The Last Olympian

slamming into the throne of her mother and crumpling to the floor.
    “Annabeth!” I screamed.
    Ethan Nakamura got to his feet. He now stood between Annabeth and me. I couldn’t fight him without turning my back on Kronos.
    Grover’s music took on a more urgent tune. He moved toward Annabeth, but he couldn’t go any faster and keep up the song. Grass grew on the floor of the throne room. Tiny roots crept up between the cracks of the marble stones.
    Kronos rose to one knee. His hair smoldered. His face was covered with electrical burns. He reached for his sword, but this time it didn’t fly into his hands.
    “Nakamura!” he groaned. “Time to prove yourself. You know Jackson’s secret weakness. Kill him, and you will have rewards beyond measure.”
    Ethan’s eyes dropped to my midsection, and I was sure that he knew. Even if he couldn’t kill me himself, all he had to do was tell Kronos. There was no way I could defend myself forever.
    “Look around you, Ethan,” I said. “The end of the world. Is this the reward you want? Do you really want everything destroyed—the good with the bad? Everything ?”
    Grover was almost to Annabeth now. The grass thickened on the floor. The roots were almost a foot long, like a stubble of whiskers.
    “There is no throne to Nemesis,” Ethan muttered. “No throne to my mother.”
    “That’s right!” Kronos tried to get up, but stumbled. Above his left ear, a patch of blond hair still smoldered. “Strike them down! They deserve to suffer.”
    “You said your mom is the goddess of balance,” I reminded him. “The minor gods deserve better, Ethan, but total destruction isn’t balance . Kronos doesn’t build. He only destroys.”
    Ethan looked at the sizzling throne of Hephaestus. Grover’s music kept playing, and Ethan swayed to it, as if the song were filling him with nostalgia—a wish to see a beautiful day, to be anywhere but here. His good eye blinked.
    Then he charged . . . but not at me.
    While Kronos was still on his knees, Ethan brought down his sword on the Titan lord’s neck. It should have killed him instantly, but the blade shattered. Ethan fell back, grasping his stomach. A shard of his own blade had ricocheted and pierced his armor.
    Kronos rose unsteadily, towering over his servant. “Treason,” he snarled.
    Grover’s music kept playing, and grass grew around Ethan’s body. Ethan stared at me, his face tight with pain.
    “Deserve better,” he gasped. “If they just . . . had thrones—”
    Kronos stomped his foot, and the floor ruptured around Ethan Nakamura. The son of Nemesis fell through a fissure that went straight through the heart of the mountain—straight into open air.
    “So much for him.” Kronos picked up his sword. “And now for the rest of you.”
    My only thought was to keep him away from Annabeth.
    Grover was at her side now. He’d stopped playing and was feeding her ambrosia.
    Everywhere Kronos stepped, the roots wrapped around his feet, but Grover had stopped his magic too early. The roots weren’t thick or strong enough to do much more than annoy the Titan.
    We fought through the hearth, kicking up coals and sparks. Kronos slashed an armrest off the throne of Ares, which was okay by me, but then he backed me up to my dad’s throne.
    “Oh, yes,” Kronos said. “This one will make fine kindling for my new hearth!”
    Our blades clashed in a shower of sparks. He was stronger than me, but for the moment I felt the power of the ocean in my arms. I pushed him back and struck again—slashing Riptide across his breastplate so hard I cut a gash in the Celestial bronze.
    He stamped his foot again and time slowed. I tried to attack but I was moving at the speed of a glacier. Kronos backed up leisurely, catching his breath. He examined the gash in his armor while I struggled forward, silently cursing him. He could take all the time-outs he wanted. He could freeze me in place at will. My only hope was that the effort was draining him. If I could wear him down . . .
    “It’s too late, Percy Jackson,” he said. “Behold.”
    He pointed to the hearth, and the coals glowed. A sheet of white smoke poured from the fire, forming images like an Iris-message. I saw Nico and my parents down on Fifth Avenue, fighting a hopeless battle, ringed in enemies. In the background Hades fought from his black chariot, summoning wave after wave of zombies out of the ground, but the forces of the Titan’s army seemed just as endless.