackson and the Titan's Curse. Part 3 of the Daughter of Wisdom series.
In this chapter
Chapter Title: I Snare A Fox
Rating: PG-13
Characters: Annabeth Chase, Grover Underwood, Hephaestus, OCs
Word Count: 4,945
Chapter Summary: Annabeth confronts Kitsune at last.
Notes: I hope it's become clear by now why I chose the title of this fic! The challenge with writing Annabeth's story in this book was finding something to tie it all together-her family struggles, the Hunters' offer, her increasing dilemma as she's caught between Percy and Luke, her 'kidnapping' at winter break, her involvement with the Labyrinth … And the Necklace of Harmonia fit so well thematically, with its association with broken families, trials and misfortune, and tainted love. Not to mention a convenient 14-year-old character who could step in as the Hunter scout I needed.
By now the myth should be clear enough-this enchanted necklace was wrought by Hephaestus and gifted to his 'daughter' Harmonia, but cursed to bring misfortune to its owners. It conveniently follows the House of Thebes and a bunch of intriguing (and tragic) stories that come from there. Kitsune is entirely fictional, but her provenance was thanks to the realisation that the Teumessian Fox was a terror of Thebes as well. Initially I was going to draw upon that fox as a villain, but I struggled to make it fit. And then The Dark Prophecy came out and it seems RR has some other ideas for the Teumessian, so I decided to take a different route. And Kitty stepped up beautifully.
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Figuring out who could break the curse on the Necklace of Harmonia was one thing. Finding him was another. Gods didn't exactly come with handy location services.
Fortunately, Percy, Thalia, and Grover's adventure in December gave me a hint.
I would have IM-ed Percy, except our last message hadn't gone so well. If his mom hadn't yet told her boyfriend we were demigods, I didn't want to accidentally spring the knowledge on him. My new cell phone might have been an option, but I needed Percy's home number. (I made a mental note to ask him for it this summer.)
So instead, I directed Iris to Grover at Camp Half-Blood.
The woods at the edge of the strawberry fields came up in the rainbow. Then the holographic image wavered and a pleasant female voice came out of the rainbow: 'No Grover Underwood at Camp Half-Blood! Can I try a different location?'
At first, I was mystified. Then I realised he was probably off searching for Pan again. Where was it that he'd intended to go? He'd mentioned coffee, and a wild pig, and …
'New Mexico!'
'One moment, please!'
Fluffy cloud patterns drifted across the rainbow. A soft voice crooned, 'Somewhere over the rainbow …'
It took two verses of the song before the rainbow image zoomed in on a mossy stone barn under a wide, open sky. Grover's back was to me, bent over a water trough by the barn entrance. He wasn't wearing his rasta cap, so his horns were fully visible, curving up through his curly hair. They'd grown about an inch or so since March.
'Grover!'
His horns perked up. 'Hey sweetie!' he said, turning around with a bright smile that faded the moment he saw me. It was replaced by a look of chagrin. 'Oh, it's you. Um, not that I'm not happy to see you. I mean …' He twisted his rasta cap in his hands.
I grinned wickedly. 'Who did you think I was?'
'Uh, that's not … I was expecting … she was gonna …' Grover's face was bright red. 'Fine, if you must know-I'm dating Juniper.'
'Juniper? The tree nymph?'
'Yeah.' A dreamy look washed over Grover's face. 'She's so amazing … smart, and pretty, and so natural …'
I shouldn't have been surprised. Grover had obviously been attracted to her during our tussle with the Maenads. Still, Grover with a girlfriend … Was he even old enough? Sure, he was technically about twice my age, but satyrs aged half as fast, so it'd be like me or Percy getting together with … with someone.
I snapped my fingers to get Grover's attention back. (No, it was not to distract myself from the image that popped unbidden into my head, of Percy gazing at me with Grover's moony-eyed look. Really.) 'Okay, good for you, Goat Boy. But can we focus? I need your help.'
I explained about the Necklace of Harmonia. 'When you guys went on the quest last winter, Percy said you passed through Hephaestus's junkyard.'
Grover's face drained of its colour. 'That's where we lost Bianca.'
'It's the only place I can think of that's linked to Hephaestus. I have to go. Zoë's last request was for me to break the curse on the necklace. So I need to know where this junkyard is.'
