Poseidon and the Sea of Fury (Volume 2) - Couverture souple

CHAPTER ONE

Under Attack!

A SPEAR WHIZZED BY TEN-YEAR-OLD Zeus’s ear. He ducked his head but didn’t stop running. Neither did his two companions, Hera and Poseidon. They were right behind him.

“Halt in your tracks or you’re dead meat, Snackboy!” a cruel voice boomed.

He’d know that voice anywhere. It was Lion Tattoo. That was what Zeus had nicknamed him, anyway. He was the leader of the three half-giants who were after Zeus. They were soldiers in King Cronus’s army and stood as tall as trees.

Just three days before, they’d snatched Zeus from his cave in Crete and brought him here to Greece. He’d already escaped them—twice. But he might not be so lucky a third time.

“When we catch you, we will eat you!” hollered a second voice. Blackbeard’s. Another of the half-giants.

Then the third one—Zeus had dubbed him Double Chin—added his two cents. “Yeah! And we’ll chomp your friends for dessert! Ha-ha-ha!” He followed this up with a loud burp.

A shiver ran down Zeus’s spine. They were probably bluffing, though. Their orders were more likely to take him, Hera, and Poseidon back to King Cronus. So that the king could swallow them whole!

They approached a ditch. Zeus jumped in and hunkered down, waiting for Hera and Poseidon to catch up. Within seconds Hera dropped in to crouch beside him.

“We’ll never reach the sea at this rate. Somebody else is going to find that trident thingie before we do. Do something, Thunderboy!” she hissed.

Zeus liked the nickname she’d given him. But she sure did know how to make it sound like an insult sometimes.

“Don’t be so impatient. We’ll get there,” he told her. “We’re on a quest, remember? You can’t expect it to be fast or easy.”

An oracle named Pythia had sent them on this quest to search for a magical trident. Which was going to be a challenge, since none of them knew what a trident was. But they did know their destination—the sea.

Joan Holub has authored and/or illustrated over 140 children’s books, including the Goddess Girls series, the Heroes in Training series, the New York Times bestselling picture book Mighty Dads (illustrated by James Dean), and Little Red Writing (illustrated by Melissa Sweet). She lives in North Carolina and is online at JoanHolub.com.

Suzanne Williams is a former elementary school librarian and the author of over seventy books for children, including the award-winning picture books Library Lil (illustrated by Steven Kellogg) and My Dog Never Says Please (illustrated by Tedd Arnold), and several chapter book and middle grade series. She also coauthors the Goddess Girls and Thunder Girls series with the fantastic Joan Holub. Visit her at Suzanne-Williams.com.

Craig Phillips has been creating cover art and drawings for books, comics, and magazines for nearly two decades. He is most at home working on tales about myth and magic. His latest book—Giants, Trolls, Witches, Beasts: Ten Tales from the Deep, Dark Woods—is a 200-page graphic novel about just that! It will be in stores in May 2017. When he is not drawing and writing, he likes to swim in the lakes and walk in the forests and mountains of New Zealand. Visit him at CraigPhillips.com.au.