Oh.My.Gods. 02 - Goddess Boot Camp

  "Why did you send me the call num­ber if you knew it wasn't the­re?"

  "Be­ca­use I-"

  "Wa­it. The dist­rac­ti­on. I get it." I may not li­ke it, but I get it. "So you mo­ved it?"

  "Yes. Se­ve­ral in­qu­iri­es in­to Mo­unt Olym­pus do­cu­ments ca­me ac­ross my desk and I grew con­cer­ned that so­me­one might stumb­le upon yo­ur fat­her's re­cord. I mo­ved it to the va­ult to pro­tect you."

  To pro­tect me?" I ask, prac­ti­cal­ly jog­ging to ke­ep up now that we can ac­tu­al­ly see whe­re we're go­ing.

  "I didn't want you to dis­co­ver the con­tents of the re­cord ca­re­les­sly. I wan­ted to pre­sent them to you myself." He pulls up his hur­ri­ed pa­ce as we re­ach the end of the cor­ri­dor. "You we­re not re­ady to le­arn the truth. I now be­li­eve you are re­ady to ma­ke that de­ter­mi­na­ti­on for yo­ur­self."

  Be­fo­re I can get of­fen­ded that he tho­ught I co­uldn't hand­le the truth be­fo­re-we went thro­ugh all that last ye­ar with the Gre­ek-gods-are-morc-than-myth thing-I no­ti­ce whe­re we've stop­ped. The cor­ri­dor de­ad-ends at a small cham­ber with twel­ve do­ors ra­di­ating out in a se­mi­circ­le. It lo­oks li­ke so­me sort of me­di­eval laby­rinth, with walls of mas­si­ve dark sto­ne blocks and gi­ant-si­ze do­ors that lo­ok li­ke they're ma­de of high-ri­se-gra­de ste­el. Abo­ve each do­or, car­ved in­to a gi­ant slab of sto­ne that spans the en­ti­re do­or­way, is a very an­ci­ent-lo­oking symbol. The symbol abo­ve each do­or is dif­fe­rent.

  "What are the­se?" I ask ner­vo­usly.

  "Do­de­cat­hu­ron," he rep­li­es. The twel­ve do­ors of Olym­pus."

  "Of Olym­pus?" I re­pe­at. "As in Mo­unt Olym­pus? Do the­se do­ors le­ad the­re?"

  Da­mi­an sha­kes his he­ad. "When the Aca­demy was bu­ilt, the gods fo­ught over the right to pat­ro­ni­ze the scho­ol. Af­ter many we­eks of vi­olent bat­tles, The­mis fi­nal­ly pro­po­sed a comp­ro­mi­se. Each Olym­pi­an wo­uld be the scho­ol's pat­ron for one month of the ye­ar. No­ne of them was en­ti­rely happy, of co­ur­se, so each de­man­ded a se­pa­ra­te ac­cess por­tal."

  "But you sa­id they don't le­ad to Olym­pus?"

  "They don't," he exp­la­ins. They le­ad from Ol­y­m­pus. If we we­re to open one of the do­ors, we wo­uld find an empty ro­om on the ot­her si­de."

  "If they're empty," I po­int out, "then whe­re is the va­ult?"

  Da­mi­an turns back to­ward the cor­ri­dor we just left and po­ints. "The­re."

  "Whe­re?" I ask, spin­ning back aro­und and ex­pec­ting an empty hal­lway. Ins­te­ad, the­re's a gi­ant ste­el do­or fil­ling the en­ti­re spa­ce that we just wal­ked thro­ugh. "H-how?"

  Whir­ling in a three-sixty, I con­firm that I'm not crazy. The­re are the twel­ve do­ors of Olym­pus, the va­ult do­or, and so­lid sto­ne walls. What hap­pe­ned to the cor­ri­dor we just ca­me down? And how are we sup­po­sed to get out?

  "The­re is a sa­fe­gu­ard on this ro­om," Da­mi­an exp­la­ins, step­ping to the ste­el do­or and deftly spin­ning the com­bi­na­ti­on lock abo­ve the hand­le. "Once so­me­one en­ters the ro­om, it shifts, tur­ning on a smo­oth and si­lent re­vol­ve to re­ve­al the va­ult."

  "How is that a sa­fe­gu­ard?" I ask.