Grover was quiet for a while. I could tell he was weighing the decision in his head. If he told me where to find the junkyard, he'd feel responsible if I got into trouble there. But if he refused, he'd be the reason I couldn't break the curse. Finally, he said, 'It's in Arizona. Near Gila Claw.'
I drew in a sharp breath. That was less than a hundred miles from me, just over the Superstition Mountains running down the centre of the state. It felt like a sign-it had to be the right place.
'Thanks, Grover. Don't worry, I'll be careful. I won't touch anything-I need to get rid of something there.' I tipped the clasp of the necklace out of my pocket.
'You know what?' Grover took a deep breath. 'I'm coming with you. I'm right on the state border. I can meet you at Gila Claw.'
'What? No, Grover, you don't have to-'
'I'm your friend, Annabeth,' Grover insisted. 'If you're doing something dangerous, I can't let you do it alone.' He looked me dead in the eye. 'I know you think I'm not as powerful, or as good a friend-'
'What? No, Grover, that's not …' I winced. It wasn't entirely false that I'd have preferred Percy or Thalia, but Grover had plenty of great qualities going for him, too. 'You are my friend. And you got us out of a lot of tight spots. If you're really okay to come, I'm glad to have you. I'll need a guide.'
Grover beamed. 'And my tracking's gotten loads better. I'll be your Sacagawea!'
'My what?'
'Your guide, duh. You know, like on the western frontier. Don't you learn about Lewis and Clark in school?' He looked like he was about to go into a long lecture on nature exploration and wilderness survival, so I cut him off quickly.
'Yeah, perfect! I'll see you in Gila Claw.'
+++
Hephaestus's junkyard was larger than I expected. Acres upon acres of it stretched towards the horizon, a sea of metal piled up in rolling waves. There was just about any invention you could think of, from old Antikytheras to Apple iMacs.
'Whoa,' I said, 'look at all this stuff!'
It was all broken, though. Bronze gears hung limply out of the ancient Greek computers. The Mac screens were smashed in. Among the mountains of cars, weapons, electronics, and household appliances, I spotted a totalled chariot, a television set missing a screen, and a wrecked guitar hanging out of a refrigerator without a door. Smaller objects littered the ground-dented shields, split containers, cracked jewellery.
I picked up a golden necklace. It looked suspiciously like the one I had in my pocket, except there were hollow spaces where the jewels should have been, and the snake-head clasps were twisted and misshapen.
I turned the fake necklace over in my hands. 'Some of these must be prototypes. The stuff that didn't come out right and got discarded.'
Grover looked around edgily, like he was worried one of the appliances might spring to life and bite us.
'Don't take anything with you,' he said. 'That's why Talos came after us.'
I dropped the necklace, but it was hard to leave the piles of junk alone. A little way in, I came across a set of adjustable architect scales that could not only switch between measurement units, but also expanded and contracted flexibly to measure around tight spaces. Although its hinges were stiff and rusty, and some of the markings were scratched through, I bet it would still work.
Grover clung to me as we clambered over the mountains of discarded inventions, jumping at every sudden noise.
'Relax, Grover, it's just the wind,' I said. It was rustling through the junk heaps with a strange whistling noise, almost like birdsong.
'No, did you see that? Look-there!'
My heart leapt as I saw it, too: something darting between a rickety rocking chair and an upturned washing machine. The chair creaked back and forth.
'I don't like this,' Grover muttered. 'It stinks of monsters.'
The mound of stuff we were standing on rumbled. Pieces of junk were thrown about, like someone was rifling through it. Grover and I skated down the side of the junk hill, our arms flailing, to find a thick-set man in a blacksmith's smock poking around at the bottom. He was sorting stuff into new piles, muttering, 'No, not that … that's gotta be destroyed … oh, that can be re-used.'
Grover and I exchanged a wide-eyed look.
'Um, sir? Hephaestus?' I said tentatively.
The god turned. He was bald and burly, like you'd expect Hephaestus to look, but something about his appearance was off. Wasn't Hephaestus supposed to be crippled because he'd been thrown off Olympus as a baby? This god-if he was one-was straight-backed and strong.
'Huh. You don't look like defects. Go stand with the re-usables.' He pointed towards a little heap of less-broken bronze appliances.
'We're not machines,' Grover said.
'Don't be ridiculous. Everything here's a machine.'
Something about the jerky, robotic quality of his movements rang a bell in my head. 'You're not Hephaestus! You're an automaton!'
