Hedge and the flight attendant got Piper’s dad on board. Then Hedge came down one last time to say his good-byes. He gave Piper a hug and glared at Jason and Leo. “You cupcakes take care of this girl, you hear? Or I’m gonna make you do push-ups.”
“You got it, Coach,” Leo said, a smile tugging at his mouth.
“No push-ups,” Jason promised.
Piper gave the old satyr one more hug. “Thank you, Gleeson. Take care of him, please.”
“I got this, McLean,” he assured her. “They got root beer and veggie enchiladas on this flight, and one hundred percent linen napkins—yum! I could get used to this.”
Trotting up the stairs, he lost one shoe, and his hoof was visible for just a second. The flight attendant’s eyes widened, but she looked away and pretended nothing was wrong. Piper figured she’d probably seen stranger things, working for Tristan McLean.
When the plane was heading down the runaway, Piper started to cry. She’d been holding it in too long and she just couldn’t anymore. Before she knew it, Jason was hugging her, and Leo stood uncomfortably nearby, pulling Kleenex out of his tool belt.
“Your dad’s in good hands,” Jason said. “You did amazing.”
She sobbed into his shirt. She allowed herself to be held for six deep breaths. Seven. Then she couldn’t indulge herself anymore. They needed her. The helicopter pilot was already looking uncomfortable, like she was starting to wonder why she’d flown them here.
“Thank you, guys,” Piper said. “I—”
She wanted to tell them how much they meant to her. They’d sacrificed everything, maybe even their quest, to help her. She couldn’t repay them, couldn’t even put her gratitude into words. But her friends’ expressions told her they understood.
Then, right next to Jason, the air began to shimmer. At first Piper thought it was heat off the tarmac, or maybe gas fumes from the helicopter, but she’d seen something like this before in Medea’s fountain. It was an Iris message. An image appeared in the air—a dark-haired girl in silver winter camouflage, holding a bow.
Jason stumbled back in surprise. “Thalia!”
“Thank the gods,” said the Hunter. The scene behind her was hard to make out, but Piper heard yelling, metal clashing on metal, and explosions.
“We’ve found her,” Thalia said. “Where are you?”
“Oakland,” he said. “Where are you?”
“The Wolf House! Oakland is good; you’re not too far. We’re holding off the giant’s minions, but we can’t hold them forever. Get here before sunset, or it’s all over.”
“Then it’s not too late?” Piper cried. Hope surged through her, but Thalia’s expression quickly dampened it.
“Not yet,” Thalia said. “But Jason—it’s worse than I realized. Porphyrion is rising. Hurry.”
“But where is the Wolf House?” he pleaded.
“Our last trip,” Thalia said, her image starting to flicker. “The park. Jack London. Remember?”
This made no sense to Piper, but Jason looked like he’d been shot. He tottered, his face pale, and the Iris message disappeared.
“Bro, you all right?” Leo asked. “You know where she is?”
“Yes,” Jason said. “Sonoma Valley. Not far. Not by air.”
Piper turned to the ranger pilot, who’d been watching all this with an increasingly puzzled expression.
“Ma’am,” Piper said with her best smile. “You don’t mind helping us one more time, do you?”
“I don’t mind,” the pilot agreed.
“We can’t take a mortal into battle,” Jason said. “It’s too dangerous.” He turned to Leo. “Do you think you could fly this thing?”
“Um …” Leo’s expression didn’t exactly reassure Piper. But then he put his hand on the side of the helicopter, concentrating hard, as if listening to the machine.
“Bell 412HP utility helicopter,” Leo said. “Composite four-blade main rotor, cruising speed twenty-two knots, service ceiling twenty-thousand feet. The tank is near full. Sure, I can fly it.”
Piper smiled at the ranger again. “You don’t have a problem with an under-aged unlicensed kid borrowing your copter, do you? We’ll return it.”
“I—” The pilot nearly choked on the words, but she got them out: “I don’t have a problem with that.”
Leo grinned. “Hop in, kids. Uncle Leo’s gonna take you for a ride.”
XLVII
LEO
FLY A HELICOPTER? SURE, WHY NOT. Leo had done plenty of crazier things that week.
The sun was going down as they flew north over the Richmond Bridge, and Leo couldn’t believe the day had gone so quickly. Once again, nothing like ADHD and a good fight to the death to make time fly.
Piloting the chopper, he went back and forth between confidence and panic. If he didn’t think about it, he found himself automatically flipping the right switches, checking the altimeter, easing back on the stick, and flying straight. If he allowed himself to consider what he was doing, he started freaking out. He imagined his Aunt Rosa yelling at him in Spanish, telling him he was a delinquent lunatic who was going to crash and burn. Part of him suspected she was right.
“Going okay?” Piper asked from the copilot’s seat. She sounded more nervous than he was, so Leo put on a brave face.
“Aces,” he said. “So what’s the Wolf House?”
Jason knelt between their seats. “An abandoned mansion in the Sonoma Valley. A demigod built it—Jack London.”
Leo couldn’t place the name. “He an actor?”
“Writer,” Piper said. “Adventure stuff, right?
“Yeah,” Jason said. “He was a son of Mercury—I mean, Hermes. He was an adventurer, traveled the world. He was even a hobo for a while. Then he made a fortune writing. He bought a big ranch in the country and decided to build this huge mansion—the Wolf House.”
“Named that ’cause he wrote about wolves?” Leo guessed.
“Partially,” Jason said. “But the site, and the reason he wrote about wolves—he was dropping hints about his personal experience. There’re a lot of holes in his life story—how he was born, who his dad was, why he wandered around so much—stuff you can only explain if you know he was a demigod.”
The bay slipped behind them, and the helicopter continued north. Ahead of them, yellow hills rolled out as far as Leo could see.
“So Jack London went to Camp Half-Blood,” Leo guessed.
“No,” Jason said. “No, he didn’t.”
“Bro, you’re freaking me out with the mysterious talk. Are you remembering your past or not?”
“Pieces,” Jason said. “Only pieces. None of it good. The Wolf House is on sacred ground. It’s where London started his journey as a child—where he found out he was a demigod. That’s why he returned there. He thought he could live there, claim that land, but it wasn’t meant for him. The Wolf House was cursed. It burned in a fire a week before he and his wife were supposed to move in. A few years later, London died, and his ashes were buried on the site.”
“So,” Piper said, “how do you know all this?”
A shadow crossed Jason’s face. Probably just a cloud, but Leo could swear the shape looked like an eagle.
“I started my journey there too,” Jason said. “It’s a powerful place for demigods, a dangerous place. If Gaea can claim it, use its power to entomb Hera on the solstice and raise Porphyrion—that might be enough to awaken
