I didn’t want to wait for Annabeth and Grover to try to rescue me, either. I couldn’t imagine how they could distract so many serpents without getting themselves killed.
I thought about all the plans Annabeth and I had made about college and beyond. I thought about all the things I wanted to tell her . . . I wished I could at least let her know how much I loved her.
Suddenly, I felt lighter on my feet. The pressure eased on my twisted ankle. I was raising the staff so high it was pulling my arm out of its socket, and I asked myself, Percy, why are you doing that?
I don’t know,I answered, because I am not very helpful when I talk to myself.
The snakes watched in fascination as the rainbow grew brighter. I found myself on my tiptoes, desperately trying to keep a grip on Iris’s staff. Finally, I realized I wasn’t lifting the staff. The staff was lifting me.
My first thought was Why?
My second thought was Wait a minute. . . . This is a messenger’s staff. Don’t messenger gods fly through the air delivering messages?
Just before the staff had started pulling me upward, I’d been thinking how much I wanted to tell Annabeth I loved her. That was the message.
I held on with both hands.
“Take me to Annabeth,” I told the staff.
My feet left the rocks, and I rose slowly into the dank, dark air. Below me, the snakes watched in amazement.
“Farewell, my friends,” I told them. “Be good to one another.”
Then I ascended.
I wondered if I was leaving the snakes with a new religion; if they would tell stories to future generations about the strange rainbow god boy who tripped a lot before returning to the heavens. Or maybe they were just thinking, That kid is really weird.
As I picked up speed, the rainbow shimmered around me, engulfing me in light. My insides twisted. My limbs lost their substance. I wasn’t just flying inside the rainbow . . . I was becoming part of it, which sounds a lot cooler than it felt. All the molecules in my body dissolved into energy. My consciousness elongated, like I existed at each point along the arc of my journey simultaneously. And yet I still had all my physical senses. Don’t ask me why, but the light spectrum tasted like copper. It smelled like burning plastic. I began to wonder if this was why Iris had gotten tired of her messenger job and started a business where she could burn incense and apply essential oils.
I rematerialized at the mouth of the cave, right next to Annabeth and Grover. My satyr buddy was wheezing and clutching his knees, but he looked unharmed.
“Greetings, earthlings,” I said.
Annabeth nearly leaped out of her shoes. “What? How?”
She’s cute when she’s startled. It doesn’t happen very often, so I have to enjoy it when it does.
“I have a message for Annabeth Chase,” I said. “I love you.”
I tried to give her a kiss, but it was difficult, because she started laughing.
“Okay, I get it,” she said, pushing me away gently. “Messenger’s staff. Nice work!”
“Yeah, I totally planned it.”
“You totally had no idea.”
“Just because you’re right doesn’t mean I don’t resent it.”
She kissed me back. “I love you, too, Seaweed Brain.”
Grover cleared his throat. “I’m fine. Thanks.”
“Love you too, G-man,” I assured him. “That was some fine panpiping.”
“Hmph.” He tried to look grumpy, but from the way his ears reddened, I could tell he was secretly pleased. “Let’s just get back to Manhattan before things get weird.” He hesitated. “I mean even weirder.”
Going back on the train, we looked like three normal kids who’d been rolling around in a muddy field in Yonkers all day, except I was carrying the cleanest, shiniest staff in the universe. And every time I burped, I let out a little cloud of violet or chartreuse.
The next afternoon we returned the staff to Iris.
I was glad to get it out of my room, because it tended to glow and shoot rainbows around the apartment whenever I thought of a message I needed to tell someone, or whenever a mail truck drove by. That morning, my mom had gotten a special delivery of books from her publisher, and the staff nearly beat up the FedEx guy. I guess it thought he was competition.
Anyway, I met up with Annabeth after school. Grover wasn’t with us, since he was downtown doing his photo shoot with Blanche. Apparently, she was going to dress him in a kilt of withered palm leaves, drape him across a burnt log, and photograph him surrounded by dead insects. Grover planned to frame the photo and present it to Juniper as a gift on her bloom day in January. I don’t understand a single part of what I just said, but nobody asked my opinion.