Hephaestus's automaton stopped what he was doing to look at us properly. 'That's Hephaeston to you! I'm his automated proxy.' His face twisted into a ferocious scowl. 'You ain't judging the quality of my animus, now? You got a problem with machines?'
'No!' I said quickly. 'It's just that we really need to find Hephaestus.'
'Well, he's busy. Wars need weapons, you know. That's why I'm up here. Gotta sort out the old scraps.'
'I thought everything here was supposed to be-well, junk!' Grover said.
'Yeah, the gods throw stuff away all the time.' Hephaeston reached back into the junk heap and flung a dented bronze discus onto his recycling pile. 'Nothing lasts forever. But everything can always be re-used.'
'We need to throw something out, too.' From my pocket, I drew out the Necklace of Harmonia. 'It's been around long enough.'
Hephaeston's eyes narrowed. 'That looks familiar.'
'If you're Hephaestus's proxy, can you break his curses?'
'That's up to him.' Hephaeston sighed and crossed his arms. 'I can't take you to him, but I can get him on speed dial.'
A little flap popped open at the top of his bald head. We watched in astonishment as out popped a headset with an antenna and mouthpiece. Hephaeston settled it over his ears and closed his top flap. The centre pocket of his smock flattened and elongated into a blank LCD screen. With the antenna sticking up above his head and the screen over his belly, he resembled a bizarre, muscular Tellytubby.
The screen flickered to life. A gnarled face appeared in it.
'What's the trouble?' Hephaestus growled, sounding strikingly like his automaton. Or I guess it was his automaton that sounded like him, since he'd animated Hephaeston. 'Not computers again? I told you, no more PC's. I only want the Mac OS's.'
'No, I trashed the PC's. It's a demigod and a satyr looking for you. Something about a cursed necklace.' Hephaeston motioned for me to hold the necklace up to the screen.
There was a long pause.
'Ah,' Hephaestus said at last.
'Lord Hephaestus,' I said, 'I know it caused you a lot of grief over the years. But it's hurt a lot of people now, people who didn't have anything to do with your w-I mean, Aphrodite, or Ares. And the Titans are trying to use it in the war. Can you-could you break the curse? Please? I'll, um …' I floundered for an appropriate sacrifice. The only things left in my pockets were my faithful dagger and my invisibility cap.
It was a wrench, but I retrieved them. 'These are my most precious magical items,' I offered, swallowing hard.
Hephaestus's coal-black eyes seemed to be X-raying the objects through the screen. His face was so twisted and wrinkled, it made his expression impossible to read. Finally, he said gruffly, 'Keep your trinkets, girl.'
I wasn't sure whether to be relieved that he didn't want my knife and cap, or worried that I had nothing left to offer him. Or maybe insulted that he'd referred to my prize possessions as 'trinkets'. I stowed them back in my pocket and clasped the necklace tightly in both hands, biting my lower lip. Grover gave me a worried sideways glance.
'Lord Hephaestus, I could-' He pulled out his precious reed pipes.
'Grover, you can't!' I gasped.
'I won't take your gifts,' Hephaestus said. 'I have no use for them. Or I should say, you have more use for them than I.'
'Then you won't remove the curse?'
'I ask instead for a favour.'
'Name it!'
Hephaestus raised his eyebrows. 'Eager, aren't you? Very well. My workshop lies beneath this junkyard. Orders are piling up from Olympus, and how Zeus expects me to keep up when Poseidon has a monopoly on Cyclops labour … now, if only I still had the Hekatonkheires … but that's neither here nor there. Point is, my slack tub empties too quickly, and I haven't got enough workers to refill it quickly.' The screen image shifted to a large stone basin, in which several swords and a shield lay cooling in water. 'So if you want a favour, you do me one. Build me something to keep the slack tub full … and I'll consider your request.'
The screen went black. Hephaeston tucked his headset and antenna back into his head flap.
'You heard the god,' he said. 'Plenty of scrap material here to start you off.' He waved us away and returned to his recycling.
'Build something,' Grover moaned. 'That sounds really hard! Couldn't he have asked us to, like, grow something? I could've made him a nice potted cactus for his workshop.'
'It'll be fine,' I said. 'I'm a daughter of Athena, remember? I can do this!' I searched in my backpack for my sketch pad. 'Okay.' I drew a crude outline of Hephaestus's stone basin. 'We need something to keep that filled. And it's under us, so if we can get water up here and connect it all the way down …' I drew a pipe extending upwards from the slack tub.
