Summary: Annabeth Chase has finally gotten her chance to lead a quest, but the stakes have never been so high. With war on the horizon, she and her friends must navigate the Labyrinth to find its creator and convince him to help Camp Half-Blood. But the Labyrinth is more than just a physical maze—in its twist and turns, Annabeth must not only confront the Titan army's monsters, but her own fears, hopes, and scariest of all, her developing feelings for her best friend. An alternate PoV retelling of The Battle of the Labyrinth.

A/N: Wow, can you believe we've made it to book four already? I know some of you have been waiting for this one for a while, and I really hope it won't disappoint! HUGE thank you to my faithful readers, in particular strawberrygirl2000, CupcakeQueen816, and Hello for years (no seriously wow!) of cheerleading this series every single week. You guys are the best, and I would not have got this far with Annabeth's story without you. This one is really for you.

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Chapter 1: My Flight Skills Are Put To The Test

San Francisco looked like a Lego city.

From my vantage point of twenty-thousand feet in the air, the buildings were miniature blocks sprawling across the western edge of California. Even the Golden Gate Bridge was just a red smear across the bay, the cars trundling across it no bigger than my stepbrothers' toys. In my Sopwith Camel (well, technically it belonged to my dad), I had a 360-degree view of the Bay Area, from Napa all the way down to Palo Alto, with Alcatraz Island perched like a glowering orc in the middle of the bay. On the opposite side of the Golden Gate Bridge, Mount Tamalpais rose forbiddingly into the sky.

Okay, so there was one spot that remained out of my aerial viewpoint. Half of Mount Tam was shrouded in heavy fog, its peak disappearing into dark clouds. Even on a clear day, the residents of Marin County never got a break. Meteorologists had speculated on this strange phenomenon all year, suggesting everything from pressure systems to climate change as an explanation. But I knew the real reason behind the perpetual bad weather.

The storm clouds had been there since last winter, when the Titans had reclaimed the mountain as their home base, Mount Othrys. Their army general, the devious giant Atlas, was trapped under the sky at the tip of the mountain, but this was only a small setback for their leader, Kronos. The Titan lord, despite being a jumble of cut-up pieces in a golden coffin at the moment, had been working through my friend Luke for years. Once my dearest friend and only family, Luke had turned against our parents, the gods, and begun recruiting for Kronos, preparing for an all-out war on Olympus. It was almost certain that their opening volley would be on the Long Island training camp for demigods like me and my best friend, Percy. Our mentor, Chiron, was convinced the attack would come this summer. The only question was how.

But the last time I'd seen Luke …

I stared at the billowing columns of fog and cloud obscuring Mount Tam. I'd tried to scout it all semester, without success. Every time I got near, it would send me in the wrong direction, or the fog would thicken until I had no choice but to land. It was unlikely that I'd get any further today. Still, I banked my plane, turning around to face the mountain. In my mind, I pictured Luke standing on my doorstep, pleading …

It hadn't even been a week ago. Maybe he had left.

One last try. It would be my last chance to find out anything about the Titans. Tomorrow, I would return to camp, on the other side of the country. I wanted something concrete to report to Chiron and the other counsellors. And if Luke really had run away like he'd intended to …

I had to know.

Steeling myself for the turbulence ahead, I set a course for Mount Tam.

I'd flown up enough times this year so I knew what to expect. I was prepared for the swirling fog that surrounded me the moment I crossed the invisible line where the Mist kicked in, hiding all magical activity from mortal eyes. This time, it billowed up around me in columns of black cloud, like solid walls trapping me in a narrow passage. I turned up the Camel's spotlights as brightly as they would go. It was like flying through a dark, twisting tunnel—an aerial maze.

Ahead of me, the tunnel forked. I banked to the left. My spotlights illuminated something at the end of the passage: a rock face with a sharp drop-off.

I gripped my control yoke tightly. This was it. I was in.

It was definitely the cliff of Mount Tam. I'd been there last winter. As I got closer, I spotted three tiny figures on the cliff. Three people standing at the edge, who looked like …

My stomach swooped as though my plane had gone into a sudden dive.

One of the figures had dark, spiky hair. The air around her crackled like she was charged with electricity. She reached out and pushed one of her companions, a sandy-haired boy with a thin scar running diagonally over his right eye.

Luke. And the girl was our friend Thalia. But they couldn't possibly be here. Thalia was a Hunter now—the leader of the immortal band of teenage girls who served the goddess Artemis. And this scene had already played out last winter. I'd been there, watching Luke and Thalia fight on the mountain peak. I'd screamed when Luke had fallen …

There. I spotted myself, the last of the trio on the cliff. But it was all wrong. I looked about seven years old, the age I'd first met Thalia and Luke.

What was going on?

