Look, I'll be honest: I kind of asked for this.
Most kids, when they find out they're a demigod, they freak out. They cry about how dangerous it is, or how they just want to be normal, or how monsters trying to eat them is a "huge inconvenience." My best friend Percy Jackson is one of those kids.
Not me.
I spent the first twelve years of my life waiting for something to happen. You know that feeling when you're walking down the street and you just know a Hydra is going to burst out of the sewer? Or when you're sitting in algebra class and you catch the teacher looking at you with eyes that are just a little too yellow to be human?
Everyone called me crazy. My teachers called it "hyperactive imagination." My foster dad called it "a reason to send me to boarding school."
But I knew. I always knew the world was weirder than it looked.
My name is Dante. I'm twelve years old. I go to Yancy Academy, a private school for "troubled kids" in upstate New York. Am I troubled? Maybe. I mean, I did try to climb the gym roof last week because I swore I saw a Harpy nesting in the gutters. (It was a pigeon. A really aggressive pigeon).
But usually, the trouble finds my roommate, Percy.
Percy is the best guy I know, but he has the worst luck in the universe. If there's a loose cannon on a field trip, it fires at him. If there's a puddle, he falls in it. And if we're going on a field trip to the Metropolitan Museum of Art to look at ancient Greek and Roman stuff?
Yeah. We were doomed.
"Dante, stop staring at the Fates," Percy grumbled, slumped in the seat next to me on the school bus.
"They aren't the Fates, man," I said, sketching furiously in my notebook. "They're just old ladies knitting socks. But if one of them takes out a pair of giant scissors, we bail. Deal?"
Percy rolled his eyes. He looked miserable. He hates field trips. He has dyslexia and ADHD, just like me, but for him, it's like the words are dancing the cha-cha on the page. For me? The words just look boring compared to the pictures.
"I just hope Mrs. Dodds doesn't kill me," Percy muttered.
Mrs. Dodds was our pre-algebra teacher. She was a tiny little woman in a black leather jacket who looked like she rode a Harley into a graveyard. She hated Percy. She loved Nancy Bobofit, this redheaded kleptomaniac who enjoyed throwing peanut butter and ketchup sandwiches at Grover.
Grover Underwood was our other best friend. He was crying. He usually cried when he got frustrated.
"It's okay, G-Man," I said, leaning over the seat. "If Nancy tries anything, I'll tell her she's cursed by Nemesis, the goddess of revenge. She's dumb enough to believe it."
"I think I'm going to throw up," Grover moaned.
"Aim for Nancy," I advised.
Mr. Brunner, our Latin teacher, was the only cool adult at Yancy. He was in a wheelchair and had this massive collection of Roman armor. He was leading the tour through the galleries.
I was in heaven.
Seriously. While the other guys were flicking spitballs, I was vibrating with energy.
"That's a stele," I whispered to Percy, pointing at a grave marker. "That depicts a warrior saying goodbye to his wife before going to the Fields of Asphodel. Dude, look at the detail on the shield!"
Percy tried to look interested, mostly because he's a good friend, but I could tell he was struggling to focus. "Cool, Dante. Really cool."
"And over there," I pointed to a black-figure vase, "that's Heracles fighting the Nemean Lion. See how he's choking it out? That's because its skin is impenetrable. You can't stab it. You have to grapple it. Pure technique."
"Will this be on the test?" Nancy Bobofit sneered from behind us.
I turned around. "I don't know, Nancy. Will 'How to be a decent human being' be on the test? Because you're failing that one."
Percy snorted. Mr. Brunner looked back, raising an eyebrow, but he didn't shush us.
We moved outside for lunch. The weather was weird. It had been weird since Christmas—massive storms, snow in April, flooding. I told Percy it was obviously Zeus and Poseidon having a brawl, but he told me to stop playing Age of Mythology.
We sat by the fountain, away from the other kids.
"Detention," Grover mumbled, chewing on his sandwich wrapper. Not the sandwich. The wrapper. "We're going to get detention."
"Relax," I said, cracking my knuckles. "Nothing is going to happen."
That was the moment Nancy Bobofit appeared. She dumped her half-eaten lunch right in Grover's lap.
"Oops," she grinned. Her crooked teeth looked like a graveyard fence.
