Meg abruptly joined in, singing nonsense lyrics in a terrible monotone. “Hey, how about that nature? We love those plants. Come on down, you dryads, and, uh, grow and…kill this sorceress and stuff.”

Herophile, who had once had such a lovely voice, who had been born singing prophecies, looked at Meg in dismay. With saintlike restraint, she did not punch Meg in the face.

Medea sighed. “Okay, that’s it. Meg, I’m sorry. But I’m sure Nero will forgive me for killing you when I explain how badly you sang. Flutter, Decibel—silence them.”

Behind the sorceress, Crest gurgled in alarm. He fumbled with his ukulele, despite his bound hands and two crushed fingers.

Meanwhile, Flutter and Decibel grinned with delight. “Now we shall have revenge! DIE! DIE!”

They unfurled their ears, raised their swords, and leaped toward the platform.

Could Meg have defeated them with her trusty scimitars?

I don’t know. Instead, she made a move almost as surprising as her sudden urge to sing. Maybe, looking at poor Crest, she decided that enough pandos blood had been shed. Maybe she was still thinking about her misdirected anger, and whom she should really spend her energy hating. Whatever the case, her scimitars flicked into ring form. She grabbed a packet from her belt and ripped it open—spraying seeds in the path of the oncoming pandai.

Flutter and Decibel veered and screamed as the plants erupted, covering them in fuzzy green nebulae of ragweed. Flutter smacked into the nearest wall and began sneezing violently, the ragweed rooting him in place like a fly on flypaper. Decibel crash-landed on the platform at Meg’s feet, the ragweed growing over him until he looked more like a bush than a pandos—a bush that sneezed a lot.

Medea face-palmed. “You know…I told Caligula that dragon’s teeth warriors make much better guards. But noooo. He insisted on hiring pandai.” She shook her head in disgust. “Sorry, boys. You had your chance.”

She snapped her fingers again. A ventus swirled to life, pulling a cyclone of cinders from the ichor lake. The spirit shot toward Flutter, ripped the screaming pandos from the wall, and dumped him unceremoniously into the fire. Then it swept across the platform, grazing my friends’ feet, and pushed Decibel, still sneezing and crying, off the side.

“Now, then,” Medea said, “if I can encourage the rest of you to BE QUIET…”

The ventus charged, encircling Meg and Grover, lifting them off the platform.

I cried out, thrashing in my chains, sure that Medea would hurl my friends into the fire, but they merely hung there suspended. Grover was still playing his pipes, though no sound came through the wind; Meg was scowling and shouting, probably something like THIS AGAIN? ARE YOU KIDDING ME?

Herophile was not caught in the ventus. I supposed Medea considered her no threat. She stepped to my side, her fists still clenched. I was grateful for that, but I didn’t see what one boxing Sibyl could do against the power of Medea.

“Okay!” Medea said, a glint of triumph in her eyes. “I’ll start again. Doing this chant while controlling a ventus is not easy work, though, so please, behave. Otherwise I might lose my concentration and dump Meg and Grover into the ichor. And, really, we have too many impurities in there already, what with the pandai and the ragweed. Now, where were we? Oh, yes! Flaying your mortal form!”

“RESIST!” Herophile knelt at my side. “Apollo, you must resist!”

I could not speak through the pain. Otherwise I would have told her Resist. Gosh, thanks for that profound wisdom! You must be an Oracle or something!

At least she did not ask me to spell out the word RESIST on stone tiles.

Sweat poured down my face. My body sizzled, and not in the good way that it used to when I was a god.

The sorceress continued her chant. I knew she must be straining her power, but this time I didn’t see how I could take advantage of it. I was chained. I couldn’t pull the arrow-in-the-chest trick, and even if I did, I suspected Medea was far enough along with her magic that she could just let me die. My essence would trickle into the pool of ichor.

I couldn’t pipe like Grover. I couldn’t rely on ragweed like Meg. I didn’t have the sheer power of Jason Grace to break through the ventus cage and save my friends.

Resist….But with what?

My consciousness began to waver. I tried to hold on to the day of my birth (yes, I could remember that far back), when I jumped from my mother’s womb and began to sing and dance, filling the world with my glorious voice. I remembered my first trip into the chasm of Delphi, grappling with my enemy Python, feeling his coils around my immortal body.

Other memories were more treacherous. I remembered riding the sun chariot through the sky, but I was not myself…I was Helios, Titan of the sun, lashing my fiery whip across the backs of my steeds. I saw myself painted golden, with a crown of rays on my brow, moving through a crowd of adoring mortal worshippers—but I was Emperor Caligula, the New Sun.

Who was I?

I tried to picture my mother Leto’s face. I could not. My father, Zeus, with his terrifying glower, was only a hazy impression. My sister—surely, I could never forget my twin! But even her features floated indistinctly in my mind. She had silvery eyes. She smelled of honeysuckle. What else? I panicked. I couldn’t remember her name. I couldn’t remember my own name.

I splayed my fingers on the stone floor. They smoked and crumbled like twigs in a fire. My body seemed to pixelate, the way the pandai had when they disintegrated.

Herophile spoke in my ear, “Hold on! Help will arrive!”

I didn’t see how she could know that, even if she was an Oracle. Who would come to my rescue? Who could?

“You have taken my place,” she said. “Use that!”

I moaned in rage and frustration. Why was she talking nonsense? Why couldn’t she go back to speaking in riddles? How was I supposed to use being in her place, in her chains? I wasn’t an Oracle. I wasn’t even a god anymore. I was…Lester? Oh, perfect. That name I could remember.

I gazed across the rows and columns of stone blocks, now all blank, as if waiting for a new challenge. The prophecy wasn’t complete. Maybe if I could find a way to finish it…would it make a difference?

It had to. Jason had given his life so I could make it this far. My friends had risked everything. I could not simply give up. To free the Oracle, to free Helios from this Burning Maze…I had to finish what we’d started.

Medea’s chant droned on, aligning itself to my pulse, taking charge of my mind. I needed to override it, to disrupt it the way Grover had done with his music.

You have taken my place, Herophile had said.

I was Apollo, the god of prophecy. It was time for me to be my own Oracle.

I forced myself to concentrate on the stone blocks. Veins popped along my forehead like firecrackers under my skin. I stammered out, “B-bronze upon gold.”

The stone tiles shifted, forming a row of three tiles in the far upper left corner of the room, one word per square: BRONZE UPON GOLD.

“Yes!” the Sibyl said. “Yes, exactly! Keep going!”

The effort was horrible. The chains burned, dragging me down. I whimpered in agony, “East meets west.”

A second row of three tiles moved into position under the first, blazing with the words I’d just spoken.