Grover studied my sketch. 'A water catcher? It'll fill when it rains, and-'
He stopped. We looked at the bright, cloudless sky, and then at each other.
'We're in the desert,' I said slowly. 'It doesn't rain here.'
Grover slapped his rasta cap against his thigh. 'What are we going to do?'
If only Percy were here. Then again, I guess even the son of a sea god would have a hard time finding water in the middle of a desert.
Grover and I wandered around the junk piles, hoping to be inspired. I got the sense that someone was watching us as we sifted through the various inventions. Probably Hephaestus, wondering if we'd manage to complete the task after all. I bet he had spy cams all over the place.
After about an hour of this, Grover and I collapsed under the sparse shade of an acacia tree. By then, I didn't just want water for Hephaestus's slack tub. My mouth was uncomfortably dry. The desert heat made my throat scratchy.
I wrung the sweat from the hem of my t-shirt. If only I could send that to Hephaestus's workshop.
Grover reached up and plucked a few leaves off the tree. He handed some to me and sucked on his own. 'It's not much, but I'm parched. I'll take what we can get.'
The leaves were mostly dry and tasteless, but he was right. If you sucked hard enough, you could get the tiniest bit of moisture out of the leaves.
Then it hit me.
'Grover, the plants!' I sprang to my feet, staring around at the sparse vegetation that popped up in isolated patches among the junk hills. 'They have to get their water from somewhere!'
Grover dropped his leaves. 'Lord of the Wild, you're right! There must be a water table under here.'
'A what?'
'You know, with groundwater …'
'Oh, like underground reservoirs? We learned about those in geography.' California drew on the greatest source of groundwater of all the states. Unfortunately, we'd never discussed Arizona in class.
'Yeah, even deserts have them.' Grover ran over to the nearest junk pile and rummaged through it, searching for something. 'They're harder to find, of course, but if the plants are drawing on it, we just need to trace it.' He burrowed under a broken television set and emerged with a crooked, two-pronged metal wand-a dowsing rod.
'Then we just have to figure out how to redirect the water to Hephaestus's forge!' That was still a challenge, but at least we'd figured out where we were going to get the water.
I stared at the acacia tree. For some reason, my old teacher at St Catherine's, Mrs Carlson, popped into my head. Something about the pictures on her office walls. The Frank Lloyd Wright building … architecture imitating nature …
'Grover, how do plants draw water from the soil?'
'Seriously?' Grover paused in his dowsing. 'Through their roots.' He looked like he was biting back a duh!
'I know that. I mean how do root systems actually work? Like, they have to suck water up, right?'
'Oh. It's osmosis-you know, when stuff goes through little gaps 'cause there's less of it on one side than the other. That's how water gets into the roots. Then the stems have these really skinny tubes so the leaves can suck it up, like when you drink your soda through a straw.' The dowsing rod jerked in his hand, but from excitement, rather than the presence of an underground water source. 'Are you gonna build something that does that?'
'Exactly,' I said, slamming my sketchbook shut. 'You find the water source. I'm going to build us a root system.'
+++
As I worked on our contraption, I felt again like there were eyes on me. It wasn't benign or curious, but a sinister prickle in the air that a hostile glare can sometimes produce. I was beginning to think it had nothing to do with Hephaestus.
Grover, who was sitting next to me, handing me tools and materials out of the little pile I had amassed, noticed my hands pause over the roots-inspired water pump I was constructing. 'What's wrong? Do you want the mesh instead?'
I shook my head. I'd already finished with the absorption tube, which I'd lined with a fine, silver mesh. Once we sent it down the spot where Grover's dowsing rod had twitched wildly, it should start sucking in water.
'Do you feel something strange?'
Grover leaned in close. 'I told you there was something weird. I felt it as soon as we got here.'
I took the wrench Grover handed to me and screwed a connecting pipe in place. It formed a U-shape at the top of the pump. 'Maybe it's more automatons. Hephaeston said there were others around.'
'He said everything here was a machine,' Grover corrected. He took my wrench and handed me a set of pliers. 'But we're here, and we aren't machines.' He cast a furtive look around and let out a little gasp. 'I saw something!'
'What?' I didn't dare look up from the bronze tube I was inserting into the U-pipe. It had to fit just right.
'It's … I don't know. It was really fast. But I definitely saw something with orange fur, and a tail.'
