The Tower of Nero - Shadow Travel

At last we reached the crane’s central mast. Nico led us down the rungs of the ladder. My limbs shook with exhaustion. I was tempted to ask Meg if she could create another latticework of plants to carry us to the bottom like she’d done at Sutro Tower. I decided against it, because 1) I didn’t want her to pass out from the effort, and 2) I really hated being tossed around by plants.

By the time we reached the ground, I felt wobbly and nauseated.

Nico didn’t look much better. How he planned to summon enough energy to shadow-zap us to safety, I couldn’t imagine. Above us, around the rim of the pit, the tauri watched in silence, their blue eyes gleaming like a string of angry Hanukkah lights.

Meg studied them warily. ‘Nico, how soon can you shadow us out?’

‘Catch … my … breath … first,’ he said between gulps of air.

‘Please,’ Will agreed. ‘If he’s too tired, he might teleport us into a vat of Cheez Whiz in Venezuela.’

‘Okay …’ said Nico. ‘We didn’t end up in the vat.’

‘Pretty close,’ Will said. ‘Definitely in the middle of Venezuela’s biggest Cheez Whiz processing plant.’

‘That was one time,’ Nico grumbled.

‘Uh, guys?’ Rachel pointed to the rim of the pit, where the cows were becoming agitated. They jostled and pushed each other forward until one – either by choice or with pressure from the herd – toppled off the edge.

Watching it fall, kicking its legs and torquing its body, I remembered the time Ares dropped a cat from Mount Olympus to prove it would land on its feet in Manhattan. Athena had teleported the cat to safety, then beat Ares with the butt of her spear for putting the animal in danger, but the fall had been terrifying to witness, nonetheless.

The bull was not as lucky as the cat. It landed sideways in the dirt with a throaty grunt. The impact would have killed most creatures, but the bull just flailed its legs, righted itself and shook its horns. It glared at us as if to say, Oh, you’re gonna get it now.

‘Um …’ Will edged backwards. ‘It’s in the pit. So why isn’t it choking on its rage?’

‘I – I think it’s because we’re here?’ My voice sounded like I’d been sucking helium. ‘It wants to kill us more than it wants to choke to death?’

‘Great,’ Meg said. ‘Nico, shadow-travel. Now.’

Nico winced. ‘I can’t take all of you at once! Two plus me is pushing it. Last summer, with the Athena Parthenos … That almost killed me, and I had Reyna’s help.’

The bull charged.

‘Take Will and Rachel,’ I said, hardly believing the words were coming out of my mouth. ‘Return for Meg and me when you can.’

Nico started to protest.

‘Apollo’s right!’ Meg said. ‘Go!’

We didn’t wait for a response. I drew my bow. Meg summoned her scimitars, and together we raced into battle.

There’s an old saying: the definition of insanity is shooting an invulnerable cow in the face over and over and expecting a different result.

[...]

‘Cowie, cowie, cow!’ I strummed desperately. ‘Hey, cow! Bad, cow! Run away, cowie, cowie, cow!’

I doubted the tune would win any Grammys, but I was hoping it might at least distract Cow the First long enough for Meg to get around it. The cow stayed stubbornly put. So did Meg.

I reached her side. I glanced back in time to see Potty Cow throw off the tarp and charge towards us. The newly fallen cows were also getting to their hooves.

I estimated we had about ten seconds to live.

‘Go,’ I told Meg. ‘J-jump the cow and climb the ladder. I’ll –’

I didn’t know how to finish that statement. I’ll stay here and die? I’ll compose another verse of ‘Cowie, Cowie, Cow’?

Just as Cow the First lowered its horns and charged, a hand grabbed my shoulder.

Nico di Angelo’s voice said, ‘Gotcha.’

And the world turned cold and dark.

[...]

‘ JUMP THE COW? ’ MEG DEMANDED. ‘ THAT was your plan?’

The five of us sat in a sewer, which was something I’d grown accustomed to. Meg seemed to be bouncing back quickly from her shadow-travel sickness, thanks to Will’s timely administration of nectar and Kit Kat bars. I, however, still felt like I was coming down with the flu: chills, body aches, disorientation. I was not ready to be assaulted for my choices in combat.

‘I was improvising,’ I said. ‘I didn’t want to see you die.’

Meg threw her hands up. ‘And I didn’t want to see you die, dummy. Did you think of that?’

‘Guys,’ Rachel interrupted, a cold pack pressed against her head. ‘How about none of us lets any of us die? Okay?’

Will checked her bruised temple. ‘Feeling any better?’

‘I’ll be fine,’ Rachel said, then explained for my benefit: ‘I managed to stumble into the wall when we teleported here.’

Nico looked sheepish. ‘Sorry about that.’

‘Hey, I’m not complaining,’ Rachel said. ‘Better than being trampled.’

‘Guess so,’ he said. ‘Once we …’

Nico’s eyelids fluttered. His pupils rolled up in his head and he slumped against Will’s shoulder. It might have been a clever ploy to fall into his boyfriend’s arms – I had used the catch me, handsome fainting trick a few times myself – but since Nico immediately began to snore, I decided he was not faking.

‘That’s night-night for Nico.’ Will pulled a travel pillow from his supply bag, which I suspected he carried just for these occasions. He eased the son of Hades into a comfortable sleeping position, then gave us a weary smile. ‘He’ll need about half an hour to recover. Until then, we might as well make ourselves comfortable.’

On the bright side, I’d had plenty of experience getting comfortable in sewers, and Nico had shadow-travelled us to the New York drainage system’s equivalent of the presidential suite.

The vaulted ceiling was adorned with a redbrick herringbone pattern. Along either wall, terracotta pipes dripped only the finest goo into a canal running down the middle of the floor. The concrete ledge upon which we sat was comfortably upholstered with lichen and scum. In the dim golden glow of Meg’s swords – our only illumination – the tunnel looked almost romantic.

Given New York rental prices, I imagined a place like this could go for quite a bit. Running water. Privacy. Lots of space. Great bones – mouse bones, chicken bones and some others I couldn’t identify. And did I mention the stench? The stench was included at no extra cost.


- The Tower of Nero, Chapters 15-16