  "If so­me­one en­ters who do­es not know the com­bi­na­ti­on…" He so­unds a lit­tle smug as he grasps the hand­le and twists. A lo­ud click ec­ho­es in the cham­ber just be­fo­re the do­or cre­aks open. "… they will not be ab­le to get out."

  "So what?" I ask, glan­cing aro­und the ro­om to ma­ke su­re I hadn't mis­sed spot­ting the ske­le­tons of un­wit­ting stu­dents who had be­en trap­ped he­re. "They wo­uld be stuck he­re and die of star­va­ti­on-" I sud­denly re­ali­ze the­re are no air vents or anyt­hing. "Or suf­fo­ca­te when the­ir oxy­gen runs out?"

  "You sho­uld con­si­der a ca­re­er as a wri­ter of fic­ti­on," Da­mi­an says, step­ping in­to the mas­si­ve va­ult and scan­ning over the shel­ves of bo­oks that li­ne one si­de. "You ha­ve a very vi­vid ima­gi­na­ti­on."

  "No," I exp­la­in, step­ping clo­ser and pe­eking in at the va­ult's con­tents. "I've just re­ad eno­ugh myth to know bet­ter."

  Da­mi­an la­ughs.

  The va­ult it­self is the si­ze of Ces­ca's walk-in clo­set-in ot­her words: hu­ge. As tall as the cor­ri­dor ce­iling, it's at le­ast six fe­et wi­de and so de­ep I can't see the back wall. I am not abo­ut to step in­si­de-I've se­en eno­ugh af­ter-scho­ol spe­ci­als abo­ut kids get­ting ac­ci­den­tal­ly loc­ked in a sa­fe-or may­be that was a ref­ri­ge­ra­tor-to know bet­ter. But even from my po­si­ti­on of sa­fety, I see tons of stuff.

  The en­ti­re left wall is li­ned with de­ep bo­oks­hel­ves, full of le­at­her-bo­und bo­oks that lo­ok even ol­der-if pos­sib­le-than tho­se in the sec­ret arc­hi­ves. On the right, the­re are even de­eper shel­ves, li­ke the ones you use in yo­ur ga­ra­ge to or­ga­ni­ze junk. They're jam-pac­ked with bo­xes and bas­kets and see-thro­ugh sto­ra­ge con­ta­iners. Each one se­ems to be ca­re­ful­ly la­be­led in Gre­ek let­ters, but I bet it's a night­ma­re to ke­ep track of everyt­hing.

  "What is all of this?" I ask ab­sently, not re­al­ly ex­pec­ting Da­mi­an to ans­wer. He's not ge­ne­ral­ly the forth­co­ming type.

  "The va­ult is de­sig­ned to sa­fe­gu­ard the most dan­ge­ro­us items of the Aca­demy col­lec­ti­on," he exp­la­ins.

  "Dan­ge­ro­us stuff from the lib­rary?" I ask.

  "From all of our col­lec­ti­ons." He pulls a bo­ok from the stack and dusts off the co­ver. "He­re it is."

  I've be­en trying to trans­la­te one of the Gre­ek la­bels, but when he says that my eyes ins­tantly snap to the dust-co­ve­red le­at­her-bo­und bo­ok. My he­art go­es crazy in my chest. Right the­re, in Da­mi­an's hands, is the re­cord of my fat­her's tri­al. The pro­ce­edings that led to the smo­ting dec­ree-a vir­tu­al de­ath sen­ten­ce.

  Da­mi­an holds it out for me.

  My hands sha­ke as I re­ach for the re­cord. I'm not su­re what I ex­pect, but not­hing earth-shat­te­ring hap­pens when my fin­gers clo­se over the le­at­her. The ce­iling do­esn't crumb­le. I don't get zap­ped to Ha­des by so­me un­fo­re­se­en cur­se. I don't wa­ke up and find that it's all a dre­am.

  I glan­ce up at Da­mi­an, sud­denly very af­ra­id and very ner­vo­us. What if the­re are things in he­re that I don't want to know, things I can't hand­le?

  "You do not ha­ve to re­ad it now," Da­mi­an says, his vo­ice soft and re­as­su­ring. "In fact, you do not ha­ve to re­ad it at all. It is right­ful­ly yo­urs. You may ke­ep it as long as you ne­ed. I know you will gu­ard it well."

  At this exact mo­ment he's not be­ing smug or pa­ren­tal or he­ad mas­ter-li­ke or anyt­hing but un­ders­tan­ding.

  Clutc­hing the re­cord to my chest, I say, "Thank you, Da­mi­an."

