"Scarlet," Sofia asked me tentatively, as we continued to fly to London, "what… what are you doing at the end of summer?"

"What do you mean?"

"Are you going back to your mums? Or are you going to stay year round?"

Oh, jeez. I had never thought about it. I was so focused on surviving the quest, I hadn't even begun to consider my decision.

"Truth is, Sofia, I have no idea. You?"

"I… I think I want to be a summer camper only."

"You do?"

"I'm really, really missing my dad. And I think I'll be able to survive. I can Charmspeak. And I'm not too powerful so monsters won't find me as much."

I was about to argue when she raised a hand to stop me – a risky manoeuvre when you're flying on the back of an eagle.

"Not in that sense. I'm talking about my scent."

"Scent." I scoffed. "The way people talk about demigods, we're made to sound like animals. Treated like it to, by the gods."

"That's not true."

"Yes it is, Sofia. Have you ever met, or even spoken to Aphrodite?"

"Well, no… but she's my mother. I have to care for her."

"No you don't."

"Um, Miss? We're about to land." Our eagle informed me.

"Thank you… um, what's your name?"

"I don't have one. I'm a fucking eagle."

"Calm down."

By the time we descended into London, I was informed by Dean that it was about half five. Nearly evening. We jumped off and thanked the eagles.

"I'm going to give you names." I announced. "Bobby, Bilbo, and… Baggens?"

"You can't have two eagles named Bilbo and Baggens. Bilbo Baggens?" Lucas shook his head, amused.

"I like it." I said defensively, and apparently so did my eagles. They stood up and looked even prouder than before - if that were possible - and they flew off into the sky.

"We're in Trafalgar Square!" Alfie sounded excited. I should have realised that a place like this would interest someone like Alfie, but for me… well, it had the same sentiment that the drachma did for Helia. This was the place my parents met.

I looked round, and could almost imagine the scene. I could imagine the rain pouring down, and my mum - beautiful and young - sitting down melancholically. The image in my head was ruined by the fact that I couldn't visualise what my dad looked like, and I was angry again.

"Okay, so we need to head to the London Eye." I said. I felt more confident now we were in London. I knew this place. I knew exactly where we needed to go and was about to lead my friends to Olympus, but they had other ideas.

Alfie told us that he had to look around. Sofia, Dean and Lucas were excited at the prospect, and so I thought we may as well. We had ages, anyway. Helia and I lagged about behind while I looked around - slightly overwhelmed - thinking this was the place it all started.

"You alright?" Helia asked.

"Yes." I snapped. She looked at me, eyebrows raised, and I tried to decipher whether she was hurt, angry, or amused. I sighed. "This… this is, um, the place my parents met."

"Ah." Helia nodded understandingly, and I was happy that she didn't show pity, or ask more questions.

Alfie was chatting away - talking about different facts and dates, which I doubted anybody was truly interested in.

Just as we were about to leave, three girls came in front of us, and they were about fifteen. They looked like typical, mortal teenage girls looked like… they had dip died, back brushed hair, wore patterned leggings, khaki green coats and white, see through blouses. Their makeup wasn't done very well, and I saw Sofia look critically at it, and then the question of 'what do they want?' struck me.

"Yes?" I questioned. The girls smiled.

"My name is Frankie." The first girl informed us. "And this is Alisha and Laura. We're filling out a survey on what it's like to be homeless, and would love it if you could help us."

"Um, no, we're busy." I said shortly.

"And we're not homeless!" Sofia added.

"Oh no, honey." Alisha smiled consolingly. "We aren't judging."

"Yeah, but we're not homeless. Really. But we have to go." I informed them.

"Please!" Frankie batted her eyelashes, like that was going to fucking work.

"I'm sorry, but we're really busy."

"Scarlet," Alfie consoled. "it wouldn't hurt to talk, would it?"

"Alfie!" I snapped. "We aren't even homeless, what are you doing?"

"They say we're homeless, though." Dean shrugged, and Alfie nodded in agreement.

"We have to go somewhere important… remember?" I glared at them.

"That can wait." Alfie argued, although he sounded dazed.

