‘Right.’ Jason cleared his throat. ‘Everybody in the boat!’
We were thirty yards offshore when we heard the mercenaries shouting, ‘Hey! Stop!’ They ran into the surf, holding half-eaten fish tacos and looking confused.
Fortunately, Piper had taken all their weapons and communications devices.
She gave them a friendly wave and Jason gunned the outboard motor.
Jason, Meg and I rushed to put on the guards’ Kevlar vests and helmets. This left Piper in civilian clothes, but, since she was the only one capable of bluffing her way through a confrontation, she let us have all the fun playing dress-up.
Jason made a perfect mercenary. Meg looked ridiculous – a little girl swimming in her father’s Kevlar. I didn’t look much better. The body armour chafed around my middle. (Curse you, un-combat-worthy love handles!) The riot helmet was as hot as an Easy-Bake oven, and the visor kept falling down, perhaps anxious to hide my acne-riddled face.
We tossed the guns overboard. That may sound foolish, but, as I’ve said, firearms are fickle weapons in the hands of demigods. They would work on mortals, but, no matter what Meg said, I didn’t want to go around mowing down regular humans.
I had to believe that if these mercenaries truly understood whom they were serving they too would throw down their arms. Surely humans would not blindly follow such an evil man of their own free will – I mean, except for the few hundred exceptions I could think of from human history … But not Caligula!
As we approached the yachts, Jason slowed, matching our speed to that of the other patrol vessels.
He angled towards the nearest yacht. Up close, it towered above us like a white steel fortress. Purple and gold running lights glowed just below the water’s surface so the vessel seemed to float on an ethereal cloud of Imperial Roman power. Painted along the prow of the ship, in black letters taller than me, was the name IVLIA DRVSILLA XXVI.
‘Julia Drusilla the Twenty-Sixth,’ Piper said. ‘Was she an empress?’
‘No,’ I said, ‘the emperor’s favourite sister.’
My chest tightened as I remembered that poor girl – so pretty, so agreeable, so incredibly out of her depth. Her brother Caligula had doted on her, idolized her. When he became emperor, he insisted she share his every meal, witness his every depraved spectacle, partake in all his violent revels. She had died at twenty-two – crushed by the suffocating love of a sociopath.
‘She was probably the only person Caligula ever cared about,’ I said. ‘But why this boat is numbered twenty-six, I don’t know.’
‘Because that one is twenty-five.’ Meg pointed to the next ship in line, its stern resting a few feet from our prow. Sure enough, painted across the back was IVLIA DRVSILLA XXV.
‘I bet the one behind us is number twenty-seven.’
‘Fifty super-yachts,’ I mused, ‘all named for Julia Drusilla. Yes, that sounds like Caligula.’
Jason scanned the side of the hull. There were no ladders, no hatches, no conveniently labelled red buttons: PRESS HERE FOR CALIGULA’S SHOES!
We didn’t have much time. We had made it inside the perimeter of patrol vessels and searchlights, but each yacht surely had security cameras. It wouldn’t be long before someone wondered why our little dinghy was floating beside XXVI. Also, the mercenaries we’d left on the beach would be doing their best to attract their comrades’ attention. Then there were the flocks of strixes that I imagined would be waking up any minute, hungry and alert for any sign of disembowelable intruders.
‘I’ll fly you guys up,’ Jason decided. ‘One at a time.’
‘Me first,’ Piper said. ‘In case someone needs charming.’
Jason turned and let Piper lock her arms around his neck, as if they’d done this countless times before. The winds kicked up around the dinghy, ruffling my hair, and Jason and Piper floated up the side of the yacht.
Oh, how I envied Jason Grace! Such a simple thing it was to ride the winds. As a god, I could have done it with half my manifestations tied behind my back. Now, stuck in my pathetic body complete with love handles, I could only dream of such freedom.
‘Hey.’ Meg nudged me. ‘Focus.’
I gave her an indignant harrumph. ‘I am pure focus. I might, however, ask where your head is.’
She scowled. ‘What do you mean?’
‘Your rage,’ I said. ‘The number of times you’ve talked about killing Caligula. Your willingness to … beat his mercenaries unconscious.’
‘They’re the enemy.’
