ONE LAST TIME . . . heroes of olympus

76

KAT WAS HAPPILY sleeping when someone rudely woke her up.

Like, at this point, she should just get a better sleeping schedule, but she's still not used to waking up on time with everyone else. Oops.

She cracked open an eye to see one of her faves. One of her big three, as she would call it, because let's be real; Zeus, Poseidon, and Hades are a shitty Big Three. Though maybe that's just Kat Mikhailova, daughter of Hermes's thoughts.

"Foo Foo Bear," she greeted. "What's up?"

"Venice," he told her.

"Ooh, I love Venice," she said, sitting up and stretching. "You know me so well. Milaya and malyshka didn't even wake me up. Betrayers."

He paused before replying. "Yeah, I do."

She frowned. "You alright?"

"Have you heard voices in your head?" asked Frank.

"I always hear voices in my head," answered Kat, kinda concerned about where the conversation was going. "Mama and uncle Nikita tell me it's a Mikhailov side effect from using my powers, though. You know this. I'm going insane. I'm off my rockers, as Hazelnut would probably say. See? You can see it now. Why?"

"It's . . ." he hesitated.

She raised an eyebrow. "You can tell me anything, you know."

"I know." Frank took a breath. "I can hear my dad's voice in my head. Both Ares and Mars. And they're always fighting . . ."

"Oh," she grimaced. "Ew. I would hate that. Then again, Papa doesn't care about me enough to invade my head, so at least you've got that going for you."

"Not helping."

"Tough crowd," Kat chuckled. "Personally, I just try and block out the voices. Don't pay any attention to them and they'll disappear, right? That's what they say works for other diseases. Mine won't disappear forever, but yours hopefully will. Just pay attention to the world around you more. It gets harder when you sleep and when you're alone and stuff, but . . . that's why I sleep over with Piper sometimes."

"Oh," said Frank, looking at the door between her and Piper's rooms. "Thanks, KitKat. For the advice."

Kat hummed in reply, finally getting out of bed. "Venice?"

"Venice."

Kat was talking to Frank about taking a trip to one of the Caribbean islands after the quest if they survived because they seriously needed a break when they climbed on deck and, subsequently, the conversation died out.

"What are they?" asked Hazel.

The Argo II was docked at a busy wharf. On one side stretched a shipping channel, like, a quarter of a mile wide. On the other spread the city of Venice — red-tiled roofs, metal church domes, steepled towers, and sun-bleached buildings in all the colors of Valentine candy hearts: red, white, ochre, pink, and orange.

Everywhere there were statues of lions — on top of pedestals, over doorways, on the porticoes of the largest buildings. There were so many, the lion has to be the city's mascot, there's no way it isn't. There're better animals. Like flamingos. Kat loved flamingos.

Where streets should have been, green canals etched their way through the neighborhoods, each one jammed with motorboats. Along the docks, the sidewalks were mobbed with tourists shopping at the T-shirt kiosks, overflowing from stores, and lounging across acres of outdoor café tables, like pods of sea lions.

The rest of the crew ( minus Frank; they were always on the same wavelength ) weren't paying attention to any of that, though. They had gathered at the starboard rail to stare at the dozens of weird shaggy monsters milling through the crowds.