PARTY PONIES—groups of centaurs that are wild and drink root beer; known for attaching boxing gloves to the tips of their arrows and using paintball guns with Celestial bronze dust mixed into the paint

PEGASUS (PEGASI, pl.)—a winged divine horse, sired by Poseidon, in his role as horse-god

PEPLOS—an outer robe or shawl worn by women in ancient Greece, hanging in loose folds and sometimes drawn over the head

PERSEUS—a Greek hero; one of his many feats of bravery was rescuing Andromeda from the sea monster Cetus

POSEIDON—the Greek god of the sea and of horses; son of the Titans Kronos and Rhea, and brother of Zeus and Hades

PYTHON—a monstrous serpent that Gaea appointed to guard the Oracle at Delphi

RIVER STYX—the river that forms the boundary between earth and the Underworld

SATYR—a Greek forest god, part goat and part man

SHADOW-TRAVEL—a form of transportation that allows creatures of the Underworld and children of Hades to use shadows to leap to any desired place on earth or in the Underworld, although it makes the user extremely fatigued

STROPHION—a garment worn by females in ancient Greece; a soft band placed underneath the breasts to give them support

TARTARUS—lowest part of the Underworld

TITAN WAR—the epic ten-year battle between the Titans and the Olympians that resulted in the Olympians taking the throne

TITANS—a race of powerful Greek deities, descendants of Gaea and Ouranos, that ruled during the Golden Age and were overthrown by a race of younger gods, the Olympians

TROJAN—of Troy

TROJAN WAR—According to legend, the Trojan War was waged against the city of Troy by the Achaeans (Greeks) after Paris of Troy took Helen from her husband, Menelaus, king of Sparta

TROY—a city situated in modern-day Turkey; site of the Trojan War

TYCHE—the Greek goddess of good fortune; daughter of Hermes and Aphrodite

UNDERWORLD—the kingdom of the dead, where souls go for eternity; ruled by Hades

URSA MAJOR—the Great Bear, the constellation form of Callisto, whom Hera turned into a bear in a fit of jealousy and Zeus made eternal by making her a cluster of stars

URSA MINOR—the Little Bear, the constellation form of Arcas, Zeus’s son with Callisto

ZEUS—the Greek god of the sky and the king of the gods

Endnotes

The Magical Border

* Some restrictions apply. With invading armies and giant, hostile animated statues, results may vary.

Thalia’s Pine and the Golden Fleece*

* Approach at your own risk. Peleus the guardian dragon only appears to be sleeping.

The Athena Parthenos

* chryselephantine: sculpted of gold and ivory

Also by Rick Riordan

PERCY JACKSON AND THE OLYMPIANS

Book One: The Lightning Thief

Book Two: The Sea of Monsters

Book Three: The Titan’s Curse

Book Four: The Battle of the Labyrinth

Book Five: The Last Olympian

The Demigod Files

The Lightning Thief: The Graphic Novel

The Sea of Monsters: The Graphic Novel

The Titan’s Curse: The Graphic Novel

Percy Jackson’s Greek Gods

Percy Jackson’s Greek Heroes

THE KANE CHRONICLES

Book One: The Red Pyramid

Book Two: The Throne of Fire

Book Three: The Serpent’s Shadow

The Red Pyramid: The Graphic Novel

The Throne of Fire: The Graphic Novel

THE HEROES OF OLYMPUS

Book One: The Lost Hero

Book Two: The Son of Neptune

Book Three: The Mark of Athena

Book Four: The House of Hades

Book Five: The Blood of Olympus

The Demigod Diaries

The Lost Hero: The Graphic Novel

The Son of Neptune: The Graphic Novel

MAGNUS CHASE AND THE GODS OF ASGARD

Book One: The Sword of Summer

Book Two: The Hammer of Thor

For Magnus Chase:

Hotel Valhalla Guide to the Norse Worlds

THE TRIALS OF APOLLO

Book One: The Hidden Oracle

Book Two: The Dark Prophecy

CRAVING MORE APOLLO?

(And honestly, who wouldn’t?)

Fall into

THE DARK PROPHECY,

BOOK TWO

in Rick Riordan’s Trials of Apollo Series.

Here’s a preview….

WHEN OUR DRAGON declared war on Indiana, I knew it was going to be a bad day.

We’d been traveling west for six weeks, and Festus had never shown such hostility toward a state. New Jersey he ignored. Pennsylvania he seemed to enjoy, despite our battle with the Cyclopes of Pittsburgh. Ohio he tolerated, even after our encounter with Potina, the Roman goddess of childhood drinks, who pursued us in the form of a giant red pitcher emblazoned with a smiley face.

Yet for some reason, Festus decided he did not like Indiana. He landed on the cupola of the Indiana Statehouse, flapped his metallic wings, and blew a cone of fire that incinerated the state flag right off the flagpole.

“Whoa, buddy!” Leo Valdez pulled the dragon’s reins. “We’ve talked about this. No blowtorching public monuments!”

Behind him on the dragon’s spine, Calypso gripped Festus’s scales for balance. “Could we please get to the ground? Gently this time?”

For a formerly immortal sorceress who once controlled air spirits, Calypso was not a fan of flying. Cold wind blew her chestnut hair into my face, making me blink and spit.

That’s right, dear reader.

I, the most important passenger, the youth who had once been the glorious god Apollo, was forced to sit in the back of the dragon. Oh, the indignities I had suffered since Zeus stripped me of my divine powers! It wasn’t enough that I was now a sixteen-year-old mortal with the ghastly alias Lester Papadopoulos. It wasn’t enough that I had to toil upon the earth doing (ugh) heroic quests until I could find a way back into my father’s good graces, or that I had a case of acne which simply would not respond to over-the-counter zit medicine. Despite my New York State junior driver’s license, Leo Valdez didn’t trust me to operate his aerial bronze steed!

Festus’s claws scrabbled for a hold on the green copper dome, which was much too small for a dragon his size. I had a flashback to the time I installed a life-size statue of the muse Calliope on my sun chariot and the extra weight of the hood ornament made me nosedive into China and create the Gobi Desert.

Leo glanced back, his face streaked with soot. “Apollo, you sense anything?”

“Why is it my job to sense things? Just because I used to be a god of prophecy—”

“You’re the one who’s been having visions,” Calypso reminded me. “You said your friend Meg would be here.”

Just hearing Meg’s name gave me a twinge of pain. “That doesn’t mean I can pinpoint her location with my mind! Zeus has revoked my access to GPS!”

“GPS?” Calypso asked.

“Godly positioning systems.”

“That’s not a real thing!”

“Guys, cool it.” Leo patted the dragon’s neck. “Apollo, just try, will you? Does this look like the city you dreamed about or not?”

I scanned the horizon.