  Then, be­fo­re I can stop myself, I rush for­ward and throw one arm aro­und him in a big hug. He do­esn't even he­si­ta­te be­fo­re wrap­ping his arms aro­und my sho­ul­ders and hug­ging me back. For the first ti­me sin­ce be­ing up­ro­oted and thrown in­to his world, I fe­el li­ke we just mig­ht-mig­ht-be­co­me fa­mily.

  Our step­dad-step­da­ugh­ter mo­ment is cut short by a de­ep rumb­ling so­und co­ming from the depths of the va­ult.

  "We ne­ed to go," Da­mi­an says, ab­ruptly re­le­asing me and step­ping back. "Now."

  I ba­rely jump out of the way be­fo­re he grabs the open va­ult do­or and slams it shut. He fin­gers the com­bi­na­ti­on lock and spins it back and forth qu­ickly. I'm trying to fi­gu­re out why he's ope­ning the va­ult aga­in when he twists the hand­le, and ins­te­ad of the va­ult ope­ning, the va­ult di­sap­pe­ars. The cor­ri­dor is back.

  "Hurry," he says, g
rab­bing my arm and pro­pel­ling me in­to the hall.

  With my dad's re­cord clutc­hed un­der one arm, I jog to­ward the dis­tant sta­ir­ca­se-the dis­tant mo­on­light. I he­ar Da­mi­an's ox­fords ec­ho­ing on the sto­ne flo­or be­hind me. When I re­ach the sta­irs, the gro­und starts to tremb­le aga­in.

  "Up," Da­mi­an sho­uts over the gro­wing ro­ar.

  I ta­ke them two at a ti­me, my qu­ads scre­aming that they still ha­ven't fully re­co­ve­red from run­ning the sta­di­um steps, I burst in­to the co­urt­yard and turn aro­und in ti­me to see Da­mi­an le­ap from the ope­ning to land on At­he­na's fe­et, just as the sta­ir­ca­se clo­ses up be­hind him.

  He rolls on­to his back, eyes clo­sed, and pan­ting. With a ner­vo­us gig­gle, I de­ci­de not to po­int out that he's get­ting his su­it dirty.

  "I am most de­fi­ni­tely get­ting too old for this," he says bet­we­en pants.

  I've ne­ver se­en Da­mi­an ove­re­xert him­self li­ke this.

  "Why didn't you just zap us out of the­re?" I ask, wis­hing I'd tho­ught of that be­fo­re run­ning for my li­fe.

  "Impos­sib­le," he whe­ezes. The sa­fe­gu­ard blocks po­wers usa­ge in the cham­ber and the cor­ri­dor."

  Stan­ding over Da­mi­an, I say, "That's pretty in­con­ve­ni­ent."

  I of­fer him my hand.

  He ta­kes it and lets me ha­ul him to his fe­et. "Incon­ve­ni­ent, but ne­ces­sary," he says, dus­ting off his su­it. He glan­ces at his watch. "I ne­ed to get back to yo­ur mot­her. I trust yo­ur fri­ends will see you ho­me sa­fely."

  "Of co­ur­se," I say, sad that he's le­aving al­re­ady. "I gu­ess you can't tell Mom I say hel­lo."

  He smi­les, li­ke he can sen­se my sad­ness. "I'll tell her."

  I gi­ve him my best smi­le-but I bet it co­mes off pretty we­ak.

  "Is everyt­hing el­se all right?" he asks. "Yo­ur run­ning. Yo­ur fri­ends."

  "Yes," I say, glad I can ho­nestly say things with Grif­fin are fi­ne now.

  "And yo­ur po­wers?" he asks. "They are less er­ra­tic. Are you fe­eling mo­re com­for­tab­le with yo­ur cont­rol?"

  I bi­te my lip. It's not li­ke I can lie to him-he'll re­ad my mind and know it's not true. "It's get­ting bet­ter. But not per­fect," I ad­mit. "I'm still ha­ving tro­ub­le."

  "You will get the­re," he says, la­ying a hand on my sho­ul­der. "I trust in you."

  "I know." And I do, re­al­ly. It's not li­ke I ever ex­pec­ted ins­tan­ta­ne­o­us cont­rol. "I'm wor­king on it. Stel­la and I are wor­king on it."

  "Go­od." He steps back and smi­les. "And stop wor­rying abo­ut the test. I reg­ret ever ha­ving men­ti­oned it."

