Where You Go ― Jason Grace

vi. ophelia gets offered a god's hand in marriage

THEY BARELY MADE it inside the Black House.

As soon as their host threw the bolts, the cow monsters bellowed and slammed into the door, making it shudder on its hinges. Ophelia looked at it with a nervous frown—she could sense the locks from where she stood, and they didn't seem all that sturdy.

"Oh, they can't get in," the man in denim promised. "You're safe now!"

"Safe?" Frank demanded. "Hazel is dying!"

Their host frowned as if he didn't appreciate Frank ruining his good mood. "Yes, yes. Bring her this way."

Frank carried Hazel as they followed the man farther into the building, refusing Nico and Ophelia's offers to help.

The house's front room was some sort of greenhouse. The walls were lined with tables of plant trays under fluorescent lights. The air smelled of fertilizer solution. Maybe Venetians did their gardening inside, since they were surrounded by water instead of soil? Ophelia wasn't sure, but she didn't really care at the moment.

The back room looked like a combination garage, college dorm, and computer lab. Against the left wall glowed a bank of servers and laptops, their screen savers flashing pictures of plowed fields and tractors. Against the right wall sat a single bed, a messy desk, and an open wardrobe filled with extra denim clothes and a stack of farm implements, like pitchforks and rakes.

The back wall was a huge garage door. Parked next to it was a red-and-gold chariot with an open carriage and a single axle, like the chariots Ophelia had raced at Camp Jupiter. Sprouting from the sides of the driver's box were giant feathery wings. Wrapped around the rim of the left wheel, a spotted python snored loudly.

"Set your friend here," the man in denim said.

Frank placed Hazel gently on the bed. He removed her sword and tried to make her comfortable, but she was as limp as a scarecrow. Her complexion definitely had a greenish tint.

"What were those cow things?" Frank demanded. "What did they do to her?"

"Katoblepones," their host answered. "Singular: katobleps. In English, it means down-looker. Called that because—"

"They're always looking down." Nico smacked his forehead. "Right. I remember reading about them."

Frank glared at him. "Now you remember?"

Nico hung his head almost as low as a katobleps. "I, uh... used to play this stupid card game when I was younger. Mythomagic. The katobleps was one of the monster cards."

Frank blinked. "I played Mythomagic. I never saw that card."

"It was in the Africanus Extreme expansion deck."

"Oh."

Ophelia raised an eyebrow.

Their host cleared his throat. "Are you two done, ah, geeking out, as they say?"

"Right, sorry," Nico muttered. "Anyway, katoblepones have poison breath and a poison gaze. I thought they only lived in Africa."

The man in denim shrugged. "That's their native land. They were accidentally imported to Venice hundreds of years ago. You've heard of Saint Mark?"

"The patron saint of notaries and Venice," Ophelia remembered. "Some Christians believe he wrote the Gospel of Mark. He was executed in Egypt for trying to turn Alexandrians away from the worship of their traditional gods."

Nico and Frank looked at her like she'd grown a second head.

"What?" Ophelia said defensively. "You two get to nerd out over trading cards and I can't nerd out over saints?"