As we ran I thought about just how I was supposed to fight this Rio guy.
My nightmare got at least one thing right. Riptide, the sword that refused to leave my side, had been missing since the Olympus fight. I hadn't tested my water powers yet, and unfortunately, I didn't see this being a chance to start. There wasn't a creek, river, or pond anywhere within a thousand meters.
I had always been an improvisational kind of guy, though, and most of the time it all worked out. Besides, I meant what I said to Mikey. I owed Calypso. If I could pay that back by sending this guy packing, I'd find a way to make it happen. It really was that simple.
Refugees started passing us running the opposite direction. While we went toward the trouble, they were running away. I recognized a few of them. They were the checked-out, visibly defeated ones that typically lazed around like corpses.
I wondered if it was Rio specifically that was getting this reaction out of them, or if any god or monster would've put them in the same state. Even a weak Dracaena could feel deadly to a regular person.
Up ahead, I could see other people congregating and forming ranks. That must be where Rio had appeared. We weren't far off now— in thirty seconds we'd reach the crowd.
Without any warning, my body stopped.
Mikey froze next to me. It wasn't like we were scared. Instead, our joints had turned stiff, and no amount of effort could make a single muscle move. I couldn't even shout out in surprise.
It had to be magic. It had the same scent as the weird spells Circe worked on me after we washed up on her island. Thankfully, this one wasn't making me shrink and go fur. That was a positive, but I wasn't really in the mood to look for more. There was no feeling I hated more than powerlessness.
Especially now. After what had happened…
I was just about to slam my will against the spell, trying to break through it, when I caught sight of something.
Calypso had appeared between us and where Rio must've been. Her stylish Greek dress flapped and fluttered in an imaginary wind. She looked at Mikey and I with glowing gold eyes, small swirling clouds coalescing around each of her hands. Slowly, the clouds dispersed. Her eyes faded to their usual gold.
'Stay,' she mouthed at us. Her eyes turned pleading. 'Please!'
She spun, dress whipping out behind her. And she pushed through the swell of bodies out of sight.
-
Mikey was grinding his teeth.
I mean, I couldn't hear it. And I could only see him from the corner of my eye. But I could just tell.
Nobody paid us any attention. More people fled, running past. They instinctively avoided the spot where we were frozen. Not one gave us so much as a glance.
There were two spells on us, I decided. One was something like invisibility. The other was what had us doing our best statue impressions. Because the spells did different things, they each had slightly different scents. Two separate flavors.
With all the time for thinking, my mind raced over the question of why Calypso had done this. It wasn't like her. I hadn't known her for that long, but I still felt like I understood her pretty well. For her to trap us like this… The only explanation was that she was scared.
Scared of Rio? My guess was yes, but not for herself. She was scared of a fight with him. Scared of what she might lose.
Scared for us, then? That seemed likely. She'd only just gotten me back. I could see what that meant to her; it was impossible not to. She was worried Mikey and I would get in over our heads, and maybe never make it out.
Yet, I couldn't shake the feeling that what she was really scared of was something else. Something much scarier. I didn't know who this Rio was… but I could kind of sense him in a way I didn't fully understand. It was the same aura given off by the Olympians or even minor gods, only weaker. Much weaker. When serious, Calypso herself gave that same feeling a hundred times stronger.
If she wasn't scared of Rio himself, there was something else she feared. I had to find out what that thing was. For that, I needed to see what was happening on the other side of the sea of bodies.
My attention returned to the spells wrapped around my body. I frowned. Calypso desperately wanted us to stay hidden. I didn't want to ruin that for her. And maybe it was crazy, but I didn't think I had to.
Those two scents, the two distinct flavors— I began wrenching them apart. Separating the two was like opening a bag of chips by pulling on the sides… if that bag was made out of kevlar and shut with superglue. Yet, I was making progress.
I wasn't actually moving. I still couldn't. But very slowly, I felt the spells separating, just like I wanted. In minutes, the invisibility spell was collected in my left hand while the immobility one was collected in my right. I took a deep breath, giggling in my head over the fact that this was working at all.
Then I crushed my right hand into a fist.
This time, I really did move. I put all of my willpower that once held up the sky into making my fingers move, squashing the spell into motes of magic. Control of my body snapped back in an instant.
I was sprinting the moment I could. Mikey would be fine, and if I understood that kid at all this was exactly what he'd want me to do. He would put up with way more discomfort than this if it meant getting rid of Rio.
Although, I wasn't going to fight. This time, unless things got really ugly, I needed to watch no matter what.
To find out what it was. What Calypso was scared of.
The crowd was probably pretty freaked out by someone they couldn't see shoving through them, but to be honest they were pretty close to maximum freakout levels long before I got there. There were less onlookers than earlier. More must have fled. Then I was through them, stumbling out the other side to stare at a scene that made my blood run hot.
It wasn't just Calypso that I recognized. Aubrey, the beautiful emotionless kitchen hand, was on the ground. Her fingers were digging into the turf and her eyes were fixed straight down. She was trembling. Grace was there, rubbing soothing circles onto her back. Annie stood there glaring at something, just behind Calypso herself. I followed Annie's eyes… and that's where I found Rio.
He stood out. That's the most positive thing I can say about him. Standing well over six-foot, he wore tall boots with spurs on them and tight leather pants. Two holstered revolvers hung off of his belt, and a third was strapped to his vest. A wide-brimmed cowboy hat sat on his head, casting shade over a mean-looking face framed by twin sideburns. His black hair looked oily, and his brown eyes were beady. When I caught the way they looked at Calypso, I nearly forgot my whole plan and charged him right there.
Holding myself back with a steadying breath, I finished studying the scene.
