The Titan's Curse

he cried, “You made it!”
    He started to run toward me, then remembered he was turning his back on Zeus, and looked for permission.
    “Go on,” Zeus said. But he wasn’t really paying attention to Grover. The lord of the sky was staring intently at Thalia.
    Grover trotted over. None of the gods spoke. Every clop of Grover’s hooves echoed on the marble floor. Bessie splashed in his bubble of water. The hearth fire crackled.
    I looked nervously at my father, Poseidon. He was dressed similar to the last time I’d seen him: beach shorts, a Hawaiian shirt, and sandals. He had a weathered, suntanned face with a dark beard and deep green eyes. I wasn’t sure how he would feel about seeing me again, but the corners of his eyes crinkled with smile lines. He nodded as if to say It’s okay.
    Grover gave Annabeth and Thalia big hugs. Then he grasped my arms. “Percy, Bessie and I made it! But you have to convince them! They can’t do it!”
    “Do what?” I asked.
    “Heroes,” Artemis called.
    The goddess slid down from her throne and turned to human size, a young auburn-haired girl, perfectly at ease in the midst of the giant Olympians. She walked toward us, her silver robes shimmering. There was no emotion in her face. She seemed to walk in a column of moonlight.
    “The Council has been informed of your deeds,” Artemis told us. “They know that Mount Othrys is rising in the West. They know of Atlas’s attempt for freedom, and the gathering armies of Kronos. We have voted to act.”
    There was some mumbling and shuffling among the gods, as if they weren’t all happy with this plan, but nobody protested.
    “At my Lord Zeus’s command,” Artemis said, “my brother Apollo and I shall hunt the most powerful monsters, seeking to strike them down before they can join the Titans’ cause. Lady Athena shall personally check on the other Titans to make sure they do not escape their various prisons. Lord Poseidon has been given permission to unleash his full fury on the cruise ship Princess Andromeda and send it to the bottom of the sea. And as for you, my heroes . . .”
    She turned to face the other immortals. “These half-bloods have done Olympus a great service. Would any here deny that?”
    She looked around at the assembled gods, meeting their faces individually. Zeus in his dark pin-striped suit, his black beard neatly trimmed, and his eyes sparking with energy. Next to him sat a beautiful woman with silver hair braided over one shoulder and a dress that shimmered colors like peacock feathers. The Lady Hera.
    On Zeus’s right, my father Poseidon. Next to him, a huge lump of a man with a leg in a steel brace, a misshapen head, and a wild brown beard, fire flickering through his whiskers. The Lord of the Forges, Hephaestus.
    Hermes winked at me. He was wearing a business suit today, checking messages on his caduceus mobile phone. Apollo leaned back in his golden throne with his shades on. He had iPod headphones on, so I wasn’t sure he was even listening, but he gave me a thumbs-up. Dionysus looked bored, twirling a grape vine between his fingers. And Ares, well, he sat on his chrome-and-leather throne, glowering at me while he sharpened a knife.
    On the ladies’ side of the throne room, a dark-haired goddess in green robes sat next to Hera on a throne woven of apple-tree branches. Demeter, Goddess of the Harvest. Next to her sat a beautiful gray-eyed woman in an elegant white dress. She could only be Annabeth’s mother, Athena. Then there was Aphrodite, who smiled at me knowingly and made me blush in spite of myself.
    All the Olympians in one place. So much power in this room it was a miracle the whole palace didn’t blow apart.
    “I gotta say”—Apollo broke the silence—“these kids did okay.” He cleared his throat and began to recite: “Heroes win laurels—”
    “Um, yes, first class,” Hermes interrupted, like he was anxious to avoid Apollo’s poetry. “All in favor of not disintegrating them?”
    A few tentative hands went up—Demeter, Aphrodite.
    “Wait just a minute,” Ares growled. He pointed at Thalia and me. “These two are dangerous. It’d be much safer, while we’ve got them here—”
    “Ares,” Poseidon interrupted, “they are worthy heroes. We will not blast my son to bits.”
    “Nor my daughter,” Zeus grumbled. “She has done well.”
    Thalia blushed. She studied the floor. I knew how she felt. I’d hardly ever talked to my father, much less gotten a