A Metal Mage.Son of a Cyclops!She can take our weapons.
Surprised, but still moving toward her, Flynn draws his short sword before I can warn him to keep it sheathed. The Metal Mage makes a grasping move, wrenches it from his grip, and then sweeps her hand out with a quick, violent snap. The sword flies straight for Jocasta.
“Jo!” Flynn’s cry is nearly lost in the deafening gasp of the crowd.
Jocasta dives to the sand and then pops back up with a shallow slice and a splash of blood on her arm. She doesn’t look terribly injured. She looks livid. She draws a knife, and it immediately starts vibrating in her hand. Looking at the blade like it might bite her, she shoves it back into the loop on her belt, securing it.
Griffin and Carver both step in front of their sister. Flynn backs up until all three of them are between Jocasta and the Tarvan woman.
“Cat!”
I turn at Kato’s frantic call, realizing I’d lost track of him.
My eyes widen, and I leap back, swallowing a scream. A massive snake looms over me. I draw my sword, and it rattles in my hand. I tighten my grip. I amnotlosing Thanatos with a gargantuan snake on top of me.
Its fangs elongate, curving into lethally sharp points. A bead of venom drips off one side, smoking when it hits the sand. I wheel back, finally getting a look at where it’s coming from. The serpent sprang from the male Magoi’s chest. I failed to kill him, and he hatched a snake out of his breast!
There’s a pop and a rip. I cringe at the sound of splitting flesh. A second snake forms, growing fast in scaly fractals. The thick, muscled body hits the ground, taking its weight from the Magoi’s chest while its already huge head lunges for me, quick as a whip.
I dive right, cartwheel with my sword in my hand, and then come up swinging.
Both snake heads rear back, hissing at me. The long necks twist, winding around each other, and then drop as one. I barely sidestep the reptilian bomb and then take a two-handed swing, hitting a fang and slicing it off halfway down.
Venom splashes my hands.Mighty Gods on Olympus! That burns!My skin smokes, turning an angry, cratered red.
Kato slams into the snake heads from the side, jarring them away from me. They lift and untwist. One strikes at him and the other at me. I swing my sword again, but the venom weakened my grip, and Thanatos flies from my hands before it can connect, collected by the Metal Mage.
I snarl a curse and scoot out of the snake’s path, rolling along the scaly side of its head. As I turn, I whip out a knife and backhand it into the snake’s eye. Both the man and the serpent jerk in pain.
Kato leaves his mace in its harness, not risking losing it. Shouting, he draws the second serpent farther away from me. It lunges and eats air. It attacks again, its giant jaws slamming shut just inches from Kato’s leg. He scrambles from side to side, and it follows.
The pit floor suddenly shudders, and I risk a glance over my shoulder. The Cyclops just decided to get involved.
Griffin, Carver, Flynn, and Jocasta scatter, their weapons either gone or locked down. The Cyclops swings its massive club for the first time, missing Griffin by inches. Griffin races across the sand, forced in the opposite direction from me.
Swallowing the knot of fear in my throat, I turn back around an instant too late. The half-blind snake rams its head into me with a hiss of sulfurous breath. I flail, grasping at anything, and my fingers hit my knife. I grab it and rip the blade from the snake’s eye before landing hard on my back under its neck. With the air still momentarily punched from my lungs, I jab upward and then slice along the yellowish scales.
Useless. They’re like armor.
I roll away and regain my feet, trying to find my breath again. I have to get the Magoi.
The snake swings back on me, and I jump, launching myself onto the back of its head and surprising us both. It rears up, nearly unseating me, but I grip hard with my thighs and hold on to the bony ridges above its eyes.
“You are mine,” I tell it forcefully, throwing all my mental energy behind the compulsion in one fierce, all-out grab. I dive straight for the spark I need—no hesitation. “You will obey me.”
The snake goes still. A rush of consciousness floods my mind, cold, slithery, and dark. Goose bumps shiver down my arms. There’s hunger. There’s hate. There’s obedience warring with a bitter longing to be free. I latch on to that last emotion because it’s familiar to me, and the connection solidifies, burning brightly behind my eyes.
The Magoi starts muttering. A half-dozen words into his frantic chant, I recognize a blocking spell, but it’s too late. This serpent is mine.
I glance at Kato, who is still keeping the second serpent distracted, and swallow hard. Now I have to make this snake kill its brother before its brother kills mine.
Kato is breathing hard, slowing down. He’s still keeping the creature away from me, but he’s not as strong or as fast as he needs to be—or usually is. With a lightning-fast strike, the second serpent seizes Kato’s arm. The venomous fangs just miss piercing his flesh, searing two bright-red, burning lines down the back of his biceps instead.
Dread explodes in my chest as the reptile lifts its huge head high into the air, its prize clamped brutally between its jaws. Kato’s legs dangle eight feet above the ground, all his considerable weight on his compressed arm. His face washes of blood and turns the color of pain.
Thump! Thump! Smack!
I whip my head around and see Griffin dive. The Cyclops’s club beats the sand where he just stood, spraying coarse, reddish grains into the air. Griffin somersaults to his feet, never slowing down as the monster swings its huge weapon again. On Griffin’s right, Flynn rattles the arena with his bellow, and the Cyclops changes target, rotating its huge body toward the noise. On the other side of the pit, my teammates run, weaponless and small.
