Percy Jackson and the Olympians 1 by The Lightning Thief (Rick Riordan)

Author:The Lightning Thief (Rick Riordan) [Thief, The Lightning]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2010-10-24T23:48:37.406000+00:00

With best wishes,

PERCY JACKSON

"They're not going to like that," Grover warned. "They'll think you're impertinent."

I poured some golden drachmas in the pouch. As soon as I closed it, there was a sound like

a cash register. The package floated off the table and disappeared with a pop!

"I am impertinent," I said.

I looked at Annabeth, daring her to criticize.

She didn't. She seemed resigned to the fact that I had a major talent for ticking off the gods.

"Come on," she muttered. "We need a new plan."

Rick Riordan

Percy Jackson and the Olympians

Chapter Twelve

We Get Advice From A Poodle

We were pretty miserable that night.

We camped out in the woods, a hundred yards from the main road, in a marshy clearing that

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local kids had obviously been using for parties. The ground was littered with flattened soda cans

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and fast-food wrappers.

We'd taken some food and blankets from Aunty Em's, but we didn't dare light a fire to dry our

damp clothes. The Furies and Medusa had provided enough excitement for one day. We didn't want

to attract anything else.

We decided to sleep in shifts. I volunteered to take first watch.

Annabeth curled up on the blankets and was snoring as soon as her head hit the ground.

Grover fluttered with his flying shoes to the lowest bough of a tree, put his back to the trunk, and

stared at the night sky.

"Go ahead and sleep," I told him. "I'll wake you if there's trouble."

He nodded, but still didn't close his eyes. "It makes me sad, Percy."

"What does? The fact that you signed up for this stupid quest?"

"No. This makes me sad." He pointed at all the garbage on the ground. "And the sky. You

can't even see the stars. They've polluted the sky. This is a terrible time to be a satyr."

"Oh, yeah. I guess you'd be an environmentalist."

He glared at me. "Only a human wouldn't be. Your species is clogging up the world so fast ...

ah, never mind. It's useless to lecture a human. At the rate things are going, I'll never find Pan."

"Pam? Like the cooking spray?"

"Pan!" he cried indignantly. "P-A-N. The great god Pan! What do you think I want a

searcher's license for?"

A strange breeze rustled through the clearing, temporarily overpowering the stink of trash

and muck. It brought the smell of berries and wildflowers and clean rainwater, things that might've

once been in these woods. Suddenly I was nostalgic for something I'd never known.

"Tell me about the search," I said.

Grover looked at me cautiously, as if he were afraid I was just making fun.

"The God of Wild Places disappeared two thousand years ago," he told me. "A sailor off the

coast of Ephesos heard a mysterious voice crying out from the shore, 'Tell them that the great god

Pan has died!' When humans heard the news, they believed it. They've been pillaging Pan's

kingdom ever since. But for the satyrs, Pan was our lord and master. He protected us and the wild

places of the earth. We refuse to believe that he died. In every generation, the bravest satyrs pledge

their lives to finding Pan. They search

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