The Battle of the Labyrinth

insisted.
    Grover didn’t need to be told twice. He pulled a heap of straw out of his pack, ate some of it, made a pillow out of the rest, and was snoring in no time. Tyson took longer getting to sleep. He tinkered with some metal scraps from his building kit for a while, but whatever he was making, he wasn’t happy with it. He kept disassembling the pieces.
    “I’m sorry I lost the shield,” I told him. “You worked so hard to repair it.”
    Tyson looked up. His eye was bloodshot from crying. “Do not worry, brother. You saved me. You wouldn’t have had to if Briares had helped.”
    “He was just scared,” I said. “I’m sure he’ll get over it.”
    “He is not strong,” Tyson said. “He is not important anymore.”
    He heaved a big sad sigh, then closed his eye. The metal pieces fell out of his hand, still unassembled, and Tyson began to snore.
    I tried to fall asleep myself, but I couldn’t. Something about getting chased by a large dragon lady with poison swords made it real hard to relax. I picked up my bedroll and dragged it over to where Annabeth was sitting, keeping watch.
    I sat down next to her.
    “You should sleep,” she said.
    “Can’t. You doing all right?”
    “Sure. First day leading the quest. Just great.”
    “We’ll get there,” I said. “We’ll find the workshop before Luke does.”
    She brushed her hair out of her face. She had a smudge of dirt on her chin, and I imagined what she must’ve looked like when she was little, wandering around the country with Thalia and Luke. Once she’d saved them from the mansion of the evil Cyclops when she was only seven. Even when she looked scared, like now, I knew she had a lot of guts.
    “I just wish the quest was logical ,” she complained. “I mean, we’re traveling but we have no idea where we’ll end up. How can you walk from New York to California in a day?”
    “Space isn’t the same in the maze.”
    “I know, I know. It’s just . . .” She looked at me hesitantly. “Percy, I was kidding myself. All that planning and reading, I don’t have a clue where we’re going.”
    “You’re doing great. Besides, we never know what we’re doing. It always works out. Remember Circe’s island?”
    She snorted. “You made a cute guinea pig.”
    “And Waterland, how you got us thrown off that ride?”
    “ I got us thrown off ? That was totally your fault!”
    “See? It’ll be fine.”
    She smiled, which I was glad to see, but the smile faded quickly.
    “Percy, what did Hera mean when she said you knew the way to get through the maze?”
    “I don’t know,” I admitted. “Honestly.”
    “You’d tell me if you did?”
    “Sure. Maybe . . .”
    “Maybe what?”
    “Maybe if you told me the last line of the prophecy, it would help.”
    Annabeth shivered. “Not here. Not in the dark.”
    “What about the choice Janus mentioned? Hera said—”
    “Stop,” Annabeth snapped. Then she took a shaky breath. “I’m sorry, Percy. I’m just stressed. But I don’t . . . I’ve got to think about it.”
    We sat in silence, listening to strange creaks and groans in the maze, the echo of stones grinding together as tunnels changed, grew, and expanded. The dark made me think about the visions I’d seen of Nico di Angelo, and suddenly I realized something.
    “Nico is down here somewhere,” I said. “That’s how he disappeared from camp. He found the Labyrinth. Then he found a path that led down even farther—to the Underworld. But now he’s back in the maze. He’s coming after me.”
    Annabeth was quiet for a long time. “Percy, I hope you’re wrong. But if you’re right . . .” She stared at the flashlight beam, casting a dim circle on the stone wall. I had a feeling she was thinking about her prophecy. I’d never seen her look more tired.
    “How about I take first watch?” I said. “I’ll wake you if anything happens.”
    Annabeth looked like she wanted to protest, but she just nodded, slumped onto her bedroll, and closed her eyes.
    When it was my turn to sleep, I dreamed I was back in the old man’s Labyrinth prison.
    It looked more like a workshop now. Tables were littered with measuring instruments. A forge burned red hot in the corner. The boy I’d seen in the last dream was stoking the bellows, except he was taller now, almost my age. A weird funnel device was attached to the forge’s chimney, trapping the smoke and heat and channeling it through a pipe into the floor, next to a big bronze manhole