“I…” Her voice broke. “I’ll see you in the morning. Sleep well.”
She ran off toward the beach. I was too confused to do anything but watch until she disappeared in the dark.
***
I don’t know exactly how much time passed. Like Calypso said, it was hard to keep track on the island. I knew I should be leaving. At the very least, my friends would be worried. At worst, they could be in serious danger. I didn’t even know if Annabeth had made it out of the volcano. I tried to use my empathy link with Grover several times, but I couldn’t make contact. I hated not knowing if they were all right.
On the other hand, I really was weak. I couldn’t stay on my feet more than a few hours. Whatever I’d done in Mount St. Helens had drained me like nothing else I’d ever expected.
I didn’t feel like a prisoner or anything. I remembered the Lotus Hotel and Casino in Vegas, where I’d been lured into this amazing game world until I almost forgot everything I cared about. But the island of Ogygia wasn’t like that at all. I thought about Annabeth, Grover, and Tyson constantly. I remembered exactly why I needed to leave. I just…couldn’t. and then there was Calypso herself.
She never talked much about herself, but that just made me want to know more. I would sit in the meadow, sipping nectar, and I would try to concentrate on the flowers or the clouds or the reflections on the lake, but I was really staring at Calypso as she worked, the way she brushed her hair over her shoulder, and the little strand that fell in her face whenever she knelt to dig in the garden. Sometimes she would hold out her hand and birds would fly out of the woods to settle on her arm—lorikeets, parrots, doves. She would tell them good morning, ask how it was going back at the nest, and they would chirp for a while, then fly off cheerfully. Calypso’s eyes gleamed. She would look at me and we’d share a smile, but almost immediately she’d get that sad expression again and turn away. I didn’t understand what was bothering her.
One night we were eating dinner together at the beach. Invisible servants had set up a table with beef stew and apple cider, which may not sound all that exciting, but that’s because you haven’t tasted it. I hadn’t even noticed the invisible servants when I first got to the island, but that’s because you haven’t tasted it. I hadn’t even noticed the invisible servants when I first got to the island, but after a while I became aware of the beds making themselves, meals cooking on their own, clothes being washed and folded by unseen hands.
Anyway, Calypso and I were sitting at dinner, and she looked beautiful in the candlelight. I was telling her about New York and Camp Half-Blood, and then I started telling her about the time Grover had eaten an apple while we were playing Hacky Sack with it. She laughed, showing off her amazing smile, and our eyes met. Then she dropped her gaze.
“There it is again,” I said.
“What?”
“You keep pulling away, like you’re trying not to enjoy yourself.”
She kept her eyes on her glass of cider. “As I told you, Percy, I have been punished. Cursed, you might say.”
“How? Tell me. I want to help.”
“Don’t say that. Please don’t say that.”
“Tell me what the punishment is.”
She covered her half-finished stew with a napkin, and immediately an invisible servant whisked the bowl away. “Percy, this island, Ogygia, is my home, my birthplace. But it is also my prison. I am under…house arrest, I guess you would call it. I will never visit this Manhattan of yours. Or anywhere else. I am alone here.”
“Because your father was Atlas.”
She nodded. “The gods do not trust their enemies. And rightly so. I should not complain. Some of the prisons are not nearly as nice as mine.”
“But that’s not fair,” I said. “Just because you’re related doesn’t mean you support him. This other daughter I knew, Zoë, Nightshade—she fought against him. She wasn’t imprisoned.”
“But, Percy,” Calypso said gently, “I did support him in the first war. He is my father.”
“What? But the Titans are evil!”
“Are they? All of them? All the time?” She pursed her lips. “Tell me, Percy. I have no wish to argue with you. but do you support the gods because they are good, or because they are your family?”
I didn’t answer. She had a point. Last winter, after Annabeth and I had saved Olympus, the gods had had a debate about whether or not they should kill me. That hadn’t been exactly good. But still, I felt like I supported them because Poseidon was my dad.
“Perhaps I was wrong in the war,” Calypso said. “And in fairness, the gods have treated me well. They visit me from time to time. They bring me word of the outside world. But they can leave. And I cannot.”
“You don’t have any friends?” I asked. “I mean…wouldn’t anyone else live here with you? it’s a nice place.”
A tear trickled down her cheek. “I…I promised myself I wouldn’t speak of this. But—”
She was interrupted by a rumbling sound somewhere out on the lake. A glow appeared on the horizon. It got brighter and brighter, until I could see a column of fire moving across the surface of the water, coming toward us.
I stood and reached for my sword. “What is that?”
Calypso sighed. “A visitor.”
As the column of fire reached the beach. Calypso stood and bowed to it formally. The flames dissipated, and standing before us was a tall man in gray overalls and a metal leg brace, his beard and hair smoldering with fire.