Chapter Text
ANNABETH HAD SEEN SOME STRANGE THINGS BEFORE, but she’d never seen it rain cars.
As the roof of the cavern collapsed, sunlight blinded her. She got the briefest glimpse of the Argo II hovering above. It must have used its ballistae to blast a hole straight through the ground. Chunks of asphalt as big as garage doors tumbled down, along with six or seven Italian cars.
One would’ve crushed the Athena Parthenos, but the statue’s glowing aura acted like a force field, and the car bounced off. Unfortunately, it fell straight toward Annabeth. She jumped to one side, twisting her bad foot. A wave of agony almost made her pass out, but she flipped on her back in time to see a bright red Fiat 500 slam into Arachne’s silk trap, punching through the cavern floor and disappearing with the Chinese Spidercuffs.
As Arachne fell, she screamed like a freight train on a collision course; but her wailing rapidly faded. All around Annabeth, more chunks of debris slammed through the floor, riddling it with holes.The Athena Parthenos remained undamaged, though the marble under its pedestal was a starburst of fractures.
Annabeth was covered in cobwebs. She trailed strands of leftover spider silk from her arms and legs like the strings of a marionette, but somehow, amazingly, none of the debris had hit her.
She wanted to believe that the statue had protected her, though she suspected it might’ve been nothing but luck. The army of spiders had disappeared. Either they had fled back into the darkness, or they’d fallen into the chasm.
As daylight flooded the cavern, Arachne’s tapestries along the walls crumbled to dust, which Annabeth could hardly bear to watch. Then she heard Percy’s voice from above: “Annabeth!”
“Here!” she sobbed. All the terror seemed to leave her in one massive yelp. As the Argo II descended, she saw Percy leaning over the rail. His smile was better than any tapestry she’d ever seen.
The room kept shaking, but Annabeth managed to stand. The floor at her feet seemed stable for the moment. Her backpack was missing, along with Daedalus’s laptop. But Annabeth didn’t care.
She was alive.
She edged closer to the gaping hole made by the Fiat 500. Jagged rock walls plunged into the darkness as far as Annabeth could see. A few small ledges jutted out here and there, but Annabeth saw nothing on them—just strands of spider silk dripping over the sides like Christmas tinsel. Annabeth wondered if Arachne had told the truth about the chasm. Had the spider fallen all the way to Tartarus?
She tried to feel satisfied with that idea, but it made her sad. Arachne had made some beautiful things. She’d already suffered for eons. Now her last tapestries had crumbled.
After all that, falling into Tartarus seemed like too harsh an end. Annabeth was dimly aware of the Argo II hovering to a stop about forty feet from the floor. It lowered a rope ladder.
Annabeth stood in a daze, staring into the darkness. Then suddenly Percy was next to her, lacing his fingers in hers. He turned her gently away from the pit and wrapped his arms around her. She buried her face in his chest and broke down in tears.
“It’s okay,” he said. “You're okay” Their friends gathered around them. Nico di Angelo was there, but Annabeth’s thoughts were so fuzzy, this didn’t seem surprising to her. It seemed only right that he would be with them.
“Your leg.” Piper knelt next to her and examined the Bubble Wrap cast. “Oh, Annabeth, what happened?”
She started to explain. Talking was difficult, but as she went along, her words came more easily. Percy didn’t let go of her hand, which also made her feel more confident.
When she finished, her friends’ faces were slack with amazement. “Gods of Olympus,” Jason said. “You did all that alone. With a broken ankle.”
“Well…some of it with a broken ankle.”
Percy grinned. “You made Arachne weave her own trap? I knew you were good, but Holy Hera—Annabeth, you did it. Generations of Athena kids tried and failed. You found the Athena Parthenos!”
Everyone gazed at the statue. “What do we do with her?” Frank asked. “She’s huge.”
“We’ll have to take her with us to Greece,” Annabeth said. “The statue is powerful. Something about it will help us stop the giants.”
