The Lightning Thief

wrong—”
    “I can’t talk about it,” Grover said, and his quivering lower lip suggested he’d start crying if I pressed him. “But as I was saying, back at Medusa’s, Annabeth and I agreed there’s something strange going on with this quest. Something isn’t what it seems.”
    “Well, duh. I’m getting blamed for stealing a thunderbolt that Hades took.”
    “That’s not what I mean,” Grover said. “The Fur—The Kindly Ones were sort of holding back. Like Mrs. Dodds at Yancy Academy . . . why did she wait so long to try to kill you? Then on the bus, they just weren’t as aggressive as they could’ve been.”
    “They seemed plenty aggressive to me.”
    Grover shook his head. “They were screeching at us: ‘Where is it? Where?’”
    “Asking about me,” I said.
    “Maybe . . . but Annabeth and I, we both got the feeling they weren’t asking about a person. They said ‘Where is it ?’ They seemed to be asking about an object.”
    “That doesn’t make sense.”
    “I know. But if we’ve misunderstood something about this quest, and we only have nine days to find the master bolt. . . .” He looked at me like he was hoping for answers, but I didn’t have any.
    I thought about what Medusa had said: I was being used by the gods. What lay ahead of me was worse than petrification. “I haven’t been straight with you,” I told Grover. “I don’t care about the master bolt. I agreed to go to the Underworld so I could bring back my mother.”
    Grover blew a soft note on his pipes. “I know that, Percy. But are you sure that’s the only reason?”
    “I’m not doing it to help my father. He doesn’t care about me. I don’t care about him.”
    Grover gazed down from his tree branch. “Look, Percy, I’m not as smart as Annabeth. I’m not as brave as you. But I’m pretty good at reading emotions. You’re glad your dad is alive. You feel good that he’s claimed you, and part of you wants to make him proud. That’s why you mailed Medusa’s head to Olympus. You wanted him to notice what you’d done.”
    “Yeah? Well maybe satyr emotions work differently than human emotions. Because you’re wrong. I don’t care what he thinks.”
    Grover pulled his feet up onto the branch. “Okay, Percy. Whatever.”
    “Besides, I haven’t done anything worth bragging about. We barely got out of New York and we’re stuck here with no money and no way west.”
    Grover looked at the night sky, like he was thinking about that problem. “How about I take first watch, huh? You get some sleep.”
    I wanted to protest, but he started to play Mozart, soft and sweet, and I turned away, my eyes stinging. After a few bars of Piano Concerto no. 12, I was asleep.
    In my dreams, I stood in a dark cavern before a gaping pit. Gray mist creatures churned all around me, whispering rags of smoke that I somehow knew were the spirits of the dead.
    They tugged at my clothes, trying to pull me back, but I felt compelled to walk forward to the very edge of the chasm.
    Looking down made me dizzy.
    The pit yawned so wide and was so completely black, I knew it must be bottomless. Yet I had a feeling that something was trying to rise from the abyss, something huge and evil.
    The little hero, an amused voice echoed far down in the darkness. Too weak, too young, but perhaps you will do.
    The voice felt ancient—cold and heavy. It wrapped around me like sheets of lead.
    They have misled you, boy, it said. Barter with me. I will give you what you want.
    A shimmering image hovered over the void: my mother, frozen at the moment she’d dissolved in a shower of gold.
    Her face was distorted with pain, as if the Minotaur were still squeezing her neck. Her eyes looked directly at me, pleading: Go!
    I tried to cry out, but my voice wouldn’t work.
    Cold laughter echoed from the chasm.
    An invisible force pulled me forward. It would drag me into the pit unless I stood firm.
    Help me rise, boy. The voice became hungrier. Bring me the bolt. Strike a blow against the treacherous gods!
    The spirits of the dead whispered around me, No! Wake!
    The image of my mother began to fade. The thing in the pit tightened its unseen grip around me.
    I realized it wasn’t interested in pulling me in. It was using me to pull itself out .
    Good, it murmured. Good.
    Wake! the dead whispered. Wake!
    Someone was shaking me.
    My eyes opened, and it was daylight.
    “Well,” Annabeth said, “the zombie lives.”
    I was trembling from the dream. I