A shiver ran through me in spite of the desert heat. 'How many tails did you see?'
'Just one … why?'
'Are you sure?'
'Positive.'
'I think it's her.' I finished inserting the tube. The water pump was ready, but with Kitsune lurking nearby, I wasn't in the mood to celebrate. If she got to the Necklace of Harmonia before we could get Hephaestus to remove the curse …
'Who?' Grover looked really spooked now.
'The fox,' I whispered. 'The one who's been passing the curse on from person to person. But she has more than one tail. Unless …' My hand flew to my mouth. 'If she's down to a single tail, she'll be really desperate to get the necklace back!'
'I don't get it …'
'Each one of her tails represents a life-she collected them from the people the necklace killed. But she's lost them and she's down to her last one.'
And if that was the case, maybe we could finally end this. The curse, and its bearer, too.
But we would have to be really careful. I knew how fast Kitsune could move. One miscalculation and all of this-our journey here, my painstaking effort over the water pump-it would all be for nothing.
I wrote out the plan for Grover. Sharp as Kitsune's hearing undoubtedly was, she couldn't eavesdrop on a non-existent conversation. Grover looked terrified with his role in my plan, but he nodded firmly and ate the evidence before heading off into the junk heaps.
I started drilling into the earth, sending the roots of my water pump underground.
It was several minutes before Grover returned, sprinting as fast as his goat legs would carry him. Kitsune bounded into view behind him, her single tail whipping back and forth. Grover let out a terrified whimper as Kitsune's teeth clamped down on his shirt. As soon as she jerked him back, he flung the necklace he was clutching against his chest towards me. I leapt up and caught it, holding it high so that the gold caught the sunlight.
'Mine!' Kitsune shifted into teacher-form without letting go of Grover. But she was no longer the neat, pencil-skirted Ms Seunis. Her flame-coloured hair, freed of its previous tight bun, was wild and frizzy. The long, manicured nails that replaced her claws shook as they clenched around the collar of Grover's shirt. Fire danced in her eyes, which darted between me and the necklace. Their crazed desperation told me I was right-she was down to her last tail, her final life. I could almost see the ghost of it still waving behind her human form.
This was her last chance.
'Curse you,' she snarled. 'I knew you were a troublemaker from day one!'
'So put me in detention,' I retorted. My eyes flickered to the pressure gauge on my water pump. There wasn't enough yet … I had to keep her talking while it built up.
'I have your friend the satyr.' Kitsune's nails dug sharply into Grover's neck, making him yelp. She shook him like an errant puppy. 'He doesn't need to die. You just need to hand over that necklace … and yourself along with it. You're already under its curse-your life is forfeit.'
'You're wrong. The curse doesn't bring death. It's about betrayal. It destroys families.'
Kitsune snorted. 'Who cares what the manner of death is? As long as I can strip the lives off you pathetic mortals. I've done plenty … Agave … Jocasta … Polynices …'
There was a trend to the lives Kitsune had claimed. Agave had murdered her own son. Jocasta had committed incest. Polynices had killed his brother. Their actions stood in contrast to the misfortunes that had befallen some of the other owners of the necklace. Harmonia had fallen afoul of her dad's temper. Izzy had lost her family. Zoë had died on her home ground.
And I'd been betrayed by someone I loved.
Kitsune was partly responsible for the way the curse had compounded over the years. But if I was right, she didn't have a lock on all the victims of the necklace.
'The necklace made their lives miserable, but you goaded them into betraying their families, didn't you? That's how you had power over them. That's why you could take their lives. But only theirs. You weren't able to collect every life that the necklace ruined.' I thought of Zoë's spirit, breathed into the stars by Artemis herself. 'You didn't get Zoë Nightshade.'
'The cursed Hunter was under Artemis's protection! I was cheated!' Kitsune tossed her head. 'And so what if a few puny mortals escaped me? I got enough lives to keep me going for centuries!'
'But they're gone now. You're down to your last life. That's why you're here now. If you don't get this back-' I twirled the necklace on my index finger, 'the next person to kill you is going to send you back to Tartarus where you belong!'
The reddening of her face confirmed yet again that I was right.
'What does that matter, when you shall contribute my next life? I know that cursed half-blood pet of the Titan lord was protecting you. But he won't be paying attention now, not with Lord Kronos's plans for him. I'll just unravel that protection and your life will be mine-as it should have been from the start!'