Her tone was as sharp as scimitars, giving me fair warning that if I continued with this topic, she might add my name to her Beat Unconscious list.
I decided to take a lesson from Jason – to navigate towards my target at a slower, less direct angle.
‘Meg, have I ever told you about the first time I became mortal?’
She peered from under the rim of her ridiculously large helmet. ‘You messed up or something?’
‘I … Yes. I messed up. My father, Zeus, killed one of my favourite sons, Asclepius, for bringing people back from the dead without permission. Long story. The point is … I was furious with Zeus, but he was too powerful and scary for me to fight. He would’ve vaporized me. So I took my revenge out in another way.’
I peered at the top of the hull. I saw no sign of Jason or Piper. Hopefully that meant they had found Caligula’s shoes and were just waiting for a clerk to bring them a pair in the right size.
‘Anyway,’ I continued, ‘I couldn’t kill Zeus. So I found the guys who had made his lightning bolts, the Cyclopes. I killed them in revenge for Asclepius. As punishment, Zeus made me mortal.’
Meg kicked me in the shin.
‘Ow!’ I yelped. ‘What was that for?’
‘For being dumb,’ she said. ‘Killing the Cyclopes was dumb.’
I wanted to protest that this had happened thousands of years ago, but I feared it might just earn me another kick.
‘Yes,’ I agreed. ‘It was dumb. But my point is … I was projecting my anger onto someone else, someone safer. I think you might be doing the same thing now, Meg. You’re raging at Caligula because it’s safer than raging at your stepfather.’
I braced my shins for more pain.
Meg stared down at her Kevlar-coated chest. ‘That’s not what I’m doing.’
‘I don’t blame you,’ I hastened to add. ‘Anger is good. It means you’re making progress. But be aware that you might be angry right now at the wrong person. I don’t want you charging blindly into battle against this particular emperor. As hard as it is to believe, he is even more devious and deadly than Ne– the Beast.’
She clenched her fists. ‘I told you, I’m not doing that. You don’t know. You don’t get it.’
‘You’re right,’ I said. ‘What you had to endure in Nero’s house … I can’t imagine. No one should suffer like that, but –’
‘Shut up,’ she snapped.
So, of course, I did. The words I’d been planning to say avalanched back down my throat.
‘You don’t know,’ she said again. ‘This Caligula guy did plenty to my dad and me. I can be mad at him if I want. I’ll kill him if I can. I’ll …’ She faltered, as if struck by a sudden thought. ‘Where’s Jason? He should be back by now.’
I glanced up. I would have screamed if my voice were working. Two large dark figures dropped towards us in a controlled, silent descent on what appeared to be parasails. Then I realized those were not parasails – they were giant ears. In an instant, the creatures were upon us. They landed gracefully on either end of our dinghy, their ears folding around them, their swords at our throats.
The creatures looked very much like the Big Ear guard Piper had hit with her dart at the entrance to the Burning Maze, except these were older and had black fur. Their blades were blunt-tipped with serrated double edges, equally suited for bashing or hacking. With a jolt, I recognized the weapons as khandas, from the Indian subcontinent. I would have been pleased with myself for remembering
such an obscure fact, had I not at that moment had a khanda’s serrated edge across my jugular vein.
Then I had another flash of recollection. I remembered one of Dionysus’s many drunken stories about his military campaigns in India – how he had come across a vicious tribe of demi-humans with eight fingers, huge ears and furry faces. Why couldn’t I have thought of that sooner? What had Dionysus told me about them …? Ah, yes. His exact words were: Never, ever try to fight them.
‘You’re pandai,’ I managed to croak. ‘That’s what your race is called.’
The one next to me bared his beautiful white teeth. ‘Indeed! Now be nice little prisoners and come along. Otherwise your friends are dead.’
26
Oh, Florence and Grunk
La-di-da, something, something
I’ll get back to you
Perhaps Jason, the physics expert, could explain to me how pandai flew. I didn’t get it. Somehow, even while carrying us, our captors managed to launch themselves skyward with nothing but the flapping of their tremendous lobes. I wished Hermes could see them. He would never again brag about being able to wiggle his ears.
