The Son of Neptune

Laistrygonians. They’ve been here for days, waiting.’

Frank shook his head. Was Mars playing some kind of trick? No way would a goddess be worried about Frank, especially when there was somebody like Percy Jackson to worry about.

‘No weaknesses?’ he asked. ‘I’m nothing but weaknesses. My life depends on a piece of wood!’

Mars grinned. ‘You’re selling yourself short. Anyway, Gaia has these Laistrygonians convinced that if they eat the last member of your family – that being you – they’ll inherit your family gift. Whether that’s true or not, I don’t know. But the Laistrygonians are hungry to try.’

Frank’s stomach twisted into a knot. Grey had killed six of the ogres, but judging from the campfires around the property, there were dozens more – all waiting to cook Frank for breakfast.

‘I’m going to throw up,’ he said.

‘No, you’re not.’ Mars snapped his fingers, and Frank’s queasiness disappeared. ‘Battle jitters. Happens to everybody.’

‘But my grandmother -’

‘Yeah, she’s been waiting to talk to you. The ogres have left her alone so far. She’s the bait, see? Now that you’re here, I imagine they’ve already smelled your presence. They’ll attack in the morning.’

‘Get us out of here, then!’ Frank demanded. ‘Snap your fingers and blow up the cannibals.’

‘Ha! That would be fun. But I don’t fight my kids’ battles for them. The Fates have clear ideas about what jobs belong to gods, and what has to be done by mortals. This is your quest, kid. And, uh, in case you haven’t figured it out yet, your spear won’t be ready to use again for twenty-four hours, so I hope you’ve learned how to use the family gift. Otherwise, you’re gonna be breakfast for cannibals.’

The family gift. Frank had wanted to talk with Grandmother about it, but now he had no one to consult but Mars. He stared at the war god, who was smiling with absolutely no sympathy.

‘Periclymenus.’ Frank sounded out the word carefully, like a spelling-bee challenge. ‘He was my ancestor, a Greek prince, an Argonaut. He died fighting Hercules.’

Mars rolled his hand in a ‘go on’ gesture.

‘He had an ability that helped him in combat,’ Frank said. ‘Some sort of gift from the gods. My mom said he fought like a swarm of bees.’

Mars laughed. ‘True enough. What else?’

‘Somehow, the family got to China. I think, like in the days of the Roman Empire, one of Pericylmenus’s descendants served in a legion. My mom used to talk about a guy named Seneca Gracchus, but he also had a Chinese name, Sung Guo. I think – well, this is the part I don’t know, but Reyna always said there were many lost legions. The Twelfth founded Camp Jupiter. Maybe there was another legion that disappeared into the east.’

Mars clapped silently. ‘Not bad, kid. Ever heard of the Battle of Carrhae? Huge disaster for the Romans. They fought these guys called the Parthians on the eastern border of the empire. Fifteen thousand Romans died. Ten thousand more were taken prisoner.’

‘And one of the prisoners was my ancestor Seneca Gracchus?’

‘Exactly,’ Mars agreed. ‘The Parthians put the captured legionnaires to work, since they were pretty good fighters. Except then Parthia got invaded again from the other direction -’

‘By the Chinese,’ Frank guessed. ‘And the Roman prisoners got captured again.’

‘Yeah. Kind of embarrassing. Anyway, that’s how a Roman legion got to China. The Romans eventually put down roots and built a new hometown called -’

‘Li-Jien,’ Frank said. ‘My mother said that was our ancestral home. Li-Jien. Legion.’

Mars looked pleased. ‘Now you’re getting it. And old Seneca Gracchus, he had your family’s gift.’

‘My mom said he fought dragons,’ Frank remembered. ‘She said he was … he was the most powerful dragon of all.’

‘He was good,’ Mars admitted. ‘Not good enough to avoid the bad luck of his legion, but good. He settled in China, passed the family gift to his kids, and so on. Eventually your family emigrated to North America and got involved with Camp Jupiter -’

‘Full circle,’ Frank finished. ‘Juno said I would bring the family full circle.’