I was so stunned, I nearly forgot about the plan. 'What-are you talking about Luke?'
She smirked. 'Wouldn't you like to know?'
'What do you mean, Luke was protecting me? He never knew about the necklace … did he?'
Her lips curled wickedly. 'Bring me the necklace and I'll tell you.'
'Annabeth!' Grover's eyes were fixed on the flashing pressure gauge on the water pump. My pipes were full. I forced myself to return to the plan.
'If you want it so much, take it!'
And I flung the necklace towards the acacia tree.
Kitsune dropped Grover and dove towards the flying necklace. Immediately, I twisted the knob at the base of my pump and aimed its nozzle at her. At the same time, Grover brought his reed pipes to his lips.
In the shade of the acacia, Kitsune took a moment to examine the necklace. Her head snapped up in outrage when she realised it was not, in fact, the Necklace of Harmonia, but the fake I'd picked up earlier, which I'd sent Grover to retrieve.
Then my water pump, filled and pressurised while I'd kept her talking, blasted its contents straight at her. The jet slammed her into the tree trunk. Roots emerged from the ground, growing in time to Grover's melody, and ensnared Kitsune. She tried to shift her shape, but the acacia roots held fast. She screamed, shaking her head wildly against the onslaught of water.
'How do you like being the one caught in a trap?' I advanced on her with my dagger. Her eyes narrowed when she saw it.
'Cursed blade,' she spat, but her eyes were wide and fearful at the sight of the celestial bronze.
I wanted to make her explain everything she had said about Luke. But Grover was almost going blue with the effort of playing continuously on his pipes.
We had one chance to kill the fox. It would be folly to waste it.
'It's going to stop you from cursing anyone else,' I agreed. And I plunged my dagger between the roots, into Kitsune's heart.
Kitsune gave a final scream of despair. She seemed to burn up from the top down, the flames of her hair consuming the rest of her body until all that was left was a pile of glowing ash and a single orange tail that crumbled into fine hairs.
Grover put down his pipes. The acacia roots retreated into the ground.
I stared into the ashes, wondering what Kitsune had meant about Luke's protection. Had he made some bargain with Kronos? Did Kronos even have the power to overturn a curse like this? Or had Luke somehow split its tragic bad luck between us? His fall from Atlas's mountain should have been fatal, just as the sky should have crushed me to death. Although I hadn't seen or even dreamt of Luke in months, the threads of Fate seemed to pull tight around us again. My dagger tingled in my fingers, as if it were trying to warn me that important had just transpired … but I had no clue what it was.
Grover touched my arm lightly. He had a funny expression on his face, as though he knew exactly what I was thinking about.
'Well,' said a deep voice, 'I guess that pump'll do.'
Hephaeston's head appeared over the crest of the nearest junk pile. He surveyed my water pump with appreciation. It had now drained to a light trickle.
'You'll break the curse, then? I mean, Hephaestus will?'
Hephaeston held his hand out in reply. I brought out the real Necklace of Harmonia and handed it over. The screen on his smock crackled to life.
'I'll take care of the necklace.' Hephaestus's voice was tired. 'But remember this: the curse of Harmonia wasn't laid down out of nowhere. It was seeded by choices and enabled by the actions of men. Our choices can hurt one another just as badly as a curse.'
It didn't seem fair to name the curse after Harmonia, who hadn't been the one to hurt Hephaestus with her actions. But I guess that was sort of the point. Innocent people got hurt by selfish, irresponsible decisions.
'What goes out into the world can never be taken back,' Hephaestus warned. 'Think about that the next time you have a choice to make.'
I was about to ask if Hephaestus knew anything about Luke. But the smock-screen image was already fading. The entire junkyard spun, like we'd been shoved into one of the broken washing machines. When it stopped, Grover and I were in the middle of the open desert. The only thing in sight was my Sopwith Camel.
'I guess that's it,' I said.
'Thank Pan,' Grover sighed.
'Thank you. Grover, you were amazing. I couldn't have done this without you.'
Grover blushed and patted his pipes. 'I've been practising.'
'Well, I'm really glad you were with me. And …' I touched the first bead on my camp necklace, the one from our first summer together. Our choices can hurt one another. 'You're still the bravest satyr I know. Don't let anyone tell you otherwise, okay?'
We hugged each other tight. Then I climbed into the Camel and turned my plane towards home.
Chapter 30