The Son of Neptune - Chapter 19

HAZEL WAS AN EXPERT ON WEIRD. She’d seen her mother
possessed by an earth goddess. She’d created a giant out
of gold. She’d destroyed an island, died and come back
from the Underworld.
But getting kidnapped by a field of grass? That was
new.
She felt as if she were trapped in a funnel cloud of
plants. She’d heard of modern-day singers jumping into
crowds of fans and getting passed overhead by thousands
of hands. She imagined this was similar – only she was
moving a thousand times faster, and the grass blades
weren’t adoring fans.
She couldn’t sit up. She couldn’t touch the ground. Her
sword was still in her bedroll, strapped to her back, but she
couldn’t reach it. The plants kept her off balance, tossing
her around, slicing her face and arms. She could barely
make out the stars through the tumble of green, yellow
and black.
Frank’s shouting faded into the distance.
It was hard to think clearly, but Hazel knew one thing:
She was moving fast. Wherever she was being taken,
she’d soon be too far away for her friends to find her.
She closed her eyes and tried to ignore the tumbling
and tossing. She sent her thoughts into the earth below
her. Gold, silver – she’d settle for anything that might
disrupt her kidnappers.
She felt nothing. Riches under the earth – zero.
She was about to despair when she felt a huge cold
spot pass beneath her. She locked onto it with all her
concentration, dropping a mental anchor. Suddenly the
ground rumbled. The swirl of plants released her and she
was thrown upward like a catapult projectile.
Momentarily weightless, she opened her eyes. She
twisted her body in midair. The ground was about twenty
feet below her. Then she was falling. Her combat training
kicked in. She’d practised dropping from giant eagles
before. She tucked into a roll, turned the impact into a
somersault, and came up standing.
She unslung her bedroll and drew her sword. A few
yards to her left, an outcropping of rock the size of a
garage jutted from the sea of grass. Hazel realized it was
her anchor. She’d caused the rock to appear.
The grass rippled around it. Angry voices hissed in
dismay at the massive clump of stone that had broken
their progress. Before they could regroup, Hazel ran to the
rock and clambered to the top.
The grass swayed and rustled around her like the
tentacles of a gigantic undersea anemone. Hazel could
sense her kidnappers’ frustration.
‘Can’t grow on this, can you?’ she yelled. ‘Go away, you
bunch of weeds! Leave me alone!’
‘Schist,’ said an angry voice from the grass.
Hazel raised her eyebrows. ‘Excuse me?’
‘Schist! Big pile of schist!’
A nun at St Agnes Academy had once washed Hazel’s
mouth with lye soap for saying something very similar, so
she wasn’t sure how to respond. Then, all around her rock
island, the kidnappers materialized from the grass. At first
glance they looked like Valentine angels – a dozen
chubby little Cupid babies. As they stepped closer, Hazel
realized they were neither cute nor angelic.
They were the size of toddlers, with rolls of baby fat, but
their skin had a strange greenish hue, as if chlorophyll ran
through their veins. They had dry, brittle wings like
cornhusks, and tufts of white hair like corn silk. Their faces
were haggard, pitted with kernels of grain. Their eyes were
solid green, and their teeth were canine fangs.
The largest creature stepped forward. He wore a yellow
loincloth, and his hair was spiky, like the bristles on a stalk
of wheat. He hissed at Hazel and waddled back and forth
so quickly, she was afraid his loincloth might fall off.
‘Hate this schist!’ the creature complained. ‘Wheat
cannot grow!’
‘Sorghum cannot grow!’ another piped up.
‘Barley!’ yelled a third. ‘Barley cannot grow. Curse this
schist!’
Hazel’s knees wobbled. The little creatures might have
been funny if they weren’t surrounding her, staring up at
her with those pointed teeth and hungry green eyes. They
were like Cupid piranhas.
‘Y-you mean the rock?’ she managed. ‘This rock is
called schist?’
‘Yes, greenstone! Schist!’ the first creature yelled.
‘Nasty rock.’
Hazel began to understand how she’d summoned it. ‘It’s
a precious stone. It’s valuable?’
‘Bah!’ said the one in the yellow loincloth. ‘Foolish
native people made jewellery from it, yes. Valuable?
Maybe. Not as good as wheat.’
‘Or sorghum!’
‘Or barley!’
The others chimed in, calling out different types of
grain. They circled the rock, making no effort to climb it –
at least not yet. If they decided to swarm her, there was no
way she could fend off all of them.
‘You’re Gaia’s servants,’ she guessed, just to keep them
talking. Maybe Percy and Frank weren’t too far away.
Maybe they’d be able to see her, standing so tall above
the fields. She wished that her sword glowed like Percy’s.
The yellow-diapered Cupid snarled. ‘We are the karpoi,
spirits of the grain. Children of the Earth Mother, yes! We
have been her attendants since forever. Before nasty
humans cultivated us, we were wild. We will be again.
