“You can understand me?” I ask and she nods again.
“Ask about her blocking the road,” Jayden whispers.
“Is there a reason you’re blocking the road?”
Again, she nods her head and I sigh. Please don’t let her be hostile.
“Can we get through, please? We need to get to Arcadia.” I crouch in front of her.
She shakes her head frantically and nudges me back with her head on my chest. I nearly topple backward with the force of it, but Jayden is there steadying me.
“Why not?” Jayden asks.
“She can’t talk, Jayden,” I say. “Can you?”
She shakes her head again and paces the middle of the road in frantic movements. This isn’t the actions of someone with malicious intent. It’s almost like she’s scared of something.
“Is there danger?” I ask her.
Chelone stops pacing and she nods frantically. She’s trying to protect us, not fight us. She doesn’t want people to get hurt.
“It’s okay, we’re demigods and stronger than most. We can handle it.” My attempt to reassure her falls on deaf ears as she shakes her head again.
“Chelone.” Jayden holds out his hands to her in surrender. “The world will end if we don’t get to Arcadia.”
She stops her pacing abruptly and stares at Jayden with horror.
“That’s right. Travelers have already been disappearing to different realms and the breakdown in communication between the humans is escalating into a nuclear war,” I say. “We need to get to the temple in Arcadia or all is lost.”
Indecision wars in her muddy brown eyes before she hangs her head and moves to the side of the road. Even as a tortoise, she understands that this is bad. She may not like the idea of letting us past her, but she gets it.
“Thank you,” Jayden says.
“Yes, thank you, my friend.” I bow my head to her.
She stalks off the side of the road and I breathe out a sigh of relief. We can finally get back on the road even if I had to do something I never thought I would do.
“I just reasoned with a giant tortoise in the middle of the highway. I didn’t have that on this mission’s bingo card.” I shake my head.
Jayden chuckles and wraps an arm around me as we head back to the SUV. “That was a new one for me too.”
Raven grins at me as we get back into the vehicle. “That was the weirdest thing I think I’ve seen. She was responding to your questions perfectly.”
“We need to stay vigilant. Something spooked her on the way to Arcadia.” Jayden glances in the rearview at everyone.
“Any ideas on what could have spooked her?” Greyson asks.
“Not a clue but that tracks since she’s a tortoise and can only communicate with yes or no answers.” I glance at him over my shoulder.
“Yeah, I guess that was a dumb question.” He rubs the back of his neck.
“It’s not like we haven’t unknowingly walked into danger before. This time we have a heads-up to expect something at least.” I shrug.
“Hermes didn’t face many monsters what else is there?” Raven asks.
“Probably more giants.” I frown. “I’m not looking forward to meeting any more of those bastards, but a lot that I know of Hermes has to do with giants, so this should be fun.”
“It’s better than the monsters we usually face,” Greyson says, then winces.
