how I could break the news to her that her diapered little peach demon had become a rogue fruit.
“Let’s get you back to camp,” Lavinia said to me. “You’ve got a big day tomorrow.”
We left Don behind with the other nature spirits, all deep in crisis-mode conversation, and retraced our steps down Telegraph Avenue.
After a few blocks, I got up the courage to ask, “What will they do?”
Lavinia stirred as if she’d forgotten I was there. “You mean what will we do. ’Cause I’m with them.”
A lump formed in my throat. “Lavinia, you’re scaring me. What are you planning?”
“I tried to leave it alone,” she muttered. In the glow of the streetlamps, the wisps of pink hair that had escaped her cap seemed to float around her head like cotton candy. “After what we saw in the tomb—Bobby and the others, after you described what we’re facing tomorrow—”
“Lavinia, please—”
“I can’t fall into line like a good soldier. Me locking shields and marching off to die with everybody else? That’s not going to help anybody.”
“But—”
“It’s best you don’t ask.” Her growl was almost as intimidating as Peaches’s. “And it’s definitely best that you not say anything to anybody about tonight. Now, c’mon.”
The rest of the way back, she ignored my questions. She seemed to have a dark bubble-gum-scented cloud hanging over her head. She got me safely past the sentries, under the wall, and back to the coffee shop before she slipped away into the dark without even a good-bye.
Perhaps I should have stopped her. Raised the alarm. Gotten her arrested. But what good would that have done? It seemed to me Lavinia had never been comfortable in the legion. After all, she spent much of her time looking for secret exits and hidden trails out of the valley. Now she’d finally snapped.
I had a sinking feeling that I would never see her again. She’d be on the next bus to Portland with a few dozen fauns, and as much as I wanted to be angry about that, I could only feel sad. In her place, would I have done any differently?
When I got back to our guest room, Meg was passed out, snoring, her glasses dangling from her fingers, bedsheets wadded around her feet. I tucked her in as best I could. If she was having any bad dreams about her peach spirit friend plotting with the local dryads only a few miles away, I couldn’t tell. Tomorrow I’d have to decide what to say to her. Tonight, I’d let her sleep.
I crawled into my own cot, sure that I’d be tossing and turning until morning.
Instead, I passed out immediately.
When I woke, the early morning sunlight was in my face. Meg’s cot was empty. I realized I’d slept like the dead—no dreams, no visions. That did not comfort me. When the nightmares go silent, that usually means something else is coming—something even worse.
I dressed and gathered my supplies, trying not to think about how tired I was, or how much my gut hurt. Then I grabbed a muffin and a coffee from Bombilo and went out to find my friends. Today, one way or another, the fate of New Rome would be decided.
In my pickup truck
With my dogs and my weapons
And this fool, Lester
REYNA AND MEG WERE waiting for me at the camp’s front gates, though I barely recognized the former. In place of her praetor’s regalia, she wore blue running shoes and skinny jeans, a long-sleeved copper tee, and a maroon sweater wrap. With her hair pulled back in a braided whip and her face lightly brushed with makeup, she could’ve passed for one of the many thousands of Bay Area college students that nobody would think twice about. I supposed that was the point.
“What?” she asked me.
I realized I’d been staring. “Nothing.”
Meg snorted. She was dressed in her usual green dress, yellow leggings, and red high-tops, so she could blend in with the many thousands of Bay Area first graders—except for her twelve-year-old’s height, her gardening belt, and the pink button pinned to her collar that displayed a stylized unicorn’s head with crossed bones underneath. I wondered if she’d bought it in a New Rome gift shop or somehow gotten it specially made. Either possibility was unsettling.
Reyna spread her hands. “I do have civilian clothes, Apollo. Even with the Mist helping to obscure things, walking through San Francisco in full legionnaire armor can attract some funny looks.”
“No. Yeah. You look great. I mean good.” Why were my palms