"You know what, fine." I said angrily. "You stay here, we'll go to Olymp… to the place." I stopped myself saying 'Olympus' so I didn't freak the girls out, but it turned out they were very aware of the mythological world.

Just as I was about to storm away the three girls transformed in front of us. They weren't the fairly pretty teenage girls they were only seconds before. They had faces that were sheet white, with fire instead of hair; eyes that were red. Their leggings were gone, and we saw that their legs were mismatched. One leg was a donkey leg, and the other was a prosthetic celestial bronze.

"Empousa!" Lucas exclaimed. "Run!"

I wanted to fight, but something told me running was probably the easiest bet. It was going quite well; we managed to escape Trafalgar Square and get well away from the monsters, and pause for breath.

"They're horrible creatures…" Helia panted. "They feast on the blood of man."

It was then that I looked around and realised that Dean and Alfie weren't there. Looking back over, I realised that the empousa were back in their teenage form, and were luring the boys closer.

"Oh no they don't." Sofia sounded outraged, and we ran straight back to them.

"Come out of the trance!" Sofia used her Charmspeak to shout at the boys and they stopped in their tracks, looking confused. But then their attention went back to Alisha and Laura. Frankie approached us and sneered at Sofia.

"We are daughters of Hecate, goddess of magic. You think your petty Charmspeak can out strengthen our charms?"

The boys were heading to Laura and Alisha, who were reeling them in seductively. Sofia was fuming, and she took out her knife and stabbed Laura, who was reeling in Dean. Her first monster kill; and it was because someone was charming Dean Crown.

As Laura vaporised into monster dust, Alisha and Frankie shrieked with rage and both turned to Sofia. They changed back to their empousa form and snarled viciously. Meanwhile, Dean and Alfie were beginning to come back their senses. This being so, Alisha went back to them both - charming them to daze at her with longing, while Frankie snarled at Sofia. Helia and I drew our weapons.

Sofia dashed backwards, and she could hardly conceal the grin on her face at the fact she managed to vaporise Laura, while Helia fired an arrow at the empousa. Frankie raised her hand and froze the arrow in its tracks - using magic - and Helia and I looked at each other in disbelief.

We were going to have to be cautious with our attacks. Helia took on Frankie, while I decided to stop Alisha hypnotising Dean and Alfie. I ran in front of her with my sword out, and she laughed.

"Alfie, Dean, snap out of it!" I shouted at them, but of course it didn't work. I ran in to stab Alisha, but she grabbed my sword arm, and bared her fangs at me. I was about to be killed by this hybrid/teenage girl/vampire/robot thing, when her eyes widened, and she vaporised. Helia had managed to aim several arrows from behind Alisha.

I could hear Alfie and Dean groaning behind me. Now Alisha had gone, the spell seemed to have been broken. I didn't have time to look, however, because I had to swerve out of the way to avoid a pouncing Frankie, whose teeth were bared.

Frankie was evidently older than the other two and was a lot more skilled at escaping us. Alfie - in an obvious attempt to redeem himself - tried to swipe at her, but just as he was about to vaporise her, she disappeared in flames, reappearing straight behind Helia, who turned and yelped. Helia instinctively ran which caused Frankie to laugh, and turn back to Alfie and Dean.

"Dean… Alfie…" She said seductively. The two of them faltered, and lowered their weapons.

"No!" Helia protested, but it had no effect.

"Dean Crown and Alfie Harper! You will stop listening to her." Sofia commanded again. It appeared to work more for Dean, as he was in love with her. Alfie didn't have that compulsion to listen.

Dean raised his sword again and charged at Frankie, but Frankie held up a hand – laughing - and Dean froze. If I was very, very slow, I might be able to sneak up behind Frankie and vaporise her, but Sofia needed to continue Charmspeaking. I nodded at her slightly and she understood immediately. She began to command the boys not to listen to Frankie, and so Frankie had to concentrate twice as hard on charming Alfie and Dean.

While this was happening, I snuck behind her - a feat that was only made possible by my height - and slowly raised my sword. Frankie was soon replaced by a pile of gold monster dust.

