I face planted into the concrete. When I stood up, I could taste blood flowing from my nose to my lips. It was gross. That blood had just been in my nose. Do you know how many germs are in your nose? I wiped the blood away and got into a fighting decision. I'd dropped my dagger when I fell and it slid to the other side of the room behind Rhode.

You're alone, you're weaponless, you're going to die.

"Well, what are you going to do now? If you kill me, Poseidon won't know. He already thinks I'm dead, so you won't gain anything by killing me," I said.

Everybody thinks you're dead.

"I shall summon him! He can watch you perish!" She was yet to say how she planned to kill me, but I doubted it was anything pleasant.

"What makes you think he'd come if you called?" I sneered. I felt bad for Rhode, despite my attitude towards her. Luke had felt abandoned by his father too and had done some bad things because of it. But he didn't kidnap and kill other children of Hermes to hurt him. He just raised Kronos… The thought made me cringe.

Until my dad broke the ban, the gods couldn't see their children. I doubted that rule was in place when Rhode was born, but at least my parents would know how she felt.

"Then you will summon him. He will come if you call," Rhode whispered, stepping a few feet closer.

I wondered how many other children of Poseidon she had killed. Were those skeletons in our cells my family? I backed against the door. I could feel fists pounding against the other side. The lock had somehow been molded into the door, preventing it from being opened on either side. How had Rhode done that? I knew she could control water, but the door wasn't made of water. I didn't know if Rhode was a goddess or just immortal or what, but this was more powerful than I had expected.

"Yeah, not going to happen. I'm sure he's busy riding dolphins into the sunset or something."

Rhode lunged forward and grabbed my face. Her once petite fingers grew into sharp talons, piercing the skin on my cheeks. I raised my leg and kneed her in the stomach. She let go and I took the opportunity to dash around her and scoop my dagger off the ground.

Rhode cracked her neck like a biker in those old action movies. She raised her talons and opened her mouth. Pointed rows of fangs replaced the normal human teeth.

"I could just tear off your other arm and send that to him instead." Her voice was much harder to understand with the rows of shark-like canines, but I still got the point. I turned defensively to put my body between her and my arm. I needed my arm. I needed a plan. I took a quick glance around the room as Rhode walked towards me.

With each step her body transformed into something more terrifying than before. Her feet broke free off her sparkly sandals and evolved into what I could only describe as bear paws. Her mouth grew into a beak to make room for the daggers of teeth. Her eyes grew barron and dark and her nose shrunk into two small holes in her face.

There was a small window in the top right corner of the room. I knew It was too high up and too small for me to crawl through, but there was enough room for me to throw something if my aim was good enough. But the only thing I had to throw was my dagger. I knew Grover was somewhere outside, but I didn't know where. How would I know he would see it? Even if he did, there was nothing he could do. This was a big building, he could be anywhere. So I summoned my inner Percy Jackson and stalled. Dad would have made a joke, but I wasn't in a very humorous mood.

"So what do you think is going to happen once you hurt Poseidon or whatever?"

Rhode paused. "He will be hurt. I will win."

"Yeah, but don't you think that Poseidon might want revenge if you kill his grandson?"

"No. I will have won. He can't hurt me. I love nothing."

I rolled my eyes. "Yeah, but he could physically hurt you, or kill you. You know, like gods usually do when they get mad."

"Then I will threaten to kill more of his own. You say he has a son that he is fond of. Maybe I'll send Poseidon his head."

Anger swelled in my chest and I thrust my hands forward, summoning all the water in the room and slamming it into her. I found myself unable to breathe for a moment until the liquid returned to its natural state in the room.

"You didn't like that?"

I threw my arms in the air. "Of course I didn't like that! You just said you're going to cut my dad's head off!"

She nodded curtly. "I suppose I did. But you'll be dead so it won't matter."

I turned my stance slightly, raising my dagger. "Don't count on it." This was the kind of thing that happened when powers like ours were used for bad. Nobody else could know I had these powers, except the monsters who should fear them. People like us shouldn't be able to do things like this.