The pandai dropped us unceremoniously on the starboard deck, where two more of their kind held Jason and Piper at arrow-point. One of those guards appeared smaller and younger than the others, with white fur instead of black. Judging from the sour look on his face, I guessed he was the same guy Piper had shot down with Grandpa Tom’s special recipe in downtown Los Angeles.
Our friends were on their knees, their hands zip-tied behind their backs, their weapons confiscated. Jason had a black eye. The side of Piper’s head was matted with blood.
I rushed to her aid (being the good person I was) and poked at her cranium, trying to determine the extent of her injury.
‘Ow,’ she muttered, pulling away. ‘I’m fine.’
‘You could have a concussion,’ I said.
Jason sighed miserably. ‘That’s supposed to be my job. I’m always the one who gets knocked in the head. Sorry, guys. Things didn’t exactly go as planned.’
The largest guard, who had carried me aboard, cackled with glee. ‘The girl tried to charmspeak us! Pandai, who hear every nuance of speech! The boy tried to fight us! Pandai, who train from birth to master every weapon! Now you will all die!’
‘Die! Die!’ barked the other pandai, though I noticed the white-furred youngster did not join in. He moved stiffly, as if his poison-darted leg still bothered him.
Meg glanced from enemy to enemy, probably gauging how fast she could take them all down. The arrows pointed at Jason and Piper’s chests made for tricky calculations.
‘Meg, don’t,’ Jason warned. ‘These guys – they’re ridiculously good. And fast.’
‘Fast! Fast!’ the pandai barked in agreement.
I scanned the deck. No additional guards were running towards us, no searchlights were trained on our position. No horns blared. Somewhere inside the boat, gentle music played – not the sort of soundtrack one might expect during an incursion.
The pandai had not raised a general alarm. Despite their threats, they had not yet killed us. They’d even gone to the trouble of zip-tying Piper’s and Jason’s hands. Why?
I turned to the largest guard. ‘Good sir, are you the panda in charge?’
He hissed. ‘The singular form is pandos. I hate being called a panda. Do I look like a panda?’
I decided not to answer that. ‘Well, Mr Pandos –’
‘My name is Amax,’ he snapped.
‘Of course. Amax.’ I studied his majestic ears, then hazarded an educated guess. ‘I imagine you hate people eavesdropping on you.’
Amax’s furry black nose twitched. ‘Why do you say this? What did you overhear?’
‘Nothing!’ I assured him. ‘But I bet you have to be careful. Always other people, other pandai snooping into your business. That’s – that’s why you haven’t raised an alarm yet. You know we’re important prisoners. You want to keep control of the situation, without anyone else taking the credit for your good work.’
The other pandai grumbled.
‘Vector, on boat twenty-five, is always spying,’ the dark-furred archer muttered.
‘Taking credit for our ideas,’ said the second archer. ‘Like Kevlar ear armour.’
‘Exactly!’ I said, trying to ignore Piper, who was incredulously mouthing the words Kevlar ear armour? ‘Which is why, uh, before you do anything rash, you’re going to want to hear what I have to say. In private.’
Amax snorted. ‘Ha!’
His comrades echoed him: ‘HA-HA!’
‘You just lied,’ Amax said. ‘I could hear it in your voice. You’re afraid. You’re bluffing. You have nothing to say.’
‘I do,’ Meg countered. ‘I’m Nero’s stepdaughter.’
Blood rushed into Amax’s ears so rapidly I was surprised he didn’t faint.
The shocked archers lowered their weapons.
‘Timbre! Crest!’ Amax snapped. ‘Keep those arrows steady!’ He glowered at Meg. ‘You seem to be telling the truth. What is Nero’s stepdaughter doing here?’
‘Looking for Caligula,’ Meg said. ‘So I can kill him.’
The pandai’s ears rippled in alarm. Jason and Piper looked at each other as if thinking Welp. Now we die.
Amax narrowed his eyes. ‘You say you are from Nero. Yet you want to kill our master. This does not make sense.’
‘It’s a juicy story,’ I promised. ‘With lots of secrets, twists, and turns. But if you kill us you’ll never hear it. If you take us to the emperor, someone else will torture it out of us. We would gladly tell you everything. You captured us, after all. But isn’t there somewhere more private we can talk, so no one will overhear?’
