Sweet Venom

“Don’t send me back,” it pleads.

“Back?” I smile sweetly. “Back where?”

“You know where,” it says. “Huntress always send back.”

“That’s the general job description,” I agree. “Send bad beasties home.”

It must be a sign of my frustration that I’m taunting the monkey. Usually I just get my bite in and go home. But for some reason, I feel like playing with my prey a little.

And besides, I could use some answers about this supposed bounty on our heads. Maybe the monkey knows something useful.

“Not bad.” It shakes its head again. “Not all bad beasties.”

“What do you mean? I send home every bad beastie I can find.” I’m definitely not counting the hybrids that got away recently. Before that my track record was pretty perfect.

“No, not all beasties are bad,” it says carefully.

I laugh.

It takes advantage of my distraction to wriggle out of my grip, crawling up my arm and heading for my shoulder. Before it can reach my neck, I squat and then jump, flinging myself back in a somersault over the monkey and knocking it to the ground as I land. I press my right foot to its furry little chest, securing it against the crumbling blacktop.

“And I thought we were getting along so well.”

“Why you toy?” It lifts up a foot, presenting it for my biting pleasure, I guess. “Do already.”

“Not so fast.” I shake my head, surprised that the creature isn’t fighting back. “I have some questions first. Tell me about the bounty.”

“Bounty?” it echoes. “What bounty?”

“Nice try.” I press down on its chest. “Talk.”

“Ow, okay,” it says. “Sillus hear about bounty.”

I release the pressure from my foot slightly. From the broken speech, I’m going to assume that it is Sillus.

“Word say, big honcho on Olympus want huntress. Any huntress. Any way, live or no live.”

“What big honcho?” I think back to Ursula’s hushed conversation I overheard a few months ago. “Zeus?”

“Maybe.” It pushes against my boot with tiny monkey hands. “May not be. Sillus no go home for many months. No hear firsthand.”

Many months? “Do you mean you’ve been here, in San Francisco, for—”

The blaring ring of my phone interrupts my thought. The monkey is instantly forgotten, because I’m hoping it’s Ursula.

My cell number is unlisted—not even the school has it—so if things ever get hairy and we need to slip away, I won’t need to get a new number. It’s been nearly two weeks since I’ve heard from Ursula. I’m a little disappointed when I answer and Grace is on the other end. I forgot I gave her the number just in case she’s ever in danger.

“Everything okay?” I ask.

“No,” she says. “Not really.”

The hair on the back of my neck stands up. “What happened? Are you hurt?” I swallow hard. “Is Greer —”

“We’re fine.”

I exhale a huge sigh. I’m not used to having people to worry about, but apparently my sisterly instinct is strong enough to make me panic at the thought of them in trouble. I shouldn’t give a centaur’s backside what happens to the ice queen, but I do.

Sillus starts to wriggle under my boot, as if I’m so distracted it could just sneak away. I press down harder and wag a finger at the naughty monkey.

Grace says, “We were fighting a monster and—”

My muscles tense up again. “What kind?”

“I don’t know,” she says. “Some kind of serpent-tailed lady who came out of the Bay, but—”

“A sea dracaena?” I squeeze my eyes shut. “You fought one of Scylla’s spawn alone?”

“I guess.”

“Idiot.” A sea dracaena. Of all things. “Grace, they’re among the most dangerous creatures out there. She didn’t scratch you, did she?”

“No,” she says, sounding a little exasperated. “But Gretchen—”

“You’re lucky.” I don’t care if she thinks I’m being overprotective. This is serious. “One scratch is all it takes. There’s no antivenom for—”

“I saw Ursula!”

I nearly drop my phone. “What?”

“After the fight,” Grace explains. “I was about to call and tell you what happened when she appeared right in front of me. Out of nowhere.”

“What do you mean?” I shake my head. “Out of nowhere?”

“She materialized,” she says. “Gretchen, she autoported.”

Autoported? That must mean— “She has your same gift. She has Euryale’s power.”

A part of me aches at the realization that Ursula has kept this secret from me for so long. How did I not know this? How did I not figure out that she was a descendant just like me? She sees the monsters, used to fight them. I should have guessed. I feel so dumb.

Sillus struggles again. I’m too stunned to deal with it right now.

“Hold on,” I tell Grace.

Reaching down, I grab the little monkey by the scruff of the neck.

“Please,” it begs. “Don’t send me—” When it sees my fangs drop, it sighs. Lifting up its foot, it says, “Fine. Make quick.”

I almost feel sorry for the little monster. With my quick bite to the sole of its foot, it’s gone.

“Okay, Grace,” I say, my attention back on the call, “so Ursula is a descendant too. What else did she —”

“Gretchen,” Grace says, like she’s bracing me for something, “Ursula is Euryale.”

For a second I think I’m going to collapse to the ground. All the air whooshes out of my lungs. I sink to my knees, sitting back on my heels.

“She’s—what?”

“There’s more,” Grace says.

How much more could there be? Not only is my longtime mentor secretly my relative, she’s one of my immortal ancestors.

“Wait, why did she come to you?” I ask. “Why didn’t she visit me?”

“I’m not sure,” Grace says. “At first she called me Gretchen, so she must have been trying to reach you. But I think her situation probably made things more difficult.”

“What situation?” I’m so not used to being the one asking questions of Grace. I’m usually the one with all the answers.

“Gretchen, she’s been taken prisoner.”

I lurch to my feet. “What? Where?” In three quick strides, I’m pulling open Moira’s door and sinking into the driver’s seat. As I turn the key in the ignition, I say, “I’ll pick you up so we can go get her.”

“We can’t,” Grace says. “She says we can’t come get her, but she’s safe.”

There is a hesitation in her voice. “She said she was safe?”

“Yes.”

“But you don’t believe her.”

“No, I—” Grace takes a breath. “I don’t know. Maybe, maybe not. She’s trying to protect us, I know. She knew about me and Greer and that we’re all in danger right now.”

That doesn’t surprise me. Those are probably some of the answers she kept promising to tell me. I lean back against the headrest.

“What does she want us to do?” I ask, knowing Ursula wouldn’t go to these measures just to not tell me