Rio wasn't alone. Arrayed behind him were a half-dozen Laistrygonians, a handful of smaller Telkhines, and right in the center was the main event: a drakon.
I didn't think it was a named one. It clearly wasn't full grown, despite its two heads and shiny green scales. Periodically, one of the heads would snarl at the mortals behind me. Every time, the mortals scrambled further back.
Rio was talking.
"...being reasonable here, Cally. After how long you've been leading me on, don't you think it's only right to loan me one of ya pets? A man has got needs."
He thrust his hips against the air, his holstered pistols rattling against his oversized belt buckle. It didn't take me two guesses to understand who he meant by pets. The lecherous looks he was shooting Aubrey didn't leave much room for doubt.
"I will not negotiate on matters like this," Calypso said coolly. "Leave. Now."
Rio shook his head. "Don't be like that. I'll even give you one of mine in return. How about Junior here?" He gestured behind him at the largest of the Laistrygonians, a beast with a particularly vacant expression and a club in each hand. "Just imagine how fun it would be, watching the rest of your pets scramble away from him. But no matter how hard they try, or how much they run, he'd be faster. As soon as they let their guard down, he'd be there to snap them up, and in one bite—"
Aubrey let out a sob as Grace tried frantically to calm her down. Calypso took an extra step toward Rio.
"No more," she said. "No deal. I will never agree to your terms. Begone!"
Rather than back down, Rio stepped forward too. There was only ten feet between them now. His smirk had only grown.
"That's what I like about you, Princess," he said. "You aren't like those other nymphs. You don't bend over as soon as a god comes calling, and you've got just enough power to make you think I can't pin you down in the dirt right here and now. But ya can't fight the whole world. Sooner or later, the Masters are going to get sick of that rebellious streak you've got. Daddy's still trapped under the sky. Nobody else loves ya. You need protection. You need a man like me."
"Only under the basest definitions do you qualify as a man," Calypso snarled.
"Look at how mouthy you've gotten." Rio chuckled. "All this, just because your little sleeping boyfriend woke up?"
Calypso froze.
"What, did you think I didn't know?" Rio walked even closer. "I've chased you halfway across this beautiful country. Your spells aren't as foolproof as you think. I know you've been lugging around that useless defeated hero. I just didn't care, as long as he had the grace to keep sleeping like a corpse. But he's awake now. Isn't that right? And I'm sure turning him in would net me quite a grand reward from the Masters. But I'm nothin' if not gracious. If my wife wanted to keep an old pet as a wedding gift… I'm sure that could be arranged."
"You're trash," Calypso said.
"And you need me," Rio said. "Ain't the world a funny place?"
He knew about me. He knew who I was, and that I was awake. He thought that made good blackmail material, but not if I caught him from behind and—
I caught myself with my fingers halfway clenched to break the invisibility spell.
I was even more sure now that we were this close. Calypso's aura was more potent than Rio's. Why the god himself couldn't sense that I didn't know. He wasn't the real threat here, and I was starting to think I understood what was.
The Masters. He'd mentioned that name two separate times. They were clearly his bosses, but even more than that they were what he was using to threaten Calypso. Maybe Rio wasn't the problem. Maybe it was what would happen afterwards if she fought him off.
But there was only so much that speculation could get me. I had to talk things out with Calypso, to figure out my next step.
Suddenly, Rio turned away.
"I'll give you a week," he said. "That's plenty gracious, I'd say. After that I'll be wanting my answer. For your sake it'd best be the one I've waited this long to hear."
He walked back toward his monsters. Just as he reached the group, he stopped and looked over his shoulder.
"I'll even give ya a gift," he said with a nasty little smile. "Y'all can keep Junior for free. Just make sure to think of me when the game gets goin'."
Tumbleweeds like the ones that announced his arrival blew across the field in even greater numbers. Soon they collected so high and so thick that his entire monster contingent was obscured behind them. Just as the blockade was at its highest, something burst through with a roar.
It was Junior, the dual-wielding Laistrygonian. The crowd yelled and ran as he rushed straight for them. Mist collected around Calypso's hands. It wasn't necessary. I was already moving.
I sprinted straight into the giant's path. Junior was tall, even for his kind. The clubs in his hands were just trees with the branches stripped off, but that wouldn't make them any less dangerous. He raised both high in the air. If they came down on the crowd, dozens would die from a single swing.
As soon as he got close, I jumped. My feet kicked off of his knee. The momentum of his leg helped boost me high into the air. For a moment I was flying. Then I grabbed a big tuft of his ugly oily hair to stop myself in the right place.
His eyes widened in dumb confusion as something he couldn't see yanked his hair painfully. That wouldn't last long. Pulling back my left arm, I clenched the hand into a fist.
The invisibility spell worked over me snapped and faded. For the giant and the fleeing crowd, it must've looked like I appeared from thin air in front of his face. I brought my fist down against his skull with all the strength I had.
The tests I'd run with my body were fresh in my mind. I couldn't move as quickly or as easily as I had in my mortal body — not yet, anyway — but there was one thing I did have. When I punched a wall out of frustration, the cement broke before my hand did. Currently, my raw strength was beyond anything I'd ever known.
A crack louder than a gunshot filled the football field. Junior didn't even have time to grasp what was happening before his skull fractured and he was falling to the ground in a rain of dust. His clubs thudded down with heavy impacts, while I landed a moment later in a crouch.
For a moment the whole field was silent. When the tumbleweed wall dispersed, Rio and the rest of his goons were nowhere in sight. The mortals still seemed to be trying to figure out what just happened. Even Calypso hadn't had time to dismiss the Mist clouds swirling around her hands.
I looked at her and crossed my arms.
"I think the two of us need to have a talk," I said.
With a long, drawn out sigh, Calypso let her magic recede. And she offered me an awfully tired nod.