Orcus ruffled his feathers. “Quinoa wanted to work with the kinder-gardeners. Is that so terrible?”
“We know he got into New Rome safely.” Frank moved the figurine across the map from the Field of Mars to the city. “The kindergarten teacher told me he did an incredible job. The kids loved him. They wanted the, uh, ‘angry green baby’ to teach them every day.”
Nico felt a sense of dread building in the pit of his stomach. “And then?”
“Quinoa stayed at the school until nightfall, when the last of the kids was picked up from after-school care. He helped clean the classrooms. He was basically a perfect assistant. Magistra Camilla said she would welcome him anytime. Quinoa left and started walking back to his quarters.”
Frank moved the figurine toward the edge of the city but stopped after only a few inches. He set down the figurine and knocked it sideways. “Terminus never sensed him cross the Pomerian line.”
“Wait,” Will interrupted. “You have a line of Pomeranian dogs?”
“No, it’s…” Frank pinched the bridge of his nose, probably forcing back a headache. “It’s the city limits. The Pomerian line is like an interior magic defensive border. Only protects the city, so it’s a lot smaller than the barrier around the whole valley—more secure and easier to monitor. Anyway, Terminus was on the lookout for Quinoa to leave town, because he, uh, didn’t trust the karpos.”
He glanced apologetically at Orcus.
Orcus’s only protest was another fart. Apparently, he’d been eating citrus.
“Quinoa disappeared,” Hazel concluded. “Terminus alerted us around ten last night when he realized the karpos hadn’t left. He scanned the city himself. Nothing. We spent the night searching door to door. Nothing. Quinoa was just…gone.”
The praetors had obviously gotten no sleep. Frank’s eyes looked red and puffy. Hazel’s hair was once again tucked into a sleep bonnet, like she’d just been about to turn in when she got Terminus’s message. The cap was hand-knit silk-lined purple wool, no doubt a gift from Asterion. Nico found that both sweet and heartbreaking, given everything that had happened.
He turned to Orcus. “Where are the other mythics?”
“At our quarters.” The griffin’s tone was mildly disgusted. “Asterion insisted we hunker down and wait for you all to come up with a plan. As if we’re safeanywhere. If Quinoa was taken, too…”
Orcus made a sound somewhere between a cat’s mew and a bird’s chirp. Nico suspected it was the griffin version of a sob.
“I know,” he sympathized. “We’re going to find them.”
“How?”Orcus demanded.
Nico scanned the other demigods’ faces. They looked just as lost as he felt.
“We can’t be sure they were taken,” Frank said tentatively. “I know Arielle and Quinoa were close. Is it possible Quinoa went to look for her?”
Hazel shook her head. “He couldn’t have gotten past the Pomerian line, not with Terminus keeping tabs on him.”
“But if somethingtookhim,” Frank countered, “that means it gotinsidethe line to do it, without Terminus sensing it or being able to stop it.”
Hazel shivered. “In which case, even our strongest defenses are useless. What could do that?”
Nico remembered the feeling he’d had the night before—like something large and powerful was watching him, something none of them could see.
He studied the map, the two gold figurines. The setup reminded him of the Mythomagic games he used to play with Henry when he was younger. He wished he could simply turn over a card or roll a die to solve this problem….
Then he recalled one of Henry’s favorite trap cards: the Trojan Horse.
He picked up four more figurines and placed them next to Arielle in the mythics’ quarters. “Let’s say these are the other mythics: Asterion, Semele, Johan, Orcus.”
“Wealllook like legionnaires now,” Orcus muttered. “This is clear discrimination.”
“Bear with me,” Nico pleaded. “I think you’re right, Orcus. No place is safe….”
“Is that supposed to make me feel better?”
“Oh!” Will said, a glimmer of understanding in his eyes. He picked up a few more figurines, placing them in a defensive ring around the mythics. “Like this?”
Nico loved it when he and his boyfriend got on the same wavelength, which seemed to happen more and more frequently these days.