I lunged forward with my dagger and stabbed her in the stomach. Blood flowed quickly from the wound, but Rhode did nothing but look down in surprise.

"You stabbed me!" she yelled.

"You didn't die!" I yelled back. With my dagger now embedded in her stomach, I was weaponless. Her blood seeped onto the floor, so much that it made the concrete slippery. It wasn't possible for a person to have that much blood inside of them. I didn't want to know how or why it was there. But it was gross.

Rhode approached again. She pulled my dagger from her stomach and raised it over her head. I found myself backed against the wall without a weapon. My powers wouldn't work on her, unless I used all the powers I had learned to control in Tartarus. I had nowhere to go. I was out of options.

The grandson of Poseidon is going to die surrounded by water.

Charlie once told me to "kill the bitch before she kills you." That probably applied to my current situation. I was about to be killed with my mom's dagger, the dagger that sent Kronos (and Luke) to Tartarus. Mom used to think that the dagger would protect the one who wielded it. After what happened to Luke and what happened to her, she decided it probably just cursed them. Either way, I didn't want to be killed with it.

"Listen, lady. I just spent the last nine months of my life killing monsters and dying. I am not in the mood to die right now, especially before I see my family again or have a decent meal. I haven't had a shower in nine months! Do you know how disgusting that is?"

Rhode paused. "Have you really not had a shower in nine months?"

Yeah it was gross, but having this goddess that killed people by controlling their blood agreeing with me was more insulting.

I took a step backwards and slipped, landing on my butt in more blood. I wanted to shower for the next year and brush my teeth for the next two. I stood back up and tried to wipe the blood from my new jeans.

"Kill the bitch before she kills you," I whispered.

Rhode swung the dagger towards me. It was now or never. I squeezed my eyes shut and clenched my fists, unsure of what I was doing but sure I was doing something.

Liquid splattered against my face and dampened my hair. I didn't want to open my eyes. I knew what it was. Sticky, warm, gooey. I wiped my eyes meaninglessly before finally opening them to look around.

The scene reminded me of Beverly's bloody bathroom in IT. Blood coated the walls and the floor and the entire right side of my body. Rhode had exploded. Literally exploded.

"Oh Gods, this is the most disgusting thing I have ever witnessed," I muttered to myself. The blood seeped into the walls as if it were a sponge. It dripped from the ceiling and swam in thin lines like snakes across the floor. I understood how Rhode had been able to control the door. Blood was in the walls, in the very foundation of the building.

I dropped to my knees, sadness overwhelming me. The blood couldn't all have belonged to Rhode. She had been capturing Poseidon's children and descendants. The blood surrounding me belonged to my cousins, my aunts, my uncles. To go like this was just terrible. To be used against a god that never cared that much in the first place. How had Poseidon not put a stop to this? Did he even know it was happening?

I cocked my head sharply, tearing the door from its hinges and letting it fall to the ground. Charlie, Luke, and Perseus stood on the other side of the door. Their expressions read of shock, even I could tell that. Fear. Confusion. Charlie stepped forward cautiously.

"Jase?" He spoke as if talking to a scared child or violent stray dog.

"It's my family. The blood. Descendants of Poseidon. She's been killing them for centuries, trying to get back at Poseidon for letting the world forget her mother's name. Their blood, it's part of the building. It's how she's able to control it. It's everywhere."

Charlie crouched next to me, wincing slightly at the blood soaking into his pant legs. "C'mon," he said. "Let's get you out of here."

I nodded and let him help me off the ground. He stood on my right side, staying clear of the blood. He half-carried me outside. I wasn't paying much attention. Outside, we found Grover locked in a barn. I tore the top off the small shed with a flick of my hand. Grover bleated in anger until he saw us. His jaw went slack.

"What happened? Are you ok?"

"It's not his blood," Luke responded. Grover paused. I noted the dazed look in his eyes.

"We should get you cleaned up before we keep going. The mist won't keep the public from seeing this," he said.