A loud thump grabbed my attention and I looked up in time to see a cat bolting across the sand, away from the figure who’d just fallen out of a tree. A pretty woman with sandy blonde hair jumped to her feet and brushed herself off, shooting a glare at the offending branch. Her curly hair was pulled into a high ponytail and she wore thick, but close-fitting clothes to combat the chill. Light freckles dotted her nose and cheeks, barely noticeable against her slightly faded beach tan.
My dad patted me hard on the back, sending me stumbling a step forward. “I’ll be around, Ms. Sutton, so just call when you’re finished here.”
Which meant he’d be somewhere close, watching me try to fight and probably laughing. He disappeared with a wink. Nathan frowned at the spot where he’d vanished, but the woman stopped in front of us and shoved her hands in her back pockets. Forest green eyes stared Nathan down in the grey, overcast light, and for a moment, I thought there was about to be a different kind of fight.
“What are you doing here? I thought you asked me to watch this area?”
“Yeah, well, I didn’t plan this.” Nathan scratched at the back of his neck and gestured to me with one massive hand. “Lexi, this is Sasha. Sasha, Lexi. She’s still working on control, but she’s got potential.”
As we shook hands, the presence she emanated easily beat Nathan’s, and even my mom’s. She had to be part of his team, I figured—possibly another demigod like us. Sasha only held my grip for a second before she jerked it back and shook her hand out.
“Jeez, what are you made of? Lava?”
I looked down at my hand, which seemed perfectly normal to me, though I had noticed hers was slightly cooler than I was used to. Nathan, on the other hand, thought it was funny.
“Let’s just say Lexi runs a little hot,” he said with a grin, nudging me with his elbow and almost knocking me over. “What’s the situation here?”
Sasha turned away and we followed her as she headed for the edge of the beach she’d been watching over. “Nothing yet, or I wouldn’t still be here. I’m starving and cold and Ace said he’d bring me dinner an hour ago. I wish the damn things would just show up already so I can go home.”
“How long have you been here?” I asked curiously. Nathan had mentioned his visions never specified a time, so we were lucky to have caught ours the first night, but I had a feeling it didn’t always work out so neatly.
“Four days.” She jumped and caught a tree branch, hauling herself up to sit above our heads. Crossing her arms, she leaned against the trunk and gazed out over the choppy water. “Luckily, it’s too cold for swimming so the number of people is at a minimum, but I’ve seen the occasional jogger running through. Here’s hoping the rain will keep them away today, just in case.”
“If not today, then tomorrow,” Nathan said. “It’s getting closer, I can feel it.”
Thunder rumbled and the wind picked up, blowing the rain into my face. “Wish I’d thought to bring an umbrella, or at least a rain jacket.”
Sasha snorted a laugh. “I love a good storm. Watching the lightning fight the ocean waves, it’s like a clash of titans.”
Turning his face up to her, Nathan grinned. “Doesn’t hurt that water’s your element.”
“Doesn’t hurt at all,” she replied.
I opened my mouth to ask questions that my curiosity was dying for, but something shifted in the energy nearby. From our partially sheltered position, I didn’t see anything immediately concerning, but judging by Nathan and Sasha’s tense expressions, they’d felt it too. I took a couple steps away from the tree, the rain picking up to something just short of a downpour. Steam rose from my skin, my inner fire ready to go, but my stomach twisted uneasily.
I wasn’t so sure about this anymore.
“Lexi, watch out!”
Sand stuck to my skin and clumped in my wet hair as I leapt forward and hit the ground, narrowly avoiding the blade that came out of nowhere. I tried to wipe it off my face, but all that did was push it around and I obviously didn’t have time to find a shower. Rolling to the side, the blade missed again, and the ocean lapping at my feet surged into the demon that towered over me.
Only he didn’t look like any of the demons I’d seen before—close as I was, there wasnomistaking his gender. His skin was solid and tough, like leathery alligator skin, and he looked almost like a walking rhino with six eyes and a long tail. The horn on the end of his elongated nose was the start of a whole chain of spikes that ran up over his head and halfway down his back. Around his neck hung another pendant nearly identical to mine, but there was one glaring difference: the bronze dragon had been replaced by some kind of warped bat-thing—another kind of demon, maybe.
Salt water lashed against its hide, and it was then that I realized Sasha was holding a whip made out of a fucking wave. It was the coolest thing I’d ever seen. She was yelling something at me, and only then did I move, lurching sideways unsteadily as the demon threw a massive fist in my direction. I needed to get my head in the game, but this demon variant wasn’t what I’d been expecting.
I threw my hands out, hoping he’d explode like the others did. The demon flinched, then roared. He hadn’t been affected at all, or at least, not enough. He took two pounding steps toward me, then was knocked off his feet when Nathan barreled into his side. They landed in a flurry of fists in the shallow waves.
Sasha flicked her water whips out and they wrapped around the thing’s throat and one arm. “Hey, new girl, stop standing there like an idiot!”
Static prickled across my skin and I moved forward awkwardly again. I grit my teeth and strained against the odd sensation. When I whipped my arm out, fire followed and slammed into the side of the rhino demon’s head. He roared again and flipped Nathan with his free arm, shoving his face into the waves. Sasha was already moving, her water whips slashing at the brute’s thick hide.
I stretched my fingers, and this time, fire came rushing to them. Watching Sasha, I jerked my arms down as I ran forward and tried to mimic her whips. They didn’t come out exactly as I’d hoped—more like two short swords than anything—but I pushed every ounce of will into them until they elongated and looked exactly like hers.
She had both whips wrapped around the demon’s thick neck, black blood pooling where they were cutting into the skin, and still he staggered to his feet. I’d never used a whip before, but I knew what I wanted it to do, so I aimed for one of his chunky feet and pulled. The flame solidified enough to grab hold and the demon tipped into the waves with an angry bellow.
Sasha nodded at me and dropped her whips, settling into a form that looked suspiciously like Tai Chi, or something very similar. The ocean responded, wrapping around the demon, trapping him in a bubble of salt water. Three pairs of frantic red eyes darted between us when he realized he was drowning, and then black fluid bubbled out of his chest where the point of a sword protruded.
The sword was clean when Nathan withdrew it, washed by Sasha’s amazing ability. “That… that wasn’t the one I saw in my vision.” He stepped around the body now dissolving in the waves, his jaw clenching when he met my gaze. “What I saw is still coming. This one, though—”
