𝐚𝐫𝐭𝐞𝐦𝐢𝐬'𝐬 𝐡𝐞𝐢𝐫 • 𝘱𝘦𝘳𝘤𝘺 𝘫𝘢𝘤𝘬𝘴𝘰𝘯

Grayson And I Make A Dangerous Promise

I uncapped Riptide, and the sword grew to full length in my hands, its bronze blade gleaming in the dark. 

The cow serpent freaked out and started struggling against the net, its eyes full of terror."Whoa!" I said. "I'm not going to hurt you! Just let me cut the net." 

But the cow serpent thrashed around and got even more tangled. The boat started to tilt, stirring up the muck on the sea bottom and threatening to topple onto the cow serpent. The hippocampi whinnied in a panic and thrashed in the water, which didn't help. 

"Okay, okay!" I said. I put away the sword and started speaking as calmly as I could so the hippocampi and the cow serpent would stop panicking. I didn't know if it was possible to get stampeded underwater, but I didn't really want to find out. "It's cool. No sword. See? No sword. Calm thoughts. Seagrass. Mama cows. Vegetarianism." 

I doubted the cow serpent understood what I was saying, but it responded to the tone of my voice. The hippocampi were still skittish, but they stopped swirling around me quite so fast. 

Free it, lord! they pleaded. 

"Yeah," I said. "I got that part. I'm thinking." 

But how could I free the cow serpent when she (I decided it was probably a "she")panicked at the sight of a blade? It was like she'd seen swords before and knew how dangerous they were. 

"All right," I told the hippocampi. "I need all of you to push exactly the way I tell you." 

First, we started with the boat. It wasn't easy, but with the strength of three horsepower, we managed to shift the wreckage so it was no longer threatening to collapse on the baby cow serpent. Then I went to work on the net, untangling it section by section, getting lead weights and fishing hooks straightened out, yanking out knots around the cow serpent's hooves. It took forever—I mean, it was worse than the time I'd had to untangle all my video game controller wires. The whole time, I kept talking to the cowfish, telling her everything was okay while she mooed and moaned. 

"It's okay, Bessie," I said. Don't ask me why I started calling her that. It just seemed like a good cow name. "Good cow. Nice cow." 

Finally, the net came off and the cow serpent zipped through the water and did a happy somersault. 

The hippocampi whinnied with joy. Thank you, Lord! 

"Moooo!"The cow serpent nuzzled me and gave me the big brown eyes. 

"Yeah," I said. "That's okay. Nice cow. Well... stay out of trouble." 

Which reminded me, I'd been underwater for how long? An hour, at least. I had to get back to my cabin before Argus or the harpies discovered I was breaking curfew.  

I shot to the surface and broke through. Immediately, Blackjack zoomed down and let me catch hold of his neck. He lifted me into the air and took me back toward the shore. 

Success, boss? 

"Yeah. We rescued a baby... something or other. Took forever. Almost got stampeded." 

Good deeds are always dangerous, boss. You saved my sorry mane, didn't you? 

I couldn't help thinking about my dream, with Y/n crumpled and lifeless in Luke's arms. Here I was rescuing baby monsters, but I couldn't save my friend. 

As Blackjack flew back toward my cabin, I happened to glance at the dining pavilion. I saw a figure—a boy hunkered down behind a Greek column like he was hiding from someone. 

It was Nico, but it wasn't even dawn yet. Nowhere near time for breakfast. What was he doing up there? 

I hesitated. The last thing I wanted was more time for Nico to tell me about his Mythomagic game. But something was wrong. I could tell by the way he was crouching.