The Titan's Curse

south for Long Island,” Apollo said. “Hang a left.”
    Thalia jerked the wheel and again threw me into Grover, who yelped.
    “The other left,” Apollo suggested.
    I made the mistake of looking out the window again. We were at airplane height now—so high the sky was starting to look black.
    “Ah . . .” Apollo said, and I got the feeling he was forcing himself to sound calm. “A little lower, sweetheart. Cape Cod is freezing over.”
    Thalia tilted the wheel. Her face was chalk white, her forehead beaded with sweat. Something was definitely wrong. I’d never seen her like this.
    The bus pitched down and somebody screamed. Maybe it was me. Now we were heading straight toward the Atlantic Ocean at a thousand miles an hour, the New England coastline off to our right. And it was getting hot in the bus.
    Apollo had been thrown somewhere in the back of the bus, but he started climbing up the rows of seats.
    “Take the wheel!” Grover begged him.
    “No worries,” Apollo said. He looked plenty worried. “She just has to learn to—WHOA!”
    I saw what he was seeing. Down below us was a little snow-covered New England town. At least, it used to be snow-covered. As I watched, the snow melted off the trees and the roofs and the lawns. The white steeple on a church turned brown and started to smolder. Little plumes of smoke, like birthday candles, were popping up all over the town. Trees and rooftops were catching fire.
    “Pull up!” I yelled.
    There was a wild light in Thalia’s eyes. She yanked back on the wheel, and I held on this time. As we zoomed up, I could see through the back window that the fires in the town were being snuffed out by the sudden blast of cold.
    “There!” Apollo pointed. “Long Island, dead ahead. Let’s slow down, dear. ‘Dead’ is only an expression.”
    Thalia was thundering toward the coastline of northern Long Island. There was Camp Half-Blood: the valley, the woods, the beach. I could see the dining pavilion and cabins and the amphitheater.
    “I’m under control,” Thalia muttered. “I’m under control.”
    We were only a few hundred yards away now.
    “Brake,” Apollo said.
    “I can do this.”
    “BRAKE!”
    Thalia slammed her foot on the brake, and the sun bus pitched forward at a forty-five-degree angle, slamming into the Camp Half-Blood canoe lake with a huge FLOOOOOOSH! Steam billowed up, sending several frightened naiads scrambling out of the water with half-woven wicker baskets.
    The bus bobbed to the surface, along with a couple of capsized, half-melted canoes.
    “Well,” said Apollo with a brave smile. “You were right, my dear. You had everything under control! Let’s go see if we boiled anyone important, shall we?”

FIVE

I PLACE AN UNDER WATER PHONE CALL
    I’d never seen Camp Half-Blood in winter before, and the snow surprised me.
    See, the camp has the ultimate magic climate control. Nothing gets inside the borders unless the director, Mr. D, wants it to. I thought it would be warm and sunny, but instead the snow had been allowed to fall lightly. Frost covered the chariot track and the strawberry fields. The cabins were decorated with tiny flickering lights, like Christmas lights, except they seemed to be balls of real fire. More lights glowed in the woods, and weirdest of all, a fire flickered in the attic window of the Big House, where the Oracle dwelt, imprisoned in an old mummified body. I wondered if the spirit of Delphi was roasting marshmallows up there or something.
    “Whoa,” Nico said as he climbed off the bus. “Is that a climbing wall?”
    “Yeah,” I said.
    “Why is there lava pouring down it?”
    “Little extra challenge. Come on. I’ll introduce you to Chiron. Zoë, have you met—”
    “I know Chiron,” Zoë said stiffly. “Tell him we will be in Cabin Eight. Hunters, follow me.”
    “I’ll show you the way,” Grover offered.
    “We know the way.”
    “Oh, really, it’s no trouble. It’s easy to get lost here, if you don’t”—he tripped over a canoe and came up still talking—“like my old daddy goat used to say! Come on!”
    Zoë rolled her eyes, but I guess she figured there was no getting rid of Grover. The Hunters shouldered their packs and their bows and headed off toward the cabins. As Bianca di Angelo was leaving, she leaned over and whispered something in her brother’s ear. She looked at him for an answer, but Nico just scowled and turned away.
    “Take care, sweethearts!” Apollo called after