“The giants’ bane stands gold and pale,” Hazel quoted. “Won with pain from a woven jail.” She looked at Annabeth with admiration. “It was Arachne’s jail. You tricked her into weaving it.”
With a lot of pain, Annabeth thought.
Leo raised his hands. He made a finger picture frame around the Athena Parthenos like he was taking measurements. “Well, it might take some rearranging, but I think we can fit her through the bay doors in the stable. If she sticks out the end, I might have to wrap a flag around her feet or something.”
Annabeth shuddered. She imagined the Athena Parthenos jutting from their trireme with a sign across her pedestal that read: WIDE LOAD. Then she thought about the other lines of the prophecy: The twins snuff out the angel’s breath, who holds the keys to endless death.
“What about you guys?” she asked. “What happened with the giants?”
Percy told her about rescuing Nico, the appearance of Bacchus, and the fight with the twins in the Colosseum. Nico didn’t say much.
The poor guy looked like he’d been wandering through a wasteland for six weeks. Percy explained what Nico had found out about the Doors of Death, and how they had to be closed on both sides.
Even with sunlight streaming in from above, Percy’s news made the cavern seem dark again.
“So the mortal side is in Epirus,” she said. “At least that’s somewhere we can reach.”
Nico grimaced. “But the other side is the problem. Tartarus.”
The word seemed to echo through the chamber. The pit behind them exhaled a cold blast of air. That’s when Annabeth knew with certainty. The chasm did go straight to the Underworld.
Percy must have felt it too. He guided her around him so she was a little farther from the edge. Her arms and legs trailed spider silk like a bridal train. She almost pulled out her dagger to cut it away, but before she could, Percy said, “Bacchus mentioned something about my voyage being harder than I expected. Not sure why—”
The chamber groaned. The Athena Parthenos tilted to one side. Its head caught on one of Arachne’s support cables, but the marble foundation under the pedestal was crumbling.
Nausea swelled in Annabeth’s chest. If the statue fell into the chasm, all her work would be for nothing. Their quest would fail.
“Secure it!” Annabeth cried. Her friends understood immediately.
“Zhang!” Leo cried. “Get me to the helm, quick! The coach is up there alone.”
Frank transformed into a giant eagle, and the two of them soared toward the ship.
Jason wrapped his arm around Piper. He turned to Percy. “Back for you guys in a sec.” He summoned the wind and shot into the air.
“This floor won’t last!” Hazel warned. “The rest of us should get to the ladder.”
Plumes of dust and cobwebs blasted from holes in the floor. The spider’s silk support cables trembled like massive guitar strings and began to snap. Hazel lunged for the bottom of the rope ladder and gestured for Nico to follow, but Nico was in no condition to sprint.
Percy gripped Annabeth’s hand tighter. “It’ll be fine,” he muttered. Looking up, she saw grappling lines shoot from the Argo II and wrap around the statue. One lassoed Athena’s neck like a noose. Leo shouted orders from the helm as Jason and Frank flew frantically from line to line, trying to secure them.
Nico had just reached the ladder when a sharp pain shot up Annabeth’s bad ankle. She staggered with a pained gasp.
“What is it?” Percy asked. She tried to stagger toward the ladder. Why was she moving backward instead? Her legs swept out from under her and she fell on her face.
“Her ankle!” Hazel shouted from the ladder. “Cut it! Cut it!” Annabeth’s mind was woolly from the pain. Cut her ankle?
Thankfully, Percy realized what Hazel meant. Percy lunged. He grabbed her arm, his other hand drawing Riptide. The momentum carried him along as well, dragging them backward.
“Help them!” Hazel yelled.
Annabeth glimpsed Nico hobbling in their direction, Hazel trying to disentangle her cavalry sword from the rope ladder. Their other friends were still focused on the statue, and Hazel’s cry was lost in the general shouting and the rumbling of the cavern.