  "No, I'd rat­her know," I say.

  Bet­ter to know the de­mons you fa­ce, right?

  Oh gods. I ho­pe the­re aren't de­mons. What if I ha­ve to fight mons­ters or gor­gons or so­met­hing? What if I-

  "Pho­ebe," Da­mi­an in­ter­rupts my crazy tho­ughts, ta­king both my sho­ul­ders in his hands and lo­oking di­rectly in­to my eyes. "Stop. Worry will only im­pe­de yo­ur cont­rol. Just ke­ep prac­ti­cing and ke­ep tra­ining. You will get the­re."

  I ta­ke a de­ep bre­ath and try for so­me of No­la's Zen calm.

  "You'd bet­ter go," I say, thin­king calm, calm, calm so he won't re­ad that I'm still fre­aking out. "Mom will worry."

  "Of co­ur­se." He nods and starts to glow. Then stops and says. "Oh, and tell Miss Ma­ti­os that if she re­turns the re­cord she bor­ro­wed from the arc­hi­ves to my of­fi­ce be­fo­re I re­turn, the­re will be no de­ten­ti­on."

  Then he glows and is go­ne.

  Only Da­mi­an co­uld know that a stu­dent bro­ke the ru­les from tho­usands of mi­les away. So­me prin­ci­pals ha­ve eyes in the back of the­ir he­ads… he has eyes ever­y­w­he­re!

  We're lucky he ne­ver fo­und out abo­ut the ti­me Ni­co­le and I switc­hed pla­ces to ta­ke fall fi­nals. If he knew she had ta­ken my physics exam and that I'd ta­ken her his­tory test, we'd be in de­ten­ti­on un­til gra­du­ati­on.

  * * * *

  Grif­fin is pa­cing back and forth on the Aca­demy steps. Troy and Uri­an are sit­ting on the top step, watc­hing him li­ke spec­ta­tors at a ten­nis match. On one par­ti­cu­larly long pass, Troy no­ti­ces me in his pe­rip­he­ral vi­si­on.

  "Pho­ebe!" He jumps to his fe­et and starts to­ward me. "Did you-"

  Grif­fin sho­ves past him and grabs me by the sho­ul­ders. "Are you all right?"

  "Of co­ur­se. Didn't they tell you?"

  From the dark lo­ok in his nor­mal­ly bright eyes, I'm go­ing to gu­ess no.

  He twists to lo­ok back over his sho­ul­der and prac­ti­cal­ly growls. "They didn't tell me anyt­hing. Ex­cept that I had to wa­it out he­re."

  "Um, I ne­ed to go," Troy says, bac­king down the steps. "I ha­ve class in the mor­ning."

  "Co­ward," I ta­unt.

  "Right." He stumb­les when he gets to the last step, trip­ping back in his hurry to es­ca­pe Grif­fin's wrath. "That's me." With a gulp, he adds. "La­ter."

  Then Troy turns and rus­hes aro­und the cor­ner of the Aca­demy, pro­bably he­ading for his dorm.

  Uri­an, re­ali­zing that he's be­en left to fend for him­self, says. "I'll just ma­ke su­re he gets ho­me wit­ho­ut in­ci­dent."

  I co­ver my mo­uth to ke­ep from la­ug­hing as Uri­an fol­lows Troy aro­und the cor­ner at light spe­ed. They cle­arly don't know Grif­fin li­ke I do. He wo­uldn't hurt a fly. But-he turns his at­ten­ti­on back on me and I'm pre­sen­ted with the full fo­cus of his fury-he is a des­cen­dant of Ares. He do­es a de­cent god-of-war imp­res­si­on. If I didn't know he had the he­art of a teddy be­ar, I might run away, too.

  Inste­ad, I la­ugh.

  "What," he bi­tes out, "didn't they tell me?"

  "The iden­tity of the sec­ret e-ma­iler." I didn't think his eyeb­rows co­uld fur­row any de­eper, but they do. "It was Da­mi­an."

  He jerks back. "He­ad­mas­ter Pet­ro­las?"

  I nod.

  "Why wo­uld he send you anony­mo­us mes­sa­ges? Why wo­uld he send you on a hunt for yo­ur fat­her's re­cord." He's still hol­ding on to my sho­ul­ders, but his fa­ce has sof­te­ned in­to con­fu­si­on. "And isn't he in Tha­iland?"

  "He is," I say, ans­we­ring his last qu­es­ti­on first. "It's a long story."

