Poseidon narrowed his eyes until they were mere slits. “That is not how one begs for mercy.”

“You’re going to kill me no matter what. I might as well go out with a little dignity.”

“This from the naked woman,” Ernie said, breezing in behind Poseidon. “How you doing, Fish King?”

“Knock it off, Eros. I have a monster to kill.”

“Rich, coming from you with your kraken.” Ernie snorted. “Look, I don’t think you should be so ready to jump at killing her. You didn’t even like Theseus. He was your least favorite. I seem to recall you calling him a shithead more than once.”

“Eros, stop interrupting me. I know you are on her side.” Poseidon spun to point the trident at Ernie. “And besides, the fact that I didn’t like Theseus is not the point. If we just let the monsters do what they want without repercussions, we’re going to have a clusterfuck on our hands again. Do you not recall the Titans?”

“She’s hardly a Titan,” Ernie pointed out. “Even if she is a big-ass snake.”

“My bum isn’t all that big, to be fair,” I added.

Ernie nodded. “Point taken, her bum is only big when she’s a snake.”

“Do I even have a bum when I’m a snake?”

“Ha, good point. Just a big tail, then? A big-ass tail? Ass tail. That’s funny.” Ernie laughed at his own joke.

Poseidon rolled his eyes, and the kraken slid a tentacle down around my middle and squeezed me hard enough that I couldn’t breathe, couldn’t suck even a single gasp in. I did the only thing I could. I let my fangs drop and bit into the tentacle holding me. I didn’t draw back but instead let the venom pump into the creature.

Slowly it eased off and then dropped me onto the deck. I hit with a hard thump, spinning to watch as the kraken slid away from sight, under the water, with barely a burp of air.

“Damn it, Drakaina!” Poseidon strode to the edge of the deck. “Do you know how much Hades is going to love holding that over me? It’s going to cost me to get my pet back.”

I slid back on the deck to the railing edge. My fangs throbbed, ached like they were empty. I reached up and touched one; not a single drop of venom fell. I guess it made sense that I could run out of venom, but it did not bode well, seeing as I hadn’t even gotten to the underworld yet.

The king of the ocean spun around, his trident pointed at me once more. The CB radio crackled to life behind him, and he reached for it with one hand. “Kraken One here.”

A voice came through, distorted and scratchy with the airwaves. “We need you back at port. We’ve got a ship coming in we suspect of smuggling infected people to the city.”

Poseidon let out a sigh and scratched at his head with the hand holding the radio before he let out another sigh. “I’ll be back ASAP.”

He hung it back up. “Guess that means I need to kill you in a hurry instead of drawing it out and feeding you to the fishes piece by piece.”

I scrambled backward. “You don’t understand, Hera is going to take Olympus, Hades is behind the Aegrus virus, I think he has Zeus trapped, the Hydra is out of control, and people are dying, and I’m trying to help! Zeus needs you to side with him. Please.”

The trident paused at my chest, and I didn’t dare breathe.

“Please. I’m doing the best I can.”

He rolled his eyes and pulled the trident back, his eyes thoughtful. “You’re going to make Hera look like a fool.”

I grimaced. “I’m not trying to.”

The king of the ocean gave me a gruff laugh. “Oh no, I want you to. She’s a bitch of a sister-in-law.” He took a step back. “I won’t help you, but I won’t get in your way either. Besides, if you think to take on Hades, you have some serious balls.” He glanced between my legs, and I slapped a hand over my bits as my face heated up.

He shrugged. “I will give you a piece of advice. Hades is not like the rest of us. He hasn’t had to acclimate to the changing world, stuck in the underworld as he’s been.” He bent down low so we were eye to eye. “He’s the same miserable bastard that liked to torture small animals for fun when he was a child.”

He reached forward, grabbed me around the arm, and threw me overboard before I could even protest. I hit the water hard and was tumbled around in the wake of his boat speeding back the way he’d come.

“Good luck,” he called back. “You’re going to need it.”

I swam backward, then flipped to my belly and headed toward the shoreline of Whidbey Island. Ernie flew above me. “That was close. And shit, that kraken! You totally took him out!”

“I’m out of venom.” I spit out a mouthful of salt water and kept moving.

“Well, that’s not good.” He spoke the obvious like I wouldn’t know. “You’re going to need venom for the underworld for sure.”

I didn’t answer him, wanting to focus on getting to shore as quickly as I could. Who knew how long Merlin would actually be at the hospital? What if he took the last ferry back to Seattle?

The waves at least were pushing me in the right direction. I don’t know how long I swam the dark waters, heading toward the lights on shore. My feet were just suddenly on shifting sand, and I was being helped up and out of the water by Remo. He had a towel he got from heaven knew where, and he wrapped it around me. “Had a nice dip?”