The Curse of the King. Peter Lerangis

decided to talk first.

      “January, August, April, July,” I said. “Those are the months Aly, Marco, Cass, and I turn fourteen. I know what you’re going to say, Dad. MGL is hard at work on a cure. But—”

      “We had a setback at McKinley Genetics Lab,” Dad said. “Our team was developing a shutoff mechanism. But it doesn’t work. The gene mutates, Jack. When you attach anything to its receptors, they change shape. It’s like a beast that grows a new heart after you kill it.”

      “That so totally sucks,” Cass said.

      “What does it mean?” I asked.

      Dad sighed. “It means we’ll need six months of new research, maybe a year …”

      I felt the blood drain from my face. “We don’t have that time.”

      Aly’s mom ran her fingers through her daughter’s hair. “No, you don’t.”

      Dad nodded. “We’re going back to the hotel. How long will it take you to be ready, Aly?”

      “Five minutes!” Aly shot back. “Maybe four.”

      Dad turned toward the door and said the words I hadn’t expected to hear. “Wheels up in one hour. Wherever you guys want to go.”

      

      LEAVING THE LOCULI at home was out of the question. Dad and I were both paranoid the Massa—or some snoop hired by Morty Reese—would break in and steal them. So we took them with us on Dad’s jet. For protection. We also packed flashlights and supplies in our packs and made sure our phones were charged.

      The ride was bumpy. We argued for six hours about how to proceed. Aly was still thin and quiet from being sick. But by the time we reached the Kalamata International Airport, we had a plan. Cass, Aly, and I would grab a taxi. Alone. Bringing Dad with us, we decided, would make the Massa suspicious. Plus, it would do us no good if he wound up captured along with us.

      So Dad and the Loculi stayed behind with the plane.

      I was a nervous wreck. The taxi had no air-conditioning and there was a hole in the front passenger floor. Rocks spat up into the car from the road as we sped noisily across Greece. Soon the mountains of the Peloponnese rose up in the distance to our right, and Cass had a revelation. “Whoa,” he cried out, looking up from his phone. “The meaning of Routhouni is ‘nostril’!”

      “Is geography!” our driver said. (Everything he said seemed to come with an exclamation point.) “Just north of Routhouni is long mountain with—how do you say? Ridge! To Ancient Greeks, this looks like straight nose! Greek nose! Strong! At bottom is two valleys—round valleys! Is like, you know … thio Routhounia … two nostrils!”

      “And thus,” Cass announced, “Routhouni picked its name.”

      “Cass, please …” Aly said.

      Cass began narrating like a TV host. “Our car develops a moist coating as it enters the rim of the Routhouni. It is said that the people here are a bit snotty, tough around the edges but soft at the core.”

      “Ha! Is funny boy!” the driver exclaimed.

      Cass gestured grandly out the window. “Exotic giant black hairs, waving upward from the ground and dotted with festive greenish globs, greet visiting tourists as they plunge upward into the—”

      “Ew, Cass—just ew!” Aly said. “Can we leave him by the side of the road?”

      On the outskirts of town, goats roamed in vast, sparse fields. Old men in ragged coats stared at us, their backs bent and their hands clinging to gnarled wooden canes. Black-clad old ladies sat knitting in front of rickety shacks, and a donkey ignored our driver’s horn, just staring at us in the middle of the street. I felt strangely paranoid. I clutched the backpack tightly.

      As we drove slowly through a flock of squawking chickens, I read the English section of a big, multilingual road sign:

      YOU ARE APROCHING ROUTHOUNI

      THE PRID OF THE PELOPONNESE!!!

      “Prid?” Cass said.

      “I think they mean ‘pride,’” Aly answered.

      Where on earth were we?

      “Maybe we should have brought Dad along,” I said. “This is pretty remote.”

      “We want the Massa to think we’re alone,” Aly said. “That was the plan. If we need to, we can call him.”

      I nodded. Dad had promised to hire a chopper if necessary, if anything were to go wrong. Which seemed weird, considering that “going right” meant being captured.

      I tried to imagine Brother Dimitrios and his gang actually traveling to this place. I couldn’t imagine anyone in his right mind traveling here.

      We rounded a bend, following a narrow alley lined with whitewashed buildings. The car began swerving around potholes, bouncing like crazy. “Who paved this road,” Aly grumbled, “Plato?”

      “Is funny girl!” the driver barked.

      He slowed to ten kilometers an hour as we crept toward the town center. I knew we were getting close by the sound of Greek music and the smell of fried food. Soon the dark, tiny street opened up into a big cobblestoned circular plaza surrounded by storefronts. We paid the driver and got out. I don’t know what they were cooking, but I had to swallow back a mouthful of drool.

      Did I say I was starving?

      I was starving. I hadn’t eaten in five hours.

      Most of the shops were shuttering for the evening, but the cafés and restaurants were jumping. People strolled across the plaza, slowly and aimlessly, arm in arm. Kids chased each other and played catch. In the restaurants, stray cats wove around people’s legs, looking for scraps, while entertainers in flowing costumes sang and played tambourines, guitars, and strange instruments that sounded like oboes. Old men sat silently outside the cafés at backgammon tables, sipping coffee and amber-colored drinks. An outdoor bar called America!! had two huge flat-screen TVs, one blaring a soccer game in Greek and the other an old rerun of Everybody Loves Raymond in English.

      In the center was Zeus.

      Or something Zeus-ish.

      The statue glowered over the surroundings like a creepy, unwanted party guest. No one seemed to be paying it much notice. Its face and shoulders were peeling and pockmarked, like it had a skin disease. Its eyes were pointed in the direction of a flat-screen TV. Over time the eyeballs had eroded, so it looked like a grown-up Child of the Corn. In its raised hand was a big soccer ball–like thing, but I could barely see it under a dense crowd of birds.

      “Behold, the Loculus of Pigeon Droppings,” Cass mumbled, as we slowly walked around the plaza. “Held aloft by Zeus, God of Couch Potatoes, now approaching his record two millionth consecutive hour of TV viewing.”

      “Can’t you be serious for once?” Aly hissed.

      I could feel the curious eyes of the café-dwelling old men. One of the musicians moved toward us through the crowd—a girl about our age, maybe a little older. The hem of her skirt was raggedy, but the fabric was a rich patchwork of reds, purples, and blues, spangled with bright baubles. Her ankles and wrists jangled with bracelets. As she caught my eye, she smiled and then said, “Deutsch? Svenska? Eenglees?”

      “Uh, English,” I said. “American. No money. Sorry.”

      One of the café waiters came running toward us, shouting at the beggar girl to chase her away. As she ran off, he gestured toward the café. “Come! Eat! Fish! Music! I give you good price!”