  Sha­king his he­ad, he glan­ces down and no­ti­ces the bo­ok clutc­hed to my chest. "You fo­und it, then."

  I lo­ok at the soft brown le­at­her, at the slightly yel­lo­wed pa­ges that smell fa­intly of dust and lib­rary-not that I snif­fed them or anyt­hing. That wo­uld be a lit­tle ob­ses­si­ve… right? Con­ta­ined in tho­se pa­ges are ans­wers to qu­es­ti­ons I ne­ver knew I had un­til a few months ago.

  "Ha­ve you lo­oked in­si­de?"

  I slowly sha­ke my he­ad.

  Grif­fin brus­hes his fin­ger­tips ac­ross my che­ek. When I lo­ok up in­to his shi­ning eyes, he asks, "Are you go­ing to?"

  "I-" I fe­el the te­ars li­ne the bot­tom of my eyes. This sho­uld be an easy ans­wer. Of co­ur­se I want to know what re­al­ly hap­pe­ned to my dad. Of co­ur­se I want to see what ma­de the gods de­ci­de to smo­te him-so I can avo­id ac­ci­den­tal­ly do­ing the sa­me thing to myself. But when I ha­ve to ac­tu­al­ly spit out the ans­wer, it's anyt­hing but easy. "I don't know. Sho­uld I?"

  Grif­fin ta­kes my hand, pres­sing our palms to­get­her and la­cing his fin­gers thro­ugh mi­ne. As he le­ads me down the steps, he says. "I can't ans­wer that qu­es­ti­on for you."

  "I me­an, I sho­uld find out what hap­pe­ned, right?" We step on­to the lush lawn, he­ading to­ward my ho­use. "He's my dad. I sho­uld want to know."

  "May­be," Grif­fin says, squ­e­ezing my hand. I melt a lit­tle as he rubs his thumb
back and forth ac­ross the sen­si­ti­ve spot bet­we­en my thumb and fo­re­fin­ger. "But if so­met­hing in­si­de is hol­ding you back, then you sho­uld pro­bably cle­ar that up be­fo­re do­ing so­met­hing you can't un­do."

  "I de­fi­ni­tely can't un­le­arn wha­te­ver I re­ad in he­re." I wa­ve the re­cord in the air. "Once I know, I'll al­ways know."

  The im­por­tant qu­es­ti­on is"-he lifts our jo­ined hands and pres­ses mi­ne to his lips-"… what are you re­al­ly af­ra­id of fin­ding?"

  He's right. That's the qu­es­ti­on. Why am I re­al­ly hol­ding back?

  From what ever­yo­ne has sa­id abo­ut Dad's de­ath, he kno­wingly used his po­wers to help the Char­ters win the AFC play-offs. That vi­ola­tes a ma­j­or he­mat­he­os ru­le abo­ut using our po­wers for ad­van­ce­ment in the not­hos world. If we didn't ha­ve that ru­le, then he­mat­he­os wo­uld cont­rol the pla­net-which wo­uldn't ne­ces­sa­rily be a bad thing, but it wo­uldn't be fa­ir. He bro­ke a ru­le and he was pu­nis­hed. That's the bot­tom li­ne. Right?

  But what if it isn't? What if he didn't kno­wingly bre­ak the ru­le? Or what if he hadn't be­en gi­ven a war­ning? Or what if he was for­ced to-

  "I think…" I start, but my vo­ice catc­hes in my thro­at.

  Grif­fin pulls us to a stop, tugs me in­to his arms, and just holds me. He do­esn't say a word, do­esn't press me to say anyt­hing, just com­forts me un­til I get my emo­ti­ons un­der cont­rol.

  "I think," I fi­nal­ly say aro­und the knot in my thro­at. "I'm af­ra­id to find out that he was gi­ven a cho­ice. That the gods as­ked him to cho­ose bet­we­en fo­ot­ball and-"

  Mo­re te­ars.

  Grif­fin rubs my back in rhythmic circ­les.

  "What if he was for­ced to pick fo­ot­ball or us?" I cho­ke out. "And he pic­ked fo­ot­ball?"

  "Shhh." Grif­fin hugs me clo­se, smo­ot­hing his hand over my ha­ir and trying to calm me.

  "I just…" I stam­mer bet­we­en sniffs. "I just don't think I co­uld stand it if I fo­und out he'd be­en gi­ven the cho­ice, and hadn't cho­sen us."