The Battle of the Labyrinth

ghost again—”
    “He’ll be all right,” Eurytion promised. The cowherd had cleaned up nicely. He was wearing new jeans and a clean Western shirt and he’d even trimmed his beard. He’d put on Geryon’s boots. “The boy can stay here and gather his thoughts as long as he wants. He’ll be safe, I promise.”
    “What about you?” I asked.
    Eurytion scratched Orthus behind one chin, then the other. “Things are going to be run a little different on this ranch from now on. No more sacred cattle meat. I’m thinking about soybean patties. And I’m going to befriend those flesh-eating horses. Might just sign up for the next rodeo.”
    The idea made me shudder. “Well, good luck.”
    “Yep.” Eurytion spit into the grass. “I reckon you’ll be looking for Daedalus’s workshop now?”
    Annabeth’s eyes lit up. “Can you help us?”
    Eurytion studied the cattle guard, and I got the feeling the subject of Daedalus’s workshop made him uncomfortable. “Don’t know where it is. But Hephaestus probably would.”
    “That’s what Hera said,” Annabeth agreed. “But how do we find Hephaestus ?”
    Eurytion pulled something from under the collar of his shirt. It was a necklace—a smooth silver disk on a silver chain. The disk had a depression on the middle, like a thumbprint. He handed it to Annabeth.
    “Hephaestus comes here from time to time,” Eurytion said. “Studies the animals and such so he can make bronze automaton copies. Last time, I—uh—did him a favor. A little trick he wanted to play on my dad, Ares, and Aphrodite. He gave me that chain in gratitude. Said if I ever needed to find him, the disk would lead me to his forges. But only once.”
    “And you’re giving it to me?” Annabeth asked.
    Eurytion blushed. “I don’t need to see the forges, miss. Got enough to do here. Just press the button and you’ll be on your way.”
    Annabeth pressed the button and the disk sprang to life. It grew eight metallic legs. Annabeth shrieked and dropped it, much to Eurytion’s confusion.
    “Spider!” she screamed.
    “She’s, um, a little scared of spiders,” Grover explained. “That old grudge between Athena and Arachne.”
    “Oh.” Eurytion looked embarrassed. “Sorry, miss.”
    The spider scrambled to the cattle guard and disappeared between the bars.
    “Hurry,” I said. “That thing’s not going to wait for us.”
    Annabeth wasn’t anxious to follow, but we didn’t have much choice. We said our good-byes to Eurytion, Tyson pulled the cattle guard off the hole, and we dropped back into the maze.
    I wish I could’ve put the mechanical spider on a leash. It scuttled along the tunnels so fast, most of time I couldn’t even see it. If it hadn’t been for Tyson’s and Grover’s excellent hearing, we never would’ve known which way it was going.
    We ran down a marble tunnel, then dashed to the left and almost fell into an abyss. Tyson grabbed me and hauled me back before I could fall. The tunnel continued in front of us, but there was no floor for about a hundred feet, just gaping darkness and a series of iron rungs in the ceiling. The mechanical spider was about halfway across, swinging from bar to bar by shooting out metal web fiber.
    “Monkey bars,” Annabeth said. “I’m great at these.”
    She leaped onto the first rung and started swinging her way across. She was scared of tiny spiders, but not of plummeting to her death from a set of monkey bars. Go figure.
    Annabeth got to the opposite side and ran after the spider. I followed. When I got across, I looked back and saw Tyson giving Grover a piggyback ride (or was it a goatyback ride?). The big guy made it across in three swings, which was a good thing since, just as he landed, the last iron bar ripped free under his weight.
    We kept moving and passed a skeleton crumpled in the tunnel. It wore the remains of a dress shirt, slacks, and a tie. The spider didn’t slow down. I slipped on a pile of wood scraps, but when I shined a light on them I realized they were pencils—hundreds of them, all broken in half.
    The tunnel opened up onto a large room. A blazing light hit us. Once my eyes adjusted, the first thing I noticed were the skeletons. Dozens littered the floor around us. Some were old and bleached white. Others were more recent and a lot grosser. They didn’t smell quite as bad as Geryon’s stables, but almost.
    Then I saw the monster. She stood on a glittery dais on the opposite side of the room. She had the