Luke toppled off the side of the cliff. The bottom was only about fifty feet down, but I couldn't see it. The entire base of the mountain was obscured by more black fog, so thick that it formed a churning ocean. Luke sank through it in slow motion.

'Luke!' It was the high, clear scream of a child. My voice.

Thalia flung out a rope. It flashed bright blue into the dark chasm where Luke was drowning. The free end looped around his shoulders, holding him fast. We tugged on the rope, heaving him up.

'Stay with us!' Thalia yelled. 'Hang on, Luke!'

Bit by bit, we reeled him back onto the clifftop. As I watched myself pull, I could almost feel the rope in my hands instead of my yoke. It chafed against my palms, but I didn't let go.

Then I was the one falling. My cockpit dissolved. I plummeted through darkness …

Strong arms caught me. I found myself clinging to Luke's neck, sobbing.

We were at the top of the mountain—no, wait, this was a hill. One that I knew like the back of my hand. The pine tree that had been Thalia for six years stretched towards the sky. Lightning crackled above it. Rain poured down on me and Luke. A hazy barrier rose like smoke from the ground.

Luke's arms were tight around me, almost as if he were clutching me as a lifeline instead of offering me one. 'It's okay, Annabeth. There's still me,' he murmured. 'I'm your family.'

I raised my tear-streaked face to him. 'You promise?'

'Promise,' he said. 'I'm your family always.'

Promise …

The word echoed in my ears. My skin tingled.

Luke let go. I tumbled away from him, free-falling through the air again. This time I landed hard in the seat of my cockpit. My nose was against the instrument panel, like I'd fainted mid-flight. I jerked my head up, trying to get my bearings.

The spotlights had gone out. It would have been pitch-black if not for my dagger, balancing on my consoles. I couldn't remember if I had placed it there, but I must have. Its Celestial bronze blade gave off a faint glow. By its light, I found my controls and switched on the spotlights just in time to see a thick, threatening wall rise up in front of me.

My plane smashed into it.

But it was only wind and cloud. It buffeted me from all directions, tossing my plane from side to side like a dog with a rag doll. I gritted my teeth and did my best to hold the Camel steady through the turbulence.

And then I was clear. The maze of clouds spat me out over the San Francisco Bay, in a nose dive towards its choppy waters. I pulled up frantically, before I ended up making an emergency water landing. That sort of thing might be no problem for my friend Percy, the son of Poseidon, but children of Athena didn't have special water-bending powers. Or any magic at all. I just had to rely on my wits.

It took a while to get the Camel under control. By the time I got back on a steady course, Mount Tam was a distant black smear against the horizon.

I headed back north, but only to land the plane at Crissy Field. The sun had come out on my side of the Golden Gate Bridge, but the thunderclouds continued to sit, undeterred, over the mountain. Arching across the bay, cutting over the bridge to divide Marin County and the city, was a brilliant rainbow. It made me wonder if the whole thing had been an IM—a message sent through the rainbow goddess Iris's communication network.

But I couldn't think who would have sent me a message like this. It wasn't like any IM I'd ever received. And the only people who kept in regular contact with me over the school year were Chiron and Percy. I'd only just IM-ed the former yesterday to arrange my return to camp. The latter … well, I meant to tell him I was on my way to Long Island, but it seemed easier to do that once I actually got to New York.

Anyway, this couldn't have come from Percy. He wouldn't send me a message about Luke. He hated Luke.

Besides, the whole thing felt more like a dream. Demigod dreams are often like mysterious, encrypted messages. Lately, mine had been even more so, full of Labyrinthine paths, doorways, and crossroads—not unlike the maze of clouds I'd just flown through.

I got on the bus for home, the afterimage of my vision still playing at the forefront of my mind. My palms felt raw from pulling on the rope securing Luke, although there were no visible blisters or callouses. A thin, blue string danced in the corners of my eyes, flashing a line that led away from the city. I could not say why, but I was certain it would lead me to Luke. Where he'd gone, I couldn't say either, but he wasn't with Kronos's monsters on Mount Tam.

This might have given me hope, except my cryptic vision must have been trying to tell me something about Luke as well. Which meant that despite what he'd said when I'd last seen him, he was still—

The bus jerked abruptly to a stop, sending my face smacking into the seat in front of me. The magical blue line vanished. Rubbing my nose, I looked out the window. What I saw made me groan.

Bursting out of the Target on Geary and Masonic was a herd of hippogriffs.

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A/N: HAPPY BIRTHDAY PERCY! Unfortunately he doesn't get an appearance yet, but he'll be showing up soon enough. Yes, I know this is a short chapter. Anyone can guess what the vision was all about, though? *wink* Anyway, you guys know the drill by now, I'm sure—chapter updates every Saturday.

As always, please do let me know what you think of the story! Especially if you've been following silently this far, do consider hitting that little review button to say a few words. It's been about 300K words on my part already … don't leave me hanging!