I marched over to Dean and Alfie and looked at them disgustedly.

"You two are such idiots." I shook my head. "Three easy looking girls come along, and boys instantly get transfixed."

"Sofia," Dean rushed over to his girlfriend, "that wasn't me, it was her! She twisted my mind, I had no idea what I was doing…"

"It's fine, Dean." Sofia grasped his shoulders and kissed him. "I know."

"On a scale of one to ten," Lucas came up to Alfie, "how embarrassed are you?"

Alfie glared at him. "They weren't even pretty, for fuck sake."

I was about to make a taunt when the sound of sirens could be heard and I saw police officers jump out of cars. Tourists and fellow Londoners alike were gathered around, watching us appallingly. I looked at the others and I didn't need to give them the instruction. We ran.

We ran until we made it to the nearest tube station, Charing Cross, and bolted down - Helia and Lucas seemingly over their underground aversion. Or that they were more concerned about the police that were after us. We squeezed past people on the long escalator down, and there were quite a few tuts, until we pretty much jumped down.

"Okay, so Northern or Bakerloo line?" Sofia mused.

"It doesn't matter!" I exclaimed, and dragged her down one of the paths. I was feeling slightly optimistic about my plan, until we made it to the platform and found there was nowhere to hide.

We tried to conceal ourselves in a crowd that had formed, but it was no good. We were six - very rough looking - teenagers, and so we stuck out like a sore thumb.

"Right, stay close." I muttered. "Do our best to blend in."

"Do you want me to use Charmspeak?" Sofia asked.

"If you can."

Six PCs entered, one for each of us. We retreated, but they saw, and soon had us backed up. We were positively trapped.

"Put your knives to the floor." We were commanded. Only Sofia actually had a knife, the rest of us - other than Lucas - had swords, shields, or a bow and arrow. We did however do as they ordered, although I was pretty screwed as I couldn't exactly blow on the weapon, and I had no rucksack, so swiftly passed Brontes to Lucas to put in his. This created uproar.

"PUT YOUR WEAPONS, DOWN." We were commanded again, but we didn't.

"We've put them away!" I argued. They looked at me suspiciously, but I had a point. They started to approach us calmly, but then they grabbed. Sofia and Lucas were instantly handcuffed, and Sofia kept trying to Charmspeak, however she was shaking and she didn't sound sure enough. The rest of us tried to put up a fight. Helia was kicking wildly in the soft spot of the man trying to handcuff her, while Alfie had his in a headlock. Dean was slightly more wary, as his was a woman, so instead he tried to run for it, but that didn't work.

I was kicking the woman trying to arrest me, which didn't make me feel particularly pleased, but I couldn't let myself get taken to the station. I couldn't. However these people had been professionally trained, and so I was soon - to my absolute dismay - nearly handcuffed, but I gave off one of my static shocks instinctively. The woman looked surprised, and I started to back away - my mind thinking rapidly of how I was going to help my friends escape - but then she grabbed me, and this time I gave off no shock and ended up handcuffed.

Now we were down, our names were being demanded.

"What's your name?" Mine asked, in a rough voice. I raised an eyebrow, clearly highlighting that I wouldn't be answering that. "Tell me your name. If you don't co-operate, then your chances of receiving bail will be minimalized."

I deliberated. I then decided I might as well say… maybe if I did co-operate, the whole thing might blow over.

"Scarlet Swan," she then said, sounding highly official, and I knew what was coming. "I am arresting you on suspicion of animal cruelty, arson, theft and the murder - or accompanying the murder - of three teenage girls. You do not need to say anything, and anything you do say will harm your defence, and may be held against you in court."

I could hear my other friends having similar speeches being made at them, and we all got taken away, back up the escalator into London, and then into a car. The whole time I looked down at my feet, completely mortified and angry, feeling the disgusted and judgemental stares of the mortals we passed. We had come so far, survived so much, only for it to be ruined at the end by mortals. Despite how I'd always been labelled as a 'troublemaker', I never in a million years thought I'd be arrested. This really was the cherry on top of the hell our lives had been the last eight days.