Percy Jackson & The Olympians: The Demigod Files

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    Mrs. O’Leary was sniffing the deer and basically not respecting its personal space. The deer butted the hellhound in the nose. Pretty soon, the two of them were playing a strange game of keep-away around the clearing.
    “Percy . . .”Thalia frowned. “This can’t be a coincidence. You and me ending up in the same place at the same time?”
    She was right. Demigods didn’t have coincidences. Thalia was a good friend, but I hadn’t seen her in over a year, and now suddenly, here we were.
    “Some god is messing with us,” I guessed.
    “Probably.”
    “Good to see you, though.”
    She gave me a grudging smile. “Yeah. We get out of this in one piece, I’ll buy you a cheeseburger. How’s Annabeth?”
    Before I could answer, a cloud passed over the sun. The golden deer shimmered and disappeared, leaving Mrs. O’Leary barking at a pile of leaves.
    I readied my sword. Thalia drew her bow. Instinctively we stood back-to-back. A patch of darkness passed over the clearing and a boy tumbled out of it like he’d been tossed, landing in the grass at our feet.
    “Ow,” he muttered. He brushed off his aviator’s jacket. He was about twelve years old, with dark hair, jeans, a black T-shirt, and a silver skull ring on his right hand. A sword hung at his side.
    “Nico?” I said.
    Thalia’s eyes widened. “Bianca’s little brother?”
    Nico scowled. I doubt he liked being announced as Bianca’s little brother. His sister, a Hunter of Artemis, had died a couple of years ago, and it was still a sore subject for him.
    “Why’d you bring me here?” he grumbled. “One minute I’m in a New Orleans graveyard. The next minute—is this New York? What in Hades’s name am I doing in New York?”
    “We didn’t bring you here,” I promised. “We were—” A shiver went down my back. “We were brought together. All three of us.”
    “What are you talking about?” Nico demanded.
    “The children of the Big Three,” I said. “Zeus, Poseidon, Hades.”
    Thalia took a sharp breath. “The prophecy. You don’t think Kronos . . .”
    She didn’t finish the thought. We all knew about the big prophecy: a war was coming, between the Titans and gods, and the next child of the three major gods who turned sixteen would make a decision that saved or destroyed the world. That meant one of us. Over the last few years, the Titan lord Kronos had tried to manipulate each of us separately. Now . . . could he be plotting something by bringing us all together?
    The ground rumbled. Nico drew his own sword—a black blade of Stygian iron. Mrs. O’Leary leaped backward and barked in alarm.
    Too late, I realized she was trying to warn me.
    The ground opened up under Thalia, Nico, and me, and we fell into darkness.
    I expected to keep falling forever, or maybe be squashed into a demigod pancake when we hit the bottom. But the next thing I knew, Thalia, Nico, and I were standing in a garden, all three of us still screaming in terror, which made me feel pretty silly.
    “What—where are we?”Thalia asked.
    The garden was dark. Rows of silver flowers glowed faintly, reflecting off huge gemstones that lined the planting beds—diamonds, sapphires, and rubies the size of footballs. Trees arched over us, their branches covered with orange blooms and sweet-smelling fruit. The air was cool and damp—but not like a New York winter. More like a cave.
    “I’ve been here before,” I said.
    Nico plucked a pomegranate off a tree. “My stepmother Persephone’s garden.” He made a sour face and dropped the fruit. “Don’t eat anything.”
    He didn’t need to tell me twice. One taste of Underworld food, and we’d never be able to leave.
    “Heads up,” Thalia warned.
    I turned and found her aiming her bow at a tall woman in a white dress.
    At first I thought the woman was a ghost. Her dress billowed around her like smoke. Her long dark hair floated and curled as if it were weightless. Her face was beautiful but deathly pale.
    Then I realized her dress wasn’t white. It was made of all sorts of changing colors—red, blue, and yellow flowers blooming in the fabric—but it was strangely faded. Her eyes were the same way, multicolored but washed-out, like the Underworld had sapped her life force. I had a feeling that in the world above she would be beautiful, even brilliant.
    “I am Persephone,” she said, her voice thin and papery. “Welcome, demigods.”
    Nico squashed a pomegranate under his boot. “ Welcome? After last