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Feed us all the things, warned the fourth eel, Janet.Or we will bite you.
We were off to a great start.
A half dozen side corridors branched off from Eel Hall, each lined with black lacquered doors stenciled with creepy Art Deco skeletons. Art Creepo?
“These are bedrooms,” Hecate said, gesturing down one of the corridors. “But they are only for the lucky acolytes I train in magic.”
Annabeth looked interested. “Do you do that often?”
“I haven’t for many years.” Hecate sighed. “Once, this mansion was a school for magic—”
“Weird concept,” I muttered, because sometimes I blurt stuff out that should not be blurted. It was just that I was having trouble imagining students running around the house, zapping one another with wands and making potions out of eel mucus.
Before Hecate could smite me, Annabeth jumped in. “Hecuba mentioned that the school closed. Why was that?”
Hecate gave the hellhound a withering look. “We don’t talk about the school if we want to remain a happy family.”
The dog tucked her tail between her legs. On Hecate’s shoulder, the polecat chittered, probably teasing the hellhound.
Grover cleared his throat. “So where do we sleep, then?” He sounded vaguely worried, since sleep is one of his favorite things.
Hecate hesitated. If I were a betting man, I’d guess that the question of our sleeping arrangements hadn’t occurred to her.
“You may…camp in the living room,” she offered.
“Awesome!” Grover grinned triumphantly. “Glad I brought extra bedrolls!”
I imagined myself sleeping under the iron candelabra, waiting for it to fall and cut me into the shape of a sugar cookie. Or maybe I’d stretch out on the grand piano next to Gale the farting polecat. There were so many options.
“What about bathrooms?” I asked.
Hecate frowned. Another mortal necessity she probably hadn’t thought about in years: the need to flush. She gestured vaguely down another corridor. “You will find rooms with…baths…down there.”
“You just created new ones, didn’t you?” I asked.
“No!” she snapped. “Now, down here you will find the library.…”
“Also off-limits?” I guessed.
Hecate arched her eyebrows. “I don’t limit access to books, Percy Jackson. I’m not a monster. If you think you can navigate the knowledge in my library, be my guest. But if that knowledge turns you into a flaming purple armadillo, don’t come crying to me later.”
I made a note of which hallway she was indicating. I didn’t want to stumble around at night, looking for a toilet, and find myself in a room full of hazardous magical textbooks. Plus, the warning about the armadillo sounded oddly specific, like it had happened before.
Annabeth, however, had a gleam in her eyes. To her, knowledge was irresistible. Even the flaming purple kind, which kind of troubled me.
Grover raised his hand. “And is there a kitchen…?” He pointed to Annabeth’s bag of Mexican food. “Our tacos and enchiladas are probably getting cold.”
He sounded definitely worried now. He liked eating even more than sleeping. Hereallyliked enchiladas, which he said were so important they deserved a separate category from “food.”
Hecate scoffed. “Of course I have a kitchen, although we call it the laboratory. It’s in the basement. Follow me.”
She led us down a different stairwell. How many were there? I got the sense that the house was way bigger than it ought to be—as if the inside, like the outside, blurred and blended into the surrounding buildings. I hoped I didn’t wander into a neighbor’s house by accident and surprise them in the shower.
The hellhound Hecuba padded behind us, still looking morose from her mom’s scolding. She left a trail of drool, which I suspected would make it easy to track her comings and goings.
The polecat Gale was still perched on Hecate’s shoulder. She had a talent for waiting until I was directly behind her before ripping a stinker.
The basement turned out to be the brightest and most spacious area of the house. The white stone floor gleamed like ice milk. Windows let in bright light through frosted glass, which was weird since the sun had already started going down. Maybe each bank of windows existed in a different time zone, at just the right time of day to capture the perfect light.
