The Lost Hero Read Online Free Page B

was a brittle sound like dry twigs snapping, and the cracks in the skywalk began to widen.
    “We need to get off this thing,” Jason said. “Maybe if we—”
    “Ohhh-kay,” Leo interrupted. “Look up there and tell me if those are flying horses.”
    At first Jason thought Leo had hit his head too hard. Then he saw a dark shape descending from the east—too slow for a plane, too large for a bird. As it got closer he could see a pair of winged animals—gray, four-legged, exactly like horses—except each one had a twenty-foot wingspan. And they were pulling a brightly painted box with two wheels: a chariot.
    “Reinforcements,” he said. “Hedge told me an extraction squad was coming for us.”
    “Extraction squad?” Leo struggled to his feet. “That sounds painful.”
    “And where are they extracting us to ?” Piper asked.
    Jason watched as the chariot landed on the far end of the skywalk. The flying horses tucked in their wings and cantered nervously across the glass, as if they sensed it was near breaking. Two teenagers stood in the chariot—a tall blond girl maybe a little older than Jason, and a bulky dude with a shaved head and a face like a pile of bricks. They both wore jeans and orange T-shirts, with shields tossed over their backs. The girl leaped off before the chariot had even finished moving. She pulled a knife and ran toward Jason’s group while the bulky dude was reining in the horses.
    “Where is he?” the girl demanded. Her gray eyes were fierce and a little startling.
    “Where’s who?” Jason asked.
    She frowned like his answer was unacceptable. Then she turned to Leo and Piper. “What about Gleeson? Where is your protector, Gleeson Hedge?”
    The coach’s first name was Gleeson? Jason might’ve laughed if the morning hadn’t been quite so weird and scary. Gleeson Hedge: football coach, goat man, protector of demigods. Sure. Why not?
    Leo cleared his throat. “He got taken by some … tornado things.”
    “Venti,” Jason said. “Storm spirits.”
    The blond girl arched an eyebrow. “You mean anemoi thuellai ? That’s the Greek term. Who are you, and what happened?”
    Jason did his best to explain, though it was hard to meet those intense gray eyes. About halfway through the story, the other guy from the chariot came over. He stood there glaring at them, his arms crossed. He had a tattoo of a rainbow on his biceps, which seemed a little unusual.
    When Jason had finished his story, the blond girl didn’t look satisfied. “No, no, no! She told me he would be here. She told me if I came here, I’d find the answer.”
    “Annabeth,” the bald guy grunted. “Check it out.” He pointed at Jason’s feet.
    Jason hadn’t thought much about it, but he was still missing his left shoe, which had been blown off by the lightning. His bare foot felt okay, but it looked like a lump of charcoal.
    “The guy with one shoe,” said the bald dude. “He’s the answer.”
    “No, Butch,” the girl insisted. “He can’t be. I was tricked.” She glared at the sky as though it had done something wrong. “What do you want from me?” she screamed. “What have you done with him?”
    The skywalk shuddered, and the horses whinnied urgently.
    “Annabeth,” said the bald dude, Butch, “we gotta leave. Let’s get these three to camp and figure it out there. Those storm spirits might come back.”
    She fumed for a moment. “Fine.” She fixed Jason with a resentful look. “We’ll settle this later.”
    She turned on her heel and marched toward the chariot.
    Piper shook her head. “What’s her problem? What’s going on?”
    “Seriously,” Leo agreed.
    “We have to get you out of here,” Butch said. “I’ll explain on the way.”
    “I’m not going anywhere with her .” Jason gestured toward the blonde. “She looks like she wants to kill me.”
    Butch hesitated. “Annabeth’s okay. You gotta cut her some slack. She had a vision telling her to come here, to find a guy with one