Annabeth sobbed as she hit the edge of the pit. Her legs went over the side. Too late, she realized what was happening: she was tangled in the spider silk. She should have cut it away immediately. She had thought it was just loose line, but with the entire floor covered in cobwebs, she hadn’t noticed that one of the strands was wrapped around her foot—and the other end went straight into the pit. It was attached to something heavy down in the darkness, something that was pulling her in.
“No,” Percy muttered. He swung Riptide around her, reaching down into the pit. It was no use, he couldn't reach the line while holding onto her. He tried to throw Riptide, aiming at the string- but it went wide.
The glow of the bronze blade was swallowed quickly by the abyss, and Riptide was gone.
Percy tugged, pulling her arm, holding her half in and half out of the chasm. Nico reached them where Percy was holding them at a stalemate. Annabeth suddenly remembered her first quest, with Percy and Grover, when they had encountered Procrustes, the stretcher.
She and Grover had been tricked into laying on one of the titan’s waterbeds and almost stretched to death. She felt like the same thing was happening again.
Percy's grip on her arm was firm, but so was the spider silk on her hurt ankle. Spikes of white hot pain shot up her leg with every tug, and spots danced in her vision.
Percy and Nico must have been discussing something that was lost to the ringing in her ears, because Nico nodded.
He knelt next to Annabeth, and swung his sword. She could see his arms shake with the effort, but his sword was longer than Percy's.
There was a loud snap that seemed to echo in the cavern. The pressure yanking on Annabeth’s ankle released, and she went up, up, up.
Percy's pull on her arm yanked her back over the edge of the pit, and rolled her right over him.
Suddenly, the roles were reversed. Annabeth had been tossed a few feet away from the edge and Percy had slipped halfway into the pit. He was scrabbling for a hold, his knuckles white with the strain of gripping onto the cracked ground.
Nico, who had hobbled over to help Annabeth up, turned at her scream. “PERCY!” Only his fingers were visible now, holding tight.
No escape, said a voice in the darkness below. I go to Tartarus, and if you will not come too, I'll take this one instead…
Annabeth wasn’t sure if she actually heard Arachne’s voice or if it was just in her mind. The pit shook. Percy's fingers slipped. Nico let out a hoarse wail, Annabeth sobbed.
They both scrambled to the edge of the pit despite the fact that neither of them were in any condition to help. Annabeth sighed in relief when she saw Percy.
He was about fifteen feet down, barely holding onto a ledge the size of a bookshelf. His legs dangled into the abyss and his hands were shaking with the effort of holding his weight by his fingertips.
Nico leaned over the edge of the chasm, thrusting out his hand, but he was much too far away to help. Hazel was yelling for the others, but even if they heard her over all the chaos, they’d never make it in time.
The force of the Underworld tugged at Annabeth’s hair and clothes like dark gravity as she leaned over the pit.
“Percy!” She called down. Their eyes met. He looked up at Nico, fifteen feet above.
“The other side, Nico! I’ll see you there. Understand?”
Nico’s eyes widened. “But—”
“Lead them there! Take care of Annabeth!” Percy shouted. “Promise me!”
“I—I will.”
Below them all, the voice laughed in the darkness. Sacrifices. Beautiful sacrifices to wake the goddess.
Percy's face was gaunt, scraped and bloody. When he locked eyes with her, she thought he had never looked more handsome. “Be safe!”
Annabeth understood what Percy was going to do a moment before he did it. She lunged forward, trying to throw herself over the edge to him, but Nico caught her around the waist with thin arms and tugged her back.
She heard Hazel still screaming for help. She saw Percy's face illuminated by a single shaft of sunlight from far, far above—maybe the last sunlight he would ever see. Then Percy let go of his tiny ledge and he vanished into the endless darkness.
Annabeth screamed and fought, shoving at Nico with all her might. But even in his weakened state, Nico was able to drag her, hurt ankle and all, back over to Hazel at the ladder.
Annabeth sobbed, scratching at Nico’s stick thin arms and hurling accusations that she herself didn't even register. But she was hurt, tired, and dehydrated- and everything was fading,
fadi n g,
f a d i n g