Page 151 of Blood of Olympus

But no — I’ve already defeated them.

Snap.

Instead of a sandy arena floor, my boots now stood on the rotting deck of a long-since sunken ship as we swayed to and fro on Poseidon’s tumultuous seas.

Snap.

The mottled grey, tentacled limb of Scylla reached out and plucked Aros from the deck right in front of where my ankle was trapped in it. She pitched him through the air, into the cliff face, and he disappeared beneath the roaring waves.

“Stop it!” I roared, lashing out at everything I had and landing no hit.

Snap.

A glorious feast laid out on a dining table overlooking Aetherion. There was the sparkling pink wine and Aros’ favourite lemon tarts.

Snap.

A mirror-filled arena with a gold-clad goddess standing in the middle.

Snap.

Darkness. Final and absolute.

“Have you figured it out yet?” the voice taunted from somewhere in the endless oblivion of night. “Have you realised who holds the key to your demise?”

“No one holds the key to my demise. Not you, Hyperion” — he purred — “Not Kronos, or any other big bad Titan wanting to gut me for world peace,” I spat.

I sensed movement in the blackness. Though I could see nothing, I still felt the ground beneath my feet; still heard the faint clamour of battle in the distance; still tasted ash on the breeze.

I was still in Hellespont, and this giant, bull-headed, gaping asshole of a light bulb thought he’d outwitted me.

“Ah, so you do recognise your betters after all,” he leered. His breath reeked of stale bread and stagnant ale. “She said you’d be asinine.”

“The last one who thought themself better than me ended up with a blade tearing through their skin. His vapid little bitch did, too,” I snarled.

“Tsk, tsk,” Hyperion tutted. “I’d caution against speaking ill of that one. She wants you as dead as your mother is.”

I snarled — a wordless sound emanating from the back of my throat. My fingers splayed, itching to cause damage to a man I couldn’t see. “Do not speak of my mother.”

“No?”

The darkness shifted and I wasn’t in Hellespont after all, but in the ruins of some long-forgotten city. Dust motes and ash flakes spiralled around in a gentle breeze — an echo of the people who once lived here.

It shifted again and ten feet before me stood a god with altogether too much audacity for whatever time in the day it currently was — the quickfire scenery changes made it hard to tell.

Bare chested and bold, Hyperion towered over the crumbled ruins surrounding us, looking for all the world like a statue built solely to portray the impudence of man. His unusually pale skin glistened like glitter caught in the sun. His hair — the same salt-and-pepper as his brother’s — hung almost to his waist, tangled in matted waves like he’d never heard of a hairbrush. His eyes — as gold and glowing as stars in place of each of his irises — stared daggers at me, above a sneer so large one would assume he was compensating.

“Who, then, should we speak of, hmm?” he growled. “Your father? The magnificent Hades who personally sent me tumbling into the abyss?”

“Oh, so, Hades is the reason for that disaster of a tan?” He growled again. “I don’t know whether to disparage him for being the cause of this glaring dildo of a god I now have to shield my eyes from” — I gestured to his entire body — “or thank him for ensuring that this is the first time I’ve ever had the displeasure of speaking to you.”

Hyperion moved quicker than a blink. One second he was ten feet away, the next he had his meaty hand clenched around my throat. With no apparent struggle, he lifted me into the air and snarled into my face.

I coughed, causing him to jerk back ever so slightly, upper lip curling.

“Did—you—” The rest of the sentence died as my vocal cords were strangled into submission.

Even with my feet dangling in the air somewhere around Hyperion’s shins, I managed a scowl.