Amax glanced towards the ship’s bow, as if Vector might already be listening in. ‘You seem to be telling the truth, but there’s so much weakness and fear in your voice that it’s hard to be sure.’
‘Uncle Amax.’ The white-haired pandos spoke for the first time. ‘Perhaps the pimply boy has a point. If it’s valuable information –’
‘Silence, Crest!’ snapped Amax. ‘You’ve already disgraced yourself once this week.’
The pandos leader pulled more zip ties from his belt. ‘Timbre, Peak, bind the pimply boy and the stepdaughter of Nero. We will take them all below, interrogate them ourselves and then hand them over to the emperor!’
‘Yes! Yes!’ barked Timbre and Peak.
So it was that three powerful demigods and one former major Olympian god were led as prisoners into a super-yacht by four fuzzy creatures with ears the size of satellite dishes. Not my finest hour.
Since I had reached peak humiliation, I assumed Zeus would pick that moment to recall me to the heavens and the other gods would spend the next hundred years laughing at me.
But no. I remained fully and pathetically Lester.
The guards hustled us to the aft deck, which featured six hot tubs, a multicoloured fountain and a flashing gold and purple dance floor just waiting for party-goers to arrive.
Affixed to the stern, a red-carpeted ramp jutted across the water, connecting our boat to the prow of the next yacht. I guessed all the boats were linked this way, making a road across Santa Barbara Harbor, just in case Caligula decided to do a golf-cart drive-through.
Rising amidships, the upper decks gleamed with dark-tinted windows and white walls. Far above, the conning tower sprouted radar dishes, satellite antennae and two billowing pennants: one with the imperial eagle of Rome, the other with a golden triangle on a field of purple, which I supposed was the logo for Triumvirate Holdings.
Two more guards flanked the heavy oak doors that led inside. The guy on the left looked like a mortal mercenary, with the same black pyjamas and body armour as the gentlemen we’d sent on the wild fish-taco chase. The guy on the right was a Cyclops (the huge single eye gave him away). He also smelled like a Cyclops (wet wool socks) and dressed like a Cyclops (denim cut-offs, torn black T-shirt and a large wooden
club).
The human mercenary frowned at our merry band of captors and prisoners.
‘What’s all this?’ he asked.
‘Not your concern, Florence,’ Amax growled. ‘Let us through!’
Florence? I might have snickered, except Florence weighed three hundred pounds, had knife scars across his face and still had a better name than Lester Papadopoulos.
‘Regulations,’ Florence said. ‘You got prisoners, I have to call it in.’
‘Not yet, you won’t.’ Amax spread his ears like the hood of a cobra. ‘This is my ship. I’ll tell you when to call it in – after we interrogate these intruders.’
Florence frowned at his Cyclops partner. ‘What do you think, Grunk?’
Now, Grunk – that was a good Cyclops name. I didn’t know if Florence realized he was working with a Cyclops. The Mist could be unpredictable. But I immediately formulated the premise for an action-adventure buddy-comedy series, Florence and Grunk. If I survived captivity, I’d have to mention it to Piper’s father. Perhaps he could help me schedule some lunches and pitch the idea. Oh, gods … I had been in Southern California too long.
Grunk shrugged. ‘It’s Amax’s ears on the line if the boss gets mad.’
‘Okay.’ Florence waved us through. ‘You all have fun.’
I had little time to appreciate the opulent interior – the solid-gold fixtures, the luxurious Persian carpets, the million-dollar works of art, the plush purple furniture I was pretty sure had come from Prince’s estate sale.
We saw no other guards or crew, which seemed strange. Then again, I supposed that, even with Caligula’s resources, finding enough personnel to man fifty super-yachts at once might be difficult.
As we walked through a walnut-panelled library hung with masterpiece paintings, Piper caught her breath. She pointed her chin towards a Joan Miró abstraction.
‘That came from my dad’s house,’ she said.
‘When we get out of here,’ Jason muttered, ‘we’ll take it with us.’
‘I heard that.’ Peak jabbed his sword hilt into Jason’s ribs.
Jason stumbled against Piper, who stumbled into a Picasso. Seeing an opportunity, Meg surged forward, apparently meaning to tackle Amax with all one hundred pounds of her weight. Before she took two steps, an arrow sprouted from the carpet at her feet.