‘We’ll see.’ Mars nodded at his grandmother. ‘She wanted to tell you all this herself, but I figured I’d cover some of it since the old bird hasn’t got much strength. So do you understand your gift?’

Frank hesitated. He had an idea, but it seemed crazy – even crazier than a family moving from Greece to Rome to China to Canada. He didn’t want to say it aloud. He didn’t want to be wrong and have Mars laugh at him. ‘I – I think so. But against an army of those ogres -’

‘Yeah, it’ll be tough.’ Mars stood and stretched. ‘When your grandmother wakes up in the morning, she’ll offer you some help. Then I imagine she’ll die.’

‘What? But I have to save her! She can’t just leave me.’

‘She’s lived a full life,’ Mars said. ‘She’s ready to move on. Don’t be selfish.’

‘Selfish!’

‘The old woman only stuck around this long out of a sense of duty. Your mom was the same way. That’s why I loved her. She always put her duty first, ahead of everything. Even her life.’

‘Even me.’

Mars took off his sunglasses. Where his eyes should’ve been, miniature spheres of fire boiled like nuclear explosions. ‘Self-pity isn’t helpful, kid. It isn’t worthy of you. Even without the family gift, your mom gave you your most important traits – bravery, loyalty, brains. Now you’ve got to decide how to use them. In the morning, listen to your grandmother. Take her advice. You can still free Thanatos and save the camp.’

‘And leave my grandmother behind to die.’

‘Life is only precious because it ends, kid. Take it from a god. You mortals don’t know how lucky you are.’

‘Yeah,’ Frank muttered. ‘Real lucky.’

Mars laughed – a harsh metallic sound. ‘Your mom used to tell me this Chinese proverb. Eat bitter -’

‘Eat bitter, taste sweet,’ Frank said. ‘I hate that proverb.’

‘But it’s true. What do they call it these days – no pain, no gain? Same concept. You do the easy thing, the appealing thing, the peaceful thing, mostly it turns out sour in the end. But if you take the hard path – ah, that’s how you reap the sweet rewards. Duty. Sacrifice. They mean something.’

Frank was so disgusted he could hardly speak. This was his father?

Sure, Frank understood about his mom being a hero. He understood she’d saved lives and been really brave. But she’d left him alone. That wasn’t fair. It wasn’t right.

‘I’ll be going,’ Mars promised. ‘But first – you said you were weak. That’s not true. You want to know why Juno spared you, Frank? Why that piece of wood didn’t burn yet? It’s because you’ve got a role to play. You think you’re not as good as the other Romans. You think Percy Jackson is better than you.’

‘He is,’ Frank grumbled. ‘He battled you and won.’

Mars shrugged. ‘Maybe. Maybe so. But every hero has a fatal flaw. Percy Jackson? He’s too loyal to his friends. He can’t give them up, not for anything. He was told that, years ago. And some day soon he’s going to face a sacrifice he can’t make. Without you, Frank – without your sense of duty – he’s going fail. The whole war will go sideways, and Gaia will destroy our world.’

Frank shook his head. He couldn’t hear this.

‘War is a duty,’ Mars continued. ‘The only real choice is whether you accept it, and what you fight for. The legacy of Rome is on the line – five thousand years of law, order, civilization. The gods, the traditions, the cultures that shaped the world you live in: it’s all going to crumble, Frank, unless you win this. I think that’s worth fighting for. Think about it.’

‘What’s mine?’ Frank asked.

Mars raised an eyebrow. ‘Your what?’

‘Fatal flaw. You said all heroes have one.’

The god smiled dryly. ‘You gotta answer that yourself, Frank. But you’re finally asking the right questions. Now, get some sleep. You need the rest.’

The god waved his hand. Frank’s eyes felt heavy. He collapsed, and everything went dark.