Wheat will destroy all!’
‘No, sorghum will rule!’
‘Barley shall dominate!’
The others joined in, each karpos cheering for his own
variety.
‘Right.’ Hazel swallowed her revulsion. ‘So you’re
Wheat, then – you in the yellow, um, britches.’
‘Hmmmm,’ said Wheat. ‘Come down from your schist,
demigod. We must take you to our mistress’s army. They
will reward us. They will kill you slowly!’
‘Tempting,’ Hazel said, ‘but no thanks.’
‘I will give you wheat!’ said Wheat, as if this were a very
fine offer in exchange for her life. ‘So much wheat!’
Hazel tried to think. How far had she been carried? How
long would it take her friends to find her? The karpoi were
getting bolder, approaching the rock in twos and threes,
scratching at the schist to see if it would hurt them.
‘Before I get down …’ She raised her voice, hoping it
would carry over the fields. ‘Um, explain something to me,
would you? If you’re grain spirits, shouldn’t you be on the
gods’ side? Isn’t the goddess of agriculture Ceres –’
‘Evil name!’ Barley wailed.
‘Cultivates us!’ Sorghum spat. ‘Makes us grow in
disgusting rows. Lets humans harvest us. Pah! When
Gaia is mistress of the world again, we will grow wild, yes!’
‘Well, naturally,’ Hazel said. ‘So this army of hers, where
you’re taking me in exchange for wheat –’
‘Or barley,’ Barley offered.
‘Yeah,’ Hazel agreed. ‘This army is where, now?’
‘Just over the ridge!’ Sorghum clapped his hands
excitedly. ‘The Earth Mother – oh, yes! – she told us:
“Look for the daughter of Pluto who lives again. Find her!
Bring her alive! I have many tortures planned for her.” The
giant Polybotes will reward us for your life! Then we will
march south to destroy the Romans. We can’t be killed,
you know. But you can, yes.’
‘That’s wonderful.’ Hazel tried to sound enthusiastic. It
wasn’t easy, knowing Gaia had special revenge planned
for her. ‘So you – you can’t be killed because Alcyoneus
has captured Death, is that it?’
‘Exactly!’ Barley said.
‘And he’s keeping him chained in Alaska,’ Hazel said,
‘at … let’s see, what’s the name of that place?’
Sorghum started to answer, but Wheat flew at him and
knocked him down. The karpoi began to fight, dissolving
into funnel clouds of grain. Hazel considered making a
run for it. Then Wheat re-formed, holding Sorghum in a
headlock. ‘Stop!’ he yelled at the others. ‘Multigrain
fighting is not allowed!’
The karpoi solidified into chubby Cupid piranhas again.
Wheat pushed Sorghum away.
‘Oh, clever demigod,’ he said. ‘Trying to trick us into
giving secrets. No, you’ll never find the lair of Alcyoneus.’
‘I already know where it is,’ she said with false
confidence. ‘He’s on the island in Resurrection Bay.’
‘Ha!’ Wheat sneered. ‘That place sank beneath the
waves long ago. You should know that! Gaia hates you for
it. When you thwarted her plans, she was forced to sleep
again. Decades and decades! Alcyoneus – not until the
dark times was he able to rise.’
‘The 1980s,’ Barley agreed. ‘Horrible! Horrible!’
‘Yes,’ Wheat said. ‘And our mistress still sleeps.
Alcyoneus was forced to bide his time in the north, waiting,
planning. Only now does Gaia begin to stir. Oh, but she
remembers you, and so does her son!’
Sorghum cackled with glee. ‘You will never find the
prison of Thanatos. All of Alaska is the giant’s home. He
could be keeping Death anywhere! Years it would take
you to find him, and your poor camp has only days. Better
you surrender. We will give you grain. So much grain.’
Hazel’s sword felt heavy. She’d dreaded returning to
Alaska, but at least she’d had an idea where to start
looking for Thanatos. She’d assumed that the island
where she had died hadn’t been completely destroyed, or
possibly had risen again when Alcyoneus woke. She had
hoped that his base would be there. But if the island was
really gone she had no idea how to find the giant. Alaska
was huge. They could search for decades and never find
him.
‘Yes,’ Wheat said, sensing her anguish. ‘Give up.’
Hazel gripped her spatha. ‘Never!’ She raised her voice
again, hoping it would somehow reach her friends. ‘If I
have to destroy you all, I will. I am the daughter of Pluto!’
The karpoi advanced. They gripped the rock, hissing as
if it were scalding hot, but they began to climb.
‘Now you will die,’ Wheat promised, gnashing his teeth.
‘You will feel the wrath of grain!’
Suddenly there was a whistling sound. Wheat’s snarl
froze. He looked down at the golden arrow that had just
pierced his chest. Then he dissolved into pieces of
Weetabix.

Categories: The Son of Neptune