Percy snapped. I saw it happen. His face went red, and a wave of pure anger rolled off him.
I stood up to shove her, but I didn't have to.
WHOOSH.
Water from the fountain didn't just splash; it shot out like a cannon. It grabbed Nancy by the waist and tossed her into the fountain screaming.
"Percy pushed me!" she shrieked, spitting out fountain water.
Mrs. Dodds materialized out of nowhere. Seriously, one second the spot was empty, the next she was standing there, staring at Percy with beads of light glowing in her eyes.
"Now, honey," she said to Nancy. "Come with me." Then she turned to us. Her eyes drifted over me—dismissive, like I was just furniture—and locked onto Percy. "And you, Percy Jackson."
Percy looked terrified.
"I'll come too," I said, stepping forward. "I saw the whole thing. Nancy slipped."
Mrs. Dodds' nostrils flared. "Stay here, Mr. Bradford."
"No," I said. My heart was hammering against my ribs. Something felt wrong. The air smelled like ozone, like right before a thunderstorm. "We're roommates. We stick together."
She stared at me for a second, looking surprised that I had a backbone. Then she gave a nasty little smile. "Fine. But stay out of the way."
We marched into the Greek and Roman section. The gallery was empty.
Mrs. Dodds stood by a marble frieze of the Greek gods. She was making this weird growling noise in her throat.
"You've been giving us problems, honey," she said to Percy.
"I'll try harder, ma'am," Percy stammered.
I moved slightly to the left, scanning the room. My hand drifted to my pocket, though all I had was a plastic spork from lunch. "She's not talking about math, Percy," I whispered.
Mrs. Dodds' eyes began to glow like barbecue coals. "Did you really think you could steal from us and get away with it?"
"Steal what?" Percy asked.
"Stop playing dumb!" she shrieked.
Then, the coolest and scariest thing I have ever seen happened.
Mrs. Dodds exploded.
Well, not exploded-exploded. Her skin stretched and tore. Her leather jacket melted into large, leathery bat wings. Her fingers turned into claws. Her teeth grew into yellow fangs. She wasn't a teacher. She was a shriveled hag with wings.
"A Fury!" I yelled, pointing a finger at her. "Percy! It's an Erinyes! One of the Kindly Ones!"
Percy looked at me like I was insane. "A WHAT?"
"Die, honey!" Mrs. Dodds snarled, and she lunged.
Percy froze. Total deer in the headlights.
I didn't think. I just moved. I stepped in front of Percy and swung the only weapon I had—my red plastic lunch tray.
"Back off, you flying prune!" I shouted.
I slammed the tray into her midsection. It shattered on impact. It was like hitting a brick wall wrapped in sandpaper. She didn't even flinch. She just backhanded me.
It felt like getting hit by a truck. I flew ten feet, slid across the polished floor, and slammed into a statue of Aphrodite. My head spun.
"Dante!" Percy screamed.
Mrs. Dodds turned back to Percy, her claws ready to slice him into ribbons. "Your friend can't save you."
I tried to get up, blinking away the stars in my vision. "Use the..." I coughed. "Percy, use the grapples! Like Hercules!"
But then Mr. Brunner wheeled into the doorway. He held up a pen.
"What ho, Percy!" he shouted, and tossed it through the air.
Mrs. Dodds lunged. Percy caught the pen.
And then—SHING!
The pen wasn't a pen. It was a sword. A glowing, double-edged bronze sword.
My jaw dropped. "No. Way."
Percy swung wildly. The blade hit Mrs. Dodds' shoulder, and she didn't bleed. She just... popped. Like a sandcastle exploding in a wind tunnel. She turned into yellow dust, smelling like sulfur, and vanished.
Silence.
Percy stood there, holding a ballpoint pen. He was shaking.
I pulled myself up, rubbing the massive bruise forming on my ribs. I walked over to the pile of dust.
"Did you see that?" Percy asked, his voice trembling. "Dante, she... she turned into a monster."
I grinned. My ribs hurt, my head was spinning, and I was pretty sure we were in huge trouble. But I had never been happier.
"She was a Fury, Percy," I said, clapping him on the shoulder. "A literal monster from the Underworld. And you just vaporized her."
"I... I did?"
"We are in so much trouble," I laughed, looking at the empty gallery. "This is going to be the best summer ever."