Percy Jackson, a boy about your age with messy black hair and sea-green eyes, shoved a pen into his pocket and drew a bronze sword from thin air. He planted himself between the monsters and two other kids—a blonde girl with stormy gray eyes, and a boy with a wispy goatee and anxious, kind features.

Annabeth’s voice was calm, calculating. She held a bronze knife, her eyes darting between the three winged horrors.

One Fury, her snake-like hair hissing, ignored Percy entirely. Her burning gaze locked onto you, still half-sprawled in your seat by the torn edge of the bus. She clicked her brass talons.

She lunged, a blur of leather and flame, straight for the twelve-year-old with no weapon, no training, and nowhere left to run.